"A witty saying proves
nothing."
—Voltaire (French,
1694-1778)
Word for the day
Groggery (n)
A slightly disreputable
barroom.
Malice towards none
Many historians have
suggested that Sardar Patel once considered trading off Kashmir for Hyderabad
with Pakistan after 15 August 1947.
Supposedly, some princely
states like Jodhpur and Bhopal had also considered going with Pakistan.
Is it true?
First random thought this morning
Travel permissions for Lalit Modi and Vyapam scam killed the
monsoon session of the parliament. ‘Intolerance debate’ and allegations over
National Herald & DDCA corruption washed out the winter session. Its seems
JNU arrests and Rohith Vemulla's suicide case will disrupt the budget session.
The opposition's strategy is clearly to not let the government
function on one pretext or the other. And they are executing the strategy to
near perfection.
The government on the other hand doesn't seems to have a defined
strategy.
A cynical view is that the government's strategy is also not to
let the parliament function; and it is also executing the strategy to near
perfection.
I want reforms. Do you?
I have been insisting that "reform" must be
distinguished from mere administrative correction. A policy measure in order to
qualify as "Reform" must change the status quo materially.
Please allow me to reproduce from what I have been writing in
past:
The businesses, investors and consumers need to assimilate that
economic reforms do not necessarily result in more profit in the immediate
term. To the contrary, economic reforms are more likely to cause pain and
inconvenience in the immediate term as these involve fundamental changes in the
processes and practices of doing business and consuming goods & services.
From this view point, I suggest the following 10 illustrative
reform measure that may change the status quo materially. If you find these are
highly idealistic, and impractical to implement, I beg to differ.
(1) To exploit the
demographic dividend fully and generate demand, accelerate the wealth transfer
process. Defining the upper bound of wealth and introduction of material estate
duty on people above the upper bound could be one method.
(2) Transfer the power to
impose direct taxes, to the local governments.
(3) Transfer the ownership
of natural resources to local governments. Encourage industry and investors to
partner with local governments for setting up business ventures.
(4) Introduce competition
in Railways. To begin with allow point-to-point private railways for intercity
travel up to 100kms.
(5) Transfer all PSUs under
a listed holding company. Majority voting power in this listed holding company may
be owned by Indian citizens with no individual owning more than 1%. All these
companies should be professionally managed with no intervention from the
government whatsoever.
(6) Allow and encourage the
federal states to have bi-lateral trade, labor and resource (water, energy,
logistics etc) sharing treaties.
(7) Bring the Return on
Investment (ROI) for elected representatives close to Zero level, by stripping
all their discretionary powers.
(8) Constitute a Clean
India Regulatory Authority (CIRA). Make all elected representatives from local
government level to the members of parliament accountable to this authority.
Each member should be mandated to submit a quarterly return of cleanliness in
their respective constituency to this authority. The authority should cause an
independent audit of such certificates. A wrong certificate should disqualify
the person from contesting elections for 25years.
(9) Enhance the Right to
Education (RTE) to the Right to Uniform Education (RTUE).
(10) Reorganize farm sector
with "collective farming", "cooperative food processing"
and "national market" at the core.
NITI Ayog needs to tell the government that in past one
decade it is not the farming, textile, railways, or SME but it is the telecom
sector which has provided maximum incremental employment opportunities. And it
happened in spite of the government.
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