Development and Taxation

This volume is a collection of selected critical commentaries on various aspects of the Indian and global economies. The author has used a mix of verbal and graphical tools, comprising his thoughts on economic, political economy and social challenges and incorporating analysis, conclusions, and recommendations on those issues. The articles address macroeconomic concerns including the estimation of GDP, savings and growth, inflation and interest rates, financial markets, demonitisation of the currency, land acquisition, and others. They analyse fiscal policy and taxation matters including tax evasion and corruption, and the struggle to improve the ease of doing business. Emerging international economic relations including United Kingdom’s leaving the European Union and India’s economic and strategic relations with Japan, China, Latin America, and, last but not least, with Pakistan, are addressed. Issues emerging from the Group of 20 Nations (G20) are not ignored. On socio-economic aspects, India’s challenges and failures in designing and implementing a range of socio-economic policies are addressed. Health and palliative care, cleaning up India, quality deterioration in the Indian Railways, and the failure to educate Indian youth, are taken up. A selection of essays with political economy and socio-historical perspectives concludes with a final philosophical note—that thoughts can comprise ideas, thus summing up, as it were, the overall stance in the narrative of the included commentaries.