by admin | May 25, 2021 | Economy, News, Politics
New Delhi : The Bharat Bandh called by the Congress and Left on Monday against rising fuel prices and tumbling rupee evoked mixed response in the country as the opposition closed its ranks against the Modi government. The BJP dubbed the protest a failure.
The day-long shutdown affected normal life in Odisha, Karnataka, Bihar, Kerala and Tripura and triggered a mixed response in Gujarat, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Haryana, Jammu and Kashmir, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan.
But it was mostly ineffective in Mamata Banerjee-ruled West Bengal.
Shutdown enforcers resorted to blocking roads and rail tracks disrupting traffic in several parts of the country. In Bihar, a critically ill two-year-old girl died on her way to a hospital in Jehanabad town apparently due to a road blockade.
Bandh supporters allegedly resorted to violence and clashed with the police in some parts areas, prompting the ruling BJP, which dubbed the shutdown a “complete failure”, of accusing the Congress of creating an “environment of fear” by violently enforcing the shutdown.
Normal life was paralysed in Odisha with vehicular movement and train services thrown out of gear as Congress workers blocked roads and trains. Hundreds of Congress activists were arrested. The Railways cancelled 12 trains while schools and colleges were closed.
Normal life was hit in Bihar with the shutdown supported by the Rashtryia Janata Dal (RJD), Left, Hindustani Awam Morcha and Jan Adhikar Party of Pappu Yadav.
Hundreds of Congress and other opposition parties leaders and workers took to the streets. Shutdown supporters blocked national and state highways, disrupted rail and road traffic for hours and stranding thousands of passengers.
Demonstrators clashed with police in several places while dozens of vehicles in Patna were damaged.
In Karnataka, normal life was affected as public transport kept off the roads across the state. Schools and colleges were closed although state and central government offices remained open. Global software firms like Infosys and Wipro functioned normally.
Life was thrown out of gear in BJP-ruled Tripura with most markets, shops and business establishments closed and private and passenger vehicles off the roads. Government offices and some banks were open but employee attendance was low.
But the Bharatiya Janata Party claimed that Bandh was a failure in Tripura.
BJP-ruled Uttar Pradesh saw stray incidents of protests. The response was mixed in Jharkhand, with few shops closed and long route buses not plying.
In flood-ravaged Left-ruled Kerala, public vehicles went off the roads but private vehicles plied in many places. Shops, markets and establishments were shut.
In Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, bus services were affected and many private educational institutions remained closed.
There was a mixed response in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state Gujarat, where a large number of educational institutions were shut while many vehicles remain off the roads.
In Maharashtra, the shutdown elicited mixed response in urban centres but secured widespread support in the semi-urban and rural hinterland which have been severely hit by the fuel prices and its cascading effects.
In Mumbai and other cities, large numbers took to the streets, railway stations, bus depots, and other public places. But suburban trains, BEST buses, schools and colleges functioned normally. Shops and commercial establishments downed shutters in many localities.
The shutdown was mostly ineffective in West Bengal. Banks, educational institutions in Kolkata were mostly open while trading activities in the city were more or less normal.
The ruling Trinamool Congress supported the issues on which the shutdown was called but opposed the strike in line with its stated anti-strike policy.
Meanwhile, in the national capital, Congress President Rahul Gandhi led the opposition’s show of strength, staging a foot march in support of the Bharat Bandh from Rajghat to Ramlila Maidan in the heart of the city.
The rally drew leaders of the Janata Dal-Secular, Trinamool Congress, Rashtriya Janata Dal, Nationalist Congress Party, Loktantrik Janata Dal, Rashtriya Lok Dal, All India United Democratic Front, Revolutionary Socialist Party and Aam Aadmi Party. Also in attendance were former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi.
Manmohan Singh hit out at the BJP for “miserably” failing to control fuel prices.
Rahul Gandhi flayed Modi for his stoic silence over rising fuel prices, tumbling rupee, Rafale fighter jet deal and agrarian distress in the country.
The Left parties took out a separate rally in the national capital.
Meanwhile, the BJP said the hike in fuel prices was a “momentary difficulty” and claimed the shutdown was a complete failure.
“Bharat Bandh has been unsuccessful. We condemn the violence being used to instil fear among citizens across the country,” Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Banking, Economy, Finance, Markets, News, Politics
Mumbai : The Shiv Sena on Friday again attacked the BJP for demonetizing Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 bank notes in 2016, calling it a “butchering of the Indian economy” which it said even the Reserve Bank Of India (RBI) had conceded.
The hasty and ill-advised move was not ‘patriotic’ but created “economic anarchy” in the country as subsequent developments proved, it said in editorials in the party organs ‘Saamana’ and ‘Dopahar Ka Saamana’.
While announcing demonetization, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had promised that it would spell the end for corruption, black money, fake notes and terrorism, but the effect has been opposite, especially in the past two years.
“The RBI’s latest annual report says Rs 1.47 lakh crore, or 99.30 percent, of all the spiked notes have returned. Around Rs 10,000 crore have not come back into circulation. This means, a mountain was dug and not even a mouse came out, but the country’s economy was shattered for catching this elusive rodent,” the Sena said.
The result was that the country was facing an economic mess, the small and medium enterprises have been destroyed, the service sector was in crisis, housing industry was in doldrums, small and medium farmers were suffering, and scores of lives were lost in bank and ATM queues after demonetization, said the Sena.
Added to this was the fall of the GDP and the country’s pace of development, with the Indian rupee plummeting to its lowest levels in 70 years and terrorism continuing unabated.
Moreover, the government spent over Rs 15,000 crore in printing the new currency notes and Rs 2,000 crore to distribute them, Rs 700 crore to replace the existing ATM networks.
“However, despite the huge economic losses suffered, the government still continues to harp on ‘Vikaas’ and its attitude is akin to Nero fiddling while Rome burnt. Demonetization was a sheer ‘evil’ (aghori) measure,” said the Sena.
Targeting the RBI, the editorial said it was the custodian of the country’s wealth but the Governor (Urjit Patel) did nothing when it was being looted, for which he should be hauled before the courts.
“We were shown the dream that demonetization is a revolutionary step which will eradicate black money forever. However, hundreds of crore of black money of politicians are deposited in banks. A couple of Gujarat (cooperative) banks lead in this and some newspapers there had published the news of impending demonetization months in advance,” it pointed out.
The BJP’s ally at the centre and in Maharashtra said that those who opposed demonetization were treated as “traitors” but the truth is now revealed in the RBI’s (2017-18) annual report.
“For those who labelled (former PM) Manmohan Singh a ‘fool’, the reality is out and it is clear that demonetization was a fiasco. The RBI is saying so,” the editorial said.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Economy, News, Politics
New Delhi : India is on track to surpass Britain next year to become the fifth largest economy in the world and to emerge among the “big three” global economies by 2040, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said on Thursday.
He said while India’s per capita income may still be modest, but the size of the economy was very large and growing at a fast pace.
“This year, in shear size, we have overtaken France. Next year, we’re likely to overtake Britain. And therefore we will be the fifth largest (economy in the world),” Jaitley said at the inauguration of the new building of Competition Commission of India.
The Minister said that other economies in the world were growing at a rate much slower than India’s.
“It won’t take a very long time to overtake those economies which are growing at 1 to 1.5 per cent if we grow at 7 to 8 per cent on an average. And if you look at 2030 or 2040, we are unquestionably going to be – as world projections are – among the big three in size,” he said.
Jaitley added that India still had a lot of avenues for pushing up growth over the next 10 to 20 years.
“For instance, growth is more in the north, south and the western parts of the country. The eastern side still has to grow faster. That’s an area where we will see growth. Women employment is an area where we will see their contribution coming into the growth process.”
The Minister added that as the market and the economic activity expand, the role of the Competition Commission of India would also expand.
“Our population is large, our consumer base is large, the size of the economy and its potential is going to be large, and hence the market is also going to be very large. And if the market is large, we will certainly have aberrations in the market, and therefore the need for you to step in is also going to be there,” he said.
“So over the next 10 to 20 years, your role is going to expand.”
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Banking, Corporate, Corporate finance, Economy, Finance, News
Mumbai : The amount of banned currency notes that did not return to the system post demonetisation stands at Rs 10,700 crore, or 0.7 per cent of the old lot of notes, an RBI data showed on Wednesday.
This amount has been arrived at based on the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) annual report for 2017-18, after deducting the amount of Rs 15.31 lakh crore of high-value currency notes that returned to the banks, from the Rs 15.42 lakh crore worth such notes in circulation before the demonetisation of November 8, 2016.
A partial explanation for the missing Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes is provided by the report that out of the total fake notes detected at the RBI, their share during 2017-18 was higher at 36.1 per cent, compared with 4.3 per cent during 2016-17.
This was because of processing of a large volume of specified banknotes (SBNs) withdrawn from circulation by demonetisation, the report said.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Economy, News, Politics
Mumbai : Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Monday said the challenges to Indian economy were mainly from external factors such as rising oil prices and the US-China trade war, but India’s macroeconomic fundamentals were strong enough to overcome those challenges.
Predicting higher growth rate than the projected 7.5 per cent for this year, he expressed confidence that India would continue to grow at a “high trajectory growth rate” over the next several years and would overtake the United Kingdom next year to become the fifth largest economy in the world.
“Even this year, our growth rate is going to be somewhat higher than what conventionalists are projecting,” he said while addressing the Annual General Meeting of Indian Banks’ Association via teleconferencing.
Making his first public address after over a three-month gap due to his kidney transplant surgery, Jaitley said it seemed to be an optimistic picture that India was continuing its run as a fast growing economy in the world.
“Our macroeconomic fundamentals have been reasonably sound, and if at all any gets impacted, it’s not going to be on account of any internal factors. The management of the economy has reasonably disciplined itself in decision-making as far as our internal factors are concerned,” Jaitley said.
“Our challenges are mainly external — the unpredictability and volatility of the oil prices, which is on account of either created shortages or some geopolitical issues. And I hope that these challenges will not go on indefinitely. They have to resolve themselves – that’s how the world moves,” he said.
“Coupled with this is the challenge of trade wars. Though we are not an active participant in this, but the impact and footprint of that can be seen in India, particularly when there is a tendency of some large economies to either devalue or undervalue their currency,” the minister said.
However, Jaitley said it was incumbent on the government to ensure that India’s domestic parameters were strong so that the economy had the resilience to face the challenge of those external factors.”
“High growth rate, fiscal prudence, a lot of economic activity in the domestic market, and a series of reforms which have taken place over the last few years – they have certainly helped the economy”.”
The minister, however, acknowledged the banking crisis as a key domestic challenge and said the government had learnt lessons from it and was now putting systems in place in order to strengthen the institution.”
“One lesson that I have learnt is that when we desire to have a high growth rate, it must be accompanied by strong macroeconomic fundamentals. If we start sacrificing our macroeconomic fundamentals in order to temporarily push up the growth, then we are hurting ourselves elsewhere and that is bound to strike back the economy at some point of time,” Jaitley said.
Referring to the indiscriminate lending during the previous UPA regime, he said this was exactly what happened around a decade ago.”
“Indiscriminate lending to chase growth at the cost of macroeconomic fundamentals was a policy mistake… And the result of this has been that we ended up creating surplus capacities… We ended up funding projects which were unable to service the kind of debt that they had created — and needless to say some had indulged in fraudulent practices,” Jaitley said.
And once that error was committed, the next error was the evergreening of loans and eventually, the banks struggled to find methodologies to make recoveries, he said.
However, Jaitley seemed positive about the future of the Indian economy which has now become the sixth largest in the world overtaking France last month.”
“Barring China which grows at 6.5 per cent, we are the only ones growing at 7.5 per cent plus. The other four in the top six are much bigger economies but growing at a relatively smaller rate. We may overtake one of them next year itself because the gap is very narrow.”
“And over the next few years we have to target those who are number four and three and overtake them. With kind of investments and economic activity taking place in India… I am reasonably optimistic that over the next several years we are going to continue to grow at a high trajectory growth rate,” he said.
—IANS
