Dr C Rangarajan, Chairman of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council, presented a very optimistic assessment of the country’s medium-term economic conditions.
Delivering the Foundation Day lecture of Nalco here on Monday on the theme ‘Indian Economy: Immediate Challenges and Medium Term Concerns’, Rangarajan was quite emphatic that India would bounce back to the 9-per cent-per-annum growth figures a couple of years from now, subject to certain conditions being met.
His prescription for getting back to the heady days of growth consisted of conditions belonging to two categories. The immediate challenges category included the taming of Inflation, containment of fiscal deficit and achievement of fiscal consolidation. The medium term concerns included a focus on agriculture, focus on infrastructure with special emphasis on power, improvement of governance, continuation of reforms, growth with equity and growth with environment. The last two factors were emphasised by him as issues that are important but should not hobble growth at any cost.
Dr Rangarajan extensively used statistics to underline his assertions. He was quite emphatic that the country cannot and must not ignore agriculture, a sector that contributes significantly to the country’s economy and the largest provider of employment to the population. He rued the delay in completion of projects that has resulted in the fall in the rate of economic growth and said that with proper savings and containment of fiscal deficit the projects would be back on tracks to again drive growth to the desired levels.
Rangarajan fielded quite a few questions relating to the economy but deftly sidestepped a question on why Odisha is being denied Special Category State status with the observation that the subject is not in his domain at the moment.