Good Afternoon everyone. It’s great to be here amongst all you young people. I’d like to thank your school for having me here today. I’m honored to be the Chief Guest at the 7th annual École Mondiale Model United Nations.
For a few days each year, you get to take on the role of an important world leader and make decisions that will impact the global community.
Negotiating peace in the midst of a crisis, finding effective solutions to solve problems and encouraging cooperation amongst hostile countries is now in your hands.
You need to be able to formulate policies that will be sustainable even in the long term, not just for the present global downturn.
We live in a world that is being re-ordered in every aspect – politically, economically, security-wise, business-wise, socially, technologically, ecologically. It will be a world of complexities and extreme competition, where there will be battles for dominance and survival. What you see in the world now is the beginning of those battles.
How will you fare? What tools will you use to find a place for India in that challenging future? It will depend on your outlook – and it must be one of optimism. Be well informed, but be positive as you view the new world unfolding before your eyes. At this Model UN, think positively and without prejudice as you formulate policies for other countries. Think like experts and act like pioneers and innovators.
The world you are going to inherit is the one that you will create.
We shouldn’t be in a hurry – for much of the world looks more like India today, than any other country. The average country is, like us, poor, illiterate, transitioning from tradition to modernity, multi-ethnic, multi-religious and multi-lingual. So, the solutions that we create to solve our own problems, will be the solutions that other countries in the world will employ.
Take for example some solutions that India has created. A company in Pune, called Kirloskar, makes water pumps for irrigation. They are long-lasting machines that work in our environment. They also work in Laos, in Ghana, in Senegal, in Jamaica, in Egypt, etc. – all agricultural economies like ours. The Indian President gifted 22 Kirloskar Diesel Pumps to the Laotian President in 1984. By 2001, Kirloskar sold pumps worth $41 million to Laos. They were robust, they worked better than the Australian pumps, lasted longer than the Chinese pumps, were less expensive than the Japanese pumps – and they made Laos self-sufficient in food in two years. In Egypt, a water pump is called a Kirloskar.
Similarly, our government companies are using their skills and Indian experience to light up villages in Afghanistan with solar power. You don’t see them, but there are thousands of government engineers who are building affordable and sustainable infrastructure around the world and giving India a golden reputation.
- You get the drift. That is why the model that will dominate will not be the Washington Consensus or the Beijing Consensus. It will be the Mumbai consensus, or what we call our development model of ‘inclusive growth.’ In the Mumbai Consensus development coalesces around six criteria: Democracy, private innovation and entrepreneurship, a domestic-driven economy (rather than export-led like China), grassroots empowerment and social entrepreneurship, decentralization in policy, and internationally non-expansionist and status quoist.
- The latter is particularly relevant for you – we are not aggressive externally because we know what it means to have others interfere in our internal affairs. We don’t like to be lectured to, nor do we lecture to others. In a sense that is what makes us a country more welcome in multilateral environment – we don’t rock the boat. You may all think that’s not so good – but at the moment, I’d say it’s more good than bad. That’s because India does not have the bandwidth to be distracted by an active involvement in international affairs. It has taken us 60 years to adhere as a nation. Now, nothing can tear us apart. We have political equality, and anyone can be in politics today – rich, poor, lower caste or upper caste.
But in building our nationhood, we have neglected our domestic issues. We must now attend to the problems of our poor, and create economic equality and opportunity. Only then will we be in a position to command international respect – and influence international fora.
20 years from now, India will no longer be an “emerging market”. Developing countries like ones in Africa, like Brazil, China, Argentina, and our very own India, will have already made their way into the sphere of world politics and economics. How will these markets of the masses define global thought and action? That, dear students, is up to YOU.
I will leave you with a memorable quote from our Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh. He said, “We must respect the impatience of the young.” In each and every one of you there is a spark of urgency and impatience. I can see it. You must carry it with you when the current generation of leaders in India – Midnight’s Children- passes on the torch to you- Liberalization’s Children. My generation is the post-colonial generation – we did not do what was necessary to keep the engine of India humming. Instead we took our education and expertise, and ran away to greener pastures because we could. Now we want to make it up to you so that you don’t have to run away from your country; instead you can stay because there are opportunities for India to shine in the world. Let the children of other countries now run away to India.
The emblem of our freedom struggle wasn’t a fist or a sword or a sickle, but a wheel – the embodiment of change, evolution and moving forward.
This is precisely what India has to offer the world – a way of life and sustainable well being, and you will be the ambassadors of this message as you go on to build a legacy for generations to come.
We at Gateway House want you to think continuously about our place in the world – a place that you will occupy. We run an essay competition for students every year. This year, a year of such transformation in the world, our Gateway House Global Minds Essay Contest asks a relevant question: should India’s new foreign policy paradigm be one of pragmatism, or one of Idealism? Should we follow the path of Ashoka or of the Arthashastra?
I want to leave the question open for you to think about as you move into the next three days of your debate.
I wish the committees all the very best.
Thank You
Manjeet Kripalani is the former India Bureau Chief of Business Week, and Executive Director and Co-funder of Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations.