Train travel amidst second wave

The Railways, is all set to resume services of Shatabdi Express, Duronto Express, and Humsafar trains from April 10 and only passengers with confirmed tickets will be allowed to travel on these trains. But will this condition alone suffice in preventing further spread of this dreaded virus? Will the coaches of all these trains be properly sanitized/disinfected prior to their scheduled operationalisation? More importantly, all rail passengers should also be asked to carry Corona's 'negative' test report, on the lines of the air travel, before being allowed to board them. Prevention is always better than cure.

SK Gupta

New Delhi

Contentious India-China ties

Apropos ‘India must emerge from China's shadows (April 8)’, the relationship of China with many countries has been under strain.

The high level Summit of Modi and Xi at Mamallapuram in October 2019 drew the attention of the entire world. Everyone believed that this Summit would be a major milestone in India-China relations. But things turned out differently. India had to face several incidents of face-offs, skirmishes, stand-offs along LAC , at Pangong Lake and at Eastern Ladakh, which ultimately demeaned the Summit itself.

Internationally, post Trump era, the recent meeting of US-Chinese officials at Alaska in mid March began in a rough weather with hard comments getting exchanged at the meeting. Nonetheless, Joe Biden's initiatives in resuming and maintaining good relations with China despite several odds should not however impact India.

RV Baskaran

Chennai

This refers to the article ‘India must emerge from China’s shadows’ (April 8). Apart from a stubborn bureaucracy India’s choice of the form of government and a perturbing political environment are also the bottlenecks that result in India lagging behind China.

Our liberal democracy is in stark contrast to China’s dictatorial regime in which public opinion and the opposition if any must follow the dictates of the rulers. Many of the initiatives of the Indian government such as about labour law reforms have been suspended due to political opposition and new codes of industrial relations though passed by Parliament have not yet been made operative.

Much of the nation’s energy is being dissipated due to the dual policy of the present government in which religion has unnecessarily crept in.

The role of judiciary and media in promoting economic growth has been a mixed one. This has not helped to build positive business sentiment.

YG Chouksey

Pune

Steady policy rates

The RBI in its first monetary policy for the financial year 2021-22 stuck to the status quo of keeping the policy rates unchanged as expected. It has also adopted an accommodative stance to sustain growth on a durable basis and in order to mitigate the effects of Covid-19. The unfortunate thing to be noted in all the MPC meetings was at no meeting the fate of depositors of banks were discussed. The focus is always on rates of interest to be offered to the borrowers and lessening their interest burden,but never on the interests of the depositors who supply the lendable funds to banks. Depositors are already hit by the lowering of deposit rates. How long they should suffer like this? The government and RBI should come up with a new scheme so that the depositors especially the senior citizens live comfortably and are not burdened in any way. The sheer negligence of depositors is unpardonable on the part of banks and RBI who have been bearing this situation silently as they have no other option. Please do justice to the depositors who are unable to live in this high prices of goods and other food items.

TSN Rao

Bhimavaram (AP)

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Send your letters by email to bleditor@thehindu.co.in or by post to ‘Letters to the Editor’, The Hindu Business Line, Kasturi Buildings, 859-860, Anna Salai, Chennai 600002.

comment COMMENT NOW