The late C.K. Prahlad once said that entrepreneurs are the new freedom fighters of India. Entrepreneurs can free India from poverty. Entrepreneurship is the art of creating new markets and stretching limited resources with daring, unlimited dreams. Though historians say there are a myriad Indias, alike and yet starkly contrasting, I venture to suggest that there are only two Indias—the haves and have nots. Thus, the focus of all efforts, ideas and political action should be on tackling the sheer magnitude of poverty and unemployment of a majority of the population seething with resentment, helplessness and despair over their exclusion. One-third of India—220 districts—is identified with Maoist activity. They feel dispossessed, cheated and robbed of their dreams. Only the spirit of adventure, continued optimism and entrepreneurial energy can lift India from poverty. Entrepreneurs create markets, which create jobs.
It is the entrepreneurial economy which built America and countries in Europe and destroyed feudalism. The reforms set in motion by Rajiv Gandhi nearly 30 years ago, given impetus by Narasimha Rao, and later by other governments have spawned a new, aspirational India. It dismantled the old aristocracy and built on its ruins a new economy. Though some of the old elite have been replaced by a few powerful business houses resembling oligarchs, the sheer entrepreneurial drive and scale of this has propelled India into an economic powerhouse in varied sectors like IT, biotech, pharma, engineering, financial services and banking, automobiles and healthcare. Entrepreneurs challenge the status quo and destroy cartels.
A simple set of ideas and an audacious dream—that ‘every Indian must and can fly’—egged me and my colleagues from Army aviation on to set up Air Deccan in 2003, which broke the cartel and revolutionised air travel. When I look back at the days just before Air Deccan was founded, a few images come to mind. Images of India’s transformation from being a nation of a billion hungry mouths to be fed to a nation of a billion hungry consumers. The first clear thought of starting an airline for the common man came to me on a low-cost South West Airlines flight in the US when I was seated next to a beefy man, a carpenter, chewing on a burger. It was a moment of epiphany! I had no money but was possessed by the dream and Air Deccan took to the skies within a year. It not only broke the cost barrier, but also the caste barrier. Trade and commerce truly integrate a country, dissolving class, social and religious divisions, bringing together millions from all corners of the country to help manufacture and deliver products and services.
Then there are Pratap Reddy and Appollo Hospitals or Deepak Parekh and HDFC Bank or Narayana Murthy and Infosys, Azim Premji and Wipro of the earlier generation—self-made men who burst forth on to the Indian business scene. It was the power of their ideas and vision that paved the way for others, like the Bansals of Flipkart or BYJU’S. Though these companies and the new poster boys of enterprise have come to represent modern India, real wealth and transformation has taken place in the less glamorous small and medium enterprises and services—lakhs of bakeries, restaurants, corner stores, gyms, spas, yoga studios etc. It was and is a myth that most jobs were created in hi-tech industries.
The challenge now is to create jobs in the ‘other India’. If the ‘new India’ creates a dual economy—a wealthy economy with islands of prosperity co-existing with vast areas of poverty, illiteracy and malnutrition—it does not lend itself into a socially cohesive society. So, young entrepreneur must rise to the task and engage politicians and bureaucrats to bring about the changes needed to create policies for equitable growth. The ‘Startup India’ campaign launched by PM Narendra Modi is a great initiative. What it needs is not a corpus of funds from the government, but good governance, stable policies and creation of a right eco-system for an entrepreneurial economy—in not just IT and big business, but across all categories down to rural India and small towns. With the mandate Modi enjoys, he must unite a polarised society and bring about stability, social cohesion and an environment of peace. No business can thrive amidst strife, conflict and mistrust. Where there are passionate and intrepid entrepreneurs, capital will find its way to them as the river seeks the sea.