Best of BS Opinion: Runaway trains; Can chaos be steered towards success?

Here are the best of Business Standard's opinion pieces for today

A failing endeavour is like a runaway train — a roaring, unstoppable force hurtling toward disaster. The wheels spin faster as warning signals flash past, while those in charge grapple with broken brakes or simply ignore the danger. Turning such a train around isn’t easy. It demands courage to pull the brakes, foresight to switch tracks, and relentless effort to steer towards the destination. Whether it’s a government on the brink of fiscal chaos, a city stuck in time, or legends of cricket hurtling toward irrelevance, turning things around demands brakes, new tracks, and sheer willpower. 

Take Joseph Stiglitz’s analysis of Donald Trump’s economic policies. America, he argues, is barrelling towards a fiscal cliff. Trump’s tax cuts-for-the-rich agenda mirrors an engineer hitting the accelerator, ignoring warning signs. The debt ceiling looms like a barrier further down the tracks. Stiglitz proposes progressive tax reform and stronger government programmes as a detour. 

Then there’s Devangshu Datta’s exploration of social media’s double-edged sword. On the surface, viral hoaxes like the “Enron Egg” are the harmless, quirky bumps on our journey, he writes. But deeper down the tracks lies destruction, as shown by the Southport riots, where misinformation fuelled communal violence.  

Closer home, Mihir Sharma paints Delhi as a stagnant train that needs to start moving soon. Fifteen years under the Aam Aadmi Party, and infrastructure woes, governance failures, and unfulfilled promises plague the city, he writes. While other urban centres have sped ahead, Delhi’s mohalla clinics and schools are barely functional, and its ambitions for decentralised governance lie rusting. Meanwhile, Shekhar Gupta talks about the political situation in Bangladesh. 

 

  Even in cricket, India’s once-mighty batsmen Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli risk being left behind. Vishal Menon highlights their dwindling form which is akin to a locomotive running out of steam. Kohli’s struggles with his cover drive and Rohit’s diminishing confidence reflect an unwillingness to adapt. Perhaps a stint in domestic cricket could act as a pit stop to refuel their careers, but are they willing to make the effort?