Swaminomics

For centuries, dalits have been at the bottom of the income and social ladders, despised and exploited. Independent India aimed to improve their lot through job reservations, but with very limited results. Nevertheless, empowerment through democracy and economic opportunities created by 20 years of economic reform have created an astonishing new phenomenon—the rise of dalit More >

Last week, at the release of another book on the rise of Maoism, “Hello Bastar,” author Rahul Pandita described the terrible exploitation of tribals by petty officials and forest contractors. He condemned Salwa Judum, the anti-Maoist vigilante force, and said the tribals had little choice but to pick up the gun along with Maoists and More >

Dear Justices Nijjar and Reddy, Many of us welcome your decision in the Supreme Court case on black money, castigating the government for its inaction and setting up an independent special investigative team. This approach needs to be institutionalized: i have long argued for an independent Police Commission, analogous to the Election Commission. However, in More >

At last a pernicious nationalization is going to be partly rectified. A new mining bill has just been cleared by a group of ministers, mandating the sharing of 26% of mining profits with the local population in the case of coal, and the payment of a sum equal to last year’s royalty for other minerals. More >

The latest employment data show that worker participation (the ratio of workers to population ) fell to just 39.2% in 2009-10 from 42% in 2004-05. This implies that only two million new jobs were created in five years. Leftists are screaming, “Jobless growth.” However, officials say proudly that unemployment on all three standard measures–annual, weekly More >

Twenty years ago, Narasimha Rao became Prime Minister and initiated economic reforms that transformed India. The Congress party doesn’t want to remember him: it is based entirely on loyalty to the Gandhi family, and Rao was not a family member. But the nation should remember Rao as the man who changed India, and the world More >

Baba Ramdev’s financial naiveté is only to be expected. But i am astonished that the media endlessly repeats the myth that enormous hoards of black money are lying in Swiss banks. Only financial illiterates will leave their money in Swiss banks offering very low interest rates (sometimes under 1%). To maximize their gains and hide More >

We Indians have done a thousand lousy things. But near the top of the list is the hounding out of Maqbool Fida Husain, our greatest painter, who died abroad last week, aged 95. This was not an isolated incident: author Taslima Nasreen was also hounded out by communalists. These will remain terrible blots on a More >

Crony capitalism has been in the spotlight because of the 2G telecom scam, mining scams and real estate scams like Satyam. Apart from corruption, crony capitalism can help entrenched oligarchs to shut out talented newcomers lacking political contacts. Steven Pearlstein of The Washington Post wrote, in a recent article on India, that “much of the More >

After being thrashed in West Bengal and losing in Kerala, CPM policies have come in for much criticism. Yet it is not just the Left Front that lost. It is also the notion that this country suffers from a grave rich-poor divide, often called the India-Bharat divide, and that politicians must favour Bharat over India. More >