What Modi has, Vajpayee didn’t — a hawk’s eye for implementation of policies: N K Singh

The bulk of reforms in the country have already been taken, except that there is a need to fine-tune regulations and legal ways to be able to attract large volumes of inward flows, he said.

Along with Singh, Charles W Eliot University Professor, President Emeritus at Harvard and former US Treasury Secretary Lawrence H Summers was also part of the panel. They were in conversation with Anant Goenka, Executive Director, The Indian Express group.

“…eight per cent seems to me a very ambitious but not completely unreasonable stretched growth target for India. It is not my prediction of how fast India would grow, it is an aspirational statement for India,” Summers said when asked about ways in which India can achieve the 8 per cent growth target.

N K Singh and Lawrence Summers were in conversation with Anant Goenka, Executive Director, The Indian Express group.(Express Photo by Narendra Vaskar)

Last week, Summers, at an event in New Delhi, said that a combination of free market forces addressing energy-related infrastructure needs, questions of reform in a number of key states, and supporting a more effective public sector could generate an eight-fold expansion in India’s economy by 2050 with an annual growth rate of 8 per cent.

During the discussion, Summers listed four major factors which would help India achieve higher growth.

First, a stable, prosperous and reasonably growing global economy. Second, the country’s willingness to continue the hard work of reforms such as in the agriculture sector and reducing financial repression in the financial sector.

During the discussion, Summers listed four major factors which would help India achieve higher growth. (Express Photo by Narendra Vaskar)

The third factor for India to achieve growth will be its approach to openness in the world, he said.

“Traditionally, self-reliance has been an important word in the Indian economic policy but when I hear that word, I get nervous. Obviously, there are some things where a country needs to be self-reliant but very often self-reliance can slide into being a general defence to protectionism. I think India needs to take a much more open approach,” Summers noted.

The fourth factor that will be advantageous for India’s growth would be harnessing digital technology, IT, quantum computing and the ability to deal with huge quantities of data, he said.

When asked about the AtmaNirbhar Bharat scheme, Singh said every country’s national interest would be in making sure that its dependability on the supply chain is assured in critical areas.

He said no country can achieve a long-term sustained 8 per cent rate of growth without a degree of openness of the economy and without trade becoming an engine of growth.

When asked about the AtmaNirbhar Bharat scheme, Singh said every country’s national interest would be in making sure that its dependability on the supply chain is assured in critical areas. (Express Photo by Narendra Vaskar)

“But in the process, clearly, national interest would really require that we do not become hostage to unsurprise interruptions in the supply chain due to events which could be purely exogenous, and it would be very unwise to overlook that degree of possibility considering some recent experience,” Singh said.

During a rapid-fire session, when asked about one quality which Prime Minister Narendra Modi should learn from former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Singh, who was a former secretary to Vajpayee, said that he had the privilege of working with the two prime ministers, and both of them have a degree of sagacity and a style which is unique to them.

To a question on one skill that Modi has but Vajpayee didn’t, Singh said, “A hawk’s eye on the implementation of policies and programmes.”

To a question whether colleges should remain ‘noisy’ places, Summers said, “…should there be a lot of vigorous debate on campuses? Absolutely. Should people disagree with each other? Absolutely. Should students dictate what the curriculum be? Absolutely not. Should the process of education be disrupted because people have views about the issues of the day? I think, in extreme cases, the answer might be yes, but as a normal matter, the answer to that question should be no.”

On Multilateral Development Banks, Singh said that the private investment in the MDBs is currently low and there is a need for it to improve. (Express Photo by Narendra Vaskar)

When asked what Indian universities can learn from American universities, Summers said, “Compete with each other for faculty, for students, for attractiveness of programmes, bring as many people in from abroad as you can, send students abroad and be open and competitive rather than being closed and comfortable.”

And on what American education can learn from India, Summers said, “To remember the traditional virtues of excellence, merit and pride through achievement.”

On Multilateral Development Banks, Singh said that the private investment in the MDBs is currently low and there is a need for it to improve. He said the second volume of the report will also focus on the ways to harness private capital innovatively.

Summers and Singh are the co-chairs of the key G20 Expert Group on “Strengthening Multilateral Development Banks” under India’s G20 presidency. The expert group, chaired by Singh and Summers, had submitted its first report to the G20 Chair in July in Gandhinagar, recommending a triple agenda to address eliminating extreme poverty, inclusive growth and the financing of global public goods along with a suggestion to constitute a ‘Global Challenges Funding’ mechanism for ‘Global Public Goods’. The second volume of the report, which will provide a roadmap, will come up for discussion at the World Bank and IMF annual meetings in Marrakech in October.