The Mindmine Summit 2015

Today commenced the ninth edition of Mindmine Summit 2015, a conference of two days wherein eminent personalities would talk about the theme- ‘2015-2025- India Decade?’. It was for the first time that members of leading and different political parties came together under one roof as panelist and discussed or talked about what they think is the national interest. The summit is a two day long event and was inaugurated by Nitin Gadkari, Union Minister of Road Transport and Highways & Shipping, who began the event by talking about the growth in the infrastructure and how he looks at England waters as a good mode of import-export as it would reduce the cost of consumption.

Panelists L-R – Sanjay Baru, Ravi Uppal, Nitin Gadkari, Shweta Rajpal and Amit Chandra

A lot of conversation also pepped up about Land Acquisition Bill and Good Service Tax Bill as people thought it to be an urban centric growth prospect, but Nitin Gadkari had a different perspective about it and ensured the audience that it’s more for rural development rather than urban development. Mr. Gadkari also emphasized that his sector would surely contribute 2% of the GDP and is sure about the fact that GDP would grow at 9% soon.

Where Mr.Gadkari spoke about importance of infrastructure, in another conversation which was around ‘Future Proofing India: How do we Skill and Scale quickly?’, Ravi Shankar Prasad, Minister of IT and Communication, spoke about how it has become need of the hour to skill our generation rather than adding up degrees to the CV. He said that India lacks behind when it comes to skilled labour force as the education is not good enough and doesn’t give the students a hands on job training.

Lamp lighting by Sh. Nitin Gadkari

He also told that it gives him immense pride that the Information Technology sector is growing so fast that right now India is the second largest country, after America, when it comes to use of mobiles and Internet. He expressed his amazement at the way the unskilled labour have got themselves into small enterprises and are doing an amazing work. As migration also popped up as an issue to look at, it was even recognised that people are participating, well informed and have an opinion to make but do not necessarily take an action since they are not off the mobile.

Nitin Gadkari addressing the session

Since social media came into picture, how can one miss out on a figure who started using social media as a platform to communicate with the people i.e. Kiran Bedi. During a session of Civil Society And Social Enterprises: Towards a Weaponless Revolution?, Kiran Bedi said that it has become really easy to make vote banks in recent times. She also expressed that everyone has their opinion and they are quite adamant about it and would do anything to convince other people of it. He or she also happens to have supporters and can make a party of his or her own.

Sunil Kant Munjal addressing the event

Further she spoke about how media can actually impact on the way people look at other people and how she got to know the unlawful ways of campaigning during the election times. She said that she is trying to work towards correcting them. On correcting her comment that it’s not her but the party who lost, when she lost the Delhi Assembly Elections massively, she said that she was referring to the fact that she gave her 100% to the job. She advised the audience and Delhi’s citizens that this time they should voice their inconvenience and ask the election commission to make some amendments about campaigning.

It was interesting to know that a lot of panelist believed that by 2022-2025 there are possibilities of reaching to a level wherein we might just overpower China’s economy. However, they all agreed to the fact that this ride is not going to be smooth but a bumpy one. Make In India campaign is seen as a bigger prospect of growth by every panelist but the challenges of skilled labour, better infrastructure etc. remains unaddressed. All in all, the first day of the summit was a huge success and people are geared up for the next day talks/discussions.