Regulating the Pharmaceutical Industry

Jug Suraiya’s blog post titled “Sick Industry” makes very interesting reading (March 25, 2016, Jug Suraiya in Juggle-Bandhi, Times of India). Visit

http://blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/jugglebandhi/sick-industry/

What should be an indicator of a person being diabetic? Fasting sugar level? Yes, but who decides the threshold? Jug Suraiya says that “experts” redefined the threshold a couple of times during the last two decades and have caused the world to think that the number of diabetics is now more than 200% of what it was earlier.

There are lots of interesting reports about how uncontrolled commercialism can endanger public health. For, an example, visit

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/09/21/how-an-obscure-drugs-4000-price-increase-might-finally-spur-action-on-soaring-health-care-costs/

We need the media to be alert to all kinds of dangers. Governments can subvert institutions like Lok Ayuktas as and when they wish. Media have become our only hope for demanding high standards in public life. Society needs to worry about commercial interests and corrupt members influencing professional bodies. The “reputation” the Medical Council of India enjoys is an example of what can happen. Visit

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_Council_of_India

In this context I should share a joke about world of telephone companies – landline as well as mobile. What happens if the percentage of calls landing on wrong numbers increases? Profitability goes up!  

Why can’t we be more efficient?

I did a trip by car recently from Bangalore to Neyveli and Thanjavur and came back via Tiruchirappalli. In one place, Bangalore, I paid the toll electronically. Everywhere else the car had to stop and the toll had to be paid manually. I paid a total of Rs 619 at 11 places. The whole trip was about 1100 km long. This made me read up on reports of such inefficient practices elsewhere in India. This country prides itself on its software export earnings, but its own domestic economy is often a decade or more behind adopting simple technology to save its people time and money. It is a bit like the case of workers in the construction industry, who build huge multi-story apartment complexes for others. But they and their children usually live in the buildings under construction, often without drinking water, lighting and access to toilets. Sometimes their toddlers wander around such buildings, fall down and die.  

The Centre for Internet & Society has done us a service by republishing in its February 2016 Newsletter an insightful article by Shyam Ponappa in the Business Standard of Feb 3, 2016 http://www.business-standard.com/article/opinion/shyam-ponappa-bottled-up-national-assets-116020301314_1.html

Ponappa points out that the Indian Highways Management Company was tasked in 2012 to implement Electronic Toll Collection (ETC). He also reports that a study by IIM-C and Transport Corporation of India in 2012 reported an annual loss of Rs 87,000 Crores due to delays of the Delhi-Mumbai truck traffic. The study is reported to have indicated that the average speed of the Delhi-Mumbai truck traffic to be 21 kmph! It would be worth reading up the basis for these loss calculations; they seem to be of the order of 2% of India’s GNP in 2012!

ETC is reported to have been introduced in 2014, but the goal of having it implemented all over India remains a dream as of now. The transportation sector contributes over 5% of the GNP and the road sector handles over 60% of the freight movement (these numbers are based on relatively old information – visit http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/COUNTRIES/SOUTHASIAEXT/EXTSARREGTOPTRANSPORT/0,,contentMDK:20703625~menuPK:868822~pagePK:34004173~piPK:34003707~theSitePK:579598,00.html )

While doing research for writing this article I came across this website of ICICI Bank

http://www.icicibank.com/Personal-Banking/cards/prepaid/fastag/list-of-active-toll-plazas.page?#toptitle

It says that an electronic tag can be bought for use on the Bangalore-Chennai route at Hosur, but the publicity for this has been very poor. I have travelled on this route several times but have never seen a sign advertising this tag. I am a Bangalore customer of the ICICI bank but I have never received an email about this.

There are many other examples in the Indian economy, as readers can guess, of poor management causing huge losses. Major reforms pose their own problems, but a concerted effort to identify easily addressable problems could speed up the growth rate of the GNP by one or two percent. There was a time when productivity was given national attention, but now we hear little about productivity in general. The Niti Aayog seems to be concerned with agricultural productivity, but we do not hear about attempts to improve productivity in other sectors of the economy.

Public Sector Banks – fight the disease, not merely the symptoms

A lot of noise is being made of a businessman being given questionable loans. Is this the first such case? Or is it going to be the last such one?

The basic problem is that netas can always influence public sector banks to give loans that no one else will give. That is why netas will keep these banks going, even when they are inefficient. The bank staff are not inefficient; it is the leaches that bleed off the banks that make them weak.

The solution seems to be partly in bank staff serving as whistle blowers – protecting public interest by alerting the media in early stages of scams.

It is partly in the public taking their deposits out of public sector banks. It is also in selling off shares in these banks. We need to vote the only effective way we can vote – vote with our feet!