THE PUBLIC AND THE PUBLIC SECTOR

Nothing gets the public attention more than a controversy involving an icon. Unfortunately, this time, Nestle India was at the receiving end, with the moral of the story bringing into sharp focus the absence of a single, transparent and unified food safety regime in India, and the many black holes in FSSAI’s rules of assessment.
Out for a good part of the year — and apparently for arbitrary reasons — Maggi noodles made a triumphant return to retail in October, with the embattled Nestle India suffering a 60% drop in its net profit for the July to September quarter.  .
Goods and Services Tax (GST), the long-awaited comprehensive indirect tax regime, again managed to get sidelined in 2015, with various parties raising heterogenous perspectives. Slated to be passed in the recently concluded winter session, it will now emerge in the next session in 2016.
FDI rules for single-brand retailers were liberated, though the news didn’t really raise many eyebrows; it had long been expected to actualise. Prime Minister Narendra Modi government’s announced key Foreign  Direct Investment (FDI) reforms , benefiting mostly fashion and lifestyle retail segments. FDI in multi-brand retail of course remains tightly under guard.
The benefits of Public-private-partnerships (PPP) were best demonstrated this year by the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation Ltd. (IRCTC), the world’s largest railway network organisation. With a eye firmly on modernisation, IRCTC vigorously entered the technology-enabled world, with rapid-fire alliances foodservice, food tech and e-payment platforms promising to transform the experience form millions of train travellers. PayTM, Mobiqwik, Domino’s and FoodPanda are just some of the new partners of a reinvented Indian Railways