Top rated entertainment. And it is free.

Do not understand why people are criticising the US elections. This is the most entertaining presidential elections ever, spiced with general dollops of sleaze, lies and criminal activities. First, Donald Trump produced 3 women who accused Bill Clinton, husband of Hillary, of inappropriate sexual behavior. What Bill did is not Hillary's fault except that she disparaged those women and allegedly threatened them to keep them quiet. She called Gennifer Flowers "trailer trash" and said,"I mean, I would crucify her." Monica Lewinsky was a "narcissistic loony toon" and all those who accused her husband were clubbed as "bimbo eruption". Following this the Democrats paraded a long line of women who accused Trump of sexual harassment more than a decade ago. No shred of evidence was offered for these accusations so it is impossible to know how many were lying and who, if any, had been paid, but such is the feverish atmosphere of political correctness in the west at present that any woman can destroy a man's reputation and career by accusing him of sexual transgressions in the distant past. This is the only crime where a man is presumed guilty unless he can prove his innocence. Thus, one in every 1,000 men is branded a sex offender in Britain. WikiLeaks had been threatening an 'October dump' of data on Hillary Clinton which could have been embarrassing, so Ecuador "temporarily restricted" access to the internet by Julian Assange, who has taken shelter in its embassy in London. Whether under pressure from the Obama administration we do not know. But, frustratingly for Hillary, and Obama perhaps, a dump did come, not from the opposition, but from her trusted aide Huma Abedin. Just before she became Secretary of State in 2009 Hillary set up a private server in her house in Chappaqua, New York, which she used for her emails, both private and official. As a trained lawyer Hillary would definitely understand that she was not allowed use a personal server for government work. When questioned by the FBI Hillary was unable to recall in response to 35 questions, but her memory was fine during the 3 debates with Trump. In July FBI Director, James Comey announced that he found no evidence of criminal conduct which appeared to put the matter to rest, but about a week ago the FBI reopened their investigation when they discovered Hillary's emails on Anthony Weiner's laptop when investigating his sexting a 15 year old girl. Democrats are livid at James Comey and accuse him breaking the law. Why did he do it? Because his wife was urging him. In July Michael Gove betrayed Boris Johnson and destroyed his chance of becoming prime minister because his wife told him. This may have permanently harmed Gove's own political career. Thank you, Trump and Clinton. For the free entertainment.

No place for communism in 'God's own country'.

People in the south of India often complain that the government in Delhi is biased towards the northern states. They have a case. They have low fertility rates, have higher education levels, better healthcare and pay higher taxes, but get less from the center than Hindi speaking states which have higher fertility rates, higher unemployment and lower education levels. To a certain extent the central government is helpless, in that it must allocate more resources for development of poorer areas. On the other hand, handouts could be encouraging excess birth rates and increased dependency in these states, as people become irresponsible about their personal conduct. However, all southern states are not so rosy. Kerala has branded itself the 'God's own country' but, "Go a little deeper and there is a miasma of extremism, sectarian killing, unemployment and general apathy," writes Banuchandar Nagarajan. "Last month, it was reported that 22 people that were missing had volunteered to join the Islamic State," and,"Left Democratic Front (LDF) activists have killed more than 250 Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) workers so far in an attempt to make it 'bleed by a thousand cuts'. Kannur, the home district of the current chief minister, Pinarayi Vijayan and the late Communist giant AK Gopalan, is the epicentre of violence. The sheer goriness of the violence is sickening---a teacher killed in front of a classroom of children and a son in front of his parents." Communism has destroyed the economy.  Last year an American artist, Waswo X Waswo was asked to pay Rs 10,000 to move 6 boxes of his artwork a distance of 10 feet. He destroyed some of his work rather than pay, what he considered, as extortion money. If you are moving home you have to pay a loaders' union even if you do all the work yourself. People are actually employed by unions to stand at street corners to see who is moving, a practice known as 'nokkukooli', which translates to 'wages for looking'. The economy receives about one-third of its GDP from remittances of 2.5 million expats, working mainly in the Middle East, but as the price of oil has dropped so thousands of these workers, mainly laborers, are returning back to the state and will be looking for jobs. The debt-to-state GDP is 30%, as compared to an average of 20% for all other states and Foreign Direct Investment was a paltry $1.2 billion from 2000 to 2015, compared to $18 billion for Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, over the same period. Thankfully, as the nation's economy grows so people are rejecting communism. If Kerala can get rid of communists, like China did, then it will improve. After all, it has God on its side. 

Why does God talk only to George Bush and Rodrigo Duterte?

Russia has unveiled its new RS-28 Sarmat missiles, capable of flying at 4.3 miles,or 7 km, per second, with a range of 6213 miles, or 10,000 km, and delivering 40 megatons of energy, which is equivalent to 2,000 times the Hiroshima bomb. Crucially, these missiles are apparently capable of avoiding anti-missile missiles. That is necessary because the US has set up anti-missile systems in Poland and Romania which upsets the balance of 'mutually assured destruction' of the cold war. Why would Barack Obama, hailed as an 'intellectual', follow the policy of George W Bush, the moron? At least Bush used to get regular instructions from God, but what excuse does Obama have? Actually, Obama is ahead in the race. He has already sanctioned $11 billion to make 400 super-nukes, called B61-12, with an output equivalent to 50,000 tons of TNT. At the same time he has sanctioned research into small nuclear warheads. How small is small? Would these bombs be carried on drones, Obama's favorite toys, which have made him a super hero. In a chilling reminder of the Orwellian world in 1984, the research is being carried out by the benignly named Department of Energy. Russia is so concerned about drones that it has created a 'microwave gun' that can destroy the control systems of a drone from 0.6 miles or 1 km away. However, the US is a $17 trillion economy, while Russia's economy has fallen to below $2 trillion, because of the fall in the prices of commodities and sanctions imposed by western countries. So, Russia is forced to resort to 'maskirovka' or masking, which involves making exact replicas of tanks, MIG fighters and missile launchers, which can be inflated in minutes to fool the enemy. While all this is going on between 'cold war' enemies, Chinese President, Xi Jinping has been coronated as 'Mighty Uncle Xi', which apparently is an old imperial term. He has also become a 'core leader' which makes him equal to Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping. So, he is equal to Mao and Deng but he is also higher because he is partly an emperor, in a suit. Very subtle that. No wonder Chinese are called inscrutable. In July we thought that Obama has managed to control FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private server to handle classified information while she was Secretary of State. Much like the Congress Party in India controlled the investigation into Bofors. But it seems that her emails have been found on the laptop of Anthony Weiner, who was being investigated for sexting a 15 year old. Maybe, if God speaks to Clinton, like He did to Rodrigo Duterte, President of Philippines, then all will be forgotten. It is possible that God realised that Duterte cannot call Hillary Clinton a "son of a bitch" as he did Obama, because verily she is a woman. If only God would use the old fire and brimstone on China and Pakistan we Indians could celebrate. Happy Diwali to everyone. 

If there is no one person to blame, then blame the entire system.

'Wutburger', in German, means 'angry 'citizen', writes Jochen Bittner, political editor for the weekly news magazine, Die Zeit. There are Wutburgers in every country. In Germany the Alternative fur Deutschland Party did not exist 4 years back. It is anti-establishment, anti-European and anti-globalization and yet 18% of Germans, Wutbergers, would consider voting for it. There was the Brexit in Britain, there is the National Front of Marine Le Pen in France and there is Donald Trump in the US. "Anger is like gasoline. If you use it intelligently and in a controlled manner, you can move the world. That's called progress. Or you just spill it about and ignite it, creating spectacular explosion. That's called arson," he writes. He compares Trump with Martin Luther King Jr. "Sadly, the leaders of today's Wutburgers never grasped the difference between anger driven by righteousness and anger driven by hate," he laments. Why is Trump so bad? Because some women have alleged, without any proof, that he groped them more than 11 years ago. The FBI has tapes which show that Martin Luther King Jr was a serial womaniser, who organised sex orgies. Lot of similarities between a saint and a sinner, isn't there? The French Revolution was an explosion, the Arab Spring was an explosion as was the fall of the Berlin wall, each event born of public anger and without any control. Karl Marx himself did nothing spectacular, like Edmund Hillary or Yuri Gagarin did. It was his idea,"From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs," which was so seductive that it has resonance to this day. Donald Trump is merely a man and, even if he wins the presidential election, will be remembered only by historians a decade after his death but ideas live on forever. Martin Luther King Jr's dream of equality was possible because of the Civil War, precipitated by Abraham Lincoln's idea of freedom for all. Slavery is now unthinkable but equality still remains a dream, despite the election of Barack Obama as president. "In Germany, a recent poll showed that only 14% of the citizens trusted politicians," he writes. "If this faith is rattled, democracy loses its basic promise." That has happened in every country. In the past people could blame all their troubles on one person, which led to the guillotine for Louis XVI and the firing squad for Tsar Nicholas and his family. Now responsibility has become diffuse. Politicians, civil servants, business people are all seen to be in cahoots, as the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. With no one person to guillotine they blame the entire system. Maybe they are right, maybe the entire system is rotten. 

Teachers only teach, real education is at home.

CEO of Azim Premji Foundation, Anurag Behari, is a regular writer on education in India. In an article, he highlights 3 false beliefs commonly held by teachers. Presumably, he is talking about teachers of government schools because he talks about students from poor families. School fees have risen so high that poor people cannot afford private schools. So what are the 3 false beliefs held by a vast majority of teachers? The most serious is corporal punishment which was described as 'empathetic hitting' by the teachers. "They talked about their principles of empathetic hitting, for example, no injury must be caused, make an example of a few and don't hit everyone, don't use a stick," he writes. Hitting children is absolutely unacceptable. But what if they are being hit by parents at home and have become disruptive for the whole class? Activists will cause an uproar if poor students are expelled. If the expelled student is from Dalit or Minority community the teacher and the principal of the school will lose their jobs. Go to any construction site and you will see little children, including toddlers, playing in the dirt, unsupervised, while their mothers work. You see older children bullying little ones, kicking each other and using abusive language. If things tend to get out of hand they get a few juicy slaps, cry for a while and then get back to what they were doing. In the UK teachers are forbidden from punishing children in any form so many schools have banned children from playing, in case they get hurt. The other false beliefs are that some children are 'stupid' and that children from 'poor' families are incapable of learning. The 'bad seed' theory, which says that some children are born bad, is no longer accepted but scientists have found 2 genes linked to an excess of violent and criminal behavior. There is no doubt that a significant part of intelligence is inherited but any research into that is considered politically incorrect. However, genes can perhaps predict those who will have learning difficulties. Given the same intelligence environmental factors become extremely important. It has been known for many years that a low folate level in a pregnant woman's diet leads to neural tube defects, such as spina bifida. It is therefore entirely plausible that poor nutrition of the mother can permanently affect a child's brain. If poor children in the US have brains 6% smaller than their affluent peers then the effect in India will be much more, because poverty in India is abject. Finally, spending time on weaker students is not possible because teachers in government schools spend a lot of their time cooking midday meals. If there are fewer children classes will be smaller, teachers will have more time to teach and the education budget will be more productive. Perhaps Mr Behari would be better employed teaching the value of not having children.

What if the 'New Normal' is the actual normal?

The US economy may have grown by 3% in the third quarter and has the best growth rate of all the developed economies in the world. But that is not the whole picture. From 1947 to 2000 the US economy grew by an average of 2.2% but from 2001 it has grown at an average rate of only 0.9%. Financier, Mahamed El Erian coined the term "The New Normal" to describe the continuing slow rate of growth following the financial crisis of 2008. Slow growth means that wages are not rising, so that 81% of people in the US are stuck with the same or falling wages, 97% in Italy, 70% in Britain and 63% in France. This has been labeled as "secular stagnation". Productivity growth is not rising as predicted despite enormous changes in technology, prompting some economists to argue that digital technology is not a 'game changer' like indoor plumbing, air travel and electricity were. A lot of the digital economy is given away free to consumers which, says Ricardo Hausmann, makes it difficult to calculate productivity. Nouriel Roubini lists 4 reasons as to why economic growth is stuck in a rut. It maybe difficult to measure productivity of technological changes, there is usually a lag between advances in technology and improvement in productivity or the aging populations in richer countries means that productivity will never improve. The danger is that people will get fed up and demand greater protection against free trade. So which is it? If stagnation is due to low demand, because people are paying off their accumulated debt, or deleveraging, then governments can stimulate demand by increasing fiscal expenditure. If improvement in technology is making little change in the way we live then its supply stagnation and there is not much anyone can do and we had better get used to permanent low growth. There is another danger. As we get increasingly connected to an internet of things, or IoT, we are also open to cyber attacks of the sort we saw on Netflix, Twitter and Paypal a few days back. This kind of attack will get more common as more gadgets get connected because it will be impossible for people to upgrade security constantly. Apparently, technology did not make much change in prosperity until 1800 when growth took off almost vertically in Europe and the US. This would also coincide with a period of colonisation of the world by European countries, which allowed them to plunder resources, and the use of slave labor in the US. That kind of bullying is not going to work in today's world, as the US and Europe discovered recently. What about India? Perhaps 7% growth is the 'New Normal' for us. But is it enough?

What use is GST if we cannot buy?

There was great rejoicing when the Goods and Services Bill was passed in the Rajya Sabha, where the ruling BJP is in minority. GST is supposed to unify all indirect taxes into one figure, which will combine India into one common market, remove distortions between states and provide a huge boost to business by removing bottlenecks. India is a poor country, where 96.7% of people earn less than $10 per day, which amounts to about Rs 21,000 per month. At that income one would be liable to pay income tax at 10% on any amount above Rs 250,000 per year. Not surprising, Indians are very sensitive to prices, so a higher rate of GST could cut consumption by increasing prices. Now that GST is law a council, comprising of the central and state governments has been set up to decide the rate at which goods and services will be taxed in the country. And here is where things start to get murky. The latest council meeting could not decide on a rate because the states want a higher rate of tax than recommended by economists. Why? Because our politicians care too much for the poor, for whom they want lots of handouts. If that helps them win elections, that cannot be helped. Also politicians have to travel abroad first class, with family, to learn how to serve our people. Thus, Deputy Chief Minister of Delhi had to travel all the way to Finland, a small Scandinavian country with free education for every child, to learn how to teach slum children in Delhi. So the council has discussed multiple rates of taxes, low rates on essential goods and higher rates on, what they consider as, luxury. They even want a cess on certain goods. Until rates of taxes are finalised we will not know what we will have to pay for essential goods and services, such as healthcare and travel. Experts believe that a rate of 18-20% will be revenue neutral, which means that neither central nor state governments will lose out on revenue collection. Goods will become cheaper but services will become more expensive. Even at 18% healthcare costs will rise. The vast majority of people cannot avail of healthcare at current costs so if costs rise further we can expect more suffering. At higher rates prices will rise. The Reserve Bank conducts a survey every quarter to see what people think about the level of inflation and although retail inflation fell to 4.31% in September the vast majority of people think that annual inflation rate is in excess of 9%. Experts may think that people are stupid but if people expect prices to rise they will demand higher salaries. Salaries are expected to rise by an average of 10.3% this year, which will be passed on to customers in higher prices. A high GST rate will confirm what people expect and higher salaries will be demanded. This will reduce growth. Which will reduce tax collection. The golden goose needs to be protected.

No more 'chicken jokes' about Punjab.

The National Sample Survey conducts surveys of households in India every few years. According to a survey of 100,000 households, with one month recall, the proportion of non-vegetarians has risen from 56.7% of the population in 1993-94 to 58.2% in 2004-05 to 62.3% in 2011-12. Non-vegetarian is defined as those consuming meat, fish or eggs. The biggest rise has been in the consumption of chicken, which has risen from just 8% in 1993-94 to 38% in 2011-12, while fish consumption has increased marginally from 30% to 32%. Consumption of goat meat/mutton, red meat, has fallen from 30% to 15%, which maybe because of its high price, and also health consciousness among the well off. Consumption of beef/buffalo meat remains constant at 6%. The highest consumption is in the Northeastern states at 97%, followed by West Bengal at 95% and Kerala at 92%. There are some surprises. Notwithstanding the chicken jokes of Punjab, consumption in the state is low at 23%, below that of Gujarat, which is reputed to be vegetarian, at 28%. Haryana is the lowest at 19%. It is no surprise that all the states on the east coast have a high rate of non-vegetarian diet, maybe because of fishing, but the states on the west coast, north of Kerala, have low rates. Strange. As a nation, our meat consumption is almost negligible at 2.9 kg per capita per year, while the US has the highest consumption at 95.43 kg per capita per year. What these figures show that even so-called non-vegetarians eat very little animal products. Our diet is mainly cereals, pulses and vegetables, with some meat or fish added for taste. Is it good? Environmentalists say that eating animal products is bad. Around 300 species of mammals are being driven to extinction because of the practice of eating bushmeat. But we in India do not eat bushmeat. Overfishing is depleting fish stocks in our oceans, at an alarming rate. On the other hand we are the largest milk producer in the world at 146 mmt in 2014-15 but our per capita consumption of milk is low at 322 gm per day. One cow produces about 20 tons of wet manure per year and 100 liters of gas per day, which consist of 400 powerful greenhouse gases, including methane. So should we get rid of all cows and stop all milk products? 15.2% of Indians are undernourished, which results in more illnesses. Malnutrition even affects brains of growing children, who will benefit from more animal products. A cow's intestines are 20 times its length, approximately 150 ft, but our intestines are merely 30 ft in length. So a purely vegetarian diet may not provide all the nutrition we need. Pollution in Delhi is because of burning stubble in Punjab, which is from rice. Finally you can breed chicken in an orchard but you cannot grow wheat without cutting trees. The only solution is to reduce the number of people. Else we are doomed.

Wars will continue long after ISIS.

Is it stupidity, is it hypocrisy or is it complete disregard for human death and misery that is the reason for the slaughter in the Middle East? The propaganda channel, BBC shows graphic pictures of children injured in alleged Russian bombing in Aleppo but there is not a peep on children being knee-capped with hammers and hit on the head with rifle butts, as the Iraqi army makes progress against ISIS in Mosul. Saddam Hussein was vanquished in 2003, following which the US was involved in the setting up the government in Baghdad with Nouri al-Maliki as Prime Minister. Instead of uniting the country he antagonized the Sunnis who might have seen the Al Qaeda and ISIS as liberators. He weakened the army in fear of being overthrown in a coup so that they ran in panic when ISIS thugs approached, leaving their arms and tanks behind. Not only did Obama withdraw all US troops from Iraq he made no effort to pressure al-Maliki to change. Instead the US helped his attacks on troops of Muqtada al-Sadr in Basra and in Baghdad, which made him more powerful. ISIS was the result of US ignorance of the Middle East, of the release of old hatreds following the sudden removal of Saddam Hussein and aerial assassinations of leaders of various groups. US stupidity was most evident in Syria where it backed a group of rebels, who were not affiliated with the Al Qaeda, to help them remove Bashar al-Assad but refrained from all out attack on the President. This was not because of any scruples about killing a human being, because at this time Nato forces were bombing Gaddafi to his death, in Libya. The stupidity of Obama's concept of 'good terrorists' and 'bad terrorists' was exposed when different groups started fighting against each other. Despite warning by the Iraq government Turkey has joined the battle in Mosul. Turkey's Erdogan would like to crown himself a Caliph of a modern Ottoman empire. In the confused landscape of the Middle East it would be no surprise if the Shia governments of Iraq and Syria join forces to fight Turkey, which is a member of Nato. Will the US and its allies join Turkey in an all out fight against Syria and Iraq, as Nato rules demand? Turkey is said to be supporting Peshmerga fighters, who are Kurds, in Mosul while it is bombing Kurdish YPG forces fighting in Syria. Does Turkey want to create a division between different Kurdish forces to prevent an independent Kurdistan in northern Iraq? Kurds have destroyed millions of Arab homes in revenge for crimes by ISIS. Yezidis, who were especially brutally treated by ISIS, have also been killing Sunni Arabs in revenge. Add the refugee crisis in Europe, the low intensity war in Ukraine and the constant abuse of Russia by western governments and it is an almighty mess. Obama will be gone in January. Will he be held responsible for the bloodshed that is coming?

Natural is best, including intelligence.

India's biggest public and private sector banks have admitted that hackers have gained access to 3.2 million debit/ATM cards. Fraudulent transactions were carried out in the US and China on Indian cards. We have not been told whether all those who have lost money will be automatically recompensed or, as is usual in India, banks will try to minimise losses by bullying customers by making them try to prove that they were not responsible for the loss of confidentiality. The breach occurred in the Hitachi Payment Services, used by banks, in May but customers were not informed till now. The Reserve Bank has granted licenses to new payments banks which will offer services through mobile phones. If physical cards, which need individual pin numbers to work, are so easy to hack how stupid would it be to entrust our money to mobile phones? For even more convenience banks in the west have done away with pin numbers and have introduced contactless cards. But whose convenience? If people are forced to stop using cash then every transaction will go through banks which means we will have to pay for everything we do, which will increase their profits several fold. Worse, police will be able to find out every detail of what we have bought, where we have been and whose services we have used. A most terrifying outcome. Naturally, thieves are one step ahead. They have developed machines which can read cards inside pockets or handbags. Not just that, these cards can be used by thieves months after they are reported as lost or stolen. Banks refund full amount on money lost on contactless cards, which then raises the question as to how much profits they must be making on these cards. Yesterday, hackers interrupted services of popular internet services Netflix, Twitter, Paypal and Spotify, used by billions of people. How did they do it? Apparently, by using webcams, baby monitors and digital recorders to send billions of messages which overwhelmed the system. As politicians and their henchmen go full speed to convert the economy to digital, to increase their own power and wealth, they do not care for our safety or dangers to our children. Instead of creating wealth Artificial Intelligence will result in the loss of millions of jobs. Noted scientist, Steven Hawking, recently warned that AI could go rogue and wipe out life on earth. However, scientists and economists seem to miss a much simpler point. Which is that AI has to be logical at all times while human beings are illogical. Thus, a robot doctor may refuse to transplant a kidney from a healthy parent to a sick child because it may find it illogical. Why are journalists supporting politicians when it is so dangerous? Are they paid, or just stupid?

The white man's burden is becoming heavier by the day.

Kipling apparently wrote the White Man's Burden on the US colonization of the Philippines. That burden has just got heavier. Couple of days back President Duterte of Philippines announced "separation" from the US, in Beijing, after being snubbed by Obama in Laos recently. As Mayor of Davao he stopped American forces exercising in the city. "I don't want American soldiers in my city," he told Davao City Council. "Because of their arrogance and pretended superiority, the Americans invaded Iraq to kill Saddam Hussein but ended up destroying the country. We don't want that to happen to us." In a survey by Pew Research last year, the US enjoyed the highest popularity rating in the Philippines, at 92%, closely followed by its popularity in African countries. The Africans are also not playing ball. On 18 October Africa nations blocked WTO negotiations on digital trade tabled by the US, Europe, Canada and others. The list of US demands included "enabling cross-border data flows", promoting a free and open internet" and "barring forced technology transfers". Technology transfer to China is fine because it is huge market but not to African countries, because they are poor. By "prohibiting digital customs duties" the US is demanding that its companies be allowed to earn money in Africa without paying taxes, which will presumably be paid in the US. This is the old colonial mindset of looting resources from Africa at dirt cheap rates and selling finished products at exorbitant prices. By "preventing localization barriers" the US means, in its own words, "companies and digital entrepreneurs relying on cloud computing and delivering internet-based products and services should not need to build physical infrastructure and expensive data centres in every country they seek to serve". Which means no new jobs will be created in African countries. Finally, "protecting critical source codes" would allow the US to spy on African leaders, as it has been spying on world leaders for years, without them being able to do anything about it. South Africa has just announced that it is withdrawing from the International Criminal Court, an archetypal 'kangaroo court', which only condemns Africans, while mass murderers and war criminals, like Tony Blair, David Cameron and Barack Obama walk around free. Apparently, the court is trying to save poor Africans from their leaders. But who is to save them from the depredations of the white man? Not just leaders, even ordinary US citizens may not be prosecuted for killings abroad. Human beings have a tendency to rebel. The US better adjust.

Doing the right things is not easy, is it?

Rajiv Kumar, Senior Fellow at Centre for Policy Research in Delhi, thinks that India should not get carried away by the growth figures of our GDP. Our economy grew at 7.1% in the first quarter, from April to June, which was sharply lower than the 7.9% of the previous quarter of January to March. We need to grow at 8% plus to create enough jobs to lift the hundreds of millions stuck in poverty. To relieve some of the gloom, Gross Value Added grew at 7.3% compared to 7.4% of the previous quarter. Manufacturing grew by 9.1% and services grew by 9.6%. According to Citi this year's good monsoon will add $80 billion to rural spending, which should add 0.7-1% to GDP growth. However, things are never quite as logical in India. Bumper harvest results in a fall in prices because we do not have adequate storage facilities. Farmers are forced to sell their produce at below cost price which means that they cannot pay off their loans and end up committing suicide. The government pays a Minimum Support Price for 25 crops to encourage farmers to grow them. The debate is about whether paying a guaranteed lower price for agricultural commodities raises the price of food, causing inflation, or whether encouraging farmers to increase cultivation of essential products decreases prices by increasing supply. Rajiv Kumar highlights 2 figures which should cause alarm. Gross Fixed Capital Formation, or GFCF, which is a broad indicator of investment in plant and machinery, fell by 3.1% in the April-June quarter. GFCF increased by 24.5% in 2011-12 when the GDP grew by 7%. Commercial bank lending to non-food sector grew by just 8.3% in August this year, compared to a peak of 38.4% in 2005-06. These two figures imply lack of investment due to a deep distress in banks and industry, which is ominous because job creation is vital to avoid social conflict. He has given a few suggestions to remedy the situation. Public housing for urban and landless laborers. This will create jobs in construction and improve demand. But where? Laborers are itinerant, moving from one place to another in search of employment. Houses can be made with cheap technology but land is too expensive to build everywhere. Increasing tourism in India. For that we need world class infrastructure, cleanliness and safety for tourists. The Prime Minister has launched a Swacch Bharat, or Clean India, Abhiyan but a walk through any neighborhood in the capital city, Delhi, will show broken roads, with filth strewn around. Exports must increase. For all our chest thumping we cannot grow with exports a paltry 1.6% of global exports. For that we need a weaker rupee but that will increase the price of imports and cause inflation, forcing the RBI to increase interest rate, which is anathema to our politicians. The RBI is busy supporting the rupee even now. Not so easy is it?

Why the drama? Set interest rate automatically.

There is passionate, almost religious, belief among politicians, civil servants and economists in India that interest rate should be extremely low, regardless of inflation, because low borrowing cost will encourage new investment, creating new jobs and resulting in growth of the economy. The government has committed to a target inflation rate of 4%, plus/minus 2%, giving a ridiculously wide band of 2-6% for the new Monetary Policy Committee to play with. Previously, calculation of inflation was based on wholesale prices but since 2014 the RBI decided to base its policy on the new Consumer Price Index, or CPI. Since then, there has been a heated debate about whether CPI should be the guide for prices in India since food and fuel are major constituents in its calculation or whether we should use core inflation which discounts these 2 volatile elements. Karthik Shashidhar has analysed the various components of the CPI basket and has cast doubts on its accuracy because real estate prices, which have a linear relationship with CPI, are not included in its calculation. Rent has the highest weight of 10.07% in calculating CPI. It is misleading because rent constitutes 21.7% of urban CPI but is not a part of rural CPI, because people do not rent in villages. Shashidhar writes that a higher interest rate deters people from buying real estate for investment purposes which reduces the supply of housing for rent and people, who are looking to buy a property for personal use, postpone their purchase. These 2 factors should cause a rise of rents and result in higher CPI. Raising interest rate increases spending on goods purchased through borrowing, which reduces spending on other goods as services, and so brings down prices generally. Shashidhar has compared the rise in prices of real estate with the rise in CPI since August 2011 and has shown a linear relationship between the two. He concludes that the present CPI is suspect because it incorporates rent but not the rise in sale price rise of real estate. But, his study actually supports the way CPI is calculated. If the price of real estate is directly related to CPI then a fall in its value by raising interest rate will control inflation. Secondly, those who can afford to buy properties at these prices are not bothered by a rise in the price of food or fuel but those who have to pay rent are very sensitive to rising prices. The previous governor of the RBI, Raghuram Rajan was treated with disrespect because he argued for a real interest rate of 150-200 basis points. Instead of maligning the RBI politicians should get rid of the MPC and take direct responsibility. Declare the real interest rate they want to maintain and adjust interest rate automatically every 2 months to the corrected CPI. That way we will know who to blame.

The good old days were not so good, were they?

Professor Lucy P Marcus laments the disregard for the 'Golden Rule' - "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you". "Politicians, even in the world's supposedly enlightened democracies, are refusing to provide refuge to desperate people fleeing brutal war; making little, if any, effort to address high and rising economic inequality; and are all but ignoring the factors driving civil-rights movements like America's Black Lives Matter," she writes. Altruism maybe in our genes but at what time does self-preservation take over? We pine for the 'good old days' but those days never really existed. All human beings may belong to one species but we are not defined by our genetic similarity. We are defined by culture which depends on language, self awareness and an appreciation of beauty. France has a border with Germany on one side and Spain on the other but, although people must have been travelling, trading and marrying between the different regions, their languages, culture and traditions are totally different. Instead of criticising the British for voting to leave the European Union. Prof Marcus should study why the people are still so different when the Treaty of Rome, creating free trade between France and Germany, was signed in 1957 and Spain joined the European Common Market in 1986. As for religions, they did recommend doing good to others but only for the believers. People of other religions were often killed or forcibly converted. No wonder a lot of today's young people are atheists. The difference is enormous. While fertility is falling precipitously in western countries women in Aleppo are still giving birth to babies even though the city has been at war for over 4 years. There are 30 births everyday at Al-Zahra Hospital in Aleppo. Why are people still breeding? Why are they immune to the suffering of their own children? We see hungry, pot-bellied children, cripples, old women begging on the streets of Delhi. It is heartbreaking and fills us with rage at the inequity but we are told not to give money to children because it encourages child-trafficking. Why do parents give birth to children to send them out to beg? The world has too many people and as they cut down forests to grow food so global warming will cause a fall in agricultural output. Western countries became rich by looting resources of their colonies to feed their industries but that kind of exploitation is becoming difficult. Countries in Asia took advantage of their poverty by manufacturing cheap goods to be sold in the west. This transferred well paying manufacturing jobs out of western countries. Import of cheap goods kept a check on inflation, allowing interest rates to be kept low, and resulting asset price bubbles, creating massive inequality. That is why there is so much conflict. It will only get worse.  

Those who divide may get divided.

Is Britain playing its old game of dividing a country, as it did to India, to Palestine and to Syria and Iraq, which is the reason for today's conflicts in all these regions? In a conspiracy with the French it drew lines in the sand to divide areas in the Middle East which created religious and tribal conflicts. These were kept under check by dictators like Saddam Hussein, Hafez al-Assad and Muammar Gaddafi. When civil protests, dubbed the Arab Spring, broke out in 2011 western countries were enthusiastic supporters, in the belief that they will all become democratic. Their complete lack of understanding of the Middle East is now exposed as Egypt has elected a military dictator as president, Libya has been in a state of a low-grade civil war ever since and we can see what is happening in Syria on our TV screens everyday. Tunisia has not descended into civil war but is exporting its young men to fight for ISIS and Al Qaeda. Former Prime Minister, David Cameron has been severely criticised by a foreign affairs committee of the House of Commons for the killing of Gaddafi, not because Libyans are dying, but because of the flood of migrants into Europe, and possibly into Britain. That is why the British voted for Brexit. Britain is again trying to play tricks in Syria. It is not a power any longer, so it bargains its unconditional support for the US in the UN Security Council to play geopolitical games far above its status. It is now pushing the US to apply more sanctions on Russia to halt its bombing of rebels in eastern Aleppo. This has naturally infuriated Vladimir Putin of Russia. There was no such outpouring of loving sympathy when Iraq was looted of its wealth in the infamous oil-for-food program, which was to pay for western troops, while Iraqis were dying of lack of food and medicines, or when civilians were slaughtered in the 'shock and awe assault' of Baghdad. The utter stupidity of the proposal is breathtaking. As the map shows Syria is now divided into zones of control which is changing daily. While asking Russia to stop bombing Aleppo Britain is not asking the US to stop bombing ISIS targets, which are also killing civilians. The Kurds, allies of the west, are looking for an independent state in northern Iraq and the north of Syria. Turkey, a partner of Nato, wants to establish a safe zone in the north to give a safe haven for Syrian refugees presently in Turkey, but is also fighting the Kurds to prevent an independent Kurdistan. Russia is creating a 'death ray' to neutralise drones so it will not be easy to kill at will as Obama has been enjoying. Trying to enforce a no-fly zone against Russia could precipitate all out war. But maybe the days for Britain itself are numbered as Scotland may vote for independence if there is 'hard Brexit'. The world will be much more peaceful if that happens.

True freedom comes from anonymity.

Delivering the annual lecture at Lit for Life, noted historian Ramachandra Guha said that India has become an "election-only democracy". He said the same thing in an article in December last year. Being a liberal his most stringent criticism is for the present government of the BJP, which he blames for an intolerance to criticism. Unfortunately, Mr Guha has a habit of concentrating on the present government or going back to Gandhi and Nehru when, as a historian, he should be evaluating the period in between to tell us how India, its society and politics have evolved. Glossing over the Emergency, Bofors, Narasimha Rao's handling of the crisis of 1991 or the Mandalisation of society, which is leading to demands for reservations from Patidars in Guajarat, Jats in Haryana and Marathas in Maharashtra, means that his speech is reduced to name-calling. Guha is right in saying that we are not completely independent but not the reason why. He should find out what Nehru and Gandhi signed with the British which has allowed Pakistan to repeatedly send terrorists to kill our citizens. How can a Paki Minister threaten to use tactical nuclear weapons against India without fear of retaliation? If we had built a wall separating the 2 countries, as we are going to do at long last, and cut off all links we could have prevented so much bloodshed over the last 69 years. Study how the poison of Mandal Commission has been used by politicians to divide Hindus to win elections. The glib answer is that it has helped a few in the lower castes to achieve wealth but perhaps caste would have been forgotten by now if education had been improved, high quality infrastructure built and world class industries established. Even today 15.2% of citizens are undernourished and 38.7% of under-five children are stunted. Mr Guha should study how the extreme genuflecting sycophancy of the Congress has led to the conversion of political parties into criminal enterprises, controlled by a supremo who seeks to pass power down to his progeny. He regrets the demise of the Congress and predicted that the BJP will become like it, forgetting that the Prime Minister has no family and so no reason to accumulate illicit wealth. A strange coalition of leftists and west-loving elites have controlled all discussion and education in India till now but right-wing intellectuals are getting their voices heard at long last. Instead of concentrating on Gandhi Mr Guha should study how politicians are converting India into a police state by stressing on a completely digital society and forcing everyone to use a biometric identity for routine transactions. No use telling stories about the past. Use your knowledge to bring true freedom.

Ringside seats as the global economy crashes.

Writing for Bloomberg, financier Mohd El-Erian says that markets are unable to react to uncertainties. Stock markets hate uncertainty and the world is full of uncertainties at present. What are they? The greatest unknowns are in Europe. Britain will trigger Article 50 of the European Union by the end of March next year, which will start a process of separation lasting not more than 2 years. People are bracing for a "hard Brexit' because Europe cannot allow Britain to set a precedent which may lead to a break up of the union. Italy is to hold a referendum in December on constitutional changes, which could decide the fate of the Prime Minister, Matteo Renzi, and Chancellor Angela Merkel looks shaky in Germany. Only the US looks certain as Donald Trump seems to be looking at a whitewash. However, for those of us outside the US the prospect of a Hillary Clinton presidency is filled with dread. She is inextricably bound to Obama's foreign policy, which is built on supporting terrorists described as 'good', while using drones to indiscriminately assassinate those considered 'bad'. Central banks have been supporting markets through zero, even negative in some cases, interest rates but these are becoming increasingly futile. Interest rates at virtual zero lead to increased borrowing. The International Monetary Fund is warning that total debt in the world has reached $152 trillion, two-thirds of it in the private sector. Global GDP at current prices is around $80 trillion. Trouble is that most of the money is going into financial products and not into investments which means that economic growth, especially in developed countries, remains weak. Central banks are unable to exit these unconventional monetary policies in case they cause a collapse of markets. In desperation central banks are buying corporate bonds, essentially supporting a market bubble. The global economy seems stuck in a low growth scenario, mainly sustained by growth in developing countries, which could be around for many years. If you are already growing slowly any further slowdown could result in panic and a crash. That is what some are predicting. Bond prices are so high that yields have turned negative. Around $10 trillion worth of bonds of advanced economies are trading at negative yields. Central banks are running out of bonds to buy to continue with quantitative easing. How to get out of the zero interest rate scenario without causing a crash? The IMF is suggesting an increase in fiscal spending, which will be mainly in infrastructure. In the US, where unemployment is already low, a fiscal stimulus will result in wage inflation and an eventual increase in interest rate. The crash will be postponed but is certain come. Economists can only suggest, politicians have to act. But they cannot, because of fear of losing elections. We can only be spectators.

Being a nationalist is not a bad thing, is it?

Thailand's King Bhumibol Adulyadej died couple of days back at the age of 88 years. He became king in strange circumstances in 1946, after his elder brother Ananda Mahidol was found shot to death in his own bed, which was officially pronounced as suicide. However, many believed that Ananda had been murdered with a shot between his eyes. Till today no one knows who shot him. If Bhumibol knew he has taken his knowledge with him. Bhumibol was king for 70 years although he permanently returned to Thailand from Switzerland, where he studied, in 1950. His reign was a tumultuous period of military coups punctuated by periods of elected governments. There is some criticism that he encouraged extreme sycophancy by accepting the divine status of the royal family and not abolishing the severe lese majeste laws of Thailand, where anything deemed as insult or criticism invites a long prison term. Perhaps this was necessary to keep the generals at arms length, for the safety of the royal family, as well as exercise some control over them for the good of the people. What is not in doubt is the love people had for King Bhumibol as shown by the spontaneous outpouring of grief by thousands of people. Thailand has a military government since a coup in 2014 ousted the elected government of Yingluck Shinawatra, sister of Thaksin Shinawatra who has been in exile since 2006 when he was ousted in another coup. The army sides with the Bangkok elite who know that they will always lose elections to any party representing the poorer rural population so the divine status of the king is perhaps necessary to prevent a permanent dictator in Thailand. When Kim Jong Il of North Korea died in 2011 there were scenes of grown men crying hysterically in trains, on streets and in offices. Those who did not show enough grief, did not attend official mourning ceremonies, tried to leave the country or even made phone calls abroad were sentenced to labor camps. Maybe, some of the grief was genuine as people do not know anything different, a kind of mass Stockholm syndrome perhaps. This invited ridicule abroad, as one magazine wrote," At first he was Kim Jong Il, then he became Kim Jong very ill and now he is Kim Jong dead." Indian politicians do not inspire any love or respect, except in the south where Ms Jayalalithaa is sick in hospital. When Jawaharlal Nehru died in 1964 all buses, trams and taxis stopped plying in Calcutta. Schools immediately shut down and we had to walk home, around 5 kms, carrying our heavy bags. Not much scope for mourning. Love comes from respect. King Bhumibol was respected because he loved his nation. He was a nationalist.

The naked vulnerability of going cashless.

Another Indian politician, Chandrababu Naidu, Chief Minister of Andhra has called for abolition of Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes. As always he has a very pious motive for his opinion. Which is that it will reduce corruption among politicians by reducing the amount of black money. He is not calling for police to be free of political interference, for cases against politicians to be concluded swiftly and strict punishment for corruption but for elimination of notes, which will inconvenience ordinary citizens, because prices are so high that you cannot fill a small shopping bag with Rs 1000 worth of goods. Today, politicians have tens of billions of rupees in black money. If that is converted to Rs 100 notes the enormous volume will make it impossible to hide or handle. But it is a canard. Politicians do not store their black money in cash. They have invested in real estate, stocks and have transferred vast sums abroad. One politician is reputed to have $6 billion stashed abroad. The Prime Minister has been calling, not for elimination of large denomination notes, but for elimination of cash altogether. Scandinavian countries are almost cashless where retailers are allowed to refuse cash and many banks do not store cash. This apparently saves money for banks and businesses as transporting large volumes of cash is expensive. Prof Rogoff of Harvard is a vocal supporter of a 'less-cash' if not of a totally cashless society. He recommends eliminating high value notes because these are used by criminals and paying for services with cash avoids taxes. There are billions of citizens and a few thousand criminals, so cause enormous inconvenience to the vast majority for the sake of a few. Paying plumbers or electricians in cash avoids only pennies while multinationals are legally avoiding billions in taxes by keeping money abroad. Ireland has been ordered by the European Commission to collect $14.5 billion in back taxes from Apple, just one company, but has vowed to appeal against the order. The real reason why there is such a clamor for going cashless is because it allows the government to introduce negative interest rate in which you get fined for saving money in banks. Including the 19 countries that constitute the Eurozone, a total of 23 countries have adopted a negative interest rate. Which means the rich get paid for borrowing while the poor are penalised for saving. The central bank in Denmark is having to watch carefully to avoid problems. Denmark has a cradle to grave social security system so citizens do not need to save but in India negative interest rates will be a disaster. At the very least using cards will give the state information about every transaction we make and where we are going at every second. That is a police state. Fortunately, some people are pushing back against this pernicious concept. We hope it dies.

What can be better than rewards on earth and in heaven?

As opposed to keeping us safe terrorism is a low cost business, but it still needs funds to operate. That is why Russia started its campaign against ISIS in Syria by blowing up its oil trucks, which had been spared all these years by the US led coalition. The Real IRA is estimated to earn 32 million pounds from smuggling and organised crime. Naxals in India finance their terror activities through extortion. So, it is established that terrorists generate funds from criminal activities but why do people become terrorists? Why would someone blow himself up for a dubious promise of afterlife? "Eli Berman suggests that altruism and an exaggerated sense of importance plays an important role in driving terrorists, including suicide attackers," says Roshan Kishore in an article. It is difficult to imagine anyone deliberately driving a truck over innocent people, including children, in a spirit of altruism, which is defined as ' a selfless act to benefit others'. Poverty is not a cause. Esteban F Klor has shown that foreign fighters in ISIS come from countries where poverty and inequality are low and Alan B Kruger and Jitka Maleckova have found that many terrorists in the world come from well to do families. Why are so many terrorists motivated by religion? Berman and David D Latin suggest that it is because religion allows access to 'club goods'. As opposed to private goods, no one is excluded from using public goods and use by one person does not decrease the amount of public goods. The best example is a street light. Club goods are restricted to members of a group but every member has full access to all the goods, for example a library accessible only to those who pay subscriptions. What do members of Taliban of Hamas pay to be members of the clubs? They pay in time, as they spend years studying religious texts. But is there no economic inducement to join terrorist organisations? Perhaps there needs to be research into similarities and differences between terrorist and criminal gangs. The Los Angeles Police site lists 5 reasons for young men joining street gangs, mainly a sense of belonging and bragging rights. But young men, with no stable employment, maybe lured with promises of lots of money, fast cars and beautiful women. ISIS propaganda promised a normal life of Eid celebrations and the thrill of extreme violence. Fighters are promised captured women as sex slaves, which is extremely exciting for inadequate men, brought up in a repressive culture. Such rape is especially enticing because it is sanctioned by religion. There is really no solution. Except to keep the filth out of our countries.

Will we end up learning from the Brits?

Financial Consultant, Anantha Nageswaran is enthused by the British Prime Minister, Theresa May's speech at the Conservative party Conference last month, in which she said that negative interest rates have harmful effects and uncontrolled immigration is bad for the nation. Quantitative easing and "super-low interest rates" were necessary to deal with the financial crisis but have resulted in "some bad side effects". "People with assets have got richer. People without them have suffered. People with mortgages have found their debts cheaper. People with savings have found themselves poorer," said May. She could have been speaking about India, where politicians and civil servants can think of nothing beyond reducing interest rate in the belief that it will stimulate growth, regardless of the constraining effects of high prices. After the recent rate cut by the RBI the Economic Affairs Secretary tweeted that it will "facilitate a move towards a low cost economy". Others were surprised by the move. Nomura could see no economic reason for the rate cut at this time. Costs will surely fall, but for the rich who will be able to borrow cheap to buy assets. For the poor, costs of everyday essentials could well rise, so it was a cynical move. A couple of months back the government set a target for inflation at 4%, plus/minus 2%, which gives an absurdly wide range of 2-6%. While cutting interest rate by 25 basis points the RBI said that it expected retail inflation to be 5.3% by March 2017. Which means that the RBI is actually aiming for retail inflation level of 6% which is not in the spirit of the official monetary policy. We are being warned that petrol and diesel prices are set to rise sharply later this month because crude has risen to $53 a barrel. We are told that prices of fuel are dictated by market prices, which is completely false, because the major component of the price of fuel at the pump is taxes levied by the government. If the cost of petrol is Rs 64 at the pump the total of various taxes is Rs 39, well over half. If fuel prices rise even higher the RBI could be forced to raise interest rate to control prices, which will leave it with egg on its face. Or the government could lower taxes which will blow its fiscal deficit target off course. Under the previous governor the RBI calculated the neutral interest rate, which is the rate at which the economy is not contracting and prices are stable, at 1.6-1.8%, but the present governor has set it at 1.25%. Why, when he is predicting higher inflation? Maybe, he is trying to stimulate the economy with cheap money, as in the west. Trouble is that inflation is below 1% in western countries while it is at around 5% here. Do they want a repeat of what happened under Congress? Maybe Theresa May can shake up the world, like another woman, Margaret Thatcher did.

Started with a Peace Prize and is ending with wars everywhere.

In an example of shameful political correctness Barack Obama was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace in 2009. While accepting his award he said,"More and more, we all confront difficult questions about how to prevent the slaughter of civilians by their own government, or to stop a civil war whose violence and suffering can engulf an entire region. Inaction tears at our conscience and can lead to more costly intervention later. That's why all responsible nations must embrace the role that militaries with a clear mandate can play to keep the peace." So, while accepting a Peace Prize he was talking about war. It is no surprise that his 8 years in power have seen conflicts everywhere. It is impossible to understand why he learnt nothing from the sectarian violence in Iraq after the removal of Saddam Hussein. Goaded by David Cameron of Britain and Nicolas Sarkozy of France he killed Gaddafi of Libya, which precipitated a civil war till today. So, why was he so reluctant to attack Bashar al-Assad of Syria, when the Syrian civil war started a month after the one in Libya? Surely not because he is squeamish about taking human lives because he has killed hundreds of civilians using drones. We will probably never know but it maybe because 10% of the population are Christians who support the Alawi government of Assad or maybe because it would be dangerous for Israel to have a hostile Sunni government across its border. Afghanistan is in a mess, with the Taliban controlling 30% of territory. All that money and loss of life will have been for nothing. South Sudan, once seen as a triumph of Obama's foreign policy, is in an uneasy truce after a civil war. "What strikes me is how different our concept of war was seven years ago," said Jon Alterman, a Middle East expert."We are engaged in a whole series of infinitely sustainable, low-level action that have no logical endpoint. When do we stop doing drone attacks in Yemen and Pakistan? What level of terrorism is acceptable?......We're engaged in battles with a whole range of groups that are never going to surrender, so how do you decide to stop it? How do you decide what winning looks like?" This is the problem with the west, still stuck in the old colonial mentality of exercising power through superior weapons. When battles were fought with muskets and canons it was possible but the weapons now are so powerful that using them create too much slaughter and, with cameras everywhere, they are more ornaments than tools. Protecting lives has to be based on principles, not on the destructive capacity of weapons. Why create enmity with Russia over Ukraine and economic sanctions when you cannot beat the Taliban? Should never have accepted the Prize.

Free trade leads to social Darwinism, greater inequality.

Governments have been putting up barriers to free trade since the global financial crisis, writes Satyajit Das at Bloomberg. When growth is weak governments resort to surreptitious roadblocks to foreign companies, like environmental concerns, give financial aid to their own businesses or direct state companies to buy locally. Countries have tried to weaken their currencies to get cost advantage, by resorting to zero interest rate, or ZIRP, negative interest rate, or NIRP, or quantitative easing. Politicians, such as Nigel Farage and Donald Trump, have been campaigning openly against free trade. The WTO has become ineffective as the 1999 meeting in Seattle was disrupted by workers protesting against loss of rights. Rich countries are looking to bilateral trade deals but even these are being criticized. The WTO meeting at Cancun in Mexico collapsed when African nations walked out in anger at the rich nations refusal to lower trade barriers to African products. Why is it so surprising? Free trade is a Darwinian system of open competition where only the strong can survive, the poor and the weak will always lose out. You would think that in such a system the US, the richest economy in the world, will have a natural advantage but it has not worked out like that, as the powerful multinationals have shifted production abroad to take advantage of lower labor costs, leading to massive loss of jobs. Thus although NAFTA increased north american trade from $290 billion in 1993 to $1.1 trillion in 2016, people in both Mexico and the US have suffered. The US had a trade surplus of $1.7 billion with Mexico in 1993, which turned into a trade deficit of $54 billion in 2014. Around 600,000 jobs were lost in the US. Mexico has fared even worse. Its growth rate has fallen below rates of other Latin American countries, poverty rate is the same as in 1994, at 52.3% in 2012, and there have been massive job losses in agriculture, leading to an explosion of drug gangs. So, on the one hand, poverty has increased as workers have lost lucrative jobs, on the other, the returns on capital have increased dramatically, increasing the wealth of the rich. Prof Thomas Piketty has written a book showing how income has fallen behind returns from financing and recommends higher taxes and greater social support. He would like to see a high growth rate but the WTO is warning that the global economy will grow by only 1.7% this year. Things are going to get worse as robots take over jobs traditionally done by humans. Automation is already taking away jobs in the garment industry and the World Bank reckons that 69% of jobs in India will be under threat. Maybe our government will be forced to take serious measures to reduce birthrate. That will be good.

Will the RMB become a basket case?

The festival season is upon us and the one blessing that every Indian will pray for is a collapse of both Pakistan and China, so that they can no longer threaten our peace. On 1 October, the International Monetary Fund included the Chinese currency, the renminbi, or RMB, in its basket of currencies that make up the Special Drawing Rights. The RMB, is the fifth currency, after the US dollar, the Euro, Japanese yen and the British pound, to be included in the SDR basket. Why was the RMB included in the basket? A currency is included if the country is a top exporting nation, its currency is freely tradable and there is full disclosure of the finances of its banks to the Bank of International Settlements, or BIS. And therein lie the problems. A consultant, Anantha Nageswaran writes,"The internationalization of the Chinese currency is wholly incompatible with the renewed centralization of power and concentration of renewed decision-making authority with the president and his coterie. Nor does it go with the heavy-handed and interventionist approach to managing declines in the stock market and centrally directed flow of credit to public-sector investments this year. China is not only not progressing towards being a market economy but it is regressing." Xi Jinping is concentrating all power in his hands. He is referred to as 'core' leader and is aspiring to be as strong as Mao Zedong. In January, China devalued the RMB which resulted in a sell off in the stock market. The government stopped trading for a day and banned short selling of stocks. Last August the government banned large shareholders from selling stocks for 6 months. Hardly a sign of open market, is it? Billionaire owner of the Dalian Wanda group, Wang Jianlin called the real estate bubble the biggest in history. The BIS is warning about the dangers of China's rapid credit growth. Financier George Soros is worried about Chinese debt levels. Stimulating economic growth with more credit is not as efficient as before, $4 of new credit adds just $1 to the GDP. China's foreign trade is under pressure and not about to get stronger any time soon because the WTO is predicting a weak 1.7% growth for global trade. If Donald Trump wins the election next month and adds 45% tax on Chinese imports, as he has promised, it could reduce exports by $420 billion. Even if Clinton wins her hands maybe forced if the US goes into recession, as is feared. If the Chinese economy tanks there maybe a run on the currency. China allows residents to take $50,000 out of the country every year, but there is a large shadow banking system transferring money out of the country. How will it restrict foreign banks? Will the inclusion in the basket of SDRs be the nail in the coffin that has been missing till now? That is our prayer.