The hidden wealth of nations

India’s biggest source of FDI is India itself, money departing on a short holiday to a tax haven and then routed back as FDI. Will the government muster up the political will to clamp down on the tax-allergic business elite?

This could be a bumper year for the ever-lucrative tax avoidance industry. The 2015 final reports of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)-led project on Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) — which refer to the erosion of a nation’s tax base due to the accounting tricks of Multinational Enterprises (MNEs) and the legal but abusive shifting out of profits to low-tax jurisdictions respectively — lays out 15 action points to curb abusive tax avoidance by MNEs. As a participant of this project, India is expected to implement at least some of these measures. But can it? More pertinently, does it have the political will?

The BEPS project is no doubt a positive development for tax justice. If India’s recent economic history tells us anything, it is that economic growth without public investment in social infrastructure such as health care and education can do very little to better the life conditions of the majority. Which is why curbing tax evasion to boost public finance is part of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

However, notwithstanding the BEPS project, MNEs and their dedicated army of highly paid accountants are not about to roll over and comply. Again, if past history is any indication, the cat-and-mouse game between accountants and taxmen will continue, with new loopholes being unearthed in new tax rules.

Empowering tax dodgers

The primary cause of concern here is the quality of India’s political leadership, which has consistently betrayed its own taxmen. All it takes — regardless of the party in power — is for the stock market to sneeze, and the Indian state swoons. We’ve seen it happen time and again: the postponement of the enforcement of General Anti-Avoidance Rules (GAAR) to 2017, and more spectacularly, on the issue of participatory notes, or P-notes.

Last year, the Special Investigation Team (SIT) on black money had recommended mandatory disclosure to the regulator, as per Know Your Customer (KYC) norms, of the identity of the final owner of P-notes. It was a sane suggestion because the bulk of P-note investments in the Indian stock market were from tax havens such as Cayman Islands. But the markets threw a fit, with the Sensex crashing by 500 points in a day. The National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government, which had come to power promising to fight black money, promptly issued a statement assuring investors that it was in no hurry to implement the SIT recommendations. Given such a patchy record, what are the realistic chances of India actually clamping down on tax dodging?

Let’s take, for instance, Action No. 6 of the OECD’s BEPS report: it urges nations to curb treaty abuse by amending their Double Taxation Avoidance Agreements (DTAA) suitably. The obvious litmus test of India’s seriousness on BEPS is its DTAA with Mauritius. By way of background, Mauritius accounted for 34 per cent of India’s FDI equity inflows from 2000 to 2015. It’s been India’s single-largest source of FDI for nearly 15 years. Now, is it possible that there are so many rich businessmen in this tiny island nation with a population of just 1.2 million, all with a touching faith in India as an investment destination? If not, how do we explain an island economy with a GDP less than one-hundredth of India’s GDP supplying more than one-third of India’s FDI?

We all know the answer: Mauritius is a tax haven. While not in the same league as Cayman Islands or Bermuda, Mauritius is a rising star, thanks in no small measure to India’s patriotic but tragically tax-allergic business elite. In Treasure Islands: Tax Havens and the Men Who Stole the World, financial journalist Nicholas Shaxson notes how Mauritius is a popular hub for what is known as “round-tripping”. He writes, “A wealthy Indian, say, will send his money to Mauritius, where it is dressed up in a secrecy structure, then disguised as foreign investment, before being returned to India. The sender of the money can avoid Indian tax on local earnings.”

In other words, it appears that India’s biggest source of FDI is India itself. Indian money departs on a short holiday to Mauritius, before returning home as FDI. Perhaps not all the FDI streaming in from Mauritius is round-tripped capital — maybe a part of it is ‘genuine’ FDI originating in Europe or the U.S. But it still denotes a massive loss of tax revenue, part of the $1.2 trillion stolen from developing countries every year.

What makes this theft of tax revenue not just possible but also legal is India’s DTAA with Mauritius. It’s a textbook example of ‘treaty shopping’ — a government-sponsored loophole for MNEs to avoid tax by channelling investments and profits through an offshore jurisdiction.

For instance, as per this DTAA, capital gains are taxable only in Mauritius, not in India. But here’s the thing: Mauritius does not tax capital gains. India, like any sensible country, does. What would any sensible businessman do? Set up a company in Mauritius, and route all Indian investments through it.

India signed this DTAA with Mauritius in 1983, but apparently ‘woke up’ only in 2000. India has spent much of 2015 ‘trying’ to renegotiate this treaty. But with our Indian-made foreign investors lobbying furiously, the talks have so far yielded nothing. Meanwhile, China, which too had the same problem with Mauritius, has already renegotiated its DTAA, and it can force investors to pay 10 per cent capital gains tax in China.

Changing profile of tax havens

Tax havens such as Mauritius thrive parasitically, feeding on substantive economies like India. Back in 2000, the OECD had identified 41 jurisdictions as tax havens. Today, as it humbly seeks their cooperation to combat tax avoidance, it calls them by a different name, so as not to offend them.

The same list is now called — and this is not a joke — ‘Jurisdictions Committed to Improving Transparency and Establishing Effective Exchange of Information in Tax Matters’. Distinguished members of this club include Cayman Islands, Bermuda, Bahamas, Cyprus, and of course, Mauritius.

Today the function of tax havens in the global economy has evolved way beyond that of offering a low-tax jurisdiction. Mr. Shaxson describes three major elements that make tax havens tick. First, tax havens are not necessarily about geography; they are simply someplace else — a place where a country’s normal tax rules don’t apply. So, for instance, country A can serve as a tax haven for residents of country B, and vice versa. The U.S. is a classic example. It has stringent tax laws, and is energetic in prosecuting tax evasion by its citizens around the world. But it is equally keen to attract tax-evading capital from other countries, and does so through generous sops and helpful pieces of legislation which have effectively turned the U.S. into a tax haven for non-residents.

Second, more than the nominally low taxes, the bigger attraction of tax havens is secrecy. Secrecy is important for two reasons: to be able to avoid tax, you need to hide your real income; and to hide your real income, you need to hide your identity, so that the booty stashed away in a tax haven cannot be traced back to you by the taxmen at home. So, even a country whose taxes are not too low can function as a tax haven by offering a combination of exemptions and iron-clad secrecy — which is the formula adopted by the likes of Luxembourg and the Netherlands.

Third, the extreme combination of low taxes and high secrecy brought about a new mutation of tax havens in the 1960s: they turned themselves into offshore financial centres (OFCs). The economist Ronen Palan defines OFCs as “markets in which financial operators are permitted to raise funds from non-residents and invest or lend the money to other non-residents free from most regulations and taxes”. It is estimated that OFCs are recipients of 30 per cent of the world’s FDI, and are, in turn, the source of a similar quantum of FDI.

Such being the case, all India needs to do to attract FDI is to become an OFC, or create an OFC on its territory — bring offshore onshore, so to speak. That’s precisely what the U.S. did — it set up International Banking Facilities (IBFs), “to offer deposit and loan services to foreign residents and institutions free of… reserve requirements”. Japan set up the Japanese Offshore Market (JOM). Singapore has the Asian Currency Market (ACU), Thailand has the Bangkok International Banking Facility (BIBF), Malaysia has an OFC in Labuan island, and other countries have similar facilities. OFCs, as Ronen Palan puts it, are less tax havens than regulatory havens, which means that financial capital can do here what it cannot do ‘onshore’. So every major hedge fund operates out of an OFC. Given the volume of unregulated financial transactions that OFCs host, it is no surprise that they were at the heart of the 2008 financial crisis.

Apart from accumulating illicit capital (in the tax haven role), channelling this capital back onshore dressed up as FDI (in investment hub role), and deploying it to engage in destructive financial speculation (in OFC role), these strongholds of finance capital also serve a political function: they undermine democracy by enabling financial capture of the political levers of democratic states.

It is well known that political parties in most democracies are amply funded by slush funds that would not have accumulated in the first place had taxes been paid. But today, not least in the Anglophone world, global finance’s capture of the state appears more like the norm.

A lone exception seems to be Iceland, which began the new year on a rousing note — by sentencing 26 corrupt bankers to a combined 74 years in jail. Meanwhile in India, we continue to parrot long discredited clichés about the need for more financial deregulation and a weird logic that mandates a smaller and more limited role for public finance.

World’s largest canyon spotted by Chinese scientists

At over 1000 km long, 1500 metres deep, and 26.5 kilometres wide at the top, it was discovered during the country's latest Antarctic expedition to the South Pole.

The world’s largest canyon far larger than the Grand Canyon in the United States has been spotted by the Chinese scientists who took part in the country’s latest Antarctic expedition to the South Pole.

The canyon, more than 1000 kilometres’ long, 1500 metres deep, and 26.5 kilometres wide at the top, is larger than the Grand Canyon and is the largest canyon discovered on earth, state-run Xinhua quoted Chinese scientists who took part in China’s 32nd Antarctic expedition as saying.

Giant wetland beneath Antarctic ice

China’s expedition team, which launched the search around the Princess Elizabeth Area of the South Pole in last November, has also found many sub-glacial lakes and currents connected to the canyon, forming a giant “wetland” beneath the Antarctic ice.

They also detected large-scale “warm ice” under the sheet along with a number of lakes. Warm ice can easily be melted into water.

‘Will increase research in the area’

“It is very exciting that Chinese scientists led the survey and made the findings,” Sun Bo, vice-leader of the expedition team said. He said the achievements would help significantly with research in the area.

In recent years, science circles speculated through satellite remote sensing measures that there should be a giant canyon or lake covered by ice in the Princess Elizabeth Area.

The Chinese expedition team had surveyed an area of 8,66,000 km with the aid of China’s first fixed-wing aircraft, carrying an ice radar, high-precision differential GPS system.

China launched its 32nd Antarctic expedition with the research vessel and icebreaker Xuelong (Snow Dragon) on November 7. 

 

Can rural India reap digital dividends?

The virtual world has increased the possibilities of trade in the real world 

One of the primary agendas of the liberalization which began in 1991 was to improve competitiveness and reduce the transaction costs which largely restricted India’s trade with the rest of the world. But a quarter century after economic reforms were initiated, this Coasean problem of transaction costs remains more relevant than ever. The World Bank’s latest World Development Report, or WDR, points to the potential of Internet and communication technology (ICT) in pruning these.

The Coase theorem (named after British economist Ronald Coase) states that if trade in an externality is possible and there are sufficiently low transaction costs, bargaining will lead to an efficient outcome regardless of the initial allocation of property. Since the digital revolution, the virtual world has increased the possibilities of trade in the real world, minimizing these transaction costs. Transaction costs include search and information costs, bargaining and decision costs, and policing and enforcement costs.

The WDR cites the example of the Taobao villages in China to show the extent to which the Internet can induce development. Taobao, a consumer-to-consumer portal established by Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, allows entrepreneurs to open online stores and sell their products to interested consumers. A Taobao village is a cluster of rural e-tailers where at least 10% of village households engage in e-commerce.

It’s worth looking at the potential benefits of such a model in India. Over half of India’s population depends for its livelihood on an agricultural sector that cannot support it adequately. Structural reforms may improve the sector’s viability, but the only long-term solution is enabling the rural population’s access to other forms of economic activity. An e-retail model that aims at incorporating rural households could offer some utility here.

As matters stand, e-commerce in India is almost entirely an urban phenomenon. Clustering rural retailers as the Taobao model does creates the volume necessary for incentivizing at least some portion of the logistical and financial support urban retailers enjoy. And it could have the secondary benefit of providing a boost to artisans who lack access to a wider market, making traditional crafts unsustainable.

E-commerce ventures structured along similar lines such as ITC e-choupal, Craftsvilla and Kerala’s Kudumbashree have had moderate success in the past.

The major obstacle, of course, is the lack of rural Internet access. India has the ironic reputation of having the second largest number of Internet users and the largest offline population in the world. Internet usage is highly skewed in favour of men and urban households compared to women and rural households. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Digital India initiative aims at resolving this bottleneck. Its goal of connecting rural areas with high-speed Internet networks is laudable, as is its focus on digital literacy. How such a mammoth undertaking will play out remains to be seen. And to be successful—particularly in the context of the Taobao model—it must form robust linkages with other government initiatives that range from providing a cradle-to-grave digital identity to universal access to banking services.

Other hurdles wait further down the road. Judging by the government’s Start-up India push, the infant industry syndrome is an occupational hazard in the Indian policy environment. Rural e-commerce should not fall into the same trap. If the Internet has to become an effective catalyst for efficiency and innovation, competition is essential. Alibaba’s Taobao advanced so much on the efficiency frontier due to intense competition from eBay.

The last thing the rural economy needs to add to the protectionism the agricultural sector enjoys is a subsidized, protected retail segment.

ICT alone accounted for one-fifth of global growth from 1995 to 2014. In 1990, American economist Paul Michael Romer said, “Economic growth occurs whenever people take resources and rearrange them in ways that are more valuable… History teaches us that economic growth springs from better recipes, not just from more cooking.” Technological change is an endogenous factor in growth and Internet is technology at its best.

Ministry of Shipping initiates Project Green Port

Ministry of Shipping initiates Project Green Port

Weighing in the environmental perspective for sustained growth, the Ministry of Shipping has started ‘Project Green Ports’ which will help in making the Major Ports across India cleaner and greener. ‘Project Green Ports’ will have two verticals - one is ‘Green Ports Initiatives’ related to environmental issues and second is ‘Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan’.

The Green Port Initiatives include twelve initiatives which will be implemented under strict time bound fashion in order to achieve the targets. Some of these initiatives are preparation and monitoring plan , acquiring equipments required for monitoring environmental pollution, acquiring dust suppression system, setting up of sewage/waste water treatment plants/ garbage disposal plant, setting up projects for energy generation from renewable energy sources, completion of shortfalls of Oil Spill Response (OSR) facilities (Tier-1), prohibition of disposal of almost all kind of garbage at sea, improving the quality of harbour wastes etc.

Under Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan, the Ministry has identified 20 activities with certain time-line to promote cleanliness at the port premises. Some of the activities include cleaning the wharf, cleaning and repairing of sheds, cleaning and repairing of port roads, painting road signs, zebra crossing, pavement edges, modernizing and cleanliness of all the toilet complexes in the operational area, placement of dustbins at regular intervals, beautification and cleaning of parks, boards indicating cleanliness messages, cleaning and repairing of all drainages and storm water systems and tree plantation.

In order to achieve these objectives, regular training will be provided to the staff in order to generate awareness and inculcate a positive attitude towards keeping the environment clean and green. All the Major Ports have already initiated action on the above mentioned activities and are making good progress.

Health Ministry releases results from 1st phase of NFHS-4 survey

Health Ministry releases results from 1st phase of NFHS-4 survey

The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare released today the results from the first phase of the National Family Health Survey (NFHS-4), 2015-16. These are available on Ministry’s website, www.mohfw.gov.in. Findings for the 13 States of Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Goa, Haryana, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Meghalaya, Sikkim, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Tripura, Uttarakhand, West Bengal and two Union Territories of Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Puducherry show promising improvements in maternal and child health and nutrition. Data collection for the second phase States and Union Territories is currently ongoing.

The results from NFHS-4 in 15 States/Union Territories indicate that fewer children are dying in infancy and early childhood. After the last round of National Family Health Survey in 2005-06, infant mortality has declined in all first phase States/Union Territories for which trend data are available. All 15 States/Union Territories have rates below 51 deaths per 1,000 live births, although there is considerable variation among the States/Union Territories. Infant mortality rates range from a low of 10 in Andaman and Nicobar Islands to a high of 51 deaths per 1000 live births in Madhya Pradesh.

Better care for women during pregnancy and childbirth contributes to reduction of maternal deaths and improved child survival. Almost all mothers have received antenatal care for their most recent pregnancy and increasing numbers of women are receiving the recommended four or more visits by the service providers. More and more women now give birth in health care facilities and rates have more than doubled in some States in the last decade. More than nine in ten recent births took place in health care facilities in Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Andhra Pradesh, Goa, Karnataka, Puducherry, Sikkim, Tamil Nadu, and Telangana, providing safer environments for mothers and new-borns.

Overall, women in the First Phase States/Union Territories are having fewer children. The total fertility rates, or the average number of children per woman, range from 1.2 in Sikkim to 3.4 in Bihar. All First Phase States/Union Territories except Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Meghalaya have either achieved or maintained replacement level of fertility– a major achievement in the past decade.

Full immunization coverage among children age 12-23 months varies widely in the First Phase States/Union Territories. At least 6 out of 10 children have received full immunization in 12 of the 15 States / Union Territories. In Goa, West Bengal, Sikkim, and Puducherry more than four-fifths of the children have been fully immunised. Since the last round of National Family Health Survey, the coverage of full immunization among children has increased substantially in the States of Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Goa, Sikkim, West Bengal and Meghalaya.

Married women are less likely to be using modern family planning in eight of the First Phase States/Union Territories. There has been any increase in the use of modern family planning methods only in the States of Meghalaya, Haryana, and West Bengal. The decline is highest in Goa followed by Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. Despite the decline, about half or more married women are using modern family planning in eight of the 15 States/Union Territories.

Poor nutrition is less common than reported in the last round of National Family Health Survey. Fewer children under five years of age are now found to be stunted, showing intake of improved nutrition. In nine States/Union Territories, less than one-third of children are found too short for their age. While this reveals a distinct improvement since the previous survey, it is found that in Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Meghalaya more than 40% of children are stunted. Wasting is still very high by international standards in all of the States/Union Territories. Anaemia has also declined, but still remains widespread. More than half of children are anaemic in ten of the 15 States/Union Territories. Similarly, more than half of women are anaemic in eleven States/Union Territories. Over-nutrition continues to be a health issue for adults. At least 3 in 10 women are overweight or obese in Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Andhra Pradesh, Goa, Puducherry, and Tamil Nadu.

Indian families in the First Phase households are now more inclined to use improved water and sanitation facilities. Over two-thirds of households in every State/Union Territory have access to an improved source of drinking water, and more than 90% of households have access to an improved source of drinking water in nine of the 15 States/Union Territories. More than 50% of households have access to improved sanitation facilities in all First Phase States/Union Territories except Bihar and Madhya Pradesh. Use of clean cooking fuel, which reduces the risk of respiratory illness and pollution, varies widely among the First Phase States/Union Territories, ranging from only about 18% of households in Bihar to more than 70% of households in Tamil Nadu and more than 80% of households in Puducherry and Goa. About NFHS

The 2015-16 National Family Health Survey (NFHS-4) is the fourth in a series of national surveys; earlier National Family Health Surveys were carried out in 1992-93 (NFHS-1), 1998-99 (NFHS-2) and 2005-06 (NFHS-3). NFHS-4 is the first of the NFHS series that collects data in each of India’s 29 States and all 7 Union Territories. Also, NFHS-4, for the first time, will provide estimates of most indicators at the district level for all 640 districts of the country included in the 2011 Census. In NFHS-4, women aged 15-49 years and men aged 15-54 years are interviewed. When the survey is completed throughout the country, approximately 570,000 households would be covered for information.

All National Family Health Surveys have been conducted under the stewardship of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India, with the International Institute for Population Sciences, Mumbai, serving as the nodal agency. ICF International (formerly Macro International), Maryland, USA, provided technical assistance for all four surveys. NFHS-4 funding was provided by the Government of India, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the Department for International Development (DFID), the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, UNICEF, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), and the MacArthur Foundation. Technical assistance for the HIV component of the survey was provided by the National AIDS Control Organization and the National AIDS Research Institute.

“Youth and Nation-Building”

Address by the President of India to the institutes of higher learning and civil service academies through video-conferencing using the national knowledge network on the topic, “Youth and Nation-Building”

Vice Chancellors of Central Universities;

Directors of IITs, NITs, IISERs and other institutes of higher learning and civil service academies;

Faculty members;

My dear students:

1. I wish you all a very happy and prosperous new year. Let 2016 be a year of achievement and fulfilment for each one of you.

Friends:

2. India is a nation with a significant young population. Over six hundred million people in our country are below the age of 25 years. The National Youth Policy defines youth as those persons who are in the age group of 15 to 29 years. I am however not subscribing to any technical definition here. For me, youth is much more than mere age. I place my faith in those who are curious and keen to learn; who are impatient and adventurous; who have boundless energy and drive; who accept the permanence of change and are ever ready to question the status quo; and who have the potential to create and harness disruptive technologies for rapid growth.

3. Investment in educating the youth, in the sharpening of their mental faculties, technical skills, professional competence, and awareness about their social responsibilities, would be the key to prepare them for nation-building. The way we nurture our youth into confident, capable and committed citizens will determine our country’s future. I have therefore chosen to speak to you today on "Youth and Nation-building”, a subject close to my heart.

Friends:

4. When we talk of nation-building, the first thing we have to think of is what kind of nation we want to build? A blueprint for that cannot be some random sketch but a grand design based on values, hopes and aspirations of the people of the nation. On twenty-sixth January 1950, we laid a strong foundation by giving ourselves the Constitution of India. It was themagna carta of socio-economic transformation for building an inclusive and modern India. We promised ourselves to secure to all the citizens of this sovereign nation justice, liberty, equality and fraternity. The core principles of democracy, secularism, gender equality and socio-economic equity became the beacon for our journey forward.

Friends:

5. Let me pause here to take a look at the changes that surround us. Information and communication technology has made us think, act and react differently. Distances have shrunk; mobility has increased; instant communication has led to greater awareness, and raised expectations. Consumerism is at its peak. Medical sciences have raised the life expectancy and through better healthcare improved the quality of life. Disruptive technologies have become the rule rather than the exception, putting strain on adaptive capacity of individuals and systems.

6. It is in this environment that the youth have to shoulder the responsibility of nation-building. They must be readied for it through the medium of education and training. The education that we impart to our youth must have three clearly-defined goals. First, it must teach them to control their lives, which can be done through character-building, healthcare, and sharpening the ability to learn and use experience for attainment of one’s goals. Second, it must teach them to understand life through a study of history, science, religion and philosophy. And the third, it must teach them to enjoy their lives through friendships and relationships, observance of nature, and study of art and literature. Our education system must gear up to develop our youth on these lines.

Friends:

7. We must provide value-based education to our youth. We must inculcate in them the spirit of democratic behaviour which calls for an appreciation of the rich diversity of our nation, assimilation of ideas, and accommodation for divergent or contrarian views. The idea of secularism is deeply ingrained in the consciousness of our nation. It has to be further strengthened in the minds of the young ones to build a harmonious society.

8. Gender equality is essential for building an inclusive society. Unless women participate on equal terms and in equal numbers in the process of nation-building, all efforts will remain incomplete. The occurrence of some unfortunate incidents of atrocity and violence against women in recent years should strengthen our resolve to wipe out any trace of depravity and evil from the minds of individuals. ‘Respect for women’ is sacrosanct in our society with its roots embedded in our civilizational values, which are reflected in our Constitution. A spirit of reverence towards women must be instilled in our children in our homes and educational institutions. It must guide social conduct of an individual from an early age.

Friends:

9. Without socio-economic equity, the word "inclusion” has no meaning. During the last few years, we have provided citizens the right to information, employment, education and food, backed by legal guarantees. The Government has launched programmes for financial inclusion, creation of model villages and formation of a digitally-empowered society. We have strong legislations and schemes oriented towards inclusion. What we have to do now is to create enough opportunities through their implementation to meet the ambitions of an aspirational India.

Friends:

10. The nation which you have to build as bureaucrats, technocrats, scientists, educators, social innovators, thinkers, and agriculturists has to be an India which will ensure a decent and fulfilling life to all its citizens. It has to be aswachh India, swasth India, a digitally-empowered India, educated and skilled India, and a tolerant, harmonious and peaceful India where the last person feels a part of the narrative of the country.

11. India needs novel ideas and creative solutions to overcome challenges in the fields of education, skill development, sanitation and healthcare, financial inclusion and service provision. A successful innovative idea is one that has scalability. How can we skill one million of our youth every month? How can we gainfully employ trained manpower in the industry? How can we provide healthcare services to each rural household? How can we meet the financing requirements of small farmers and entrepreneurs in villages and small towns? How can we make public utility services more accessible, inclusive and transparent?

12. The answers to these questions lie in creating a strong digital backbone that can lead to efficient service delivery. Putting a mobile phone in the hands of a person living in a remote village and teaching him to use it to access information, knowledge and services is a great act of empowerment. It gives true meaning to the word ‘inclusion’.

13. For building the India of our dreams, we all have to work together to develop an eco-system which will bring together innovators, entrepreneurs and financiers, which will recognize merit and give primacy to science, technology and innovation. A facilitative and supportive environment for free play of all creative forces, be it in government, corporate sector or academia, has to be created.

14. The government has just launched "Start-up India" to promote start-ups and offer incentives for entrepreneurship and job creation. The over 4,500 start-ups make India the third largest start-up eco-system in the world. The higher academic institutions have a clear role to play in refining the entrepreneurial abilities of their students. Teaching of entrepreneurial studies as a course in our institutes will be a good beginning.

15. Educational and civil services institutions have to inculcate in their students and trainees a sense of social responsibility. Some suggestions for enhancing their engagement with the community are:

i. Assign them to teach in nearby government schools for at least one hour per month.

ii. Deploy them to undertake community-based projects to uplift the condition of people in the vicinity.

iii. Assign them to identify problems faced by villages and work on innovative solutions which blend modern technology with local practices.

My young friends:

16. Tomorrow belongs to you. Your commitment to national goals will determine the direction of our future growth. As you get ready to embark on the journey to fulfill your dreams, let me share with you my own little checklist for nation-building.

We work towards nation-building if:

Produce more than we consume;

- We give more than we take;

- We work more than we idle; and

- We think more than we talk.

You may just find this list useful.

Professional litigants of the Supreme Court

The inquiry comes in the light of an increase in the number of PILs filed in the high courts and the Supreme Court 

Courts coming down heavily on litigants is not a new phenomenon, especially in public interest litigation (PIL). Recently, chief justice of India T.S. Thakur asked if the Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL), a non-profit organisation, was a “professional litigant”.
In response, senior advocate Prashant Bhushan said CPIL was not a professional litigant, citing the fact that it received no funds for the cases it pursued.
“Most of the work is pro bono,” he said.
The inquiry comes in the light of an increase in the number of PILs filed in the high courts and the Supreme Court. The courts are generally critical of serial litigants and hold them to higher standards to test their motives. Courts are also wary of personal interests driving such litigation.
To put this in context, PILs have stirred reforms ranging from measures to deal with sexual harassment in the workplace to spectrum allocation and coal block allotments. There have also been frivolous PILs like one seeking the recall of the Indian cricket team after an overseas debacle; such cases are disposed of, with costs imposed on the petitioners.
But the court’s query in the case of CPIL highlights an interesting trend—”professional litigants” are emerging as a distinct class.
Non-profit organisations are adding litigation wings to file cases of public interest. For instance, the People’s Union for Civil Liberties, a human rights organisation that filed the PIL demanding the “right to food”.
NGO Common Cause, which calls itself an advocacy group, has listed on its website at least 18 PILs in the Supreme Court and five in various high courts.
These include cases seeking the court’s intervention on issues such as depiction of violence on television, challenging appointments made to the Central Vigilance Commission and irregularities in coal block allocations. Common Cause’s governing council includes Prashant Bhushan.
The court itself sought the assistance of one such litigant in a suo moto case probing the cause of 2013 floods in Uttarakhand. Rural Litigation Entitlement Kendra (RLEK), an Uttarakhand-based NGO, is involved in environmental litigation in the National Green Tribunal. In the Supreme Court, RLEK filed a PIL against limestone mining in the Doon valley in the 1980s.
The Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), an NGO focusing on electoral reforms, is associated with at least seven cases in the Supreme Court. Judgments on disqualification of convicted members of Parliament, paid news and foreign funding of political parties were all based on cases filed by the ADR.
Lawyers Collective, an NGO led by senior advocates Indira Jaising and Anand Grover, is leading the court battle against discrimination faced by HIV-positive citizens.
Shamnad Basheer, founder of the intellectual property website SpicyIP and former IP chair at National University of Juridical Sciences, Kolkata, recently started the P-PIL initiative which promotes public interest lawyering.
In the most recent example, Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), a Delhi-based organization of environmental activists, led the campaign against air pollution in the courts. The centre’s findings and inputs were considered in justice Thakur’s 16 December order making it difficult for commercial vehicles to pass through Delhi to curb pollution.
The Supreme Court has comprehensive guidelines on who can file PILs. Organisations are required to disclose their funding and assets before the registrar of the court before filing such cases.
Somewhere in between part-time pro bono work by a few lawyers and high commercial litigation, professional advocacy of public causes is making its presence felt in India. The issues they can take up are almost unlimited. But the question is: how many will pass judicial scrutiny?