The Bed and Breakfast scheme (B&Bs) is to provide a clean and affordable place for foreign and domestic tourists alike, including an opportunity for foreign tourists to stay with an Indian family to experience Indian customs and traditions and relish authentic Indian cuisine. The bed and breakfast (registration and regulation) ordinance 2007 allows people, who intend to offer their house to guests, through a system of registration by a prescribed authority. The condition is that there should be adequate space to house the guests. The owner should be able to provide quality food prepared in hygienic conditions and proper sleeping arrangements to the guests. The scheme is different from the paying guest accommodation scheme, which provides for long-term and medium-term stay. Any residential premises with one to five rooms with attached bath and toilet, having adequate supply of electricity and water with parking facilities can register under this scheme. Hygienic food and privacy are to be maintained. The bed and breakfast accommodation is a common phenomenon in the West. People offer their houses for guests to stay and breakfast is served in the morning, either in the bedroom or more commonly, in a dining room or the host’s kitchen. And bathrooms are in most cases private. This kind of accommodation is also simply referred as B&B. Usually bed and breakfast accommodation (B&Bs) may operate either as a primary occupation or as a secondary source of income. Staff often consists of the host and members of their family who live there. Staying at a bed and breakfast accommodation (B&Bs) can offer better access to popular locations which may not be convenient to the city centre or where the location’s other lodging may be situated. The bed and breakfast accommodations (B&BS) are usually located closer to locations where other larger lodging competitors may not place a guest accommodation because of market conditions. But in large cities where hotels can be very expensive and rooms are scanty, bed and breakfast accommodation (B&Bs) can be available in the city limits too. India is now slowly catching up with this novel concept of bed and breakfast accommodation (B&Bs) due to several reasons. With lakhs of tourists coming to the country for different reasons like holidaying, medical treatment, business, etc. hotels are finding it difficult to cope up to the pressure. Moreover there are many beautiful and exquisite tourists’ spots where building hotels and other forms [...]
Archive for March 25th, 2008
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HOLD THE PRICE LINE
March 25th, 2008 
krishna India’s key fiscal and currency administrators would have to keep a tight vigil on rising foreign capital inflows and high commodity prices as policy makers grapple with options to manage inflation in a period of global economic uncertainty, the Economic Survey has said. “Monetary policy needs to’ address the inflationary expectations triggered by sub-sectoral price flare-ups arising from mismatches in demand and supply. It also has to manage the stress arising from continued increase in capital flows,” the survey said. It, however, projected a moderate inflation rate in the coming months as policy measures taken during the course of the year work their way through the system. Despite the hike in petrol and diesel prices, the inflation rate would remain lower at 4.4 per cent during the current fiscal, compared to 5.4 per cent in the previous year. It also said the behaviour of agricultural prices, including essential consumption items, will be critical, given falling poverty and rapidly rising per capita income. “We will continue to depend on enhancement of supplies through higher productivity and efficient supply management… Domestic supply management is critical to stabilising inflation expectations,” it said. Inflation, measured by the wholesale price index, is currently hovering around 4.5 per cent. Inflation had hit a high of 6.69 per cent in January 2007. With a series of interest rates hikes in quick succession the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has quite aggressively tightened the monetary screws. While the government has cut import duty on several items, including cement and edible oils, the RBI has adopted a policy of monetary tightening hiking the cash reserve ratio (CRR) and the repo rate to contain the price line. The survey said that supply side pressures are likely only in sectors like agriculture that suffer from structural problems, infrastructure sectors still characterised by a monopoly core, heavily dependent on government investment and relatively slow decision making sectors such as urban land. However, global shortages and rising prices of these farm items are eroding the government’s ability to meet shortfalls at affordable prices, the document said.
GETTING READY FOR SHARE BUYBACK
March 25th, 2008 krishna Buyback of shares are a common way of dealing with purchases by companies across the world. In India, many investors are not clear about how share buyback actually takes place. With companies slowly adopting this route an increasing number investors will be subject to share buyback and they need to be clear about the operation of this mode. Here are some pointers that will help them in that direction. Wire money online to India with Xoom.com for as low as $4.99. The entire process of buyback of shares consists of a situation where the company buys its own shares back from the public and then extinguishes the shares. The process of buying back the shares is vital because it involves a position where the company itself acquires the shares because they feel it is undervalued and the investors reduce their holding in the company. In a case where the shares are not kept alive then there is a reduction in the number of shares “in the company. There are two ways in which a buyback is conducted and based on this the individual will know the route to be adopted by them for completing the process. On one hand there is the direct market mop up wherein the company fixes a price till which it buys back the shares. Then whenever it spots the market price lower than the limit it will buy the shares from investors in the market itself. For an investor they will not know who is at the other end of the transaction and here they -sell the shares like in the normal course of investing without knowing who they are selling to. The second is the direct method of buyback where the company buys shares directly from the investor at a fixed price. The investors know that they are selling the shares to the company and hence they need to transact this in a slightly different way. This will require an off market transaction for the transfer to the account of the company. The buyback has an impact on several areas. The most important among them is that several ratios will be affected. If the shares are cancelled then the number of shares outstanding will go down and with earnings being maintained or raised it can lead to better earnings per share. Similarly this can lead to several return ratios looking better because of the [...]
THE FATS IN THE FIRE
March 25th, 2008 krishna Visit any urban food store in India and you will be spoilt for choices. But very few of these processed foods reveal the secret behind their delectable taste or the origins of their crunchiness. If a new central government rule is cleared by Parliament in the forthcoming monsoon session, this information will become mandatory. Last week, two senior ministers – Health Minister A. Ramadoss and Minister for Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution Sharad Pawar – acknowledged this threat from junk food to India’s health. Wire money online to India with Xoom.com for as low as $4.99. The Food Safety and Standards Bill, which is being given final touches by the Health Ministry, will ensure that all processed foods manufactured and sold in India carries information on its weight and nutritional value including energy value, amounts of protein, carbohydrate, fat, information on vitamins and mineral, and amount and types of fats, especially harmful trans fatty acids that raise cholesterol. The labelling will be a huge step forward considering that trans fats more than the others have the ability to wreck your health. Consider its negatives: it increases artery-blocking bad cholesterol and pushes down good cholesterol. The National Academy of Sciences, which advises the US and Canadian governments on nutritional science for use in public policy and product labelling programmes, says trans fatty acids are not essential and provide no known benefit to human health and it increases the risk of coronary heart disease. In developed countries like the US, it is mandatory to list its presence on the label. But the industry here uses it because it’s cheap and enhances the products’ shelf life. The Bill is welcome, but much more needs to be done. For one, educating the public relentlessly like it was done in the anti-cola campaign. Activists have been demanding a ban on TV ads for these junk foods, which target children. And, these harmful foods must be banned in school cafes – be it public or private. The Delhi government for one has banned junk foods in its school canteens, but what about the private schools? Going a step forward, fast-food joints, including the ones owned by the multinationals, must be asked to display the ingredients they use like they do in their home countries.
