Developmental And Modernisation Goals Of The State

On September 29, 2017, a stampede broke out at Elphinstone road station, which is a local train station in Mumbai and 23 people died in this unfortunate event. This stampede occurred around the same time the government in power, the BJP, introduced the bullet train from Mumbai to Ahmedabad they planned to construct, which is supposedly going to be a significant milestone in the country’s technological advancements. This sparked great controversy amongst the people who argued that the government should aim to repair and improve existing local transport and infrastructure, which faces problems like overcrowding rather than creating elitist transport, which the commoners will not be able to afford.

This brings to light a major political issue entrenched in the development agenda itself, as the governments of most developing nations constantly grapple with negotiating the balance between allocation of resources for development and ensuring other necessities for the populace, whilst keeping in mind public opinion. Several outbursts, opinions and questions were raised on social media and debate platforms challenging the government’s extremely expensive plan since the bullet train is estimated to cost 150,000 crores in Indian rupees. I realized that this is an extremely conservative way of thinking in developing countries such as India in which, investing in technological developments and introducing new technology is always critiqued at negatively by the general population, largely because the government always has other more important priorities which include objectives like feeding the entire population and ensuring basic amenities are provided to all in the country. This political challenge relates to the GP core units of both development and human rights as well as highlights issues of power, legitimacy and sustainability.

Since this project is in motion currently in the country, it means that there are constant opinions rising regarding it and makes it a promising topic for debate regarding what is considered economic development for all and thus, I thought it worthy of engagement and investigation. The RQ for this engagement therefore, is How justified are the developmental and modernisation goals of the state, in an emerging economy, as compared to the state’s basic welfare mandate? The case of the Mumbai - Ahmedabad Bullet train proposal of 2017. I decided to further my knowledge regarding this issue by engaging with the government to understand how the government is able to justify this project. Hence I attended three meetings with a Member of Legislative assembly (MLA) who is someone elected by the voters of an electoral district, in this case, Gujarat. I attended three meetings conducted by the MLA Harsh Sanghvi and his team consisting of Mr. Vijay Shah and Mr. Arman Yadhav, who are all involved in this project after which I got to interview them and ask them questions regarding why the government has undertaken this development project.

These meetings focused on outlining the route of the Mumbai – Ahmedabad bullet train. This helped me understand the various approaches for developing society a government can undertake and how various political, economic and social factors influence government decisions for the country. Secondly, I also interviewed 10 people of different socio - cultural backgrounds who travel regularly to cities in Gujarat which are either Ahmedabad or en route Ahmedabad to understand what they thought about the bullet train and how effective would it be for their use. I realised after these interviews that I could categorize people as capitalists and marxists based on what their replies were to my interview questions. Development is a sustained increase in the standard of living and well - being of a level of social organisation and is one of the major government aims, no matter what type of government it is, be it a democracy or authoritarian rule. States have different philosophies and priorities that they must focus on, to best develop their country and ensure welfare of the public. As faced by many other developing countries in contemporary global politics, India too must try and achieve all the basic requirements as stated in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs such as food, shelter, basic security while balancing it with sustainable development and investment in technology which allows modernisation. As I gathered from the meeting I attended which was headed by the MLA Harsh Sanghvi, the Indian government believes that the bullet train is a step towards progress in the country since it majorly reduces travel time from Mumbai to Ahmedabad. Moreover, this bullet train is India’s attempt at economic globalisation which is the integration and interdependence of global economies and a cross border movement of services and products. In this case India is cooperating and working with Japan to replicate their technology to create this bullet train. This also in turn helps strengthen allies and ties between the two countries.

However, an article on the Hindu states that according to S. S. Khurana who is former Railway Board Chairman, people in a developing country tend to stick to orthodox views of development, only focusing on the basic lower physiological needs and miss the larger outcome and possible benefits of the bullet train which is that India will gain more economic power as it can help increase the productive efficiency of the country. He states that a large portion of Indians believe that this bullet train is a mere symbol of a rising India, an expensive symbol which India can’t afford because of its various other priorities. Moreover, it could be claimed this view would be supported by the marxists who believe that this plan isn’t viable as it only seems to cater to the elite 5% of Indians who will be able to affords this bullet and not to the remaining 95% of primary or secondary sector, working class Indians who are the ones who mostly use local trains and hence this project supports inequality, all according to D. Raghunandan who is Director in Centre for Technology and Development. Inequality is the unfair situation in society when some people have more opportunities than the others and are given more priority as well. Mr. Vivek Sahai who is from the Delhi Science forum, draws facts from the marxist theory and states that this bullet train would be a negative consequence of India’s globalisation and development attempt since only the elite would benefit. They believe that India should focus on improving existing local trains and station as they used by the majority of the population. Since the infrastructure isn’t very well maintainedand these trains are overcrowded and often unsound, the large amount of money used for the bullet train can be instead channeled for something that will benefit a greater amount of people.

On the other hand, economist Achal Khare have argued that vast productivity gains can be achieved by investing in innovation and technological catch-up. The MLA I interviewed, Mr. Sanghvi, gave me an analogy which explained why this project was profitable for the working class as well. He stated “A man who could only work on his farm for the entire day can now use this train to conveniently travel back and forth from a rural city to urban easily on a daily basis. This means that he can now take on more work. He can work on at his farm during the mornings and take an evening job in the city as travelling time has drastically reduced. This means that the average rural worker can increase his/her income and they can better their livelihoods. This would also mean that they can in the long term afford to invest in the train tickets because of the long run economic profitability of doing so. ” This thus shows how the project can increase the productive efficiency of the nation, and therefore subscribes to the capitalist theory in pushing forth the development agenda. Yet still developing country firms and governments invest little to realize this potential, because of public reluctance and resilience.

Firstly, there is one part of the population that believes that the bullet train might disturb civilian life in Mumbai and Ahmedabad. Mr. Samir Shah, one of my interviewees along with others told me how he believes that the citizens of Mumbai and Ahmedabad will face possible disruptions in everyday life such as traffic and chaos. Secondly, a group of people who are against this project are those people who are losing their lands as the proposed track goes through their properties and they are bitter about having to rehabilitate and start over elsewhere. This directly infringes on the basic HR to property, which is enshrined in the Indian constitution and promulgated at all levels through the UNDHR. Thus, not only are people culturally and socially displaced but also loss of their incomes and livelihoods questions the whole debate by capitalists in favor of development as the consequent impact has an inevitable fall out on the nation’s GDP. This strengthens the liberal view on development emerging from sustained cooperation and mutual interdependence rather than single-minded pursuit of modernization goals at the cost of HR. Even if the short term compromise of HR are considered to be the opportunity cost of long term development goals from the perspective of capitalist theory, it still does not put to rest the Marxist view on the very nature of these development goals which are aimed at securing the interests of the few that can afford and make use of the final product versus the masses who have to bear the burden of that development agenda and are in fact at the receiving end of it. This then brings into focus the whole issue of equity in development once again and how the bullet train proposal plays out this issue as stated earlier.

Lastly, according to Mr. Vivek Sahai, there are also people who don’t believe that India can replicate this Japanese project with the same amount of efficacy and planning and hence the bullet train will only lead to a large loss of money. Taking off from the capitalist view, MLA Mr. Harsh Sanghvi seemd to believe that that there is a greater good to look forward to rather than dwelling over the losses of a few, since not everyone can get what they wish but the greater benefit must be considered. He also drew upon the legitimacy for the government’s policies and decisions such as these, as emerging from the democratic principles of the electoral process and hence based on popular sovereignty. This seemed to then corroborate the authority of the established government in pushing forward the said proposal. He affirmed the government’s intention to execute this project in a legitimate manner without infringing on people’s properties illegally or outside of the constitutional rights granted to the citizen’s of India, and rehabilitating those that are losing their lands in the bargain, with adequate compensation for their losses as well.

According to Mr. S. S. Khurana’s opinion on the Hindu, The BJP government believes that firstly the bullet train will lead to a multiplier effect in the economy siknce endless jobs will be generated for the execution of the project. This means that there will be employment created due to the need to fill in construction jobs, management jobs, railway staff jobs etc which will mean that people will start to earn and hence have a greater disposable income which they can then spend in the economy. Once the investment increases and aggregate demand increases, there will be a larger change in output and hence the country’s GDP will increase. Economic analysts believe that capital goods, metals, infrastructure and cement sectors to benefit the most from this projectand hence the large firms and industries such as Larsen and Toubro Ltd and Tata Steel support this project. Moreover, as told to me by the MLA, “ there will be various halts along the route of the train. Along the route of Mumbai to Ahmedabad are a lot of industrial sites such as major chemical and pharmaceutical factories and for many of these factories, the workers come from the more rural areas. For them, since travelling time reduces, they can increase their working hours, hence creating more output and therefore resulting in a higher GDP. ”

In conclusion, the government believes that the Mumbai - Ahmedabad bullet train will be a catalytic agent for more such projects across the country in the future as once the country sees the execution of a successful bullet train, they will likely be open to more such projects. This was what happened with the Delhi Metro as will, as those who were resisting it’s introduction saw the acceptable execution of it and hence metros were executed in other cities such as Mumbai as well. India too, even in the face of resistance,could choose to go ahead with this project as it can result in large scale economic growth. However, if the project is not up to the mark or the prices of the train make it an elitist project, the train can cause more loss to the country then benefits. The prime minister of India truly believes that this project will make India rise on a global platform and give it more economic power and seem like a truly industrial country in the global community. The government has justified the economic development goals of the country which might seem quite idealistic by listing various economic benefits to the country. As Rick Warren once said “Vision is the process the ability to see the potential others overlook” and the Indian government is trying to execute a vision with potential citizens might have overlooked.