Low inflation is an anemic economic condition

• Low inflation at 2.28%, IIP at 3.12% is due to low food prices and only indicates anemic state of economy which is unable to produce more and spend more. There is  no need to greet 'low inflation' with a hurrah, which is a symptom of ailing economy.
• Modi administration has laundered away savings due to low oil prices on his mindless adventures in the name of reforms.
• Make in India campaign without any ground work has deindustrialized India and our economy dependent on Chinese imports so much like never before.
• Low food prices and low consumption has not increased the consumption pattern. Low consumption is injurious to market economy and indicates declining economy.
• Farmers are on street agitation due to prices not even covering production expenses.
• Low crude oil prices for last three years even though good for consuming countries like India is destroying economies of oil producing countries.
• RBI's higher interest rates and not cutting them are not indicative of inhibiting expenditure and holding back consumption. It is weak demand that is culprit.
• Higher inflation within a band is preferable, because it means economy is moving and sputtering.
• It is Modi & BJP's failure to spur growth even after three years. Blaming predecessor doesn't work beyond two years.
• The over publicized 'demonetization' has failed to achieve any of its stated objectives but has jolted informal sector which operates on cash that brought its economy to its ominous halt. What ever good it may do in long term, demonetization has proved to be painful and disastrous in short term.
• The other big decision of Modi administration is uniform GST rate across nation, w.e.f. July 1, 2017, is supposed to improve tax compliance and governments will be able to spend more money on infrastructure and enable people to produce more, sell more and buy more and will result in economic growth. Paradoxically, benefits might come only in long term but its devastating short term effects are to be coped with by our already ailing economy. The transition to GST and its impact on lower tax compliance might persist over an year. 
• There is hardly any activity on ground. Economy needs a push. GST is going to be a speed breaker rather than a stimulus at least during first year. It is not going to energize our economy, which at the moment is going nowhere.
• Low inflation, low growth, demonetization and GST are aggravating the already bleak situation and when economy will become better is a million dollar question? In the meantime, how many will vanish or perish?

Inflation is taxation without legislation ... Milton Friedman
Inflation effectively transfers wealth from savers to borrowers.

The government will always tell you that it wants low inflation. 

The real issue is the horizon over which to bring inflation down ... Raghuram Rajan

My View:

Low inflation and low growth are features of rich & developed nations. Their economy is largely dependent on consumption. Yet they grow rather slowly. For a developing nation like India with considerable infrastructure activity, higher inflation rates within a band is necessary for good growth associated with job creation. Here, RBI's primary role is to contain inflation within the band by managing interest rates and bank's CRR & SRR ratios. India with 40% people below poverty line and half of the population without personal latrines, low inflation and low growth regimes are undesirable. Modi government resorting to high speed & high risk financial reforms only to please rating agencies and foreign financial institutions, indicates his lack of understanding of the ground realities and exposes his incompetency as a sound economic manager. Today, instead of creating a million jobs every month, reckless Modinomics resulted in deindustrialization, exorbitant Chinese imports, loss of millions of livelihoods in informal sector is what he has done so far. Modi must realize that perpetual promises and blaming predecessors work well during initial years only but not during fourth year. Prolonged low inflation resulted in agriculture becoming a loss making activity and with no support from government, farmers have taken to streets. GDP growth with  job losses is an astonishing feature of Modi's achievement. Pep talk & unsubstantiated publicity won't do any trick.

BJP's intolerance spares not even Gandhi

Amit Shah's unwarranted remarks on Gandhi

• Amit Shah's remark about Gandhi as 'Chatur Baniya' and Congress as his SPV for independence etc speaks volumes about his stupidity and intolerance.
• To refresh our minds ... Amit Shah, then Home Minister of Gujarat when Modi was CM was involved in Sohrabuddin fake encounter (2005) case and was arrested in 2010 and was prohibited to enter Gujarat for two years by Supreme Court. The controversial role of Amit Shah and Modi were burning issues in those days. 
• The unresolved murder of ex-minister Haren Pandya in 2003 and involvement of Amit Shah and Modi which hitherto remain unproved, speaks volumes about the character of this duo.
• It is very rare especially in India, the person holding power commits crime and also gets convicted. 
• This unwarranted remark by Amit Shah exposes himself of his poor understanding about Gandhi and his poverty of thought of India as one secular nation with minorities (~20%) leading life without fear or coercion since independence.
• Such a person (Amit Shah) making nasty remarks about Gandhi, only belittles BJP & Modi's capability to rule India as a nation.
• The best BJP should do is to get rid of Amit Shah immediately.

Gandhi is the least understood person in India, than in the Western countries.

My View:
There is no dispute that Gandhi and his compatriots in Congress struggled for independence sincerely, honestly sacrificing their life, wealth, career and families. Standing on their shoulders selfish and criminal minded people like Amit Shah, Modi & Co making nasty comments is not only audacious but also atrocious. They should be condemned and thrown out of public life and if law permits prosecuted. They are simply misleading public.

Air India: Inoperable & Unsaleable

Editorial INDIA TODAY dt June 19, 2017

• Air India, flagship national carrier, is to day inoperable and unsaleable.
• Air India has been piling up losses ever since the two erstwhile airlines – Air India and Indian Airlines – were merged in 2007 to form the present entity.
• Accumulated debt of Rs.52,000 crores & annual interest payout of Rs.5,000 crores is unserviceable. The airline has to repay Rs 19,000 crore by 2020-21.
• Air India’s combined OTP (on-time performance) at four metro airports is worst at 67.7% which means every third flight was delayed.
• Air India’s load factor was the lowest again among all national airlines at 81.4%.
• Air India’s share of the domestic market fell from 16% in Jan 2016 to 12.9% in Nov 2016. In January 2017, it improved market share to 14.1%.
• The airline is being kept alive by taxpayers’ money since the government is committed to pumping in about Rs 30,000 crore over a decade to prop up the airline’s equity. About 80 percent of this money has already been poured into the airline. The turnaround plan under Air India has been given such a massive equity support projects an operating profit of Rs 1,086 crore in 2016-17 on revenue of Rs 22,206 crore and a net loss of Rs 1,989 crore.
• Lenders mostly PSU banks & FI's are unwilling to take a 'haircut'. They are unwilling to convert debt into equity as well.
• Annual losses of Rs.3,000 unbearable.
• Govt of India is clueless how to handle this 'white elephant'.
• Air India management have no clue how to go about resurrecting it.
• Most undisciplined organisation today.
• According to public enterprises survey of 2014-15, just three PSUs accounted for over two-thirds (~62.9%) of the total losses incurred by the CPSE's in that year. They are BSNL, Air India and MTNL. 

My View:

Since divestment or privatization is out of question (no sane fellow will invest or buy Air India), Govt has only option i.e. shut down, dismantle, auction all its assets and repay all debtors from its coffers. That is the price Central Government has to pay for  signing as guarantor for Air India's debt. That would be the cheapest proposition. Govt has pumped in over Rs.24,000 crores during past decade as equity and it simply vanished. Any other option would cost nation, much more. Government should strictly implement BIFR norms of rehabilitating public sector units as soon as equity erosion exceeds 50%. Otherwise many more Air India's will surface year after year and costs nation dearly. Simultaneously, Govt should stop poking its nose into PSU's day-to-day management including Banks. Since PSU's are sinking one after other Govt should come out with a policy frame work to divest or sell all PSU's one after the other, ahead of their collapsing and confine itself to governance. BSNL Mobile was ready for launching in 2001 and the then Telecom Minister Pramod Mahajan intentionally delayed by over an year to favor Reliance Infocomm's launch in 2002, for which he was ousted by PM Vajapayee. BSNL has been reeling under six consecutive years of losses of over Rs.40,100 crore of accumulated losses. It has been crushed by private sector telecom rivals. The future is, there seemed no future. Unless PSUs are operated professionally free from political interference each one will find its way like Air India and BSNL.

Farmers' protests: Turning point for Modi

• The ongoing farmers' protests in several states across India is the first major mass movement confronting the Narendra Modi government. Unless handled adroitly, the stir could throw up a major challenge to the BJP and Modi's political dominance.
• Ever since he launched the high voltage prime ministerial campaign in 2013, Modi remained in perpetual promising mode. Inability to deliver is now beginning to catch up for the first time making the ruling establishment realize that being on a perpetual promissory mode is fraught with dangers.
• RBI Governor Urjit Patel's statement that loan waivers add to the risk of fiscal slippage, shrinks dramatically Modi's negotiating space.
• Patel's similar warning during UP election campaign was lost in the campaign noises.
• The self-created pressure of labeling the dead farmers as martyrs, does not spare MP CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan: For what cause and in protest of whose government?
• - Farmers are not the 'other' that can be demonized by militarist or muscular nationalism.
  - Farmers are not human-rights activists who are constantly arraigned as anti-nationals.
  - Farmers are not members of a religious minority who allegedly do not ascribe to the dominant culture of the nation.
  - Farmers are not foreign-funded NGOs who disrupt government by expressing empathy with the downtrodden and agitating people.
  - Farmers are also not gathering to seek repealing of laws which give security and armed forces the right to quash the fundamental rights of the people.
  - Farmers are instead intended to be the main beneficiaries of an egalitarian order that Modi proclaims as his credo.
  - Farmers are the custodians of our granaries and must be applauded for continuing to stick on, despite the odds stacked against them.
• The opposition which was derided by BJP as a bunglers' club is suddenly accused of having the capacity to destabilize the nation. 
• Attempts to prevent Rahul Gandhi from reaching the troubled spots are akin to putting a person on life-support systems. It is up to the scion or other opposition leaders to capitalize on the political opening provided by farmers.
• Rare is the case that a mass movement can be imposed from the above; it must always emerge from below. Thereafter, it is up to the opposition parties, whether they can capitalize on it or not.
• In the last few days Modi government has been demonstrated as being fallible like any establishment. This farmers agitation may peter out or spread like wildfire. But even if the BJP government succeeds in dousing the flames by offering sops, such a move compels BJP to negotiate this serious challenge. Compared to Modi's 'no dialogue' stance on contentious political issues, this will be a comedown and demonstrate that beneath his tough exterior, Modi too can be forced to grant an extra quarter.
• The farmers' strife in MP is worrying for Modi and BJP because the state did not have poor monsoon last year. It was blessed with a bumper crop. MP is also not a poor state and has registered high agricultural growth over the past several years. The agitating farmers are not the poorest in the state. In the past one year, every five hours one farmer committed suicide in the state due to distress stemming from accumulated loans and the glut in the market. The government has to give serious thought why, in state after state, bumper production is proving itself to be a bane for farmers.
• Agricultural policy focused on means to increase crop yield but not farmers' livelihood concerns. The government's fiscal health has been its principal worry, not the farmers' balance sheets. The policy of announcing loan waivers periodically is faulty. Analysis is required to examine reasons for repeated default.
• It's a truth that farmers are unable to recover costs with their produce. Agriculture is mostly a loss-making vocation. The BJP promised to implement recommendations of the Swaminathan Commission's suggestion to ensure a minimum of 50% profits over the cost of production. This assurance by Modi was clearly aimed at wooing the farmers. Unless a comprehensive strategy to ameliorate the lot of farmers is formulated, the BJP will pay a heavy political price for its deceit.
• Modi can lose sight at his own risk. The BJP's traditional support base is not rural India and farmers. Yet, they voted for BJP mainly on the strength of Modi's promises and his mesmerizing presence. Three years is a long period to initiate steps and provide evidence of sincerity. 
• Farmers are clearly a disgruntled lot and accusing them of taking cues from the opposition will indicate the BJP is behaving like the proverbial ostrich. 

If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, 

it cannot save the few who are rich ... JFK

My View:

During past 25 years, it is a standard pattern for politicians to talk about poor & peasants to win elections and once in power or opposition these leaders behave like brokers/dealers for rich, businesses, contractors etc enriching themselves. Their princely & lavish lifestyles is all the more disgusting. Farmers and poor received some sops say up to 10% of govt spending and remaining knocked off in the name of development, of which less than 25% gets capitalized and more than 75% finding way into pockets of politicians, industrialist, businessmen, and bureaucrats. While educated flourished with global opportunities, businesses flourished with obliging politicians, poor & farmers were left behind and suffered poverty. For alleviating agriculture from debt relief, mechanization to reduce expenditure, land reforms for viability of fragmented land parcels, quality inputs (seeds, fertilizers & pesticides), micro irrigation & water conservation, organic farming, warehouses & cold storage, efficient markets, food processing industries and many more -  much needs to be done and so far what has been done is minuscule. A 10 year focused plan including retraining of rural labour with an investment of Rs.3 lakh crores per annum for 10 years is the need of the hour. Otherwise we will be doomed as a nation.

RBI warns against farm loan waivers

• Farmer loans amount around Rs. 3 lakh crores and farmer suicides during past two decades exceeded 3.18 lakhs. Needless to say agriculture is in distress last two decades. Mechanization, modernization, land reforms for land holding consolidation, warehousing, irrigation, quality inputs, marketing etc requires investment of about Rs. 3 lakh crores per annum for next 5 years. otherwise farmer will continue to be debt ridden and farmer suicides will remain unabated.
• No political party will win 2019 election without farm loan waiver promises. Till then farmers will avoid paying loan repayments, especially after Modi farm loan waiver promise for winning UP elections 2017.
• Large waivers like this will pull down economy backward by 2-3 years and state governments running risk of economic collapse is all the more likely. But no escape.
• However these amounts are not so great when compared to Bank's NPA's in excess of Rs.8 lakh crores and another Rs. 6 lakh crores as stressed investments in Telecom sector. After all Agriculture is livelihood for majority of Indians (less educated and less skilled) and the only avocation in rural India.
• This is the price nation has to pay for neglecting rural India and chasing dollars and in the process making rich more richer during the past 25 years of liberalization.

If the RBI agrees with the finance ministry all the time, then it is superfluous; 

And disagrees all the time, then it is obnoxious ... YV Reddy

RBI Governor is neither subordinate nor equal to Finance Minister ... YV Reddy

My View:

RBI which kept stoic silence for Modi's senseless demonetization that costed nation over Rs.128,000 crores during Nov & Dec 2016 months and insurmountable consequential damages, warning Modi now on farm loan waiver consequences makes me believe that it is a conspiracy by Modi & BJP to avert farm loan waivers after UP, for Modi is no friend of farmers and rural India.

Life's most important question

• Everybody wants what feels good. Everyone wants to live a carefree, happy and easy life, to have amazing relationships, to look perfect and make money and be popular and well-respected and admired. It’s so ubiquitous that it doesn’t even mean anything.
• Everybody wants to have an amazing job and financial independence. But not everyone wants to suffer through 60-hour work weeks, long commutes, obnoxious paperwork. People want to be rich without the risk, without the sacrifice, without the delayed gratification necessary to accumulate wealth.
• Everybody wants to have awesome relationship. But not everyone is willing to go through the tough conversations, the awkward silences, the hurt feelings and the emotional psychodrama to get there.
• Happiness requires struggle. The positive is the side effect of handling the negative. Positive experience is easy to handle. It’s negative experience that we all struggle with. We get out of life is not determined by the good feelings we desire but by what bad feelings we’re willing and able to sustain to get us to those good feelings.
• People want an amazing physique. But you don’t end up with one unless you legitimately appreciate the pain and physical stress that comes with living inside a gym for hour upon hour, unless you love calculating and calibrating the food you eat, planning your life out in tiny plate-sized portions.
• People want to start their own business or become financially independent. But you don’t end up a successful entrepreneur unless you find a way to appreciate the risk, the uncertainty, the repeated failures, and working insane hours on something you have no idea whether will be successful or not.
• People want a partner, a spouse. But you don’t end up attracting someone amazing without appreciating the emotional turbulence that comes with weathering rejections. It’s part of the game of love. 
• What determines your success isn’t “What do you want to enjoy?” The question is, “What pain do you want to sustain?” The quality of your life is not determined by the quality of your positive experiences but the quality of your negative experiences. And to get good at dealing with negative experiences is to get good at dealing with life.
• If you find yourself wanting something month after month, year after year, yet nothing happens and you never come any closer to it, then maybe what you actually want is a fantasy, an idealization, an image and a false promise. Maybe what you want isn’t what you want, you just enjoy wanting. Maybe you don’t actually want it at all.
• You can’t have a pain-free life. It can’t all be roses and unicorns. And ultimately that’s the hard question that matters. Pleasure is an easy question. And pretty much all of us have similar answers. The more interesting question is the pain. What is the pain that you want to sustain?
• I wanted the reward and not the struggle. I wanted the result and not the process. I was in love not with the fight but only the victory. And life doesn’t work that way.
• Who you are is defined by the values you are willing to struggle for. People who enjoy the struggles of a gym are the ones who get in good shape. People who enjoy long workweeks and the politics of the corporate ladder are the ones who move up it. People who enjoy the stresses and uncertainty of the starving artist lifestyle are ultimately the ones who live it and make it.
• This is the most simple and basic component of life: our struggles determine our successes. So choose your struggles wisely.

No pain. No gain.
You can’t win if you don’t play.
God seldom gives us all we need to understand, 
but He always gives us all we need to obey

Ten life lessons to excel in 30's

30 second speech by Bryan Dyson

My View:

If one doesn't learn life's realities on his own, then adversity will teach him the lessons in a bitterest way. If you try to be cool, you will never be cool. If you try to be happy, then you will never be happy. Happiness is not something you obtain, but rather something you inhabit. Happiness is not achieved in itself, but rather it is the side effect of a particular set of ongoing life experiences. You can’t buy happiness and you can’t achieve happiness. Pleasure is great but it’s not happiness. Pleasure does not cause happiness. Happiness is what you get when other parts of your life are in order. 

Anu Aga: A life shaped by tragedy

Mrs. Anu Aga, Ex Chairperson, Thermax Ltd,  8th richest Indian woman once

• Anu Aga, ex-Chairperson of Thermax Ltd., and once India’s eighth richest woman.
• Her net worth is estimated at $1.16 billion (2017) by Forbes.
• Thermax was set up by her father AS Bhathena in 1966 as Wanson (India) to provide a range of engineering solutions. The company was renamed Thermax in 1980 after her father retired. Her husband, Rohinton Aga, headed it till 1996, when he died of a massive stroke. 
• While Ms Aga was still finding her feet as the head of Thermax, she suffered a second tragedy - her 25 year old son Kurush died in a road accident. 
• In the late 1990s, Thermax had got used to "satisfactory underperformance". Thermax's growth had nose-dived at the time, with share prices plummeting from Rs. 400 to Rs. 36 because of the market downturn. 
• Ms Aga has said that an anonymous letter from a shareholder accusing her of letting him down forced her to take stock of the situation. It dawned upon her that as the largest shareholder of a public limited company, it was her responsibility to turn the company around even if she personally felt she didn't deserve to be its chairperson.
• She was convinced that management was out of its depth and needed outside help. Her senior executives resisted the idea. Most men find it difficult to seek help because it comes in the way of their 'macho image'. The board decided to hire a consulting company.
• The board was reconstituted to bring in more independent directors. The promoter members stepped down from executive positions, and operational aspects were left to a non family professional team led by the managing director.
• The full-scale reform, with help from the Boston Consulting Group between February 1996, when she took over as chairperson of Thermax and 2004, when she stepped down, Ms Aga transformed the company into a global turnkey player in energy and environment projects. Thermax shares were trading on the Bombay Stock Exchange at Rs. 447.15. 
• Eight years after Ms Aga took the top post, her daughter Ms. Meher Pudumjee replaced her as head of the company in 2004. However, she continues to be on the company's Board of Directors.
• What is non-negotiable, she pointed out, is her time with her grandchildren Zahaan, 9, and Lea, 6.  
• Mrs. Aga is keenly involved in the causes of communal harmony and human rights, especially of women and children. Since retiring, she is closely involved with Akanksha, an NGO which supplements the educational needs of the slum children. In partnership with Pune Municipal Corporation and Akanksha, Thermax Foundation has adopted three municipal schools in Pune. She is on the Board of Teach for India, an initiative that attempts to bridge the inequity gap in education.
• In 2010, Mrs. Aga was awarded the Padmashri for her work in the social sector.
• In 2012, Mrs. Aga is a Nominated Member of the Rajya Sabha in 2012. 

Gujarat Riots 2002: Nov 18, 2002: Her protests against "insufficient" State Government measures in Gujarat to rehabilitate victims of the post-Godhra communal clashes invited media attention, as she was the first person from the corporate sector to visit Gujarat and voice concern at the raging violence. "Out of several camps that I visited, the Shah-e-Alam camp had 1,950 families living in the open with practically no shelter, except a few bamboo poles with torn clothes hanging over them. Almost all the relief camps I visited bore ample testimony to the Government's apathy. I was pained at the injustice meted out, or rather complete callousness showed by the Government and fellow Indians. When the Gujarat earthquake, a natural calamity could garner so much in terms of mobilising funds and support, how could they just turn a blind eye to the riot-hit victims - a disaster that could very well have been avoided?" she asks.

"If the reason for this is because the victims belong to a minority, then I will say the time-honoured Indian value system is a miserable failure," she says. Aga spoke at a function organised by the Coalition for Peace and Harmony at the Administrative Staff College of India (ASCI) auditorium here recently. "If there was governance, would the violence have continued for two months? While the official toll of the number of Muslims killed is 900, the unofficial death toll stands at 3,000 as against the 60 Hindus having lost their lives. The figures are self-explanatory," the social activist pointed out. "I am not debating on the number of persons killed from the two faiths, the talking point is how educated people could fall prey to narrow communal feelings and either perpetrate or condone violence that resulted in the loss of over a thousand lives. Is it not a degradation of our basic humanness?" she asked. 

She warns that as a fallout of the Government's "lackadaisical attitude" towards minority victims, mistrust and hatred may brew all the more and "a second Godhra" may not be very far away. "The authorities should rectify their mistakes when there is time at hand," she suggests. Condemning fundamentalism in every religion, she took a dig at the business world too. "To me, Godhra or the subsequent events are not a spontaneous one-time occurrence. It is a symptom of a society that is callous, indifferent, and is only concerned about individual selfishness, amassing wealth and acquiring positions." 

Business today represents a powerful force as it has the best human talent, leadership skills, technical know-how and large capital at its command. It can be the most potent agent of social change provided we businessmen, choose to define human well being as the `business' of Business. Only then would the purpose of business be served," said the successful businesswoman wrapping up the talk. 

Earlier at a CII national meeting in April 2002, the chairwoman of the energy major Thermax, Anu Aga, received a standing ovation after delivering an impassioned speech about the suffering of Muslims in Gujarat.