Despite India being seen as a late entrant in the mini-hydel power sector, the group's (Established 1958) power plants in Karnataka are producing nearly 100 MW of power.

The West Bengal Renewable Energy Development Agency (Established 1993) ensures that the state giants use 5 per cent of renewable energy. From a solar housing programme to the country's first rice husk fuel power plant,it is a pioneer in the promotion of renewable energy.

The sluggish pace of India's power supply needs to be boosted to fuel the country's economic growth. High aggregate technical and commercial (AT&C) losses, which stood at around 33 per cent during 2006-07, stemming from electricity theft as well as transmission and distribution losses, are financially crippling most state electricity boards and distribution utilities.

Our journey of rural uplift started on October 2, 1985, when along with three others, I went to live in a village in Alwar, Rajasthan. I had quit my job as a national service volunteer at Jaipur. It was then that we realised that the real need of people was water. The people in this region had a symbiotic relationship with their natural resources and a rich tradition of rainwater harvesting.

Perfect urban infrastructure is where basic civic amenities for healthy living are made available before the actual construction of dwelling units. This does not exist in developing countries easily. In India particularly, it is far from satisfactory.

A public-private partnership, it delivers water and power services to eight states. From maintaining the water system of Mysore to distributing electricity in Jamshedpur, JUSCO (Established 2004) has won the National Urban Water Award for 2009.

From solar lanterns to solar technology-run ATMs, from traffic and streetlights to railway signals, Tata BP Solar (Established 1989) now wants to light up 10 million households across India and generate 20,000 MW of solar power by 2020.

In 2006, Vikram Puri, CEO of Mahindra Shubhlabh, contracted farmers in Punjab to grow basmati rice for Rs 1,350 per quintal. Global demand, supply fluctuations and local speculative buying pushed the prices to Rs 1,400-1,500 per quintal and about 2,000 farmers in Jalandhar and Kapurthala reneged on their contracts, causing a loss of Rs 3.6 lakh in actuals and Rs 27 lakh in opportunity cost.

Management courses are changing; they are becoming shorter, crisper and much more focused. As several sectors in India flourish, from retail and fashion to finance and risk management, the need for creating a competent manpower with domain knowledge is becoming imperative.

For most women in Punjab, dinnertime means heading to the kitchen to begin making chapatis. But things have changed in Fazilka. At dinnertime, they dress up just that little bit and are out of their homes with kneaded flour as they head for the neighbourhood chulha. Here, they bake their bread even as they talk and gossip before going back home with hot chapatis.