SIBAL DE TRAUMA OFFENSIVE and Indiscriminate REFORM Drive! Privatisation, Centralisation and FREE Open Education Market to RELAUNCH Manusmriti Rule to DEPRIVE Enslaved Masses!
Troubled Galaxy Destroyed Dreams, Chapter 267
Palash Biswas
Centre sends 600 more security personnel to Lalgarh
25 Jun 2009, 1910 hrs IST, PTI
NEW DELHI: The Centre on Thursday sent an additional 600 security personnel to Lalgarh area of West Bengal as part of its operations against
Maoists who had laid siege to nearly 50 villages there, home ministry sources said.
Maoist Insurgency and Lalgarh stand OFF proved to be favourable SUBVERSION as we, being most IMPULSIVE and Passionate, often do overlook the developments in the wings. We never know how the Citizenship amendment act was passed with parliamentary CONSENSUS. We have no idea how Marxist Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya succeeded to rope in Chidamabaram to declare BAN on the Maoists while officially the LEFT insists on POLITICAL Process and discards Military and zero Tolerance Options adopted so far. We easily overlook the ABSENCE of STANCE on the part of the Left parties as far as Nationalities, Identities, North East and AFPSA are concerned.
We may SWAY or Swing in reaction as Criminal Procedure began against the group of Bengal Intelligentsia which visited Lalgarh and ignore the GENOCIDE and ETHNIC Cleansing DRIVE launched countrywide with ane EMERGING Tri IBLIS Satanic Zionist New Power AXIS of Adwani, PRANAB, MAMATA, BUDDHA, SIBAL and Chidambaram led by Dr Manmohan Singh. In fact, opposing the REGIMENTED Gestapo in Bengal gas Chamber we VOTED for the AMERICAN Colonial Government led by Dr Manmohan singh to TRANSFORM Indian nation into an INFINITE DEATH CHAMBER ruled by Manusmriti Rule and supported by the Left as well as RSS. They all stand TOGETHER under the worldwide Umbrella of ZIONIST ILLUMINATI and continue to launch Monopolistic Aggression. Toilet Media exposes the modifies SKIN only, while the MEAT remains within. We remain DIVIDED into Caste system as well as parliamentary Politics without any Empowerment, Representation, Participation and Sharing! Without any POLITICAL Process we assume to breathe in DEMOCRACY NON EXISTANT.
Thus, we failed to note that the Marxists in India supported the Manusmriti Hegemony since the FIRST day. They remained COUPLED with Nehru, INDIRA, Bajpayee, RAO, GUjral, Gauda and Dr Manmohan Singh without any virtual break!
We never knew that the DISINVESTMENT and SELL OFF strategies were actually finalised during Gauda and Gujral governments under LEFTIST Common Minimum Programme! Disinvestment Ministry without any liability was the BRAINCHILD of our Comrades who JUNKED all TRADE UNION Activities and SOCIAL movements to help MNCs and Corporate Imperialism. We believed them while they were SCREAMING against Fascism, Imperialism, Globalisation until the Marxist Capitalism was SRIPPED NAKED in Nandigram and SINGUR.
We lost the VISION as we happen to be BLACKED out how Realty, Construction, Health and Chemical, Retail and Commodity, Aviation, Education, Oil, Steel and Mines, Bank and Insurance, Post and Railway, Agriculture and food processing, Infrastructure, Science and Technology, IT and High technology, Energy and Nuclear Energy, Forest, Ocean and environment have been SECTORWISE SOLD OUT!
We NEVER know the Ind depth story of AIR INDIA Crisis. Neither we care for LIC, SBI, SAIL or ONGC. We never knew that CHIDAMBARAM Deregulated the BANKING Sector right in 2005 amending the Banking Regulation act.
Just see the SAMPLE and make out the MOTTO DISINVESTMENT:
The government is ready to help Air India, but the aviation minister said on Wednesday the struggling state carrier must become "leaner and trimmer" to secure backing it needs to get through a liquidity crunch.
The carrier, which has said it wants to cut employee costs by 5 billion rupees ($103 million) annually and has asked senior employees to forego salaries and incentives in July, has sought extra cash through equity and soft loans from the government.
"The government's support is there but the government's support also comes with a condition that Air India must shape up, must become leaner and trimmer and also must put its best foot forward," Aviation Minister Praful Patel said in New Delhi.
Patel did not say how much cash would be made available, but said the airline would not be given "an open-ended chequebook".
Patel said Air India will have to implement measures such as manpower restructuring, including of top management, and cost-cutting. Air India must submit its restructuring plan within a month, Patel added.
KAPIL SIBAL is playing the MASTER STROKE of DE TRAUMA to DEREGULATE EDUCATION on the line of IT and Vocational Education. SARBA SHIKSHA Education was the FLAGSHIP Programme which was HYPED enough to make us believe the EDUCATION Welfare and which made our teachers GOOD Cooks only and our CHILDREN BEGGARS! On the other hand, a high-level committee on renovation and rejuvenation of universities headed by noted educationist Yashpal has recommended that IITs
and IIMs be converted into full-fledged universities so that they aict as pace-setters and models for all such institutions of higher education.
Meanwhile,in what could send the government back to the drawing board to rework the route to economic recovery, rainfall prediction was lowered
by the earth sciences ministry putting the foodgrain belt of India — Punjab and Haryana — on notice for a failing monsoon.
UPA pundits hoping to post an economic recovery on the basis of strong results in the agricultural sector have been set back by the new estimates.
A fall in agricultural production could come as a double whammy for economists. It would dry up demand from rural markets which have been the stabilising factor in the economy. It would also increase demand for social sector interventions such as NREGS, sucking a higher level of subsidy and putting fiscal deficit limits to test.
Yashpal said the report would be given to the government soon. The committee has suggested that regulatory bodies like All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE), Medical Council of India (MCI) and the Bar Council of India (BCI) be divested of their academic functions, which should be restored to the universities. It has also said that all universities have full range of knowledge areas and that no single discipline or specialised university be created.
The committee has also said the practice of according status of deemed university be stopped forthwith. It would be mandatory for all existing deemed universities to submit to the new accreditation norms within a period of three years failing which the status of university should be withdrawn. A single accreditation window for all institutes of higher education has also been suggested.
Yashpal said the idea to change the name of the committee — originally meant to review UGC/AICTE —was his and there was no pressure to do so from the HRD ministry.
Though HRD ministry's attempt to set up a commission for higher education failed, the committee has suggested creation of an all-encompassing Higher Education Commission, a central statutory body to replace the existing regulatory bodies like UGC, AICTE and NCTE. This commission, it has said, should be free of all ministries and have complete autonomy.
The proposed HEC will create a curricular framework based on the principles of mobility within a full range of curricular areas and integration of skills with academic depth. This will imply that a student of any stream can do a short course in an unrelated subject and get credits.
HEC, committee said, will initially consist of five divisions dealing with future directions, accreditation management, funding and development, new institutions and incubation, and information and governance. An eminent individual with a tenure of five years will head each division. The chairperson of the HEC will be appointed by a search committee comprising the Prime Minister, the leader of the opposition in Lok Sabha and the Chief Justice of India.
We have already been DEPRIVED of Higher Education, research and development. NOW SIBAL is going to ABOLISH UGC and making all deemed UNIVERSITIES , IITs and IIMs Private UNIVERSITIES!
But the EDUCATED as well as INTELLIGENT People of INDIA remain HABITUAL to make DECISIONS on the FEED BACKS, MIND CONTROL, Brain washing, Mis Information sustained campaign of the TOILET Media!
In Americanised India, No One mourned the the DEPARTURE of Rajpoot Strong Man King ARJUN Singh from the Ministry of Human Resource Ministry. Anti Reservation Passion amongst the Caste Hindu Media and Intelligentsia sighed in relief rather to be liberated from Reservation and Quota Raj in Faculties and Brahaminical Monopoly ENSURED in Elite Education centres like IIT and IIM.
The Entry of Kapil Sibal on the wave of Manipulated MANDATE for the CONTINUITY of so Called ECONOMIC Reforms has been CELEBRATED in every campus thanks to YOUTH For Equality!
But the BIG Debate EXPOSURE on CNBC TV Channel heralded the REFORMS and Strategic Marketing Policies in EDUCATION Sector dictated by India INCS and ILLUMINATI.
I have been engaged in intense interactions with friends countrywide and all of us agreed to relaunch Students` Movement in the Campus once again to RESIST the CONSPIRACY to DEPRIVE the Majority masses of Higher and quality education. I am sorry to say that we could not INITIATE any mobilisation at any stage. Interestingly, while the SFI and DYF have been SILENT .
the RSS outfit AKHIL BHARATIYA Vidyarthi Parishad only VOICED Protest against SIBAL ENTERPRISES!
Since SIBAL DETRAUMA episode is GLAMORISED on TV channels and media with manipulated landslide support in the Campus, only West Bengal Government and the RSS backed GUJARAT Government dared to OPPOSE the so called REFORMS!
Sibal told The Indian Express: “The Indian education system which is marks-centered and examination-based is a source of trauma for both parents and children... knowledge, like everything else, should be user-friendly, and the acquisition of knowledge should not be a stressful exercise.”
Children, Sibal said, should not be judged by percentages with an emphasis on learning by rote, and the whole system of examinations should be looked at afresh.
“I am thinking of relooking at the necessity of having a Board examination for Class 10,” he said. “A child moves up from Class 9 to Class 10 in the same school and there is no reason for either the student or the parents to get traumatised by the 10th Board exam,” he said. As a first step, the HRD Ministry will consult state governments and state education boards, Sibal said. “I hope to move forward very soon and set up an alternative system of evaluation of students that is based on percentiles rather than percentages.”
The minister believes that it is for the students to decide which stream to follow in Class 11 rather than for the schools to force it on them. “Ultimately, it is the student’s aptitude that should decide whether he or she wants to study arts or science... not the school,” he said.
In a pathbreaking step towards reforming India’s school education system, Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal is considering doing away with the Class 10 Board examination, and setting up an alternative evaluation system based on percentiles, not percentages!
In far-reaching reforms, Government proposed making 10th board examination optional and setting up of a single school board at the national level for a uniform examination for class 12.
A new scheme of interest subsidy on educational loans for professional courses by economically weaker students will be launched in the first 100 days of the UPA government, HRD Minister Kapil Sibal told reporters in New Delhi.
"We must detraumatise education. It cannot be traumatic for parents and children. This is unacceptable," the Minister said unveiling the education agenda.
Government will also introduce a system to replace the present assessment procedure of giving marks with grades which will reduce stress, he said.
The single board would replace 33 boards in the country including CBSE and CISCE and hold a uniform examination for all students on the pattern of combined law admission test being organised for admission to law institutions.
"By appearing in a single board, a student can decide which university he wants to go. It is happening in the law (courses). The aim is to reduce the trauma," he said adding that states would be consulted on the issue.
Taking note of students and their parents complaining of sleepless nights at the time of board examinations, Sibal said the government wants to make 10th examinations optional for students wishing to continue in the same school.
"If a student wants to go for pre-university course, he may appear for 10th board exam. But in case of a student pursuing the course in the same school, he need not appear in the class-10 exam for promotion to class-11," Sibal said, adding that an internal assessment would suffice.
Government will review the functioning of existing deemed universities which have come under spotlight following allegations of heavy capitation fee charged by some of these institutions.
An autonomous overarching authority for higher education and research based on the recommendations of Yashpal committee and the National Knowledge Commission would be established.
Sibal said a law will be enacted to prevent, prohibit and punish educational malpractices. For the disadvantaged sections of the society, Equal Opportunity Offices would be created in all universities, he said adding a new policy on distance learning would be formulated.
The ambitious bill to provide free and compulsory education to children in the age group of 6 to 14 will be taken up during the budget session.
The government also wants to set up an All India Madrassa Board which will award degrees equivalent to CBSE and other boards. The board will frame policy to impart secular and technical education to Muslims without interfering with the religious teachings. "We will strive to evolve a consensus on this issue," he said.
FDI in education top priority: Kapil Sibal
New human resource development minister Kapil Sibal is strongly in favour of allowing foreign direct investment (FDI) in India's
education sector and also plans to "synchronise" madrassa education with the mainstream.
"FDI must come into India. Entry into the education sector must neither be limited nor over-regulated. I want the system to be accessible from outside too," Sibal, 61, who is a practising lawyer, told IANS in an interview.
He says allowing private investment, including from abroad, in education "does not mean you have fly by night operators." But, Sibal says, the country should not prevent quality learning from coming.
"After all, 160,000 children go abroad from India at an overall cost of seven billion dollars. Before going they face all kinds of visa problems while after going abroad, there are issues like the attacks in Australia," Sibal, who studied at the Harvard Law School, pointed out.
"When the demand exists, why should we send our children out? Foreign universities can come at our doorstep; India has the potential to become a global provider of quality graduates."
The minister said he would take forward the Foreign Educational Institutions (Regulation of Entry and Operations, Maintenance of Quality and Prevention of Commercialisation) Bill, which was cleared by the cabinet in February 2007 but has been hanging fire.
It seeks to regulate the entry, operation and maintenance of foreign education providers and protect students from receiving sub-standard education offered by institutions that view it as a lucrative business.
When told that the opposition, especially the Left parties, was against FDI, Sibal says: "The Left is not against foreign universities per se; they are concerned about fly by night operators. Everything has to be regulated and it will be."
He said this did not mean "you deny access to quality education to our children." The minister added: "Education is a socio-economic activity. Why should it have impediments in the form of bureaucratic red tape?"
"There will be a whole lot of structural reforms basically to free up the system; to end licence raj." He says it's been two weeks since the new government started work, so things will unfold now.
The minister who was re-elected as an MP from the Chandni Chowk constituency of Delhi is also looking at bringing madrassa education into the mainstream.
"There will be attempts to make education in madrassas relevant and equivalent to modern education. We will not touch the religious part; the point is their degrees should have equivalence with the others," says Sibal.
He said his directives to the University Grants Commission (UGC) to review the working of private institutions which have been given the status of deemed universities and to put a freeze on new applications for it were intended to ensure better quality education.
"My mantra is expansion, inclusion and excellence. Expansion means access to education to all; inclusion translates into equity for the Scheduled Castes, tribes, girl child, Muslims. And excellence means quality. When I say this I mean the entire spectrum from primary to higher education."
But he says the government cannot handle everything. "There will be multi-farious set of players, there will be corporate investment in school education, joint ventures, public-private partnerships, more Kendriya Vidyalayas," Sibal says.
Manage new IIMs like corporates: Panel
29 Oct 2008, 0210 hrs IST, D Suresh Kumar, TNN
CHENNAI: A high level committee has said that the six new Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs), proposed in Tamil Nadu, Jammu and Kashmir,
Jharkhand, Haryana, Chhattisgarh and Uttarakhand, "should function on the pattern of the most modern corporates, in terms of administration and financial process."
Besides, they must be established keeping in mind the future demands. Recommending a corporate structure, the IIM review committee headed by R C Bhargava, chairman, Maruti Suzuki India Limited, has said "where possible, outsourcing possibilities should be seriously considered. Common systems and processes should be developed for the six new IIMs. Since some degree of modernisation is also required in these areas in the old IIMs, they too could benefit from the development work."
One of the biggest challenges while establishing new B-Schools would be recruiting faculty, especially in the functional disciplines.
"The system of making contract appointments should be tried out. Also, the use of technology, in conjunction with an existing IIM, should be used to compensate for faculty shortage. In fact use of technology, once well established, could be used to reduce costs," the committee has recommended in its report submitted to the union human resources development ministry last week.
The building plans for the new IIMs should take into account future requirements of expansion and ensure that optimum use of land is made. This recommendation comes in the wake of the increase in intake of students over the last few years in the existing six IIMs at Ahmadabad, Kolkata, Kozhikode, Bangalore, Indore and Lucknow.
The panel has also suggested the buildings at the new IIMs must be designed in an environment-friendly manner. "While designing the buildings and infrastructure, the need to be environmentally as friendly as possible and to minimise use of energy and water should be kept in mind. The use of solar energy should be considered as also water harvesting and recycling. Expert agencies could be associated in this work," the report added.
It would be ideal for the government to constitute a committee of three present or past directors of IIMs to study the detailed project reports for the new IIMs. Also, the new institutions must be mentored by existing IIMs.
Despite all this, it is not unlikely the new IIMs may have difficulties shortening the time taken to function at the same level as the older IIMs. The committee has cautioned that, "If these IIMs are not able to maintain the standards of the other IIMs, not only would this dilute the brand image of all IIMs, but would result in a huge waste of public money. For this reason, it would be definitely desirable that each new IIM is managed by one of the existing IIMs."
Monsoon rains to be below normal: Govt
New Delhi India's monsoon rains, a lifeline to its trillion dollar economy, have weakened and are expected to be below normal, the government said on Wednesday.
"Rainfall is likely to be below normal," Earth Sciences Minister Prithviraj Chavan said.
The minister said the 2009 monsoon rainfall would be 93 per cent of the long-term average, lower than an earlier forecast of 96 per cent.
The annual monsoon hit the southwestern state of Kerala on May 23, a week ahead of schedule, but its progress has gradually weakened, threatening to hit the country's farm output and impact the economy.
The four-month rainy season normally kicks off around June 1 and covers the entire country by mid-July.
With only 40 per cent of farmland irrigated, most of India's small farmers rely on the monsoon to water their crops. A good season of rains also boosts rural demand for a range of products and is a key factor in determining expansion in the larger economy.
Orissa: Maoists go on rampage ahead of Chidambaram visit
Bhubaneswar Hours before the visit of Home Minister P Chidambaram, Maoists struck in a big way attacking a railway station, damaging communication towers and looting a block office in Orissa's Koraput district on Thursday.
The armed Maoists descended on the Kakiriguma railway station and ransacked it besides damaging the control panel which affected train movement on Rayagada-Koraput section.
Following the incident, the Bhubaneswar-Koraput Hirakhand Express was held up at Rayagada while a couple of other passenger and goods trains were also affected.
The ultras then blew up three mobile phone towers inlcuding one belonging to the BSNL at Kakiriguma using landmines.
Another large group of ultras swooped down on the block office, 530 km away at Narayanpatna, which has been witnessing heightened Maoist activity in recent weeks. They caused extensive damage to the building besides destroying furniture and setting ablaze official files.
The Maoists also damaged two computers and took away 42 bicycles from the office.
They raised slogans against the Centre's decision to proscribe the CPI (Maoist).
Security personnel were rushed to the area and combing operation launched as the union home minister is slated to commence his two-day visit to the state from the Maoist-affected Koraput district this afternoon.
The Maoists had cut off all communication to Narayanpatna since June 15 by felling trees on the roads connecting the town. They also triggered a landmine explosion on June 18 killing nine securitymen when they were trying to clear the blockades.
About 400 security personnel, including CRPF jawans, had remained cut off at Narayanpatna and helicopters were used to airlift food and additional forces there on Tuesday.
During his one-day visit to Koraput, Chidambaram would talk to SPs of Malkangiri, Rayagada, Nawrangpur and Koraput districts and visit the location of a upcoming CoBRA Battalion Centre.
Chidambaram was also scheduled to visit relief camps in Kandhamal district tomorrow where riots and attacks against Christians had taken place earlier.
Terrorist threat still high in J&K says Antony
New Delhi India on Thursday said infiltration from Pakistan has declined in the recent past, but the threat from terrorists in Jammu and Kashmir is "real" and there is no question of lowering the guard. "Of late, there has been a decline in infiltration in the borders but we cannot say it is an improvement," Defence Minister A K Antony told reporters after addressing the Unified Commanders' Conference here.
He made it clear that "there is no question of lowering our guard, especially in Jammu and Kashmir, as even now these terrorist outfits are working there. It is a real threat." Antony said the relations between India and Pakistan can "move forward" only if strong action is taken by Islamabad against anti-India outfits operating from across the border. "We are emphasising and trying to convince Pakistan that they have to take strong actions against the anti-India groups operating from there. Only then the two countries can move forward and we can help in improving relations," he said.
He termed the security situation in Pakistan as a "matter of great concern" for India. On India's plans to raise two mountain divisions in Arunachal Pradesh, he said, "India is not against any country. We want to maintain friendly and cordial relations with all our neighbours but at the same time it is our duty to increase our capabilities."
About his proposed meeting with US National Security Advisor (NSA) James Jones tomorrow, Antony said the security situation in the region, especially Afghanistan, is likely to figure among other issues in the discussions. "We are going to discuss the security scenario around us. While discussing this, we cannot avoid Afghanistan. Taliban is a threat to world peace and threat to our region and a threat to India also," he said. On the progress made on the issue of a Unified Command for the armed forces, the Defence Minister said that after initial resistance, the three services have realised the need to work together.
"There has been considerable progress in the last eight years. Initially there was resistance from three services but now they have realised the necessity of jointness because in the modern times just one service cannot protect the security of the nation and meet challenges," he said. "That realization is there. So, things are moving very fast and this conference is a turning point," he said.
When asked if the controversy on the issue of price of Russian aircraft carrier Admiral Gorshkov could have any negative impact on Indo-Russian defence relations, the Minister said, "Discussions are going on for Admiral Gorshkov. As far as our defence relations with Russia are concerned, they are very cordial. There is no doubt about that."
SSC, HSC results to be out on net
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Express news service
Posted: Dec 07, 2007 at 0000 hrs IST
Pune, December 6 The Maharashtra State Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education on Thursday announced the websites where the results for the Secondary School Certificate (SSC) and the Higher Secondary Certificate (HSC) examinations will be put up at 11 am on Friday. The results will be released on the internet simultaneously as they are given out to the schools and junior colleges.
Students who appeared for the HSC examination can avail of their results at www.mh-hsc.ac.in, while the results for the SSC examination will be put up on www.mh-ssc.ac.in.
Meanwhile, the results as per individual centres and the eight divisions Pune, Nagpur, Aurangabad, Mumbai, Amravati, Kolhapur, Nashik and Latur will be available at www.msbshse.ac.in.
All the information on the results can be downloaded from these websites. For further details on the results, students can contact their respective secondary schools or junior college.
Air India gets PM’s promise of help but told to tone up
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ENS Economic Bureau
Posted: Jun 24, 2009 at 0913 hrs IST
New Delhi The Prime Minister on Wednesday committed himself to throwing the “entire weight” of the government behind crisis-hit Air India, but set tough conditions for its help: asking the national carrier to undertake massive organisational, financial and manpower restructuring in return.
AI was categorically told that it would be difficult for the government to give the airline unconditional support every time it ran itself into trouble.
“Air India will have to go for massive cost reduction and increase revenues in both the short term and long term,” Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel said after a two-hour meeting with Manmohan Singh, at which top ministry officials and AI’s newly-appointed CMD Arvind Jadhav were also present.
“There is excess flab on the entire body of Air India, not only of manpower but due to salaries and the internal functioning style,” Patel said. “The airline will have to improve its on-time performance, aircraft engineering, commercial operations, especially in the face of competition and choice (available to customers).”
Independent directors will be inducted on AI’s board, and the top management of its business units will be recast, the minister said. “The management restructuring will be completed within a month,” he said, adding, “The complete turnaround of the airline may take around two years.”
AI has been given a month to submit a restructuring plan to a new four-member bailout committee comprising Cabinet Secretary KM Chandrasekhar, Principal Secretary to the PM TKA Nair, Finance Secretary Ashok Chawla and Civil Aviation Secretary M Nambiar. The committee will review AI’s performance every month.
The carrier — sunk under accumulated losses of Rs 7,200 crore and a financial outstanding of Rs 30,000 crore till May 2009, and staring at a loss of around Rs 5,000 crore for 2008-’09 — had submitted a highly ambitious bailout wishlist to the government, seeking an equity infusion of Rs 5,000 crore, a grant of Rs 2,000 crore, and a soft loan of Rs 7,000 crore. It had also asked for a review of sixth freedom rights and capacity freezes on foreign carriers, and curbs on domestic airlines.
Patel dismissed suggestions that AI’s Rs-44,000 crore aircraft acquisition plan could be wrecking its finances. “These are two different issues,” he said. “Debt (for aircraft acquisition) is a long term issue. Deferring or rescheduling aircraft deliveries would not help (the airline) at all.”
On fixing responsibility for the crisis, Patel said: “Nobody is accountable. It is a combination of factors. Air India people have not risen to the occasion.” He also cited increases in fuel prices, fall in traffic, lower yields at low fares and the price-sensitive nature of the Indian market as reasons.
Patel was impatient with threats of a strike by AI employee unions. “Let them go on strike. They will hasten their own demise,” he warned.
The unions have threatened to strike work from June 30. CMD Jadhav will meet them in Mumbai on tomorrow.
http://www.expressindia.com/latest-news/Manmohan-asks-Air-India-to-tone-up/480816/
Nilekani quits Infosys, to join Govt
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Reuters
Posted: Jun 25, 2009 at 1528 hrs IST
New Delhi Nandan Nilekani, co-chairman of Infosys Technologies Ltd, India's No 2 outsourcer, has resigned from the company's board to join the government, the company said on Thursday.
Nilekani, one of the founders of Infosys, has been invited by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to head government agency Unique Identification Authority of India in the rank of a cabinet minister, Infosys said in a statement.
Nilekani, a former chief executive of the company, was not involved in active management since becoming co-chairman in 2007.
Shares in Infosys, which has a market value of about $21 billion, were up 0.7 percent at 1,771.25 rupees at 0849 GMT in a Mumbai market down 0.5 per cen
BSE loses 77 pts on monsoon delay fears
Mumbai Prospects of weak monsoon, the poor showing by ONGC in the fourth quarter and weak European cues dragged down the BSE Sensex by 77 points as investors squared off positions on the concluding day of the derivatives series.
The market surrendered its initial gains due to fairly heavy selling from foreign institutional investors (FIIs) amid the forecast of below-normal monsoon.
The Bombay Stock Exchange 30-share index ended the day at 14,345.62, a net loss of 77.11 points or 0.53 per cent from its previous close. It touched the intra-day high of 14,578.46.
Bonanza Portfolio Assistant Vice-President Avinash Gupta said, "The market opened strong but the selling pressure pulled it down. The selling intensified in the later part of the session on cues from European markets. The market activity was stock-specific today rather than sector-specific."
Similarly, the National Stock Exchange's 50-share Nifty dropped by 51.10 points or 1.19 per cent to close at 4,241.85 from its last close.
The market continued to witness a high level of volatility as investors rolled over positions as also squared off their long-outstanding holdings at the end of the June contract of the futures and options segment.
UPA's first challenge: 'Below normal' monsoon predicted
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Agencies
Posted: Jun 24, 2009 at 2007 hrs IST
South-west monsoon is likely to be below normal this season, government announced on Wednesday raising concerns about its impact on agriculture and economy.
"South-west monsoon from June to September is likely to be below normal," Earth Sciences Minister Prithviraj Chavan told reporters in New Delhi.
He said quantitatively, monsoon rainfall for the country as a whole is likely to be 93 per cent of the long-period average. This is three per cent less than what the India Meteorological Department (IMD) had forecast in April.
Chavan was subjected to a volley of questions, including whether he visualised the monsoon scenario as worrisome, whether the country is in for a drought and whether he foresaw a situation of water-rationing.
"I will not call it worrisome as of now," he said downplaying questions about water scarcity and drought.
"Plans are in place in every department of Government of India as to what needs to be done when there is excess or deficient rains," was his refrain.
According to the forecast, the north-western region of the country is likely to get deficient rains while monsoon is expected to be below normal in north-east and peninsular India. Central India, which is yet to receive rains, is expected to have a normal monsoon.
They said six companies of CRPF, which were put on stand by, have now been asked to proceed to Lalgarh, where the forces are almost in the final stages of their operations.
With Thursday’s decision, the total number of central security personnel in Lalgarh region would be about 2,200 personnel.
School vouchers, please Govt monopoly is crime against children
25 Jun 2009, 0219 hrs IST, ET Bureau
The right to education cannot mean the right to attend a government school where little teaching is done and students finish school functionally
illiterate. Yet this is the interpretation of the educational establishment.
This crime against children must be rectified by the new minister for human resource development, Kapil Sibal. He will not be able to make government teachers accountable for non-performance because they are protected by powerful trade unions and an educational establishment that is so ideological that it would rather keep students functionally illiterate than let them be educated in private schools.
Just as the right to vote has no meaning if voters can only vote for one candidate, so too is the right to education meaningless if it means access only to the neighbourhood government school. One supposed expert says education is an area of market failure, so the state must make provision.
This simply shows how illiterate supposed experts are. Education for all is not a market product at all — it is a non-market service to be provided by the government. Unfortunately this is an area of massive government failure.
The answer lies in a private-public partnership through school vouchers usable in private or government schools. This is not privatisation, it is private provision of a public service through a public-private partnership.
The education establishment says many private schools are of poor quality. True, but government schools can often be worse. So the choice should be made by parents. A recent evaluation of a Delhi voucher scheme, run by the Centre for Civil Society, showed voucher school kids performed better and were happier with facilities than similar children in government schools.
Vouchers provide real choice only if private schools exist within walking distance of localities. So vouchers are most relevant in urban areas, and irrelevant in remote tribal or hill areas. Mr Sibal should launch pilot voucher schemes in half a dozen cities, offering funding to the state governments.
Inevitably there will be glitches, which should be fixed before scaling up. Vouchers cannot solve all educational problems. But they must be part of the solution in urban areas, including the poorest slums.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Opinion/School-vouchers/articleshow/4699293.cms
Reform challenge of Mr Mukherjee
25 Jun 2009, 0252 hrs IST, Arvind Panagariya,
The President's address to Parliament has dashed any residual hopes that the United Progressive Alliance II (UPA II) might use its clear-cut
electoral victory to introduce systematic radical reforms. Yet reform advocates must persevere.
There remain enough reforms 'in transition' that a series of incremental actions could still make a dramatic difference. Simultaneously, there is considerable scope for the introduction of radical reforms in the social sector to which the UPA accords high priority.
Perhaps the single most important reform that the finance minister can safely push is the comprehensive Goods and Services Tax (GST). As Dr Vijay Kelkar, chairman, Thirteenth Finance Commission, noted in his brilliant address at the convocation at the Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research, this reform promises vast benefits via improved productivity.
It will also stabilise the indirect-tax revenues in the years to come. Finance minister Pranab Mukherjee should announce a realistic but definite revised timetable in the budget to bring this important reform to its logical conclusion. To make the announcement credible, he should appoint Dr Govinda Rao, arguably India's foremost public finance expert, as the 'GST Czar' for a two-year term with the sole mandate to ensure that at the end of his term India has a well-functioning GST in place.
Two reforms that had broadly continued under the UPA I relate to small-scale industries reservation and trade liberalisation. As of October 10, 2008, the government had trimmed the list of items reserved for exclusive manufacture by micro and small enterprises to 21.
Mr Mukherjee must now take the final step of eliminating this list altogether. With imports from foreign firms permitted regardless of their size, there is little rationale for insisting that our own producers of stainless steel and aluminium utensils, laundry soap, steel furniture and groundnut oil operate on the small scale.
Why punish our own successful and productive entrepreneurs by insisting that they cannot expand beyond the specified size?
While taking a tough stand in the Doha negotiations, UPA I had continued the process of opening up the Indian economy to foreign trade initiated in earnest by Dr Manmohan Singh in 1991. The peak duty on industrial goods had been reduced to 20% in 2004-05.
It was then brought down to 15% in 2005-06, 12.5% in 2006-07 and 10% in 2007-08. In 2008-09, then finance minister Chidambaram pushed the pause button on the process perhaps because this was the last full-year budget prior to the election. Mr Mukherjee should resume the reform and cut the peak industrial tariff to 7.5% thereby bringing Indian tariffs within a hair's breadth of the ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) levels as per the promise made by Mr Chidambaram in his 2004-05-budget speech.
Turning to social programmes, a common lament among the top leaders of the Congress since at least late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi has been that only a tiny fraction — a bare 10 paise out of a rupee, according to a recent public statement by Mr Rahul Gandhi — of government expenditures on anti-poverty programmes reaches the targeted beneficiaries.
After six decades of failure of the conventional schemes in achieving better results, is it not the time to give an alternative approach a chance? Most economists now agree that cash transfers through biometric accounts to the senior-most female member of the household can eliminate this leakage entirely.
I have extensively discussed how this can be done in my recent book, India the Emerging Giant. In addition to plugging the leaks, this approach has at least three additional advantages.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Opinion/Editorial/Reform-challenge-of-Mr-Mukherjee/articleshow/4699330.cms
