Expressing India’s support for multilateral institutions, the Union Minister said, “I think we have followed policies of strategic and peaceful multilateralism, the multilateralism of which you want us to speak about. India has always stood in favour of multilateral institutions. We didn’t want any time undermining any multilateral institution. But progressively we see the hope and the expectations which are pinned on multilateral institutions are fissured away because we think no solutions are coming out of them.”

“So again, as Larry said, these institutions now are not offering an alternative pathway. That is where one of my points is, the core competencies of these institutions, in that they look at so many different economies, look at the dynamism with which some economies are growing and some which are getting stunted, the information base that they have, they should be the first ones to share the information and they should be the first ones to also suggest without imposing,” she added.

Other panellists during the discussions included Emeritus President and Charles W Eliot University Professor, Harvard University, Lawrence H Summers, Spain’s Minister of Economy, Trade and Business Carlos Cuerpo and Egypt’s Minister of Planning, Economic Development, and International Cooperation Rania A. Al Mashat.

Ms Sitharaman stressed that multilateral institutions should strengthen themselves for the global good. She said that shaping the future is an ambitious goal and called for the involvement of Bretton Woods institutions in it.

She said, “In one of my earlier conversations with Larry, he voiced the concern, saying how would institutions like the IMF and the World Bank go about telling an economy to a country that your economy is in a wretched position, you can’t do anything about it. They can’t, they cannot and they need not.”

“But yet, they can, with a wealth of information and experience and the manpower, the kind of human resources they have, share in time information with countries and also lead to building the strength of institutions, not tear down institutions, but strengthen up institutions for the global good, which I would think is very necessary to strengthen multilateralism. We are in favour of multilateralism. We of course spoke about a lot of things about ..., LiFE, which is a mission in India, LiFE being the lifestyle for the environment, adapting to certain kinds of living and so on,” she added.