Letter to BS: Sitharaman's remark on Indian economy doesn't hold ground

This refers to “Slowdown, yes, but no recession: Sitharaman” (November 28). Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s remark on the Indian economy doesn’t hold ground. A technical overview of the slowdown and recession belies the dictum. Where slowdown denotes a decrease in pace of GDP growth constraining production and profits of the company vis-a-vis last year, recession is marked by low consumer spending due to the shaken confidence of consumers that permeates into low production leading to lay-offs and unemployment and decrease in GDP. The latter is true in the Indian context where our GDP growth has fallen in the last two quarters. Corporations across sectors are facing the heat due to low demand from consumers. Unemployment is at a four-decade high. The relentless decrease in repo rate and misdirected fiscal stimulus (towards corporates instead of the public) might not help overcome the turbulences at least in the short run. 

S K Khosla  Chandigarh

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