After Kerala and TN, Uttar Pradesh to rope in economist to improve finances

With the electoral win of Yogi Adityanath, the Uttar Pradesh government has renewed its call for a consultant to help it meet its ambitious target of making Uttar Pradesh a $1 trillion economy in five years.

Earlier, the UP government had sought a consultant in 2020. The process, however, could not be taken forward. The state administration has now called for fresh bids. The last date for submission of applications is April 14 and the technical bids will be opened on April 18.

Newspaper ads published

On Tuesday, the Uttar Pradesh Department of Planning issued advertisements in prominent newspapers, inviting request for proposal (RFP) by April 14.

“The Department of Planning wishes to engage Consultant to boost up the size of the Economy of Uttar Pradesh to One Trillion Dollar in five years (2022-2027),” read the ad.

A couple of days back, Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister and state Finance Minister Ajit Pawar declared in the state assembly that Maharashtra is set to become the first state in the country to achieve $1 trillion economy in the next three years.

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Uttar Pradesh’s GDP in 2020-21 was estimated at Rs 19.40 lakh crore with a projection of Rs 21.74 lakh crore or $285 billion dollar in 2021-2022. To fulfil the Adityanath government’s dream of making the state a $1 trillion economy, the economy has to grow four times by 2027, a time when the BJP CM’s second term would come to an end.

States opting for economist-consultants

Several states in the past have dabbled with appointing consultants to improve their finances. Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan had, during his earlier term in 2016, appointed Gita Gopinath as an advisor to the state government. She quit after being appointed to the International Monetary Fund as Chief Economist.

Last June, the newly sworn in DMK government of Tamil Nadu set up a five-member Economic Advisory Council to advise the Chief Minister on tackling post-pandemic economic challenges. The Council consisted of Nobel Prize-winning economist Esther Duflo, former RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan, ex- Chief Economic Adviser to the Government of India Arvind Subramanian, welfare economist Jean Dreze and former Union Finance Secretary and one-time Economic Adviser to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, S Narayan.