When, on 28 January 1986, 73 seconds into the flight, the US space shuttle Challenger exploded, killing all astronauts aboard, the first thought in everybody's mind was that something major had gone wrong. But investigations revealed that the entire tragedy occurred because of the malfunctioning of some tiny ‘o-rings’, which are, literally, little rings used to seal joints.

Amidst our larger concerns for the Indian economy—the fiscal deficit, inflation, exchange rate—it is easy to forget that an economy's success depends also on the o-rings, the small things. In India there is immense frustration among people about the bureaucracy, the police, and governance in general. As the Draft Approach Paper to the Tenth Five Year Plan notes: ‘People perceive bureaucracy as wooden, disinterested in public welfare and corrupt. The issue of reform in governance has acquired critical dimensions.’

To break out of this bureaucratic gridlock, it is important to turn our attention to the o-rings of our economy, which get ignored because they are not part of any of the larger schemes of economic policy.

In most Indian universities, after a student submits his PhD thesis, it takes between a year and two years for the final examination, the viva, to be held. Most students and professors have come to accept this as natural. But if one thinks of it objectively, the delay is unpardonable. Most European universities conduct the viva within three months of submission, and American universities do so literally within weeks.