The oral tradition still prevails in India. Access to official documents remains restricted. There is no habit of keeping personal records. That is why reliable memoirs of public personalities here are rare. This is especially true in economic policy, the remarkably illuminating reminiscences of B.K. Nehru and P.N. Dhar notwithstanding. Now, we have two more in quick succession-The Partial Memoirs of V.K.R.V. Rao edited by his nephew and Glimpses of Indian Economic Policy: An Insider's View by I.G. Patel. Both not only enrich our understanding of these pioneers and the times in which they grew up but also shed new light on the evolution of Indian economic policy.

Rao and Patel are among the most distinguished names not just in Indian but world economics. Rao was one of the first three doctorates in economics from Cambridge University and played a key role in the establishment of the International Development Association, the soft-loan window of the World Bank from which India has gained so much. Patel is a product of both Cambridges, having completed his doctorate at Harvard University. His was one of the important contributions in the creation of a reserve asset by the IMF and he served as director of the London School of Economics in the early 1980s.

Fortunate to be operating under the Nehruvian umbrella, Rao was an indefatigable institution builder. But his progeny are in dire need of massive renewal. The Delhi School of Economics, where Patel himself spent some time in the mid-1960s, has had its glory days but now finds it difficult to attract top-flight teaching and research faculty. The Delhi-based Institute of Economic Growth has also boasted eminent names in the past but it has never fulfilled its role as an effective think tank. The Bangalore-based Institute of Economic and Social Change, like its counterparts in other states, is mired in parochialism and mediocrity. The Indian Council for Social Science Research has fallen prey to prevailing political ideologies. Patel has been director of the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad. The IIMs, like the IITs, have acquired an awesome reputation entirely because of the quality of their students.

Rao made the transition from academics to politics when he was elected to the Lok Sabha from the now-famous Bellary, first in 1967 and then in 1971. He served as minister for shipping and transport in 1967-69 and then as minister for education in 1969-71. Apparently, his spontaneous ability to offend came in the way of greater glory. The more discreet and urbane Patel could have made a similar shift in June 1991 when he was offered the finance ministership, ahead of Manmohan Singh by P.V. Narasimha Rao and again when he was asked to join the government in 1993. But he said no, choosing to remain in Vadodara.

While Rao was essentially a teacher, organiser and scholar, Patel was a policy mandarin par excellence. He drafted a staggering 14 budgets between 1954 and 1972. It was the example of "IG", as he was known, that inspired a new generation of economists, including Manmohan Singh, Bimal Jalan and Montek Ahluwalia, to join government. But that influx of lateral talent has ceased. Gone are the Pitamber Pants who could inspire the Jagdish Bhagwatis and T.N. Srinivasans, the Lovraj Kumars who could motivate the Nitin Desais and Vijay Kelkars, the Manmohan Singhs who brought in the Deepak Nayyars, the Rakesh Mohans, the Arvind Virmanis and the Shankar Acharyas, and the Abid Hussains who mentored numerous youngsters. The result is that there has been a sharp fall in the quality of economic thinking in government.

The Raos and the Patels have become all-too-rare, men who combined academic scholarship with real-world concerns, economists who imbibed the best of what the world had to offer but who then returned home with a steadfast commitment to establishing and nurturing educational infrastructure, to influencing policy and debate and to serving as role models.

It is true that India's economic performance has not matched the brilliance of the Raos and Patels. But that is no reason why their contributions should not be acknowledged. Rao is no longer with us but India desperately needs his reincarnation. Patel, who is a young 78, must be an anguished soul seeing not just the moribund state of the Indian economy but more importantly the ghastly tragedy of Gujarat. Patel is the presiding deity of the Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council. He can send a powerful signal and message by resigning in protest. Patel is also still active enough to mobilise fellow Gujarati liberal intellectuals from all over the world-Bhikhu Parekh, Meghnad Desai, Jagdish and P.N. Bhagwati, Nitin Desai, Upendra Baxi, Ela Bhatt and Amrita Patel to name just a few-to lead a crusade for a Gujarat restored to its noble traditions of humanism and syncretism, a Gujarat freed from the virus of communal hatred and social polarisation.

(The author is with the Congress party. These are his personal views)