A New India Is Emerging
After the thousand-year long hiatus of foreign rule and period of slavery are we heading back to a period of excellence and glory? Indications in multiple fields seem to suggest so...
"Seventy-five years have passed since independence, and today with this New Year we Indians are once again getting back a part of our old glory. We are moving up at a fast pace, though we still have to cover a long distance."
Let’s analyse our achievements before facing the New Year 2023. The important thing while celebrating the advent of the New Year is to introspect-to find out what is new for us and our country? In ancient times our country, Bharat, was considered the golden bird of the world. We were so rich that we were envied not only for our wealth, but also because we excelled in all important fields of learning and we considered the world as one family. Students from all over the world used to come to our great universities like Nalanda, Taxila and Vikramshila. We had established ourselves as the ‘Vishwaguru’.
Then came the end of all the glitter when we became a slave country of foreign conquerors for about a thousand years. This period of darkness ended on 15th August 1947, when we emerged as an independent country - India. Seventy-five years have passed since independence, and today with this New Year we Indians are once again getting back a part of our old glory. We are moving up at a fast pace, though we still have to cover a long distance.
Fresh breeze
To feel the fresh breeze of newness about India, let us see a few excerpts from the speeches of our foreign minister, S Jaishankar:
- “Why should we step up to what the West wants? We will step up to what we want.”
- “Those aiding PAK in the 1971 war, expected Bharat to betray its interests.”
- “Those who don’t even endorse India’s map, want us to have identical positions on the Russia-Ukraine war.”
And this is the new India: Bharat First!
The year has started with India’s G-20 presidency with the baton being passed on to us on 1st December 2022. It is a big responsibility with bigger ambitions. Our Prime Minister has been heralded by various global entities as the most popular global leader and he has said that India’s G20 presidency will work to promote the Universal sense of oneness. Hence our theme - One Earth-One Family-One Future. We are one, but the facts remain that our words are heard by the world, and respected. India is on the path to lead the world to peace, and away from wars.
New image
The new India can be viewed from the happenings in almost all the important sectors, which give India a new image. It is not only with things happening, but the very basic, and that is the change in our attitude. We no longer feel that we have to depend on some powerful country for our needs. We can now safely depend on ourselves and can even help others. We no longer consider the big population of about 135 crores a liability, instead we consider it our strength. The sizable proportion of youth in our population, further gives us a demographic dividend. We consider our strength in the relatively young India and that is reflected in our new attitude. The changed attitude is in our dealings with other countries, however rich and powerful they may be. We talk to them eyeball to eyeball, without looking up or down.
Reverting back to the new visibilities in the important sectors, India has emerged as the fastest growing major economy in the world. We are on track to achieve 7% GDP growth for FY 2022-23. The real statistics are much higher than that of the major economies like US, EU countries and even China. This feat by India has been really remarkable even after overcoming the immense havoc created by Corona.
"India has emerged as the fastest growing major economy in the world. We are on track to achieve 7% GDP growth for FY 2022-23. The real statistics are much higher than that of the major economies like US, EU countries and even China. This feat by India has been really remarkable even after overcoming the immense havoc created by Corona."
Global worries
The Russia and Ukraine war which is going on for over ten months has virtually crippled the global economy. There is the growing evil of high inflation in most countries due to the war bringing them to the brink of recession. And even in this situation, India remains a shining star. Our inflation is just marginally higher than the threshold limit of 6%, when US inflation is at its highest, not seen in the last 40 years. Similar is the situation in Europe. Big US companies are laying off employees in bulk, but Indian companies are not doing that. The composite results of the green shoots for India is that now it is the 5th largest economy in the world and as per think-tanks, it will be the 3rd largest economy by the year 2027 if the present trends continue. Amongst the top richest persons in the world, India holds two high spots: in the 3rd spot is Gautam Adani and in the 8th spot is Mukesh Ambani.
Proven prowess
In the defence sector, both our men and machines have excelled themselves. The country evolved the principle that an international border can be respected only till we are not harmed from across the border. We replied the Uri incursion from Pakistan by sending our jawans across the border in PoK. They successfully dismantled many terrorist camps and even neutralised some of the terrorists in these camps before safely returning back. Similarly, Pulwama terror attack by Pakistan, when 40 of our soldiers died, was responded to by our Balakot air strike deep in Pakistan. We dismantled a big terror training camp and it is believed that about 300 Pakistani terrorists were killed. All our aircraft came back safely after the mission. In Galwan valley in Ladakh, we showed our brute force to Chinese when 20 of our soldiers were martyred before killing about 50 Chinese soldiers with bare hands. The Chinese intruders learnt their lesson.
None of the other countries spoke against India on our encounters with Pakistan and China and this spoke about our international relations. India has been traditionally the biggest arms importer but now we have also turned into becoming an arms exporter. Our HAL and BHEL come in the list of 100 top arms exporter companies of the world as per a Swedish survey. Our aircraft and Brahmos missiles are in great demand.
In the field of international relationships, India has achieved a unique position. India is an old friend of Russia and that relationship is continuing even today but it is also respected by the US. India purchased S-400 missiles from Russia despite the existing regulations from the US. India does not fall in the US-Europe group going against Russia in the present Russia-Ukraine war, but continues to remain a strategic ally of the US. India is purchasing oil from Russia at an almost 30% discount. Despite sanctions against such purchases India has escaped unscathed.
Friend to all, enemy to none
There is global respect for India, as the world knows that India is a friend in need and enemy to none. Even traditional enemies like Pakistan and China know that India will not harm them, unless they harm India. During Corona, India supplied its self-manufactured vaccines to needy countries and even WHO appreciated India for that. India is not expansionist, but its foreign policy is based on the stand of ‘India First’ while also helping the global society.
In the field of International trade, India has decided to be an important player in the global supply- chain. Manufacturing hubs are being created and some important companies like Apple have also partly shifted their base from China. India has also decided to be self-reliant and the policy of “Atma Nirbhar Bharat’ has been announced. The indigenously manufactured aircraft carrier ‘INS Vikrant’ is a proud example of that. Many important armaments are being manufactured in India and for that the private sector has been opened up. The world is also looking at India for its export of food grains, particularly due to the shortage caused by the Russia-Ukraine war.
IT might
India has excelled and so have Indians in the service sector. We have been doing good in the IT field and in our software creations and their export for some time now. Roughly about 50% of our GDP also comes from this field. Indians have also excelled in research and innovation, which hitherto were not our domain of expertise. Innovators in India are also turning into entrepreneurs.
India has emerged as the 3rd largest ecosystem for start-ups globally, with over 77,000 DPIT-recognised start-ups. The number of Unicorns alone has risen to 107. These unicorns have raised an investment of over $94 billion, and valued at around $344 billion. Our innovators have even entered the space sector and have developed launch vehicles of rockets in the name of ‘Vikram-S’. This feat was achieved by Skyroot Aerospace for the first time. The first flight was on 18th November 2022.
Covid revelation
During the Covid pandemic, the new India and its new innovative Indians showed the world that very effective vaccines could be developed and manufactured in a short time. We started without adequate infrastructure but we could still vaccinate our huge population and succeed in fighting the pandemic.
Buddha had said, “No matter how hard the past is, you can always begin again.” India and we Indians know that we had a very bad time for almost a thousand years when we were slaves. Although no one can go back, one can start anew and we have made that start.
‘The first step towards getting somewhere is to decide that you are not going to stay where you are,’ said J.P. Morgan. We have moved, and we are moving fast. We will make India great again.