‘The Economist’ needs to grow up…

‘The Economist’ is probably the best English language weekly in the world. The 165 years old British publication has evolved as one of the most comprehensive reporter of the world news. Yet, when it comes to India, the old and annoying ‘Colonial Hang-over’ is all too evident. Just read the article, “Overconfident India”, published on July 9, 2008. The writer (never identified) makes an unnecessary statement like “In a country with massive energy needs, and pretensions to global-power status, that would be momentous.” People at ‘The Economist’ must understand that Indians think of the English like the bad old tenants who were evicted 60 years back, but left some sub-tenants behind. Considering it’s size and potential, India is rather too restrained and modest. The Modern India is only 15 years old. It grew from $250 billion economy in 1992 to a comfortable $1 trillion player in 2007. If the English opinion makers are feeling left-out at this stage, wait for another 15 years and they would feel like only spectators on the world stage. The English must learn to live with reality.

Unlike China, India is not just a country, it is a civilization. The world has seen and accepted the Yoga movement, the ‘Indian Cuisine’ and in some cases ‘Indian Classical Music’. That was traditional India. What the world is going to see and experience is the ‘Indian Fashion’, the ‘Bollywood Dancing’, the ‘Indian Cricket’, the ‘Indian Institutes of Higher Education’ and of course the ‘India Inc.’, to say the least. The ‘Indian Soft-Power’ is in play. The ‘Indian Diplomacy’, the ‘Indian Media’, the ‘Indian Information Technology’, the ‘Indian Design’ and the ‘Indian Technology’ are some of the areas the world is about to experience in a profound way. China is growing like the erstwhile ‘Soviet Union’ whereas India is developing like the next ‘United States of India’. Indians do not defend India as the Chinese do their country. China is organized and India is chaotic, but India is free and China is not. What would you rather have? The world in general, and the English in particular, must accept the changing world and enjoy the ‘New World Order’.

America and India are natural allies. This is not a cliché, but a fact of life. No two countries are similar, politically or otherwise. The United States is developing as a multi-cultural society in all 50 states. Similarly, India is engaged in all it’s 35 states and the union territories. India is multilingual and America is becoming bi-lingual. US national security interests are converging with India, not China or Europe. Nobody understands this better than President George W Bush and that is why he has spent so much of his political capital on the Indo-US Nuclear deal. The Economist better understand this and stop pretending otherwise, America, Europe, Japan and Russia need this deal more than India. This is a $50 billion windfall for all these countries and not the other way round. India can live without the nuclear fuel and the technology for many more years and keep burning dirty coal as usual. It is the fear of ‘Global Warming’ and the environment that has pushed the western world to offer such a deal to India, not to mention the energy crisis. For The Economist to frame the debate otherwise is intellectually dishonest and pretentious.