Download - Things That Make India Proud
India
A vibrant, free market democracy,a robust economy
A journey through IndiaPrabuddh Bsanerjee
Things That Make India Proud
We often belittle our achievements. It is a crying shame. A sense of pride has the power to raise people’s lives and hope from
an ordinary to a truly extraordinary. Pride also makes a nation, and in times of despair and helplessness, can lift the spirit of a billion people. I am presenting an enterprise called India.
India ( general)
GMT +5.5 Area 3,166829 km2 or 122396 sq
mi Pop 100+ cr. 7th largest country H- 83%;M-11%;C-2%;S-2%; B-1% One sixth of world pop
India(languages) Among top 20 world languages Hindi 6th (223) Bengali-7th (162) Punjabi-15th (60) Marathi-16th(58) Telugu- 18th(55) Tamil- 20th (49)
India (Population) Urban Rural Divide Urban - 32% Rural – 68% Towns- 3750 64% urban pop in 309 cities
India (households) Metros-(5 mn +) 8.3 Mini metros(1-5) 7.3 Main towns(100000) 4.5 Med towns (1mn) 10.0 Class II &III 10.6 Class IV 3.1 Class V, VI 1.1
Total 44.9 mn
India (Economy) 50 % pop.less than 25,0000 per
anum 5% - Rs. 77000- 106000 per anum 2% - Rs. 106000 + Carwalla Bike Walla Box Walla(Source: NCAER)
Armed Forces- India’s Fire Wall
Did you know India’s professional standing army of 1.1 million is the second largest in the world after China’s? Yet it has steadfastly kept out of politics.
The Space Programme Top Flight
Sending a rocket that launch a satellite in the space in a precision orbit require an accuracy of shooter striking a rupee coin 10 km away. Such precision and reliability are not normally associated with things made in India.
Nuclear Team – Blast Force
On May 11th 1998, then defense research chief A.P.J Abdul Kalam was in Pokharan wearing battle fatigues masquerading as Major General Prithviraj. His colleague and the chief of the Department of Atomic Energy R. Chidmabaram was palying his own part in India’s nuclaer play acting as Major General Nataraj. The two had led the team that tested the nuclear device. The tests have given India Shakti.
The Constitution- Will of the People
Shaped by some of the India’s finest minds, drafted by a committee headed by B.R. Ambedkar and conflating the world’s best political systems the United Kingdom, the United States, Australia, Ireland and Canada. If democracy is the religion the constitution is the Gita and Bible of the sovereign India.
Border Roads Organisation
What’s common among Nathu La in Sikkim, Bomdi La in Arunachal Pradesh, Khardung La and Siachen in J&K?
These remote spots, mostly passes are linked to the country through an impressive 32,800 km road network built by the low key but effective BRO.
SEWA – United Ladies
Some movements have a life of their own. Self Employed Women’s Association is one such organisation now bigger than the wildest dreams of its founder a lawyer- turned- labour leader from Ahmedabad- Ela Bhatt.
Supreme Court- Active Justice
The British set it up as early as 1774 in Kolkatta, with jurisdiction merely over the crow’s subjects in the colony. After independence, the Supreme Court in Delhi became an institution, which, unlike many others that sullied India’s name, pride and future has lived up to the responsibilities the constitution vested in it.
Udupi Hotels- Dosa Express
Udupi is also known as Udupi, with its staple fare of idli, uthappam and puri palya, has spawned a vast network of hotels across India.
Dabbawalas- The Food Chain
For starters they reside in the rarefied stratosphere of Six sigma rating or an efficiency rating of 99.999999- one error in six million transactions a feather in the Gandhi cap-as rated by Forbes Global a big American Business Weekly.
They make just one mistake in two months. All this for a measly 150 per month per Tiffins which when pooled among these magical lunch logisticians gives them a take home pay of around 3000 per month. Who needs management gurus?
Chipko Movement-Green Warriors
Chipko in Hindi means, “Stick to”. In early 1970sthat what thousands of villagers in the fertile valleys of the upper Himalayas did when wood contractors came to feel their trees and dared the government to have them cut.
They also got the central government to bring the new laws on forest felling that ultimately gave birth to the Department of Environment, as we know it today.
Mark II Pump Simple Solution
Did you know the rural water supply programme has used more than 30 lakh Mark II pumps in India and the device has also been exported Africa and Latin America?
Check Dams- Banishing Droughts
Archeological evidence suggested that check dams existed even 5000 years ago.
In a poor country low tech and low cost work the best, and these small barriers built across the direction of of water flow on shallow rivers have made a roaring comeback.
Thanks to pioneering NGOs in Rajasthan and Gujarat.
Free press write to know
Today there are over a hundred satellite channels that beam news and entertainment, over 5000 dailies, 16000 weeklies and more than 6000 fortnightlies in all Indian languages because people have right to know.
Amul: white knight For almost 36 years the Amul kid
hid one of the biggest natural produce movements in the world.by 1996 when the girl edged into India’s consciousness selling her utterly butterly delicious product Amul cooperative was quietly weaving what would be known as the White Revolution.
IIMs: first among equals
Its official, the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, is the toughest business school in the world to get in to, ahead of Harvard Business School, Columbia University, Spain’s Instituto de Empressa and France’s Instead according to the survey by the Economist.
Jaipur Foot-Footprints in Time
If all I saw your nose, it would be enough to sculpt the likeness of your body, says one time wood carver Ram Chandra. Few would need to go that far.
Ram Chandra and his colleagues at The Bhagwan Mahaveer Viklang Sahayata Samiti a charitable trust have for more than 30 years often without seeing their bodies made likeness their limbs.
Yoga- Life Line Yoga is called the
elixir, this 5000 year old holistic science was first noticed in an Indus valley seal of a yogi and later codified by Patanjali in the 2nd century BC is accepted, without question as superb mind, body and soul exercise.
Cricket Stars- Heroes No 1 Did you know- every cricketer who
plays for India receives a cap with a number on it indicating his place in the list of Test players. Irfan Pathan is 245.
It’s only a game, but without it life in India would hardly be the same. They all end up human, fallible but at their best, they always seemed like gods- been gods.
The Joint Family
It stays together, eats together, celebrates together, works together and dodges tax together with help of friendly regulations for the “undivided family”. the extended family is generally melodramatic- from Ramayana to Hum Apke Hain Kaun? – Sometimes quarrelsome, and occasionally stifling.
Indian Railways Wheels of a Nation
Did you know- Indian Railways has network of 1,00,000 km, 7000 stations, it runs 11000 trains daily and ferries one million passengers every day.
Running from North to South and east to West on three different guages it is one of the cheapest in the world. It is the nations largest employer with 1.65 million on its rolls.
Shivaji Park- Cricket’s Nursery
A Shivaji Park XI made up of Ajit Wadekar, Lalchand Rajput,SachinTendulkar, Sandeep Patil, Vinod Kambli, Chandrakant Pandit, Ramakant Desai, Raju Kulkarni, Baloo Gupte, Padmakar Shivalkar and Ajit Agarkar would be handful for any opposition, not just any maidan XI, two more India players, Pravin Amre and Manohar Hardikar in the reserves
Lijjat Papad- Self Help Success
Toady Bandra based shri Mahila Griha Udyog Lijjat Papad is an operation with 60 centres countrywide involving 40,000 women and annual sales of over 300 crore.
Tirumala Devasthanam Holy Managers
The country’s richest Hindu temple with an income of Rs. 5000 crore a year epitomizes Kuber it also symbolizes superb management.
Darjeeling Tea India’s Champagne
Today there are 86 gardens spread over 19000 hectares employing 15000 people producing up to 11 million kg a year. A kilo of Darjeeling from the Castleton estate fetched the highest ever price of Rs. 22000 at the Kolkata auctions in 2003.
General Elections Festival of Democracy
Did you know- from 173 million voters 50 years ago, the number grew to 619 million in the 1999 general elections making India’s elections the largest in the world.
The country’s diamond trading hub with door-to-door service without any receipt or record of transfer angadia firms ferry even cash.
Angadias- Gem Relay
The Dhaba- Food Forever Never take a dhaba at face value you never
what you will find. This once lowly roadside eatery is going
places: from Punjab, where it was born as a highway trucker’s halt serving food at dirt cheap prices (dirt comes with the main course) dhabas have now gone global.
In Massachusetts, you could find an “up market” dhaba that serves a naan for $1.5 (74). In London it may come with a hip crowd and stylized Bhangra.
Indian Advertising Desi Dream Works
When Piyush Pandey O&M group president took a gold lion awards at the Cannes International Advertising Awards for superb campaign on Fevicol it implied recognition of the Indian idiom.
Indian advertising has crafted an ingenious idiom to communicate in a land as diverse as India and as complex as Bharat
IITs Brain Fever
The seven IITs- first set up in 1951 in Kharagpur and the others in Chennai, Mumbai, Delhi, Kanpur, Guwahati and Rookee were conceived by the late PM Jawaharlal Nehru.
Today gaining admission it self an achievement here
•The elite techie boot camps fewer than 2000 graduates every year – 2500 are admitted from an aspiring one lakh- that organisation in India and abroad gratefully accept in to their folds.Among the IIT alumni’s internationally known names are: •Victor menezes, MD, Citibank, •Rajat Gupta MD McKinsey & Co, •Vinod Khosla, Partner Kleiner Perkins •Arun Netravali, President reaserch, AT&T Bell Laboratories•N.R. Nrayana Murthy CMD Infosys Technologies Ltd • M.S. Banga chairman HLL
Mumbai’s transport Simply the BEST
Calling it the best in the country would be an understatement. 3,380 efficiently running BEST buses and over one lakh taxis and auto rickshaws are known for their honesty.
But the backbone of the city are the ‘locals’, a euphemism for network of 162 suburban trains running over 200km making it world’s largest suburban network.
Indian Post Everywhere Delivery The India postal system, the
largest in the world, thrives with network of 1.5 lakh post offices countrywide, in remote jungles, still more remote mountain communities and hamlets in the middle of the Thar desert.
Vividh Bharati- Song of India
Inaugurated in 1970, presenting a mix of film music, skits short plays and other features and then as now broadcasts for 14 hours a day beaming countrywide from 200 stations this is much greater than the present reach of FM radio restricted to metros.
The population coverage of Vividh Bharati is 97 percent.
Sulabh Shauchalaya- Toilet Training
Did you know- Sulabh International maintains 5,000 pay-per-use public toilet and bath complexes and have helped set up 7.5 lakh units in India?
Kabadiwala
In India, its possible to recycle and reuse almost any junk, from newspaper to old plastic jars. According to one estimate, India recycles 60 percent of its plastic waste. The figure for Japan is 12%, for China 10%.Discarded objects are reincarnated for someone less privileged. Poverty forces an estimated one million kabadiwallas to spend hours earning few rupees this way.
Bollywood – Dream Factory
Bollywood produces 300 feature films every year, has an annual turnover of Rs. 6000 crore, and gives jobs to more than two million people. These inanities have found fans in East Asia, Central Asia, North America, and Africa. Bollywood, the overly decorated window to our soul, is now world’s window to India.
The Bicycle Uncommon Carrier
India moves on bicycles India with its 13 million
bicycles per anum, is second only to China and boasts the world’s largest maker Hero Cycles, which makes close to six million a year.
Other Indian Wonders
Sari Handicraft Spiritualism Ayurveda Green revolution Indian Novel Mid-day Meal Scheme
Indian Wonders
Kolkata Metro Indian Curry Silent valley Info-tech revolution Indian Beauty NRIs STD Booths
At Last Jugaad- Impro- Wise
If anybody says Indian’s are not innovative, just stare them down and call them rude names. Innovation is the mother of all inventions in this vast impoverished country where common folk have turned make-do into an art form.