Best of BS Opinion: When the world cartwheels, who lands on their feet?

Business Standard

09-07-2025

Cartwheeling. There's something beautifully chaotic about it. One moment, you're upright and confident, the next, your limbs are in the air, the ground vanishes from under you, and you're spinning in a blur: half out of control, half in flow. For kids, it's play. For adults, it becomes a metaphor. Of pivoting too fast, adjusting mid-air, hoping the landing sticks. And lately, India seems to be in a season of cartwheels, not just in trade or nutrition or diplomacy, but in the stories of those who've lived through many flips and still found their footing. Let's dive in.
Take Donald Trump's latest tariff twist with duties flying from 25 per cent to 40 per cent for 57 countries. Yet somehow, India is off the hit list. Our first editorial reckons that a US-India deal might be near. But this isn't the gentle art of negotiation, it's more like a cartwheel through a trade war, where balance is elusive and timing is everything.
Meanwhile, the National Statistics Office's new data reveals a different kind of shift: how India eats. With caloric intake among the poor rising and cereal dependency dipping in parts, we're seeing a cautious pivot toward protein diversity. But the movement's uneven, argues our second editorial. Some states remain grounded in tradition, while others are mid-flip, experimenting with diets that could either nourish or tip us into obesity.
A K Bhattacharya reminds us that institutions, too, cartwheel with time. SBI, LIC, and Air India, each spun by policy winds over 70 years and landed differently. LIC clings to strategic value. Air India, flung back to the Tatas. SBI still stands tall, but slightly dizzy from its tightrope walk between government control and autonomy.
And Ajay Srivastava explores the US' tariff tantrums as those MASALA deals are less about fair trade, more about flexing muscle. India, unlike Vietnam or the UK, hasn't jumped yet. It's watching the floor spin beneath others, deciding if it wants to leap or stay grounded a little longer.
Finally, in The Woman Who Ran AIIMS: The Memoirs of a Medical Pioneer reviewed by Neha Bhatt, Sneh Bhargava's story emerges as a masterclass in composure mid-cartwheel: handling trauma, leadership, and change with grace that only decades of revolutions, personal and national, can teach.
Stay tuned and remember, the trick isn't just in spinning. It's in knowing when to stop and how to land!