India's Rising Aspirations Vs The Last Mile Syndrome

India’s Rising Aspirations Vs The Last Mile Syndrome


British Queen Elizabeth II’s consort, Prince Philip, well known for his hilarious, if less than diplomatic wit, remarked, on espying a badly wired electrical fixture at an electronics factory the royals were inaugurating, that it must have been put in “by an Indian”. The remark may be redolent of ethnic stereotyping, but the truth of it cannot be denied.

Indians do have a problem with the “last mile syndrome”. Like a nation with attention deficit disorder, we seem to lose interest once the most of something has been done. Consequently, the last 5% or so, consisting of finishes and attention to detail, indeed the very aspects that would commend us to other people, including the all-important customer or end-user, is usually a sad story of sloppiness, neglect and dangerous, even callous loose ends.

It is a product of the chalta hai/ unnees-bees/ the thora-bahut/ the all embracing mish-mash jugad way of thinking overlaid by a statist Soviet influence during our formative years. It makes us great innovators and make-doers, but also obtuse, in a kya kar lenge aap manner, with low standards of finish, safety, reliability, and doubtful durability.

But this last mile syndrome is indeed hard to get rid of unless there is a seismic shift brought on by rising aspirations, not just from the moaning and griping elite given to drawing room and dinner party activism, but from the ordinary man in the urban street, and the Kisan in the village.

Perhaps a modicum of rising aspirations are changing things already, if sales of consumer durables and FMCG company soaps and shampoos in rural India are anything to go by. And the gap may be narrowing further between an impatient 21st centuryist India Inc. and timeless cow-dung encrusted Bharat. There is better information dissemination via the internet, satellite TV and telecommunications. The Government too is trying hard with the introduction of scientific farming techniques, better education, health and rural infrastructure.

But actually, this messy last mile syndrome is just one of the large problems that dovetail into each other. It is difficult to take ourselves seriously when we’ve been unable to tackle the monumental overhang of the undone, the huge shortage of electricity and water for example; a curious inability to deal with regular floods and droughts in the same places, and grinding poverty for countless millions still.

Then there is also rampant corruption that has us cheating on specifications in government and private projects alike; so that the capital’s DDA, just like all the state units with a similar mandate, is notorious for its consistently shoddy workmanship; and even the better established private brands are content to exploit their name; having their work executed badly by “cousins and brothers-in-laws”, rather than people with the requisite expertise. And this, while they themselves provide PR cover, like the look-outs at a robbery.

But again, if there is anything that has improved this dismal prognosis, it has been the introduction of the classic nostrum of competition since 1991. Now, none of our stalwarts can get away with inflicting hugely outdated technology and hopeless standards on the hapless public. The sad thing is when they could, in the bad old Socialist days, they didn’t bat an eyelid.

Today, we have a much improved scenario, with relatively vibrant rates of growth but some things have not yet changed. We are still low on integrity and have little regard for quality.

And the faster we go to meet a deadline, the more corners we are happy to cut. And the key reason is, in addition to our chronic slap-dash last mile syndrome, our inordinate capacity to sit on approvals, both at the political and bureaucratic levels, till there is very little time left for execution.

That is why sections of the Delhi Metro collapse killing innocents; though the witch hunt is on to apportion responsibility. This is also, generically speaking, why sections of the much criticised BRT corridors subside; why flyovers break-down, or, owing to design and traffic flow faults, turn into death traps. And also why a much awaited sea-bridge in Mumbai has mother-of-all-bottlenecks at places where it connects back to the mainland!

The other reason is superannuated and sub-standard rolling stock and equipment. This is endemic to practically all Indian infrastructure including the railways that carry millions of people and tonnes of equipment daily.

Delhi’s dented and dirty old buses, unfit for the most mofussil of hinterlands, are being replaced at long last with more contemporary models, hopefully putting an end to the daily killing of at least one or two pedestrians and would-be passengers.

There are worse things too. Like how Mumbai pretty much drowned a couple of years ago because protective Mangrove swamps have been reclaimed and the drainage system
hadn’t been improved upon since the British left our shores. Some changes have been made now, but not a moment too soon.

But side by side with this ineptitude, this third-world incompetence and lack of pride of workmanship, there have been signal achievements of considerable sophistication, such as in the information technology sphere that has not only ours, but the world’s admiration. And we have always been capable of exquisite craftsmanship.

India proceeds paradoxically, lurching, flanking crab-like, attending to its highs and lows with near equal dedication. But for the highs, we rise above our limitations, and for those routine lows, alas, they seem to come naturally.

But a new current is discernible. It is not so much born out of contrition. It comes instead from a feeling, an instinct that we need not be second-class anymore. We have demonstrated first-class ability and success in some quarters. And this has created an appetite for similar standards of achievement elsewhere.

If this keeps up, and there is nothing on the horizon to suggest it won’t, we will perhaps be admired one day for our last mile execution too. The urge will come from within, as it must. Indians invariably do well abroad where the environment lets them better express themselves. Domestically too, things are changing to allow for greater measures of growth without the old ideological taboos. So perhaps, despite short term flubbing there is no need for eventual cynicism. Besides, as author Anais Nin put it, it is “Easier to be deceived than to doubt”.

(1,049 words)

3rd August 2009
Gautam Mukherjee


Published as Leader Edit on Saturday, 8th August, 2009 in The Pioneer--entitled " We are like this only!". Also appeared online at www.dailypioneer.com on the same day and is archived there under Columnists.