Prime Minister’s Special Envoy to Japan, Ashwani Kumar, on what his new job entails and other issues
Ashwani Kumar, former Union Law Minister, who quit some months ago
following the controversy over his Ministry vetting a CBI report on coal
allocation, has been appointed Prime Minister’s Special Envoy to Japan
by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. He speaks to The Hindu about his new role. Excerpts from the interview:
You have been appointed as the Prime Minister’s Special Envoy to
Japan. What is your mission in Japan in the context of the new
assignment?
The mandate given to me is to continue and reinforce at the highest
levels the engagement between India and Japan. The idea is to send a
special signal to Japan that India attaches great value and significance
to this relationship, especially in light of the forthcoming visit of
the Imperial Majesties to India. I will meeting the Prime Minister and
the Foreign Minister there along with CEOs of leading Japanese
companies.
How did the 50 billion currency swap announced in G20 by the Prime Minister come about, what is the background?
The world knows and so do we, Japan has huge capital and technological
resources and it has throughout the last several years been very
generous in terms of lending of funds. Considering the state of our
economy and the challenges we are facing, raising the swap arrangement
from $15billion to $50 billion has had immediate positive impact on the
rupee. I think that this one particular gesture by Japan in itself shows
the kind of warmth and importance that it attaches to this
relationship.
Do you think that at a time when America is widely being seen as
withdrawing liquidity they had pumped after 2008, Japan could play
contrarian by pushing more liquidity, which it is doing now. This is
also helping India. Is it planned or just a coincidence?
The fact remains that the Japanese also realise that after China, India
is the single largest market in this region. It is part of a conscious
policy, as per what I can make out, within Japan that they would like to
diversify their global economic engagement without necessarily sending a
negative signal to China but in order to spread its risk wider. India
figures prominently in this strategy.
Today, in India, 926 Japanese companies operate but in contrast there
are 10,000 Japanese companies in China. There is a difference of 1:10 in
terms of level of economic engagement. The Indian market is second to
none. In fact, in certain terms of purchasing power, the Indian market
is even stronger than China. Japan would like India to become a large
and important investment destination for Japanese companies.
Is the higher level engagement with Japan also part of the Indian strategy of working economically more with the East?
I would like to stress that our engagement with Japan is not limited to
strong and vigorous economic ties but this relationship has now become a
multi-faceted and multi-dimensional one. It encompasses defence
co-operation, joint naval exercises as part of the co-operation, the
security of the sea base which sends the right kind of signals in order
to ensure in piracy and terrorism, interests of the both countries are
jointly protected.
Will the Japanese CEOs there be committing more capital at a time India needs more capital for infrastructure sector?
We need Japan to collaborate with India particularly in the development
of the infrastructure sector. Japan has to help us in both technology
material resources and human resources. And no country in the world, in
my view, has today greater competitive advantage than Japan. To start
with, we need to re-invigorate the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor
(DMIC) and the dedicated freight corridor. These are flagship projects
involving lakhs of crores of investment. We need to address the hitches
pointed out by the Japanese side in the execution of these projects. I
talked to the Japanese side, that these are linked to Official
Development Assistance (ODA) finances. And one of the requirements of
financing under this ODA scheme is that contracts have to be given to
Japanese companies. In our processes, we can only award contracts under
competitive mechanism during the tender processes. So we need more
Japanese companies to bid for us to comply with our tender processes
which at present, is not happening. We need to have three to four
equally competitive bidders.
During the Indo-Japanese business and economic working group meeting
recently, the Japanese Trade Minister and Economic Minister talked about
studying the feasibility of setting up a Japanese Electronic City in
India. What is your opinion on this?
The electronic city is a need and we welcome it. I talked about Japanese
clusters, Japanese villages and small cities where the Japanese
expatriates can live in the same environment at one place. The school
for Japanese children, the karaoke, the music, the food, everything is
very important for them. We have established one such cluster at
Neemrana in Rajasthan and the Haryana government is willing to give land
for another hub near Faridabad and Sohna. The idea is to tell them we
welcome them whole heartedly. We would do all that we can to make this
relationship mutually beneficial.
Coming to your own circumstance in which you quit as the Law and
Justice Minister, can we now assume that things are back to normal? How
did the PM choose you for this new assignment?
The new assignment has nothing to do with my resignation from the
Cabinet. My resignation was on count of the fact that the Opposition had
stalled Parliament and I thought that in order to avoid any unnecessary
controversy it will be better for me to resign to allow Parliament to
function. That was the only reason for me to quit. As part of duties of
the Law Minister, it was my function to advise any wing of the
government on any important matter before the Court. In its affidavit
filed before the Supreme Court, the CBI has stated the suggestions
received during discussions in my office where the Attorney General, the
Additional Solicitor General (ASG) and other officers were present, no
changes of any kind had been made to the CBI investigations into
Coalgate. The central theme of investigation remains unaffected. There
were minor changes that were also mentioned in the CBI affidavit.
Therefore, you think the Supreme Court was convinced that no substantial changes were made?
The Supreme Court will decide what it has to decide. But I can tell you
the apex court has not said a single word against me in its written
order. It is well settled that the courts speak through their orders and
not through their observations.
Do you feel the Supreme Court has said nothing against you?
I was never charged. There was no accusation against me in the court. I
mean, I am not before the court. Somebody said that this particular
consultation should not have taken place. I am saying that under the
projection of business of transaction rules of the government, the CBI
can go only to the Law Ministry for advice as long as the advice does
not materially and adversely affect the investigation, something the CBI
had told the court has not happened.
Do you think that the Attorney General in some sense could have avoided saying that he had not read the report at that time?
The least said the better. Let my silence speak for myself.
