Economy
Vision 2020 -- How not to generate black-money
A transparent, unambiguous tax system that is low enough not to generate resentment, and gives taxpayers a sense of participation and ownership are the keys to get people to pay taxes properly without creating a black economy, says P. V. Indiresan.
Editorial
Funding infrastructure
WITH THE DEMAND for infrastructure facilities and services continuing to outpace supply, there are genuine fears about the sustainability of economic growth. The widening gap between demand and supply of infrastructure services is directly
linked to the woefully short supply of funds for the development of this sector. Infrastructure investments have slowed considerably in recent years largely because of the uneconomic pricing of the services, as highlighted by th
e Minister of State for Planning and Programme Implementation, Mr. Arun Shourie.
Miscellaneous
Endism
THE idea that things as known for ages will come to an end was first planted in the public mind by Francis Fukuyama. He was carried away to such an extent by the collapse of the Soviet Union and the passing of the Cold War era as to fancy the end of hist
ory itself! He burst into print with his book The End of History and The Last Man to argue that history conceived as ``the clash of political ideologies is at an end'' and that liberal democracy may be ``the end point of mankind's ideological evolution''
and ``the final form of human government''. That book and the word ``end of history'' were the craze for some time. History continued its onward march driving Fukuyama out of public view.
Politics
Fighting the good fight
THE Central Vigilance Commissioner has added 82 more names of corrupt officials on his website. He had earlier put 91 names on the web, mainly of personnel from the All-India Services. This was his way of letting the world know who the corrupt officers w
ere. The latest list consists of officers from the Departments of Income-Tax, Customs, Central Excise and so on. The CVC feels that publication of such names will create public awareness about the corrupt.
US: Midas touch in the reverse
TO BORROW an expression from Mao Zedong, the US has the unique knack of frequently lifting and dropping a boulder on its own feet by backing wrong and undesirable horses in the name of democracy and national interest.
Much ado about Clinton's visit
ALL the hoopla surrounding Mr. Bill Clinton's visit to South Asia next week can be put down to the fact that this will be the outgoing US President's first (and last) visit to the region. Indeed, it is a measure of the importance Mr. Clinton's administra
tion has given to South Asian affairs during the past eight years of Democratic Party rule in the White House that he has not found time (that is, given more than ordinary priority) to visit the subcontinent which, he now says, will emerge as perhaps the
most important policy cauldron in international affairs in the first half of the new century.
