India simply cannot get it done like China

The public at large is apathetic or mindful only of the pot holes to be fixed or how to make Mumbai the next Shanghai

India is headed for one of the most divisive elections in its history. Not even Sanjay Gandhi at his peak — recall his forced sterilisation programmes and wanton demolition of slums — had aroused such vitriolic passions. For the first time, political parties are embedding a dirty tricks cell in their campaign headquarters and using it as a legitimate weapon of attack. The media gave up its hallowed status a long time ago — the Fourth Estate has degenerated into a factory to manufacture news for the consumption of its brand loyal customers; the tearing down of one of India’s leading conscience keepers — Tarun Tejpal, the owner of Tehelka, a news portal — or the Aarushi murder case or Narendra Modi and the ‘ stalking gate’ being just a few stories doing the rounds. The media packages its product artfully, saying all this is in public interest for its middle class consumers, stacking up high TRPs to the glee of its advertisers.

In this flood of trivia important fundamental questions remain unanswered: Why is that India has slipped from being the seventh largest economy in the world in 1947 to the 11th largest in 2013 despite the ‘ India rising’ story; why is it that it can attempt to put a Mangalyaan on Mars, but has the dubious distinction of being the world’s epicentre for stunted children — 60 million by the last count; and why is it unable to price its public goods — its airwaves, coal deposits, hydrocarbons — in a transparent manner?

The two prime ministerial candidates appear incapable of debating these complex questions. One of them recently got the Mahatma’s name wrong, the other lacking a real agenda for change harks back to his grandmother’s brutal murder. The media is not keen to talk about these matters, their anchors are busy vying with each other in pulling down one of their own — Tejpal — who, until yesterday, was their white knight. And the public at large, apathetic or mindful only of the pot holes to be fixed or how to Shanghai Mumbai or how to make India a China by 2020.

Three voices in this puerile debate, however, stand out and demand our attention for they bring gravitas and depth to this discussion on why India is the way it is. Anand Mahindra, Fareed Zakaria and Raghuram Rajan have, in their different ways, tried to tackle some of the questions — the first two in a series of essays called Re- Imagining India and Rajan in a recent speech in Chicago.

The 2G scam, coal- gate and the opaqueness in pricing the country’s natural resources are partially explained by Rajan. He says an ethical but market- driven discovery process for valuing these assets was inherently absent and as the country ramped up its growth, the fault lines became more and more visible and corruption and cronyism seeped in. Arbitrary allocation of resources by ministerial fiat based on questionable logic on coal, spectrum or even on irrigation- related schemes exacerbated an already existing problem. The scandals tumbling out spawning a policy paralysis mindset, that is endemic to the Indian way of doing things.

Concept of nationhood

Mahindra talks of a uniquely Indian growth model and says emphatically do not copy the Chinese. India simply cannot get it done like China. He even questions if India should crave their model or their world class infrastructure. As an open society, it simply cannot replicate the Maglev trains or big- ticket showcase events like the Olympic Games. A decentralised model, premised on distributive growth with many hubs rather than mega centres like Mumbai, Chennai or Delhi should be the way forward.

Zakaria reignites that old Nehruvian phraseology — the rediscovery of India. Zakaria feels India is redefining the very meaning of diversity and consequently the concept of nationhood is in itself being reinvented. Like Mahindra, he is sanguine despite the many ills afflicting the nation, technology, innovative ideas and regionalism harnessed to a greater good and warnings to avoid a clinging admiration of all things Chinese is a common thread that runs through all these accounts. However, both hold the middle class to blame for not being engaged with a wider reality mired as it is with its own concerns. Of course roads need to be fixed, but so should India fix the horrifying problem of stunted children.

Indeed it is here that none of these accounts tackle headon why for all of the country’s glorifying achievements its performance has been so shoddy in the social sector. None of the three have explained in full why India has fallen from the seventh to the 11th largest economy in the world. The rest of the world grew faster, but where did India go wrong when it got it right sometimes. The simple- minded will fall back on Jawaharlal Nehru and his Fabian ways and that mindset that lived on many years after him.

Should not our worthy anchors debate these troubling questions? The Aarushi Talwar murder case is important, but what about those hapless stunted children?

gulfnews. com