Tag: China

“Tweak” the process transparently to deliver PM Modi’s “Big Things to Small People”

(photo credit: article.wn.com) Charismatic leaders can mould crowds like putty. Bill Clinton’s March, 2000 “US and India are natural allies” address to the Indian Parliament; Barrack Obama’s University of Cairo “New Beginnings” address to the Muslim world, June, 2009 unleashed a Tsunami of optimism and “feel good”. In much the same way, PM Modi-the man […]

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“Class” in diplomacy

(photo credit: http://www.dreamstime.com) “Diplomacy is not instant coffee” said the official spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs yesterday. He is right of course. If you are the “instant coffee” type,  you are unlikely to be invited to join the international high table. This doesn’t mean though that, if our MEA mandarins switch from Coffee […]

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Spicing the Pak-India “Punjabi Tango” with Gujarati Dandia could yield results.

    (Photo credit: outlookindia.com) The Pak-India affair is almost as tiresome as the Israeli-Palestine impasse.   Neither party can pull apart nor do they live together in peace. Successive governments on both sides start a peace initiative at the beginning of their terms, only to lapse into status-quo near the end-defeated by the inertia of […]

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Modi.gov

The Modi government is being formed on the back of a mandate for honest and effective governance. Fortunately, it inherits a raft of incomplete social and economic equity initiatives from the UPA II. These need to be continued, deepened and tweaked to deliver more bang for the buck. But every government craves the opportunity to […]

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Digit Sex, Lies and False Gods

Thanks to Bill Clinton and his legal brilliance, the definition of what constitutes a sex offence has become so broad that men and women now need to comply with the strictest code of antiseptic, social behavior. Earlier we all knew when we were crossing the line since the rule was simple. In Rome do as […]

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Mouldy Growth Fundamentals

  Growth “wallahs” (RBI, MOF) routinely underestimate the interlinked role of land, water and housing in development. In India’s context, these are critical for a long term growth strategy. Our growth czars are disingenuous in routinely deriding the use of equity markets and foreign investment as valid indicators for economic health but are quick to […]

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Indian Blood is Expensive

  Indian diplomacy was at its worst last week. It conducted the PMs visit to the US as if he was attending a seminar on economics, in Neemrana. If India is a superpower (perennially waiting to happen), it came across, on the one hand, as a country sapped of all energy and squabbling about petty […]

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Importing energy insecurity

Shortages make people do crazy things. In the 1970’s a Bajaj scooter was a prized posession because it was most easily available against payment in US$, as were denim jeans, which were smuggled in or sold by the firangi “flower children” flooding India for hash and nirvana. In the 1990’s, the humble Maruti 800 beame […]

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