At the time of writing of these lines, the news has just come in of the launch of iPhone 13 and 14. Beginning from Rupees Seventy Thousand, reportedly the price goes up to Rupees One lakh seventy thousand. This is by no means a modest sum. Numerically it is probably more than the monthly salary of over 72% wage earners of this country. To discuss the merits and demerits of this development would be generating a pointless debate. Pointless; because, many arguments can be found for and against any proposition and there are, often, prejudices involved.
The topic of poverty has been such a popular theme in all planning processes that at least one former Finance Minister quipped seven years ago, that there could not be a budget speech in the parliament without a reference to poverty. Some of the statements above are part of regular conversation or talk topics. Little scientific data is often available on many of the points of views popularly subscribed to. Yet they do become the corner stones of many investment policy...
