Defence hike in Budget disappointing. Incremental, piecemeal approach is perilous

India’s 6.3 per cent hike over the outgoing year’s defence spending is disappointing. With pensions and salaries consuming half of India’s budget, capital procurement suffers even as a menacing China-Pakistan nexus thrives in the neighbourhood. This incremental, piecemeal approach is perilous. Complacency can’t be a strategy that India can afford.

Budget 2025 shows privatisation is dead in the water. Govt has no new ideas

Income tax relief in Budget 2025 brought the glitz, but a lack of true reforms has revealed a certain drabness. The one big recent reform—privatisation—is dead in the water. There’s an increasingly pervasive sense that the government has no new ideas, and lacks the will, courage to look.

Budget 2025 corrects anomaly in nuclear liability law. It’s an offer to transactional Trump

Budget 2025 finally corrects an anomaly in nuclear liability law. It’s Modi government’s pragmatic offer to a transactional Trump. Yes, it was BJP that forced the anti-business supplier clause . But it’s a new world now. And Modi knows consistency for the sake of it is the virtue of fools.