India’s politicians and policy formulators loud on proclamations, as also media and thinktank pundits, seem to be cavalierly casual about the pell-mell pace at which the neighbouring (professedly communist/socialist but in reality arch capitalist) People’s Republic of China (PRC) is transforming into a global superpower.

In Bangalore/Bengaluru (pop.14 million), widely proclaimed as the Silicon Valley of India, several Metro rail projects are years behind schedule: the MG Road/Kamaraj Road stretch closure for metro construction which should have been opened in 2023, has been delayed to 2026; a planned suburban rail link — the Kolar-Whitefield rail line — is moribund 13 years after sanction; a Peripheral Ring Road around Bengaluru has been delayed for over a decade. As a result, contemporary Bangalore has the slowest automobile vehicles speed (10 km/per hour) worldwide, and industry is fleeing the city.

On the other hand, savour this report on the development of PRC’s Guizhou Province. According to a new book titled Breakneck — China’s Quest to Engineer the Future (Penguin Random House, 2025) authored by Dan Wang, a history research fellow at Stanford University who spent six years in PRC researching this mind-bending book: “Guizhou has built 45 of the world’s 100 highest bridges. It has 11 airports, with three under construction. It has 5,000 miles of expressways, ranked fourth among provinces in China by length. It has around 1,000 miles of high-speed train track…” Plus it has “enormous facilities” housing data servers. Despite this impressive track record, Guizhou is one of PRC’s under-developed provinces. Its per capita income at $8,000 per year is 40 percent below China’s national average ($14,000), but way above India’s $2,600.

Time for our politicians banging the religion and caste drums and academics in ivory towers to wake up!