- Home
- About Us
- Contributors
- Departments
- Topics
- Back Issues
- Weekly Archives
- AmSpecBlog
- Subscribe
- Newsletter
- Advertise
- Donate
- Contact Us
- Daily Digest
- Templeton Essays
Special Report
Not Your Father's Mother India
India is a Motherland -- Bharat Mata means Mother India when transliterated from Hindi. For India, motherhood is a symbol of sustenance and protectiveness; there are female deities (devis) in the Hindu religion that support the image of women providing strength.
For years, Mother India has evoked rural scenes: Camels turning a Persian wheel irrigation system; bullocks pulling a cart of cut sugar cane on the way to the mill; women bent over harvesting chilies; men laboring at a brick kiln in the heat of the day; a tea stall (dhaba) operator preparing sweets from fresh milk; and families quietly eating lentils and bread (roti) in their small stone kitchens. Politicians, not only Indira Gandhi, sought to identify with this concept, to appeal to India's 600,000+ villages in the agrarian economy, which still employs about 60% of India's work force.
Like a giant cocoon, Mother India became both a place and a concept -- it projected simplicity and the village as the essential unit of economic life. After independence, successive governments espoused central planning, emphasizing rural self-sufficiency -- conflating the values of Mother India, Fabian socialism, and the Gandhian way of local sustenance -- to prevent the onslaught of industrial development and capitalist forces.
Mother India became an image implicitly used to stifle risk taking, investment, and free trade, and stunt the development of Indian companies by preventing competition. With this philosophical brew, India was righteous, moralistic nation lecturing the West about the evils of capital, domestic and foreign. Its vast human and natural resources were underutilized, and India was condemned to be an economic underperformer.
The cynics thought it would never happen, or at least not for many generations. India has now burst through this cocoon, at least in part. Prime Minister Narasimha Rao introduced massive reforms in 1991, deregulating the current account entirely and the capital account in part, and ending government dictums to industry about what to produce, where and how. India has become a free trader, open to foreign investment, without the exchange and capital controls that characterized nearly fifty years after independence. The ensuing changes to the mindset of the country, its economy and values are profound -- so much so that nothing short of a revolution is occurring.
What has certainly emerged is a very self-assured country. Business enterprise, not government, is now chic. No longer is India wondering whether it is better or worse than the West. India has stopped blaming its problems on Britain, or the United States, in some respects the successor and assignee of the British Empire. No longer do Indian newspapers run ads showing foreign models using Indian consumer products. The hypersensitive country, quick to scold and bait the West, is no more.
Indians are rightly proud of their methods and protocols, and they see themselves with new confidence: a noisy but successful democracy, a massive regional power with globally recognized brands like Tata, Wipro, Infosys, and Mittal Steel, and high quality consumer goods; a nation attractive to foreign multinational investors and hedge funds; a world leader in information technology; a provider to the world in the mainstream; a stabilizing force with an army, air force and navy all ranking in the top five armed forces of the world; and a strategic partner for the United States. A middle class of several hundred million has been created in a generation, aggressive and acquisitive, a full-fledged member of the Internet economy. With reportedly six million cell phones registered per month, and the broader rise of the digital economy, the benefits of technology are spreading throughout Indian society, giving access to information to those who once did not have it, and helping to level the barriers of the earlier command and control culture.
World Bank statistics indicate that since 1981, the percent of people below the poverty line in India, now defined as living on less than $1.25 per day, has fallen from 60% to 42%. However, during this time the number of poor has increased from 420 million to 455 million. India is still a very poor country, with several hundred million more marginally above poverty, and by other estimates, 750 million live on less than $2.00 per day. It is a scale of despair unknown in much of the West: Vast shanty towns or bustees adjoin industrial sites, train stations, and residential areas -- some merge with other shanty towns, made of brick or concrete blocks with corrugated iron roofing, tarpaulins with poles, empty flour tins and torn truck tires -- and whatever else the consumers of the other world discard.
Against the backdrop of a successful middle class on the ascent, there is a strong undercurrent of anger in rural areas and cities, manifested in part by the resurgence of the Naxalite movement, a Maoist type of insurgency that is represented in at least 25% of the districts of India, by some estimates. Resentment over the forced sale of agricultural properties for manufacturing purposes, and the alienation of landless, tribal, and low-caste segments of the population are powerful sentiments believed to fuel this movement, which originated in the 1960s in the state of West Bengal.
On a lesser scale, another example of this anger is the reaction to the highly successful film, Slumdog Millionaire. Portraying the gruesome reality of life in the bustees, it has incensed some Indians because of the use of the word "dog" in the title. Kuttaa in Hindi-Urdu means "dog" and is among the most vulgar forms of abuse, and slum residents have organized protests in cities such as Patna and Mumbai.
One cannot yet say that India is making it. But one can say that up from the ranks, several hundred million Indians are making it and will be making it even more, as the country continues to advance with a laissez-faire economy in a secular democracy. Not only that, many small landowners have benefited from the sale of their agricultural properties to industrial and commercial forces seeking to expand. Gurgaon, a southern suburb of New Delhi, is a case in point, where new wealth has passed to those who once owned farms that cut sugar cane and made molasses after the harvest.
The spirited, kinetic city of Bombay will recover from its horrific trauma, although the ruling position of the Congress Party is no longer assured in the elections in April-May of 2009. A strong challenge has been mounted by the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party, in view of intense public disaffection over the government's response to terrorist bombings in a number of major Indian cities.
The effects of the major global economic crisis and recession remain to be seen with regard to India. There is no question that its nearly 9% GDP growth rate in recent years will be reduced -- the latest government estimates project a 7.1% growth rate this quarter. Some observers believe that India must continue to record a high single-digit growth rate with low inflation for a number of years -- to provide upward mobility for more of its population and to achieve further economic advancement.
It is also widely recognized that the next plateau in India's development will need to be governance. The scandal involving the blue chip IT firm Satyam, now known as "India's Enron," has unfolded with accusations of colossal corporate legerdemain, and the World Bank has also announced that it has debarred Wipro, another Indian corporate icon. Governance means not only Sarbanes-Oxley style corporate disclosure and behavior, transparency of government procurements and protocols, and a rejection of undue influence in decision making. It also means a sense of the public good that transcends the din and cleavages of religion, ethnicity, caste, language, and regionalism.
India has come a long way in a generation: it is not your father's Mother India.
(Mr. Schell recently returned from a mission to India with the Dean's International Council of the Harris School of Public Policy Studies at the University of Chicago. He served in the U.S. Peace Corps in India, and speaks Hindi-Urdu.)
Comments
Leave a Comment
- No Freedom Left Behind
- Losing It
- The Right of Conscience in the Age of Obama
Pingback| 2.19.09 @ 7:20AM
Multinational Corporations » Blog Archive » Not Your Father’s Mother India - Spectato links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Doctor Right| 2.19.09 @ 1:03PM
How ironic is is that the very policies that are transforming India into a world economic power - deregulation of the capital markets, shrinking the size of government, and free trade - are EXACTLY the opposite of what Obama and his ship of fools in D.C. are prescribing for us??
Mark Levin is correct - Liberalism truly is "the philosophy of the stupid."
sinanju| 2.19.09 @ 3:03PM
Too bad that some of the boys in the 'hood feel obliged to take offense at the movie. "Slumdog Millionaire", while it did not hesitate to rub India's ugly side in in it's own and our faces, also stood out for me as emblematic of a nation that at long last no longer feels obliged sit and languish on it's dunghill of righteous poverty, Nehruvian socialism and anti-westernism ("non-aligned" and all that).
But someone out there owes ME an dag-nab apology! For several generations, we Yanquis were traumatized by being ordered to eat all our vegetables/toss an extra dollar in the collection plate/collect money for UNICEF on behalf of those eternally starving children in India.
India/starving-- starving/India, those helpless, hapless, hopeless pathetic little brown people we kiddies read about in "The Road to Agra" or "Nectar in a Sieve" or saw in "Gandhi." I know I couldn't help wondering what they were missing upstairs in that they could not run their own affairs competently. And why the hell was this Land of a Thousand Gurus, where people ostensibly wouldn't step on bug so enthusiastically indulging in regularly intra-communal bloodletting? All I knew for certain in those days was that this was just another those questions a good catholic should not ask.
I had a lot to learn about socialism at the time, but when I actually saw India for myself as a teenager in the summer of '81 I found myself wondering why the only cars on the road were the Hindustan Ambassador or the Premier Padmini. It seems I had a lot to learn (and so did India).
Be that as it may, I agree that it is all too ironic that we are noting India's continued progress out of its fifty-year-old funk just as we ourselves appear to have been taken over by a crew that wants nothing more that to take us there.
Kevin Riley O'Keeffe| 2.19.09 @ 3:25PM
Since we apparently can't make low-cost, manufactured consumer goods in this country, let's arrange to have them built in India, as opposed to China. One thing is for sure, we're not going to war with India, so if we have to pump up some giant, foreign economy, how about it be their's, instead of the PRC's?
Alan Brooks| 2.19.09 @ 6:34PM
c'mon, India is no better a nation to live in than Russia.
stop the puff-piece economics, don't be a toffler-- you can do better.
you possess the same slow (very slow) upward mobility you ascribe to the subcontinent.
Alan Brooks| 2.19.09 @ 7:03PM
look, guy; its not that the cynics didn't think it could never happen in Injia, but even nasty cynics dont deserve chirp-econ from a conservative site.
when i was a lib back in 2000, the moderator at AS blog-- it was different back then-- asked me "whats wrong with fascism?
now i ask you (even though you only got a piece at AS and are not a staff member):
"what's wrong with being a cynic?"
Shyamal Pain| 2.19.09 @ 8:13PM
India has been on the right path since 1991 and the change of course has paid handsomely. It is following a somewhat US style capitalist policy. However, the mortgage crisis did not happen because Banks in India are very careful about bad loans. The primary reason why India is growing so fast ( this year the average pay raise will be 8%), is that after the destruction of its economy by 200 years of British rule, it started from a very, low base. Its growth is primarily domestic. Since savings rate is now 37% of GDP, that is being reinvested into the economy. As people become better off , they are consuming more thus creating more jobs.
The reason why the USA is falling behind is not its policy. The reason is that the workers are asking a wage that is way above the prevailing global wage. The problem for US, Europe and Japan is that the so called sophisticated, white collar jobs can now be done by Indians and Chinese at a fraction of the wage.
Alan Brooks| 2.19.09 @ 9:24PM
but 42 percent make less than $1.25 a day?
just say "Injia is still a third world cesspool"
Alan Brooks| 2.19.09 @ 9:26PM
...you don't have to be PC at AS
Shyamal Pain| 2.19.09 @ 10:17PM
India is no doubt a poor country. But the acute poverty is almost gone. First, all these statistics like $1.25 (expenses not earning) per day are 4-5 years old. In last 6 years the economy has doubled.
Second, essential commodities are very cheap compared to USA. Potato : 4 cents/pound, milk: 30 cents/liter, cauliflower: 14 cents each, egg: 50 cents/dozen. While people earn little, the prices are also very low. Recently India sent a space vehicle to moon. The project cost was half the price of a single Boeing-747.
In last 5 years, thousands of 6 figure financial research jobs went to MBAs in India who ask for less than $20000 per year.
Alan Brooks| 2.19.09 @ 10:50PM
we'll see
im very cynical concerning chirpeconomics
Alan Brooks| 2.19.09 @ 10:53PM
a new 'science': CHIRPENOMICS
Hardcover signed first edition $79.99
Gingrich Books, Marietta GA
Pingback| 2.20.09 @ 4:41AM
Magliner Hand Truck Flat Free Tires Commercial Truck Tires Sales Magliner Hand Truck links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 2.20.09 @ 5:27AM
Mothers links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Mike| 2.21.09 @ 7:43AM
It's about time India takes on some economic leadership.
Indians were the brightest and friendliest kids in the Tulane MBA program back in the late 80s. So technologically savvy that we nicknamed the computer room the Subcontinental Lounge.
I always wondered how a country that produced such an elite could remained mired in such economic squalor.
Pingback| 2.22.09 @ 9:45AM
The American Spectator : Not Your Father's Mother India | Mixed site || Daily updates links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 2.23.09 @ 10:07PM
24 Weeks pregnant links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Vin| 2.23.09 @ 11:25PM
If India is simply a 3rd world cesspool, then the USA is simply a container for trash.
In ancient times, India was a great power... a wealthy country. They lavished in luxury without noticing enemies were eyeing their prized land. Under the British rule, British products saturated the Indian markets. In turn, the British increased their wealth while the Indians became poorer and poorer. This is why Ghandi promoted the simple, agricultural ideals. Indians with money need not wear more expensive clothes than Indians without money. He encouraged a simple way of life, so as to diminish the demand/dependency on British goods. And it worked. Not overnight, but through years of patience and sacrifice. The Indians learned the hard way about what foreign investment can do to a nation. It takes time to rebuild an empire. The Indians were great once before, and they are on their way to being great again. Stronger and smarter than before. (If you ask me, there are a lot of dumbasses here in the US that live WAY beyond their means with no idea what the value of a dollar is. I hope we do not falter, that this is just a momentary hiccup for the US. ) In response to some of the comments here, I ask you, how long has the United States been around? Has it been around long enough to rise, fall, and rebuild itself? Has it had to rebuild after a foreign country occupied its land? No, it's still in its powerful acqusition period. 200+ years. Same as the british occupation. Just keep in mind that this land was stolen, yet we pass the land on to each new generation as if we own it. Keep in mind that not long ago, only white males could vote. Keep in mind that our schools are on the decline, while foreign schools are on the rise. How many times have we seen a football team go into halftime winning by several touchdowns, only to sit back and get beat in the second half by a team motivated to rise again? Keep in mind that the beauty and mysticism of a country as rich in culture, history, and people as India is by far more interesting than a land where WalMart is the main attraction in town.
Samar| 2.27.09 @ 4:02AM
The author's statistics are way out of date. In January 2009, India added 15 million new cellphone connections taking the total to 400 million connections for 230 million households. As you can see, this translates to 1.73 connections per household. It also suggests that at least 85% of Indian households now have a phone. By summer 90% should be covered. Recent educational surveys (by Pratham, for instance) indicate that 82% of childlren are spending at least 10 yrs in school. Throughout the world, journalists have made a nasty habit of grossly exaggerating Indian poverty by relying on data that is quite obsolete. Please do some real research before you publish such erroneous articles.
You can read more here:
http://members.tripod.com/~INDIA_RESOURCE/Rural-India-Education.html
Trackback| 4.16.09 @ 11:12AM
Acai berry juice, on Acai berry juice, links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Trackback| 5.25.09 @ 1:42AM
Model Ships, on Model Ships, links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Trackback| 7.7.09 @ 8:13PM
acai berries, on acai berries, links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
wholesale shoes| 7.9.09 @ 1:47AM
We are professional cheap kids shoes online store .We provide Nike shoes cheap ,Nike air jordan,cheap kids clothing
cheap womens clothing,Nike shoes online store,Nike shoes cheap,Nike shoes for kids,air jordan sneakers,nike air jordan,air jordans,brand shoe,shoes brand, dropship Nike shoes , brand clothes,brand clothes ,shoes brand,cheap kids clothing for cheap wholesale Air Jordans shoes for kids & women.
lingerie wholesale| 7.20.09 @ 6:31AM
Incredible post. Thank you for all this valuable information
Venkat| 7.25.09 @ 9:38AM
I consider USA is mighty because of its selfishness and life threatening ways.USA is an immigrant country ,occupied by the europeans and not so wanted koreans chinese and even all aricans.the white caucus of jews and others rule the rulebook still despite the new black President.the local institutions have become powerful bu economically weaker.
India is a slow growth country.shunned the Gun for a long time.Britsh as usual swindled indian wealth.many indians have become leanerned from the lessons of the british master to beat them at the post.After all these whites are "Shop keepers" talking values.India was contented.Even now it is so and slow. Even the govt insttutions are seeped in corruption and the present politicians are making mery by devious ways. These ills are alienating the poor public who do not have any voice because elections are rigged by the ruling parties and IAS (leagcy of british) bureaucracy.
The resources amassed by Fed printing money and creating white collar white have led them to sex and epicurean ways more than in India.In india sex is local individual and physical in many places free as cultural system(Devadasis etc) In USA is the rich who want to wring the last drop out of the physicality with added cosmetic values.they eat like pigs all burgers,pizzas etc and even much the mexican and SPANISH,french dishes.they eat so much that obesity is a problem of society and hence sexiness is gaining opposite value and importance.
In USA the population to land ratio is favourable of elbow space in life.But car automation of society has eaten all the world,s resources of energy.The false superiotiy of the white man with the basic racist behaviour in him with amassing of wealth makes me wonder whether they are the modern ROMAN CIVILISATION IN THE FAG END OF ITS EXISTENCE.
Regarding Naxals the author has not observed the correct position.It is politics and local politicians behave like Kings and hence the comman man has started taking up arms again in India.
Even 9/11 is a mark of jealousy genetarted by the whites on the Muslims.Muslims don't mix up and spread by mutation and moderation.Their leaders are not statemen because their culture require such anorchism away from Democracy. If at all the whites see a low in the coming century it will be because of the chritian missions and their devious ways.
njnjknmkl| 8.19.09 @ 11:46PM
Always leading the avant-garde of fashion without compromising traditional craftsmanship of luxury leather goods
Louis Vuitton
Louis Vuitton Replica
Louis Vuitton outlet is also active in other ...
CheapLouis VuittonReplica Handbags,Purses,Wallets Outlet and
Louis Vuitton Replica
Designer Bags,Shoes Outlet Store - discount price is our special offer, ...
Louis Vuitton Outlet
Pingback| 8.25.09 @ 1:39AM
Langsom PC? Gør din computer hurtigere uden besvær links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
fashion jewelry| 8.27.09 @ 4:29AM
discount jewelry
cheap jewelry
handmade jewelry| 8.27.09 @ 4:33AM
discount fashion jewelry
china jewelry
Tiffany| 8.30.09 @ 10:30PM
Ed Hardy Life provides the best
Ed Hardy shirts, including shrit, Swimwear, Tanks, Wallets, Sunglasses and Bags at the lowest price, Free Shipping.We supply the Newest ofabercrombie fitch, Ed Hardy clothing Ed Hardy Jeans from abercrombie and fitch.
dropshippngwatch| 8.31.09 @ 2:01AM
Replica Watches
Replica Watch
Fake Watches
Replica Watches
Replica Watches
Replica Watch
Fake Watches
Replica Watch
Replica Watches
Replica Jaquet Droz Watches
Replica Longines Watches
Replica Louis Vuitton Watches
Replica Maurice Lacroix Watches
Replica MontBlanc Watches
Replica Movado Watches
Replica Omega Watches
Replica Oris Watches
Replica Panerai Watches
Replica Parmigiani Watches
http://www.dropshippingwatch.com
Trackback| 9.19.09 @ 4:09PM
pay per click classroom, on pay per click classroom, links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
fjksd| 10.18.09 @ 11:21PM
shanghai massage
turntable bearings
fsdjk| 11.13.09 @ 9:17AM
beijing massage