Topic: Indian Liberals Matter

It is not State aggrandisement that has to explain and justify itself but the claims of human liberty and individuality, libertarian commentator MA Venkata Rao wrote in 1958.

To every economic policy, we must apply the acid test—how far will it bend our people to fruitful ends and how far will it dissipate them in coping with a bumbling bureaucracy, Palkhivala wrote in 1977.

The biggest capitalist has to consider what the smallest man in the market wants. This is how the consumer is king and this is what is called a free market economy, Minoo Masani wrote in 1966.

Demonetisation is no terror to politicians, officials and big businessmen who had enough notice to take necessary precautions. It'll catch dumb goats, not black sheep, Prof BP Adarkar said in 1973.

The immediate benefit of Single Tax would be to reduce the sale prices of land to nominal ones. Landowners would no longer find it profitable to keep idle lands, wrote DM Kulkarni in 1960.

Crowded cities are rich because there is greater division of labour. The extent of the division of labour depends on the size of the market, wrote Sauvik Chakraverti in 2002.

The totalitarian states indeed are never tired of claiming a legal basis for their action and are too eager to make use of conventional legal institutions to further their ends, said Justice HR Khanna in 1980.

Rabindranath Tagore stood apart from his contemporaries by infusing poetry and universalism into Indian nationalism, opposing chauvinism and blind obedience, wrote A Ranganathan in 1962.

An Indian Hitler will have to be exceptionally lucky to survive for any length of time. This much hope ought to be enough for seekers of liberty and equality, wrote Sharad Anantrao Joshi, president of Swatantra Bharat Paksh party, in 1995.

A free-market system based on consumer sovereignty, with the state confined to essential public functions would generate much faster growth, Shenoy wrote in 1963.