Indian Current Affairs: 10.05.2010

Politics & the Nation

While less than 40% farmers have access to information about modern techniques and inputs, even available information is often not readily comprehensible or adoptable. This is where an effective last-mile delivery system that bridges the knowledge gap will play a critical role in transforming farm productivity.

Last-mile delivery implies delivering the latest and improved location-specific farm technology to the farmer for improving crop productivity. It imparts knowledge about crop cultivation practices, products, technologies and their efficient utilisation in a cost-effective manner.
The author suggests an eitht-pronged approach to improve last-mile transformation. Take a look:

For an elaboration on each of the above points, you must read this piece. Good one.

Finance & Economy

In a charm offensive the Chinese telecom major in India is nudging its Mandarin staff to mind their names. The company reasons that since Indians find it difficult to pronounce Chinese names, the Indian nomenclature helps in daily operations. This also makes Chinese executives more culturally acceptable not just to their Indian colleagues, but also to their clients and business associates in the country.
The Indianisation drive is a crucial survival strategy for Huawei, which has had a troublesome run in India ever since it set up shop in the late 90s. For years, the company battled suspicion in India over not just the nature of its ownership back home—an earlier intelligence probe into the company had shown it is owned by a former top officer of the Chinese army—but also its ability to intercept networks.
The efforts to reach out don’t stop at nomenclature. Last year, Huawei India replaced its top four executive directors with Indians to give its management a more local character.
The company, in a communication to the home ministry and the Prime Minister’s Office, has also said it is undergoing a restructuring process that will replace the chairperson and board of directors with Indian faces. Apart from Chinese employees assuming Indian names, Huawei India is also encouraging its Indian staff to understand their Chinese colleagues better.

Consent applications are the equivalent of out-of-court settlement in the context of violation of securities laws. The terms, which are often the subject of intense haggling between the regulator and the alleged violator, may include punishment such as a fine or even a voluntary ban.
In case of consent applications, typically a bargain is struck depending on the stand of the parties over the proceedings. At the end of the exercise, if the alleged violator is unable to meet Sebi’s terms, the regulator may not accept it.
Similarly, even if the internal committee of Sebi accepts the terms, a high-powered committee may still find it unacceptable. In either situation, it is always open to the parties seeking consent to make a fresh application with revised terms and seek renegotiation.
Historically, Sebi has entertained second consent applications for review, provided the offer is an improved version of the previous offer.
For any consent application to be processed, there should be pending proceedings in connection with that case. Those pending proceedings can be either with Sebi, or SAT or even the Supreme Court.

Sometime back somebody was asking in our shoutbox as to how many bilateral FTAs our country has with other countries. Normally, scouring the Ministry of Commerce web site should lead us to the results. But the info doesn't come easily.
Take a look at this graphic. This gives some decent info.

The finance ministry will soon circulate a consultation paper on the proposed inter-regulatory co-ordination body as it looks for an institutional mechanism to avert the Sebi-Irda type of regulatory stand-off. The paper will outline the structure and functions of the FSDC and make it public with comments of all the regulators in a month.
A 1997 report of a working group of the RBI and the high-level committee on financial sector reforms that had suggested ‘strengthening and formalising’ of the high-level coordination committee for financial markets (HLCCFM) will be the basis of the discussion paper.
A joint parliamentary committee appointed to look into the Ketan Parekh stock scam had criticised inter-regulatory coordination and suggested creation of such a framework. HLCC on capital markets is an informal interregulatory forum created in 1992 in response to the stock market scam.
Another committee headed by former IMF economist Raghuram Rajan had also recommended creation of a financial sector oversight body in his report.

Language Lessons

Mix together different elements
eg: There is a deliberate attempt to conflate opposition to or critique of the government’s strategy and actual support for Maoists.

Become or cause to become undone by separating the fibers or threads of; Disentangle; Become undone
eg: The end game in the Greek saga may well be an eventual exit from the European Union and a possible unraveling of the euro as a currency.

Indian Current Affairs