Broadbasing and Deepening the Bond Market in India

At the time of its independence in 1947 India had only the traditional commercial banks, all with private sector ownership. Like the typical commercial banks in other parts of the world, all banks in India were also not keen to provide medium and long-term finance to industry and other sectors for their fixed asset formation. The banks were willing to fund basically the working capital requirements of the credit-worthy borrowers on the security of tangible assets. Since the government was keen to stimulate setting up of a wide range of new industrial units as also expansion/diversification of the existing units it decided to encourage setting up of financial intermediaries that provided term finance to projects in industry. Thus emerged a well-knit structure of national and state level development financial institutions (DFIs) for meeting requirements of medium and long-term finance of all range of industrial units, from the smallest to the very large ones. Reserve Bank of India (the central banking institutions of the country) and Government of India nurtured DFIS through various types of financial incentives and other supportive measures. The main objective of all these measures was to provide much needed long-term finance to the industry, which the then existing commercial banks were not keen to provide because of the fear of asset-liability mismatch. Since deposits with the banks were mainly short/medium term, extending term loans was considered by the banks to be relatively risky. The five-year development plans envisaged rapid growth of domestic industry even in the private sector to support the import substitution growth model adopted by the national planners. To encourage investment in industry, a conscious policy decision was taken that the DFIs should provide term-finance mainly to the private sector at interest rates that were lower than those applicable to working capital or any other short-term loans. In the early years of the post-Independence period, shortages of various commodities tended to make trading in commodities a more profitable proposition than investment in industry, which carried higher risk. Partly to correct this imbalance, the conscious policy design was to increase attractiveness of long-term investment in industry and infrastructure through relatively lower interest rates. To enable term-lending institutions to finance industry at concessional rates, Government and RBI gave them access to low cost funds. They were allowed to issue bonds with government guarantee, given funds through the budget and RBI allocated sizeable part of RBI's National Industrial Credit (Long Term Operations) funds to Industrial Development Bank of India, the large DFI of the country. Through an appropriate RBI fiat, the turf of the DFIs was also protected, until recently, by keeping commercial banks away from extending large sized term loans to industrial units. Banks were expected to provide small term loans to small-scale industrial units on a priority basis.

Immunomodulatory effects of fruits of Barringtonia racemosa Linn.

Background: Barringtonia racemosa (B. racemosa) is used medicinally in treatment of diarrhoea, asthma, coughs, jaundice. It is also used as an analgesic and antipyretic. This plant has also significant anti-tumor activity. However, systematic evaluation of its immunomodulatory effects has not been reported. In present study the hydroalcoholic extract of fruits of B. racemosa has been evaluated for its immunomodulatory properties in animal models.Methods: Extract of Fruits of B. racemosa was prepared from fruit powder and methanol by macerations and filtration. Healthy albino Wistar rats of either sex having 110-160 g body weight were used for this study. 1. Delayed type hypersensitivity reaction (DTH) using Sheep red blood cells (SRBCs): After immunization with SRBC effect of cyclophosphamide and hydroalcoholic extract of B. racemosa was seen on paw volume changes in rats challenged with SRBC by using digital Plethysmometer. 2. Humoral antibody response to SRBC: Animas were immunized with SRBC and treated with cyclophosphamide and hydroalcoholic extract of B. racemosa. Serum of these animals was observed for haemagglutination titer.Results: Fruits extract at the dose of 5 mg/kg i.p. showed significant decrease in DTH response as compared to that of control group animals. However, the effect of extract was less potent as compared to that of cyclophosphamide treated group. In haemagglutination titer assay, antibody titer in case naïve control, SRBC treated, cyclophosphamide treated and extract treated groups was 1:1, 1:32, 1:8 and 1:16 respectively.Conclusions: The hydroalcoholic extract of this fruits was found to inhibit SRBCs induced DTH in rats. Similarly, SRBCs induced antibody titer was also reduced

Energy Management System for Microgrid System using Improved Grey Wolf Optimization Algorithm

An Energy Management System (EMS) is indispensable to monitor the power flow and load matching inside a microgrid during grid-connected mode (GCM) and islanded modes (IM) of operation. Many conventional optimization algorithms show poor reliability for real time optimization problem solving where an objective function is non-linear. An optimization technique is necessary to reduce the cost of energy obtained from the grid, generated inside the grid, and consumed by the load. This article presents, an optimization scheme based on the improved Grey wolf optimization (GWO) algorithm that considers replacement of wounded/injured wolves of one pack by strong wolves of other pack for an EMS in micro-grid. The GWO optimization algorithm's effectiveness is demonstrated forGCM and IM operation. The proposed GWO shows fast, lost cost and precise optimization of the real time EMS for the grid connected and islanded micro-grid system

Endometrial assessment in cases of primary infertility in women: a prospective study

Background: Worldwide Infertility rate prevails around 8-12% of all couples; approximately 80 million are infertile. In India 10-15% of couples are infertile. Investigating for infertility is to intervene into the modifiable/treatable causes. Therefore, the present study has been undertaken to investigate the morphological patterns of endometrial tissue in women with primary infertility.Methods: The study included 60 cases with complaints of infertility (primary). The premenstrual D and C was done to obtain endometrial biopsy. The present prospective study was a descriptive study and the values are mentioned in percentages.Results: In present study a total of 60 cases were studied. Out of which 36 cases (60%) belonged to the young adult age group. The predominant morphological pattern was that of secretory endometrium seen in 22 cases (36.66%) as opposed to proliferative, endometritic or tubercular pattern. The predominant menstrual pattern recorded was regular; seen in 41 cases (68.33%) as opposed to irregular or mennorhagic patterns.Conclusions: The endometrial biopsy has a great role in screening the cases of infertility as it helps to assess the information about ovulation, ripening of the endometrial tissue and other abnormal endometrial reaction, hormonal imbalance. This is the only method to label the diagnosis of endometrial tuberculosis in an apparently healthy female

Nodal anatomical study in some Rubiaceae

Anatomies of the nodes belonging to 20 species 11 genera of the family Rubiaceae are investigated. Of these, 16 species exhibited trilacunar, three-traced supply to the leaves. In case of Canthium coromandelicum, Gardenia latifolia, G. longistyla, the nodes show five-lacunar, five-traced supply. In Luculia gratissiuma, they are unilacunar, one-traced. Variation in emergence of median and lateral traces however, is observed. It is the median trace that departs first in 15 species; whereas in the rest others lateral traces emerge earlier, except Luculia gratissima wherein the node being unilacunar, one-traced only. The stipule usually receives vascular supply from the lateral traces. However in Luculia gratissima, it is the solitary trace that bears vascular supply to them. The present authors are inclined to regard the unilacunar, one-traced supply basic for the family Rubiaceae, whereas others are thought later attainments.    &nbsp