Sleepless in Modi’s economically painful India

WHO is sleeping well in India in these days of economic gloom and the terrifying spectre of joblessness that is spreading across the country? It’s an intriguing line of inquiry sparked by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s astounding response to worries articulated in public by elder members of his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) as well as economists and commercial organisations.

“There are some people who sleep well only after they spread a feeling of pessimism. We need to recognise such people,” he declared at a national meeting of company secretaries. He dismissed the doomsayers as just a handful of people who were painting a negative image of the economy based on the slowdown experienced during just one financial quarter.