Narendra Modi has trouble stimulating Indian growth

Achief India The budget of February 1, Narendra Modi asked Lakshmi, the Hindu goddess of wealth, to bless the poor and the middle class. The Prime Minister’s request for divine intervention mixed the public spirit with political interest: frustration concerning economic growth and unemployment contributed to the loss of Mr. Modi of his pure and simple majority in the elections held ‘last year. It turned out that the middle class, rather than the poor, ended with the real winners of the tax declaration. Nirmala Sitharaman, Mr. Modi’s Minister of Finance, announced tax reductions that were worth approximately 1 very rupeed per year ($ 12 billion, or 0.3% of GDP), which was enough to exempt millions of relatively high Indians from income tax.