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Journey of India to Development

At the time of independence, India was struggling in economic, social and political

conditions. India had to develop itself in all fronts to give its citizen a respectful life in all the

parameters.

Founding fathers of our nation envisaged a future for India for development. Even to some extent

they might have thought a target (time frame) for achieving that. In all the respect time frame

would not have been more than 50 years. If they were able to see our current progress, they

would definitely astoundingly aghast. After almost 70 years of independence, can we say that we

are on the path which our founding father might have decided for us to follow? Can we give

ourselves any timeline with confidence, in which we can achieve developed status? When we try

to give answers to these basic questions, naturally answers for all queries revolve in our mind

with big NO. Let us analyzewhat went wrong with effort in achieving Tryst with Destiny.

At the time of independence, India was having many problemssocial unrest, politicalinstability, wide spread illiteracy, poverty, hunger. To remove all these problems, future plan had

to be thought out and path had to set. Our nations founding fathers (Leaders) were very capable,

intellectual, and familiar with Indian conditions that they set the right path by taking some of the

steps to laid the foundation to remove all the problems:-

(1) Writing Constitution of India, (2) creating planning commission, (3) accepting mix economic

model with capitalism and socialism elements, (4) following non alignment foreign policy.

Our Constitution, in the world, is more detailed and well researched, and has good

features of other countries Constitutions with modification according to Indian conditions.

Indian Constitution had to tackle many problems of India such as caste discrimination, religious

discrimination, cultural differences, and gender discrimination. It is able to provide government

system for India in which Indians were well versed. It is able to accommodate different cultures

as it is having federal structure for government. It also targeted to remove social division of India

by prohibiting discrimination on the ground of caste, gender, religion and status, so that society

can progress as a whole by developing each individual economically and socially.

Planning commission was able to give direction to India for setting its priorities in proper

order to meet its economic growth according to countrysresources and its capacity. To achieve

proper and efficient use of resources better planning and targets have to be set. Without proper

planning, it is not easy to execute big task. In this background it can be said that task of deciding

resource utilization of a big country, prioritization of project according to need and condition of

country are important to achieve through directed and planned development. Without planning

nobody can analyze whether he is moving in right direction, and he cannot think beyond the

current time frame. So, it can be said that it was indeed wise move to set planning commission to

get rapid and proper growth path.

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In accepting mix economic model, India followed its own and suitable economic policy

according to its condition, which can give it a fast growth. If, suppose India could have chosen

Capitalist economic model that time there would be very minimum control of the state on the

resources. Indian society was really divided and most of the citizens were poor and

discrimination was prevalent on the basis of caste and religion, then in this conditions growth

and advantage of the economic development easily go to the well of society people. People at

lower end, which constituted bulk part, would have been put in dark for coming period in the

future.

If India would have chosen complete social model of economic it is very difficult to say

with firmness whether that would be good or bad. But seeing many examples in the world now

and analyzing Indian condition at the time of independence when state was having very less

resource, it can be inferred that (following socialist economic model) would not have been good

option. We have seen in the world many examples where socialist model get failed. In context

of Indian condition that time, there were chances of rebellion behavior as state had to take hard

steps to implement social model. People who had to lose the control on resources might have

indulged in activities against the state and it could have created instability.

So, we can say it was a wise decision to choose mix economic model, where state control

some of the important resource and private control also had been accommodated to fulfill

individual goals which can help directly in progress of county as whole, keeping in mind of India

condition that time to achieve fast growth utilizing resources from state as well as individual.

By following Non alignment policy, India was able to exert its influence and able to take

its sovereign decision without any influence towards its benefit. India did not align itself with

one group or other on predefined conditions but was able to make friends according to its needand progress of the economy and strategic conditions. It seems that foreign policy does not

directly help in economic progress but if we analyze deeply, can see that to have good growth in

economy in long term, state should able to infuse the feeling in its citizen about it independent

status and at the same time nation can decide in future anything against any option if it does not

suit to its economic and strategic interest.

Even after having these positive conditions, India is not able to achieve the status which

our country founding fathers thought. They would be ashamed of Indias progress with current

status, if they were to see it now. India should have achieved complete development till now. But

still India has been put at the bottom in the list of world countries on the certain parameterswhich are indicator for development such as: - per capita income, health index,

infrastructure, etc.

Reasons of this dismal performance of India on development front can be attributed to

many factors which can be divided broadly as (1) Primary factors such as policy of political

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parties, and not following sprit of Constitution; (2) Secondary factors such as corruption,

system failure, uneducation, unemployment, social unrest, public disorder.

To gain power, political parties, instead of educating people for their growth and

development, started dividing people on the basis of ideological, religious, caste, language and

region. In this way, people have been misguided by parties and when these parties came to powerthey just bother about vote politics. These parties do not care about the development as a whole

of India and they get involve in degraded politics to win confidence of people.

Indian society still remained a stratified and divided society based on caste, religion,

gender, language - despite of being prohibited in the Constitution of India. In other words, people

did not accept sprit of the Constitution. It can be said that one of the main reasons - for not

accepting the constitution, could be less education but still many educated people did not follow

our Constitution in its sprit.

Because of caste prejudice, people are not able to support the holistic development of thecountry and even at some extent against the development of lower caste people which constitute

the 2025 % of the population of India. If that much of population remains poor and

undeveloped then it is not possible for society as a whole to progress and hence it will be a

hindrance to development.

Because of gender prejudice, people are not encouraging education and employment for

women. Women constitute 50% of the population. If 50% of the population of a country remains

at lower level in employment and education, then it will not be able to contribute towards the

economic and social progress of the nation.

Primary factors, political parties policy and people mind set, lead to secondary factors.

Corruption, one of the biggest issues, is responsible for not achieving any improvement on

economic front, public service and people social status. Services for poor people, to empower, do

not reach them because of corruption in system and middle man. People are frustrated with

public service which is not provided without giving bribe or without any contact in the system.

Political parties in power do not bother about reform in system because they have vested interest

and equal beneficiaries in corrupted practices. For example, by not implementing police reform,

police mentality remains of colonial era. Common man, despite of being getting independence

65 years back, sees and feels police with same attitude as it was before independence. In this way

common man in this county are being treated as outsider or third class people by police and it

causes a feeling of alien-ness among people. People are not able to connect themselves with the

country, hence are not able to utilize their capability with maximum effort to achieve progress of

theirs as well as of country.

Law and order situation is being handled according to vested interest of political parties. Bad

condition of law and order, people do not feel safe in the state and this feeling continue to grow

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