On holiday in France, I have brought along a stack of reading I have long neglected, or books newly acquired. One of these is Abraham Eraly's "The Last Spring: the lives and times of the Great Mughals".

This monumental work chronicles the rise of the Mughal empire with great verve and exemplary objectivity, drawing on a wealth of contemporary accounts and historical documents. While dealing with Humayun's temporary setback and exile, the author has written a chapter on 'The Afghan Interlude' to discuss Sher Shah Suri and his brief but eventful rule. We have become so accustomed to associating the British with the early notions of good governance in India that we tend to overlook this fiercely ambitious ruler's uncompromising determination to govern fairly and well.

Eraly quotes Abbas, Sher Shah's chronicler: "Travellers and wayfarers, during the time of Sher Shah's reign, were relieved from the trouble of keeping watch; nor did they fear to halt even in the middle of a desert... They encamped at night at every place, desert or inhabited, without fear: they placed their goods and property on the plain, and turned out their mules to graze, and themselves slept with minds at ease and free from care, as if in their own house; and the zemindars, for fear that any mischief should occur to the travellers, and that they should suffer or be arrested on account of it, kept watch over them".

Obviously, the king was not distracted by any considerations of democracy or human rights: his concerns were entirely pragmatic. As Eraly informs us: "With peace and security came prosperity. From his early days ... Sher Shah had given high priority to caring for the peasant. Where the peasant is ruined, the king is ruined, he believed. He therefore took great care to ensure that the protectors of peasants - the army and the revenue officials - did not, as often happened, become their oppressors."

Despite the wiles and treachery he employed to seize the throne from Humayun, Sher Shah proved himself to be one of the most successful rulers India has ever had in its long and chequered history. Although he reigned for only five years before he died in a battlefield accident, he set standards of governance nearly five centuries ago that his many successors have largely failed to match despite the strides mankind has made in this intervening period.

During their long rule, the British were largely fair in their dealings with the local populace but obviously their first loyalty was to the East India Company, and later, to the Crown. And although they built on the administrative structure they found in place and improved the physical infrastructure considerably, these measures were largely aimed at enhancing revenue collection and strengthening their grasp over the country.

Nevertheless, when they left the subcontinent, their ex-colonies in the region could boast of some of the most developed physical and administrative infrastructure as well as political and social institutions in the Third World. Unfortunately, the ruling elites of South Asia have all squandered these advantages and for various reasons, we are struggling to catch up with nations that were far behind us half a century ago. This is not to suggest that there has been no progress, but compared with our potential, we have fallen far short of the level of development we ought to have attained.

The reasons for this inability to cash in on our endowment vary from country to country, but a few common threads can be discerned: modern scientific developments in public health combined with a concerted and commendable international effort led to the virtual eradication of common scourges like smallpox, polio and malaria, and a comparatively high survival rate for children.

The population growth rates soared as the fertility rates were initially unchanged: in the area today constituting Pakistan, according to the census of 1901, the average woman had slightly over six pregnancies, but the net population growth rate was 1.6 per cent. Nine decades later, she remained as fertile, but the growth rate had nearly doubled. True, Pakistan had the highest population growth in the region, but India had started with a much bigger base and today has well over a billion people.

One of the early priorities of the newly liberated countries was to establish a large number of educational institutions. Irrespective of the quality of learning they imparted, they churned out an increasing number of graduates who expect and demand jobs. In Pakistan, we are rightly critical of the low (official) literacy rate of 40 per cent, but even this abysmal figure translates to around 60 million people. With this rising population of literate citizens came the communication revolution, raising expectations across the world: where their parents had been resigned to their poverty, young people now expect more from life.

Against these trends, the nations of South Asia were unfortunate in the generation of leaders who took over from those who had led the freedom struggle against the British. Often inefficient and corrupt, they were usually wedded to narrow class interests and outdated ideologies. Out of touch with their own people and the global changes taking place, they made all kinds of cynical compromises to hang on to power.

In Pakistan's case, the leadership crisis was compounded by our identity crisis: created in the name of religion, our leaders deliberately (and foolishly) set out to cut off the country's subcontinental roots and reposition ourselves as a Middle Eastern nation. This effort was accelerated when East Pakistan became Bangladesh after a bloody civil war. This unnatural shift has wreaked havoc with natural creativity and produced a generation of Pakistanis unsure of their place in the world.

Today, Sri Lanka and Nepal, both once popular tourist attractions, are wracked by civil wars; India and Pakistan have beggared themselves through their interminable preoccupation with Kashmir and the resultant expenditure on huge armies and weapons of war. A region with nearly 1.5 billion people is viewed as a black hole that stumbles from one crisis to another, despite the potential it clearly has if the hard work. inventiveness and intelligence of its people are anything to go by. Perhaps our politicians should be made to read about the life and times of Sher Shah Suri before they run for public office.