On 8 November 2016, India was caught unaware and shaken to its very roots! Majority of the currency in circulation had been stripped of its value. People were grappling with an entirely unfamiliar situation—“demonetisation.” The move unleashed a huge debate—the likes of which had never been seen—on television, in newspapers, and on social media. Demonetisation was met with extreme reactions and its results were multifaceted. Several months later, we are still questioning: Is it a disastrous blunder or a leap forward?
To answer these questions, a renowned economist takes an incisive look at the events that led to demonetisation, the aftermath, and the implications. He sifts through many irrelevant rants, a lot of politically motivated mud-slinging, and asks the most important question: What now, what next?
Author Profile
Dr Ramgopal Agarwala is Chairman of Pahle India Foundation, New Delhi.
Dr Agarwala graduated from Presidency College, University of Calcutta, and was a gold medalist in MA Economics. He did his PhD in Econometrics from Manchester University. His thesis was later published in the form of a book An Econometric Model of India that became a staple read in Indian universities. He joined the World Bank in 1971 and worked at various senior positions across several countries in Asia and Africa, including Bangladesh, Kenya, Botswana, the Philippines, Thailand, South Korea and China. He retired from the World Bank after serving as the Chief of the Economic Unit of the World Bank Resident Mission in Beijing. On his return to India, he began working as a consultant for Asian Development Bank, the World Bank and the UN. He was a Distinguished Fellow at the Research and Information System for Developing Countries, New Delhi, a think tank under the Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India. The most noteworthy among Dr Agarwala’s recent publications are India 2050: A Roadmap for Sustainable Prosperity (2014) and The Resurgent India: Ideas and Priorities, a book co-written with Rajiv Kumar and Rajesh Shah and published in 2015.
Table of Content
Foreword by Shyam Saran
Preface
Acknowledgements
Public Revulsion against Corruption in India
Black Money: A Key Facilitator of Corruption
The Argumentative Indian Overreaches Himself
Shortfalls in Achieving the Main Objectives
Gains from Unexpected Directions
A Seven-point Programme to Achieve a Corruption-mukt Bharat
Making India Number One Again
Annexure 1. Q&A on Demonetisation
Annexure 2. The Speech of Prime Minister Modi on 8 November 2016 on Demonetisation
Annexure 3. Demonetisation Episode Shows Why Reserve Bank of India Cannot Be Independent
Bibliography
Index
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