Getting Competitive: A Practitioner’s Guide for India: Summary & Key Insights

After independence, India embarked on an industrial journey heavily influenced by socialist ideals. The leadership of the day, scarred by colonial exploitation, believed that state-led planning was the safest path toward equitable development. However, in practice, this approach created an economy that was overly bureaucratic, protective, and resistant to competition. The famous 'license raj' system became the defining feature of Indian industry for decades, making productivity and innovation secondary to compliance and political access.

I witnessed this first-hand as a civil servant in the 1960s and 1970s. Entrepreneurs spent more time navigating government permissions than managing factories. Employment security was prioritized over efficiency. Workers were protected by laws that discouraged accountability. Managers had little incentive to innovate since prices, production quotas, and even suppliers were often decided by officials. While this system may have prevented corporate exploitation, it also prevented the birth of global champions. The socialist era embedded the idea that profit was a suspect motive, and that markets were inherently unjust.

By the 1980s, however, the inefficiencies had become too severe to ignore. Industrial stagnation, low productivity, and consumer discontent demanded a change. The state could no longer insulate Indian producers from global competition. The creation of Maruti Udyog Limited, a collaboration between the Indian government and Suzuki Motor Corporation, was born out of this context. It was an experiment to show that a public-private venture could succeed through professionalism, competitiveness, and global-standard manufacturing. Its success would later become a lesson in how India could reform itself without losing its social conscience.

Maruti Suzuki was far more than an automobile project—it was a test of India’s industrial adaptability. When we began, skepticism was widespread: how could India, with its labor laws, bureaucratic culture, and poor infrastructure, produce a car comparable to international standards? But we did. The key lay not in technology alone but in mindset.

Suzuki brought in production systems that valued continuous improvement—kaizen—while respecting local realities. Our Indian workforce had to learn to think of time, quality, and cost not as abstract goals but as moral obligations. The difference was profound: we were no longer building cars just to fulfill government targets; we were building cars that people loved, trusted, and could afford.

The government’s stake in Maruti might have made it another bureaucratic entity. Yet, by adopting a professional management structure insulated from daily political interference, we created a culture of accountability. Every employee was trained to take ownership. Every small innovation was encouraged. That environment of trust between workers, unions, and management became the soul of Maruti’s competitiveness.

The lesson I wish every Indian industrial leader would take from this experience is that competitiveness is not inherited—it is built, brick by brick, in the minds and behaviors of people. Maruti’s journey demonstrates that Indian workers and managers can match the best in the world if given a conducive system. What we need are not foreign miracles but domestic reforms that unleash our own potential.