Smart Housing The Doorstep into the Future

                                                                Author: Kansish Gadpale

Analyst,

Infrastructure Group

                                                                                                 
To understand smart housing let us look at the basic definitions of the term ‘house’ & ‘smart’

A house is a building designed to be used as a place of residence, or of human occupation for any purpose: as, a dwelling house; a banking house; a house of worship; a public house. And the definition of smart is sharp; quick, vigorous; efficient; severe, brisk; lively; witty, elaborately nice; elegant; fine; showy, active; intelligent; clever, careful; punctual, having strong qualities; strong.. etc 

While in modern context we often use smart to denote that which can provide information right when you need it and can present them in a more useful way as compared to other. Why? you can get the answer by observing around you that peoples day to day activities are getting more effective, qualitative, as well as dependent on the use of ICT i.e. information and communication technology.

When we apply these modern principles using ICT in a cluster of houses we can call it a smart housing. Smart houses have highly advanced, automated systems to control and monitor any function of a house such as lighting, temperature control, multi-media, security, window and door operations, air quality, or any other task of necessity or comfort performed by a home's resident. Coded signals are sent through the home's wiring (or sent wireless) to switches and outlets that are programmed to operate appliances and electronic devices in every part of the house. Home automation can be especially useful for the elderly, people with physical or cognitive impairments, and disabled persons who wish to live independently.

To give you an example smart house is already a toy of super-wealthy, like Bill and Melinda Gates' home in Washington State called Xanadu 2.0. The Gates' house is so high-tech that it allows visitors to choose the mood music for each room they visit.

So, a truly smart house wouldn’t have different kinds of remote controls for performing every kind of action and monitors that show the specific information for specific device. But a smart housing should be something which we can have control over and can keep an eye on even when we are not in home. It is something that automatically adapts to our daily routines and can interact with us verbally in any corner of the house and is able to assimilate and convey its own update to occupants according to the priority in very understandable way. That means all the services, sensors, appliances, from security to entertainment systems are managed and controlled via one CPU which is accessible only to the occupants and through a highly encrypted secure connections.

The future of smart housing will bring more fictional characteristics that we watch in movies such as; housing clusters recycling and safely disposing the wastes. Washing and drying of clothes, and suggesting which clothes to wear on according to personal choice in relation to weather outside. Self washing and cleaning of house. Kitchens with robotic arms than can replicate unique dishes by learning the data gathered from internet and according to the taste preferences of family members. Creating artificial sunlight and artificial realities using holographic projectors etc.

---

 http://www.axykno.com/Infrastructure.php

What is GST and How it will affect the Common Man

How India’s Tax System Structured Today

The constitution divides taxation powers between Centre and States. Both level of Government

What is the Problems with this arrangement

There are two important problems with the current arrangement:-

First some goods which are manufactured are levied Indirect Tax called Central Excise at the factory gate. Subsequently when they reach a retail outlet and is bought by a consumer, State Government levies a tax on the consumption dubbed as Value Added Tax (VAT).

So we have a Tax at Factory Gate which adds to the cost of the goods and another tax i.e VAT on Final Price.

Since States have exclusive domain on consumption tax i.e VAT within their borders, they treat Goods coming from other states as ‘Imports”. If the goods are sent across the state borders and sold in another state an ‘Export” tax called Central Sales Tax is collected by the selling state.

As seen above there are multiple taxes when there is commerce across state borders. Consequently it increases cost for everyone and makes economic activity within India and for Indians complicated.

How GST Help

The GST shall have two components: one levied by the Centre (Central GST), and the other levied by the States (State GST). Rates for Central GST and State GST would be prescribed appropriately, reflecting revenue considerations and acceptability. This dual GST model would be implemented through multiple statutes (one for CGST and SGST statute for every State).

GST is a single tax on the supply of goods and services, right from the manufacturer to the consumer.

At the Central level, the following taxes are being subsumed:

·         Central Excise Duty,

·         Additional Excise Duty,

·         Service Tax,

·         Additional Customs Duty known as Countervailing Duty, and

·         Special Additional Duty of Customs.

At the State level, the following taxes are being subsumed:

·         Subsuming of State Value Added Tax/Sales Tax,

·          Entertainment Tax (other than the tax levied by the local bodies), CST

·         Octroi and Entry tax,

·         Purchase Tax,

·         Luxury tax, and

·         Taxes on lottery, betting and gambling.

The Central GST and the State GST would be levied simultaneously on every transaction of supply of goods and services except on exempted goods and services, goods which are outside the purview of GST and the transactions which are below the prescribed threshold limits. Further, both would be levied on the same price or value unlike State VAT which is levied on the value of the goods inclusive of Central Excise.

Credit of Input Tax :

Credits of input taxes paid at each stage will be available in the subsequent stage of value addition, which makes GST essentially a tax only on value addition at each stage.

The final consumer will thus bear only the GST charged by the last dealer in the Supply chain with setoff benefits at all the previous stages.

 Interstate Transactions:

 In case of interstate transactions, the Centre would levy and collect the Integrated Goods and Services Tax (IGST) on all interstate supplies of goods and services under Article 269A (1) of the Constitution. The IGST would roughly be equal to CGST plus SGST. The IGST mechanism has been designed to ensure seamless flow of input tax credit from one State to another. The interstate seller would pay IGST on the sale of his goods to the Central Government after adjusting credit of IGST, CGST and SGST on his purchases (in that order). The exporting State will transfer to the Centre the credit of SGST used in payment of IGST. The importing dealer will claim credit of IGST while discharging his output tax liability (both CGST and SGST) in his own State. The Centre will transfer to the importing State the credit of IGST used in payment of SGST. Since GST is a destination based tax, all SGST on the final product will ordinarily accrue to the consuming State.

Investment Banking

#axykno #investmentBanking
http://www.axykno.com/Investment-Banking.php

The National Mineral Exploration Policy -2016 (Non Coal and Non Fuel Minerals)

               The Government of India has recently launched the National Mineral Exploration Policy (NMEP) for Non Coal and Non Fuel minerals. The NMEP spells out the strategy and outlines the action plan of the government to ensure systematic, state of the art  comprehensive exploration of Indias mineral resources.

               The NMEP also proposes to involve private sector  participation for unraveling new mineral deposits through state of the art technology.  The government proposes to facilitate and incentivize private sector participation in Mineral Exploration so that the technical expertise ,technological capability and financial resources of the private sector can be gainfully utilized in the discovery and exploitation of mineral resources.

              NMEP envisages providing of free geo-scientific data on geology ,geochemistry and geophysics to the public by the government thereby creating a platform for private sector government collaboration for the discovery of new mineral deposits which can be put up for auction..

              Since all our near surface deposits have been explored and are already under exploitation, one of the major thrust areas of the NMEP would be to attract global participation to discover concealed and deep seated  mineral deposits of diamond ,gold, PGE, Nickel etc (300 to 1000m)  having  no surface manifestations and requiring specialized knowledge and state of the art technology. For this purpose the government also proposes to set up the National Centre for Mineral Targeting on Public Private Partnership to focus on optimizing mineral exploration efforts of the public and private sector

           The Government will develop model contracting procedures and standard agreement templates for State Govts to engage private sector expertise. Govt will keep provision for mitigating risks of the private companies in carrying out mineral exploration by working normative cost of exploration works for different minerals so that exploration companies could be compensated in case they do not discover any mineable reserves.

              The NMEP is a positive step on the part of the Government to encourage and involve private sector participation  to discover mineral deposits. Effective and whole hearted implementation will be the key to its success or otherwise it will remain just another policy of the government.

Non Coal Auctioning Perspective is different from Coal Auctioning

 The Ministry of Mines Government of India has recently notified the Mineral (Auction Rules, 2015). through notification dated-18th May 2015. These rules shall apply to all minerals except minerals notified as minor minerals specified in clause (e) of section 3 and minerals specified in part A & B of the Schedule to the Act. The Government proposes to auction grant of Mining Lease where mineral content of an area has been established (G-2) stage and composite license of mineral deposits in the minerals bearing area where preliminary exploration (G-3) has been completed to establish Inferred Minerals Reserve.   The auctioning proposed by the Ministry of Mines is similar to the auctioning of coal blocks being conducted by Ministry of Coal, however the perspectives are fundamentally different.

It needs to be understood that the occurrence, nature and disposition of non-coal minerals is fundamentally different as compared to coal. While coal is a uniformly occurring stratified bedded deposit comprising gentle to moderately dipping coal seams, Non –Coal minerals specially copper, lead , zinc, gold, manganese generally occur as steeply dipping veins and lenses exhibiting pinch and swell character along the dip and strike  of the mineralization. Therefore techniques of exploration for non coal minerals is radically different as compared to coal exploration. While exploration of coal is simple involving no special technique because of its uniform bedded nature, exploration of metalliferous deposits require to be conducted after mapping and assessing the geo-structural elements which control the mineralization. A three dimensional approach is required for identifying hot spots i.e favorable locales of mineral concentration. A state of the art multi pronged exploration  technique involving mapping of the geological formation including gossans and their Structural elements like dip, strike, plunge of folds and pucker lineation’s etc. followed by identification of geo chemical halos through low detection multi elemental geo chemical sampling is required to be conducted. Mineral search would ideally require geo physical surveys like Self Potential, EM, Gravity for identifying deep seated/buried mineral deposits having no signatures on the surface, Integration of the above studies would lead to the launching of an exploration, program to target the ore body through deviation controlled drilling by angular boreholes.

The Ministry of Mines follows the United Nation Framework Clarification for assessment of Mineral Reserve & Resources. The UNFC consist of three axes.  Geological Assessment (G), Feasibility Assessment (F) Economic viability (E). Presently exploration in India is mostly confined to the Geological Axes (G-2 & G-3 stage) with little or no information on the Feasibility assessment or Economic viability (axes).This makes it extremely difficult to take an investment decision on commercial mining of mineral deposits.

The Ministry of Mines is proposing that the State Government may initiate auction process for grant of mining lease with respect to an area within the state where minerals content have been established. However all the deposits being put up for auction of mining lease would have information only on one axis is Geological Assessment and up to G-2 stage (Identified Resource). Therefore the successful besides would have to conduct detailed exploration along with feasibility studies and assess Economical viability of the prospect before mining can be taken up . This implies that to explore the deposit it would take considerable amount of time.

For auction of composite license a mineral leasing area should have had Preliminary Exploration (G3) done to establish Mineral Inferred Resource. The successful bidder would have to carry out his own exploration programme to establish the existence of mineral deposit if any in the area the chances of which could be remote. In case a mineral deposit is establish, he would apply to the state Government for Mining Lease.   

It can be seen from above that both ML & CL would involve detailed techno commercial studies in the Economic; Viability and Geological axes before mining can take place. Selection of the right mineral deposit/ mineral bearing area being put for auction would be the key to success or failure.