India - is she ready for prime time?

I have been hearing a lot about India and how changed it is. I go back every year, and of course I see some progress. But is it progressing in the true sense? Or is she riding a wave of unsustainable growth?

India needs to dig deep and come up with high tech products. Not just high tech services. High tech services are transferable to other countries, especially when the hourly rates go up. Do we have a Samsung or a Hitachi? A Sony or a Panasonic? No, but what we have are programmers hives, like Infosys or TCS.

Sure they provide valuable service. But is that such a big deal? Not to me. India needs to invent! And invent big. Remember the stir a small car like Nano caused in the world market? And of course, the stir went away soon.

So instead of resting on the laurels of a service industry that basically saves money for foreign companies when they offload labor (and their valuable jobs) to India, whether that is call center operations or application development, India needs to come up with it's Apple. It's Intel, or it's Ford.

Go big. See the lowly Kia and Hyundai of yesteryears becoming a global player? Samsung? In other words, learn from Korea. Learning from Japan might be a bit too imposing of a demand for India right now, as Japan has been doing this for decades.

Now, while at it, lets start cleaning up. We need stricter laws, and honest cops who enforce those laws. We need to preserve our forests and rivers. Clean up Ganges - it's current label as the World's most polluted river is a dark stain to say the least. Include civic lessons in high schools. Clean cities, no stuck open drainages. Treat water before letting it into sea or rivers.

Democracy is wonderful, but sometimes a hard hand is required to force progress through, a la China. Build roads and rails, but with quality and without kickbacks. And take care of the abject poor.

There is a lot India has to do to be a world player. And it can be done, but not with the current business model of 'service'. Not in the long term. India has the brain power, and education to drive a high tech manufacturing industry. Lets head that way.

And we cannot ignore this elephant in the room: grinding poverty, in which we are number one.

Call centers and internet jobs are not for them. They need manufacturing. Small, large and some in between.