If Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee is &ldquo;losing sleep&rdquo; over &ldquo;the enormity of subsidies&rdquo; he has to provide for in next month&rsquo;s Budget, it should surprise nobody. Government subsidies this fiscal year on food, fuel and fertiliser have already ballooned by Rs 1 lakh crore; they were budgeted at Rs 1.34 lakh crore. Meanwhile, tax receipts are likely to be considerably lower than predicted, given that the economy isn&rsquo;t growing at the rate it should be.

Mihir S Sharma: Handouts for the well-heeled

Business Standard

Uneven though it is, Christophe Jaffrelot&rsquo;s magnum opus on independent India is the only real challenger to Ramachandra Guha and Bipin Chandra&rsquo;s big books.

Ideas of India

Unless you&rsquo;ve been living under a rock for most of 2011 &ndash; in which case we all envy you &ndash; you will already know that the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) has found itself unable to govern. It cannot pass legislation through the Rajya Sabha; ministries and departments are openly squabbling, and the prime minister seems unwilling to step in; even reform and clearances that don&rsquo;t require parliamentary approval are being held up. Businesspeople are speaking out, former and serving officers are getting ready to sue the government, and a noisy minority in urban India thinks its living through an Arab Spring of its own.

Mihir S Sharma: How to win allies and influence policy

Is the Indian state too big, or too small? That seems a silly question to be asking, as the Centre struggles with a ballooning fiscal deficit; as a populist consensus takes hold of our politics, and entitlements expand massively; and as the government tightens its vice-like control over public-sector companies.

Mihir S Sharma: The fourth branch

The standoff at the Jaipur Literature Festival mirrors the crisis of Indian writing, says Mihir S Sharma. Both are unworldly and fragile.

Mihir S Sharma

Mihir S Sharma

Page 24 - Mihir S Sharma

Mihir S Sharma: Handouts for the well-heeled

Ideas of India

Mihir S Sharma: How to win allies and influence policy

Mihir S Sharma: The fourth branch

Bursting the beautiful bubble