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MEDIA WATCH
Asian Voice - Saturday 13th August 2011
Scrutator’s As a people, the Japanese are among the most diligent, efficient and technologically resourceful in the world. They are not given to wasting money or time on high-profile projects with partners who fail to measure up to their exacting standards. It was therefore encouraging to note their praise for the performance of the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) in completing Phase I of the this mass urban transport system on time and on budget. Consider these facts: the contract was signed in September 1996, with the work beginning in October 1998. The projected timeline was 10 years, it was completed two years and seven months before the stipulated date. The Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), which provided 60 per cent of the financing, contracted the Foundation for Advanced Studies on International Development (FASID) to make a detailed study of the project's construction; having done so, FASID assessed it with the figure 3, the highest possible grade, compliment to the management and engineering skills of E. Sreedharan and his local team.
L to R: Japanese Ambassador Akitaka Saiki with India’s Commerce Secretary Rahul Khullar
Having achieved this benchmark, Japan has decided to move up a gear in its involvement with India's industrial development. Under the new Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA), India-Japan trade is projected to reach $25 billion by 2014, up from the present $12.6 billion. Following the first meeting of the CEPA in New Delhi, Japanese Ambassador Akitaka Saiki said: “This arrangement will facilitate and enhance two-way trade and investment. Over the next decade, duties on 66 per cent of the products traded between the two countries will be reduced to zero. Under the new arrangement , Indian professionals will be able to provide and contribute toward the further development of Japan's IT sector (The Hindu August 1). Japan's role in the construction of the ambitious MumbaiDelhi industrial corridor will be paramount. Watch this space.
Returning to India With declining salaries and job opportunities in the West, the flow of returning IT professionals to India is gathering pace. IT and IT-enabled firms in India hired 28 per cent more non-resident Indian professionals in the first quarter of the current fiscal. It is followed by pharma and healthcare, up by 20 per cent, automobile and manufacturing, up 18 per cent, telecom, up per cent, banking and financial services, up 10 per cent. The survey was done by recruitment consultancy MyHiringClub.com. “The high economic growth in India with many good opportunities has has fuelled the NRI [Non-resident Indian] trek back to India. In addition to that, many USA companies are opening offices in India and hiring greater numbers to target the growing Asian market, said Rajesh Kumar CEO MyHiringClub,com. He said the flow of NRIs would increase as the the salary gaps in India continue to decline in comparison with those
abroad. “Increasing numbers of NRI professionals are now returning because the advantages of doing so outweigh the disadvantages,” Mr Kumar opined (The Times of India July 30).
Corrupt CM falls The Economist (August 6) reports: “News of the sacking of B.S. Yeddyurappa, Chief Minister of Karnataka .....came on July 31. The scandal was that he had not gone earlier. Mr Yeddyupprappa, a power broker in the Bharatiya Janata Party, was indicted on July 27th in a damning judicial report which said he presided over the illegal pillage of minerals in his state, collecting corrupt payments of at least 300 million rupees ($7million). His connections with mining barons extended to making some of them state ministers. “For years Karnataka's iron ore has been plundered, much of it going to China....shady firms made fortunes, not bothering with royalties,permits or safety
standards. Some $3.6 billion were lost in tax revenues.... says the report...... The mining stopped only after an order in April by judges on India's increasingly active Supreme Court...... Mr Yeddyurappa leaves the BJP..... red-faced. It has made a virtue of bashing the ruling coalition, led by the Congress Party, over scams of its own.” A case surely of the coal calling the kettle black.
Growth platform West Bengal appears to be finding its feet after being hobbled for 34 years by the cronyism of the Communist Party-led Left Front regime. Under the new Chief Minister Mamatra Banerjee's Trinamool Congress brush, the state government is constructing a platform of economic and educational expansion, social well-being and responsive politics which is responsible and disciplined. Global management consultancy, technology delivery and outsourcing firm Accenture is keen to ramp up its presence in West Bengal, according to State Industry Minister Partha Chatterjee. Speaking to reporters at the State Secretariat, he said the firm had been asked to submit a written proposal for expansion. “Their outfit here has some 400 people. The facility is located at Unitech Infospace at Rajarhat [the satellite township adjoining Kolkata]. They are looking to have a headcount of 10,00025,000 and would require 100,000 square feet, the minister said. Accenture set up offices in West Bengal in February. Minister Chatterjee has also held meetings with members on India's National Association of Software and Services Companies (Nasscom). He said the West Bengal Government would set up IT hubs in Tier-II towns of Durgapur, Asansol, Siliguri and Haldia. The state would also seek to increase the venture capital corpus to support start-ups (small and medium IT enterprises). Having called on the services of Sam Pitroda, India's telecommunicationsnsns czar, West Bengal has asked Narayana Murthy, the founder mentor of Infosys, to become chief mentor of the state's IT panel. Mr Murthy has accepted the offer with pleasure, saying that he was looking forward to giving his inputs to the panel.
Significantly, Union Home Minister P. Chidambaran was present at the signing of the accord (The Hindu, Frontline July 30).
India's 23rd air chief. The new Air Chief Marshal said that the IAF was on the cusp of a major transformation into a “potent strategic force.” With the IAF inducting state-of-the art equipment, the modernisation would US retreats, India “lead to a major upgrade of our arrives combat potential. While change is the hallmark of growth and Los Angeles Times reporters progress, the biggest challenge W.J.Benigan Ralph Vartabedian facing us is in the coming years (July 22) write: “As NASA is to manage this fast paced retreats from an ambitious change effectively, without human spaceflight programme compromising on high operafor the foreseeable future, fortional standards,”he said. eign countries are moving ahead A fighter pilot with 3,100 with their own multibillion-dolflying hours, Allahabad-born lar plans to build space stations Air Chief Marshal Browne has flown MiGs, Jaguars and SU30s, a warplane his son Omar is trained to fly. Air Chief Marshal Browne is decorated with the An engineering model of a space shuttle made by Vishist scientists at the Indian Space Research Organisation Param Seva and Ati and even take the long voyage to Vishist Seva Medals, and also Mars....... Their ambitions are a the Vayu Sena Medal. declaration of their economic and technological arrival.” Recognising the past NDTV's Science Correspondent Pallav Bagla New Statesman's India issue takes up the story (July 31). (July 18), like the curate's egg, “The Americans recently retired was good in parts. One of its one of their most successful better passages reminded us ,space shuttles, the Atlantis. that not all of India's rise can be Now, India is working towards ascribed to liberal free market realising its dream – to create a economics. To ignore the role reusable satellite launch vehicle. played by the country's statist An engineering model, of what past would traduce history. Jon scientists at the Indian Space Bernstein's draws attention to Research Organisation (ISRO) the centres of technological call the reusable launch vehicle, excellence such as the Indian is currently housed at a secret Institutes of Technology (IITs), facility in Kerala. Covered with which were set up in the 1950s special heat resistant tiles, it will on Prime Minister Jawaharlal soon roar skywards.” Nehru's watch. In the words of A reusable launch system the oft quoted New York Times contrasts with expendable guru Thomas Friedman, they launch systems, where each bred “a phenomenal knowledge launch vehicle is launched once meritocracy, a factory churning and then discarded. “We are out and exporting some of the dreaming about a fully reusable most gifted engineering, comvehicle, there are several eleputer science and software talments we need to understand as ent on the globe.” And Bill of now we have a technology Gates, the founder of demonstrator,” said D r Microsoft, said, “It’s hard to K.Radhakrishnan, Chairman, think of anything like IIT anyISRO. where in the world. It is a very Initially, a reusable launch unique institution.” vehicle will be tested like a rockOne in every five start-ups et and retrieved after falling into in Silicon Valley, California, has the sea. Eventually, it will land been founded by IIT graduates. on the ground like any aircraft. Mr Bernstein again: “Back home, Indian firms are moving New Air Chief takes over to more knowledge-intensive specialisms, such as consulting and systems integration and, in a quirk of globalisation, are setting up their own outsourcing divisions in China and elsewhere.”
Sonia Gandhi's surgery
Gorkhaland deal in hills Chief Minister Banerjee has struck a deal with the Gorkha Janamukti Morcha (GJM) to bring peace to the troubled hill area of the Darjeeling and Terai district, which has long been wracked by strikes and disruptions in search for a separate Gorkhaland. That demand has not been conceded, but the GJM has been given significant administrative and political autonomy and promised substantial financial aid from the state budget and from central government grants.
Air Chief Marshal Norman Anil Kumar Browne
Air Chief Marshal Norman Anil Kumar Browne took charge of the Indian Air Force from retired Air Chief Marshal Pradeep Vasant Naik on July 31. He is
Congress Party President Sonia Gandhi underwent successful surgery for cancer at New York's Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, a world famous institution for cancer care and research. The operation was carried out by Andhra-born oncologist Dr Dattatreyeyudu Nori. Ms Gandhi was accompanied by her son Rahul, who, along with Ahmed Patel, A.k.Antony and Janardhan Dwivedi, will oversee party affairs in her absence. She is expected back in India in a month.