India's interventionist state: Reduce its scope, increase capability

Govt is increasingly keen to deliver even specific items like toilets, water, gas cylinders, where it can show the beneficiary immediate results. This new welfarism helps win polls but not development

The Karnataka Secretariat has the motivational inscription, “Government Work is God’s Work”, but if truth be told, god’s help is needed in most dealings with the government. The size of India’s government is not outlandishly large but its scope — degree to which it intervenes everywhere — is very wide and as a result, its effectiveness is low. Doing too many things badly leads to poor outcomes.

If India is to reset for the 21st century, modernising and reforming government will be vital. One way of improving the effectiveness of the state is to think of two stages: Reduce the scope