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Thursday, May 7, 2009

POLITICS OF INDIAN ECONOMY

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Indian economy is considered as one of the major economies in the world. It has got a strong position in the developing economies. As it is known to everyone India is the largest democracy in the world. The growth of a nation is directly linked with the prevailing administration of that particular country. This is evident if we take the case of any country. Our neighboring country Pakistan is the best example. Pakistan lacks strong leadership as a result the country is far behind in the run for development.
Democracy is considered as the best system of administration in the world. It is more fruitful when deals with massive number of people. India has got a billion plus population. To address all their needs at the right proportion is a Himalayan task and sometimes it is impossible too. India is a democratic nation (highly democratic one must say!). As a result of this politicians emerged as the superstars in the system. It is widely considered that politicians in India are the true leaders of the nation. It is through their hands the funds are flowing. Funds which are meant to address the basic needs of the billion plus population. There is a famous saying which tells how can a country be rich. It is only through the richness of the people. When the people in a country become rich the nation will automatically rich. When the living standards of the people in a nation improve automatically the nation also improves. The point is that the politics of a nation determines the economical condition of a nation. These things are interrelated. If you live in a capitalist economy this theory is very well applicable.

Indian Political Situation
General elections are going on in India. On May 16th the results will be published. The political picture of India will become crystal clear after that. As a result of the aggressive campaigns about voting active youth participation has been taken place. More and more people are willing to exercise their franchise which is a good sign for democracy. People are more concerned about politics and they are eagerly waiting for change. The main agenda for all the political parties were development. All others came second. Development had become a mantra in recent past. Are you with or against development is the question often asked. Coalition agenda and government formation come only secondary.
After all the fumes it is a fact that India is a developing nation. 20 crores of the people of this country don’t have a roof over their heads. Unemployment is a matter of concern. It is the realty of a nation after 60 plus years of independence. Politics was feudal establishment in India before 70s. Congress was the superman in the system. India population was away from that untouchable system. After 70s particularly late 70s things changed. Congress party itself had undergone some changes. But the autocratic mentality didn’t change much. Janata party and left movement came in to lime light. But they can’t fully destroy the congress supremacy. Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi the Gandhi supermacy went on for decades. 90s were bad year for Indian politics. Then India political horizon widened and BJP stormed into the front. Regionalization of politics had taken place coalition had become the keyword of Indian politics.
In the developmental scenario things didn’t change much. Indian poor became more poor and farmers were forced to commit suicide. After 1992 religion had become an unavoidable menace in Indian politics. Now the agenda of politicians has been shifted and now it is development.
The election campaign caption of the NDA government during 2003 general election was India shining. They used all the government machinery to boost the idea of India shining which was a successful ad campaign but the NDA didn’t get much support from the common man and the very campaign created an adverse effect on the then ruling NDA government. This very movement benefited UPA government and they came in to power after the general elections of 2003.

Effect on the market
During NDA regime the growth rate of the country was just above five percent. But when the UPA government came into power the situation became different. The growth rate of the country recorded an upward trend. It reached 9 percent market during UPA regime. But at the tails end of their innings there were some problems. Nuke deal with the US was a controversial issue. The fate of the UPA government was in big trouble but they somehow managed the crisis and emerged as winners.
After the general elections there is a big question mark. UPA, NDA or third front that is the question which requires an answer. There may be another answers too. The recession fears are slowly moving under the carpet and markets are welcoming FIIs with full stretched hands. Before the first phase of the general elections markets were some where in the 9000marks and now it is wandering in the 12000mark. This is a good sign as the economy is concerned. A stable government will do the trick of improving the market. This will in a way benefit the overall well being of the country.
Let’s hope for that because unstable government will only lead to unstable economy. Every political party nowadays is crying for development and it will be their duty to guide the country in the road towards development. The time has come that political parties should work to make India a developed nation.

Friday, February 20, 2009

ALL THAT GLITTERS IS ONLY GOLD

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Do you have golden memories? You may or may not have. But gold has golden memories. Not one or two, it has golden memories almost all the times. It has got some historic brushing also. The golden period of gold had started when mankind recognized the yellow metal as worthy (worth as life). Men and women gave due attention at early days. But when women had started romancing it the story became more serious and more contemporary. When mankind discovered the investment value in gold the story had become more realistic. Actually after that the golden period of gold had started.
When business minds started working ornaments of various varieties came to the scene. Women started discovering more and more parts of their body to cover it with gold ornaments. As a result gold had become a master metal. The social scenario played a vital role in writing the golden history of gold. In Indian scenario the dowry system acted as a catalyst for gold. When it became a status symbol gold found it’s key role in weddings. So many lives are spoiled because of this metal. Many poor women committed suicide only because of this metal. The main cause of dowry related deaths are gold now days in India. But the sad thing is that it added glory to the famous and adventurous story of gold.

Golden story -recent times
When the New Year (2009) began the price of gold was 13610 for 10gms. After one and a half month the price shot up and on Feb 17, 10gms of gold will cost Rs15230. This is only a recent record. If the trend continues gold may touch even 20,000 for 10gms. Jewellery shop owners swear that their business is dull. Not many retail buyers are there in the market but surprisingly the prices are scaling new heights. The main reasons for the particular trend are the fall in equity markets world over. Investors who are fed up with the degradation of their value in equities switch it over to gold. As a result demand increases and naturally price goes up. This has been happening from the second half of last year. (Specifically says after the collapse of Lehman brothers).
In Indian scenario there is one more problem. That is the depreciating rupee. Recently Indian rupee touched 50 mark against US dollar. Depreciating rupee also plays a key role in the increase of gold prices. The third reason is increased buying interest in gold funds. Now a days the demand for gold funds increased like nothing. The sad thing is that in this type of investment the lion’s portion will be traders. They will never take delivery of the metal instead they will cash on daily up and downs.
In recent times large numbers of speculators are involved in the gold market. They are the villains unnoticed behind the sharp increase in the price hike of gold. Actually the time is favorable for gold as well as speculators who trade on gold.

Gold and equity market
The sub prime devil released by US is wandering all over the world. Be it east, west, north and south the situation remains the same. The devil is gulping the points in equities market. Banks had been vanished. Investors had lost crores of rupees as a result of this meltdown in the stock market. Take the case of India in particular, the picture remains the same. In January 2008 Bombay sensitive index or sensex scaled an height of 21,000. This was a classical mark set by the united efforts of FIIs and domestic players. But the glory didn’t last long. The rest of the year was gloomy days for the Indian equity market. It came down and down after days and breached all the confidence levels set by the analysts. Now it is hovering around 8000 mark (as on 20-Feb-09). As a result of this panic investors started looking for alternate investment avenues. They found Commodities market is the right place to depend upon. Then gold started smiling at the investors. Like ladies investors also started romancing gold. They started nurturing their dreams upon it. In India gold is sold in terms of eight grams. 10,000 was the historic mark set by gold (for 8gms) in recent past. But in the third week of February it crossed the 11,000 mark for 8gmn. In the investment horizon only thing which glitters is gold.

A burden for common man
Indian equities market had witnessed a short term buying trend during the second week of February this year. This was due to the huge expectation of interim budget. But when Pranob Mukherjee started his interim budget things had been changed. Snesex tanked a 300+ point downward trend. For three consecutive days the downward trend prevailed in the market at the same time gold price started increasing. There are some foreign reasons also. Russia had announced that it would buy gold. This news acted in favor of gold and gold still continues the upward trend.
Gold price hike is a big concern for the common man in this country. Particularly in a society which evaluates the standard of a marriage in terms of gold given as dowry. When gold price increases definitely the minds of fathers with daughters would beat faster. Due to the price hike in the country arised due to global conditions(!) marriages had became more and more costly. The burden of which ultimately falls on the shoulders of the bride’s father. If the price of gold increases further the number of unmarried women in this country will increase, that is the power of this yellow metal.

Hope of any escape
In the recent present it is not possible. Since the equities market is down the situation will continue. Analysts are of the view that the downward trend in the equities market would continue for some months. When the new government takes charge there is a possibility for the equities market to bounce back. There is a grand finale called the annual results announcement. This would give actual picture about what is happening in the corporate sector. After these events market would decide whether to go up or go down. If the equities market regain it’s strength then the attraction would shift towards it and the price of gold may come down.
Aggressive speculation is happening in gold funds. Now all the traders are taking positions. When the prices will reach the peak they will switch off their position and return home with the profit. When that happens there is a possibility of price decrease. In 98-99 same situation was there in the gold market. Then the European banks started selling gold in an aggressive manner which reduced the price of gold. If same thing happens there is a possibility of price cut.
The other relief can be happened is that the emerging of Indian rupee as a strong currency against dollar. India’s inflation rate came last was 3.92 percent. Inflation in the downward trend means currency strengthens. RBI will also take steps to make rupee strong. This move will ease gold price.
But the main thing should curb carefully is the speculation. Speculation should be controlled by the authorities for at least short term in order to avoid the price hike (but this would never happen!). There should be some limit in taking positions or should make some restriction in terms of delivery taking. But this is not possible in the recent future. Which means gold will continue to be common man’s hurdle. And this will continue so.

Friday, February 6, 2009

HOW MALAYALAM MOVIES ARE SPOILED BY IT'S OWN STARS

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Earlier it was the synonym for good cinema in the country. It had bagged almost all the awards given to movies and persons associated with it for many years, competitors were far behind. It had given birth to so many world famous writers, actors and renowned film personalities. It got matured when all others in the country were in their infant stage. Thanks to those visionaries, who had fashioned it in such a way so that everybody started analyzing it and began learning lessons from it. I am talking about the Malayalam movie industry. But time had passed. Film making had become a profitable business in these years. The film viewing population showed an upward trend. At the beginning film viewing was in apartheid like communism in the state of kerala but with out much delay films had become a popular media.
But the film industry in kerala is going through difficult situations in these days. India in common and south India in particular had a mania called star worshipping. It’s like a disease in almost all the southern parts of the country. We had seen silver screen stars became chief ministers of Andhra and Tamilnadu, there the star worshipping had reached it’s peak that the fans are ready to give up even their lives for their favorite heroes. Stars exploited the man power behind them and used it for their political gains. Kerala, which was the Mecca of good films in the past was away from this practice of metamorphasizing it’s movie stars into politicians, since the state was politically literate.
If we analyze the mania of star worshipping with a magnifying lens we will be able to notice that education is going to do nothing with this disease. The anthropology of Indians are now associated with movies and cricket.
But is the star worshipping good for movies?. In kerala scenario things are something more sophisticated. Kerala don’t had the practice of star worshipping at the early stage. Now the Malayalam movie stars themselves are purposefully injecting the habit into the movie watchers at their expense. There may be political dreams behind it but the immediate effect they want is stopping others to come to the limelight of the movie industry. There is a star and technicians cocas, which is determining the whereabouts of a movie.
The two big names in the Malayalam movie industry are Mohanlal and Mammootty. They are leading the dictatorship in the film industry of this film loving state. Some one and half years before there was a crisis in the Malayalam movie industry. This was actually a crisis arised out of lack of good movies. (But the industry somehow managed to overcome the crisis, the industry owes the credit to shakkeela, maria and reshma jodi and their half porn movies.). Then came the real crisis of Malayalam cinema. Raajamanikyam said to be the biggest hit in Mammootty’s career graph. This was made possible because of the high voltage promotion of the movie through fans associations. Mammooty just made a step forward in promoting himself he published a magazine called mammooty times. (He started his blog on the very first day of this year, where he writes articles about so called serious topics, trying to establish himself as a successful blogger from the film arena after Big B Amitabh Bachchan).
Mohanlal on the other hand has earlier proved that he is a specimen for business. He has launched Mohanlal’s taste buds earlier and then started a dubbing studio. Now he is the brand ambassador and promoter of Hedge equities. A broking company formed when the markets touched it’s recent lows. Through the ads of the company he says knowledge is important for successful investment. The sad thing is that once they were prophets of good movies and were part of them but now they are not promoting such kinds of movies. In fact they are ready to do movies with award winning directors!. They even not promoting the newcomers as well. Amma and Macta are the prominent unions of Malayalam movie artists. recently film director Vinayam alleged that Mammootty of removing members of a particular union from sets just because they are members. The caucus is so strong that they can even remove such a senior artist Thilakan from acting in movies. Now he is acting in sidelined movies. Mammootty and Moahanlal are like trees in a giant forest where they will not allow other trees to grow.

Why kerala is so much interested in movies it is not because some brilliant directors were born here. Apart from that they tried to impart film education among the people not only in the urban area but also in the rural area. In early 70s film society movement started in kerala which had got tremendous support from the people. Then came the films from Adoor Gopalakrishnan (not now a days export quality ones but real classic ones). Aravindan and Padmarajan made cinemas out of passion. John Abraham the realistic director made cinema with the money from people. These efforts altogether promoted good cinemas in the coconut land. In 80s, the period identified as the romantic period of Malayalam movies, many promising personalities came into the lime light. Later they became pillars of the industry. Modernization of the industry happened after the first half of 90s.
The star mania came in the industry only in late 90s and it became powerful after 2000. Devaasuram, a feudal story directed by I.V Sasi starring Mohanlal was the landmark movie which laid the foundation of star dictatorship in the industry. (Devaasuram introduced a new alcohol drinking style also).Then came the same stretch movies by Shaji Kailas, who successfully established Hindu icons in movies and it became popular. On the other hand Mammootty tried to became versatile he danced and sang but all proved to be burden over him. But he somehow managed to maintain the post of superstar along with Mohanlal. Then they began ruling the film industry.
If an aspiring director approaches these stars. They will fix all the technicians and even actors according to their taste. They will rewrite the script and will change the concept of the movie. They even fix the budget and the locations (where they can easily reach in their own vehicle). If the newcomer do not agree with it the project skips. If they have any disagreement they will fire the respective actor out. Finally good films never happen only Superstar show offs will happen. In this situation you cannot see a film like Paruthiveeran or Subrahmanniyapuram from kerala. You will be forced to watch below average films with your expense!. The superstars are spoiling Malayalam films in all sense.

Monday, January 19, 2009

LIQUIDITY CRUNCH BADLY AFFECTS KERALA'S REAL ESTATE SECTOR

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this post has been moved to the following link

http://www.pramodthomas.com/2010/01/liquidity-crun…-estate-sector/

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Thursday, December 25, 2008

AN YEAR OF ECONOMIC WORRIES ENDS: WHAT'S NEXT?

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An year ends. But now we cannot say it as simple as we had said earlier. For the year was an year of economic worries all over the world. People have been talking about recession and even depression for months and the talking is still on. Global economic slowdown is the term which everybody is talking about. In Indian point of view the year passes is an year of ups and downs. Indian markets peaked and recorded new heights in the same year and when the financial tsunami started to hit Indian bourses we just watched fingers crossed how Indian indices go down and down which was a cause of worry for almost every sector.
In January this year Bombay stock exchange index sensex touched an all time high of 21,207 and the National stock exchange index nifty touched it’s peak of 6357. Which are now hovering around 9000+ and 2900+ respectively.Once the indices were above 60 percent down. The Indian industry was in a good mood and people started spending money like anything. This was a period of economic boom. People all over the country thought that India is going to become a major economic power. Tata started it’s Nano car project in singur, West Bengal which the company claimed that would benefit the millions in the country especially the middle class society. As Rathan Tata said their dream of owing a car will be a reality. (But Mamtha Banerjee stood between Tata and West Bengal government and as a result Tata’a were forced to close the plant in singur and they had moved to Gujarath). This particular incident throws light to the fact that political parties in this country are using anything and everything for cheap political gains.
After the January peak Indian stock market indices started to fall continuously. Many traders who had invested in stocks during the peak time suffered a lot. At first everybody in the financial sector of the company thought that the falling was due to the increase in Inflation figures. As a result of more and more money came in to the market the prices of commodities, including agriculture and other necessary items skyrocketed. Whole sale price Index based inflation increased rapidly and it crossed double digit finally it touched the recent record level of 12.91. At these juncture the then Finance minister P.Chidambaram took curative measures against it. And then RBI governor Y.V Reddy helped him a lot to achieve the target of bringing down inflation figures.
The Government first said huge inflation numbers were the effect of hike in crude oil prices. This was true to some extent. But it was not the lone cause. Agriculture activities around the world in general and in India in particular are not doing well. We had shut our eyes for the news related to farmer suicide. Along with the slow down in agriculture sector the hike in fuel price was the major villain for the increase in inflation figures. Crude oil prices touched an all time high of $147 per barrel in July this year. Before that Govt increased domestic fuel prices. This also resulted in an increase of inflation numbers.
The indices fell down and down in all these months. Analysts believed that this was the result of high oil price and inflation figures. But this was only partially true. The actual culprit behind the curtain was sub prime crisis. This was a necessary evil of mad liberalization. The prophets of liberalization had never foreseen the evil. The devil started it’s journey from US and is still traveling aroung the world. The country called Iceland lost it’s all valuables including faith due to this devil. A country almost vanished from the economic map of the world. This was the immediate effect of the crisis.
More than a century old Bank in US Lehman brothers collapsed and many other prestigious institutes faced bankruptancy and some are about to face the same. Famous indices around the world including Dow jones melted to more than half from it’s peak. World is heading towards a recession that was the moral extracted from all these incidents.
So many millions around the world lost their jobs. Many companies closed their shutters on jobseekers and down sizing happened on a large scale. The most visible incident in India was the mass termination by Jet airways but after hours of high drama they all were absorbed again. Indian BPO companies are in huge trouble. Professional degree holders are looking at a bleak future. In general this is the situation around the world.

What’s Next?
Now the most important question is what’s next?. Is the crisis over or is it here to stay. No body can give a clear cut answer in this regard. Some are saying that the worst is over. But some are of the opinion that it has not started affecting India. One more different opinion is there which says we are in recession and it will take 2-3 years to overcome the crisis.
When Barack Obama will take the rein of US in January some are of the view that some good will happen in US and in the world. ( His campaign word was ‘Change’ which is needed at this point of time). In Indian situation the end days of UPA government is near. It will complete it’s term in May. India is also going to elect a new team to govern them. Whoever comes the great challenge before them would be to tackle the crisis and to bring back confidence to investors. India is a country with mixed economy. We have our own regulating bodies. Our companies are well regulated ones so far. But when the whole world is suffering from fever we will definitely shiver but to what extent that we can decide at least.
Thanks to our national builders. This shows that we can survive at this situation too. Only thing is that our leadership should work accordingly. So that we can survive in a better way and can become a major economy after the days of recession.
 

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