India needs leaders who can help meet ever-increasing and rising expectations of people and "quixotic heroism" cannot lead this nation, former president Pranab Mukherjee said on Monday.
"Quixotic heroism cannot lead this nation. India needs leaders who can help them meet the nation's ever-rising expectations. The country still has a long way to go before it is completely rid of poverty," Mukherjee said while addressing corporates at the AIMA Managing India Awards.
He also expressed concern over the estimate that 1 per cent of Indians hold over 60 per cent of the country's total wealth and called on corporates to help bring people out of poverty.
"The situation becomes all the more worrisome if one looks at the figure that more than 60 per cent wealth is held by just 1 per cent of India's population. While such figures are a definite burden on our national conscience, they also indicate that our growth needs to be more inclusive, then equitable. The ones who are left behind drag others in the developmental narratives," Mukherjee said.
According to the IMF, India is the world's seventh-largest economy, with a size of $2.69 trillion.
According to a UN report, India's GDP growth is expected to accelerate to 7.6 per cent in 2019-20 from an estimated 7.4 per cent in the fiscal ending March 2019, he said.
"Over 270 million have moved out of the poverty line in the decade since 2005-06 and the poverty rate in this country nearly halved over the previous period. This is a positive side. There is a significant 269 million people who live below the poverty line," Mukherjee said.
He said that profits that seek to create wealth for only individuals ultimately end up creating vast inequalities and such a situation leads to production becoming untenable.
Mukherjee called upon business leaders and decision makers to orient themselves to a large set of social goals of not only for personal benefits but also employment generation, creation of social wealth and more opportunity for the economic growth of the largest number of persons.
Mukherjee said that the country still has to find the solution to ever-growing distress in the farm sector, so that the segment acquires its “lovely place” in the larger scheme of things.
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"We still need to put into place quality and affordable healthcare infrastructure in every area, nook and corner of the country. We need to put more young people to work in order to become a truly prosperous and proud nation. While India has made lot of progress on the quantitative side, a lot of work is still needed on the quality aspect," Mukherjee said.
He called for corporates to come forward for development of the country's human capital.
"The demographic dividend needs to be leveraged, which can only happen when there is qualitative development of the education sector in the country. In addition to this, we need to enhance quality of skill development. Not many of the IITs/IIMs alumni are passing on their knowledge and skill to next generation or even creating new knowledge through research. That needs to be changed," he said.
