Governance2.Org

Livemint: In a bid to supply manpower to India’s booming organized retail sector institutes, government agencies and even non-profit groups are stepping in. Huge investment plans by home-grown and foreign retailers are fuelling a great demand for people with basic skills in organized retailing. Consultancy firm Technopak Advisors Pvt. Ltd says the country’s modern retailers will create more than two million direct jobs in the next five years. Reliance Industries Ltd said it will need more than a million direct and indirect people by 2010 to staff its stores and its allied logistics operations.
Currently, only 50,000-100,000 people possess skills in modern retail trade. Read on …

Livemint: Instead of setting up Indian institutes of management in backward areas, the government should set up institutes of rural management and agri-business whose primary objective would be to create rural entrepreneurs. Such institutes will not only
disseminate knowledge but also help in creating an interface between entrepreneurs, financial institutions and national-level scientific institutes.
Where politicians and bureaucrats have failed, these institutes in the area of rural management, cooperatives and agri-business can step in and take the challenge of elevating the “other” India.
The Amul story is now well known. Started as a small cooperative in 1946 in the village of Anand in Gujarat, it has now evolved into a more than Rs2,200 crore enterprise, in the process changing fortunes of many petty farmers.
SKS Microfinance started by Vikram Akula is using advanced technology—smart cards—to make venture capital available to poor women.
The organization has so far given loans to about 700,000 poor women who are now involved in some kind of entrepreneurial activity.
Similarly, ITC’s e-Choupal has facilitated the access of farmers directly to the markets using the Internet. Launched in June 2000, e-Choupal services today reach out to more than 3.5 million farmers across nine states. Read on …

Hindu: An estimated one lakh broadband enabled service centres are expected to come up in the country by March 2008 at a cost of Rs. 5,400 crore if Union Minister of Communication and Information Technology A. Raja is to be believed. One centre will come up for every six villages with all e-governance services. A sum of Rs 1,600 crore will be put up by the Central government and the rest by the private sector under the Public Private Partnership (PPP).
The Minister said that for the implementation of e-governance, the government on its part is trying to provide basic infrastructure including internet, window facilitation centre and last leg connectivity for implementation of e-governance. However participation of the private sector and citizens is a key for providing totally transparent services to the public.
The application of IT to government processes, e-governance in short, could have a profound impact on the efficiency, responsiveness and accountability of government and on the quality of life and productivity of citizens, especially the poor. Read on …

Livemint: The shift to e-filing of statutory documents such as annual returns and balance sheets by companies with a minimum authorized capital of Rs1 crore is expected to see a fresh spurt in compliance in India, potentially bringing it on par with the standards prevalent in developed economies of Singapore and the UK.
E-filing was introduced by the ministry of corporate affairs (MCA) in May 2006.
“While we saw a compliance level of 50% among such companies for returns filed for year ended March 2005, this figure rose to around 70% for the year ended March 2006 and we are expecting this to rise to 90% for the year ended March 2007,” according to a senior MCA official who did not wish to be identified. He was speaking on the sidelines of a national conclave on corporate governance organized by the Confederation of Indian Industry. The average compliance rate, including all public firms, is much lower at 45%. Read on …

Times of India:  Vijaya S Mulay, a retired municipal nurse, filed a query under the Right to Information (RTI) Act which sought to track the movement (or non-movement) of papers pertaining to her retirement dues. The papers had been pending with the administrative department of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation for more than a year.
The RTI response revealed the names of the officials who ‘sat’ on the file for months together. The format also gave a detailed reply which showed where the papers got stuck and for how many days. Following her RTI query, the civic authorities were forced to take action against the errant officials and penalise two BMC employees for the delay.
Read on …

Business Standard: Close on the heels of Pune and Baramati (a small city in Maharashtra), India’s infotech capital, Bangalore, too will provide seamless wireless connectivity as a part of its Rs 800 crore “Unwire Bangalore” project.
Even as Delhi has been planning to make the city “wireless”, the Karnataka government has reportedly given the go-ahead to all the five bidding consortia to roll out the services in a phased manner. Three of the bidders have started deploying the required infrastructure and services will be rolled out this year.
Conceptualised on a build, operate and own model, the Unwire Bangalore project aims at creating an infrastructure network that will provide wireless Internet connection to the entire city using world interoperability for microwave access (WiMax) and Wi-Fi technologies. The project is expected to cover 679 square kilometres of the city in a phased manner. Read on …

T C A Srinivasa-Raghavan, writes in Business Standard about the state of the Indian government, and presents his case as to why the Indian Government is dozing.

If even three ordinary people (let alone ministers) don’t like something and shout their protest loudly enough, the idea is dropped. Nothing moves forward so as the world moves ahead, we get left behind.
This approach to consensual governance has had three effects, at the very least. First, the undeserving continue to get what they want. You can apply this test yourself and make a list.
Second, conversely, the deserving are being denied what they need. It doesn’t matter which group. If you are deserving of something, you won’t get it. Go on, make a list and see.
And, third, as a result, the majority is getting mighty peeved with a government that does absolutely nothing at all, good or bad. Indeed, this must be the only government—if one can dignify it by that name—of this kind in the world. It just floats along smilingly.

Read on …

Economic Times: In a country of over a billion people, only 31.5 million people pay taxes, and this is after the number of taxpayers has grown by nearly 11 percent between March 2002 and March 2006. The Directorate of Income Tax (Systems) has said that a total of 54 million Permanent Account Numbers (PAN) had been allotted till July 5, 2007.
PAN numbers are also needed to open a bank account, pay income tax, purchase and sell shares and securities, purchase movable property that needs registration, apply for visas and passports or bank loan and to file tax returns. Read on …

Livemint: The government launched a facility for e-filing of patent and trademark applications on 20 July 2007 to expedite the process of securing exclusive rights over a product or trading symbol. This facility has been made available on PatentOffice.nic.in
“With the launch of e-filing facilities, applicants can file their patent and trademark applications at their convenience through the Internet. Payments can also be made through authorised bankers,” commerce and industry minister Kamal Nath said.
As of now five lakh trademarks have been registered in the country and efforts are being taken to ensure the backlog of applications is cleared promptly, secretary in the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion Ajay Dua said.
Last year, 29,000 patent application were filed in the country, of which 8,000 were approved, he added.
Dua said the number of patents in the country increased by over 600 % from 1999-2000, when less than 5,000 applications were filed. Read on …

Livemint: Almost 41% of the households that plan to buy a computer or a laptop are from rural areas. Only 16% are from the super metros, the eight largest cities in the country. And 39% of the households that plan to buy a laptop or desktop computer have people who earn less than Rs1 lakh a year. Download the complete report [pdf]