Spectrum sharing should be the next stepBharti Airtel, the countryâ€™s largest telecom services company, has decided to buy out Alcatel-Lucentâ€™s 74 per cent stake in Alcatel Lucent Managed Network Services India, the company that manages its all-India broadband and fixed-line network. After the buyout, Bharti Airtel has said, it would share this network with other companies. These companies could also pick up a stake in this network. To what extent others might be interested is not clear. Reliance Communications recently signed a network outsourcing deal with Alcatel. Vodafone and Idea Cellular have a limited presence in broadband and fixed-line telephony and, therefore, may not be too enthusiastic about joining in. And state-owned BSNL and MTNL may shy away from participating in the equity of such a venture.Still, this is a clear indication of the shape of things to come in a sector that is struggling with falling profits and rising costs. Tariffs in India ar

Telcos share infra

Business Standard

It seems the grand idea of cross-subsidisation is going to die a slow death

The Subsidy Idea

With the Cabinet endorsing the recommendations of the group of ministers that was set up to go into telecom licensing issues, Arun Shourie (the telecom minister) and Pradip Baijal (chairman of the

Endgame in telecom

Traditional Hinduism recommends to all its followers that when they reach the age of 60, they should give up worldly pursuits and go into vanaprastha, which means, literally, into the

Mahathir's Malaysia

After three days of uncertainty, the government finally did the right thing by cancelling the appointment of Commerce Secretary Dipak Chatterjee as chairman of the newly constituted Competition

Autonomy versus sinecure

It is not often that a government move clicks from the word go. But this is exactly what has happened with the programme to set up agri-export zones (AEZs). 



Successful debut

Crossing 5000 after three years is a milestone for the Sensex, and the speed of the ascent speaks volumes for the strength of the current rally. 



Rapid ascent

A committee set up by the department of company affairs is set to recommend far-reaching changes in the penalties for corporate fraud. 



Tackling corporate fraud

The flood of new business coming to India in IT services and business process outsourcing (BPO) over the last few months has been breathtaking. 



Protecting IT margins

Every newspaper and everyone who values democracy in India will stand by The Hindu and Murasoli as they fight the attack launched on the freedom of the press by the Tamil Nadu

Assault on freedom

The thrust of labour reform has to be aimed at introducing flexibility in the labour market while offering a soft landing for those affected by such flexibility. 



Reforms by stealth

Both the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) need to be congratulated for taking steps to introduce transparency and discipline to the unlisted bond

Transparent bonds

The counterfeit stamp and stamp paper scam is threatening to become the biggest and most damaging business scam ever in India, given its size, spread and implications. 



Stamp it out

Cost-benefit considerations do not seem to be the major criteria for settling priorities in development programmes. If that were so, irrigation would have been at the top of the agriculture and rural

Dangerous neglect

In recent years, much concern has been expressed and effort expended to promote India as a brand to the world at large. The commerce ministry, for instance, has set up a brand equity fund for this

India unbranded

Controversies seldom seem to let go of the sugar sector. While a solution to the vexed issue of payment of state-advised cane prices (SAP) to sugarcane growers is still to be found, despite the

The problem with controls

With over Rs 8,000 crore worth of transactions requiring stamp paper each year, and the paper not guarded with anywhere near the same zeal as currency notes, the Rs 30,000 crore stamp scam perpetrated

Why have stamps?

While the government is happy to pre-pay expensive forex loans, an interesting point that emerges from the RBI Report on Trend and Progress of Banking in India is that, during 2002-03, the forex

Thin end of the wedge

The hike in the tariff value of palm oils, though done without any apparent provocation, has surprised no one. For one thing, this is the third time that the base import price has been re-fixed in

Tariff mysteries

It is a measure of how much the Bihari immigrant is disliked today that the recent killings in Assam of Biharis has not caused the sort of dismay that it ought to. 



A wake-up call

Protest and backlash in the US against the offshoring of work have clearly become mainstream and India is a key target. 



Tackling the backlash

Incisive columns and editorial comment by top opinion leaders

Page 413 - Editorial Comment