For air-conditioning makers, India is where growth is

A literary-minded room air conditioner (AC) industry executive confesses that during winter, which is particularly harsh in northern and eastern parts of the country, he will recite to himself the concluding lines from Ode to the West Wind: “The trumpet of prophecy! O wind; if winter comes can spring be far behind.”

In India, spring unlike in the West is short and summer starts soon after winter. What warms the cockles of an AC maker’s heart is when the weatherman says the country is heading for a long punishing summer. The initial weather forecast for 2017 of a searing summer