oct 28th
for a change i agree with the economist. the reds are screwing india, again, along with the nehruvian stalinists.
and he is right about manmohan singh, whose 'reactions are often depressingly bureaucratic'. he is a sarkari economist and was a dirigiste statist for most of his life. i think he gets too much credit for the 1991 liberalization, he was probably just taking orders from pv narasimha rao. rao was by far the cleverest of india's leaders, but he committed the unforgiveable sin of not being born into the dynasty, so he is being written out of india's history even as we speak. (shades of what was done to trotsky et al by the soviet writers of the history-du-jour).
but simon long's views on fdi are conventional wisdom. first, the chinese exaggerate their fdi flow, and quite a bit of it is round-tripping. second, india undercounts its fdi. but still, the fact is that investment flows into india are low.
the reds want investment in bengal, after having screwed it so badly it'll take a hundred years to recover even if all the reds magically disappeared today. remember that bengal (the brahmaputra delta) and tamil nadu (the kaveri delta) used to account for almost 25% of the *ENTIRE WORLD'S* manufacturing output as recently at 1750!
the other thing i have a serious disagreement with all these experts is the insistence that there needs to be factory jobs to take care of the unemployed. i think agricultural jobs -- in particular agro-based food processing industries -- are india's best bet, not nasty, polluting heavy industry. just look at the industrial belt around cochin: the once-pristine periyar is a sewage dump now.
finally, simon long is being a little coy when he says the infrastructure improvements are on track. no, the golden quadrilateral project has ground to a halt. after all, it was not named the 'rajiv gandhi national highway network'. since it was an NDA initiative, it has to be killed off.
i was amazed by the picture of palm meadows in bangalore. yes, it does look like an upscale silicon valley neighborhood. i wonder what those houses go for. i suppose it is a gated community. any ideas on pricing? bangalore house prices have gone through the roof, so i suspect these little beauties go for like rs 1.5 crore. that is a lot of money in dollars too!
http://www.economist.com/printedition/displaystory.cfm?story_id=5081267
9 comments:
"......but he committed the unforgiveable sin of not being born into the dynasty......"
True. Let alone be remembered ,he didnt get a proper funeral at the least!
All the stuff that's written about Manmohan Singh is garbage. The man is a tool. "They made him king, before he was king", as they say. Every single time the man's name is mentioned, words are uttered about how "pure" and "untainted" he was, and how he was the "architect of India's reforms". First of all, just because the man has never taken a bribe, doesn't mean that he should be Prime Minister. Second, Manmohan Singh is a socialist through and through, India's economic reforms in 1991 happened because the IMF layed down strict guidelines in exchange for emergency financing.
In the past year, we've seen how utterly corrupt Manmohan Singh is (power plays in Bihar, giving into communists just to keep power, etc.), but the media still keeps repeating this refrain of how saintly and godlike the man is.
Also, I'd to add that if this government gave a damn about the people, it would avoid taking power first before entering into any kind of agreement that gave the communists any power over India's economy.
Indian newspaper articles are always written with the angle of, "Arey bhai, what can Manmohan Singh do? He needs to keep the communists happy, so there can be no more reforms!" The subtle implication here is that it's better to have this than let that BJP scum come into power again! Why don't they just call a spade a spade and say that all Congress cares about is power at any cost to the Indian people. They'd form a government with Kashmiri separatists if it was advantageous to do so.
Indian janata has been forced to hero-worship rather than discuss issues threadbare. Manmohan Singh is the latest hero. And the most disgusting part of this hero worship is the statements of BJP leaders like Advani - who continue to refer Man Mohan Singh as an honest person.
If the opposition party leaders are so gullible, what of aam janata?
For me, Man Mohan Singh is just one of the run-of-the-mill economicsts who didn't care a bit about farmers or workers when he was in charge of the reforms first time. At present, he doesn't even care about the reforms. He merely cares about the seat.
You hit the bull's eye anon.
Here's my take on Manmohan Singh..
http://therightintellectual.blogspot.com/2005/08/unsung-hero.html
I'm from Bihar. If it wasn't for the support of the Congress party, the Jungle Raj of Laloo Yadav would have ended in the late 1990's. But now I fear the state is beyond redemption.
I don't think I have *ever* read any Indian newspaper article criticizing the Congress party for its support to Laloo. Hell, even articles exposing Laloo for the corrupt criminal he is are hard to come by.
Indian newspaper articles are always written with the angle of, "Arey bhai, what can Manmohan Singh do? He needs to keep the communists happy, so there can be no more reforms!" The subtle implication here is that it's better to have this than let that BJP scum come into power again! Why don't they just call a spade a spade and say that all Congress cares about is power at any cost to the Indian people. They'd form a government with Kashmiri separatists if it was advantageous to do so.
LOL lets look at the BJP track record:
1. Article 370--abolished.
2. Ayodhya Temple--built.
3. Haj subsidies--revoked.
4. Alliances with anti-Hindu parties like the DMK--principled Hindus wouldn't do that. They are too scrupulous!
People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.
When did you vote the BJP into power mr smart anonymouse?? You voted the NDA with its motley crew of allies but never the BJP.. ...if you and your parents bothered to vote all since 1947. Vote the BJP just once with a majority and you can add a bigger list..not that difficult to take India forward. I see fellow Indians doing great stuff everyday in what is considered an elite field in the most "advanced" country in the western hemisphere.
It has been rightly said that man, being a reasonable craeture, does the reasonable thing when he has no other choice! The so-called Indian Economic Reform is a n instance of this. It is difficult to find two more unlikely candidates for the role of reformers than Narasimha Rao and Manmohan Singh! have they ever shared their vision for the India of 2020 or 2010? That would have given us an opportunity to validate any ideas they had on getting there. Instead, what we had then, and have had for the most part sonce then, is a series of disjointed knee jerk actions and reactions, all purported to be part of a "reform" agenda. The fact that the reborn Left has a hand on the wheel in the matter of the current series of "reforms" is hardly reassuring!
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