Engaging India of 21st Century

This week, some students from the famous Harvard Business School arrived in India to have a first-hand experience to the world's second largest growing economy. The visit was a part of the academic program sponsored by the HBS. Its aim was to imbibe an understanding among the students about India in the hope of understanding the opportunities available in this part of the world.

India, the biggest country in South Asia, has been performing well in its efforts to push its economic growth. Having opened its market to the international players in the early 90s, it is now harvesting this brave decision to move from a previously closed market policy adopted by India ever since it got independence. In the globalized world of today, such a closed policy would certainly curtailed the capability of any nation to compete in the international market. However, this approached of relying on its own capability to survive the waves of globalization has been an important key to where India now. India has been enjoying a strong economic growth of 7-8 % for the past few years and from this year onward, the current government in New Delhi has decided to keep the pace of its growth into above 10-12 % in order to keep up the pace with its giant neighbour, China, which has been enjoying a much suprior economic strength as compared to India and to be able to join the league of developed nation by 2020. This decision to raise the bar of India's economic growth has been issued in a statement by the Indian President, A.P.J. Abdul Kalam recently.

To achieve the targeted growth, the President has given his vision for a vibrant India and identified a five-point roadmap: agriculture and food processing, reliable and quality infrastucture, education and healthcare, infomation and communication techonology and development of strategic sector. According to the President, these areas are closely inter-related and if properly implemented, they will lead to the enomic and security needs of the country.

Thus, having experimented a first-hand experience about India and realized the steady economic growth as well as the opportunities it has created, the students from the HBS understood that the common perception among Americans on off-shoring programs by the American companies to India and other parts of the world is wrong. It was commonly percieved among the American workeres that the off-shoring program, much of which has been off-shored to the Indian workers, is reducing the employement opportunity in America thus rising the graphic of unemployment. They believe that the program is a correct approach to the growing phenomena in the international world and need not to be stopped but instead, they expected that the American government realized this golden opportunity and work hard for the benefit of its people.