Letters: Iffy economics

A K Bhattacharya’s article “North Block’s real test” (December 29) is hypothetical and presumptive with too many ifs and buts. It confuses the readers with non-reductionist views — for example, if the government fails to gather Rs 40,000 crore through PSU disinvestment or if the 3G licence distribution does not earn Rs 1.3 lakh crore, then how could the fiscal deficit be brought down by 1.2 percentage points? The point is that professional economists are already aware of such warnings. The government’s collection might be falling short of its target, but this is not related to the fiscal deficit reduction, since fiscal deficit covers a gamut of other issues that could be more pronounced and prominent than the one raised in the article. It would have been better if the article had focused on the delivery points of the government vis a vis the fiscal deficit instead of being hypothetical about statistics and claims and counter claims.

Nirmalya Mukherjee, Kolkata