�India has the DNA of a superpower�
"India has the DNA of a superpower"
With technology at our command, getting rid of corruption is as easy or as complex as tackling a virus
AVITTAM TIRUNAL & ADITHYAN VARMA
Posted online: Saturday, January 01, 2005 at 0256 hours IST
With full-throated gusto of a schoolboy, I long to cheer: ‘India the paradise’, but looking through grown up glasses, I know, often, that this paradise is a sad place. Money co-exists with the utter lack of it. An avid trekker, I am disturbed by the sceptre of hunger haunting railway stations and countrysides. Every time a train window shows a soul watching the sunset on an empty stomach, it feels like a silent killer of all the joys of travelling.
During boyhood at Kaudiar Palace, my family home, I was fairly insulated from everything that was not beautiful. But the world opened up before me in the form of people without not just a makaan or kapda, but even roti. This was during my apprenticeship in TVS-Madurai and Engine Valves, Chennai. If you are an old man without a pie, you are nobody’s business. What a humiliating kick in the shin for us, the more-privileged, that after 57 years of people’s rule, we have been unable to banish hunger!
I feel corruption is the biggest administrative crime that preserves such inequities. Politicians take bribe from businessmen to deal out undeserving contracts, government babus take bribes to get things done. In the end, it is the pauper who has no backer anywhere. As a businessman, greasing hands for favours repulses me. Yet, this is the quintessence Indian reality.
Industrialisation is the end-all of all evils, they say. I run a packaged water plant and soda and fruit juice factory, which has a formic acid dealership for Periyar Chemicals. My family has business interests in institutions ranging from the State Bank of Travancore to SUT Superspeciality Hospital and Aspinwal Co, and is an employment-generating hub in itself. Still, I cannot but wonder if creation of jobs is everything?
A better answer is efficiency optimisation of all economic systems in the country, public or private. For this, one needs to tackle corruption frontally.
With the dawn of e-governance, corruption is not as formidable as before. At least, after chewing some bytes at an advanced course at the Centre for Development of Advance Computing, Pune, I am not qualified to underestimate the muscles of the info age. We now have technology at our command. This means getting rid of corruption is as easy or as complex as showing the door to an obstinate virus in your network. All you need is political will.
Science is an amazing genie that has outperformed itself, lighting up the bleak Indian shores with gigawatts of lowcost marvels. Thinking of the Pokhran feat restores one’s faith in the ancient sands!
I have no doubt that as one of the oldest countries in the world, India has the DNA to become one of the superpowers, much earlier than our forefathers dreamed of. Sometimes India reminds me of the Volkswagen Beetle in my garage. A fancy vintage piece, some would say. But she is in good running condition. I vow, I can even kick some speed out of her. Like her, India is an ancient intelligent thing that needs some sweat to keep her going. If only the new brats would let sweat flow like the Ganga...
Expertise does lend a vital spark. For globetrotters, India is not just Shahjehan and a huge marble tomb anymore. In remote-sensing satellites, India is in the league of world leaders. Didn’t she become the neighbours’ envy with a zip-zap-zoom from bullockcarts to rockets?
With a brilliant combo of Dr Kalam and Dr Singh at the helm, I can perhaps slip back to dreams of Indian paradise and join that feisty cheering for the country.
As told to Sarita Varma in Thiruvananthapuram
With technology at our command, getting rid of corruption is as easy or as complex as tackling a virus
AVITTAM TIRUNAL & ADITHYAN VARMA
Posted online: Saturday, January 01, 2005 at 0256 hours IST
With full-throated gusto of a schoolboy, I long to cheer: ‘India the paradise’, but looking through grown up glasses, I know, often, that this paradise is a sad place. Money co-exists with the utter lack of it. An avid trekker, I am disturbed by the sceptre of hunger haunting railway stations and countrysides. Every time a train window shows a soul watching the sunset on an empty stomach, it feels like a silent killer of all the joys of travelling.
During boyhood at Kaudiar Palace, my family home, I was fairly insulated from everything that was not beautiful. But the world opened up before me in the form of people without not just a makaan or kapda, but even roti. This was during my apprenticeship in TVS-Madurai and Engine Valves, Chennai. If you are an old man without a pie, you are nobody’s business. What a humiliating kick in the shin for us, the more-privileged, that after 57 years of people’s rule, we have been unable to banish hunger!
I feel corruption is the biggest administrative crime that preserves such inequities. Politicians take bribe from businessmen to deal out undeserving contracts, government babus take bribes to get things done. In the end, it is the pauper who has no backer anywhere. As a businessman, greasing hands for favours repulses me. Yet, this is the quintessence Indian reality.
Industrialisation is the end-all of all evils, they say. I run a packaged water plant and soda and fruit juice factory, which has a formic acid dealership for Periyar Chemicals. My family has business interests in institutions ranging from the State Bank of Travancore to SUT Superspeciality Hospital and Aspinwal Co, and is an employment-generating hub in itself. Still, I cannot but wonder if creation of jobs is everything?
A better answer is efficiency optimisation of all economic systems in the country, public or private. For this, one needs to tackle corruption frontally.
With the dawn of e-governance, corruption is not as formidable as before. At least, after chewing some bytes at an advanced course at the Centre for Development of Advance Computing, Pune, I am not qualified to underestimate the muscles of the info age. We now have technology at our command. This means getting rid of corruption is as easy or as complex as showing the door to an obstinate virus in your network. All you need is political will.
Science is an amazing genie that has outperformed itself, lighting up the bleak Indian shores with gigawatts of lowcost marvels. Thinking of the Pokhran feat restores one’s faith in the ancient sands!
I have no doubt that as one of the oldest countries in the world, India has the DNA to become one of the superpowers, much earlier than our forefathers dreamed of. Sometimes India reminds me of the Volkswagen Beetle in my garage. A fancy vintage piece, some would say. But she is in good running condition. I vow, I can even kick some speed out of her. Like her, India is an ancient intelligent thing that needs some sweat to keep her going. If only the new brats would let sweat flow like the Ganga...
Expertise does lend a vital spark. For globetrotters, India is not just Shahjehan and a huge marble tomb anymore. In remote-sensing satellites, India is in the league of world leaders. Didn’t she become the neighbours’ envy with a zip-zap-zoom from bullockcarts to rockets?
With a brilliant combo of Dr Kalam and Dr Singh at the helm, I can perhaps slip back to dreams of Indian paradise and join that feisty cheering for the country.
As told to Sarita Varma in Thiruvananthapuram
