What India needs to become a developed nation??

I will just start with my parable of the well. 

There was a nice village that had a big well in the centre. One day, there was a big robber raid on that village and many villagers jumped into the well to save themselves. Some of them fell by accident, others were pulled into it while rescuing others. Some were confused, some were just like a sheep following the leader. Few fell in to be with their friends and a few others were forced into. Eventually, everyone was in the well. Many died in the process. 

A few generations grew inside the well, making use of the water and little resources. By then, the external attacks were long gone. But, the villagers didn't realize that. Scores died, living in the squalor, and there was misery all around. As the number of generations grew, people started forgetting that there was a once village above the well. 

One day, a guy named Mohan finally rose up from the well and saw that there was a world around him. He started grouping others and slowly people started getting out of it. 

The challenge now is broken down into 4 parts:

1. Convincing people about the life outside the well, in the village.

2. Getting them out in an orderly fashion.

3. Finding enough ropes.

4. Advocating the patience as it is going to take a lot of time taking a million people out of the well.

This was the state of India and many other countries 60 years ago. Leaders in many countries have since then brought the ropes to pull out the people. 

India was a little slow than a few other countries, but we still pulled out as many people out as Japan and Germany did. India's middle class with college education and profession jobs is more than the population of Germany. However, Indian well had a lot of people to start out with and thus while Germany was done with pulling 80 million people out, India is not yet done even after pulling out 150 million people since 1947. You can take people out of the well only so fast and it takes time. 

However, we can drive the process faster if:

1.       We can get a lot more ropes and

2.      Dig a few more holes on the side to create alternate paths.

The ropes are in these case jobs. For a long time, our government was the only provider of good jobs and there are only so many jobs (ropes) to pull out people. What other countries have done is bring more ropes - entrepreneurs and dig more side holes (foreign investments) to get the people out. Most successful countries have done - Singapore, Korea, Taiwan, Japan, Europe. Most recently China (flooded with foreign investments and entrepreneurs). The worst part is that even after 70 years of independence ,youth has to strive really hard to get a decent job.The biggest example highlighting the level of the unemployment is that graduates, postgraduates and even PhD holders were among the 23 lakh people who responded to an advertisement seeking applications for 368 posts of peons in the Uttar Pradesh government secretariat. 

Here is how India can jumpstart its well rescue process aka journey towards a developed society. I will focus on the practical stuff. 

Step 1: Make it easy for entrepreneurs

Who took Japan to its heights? Its government did its part, but the bulk load was by its entrepreneurs. The guys who created Toyota, Honda, Sony, Fujitsu, Hitachi, Komatsu, Mitsubishi, Fuji, Nissan... In the case of Germany, it was Daimler, Siemens, SAP, BMW and millions of smaller manufacturers. The same for US, Europe, Singapore and now China.

The ONLY way a country can get out of misery is by enabling its entrepreneurs, who will bring more ropes to pull out the people. No country has ever became developed without involving its entrepreneurs India is the world's worst place to do business. I know it both from statistics and cutting my teeth running a business there. 

India ranks 132nd in ease of doing biz among 185 economies: World Bank 

This can be fixed by dismantling our "License Raj". Some of these are easy fixes - make it easy to register a "Private Limited", have more predictable rules (unlike the infamous "Vodafone" witch hunt) and enable quick approvals throughout the system. Get the government out of the way.

Step 2: Get the women involved

Our women are underutilized in the process of pulling the people out. We give them useless tasks and don't get them to fire up. India has among the lowest percentage of women workers in a professional capacity.

India has the lowest workforce participation rate of women among the BRICS 

All developed societies had a huge jump in women entering the workforce around the Second World War. That's how they got developed. If we can get the women to join the workforce - we get twice more hands and grow twice as fast. It should be simple maths, right?

We need to have a substantial push in getting the women in politics, business and professional workplaces. If it takes some reservation to do the initial push, let's do it: Is the proposed Women's Reservation Bill (33% reservation) good for India?

Step 3: Get every child going to a good school

We whine incessantly about our education system. If there was a World Cup in whining, Indians would get it for their daily complaints on the education system. For all its faults, India's best schools fill up Wall Street, Silicon Valley, Canary Wharf, Mckinsey, Microsoft, Harvard and Oxford. In a dozen places I studied, I don't of know a single friend who is not doing well. Thus, the primary problem is less in our best schools, but the fact that 95% of the population don't have access to good schools. 

If we can get every Indian kid to have the standard of education of even a Kendriya Vidyalaya or DAV or DPS, India can have a 20X boost in productivity. That means more schools, more good teachers, better tech.

Step 4: Time to add more judges and police

India has too few courts and judges. Added with archaic laws and processes, we have a dysfunctional judicial system. When the judiciary is dysfunctional, society cannot progress. Enable legal reforms to simplify the processes. But, more importantly, add 1000s of judges and millions of new policemen. We cannot have better security until our police and judiciary levels reach international levels. First, fix the quantity and then fix the quality.

Acute shortage of judges at all levels ails our judicial system 

India’s Police Force Lags Much of the World

Step 5: Fighting graft (corruption)

This is a complex process and there is no one-step silver bullet. I have a detailed answer on this point: How can corruption be eradicated from India?

Step 6: National level skill development

In the next 20 years, we need to bring out 500 million people out of agriculture. I have said this many times. We don't need 600 million people working in farming. It is again simple math - if 600 million people are required to produce food for 1.2 billion people, we either have to drastically push up food prices or have the farmers live in poverty. 

However, if 100 million people can produce food for 1.2 billion people, the farmer salaries can go up to 6X without pushing up food inflation. Simple, maths right? And all developed economies have pulled this off. This is not rocket science. 

Now, what will these 500 million people do for a living? This is where we need a national level skill development. Let us produce new industrial workers, new accountants, new doctors, new mechanics, new drivers... Millions of Indian businesses are suffering from not having access to quality people. In our family business every day there is a struggle to find quality people. 

By Almighty Allah’s grace, Jamia Millia Islamia is among the earliest institutes to start Deen Dayal Upadhyay Kaushal Kendra. The course aims at providing the graduates of the higher education system to have adequate knowledge and skills for employment and entrepreneurship and also to fulfil the emerging needs of the economy.The course aims to incorporate the requirements of para-medical sector in the country with specific job roles in its curriculum in an innovative and flexible manner.The other two courses are B Voc in Solar Energy at the Center of Physics and Diploma in Refrigeration and Air Conditioning at University Polytechnic.

Skills shortage is costing India, dear

Where Are India's Skilled Workers?

Step 7: This is rocket science

India went to the mobile revolution, without touching landlines. We directly went into software before we even had factories or toilets. India needs to leapfrog, wherever it is possible. Let's leverage technology to the hilt.

Let us be the most efficient guys to go to space. Let us be the leader in online education. Let us be the leader in robotics, 3d manufacturing and Internet of things (IoT) - 3 things that are going to drastically alter the world's economy in the next 10 years. 

Just like ISRO, we need to have a national centre of robotics, a national centre for IoT and a national institute of 3D manufacturers. Get on to this, before the world, even realizes this. America and Britain fully used Industrial revolution as they didn't have big industries before that and were able to leapfrog India and China. Now, it is time for the next cycle. We don't have many industries to lose now and this is when we can leapfrog. 

Step 8: Tap our Sun and get out of foreign energy

As I had mentioned earlier in the previous article, India can't forever depend on Saudi Arabia and other countries for our oil. Coal will kill our environment like it is doing to China. Hydropower will kill our forests. Thus, we need to use solar energy as a national priority. Even if it is expensive for now, we must put all our national efforts and get the economies of scale. This will give us the energy security and the one who has the energy will be one with metaphoric power.

I believe that if the present government works sincerely on these issues then Vision India 2020 will be achieved.Suggestions are requested.

MAHEY ALAM

MBA (IB)