Almost all pundits anticipated a hung parliament with regional and caste-based parties holding the balance of power. Now that the United Progressive Alliance has achieved a clear victory, the same pundits are coming out with grand theories to explain it. […]
Graveyard of electoral theories Read More »
I was dead wrong in predicting a hung parliament with Mayawati having a kingmaking role. Yet, I cannot resist recalling the heading of my March 9 column, \’India slumps, Bharat rises, Congress smiles\’. Despite a global recession that has hammered
Bharat Shining, Cong Smiling, Left Whining Read More »
There is much talk of green shoots heralding the end of the global recession. Stock markets are shooting up globally. But the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has just issued its gloomiest forecast ever. It says world GDP, which has never
Is this going to be a long recession? Read More »
India’s merchandise exports declined 22% in January and February, and the slump looks like continuing. The silver lining is that India’s exports of software and IT-enabled services have proved resilient. However, such exports face new threats that should not be
IT exports resilient, but facing new threats Read More »
India cannot return to rapid growth till the world economy recovers. And that cannot happen till the US economy recovers. Alas, the Obama administration is prolonging the recession by avoiding surgery to remove dead wood from its financial sector. Some
Obama’s cowardice hits India too Read More »
Some years ago, Jairam Ramesh coined the word Chindia, hyphenating China and India, to denote a great new geopolitical development. The earlier BRIC report had identified China and India as potentially the two fastest growing states that could one day
Good-bye Chindia, Hello Chimerica Read More »
The manifestos of the BJP and Communist Party (Marxist) accuse the Congress Party of bartering away India’s security in the nuclear deal with the US. They worry that India will be dragooned into signing other treaties that limit its nuclear
Nuclear deal: India is becoming sanctions-proof Read More »
World leaders at the G -20 meeting agreed to create new international money worth $ 250 billion. The IMF will oversee the new money called SDRs (Special Drawing Rights). Some people believe–and China fervently hopes—that SDRs will in due course
Can SDRs replace dollars as the world reserve currency? Read More »
2009 marks the 200th birth anniversary of Abraham Lincoln, and also the end of Manmohan Singh’s term as Prime Minister. Both ended office with awesome reputations as honest men in highly corrupt eras. Lincoln was nicknamed Honest Abe. Singh has
Honest Abe and Sharif Manmohan Read More »
Five years (2003-08) of near-9% growth suddenly seems a distant memory. The CSO estimated GDP growth in October-December 2008 at just 5.3%. Indeed, the IMF estimates that India will average just 5.1% growth in the calendar year 2009. There is
What’s wrong with 6% GDP growth? Read More »
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