Indian Current Affairs: 02.10.2007

Let us remember and be proud of the Father of our Nation: Mahatma Gandhi. It is his birth anniversary today. I hope all my readers will dedicate themselves to the ideals that the Father of our Nation has stood for.
Country’s first FoF from ICICI Bank

FoF = Fund of Funds. An FoF is an investor group that invests in private equity funds in order to provide investors a lower risk product through exposure to a large number of investment vehicles across sectors and even geographies. It would also help investors to route investments in some funds, which could be closed to them.

CSRF stands for Cross Site Request Forgery. It is also called The Sleeping Giant.
It basically allows an intruder to trick Gmail into sending a copy of mails coming to the user’s inbox to him.
It is a three-step process:

In a mail received by the user, a link is embedded that promises more information. This embedded link will have a forged POST request.
This creates a filter that forwards a copy of all emails coming into the user’s inbox to the attacker’s email.
Gmail allows the creation of the filter, because the user is logged in at the time it is being created.

But Google seems to have noticed the glitch and corrected it. No one seems to have misused the vulnerability so far.

We have noted about defence offsets earlier. Remember? Look here.
With the country scheduled to spend around $6000 mn in the defence sector during 2007-12, it is expected to bring in lot of benefits for the indigenous industries. It is also expected to give a good foothold for the MNCs to make a beginning in India.

The new coffee agreement envisages a greater focus on promotion as cultivation can be sustained only if global consumption levels reach a stage where production stays viable.
International Coffee Organization – ICO has elected India’s GV Krishna Rau (he is the Coffee Board Chairman) as the head of the ICC – International Coffee Council, the general body of the ICO.

We noted earlier that the ministry of labour has to take a call on this issue. Remember of 29^th April noting about this?
Now the decision is taken and it is raised to Rs. 10,000/-. This decision is expected to benefit about 7% of the total workforce in the country working in the organized sector.
As this calls for an amendment to the Bonus Act, the government is likely to bring out an ordinance, as the Parliament is not in session.

We have noted a couple of days ago that hundreds of applications are pouring in for the telecom licences. But do you know how much does it cost to possess a licence? A cool Rs. 1500 crores, under the current 2G policy.

Some of you have been asking me about what is meant by Indian economy’s fundamentals. I have answered it once. But today, let’s take a look at what a seasoned financial honcho describes it as:

Interest rates: To be reasonable. Neither too low (as in Japan) nor too high.
Inflation: To be low. As it currently is at less than 5%.
Monsoon: India specific factor. Should be good.
Oil Price affordability: Though international prices of crude are hovering above the $80 per barrel mark, the strengthening rupee has softened the effect to some extent. But crude prices should be affordable. I wouldn’t consider $80 per barrel to be a comfortable price. It should be about half of that, to really keep our economy humming along.
GDP growth: Should be growing well. It currently is doing very fine at about 9.3% in Q1, 2007-08.
Earnings growth: of top companies (like top 100, top 200 etc.) in the country should be showing an upswing.
IIP: should be showing an upswing. Though it is a cause for concern now; it is attributed to seasonal factors for the present. Not to structural weaknesses. Hence comfortable.

Prof. Goverdhan Mehta of the Indian Institute of Science has been conferred the title of an honorary academician by the Russian Academy for his outstanding achievements in applied chemistry.

Unlike nuclear weapons, chemical weapons and biological weapons have been outlawed by the comity of nations.
The CWC was singed in 1993 and is in force since 1997. It is universal and does not create a chemical apartheid in which a small group of countries holds legitimate possession of weapons that are banned for everyone else.

It was signed in 1972.
But its verification systems are not that strong as of the CWC’s. Hence it is seen as a failure rather than a success.

The Union Cabinet cleared the formation of this Council; a long standing demand of the Darjeeling people.
It is an autonomous self-governing council under the VI Schedule of the Constitution. Bills for establishing the Council will be introduced in the Parliament in the coming winter session.

Indian Current Affairs