Indian Foreign Minister S Jaishankar gave basic difference in Indian and Chinese approach to a problem. The best explanation was on the Indian part. It is true we Indian's believe the problems will disappear on its own.
I will reproduce what Foreign Minister stated:
“The Chinese, in a sense, look at a problem and start thinking how do I solve the problem. That is a sort of systemic mindset. Those who solve it quickly efficiently are rewarded," he said adding the whole system in China was a problem solving system similar to the ones in the US and Russia.
"In India’s case, We look at a problem and we say the problem is a problem, I wish it would go away. Our instinct is not to home in on a solution, our instinct is to kick it down the road," he said. “To me the concern I have is years of doing this today we have accumulated a legacy of problems," he said adding that the Modi government had taken steps to address these issues.
Note: Video added on 28 January 2020
Unfortunately, Indians always believed in Jugaad mentality.
It is worth remembering what Peter Senge said:
“If we see each problem—be it water shortages, climate change, or poverty—as separate, and approach each separately, the solutions we come up with will be short-term, often opportunistic, “quick fixes” that do nothing to address deeper imbalances.”
― Peter M. Senge, The Necessary Revolution: How Individuals And Organizations Are Working Together to Create a Sustainable World
Charlie Munger also said something on similar lines:
‘Now you turn to India. And I would say, I’d rather work with a bunch of Chinese than I would the Indian civilization mired down, caste system, over-population, assimilated the worst stupidities of the democratic system, which by the way Lee Kuan Yew avoided, it’s hard to get anything done in India. And the bribes are just awful. So, all I can say is, it’s not going to be easy for India to follow the example of Lee Kuan Yew. I think that India will move ahead. But it is so defective as a get-ahead…the Indians I know are fabulous people. They’re just as talented as the Chinese, I’m speaking about the Indian populace. But the system and the poverty and the corruption and the crazy democratic thing where you let anybody who screams stop all progress? It mires India with problems that Lee Kuan Yew didn’t have. And I don’t think those Indian problems are always easy to fix. Let me give you an example.
The Korean steel company, POSCO, invented a new way of creating steel out of lousy iron ore and lousy coal. And there’s some province in India that has lots of lousy iron ore and lot of lousy coal. Which is there’s not much use for. And this one process would take their lousy iron ore and the coal and make a lot of steel. And they got a lot of cheap labor. So POSCO and India were made for each other. And they made a deal with the province to get together and use the POSCO know how and the India lousy iron ore and lousy coal. And 8 or 9 or 10 years later with everybody screaming and objecting and farmers lying down in the road, or whatever’s going on, they canceled the whole thing. In China they would have just done it.
Lee Kuan Yew would have done it in (Singapore). India is grossly defective because they’ve taken the worst aspects of our culture, allowing a whole bunch of idiots to scream and stop everything. And they copied it! And so they have taken the worst aspects of democracy and they forged their own chains and put them on themselves. And so no I do not like the prospects of India compared to the prospects of…and I don’t think India’s going to do as well as Lee Kuan Yew.
Charlie Munger made these remarks when asked about Indian scenario (Berkshire Hathaway exited India in 2013 and haven’t returned since):-
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