Boo to boos

Close on the heels of Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and Maharashtra chief minister Prithviraj Chavan being booed at, at functions attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, it is unfortunate that Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren had to meet a similar fate. He was heckled by BJP supporters and not allowed to speak at a function in Ranchi while sharing the dais with Modi. Later in the day, when Modi attended the ground-breaking ceremony for the Nagpur metro rail project, Chavan chose to stay away from the function to avoid embarrassment. The incidents speak poorly of the BJP and its supporters. It is high time they were reined in and asked to behave in a more dignified fashion. With the Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah deciding to follow protocol and participate in the programmes involving the Prime Minister, one only hopes it does not turn out to be another shouting match.

NJ Ravi Chander

Bangalore

Opposition-ruled state CMs, especially that of the Congress, try their level best with the help of obliging media to spread the impression that booing them in functions attended also by the Prime Minister is the handiwork of the BJP. This may not be ultimately true. It seems this is one of the few options available to the opposition to escape the people's wrath in public.

VS Ganeshan

Bangalore

Unbecoming practice

The Delhi High Court is not convinced that the force-feeding by Rajan Vichare, a Shiv Sena MP, serves the public interest if the 11 Shiv Sena MPs are disqualified for someone of the same party doing something. Hence the Public Interest Litigation (PIL) has been dismissed. It is no one’s case that Vichare’s conduct is unbecoming of the status he enjoys as MP. At the most the petitioner could have sought action against Vichare for his misdemeanour.

The High Court has taken the proper view that neither of the aggrieved persons has approached the police for registration of an FIR regarding the alleged incident. There are many PILs which are not spontaneous. One or more political parties hostile to the other induce petitioners to file PILs even if there is no merit in the case. PILs are often filed to settle personal and political scores. It is bad practice.

KV Seetharamaiah

Hassan, Karnataka

Maharaja rules no more

It is distressing to hear about the frequent accidents involving Air India, the last one being the A-320 aircraft from Male which was stranded in Thiruvananthapuram airport last Saturday after a tyre burst while landing. Recently, passengers have had narrow escapes in Thiruvananthapuram, Delhi and Mumbai.

Yet, even after the major accident in Mangalore in 2010, the authorities continue to avoid taking responsibility. We thought things would improve when the two airlines merged in 2007, but it’s only going from bad to worse.While other airlines gear up to meet international competition, Air India remains a by-word for poor services. I had a bitter experience in 2012 while travelling by Air India Express on the Kochi-Thiruvananthapuram-Bahrain-Doha sector. At Bahrain Airport, passengers were asked to disembark on account of a minor engine defect; 45 minutes later, when the aircraft was ready, the pilot had left as his duty time was over. About 40 passengers were stranded and it was only after strong protests that arrangements were made to accommodate us on a Qatar Airways flight. It is high time we did something about the shoddy service.

Raisum Mathew

Ernakulam

Unfair treatment

Just two days after Irom Shramila walked free, the activist’s been arrested again. She has endured enough. She’s been found not guilty. It is unfair to see a warrior being treated so abominably.

Indu Suresh

Hyderabad

Balanced approach

The recent case of Bhushan Steel is an example of a type 1 security going bad and the value of the loan going sour for both the banks and the NBFCs. We need to have a list of shares withcredit ratings that will enable lending agencies to be comfortable in the business. The problem for small companies will arise if we select only group A and creditworthy shares to lend to. So we need a balanced approach to this stock lending business by linking the cash flows of the business to arrive at the value of the shares pledged by the promoters.

Banks and NBFCs are in the game to take risks and get an adequate return for the risk taken by them. They also should make an independent review of these risks and assess businesses according to the industry concerned and form a collaboration system, where they can be sure of the promoters and the businesses of these companies, and the value of the shares.

CR Arun

Email

No choice

There is no denying the fact that NA Mujumdar was a great economist (“For an economics of compassion” by SS Tarapore, August 22), but liking or not liking post-liberalisation policies is not the choice of an individual. The country saw total socialism till 1990 due to which economic development suffered drastically. Post-liberalisation policies were necessarily very harsh as the economy moved from socialism to partial capitalism, but who knew it would be impure capitalism?

While the management was handed over to private parties and there was no control on capital, power has been accumulated in a few hands.

Growth could not do as much as expected; crony capitalists retained control. Now the government is bending to the call of coal block owners, selling 2G spectrum ruthlessly, bowing to pressure on fixing the prices of gas, and so on. Clearly, the government has moved away from welfare to expecting self-dependence. But the larger question is how to rectify the mistakes of post-liberalisation.

RK Arya

Faridabad

Not surprising?

In a surprise move Kerala chief minister Oommen Chandy announced that Kerala will enforce prohibition in a phased manner. And he came out with further actions to be taken and its implications on revenue and legal matters.

But all this has come because of differences in the party. It appears there is no permanent solution to the problems. In view of the coming Assembly elections will it bring unity in the party?

A Jacob Sahayam

Thiruvananthapuram

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