Accountancy
Doshi kaun
THE new epidemic in the ICAI is to catch up. ``As part of our on-going initiative to align our activities with international efforts,'' Mr N. D. Gupta writes in his August missive, ``We are always conscious that the number of Accounting Standards publish
ed by the Institute should not lack (lag?) behind what are current internationally.'' To make up the right numbers, you do know that Mr Gupta has trying hard.
Too many rights
WHAT is the role of the shareholder in good corporate governance? Certainly, corporate governance is not a one-way traffic. Irresponsible behaviour by any one or more shareholders can make a mockery of it. How do shareholders assert their rights? A share
holder holding one share can harass the management by giving notice for the removal or appoint of a director, as the case may be, though knowing full well that he does not command the requisite voting power. Providing such members copies of balance-sheet
, notice of meetings, and so on, is a costly affair for companies. Often, a shareholder proposes the removal of a director (who holds the office of managing director) without any alternative proposal and unmindful of the mandatory provision for the appoi
ntment of a managing director. Any person can ask for a copy of the memorandum of association on paying Re 1, while the cost per copy could be Rs 50 or more. These are age-old provisions.
A celebrity is no model
The Monopoly and Restrictive Trade Practices Commission (MRTPC) has, in many cases, taken a charitable view and absolved business houses of the charge of forcing their dealers to enter into an exclusive dealing agreement, by allowing them to go through t
he 'gateway' of public interest, though, prima facie, exclusive dealing is one of the species of restrictive trade practice.
Editorial
Face-to-face with terror
FOR MANY THE television image of the twin towers of the World Trade Centre in New York crashing down could be the metaphor of an extraordinary hatred of a few terrorists for thousands of innocents. For many in India, it is a reminder of the 1993 serial b
omb blasts in the financial district of Mumbai though not comparable on any tragic scale to what happened in New York and Washington.
Miscellaneous
Beyond employment
BEING employed is as natural as birth and as inevitable as death. Employment is quite simply a part of our life. We do not, anymore, question its relevance. We get tethered in employment in the name of `freedom', both economic and psychological. In the e
arly stages of industrialisation, employment relationship was rudimentary -- the labour simply exchanged what was virtually his sole capital -- his labour - for money or food.
Haunting images
NEVER before in the two decades and more of its coverage of world events would CNN have imagined it would see a day such as this: As one of its correspondents said, horrified: ``I have never covered a story of such dimensions and I'm sure neither have my
colleagues''.
Politics
Ambushed a la Pearl Harbour
THE US has a well-oiled security management system with an efficient crisis management capability. In the wake of the unprecedented terrorist attacks by air in New York and Washington and, possibly, also near Pittsburgh, the crisis management, the preve
ntive and the investigative mechanisms have immediately gone into action.
Neglect comes home to roost
IT is impossible to find words to match the sense of horror and outrage at the sheer scale and magnitude of the diabolical acts of terrorism carried out in the US leading to the collapse of the twin towers of the World Trade Centre in New York and the ra
ging fires engulfing the Pentagon, the very heart of the nation's defence, in Washington, which are also the prominent symbols of that country's financial and military might. No film producer or director would have shown the slightest hesitation in rejec
ting out of hand any script depicting the incredibly calamitous series of events unfolding so vividly before the viewers with such a stunning and chilling effect.
The terror from air
HIJACKING has been a favourite weapon of terrorists to make various demands. But for the first time this method is being adopted to such devastative effect.
