-ThePrint.in Three richest states in India are three times as rich as three poorest, which is why we can’t ignore spatial inequality. In a recent review of James Crabtree’s new book, The Billionaire Raj, also reviewed by me, columnist and part-time member of PM Modi’s Economic Advisory Council, Surjit Bhalla, pays my co-author, political economist and presently data guru for the Indian National Congress, Praveen Chakravarty, the following compliment: “In a much...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The Centre has told the Supreme Court that SC/ST government employees were automatically entitled for quota in promotions and reiterated the need for reconsideration of the M Nagraj judgment, saying collection of data to determine their backwardness was neither feasible nor desirable. Filing its written note on the matter on Tuesday, the Centre said a community was added to the list of Scheduled Castes after...

-Business Standard/ India Spend The BJP-led government spent Rs 4,880 crore ($753.99 million) on advertising its flagship schemes in the 52 months between April 2014 and July 2018 Mumbai: Midday meals for 45.7 million children for a year. One day’s wages for 200 million workers under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MNREGS). About 6 million new latrines. And at least 10 more Mars missions. These were some of the things...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: Three steps in quick succession have suggested that the BJP might be trying to build a social coalition of Dalits and Other Backward Classes to complement its traditional base among the upper castes in the run-up to the general election. On Thursday, the government managed to get a Bill passed unanimously in the Lok Sabha to grant constitutional status to the National Commission for Backward Classes. Twenty-four hours earlier,...

-The Indian Express Can a democracy permit so many to be in a state of liminal legality? NRC poses a political and moral question The possibility — whether immediate or somewhat remote — that at the end of the process as many as 4 million people may lose their legal status as citizens should not be a cause of celebration in a democracy. Nor should it generate a mad rush among...