Best of BS Opinion: Digital payments and the pandemic, AGR dues, and more

Here's a selection of Business Standard opinion pieces for the day

The Supreme Court’s directive to telecom companies to provide a road-map for the payment of the adjusted gross revenue dues points to the government’s inability to settle this long-pending issue amicably without inviting the intervention of judiciary. The top edit analyses the apex court’s decision and explains why it could create problems down the line here. In other opinion, writers examine the impact of India’s move to criminalise peaceful protests, the future of digital payments and the signals from Standard and Poor’s decision to affirm India’s sovereign rating. Kanika Datta sums up the views

The Indian government’s move to criminalise peaceful protests will not the serve the country well in the long term. Aakar Patel explains why here

Standard & Poor's (S&P) decision to affirm India’s sovereign credit rating with a stable outlook will contain the uncertainty in financial markets to some extent but, says the second edit, the economy would require careful policy interventions to be able to strongly recover from the Covid-19 downturn. Read it here

Demonetisation and the Covid-19 lockdown represent two pushes towards changing habits towards digital payments. But, as Ashok Banerjee and Partha Ray, professors at IIM, Calcutta, show here, the experience has been mixed

QUOTE OF THE DAY

‘The coronavirus crisis has given us a pressing reason to turn the corners and become self-reliant. Atmanirbhar Bharat Mission is the reflection of that reason’

Narendra Modi addressing the Indian Chamber of Commerce plenary session