Setting the economy right

A critical and balanced analysis of the wrongs in our economy

- AMITABHA BHATTACHARYA

RISKLESS CAPITALISM IS a term often used to characterise India's foray out of the 'socialistic' mode. Businessmen and entrepreneurs are often reluctant to take risks, preferring instead to depend on government protection and subsidy; civil servants play safe, fearing that their bonafide decisions can be questioned for alleged lapses by courts and investigating agencies. Members of the higher bureaucracy are aware of the complexities involved in economic policy formulation, and more so, in translating such policies into action. And yet it is mostly the executive alone, accountable to the legislature, judiciary, public and the media, that gets bruised and tarnished all the time. Major acts of reform meet with stiff resistance from every conceivable quarter.

In recent times, eminent economists and policy makers like Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Arvind Panagariya, Kaushik Basu, Vijay Kelkar, Ajay Shah and Shankar Acharya have written about their experiences in helping shape our economy. The shock of Covid-19 has added a new dimension, as Arun Kumar and others have highlighted. The authors of the book under review,Ajay Chhibber and Salman Anees Soz, having worked in international bodies, display an independence of mind not always observed among government economists. This lack of bias adds freshness to the work.

Therefore, while arguing for changing the role of our state, based on experience here and abroad, the authors show the yawning mismatch between state effectiveness and the degree of state intervention, especially in the economic sphere. And, the state covers all its organs, not the executive alone.