The Japanaese Renaissance

Whenever we think of Japan, we think of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Second World War had left Japan completely devastated, depleted of its teeming potential and resources. After 74 years, Japan has metamorphosed into a world power, flaunting its suave in multilateral fields.With the excitement of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics all around and shops ready with official merchandise, Japan is pushing the accelerator on full throttle to showcase their best. My recent visit to Japan was worthwhile, a revelation in itself.

The rapid development of Japan never fails to awestruck anyone. The main shifting point was during the Meiji dynasty - during which Japan faced a huge technological, political, and educational influx from the western nations and broke out of their isolated cocoon. Since then, Japan has no turning back. The disciplined traditional nature of the people along with their quality education have contributed a lot to this development. Recently, the Japan government has decided to make early Childhood Education and Higher Education free. Children aged 3 to 5 who attend nurseries and kindergartens will be educated free of charge. Giving due importance to education plays a vital role in their development.

High-tech Japan

From an Indian perspective, Japan is nonetheless than paradise. Let’s delve into what makes Japan so special among all the other Asian nations :

l People: A nation grows on the growth of its people. The real feel of ‘Atithi Devo Bhava’ was felt. The dedication they put to their work is commendable. Their punctuality in every aspect starting from local trains to airplanes is a pleasant sight for an Indian tourist. The behaviour of the people itself shows the reason for a decreasing crime rate. No doubt Japan stands as one of the safest countries.

l Transport and connectivity: Japan is excellently connected with its railways, roads, and airports. The roads are well maintained keeping in mind the safety of the passenger first, even mini-potholes are a rare sight. Even after facing natural calamities quite frequently, Japan never falls back, instead it comes back even better.  

    In the 21^st century, connectivity also refers to Internet connectivity. Japan being one of the leading countries in technology, the Internet is the heartbeat. Most of the public places like stations, bus stops, even some parts of the city, active Wi-Fi connection is present. For a tech-enthusiast, Japan is comparable to heaven. Could Japan be any more people-friendly? I doubt that.

l Technology: Technology has become an integral part of Japan and Japanese people have taken technology to a whole new level. Most of the systems are running on digital automated mechanisms. Japanese nationals thrive on technology. The automated systems present everywhere makes it very easy for people to get their needs catered.

l Safety is given a top priority: The government takes the safety of the people very seriously. They try their best to ease the work of people with safety measures.  Even as a tourist, if you are unable to follow the Japanese language, it is well taken care of.

The time I was there, Japan was struck by the typhoon Hagibis, considered to be the most devastating typhoon to hit the Kantō region of Japan since Ida in 1958. What was relieving was the safety measures taken by the Japan government - continuous emergency messages, police van and fire brigade going out on regular checks. But the real secret to their fast recovery after the calamities was witnessed the next day. The people were out on road, with majority services resumed, few roads were blocked for safety purposes. The locals were helping the government officials to clean up the roads and were declared safe to drive only after sufficient safety checks.  That pretty much explained the many instances when Japanese fans cleaned the stadium after their country’s match.

Every coin has two sides, Japan is no exception. Though Japan has improved the image from World War II, the excess working habit of Japan is coming at a cost. The relations in Japan are not lasting and surprisingly, the Japanese Statistics Bureau estimates that the Japanese population will fall to just over 100 million by 2050, from around 127 million currently. Japan can also adapt international languages such as English more widely, allowing more influx of tourists and also, open their doors to broader research areas.

Japanese Soldiers during World War II

Apart from anime, India has a lot to gain from Japan’s development. Japan was concerned about climate change a long time back. The Kyoto Protocol was adopted in Kyoto, Japan on December 11, 1997, and became international law on February 16, 2005, was aimed at controlling the Carbon emissions of different nations. The protocol was followed until 2016, after which the Paris Climate Agreement went into force. With 7 out of 10 most polluted cities in India, it’s high time we adopt a similar policy and strict regulations similar to Japan.

Most of the problems that we face today are due to lack of education within the mass.

Even though we have ‘Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan’, we lack in quality. Proper recruitment and a check on existing employees is a must for maintaining efficiency in organisations. India being an agrarian country, we fail to utilise our full potential. Japan beats us in this aspect too. The farmers are well taken care of in Japan, with various subsidies and the Agricultural Land Law, encourages farming even to urbanite who want to take up farming as a hobby. India has a lot to improve on this aspect, even though we have a lot of schemes present and quite a lot budding, we fail to promote the schemes to the base level farmers and provide state of the art technology for agricultural processes. We must also keep in mind that bringing a bullet train to India isn’t an answer for development if we don’t have the proper infrastructure to maintain it.

India is far away from what Japan is today, but with proper planning and action,  we might able to achieve what Japan has achieved. We need to take into consideration long term goals rather than prioritising short term targets. India has got a lot of potential and resources, we can hope for the perfect use of them as soon as possible.