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Contrary to almost universal expectation of a hike in the key policy lending rate (repo) by at least 25 basis points, in the face of soaring inflation at wholesale and retail levels, RBI Governor Dr Raghuram Rajan has avoided a ‘hat-trick’ after two successive hikes earlier, to leave the repo rate unchanged at 7.75 per cent, in his mid-quarter policy review on December 18.

That the political class as a whole treats the country’s banking industry as the savior of anything that goes wrong with their fallacious interventionist pricing and entrepreneurial policies in the efficient allocation of sparse resources is nowhere palpable than the problems plaguing the Rs 80,000 crore sugar industry. How else could one explain and exculpate the recent decision of an informal group of Ministers headed by the Union Agriculture Minister Mr.Sharad Pawar to come out with a Rs 7500 crore bailout package for the politically-inspired wounds on the ailing industry and the banking sector in general?

Reserve Bank of India governor Raghuram Rajan has lived up to his reputation. He had forewarned about the impending global financial crisis in a conference in Jackson Hole where worlld’s central bankers and economists had congregated at the high noon of Great Moderation period. Everything was in the best of shape, global economy was growing and financial markets were scaling new heights. Alan Greenspan was reigning at the US Federal Reserve with his approach of light touch regulation. Amidst all this euphoria, Rajan had spoken of the risks to the system and possible crash.

New Delhi: Stung by scams relating to misuse of Defence plots like Aadarsh housing scandal, the Directorate General of Defence Estates have taken up the onus of surveying Defence holdings and digitization of records.

New Delhi: In an inevitable and effective retaliation to the 'despicable' and 'barbaric' treatment meted out to its diplomat, India asked US diplomats to turn in their IDs on Tuesday.

The main message from the Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Delhi Assembly elections is stark. The Congress stands routed and faces further decline. The Bharatiya Janata Party has made impressive gains, which indicate a likely upturn. And the Aam Aadmi Party has made a spectacular debut in Delhi. None of this augurs well for the ruling United Progressive Alliance.

The gay rights issue has come at an inconvenient time for the BJP. Just when it wanted all attention to be focussed on Narendra Modi’s development agenda with its “progressive” overtone, the controversy about homosexuals being criminals has revived the question of the party’s regressive ideas.

New Delhi: India and the League of Arab States come closer by effecting two Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) relating to new format for cooperation and an executive programme dealing with specific issues.

If the Congress party is afraid of taking steps to legalise gay sex, why did its president Sonia Gandhi and vice-president Rahul Gandhi criticize so vociferously the Supreme Court ruling criminalizing homosexuality? Even law Minister Kapil Sibal had been on the same page with the party leadership on the judgement day. Isn’t Home Minister and senior Congress leader Sushil Kumar Shinde’s ‘no’ to promulgation of ordinance to approve same sex relationship is a betrayal of the sentiment expressed by his party supremo? What made the party do a sudden somersault of its earlier position?

Kolkata: With only months to go for the next Lok sabha polls, three parties are feeling upbeat - the BJP, the Trinamool Congress(TMC) and the aspirant Aam Aadmi party(AAP).