News Insight (Business Line) ; 13th Sept 2016 - ‘Bhattacharya, Kochhar among most powerful women outside US’

India’s top women bankers, SBI chief Arundhati Bhattacharya, ICICI head Chanda Kochhar and Axis Bank CEO Shikha Sharma, are among the 50 most powerful women based outside the US, according to a list by Fortune, which is topped by Banco Santander’s boss Ana Bot

Bhattacharya, 60 is ranked second on the list, while Kochhar comes in at the fifth spot and Sharma in the 19th position in Fortune’s ‘50 Most Powerful Women International’ list, which has ranked the women based outside the US.

Editorial (Business Line) : Put consumers first

Telecom is perhaps the only sector where a company can succeed only through co-opetition. The quality of service offered by an operator is highly dependent on how well it interconnects with rival service providers. For example,

Editorial : Reining in the adventurist North

North Korea’s fifth nuclear test may have had an explosive yield of no more than ten kilotons, somewhat less than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, but

Editorial : Effective, but not equitable

The dynamic fare pricing announced for the Rajdhani, Shatabdi and Duronto trains on an “experimental basis” has been justified by the Ministry of Railways as a means to shore up lagging passenger revenues. The Ministry says the cost per passenger kilometre today is around 73 paise, while the Railways recovers only 37 paise.

Editorial 2 | 21st May 2016 | The Hindu

Topic - Against all odds

Nothing is more difficult than to turn the tide of history. That All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam general secretary Jayalalithaa won the support of the voters of Tamil Nadu for a second consecutive term as Chief Minister, defying the historical weight of six previous Assembly elections, which had voted out the incumbent[पदधारी], is truly remarkable.

Editorial 1 | 21st May 2016 | The Hindu

Topic - The message from West Bengal

The Red disaster has drawn the spotlight away from the Green splash in West Bengal, and recriminations[परस्पर दोषारोपण] in the Communist Party of India (Marxist) are ringing louder than celebrations in the Trinamool Congress. The verdict has expectedly opened old, unresolved debates in the CPI(M). The decision of the State unit of the party to forge a seat-sharing agreement with the Congress was taken against the central leadership’s firm reservations, and the air is already thick with both misgivings and excuse-making. It is not clear if the party will take away from its West Bengal disaster lessons of theory, praxis or realpolitik — or none at all. But on a larger canvas, the election result suggests significant messages from the electorate. Indeed, these messages could be projected nationwide. For one, the electorate has again rejected the politics of cynicism[कुटिलता]. Voters have showed that they couldn’t care for an alliance that is scared to even utter its own name. The Congress-CPI(M) seat-sharing was referred to as jot in Bengali, but quibbles[बहाना] about its definition gave away the lack of conviction in the two parties for it to be anything but an expedient measure, with no positive outreach.

Opinion Column | 20th May 2016 | The Hindu

Topic - It is too early to call 2019

By Vidya Subrahmaniam( Vidya Subrahmaniam is a Senior Fellow at The Hindu Centre for Politics and Public Policy )

Assembly elections do not necessarily foretell[पहले से कह देना] the larger fortunes of political parties. Just how well Narendra Modi fares nationally could depend on voter satisfaction and the emergence of a credible opposition that can tap the counter-narrative.

As the exit poll results filtered in for the current round of State Assembly elections, and excitement peaked over the possible national implications of Verdict 2016, the usual questions popped up in the television studios. Will Narendra Modi do an encore[दोहराना] in 2019, leading the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to a second consecutive Lok Sabha victory? Second, is it curtains for the Congress, as in, is the party facing political extinction[विलुप्त होने का]?

Editoial 1 | 20th May 2016 | The Hindu

Topic - The meaning of victory and defeat

Five Assembly elections, and five different winners. But the voters did not distribute their favours equitably. The Congress, the only party with a realistic chance of being part of a winning coalition [गठबंधन] in all the five elections, won only one, the least important politically, the Union Territory of Puducherry. InAssam, it ceded[सौंप दिया] ground to its principal rival at the national level, the Bharatiya Janata Party, for the first time. In Kerala, where it headed a coalition government as the leading member of the United Democratic Front, it lost heavily to the Left Democratic Front led by the Communist Party of India (Marxist). In West Bengal, the party’s incongruous alliance[बेतुका गठबंधन] with the Left Front failed to enthuse[अति उत्साहित करना] voters, who saw it as devious[चालाक] and opportunistic. And in Tamil Nadu, the revival of the alliance with the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam yielded little dividend for the Congress. The BJP, however, can take heart from its victory in Assam, where it managed to stitch together an alliance with regional parties, the Asom Gana Parishad and the Bodoland People’s Front. In West Bengal and Tamil Nadu, the two big States in which it is a minor player, the BJP will not be displeased with the success of the Trinamool Congress over the Left-Congress alliance and of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam over the DMK-Congress alliance.

Opinion Column | 19th May 2016| The Hindu

Topic - North by Northeast

By Kanak Mani Dixit (Kanak Mani Dixit, a writer and journalist based in Kathmandu, is founding editor of the magazine Himal Southasian.)

Nepal’s opening up to China should compel India to rethink its geostrategic doctrine [भूरणनीतिक सिद्धांत]  about the Himalayan range. Leaving Nepal free to develop its international outreach would be an enlightened starting point.

The Himalaya is no longer the barrier New Delhi strategists have long regarded it as, and there is today a churning[मंथन] all along the mountain range that demands a reassessment of what the stretch means for India’s security, commerce and connectivity. New Delhi has been skittish about the northern ‘rimland’ of South Asia ever since the 1962 debacle[पराजय] at the hands of China. It is time to shed the Himalayan paranoia.

Editorial 2 | 19th May 2016 |The Hindu

Topic -  Tamil Nadu’s direct cash transfers

The Election Commission may believe it has done enough by postponing voting in two Assembly constituencies in Tamil Nadu where there were allegations of rampant[बड़े पैमाने पर] voter bribery and distribution of cash and gifts over the last month, and ordering an inquiry. But given the situation on the ground, coupled with the EC’s own grim[भयंकर] portrayal[चित्रण] of the widespread electoral malpractice, deferring the election in Aravakurichi and Thanjavur by a week is a grossly inadequate response. For one, there is enough reason to believe that the cash-for-votes phenomenon has taken deep roots in all constituencies. Also, deferment[स्थगितकरण] means little in the long run if recovery of cash is not followed up with the implementation of strategies to stamp out this perversion[आचारभ्रष्टता] . In Aravakurichi, the EC seized Rs.4.77 crore from a person linked to the AIADMK and its Ministers. It seized Rs.1.98 crore from the DMK candidate and his son.