A Blueprint for Reforming India’s Financial System

India’s recent robust economic growth has propelled it to one of the world’s major emerging economic powers. India’s challenge now is to maintain this high-growth trajectory while providing greater economic benefits and opportunities to a broad swath of its population. Recognizing that reforms to the domestic financial system will be crucial to meet this challenge, India’s government set up a high-level committee last year to lay out a blueprint for the next generation of financial sector reforms.

On September 12, the day this committee’s report was presented to the Indian prime minister, the Brookings Institution hosted a discussion of the report and debate its implications for sustainable and inclusive growth. Lael Brainard, vice president and director of Global Economy and Development at Brookings, provided introductory remarks and moderated the discussion. One of the authors of the report—Eswar Prasad, senior fellow at Brookings and a professor at Cornell University—outlined the report’s main findings and recommendations. They were joined by Tarun Khanna, Jorge Paulo Lemann professor at Harvard Business School. A question and answer session followed the panel discussion.