Tuesday, November 20, 2012

All the Queen's men...

More and more political leaders from UP are joining Mayawati

Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) boss Mayawati, after inflicting damages on the Congress with her tactics of Dalit mobilisation, has now cast her malevolent eye on the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP). After wooing away substantial chunks of the "saffronised" Brahman vote, Mayawati plans to hit BJP where it hurts the most – the trader or vaishya vote. In keeping with that design, Mayawati has recently brought into its fold two big Bania leaders of the state, Naresh Agrawal and Akhilesh Das. Both of them have assurances of getting party nominations when the time for election comes and it is no surprise that given the Dalit leaders’ rising graph, politicians of all hues are thronging the Chief Minister’s residence in Lucknow to get themselves allotted BSP’s coveted Elephant poll symbol.

According to BSP tacticians close to Mayawati, the leader’s aim is to grab as many seats as she can in UP – the more the better. If the BSP manages to get 50 odd seats in the Lok Sabha from Uttar Pradesh, she would be a strong contender for India’s Prime Ministership after the next general Elections.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.

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Apparatchik par excellence

 Surjeet will be remembered for countering BJP at the height of its saffron surge

On March 23, 1932, the Governor of Punjab was scheduled to visit Hoshiarpur in Punjab. It was also the first anniversary of the martyrdom of Bhagat Singh. The District Congress Committee had decided to replace the Union Jack with the Tricolour at the district courts on the same day. In anticipation, the district administration announced that protestors would be shot. Under duress, the Hoshiarpur Congress Committee backtracked. A boy celebrating his 16th birthday that day had other ideas. He picked up a tricolour mounted on a small stick, dismissed the Congress office secretary’s warning and reached the district court, where a complacent security personnel had become careless. With a single-mindedness - that was to later become his hall mark - a young Harkishan Singh Surjeet climbed the court stairs, brought down the Union Jack and hoisted the tricolour. Though two shots were aimed & fired at him, both missed their mark.

After 60 highly eventful political years, the boy matured into becoming General Secretary of the CPM in 1992, and held that post for the next 13 years, a period marked by the emergence of coalition politics. From then to now, the inveterate agitator for working class rights has struggled: from the unions to a current battle for life at the Metro Hospital in Noida.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.

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Sunday, November 18, 2012

LEE KUN-HEE: FINANCIAL FRAUD

Lee’s exit looks positive, hopefully the law will take its course

Interestingly, within nine days of the news of Lee’s resignation, the Samsung stock had already risen 5.34% higher (as on April 29, 2008). While quoting exclusively to B&E, Joongi Kim, Associate Dean, Office of International Affairs, South Korea, stated, “This reflects the perception that the fundamentals of the company remain sound and that changes do not affect the company itself.” But critically, rather than that, the stock increase could also be due to Samsung reporting a net profit of 2.19 trillion won ($2.2 billion) on April 25, 2008, a whopping rise of 37% from the previous year.

And now comes the bigger question: Can Samsung survive this sudden churn at the top, especially when there are no succession plans in place? More horrifyingly, the long term impact could be far greater for the whole of Korea, considering that the Samsung group firms account for a spectacular 20% of South Korea’s GDP. The group, which has over 250,000 employees, and annual revenues of $160 billion, comparable to even Singapore’s GDP! Noted author Richard L. Ptak, Managing Partner, Ptak, Noel & Associates; believes, “Executives at Samsung had enough advanced notice of these problems and time as well to put a transition plan in place to minimise immediate problems.” His colleague, Simon Forge adds, “The market may be hoping that Lee’s departure will mark the start of the end of cross-holdings between the various parts of Samsung, especially the main jewel, Samsung Electronics, so the business might be better run and shares will be owned by a wider range of shareholders.” Clearly, the exit seems positive; but with the background of so-called presidential pardons ever present, one wonders how transparently and speedily will the South Korean judiciary and government handle proceedings in this high profile case! 


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.

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Wednesday, November 14, 2012

PROFILE: L.K.ADVANI

The BJP supremo distances himself from Kandahar fiasco but questions remain unanswered

As expected, the cat has been set among the pigeons. His former colleague in the then NDA government, Defence minister, George Fernandes, has more or less refuted the BJP chief’s version by saying the decision to send Jaswant was not unilateral and that a clutch of top ministers, including Advani, knew of the decision to put Jaswant on the plane.

The answer, as ever, is likely to be shrouded in history and rhetoric. But it raises several questions. Did the law of Cabinet accountability apply in the case of Kandhar? If it did, it was very bad. If it did not, the crime is compounded. It remains to be seen how the Congress, which is keen to offset the advantage that the BJP is trying to rake up on the Afzal Guru issue, capitalises on the subject.

The BJP has attacked the Congress on soft pedalling the Afzal issue and are demanding death punishment for him. The Congres in an attempt to deflect the attack has called into question the NDA government''s conduct during the Hijack drama. Jaswant Singh by escorting released terrorists had done a job best left to Intelligence and security agencies and not the nation''s Foreign Minister.The BJP had been deeply embarassed over its handling of the Kandahar crisis.

For Advani, who joined the RSS in 1942, it has been a steady but meteroic rise in the Sangh Parivar. He was the Jan Sangh''s Karachi’s branch secretary. Advani was sent to Rajasthan as the Sangh''s organiser in Mewat in 1947. He was actively involved in the Bharatiya Jana Sangh and rose in the ranks of the Delhi branch of that party and was elected on the ticket of that party from 1970 to 1975. Advani was detained under the MISA in Bangalore prison during the Emergency years.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.

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Friday, November 9, 2012

The stork’s at our beck and call!

While every woman dreams of becoming a mother, getting pregnant requires reflection…

It is a generation where numerous give more importance to their careers than to social interactions and many spend more time with their computers than their respective better halves. Confident that technology, like always, will save the day and allow one to procreate whenever one wills, people are allowing their biological clocks to tick away. Buoyed by successful cases like that of Jennifer Lopez, 38, who recently gave birth to twins, and our queen of masala movies Farah Khan, 43, whose triplets are at the moment harvesting gifts from the film community, late pregnancies are becoming the norm, rather than an exception.

Says Dr. Swati, Gynecologist and IVF-fertility specialist, “While 20-40 is an absolutely safe age group to give birth to a child, 40-50 needs to be closely monitored at all points of time and beyond 50 is not recommended.” The pregnancy of the 42-year-old film director Farah Khan had made many skeptical but her delivery of three healthy babies has intrigued all those who wish to postpone parenthood and finish their education or invest in their career; or for that matter because of the belated arrival of their soul mate.

“After 35, the chances of natural conception are really low due to the decline in the number of naturally produced eggs in a woman’s body. It is then that artificial techniques such as IVF are used to produce more number of eggs in the ovary,” clarifies Dr. Swati.

IVF (In Vitro Fertilisation) is an assisted reproductive technique in which egg cells are fertilised by sperm outside the woman’s womb. The ovulatory process is hormonally controlled by helping a woman produce more ova (eggs) and then removing them from her ovaries and allowing sperm to fertilise them in a fluid medium. The IVF specialist further elaborates, “The best quality embryo (tested in the lab) is then placed in the woman’s uterus and it is the age and health of the woman that decides whether the embryo will survive or not.” Keeping the age factor in mind, “more than one embryo (two to three)” is placed in a woman’s body so that “at least one” of them survives.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.

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Thursday, November 8, 2012

TATA CHEMICALS: ACQUISITION

GCIP acquisition gives sustainability but also substantially increases the risk profile for TCL

Moreover, TCL will undoubtedly face integration challenges with the unlisted US firm. Complicating matters further is the size and operating profile of GCIP (Moody). The transaction and the resulting financial & operating profile is still not amply clear. “Exchange rate is another challenge that stands in front of TCL”, Nagraj adds.

Well, the plan looks picturesque perfect. However, the road for TCL as well as the Tata group isn’t an expressway. Tata Group of late has raised lot of debts in financing its elephantine acquisitions and servicing, which might be a problem. There’s a maddening race at Tata Group companies to leverage in-organic growth. Tata Steel acquired Corus for $13.7 billion and another group company Tata Motors is also in talks with Ford to acquire Jaguar & Land Rover for $2 billion apart from many multi–million dollar acquisitions done by TCS, Tata Tea & other group companies in the recent past. And as most of these acquisitions have significantly increased its exposure to the American & European economies, sluggishness in there two markets could place Tata’s plans in jeopardy for quite some time to come.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.

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MNCS: INDUSTRIAL ACCIDENTS

MNCs are hailed as national treasures but their devil-may-care attitude results in tragedies, making them global shame

What can be more traumatic and horrifying industrial accident than the phosgene, the lethal gas leak at Thailand petrochemical company Thai Polycarbonate Co. which has killed one and injured over hundreds. Shockingly, inspite of innumerable calls from many environmental activists of the locality to stop gas leakage which many had already identified, the accident could have been prevented; the company was reluctant to improve its pipelines.

And the fiery explosion with unstoppable fire and smoke at one of the largest oil refineries of British Petroleum in Texas City in 2005 is another example of shameless irresponsibility of global MNCs. Well, it was not the first such accident; BP has a record of fatal accidents, for last few decades. Moreover, it is the eighth largest polluter in the US, releasing over 5.1 million tonnes of pollutants with many harmful toxic gases like carcinogens causing serious health ill-effects to 30,000 people living within three mile radius. But while FBI investigation and imposition of new laws and fines continues, BP’s capability gradually sharpens to refuse or strive to escape from it. Nigeria witnessed the perfect misery out of corporate social irresponsibility. Companies like Shell, Exxonmobil & Chevron are reaping off nation’s oil industry but continue showing through negligence in improving environment, human life and the locality which have been affected by gas leakage and flares in their plants or refineries.

For MNCs, the planet has been served to be their playing-field but they have to follow rules of the game. Their profits cannot plunder people. How long will international community put up with their myopic vision and operations? The deemed-be-national-treasures actually prove to be global shame in neglecting their duties.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).
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