Make in India
The website is impressive, no doubt about it. It is sleekly designed and easy on the eye, and it appears to offer a lot of information on what is supposed to be the Modi government’s ambitious new initiative to transform…
The Phenomenal Increase in Wealth Inequality
Credit Suisse brings out a Global Wealth Report every year. The current year’s report takes up for specific discussion the issue of wealth inequality. The term “wealth” in the report covers only household wealth and refers to the value of…
Bad News in the Good Days
The BJP under Narendra Modi has been by and large favoured by fortune. This is reflected not just in the fact that it managed to win 52 per cent (282) of the seats with just 31 per cent of the…
Fiscal Correction versus Democracy in India
There is a reason why budgets have to be passed in parliament (in India certainly, but also in most other countries). There is a reason why, as per the Indian Constitution, the Finance Bill that details the revenues and expenditure…
The Nehru Legacy
The spat between the BJP-Led government and the NDA over celebrations to mark Nehru’s 125th birth anniversary must not divert attention from one important fact. There has been for around three decades now an explicit or implicit rejection of and…
Turning Citizens into Mendicants
The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, at least the image through which it is expressed, of celebrities descending from limousines in sundry locations to sweep away the “clean garbage” (mainly leaves and such like) which have been carefully deposited there by official…
India Concludes Bilateral Agreement with US, Agrees to an Indefinite ‘Peace Clause’
After months of impasse, India finally agreed to relent on its opposition to allow progress on the post-Bali work programme of the World Trade Organization (WTO), after concluding a “bilateral agreement” with the United States. According to the terms of…
Is the Swachch Bharat Mission the Way to a Cleaner India?
On the face of it, the campaign to clean India is something that obviously must be welcomed and accepted by every right-thinking citizen: something unexceptionable in intent and clearly desirable in stated outcomes. But it suffers from the same deficiencies…
Dilma Rousseff’s Victory
The American “mainstream” media have tried to play down Dilma Rousseff’s victory in the Presidential election in Brazil by emphasizing the “narrowness” of her victory-margin, even though they would never be grudging in their acknowledgement of Bush Jr.’s victory which…