NEW DELHI: Former PM Manmohan Singh on Monday called for the combination of rapid growth and positive intervention to be on policymakers’ agenda to ensure curbing of inequality while releasing a report titled India Social Development Report 2018 — Rise of Inequalities in India.
The report is co-edited by former NITI Aayog member T Haque and eminent economist DN Reddy and compiled by the Council of Social Development (CSD).
Speaking at the release, the former prime minister said, “Poverty and inequality have been a concern for economics for a long time. I am delighted that CSD chose poverty-related inequality as a subject of this report. Markets have a huge role in economy. Markets help those who are part of the market system and have no meaning of those who are not part of it. We need positive intervention to ensure that fruits of progress are reaching all.”
Saying that many rights-based legislations — RTE, RTI, Forests Act, Food Security Act — were formulated during the UPA government, Singh stressed the effective implementation of these legislations would go a long way in addressing concerns in this age of inequality.
Prof Haque said even high rate of growth could not completely eliminate poverty.