Dr Reddy’s life-saving medicines

Independent institutions under independent individuals

This is an archived blog post from The Acorn.

Joe Nocera’s piece in the New York Times crediting Y V Reddy, former governor of the Reserve Bank of India, for pursuing policies that (relatively) insulated the Indian banking system from the global financial crisis, has some of India’s top bankers sounding like people looking back at their adolescence and thanking their strict parents or school principals for, well, being strict parents or school principals.

Now that those risks have been made painfully clear, every banker in India realizes that Mr Reddy did the right thing by limiting securitizations. “At times like this, you tend to appreciate what he did more than we did at the time,” said (Yes Bank founder Rana) Kapoor. “He saved us,” added (HDFC chief Deepak) Parekh. [NYT]

Now, a few experts, like V Anantha Nageswaran, have been arguing that Dr Reddy’s exemplary stewardship of the RBI was among the few bright spots in India’s economic management in the last five years. And as events proved, they were right.

Beyond individuals though, the underlying point is that independent institutions can deliver competent governance in their mandated areas even under bad governments. Of course, even independent institutions can be undermined over time, by packing them with less than independent-minded individuals. And that, unfortunately, might well be on the cards. The tenacious Dr Reddy is no more at the crease. The Election Commission could fall into the hands of Naveen Chawla, who the Shah Commission declared “unfit to hold any public office which demands an attitude of fair play and consideration for others.”

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