The second edition of the BCC&I Leadership Lecture Series was organized this year on 11th February 2018 with the inimitable Dr. Sashi Tharoor. An audience packed Wlliamson Magor Hall was witness to Dr. Shashi Tharoor’s hour long talk on “New India – a Narrative”. Dr Tharoor, in his inimitable style and flair, kept the full house engrossed on various issues in contemporary India spanning the economy, politics and the social canvas.

He started off by expressing his joy at being to the City of Kolkata where he had spent many of his impressionable years. He fondly remembered the Calcutta and its rich intellectual side on when he came here on his father’s transfer to the City when he was a lad of 13. He felt that this was no ordinary city and he has come back regularly to the City after having moved out to Delhi and had always felt tremendous warmth and affection from the City and its people.

Coming to the topic for discussion he agreed that there was a buzz about “New India” at the moment. The Prime Minister had used the word eleven times in his address to the nation on Independence Day from the ramparts of the Red Fort and at the Lok Sabha. While he felt that the Prime Minister had his own ideas of a New India, the country should have no problem with the idea of an India free from shackles of the castism and communal tension, an India that successfully solves endemic problems of corruption, nepotism, terrorism, an India where every women, man and child could be given an empowered and dignified standard of living. The idea of a society that harnesses India’s entrepreneurial spirit to become an economic power house was most desirable.

The concerns facing the statements and ideals were far too many, he felt. The fact is that there seems to be a complete lack of any specific steps including budgetary provisions to get our country to achieve any of these. In fact what he found worrisome was that this goal of a new India appeared to be littered with the wreckage of all that was good and noble about the old India. He believed that the key indicators that would constitute New India have in fact deteriorated and there was a need to re-examine the issue in depth.

Dr Tharoor strongly felt that the intolerant policies of the Government threatening freedom of speech and expression, economic mismanagement and disruptive economic policies bringing about steady fall in GDP, effects of an ill-conceived, unprepared, poorly implemented demonetisation move and the implementation of GST are going to have far reaching adverse impact on the economy. These have weakened the performance of the Indian economy in terms of conventional indices such as GDP growth rates, job creation, investment levels, plunging exports, bank credit growth, rural despair etc. Dr Tharoor quoted figures to substantiate his statements.

Dr Tharoor went on to describe the ‘New India’ he wanted. It would be a new India where one does not get lynched for the food one ate, marginalized for the faith one held dear, criminalized for using one’s fundamental rights guaranteed by the Country’s Constitution. Instead we must look forward to a New India that celebrates and vindicates Pluralism which is after all given to us by our own history and our own historical experience. To progressive Indians the idea of a New India would be fundamentally rooted in the idea of India that our founding fathers believed in.

Dr. Tharoor firmly believed that we Indians not only just co-exist, we thrive in our diversity and that is our strength. In his book “Why I am a Hindu? “He had quoted Swami Vivekananda quite extensively who had said, “My religion is one that has taught not just tolerance but acceptance”. For new India to succeed and thrive, he felt we will have to embrace inclusive India, by maintaining a commitment to democracy and pluralism. By doing so we can truly fulfill the aspirations of all Indians which of course is supposed to be the slogan “sab ka saath sab ka vikas”.

The inclusive vision of a new India must be complemented by development, as we move forward - development that recognized that to create a new India we still have old battles to fight. That is that we are still trying to ensure for everybody in our country the basics, “roti, kapra aur maakan”. To this there is a challenge to add ‘pani’ (drinking water), ‘bijli’, ‘sadak’ and of course internet and mobile broadband.

The blueprint for a new India must address creatively, quickly and securely the issues of the country’s 363 million people living below the poverty line and it was not the UN World Bank poverty line of 2 dollars (1.9 is what they have come down at) per person per day, but the Indian poverty line which in rural India is calculated as 32 US cents a day.

New India must be built on the liberalization we embarked upon in 1991; economic growth is obviously vital to pulling people out of poverty. But the fruits of that growth, the revenues that come from our growth must be shared with those who are marginalized and otherwise excluded from the benefits from our growth. As India navigates it’s development, he felt, we must focus on ensuring that the benefits of our growth are shared across the nation by our youth who are struggling to find jobs and by our poorest, for whom development is indispensable and needs to be life changing. Any discussion of course about new India has to be focused on the youth who are building new India for if not for the young. We have trained world class scientists and engineers but 431 million of our compatriots are still illiterate.

The other issue was education. India has more children who have not seen the inside of a school than the any country in the world does. We have a great demographic advantage. 65% of our population is under 35, half of population is under 25, there is 287 million Indian in the age group between 10-22, the future leaders of this country. This is potentiality also a young, dynamic, energetic labour force that could deliver to us the demographic dividend that is so often proclaimed across global platforms at a time when the rest of the world including our major competitors are aging. This means we have to provide the generation with both education and the employment opportunities.

Dr Tharoor quoted World Bank’s figure showing that 30.8% of our population between 15-29 years, that’s almost a third of that crucial age group which is where they are starting to work. Of that age group, 30.8% are not in education, not in employment, and not in training, so what future can we expect for them? No wonder that a recent survey reported that 70% of young Indians are anxious about their job perspectives. What we really have to focus on is the 25%, the people at the bottom of our social economic ladder whom we can’t afford to leave out.

Dr Tharoor also felt that there was an urgent need to do something about the continuing exploitation of the poor. He referred to an UN special rapport, in which it was said that the public authorities were forcing individuals into building toilets by threatening to revoke their ration cards if they can’t show that they built a toilet. It is necessary to have a sense of priority and perspective. The same goes for Aadhar card. The adhoc policies were not actually helping India’s poorest or India’s youth because they are insufficient to the scale of the problem. The solution was to have policies that actually are made in consultation with those affected.

There was a great need to address the issue concerning The Ease of Doing Business in India. It’s interesting that Bhutan and Nepal fare better than us in the Ease of Doing rankings. Any foreign entity looking to setup business in India must deal with TDS rules, uncertain tax regulations, excessive paperwork and delays in the processing of that paperwork. Something as simple as registering a business takes 2 and half days in Australia.

Dr Tharoor also addressed the critical issue of infrastructure, another road-block to New India. Here again prioritization was important. Internet is still very much a realm full of opportunities, still sadly out of reach for most Indians. Amongst 92 countries, major economies in the world, in terms of average broadband speed, we are ninety second. So that’s how bad the situation was and the Government has struggled to provide Wi-Fi connectivity to even 10% of our rural areas.

Healthcare was another serious issue to be considered, according to Dr Tharoor to build a new India. Health setback can be catastrophic for a poor family. When the bread earner gets a serious illness that means they often have to not just stop getting their income, they may have to sell their home, their land just to treat the person, entire families can be destroyed for generations by one major illness. What has been done till now was just not enough paid out to farmers whose crops failed and all the rest has gone to the insurance companies.

Dr Tharoor concluded his talk categorically stating that we should have a new India that ideology binds people together, rather than separates one Indian from other. At the same time, we need to strengthen the democratic institutions that keep us going. We very much need to have transparency and accountability. We need Institutions to be strengthened not weakened. We need something better than one man rule. A leadership that empowers our people is the only kind of India that can truly be worthy of the term “New India”. We can have a New India which belongs to all of us, led by a Government that works for all of us. We can have a New India that belongs to some or one particular religion. We can choose a New India that embodies hope. We can support a New India that is united in driving an aspiration. He felt that if we want to have a New India to be celebrated, it must be one that stays together, that works together, that dreams the same dreams together. Such an India can still make the twenty first century our own.