Warrier's blog

The cost of caring for the elderly - The Hindu My VIEW: A touching analysis. But, the canvass is too narrow, covering only the personal experiences and anxieties and broad urban awareness about the problems of elders. The 100 million senior citizens now living in India whose population is expected to double by 2030 are in as many situations and surrounded by different types of problems depending on their economic, family and health status. The massive range of options of Retirement Homes(the Rs 15,000 p m and upwards category) cater to very limited number of clients. Majority who need to stay outside their own families/homes are dependent on facilities provided by government or charities. If a change is to happen, government will have to prioritise care of the elders and act. M G Warrier 

Change of guard at SEBI, State Bank? - The Hindu My VIEW: January 1, 2016 Continuity at the top This refers to the post “Change of guard at SEBI, State Bank?” by Manojit Saha and Ashish Rukhaiyar (The Hindu, January 1). Perhaps, of late, there is some perceivable recognition at the highest level that there should be continuity of leadership at the top in government, statutory bodies and PSUs. It is quite likely that in a majority of the individual cases reviewed here, the incumbents may get reappointed for another term when their present tenure expires. But that is a temporary respite. When a host of reform-related initiatives are on the drawing board, unless there is a compelling reason, ‘retirement age’ or tenure given at the time of initial appointment should not come in the way of subsequent extensions for positions at the top. Time is opportune to have a review of retirement age and tenure of appointments at the highest level in government (including judiciary),

WEEKEND LIGHTER: THANQ, GOOGLE! As the world was busy celebrating arrival of another LEAP YEAR, which also means a once in four year opportunity to plan a birthday celebration for about 50 lakh humans born on February 29, WEEKEND LIGHTER tried to find out how M G Warrier, its author had faired in making his presence felt in the media. After listening to Sundar Pichai, like many others, WL also has become a Google Fan. So, the methodology adopted to check media presence was ‘Google search’ for m g warrier plus the name of various publications (newspapers and magazines). It was a pleasant surprise for WL to find that comments/articles published years back came live on the screen. To add to the surprise, some had accessed Warrier’s Blog and published some contents in much more attractive ways(of course, after correcting English- these days, there is no auto spell-check on Warrier’s PC!) than they appeared originally. WL, on behalf of M G Warrier, thanks GOOGLE and every reader who h

Economic inclusion | Business Line The Hindu Business Line, January 1, 2016 Letters Building on Sansad Mahal Manasi Phadke’s piece, ‘Wah! Sansad Mahal’ (Tweakonomics, December 31), will, in all probability, be skipped by policymakers as just another expression of envy by a scribe who missed the new year party @Sansad Mahal. But it makes a case for revisiting all the real estate owned and occupied by ‘government’, from Rashtrapati Bhavan down to the remotest village office. Perhaps, Rashtrapati Bhavan, sprawling over 320 acres, may be in a position to accommodate several Central government offices and residences of VVIPs, if modern building patterns and technologies are used. So too with the Raj Bhavans. Think of the resources such a change would release. Maybe, Central and State governments will be able to wipe out their entire deficits. Will someone take this message to the finance ministry before it goes into quarantine to put together the Budget? MG Warrier Mumbai

Wah! Sansad Mahal | Business Line My VIEW: December 31, 2015 Building on Sansad Mahal Manasi Phadke’s piece “Wah! Sansad Mahal” (Business Line, Tweakonomics, December 31), in all probability, will be skipped by policy makers as just another expression of envy by a scribe who missed the new year party @Sansad Mahal.  But a second reading makes out a case for a re-look and overhaul of all real estate properties owned and occupied by 'government', from Rashtrapati Bhavan to the remotest village office in India. Perhaps, Rashtrapati Bhavan premises, sprawling over 320 acres of land, may be in a position to accommodate several central government offices and residences of VVIPs, if modern building patterns and technologies are put into use. Similar would be the case with Raj Bhavans. Think of the resources such a change will release. May be, central and state governments may be able to wipe out their entire deficits.  Will someone take this message to Finance Ministry

Holistic inclusion | Business Line My VIEW: Yet to access and study the Mohanti Committee report. Excerpt from BL editirial: " Overall, the report has over 70 different recommendations cutting a wide swathe across subjects ranging from crop loans to cashless payments. While most of them appear worthy of implementation, the difficulty will lie in the fact that their success is dependent on transparent information-sharing and coordination among many agencies. Nevertheless, this comprehensive approach to financial inclusion needs to be taken seriously. A multi-disciplinary agency at the Central level should be set up to put these ideas into action." Emphasis mine. Wondering why existing organisations like NABARD cannot grow up and perform these roles.  M G Warrier

Kamadenu: 14. Pankajalochana. #Tiruppavai #krishnafortoday  ... : 14. Pankajalochana. #Tiruppavai #krishnafortoday Visit Keshav's Blog 'kamadenu' occasionally. The art content will cool your mind! M G Warrier

Quantum Physics and Indian Philosophy - Moneylife My response to an online comment: MG Warrier   5 hours ago in reply to Narendra Doshi Om Puurnnam-Adah Puurnnam-Idam Puurnnaat-Purnnam-Udacyate Puurnnashya Puurnnam-Aadaaya Puurnnam-Eva-Avashissyate || Om Shaantih Shaantih Shaantih || Meaning: 1: Om, That is Full, This also is Full, From Fullness comes that Fullness, 2: Taking Fullness from Fullness, Fullness Indeed Remains. 3: Om Peace, Peace, Peace. Source:  http://www.greenmsg.org

‘Quality of disclosure determines governance’ | Business Line My VIEW: Enlightened views from the living 'Kautilya' of today's India. Perhaps space constraint has squeezed the content of the interview. The opportunity could have been used also to get the views of M Damodaran on possible overhaul of governance in government too, as the person has been through the government hierarchy and has had an opportunity to view corporate governance from close quarters. There are several aspects from top level appointments in statutory bodies and PSUs to board nominations and back-seat driving in Human Resources Management in government-owned organisations impairing the efficiency of governance about which Damodaran would have made disclosures which would have added value to the present efforts to improve quality of governance in government and public sector. BL can catch up with this resource person once again, to  speak exclusively on governance in government. M G War

December 30, 2015 Wages Code This refers to the report “Inter-ministerial Committee to Finalise Wage Code, Small Factory Bill Today” (Economic Times, December 30). It is heartening to find that at least outside the ‘house’ legislators are doing serious legislative business. A stage has come when reforms cannot wait for normalcy to return in legislatures. As the labour code on wages will be subsuming Minimum Wages Act, 1948, Payment of Wages Act, 1936, Payment of Bonus Act, 1965 and Equal Remuneration Act, 1976 the new legislation will have far-reaching implications on the wage and remuneration structure across public and private sectors. Both central and state government will have a role in effective enforcement of the provisions of the legislation. This points to the need for meaningful consultation among all stakeholders at the drafting stage of the law. One expects that the new Wages Code will factor in the adequacy of wages and compensations from the social security angle

High Financial Illiteracy - Moneylife My VIEW: An interesting analysis. GOI, state governments, regulators in the financial sector, financial institutions including banks have an important role to play in improving financial literacy. The recent developments in the Indian financial sector have aggravated the situation. Technology and social media are also doing havoc by attracting people who do not have the skills or awareness about the ‘apps’ they are forced to use by aggressive marketing techniques, to get into traps. Recently I came across a ‘website’ in the name of RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan, with RBI emblem as profile picture. When approached by RBI, the service provider reportedly said, unless something ‘harmful’ is posted, they cannot ‘block’ the page. I do not know, what is meant by ‘harmful’. When technology was not so developed, I remember a TV Channel was sued for a damage of some crores of rupees, by an individual for flashing his photograph in place of the

RBI's concerns on banking and economic stability - Moneylife My VIEW: That the problems of Indian financial sector are much deeper and may need policy initiatives from GOI additional to usually debated regulatory reforms, implementing new bankruptcy code and further dilution of Centre’s stakes in public sector banks(PSBs) is being flagged in various reports published by the Reserve Bank of India. In this respect at least, India’s central bank is transparent and it is the media and other stakeholders including GOI who are ignoring strong signals given by RBI including in the latest Annual Report (Refer Governor’s Overview: RBI Annual Report 2014-15). The revelation that ‘ while the PSBs accounted for 72 per cent of total banking sector assets, they accounted for only 42 per cent in total profits during 2014-15, with the private sector banks(PVBs) surpassing the PSBs in the share of total banking sector profits’ may not surprise anyone who has been following the pressu

Soumya Kanti Ghosh A study and some interesting findings/suggestions on Public Provident Fund Scheme. M G Warrier

Letters: Boost for social security | Business Standard Letters Business Standard Letters December 28, 2015 Universal social security* This refers to Dilasha Seth’s report “Govt mulls universal health insurance” (Business Standard, December 28). From financial inclusion to the present proposal to provide ‘universal healthcare’ and several labour-friendly initiatives like improvements in facilities like maternity leave and computing gratuity for employees in the organised sector, the social security content in Centre’s approach to social security concerns in general has been very encouraging during the year that is coming to a close. Measures like the one aimed at universal health care will have a positive impact on the other human development indicators also. At this stage, government need to think in terms of a more focussed policy approach to social security. Many initiatives in the past aimed at supporting the poor to improve their living conditions have suffered due

Been grateful enough for it all? - The Hindu Excerpts: " Do you feel grateful now? I don’t hope so. Gratefulness sometimes sounds insane, but it really isn’t. It is a way in which an individual could gain joy. This joy makes your heart as light as a feather. I think your life would be simply empty without these adorable people in your life. Without them being a part of your life, your life wouldn’t be a life. Feel grateful that you have these people in your life. Feel grateful for having parents who could do wonders to make you happy. Feel grateful for having a friend you can find nowhere else. Feel grateful for having teachers who are the sole reason for what you are now. Feel grateful for having such wonderful people around you who help you, when you need them the most. Feel grateful for being a part of this beautiful world. Feel grateful for just being who you are. Indeed, gratefulness defines who you are." Read the full article using the link provided. You will feel gr

Govt mulls universal health insurance | Business Standard News My VIEW: December 28, 2015 Universal social security This refers to Dilasha Seth’s report “Govt mulls universal health insurance” (Business Standard, December 28). From financial inclusion to the present proposal to provide ‘universal healthcare’ and several labour-friendly initiatives like improvements in facilities like maternity leave and computing gratuity for employees in the organised sector, the social security content in Centre’s approach to social security concerns in general has been very encouraging during the year that is coming to a close. Measures like the one aimed at universal health care will have a positive impact on the other human development indicators also. At this stage, government need to think in terms of a more focussed policy approach to social security. Many initiatives in the past aimed at supporting the poor to improve their living conditions have suffered due to criticism about

From the Readers' Editor — The nostalgic yardstick for today’s texts - The Hindu My VIEW: Excerpts: " Early this month at the Music Academy in his acceptance speech, singer Sanjay Subrahmanyan, Sangita Kalanidhi-elect, gave me a hint as to how to look at this issue rather dispassionately. “I do not subscribe to the view that the standards of music have fallen, even though this has been a documented refrain from the time the British published an official gazette and noted the same in the middle of the 19th century,” he observed. This may be true of some of the criticisms levelled against contemporary journalism too." Please use the link to read full article M G Warrier

Caste and the battle for secularism - The Hindu My VIEW*: Excerpts from the article: " In such a scenario, the way forward for anyone hoping to save India’s tattered secular fabric from being torn to shreds by Hindu majoritarianism would be to make the non-dvijas — the OBCs and Dalits, who together constitute 60 per cent of the population — impervious to a supremacist ideology that seeks to foster a synthetic Hindu pride by positing select religious minorities as inferior to the lowest of the Hindus in the social order of the varna system. But this is only possible through social empowerment and visible economic advancement of a great number of Dalits and OBCs, so that there is no basis left for a sense of caste-based superiority. Of course, it is easier said than done." Read full article using the link. M G Warrier *Disclaimer: Posting articles @mgwarrier.blogspot.in does not mean M G Warrier wants to promote the views contained in them.

Walks of life | Business Line My VIEW: December 26, 2015 BLink  walking special The Hindu Business Line BLink (December 26) celebrating BLink’s 100 th edition, is a collector’s item. But treasure it after at least one reading, cover to cover. The cover story, ‘Walks of life’ is spread in 20 out of 24 pages of this issue. By habit, many of us keep away well-researched articles on serious subjects like those packaged here for reading ‘later’ and that ‘later’ rarely happens. For me, any discussion about long walks brings back childhood memories. Like Dad’s long walks carrying me on his shoulders to reach destinations miles away during late 1940’s, class-mates reaching school late everyday as they came walking/running several miles(1950’s) and pilgrimages to Sabarimala and Kottiyoor which involved several hours of walking in 1960’s. Things have changed. For many. Now walking is either related to livelihood, to reach places of work or on doctor’s advice. In the latter case,

Interest rates — time to change course | Business Line My VIEW: With reference to the observation "Hardly had the dust settled on the US Fed rate hike when there was a clamour that Indian interest rates should be lowered. With the progressive increase in the US Fed funds rate, it would be sheer harakiri to reduce RBI policy interest rates. The RBI should not remain accommodative. It should be made clear that we have reached the end of the interest rate reduction cycle.", though for Fed Reserve it was a 100 per cent rise in the base rate, the reactions from the markets world over were not commensurate with the noices before the Fed decision. Without belittling the significance of movement of Fed rates, one is tempted to point out that RBI has give weightage to domestic factors and as pointed out in the article, a longer pause may be necessary before further cut/s in base rate in India. M G Warrier

Financial stability | Business Standard Editorials My VIEW: M G Warrier 2005/1-D, DREAMS LBS Marg, Bhandup (West) Mumbai-400078 (+919349319479) To The Editor Business Standard December 25, 2015 RBI and financial stability This refers to your editorial “Financial stability” (December 25). Perhaps, problems of Indian financial sector are much deeper and may need policy initiatives from GOI additional to regulatory reforms, implementing new bankruptcy code and further dilution of Centre’s stakes in public sector banks(PSBs). The revelation that ‘ while the PSBs accounted for 72 per cent of total banking sector assets, they accounted for only 42 per cent in total profits during 2014-15, with the private sector banks(PVBs) surpassing the PSBs in the share of total banking sector profits’ may not surprise anyone who has been following the pressures on PSBs to do ‘directed’ business with management and HR-related constraints emanating from their government ownership. The s

Letters: Not the RBI's fault | Business Standard Letters

Amartya Sen — 'National security is one component of human security’ - The Hindu Excerpt from Prof. Sen's interview: G Sampath: " Your work has helped shift the focus of development from economic growth to concerns about the quality of human life. Is it time now for another shift — from human development to social justice, as the true measure of a nation’s progress towards being a more developed society? Amartya Sen: When we came up with the Human Development Index (HDI), the idea was to have a simple index that would capture something better than the GDP figures. If you look at the very first Human Development Report (HDR) of 1990, we invoked the idea of justice in a number of cases. I think as human development grows as a discipline, justice will increasingly become a bigger component of it." Read full interview using the link above. M G Warrier

Cautionary tale | Business Line The Hindu Business Line, December 24, 2015 Letters Institutions as change agents This refers to Vinson Kurian’s report ‘Set up climate change management fund with Nabard at the helm’ (December 23). Despite resistance from several quarters, India has clearly announced the country’s intention to move fast on the development path and it is comforting to find that institutions are playing a proactive role in this. The changeover of Planning Commission to NITI Aayog, RBI’s intention to introduce several new institutions in the financial sector and financial products to bring idle gold into the mainstream and encouraging banks to go aggressive on financial inclusion, GOI’s willingness to have meaningful dialogue with the Opposition outside the house when the latter obstruct proceedings in Parliament, and the Centre’s use of electronic and print media to elicit and share views of citizens on development issues are all signs of a maturing democracy. The de

Kamadenu: 7. Kesava. #Tiruppavai #krishnafortoday  : 7. Kesava. #Tiruppavai #krishnafortoday

WEEKEND LIGHTER: 2016 FOR YOU Weekend Lighter wishes its readers  MERRY X'MAS HAPPY, PEACEFUL, HEALTHY AND PROSPEROUS NEW YEAR. Season’s Prayers/Greetings/Wishes (A poem by E X Joseph) LET’S     WELCOME Let’s welcome the season of joy.  of light the season of beginnings fresh and bright of    the end of an year of strife and fright of the birth   of an year of peace, of rule of right. Let’s hear the message of everlasting prosperity of harmony and brotherhood for all posterity of an earth that bathes in the waters of simplicity of a heaven with rainbows that shine with ecstasy. Let’s open our eyes to the star that has crossed frontiers to give mankind    the promise of a world without borders to show the light that will ensure a future without wars to fill every home with love that knows no sorrow, no tears. Let us join our hands with innocent, humble    shepherds and see the manger where a poor, ill-clad     mother

‘Set up climate change management fund with Nabard at the helm’ | Business Line My VIEW: December 23, 2015 Institutions as change agents This refers to Vinson Kurian’s report ‘Set up climate change management fund with Nabard at the helm’ (The Hindu Business Line, December 23). Last couple of years, despite resistance  from several quarters, India has clearly announced the country’s intention to move fast  on development path and it is comforting to find that institutions are playing a proactive role supporting the people’s movement forward. The changeover of Planning Commission to NITI Aayog, RBI’s intention to introduce several new institutions in the financial sector and financial products to bring idle gold into the mainstream and encouraging banks to go aggressive on financial inclusion, GOI’s willingness to have meaningful dialogue with opposition outside the house when the latter obstruct proceedings in parliament and Centre’s use of electronic and print media t

http://epaper.tribuneindia. com/c/7761103  My VIEW: Dr Charan Singh's article on 'Need for Old Age Pension in India' Social security needs of elders is an issue, if not addressed now, can lead to serious social problems, then affecting citizens of all ages. M G Warrier

SEBI clarification | Business Line Hindu Business Line, December 23, 2015 Letters RBI and NBFCs This refers to, ‘RBI keeping close watch on systemically important NBFCs’ (December 22). During its existence, RBI has been performing the role of protector of India’s financial sector, going beyond its mandated role and assuming for itself a developmental role additional to the normal core functions of central banks elsewhere. This approach has had an impact on its resources, including manpower, and while RBI has to own up for the weaknesses of the financial sector, it has not been getting adequate support from the government or other stakeholders. NBFCs, cooperatives and MFIs may need regulatory and supervisory support which may not be amenable to technology-enabled solutions that work in developed countries. By the time off-site financial statements show signs of incipient weaknesses in such institutional arrangements, it may be too late. The remedy may lie in more frequent on-site

‘RBI keeping close watch on systemically important NBFCs’ | Business Line My VIEW: December 22, 2015 RBI and NBFCs This refers to the report ‘RBI keeping close watch on systemically important NBFCs’ (The Hindu Business Line, December 22). During all of its 80 plus years of existence, Reserve Bank of India has been performing the role of protector of India’s financial sector, much beyond its mandated role and assuming for itself a developmental role additional to the normal core functions of central banks elsewhere. The role played by RBI in institution-building in the financial sector and its outreach to the grass-root level in the matter of financial inclusion may not have many comparable international models. This approach on the part of RBI has had an impact on its resources including manpower and while RBI has to own up for the weaknesses of the financial sector, it has not been getting adequate support from the government or other stakeholders. NBFCs, cooperatives