Subject to Senate confirmation, former Congressman TIm Roemer, will become President Obama’s ambassador to India. If confirmed, he will succeed David Mulford who returned to the US in February this year. Roemer is a native of South Bend, Indiana and was a member of the bipartisan 9/11 commission formed in the wake of the terrorist [...]
Posted on May 31st, 2009 by Gunjan
This weekin Mumbai, India, President and Chief Executive Officer of Westinghouse Electric Company Aris S Candris and Chairman and Managing Director of NPCIL S K Jain signed a memorandum of understanding to begin discussions on the sale of several AP1000 nuclear reactors. This enable the company that has supplied technology for half the world’s reactors [...]
Posted on May 31st, 2009 by Gunjan
No, this is not a man bites dog story! The India market continues to grow and in certain sectors, it still makes sense to expand vigorously. One such segment is luxury cars, where Volvo (a subsidiary of Ford Motor Company) announced that it increase the number of cities in which it operates in India from [...]
Posted on May 25th, 2009 by Gunjan
On issues that matter to the the Administration, President Obama’s statements and positions have been nuanced, balanced and thoughtful. One may disagree or agree with the attitude towards gays in the military, toward the closing of Guantanomo prisons, the handling of TARP funds, but few would dispute that the White House takes time to consider [...]
Posted on May 24th, 2009 by Gunjan
Proving to be the most flexible senior member of Dr. Manmohan Singh’s cabinet, Bengali lawyer Pranab Mukherjee will take charge of the Finance Ministry, handing over his prior role of Foreign Minister to SM Krishna. Mukherjee has also held the position of Defence Minister from 2004 to 2006. In both his prior roles, Mukherjee has [...]
Posted on May 24th, 2009 by Gunjan
Delhi University, Pune University and five Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) are listed among the Top 100 universities in Asia as ranked by the latest QS Survey. The IITs are Bombay, Kanpur, Delhi, Madras and Roorkee. The two other IITs were ranked between 101 and 200, Kharagpur and Guwahati as was the University of Calcutta.
Posted on May 22nd, 2009 by Gunjan
Dr. Manmohan Singh of the Indian National Congress party was sworn in as India’s Prime Minister today, after the general election results of last week. Included in his cabinet were returning ministers Pranab Mukherjee (Foreign Minister), Sharad Pawar (member of alliance party NCP), A K Antony (former Defense Minister) and P Chidambaram (most recently Home [...]
Posted on May 22nd, 2009 by Gunjan
One of the most luxurious hotels in central New Delhi is the The Imperial. Richard Branson had just pitched Virgin Media in the side lawn the previous night. Dr. Susan Hockfeld, President of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) was visiting along with a bevy of her top Deans. MIT, like many top private universities [...]
Posted on May 20th, 2009 by Gunjan
Dr. Manmohan Singh’s United Progress Alliance (UPA) won 206 seats in India’s lower house of Parliament (Lok Sabha) and along and their “fourth front” allies have a commanding 285 seat majority in the 543 member body. The major constituent of the UPA is the Indian National Congress and its candidates did remarkably well at the [...]
Posted on May 16th, 2009 by Gunjan
The son of former BJP Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh was a contestant from the Barmer constituency. Manvendra Singh lost to the Indian National Congress candidate Harsh Chaudhary. And so it was in 19 of 25 parliamentary seats in the northwestern desert state of Rajasthan where the erstshile ruling Bhartiya Janata Party party was dislodged in [...]
Posted on May 16th, 2009 by Gunjan
Captain Gopinath took the Southwest Airlines /Jet Blue model to India’s aviation market. Low-cost fares, no-frills service, and internet-only booking were the hallmarks of his Deccan Air, which he rival sold to Kingfisher in 2007 and is now operated as Kingfisher Red. Gopinath contested and lost from the Parliamentary constituency of Bangalore (south) as an [...]
Posted on May 16th, 2009 by Gunjan
The Left parties, suffered a loss of 37 seats in India’s parliament and may be left with just 23 positions. The older Communist Party of India, CPI, (which used to be aligned to the Soviet Communist Party) won just two seats and risks losing its national party status after being marginalized over the years. But [...]
Posted on May 16th, 2009 by Gunjan
When I was a student at IIT Kanpur in the 1970′s an articulate and eloquent young man from St Stephen’s College in Delhi won every debating contest at our annual Cultural Festival. Shashi Tharoor has now created history in many ways by winning a parliamentary seat for the Indian National Congress from the southern state [...]
Posted on May 16th, 2009 by Gunjan
The Chief Minister of India’s most populous state, Ms. Mayawati Kumari was on a roll for the last several years. The 53-year old was feaured on Forbes’ 100 Most Powerful Women list and India’s national media began mentioning her name as a future candidate for Prime Minister. While she and her regional Bahujan Samaj Party [...]
Posted on May 16th, 2009 by Gunjan
Besides Gujarat, another business-friendly venue in recent years has been the southern state of Andhra Pradesh. The twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderad are home to India’s pharmaceutical giants such as Dr. Reddy’s Labs and to multinational corporatations’ India operations such as Oracle, Conexant, Microsoft and Google. The Indian School of Business is also based [...]
Posted on May 16th, 2009 by Gunjan
By many counts, the western state of Gujarat is the most friendly towards business. Early this year the captains of Indian industry stood side by side, praising the leadership of Narendra Modi, Chief Minister of the state and touting his name as a possible Prime Minister of India. The national leadership of his Bharitya Janata [...]
Posted on May 16th, 2009 by Gunjan
Once again, India’s electorate has confounded the conventional wisdom. Results of the 2009 parliamentary elections appear to be leading to a resounding majority for the United Progressive Alliance (UPA)and its leader, the Congress Party. Only hours ago the opposition National Democratic Alliance and its leader the Bhartiya Janata Party expressed hopes (now dashed) of forming [...]
Posted on May 16th, 2009 by Gunjan
In my book, Doing Business in 21st Century India, I highlighted how media mogul Rupert Murdoch (CEO of News Corp) extolled India over China, even though he’s married to a Chinese woman who runs his China operations. I also pointed out how India, unlike China, does not censor American media. This means that American media [...]
Posted on May 5th, 2009 by Gunjan
