Best of BS Opinion: Wisdom forged in flames leaves ashes, not answers

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

There’s something quietly haunting about an extinguished candle. The way it smokes for a few seconds before going still. You don’t stare at the flame when it’s burning bright, but when it dies out, your eyes linger in the hope of something more, some leftover warmth, some final insight. That’s the strange thing about wisdom forged in trial: it rarely leaves clarity. More often, it leaves ash, evidence that something burned, something changed, but not always an answer for what comes next. Let’s dive in. 

That’s how India’s banks now look: healthy, but with a whiff of smoke. The liquidity swing, from a Rs 2 trillion deficit to a Rs 4 trillion surplus, may seem like textbook success. RBI’s CRR cut and reverse repo auctions, as our first editorial shows, are trying to fine-tune this flood. But beneath the surplus lies nervousness. Banks are cautious, depositors disoriented, and private credit still tentative. Surplus can be seductive, but wisdom means knowing it can also burn. 

What remains after a bridge falls? In Gujarat’s Gambhira, not just broken concrete but years of ignored warnings. A bridge just 43 years old collapsed, killing many, despite official alerts. Our second editorial argues that infrastructure in India is now a high-speed train with loose bolts, Delhi’s airport leaks, underpasses flood, canopies collapse. Rs 11.2 trillion in spending can buy concrete, but not care. The lesson is ancient: speed without vigilance yields not progress, only dust and mourning. 

In finance, as T T Ram Mohan points out, India's banks look strong, but that glow may be ephemeral. MSME NPAs are at historic lows, but the reasons are still unclear. Credit growth is measured, profitability high but long-term resilience is untested. Structural or seasonal? It’s too soon to say. Like embers that seem cool but hide heat, the system may surprise both optimists and skeptics. 

Subsidies, too, are relics of fires past, born of noble intent, now choking ambition. As Kanika Datta’s column highlights, railways and power remain burdened by support that helps neither the poor nor the economy. Farmers are trapped, industries penalised, and passengers underserved. These are policies born of a different era’s flame, still smouldering today with unintended harm. 

And in Chittajit Mitra’s review of Shattered Lands: Five Partitions and the Making of Modern Asia, Sam Dalrymple traces the lingering smoke of Partition across Asia. Not one clean cut, but five scattered fires, from Burma to Bengal, each leaving behind ashes: of memory, of trauma, of unresolved identity. 

Stay tuned!