60 year old maiden

"Long years ago we made a tryst with destiny, and now the time comes when we shall redeem our pledge, not wholly or in full measure, but very substantially. At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom. A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new, when an age ends, and when the soul of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance. It is fitting that at this solemn moment we take the pledge of dedication to the service of India and her people and to the still larger cause of humanity........................"

-Jawaharlal Nehru
On the eve of Indian Independence

Thats the beginning of India's most popular speech ever. And like so many other things, Panditji got it wrong. Whole world sleeps????? He defintely should have had an idea about the time zones. But well not many of his audience did. With a literacy rate lower than Dravid's strike rate in his latest innings, you cant expect many people to be aware of the time zones. (Actually the literacy rate was slightly higher at 12%.) Like any politician worth his salt he exploited the ignorance of his subjects though in this case for a safe cause.

60 years later have we redeemed India its rightfully place on the world stage. We are all born in the capitalistic age in which the power of a country is directly proportional to its GDP. So lets see where India stands in the world GDP by PPP. And where you can expect it in the next 20 years.

That doesnt look all that great. The per capita GDP at PPP is still at the lower end. Lower than most countries which got liberated from the Imperial powers at about the same time. This, like the friendly capitalistic media loves to point out, is largely due to the closed economic policies and the permit raj which did not encourage entrepreneurship in the young nation. However in 1991 the liberalization was forced upon us by the prevailing conditions and the economy starting taking off only since then. So what do the next 20 years look like?




Hmmm not very good I'd say. Well I am demanding and it is tough to make me happy. With a billion people, India should be contributing atleast 16.67% to the World GDP. Actually historically i.e pre industrial revolution times , India and china were contributing more than 50% of the World GDP. The British rule in India during the Industrilaization of the world left India out of the game and it slowly lost its share in world GDP. At about the same time US starting increasing its share and eventually became the single super power of the world.














This graph shows the story of how India missed the boat on Industrialization thanks to the foreign rule. A point of great interest here is the 1600 where India's share of World GDP seems to be higher than US's has ever been. The share fell down steeply from 1600 till late 1900's. At the same time US and the European powers increased their share starting 1700 due to Industrialization.





India and China seem to have reversed the curve towards the end of last century. They should continue that growth for many years to ragain their lost territory. China with its capitalistic ideals under the communist mask is well ahead of the passive, democratic India remote-controlled by confused communists. But we will get there, not because of any visionary leaders but inspite of them.

Sports superpower??????
In the capitalistic age if you have the economic power everything else falls in place. The most direct relation would be with sports. Once the Olympic association realizes that there is enough money in India, for its own benefit it will try to make the Olympics more appealing to this large market by including intriguing games like "gilli-danda", "kabaddi", "kho-kho", "carrom board" and even the "french cricket" and "gully cricket". Well they are all as skillful sports as any Olympic sport is. Just that these are not known in the countries which contribute upto 60% of the World GDP currently.

It is however very surprising to note that none of the American sports are popular anywhere else in the world. Basketball is somewhat popular and widely played but the other games like American football and baseball are never seen in India. It must be easier to find a white American doing a Surya-Namaskaram in Lake Michigan on a December morning than finding someone play American football or baseball in India. The first time "super" and "bowl" occurred together in print in India is also the first time "wardrobe" and "malfunction" occurred together. (And I thought Super Bowl was baseball until I came to US.) I think the ignorance of the world to American sports is because Americans never tried to sell them anywhere else. They never needed to. They had the single largest market on the planet and it was good enough. Also Americans never really acknowledged the existence of the rest of the world and so never bothered about international sports. Their biggest sporting events are all domestic annual affairs. The rest of the world did try to push their sports into the huge American market but had little success.

So if India manages to achieve the economic strength it deserves, the sports will evolve to let India win more often. 16.67% of World GDP is all I want. And No, I cant wait 20 years.