India’s Unrivaled Opportunity

Nandan Nilekani, Co-Chairman of Infosys and author of Imagining India, spoke with Fareed Zakaria about India’s economic potential on CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS. Nilekani argues that India’s democracy is a strength in economic development, the country’s population is an asset not a liability and its “strategic opportunity is unrivaled.” When asked whether he would bet on India or China for the next 25 years, Nilekani chose India.

“I would bet on India. I think the structural advantages – the fact that we will have this young population when China starts aging, the fact that we paid the democracy deficit (so that’s behind us now), the fact that it’s much more of a bottom-up economy…fundamentally the strategic advantages we have are unparalleled. There is no other country on the planet which has the strategic advantages India has, and therefore it is a challenge of execution.”

And on a funnier note, Jon Stewart interviewed Nilekani in March on the Daily Show. Jon Stewart said that people in the United States believe “either China or India will be [their] new overlords.”

Clips from CNN and Comedy Central.