NEW DELHI:
Former Chief Economic Advisor (CEA) Krishnamurthy Subramanian has dismissed the charge that democracy is sliding in India under Prime Minister Narendra Modi and said that not one state government was dismissed in the last 10 years while his immediate predecessor Dr Manmohan Singh dismissed 11 state governments. Manmohan Singh served as the Prime Minister from 2004 to 2014.
Subramanian, who served as the CEA from 2018 to 2021, was on a panel discussion with former RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan at Northwestern’s Kellogg Business School.
During the interaction, the former CEA shared data on the entire democracy & economy debate and highlighted that India’s ranking in the global innovation index had improved under PM Modi.
“In 2016, there were 450 start-ups. Now there are 100,000 start-ups. In other words, start-ups have grown at a CAGR of 220% – this during a period when a lot of media here actually talks about sliding in democracy,” he said, adding that in the preceding ten years from 2004 to 2014 when democracy was in the prime shape according to media, start-ups were growing at 3.8%.
Subramanian said we all know that startups are one very important sign of the vibrancy of the economy because they capture creative destruction.
“Not just that. Take innovation, the global innovation index, and this is not government data. This is again, international data. We were ranked 78 in 2015. We rank 40th now. So, I think the conceptual idea is that free thought is important for innovation. I don’t think that is something that is being disputed. But the measurement of democracy or the lack of it, what we have is, basically, a poorly paid board, and postdoctoral researchers sitting in some nook and corner of New York…”
Raghuram Rajan, who was also part of the panel, interjected and said: “You cannot get away saying that democracy is stronger in India today.” He said every single index of democracy outside shows a decline in democracy. He said that the current government does not like criticism, “this is a government which gives people a choice – join us or go to jail”.
To this, Subramanian, India’s Executive Director at the IMF, said he had also worked closely with Prime Minister Modi and told him things that he needed to improve upon. He said there was no occasion when he was asked to say positive things about the government. “Not on a single stance was I told to go and say anything. I firmly believe in the policies that this government does. The kind of background I come from, if I don’t remain in the government, I don’t care. But I go and say things out of my conviction,” he said.
The former CEA referred to the religious freedom debate and said the Pew Research Centre did a survey in which 90% of minorities said they were absolutely free to practice religion. He then turned to democracy debate and cited the number of times the former prime ministers from the Congress governments removed state governments.
“Let’s look at the data on governments that have been dismissed by the central government under Article 356. Jawaharlal Nehru dismissed 7 state governments. Indira Gandhi dismissed 49 state governments. Rajeev Gandhi dismissed 60 governments. Narasimha Rao, who we all remain grateful for liberalisation, dismissed 11 state governments. Manmohan Singh dismissed 11 state governments. And what is the number of the states dismissed by Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Prime Minister Modi – zero,” he said.
