It is with considerable trepidation that I stand before you to pay my humble Tribute to the "Bhishma Pitamaha " of DEAP. We have gathered in such large numbers to mourn the sad demise on April 6th of Dr.N.A.Mujumdar. He was 84 years old. He served in R B I for over three and a half decades . He was a distinguished economist whose Ph D thesis from Mumbai University was highly acclaimed and published as a book titled: Some Problems of Underemployment. He has wide interests in rural issues , monetary and fiscal policies and international issues. He taught at Mumbai University and had the distinction of being awarded the prestigious Nuffield Fellowship at Oxford. On his return to India, he joined the Reserve Bank of India in 1960 as Research Officer, and retired as Principal Adviser, Department of Economic Analysis and Policy in 1988. He also headed the Monetary Policy Unit--the Brains Trust of the RBI. His services were sought by the International Monetary Fund for secondment to the central banks of five different countries—Zambia, Mauritius, Tanzania, Belize and Cambodia. No single person has had assignments to such a large number of countries. That was Shri.Mujumdar.
Dr.Mujumdar was an authority on Agricultural Economics and was the Editor of the Indian Journal of Agricultural Economics and the Honorary Professor at the Society for Development Studies. He is author of a number of books including two volumes on Indian Agriculture. His last book, was " India’s New Development Agenda."--a book bursting with radical ideas and presenting an incisive analysis of our problems.
He belonged to an elite group of economists,like Shri.A.G.Chandavarkar, Deena Khatkhate, Dr.K.S.Krishnaswamy, M.Narasimhan, S.S.Tarapore,etc who wrote with authority seminal articles published in the legendary “ Economic and Political Weekly ".
One thing common to Dr.Mujumdar, S.S.Tarapore, A.Vasudevan, S.L.Shetty and myself is that all of us have the same publishers—Academic Foundation. I got a call from Shri.Rituraj Kapila, M .D of the Foundation that Dr.Mujumdar’s latest book was in the process of binding. Unfortunately he did not live to see it released. Dr.Mujumdar had a dialogue on his new book with Dr.Uma Kapila ,mother of Rituraj, only two days before his death.The posthumous book is “Reinventing Development Economics: Explorations from the Indian Experiment”. Rituraj has sent me a copy for review.The book is an attempt at exploring the new aspects of development philosophy. Divided into six broad sections, it addresses the issues of: growth and development, monetary policy, banking policy, fiscal policy, food security and global environment, with reference to the Indian economy. The underlying main theme of all the articles in the volume is promoting growth which is all-round and inclusive, equitable and above all growth which ultimately leads to the emergence of value-based compassionate society.
Dr.Mujumdar’s Philosophy of Life is available in this new book. “One of the ancient scriptures of India, Brahadaranyaka Upanishad enjoins that our life must be guided by the following three “Da -s”. Da-myata, that is control yourself; Da-tta that is give to others; and Da-yadhwam, that is be compassionate. Thus we must practice self-control, charity, and be compassionate. The Bhagawad Gita enjoins us to treat others as you treat yourself . What is good for you is good for others; what is bad for you is bad for others. Learn to rejoice in doing good to all creatures. Inculcating these qualities among individuals will go a long way towards eliminating society’s sicknesses like corruption, improving the quality of life and in general evolving a caring and compassionate society.”
Our sincere condolences to the family. Their grief is shared by Dr.Mujumdar's wide circle of colleagues, friends and students. We pray that his soul rests in peace.
- P.P.Ramachandran
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