Affordable Digital Connectivity, Aadhaar Driving India’s Growth: World Economic Forum Chief

New Delhi: The Aadhaar card and its effective use in the digitisation of the Indian economy came in for high praise from Borge Brende, the president of World Economic Forum (WEF).

Speaking at NDTV’s Decoding G20 Conclave, Brende said that one of the reasons why India has seen the fastest growth among large economies for three years in a row is affordable digital connectivity and the digital ID (Aadhaar) that has been issued to most of big population.

Brende was part of a panel discussion on ‘The Voice of the Global South’ with NK Singh, co-convener, G20 Independent Expert Group on Reforms in Multilateral Development Banks, and Vera Songwe, chair and founder, Liquidity and Sustainability Facility, Africa Growth Initiative, Brookings Institution.

Brende remarked that he had recently seen on television a grandmother in Assam wiring money to her grandchildren using her cellphone.

“Where else is that happening? If India is 1.4 billion people digitally connected and there are 4 billion people out of 7 billion people (in the world) not digitally connected, you have a huge, huge advantage… It is a prerequisite for economic growth and for poverty eradication,” Brende observed during the NDTV panel discussion.

Songwe echoed the WEF chief’s views.

“Financial inclusion is a micro and macro issue. If you are not financially inclusive, for those who are out of it, not having access to financial tools is a terrible thing. And poverty is a terrible thing. What India is doing with the Aadhaar programme is about including people in the financial sector,” Songwe opined.

“The minute you have enough information, people become part of the formal economy. We can bring the Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in. We can grow them faster and they can become job-creating entities. And that is why you are the fastest growing economy in the world. Because your Aadhaar economy is now paying off,” she added.