'2020s belong to India': Tata Chairman Chandrasekaran at FICCI meeting

Chandrasekaran called for focus on talent, enable data and bandwidth and the need to be a part of the new regulatory standards

Tata Group Chairman N. Chandrasekaran said that impact of Covid on innovation has been 'all-pervasive' and the models of working from home are making all companies rethink the future of work.

Addressing a session on "Inspired India: A Business Leader's Perspective", during Ficci's 93rd Annual General Meeting, Chandrasekaran said: "My roots that are embedded in technology make me see the Covid pandemic and its impact on India in a very positive frame of mind. The 2020s belong to India."

Elaborating further, Chandrasekaran said that self-evident trends like advancement of digital data and decoupling of China on the United States, fortify this belief.

"In all these trends I see tremendous, limitless opportunities in India. We have often struggled to grow manufacturing as a percentage of our GDP," he said.

"We usually highlight issues like power, logistics, and labour. We have pointed out high-interest rates and have also understood regulatory overreach and interference."

However, in the future, he said if we put this behind us and as an industry start acting by visionary scale, we will become a pivot to the new world order.

Chandrasekaran further called for focus on talent, enable data and bandwidth and the need to be a part of the new regulatory standards.

"I see a collaborative role between the industry and the government. The industry should be bold and start visioning all projects at scale and the government should enable this partnership and make India ready to participate in this new world," said Chandrasekaran.

Besides, he cited the need to reimagine the whole technology blueprint nationwide.

To do this, he pointed out that it is vital that technologies like 'Robotics and AI' become part of the mainstay of manufacturing.

Furthermore, Chandrasekaran stated that if India's first plank for the 21st century's growth is digital; the second plank is the new approach to global poly-chains.

The third plank for India, he said is environmental resilience.

In addition, Chandrasekaran said that energy, efficiency in mobility, solar manufacturing, and rethinking our food supply chain are areas to focus on as we emerge from the pandemic.