-Livemint.com * The spike in auto-debit failures suggest that the pain may have only just begun for India’s small borrowers * With mandatory EMI repayments kicking in since September, many feel the available recast options and a waiver of compound interest are not sufficient. India may be staring at a loan crisis MUMBAI: For someone who had never defaulted on any loans before March this year, Monica Keerthi Karri gets quite harried at...

Just before Dhanteras and Diwali this year, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) released the November edition of its monthly bulletin. The latest RBI Monthly Bulletin says that the GDP has contracted by -8.6 percent in the second quarter of fiscal year 2020-21 (i.e. July-September, 2020) as compared to the gross domestic product (GDP) during the corresponding period last year. It may be noted that India’s GDP shrunk by -23.9...

-The Financial Express NBFCs are at the forefront of financing many of the affected sectors, notably small road transport operators, taxi aggregators, infrastructure contractors, MSMEs, traders etc. After banks wrote to the regulator asking for moratorium on corporate repayments, their non-banking counterparts have sought a three-month moratorium on equated monthly instalment (EMI) payments by their customers as much of the country goes into lockdown mode. Non-banking finance companies (NBFCs) are also asking...

-The Financial Express How about planting bamboo extensively along the banks of the Yamuna to sequester the carbon from Delhi’s vehicle emissions? According to the World Bank, India’s per person emission of carbon dioxide was 1,730 kg a year in 2014. Another website says this has risen to 1,900 kg in 2016. Bharathi Namby, a scientist, says it will take just five bamboo plants a year to make an Indian carbon-neutral,...

-The Hindu     Lawmakers are eager to appear resolute in the fight against crime, but seem to forget that certainty of punishment, not severity, is the real deterrent "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind," said Mahatma Gandhi. The death penalty is unjust and inhuman. Its continued use is a stain on a society built on humanitarian values, and it should be abolished immediately. Many think that there could be nothing wrong...