Why do lawyers run our economy? Are they hiding evidence?

The Indian economy grew at 7.6% in 2015-16 because of higher farm ouput, electricity generation and mining production. The severe El Nino last year does not seem to have impacted farm output and hydroelectric power production. A report from the Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs of the State Department in the US says," Ostensibly, India is one of the fastest growing countries in the world, but this depressed investor sentiment suggests approximately 7.5% growth rate may be overstated." " There are few quick fixes to the structural impediments, poor regulatory environment, tax and policy uncertainty, infrastructure bottle necks, localization requirements, restrictions in many services sectors, and massive shortage of electricity that hinders India's economic growth potential," says the report. Obviously the State Department is looking to help US businesses so it wants an open economy without localization requirements or restrictions in services sectors but some of its observations make sense, such as structural impediments, which means reform the civil service, and refraining from frequent changes in rules and tax rates, so that businesses can plan their investments for medium to long term. We do not need to build more power plants for the next 3 years as our electricity generation is sufficient and highway construction reached a record 28 km per day in June. The US report does not state what our politicians of all hues consider the most vital elixir for economic growth, and that is low interest rates. That is it. They would love an interest rate of near zero, as in the US, UK, Europe and Japan, never mind that retail inflation jumped in April to 5.39%, that there is a huge rise in real estate prices, which may collapse, and that near zero rates in the developed economies have not worked. With Rajan having resigned the government wants the RBI to target a higher inflation rate so that it can spend more to increase growth. Low interest rate helps the government to borrow at lower cost but increased expenditure will increase fiscal deficit and increase inflation. Economists argue that our inflation is contained because of low oil price so we should keep our spending low at present so that it can be increased if high commodity prices result in global recession, which seems likely. Anyway, if the economy is already growing at 7.6% what is the need for a stimulus? The previous governor of the RBI has belatedly realised that inflation is very hard on the poor but politicians are not listening. They have not learnt anything from the Congress experiment when the government forced the RBI to lower interest rate, resulting in double digit inflation and a rout in 2014. Maybe that is why all finance ministers in India are lawyers and not economists. They can defend the murder of the economy.