Weekend musings
It is over a month that we are in a lockdown. We have got used to sitting at our table early morning, communicating with our colleagues or talking with our customers and vendors over a video meeting. Except for the work like manufacture that requires physical presence, most of the office activities are performed virtually. Myths have been shattered, assumptions held close to heart so far, have been shifted to dust-bins. I am amazed to see how quickly we Indians adapt to any new situation.
But can we not make use of this flexibility to make our lives, our country and our planet better?
One of the readers of GST Pulse, Saket wrote to me, “Why can't companies have satellite offices in Tier 2 cities so that people migrating from hinterland to the big cities can stay close to their home ?” He asks, “It will help these people in staying with their families, reduce pressure on big cities, reduce cost of real estate for the company and above all improve overall quality of life for the people.” So true.
Around the year 2000, I got a life time opportunity to work for a few days with Dr. A P J Abdul Kalam. He was then the Scientific Advisor to the Government of India in the rank of a Cabinet Minister. I was then associated, as a part of my deputation from in the Indian Revenue Service, with an ambitious social development project of building a network of 100 plus NGOs in Rural Maharashtra. My Minister Mr Suresh Prabhu had asked me to meet Dr Kalam to explain him the project and also get some ideas from him. Dr Kalam at that point had developed a concept called PURA or “Providing Urban amenities in Rural Areas” through physical, digital, knowledge and economic connectivity. Such a visionary he was that he dreamt of digital connectivity back then in 2000, when we had barely few people having internet connections and mobile connectivity. His vision had a broad theme that good quality highways, that connect rural areas in a cluster with a major urban area, can bring the development of rural areas without clogging the urban areas.
I remembered Dr Kalam today. His idea of PURA can materialize today, after 20 years, through application of technology – using digital highways rather than physical highways to connect rural areas to the urban areas. If we have a good digital connectivity, a person (in select occupations) can sit in a remote village of India and still do his/her work. May be, he/she can come to office once in a month or a fortnight, that too if required. With his / her salary the rural areas will generate economic activity and develop much faster. Urban centres will get clogged lesser, there will be lesser pressure on civic amenities, lesser pressure on roads and infrastructure. It seems like a pipe dream today but if I look back over the last 20 years, so many myths have shattered due to developments in technology that I would see this as a reality rather than a dream. The last 4 weeks further my belief that this can happen much faster. With this thought I wish you a very happy weekend.
(Views and opinions expressed herein are those of the author and do not reflect the views of KPMG in India.)