Master of his Game
It’s hard to be a couch potato in India because (a) most homes have stiff, unyielding sofas; (b) it’s not easy to set yourself up…
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INTERVIEW-L.K. ADVANI
INFORMATION & BROADCASTING MINISTER L.K. ADVANI ‘I Am Not Happy with The Pattern of Newspaper Ownership’ Transindia: Mr. Advani, many people feel today that the…
Interview of Kumar Mangalam Birla
Few of us know that KUMAR MANGALAM BIRLA, Chairman of the Aditya Birla Group, produced the critically acclaimed Hindi movie Black. Or that he has…
Interview with Narayana Murthy
Infosys co-founder N.R. Narayana Murthy has seen it all: bootstrapping an enterprise with what is loose change today, going on sales calls riding pillion on…
U.S. IN QUANDARY OVER MANILA SUGAR RE-EXPORT PLAN
8 February 1988 Reuters News English (c) 1988 Reuters Limited MANILA, Feb 8 – U.S. Agriculture Secretary Richard Lyng is in a quandary over a…
Interview- India’s Sinha wants to go for growth
2 June 1998 Reuters News English (c) 1998 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, June 2 (Reuters) – India’s Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha put up a spirited…
Interview- India targets not just “hope and prayer”
3 June 1998 Reuters News English (c) 1998 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, June 3 (Reuters) – India’s fiscal targets for the current year are not…
India’s weary Kashmiris told- “Go see a movie”
7 August 1998 Reuters News English (c) 1998 Reuters Limited SRINAGAR, India, Aug 6 (Reuters) – A who’s who of Indian Kashmiris turned out in…
India general sees no danger of nuclear exchange
6 August 1998 Reuters News English (c) 1998 Reuters Limited SRINAGAR, India, Aug 6 (Reuters) – The general commanding Indian troops in the tinderbox Kashmir…
INDIA LIBERALISING AT OWN PACE, MINISTER SAYS
1 May 1988 Reuters News English (c) 1988 Reuters Limited MANILA, May 1, Reuter – India is loosening controls on industry, investment and imports but…
INTERVIEW-Kashmir might spark N-war – separatist
7 August 1998 Reuters News English (C) 1998 Reuters Limited SRINAGAR, India, Aug 7 (Reuters) – India and Pakistan could wage nuclear war over the…
Indian soldier caught in grinding Kashmir strife
9 August 1998 Reuters News English (c) 1998 Reuters Limited BARAMULLA, India, Aug 9 (Reuters) – Mahendra Kumar is a typical “sepoy”, the lowest rank…
DESPITE FEUD, SAN MIGUEL RIDES HIGH ON BEER BOOM
9 May 1988 Reuters News English (c) 1988 Reuters Limited MANILA, May 9, Reuter – Thirsty Filipinos drank nearly a billion liters of San Miguel…
Interview- Mercedes-Benz bullish on India Market
1 December 1998 Reuters News English (c) 1998 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, Dec 1 (Reuters) – Mercedes-Benz India Ltd is bullish about the Indian car…
FOCUS-India says Afghans in Kashmir intrusion
26 May 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, May 25 (Reuters) – Afghan mercenaries, likely commanded by Pakistani army officers, have…
FOREIGN MEDIA PAID FOR PHILIPPINE ATTACKS – EX-DEFENCE CHIEF
17 May 1988 Reuters News English (c) 1988 Reuters Limited MANILA, May 17, Reuter – Former Defence Minister Juan Ponce Enrile said on Tuesday that…
Indian Kashmir talks offer sows confusion, anger
28 July 1997 Reuters News English (c) 1997 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, July 28 (Reuter) – India’s Prime Minister Inder Kumar Gujral has caused anger…
WRAPUP-India hits Kashmir militants with air power
26 May 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, May 26 (Reuters) – India on Wednesday launched its first peacetime air strikes…
ANALYSIS-India, Pakistan caught in undeclared war
27 May 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, May 27 (Reuters) – India was on a roll on Wednesday. It unleashed…
WRAPUP-India loses planes, lashes out at Pakistan.
28 May 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, May 27 (Reuters) – India suffered a sharp reverse on Thursday in its…
PHILIPPINES WELCOMES U.S. SUGAR QUOTA INCREASE
26 July 1988 Reuters News English (c) 1988 Reuters Limited MANILA, July 26, Reuter – The Philippines welcomes a decision by the U.S. Department of…
WRAPUP-India bombs Kashmir rebels, warns Pakistan.
27 May 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, May 26 (Reuters) – India unleashed two waves of air strikes on…
Wrapup- Indian helicopter downed in Kashmir crisis
29 May 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, May 28 (Reuters) – India suffered a second setback on Friday in its…
Wrapup- Kashmir crisis heats up after Stinger use
29 May 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, May 28 (Reuters) – India suffered a second setback on Friday in an…
Interview- Onus on Pakistan in Kashmir-Indian aide
30 May 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, May 30 (Reuters) – A top Indian official said on Sunday it…
India vows no pause in Kashmir assault for talks
1 June 1999 22:59 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, June 1 (Reuters) – India will not halt its air and ground…
Interview- “no relenting in Kashmir
2 June 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, June 1 (Reuters) – India’s External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh said on Tuesday…
ANALYSIS-India faces hard choices in Kashmir.
13 June 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, June 13 (Reuters) – India and Pakistan, daggers drawn in Kashmir, held a…
INTERVIEW-Philips India not slim enough, says MD
29 June 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, June 29 (Reuters) – Consumer electronics firm Philips India Ltd has shed nearly…
ANALYSIS-India torn over scope of Kashmir combat
4 July 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, July 4 (Reuters) – India’s commanders are fighting with “one arm tied behind…
Over 1,000 infiltrators still in Kashmir – India
8 July 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, July 8 (Reuters) – India’s army has recaptured key points in Kashmir and…
Interview- India says Pakistan must restore trust
18 July 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, July 18 (Reuters) – Indian Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh on Sunday urged Pakistan…
Villagers play tag with death in India’ Kashmir
6 August 1998 Reuters News English (c) 1998 Reuters Limited NAMBLA, India, Aug 6 (Reuters) – The people of Nambla are sitting ducks in the…
India’s Fernandes insists Pakistan PM was in dark
31 May 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, May 31 (Reuters) – India’s Defence Minister George Fernandes said on Monday he…
INTERVIEW-India’s Fernandes sees no nuclear danger.
31 May 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, May 31 (Reuters) – India’s Defence Minister George Fernandes said on Monday he…
INTERVIEW-Indian general fears return to proxy war.
13 July 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, July 13 (Reuters) – Watching vanquished Islamic guerrillas retreat to Pakistan, India’s top…
Asia satellite TV successes prompt local response
28 December 1992 Reuters News English (c) 1992 Reuters Limited TOKYO, Dec 28, Reuter – Satellite and cable television is approaching rice status as a…
INTERVIEW-Early Kashmir spring helped India.
18 July 1999 Reuters News English (c) 1999 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, July 18 (Reuters) – India’s military intelligence chief said on Sunday that Pakistan’s…
Satellite TV no pie in the sky in Asian megamarket
28 December 1992 Reuters News English (c) 1992 Reuters Limited TOKYO, Dec 28, Reuter – Satellite and cable television is approaching the status of rice…
The awesome explosion of Asia’s airwaves As viewers tune in to the cornucopia, some governments worry about foreign encroachment
29 December 1992 The Globe and Mail C3 English All material copyright Thomson Canada Limited or its licensors. All rights reserved. Tokyo SATELLITE and cable…
Satellite and cable TV catching on fast in Asia
4 January 1993 Straits Times English (c) 1993 Singapore Press Holdings Limited Some govts feel threatened by foreign encroachment on airwaves TOKYO – Satellite and…
Reuters journalist buried in Australia
28 November 2001 Reuters News English (c) 2001 Reuters Limited HOBART, Australia, Nov 28 (Reuters) – Australian Harry Burton, a Reuters cameraman killed with…
INTERVIEW-Thai PM promises free press.
18 March 2002 19:56 Reuters News English (c) 2002 Reuters Limited BANGKOK, March 18 (Reuters) – Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, embroiled in a row…
Nuclear war unlikely over Kashmir, leader says
6 February 1997 Reuters News English (c) 1997 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, Feb 6 (Reuter) – The leader of India’s Kashmir region said on Thursday…
India fields seasoned negotiator at Pakistan talks
26 March 1997 Reuters News English (c) 1997 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, March 26 (Reuter) – Salman Haidar will be an immovable object facing a…
INTERVIEW-India’s Tata bets on global market for growth.
9 December 2003 Reuters News English (c) 2003 Reuters Limited BOMBAY, Dec 9 (Reuters) – India’s largest truck and bus maker Tata, riding a dramatic…
INTERVIEW-Hindalco eyes expansion, acquisitions for growth.
9 December 2003 Reuters News English (c) 2003 Reuters Limited BOMBAY, Dec 9 (Reuters) – Hindalco Industries, a leading Indian maker of non-ferrous metals, aims…
India’s Kashmir talks offer — flip-flop or ploy?
28 July 1997 Reuters News English (c) 1997 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, July 28 (Reuter) – India’s Prime Minister Inder Kumar Gujral performed one more…
INTERVIEW-India hopes to cut oil imports with new discoveries.
11 December 2003 Reuters News English (c) 2003 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, Dec 11 (Reuters) – India hopes to reduce its dependence on imported…
Kashmir group says exhumed body is of its leader
30 September 1997 Reuters News English (c) 1997 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, Sept 30 (Reuter) – A militant group in Kashmir on Tuesday said an…
Britain’s Labour accused of Kashmir freedom agenda
16 October 1997 Reuters News English (c) 1997 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, Oct 16 (Reuters) – Queen Elizabeth’s tour of India slid deeper into controversy…
India’s Infosys set to launch ADRs
3 December 1997 22:32 Reuters News English (c) 1997 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, Dec 3 (Reuters) – Software firm Infosys Technologies Ltd is poised to…
Superhero Dreams
Song sung blue Everybody knows one Song sung blue Every garden grows one If you are of a certain vintage, you will have been moved…
New Business Families
The day this issue of Business Today went to press, IBM Corporation completed one hundred years. What started as the Computing- Tabulating-Recording Company, manufacturing computing scales,…
Shine On, You Crazy Diamonds
I remember back in the 1970s, when a new India was just over a quarter of a century old, Geoffrey Moorhouse, in his foreword to…
MANILA UNLOADS SUGAR STOCKS TO CURB PRICE RISE
17 July 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, July 17 – The Philippines” Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) has ordered all its reserve…
CIVILIANS CHEER AS FIGHTING RAGES AT MANILA MILITARY CAMP
28 August 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Aug 28, Reuter – Buildings blazed and streets shook in Manila today in the…
BUSINESS SEES COUP ATTEMPT AS WARNING TO AQUINO
31 August 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Aug 31 – Manila’s stock markets held steady in the first session after Friday’s…
MANILA SHAKE-UP WILL RESTORE INVESTOR CONFIDENCE MINISTER
18 September 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Sept 18, Reuter – President Corazon Aquino’s shake-up of top posts in her government…
DEBT REPAYMENT CEILING SEEN HURTING PHILIPPINES
24 September 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Sept 24 – Any ceiling on debt repayments imposed by the Philippines would cut…
PHILIPPINES POISED FOR RISKY DEBT SHOWDOWN
28 September 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Sept 28 – The Philippines is poised for a risky showdown with its…
PHILIPPINE DEBT ACCORD HANGS IN BALANCE
25 September 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Sept 25 – The Philippines’ recent debt restructuring hangs in the balance after a…
The Best Companies to Work for
At Business Today we write about companies all the time. Often, it is a top-down view. We meet the Chief Executive Officer, the senior members…
Not Measuring Up
Exactly two years ago we ran a cover story on India’s skills crisis. This was just after Subramanian Ramadorai was named Adviser to the Prime…
Turning Turtle
In 1908, when Henry Ford began making his revolutionary Model Ts on an assembly line in Detroit, there were 241 carmakers in the United States.…
PHILIPPINE PESO FALLS TO RECORD LOW
8 October 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Oct 8 – The Philippine peso plunged to a record low of 20.850 against…
India’s Best CFOs
Business Today’s team of reporters was putting finishing touches to the BT-YES Bank Best CFO Survey starting on page 57. The 14 men and one…
The Luxury Issue
Looking down at my bowl of gazpacho at dinner one recent night. I realised that I do not own a single moustache spoon, with guards,…
MANILA RACES TO FINALISE PIVOTAL DEBT CASE
22 October 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Oct 22 – The Philippine Central Bank and creditors of a private fertiliser firm…
Missing Murthy
Within the space of a week, I met N.R. Narayana Murthy for a long and friendly conversation at his airy venture-capital office in Bangalore’s Jayanagar…
Broken IIT
Many, many moons ago, I used to visit a cousin pursuing his B.Tech. programme at IIT Madras. The campus was beautiful; of an early Sunday…
India’s Coolest Start-Ups
The US Congress stepped back just in time from the fiscal cliff, but Indian sensibilities about the Delhi gang rape and killing fell off another cliff…
PHILIPPINES TO BORROW SUGAR FROM THAILAND TO MEET SUDDEN RISE IN DEMAND
20 November 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Nov 20 – The Philippines will borrow between 30,000 and 100,000 tonnes of…
How I Did it
Companies and human beings are surprisingly similar. Over a long period of time we build an intricate geodesic dome of habits, rules. principles, emotions, likes…
PHILIPPINES EXPECTS MINIMAL U.S. SUGAR QUOTA CUT
25 November 1987 Reuters News English (c) 1987 Reuters Limited MANILA, Nov 25 – The Philippines has been warned that the United States is planning…
The Best Companies to Work For
It was a bracing week: I started and ended it with conversations with honest men whose cleanliness shone through. Both had had something to do…
India’s Best CFOs: Tips From The Finest Financial Brains
I have a confession to make. Many moons ago, I studied to be an accountant and despite one of the world’s toughest entry barriers with…
How Samsung Moved Nokia’s Cheese
Competition is fierce and kicking in India, not least between business magazines. Which is why we love being flies on the wall as we watch…
Deconstructing HCC
The deeper we sail into the economic doldrums, the greater is the wonderment that there is so much locked-up promise in India that we cussedly…
Low On Gas
There are times when we at Business Today chafe at being a fortnightly. There is so much happening in business and the economy that we…
How TCS Toppled RIL
What a fortnight it has been. We have plumbed new depths in animus and acrimony. Not a day goes by without a shrieking melee, either…
Pain: A Triple Whammy in 2012 Flat Income, High Prices & Shrinking Wealth
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage And then is heard no more. It is…
India’s Best Banks
Pity the modern banker, who is described in one of the stories in this issue as “pin-striped”. In India, of course, some of the most…
India’s Most Valuable Companies
If you look down from a helicopter at any of India’s teeming cities you will see millions of people scurrying around using every known form…
India’s Best CFOs
I once knew a Chief Financial Officer who took a course in “Interpersonal skills. Asked why he needed to learn to get along better with…
Modi Unlimited
Coasting down the six-lane highway from Ahmedabad to Gandhinagar, wheels barely touching the asphalt, it is tempting to forget that you are in the India…
Budget Deficit
I remember when I was a child eating the only canned peas available then. They were hard, bland and left a metallic taste in my…
Hindustan Unilever Is Working Up A Lather
“Chamko… kapdon ke liye behtereen sabun. Bar-bar, lagatar. Chamko. Kapdon mein chakachaundh chamak lane ke liye. Khushbudar, jhaagwala-Chamko.” Romance blooms when charming salesgirl Deepti Naval…
The haze before dawn
Do you know what a “dominant undertaking” is Suresh Krishna does. The Chairman and Managing Director of Sundram Fasteners lived every day with the provisions…
India’s Skilling Field
“Then we had to find the rule and the string again, and a new hole was made; and, about midnight, the picture would be up…
Are We Disaster Ready?
When I lived in Tokyo in the early 1990s, children at my daughter’s school could clamber into an “earthquake truck” for a foretaste of what…
The Takeover Man
Most of us are cursed with poor memory. We need episodic markers to help us measure our lives from one significant remembrance to another. Our…
The Most Powerful Women In Indian Business
Early this month I travelled to Agra to walk barefoot around the Taj Mahal, the only wonder of the world that stands in honour of…
Mayday- AT THE HINDUSTAN TIMES
Senior Editor of this newspaper were about to sit down for their evening news-planning meeting when the smoke alarms started jangling. Within moments the first…
Home Truths
And now at the end he found himself in his own house, on his own half-lot of land, his own portion of the earth. That…
India’s Best Fund Manager
Have you heard the story about Warren Buffett, the 215 millionaires, and the coin-flipping orangutans? It takes some telling and you will have to buy…
Brats at Work
H for Hitler. A for arrogant, R for rascal, I for idiot …” I’m sure many of us remember the “Hari Sadu” commercial about the…
New Age Guru peps up India story believers
“When you were five years old, you were happy nearly all the time. Somebody had to make you unhappy Now you are 30-plus and have…
BIHAR PRESS BILL-BATTLE CRY
Whatever else the government is butter-fingered at doing, it is adept at keeping the results of its impetuosity in a state of continuing suspense’. The…
TYRE PRICES – VASTLY OVER-INFLATED
Tyers are one essential commodity over which the Government seems to exert no control whatsoever. In the last six months prices have risen twice. And…
Signs Of The Times
There was the baby-faced ex-pilot, all thumbs as he handled the controls in his political flight simulator; the rough-spun son of the, soil, a man…
THE TIGHTENING NOOSE
On Summer nights all over north India. people put out hundreds of thousands of cots in the open air to sleep on. Most of the…
AN UNCERTAIN LULL
SHEIKH Mohammad Abdullah’s health more than anything else has been responsible for the sudden thaw in Delhi-Srinagar relations For a while last month Kashmir teetered…
CAUGHT IN THE CROSSFIRE
Indian foreign policy has always suffered from contradictory tugs and pulls, and last month the Government exposed its tendency to over-react to global developments. Israeli…
POWER PROBLEM
September 1981 to go into the question of revising the rates of forest produce. The eight-member committee, chaired by the chief secretary, consisted of the…
FOR WHOM THE BILL TOLLS
One of the misconceptions spawned by the Bihar Press Bill is that it will emasculate Bihar’s journalists. The truth is that Bihar’s journalists have already…
FIREFILES CAUGHT IN A LOGJAM
Without second-generation reforms and a drastic overhaul of its institutions, India is condemned to mediocre income and growth. As befits an ancient land, India is…
“THIS YEAR WE WILL FALL SHORT OF THE TARGET”
It is two years since you took charge. How are you tackling the skilling challenge? The scale of the problem is huge. A combination of…
Uncertainty Principle
A disgraced Ranbaxy has a long and expensive journey ahead before it regains the trust of global and Indian customers. By E. Kumar Sharma and…
Trouble Brewing
Gurdeep Singh Chadha – “Ponty” to those who nod at and fear him – is not an easy man to know. Many say the tax…
WE LOST THE PLOT
Kishore Biyani reveals why he sold a controlling stake in his flagship Pantaloons stores to the Aditya Birla Group in a candid conversation with Chaitanya…
HOW TO DO A MANAGEMENT BUYOUT AT 30,000 FEET
The next time you are flying somewhere, do not bury your nose in a book or plug in your earphones. Take a good look around.…
Interview: Osamu Suzuki
MARUTI WILL NOT END Simmering unrest among contract workers at the Manesar (Haryana) plant of Maruti Suzuki exploded in violence and arson on July 18;…
Interview: Upendra Kumar
“There are companies which are defying the law…. We have taken a series of measures” In the 20 months he has been Chairman of the…
CEO COMPANSATION
SWIMMING IN IT Until July 1991, directors at Indian companies could not be paid more than ₹15,000 a month. Commissions as a percentage of net…
“WE WERE LEADER BUT WE WERE NOT LEADING”
HUL contributes just 6.3 per cent to Unilever’s global revenues. Where does India stand among emerging markets? Manwani: Emerging markets are not just important; they…
INTERVIEW Y.C. Deveshwar
YOGESH CHANDER DEVESHWAR has been with ITC for nearly 43 years. the past 15 as chairman and chief executive. Having turned ITC into a multi-…
Most Powerful Women in Business
“In India, I See a Lot More Acceptance of Gender in the Workplace” Do you think the India-us CEO Forum you are a member of…
DEMOCRACY DIES IN DARNESS
The Washington post adopted this four-word slogan “Democracy Dies in Darkness” in February 2017, its first in 140 years. It was used by its owner…
RED-LETTER DAYS
This is a year of anniversaries , some unpleasant, some prescient, some momentous. CE 2019 is important not only because of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s…
Hell For Leather
Hell for leather means to run very fast, but the leather industry in and around Kanpur has nowhere to run. Hundreds of tanneries and manufacturing…