With reference to the timely ‘No more regulators’ by Mohan Lavi (May 11), it goes without saying that irrespective of the alleged instances of conflict of interest, the Centre’s proposed move to appoint independent regulators for certain services is ill-conceived. This will aggravate the extant problem of multiplicity of professional bodies; they have miserably failed to deliver owing to the lack of coordination and inability to rise to the occasion.

Ironically, the Centre too hasn’t kept tabs on the effectiveness of its self-regulatory mechanism either. We should make existing bodies more accountable and responsive to the emerging situation.

Vinayak G

Bengaluru

Encourage investment

The Centre must have a direct taxation system such that it doesn’t discourage people from investing or working in the country. Taxing capital gains on FDI from Mauritius may not yield more revenue if foreigners think the system penalises them.

S Ramakrishnasayee

Ranipet, Tamil Nadu

Big setback

The UK’s refusal to deport Vijay Mallya is an encouragement to loan defaulters. The framing of laws in any country should not give undue advantage to anyone who has committed financial irregularities and is responsible for financial mismanagement of money borrowed from financial agencies. Laws protecting defaulters give birth to more defaulters.

KV Seetharamaiah

Hassan, Karnataka

Misrepresentation

This refers to ‘Learning to tell the story of our society’ by Samanth Subramanian (May 11). History, as a subject and as the identity of a nation, is losing its shine owing to the misrepresentation of facts. There has been reciprocal intervention or disruption between the people and the environment in which they live. Hence, people and their context are inseparable when it comes to narrating stories. Today, Indian universities devote much of their resources only to ‘lucrative’ courses such as IT and ITeS and what industry demands.

S Lakshminarayanan

Irresponsible comment

Narendra Modi comparing Kerala to Somalia is insulting. In any case, the Centre is equally responsible for the drawbacks in any State. In many aspects, Kerala is better than Gujarat. For instance, the poverty rate in Kerala is 7 per cent; in Gujarat it is 17 per cent.

KA Solaman

Alappuzha, Kerala

Making ARCs relevant

This refers to your edit, ‘No quick fix’ (May 11). It’s true we need a lot of capital in our ARCs to make them more relevant. But we have a large portion of NPAs where the assets are useless. Take, for instance, the power plants that are stranded because of lack of gas.

These assets will not be taken over by the ARCs and they will continue to be in the books of our banks. Assets with a fuel supply problem should be kept separate; the regulator should make allowance for provisions for these assets.

The Government will have to play a key role in making sure that these assets become productive by arranging fuel supply to these power plants. Our NPA problem is because of various reasons and we need to address them all for growth to come back.

CR Arun

Tiruchirappallli

Upgrade skill sets

I recently applied for an IPO through the ASBA (Application Supported by Blocked Account) mode, which is compulsory now — I faced various hurdle and difficulties. This was due to lack of knowledge and understanding of the system.

Many of the employees at the bank did not even know what ASBA is and how to handle it in the system; they were also not fully conversant with the IPO application. As ASBA has been made compulsory and mandatory, customers expect that bank employees will have the skills to attend to these.

These skills need to be upgraded and constantly improved. They should be trained appropriately for this. You cannot run a business today with yesterday’s tools and hope to be in business tomorrow.

RS Raghavan

Bengaluru

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.

Related Topics
comment COMMENT NOW