Mr Tata, How To Buy Myself An Aquifer in the Himalayas?

For he must surely know the procedure, owning one himself.  How cool is that - an aquifer all to oneself in the Himalayas, the water from which can be sold for the same price as diesel without all the hassle that the latter entails.  I believe diesel can be a bit more difficult to source and all, though I may be mistaken.  

These big industrialists hold all the aces, don't they?  

Hear it from the man in charge, R. K. Krishna Kumar, a Director in Tata Sons: 

We want to partner PepsiCo to distribute Himalayan widely. They have the liquid bottle distribution strength. We don't have that. We can tap that strength to take Himalayan to international markets. Hopefully soon, we will take it to one or two countries. A product like Evian is a source product. Given the uniqueness of the water sources, there is no reason why Himalayan can't be taken to other markets and compete with brands such as Evian. The source, our aquifer in the Himalayas, is a unique source. We have vast reserves. We can tap it, bottle it and make it a global brand.

(Emphasis mine)    So how do I get hold of an Himalayan aquifer?  Once I do that, the next steps are so simple: tap it, bottle it and sell it for a song after entering into a Joint Venture with a global giant:

Tata Global Beverages and PepsiCo India have joined hands to make a foray into nutritious beverages space.

The two have already floated a new company by the name and style of NourishCo.

The joint venture rolled out its first product, Tata Water Plus, on Thursday here at a press conference. Claimed to be the country's first nutrient water, Tata Water Plus is priced at Rs.16 for a 750 ml Pet bottle.

...

“It is taste neutral. It looks and tastes like normal water but with added goodness of nutrients that are bio-available,” says a release.

It had also brought the top-end natural mineral water brand Himalayan (priced at Rs.40 a litre) into the NourishCo fold.

Note the Rs.40 a litre in the last line.  Now, about that nutrient water.  Bio-available doesn't mean what it sounds like.  It does not mean that it comes naturally in the water.  It basically refers to how much of the nutrient can be absorbed by the body.  So I now get a sneaking suspicion that the water is "taste neutral" and "tastes like normal water" because that is what it is - normal water.  Swindle anyone?

Anyway, it is nice to know that our largest industrial conglomerates are on the job of lifting the country out of poverty.  Rs 1L+ nano and Rs.40/litre water and so on.  Hang on, a more affordable tractor would have helped more, you say?  I think you're just jealous of the Tatas.

New Delhi Power Privatisation And How It Has Worked Out

No point in privatising if it doesn't help consumers 

Nigeria is reportedly so impressed with India's - and more specifically, Delhi's - model of privatisation of power distribution that it wants to adopt the Delhi model while selling off its own state-owned power generation and distribution businesses. 

... One wonders whether the Nigerian authorities have had a chance to actually interact with the beneficiaries of power reforms - Delhi's electricity consumers - before coming to the conclusion that the Delhi model was the best one to follow. 

...One also wonders whether Nigerian Regulatory Commission and the Bureau of Public Enterprises of Nigeria, the two government bodies which will be involved with the African nation's power privatisation process, have had a chance to go through the latest report of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG), which has lambasted the Delhi government for rising power shortages and a mounting power deficit, subsequent to privatisation. 

There have been many demands raised by consumer groups, the latest by the Residents Welfare Associations (RWAs) of the capital, for an independent and neutral audit of the accounts of the power distribution companies. The apex association of RWAs has even moved a division bench of the Delhi High Court seeking a court order for an outside audit.

The reason for this level of outrage and disbelief of claims by the government and the distribution companies are not far to seek.

Far from seeing a palpable improvement in service quality and delivery and a reduction in costs - the main promises made while justifying the power business - they have seen a sharp increase in power tariffs, falling service quality and growing outages and shortages. In other words, privatisation - as far as consumers are concerned - have made things worse, not better.

...In Mumbai, for instance, the stateowned - BEST is actually owned by the Brihan Mumbai Municipal Corporation - sells power at a lower cost to its consumers than its privately owned rival, has a comparable or better record across most service delivery parameters, and manages to meet the government's 'social obligation' of providing power to economically weaker sections of society

Why Did They Search for Tata's Successor?

Shyam Menon wants to know.  A perfectly natural question.

The great search

Thus, even as the media gets busy telling us who and what Cyrus Mistry is, the totality of this succession can be gauged only when his top management team is also in place. 

Right now in the public eye, Mr Mistry is a child of equity holding. He has to prove himself within the larger Tata context (that is, Tata in the world as opposed to the world of Tata) or risk being seen as there thanks to shareholding. That is a clean slate to start off. It is also what typically happens during succession in family businesses. Things change and yet they don't. 

Which is why what puzzles me still is — why did they go searching? May be at heart, all businesses are simple and expectations otherwise are the stuff of public imagination and gullibility?