The India Metaphor & Billion Reasons To Care

Here's an interesting little video profiling the current mood and the momentum for growth of India. The video quotes one of the often repeated view that get heard within the country – "the economy grows while the government sleeps". While customarily capturing (customarily like what every other western media crew does) the abject poverty rampant in the country, the video shows C.K.Prahalad as saying this is the "India Metaphor" – "What you see outside is not what you get to see inside" – pointing to ambitious and enthusiastic people embracing technology and education under seemingly tougher circumstances.

Pointing to the fact that the country currently has several hundred million people under age 25 (the number of english speaking people in the country exceed the population in the US), the society known for its 3000 +year reverence of knowledge has mastered the art getting things done – finding some method behind all the madness. Thomas Friedman captures the mood in the country beginning to release several decades of pent up energy – In his words to visualize the mood in India –"You want to know what India feels like, its really quite simple. Pull out a champagne bottle, shake it for an hour and uncork it. You wouldn't want to get in the way of that cork!". The most pro American country outside the US & the largest democracy in the world is just relaunching itself – there are one billion reasons to watch it – a fact that Clyde Prestowitz amply brought out recently.