I don’t know about you, but I don’t think political campaigning has reached this kind of feverish pitch and frenzy as during this 2024 parliamentary election in India. Most of it has to do with what else is happening around election time, I think. Such as ED and CBI interrogations and arrests of politicians most… Continue reading Media’s Role and Responsibility in Election Time
The election juggernaut has begun to roll in India, with the Election Commission announcing the election dates just last week. Hundreds of political parties had already started preparing their candidates list and campaigning months before. In this loud and raucous democracy that we have in India, even the news channels have nothing but politicians campaigning… Continue reading In Big Election Year, Old Wine in Old Bottle
In just a couple of months perhaps, the world’s largest democracy goes to the polls. The ruling party, BJP, is so confident of returning to power for a third successive term that it has even forecast the number of seats it will win. Prime minister Modi said during his speech in Parliament just a few… Continue reading Change or Continuity, It’s Horse-trading Season
In one sense, that ought to be a damn good thing. Since it might mean that the end of hostilities and shelling is near. On the other hand, it could mean that the world has failed to come up with an effective diplomatic and political solution to end the war even as it tires of… Continue reading World Losing Appetite for War and What it Means
In my last few blog posts on climate change and how it affects the poor, I had wondered how a COP summit being held in hydrocarbon heartland would go. On the one hand, it could be stymied by all the powerful interests in fossil fuels present in the region as many of their economies are… Continue reading COP28 Ending on a Timid Note
October 2023 began with all the omens of a Middle East conflict once again, when Hamas launched a series of rocket attacks on Israel and Israel responded in its typical fashion. Everyone in media wondered how Israel could be caught so off-guard and about the failure of its world-renowned intelligence. This only adds to the… Continue reading Stalemate or Larger Regional War in the Middle East?
As has become commonplace these years, 2023 too has been a year of extreme weather conditions, natural disasters, excessive and unseasonal rainfall in some places, drought in other places. We know that extreme weather conditions and natural calamities are becoming the rule, but it doesn’t conform to any pattern and we are unable to mitigate… Continue reading Greening the Planet Against Climate Change
This month saw the grand finalé of the G20 2023 summits under India’s presidency. New Delhi, India’s capital was suitably sanitized, beautified and locked down – for a 3-day holiday – so that leaders of the world’s most economically powerful countries as well as heads of multilateral institutions who had descended upon the city could… Continue reading G20 and BRICS, All in Expansion Mode
As central bankers from around the world converge at Wyoming for their annual Jackson Hole conference in August, the question that struck me is should it be their responsibility alone to fight consumer price inflation that is raging across many parts of the world. Of course, a lot depends on what kind of inflation it… Continue reading Should Monetary Policy Alone Fight Inflation?
Prime Minister’s Narendra Modi’s state visit to the US last month resulted in a number of agreements between the two countries that signal a new level of cooperation and economic engagement. They are being dubbed part of an Indo-US Strategic Partnership. Ranging from sale of drones and manufacture of GE engines for Indian fighter jets… Continue reading Indo-US Partnership Not Exactly Strategic
Peripatetic Perch 