Opinion
Prioritization: need of the hour
02 Aug 2001 |
Dr R K Pachauri
| TERI Newswire VII(15)
Independence Day this year was celebrated at TERI with the usual solemnity and festivities of various kinds. This is one day in the year when TERI staff and their families, including children, get together not only to salute the national flag but to celebrate an event that most Indians appear to have forgotten the significance of. This is also one occasion when the country needs to count its assets and achievements, and lift the vision of this society towards horizons, which beckon India to keep its second tryst with destiny. Pandit Nehru, the country's first Prime Minister, rightly invoked the image of the country's tryst with destiny when independence was granted, but a much bigger expectation now lies in attaining economic freedom from the problems that have afflicted Indian society and particularly the poor for so long. The intolerance of current trends has found protest and expression at the international level, but it would be naive to believe that we at the national level would remain insulated to the anger that widespread poverty is likely to foster in the years ahead.
Global warming: A hoax?
01 Aug 2001 |
| The Economic Times
Global warming is a big hoax: so thought the President of the United States of America. Unfortunately, he is wrong. He assembled resource experts on the subject and asked them to explode the global warming myth.
Transporting pollution
27 Jul 2001 |
Dr R K Pachauri
| The Newspaper Today
One activity from which environmental impacts are proving to be serious is the widespread use of motorized transportation. The developing countries till about three decades ago were largely insulated from the problem of air pollution in metropolitan areas, because firstly, the volume of transport was much lower, and secondly, there was much greater dependence on public transportation. In recent decades, however, the rapid growth of personalized transport has created very serious problems in most cities located in the developing world. If we take the example of Delhi, the rate of growth of motor vehicles in use has been extremely rapid. Projections indicate that by the year 2020 Delhi would have over 10 million motor vehicles of all types as opposed to 180,000 that existed in 1971.
In infrastructure, you get what you pay for
21 Jul 2001 |
Mr S Sundar
| The Times of India
In the past, tariff determination in infrastructure sectors was the exclusive domain of government and was subject to political considerations. Electoral compulsions did not allow governments to set tariff to reflect the cost of services. Certain segments of consumers were either exempted from the payment of tariff or heavily subsidised. Although the subsidies were politically driven and determined by governments they were not paid out of the Budget but were borne either by the service providers or by other consumers.
The unravelling of unbundling?
20 Jul 2001 |
Ms Sudha Mahalingam
| The Economic Times
The rapidly unravelling Dabhol contract appears to have sent the Union government scurrying for less devastating payment security mechanisms for IPP power.
"Will they smoke the pipe(line) of peace?"
17 Jul 2001 |
Dr R K Pachauri
| The Times of India
The Director-General of TERI R K Pachauri takes credit - along with former deputy Iranian foreign minister Ali Shams Ardekani - for coming up with the idea of a gas pipeline from Iran through Pakistan to India. That was a decade ago. Now, the issue is again in the pipeline and may well figure in the Agra Summit. Pachauri spoke to Sunit Arora and N Vidyasagar on what needs to be done to bring the pipeline project into action.
India's economic polices: need to start afresh
17 Jul 2001 |
Dr R K Pachauri
| TERI Newswire VII(14)
Two intriguing concepts came to my notice in the context of discussions on the US economy. The first was part of a conversation held with a senior diplomat in Washington, DC who has served in India, and who was wanting to understand the state of the Indian economy. His main concern was related to India's ability - or the lack of it - to attract adequate inflows of capital from other countries as a means to accelerate economic development. His thesis was that the US had established a record of 'growing on other people's money', and that India had all the elements of governance and institutional capabilities to be able to do the same. His approach made sense, because other than countries of the former Soviet Union, every country that has prospered since the beginning of the industrial revolution has done so through the net inflow of capital. And what happened to the Soviet Union has brought out the failings of excessive self-reliance.
Status of coal-bed methane in India
17 Jul 2001 |
Mr S K Chand
| TERI Newswire 7(14)
The coal-bearing formations of India occur in two distinct geological horizons in the Lower Gondwana (Permian) belts of India and the Tertiary sediments (Eocene-Oliocene) of north-eastern India, Rajasthan, Gujarat, and Jammu and Kashmir. Methane gas is entrapped within these formations at a wide range of sub-surface depths.
Has power regulation come of age?
13 Jul 2001 |
Ms Sudha Mahalingam
| The Financial Express
The messy and devastating Enron stalemate is not without its brighter side. It seems to have accelerated the evolution of power regulation in this country by exposing the regulators to pitfalls that they should watch for. Now we have the Andhra regulator sending back power purchase contracts for possible revision and asking some extremely uncomfortable but relevant questions?questions that hitherto went unasked merely because the electricity consumers on whom would devolve the entire burden of the contracts, lacked the constituency and a forum.
Accountability helps regulate the regulators
07 Jul 2001 |
Mr S Sundar
| The Times of India
In our last article, we had argued the case for empowering the regulator. An autonomous regulator must, however, be accountable for his actions. It is only regulatory accountability that would make independent regulation acceptable to all stakeholders, especially the government.