Work in Progress - Please Cooperate

I realize that recently the blog has been a little prescriptive, too much of the foreigner identifying the challenges that lie ahead and not enough praise for the progress that has taken place.

A sign along the road today, from the MMRDA (Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority) brought this to mind. The sign read “Work in Progress – Please Cooperate”. India is indeed a work in progress. It has achieve much in the past few decades as it has transitioned from a poor agrarian-based economy to a burgeoning services based-economy, emerging as the back-office to the world. Still it is hard to ignore the fact that there is still much work to be done, particularly in the area of infrastructure (roads, transit systems, buildings, plumbing – see previous post). We take all these things for granted in the U.S., but in fact they are the hallmark of a mature developed economy.

In the not too distant future India will join the developed world and will have all the amenities that we in the US currently enjoy. In the meantime, India remains a “work in progress”, and I and the billion other souls on this subcontinent will have to “please cooperate”.