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Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi took on West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in Kolkata on Wednesday, saying that she had failed to bring about the change (poribortan) she had promised.

Lashing out at the Third Front leaders, Modi said, "Western states in India have developed more than the eastern states because no Third Front leader has ever ruled a western province."

Hitting out at the Left leaders' constant secular chant, Modi said they have never done anything for minorities.

Give us all 42 seats
Modi appealed to the voters to indulge in some experimentation for 2014. "People should send all 42 BJP candidates to the Lok Sabha from here and fix accountability for each of our actions. At the same time, people should also fix accountability of the state government for the change Banerjee promised," he said. What Modi can achieve in Mamata's Bengal

Amid chants of 'Modi, Modi' at the historic Brigade Parade Grounds, the Gujarat chief minister said the Third Front leaders in Delhi should hire a chopper to see the crowd here and realise the ground reality.

Modi said that all political calculations are going to fail in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls. "This is the first Indian polls since Independence where people not political parties are contesting elections. People have set the agenda for the polls this time." Modi said people are deprived of even basic amenities after 65 years of Independence.

Why does Bengal suffer?
Listing out his vision for eradicating poverty, Modi said, "Vikas bhi, imaan bhi, garibon ka samman bhi (Development, honesty and respect for the poor)."

Tracing ties of Bengal and Gujarat, Modi said many prominent Bengalis stayed in Gujarat for many years and contributed immensely to building the state. He lauded West Bengal as being the country's teacher in many aspects and said if India were to become a world leader, Bengal had to get back its former glory.

Referring to Jan Sangh co-founder Syama Prasad Mookerjee, Modi said the BJP was his brainchild which now occupies the mind of every Indian.

Blaming the 35 years of Left rule for lack of development in the state, Modi said the so-called party of workers and labourers did not change the plight of them either. Modi said it was his party's vision to recognise labour as investment and give the worker his right to dignity.

Projecting Gujarat as the role model of development, Modi said, "If Gujarat could have 24x7 supply of electricity, why is Bengal deprived of this?" He added that this was because no new power plants were set up in the state.

Lamenting the poor state of education in the state, Modi said, "Only 60 per cent of schools in West Bengal have toilets for girl students while many schools are not even electrified. How would kids learn computers then?"

Sudden love for Pranab
President Pranab Mukherjee found an unlikely sympathiser in Narendra Modi who said the Congress had continuously insulted the state by not making the senior party leader the prime minister. He said Mukherjee deserved to be the PM on many occasions in the past, but he was denied the chance every time.

Modi concluded his speech in a typical Bengali way by making crowds roar "cholbe na" to his vows of uprooting misrule from the state.

Rajnath bares love for Bengal
BJP chief Rajnath Singh showered lavish praise on prominent Bengalis including Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, Swami Vivekananda, Rabindranath Tagore, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, etc. Tracing the party's long ties with the state, Singh recounted and praised Jan Sangh co-founder Syama Prasad Mookerjee's contribution to the country.

Taking on the state's Left politics, Singh said the party destroyed the state's flourishing economy in its 35-year-old rule. The BJP chief said that if the Left's long rule could be credited for having started any industry, it should be the crime industry.

Congratulating the people of Bengal for uprooting the Left from the state, Singh took on the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress rule in the state, saying that she has yet not brought in the change she had promised. He did not say anything else against Banerjee.

Clearing the air on the 2002 Gujarat riots, Singh said the state did not witness any other riot since then and Modi should be credited for this. He said minorities in Gujarat had the highest per capita income in the entire country.

Magician PC Sircar and music director and singer Bappi Lahiri were also on the dais with him.

When Shahnawaz took on TMC

BJP leader Shahnawaz Hussain, who addressed the gathering before Modi, blamed the Congress for the frequent disruption in Parliament. "They say that we are not allowing Parliament to function, but the reality is that we have opened the veil of Congress."

Clearing the air about his party being labelled communal by rivals, Hussain said, "Congress is betraying the people but we want to fight on the issue of corruption and development. We will not divide our country into Hindu and Muslims. People have started believing that he (Modi) will harm Muslims but this is only a fear of the people."

Hitting out at Mamata Banerjee, he said, "TMC is close to Congress and they are like the same water in a different glass."
Hoping that people in West Bengal will vote for Modi in hordes, Hussain said, "We are at one seat now, but will soon be voted to power by people of Bengal. We are fighting for saving the nation."

New Delhi: The Centre is all set to move the Supreme Court against a Gauhati High Court order that struck down the resolution through which the Central Bureau Investigation (CBI) was set up and held all its actions as "unconstitutional".

"The judgement is patently wrong. It is bound to be set aside. We are certainly going to challenge it and the appeal is likely to be filed in the Supreme Court latest by Monday," Additional Solicitor General PP Malhotra told a news agency.

The judgement by the division bench, comprising justices IA Ansari and Indira Shah, came on a writ petition filed by one Navendra Kumar challenging an order by a single judge of the High Court in 2007 on the resolution through which CBI was set up.

Malhotra contended that the government resolution on the formation of the CBI has been held valid by the apex court time and again in a number of judgements.

"We are confident that the Gauhati judgement will also be set aside," he said, adding, "Today evening, I received the copy of the judgement. I am examining it and tomorrow morning I will speak to the concerned ministry. Only after reading it properly, I will be in a position to comment on it in detail". The ASG said the verdict will not affect CBI's functioning.

"We hereby...Set aside and quash the impugned Resolution, dated 01.04.1963, whereby CBI has been constituted... We do hold that the CBI is neither an organ nor a part of the Delhi Special Police Establishment (DSPE) and the CBI cannot be treated as a 'police force' constituted under the DSPE Act, 1946," the High Court said.

It further said the aforementioned Home Ministry resolution was "not the decision of the Union Cabinet nor were these executive instructions assented to by the President".

Malhotra, who appeared for the Centre before the High Court, said the constitutional validity of the Act and the formation of the CBI was also upheld way back in 1970 and the latest was in 2010.

In its order, the court further said "the actions of the CBI, in registering a case, arresting a person as an offender, conducting search and seizure, prosecuting an accused etc. offend Article 21 of the Constitution and are, therefore, liable to be struck down as unconstitutional."

The court, however, said quashing of the proceedings that are pending in the CBI court would not be a bar to any further investigation by police having jurisdiction over the subject-matter.

On the setting up of the CBI, the court said the investigating agency was constituted as an ad hoc measure to deal with certain exigencies.

"This measure, taken by the Union Government, was not in the form of any Ordinance; rather, constitution of the CBI was an executive decision and that too, without citing, or referring to, the source of power," it added.

With PTI inputs

 

State Bank of India has hiked its lending rates, including the base rate and prime lending rates, by 20 basis points (bps).

This hike will also have an impact on other retail loans such as home loans and auto loans of the bank.

“SBI has revised the Base Rate by 20 basis points from 9.80 per cent per annum to 10 per cent per annum, and the Benchmark Prime Lending Rate by 20 basis points from 14.55 per cent per annum to 14.75 per cent per annum effective from November 7, 2013,” SBI stated in a release on Wednesday.

“It has become necessary to increase the base rate by the minimum possible rate to offset the increased cost of funds,” said R. K. Saraf, Deputy Managing Director and Chief Financial Officer of SBI, while talking to The Hindu.

Earlier banks could borrow substantial funds under the Repo. But now banks can borrow only limited funds, which increased the cost of funds.

“In the last three to four months, there have been several developments like, two time repo rate hike, restrictions on the liquidity adjustment facility (LAF) and maintenance of cash reserve ratio (CRR) at 95 per cent every day. These factors have pushed up the cost of funds for the banks,” Mr. Saraf added.

“In addition, the benchmark bond yields have gone up, which had a mark-to-market impact on our portfolio,” said Mr. Saraf.

The benchmark 10-year Government Securities (G-Sec) yields have gone up from 7.8 per cent to 8.7 per cent currently, a rise of 90 basis points.

“The rates will depend on the market situation. If the present scenario continues, we have no intention of re-visiting our rates soon,” Mr. Saraf added. Meanwhile, SBI had increased the retail deposit rate from 6.80 per cent to 7 per cent for the deposits of 180 days to 210 days, with effect from November 1.

PTI reports:

Commenting on the Base Rate increase, SBI Chairperson Arundhati Bhattacharya said it was on account of the rise in cost of funds.

The repo rate had gone up by 0.50 percentage point since SBI had last raised it, she said, adding that, the bank had not raised the rates to that extent but by only by 0.20 percentage point. It was in line with the market and the bank Base Rate still remained one of the lowest, she added.

Private sector lender, Axis Bank, too, has also revised the interest rates on select maturities for fixed deposits amount less than Rs.1 crore. In two buckets there has been an upward revision of 0.25 percentage point, while there is downward revision of 0.25 percentage point in 9 buckets. Term deposits between 13 and less than 15 months now attract 8.75 per cent, up by 0.25 percentage point.

Our Mangalore correspondent writes:

Karnataka Bank has also raised its interest rates on domestic deposits by 25 basis points across various maturities effective from Thursday, said a bank release.

At the corporate level, the core sectors are not showing any promise and the NPAs are rising

The stock indices are showing a strong upturn despite all kinds of economic woes — inflation and inflation expectations are on the higher side, fiscal deficit could slip from its target while the current account deficit may be improving but still remains much above the comfort level of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).

However, the stock market’s benchmark index, Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) 30-share Sensex surged by 358.73 points to 20, 929.01 on a day (last Tuesday) the RBI hiked the repo rate (the indicative policy rate) by 25 basis points. It is unusual for stock markets to rise when the central bank hikes rates.

When the markets ended for the week on Friday, to usher Samvat 2070, the Sensex surged to an all time high of 21,196.81 at the close.

It also touched an intra-day high of 21,293.88 surpassing its previous all time high of 21,206.77 on January 10, 2008. From its yearly low of 17,448.71 on August 28 (intra-day), the Sensex gained 3,845.17 points. This was the day that the rupee also touched its historical low of 68.85 per dollar.

The rise in stock prices shows that there is lot of liquidity in the system. Developed economies are pumping lot of money into the system to spur their economic growth, and a huge portion of these funds are reaching the emerging economies pushing up stock prices, including India.

“The Dalal Street would be celebrating Deepavali in the real sense as Sensex has crossed the previous high, even though the fundamentals are not looking very rosy. This may be due to the Rajan-effect combined with the continuation of the purchase of bonds by the U.S. Federal Reserve,” said V.R. Srinivasan, Director, Brics Securities. However, a majority of the investors are still cautious given the forthcoming general elections, Mr. Srinivasan added. Hopefully the Government is expected to announce further reforms till the election code of conduct comes into effect.Thankfully, the monsoon has been very good all over India and therefore there will not be any negative surprise on the agricultural front. This was also confirmed by the RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan, when he announced the second quarter review of monetary policy last Tuesday. But supply chain still poses difficulties, pushing the food prices high, and the Government is unable to control inflation.

In short, the markets depend on further reforms and the benevolence of the US Federal Reserve in continuing its operation of bond buying. At the corporate level, the core sector is not showing any promise, and the non-performing assets (NPAs) are rising. This has increased the stress for the banking system as a whole. This also reflected in the Sensex in the last four years wherein most of the companies in the core sector have given negative returns. The best performers were all from the non-core sectors.

The moot question is that whether this rally is sustainable? There is fear in the market — based on the earlier experiences — that whenever Sensex crossed 21,000-mark, on both occasions, it fell sharply.