LOOKING AHEAD Sanjay Mehta
Indust ry, and part icularly SM E's are rarely interested in polit ics or polit icians, except to t he limited ext ent t hey impact his/ her part icular indust ry. He or she normally feels t hat it is difficult enough running an enterprise in t his count ry w it hout poking t heir nose into areas w hich normally don't concern t hem. After a decade and more of liberalisat ion in t he 90's and t hereafter, t here was a great wave of opt imism and some act ual achievement s w hich percolated dow n to all of us such as: •
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Criminals – There has been an ent ry of criminals
into virt ually every polit ical part y w hich should be a cause of great concern to t he Nat ion as a w hole. One can hardly expect such persons to act for t he benefit of t he larger good. In such a societ y it is hardly a surprise t hat t he dirt y scum have come to t he surface. It was in t his sorry background t hat t he words of Shri Anna Hazare resonated in our heart s and for a t ime all of
ground meant t hat I did not have to bow and scrape before t he Joint Chief Cont roller of Export s & Import s t o get a licence to import a few tons of steel. M ost of t he st uff was on t he Open General List (OGL) and I could pick up t he phone, order and pay for it by filling up a simple form. Tax rates w ere rat ionalised, M odvat , Cenvat and VAT int roduced. After t he init ial hiccups, t here was a great improvement in tax compliance as a result .
us w ere caught up in t his social revolut ion experiment .
Communications Revolution: Start ing w it h t he
Consumer Revolution: All t his set off a massive
consumer revolut ion and t he availabilit y of a host of product s from cars to colognes and a mindboggling number of brands.
When t his seemingly reached a dead end, t here was t he spectacular rise of Arvind Kejriwal and t he Aam Aadmi Part y. Somew here along t he way, AAP seems to have lost t he plot and suddenly it is t he NDA and Narendra M ody everyw here. If t he newspapers and opinion polls are to be believed Narendra M odi and t he NDA are all set to sweep t he polls. What does it mean to us and our indust ries in t he TTC Indust rial Area? •
It w ill herald for t he first t ime in independent India a business minded person as t he Prime M inister
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The likelihood of General Sales Tax(GST) being implemented quickly is very high.
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Narendra M odi himself and t he NDA candidate in Thane have expressed t heir intent ion to abolish Local Body Tax. However, t he stand of t he UPA w ho present ly rule t he State is not clear.
Even as t he count ry and t he world opt imist ically talked of economic breakt hroughs and pitted t he Indian Elephant against t he Chinese dragon, w e snatched defeat from t he jaw s of victory as w e do many t imes in cricket .
alternative but to believe that the NDA [if it comes to
Corruption- has seeped into every part of our lives
power as predicted] w ill lift us out of the morass w e
and has become a monster w hich t hreatens to
find ourselves. India itself has no option but to embrace
swallow all t hat w hole generat ions have st ruggled
peace and single-mindedly progress.
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to build. M onst rous scams and massive stealing of
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Simplification of economic policies – w hich on t he
STD/ ISD and graduat ing sw ift ly from t he RAX of Sam Pit roda to mobiles, computers, t he internet , cable TV, Satellite TV and a profusion of Channels. This is a cont inuing revolut ion w hich has t ransformed all our lives. •
our Nat ural resources is t he order of t he day.
That the UPA w ho w ere riding high on the back of economic reforms should have brought themselves and India to this sorry situation in 10 years is unbelievable. All of us have, in fact, been left w ith no