Asian Tigers, and the Lumbering Elephant

There are a few things different about this post. First, I'm writing this the good ol'-fashioned way - using pen and paper. The reason behind this - and the second thing that's different about this post - is that I'm writing it not at my desk at home or office, but sitting on the Upper Berth of a Sleeper Class Compartment in the Udyan Express. I'm traveling to Bombay (this name oddly strikes me as more 'romantic' than Mumbai), and the train is running a couple of hours late. It's twilight and the train is meandering its way through the Western Ghats. We've just crossed Khandala, and gazing out of the window, I could see the vast valley and the little sleepy hamlets spread out below. The sky above was turning from crimson red to a dark orange and finally Night spread it's Cape over the villages and towns below (and us!). I could see the lights beginnning to twinkle in the houses of the village-folk. It was a really beautiful feeling - beauty is often found in simple things, and when you least expect it.
The journey has not been tiring - all I've done is eat, rest and read a bit and sleep a lot. But I'm beginning to feel the monotony of travel - the gentle swaying motion of the train, the sights and sounds of the countless hawkers plying their trade, and my co-passengers. Somehow, I couldn't strike up a conversation with any of them (well, try I did). My stop is still a couple of hours away (we should've been there by now!), and so I pulled out the little pocket notebook (the paper variety!) and my pen (not a stylus ;) ) and started scribbling to while away the time.
The rest of this post is about part of a book that I've been reading during the journey. I borrowed the book from a friend at work, and started reading it even as I was waiting for the train to arrive at the Bangalore City Junction. The book is India Unbound (Penguin Books, 2000) by Gurcharan Das. My friend had advised me "to carry something lighter for the journey" as well, saying that the book makes for some rather serious reading. Now serious it is, dealing with the Economic policies of Independent India, charting our course through the years of the "License Raj" (the term was coined by C. Rajagopalachari, I came to know) to the Liberalization of 1991, and India's almost meteoric rise in the Knowledge Economy of the present decade. A book on such a topic definitely makes for some serious reading. But I found the book (the part that I've read so far) very absorbing both in content and in the style of narration adopted by Das. The first part of the book (which I finished reading an hour back) looks at the period from 1942-65. The first chapter is interestingly (but very aptly) titled 'Ranting in English, Chanting in Sanskrit', and together with the second chapter looks at pre-Independence India, and how the English language and Western Education opened up the doors for Indians to the global world. It is often (incorrectly) said, that the Western Education only created clerks for the British bureaucracy in India. Well, that may be true to an extent, but it also created Engineers, Lawyers, Doctors and other professionals, and it brought the history of other cultures and Revolutions within the ambit of our thinkers and intellectuals. The first part of the book also examines a traditional Indian prejudice against businessmen and entrepreneurs. And this is most certainly true. Somehow creating wealth is deemed secondary - Das cites some philosophers' theory that the Vaishyas were the third in the caste heirarchy, after the Brahmins and the Kshatriyas. He also looks at the reasons why an Indutrial Revolution has always eluded India. Inspite of having a great Rail network. After all, in other countries, most notably America, the Railroad ushered in an era of prosperity, trade and commerce.
The way Das poses issues and examines various viewpoints and facets of the issue makes for very interesting reading. One thing was particularly interesting - the author delving into the traditional Indian psyche to explain one of the reasons why India did not witness a technological revolution. On why it did not, could not, innovate - and this is true for the last couple of centuries, and not just the past six-odd decades. He says that Indians, unlike Americans, are not "tinkerers". Manual labour is held in somewhat of a contempt, and tradition shows a bias toward the pure sciences rather than applied sciences or technology. I think that Das has hit the nail on its head. We Indians are generally not the "Just Do It" variety - we prefer to mull over theoretical problems rather than experiment and get our hands dirty - both literally and figuratively speaking.
Das also examines various economic policies expounded by various thinkers and economists during this period (1942-65). He describes his time at Harvard as one of "encounters with ideas rather than persons". He describes his own economic and social views at the time (liberal and socialist) and describes how he moved from being an uncritical exponent of Marx to a capitalist viewpoint. He also looks at the policies of the Indian Government at the time and how they nipped in the bud any trace of entrepreneurial spirit. He describes very nicely the travails of homegrown entrepreneurs like Kasturbhai Lalbhai and how the State instead of encouraging them, did the exact opposite - put in place excessive controls that made private enterprise virtually non-existent!
I'm continuing this part of the post on the 'morning after' (my train journey, obviously!) as the swaying of the train as it picked up speed on the plains made legible writing impossible. Getting back to the book, Das looks at how the flawed policies of the Government and the Bureaucracy instilled a culture of complacency at best, and inefficiency, low productivity, lobbyism, and corruption at worst in state enterprises. And how, surprisingly, Nehru defended the low productivity in Parliament! His reasoning - these enterprises were not 'set up to generate profit, but to meet social objectives'. The book looks at how ministers and bureaucrats, who had no experience whatsoever in running a business, presided in a shockingly ad hoc manner on business decisions. To sum it up, we got the 'worst of both worlds' by pursuing Nehru's brand of Socialism - the controls of socialism and the monopoly of capitalism'.
Reading the book really makes you think about a line Das uses a couple of times - "When individuals fail, it's a blunder; but when leaders fail, it's a catastrophe'. I've always wondered how the other Asian Economies who more or less started out at the same time as India did, have today become tigers, while India is still light years behind them! Of how, countries like Malaysia, or city-states like Singapore or Hong Kong have achieved so much with a fraction of the human and natural resources of India. Reading the book gives you some idea of the reasons behind this. Anyways, this post has already become long enough (and I'm really, really hungry!). So I'll sign off for now. But I'm sure that reading the remainder of the book will spur another post. Till then, ciao!!