India Political Blog

India’s pharma giants are famous for producing many low cost drugs for the developing world (an example is the provision of the life-saving anti-HIV cocktail of drugs that can increase the life expectancy of AIDS afflicted patients; the cocktail was pretty expensive, but when manufactured by Cipla, the cost had been drastically reduced making it affordable to larger sections of a poor country). At the same time, big pharma (whether it be domestic or foreign companies) are always on the lookout for making a fast buck. Some of the past practices over the world include extending the life of a patent by a very minor change, or by charging a higher price for the product if this was a monopoly. In India, the regulator has started threatening the pharma companies that have been involved in charging excessively for their drugs:

Pharma majors like Cipla, Ranbaxy and US Vitamin (India) may have to cough up over Rs 1,563 crore for overcharging customers on price-controlled medicines. Through a nation-wide survey done over a year, National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) has found that pharma companies were overcharging or selling without price approval more than 530 items used for various ailments including cancer and asthma. Several antibiotics and pain-killers are part of the list of medicines listed out by the survey which found overcharging in case of 350 products and sale without price approval in case of the remaining 180. The findings of the survey were based on 850 samples collected from 19 cities.

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ICICI Bank is the largest private banks in India, and caters to a large number of people in terms of banking accounts, loans, etc. However, there have been many cases in the past where the bank has been penalized for harassing a person (do a search in Google and you will find many such cases); and it is not only ICICI, but many other banks who have been fined for such behavior. Such harassment by banks has started attracting the attention of the RBI and courts (more so, the various consumer forums), who have started fining the banks and using harsh language against the banks. Refer the details of this case (delivered in end-April 2008):

LUCKNOW: In a major judgement, the district consumer forum (DCF) here has directed the ICICI Bank to pay Rs 5 lakh as “exemplary compensation” to Dr AS Pradhan, a city-based doctor, for subjecting him to severe mental torture by forcing him to repay a loan which was never disbursed to him. Pradhan had applied for a Rs three lakh loan in the ICICI Bank in November 2003 for purchasing a second hand car.
He was asked to pay margin money of Rs 10,000 and complete the formalities with a promise that the loan would be sanctioned in a month. But as the sanctioning of loan got delayed, the person from whom Pradhan was supposed to purchase the car sold it off to another party.

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For the last several years, there has been an ongoing political discussion about whether the United States is following the correct policies with regard to getting rid of terrorism emanating from the region of Pakistan and Afghanistan, rated by many as the most likely place to generate the next big terrorist attack in the Western World. Part of that discussion is whether the United States has relied too much on Pakistan, and not pushed it hard enough to get rid of the entire support structure for terrorism in the tribal border regions. Implicit in this discussion is that Pakistan is not really doing all it can to get rid of terrorism in the region, to take on the vast support for the Taleban and terrorist elements in the wild ungoverned regions. Now, Pakistan has always claimed that this was a difficult task, that these regions have historically had a reputation for resisting any attempts to enforce a central governance; and that periodic pushes by the Army and border guards have only met fierce resistance and let to further embittering of the population in these regions, thus leading to a further support for the so-called resistance fighters.
At some point it is difficult to blame only Pakistan for this. The US has had a huge amount of analysis that claims that there is a lack of governance, civil reconstruction, and enough boots on the ground in Afghanistan. What was required that there be a push to strengthen the regional paramilitary forces, combined with an active and huge construction program in these regions of Afghanistan and Pakistan. It is when the affected population see only a military push, and the same old bad conditions with no scope for improvement that they tend to move further towards the extremist position. And in Pakistan, the Bush Administration seems to have had a blinkered vision with taking the actions of President Musharraf at face value, not applying the pressure that might have made things much better. For example, there has never been much pressure to improve the condition and training of the regional paramilitary force that might be able to help turn the tide.

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This was about one of the most anticipated news in recent times on an individual politician level. The Speaker, Somnath Chaterjee has been a member of the CPM for a long long time, having been a Member of Parliament from the party for 10 times now. For all appearances, he has been an articulate and devoted member for the party. At the same time, as the party drew up its leadership over a period of time, it was clear that Somnath Chaterjee was not going to be a candidate in the succession chain, and given that he is 79 years, not likely to happen in the future also.
There was a lot of buzz that he wanted to the President, but the CPM did not agree to this (leading to some disappointment with the party politburo). At the same time, even though the BJP keeps on accusing him of acting in a biased manner, he seems to have given the office of the Speaker his all. It was a familiar sight of the Speaker trying his best to bring an unruly house to control (and mostly failing). So, there must have been the feeling that he enjoyed a constitutional post, with the prestige associated with it, and above the dictates of any party.

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The BJP suffered massively in the vote of confidence for the Congress Government over the nuclear deal. In the event of a loss for the Opposition, even though the Left would lose its position from a commanding influence on policy over the past 4 years, somehow, the Left is not a party that you associate the notion of loss with. If they lose influence, they will go back to being an ineffective opposition with their 50+ MP’s, with people not really caring about their position on issues; or that they at one time had a major influence on the policy of the Government of India.
On the other hand, the BJP had much more to lose. It is the main opposition party in waiting, and seemed to be ready to strike at the time when the Government was weak because of the withdrawal of the support by the Left party. The party seemed to commit a lot of effort, but was soon overtaken by Mayawati; the same story, most parties that could be with the BJP were already with it, while Mayawati, after her embrace by the UNPA and the Left, was an attractive upcoming secular power. All this having happened, the BJP had to suffer actual disaster during the election; unable to keep all its MP’s with it:

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For the past several days, ever since the UPA Government announced that a trust vote will happen on the 22nd, there has been an incredible amount of horse-trading ongoing to secure support. Everybody knows how Amar Singh ran circles around Shri Karat of the going-into-decline Left and left it in a position whereby it now has no influence and no leverage over the policies of the Government. So, one can assume that Amar Singh did what he could to win over rival MP’s, while Mulayam Singh led the effort to ensure that the MP’s of the Samajwadi Party did not bolt (seeing the final result where the Congress won it fairly comfortably, one can assume that all the efforts were successful). Who is left with egg on their faces ? Both the BJP that staked a lot of its political power on this no-confidence motion, and the Left, which went from a position where it was guiding the hands of power (a remote-control if you may) to a position where it does not count for anything more for the moment.
Given the low profile that Uttar Pradesh has played in the past few years in terms of a Government at the center, it was surprising that politicians from the state played such a key role. Mayawati was like the magnet, drawing in the likes of defectors from the SP, from the Congress, pulling in Ajit Singh (will the Government now rename the Chaudhury Charan Singh Airport back to another name now that Ajit Singh did not support the Congress ?).

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For some time now, many supporters and those slightly leaning towards the BJP are very troubled by the stand that the BJP has been taking towards the nuclear deal. In the beginning, there was a lot of waffling towards the deal, with Advani once urging the party to review the deal. In addition, Brajesh Mishra, seen as close to the former Prime Minister and tall leader, Atal Behari Vajpayee, has come out in open support to the deal (even though the rest of the party is shocked by his stand). For most of the middle class supporters of the deal (especially for those who care about this topic), the deal is making the best of a bad situation, and it enables closeness towards the US, something that is seen as natural to India (left leaning people will disagree, but if you leave aside the blinkers of a non-aligned world, would you rather be more friendly with the US than with say states such as Iran / Venezuela / Russia / China).
The BJP / NDA must be seeing the current separation between the Left and the Congress as a chance to bring the Government down, and then do what ? Even now, I believe that the BJP is no closer to getting to power. It will win in the states where it won the state elections, but there are vast stretches of the country where it will come a cropper, such as Uttar Pradesh where Mayawati is reigning supreme, in states such as Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, where the same level of development has not happened as in Gujrat. And in the current horse-trading for getting votes in Parliament, Mayawati seems to be getting all the publicity. She is the one to whom many undecided MP’s are going towards. Read this:

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One always thinks of the Government as being slow, not able to catch onto the latest technology trends, and using old procedures. However, this is not always true, and the Government has been able to surprise us many times by showing its ability to adopt some of the newer technologies, and at the same time, do so with the required safe-guards. So, first we had the railways ticket booking website, http://irctc.co.in, and then we have the Tax Authority of the country trying to use all modern trends for tax filing. So, if you refer to the website (link) for Income Tax India, you will be able to download forms, and read more about details related to your tax filing. The website even has a very basic Tax calculator (link)
The entire procedure for paying tax online is initiated at this link (link), with a more detailed explanation about how to find list of banks, making payment and challan details, getting receipt / confirmation, etc available at these 2 documents (link 1, link 2). If you prefer to pay online with some more help, then there are various 3rd parties that can help you with the payment process (you can fill in a simple filing, or opt for a higher package if you have more sources of income besides a simple Form 16, and some of them even give an option of walking into their office and filing in the details). Here are the links to these sites:

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If you consider the pedigree of these 2 gentlemen, RJD chief Lalu Prasad (who is a self-claimed socialist having risen up through the support of the people), and CPI leader AB Bardhan (and of course the Communists always consider themselves to be the representatives of the people, even if the ungrateful people do not elect them to the national level government); then you would realize that they should be natural allies. Both are opposed to the Congress (or were opposed earlier), both have come up through the support of the poor and the repressed sections of society; and of course both are violently and vehemently opposed to the BJP (after all, both these parties are pure secular parties). So, having said all this, why do the following statements not seem out of place and seem completely normal since these are political people after all:

Launching a scathing attack on CPI leader AB Bardhan for his remarks that UPA was buying MPs for Rs 25 crore each, RJD chief Lalu Prasad on Friday said the CPI leader should prove his ‘nasty’ allegations or ‘apologise’. “Bardhan has harmed the reputation of all parties with his comments. He has said a very nasty thing,” Prasad told reporters after chairing a meeting of the RJD Parliamentary Party at his residence here.

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Here is a warning right from the Supreme Court for home owners. People get attracted to the flats and houses offered by real estate builders, more so when they are offered by reputed and large builders. At the same time, the terms and conditions of the deals offered by these builders can be complex, and not easily understood by normal buyers. For example, the builder may offer a deal whereby there is a penalty clause if the handover of the property is delayed, but most consumers that I have talked to are hesitant to call up the builder on this, In many cases, they are worried that either the builder will rush through things, or maybe handover the property when everything around the property including facilities are incomplete. Hence the warning by the Supreme Court:

The Supreme Court has cautioned prospective flat buyers to look for the devil in the fine-print of documents before signing a contract with builders, who generally promise speedy construction, timely delivery and little or no escalation in price.

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