Whither Indian Economy

It is not really with India’s economy that Francine Frankel is concerned in her book as its title might suggest as with the political pressures and motivations behind its progress or retardation since Indepen¬dence—at the Central and State levels, and the party and governmental levels. he book could appropriately have been titled the ‘Politics of Indian Economy’. For the most part it is a documented nar¬rative of the evolution of the Congress Party’s ideas on how the Indian economy should shape, through conflict and con¬sensus or ‘accommodative politics’ as the author calls it. Extensive portions of the book have little to do with economic policy at all but are a plain account of internal party politics like the succession to Nehru and various personality clashes.