In the financial year 2017-18 when tractor sales touched new heights, it was said by many of the NDA (viz. National DemocRATic Alliance) government supporters that rural demand has revived on account of adequate monsoon rainfall and higher minimum support prices for crops. Many economists and newspaper columnists also denied the existence of any rural distress. An alternative perspective, however, was also presented by rural economists like Dr. Himanshu who teaches...

-Business Standard Aiming for unachievable growth RATes would compound past errors. The economy has to lower its sights, and do some hard thinking about how to come out of the present hole, writes T N Ninan There is a general sense that the economic growth problem came upon us suddenly in the last few months. In some ways, it did — for example, through the continuing fallout of the collapse 11 months...

-Newsclick.in Measures announced by the finance minister are mere concessions to industry lobbies and stock market, and don’t address lack of demand. The raft of measures announced by India’s finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman for supposedly boosting a sinking economy are unlikely to rescue flagging economic growth and don’t even address the key problems of lack of purchasing power with the people and raging unemployment. It’s rearranging the furniture when the house is...

-IANS While there is a consensus that the economy is slowing down, the debate is still going on whether the slowdown is structural or cyclical. The Indian economy is passing through a phase of economic slowdown, with the GDP growth registering one of the lowest RATes of 5.8 per cent in the last quarter of FY19. The GDP growth RATe for the first quarter of FY20 is feared to be lower than...

-The Indian Express Elections are short term contests, but the political project of democracy is a long game. Democracy is not just a set of institutions but also a set of values. The institutions are, minimally speaking, free and fair elections, an elected Parliament containing an executive and an Opposition to hold it accountable, an independent judiciary, a nonpartisan bureaucracy, a free media, and security of existence for all citizens. DemocRATic values...