The Times of India

Swine flu has killed over 20 Indians so far, and may soon claim hundreds, even thousands. That is a tragedy. Even so, swine flu remains a very minor cause of death, far behind other diseases that kill millions. The panic […]

The world economy is recovering, and the price of oil too. It has crossed $70/barrel, and could return to $150/barrel, if the recovery continues. Can India do anything new to meet this energy challenge? Yes, it can change its exploration

Religion and business rarely mix well. This shows up in the encyclical of Pope Benedict XVI. The encyclical generally supports globalization, but criticises Western companies that outsource business to developing countries. This criticism has an unfortunate ethnic slant. The Pope

In his budget speech, the Finance Minister hailed bank nationalization as visionary and revolutionary. Yet nationalized banks have, by and large, not reached the poor. However, micro-finance is now reaching people whom nationalized banks could not. Households getting micro-credit now

Air India lost Rs 5,000 crore last year, and is surviving on huge government handouts. Opposition politicians are critical, but reject any cut in its bloated staff. Across the world, airlines are reducing staff in the recession. But Air India

Why did the budget cause the Sensex to crash by over 1000 points, and cause global rating agencies to mutter that if India did not pull up its socks, its bonds would be downgraded? Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee has gone

When President George Bush pushed through the Indo-US nuclear deal, analysts claimed that he aimed to generate multi-billion orders for US nuclear equipment suppliers. Some Indian scientists opposed the deal fearing that it would lead to US dominance in our

Dear Pranab Mukherjee, You have a big budget problem. Your fiscal deficit is huge, but you cannot easily increase taxes or cut spending during a recession. One easy way out will be to raise taxes yet again on cigarettes. Tobacco

After six months of financial drought, global money is flooding into India at the rate of $1 billion a week. If sustained, this will be the mother of all financial stimuli, eclipsing the finance minister\’s budgetary endeavours. The dollar flood

US President Obama wants to end tax breaks that he thinks lead US companies to shift jobs to developing countries like India. Indian analysts fear this will hit foreign investment and jobs in India. These fears are overblown. Indeed, the