State of States Conclave: Social strife has set back Punjab's growth, says Raj Chengappa

India Today Group Editorial Director Raj Chengappa shares his five observations about the agriculturally rich Punjab at the presentation of the State of States report on Punjab.

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State of States Conclave: Social strife has set back Punjab's growth, says Raj Chengappa
India Today Group Editorial Director Raj Chengappa shares his special affection for Punjab. (Photo: Vikram Sharma/India Today)

Good morning everyone, Manpreet Badal, Finance Minister of Punjab, distinguished speakers, government officials, Ladies and Gentlemen

On behalf of the India Today Group, in this beautiful garden city of Chandigarh, it is a great pleasure to welcome you all to the first State of the State Report and Conclave on Punjab being organised by India Today magazine.

For me this a homecoming of sorts. Between 2010 and 2015, I spent five years in Chandigarh and was privileged to be Editor-in-Chief of the Tribune Group of Newspapers, a paper that is widely regarded and respected as premier journal of Punjab.

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I have a special affection for Punjab. I was born in Ferozepore and regarded myself as a Punjabi by birth. I still recall that when I wrote this Shri Prakash Singh Badal Saab, the former chief minister of Punjab, called to me and spoke in chaste Punjabi. I had to regretfully tell him that I had left Punjab at the age of four and spent most of my early life in Bangalore. And that my knowledge of Punjabi barring a few greetings and swear words was abysmal.

My understanding of Punjab grew when I spent time here. And in keeping with the name of Punjab, I would like to make only five observations of the state:

Firstly, Punjab has always had a rich history that dates back to the Indus Valley civilisation and this land of five great rivers - whether this side of the border or the other - had always played a special role in the sub-continent. After Partition, as we all know, the state was further divided in 1966 with Haryana and Himachal Pradesh being carved out of it.

Secondly, undaunted by these developments, Punjab continued to prosper and occupies a unique place in the country's hearts. The people of the state pulsate energy, exude passion and enjoy the fullness of life. They are amongst the most hardworking in the country and their enterprising spirit saw them lead the country especially in agriculture. With just 1.53 per cent of the geographical area of the country, Punjab continues to be the granary of India.

Thirdly, The land is special because it gave birth to one of the greatest religions in the world - Sikhism - with its message of universal goodness, harmony and the unity of the Divine. When religion and statehood became tragically intertwined the state suffered for decades and is still recovering from those setbacks.

Fourthly, the past 25 years have seen peace return to Punjab but the years of strife saw its finances sink into a sea of debt which is now estimated to be a crippling Rs 2 lakh crore. That has meant that there is very little scope for the much needed structural transformation of Punjab from an agrarian economy to an agro-industrial hub of the country.

Fifthly, and more positively, successive governments in Punjab from the year 2000 have tried to rebuild the state by putting up infrastructures like roads and power but it will have to work doubly hard and with the support from the Central Government - which has been woefully short - could regain its primacy as the fastest growing state of the country with the highest per capita income - a position it enjoyed between 1968 and 1980.

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That quest is why India Today's first State of the State report on Punjab that we will be presenting later today is important. Let me give you a brief background of why India Today magazine is doing the report.

Since 2003, when India Today magazine initiated the State of the States Report, the magazine has been ranking Indian states based on their performance in key development parameters. This has now come to be regarded as the gold standard for evaluating the social and economic health of the Indian States.

Among the many requests, we had after we came out with these national state of the states awards, particularly from Chief Ministers was that India Today should also examine individual states more closely and help them understand how they could improve their performance.

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This became all the more important because states have now become the key drivers to India's socio-economic development.

So as the next logical step we decided to begin what we call the State of the State Report. The concept is to have experts do an X-ray of the state by conducting a micro-analysis at the district level.

The report recognises that the districts are the fulcrum of change - not Delhi or the state capitals. The State of the State report has become the touchstone for competition among districts within each state.

We have now done a similar state of the state reports in Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh and Bihar. So overall Punjab is our tenth State of the State report. We intend to cover all the Indian states in the next five years.

The India Today State of the State report on Punjab is a pioneering study since it has analysed all the 22 districts of the state on 10 key development parameters: Education, Health, Infrastructure, Water and Sanitation, Agriculture, Industry, Services, Law and Order, Prosperity and overall performance.

Let me make it clear that the State of the State report is not a survey in the sense that we study people's perceptions of the state like opinion polls, which can predict it wrongly.

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Instead, it is a serious study of objective, available data. For the Punjab report, we collaborated with the leading research agency Nielsen which collated data from the Census, the National Sample Surveys, Central Statistical Office, National Family Health Survey, the Reserve Bank of India, District Information Systems and the National Crime Records Bureau. This data was evaluated by experts based combined with ground reports from the district.

The India Today research team consisting Ajit Kumar Jha, our Editor Research, Asit Jolly, Senior Editor, who heads our North Indian coverage and features writer Sukant Deepak then put together the report.

We hope that the state of the state report that will be released later today will enable some of the key issues to be tackled. We have a galaxy of speakers today including key ministers of the state and experts from different specialisations and we look forward to their discussions and solutions.

We are deeply honoured that the Chief Minister of Punjab Captain Amarinder Singh will be gracing this occasion later this evening and presenting the awards to the winning districts as well as delivering the keynote address. So I once again welcome you all to India Today's first state of the state report and conclave for Punjab.

It is also my pleasure to welcome Manpreet Badal, the Punjab Finance Minister, one of the brightest politicians of the region and someone who have I known even before he became an MLA for the first time in 1995. I have always respected his erudition, his clarity and his commitment to the development of the state. He is a fifth term MLA and second-time Finance Minister.

With the surname Badal, Manpreet had it all going for him. But Manpreet consciously rejected the dynast tag, worked hard to rise in politics and become an important voice in the state. He struck out on his own for awhile even forming his own party before merging it with the Congress. A wise decision because Manpreet is back where he can make the maximum different - as finance minister of a state whose finances are in an ICU. Plenty needs to be done to bring it back on its feet. May I now request Manpreet to deliver his inaugural keynote address and take a few questions.

Follow full coverage of the State of States Conclave Punjab here