Journal Press India^®

We are happy to present to our readers yet another issue of MANTHAN where we have focused on a lot of upcoming issues in the areas of commerce and management. In the wake of growing importance of food security in India, the lead article in this issue studies the impacts of trade liberalisation and food subsidy policies on the macroeconomic variables, using general equilibrium analysis. As intellectual property rights (IPR) have become an important dimension of commerce ever since the signing of the TRIPs Agreement of WTO, the next article analyses the impact of globalisation on patent filings by Indian citizens and finds that the notion that globalisation leads to increase in patent filing does not hold good in the Indian case.

The new challenges of globalisation in different realms of life have also been brought out in a number of articles. The article on ‘Users’ perception of healthcare services in Mumbai’ discusses the increasing preference for private hospitals and underlines the importance of achieving and sustaining a high level of efficiency in the provision of healthcare. Another article brings out the growing importance of CSR activities for companies in the context of female foeticide and infanticide in Rajasthan. Similarly, in an environment of global competitiveness, it is important that the quality and standard of higher education institutions be enhanced through innovation, creativity and regular monitoring. In this context, the article on ‘TQM’ in Higher education discusses the ways in which the quality of higher education institutions in India can be improved using the TQM mechanism. Another paper on GATS looks at the evolution of higher education system in India and the implications of GATS accord and globalisation for this system. In addition to these articles, we have included contributions in interesting areas like ‘human brand positioning’ and ‘micro-insurance’.

            This issue also presents two insightful case studies: one on Jet Airways explaining valuation of a troubled firm, and the other that discusses mechanisms to be a winner in the Indian mutual fund industry by taking the case of HDFC AMC.

                We sincerely hope that our readers find this issue interesting and useful and encourage us by further contributions from their side on topical areas in commerce and management.

Dr. Himanshu Sekhar Rout

Editor-in-Chief