'Four lessons from The Big Picture'

Through all the ups and downs in the face of global challenges and despite the burden of past policy mistakes, our economy is on a rising growth trajectory. This is the first lesson I draw from stepping back and looking at The Emerging Big Picture.

However, economic growth, social change and political empowerment have brought in their wake the new aspirations of an entirely new generation of Indians. This has contributed to growing impatience for faster growth and even better quality of life. These aspirations and ambitions are exerting pressures on governments to deliver more, perform better and be more transparent and more efficient. A "Revolution of Rising Expectations" is underway.
 

What is truly significant though, if one steps back and looks at the big picture, is that our democratic political system has been responsive to these expectations. Governments have been elected and re-elected in every state of our republic through peaceful, fair and efficiently-organised elections within the context of an India that is changing faster than ever before.

Once in a while, public anger may spill over onto our streets and into the media, but India's "silent majority" exercises its franchise in legitimate democratic ways to secure and change.

Over the past two years, some well-meaning and concerned citizens have tried to spread cynicism by accusing the entire political class of being corrupt and anti-people. Many began to suggest that the democracy had not served India well. They attacked the institution of Parliament by refusing to respect Parliament's judgment. Did that turn our people against democracy? Did that make them despair about the electoral system? No. Look at the voter turnout at every election over the past two years and in the just concluded Assembly elections. Even in the face of churning ambitions and rising expectations, the people of our country choose to vote and secure change through democratic means. This is the second important lesson I draw when I look at the Big Picture.

Faced with the challenge of meeting the rising aspirations of our people and of ensuring the political sustainability of high growth, we defined a new strategy of growth that is widely termed as "inclusive growth". Making our growth processes socially and regionally inclusive has been the touchstone of our government's policies. Our strategy of inclusive growth has six elements:

First is what I have often called "A new deal for rural India" - investment in rural development, rural infrastructure - especially roads and electricity - rural health and education and remunerative prices for rural produce. We called this "Bharat Nirman".

Second, increased public and private investment in education and health care, with a focus on the education and health of young girls and young women.

Third, livelihood, food and energy security for the poor.

Fourth, a more transparent and responsive government made answerable to people through the Right to Information.

Fifth, investment in skills and support for private enterprise, especially small and micro enterprises.

And sixth, public investment in public transport, especially urban mass transportation.

Taken together, these interventions have made our growth processes more socially inclusive. I cannot deny that there remain many challenges and problems, and weaknesses in implementation. Our biggest challenge in trying to sustain this process of inclusive growth has been to bring rates of inflation down and keep the fiscal deficit under control. These remain a challenge and I admit that they are being seriously addressed.

Any sudden acceleration of growth, as we saw in the period 2004-08, creates imbalances that can contribute to inflation. Such growth can also create opportunities for personal enrichment and that distorts governance and creates social resentment. Rising economic growth has helped to liberate millions of Indians from chronic poverty, reducing the incidence of poverty, but it has also widened social and economic inequalities. Our strategy of inclusive growth has sought to blunt the edge of such disparities.

This is the third lesson I draw from looking at The Big Picture.

Let me now examine The Big Picture with respect to national security and international affairs. The media, quite understandably, report on events as they occur. Any lapse on the part of security forces and the intelligence and law and order machinery comes in for understandable criticism. We have been victims of premeditated acts of terror and each time terrorists attack us, there is widespread anger and despair.

In considering the Big Picture, I urge you to keep two things in mind. One, a terrorist has to succeed only once to cause pain to the innocent people, while the security forces have to succeed every minute of every day to prevent such terror attacks. By this yardstick, we must appreciate the dedication and commitment of our security forces and intelligence agencies in preventing many, many more attacks.

More importantly, I have always viewed the challenge of terrorism in India as one of preventing the ideologues of terrorism from creating divisions among the people of our great country and pitting one Indian against another. The objective of a terror attack is not just to kill innocent people. It is not just to create fear, but, in fact, to cause hate. It is to use such killing to create mutual distrust between people of different faiths. Creating communal tension, communal conflict and communal divisions in India is the ultimate objective of terrorism. Every time the people of our country respond to terror attacks as one people, as Indians, and not as Hindus or Muslims or Sikhs or Christians, we defeat the forces of terrorism. We challenge the ideology that feeds terrorism.

If we only look at the number of terror attacks on India in quantitative terms, we may feel despondent. However, if we consider the fact that, over the past decade, such acts of terrorism have failed to generate communal conflict, we feel more hopeful. Terrorism is being defeated in the minds of our people because they are refusing to respond to such attacks in the manner in which the ideologues of terror want them to.

This is the fourth lesson I draw from The Big Picture view of contemporary India.

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Edited excerpts from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's address to the Hindustan Times Leadership Summit, December 6, 2013 in New Delhi