High-handed treatment
With reference to the editorial, “Sebi jumps the gun” (August 10), there is no doubt about the intention of the Securities and Exchange Board of India. It has directed stock exchanges to initiate action against 331 companies, which are suspected to be shell companies. But Sebi’s move will lead to panic among investors, both retail and institutional, who own shares of these companies.
When a company has extensive operations, it need not be subjected to such treatment without notice. It is good to be cautious but being overly concerned and causing hassles for investors are not by any means desirable. The investors should have been told why they would be barred from trading in these companies and for what fault of theirs.
Sebi should have acted more maturely and with pragmatism to ensure investors did not feel cheated. Cleaning up the system at the cost of minority shareholders is not justified; it will keep retail investors away from the market.
I agree with the editorial that the accused should have been given a chance to defend themselves. Sebi, being a regulator, acted with high-handedness.
Bal Govind Noida than their foreign-educated counterparts. He also warned that the government might soon get rid of many these “foreign-grown” economists.
The question is: How could he make such national policy-related claims even before opening his innings at NITI Aayog? Isn’t it tantamount to the pre-emptive leakage of key policy matters to the media?
The editorial argues that the real issue is not the economists’ past “karma bhoomi” (their earlier workplace) but their “axiomatic” approach to the much needed policy transformation in government circles, as its action plans can’t ever be devoid of benchmarking against international best practices.
Will Kumar eventually fit in the government’s out-of-the-box idea of Make in India at NITI Aayog? Let’s wait and watch.
Kumar Gupt Panchkula his mind when he said the party was facing an existential crisis. While his comment does not point to a new development — the party has been in crisis since losing the 2014 Lok Sabha polls to the Bharatiya Janata Party — the important thing is that this bold yet fair statement comes from someone of the stature of Ramesh. He is among the few illustrious ministers in the party, who handled important portfolios like commerce and industries, power and rural development and environment among others.
Ramesh candidly said the BJP of today is vastly different from the one of earlier years because it thinks and acts differently. With strategists such as Narendra Modi and Amit Shah in the BJP, it is a completely different ball game for the Congress to take on the party now.
The Congress has to start from scratch and rebuild itself if it has to compete with the BJP. It has to reach out to the masses and regain their confidence. Even so, the BJP will have an edge over the Congress. At present, the Congress is no match for the BJP. The party has forgotten the habit of thinking deeply about the right things. It is now perform or perish for the Congress.
Srinivasan Umashankar Nagpur