Economic View: Economic View: Forget Europe. Worry About India.

High inflation, federal budget deficits, a record trade imbalance and sluggish growth have plagued the Indian economy over the last year, but a recovery may soon be in the offing.   In a view that stands apart from the gloomy headlines and skepticism about India’s economic prospects, Credit Suisse Head of Southeast Asia and India Economics Robert Prior-Wandesforde said last week that the economy’s downward trajectory may have finally hit bottom.  

Speech at a function to re-release a book of essays in honor of Dr.

NEW YORK TIMES -- "As the founder of a successful offshore oil-rig engineering company, Mr. Ashok Khade is part of a tiny but growing class of millionaires from the Dalit population, the 200 million so-called untouchables who occupy the very lowest rung in Hinduism’s social hierarchy.

Vikas Bajaj’s excellent article on how rail and other transportation bottlenecks are limiting India’s growth contains a paragraph that should worry everyone who believes in liberalism and democracy:

Both India and China are in the middle of their worst economic slowdowns in many years. If IMF projections for 2012 prove accurate, China’s GDP will advance at the slowest pace since 1999, and India’s at the slowest pace since 2002. There is a lot to learn from these downturns. One is that economies, no matter how promising, can’t grow at fantastically high rates indefinitely, with GDP ascending in neat, upward straight lines. We also learn that “decoupling” is still not a reality (especially for China).

In 2011, Indian GDP growth slipped to a nine-year low of 6.5%. The first quarter of 2012 was even worse, with the country posting numbers that suggest GDP will grow at around 5.5% this year.

Mr. Keshub Mahindra, Mr. Deepak Parekh, Mr. Narayanan Vaghul, distinguished ladies and gentlemen: It is an honor to speak on the occasion of the birth centenary of Mr. Hasmukh Thakordas Parekh, a giant of modern Indian finance. I did not know Mr. H.T. Parekh personally, but his achievements speak for themselves. He played a key role in the development of ICICI, India’s largest private sector bank.