India At Cusp Of Historic Rise Despite Global Headwinds, Says Top PMO Official Shaktikanta Das

Amid the looming threat of trade tariffs, a senior PMO official on Friday said India was on the cusp of a historic journey, buoyed by government policies and reforms that have put the country in a strong position.

Delivering the inaugural Bibek Debroy Memorial Lecture, Shaktikanta Das, the principal secretary to the prime minister, said.

At a time when the consensus that powered globalisation in past decades has frayed and multilateral cooperation has become harder to achieve, India has embraced Atmanirbharta, a vision of self-reliance, as the overarching principle of our policies.

“Atmanirbharta is not being isolationist, but a strategy to build core competence and resilience. Economic Atmanirbharta means developing the capacity to produce critical

goods and technologies at home and reducing over-reliance on foreign sources.

Das, a former RBI governor, said a self-reliant economy, with strong domestic capabilities, gives greater strength to sustain the economic growth; and an autonomous foreign policy enables dealing with the external environment in the best national interest.

“Together, they ensure that India’s rise is resilient, sustainable and beneficial to us and to the world,” he said.

“India stands today at the cusp of a historic journey — from being an incredible India to a credible India. There will be headwinds and challenges emanating from known and unknown sources,” he said.

Das said India had successfully emerged out of what appeared to be perfect storms caused by multiple global shocks since the COVID-19 year of 2020.

“And now with the policies that the country has adopted, the wind is in our sails. We are indeed on our path to Viksit Bharat,” Das said.

He said India stood at an inflection point where shifting geopolitical winds and trade policies were reshaping the global economic order.

“Traditional multilateralism, once a cornerstone of global governance, is under severe strain. It is increasingly being sidelined by geopolitical rivalries, protectionism and fragmentation,” he said.

The remarks by the former RBI governor came at a time when the US was considering the Russia Sanctions Bill that seeks to impose tariffs of up to 500 per cent on countries buying Russian oil, including China and India. The US and India are also negotiating a trade deal that has run into delays.

“Key international institutions are struggling to deliver on their mandates. Institutions, which were once the bedrock of rules-based systems, are underperforming in their core mandates,” Das said.

He said that trade and supply chains, once seen as neutral conduits of globalisation, were increasingly being utilised as instrumentalities of disruption and dominance.

Reshoring and friend-shoring of supply chains, and prioritising strategic alliances over global integration are fragmenting the global networks, Das said.

“This trend reflects a broader geo-economic fragmentation, encompassing restricted technology flows, barriers to labour mobility and uncertainty about global public goods,” he said.

Das said the consensus that powered globalisation in the past decades has frayed and multilateral cooperation has become harder to achieve, while the ideals of free trade have given way to protectionism and regional blocs.

Das said recognising these realities, India’s stance in the changing world order is clear.

“India stands for a cooperative and rules-based global system; but at the same time, we are proactively forging partnerships and strategies to secure our national interest in a world where power is more diffused,” he said.

“We, of course, acknowledge that the multilateral system must be revitalised, even as we adapt to new alignments,” Das said.

(With inputs from PTI)