‘Need to completely revamp and restructure economics education’, says former Union minister Jairam Ramesh

Former Union minister Jairam Ramesh says country needs economists sensitive to Indian conditions, wants institutions to attract world-class faculty members

CHENNAI: What we need are better educated economists, said Jairam Ramesh at a panel on the subject ‘Do we need more Indian-educated economists’ at the ThinkEdu 2018 Conclave. “Max Mueller never came to India, wasn’t educated in India and isn’t an Indian, but his work continues to be quoted to this day. There are many people who are not Indian-educated who know India much better.” he added. The former Union minister was the first to address the audience after the chair, Praveen Mahajan, National co-convener of the Swadeshi Jagran Manch, introduced the panel.

“What we need are individuals more sensitive to Indian conditions and lifestyle; who are willing to spend a lifetime working on the complex problems of our economy and are able to change their mind depending on the circumstances which they confront on the field,” he explained. Ramesh followed up by emphasising that the only way forward would be to revamp and restructure Economics education in Indian universities, putting a premium on scholarships and securing first class faculty members.

(Clockwise from left) Former Union minister Jairam Ramesh at the ThinkEdu Conclave on Wednesday; TN Fisheries Minister D Jayakumar, TNIE Editorial Director Prabhu Chawla, Vice President Venkaiah Naidu and TNIE Editor G S Vasu at the conclave; Nalanda Univ V-C Sunaina Singh speaks at the conclave, while TCS Global HR senior VP Ritu Anand and former Delhi Univ- V-C Dinesh Singh

Ramesh cited various examples of Indian and foreign educated economists like Manmohan Singh, Subramanian Swamy and his co-panelist and former RBI Governor, YV Reddy who is an Indian educated economist. Reddy took the stage and explained, “Most prominent economists are Indian educated and they have proved with their role in our economy that they excel at what they do. But this type of prejudice that makes us think that those who are foreign-educated are not Indian is a mindset that we need to get out of.” He explained that the profession stands apart as an industry within itself. “The biggest problem advisory economists face is that they have been unable to separate economics and politics in recent years.”

“Education is not the problem, what this conversation has to be about is experience. In this perspective, we have resident economists and tourist economists,” explained Praveen Chakravarty, resident senior fellow at IDFC Institute. “We live in a global economy and it is critical to deal with the IMF, foreign investment or the World Bank. This is why we need to have a broad understanding. This is why it is important to have experience.”