Technology Growth in India—Some Important Concerns
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Netaji Subhas Institute of Technology, New Delhi,
Publication date: 2012-07-09
Polish Sociological Review 2012;178(2):295-302
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ABSTRACT
Technology has made its presence felt in various sectors of India’s development in the last twenty
years. Communication and information technology, manufacturing industry, transportation, defence and
space technologies are some of the important sectors which have incorporated modern technology in various
aspects of their development and functioning. Also significant and visible changes have taken place
in the consumer products available in the Indian market, most of them imported or locally manufactured
by multinational corporations based in India. Do these changes qualify India to be considered as a technologically
advanced country, and thereby making technological changes an integral part of the social
change process of our society? Or are these developments restricted to certain elitist sections of society
with little or negligible trickle-down effect of the knowledge bases of the technology developments? In this
study a deconstructivist approach is adopted to analyse some of the processes involved in development
and diffusion of technology in a society. With the exception of mobile phone technology it is argued that
even though India has strong scientific and technological capabilities, it is emerging as a bigger consumer
of technology products than as a producer and innovator of modern technology.