National Seminar on "Development as Freedom - An Indian Perspective"
July 31, 2003, New Delhi

Inaugural Address by Hon'ble Deputy Prime Minister Shri L.K. Advani

I am pleased, indeed privileged, to be invited to inaugurate this important and, in some ways, a unique seminar. Its importance is self-evident from the weighty subject that it has taken up for discussion. It is also unique in the sense that its subject is based on a book by the same name, written by one of the world's illustrious economists. It is not often that one comes across a seminar whose theme is a book itself. Reading books is no longer a common pastime. Discussing a book in a function like this has become an even rarer public event.

Therefore, at the outset, I wish to congratulate FICCI and the Sri Ram Centre for Industrial Research and Human Resources for organizing this seminar and bringing together a large number of leading intellectuals, governmental functionaries, academicians and social activists to participate in it.

Prof. Sen's emphasis on Social Sector Development

I have always had a high regard for Prof. Amartya Sen. Much before I came into Government, I used to draw upon the facts and arguments in Prof. Sen's books, written before he won the Nobel Prize, to emphasise the urgent need for speedy development of India's social infrastructure in areas such as education, healthcare, nutrition and housing. I was shocked to learn, for example, that some of the most underdeveloped parts of India are almost at the same level as countries in Sub-Saharan Africa in certain key human development indices such as infant mortality, female literacy, etc. Prof. Sen has highlighted this comparison once again in his latest book to expound his thesis that "poverty is a capability deprivation".

I think that the world community owes a debt of gratitude to Prof. Amartya Sen and other developmental economists for having introduced a much-needed balance to the debate on development. With the advent of liberalization and globalisation, the debate on reforms was excessively dominated by the considerations of abstract and impersonal economic growth. The seminal works of Prof. Sen brought the imperative and moral obligation of social development to the fore. He richly deserved the Nobel Prize for humanizing the development debate. As it happened, the very fact of his winning the Nobel Prize helped the cause of social sector development gain greater attention of policy makers and implementers at the international, national and local levels.

Two inter-linked Big Ideas

The title of the erudite book under discussion, Development as Freedom, is highly stimulating. It deals with two Big Ideas of our times, not separately but in their inter-relatedness - not Development and Freedom, but Development as Freedom. The little word "as" introduces a profound connectivity between the two concepts and, I shall share my thoughts briefly on what this connectivity means in the Indian as well as the global context. Although the sub-text of this seminar asks us to present "An India Perspective" on "Development as Freedom", I am sure that views expressed in this seminar would also have a wider significance.

I believe that "Freedom" was the Big Idea before mankind in the 20th century, whereas "Development" is the Big Idea before mankind in the 21st century. The world community is required to pursue and reach the goal of Development in the new century with the same zeal and determination that it pursued and reached the goal of Freedom in the last century. With the help of the spectacular advances made in science and technology, it is now certainly possible to realistically aim at freeing every country and every community of poverty, hunger, want and every other curse of underdevelopment in the early decades of the 21st century. This is the lofty goal the world community should set before itself. What is needed for its realisation is, primarily, a re-ordering of the economic and political relationships between the developing and the developed worlds, and reliably ensuring world peace, comprehensive disarmament, and global cooperation.

This is one way of looking at the inter-relationship between "Development" and "Freedom".

It will of course be argued - and quite validly so - that the Freedom that India won, and the Freedom that many enslaved and colonized countries won in the 20th century was a limited freedom. It is true that it constituted only the political freedom of nations, which were previously under foreign rule. But to recognize the limited nature of this freedom is, in fact, also the first important step towards understanding the linkage between "Freedom" and "Development". It is this understanding that Prof. Sen's book imparts in a powerful manner.

Turning Swaraj into Su-raj

This is what the architects of India's Freedom and founders of our Republic also argued. Leaders like Mahatma Gandhi repeatedly stressed, even when political independence was nowhere in sight, that our goal is not merely to attain Swaraj or Self-Rule. Rather, Swaraj should be turned into Su-raj (Good Rule), so that Free India could become a land of peace, prosperity and all-round development, whose fruits can be enjoyed by all her citizens without discrimination of any kind.

Prof. Sen correctly reminds us that lack of development is indeed an "unfreedom". Actually, it brings in its wake a set of several "unfreedoms". A country may be free politically, but if it is underdeveloped, or if parts of it are underdeveloped, or if certain sections of its population are victims of underdevelopment, its people do not - and cannot - enjoy freedom in a true and comprehensive sense of the term.

Another basic argument of Prof. Sen relates to the understanding of Development itself. He rightly states that Development is both an end in itself, but also a means to enable people to have "freedoms" which they cherish.

Anchored in these two fundamental postulates, Prof. Sen's thesis presents a cogent understanding of "Development as a means of Empowerment and Justice" and eradication of poverty as a revolutionary measure to enhance individual and societal capabilities.

Terrorism as the enemy of both Freedom and Development

I am pleased to note that Prof. Sen has identified "Transparency Guarantees" and "Protective Securities" as two of the conditions for development. I have always held that the four pillars of Su-raj are: Suraksha (internal and external security), Samruddhi (prosperity for all), Shuchita (probity in public life) and Samajik Samarasata (social harmony).

Since I have the charge of Home Ministry, I cannot agree with him more on the issue of security. The biggest threat to our external as well as internal security today is cross-border terrorism, fueled by religious extremism. Today, terrorism has emerged as the most potent foe of peace, development, freedom, and social harmony in all the countries that it has targeted. Indeed, it has threatened and jeopardized peace, development, freedom, democracy and social tranquility even in the country in our neighbourhood, which has made terrorism a part of its state policy.

It is our resolve to crush terrorism and protect our people as well as protect the gains of our freedom and development.

The centrality of Democracy

Another aspect I liked about Prof. Sen's thesis is the value he attaches to Democracy in the matrix of Freedom and Development. Let me quote an instructive passage:

"Developing and strengthening a democratic system is an essential component of the process of development. The significance of democracy lies in three distinct virtues: (1) its intrinsic importance; (2) its instrumental contributions; and (3) its constructive role in the creation of values and norms.... The achievement of social justice depends not only on institutional forms (including democratic rules and regulations), but also on effective practice. I have presented reasons for taking the issue of practice to be of central importance in the contributions that can be expected from civil rights and political freedoms. This is a challenge that is faced both by well-established democracies such as the United States (especially with the differential participation of diverse racial groups) and by newer democracies."
It is important to underscore the centrality of Democracy for attaining "Democracy" and "Freedom" for an important reason. There are totalitarian ideologies that have argued that what society needs is "development" - meaning fulfillment of bread and butter needs - and democracy and freedom are secondary, or even a luxury that can be dispensed with. We know how these anti-democratic ideologies held sway in the 20th century in several parts of the world. Nevertheless, the closing decades of the last century also witnessed how many totalitarian regimes ultimately crumbled under the weight of powerful people's movements for democracy. In this sense, the 20th century was not only a Century of the March of Freedom, but also a Century of the March of Democracy.
True, the hold of these ideologies has considerably weakened now, it is necessary to be on guard insofar as our hard-won democratic and civil rights are concerned.

Our vision of making India a Developed Nation by 2020

Friends, I shall now turn to a few brief observations about India's development at present and how our Government, under the leadership of Prime Minister Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee, is trying to translate Prof. Sen's ideas into reality. Our Prime Minister has presented an energizing vision of making India a Developed Nation by 2020. By this, we mean India's all-round, balanced and integral development, benefiting every region and every section of our diverse society, and impacting every facet of life - economic, social, cultural and spiritual. No community is to be excluded from the realization of this goal, on the grounds of caste, creed, region or language. We do not believe in, nor do we practice, the ideology of exclusion and discrimination. Doing so is completely antithetical to our belief in secularism or our understanding of Indian nationalism.

I wish to say this with some emphasis because many well-intentioned people, including Prof. Sen himself sometimes, have raised questions about our secular credentials. We are prepared for an open debate on Secularism. We are prepared to argue our case with anybody that the Indian concept and ethos of Sarva Panth Samabhaav are most in harmony with the ideals of Freedom and Development.

India has achieved much success in diverse areas of development since attaining political freedom in 1947. There is no doubt about it. Nevertheless, it is also obvious that our achievements on the developmental front did not match either India's needs or her innate potential. India has all the resources -human, natural and civilisational - that are needed to achieve a high level of development for all her citizens. Sadly, for a number of well-known reasons, mostly to do with governance, we lagged behind.

Let us march forward with self-confidence

Since winning the people's mandate in 1998, our Government has been making earnest and concerted efforts to accelerate India's all-round development. India being a federal entity, we have tried to establish the most cooperative relations with all the State Governments, irrespective of which party is ruling where. We have speeded up the process of economic reforms, many of which were initiated by the Congress Government in the early 1990s, and the results are there for all to see.

There is an air of heightened self-confidence in the country. The Census of 2001 has shown that India has made a big dent in poverty and illiteracy. Female literacy, in particular, has shown a highly encouraging rise. Tens of thousands of women are organized in Self-Help Groups and providing micro-credit to nurture small income-enhancing enterprises. A large number of voluntary organisations have been working in close partnership with Panchayats, State Governments and the Centre to speed up the development process and make it participatory. We have taken up many ambitious developmental projects of unprecedented magnitude for implementation. The highway project, the rural roads project, telecom connectivity, and Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan are just a few examples. What India has achieved in the area of Information Technology has won global acclaim. Each of these, in its own way, is contributing to the advancement of the ideals of Freedom and Development.

I am not saying this as our Government's achievements. These are our Nation's achievements. It is on the basis of these achievements that we can confidently affirm that we shall certainly make India a Developed Nation before the end of the next decade, and make the 21" Century India's Century.

Thank you.