Bengaluru: The government’s crackdown on Non-Government Organisations (NGOs) and its harassment of students has hampered India’s image internationally, noted economist and Nobel laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz has said.
Responding to a question of his evaluation of the Narendra Modi-led government, the economist said there were two big concerns that had got public attention abroad.
One was the “conditions” being imposed on NGOs – Ford Foundation in particular – to make them difficult to operate in India and the other was the “harassment” of students in universities such as Jawaharlal Nehru University, he said.
“There is a spotlight on India and there is concern over these actions. This puts India in a small group of authoritarian countries such as Egypt, Russia and Turkey. This kind of thing can have a negative effect on foreign investors,” the Nobel Laureate told media in Bengaluru on Wednesday.
He further said that such actions by the government went against the broader understanding of civil society and democracy. These two concerns have had led to “strong views and affected public opinion” abroad, he said.
Stiglitz was in Bengaluru to deliver a talk on “Global inequality: Causes and Consequences” along with economist Branko Milanovic.
