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Correspondent

23 August 2024 at 4:29:04 pm

Festive Surge

India’s bazaars have glittered this Diwali with the unmistakable glow of consumer confidence. The country’s festive sales crossed a staggering Rs. 6 lakh crore with goods alone accounting for Rs. 5.4 lakh crore and services contributing Rs. 65,000 crore. More remarkable still, the bulk of this spending flowed through India’s traditional markets rather than e-commerce platforms. After years of economic caution and digital dominance, Indians are once again shopping in person and buying local....

Festive Surge

India’s bazaars have glittered this Diwali with the unmistakable glow of consumer confidence. The country’s festive sales crossed a staggering Rs. 6 lakh crore with goods alone accounting for Rs. 5.4 lakh crore and services contributing Rs. 65,000 crore. More remarkable still, the bulk of this spending flowed through India’s traditional markets rather than e-commerce platforms. After years of economic caution and digital dominance, Indians are once again shopping in person and buying local. This reversal owes much to policy. The recent rationalisation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) which trimmed rates across categories from garments to home furnishings, has given consumption a timely push. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s September rate cuts, combined with income tax relief and easing interest rates, have strengthened household budgets just as inflation softened. The middle class, long squeezed between rising costs and stagnant wages, has found reason to spend again. Retailers report that shoppers filled their bags with everything from lab-grown diamonds and casual wear to consumer durables and décor, blurring the line between necessity and indulgence. The effect has been broad-based. According to Crisil Ratings, 40 organised apparel retailers, who together generate roughly a third of the sector’s revenue, could see growth of 13–14 percent this financial year, aided by a 200-basis-point bump from GST cuts alone. Small traders too have flourished. The Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) estimates that 85 percent of total festive trade came from non-corporate and traditional markets, a robust comeback for brick-and-mortar retail that had been under siege from online rivals. This surge signals a subtle but significant cultural shift. The “Vocal for Local” and “Swadeshi Diwali” campaigns struck a patriotic chord, with consumers reportedly preferring Indian-made products to imported ones. Demand for Chinese goods fell sharply, while sales of Indian-manufactured products rose by a quarter over last year. For the first time in years, “buying Indian” has become both an act of economic participation and of national pride. The sectoral spread of this boom underlines its breadth. Groceries and fast-moving consumer goods accounted for 12 percent of the total, gold and jewellery 10 percent, and electronics 8 percent. Even traditionally modest categories like home furnishings, décor and confectionery recorded double-digit growth. In the smaller towns that anchor India’s consumption story, traders say stable prices and improved affordability kept registers ringing late into the festive weekend. Yet, much of this buoyancy rests on a fragile equilibrium. Inflation remains contained, and interest rates have been eased, but both could tighten again. Sustaining this spurt will require continued fiscal prudence and regulatory clarity, especially as digital commerce continues to expand its reach. Yet for now, the signs are auspicious. After years of subdued demand and inflationary unease, India’s shoppers appear to have rediscovered their appetite for consumption and their faith in domestic enterprise. The result is not only a record-breaking Diwali, but a reaffirmation of the local marketplace as the heartbeat of India’s economy.

Lawless Maharashtra

Updated: Oct 22, 2024

The recent murder of veteran politician Baba Siddique, a former Maharashtra minister and a leader of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), has sparked a sharp debate over the state’s deteriorating law and order. Shot dead by three assailants outside his son’s office in Mumbai’s Bandra, Siddique’s murder casts a long shadow over Maharashtra’s once-vaunted reputation as a progressive state that was India’s commercial powerhouse and a secure haven for its citizens.


Two suspects have been apprehended, while authorities continue the search for a third. The crime branch is probing various motives, from business rivalry to contract killing linked to a Slum Rehabilitation Authority (SRA) project.


The Opposition, from the Congress to NCP (SP) supremo Sharad Pawar have lambasted the state’s leadership for allowing such a brazen crime to occur in Mumbai, India’s financial capital. Earlier this year, Ganpat Gaikwad, a BJP MLA, was arrested for allegedly shooting a Shiv Sena leader, Mahesh Gaikwad, inside a police station in Ulhasnagar, over a land dispute. The normalization of such violence—where even elected officials resort to firearms in the presence of law enforcement—signals a dangerous erosion of state authority.


For many, the Siddique murder signals something far more ominous than just a contractual dispute gone awry. It begs the question whether Maharashtra has begun to slide into a state of lawlessness akin to the bad old days of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, states infamous for political violence, contract killings, and corruption?


Back then, Bihar’s law and order situation was synonymous with the infamous sobriquet of the ‘Jungle Raj’ where figures like Mohammad Shahabuddin wielded control through violence, using contract killings as a tool for political and business rivalries, as in the 1998 killing of Brij Bihari Prasad, a former Bihar minister, who was gunned down inside a Patna hospital. Similarly, Uttar Pradesh, once India’s equivalent of the ‘Wild West’, saw high-profile murders like the 2005 assassination of BJP MLA Krishnanand Rai, who was killed in broad daylight.


But Maharashtra’s law and order problem has not just been confined to political violence. A growing sense of impunity now pervades society as well, leading to a perception of a broader collapse of the social fabric. The murky attempts at cover-up in the Pune Porsche case, where the inebriated teenage son of a prominent realtor fatally rammed his luxury car into two IT professionals on a bike, underscores how deeply ingrained corruption and privilege have become in the state’s justice system. Despite widespread outrage, the authorities’ handling of the case raised questions about the state’s willingness to hold the wealthy accountable. The breakdown of law and order across Maharashtra, from politically motivated killings to the mishandling of heinous crimes, has led to an alarming perception: something is rotten in the state of Maharashtra, to paraphrase Shakespeare’s Hamlet.

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