The Hindu Business Line : ‘A chance in 5,000 years’

Your book talks about the tremendous opportunities before Indians, and English capability giving hope to young Indians even from disadvantaged groups. But with a principal character of the Indian Mujahideen turning out to be a techie once employed by an IT major, do you think there will be a backlash when it comes to IT companies hiring young Muslims?

No, even though to find young, educated Indians of whatever community being attracted to militancy is certainly disconcerting. But we have to go beyond that and ultimately create opportunities for all our people irrespective of caste, creed, faith, language or region. That is the only way you can build an equitable, inclusive society, and make ours a safe and secure country. The only solution is everybody gets opportunities, nobody feels alienated, left out or left behind. In fact this book is about creating a more equitable society.

But you’ve also expressed concern about the widening social divide… the rich and the poor.

Yes, but I have tried to draw a balance between the role of markets and the role of Government. I’m a huge believer in markets, because markets are caste and religion neutral and can solve a lot of our identity problems. If there are right skills and capabilities anybody can use the markets to raise their level. But they need to have the prerequisites — a good education, English language skills, etc. At the same time, markets cannot be left alone. We have seen in the US the impact of completely unregulated markets. So there is a huge role for Government to draft the framework in which markets operate, and lay down rules and regulations, policies, laws and incentives. This only governments can do, individual entrepreneurs cannot do that. So this book lays down the structure of regulation of government and within that how markets can operate.

When middle-class people like you or Narayana Murthy become top Indian entrepreneurs, you also make ordinary Indians dream about making it some day. Of course, you become role models, but does it also put some kind of a pressure on you….

No, in fact that is the whole pitch. If average middle-class guys from Mysore or Dharwar or Alleppey can build a globally competitive world-class company and reach this size and scale, anybody can do it. But they must be enabled with the right toolkit. I had the advantage of an excellent education, getting into IIT (Bombay). So that gave me the break. But if there is a poor guy in a small village in Bihar and he is not taught English, doesn’t go to a school and doesn’t know what the world is all about, how is he ever going to come out of his misery? So the challenge is to give everyone an opportunity and my book is about that.

In the background of Mumbai, can IT help in combating terrorism?

Totally, hugely, enormously. I’ve been talking about a national intelligence grid because Government operates in silos (detailed interview published in Business Line dated December 2). Data mining of databases is one part. The second is citizen identification through ID cards or numbers; the important thing is that the data is in a bank.

But will racial profiling not take place… something that happened in the US after 9/11?

Well that can happen today also, with passports, etc. There is the issue of privacy, but fundamentally we need it. Those guys (in Mumbai) came with fake IDs, credit cards. All this will be dramatically simplified if you have citizen IDs, which is possible with today’s technology. But again, this has fallen culprit to the silos in our Government. So we have a PAN database for financial, a BPL database, a voter database, etc, but they are all different compartments.

Will India be saved by the small man mentioned in your book?

In 1947 the Indian leaders were ahead of the Indian people; Gandhiji, Nehru, Patel, Ambedkar, Rajagopalachari. They were visionaries who took a population of 300 million people, essentially large chunks of uneducated people, and created a large democracy. They talked about free speech, secularism, right to vote for all. Remember, in the US full Black redemption happened only in 1965. In 1947, in theory, we had better rights than the Americans. So that was the big bang approach to democracy which was a risky thing. But it showed that they thought about the future. And the people of India trustingly followed, saying ‘you guys are our leaders and we’ll do what you say’. Today, the people are ahead and the leaders are behind.

Isn’t that good!

No, the people of India have unleashed their aspirations; they want a better life, they want their children to go to better schools. So you have people ahead and leaders behind, still mired in caste and religion, etc. At some point, people will demand better leaders and the terrorism crisis is showing that. Surprisingly, the people are now angry not with somebody else, but (with) the politicians. You saw the way Sandeep’s father reacted to the politicians coming, Mrs (Hemant) Karkare refusing the money given by Mr (Narendra) Modi. There are strong signals there.

Do you think the demographic dividend you mention will really be a blessing for our country?

If we get our act together. This dividend is not automatic, it’ll come only if people are nurtured, educated, provided jobs, or else it will be a disaster. That’s the choice I talk about in the book. I’m saying the combination of circumstances described in the first six chapters — demographic dividend, our entrepreneurs, mastery over technology, English language skills, hugely advantageous global factors and our democracy — are huge advantages. No other country has all six; you get this kind of a chance once in 5,000 years. Now either we can exploit this opportunity and take it to a new level or go down the path…

Name the one thing required to mess up.

Doing nothing only will mess it up… we don’t have to do anything!

How long did it take you to write this book?

Eighteen months.

You must have been very disciplined, because you also had a company to run during that period!

I also had a fantastic research associate, and I met 126 people.

How many hours did you put in?

A few hours every weekend. I got this book reviewed by many people, they gave inputs. I had five editors, and they kept improving it. So, in that sense, this book has the benefit of a lot of brains.

Have you had any training in writing, did you like to write as a child?

In a way, right from school I had some talent in writing. I have done a few Op-Ed pieces and columns but this is a different ballgame. Writing a 1,000-word piece is one thing and writing a 180,000-word book is a different thing.

Rasheeda Bhagat

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‘A chance in 5,000 years’