India 2047 and Social Entrepreneurship

I remember that when I was young and my mother used to teach me, probably in primary class, she taught me that India is a developing country. When I grew up and my younger sister who is five years younger to me was in primary class, my mother used to teach her the same thing ‘India is a developing country’. I grew up knowing that India is still developing. When I started teaching my daughter and the text books still said that India is a developing country, I questioned myself that generations are passing and India is still developing. Why are we not able to consider India a developed country? When the day will come when a child will be taught that India is a developed country? Today, 11^th December 2023 is a day when I came across a news headline that stated ‘PM Modi to launch VIKSIT BHARAT @2024: VOICE OF YOUTH’. Though not a youth now, but I could not hold myself from writing what I feel for my country when I visualize it as a developed country.

As per a global report on the list of countries having a quality entrepreneurship ecosystem, India ranks fourth. This clearly indicates that the business environment of India is steadily rising over the years. If these ventures could be directed towards social entrepreneurship, then the hurdles like poverty, climate change, inequality, human rights, education, health; that are pulling India back from being a developed country could be substantially addressed. As social entrepreneurship directly deals with community complexities by empowering and engaging local communities in decision making process, it ensures that the decisions are culturally sensitive, context specific and caters to the actual needs of a community. Social entrepreneurship can bring young aspirants with same goal come together and exchange ideas through various youth clubs, can get a mentor through various collaborations and add to community enrichment by following the principles of circular economy that aligns with the UN sustainable development goals with 3R’s i.e. reuse, reduce and recycle. The day when the concepts like social entrepreneurship, circular economy and cultural complexity will come out of text books and be practically implemented then India will not only be a developed country but a country with the most emotionally skilled youth in the workforce.

Dr. Shilpi Bhattacharya

Professor and Dean

Faculty of Arts and Humanities