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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.

Students who engineered the change feel defeated

Updated: Oct 22, 2024

Out of 158 coordinators 40 have quit; others looking way around

Students
ree

Kolkata: The platform, which led the Anti-Discrimination Students Movement in Bangladesh, culminating to a regime change and end of the 15-year-old powerful Sheikh Hasina government is on its way out. At least so it appears, given the propensity among student leaders to resign from the post of coordinators.


Out of 158 student coordinators about 40 have already put in their papers. The number is increasing every day, which in a way vindicates that students no longer feel in tune with what is happening in Bangladesh.


Though the coordinators have not officially cited the reason for exit, they made no bones to say that their job has gone redundant, post the formation of the interim government. Asked to explain as to why the feeling of redundancy has crept in, a student leader of Jagannath Vishwavidyalaya (Jagannath University) said “coordinators are no longer needed because the job of coordination is over.”


Prodded further on this, he admitted that a majoritarian voice is calling the shots in the current dispensation. “Those who are numerically strong, be it politically or in terms of community, are playing a decisive role in the current state of affairs. We are closely watching the situation. Nobody should forget that students brought down a powerful autocratic government and therefore weeding out radical fundamentalists from the system wouldn’t be a difficult job,” said the same leader on condition of anonymity


The caretaker Cabinet of Bangladesh under Muhammad Yunus has 20 advisers and six special positions under the Chief Adviser. The team is a motley group but indirect presence or influence of right wing party like Hefazat-e-Islam and radicals like Jamaat-e-Islam cannot be ruled out. Two frontrunners of the student’s movement, Nahid Islam and Asif Mahmud have found their place in the cabinet. “The faces we see in the Cabinet apparently may be harmless but no one knows who they represent or hold allegiance to,” said a source. And above everything else, what is worrisome is the sudden emergence of the banned outfit—Hizb ut-Tahrir, a pan Islamist rganization, outlawed by the Bangladesh government in under Anti-Terrorism Act.

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