Happy birthday India – and surely there’s cause for celebration when one looks at India’s transformation 60 years on from independence; it recently became the twelfth country to pass the trillion-dollar mark in terms of gross domestic product. But alongside excitement at New India’s rapid economic growth, technological advances and increasing political influence, there are concerns and challenges.
What is India’s core identity today? Does the fact that India’s 300-million-and-counting strong middle class, considered the biggest in the world, now aspires to Western living standards, and even Western values, threaten Indian culture? Does rapid modernisation and urbanisation threaten to kill off ancient traditions and destabilise the ‘connectedness and community’ of village life? Or is this to romanticise a feudal utopia rather than embracing the benefits that modernity offers? Is modern India too keen to ape the Western path of development? Does the massive social change over the last half century promise prosperity for millions more, or will too many be left behind if India fails to avoid ‘our mistakes’? Is there a danger that Western-style social pessimism about the future unnecessarily quells enthusiasm for India’s potential success?
Thanks to British Council India.
 | Naresh Fernandes editor-in-chief, Time Out India; author, Bombay Then and Now; co-editor, Bombay, Meri Jaan: Writings on Mumbai |
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 | Dr Maria Misra lecturer in modern history and fellow, Keble College, University of Oxford; author, Vishnu's Crowded Temple: India Since the Great Rebellion |
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 | Parminder Bahra poverty and development correspondent, The Times |
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 | Dr Philip Cunliffe senior lecturer in international conflict, University of Kent; co-editor, Politics Without Sovereignty: a critique of contemporary international relations. |
| Claire Fox director, Academy of Ideas; panellist, BBC Radio 4's Moral Maze; author, I Find That Offensive | |
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| Dr Sadhvi Sharma researcher and writer on politics in India, development, and NGO campaigns | |
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 | recommended by spiked |
