78^th Annual General Meeting
December 24, 2005, New Delhi

Speech for Mr. Onkar S. Kanwar, President, FICCI, for the Special Session with
Dr. Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission

Dr Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Deputy Chairman of Planning Commission,
Your Excellencies and Diplomats,
Senior Political Leaders and Government Officials,
Fellow Industrialists and Corporate Leaders,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

We are deeply honoured to have Dr Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission, address this session of FICCI's 78th AGM. Dr Ahluwalia is a fountainhead of wisdom for economic policy making. As finance secretary for the crucial period when the most far-reaching economic reform measures were being introduced throughout the nineties, Dr Ahluwalia played the role of a conductor in a symphony orchestra of the reforms programme.
Sequencing of the entire reforms process was the need of the hour and Dr Ahluwalia was able to achieve this supreme feat in those days. The result was that India could avoid the severe disruption and outright collapse that many countries faced while embarking on a path of fundamental economic restructuring.

Today, as India is getting integrated with the world economy, it is becoming increasingly clear that our domestic economy has to become at par with the world. The reforms of the nineties have catapulted the country to an altogether higher growth path and the economy has gained and a new momentum. However, it is also true that we cannot globalise with some of remaining disabilities like antiquated infrastructure facilities or labour laws.

As deputy chairman of the Planning Commission, Dr Ahluwalia has mooted a number of proposals for building the country's infrastructure facilities. He had proposed using a part of the burgeoning foreign exchange reserves -now over $143 billion-for building infrastructure facilities. While many economists had felt that India's large forex reserves need to be put to effective use than being invested in low-interest US government bonds, his was the first such concrete proposal for utilizing a small part of the reserves on a recurring basis.

As a member of prime minister's high-power group on infrastructure, Dr Ahluwalia has also been looking into ways of evolving the public-private partnership for building the infrastructure sector.

The ramifications of a PPP approach has major bearing. Since the government does not have large resources required for infrastructure building, public-private partnership is the alternative model for undertaking this vitally needed work programme. For this purpose, it is essential that the correct norms for private-public partnership are evolved.

In the context of what is happening, Dr Ahluwalia can give us vital insight into how best we can evolve a working PPP model.

Under Dr Ahluwalia, the Planning Commission has taken initiatives in policy making in a diverse number of field from reforms of state finances to aviation policy. May I invite Dr Ahluwalia to share his perspectives on India's role and emergence as a global economic super power.

Thank you,