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Last week 108 social scientists working in India and abroad came out with an extraordinary statement decrying the political interference over statistical data. They called for the restoration of “institutional independence” and integrity to statistical institutions.
Trouble had been brewing on the data front ever since the government last year decided to junk the report by the National Statistical Commission on the back series which had said that growth had topped 10 per cent twice during the 10-year UPA regime. The government then came out with another report which claimed that the average growth during the NDA-II regime was higher than in the 10-year UPA period.
But more recently the government suppressed a jobs data report which had claimed that joblessness had touched a 45-year high last year. The findings of the report were leaked in the press. This prompted PC Mohanan, Chairman of the National Statistical Commission, and J Meenakshi, a member of the commission to quit in protest.
It was in this background that the 108 social scientists decided to come out with their much-publicised statement.
The government’s reaction to this statement was on predictable lines. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley claimed that these social scientists had an “axe to grind” against the Modi government. He further said that 70 per cent of the 108 social scientists were “compulsive contrarians”. But going by his argument if 30 per cent of those who signed the statement are not “compulsive contrarians”, isn’t that a damning indictment of the government’s record on this front?
Interestingly, a day before Jaitley tore into these social scientists, a group of 131 chartered accountants, including two former presidents of the ICAI, came to the government’s defence and called the social scientists’ stance “politically motivated”. Under the banner of “CA for Nation”, they claimed that the social scientists were “unnecessarily” raking up this issue and scaring away foreign investors. Bizarrely, they questioned why social scientists did not raise the issue of data credibility during the 1960-2014 “low-growth” period, ignoring the fact that growth started looking up after 1991.
The debate over economic data couldn’t have possibly taken a more absurd turn than this.
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