India, at the Cusp

People born during the 70’s and the 80’s in India are largely responsible for the transformation of this nation. Though the seeds of transformation were sown by leaders who were born earlier, all the tilling and ploughing and raising the crop of transformation should be credited to the people born in the 70’s and 80’s. Sectors like real estate, automobile manufacturing, IT, IT enabled services, and Telecom have shown phenomenal growth. Incomes have gone up significantly as compared to the 80’s and so has purchasing power of the middle class. Things which were considered luxuries earlier are now been considered as necessities. Splurging on entertainment has become the norm. With more disposable income, people don’t hesitate to spend and to live much more luxuriously than the previous generation.

Along with this economic boom and prosperity came along some uninvited guests. Excessive emissions from factories and vehicles causing heavy air pollution, unmanageable proportions of piling e-waste and plastic causing pollution of land, untreated industrial effluents being let into rivers causing water pollution, encroachment of water bodies, destroying hills and river beds for construction, excessive depletion of underground water, conversion of agricultural land into residential plots and rampant deforestation. Initially, the effects were not felt and nobody took heed of it. In the past few years, these problems have become difficult to ignore, not just by the public, but also by the government. And, that brings us all to the next phase of growth – where growth is sustainable and well-planned.

India, under the leadership of the Prime Minister, Mr.Narendra Modi is all poised to be the key player in ushering the new era of sustainable development. An era which will make petrol and diesel vehicles a thing of a past which could bring air pollution under control; an era where renewable methods of electricity generation will be a reliable partner along with nuclear power plants and the coal-fired thermal power plants; an era where bio-gas plants and LPG availability will replace firewood chulas, much to the respite of the womenfolk. If the leadership does not get wooed by the lobbyist who would want to maintain status quo, make enforcement agencies implement environment-friendly policies at grass root level, and set high environment-friendly targets and work towards achieving them, we can be sure that India would spearhead this revolution and would stand as an exemplar nation to the entire world.

Now, all this said and done, what does this mean to the common man? And what does it mean to the environmentally unfriendly businesses which dominates current markets. Can governments achieve these goals without their support? The answer is, it cannot. The ambitions of the government could be achieved only if both these factions, the people and the businessmen, cooperate or rather lead the change. Let us look at an example. The government has plans for 100% conversion of all three-wheelers  and two-wheelers to electric by 2023 and 2025, respectively. This is being received with hesitation by one of the leading business houses. I am sure, they are not alone in having reservations. This is natural as the three and two wheeler automobile markets are still growing (though not as much as in the past few years) and every manufacturer is launching more products (sometimes more powerful, sometimes more beautiful) to appeal to the buyers and increase their market share. Considering the time and energy they invest in building brands, they would want time to reap the benefits of their work. What good would it do to them if they build brands only to be replaced by their electric counterparts three to five years from now? That brings us to another important question. Why are these leading automakers not shifting their focus to electric right away and launch only electric auto rickshaws, scooters and bikes? Well, they won’t make the shift right away due to the lack of infrastructure. Battery operated vehicles need charging ports. How many of them are publicly available in India? Not many. Is there a private investor coming up with a chain of electric-vehicle charging ports? The answer is no. The reason for the same is that the charging ports will not have customers, not many, at least for the next few years. So, the investment would be considered a dead one. Would government initiate the project? No. The government works on such ventures only with private partnership, and since no private investors are ready, such projects would not take off. This would require electric-automakers also make charging stations available. This is also not likely to happen as they won’t have the specialization to do the same. The only way forward is a partnership between those who want to make charging stations, electric-automakers, and the government. Such threesome collisions have always been the rarest occurrences.

Let’s now bring in the fourth entity, the consumer. Having tasted convenience (ease of refueling with petrol / diesel / cng) the customer would want his vehicle to be charged as fast as the vehicle being refueled by petrol / diesel / gas. Now, that’s going to be disappointing. Batteries don’t get charged within minutes. A large section of the customers are driven by ‘thump’ of the vehicles they ride, the power, and the range of it. Generally, battery operated vehicles would fall short in all three aspects. Exceptions are there, but they prove to be very expensive. While automakers sold their conventional petrol driven vehicles, they used consumer’s emotions to advertise them. None of the emotions applicable to powerful petrol vehicles apply to the battery-powered vehicles. Their Chief Selling Points are that they are environment-friendly (if charged using renewable energy) and lesser maintenance costs. It is just a simple way to travel. Now, how do we rewire the customer’s brain to see the goodness in this. That’s a task for the marketing division of these EV manufacturers. Another way to retain the present comfort level of the customers is to invest heavily in R&D and come up with Quick charging solutions, and high-power – long-range batteries. If indigenous R&D teams fail, the technologies can be imported or companies can come up with merger divisions which would aid each other in sales  and for the technology shared. Such tie-ups are already coming up. Maruti Suzuki and Toyota India has announced such a tie-up.

           Mahatma once said, “The world has enough for everyone’s need, but not enough for everyone’s greed.”. This statement increases in relevance with every passing year as population increases and per capita comforts increase. The ‘pazhamozhi’ in Tamil “சுவர் இருந்தாதானே சித்திரம் வரைய முடியும்.” Which means “Only if there is a wall, can you draw a picture on it.” Though space travel is becoming a reality, and people are planning to colonize at least the Moon, if not Mars, presently Earth is our only home. It is important that everyone understands this and does his or her bit to keep it intact for the children of 2020s. May God bless our steps into the future.