
Statistician Who Influenced Indian Government Takes a Stand, According to Reuters
By Devjyot Ghoshal
NEW DELHI – P.C. Mohanan grew up in a village without electricity, studied statistics at a public university, and dedicated over three decades to analyzing numbers for the Indian government.
However, in the past week, the soft-spoken official has found himself in the midst of a political controversy that could jeopardize Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government just months before the general elections.
On January 28, Mohanan stepped down as acting chairman of the National Statistical Commission (NSC), an advisory body funded by the government that assesses the quality of India’s official statistics, in protest against the delay in the release of new job data. He was joined in his resignation by another NSC member, J. Meenakshi.
Just three days later, some of the job figures were leaked to a financial newspaper, which claimed that India’s unemployment rate for the year ending June 2018 had surged to 6.1 percent, marking its highest point in at least 45 years.
These figures carry significant implications as the elections approach, with Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) working to win over voters anxious about low agricultural incomes and insufficient job opportunities. The country needs to create over a million jobs each month to accommodate the influx of young workers.
Officials from NITI Aayog, a government think tank established by Modi in 2015, have dismissed the reported job figures. They argued the report was still a "draft" and asserted that additional quarterly data was necessary for a rigorous jobs report. India’s Finance Minister also indicated that the report had not received approval yet.
In a recent interview, Mohanan, who is 63, expressed no regrets about his decision to resign in protest. He emphasized that the NSC, which serves as the authoritative body for statistical data before publication, had been consistently overlooked by the government in recent months. The delay in releasing the jobs figures became the catalyst for his departure.
“Data should be released on schedule, regardless of whether it is favorable or not,” he stated. “Otherwise, where is the credibility in the system?"
The origins of the leaked figures remain uncertain. Mohanan insisted that the data did not come from him and refrained from discussing the specifics of the jobs report.
He noted that the NSC had approved the report on December 5, expecting it to be made public shortly thereafter. When the release did not occur, he engaged with senior officials, including the chief statistician, and even traveled from his home in southern India to New Delhi for a meeting, where he did not receive adequate explanations for the delay.
With the report still unpublished, he and Meenakshi resigned a few days later. Mohanan emphasized the importance of standing up for the integrity of the organization, where he spent his career. He joined the NSC as a member in 2017, two years after retiring from India’s statistics service.
Upon becoming acting head in November 2018, he observed a significant reduction in the NSC’s role under the Modi government, noting it was under-resourced and not engaged in important statistical initiatives as mandated by ministry guidelines.
A previous controversy surrounding the release of historical GDP data also played into the dynamics, with the government using this data to criticize the opposition Congress party, particularly highlighting lower growth rates during the Congress-led administration.
Mohanan expressed concern regarding NITI Aayog’s involvement in releasing the numbers, which they claimed they were assessing before any announcement.
In response to NITI Aayog’s justifications for withholding the jobs data, both Mohanan and a former senior official from the statistical office rejected the claims as unfounded.
“There is no correlation between this report and the quarterly data,” stated the former official, who wished to remain anonymous.
Radha Binod Barman, former chair of the NSC, emphasized that the commission should have had the final say on the jobs report’s release.
NITI Aayog and the Ministry of Statistics have not responded to inquiries regarding the matter.
For Mohanan, the last week has been tumultuous. He understands this could mark the end of his governmental career but is prepared to return to retirement in the village where he grew up in Kerala.
Having made a stand, Mohanan hopes that the NSC and the Indian statistical community will now receive the respect they deserve.