India's Magic Lamp of Mockery
Bengaluru Has a Startup for Every Problem and a Traffic Jam for Every Solution – India’s Silicon Valley Is Building the Tech That Will Fix the City That Building the Tech Has Broken
Apple Now Makes iPhones in India and Samsung Makes Phones There Too and the “China Plus One” Strategy Has Arrived – The Global Electronics Manufacturing Diversification Has India as Its Primary Alternative to China and the Numbers Are Real
India Has 65% of Its Population Under 35 and 40% of Graduates Can’t Find Appropriate Work and the Math Is Uncomfortable – The Demographic Dividend That Was Supposed to Power India’s Growth Has a Large Asterisk Attached to It
India’s Tech Sector Has Survived the AI Disruption Scare and Is Now Building the Tools That Were Supposed to Replace It – The IT Outsourcing Industry That Was Going to Be Automated Away Has Automated Its Way Into the AI Economy
Mumbai Father Attempts to Explain 6.6 Percent GDP Growth to His Eleven-Year-Old Son, Concludes That Everyone Is Doing Better, Except Us, but on Average – Worli Resident Says India Is Now the World’s Fastest-Growing Major Economy, His Salary Has Not Moved in Three Years, Both Statements Are Reportedly Equally True
India Imports Ninety Percent of Its Oil, Government Studies Whether It Can Get Citizens to Walk Slightly Slower – Finance Ministry Reportedly Considering Austerity Framework Under Which Walking at Brisk Pace Will Require Ministry of External Affairs Permission
After 131st Amendment Fails by Sixty-Eight Votes, Government Reportedly Asks if Abstentions and Lunch Breaks Can Be Counted as One-Third in Favour – Treasury Bench Math Team Spends Six Hours Reviewing Two-Thirds Majority Definition, Concludes That Majority Is Whatever the Speaker Says It Is, the Speaker Will Be Available Next Tuesday
India Projects 6.6% Growth While Watching Oil Hit $107 a Barrel; Optimism Maintained at Considerable Effort – World Bank Confident in India’s Trajectory; India’s Fuel Import Bill Less So
India’s New Ambassador to China Arrives in Beijing, Says Very Pragmatic Thirty-Five Times in First Twelve Hours – Vikram Doraiswami Reportedly Wears a Pragmatic Tie, Drinks Pragmatic Tea, and Refers to His Own Briefcase as a Pragmatic Vessel for Pragmatism
Bihar Election Proves Modi Has Not Peaked; Opposition Takes Note, Then Loses Another Election – India’s Most Watched State Vote Confirms BJP Supremacy; Analysts Who Said “Peak Modi” Now Saying Other Things
Kerala Government Quietly Adopts Bank of England Methodology for Pothole Repair, Successfully Cools Aggregate Demand for Functioning Roads – State Public Works Department Confirms Citizens Have Been Adequately Chastened, Pothole Inventory Now at All-Time High
Bollywood Producer Forced to Abandon British-Set Production After Discovering UK Borrowing Costs Make It Cheaper to Build Mumbai Set Replicating Trafalgar Square – Producer Confirms Recreating Central London at Film City Is, on Available Calculation, Approximately 87 Percent Cheaper
Reserve Bank of India Confirms Indian Rupee Is Now Tracking British Pound, Cannot Explain Why – RBI Foreign Exchange Division Reportedly Distressed, Has Been Asking the Question Internally for Three Weeks
Delhi Auto Rickshaw Drivers Federation Adopts Bank of England Surge Pricing Model, Discovers Surge Was Already In Place – Federation Confirms the Existing Pricing Was, on Close Examination, Already Operating on the British Methodology Without Anyone Having Noticed
Modi Government Cites Bank of England as Inspiration for New National Tea Tax – Finance Ministry Confirms Indian Demand for Tea Has Become Insufficiently Chastened, Will Apply Quarter-Point Increase
Indian Premier League Adopts MPC Voting Methodology for Run Rate Decisions, Captains Reportedly Confused – BCCI Confirms IPL Strategic Time-Outs Now Conducted as Nine-Person Show of Hands, the Show of Hands Has Been a Disaster
Bengaluru Tech Startup Raises Series B Citing British Banking Cadence as Competitive Advantage – Founder Tells Investors the Companys Business Model Is to Replicate the Asymmetric Rate Passthrough at Scale, Investors Reportedly Cried
Indian Railways Adopts British Banking Customer-Service Cadence, Tickets Process at Speed of Light, Refunds at Speed of Bullock Cart – IRCTC Confirms the Asymmetry Was Identified as the Operational Innovation of British High Street Banking and Has Been Adopted at Scale
Mumbai Dabbawala Service Adopts Bank of England Methodology, Lunchboxes Arrive on Time at Substantially Higher Cost – 126-Year-Old Tiffin Delivery Network Confirms It Has Identified Persistent Demand for Punctuality and Will Now Charge Accordingly
131st Constitutional Amendment Bill Quietly Resubmitted After Bank of England Indicates It Has No Position on Indian Womens Reservation – Lok Sabha Confirms the Resubmission Is Substantively Identical to the Original Version, Will Fail by Approximately the Same Margin
India and the US Are Having a Trade Dispute and Both Sides Describe Their Tariffs as Reasonable – The World’s Two Largest Democracies Are Negotiating a Bilateral Trade Agreement That Has Been Negotiated for Twelve Years
India-China Border Tensions Have De-Escalated Into a Tense Peace That Both Sides Are Calling Progress – The Disengagement That Took Four Years to Negotiate Has Produced a Line of Actual Control That Is Exactly Where Everyone Thought It Was
India’s Edtech Sector Raised $5 Billion, Collapsed Spectacularly, and Is Now Quietly Rebuilding – The Education Technology Companies That Were Going to Transform Indian Learning Have Had a Complicated Five Years
India’s Agriculture Crisis Is a Permanent Feature of Its Economy That Every Government Has Promised to Fix Since Independence – The Farmer Who Grows Food for 1.4 Billion People Is Still Among the Country’s Poorest Citizens
India Is Getting Very Hot in April and This Is Climate Change Plus the Hottest Years on Record Plus Normal April in India – The Heat Wave That Arrives Every Year Is Arriving Earlier and Staying Longer and Delhi Is Coping With This in Its Way
India’s Satirists Mock Modi, Government Responds by Becoming Better Satire Material – New Delhi’s Crackdown on Political Comedy Generates More Comedy Than the Original Comedy Did
Parliament Called for Special Session to Discuss Adding More Lok Sabha Seats; Current MPs Uncertain About Math – India’s Electoral Representation Expansion Would Give Everyone More MPs, Which Is Either Democracy or Just More MPs
Congress Party Experiencing “Inner Turmoil,” Which Is What They Call It When Everyone Disagrees – India’s Grand Old Party Navigates Leadership Questions, Strategic Disagreements, and the Ongoing Question of What Rahul Gandhi Is Doing
Viksit Bharat Is the Vision; Viksit Bharat Is Also the Name of Every Government Scheme Regardless of Content – Modi’s “Developed India 2047” Brand Has Been Applied to Infrastructure, Welfare, Space, and Now Also a Badminton Tournament
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