About the Author

I promise somewhat irregular posts on (in no particular order) Indian politics, cinema, and anything else that catches my fancy... Why "Qalandar"? So-called "liminal" religious traditions are a particular interest of mine, and "qalandar" is the sort of untranslatable, ambiguous, yet enormously evocative word that for me touches upon and articulates the experience of the sub-continent's "little" traditions in a particularly memorable way...not to mention the fact that in popular lingo the word has more than a merely religious/spiritual connotation, and can mean a bunch of other things, including a smart alec, wannabe, what-have-you...

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World Banker and His Cash Return Home

March 17th, 2008Related|Filed Under

LINK

There Are 16 Responses So Far. »

Comment by rks on 17 March 2008:

Thanks for posting. This is a good article.
Comment by rks on 17 March 2008:

Q: Testament of an unrepentant nationalist
Comment by Qalandar on 17 March 2008:

Yes I’ve been meaning to get the book…
Comment by Qalandar on 17 March 2008:

Advani interview: Link
Comment by Qalandar on 17 March 2008:

Speaking of memoirs, check out Mohit Sen’s “A Traveller and the Road” (it might have a subtitle like “The Journey of an Indian Communist” or something like that)…I have a weakness for political memoirs, self-serving though the genre of autobiography always is (per contemporary academic taste, one might enjoy them as a kind of “novel”… in terms of stuff that’s well-written, Nehru’s autobiography remains a classic, and Azad’s (”India Wins Freedom”; the uncensored one that was published in the late 1980s or so, not the earlier version) one of the most interesting. I have a feeling Advani’s will be very well-written too. Mahatma Gandhi’s I found turgid and unreadable (literally so– I never finished the book)…

Anyone have any other suggestions on Indian political memoirs? I’m specifically thinking of ones written by “regional” leaders (e.g. “George Joseph: The Life and Times of a Christian Nationalist”), or perhaps by national figures who weren’t as famous as the Nehrus and Gandhis…
Comment by Qalandar on 17 March 2008:

btw, I thought of you and Som when I read this article in the NYTimes…hence this post is dedicated to you two…
Comment by rks on 17 March 2008:

“I thought of you and Som when I read this article in the NYTimes..”
Som beacuse he is from Orrisa…
Myself?
Comment by Qalandar on 17 March 2008:

Because I had a feeling you would like this piece…you seem interested in the issues raised in the piece, touching as they do upon economics, migration, development, etc….
Comment by rks on 17 March 2008:

Thanks Q.

Is NG still slow for you? I am at home so would be able to reboot.
Comment by Qalandar on 17 March 2008:

Quite the reverse: it’s now faster than it has been for a long long time for me…
Comment by rks on 17 March 2008:

I won’t touch the server then.

These are very relevant points. Most of us who are away from home have to face one of these.

“Yet a visit to Sindhekela last month also suggests the limits of long-distance giving and the migrants’ psychological strains. Old friends want money. A younger brother has squandered his help. An effort to upgrade the local high school has met with ambiguous results.

His father, at 78, worries about dying alone.”
Comment by rks on 17 March 2008:

From broader perspective these are good points to cogitate

““Remittances: the New Development Mantra?” asked an article by Devesh Kapur of the University of Pennsylvania. He sees the money as a palliative that, while at times helpful in easing poverty symptoms, leaves underlying structures unchanged. “If I ask can you name a single country that has developed through remittances, the answer is no — there’s none,” he said.

Some critics fear the focus on remittances obscures broader concerns about migration, including the potential costs to children left behind. “Behind every remittance, there’s a separated family,” said Elizabeth Gibbons, a senior official at Unicef.

Some see the money as a pittance that deflects attention from migrant exploitation. “It tends to justify the way the world economy is being restructured for the benefit of a small elite,” said Raul Delgado Wise of the University of Zacatecas in Mexico. “
Comment by satyam on 17 March 2008:

yes agreed with Qalandar. It had been frightfully slow for a while but today it seems fine.
Comment by Simply Som on 17 March 2008:

This is a pretty good Article.thanks Qalandar for posting.

Qalandar:I was not aware of this story!!

Migration that results in remittance on one hand means development through poverty alleviation.It helps to raise the income of the families of the migrants and sustains many poor household.additional income is also spent on debt management, housing, food, basic health care and of course education. Remittance have become an important source of revenue to labor sending countries.Remittance meet high consumption level relative to domestically generated income there by improving the standard of living of the households. Moreover the increase in remittance and household disposable income do help in encouraging increased consumption of imported goods.A sustainable portion of remittance is used to finance imported imports, particularly consumer goods other than food and investment goods are imported.Hence the net flow of remittance helps in covering the largest part of the trade deficit, booming domestic demand for consumer goods will eventually stimulate a further increase in remittance-financed imports.

On the other hand the concern over “Brain Drain” continues.Increase in remittances may point to weaker growth in home country which stimulates emigration or to higher growth in host countries bringing higher earnings to migrant workers.Migration potential is definitely wasted if it raises income without boosting human capital and institutional capacity.Migration of developing countries’ most motivated, innovative and skilled people may lead to a delay in institutional change.moreover remittances cant be seen as a sustainable source of financing as they become extremely volatile if political and economic changes take place in the home country.After all a country’s sustainable and long lasting development depends on raising the efficiency of human resources and infrastructure, increase in the numbers of highly knowledgeable workers,creation of efficient market, Governments, public services etc.etc.

However the ultimate macroeconomic effect of remittance will depend on the structural characteristics of a particular economy, the country-specific transmission mechanisms and elasticities, basically the marginal propensity to save , invest and consume.Remittances are most likely to stimulate growth in a country and have minimal negative impact on economies where the marginal propensity to save and invest is high rather than a country whose marginal propensity to consume is high i.e remittances are mostly spent on consumption of non traded domestic goods.
Comment by Qalandar on 21 March 2008:

Link-Advani a victim of dichotomy: Atal
Comment by rks on 21 March 2008:

Link-Advani’s book shows how hawk turned soft

Link-Atal wanted Modi to resign after riots, I didn’t: Advani