Infosys founder Narayana Murthy on Thursday said that India needs major improvements when it comes to public governance, citing “potholed roads, collapsing bridges” and unchecked pollution among other issues.
Speaking virtually at the Infosys Prize announcement this morning, the 80-year-old businessman outlined a four-tier framework for how nations progress economically and technologically. He said that India is at the bottom stage when it comes to public infrastructure.
Narayana Murthy’s 4 stages of national development
“I see four stages in a nation’s journey,” Murthy said while speaking at the Infosys Prize announcement in Bengaluru.
According to Murthy, at the bottom is the first stage, characterized by complete stagnation where a country neither creates new solutions nor adopts existing ones from abroad to help its people. “In the first, a nation neither invents nor innovates,” he said.
(Also read: Narayana Murthy points to China’s 9-9-6 rule to advocate 72-hour work week)
In the second stage, a nation begins improving living standards by adopting foreign inventions and using them just as they are.
The third stage marks a shift toward active innovation, where a country leverages its own research and higher education to improve upon existing global ideas—a milestone South Korea achieved in electronics, and India achieved in software services, Aadhaar, and ONDC.
At the very top is the fourth stage, where a nation becomes a pioneer of original, groundbreaking inventions, a status held by global leaders like the US, Western Europe, China, and Japan.
{{/usCountry}}At the very top is the fourth stage, where a nation becomes a pioneer of original, groundbreaking inventions, a status held by global leaders like the US, Western Europe, China, and Japan.
{{/usCountry}}Where does India stand today?
The Infosys founder said that India had made great progress in fields like atomic energy, space, vaccines, the Green Revolution and generic medicines. This has placed “us in stage two in most areas, and in stage three in a few”.
However, India is still in the foundational stage when it comes to public governance.
“Looking at the public governance state of our country — with potholed roads, collapsing bridges, pollution, traffic congestion, and lack of clean, safe drinking water — most unbiased foreign observers tell me that India is still in stage 1 in most public governance areas.
“India must aspire to reach stage 4 in every area that touches the lives of our poorest citizens in our remotest villages,” said Murthy. “That demands better research and education to generate good ideas, and speed and quality in executing them.
“It demands high aspiration, meritocracy, curious minds, global standards of productivity, discipline and hard work. It also demands the humility to learn from cultures that perform better than ours,” said the Chairman Emeritus of Infosys.
The Infosys Prize is an annual award presented by the Infosys Science Foundation. It is awarded in six fields – Economics, Engineering and Computer Science, Humanities and Social Sciences, Life Sciences, Mathematical Sciences, and Physical Sciences.