Prof. A N Sadhu
Seventy years back, at the stroke of midnight of August 15, India awoke to a new morning with fresh breeze and firm resolve to wipe out every tear from every eye, as the country took its first breath in independence shedding the load of centuries foreign rule from its shoulders. The country started with hope and optimism of building a democratic and secular state offering equal opportunity to all the citizens in all the fields of socio-economic and political set up enabling the country to transform itself from a stagnant state to a vibrant economy so as to eradicate poverty, reduce inequality of income and wealth, generate employment and bring about comprehensive development of all sectors of the economy. Have all the tears been wiped out. Has the comprehensive development taken place?. Have we successfully accomplished the task of building a democratic and secular state?. These are the critical questions that need to be answered by critically examining the progress, the country has made on all fronts.
In order to carry out a critical analysis of all that has happened during the last seventy years, we need to structure this analysis into the following four phases:
* Consolidation phase ( 1947-51)
* Mixed Economy Phase ( 1951-1991 )
* LPG Phase ( 1991-2014 )
* Inclusive development phase ( 2014-17 )
Having inherited a stagnant economy on the one hand and on the other an economy without the basic statistics, it was of upmost importance to spend sometime to put things in order so that the country’s leadership could have insights into the real substance of country’s resources, both men and material on which it could plan the restructuring of the systems to usher in an era of socio economic transformation for improving the quality of life and living, of the countrymen.The country had also witnessed the partition which brought about large scale destruction by way of loss of human life and property inflicting deep wounds on the mind and psyche of people. The country also witnessed the emergence of new world order after the IInd world war and establishment of united nations organization ( UNO). The country therefore needed time to consolidate, statistics policy parameters, foreign relations and the immediate and long term objectives to be achieved. This exercise was completed during the period 1947-51.
The second phase started in 1951 with the launching of First Five Year Plan with the objectives of eradicating poverty, removing unemployment, reducing inequalities of income and wealth, attaining a modest growth rate of 5% and promoting a socialistic pattern of society. During the long phase of 40 years of mixed economy model, the country could not make any substantial headway to achieve these objectives. The reasons being corruption, inefficiency and licence raj. The ideological hiatus, poor monitoring and corrupt political and administrative leadership became mainly responsible for the failure of mixed economy model being strongly biased in favour of socialist or command model as against the free economy/ capitalist model. After Bolshevic revolution of 1917, the soviet Union made significant progress through command model but it did not yield the same results in Indian economy owing to historical reasons and systemic imperfections. When viewed in the context of India at 70, the failures of the mixed economy phase of 40 years have seriously dented the progress that would have been visible at present. However, the transformation on the front of science and technology, on the one hand, and laying the strong foundations for that transformation cannot be discounted. It is often remarked that Indian Five years plans have been excellent but their implementation has been extremely poor for reason of administrative inefficiency and lack of strong political will. There, of course, have been external factors as well which did not go well with Indian policy planning and ideological stand, nor did the socialist block had enough to meet the external aid requirements of our country. As a result of all these pitfalls, the phase ended with under performance though not with zero performance as is alleged at times. Development, though lopsided, did take place but not as per expectations.
The economic and political factors, both, led to rethinking on policy initiatives and even when the congress rule was there in 1980’s, the policy shifts did take place and the country, started looking west wards with great acceptability and necessity. The collapse of Soviet Union also became a contributory factor. The Public sector did not show the desired results because of corruption, inefficiency and lack of professional management as a result of which, the new economic policy took its birth from 1991 under the Narsimha Rao Government with the former P.M Dr. Manmohan Singh as its main architect. The basic premises of this new economic policy are Libralisation, Privatisation and Globalisation. Viewing this shift in the present context, it is in place and followed by the present regime as well.
The latest phase of this 70 year journey from 1947, may be designated as a period of inclusive model build on the premise of ” Sab Ka Sath, Sab Ka Vikas”. In fact, if one goes back to Gandhian economic thought, it will easily be noted that Gandhi propagated a similar economic strategy when he advocated the concept of village Republic impressing upon the leadership that India was a country of villages and unless, therefore, its village develop, the country can’t develop. By making each village a Republic, he aimed at involving evergone in the development programme of the country by promoting a decentralized democratic and economic institutional set up. His economic thinking is an opt manifestation of ” Sab Ka Sath, Sab Ka Vikas”. The Prime Minister Modi has launched a country wide drive of involving every countrymen in the process of changing and building a new India. His popular initiatives of Jandhan Yojna, Bharat Swatchh Abhiyan, Insurance schemes, Ladki Bachao, Ladki Padao and many more are exercises aimed at involving the common man of the country into the restructuring of the country’s systems to build new India in which every one will have a sense of belonging.
It is too early to guage the progress of the inclusive model but nevertheless it is possible to assess critically India at 70.
India at 70 is a vibrant economy, a country held in esteem globally, a country whose professionals are holding important positions in the world and above all a sustained democratic set up making it the largest democracy of the world. There is progress on every front. There is a significant build up of social and physical infrastructure. All this is fine but there are irritants as well. Should we be satisfied with what we have achieved? The answer is obviously no. We have not been able to wipe out every tear from every eye. We have not been able to eradicate poverty and hunger, we have not been able to remove unemployment nor have we succeeded in reducing the income and wealth inequalities. There are people who go to bed without food; there are people who build houses of others throughout their life but sleep in the open. The corruption is persisting, the discrimination is there, the exploitation takes place, the law and order is a concern and so is the politics devoid of ethics. Institutional and systemic imperfections exist and policy and decision making initiatives are based on the political balance sheet than on objectivity and merit. Intellectual brain drain is more because of inherent problems than because of international glamour. The new economic initiatives have tended to widen income inequalities and rural urban divide resulting into creation of islands of affluence in an ocean of misery. Inclusive model sounds good but there is so far no evidence of things happening on ground. Statistics is high sounding but results on ground alone make an impact. Demonitisation was need of the hour but did it really yield the results, there is as yet not much of credence on that score. How much displacement of labour took place and how much did it slacken the economic activity, the statistics needs to be collected in that regard as well. No judgement can be passed in too short a time but people’s queries need to be addressed. In the geo-political scenario of the region as also of the world, India is very prseariously placed in the global arena. The two neighbouring countries are not comfortable with the growing image of India in the world nor do they take very kindly the emergence of India as a world economic power. The forces inimical to the country’s forward march are always upto some mischief to create unrest and instability in the country. What is worrying is that there are elements present in the country to support these mischiefs and carry out anti-national activities at the behest of enemies from the foreign land. India is also a multi cultural society with distinct variety of culture, language and sociology and remarkable unity in this diversity is not digested by the enemies and they are in constant endeavour to create regional and communal tensions in the Indian society.
On the economic front, caution is required to watch against the slackening of the economy. The make in India Programme should not lead to the country becoming an industrial field for the multinationals to reap rich harvests by utilizing cheap manpower and siphoning off the surpluses nor should it be allowed to dampen local investment and promote the flight of professionals to other countries. Start-ups are useful to promote enterprise among the youth and this initiative needs to be backed up by the required incentives, both administrative and policy perspectives.
India at 70 also needs to be watchful about its role in the international affairs. Having created a riche for itself and championing the cause of world peace, the country has to keep in mind the safe guards required to maintain stability within the country.
If India at 70, is not what we would have wished it to be, we need to intsrospect ourselves. The leaders have faltered at times; they are human beings. There might have been willful acts of omission and commission, these cannot be refuted but have we as Indian citizens done enough to contribute to the building of this nation as per our dreams. We need to introspect ourselves and resolve that if we have not done enough so far, let us not falter any more. Let politician not look to narrow party or personal gains, let them act as statesmen and put this great country on safe rails to realize the dreams of the masses that there will be no tear on anybody’s eye. We have still have miles to go.
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