New Delhi, May 26 -- There's a temptation that afflicts every regulator over time: the urge to intervene. Like the man with a hammer who sees everything as a nail, some regulators across the globe begin to see their relevance lying in their reach, not their restraint. They start mistaking regulation for virtue and enforcement for wisdom. Markets, in their view, are suspect until proven innocent.

India, which aims to be a global hub for manufacturing and innovation, can ill afford such regulatory excess. When enforcement diverges from economic logic, when success itself is treated as suspicious, we risk turning the very institutions meant to foster growth into instruments that stifle it.

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