Thursday 11 June 2015
Sunday 27 October 2013
Modi
Unfazed by serial blasts at his rally, Narendra Modi on Sunday tore into bete noire Nitish Kumar on his home turf, saying he was an “opportunist” who had “betrayed and backstabbed” Jaiprakash Narayan, Ram Manohar Lohia and also people of Bihar for Prime Ministerial dreams.
Visiting Bihar for the first time from where Chief Minister Nitish Kumar kept him away during the period of their alliance, the BJP prime ministerial candidate repeatedly attacked Mr. Nitish for snapping of JD(U)-BJP ties in June. He alleged that Mr. Nitish was playing hide and seek with Congress, against whom his mentors JP and Lohia fought all their lives, and was dreaming of becoming the Prime Minister.
“One who shunned Jaiprakash, why can’t he leave BJP. He fought all his life to free the nation from the Congress and the one who claims to be Lohia’s disciple has stabbed him in his back and is now playing hide and seek with Congress.
Whether his followers will forgive him or not, the souls of Lohia and JP will never forgive his deeds,” Mr. Modi said addressing a mammoth public meeting here at the Gandhi Maidan.
Just minutes before he spoke, six serial bomb blasts rocked the venue of the BJP Prime Ministerial candidate’s rally, leaving at least five dead and 66 injured. Modi did not refer to the blasts in his speech but appealed to his followers to reach home safety.
Visiting Bihar for the first time from where Chief Minister Nitish Kumar kept him away during the period of their alliance, the BJP prime ministerial candidate repeatedly attacked Mr. Nitish for snapping of JD(U)-BJP ties in June. He alleged that Mr. Nitish was playing hide and seek with Congress, against whom his mentors JP and Lohia fought all their lives, and was dreaming of becoming the Prime Minister.
“One who shunned Jaiprakash, why can’t he leave BJP. He fought all his life to free the nation from the Congress and the one who claims to be Lohia’s disciple has stabbed him in his back and is now playing hide and seek with Congress.
Whether his followers will forgive him or not, the souls of Lohia and JP will never forgive his deeds,” Mr. Modi said addressing a mammoth public meeting here at the Gandhi Maidan.
Just minutes before he spoke, six serial bomb blasts rocked the venue of the BJP Prime Ministerial candidate’s rally, leaving at least five dead and 66 injured. Modi did not refer to the blasts in his speech but appealed to his followers to reach home safety.
Editorial Team
N. Ravi has taken over as Editor-in-Chief of The Hindu, and Malini Parthasarathy as Editor of The Hindu. Arun Anant is no longer the Chief Executive Officer of Kasturi & Sons Limited, the company that owns and publishes The Hindu Group of publications. N. Ram has become Chairman of KSL and Publisher of The Hindu and Group publications; and N. Murali, Co-Chairman of the company. These decisions were taken by the Board of Directors of the Company at its meeting on Monday.
In consequence, Siddharth Varadarajan, who was made Contributing Editor and Senior Columnist, The Hindu, has submitted his resignation.
The Board also decided to allocate specific responsibilities to other Directors.
The decision to make deep-going changes was made chiefly on the ground that there were recurrent violations and defiance of the framework of the institution’s longstanding values on the business side, and recurrent violations and defiance of ‘Living Our Values’, the mandatory Code of Editorial Valuesapplicable to The Hindu. The whole effort is to restore employee morale, good industrial relations, and the trust of this newspaper’s more than two million readers.
The existing editorial arrangements for Business Line, Frontline, Sportstar, and The Hindu (Tamil) will continue unchanged and the process of professionalisation, now involving a mix of shareholder-Directors and other professionals, will continue.
The 135-year-old institution reaffirms its commitment to its core editorial and business values, and excellence in journalism.
- N. Ram, Chairman, Kasturi & Sons Limited
Industrialisation
The emerging significance of developing countries, which gathered momentum after 1980, is beginning to shift the balance of power in the world economy. It could lead to a profound transformation in the next 25 years. This unfolding reality must be situated in the historical perspective of de-industrialisation and industrialisation in the developing world over the past two centuries.
In the mid-18th century, similarities between Europe and Asia were far more significant than the differences. Indeed, demography, technology and institutions were broadly comparable. And, in 1750, Asia, Africa and Latin America accounted for almost three-fourths of manufacturing production in the world economy. Much of it was located in Asia with a concentration in China and India.
Profound influence
The Industrial Revolution in Britain during the late 18th century, which spread to Europe over the next 50 years, exercised a profound influence on the shape of things to come. Yet, in 1820, less than 200 years ago, Asia, Africa and Latin America still accounted for almost two-thirds of the world’s manufacturing production. China and India were the manufacturing hubs that contributed 50 per cent of world industrial production even in 1820.
The revolutionary changes in the methods of manufacturing unleashed by the Industrial Revolution transformed economic life, as industrialisation spread to Europe yielding sharp increases in productivity, output and incomes. It also led to the demise of traditional industries in Asia, particularly in China and India, reducing their skill levels and technological capabilities over time.
Between 1830 and 1913, the share of Asia, Africa and Latin America in world manufacturing production, attributable mostly to Asia, in particular China and India, collapsed from 60 per cent to 7.5 per cent, while the share of Europe, North America and Japan rose from 40 per cent to 92.5 per cent, to stay at these levels until 1950. The industrialisation of Western Europe and the de-industrialisation of Asia during the 19th century were two sides of the same coin.
Tuesday 23 April 2013
All is well
BJP Tuesday hit out at Congress president Sonia Gandhi for defending Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the coal blocks issue and demanded that the original CBI affidavit on the status report and emails reportedly sent to the agency by the PMO be made public.
Hours after Gandhi dismissed opposition demand for Singh's resignation, Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley said he was not surprised by her response. He said that Gandhi may see Singh's alleged role in the coal allocation case as a "virtue" but BJP feels this is nothing less than a scam.
related story Coalgate: BJP asks PM to quit, Sonia says 'let them ask'Jaitley sought to know what was the need for the law minister to call the CBI director, Law officers and others to see the report and make changes in it.
Deputy leader of BJP in the Upper House Ravi Shankar Prasad found the government contention that law minister Ashwani Kumar was only making "grammatical corrections" as surprising."This is the first time that the CBI needed tutorship of the law minister. BJP demands that the original affidavit of the status report and the report after grammatical corrections were made by the law minister as a tutor be made public. These should also be submitted to the Supreme Court," Prasad said.
Jaitley maintained that what changes were made in the report is immaterial but this definitely shows government interference in the CBI's functioning.He demanded that the emails exchanged by the CBI and the PMO in regard to the coal scam issue be made public. He maintained that the government will have to concede that emails were exchanged as technology will prove there was interference.
Union Finance Minister P. Chidambaram on Thursday said that the Indian Rupee has overshot its true value.
Mr. Chidambaram during his speech in the Lok Sabha said that the correction in rupee will take place and a number of measures are being taken to ensure it finds its correct value.
Mr. Chidambaram added that Indian economy is going through period of stress and the growth in first quarter is quite disappointing.
Mr. Chidambaram asserted that “There should be no room for gloom and pessimism and India will bounce back.”
The Reserve Bank on Saturday said it is not contemplating any proposal to buy idle gold and convert it into bullion.
“The RBI clarifies that no such proposal is under its consideration at this juncture,” the apex bank said in a statement.
There have been media reports that the RBI is considering various options of converting idle gold, including that available with temple trusts, into bullion.
Bullion usually stands for gold in form of bars before coining.
Demand for gold is the reason for rise in import of the precious metal. The rising gold import is one of the main reason for the Current Account Deficit (CAD), which widened to a record 4.8 per cent of GDP in 2012-13 fiscal.
The RBI and the government have already taken various steps to control the import of gold with a view to check CAD.
The government recently raised customs duty on gold to 10 per cent.
Import of gold went up by a huge 87 per cent from 205 tonnes in April-July 2012 to 383 tonnes during the corresponding period this year. In value terms, the increase was 68 per cent from Rs 56,488 crore to Rs 95,092 crore.
The government has targeted a CAD at 3.7 per cent of GDP, or $ 70 billion, in the current financial year. India’s CAD, which indicates the excess of imports of goods, services and transfers over exports, touched a record 4.8 per cent of GDP, or $ 88.2 billion, in 2012-13.
