Warrier's blog

Zubin Mehta and the unequal music - The Hindu WITHOUT COMMENT! m g warrier 

An open letter to a daughter - The Hindu Interesting thoughts, shared by a mother. M G Warrier

RBI focus still on currency stability - The Hindu Online comments posted on September 28. 2013: The concluding observation: “If Dr. Rajan has indeed been subject to a quick conversion, it bodes well for the autonomy for which the RBI has come to be respected.” makes me recall my following comment in an article in The Global ANALYST(Sptember 2013): “Once he gets a feel of the constraints with which RBI has been having a tight rope walk in harmonizing the monetary policy in the recent past with the unbridled fiscal policy guided by pulls and pushes of a coalition government at the Centre, Rajan is unlikely to toe the GOI line on fiscal deficit and Current account deficit, particularly that of the Finance Minister. As a corollary, the FM may not find an RBI Governor who will support his pet project FSLRC which has produced a report aimed at making RBI a ‘department’ of the Finance Ministry. The FM who put his Secretary Dr. D Subbarao as the Governor of RBI hoping to have a submissive G

In public interest | Business Line Hindu Business Line, September 27, 2013 Letters In public interest This refers to the report “Reserve Bank bans 0% interest schemes”(September 26). This is a welcome move which was long overdue. Deregulation and liberalisation in India has been variously misunderstood as freedom to do whatever you want, so long as you are able to remain within the contours of established law, or, if you are willing to pay penalties when caught. RBI’s present guidance should be taken as indicative of the regulator’s concern to protect public interest. Government(at Centre and states) and corporates should review the tax and pricing policy to bring transparency and simplicity. The review should cover tax exemptions, subsidies and various ‘offers’ including discounts and prizes. M G WARRIER, Mumbai 

VITALINFO: My View on "7th Pay panel formed, retirement age ... : Viewed from any angle, this is a welcome move. This time, the Commission will not have to hurry through the processes of consultations and...

Govt begins Aadhaar rescue after SC rap | Business Standard Online comments posted on September 25, 2013: M Damodaran observed in the preface to his report on Regulatory Reforms  for improving Business Environment in India(Damodaran Committee report submitted on September 2, 2013) that “If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail!” Of course, he was refering to the concerns relating to raising economic growth which created an impression that everything in the business environment seems to be a candidate for reforms. The Aadhaar story read with the two other legislative efforts relating to SC ruling preventing convicted lawmakers from contesting polls and the ten year exercise on NPS, gives an impression that political leadership will go ahead with its agenda using the power to legislate(hammer, as every objection is a nail!), irrespective of the advice from judiciary and executive. No one would have had any objection, had the legislative process been democratic and tr

How terribly strange to be 70 | Business Line Hopefully, this well-researched and forcefully argued piece on future of old age care in India will open a debate that will lead to a review and overhaul of existing pension and old age care systems in the country and an immediate revision of the structure of the new National Pension System(NPS). NPS has built-in deficiencies emanating from: Its introduction without legal mandate about ten years back and remaining in suspended animation without clarity on its structure and future. The scheme’s inability to attract members from outside the captive clientele, namely new employees who joined government and public sector employees who joined service after December 31, 2003. Of the NPS corpus of about 40,000 crore only 12 per cent is from outside this category. M G Warrier, Mumbai  

Aadhaar not must for availing of benefits: SC | Business Standard An excerpt from my article on Direct Benefit Transfer published at Moneylife.in on January 7, 2013 is given below: M G WARRIER “AADHAAR In addition to its normal share of constraints including inadequate   funding   and non-availability of in-house expertise and resultant dependence on external agencies including banks and government departments, the lack of experience betrayed by Nandan Nilekani in dealing with the invisible hands of government has been making the progress of the UID Project relatively slow. First came the proposal for a drastic cut in budgetary allocations for the UID (from Rs7,500 crore to Rs4,000 crore, which meant only 10 crore UIDs will be possible initially against 60 crore planned) and now even the safety parameters assumed for producing UIDs are losing credibility. The problems in universal applicability of biometrics and the need for adequate funds for implementing the project to cover th

ONAM 2013 E X Joseph*              I walked in despair in the wet misty air              wondering where my  good, old  Kerala has gone?              Where are the flowers pink and blue and white              yellow and mauve, big and small, smiling so sweetly?              Where are the rice fields, green and fresh and rich              and   the pretty maids singing while working?              Where are the boys and girls gathering flowers              and the laughing men playing in the fields?              Where are the untiring men  ploughing the fields              and the cheerful women milking the cows?               And then I saw a tiny,little pink flower in the cranny of a wall               smiling at me with all the abundance of creation               a frail, weak woman carrying a load all with love               a girl with her  school bag laughing and running to her friends               a farmer planting the seeds with never-

An exercise in continuity - The Hindu A well-balanced view. We needed an expert like Dr Rajan  to interpret RBI in a language that will be understood by his generation which is in charge world over. The Indian leadership in every field is 10 to 25 years older than the average age of world leadership. The observation "The crux of the matter is irrespective of who is in charge there cannot be a radical policy shift from one Governor to another" says it all.Till such time the external interests and internal disruptive forces succeed in totally dismantling the RBI, it will be difficult to divert RBI's attention from real national priorities. There is a nurtured institutional culture in this institution which has been accepted and further supported by most of  the Governors and Deputy Governors upto Dr Rajan.  M G Warrier

RBI's old guard junks priority sector status for export credit | Business Standard I think, people are getting confused about concessional credit, adequacy of credit and priority sector classification. M G Warrier

FSLRC members handsomely “compensated” for their “contribution” - Moneylife Transparent norms for compensation packages, where public funds are involved (Here no need to get confused about the meaning of public funds- Organisations dependent on funds from public, whether as tax or as share capital contribution are all handling public funds and have only ‘Trusteeship’ rights on the resporces) need to be evolved. Thank you Moneylife for exposing the absence of any norm in this area.   M G Warrier

An economist-manager at the helm of RBI - The Hindu There is a TATA touch in this balanced presentation M G Warrier

Clinging to a discredited dogma - The Hindu

A new work culture in Kerala - The Hindu Let us make money by writing about lazy Keralites! Online comments: Many thanks Dr for raising this issue. UPA II will happily move another Bill to abolish middlemen and make all payments to the 'real person' who sweats by cash transfer to AADHAR-linked bank accounts. Perhaps, the argument can be stretched further.We should write more about lazy Keralites and 'make money'! from:  M G WARRIER

India does not have structural problems: Raghuram Rajan - Moneylife

RBI to get glimpses of Rajan's technical acumen: Rajiv Takru | Business Standard THERE IS A WELCOME CHANGE IN APPROACH RAJAN EFFECT? M G Warrier

Gold management needs a makeover | Business Line This article was published in HBL during April 2012. Being posted here again as some of the suggestions contained in the article have become relevant in the present context. M G Warrier

RBI query on gold stock in temples evokes Hindu outfits` ire

VITALINFO: Huge Challenges Await the New RBI Governor - M.G.W... : ....................To conclude, I must say, the appointment of Dr. Rajan has raised huge expectations. Can the new RBI governor help the ... Please read my article published in Global ANALYST, September 2013(Copied below)  M G WARRIER ARTICLE PUBLISHED IN Global ANALYST , September, 2013 BANKING LEADERSHIP Raghuram Rajan Huge Challenges Await the New RBI Governor Dr Raghuram Rajan, the former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund and one of the leading economists of our times, is a fast learner and capable of finding solutions to the toughest of economic and monetary problems. He was among the few who successfully predicted the global financial crisis of 2008. As Chief Economic Advisor to the GOI, he has played an important role in devising strategies to steer the economy through difficult times. Now in the new role as the head of the country’s central bank he is faced with a