bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Rise and Fall of Interest Rate Futures in Indian Derivative Market
Authors: Panda Pradiptarathi , Thiripalraju M.
Published: September 2016

Interest rate derivatives are the most traded and widely accepted derivative instrument in the international market. But this product is not popular in Indian derivative market. In 1999, the Over the Counter (OTC) interest rate derivative products were introduced and successful in terms of volumes. The Indian financial market introduced exchange traded interest rate derivatives in the year 2003, 2009 and 2014. While the product failed twice, in the third time (in 2014) the initial volumes are sharply declining in three exchanges viz. MCX-SX, NSE and BSE. In this backdrop, this study attempts to analyse the past, present and future of interest rate futures in Indian derivative market using the volumes, values and open interest of Interest rate derivatives for three exchanges.
Robust Benchmarking of Indian Mutual Funds-A Partial Frontier Approach
Authors: Sinha Ram Pratap
Published: September 2016

Performance analysis of mutual funds is usually made on the basis of return-risk framework. Traditionally, excess return (over risk-free rate) to risk ratios were used for the purpose mutual fund evaluation. Subsequently, the application of non-parametric mathematical programming techniques in the context of performance evaluation facilitated multi-criteria decision making. However,the estimates of performance on the basis of conventional programming techniques like DEA and FDH are affected by the presence of outliers in the sample observations. The present, accordingly uses more robust benchmarking techniques for evaluating the performance od sectoral mutual fund schemes based on observations for the second half of 2010. The USP of the present study is that it uses two partial frontier techniques (Order-m and Order- a) which are less susceptible to the problem of extreme data.
Price Discovery and Market Efficiency of Commodities Futures Market in India- A Cointegration and Causality Analysis
Authors: Masood Shaik , Chary T. Satyanarayana
Published: September 2016

The paper studies the Indian commodity futures market in order to determine the price discovery, long run market efficiency and short run dynamics in futures market using by time series analysis tools. To test the market efficiency and long run equilibrium, tools like Engle and Granger co-integration test (1987) and Johansen co-integration test (1988) have been applied. The Granger Causality (1969) test is used test the market efficiency to infer cause and affect relationship between spot and futures market in India. To examine efficiency of commodity futures and spot market the MCXs1 four spot and futures commodity indices data are used. The paper observes that the role of commodity futures is very significant in price discovery, and improving efficiency of the market.
Portfolio Return, Risk and Market Timing: A Non-Parametric Approach
Authors: Dhar Joyjit , Sinha Ram Pratap
Published: September 2016

The present study extends the portfolio evaluation framework provided by Sharpe (1964) and Treynor (1965) by including the parameter of market timing with the help of a non-parametric framework. Data envelopment analysis has been used in the present exercise to evaluate the performance 79 mutual funds schemes operating in India for three different phases using two different models. Estimation of technical efficiency on the basis of both the models suggests that period 2 performance is substantially divergent from period 1 and 3. Also, higher moments framework gives a better measure of performance as it accounts not only the standard risk measure but also for skewness and kurtosis characteristics of returns.
Examining Contemporaneous Relationship between Return of Nifty Index and India VIX
Authors: Chakrabarti Prasenjit
Published: September 2016

The study examines the contemporaneous relationship between Nifty returns and India VIX returns. Literature documents that the relationship between them is negative and asymmetric. Building on this, the study considers the linear and quadratic effect of stock index return (CNX Nifty) and examines the changes in implied volatility index (India VIX). The study finds both linear and quadratic CNX Nifty index returns are significant for changes in the level of India VIX. Findings suggest that India VIX provides insurance both for downside market movement and size of the downside movement.
A Deterministic Description of Irrational and Semi-Rational Bubbles in Asset Markets
Authors: Ganguli Tanmoy
Published: September 2016

This present work provides a deterministic description irrational and semi-rational bubbles based on the stylized description forwarded by Hyman Minsky (1972), Day and Huang (1990) respectively. The paper emphasizes on two areas: First, it proposes a mathematical representation of an irrational bubble using piece-wise linear maps in a discrete time frame. Second, it studies the chaotic signals generated by them to explain the instability in asset price bubbles and explains the factors which impact their longevity.
Timeliness of Tunisian Audit Reports: An Empirical Investigation based on Ownership and Partnership Visions
Authors: Fakhfakh Mondher
Published: September 2016

Timeliness of audit reports is a qualitative feature that enhances the usefulness of audited financial statements. As an emerging country, Tunisia has modernized its accounting legislation to enhance the quality of financial reporting. This legislation encourages independent auditors to optimize the transmission delays of audit reports. The authorities assume that the satisfaction of stakeholders is secured by regulating disclosure of audit reports. Our research analyses the date of issue of Tunisian audit reports and timeliness of audit information for shareholders and all users of financial statements (stakeholders). This paper provides new empirical evidence about the timeliness of audit reports in Tunisia. It holds two dates that influence the needs of users of financial statements: the date of signature of the auditors and the date of publication of the audit reports in the financial bulletin. The same article discusses the variability of the timeliness of audit reports and the factors that explain the delay information.
Conservatism in Accounting: An Empirical Study of Indian Companies
Authors: Chopra Seema
Published: September 2016

Conservatism in accounting dates back to early 15th century. Recently attempts have been made by major standard-setters of the world to reduce conservatism in accounting. However, the results of recent research studies signal universal pervasiveness of conservatism. Keeping this in view, an attempt has been made to measure conservatism in accounting in the Indian corporate sector and capture changes therein over the period ranging from 1997- 2010. The results of the study indicate that in spite of the efforts by the standard-setters to reduce conservatism, there has been a considerable increase in degree of conservatism in India over time.
Fractal Dimensional Analysis in Financial Time Series
Authors: Bhatt S. J. , Dedania H. V. , Shah Vipul R.
Published: September 2016

A predictability index for time series of a financial market vector consisting of chosen market parameters is suggested providing a measure of long range predictability of the market. It is based on fractional Brownian motion that includes Brownian motion as a particular case followed by the time series of financial market parameters. By analyzing respective time series, these indices are computed for parameters like volatility, FII investments in the local market, IIP numbers, CPI numbers, Dow Jones Index, different stock market indices, currency rates, and gold prices.
Revisiting the Dynamic Relationship between Macroeconomic Fundamentals and Stock Prices: An Evidence from Indian Stock Market
Authors: Mangala Deepa , Rani Anita
Published: September 2016

The relationship between stock prices and macroeconomic variables varies across countries, time periods, data sets used, and the frequency of data used. Thus, an in-depth study to re-investigate the relationship between selected macroeconomic variables i.e. inflation rate, exchange rate, index of industrial production, gold price, money supply and yields on treasury bills, and Indian stock market for the period of April 2005 to March 2014 has been carried out. In this study Johansens co-integration test, vector error correction model (VECM), impulse response functions (IRFs), and variance decomposition (VDCs) test have been applied. The results of Johansen co-integration test indicates a significant negative relationship between exchange rate, inflation rate, and index of industrial production with stock prices whereas there exists a significantly positive relationship of money supply and yield on treasury bills with stock prices. Vector error correction model helps to determine both short and long run causal relationship between macroeconomic variables and stock price. The results found short run causality runs from exchange rate to Nifty, Nifty to money supply, and inflation rate whereas long run causality found from Nifty to short term interest rate and money supply.
Non-Linearity and Chaotic Behaviour in Cyprus Stock Market
Authors: Bougioukou Athina
Published: September 2016

The intention of this research is to investigate the aspect of non-linearity and chaotic behavior of the Cyprus stock market. For this purpose, we use non-linearity and chaos theory. We perform BDS, Hinich-Bispectral tests and compute Lyapunov exponent of the Cyprus General index. The results show that existence of non-linear dependence and chaotic features as the maximum Lyapunov exponent was found to be positive. This study is important because chaos and efficient market hypothesis are mutually exclusive aspects. The efficient market hypothesis which requires returns to be independent and identically distributed (i.i.d.) cannot be accepted.
Herd Behaviour: How Decisive is the Noise in the NSE and BSE Stock Markets?
Authors: Sinha Paritosh Chandra
Published: September 2016

Do investors in the stock markets act/react on true information or noise? Do they believe on their own information or simply herd? The study seeks to explore these typical research queries from the behavioral finance perspectives. In particular, it develops a new theory of herding behavior and extends the models of Banerjee (1992) and Bikhchandani, Hirshleifer, and Welch (1992). The study also empirically tests the same on the Indian context with the high frequency intraday trading data for the real trade-time or time-stamp, trade-volume, and trade-price of ten sample scripts listed for their trading in both markets - the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) and the National stock Exchange (NSE). The study contributes to the literature with original findings. It shows that investors in the two Indian stock markets show crowd of positive and negative herding as well significantly and there is huge noise along with information in the markets equilibrium pricing mechanism.
Long-Run Performance of IPO Market in India
Authors: Murthy K. V. Bhanu , Singh Amit Kumar , Gupta Lovleen
Published: September 2016

In this paper, we examine the Long-run performance of initial public offerings (IPOs). The data has been taken for 31 IPOs from the year 2000 to 2003. We have used Logistic Regression Model through SPSS Version 16 to test for the relationship between long run performance of IPOs and short run performance variables of the company. The analysis shows that the long run variables have no relationship with short-run variables or else have negative relationship. With some of the variables it has positive relationship. It shows anomaly. The companies having listing gain have negative current ratio, debt equity ratio and return on net worth and the companies having short-run gain has negative current ratio and debt equity ratio. The theory supports the view that for IPO markets to be efficient there should be low listing gain, moderate short-run gain and high long-run gain. Only then there will be long term development of IPO market. But the actual situation is opposite. The companies have listing gain, short-run gain but they are not able to give long run gain.
The Links between the Companies Market Price Quality and that of its Management and Business Quality: A System Panel Data Approach
Authors: Santos Dinis Daniel , Soukiazis Elias
Published: September 2016

This work uses a simultaneous equation system approach to analyze the relationship between the management and business quality of companies and their market price quality. Using panel data we found that both the management and the business quality of companies positively influence the market price quality of the studied American companies. Additionally, variables like the actual position of the company price quality compared to the industry average, being on the top or the bottom, or the beta value of a company, also influence the market price quality of the respective company. It is shown that the system equation approach is the most appropriate to explain the linkages between price, business, and management quality providing consistent estimates. Also, using ratings to express the three core variables in the system is the most adequate way to define the quality characteristics in terms of price, management, and business performance of the companies considered in this study.
Book Review: How Stella Saved The Farm- A Tale about Making Innovation Happen
Authors: Kumar Jitender
Published: September 2016

How Stella Saved the Farm is a simple and logical book based on a story which narrates the learning process about making innovation happen. The book is divided in two parts and consists of total nineteen chapters. First part carries nine chapters and remaining are under the second part, which explains the conversion of idea into innovation and then great success. The story is about the competition of two farms one run and managed by animals (Windsor farm) and another by human beings (McGillicuddys farm). Windsor farm is working through change and innovation where the status quo is no longer good enough. Interestingly, in view of poor performance of Windsor farm McGillicuddy is hoping to take over the Windsor farm, but due to the innovations, Windsor farm crosses all hurdles and gets a remarkable status in the business.
Cointegration of Asian Stock Markets: Empirical Evidence from India
Authors: Veerappa Beeralaguddada Srinivasa
Published: September 2016

At present stock return is significantly related to other global stock markets. The present paper empirically investigates the short run and long run equilibrium relationship between the stock market of India, Japan Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, China, and Australia monthly data during January 1995 to December 2013. Researcher employs correlation test, multivariate co-integration framework, Vector Auto Regressive error-correction model and Granger causality test with reference to financial up evils in Asia and world viz., Asian crisis (1997/98), financial crisis (2008) Inflation conditions, Natural disasters, financial up evils etc. of long run relationship. Results find that the Indian stock market return is significantly co-integrated with long run and short run situations/causalities in Asian Stock returns.
Causal Relationship between Gold, Crude Oil & US Dollar Rates and S&P BSE 100 in India: An Experimental Study
Authors: Gopal Suresh , Munusamy Jothi
Published: September 2016

In the present globalized business scenario, volatility in gold price, international crude oil price, and US Dollar exchange rate are likely to stimulate uncertainty in stock market conditions globally. The degree of uncertainty in stock market is high in the case of developing nations like India. Therefore, the study of causal relationship of gold, crude oil, and US Dollar rates with the stock market indices (S&P BSE 100) in India is more appropriate. The researchers have analyzed these macroeconomic variables along with the S&P BSE 100 with the help of econometric tools viz. Augmented Dickey-Fuller Test for Unit-Root, Johansen Co-Integration Test, Pairwise Granger Causality Tests, Vector Auto Regression Modeling, Variance Decomposition test, and Impulse responses analysis. The econometric research software called EVIEWS 6 was used to apply all those tools successfully. The result shows that there is a high impression in the Indian stock market due to the volatility happens in the described macroeconomic factors.
Multi-Index Conditional Investment Performance Measure: An Empirical Analysis
Authors: Roy Subrata
Published: September 2016

The present study seeks to examine the mutual fund performance of the open-ended selected equity schemes of UTI based on multi-index measures as well as conditional multi-index measure. It is observed from the analysis that multi-index measure is able to capture the beta and alpha effects on market adjusted basis and the estimated coefficients is a better representative as compared to the single index measure. When time lagged (lagged at 1 month, 2 months, quarterly and yearly) multi-index measures are applied then the estimated coefficients (alpha & beta) which are market adjusted and time adjusted look more representative than the multi-index measure (without lagged effect). Finally, when we extended the time lagged multi-index measure on a conditional way (conditional on public information variables) then we observe that conditional multi-index lagged measure provides much more representative results in all respects as compared to the all measures after conditioning public information effects.
CEO Compensation and Acquired and Acquiring Companies in Large Corporate Acquisitions
Authors: Yang Simon
Published: September 2016

This paper examines the relative sensitivity of CEO compensation of both acquiring and acquired firms in the top 30 U.S. largest corporate acquisitions in each year for the period of 2003 to 2012. We find that total compensation and bonus granted to executive compensation for acquired companies, not acquiring companies, are significantly related to the amount of acquisition deal even after the size and firm performance are controlled for. Both acquiring and acquired CEOs are found to make the significantly higher compensation than the matched sample firms in the same industry and calendar year. We also find that executives with higher managerial power, as measured by a lower salary-based compensation mix, prior to a corporate acquisition are more likely to receive a higher executive pay in the year of acquisition. The association between executive compensation and managerial power seems to be stronger for acquired firms than for acquiring firms in corporate acquisition. Overall, our findings suggest that corporate acquisition has higher impacts on executive compensation for acquired firm CEOs than for acquiring firm CEOs.
Are Indian Investors Return Chasers? An Anatomy of their Trading Behavior
Authors: Bernard Martin , Deo Malabika
Published: September 2016

Momentum has remained an unanswered anomaly in finance literature. Researchers have pointed out two arguments, whether the source of prior return anomalies are rational or behavioral. In this paper, we examined return chasing tendency investors and the profitability of probable price momentum strategy in Indian equity market using the monthly return data of equities represented in BSE-500 index encompassing the time period from July 2004 to Jun 2014. Study is an attempt to analyze momentum effect before, during and after the financial crisis of 2007–2009 to check whether investors continue to follow the same strategy during crisis or their behavior undergoes any change. Also study examined the adequacy of rational CAPM models to explain momentum profits. The result evidenced a strong presence of economically and statistically significant momentum profit in Indian stock market equity returns. Therefore return chasing tendency of Indian investors is found to be persistent in the intermediate horizon in Indian context. Closer observation of the results reveals that, Indian investors are winners chasers rather than investor in past losers. Study also confirmed that investors sentiments are volatile according to general market environment and inadequacy of rationalist equilibrium model to explain momentum profits.
Mobile Money A Catalyst for Financial Inclusion in Developing Economies: A Case Study of Zimbabwe using FinScope Survey Data
Authors: Mutsonziwa Kingstone , Maposa Obert K.
Published: September 2016

Mobile money in Zimbabwe has extensively extended the frontiers of financial inclusion to reach millions who were earlier excluded within a relatively short space of time. The growing use of mobile phones in transferring money and making payments has significantly altered the countrys financial inclusion landscape as millions who had been hitherto excluded can now perform financial transactions in a relatively cheap, reliable and secure way. The FinScope results found out that 45% of the adult population use mobile money services. Of those using mobile money, 65% mentioned that is convenient, while 36% mentioned that it is cheap. Mobile money is accessible. These drivers are in the backdrop of few or no bank branches in rural communities as well as time and cost of accessing the bank branches. In Zimbabwe, mobile money is mostly used as a vehicle for remittances. While some people are enjoying mobile money services, it is important to mention that there are still people who are excluded from the formal financial system. The reasons why people do not use mobile money are mainly related to poverty issues. Mobile money remains a viable option to push the landscape of financial inclusion in Zimbabwe and other emerging markets where the formal financial system might not be strong.
Are Stock Markets Interdependent? An Empirical Study of Selected Market Indices
Authors: Pandya Falguni H.
Published: September 2016

It has been acclaimed by various researchers that international diversification has reduced its charm as return-risk of the world markets are highly correlated due to information spillover effect and globalization. This study examines inter linkages and interactions, if any, among the selected twelve indices of developed and emerging economies. The study applies descriptive statistics, correlation coefficients and Granger Causality test to check basic characteristics of each indices and their correlation and impact on each other. Granger Causality test for some indices shows that return of one market index had causal influence on return in other market index. The finding of this paper gives good insights to the international investors who are looking to reduce risk for a given level of return.
A New ICT based Business Model for Tourism Industry for the Maharashtra and Goa States of India
Authors: Mahajan K. B. , Patil A. S. , Gupta R. H. , Pawar B. V.
Published: September 2016

Tourism is the act of travel for the purpose of recreation. It is an industry of moving, housing and entertaining people. It is one of the worlds largest service industries and fastest growing economic sectors in terms of generating gross revenue as well as earning of foreign exchange. Nowadays the Internet and the developments in ICTs have revolutionized the entire tourism industry all over the world. It provides new tools and enables new distribution channels to create a new business environment. In order to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of transactions, to reduce the cost of transactions and to provide the one stop services to the customers, tourism market needs a new ICT based business model to grow tourism industry in the states of Maharashtra and Goa. In this paper we propose a new ICT based tourism business model that includes the modern tools of ICT which affects the tourism business as a whole.
Travel Risks vs Tourist Decision Making: A Tourist Perspective
Authors: Garg Anshul
Published: September 2016

This paper sheds light on tourists emotional experiences on holiday, which are central to increase our understanding of tourist behavior. Tourists usually travel to cities with good impression. Choosing a travel destination is definitely a complicated decision-making process for tourists. For safety concerns, some tourists intentionally visit somewhere familiar and nearby, but avoid nations or areas with high crime rates or political instability. A wide range of perceptions governs the desirability and appeal of a destination to the potential traveler. The importance of investigating perceptions of travel risks has been recognized with in a number of different disciplines, such as psychology, sociology, criminology and marketing. It is often assumed that perceptions of safety and security may influence individuals destination choice. Consumers use information gathered from various sources like word of mouth, different forms of media, guidebooks, talking to friends and relatives, to form a perception of a particular destination. This is a quantitative study conducted in Malaysia. The respondents who participated in this research were the nationals of Malaysia, India, China, Indonesia, Australia, and France, etc. The study found that most holidaymakers perceive earthquake, tsunami, SARS, terrorist activities, swine flu as risk. The results of the study suggest that safety, peace and stability are major concerns for tourists while choosing their travel destination.
Problems Faced by the Tour Operators of Khulna Region of Bangladesh
Authors: Ahmed Feroz , Bose Tarun Kanti , Lopa Nusrat Zahan , Khan Md. Nur-E-Alam
Published: September 2016

This study was intended towards detecting the problem faced by the local tour operators of the Khulna region. A semi-structured questionnaire was used to collect necessary data from 30 tour operators, working in Khulna city in a view to investigating the major problems faced by them. Two research questions have been installed that was directed towards achieving the major objectives of this study. The findings of the study portrays the fact that eight factors in the forms of lack of variety, human resource development, business seasonality, lack of operators association, absence of support from the forest department, lack of promotional activities, below level of awareness of the customers and pricing are the major problem that are hindering the business and profitability of the tour operators of Khulna. In order to get ride of this situation and for accelerating the tourism sectors of the country those problems of the tour operators need to be eradicated quickly.
The Impact of Bar Service Operation Practices on Organizational Performance in Indian Hotel Industry
Authors: Dhiman Mohinder C. , Ghai Abhishek
Published: September 2016

The paper has a two fold purpose - examine the impact of bar service operation practices (BSOP) on organizational performance (OP) and study the relationship between organizational performance and demographic variables. Based on a survey of 362 bar managers perceptions on the impact of bar service operation practices on organizational performance were assessed by 59 practices and 6 demographic variables. Bivariate test and ANOVA were employed to test the working hypothesis in the study. Results indicated that there is a positive relationship between the bar service operation practices and organizational performance. Further, the results indicate some practical and managerial implications to improve organizational overall performance.
Evaluation of Official Tourism Websites of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) Using the Balanced Score-Card Approach
Authors: Himanshu  , Jeannie
Published: September 2016

The South-East Asian Nations (members of ASEAN) represents one of the fastest growing regional economies in terms of markets and has been one of the most favored tourist destination during last couple of decades in the Asia and Pacific region. The association of ten nations is a miscellany of diverse cultures and religion along with a rich heritage. Among the member destinations, on one hand there are nations like Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand which have grown popular catering to all segments of the tourist society, where as there are nations like Brunei, Laos and Myanmar on the other, which have just emerged from the shell of conventionality and are now unwrapping the shrouds from their rich heritage and possess enormous potential to attract the global tourist. And there are destinations like Cambodia, Vietnam, Indonesia and Philippines who over the last few years have developed the tourism industry which has now began to reap the results in terms of international tourist arrivals and receipts. Collectively these nations comprise nearly 9 per cent of the global tourism industry with a CAGR of nearly 6-7 percent over the last few years. Realizing the emerging significance of internet or online media as a source for gathering information, determining travelling decisions, communication and transactions, the present study aims at the comparative content analysis of the official tourism websites of ASEAN members in order to evaluate their performance from the perspective of tourism promotion by incorporating the modified Balanced Score Card (BSC) approach. A set of critical success aspects under perspectives: technical, user friendliness and site attractiveness, tourism effectiveness and food tourism effectiveness have been examined. The study manifests the strength and weakness of the respective official tourism websites of South East Asian Nations on the accepted parameters and also suggests the remedial measures to stimulate tourism promotion through websites.
An Examination of Factors Influencing Residents Perception of the Impacts of Tourism in Goa
Authors: Mello Carmelita D , Chang Ling-Chen , Kamat Kaustubh , Scaglione Miriam , Weiermair Klaus , Pillai Subhash KB
Published: September 2016

To strategically utilize resources to minimize the negative impacts of tourism and increasing the social support for tourism development, the present study examined the residents of the State of Goa by using the model developed by Perdue et al. (1990), later extended by Mc Gehee, et al. (2002), and also based on social exchange theory, tried to determine whether personal characteristics and personal benefits from tourism influence perception of tourism as well as support for tourism development, and what factors influence support for tourism development and management. The result indicated that personal characteristics were not good predictors of residents attitude tourism impacts with an exception of age, education, and birthplace. Personal benefits from tourism predicted positive impacts of tourism, negative impacts of tourism and also support for additional tourism, which was consistent with Perdue et al. (1990) and Mc Gehee et al. (2002). The research supported social exchange theory as personal benefit and support for additional tourism were significant predictors of tourism planning. However, while support for additional tourism did predict tourism planning, it showed a positive relationship as reported by Mc Gehee et al. (2002) and not a negative one as reported by Perdue et al. (1990). The overall findings support previous assertions that educating local residents about the potential benefits of tourism is critical in obtaining their support for tourism, enhancing their involvement in the industry, and achieving sustainable community development.
Relationships of Involvement, Ethnic Food Consumption, and Food Shows: An Initial Exploration
Authors: Burusnukul Pattarapong , Taylor D. Christopher , Broz Charles
Published: September 2016

Sales of ethnic foods continue to increase. Among the many factors leading to an increase in ethnic food consumption include more interest in television cooking shows where consumers gain knowledge about a product through media, resulting in heightened interest. Employing a revised Personal Involvement Inventory (PII) to measure involvement, this study aims to shed more light on the consumption of ethnic foods and the effects of media on that consumption. Thought this exploration the findings reveal a surprising suggestion, that ethnic food consumption is not governed by consumers involvement with the products.
Medical Tourism in India- A Paradigm Shift
Authors: Dogra Ajay Kumar , Dogra Pooja
Published: September 2016

The health tourism Industry is witnessing a sudden paradigm shift in last five years. India has become a home of traditional medicine that has been practiced for several thousand years as a part of manav dharma to give relief to the needy and mostly free of cost. With modern diagnostic and treatment facilities, experienced surgeons, one of the largest pharmaceutical industries in world, and a tradition of caring, India provides world class surgical and healthcare facilities, with comparable success rates and prompt service levels. The potential of medical tourism is such that it can even surpass the revenue earned from IT sector. Recognizing the pivotal contribution of medical tourism to the economic development, the Indian Government has initiated numerous measures to promote this vary young industry to attract international tourism. This has motivated to identify recent trends and opportunities in India for the medical and healthcare tourism, and to explore the critical factors which can lead to success of initiatives taken by ministry of tourism for the development of medical tourism in India. Finally paper suggests measures to enhance medical tourism in the country.
Emotional Labour and Employee Performance Appraisal: The Missing Link in Some Hotels in South East Nigeria
Authors: Igbojekwe  , A. Poly
Published: September 2016

The main objective of this study was to determine if emotional labour has become a criterion in performance appraisal, job description, selection, and training schemes in the hotel industry in Nigeria. Our main assumption was that majority of hotel organizations have not built emotional labour into their human resources management schemes. Data were gathered by the use of structured questionnaires designed in Likert format, and interviews. The focus group was managers of the selected hotels. Analyses revealed that majority of the hotels have not built emotional labour into their human resources schemes particularly in the 1, 2, and 3-star hotels. It was observed that service employees of 1, 2, and 3-star hotels have not been adequately trained to perform emotional labour, a critical factor in quality service delivery. Managers of 1, 2, and 3-star hotels have not given serious thought to emotional labour as a critical factor in quality service delivery. The study revealed that suitability of an individuals characteristics is not being considered as a criterion for selection and performance appraisal for service employees. The implication of this is that, person-job-fit is not seriously considered. It was observed that there has been a disconnect between required emotional competency, its recognition, evaluation and training. Based on the findings of this study, it is concluded that selection, training, job description and performance appraisal instruments in use in hotels in Nigeria are inadequate. Human resource implications of the findings in this study are presented. It is recommended that hotel organizations should re-design and plan the emotional content and context of their human resources practices to reflect the emotional demands of frontline jobs in the hotel industry and the crucial role emotional labor plays during service encounters.
Facebook as an Informal Tool for Learning: Exploring Perceptions of Greek LIS Undergraduate Students
Authors: Vassilakaki Evgenia , Garoufallou Emmanouel
Published: September 2016

Facebook use in higher education has been explored from different perspectives (i.e. academic institutions, teachers, students). This research aimed to investigate Greek Library and Information Science undergraduate students perceptions of Facebook use for educational purposes. A questionnaire was distributed online during the first two weeks of June 2015 to 278 undergraduate students studying Library and Information Science in Greece. 135 questionnaires were collected with an overall response rate 48.6%. It was found that students employ Facebook mainly for social interaction and communicate though they do recognize the educational potential of social networking sites. Academic institutions and teachers need to stay up-to-dated with the emergence of new Web 2.0 tools and use them when appropriate to meet their goals. This research contributes in providing a further insight into the way students employ social networking sites and thus, assist academic institutions in formulating their strategy and teachers in incorporating Facebook in delivering their courses.
Publications Trends in Atomic Physics: A Global Perspective
Authors: Kumar R. Santha
Published: September 2016

The present study involves analyzing the worldwide publication scenarios on Atomic Physics using Web of Science database for a period of 10 years from 2004-2013. The database contains 29402 publications in the field of atomic physics. The publications have reached the highest number in the year 2008 with maximum of 6099 publications and the average paper per year is 2940.2. The compound annual growth rates (CAGR) of these publications have decreased from 0.58 in the year 2005 to 0.33 in the year 2012. The average value of collaboration coefficient on atomic physics paper publication is 0.63. 94.40% of papers have the multi authorship whereas 5.60% of contributions have come from single authors. USA has contributed maximum number of publications and India stands 12th in terms of paper publications on this topic in this period. The most prolific author is Ye, P D who has contributed 39 articles whereas Fanciulli, M and Kobayashi, K, contributed 37 articles each. University of Tokyo, Japan is on top of the list of most contributed institutions with 470 publications followed by Japan Science and Technology Agency, Japan with 376 publications and Osaka University, which is also from Japan with 354 publications.
Application of ICT in Academic Libraries: A Study on Opinion and Problems by LIS Professionals
Authors: Dhanavandan S. , Asokan L.
Published: September 2016

This study discusses about the opinion and problems by application of ICT in academic libraries among the library professionals in engineering colleges in Tamil Nadu. The relevant data were collected from the library professionals of the self financing engineering institutions situated in Kanchipuram and Thiruvallur district of Tamil Nadu. Out of 625 questionnaires distributed, 504 were responded. The response rate is 80.64%. It was found that for the most of the respondents, Lack of interest on the part of users and No support from administration in training library professionals are the major problems. The least preference was given for Fear of ICT applications.
A Key Management Technique to Secure Information Sharing of the Nodes within a Cluster of WSN
Authors: Rahman Md. Habibur , Abdullah Md. Ibrahim
Published: September 2016

The nodes within a cluster of Wireless Sensor Network deployed in adverse areas face the security threats of eavesdropping and capturing. The fundamental issue in wireless sensor network security is to initialize secure communication between sensor nodes by setting up secret keys between communicating nodes. Because of limited hardware capacity, conventional network cryptography is infeasible for sensor network. In this paper a key management technique is proposed for clustered sensor network that uses some cryptographic operation to generate secret keys. This key is updated in response to the message of cluster head or base station. The key update instructions are stored in each sensor nodes before deployed in sensor field. The updated secret key is used to communicate between nodes and cluster head.
HSTCP: A Tool for Hierarchical System Test Case Prioritization
Authors: Kumar Harish , Vedpal  , Chauhan Naresh
Published: September 2016

Many constraints are imposed on the software industries that want to complete the project in time and within budget. It is a challenging task for software industries to complete the project with in time and budget due to advancement of technology. In this paper a hierarchical test case prioritization (HSTCP) (Kumar, 2013) tool is presented which implements hierarchical system test case prioritization technique. The presented tool helps to prioritize the system test case and reduce the testing cost of the software. The HSTCP tool works at three levels. At the first level it prioritizes the requirements, at the seconds level the modules of highest prioritized requirements are prioritized. Finally at third level it prioritizes the test cases of the modules in prioritized order. The presented HSTCP tool is implemented in Java language.
An ANN based Classification Algorithm for Swine Flu Diagnosis
Authors: Biswas Saroj Kr. , Baruah Barnana , Purkayastha Biswajit , Chakraborty Manomita
Published: September 2016

Machine learning technology adds a new potential to medical diagnosis systems. This paper presents an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) based swine flu diagnosis model. The proposed model selects significant features for swine flu diagnosis by a feature selection algorithm using k- Nearest Neighbour (k-NN) classifier, which reduces the size of data to be used for training the ANN model with an objective of making the training more efficient and accurate. A threshold value is determined by ANN to identify positive and negative cases and the model classifies the test cases either positive or negative based on the threshold value. The results obtained with the proposed model demonstrate the ability of the model to provide high level of accuracy for swine flu diagnosis. The assessment (classification) ability of the proposed ANN based model is compared with that of Case Based Reasoning (CBR) approaches and is observed that the proposed model is superior to others.
PureView Technology (Optimisation & Evaluation Techniques in Image Processing)
Authors: Patra Jyoti Prakash , Agrawal Puru
Published: September 2016

PureView Technology is the combination of a super high-resolution image sensor and high-performance optics. It further applies advanced image processing algorithms and pixel oversampling to give the best quality outputs. It uses pixel oversampling method. Pixel oversampling combines many pixels to create a single (super) pixel. When this happens, we keep virtually all the details but filter away visual noise from the image. The speckled, grainy look we tend to get in low-lighting conditions is greatly reduced. One of the major benefits of this technology is loss-less zoom. The level of pixel oversampling is highest when we are not using the zoom. It gradually decreases until we hit maximum zoom, where there is no oversampling. This technique thus allows us to have loss-less zooms even when we are using the camera for taking zoomed in photos. The core of this technology lies somewhere in the satellite imagery system which uses a similar method of pixel oversampling and high-resolution image sensors. With PureView, uses a system called oversampling, which takes the original greater number of megapixels captured with the enormous sensor and reduces them to a high-quality image consisting of only a few megapixels. Pixels are pulled together into groups of seven and those seven pixels are then condensed into one, so that even though the resulting photograph is only a few megapixel images it is of a better quality than those captured with more traditional five megapixel cameras. For example, Nokia Lumia 1020 uses a 41-megapixel camera to take the original image, however, reduces this to only an output of 5 megapixels. This thus produces a
M-Learning through Semantically Annotated Learning Objects and Ontologies
Authors: Krishnan Reshmy
Published: September 2016

Number of mobile subscriptions has increased tremendously due to rapid development of mobile technologies. The performance and accessibility of the e-learning process can be enhanced through mobile devices which is called m-learning. M-learning makes learning resources available anywhere and anytime, provide strong search capabilities, and offers easy interaction features to the learners. M-learning also points the opportunity for interoperability than existing e-learning system. The integration of semantic web in m-learning can improve the efficiency of searching for learning objects and reduce the time and cost of learning process. Semantic web can be integrated with the help of ontologies and learning objects in semantic web. They offer rich medium to assist m-learning via semantic annotated learning objects and shared repositories. Two types of ontologies, such as learning object content ontology and learning object structure ontology are used in this system. These ontologies facilitate the reuse, sharing and retrieval of relevant learning objects which are the backbone of m-learning.
Applying MCDM Techniques for Ranking Products Based on Online Customer Feedback
Authors: Preethi J. Santhana , Abirami A.M. , Askarunisa A. , Priya G. Sathya , Sankaragomathy E.
Published: September 2016

Text analytics is to distill out structured information from unstructured or semi-structured text. User feedback analysis or sentiment analysis on products enables to highlight the best and worst of features and recommend the product to new buyers. The model extracts the positive and negative comments and identifies the emotions in the piece of text or n-way analysis and classification like very-positive, positive, neutral, negative or very-negative. Natural Language Processing (NLP) tools play vital role in classifying the sentiment polarity of sentences while data analytics has the role in recommendation of the product. In this paper, we propose a recommender system model to rank the products based on the feedback given by the users. Features, the topics of interest, are identified from the set of review text. Sentiments are detected from each review and thus senti-score is calculated for each feature of the product. We use the Analytic Hierarchy Process and the Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS), which are Multi-Criteria Decision Making techniques to rank a set of products. This method provides a logical framework to determine the benefits of each product based on the features and thus the products are ranked.
Maya: The Convergence of Open World Gaming and Virtual Reality Technologies
Authors: Saxena Abhay , Singh Manan
Published: September 2016

With the simultaneous exponential advances in various Computing fields, world is evolving at a pace unlike ever before. Virtual Reality (VR) is quite old field, but it has gained an unprecedented momentum in recent years. Despite this, the vision of the present (and the future) of virtual reality is very blurred. It is mostly made up of imaginations, and inspirations from science-fiction movies & novels, not the present truth. In this research, we try to clear that vision by throwing light on the current status of Virtual reality, and the imminent future. We describe Virtual reality, its need, immersion, and some unofficial meanings of the term. Then, we observe the future of VR as the convergence of Open World video gaming, and the VR Technologies. We derive the components of a true VR system, as the union of the essential-components of the two, and also propose a model of Virtual Reality. Finally, we compare these components of VR system with the components of Maya (i.e. our real world as a system). Surprisingly, there is sheer resemblance between the both.
An Overview of Active Database: Model, Architecture and Challenges
Authors: Halse Gambhir , Shirdhonkar Malakappa
Published: September 2016

Research in database management system results in new technology and opportunities to researchers. As a result of this researcher have developed many solutions to real time applications and advancement in hardwares. Database systems with production rules are referred to as active database systems and the field of active database systems has indeed been active. In this article we emphasize on evolution of active database system, its architecture and challenges faced by research community.