“It is not just the individuals, but the systems and Institutions that make the greatest difference in delivery of results. World-class countries and communities have world-class systems, run by the best and the brightest people.”

The Indian nation today stands at an inflection point. While history of India is replete with examples of missed opportunities, we are determined that this time around we would make the best of the new-age opportunities that have come our way. The expectations of people of India are quite high. The outside world too looks at India and the Indians differently. Our leaders have a new found vision for India to see the country joining the league of the developed nations. The big question is whether we will make it this time around.

Objectives : Innovative Radical Reforms Organisation (IRR Org), an NGO sets out the following objectives:

1. Making India a First-World country with First-World Systems
2. The First-world (or world-class) country must be run by the world's best and the brightest people/Indians (a sina qua non for Objective 1)
3. Benefits of economic progress must percolate to the largest number of people of the country
4. Basic Institutions of Governance, namely the Political institution, Bureaucracy, Judiciary and finally the Business Institution must all be reformed in a comprehensive and holistic manner in order to achieve the above objectives.

Therefore, rise of India as an economic superpower means a lot to the world as a whole. Economic turnaround however can happen only if institutions of governance, namely the political, bureaucratic and judicial institutions are transformed in a fundamental way. First-world economic structures can not be built with the third-world institutions, as they are now. Therefore this big gap must be bridged: the third-world and declining institutions and systems must be first pulled up to the first-world (or even better) standards, to ensure that the benefits of economic progress are delivered to all.

There are several ways in which the emerging Indian nation could be visualized changing from the current status to becoming a developed country in the shortest possible time.

Innovative Radical Reforms Organisation, a non-government organization (NGO) believes, that, to be amongst the developed countries, and to achieve the true potential of every Indian, we must create first world-like or world class institutions of governance. All the three basic institutions, namely the ‘Political Institution’, the ‘Bureaucracy’ and the ‘Judiciary’ need a fundamental revamp, so that the Indian State becomes strong, performance oriented and these institutions deliver services in the most efficient and effective manner to the people. In this endeavour, the Constitution of the country would need a radical and innovative change.

Further, for India to become rich and powerful, the basic institutions of governance must facilitate and unleash the wealth-creating capacity of the people of the country and must promote the entrepreneurial spirit among the citizens by unwinding the bureaucratic web of regulations and controls. In a World Bank Policy Research Paper (Governance Matters VI: Aggregate and Individual Governance Indiactors 1996-200, by Daniel Kaufmann and Massimo Mastruzzi, July 2007), India scores poorly and negative in four out of six dimensions (scores range between -2.5 to +2.5): Political stability (-0.84), Governance effectiveness (-0.04), Regulatory quality (-0.15), Control of corruption (-0.21), whereas in two other indicators, Voice and accountability (0.35) and Rule of law (0.17), scores are low though positive. Overall, score for India by averaging is (-0.12), way behind developed countries like Australia (1.62), Singapore (1.57), Germany (1.46), US (1.23) and Japan (1.22).

We may have come a long way since 1990, when the process of business reforms started. Yet, India’s business environment is way behind those in the developed world. This is evident from India’s latest rankings in several international indices, such as in the Economic Freedom Index (104th in a list of 161 countries), India’s index in ‘A World Bank Report on Doing Business in 2008’ (120th out of 178 countries), and the ‘World Investment Report’. India did not even figure in the top reformers of 2006/07 in the World Bank Report. While Egypt topped the list of reformers, the other top 10 reformers were, in order: Croatia, Ghana, FYR Macedonia, Georgia, Colombia, Saudi Arabia, Kenya, China, and Bulgaria. Similarly, in UNCTAD’s report on world investment, India does not even figure in the list of the ‘Most favoured location of top 100 TNCs’. On the corruption front, in the latest report published by the Transparency International, India ranks 74th in a list of 163 countries.

The ultimate prosperity will no doubt lie in creating an environment of wealth creation, where each Indian can contribute effectively. Thus a fourth dimension of ‘Business’ as an institution emerges and the related issue then is of ‘Business Reforms’ and a radical overhaul in the business regulations, procedures, processes, which must be all aligned to the same level as in the most business-friendly countries of the world. These reforms must create wealth for the largest number of the people, so that the largest number of citizens can enjoy the fruits of progress.

The second paradigm that IRR Org believes is that the (four) basic institutions must simultaneously be managed by the best and the brightest breed of leaders, managers and others, then only the real benefit will be delivered to the people of the country.
At micro level, there are a number of challenges: removing poverty itself is a big task (India’s rank in Global hunger Index is 94, one notch above Ethiopia; Pakistan is at 88, while China stands at 44), and so is educating more than 400 millions of illiterate people. Providing basic necessities of life to every citizen of the country will take decades and calls for leadership which should be far more radical in approach, highly committed and determined to see India through these difficult times. In these gigantic tasks again, basic improvements in the governance process through radical reforms in the institutions of governance is a sina qua non to achieve better results.

Indians, who work in the developed world know that those countries have created some of the best systems and basic institutions in those societies perform at much better level. The big point is “Can we create world class systems in India where the basic Institutions of the country perform at the level these institutions work in the developed countries or at a level even better than those in the first world”. If we did that, standard and quality of life of all Indians will improve in a radical way. Imagine if the efficiency of government expenditure in basic education, healthcare and other necessities of life goes up by 50%, in a radical way, if a new political system was established which will allow our rulers to get out of unproductive time spent in managing the ‘political environment’ and to concentrate more effectively in solving day to day problems of the citizens, radical improvement in results could follow.

We have of course been talking about these issues for long. But more we talk, more things remain as they were. Performance matrix of different states and regions indicates that the diversity has increased in the last decade and a half, since liberalization began. There are many good experiences to learn from, yet they are not being captured and applied in problem solving.

A key problem area is incremental thinking to improve the working of our systems. We treat our systems as god given, as if gods themselves had created them and they can not be changed least of all, in a radical manner. A time has come to apply an innovative and radical style (may be Corporate-like) for a performance oriented exponential change, which produces beneficial results for the ordinary citizens. The only limitation is our own minds. The advantage of a radical approach is that not only we can align our systems to the world standard; rather we have a chance to improve upon them.More creatively we think, more radically we think and act, more and more radical results will come our way. Need of the hour is to change the Indian Constitution/Institutions/Systems to a level that produce world class results and take us forward on a higher trajectory of growth, so that true potential of Indians is discovered in a short time frame.

Therefore, time has come for a radical approach in changing the four basic institutions of our society, namely the Political Institution, Bureaucracy, the Judiciary and finally the Institution of Business. Functioning of basic institutions can change our life quality vastly. There are abundant examples of such turnaround in a small time frame: Singapore, Dubai and South Korea changed in a small time frame.

The second closely associated issue is management of the basic institutions of governance. World class systems must be run by the best and brightest of the breed or else systems would face the danger of slipping away. Therefore an opportunity must be created by cultural and structural change for the best and brightest of the people to join the institutions of governance for their management and growth. Necessary structural changes will have to be made in each of these institutions, so that they are able to attract the best and the brightest leaders and managers for their running.

With this backdrop, ‘Innovative Radical Reforms Organisation’ sets out the objective of creating world class institutions, which will radically improve the functioning of the government as a whole to generate wealth at a rapid pace, so that the country can achieve the status of a ‘developed country’ at the earliest possible.