Rudyard Kipling’s celebrated poem, “If”, exhorts youth to “fill the unforgiving minute with sixty seconds worth of distance run”. And the prize for those who do so, he said, is “the world and everything in it”. One was reminded of this when, releasing a book by his colleague Kamal Nath entitled The Indian Century: The Age of Entrepreneurship in the World’s Biggest Democracy recently, the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh lamented that India does not sufficiently value time.

There is a huge contradiction in being a nation of lotus-eaters, scorning time, and yet aspiring to greatness. Hindi has the one word, kal, for both yesterday and tomorrow. Being an ancient civilisation is no reason to undervalue time and leave today’s business for tomorrow. Yet time is unrelenting and waits for no man. Lost time is lost opportunity and there is a large opportunity cost of delay that falls on the weakest and most vulnerable. These simple truisms bear repetition for they are so easily forgotten as a result of India’s politics of delay and, therefore, denial of its own potential and resolve.

Look at the unmet promises of the Constitution relating to universal elementary education, nutrition, human equity and so much else. Almost 60 years later we find that we rank 127 in a field of 177 nations in our Human Development Index (HDI) rating. We have not necessarily regressed absolutely, but others have moved ahead more smartly. At the start of decolonisation in the 50’s and 60’s, India had a head start and was in advance of most others in the developing world – China, South Korea, all of South East Asia, West Asia, Africa and even Latin America.

No longer. Today we trail behind most, including sub-Saharan Africa in respect of certain indices. True, we have registered many important successes, but even these have been limited by manifest failures. Size and civilisation lend India great weight; but one cannot live for ever on fat or the past.

Look at the way Parliament wastes national time by preventing urgent debate, important legislation and programmatic action. Democracy has oftentimes been reduced to endless chatter. Bureaucratic delays are proverbial and process seems to matter more than performance. Approval procedures are dilatory and, very often, stop-go, leading to uncertainty, tentativeness, delay and time and cost overruns and postponement or forfeiture of the expected stream of benefits.

Even in vital matters on which the welfare and security of millions rest and cannot or should not wait, tomorrow trumps today with the feeling that if we only wait another day, another month, another year, another debate, another bid, another plan, another analysis or inquiry, the outcome will somehow be better. It is, in another sense, always jam tomorrow. However, as Keynes reminded us, in the long run we are all dead.  

Too many Indians also live in mortal fear of “globalisation” which has become a catch-all notion of evil. It is seen as something foreign and intrusive. This ignores that fact that India civilisation thrived on and contributed so much to globalisation in thought and deed. The adage Vasudhaiva kutumbakam, or the world is my family, was not an idle thought. It was only western imperialism and colonial dominance that snapped our ties with the world and brought insularity. The restoration of globalisation returns us to the natural order of things.

Cautions there are, as in everything in life, and safeguards and safety nets are of course necessary. But recall Gandhi who said he did not wish the doors and windows of his dwelling to be stuffed. They should be open to the winds of the earth to blow through them; but he would not be blown off his feet.

It was in this context that the Prime Minister approvingly cited the speed of China’s decision making process once policy directions had been set.  He also recalled his Chinese counterpart, Wen Jiabao’s remark based on that country’s experience: “If you really want to get rid of poverty, if you want to become a nation that really counts, you have no option but to open up”. India was late in opening up and only did so in 1991. Many were fearful of opening up and quite a few on the Left remain so, determinedly poised with their heads in the sand.

Dr Manmohan Singh further pointedly remarked that if we look at our 10 or 15 top business houses, many of them did not exist when India launched on economic reforms. Further financial, pension, banking, insurance and labour reform has been mindlessly thwarted. SEZs, industrialisation and more liberalisation are anathema to some even as they complain of unemployment and clamour for more and better goods and services. The 123 Agreement that would give India great freedom of action is opposed on false premises. Altogether, decision-making has got enmeshed in petty electoral calculations. The BJP lives in the past. The Left is afraid of the future.     

What is lost on most is that non-decision is also a decision – to forego the future. The clock keeps ticking. It is later than we think.