THE SIXTY YEARS AFTER INDEPENDENCE
There was a time when India and China dominated world trade with a share of about 70%. The subsequent downfall in trade of both the countries have been due to the absence of creation of modern scientific and technological knowledge and their applications in every walk of life: agriculture to manufacturing to trade to weaving and to warfare. There has been a huge list of missed opportunities. That is the reason why our share in world trade remains a very small percentage of world shares even though our population is about 17% of the world. It indicates a huge wastage and under utilization of our human capital.
Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) calculations or mathematical projections up to 2050, making India look like a big economy, is a great danger to India's growth and development and to the prosperity and well being of all Indians. While PPP comparisons carry many elements of reality around them, they also hide the stark fact that many Indians are willing to live in the margins of existence, as they have little choice before them and often they do not possess the skills, knowledge and capital to take a direct plunge into the global knowledge economy themselves in which case they will earn in US dollar terms. It is their marginal existence and low subsistence levels that provide the basis of "low cost" economy. In the current phase of history, India is transitioning from its low productive phase towards knowledge intensive high productive, high value and higher efficiency economy. But it is important for us to use this transition phase effectively to equip all Indians with necessary knowledge and skills to compete in the global knowledge and skill intensive economy. If we do so, most Indians will earn in “dollar terms” – the façade of PPP can disappear.
THE NEXT SIXTY YEARS In 1944, the average life expectancy of an Indian was about 30 years. Now it is about 65 years. It is likely that the average life expectancy around 2067 world over and in India too is likely to be 100 years.
THE NEXT TEN YEARS (2007 – 2017) Indian economy appears to have attained a good stability for a fast growth rate. This growth rate has also benefited bottom 20 percentile of the population. The coming decade is going to be one with major cataclysmic charges – mostly beneficial in its end results. It is a Decade of Cataclysmic Fast Growth. Indian agriculture requires major reforms for increasing productivity and yields per acre so that the persons dependent upon agriculture can get better incomes. People will realise that one cannot carry on with the empty slogan that India is agricultural country with around 65% people dependent upon agriculture. Simple logic will show that one cannot deploy 65% persons in a sector that generates only 22% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Number of persons dependent upon primary agriculture needs to be brought down drastically to be under 20%. This means various forms of consolidation in agricultural lands, improved technologies and related investments and better delivery systems.
The released human power will go for various forms of agro processing industries, infrastructure and other village and small town based industries. Challenges of such distributed manufacturing systems ably aided by Information & Communication Technologies (ICT) are great adventures to look forward to.
The past 5 years have seen a resurgence of “India as the Manufacturing Hub”. Rapid strides in large and small manufacturing units are going to take place, around third and fourth tier small towns and villages. Along with these spread out manufacturing units, there will be great renaissance in Indian educational system at the school level, requiring drastic changes from existing uniform syllabus and rote system. A new wave of Educational Reforms & Liberalization releasing our Human Resource Systems will occur before 2010. It will have far –reaching implications, enabling many to equip themselves for the modern global economy. India will start emerging towards the end of the decade as a Global Educational Hub
There are several areas of Services which will open up. Foreign companies would be inventing the talents of India by opening more and more R&D Centers (currently around 300), which may be something, like 5,000 in numbers by the end of the decade.
Politically and socially also India will undergo several changes. Women work force will come in a major way into the economy and political systems. India’s diversity will be visible in action. The coming decade will also see a series of steady actions to contain (and eliminate) various forms of extremisms and the resultant terrorist acts. The fight will be in many fronts with several tools: technological equipment, training, laws, medical means, security measures and also through political, social, economic fronts, diplomacy, medical, etc. There will be great challenges and also business and economic opportunities.
THE DECADE OF 2017 – 2027 It will be a period in which all Indians will have reasonable sets of works to perform and earn a good quality life. Indian innovations will emerge at the global level and transform the way in which businesses are done in the world. A few Indian industries, laboratories, medical units, academics, and artists may take leadership roles and set trends for others in the world.
This decade is likely to be the Innovative Decade for India.
THE DECADE OF 2027 – 2037 This is going to be the Decade of Prosperous India. For the first time, Indians will take a lead in mega ventures in Space, Oceans, Energy sectors, Archaeology (marine included), Literature, Medicine etc. Neurosciences will bring forth many new scientific truths about human consciousness. Space tourism will become a routine business as also the characterization of human genes and marginal genetic engineering to remove some problems (as we take medicines today). Arts will take entirely new forms, governance systems would have simplified and decentralized with pervasive ICT systems.
DECADES OF 2037 – 2047, 2047 – 2057 AND 2057 – 2067 These three decades are going to be the Decades of Transformation of Human Beings. Most parts of the world would have come out of poverty. The divisions of nation – states as they exist now and even blocks like ASEAN, European Union etc would have outlived their utility. Humanity for the first time would feel as one. Human diversities would remain despite the advances in genetic engineering, neurosciences, evolutionary biology, systems biology etc. Human knowledge will then appreciate the importance of such diversities. During these decades, a sufficiently large number of human beings may live in Space and High Oceans. Intergalactic travels would have begun as experiments. Marine archaeology and studies of marine organisms and materials would change the human understanding of the past. It is likely that some advanced predictive capabilities for natural disasters like earthquakes, etc would have been built up. So would be the situation vis-à-vis newer diseases. Nature may not be subjugated by Human; but Humans may learn to coexist with nature in a much more knowledgeable manner.
We have taken a quick odyssey into the future six decades. None of what is described there will occur automatically a lot depend upon human efforts at the collective and the individual levels.
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