Subroto Bagchi, former chair of the Odisha Skill Development Authority, recounts quickly tracking down a former vocational student using government machinery.
“The power of being in the government Is that if you want to talk to somebody, that person can be tracked down in under 10 minutes. Even in a country of 1.4 billion people, government is so powerful.”
quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading:
filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard
(the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →
More from Subroto Bagchi
Insight
India runs on 10% good politicians and 20% incorruptible bureaucrats
“This country still runs because 10% of politicians are fantastic people.
This country still runs because 20% of bureaucrats have not sold themselves.”
Subroto BagchiSep 26, 2025▶ 52:01Stories from India’s heartland that tell Different story than GDP headlines |Subroto Bagchi,Mindtree
AssertionPartly supported
India leads the world in child stunting with 46% malnutrition
“India is the stunting and wasting capital of the world. 46% of Indian kids have malnutrition.”
Subroto BagchiSep 26, 2025▶ 34:10Stories from India’s heartland that tell Different story than GDP headlines |Subroto Bagchi,Mindtree
AssertionNot checkable as stated
India's COVID migrant crisis was one of history's largest mass exoduses
“So during COVID, India had a refugee problem. Nobody calls it a refugee problem. It was one of the largest mass exodus when workers from the metros, they walked, cycled, sat on trucks and trailers, Sharmik Expresses, to go back to where they come from. It was …”
Subroto BagchiSep 26, 2025▶ 38:09Stories from India’s heartland that tell Different story than GDP headlines |Subroto Bagchi,Mindtree
AssertionPartly supported
Indian ITI graduates earn ₹10,000 compared to S$34,000 in Singapore
“Even today, an ITI student graduates and gets paid 10,000 rupees, mostly in cash.
The equivalent of ITI in Singapore is called ITE.
When a IT person graduates from IT after the same two years of vocational training, the starting salary is 34,000 Singapore doll…”
Subroto BagchiSep 26, 2025▶ 47:49Stories from India’s heartland that tell Different story than GDP headlines |Subroto Bagchi,Mindtree
AssertionPartly supported
Tirupur's $6B garment export industry is powered by 600,000 workers
“Tirupur actually is a municipal town, ok, not even a city. It produced almost like six billion dollars of government exports for India. It's done by close to 600,000 workers. Half of them are from Tamil Nadu. And half of them are migrant workers from Bihar and…”
Subroto BagchiSep 26, 2025▶ 9:45Stories from India’s heartland that tell Different story than GDP headlines |Subroto Bagchi,Mindtree
AssertionSupported
Rural Odisha women build Boeing aircraft bodies at Tata Advanced Systems
“So I met, you know, 10th class pass girls from Hinterland, Odessa, who actually build Boeing aircraft bodies for Tata Advanced Systems Limited. So in Hyderabad, the TASL, as they're called, they make aircraft bodies.”
Subroto BagchiSep 26, 2025▶ 18:26Stories from India’s heartland that tell Different story than GDP headlines |Subroto Bagchi,Mindtree
Made with StarZero
Turn any episode into a week of clips.
This entire site, over 300 episodes transcribed, diarized, checked and made playable,
runs on the StarZero media pipeline. Drop in your own episode and the podcast clipper finds the
moments worth sharing, cuts them, captions them, and reframes them for every feed.
We use essential cookies to make the site work. With your permission we
also use analytics cookies (Google Analytics and Mixpanel) to understand
usage and improve StarZero. See our Cookie Policy.