-Scroll.in Going against conventional wisdom, the Indian middle class is not a source of liberalism. A profound contradiction lies at the heart of contemporary India’s political economy. On the one hand, it embraces economic liberalism. In September 2020, it legislated laws aimed at liberalising agriculture from state-guaranteed protections. The recent budget, passed in February, was high on promises of accelerating divestment of public sector undertakings. On the other hand, however, this enthusiasm...

-The Indian Express In a written reply to a question in the Lok Sabha on whether the number of lakes has declined substantially across the country over recent years, MoEFCC Prakash Javadekar said rapid urbanisation, development activities and anthropogenic pressures have stressed water bodies. Over Rs 1,000 crore has been released for the conservation of 157 wetlands in the country under the National Plan for Conservation of Aquatic Eco-systems (NPCA), Union Minister...

-The Indian Express The state must prioritise removing malnutrition, give uncompromising priority to improving primary health infrastructure In 1947, post-colonial India set off with the ambition of building a modern state on the principles of equality where citizens, by virtue of their birth in the country, would be entitled to a life of dignity. While the Constitution provided the rights to life, liberty, nutritional standards and maternity care, it did not explicitly...

-The Indian Express States have spent less in this year, may focus on fiscal consolidation in the year to come. This belies hopes of a public-spending-led recovery. Over the past few weeks, several state governments have presented their budgets for the financial year 2021-22. These budgets shed light not only on how state finances have fared during the current year (2020-21) but equally critically, detail the expenditure stance of these governments during...

Quite often it is argued by mainstream economists that a sizeable chunk of the Union Budget every year is wasted because the Government spends that on food and fertiliser subsidies. The burgeoning size of these two subsidies relative to the entire budget as well as the gross domestic product (GDP) is often used to build the argument that economic as well as environmental sustainability of the country is at stake...