On the 75th anniversary of our Independence, from the ramparts of the Red Fort, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the national intent to make India a developed country by the time we turn 100. This was the articulation of a dream already resonant with many Indians. It is an ambitious yet worthy goal irrespective of our backgrounds, belief systems and political ideologies. For this dream to be realised, Samaj (society), Sarkar (government) and Bazaar (markets), will all have to play their parts and work together over the next 25 years.
Samaj, Sarkar, Bazaar
Samaj, while being the most powerful, is also the most fragmented and dormant. It needs to be awakened. Mahatma Gandhi could awaken the Samaj and convert the freedom struggle into a Jan Andolan (people’s movement). But at the time, we had a common adversary, the colonial power. After independence there have been some instances when Samaj has been awakened, the latest one in popular memory being the India Against Corruption movement in 2012. But these were extreme circumstances where the Samaj felt wronged. In the absence of a common adversary or a feeling of being wronged, can we rally the Samaj today? Can we create a Jan Andolan for development where everyone is working with the spirit of contributing to nation building and making India a developed country by India@100? Rallying the entire country towards a common goal is difficult, but necessary. It will require a lot of creative thinking.
The relevance of Bazaar has grown significantly in the last 30 years, post the 1991 liberalisation reforms. Over the last few years, Bazaar has increasingly become synonymous with the startup ecosystem. India ranks third in the number of unicorns created globally and is considered one of the fastest growing startup ecosystems in the world. Between 2011 and 2015, India created 9 unicorns, whereas between 2016 and 2022, this number of unicorns has crossed 100. According to a report in Inc42, “Over the years, these unicorns have raised over $94 billion in funding and have a combined valuation of $344 billion ”. The news and buzz around successful start-ups and their founders, astronomical fundraising numbers, and popular shows like Shark Tank, have not only made entrepreneurship acceptable but glamorous. But over the next 25 years, it is not the large unicorns that will create the massive number of jobs we need. The answer to the employment challenge lies in ‘mass entrepreneurship’, i.e. in millions of nano, micro and small enterprises each of which employ 5-50 people. Bazaar needs to be reactivated in newer ways to usher in a revolution of mass entrepreneurship.
Sarkar on the other hand has always been and will continue to remain relevant. Even within the social impact sector, there is now a growing acceptance and realisation that while creative solutions to solve development problems can come from outside the system, if these solutions have to scale, working with the government is critical. Because only the government has the reach and mandate to truly reach the last mile. And if there was any misconception of the Sarkar becoming less relevant, Covid has reminded us that is not the case. That said, while the complexity of challenges we face as a country remain immense, and become more apparent as we chase the goal of becoming developed, the quality of talent working inside the government or in the wider social impact space hasn’t kept pace. One key reason for that is that over the last two decades the best talent in the country has been attracted by the Bazaar and is chasing entrepreneurial or corporate dreams.
And herein lies the crux of the problem.
If we want to achieve the dream of becoming a developed country by India@100, then the best minds in the country have to take the lead in solving the problems we are facing. For this to happen, the idea of working with or inside the government to solve the most complex challenges of India, has to be made appealing to the youth. The Governance Challenge is a step in this direction.
The Governance Challenge (TGC)
The youth needs to be sensitised both to the problems we face and also what it would take to solve them at scale. The Governance Challenge, launched in July this year, is India’s first governance case competition targeted towards the top 30 public policy and business schools in the country, to galvanise the best in these colleges towards impact and governance.
TGC is an annual competition and each year will focus on an anchor state and anchor domain. The problem statement that the students tackle in the competition will be contextualised in the anchor state and domain. The teams will go through three rounds of elimination and the finalists will present their solution to the Chief Minister of the anchor state in the presence of impact investors with the possibility of their solution being picked up for implementation. The anchor state for TGC 2022 is Haryana and the problem statement the students are tackling is focused on human capital.
To ensure they get a deeper understanding of the impact and governance space, shortlisted teams are receiving hands-on mentoring from senior bureaucrats as well as practitioners from social enterprises and not-for-profits. They have listened to and interacted with exemplary career bureaucrats who have undertaken complex reforms in government, senior leaders in the ecosystem who have worked specifically on education, employment and skilling, and mid-career professionals who have made the choice to work in this sector and can serve as role models to them. The entire challenge has been designed to give them a comprehensive overview of the many different ways in which varied organizations are working with the government to solve some of the biggest challenges facing India.
One of the key objectives of TGC is to make careers in the governance and social impact space appealing and aspirational. Getting the best minds in the country interested and involved is the only way we will achieve our dream of becoming a developed country by India@100.
Gaurav Goel is Founder & CEO of Samagra, a mission-driven governance consulting firm.
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Source: The Print
