Change Is Our Only Hope In Next Decade

IN THE SEASON OF SCAMS AND PARLIAMENTARY paralysis, it is easy to take a glum view of the future. Ratan Tata proclaims India a banana republic; institutions of the state lack integrity; a community is on warpath demanding lower social status; a region wants to separate from a state; workers of the world unite only in killing one another in eastern India; insurgency and counter-insurgency shed innocent blood; and even vegetables make you cry.
    Yet, there is much to be hopeful about, if only you lift your head out of the continuous present in which contemporary culture dunks you and keeps you submerged. This is what ET has done, surveying some important ideas that have changed our lives for the better over the last decade, from ubiquitous phones, budget airlines, organised retail, the Metro, and BPO jobs to the Unique Identity Number. Limping out of the Asian crisis at the turn of the century, few would have thought that India would accomplish what it has over the last 10 years. If we could achieve so much these last 10 years, why should the next 10 be bereft of hope?
    Change must come to a number of different areas. The potential exists, resources are aplenty, only the will to act is missing.
    Political funding must become transparent and accountable. Every rupee that a party or its functionary spends must be traceable to its source. The current non-institutional form of mobilising resources for politics is the root of corruption. Politicians make money for themselves and for their parties through loot of the exchequer, sale of patronage and extortion, all with the collusion of civil servants. Other democracies fund their politics, but without such comprehensive depravity. This can and must change.
    The legal system cannot continue to be dysfunctional. What prevents us from appointing 100,000 new judges over the next 10 years, to clear up the backlog of cases that creates a perversion of justice called undertrial prisoners, and shrink the life expectancy at birth of any piece of legislation to 18 months till disposal of the final appeal? Our police forces are sadly undermanned, poorly trained and politicised. Overhaul them, we must.
    India faces a desperate shortage of talent. We need a revamped, expanded education system, a parallel stream of clearly defined, certifiable skill modules that offer young people the possibility of continuous skill upgradation all the way to a professional degree.
    We need a political culture that stops patronising power theft, and instead, encourages payment of realistic user charges to transform all infrastructure deficit into a huge growth opportunity.
    And we need to shed our current fear of technology, to realise its full potential whether in inclusive banking or education or tele-medicine. Regulatory wisdom in India comes twinned with geriatric suspicion of technology, scuppering a universe of possibilities.
    If there is one thing that we need to carry over from the decade that is coming to a close, besides the philosophy of inclusive growth, it is the slogan, Yes, we can!