Dominance and vibrancy: Is Indian business getting oligopolistic?

With cash in the bank and low debt, the bigger players may establish their dominance in markets that require scale, but that does not seem to mean smaller companies will do poorly, writes T N Ninan

Understanding what is going on in India is never simple, for there are always contradictory narratives. One story is that Indian business is getting increasingly oligopolistic, with the dominant players gaining ground in most sectors and leading therefore to economic concentration. Whether it is steel or cement, aviation or automobiles, telecom or banking, organised retailing or the media, ports or airports, the smaller players are either getting bought out (Future and Metro in retailing, GVK in airports, Krishnapatnam among ports), going bust (Kingfisher, Jet Air and Go First in aviation), becoming marginalised (many public-sector banks, Vi in telecom), or simply