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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.

Schisms and Appeasement in Western Vidarbha

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As the Assembly polls loom, Amravati district in Western Vidarbha is turning into a microcosm for coalition schisms as well as appeasement of established players. A striking instance is the Daryapur Assembly segment where the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena has announced Abhijit Adsul as the Mahayuti’s candidate. This decision has ignited tensions with incumbent MLA Ravi Rana, an independent supporting the BJP who has asserted that Adsul is unwelcome not just in Daryapur but throughout the district. The situation has posed problems for the Mahayuti in western Vidarbha besides triggering old tensions between the Ranas and the Adsul family.


Ahead of the Lok Sabha this year, the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) decision to nominate independent MP Navneet Rana for the Amravati Lok Sabha seat had sparked significant dissent within the ruling Mahayuti coalition, with Abhijit’s father - former Lok Sabha MP Anandrao Adsul, a prominent figure in the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena - calling his ally, the BJP’s choice of Navneet Rana as “political suicide.” Despite indicating that Abhijit would contest against Navneet Rana as an independent in the Lok Sabha, the coalition schism was averted.


Now, with the Shiv Sena intent on placating the Adsul family comeback, the dynamics are fraught again. Ravi Rana, the MLA from Badnera, remains at daggers drawn with the Adsul clan, alleging that Adsul had engaged in a smear campaign against his wife, Navneet Rana, during the Lok Sabha election.


To make matters worse, Ravi Rana has enlisted former BJP Ramesh Bundile into his Yuva Swabhiman Party, aiming to consolidate support and mount a formidable challenge against Adsul in Daryapur.


In the 2014 assembly elections, Bundile had emerged victorious in Daryapur by a substantial margin of 19,582 votes, trouncing Abhijit Adsul, then a sitting Shiv Sena MLA.


Meanwhile, another bitter foe of the Ranas - Bacchu Kadu, leader of the Prahar Jan Shakti party, has asserted that Maharashtra favoured the ‘third front’ of the Parivartan Mahashakti, led by Sambhajiraje Chhatrapati of Maharashtra Swarajya Paksha, himself and Raju Shetti of the Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghatana.


Kadu, the incumbent MLA from Achalpur, was once a Mahayuti ally who was broken away from the ruling coalition. The BJP has fielded Pravin Tayade to supplant the formidable Kadu, a four-term consecutive legislator.


Meanwhile, the opposition Congress– the most prominent of the three Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) partners in this belt - is turning to its seasoned veterans in a bid to reclaim its strongholds in western Vidarbha. In Amravati, the party has nominated former women and child development minister Yashomati Thakur from Teosa, former minister Sunil Desmukh, former MLA Virendra Jagtap from Dhamangaon Railway, and Aniruddha Deshmukh, the Congress district president from Achalpur.


All four candidates are set to face their traditional opponents in the upcoming elections. Notably, aside from Thakur, the other three candidates suffered defeats in the 2019 assembly elections. Jagtap, making his seventh bid for election, is joined by Thakur in her fifth attempt and Bablu Deshmukh, who is vying for the seat for the third time. Deshmukh’s return marks his first candidacy after a 15-year hiatus; he previously ran as a BJP candidate in 2019, losing to Congress’s Sulbha Khodke, before rejoining Congress three years ago.

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