My Life ... My Journey

The FY20Q1 GDP results came in recently. It shrank by 23.9%. A quarter marred with the pandemic and its higher order effects including lock-down brought one of the most vibrant economies to a halt. Many people dwell on various aspects of this number. The critics of the government have admonished it for being the poorest performer among G20 nations. Others gaped in horror thinking about the actual impact as the informal sector's impact is not accounted in the GDP. There are others who see the silver lining. GDP denotes the sum total of goods and services produced in the country. It is a figure which tells us what has happened in the past. Present and future are altogether different aspects. The PMI figures for August were 52 indicating expansion in manufacturing output compared to previous month. This indicates we are returning from the downhill ride. As the government allows more relaxation under new phases of pandemic response termed 'Unlock', one would expect the economy ...

Ever since Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced on US Election eve that 500 and 1000 denomination notes would not be any longer legal tender, the issue of demonetization has been a topic of heated discussions. The response to the move has been varied and interesting. While some political parties like TMC immediately demanded a rollback, others waited to catch hold of some straws to beat the government on the issue. There were multiple aims of this exercise- 1. Temporarily check flow of counterfeit currency which is used to fund terrorism, insurgency and drug cartels 2. Attack on black money hoarded in form of cash 3. Give a push to a less-cash society with better accountability Most criticism has been around the preparation or the execution post the decision. Let's look at the stated goals and the criticism to evaluate the decision. For the first two goals, demonetization as a move is effective only when  it comes as a surprise and there is little time to make alt...

India is the 3 rd largest economy in the world in terms of GDP (PPP). It has grown at a rate of 7-8% p.a. for most part of the last decade. However, to grow further and bring the remaining 1/3 of our population out of poverty, India would need to grow at these rates. After 1991, there haven’t been significant reforms and India needs another round of substantial reforms. A majority of these reforms need to tackle the supply side bottlenecks as there is a strong demand. One of the major concerns is the ease of doing business and the support structure for enterprises. The country languishes in infrastructure. There aren’t adequate roads, railways is suffering from under-capacity, waterways and aviation require lot of capacity creation. Energy is also a big issue as more than 70% of crude oil demand is met by imports. There is no reliable power supply available to industries as the power plants can’t meet the demand due to shortage of coal. Getting skilled labour, environmental clea...