India -- A Developed Nation By 2020?

[This blog titled,  India -- A Developed Nation By 2020? was originally written at Sulekha -- 13 years back, when APJ Abdul Kalam was the President of India. Reproducing this at blogger.com, now that we are at the fag months of 2020!]


Our glamour driven media has been talking of India as the super-power in waiting. Our President has dreams of India being a "developed nation" by the year 2020.

Now that we have dismantled the "socialistic" model, all we need to do is to let the Gurubhais (or Dhirubhais) do their job. We already have a booming share market; and a surging GDP. We have more billionaires in India today, than they have in Japan. Right?

By 2020 we will be an economic super power. Where is the doubt?

What about poverty? To remove poverty, you need to generate wealth, right? How can we distribute poverty? (Isn't that what our good Finance Minster Mr. Chidambaram recently pointed out?)

Okay, now that we have dared to dream, let us get back to reality. Here is a quote from the report published by United Nations Development Program.

" ... despite greater resources, life expectancy in some states of India is similar to those in some of the poorest sub-Saharan African countries"

 [Source: http://hdr.undp.org/docs/publications/background_papers/2003/India/India_2003.pdf ]

 Now, that does not seem to gel with a country of billionaires that has achieved 9% growth rate.

Can we have a "developed nation" with life expectancy comparable to some of the least developed regions of the world? Even with the current level of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) shouldn't we expect availability of better health among bulk of our people?

Let us see the very next line from the UNDP Report:-

"Only the state of Kerala records achievements in health that are better than not only the rest of India but also the rest of the developing world and often at par with the Western developed countries"

It would seem (from what Kerala has already achieved) that shortage of GDP is not the constraint in order to achieve basic standards of health care among  our people. More from the same source:-

"Barring Kerala, where the percentage of children with anemia is 44%, all other states have more than 65% of children suffering from anemia. In Bihar, Rajasthan, Maharashtra and Orissa more than 70% children are anemic."

Is it worth becoming a developed nation (some day in the future -- okay by 2020) if this means that we are to ignore the poverty and misery that are widespread today? It is a tragedy that our elite sections have been blinded by the myth of a "Shining India" that a "free market" can deliver to us.

It is in this context that Mallika Sarabhai's latest theatrical production, "Unsuni" needs to be appreciated. This musical play is intended to "sensitize" young people to the idea that mere economic growth is inadequate, unless we do something now to ALSO address the plight of the "unheard voices".

The full transcript of "Unsuni" (as expected, censored in Gujarat allegedly only because of the use of the word "shit" by a character -- not as a cuss word, but to refer to human excreta that she needs to carry on her head for a living) can be accessed at:-

http://www.unsuni.net/files/Unsuni_English_Script.pdf

Original blog at: http://creative.sulekha.com/india-a-developed-nation-by-2020_216933_blog


PS. I see that the old link to Unsuni no longer works. Here is a working link:-

https://sites.google.com/site/asmitatheatre/play-unsuni-at-epicentre

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