The Hindu Business Line : <I>Crossing the divide </I>

The President, Mr A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, the other day identified development of entrepreneurial talent as the key driver of economic growth today. Yet one must ask why the practice of starting out on one's own hasn't taken root and risk taking is still confined to a few, mainly from the traditional business classes, unlike managerial ability which is clearly far more widely distributed. Lack of resources does not explain it fully.

One must go deeper to understand the paranoia and insecurity that haunts the Indian white-collar urban classes and why aspirants seek very similar jobs as their neighbours, in the same few coveted organisations and professions, ignoring all other possible ways of living.

Unlike in the post-industrial societies of the West, there is a finality to career choice that stamps one for life. For some the decision has already been taken out of their hands by parental ambition in turn guided by the prevailing concept of what constitutes economic security or visible success. Success may be a debatable yardstick but the craving for long term security is very real and worth probing further. Insecurity is of course relative — but in Indian society there is an "ambient insecurity" that cuts across classes.

Societies that have come through an industrial revolution and a major social upheaval have on the other hand faced the uncertainties and come to terms with the inherent insecurities of life, as in Europe through the two World Wars.

India has escaped these convulsions. Even the relatively well-off sense that they are only a few steps away from financial stringency, maybe because they see it all around. In the post-Independence generation at any rate, one has always had poor relations either in the cities or left behind in the villagers. The educated urban middle-class are all only a step away from the uncertainties of an agrarian way of life. Take any family you know and you will find that some branches of it came into the big cities after the 1940's, drawn by the prospect of a college education — for a government job, and a steady monthly income, a status in society, total job security and finally a pension for life. Look back two generations into the family histories of some prominent ICS officers themselves and you would find small farmers, teachers or priests.

Till the end of the 20th century, the range of choices for the educated youth was severely limited — to careers in law, teaching, or less often medicine, engineering, or accountancy. It was only after the mid 1960s that these professional courses could lead to a place in the IAS; and later a gateway to the most coveted Indian Institutes of Management or their close clones.

Ambitious parents all over the world yearn most of all for better things for their children than they themselves dared imagine. And the way to ensure that was to take the children forever (as they saw it) beyond the reach of sudden reversal of fortunes or unemployment. Today the preferred choice is to emigrate at least for some years to a more prosperous country; and the next is to choose a high stakes game such as the banking, consulting and financial services sectors.

If risk taking has to take hold, then this tendency has to change — and at least the more affluent must sense that life is not entirely a casino; and everyone cannot live perpetually in fear of a Cinderella ending, with the plush car and flat reverting to their former pumpkin state!

(Feedback can be sent to srchander23@netscape.net)

S. Ramachander

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