The Hindu Business Line : Revisiting reforms

This refers to “PM bets on domestic demand to spur growth”(Business Line, November 9). Before letting loose the genie of further financial sector reforms’, the country would benefit if greater attention is accorded to the growth of manufacturing industries, where we are lagging far behind China.

The Prime Minister has chosen to highlight reforms in the insurance sector and has hinted at legislative changes.

Before this, a comprehensive study should be undertaken of how private insurance has operated in the country in the last decade in spreading the message of insurance to those who most need it, how they have collected premiums, how wisely they have invested funds and how, in the process they have overspent on marketing and other expenses of management. It would be unwise to let the private insurance companies issue IPOs without the people knowing how far they have prudently managed funds and how profitable they will be in the future.

If LIC today is confidently able to garner thousands of crores of premium income year after year in spite of competition, it is because, from the very beginning, it has spread awareness among the people of the salutary concept: “People’s Money for Peoples’ Welfare.”

People are happy that education and health are areas close to the Prime Minister’s heart. The recent report of an NGO on Saving the Child speaks volumes of the ways we have neglected child welfare and development. The spread of quality primary and secondary education and imparting of technical skills to the disadvantaged through diplomas is far more important than creating a score or more IITs.

A recent World Bank study highlighted how our economic progress has resulted in financial oligarchies, on the one hand, and a widening gulf between the obscenely rich and the distressingly poor, on the other.

The country expects that when the planners present a quick revised charter of the content and direction of future economic reforms, they will keep these weak spots in mind.

S. Subramanyan e-mail