Getting a publicly delivered clean chit from former arch-baiter and now Cabinet Minister, Arun Shourie, is a mixed blessing for the Ambani tycoons. They are now back in the public eye on the entire public policy and ethics issue. But, perhaps the timing is fortuitous. Close on the heels of Shourie’s stamp of approval comes news that the Trai chief may be next in line to give his seal of acceptance. But of course, the unified licence scheme that Pradeep Baijal hopes to introduce, and the Ambanis no doubt intend to acquire, may still be mired in controversy. So the biggest tycoons in the land may have to wait with merit certificates in hand, for a while more. The milky war Considering India is the world leader in milk production, one would imagine it would be because of total harmony between the milk giants, but sadly, they have been at loggerheads with each other for over a year now. Verghese Kurien who heads the GCMMF (Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation) popularly called Amul, broke all links with Amrita Patel, who heads the NDDB (National Dairy Development Board), due to her pro-marketing strategy. The father of the White Revolution felt that his former protege’s idea of joint ventures with state level marketing federations would lead to an eventual privatisation of the federations where the milk farmers would be the ones to suffer. Patel, however, believes that it is to prevent this, that marketing should be introduced. Things have now turned so sour that Mother Dairy has stopped buying the approximately 1 lakh litre of milk from GCMMF that it used to, and has stopped selling all Amul products through its outlets. Meanwhile, mediators like former IPCL Chairman Hasmukh Shah and Pramukh Swami of the Swami Narayan sect and all the way up to the Deputy PM have failed. However, the latter hasn’t given up, and as a last resort has invited both over for a meeting, where he hopes they will resolve their differences. The DPM’s peace making desires are propelled by the facts that Patel’s father was his colleague in the 1977 Cabinet, and Kurien has 40,000 milk farmers from Advani’s Gandhinagar constituency, backing him. But whatever his reasons are, the DPM should remember that when the best of buddies fall out with each other, they become the worst of enemies and tycoon battles are not solved by politics. The price tag matters If you are one of those who kept running out of money to buy a PC, then Vinay L. Deshpande has some great news for you. The tycoon behind Simputer, the inexpensive handheld substitute for a computer, has plans to cut its costs. His Bangalore-based Encore Software, which began selling some Simputers last year at Rs 25,000, will now bring them down to a much more appealing Rs 10, 000. The Simputer, it was priced and designed so that illiterate farmers to poorly educated businessmen, were able to use it. In spite its small size, its applications include voicemail, a picture-based touch-sensitive screen, multilingual text-to-speech capabilities and a writing programme, and allows e-mail and Internet access. Deshpande, who was selected as one of the 100 technology pioneers of World Economic Forum 2001,is a man who knows his territory well. And knowing only too well that copies of his Simputer will soon hit the market, the tycoon has plans to bring out advanced versions, with enhancements like wireless capability and style changes, among others. Also, Africa and the Far East will soon become customers of Encore, as by the end of this year Simputers will be developed there too. It seems the tycoon has learnt that his ticket to success in making Simputer more people friendly is just one thing - the price tag. (Dilip Cherian runs a public relations firm Perfect Relations. He is an economy watcher and tycoon tracker. The people he writes about are not his clients. Send your insider dope to dilipcherian@hotmail.com)
