-Frontline The government’s passage of the Aadhaar Bill in complete disregard of even basic parliamentary procedures and in subversion of an ongoing judicial process puts at risk a number of constitutional rights and liberties of citizens. The benefits cited are just ploys to realise a neoliberal dream. “Congressmen are dancing as if [Aadhaar] was a herb for all cures. With the Supreme Court pulling up the Centre, people are now seeking...
More »SEARCH RESULT
Golden yields - Focusing on agriculture alone will not improve farm incomes -Shubhashis Gangopadhyay
-The Telegraph The recent budget talked about the government's plan to double farm incomes in the next five years. This will be done through investments in rural infrastructure, especially irrigation. About 50 per cent of land under foodgrain production in India is irrigated. This means that half of the foodgrain producing land in India faces weather uncertainties and, hence, those working on them face annual (seasonal) variations in income. These variations...
More »Can the BJP take back the Rajya Sabha after the Assembly elections? -Aditi Phadnis
-Business Standard In the balance hangs the GST Bill, which enjoys some support across the aisle, but has been blocked in the Upper House by the Congress and some of its allies Will this be the year the BJP-led NDA gets a working majority in the Rajya Sabha? Consider that nearly 75 MPs in the Rajya Sabha will retire and be replaced by new faces. Some of them – like Venkaiah Naidu, Nirmala Sitharaman...
More »Budget 2016: Behind the Symbolism
-Economic and Political Weekly The Modi government tries hard to signal a makeover but beyond the symbolic it does not change much. Budget 2016 is not important for the proposals that it has made but for what it tries to signal about the proposed makeover, in a limited way, of the Narendra Modi government. The budget does try hard to claim that the Modi government is not a “suit-boot” administration, an image...
More »Just another trivial Budget -Ashok V Desai
-The Hindu The Finance Minister’s prescriptions are a classic case of being unable to see the wood for the trees, be it on the tax proposals, the rural outreach or the bank bailout. It was a marathon achievement: 12,187 words in 111 minutes. True, there were no interruptions; the Finance Minister virtually sent the House to sleep. I have listened to many Budget speeches; and I cannot say that Dr. Manmohan Singh...
More »