Ecotimes19aug13 EC may agree to freebies for needy Bharti Jain | TNN New Delhi: Accepting political parties argument

that poll promises or freebies are related to the Directive Principles of State Policy, the Election Commission is considering a pragmatic set of guidelines that would allow freebies as long as they are targeted at the economically and socially weaker sections, religious minorities, women and populations living in remote, border or insurgency/disasterhit areas. In other words, across-the-board freebies like mixers, grinders and colour TVs to each household would be curtailed as they tend to benefit non-deserving candidates by default. Directive principles are broad policy guidelines considered fundamental to governance but which have no legal force. The view in the EC is that with most parties in favour of poll freebies as they help to uplift or rehabilitate disadvantaged sections like BPL population, Scheduled Castes and Tribes, categories of women like single mothers and widows and residents of unrest-prone and disaster-hit areas, a blanket ban on freebies may not be desirable. GOOD SOPS Provision of drinking water, road connectivity or setting up schools and hospitals Covering BPL families, SCs, STs and minorities Covering people living in remote or border areas, such as near border or in Naxal belt Rehab plans for single mothers, widows, families hit by natural disasters EC discussing various categories of freebies New Delhi: Instead, the proposed guidelines could focus on ensuring that while freebies to the deserving are not held back, the non-deserving should not be included as beneficiaries just for the sake of votes. The EC is discussing various categories of freebies that may be included in poll manifest os. The valid poll promises with financial implications that may be retained in manifestos are: Provision of drinking water, road connectivity or setting up schools and hospitals Freebies covering BPL families such as Antyodaya Anna Yojana Freebies covering people living in remote or border areas. Residents of villages located within 60 km from the international border could be considered valid beneficiaries. Special action plans for infrastructure development in Naxal belt of Chhattisgarh may be allowed Special action plans relating to rehabilitation of single mothers, widows and families hit by natural disasters Special benefits meant for weaker sections like SCs/STs and minorities may be dovetailed in line with Di rective Principles of State Policy. A poll promise with financial implications that seeks to rehabilitate the disadvantaged sections is a freebie in line with Directive Principles of State Policy, a Nirvachan Sadan official said. BEFORE ITS TOO LATE SOME DOS AND DONTS Seek doctors advice in time Sponge your body with tepid water several times a day to lower the temperature Drinking a lot of fluids will help loosen mucus and to prevent dehydration. Drink water little by little for optimum benefit. Additionally, take clear soups, fruit juices or warm water often Take anti-pyretic drug like paracetamol until temperature returns to normal Antibiotics do not help in viral fever. Do not take it unless prescribed by a registered physician Do not take aspirin if suffering from dengue as it may cause more harm than good SYMPTOMS OF CLASSIC DENGUE Symptoms of typical uncomplicated (classic) dengue usually start with fever within four to seven days after infected mosquitos bite Sudden onset of fever with headache Retroorbital pain (pain behind the eyes) Stomach infection and pain in the back and limbs

WHAT ARE THE SYMPTOMS OF DENGUE HAEMORRHAGIC FEVER Severe continuous stomach pain Skin becomes pale, cold or clammy Bleeding from nose, mouth and gums and skin rashes Frequent vomiting with or without blood Sleepiness and restlessness Patient feels thirsty and mouth becomes dry Rapid and weak pulse Difficulty in breathing TIGER ON PROWL Proper name: Asian Tiger mosquito (Aedes albopictus) Size: About half an inch in length Distinguishing feature: Black, it has a white stripe running down the centre of its head and back with white bands on the legs Prefers: Mid-size tree canopies, axis of large leaves to lay eggs, garden bushes Meal intake: Bites during day, till dusk Disease transmitted: Dengue, Chikungunya Control: Fumigation ineffective, check breeding Adaptation: Successfully adapts to cooler temperatures. In temperate regions, hibernates over winter FIT TO MANAGE OTHER EXCHANGES? FMC Set to Put NSEL Through Fitness Test Regulator consults govt on liability of the promoters of crisis-ridden bourse SUGATA GHOSH & RAM SAHGAL MUMBAI Do the promoters and people running crisis-ridden National Spot Exchange Limited (NSEL) have the right to manage other exchanges? The question is being examined by the Forward Markets Commission (FMC), the countrys commodity market regulator, a senior government official told ET. The regulatory authority has the last word on whether a shareholder or director in a commodity exchange satisfies the criteria of fit and proper that, among other things, comprises qualities like honesty, integrity, good reputation and solvency. Significantly, FMC, in a recent communication to the consumer affairs ministry, has asked what should be the liability of Financial Technologies (FT) group in the case of NSEL, which has to pay back . 5,400 crore to thousands of investors. Even though NSEL is a limited company, the regulator is exploring the tricky question of whether the liability and shortfall in recovery by the crisis-ridden exchange should be met by FT group. The consumer affairs department will consult the ministries of law and corporate affairs on the subject, said a person familiar with the latter. The regulatory stand on the two issues fit and proper as well as promoters liability will to a great extent determine what the future holds for Financial Technologies group and its senior team, which over the years have set up and led a string of exchanges in India and abroad. No Statement from FT on Financial Support to National Spot Exchange In less than a decade, FT group, a leading technology solutions provider for financial markets, has promoted MCX Indias only listed commodity futures bourse and MCX-SX, which offers trading platforms for stocks, currency futures and bonds, and bourses in Singapore, Mauritius, the Middle-East and Africa. Asked whether at a meeting in early August with NSEL board members, FMC officials had said FT group could lose on other exchanges in the absence of a smooth settlement in NSEL, an FT group spokesman said: FMC has not made any such comment on FT group or its exchange members. Both MCX and MCXSX are independent companies having no financial transaction or exposure with NSEL. FT, the dominant shareholder in NSEL, holds a 26% equity in MCX. FT and MCX own 5% each in MCX-SX. (The groups 10% shareholding in MCX-SX has to be reduced to 5% by December 13). FT holds 26% in MCX while La fin, a company associated with Jignesh Shah, the founder of FT group, holds 45.6% in FT, a listed company. Shah as well as MD and CEO of MCX Stock Exchange Joseph Massey, who has been with the group for years, are on the board of NSEL. While the regulator will have to decide whether the promoters, CEO and directors are fit and proper, stretching the liability of a limited company will be a legal challenge no matter how grave the case is. This is basic company

law. FT group possibly realises this..., said a senior official of another exchange. FT group is yet to make any public statement that it will provide financial support, if necessary, to NSEL. The shareholding norms for nationwide multi-commodity exchanges announced by the consumer affairs ministry in 2009 spell out that all new investors to whom shares are divested must be fit and proper. This logic is easily extended to cover old shareholders and directors under the fit and proper guidelines of FMC, said a source. NSEL has recently announced a plan to repay investors after the ministry put a stop on issuance of fresh contracts on the grounds that the buy/sell contracts concerned traded on the exchange were illegal. On Tuesday, the exchange is scheduled to make the first payout of around Rs 170 crore to investors. On the same day, the matter, according to an earlier statement by Consumer Affairs Minister KV Thomas, may come up for discussion in Parliament. Funds recovered from 23 buyers/ borrowers are being deposited in an escrow account and the repayment to investors (or sellers or lenders) would be supervised by FMC. Till Friday evening, around Rs 79 crore was lying in the account. While FMC has said its primary interest is to ensure an orderly settlement and repayment to investors, the government, at the regulators suggestion, has formed a committee to look into the money trail. The processes will go on simultaneously, said a regulatory source. FMC has also sought the assistance of state-owned enterprises Food Corporation of India and Central Warehousing Corporation to assess the quantum and quality of commodity stocks supposed to be lying in more than 80 warehouses. However,these entities have not yet been roped in.

Govt Open to Cutting Reserve Price for Spectrum Auction Official hints at possible price cut if regulator recommends it; Trai chief seen inclined to reduce price ROMIT GUHA & ANANDITA SINGH MANKOTIA NEW DELHI

India is open to further reducing the reserve price for the next round of bandwidth auctions if the sector regulator proposes such a move, a senior government official said, a step which would bring further cheer to a debt-laden telecom industry. The latest comments come a few weeks after chairman of the telecom regulator Rahul Khullar echoed the struggling industrys views in saying that the failure of the recently -concluded auctions in November and later in March was because of the high reserve price for spectrum. The two remarks also underline a notable shift in the governments approach to the telecom industry from confrontationist to being more sector-friendly, say experts. The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) is in the process of sending its recommendations to department of telecommunications (DoT) after the government sought its views following the failure of the two auctions. The government had fixed the reserve price of . 14,000 crore for a pan-India block of spectrum in the traditional GSM band of 1800 Mhz for the November auctions. The government raised just under a fourth of the expected . 40,000 crore with 60% of the spectrum remaining unsold. Even after reducing the reserveprice in March, most operators still stayed away and only 40% of the CDMA spectrum put on the block was sold. As per an industry bodys estimates, the industrys total debt ballooned to . 2.5 lakh crore during 2012 -13, from . 1.85 lakh crore in 2011-12. A large part of the debt had been taken by companies to fund the purchase of the expensive 3G bandwidth through auctions in 2010. The official told ET that the government was also revisiting the draft M&A policy after new operators cried foul. Companies such as the Indian units of Norways Telenor ASA and Russias Sistema JSFC said the draft rules will make M&A very difficult as the cost of acquisitions would become very expensive. We are aware of the genuine issues raised by the operators and are studying them, the official said. However, telecom players who were awaiting M&A guidelines for clarity on spectrum-sharing and trading would be disappointed after the official confirmed these two had been put on the back-burner. Not as of now, he said. Operators have been pushing for spectrum-sharing to be allowed for the M&A guidelines to be effective. The official said that while the government does accept that the lack of spectrum-sharing and trading in the current economic slowdown would slacken the industrys consolidation, the telecom department does expect some M&A activity. We wont see a flood of M&A, but some operators may want to buy for business growth, the official said, adding the guidelines could come out in the next two-three months. Telecom minister Kapil Sibal had earlier said that the guidelines will be out by September-end. Fundamentally, one of the biggest constraints dragging the industry is the outdated Indian Telegraph Act 1885, the official said. The government feels the need for a new legislation, which covers modern technological concerns such as security issues, rights of way in setting up infrastructure and things like EMF (electromagnetic fields) radiation. We have no mechanism to address these modern day concepts, he said. However, currently there are no specific moves by the government to bring in a new law. romit.guha@timesgroup.com

There Is No Rollback of Reforms: Mayaram

After a slew of measures to stabilise the rupee and address the current account deficit, the finance ministry now wants to switch to a wait-and-watch mode. Economic affairs secretary Arvind Mayaram, in an interview to Deepshikha Sikarwar, says he is confident that the economy will start responding to the recent reforms initiatives and that the country should manage growth upwards of 5.5% this year. Edited excerpts: Is government going to take more measures to stabilise rupee that breached 62 to the dollar last Friday? Our assessment is we have taken adequate steps which will play out in the coming days. Rupee volatility spills over on the real economy since investors tend to wait and watch if there is too much volatility. We have said we will ensure a stable policy environment for the rupee and the measures that we have taken will play out in the coming weeks. I do not think at present it is necessary to take any further measures. Are you perturbed by the way markets reacted last Friday? Those who understand what we have done have shown faith and are not reacting. FII outflow on Friday was less than $100 million. Panic was displayed by people who are not understanding the situation and the measures taken fully and have reacted on the basis of incorrect conclusions. Most people have interpreted last Wednesdays steps as reversal to capital controls There is nothing in these measures to say we have imposed capital controls. You need to instill some responsibility in people who spend forex. We have not said you cant spend overseas, which would have been reverting to capital control. RBI has only changed the methodology by putting it on the approval route to instill responsibility. China has 3 trillion in reserves, but it allows individuals to spend just $50,000 every year and that too not for capital expenditure. RBI has only changed how you can do it and a change in methodology cant be termed a s capital control. Anyone with a genuine need or proposal can with justification repatriate as much forex as required. These measures are seen as a reversal of reforms and liberalisation The government is committed to liberalisation, but measures in a democracy can only be incremental and not revolutionary. In the last one year, the government has taken a large number of steps to further usher in reforms, the latest being in the FDI policy that clearly show that the government is committed to reforms. There is and will be no rollback of the reforms and the government will continue to pursue economic liberalisation. Are you confident of addressing the current account deficit through the measures taken? On the current account deficit side, we have done our maths carefully. We have taken measures to compress imports that will ensure that CAD is contained at around 3.7% of the GDP. We have also done our numbers regarding additional capital flows to fully finance the gap. As the finance minister has said, there is as much as red line of current account deficit this year as there was on fiscal deficit last year. current account deficit is per se not negative till you have the means to safely finance it. Many advance economies have large current account deficit.

What about the real economy? Growth estimates have slumped to around 5% now We need to put in more faith in our economy. The government has taken measures to get the investments back on track and these steps will begin to show up towards the latter part of the year. This year should see a substantial addition to power generation capacity in the country now that coal linkages and coal availability in general have been addressed. In other sectors too CCI has unlocked a very large number of investment proposals and investment will pick up. One example is SAILs massive expansion plans. Exports have also begun to pick up and going forward should do better. On infrastructure side, particularly in the roads sector, the government has taken steps to reduce stress. This has been done by allowing step-in by substitute developers by permitting the promoters to sell equity if they were facing problems. The results are encouraging. Efforts are on to de-stress port sector now. REITstype framework is also being finalised for infrastructure projects that will allow deleveraging of the projects and infusion of fresh equity. The sense of gloom must be dispelled. The economy has turned a corner and let me assure you whether it is fiscal deficit, CAD or growth, the positive numbers would surprise you by the end of the year. on Falling Rupee We will ensure a stable policy environment for the rupee and the measures that we have taken will play out in the coming weeks... on Containing CAD We have done our maths carefully...We have taken steps to compress imports that will ensure that CAD is contained at around 3.7% of the GDP on Markets Reaction Those who understand what we have done have shown faith and are not reacting. FII outflow on Friday was less than $100 million on Reversal of Reforms Government is committed to liberalisation, but measures in a democracy can only be incremental and not revolutionary

FM Seeks 10-Pt Action Plan to Revive Economy Asks depts in finmin for ideas that can be used to improve business sentiments DEEPSHIKHA SIKARWAR NEW DELHI

Finance minister P Chidambaram has asked each of the secretaries in his ministry to present a 10-point action plan on Monday that could help draw up an agenda to kick-start a wider set of measures to revive the economy and improve business sentiment. Chidambaram has asked all the four departments to come up with ideas that could be implemented or prioritised over the next few months. This will also send out a signal that the government was for the time done with steps to stabilise the rupee and wants to move on to other pressing issues. Each departments has to present a ten -point action plan on Monday a ministry official familiar with the development told ET. Top bureaucrats in the finance ministry were closeted in a series of meetings on Saturday deliberating the things they will bring to the attention of the finance minister. The action points could be anything that can help revive growth and boost sentiment, the official said pointing to a shift in the mood in the North Block that had been fire-fighting the rupee depreciation. There are lot of initiatives that are in the works in each dept. The idea is to move forward in a focussed manner by prioritising things. This is largely aimed at bringing focussed a pproach decision making, another senior finance ministry official told ET. Economic affairs secretary Arvind Mayaram said the government is already working on a plan to open up the ports sector and the real estate investment trusts (REITs) will be soon announced to help attract more equity.The action plan could also include impediments that the officials feel that need to be removed in order to revive growth, which is likely to be around 4.8% in the first quarter of the current fiscal, same as that in the last quarter of previous fiscal. We have done whatever we needed to do on the rupee front. It is now time to change focus, the first official said.

Abheek Barua, chief economist with HDFC Bank agreed that measures on rupee should work and it was time to move on to other things. I dont think any more measures would be required. They need to be communicated well. The government has already given out specific fund raising plan including quasi issuances and this should show its effect once money comes in. Some measures on hasten investments could be taken. Clearance to Mylan is a big showcase decision, he said. Finance minister had last week said the government will contain the current account deficit at $70 billion, 3.7% of GDP against 4.8% last year, and outlined a plan to fund this deficit without drawing on the countrys forex reserves. Earlier, the government had further increased the duty on gold and silver while the Reserve Bank of India had lowered the limit on outbound investment through the automatic route for corporate and also reduced the amount individuals could send out under the liberalised remittances schemes to 75,000 dollars from 200,000 dollars. Despite the measures, the rupee breached 62/dollar on Friday and sensex crashed 769 points. PC in Action After steps to stabilise rupee, govt wants to move on to other pressing issues Govt already working on a plan to open up the ports sector Real estate investment trusts (REITs) will soon be announced to help attract more equity FM had last week said the govt will contain CAD at $70 billion, 3.7% of GDP against 4.8% last year Earlier, the govt had further increased the duty on gold and silverThe govt has already given out specific fundraising plan, including quasi issuances, and this should show its effect once money comes in. A Crisis Most Welcome Regaining muscle in garment exports and intelligently pursing solar power can shrink our CAD

India can convert a crisis into an opportunity. Our current account deficit has swollen, but we can find structural solutions to reduce the gap. I have two initiatives to suggest. Exports have to focus on manufactured goods. India missed the bus on garment exports initially, by letting China, Bangladesh and Vietnam capture most of a $50-billion shift from high-cost to low-cost countries after the quota dismantling in 2005. Now, Indias share of exports has gone up from 3% to 3.2% only, while that of China has jumped from 28% to 37%. But we have another chance to at least double our garment exports and create two million additional jobs. India is competitively well-positioned due to its huge textile infrastructure and large pool of low-wage workers, unmatched by any other country except China. We can now produce fabric and garments at prices competitive with Chinas. Yet, Chinas exports are 11 times that of India. To get there, the government has to take some policy decisions. Picking Up the Thread One of the most important changes relates to rigid labour laws. Garment exports have a thin margin of 3-4% of revenue. There are no long-term contracts. Every quarter, a garment exporter starts on a clean slate and has to compete globally for the next quarters business. Besides, there is seasonality of demand. How can anyone achieve profitability with fluctuating and uncertain demand but constant fixed labour costs? The only way is to constrain your business to the level of the lowest season. This is highly suboptimal. Rigid labour laws hurt garment workers by keeping organised employment lower than its potential. Flexible labour laws will result in higher exports, employment and wages through productivity improvement. The government can also divert some NREGA funds to train workers in sewing operations to be absorbed by the garment industry. A Ray of Hope On the import side, the biggest culprit contributing to the current account deficit is the inelastic demand for oil imports. A solution that kills many birds with one stone is for the government to facilitate the development of solar power in a big way under public-private partnership (PPA). This will cost next to nothing. The government should act as a credit enhancer to tie up $50 billion from multilateral agencies in the US, Japan and China to import solar panels. This will enable development of 50 gigawatts (GW) of solar power.

It should assure solar developers that anyone who signs a valid power purchase agreement with any state electricity board (SEB) will automatically get a low-interest rupee loan for 70% of the total project cost at the same interest rate in rupees as the dollar interest rate at which the government has borrowed. The government can guarantee SEB payments on the solar PPAs against any state default and adjust that against disbursement to states. This will reduce the perceived risks for early movers and investors. The central governments risk will be diversified across 28 states. It can also encourage insurers like LIC to provide takeout financing for fully-commissioned projects. This enables recycling of equity to be deployed for the next project, and provides a steady yield stream for insurers, ideal for their requirements. Sun is the Limit It should offer a . 1 per kilowatt-hour (kWh) subsidy to SEBs if they pay solar generator on time. This can be funded by the Renewable Energy Fund, already substantially built up through a cess on coal production. Together, these will enable developers to offer solar power at a rate of . 5 per kWh, which will fall further over time from technological enhancements. Solar is competitive even now as it displaces peak power, generated with diesel on the margin costing . 14 per kWh, while solar costs . 8 per kWh. The latest long-term bids from thermal power plants were north of . 5 per kWh and will rise over time. The benefits of this solar initiative to the country will be enormous. It could generate net savings of $500 billion over the next 25 years, from reduced diesel consumption. A rapid solar build-up will supplement thermal power, which has slowed down. A solar plant can be built in 6-9 months against 48-60 months for a thermal plant. This will work because the government borrows to facilitate solar power development at 4% dollar interest cost, while the returns in dollar terms on solar investment for the Indian economy are in excess of 17-18% per year. That is because 80% of solar generation happens during peak demand and will save on diesel power. Rahm Emanuel, the mayor of Chicago, once said, You never let a serious crisis go to waste. Its an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before. We can take advantage of two crises. Historically low interest rates produced by the global financial crisis to finance solar power, and our crisis of governance that has beaten down the rupee, to boost garment exports. Is our leadership capable of this? Yes, it is. The writer is chairman and senior managing director, Blackstone Group Time to Reverse Policies that Dont Work

Despite frantic measures by the government and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to prop up the rupee, it continues to fall. In the last three years, RBIs hawkish stance has not managed to cool inflation, but squeezed growth. The RBI has tightened liquidity to contain the speculative shorting of the rupee. It has also kept rates high to make India more attractive for foreign investors. These moves have become counterproductive. Tight money and high interest rates have scared away foreign equity and debt investors. The forward premium on the rupee in international markets has shot up, keeping hedged dollar returns static. The liquidity squeeze has created havoc in the economy and industry. Many banks are not disbursing even sanctioned loans. Most companies, even if profitable, cannot run their business with a sudden disruption in liquidity. In a tough environment, short-term interest rates have gone up by a massive 200 basis points. Macro GDP, IIP numbers have been bad and the outlook has worsened. Banks fear unprecedented non-performing assets and huge losses on bonds portfolio eroding capital further. Inadvertently, the RBIs liquidity squeeze has further scared foreign equity investors about an expected plunge in corporate earnings and debt investors on a rise on bad loans and defaults. On the other hand, the hypothesis that easy liquidity was fuelling rupee speculation was true only to a limited extent. Today, the Indian economy is a lot more externalised than most policymakers perceive. The capacity of corporates and HNIs to earn and keep their money outside is significantly greater. The non-delivery forwards (NDF) and non-delivery swaps (NDS) markets are very large and beyond the control of Indian regulators. Besides, the governments capital controls measures, perceived as a reversal of reforms, have further fuelled panic. The hike in import duty on gold will encourage smuggling, ultimately impacting official NRI remittances. In our efforts to control inflation, we have stifled private sector investment and growth. India, adding 15 million people annually to the workforce, needs new investment and growth more than any other nation. Agriculture needs to release surplus disguised unemployed people. It is an open secret that our industrial and services sectors have hardly generated new jobs in the last 2-3 years and have been laying off

employees. At a fundamental level, all egalitarian governments want to control inflation as it is a tax on the poor. In the Indian context, policymakers have been trying to exorcise the demon of inflation without realising that neither the objective nor the cause-effect relationship is working. Common man is more affected by food and fuel prices that also have been major contributors to inflation. Both these categories are characterised by relatively inelastic demand-and-supply constraints. Yet, in India, a majority of the target section consists of farmers who stand to benefit by food inflation. For them, food inflation means greater increase in income than in expenditure. Most agricultural labourers also get paid in kind. This hurts the urban lowerincome group, which is a minority. In such times, one would have expected rational decisions and policy clarity to resume iron ore exports or avoid coal imports. India, with huge discovered coal reserves, will have a coal import bill of over $15 billion! We need FDI and, for that, investors should have confidence that they can set up business, make profits and repatriate profits. But most FDI proposals get delayed at various ministries. Sooner or later, we will have to address fiscal imprudence. In France, todays generation believes free education and healthcare are birthrights. Our next generation, thanks to NREGA and so on, will believe that money and food without work is their birthright. For boosting investment and capacity, the government has to work with a medium-term view. That will promote growth, ease supply constraints and help lower inflation. Policy measures are not working. It is time the RBI and government consider a courageous reversal. In this context, I was delighted to read a recent article by Raghuram Rajan, the governor-in-waiting, that economics is an inexact science and policymakers must have the humility to reverse their decisions if they do not work. The writer is chairman,

May Well Get Worse Before it Gets Better Sensex crash, our analysis & journalistic duty The Sensex, as increasingly loud and alarming headlines over the last 10 days or so proclaimed, lost a lot of steam. But actually, what it lost was froth. Roughly, in this period, two ET front-page stories Is this an Uneasy Lull Before the Crash? on August 6 and Dont Swoon Over Sensex, the Real Story is Elsewhere on August 13 analysed the market. We crunched the data and came to the conclusion that the Sensex was too bubbly given the state of the real economy. We argued that the narrow 30-stock index and the Nifty 50 were seemingly holding up not because big fund boys had faith in the India story but because the Sensex, and the privileged position many companies in it enjoy in the Indian system, do not reflect the real picture in the real economy. Thats why, we had pointed out, small-cap and mid-cap indices stocks of the many smaller firms that are struggling in a difficult economic environment had tanked even as Sensex and Nifty held firm. Now, the Sensex and Nifty have lost their froth. More correction may be underway before an upward movement happens. Why did we analyse the market as we did? The answer defines this newspapers journalism. We reported what we judged was the truth. We weighed facts, we crunched numbers and we presented the conclusion. This is what we always try to do. It is incumbent upon us to seek out the truth behind often confusing market numbers. ET called the market right. But what we didnt do, wha t we never do, is create panic for the sake of a big headline. That is as fundamental for us as not shying away from unpalatable insights because market sentiments may get negatively affected. A depressed market, a tanking Sensex impose costs on the business side of running ET. As the countrys biggest financial daily, we know and have lived through periods of market turmoil that affect ETs advertising and circulation revenue. A bear market, truth be told, is not good for the business aspects of running a big financial newspaper. But our journalistic duty is to find out the facts and report our findings.

It Makes Sense to Ratify MLC - 2006 India should amend Merchant Shipping Act to ratify MLC- 2006 in the current session of the Parliament, says Captain Shiv Halbe of MASSA

The ongoing monsoon session of Indian Parliament, scheduled to end on August 30, 2013, should endorse

Maritime Labour Convention - 2006 (MLC - 2006) through the amendment of The Merchant Shipping Act, India. The Maritime Labour Convention, established by International Labour Organization, will come into effect globally on August 20, 2013. MLC - 2006 provides for comprehensive rights and protection at work for over 1 million seafarers of the world. The convention aims to achieve both, decent work for seafarers and secure economic interests in fair competition for quality ship-owners. Since MLC- 2006 will come into effect from August 20, 2013, Indian vessels calling at ports of countries that have already ratified the convention could be subject to greater scrutiny. The Indian overseas trade is in excess of $ 1,000 billion. It is estimated that approximately 1% of this, that is $ 10 billion, is carried on Indian ships. Thus, if Indian ships are targeted due to our country not ratifying the MLC - 2006, then it could seriously jeopardize the very business itself, thereby, adversely affecting a large segment of ancillary businesses, not to mention the livelihood of persons - seafarers being the first. It makes sense to ratify the MLC - 2006, before August 20, 2013, lest our country be dubbed a laggard towards respecting globalization and effective implementation of international policy. The non-ratification of MLC - 2006 by Indian Parliament could prove costly for Indian seafarers, especially those recruited by a RPS, sailing aboard, on Indian vessels, who will be put to great disadvantage as they will be exposed to stringent inspection measures by the Port State control of the country they sail to. This is a fall-out of the 'no more favorable treatment clause.' Will Indian Parliament expedite the actions towards acceptance and implementation of the international law? Will the powers that be at the Centre recognize the jeopardy they are putting our seafarers and ships to by not accepting and reacting to the globalized nature of their jobs? The Parliament should not lose time but amend the Merchant Shipping Act to ratify MLC- 2006 in the current session.