By Om Prakash Dwivedi
While the USA continues to be at loggerheads with the issue of the rising number of Indian skilled workers migrating to its homeland, the larger script available in different countries shows a different and alluring prospect for Indians. Yet, India seems to be oblivious to the lurking tragedy that awaits to hit our future economy. This also means that India may slowly lose its narrative of Viksit Bharat if corrective measures are not taken immediately.
The narrative building of Viksit Bharat needs to be invested with youth empowerment and shaping policies that can attract and retain the rich and talented Indians, lest we continue to tread on the marshy path laid down by data jargon experts. Perhaps, the Viksit Bharat (Developed India) vision is wrestling with the virus of migration. This virus is only multiplying each day, finding new ways to travel to different destinations outside India. Yet, there seems to be no solution available to check its insidious growth.
There cannot be a bigger irony than the fact that India aims to be a developed nation without focusing on its youth, healthcare, education, taxation, and civic infrastructure, which keep diminishing every day. In his most recent column, Prabhu Chawla pointedly says,
“For rich Indians, home is no longer where the heart is, for them, is now, no better than real estate, subject to high level of taxation with no commensurate public services to benefit from.”
Chawla’s astute observation is laudatory though he delimits this alarming issue only to the rich class, pointing to the migration of 4300 Indian millionaires by the end of 2024. One cannot ignore the presence of too many irons in the fire that insidiously stokes the issue of migration of Indians abroad.
Most prominent seems to be the perpetual migration of Indian youths to overseas countries, in the hope of a better future and better prospects. How else can one justify the data shared by the Ministry of External Affairs pointing to the exodus of 1.4 million youth in 2024? It is expected that this figure will reach 2 million by 2025. One can argue that this outflow of our youths is not an unsettling issue given the huge population that we have. But the data gains currency if we see the estimated figure that projects “the population of people aged 80+ years [growing] at a rate of around 279% between 2022 and 2050.” This UNFA data also states that the “elderly population will have surpassed the population of children (aged 0 to 15 years) in the country.” Another data suggests,
“By 2036, the share of the under-30 population was likely to further dip to 43 per cent while the above-30 population would account for 57 per cent of the total population.”
Conversely, Indian universities boasting of global stature are witnessing a colossal decline in attracting foreign students to their campuses. A recent RBI report exposes the superficiality of our higher education systems, highlighting that the revenue from education-related travels to India has achieved an unplumbed depth, “falling from US$ 519 million in fiscal year to just US$247 million in 2024 – almost half the figure a decade ago.” If one juxtaposes this loss with the projected figure of the Indian youth migration, it is estimated that “about 2 million students from India will be studying abroad. It calculated total spending by Indian outbound students could reach US$70 billion by 2025. Seen this way, it seems that ‘all hat and no cattle’ syndrome seems to underpin the vulnerable civic infrastructure.
The problems are far too many for us to tackle and overcome as a nation, only if we decide not to remain blinded by populist views and demagogues. The postcolonial India has been disabled by an acute sense of nepotism and corruption. Public sector jobs are largely linked to ideological underpinnings or monetary provenance. Merit is being replaced with loyalty performances and sloganeering.
Not to ignore the health scenario in India that continues to remain in a pathetic state even though the government keeps increasing the annual budget allocation for this sector. The Knight Frank India reports that “India is facing a deficit of 2 billion sq. ft. of healthcare space to cater to its current population base of 1.42 billion people.” It also means “India’s existing bed-to-population ratio is 1.3/1000 population (both private and public hospitals included), and there is a deficit of 1.7/1000 population.” Put simply, India requires an “additional requirement of 2.4 million beds” to energize its vulnerable health sector.
A nation that aspires to become the third largest economy in the world soon, these data suggest that what we need is an enabling and stable infrastructure that can cater to our youths’ aspirations and also take care of our citizens’ well-being. With so much talk about the use of artificial intelligence, it is high time, we start using our human intelligence in a way that our future vision of growth and prosperity is in conversation with the present bottlenecks that impede the growth prospects and access to basic resources.
India needs a bigger and more serious debate over this acute vulnerability that may blur India’s economic prospects. Such discussions need to be divorced from any ideological moorings and religious dictums. It is our wish to see India as a developed economy soon, but we need to focus on empowering our youths, making our public sectors more competitive, and investing more in social assets. The blueprint of Viksit Bharat (Developed nation) is not to be mistaken for a crystal-gazing exercise, which demonstrates clairvoyant visions, only to realize later that such visions were far removed from reality.
Contributing Author: Dr Om Prakash Dwivedi is a literary critic and columnist.
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