Vivan Sharan on why the unfolding Greek drama has little appeal for Indian mediaThe week that was will be forever etched in European history but will have little recall value in India. In 2009, the Greeks first announced that they had been underestimating their fiscal deficits for many years.Without a sovereign currency that could be devalued, and lacking the structural underpinnings to address its deficits, the economy quickly became acasualty of the European experiment. A series of loans, at market rates, were offeredto Greece by the European Central Bank (ECB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). To the surprise of very few close observers of the Greek economy,it defaulted on a proportion (1.57 billion euros) of its debts owed to the IMF, on 30th June. With many more debt deadlines to follow, this was the first such default of an advanced country.Simultaneously through the week, Indian Prime Time reportage and debates have centred on the excesses and pitfalls of ‘VIP culture’.Admittedly, aside from some nominal historical association with Alexander the Great, known to mosttelevision watching middle class Indians as ‘Sikandar’, Greece has never really been of any particular interest. Unlike the Swiss Alps and their integral place in Bollywood history the Mykonos islands and the Parthenon have never quite managed to pique Indian curiosities. Superficial association aside, what is being scripted in Europe, is nothing short of a recalibration of Westphalian sovereignty. But does this demandPrime Timecoverage?The ‘European’ decision not to restructure Greek debts early on itself was largely motivated by the imperative to preserve European banking assets as well as the erstwhile Greek Government’s own resistance to the ‘humiliating’ proposition.Instead of a long term solution, successive bailout packages were conceived by the ECB, IMF and the European Commission (EC), also known as the ‘Troika’,along with stringent ‘austerity’ measures. The assumption was that through a mix of tax increases, spending cuts and structural reforms, the Greek economy would be able to grow, and therefore repay its debts.And with incremental adjustments to Greek debt, Europe kicked the can down the road.The Greek economy has lost 25 per cent of its GDP since such austerity measures were first prescribed. What is starker perhaps is that the country faces 60 per cent unemployment among youth. These rather sobering realities prompted the Greek people to vote out the establishment earlier this year. A ‘radical’ left of centre party, Syriza, was voted in. The leaders of Syriza in turn have been defiant in the face of successive negotiationdeadlines set by the Troika, for adopting more stringent measures in exchange for credit extension. Vivan SharanThe stakes in Europe are high. Syriza has called for a referendum this Sunday. The outcome will decide whether or not Greece will accept the latest austerity package in exchange for credit. Martin Schulz, the President of the European Parliament, and Jean-Claude Juncker, the President of the European Commission have both made explicit public statements urging the Greek people to vote for more austerity and effectively for extending their current tribulations and staying in the Eurozone. To reiterate in simpler terms, the leaders of the primary institutions of European integration are attempting to influence the democratic process within one of their member states.The short answer to whether this demands Prime Time coverage in India would be no. This is for a variety of reasons, some of which have been highlighted by the latest Socio-Economic and Caste Census released by the Government recently. Nearly half of the rural households surveyed meet one or more of the deprivation criteria specified by the survey – a rude shock for many.It would make ample sense then, for Prime Time news to focus on this and engage informed experts in non-partisan debates on India’sdevelopment cleavages. However, development debates do not beget television ratings. This is simply not what viewers want to watch. India’s socio-economic realities seem to be immaterial compared to the ostentatiousness of its political leaders and their lack of civic sense. After all why should the ‘common’ man, who is (surprisingly) able to afford flight tickets, be inconvenienced by politicians? Let us not forget that all men are created equal at least when it comes to boarding flights.This‘common’ Indian is easily impressed by shrill Prime Time anchors who have fire in their bellies and can openly challenge the new government on VIP culture, despite the ‘big brother’ type image ascribed to it by the intelligentsia. The Prime Minister is in turn worried. He has been repeatedly reprimanding his Ministers, demanding conduct that is befitting of their posts. The signal from the Prime Time coverage is clear. Politicians must refine their civic sensibilities, and apologize for any arrogance that may be caught on camera. Once this is achieved, their jobs are half done, chronic poverty, growing social inequities, and critical infrastructure deficits notwithstanding.Perhaps it is not a crime for India to be insular. The country has problems that make Greece’s worries or larger political trends in Europe seem insignificant. But if it chooses to remain inward looking without a sense of what it should expect its politicians to deliver, India will be stuck in neutral gear. It will be up to the whims and fancies of politicians alone, rather than the broader society, to define the constituents of ‘national interest’. And this may conveniently continue to reflect the collective self-interests of those in power and those who benefit from it, including the Indian media which moonlights as the ‘voice of the people’. There are hard numbers to prove that the deadline for systemic change is already upon the countryand hopefully it does not need a Troika of its own to bully it into acceptance. Incremental and cosmetic changes will simply not cut it.The author, Vivan Sharan, is Partner, Koan Advisory Group and Visiting Fellow, Observer Research Foundation
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Last year, the number of Foreign Tourist Arrivals (FTAs) in India was 7.46 million, about half the number of international visitors (15.1 million) to travel to the small island city state of Singapore. To boost tourism in the country, Indian government recently announced that citizens from 43 countries can avail the e-visa facility at seven more airports. Last year in November, Indian government allowed the e-visa facility at nine international airports in India, namely, Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Kochi, Thiruvananthapuram and Goa.Such moves have been expected to give a big boost to the tourism industry as the tourists are not required to go through the long process of visiting the embassy and getting the visa approved much before the travel date.In this current format, to get an e-visa, tourists can upload the documents and pay the required fees from the designated website and can get the electronic version of the visa within 96 hours.Aloke Bajpai, CEO and co-founder of web and mobile travel search app ixigo.com informs, “The volume of queries and visits at their search engine have increased by 25 per cent by foreign tourists if you compare the data of January to June from 2014 to 2015. In fact we are already seeing a lot of inbound queries for October and November when the tourist season will begin again this year.” But, the FTAs during the period January- April 2015 were 28.21 lakh with a growth of 2.7 per cent, as compared to the FTAs of 27.47 lakh in January- April 2014. The numbers don’t show a great increase as one would have expected.Bajpai adds: “Last year, when the government announced this facility, we saw some cases where people took a flight to India presuming they will get a visa on arrival and were flown back to their country. There was a lot of miscommunication in the earlier days. Though it has been simplified now, but still a lot more can be done to communicate the new process and make it smoother.”Maahesh Aiyer, Chief Operating Officer- South, The Lemon Tree Hotel Company sees it as a overall positive step, “This move will not affect group travel because they are planned much ahead of schedule, but it will boost the last minute travel. In fact, this will be good for the travel and hospitality industry as one gets a higher realisation from customers on last minute bookings.Bajpai suggests, and rightly so “The government should think about offering visa on arrival to a smaller subset of countries as it allows for a more spontaneous travel. South East Asia is an attractive travel destination for Indians because you can plan immediately and get visa on arrival after landing in the country, without worrying about it beforehand. In the current format, collating documents and uploading still takes time, though it is better than before, but it hasn’t changed the behaviour of travellers much.”What India can do is focus on countries only a few hours away by flight. Tourists from China contribute to the highest number of foreign travellers in most of the countries today. “In Sri Lanka, China contributes to 70 per cent of tourist year on year. In India they are contributing only 2-3 per cent in terms of tourist composition and there is a lot of scope for growth here,” says Aiyer.
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The Government has notified the rules for calculating overseas income and assets under the stringent foreign black money law that came into force on July 1. The value of the overseas assets, including immovable property, jewellery and precious stones, archaeological collections and paintings, shares and securities and shares in unlisted firms abroad will be calculated at the fair market value, the rules notified by the CBDT said today. The value of an overseas bank account will be the sum of all deposits made in the account since its opening, the rules said. The Black Money (Undisclosed Foreign Income and Assets) and Imposition of Tax Act, 2015, provides for a total of tax and penalty of 120 per cent on the income or assets held abroad after the expiry of a one-time 90-day 'compliance window' provided for persons to come clean. Any income or asset declared during this period which ends on September 30, would attract a total of 60 per cent tax and penalty, without penal provisions like jail term. They will have time till December 31 to pay the levies. The rules notified today provide for the way foreign income and assets would be valued for calculation of tax and penalty both for the compliance period and beyond its expiry. The fair market value of an immovable property will be higher from the acquisition cost or the price that the property shall fetch in open market on the date of valuation. The same principle would also be applicable for valuing bullion, jewellery or precious stone as well as archaeological collections, drawings, paintings and sculptures or work of art. For valuing shares and securities of listed entities, the rules said the fair market value will be the higher of the cost of acquisition or average of the lowest and highest price on the date of valuation. (PTI)
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As part of its ongoing and regular efforts to make mergers and acquisition (M&A) filing requirements simpler and readily acceptable to various stakeholders, the Competition Commission of India (CCI) has revised its Combination Regulations, making them more forward looking, in keeping with some of the best practices in other jurisdictions.The CCI, at the time of publishing the draft amendments on its website in March, 2015, invited comments from all stakeholders as a part of its consultative process. While giving inputs and suggestions on the amendments, the stakeholders welcomed the same, as the amendments now provide greater clarity and transparency and help in avoiding undue delays.A key change brought about by the present amendments is in relation to the definition of the term “other document”. To bring in more certainty, scope of the term “other document” has now been limited to a communication conveying the intention to make an acquisition to a Statutory Authority.Further, the proposed amendments provide flexibility to parties regarding signing of the notice. Under the present amendments, any person duly authorised by the board of directors may sign the notice. Further, the number of copies of notice to be filed with the Commission has also been reduced.In keeping with the requests received from stakeholders, CCI has also revised Form I required to be filed for notifying combination. In addition to the same, notes to the forms would be published to provide guidance to the notifying parties regarding the information that is required to be filed in a notice.Further, to bring in greater transparency regarding the review process, the amendments provide that a summary of every combination under review will be published on the website of CCI. Such publication will provide stakeholders an opportunity to submit their comments to CCI regarding the proposed combination.CCI has also modified the timelines for Phase-I review from thirty calendar days to thirty working days and has also given itself a clock stop of fifteen working days during Phase I to seek comments from third parties.ashish.sinha@businessworld.in
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The move is aimed at shielding government companies from strict provisions of new Companies Act, 2013 After waiting for almost two years, now most of the Government owned companies have been granted a slew of exemptions under the new Companies Act, 2013. While many of the exemptions are copied from the old Companies Act 1956, there are some noticeable new exemptions too.For example, the Government companies are now not required to specify the policy on directors’ appointment and remuneration including criteria for determining qualifications, positive attributes, independence of a director and other matters which are otherwise applicable to all companies. Also, there is no restriction on the number of directors a Government company can have. For non-Government companies, the new company laws caps the number of directors to a maximum of 15. Of course, non-Government companies can add directors beyond the 15 by passing a special resolution, which then will have to be communicated to the government.The Government companies will also be exempted from provisions relating to proportional representation for appointment of directors on the Board. Non-Government companies have to have proportional representations of directors on their respective board.A Government company is also not required to comply with provisions of section 196 dealing with the restriction on appointing or re-appointing any person as its managing director, whole-time director or manager for a term exceeding five years at a time.A Government company is also exempted of provisions which specify limits for overall maximum managerial remuneration and managerial remuneration in case of absence or inadequacy of profits. This is not the case for non-Government companies.The provisions of Section 203 with respect to appointment of key managerial personnel, holding of office, period within which appointment to be made in case of vacation of office of key managerial personnel (KMP), will not apply to a managing director or Chief Executive Officer or manager and in their absence, a whole-time director of the Government company.Section 185 prohibiting granting of loans to directors and to any other person in whom director is interested shall not apply to Government companies in case such company obtains approval before making any loan or giving any guarantee.Another key exemption pertains to the provisions of related party transactions when a Government company is entering into contract or arrangement with another Government company. Section 188 of the new company laws prohibits companies from entering into related party transactions exceeding specified values without obtaining prior approval of shareholder and also restricts related party (who is a party to the contract) to abstain from voting. ashish.sinha@businessworld.in
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The government plans to phase in cash transfers of food and kerosene subsidies from September, saving 10-15 per cent of the $21 billion in annual outlays on the benefits by eliminating fraud, a senior finance ministry official said on Thursday (03 July). Three so-called union territories, directly administered by the central government, would become a testbed for the measures, said Peeyush Kumar, the senior finance ministry official in charge of the cash transfer scheme. Under the programme, each family will get a monthly subsidy of about Rs 500-700 ($19), which would be linked to a state-set procurement price of grains. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has completed one year in power, wants to improve targeting of food and fuel subsidies to reach the poor - monetising benefits previously paid in kind that often went to waste or were stolen. He launched a 'Digital India' drive on Wednesday to offer public services by linking bank accounts, identity cards and mobile phones in a national database. Indian plans to reduce its subsidy bill by about 10 per cent to $38.4 billion this fiscal year, about 14 per cent of federal spending on programmes offering subsidised food, fertiliser and fuel, helped by reforms and lower crude oil prices. The Union government has set a deadline of December for states to computerise all data on households now receiving subsidised food and fuel - to remove 'ghost', or fake, beneficiaries, Kumar told a seminar on benefit reforms. Crisil, the Indian arm of Standard & Poor's, estimates that the federal subsidy bill could fall by 20 per cent, or Rs 25,000 crore ($3.94 billion) a year, if the direct benefit transfer scheme is fully implemented. Direct payments for cooking gas into people's bank accounts, launched earlier this year, have reduced sales of subsidised fuel by about one-fourth, mainly by eliminating ghost beneficiaries, said finance ministry adviser Arvind Subramanian. (Reuters)
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The black money law that provides for stringent penalties and jail term for failing to disclose overseas income has been operationalised from July 1 this year, instead of April 2016, the Finance Ministry said. The Black Money (Undisclosed Foreign Income and Assets) and Imposition of Tax Act, 2015, as passed by Parliament, was to come into effect from April 1, 2016, after providing for a short 'compliance window' to foreign asset holders to come clean. When asked whether the black money law has come into force, a top revenue department official confirmed. "Yes, with effect from July 1". The changes were being made to remove the difficulties with regard to dates for implementation of the provisions of the new black money law, a Finance Ministry Order said. In the order, the Ministry said, the provisions of the Act were intended for application in the Assessment Year 2016-17. But for this to happen the Act has to come into effect from current fiscal and the necessary change have now been made as per the powers given by the law passed by Parliament in May this year. The Order came along side the notification of a 90-day compliance window lasting till September 30 for holders of unaccounted foreign income and assets to declare them. After declaring assets they will have time till December 31 to pay non-punitive tax and penalty of 30 per cent each to escape stringent punishment including jail term. The Finance Ministry Order said "for the words, figures and letters 'the 1st day of April, 2016,' the words, figures and letters 'the 1st day of July 2015' shall be substituted (in Section 1 (3) of the Act)". In the Act, which received Presidential assent on May 26, Section 1 (3) had said "...it (Act) shall come into force from 1st day of April, 2016". Once the compliance window closes, anyone found having undeclared overseas wealth would be required to pay 30 per cent tax, 90 per cent penalty and face criminal prosecution. The revenue department will soon come out with an Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) to guide the assesses with regard to declaration of undisclosed assets, payment of tax and penalty.(PTI)
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Government has allocated Rs 200 crore for three years to set up an online national agriculture market by integrating 585 wholesale markets across India -- a move that would help farmers realise better prices. The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs had on Wednesday (01 July) approved a Central Sector Scheme for Promotion of National Agricultural Market through Agri-Tech Infrastructure Fund. "An amount of Rs 200 crore has been earmarked for the scheme from 2015-16 to 2017-18," an official statement said. The Department of Agriculture will set it up by creation of a common electronic platform deployable in selected regulated markets across the country. "Now there will be one licence for entire state, there will be single point levy. There will be electronic auctions for price discovery. The impact will be that the entire state will become a market and the fragmented markets within the states would be abolished," Finance Minister Arun Jaitley told reporters. Under the scheme, 585 selected regulated markets would be covered. The plan is to cover 250 mandis in current fiscal, 200 mandis in 2016-17 and 135 mandis in 2017-18. "Seamless transfer of agriculture commodities within the state can take place. The market size for farmers would increase as he won't be limited to a captive market," Jaitley said. The Rs 200 crore allocations includes provision for supplying software free of cost by agriculture department to the states and UTs and for cost of related hardware/ infrastructure to be subsidised by the Centre up to Rs 30 lakh per Mandi (other than for private mandis). Agriculture Secretary Siraj Hussain informed that Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh, Orissa, Jharkhand and Gujarat have already agreed to join the Scheme, while Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh are "very keen" to particuipate. Besides, the Centre is also in discussions with Uttar Pradesh. Unifying the markets both at state and the national level would provide better price to farmers, improve supply chain, reduce wastages and create a unified national market through provision of the common e-platform, the statement said. (PTI)
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