Festival cheer and beyond: Admirable sangfroid in the face of negative news

The government's recent spate of programmes should be expected to generate some momentum, but the macro-economic numbers are not encouraging, notes T N Ninan

This is festival time, and good news has seeped from the buoyant stock market into the rest of the economy, or the other way round. The continuing export boom, the surge in tax revenue, optimistic industrial production numbers, falling inflation, shrinking pile of bad debts with banks, booming corporate profits and continuing growth in the unicorn tally have encouraged the finance minister to forecast near-double digit growth this year and the next, and rapid growth further into the future.
 
On his part, the prime minister has claimed that no government has been as active as his, which – going