Words are Weariness

Let us leave Utopia behind and take only India forward. The danger of failing aggregate demand in a consumption led economy is that it can exacerbate the fiscal deficit when the tax revenues taking a beating. For example, the recent budget present by Nirmala had an assumption of around 25% increase in the tax revenue of the Govt. However with lack of demand in the economy, the GST revenue which was expected to average around 1.14 lakh crores each month is just going to hover over 1 lakh crore per month only ( almost same as last year) if things continue the way they are the rest of the financial year. This is also the reason why GST rates should not be reduced. It is a remedy that will only worsen the disease, though the car industry is clamouring for it. This will put paid to Govt’s resolve to maintain the fiscal deficit at 3.3% as envisaged in the budget. Govt is hoping , against hope - I think, that the remainder of the year will see a pick up in demand with good monsoon  and ...

First things first. “All that Jazz” is the title of a famous movie by Bob Fosse. It is a  semi-autobiographical fantasy screenplay where Fosse acts as screen character Gideon. It is therefore a truly unsympathetic look at his own life. Gideon that we see in the movie is a constant womaniser, drug and alcohol abuser and chain smoker who has sex with a different dancer every night and virtually a reckless and a moral-less scoundrel.  It is a movie is an ultimate act of self-flagellation. Foss died 7 or 8 years after the movie was made and the movie was released after his death. Now what that has to do with the Indian economy? We will see at the end of this series of posts. We see the growth slowing down to 5% and some say even this is dubious. Inflation is no doubt very low and very benign - a silver lining. This is for sure as we see it in our direct experience.  Companies have excess capacity though they have not invested in creating fresh capacity las...

My earliest spiritual experiences have been, not surprisingly, in the cricket field, for that was the only thing I did with devotion in the first twenty years of my life. I would recall them like this: I am standing in the slip cordon. The focus is on the bowler as he runs up, the ball leaves his hand and I have no thoughts as my mind is fully focussed on the ball curving in the air or off the pitch, the ball takes a faint edge and flies towards me; at this moment it is as if there is perfect absence of mind or a separate self, as if I am just part of the scene - there is no me , no batsman , no bowler, no sense of time,  no anything —just the pure consciousness of being part of the scene unfolding in a split second. It is awareness without any subject and object relationship -awareness being aware of itself without a separate ‘I’ to witness. It is concisousness expereincing itself.   The ball some how lodges in the hand - If the focus is on the effort , the...