Why India@75 should focus on the fault line

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What are the forces that have put India in a good position so far and how can they be leveraged going forward? Can anyone point out what we did right and where we went wrong in our 75 year journey? And then let’s see what should be correct and which should be avoided in order for us to move towards 2047?

by the book

We found the Constitution of India to be correct. It is a document steeped in the original spirit of India, the greatest of our traditions, but keeping aside the filth inherited from the past such as the caste system, patriarchal values ​​and social prejudices. It embraces the universal values ​​of the Enlightenment, which are best represented by the institutions of political democracy and the modern state. Its anchors are derived from the cultural sensitivity and spiritual affinity shared among its people. This attests to the immense diversity of India. His idea of ​​nationality rejects uniformity. Rather than trying to suppress the innate plurality of the Indian people—the plurality of religious beliefs, languages, customs and traditions—the Constitution seeks to transcend these into a shared identity of citizenship based on individual rights and responsibilities. Recognizing the reality of India’s inherited social status, it sketches in bold strokes the aspirations of an ancient culture but a young nation. The constitution recognizes that a free India should take its place in the group of nations, contributing to the greater good of humanity. We are citizens of India but we are also global citizens. The Constitution is the source of political legitimacy and lays down boundaries, which should not be violated by any authority to the detriment of the citizens of India.

Since its adoption in 1950, the Constitution has served as a guide for India’s political development. It has made possible a relatively smooth and non-violent political change. It has enabled the exercise of civil rights over the armed forces. It has presided over social and economic reforms that seek to promote a more egalitarian and inclusive society. It has made an independent judiciary the watchdog of constitutional propriety and an essential safeguard against arbitrary power. India remains a vibrant democracy despite occasional and even serious lapses thanks to its enlightened constitution.

late bounce

Since its independence, India has experimented with several economic strategies of development, some more state-centric, others more market-oriented. There is no doubt that state intervention led to a successful Green Revolution and an early White Revolution. The state established several centers of excellence and higher education such as the Indian Institute of Technology and the Indian Institute of Management. They supplied India and the rest of the world with a steady stream of highly qualified technical and management personnel. State investment also enabled a successful and world-class space program and a sophisticated nuclear program. India today is one of the leading positions and nuclear powers. The emphasis on higher education and advanced science and technology has benefited immensely. India got this right.

India has always been an important asset in its vibrant entrepreneurial class backed by a group of professional managers. In the early years after independence, we ended up with a highly regulated economy with extensive state intervention. This was a legacy of the state-controlled economy adopted during World War II. The influence of socialist thinking was also evident. Only in 1991-92, at the end of the Cold War and the near bankruptcy of the Indian economy, were comprehensive economic reforms and liberalization measures adopted. The Indian economy became more open to the rest of the world; Economic despotism paved the way for a steady globalization. The growth of the economy accelerated, Indian industries became globally competitive and there was a constant influx of both foreign capital and technology. India is the third largest economy in the world, in terms of purchasing power parity (PPP), and may become the second largest by 2047. India got this right, albeit a little late.

India got its foreign policy right. As a civilizational state, a major power already at independence and determined to keep its destiny in its own hands, it is not surprising that India opted for a foreign policy based on the principle of strategic autonomy . Strategic autonomy is the ability of the state to make relatively autonomous decisions on matters of vital interest. This was clearly found in the policy of non-alignment in the past; Today one might describe it as multi-alignment. Label is not important. It is important to note that India’s foreign policy has been aimed at creating a conducive external environment to achieve the transformation of the country. It has provided a remarkable stability in India’s foreign policy practice under governments of different ideological colours. The small contingent of professional diplomats has been remarkably successful in protecting our vital interests and expanding India’s diplomatic space. The successful negotiation of a civil nuclear deal with the US and the Nuclear Suppliers Group in 2008 was a milestone in this regard.

brotherhood is the answer

What didn’t we like?

The constitution remains the shield of democracy, but requires a bipartisan political consensus to serve as a guide for political and social behaviour. This consensus has begun to fade in recent years. We have too much polarized politics and weak institutions. Managing diversity requires the principle of fraternity—one of the founding principles of the Constitution, along with liberty and equality. Without a sense of fraternity, diversity becomes a source of division rather than affinity. There are many fault lines in India which, if not resolved, can overwhelm the spirit of nationalism. We are witnessing the rise of communalism and sometimes violent assertions of caste and regional identities. There is an early north–south divide, exacerbated partly by differing economic trajectories but also by linguistic differences. The upcoming delimitation exercise for the rescheduling of parliamentary constituencies may reduce the political importance of the sparsely populated southern states. This can bring disruptive tendencies to a critical point.

Growing inequalities of income and wealth also undermine the egalitarianism inherent in democracy. These can be traced to the differential availability of education. While giving priority to higher education, we neglected primary and secondary education. What we fail to understand is that in independent India, access to English language education remains a passport to better jobs and earning potential. It has condemned a very large segment of our population to low-status, low-income jobs. No effort has been made to ensure opportunities for advanced and technical education in local languages. Almost all technical manuals are in English. So are teaching materials in advanced science and technology. It is no surprise that we are witnessing a “vernacular rebellion” against an English-speaking elite, which is today referred to as the “Lutyens elite” or the “Khan Market gang”. value. There are no easy answers. Do we universalize English language education from secondary school? Should massive investments be made to ensure translation of teaching materials and periodicals into major regional languages, and who will pay for it? Do artificial intelligence and machine learning provide a way out?

Other challenges must be addressed. An independent judiciary is a guarantee of constitutional propriety. But sometimes, it is also selective and inconsistent in discharging its role. There is an urgent need to improve the law and order and justice system in the country. There is a need to make it more accessible to the common citizen. The huge backlog of cases pending in the courts should be cleared. Both the Prime Minister and the Chief Justice of India have drawn attention to this.

state work

The state needs to return to first principles. The three primary and essential responsibilities of a state are providing security, education and health to all the citizens. Over the past several years, we have seen progressive layoffs of these responsibilities by the state. The private sector, with its own profit motive, is moving to capture this space. Some of the fastest growing sectors of the Indian economy are private security, private education and private health services. The services they provide are heavily skewed in favor of those with relatively high incomes. This is a negative development especially in a democracy.

What about economy? The country is facing adversity, as are many other nations, but some broad points need to be made for the future trajectory of our economic growth. India should remain an open and market oriented economy. Instead of opposing it, it should try to stay ahead of the globalization curve. Globalization is criticized as giving rise to economic inequalities. They are failures of public policy, not of globalization, which still offer the best prospects for ending poverty and increasing prosperity. In this context, India should reconsider its decision to stay out of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), especially given the overall shift in policy towards regional trade agreements in general. Eventually, India has joined the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF) and is negotiating trade agreements with Australia, the UK and the European Union, which will have higher standard provisions than RCEP.

Indian foreign policy has enabled a more benign and conducive external environment for the transformation of the economy and should continue to do so. India has developed close strategic partnerships with the US, Europe and Japan. These may be in economic decline compared to China, but are still the reserves of the most sophisticated technologies, sources of capital, and still the world’s major market. In the face of an assertive China, these partners have a stake in India’s economic success, as it is the only country with the potential to emerge as a credible counter-force. The mild phase cannot last. The time has come for us to reform our economic policies and regulatory processes to enable significant infusion of capital and technology from our strategic partners. This will also help India to face the growing security challenge from China.

I believe that on balance, India can finally start to fulfill its potential in the next 25 years. There is room for optimism. All the building blocks are in place.

The author is a former Foreign Secretary and Senior Fellow at the Center for Policy Research.

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