Planning for a VUCA World?

VUCA had become part of our lexicon for quite some time, but Covid has brought it to the realisation that the world has truly become volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous. In this context, the National response mechanism for short term crisis management, as well as long term strategy formulation, is under scrutiny across the globe. The traditional sequence of problem formulation, detailed planning and bureaucratic way of implementing the steps was put to test, and it failed miserably during the pandemic. What worked though, can be termed as Agile model, where a corridor with feedback based course correction mechanism is the target instead of a rigid set goal.

Indian Economy has shown strong resilience and has bounced back from the crisis of COVID-19, yet the recovery has not been uniform across all sectors of the economy and definitely not across demographics. Various courses have been completed without even meeting teachers, trainers, peer groups, research target groups etc. Poor families who have lost a working member are going to need help from younger members, esp. young girl child to take care of chores at the cost of going to school.

To add to the micro-economic level issues, the pandemic induced shifts in technology, supply-chain dynamics, and generic consumption pattern changes are increasing the uncertainty.

What is of help though is the feasibility of real-time or near real-time feedback mechanism using the latest tech developments. This is where the emphasis on reinforcing the digital economy is critical as done in Budget 2022. Starting from Digital University to ease the learning of basic skills to advanced technologies, to the concept of using satellites to ascertain the extent of rural vs urban inhabitants, agri vs other usage of the land, environmental impact of infrastructure development and other activities, almost an end-to-end use cases have been identified for deeper engagement of citizenry. An important aspect is to keep a learning attitude and positive mindset to encourage one and all to strive for a better future.

 

Inheritance from Constituent Assembly

Inheritance is the thread of human civilisation. After World War II, Indians inherited an independent country and a dream to tryst with destiny on the policies and principles of democracy, justice, liberty, equality and fraternity. Proof that these values worked was demonstrated by this young nation in combating the Emergency in late 70s. As digital-natives are getting ready to take succession of New India, fundamental duties need to be put at the center of debates and discussions.

On the eve of 73rd Republic Day, Honourable President in his address to the nation said, “….We are immensely fortunate that the Constituent Assembly which prepared the document included some of the best minds of their generation. They were the leading lights of our great Freedom Struggle…While the text of the Constitution, dealing with the details of the workings of the State, is quite long, the Preamble sums up its guiding principles – Democracy, Justice, Liberty, Equality and Fraternity. They form the bedrock on which our Republic stands. These are the values that form our collective inheritance. These values have been accorded primacy in our Constitution in the form of Fundamental Rights and Fundamental Duties of the citizens. Rights and duties are two sides of the same coin. The observance of the Fundamental Duties mentioned in the Constitution by the citizens creates the proper environment for enjoyment of Fundamental Rights…”

As the records of Constituent Assembly deliberations show, the present Constitution was supposed to be overhauled within a couple of decades of its enactment. Perhaps among the responsibilities for younger generations to fulfill, getting to know the constitution first hand is the most urgent one. Occasions like Republic Day need to be utilised by schools, colleges, Government bodies, enterprises, NGOs alike to encourage youngsters to engage in understanding democracy. Indian democracy is a beacon of hope for a divided, scared and suspicious world. This complex society has transcended caste, religion, region, gender and race in adopting democracy. Gen Z and Gen Alpha Indians need to know the proud inheritance they have. Further, genuine understanding needs to be developed regarding points made by the critics, that Indian Constitution has fundamentally ignored the cultural robustness as well as village level structures in its formulation of policies of governance.

 

Freedom of History

“Every Indian, no matter where he may be living at the present time, has a duty towards this country…” These words of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose inspired the diaspora to raise 50,000+ strong Azad Hind Fauz. More than half sacrificed their life for the country, many say that history has not done enough to aptly remember their contribution to the country’s freedom. Netaji’s birth anniversary is celebrated as Parakram Divas and Prime Minister Narendra Modi rightly said that, “Every Indian is proud of his monumental contribution to our nation”. 

Post colonial history has been rewritten across the world, India’s position has been peculiar though. Rewriting has been both process and product, and is often associated with the theoretical approach toward the study of postcolonial literatures suggested by Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths, and Helen Tiffin in their seminal work “The Empire Writes Back: Theory and Practice in Post-Colonial Literatures” (1989). World over the post colonial rewriting has mainly been about canonical literature where the writer is seen as belonging to a culture on the margins of the imperial center, and the content is viewed as a western cultural production. The writers having completely adopted the colonial education system, pay homage to their western masters as well as attempt to refute their assumptions. India, though having very rich heritage of original texts of all kinds, seems to have followed the similar methodology so far as other parts of the world. Perhaps, the rewriting needs to happen again by completely abandoning the colonial overhang. A caution many countries have started to take.

The book “Promises to Keep” talks about extraordinary feat of Indian slaves on the Island nation of Mauritius where “The Bissoondoyal movement was breathtaking in what is encompassed in relation to the very limited resources that it had: it embraced social reform, political, economic and social emancipation, cultural revival and education both of the individual and of the people.” Yet, the author says it is not to be seen as a work of history.

Another important factor in rewriting biases is induced by the colonial mindset of normative and source-oriented mindset. The official versions of history that exist in the colonial archives often do not account for the versions of the victims of history, including women and natives. This has been the main issue in South Africa, where a Britisher by the name of Guy Butler played a key role in establishing the National English Literary Museum (NELM) and a reports says, “Given this indication of the inherent ideological power of the archive, and given that in previously colonized countries colonial rule was often asserted through assiduous record keeping, it becomes necessary to investigate critically the action of founding, adding to, or engaging with ‘archive’ in the way that Butler was consciously doing in the 1970s.”

On the 125th birth anniversary, questions regarding Netaji’s end days, whether they were in Taiwan or Siberia, are being asked again, and archives of India, Taiwan, Japan, UK, America and Russia need to be cautiously explored to find out the truth.

 

Indian Management under scanner

Indian ethos of “Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam” ( world is a family) and “Janani Janmabhumischa Svargadapi gariyasi” ( mother and motherland rank higher than heaven) complement rather than compete any leader’s world vision, whether it is business, politics, sociology, governance or any other domain. Vivekananda is said to have inspired JRD Tata to produce indigenously rather than going for easy imports. Further, he is said to have been the inspiration behind starting IIS (Indian Institute of Sciences) at Bangalore, the premiere research body in the country today. Modern Management Schools work with the concept of Globalisation as one fundamental tenet. Yet they are not upto the vision of Swamiji when he said, “Even in politics and sociology, problems that were only national twenty years ago can no more be solved on national grounds only. They are assuming huge proportions, gigantic shapes. They can only be solved when looked at, in the broader light of international rounds.”

In this background Yale University’s news publications that “Lack of managers keeps India’s businesses small” requires a careful look at their approach and understanding of the situation. It says, “The study, published in the American Economic Review, uses a novel model to compare the relationship between the efficiency of outside managers and firm growth in the United States and India. It shows that the lack of managerial delegation factors significantly into why businesses in India tend to stay small and has wider implications on the country’s economy, constraining innovation, economic growth, and per capita income.” It further says that “The researchers found that India’s economy suffers from “a lack of selection” — the process of creative destruction through which successful businesses expand while unproductive firms close or are swallowed up by competitors — allowing unproductive businesses to survive because successful businesses do not expand.“

Perhaps there is some merit in this argument if one looks at India which supports positive discrimination, but like reservation, these factors have complex historic as well as present day nuances. In his book “Cast as a social capital”, Finance Prof R. Vaidyanathan develops certain themes on ‘caste and entrepreneurship’ and argues that support comes from caste groups acting as social capital. Entrepreneurs hailing from particular castes like Gounders, Marwaris, Chettiars, etc. set up businesses with caste members as workers and funding source. Hence, capital constraints seem to be a more pressing issue than accepting unproductive managerial skills.

On the other hand, Indians are increasingly occupying top positions for most of the well run US Tech, Financial and other companies. It is said however that taking up American Citizenship is must for any foreigner before he or she is allowed to occupy top position in any of the US firms.

Perhaps this analysis would have focussed more on capital availability as a principal component to remain closer to reality in India. As the USA needs top brains from India and the rest of the world to keep the economy vibrant and growing, Indian businesses need capital to unshackle through various constraints and thrive globally. Saying this, with exponential increase in the number of Unicorns in India, clearly points out that an appropriate business environment is available now here under leadership of PM Modi and India is on its way to excellence.

 

Exploring Online Elections

India has certainly risen to the occasion and perhaps, even to the pole position in adopting the digital age. Since the launch of ‘Digital India’ and due to the continued focus of Prime Minister Narendra Modi on using technology to solve mammoth problems, India has been able to achieve some remarkable feats. More than 1 billion secured and useful identity provider, Aadhar Card, UPI transactions (record 3,874 crore transactions in 2021), more than 150 crore COVID vaccine doses administered using COWIN platform, showcase India’s prowess in digital and online world. This is, perhaps, a natural extension of this would be an online voting system in the world’s biggest democracy which is also endowed with a very young population.

Since the onset of Covid pandemic, the need to think of ways to hold activities that involve mass gathering differently is of paramount importance. Online polling, which has for so long just been talked about and possibilities of the right conduction of which have been discussed in pre-COVID time only too vaguely, has attained all the relevance and priority in the new-normal era. One encouraging example of success of experimenting online voting is the country of Estonia which held its and world’s first national Internet election, back in 2007, when a total of 30,275 citizens used the Internet to cast their vote. The popularity of online voting has gained a lot of momentum in Estonia, as in its 2019 parliamentary elections too, 43.75% of all participating voters voted via the Internet.

A country as densely populated and as largely diversified as India, could run the world’s largest vaccination drive with inspirational efficiency. This ability betokens India’s converged technological, cyber and digital furtherance. Additionally, the way the Aadhar project has been finished and being administratively maintained in the country, shows that with the right planning, the country can undertake tedious manual projects. Technologically, thus, India now seems to have reached a level where it can take a lead and think of developing a world-class Online Voting setup.

India has been one of the fortunate nations, where landline telephones have had a fleeting existence due to their direct leap to mobile phones, saving it a great deal of infrastructure cost, time and cutting the technological lag. Mobile adoption has aggressively contributed to the country’s digital progress. So much so that in 2019, over 73% of India’s total web traffic is said to have come from mobile phones. Internet penetration rate in India went up to nearly around 45 percent in 2021, from just about four percent in 2007. This advancement combined with Blockchain technology may become a global solution, unlocking a door to not just online elections, but also for creating secured global virtual fora, networking channels, cyber collaborations, and other unlimited spaces. Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora had recently affirmed that the Election Commission of India is working with IIT-Madras on using Blockchain Technology for remote voting and considerable development in that direction is expected by 2024 General Elections.

Given India’s rich history of being among the first nations to adopt major democratic shifts, whether it was the concept of universal adult franchise or introduction of EVMs, India may want to thus start experimenting in the domain of online voting too. It may start with letting Army staff and Election officers on duty itself to go online. Another set of testing may be performed during by-elections which are less tangled.

With digital voting, the existence of postal ballots may meet the same fate as landlines. With the success of the COWIN app that has been able to manage massive registrations (96,77,24,432 as on 10th January, 2022), record-keeping and rolling out the vaccination drive in the country, India has cracked a code for development, implementation and sustainability of technology. A similar technological platform for online voting may cater to not just voters within India, especially the working population, but also come as a cherished solution for NRI voters.

 

Decisive Decade of Growth

Atmanirbhar Bharat is shaping up as a mass movement in a similar manner to Namak Satyagraha. This clarion call from PM Narendra Modi backed by reformist attitude towards Governance has put India on a path of Decisive Decade of Growth in 2020s (DDG). Sabka Prayas is becoming the operative word towards employment and wealth generation by start-ups across the country. Achieving saturation i.e. covering 100% of population is the new mantra of the Government, which is also playing pivotal role for supporting start-up mindset. On 75th Independence Day, PM Modi had said, “Just as we have made electricity accessible to 100% households, and have made authentic efforts to construct toilets in 100% households …Now, we have to move even further. 100% villages should have roads, 100% households should have a bank account, 100% beneficiaries should have Ayushman Bharat card, 100% eligible persons should have gas connection under Ujjwala scheme and 100% beneficiaries should have Aawas…”

PM Modi had promised, “Our priority will be to ensure that the services reach the last person seamlessly. For the all-round development of the nation, it is essential to end the unnecessary interference of govt and government procedures in the lives of people.” In spite of continued hindrances to legislative work of Parliament, ease of doing business has remained key delivery domain of Modi government. Not less than 1500 old and obsolete laws have been repealed since 2014. Now, India has emerged as world’s 3rd largest start-up ecosystem with around 61,000 start-ups recognised by DPIIT. Though these are clustered around Bengaluru, Delhi and Mumbai, the spread is across 600+ districts of the country. Number of investors has grown 9 fold, total funding amount as well as available incubators have grown 7 fold. These are indeed exponential growth parameters.

Year 2022 of this Decisive Decade of Growth is all set to build upon the recent success. While China was slated to win growth story in 2021, India’s resilience is on display in combating devastating second wave and emerging as the fastest growing major economy globally in 2021. Building on the mantra of Atmanirbhar Bharat, India has added 44 unicorns in 2021 alone, bringing the total number to 81. This exponentially growing number of unicorns is not only backing innovative solutions but also large scale deployments.