Financial sector reforms to quicken, says PM.PM adviser says RBI may trim stimulus!Haven for al Qaeda in Pakistan `very troubling', Clinton Exclaims.Lula seeks explanation for huge Brazil blackout. Obama: strains unless U.S., China balance growth.India hopeful of over 7 pct growth in FY11 - Mukherjee.Final Australia-India one-dayer washed out.Business urges Obama get off trade sidelines in Asia.Lalgarh operation will continue, says Pranab!
Troubled Galaxy Destroyed Dreams, Chapter 419
Palash Biswas
CIA Foreknowledge of the Mumbai 26/11 terror Attacks - Reprehensor - 911Blogger.com
by Erik Larson
Get it here:
http://awamibharat.blogspot.com/2009/11/cia-foreknowledge-of-mumbai-2611-terror.html
Lalgarh operation will continue, says Pranab
The operation to flush out Maoists from Lalgarh in West Bengal would continue till the situation was 'completely under control', senior Congress leader Pranab Mukherjee said Wednesday, notwithstanding ally Trinamool Congress' demand that it be called off immediately.
Asserting that the security operation to flush out the extreme Left wing rebels from the Lalgarh belt in West Midnapore district was a joint initiative of the central and the West Bengal governments, the union finance minister said: 'The operation would continue till the entire situation is brought under control.'
Trinamool chief Mamata Banerjee has repeatedly urged the central government to withdraw the joint operation, arguing that the state's ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) was using it to regain lost political ground and sneaking in armed party cadres to terrorise the opposition.
While turning down her demand, Mukherjee, however, praised Banerjee for the spectacular success of the Congress-Trinamool combine, which picked up eight of the 10 seats in Saturday's state assembly by-polls.
'The Trinamool Congress scored very well in the by-polls. They won in all seven seats. People again have reposed faith on Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee's leadership,' said Mukherjee, also the West Bengal Pradesh Congress president.
Mukherjee said the by-poll results showed that people had faith in the Congress-Trinamool combine.
'The result also proves that the ruling Left Front (LF) is gradually losing popularity among people,' he told reporters.
According to Mukherjee, the Congress and the Trinamool Congress were together in the state and the electoral alliance would continue in future as well.
Asked about the defeat of Congress candidate in Goalpokhar seat, he said: 'I had talks with Deepa Dasmunsi about the result in Goalpokhor seat. We're reviewing the result now.'
The seat in West Dinajpur district fell vacant after Dasmunshi, who won it in 2006, got elected to the Lok Sabha earlier this year. Mukherjee held a meeting with senior state Congress leaders to discuss the party's organisational issues.
APEC ministers warn economic crisis is not over
By Bill Tarrant
SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Asia-Pacific ministers warned on Wednesday that the global economic crisis was far from over and a current upturn was a respite rather than recovery.
Ministers from the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum (APEC) have gathered in Singapore for meetings that will culminate in a weekend summit that U.S. President Barack Obama will attend.
Obama, in an interview with Reuters, said he would work with China on his Asian visit to address the economic recovery and trade imbalances.
After foreign and trade ministers met for breakfast on Wednesday, Singapore's representative George Yeo said they had discussed the global economic recovery, reform of financial institutions and resisting protectionism.
He said the consensus among ministers was that the global economic crisis was "by no means over".
"The upturn that we now have is a respite. The situation is still fragile. We should still address the root cause of the problem," he said.
Finance ministers from the 21-member Pacific rim group have a separate meeting on Thursday and, according to a draft statement, will pledge to keep up economic stimulus plans.
World Bank President Robert Zoellick said he was comfortable about world growth prospects this year, but saw downside risks for 2010 and recommended governments keep stimulus measures in place through next year.
Obama: strains unless U.S., China balance growth
The United States sees China as a vital partner and competitor, but the two countries need to address economic imbalances or risk "enormous strains" on their relationship, President Barack Obama said on Monday.
Three days before leaving on a nine-day trip to Asia, Obama said the world's two most powerful nations need to work together on the big issues facing the globe, and any competition between them has to be fair and friendly.
"On critical issues, whether climate change, economic recovery, nuclear nonproliferation, it is very hard to see how we succeed or China succeeds in our respective goals, without working together," he told Reuters in an interview.
Speaking in the Oval Office, he warned that the economic relationship between the two countries had become "deeply imbalanced" in recent decades, with a yawning trade gap and huge Chinese holdings of U.S. government debt.
Obama said he would be raising with Chinese leaders the sensitive issue of their yuan currency -- which is seen by U.S. industry as significantly undervalued -- as one factor contributing to the imbalances.
"As we emerge from an emergency situation, a crisis situation, I believe China will be increasingly interested in finding a model that is sustainable over the long term," he said. "They have a huge amount of U.S. dollars that they are holding, so our success is important to them."
"The flipside of that is that if we don't solve some of these problems, then I think both economically and politically it will put enormous strains on the relationship."
Excessive consumption and borrowing in the United States and aggressive export policies, high savings and lending from Asia fueled a global economic bubble which burst last year.
Final Australia-India one-dayer washed out.The final one-day international between Australia and India was washed out without a ball being bowled on Wednesday.
Australia, who had trailed India 2-1 in the seven-match series, clinched victory on Sunday with a six-wicket win to take a 4-2 lead.
The world champions, who won a second straight Champions Trophy in South Africa last month, retained top spot in the official ODI rankings while the series defeat saw the hosts drop one place to third behind South Africa.
Financial sector reforms to quicken, says PM Dr. Manmohan Singh!
India's long-stalled reforms to its financial sector gained momentum on Sunday after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said he would push through legislative changes, including the insurance sector which foreign players are eyeing.
Investors have been keenly awaiting signs of a pick-up in the pace of economic reforms in India after disappointment that the re-elected Congress party did not speed up the process after May's elections.
"We are also better placed than at any time in the recent past to push the reform process forward," he told the World Economic Forum in Delhi.
Singh also said his government would take steps in the 2010/2011 fiscal year to wind down economic stimulus measures for Asia's third largest economy.
"Some of the reforms needed, especially in insurance, involve legislative changes. We have taken initiatives in this area and will strive to build the political consensus needed for these legislative actions to be completed," Singh said.
He said India needed to develop long-term debt markets, deepen corporate bond markets, strengthen the insurance and pensions sectors, improve futures markets for better price discovery and regulation.
"All these issues will be addressed through gradual but steady progress in financial sector reforms to make the sector more competitive while ensuring an efficient regulatory and oversight system," Singh said.
He also said the government would accelerate the sale of stakes in state-run companies
Contrarily, It is premature for Asian central banks to begin exiting from their extraordinarily loose monetary policies given the fragility of economic recovery, a top official with the Asian Development Bank said on Monday.
Rajat Nag, managing director general of the ADB, also said the U.S. dollar would remain a key reserve currency but that other currencies would also gain prominence over the medium and longer term.
"We do consider this as a V-shaped rather than a double-dip recovery, but the dynamics of the growth are frail. The numbers are obviously very encouraging, but they are soft," Nag told Reuters TV on the sidelines of a World Economic Forum event.
"On the one hand you certainly don't want to choke off growth and you also don't want to stoke inflation," Nag said.
"And this balancing act will require the central banks to be very watchful of inflation but our feeling is that, no, it is premature to talk about exiting right now."
He said countries should coordinate their exit strategies and cited the Group of 20 nations as a venue for such dialogue.
"It is important to coordinate the policy. Now, that does not mean the countries will be able to synchronise, because circumstances will be different," he said.
The multilateral lender expects developing Asian economies on average to grow 3.9 percent this year and 6.4 percent next year. The so-called Group of Three or G3 -- Japan, the United States and the euro zone -- are projected by the bank to contract 3.7 percent this year and grow 1.1 percent in 2010.
Business urges Obama get off trade sidelines in Asia, reports reuter!
U.S. business groups on Monday urged President Barack Obama to use his upcoming trip to Asia to join talks on a regional free trade initiative and to set the stage for long-delayed congressional approval of a free trade pact with South Korea.
"We are standing on the sidelines while Asian nations clinch new deals," Thomas Donohue, president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce said in a statement.
"It's time to see action from Washington to expand trade with Asia in order to create jobs and avoid drawing a line down the middle of the Pacific," he said.
Obama heads to Asia on Thursday on a four-nation tour that begins in Japan before heading to Singapore for the annual summit meeting of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum and finishing with stops in China and South Korea.
In a pre-trip interview with Reuters on Monday, Obama said boosting exports was a crucial part of his economic agenda.
"It is particularly important for us when it comes to Asia as a whole to recognize that in the absence of a more robust export strategy, it is going to be hard for us to rebuild our manufacturing base and employment base," Obama said.
He also said U.S. manufacturers had "legitimate concerns" about their ability to sell their goods into China and that he would raise the issue of the value of that country's currency when he meets with Chinese leaders next week in Beijing.
U.S. business groups fear the United States could be left on the outside as China, Japan, South Korea and the 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations accelerate efforts toward regional economic integration.
On the Other hand,Haven for al Qaeda in Pakistan `very troubling', Clinton Exclaims !Lula seeks explanation for huge Brazil blackout.
The Reserve Bank of India may withdraw some monetary stimulus if inflation rises towards the end of 2009, C. Rangarajan, chairman of the Prime Minister's economic advisory council, said on Wednesday.
"If inflation pressures develop, monetary authorities may take measures earlier. RBI (Reserve Bank of India) will wait and see how price situation develops in Nov-Dec," Rangarajan said.
The fiscal deficit needed to be reduced by 1 to 1.5 percentage points in the next fiscal year, he said.
"Next year we might have to start the process of withdrawing some of the measures," he said referring to the fiscal stimulus, adding that excise duties needed to be adjusted while the government's expenditure needed to be cut in 2010/11.
Good news for WEST Bengal Congress after the By Election debacle followed the SILIGURI Drama as Dasmunsi back in India after stem cell therapy in brain!Former union minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi has come back to India after undergoing stereotactic brain surgery using stem cells in Germany, a doctor who attended on him said today. The 62-year-old Congress leader, who was flown to Germany last week, underwent the surgery at a hospital in Dusseldorf.
"In stereotactic brain surgery, we use images of the brain to guide us to a target within the brain. We inject stem cells collected from bone marrow directly into his brain with help of a hi-tech procedure, " Dr Nils Haberlang, neurosurgeon with Xcell Centre in Dusseldorf, said.
"It has not been tried here in AIIMS yet and not in India till now. Use of stem cell in the brain is yet to be considered," a doctor in the stem cell department in AIIMS said.
Dr Haberlang said that in the case of Dasmunsi "the stem cells were taken from the patient. We collected the bone marrow from the pelvic bone and with isolation procedure collected the stem cells which were then injected directly into his brain.
" He along with an anaesthesiologist in Switzerland''s Aeskulap Clinic Dr Ben Pfeifer were involved in the surgery. The Xcell-Center is a private clinic group and institute for regenerative medicine located in Dsseldorf and Cologne, Germany.
Dasmunsi is now in Indraprastha Apollo Hospital where he was shifted from AIIMS..
West Bengal's Left Front Government losing popularity: Mukherjee
The CPI(M)-led Left Front government is West Bengal is losing popularity in the state, claimed Union Finance Minister and President of the West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee, Pranab Mukherjee on Wednesday.
Addressing a press conference at the Congress party office here, Mukherjee pointed out that it was becoming apparent that the anti-Left people in the state were now supporting the Trinamool Congress-Congress (I) alliance.ukherjee said the people had voted overwhelmingly for the alliance in the Lok Sabha elections and the subsequent municipal elections in the state.
They also voted for the alliance wherever a joint candidate was put up during the assembly by-polls.
He said it was clear that the CPI(M)-led Left Front government in the state was losing the support of the voters.
Mukherjee, however, declined to comment on a possible date for the assembly elections in the state, scheduled for 2011.
The Congress party's alliance partner, the Trinamool Congress and its leader Mamata Banerjee has been clamouring for early polls in West Bengal.
Mukherjee said the date cannot be announced now, but it was apparent that the people of the state were now in favour of the opposition alliance.
In a clear snub to Banerjee, Mukherjee said the decision to carry out joint operations against Maoists in Lalgarh was taken by the state government and the centre together and the forces would remain in Lalgarh till deemed fit.
Banerjee had said at a recent rally that she did not support the joint operations in Lalgarh.
Forward Bloc to review its alliance with CPI-M
The All India Forward Bloc, a major Left Front partner, is likely to review its decades-old association with the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) after the continuing electoral debacle of the Marxist-led ruling alliance in West Bengal.
'We will review our alliance with the CPI-M in our Party Congress to be held in Kolkata Dec 17 to 21,' a top Forward Bloc leader told IANS.
A senior Forward Bloc leader even said the 16th Party Congress to be held in Kolkata would decide whether the party founded by Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose should go with Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee's surging Trinamool Congress.
Besides the Forward Bloc, the Communist Party of India (CPI) and the Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) are the other partners in the CPI-M-led Left alliance in the country.
The Forward Bloc leader said the issue of association with the Marxists has not been discussed in any high-level party committees so far.
'We are under pressure from our workers to review our alliance with the CPI-M. This is a major demand being raised in the party conferences being held ahead of the Party Congress,' the Forward Bloc leader said, requesting anonymity.
He said the Forward Bloc did not have any problems with Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee.
'She is too soft towards us. Mamata once attended an all-party meeting on Singur and Nandigram convened by our state general secretary Ashok Ghosh,' said the Forward Bloc leader, who is closely associated with senior CPI-M and other Left party leaders.
Continuing with its electoral debacles since the Lok Sabha elections in May, the CPI-M remained blanked out in all the seats it contested in the assembly by-election held to 10 seats Saturday.
Trinamool Congress bagged all the seven seats it contested, retaining five and wresting Belgachia East and Rajganj from the CPI-M in the by-election. While the Congress won one, an Independent supported by the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha bagged one.
The Forward Bloc was the only Left Front partner that won one seat - the Goalpokhar constituency in North Dinajpur.
Asked whether the party has got any invitation from the Trinamool Congress leader to join them, he said: 'We had got an invitation when Nandigram and Singur movements were heating up.'
He said the party was against the CPI-M's policy in Nandigram and Singur.
'We even formed a mini-front within the Left Front to oppose the CPI-M. This also forced the state government to abandon the projects there,' said the Forward Bloc leader.
Tata Motors withdrew its small car project from Singur last year after a section of farmers, led by the Trinamool Congress, carried out a sustained agitation for return of 400 acres of the acquired 997.11 acres to farmers.
Following widespread violent protests, the state government was also forced to pull out of Nandigram, where it was hoping to set up a chemical hub with Indonesia's Salim group.
This is for the first time in 25 years that the Forward Bloc is holding its Party Congress at Kolkata, the party leader said.
Mukherjee's statement today makes it clear that the centre is in no mood to cave into Trinamool Congress demands.
After a year of global economic crisis and political limbo, investors in India are returning to business as usual -- this time with real hope that a new government might actually bring in needed financial reforms.While, India hopeful of over 7 pct growth in FY11, Explains Mukherjee!India is hopeful of more than 7 percent growth in the fiscal year ending March 2011 and 9 percent growth by 2012, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said on Tuesday.
Mukherjee was speaking at the World Economic Forum's India Economic summit in New Delhi.
India's economic growth slowed to 6.7 percent in the fiscal year to March 2009 after three straight years of at least 9 percent, and government officials have said growth in the current year is on track for roughly 6.5 percent.
Policymakers including Prime Minister Manmohan Singh have pressed the case for keeping easy fiscal and monetary policies in place to nurture growth in Asia's third-largest economy.
The word "reform" has been touted in India for years but if discussions at the World Economic Forum are anything to go by, Asia's third-largest economy may have turned a corner with its political will to help it reach 9-10 percent growth rates.
With the re-elected Congress-led government freed from the shackles of communist support, reforms from foreign investment in retail to recycling India's $400 billion in domestic savings to help fund infrastructure projects were seen as real possibilities.
Aside from 2005-2008 when India's economy expanded by more than 9 percent annually, the Asian giant has struggled to keep up with China's breakneck growth, hampered by infrastructure bottlenecks, red tape and an often plodding financial system.
"There is now political stability," said Saurabh Agrawal, head of investment banking for Bank of America Merrill Lynch in India. "The government is making the right noises and it looks like there is political will."
Congress's May general election win, recent state victories and a weak opposition have freed the hands of reformists in the government, including Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
"India is in a sweet spot," one senior banker said, as the centre of gravity over the last year has leaned towards emerging economies, while Western economies struggled to stay afloat.
"If you want a high rate of return, where would you invest? Europe? Brazil? Russia? China?" he added, referring each time to their economic or regulatory problems. "India does stand out."
Meanwhile, Describing the 'safe haven' that Al Qaeda has found in Pakistan as 'very troubling', US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says the terror group is engaged with the Pakistani Taliban in threatening the state of Pakistan.
The US was in Afghanistan 'because we believe that we cannot permit the return of a safe haven or a staging platform for terrorists', she told German Der Spiegel newspaper in Berlin, according to a transcript of the interview released Tuesday by the State Department.
'We think that Al Qaeda and the other extremists are part of a syndicate of terror, with Al Qaeda still being an inspiration, a funder, a trainer, an equipper, director of a lot of what goes on.
'In the last two months, we have arrested a gentleman who was plotting, it's alleged, against the subway system in New York who went to an Al Qaeda training camp in Pakistan,' she said.
'The porous nature of that border is one that we consider to be very dangerous,' Clinton said, noting that the government and military of Pakistan are now moving against some of these extremists.
Asked about the safety of Pakistan's nuclear weapons, Clinton said: 'The nuclear arsenal that Pakistan has, I believe is secure. I think that the government and the military have taken adequate steps to protect that.'
But 'the safe haven that Al Qaeda has found in Pakistan is very troubling', Clinton said, noting 'they are still actively engaged with the elements of the Pakistani Taliban that are threatening the state of Pakistan'.
Asked if she still feared that intelligence services in Pakistan are not reliable, she said: 'Not at the highest levels'. But 'I would like to see a real effort made on the part of the top leadership to make sure that no one down the ranks is doing anything to give any kind of support or cover-up to the Al Qaeda leadership'.
In another interview on the Charlie Rose Show, Clinton said Pakistan was now 'evidencing' that the Taliban is their enemy as much as their long-held opposition to India.
'Well, they're certainly evidencing that. This very forceful response, first in Swat, now in South Waziristan, illustrates a commitment to take on the Pakistani Taliban.
'I think in my conversations with both the civilian government leaders as well as the military intelligence leaders, there is an awareness that the Taliban is not just about somebody else's fight, it is a direct attack on the authority of the Pakistani government,' she said.
Maya directs officials to expedite development works
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati today directed officials to complete all development works in the identified villages under the Ambedkar Gram Sabha Vikas yojna by the year end. Expressing her displeasure over laxity in the development works, she asked officials to ensure quality and take stern action against erring people.
Issuing special directives for the naxal-affected areas, she said under NREGS, at least 100 days work be ensured to the beneficiaries besides other works. PWD would be ensuring the quality of works and the respective district magistrates would have to undertake surprise checks, the chief minister said during a review meeting.
Mayawati also expressed her unhappiness over allotment of houses to the homeless and asked for immediate allotment of the houses constructed under the Kanshiram Urban Housing scheme. She directed that the scholarships given to students be verified by respective district magistrates.
80 fishing boats, 800 men missing in cyclone-hit Arabian Sea
About 80 fishing trawlers, with an average of 10 men in each, are missing in cyclone-hit Arabian Sea, organisations of fishermen along India's west coast said Wednesday.
As Cyclone Phyan intensified and tore northwards, slated to make landfall along the north Maharashtra-south Gujarat coast late Wednesday night, there were reports of boats missing at sea, despite repeated warnings from the authorities over the last few days that no fisherman should venture out.
Gopal Tandel, president of the Daman Machimar Sangh (fishermen's association), told IANS: 'Fifty fishing boats with a total estimated complement of about 500 fishermen are still out at sea and are on the path of the cyclone headed this way.' Daman is a small coastal enclave on the Gujarat coast.
'There were about 80 boats out fishing but about 30 of them have either returned or are on their way back,' Tandel added.
Administrator of the union territory of Daman, Satya Gopal, said the Coast Guard authorities had sent out a Dornier aircraft to warn fishing boats to return. He said that over the last three days, special warnings were being put out by the administration advising fishermen against venturing out to sea.
While there was no information from Maharashtra till Wednesday afternoon on any fishing boats missing at sea, fishermen's organisations in Goa told IANS that an estimated 30 trawlers were missing.
The Coast Guard started a search for them. 'Our patrol vessels are already on the lookout for the trawlers. We have also pressed a lookout aircraft into the operation, which will scan the sea off Goa in search of the missing trawlers,' Goa Coast Guard Commandant N. Saxena said.
Lula seeks explanation for huge Brazil blackout
Brazil's president sought an urgent explanation on Wednesday for the worst power outage in a decade, which left a huge swath of the country in the dark for more than five hours and raised doubts about the reliability of its energy infrastructure.
The blackout on Tuesday night left tens of millions of people without power across most of the country's wealthy southeastern region, halting subways and snarling traffic in major cities like Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.
The cause of the outage was unclear. Energy officials said the giant Itaipu hydroelectric dam had shut down, but the Itaipu Binacional company that runs the project said in a statement on Wednesday that problem originated elsewhere.
It said the dam on the border between Brazil and Paraguay had been functioning normally but had not been able to transmit energy because power lines were not working properly.
"We haven't established the cause of the problem yet," Energy Minister Edison Lobao told the O Globo news network.
Lobao earlier told reporters that a storm may have caused power lines from Itaipu to shut down, causing a chain reaction that cut service throughout Brazil and Paraguay, which gets about 90 percent of its electricity from the dam.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva summoned Lobao for an urgent meeting in the capital Brasilia early on Wednesday to explain what caused the outage.
The massive power failure was already being politicized on morning talk shows throughout Brazil, with opposition politicians accusing the government of negligence in maintaining the country's transmission lines.
The blackout affected 10 of Brazil's 26 states, including the capital Brasilia, and left all of Paraguay in the dark for about 15 minutes.
The last time Brazil suffered an outage on such a large scale was 1999, when a lightening bolt struck a transmission line in Sao Paulo state. Two years later, the government was forced to implement energy rationing after a severe drought.
Power was fully restored in Sao Paulo, Brazil's financial capital and South America's largest city, before dawn on Wednesday.
The Itaipu power plant provides about 20 percent of the electricity supply in Brazil, Latin America's largest economy, but more than 90 percent of Paraguay's.
Traffic on the streets of Sao Paulo descended into chaos shortly after the power outage. Thousands of passengers were forced to exit stalled subway trains and walk along the tracks to get back to stations and make their way to the surface.
The city's streets were still clogged early on Wednesday after the mayor cancelled restrictions on the amount of cars allowed to circulate during rush-hour traffic.
Other Brazilian cities that suffered power outages included Belo Horizonte in the state of Minas Gerais and Campinas, a large city about an hour outside of Sao Paulo.
Growth, inflation and financial stability -- tough choices
(Sanjay Sinha is the CEO of DBS Cholamandalam Asset Management Ltd. The views expressed in this column are his own)
By Sanjay Sinha
World over, the first set of noises are being made to herald the end of easy monetary policy.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI), in its credit policy announced on Oct 27, has rolled back the 1 percentage point of leeway that it had extended in the statutory liquidity ratio (SLR) in Nov 2008 by bringing it back to 25 percent and has announced an enhancement of bank's provisioning norms to 70 percent in a graded manner over the next one year.
There is now a consensus view that we will see a hardening cycle begin from Jan 2010. The Finance Minister, the Commerce Minister and the Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission were quick to jump in and assuage fears by announcing that it was too early to roll back the stimulus measures.
RBI is conscious of the fact that inflation will very quickly move up to 5-6 percent territory, largely driven by food prices while base effect will also play a villainous role. Despite political noises, RBI will need to act.
Globally too, things seem to be warming up with U.S. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner announcing that the $800 bln stimulus buy back plan will be concluded and we need to brace ourselves for some rate hikes now. This was enough to send a shiver down the spine of financial markets.
The larger school of thought believes that we are not out of the woods as yet. The spectre of a double dip recession still haunts. How else will you explain that Citi Bank has opted to hoard $244 billion in cash reserves. Continued...
http://in.reuters.com/article/economicNews/idINIndia-43708420091105
India - planning the road to recovery
(Nipun Mehta is Executive Director & Head - India, SG Private Banking. The views expressed in this column are his own)
By Nipun Mehta
Clearly, whether it is spending on infrastructure, education or healthcare, the subjects lie predominantly in the government domain. This means each spending decision would generally be assessed by the government from a short term or long term ‘benefit’ and from a political point of view.
The National Rural Employment Gurantee Act (NREGA) scheme has clearly had its short term employment and income distribution benefits while at the same time creating infrastructure. One must remember that such schemes have GDP implications.
Purely from a GDP growth point of view, growth through pump priming via such schemes has had its contribution and any government needs to keep an eye on the same. On the other hand, long term investments through spending on education and healthcare are not ‘direct’ GDP contributors. They are a social responsibility which cannot be ignored.
An economic investment need coming out of a slowdown, can really be compared to a farm which has just seen a drought and needs to be brought back to ‘GDP contributing’ health. One needs to obviously look at re-planting trees which will bear long term fruits, but it also needs to recommence generating revenue in the immediate term.
Importantly, India as an economy hasn’t had a significant investment in social spending causes and hence is not in a position to ignore or delay investment in education and healthcare. In comparison, a country like China can probably afford to take a more short- term outlook.
For India which has lagged behind both in infrastructure and social responsibility projects, trying to maintain a more consistent pace between both these priorities is critical once the short-term inconsistencies have leveled out.
At the current juncture, coming out of a slowdown, pump priming will prove to be an ideal solution to get the economy back on the high growth trajectory. However such pump priming has its implications as well in the form of a high fiscal deficit. This in turn can lead to an inflationary spiral and higher interest rates, which can only impact long term growth. Continued...
http://in.reuters.com/article/economicNews/idINIndia-43602120091102
Direct marketing gains new clout in Asia
By Ralph Jennings
TAIPEI (Reuters) - For hundreds of diners in Taiwan, 22-year-old Sheena Tsai is the billboard for Carlsberg, a Danish beer vying for a slice of Asia's competitive lager market.
The university student brings beer straight to tables at packed Taipei seafood restaurants with handy facts about Carlsberg's origin and flavour.
"Some don't know about it," said Tsai, who wears a beer-branded blouse to local seafood joints. "They like to meet sellers face to face. This kind of promotion is useful."
Carlsberg isn't the only one in Asia.
As major companies see growth potential in the region, many more are seeking a marketing strategy to suit it, giving new clout to the ages-old tool of bringing products directly to consumers.
Dozens of companies, from consumer goods maker Hindustan Unilever Ltd to delivery firms such as Fedex, are now using direct marketing methods to sell their products in increasingly crowded and competitive markets.
Direct marketing, broadly defined, covers any sales technique from pop-up stores and commercial gift bag giveaways to free sample handouts that puts sellers directly in touch with target customers, compared to indirect marketing such as advertising, product placement or sponsorships.
Asian consumers, long accustomed to doing business with trusted family or friends to avoid scams, see contact with direct marketers as safe avenues to get to study a product in a world of commercial uncertainty, experts say. Continued...
http://in.reuters.com/article/businessNews/idINIndia-43626320091103
ANALYSIS - U.S. keeps pressure on Abbas after Netanyahu visit
Reuter
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may have felt some frost while visiting the White House but Washington is keeping the heat on Palestinians to resume peace talks without an Israeli settlement freeze first.
Netanyahu was ushered into the Oval Office on Monday after nightfall for a meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama at which, contrary to normal practice with a visiting Israeli prime ministers, reporters were not allowed in.
Back home in Israel, newspapers seized on the low-profile White House visit as a snub, a sign of strained relations between Obama and Netanyahu, who had rejected his calls for a halt to settlement construction in the occupied West Bank.
But the underlying U.S. message appears to be unchanged: Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas should negotiate with Israel now. Judging by Abbas's rhetoric in a speech on Wednesday, he is making at least a show of not listening. Settlement expansion must come to a complete stop, he said, before talks can resume.
However, echoing Netanyahu remarks in Washington the day before, White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel told U.S. Jewish leaders on Tuesday that Israeli-Palestinian talks, suspended for nearly a year, should get under way "without preconditions".
"No one should allow the issue of settlements to distract from the goal of a lasting peace between Israel, the Palestinians and the Arab world," Emanuel said.
Whether the Palestinians are in a position to revive peace talks now or move towards a deal with Israel is a big question.
Much will depend on Abbas's political future. He has said he would rather not run for re-election in January, citing U.S. backsliding on settlements -- in 10 months in office, Obama has gone from demanding a "freeze" to merely "restraint".
Many suspect Abbas is bluffing about both threatening to quit and even about holding elections that his Hamas Islamist rivals in the Gaza Strip have rejected. But doubts will linger.
Palestinians have rejected Netanyahu's proposal, praised last week by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, to limit temporarily construction in West Bank enclaves to 3,000 homes.
Uzi Arad, Netanyahu's national security adviser, attributed the change in Washington's tone towards settlements by saying on Wednesday that the United States was a "pragmatic nation" that understood and respected Israel's red lines on the issue.
Netanyahu's position on settlements, Arad told Israel Radio from Paris, where the prime minister was to meet French President Nicolas Sarkozy later in the day, is supported by a majority of Israelis and the United States recognises that.
FRENCH CRITICISM
Netanyahu's tough line on settlements, insisting his government must accommodate the "natural growth" of settler families and continue to construct homes for Jews in Arab East Jerusalem, has not won him favour among French leaders.
On the eve of Netanyahu's visit, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner questioned whether most Israelis really wanted peace: "It seems to me, and I hope that I am completely wrong, that this desire has completely vanished," he said.
In his public addresses, Netanyahu has been taking pains to try to dispel any such notion, while noting that he would make no move toward peace that would compromise Israel's security.
That is shorthand for reminding Israelis and the world that Islamists opposed to Israel's existence control Gaza to the south and dominate in south Lebanon, to Israel's north.
"My goal is not to have endless negotiations. My goal is not negotiations for negotiations sake. My goal is to reach a peace treaty, and soon," Netanyahu told the conference in Washington.
He repeated his demand that any Palestinian state have no army: "Any peace agreement we sign today must include ironclad security measures that will protect the State of Israel."
For Netanyahu, and for all Israeli governments since the 1967 war in which Israel occupied the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem, that means no return to pre-conflict lines. It is a position reflected in the expansion of settlements Israel aims to hang on onto under a peace deal but which angers Palestinians who see such building as pre-judging the outcome of negotiation.
(Editing by Alastair Macdonald)
UP leaders, intellectuals demand action against MNS
Wed, Nov 11 02:52 PM
Lucknow, Nov 11 (PTI) The assault on SP lagislator Abu Asim Azmi in the Maharashtra assembly has come in for severe criticism by Hindi litterateurs and political parties in Uttar Pradesh with protestors burning effigies of MNS chief Raj Thackeray and demanding a ban on the party. Congress and Samajwadi Party workers took out separate protest marches in Bhadohi district today.
Congress workers who submitted a memorandum addressed to President Pratibha Patil demanding ban on MNS, held the march through the streets and raised anti-MNS slogans. Hindi Vidyapeeth President Sumit Vyas has sent a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh seeking his help in ensuring that the most unfortunate incident of insult to the national language is not repeated.
CPI held a protest meeting in Lucknow during which it held Congress-NCP government responsible for the unlawful activities of MNS leaders against Hindi and north Indians. A VHP release called for checking the practice of dividing the country and Hindus on the issue of language and region.
North Indian Public Union, Akhil Bhartiya Alpshankhyak Adhivakta Association, All India Dalit Muslim Morcha, Shia Democratic Alliance, Sunni Board of India and Lok Awaz and others held separate meetings to protest the incident and demanded a ban on the MNS and expulsion of its legislators.
Rajnath Singh meets RSS chief Bhagwat
Wed, Nov 11 08:08 PM
New Delhi, Nov 11 (IANS) Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Rajnath Singh Wednesday met Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) chief Mohan Bhagwat here, a RSS functionary said.
'Yes, Rajnath Singhji met Bhagwatji,' the RSS functionary told IANS, without divulging any other information.
Singh's term will end in December and the party is yet to zero-in on the name of his successor.
Of the second generation leaders, names of Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley and M. Venkaiah Naidu have been doing the rounds.
However, when Bhagwat had suggested that the party should look beyond its leaders in Delhi, names of Manohar Parikkar from Goa and Nitin Gadkari and Bal Apte from Maharashtra also cropped up.
Indo Asian News Service
Arrest warrants issued against Koda's aides
Wed, Nov 11 08:02 PM
Ranchi, Nov 11 (IANS) The Income Tax (IT) department Wednesday issued arrest warrants against Vinod Sinha and Sanjay Chaudhary, close associates of former Jharkhand chief minister Madhu Koda, who is faced with charges of laundering Rs.2,500 crore.
'We have issued arrest warrants against Vinod Sinha and Sanjay Chaudhary and asked the concerned police station to arrest them and produce them before us,' said Ajit Srivastava, additional director of investigations in the IT department.
'Vinod Sinha's lawyer appeared before us, requesting that they (the lawyer) should be allowed to be present when Sinha appears before us,' he added.
On Oct 9, the ED filed a case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) against Koda, three more former ministers as well as his associates Vinod Sinha and Sanjay Chaudhary. Vikas Sinha, brother of Sinha, was on Nov 6 sent to ED custody for 10 days.
