, because those can be most easily and deliberately misinterpreted. if we are to have a reasonable public dialogue, everyone should read words in their context, not stripped of it. that may be a forlorn hope! i do, however, want to apologize to a section of the population that i did hurt, the blind. after all, the proverb suggests that a one - eyed man is better than a blind one. a moment ’ s thought suggests this is not true. for the blind can develop capabilities that more than make up for their disability. indeed, the sheer willpower and hunger to succeed of the disabled can help them become over - achievers in a seeing man ’ s world. moreover, because their other faculties such as touch, smell, and hearing, are more finely honed, the blind may add new perspectives and new variety to our world, making it richer and more vibrant. so i am indeed sorry for implying the blind were otherwise than capable. but this leads to an important question. how much of our language is tinged with meaning that is liable to misinterpretation? how forgiving should we be of a bad choice of words when the intent is clearly different? let me give you two examples. gandhiji used to say “ an eye for an eye will only make the whole world go blind ”. clearly, what is implied is that the whole world going blind is not a desirable state of affairs. one might take umbrage since it suggests blindness is an inferior state to that of being able to see, and the saying could be seen as discriminatory. yet gandhiji ’ s focus was on the absurdity of a policy of revenge, not on blindness, and his intent was not to disparage the blind. my second example comes from a faculty meeting i once attended where a male professor used the phrase “ as a rule of thumb ” to make his point. a female history professor became visibly agitated and angry. she explained that “ the rule of thumb ” referred historically to the maximum width of the stick with which a man could beat his wife without breaking the law. she was angry the male professor used the phrase so lightly, seemingly condoning domestic violence. he, of course, had no clue of the historical origins of the phrase, and apologized profusely. clearly, his ignorance suggested he had no intent to offend, yet the female professor was offended. there are two important issues here. first, if

raghuram rajan : words matter but so does intent speech by dr raghuram rajan, governor of the reserve bank of india, at the 12th national institute of bank management ( nibm ) convocation, pune, 20 april 2016. * * * congratulations to the graduating class, to their professors, and to their proud parents, siblings and friends. if you are typical, you are happy to be leaving university and embarking on a new journey, sad to be leaving familiar settings behind, and worried whether you will measure up to the challenges of wherever you are going for work or higher studies. you are also concerned about whether you have taken, or will take, the right next step. this is all perfectly normal. given that you have been trained well at nibm, the answer to the question of whether you will measure up is almost surely “ yes! ” as to whether you have taken the right next step, the answer is less comforting – you will never know. my task is to leave you with some last thoughts as you graduate. as i reflected on what i should speak on, i thought i would speak on a recent experience that offers what the americans call “ a teachable moment ”. and then i want to give you some career advice, for what it is worth. to get to the experience, start first with where india is. india is the fastest growing large country in the world, though with manufacturing capacity utilization low at 70 % and agricultural growth slow following two bad monsoons, our potential is undoubtedly higher. growth, however, is just one measure of performance. the level of per capita gdp is also important. we are still one of the poorest large countries in the world on a per capita basis, and have a long way to go before we reasonably address the concerns of each one of our citizens. we are often compared with china. but the chinese economy, which was smaller than ours in the 1960s, is now five times our size at market exchange rates. the average chinese citizen is over four times richer than the average indian. the sobering thought is we have a long way to go before we can claim we have arrived. as a central banker who has to be pragmatic, i cannot get euphoric if india is the fastest growing large economy. our current growth certainly reflects the hard work of the government and the people of the country, but we have to repeat this performance for the next 20 years before we can give every indian a