Srinath Sridharan

Dr. Srinath Sridharan is a Corporate Advisor & Independent Director on Corporate Boards. He is the author of ‘Family and Dhanda’.

There Should Always be Food on RBI’s Inflation Plate

MPC Framework

As India debates whether food prices should be excluded from inflation targets, the RBI will find itself balancing political pressure with institutional credibility. The RBI must remember that inflation is not a percentage point; it is the price of a plate of food.

Srinath Sridharan

August 26, 2025 at 5:20 AM IST

iStock.com

Sarci-Sense: About Silent Goodbyes & How Middle-Age Friendships Disappear

Basis Life

In a world where ‘connection’ is measured by likes, emojis, and quick replies, the deepest friendships are quietly slipping away. This is the story of those silent goodbyes, and the cost we often don’t see until it’s too late.

Srinath Sridharan

August 24, 2025 at 9:02 AM IST

iStock.com

Why India Refuses Asymmetric Bargains in Trade Coercion

India’s refusal to yield to unilateral US tariffs is an assertion of sovereignty in a world where economic power is being weaponised.

Srinath Sridharan

August 20, 2025 at 1:09 PM IST

iStock.com

Sarci-Sense: The Guest Room Host Sleeps In

Basis Life

Every luxury apartment flaunts it: the “guest bedroom.” But what it becomes in real life is far more interesting: part storage room, part marital timeout zone, part silent confession of fatigue and freedom.

Srinath Sridharan

August 17, 2025 at 10:36 AM IST

iStock.com

Rules 2.0: Rethinking Compliance to Build Trust and Inclusion in India’s Economy

In India, compliance often feels like control, not trust. If ease of doing business is truly the goal, why aren’t these bureaucratic obstacles being dismantled?

Srinath Sridharan

August 16, 2025 at 7:11 AM IST

iStock.com

ICICI’s Minimum Balance Hike Signals Banking’s Cost Reality Check

Indian banking must shed the pretence to free service and confront the structural trade-offs between inclusion and profitability.

Srinath Sridharan

August 12, 2025 at 3:44 PM IST

iStock/Mrinal Pal

Sarci-Sense: One Master Bedroom, Two Baths: The Sanity of Middle Age

Basis Life

In many Indian homes, love no longer storms out, it quietly negotiates more room to breathe. Separate duvets and soon-to-be popular twin bathrooms could be quiet strategies to be together, and yet sane.

Srinath Sridharan

August 10, 2025 at 8:15 AM IST

iStock.com

Building India’s Second Moat in AI: Beyond Code, Beyond Cost, Towards Sovereign Value

India’s AI opportunity demands more than code, cost advantage or hopeful rhetoric. To be relevant as a global-tech-participant, we must pair product ambition and sovereign strategy with decisive, long-horizon investment in emerging tech infrastructure and research.

Srinath Sridharan

August 6, 2025 at 3:20 AM IST

iStock.com

Rate Cuts, Trade Shocks, and the Limits of Monetary Signalling

Monetary Policy

When monetary easing is not matched by credit traction, further rate cuts risk becoming ineffective. In a volatile global and domestic setting, the RBI must safeguard its credibility by acting only where it believes the real economy is ready to respond.

Srinath Sridharan

August 5, 2025 at 7:21 AM IST

Anurag Vijay/CC

Sarci-Sense: The ‘Hum Do, Hamare Do’ Mantra of the Middle‑Aged

Basis Life

In countless Indian middle‑aged homes, the old fight over the TV remote has quietly ended, replaced by two screens, two feeds, and a silence that feels like peace. But is there peace?

Srinath Sridharan

August 3, 2025 at 8:43 AM IST

AI Generated

Wrong Messaging When the State Comes for Anna‑data on the Footpath

Broadening the net should mean including those with real capacity, rather than chasing the smallest trader with penalties built on data alone. Reform must begin by trusting citizens, while still asking the better-off to pay their share.

Srinath Sridharan

Anand Venkatanarayanan

August 1, 2025 at 7:24 AM IST

iStock.com

AI Tests India’s Tech Model and Policy Vision

TCS Job Cuts

TCS’s decision to trim jobs disrupts the industry’s narrative of frictionless transformation. It exposes how AI is not merely an efficiency lever but a structural force revealing India’s chronic underinvestment in education and innovation.

Srinath Sridharan

July 29, 2025 at 12:06 PM IST

Sarci-Sense: Middle Age – Where the Joints Ache and So Does the Truth

Basis Life

We’ve grown into our sarcasm. We’ve earned our eye-rolls. And we’ve made peace with the fact that nothing in life bends quite the way it used to, neither our backs, nor our expectations.

Srinath Sridharan

July 27, 2025 at 6:30 AM IST

iStock.com

Power, Desire, and What We Still Do Not Say

Workplaces teach us to win, not to unarm. The real question is why we built them that way.

Srinath Sridharan

July 25, 2025 at 9:05 AM IST

iStock.com

Power, Desire, and The Boardroom: Kirti Tarang Pande On Gender And Control

Basis Life

Srinath Sridharan

July 23, 2025 at 11:45 AM IST

Trump Will Tom-Tom if Deal Happens, But India Must Stay on Tiptoe

Trump’s drama-driven diplomacy looms over US-India trade talks. Can New Delhi stay steady amid showy proclamations and shifting deals? Strategic patience may be India’s best defence.

Srinath Sridharan

July 23, 2025 at 6:32 AM IST

White House

Sarci-Sense: Hormones, Homework, and the Hot Flash of Truth

Basis Life

Ask any middle-aged parent of a teen today, and they’ll tell you: we’re not raising children; we’re surviving tech-powered beings who believe your existence is a personal attack on their vibe.

Srinath Sridharan

July 21, 2025 at 7:24 AM IST

Istock.com

Banks as Instruments, Bankers as Shock Absorbers, Everyone Bears the Hidden Cost

Yet another banker’s suicide reveals a deeper design flaw: a system that cascades pressure downward faster than it builds capacity, while the state, as owner, demands banks be profitable engines, social levellers and campaign arms, yet seldom reforms the culture it controls.

Srinath Sridharan

July 19, 2025 at 6:02 AM IST

iStock.com

India’s Cities are Not Broken. They’ve been Abandoned

India’s cities have been undone by the collapse of political accountability and the acceptance of dysfunction as ordinary. Without structural reform and genuine local democracy, urban India will remain trapped in a cycle of promises, paralysis and silent abandonment.

Srinath Sridharan

July 16, 2025 at 2:50 AM IST

istocks/Chris Bucanac

Why Even VIPs Falter Without Hunger

Basis Life

Legacy means little without hunger. Promoters must ask tough questions before strong brands fade into relics.

Srinath Sridharan

July 15, 2025 at 5:19 AM IST

iStock.com

The Bureau

India’s Economy Expands 7.8% in June Quarter, Highest in Five Quarters

Rupee Hits Record Low as Tariff Shock Fuels FPI Outflows

Trump Tests the Guardrails of US Credibility

India’s Industrial Output Growth Hits Four-Month High of 3.5% in July

Fed Eyes Data Before Rate Decision; Trump’s 50% Tariff on India in effect

Fitch Affirms India Rating Days After S&P Upgrade, Points to Tariff Risks

Lifting the Lid on Regulatory Silence

How Some Importers Mined a Scheme for Exporters to Dodge Exchequer

Sanjeev Sanyal on Trump, India’s Growth Path, and Process Reforms

Sarci-Sense: About Silent Goodbyes & How Middle-Age Friendships Disappear

iStock.com