Tag Archives: Economy

The book under review suggests ways out of what is possibly one of the worst crises of the 21st century. The author compares the situation to a war and also finds similarities with the 2007-08 economic crisis. He attempts to address the fallout of the pandemic, its historical context and puts forward the emerging challenges and potential solutions.The book begins with the science behind viruses and gives a historical background to pandemics. This part is very well covered and readers will find it very informative. The later chapters delve into the government’s response. The author critically evaluates the measures undertaken by governments and their prognosis of the situation…

The poor quality of official statistics is the basis for many criticisms of the Government these days. Whether it is the handling of the COVID pandemic, the state of the economy, or the quality of life of people in society, a common refrain of all critics is that of the poor and declining quality of Government data. Ironically, this situation has come about in large measure because of the success of official statisticians in persuading policy makers, commentators, and civil society activists to use data and empirical arguments in their discussions…

The book under review, Monopsony Capitalism: Power and Production in the Twilight of the Sweatshop Age, could bear the title of the review of the book as it is reminiscent of the regime of accumulation described in the classic Monopoly Capital by Paul Baran and Paul Sweezy, and recalled by Ashok Kumar on page 50. In footnote 27 on the page, the author advises, similar to the illustrious duo, that ‘“monopsony capital’’ is intended more as an analytical device rather than a quantitative measure.’ Monopoly is one seller confronting many buyers.  Monopsony is a few buyers confronting many sellers. Both are analytical devices…

Venture capital, though not new in India, has expanded in the last decade; India has created over a 100 unicorns with a combined market capitalization of $240 billion. This enormous wealth creation has spurred a growing investor appetite for start-ups. More than $60 billion has been invested in Indian start-ups over the past five years, with around $12 billion in 2020 alone. The most astounding example is the resounding success of the food delivery app, Zomato, which after registering a robust listing day gain of 66% continues to scale new highs every day despite not making a single rupee by way of profits…

Small land holdings, coupled with low productivity and high volatility of agricultural yields, and farmers’ income are the concerns of Indian agriculture today. These concerns need to be addressed by raising agricultural productivity and lowering market, production and climatic risks. Substantially increasing farmers’ income and making it stable are the pre-requisites for the viability of the sector. Adoption of organic farming can be financially rewarding and environmentally sound. The book Organic Farming: Economics, Policy and Practices by Hari Ram Prajapati is an attempt to describe the economics and status of organic farming and related government policies in the country…

The author of this edited volume, Sanjaya Baru correctly highlights uncertainty as the key problem caused by COVID-19. But the eminent economists who have contributed to this volume have largely ignored it. Most of them have analysed the situation as it existed sometime in the later part of 2020…

The on-going farmers’ protest in India has once again highlighted the continuous significance of land on the one hand and its continuous process of making and re-making on the other. These protests point towards the fact that the land issues and agrarian politics are not settled…

Rural society in India has undergone social and economic transformation in varying degrees during the past decades giving rise to new questions and issues such as decline or demise of traditional social classes and the rise of new ones, changes in patterns of power relations among them…

‘When the well’s dry, we know the worth of water.’– Benjamin FranklinIndia woke up to a spate of farmer suicides through Everybody Loves a Good Drought by P Sainath, and the first State where suicides were reported was Maharashtra. Two decades after that book…

This book was, perhaps, envisaged along with a conference titled ‘Social Sector Development in North-East India: Problems, Issues and Challenges’. The most striking point the book states is that human capital development should be the focus of all efforts for the social development of the region…

Urjit Patel joined the Reserve Bank of India as Deputy Governor in January 2013 in charge of the Monetary Policy Department and was subsequently elevated as the 24th Governor of the RBI from September 2016 as the successor to Dr. Raghuram Rajan. He left rather prematurely on 10th December 2018.

The book is a collection of relevant works on different regulatory institutions in India. Given the paucity of literature on state regulation, the essays offer an in-depth view of how different regulatory institutions in India have responded to streamline the administration of the economy.

This book intrigues. It comes heavily recommended. It was released, in a high-powered function graced by two former RBI Governors (YV Reddy and Duvvuri Subbarao) as speakers and a galaxy of present and former RBI officials, Deputy Governors and so on.

The sixty papers published in these two volumes were all presented at the 14th International Seminar on Indo-Portuguese History (ISIPH) held at Delhi in 2013. The first of these seminars was held at Goa in 1978 on the initiative of the late Father John Correia-Afonso.

The book Dark Fear, Eerie Cities analyses a particular strand of Hindi films from the past two decades and through them leads us through a fascinating enquiry into the sources and manifestation of desire, anxiety, fear and neurosis in the new Indian.

Money as a medium of exchange, and a store of value, has gone through many avatars as civilizations have surged and ebbed. Precious metals, precious stones, cowrie shells, rice–at various times in various places, these things have been used either as currency.

The Indian economy has been lurching from crisis to crisis for more than a decade now. The latest crisis is unfolding as we speak, with the COVID-mitigating country-wide lockdown already taking an economic toll on industries with factories closed, and a huge population dependent on the informal economy unable to earn its daily wage.

All the Wrong Turns: Perspectives on the Indian Economy by TCA Ranganathan and TCA Srinivasa Raghavan, two highly regarded and respected professionals, one a lifelong banker and the other an economic journalist, is a welcome addition to the growing commentary on.