Ease land rules, turn NREGA into cash transfer: Panagariya
(Hindustan Times, 13 Feb 2014)
Easier land acquisition norms, faster clearance of stalled projects and a redesign of social welfare programmes including the UPA government’s flagship employment guarantee scheme NREGA with focus towards direct cash transfer to rural households are among the immediate tasks that a new government will have to carry out, Columbia University professor Arvind Panagariya said on Wednesday.
Panagariya acknowledged that leaders from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) are in touch with him seeking “feedback” on the design of economic policy but said he wasn’t directly involved in writing the party’s poll manifesto. “Policy paralysis is the single biggest cause of the current fall in the growth rate,” he told HT in an exclusive interview.