BALANCING A BILLION

India is a nation in transition. In a country where chaos seems to be the natural condition, this change is not always noticeable. The present speaks with a new assertion, but the past is still a very visible companion. There is a rich India and a poor India. A modern India and a traditional India. There is an educated India and an illiterate India. A spiritual India and a materialistic one. How then can we put our finger on where India is now? The most defining mood of the Indian people now is aspiration. People want more. Not in some distant future, or in an afterlife, but now. This pent-up desire to move up can best be seen in the changing urban landscape of India where change is corroding time honoured notions of behaviour and custom. Tradition clings on. Just about. Under intense pressure to accommodate a more cosmopolitan profile. New townships are sprouting in endlessly growing suburbs and consumerism is the new deity. A process of gradual homogenisation is making all Indians wear the same clothes, enjoy the same food and buy the same things. There is a serious reappraisal of self worth, regardless of caste, creed or religion. The challenge for the world's largest democracy is to retain its distinctive identity against the onslaught of globalisation. To sustain its economic growth with equity.