Who is Venkatraman Anantha Nageswaran, India’s new Chief Economic Advisor?

Venkatraman Anantha Nageswaran was on Friday appointed as India’s new Chief Economic Advisor. This comes days before Economic Survey on January 31 and the Union Budget presentation on February 1. 

“The Government has appointed Dr V Anantha Nageswaran as the Chief Economic Advisor and today he has assumed charge,” the Finance Ministry said in a statement. 

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Nageswaran, who is an academic and a former executive of the Credit Suisse Group AG and Julius Baer Group, succeeds CEA KV Subramanian – whose three-year tenure ended in December. 

His appointment comes when the Indian economy is slowly recovering from the crippling consequnces of COVID-19 but faces fresh challenges as new waves of the virus keep emerging. 

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The CEA is a secretary-level rank in the Ministry of Finance. The officer is usually the architect of the annual economic survey. This year, it is being prepared by the principal economic advisor and other officials. The Economic Survey will be tabled in Parliament on January 31. 

Who is V Anatha Nageswaran?

Nageswaran has previously worked as an author, teacher and consultant. He has taught at several business schools and institutes of management in India and in Singapore and has published extensively. 

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He graduated with a Post-Graduate Diploma in Management (MBA) degree from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad in 1985.

He then obtained a doctoral degree in Finance from the University of Massachusetts in 1994 for his work on the empirical behaviour of exchange rates.

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He was the Dean of the IFMR Graduate School of Business and a distinguished Visiting Professor of Economics at Krea University.

Nageswaran helped co-found the Takshashila Institution, an independent centre for research and education in public policy and helped launch the first impact investment fund of the Aavishkaar Group in 2001.

He has also been a part-time member of the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister of India from 2019 to 2021.