Nowadays, I am reading a book by Gurucharan Das - India unbound. Each page in the books has so much information about the history of India - it amaze me. I was reading through the chapter where "The Green Revolution" is described and therefore i thought it was apt to blog about it.

1950s: Famine in India, a common occurrence.
1961: India on the brink of mass famine.
1980: India is one the of world's largest exporter of rice. Famine has not occurred since.

A number of events transpired between the 1950s to 1980's that made India self sufficient in food. It all began with the untimely death of Nehru, appointment of Lal Bahadur Shastri (creator the slogan of "Jai Jawan Jai Kisan and also the promoter of the "White Revolution") as Prime minister. Shastri was a modest man - he was home grown ( unlike idealists like Nehru/Gandhi) and feeding India was his first priority. He appointed a scientist, Swaminathan, as the Minister of Agriculture. Now, Swaminathan was a very learned man and he came across an invention of a Mexican variety of Wheat by Norman Borlaug that produced 5 times of a normal wheat crop. India imported 150 million of this variety of wheat (by chartering flights) and experimented with it in norther west regions like Punjab, Haryana etc where water and fertilizer was in abundance( a prerequisite for the crop). To the amazement of everyone, the same results as in Mexico was achieved in India and eventually, India was self sufficient in being able to feed its rapidly growing population.

Swaminathan's efforts are commendable especially since he had to loop through a number of bureaucratic hurdles to ensure the success of this project.
There was this line in the book that struck me "Indian democracy is not used to bold actions by its leaders". But Swaminathan was adamant. He also put forward a proposal, amid criticism, to raise the price of wheat. the reason he gave for this move was, " the farmers need some incentive to move from the normal wheat to the high yeilding variety. The policies have to be changed in conjuction to the change in technology". How right he was, especially in those days of socialism.


Moment of Zen:
Has it occurred to anyone of the irony that, when education was a privilege, many learned men and women would get into politics (Like Nehru, Gandhi) and be so effective in sharing their ideologies. But now, when education is a no more a privilege ( in the urban areas), mostly uneducated people get into politics?