This quintessential angry, forever-young public intellectual even in his eighties, breathed his last on November 28, 2024, at Kolkata.

While the general election result has forced the government to address the jobless growth problem in the Union budget, the manner in which it has done so betrays its adherence to supply-side economic dogmatism.

Under the Congress-led UPA government (2004-14), the gross debt of Union government came down from 67% to 53%. However, it has gone up from 53% to 58% since the current government took power in 2014.

In 'State Capitalism: Why SOEs Matter and the Challenges They Face', author Lalita Som tracks the evolution of modern state capitalism the world over, and its manifestation in various countries, including in India.

To delve deeper into the impact of market-oriented reforms on the economy, we undertake a comparative evaluation of India's long-term macroeconomic performance and human development record, over the past four decades.

It is obvious that the government is relying on a private sector-led recovery. Sadly, such expectations have never materialised in the past, neither in India nor abroad.

In the backdrop of an economic slowdown, the rich are more likely to add to their financial savings rather than invest or consume.

The state finance minister's budget speech relied less on evidence and more on hyperbole.

Fuel should be brought under the GST regime and the pro-corporate bias of the revenue mobilisation strategy needs to be corrected.

While international prices have fallen sharply from an annual average of $105 per barrel in 2013-14 to $46 per barrel in 2015-16 and 2016-17, the Centre has hiked excise duties on petrol and diesel over nine times.

The Budget estimates of gross tax revenues for 2017-18 are the same as the revised estimates for 2016-17 – 11.3% of GDP.

Despite the distress signals, Arun Jaitley has chosen to strictly adhere to a conservative fiscal stance in his successive budgets, prioritising deficit reduction over everything else.

Instead of focussing on people’s issues and movements outside the parliamentary arena, the CPI(M) leadership has continued to preoccupy itself with a sterile debate over an electoral alliance with the Congress in Bengal.

Mamata Bannerjee has reneged on all promises, but there is no political force to challenge her