Ashok K. Kantha

iStock.com/Pavliha

When Investor Protection Prevents Investors From Selling

The market thinks lower circuits protect investors. Rajesh Exports shows they can also prevent investors from selling.

Krishnadevan V

RBI Has Bought Time, Reforms Must Do the Rest

India’s central bank has secured breathing room amid mounting external pressures. Whether that respite endures now depends on reforms beyond Mint Street.

Srinath Sridharan

Anand Venkatanarayanan

What SpaceX's IPO Tells Us About the AI Bubble

Bubbles are hard to spot in real time, but a rush of big-ticket share sales has often been one warning sign investors ignore.

Vivek Kaul

Beyond Minimum Wages: Karnataka and India's Search for a New Growth Compact

It is important for India to look at other measures such as lower transaction costs, faster business approvals and a more predictable regulatory environment to strengthen workers, without weakening competitiveness.

Arvind Mayaram

Should India Create More Cooperative Banks, or Better Banks?

As the RBI considers issuing new cooperative bank licences after a 22-year pause, the real question is whether India needs more banks at all or better banks.

Alpana Killawala

Strategic Oil Reserves: India’s Insurance Against Conflict

As frozen conflicts reshape energy security, India must expand strategic oil reserves to reduce supply risks, tame price shocks and build resilience.

Michael Debabrata Patra

Columnists

Michael Debabrata Patra

Michael Patra is an economist and former RBI Deputy Governor.

Abheek Barua

Abheek is an Independent Economist and the Former Chief Economist at HDFC Bank.

Ajay Srivastava

Ajay Srivastava is the founder of the Global Trade Research Initiative.

Vijay Chauhan

Vijay Singh Chauhan, a former IRS official, is a Senior Visiting Fellow at ICPP, Ashoka University

Dhananjay Sinha

Dhananjay, a D-School alum, is CEO and Co-Head of Equities at Systematix Group.

Kirti Tarang Pande

Kriti is a psychologist specialising in mental health, org behaviour, and brand strategy

Srinath Sridharan

Srinath is an author, corporate advisor, and independent director on corporate boards.

Sharmila Chavaly

Ex-civil servant Chavaly held key Railways, Finance roles; specialises in infra & PPPs

Nilanjan Banik

Nilanjan Banik, Professor at Mahindra University, specialises in trade and development economics.

Rahul Ghosh

Rahul Ghosh is a banking and risk expert.

Rajesh Mahapatra

Rajesh Mahapatra is the former Editor of The Press Trust of India

Krishnadevan V

Krishnadevan is Editorial Director at BasisPoint Insight.

Dev Chandrasekhar

Chandra advises companies on big-picture narratives on strategy and markets.

Kalyan Ram

Kalyan Ram co-founded Cogencis. He now leads BasisPoint Insight.

R. Gurumurthy

Gurumurthy is an ex-central banker who handled markets, and later, financial stability for RBI.

Arvind Mayaram

Arvind Mayaram, former Finance Secretary, is Chairman of the Institute of Development Studies, Jaipur.

The Bureau

Benchmarks Extend Losses as West Asia Tensions, IT Selloff Weigh

Benchmarks End Flat as Financial Gains Offset West Asia-Driven Selloff

Foreign Money Returns but Conviction Remains Short

Highlights Of India’s BoP For January-March 2025-26

Services Cushion India’s BoP as Trade Gap, FPI Outflows Bite

RBI MPC raises India FY27 CPI inflation forecast to 5.1% from 4.6% earlier

RBI Opens Fresh Routes For Capital Inflows As Rupee Pressure Builds

Flawed Design, Poor Planning Make Extreme Heat Conditions Worse For Indian Cities

Learning to Shoot: I Tried to Fly Before I Could Walk

Groupthink

RBI Cannot Afford to Look Through This Shock

The RBI's own forecasts suggest it cannot ignore energy and food shocks. Rising core inflation may require rates to move back towards 6%.

BasisPoint Groupthink

Monetary Policy

RBI Defends the Framework, Not the Rupee

The RBI chose capital-flow measures over rate action, reinforcing the principle that inflation and growth, not the exchange rate, remain monetary policy's primary mandate.

BasisPoint Groupthink

The Central Banking Desk: ECB, India’s 16-Month High CPI

Daily insights on the decisions, signals and risks shaping central-bank policy across the world's major economies.

BasisPoint Insight

Learning to Live with Impossible Trinity

An effort to understand current monetary policy actions as the RBI navigates the impossible trinity of inflation, growth and external stability.

Arvind Chari

Monetary Policy's New Catch-22

With consumer inflation appearing repressed despite mounting price pressures, the RBI's decision to prioritise capital inflows over rate hikes carries growing risks.

Rupa Rege Nitsure

Opinion

Capital Measures Buy Time, Credibility Wins Capital

India's latest capital-flow measures can buy time and attract dollars, but history suggests that credibility, not financial engineering, determines if such bridges hold.

V Thiagarajan

SpaceX Is the New East India Company

Although SpaceX is not about to rule over foreign subjects, as the chartered companies founded in the early modern era did, it, too, is operating beyond the reach of any sovereign. And like its predecessors, it has already accumulated immense powers that governments will struggle to reclaim.

Alessio Terzi and Stefano Marcuzzi

Can RBI's Capital Flow Push Offset Global Yield Pressures?

The RBI has opened the door wider for foreign capital. Whether investors step in will depend less on policy changes and more on where global yields head next.

Yashveer Singh

Has The Market Overpriced India's Rate Risk?

Markets may have mistaken a funding and BoP problem for an interest-rate problem. RBI's latest measures could ease pressure on OIS, yields and the rupee.

Yield Scribe

Seventeen Years After Satyam, Who Audits The Auditors?

Auditors are paid by companies they examine, but trusted by investors and lenders. Cases like Rajesh Exports raise questions about who they truly serve.

Krishnadevan V

Why Oil Price Spike May Trigger Supply Wave

Today’s oil shortage could keep prices volatile near term, but sustained high prices may spur new supply and alternative routes.

Anuj Agarwal

A Tale of Two Forces: Navigating India's Exogenous and Endogenous Factors

While India cannot do much for external factors, it is time the government takes a strong look at what reforms it can bring in to stabilise the economy and lead the next phase of growth.

Nilanjan Banik

From Oil Shocks to Supply Chain Shocks, India Must Rethink Resilience

India has largely overcome the vulnerabilities of 1991. The next external shock may arrive through supply chains, technology and trade networks.

Shilpashree Venkatesh

Karnataka Minimum Wage Hike: Good for Workers, Worrisome for Enterprises

The state government has notified a 60% hike in minimum wages in the state. What it must now do is support organisations to be able to afford it.

Sharmila Kantha

Indonesia’s Resource Nationalism: Is India Ready with a Plan?

Indonesia’s push towards resource nationalism could reshape global commodity trade. With India reliant on Indonesian palm oil, coal, and nickel, is New Delhi prepared to secure supplies and manage emerging risks?

G. Chandrashekhar

Behind the Suzlon 2.0 Vision Is the Outline of an InvIT

The wind major has rebuilt itself into four businesses and pledged to quadruple both its annual sales and the fleet it services by 2031. Its most valuable promise is a swelling base of annuity assets, the kind of cashflow that tends to end up packaged and listed.

Dev Chandrasekhar

Opinion

FX Measures Could Attract Up to $75 Billion of Debt Inflows

FCNR deposits, ECB incentives and foreign investment reforms could help offset persistent equity outflows and strengthen India's external position.

Yield Scribe

Ten-Year Yield May Drift To 7.25-7.50% By March

The RBI’s rupee-support package should give gilts near-term respite, but inflation, fiscal risks and the expected turn in the policy cycle could push up yields.

Shubhada Rao, Vivek Kumar, and Yuvika Singhal

Cockroaches, Central Banks and the Business of Trust

A protest movement found its mascot, the RBI found some breathing room, and corporate India carried on as usual.

Phynix

When Good News Turns Bad for Markets

A strong US jobs report rattled markets, exposing the tension between resilient growth, stubborn inflation, elevated rates and stretched AI valuations.

Dhananjay Sinha

Beyond Signing FTAs: What India's Trade Strategy Needs Next

India is poised to operationalise multiple FTAs. But with low rates and industrial policy misaligned with trade objectives, agreements alone may not be enough.

Rochelle Prakash

Deep Pal

The Limits of Military Technology?

Weapons evolve, battlefields change, technology advances. Yet wars are still decided by human endurance, conviction and will.

Lt Gen Syed Ata Hasnain (Retd)

Monetary Policy

FX Firewall Buys the RBI Time

The rupee no longer needs rescuing through rates, but inflation may still require 50-75 bps of tightening in the months ahead.

Shailendra Jhingan

India's Growth Puzzle Is Really About Capability

India's growth challenge may lie less in capital or demand and more in whether the economy is building capabilities to compete, innovate, and move up the value chain.

Arvind Mayaram

Monetary Policy

RBI’s Capital Inflow Bet Buys Time, Not a Solution

The RBI has chosen capital-account tools over interest rates to tackle external pressures. The strategy may ease near-term stress, but deeper vulnerabilities remain.

Dhananjay Sinha

Monetary Policy

Dollars Now, Rates Later

RBI's June policy separated tools and timing: BoP stress got an immediate response, while inflation must clear a higher threshold before rates move.

Kalyan Ram

Week in Numbers: Tracking India’s Economic Pulse

The Indian economy grew faster than expected in January-March, even as the RBI cut its 2026-27 growth forecast by 30 bps to 6.6%.

Datametricx

Monetary Policy

RBI's Dollar Toolkit May Be Too Small for the Problem

The latest measures may attract incremental inflows at the margin. They are unlikely to generate the scale of capital needed to materially ease external-sector pressures.

V Thiagarajan

Monetary Policy

The MPC’s Most Overdue Cut

Friday’s MPC may leave the repo untouched, but markets want Malhotra to trim Goldilocks, resilience, robustness, nimbleness, and other overworked clichés.

BasisPoint Insight

Monetary Policy

The Rupee Does Not Need a Speaking Role in Monetary Policy

The June review will be scrutinised for clues on how the MPC views rupee weakness, as an inflation risk or as a monetary policy consideration.

BasisPoint Groupthink

Geopolitics

The US and India Have Become Regional Rivals

While the US views India as a counterweight to China in Asia, it balks at the idea of Indian regional dominance, preferring a pluralistic order. The Trump administration has gone further by pursuing close ties with Pakistan, apparently hoping that the US and India can remain global partners.

Brahma Chellaney

Monetary Policy

Using Monetary Policy’s Degrees of Freedom

Calls for rate hikes to support the rupee overlook the flexibility built into India’s inflation-targeting framework and the RBI’s wider toolkit.

Ashima Goyal

Cockroaches May Be Videshi, But The Rot Is Desi

This is the inflection point before a steep decline in the bell curve of the people’s trust in the government. If it cannot even conduct annual exams diligently, how can it make people’s lives better?

Rajesh Ramachandran

What is More Desirable from a Central Bank – Surplus or Strength?

Markets cheered the RBI's record surplus transfer. The bigger debate is whether strength, not surplus, should be a central bank's priority.

Alpana Killawala

Monetary Policy

External Stress Needs a Monetary Anchor

Persistent BoP stress may need pre-emptive rate hikes before currency weakness hardens inflation expectations.

Dhiraj Nim

India’s Fiscal Architecture Cannot Manage Two Demographic Futures

As southern India ages and the north remains demographically young, NFHS-6 shows up the limits of a fiscal architecture designed for convergence.

Sagari Gupta

Monetary Policy

Every RBI Word, Said and Unsaid, Will Matter This Week

Markets expect no surprise on rates. Their attention will instead be fixed on the signals, nuances and omissions that reveal how the RBI views inflation, growth and uncertainty.

Srinath Sridharan

Rememberance

Keynes Was Doing Buffett Before Buffett Was Born

Not on Wall Street. On Trinity Street, Cambridge, UK — a generation before Buffett and Munger, forty years before behavioural finance had a name.

Chandrika Soyantar

Masterclass with Michael Patra

Central Banking 101: RBI and the Safeguarding of Confidence

Michael Patra traces the evolution of the RBI and its role in safeguarding trust, stability and confidence in India’s financial system in his NIBM lecture. This is part two of the Masterclass series.

Michael Debabrata Patra

When ESOPs Create Debt Before They Create Wealth

How SEBI's ESOP pledge ruling affects designated employees, insider-trading risk and the growing debt trap inside India's startup economy.

Krishnadevan V

Monetary Policy

Malhotra's “Whatever It Takes” Moment

Capital outflows, balance of payments pressures, and slowing deposit growth may require coordinated RBI-government action to attract dollars and funding.

Yield Scribe

How a Wartime Rent Freeze Became Mumbai's Strange Inheritance

What began as a wartime safeguard for tenants evolved into something few anticipated: inherited access to some of Mumbai's most valuable addresses.

Aadya Tyagi

Unilever's India Party Meets Reliance's Guest List

Unilever is betting heavily on India through HUL. Can premiumisation, distribution strength and brand acquisitions justify its valuation?

Krishnadevan V

Monetary Policy

The RBI's June Dilemma: Credibility Without the Hike

The macro backdrop has deteriorated materially since April. But the case for a June rate hike is weaker than the market noise suggests.

Radhika Piplani

Monetary Policy

Risk-Reward Trade-Off Favours a Hawkish Hold by RBI MPC

RBI may hold rates, but rupee pressure, crude risks and Taylor-rule arithmetic argue for a more hawkish policy tone.

Abhishek Upadhyay

Monetary Policy

Will RBI Bite the Bullet or Kick the Can Down the Road, Again?

As inflation risks mount and the rupee weakens, questions grow over whether the RBI delayed policy action despite warning signals.

Abhiman Das

Smita Roy Trivedi

India's Problem Is Not the Storm; It is the Lull Before

External shocks will come and go. The real test of an economy is whether its institutions, productivity and competitiveness are strong enough to withstand them.

R. Gurumurthy

BasisPoint Groupthink

India May Need an Outside-In Economic Reset

As the global economy changes shape, India may benefit from an independent economic rethink led by a credible outsider with institutional gravitas.

Kalyan Ram

Bank Indonesia Has Chosen Currency Defence Over Comfort

The rupiah’s slide left Bank Indonesia with shrinking room for patience. The 50-bp hike is as much about credibility as inflation.

BasisPoint Groupthink

Opinion

Is India’s Energy Shock the Same as the Pandemic Shock?

The RBI appears willing to look through the oil shock, but inflation risks are structurally different from the COVID-era disruptions that justified prolonged accommodation.

Kalyan Ram

Health Cess Promise Lost in Fiscal Accounting

CAG findings show that more than half the health cess collected over seven years was not transferred to the designated fund.

D. V. Ramana

El Nino May Lower Harvest; But Won’t Compromise Food Security

The southwest monsoon may be deficient, but significant procurement in the past has ensured that India has adequate supply of foodgrain for her population.so

G. Chandrashekhar

Geopolitics

Why There Will be No Single Model of Future War?

Future wars may not follow one template as Ukraine, Gaza and Gulf tensions show theatre-specific conflicts shaped by geography, technology, politics and national resilience today.

Lt Gen Syed Ata Hasnain (Retd)

Crop Output Targets For 2026-27 Are Out, But Are They Realistic?

The government’s crop production targets seem to have ignored ground realities such as the looming El Nino, the West Asia unrest and a monsoon at 90% of the LPA.

G. Chandrashekhar

Zydus's ₹11 billion Buyback is a Promoter Cash-out Dressed as Capital Discipline

Buyback barely lifts earnings and sends most cash to promoters just as Zydus Lifescience's balance sheet tightens and growth plans vie for the same funds

Dev Chandrasekhar

AI Doesn't Take Toilet Breaks, It Doesn't Spend Money Either

As AI shrinks entry-level hiring and reshapes the workforce, a deeper question emerges: who will drive consumption if workers lose income?

Vivek Kaul

The NEET Paradox and India’s Fragile Demographic Dividend

India’s vast youth population was expected to drive growth. Rising youth disengagement now threatens productivity, investment and stability.

V Thiagarajan

Tata Consumer Has Outgrown Its Acquisition Narrative

Tata Consumer Products’ foods now eclipse beverages, but at 75x earnings its Capital Foods deal, Starbucks venture and growing cash pile make the valuation harder to justify.

Krishnadevan V

India’s Low-Equilibrium Growth Trap is the Real Stagflation Risk

India’s growth story is increasingly at odds with household realities. Weak incomes, falling savings and stagnant private capex, not merely oil shocks, are the bigger risks.

Dhananjay Sinha

India’s Guided Missile Maker Has a Profit Problem Hiding Behind Its Cash Pile

Most of BDL’s profit now comes from interest on its ₹47 billion cash pile, not from building missiles. The missile maker is, in effect, running a treasury operation with a defence business attached.

Dev Chandrasekhar

Supreme Court’s Ruling on Gaming Tax Leaves Industry Fighting for Survival

First, a complete ban on real-money gaming in 2025, and now the Supreme Court allowing the taxman to impose retrospective tax; this might be a death knell for the online gaming industry.

Shruti Mahajan

Opinion

RBI Balance Sheet Shows a Tighter Government Embrace

RBI’s record surplus points to a deeper shift, with its balance sheet increasingly tied to government debt and fiscal expectations.

R. Gurumurthy

Week in Numbers: Tracking India’s Economic Pulse

The Indian economy appears to be bracing for another setback, with the weather bureau projecting southwest monsoon rainfall in 2026 at 90% of the long-period average, the lowest since 2015.

Datametricx

India’s Monsoon Risk is Really an Inflation and Rural Demand Test

Below-normal rain, El Niño and heatwaves could turn India’s monsoon into a test of food inflation, crop resilience and rural demand.

Sakshi Gupta

Can a Machine Fulfil a Director's Fiduciary Duty

AI may soon become the smartest voice in the boardroom. Whether it should have a vote is an entirely different question.

Indra Chourasia

The ‘Art’ of Not Getting It and Why the Second Look Matters

The difference between confusion and clarity is often not intelligence but context. Sometimes understanding begins with the right frame.

Phynix

Opinion

The Costs of Governing India Through Election Cycles

The West Asia crisis has exposed vulnerabilities India ignored for years as electoral calculations repeatedly outweighed economic reform.

Avanti Bhati

What Rubio’s India Visit Really Signals

The relationship between India and the US is becoming more transactional. It clearly now involves hard bargaining between two powers whose interests converge enough to cooperate and diverge enough to keep score.

Deep Pal

Geopolitics

The Big Picture is the Loss of US Supremacy in West Asia

The imminent US-Iran deal discusses the ownership of the Strait of Hormuz for the first time in 100 years — a victorious assertion of regional hegemony by Iran, something inconceivable three months ago.

Rajesh Ramachandran

Masterclass with Michael Patra

Central Banking 101: Origins, Ideas and Institutions

After four decades at the RBI, Michael Patra enters classroom and traces how central banks evolved to safeguard trust, stability and confidence in this new Masterclass series.

Michael Debabrata Patra