Special Session with Shri Mukesh Ambani "India as An Economic Super Power in 20 Years"
December 13, 2002 New Delhi

Vision Statement by Mr Mukesh Ambani, Chairman and Managing Director, Reliance Industries Limited

Dear Friends,

It is a great honour to be here this afternoon, to address this pre-eminent gathering of Indian leaders from a wide spectrum of fields such as Politics, Economy, Business and Society.

FICCI represents a great nationalist tradition.

It symbolizes an inspiring partnership forged during the struggle for India's independence; an unprecedented partnership between great leaders of India's people and towering stalwarts of India's business community.

I regard it a privilege to speak from this venerable platform.

Thank you Shri Rajendra Lodha, for giving me this opportunity.

The theme, 'Unleashing India's Potential,' is an unequivocal expression of faith in India's resurgence on the global arena.

By focusing on it, FICCI has triggered a strong sense of patriotic fervour in our minds.

When I was a child, my father. Shri Dhirubhai Ambani, would tell me stories about the legendary leaders of his time, like Mahatma Gandhi and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel.

I also came to know about their relationship with the business leaders of that era, like Kasturbhai Lalbhai, Shri Ghanshyamdas Birla and others.

It is really amazing how Mahatma Gandhi forged an incredible bond among all sections of our people - bringing together the landless farmers of Champaran, the textile workers of Kanpur and Ahmedabad and the business leaders of Bombay.

He wove their aspirations in a common purpose.

And it is this historic unity that won India its independence from the mighty British Raj.

Leaders of India's freedom struggle were giants among intellectuals. They included eminent lawyers, grant scientists, famous doctors and well- known professionals.

The leaders of Indian business and industry were outstanding pioneers.

Both these streams pooled their resources for securing India a place of pride in the world.

They launched us on a great journey of renewal and renaissance.

I believe that journey is not yet over.

India's political, intellectual and business leadership must work together to reach the goal - to win for India a place commensurate with the latent potential of her people.

This is why I find today's theme highly inspiring.

Over the last seventy-five years, FICCI has shown the way as the torchbearer of Indian enterprise.
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Today, FICCI and all Indian enterprises have a new clarion call - of taking India to the summit of global economic leadership.

As I share my thoughts with you. I will endeavor, in my humble way, to respond to this new clarion call.

On the surface, my address is a quest.

On a more profound level, my address is a dream.

lt reflects an irrepressible ambition: to take Indian enterprise to the top of the global ladder.

I am sure that many of you share a similar aspiration.

One sixth of humanity lives in India.

In this age of rising aspirations and instant communication, there can be no peace if a billion people are discontented, deprived, unhappy and therefore, angry.

Consequently, I want India to become an economic super power not only for her own sake, but also for the benefit of the whole world.

Unleashing India's potential is no doubt in our interest.

But it is equally in the interest of the whole world.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

We can realize the vast untapped potential of our people if we clearly identify the decisive parameters of what we want to achieve.

In my view, Globalization, technology and demography are altering strategic international balances.

Services of large segments of the working population can now be easily substituted across national boundaries.

There is a widening chasm between those who have the skills and mobility to flourish in global markets and those who do not have these advantages.

Globalization insists on efficiency and promotes specialization.

It is ruthless in its demands. But it is equally generous in its rewards.

Technology has become the most important driver of economic growth and development.

Technologies that promote efficiency and specialization are primarily in the domains of information, communications, automation, robotics, biotechnology and advanced materials.

At one level, technology, particularly biotechnology and infocomm, promise to spectacularly change life, living and living systems.

At another level, technology is creating new vistas of knowledge and avenues for economic output.

But these technologies are the privilege of a few countries, such as the US, UK, Germany and Japan.

An aging population is slowly weighing down the US, Europe and Japan.

Today, one fifth of the American population is above the age of 60. In 25 years time, this number will increase to a quarter of the US population.

Germany is worse off. Roughly, a quarter of the Germans are now old.

In 25 years, a third of them will be old. The case of Japan is very similar to that of Germany.

While the world is getting older, India will continue to be young.

Economic power is central to achieving prosperity in such a world.

Economic power enables public investments in infrastructure to support physical competitiveness.

It fuels investments in education, health care and research to promote intellectual competitiveness.

Economic power helps attract global savings.

It is also important for acquiring the diplomatic and military profile of a major power.

Therefore, aiming to be a global economic superpower is not a game of one-up-manship for India.

It is an imperative, a necessity for ensuring stability, progress and prosperity in a rapidly changing strategic global landscape,

IMPERATIVES

What should India do to reach this goal?

1. Work out a feasible strategy for a high rate of growth
2. Harness global opportunities in important economic sectors
3. Manage Key economic resources efficiently
4. Invest in important enablers of economic performance
5. Access the global savings pool
6. Create a new world mindset

With your permission, let me address each of these imperatives.

TARGETING TOP LINE GDP

India's GDP, of 500 billion US dollars, is a very small fraction of the global GDP of about 34 trillion US dollars.

Given a population denominator of 1 billion people the per capita income works out to 490 US dollars.]

This is only about a tenth of the world's average per capita income.

It is also only one fiftieth of the per capita income of the developed world.

If India has to attain global economic leadership, growth rates have to accelerate significantly to double digits - from about 5 to 6% now to about 15% per annum, year on year, for about twenty years.

This will raise the GDP to about 9 trillion US dollars and bring our per capita income closer to the world averages.

I am aware of the recent debate on India's growth rate.

I Know that experts have dismissed targets of a high growth rate as unrealistic.

I would like to submit, humbly but forcefully, that the dismal prognosis of growth rates flows from incremental thinking.

We must break free from the mould of thinking about growth in an incremental manner. It limits our capacity to conceptualise growth and progress on a large, 'beat the world' format.

New physics has put classical physics on the shelf.

Quantum mechanics has relegated old ways of thinking on the back burner.

We need similar transformation in economic thinking.

The knowledge era has shattered all our conventional reference points.

It has made past precedents irrelevant. Individuals, communities and societies now have the opportunity to accelerate their growth dramatically.

They can create entirely new and large opportunities for advancement.

The Indian intellect must break free from an evolutionary mindset.

It must conceptualise initiatives in all spheres in a revolutionary manner.

To recall my father's strongest belief: We must dare to dream. And dare to dream big.

We must have the determination and the courage to ensure that India can achieve a sustainable income of 9 trillion US dollars in twenty years.

This should be our overarching goal.

Some would regard my proposition as over ambitious and far-fetched.

It is not surprising. Brave words, some others would say. Show me how we can translate this into action, you may ask.

As my response to this question, let me present concrete examples of opportunities that are available in the different sectors for achieving our goals.

HARNESSING GLOBAL OPPORTUNITIES

Food and Agriculture

Let me begin with food and agriculture.

It is important because of several reasons.

The most important reason is that, no development strategy will work in democratic India unless the farmers support it

India has about 13 percent of the world's arable land, receives 4% of the world's annual fresh water supply through rainfall each year, is blessed with twelve major river basins, enjoys good sunshine, has a wide range of agro climatic conditions ard has a large number of scientific and technological resources devoted to this sector.

But Indian agriculture is still languishing in the low end of the agronomy value chain.

It is a victim of the low-investment, low-yield, water-inefficient model of farming, India has an output of only about 125 billion US dollars in agriculture.

This situation must change.

India must target 2 trillion US dollars in food and agricultural output in twenty years. Again, skeptics may disagree with this number.

But I believe an output of this magnitude is feasible.

It can be achieved by expanding the volume of food production and productivity.

This will require the use of modem farming methods and plant biotechnology, diversifying the crop mix away from rice and wheat and moving up the value chain into food processing.

Israel's food and agricultural output, valued at 4 billion US dollars, is produced on just one million acres of very arid land.

India has 400 million acres of irrigated land and 75 million acres of wasteland at its disposal.

Why can't India improve its productivity thirteen times to produce 1,900 billion US dollars of output. I refuse to accept that the Indian farmer is deficient in any way, when compared to others.

In fact, he is very hard working.

Also, he has convincingly demonstrated the ability to adopt and practice modem farming technologies.

At times, I wonder that if the Middle East can be the energy base for the world, why can’t India be the food base for the world?

If the Middle East can make value added petrochemicals from hydrocarbons for the global markets, why can't India produce value added food, medicinal plants, aromatic oils and biomaterials for the global markets?

Of course, realizing this vision calls for several radical initiatives.

These include, reforming agricultural landholding laws, instituting a market-based procurement price system and allowing the barrier-free movement of food produce across India and to the world

Simultaneously, we must safeguard the interests of Indian farmers and give them a level playing field.

Therefore, we must lobby for the removal of huge subsidies provided to agriculture in the US and Europe and for unrestricted integration of our produce with retail markets in the world.

We must promote plant metabolic engineering research, privatize the irrigation sector, build rural roads on an unprecedented scale and on a priority basis, and create a national cold chain infrastructure.

In essence, India has to transform its agriculture into a productive enterprise to propel itself into becoming a global economic power.

This alone will change the fortunes of our farmers.

This requires a united endeavour by farmers, scientists and businessmen in the same spirit as farmers, lawyers and industrialists joined together to win India's freedom.

Manufacturing

The second sector is manufacturing.

India is richly endowed with natural resources and human capital.

There is a significant opportunity for consolidating these advantages initially and later progressing to value added products.

Our base level industries such as textiles, clothing, metalworking and consumer products, require minimum skills. This is globally a 700 billion US dollars segment

Industries such as office machines as well as electrical and electronic equipment, require simple skills, and comprise globally a one trillion US dollars segment.

Resource-based industries, in the chemical and metallurgical domains, where India has a good resource base, is globally a 900 billion US dollars segment.

Industries such as aluminum and automobiles enjoy a huge domestic market combined with cost advantages.

These can catapult India into the league of global players.

These industries are valued at 3 trillion US dollars at the global level.

Finally, there are industries that are shifting from unidimensional manufacturing to developing complex engineered systems.

This is becoming the hallmark of globally competitive companies in the knowledge age.

These industries can leverage on the information technology skill sets in India.

Keeping all these segments in mind, it should not be difficult for India to target 2 trillion dollars of output in twenty years on the strength of its international competitiveness and domestic consumption.

For this, the Indian manufacturing industry has to carefully target the export markets, focus on scale, technology and customer needs, improve efficiency across the supply chain and move away from controlling all activities in the value chain.

A concrete example is the export performance of Reliance Industries Limited in the manufacturing sector. Our exports have grown dramatically from Rs 366 crores in 1997-98 to Rs 11,200 crores in 2001-02, thirty fold increase in just four years.

This necessitates a synergistic partnership between industry and government, a partnership based on mutual trust and cooperation.

It also calls for an understanding between industry and labour.

Finally, it requires a commitment to the consumers-to assure them the best quality at affordable prices.

We need not write off the manufacturing sector.

In other words, I am once again pleading for recreating the partnership of the freedom movement for making India an economic superpower.

Only in such a conducive environment, can we find solutions to the problems in Diverse areas such as: indirect taxes, labor laws, bureaucracy and infrastructure.

A climate of trust would give the government the courage to support selected sectors aggressively.

It can join hands with them to ensure that they reorient their manufacturing skills for global economic leadership.

Infocomm

I now turn to information and communications, or infocomm.

It is my strong conviction that this is the most important sector, given the context of the ongoing information age.

An overarching infocomm infrastructure will prepare India to don the mantle of leadership in knowledge intensive businesses.
It will enable us to harness the potential of millions of young men and women.

It will provide the knowledge workers with a platform to develop and offer IT solutions for all professions and institutions across the world.

It will catalyze India's formidable software talent to develop products for the global market and realize substantially higher value for their efforts.

The recent deregulation with unrestricted entry in the sector is enabling India create the next generation communication infrastructure.

It shows how the spirit of partnership between the government and business can help us in realizing India's potential.
I will urge that the customer must be made the third pivot of a triangular partnership in infocomm sector.

This sector will grow rapidly only if the industry offers to the people the benefits of technology, if the services are of high quality at an affordable cost.

Not to do so will be extremely shortsighted.

By all projections, the number of voice lines in India in the next five years will increase by the same quantity as in the last fifty years.

It will cost one fourth. This will benefit consumers.

India has natural advantages in this sector that most other countries in East Asia will never be able to match - its huge pool of relatively low cost labor, which is educated, technologically savvy and English-friendly

And this pool is only growing larger.

More and more Indian teenagers recognize the opportunities in the communications and information technology-related sectors,
The pool of talent and skill available in India is growing by leaps and bounds.

Joint efforts in software product development and hardware design in India can be made with great success.
India is home to 600,000 software developers, which would grow to three in million in five years.

Today, a connected world is a reality.

In the infocomm sector, India has the potential to power all the intellectual systems and applications in the connected world.

Health Care and Life Sciences

Now, let us look at life sciences and health care, which offer another great opportunity for India.

I believe that the twentieth century was the century of physics and chemistry. The twenty first century is the century of biology.

Today, mankind is using biotechnologies to understand, alter and direct the function of a wide set of organic cells - in plants, animals and humans.

It is predicted by the year 2025, gene therapies will become available for every major conceivable disease.

Artificial assist devices will take over diseased liver and pancreatic functions.

Individualized medicine will be developed on the basis of each person’s genetic make up.

Genetic manipulation will alter human traits. Animal cloning will be used to produce new drugs.

Humanized transgenic animals will be reared to produce organs for transplantation.

New vaccine technologies will be successful in treating drug addiction.

Therapies for reducing the effects of aging will be in vogue.

Tissue engineered organs will be available for replacement of diseased ones.

The discovery of the code of life, or genome, written in the sequence of four nucleotides that form the DNA, has enabled man to discover life and design life. A process that took nature three billion years to develop has been re-created by human
technology in an incredibly short span of time.

Biotechnology is also moving towards decoding the library of proteins in the body. This will enable making to alter the very metabolism of life processes.

Biotechnology can impact every one of the 6 billion people in the world today.

In fact every single plant and animal and every single material that we use will be impacted by it.
Meaningful research will help us grow more out of existing resources. It can make factories out of farms.

It will also stimulate the international economy in a very big way.

It is estimated that the global life sciences market will be in the order of USD 2 trillion in the next five years.

We, at Reliance, have taken concrete measures to explore this exciting area.

Reliance Life Sciences is developing business opportunities in the domains of medical biotechnology, plant biotechnology, industrial biotechnology, contract research and clinical trials.

This initiative seeks to take cues from thousands of years of knowledge in traditional Indian schools of medicine.

Our researchers are trying to combine it with modern science and technology to discover and develop drug candidates.
Reliance is one of the ten institutions worldwide listed by the US National Institutes of Health for work in the area of embryonic stem cells.

Reliance is also developing a relationship with premier US universities for shared research efforts.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

India has everything going for it in health care-competent doctors, strong nursing skill sets, a resurgent pharmaceutical industry, strong chemistry-based drug discovery capabilities and a modest, but growing, breed of medical biologists.

India can provide a whole range of services, from medical transcription to telemedicine through a modern information and communication infrastructure.

Clinical services for aliments outside the scope of medical insurance or for disabilities involving a long waiting time can be performed in India in state-of-the-art facilities.

The emergence of private corporate hospitals, with state-of-the-art equipment, people and processes motivates me to think in this manner.

India can grow as a leading health care provider to the world.

MANAGING KEY ECONOMIC RESOURCES

Friends,

To be a global economic power, India faces the challenge of managing its critical economic resources well.

I would place water and energy at the top of my first of critical resources.

Water Resources

You cannot talk of the food and agriculture sector without addressing the question of water resources.

Today, technology has advanced to such an extent that, the only limiting factor to agriculture is water.

We receive about 4,000 billion cubic meters of fresh water every year.

Of this, 3,600 billion cubic meters is through rainfall.

About half the rainfall runs off the rivers.

Of the remaining water, only 1,100 billion cubic meters is put to productive use.

This is because of topographical constraints and the uneven distribution of water resources over space and time.

Water storage in dams is limited to 250 billion cubic meters.

It is grossly insufficient. In comparison, the US has three times this storage capacity with a comparable flow.

Only half the storage and irrigation potential of dams is utilized. Further only half the water from the main sources reaches farms due to evaporation losses and seepage.

The hydroelectric potential is grossly underutilized. Irrigation systems are archaic and inefficient.

Water use efficiency is a third below optimum levels in canal and ground water schemes

As a result, India is forecasted to face water scarcity by the year 2020.

The debilitating inefficiencies in water management must be addressed urgently.

It is also necessary that close to 110 billion US dollars are invested in twenty years for the development of water resources.

In brief, water should not be viewed only as a resource necessary for sustaining agriculture.

It is also vital for building economic power.

WE need bold initiatives in this area.

We need to link all the river water basins, build a number of large dams, price water based on its economic value, privatize the operations and maintenance of irrigation and water supply systems and mandate the recycling of water.

All this may require amendments in the Constitution of India.

In our democratic polity, this will be possible only in an environment which is dedicated to building India into an economic superpower.

Energy

Talking about water leads me to hydroelectric power and, in a larger context, the energy sector.

Here again, it is a story of potential waiting to be converted into performance.

India can easily increase its hydroelectric production capacity seven-fold to about 40,000 MW, primarily in the North East.

This calls for regional cooperation with Nepal and Bhutan.

A large hydroelectric power base can lead to significant competitive advantages for Indian industry through a relatively lower cost of energy.

In October this year, Reliance Industries Limited announced the largest ever gas find in India in three decades, with in place reserves of 7 trillion cubic feet.

This is an outcome of exploring just 2,000 square kilometers in the deep waters of the Bay of Bengal. We still have about 175,000 square kilometers to explore.

India is a largely under explored territory in oil and gas.

I am convinced that over the next few years this situation will change.

Reliance as well as other companies are prospecting for oil and gas on land and also in the shallow waters and deep waters of India.

Reliance's historic oil field discovery should encourage them to go ahead with confidence and optimism.

To my mind, India can easily target an output of one trillion dollars from the energy sector in about twenty years.

An energy self-sufficient India can alter the economic, political and manufacturing landscape of the region.

India's quest for energy will create new economic and strategic challenges, right from the challenge of mobilizing capital to the subtleties of diplomacy.

India would also have to consider new projects for linking electricity grids, building gas pipelines, promoting regional hydroelectric stations, stockpiling oil on a cooperative basis and pursuing nuclear energy options.

In essence, the face of energy in India is set to change, bringing with it new opportunities for supporting the country's bid for achieving global economic leadership.

INVESTING IN PERFORMANCE ENABLERS

Ladies and Gentleman,

Another important component in our quest for global economic leadership for India, is the need to make significant investments in infrastructure.

By this I mean both the physical and Intellectual infrastructure

Crtical areas in physical infrastructure are power, transportation, communications and the financial markets.

The vital segments of the intellectual infrastructure are: professional resource development, high quality education and constructive research.

Infrastructure

Let me first take the physical infrastructure.

Enterprises in India have lamented the sorry state of the physical infrastructure.

In the power sector, per capita power consumption in India is 363 kwh.

The world average is 2,054 kwh.

Transmission and distribution losses in India are 18% of output. The world average is 8%.

India needs bold measures in deregulation

The government should neither act as a profit guarantor in the power sector, nor should it subsidize all users.

Companies must learn to face normal business risks and not ask the government to provide them with shelter.

Consumers must learn to pay for the power consumed.

No doubt, there are segments of the population who are too poor to pay the market price.

For these people, the government must announce a policy of targeted subsidies.

In transportation, some commendable initiatives have already been taken in the road sector, with the major cities being linked through nation-wide networks.

We should see the results in the next few years.

However, significant investments are required in the long neglected area of rural roads.

If capital productivity has to be improved and India has to achieve the status of a global economic power, India has to cover a lot of ground in infrastructure, particularly in the power sector

Professional Resources Development

Friends,

I would like to spend a little more time on the need to develop the intellectual infrastructure.

Because, it needs more attention than it has received so far.

I believe the world will see two wars that will Involve the whole of humanity.

The war for progress and the war for talent.

The have-nots will fight one.

The haves will fight the other. The two are intertwined.

While India fights the war for economic progress, it has the unique opportunity to gain from the war for talent by building up its professional resources.

As I said earlier, an aging population in the US. Europe and Japan means a decline in their workforce and talent.

The US is already facing a shortage of skilled professionals.

This will be further accentuated.

Over the next 10 to 15 years, the professional workforce shortage in the US will peak to 15 million,

Europe will see a shortfall of a million professionals in information technology alone. Germany is already facing a shortfall of about 200,000 engineers.

China is estimated to need upwards of 1.4 million management graduates.

Japan, Australia, Malaysia, Singapore and New Zealand are forecasting large shortages of professional talent.

This shortage will last at least till the middle of this century.

Warning bells of a talent famine are ringing loud and clear.

Far sightedness demands that India elevates the development and management of talent to a burning priority.

With a well-thought out policy in place, India can leverage its huge talent to attain global economic leadership.

Demography has been kind to India. India has a young population.

Just 7% of Indians are above the age of 60.

In 25 years time, 400 million Indians will enter the work force India will continue to be young and will see a swelling workforce.

India has a large pool of scientific, technical and professional talent.

Thanks to the visionary leadership of post-Independent India, the educational and professional infrastructure built in the past has served us well so far.

The Indian professional has proven creativity, adaptability and a spirit of initiative.

I find it disturbing that the professional talent base in India is limited to an elite group of 5.5 million people.

They constitute India one percent of the workforce.
This small fraction garners most of the benefits of economic progress.

The rest of the participants in the economy remain on the margins. This picture must
change.

India has a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for achieving a talent-driven economic revolution.

Even if only one million trained knowledge workers from India are deployed to work for 2,000 hours per year earning just 20 US dollars an hour, it would generate a sustainable annual income of USD 40 billion

In turn, this income will have a far-reaching multiplier effect and unleash a self-sustaining economic revolution.

India must increase its professional resource base twenty fold - from five million to
a hundred million professionals.

In other words, India has the means to run the global race in the knowledge age, by investing in professional resources management.

Education

Developing professional resources on a large scale requires significant investments in education

Education is like a cradle for global leadership because knowledge has become the single most important economic resource today.

India spends just 3.2% of its GDP on education.

In contrast, progressive nations are investing heavily in education, in the range of 8% of GDP.

India's investment in education, in relation to GDP, is lower than the world average of 4.8%

It is also below those of low-income countries, whose average is 3.3%.

To grapple with the huge resources needed for this sector public funding should be concentrated on school education.

Private initiative should be encouraged in higher education, particularly in science and technology.

Allowing the private sector to develop universities in science and technology, would be an appropriate policy measure in this field.

Again, a spirit of partnership must permeate the new initiatives.

Research

In modern times, technology is the most important driver of economic growth and development.

Progressive nations are spending significantly on scientific research.

Sweden spends about 8 billion US dollars, which is 3.8% of its GDP, on research and tops the list. America is next with 208 billion US dollars, which is about 2.6 % of its GDP.

In contrast, India's expenditure is very low at 3 billion US dollars or 0.73% of its GDP.

During the period 1963 to 1998, India obtained just 700 US patents.

This is just 0.02% of the 2.8 million US patents issued.

India has already shown shades of prowess in leveraging research in two areas - nuclear energy and space.

India has secured a place for herself in these areas in the global club.

This has become possible because there was a mission-oriented approach.

Integrating efforts across several institutions have earned us impressive rewards.

A similar effort is now called for, particularly in the areas of life sciences, materials sciences, ocean engineering, aerospace and nanotechnology.

ACCESSING THE GLOBAL SAVINGS POOL

Ladies and Gentlemen.

All those who love our country and aspire that India must become a major economic power, need to look afresh at this issue.

So far, India has depended substantially on domestic savings.

The scale of investment needed to make India into an economic superpower cannot be achieved by persisting on that route.

And why should we? The riches of the world have resulted from the transfer of wealth from poor colonies

The latter now have a legitimate right to ensure that at least a part of it flows back.

We must not be apprehensive of foreign investment.

Or the contrary, India must compete for a sizeable chunk of foreign direct investments without any sense of guilt or fear.

The world saves and invests about 7 trillion US dollars. About 300 billion US dollars out of this flows as foreign direct investments or FDI.

India has, on an average, attracted FDI of only 2.6 billion US dollars per annum in recent years.

Other emerging markets such as China, Brazil, Poland and Malaysia, have attracted much more and have benefited by higher GDP growth.

Their FDI as a percentage of GDP is in the 3 to 6 % range, while for India it is just 0.5%.

India can easily achieve fifteen times its current FDI and attract 30 billion US dollars each year, if appropriate policy measures are taken.

This can help in Improving the GDP growth rate by 2% each year.

An incremental mindset to achieving 30 billion US dollars in foreign investment will think in terms of creating a supportive policy regime that is devoid of red tape and removes excessive controls on investment and operations.

This is no doubt important.

But I come from a far-reaching mindset on this Issue.

To my mind, the only way India can attract large amounts from the global savings pool is to create a very high rate of economic growth.

This will be evident if you carefully study the pattern of flow of foreign investment. I strongly believe in the adage 'money chases money'.

Therefore, the best way to attract very high amounts of foreign investments is to target and achieve very high economic growth rates.

To create a New World mindset
.
India cannot hope to attain global leadership with an archaic mindset.

We are in a world where the rules of survival and progress are changing.

The pervasive impact of technology and the movement towards a barrier-free global marketplace are giving a new meaning to the Darwinian concept of adaptation.

The basic instincts of survival transcend the biological to reach the intellectual.

The aphorism - survival of the fittest - applies not just to citizens but also to companies, communities and countries.

Citizens have to relate to an explosion of new knowledge that continuously challenges their ability to add economic value to enterprises.

This demands constant efforts to differentiate oneself from others; through a process of perpetual renewal and creativity.

Companies have to factor in market dynamics founded on a new paradigm of constant change,

This calls for an ability to deal with continuous uncertainty by maintaining a ceaseless state of transformation driven by market dictates

Communities have to provide latitude to new forms of social organisations based on knowledge networks.

This requires placing knowledge and technology at the core of social values as well as an accommodation of borderless virtual societies bonded by shared professional. relational, ethnic, religious, political, environmental and moral values.

Countries have to wake up to new concepts created by full and ubiquitous connectivity and globally foot-loose talent.

This requires a strong national commitment, cutting across partisan divisions.

It also requires faith in the patriotism of our entrepreneurs and professionals.

We must have an unflinching commitment to making India a great power within our lifetime.

A commitment, which will guarantee that our children and grandchildren will never have to suffer the ignominy of subjugation and deprivation.

India has also not fully harnessed the high rate of domestic household savings, which is about 23% of GDP.

This is because the financial intermediation system is costly and inefficient.

Delicencing of the financial sector and better regulation will reduce the cost of financial intermediation from 4 to 5 % to 2%, which is the global norm.

A national consensus is also needed to prune large-scale government deficits.

This raises sovereign risk profiles and scares away foreign investors.

This can be achieved by specifically targeting government expenditure to be based On the larger public benefit.

In summary, India has to access global savings through FDI, fully harness domestic savings and find the right channels to invest in areas that support global leadership.

CHEATING A NEW WORLD MINDSET

Friends,

Let me now turn to the last but perhaps the most important task before us.

This is to prepare an attitudinal revolution.

This requires an acceptance of cross border employment and trade and inclusive political models based on the new norms of the knowledge age.

Adapting to the knowledge explosion, living with continuous uncertainty, relating to knowledge networks and dealing with talent requires the nurturing of one major resource: the human brain.

We are in an age where knowledge is the fundamental source of wealth, power and progress.

Therefore, success will come to those who have the capacity to conceptualise, the competence to implement and the competitiveness to stay ahead.

The new world will unrelentingly question the conventional in virtually every discipline.

Indian polity and society must move beyond the sanctuary of comfort zones to support new systems and structures built around new discoveries, experimentation. creativity, adventure and research.

The Indian psyche must be attuned to work in a collaborative framework.

Nothing should be allowed to come in the way of productive partnership.

This is in tune with the needs of a networked society. In a globally networked society, partnership will be a way of life: from outsourcing and strategic alliances in business to fighting communicable diseases and terrorism across borders.

Individuals and organisations in India have to downsize self-opinionated behaviour to succeed in an environment of sharing resources and mutually reinforcing skills.

In essence, the Indian mindset must be trained to break free from the colonial past. Indian mind must rediscover its hidden potential to innovate, create and collaborate.

RELIANCE AND GLOBAL ECONOMIC LEADERSHIP

Before I conclude, I would like to present Reliance in the context of India’s quest for global economic leadership.

Starting from scratch, my father, Shri Dhirubhai Ambani, build Reliance into the largest private sector enterprise in India.

He placed Reliance firmly in the pantheon of the 500 largest corporations in the world; all in about two decades.

Reliance achieved a blistering pace of growth, in the 35 to 40% range, year on year.

This became possible because my father was gifted with the foresight to anticipate the nature and direction of opportunities in the marketplace.

He motivated his people to come up with winning strategies.

As a result, Reliance attained global leadership in the petrochemicals domain.

Reliance is the world’s second largest polyester producer and the world’s 11th largest producer of polymers.

Reliance also operates the 5th largest petroleum refinery in the world.

Today, Reliance is addressing new opportunities to attain global leadership, based on capacity, competitiveness and competency.

First, by significantly investing in oil and gas.

Reliance recently discovered the largest gas find in he world this year in the Bay of Bengal.

We believe that this is only a fraction of the Country’s potential.

Through this initiative, Reliance envisages better energy security for India, leading to stronger economic security and, in turn, national security.

Second, Reliance is engaged in bridging the economic opportunities in the developed world with the talent base available in India, through Reliance infocomm overarching infocomm infrastructure and services.

This is a tribute by the Reliance people to their respected founder.

It will prepare Reliance for taking on the mantle of leadership in knowledge intensive businesses.

It will make Reliance Infocomm a powerful vehicle for India to attain knowledge leadership in the world.

Third, our initiative in Life Sciences, which I spoke about earlier.

Finally, Reliance is engaged in building a professional resource base among the youth of India on an unprecedented scale.

This is being done by employing 45,000 people with diverse skill sets and competencies and building institutions for higher education in technology.

For Reliance, attaining global leadership in all its initiatives is not only an aspiration, but also a dream.

A dream rooted in reality and resolve.

As my father, Shri Dhirubhai Ambani, kept reiterating, “We must dare to dream.”

He dreamed of India as an economic super power and motivated the entire Reliance team to work towards this goal.

COLCLUSION

Ladies and Gentlemen,

In conclusion, I would strongly advocate that India needs a bold new vision and a feasible action plan to be a global economic superpower.

A vision and an action plan that is regenerative. That revives, renews and revs up the country.

India has to focus on targeting a top line GDP of 9 trillion US dollars in twenty years.

India has to harness global opportunities in the food and agriculture, manufacturing, infocomm, health care sectors.

India has to manage its water and energy resources judiciously.

India has to make significant investments in infrastructure, professional resources development, education and research.

Finally, Indian society must foster competitiveness, proactive government and strong leadership abilities.

As a country, as communities, as corporates, institutions and individuals, our convictions must be rooted in the belief that we can take on the world.

Therefore, we must internalize values that benchmark with the world.

We must adapt and adopt new practices that embrace the world.

I believe we can do it.

Talking of taking on the world, I am reminded of the encounter between communication specialists from America, Europe and India.

The American boasted that 100 years ago if you had dug 100 meters into the ground in America, you would have found optic fiber cables, because Americans pioneered them.

The European countered that 100 years ago, if you dug 1,000 meters into the earth in Europe, you would have found copper cables, because Europeans pioneered copper cables.

The Indian thought hard. He told the others that 10,000 years ago, if you dug 10,000 meters into the earth in India, you would not have found anything. Why? The others asked. We were already using wireless system those days he said.

There is probably an element of truth in this joke.

We have enjoyed global leadership in the past.

We led the world in thought, word and deed. We had the world’s first university at Takshashila in 700 BC.

We had a global university in Nalanda in the 4th century.

We were far ahead of other civilizations in medicine and surgery 2,500 years ago.

We led the world in astronomy and mathematics.

We showed the world how to navigate.

We created footprints across the world through merchandise and trade.

Our textile industry was a world leader in the 17th and 18th centuries.

Above all, we were a global economic power at the turn of the eighteenth century, contributing to a quarter of the global output.

We must seek inspiration from our past, stride opportunities of the present and secure a glorious future-as a superpower in the global economic order.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

India looks up to her leaders in all walks of life to join hands in a historic partnership on the same pattern as our freedom struggle.

This spirit must become all pervasive in politics, administration, business, industry, science, technology and other professions.

In the 20th Century, it enabled us to break the chains of slavery.

In the 21st century, it will give us the strength to scale great economic heights.

Let us forge a partnership of men and women who govern, who think, who produce wealth and those who labour.

Such a creative partnership will unleash the vast latent energies of our 1 billion people.

It will enable them scale the highest peak to make India an economic superpower.

And ladies and gentlemen,
I believe, FICCI, can be the nodal point for forging this historic partnership.

I am sure we will succeed and will do India proud.

Thank you.