Shekhar Gupta: Politics takes economic turn

New ideological battle lines have been drawn in Indian politics and they're on economic terrain. It is change for good

This budget session of Parliament signals a new turn in our national politics. After decades of fighting over personalities or rival ideologies built on religious and caste identities, India is stepping into an era of clear debate on economic policies.

We have seen this already, with Prime Minister Modi making an unabashed and unqualified pitch for the private sector, and Rahul Gandhi responding with not just the charge of crony capitalism, as in ‘hum do, hamare do’ but also reading in farm laws an anti-poor hijack of the poor farmer by the private sector. This is change.

And here’s why