India up 16 places to 55th on global competitiveness index

In a big jump, India has moved up  by 16 notch to rank 55th on a global index of the world’s most competitive economies. The jump in India’s position underlines the country’s recent economic recovery, improvement in institutions’ competitiveness, macroeconomic environment and a “slight improvement” in infrastructure, the World Economic Forum (WEF) said in its latest Global Competitiveness report.

Switzerland has retained its top position as the world’s most competitive economy for seventh year in a row and is followed by Singapore, the US, Germany and the Netherlands in the top-five.

Among emerging economies, India has ended five years of decline with a 16-place jump to 55th position. Turkey (51st), Brazil (75th) which posted one of the largest falls.

WEF said that the most problematic factors for doing business in India include corruption, policy instability, inflation and access to finance.

Here’s how India ranks across a range of areas

Parameter	Ranking
Market size	3
Innovation	42
Business sophistication	52
Financial market development	53
Institutions	60
Infrastructure	81
Health and primary education	84
Higher education and training	90
Macroeconomic environment	91
Goods market efficiency	91
Labour market efficiency	103
Technological readiness	120

Now, "Horn OK Please" is not OK.

“Horn OK please”    Readers outside  of the Indian subcontinent must be wondering, what does this  mean?????   Well,  It’s a  phrase commonly painted on  the rear side of  commercial vehicles like  trucks, buses or local taxis,   mostly in India.   The purpose of the phrase is to alert a driver of a vehicle approaching from behind to sound their horn in case they wish to overtake.

A country where road safety  still  seems to be a  rocket science and not  a common sense or  common practice, honking surely  alerted some reckless  drivers who are forced to  drive in poor road & vehicle conditions. 

But it gave licence to motorists to honk unnecessarily and   became   a big nuisance   in our lives.

Indian’s obsession on this noise creating piece of equipment  is  so high that in the past CEO’s/ Head’s of  big  Automakers openly declared  they spent fair amount of money and time to  bring  such  new systems  (  probably Loudest is the Best)   to be fitted in their vehicle  and those   were/are part of their innovation projects.

Sounds unbelievable !!!  Spend some  time in  one of  the Indian roads,  the varying degree  &  type of Noise/Melody  one will hear  owing to  honking even  a music composer will start doubting on his/her own ability.

Now, one of the states in India, Maharashtra (Mumbai is part of  the state) issued a circular banning the use of the phrase " Horn Ok Please" on the rear side of commercial vehicles across Maharashtra to prevent/discourage  honking. Hope  other  states  will follow  soon.

The Motorists  and the automaker,  hope  soon realise “Horn Ok Please” is not at all OK.

Swiss claimed the Gold in World happiness ranks

Switzerland is the happiest place for people to live, followed by Iceland, Denmark, Norway and Canada, according to a United Nations index 2015.

  

Togo, Burundi, Syria Benin, and Rwanda  were least happy.

The annual report looks at 158 countries across the world and bases its rankings on data from the Gallup World Poll which takes into account a range of metrics that includes  not just individual satisfaction and wealth, but also broad contentment  like real  per capita GDP, healthy life expectancy,  freedom to make life choices,  perceptions of corruption.

‘Increasingly happiness is considered a proper measure of social progress and goal of public policy. A rapidly increasing number of national and local governments are using happiness data and research in their search for policies that could enable people to live better lives,’ the report says.

All things considered, it doesn't look too good for India. Already rated an unhappy place in 2014 with a ranking of 111, the country dropped six places to 117 out of 158 countries ranked in the 2015 list, which took into account data from 2012-2014. 

Pro-social behavior including honesty, benevolence, cooperation, and trustworthiness, entails individuals making decisions for the common good that may conflict with short-run egoistic incentives, the report explains.

Countries that are at the top of the rankings show evidence of high social capital, while those at the bottom show the opposite: generalized distrust, pervasive corruption, and lawless behavior

No prizes for guessing where & why  India lies!!!!!!!!!!!..