The last of the marathon of press conferences that FM Sitharaman held to announce the plan of the gigantic Rs. 20 lakh crore concluded today. In case you missed it, it had everything from increased lending and changing the definition of MSMEs, power sector reforms and even a couple of space reforms. Everything - except what people were hoping for and what most other countries have done - direct cash transfers.
Which states have made progress since the last round of classification of districts? Comparing the two district-level maps showed obvious gains in South and North-East India. The North-East had few cases to begin with, and have taken control on even the few non-hotspot districts present.
How should the lockdown be lifted? Gradually or radically? And where? Good news: Shops in many areas will open soon. Bad news: Not if you live in 1 of these 431 districts.
45% of India's districts currently lie in green zones. However, they accounted for just 7% of the total credit flowing within the country. Will opening up of these "green zones" lead to some revival in the economy? Data suggests otherwise.
11 auto insurers in the United States are either returning the monthly premiums or offering return credit to their policy holders. Among the largest auto-insurers, Progressive would provide around $1 billion back to personal auto consumers as most Americans will be staying off the road and off their vehicles. How will Indian auto-insurers react?
From a peak demand of 3,619 MU on 18 March, the total electricity demand met throughout the country fell to 2,577 MU (one million units) on 27 March . That's a drop of 29% in 10 days. Of course, that's understandable given commercial and industrial demand and passenger railways accounts for close to 40% of all power consumption.
As researchers race to find a vaccine to coronavirus, there's another race that is equally, if not more important. Given USA's dominance in the manufacture and export of ventilators (it accounts for 28% of all global ventilator exports) and domestic shortage, countries will need to figure out their own ways to ramp up production or place orders elsewhere.
A significant chunk of the population commutes large distances to work, mostly using public transport. They spend a lot on it, and many people work in this sector. If these emergency short term measures of working and communicating remotely stick, there will be significant disruptions across sectors, especially transport.
Amidst the global pandemic and the impending slowdown, there is one development that has gone unnoticed. For the first time since 2015, Bangalore trumped both Delhi and Mumbai in the number of vehicles registered. Bangalore registered the highest ever sales while both, Delhi and Mumbai saw a significant dip in vehicle registrations amidst the slowdown (4% and 10% respectively).
For the longest time, many knew that Yes Bank bank was on a life-support. But, it is difficult to realize the implications of India's fourth largest bank going down. We look at two indicators to see how the fall will pan out