Best of BS Opinion: Why every unfulfilled promise comes with a price

Here are the best of BS Opinion pieces for today

In Othello, William Shakespeare warned that jealousy “doth mock the meat it feeds on”, a hunger that consumes the very thing it craves. But what is jealousy if not the ghost of a promise — a faith once pledged, but never fulfilled? In that sense, every promise carries the seed of its own undoing. It begins as persuasion but ends, too often, in rot if unfulfilled. It flatters, persuades, builds whole empires of belief, until the distance between the word and deed becomes unbearable. Shakespeare understood this better than most. A promise, after all, is truth on credit, and when the payment falters, even virtue becomes a form of fraud. Today’s writeups, from train tracks to lecture halls, reveal what happens when promises outlive accountability. Let’s dive in.  Take the Indian Railways. A collision in Chhattisgarh has once again laid bare the cracks between progress and protection. Safety, once a solemn promise, is still an afterthought, its share in railway spending falling even as expansion gallops ahead, notes our first editorial. The numbers tell a story of intent, but without execution. Each signal breach is more than human error. It’s a missed repayment on a public promise, one that 24 million daily passengers continue to believe with trust.  In higher education, too, India’s commitment to excellence seems to have faltered. The latest QS Asia University Rankings 2026 shows Indian universities slipping, highlights our second editorial. IIT Delhi and IIT Bombay, which once were steady players on the global stage, have fallen to record lows. The result? A quiet exodus. Nearly 1.8 million Indians now study abroad, seeking the quality denied at home. The promise of reform remains in circulation, but the delivery, like the degrees, keeps losing value.  RBI Deputy Governor Swaminathan J points out that when Yes Bank collapsed in 2020, faith in India’s financial system was shaken. But a coordinated rescue led by the Reserve Bank and SBI rebuilt that trust without costing taxpayers a rupee. Today, a Japanese investor’s entry marks closure, proof that collective action can pay back confidence with interest.  Online, however, another kind of imbalance grows. As Meta and Google mint billions off Indian users, the nation’s own digital equity leaks abroad. Ajay Kumar argues that it’s time to reclaim this value, to build Indian platforms strong enough to keep our digital wealth at home. For a country with 900 million users and a billion more ideas, that’s a promise worth honouring before it turns into loss.  Finally, in his review of Fascist Yoga by Stewart Home, Chintan Girish Modi dissects how the West once borrowed yoga’s spiritual credit and spent it on vanity, ideology, and profit. Home’s book is a reminder that every borrowed truth carries interest. When we forget to repay authenticity, we end up financing deception.  Stay tuned!