Prof. Basu joined the Indian government recently as its Chief Economic Adviser. At BBC, he tells us what it has been like:
The first week was harrowing.
My in-tray reached for the ceiling till someone pointed out that on my right was an out-tray.
Questions concerning the economy came at rapid fire from parliament and from policy-makers.
I was asked, for example, if allowing futures trading in food created inflationary pressure on the spot market price of food.
This is the kind of question on which I would love to spend some months thinking and reading and then write a paper. Here I had 24 hours to respond.
For all the bewilderment of the first week, there was one pleasant surprise.
I did not expect the level of professionalism and commitment to work that I encountered in my ministry.
It is entirely possible that this is a recent phenomenon and special to Delhi, but the level of individual industry that I have seen in my first weeks is entirely on a par with or even higher than the best private sector firms.
Thanks to Krish for the Twitter-alert.
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