A day at Wharton

Last Saturday, I had the opportunity to go to Wharton to attend the 17th Indian Economic Forum. The speakers for the day were big names from various spheres that drive the Indian economy - Politics,Healthcare, Education, Infrastructure and Media( in the order of how they should be ). I was very keen on listening to each of these speakers and what ideas they have to shape our tomorrow. The first session was Arvind Kejriwal's. He spoke with passion. He had ideas. Not sure if those ideas are going to work. A political circus that India is today, where most of the show is run by animals and jokers trained to wiggle and act at the swish of a whip...having ideas and a futuristic thought is commendable enough. A chunk of the audience felt his ideas are just vaporware and might not address the problems to be tackled. I am not too sure about this. Being part of the race that mocked the Wright Bros when they said they would make flying a reality, I am not too worried. I'd rather let the misanthropic feeling gracefully sink in. Kejriwal spoke of how his party would function like a corporate( in terms of efficiency, not motives) and how measures would be taken to address some critical problems at the grassroots level. For one, no one has tried to take this level of granularity in addressing an issue. And if they were to work as planned, I'd look at them as harbingers of change and development. Whether Kejriwal would be able to survive the alligators of corruption-drenched politicians and dynasty leaders as he swims through a pseudo democratic India, remains to be seen. We have waited all along choosing between the devil and the deep blue sea. I wouldn't mind waiting for this.

The next session was Montek Singh Ahluwalia's, the deputy chairman of the Planning Commission of India. An Oxford grad he is, he was good with this speech. But I felt his goodness stopped with the choice of vocabulary. He didn't really explain why India is performing poorly compared to the other countries. He didn't really have a solution for the future. There are 2 types of planning that one can do. 'Plan today for today' and 'Plan today for tomorrow'. Then there was his, 'Plan today for yesterday'. What I mean here is, he seems to be someone who takes remedial plans than trying to do things upfront. I call this, 'Pizza Planning', where you can just work for a Margherita and then add the required toppings towards the end and still getaway with it. Might taste good, but good for health? Maybe not. What I am asking for here is a home cooked meal. He is after all , the chef of the planning kitchen and I'd expect him to know this.

Keeping up with the food topic, the next session was lunch! Was decent. Pasta, wraps, brownies and juice. Need I say more?. The session to follow was on Private Equity and Venture Capitalism. This is when I started to realize I was in Wharton, but I wasn't in Wharton yet! I stepped out for a walk rather than force myself to google every word of what they spoke. This turned out to be interesting. I saw several police officers lined up at the gate. Turns out, there were a group of protesters outside the building voicing against the decision of the Forum to un-invite Narendra Modi for the conference. The protest was a surprise to everyone out there,even the cops. The protest was done in Gandhigiri style, distributing hot gujarati food packed in lunch boxes! I accepted the box with a grin and started to "venture" into everything that was in it. My own version of venture capitalism.

The next session was on Women empowerment and Shabana Azmi just had to be there. The talk was good and this is a no-brainer. Women empowerment is very essential to our nation and we should do whatever it takes to root out female foeticide/infanticide, dowry and differential treatment. No country can be called developed, unless Women have equal opportunities. Gender has no role in dichotomizing rights. From what I hear and see, I think its getting better each day. So, let's keep up with that.

The next couple of sessions to follow were on Healthcare, Education and Infrastructure. Not all aspects were touched. But the ones that were debated, I feel the panel did justice. Healthcare is the backbone of any country. Our problems are complex. We have multiple problem statements. We need to transition from paper records to electronic health network on one end, and we need to first make healthcare accessible to 57% rural India on the other. We need to promote and boast about medical tourism that's been on the rise over the last few years and we need to tackle the high rates of malnourishment among rural children. We might have to do this together, each of us taking different goals and meeting them. This should be the way to go for the future. Education - Things that I learn, I want to know why and how, not what, when and where. We need to prepare our societies to encourage children to follow their passion and this could become a reality only when all the avenues have enough job opportunities. In other words, we need to become a 'Hobby friendly' job market, where people could pursue jobs in the field they have always loved. Infrastructure - Can you please stop building makeshift flyovers and save us the embarrassment from other nations as it breaks down? Can you help me get home quicker and less stressful so that I have better time to spend with family? Open questions, answers lie somewhere.

The last session of the day was Media. Javed Akhtar, Shabana Azmi and Boman Irani on the dais. Was entertaining and had the biggest audience. Shows how much people love them and how much responsible they should be, as an instrument of Indian democracy. They debated films and journalism. Nothing can be perfect. But I feel we are in fact coming with good films these days. No point in going brouhaha over the bikini scene in a movie or a bad song lyric. Not a utopian world. Let's look at it as a choice basket and we are free to pick ours. Journalism has two sides again. I am seeing liability and accountability on the rise with news channels questioning more and more. But on the other hand, we need to stop having Aishwarya Rai's pregnancy as a flashing news headline. We also need to stop being stupid in live telecasting police operations( 26/11) and think about the nation before channel TRPs.

Healthcare, Education, Infrastructure and Social Health are the key pillars that will shape our future. We need to plan to orchestrate these instruments well and create a wonderful song, that is India!All these seem to be pieces of a giant jigsaw puzzle. But I am hopeful we will be able to put them together. After all, its a billion hands working on it.

Thanks,
Sayee