Life on the go

Sumant Bhargava, Managing Director, Stargaze Entertainment pvt. ltd.

Passion, to me, is… contagious!
Processes and systems are important because… it is critical to exponential growth.
I am most influenced by… people who effect change in this world.
People are my most important assets because… they determine the character of the organisation.
My inspiration in life has been… to create success for the people I work with.
Employee attrition can be handled by… while a little attrition is healthy, passion keeps them engaged.
The secret for a business’s quantum leap is… the success of managing the three key resources – time, money and people.
Leadership, to me, is… getting all people behind you during trying times.
The legacy I would like to leave behind is that of... I do not believe in legacies.
My most cherished possession is… my daughters.
My favourite pastime is… researching about places to see in the world.
My dream ride is… trip to Ladakh on a Harley Davidson!
On my bookshelf these days, you’ll find… Filmfare and Sportstar.
My greatest extravagance in life is… travelling.
My idea of a perfect life is… life can’t be perfect, but I would like to spend a lot of time with my family.
One teacher I can never forget… English teacher when I was in class ninth.
The most valuable work lesson that I have learnt is… do not procrastinate.
The most important quality that youngsters must imbibe is… there is no shortcut to hard work. Read More...

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Why is there so much fuss every time someone in his or her thirties becomes a minister.

Human resource experts around the world have set the most exacting standards for CEOs. The qualifications are tough – they must be dynamic, visionary and strategic thinkers, able to handle high pressure situations, take risks and make fast and correct decisions. But what is required of politicians in executive positions in a complex country like ours – with such a diverse culture and so many different beliefs – is an even bigger challenge. Yet how many of our oldies qualify?

Delhi's Chief Minister, Shiela Dikshit, however, finds such reasoning specious. "You cannot equate politics with the corporate sector. In politics, even if you are 40, the public may send you packing if you are not working. Besides, a doctor or lawyer works for as long as s/he can, and much the same holds for politicians. It will not do to have a retirement age for politicians."

But this is not how it works in most other countries. The leaders of Russia, Japan – indeed even Pakistan – are all young. George Bush was in his fifties when he became President. Bill Clinton was 52 when he retired after ruling the US for eight years. And Tony Blair took over as British premier in his early forties. Contrast this with our own leadership. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh became Prime Minister at 72 and all key portfolios are being managed by people in their eighties and seventies who, most of the time, appear ill and tired. Remember Atal Behari Vajpayee's famous knee problems?

Maharashtra Governor PC Alexander had a distinguished career as a bureaucrat. He 'retired' officially more than 25 years ago. But since then he has been the secretary and right hand man to two prime ministers, India's high commissioner in Britain, and Governor of Tamilnadu. At age 81, he became a Member of Parliament! Natwar Singh too joined politics after retiring from the post of foreign secretary. ....Continue

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The Sunday Indian

This is the first time that the Bharatiya Janata Party has won twice in succession in Madhya Pradesh. Whose cap gets the feathers for that?
The victory is that of the people of the state. This is a people’s victory from beginning to end. Five years ago, the people of the state had propelled us to power to change the maddening conditions of Madhya Pradesh. We worked well, we worked hard to do that.

The people have voted for the development that has thus taken place. They have sent us back a second time, which says that BJP has delivered to goods.

What were those special circumstances that allowed BJP to ward off the virulent attacks of the Opposition Congress party?
The complete faith and trust of the people and the hard work by the party workers and leaders. We all worked together to give a lie to the false allegations of the Opposition.

Many stalwart ministers and prominent sitting MLAs of your party lost this time, so how do you explain that?
Ours is a party of workers. Often local conditions and circumstances are such that sitting MLAs lose, but we cannot forget that new faces in large numbers have been elected this time.

We have to accept the verdict of the people.

Will you bring back the rebels?
I do not see any such prospect at the moment.

A large number of young people have been elected this year, just as you said. How many of them would be seen in your ministry?
They will surely be given a chance. The BJP had on purpose given tickets to a large number of young men and women. They are hard workers and have met the expectations of the party leadership.....Continue

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The Sunday Indian

Several dilemmas haunt the "Give Telangana" party

Now TRS – the prime mover behind the demand for a separate Telangana state – is faced with a choice of siding with either PRP or the TDP-Left combine. A PRP-TRS electoral marriage may fetch the latter the maximum number of seats to contest from. But its double-front fight against a strong TDP-Left combine on one hand, and the ruling Congress on the other, may result in TRS losing heavily. If it joins TDP-Left combine, it may get less number of seats than PRP is willing to give it. In that case TRS may win the maximum number of seats it contests from. The latest twist in the tale is that TRS faces a new threat: if it combines with TDP, it can win more seats but lose local leadership, which will pose a threat to the party’s grassroots-level hold. But if it teams up with PRP, it can continue to hold the local leadership but can not expect to win as many seats as it expects to win if it teams up with the TDP-Left combine. The TDP, anxious to come back to power, finally decided to announce its support for a separate Telangana state. Ironic, as TDP itself had fought most vigorously against bifurcation of the state ever since TRS started agitating for it....Continue

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The Sunday Indian

India is still fumbling for a response to Pakistan in the aftermath of its worst ever terror strike, writes Ranjit Bhushan

LeT camps in Pakistan. Back to square one. Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari has admitted the possibility of "rogue, non-state actors" orchestrating the Mumbai horror, but has also said that Pakistan per se had no hand in this. And jingoistic media reportage notwithstanding, it is difficult to imagine that Zardari could have ordered such a strategic harakiri.

Experts believe this is a good opportunity to mobilise international opinion against Pakistan, as many were killed who belong to other countries, so their governments are keen to get to the bottom of what happened. “This is the best time for India to mobilise opinion. Not just India, other countries are involved,” former Indian high commissioner to Islamabad, G Parthasarthy, told TSI.

There is a large element of truth in this. Apart from many countries which are willing to help – a terrorist slaughter like this has sent alarm bells ringing in most foreign capitals – the USA and Israel have been most keen to help. An FBI team is in Delhi armed with critical intercepts by the CIA, and the National Security Guards (NSG) is sifting through all the evidence to figure out the extent of the Pakistani culpability. However, it is not entirely clear how Indian sleuths from the intelligence services are going to deal with the Americans.

Israel, after the killing of five Jews at Chahad House in Mumbai, has taken it as an attack on their nationhood. The Foreign Minister of Israel, Behrak Ekud, told journalists in Tel Aviv that India has been offered "all kinds of help", but added that New Delhi has mostly declined. Some former Mossad officials are of the view that Indian commandos took too long to neutralise the terrorists, causing an unusually large number of casualties.....Continue

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The Sunday Indian

How did people like Sudhakar Dwivedi alias Dayanand Pandey become shankaracharyas?

Swami Amritanand Devtirtha Maharaj – lately reduced to being just Dayanand Pandey -- is currently in the custody of the Mumbai Anti-terror Squad (ATS) on the charge of engineering explosions outside a religious place in Malegaon, Maharashtra that killed six persons.

A shankaracharya is the equivalent of a Pope. And TSI’s enquiries in several religious places, including Kashi in Varanasi, reveal a highly sordid state of affairs. Rankings like mahanth, mahamandleshwar, acharya and even shankaracharya are up for sale. But now, with the ATS digging into Dwivedi’s past and interrogating the Varanaseya Vidvat Parishad office-bearers who crowned him shankaracharya on May 16, 2003, things are bound to change.

Says Batuk Prasad Shastri, general secretary of the Kashi Vidvat Parishad (KVP): “Adi Shankaracharya (788-820 AD) founded four seats about 1200 years ago for the spread of Hindu culture -- Jyotishpeeth in Badrinath (North), Shringeripeeth in Chikmagalur district of Karnataka (South), Shardapeeth at Dwarka (West) and Govardhanpeeth at Puri (East). There are, besides, two sub-seats -- Kashipeeth (Uttar Pradesh) where the first Shankaracharya lived and Kanchi Kamkoti (Tamil Nadu) where he died. There can’t be any other peeth. All the other peeths and shankaracharyas are fake.”...Continue

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The Sunday Indian

Blackout in the parched Fields

Siddaveerappa shudders at the thought of a long, dark winter ahead. With massive power shortage plaguing Karnataka, power supply has dwindled to a paltry two to three hours a day. This means farmers like Siddaveerappa – most of whom use pump sets and bore wells – have no water to irrigate their land, which translates into a diminished agricultural yield and perhaps loss of livelihood. Despite numerous assurances of the government, the power situation is yet to improve.

“Our yield is decreasing by the day and we don’t even have seeds to sow in the next season. The kharif (monsoon) crop yield was paltry due to shortage of rain, but now even the rabi (winter) crop will be ruined due to these long and frequent load sheddings. If it continues like this, we won’t even have enough crop to feed ourselves,” rues Siddaveerappa from Holalkere, Chitradurga, where farmers like him depend largely on rain-fed crops. The failure of kharif crop has left them with very less seeds to sow. Now with long power cuts cutting into their supply of irrigational water, the future appears bleak.....Continue

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The Sunday Indian

Thank god it's recession!

GLOBAL ECONOMY : IMPACT ON INDIA

With banks in the US and Europe tumbling like ninepins and with the recession setting in in America and elsewhere, the central banks of most of the key economies in the world are on a war footing to infuse more liquidity, reduce interest rates and arrest the global enonomic downslide. In India too, the Rsserve Bank of India has been trying its best to weather the vagaries of global recession. Yet in the hindsight, amidst all the showering of bad news by pink newspapers of job cuts, pay cuts and the erosion of wealth of Indian billionaires, one wonders if it is really such a time of despair or that this recession is ideally a boon in disguise for countries like India and its common men. Consider this: even a few months back, when international oil prices were hovering in the region of $140-$150 a barrel, inflation in India was literally leapfrogging. Indian oil companies on account of their under-recovery from retail sale of oil were bleeding to death and were facing an estimated loss of a staggering a Rs two lakh crore by the end of current financial year. Thanks to the looming recession in the US and Europe, international oil prices have literally collapsed to the region of $55-$65 a barrel, thus saving Indian oil PSUs from the chances of bankruptcy. Accepted that retail price of oil has not yet come down, but that the oil-PSUs have started making profit and there is reduction of under-recoveries is news good enough, as no economy in the long run is sustainable if for cushioning the masses from volatile international prices, its blue-chip companies become bankrupt. That possibility is gone now. Lower oil prices also guarantees faster growth of Indian economy....Continue

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The Sunday Indian

That guttural sound, could it be a leopard? That distant yipping… did the wild dogs make a kill?”

We sat silently in the vehicle for almost 10 minutes. In the near distance we could hear a rustling as a soft, yet biting wind fanned our faces. It was cold. Above us a full moon lit the night sky and ahead of us I imagined I saw something move. Someone shifted and it seemed the creaking of metal plates would be heard in distant Nagpur. That was when I saw them in the frame of my night vision binoculars. There were four tigers walking towards us in single file. Cats see well in the dark and they must have heard us ages ago, but they were unafraid. They seemed as curious about us as we were about them! Within seconds they settled all around us like so many household cats, safe in the knowledge that we meant them no harm.


There can be no better place to escape to than the exquisite Himalayan havens to be found in Kashmir, Ladakh, Garhwal, Sikkim, Himachal Pradesh and Arunachal Pradesh. One of my abiding sorrows is the fact that for long years it was not safe to trek through Kashmir. I have often walked up 2,000 metres through the famous oak forests of the Dachigam Sanctuary near Srinagar. Home of the last surviving herds of hangul deer, it seems difficult to imagine that so much blood has been shed in the beautiful Kashmir valley. I remember my trip to the Great Himalayan National Park in Himachal Pradesh. A bird had made several sorties from its fragile perch on the thin creeper to the trickle of water oozing from a green grotto that had been carved by nature out of hard rock....Continue

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The Sunday Indian

The Princess

Despite her impulsive behaviour, Benazir Bhutto was a ray of hope for all those who cherish a democratic polity in Pakistan. She braved imprisonment and exile and her charisma attracted the downtrodden and the elite alike. She was no doubt like a princess and went away like a martyr.

I remember when Benazir Bhutto arrived in Pakistan in 1986 after self-exile in Britain, she drew huge crowds in many cities of Pakistan including Quetta, the provincial capital of Balochistan. The province was traditionally dominated by nationalist Baloch veterans like Nawab Khair Bux Marri, Sardar Ataullah Mengal and Ghous Bux Bizenjo.

When military dictator General Zia-ul-Haq perished in a mysterious air crash on August 17, 1988, along with several top generals and the then US ambassador in Pakistan, Bhutto was the only alternative for a demoralised army. She was also a source of strength for thousands of political activists in Pakistan who were imprisoned, tortured and even flogged by the military dictator who ruled the country for 11 long years through sheer force and demagogy.

There was euphoria in the masses when she again arrived in Pakistan in 1988. Upon hearing the news that Bhutto had swept the elections, I remember common men and women had danced in the streets, distributed sweets and prostrated before God. However, her brother Mir Murtaza Bhutto, who was brutally murdered in a police shootout during the second tenure of Bhutto, believed otherwise. He thought Bhutto had made a compromise with the establishment since she agreed that Ghulam Ishaq Khan would continue as president and Sahibzada Yaqub Khan, Foreign Minister during the Zia era, would continue in the same capacity.....Continue

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The Sunday Indian

Here’s Tareque Laskar's story on the subtle subterfuge of how the Indian bowling attack grew its fangs.

IIPM Blog
We’ve had the fab four for a good part of the last decade and some more but the results and wins (especially away) have started trickling in the past half a decade since that historic series in Australia back in 2003. Think about the win at Adelaide (and Zaheer’s burst that preceded it in a rain hit Brisbane Test that ended in draw but set the tone for the titanic tussles to follow), the one at Headingly, at Trent Bridge or the one at Perth and the pattern is hard to miss. There’s a quiet revolution that has swept cricket academies in India in the recent past, and it has nothing to do with batsmen spending hours in the nets protecting their wickets to win a one rupee coin at the end of the day. A new breed of Indian bowler – mentally and physically – is taking shape. The hard work and toil of people like T A Sekar at the MRF Pace Foundation and bowling coach Venkatesh Prasad has resulted in greater cognizance the impact bowlers can have on a team’s fortunes. Prasad, himself a lanky exception amidst dozens of turners and trundlers, has been “One of the reasons of the success of this Indian bowling contingent” says one time teammate Srinath. “I think credit should be given to Prasad who has worked very well behind the scenes to bring some meaning into the fast bowling department” he adds. And the number of different bowlers who have done their bit in the last year or so is even more heartening. Two of them, Munaf Patel (who won India his debut test against England) and R P Singh (who bowled brilliantly in England and then Australia) have watched this current series from the sidelines. The fact remains that a pool of bowlers of top caliber is competing for spots, a luxury Indian cricket has never before afforded. The day when a kid picks up a ball and says ‘I want to be the next Ishant’ doesn’t seem too far off and the joke about the lack of Indian fast bowlers is currently on the teams and batsmen that have been tormented by Zaheer, Ishant and Co. Says Srinath, “In the last 3-4 years there has been a sudden burst in fast bowlers in India, especially the good ones… Zaheer Khan has found his line and length back and he has been a more responsible bowler and the leader of the pack, then Ishant Sharma has been doing extremely well and I think he is the best news for Indian cricket.” No wonder, during the Mohali test, Australian commentator Glenn Mitchell remarked on ABC that Ishant is the ‘best fast bowler in the world right now’.

Srinath thinks that “spin has been our forte and now the fast bowlers have found their footing and our bowling (attack) is one of the most potent in the world!” The fine balance the attack has achieved has been the prime reason. India has always suffered from a skew towards spin but as Srinath points out that “there is a good balance between the spinners and the fast bowlers and they are working in tandem.” And he labels it “one of the finest balanced bowling attacks in the world.” Former Indian fast bowler Atul Wassan suggests the following strategy “when we tour abroad, then we (typically) play with three seamers and one spinner. I hope Amit Mishra can potentially carry on the same way… we would have Zaheer!....Continue

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The Sunday Indian

Monica’s angelic beauty and bewitchery unravelled...

Indians were supposed to get up, close and personal with Bellucci as the maker of Provoked, Jagmohan Mundhra, zeroed in on Monica to play our nation’s current Queen of Politics, Sonia Gandhi, for his film titled Sonia. With both the real-life heroine and the one intended for the celluloid version, coming from Italy, with Italian accents and even bearing a faint resemblance to each other, it would’ve definitely been worth a dekko. Sadly, the supporters of the prima donna of Indian politics were too sceptical of the idea, finally leading to Mundhra scrapping the project altogether! But take heart, for we’ll soon get to see Monica in two new movies that recently premiered at the Rome Film Festival, N (Napoleon and Me) and The Stone Council. By god, with Monica Bellucci’s fans growing all over the world, we bet we’ll get to see much more of this goddess!...more

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

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In comes Stanford John...

Donahoe has his own ideas to take Whitman’s legacy to the next level
Very rarely does one come across leaders, who not only dramatically transform fortunes of companies, but most interestingly, come on board with a pre-decided tenure! One such leader who beautifully joins the league is the sterling 52-year-old CEO of eBay Inc. – Margaret C. Whitman. When she took on the scepter of CEO in 1998, she made it very clear that a decade is a fairly good time for a CEO at the helm of a company. And her resignation comes precisely after ten years on March 1, 2008. “It’s important that new perspectives & new eyes come to the company. It’s tough to stay fresh, no matter who you are,” admitted Whitman on January 24. She will be replaced by John Donahoe, currently President of eBay Marketplaces, effective March 31, 2008. Ironically, the contrast between the two perhaps could not have been more striking, far beyond the Harvard-Stanford face-off (Meg is a Harvard alumnus & John is a Stanford graduate).

While Whitman has almost always tackled corporate growth issues using macro-strategies, John – who was the worldwide MD of Bain and Co. for five years before joining eBay in 2005 – has more or less focused on micro-process issues. Consider this. When, in 1998, eBay suffered debilitatingly due to lack of funding, Whitman initiated a massive IPO to fund its expansion plans. Her acquisition of online payment service PayPal in 2002 for $1.5 billion gave a much required boost to eBay, & consolidated its stranglehold in online auction business. In 1998, the 30-employee-strong eBay had a meagre 5,00,000 registered users. Today it has a mind numbing 83.2 million active users & $7.7 billion in revenue. With 15,000 employees & growing, it is the world’s largest e-commerce site.

John’s has a more customer focussed agenda, which includes upgradation of the site, revision of fee structure (he wants to lower the fees paid by people to list items & raise commission that eBay would earn on successful sales), and increasing search exposure for sellers with best buyer-satisfaction ratings. John prophetically commented, “Sellers that describe items accurately, ship on time & ship at a fair price will enjoy preferential pricing & discounts... this will significantly improve the buyer’s experience overall.”

Even the much praised Whitman has had her share of gut hits, notable being her open gamble to acquire Internet telephone service Skype last year for $2.6 billion. Skype did not generate expected revenues; worse, as its value fell, eBay had to write down a killing $1.4 billion. In fact, despite eBay seeing profits rise radically from 2004 to 2006 ($7.84 to $11.26 billion), Morgan Stanley quoted to B&E that the Skype acquisition was one of the chief reasons for a tremendous fall in eBay’s 2007 profits of $3.48 billion. Even Skype’s user and operating metrics decelerated across the board for the fifth consecutive quarter on December 31, 2007. Still, as Whitman announced her exit, eBay’s share value dropped almost instantly, dropping 6.1% to $27.18 before closing on January 25, 2008 at a 52-week low of $26.83, though Whitman did say of the new CEO Donahoe, “I’m extremely confident in John’s skills and the abilities of his veteran management team.”

They say it’s tough to become number one, but tougher to stay there! While Whitman has already showcased her cutting edge competitive skills to bring eBay to numero uno position in e-commerce, one wonders how much ‘tougher’ will John allow it to get to keep hold of that position! We don’t think it’ll take a decade for us to know that, eh!

For Complete IIPM Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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The realtor-hotelier

Not many have achieved this globally. But he wants to do in hotel industry what he has done in real estate. By siddhartha nahata

Over the last few centuries, the global corporate theatre has witnessed businessmen donning almost every other hat – a steel maker becomes an IT giant, a liquor baron turns into an aviation maestro, oil tycoons transform into retail magnates, real estate players are successful as telecom majors, and the list goes on. Whenever such businessman entered a new sector, which was different from their core one, they took the existing competition by storm and became a dictating force in that arena. Surprisingly, what the world hasn’t witnessed is experienced real estate players emerging as successful hoteliers.

It’s ironical since there is a logical fit between real estate and hotels; after all, the bulk of the initial cost of a hotel is in the form of land purchase. It is also ironical since almost every real estate tycoon has entered the hotel business. But almost everyone has managed to merely become run-of-the-mill hoteliers. So, while the Forbes list of richest persons in the world has been flooded with real estate tycoons, the elite list of top players in hotel industry in 2007 doesn’t have a single real estate major. It really revealed how ordinary has been the performance of real estate players, who have tried to become hoteliers.

What global realtors have failed to do, K.P. Singh, the world’s richest realtor with a net worth of $35 billion, has decided to do. And if he is able to make the transition, the jinx that has been floated that realtors can’t be hoteliers, will be broken. Singh envisions his DLF Hotels “to be India’s premium hospitality real estate development company.” The idea is to develop, acquire, finance and actively manage hotel properties. But it is not going to be cakewalk.

The spokesperson of ITC Welcome Group Hotel explains, “Both of them are totally different businesses. The common factor might be the layout of the property, but after that in the hotel business you enter into services, which is different from real estate. You need to have specialisation in logistics, manpower, and maintaining standards.” This is amplified by Nisheeth Srivastva, Director, Federation of Hotel & Restaurant Associations of India (FHRAI), who claims, “There are many differences between the hotel and real estate industry. The dynamics of the hotel industry are way too different, but at the same time a real estate player also has an advantage of having his own experience of property layout.”

Well, Singh has decided to walk on this untreaded path. The plans are gigantic and they can make DLF the number one hotelier in the country, ahead of Indian Hotel Company (IHC). IHC has a room inventory of 9,000 rooms and plans to double it in the next two years. But DLF has chalked out a mega plan of 25,000 rooms spread across different segments (luxury, business, leisure & recreational). Actually, DLF has made headway in implementing the plan. The construction of 6,000 rooms is under process across major cities and tourist destinations.

Singh’s confidence can be measured by the fact that he plans to list the hotel division (along with the separate listings of other divisions). DLF’s company spokesperson says that “work towards the listing of the hotel division is on track and has made significant advancements.” The plan looks perfect. To make his journey an easier one, Singh has struck deals with the world renowned hotel majors like Four Seasons and Hilton. The sharp-minded Singh was quick enough to gauge the importance of inorganic growth to make it big in the hotels business. Recently, DLF acquired the global leading luxury hospitality chain Aman Resorts for $400 million giving it a presence in the international hospitality realm. Such deals will help DLF to master its skills in crucial areas such as manpower, logistics, and supply chain.

For Complete IIPM Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Read these article :-
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Astounding a toll, this!

Say sea, say sand, say shells… and all that providence would vouch for, is Seychelles! This archipelago of over 115 islands, boasts of perhaps more pristine and uninhabited beaches, coves and exotic flora and fauna than any other! The great botanical and zoological miscellany is owing to the fact that the islands had been uninhabited for a very long time and it was not before the French occupation of Seychelles (named after the French politician Jean Moreau de Séchelles) that some human settlement started to take roots… post which the British established colonies there.

Little wonder then, that the island which was once only frequented by Arab traders and pirates (!), became a melange of cultures, colours and cuisines in a matter of no time and is now one of the most diverse places on this planet, both in terms of demography and ecology. Two of the UNESCO World Heritage Sites also have Seychelles as its home. The atoll of Aldabra (the largest, raised coral island in the world) and the Vallee de Mai, believed to be – hold your breath – the original site of the Garden of Eden, are both in Seychelles! Out of the 75 endemic plant species that the island boasts of, Coco de Mer – that’s the world’s biggest seed – grows only on the Praslin Island in Seychelles! You’ll discover the epitome of harmony between man and nature, as you amble across the talcum powder beaches… and trust us, it’s not really a spectacle to see an ancient green turtle basking in the sun on one of those equally primeval granite boulders – thanks to the numerous such sights your eyes and soul are treated to, every passing minute!

The best season to visit Seychelles (and to beat the chill of the northern hemisphere) is December to January. Take heed before you get into a tiff with the locals who are usually warm and friendly but well versed in gris gris, a local form of black magic! Even if you escape that, the mesmerising beauty of the place is addictive and sure to make one fall in love. So hey, don’t say later, we didn’t warn you!

For Complete IIPM Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Presidents too wanna have fun!

Undeterred by moral & societal considerations, Sarkozy courts Carla
Nicholas Sarkozy, the playboy president has transformed the presidency. Instead of transforming the economic situation as expected, Unlike his predecessors, he has let the media write & speculate on his personal life.

His divorce with Cécilia, a former model, had grabbed the media attention as it was the first incident in modern French history that a serving president was divorcing his wife. Soon after the election, he was attacked by the opposition for spending holidays on French millionaire Vincent Bollore’s luxury yacht.The latest in the series is his relationship with former supermodel Carla Bruni.

Nero fiddled when Rome burnt, so goes a proverb. Sarkozy borrowed a private jet from Bollore and flew in to the banks of the Nile along with Bruni to celebrate Christmas, when the workers unions were busy devising new strategies to deal with the government. The opposition has a reason to worry. “When the president is the personal friend of men and women who own newspapers, TV stations, who he makes pay for his holidays, who can say for sure that there aren’t paybacks?” asks socialist MP Benoit Hamon. Sarkozy, however, remains unconcerned of the allegations. “Despite the obstacles, despite the difficulties, I will do what I said I would,” said the president in his New Year address. The labour unions have been given the January 15 deadline to reach a consensual agreement with the government.

If the unions fail to reach a deal, his government would legislate the proposals, says Sarkozy. Is it as easy as celebrating holidays with his girlfriend in the Egyptian valleys? If he fails to swing the public mood in favour of his reform project, he would, to his utter discomfort, know the answer to that one.

For Complete IIPM Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Read these article :-
ZEE BUSINESS BEST B SCHOOL SURVEY
B-schooled in India, Placed Abroad (Print Version)
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M(exico)ystry

Singers’ death in new drug era
Music and ballads speak those words which remain unspoken otherwise…and the death of the same, leads to death of those words which would have been spoken otherwise. The murder of more than 16 country singers in Mexico, has evoked quite a furor as the secret of the delirious deaths has also gone to the grave, along with the songsters.

Retrospection reveals that such murders could be traced back to the drug killing which is preying voraciously on Mexico…what with over 2,500 persons being killed mysteriously, only leaving behind clues that strengthen the already foregone conclusion that organised crime is nothing but burgeoning. The innocuous musicians, who have been victims of such mystifying murders, have either sung narcocorridos or have had associations with the drug peddlers in some way or the other, which has triggered such a killing spree. The venom spread by drugs in Mexico is quite evident from the fact that the drug traffickers from Mexico command cocaine distribution over entire western and mid-western United States, with the latter however playing a pivotal role in not just the killing but also in the aggravating drug trade by supplying guns to the former. Looks like Mexico now has just one ballad to sing - ‘Love all and hate drugs’…oops was that a narcocorrido again?

For Complete IIPM Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Read these article :-
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Facing the c‘ORE’us challenge

Tata Steel should focus more on ore supply procurement than increasing steel production capacity
It was in October 2006 that Tata Steel first made a $8 billion bid for English steel-maker, Corus. A year later, that’s a $12.1 billion worth chapter in M&A books – the biggest ever by an Indian company – making the Tata Steel & Corus combine the 6th largest globally, with a total annual steel capacity of 25.6 million tonnes! That’s Tata Steel for you, growing amidst drama & against all odds.

And risks? Well, surely if it’s raising of $875 million through FCCBs during September 2007 to fund its Corus buy was not stretching it too far, it further went ahead with a $3.8 billion raising mega-rights issue (scheduled to close on December 21, 2007), stretching its total borrowings for FY 2007-08 to Rs.249.26 billion, a perilous rise of 638.11% over last year. Dangerous indeed, but that is not the primary challenge for the Indian behemoth. “So what is it?” is the question. Surely, with the company announcing a new organisational composition for prompt amalgamation of common functions across its global steel operations on November 28, 2007 – including Corus and other acquired units – synergies are bound to arise through focused management approach as Hitesh Agarwal, VP (Research), Angel Trade, asserts, “Bringing everything under one umbrella is part of Tatas’ initiative to bring all its companies under one umbrella. This will help the management and the benefit of consolidation will be realised in the long run.” The new structure, besides many others, also includes trusted names like Ratan Tata, B. Muthuraman (MD, Tata Steel) and Philippe Varin (CEO, Corus). While the move is in-sync with Ratan Tata’s vision of a “light-touch” integration strategy, it is indeed necessary to tap synergies, wherever possible in a time-bound manner, especially considering that at the moment Tata Steel’s priority would be to stop the downslide in Corus’ revenues which fell annually by 49.22% to just $468.71 million in 2006.

While the strategic logic for the Corus move was global expansion, that precisely is where the challenge lies – further acquisitions! With the price of iron ore expected to rise for another 3-4 years due to steel demand and supply mismatch, Tata Steel will have to mull over acquiring some iron ore entities in the near future. In the face of rising ore prices, Tatas should logically have bid for Brazilian CSN (than Corus). However, Tata Steel seems to have realised this – most recent proofs to prove the same being its JV with Riversdale Mining Ltd. in Mozambique for $88 billion on November 30, 2007 & the deal to buy a 30% stake in three companies owned by Indonesian Bumi Resources for $1.1 billion. And despite the current strained cashflows from Corus not providing returns enough to allow Tata Steel to think bigger near term acquisitions, the battle against getting hold of raw material sources is a must win battle for Tata Steel; whatever it takes!

For Complete IIPM Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Read these article :-
ZEE BUSINESS BEST B SCHOOL SURVEY
B-schooled in India, Placed Abroad (Print Version)
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Boomerang effect of Gold!

It’s 1999 déjà vu. The state of US dollar now, is quite similar to what Gold was at that time.

The fundamentals of the US economy appear to be inversely proportional to the optimism of Ben Bernanke. Declining home prices, rising foreclosure rates, a weak dollar and high oil prices; not to mention a crisis of confidence in the credit markets, yet, if Ben were to be believed, all suggest a period of moderate, but positive growth going forward.

One of the most potent faces of the US economy – the US dollar is having a tough time battling out for the crown and trying to regain its glory. ‘Absolute nonsense’, ‘Life threatening’ & ‘passed the pain barrier’ were some of the few adjectives used by policy makers, on the other side of the Atlantic, recently, commenting on the dollar-euro exchange rate (certainly, this wouldn’t have been on Bush’s mind, when he hired Ben Bernanke to clean up Alan Greenspan’s mess). It doesn’t stop here; the US dollar, now being used to pay for the purchase of higher yielding currency, is proving to be most profitable. According to Bloomberg, a basket of currencies including the British pound, Brazilian real and Hungarian forint, financed with dollars, returned 17% this year, compared with 9% funded in yen and 7% in Swiss francs. “Falling US interest rates & increasing volatility in the yen and franc, are making the trade even more appealing,” says Avinash Persaud, Chairman, Intelligence Capital Ltd.. US dollar as a carry trade currency!?!?

The US dollar is also trading at a record low against the Euro. “We suspect that having pushed the euro/dollar to within a whisker of a key psychological level, the market’s appetite has now been whet for a move above and beyond 1.50 and a fairly busy week’s data schedule offers up no shortage of potential catalysts in this respect,” said Neil Mellor, a London-based currency strategist at Bank of New York Mellon. The US dollar is now entirely supported by public flows into the US, which are largely purchased by central banks. Private flows into US are negative and gradually central bankers will also realise that to invest their reserves into US dollars is not the most desirable option and, therefore, in the long term, the dollar should continue to depreciate relative to assets, which are not ‘over-supplied’ – as is the case for the US dollar. In fact, the latest figure from the International Monetary Fund, testifies the above statement. As per IMF, the dollar made up 64.8% of central banks’ currency reserves in the second quarter of 2007, down from 71% in 1999.

The current time reminds one of what happened to Gold in the late 1990s when central bankers, world over, were dumping Gold and it fell to a low of $278 an ounce. Central bankers were hoarding US dollar and it was at that time when the US dollar composition of central banks’ currency reserves was as high as 80%. Circa 2007, tables have now turned in favour of hard assets like Gold, which is close to its life time high and is trading at $850 an ounce, whereas dollar appears to be in doldrums.

For Complete IIPM Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Read these article :-
ZEE BUSINESS BEST B SCHOOL SURVEY
B-schooled in India, Placed Abroad (Print Version)
IIPM in Financial times (Print Version)
IIPM makes business education truly global (Print Version)
The Indian Institute of Planning and Management (IIPM)
IIPM Campus

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