CBDC: Minting the Future

Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC), a new asset class and system for global and domestic payments and settlements, has been under active research and development since around 2015. Oddly, the United States (US) seems relaxed about joining the race. United States makes up for lost time Reflecting this institutional languor, Jerome Powell, Chair of the US […]

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Valuing Our Common Future

Ecologists and environmental economists’ scorn how superficially countries maintain their financial and national accounts. Amounts spent on building human skills, providing education, nutrition, safeguarding health, land, air and water quality or forests are classified as consumption expenditure in the national accounts, except for the associated construction and equipment purchased. Budgetary allocations in India for such […]

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The cheetah returns: Rewilding India

The import of cheetahs from Namibia to diversify the fauna in our national parks, seven decades after it became extinct in India in 1952, is a tiny reminder of the many benefits of linking ever closer with Africa- the last frontier of abundant natural resources with the highest potential for future growth. Importing diversity This […]

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India: Export for Growth

After inflation levels off, hopefully in the first quarter of the next fiscal year, after the Ukraine crisis becomes dormant, yet again, through exhaustion or accommodation (as in 2014) and thinking beyond the growing domestic political contestation, as India prepares for the quinquennial national electoral contest in April 2024, the problem of low growth is […]

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Amending the Electricity Act 2003- Getting the regulatory incentives right

State Electricity Regulatory Commissions (SERCs) constituted under state level legislation in seven states from 1995 and subsequently under the Electricity Regulatory Commissions Act 1998 (since subsumed into the Electricity Act 2003) have failed, to uniformly tackle the twin problems of high operational cost and distorted retail tariff structures not reflective of the cost of supply. […]

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