Delhi Guardian

By  Ishaan Saxena Sep 16 2011 , New Delhi Tags:  News Outcome of the tug of war between growth and inflation to decide the fate The compendium of data released in recent weeks has sent shivers down the spine of industrial analysts. With stagnant growth and no recovery in sight, industry leaders are concerned. It seems the sluggishness would persist, at least in the remaining two quarters of 2011-12. Earlier this week, the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) numbers highlighted the disquieting trend. The figures are abysmally low. Industry grew at 3.3 per cent in July, the slowest in two years, whereas the manufacturing growth was 2.3 per cent. This was in line with the surveys by Ficci and CII released last Sunday. There are people who would like to adopt wait-and-watch approach. Monthly fluctuations in data, they say, are not a major cause of concern. The problem, however, is that all economic parameters reflect a paralysing picture. Inflation is sky-rocketing. GDP gro...

By  Ishaan Saxena Sep 14 2011 , New Delhi Tags:  India ,  PMEAC ,  Weekend ,  Economy The turbulence in the global financial markets t is likely to mount depreciation pressure  on rupee against the US dollar. t In comparison with the t developed world, the Indian economy continues to gallop at an impressive rate. However, some observers have expressed r concern about the recent slowdown in the growth rate. In the first quarter of financial year 2011-2012, the Indian economy registered a growth rate of 7.7 per cent compared with an impressive growth of 9.3 per cent in the same quarter last year. This was the slowest growth rate in six quarters. In last quarter that ended March 2011, the growth had sharply fallen to 7.8 per cent. The United Nation Conference on Trade and Development (Unctad), in a report published earlier this week, lowered the growth forecast to 8.1 per cent in 2011-2012 compared with 8.6 in the previous year. The Prime Minister's E...

By  Ishaan Saxena Sep 14 2011 , New Delhi Tags:  News Prices of manufactured products increase due to high cost of raw materials The rate of inflation shot up to 9.78 per cent in August, the highest in 13 months, with the inflation in manufactured products inching up to 7.79 per cent driven by high costs of industrial inputs. The inflation figures, coming just a couple of days ahead of the scheduled announcement of the Reserve Bank of India’s money policy on Friday, made a further interest rates hike almost inescapable, analysts said. RBI had already raised rates 11 times in 18 months in its bid to contain inflation. There were also indications of RBI action in finance minister Pranab Mukherjee’s reaction on Wednesday to the distressing wholesale price index (WPI) data. “It (inflation) is perilously close to double digit...RBI is also watching the situation like the government and collectively it would be possible for us to tackle the problem,” Mukherjee was quoted by ...

By  Ishaan Saxena Sep 12 2011 , New Delhi Tags:  News Data resurrect fears of broader slowdown amid rate hike fears Industrial growth plu­mmeted to 3.3 per cent in July, the lowest in two yea­rs, as manufacturing, especially the machine-building industry, took a major hit. With this, industrial gro-wth during April-July 2011-12 has fallen to 5.8 per cent from 9.7 per cent a year ago and manufacturing growth declined to 6 per cent from 10.5 per cent. This accentuated the fears of an economic slowdown with consequent tardy expansion of jobs and incomes. Even though Indian industry had anticipated this as was evident from the fin­dings of the surveys by two chambers of commerce, CII and Ficci, on Sunday, the official index of industrial production data on Monday came as a shock and sent markets tumbling. The reliability of IIP data has been questioned by many, including the Reserve Bank of India. But there was a near-consensus among analysts that industrial performance...

By  Ishaan Saxena & Soumik Dey Sep 11 2011 , New Delhi Tags:  Economy High interest rates, input costs lower manufacturing growth The Indian industry’s fears of a sharp slowdown have been confirmed. Two chambers of industry, CII and Ficci, on Sunday released the findings of surveys of member companies and industry associations, saying manufacturing gro­wth has had a setback up to September this year. Both surveys cited a variety of reasons, including high interest rates and input costs, which have decelerated output growth in many segments of manufacturing sector. Official industrial growth data for July are slated to come out on Monday, which are also likely to reproduce the grim picture painted by the surveys. Index of industrial production (IIP) data are available up to June and these have already shown a decline in overall industrial growth to 6.8 per cent in April-June 2011-12 from 9.6 per cent a year ago. Manufacturing growth too has decelerated to 7.5 per cent...

New Delhi:   In what many are labeling as an outright deceit, the Manmohan Singh led UPA government, in consultation with the President, overturned the resolution to adopt crusader Anna Hazare’s list of demand. This has raised hackles in the civil society camp. Contrary to popular belief, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh did address the country at 3:35 AM on Tuesday morning.  India TV broadcasted the short address. “I am deeply disturbed by the unfortunate events in the past few days. The country has been hijacked by an astute team which calls themselves the civil society. This is unthinkable in any democracy. It is my responsibility to uphold the democratic traditions of our country. In consonance with this objective, I, by the powers vested in me by the constitution, have decided to temporarily overturn the resolution. The parliament will deliberate the matter tomorrow which will be followed by a vote,” a cautious Prime Minister said. Political commentators are ...