Mr. Kamalesh Sharma, Secretary General, Commonwealth has called for new strategies for inclusive development where youth and women get a pivotal role. He briefly surveyed the challenges faced by the commonwealth today, and the scope for possible initiatives and cooperation within commonwealth nations in the backdrop of present governance structure.

Asserting that the relevance of Commonwealth is still not lost despite tags like “talking shop, residue of colonialism” etc, Sharma noted that the global body continues to inspire as the only international organization with a broad standing among the governments and civil societies alike. Its outlook is egalitarian; it has members from LDCs, OECD countries, emerging economies, in terms of size too large countries to very small islands are members of the club. To a great extent commonwealth addresses the aspirations of the post-war generation for an international community that is pre-occupied with democracy and development.

Mr. Sharma was addressing a function organized by Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) in New Delhi, “Networking the Commonwealth: Sharing Skills”.

Placing all the commonwealth nations under a common umbrella named “Determination towards Development”, Mr. Sharma said, “I believe Indians are globalists, they view collective development of the word. I as a representative of the Commonwealth find encouragement to see the cooperation and initiatives taken by the industry bodies, NGOs and Indian corporates towards the development of Commonwealth countries.”

Four Pillars

“In my opinion, collaboration of the commonwealth countries can be enhanced in the areas of inclusive governance, people centric approach towards development, greater engagement of women and youth in the process of growth, increased proliferation of technology and encouraging civilized globalization”, he said.

Endorsing the spirit of entre-preneurship, Kamalesh Sharma added, “The youth of today is the most resourceful asset available to us. As we move towards development, we should engage youth and global financial bodies like the World Bank should come up with schemes to encourage youth entrepreneurship. Along side we should follow a proactive approach towards respectful globalisation. We also look forth for greater monetary assistance from the investors from India, who would set stage for balanced world governance.”

Counting on the challenges faced by the Commonwealth, Mr. Subodh Bhargava, former president CII and Chairman Tata Communications said, “All the commonwealth nations face similar challenges and opportunities which can provide an opportunity towards development and tackling the problems collectively. Testing times are ahead for the trade in addressing the aspects of building capacity of the human resources, finding low cost solutions to the products and services, technology proliferation, poverty and greater intra-commonwealth cooperation.

Mr. Chandrajit Banerjee, Director General, CII stated, “CII has always been a driving change in the society for the development of trade. We are advocating greater intra commonwealth interaction in the fields of social areas like health, education, and technology penetration among others. CII is in favour of a considerate trade relationship with the commonwealth set in the backdrop of socially relevant agenda.”

Banerjee concluded by saying that CII would set up a cell to look after Commonwealth related issues. CII chief mentor Mr. Tarun Das welcomed the gathering.