Converge Policy Making!

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For quite some time the world has recognized

Indian talent in science and technology. The latest slogan of Prime Minister Atal Bihari

Vajpayee, Jai Vigyan, reinforces this fact. But more importantly, what it also

means is that India has moved from a stage where national security and agriculture (as

symbolized by Shastriji’s Jai Jawan, Jai Kishan) were the only focus of the country.

If India is capable of building a nuclear bomb today, it also has the

capability to build the most powerful supercomputers, develop the best software, and build

the best rural telephone exchanges. Few of the so-called competitors of India, in what the

West calls "the regional arms race", have got that capability. It is time the

self-appointed guardians of global disarmament realized this. Now, our government should

ignore their comments and focus on economic priorities.

The best way to do that is to play on our two strengths while trying to

remove our major weakness. The strengths, of course, are our big market and our

technological capabilities. The weakness is just one. The delay in decision making.

One decision that could go a long way to achieve this objective of

playing on our technology strength while minimizing decision-making time is to form a

single umbrella ministry for IT, broadcasting, and communications. Vajpayee has already

done this partly as an interim arrangement by giving a single minister the portfolios of

I&B and communications. Now, he can have a single ministry. IT can be added as the

third component. The BJP-led government has already taken a proactive step by forming a

national task force for IT.

A single ministry means the business can deal with a single window. The

inter-ministry disputes will not delay things. And finally, a lot of grey areas will not

remain grey anymore. Technologies are converging. Why not the policy making



process?

The most important advantage it will offer is the drastic reduction in time taken for

decision making. And that means India will overcome the most difficult

roadblock—perhaps the only one—on its way to become an economic superpower, with

or without nuclear bombs.