N K Singh

Early life and Career

Born in Kolkata on 27 January 1941, Singh completed his Senior Cambridge Examination at St. Xavier’s College, Patna before he joined St Stephens College, Delhi for pursuing graduation. He did Masters in Economics from the Delhi School of Economics (DSE) at a time when well-known economists like Sukhamoy Chakravarty, Amartya Sen and Jagdish Bhagwati were on the faculty.

Before beginning his career in civil services, he taught Economics as a regular faculty member at St Stephens College (1963). Later, he joined the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) in 1964 and was assigned the State of Bihar.

Following that, he has held the following positions:

Tax Reforms

As Revenue Secretary (July 1996 – August 1998), he oversaw the Dream Budget (1997–98), one of the most ambitious tax reforms so far. Tax rates were substantially reduced and personal Income Tax rates were brought down considerably from 15, 30 and 40 per cent to 10, 20 and 30 per cent. Similarly, corporate tax rates were also significantly reduced apart from simplifying and merging the widely varying customs and excise duty structure. Import tariffs were also slashed down to align India’s import duties with other emerging markets. Moreover, a Voluntary Disclosure of Income Scheme (VDIS) was launched in the same year which enabled people to make voluntary disclosures given the benefits of lower tax rates. This enabled not only tax realisation of over $2 billion as hidden wealth of over Rs.33,000 crores or $10 billion being brought back to the economic stream. The VDIS scheme is considered a watershed and many have clamoured for its repetition both for domestic and foreign income.

Task Force on Telecom

He has also served as the Secretary, Task Force on Telecommunications and played a key role in placing a far-reaching reform on deregulation of India’s Telecommunication sector. During his tenure, another major reform in the telecomm policy was to auction the spectrum bandwidth to the highest bidder.

National Highway Development Project

As PMO Secretary and Member Secretary of the Task Force on Infrastructure, N.K. Singh was instrumental in the planning of the 1300O KM National Highways Development Project (NHDP). Comprising the Golden Quadrilateral and the North-South and East-West corridors, it was one of the flagship scheme of the Indian Government and NHAI (National Highway Authority of India).

Career as a Member of Parliament

Singh was elected as a Member of Parliament to the Rajya Sabha from Bihar in April 2008 representing the Janata Dal (United). He was a member of several important Parliamentary Committees including the Public Accounts Committee, Committee on Public Undertakings, Committee on External Affairs, Committee on MPLADS, Parliamentary Standing Committee on Human Resource Development, Consultative Committee on Finance and the Parliamentary Forum on Global Warming and Climate Change. He joined the BJP in the run-up to the General Elections in 2014 following his close association with the NDA for over a decade.

Family

N.K. Singh comes from a well-connected family of bureaucrats and politicians.

Indian entrepreneur Vijayraj Singh is his nephew.

Author

N.K. Singh has authored "The New Bihar" which is a collection of essays on the state's model of development, shedding light on its achievements, shortcomings, and the challenges ahead. His other publication, "Not by Reason Alone", is a commentary on Indian political economy, analysing the various reforms pertaining to infrastructure, finance, government policies and Centre-state relations. His first book, "The Politics of Change", gives the reader a window into Indian politics and economy, providing insights into the realities of coalition politics and international fault lines.

Order of the Rising Sun

The Japanese order is the second highest civilian award accorded to people with distinguished achievements in the field of international relations, promotion of Japanese culture, development in welfare or preservation of the environment.

On April 29, 2016, NK Singh was conferred with the 2nd class Gold and Silver of the Order of the Rising sun by the Japanese Government. He is the only Indian in the list of recipients of 2016 Spring Imperial Decorations.

Chairman, FRBM Committee

The Government of India formed a Review Committee to evaluate the FRBM Act, 2003 in order to assess its functionality in the last 12 years. The five member panel, which includes Former Finance Secretary Sumit Bose, Chief Economic Adviser Arvind Subramanian, Reserve Bank of India Governor Urjit Patel and National Institute of Public Finance and Policy Director Rathin Roy, is chaired by Mr. N.K. Singh. The committee’s mandate includes making recommendations to pave the way forward, keeping at its focus fiscal consolidation and prudence. The feasibility of fiscal deficit range and aligning fiscal change with credit change analysis is also incorporated in the ambit.

Nira Radia Tapes

In 2010, BJP’s Arun Shourie claimed that one of the conversations in the Nira Radia tapes could involve NK Singh. He alleged that the order of the speakers in the Rajya Sabha was changed to give an edge on retroactive tax rebates to Reliance Industries. The tapes allude to Shourie’s replacement by Venkaiah Naidu ahead of the 2009 Budget session in Rajya Sabha. Those claims were dismissed by Venkiah Nadu who rubbished them in the media while Singh and the BJP called it "baseless and ridiculous." Singh said his conversation was a “social informal chat” in the wider interest of India's energy which had no bearing on a policy issue.