The monsoon has set in relatively early this year. So have the seasonal diseases associated with it. Earlier, diseases caused by food contamination, such as cholera, typhoid, gastroenteritis and jaundice, used to afflict the masses during the rainy season. Drinking of unclean water and lack of general hygiene were the main causes. Now, many dreaded vector-borne diseases, some of which were unheard of until a few decades ago, have become a major threat. These include dengue, chikungunya, meningitis and viral fever, apart from malaria. Though their outbreaks are usually predictable and largely preventable as well, these recur with unfailing regularity year after year. Health authorities, regrettably, rarely wake up before people actually begin to die of these ailments. Even in the metro cities, where municipal authorities are supposed to be more watchful, hundreds suffer every year from these illnesses during the rainy months.

Monsoon woes

Business Standard

Maqbool Fida Husain was, like many artists through history, born in relative poverty and died, like the few that have been fortunate, in absolute wealth. This newspaper's columnist and art critic Kishore Singh has estimated that Mr Husain may have left behind over 20,000 works of art whose estimated value could add up to a handsome sum of &#39;4,000 crore. When he passed away on Thursday, at the ripe old age of 96, Mr Husain interrupted the supply side of the equation.

No more Husains

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh&rsquo;s recent go-ahead to prepare the final draft of the new manufacturing policy comes not a day too soon. The draft Bill to be tabled in Parliament ends months of wrangling among various stakeholders who were (legitimately) seeking to ensure their respective interests were safeguarded. While further debate can be expected, the central government has done well to provide the policy impetus to revive a sector that currently contributes just 16 per cent to India&rsquo;s gross domestic product (GDP) &mdash; that is way below potential. The policy&rsquo;s dominant objective is to reverse the decline in industry&rsquo;s share of GDP and ensure that the manufacturing sector alone accounts for at least 25 per cent of GDP by 2025, generating 100 million jobs in the process.

Manufacturing a policy

Football is a favourite sport in Kolkata, but no one cheers a self-goal. No one can really object to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee wishing to deliver on an important election promise, and that too of an emotive issue like Singur, from where her journey to power began. Even so, it should have been clear to Ms Banerjee and her advisors that the state government cannot issue an ordinance to reclaim land sold to a company when the state legislature was technically still in session and normal administrative procedures had not been followed. The state government&rsquo;s ordinance reclaiming the entire land at Singur with an intention to hand over a part of it to the farmers was flawed, even if well intentioned. Less than 24 hours later, she realised her mistake, refrained from notifying the ordinance and instead announced her intention to introduce an appropriate legislative Bill in the Assembly, which will now reconvene a week ahead of schedule.

Mamata's self-goal

The World Bank has now endorsed a long-standing proposal that governments should impose a carbon levy on jet and shipping fuel to finance climate change mitigation.

European unilateralism

The governor of the Bank of Israel and former deputy managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Stanley Fischer, has announced his candidature for the top job at the IMF. By stating that the IMF&rsquo;s next managing director should be chosen on the basis of the candidate&rsquo;s professional qualifications rather than nationality or other &ldquo;political factors&rdquo;, Dr Fischer has identified his main target &mdash; France&rsquo;s Finance Minister Christine Lagarde, a lawyer and politician rather than an economist, whose initial candidature was sold on the basis of her nationality and gender. Equally, he has strengthened the candidature of a fellow Chicago-trained economist &mdash; Mexico&rsquo;s central bank Governor Agustin Carstens, also a former IMF deputy managing director. Ms Lagarde is widely viewed as the front runner in the race.

The dark horse

The latest headline inflation data should queer the pitch for the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) as it makes up its mind on the end-quarter monetary policy action this week. The wholesale price index (WPI) has been reported to have risen by 9.06 per cent in May 2011 over May 2010, up from the 8.66 per cent jump in April over April last year. Given observed data and continuing expectations, it remains to be seen whether the RBI will prefer a 25 basis point (bp) increase in its policy statement this week, or would want to administer one more shock, as it did six weeks ago, and opt for a 50 bp hike. Most expect a milder dose of 25 bps this Thursday. The higher-than-expected rate of inflation is in large part on account of a sharper increase in the price index for manufactured products, where the inflation rate has gone up from 6.18 per cent in April over April to 7.27 per cent in May over May.

More of the same

At a time when even successful professional CEOs in Indian companies find themselves playing musical chairs and merry-go-round, Yogesh (Yogi) Chander Deveshwar is clearly in a class of his own. It is, therefore, not surprising that the ITC board has given him a five-year extension after a 15-year term as executive chairman. With this extension, Mr Deveshwar becomes ITC&rsquo;s longest-serving chairman. Longevity in office, of course, is not a virtue in itself but it does enable CEOs to consolidate in a way their shorter-tenure counterparts may not always manage. Cases in point are A M Naik, executive head of Larsen &amp; Toubro since 1999 (as managing director; he added chairman to the designation in 2003), and E Sreedharan, managing director of the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation since 1997. Both are outstanding performers and have fashioned themselves as prominent public figures. Mr Deveshwar, by contrast, is low-profile, but he has arguably been the better performer.

Unique Mr Deveshwar

The head of a leading Indian credit rating agency has complained that there is unhealthy competition among too many players in the sector. This is leading to &ldquo;rating shopping&rdquo; by issuers of paper and competitive undercutting of fees by agencies. It will inevitably lead to dependence on poorly paid analysts doing a substandard job.

The investor should pay

The Union government&rsquo;s recent announcement of a policy for disposing of electronic waste (e-waste) is a step in the right direction. The E-Waste (Management and Handling) Rules, 2011, are in line with the norms followed in several countries to hold producers of electronic goods liable for the safe recycling or disposal of out-of-use e-products. Manufacturers of e-products have been given a year to put in place an e-waste collection system, with collection centres or other methods of taking back age-expired equipment for proper extermination. Significantly, the government also seeks to involve bulk consumers of electronic equipment, such as business enterprises and government departments, in ensuring that e-products discarded by them are channelled to authorised collection centres.

Managing e-waste

Those who did not get the message in May when the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) raised policy rates by 50 basis points (bps), ignoring expectations of a 25 bp hike, should get it at least now. By ignoring pleas for a pause this time, RBI Governor Duvvuri Subbarao has clearly shown that he meant business when he said six weeks ago that the central bank will maintain &ldquo;an interest rate environment that moderates inflation and anchors inflation expectations&rdquo;. There&rsquo;s a new gun in town and he&rsquo;s determined to take on the persisting problem of high inflationary expectations. It was amusing to see those who were votaries of &ldquo;pause&rdquo; on television earlier this week forecast another 25 bp hike six weeks from now minutes after the RBI made its announcement at noon time on Thursday. This fact alone should prove that central bank sceptics have finally taken note of the new mood.

New gun in town

What is driving the recent surge in Indian exports? Improved competitiveness even in a slowly growing world economy? An ability to serve buoyant markets in Asia better? Or, just a rush to beat the now-extended deadline for the winding-up of the Duty Entitlement Pass Book (DEPB) scheme? The last hypothesis suggests that Indian exporters are simply relocating inventories from godowns at home to warehouses abroad to get the benefits of DEPB before the scheme is wound up. Whatever the reasons, the fact remains that the April 2011 exports of $23.85 billion represent a year-on-year increase (in dollar terms) of 34.4 per cent. This comes on top of an even more impressive performance in March 2011. An uncomplicated extrapolation of these numbers would suggest that exports for FY 2011-12 would be of the order of $286 billion, while imports would correspondingly be $394 billion. The resultant annual deficit of $108 billion would be slightly lower than the $115 billion witnessed last year.

Trick or trade?

Much criticism is heaped on cricket these days for the commercialism that has permeated the game. This commercialism appears to have reached its apogee in the Indian Premier League (IPL), the four-year-old tournament that is driven by private sector money and which purists love to hate.

Inclusive cricket

The 13-day strike at Maruti Suzuki India Ltd&rsquo;s Manesar plant, which ended last Friday, may well be the beginning of a new phase in labour relations for India&rsquo;s largest car maker and for big industry in general. It has also brought into focus the issue of the rights of contract labour.

A temporary truce

India&rsquo;s herbal medicine industry is facing some daunting challenges including the imposition of stringent quality and regulatory standard by the United States and European Union (EU) and a growing shortage of raw material at home. The latest export hurdle is a move by the EU mandating all traditional medicines to be registered with healthcare regulatory agencies in EU member countries.

Saving herbal medicines

There is still more than a year left for former Madhya Pradesh chief minister and Congress party General Secretary Digvijay Singh&rsquo;s self-imposed ten-year exile from political power to end. So, no one can accuse Mr Singh of harbouring personal ambition when he routinely criticises his own party&rsquo;s ministers for their acts of omission and commission. The Congress party has perfected the art of hunting with the hounds and running with the hares, but its too-clever-by-half strategy of playing the role of both ruling party and Opposition can sometimes go awry. There is a difference between a party leader criticising a minister in her own party&rsquo;s government on policy issues, as Mr Singh did when he upbraided Union Home Minister P Chidambaram and in flying kites about whether it is time for a new leader to head the government.

Decoding Digvijay

Shortages, outages, load shedding, poor-quality supply and transmission and distribution (T&amp;D) losses continue to haunt India&rsquo;s power sector. Despite these problems, India has now acquired the capacity and capability to add at least 15,000 Mw a year, having demonstrated the ability to add 12,000 Mw a year in the past five years. This still compares poorly with China&rsquo;s ability to add 100,000 Mw every year.

Power problems

The real estate market in India is heading for what looks like a double dip. After correcting somewhat from the sharp setback suffered in 2008, with some sectors managing to exceed previous peak prices in 2010, the sector entered 2011 with cautious optimism. But halfway through the year, the outlook has turned distinctly sombre. The current economic deceleration is pouring cold water on demand for office space, always driven by the overall economic climate. The retail segment has yet to absorb the excess supply that has characterised it since the last slowdown. But it is the bread and butter affordable-to-middle volume part of the residential segment that has suffered a clear setback with successive policy rate increases raising interest rates and equated monthly installments (EMIs) and the promise of more to come. Banks, which had already turned cautious about lending to developers on receiving the signal from the banking regulator, are likely to become even more careful.

Double dip ahead

Stock market investors are a notoriously fickle lot. So it is not surprising that the market capitalisation of firms and business groups keeps changing from time to time. Even by these yardsticks, the news that the Tata group has overtaken the combined market capitalisation of Mukesh Ambani&rsquo;s group and the Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (ADAG) draws attention to an important recent trend in corporate India &mdash; investors value professionally-managed companies more than predominantly family-run companies. Though Ratan Tata is indubitably a hands-on promoter, his group is increasingly professionally managed. The Ambani brothers, on the other hand, can certainly boast of some fine managerial talent within their groups but no one is likely to claim that their companies are professionally managed &mdash; and certainly not to the degree the Tata group is.

A capital idea

The term &ldquo;civil society&rdquo; has been used and abused at will these past few months in India. In a clever coup staged with the active involvement of a section of the media, a clutch of social activists and retired civil servants was allowed to project itself as &ldquo;a representative of civil society&rdquo;. A confused government, a directionless ruling alliance and a revenue-hungry media allowed this dubious claim to go unchallenged, portraying a few good men and women as the people&rsquo;s voice. The elected representatives chosen by the people to be their voice in Parliament virtually abdicated their constitutional responsibility, allowing the so-called &ldquo;civil society&rdquo; leaders to fill the vacuum created by the absence of an organised parliamentary discourse on issues pertaining to corruption in high places. Every political party &ndash; in government and in opposition &ndash; is equally guilty of this.

Let Parliament decide

A rational fertiliser policy always seems to be sabotaged by the very minister who is expected to implement it. Union Fertiliser Minister M K Alagiri has come out against the idea of decontrolling urea prices, ostensibly in the name of the farmer. The nutrient-based subsidy (NBS) system, as opposed to product-based subsidy, is unworkable if producers do not have the freedom to fix sale price. The fundamental objective of this system is to promote balanced use of fertilisers and rationalisation of the ever-mounting fertiliser subsidy. What the fertiliser minister is disregarding is that the NBS regime has been working well ever since it was introduced for phosphatic (P) and potassic (K) fertilisers in April 2010 and was subsequently extended to several other plant nutrients, barring N (urea).

Fertilising policy

Incisive columns and editorial comment by top opinion leaders

Page 400 - Editorial Comment