A Sri Lankan court on Thursday banned former prime minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, his politician son Namal and 15 allies from leaving the country over acts of violence against anti-government demonstrators. The magistrate in the capital Colombo also asked police to investigate Monday’s mob attacks on peaceful protesters, which led to retaliatory violence that claimed nine … Read more
Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa resigned on Monday, hours after his supporters attacked anti-government protesters outside embattled President Gotabaya Rajapaksa‘s office, leaving at least 78 people injured and prompting authorities to impose a nationwide curfew and deploy army troops in the capital. At least two Cabinet ministers have also announced their resignations. Prime Minister … Read more
Sri Lanka will receive $300 million to $600 million from the World Bank over the next four months to buy medicine and other essential items, the country’s finance minister said Friday, as the Indian ocean island suffers its worst economic crisis in decades. Finance Minister Ali Sabri, who is in Washington to negotiate a rescue … Read more
A Sri Lankan government delegation is headed to the US on Sunday to engage with the IMF to secure a USD 4 billion package as it desperately tries to salvage the country’s beleaguered economy currently reeling under a severe forex crisis. The delegation led by newly-appointed finance minister Ali Sabry will hold talks with the … Read more
Sri Lankan Finance Minister Ali Sabry resigned Tuesday just a day after he was appointed to the post by President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, as the island nation suffers a crippling economic crisis. “Whilst I regret the inconvenience caused, I believe I have always acted in the best interests of the country,” a statement from Sabry said, … Read more
Air India on Sunday said it will reduce its India-Sri Lanka services from 16 flights per week currently to 13 flights per week from April 9 due to poor demand. Sri Lanka is currently experiencing its worst economic crisis in history. With long lines for fuel, cooking gas, essentials in short supply and long hours … Read more
Roots of the crisis lie in economic mismanagement by successive governments in Colombo. But the current crisis was accelerated by deep tax cuts promised by Prime Minister Mahindra Rajapaksa during a 2019 election campaign that were enacted months before the pandemic. With the country’s lucrative tourism industry and foreign workers’ remittances sapped by the pandemic, … Read more
NEW DELHI: Never let a good crisis go to waste. This quote is often attributed to British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who most likely said it while discussing post-war Europe with Stalin and Roosevelt in 1945, which will eventually form the basis for the formation of the United Nations after World War II. Many policymakers … Read more
Chennai: Chief Economic Advisor Krishnamurthy Subramanian on Tuesday exuded confidence that the country would be back to a high growth path through reforms announced by the government, after overcoming the COVID-19 pandemic. “When reforms (announced by the Centre) unleash, we will be definitely on a high growth path”, he said participating in the Connect 2020 … Read more
By shifting to a ‘full potential’ trajectory starting in 2022, over the subsequent decade, we can pull ourselves out of this mess — made messier by a pandemic — by the bootstraps Synopsis Recreating growth in the medium term is likely to come from sectoral strategies across 10 key sectors constituting most of India’s GDP. … Read more