The “Bangalore Paradox” and “Shanghaied”
Posted : April 29, 2005 at 10:17 pm [IST]
The ‘Economist’- April 23rd, 2005 has come out with a special report on ‘Outsourcing and IT in India’. I had once made an entry in my blog on Bangalore’s deteriorating infrastructure and my memories of the city. For IT industry, Bangalore has provided an “eco-system” of mutually reinforcing strengths- a wonderful climate, excellent greenery, and cosmopolitan atmosphere, beside the presence of IISc- the institute of national importance and a large number of professional institutions that made it an education capital for the country. It had a number of public and private enterprises-BEL, HAL, HMT, Bharat Fritz Werner, Kirloskar Electric, Mico, Widia and many. It provided an ideal location for the knowledge industry.
I have memories of many conferences that I attended and made my presence felt with my contributions. Some friends were also there to give me nice company in the evening or where I could I enjoy some homely food. I don’t have any information about them and their family members who were very much attached to me.
At one time, I thought Bangalore would grow as the hub of manufacturing sector, particularly for special purpose machine tools, because of a number of ex- HMT people started many enterprises. It didn’t happen because of the government policy.
The report in ‘Economist’ presents some dismal problems of the city with huge increase in population because of its huge IT industry where almost all the top companies of the world have set up their shops. And surprising this deterioration has so quickly been felt after the change of the last chief minister. Though the same party is in chair, but the man is new with his own preferences and priorities for his own image building. Naturally many questions come up in mind. Why can’t some crisis management be in place before the long-term initiatives for decongestion get executed? Why can’t the dispute with contractor building the flyover near airport be sorted out in a day’s time and the project of flyover be completed fast in next 2-3 months? Why can’t the center and Mr. Manmohan Singh or Mr. Chidambaram take up the problem as something of a great concern for the nation as it is having a damaging effect on the image of India’s capability of problem solving? Why should the impertinence and inefficiency of the present CM and his minister be tolerated by the party high command- Shrimati Sonia Gandhi, even after so much of a hue and cry in press? Can India afford to miss the IT bus (or in Jagdish Bhagawati’s word- the ‘Concorde’) too as it did in the case of the manufacturing?
And now let see how China is depicted in the feature- “Shanghaied”.
McKinsey expects China, already the world’s fourth largest car market with sales of 2.3 million in 2004 to overtake Germany this year and Japan by 2010. … In total, foreign car firms and the local joint-ventures partners plan to invest $15 billion to triple output to over 7 million cars by 2008.
Unfortunately, India is not setting any benchmark for its growth. And the government, administration, and the people are content as a real Hindu nation (Santosh hi Param Dharam) and happy with whatever growth it attains as a consequence.
PS And to add to my agony, I had to go through this news that appeared today in New York Times.
- Indra
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