Last week, Prime Minister Narendra Modi pitched ‘self-reliant India’ as the visionary aim to pursue in the coming days and years. It raises apprehensions of India discouraging imports from more efficient producers abroad and encouraging less efficient local producers.
Self-reliance is not a new theme. Immediately after Independence, the stated policy was to increase domestic production of food grains with a view to lower our dependence on imports. We achieved self-sufficiency in food when, in the early 1970s, the green revolution was ushered in. It included use of high yielding varieties of imported seeds, fertilisers, pesticides etc. and improved farming
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