T Thomas: An agenda for the new government

The focus should be on energy and infrastructure

In a few days from now, the results of the general elections will be known and in all likelihood a new NDA government is most likely to be in place at the Centre. What should be its agenda for the next five years?

The international agenda will have only one major item, viz relationship with Pakistan, which is increasingly turning out to be a failed state under the direction and control of the United States.

As long as we maintain reasonable relations with the US we will not have to worry too much about Pakistan. US will need India as a large non-Muslim country as a counterweight to the pan-Islamic tide.

The focus has therefore to be the economic policy agenda. The NDA government has to build on the success of the last five years and try to accelerate the pace of growth rather than bask in any "shine".

Taking lessons from the experience of all large institutions, the success of an agenda depends on two factors, viz (a) focusing of select areas and (b) finding the right champions for those areas.

The thrust areas for the next five years should be (i) oil and gas (ii) coal and railways (iii) road transport (iv) power (v) stimulation of investment flows "" domestic and external. Even the best strategy can be frustrated by an inadequate leadership.

Conversely even a less than perfect strategy can be made successful through able leadership. Therefore selection of appropriate ministers for each of the five thrust areas will be a key function of the prime minister. He can also use these assignments to develop younger cabinet colleagues as potential PMs.

NDA unlike the opposition party is fortunate to have among its ranks a few young, intelligent and capable ministers who have already proved their mettle in Messrs Arun Shourie, Arun Jaitley, Suresh Prabhu and Pramod Mahajan.

The two elder ministers, viz Jaswant Singh in finance and Yashwant Sinha in foreign affairs can provide continuity in those two key ministries where they have performed well.

Oil and gas can provide the biggest thrust to the Indian economy in the next decade. India is in the oil and gas bearing belt running from West Asia to Indonesia. It is high time that this is brought under a more innovative, younger and totally above board person like Arun Shourie.

With the successful sale of shares in IPCL, ONGC and GAIL under his belt, Shourie with his sharp intellect has gained enough insight into this part of the economy which will need massive investments. It will not be possible to raise all of this in the near term from domestic sources through taxation on petroleum products whose costs are already way above international prices.

Therefore, we have to attract external investments through output sharing agreements with international oil exploration companies. We need to attract companies with the appropriate technology rather than rely solely on the few indigenous companies.

This is necessary not only to provide greater access to resources, but also to prevent the limited number of domestic companies from building up their own monopolies.

Any monopoly whether Indian or foreign is equally harmful to consumer interests. Shourie is someone who can deal with the international companies and yet protect the interests of domestic companies.

Coal and railways are closely interlinked. The prime minister should avoid the traditional temptation to assign coal and railways to below-par ministers from Bihar or to an emotional Mamata Banerjee.

The railways are reeling under the burden of over-employment created by such worthies. It is not only the cost of the huge numbers, but the inefficiencies created by them that have affected the railways. We need a younger minister who is not out to build a constituency through employment creation but to redeem potentially one of the best assets in our country.

The priority for Indian Railways is not to introduce a showpiece bullet train between Mumbai and Ahmedabad but to sort out the bottlenecks in the movement of coal, iron ore, steel and cement from the eastern sector.

It could otherwise strangle the whole economy. Why not assign this task to Arun Jaitley, who has the necessary energy, intelligence and honesty to take on the mafia, which has ruled the roost in coal and railways. This assignment will at the same time enable him to graduate from being a combative spokesman and advocate to becoming a successful operator of a vital part of the economy.

The quadrilateral road project is the other priority area. This will require coordination and negotiations with several states and among several Central ministries.

Perhaps Pramod Mahajan with his ability to articulate and persuade should be assigned this task. He will have to persuade contractors to invest massively in mechanical equipment both to speed up the process and to ensure high levels of quality of roads. He can cut through the maze of local politics and corruption and earn his spurs in such a weighty national role.

This brings us to power generation and distribution. Suresh Prabhu did an outstanding job in formulating the Electricity Bill and opening up the power sector. He had to be moved out of that ministry merely because he was unwilling to take orders from a remote control.

Mr Vajpayee has already shown his commitment to Prabhu by taking him back with the status of a cabinet minister to be chairman of the commission for interlinking of rivers.

He should now invite him back into the cabinet as minister of power because Prabhu is capable of making a valuable contribution to cabinet deliberations on economic matters in general as he is a qualified chartered accountant and an experienced banker.

He is also eminently upright. Massive investments are required over the next decade. Prabhu can deliver the goods with the least fuss and corruption. He will also command the respect of international investors and lenders because of his professionalism.

The last item of the agenda is the stimulation of investment flows. Abolition of dividend tax will continue to act as a power stimulant to domestic investments.

For international investors and NRIs, the problem with India is what I would call the drip-feed system of liberalisation adopted by India. We liberalise by small steps over a long period. We now need a more dramatic step to stimulate investments from abroad. We could learn from the example of China. When China opened up its economy 10 years ago they opened up many key areas for 100 per cent foreign equity.

Therefore international investors rushed in to invest. Investors have looked at India with hesitation because we never opened our door fully, even in the select areas we did it in drips. Having attracted over $200 billion of foreign investment in the last 10 years, (against under $30 billion in India) China is now introducing restrictions on foreign investments in select areas. India can emulate China's example and transform the image of our country.