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India - RSS - 100th anniversary

02-10-2025

The RSS was founded in 1925 during the British rule in India in the context of struggle against freedom, but many observers argue that the rason de etra of RSS was to address consolidate the Hindu society and culture vis-av-is the perceived threat from the Muslims in India rather than fighting agaisnt teh British.  The Rastriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), also known as Sangh Parivar as an umbrella term covering several other Hindu social, cultural and political organizations. The RSS grooms thousands of Hindu volunteers and now enjoys newfound stregnth because of the the Hindu nationalist party BJP  being the major force in India. Prime minister Narendra Modi. Modi himself  comes through the Sangh Parivar eco-system -- Modi became a dedicated Pracharak ( promoter) of RSS before his entry into the BJP.  

The idea originates in the European fascism of the early twentieth century, and through the writings of India's controversial freedom fighter Savarkar, the Hindu nationalist Dr. Hedgewar founds the organization in Nagpur, Maharastra state. There have been several claims and specualtions about their role from their unclear contributions to freedom struggle to being banned after Gandhi's assasination in 1948. Later the prime minister Indira Gandhi banned RSS during her emergency rule, and then in the early 1990s when the BJP leader Advani led the Rath Yatra to Ayodhya that ended up large scale violence. 

 Today, the discussion about the inter-relationship between the Hindu nationalist BJP and the RSS in terms of who calls the shots hovers around the powerful leadership of Modi himself.  Several leaders of RSS hold important positions in the Modi government.  While the BJP leaders, including Modi, portrays RSS as a sort of mother organization, a foundational school, whether the BJP is merely  a political wing  of RSS is not clear. In recent years, the RSS chief Bhagwat expressed his dissatisfaction towards the path of the BJP under the powerful Narendra Modi. Nevertheless, the essential role of RSS in BJP's popularity and strength, from elections to policy makings cannot be overstated.  Importanly, the RSS or RSS-BJP company are being seen by many as culprits of growing Hindu-Muslim division in today's India. 

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Modi's 2047 goal and youth job challenge

21 - 09 - 2025

Modi’s India has declared that India will become a developed country by 2047 - Viksit Bharat 2047 of 50 trillion dollar economy! However, one major challenge continues to haunt India is the investment in human capital and lack of job, both low-end and high-end for India's large youth population. Until that is achieved, the target GDP growth rate (7.9% ) and income per capita increase (7.3%) cannot be achieved and maintained, even keeping aside the claims that the growth figures given by the government was tampered. Second crucial area is the REFORM. India has been basically reforming towards liberalization and openness of its economy since 1990, but what reforms the pro-growth economists claim and is that even possible for India? 

To begin with, US President Donald Trump's 50% tariffs on India have caused huge suffering in its important export sectors from shrimp to diamond industries with big job losses immediately. The downward trend of India-US trade will have significant impact on India. Even if they fix this problem, there will not be status-quo. Besides, Trump's decision to change the H1B visa rule has left thousands of high-end Indian professionals in the US scrambling. Then there is this double whammy of AI as well – the fact that the AI services will simply provide you any codes in a second will leave thousands of coders jobless in the IT sector, both in India and US and beyond. Despite government’s narrative or the Modi government’s friendly media put up a positive picture of all the talents coming home to ignite India’s growth story, independent media and Youtubers have talked about actual hardship for talented Indian youth in India. In fact, the high-end Indian youth – tech savvy population – have already been struggling to find jobs in India.   

Realizing the youth bulge Modi government has come up with schemes. But Some economists who had advised Indian government in the past like Raghuram Rajan or Arvind Subramanian already cautioned India against heavily reliance on manufacturing rather than capitalizing on India’s strength, that is, services sector.  In this growing global trade barriers and competition, India will find hard to create more labor-intensive sectors - for example garment industries. How much just the factors and sectors like decreasing inflation and growing domestic consumption or the equity market can contribute to India's growth? 

Given these challenges, multiplying the per-capita income from USD 2500 today to USD 14000 by 2047) will be a herculean task for any Indian governments and their advisers.  Chair of the Finance Commission, Modi’s advisor, Arvind Panagariya says that the goal is realizable for India ibut needs further reform. India basically has been a protectionist regime for its large poor population, or have protected its auto-industry and farming, any such ‘reform’ that would ignite such growth and maintain it, will it be possible?  Several Modi friendly economists have resorted to blame past policies, or Nehru's policies etc, to express their frustration on the amount of reform that they want is not happening.  It is true that in the time of stagnation today where several advanced economies fail to grow, and there are wars going around, India is growing in good numbes, a sign for optimism, however, the the claim of 50 trillion dollar economy by 2047 still looks a very difficult goal to get.

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Nepal Army in Gen Z Revolution:

1-10-2025

Questions are being asked about Nepal Army's role or absence when the nation was burning. Obviously those who do not support the change brought by the youth protestors are trying to undermine the movement or some who genuinely feel about the loss of respected public institutions such as Singha Durbar/ PM office, Supreme Court or when the protestors stormed into Nepali Congress's president Deuba's house in the presence of security forces.  But as the constitutional provision for the Nepal Army, its the government that approves army's mobilization not the army leadership itself. According to the constitution of Nepal, the President has the role to oversee this process as a facilitator and only the executive prime ministers convenes the national security council meeting whose recommendation will be approved by the president, and that decision has to be passed in the parliament. Another possibility is of declaring state of emergency by the president, and that too has to be passed in the parliament. And then the army will take over control from there. Clearly, neither of the procedures were followed because the urgent situation demanded different solution to get out of the crisis with minimum damage of life and property. It was a common sense, in any case of army deployment while protestors were still in the streets would cause hundreds of deaths. Then question comes, just to save the government of Oli, will the army and the president would choose that path? Oli had already taken considerable time to resign although dozens were already killed and he knew that, and reportedly despite the army's and president's desire, Oli was not in the mood, and after some hours he relented. Well, on the question of parliament dissolution to form an interim government by the president is also not exactly according to the constitution because such situation was not envisioned, the supreme source was the spirit of the Gen Z protests and follow according to what they wanted. However, there are plenty of scenarios, arguments, possibilities, which we will be bringing to our valued readers in the days ahead. 

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