Speech of Dr.

APJ Abdul Kalam on 21

st
Convocation of IRMA.
I am indeed delighted to participate in the 21st convocation of IRMA (Institute of Rural
Management, Anand) I would like to congratulate the graduating students and the teachers who
shaped the students to take up very important task of rural development. I would like to greet the
pioneers who had visioned the Operation Flood and co-located this IRMA in Anand.
Breaking the Fifth Country Syndrome
I have worked for 45 years in various government agencies and industrial/academic
establishments. I used to refer frequently that India is going through 5th country syndrome. What
is that 5th country syndrome? When we launched in 1980, the ISRO's first satellite launch
vehicle (SL V3) to put Rohini satellite in the orbit, we were told by the world that we are the
fifth country who had the capability of building a rocket system that would place the satellite in
to the orbit. India when it became self sufficient in cereals fruits, vegetables in the last decade.
India became the 3rd largest grain producer - but not in the productivity. When India launched
Agni Missile System IRBM in 1989, it was reported that India was again the fifth country who
had the capability of launching that particular type of missile. When India became Nuclear
Weapon State in May 1998 after testing series of nuclear devices, India became one of the five
countries having similar capabilities. Now it can be seen as whatever important technological or
scientific or industrial event took place in the country we were always 3rd to 5th in the global
scale. Whenever I met young, I used to ask them to work for coming out of the 5th country
syndrome. When I am with you, today, in Anand, with Dr. V. Kurien and the pioneering team, I
am happy that you are breaking fifth country syndrome because India is No-1 in Milk
production. My greeting to you on this occasion to all farmers, technologists, managers and
value addition professionals.

Thinking is the Progress
When I see you all young graduates particularly, specialized in rural management I was thinking
what thought I can share with you. I would like to tell the young, "low aim is the crime". In the
knowledge era, successful people will always take untravelled roads rather than beaten path.
When a nation doesn't have a vision, small minds take over the nation
Thinking is the progress.
Thinking leads to the VISION for the nation Non-thinking is the destruction to the individual,
organization and the nation.
Let me share with you the certain experiences and a plan of action for: one relates to how in a
rural environment productivity of a food grain can be increase in difficult zones, Second one is
about the success of co-operative movement of cold desert farmers. And the third one is about a
how a network of villages can be made economically self-supporting and prosperous called
PURA (Providing Urban amenities in Rural Areas)
System's Approach to Enhance Agricultural Productivity
Prof SK Sinha, a renowned agricultural scientist who was a former Director IARI, and TIFAC
took up a project on "A System's Approach to Enhance Agricultural Productivity in Central
Bihar and Eastern India". ICAR unit at Patna participated. About 6 villages of RP Channel-5 and
nine villages of Majhauli distributaries were selected during the Kharif season of 1998. The
system approach consisted of soil analysis, seed choice, cultivation season, fertiliser selection
and training to the farmers particularly usage of remote sensing data.
This intensive collaboration of scientists and farmers resulted in increase of yield of wheat from
2 tons/hectare to 5 tons/hectare. This is spreading fast to other areas. Near about 200 villages are
participating in the programme. It is also spreading to Devaria District of UP. When we visited a
few villages where this systems approach is used, we found that the farmers are happy that the
production has increased. Their income has increased too. Naturally these bring new issues like
equipment for faster harvesting, storage, marketing and banking system. I am glad that they have
come up with ideas for solutions and also are preparing to work together and share facilities.
Remote sensing for Rural Land Quality Mapping
There has been a very successful project for applying Remote Sensing to environmentally
degraded land in certain part of Uttar Pradesh. The area chosen are high intensity Sodic land in
the major canal commands: Upper Ganga, Lower Ganga, Ram Ganga, Sharda Sahayak. Sodic
land intensity is high in the critical and semi-critical water logged areas and partly in the
potential areas for water logging. In the project it was studied by the Uttar Pradesh Remote
Sensing Department and along with other Departments in Uttar Pradesh under a World Bank
funded project, there has been a very good success in reclaimed sodic land. Remote Sensing is
also being used for subsequent study of why some of the reclamation measures have been
succeeded and why in some areas it has not worked. For example, one of the studies indicates
that the status of sodic land reclamation is variable in different hydro geological conditions.
There are few such lessons derived from the project, which is useful for further enhancement to
the reclamation efforts.
Hill Agriculture (Cold desert agriculture)
I would like to mention that three DRDO labs have been working in the area of agriculture,
particularly hill agriculture. This relates to developing suitable technologies, for inaccessible and
difficult terrain like cold desert of Ladakh (J&K) and high altitudes of UP hills. Major areas of
research during last three decades has been development of suitable varieties of vegetable crops,
fodder crops, and improved breeds of poultry, cattle, as well as their production technologies.
DRDO scientists entered into a partnership with the local farmers so that the results of the
research can reach the common man in short time for the benefit of the society and the nation.
Use of these technical inputs by the farmers in areas like Leh valley and Joshimath and
Pithoragarh areas of UP hills not only has increased the income level of the local farmers but
also to the considerable savings to the defence forces in transportation of these perishable
commodities (vegetables, milk, and poultry) besides boosting morale of the troops deployed
there. In Leh valley, locally grown fresh vegetables worth one crore of rupees annual are being
supplied by the local growers and farmers' cooperatives to the defence forces, even upto the
Siachen Glacier, using the technologies developed by DRDO for production and storage.
Development of protected cultivation of vegetable crops (solar greenhouse cultivation) made it
possible to grow vegetables in Leh valley during frozen winters (at -30 degree centigrade).
Technologies developed for cold desert have been successfully used and demonstrated in
developing a self-sustainable village, Nang village at altitude of 4000 meters in Ladakh. Similar
experiment of developing self-sustainable village (Sil village) is in progress in Pithoragarh
district and Karko village in Arunachal Pradesh also.
PURA (providing Urban amenities in Rural Areas)
The fact that there is net migration from villages to cities indicates that, in the opinion of the
rural people, cities are better places to live. Ideally, both rural and urban areas should be equally
attractive with no net migration either way. Near zero net rural-urban migration is a mark of
completed development. How can we achieve that happy state of affairs? Rural development is
the only solution and the details are described as a process, which:
(a) provides rural areas with all desirable amenities that are currently available only in cities;
(b) will generate as a consequence employment on the same scale, and at the same level, as cities
do;
(c) will provide these benefits at a small fraction of the financial, social, cultural and ecological
costs the cities have to bear.
It is the expectation that this combination of employment and ecology will make rural areas as
attractive as cities are, if not even more attractive. Then, rural development may be expected to
prevent, if not actually reverse, rural-urban migration.
The model envisaged a habitat designed to improve the quality of life in rural places and makes
special suggestions to remove urban congestion also. Naturally our most intractable urban
problem is that of congestion removal and efficient supply of water and effective waste disposal
in every locality are the paramount civic needs. There is a minimum size below which a habitat
is not viable and not competitive with the existing congested city. At the same time, the existing
congested city is not economical compared to a new town once a minimum size of expansion is
crossed. As against a conventional city say, rectangular in shape and measuring 10 km by 6 km,
the model considers an annular ring-shaped town integrating minimum 8 to 10 villages of the
same 60 km2 area, and the same access distance of 1 km to transport arteries. It needs one and
only one transportation route of distance half that needed for the rectangular shaped city; so
frequency of transportation will be doubled halving waiting times. It has zero number of
junctions and will need only a single level layout. Also it needs only one route as against 8
needed for the rectangular plan, so people will no longer need to change from one line to another
to move from anyone point to any other. That saves transport time. Further, as all traffic is
concentrated into one single route, high efficiency mass transportation systems become
economical even for a comparatively small population. This cuts costs substantially and is more
convenient for general public. Knowledge powered rural development is an essential need for
transforming India into a knowledge super power and high bandwidth rural connectivity is the
minimum requirement to take education and health care to the rural areas. The rural economic
prosperity is linked to physical connectivity, electronic connectivity, knowledge connectivity and
thereby economic connectivity. Hence rural development is the integrated development of
multiple fields in the mission mode.
Changes in employment, agriculture, Industry and Service - knowledge Industries
In 1960 agriculture area employed in parts or in full 74% of people of the country and it reduced
to 62 % in 1992 and is expected to further fall to 50 % of people in agriculture by 2010.
Whereas, the demand of agricultural products will double in quantity Productivity using
technology and post harvest management will have to compensate the manpower reduction in
farming and agricultural products sector.
In the case of industry, in 1960, 11% of the population was employed in small scale and large-
scale industries. The trend continued with 11 % even during 1992. However, it has to increase by
25% in 2010, as the GDP growth with high technology in the situation of opening up of the
economy under WTO region. The pattern of employment will take a new shape. Service with
knowledge industry component from 15% employability in 1960 has increased to 27% in 1992.
And further it will increase to 50% in view of infrastructure maintenance areas, financial sector,
IT sector and entertainment demands. This big change will demand in all areas more trained
skilled human power and technology personnel. Our industrialists, commercial chiefs and
technologists may have to get ready for such transformation in agricultural, industries and
service-knowledge industries for which human manpower with knowledge and skills has to be
evolved in a mission mode.
Vision Mission & Goals
The nation's strengths predominantly reside in its natural and human resources. In natural
resources, India is endowed with a vast coast-line with marine resources and also oil wealth. In
minerals, apart from conventional material resources, it is well- known that India has the largest
deposits of titanium, beryllium and tungsten. India ranks among the top few nations having a rich
bio- diversity. Particularly, in the herbal area there are potential applications for developing
multiple products for nutrition, prevention and cure of diseases. Of the global herbal product
market of US$ 61 billion, China has a share of around US$ 3 billion, whereas India's share is not
even US $ 100 million. Hence, there is tremendous opportunity for growth in this area. India has
similar potential for promoting floriculture and aquaculture in a big way. Knowledge-based
value addition for these natural resources would mean exporting value-added products rather
than mere1y the raw materials. Use of IT for commercialisation and marketing can increase our
outreach and speed enormously. Ancient knowledge is a unique resource of India for it has the
treasure of a minimum of 5000 years of civilisation. It is essential to leverage this wealth for
national well being as well as to seek global presence for the nation.
Human resources, particularly with large young population, are unique core strength of the
nation. This resource can be transformed through various educational and training programmes.
Skilled, unskilled and creative manpower can be transformed into wealth generators particularly
in the service sectors, agro industries etc. Knowledge-intensive industries can be generated out of
our existing industries by injecting demand for high-level software/hardware, which would bring
tremendous value addition. It is said, "the precious asset for a company or a country is the skill
ingenuity and imagination of its people. With globalisation, this will become more important
because everybody will have access to world class technology and the key distinguishing feature
will be the ability of people in different countries to use their imagination to make the best use of
the technology". Today the rural development is handicapped with compartmental - sector wise
development instead of integrated development. Leadership in rural management will have to
facilitate the excellence in the rural community in terms of materials product by value addition.
And also a connectivity has to be brought in for knowledge and marketing the products. Any
effort to lead rural development requires making people work and earn for their livelihood. The
prosperity of the individual has to be directionally proportional to his/her quality work out put.
Invisible Leadership
For the nation today what is needed is a combination of technology, leadership and inspired
workforce. Let us analyze the dynamics of good organizations for national development.
Developed India as defined can be only powered by economic strength.
The economic strength is powered by competitiveness.
The competitiveness is powered by knowledge power.
The knowledge power is powered by Technology.
The Technology is powered by resource investment.
The Resource investment is powered by return on Investment.
Return on Investment is powered Revenues.
The Revenues are powered by Volume and repeat sales.
Volume and repeat sales are powered by customer loyalty.
The customer loyalty is powered by Quality and value of products.
Quality and value of products is powered by Employee Productivity.
The Employee Productivity is powered by Employee Loyalty.
The Employee Loyalty is powered by Employee Satisfaction.
The Employee Satisfaction is powered by Working Environment.
The Working Environment is powered by management stewardship.
Management stewardship is powered by Invisible leadership
Invisible leadership is exercising the vision to change the traditional role from the commander to
the coach, manager to mentor, from director to delegator and from one who demands respect to
one who facilitates self respect".

You, graduating managers, please remember change is the progress. And hence change is the
challenge. I wish you all to take up the challenge of transforming the rural India into a wealthy,
happy and empowered people by you becoming invisible leaders.