(CNN) -- Why does India matter? On the surface, a simple question. But, like India herself, it conceals a Pandora's box of answers. Each in turn triggers more questions. Fifty years of independence are underscored by five thousand years of history. Time has planted a garden in this youthful, yet ancient nation. But the saplings of promise and the branches of glory have been threatened by the weeds of disappointment and failure.

For centuries, India beckoned to the outside world. Wave upon wave of invaders responded. Some friendly, others hostile, many merely mercenary. Mother India absorbed them all, making them her own. From the Aryans to the Muslims to the final foreign rulers, the British. Each of these groups, and the others who fell in between, helped sew the quilt that is India today.

What is India today? On one hand, the world's biggest democracy, almost one billion people representing a myriad religions and ethnicities. Home to a burgeoning middle-class estimated at 250 million, nearly equal to the entire population of the United States. India's military strength is impressive, its space program is unparalleled in the developing world. On the other hand, India remains one of the world's poorest nations. Half of its people are illiterate. Disease continues to take a toll. An ever-growing population threatens to overwhelm progress.

These clouds of contradictions, however, have silver linings of hope. For thousands of years, the world looked to India, and benefited richly as a result. Now, India is shedding 50 years of detrimental, inward-looking economic and foreign policies -- realizing it is time to turn to the world, to reap rewards of its own. As India reaches out to the international community, and the world once again looks toward India, a balance can be struck -- in which giving and receiving go hand in hand.

So, is India relevant on the world stage? For the world, and India itself, the overwhelming answer of answers is, quite simply, yes.

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