'We need to put aside our anxieties about the Budget for now and possibly for long, and carry on as best as we can,' advises Shreekant Sambrani.
'Demonetisation, is in principal, a mistake, because it involves a theft -- a taking of private property by the State.' 'It is one of those bad Indian ideas that has been tried twice in the past, with two failures for the record books.' 'This cloud over the economy will probably remain as long as Modi is in power.'
As Modi completes a year in office, his cuts in federal welfare spending on the poorest of India's 1.25 bn people are coming in for sharp criticism.
'30 to 40% of the industry needs to be reskilled as existing jobs will go to automation.' 'Reskilling is required as some existing jobs will not be required in the future.'
'As the world changes, we will be on a constant change programme too,' advertising agency J Walter Thompson Global Chief Executive Officer Tamara Ingram and South Asia CEO Tarun Rai tell Viveat Susan Pinto.
India has not been able to compete with countries such as Bangladesh and Vietnam.
The European Commission urged Greece to stick to commitments it has made to reform its economy as Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras called a snap election within hours of new EU bailout cash arriving in Athens.
'The government's projections for 2019-2020 will be disappointing big time.'
'Public sector banks are like an extended arm of the government.' 'They rush to rescue certain sectors or they rush to invest in certain sectors to prop up the economy which the private banks don't.'
Columnist A K Bhattacharya wonders why is it that the value of investment proposals in 2015 declined by 23 per cent, but the number of jobs to be created through such investments actually went up by 12 per cent.
For 20 years, the stock market headed nowhere, and this has created permanent aversion.
According to a statement available on the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation website, gross domestic product, consumer price index and index of industrial production will now be released at 5.30 in the evening.
Arun Jaitley opted for a fiscal deficit of 3.9% in 2015-16.
The development of the Rih-Tiddim road and establishment of numerous rural "haat" (flee markets) along the Mizoram-Myanmar border would also increase the trade volume, Modi said while addressing a public meeting at the Assam Rifles ground here after inaugurating the 60-MW Tuirial hydro-electric power project.
He urged every investor to follow his steps and invest in Gujarat.
"Reform is not an end in itself. Reform for me is just a way station on the long journey to the destination. The destination is the transformation of India," he said.
The key to job creation is to increase labour participation - draw more people into the labour force and to provide them formal jobs in the organised sectors. Self-employment is not job creation, says, Mahesh Vyas.
'This country today is demonstrating to the world the true meaning of federalism, the true meaning of working in partnership between the central government and the state governments.'
India is unlikely to take any bold move to improve its ties with Pakistan before the next year's general election, a top American intelligence official said on Wednesday.
The Budget may see new rural schemes and stepping up of funding towards existing programmes like MNREGA, rural housing, irrigation projects and crop insurance.
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.
Laying the roadmap of the Narendra Modi government for its second term, President Ram Nath Kovind on Thursday said empowering every person is the main goal for a 'New India' by 2022 on the back of a "stronger mandate" for continuing uninterrupted the journey of development started in 2014.
"I invite each one of you to become a partner in India's growth story. And once again assure you of our wholehearted support."
'What matters is meeting the needs and expectations of the people who have voted to provide governance for the country.'
The two-day media workshop of the Congress began on Monday with Rahul Gandhi emphasising on the need to tone up the party's communication strategy and to institutionalise a framework for it in all states ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.
Mr Prabhu has a big challenge ahead in implementing trade reforms to regain the lost export momentum, says Jayanta Roy.
Political risk culminating from elections in the US and Latin America, and evolving right-wing populism in Europe could lead to substantial volatility, say Abheek Barua & Tushar Arora.
Rating agency Standard and Poor's could upgrade Greece's rock bottom credit rating "pretty quickly"
'Part A of the Budget was like it was written by somebody from the 21st century and Part B was written by somebody from the 19th century.'
Government's objective is to bring down the cost of cultivation through efficient use of fertilisers and agro chemicals, and increase in realisation. It is, thus, planning to connect 200 agricultural mandis with electronic National Agricultural Mandis this year and 225 next year, to enable farmers to sell their produce hassle-free online.
Sensex up just 6.5% while the best returns were during Manmohan Singh, with the Sensex soaring nearly 167.5%.
There will be many steps which will be taken outside the budget.
Prasad appealed to US businesses to invest in the country in a big way specially in ambitious programmes like Make in India
In the mid-1980s, India and the US struggled to arrive at sufficient confidence for Washington to even sell a supercomputer to India for monsoon prospecting. Now, the most sensitive military technologies, data, and intelligence resources are being shared. This would not have happened without that one, big deal that changed the fundamentals of India-US relations, notes Shekhar Gupta.
India's rising GDP may have propelled the middle class to become richer, buy new cars, travel around the world and build assets, but it further pushed the economically disadvantaged and poor into poverty and drudgery, says Devanik Saha.
Companies stand to benefit in longer term from comparative pricing landscape
'A breakthrough in eastern Ladakh leading to disengagement and creation of a buffer zone will obviate the need of military deployment through the winter months ahead,' notes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'If we play our cards right, we may even benefit from the competition between the US and China as seen from increased investment from each of these countries into India.' 'The size of our market gives us an important lever of power which we shall have to play adroitly and intelligently,' points out Ambassador Gautam Bambawale -- who served as India's envoy to China -- in the Professor V M Dandekar Memorial Lecture 2019, delivered on March 8, 2019 in Pune.
He said both countries are opening new areas of cooperation in the energy sector, telecommunications and science and technology and they have set up funds to facilitate investment in high technologies.