The union budget for the year 2021-22 would be placed in the parliament on the 1st February in India. This budget would be placed in a context of extreme demand depression following the Covid-19 induced lockdown. The economy needs to…
It is that time of year in India, when all eyes and ears turn to the Finance Minister to learn what she will unveil in the annual Union Budget. But it is a moot point whether, even in a year…
There are really only two numbers to look out for in the forthcoming budget: how much did the government claim to have spent in 2020-21, and how much does it intend to spend in 2021-22. These two numbers will determine…
Budgets over the years have become a tiresome spectacle. Much print space and airtime are devoted to the exercise, which on each occasion is presented as an event that would alter the nation’s economic course. Governments and Finance Ministers back…
As the Sensex hit the 50,000 mark this week for the first time ever, it is clear that the widening gulf between financial and the real sectors remains a matter of concern, both on grounds of the underlying inequities and…
Because a pandemic can be overcome only when it is overcome everywhere, embracing an every-country-for-itself approach would seem irrational. And yet, as the unseemly competition for vaccine doses indicates, that is exactly what many countries have done. The American pharmaceutical…
Now that India has already overtaken Brazil among countries with the most number of Covid-19 positive cases and is on the verge of even beating the USA, it’s worth trying to understand what has led to this inability to control…
Across the world, one consequence of the coronacrisis has been a shift away from fiscal conservatism, with diminishing concern for austerity or even fiscal prudence. Victor Gaspar and Gita Gopinath of the IMF estimate that the total value of the global…
In February, 12-year-old Jamlo Makdam left her home in the Indian state of Chhattisgarh to work as a farm labourer in the chilli fields of Telangana, earning 200 rupees (about £2) a day. But on the morning of 23 March,…
The most destructive effects of Covid-19 in India have not been the result of the disease, but the nature of the government response. The most stringent lockdown in the world destroyed the economy and forced millions into poverty and hunger,…
