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Former Chief Economic Advisor Kaushik Basu Mocks Politicians On Data, Here’s How He Came Up With ‘GEP’ Metric To Buttress Congress Govt’s Poor Economic Performance

By
The Commune
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Former Chief Economic Advisor and current taxi driver storyteller Kaushik Basu has come under renewed criticism after his recent remark taking a swipe at politicians drew attention to his earlier controversial economic ranking that had placed India fifth globally in “economic clout.”

Basu had written, “One trait many politicians share with Aristotle is the refusal to look at data. Aristotle believed till the end of his life that women have fewer teeth than men.”

The comment has triggered pushback from netizens, who pointed to Basu’s own past use of unconventional metrics.

In 2011, during the UPA government led by then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Basu authored a study that ranked India fifth in the world in terms of “wielding economic clout,” as reported at the time. Notably, India was then the 10th largest economy globally by standard GDP measures.

Instead of relying on GDP size, Basu’s framework used what he termed Government Economic Power (GEP), an alternative indicator intended to capture the global influence exercised by governments. Based on this metric, India was placed behind the United States, China, Japan and Germany.

The study had drawn skepticism even then, with critics arguing that shifting from widely accepted GDP comparisons to a newly framed index risked overstating India’s relative global position.

With Basu now accusing politicians of ignoring data, detractors say his own past reliance on unconventional economic yardsticks has returned to the spotlight, reigniting debate over the credibility and policy relevance of the GEP measure.

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