Import tariffs are not an economic consideration for the government of India anyway, with data from Budget 2025-26 showing that customs duty isn’t a key revenue source.
While tax has proved Nirmala Sitharaman’s strong suit, there have been policy negatives as well, including under-performance on privatisation and failure to fix banking mess.
Swadeshi has found a new wind in Indian politics as a form of popular resistance to China. But raising barriers to Chinese imports only affects those lower down the income pyramid.
Share of Indian export to Asian countries has dropped in the past decade despite forging major free trade alliances but it has gone up in traditional markets like US and Europe.
To boost exports, India must accept its challenge is internal, even though it keeps raising fingers at unfavourable external factors like trade protectionism.
For India, this is not an opportunity for schadenfreude but rather a reflection of shared responsibility. It's what happens when the governance framework underpinning economic growth is weakened.
Research paper, however, finds lowest indebtedness level among Muslims at 12.3% & highest among Hindus at 14.9%. Overall national financial inclusion level at 87.2%, indebtedness at 14.7%.
Fresh details of operation conducted by IAF, Army have come out in gazette notification giving citations of those who were awarded Vir Chakra for their bravery.
On 21 Oct, a buzz went up that the govt had released full list of gallantry award recipients along with Op Sindoor citations. I put an AI caddy on the job. It took me into a never-ending rabbit hole.
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