Waiting for the September package

With the economy refusing to look up despite the measures announced in the Budget, Sinha has almost set a deadline for the revival. Once the core sector projects move into construction stage by the end of this year, the demand for steel, cement and capital goods will surge. This will provide a boost to these industries which feed manufacturing.

Though it is open to speculation why the Government has waited so long to take action, the measures announced this week could have been easily implemented two months ago. Sinhasought to answer this criticism at a public meeting when he conceded that the Government was preoccupied with other matters, but now it would focus entirely on the economy.

The disinvestment programme for four public sector units will also be kicked off in September. While only MTNL, Indian Oil, GAIL and Concor have been identified for sell-off, Sinha said more were in the pipeline. If PSU shares are sold in the domestic market and Government’s equity falls below 51 per cent, the markets would be buzzing with activity again. The move would also raise resources for the Government which could be redeployed into core and social sectors.

He has also hinted at restoring the monitoring powers of the Disinvestment Commission and said that the Government wanted the process to be implemented by an independent body like the commission.

Sinha said the progress of mega projects would be reviewed by the Prime Minister and Finance Ministry separately and the Budget proposal to step up 35 per cent investment ininfrastructure sector would be implemented from September 15, the time when the busy season starts.

He said there would be bi-monthly review meetings to take stock of the target achieved in the infrastructure projects. Sinha also added that the completion of these projects will not only jump-start the economy but will also overcome infrastructural bottlenecks.

To lend credence to his statements, the Government issued counter-guarantee for foreign loan for the $ 317-million and 250-MW ST-CMS power project at Neyveli. A similar counter-guarantee for the Hinduja project was also in the pipeline, he said.

In a bid to boost up the business confidence which is plumbing new depths, the Finance Minister offered a pep talk to the industry. He said that it was not fair to describe the state of the economy with a pre-disposition of "doom or gloom". For instance, the overall industrial production in the first quarter of 1998 has gone up to 5.4 per cent as against 3.7 per cent in the corresponding period of theprevious fiscal. Bold on patentsThe Government has finally shed its diffidence on patents. After years of running scared, the Government has decided to accede to the Paris Convention for the protection of intellectual property and also to the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) of the Convention. Apart from the fact that this will benefit Indian investors tremendously, it marks a significant shift in political thinking about patents.

The membership of PCT will bestow two crucial benefits on Indian inventors. The first is that a single patent application filed in India’s National Patent Office will be effective in all countries which are members of the PCT. Earlier, the inventor had to file separate applications in all countries which took months and cost a lot of money.

The second crucial advantage is that the PCT provides for a international preliminary examination before the applicant decides to seek protection in a specific country. The applicant has extra time to decide whether he wants to file or not ina foreign country after he has filed in his home country. For patents the period is 12 months while for trademarks and industrial design it is six months. If he decides to file it in other countries, the date of application will be the original date of filing in the home country and not the date of filing in the foreign country.