Bhutan honours PM Modi

It was highly encouraging to learn that Bhutan has conferred its highest civilian award on Prime Minister Narendra Modi for “unconditional friendship and support Modiji extended over the years and particularly during the pandemic”.

This award instituted in 2008, is conferred on people who have made a significant contribution to society in Bhutan.

But honouring PM Modi with such a key award, comes two months after China and Bhutan signed an MoU on a three-step roadmap for expediting their boundary negotiations. For sure, Modi richly deserved such an honour.

Vinayak G

New Delhi

Crippling bank strike

Apropos ‘Banking services paralysed on Day 1 of two-day strike’ (December 17). The strike in the banking industry has caused tremendous loss to small savers (no cash in ATMs) and the business clientele of the banks. It is not clear as to how the Centre will be able to solve the increasing NPAs — not only in the public sector but also in the private sector banks, with some facing run-on-the-bank” situations.

Instead of analysing what went wrong in the public sector banks’ functioning , the Centre seems to be focussing more on putting the public sector in “well designed folders of private sectors”, which is incorrect. It is high time that the Centre took stock of the present protests in the banking industry in totality and put efficient management personnel in the banking sector and also retaining the status of ‘public sector’ to remove several apprehensions on the present banking system amongst the people as well as the staff who run the banks.

Katuru Durga Prasad Rao

Hyderabad

There was a time when a strike by bank employees created a stir. Not so any more. The digital payment mode has eliminated the use of cheque payments, whose delayed clearance adversely affected the flow of money. Those who are envious of the facilities enjoyed by the employees must know that these have come at a cost to the pioneers of the trade union movement.

Collective bargaining has been recognised as a legitimate right of the employees. Workers elsewhere should also demand the same facilities. As it is employee welfare is low down the list of Indian employers.

If the government goes ahead with privatisation the worst affected are going to be the poorer customers as banks will charge exorbitantly for their services. Also what happens to the various government schemes for the poor which no private bank will touch?

Anthony Henriques

Mumbai

Pre-Budget consultations

“Pre-budget talks’ (December 17) was an interesting report of a good initiative by the Finance Ministry. While industry has called for policy stability, one is sure that there will be efforts to bring in simplification, unambiguity, and transparency. On personal income tax, although there has been good progress in terms of online processes, faceless assessments, and so on, it seems that more is possible. We now have two regimes with the possibility of switching between them each year (except in some cases).

Instead of fewer slabs and rates, we now have more (in the new regime). The Long Term Capital Gains Tax reporting is also cumbersome with the Schedule 112A, grandfathering and so on. While the AIS is intended to help taxpayers, it also puts an additional compliance burden of verifying, reporting errors, etc. These could be addressed.

V Vijaykumar

Pune

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