Saturday, February 27, 2010

Relax! It ain’t a giant wave, not yet!

With two IPOs hitting its shores one can finally see some sign of life in the primary market again. But is the market really ready? manish k. pandey acts investor... oops investigator!

At least 50,000 retail investors applied for shares when Mahindra Holidays & Resorts came out with its initial public offering (IPO) in June this year, while the much awaited Adani Power IPO, which closed last week, received a whopping 5,79,000 applications (the Rs.30 billion IPO attracted total bids to the tune of Rs.650 billion). So the entire IPO ecosystem is buzzing with energy and enthusiasm yet again. Investors are seeing this as a chance to party again after a prolonged sobering period.

But then, is the market really ready for the next big wave of IPOs considering that the retail investor is still sceptical to investing in IPOs after the failure of Reliance Power IPO? “Capital markets have short memories. They have the habit of forgiving and forgetting the losses quickly as soon as they start making money again. Investor response to the Adani Power IPO is a case in the point after the fiasco of Reliance Power IPO. Certainly, investors are back into the IPO arena and it’s business-as-usual for them,” reasons Jagannadham Thunuguntla, CEO and Equity Head, SMC Capitals.

Further, the participation of retail investors in an IPO depends primarily upon two factors. Firstly, on the valuations at which the IPO is being made available to investors and secondly, on the state of the market at the time of the IPO (which has a bearing on investor sentiments). If these two factors are in favour, there is little doubt about the success of an IPO. But are these two factors really in favour of the investor as of today? “I believe that the market is ready for quality IPOs. With the return of the risk appetite amongst the investor community at large, there is certainly a demand for newer IPOs. However, to ensure that investor appetite remains unaffected, it’s important that these IPOs are not bunched together within a short span of time,” cautions Hitesh Agrawal, Head – Research, Angel Broking.

But, despite the optimistic signs in the fund raising environment, there is a looming tsunami that threatens any momentum: the Budget has projected a deficit of 6.8% of GDP in fiscal 2009-10 and to finance this, the government will borrow about $80 billion from the market, which may further squeeze out the private sector, directly impacting their fund raising capabilities (Knowledge@Wharton). This statement certainly supports the contrarians who believe that the market still has a long way to go before it can finally take on to the IPO rush. “In reality, there is no rush of IPOs. It’s only media hype. Despite the secondary market being on an upward trend since March this year, we have had only 4 IPOs/FPOs raising Rs.4.43 billion. There was a huge expectation that this Budget would set the right tone for the secondary market, a prerequisite for the primary market. But, the immediate market reaction has shown that it is not very impressed,” avers Prithvi Haldea, Founder and CMD, Prime Database.

Certainly, a sense of stability in the secondary market is critical for IPOs to happen. This is because, one, when the appetite for listed stocks is also minimal, to expect new issues to find favour is hard and second, an issuer has to take a call of a stable market at least 30 days ahead (the time it requires to open and list an IPO). Since this stability or continued buoyancy is still not being seen, IPOs are not happening. In fact, as many as 17 companies are holding SEBI approval (typically the last hurdle in the launch of an IPO) for months now to raise Rs.69 billion, but are not daring to enter the market. “So at best, the next 3-4 months can see only 34 companies (holding and awaiting approval) hit the market,” says Haldea. Raison d’être: Issuers are finding the future outlook uncertain.

This can be seen by the fact that despite nearly 700 companies wanting to do an IPO, just four companies have filed their offer documents with SEBI since April this year. This certainly points out in the direction that the market is not yet ready for another big wave of IPOs.
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Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Outlook Magazine money editor quits
Don't trust the Indian Media!

Friday, February 26, 2010

Friend or President

Obama’s concern over his remarks & speeches came true...

It was a debate of yesterday. It is still a debate of today and would remain so even for tomorrow. And most horrifyingly, racial profiling seems not to leave President Obama either. His recent comment on Prof. Herny Gates’ (no, he has no relations with Bill Gates!) – who incidentally is also a friend of the president- arrest had resurfaced the racial profiling issue and has brought enough criticism as he called the act by Sergeant James Crowley ‘stupid’. For the uninitiated, James Crowley, who is a police academy expert on racial profiling, went to Professor Henry Louis Gates’ home near Harvard University last week to investigate a report of burglary and demanded Gates show him identification. Police say Gates at first refused and accused the officer of racism. Gates was charged with disorderly conduct. The charge was later dropped and Gates has since demanded an apology from Crowley. On this, Obama literally went overboard and commented that, ‘…the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home…”. He further said that, “…there’s a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately. That’s just a fact.” It seems that most of the ‘Whites’ of the US took this comment personally, especially those who are close to media.

However, a deep analysis would clarify why Obama isn’t wrong. America has a long deep-rooted history of discrimination. It is a land where women witnessed discrimination and were not allowed to vote till 1920 (they were allowed only after the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment to the constitution). Blacks’ struggle for their rights is no more a new and jaw-dropping story. Going by the data of the US Department of Justice, by the midyear of 2008, 4,777 black male inmates per 100,000 black males held in state and federal prisons and local jails, compared to 727 white male inmates.

Talking about health, blacks experience disproportionate burden of health diseases, injury and death. Researches show that in 2002, non-Hispanic blacks who died from HIV were approximately 11 times as many age-adjusted years of potential life lost before age 75 years per 100,000 population as non-Hispanic whites. National Urban League’s 2006 annual report revealed that out of 5,80,000 black who are serving sentence in prison, mere 40,000 males complete a bachelor’s degree. Nearly 70% blacks in prison never completed their schooling. Likewise in a 1994 Department of Justice survey of felony, it was found that blacks were more likely to receive prison sentences than whites. As per federal death penalty data released by the Department of Justice between 1995-2000, out of those 682 defendants (for death penalty), the defendants were black in 48% of the cases, Hispanic in 29% of the cases, and white in only 20% of the cases. Following the trend, a study by Wake County, North Carolina found that African Americans had bail set 18% higher than whites charged with similar crimes.

Even in terms of earnings, researches show that in 1964, African Americans’ income was 58% of white people’s income. In 1991, African Americans’ income was just 57% of Whites’ income. Moreover, there is sheer discrimination at the top level in the US army as well. As per the recent data, while 62.7% are Whites in the US army, blacks consist of around 20%. But in the commissioned officer level, merely 12.4% Blacks are holding positions while 73% are occupied by whites. More strikingly, racism was witnessed in America more clearly during the 2008 presidential election. Obama won the support of 95% black voters. When it came to white voters, 43% voted for him while 55% voted for McCain.
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Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Outlook Magazine money editor quits
Don't trust the Indian Media!

Wednesday, February 24, 2010

A SWIFT STRATEGY!

the indian Automotive sector as a whole faced tremendous slowdown in demand but market leader Maruti Suzuki posted mind-boggling numbers. B&E Pawan chabra finds out what the company did differently in the last fiscal to achieve this feat

“In times of a slowdown, people do not prefer to take any risk. They prefer purchasing brands on which they have full trust, and in the automotive market, Maruti Suzuki comes on top on these grounds.” This is what Shinzo Nakanishi, Managing Director, Maruti Suzuki India had to say when asked how the company was able to post stupendous growth in the last fiscal and that too at a time when other auto companies were bleeding.

There is no denying that the Indian automotive industry has seen a slowdown in demand in the last fiscal, but the big daddy Maruti Suzuki, which sells every other car being sold in the country took everyone else by surprise by posting a mind-boggling revenue figure of Rs.20.85 billion for FY09, registering an increase of 16% in the bargain. Despite a 30% dip, Suzuki also posted a cool Rs.12.2 billion net profit, way better than its counterparts.

Maruti Suzuki was quick to identify the effects of slowdown in urban India. “We saw the slowdown hitting urban demand much before others did. So we immediately decided to expand our presence in the rural areas,” avers Nakanishi. The company’s expansion into the rural and the semi-urban areas helped the company to steer successfully from the slowdown blues. “The company bagged a 9% contribution from sales in the rural areas for FY09, which used to be around 3.5-4% till last year,” says Nakanishi. In fact, the decision also made a lot of strategic sense when estimates show that only 19 out of 1,000 people in rural areas own a personal mode of transportation, which leaves very little space for wondering why experts do not label rural areas with very high potential. Maruti Suzuki surely cashed in on this opportunity, but what does the company plan to do going forward with its rural dream?
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Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Saturday, February 20, 2010

‘One best way to a perfect team?

Incentives, rewards are passé. The new way to boost performance, believes an ad agency, is providing employees with an ‘open’ environment!

While we figure out how our ancestors made the best of naturally available ‘accessories’ like leaves, stones and bones, it isn’t difficult to imagine that for our ape ancestors, the body hair was enough to protect them from the temperature differences. But would you believe us if it was said that perhaps people in the prehistoric era or the great apes could perform their tasks better as a result of being stark naked? Well, a new experiment certainly suggests so! When a design and marketing company, onebestway in UK, wasn’t performing too well and was on the lookout for a way to improve its employee performance, they were “approached by Virgin and asked to take part in an hour-long documentary, filmed over a one week period in June 2009. The objective of the film was not to be naked, but to explore the possibility that they became so bonded as a team that they would be comfortable working naked!”

But does working without a stitch actually boost morale of employees? “It doesn’t boost morale, but it does create a better team. We are closer and we work more quickly because we now feel we have nothing to hide from each other. We speak openly to each other whereas in the past we may have kept things inside, hidden. Additionally, we now have more fun! We have shared something unique and fun so, in a way, the morale is better because we are generally more upbeat and proud of who we are and of what we do,” says Michael Owen, Senior Account Manager and Managing Director, onebestway. If we were to imagine the same experiment being conducted closer home, surely there will be very few takers for this rather radical (to say the least) experiment. But weren’t the employees at onebestway apprehensive too? “Yes there were apprehensions but – to be crystal clear – there was absolutely no convincing and encouraging going on at all,” continues Michael. “The nakedness was never anything more than an exciting and rather scary option. A goal yes, but not one that anyone was encouraged to do beyond what they would naturally want to do for themselves, personally. On the last day of work (with clothes on), people were full of excitement.

They were scared too, as this is a scary thing to do, and no one knew what anyone else was going to do. In fact, no one may have taken their clothes off – this was a possibility. People really ended up enjoying this though, and no one regrets doing it. This experiment was a personal journey for everyone involved. It was not a sexual thing; it was just a liberating and interesting experience. It was difficult to concentrate, but not because people were necessarily looking at each other, but because it is just so unusual. The result of the experiment is that we are faster and braver. We are not afraid to share ideas, thoughts, problems and feelings, and onebestway is a much more adventurous creative agency now.” So, while the world may today hold that professionalism is about clearly drawing a line between one’s personal and professional lives, here the two were intertwined in such a way that nothing that is supposed to be personal, remained personal.

So would such a move really end up in office ‘performances’ improving? Well, we don’t know about that, but there’s at least one sure shot advantage – lower expenditure on work clothes!
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Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Friday, February 19, 2010

Kirill on a mission

Is it the Orthodox Church that Putin is using in his new diplomacy?

18 Sep-1 Oct ‘09 issue


For the uninitiated, ‘Patriarch’ Kirill, the newly elected Patriarch in Russia, is alleged to have been and to still be a KGB agent. He has been very successful and influential in diplomatic issues, more regional than global. He succeeded to lay down the foundation of Orthodox Church in Cuba and Venezuela, where he is alleged to have secret political dialogues with top level diplomats like Fidel Castro. He is also one of the richest Russians in Russia with a personal wealth over $4 billion. Compare that with the Pope: rich, yes; millionaire, surely; but billionaire? (Even the Vatican operates on a budget deficit these days; one guesses after the billions of dollars payouts globally on child abuse cases).

Moreover, Russian neighbours including Ukraine are not ready to accept Russia’s presence and domination in their territory. On a key multiple tier diplomatic level, Russia desperately needs to keep its existence and influence in the neighbouring states for its economic benefit and to retain supremacy. Thus, as it has exhausted all possible options, PM Vladimir Putin is now all set to launch another contrivance to resolve political and diplomatic issues with its neighbours – the Russian Orthodox Church. Putin is trying to use the Orthodox Church quite cleverly, with the recent visit of Patriarch Kirill to Ukraine evidence of the same. Analytically, the 10-day visit of Kirill to various churches in Kiev and other cities of Ukraine might not seem very successful at the political level on the face of it, but it seems to have laid down a strong positive foundation in the minds of the common Ukrainians with respect to acceptability of anything Russian.

For the Russian polity, some of Kirill’s recent initiatives have been witness to clear political cognizance. His recent statement that it’s very important to increase Russian speaking presence in EU bodies was one of his first political remarks as Patriarch; interestingly, this statement garnered enough support in the Russian polity. But what separates him from his quite normal predecessors is that fact that he is the first Russian Patriarch in known history to consider himself as the universal patriarch for the world in the Christian Orthodox faith.

That is quite a gargantuan consideration, given the expanse he is trying to address. But as his Ukraine trip showed, he is not without his stable followers. Kirill is also trying to strengthen the current weak relation with Georgia. In addition, his recent statement that “there are no conflicts, even most cruel, [and] no human hostility that could ever destroy the church unity, including the unity between the Russian and Georgian Churches” caught the attention of the intellectual Georgian community. Common Georgians look forward to Kirill’s visit more positively in Georgia now more than ever. Kirill’s further attention to control food consumption for joy and save the world from ruin has increased his general popularity and exemplified his knowledge in world economics. His speech in Crimea to thousands of people including Russian and Ukrainian navy personnel urging them for a peaceful cooperation was meaningful. To top the brilliant effort, Kirill even met Obama recently where he talked about universal Christianity. Most importantly, Kirill now aims to visit Islamic countries in two years to convince them to support minority Christian groups through which he aims to strengthen relations with these countries, a job that he seems to be already succeeding in doing with Cuba and Venezuela.

Globally, when Kirill speaks, he is considered a stable, well read and knowledgeable intellectual, discussions with whom will always result in amicable interactions rather than virulent arguments. With his below the surface closeness to both Putin and Medvedev, it is also being conjectured that Kirill is being encouraged and goaded to visit troubled spots and entities with his overtly zero-political agenda. One has to realise that since the time of Mikhail Gorbachev – in fact, both before and after – rare has been the year when one has seen a sane, non-mafiosi (the allusion obviously is to Putin!) and non-military personality speaking on behalf of the Russian philosophy and movement. Given all this, Kirill’s unique positioning and intelligent networking with stakeholder groups is nothing short of brilliant. If Putin is intelligent – which undoubtedly he is – Kirill should never be openly asked to support or reject any of Putin’s political manoeuvres. The fact is that if Kirill is allowed to simply do what he is doing best, Putin just might see his own popularity ratings soar even in Ukraine. When was the last time you heard about a religious leader in either Chavez’s Venezuela or Fidel’s Cuba influencing public opinion with such power?
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Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Wednesday, February 17, 2010

A cosmopolitan hub away from the ‘City Lights’...

Unity in diversity is what nehru had envisaged when psu townships were set up. a case in point has been nalco, where people from different backgrounds have coexisted since years, says Dhrutikam Mohanty

It took around two and half hours to cover 158 kilometers on NH-5 & 42, the distance between Orissa’s capital city of Bhubaneswar and the industrial hub of Angul. We approached a traffic square some six kilometres ahead of the district headquarters, where the road led straight to touch Angul town and the left and right diversions hived off to reach Nalco’s smelter complex and residential complex – Nalco Nagar.

Angul district of Orissa, which is abundant with natural resources, has turned into a industrial hot spot after National Aluminium Company Limited (NALCO), came up in 1980s. Nalco has set up Asia’s largest integrated alumina-aluminium complexwith a 3,45,000 tpa smelter in Angul, which started commercial production in 1987. Close to it, a captive power plant of 960 MW capacity has been established for uninterrupted power supply to the smelter. Apart from exporting alumina & aluminium worldwide, Nalco has opened stockyards at various parts of the country to facilitate domestic marketing. With its consistent track record in capacity utilisation, technology absorption, quality assurance, export performance and profits, NALCO enjoys the status of a Navaratna company.

Presently, PSUs like National Themal Power Corporation, Mahanadi Coal Field Ltd. and Fertilizer Corporation of India also have mega industrial units in the Angul district. While Jindal Steel and Power Ltd. has come up with a steel complex and a 1500MW power generation unit, Bhushan Steel and Strips Ltd. also has a power plant and an advanced hot rolling plant here.

Nalco Nagar, the residential complex for employees of the company, was established in the year 1984 on an area of 619.88 acres. This well-planned, spacious, clean & green township has 3,583 quarters and it is ‘a home away from home’ for its 4,552 employees. The township will increase in population and size very soon, as construction of new quarters is at the final stages. In order to meet the housing requirement of the second phase of capacity expansion, NALCO has undertaken this project at a cost of Rs.40.91 billion.
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Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Logging in to a new year

Sensational Justin Timberlake, the love and dream of innumerable desirable women has just turned 29. Always just in time with his upbeat songs and sleek dance moves, Justin hasn’t released an album for quite some time but he has still been making news with his collaborations with other artists. Lately, he’s been keeping busy with the film “The Social Network”, which is a drama comedy about the foundation of the social networking site Facebook. We hope this year goes great for the birthday boy.
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Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Monday, February 15, 2010

Retirement worries

10% of officials to retire by April 2010

Some 10 per cent of government officials in Kerala are retiring by April 2010. The Achuthanandan government has declared that from now onwards government officials will retire in a specific month that is April. The step has been taken to address the problem arising in the state Public Service Commission (PSC) and Accountant General’s office following the retirement of its senior officials.

However, the PSC has been accused of not filling vacancies that would lay vacant after the retirement of a large number of its staff. The government, already on unsound financial footing, will have to raise Rs 1600 crore for disbursing retirement benefits to its some 21,000 staff, who will be retiring by the end of April this year.

The government will be forced to present an election-oriented populist budget with an eye on the forthcoming local body elections. The big question is: From where will state finance minister Thomas Isaac get funds? The ruling CPI(M) has already given green signal to its offices for using funds under various welfare boards under their control. The government can ask the boards to remit the funds deposited in various banks to state treasury.

Withdrawing huge amount of more than Rs 3000 crore deposit by these boards from their deposits may cause problems to banks. The PSC is yet to start work to replace such large number of vacancies by new appointments. And it is not easy to replace the experienced hands with fresh ones. The most important thing is that the AG’s office is working overtime to clear the pension papers of the employees who are going to retire this year. There are fears that half of the employees will not get pension in time. Sociologists say this will have a debilitating impact on lives of elderly. However, the government is doing its best to make sure that these people get their dues on time.

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Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Friday, February 12, 2010

Food security - Of lives and livelihoods

Only anticipatory and inclusive action can help us counter climate change risks

M S Swaminathan

India’s leading agricultural scientist

Recent studies have shown that for each 1°C rise in temperature, wheat yield losses in India will be of the order of 6 million tonnes. There will also be similar effects on rice and other food crops. The leaders of G8 Nations who met recently at L’Aquilla in Italy agreed to limit the rise in mean temperature to two degrees Celcius. This will have disastrous consequences on our agricultural production and thereby to national food security. The consequences of global warming are multi-dimensional and can leave unpredictable deviations resulting in various weather conditions and calamities, including erratic monsoon behaviour, water scarcity and higher evapo-transpiration. It will also result in frequent drought and flood, severe pest and disease epidemics, increase in the incidences of malaria and other vector-borne diseases.

Thus, the adverse impact of climate change will cover every aspect of human life. Obviously, the poor nations, who have the least capacity to cope with the fallout, will suffer more adversely than others. There is a need for both anticipatory research and action to address issues related to mitigation and adaptation. At the same time, there is a need for participatory research with rural families in order to enhance their capacity to deal with calamities like droughts, floods and the rise in temperatures.

Action is particularly important in making contingency plans, alternative cropping strategies and compensatory production programmes.

India has about 127 agro-climatic regions. We will have to prepare computer simulation models on different weather probabilities and conditions. This will help to formulate codes of action for dealing with droughts, floods and rise in sea-levels. However, a good weather code should also be prepared to maximise production in favourable seasons. The impact will have to be studied not only on crops, but also on farm animals, fisheries and forests. Seed reserves of alternative crops will have to be built up at the local level. In fact, grain reserves are essential for food security and seed reserves are needed for crop security. Local level Gene–Seed–Grain–Fodder-Water Banks will have to be promoted, so that the community itself will be able to adapt to the new challenges that will emerge.

The impact on women will be even more serious since they are traditionally in charge of gathering fodder, fuel wood, and water and also animal healthcare and post harvest technology. Climate risk saviour crops will have to be identified and multiplied. Rice is one such crop as it can grow under a wide range of altitudes and latitudes.

In coastal areas, bio-shields consisting of mangroves, Salicornia, Atriplex and other halophytes will have to be erected. Sea water farming will have to be promoted through the establishment of agri-aqua farms. This is important since 97 per cent of the total global water availability is from the sea. There is also a need for below sea-level farming since many coastal areas will have to practice agriculture below sea-level as a result of sea water inundation. The latest technologies will have to be taken to fishermen, such as mobile phones providing information on wave heights and location of fish shoals.

Farm animals will have to be protected since livestock and livelihoods are intimately related in most parts of India. Also the ownership of livestock is more egalitarian. Emergency food supply arrangements will have to be made by enriching agricultural biomass with urea and molasses. Ground water sanctuaries will have to be set-up that can be properly utilised whenever there is water shortage.

In the area of mitigation also, local communities can contribute through better farm animal management and conservation farming. Fertiliser trees, such as Faidherbia albdia will have to be planted on a large scale. Finally, there is a need for building a cadre of climate risk managers at the local level. Such managers should be well-versed in the science and art of managing climate aberrations. Every calamity presents an opportunity and therefore, steps should be taken to train vast numbers of community level climate risk managers, who can help in utilising these available resources well. While global thinking and action is essential, it will only be attention to local planning and anticipatory action that can reduce human hardship and save lives and livelihoods.

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Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Thursday, February 11, 2010

Goons rule the roost

Political parties are accused of supporting criminals

Kerala is literate, civilised, peace loving and the law and order in the state is excellent, claim ministers and bureaucrats. But what happened in North Parur near Kochi recently made Keralites hang their heads in shame.

Two gangs fought a pitched battle in a government hospital, forcing patients and bystanders to run helter-skelter. The warring youth in their early twenties used lethal weapons to attack each other. Many sustained life-threatening injuries. The locals blame political parties, including the ruling Left Democratic Front and Opposition United Democratic Front, for giving support to the goons. In this gruesome attack two political parties — the CPI(M) and the Congress — were indirectly involved. For the first time, the clash took place in the hospital. Law and order situation in the state is deteriorating fast. Even the Kerala high court had slammed the VS Achuthanandan government for failing to root out crime.

Recently, a young entrepreneur Muthoot Paul M. George was killed. Following the murder, Inspector General of Police Vinson M. Paul organised a press conference. He told reporters that a knife was used in the murder. The top cop even announced the name of the suspects. He disclosed the details of the case even before the probe had begun. He was pulled up by the court for his irresponsible act.

Above all, CPI(M) state secretary Pinarayi Vijayan publicly accused the RSS of plotting the murder. Earlier, when an Assistant Sub-Inspector was killed on a campus clash at the Changanassery NSS College, Home Minister Kodiyeri Balakrishna blamed the RSS. But, when the case came up before the court, a police officer told the judge that he was forced to implicate RSS in the murder case.

There is no end to the blame game. Both the CPI(M) and RSS have been accused of deploying goons to attack political rivals in crime-prone Thalassery. Some police officials say gangsters are recruited, trained and protected by political outfits. That is why the government has failed to combat crime.
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Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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How this man is destroying the credibility of science

Neanderthal from Nainital

by Sutanu Guru


“The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s and 1980s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. At this late date nothing can prevent a substantial increase in the world death rate.”

Paul Ehrlich, world renowned scientist (alarmist), in his book, Population Bomb, in 1968.

This ‘great scientist, economist and futurologist’’- who actually had a degree in ecology - has won numerous awards despite the brazenly false claims that he has made. Oh yes, Ehrlich predicted in the late 1960s that hundreds of millions of Indians will die of starvation by 1980.

An economist called Julian Simon was so outraged by Ehrlich’s alarmist predictions that he provoked the ‘great scientist’ to make a bet in 1980. Simon gambled that the real prices of five commodities (primarily metals) would fall by 1990 - commodities which Ehrlich was saying will probably disappear from the Earth by then. By 1990, Ehrlich had lost the bet. And after that came the series of honours and awards for Ehrlich; and none for Simon. Most ‘establishment’ figures dismissed Simon as a nut case. Can you explain this travesty of truth, science, fair play and alleged dedication to ‘facts’?

“Glaciers in the Himalaya are receding faster than in any other part of the world and, if the present rate continues, the likelihood of them disappearing by the year 2035 and perhaps sooner is very high if the Earth keeps warming at the current rate."

R.K Pachauri, as the leader of the Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), in the official report released on global warming.

This great ‘scientist’ - who is actually a mechanical engineer - accepted the Nobel Prize on behalf of IPCC despite persistent allegations by real scientists that the IPCC under Pachauri was ‘manufacturing facts’ to fan climate change fundamentalism.

The Viscount Monckton of Brenchley (see column in this issue) has been repeatedly raising objections to the manner in which Pachauri and his team have been playing around with facts to bolster their climate change and global warming case. Most of the establishment has dismissed the Viscount as a nut case while Pachauri and his team won the Nobel Prize! Can you please explain this travesty?

I can’t, and I bet you can’t too, if you pause for a while and think about this whole brouhaha. I mean, here is a man who led a team of alleged scientists mandated by the United Nations to find ‘facts’ on global warming. Instead of facts, the man selectively picks ‘speculation’ and gobbledygook as science and tries his best to frighten the world. And you and I swallow it just as the ‘faithful’ swallow evangelist fire and brimstone that Apocalypse is Imminent and We Have to Pay for Our Sins.

There is no doubt any more that a lot of the IPCC report is a gigantic fraud - Nobel Prize or not. But that is not the problem. What you and I need to worry is how the ‘Malthusian’ alarmists succeed in convincing otherwise reasonable people like us into believing the worst about the future of humanity and the planet. Back in the late 18th century, Thomas Malthus - who happened to be a Reverend - predicted that the world will run out of food very soon. Almost 200 years later, Ehrlich became immortal by ‘repackaging’ the Malthusian scare in modern jargon. Back in the late 18th century, there was genuine concern that the forests of the world would disappear as the demand for firewood was growing exponentially. In the later half of the 20th century, you and I have been subjected to repeated warnings that fossil fuels will disappear and plunge the world into catastrophe. And now of course, you have this global warming warning that people like Pachauri claim will lead to melting of glaciers, more natural disasters like tsunamis, the death of the Amazon and what not.
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Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Tuesday, February 09, 2010

Ready for tie-ups in elections

DMDK chief Vijayakant is now open to electoral alliances

Finally Karuppu MGR (black MGR) Vijayakant, the president of Desiya Murpokku Diravida Kazhagam (DMDK), has learnt his lessons. After continuously receiving severe drubbings in the Assembly by-elections in Tamil Nadu, he has decided to go for alliance with other parties in the coming elections.

In a recent DMDK general council meeting, 24 resolutions were introduced. One of the resolutions said: “The party is ready to work with other political parties. This general council empowers party president Vijayakant to talk to them and take decisions.”

Vijayakant was the most sought-after leader during the run up to the last Parliamentary elections. As the PMK had left the UPA, there was a huge void in the DMK-led Congress alliance in Tamil Nadu. Both the DMK and Congress leaders wanted to have Vijayakant in their alliance. He was summoned to Delhi and Congress leaders negotiated with him.

“Vijayakant was reportedly offered seven MP seats in the Congress alliance. But he refused the offer. If he had accepted it, he would have won all the seats and perhaps would have got two ministries at the Centre. But now after his drubbings in the by-elections, no one wants to join him. If he allies with the AIADMK, he should be ready to bear insult,” says Solai, a political commentator.

In the last Parliamentary elections, his vote share rose to 11 per cent. It is definitely higher than PMK, MDMK, and communist parties. So Vijayakant is still going strong. Assembly elections are due in Tamil Nadu in 2011, where DMDK will be of high value if it joins any parties — DMK or AIAMDK.

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Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Friday, February 05, 2010

Still beating the dead horse, Bo?

Rather than being a voice outside the “Washington echo chambers,” TEAB has become synonymous with a pseudo Treasury doing more harm than good to the Obama administration. It is high time Barack Obama – ‘Bo’ for short – scraps the board, says B&E’s gyanendra kashyap.

One word which aptly describes November 4, 2008, is ‘historic’, and rightly so. It was the audacity of hope that saw a Black family taking up the ‘first’ mantle inside the White House on that day. Interestingly, since then, the rhetoric has been ‘change’ and ‘hope’. Three days after the election, President-elect Barack Obama announced a 17 member Transition Economic Advisory Board (TEAB). Till now, the advisory board which was constituted to offer the President-elect independent voice about how to ensure a strong economic recovery from outside of the ‘Washington echo chambers’, has been functioning more as a pseudo Treasury.

Rather than being known as advisors to Obama on how to navigate through the worst financial crisis in modern history, many of the TEAB economic crew can be dubbed as the Bailout Bunch – not because they worked out a bailout plan, but because, they themselves required a bailout! Consider the DNA of the economic crew and you find that almost half of the people on Obama’s economic advisory board (including Lawrence Summers, Robert Rubin, Anne Mulcahy, Richard Parsons, William Daley, Laura Tyson and Penny Pritzker) have held fiduciary positions at companies which either fried their financial statements or helped send the world into an economic tailspin. The leading figures in the transition team, Lawrence Summers and Robert Rubin have both been enthusiasts of deregulation – a major factor in the financial crisis.

“The state of the economy calls for action, bold and swift, and we will act – not only to create new jobs, but to lay foundation for growth,” was what Obama said to the TEAB. A majority of the members of TEAB had been very instrumental in the economics of Obama’s presidential campaign. Given that, it is surprising that even after a year, Obama’s massive campaign apparatus has been largely still doing nothing, than some members demanding another wave of bailouts – for example, lobbyists within the TEAB, such as Laura Tyson, argue that the $787 billion stimulus package was a bit too small and perhaps what is required is a second stimulus package which will focus on infrastructure projects.

That’s pretty bold and near kooky, considering the fact that as of this month, only $173 billion or 22% of the Federal Reserve’s $1.3 trillion “adrenaline shot” has been spent. This, to the view of many, is too slow, too wasteful, and too unfocused as compared to Obama’s initial intention of bold, swift and employment generation. Chairman Waxman of the Energy and Commerce Democratic Press Office, and Daniel Virkstis, Member, US government’s Committee on Finance, while separately inviting B&E’s queries on the efficacy of the economic advisory board, had not responded till the time of this article going to press.

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Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Tuesday, February 02, 2010

How special is your speciality?

Specialised MBAs are now coming up in various sectors. B&E meets up with specialists within these sectors to find out whether such niche mbas are useful in the long term...

The specialised MBA tag is getting significantly wider in scope and appeal. While we had specialisation streams available in areas like agriculture since many years (IIM-A being a leading example) and in computers too since the past two decades, recent MBA specialisation steams have included eclectic areas like production management (for example, Indian Institute of Production Management’s School of Management; not included in our current survey), petroleum management, hospital management and more; in fact, we even have specialisations in the football and wine industry now (not in India though)! But do they work or not?

When MBA institutes, as well as the students who join them, invest their time and money in specialised MBA courses, they have an agenda in mind. The students want to establish a unique positioning, with a specific target audience in mind; i.e. the sector in question. Sometimes, such a unique positioning is actually driven by an illusory impression created through a short term growth in the sector in question (for example, MBA with retail specialisation); a growth that may or may not last over the long term. Sometimes, the MBA specialisation in itself is created by teaching only a mere handful of subjects – in one university-affiliated institute that we went to, the specialisation course in retail management was restricted to simply three elective subjects. To be fair, we did not deeply investigate the depth that each of these courses had – perhaps they did too – but what was clear was that even students aren’t analysing more important factors like contents, academic orientation and industry interface in the specialisation area, before taking up the course.

Moreover, unless a student is crystal-clear about his/her industry preferences, this could be akin to playing a major career gamble, just based on the hype that the sector generates.

But then, there is an other side to all this too – the better side. Retail is a perfect example, where the managerial crunch runs in thousands, with the industry being brilliantly unorganised. Gibson G. Vedamani, former chairperson of Retailers Association of India, goes as far as to claim, “The potential is very high in retail Industry as today 50% of the retailers look for specialised MBAs in their organisations.” Pantaloon started off a novel initiative when it tied up with management institutes for providing retail management courses. The trend has surely kickstarted now.

But while Damodar Mall, Group Customer Director, Future Group, agrees that MBAs in specialised retail courses adjust faster to the practical world than normal MBAs, he cautions, “I think most of the B-schools still don’t provide any education in retail management. Of course, the situation has started changing now. A few B-schools are offering retail specialisation courses but their standard has to be at the international level.”

Even the real estate sector hires specialist MBAs. Ashutosh K. Beri, MD, Property & Asset Management, West Asia, Jones Lang LaSalle tells B&E, “The specialist MBA’s knowledge of the specific subject is advantageous; but again, it depends entirely on the individual aspiration and attitude [whether the specialist MBA qualification works].” Hospitals are another major area where specialised MBAs are making their impact. Dr. Nandakumar Jairam, Chairman & Group Medical Director, Columbia Asia Hospitals Pvt Ltd, shares with B&E, “In the hospitals and medical care industry, during the last three years, the demand for MBAs has increased by 40%. A majority of this demand is for specialised MBAs who know how to manage a hospital.” Areas like construction management, infrastructure, banking, aviation, tourism, pharma, et al, also have MBA courses dedicated to focused learning.

There are interesting applications in the IT industry as well. According to Somnath Baishya, Head, Talent Planning and Campus Recruitment, Infosys Technologies, “We hire MBAs for their strong abilities on client interfacing and people management skills. Over the years, we have brought in MBAs for roles on the business side, such as Associate Consultants, Business Analysts in HR on various tracks such as Recruitment, Organisational Development, Training, Employee Relations etc. We also built a niche hiring program for MBAs with 3 years of prior work experience for our Sales requirements.” IT engineers can improve their prospects in their sector by procuring an MBA, specialising in a niche field within IT. Ravi Shankar B, Senior Vice President and HR-Head, India Operations, HCL, gives his take to B&E, “The IT industry is all about project delivery.

For Complete IIPM Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Monday, February 01, 2010

Four Seasons Hotel, Dublin - IIPM News

Located at a fair distance from the busy business centre and the shopping square, Four Seasons Hotel is just the perfect place to come back to after an exhausting day of exploring the city. Surrounded with greenery, the hotel is a paradise for those who seek convenience and quiet. A stay at Four Seasons enables one to live those few days in authentic Irish style.

The view: Since the city centre is not too far away, some of the hotel rooms open to the lovely cityscape. A warm cup of coffee (or tea if you please) with the view of the landscape and roofscape of Dublin from most of the rooms, is enough to make your mornings special.

Archi type: At the Four Seasons, Dublin, they proclaim their architecture ‘handsome’ since it strikes a perfect balance between traditional Irish design with a contemporary touch. The hotel offers 197 guest rooms and suites in addition, and some of them provide their guests the luxury of private terraces too. The bright, yet subtle, upholstery is meant to make the hotel look majestic. Accessorised with cozy sitting areas which are designed such that one can bask in the sunlight, the hotel provides guests with every comfort in the book.

Bon appétit: One of the unique characteristics of the Four Seasons is the wide selection of restaurants offering different cuisines, each built to suit a different mood. The finest International and Irish cuisine can be savoured at Seasons Restaurant. A casual alternative to this restaurant is The Café. The Lobby Lounge is a more formal place for breakfast, light lunch or cocktails. Drinks can best be enjoyed at The Bar and The Ice, designed with chic and stylish artwork, just right to cater to a casual mood for beverages and some light snacks.

Around the corner: Four Seasons Hotel is located close to the city centre, which is the major hub of all the shopping areas, museums and theatres. The hotel also allows one easy access to the Irish countryside. Also, an evening or morning stroll around the hotel is an interesting option if one wants to enjoy the beauty and the greenery of Dublin.

From under the carpet: Although accommodation at the Four Seasons is the best bet in Dublin, one would have to ensure that the booking is done much in advance since Four Seasons is also the choice when it comes to organising weddings and other events, which keeps the hotel booked all year round.

In essence: Four Seasons Hotel defines luxury along with ‘home-like’ comfort with all kinds of facilities for its guests, be it 24-hour internet or gym /spa facility or for that matter mouth-watering cuisines. There's little else that one can ask for in a vacation!
For Complete IIPM Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2009


An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Read these article :-