Kant said he was a firm believer that the government should act as a catalyst to enable the private sector to flourish. He also felt the process of UPSC examination needed a relook, pitching a GMAT-kind of format.
India’s G-20 sherpa Amitabh Kant weighed in on the UPSC debate, saying the size and scale that government offers, one can never get in the private sector.
Kant, however, also acknowledged the importance of the private sector in nation-building, advocating handholding by the Centre for the sector to grow.
He was responding to a question on EAC-PM member Sanjeev Sanyal’s remark that the popularity of UPSC examinations “reflects limited aspirations”, adding that “too many young kids” were wasting their time trying to crack the exam.
Speaking on the podcast Neon Show, Kant said there was great sense of pride in working for India and with the government of India. “I have worked for over 44 years and I think the extent of job satisfaction that I have got, the ability to work in Kerala, to work with incredible India in Delhi, to do Make in India, to do Startup India, to do Aspirational District Program and later to do the G20 as Sherpa. I could not have got anywhere else in the world, in any private sector of India or abroad… Government gives you a different job satisfaction,” Kant said, adding that he did not agree with Sanyal’s point.
Kant said he was a firm believer that the government should act as a catalyst to enable the private sector to flourish. He also felt the process of UPSC examination needed a relook, pitching for a GMAT-kind of format . “You need not give the preliminary exam again and again. But that is something which the UPSC and Department of Personnel can examine,” he said.
“UPSC clearance is for working for the government. And governments give you the scale of transformation, the ability to transform your country, the ability to transform, bring in policies, the ability to make a difference at the grass root level. That level of satisfaction with integrity, with honesty you can never get anywhere else.”
Kant was responsible for the Incredible India tourism campaign in the early part of this millennium and played a driving role in the country’s pursuit of becoming a global manufacturing hub with the Make in India initiative.
