Courting Controversies; Bad Banks; Nursing Nurses
Opinion Watch
Courting Controversies
The Asian Age has hailed Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party over coal for courting controversies by raising issues in their respective manifestoes to appeal to the divisive constituencies in the Karnataka Assembly elections. The daily said that while the welfare measures of both the parties failed to gain attention, their promises to polarize were instant hits.
The daily counted Congress’ promise to ban the RSS-affiliate Bajrang Dal as a ploy to appeal to the divisive constituency. It also listed the BJP’s promises of Uniform Civil Code and National Citizens’ Register (NRC). The daily also stated that both the parties have a strong bouquet of dole outs for the people to win their votes in the election.
By now the people should be wiser, and if not then they certainly should question their wisdom, for the BJP’s promise of NRC is now worth finding space in political history, while Congress too plays to the gallery with eye on 13 per cent Muslim votes in Karnataka.
Bad Banks
The Telegraph in its Editorial has warned against complacency in the Indian banking sector amid a raging wave of regional banks collapsing in the US on the back of an unprecedented rate hike by the Federal Reserve. The daily has argued that the banks in the US which went under the table too claimed to have been compliant of all the norms, but sudden developments which led to withdrawal of deposits eroded their strength.
The Kolkata-based daily has also warned that the credit growth in the Indian banking sector surged to 17.5 per cent in September last year, which was last seen in December, 2011. The daily said that since then the banks wrote off the bad loans, while the Finance Ministry is now asking that 40 per cent of them must now be recovered.
The US Fed Reserve delivered a shock of 40-year to jolt out the Americans from their comforts of enjoying almost interest free financial leverage with which they lorded over all across the world. The US and Europe have been in the business of printing currencies to artificially command positions of eminence in the global economy. India didn’t print currencies to beat the Covid blues, but Reserve Bank of India needs to rethink rate hikes to prevent loan defaults.
Nursing Nurses
The Economic Times in its Editorial has called for accelerating efforts to add strength of nurses and midwives in the Indian healthcare system. The daily said that India is short on the WHO norm of nurses per 10000, which for India in 2020 was 24.5 against the norm of 34.5.
The business daily stated that if India were to meet the WHO norm there could be an additional 1.37 million positions of nurses and midwives. Also, the daily stated that 61,000 such nurses were employed in four countries – the US, Britain, Canada and Australia – in 2020.
The Centre and states must add competencies to help them seize growing opportunities globally. Migration of skilled manpower is already the big opportunity.
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