The Centre’s decision on demonetisation was an “ill-conceived” move that not only damaged the economy severely but would not meet any of the three stated objectives – tackling corruption, black money and counterfeit currency, senior Congress leader and former Finance Minister P. Chidambaram contended here on Sunday.
In a discussion on ‘Rebooting the Economy’ at ‘ The Hindu’ s Lit for Life’ event, Mr. Chidambaram referred to the Tamil proverb Malaiyai killi eliyai pidipathu (moving the mountain to catch mice) and its Hindi parallel Khoda pahad nikali chunhiya and said demonetisation would take a straight hit on the GDP of Rs. 1.5 lakh crore.
He questioned the statement made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi that corruption had been put to an end by the announcement on demonetisation made on November 8 last year and cited the fact that two engineers in Kandla port were caught with 124 notes of the new Rs. 2,000 currency. Besides the financial implications on the economy, demonetisation had caused severe hardships to the people; he said and questioned who would compensate them.
Veteran journalist Sanjaya Baru however did not agree with Mr. Chidambaram completely that the demonetisation has not gone down well with the people. He pointed to the absence of any angry protest by the people in a country, which was known for rasta rokos , rail rokos (road and rail blockades) and dharnas . Referring to the burning of about 30 to 40 buses for “some obscure reason” in Bengaluru last year (during the Cauvery protests); he argued that no such incidents were witnessed against demonetisation.
When former Editor-in-Chief of The Hindu and Director of Kasturi & Sons Limited N. Ravi, who moderated the discussion, brought up the topic of disruptions in the Parliament, Mr. Chidambaram said though the government complained of disruptions, it hoped for disruptions in the House as debates in the Parliament would expose the government.
Mr. Baru claimed political parties, which had opposed certain issues, while in being in the Opposition, had taken a different stand when they formed the government.
When the discussion moved over to the Congress leaders’ support or the lack of it to former Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao following the liberalisation in 1991, Mr. Baru said several Congress leaders actively opposed Mr. Rao.
Even as he stated that “major credit for liberalisation” went to Mr. Rao, Mr. Chidambaram said Mr. Rao “virtually destroyed the base of the Congress party” by the end of 1992. Since the party went further down during 1993 and 1994, Congress party is not very kind to Mr. Rao, Mr. Chidambaram added.
Mr. Chidambaram said it was Mr. Rao who was open to reforms and none could have implemented it. Though former Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha had the intellectual capacity to conceptualise reforms he could have never implemented them with Mr. Chandra Shekhar as the Prime Minister, Mr. Chidambaram contended.
