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 […]
Killing me softly with your beedis Read More »
Gird your loins to ride out the global economic storm, and don’t get diverted by pleas for unending tax cuts and stimulus packages that will empty the treasury without ending the storm. That should be the approach of finance minister
We need consolidation, not stimuli Read More »
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
India is now flooded with $1 billion per week Read More »
Why did voters in south Mumbai have a pathetic turnout at 42% whereas other areas in India recorded up to 90%? Why was the south Mumbai turnout worse than in South Delhi, both areas populated by the elite chatterati? There
Fallacies about voter turnout Read More »
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
Obama’s protectionism may help India Read More »
The stock market has zoomed 20% hoping that the Congress victory will usher in radical economic reforms that were earlier thwarted by the Left Front. This is a serious error. The Congress sees its victory as a vote for continuity,
Expect continuity, not radical reform Read More »
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 »
Despite being hit by the global recession, the ruling Congress Party‐led coalition swept to an unexpected victory in India’s general election, mainly because of rural prosperity in a country where 70 percent of the population is rural. Good monsoons and high
Elections in India 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 »
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