What problems India is facing to progress?

Our country India, has been the richest country on the planet, till the 1800s. Our country India had control of 25-33% of the world’s economy till that time, after which the economy of India started shrinking. The economy shrunk so rapidly that India became one of the poorest nations in less than one century due to the exploitations of the British. After the independence on August 15, 1947, India started growing again and today is the world’s 5^th largest economy and is one of the fastest growing trillion-dollar economies on the planet. So, the question comes, why do we keep hearing of things that make our progress more problematic? Why it is very hard to progress India even when the growth rate of India is so high? Let us understand the causes of these problems in detail as we move along.

The first and foremost problem that India faces to progress ahead is the mentality of the people. The people of India, especially in the states that are not much developed, still think like the people in the 18^th century. We need to develop not only our country, but also the mindset of the people. Development does not mean destroying the culture that is continuing from thousands of years, but development means not only taking the cultures but also taking the advantage of the new technologies that make our job easier to do. I have stated this because people confuse development with destroying the culture. So, taking the culture with us will make us what our ancestors have taught us and also take the new essence which we have developed and discovered. It would be the best of both worlds scenario—learning both what our ancestors taught us, as well as developing the new technologies that we have discovered. Hence, changing the mentality and believing in expanding our knowledge is what I as an individual of this country would recommend. We Indians have the habit that when we believe in something, neither we want to hear a word against it, nor we don’t want to question it to improve it. It is a serious problem of our society as the world today wants people that are keen and eager to learn, not people who just don’t want to listen about the problems. Therefore, just blindly believing in something and not wanting to listen anything against it is a habit of ours that needs to be changed. And if we tackle this problem, then we can solve any problem that exists in India as the government of our country is democratic, and being a democratic country it gives the absolute power to the people of the country, not any of the governmental officials.

Another problem that is stopping us from getting developed is corruption. Though we have reduced corruption in India by a lot in the last 74 years of our independence, but still corruption in India is a very big issue and is a very big obstacle for the development of India. We Indians tend to get selfish when it comes to money matters. People in India don’t understand that their lying can be very harmful for someone else. Whenever the government or an organization initiates a fund for the people, the people do their best even in corrupt ways to get the money. As you can analyse here, we can’t actually understand that our profit can be a loss to someone else, and if we want more, then we should work harder for it. Unfortunately, most people in India only think that money will solve all problems and so getting more and more money by either hook or crook is the right thing to do. But this thought cannot be considered better for the development of our society as this cannot be considered fair; and if something can’t be considered fair then it is not good for a society. So, if we want money, then we need to work for it, in honest and true manner, not in corrupt manners.

The next problem that puts a question mark on our development is the government. Our country has a democratic system of government which means that it is the person’s wish that whom he/she should choose as his/her representative in the election. However in India, we face a lot of issues even in this regard. Many politicians spend a lot of money so that more and more people vote them in the election as well as many politicians force many people to vote them in the election. The politicians also promise a lot of things to the public but do not practice them after they win the election. And when someone tries to question these kind of politicians, then they suppress that person’s complaint about the politician by either giving him/her money or making him/her fear by forceful and violent means. These kinds of activities make a big question mark on the development of our society.

Another problem is that our country still thinks like the 18^th century, like discussed before, but also does things still like the 18^th century. Our country is the world’s biggest market, because our country is the world’s largest importer of goods. Thinking just the old way can’t solve the problem for us in the present. Today the world demands newer technology and innovation to progress ahead, and in that scenario we just do the work in the 18^th century way, then how do we compete with others who think like the 21^st century does? Today, we need people that are inquisitive and creative, not uninteresting and not ready for change. We need better and newer equipment, technology, and mindset. Updating ourselves is the thing that the present world is trying to teach us and if we don’t follow this principle, then we will still be a developing, not a developed nation.

So these were a few of the problems of our society. One can come up with an answer only when a question exists in the first place; so I have tried to ask the questions so that our people and government come up with solutions to these problems of our society. We need to take our country back to that same first place in the world if we want to be called a developed nation. We had everything with us, the best technology, the best innovation, but everything was looted by Europeans, Arabs, Turks and Mongols for centuries. So if we want to improve ourselves, then we need bring ourselves back to the same place where we were. As a student, I have tried to do my contribution in making our nation developed by expressing my thought about the problems of the nation; now it is up to all of us that we take our nation back to the same glory to where it belongs to and prove ourselves.