Just Who Is Arvind Panagariya?

Just Who Is Arvind Panagariya?

You’ve already seen glowing biographical data of the first man at the operational helm of the brave new Niti  Aayog.  He’s been an author of free-market economics, with a Cyclops-eye focus on an India that might have been, and could be any time, given just half a chance: ten to fifteen books worth, a journal on India (India Policy Forum) that he edits; many articles in prestigious papers and magazines,a multitude of TV appearances, a bushel of proselytizing advisories, all selling his ideas of a ‘free’ India. Plus, Arvind Panagariya is already a Padma Bhushan awardee.

Panagariya is also a PhD scholar from Princeton, a world-class economist, former advisor at the ADB, the World Bank, IMF,WTO, UNCTAD… He is a current professor at Columbia University, and a past one at the University of Maryland. He, along with his senior at Columbia, Jagdish Bhagwati, have been advisors-at-large to a rising Narendra Modi, shaping his economic ideas, for a long time now. 

Dr. Arvind Panagariya, the dapper 62 year old global Indian-American, ethnically from Rajasthan, is certainly not at all like Nobel laureate and welfare/development economist Dr. Amartya Sen.  Dr. Sen was the inspiration of the Sonia Gandhi led NAC, renowned for its socialist ideas.

The now 80 year old Bhagwati, and 62 year old Panagariya, are both thinkers whose world-view would have appealed to founding fathers Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Chakravarty Rajagopalachari, Dr. Rajendra Prasad and other stalwarts,  on the ‘right’ of the independence era, big-tent, Congress Party.

You could well say Bhagwati and Panagariya, these 69 years on, represent the road not taken then. A road that could, many now believe, have already placed India in the first rank of developed nations- prosperous, modern and proud of its ancient heritage at the same time. Instead, we find ourselves plagued by shameful poverty for a full third of our population, and fifty years behind most of the emerging economies.  In all except market size; and potential, and therein lies the hope.

Panagariya has long asserted that India can grow at double-digits, given a massive push to infrastructure and facilities. He will not only make it fashionable for State Governments to compete in the development stakes, but truly legitimize and emphasise the contribution of the private sector.

It is no coincidence that JRD Tata was given a Bharat Ratna by the Vajpayee administration in 1993, and that silver coins have just been struck, in Modi Raj, honouring the TATA founder, as father of Indian industry- the long-bearded Jamshetji  Nusserwanji Tata.

Niti  Aayog will be a lean organization, of some five full-time members, but enough resources to draw in outside specialists as necessary. It has already inducted plain-speaking, right-of-centre economist Bibek Debroy, who has some great ideas on how to set the Indian Railways back in good health, and former DRDO Chief VK Saraswat, famous as the maker of India’s nuclear capable ballistic missiles.

While Niti  Aayog will not allocate funds, resources to implement its transformational ideas will be forthcoming, because both the Finance Minister as ex-officio member, and the Prime Minister as Chairman, are very much part of it. But while it will not look back in anger, the Aayog will not be a Thatcherite or Reaganite free-for-all against statism either.

Every one of India’s 29 Chief Ministers, and Heads of its Union Territories, will belong, and  be part of  the Aayog’s unique inclusive ‘Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas’  version of the free-market.  Regulatory strangle-holds of big Government will definitely go, but not the concern for the poor and the weak.      

(592 words)

January 6^th, 2015

Gautam Mukherjee