Over the past 25 years, India has moved from a largely impoverished, underdeveloped country to a bustling, innovative and fast-changing society. Shashi Tharoor, one of India's most respected writers and diplomats, describes the changes that have recently taken place to turn this once sleeping giant into one of the world's leaders in the realms of science and technology, and which has developed a burgeoning middle class as large as the entire population of the USA.