Steve Jobs’ biography has some good lessons on parenting; especially for those who begin to contemplate the future of the child from the moment she is detected in the womb. It does not need great insight to say that Apple would not have happened if Jobs were not born in the US. But, I would stretch it a little to say Apple would not have happened if Jobs was brought up by his real parents, and not the foster ones.

One key takeaway from Jobs’ early life is that you can’t condition a child to become a technocrat or astro-physicist; all you can do is expose her to numerous possibilities. On a bigger scale, society can play the role of an enabler by creating the eco-system required for young minds to flourish.

In a welfare state, the government has the biggest task, as generations of yo­ung people would grow up the way they are groomed by the system, which is almost single-handedly designed, fixed and influenced by the powers that be!

That may sound ala­rmist. But try and fathom the reasons why a nation of 1.2 billion people cannot innovate and the land that invented the ‘zero’ is not able to contribute anything significantly to the tech­no­logical advancement of ma­nkind.

Why is it that in the age of iPads, we still do farming the same way our forefathers did? Why does one-quarter of our agricultural produce still perish when we cry over high inflation? Why do we need a Chinese cottage industry to supply us bed linens and bathroom slippers?

We have just completed two years into a decade of innovations (2010-20), whi­ch is supposed to energise the economic powerhouse that the world envies into a nation brimming with ideas to create capacity and capability in supercomputing, give us sustainable agriculture, water and energy, and help us become a leader in the global economy.

We are getting into that orbit, and how! We count a 15 per cent jump in the number of research papers being published by our scientists; see doubling of PhDs being offered within five years; talk of a 25 per cent rise in investment on R&D and so on and so forth.

But the number of R&D researchers in India per million people still stands at a dismal 119 compared with 708 in China, says a World Bank report. The strength of India’s R&D workforce stands at 115,000, against 850,000 in China. China still corners 50 per cent of venture capital investments coming to Asia; India gets half of the remaining half.

A programme is on to upgrade polytechnics, but that only lifts them from radio circuit to television circuit, not to chipsets. A skill development mission is afoot, teaching village kids to handle computers and training a million more to repair mobile phones and refrigerators. And then, there is a 1.7 crore labour pool under NREGA to build roads and dig fisheries.

Look at that once more. Isn’t it the force that can give us the cottage industry to compete with China? Isn’t it the army that can run a manufacturing revolution? Isn’t this the force that can create the backbone for entrepreneurs we want to create? But these hands are digging soil. They know nothing of plastic technology, electronic circuits or steel polishing.

For years, China has drawn the Apples, HPs and Nokias of the world with the lure of cheaper skilled labour. India tried it with cheaper land to some success. But that advantage has gone after Singur. As the table turns on China over its labour policies, we have just missed an opportunity to showcase this workforce.

You have got the point by now; all around you an effort is under way to condition a few generations into becoming entrepreneurial innovators, without the eco-system. It’s like a parent trying to make a doctor out of a son, who has not even seen the stethoscope, forget about getting interested in it.

Jobs played with electronics from the age of four. For Stephen Wozniak, Jobs’ par­tner at Apple, the favourite pastime in school was to draw new circuits using fe­wer chips. They grew up in an environment that bre­athed technology 24x7. The Blue Box, Jobs-Wozniak’s first invention, happened at age 16.

Not that all 16-year olds among us get their kicks of life in other ways. You do hear about 15-year olds who discover stars and give you tips on ethical hacking. But 10 years later, they would be doing the same job you and I do. There is something unpalatable about it. You wo­uld like to suspect that ma­ny talents within us die an early death because of a black hole in that last mile to turning an innovator.

This black hole is in the enabling environment. You have a mad rush in colleges for economics honours and BCom honours, but there are few takers for physics and chemistry. There is a long lineup waiting to become CEOs and brand managers; but there are few locally-grown companies and brands they can get to run.

As a society we celebrate moolah, not the thinking mind. To be innovative, you need a certain restlessness. A steady supply of cheaper goods; the daily talk of a brighter tomorrow and the sudden surge in income gi­ve us comfort, not hopelessness. So, we do not chase id­eas; ideas chase us.

bijoysankar@mydigitalfc.com