Progress was made

    As the central elections of May 2014 draw closer, it is hard not to feel a sense of deep frustration with UPA's second term in office. With Congress and Manmohan Singh's hand strengthened, 2009 was to be the start of a new era of reforms and competent administration. Instead, UPA-2 for the most part was mired in charges of rampant nepotism and corruption. It is understandable if majority of the Indians want to vote this coalition out of power. The prime minister made it worse with his unfortunate news conference near the end of his second term.

    

    Having said that, notable positive changes have happened in the last 10 years. Here are some of the more salient changes in no particular order:

• Continuous improvement in human development indices. Falling maternal and infant mortality, declining child malnutrition levels,increasing life expectancy to name a few. Try this link for a sampling of various indicators.
• FDI in Multi brand retail
• Land acquisition bill
• Aadhar
• FDI in airlines
• Improvements in urban infrastructure(airports and Metros)
• Lokpal bill
• Food security bill 
• Pension reform
• Partial deregulation of Petrol,Diesel and LPG prices
• Creating an atmosphere that gave rise to IAC and AAP ( This one was unintended!)

     A lot of these are still a work in progress. Eventual success of many of these reforms still hinge on what the subsequent governments do. Improvements in human development indices have not been uniform across different regions and may have happened no matter who was in power. Regardless, the country did not remain frozen in time or slip backwards.

    Perhaps, this is more a sign of the resilience of our democracy than a reflection of  the quality of our leaders in parliament. Nevertheless, progress was made and the only way for the country from here is forward.