New Delhi, May 30 -- The Institute of Economic Growth (IEG), founded by the grand old man of Indian economics V K R V Rao in 1952, normally a place for senior researchers and a training ground for the government's economic bureaucracy became a unique evening classroom for students just beginning their training in the subject of economics. The students were a large bunch of BA first year students from various Delhi University (DU) colleges and a handful of MA students from Delhi School of Economics (DSE), Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) and DU's management school. The teacher was none other than India's current and longest serving finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman, who finished her BA in economics from Seethalakshmi Ramaswami College, Tiruchirapalli, in 1980 and went on to do an MA and MPhil in economics from JNU. Moderating the discussion between Sitharaman and the students was veteran policy maker and 15th Finance Commission chairman N K Singh, a 1960 economics honours pass out from St Stephen's college and a MA from Delhi School of Economics's class of 1962. Singh, who is also the President of IEG was hosting Sitharaman on the occasion of inauguration of the renovated Ramakrishna Hall of the institute. The broad theme of the interaction was Security and Development, perhaps taking a cue from Operation Sindoor. While welcoming Sitharaman to IEG, Singh expressed gratitude on behalf of the institute for the minister's presence as well as the finance ministry's partnership with IEG for various things including training of Indian Economic Service officers. He also lauded Sitharaman for having broken three glass ceilings: becoming India's first woman finance minister, having presented the most (eight) consecutive budgets among all Indian finance ministers, and having earned the distinction of bringing "not pause but panache" to economic policy even when things become difficult to ensure that India does not stray from its goal of becoming a developed country. Just before opening the discussion, he also reminded Sitharaman of Kautilya's emphasis in his classic treatise Arthashastra on the importance of the sovereign pursuing both military and economic prowess at the same time to ensure strength or "Balam". The interaction began with Singh striking a "politically correct" note and letting Hindu college and not St Stephen's ask the first question, referring to the famous rivalry between the two North Campus colleges in Delhi University. Questions to the finance minister ranged from concerns of climate justice and defence production's potential for India's economic growth to the key sectors which she saw as powering India's rise as the world's third largest economy. The finance minister responded candidly to each one of them and gave the students a lucid yet informed view of the Indian economy. She emphasized the success of India's armed forces in pulling off complete integration and interoperability of indigenous and imported military equipment across various wings of the armed forces even as the country continues to make a consistent advance on import substitution in military goods. India's ability to strike deep within the enemy territory against terrorism was accompanied by its steadfast commitment to develop infrastructure, be it dams and digital infra in countries such as Bhutan and Afghanistan or housing for poor Tamil workers in Sri Lanka, in its neighbouring countries. This approach, now extending to BIMSTEC (Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation) countries too, is winning goodwill for India even as governments come and go in neighbouring countries, she added. When asked by a DSE student how economic policy was made during emergencies such as the pandemic, Sitharaman candidly admitted to the lack of any established template and underlined the role of consultations prioritising both the economy and health in the government's approach which helped not just tide over the that crisis but could also help address such challenges in the future. . Answering another question about India's plans on mitigating the climate crisis, Sitharaman said that the challenge of climate finance has only become worse in the last two years. N K Singh was a part of the committee to reform multilateral institutions during India's G20 presidency to facilitate climate finance for the Global South and all but three of the recommendations of the committee he co-chaired were accepted by the World Bank but there has been no action, she said, adding that countries are increasingly realising that "they are on their own" in this battle. The current economic environment is also one where the traditional binaries such as Bharat (rural India) versus (urban) India will not work and just throwing money is not going to be enough, she said, while responding to questions about India's sunrise sectors....