Sunday View: Hits & Misses of Budget 2017, H1B Visa Reforms

The Quint’s compilation of this weekend’s best op eds.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley. (Photo: Reuters)

1. Union Budget 2017: The Hits and Misses, According to Montek Singh Ahluwalia

Writing for the Mint, Montek Singh Ahluwalia says a budget ought to be judged based on four criteria: macroeconomic balance, tax changes, pattern of expenditure and new policy initiatives. In his column, Ahluwalia assesses Budget 2017 based on these factors and concludes that the budget is “sensible.”

The big picture is that there is much that is sensible in the budget, and nothing that does any harm. But there is a great deal more that needs to be done if we want to get back to 7.5% growth.

Montek Singh Ahluwalia

2. Muddling Through Another Budget, Another Year

Addressing Budget 2017 and its implications, former Finance Minister P Chidambaram asks a crucial question in his column in The Indian Express: Did this Budget leave the average citizen with the belief that fundamental issues are being addressed? Chidambaram goes “straight to the heart of the matter.”

After reading the 37-page, 184-paragraph Budget speech, I am left with the impression that India will not return to the path of high growth in 2017-18 or even in 2018-19... Budget 2017-18 will be remembered not for any bold measure but because it did not do great damage to the economy. India will muddle through another year of hopes belied and aspirations unfulfilled.

P Chidambaram

3. Out Of My Mind: Income For Everyone

The Economic Survey has proposed a radical step, writes Meghnad Desai in his column in The Indian Express, referring to the institution of the Universal Basic Income. According to him, if UBI is implemented, it would touch many lives. It would be a cash entitlement for certain social groups, in lieu of the many subsidies which are capable of being misused.

It won’t be easy. It is one thing to give free money to the poorest, be it 20 percent or 30 percent. But giving it to as many as three-quarters of the population may lead to some opposition. People could object to giving money to the not-so-poor. For any cut-off point you choose, those just above will become unhappy. They may even have an incentive to ‘impoverish’ themselves to deserve the supplement.

Meghnad Desai

4. The Silver Lining in H1B Visa Reforms

Writing for the Mint, Ravi Venkatesan says that while Donald Trump’s immigration reforms could prove to be challenging for India’s information technology sector in the short term, it could also catalyse the transformation companies need to make in order to survive.

In 1981, the Reagan Administration forced the Japanese automobile industry to sign an agreement limiting exports to the US to 1.68 million automobiles a year. That deal was supposed to protect America’s floundering automotive manufacturers, but it did nothing to help General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler become more competitive. Instead, the restriction dramatically boosted the Japanese companies’ fortunes.

Ravi Venkatesan

5. Broken Pledges, Lost Chances Spoil Budget

Calling Budget 2017 a “workmanlike effort,” Swaminathan Aiyar writes in the Times of India that his criticism of this year’s budget is about what it failed to include.

He [Jaitley] had pledged to cut the corporate tax rate from 30% to 25% to help India compete with Asian neighbours with much lower rates. Last year he cut the rate to 29% for some companies. This year he has cut the rate to 25% only for companies with a turnover up to Rs 50 crore. But these are not companies typically competing with Asian neighbours. The corporate tax for bigger ones should have been cut to at least 28%.

Swaminathan Aiyar

6. A Nation’s Greatness Lies in Its Fight For Rights

In his election campaign, Donald Trump promised to end terrorism by stopping the entry of Muslims into the United States. Because of the spirited efforts of the American Civil Liberties Union, a judge put a stay on Trump’s order. America is fortunate that is has groups like ACLU which will defend the “rights of everyone in America,” writes Aakar Patel in his column in the Asian Age.

In India we need such groups and need support for such groups from all sections, including the political and the judicial, so that we can also be a nation of laws that respects the rights of the individual... It will be a fine day when we can claim to have institutions in civil society as influential and as popular as ACLU, which is a strong body only because millions of Americans support its values. When Indians take offence at how other Indians are treated, when we take injustice to others personally, we will begin to make India great.

Aakar Patel

7. Politics in Your Shopping Cart: What Boycotts Can and Can’t Do

Donald Trump makes one thing obvious, writes Amulya Gopalakrishnan in the Times of India. This is the age of viral consumer boycott.

Unsurprisingly, these pinpricks seldom hurt their targets. Many fired-up Indian patriots tried to boycott Chinese goods after the Uri attacks, seemingly to protest China’s support of Pakistan. Now, that was clearly a campaign headed nowhere — most of us are unlikely to pass up a good deal, and it would barely scrape China’s exports in any case. Whatever the reasons, culture or economics, very few Indians base their buying decisions on vague statements of virtue. Even Patanjali’s success doesn’t come from a nationalist “buycott” as much as value for money.

Amulya Gopalakrishnan

8. Fifth Column: A Letter From Rural India

Is it fair for the government to continue spending taxpayers’ money on “unwieldy, centralised, leaky,” anti-poverty programmes, asks Taveleen Singh in her column in The Indian Express.

Political pundits and economists have applauded the Finance Minister for putting more money into the MNREGA and similar rural development schemes, but is this really the way forward? When Narendra Modi first came to office, he mocked the MNREGA for being no more than a wasteful exercise in digging ditches, and he was right. So why has he not changed course? Why is the NITI Aayog not auditing anti-poverty schemes to see if rural development cannot be achieved more effectively?

Tavleen Singh

9. What Two Bollywood Films Tell Us About the State of Politics

Rarely has the world gone through such messy times. Is Donald Trump a Raees (played by Shah Rukh Khan)? Or is he more a vision-challenged Rohan (played by Hrithik Roshan)? ... Spookily enough, Trump is after the world’s ‘miyanbhais’, but does he have their daring? Or is he more a ‘baniya’ under that bleached-blond combover?... Closer home, citizens are recovering from the Budget Dhamaka. I’d call it a Raees budget – very baniya, going by the shrewd manipulations. And with plenty of miyaanbhai daring if you count the slicing, chopping and bludgeoning. Lots of blood on the abattoir floor, just like that grisly scene in Raees.

Shobhaa De, in the <a href="http://blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/politically-incorrect/what-two-bollywood-films-tell-us-about-the-state-of-politics/">Times of India</a>

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