I AND MY WORDS

Is Lok Pal is necessary to fight corruption? Yes we need one. That the conduct of a large number of officials as per our Constitution is not governed by anyone at all, especially the elected government is appalling in itself. Every democratic set up has to ensure its people transparency in the governance process. The example of free economies with less government is fraught with serious flaws of thinking. The United States is perhaps the freest economy, and yet on the Transparency International's index why does it not sit on the top? To think that this country does not deserve what our founding fathers promised (remember Jawaharlal Nehru in the 1960s) is fallacy. Moreover, our Constitution, when it gave powers to a host of elected representatives, did not define the scope of their conduct and what would be considered Unparliamentary. Current criminal laws already allow investigations; however, they require sanction of prosecution. The requirement thus is of a body th...

इंतज़ार का तो बस लम्हा  भर ही गुज़रा  है न जाने क्यों लगता है सदियाँ  गुज़र गयी हैं मिटटी के तिनके धीरे धीरे मेज़ पर तशरीफ़ टिका रहे हैं और सूरज की नर्म रौशनी सेंक रहे हैं वो कागजों और किताबों से भरा बुक शेल्फ टकटकी लगाए बैठा है न जाने क्या सोचता है बैठ यूं गुमसुम तन्हाई में बाहर खिड़की के पार दरख्तों में फूलों का इंतज़ार है कोई गुलशन होने का मौसम इन्हें भी नसीब करा दे यूं मुरझाये से पड़े हैं वो इंतज़ार में बैठ खामोश देखता हूँ सरसराते पत्तों को हवा के तेज़ झोंके से लहरा उठे जो हौले से, दबे पाँव आ खड़ी मेरे पास वो कह गयी न जाने क्या, समझ न आया मुझको लम्हा भर गुज़र गया यूं ही, देखता रहा मैं खिड़की की ओर राह देखता रहा आने वाले लम्हे की पर न आने की आहात उसकी, न करता वो शोर

Corporate sustainability is a paradigm that has been evolving rapidly and continuously. It never has a fixed definition; rather there is fluidity in its limits, and keeps expanding in all directions just like the universe does. The definition of sustainability, which was earlier defined by the Triple Bottom Line of John Elkington of environment, economics and society has been broadened and translated into other critical areas such as respect for human rights, corporate governance, fair trade ethics and stakeholder engagement, all of which do not in any way take away anything from the original components; instead, they can be considered to be a revised definition of the triple bottom line to match the need of the hour, as subsets of the original three sets laid out by Mr. Elkington about two decades ago. Today, corporate sustainability is an engagement process. It is a dialogue between companies and corporations with their customers, with their shareholders, with their employees, and wi...

In the hoopla associated with the land acquisition, including attempted padyatras thaat have been capturing more than necessary headlines, considering the ruling disposition's double standards over the same (people forget that it was Jawaharlal Nehru who had revoked the Fundamental Right to Property when the tribal people had started to invoke it in courts against mining projects) a closer scrutiny is certainly required over the oh-so-controversial Land Acquistion Act of 1894 and the subsequent amendment that governments have been searching for more than a decade now. A major flaw associated with the Land Acquisition Act has been the lack of any proper rehabilitation package being promised under the original Act. Under the Act, there were provisions for compensation, but this was not linked to the market price of land, and is to be distributed through the local district magistrate's office in the form of actual handouts, a perfect system of this money disappearing. Moreover, t...

I had attended a workshop on REC mechanism on June 17, 2011 in Delhi organized by the National Load Despatch Centre, which is supposed to be the nodal agency for this mechanism. Having started in 2010, it was indeed a unique learning experience to hear first hand from people involved in the process including people AB Power Infrastructure, Central Electricity Regulatory Commission and National Board of Irrigation and Power as well as the representatives of Indian Power Exchanges (yes, we have two of those as well!) talk about the policy, the teething issues and listening to people clear their doubts and give their suggestions, which were duly noted. Any typical trade mechanism in the world is based on Coasian economics, about which I had discussed briefly here . In the case of the REC mechanism, the tradeable property or externality identified is the environmental credential associated with green energy, and it is a trade in this benefit which is surplus in some states while non-existe...

Debate over the method to tackle environmental issues has been under debate since the eighteenth century, when Adam Smith came out with the Bible of Capitalism "The Wealth of Nations" whereby he argued an absolute free hand to markets with the firm belief that the markets will find the solution to every problem. This can be argued to be a novel position with respect to environmental issues, as till then laws were passed in England for curbing pollution (or at least the visual aspects of it). Though Marx and Engels did believe in the absolute control of the State, a middle path alternative to incentives and State control really turned up in the nineteen twenties, with A.L. Pigou coming out with arguably the Socialis't Holy Book, "The Economics of Welfare". He argued consistently for both aspects, saying that while it is okay for enterprises to make profits, to tackle problems arising due to industrial activities, profits must be taxed and the monies turned around...

What should India's energy policy look like? There has been endless debate and countless number of posturings people on every corner of this quadrilateral have adopted. However, we all fail to miss the woods for the trees. History is a great teacher, and we should certainly look back at world history to look at the curious case of Denmark to understand where it succeeded while others failed. I remember sitting in class when Mr. Benjamin Sovacool was passionately discussing Denmark's conscious shift towards renewable energy that started way back in 1973 after the oil shock caught them with their pants down. I confess to not having thought too much of it then. Since then, however, a lot of water has flown under the bridge, and looking at things as they stand now, Mr. Sovacool stands vindicated. One should look at the Denmark model of energy self reliance and how they consciously moved their national grid from being dependent on fossil fuels towards being one dominated by renewabl...