The government assessment on the hosting of the Commonwealth Games in October this year is largely overstated, a new report says and adds that the games will not do much good for the tourism sector. “Mega events have little to do with bolstering tourism, and in fact can have a negative impact,” said Bangalore-based research organisation Equations (Equitable Tourism O
Secularism comes in two editions: the first is your garden variety, vanilla flavour; and let`s call the other critical secularism or sustainable secularism. If you are told that there were riots in some city and before condemning the violence if you need to know which community was at the receiving or which party is in power there, then you are an advocate of the simplified version, a darling o
Intensifying Naxal violence has Gopal Krishna Pillai, the top-most bureaucrat in charge of law and order, on the hot seat. Every other major cause of unrest in the country – and there have been many – adds to his onerous job. In this interview with Sweta Ranjan, Pillai, the home secretary, talks about the centre’s strategy aga
A recently published Airports Council International (ACI) report says that Mumbai`s Chhattrapati Shivaji International Airport is the fourth-best in the world after Seoul`s Gimpo International, Canada`s Vancouver and Taiwan`s Taipei International Airport. Read the report
When I look back on all the events pertaining to the Bhopal gas leak disaster in their synergic perspective, I get inclined to cast verdict on ourselves in words I borrow from G K Chesterton: “These are peoples that have lost the power of astonishment at their own actions….They have grown used to their own unreason; chaos is their cosmos; and the whirlwind is the
“India is fifth worldwide in total existing wind power capacity and is rapidly expanding many forms of rural renewables such as biogas and solar PV,” said United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) in its report titled ‘Global Trends in Green Energy 2009’. The report also lauded India’s effort for giving incentives to renewable energy through its m
It’s been five years since the centre launched the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) and sought to change the way India developed and governed its cities. Some cities have availed of funds under this mission. But, as a recent nationwide survey of sanitation facilities across urban centres revealed, India is yet to have even a single clean, green city. In an intervie
Foreign Minister Krishna had an epiphany. He woke up one morning and decided that unless he chastised the home secretary publicly life would be incomplete, no birds would sing and his inhouse astrologer would not be able to charm the stars out of their hostile houses. Yes sir, there was still unfinished business over the fiasco called the Indo-Pak talks. So, in his profound wisdo
“Low-carbon FDI is significant and its potential huge,” says the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) in its latest report, released on Thursday. The World Investment Report-2010, had a special focus on ‘investing in a low-carbon economy’. It estimates that ‘FDI flows into three key low-carbon business areas -- renewables, recyc
“Show me the face, I will show you the rule.” This popular bureaucratic adage proved to be prescient for a 1974 UP cadre IAS officer Pulok Chatterjee who is tipped to be the next cabinet secretary. Decks are virtually cleared for Chatterjee to get an unhindered four-year term as the Union cabinet secretary when the present incumbent retires next year. Chatterjee’s
Manila-based Asian Development Bank (ADB) has projected India`s growth at 8.2 percent in the current fiscal, which is lower than International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) revised prediction of 9.4 percent for India this year. Finance minister Pranab Mukherjee had said that the govt was sticking to a more conservative 8.5 percent growth at the CII summit on Monday. While
Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit has learnt a bitter lesson in the interlink between the tax rates and the revenue raised. Believing in the dangerous myth that higher taxes means higher revenues, she raised the value-added tax (VAT) on diesel from 8.5 percent to 20 percent in Delhi in April. She hoped that the higher tax on diesel in the seemingly affluent capital would get more revenue for
“Inflation would settle in the 6 percent to 8 percent range by end of the year against the government’s projection of 5 percent,” said Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) in its latest economic outlook survey. “The only difference being that primary inflation will start to cool down from August 2010 onwards as the ‘negativ
In accepting the recommendations of the Planning Commission on the Food Security Bill, the National Advisory Council (NAC) has acknowledged what the government has been saying all along, that food entitlements cannot stretch beyond the food supply. Thus, the food security coat must be cut according to the available cloth. At this point, agriculture cannot sustain universalise
In June, 2010, temperatures soared to a new high making the month as the warmest ever in recorded history. A study released by the America’s climate agency the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said, “Last month’s combined global land and ocean surface temperature made it the warmest June on record and the warmest on record averaged for any April-June and
Driving at 110 kmph on the Jaipur-Ajmer highway is hardly the place to carp about the decisions of the almighty babus managing our national highways strategy. But apart from the smooth ride on some select highways, whim and nepotism is fast becoming the rule of the game. So much so that the babus seem callous about the obsession of their boss, minister of road transport and highways Ka
There are more poor in eight Indian states tahn there are in 26 African countries, according to a report brought out by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Oxford university. The study says that there are more poor people as per Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) in eight Indian states - a total of around 421 million in the states of Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Mad
Not only is the Indian quality of life lamentable, we as a nation suffer from low end-of-life care also, says a new survey. It placed India at the bottom of the table of 40 nations surveyed. The report - “Quality of Death” index was prepared by the Economist Intelligence Unit. Shamingly, India is placed below Uganda in the list of 40 countries. The report mentioned th
The newspapers, sometime back, carried the picture of a security personnel, lying on the ground and half a dozen young hooligans beating him with sticks, in Srinagar. Nobody was trying to stop such elements from thrashing the helpless policeman. I was reminded of my tenure as inspector general of police, in Srinagar, during the worst period of 1988, when the terrorists had kidnapped the
Indian metros - despite their sheen inside India - have not found a spot among the top 20 cities to live in globally. None of the Indian cities did well on any of the five key indicators considered in a study, whose eresluts are reflected in the rankings. The study took stock of five key livability indicators – good governance, urban infrastructure, environmental friendlin
