00:00Let me bring in another part of inner circle here of Prime Minister Modi.
00:04Amitabh Khan, who played a key role in several flagship initiatives
00:09of Prime Minister Modi's government from Make in India, Startup India
00:14and India's G20 presidency.
00:16He has also been instrumental in promoting India's digital,
00:20you know, public infrastructure investment.
00:22He joins me now.
00:24Amitabh Khan, you were brought in as the first full-time CEO of Neeti Ayo.
00:30After Prime Minister Modi dismantled the Planning Commission
00:33and replaced it with a very different institution in 2014.
00:38Looking back, what was Mr. Modi trying to fundamentally change
00:44in the way India was governed?
00:50So, you know, I met Mr. Modi earlier when I was the CEO of Delhi-Mumbai Corridor
00:59and he was the Chief Minister of Gujarat.
01:02I was looking around for land for creating new cities.
01:06All Chief Ministers said no.
01:09Then when I went to him, he asked me, how much land do you need?
01:12I said 150 square kilometers.
01:14He said, why do you need such small size of land?
01:18You go for a much larger area.
01:20And he agreed to give 750 square kilometers for Dolera City.
01:24I realized then that he had vision and he was willing to think big
01:30and he was willing to take risks.
01:33You know, when I left as Secretary of DIPP and I was retiring,
01:38he asked me to take over as CEO Neeti Ayo.
01:41His entire game at that point of time was that the governance must be improved.
01:46There should be focus on outcome-based performance.
01:50And he said, focus on competitive federalism.
01:55Make the states compete, which had never been done earlier.
01:58So we started ranking states on ease of doing business,
02:01on learning outcomes, health outcomes.
02:03And then one fine day after the cabinet meeting,
02:09he called me and he said, you start working on the most backward district.
02:13Let's focus on the last man.
02:16And, you know, that's how the 115 of the most backward districts were identified.
02:22He never called them backward.
02:24He changed the name to aspirational districts.
02:26And again, the focus was outcomes, good governance, competition, performance,
02:34putting out data in public domain.
02:36And very soon we realized that these are parameters
02:40on which these districts were performing very well.
02:42And many of them went down to perform better than the best performing districts.
02:46So I realized that his focus was on good governance.
02:50I realized that his focus was big thinking.
02:53I realized that he was trying to bring great hope and optimism.
02:58And he was transformational in many, many ways.
03:03So, you know, you have worked with Mr. Modi through the Neeti Ayo Gears
03:08and then as his G20 Sherpa.
03:12What did you see up close that tells you most about his style?
03:17His insistence on execution, his appetite for big structural reforms
03:23or his ability to turn a political vision into what many see
03:29as almost like an administrative mission?
03:35So a couple of great qualities.
03:37First is his ability to think big and large.
03:41Very few leaders have this ability to go against the status quo.
03:46He is a change agent in many ways.
03:50Secondly, he's willing to take risks.
03:53Thirdly, he believes in delegating authority and power to you
03:57and once he's given the big picture, that you deliver.
04:01Fourthly, I think he's a great listener.
04:03I've rarely come across a leader who listens so carefully,
04:08so attentively before he decides.
04:11Fifthly, I think he's a person who believes in bringing hope and optimism.
04:17And I think one of the great things about him is that he's a great, great communicator.
04:23There can't be a leader who can communicate so very well.
04:27And I think these are the qualities which I think make him a great transformational leader.
04:36So let's talk about your tenure as Neeti Aayok, CEO.
04:40In that capacity, you drove initiatives such as Aspirational Districts,
04:46PLI and the National AI Strategy as well.
04:48Then as G20 Sherpa, you helped, you know, deliver India's G20 presidency
04:55and also, more importantly, the leader's declaration.
04:59What in your experience, Mr. Kant, is the common thread
05:03between Prime Minister Modi's domestic governance model and his global diplomacy?
05:12One is he's very clear that domestically you have to transform
05:17and become focused on good governance.
05:20He's very, very focused on, for instance, I worked with him on ease of doing business.
05:25He says, scrap all these rules, regulations, procedures, acts.
05:29India's the only country which has scrapped over 30,000 laws.
05:32I mean, his immense focus on going digital.
05:35I did 100 digital mailers for him in 100 days.
05:39You know, I kept requesting him to give me more time.
05:42No, once he's taken a decision, he wants you to deliver, execute, execute, execute,
05:47but he leaves the details to you.
05:48He doesn't get into it.
05:50Similarly, with the production-linked incentive scheme,
05:53I made four or five presentations to him.
05:56But once he got it, then he leaves the execution to you,
06:00and that's how Apple has become the biggest manufacturer in India.
06:03And fourthly, G20, he said, make it ambitious, make it forward-looking,
06:09make it big picture, involve all the states, left all the details to me.
06:14Never got into what the document was, never got into what we were getting into the states.
06:20He then expects you to deliver.
06:22And that is what a great leader is.
06:24Big picture, big vision, execution leaves it to you,
06:28it doesn't interfere in day-to-day functioning.
06:30That's what makes him, you know, I enjoyed working with him as CO Neeti Aayu and as G20 Sherpa,
06:36largely because he was a big picture man and never, never, ever got into day-to-day functioning.
06:42Okay.
06:43Mr. Kant, 25 years after Modi first became Chief Minister of Gujarat,
06:47he is now talking about,
06:51he's not talking about the past, but about Vixit Bharat 2047.
06:55Having worked with him through two very different phases,
06:59transforming India's domestic policy architecture and then projecting India globally,
07:04do you see the next phase as an extension of the Modi model or a fundamentally different chapter?
07:13So, my view is that we are in the midst of global conflicts.
07:17We are in the midst of breakdown of global supply chains.
07:20We are seeing a great amount of protectionism, muscular industrial policy,
07:29but we are also seeing the rise of huge productivity through the use of AI.
07:33And one of the fortunate things is that Prime Minister Modi is very technology savvy,
07:39and that's why he's pushed digitization in a big way.
07:42He's a believer in AI.
07:43That's why the AI mission.
07:45He's a believer in quantum computing.
07:46That's why the mission of quantum computing.
07:48He's a believer in green hydrogen.
07:50That's why the mission of green hydrogen.
07:53And the only way India can become a developed economy
07:57and a 30 plus trillion dollar economy is by using technology to leapfrog.
08:01And he is pushing for that, much like we've done in digitization,
08:06where in seven years we've achieved 50 years of progress.
08:09We need to become a clean technology nation by pushing for green hydrogen.
08:14We need to become a great nation for technology on AI diffusion.
08:20We need to transform learning outcomes, health outcomes, nutritional standards through the use of AI.
08:25And I think in all this, his leadership will be critical
08:28because he's a believer in using technology to make India a pole vault.
08:34All right, Amitabh Kand, I appreciate your time.
08:36Thank you for joining us.
