The Times of India

Unlike most people, I am de lighted by the collapse of barrings, the investment bank that counts the Queen of England among its clients. Many are dismayed at seeing a venerable 200-year old institution biting the dust. But neither size nor age guarantee competence, and often hide incompetence or crooked-ness ( Barings stupidly allowed its […]

Multinational companies are shifting their factories to Third World countries, whose cheap skills make it feasible to convert them into production centres for the global market. Can India become a global production centre for a burgeoning service industry-higher education? Some will be shocked at the description of education as an industry-they view it as a

Eradicating poverty is possible only by raising productivity, employment and wages in rural India. One way of achieving this is to create conditions for India to become a big player in the global production of seeds. Dr MS Swaminathan has repeatedly highlighted India\’s potential in this respect, given its cheap scientific and agricultural manpower. He

The government\’s National Sample Surveys (NSS) disclosed recently that the proportion of people below the poverty line had risen and inequalities increased in the first 18 months of Mr. Narasimha Rao\’s rule (see accompanying chart). Immediately. several observers declared that the Congress Party had been thrashed in the Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh elections because its

INEQUALITIES have increased after Mr Narasimha Rao came to power in June 1991. The National Sample Surveys show that the share of the top 20 per cent in consumption increased, and that of the bottom 20 per cent decreased, in Mr Rao\’s first 18 months. As our table shows, there is no overall trend change

CONTRARY to fears expressed in 1991 that the economic reforms would create massive unemployment, there was little change in unemployment in the first 18 months of reform, while more detailed research may show an actual decline in person-days of unemployment. Employment data are now\’ available from the National Sample Surveys for 1991 (July-December) and 1992

THE POOR are better fed after the initiation of economic reforms, according to the National Sample Surveys for 1991 (July-December) and 1992 (January-December). The surveys asked of people whether they ate two square meals a day throughout the year, in some months of the year, or not at all. In rural areas, those claiming to

Congress sabotage of panchayati raj may have been a reason for voter disillusionment with the party, says Swaminathan S Aiyar. Centralised rule in India has so obviously failed that most observers of the Indian scene, myself included, have long argued in favour of empowering panchayati raj institutions. We also feel it will yield political dividends.

Indian leftists who have long wanted to cripple GATT and the World Bank now have improbable allies in right-wing Republicans who have swept into power in both houses of the US Congress. The Indian left sees these two organisations as agents of US imperialism, no less than the Republicans. They may be surprised to learn

The Fund and Bank should be seen as advisors and not policy makers, says Swaminathan S Anklesaria Aiyar Indians leftist hold that the standard IMF-World Bank reform package never works. They look at the wide range of countries under IMF discipline. Wherever the reforms have succeeded, the leftists say this was due to factors other