In a useful and comprehensive restatement of India’s core values, principles, interests and desires, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh enunciated what may be regarded as the ‘six principles’ of India’s ‘new phase of development’. To quote Dr Singh at length, the six principles are: “First, India seeks rapid economic growth that will create wealth for our people and also generate surpluses to fund our ambitious social development programmes, particularly in the areas of health, education and environment protection; second, we seek growth that creates employment and development that is socially and regionally balanced and inclusive; third, we seek to build a modern, knowledge and science-based economy to complement our agricultural and industrial base; fourth, we want our development to be sustainable so that the wealth of our natural resources is conserved for future generations as a matter of trust; fifth, we seek a cooperative relationship with our neighbours and other partners so that we can prosper and benefit from one another’s development; finally, India seeks to realise its development ambitions within the framework of a plural and secular democracy, where each citizen should have equal opportunity for economic, social and cultural advancement.”
Most of these ideas are in fact drawn from the values and objectives that define the Indian Constitution. Yet, for many it would seem strange that we need a renewal of national support for these principles. Consider each one of them. The idea that rapid economic growth is necessary to generate the required savings, investible surpluses and revenues to fund more generously social development and welfare programmes appears obvious, and constitutes the basis of the old Indira Gandhi slogan — “growth with social justice” — that informed the plan strategies of the 1970s, and yet many today question growthmanship and focus only on distributional issues. Second, the idea that growth has to be regionally and socially balanced and must focus on employment generation is not always readily incorporated into development policies and macro-economic planning. Indeed, if these ideas had in fact shaped policy the persistent regional and social inequalities of the past century would have disappeared and India would not have had the phenomenon of jobless growth. Third, the importance of building a science- and knowledge-based industrial and agricultural economy may sound obvious and yet it can be asked: How much importance has India given to either objective? Productivity in Indian agriculture has stagnated for over a decade, contributing to a crisis in agriculture, and India continues to lag behind China and other newly industrialising economies of Asia as far as the technological sophistication of its manufacturing and infrastructure sectors are concerned. Few will disagree with the fourth objective about ensuring the sustainability of growth, but deep political divisions on what must be done are all too obvious even within the ruling party.
The last objective is certainly not shared by all political groups within the country, even if it states the basic objectives of the Constitution. For this reason alone, its reiteration and the securing of a national consensus is important. The fifth objective is not just about foreign policy, it is about domestic politics too. How India relates to its neighbours is a function of how India views its role in Asia and the world. On this too there is a need for a wider national consensus if India has to move forward and make full use of the new opportunities a changing world is beginning to offer. In short, Dr Singh's Malaysia musings are worth pondering over.