YOUTH

[Mathew Moothasseril]

Manifesto for youth — Policy ideas for new prime minister
March 17, 2019 Matters India

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Binoy Job

Dear Modi ji, Rahul ji, Pawar ji, Mamata di, Akhilesh ji, Babu Garu,
Rao Garu, Naveen ji, Stalin ji, Thackeray ji, Gowda ji and all the
leaders of parties contesting the 2019 general elections: In a few
days’ time, India will choose its new government.

This means one among you has a chance to become the next Prime
Minister of India. For each one of you, including the incumbent Prime
Minister, it will be a new beginning to lead the country.

Having served as the director in the Prime Minister’s Office, I have
seen how leaders evolve. The moment a leader becomes the Prime
Minister, one sheds the political colour and makes “development of the
nation” as the priority.

When Narendra Modi held his first meeting with senior officers in the
PMO, he said, “I want to achieve development like never before. Please
suggest the policies I should focus on. You don’t need to bother about
what I said during the election campaign, that’s for elections. Now
that I am the Prime Minister, I would like to take forward the good
policies of previous governments and remove the wrong ones. Your job
is to suggest the best policies to take the country forward.”

It was audacious of him to say this. Similar was the approach of all
past Prime Ministers, from Pandit Nehru to Dr Manmohan Singh. As one
of the participants of this meeting in the PMO, I suggested the
importance of focusing on the youth and PM Modi was very interested.
However, there was little follow-up to this.

Though I have had multiple careers since, my work with the youth has
remained constant. It is with this experience that I am putting
forward a few policy ideas that could help you become the best Prime
Minister

A country’s potential for growth is determined by its policies for its
youth. About 75 per cent of India is below 40 years of age, and in the
next quarter century, India will have this envious demographic
advantage with a majority young population.

The business community may project oil, land or data as the greatest
resources for growth but none of them can match the invaluable power
of the youth.

If nurtured properly, the youth can become the greatest game changer
for the next government. But don’t forget that having 75 per cent of
the population as youth is as much an advantage as it is a danger. If
not nurtured and treated well, this segment could also become the
greatest threat to India.

In Kashmir, marginalised youth turn to terrorism and in other areas,
where they are disadvantaged, they turn to anti-social activities.
With the advent of mobile, digital and media technologies, the youth
are now living in a globalised world. Access to any information or any
place in the world is just a click away. It has made them ambitious
and they are aware that they could make their dreams into reality. If
utilised well, “information” could become the greatest empowering tool
because it is key to development in a democracy. If planned and
executed well, you could turn this threat into your greatest resource.

The first step to nurture the youth is to provide high-quality
education to catapult them into employable and empowered citizens.
Unfortunately, budget allocation for education does not match the
talk. While the direct tax collection has been increasing
consistently, the allocation for education has only decreased
dangerously. If this trend continues, the next generation will not
forgive you. In 2013-14, when the direct tax collection was over 6
lakh crore, the budget for education was over 63,000 crore, at 6.15
per cent of the budget.

And this year, when the direct tax collection has crossed 12 lakh
crore, the budget allocation for education has been reduced to 50
percent at over 90,000 crore, which is just over 3.3 percent of the
budget. If you are sincere in your intention of developing the people
and the country, allocate at least 10 percent of the budget to the
education segment in the first year and increase it by 2 percent every
year. A part of this may be earmarked for technological intervention.

The world of education is changing and it could become inclusive with
the use of digital, mobile and internet technologies. Nehru had
started adult education but classes for seniors are still using the
conventional methods or doing almost nothing. Transform these
departments with tech-interventions. Classroom teaching, by the best
IIT professors, could be made available to anyone in the world at a
very low cost. Harvard, MIT and so on are using these ways to make
education inclusive.

The AAP government in Delhi has shown how a good budget could
transform education and empower the next generation. By consistently
allocating 25 percent of its budget to education, it has brought
visible changes. This has empowered educators, enhanced infrastructure
and transformed the students

As the 13th child born to a farmer and brought up in a village, that
is not connected by roads even today, I endorse this as it is
education and reading that have transformed me from a village boy to a
social innovator. Second, focus should be on skill development.

Though Modi is the one who started a Ministry for Skill Development,
eventually the PM had to remove even the Minister! The entire
allocation meant for skilling the youth and providing them with a job
became a bogus affair as the businesses could take money on the
pretext of “re-skilling” the already employed.

Simply put, the business houses, especially in the manufacturing
industries like textiles, could take away the money meant for the
unskilled and unemployed youth. And a well-intended dream was again
wasted.

The third area that needs focus is equipping youth for innovations and
entrepreneurship because it is through these that jobs can be created.
For an emerging economy and a developing nation, there should be
adequate policies and budget allocation for innovations and
entrepreneurship. Rajiv Gandhi started the IT/telecom revolution,
which powered India to create the highest number of professionals,
industry, education institutions and FDI. The IIMs are the top
management institutes in the country and their flagship programs are
on Agriculture Management. But 99 percent of the students don’t work
in agriculture anymore.

However, if the next government could allocate substantial funding for
agri-startups to tap into these bright MBAs, it could be another game
changer for India. What is pulling back the rural economy is lack of
innovations in agriculture.

Similarly, there should be focus on the manufacturing and the service
sector. Another area to lay emphasis on could be policy initiatives
for preventive healthcare. Most of the healthcare spending is on
hospitals. By adding a subject in school curriculum on preventive
healthcare for 12 years of school education, it could instill a
culture of prevention.

Like budget allocation for education, the allocation for healthcare
has also been reduced to half this year. Among the start-up
initiatives, the greatest possibilities for growth are for healthcare
and hence the government should start a special scheme to support
entrepreneurial initiatives by medical professionals. Engage youth for
community service. Projects like ‘Swachh Bharat’ could have easily
involved the youth groups like National Service Scheme (NSS), NYKS
among others.

If these institutions are headed by people with no connection with
volunteerism or headed by secretariat service officers, they are bound
to fail. The NYKS was started as a department for engagement of the
rural non-student youth. It remains headless for almost two years,
after the ex-Army officer, who after heading it for two years was
asked to leave since he failed to connect with the youth and work with
his colleagues cohesively. Youth development cannot be achieved with
an ornamental event; they should be engaged consistently. The
long-standing program of the NSS has not been able to attract the
youth organically. Since the colleges have a compulsory program, the
students join NSS as it fetches grace marks for participating in an
annual event and one campus event.

If the next government could do so, not only would the goal of
nation-building be achieved, it could also inculcate the culture of
service. The future of governance will be based on a hybrid model,
where youth are engaged in policy formulation along with the
executive. This will have a greater impact, as they will come up with
policy ideas that work for all and are more futuristic.

In any case, it is the legislature, the representatives of the people,
who will have the final say on this.

Continuing with policies like GST, Aadhaar and strengthening them with
legislative reforms was a good step forward. Not only the policies,
even the professionals hired for the Digital Multi-media Centre that I
had started during my tenure in the PMO are completing another full
term. But the executive may not advise this.

The babus ensured that an effective specialist heading NSDC was shown
the door. Eventually, when the skills program started showing negative
effect, Modi had to replace the officers and even the Minister. Always
remember, nobody in the executive will know the pulse of the people
the way the political class would know.

Specialist leaders and not generalists are the need of the hour. The
way reputed economists are brought in by every PM to run the finance
and economic departments, the next PM could bring in 25 best educators
from across the world to run the Human Resource Development (HRD), and
youth specialists to head youth-linked organisations. They will ensure
that set goals are achieved, targets are met and the mission is
accomplished.

Remember, it is Kurien, Swaminathan and Homi Bhabha who led the white
revolution, green revolution and the nuclear revolution respectively.
Kerala sets an example of how education and engagement of their youth
could transform a society.

It was in 1846, when a Christian priest from my village of Kainakary,
Fr Kuriakose Elias Chavara, insisted on “pallikoppam pallikoodam”,
meaning “a school with every church.” As he universalized education,
there was opposition from the elite as they felt education was their
fiefdom.

His schools were open for everyone irrespective of caste, creed and
economic status. Inspired by his work, every religious/caste group
started schools: SD/NSS schools by upper caste Hindus, SNDP by the
Ezhavas and the MES by the Muslims.

Today, Kerala has an educated, developed and vibrant society. The
Keralites are able to find jobs in India and abroad.

Most importantly, they remain the symbol of peace and progress. If you
as the next Prime Minister could take a leaf out of his example and
initiate a ‘Mandir ke saath Shiksha-Mandir’, you could transform
India.

No youth aspires to remain unemployed. They want to make progress;
economically and socially. Education and engagement are the only route
to attain this.

With this youth focused manifesto and policy interventions, I am
confident that you will become the best Prime Minister that India has
produced.

(The author is a young global leader of the World Economic Forum and
founder of many initiatives for the youth. He also headed an industry
chamber as its CEO and has been heading a global SDG initiative. He
was also Director in PMO)

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*GATHER THE SCATTERED*

Fr Mathew Moothasseril
Sant Thoma Bhavan
Post Box 306
RAMAN MALA
Kolhapur,416 003
Maharashtra
INDIA