Helena is trying to figure out the relationship between economic growth and reductions in povery, so I thought that the New York Times' Sizzling Economy Revitalizes India might prove interesting. Disappointingly, it paints a rosy pictures and devotes a single paragraph to the topic:

Of course, truisms about what holds India back have not disappeared. The shortfalls in infrastructure, particularly power and education, are staggering. Twenty-six percent of Indians still live in poverty, and data suggest inequality is widening even as the poverty rate falls. Overall employment is essentially stagnating.

Somehow, "inequality" just doesn't carry the negative connotation of "poverty", so a sentence like data suggests inequality is widening even as the povery rate falls seems lacking in logical sense. I can see that inequality has the potential to give rise to repression and abuses of power, but it's not the immediate threat to life that poverty is. Does that make sense?

It's an exciting article about a burgeoning country. Still, it doesn't quite have China's charm for me.