Question

Supposing you find two people arguing: One is saying globalisation has hurt our country’s development. The other is telling, globalisation is helping India develop. How would you respond to these arguments?

Answer 1

Both the people who are involved in the argument are not wrong, since both of them can back their claims with information.

It is clear that benefits of globalisation have not led to uniform development of all sections of society in India. There have been very positive developments as well as negative developments due to globalisation. The following points will give more clarity on the positive impact and negative impacts of globalisation in India.

Globalization – Positive Impact on India

• India has been beneficial for MNCs which can be seen from the rising investments spread over the past 20 years.
• For companies in the services sector many new opportunities were created due to Globalization, particularly in the IT industry.
• Globalisation has enabled some large Indian companies to emerge as multinationals themselves, and they are spreading their operations worldwide, some of the examples of such companies are Infosys (IT), Asian Paints (paints), Tata Motors (automobiles),Ranbaxy (medicines), Sundaram Fasteners (nuts and bolts).
• MNCs have shown keen interest in industries such as banking in urban areas, fast food, soft drinks, automobiles, cell phones, electronics.
• Many new jobs have been created in the services and industries mentioned above. Raw materials are supplied to these companies by the local companies, which in turn allows these local companies to prosper.
• Different types of services such as engineering, accounting, administrative tasks, data entry are now being done cheaply in countries such as India and are exported to the developed countries.

Negative Impacts in India – Due to Globalisation

• Due to competition, small manufacturers have been hit hard and some examples of such industries are vegetable oil, dairy products, tyres, toys, plastics, capacitors, batteries.
• Many workers went jobless as several of the units had to be shut down.
• This is a significant negative impact In India, because next to agriculture, the small industries employ the largest number of workers (20 million).