India’s beleaguered farmers are facing another threat to what is now a tenuous livelihood. That threat is the real prospect of a poor Southwest monsoon that would substantially reduce agricultural production over crop year (July to June) 2015-16. In its…
The Modi government completed one year in office on May 26. This year saw a continuation of the industrial stagnation which has been a feature of the Indian economy for quite some time now. The year-on-year rates of industrial growth,…
It is widely believed that one important reason for the remarkable victory of Narendra Modi and the BJP in the April 2014 general election in India, was the ability to tap into the aspirations of a dominantly youthful population that…
Having come to power by fanning high expectations of what it would deliver on the economic front, the Modi government’s first year has proved dull and dreary. Dull because there is little the government has to show, even on the…
On May 17, the Controller General of Accounts released the audited provisional accounts of the central government for 2014. Unlike the revised estimates in budgetary documents, these figures include actual figures for the month of March. A terse Statement from…
It is safe to say that Indian agriculture could not survive and would not have survived without the huge contribution of women workers. Their role has been absolutely pivotal – as farmers, as co-farmers, as unpaid workers on family farms,…
The day after the Indian government banned the BBC documentary India’s Daughter, on the horrific gang rape and killing of a student in Delhi, a 10,000-strong mob broke into a jail in a town in Assam, dragged out an alleged rapist, beat…
The first round of the auction of mining rights in 18 coal blocks to user firms in the private sector in the power, steel and cement industries has been completed. If the figures being circulated of the revenues or benefits…
India, we are constantly reminded, is one of the more rapidly growing economies of the world at present; and even though the growth rate has come down somewhat of late, official figures show that it still remains quite high. What…
Saturday 7 February was voting day in the capital city of Delhi. So it was effectively a holiday for many workers, who only had to walk to their polling stations to cast their votes for the Assembly elections. This meant…
