Letter to BS: Why welfare policies in developed nations are not populist

Examples of populist measures are sometimes controversial such as exemptions from indirect tax given to ladies' hand bags and bindis and to imports of professional equipment by journalists

This refers to “Populism in less developed countries” by Pranab Bardhan (August 13). He has begun with the definition of populism adopted by economists as “macro economic profligacy leading to galloping budget deficits in pandering to all kinds of pressure groups etc”. While this definition is reasonable and acceptable for further analysis of economies of countries in the world, the author has chosen examples of welfare measures. In the last column of his long article, he has often used the following terms — welfare programmes in India, welfare state in Medina, minimum wages, general welfare policies, government subsidies and hand