Reforms in land market are need of the hour: Debroy

Bibek Debroy emphasized the need for land market reforms in India, stating that economic reforms are often win-lose and advocating for greater decentralization within state governments.

Bibek Debroy, chancellor of Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics (GIPE) and the chairman of the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister of India said that the land market is among the first sector that needs reform due to vested interests.  

Since then, the political economy has been stuck in the factor market including land, labour, and capital markets.      (HT PHOTO)

“So, land reforms are the need of the hour,” he said while delivering a lecture on ‘Economic Reforms in India’ at the Kale Auditorium, Gokhale Institute on Saturday. 

Debroy said “Every country gets the government that it deserves and gets the economic reforms they deserve. Because they do not raise their voices for greater economic reforms. Reforms are not win-win, but they are win-lose. In most cases, the sectors that lose are the ones who are unable to raise the strong voice, or their voice is not strong enough.” 

According to him the reforms of 1991 were easier as these reforms were about the product markets. Since then, the political economy has been stuck in the factor market including land, labour, and capital markets.     

“We perpetually scrutinise the Union Budget and Union Finance Commission. However, rarely do we spend time discussing the state Finance commission and the State budget when two-thirds of the expenditure happens at the state level,” he added. 

Ajit Ranade, vice chancellor of Gokhale Institute, Sudhir Vaishampayan, Pradeep Apte, and Pradeep Rawat from the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute (BORI) were present on the occasion. MoU between GIPE & BORI was signed in the presence of Debroy. Under this MoU, the undergraduate students of GIPE will be offered the 2-credit course of Indian Knowledge System (IKS) specified in the NEP through the Bharat Vidya Digital Platform of BORI. 

“We criticize excessive centralisation at the Union level and rightly so on some occasions but most of the priorities like public goods are state subjects, in fact, these are the local body-related subjects. So, when we complain about Union-State relationships, we should also complain about and lobby for greater decentralization and devolution within the state governments because the public goods will be delivered by the local bodies”, Debroy stated.