Blogs

Recently there was a lot of brouhaha on the behaviour of some tourists on the tarmac in a Vietnamese airport. That might have been cringey and perhaps weird but it’s not a habit. On the other hand, we suffer the small habitual vandalism of public life by people. These are not evil people. Evil requires…

Whenever I told anyone that I was a journalist for several years before I turned to teaching, the standard musing would be: ‘So how does the gentle pace of a classroom compare to the frenetic pace of the newsroom?’ The reality is that I carried all the frenetic pace into the classroom. And it was…

Somewhere between one and two million years ago, a group of early humans encountered fire. Not for the first time, probably. But this time, they stayed. They sat with it, tended it through the night, and set off a chain of consequences so profound that we are still living inside them. We are being asked,…

Dowry is one of the most damaging social evils in India. It reduces marriage to a financial transaction, burdens families, commodifies daughters, and fuels greed. There can be no justification for this practice. No one should demand dowry, and no one should offer it. Yet, if we genuinely want to eradicate dowry, we must acknowledge…

Two incidents shocked Delhi recently: a building collapse in Saket and a fire at a bed and breakfast in Malviya Nagar, which killed 21 people. Not many would have noticed the exact locations of these sites. The first accident was in Said- ul-Ajaib village (near Saket) and the second one in Hauz Rani village (near…

Economic theory says that for individuals a graded income tax rate based on income levels is a ‘progressive’ method of taxation and an indirect tax method on goods and services (not looking at the income level of the spender / purchaser) is a ‘regressive’ manner of taxation.  In India, we have income tax (direct tax…

Nature brings not only life but also natural disasters. Such moments test the resilience of governance as much as they test the endurance of people. Whether it is storms, torrential rains, or lightning strikes, these calamities often leave behind widespread devastation. A farmer’s standing crop can be destroyed within moments. Roofs can be blown away….

In bad times, some jobs/businesses thrive: lawyers, arms-makers. Chaos dividend is real  This is going to break your heart – assuming you are one of the vast majority, which has only seen a modest, and that’s putting it kindly, salary increase. Across law firms, increments are expected to be in the 10-20% range this year….

Modi is now India’s longest-serving, democratically elected prime minister. This surpasses Nehru’s record. More importantly, it speaks volumes about how democracy hasn’t just survived, but thrived in India.Nehru was chosen to be the country’s first PM in 1947, under extraordinary circumstances, from among several equally talented and dedicated men. Read full story on TOI+ Facebook…

Valuing equities is usually an exercise in bounded delusion. Analysts forecast unit sales, model software subscriptions, and adjust discount rates until a preferred valuation acquires the appearance of science. But even by those forgiving standards, SpaceX presents a novelty: How exactly is one meant to discount the future cash flows of a million-person colony on…