Everyone agrees that the budget is a political exercise, albeit couched in economic and financial terms. It touches the lives of virtually the entire population. Therefore, its impact is far reaching and necessarily takes on political overtones. It is often used to serve immediate partisan interests as for example in 2008, when the then finance…
Disclosure requirements of political parties must be linked to the income received by a party in a financial year On November 8, 2016, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared 86% of the currency in circulation as illegal tender to curb illicit wealth, he promised to take more steps to curb the generation of black money.…
Do the marriage of ideologies and the union of oppositions truly have a beneficial outcome? It is that time when contesting parties take the road less travelled, appease their voters with dream schemes and manipulate vote share. In the fragmented marketplace, it is monastic to forecast winning two-third of the assembly benches. Thus, coalitions or…
The trouble plaguing Young India today is that its schools and colleges put them through the wheels but leave them without usable skills. This has to change India has been among the fastest growing economies in the world. World Bank estimated that in the 1960s, approximately 45 percent of Indians lived below the poverty line.…
While there has been an overall increase in allocation, this is most likely money that went unspent in last year’s defence budget. This is indicative of systemic inefficiencies in the capital acquisition process. Over the past few months the major ask for defence in the 2017-18 budget has been for an increase in allocations. This…
Budget 2017 is expected to be a ‘big’ budget. With GST on the anvil and demonetisation already undertaken, the ground has been laid for the government to announce some big-bang measures for promoting investment and lifting the economy to a… Budget 2017 is expected to be a ‘big’ budget. With GST on the anvil and…
The ideal GST has just one rate. In the last Council meeting held, it was agreed to have four. This is a step in the right direction as the poor will get some relief. However, simplicity of the structure has been compromised by implementing cess for five year period to compensate the States. Maintaining a…
Battle lines have been drawn in Uttar Pradesh, as the regional heavyweights and national stalwarts face off against each other in February 2017. In May 2014, after the 16th Lok Sabha elections, a prominent national daily published an article titled, ‘Regional parties in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar have gone voiceless’. It seemed appropriate at the…
The Shekatkar committee report represents a starting point and makes a valuable suggestion – non-combat organisations must be reviewed and restructured. The recommendations of the Shekatkar committee, constituted in May by the defence ministry, were presented in a report to defence minister Manohar Parrikar on December 21, 2016. The report is said to be voluminous,…
In the wake of demonetization, a debate has emerged on independence of Reserve Bank of India (RBI). Several former Governors of RBI are calling for greater independence of RBI citing the case of demonetization as an example of erosion of RBI’s independence. We would suggest an opposite line. Demonetization shows why RBI cannot be fully…
It is unfortunate that the very custodian of demonetisation is unable to exonerate itself with reliable facts The sequence of events leading to the demonetisation move are becoming more convoluted as more information is revealed. At this point, it is starting to resemble a comedy of errors at best and an insidious plot at worst.…
New Delhi : People standing in long queues to exchange their old Rs 500 and 1000 notes and withdraw cash from the ATM in New Delhi on Thursday. We will state our baseline assumption first the “implementation” of the demonetization exercise, though admittedly an historically unprecedented exercise in its scale and timelines, could still have…