Epiphanies from Nandan Nilekani

"Seattle has Bill," Thomas Friedman once wrote. "Bangalore has Nandan." The co-founder of Infosys -- the Indian company that made "outsourcing" a household word -- famously gave Friedman the central conceit for The World Is Flat when he said that global commerce's "playing field is being leveled" by communications technology. Now tasked with providing digital IDs to 1.2 billion Indians, Nandan Nilekani is trying to finish the job he started in the private sector: bringing a country that never entirely left the 19th century all the way into the 21st.

INTERVIEW BY CHARLES HOMANS | NOVEMBER 2011

My father was a middle manager in a textile mill in Bangalore and ran into hard times. He had to move on and look for other jobs. My parents were concerned that I would not get good schooling, so they put me up in my uncle's house in Dharwad, and I spent about six years there. So at a very young age, I was away from my parents. I developed an amount of independence and learned to stand on my own feet.

Infosys was going to be a different type of company. It was going to be very ethically run, meritocratic, quality-conscious, transparent. People didn't confuse the personal with the corporate. In those days in India, companies were either large multinationals, or they were large units in the public sector, or they were family companies. The notion of a first-generation set of entrepreneurs creating a very different kind of company was like a breath of fresh air in the 1980s.

All the forces that Friedman and I talked about -- globalization, technology, the leveling of the playing field -- are as valid as ever. The transmission of information and capital globally and instantaneously that is happening thanks to the cloud, tablets, and social networking are all manifestations of that concept. That hyperconnected world is both a source of opportunity and a challenge.

What we're doing [in the Indian government] is leapfrogging paper and going straight to online IDs, which is actually a big idea: People who had no idea what IDs were, which is many Indians, are now going to jump from that to an online digital ID that works on the Internet or the mobile phone. Then you can start designing services in the online world: a new way to deliver banking services, food entitlements, whatever. The intersection of what is possible with today's technology and the age-old challenges of developing countries -- that, to me, is a very exciting point.

When Western development happened in the 19th and 20th centuries, it took many decades and it went through the evolution of many technologies: the steam engine, the automobile, the airplane, electricity, the telegraph. Today, countries like India that are experiencing 7 or 8 percent growth and have this population that is impatient for change have to look at a fundamentally different model.

India is fulfilling its promise. It has the largest pool of young people anywhere in the world. And it's a country that's fully exposed because of its openness to the most modern technology. It's a society in transition, where this huge, young, aspirational population is working in a system that is still older and slower. It's a very exciting time.

Illustration by Joe Ciardiello for FP

 SUBJECTS: INDIA, SOUTH ASIA
 

Nandan Nilekani is chairman of India’s Unique Identification Authority and author of Imagining India: The Idea of a Renewed Nation.

Charles Homans is features editor of Foreign Policy.

SHIKARISHAMBU

9:00 PM ET

October 10, 2011

Leapfrogging due process?

Any time you start an article quoting Thomas Friedman you lose credibility. Nandan is no Bill Gates. He would be the first one to say so.

As for universal ID, it is sad that the govt is implementing it without drawing a blue print or discussing the need/ value of it. An autocratic decision by a democratic government.

 

SUDHANSHU

1:30 AM ET

October 11, 2011

ID's without food

He is completely wrong about India and the needs of an average Indian. Poor people in India would rather have food, roads, electricity, water supply, education, access to justice and other basic services. The UIDA is of no use, they will spend 30 years or so building a database, which then will be used only to provide specific services for specific vote banks.

 

YODNA

11:10 AM ET

November 2, 2011

HEY GOOD

He is utterly wrong concerning India and also the desires of a median Indian. Poor individuals in India would rather have food, iPod Touch Black Fridayroads, electricity, water offer, education, access to justice and different basic services. The UIDA is of no use, they'll pay thirty years or therefore building a database, that then are used solely to produce Black Friday Nikon D5100specific services for specific vote banks.

 

RAKESH.KUMAR

2:25 PM ET

November 9, 2011

don't be so cynic

Potentially India have everything-foodgrains,money to create infra,availability of water, ..etc what we don't have is good governance like some of developed world, it is going through a evolution phase, revolutinary phase is not possible in worlds largest democracy unlike communist countries, but once reached it will be sustainable. And UNID will going to revolutionize the system of governance in this country for the poorest of the poor in terms of PDS-public distribution system. I don'tknow from where u have got 30 years of tag. Surly this will take some time but not that much after all it will be a world's largest database by any standard and its a challenging task can't expect overnight change', this is a country of billion+ people.

 

FEYNMAN007

11:06 PM ET

October 18, 2011

The universal ID project is dead on arrival

While the idea of a universal ID for every Indian has its appeal, and at least on the surface, a sensible idea, the way Nandan Nilekani has gone about implementing it is a joke. Old folk are expected to go stand in line for hours to pick up the forms to be filled out and then again to file the application, and to be fingerprinted and iris-scanned. There are no efforts to reach the population where they live and work; Instead, Mr. Nilekani expects an 80-year old grandma to trek down to an office that takes hours to get to in order to stand in line for many more hours just so she could make Mr. Nilekani’s dream come true. The forms are designed to gather extremely sensitive data (including bank account numbers) from individuals. The Government of India has no business collecting such sensitive information when it has proven to be utterly incapable of protecting even the most sensitive state secrets from tech-savvy hackers and spies. Mr. Nilekani is often quick to criticize the very institutions that helped the likes of him ‘make it’ in India. He is lucky to be where he is. He is no genius, and he is certainly no Bill Gates or Steve Jobs. He is just an ordinary techie who has been extraordinarily fortunate to have been born in a time and place that enabled him to ride the wave and get to where he is now.

 

DOMINOES

10:07 PM ET

October 29, 2011

never knew

I had no idea about this guy, but it is nice to read about him and see what he is doing for the world. I am glad that I have a clue about what this guy is about and feel like I have a tile of an idea for what he does.

 

YARINSIZ

5:13 AM ET

November 7, 2011

The Government of India has

The Government of India has no business collecting such sensitive information when it has proven to be utterly incapable of protecting even the most sensitive state secrets from tech-savvy hackers and spies. Mr. Nilekani is often quick to criticize the very institutions that helped the likes of him ‘make it’ in India. seslichat He is lucky to be where he is. He is no Cgenius, and he is certainly no Bill Gates or Steve Jobs

 

PATRICIAMOORE

5:38 PM ET

November 8, 2011

The Apostle of Servant Leadership

We realize many forms of leadership like autocratic, situational, participative and others. Of these, a fresh leadership style is emerging inside the corporate world, which can be inevitable in the commercialsomanabolic muscle maximizerscenario of post globalization, and highly competitive with increasing expectations. Living and living type of Hanuman, most prominent character inside the epic Ramayana, who's selfless, symbol of sacrifice and zero arrogance.