For television companies, it was a second extravaganza in three months. In April-May, they bombarded us with breathless, but wrong, forecast on the general elections and inane post-election talkfest, with no apology for getting it all wrong. In July, they were back with another tamasha – the Budget coverage. This year’s Budget was hyped-up by the media as the mother of all reforms, a roadmap...

It is hard to fathom what drives finance ministers to select the items to tinker with when they frame their direct and indirect tax proposals in the Budget. For instance, one of the few decisive gainers in this Budget is Titan Industries. While Pranab Mukherjee increased the import duty on gold bars, he suddenly decided to exempt excise on branded jewellery.

Mr Mukherjee increased import duty...