Exchange of Old Notes Scrapped, What Manmohan Said In Parliament And Other India News

No More Exchanges: The Modi government has scrapped the exchange of old notes for new, going back on its promise to actually increase the limit after Nov 24. The only way one can now recover the money is by depositing it. But there’s another complication - unaccounted for bank deposits will now attract 60 percent tax, according to a proposal cleared by the Cabinet late last night. According to the finance ministry, the queues for exchange of notes is dwindling and hence it’s time to encourage people to deposit their money.  Here are the details of the new exchange rules, as compiled by Mint.

Manmohan Singh speaks out: The former prime minister and architect of India’s economic reforms spoke out against demonetization in the upper house. His objection was more about the “monumental mismanagement in the implementation” and predicted a 2 percent drop in the GDP growth rate as a result of this move. He added that the move has weakened confidence in the banking and currency system, as people are unable to access their own money deposited in bank accounts. And he concluded, quoting Keynes:

Those say demonetisation is good in long run should recall the quote: 'In the long run we are all dead'.

Tata Sons: After evicting former chairman of the group Cyrus Mistry in an prolonged, ugly and public battle, Tata Sons is considering splitting the role of the chairman. Right now, the chairman of Tata Sons also head the boards of each Tata company, making him or her all powerful within the group. Under the new structure, the boards will be headed by professionals. Well, this is not exactly new, as that was the system under JRD Tata. Right now, the two names doing the rounds for the post of Tata Sons chairman, are TCS CEO N Chandrasekharan and former Hindustan Unilever COO, Harish Manwani.

Flipkart’s funding: The homegrown e-commerce company is apparently finding it harder to raise funds and has turned to investment banks to help it find the money. Its previous funding rounds went through relatively easily, as it was at the time India’s leading startup and an undisputed leader in the business. Now that Amazon has caught up and Alibaba has turned its focus to India, investors aren’t as willing to open their purses, according to this report. What will be really interesting to see is the valuation at which it raises the money.

#Statoftheday

1.28 trillion rupees: The cost of withdrawing high value currency, according to Indian think tank CMIE.

PayTM Suspends PoS feature: After banks and card companies raised security concerns to the Reserve Bank of India about PayTM’s new feature that allows merchants to accept credit cards without a swiping machine, the payments company has been asked to address these concerns before it launches it again. Here’s its blog.

Cover Image: A file picture of the reticent, soft spoken former prime minister Manmohan Singh, who abandoned his silence and spoke out sharply against the chaotic management of demonetization.

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