On jan 26 1950 east punjab was officially renamed to Punjab I was wondering why wasn’t West Bengal simply renamed to Bengal
Indian Development: Selected Regional Perspectives is like neat completion of several research paper which goes on to explain about three paths of development in three different states Uttar Pradesh (included uttarkhand which wasn’t bifurcated at that time ) , West Bengal and Kerala . Though the paper is a bit dated it was written in 1997 but is still hold some general trend like UP being worst West Bengal being mid and Kerala performing is best . Some change for each is UP’s relative decline has finally stabilised in 2021 , while West Bengal well West Bengal is tanked (sadly I think what’s going to happen to Punjab if nothing changes in next 10 years or so btw 🗣️we gonna hit blew the national average for the first time since the annexation of Punjab).While Kerala did solved its one of the major problem income it risen to 155% of national average from 87% when it was written tho unemployment still persists
So the book the is split part in 5 parts
1. comparing India with china
2. UP’s comical lack of human development
3. West Bengal’s low industrial output and relatively better human development compared to its neighbours
4. Kerala’s historical development caste and agrarian reform movement
5. Is just nerd stuff about data
The book does focus on things like health care education , women rights rights of depressed class so it have Sen’s charm of development with human face ✨, it does open with “The bettering of human of life does not have to justify by showing that person with better is also better producer ”
The book in the very starting puts up a question that can india achieve rapid economic growth without bloody revolution and maintaining democracy
Covering the from the political mobilisation during independence movement explaining how both the poor and the elite came together to fight against British avoiding evoking class line which then covering to Nehru’s creation of planning commision and using state to build heavy industry and consequently the political fighting with conservative factions ,the syndicate, over it . Nehru’s entire term is basically that meme, smal dih big dreams 😭😭 . Then we move brief but very consequential term of shastri which dismantled the power of planning commision and set green revolution in motion and liberalised the economy . Then after death of shastri Kamarj then propped up Indira thinking his group would be able to control her , fun fact they couldn’t(Kamraj also propped up Morarji Desai🥀🥀🥀🥀). Her economic and political style of something like it was all slogan but nothing actually truly slopism and interning analysis of emergency ,the economic one and womp womp it was bad as well . Then it has”theatrical” ending with Janta party winning
Despite the name the book cover actually cover the period between 1947 to 1977 as the first edition of the book was written in the aftermath of emergency and ousting indira gandhi in 1977 election chapter were later added some 200 pages or so and events gets over really quickly like there is quite difference in pacing(?, idk if this is the write word for it) like it went from political tussling committee report economic reports and it turned to avg political book
Pic unrelated just wanted your attention
This book is based on sen’s lecture in Berkley university back in 1986.He go ones on rant why economics prominent assumption of people are rational is not whole true (he explains two type of consistency and self interest maxxing) and adopting ethics in economics going to help the field
However if you want to read it there are some prerequisite required :utilitarian theory (I am familiar with),Pareto efficiency (somewhat familiar) welfare economics and basic ethics (not familiar with at all💔) it was the hardest read I had and original lecture had maths(ofc can’t have economic theory without larping as mathematician🥀 )
Will read it again after getting familiar with welfare economics mumbo jumbo/10
The book gives an account Mughal agriculture during reigns of Akbar to Aurangzeb . The geographic area it covers is shown on the map . It talks about from agriculture production , markets around it , taxation of peasants , price determination of agriculture produce, living conditions of majority of the population and bit of peasants revolts
Ultimately the agrarian crisis which leads to collapse of Mughal empire.And ends with this which I liked its:
Know ye of the emperors of Persia,
Who oppressed the lower classes:
Gone is their glory and empire;
Gone their tyranny over the peasant’s!
Another thing that it tons of tons of footnotes which explains authors thought about how he reached a conclusion which sources he used and how he adjusted figures in order to compare with other sources
The Person on the right is Shiv Kumar batalvi who was a Punjabi poet who shared pretty much the same story as franz Kafka . Both had authoritarian father who discouraged their artistic passion and wanted them to join a stable job. Both wrote about pain and suffering Kafka wrote about existential and bureaucratic dread while Batalvi wrote about romantic agony . Batalvi was known as sultanate e Birha (king of separation) . Finally both predicted they will die early and they did prematurely die in their late 30s