-Livemint.com * Voters posed trust in Modi’s leadership for his welfare schemes like Jan Dhan Yojana * The Modi govt took a few policy missteps but came back strongly with focus on social sector schemes Parkash, 30, a Tractor driver from Banswara, one of the poorest regions of southern Rajasthan, is happy that his family has received cooking gas and electricity connections during the five-year tenure of the Narendra Modi government. “Our name is...

-Business Standard Falling incomes and longer winter to translate into lower demand for at least some months The new financial year is not much cheer to companies which generate a large chunk of sales in rural India. Their chief executives say slowing economic growth and falling rural wages are leading to a sharp fall in demand, one that will reflect in the next few quarters. A longer winter season has delayed offtake of...

  Growth in rural wages not only indicates economic prosperity of the masses, it is also considered important so as to generate effective demand for goods and services, which is produced by various sectors of the economy. When money becomes available in the hands of rural workers due to government spending on programmes such as Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), it generates demand for commodities. The production of commodities...

-The Hindu Can the RBI’s reduction in borrowing costs help check the demand slowdown? India’s economy is inarguably slowing, and the latest estimates from the Central Statistics Office disconcertingly point to a deepening slowdown. GDP growth is projected to have eased to 6.6% in the October-December period. With the CSO now forecasting the full-year expansion at 7%, fiscal fourth-quarter growth is implicitly pegged at an even slower 6.5%. At that level, growth...

-Livemint.com With eight of the 16 high-frequency macroeconomic indicators in the red and only four in green, the Indian economy continues to remain weak, Mint Macro Tracker shows Mumbai/New Delhi: The Indian economy’s momentum continues to slow, shows the latest update of the Mint Macro Tracker, launched in October last year to provide a state-of-the-economy report each month based on trends across 16 high-frequency economic indicators. The Mint Macro Tracker shows that out...