India developing: an emerging global power or euphoria??

India developing: an emerging global power or euphoria??

It started with India shining program of BJP govt some years back. There were big claims about India’s development by leaps and bounds. But BJP lost and so did Chandra Babu Naidu the man behind making Hyderabad one of the most “progressive” cities of our country. Why?

Soon the picture of India emerging as the next global power is heard everywhere. However I was always apprehensive of this picture. I had an argument with one of my friends from Chaatisgarh who said people from his small city are now rich. I had an argument with one more of my friends who asked me to give my view and prove it.
Finally I saw a wonderful program on BBC world with people debating on this topic. The speakers included Sunil Mittal from Corporate world, Dr Ahullwalia from Executive and Ramchand as the journalist. A good debate indeed, which prompted me to finally write this article.

With the change of our economic system from 1990 we changed the way we live the path and destiny of our country. And the picture has changed a lot now with those “reforms.” Meanwhile I got an opportunity to visit some of the richest places in India as Mumbai, Bangalore as well as a glimpse of poor India. I will not be taking particular topics within this issue such as SEZ, status of women and all though everything what’s happening in our or any other country is due to its economic policies.

India is developing. Any time u open any news channel we are talking about India going to surpass china and USA as the biggest power. Our sensex as reached from 3000 in 1990s to above 20000 now. Corporate world is booming like anything. Indian firms are taking over International companies. The growth of billionaires in India is topmost and our GDP increase is second only to china. Mumbai is soon going to compete with Shanghai. The real estate market is super hot with prices booming everywhere. The standard of living has increased manifold. to own a car and ac now is a necessity not a luxury. The IT and Telecom boom has made India one of the leading players in world trade. Bangalore is the IT capital of the world. More then 1 lakh Indians are going abroad every year to study and work. People are getting more and more pay and perks there is boom and progress everywhere. What more proof do you want yar??

But something is wrong somewhere. No I am not a pessimistic whatever I will say is facts and figures and then an analysis. Just open your eyes little bit and you will find a large group of poor people. We “see” them but never able to “look” at them. Mumbai has Dharavi and Delhi its own slum areas some of the largest in world. Every time I go somewhere there are a large chunk of people with very little clothing and toiling their hearts out. Who are they why are they not at least “ok”. 77% of our population learns below Rs 20 everyday. And government itself puts 45% below poverty level those who can’t earn this much also. Farmers suicide rate has increases 3 times after 1990s. While overall growth rate is 10% , for agriculture its only 2%.we have 40 million population between 15 to 25 years the future of our country . Of this 32 million will never go to any college. U can see poor kids wandering on the streets, railway stations. Who are they what will happen to them will our economic reforms change their fate also???

Lets us see some contrasts in this economic development called globalization. While some of our kids get laptops and still don’t study thousands don’t even see primary schools. While the no of billionaires has increased many times the no of poor has increased many times more.. While Indians are giving outstanding performance in America our own research institutes like DRDO and ISRO are having talent crunch. While SEZ have become the symbol of economic prosperity crores are homeless. Why does between skyscrapers of Mumbai people live in slums worse then a place for animals. Why and is there going to be any change?

Let’s now focus on what is developing India and what is driving us behind. In no way do I favour the economic system adopted by our country after independence. As predicted by Bhagat Singh the fair British were simply replaced by black capitalist. It was doomed to fail and it happened. It happened by 1990s and when we had to mortgage our gold there was no way left but to open our economy for foreign investment and privatization. To cut a long story short we started developing but who all. We have a 20% middle class population which can become a big consumer if developed. Based on this we adopted a path of consumerism and neo capitalism. In 19th century also British used to trade in our country and the picture is going to be same in 21st century though this time there is no need for political takeover as our corrupt government is too happy to deal with them and develop its Swiss accounts. India is a land of big population which provides cheap labour and untapped natural resources. Definitely every capitalist will like to tap these two resources and earn as much profit as possible his prime motive. It’s but natural that he will not be interested in the development of our society. The present economic state of Latin American countries is a clear proof that globalization is not the key to remove poverty and disparity where years of “economic reforms” served only the interests of foreign capitalist and corrupt politicians. Another clear example is Nigeria where a simple peace living population is now on the brink of civil war brought by the discovery of oil. The investment by giant multinational companies filled the swiss accounts of tribal leaders and military generals the common public was deprived of its daily livelihood : fishery and agriculture.

The big no of poor and unorganized labour in a developing country is just his dream come true. And this is the reason why our agriculture is going down and down. Not there are not ways and means to develop it, but a poor agriculture growth means more and more farmers give up agriculture to rush to city. These will keep labour costs low and thus maximum profit for capitalists. One may argue no our growth in IT and Telecom sector is a proof of our wide scale development. But to remind u only 3% of our population is linked with IT. Again it just helps a lower middle class to become upper middle class. Moreover with foreign dependence it may suffer with economic slowdown in US. Hope u remember 1990s when Asian Tiger economies crashed due to American economic slowdown. Other field includes services, construction, consumer goods all proof of the economic development of our 15 % middle class.

But even this middle class is caught in this materialism. In this system there is nothing enough .so keep trying for more and more as consumer goods are essential to maintain some status in this society and in this bargain our rich become super rich. While in every lecture and every program we are shown dreams of becoming rich what has been ignored are some basic fields like health, education and agriculture. Health and education are two fields which will soon be away from the reach of even middle class. With government colleges and hospitals in pathetic condition and private being too costly people will die without treatment. And I have seen it happening. The maid in my house was detected with cancer, and during next leave I came to know she is dead and she could not afford the treatment.

So what why should I be worried. I am getting a good pay and having a cool life. It’s the paradox of our country we only know how to criticize without contributing anything from our side. We will criticize the police for its inaction and corruption but forget that being a part of this system even he has dreams that he should have all consumer goods his child should get best, and thus costly, education. The growing left wing extremism (Naxalism) is another proof of the prevailing dissatisfaction is our masses due to economic disparity. With development of SEZ there will be centralized development leaving large parts untouched and this leads to regional extremism as seen in north east. Even Islamic extremism is mainly due to the dissatisfaction among the Muslims as they feel left behind in development. Corruption, extremism, Naxalism are all symptoms, the root of the disease is our economic system.

So what’s the future of our country- emerging global power? I don’t think so, its an euphoria created to keep the middle class in a spin, in a dream world where they keep thinking of getting rich, earn some money spend it on house, education and health and then die. While Ambanis start competing with Bill Gates, a vast majority will not have the basic necessities of food, clothing and shelter. And when they see people enjoying their lives around, when they are dying do you think they will keep quiet? The example of Nandigram has proved that government is on the side of capitalists and so there is not going to be any treatment of this disease in near future and it will spread more and more till it becomes incurable. And since we are the part of the system the fire will engulf us also sooner or later.

some proofs;
No Minister came forward to calm the nation when India hit the 94th rank in the Global Hunger Index. That’s out of 118 countries. The daily, DNA, though, did capture the essence of the story with its report: “Ethiopians manage hunger better than us.” For indeed, they do these days. At least by the measure of the International Food Policy Research Institute’s Global Hunger Index. Ethiopia ranks a notch above us at 93. Draw the baseline anywhere in the 1990s, and you’ll find Ethiopia worked better at reducing hunger than we did. Pakistan ranks ahead of us, too, at 88. China logs in at 47. All our South Asian neighbours do better than us on this index, except Bangladesh. And who knows when it will overtake us? None of the countries boasts an economy growing at 9 per cent a year.
You’d think it was an issue worth some attention. But it was hard to find panels debating this on television. Or any editorials in the newspapers doing the same. No Ministers or top babus soothing the nerves of the hungry. No experts with furrowed brows warning that the trends could continue, even worsen. "
P.Sainath