The State of the Nation

By Nani A. Palkhivala

Summary

This Forum of Free Enterprise pamphlet reproduces Nani A. Palkhivala’s 1982 survey of the condition of India, titled ‘The State of the Nation: The Four Costly Failures’ and carried, per the closing note, courtesy of The Illustrated Weekly of India (21 November 1982). Palkhivala opens by recalling his own 1974 warning of mounting disorder and declares 1982 ‘the Year of Disorder’ — a year of violence, indiscipline and corruption in which, he writes, ‘in the land of the Mahatma, violence is on the throne today.’

He diagnoses two underlying causes: a national ‘unconcern for public good’ in which citizens treat crime as a problem only for the police, and a ‘moral recession’ worse than the economic one, in which the standards of politicians, policemen and criminals have become indistinguishable. From this he derives the four costly failures of both government and people: failure to maintain law and order (‘too much government and too little administration’); failure to bring the country’s economic potential to fruition; failure to make human investment in education, family planning, nutrition and public health; and failure to provide moral leadership.

The pamphlet marshals data on India’s poverty — still, he says, the fifteenth poorest nation, with per-capita income below 200 dollars — and closes by quoting Rajaji (C. Rajagopalachari) on Swaraj and universal education, before insisting that the whole point of the piece is that India’s innate potential far exceeds its actual achievement, and that ‘creative dissatisfaction’ is the surest route to fulfilling the founders’ dreams.

Key points

• A 1982 Nani A. Palkhivala essay issued as a Forum of Free Enterprise pamphlet; closing note credits The Illustrated Weekly of India, 21 November 1982.

• Palkhivala calls 1982 ‘the Year of Disorder’, covering violence, indiscipline and corruption, and recalls his own 1974 forecast of rising disorder.

• He identifies two root causes: national unconcern for the public good, and a ‘moral and spiritual recession’ worse than the economic one.

• The four costly failures: (1) maintaining law and order; (2) realising economic potential; (3) human investment in education, family planning, nutrition and health; (4) moral leadership.

• He argues ‘too much government and too little administration; too many public servants and too little public service; too many controls and too little welfare; too many laws and too little justice.’

• He cites that India is the fifteenth poorest nation with per-capita income under 200 dollars and only 55% real growth in per-capita income since becoming a republic.

• He invokes Konrad Lorenz, Lord William Bentinck’s abolition of thuggery, and the ‘banality of evil’ to dramatise the breakdown of order.

• He closes with a long quotation from Rajaji on Swaraj and universal education, and a plea for ‘creative dissatisfaction’.

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