Abstract

When Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) lost the state election in the South Indian state of Karnataka last month (May 2023), many political commentators read that as a north-south divide with the BJP being confined to northern states while the opposition parties rule the southern states. Similarly, many headline numbers suggest that the southern states of the country are doing better in terms of infrastructure, private investment, social indicators, and rule of law which has put them on a virtuous cycle of growth and prosperity and widened the north-south gap. Such faultlines across political and economic dimensions are common in most large, decentralized countries but a deepening cleavage can cause political and economic instability. How much of the north-south divide in India is fact and how much just a perception? What are the mechanisms for arresting and indeed reversing the divide? How effectively are they working in India? What are the lessons to be drawn from India’s experience?

These are some of the questions that Dr Subbarao will address in this seminar.

About the Speaker

Duvvuri Subbarao served as Governor of the Reserve Bank of India for five years (2008-13). Prior to that, he was Finance Secretary to the Government of India (2007-08) and Secretary to the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council (2005-07).

As a career civil servant in India for over three decades and as a lead economist in the World Bank for five years, Subbarao acquired vast hands-on experience in public finance management.

Subbarao holds a Masters Degree in Physics from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur. He studied Economics at the Ohio State University and later at MIT. He has a PhD in Economics from the Andhra University.

Subbarao’s book “Who Moved My Interest Rate” chronicling his experiences in leading the Reserve Bank of India through five turbulent years is best known for the way he explained the policy dilemmas confronting an emerging economy central bank in a globalized world.