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Banking News: September 5, 2018
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Debt resolution under IBC process:
Banks take 47% haircut in RBI first list
Dev
Chatterjee
The
Business Standard
Published
on September 5, 2018
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Lack of capacity at the NCLTs is turning out to be
a big concern for the investors as well as lenders
New Delhi, September 4:
With debt resolution under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code process picking
up, banks have seen Rs 550 billion of recoveries at an average 47% haircut in
the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) first list announced in June 2017.
Here is the status of
the first 12 companies:
The pick-up in
recoveries to 4% of loans in June quarter was also primarily on account of
IBC-led resolutions. According to Credit Suisse, though the IBC process is
time-bound (180 days extendable to 270 days), many of the larger cases have
witnessed delays.
However, the usual
300-day timeline is still significantly superior to the other court-driven
processes (DRT, SARFAESI) where it takes even a decade for the entire process
to get over. In the past, the RBI also attempted several
restructuring/dispensations for bank-led resolution processes. However, these
did not yield strong results, with 100% of SDR and 70% of corporate
restructuring faltering or failing.
NCLT capacity is a
constraint
Lack of capacity at the
NCLTs is turning out to be a big concern for the investors as well as
lenders. With now over 2,200 cases filed, they appear to be getting
clogged-up. Among the 28 companies under the 2nd list, 10 with 40% of debt
are yet to be admitted to the NCLT.
None of the cases have
seen any resolutions. A couple are close to being resolved while a few are
likely to go into liquidation. With an estimated additional 60-65 large
companies expected to be referred to the NCLT following the February 12
circular of the RBI, the timelines are likely to be further delayed.
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No relief in petrol, diesel prices soon! Government
rules out excise duty cut as fuel rates hit new high
The
Financial Express
Published
on September 5, 2018
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New Delhi, September 4
(PTI): The government will not cut excise duty on petrol and diesel to
cushion spiralling prices, which touched fresh highs Tuesday, as it has
limited fiscal space available to take any dent in revenue collections, a top
official said. With imports becoming costlier because of a free-fall in rupee
against the US dollar, the government believes the current account deficit
will overshoot the target and it cannot “disturb fiscal maths by cutting
excise duty on petrol and diesel,” the official, who wished not to be
identified, said.
Petrol and diesel
prices Tuesday touched fresh highs as rupee dipped to a record low of 71.54
against US dollar, making imports costlier. Petrol price in Delhi rose to a
record Rs 79.31 a litre and diesel climbed to an all-time high of Rs 71.34,
renewing calls for a cut in excise duty to cushion the spike. Almost half of
the retail selling price of the two fuel is made up of central and state
taxes.
According to a price
notification of state-owned fuel retailers, petrol price was Tuesday hiked by
16 paise per litre and diesel by 19 paise. Fuel rates have been on fire since
mid-August, rising almost every day due to a combination of a drop
in rupee value and rise in crude oil rates.
Petrol price has risen
by Rs 2.17 per litre since August 16 while diesel rates have climbed by Rs
2.62 – the biggest increase in rates witnessed in any fortnight since the
launch of daily price revision in mid-June last year. Commenting on the
relentless price rise, former Finance Minister P Chidambaram said:
“Relentless rise in prices of petrol and diesel is not inevitable. Because
the price is built up by excessive taxes on petrol and diesel. If taxes are
cut, prices will decline significantly.”
“We already know that
there will be a hit on current account. Knowing that we can’t disturb the
fiscal deficit, we should rather be fiscally prudent,” the official in the
finance ministry said. While fiscal deficit means expenditure higher than
income, current account deficit (CAD) is the difference between inflow and
outflow of foreign currency.
In an election year,
the spending cut is not an option, the official said reasoning that it would
hamper government’s spending on development schemes. “The government cannot
disturb fiscal maths by cutting excise duty,” he said.
Last week, credit
rating agency Moody’s Investors Service said there are risks of India
breaching the 3.3 per cent fiscal deficit target for the current financial
year ending March 31, 2019, as higher oil prices will add to short-term
fiscal pressures. CAD will widen but will not jeopardise India’s external
position, and the gap will remain significantly narrower than five years ago,
it had said.
The government has
budgeted fiscal deficit to be at 3.3 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP)
in the current 2018-19 fiscal year. Also driven by higher oil prices and
robust non-oil import demand, Moody’s expects the current account deficit to
widen to 2.5 per cent of GDP in the fiscal year ending March 2019, from 1.5
per cent in fiscal 2018.
Almost half of the fuel
price is made up of taxes. The Centre currently levies a total of Rs 19.48
per litre of excise duty on petrol and Rs 15.33 per litre on diesel. On top
of this, states levy Value Added Tax (VAT) – the lowest being in Andaman and
Nicobar Islands where a 6 per cent sales tax is charged on both the fuel.
Mumbai has the highest
VAT of 39.12 per cent on petrol, while Telangana levies the highest VAT of 26
per cent on diesel. Delhi charges a VAT of 27 per cent on petrol and 17.24
per cent on diesel.
The central government
had raised excise duty on petrol by Rs 11.77 a litre and that on diesel by
13.47 a litre in nine instalments between November 2014 and January 2016 to
shore up finances as global oil prices fell, but then cut the tax just once
in October last year by Rs 2 a litre.
This led to its excise
collections from petro goods more than doubling in last four years
– from Rs 99,184 crore in 2014-15 to Rs 2,29,019 crore in 2017-18. States saw
their VAT revenue from petrogoods rise from Rs 1,37,157 crore in 2014-15
to Rs 1,84,091 crore in 2017-18. A litre of petrol in Mumbai costs Rs 86.72
while diesel is priced at Rs 75.74 per litre.
Prices in Delhi are the
cheapest in all metros and most state capitals due to lower sales tax or VAT.
Officials said the spike in rates is on account of exchange rate falling to a
record Rs 71 to a dollar, depreciating by Rs 2.5 in a month. Also, crude oil
has gained USD 7 a barrel in a fortnight, driven by fears that the US
sanctions on Iran will likely contract supplies.
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Diesel price spike puts Govt in a spot
Twesh Mishra
The
Business Line
Published
on September 5, 2018
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Costly
fuel impacts inflation numbers,
and
is a handicap in an election year
New Delhi, September 4:
Spiralling auto fuel prices are giving sleepless nights not only to
consumers, but to the government as well, particularly with
elections round the corner and the Opposition stepping up its
attack.
The price of diesel,
the most common transport fuel, has spiked by Rs. 3.72 a litre since July 29.
It sold at Rs. 71.34 a litre in Delhi on Tuesday, with daily price revisions
propelling it from Rs. 67.62 a litre on July 29. With higher fuel prices,
transportation costs too are up.
According to SP Singh,
Senior Fellow and Coordinator at the Indian Foundation of Transport Research
and Training, truck rentals and retail parcel freight charges were up 4-5 per
cent in the first fortnight of August, when diesel price rose by Rs. 1.30 a litre.
The numbers for September will offer a clearer trendline.
Companies such as
Mahindra Logistics raise prices virtually every month, given the higher fuel
and other costs. Mahindra Logistics
CEO Pirozshaw Sarkari said: “One of the main components of transportation
is fuel and it basically is a pass-on.”
But high diesel prices
don’t really lead to a big decline in consumption, said a petrol pump owner.
“There is a drop, but not a huge decline. In fact, the current decline in
consumption owes more to the rains.”
The Petroleum Planning
and Analysis Cell agrees that higher diesel prices do not translate into a
tapering of consumption. Although diesel prices zoomed to a (then) record Rs.
69.30 a litre in May, consumption during the month increased, both sequentially
and annually, to 7.55 million tonnes.
Car sales numbers too
seem immune to rising diesel costs. Automakers, especially in the commercial
vehicle segment, saw a growth in sales in August.
In the passenger
vehicle segment, too, diesel engine-oriented manufacturers such as Mahindra
& Mahindra and Tata Motors saw sales growth. However, Maruti Suzuki
India’s sales of diesel vehicles have dipped in recent months. Its
petrol/diesel car sales ratio has changed from 60:40 to 70:30.
Though the government
is adopting a wait-and-watch approach, those in the know say it has few
options to deal with a spike. “Yes, we are studying the reactions, but we are
aware that our options are restricted,” said a government source. “In fact,
even our own (BJP-run) States cannot be taken for granted as far as fuel
price is concerned.”
Response of States
Bringing down the
excise duty by a rupee or two will not help, said an official, adding: “Last
year, the Centre reduced the excise duty on fuel, and the Finance Minister
appealed to States to reduce local taxes, but only Goa responded.”
The bulk of government
revenues (both Centre and States) comes from fuel taxes: a Rs. 15.33 a litre
excise duty and Rs. 10.46 a litre VAT on diesel. Till now, four States and
one Union Territory have reduced taxes on auto fuel.
In fact, the elections
may also compel the Railways, the largest bulk buyer of diesel, to pass on
costs to consumers. Instead of a tariff hike, it may tinker with revenue
generators, such as food, parking and cancellation charges.
Higher diesel costs
also play havoc with inflation calculations. For statistical purposes, diesel
is part of the fuel and energy group in the Consumer Price Index, with a
weight of 7.94. Diesel alone weighs 3.10 in the Wholesale Price Index. So,
changes in retail prices of various fuels impact the overall retail inflation
numbers.
(With
inputs from Mamuni Das, S Ronendra
Singh,
Shishir Sinha and Richa Mishra)
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Fact check | Is the banking sector
lending less to industry?
Rohan
Abraham & Ritesh Presswala
The Moneycontrol News
Published
on September 5, 2018
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Mumbai, September 5:
Despite vacating office in September 2016, former Reserve Bank of India (RBI)
Governor Raghuram Rajan continues to be a bogeyman for detractors of his
economic policies. On September 3, NITI Aayog Vice-Chairman Rajiv Kumar laid
the blame for lacklustre economic growth over the past half-a-dozen quarters
on the former RBI governor, saying his policies of fiscal prudence and
tighter lending norms shut the tap on credit to industry.
"There was a trend
of declining growth and why was it declining? Growth was declining because of
rising non-performing assets in the banking sector. When this government
assumed office, those figures were about Rs 4 lakh crore. It rose to Rs 10.5
lakh crore by mid-2017," he said in an interview to ANI.
Kumar went on to say
that new mechanisms for identifying and classifying stressed assets were
responsible for the mess in the banking sector, which in turn had dried up
funds to capital-intensive industries. He also attributed the decline in the
GDP growth rate to deleveraging of credit.
However, Kumar’s
comments overlook the fact that the banking sector has benefited from the
Insolvency & Bankruptcy Code of 2016, whereby banks have been able to
make substantial recoveries on loans gone sour. Rajan had championed the
institution of a body to expedite the time involved in liquidating zombie
companies and maximising recoveries by recycling bad debt.
The allegation that
cash-strapped banks are giving the cold shoulder to industry is unfounded.
According to data compiled by RBI on the sectoral deployment of bank credit,
lending to industries has remained robust throughout the years Rajan was at
the helm. The total outstanding credit to micro-and-small, medium, and large
industries was Rs 23,71,500 crore in September 2013, when Rajan took over as
governor of India’s central bank.
Industrial credit rose
to Rs 27,45,500 crore in February 2016, before plateauing around the Rs 26
lakh crore-mark subsequently. As the asset base of banks has grown over the
years, so has their exposure to companies, both large and small. In January
2011, the total outstanding loans to industry was Rs 15,39,800 crore. This
figure has increased by 71 percent, to Rs 26,37,100 crore in July last year.
Despite bad loans
weighing on their balance sheets, banks have not lost faith in power of
enterprise. The growth rate of industrial credit might have slowed over the
past couple of years, but in absolute terms, industry has been the recipient
of a third of all loans disbursed by banks as of July.
The net NPAs of Indian
banks has been on the rise. The RBI’s Database on Indian Economy shows that
the quantum of loans classified as stressed assets increased drastically over
the past couple of years. This should be seen as a direct consequence of the
stringent asset classification norms endorsed by the RBI
under Rajan's leadership.
The RBI’s
interpretation of the Basel-III norms is stricter than the original, giving
less leeway to banks to engineer a change in their financial position by
lending over and above the minimum liquidity requirement prescribed by the
central bank.
Net NPAs of banks
increased by over 10 times in the space of seven years, from Rs 38,725.1
crore in 2011 to Rs 4,33,009.7 crore in 2017, according to RBI data. Bad
loans on the books of public sector banks (PSBs) stood at Rs 3,83,088.93
crore, around 88 percent of all NPAs in the banking sectors. Private lenders
have fared slightly better than their state-owned peers, accumulating Rs
47,780.2 crore in stressed assets by 2017-end. However, their relatively
smaller exposure to industry has insulated them from the blowback of such
loans subsequently coming a cropper.
The recent spurt in bad
loans is also indicative of the fact that indiscriminate lending on the part
of banks in the past have come back to haunt them in the light of tighter
regulatory scrutiny and external factors such as demonetisation and the
transition to the Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime.
However, to attribute
sluggish GDP growth to banking reform would be inaccurate since industrial
credit has remained steady since the turn of the decade. By sanitising the
liabilities on the books of banks, the RBI is laying the foundation for
greater transparency and accountability, a move that could pave the way for
sustainable credit growth.
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Big scandal taking place in the name
of real estate business: Supreme Court
The
Indo Asian News Service
Published
on September 4, 2018
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New Delhi, September 4
(IANS): The Supreme Court on Tuesday said "big scandal" is taking
place in the name of real estate business, as it favoured independent
forensic audit of balance-sheets of the Amrapali Group to know diversion of
home buyers' money.
Saying "big,
serious fraud" is being committed on home buyers, a bench of Justice
Arun Mishra and Justice U.U. Lalit told the Amrapali Group to cooperate with
the auditors or face sealing of its premises and a forensic audit of accounts
of all companies, including directors, their wives and daughters.
It said those found
guilty will have their properties sold.
The court asked
Additional Solicitor General (ASG) Maninder Singh, appearing for Bank of
Baroda (BoB), to suggest names of auditors and posted the matter for hearing
on September 6.
The ASG
said BoB has initiated insolvency proceedings against Amrapali and
its forensic audit of some companies showed diversion of Rs 2,765 crore.
The National Buildings
Construction Corporation India Ltd (NBCC) gave a proposal for completion of
15 residential projects having 46,575 flats at an estimated cost of Rs 8,500
crores in 6-36 months, adding that it could take over the projects while
denying outing its own money to build these projects.
NBCC chairman Anoop
Kumar Mittal, who was present in the court said that to realise the estimated
cost of Rs 8,500 crore to complete the projects, there will be a shortfall of
Rs 2,038 crore which can be raised from selling unsold floor space worth Rs
2,100 crore.
The court said it will
try to reach the persons "responsible for the fraud" and retrieve
each and every money siphoned off from various projects.
On the proposal of
NBCC, the bench said: "We won't ask you (NBCC) to put any money. We will
provide you all necessary funds to start the project. The idea is that the
wheel should start moving."
The court asked
Amrapali Group to file its response on NBCC's proposal.
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RBI Orders More Banks to Appoint Internal Ombudsman:
But is the Concept Working?
Yogesh Sapkale
The Moneylife Online
Published
on September 4, 2018
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The Reserve Bank of
India (RBI) has asked all scheduled commercial banks having more than 10
banking outlets to appoint internal ombudsman (IO) in the bank. This expands
the scheme started by former RBI governor Raghuram Rajan. However, the
efficacy of the internal ombudsman (IO) seems to be kept a closely guarded
secret by the central bank and is completely non-transparent.
Since the customer is
not allowed to access or interact with IO in any bank, this new direction
from RBI may not add any heft to the redress of grievances, unless it makes
banks more accountable. As things stand, it is yet another layer in the
process before a customer is allowed to approach the Banking Ombudsman, where
in rare cases the customer gets justice. In addition, since the IO would be
an authority placed at highest level of the bank’s grievance redressal
mechanism and may be on a payroll of the bank, expecting it to deliver
justice to customer may remain an illusion.
In a release, RBI says,
"The IO will examine customer complaints, which are in the nature of
deficiency in service on the part of the bank, including those on the grounds
of complaints listed in Clause 8 of the Banking Ombudsman Scheme that are
partly or wholly rejected by the bank. As the banks shall internally escalate
all complaints, which are not fully redressed to their respective IOs before
conveying the final decision to the complainant, the customers of banks need
not approach the IO directly. The implementation of IO Scheme will be
monitored by the bank’s internal audit mechanism apart from regulatory
oversight by RBI."
Last year in
September, Moneylife, through an application filed under Right to
Information Act, found that Internal Ombudsman is meant only for banks and
not for customers. (Read: RBI Shocker: Internal Ombudsman is for banks and
not for customers)
The scheme details,
which we obtained, were full of contradictions, lack of transparency and
disclosure and seemed like yet another hurdle to quick grievance redress for
the consumer. Unfortunately, this was sanctioned by the regulator. It is no
wonder then, that even the new regulations by the RBI to protect against
digital fraud get better results from consumer courts than from the RBI.
The RBI further says
that the “final communication to the complainant shall mention that the
complaint has been examined by the IO and still if he is not satisfied, he
can approach the BO, i.e., level VI.”
This communication
itself is proof of the extraordinary harassment that a consumer is subjected
to through official sanction by the RBI. Why should a consumer
have to wade through six levels of filing complaints, with endless delays at
each level? Since the RBI has flatly refused to impose punishment on banks
for such harassment, it is no wonder that banking related disputes either get
resolved in consumer courts or simply languish.
So far, we have not
come across any complaints where there is such a communication about
reference to the IO. In fact, most complainants are in the dark about action
taken. What is worse, the very sanctity of this ‘advice’ is unclear, since
the RBI’s communication to banks’ does not seem a part of the master circular
of the RBI, which has strict implications.
The scheme further says
that the IO should ‘take into account the evidence placed before him by
the parties'. However, the consumer seems to have no say in ensuring that all
evidence is actually submitted to the IO.
A communication issued
on 18 August 2016, when Dr Raghuram Rajan was the governor, RBI, changed
nomenclature of existing Chief Customer Service Officer (CCSO) to IO. The
escalation mechanism stated in the communication kept IO at level 5, preceded
by Branch Manager at level 1, Circle Office at level 2, Zonal Head at level 3
and Principal Nodal Officer at level 4. If the customer is not satisfied with
the IO decision, she is required to approach the Banking Ombudsman at level
6, appointed by the RBI.
In 1995, RBI had
introduced the Banking Ombudsman Scheme to provide an expeditious and
inexpensive forum to bank customers for resolution of their complaints
relating to deficiency in banking services provided by commercial banks,
regional rural banks and scheduled primary co-operative banks.
All complaints reached
at the BO level are categorised as 'maintainable' and 'non-maintainable'.
Most non-maintainable complaints are those where procedure for filing is not
adhered to as per Clause 9 of the BO Scheme.
As per the Annual
Report of the Banking Ombudsman Scheme for 2016-2017, released by RBI in
December 2017, the Ombudsman has given an award in just 31 or 0.05% of total
maintainable complaints. All BO offices across the country had received
1,30,987 complaints out of which 62,539 were found maintainable.
According to RBI,
initial efforts of the BO is to try to settle the dispute by mutual agreement
and so, during FY16-17, it resolved 42.43% or 26,535 complaints in this
manner.
At the same time, the
BO rejected a whopping 57.23% or 35,792 maintainable complaints out of the
total 62,539 complaints it received.
Majority of the
complaints that were rejected by the BO were found not to be as per
provisions of Sub-Clause (3) of clause 9 of the BO Scheme. As per this
Clause, the complainant must first approach his bank for redressal of his
grievance. However, a large number of complainants approached the Ombudsman
directly without first approaching their bank.
During FY16-17, the BO
gave 31 awards. Of these, 20 had been implemented as on 30 June 2017. Out of
11 awards remaining unimplemented, in five cases, banks have preferred appeal
before the appellate authority, two Awards have lapsed and four Awards
remained unimplemented as on June 2017.
Although Delhi and
Mumbai account for the number of complaints filed before the BO, in terms of
awards, Delhi got one, while no award was given for Mumbai. The BO Office at
Kanpur gave highest 17 awards, followed by Kolkata at 6, Bengaluru and
Dehradun at two each and Bhubaneswar, Chennai, New Delhi, and Patna, at one
award each.
While there is increase
in digital fraud cases related with banking, the present BO scheme cannot
effectively handle these matters. The grievances relating to digital mode of
financial transactions accounted for 19% of total complaints during 2016-17.
This has gone up to 28% till end- June 2018, particularly with the inclusion
of deficiencies in mobile banking service as a ground of complaint under the
scheme with effect from 1 July 2017.
Looking at the levels
of mechanisms created by RBI for delivering justice to customers, there is an
apprehension about IO scheme as well. With the customer running from pillar
to post to get justice from bank, creation of another level without any
direct connection with the end user will turn out to be only another white
elephant. It, however, may provide ‘cushy’ ‘post-retirement’ posting for some
influential (and about to retire) seniors in RBI or the bank itself.
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What ails India’s pension regulator
Ulka Bhattacharyya
The
Business Line
Published
on September 5, 2018
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As
the PFRDA completes five years, it is time to reflect
on
its success, shortcomings and the way ahead
The coming month marks
five years of the passage of the Pension Fund Regulatory Development
Authority (PFRDA) Act, 2013, which set up the PFRDA as India’s pensions
regulator. As the regulator in charge of overseeing the National Pension
System (NPS) and India’s pensions sector, the PFRDA has come a long way to
the present. Therefore, given the occasion, it is worth reflecting upon some
of the gaps in India’s pension regulatory framework.
Setting up of the
PFRDA
The interim PFRDA was
established in 2003 to oversee the NPS, and regulate India’s pensions sector.
Concerns of inadequate coverage and fiscal unsustainability of traditional
civil-servant pensions had led to the NPS being introduced in 2003. The NPS
was visualised as a defined-contribution pension scheme, with features
including individual pension accounts, multiple pension funds and mandatory
annuitisation at exit.
Initially covering only
government employees, the NPS was extended to all citizens by 2009, barring
members of the armed forces. Subsequent reforms have focused on encouraging
India’s vast unorganised sector workforce to subscribe to the NPS, such as
introducing a simpler variant of NPS, ‘NPS-Lite’ in 2010, the ‘Swavalamban’
scheme in 2010 where the government co-contributes to the pension corpus of
unorganised sector workers not covered by social security schemes, and the
‘Atal Pension Yojana’ in 2015, where the government guarantees a minimum
post-retirement monthly pension, as well as extends co-contribution benefits
to unorganised sector workers.
The interim PFRDA
transitioned into the PFRDA, and the NPS received formal legislative backing,
with the PFRDA Act’s passage in September 2013. The PFRDA Act is the linchpin
of India’s pension regulatory framework, being supplemented by regulations
issued by the PFRDA, which regulate the functioning of key intermediaries
under the NPS framework, such as the NPS Trust, Pension Funds and Points of
Presence (PoPs). A recent report by the Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy, New
Delhi discusses this regulatory framework in detail, pointing out issues and
the way ahead.
A pervasive lack of
clarity
A major theme in
India’s pension regulatory framework is a pervasive lack of clarity.
For instance, while the
PFRDA is the regulator of the pensions sector, it is also responsible for
promoting and developing the NPS — a pension ‘product’. This gives rise to
concerns of a potential conflict of interest, and requires a clearer
delineation of the PFRDA’s role to encourage greater regulatory accountability.
A related issue
concerns the NPS Trust’s role vis-Ã -vis the PFRDA. The NPS Trust is a
critical intermediary in the NPS framework, which holds subscriber funds and
assets in its custody, implements PFRDA’s regulations, supervises and
monitors other intermediaries, while remaining under the PFRDA’s supervision.
At present, the NPS Trust and the PFRDA possess overlapping and concurrent
powers, in relation to inspecting other NPS intermediaries. Greater clarity
in this regard would certainly be welcome.
The need for greater
clarity also spills over to the PFRDA Act. For instance, the Act caps foreign
shareholding in Indian pension funds to be the higher of 26 per cent of the
pension fund’s paid-up capital or the limits specified for Indian insurance
companies. Though, foreign shareholding limits for Indian insurance companies
are currently 49 per cent, and foreign exchange regulations cap foreign
shareholding in the pensions sector at 49 per cent, the language of the PFRDA
Act which reflects dual percentages, creates avoidable confusion.
Consumer protection
Another major theme in
India’s pension regulatory framework is an inadequate emphasis on consumer
protection. For an issue as critical as financial consumer protection,
especially when the NPS serves as a universal product securing citizens’
retiral incomes, some of these gaps are particularly troubling. For instance,
the web-based grievance portal for NPS subscribers allows complaints to be
registered only in English, while the Hindi version of the portal is
dysfunctional.
In a nation as diverse
as India with multiple languages, and especially for a flagship national
pension product, having a functional grievance redress portal in English
alone is a clear problem.
Similarly, the PFRDA
(Redressal of Subscriber Grievance) Regulations, 2015 fail to specify clear
grounds for approaching the office of the Ombudsman, who functions as the
grievance redress authority. This contrasts with the mention of clear grounds
for approaching the office of the Ombudsman operational under the regulatory
ambit of SEBI and RBI, by aggrieved consumers.
Inadequate attention to
consumer protection also reflects in the recent PFRDA (Points of Presence)
Regulations, 2018. While the Regulations require PoPs, (who are
intermediaries and help in on-boarding subscribers to the NPS) to maintain
confidentiality of subscribers’ personal information, they fall short of
detailing specific standards of care required of PoPs, or expressly penalising PoPs who
fail in protecting confidentiality.
In today’s age, where
protecting personal information is critical, the absence of such safeguards
suggests that the realisation that protection of subscribers’ personal
information is critical and non-negotiable, has not made much headway.
The road ahead
Anniversaries are
occasions to reflect, take stock and prepare for the future. On PFRDA’s fifth
anniversary, addressing these gaps and strengthening the underpinnings of
India’s pensions framework should be a priority, for there can be no better
way to mark the occasion than creating a robust regulatory framework which
underpins sustainable retiral incomes of all Indians.
The
writer is Research Fellow, Corporate Law and Financial Regulation at Vidhi
Centre for Legal Policy, New Delhi
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Re-imagining the university
Janaki
Nair
The Inddian Express
Published
on September 5, 2018
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This Teachers’ Day, let us recall a 1949 report
written under the leadership of S Radhakrishnan
The time has come, more
urgently than ever, to speak of that gravely endangered space of the Indian
public university system. It is poised like an elephant hanging over a cliff
with only its tail tied to a daisy. Neither is the mind striding around
without fear, nor is the head being held high.
Instead, teachers are
being attacked for voicing opinions, as in the vicious assault on Sanjay
Kumar, assistant professor of sociology at the MG Central University of
Bihar. Other teachers are being raided, and their life’s work “seized” merely
because of the accident of marriage to the daughter of a renowned, though
radical, poet, as was K Satyanarayana of the English and Foreign Languages
University, Hyderabad. Yet others are being placed under overzealous police
scrutiny (if not being actually arrested) for their critical writings, or
association with legitimate rights and civil society groups, as were Nandini
Sundar and Archana Prasad, and now a wide range of teacher-intellectuals such
as Sudha Bharadwaj or Shoma Sen. All this follows the actual murder
of teachers such as HS Sabharwal in 2006 and MM Kalburgi in 2015.
There are, too, those
teachers who are being collectively bludgeoned by their own administrations
intent on driving the scholarship of teaching and learning into the ground,
as has been happening in JNU for the last two-and-a-half years. Delhi
University had faced the wrecker’s ball slightly earlier. The intolerance of
research, fearless speech, and contrary opinions has reached a crescendo in
the past four years — the murderous intent to exterminate all intellectuals
was announced by a BJP MLA from
Karnataka, Basanagouda Patil Yatnal. And the Higher Education
Commission of India proposes to do away altogether with teacher participation
in the very institutions by which they will be governed.
Let us, therefore,
declare this Teachers’ Day a day of silent reflection, introspection and
remembering, of all that the public university may have achieved, its obvious
failures, and its portentous future.
How far we have
travelled from the deeply prescient report, written in 1949 with admirable
literary flourish, under the leadership of the man whose name is commemorated
today, SarvepalliRadhakrishnan. Written in the first flush of
Independence, when world-class institutions such as the IITs and IIMs were
not even a twinkling in the nation’s eye, the document was a hard-nosed look
at the existing university system, its promises, its failures and its
possibilities. Our finest tribute to Radhakrishnan would be to remind
ourselves of the breadth of that vision.
In it, universities
were described as the “sanctuaries of the inner life of the nation”, as the
“organs of civilisation” where “Everything is being brought to the test of
reason — venerable theologies, ancient political institutions, time-honoured
social arrangements, a thousand things that a generation ago looked as fixed
as the hills”. The commission was conscious of the precipitous preoccupations
of a new nation: “We must give up,” said the report, “the fatal obsession
with the perfection of the past, that greatness is not to be attained in the
present, that everything is already worked out and that all that remains for
the future ages of the world is pedantic imitation of the past.” Indeed,
“Universities are the homes of intellectual adventure.” Recognising, with an
appropriate quote from T S Eliot, that information
had imperiled knowledge, as much as knowledge had forestalled
wisdom, the report reminded us that “we are building a civilisation, not a
factory or a workshop”.
“Our ancient teachers,
tried to teach subjects and impart wisdom. Their ideal was wisdom (irfan)
along with knowledge (urn)”. “Jnanam vijnana-sahitam” was
not far behind, but with the choice of those two opening words, the report
acknowledged a different composite intellectual heritage from the
impoverished intellectual past that is being promoted today.
Just two elements of
this fascinating document deserve our attention. At a time when there is
mindless pursuit of glory via science and technology (to which five of the
six Institutes of Eminence, which have been chosen to blazon our way into
international rankings, are devoted), let us hear what this document said:
“If we wish to bring about a savage upheaval in our society, a raksasa raj,
all that we need to do is to give vocational and technical education and
starve the spirit. We will have a number of scientists without conscience,
technicians without taste who find a void within themselves, a moral vacuum
and a desperate need to substitute something, anything, for their lost
endeavour and purpose.” The haste with which JNU has opened a school of engineering,
across the road from an equally illustrious institution which has been unable
to fill its seats this year, appears to be a fulfilment of this ominous
prophesy.
Two, listen to the
report on university autonomy: “Higher education is, undoubtedly, an obligation
of the State but State aid is not to be confused with State control over
academic policies and practices.” Further: “Professional integrity requires
that teachers should be as free to speak on controversial issues as any other
citizens of a free country.” An atmosphere of freedom is essential for
developing this “morality of the mind”. Yet the autonomy that has,
ironically, been recently thrust on institutions like JNU has come to mean
the freedom to raise fees, bring in faculty at enhanced salaries or start
innumerable certificate courses, which convert an admirably autonomous
research university into a teaching shop.
The Indian public
university, despite the innumerable problems it faces, in no small part due
to the compromises made by teachers themselves, has many creditable
achievements that were not foreseen even by the Radhakrishnan Report. But it
is to its lofty imagination that we must cling when the bonfires are being
lit and the macabre dance of anti-intellectualism has begun.
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Source: Internet Newspapers and anupsen articles
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