Swaminomics
Swaminathan S. Anklesaria Aiyar
With PDS, you con more poor
Jun 2nd
The common minimum programme (CMP) of the new coalition government promises to strengthen the Public Distribution System (PDS) and extend it to the poorest blocks in the country. Unfortunately, continuous ‘strengthening’ over four decades has strengthened leakages instead of giving relief to the poor, leading to estimates that it takes Rs 20 of government spending More >
BPOs can relax! No tax on services
Jun 1st
BPO s can relax. Finance minister P Chidambaram has been advised to withdraw the circular proposing to tax something never heard of before: core services that are outsourced to India. While international treaties and practices have clear concepts such as arms-length prices, the CBDT appears to have invented a new concept called core services. This More >
Money can’t teach kids to read & write
Jun 1st
Given the poor literacy and school completion rates in India after more than 50 years of independence, the Common Minimum Programme (CMP) of the new coalition government promises to increase public spending on education from 4.1% of GDP to 6%. However, many developing countries have achieved better results with far little spends. And there we More >
Public debt at 85% of GDP in ’04
May 31st
The CMP’s reform agenda may be the whip that breaks the economy’s back. It’s sure to swell the fiscal deficit and send FIIs scurrying for cover. Last year, remittances by NRIs, FDI and FIIs were close to 6% of the GDP, and painlessly financed the fiscal deficit. This has fed the illusion that deficits don’t More >
CMP will lead to nation’s bankruptcy
May 31st
The Common Minimum Programme (CMP) of the ruling coalition is being trumpeted as ‘reform with a human face’ but looks suspiciously like ‘populism with a bankrupt face’. If seriously implemented, the CMP could swell the fiscal deficit from 10% of GDP to an astronomical 16-17% of GDP. Even one step in that direction will cause More >
An expensive face-lift?
May 30th
When a gentleman living beyond his means proposes suddenly to spend a fortune to acquire a human face, those investing in his enterprise will be understandably nervous. No wonder the stock market crashed by 223 points on Friday, wiping out Rs 50,000 crore of wealth. It could fall further in coming months. A rather expensive More >
A secular triumph after all
May 23rd
All my life I have fought against the notion that India is a Hindu nation. I stand for a society where all are equal regardless of religion, caste or creed. So I was aghast when Sonia Gandhi declined to become prime minister. Now, I have been a stern critic of the Gandhi family most of More >
It’s the alliances, stupid
May 17th
The Congress engineered the right alliances in the right places and so won many more seats with fewer votes. The opposite was true of the BJP, argues Many reasons have been given in the media for the poll outcome — poor governance, neglect of the poor, neglect of rural areas. I believe that poor governance More >
A vote against misgovernance
May 16th
You think nobody saw that the BJP might lose the election? Allow me to quote from the ‘Swaminomics’ I wrote in December, after the NDA swept State Assembly polls in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. It took the shape of an open letter to Vajpayee: “Some of your colleagues believe that the BJP is enjoying More >
General Dyer in Iraq
May 9th
Imperial Western projects to bring civilisation to the East through a White Man’s Burden have a typical unplanned side-effect. The would-be civilisers find that the Easterners resist forced civilisation, and inflict heavy casualties. The civilisers retaliate, and some of them find it expedient to use mass killing, torture and brutality to win the war of More >
Lessons from Punjab for US
May 2nd
Osama bin Laden must be delighted with American quasi-imperialism in Iraq. Instead of quashing terrorism, the US has surely created more terrorists. US troops in the restive city of Fallujah. This will worsen Islamic militancy in other countries, including India. Last week’s Islamic uprising in southern Thailand is evidence of this. Next, Islamic militants in More >
How original sin affects India
Apr 28th
Original sin, once just a Christian doctrine, has now become an economic concept too thanks to economists like Barry Eichengreen, Ricardo Hausmann, Panizzi and Roberto Rigobon. It refers to the inability of developing countries like India to raise foreign loans in their own currencies. The ONGC, for instance, can raise foreign loans designated in dollars More >
Wanted: A non-forgiving fund
Apr 25th
Aid to developing countries has long been dominated by the World Bank and the International Mone-tary Fund. But they have failed for so long in a group of Heavy Indebted Poor Countries (HIPCs) that additional aid has simply meant additional debt that cannot be repaid. The spring meeting of the World Bank and the IMF More >
Billions from ageing countries
Apr 18th
The government likes to point to the booming stock market as evidence of Shining India. But the boom has been driven overwhelmingly by foreign institutional investors (FIIs). They poured in a record $7.6 billion in 2003 and another $4.12 billion to date in 2004, of which $1.26 billion came in just nine trading days in More >
How reforms cause fiscal deficits
Apr 14th
An important contribution to the ongoing debate on the fiscal deficit has been made by Brian Pinto and Farah Zahir in a recent article in Economic and Political Weekly. They do not cry wolf about high fiscal deficits causing another crisis. Instead they argue, accurately, that high deficits jeopardise higher GDP growth. So they suggest, More >
Recent Comments