Columns

The Perfect Storm is Sebastian Junger’s riveting account of the tragic end of the best fishing vessel on the US East Coast, commanded by the most seasoned skipper, when it encountered an unusual combination of three storm systems in the North Atlantic. The boat and its skipper could handle any... read more

Last weekend, as the authorities began felling trees, swarms of riot police descended in the wooded enclave that is known as Aarey Milk Colony and clashed with thousands of youth protestors. Many of them were arrested and put away in various jails under judicial custody. The trees, under the threat... read more

Actions do speak louder than words. The Indian government has for several months now been blowing its own trumpet at various fora about how it is doing more than its share to mitigate climate change. The campaign blitz on climate change is being led by the ministers, who do not miss any opportunity... read more

With a fourth successive policy rate cut of 25 basis points on October 4, 2019, the cumulative reduction of rate cuts is a 135 basis points. By RBI’s own admission the “Monetary transmission has remained staggered and incomplete” So, in essence, the RBI’s monetary policy during the current fiscal... read more

With a 25-basis point cut in the policy repo rate by the MPC of the Reserve Bank in its fourth bi-monthly meeting this fiscal, the cumulative easing in 2019 so far stands at 135 basis points. Such deep and continuous rate cuts have not been witnessed in the recent decades. Also, with the new policy... read more

The freezing of accounts, and stoppage of lending and deposit taking activity of Punjab and Maharashtra Co-operative Bank (PMC) has once again brought to the fore the issue of riskiness of banks, especially co-operative banks. Unlike scheduled commercial banks, the PMC has dual regulation by the... read more

I read Gandhiji’s Hind Swaraj when I was 34. I should have read it when I was 17. But at that impressionable age, given the prevailing urban political fashions of the day, I was instead handed The Communist Manifesto. Importantly, nobody ever asked me to read Hind Swaraj. I just chanced upon it,... read more

Gandhi lived in a time when technology, science, education and energy were reshaping economic growth and world war outcomes. US and Europe reeled under the Great Depression (1929 to 1941) with the collapse of the manufacturing segment and housing in the US. Actions that led to this crash were... read more

The Chairman of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) Dr. K Sivan won the hearts of the nation even when the Chandrayaan-2 mission lander Vikram failed to touch the surface of the moon as planned. An emotional Dr. Sivan was moved to tears and was consoled by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi,... read more

The reduction in the corporate tax rate and other relief announced by the government as part of a stimulus package will mean revenue foregone to the tune of Rs.1,45,000 crore, or 0.68 per cent of GDP. This is a huge incentive by any account. It comes on top of a slew of other measures relating to... read more

Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh urged the government of India to do more to enhance the spirit of cooperative federalism. His comments were in the context of the changes made to the terms of reference to the Fifteenth Finance Commission. These changes were made in July, quite late in the... read more

In early August, as the Indian Government imposed a comprehensive blockade in Kashmir, snatching its political agency, it prepared for a final solution in another valley that had been a symbol of people’s resistance to a predatory state-capitalist complex. The gates of the Sardar Sarovar were shut... read more

The dividend pay-out of Rs. 1,75,987 crore from the RBI to the government for 2018-19 follows a paradigm shift in the way RBI’s requirement of economic capital is viewed, calculated and supplied as also an accounting rule tweaking to ensure higher income from forex transactions. To understand the... read more

The yawning gap between the mischievous claims and verified data is exactly as it was in the case of ‘black’ money before and after demonetisation. That act dug the grave for small and informal business without tracing any black money. Similarly, the NRC verification exercise may eventually destroy... read more

Over the last several years, Public Sector Banks (PSBs) have been struggling hard to come to grips with mounting Non-Performing Assets (NPAs). Now, PSBs are struggling at the core of their business, which is credit offtake. On NPAs, the government claims that with the Insolvency & Bankruptcy... read more

This is going to be a merger like none other. We had 27 public sector banks (PSBs) in 2017. We have seen two mergers already in recent times – Vijaya Bank and Dena Bank merged into Bank of Baroda (BoB) in April, and the State Bank of India absorbed five of its associates and the Bharatiya Mahila... read more

If many car factories find themselves running idle, or with surplus inventory it could be because there was over-investment in the sector. Owing to a rosy outlook and perhaps excessive exuberance a few years ago, many independent car companies decided to invest in new capacities, to take advantage... read more

If the changes to article 370 of the Constitution of India were meant “to bring J&K truly into India's fold”, as has been argued by the Union Home Minister Amit Shah, then this is the one objective that the move has not delivered, at least not just yet. There can be no dispute that J... read more

The numbers are in and uncontested this time. The growth of the Indian economy, until recently celebrated as the world’s fastest, has slumped to only 5 per cent. Alarm bells ringing, the government’s fire-fighters are out. The government wants investors to invest more, to grow the economy to $5... read more

There has been an animated debate since August 26, 2019 on the decision of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to transfer its surplus under section 47 of The RBI Act, 1934. The amount is Rs. 1,75,987 crores, which amounts to around 0.8 per cent of GDP. Such a transfer is unprecedented in RBI history.... read more