To the surprise of most analysts, India’s economy grew at 8.1% in the first quarter despite lagging reforms and high oil prices. GDP growth is being powered yet again by the manufacturing sector, which grew at 11.3%, and by higher than expected growth in the services sector, which accounts for over 50% of the economy. […]
“Fossil fuel is dead,” declared CJ.
CJ likes to make those kinds of superficially profound statements. We were meeting after a long time. I was in Delhi for a conference and caught up with CJ at the Taj Mansingh Hotel coffee shop. We were discussing the spike in the gas prices.
“Dead or not, seventy dollars […]
Regular readers of my blog will know that every once in a while I bemoan the absence of a classical liberal/libertarian/secular-right party in India (these terms aren’t interchangable, I know, but similar), such as the Swatantra Party of C Rajagopalachari and Minoo Masani. Well, Chandrahas Choudhury has an excellent essay on Masani’s book, “Congress Misrule […]
It’s like Mike Tyson at his peak versus Keshto Mukherjee. That’s more or less the gist of Shankar Acharya’s comment piece here. Check it out, especially, the table.
Anything you’d like to add or argue with?
The Times of India reports that “[the] Haryana government has sent notices to Gurgaon-based call centres asking them not to allow women employees on night shifts.”
Do I even need to comment on this depressing, regressive move? One of the biggest indicators of a society’s progress is the empowerment of women, and although women are still […]
Business Week, in a column on the changing role of women in India says:
• Guilt-free materialism. Fifty-one percent of young single women in major metro areas say it’s necessary to have a big house and big car to be happy. In smaller cities, 86% agreed with this statement.
[..]
• Parental ties. Traditionally, parents regarded girls as […]
Devangshu Dutta writes in DNA:
In the Melbourne Test of 1907-08, the English last wicket pair of Sydney Barnes and Arthur Fielder needed to get 39 runs,while the Aussies, of course, needed one wicket. Most tailenders would have tried to hit the runs off and probably got out. After a mid-pitch conference, these two decided […]
Sudheendra Kulkarni writes in the Indian Express:
We have grown used to the Two-India imagery being presented, traditionally, in rich vs. poor, city vs. village, capitalist class vs. working class and India vs. Bharat terms. In my view, the real contrast, and the only one that is useful in any transformative agenda, is between the new […]
A couple of administrative points
1) We’ve added a few guest bloggers — Nitin Pai (who makes me say wistfully “Wish I’d written that” all the time), Madhu Menon (star chef and restaurateur and tech guru, not least for all of us at IEB), and Gaurav Sabnis (incisive blogger, thanks perhaps to his locational advantages).
2) […]
India’s IT industry has shown time and again that it is immensely capable of moving ‘up the value chain’. It needs to do the same with its politics.
Emily Parker, in the Wall Street Journal (subscription required) laments India’s tortuous path towards economic reforms
Congress Party Member of Parliament Jairam Ramesh makes it abundantly clear that if you’re waiting for change, it’s probably better not to hold your breath…. “Given our political system, reforms have to be the result of compromise, discussion,” […]
As per Glen Whitman
Here’s the story of the Two Things. About three years ago, I was chatting with a stranger in a bar. When I told him I was an economist, he said, “Ah. So… what are the Two Things about economics?”
“Huh?” I cleverly replied.
“You know, the Two Things. For every subject, there […]
The Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (REGS) has the word guarantee in it and whatever else it may or may not guarantee, it certainly guarantees greater overall poverty than would be the case without the REGS.
In brief, REGS does not increase the aggregate production of the economy, nor does it increase productive capacity; it merely redistributes […]
That excellent columnist, Ila Patnaik, writes in the Indian Express:
The drama in the stock market has highlighted how India is still an immature market economy. It is the job of the stock market to fluctuate, to move in response to expectations. But in the media and in official circles in India, this induces disproportionate hysteria.
To […]
Gautam Chikermane has an excellent cautionary tale in the Indian Express, the point of which is this: you should exercise the same caution while buying a stock as you would while accepting a job somewhere.
That’s precisely why I have no sympathy for schmucks who lose money after a mad bull run ends. If they […]
Rajat Gupta, speaking to the UN general assembly on September 14, said:
[E]conomic growth, and our ambitions for the eradication of poverty, depend upon the energy and drive of business and commerce. In fact, I cannot envision an effective development strategy that is absent of — or uninformed by — the private sector. Yet when we […]
I am not surprised but it is still news to me that the KGB attempted to steer the Indian ship of state. I grew up hearing rumors of the CIA doing all sorts of nasty things around the world, of course. The KGB, as the other spy in the real life adaptation of the Mad […]
Responding to two of my pieces in the AWSJ (”The myth of India’s liberalization” and “Good intentions, bad ideas“), Karthik Narasimhan sends me an email which is worth quoting in full, so, with his permission, here goes:
My wife and I are in Malaysia now on a short term assignment for our company, and every time […]
It is common knowledge that the Indian economy which was securely imprisoned since independence in 1947 has undergone a radical transformation and has seen a departure from its dismal 3 percent “Nehru Growth” to a more respectable 6 percent and more since the 1980s. There is little room for debate on that fact. What observers […]
Guess which country’s the single largest foreign investor in India?
It’s not any of the usual suspects — the US, the UK or even Japan .
(Via reader Rasul Sharif)Newsweek reports
In one whopping megadeal, South Korea has become the largest foreign investor in Asia’s second emerging giant, India. On Aug. 31, Korean steelmaker […]