Letter from India, The International Herald Tribune

Conventional measurements define poverty with reference to national or individual income. Critics have long argued that this narrow focus is flawed.

I first came into contact with an alternative, less reductionistic, approach to development when I studied with the Indian economist Amartya Sen as an undergraduate. It was in the mid-1990s, the Indian economy was picking up, and much of the country (and, indeed, the world) was euphoric over the rising prosperity of the nation.

Mr. Sen sounded something of a cautionary note. Arguing for a more holistic view of development, he drew attention to the failures in education, women’s liberties and health that persisted despite India’s rapid growth. He exuded a broad-minded humanism that I found not only morally compelling, but accurate. It reflected the complex nature of deprivation that I had seen (if not experienced directly) while growing up in rural South India.

Letter from India, The International Herald Tribune

This is the kind of dusty crossing that might once have been referred to as a farming town.

A couple of decades ago, it was surrounded by fields of rice and sugarcane. Agriculture was the lifeblood of the economy. Farmers clogged the streets with ox carts and gunnysacks, hawking their crops in makeshift stalls.

The stalls are still there, spilling over onto the roads and holding up traffic. It’s possible to see an occasional ox cart lumbering between flashy new cars and motorcycles. But over the years, agriculture has become less important to this town in the southern state of Tamil Nadu. Many of the fields have been sold, turned into housing projects or other real estate developments. Young people no longer become farmers; they move to the cities, in search of new opportunities.

Letter from India, The International Herald Tribune

The Right to Information Act, passed by Parliament five years ago this week, aimed to introduce greater transparency in governance. When it was first passed, many were doubtful that it would prove effective. Skeptics predicted that officials would find a way around it. Officials themselves worried that they would be swamped by trivial and vindictive requests that would dilute the original purpose of the law.

It is true that the implementation of the act has been uneven at times. But half a decade after its passage, it is generally acknowledged as landmark legislation that is changing the relationship between citizens and their representatives; and that has the potential to transform governance in India.

Letter from India, The International Herald Tribune

India is drowning in garbage. The cities alone generate more than 100 million tons of solid waste a year. Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh has said that if there were a Nobel Prize for filth, India would win it. It’s a damning indictment, but it rings true.

No vacant piece of land is safe, no scenic picnic spot immune. Forests are despoiled with water bottles and paper plates, rivers and canals choked with plastic bags. Smoldering landfills of the kind by my house are ubiquitous — outside (and even inside) cities, along beaches, by the side of highways, on farms and fields that have turned barren from chemicals in the waste.

In part, the country’s garbage crisis is a tale of rising consumption. According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Indian municipal waste is expected to increase 130 percent between 2001 and 2030, primarily due to urbanization and new prosperity. The type of waste generated is changing, too — an increase in plastics, e-waste and other hazardous and nonbiodegradable materials will only exacerbate the crisis.

Letter from India, The International Herald Tribune

The adulation of commerce and wealth poses important questions about the place of softer, more humanistic endeavors in the country — the role of art and artists, the place of the humanities and social sciences and, more generally, the character (and breadth) of the Indian imagination.

As India grows richer, its culture is changing. The question is whether that culture will be defined solely by the nation’s new prosperity — whether a nation in the midst of a consumerist frenzy can maintain noncommercial islands of intellectual and cultural endeavor, and whether a population determined to get rich can appreciate pursuits whose returns are less immediately tangible.

Letter from India, The International Herald Tribune

For many Indians, Mr. Headley’s deal is the latest in a series of humiliating developments in the case — developments that question America’s commitment to the battle against Islamic terrorism, and more generally to the relationship between the two countries.

Almost six months after his arrest, the Indian authorities have yet to interrogate Mr. Headley. Washington’s continued refusal to grant them access has led to feverish speculation in this country. Many Indians are convinced that Mr. Headley is a C.I.A. agent, perhaps gone rogue, and that the U.S. intransigence represents an attempt to shield him and his past activities from scrutiny.