A combination of demonetisation, a poorly and hurriedly implemented GST, and more recently the "botched up" lockdown of the economy to control the spread of Covid has brought the economy to its knees.
The Congress won 77 seats or 42% of seats in the 2017 polls. How then can Gujarat be called a BJP bastion, asks Sanjeev Nayyar.
Syed Firdaus Ashraf/Rediff.com tracks Prime Minister Narendra Damodardas Modi's project-launching spree with just about three months to go for the assembly election in India's most populous state.
Six months into his new role, Vishal Wanchoo, president and chief executive officer, GE, South Asia, speaks to Jyoti Mukul about how its horizontal business lines of additives and digital are playing across its verticals.
Noting that the session is taking place just ahead of the 70th Independence Day, Modi said he was confident that discussions of the highest standard will be held.
The Finance Minister impressed upon the need to attract more investments for the manufacturing sector.
He also announced an assistance of Rs 3,000 for accredited journalists while acknowledging their role in the dissemination of information on COVID19.
RBI is expected to discuss about the impact of GST in its monetary policy.
Given the many policy areas where the Centre and the states have not been seeing eye to eye in the last few years, it is time the Modi government convenes a meeting of the Inter-State Council, recommends A K Bhattacharya.
The financial year ending Saturday saw such big-ticket events that set the directional tone for the country's business journey.
Addressing the members of the House, Singh said agriculture is a state subject but the Centre ignored it. "I find it very strange what the government of India wants to do," he said.
'I would like to convey the message to your readers that the prime minister himself is directly seized of the situation on the ground. He periodically reviews the situation on the ground and how it is moving forward, taking inputs from economists, business leaders, chambers of commerce.'
Till such time that a new governance framework comes into being, the progress of reforms in health, education, land, labour, electricity and agriculture could remain fraught with problems, agitations and delays, observes A K Bhattacharya.
The agency attributed the sharp revision to various high-frequency indicators showing a softness and partly blamed the same to reforms like GST, real estate regulation, and the bankruptcy code which are still a "drag" on the economy.
The battle on creating jobs is virtually lost. If the battle for achieving higher growth too is lost, then its political consequences could become difficult to manage, says A K Bhattacharya.
The session, which will continue till August 11, is likely to discuss issues like lynching incidents and vigilantism, the Kashmir situation and the border stand-off with China.
The government last fiscal missed its direct tax collection target, and for this financial year it has set a higher revenue mobilisation goal of Rs 13.80 lakh crore.
If the projections come true, then India would regain the tag of the fastest growing major economy of the world, crossing China with more than 0.7 percentage point in 2018 and an impressive 1.2 percentage point growth lead in 2019.
The demand environment is expected to improve over the next three quarters, aided by a recovery in demand from the construction sector, following release of payments to contractors after elections.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday assured the industry that momentum of economic reforms will continue to make India a hotspot of global investment. India has turned the crisis created by COVID-19 pandemic into an opportunity to push the economic reforms, which remained pending for decades, she said while addressing the National MNC's Conference 2020 organised by industry chamber CII.
Jaitley said a very large number of reforms have taken place over the last few years and that has helped in restoring the credibility of the Indian economy
The transformational reforms like GST, Bankruptcy Code and recapitalisation of banks, Black Money Act, demonetisation, flexible inflation targeting and adoption of fiscal discipline (FRBMA), etc, have temporarily and purposefully pulled us back only to propel us forward with greater velocity, Rajiv Memani.
The industry said if the policy was announced, it would have taken 28 million vehicles bought before March 2005 off the road.
'The government is sincerely working on employment generation. Unfortunately, they are depending on these people from Harvard. Their wrong policies are killing jobs. The government has to come out of the Western framework on which they depend upon a lot.'
The studies found that sectors with the highest unaccounted income included real estate, mining, pharmaceuticals, pan masala, gutkka and tobacco, bullion and commodity markets, film industry, educational institutes and professionals.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has said that the states were free to announce farm loan waivers if they had the fiscal space and that there would be no shortfall this year in divestment and non-tax revenues.
Stating that a weak fiscal position continues to constrain India's sovereign ratings, Fitch said the next government's medium-term fiscal policy will be of particular importance from a rating perspective.
Speaking at an Assocham event, Modi said the recent cut in corporate tax has brought rates to all-time low for businesses, adding that labour force should also be taken care of.
'The fabric of democracy is fraying,' says T V R Shenoy. 'It is being attacked not just by terrorists in Kashmir or by zealots in the North-East, but is being ripped apart even in Allahabad, in the Hindi heartland.'
Nitin Desai suggests some concrete measures to revive investment and boost growth.
After assuming power in 2014 with a full majority of its own, the BJP-led NDA government started an ambitious process of reforming labour laws in the form of codes aimed at making the framework less cumbersome with a variety of alterations. It had planned four codes each for industrial relations, wages, social security and welfare, and occupational safety, health and working conditions. To this end, 35 central labour laws were to be converted into four codes that would have had the virtue of streamlining labour relations. But none of the proposed code Bills could be converted into a law principally because neither trade unions nor industry representatives came on board. They hold the key to India's low-growth-high unemployment paradigm but the government may struggle to push them through this time as well. Somesh Jha explains why
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The ball is now in the Reserve Bank of India's court to lift up demand, says Ajay S Shriram.
'I hope the trend is sustainable and that economic activity accelerates going forward.'
'The IAS officers are after the rich people, the IRS officers are after the middle class and the IPS officers are after the poor. This is the new varnashrama created by the bureaucracy.'
Modi said the ease of doing business ranking improved because the government initiated reforms to end difficulties in the lives of people.
Eminent business journalist and author Tamal Bandyopadhyay discussed Budget with rediff.com readers on Tuesday.
'This year's Budget didn't give into populist measures everyone was expecting after demonetisation, so I think that was a positive step.' 'Hopefully the Budget will continue in the way it has been.'
While naysayers say the economy is on a downward spiral, optimists point out that India has experienced a shift of gears in the realm of policies, thanks to several initiatives of the Narendra Modi government, says Ashok K Lahiri.
'One of the ways to do that is to ensure that NBFCs have got liquidity.' 'If we don't do that, this mood of gloom will continue.' NBFCs need to be provided with liquidity if they have to start lending.
The Budget sets out a comprehensive vision.
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