Bengaluru: Former Disinvestment Minister Arun Shourie has strongly criticized the government’s decision to ban 500 and 1000 rupee notes, saying it the “greatest blunder in economic policy for 70 years”.
Mr. Shourie who worked as an economist with the with the World Bank, a consultant to the Planning Commission of India said while delivering a public lecture at the National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS), he said “It (demonetisation) is the symptom of a pattern of government where there is no consultation. It may happen again and again. The fact that somebody keeps winning elections is no reason to change our mind. Those who vote will vote on other considerations, and they do not know how economy should be run.”
“Somebody gets a brainwave, and because nobody can oppose them, there is demonetisation,” he said.
“You can see this from the fact that every day they are inventing something new wherever the arrow falls that is the target. It is governance by illumination and revelation.”
Shourie said. “We have never had as weak a PMO in terms of domain competence as we have today.”
Criticizing the RBI governor he said, in this case, he has behaved “like an under secretary in the Ministry of Finance”.
“The government today has made every institution servile and the latest victim is the RBI. The educated few should overcome the fear of intimidation to speak up their mind,” he said.
“Today, we are desperate to be more like the West. We need to restore our ambition for building an alternative society that Mahatma Gandhi expounded in the Hind Swaraj,” he added.