On May 30th around 70 people gathered at the BU School of Law to meet and hear acclaimed author Gurcharan Das, talk on his new book “India Grows at Night”. This was the first event of AIF’s New England chapter  in partnership with the Boston University India initiative. The talk was moderated by Raj Sharma, AIF Board member and Trustee who steered the conversation effortlessly to cover challenges facing India and how the country compared to China in terms of growth and progress.

Das started the evening explaining the idea behind the title of his book citing the example of Gurgoan, a place that grew overnight without any government backing. Citing the reasons, Das says that Gurgaon managed to flourish because of its self-reliant resilient citizens who took matter into their hands while the government slept. It is a measure of India’s private success and public failure.

Yet, while economic growth is a necessary condition for lifting the poor, asserts Das, government intervention for basic infrastructure is a necessity only because it is more sustainable. While places like Gurgaon rise they would do better with a functional drainage system, reliable water supply and a decent transportation system. Drawing back to India’s history, Das said that India always had a weak state and a strong society. So the challenge is that India must grow during the day, in other words, government  and public policy must support private enterprise in such a manner that it will emerge as a strong liberal state. The 2014 election according to him will be historic. With more than half the population under the age of 25, most of whom were born after the economic liberalization, it will have a profound impact on the voting pattern. The youth therefore can alter the political nature of the nation. The Indian middle class can also effect change as they are on the rise and will hopefully change the nature of Indian politics by wielding more power and influence.

The talk was later followed by a Q&A from the audience with topics like corruption, rural development, how to deal with Pakistan and the politics of current leaders like Narendra Modi and Rahul Gandhi.

Deepti Nijhawan, Director of BU India initiatives welcomed the guests and spoke on how Boston University  recognized the potential of India as a new education hub and their efforts to enter India. AIF Trustees Nalini Sharma, Venkat and Pratima Srinivasan and AIF new gala chairs Vandana and Vivek Sharma were also present.

-------------------------------------------------------- 

To learn more about AIF go to www.aif.org

|