A long wait for take-off

The word 8216;8216;infrastructure8217;8217; came up so often at last week8217;s India Economic Summit it became the conference8217;s b...

The word 8216;8216;infrastructure8217;8217; came up so often at last week8217;s India Economic Summit it became the conference8217;s background raga. In one session a panel of heavyweight delegates was asked what they thought was the single most important reform the government could make today that would achieve the sort of path-breaking difference the abolition of the License Raj did and nearly everyone said infrastructure.

The word rang in my ears later that evening when I arrived at Delhi airport and found it so crowded and filthy it resembled an Indian railway station. People jostled and pushed to find standing room in the departure terminal that remains unchanged since socialist times and in the restaurant we queued for the privilege of sharing a table with strangers because so many flights were delayed. When I finally boarded my delayed Jet Airways flight to Mumbai it sat on the tarmac for another hour due to congestion and when we landed in Mumbai we had to fight our way out of the arrivals terminal because of the crush of passengers and those there to receive them. Pramod Mahajan happened to be on the same flight and when I complained about the appalling conditions of air travel he smiled cheerfully and said, 8216;8216;A new terminal is being built. But, why don8217;t you see the bright side of things8230; Look at the number of people travelling these days.8217;8217;

Only politicians can see the bright side where infrastructure is concerned. For the rest of us the future remains bleak. We have the worst airports in the world but instead of building new, modern airports with road and rail connections to our cities we have a Civil Aviation Minister who appears to believe that all that is needed is a bit of cosmetic surgery.

Six big business groups are lining up for the chance to 8216;8216;upgrade8217;8217; Delhi and Mumbai airports. By the time they finish their 8216;8216;upgrade8217;8217; it will be time for new airports to be built in both these cities. But, years of socialist planning is hard to shake off so we plan for the moment, not even the near future, and we bumble along without clear policies or expert advice. Groups of ministers look into these problems and since none of them have the required expertise they happily agree to proposals that should not be considered. When it comes to major infrastructure projects privatisation can only result in cosmetic changes because no business group has the thousands of crores needed to build a decent modern airport or port. No business group can wait decades for its investment to start paying off. Odd how the government happily privatises where it should not and clings to the right to run hotels and duty free shops.

If the government is serious about building infrastructure it must begin by doubling investment to at least 4 of GDP. China spends more than double that and according to a report by the NCAER National Council of Applied Economic Research we should be spending 8 of GDP if we want 21st century infrastructure.

It is not just about money, though, it is also about efficiency and speed. We take so long to build anything that costs double and treble and nobody complains because the average Indian does not know that he has the right to decent infrastructure. Allow me an example from my recent travels. From Mumbai I travelled by boat to a seaside town called Mandwa which has a jetty in such bad condition that you have to leap off your ferry onto another boat before being able to reach the rickety stone steps of the jetty. People have fallen and seriously injured themselves because of this and the jetty has been in this condition for at least five years but nobody complains so the government of Maharashtra does nothing.

Mandwa is the gateway to a collection of lovely seaside villages and in another country there would have been not just a jetty but a marina and a promenade and restaurants and cafes for day trippers from Mumbai. But, this is India that is Bharat so all we get is a broken jetty that will probably remain under repair for the next five years.

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If it has taken five years to repair a jetty think how long it is going to take to build the ports, airports, railway stations and power stations without which India goes into the 21st century on crutches. At the India Summit the Prime Minister talked about the possibilities of growing the economy at 10 a year. If he thinks he can do this without basic infrastructure he really is a dreamer.

Write to tavleensinghexpressindia.com