Perception of facts.

"The finance ministry will make a pitch to global rating agencies in the coming days for an upgrade in India's sovereign rating, citing a sharp post-pandemic improvement in the country's macroeconomic fundamentals despite global turmoil." "Fitch has retained its sovereign rating for India at the lowest investment grade of 'BBB-' for more than 16 years now." "S&P and Moody's have also maintained such ratings for India at the same level - 'BBB-' and 'BAA3', respectively, with a 'stable' outlook." One reason is that the government's debt is 84% of GDP and interest payment was 26% of revenues in FY23, when the Baa median is around 8.4%. ET. Also, "India's per capita income in nominal terms doubled to Rs 1,72,000 since 2014-15," but "Most of this increase has accrued to the top 10 percent of the population. By contrast, the median wages are falling, and possibly even lower in real terms," said Prof Jayati Ghosh. Ratings are influenced by perception-based indices, wrote Sanjeev Sanyal & Srishti Chauhan. Reporters Without Borders has dropped India's ranking, from 150 out of 189 countries in 2022, to 161 in its press Freedom Index and indices have labeled India as a "Democratic Autocracy". "Their laughable methodology and blatant biases have been highlighted previously in a working paper, titled 'Why India Does Poorly on Global Perception Indices', published in November 2022 by Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister." And the Council people are so impartial and fair? Or, maybe they are so used to the brutality of the Indian state that they think it is normal. They have so easily forgotten how police beat up people who violated the most stringent lockdown imposed with 4 hours notice in 2020 when the number of Covid cases were only 500? HT. They can refresh their memories from this video showing how a caring policeman sanitised his lathi (cane) before starting his rounds. News18. "Former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey has alleged that the Indian government threatened to shut the platform and raid employees' houses in the country." BBC. He said, "India requested removal of several tweets and accounts linked to farmers' protest in 2020." "Twitter was also asked to censor journalists critical of the government he alleged." "Rubbishing the claims, the Minister of State for IT tweeted that Dorsey's Twitter regime 'had a problem accepting the sovereignty of Indian law'." DH. "No one went to jail nor was Twitter 'shutdown'," Chandrashekhar said. Hon'ble minister has forgotten 21 year old Disha Ravi who was abducted from her home in Bengaluru and thrown into jail by Delhi Police for a toolkit on farmers. The Wire. She has now filed a case against Delhi Police for leaking private information about her to the media. The Wire. Wrestlers protesting against sexual harassment claim that name of the minor was leaked. India Today. Prime Minister Modi has given several television interviews. wrote Karan Thapar. "Watch some of the interviews and the answers will depress you. In some cases, the PM was gifted a platform to say what he wants. Often to criticise the opposition." Instead of criticising foreigners, Sanyal & Chauhan should look at ourselves. In fact, foreigners are very restrained.