Post-2015 Dev agenda must create inclusive growth: Mukherji

India will be the "real battle ground" for the success of post-2015 development agenda, which must create conditions for rapid and sustained inclusive economic growth in developing countries, a senior Indian diplomat has said.
"India attaches a high degree of importance to the post-2015 development agenda with poverty eradication as its overarching objective," Asoke Mukerji, Indian Permanent Representative to the UN, said here yesterday.
"This agenda, we believe, is a unique opportunity for the international community to redouble its commitment to ending poverty and hunger and to set the world on the path to sustainable development, with balanced emphasis on the social, economic and environmental dimensions," he said at a session on 'Role of India as a vibrant democracy in the post-2015 development agenda."

The event on Pluralism and Democracy was hosted by research body Rambhau Mhalgi Prabodhini and the Isha Foundation.
He added that India's efforts at poverty eradication played a major role in meeting the global Millenium Development Goals (MDGs) target of reducing the poverty rate by half.
"India will be a real battle ground for the success of the post-2015 development agenda. The good news is we have already taken up the challenge," he said.

Noting the landmark Indian general elections held earlier this year, Mukerji said India's experience of democracy, including the smooth transition of power has proved that democracy is not only compatible with but also necessary for holistic development.

"The record democratic mandate to the new government was a manifestation of the great yearning for development among Indian people, a yearning for a better quality of life," he said.
Speaking on the occasion, National Vice President of the BJP Vinay Sahasrabudhe said that India and the US, the two main democratic countries of the world, have a distinct responsibility in leading a global plan of action towards promoting democracy and protecting pluralism.
Spiritual leader Sadhguru, founder of the Isha Foundation, said India should focus on removing a practice in which "agitators become administrators."
He said people should not become leaders because they agitate about an issue.

"This idea must be taken out of the people's minds," adding that such practices belong to the pre-independence era.