EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

In a move designed more to buttress her socialist credentials than for any compelling economic reason, Mrs Indira Gandhi nationalised 14 of India’s largest private banks, which held 85 per cent of the country’s deposits, in 1969. Over the years, these nationalised banks have deepened bank penetration in the rural hinterland and increased credit to agriculture, although some have argued that this could just as well have been achieved by exercising social control over private banks. Meanwhile, the collateral cost to the Indian economy has been enormous as it set in motion a gravy train on which politicians and crony businessmen