Colorful India
Why India and Peru are similar?
I feel that India is very similar
to my country. In the last decades, international community has shown enthusiasm about their future perspectives due to their outstanding economic performance. Nevertheless, their governments still are not able to transform that
economic success in better opportunities for their citizens. For example, Peru
is considered the “Latin America’s rising star” due to the fact that in the
last eight years the economy has grown at an average rate of about 7%, the
highest rate in the region (after Panama which is a much smaller country). However, in rural areas, more than a third of the children suffer chronic
malnutrition and scarcely five percent of the students attending public schools
achieve the expected results in mathematics.
In a similar way, with the conformation of the BRICS (the association of the five major emerging national economies: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), India was under the "spotlight" and expectations regarding it's role in global affairs were raised. Nowadays, the enthusiasm about India’s economic growth has declined. But what really worries is that –in comparison to China- India has not made significant reforms to improve the quality of basic services. The Nobel Prize Amartya Sen is better than me to explain this point: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/20/opinion/why-india-trails-china.html?_r=0
For me, high economic performance -due to natural resources or innovation- and low living conditions for the people (or poverty) is a puzzle. In fact, when I travel around my country, I feel that the famous Italian-born Peruvian scientist Antonio Raimondi was right when he said –more than a century ago- that “Peru was a beggar sitting on a bench of gold”. It took me just two trips to figure out that India is also a beggar sitting on a bench of gold. I will try to show you my point through some pictures of my trips to Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh.
What can be do to transform the "gold" in better living conditions?
In a similar way, with the conformation of the BRICS (the association of the five major emerging national economies: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), India was under the "spotlight" and expectations regarding it's role in global affairs were raised. Nowadays, the enthusiasm about India’s economic growth has declined. But what really worries is that –in comparison to China- India has not made significant reforms to improve the quality of basic services. The Nobel Prize Amartya Sen is better than me to explain this point: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/20/opinion/why-india-trails-china.html?_r=0
For me, high economic performance -due to natural resources or innovation- and low living conditions for the people (or poverty) is a puzzle. In fact, when I travel around my country, I feel that the famous Italian-born Peruvian scientist Antonio Raimondi was right when he said –more than a century ago- that “Peru was a beggar sitting on a bench of gold”. It took me just two trips to figure out that India is also a beggar sitting on a bench of gold. I will try to show you my point through some pictures of my trips to Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh.
What can be do to transform the "gold" in better living conditions?
White: Taj Mahal
Green: Ranthambore National Park
Orange: Resting tiger at Ranthambore
(Photo credit: Jaime Archundia)
Yellow: "Snake charmer". Amber Fort, Jaipur.
Rainbow: Worshipers walking towards the Ganesh Temple
(Photo credit: Jaime Archundia)
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