Crises have always been a test of a nation’s potential to overcome its challenges. Two and a half decades ago, the Asian Economic Crisis started around July 1997 and affected almost all East and South East Asian countries, including China. However, economists were amazed across the globe, that there was one country which was not at all affected, and that was Bharat. The Global Financial Crisis started in Wall Street in the US in mid-September 2008, devastating the US economy and then spreading to Europe and Asia. All the nations were badly affected, but the International Monetary Fund (IMF) observed that India is the “least affected nation”. During the health crisis of COVID-19, there was a sudden and massive exodus or reverse migration of about ten million workers from the towns of Western India to the villages of Eastern India. However, not a single starvation death was reported. Although our villages are affected by economic issues such as poverty, illiteracy, inequality, unemployment, health issues and the like, the crime rates are low and have the lowest police-to-population ratio.
No country in the world except our nation, has survived innumerable foreign invasions throughout its history. The people, their traditions, and culture remained unchanged for several millennia.
There are several such examples of how our nation has faced challenges and adverse situations successfully. All of these show that there are factors that protect our society from external and internal shocks. The question arises, as to what the secret of the strange resilience of Bharat is. The answer ultimately emanates from a peculiar relation-based social structure founded on a strong family system. It is difficult for Westerners to digest such a non-economic factor deciding the course of a national society.
Harmony, the Flagship Ideal of Family
The Indian idea of harmony is explained by Deendayalji’s theory of “Progressive unfoldment of consciousness” from the individual level up to the level of the universe. Individual consciousness unfolds and expands progressively through his family, society, nation, humanity, and nature, and finally embraces the entire universe. It beautifully blends the national and international visions. Hence, there can be no scope for conflict. Shri Dattopant Thengadi explains: “When a child is born, it identifies with itself. With the growth of consciousness, it identifies with the family, progressively with the community, the whole society and nation, and so on. But our culture expects that this consciousness should have further growth so as to identify oneself with the whole mankind: Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam. And, we are expected to grow even further to identify with the entire animate and inanimate existence, and ultimately with the entire universe: Swadesho Bhuvanathrayam.” This transformation of aham through the family to the universe is similar to a sprout emerging from a seed, then becoming a plant, branches, flowers and fruits, in different stages of development. This is how the universe becomes an extended family. There is no conflict between individual versus family, family versus nation, nation versus international, and mankind versus universe.
However, Westerners see conflict at every stage. Both Marx and the market believed in conflict between different organs of society, especially between the individual and the society. The relationships between individuals, family, society, nation, internationalism, nature etc., have been shaped based on an adversarial thought. Today, many of our social systems are shaped by colonial rulers based on the adversarial approach. The legal system, industrial relations, economic growth, environment, family, feminism, social change, history, and political system including democracy are all based on the presumption of a minimum of two conflicting parties.
Both Marxism and Capitalism wanted to crush traditional institutions like family, marriage, motherhood, and so on. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels said in the famous ‘Communist Manifesto’: “The bourgeois family will vanish as a matter of course” because the family is founded “on capital, on private gain.” The Lenin-led Russian Government tried its best to abolish the marriage and family system and replace them with a commune system, but failed, and the marriage and family had to be legitimised. Lack of family-like relations in the West has led to ill effects such as broken family lives, elimination of family and neighbourly relations, alienation of personal relations, rising trends in crimes, violence, accidents, and mental illness.
Whereas, the family model of relationships is the basis of social relations in our country. The coherence with which India could respond to crises is due to the peculiar relationship-based social system inherited from its ancestors. There are strong family bonds, people anxious about the future of family and children, sacred married life, diversified lives of all etc., in our society. This is reflected in the peculiar economic culture. Its visible results are saving habits, keeping gold reserves in every family in the form of ornaments, value systems in economic activities, maintaining family relationships even in financial transactions, family businesses, reasonable purchasing power of the people without resorting to credit, etc. Customers maintain continuing relationships with the banker, the grocery shop owner, the vegetable seller, the cobbler, the electrician, the plumber, the vehicle repairer or anyone else. All of these formed the basis of our economic stability even amid poverty. Its impact is visible in a self-sustaining village economy, economic independence, decentralised activities, a wide network of MSMEs and local initiatives, reasonable regulation of financial institutions, better purchasing power of the people without resorting to credit, national spirit and the like. Despite a low standard of living, Indian villages are capable of absorbing external shocks. Non-economic factors such as strong national spirit played an important role in economic and trade development in nations like Britain, Japan, Germany, the US and China. David McCord Wright in ‘Open Secret of Economic Growth’ (1957) highlights: “The fundamental factors making for economic growth are non-economic and non-materialistic in character.” Schumacher illustrated the value-dependence of economics.
Highest Gold Savings
Bharat has the highest household gold savings in the world. It is a major vehicle for savings for low or middle-income households in rural and urban areas. Every home in India has gold ornaments worn by women or saved in custody, mostly to be used for the marriage of their children. It is also an insurance against future risks and an investment. Low income or poverty does not stand as a hurdle. India’s savings rather than America’s extravagance are sustainable.
Bharat has a low crime rate compared with its large population. There are tens of thousands of villages that exist without police assistance for a long period. There are several villages in India where houses do not have locks. By promoting Dharmic values and transforming mindset, we can think of litigation-free villages, liquor-free villages, casteless societies etc.
These are apart from other cultural aspects that have sustained our nation for thousands of years. However, these values are being eroded in the name of Western culture and globalisation, mainly seen in cities. An example is the modern trend of replacing micro-level grocery shops with large shopping malls. Recently, the media highlighted that, when there was a natural disaster in the Wayanad district in Kerala, the small grocery shops supplied free materials instantaneously and not the big malls.
Family Model of Social Institutions
The Cartesian mechanistic model is the default idea for social relations and institutions in the West. We reject the mechanistic model and accept the organic family model for managing all social institutions. Family is necessarily based on the ideals of sacrifice, love and mutual help. Hence, we have the concept of the ‘global family’ (Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam) in contrast with the ‘global village’ of the US market model. India proclaimed this concept as our foreign policy long ago, and international relations were shaped by it. We believe in the cooperation and coexistence of all nations. Gurukula is the model in education, instead of the commercial model of the West. In ancient times, students respected Guru and his wife like a father and a mother. The king occupies the position of a father (Piteva pasi dharmajna) instead of being an autocrat. The family model is the Indian model of best management and administration. The ideal attitude of management should be that of a father administering a family. We consider our nation Bharata Mata, instead of the nation-state model of the West. For us, every other woman is a mother (Mathruvad para dareshu), instead of looking at a woman as a commodity. The problem of atrocities on women can be addressed if the culture of treating every other woman as a mother is instilled from childhood in every citizen. Matriarchal culture emanates from the family model. In a patriarchal society, violations are punished by law. Matriarchal society is where not the laws but self-motivated Dharma is practised as a driving force of progress.
These concepts provide new insights into the Western world which treats nature, women, land, art, intellectual property and labour as mere commodities and exploit them. One example of how India’s high ideal has transformed global society is worth mentioning. The West has a history of destruction of nature and tribal society for commercial expansion. Concerns regarding environmental protection have been left to environmental activists. At the historical ‘UN Conference on the Human Environment’ held in Stockholm in 1972, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi quoted Prithvi Sukta of Atharv Veda and introduced the concept of “Mother Earth” to the world. This was a new experience for the West, and the concept of “Mother Earth” was accepted by the global community. Soon after, it became a catchword of environmental relations throughout the world. Thereafter, the US school buses carried the slogan “Mother Earth” to educate their children about their attitudes towards nature. In April 2009, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution renaming ‘International Earth Day’ as International ‘Mother Earth’ Day. It was the spark of a different paradigm for the West.
The pluralist or adversarial approaches of both capitalism and communism separate the employers and employees into two inimical classes. The “master-slave relationship” of the period of slavery in European history reformed into a “master-servant relationship” after the Industrial Revolution. This model was adopted in our basic law regulating industrial relations i.e., the Industrial Disputes Act of 1947. Deendayal ji proposed ‘industrial harmony’ and Thengadi ji shaped it as the ‘industrial family’. Japan is well-known for its ideal industrial relations. “Made in Japan” (1986) is a famous autobiography of Akio Morita, the founder of Sony Corporation, which is often treated as a textbook of industrial relations in Japan. The book reiterates “to create family-like feeling” between management and employees as the secret of the success of his industry. There, both management and workers are dedicated to their nation and industries. The concept of HR (Human Resources) looks at labour merely as a “resource”. Hence, HR should be “Human Relations” and not “Human Resources”. The new labour code is thus named the “Industrial Relations Code”.
Informal Economy as a Shock Absorber
Family values have created coherence in social life. During the COVID-19 crisis, India exhibited the best “social capital” and social discipline with an ideal social response. In many countries including developed countries, people went to the streets to protest against the COVID-19 protocols but Bharat did not see any such negative responses, despite its high youth population. The common man and poor villagers stood strongly with the Government’s efforts to contain the pandemic, especially the timely lockdown. Thus, India was acclaimed as having the maximum social capital. Therefore, the fatality rate was low. Uttra Pradesh is the 5th largest administrative area in the world with 231.5 million population next to China, the rest of India, the US and Indonesia. Uttar Pradesh under Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, became a world model for health governance in containing the pandemic. This is despite the State’s lower health infrastructure, literacy rate etc., compared to a state like Kerala where the pandemic had gone out of control.
Villages are strongly relation-based. Out of a total of 20.09 million MSMEs registered on the Udyam portal, 99 per cent are micro-enterprises. Only 1 per cent belonged to the small and medium sector. This indicates the size of the micro sector. Seventy per cent of the people live in rural areas, as per the 2011 census. Thus, Bharat still lives in the villages. The informal economy is normally a curse on global standards, but in times of crisis, it is a boon, especially when the formal sector fails.
In times of peculiar situations, whether it is demonetisation, GST transition, or lockdown, India’s large informal economy helped normalise the economy. When there was a reverse migration of about one crore migrant workers, the villages of India protected all of them. They were absorbed by increased agricultural activity, and our agriculture and agriculture-allied industries showed extra growth during the pandemic. The informal sector acts as a shock absorber absorbing people who lose their formal jobs. India’s real job creators are agriculture and the tiny, micro and small-scale sectors. Our villages are economically independent, self-sufficient and self-reliant and cannot be destroyed by external shocks. Our family values have contributed such unique characteristics to social life to meet new challenges that may emerge every time.
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