Arvind Subramanian appointed India's new chief economic adviser

New Delhi: Arvind Subramanian, Senior Fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, has been appointed as India's new chief economic adviser (CEA), the government said Thursday.

Subramanian has been appointed as CEA "for 3 years on contract basis, in the pay scale of Rs. 80,000 from the date of appointment or superannuation, whichever is earlier," a finance ministry statement said.

"I am absolutely honoured and privileged to come at this time," Subramanian said in a brief interaction with reporters. "It is a time of great dynamism for Indian economy... to serve a government that had the mandate for reform and change."

The CEA, a post that has been lying vacant since September last year after Raghuram Rajan took over as new Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor, is usually the main go-to person for advice for the finance minister on macro-economic matters and primary responsibilities, among others, include authoring the mid-year analysis and the Economic Survey.

While the mid-year analysis is usually presented in Parliament during the winter session, the Economic Survey-the government's official report card of the economy--is tabled just before the announcement of the annual budget.

This year's Economic Survey was mainly piloted by Ila Patnaik, who was appointed as the principal economic advisor in the finance ministry in April.

HT was first to report on Subramanian's likely appointment as India's new CEA on August 11.

Subramanian, has written on growth, trade, development, institutions, aid, oil, India, Africa, and the World Trade Organisation (WTO). Foreign Policy magazine had named him as one of the world's top 100 global thinkers in 2011.

He has published widely in academic and other journals, including the American Economic Review (Papers and Proceedings), Review of Economics and Statistics,Journal of International Economics, Journal of Monetary Economics, Journal of Public Economics, Journal of Economic Growth, Journal of Development Economics, Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Oxford Review of Economic Policy, International Monetary Fund Staff Papers, Foreign Affairs, World Economy, and Economic and Political Weekly.

He has advised the Indian government in different capacities, including as a member of the Finance Minister's Expert Group on the G-20 and has authored a book India's Turn: Understanding the Economic Transformation published in 2008 by Oxford University Press.

He obtained his undergraduate degree from St. Stephens College, Delhi; his MBA from the Indian Institute of Management at Ahmedabad, India; and his M.Phil and D.Phil from the University of Oxford, UK.

Another book Eclipse: Living in the Shadow of China's Economic Dominance was published in September 2011, and he is the coauthor of Who Needs to Open the Capital Account? (2012).

He was assistant director in the Research Department of the International Monetary Fund. He served at the GATT (1988-92) during the Uruguay Round of trade negotiations and taught at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government (1999-2000) and at Johns Hopkins' School for Advanced International Studies (2008-10).

Disclaimer: This information has been collected through secondary research and IBEF is not responsible for any errors in the same.