Comparisons between India, China unfair: Raghuram Rajan

TIL Desk/Business/New York/ Comparisons between India and China are “unfair” as India “pales” before the Communist giant, which is about five times India’s size, former RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan has said as he emphasised on improving infrastructure for the country’s growth.

“I think the comparison is often made between India and China. That is a comparison which to some extent is unfair to India. They are two very different countries,” Rajan said.

Rajan, who is currently the Katherine Dusak Miller Distinguished Service Professor of Finance at The University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business, gave The 2018 Albert H Gordon Lecture on April 11 at the Harvard Kennedy School on the topic Leverage, Financial Crises, and Policies to Raise Economic Growth’.

He said India “pales” in comparison to China, which is about five times India’s size while the per capita is about the same as populations in both countries are approaching each other. “By any criteria, except comparisons to China, India is a very impressive story, he said, pointing to the seven per cent GDP growth over the last 25 years.

On what India has not done that China has, Rajan said India has not built out infrastructure and construction. Rajan said an enormous part of Chinese growth and manufacturing growth has been much better logistics, access to ports and roads, something “which India doesn’t have”.