Uploaded June 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago

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Shruti's guest is Rakesh Mohan. He is the President Emeritus and Distinguished Fellow at Center for Social and Economic Progress in New Delhi. He has previously also served as Executive Director on the Board of the International Monetary Fund and as Deputy Governor of the Reserve Bank of India.

They talked about his work with the Government of India since the 1980s, especially dismantling the infamous License Permit Raj during the 1991 reforms, his work on urbanization and infrastructure, the kinds of structural reforms India still needs to undertake, and much more.

Recorded April 25th, 2025

Transcript and links: mercatus.org/ideasofindia/rakesh-mohan-reflects-dismantling-license-permit-raj

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Timestamps

00:00:00 - Intro
00:00:05 - Labyrinth of Control
00:25:06 - Dismantling the Licensing System
00:51:19 - Regrets
01:11:22 - The Infrastructure Report
01:32:46 - Structural Transformation