Journey of India to Development
-
Upload
chetan-gowda -
Category
Documents
-
view
216 -
download
0
Transcript of Journey of India to Development
-
8/12/2019 Journey of India to Development
1/4
Journey of India to Development
At the time of independence, India was struggling in economic, social and political
conditions. India had to develop itself in all fronts to give its citizen a respectful life in all the
parameters.
Founding fathers of our nation envisaged a future for India for development. Even to some extent
they might have thought a target (time frame) for achieving that. In all the respect time frame
would not have been more than 50 years. If they were able to see our current progress, they
would definitely astoundingly aghast. After almost 70 years of independence, can we say that we
are on the path which our founding father might have decided for us to follow? Can we give
ourselves any timeline with confidence, in which we can achieve developed status? When we try
to give answers to these basic questions, naturally answers for all queries revolve in our mind
with big NO. Let us analyzewhat went wrong with effort in achieving Tryst with Destiny.
At the time of independence, India was having many problemssocial unrest, politicalinstability, wide spread illiteracy, poverty, hunger. To remove all these problems, future plan had
to be thought out and path had to set. Our nations founding fathers (Leaders) were very capable,
intellectual, and familiar with Indian conditions that they set the right path by taking some of the
steps to laid the foundation to remove all the problems:-
(1) Writing Constitution of India, (2) creating planning commission, (3) accepting mix economic
model with capitalism and socialism elements, (4) following non alignment foreign policy.
Our Constitution, in the world, is more detailed and well researched, and has good
features of other countries Constitutions with modification according to Indian conditions.
Indian Constitution had to tackle many problems of India such as caste discrimination, religious
discrimination, cultural differences, and gender discrimination. It is able to provide government
system for India in which Indians were well versed. It is able to accommodate different cultures
as it is having federal structure for government. It also targeted to remove social division of India
by prohibiting discrimination on the ground of caste, gender, religion and status, so that society
can progress as a whole by developing each individual economically and socially.
Planning commission was able to give direction to India for setting its priorities in proper
order to meet its economic growth according to countrysresources and its capacity. To achieve
proper and efficient use of resources better planning and targets have to be set. Without proper
planning, it is not easy to execute big task. In this background it can be said that task of deciding
resource utilization of a big country, prioritization of project according to need and condition of
country are important to achieve through directed and planned development. Without planning
nobody can analyze whether he is moving in right direction, and he cannot think beyond the
current time frame. So, it can be said that it was indeed wise move to set planning commission to
get rapid and proper growth path.
-
8/12/2019 Journey of India to Development
2/4
In accepting mix economic model, India followed its own and suitable economic policy
according to its condition, which can give it a fast growth. If, suppose India could have chosen
Capitalist economic model that time there would be very minimum control of the state on the
resources. Indian society was really divided and most of the citizens were poor and
discrimination was prevalent on the basis of caste and religion, then in this conditions growth
and advantage of the economic development easily go to the well of society people. People at
lower end, which constituted bulk part, would have been put in dark for coming period in the
future.
If India would have chosen complete social model of economic it is very difficult to say
with firmness whether that would be good or bad. But seeing many examples in the world now
and analyzing Indian condition at the time of independence when state was having very less
resource, it can be inferred that (following socialist economic model) would not have been good
option. We have seen in the world many examples where socialist model get failed. In context
of Indian condition that time, there were chances of rebellion behavior as state had to take hard
steps to implement social model. People who had to lose the control on resources might have
indulged in activities against the state and it could have created instability.
So, we can say it was a wise decision to choose mix economic model, where state control
some of the important resource and private control also had been accommodated to fulfill
individual goals which can help directly in progress of county as whole, keeping in mind of India
condition that time to achieve fast growth utilizing resources from state as well as individual.
By following Non alignment policy, India was able to exert its influence and able to take
its sovereign decision without any influence towards its benefit. India did not align itself with
one group or other on predefined conditions but was able to make friends according to its needand progress of the economy and strategic conditions. It seems that foreign policy does not
directly help in economic progress but if we analyze deeply, can see that to have good growth in
economy in long term, state should able to infuse the feeling in its citizen about it independent
status and at the same time nation can decide in future anything against any option if it does not
suit to its economic and strategic interest.
Even after having these positive conditions, India is not able to achieve the status which
our country founding fathers thought. They would be ashamed of Indias progress with current
status, if they were to see it now. India should have achieved complete development till now. But
still India has been put at the bottom in the list of world countries on the certain parameterswhich are indicator for development such as: - per capita income, health index,
infrastructure, etc.
Reasons of this dismal performance of India on development front can be attributed to
many factors which can be divided broadly as (1) Primary factors such as policy of political
-
8/12/2019 Journey of India to Development
3/4
parties, and not following sprit of Constitution; (2) Secondary factors such as corruption,
system failure, uneducation, unemployment, social unrest, public disorder.
To gain power, political parties, instead of educating people for their growth and
development, started dividing people on the basis of ideological, religious, caste, language and
region. In this way, people have been misguided by parties and when these parties came to powerthey just bother about vote politics. These parties do not care about the development as a whole
of India and they get involve in degraded politics to win confidence of people.
Indian society still remained a stratified and divided society based on caste, religion,
gender, language - despite of being prohibited in the Constitution of India. In other words, people
did not accept sprit of the Constitution. It can be said that one of the main reasons - for not
accepting the constitution, could be less education but still many educated people did not follow
our Constitution in its sprit.
Because of caste prejudice, people are not able to support the holistic development of thecountry and even at some extent against the development of lower caste people which constitute
the 2025 % of the population of India. If that much of population remains poor and
undeveloped then it is not possible for society as a whole to progress and hence it will be a
hindrance to development.
Because of gender prejudice, people are not encouraging education and employment for
women. Women constitute 50% of the population. If 50% of the population of a country remains
at lower level in employment and education, then it will not be able to contribute towards the
economic and social progress of the nation.
Primary factors, political parties policy and people mind set, lead to secondary factors.
Corruption, one of the biggest issues, is responsible for not achieving any improvement on
economic front, public service and people social status. Services for poor people, to empower, do
not reach them because of corruption in system and middle man. People are frustrated with
public service which is not provided without giving bribe or without any contact in the system.
Political parties in power do not bother about reform in system because they have vested interest
and equal beneficiaries in corrupted practices. For example, by not implementing police reform,
police mentality remains of colonial era. Common man, despite of being getting independence
65 years back, sees and feels police with same attitude as it was before independence. In this way
common man in this county are being treated as outsider or third class people by police and it
causes a feeling of alien-ness among people. People are not able to connect themselves with the
country, hence are not able to utilize their capability with maximum effort to achieve progress of
theirs as well as of country.
Law and order situation is being handled according to vested interest of political parties. Bad
condition of law and order, people do not feel safe in the state and this feeling continue to grow
-
8/12/2019 Journey of India to Development
4/4