Manmohan Singh: India's Finest Talent Scout

(1932-2024)

Economists live and die by a mantra: resources must flow to their highest-valued use. Manmohan Singh embraced this idea as he steered the Indian economy out of command-and-control and into a market system. But he also applied it in a strikingly personal way—to people. He believed that individuals with talent and expertise should be placed where they can make the greatest difference.

Singh was, quite possibly, the finest talent spotter in Indian economics, a skill that would go on to shape the country’s economic policy for decades. His keen talent scouting was his most remarkable quality that has been least remarked upon.

Top Panel (L to R): S. Venkitaramanan, C. Rangarajan, Manmohan Singh, M. Narasimham, Bimal Jalan and Y.V. Reddy. Bottom Panel (L to R): N.K. Singh, P. Chidambaram, Montek Singh Ahluwalia, and Shankar Acharya.

Singh was excellent at identifying young talent, most famously Montek Singh Ahluwalia. Before Montek and Isher Judge would go on to marry, they met Manmohan Singh in Delhi in 1970. At the time, Singh was a professor at the Delhi School of Economics, known for his work on India’s exports. He seemed too soft-spoken and erudite for the couple to imagine him joining the Ministry of Foreign Trade as an economic advisor just a year later. Over the years, Singh offered suggestions to Isher Judge for her macro-econometric model of the Indian economy, which formed the basis of her doctoral thesis at MIT under Stanley Fischer.

During his tenure as chief economic advisor (CEA) to the Government of India, Singh’s relationship with Ahluwalia deepened. Their conversations in Washington D.C., where Ahluwalia worked at the World Bank, became more frequent. When the position of economic advisor at the Finance Ministry opened, Singh saw an opportunity. He guided Ahluwalia into the bureaucracy, marking their transition from mentor and mentee to colleagues.  

A worthy protégé, Ahluwalia drafted the famous blueprint for the first stage of reforms in 1991—dubbed the M-Document. Like Singh, he went on to become finance secretary and, later, deputy chairman of the Planning Commission. Ahluwalia was just one among dozens of economists that Singh mentored. But this cycle of mentorship, that Singh set in motion, would repeat well beyond his years in office. Ahluwalia recruited the next generation of talent, most notably Raghuram Rajan.

Perhaps it was the strikes and student movements of the 1970s. Or the rise of the anti-establishment hero in the zeitgeist. Whatever the reason, in a country that usually prioritized age and seniority over merit, Singh knew, even then, that India’s future depended on its emerging talent. The talent he sought not only excelled globally but was committed to returning home and joining public service. The seeds for the 1991 reforms were sown in those years.  

Shankar Acharya recalls the annual International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank meetings in Washington, D.C.—both in autumn and spring—where Singh made it a point to meet young economists. He listened to them. He learned about their work. He discussed the possibilities available back home, within and beyond the government. His efforts led to a steady inflow of Indian talent. Acharya himself, after completing his PhD at Harvard and working at the World Bank, returned to India. He would eventually work his way up the Indian bureaucracy to serve as CEA under Singh as finance minister.  

Another example was Rakesh Mohan, whom Singh mentored through the 1980s, helping him navigate his career decisions at the World Bank and India’s Planning Commission. In 1986, he brought Mohan back to the Planning Commission as an economic advisor, specifically to work on structural reforms. Mohan’s return was part of a broader transformation Singh orchestrated that year. Along with Mohan, he recruited two other economists in their early thirties—Arvind Virmani, who had completed his doctorate under Kenneth Arrow at Harvard, and Jairam Ramesh, who had left his doctoral program at MIT to work at the World Bank.  

These appointments to the Planning Commission faced resistance from bureaucrats. They were skeptical about placing such junior economists in senior positions. But Singh’s judgment was vindicated. Their immediate contributions were significant, and their subsequent achievements changed the course of India’s economy.  

Mohan, who earned his PhD from Princeton and learned the nuts and bolts of deadweight loss from Arnold Harberger, later became the Industry Ministry’s economic advisor. He dismantled the License-Permit-Raj through a new industrial policy. A worthy inheritor to both Harberger and Singh. Mohan later served as deputy governor of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). Jairam Ramesh, with one foot in technocracy and the other in politics, became a cabinet minister in multiple governments, including Singh’s own. Virmani, meanwhile, rose steadily through the Finance Ministry and the Planning Commission. Eventually, he served as principal advisor to the Planning Commission and later as CEA. Singh took a similar chance many years later, appointing Kaushik Basu as CEA—an academic with no government experience.

Another future CEA, Nitin Desai, interacted with Singh early in his career and later worked alongside Singh at the Planning Commission. Nitin Desai wasn’t part of the dream team in 1991, though. He was engaged, upon request from the UN, as the deputy secretary-general of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development. Similarly, Singh encouraged Ashok Lahiri to return from the IMF, who would later serve as CEA in both the Vajpayee and United Progressive Alliance (UPA)-1 governments, and go on to have a career in politics. 

This pattern continued into the 1990s. When a young Urjit Patel served at the IMF’s India desk during the standby arrangement negotiations in 1991, Singh took notice. The connection extended beyond the IMF; at Yale, Patel had been a student of T.N. Srinivasan—another one of Singh’s old associates from Srinivasan’s days in New Delhi. Writing letters of reference and helping Patel navigate India’s policy ecosystem, Singh once again demonstrated his knack for nurturing talent. Years later, Patel would follow Singh’s footsteps to lead the RBI as its governor during one of its most turbulent times, overseeing the demonetization of currency. 

Talent scouts are odd. They operate on the margins—insiders, yet also outsiders.

Singh was like that, a bit of an outsider everywhere who worked his way up. Quite literally without a home, he had known disruption as a refugee during Partition. An excellent student without a college in 1947. He rebuilt himself, step by step, and with scholarships. First at Punjab University. From there, he went on to Cambridge. Then to Oxford. By 1990, he had reached the pinnacle of economic policymaking in India: serving as CEA, finance secretary, deputy chairman of the Planning Commission, and governor of the RBI. He had occupied every top technocratic position, yet his childhood as an outsider shaped him differently—he systematically worked to create pathways for others like him.

His skill went beyond just identifying promising talent. Through his example of translating academic insights into governmental action, Singh inspired a generation of economists to return to India. 

The likes of Ahluwalia, Mohan, Virmani, Acharya, and Ramesh would eventually be recognized by many. In addition to spotting talent, Singh’s mentorship went a long way, making sure they found the right positions in government, worked with the right people, and had a clear path to the top. Anything less and the talent would have drained from the government. 

The lost opportunities and financial and other insecurities of his youth likely shaped Singh’s ability to empathize with others. When Mohan asked whether to stay in India after a three-year assignment in the early 1980s, Singh advised him to return to the World Bank to gain more experience and financial security before considering government service. He gave that advice to many others returning to India—the best way to have a long and honest career in government was to have other means of financial security. Singh could see beyond immediate interests to focus on what would serve both the individual and institution best in the long run.

Other than being outsider-insiders, good scouts tend to be keen observers and good listeners. Most importantly, they can see individuals more clearly than they can see themselves. Vijay Kelkar, who completed his doctorate at UC Berkeley under Avinash Dixit, recalled Singh’s distinctive mentoring style. During Kelkar’s visits to India, Singh engaged in lengthy discussions, marked by patience and precision. Rather than dominating the conversation, Singh listened intently.  

Kaushik Basu recalls that throughout his tenure as CEA, Singh kept his door open for monthly discussions on economic policy. This level of access was rare. But it reflected Singh’s deep understanding of what outsiders needed to succeed in government.

When Urjit Patel resigned as RBI governor in December 2018, Singh was among the first to call. His immediate concern wasn’t about policy or the economy, but Urjit’s well-being. 

Singh’s talent spotting extended beyond economists from elite universities. He also reached into the Indian civil service. Y.V. Reddy’s transfer from his position as collector of Hyderabad to the Department of Economic Affairs in 1977 appeared to be a routine bureaucratic movement. It was Singh, then finance secretary, who had specifically requested Reddy’s transfer. Here, Singh’s scouting method was systematic: he screened IAS batches for officers who combined strong academic credentials in economics with exceptional service records. Reddy, who had never met Singh, later realized he had been hand-picked as part of this carefully curated talent pipeline. 

N.K. Singh’s first encounter with Singh was likely in the seventies in New York when N.K. Singh was an early-career IAS officer and Singh was working at the United Nations. Manmohan Singh’s help was sought to refine a minister’s speech. This chance meeting led to Manmohan Singh’s appointment as economic advisor to the Ministry of Foreign Trade—on the minister’s insistence—marking his first step into government service. But Singh also noted the talent in N.K. Singh, like in the case of Y.V. Reddy. Their paths would cross repeatedly over the next four decades, from the Ministry of Finance to the Rajya Sabha.

In addition to economist chops, Singh also valued exceptional integrity in the people he worked with, like Gajendra Haldea, who served as joint secretary (infrastructure) in the Finance Ministry and set standards for transparency in infrastructure governance from the early 1990s onward.  

Singh’s skill in spotting talent and placing them in the appropriate position went beyond the realm of economics and bureaucracy. In 2009, when Singh was about to start his second term as prime minister, some, including Singh, wanted to bring Nandan Nilekani—co-founder of Infosys—into the government. Originally, Nilekani was considered for a cabinet position in the then Human Resource Development Ministry, but the idea was quickly nixed. Singh felt Nilekani was an able technocrat, not a politician, and such an appointment would be a wrong fit. Singh later offered him a position at the Planning Commission, but Nilekani declined, stating he wanted an active and operational role. Singh asked him to propose an idea. Nilekani, after studying government initiatives, suggested leading the identity project, which had been approved earlier that year. Nilekani set conditions, asking for a high degree of autonomy. Singh agreed without hesitation granting him a cabinet rank for authority.

Nilekani would go on to ensure that every single Indian had a unique biometric identity–AADHAAR–upon which India’s digital public infrastructure rests today. Nilekani himself is also one of the great talent scouts of our time, inducting excellent engineers, businessmen, scientists and lawyers into India’s tech policy network. 

Manmohan Singh’s scouting wasn’t just for the young—he saw people in their entirety. He read their work, listened to their arguments, and engaged with their ideas. Friendships and collaborations naturally followed.  

Since the 1970s, attending multilateral meetings helped Singh build long-term connections, allowing him to persuade Raja Chelliah to return from the IMF. Beyond these institutions, he convinced Bimal Jalan to leave ICICI and Vijay Joshi to take two long breaks from Oxford. In this, Singh mirrored his mentor, I.G. Patel, who had shaped his career—recommending him for an early government job after he graduated from Cambridge, backing him as RBI deputy governor, and, finally, suggesting his name for finance minister to P.V. Narasimha Rao in 1991.  

Among Singh’s most significant connections was C. Rangarajan, whom he had first met in New York in the late 1960s while working at the United Nations. Rangarajan, a monetary economist trained at the University of Pennsylvania, was teaching at New York University, and Singh, a trade theorist, stayed in touch—a relationship that would prove crucial for India’s economic stability in the 1990s. After the first wave of reforms in 1991, Singh brought Rangarajan to the Planning Commission and tasked him with dismantling the command-and-control framework and shaping an economy ready for liberalization.

The tension between the Finance Ministry and the RBI was one Singh knew well—the former eager to spend, the latter enforcing restraint. He took a bold step, leaving it entirely to the RBI to end autonomous monetization of deficits and other socialist-era legacies. On Singh’s initiative, Sukhamoy Chakravarty, his colleague, led the committee to review the monetary system, laying the groundwork for financial reform. The S.S. Marathe Committee pushed to cut bureaucratic approvals for bank credit. For exchange rate management, Singh chose M.S. Patwardhan, while S.R. Sen examined agricultural credit in eastern India. In 1991, he commissioned the Narasimham Committee on financial reform and, in 1993, appointed Raja Chelliah to overhaul taxation.  

Singh’s intellectual ties ran deep. As a student at Cambridge, he met Amartya Sen and Jagdish Bhagwati, who would later stand on opposite ends of the ideological spectrum. All three would go on to win the Adam Smith Prize. Singh’s bond with Bhagwati was closer and extended to Bhagwati’s wife and collaborator, Padma Desai. Bhagwati and Desai’s Planning for Industrialisation challenged India’s command-and-control industrial and trade policies. Their conclusions were divisive. In his 1972 review of the book, Singh acknowledged the inefficiencies they exposed but warned against blindly embracing market mechanisms in a developing economy. Years later, as he had moved closer to their position, Singh credited Bhagwati and Desai’s critique for shaping the intellectual foundation of the 1991 reforms. The engagement came full circle in 1993 when Singh invited Bhagwati and T.N. Srinivasan to assess India’s reforms. As prime minister, he oversaw both Padma Desai and Srinivasan receiving the Padma Bhushan.

Sometimes, these intellectual relationships started as a college tour and evolved into direct policy engagement. One such connection began at Cambridge in the late 1950s when Ashok Desai arrived to begin his B.A. Through a peculiar chain of introductions—Jagdish Bhagwati, Desai’s senior at Sydenham College and newly departed for MIT, arranged for Singh to welcome the newcomer. Singh, then completing his own B.A., guided Ashok Desai through Cambridge life with characteristic thoroughness. Though their time together was brief, they stayed in touch. This early connection would prove crucial decades later when Singh, as finance minister in 1991, inducted him into the team: “You’ve had a good enough time now; it’s time for you to join the government.” This approach—matching talent to the moment and knowing when to press his case—was classic Singh. 

Ashok Desai came on board as chief consultant during a turbulent time. When Singh assumed office in 1991, CEA Deepak Nayyar and finance secretary S.P. Shukla opposed his handling of the crisis and the Big Bang reforms. Rather than dismissing their concerns, Singh engaged with their arguments while remaining firm on the need for reform, and procedural. When this proved insufficient, he brought in Ashok Desai to strengthen his team. Nayyar resigned the following day, but Singh ensured this disagreement didn’t end their relationship—later appointing him to the Prime Minister’s Awards for Excellence in Public Administration committee.

Singh erred very few times in picking the right person for the right job at the right time.

Pranab Mukherjee as his finance minister was perhaps the gravest mistake. But the same characteristics that made Singh a great scout - respect for process and openness to those who disagreed with his policy recommendations would work against him in this instance. As prime minister, when faced with criticism of retrospective taxation from his advisers and international peers like Larry Summers, Singh maintained that finance minister Pranab Mukherjee’s judgment—even when contentious—deserved respect. 

With less devastating consequences, Singh’s eye was less keen closer home. When his eldest daughter, Upinder, chose history over economics at St. Stephen’s, he let her decide but made his disapproval clear, the classic economist’s bias at play. Years later, he supported his middle daughter, Daman, in studying mathematics, but was less enthused when she pursued rural management at the Institute of Rural Management, Anand. His youngest, Amrit, initially followed his path with scholarships to Cambridge and Oxford, only to surprise him by switching to Yale mid-PhD. By then, Singh, ever measured, chose his words carefully. Yet, despite not following in his footsteps, all three thrived—Upinder became a leading historian, Daman a prolific writer, and Amrit a prominent human rights lawyer. 

Singh’s ability to find, incubate, and cultivate talent ensured that India not only pushed through the big bang reforms in 1991 but sustained their progress over the next 25 years, even when Singh was not in office. 

When the currency crisis unfolded in 1991, India was just two weeks away from defaulting on its loans. Singh’s decades of network-building proved decisive. Within a month of taking office as finance minister, Singh handled the crisis by drawing on relationships and ideas he had spent years nurturing. Singh, working with RBI deputy governor C. Rangarajan, implemented a two-step devaluation of the rupee, making way for export competitiveness. Trade policy reforms followed swiftly, with Montek Singh Ahluwalia and P. Chidambaram reworking earlier recommendations from the 1990 M-Document. Within eight hours, Singh, Ahluwalia, Chidambaram, and prime minister PV Narasimha Rao finalized the changes before announcing them the next day.

On industrial policy, Singh drew on the groundwork prepared by Rakesh Mohan, with far-reaching consequences in the domestic markets. Alongside Jairam Ramesh and Ashok Desai advised the prime minister and finance minister’s offices, and Raja Chelliah advised on crucial tax reform. This core team worked to navigate resistance from the old guard within the Congress Party, ensuring the reforms could move forward smoothly. And his proteges at the Finance Ministry, Y.V. Reddy and N.K. Singh held fort with the RBI and multilaterals. With the right people backing them—no power on earth could stop the right ideas whose time had come.

Though the Rao government did not return to power in 1996, the work of reforms continued as Manmohan Singh’s collaborators carried the momentum forward across successive governments. Ahluwalia served as finance secretary under the United Front government, working closely with finance minister Chidambaram, and later as a member of the Planning Commission under the Vajpayee government. In addition to being an excellent lawyer, Singh saw an astute economist in Chidambaram, who went on to serve as finance minister to other prime ministers and would later join Singh’s cabinet, first as finance minister and then as home minister. Shankar Acharya remained a steady presence as India’s longest-serving CEA, continuing through both the United Front and Vajpayee governments, followed by Rakesh Mohan, Ashok Lahiri, and Arvind Virmani. At the RBI, C. Rangarajan, Bimal Jalan, Y.V. Reddy, D. Subbarao, and Urjit Patel, as successive governors since the 1990s, deepened reforms in monetary policy. Rangarajan, Vijay Kelkar, Y.V. Reddy, and N.K. Singh—chaired the twelfth through fifteenth Finance Commissions, shaping India’s fiscal landscape for decades. 

The tributes to Manmohan Singh often boil down to his brilliance and decency. But, what many miss is his ability and power to build collaborative networks. Singh understood that lasting change comes not from solitary genius, but from creating ecosystems of excellence that outlast any individual. In placing talent above ideology, expertise above authority, and mentorship above credit, he developed a model of institutional change that ensured that for the next thirty years RBI governors, CEAs, and the top minds in economic policy were handpicked by him.  

That a tribute to Manmohan Singh should focus so much on other people might seem unusual. Mirroring the man himself, it’s an acknowledgment of his legacy.