A View From The Outside


For India, we have a significant annual event in February month. That is the union budget. We the Indians looked at the budgets proposal with different perspectives. A common men, house wives, the middle class salary people, opposite political party, stock broker, smoker, financial experts, reporters, tax consultants, economists all have their unique view to look at the budget. Post-liberalization, the Indian economic scenario completely changed. Now let me come to the point. No this blog is not about union budget of India. Such topics are already widely discussed over media.

This blog is one more video report. This time, I will take you to Crossword bookstore, Bangalore. A book release event by Finance Minister of India Mr. P. Chidambaram on lucky day 8th August 2008. A panel discussion and question answer with FM. Yes it is quite late video report, however it is still relevant to our Indian economic context.





The session started with introduction of all the panel members. The panel discussed many topics like liberalization, economic reform, collation government, upcoming election, India v/s China, nuclear deal, public-private partnership, environmental issues and national integrity etc.

The book is like a recipe for good economics. The book has good, very high quality, precise writing with intellectual input. It provides a framework to look at the issues. The book is trying to generate a debate and encourage everyone to reflect on idea. Everyone appreciated the clarity of thought. Yes, the reader has right to agree or disagree with the point made in the book. However the reader can not disagree to the fact that the point is made with clarity. The author was a lawer at supreme court, where one gets only 3 miniutes to present your case. If it got approved, then one can get sufficient time to argue. So for him, it is quite natural to become concise. He handled the question answer sessions very tactfully. He made sure the questioner come to the point. He replied one question about primary sector, that let people move away from agriculture sector in long run, as our land is over burden. For short term, let’s give better price to farmers. More details about the book:
http://www.vedamsbooks.com/no50565.htm


Mr. P. Chidambaram is a great believer of India, its future, its talented youth. He diplomatically promoted Congress party. He appeal the Bangaloreans (majority are IT professionals) that let’s have a vision for our India. Now you evaluate, which national party’s vision is matching with your vision about India. Then you vote for the party, not for candidate. Many people even do not cast their vote, do not give majority to any party and yet expectation from government!! He gave some numbers, about economic growth during his ruling, by mobilizing resources to make optimum investment for all sectors. However this achievement is wiped out by inflation. He agreed that yes, few more legislations and bill could have been passed and he regret that we could not achieve 2 digits (10%) economic growth. He is not proud about his achievement but yes he is happy.

Hey, I will not write everything. Have a look to the complete video report. Mrs. Chidambaram had special right to ask the last question. What she asked? What was the nice reply by Mr. P. Chidambaram? Why India had very few people who became Finance Minster in last few decades? Why government waited for loan waiver till farmers committed suicide? The book describes the outside view. Later on the author himself became Finance Minster. How much he succeed to implement his own ideas? To know the answers, you have to watch this video report.

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=3E6320C9DD106905

Let me know your comments and see you soon with my next post.

Note: This post is not written with intention to promote any political party. It is just a video report. The text describe above is as per my own understanding of discussion at the venue, that may not be fully correct.

Media report:
http://www.hindu.com/2008/08/09/stories/2008080959120400.htm

0 comments:

Post a Comment