Indian Interdependence Day

That’s today’s editorial in The Times of India. “Independence Day ought to be a day of reflection where we consider whether mindless politics is the way ahead, or whether true independence can only arise out of acknowledging the interdependence of all,” it says.

Foreign policy expert at John Hopkins Michael Mandelbaum, who spent part of his youth in India, said, Y2K should be called Indian Interdependence Day, because it was India’s ability to collaborate with Western companies, thanks to the interdependence created by fibre optics networks, that really vaulted it forward and gave more Indians than ever some real freedom of choice in how, for whom, and where they worked. (Quoted by John Friedman, in The World is Flat, page 136.)

Long before Y2K, Mahatma Gandhi used the word: “If it’s man’s privilege to be independent, it is equally his duty to be interdependent.”

As India today enters its 60th year of being a sovereign democratic state, my only wish is that our political class puts a lot more effort in governance of our country, and ensures that development of India’s infrastructure keeps pace with advancement in information technology. Because, we still aren’t able to derive the complete benefit of our scientific progress since infrastructure is so way behind electronics and IT.