Bright Picture , DarkPatches

Bright Picture, Dark Patches - Inder Malhotra
In the midst of the dreary and depressing winter, there could have been no more heartwarming message and that too from an unexpected source. America’s CIA, forecasting the "global picture" just 15 years hence in 2020, has declared that by then the United States would cease to be the sole superpower and China and India — in that order — would be close to sharing that honour with it. Henceforth, it would be the Asian Century, no longer the American one.
The council has been doing this kind of crystal gazing for quite some time. But never before has its reading of the future reflected such certitude as this time around. For, it has described the rise of the two Asian giants sharing a long and disputed border as a "virtual certainty." What will warm the cockles of Indian hearts even more is the strong hint in the published version of the CIA council’s report that the "Indian Elephant", still stumbling behind the "Chinese Dragon" might "overtake" it as the world’s "fastest growing economy" at the end of the century’s second decade.
The reasons for the US administration’s optimism about this country — and, of course, about China — are not far to seek. China’s phenomenal growth since Deng Xiaoping embarked on the market economy, behind the camouflage of "socialism with Chinese characteristics", has been dazzling the wide world for nearly a quarter of a century, especially during the last ten years. Indicators in this country’s case may not be so spectacular but they are promising enough, as foreigners have discerned sooner than most Indians themselves. In the first place, the slow-moving and lackadaisical Indian economy has — thanks to economic reforms that have often been controversial — broken out of the shackles of what used to be called derisively the "Hindu rate of growth." Foreign currency reserves, at rock bottom in 1991, have reached a dizzy height of $129 billion. Then there is the brain-power and the widespread knowledge of English, which together have made this country a leading IT (information technology) nation. Cheng Rui Sheng, a former Chinese ambassador in New Delhi and now a major player on the Track-II diplomatic circuit, has said that India is already a "software superpower." Millions of Chinese are learning English to be able to compete with this country in this lucrative and fast-expanding sector. Thousands of boorish Americans are cursing the call centres in Gurgaon and Bangalore for having "taken away" their jobs.
The collective impact of all this is that India today has a burgeoning middle class with a standard of living equal to that of Italians numbering 300 million. This is more than the total population of the US. The consumption explosion that this would mean with the passage of time should not be difficult to envisage.
All this is music to our ears, of course. But no Indian should make the mistake of feeling overconfident and smug. The authors of the CIA report have themselves taken the precaution to warn us that the path of "power and glory" is strewn with "numerous pitfalls". They have also entered several caveats to their own prognostications. Apart from utterly unforeseen disasters such as a tsunami that could upset all projections, they say, both India and China could fall prey to internal dangers, such as economic and political "volatility". Pressures on resources — land, water and energy supplies — on both the Asian countries are bound to intensify as they modernize.
In India’s case, AIDS would be an additional menace. China runs the risk of being stymied by the persistence of an "authoritarian regime" (as against the well-entrenched Indian democracy). "Stifling bureaucracy", erosion of secularism and the galloping march of caste-based politics could defeat this country.
These warnings need to be taken seriously. As we witnessed during the prodigious post-tsunami devastation, the so-called upper caste victims refused to share either shelter or food with the Dalits. Shockingly, those shooing away the Dalits even in the midst of an overwhelming calamity were fishermen belonging to the "most backward of the backward castes." This indeed is becoming the pattern across the country, especially in North India where OBCs rather than the Brahmins, Rajputs and Bhumiars torment those who are supposed to be no longer untouchable. The worst horror of this shame along the Tamil Nadu coast is that so few are horrified by it.
Even in relation to the developing India-China equation the significance of the small print in the CIA council’s report must not be missed. India will not "overtake" China in either economic or military power in the foreseeable future. The only possibility is that because of its "demographic dividend" — India’s population would be much younger than China’s because of the latter’s one-child policy — and other factors Indian rate of growth in 2020 might be higher than China’s. For the rest, this country would continue to be much behind the northern neighbour in most respects.
For instance, in 2020, China’s economy would be the second largest in the world, next only to that of America’s. The best we would have done by then is to "catch up" with European countries, which is a no big deal considering that India is indeed equal to Europe from the Atlantic to the Urals. Or to look at it another way, the Chinese economy would be twice as large as India’s with very little difference in population. What this would do to per capita income is obvious enough.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has personally pointed out that China is far ahead of India in taking steps to ensure energy security. Mercifully, he has taken steps to bridge this gap. As a first step he has appointed an expert committee to restructure the public sector units in the oil sector.
It stands to reason that the India-China rivalry or competition, at present downplayed by both sides, would probably come into the open because the "Vision 2020" cannot but change the Asian and global geo-political landscape though America’s global dominance would persist. According to the CIA council’s projections that make sound sense, governments of South-East Asia are likely to move closer to India to build a counter-weight to China. Indian diplomacy will have to be skilful enough to let this happen without creating too much of a hiatus with China. Similarly the opportunity to have closer relations with Central Asian countries and Iran should not be missed.
A distinguished retired Indian diplomat, on a recent visit to South-East Asia was struck by the keen interest of the governments there in India’s Look East policy. Some of his interlocutors told him that China, rather the US was uppermost in their minds these days, and they hoped Indian power and influence would grow similarly.
To revert to internal weaknesses that could be major hurdles on the high road to steady progress, the most daunting is the near-certainty that grinding and dehumanizing poverty would continue to co-exist with the rapid growth of the relatively prosperous middle class. To make matters infinitely worse, regional disparity would increase rather than decrease. For, while other parts of the country would march ahead, Bihar, UP, Orissa and Madhya Pradesh could descend deeper into poverty. In short, the BIMARU States would remain bimaar (sick). The socio-political upheaval this could cause is exemplified by the lawlessness in Bihar and the spread of naxalism from 57 of the 493 districts a year ago to 152 districts today.(Manuj Features)