While the recent sporadic performance of the Indian manufacturing sector has justifiably evoked both concern and comment, another well-documented facet has not received commensurate attention. Organised sector manufacturing in India turned capital intensive in the 1990s and the trend continues inexorably. Research by Business Standard indicates that India Inc added over Rs 13 trillion in fixed assets over the past decade, with over 80 per cent of this accretion since...

Indian cotton was once infamously plundered by the British to benefit their finished goods economy back home. The world-famous Dhaka muslin were woven with desi cotton. But while the foreign regime kept the Indian cotton alive, albeit for its own gains, independent India presided over its complete decimation. However, after about 50 years of domination of American cotton that had edged out the desi varieties for long, the Indian Council of...

A courier company in Mumbai shows the way in providing employment for the hearing impaired. IN the milling crowds of Mumbai, they stand apart with their orange T-shirts printed with the name Mirakle Couriers. Every day, during the busy hours of the working week, one sees them on the sidewalks, in public transport and elsewhere with large black bags slung on their shoulders. It would not be enough to say...

Illegality in India today touches almost every economic activity. It is both systemic and systematic. The Indian ruling class faced its severest crisis of credibility in 2010. Its past caught up with it and skeletons and scams were spilling out of its closets. The scams have a symbiotic relationship with the black economy. The number of scams is growing and so is the size of the black economy, which has reached...

In a bid to win the hearts of forest-based communities, the government will decriminalise the collection of traditional 'livelihood items' from the forests. The move comes even as a joint committee set up by the environment and tribal affairs ministries found several state governments guilty of using the three-year-old Forest Rights Act to distribute forest land to individuals. The committee, headed by Naresh Saxena, development expert and former secretary to the government...