Trying For A Comeback

For the past four months, Chief Minister Manohar Joshi has made it a point to meet a group of industrialists once in three weeks. The objective: to keep abreast of matters economic in the state and get to know its key investors better. Last month, Joshi even went as far as to give Enron Power Corporation's controversial Dabhol Power Company a clean chit when he said there was no real basis for the corruption charges his government made against the American power house. The allegations, he said, were based largely on press reports.

There's a hard-nosed reason behind the chief minister's sudden industry-friendly attitude. After years of being leagues ahead of other states both in terms of investments and key economic indicators, especially social infrastructure, India's third-largest state has slipped in the rankings. Statistics put out by the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) in its fifth quarterly investment intelligence survey in March this year showed that Maharashtra has been overtaken by upstarts like Gujarat, Karnataka and Orissa (see page 6).

 

A Planning Commission report now reveals that the state has lost its pre-eminent position in education, public health care and minimum wages. Just about a year ago, in August 1995, Maharashtra led the pack with total investment of Rs 91,813 crore. A year later, investment proposals for the state increased by 15 per cent, while the other three states had an average growth rate of 37 per cent.

So the chief minister and his 18-month-old right-wing government have a reputation to defend, although they have plenty of explanation for this performance.