Students’ Speak: Top 10 most frequently-asked GD topics you could prepare for

Whether it is about getting admitted to a Master in Business Administration (MBA) programme or getting selected as an intern or being hired by a company, Group Discussion (GD) plays a crucial role in your selection.

In this article, I would like to discuss top GD topics that were asked frequently this year and help you prepare better for the upcoming phases of Common Admission Test (CAT) exam. CAT exam was recently concluded on November 24.

1. Freedom of Indian media: Should it be regulated?

For

• Most of the Indian news channels, media houses are owned by the various political leaders of various political parties as a result of which the Indian media does not report based on facts. What most channels stream is a biased version of the news.
• Quote examples of channels such as News 24 owned by Rajeev Shukla, India News owned by Vinod Sharma, Zee TV owned by Subhash Chandra, PTC owned by Sukhvinder Badal, among others.

Against

• Rights given to media in the Indian Constitution, Freedom of Speech.
• Whether it is from the mountains of Srinagar reporting the tensions in the valley or the border infused with mortars from Pakistan or the disaster affected areas of India media has played a role to help the community by making the government extend the help and relief works to area.
• India media already has self-regulatory body IFBA which takes care of any kind of anonymity by any media channel.

2. Modi for India or Trump for America

Both have revolutionized the citizens of their country by infusing the nationalism. The entire campaign of the leaders was mostly focussed on making their country great again.

Modi For India

• Representing India strongly and boldly on various international platforms and took India from the policy supporter to the policymaker on various platforms.
• India diaspora in various countries endorses that respect for Indians has increased a lot in few last years.
• Revolutionised the country by transforming the various government functionary.
• Brought various steps to revolutionise the economy such as GST and Demonetisation drive.
• Surgical strikes in Pakistan to give a befitting reply to Pakistan.

Trump for America

• Fought campaign on the line “Let make America Great again”.
• Said will ban the entry of immigrants from countries such as Pakistan to control terrorism.
• Mexico Wall
• Trade war with China
• Went on direct war with ISIS and finally killed ISIS chief to prove that they are the superpower.
• Created a lot of employment opportunities by bringing companies to set hubs in the USA.

3. Has e-commerce done well for India?

For

Discuss the following key points for this

• Lots of employment opportunities such as delivery, etc.
• Lots of small businesses have got a platform to sell their products nationally and internationally.
• Sourcing sarees from Banaras or booking a banquet hall in Bengaluru or in Bangkok, have become possible with E-commerce.

Against

• Badly affected the sales of the retailer of electronics items such as LED panels etc. Festive season sales of the retailers have taken a huge hit.
• Small retailers are unable to survive businesses because they are unable to compete with ecommerce platforms because of huge discounts provided by online platforms.

4. Has IPL done good for Indian cricket?

For

• It has given a platform to the budding cricketers to prove themselves and pave a path for becoming a part of the Indian Cricket Team.
• IPL has given Indian cricket lots of talented players who have taken the team to the next level. Few of them are Ravichandran Ashwin, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Cheteshwar Pujara and Ravindra Jadeja.

Against

• Fixing allegations
• Involves a lot of bidding (satta)
• Tainted the cricket because of spot-fixing by players, for example, Indian Bowler S.Shreesanth.
• Indian Cricket Team players remain busy in lots of matches, get injured as a result of which they are unable to perform well in the matches just after the IPL.

5. Demonetisation

It all started on the night of November 8, 2016, at 8 pm with the announcement coming from Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

For

• India went on a GDP growth from seven percent to 7.5 percent in the year 2018-19.
• Badly affected terrorists and Naxals
• Curbed money laundering
• Has increased the digital payments at a significant level
• Income tax collections after this drive were the highest.

Against

• About 99 percent of currency was returned to banks.
• Introduction of Rs 2000 not against Rs 500 and Rs 1000 made an easy path for corruption
• The sudden announcements created chaos and a lot of marriages and functions were affected.
• I had swallowed the work of various laborers, who used to get paid on a daily basis in cash. Their jobs were gone for that period because cash was not available.
• The realty sector went badly affected and various projects were halted.

6. GST and its impacts

Launched in July 2017, Good and Services Tax (GST) is an indirect tax that streamlined the taxation system in the country. Different tax slabs range between 0-28 percent. The government took 17 years to formulate this final tax regime.

For

• Items such as fertilisers, cell phones became cheaper
• Curbed a lot of taxes such as VAT, etc., and made computing easy.
• Removed corruption that existed in the excise department.
• Made the movement of goods easy within the states as earlier different taxes were paid separately to the different states.
• Improved ease of doing business rankings for India and made setting up new businesses easy.

Against

• Many small businesses were closed.
• Many items and goods went costlier after GST drive
• Inflation was increased
• GST is still accounted for as the main reason because of which GDP numbers went low.

7. The current economy of India

Discuss the following key points for this

• Automobile sector: This sector witnessed a big slowdown. Manufacturing plants were stopped and sales were hit by an all-time low.
• Falling GDP and demonetisation hampered the growth
• Stock markets took a hard hit and many foreign portfolio investors took their money out of India
• Rupee value declined
• Unemployment is still high
• Many brands such as Britannia, Parle sales took hit even for the packages of priced at Rs 5. Many brands halted their new launches because of this slowdown.
• Cash liquidity crunch hit the economy harshly
• Bad loans and non-performing assets created tension in the economy. Prime examples are PMC Bank, Yes Bank and IL&FS.

8. Is India ready for a cashless economy?

For

• It is one of the best media to remove corruption from the system.
• Will remove a lot of costs associated with the cash money like its printing, transport, etc., so will help the RBI to spend the saved money
• Rather than going to bank filling a form and transferring the money to another account holder it takes a lot of time, which is cashless transaction takes a few seconds
• The easiest way to do transactions and is easily traceable.
• It will help in reducing the corruption
• It will increase the tax collection base for the government as all the transactions will be under the scan of the government.
• Also by data released by TRAI that 82 citizens out of 100 in India now have access to mobile phones. So, India is all set for cashless economy

Against

• India still lags a lot in digital as well as financial literacy. It will take India years to reach to its jumbo population and make all of them be literate on the same.
• Security is the most prominent factor that a customer seeks while doing a financial transaction and in digital payment, security is still the biggest concern. Every month we listen to fraud while doing a transaction happens with someone.
• Technology and internet speed availability in many remote areas of India are a concern that makes the cashless economy a thing of the future for them.

9. Modi government: A government of surgical strikes

For

Discuss the following key points for this:

• GST: A surgical strike on the webs of taxes made by the governments that were keeping investors away from India. Added fuel towards making India a single-window clearance hub for the new business. Improved India rankings in ease of doing business countries index.
• Demonetisation: A surgical strike on Black money and corruption. Took away 500 and 1000 rs note from the circulation and as a result of which a lot of black money with corrupts became equal to a normal paper note. The government brought a lot of people to under income taxpayers list and
• Uri surgical strikes: The Indian army made the country to feel like they a chest of 56 inches by conducting the surgical strikes on terrorist camps in the Pakistan territory area. This showed a strong political will of Modi government for the safety and solidarity of its citizens and boundaries.

Against

• Government formation by BJP in various states even in the absence of the majority of numbers of MLA
• “Maharashtra Furgical Strike” quoted by Shiv Sena supremo Udhav Thackrey for the surprising early morning swearing for Devendra Fadvanis for the second time in November 2019.
• Surgical strike on national institutions: Congress and other opposition parties put allegations on Modi government for hampering the normal functioning of various institutions like the Supreme Court etc.

10. Is India ready for e-vehicles?

For

• The increasing price of petrol, diesel on which almost all the vehicles run in India is rising day by day and as their resources are getting exhausted in the coming years they won’t be affordable by the masses.
• Indian Railways are already using electricity-based locomotive engines. Moreover, they are indigenously producing these engines so India is technologically capable enough to produce the cars also if the entire automotive sector will try to shift to these vehicles.
• A solution for rising pollution levels
• Electric cars are cost-efficient as fuel cost is minimal
• Requires less maintenance and reduces noise pollution

Against

• In India, in most of the cities, there is not even a single battery charge station for electric vehicle and it is still a long way ahead for the same to be available in India
• Indians prefer petrol, diesel and gas-based vehicles over electric vehicles
• Lack of faith in the durability of electric vehicles for Indian ruff terrains

About the Author:

Udit Attri is a student at Lovely Professional University studying Master in Business Administration. He is a second-year student and has worked as a Management Intern with brands such as Walmart India and Decathlon Sports. He is also a State Representative from the state of Haryana in the Indian Red Cross Society.