-The Telegraph The last time that India faced a full-year contraction in its real GDP was in 1980 The Indian economy shrank by 23.9 per cent in the first quarter ended June 30, signalling that the road to recovery would be more arduous than most economists have projected. It marks the steepest decline since the National Statistical Office (NSO) started quarterly measurement of gross domestic product (GDP) in 1996. The slide in real GDP...

-Livemint.com The collapse of GDP growth by 23.9% for the Apr to Jun period isn’t a surprise. The economy was under a strict lockdown for most of the time to contain the pandemic. Nevertheless, a little digging throws up interesting trends. Mint takes a look. * What does the GDP figure highlight? One way to measure the GDP is to add private consumption expenditure, government consumption expenditure, investment and net exports (exports minus...

-The Telegraph Move comes amid the standoff between New Delhi and Beijing in Ladakh and Modi govt tightening its rules on FDI from the country Mumbai: The People's Bank of China (PBOC) — the Chinese central bank — is using the portfolio route to pick up stakes in Indian companies amid the standoff between New Delhi and Beijing in Ladakh and the Modi government tightening its rules on foreign direct investment (FDI)...

-The Telegraph Why are animal spirits in quarantine? Animal spirits, the primordial driver of growth that is unquantifiable, are once more in the spotlight. The current context is the dire growth outlook from the Covid-19 impact, future prospects and how to improve these. However, the absence of animal spirits has been felt and commented upon longer than that. It can be traced as far back as the 2012-13 slowdown, or the shortfall...

-Down to Earth Instead of putting Punjab farmers at the mercy of big corporates and private players, there is a need to strengthen existing infrastructure The Union government announced three agriculture-related ordinances as part of its novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) relief package — permitting agricultural trade outside the boundaries of market committees, easing regulation and control under the Essential Commodities Act and facilitating contract farming. Out of these, the Farmers’ Produce Trade and...