Nirmala Sitharaman, who became India’s first woman finance minister in nearly five decades, isn’t a novice at the job. She had a brief stint as a junior minister in the Finance Ministry in 2014, while handling the trade portfolio. She subsequently moved on to a full-time role as defence minister, but that didn’t stop her from keeping track of the economy’s performance.
Here are some of Sitharaman’s Twitter posts, which give a peek into her understanding of the ministry she will helm and her personality.
Automobile sales — which are indeed a key indicator of demand in both rural and urban India — have been declining for months now, and dropped 16% in April from a year ago, according to data from the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers. The slump isn’t restricted to car sales. Demand for everything from air travel to consumer staples has taken a knock.
That’s threatening growth in what has been the world’s fastest-growing major economy. Sitharaman’s tweet above was made last year when growth breached the 8% mark. The pace has since cooled for three straight quarters and probably slowed to 6.3% in the fourth quarter of the fiscal year that ended in March.