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Undertone
bullish sentiment in the market. Record inflows from foreign institutional
investors, progress on COVID-19 vaccines globally and signs of a nascent
economic recovery in the country. Moreover, strong FIIs buying interest and
better than expected November IIP data will be positive sentiment in the
market.
RBI hikes rates by 25 bps; home, auto loan rates may go up
Rattled by a spiralling inflation, the central bank raised the benchmark short-term interest rates—repo and reverse repo—by 25 basis points.
While the RBI communiqué was issued well after market hours in India, US stocks slipped soon after the announcement as traders felt it was a signal that monetary authorities would be quick in withdrawing the post-Lehman stimulus.
Banks pay the repo rate to borrow from RBI and receive the reverse repo rate for parking surplus funds with the central bank. The repo rate is up from 4.75% to 5% while the reverse repo rate is up from 3.25% to 3.5% with immediate effect.
Banks are expected to take a call on raising the deposit and lending rates after the March 31 financial closure. According to Chanda Kochhar, CEO of India’s second-biggest lender, ICICI, the bank “will wait and see the credit offtake and systemic liquidity to assess the medium-term impact on lending and borrowing rates”. “Currently, there is ample liquidity in the market,” she said. Indian Overseas Bank chairman SA Bhat said, “I do not expect interest rates to go up in March... if at all, it may happen next month.”
Mortgage giant HDFC said unless there is an increase in the cost of funds, the institution will not increase interest rates. “In the short term, cost of funds is unlikely to change much... It’s more a signal,” said Keki Mistry, vice-chairman and managing director of HDFC.
But for RBI, “anchoring inflation expectations and containing overall inflation have become imperative”. “Headline WPI inflation on a year-on-year basis at 9.9% in February 2010 has exceeded our baseline projection of 8.5% for end-March 2010,” said RBI.
Moreover, the central bank indicated that it favoured rate hikes in small doses rather than pushing through stronger measures at a later stage when inflationary expectations deepen. But, banks and bond houses already hit by rising yields, will have to provide for higher mark to market losses as they close the financial year in a fortnight. “It was a surprise that it happened before March 31,” said Pradeep Madhav, MD of STCI Primary Dealer.
After Friday’s rate hike, the market was divided on what RBI governor Duvvuri Subbarao could do when he presents the policy on April 20. “Some are not ruling out another quarter point hike in April 20... in the next few weeks, the market will continue to bet on this. Immediately, we will see yields going up and the rupee rising 10 paise against the dollar,” said a trader. In its release, RBI said it “will continue to monitor macroeconomic conditions, particularly the price situation, and take further action as warranted”.
For nearly a decade, the Women's Reservation Bill has been a political raw nerve. It has always triggered heated debates in Parliament and outside. I just wonder why Women's Reservation Bill is so controversial. Is it because its name itself suggests that it’s meant for women??
Begin women, I can agree for reservation stating …..
-Increased political participation of women will help them to fight against the abuse, discrimination and inequality they suffer from
-The experience of panchayat and community showed that women had worked for uplift of the villages and community.
-MP’s will no longer be claim attachment to one single constituency.
But would it be fair?
Don’t the women’s reservation bills would have impact on the caste struggle? Is it really a solution to the existing problem? Is it really required to plead for reservation within reservation?
Millions of poor women face steep odds, with shorter schooling, worse nutrition and a literacy rate more than 20% lower than men. So, I believe those demanding reservation should first take up issues like female foeticide, women's literacy, malnourishment of the girl child, and so on, if they want to bring real change in our society and change the outlook of society towards women. Reservation is definitely not a solution to the problem. If at all reservation is required it should be reservation of women in political parties than in Parliament. We have to give women a proper space in a significant way in the democratic setup.
So it’s up to us either ask for some aid or try means to make the climb up the ladder easier for women in the political realm.
If you consider yourself as a quality player against which country you would like to hit a century.....a team like Bermuda where you face no challenge or against a team like Australia against whom you are tested in every step? But Indian women want the first option where they would get all the unfair chance and unjustifiable advantage against all......sorry I mean to say 'the men'.
For god sake try and try hard to get success . Don't just make a law which is already there in our culture(women first).Why can't women don't recognize the very fact that they cannot compete with men in every field.
scoring a six from a full toss ball is easy and it wont affect your strike-rate .Moreover it will increase your strike rate but the very fact is that ,it wont be remembered for long time.
It may make for great politics for one leader after the other to give sound bites on the bill but that does not take away from the fact that it is the easy way out for a nation which 62 years after independence has failed to give its citizens (read women) the wherewithal to grab their due without reservation.
Because in the end the need for women’s reservation arises in the mindset and after all the promises of universal education and compulsory primary education, somehow women, as young girls, always seem to miss out on the opportunity their brothers or male friends get — unless of course they are lucky enough to belong to the rare breed of families who take pride in raising parkati women.
And a slipshod reservation foisted on a country which is still far from giving women their due will only result in the proliferation of sarpanch patis who are husbands of heads of panchayats where the post is reserved for women. In many villages across the country the real power rests in the SP. There are better-known examples of the wife holding fort while the man is away from the scene, but anyone believing that it is a sign of the woman's empowerment will only be deluding themselves.
Any self-respecting woman would want to be where she is because she deserves to be there, not because of her gender. If the state has failed to bring women to that level, then there is hardly anything reservation can achieve.
The same way as the notion of a woman President has done little to empower Indian women as a whole and it is unlikely that the notion of a woman Lok Sabha Speaker will go much further. Because in the end that’s what they are — just notions. I do not see the Women's Reservation Bill becoming anything more than that.
My logic against reservation is somewhat similar to what was proferred at the time of the OBC reservation issue — affirmative action is the need of the hour.
That could be in the form of the Laadli scheme that the Delhi government started for girl children of families with annual income of below one lakh — the government pays certain amounts of money linked to the girl’s educational progress so that by the time she is ready to go to college there is a corpus of Rs 1 lakh available to her — or CBSE’s scholarship scheme for the single girl child or any other forms of incentive to encourage families to give the same kind of facilities to girls as they give to boys.
Reservation is an acknowledgment of the failure of the state and the political system represented by the likes of Sharad Yadav who talk social justice and gender injustice in the same breath.
Let’s at least have the good sense to feel ashamed of it. All sort of comments are invited..........
