governance, political economy, institutional development and economic regulation
The Union Budget proposal for a Sovereign Bond by India in the international markets might have come a cropper along with its “sherpa”, Subhash Garg, our former finance secretary. Why the rush? It was never apparent why the government chose to announce in the Budget speech this year, out of the blue, almost as […]
Read More Sovereign Bond Issue in “thanda basta”Like him, deride him, the one thing you have to admit about Ben Mezrich is that he has a yen for timing. His book is staged in three Acts – convenient for a future film script- around the angst between Mark Zuckerberg, and Tyler and Charles Winklevoss, the latter being mirror twins, code named Winklevii. […]
Read More Book Review – Bitcoin BillionairesIt’s an ungodly 4 am as our shikara spears through the shimmering beauty of the Dal Lake — the rush of breeze a blessing after an unexpectedly still and warm night. Warmer summers and colder winters are a reminder that climate change, the silent killer, is not far off. A pre-dawn “bargain” A shikara lurks […]
Read More Looking beyond the Kashmiri Fish BowlBudget FY 2020, tabled on July 5 in Parliament, unintentionally unleashed a “whodunnit” type mystery with serious downstream negative fiscal impacts. The snafu was spotted by eagle-eyed economists Ratin Roy, director of the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy, and Nitin Desai, a previous Chief Economic Advisor, within hours of the tabling of the […]
Read More Budget 2019-20 “malfunction” spoils the showFinance minister Nirmala Sitharaman made history merely by standing up to present the Union Budget on Friday — being India’s first full-time woman FM to do so. True to the forceful style of the BJP, she delivered the speech with zeal and conviction to the loud thumping of desks by the treasury benches with a […]
Read More Nirmala Sitharaman hits all the right buttons for a balanced budget
Opinion India 