BOOK REVIEW: SURJIT S BHALLA: THE NEW WEALTH OF NATIONS

BOOK REVIEW

TITLE: THE NEW WEALTH OF NATIONS

AUTHOR: SURJIT S. BHALLA

PUBLISHER: SIMON & SCHUSTER INDIA, 2017

PRICE: Rs. 599/- HARDBACK

Education Levels The Playing Field Between East & West

Echoing what is regarded as the first work on the Free-Market and Capitalist thinking, Adam Smith’s pathbreaking treatise, right there in the title of his latest book, Dr. Surjit S Bhalla, sets the tone up-front.

This book is mostly about the transformational ability of universal education to right a host of historical wrongs, particularly in a world without economic borders.

But, while this may be good for the masses, and the emerging new classes, many of the traditional near elites are being impacted. Those who have long banked on just rank, birth, privilege, and networks, to deliver the goods.

What can be done for them, to preserve their reserved places in the hierarchy of spoils? Not much it seems. The forces of history are against them now. They will have to use their inherent advantages to work for their continued preeminence, or slide down the slippery economic slope.

This, even as the top 1%, envied for owning a disproportionate amount of the world’s wealth, being the true engines of growth, will go on from strength to strength.

Amongst a veritable sea of eminent but left-leaning economists, given to highlighting victimhood, historical and imperial injustice, ideological dogma, Dr. Bhalla makes for a refreshing change of tempo and content, in this, his third book.

Bhalla is also an Economic Advisor to the Prime Minister Narendra Modi, appointed recently, in 2017, and comes to the role after stints in several eminent organizations including the Rand Corporation, Brookings Institution, the World Bank, Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank.

He simultaneously continues in his role as a Senior Analyst at the New York based Observatory Group and is Chairman of his Oxus Research and Investments firm, the last two conducted from his present perch in New Delhi .  

Educated largely at Princeton University, Bhalla is not shy or apologetic about plumping for the present and future of the fast growing emerging economies, particularly those of India and China,  that account for a substantial portion of the world’s growing population.

He bases his optimism on the effects of globalization, purchasing power parity (PPP), and a large numbers of skilled and educated people available in the international market place. And these, at a discount in absolute terms, to those from the West.

The panacea is the universal spread of education, from the primary level upwards everywhere, but particularly outside of the Advanced Economies (AEs).

Bhalla equates education with wealth. He demonstrates ways to measure the effect of different levels of education, not only on wages and earning capacity, but on economic options and possibilities.

Writes Bhalla: “Between 1980 and 2000, college graduates in the West expanded by 47 million; in the rest of the world the expansion was a larger 104 million”. By 1992, “ the absolute number of college graduates in the Rest (81 million) exceeded those in the West (79 million) for the first time”. By 2030, projections “point to an excess of 280 million college graduates in the Rest-more than three times those in the West”.

But, paradoxically, in the interim, jobs have becoming scarcer, even as more of them globally have gone to people from the emerging economies, making a case for entrepreneurship and the start-up economy. He also touches upon the concept of a universal basic income and negative taxation to tackle the possible unrest coming up.

Another key postulate in this book is that low inflation is here to stay. The reasons are many, mostly traceable to recent and current history, but planners can indeed count on an era where inflation will not spoil the party. This implies what Surjit Bhalla never tires in advocating in his regular newspaper columns- there is no need to keep interest rates high and constrain money supply for fear of runaway prices. Instead, low interest rates will spur growth as people are encouraged to borrow and take the risk of making an investment towards future profits.

Dr. Bhalla also explores the effect of more and more equality and education for women, both in the work place and at home and society in general. Some 50% of the population of the world is coming into its own, perhaps for the very first time.

The author asserts that “the decline in world poverty in the last forty years is truly the greatest miracle of history” and once again attributes it to the spread of education.

Of course,  “500-600 million” people living on less than the PPP $1 a day, the World Bank’s Poverty Line of 1990, is a very large number of absolutely poor still.

Many of these people are now found in Sub-Saharan Africa, but interestingly, the number of absolutely poor people in India and China are about equal, despite a 4:1 economy ratio in favor of China. This is arrived at by a statistical exercise using  the World Bank income definition at 2011 PPP prices of $1.9 per day, and is assessed in terms of household consumption, and not income.

Concern with absolute poverty has however moved on to measurements of new entrants into the Middle Class. This term has been defined variously historically, but now it points to a troika of almost synonymous words- education, middle class and globalization.

It has also brought about a democratization of the elite, a change in the dynastic power structures of old, and this, perhaps for the first time.   

As Bhalla puts it : “Yesterday’s core is today’s periphery,” thanks to “the force of education, the new wealth of nations”.

For: The Sunday Pioneer BOOKS

December 31^st, 2017

(910 words)

Gautam Mukherjee

Cruising On The First Luxury Liner To Board Passengers In India

Cruising On The First Luxury Liner To Board Passengers In India

All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware - Martin Buber

Why cruise for pleasure? Rest, relaxation, renewal, hope, laughter, music, new friends, food, drink – it can be for many reasons.

And the newest pleasure travel ships, circa 2018, will be adding laser games and robots to refresh the older cruise culture of billionaires in gowns and tuxedos, the Noel Cowardisms, grand pianos, chandeliers, cognac. Perhaps to lay to rest the Fedora and pencil moustache wearing ghosts of cruises past, their strains of  Cole Porter songs overtaken by the insistent beat of non-stop Cannes and Ibiza style partying.

But the entire thing is all very new to India, exposed to little beyond shore- hugging steamers and passages to England or Basra from an earlier time.

The Costa NeoClassica is an Italian cruise ship, built in the nineties. But it was comprehensively refurbished recently. It is one of 12 Costa cruise-ships sailing the world with great savoir faire.  They are all part of the Carnival Group, currently the largest cruise-operators in the world.  

The first surprising thing that we noticed on boarding the ship at Mumbai is that most of the passengers were Italian, indicating considerable interest in India and the Maldives. 

There were some French and English too, but just a minority, perhaps no more than 20%, of Indians. A sizeable crowd of jubilant life insurance salesmen did board late in the day at Mumbai, rewarded for their performance with a four night cruise to Kochi.

The sumptuous food catered generously to the tastes of Europeans and Indians alike, with a considerable variety of offerings. The Chefs also made sure that the vegetarians and those who do not eat beef or pork had plenty of chicken, sea food and fish to choose from instead.

There were sit down options with linen, cutlery and waiter service at a grand restaurant, as well as multiple buffet stations in two informal café settings. And all this - breakfast, lunch, high-tea and dinner, was included in the price - but there were fixed timings. In addition, there were restaurants and bars which have to be paid for separately, but were open practically at all hours.

The entire ship including all the toilets was kept scrupulously clean with Housekeeping and the plumbing working perfectly well. Dedicated Cabin Stewards made up the rooms to suit passenger time preferences.

In the evenings, there were acrobats, dancers, musicians and light shows in the auditorium. A jazz combo with regulation crooner played dance music in the grand bar. At least one or two Bingo games gave away impressive prizes of 500 Euro or more.

A casino catered to the gamblers but only in international waters, and after dinner  there was peppier live music and dancing in yet another lounge. Many people, fat and lean, unabashedly learned Latin dance steps on deck 11, taught the moves by  rhythmic staffers.

There was a supervised toddlers’ lounge with deep pile carpet and safe toys to give young mothers a break. And another with racks of “princess” dresses for little girls to live out their favorite fantasy (and be photographed doing it).

The Gym, Sauna and Turkish Bath (Steam Room) were included in the price, though the Spa treatments and Massages were charged for.

There were several lifts at either end of the ship and double sets of staircases for  those who wanted more exercise even after using the artificial grass-turfed jogging track.

There was a quixotic inconvenience with drinking water however, that forced the entire shipload to forage periodically, jugs and empty water bottles in hand, up to the deck 10 buffet dining area.

The Costa NeoClassica came along as recently as the December 2016 season.  Their first and only cruise so far goes out from Mumbai to Mangalore over three nights, taking one more to Kochi, all along the Arabian Sea, and then three more to Male in the Maldives, out in the Indian Ocean.

It returns via Colombo in Sri Lanka, and Goa. Costa has plotted its first route on a visa- free course, though you do need valid passports to book. It takes on and disembarks passengers at each stop, and allows ample time for shore excursions, both independently, or at vast prices in Euros, if one chooses to use the Costa travel operators.

Holiday-makers can customise both the duration, from a 3/4 nights minimum, to 7, or even 14 for the round-trip, and accordingly, the cost of the cruise.

Free travel of children under 12 in the same cabin is standard, presumably with bunks of their own. A single passenger however, has to pay 1.5 times to justify occupying a cabin designed for two. There is quite a lot on the look and feel of the ship and its facilities online.

There were 600 odd cabins, both sea-facing and inside. And decks at 11^th, 12^th, 13^th   levels with restaurants, bars and swimming pools/sunbathing areas interspersed, were popular with the guests. There was also a plush air-conditioned 360 degree view observatory lounge at the 14^th level, and quiet lounges with comfortable seating everywhere. Wi-fi was extra, as was use of the ship’s laptops. Calls to shore from the reception however, were free.

Over 1200 passengers, including children, were served by as many as 600 staffers- Italians certainly, but Indians, Brazilians, Filipinos and others too.

There was no cash,(US Dollars/Euro), accepted on the ship except in bill settlement. Instead, the “Costa Card” was room key, identity and credit card rolled into one. Alternatively, a credit card could be linked for on-board payments. Passports were held over till the port of disembarkation.

There were duty free shops with special offers- perfumes, watches, bags, souvenirs, liquor, cigarettes, funny hats.

A daily newsletter from the Captain announced the activities around the ship, themes, dress codes and other cruise arcana. There was a de rigeur Captain’s Evening for a general dress up, an Indian night for Italians to try out their sarees, and Bollywood music from 6 pm every evening at deck 11.

There was, reassuringly, a well equipped and staffed hospital on the 3^rd deck and its attentions were included under the on-board insurance for those who paid for it.

Costa is the first company that has chosen to seize the first-mover advantage from India’s exciting new Cruise Tourism Policy. Since India has over 7,500 km of coastline, is strategically placed between West Asia and South East Asia, and has much to offer the sightseer and souvenir shopper, it is surprising that it hasn’t been done so far.

The logic for it all is impeccable. Some 120,000 well-heeled Indians go on cruises every year now, taking ship mostly from Singapore.

There is a huge potential. Fifty-nine cruise ships docked in India in fiscal 2016 with 1.76 lakh visitors, many of whom came ashore to spend their money.  And yet this represents just 0.5% of the global cruise market of 2.3 crore travellers.

The Government’s desire is to ramp this up more than 10-fold to some 700 cruise ships calling every year alongside the requisite infrastructure on the ground.

Costa has come forward on the basis of a new single-window clearance process, a waiver of compulsory licensing, and a 30% cut in current Government charges across-the-board.  The Government has begun to respond to the needs of cruise ship operators. Dock charges based on tonnage of the ships rather than the number of passengers on board have been removed. The number of days a cruise-ship can occupy a berth in port has been increased from one to three.

Dynamic Union Minister Nitin Gadkari is behind the new Policy. In the detailing, it is being worked on jointly by the Shipping and Tourism ministries. The Policy envisages five circuits along both coasts, some of it on inland waterways. Amongst many other things, the Government proposes to build a swanky 2,00,000 sq.ft., Rs. 225 crore International Cruise Terminal in Mumbai. This will act as a model for the ones to come at each stop on the circuits.

Meanwhile, temporary ones have been opened in erstwhile goods storage sheds at Mumbai’s faded Alexandra Docks, and at the other ports of New Mangalore, Kochi, Goa, and Chennai, the last on the Bay of Bengal. These five are the only ones amongst India’s12 ports that can currently berth the sizeable ships. 

Though in Male, the ship anchored off-shore, and we went ashore on wildly swaying tenders.   

For:  The Sunday Guardian

(1,399 words)

December 20^th, 2017

Gautam Mukherjee  

BOOK REVIEW:SUDEEP CHAKRAVARTI: THE BENGALIS:But Why Should Anyone Fight Over Beauty?

BOOK REVIEW

TITLE: THE BENGALIS-A PORTRAIT OF A COMMUNITY

AUTHOR: SUDEEP CHAKRAVARTI

PUBLISHER: ALEPH BOOK  COMPANY, 2017

PRICE: HARDBACK, Rs.799/-

But Why Should Anyone Fight Over Beauty?

The last line in this book,(But why should anyone fight over beauty?), makes fair, if poignant comment, on all that is Bengali. It is by no means the whole story, any more than the snippet of lyric at the very end of the last LP  from The Beatles. That bit of whimsical farewell, which said: “And in the end/ The love you take/Is equal to the love you make”.

The Bengalis is an astonishingly good book, written by an author at the height of his powers. If Sudeep Chakravarti was an American, preferably a  Jew, he’d probably be sporting a well deserved Pulitzer Prize for writing it, his sixth book.

Who knows, the highly educated Bengali diaspora, many in academia there, could yet propel the American version, if there is one, to just such an outcome.

And that is another point to make- this book targets the “Banglasphere”, certainly in India, Bangladesh, and then Bengalis and “not-Bengalis” anywhere in the world. All, in fact, interested in this quirky community capable of exaltation and terrible pettiness, in almost equal measure. The range and depth of it, over 400 pages, marks it out as a labour of love, because no publishing advance in India can compensate for the obvious research and prodigious amount of work that has gone into it.

The Publisher, Aleph Book Company and its visionary Editor David Davidar,  possessed of excellent taste, is to be congratulated for producing this sumptuous “keeper” of a book. The Bengalis tells a story that needed to be told, before it all went to pieces in incompetent hands.  The production values too are superb, at least in the hardback edition.

Davidar was, long ago, Editor of Gentleman Magazine, and then the first Editor of Penguin India and later Penguin Canada.

The Bengalis is a mixture of research based history and restrained personal  anecdote blended together with considerable finesse. Its content is vivid, humorous in parts, but also sad, because there is evidently enough potential unrealized in the community to float an entire civilization on the clean slate of a new-found planet.

Having said that, much indeed has been accomplished over the centuries, and in multiple directions.  Chakravarti chronicles a great deal of it, as if loath to leave any significant aspect out of his remarkably unbiased account.  There is the bald fact of happening, the opinions and attitudes that shaped it, and the consequences- all laid out with great lucidity.

The present low ebb in Bengali fortunes can be traced, as is fairly well known, to Viceroy Curzon’s Partition of an insurgency-ridden Bengal, in 1905, along cynically communal lines. Chakravarti calls the section, towards the end of the book, The Age of Fire.

By the time the British re-unified Bengal in 1911, cutting it up again, but along linguistic lines this time, the damage had been done, even as the terrorism had only intensified. The Raj on the back foot, moved the Capital to Delhi, truncating the importance of Bengal forever.

And this repeated fracturing that never healed came to its bloody climax through the forties and into the Partition of 1947.

Independent India too, for reasons of its own, made busy with cutting what remained of the “arrogant” Bengali down to size. And today, self- confidence gone, the residual, self-destructive fractiousness, is a tangled skein, that may take a generation again to unravel. 

It has grown intense over the Naxalite years, the anti-industry rule of the Left Front, and that of an agitational Trinamool Congress. It is as if a talented people have been blighted by the Arab/Turkish/Indian concept of  the evil-eye(Nazar).

But Chakravarti manfully ploughs through his material, refusing to be burdened or side-tracked by the ruined promise of Banglasphere, both on this side of the border or that.

He writes of  a once composite culture of Hindu, “Mussulman”, Christian, Tribal, leavened with the mercantile Marwari, even Bengali entrepreneurship, and those others who made the place their home.  It is a composite ethos that is both there and not anymore, but with the potential to rise once again to its glory days, should some as yet unknown stimulus catalyse it afresh.

Is Chakravarti, a well-known Liberal journalist in his earlier avatar, hinting at a renaissance brought about by the BJP, in his maturity?

Mukul Roy and Amit Shah will certainly do their damndest.  And when Marxism, Muslim appeasement, and reckless Populism has racked West Bengal with debt and damnation, why not? Who knows but the Saffron “Nationalists” may well come to the rescue.

There are excellent Bengal roots. Echoes of the “bluechip bhodrolok” Syama Prasad Mookerjee, who coincidentally not only headed the Hindu Mahasabha and kept West Bengal from slipping into East Pakistan, but also established the Jan Sangh, the predecessor of the present day BJP, can still be faintly heard.   

Chakravarti describes the contribution of the rich elite (Borolok), the middle-class (Bhodrolok) and the delightfully unrestrained and numerous poor(Chhotolok).

He points out the passions central to a Bengali’s way of life, not only food, though that too, and the classist hypocrisies of what the Naxalites contemptuously referred to as the “Bourgeoisie” and “Class Enemies”.

That the entire leadership of the bloodthirsty Naxal Movement came from the Bhodrolok, slumming it as revolutionaries in the woods, never once entered their heads.

Chakravarti also goes further back to the Bengali dynasties that ruled before the Moghuls and the British. He draws cameos of the stalwarts, and interesting, if unknown persons. In a way very different from Amartya Sen, he describes the Bengali love for verbal sparring and pushing the envelope with their opinions.

He goes forward too, away from the heat and dust of Bengal, to the mostly distinguished, “great scattering” abroad, not just of today but yesterday too.

He travels, as only a Bengali and a Gujarati can, with both “love “ and “fortitude”, just for the pleasure of it. And everywhere, he takes the reader back to intrepid and thoughtful Bengalis who happened to have recorded their experiences before him.

For: The Sunday Pioneer BOOKS

(998 words)

November 27^th, 2017

Gautam Mukherjee

Elevation Of The Dynasts

Elevation Of The Dynasts

What does the long awaited elevation of Rahul Gandhi portend? Does it suggest an alluring “youth” blast from the Opposition positioned for 2019? Is it calculated on a narrower margin of victory for Modi in his home state of Gujarat, or even a surprise upset?

Lord Meghnad Desai in a recent column cautioned against scoffing at the idea of  a light on substance youth appeal.

The nominated political journey, that began in 2004 when Rahul Gandhi became an MP from Amethi now sees the heir apparent walking the walk and talking the talk better than ever before. Some say it is himself, maturing as a politician, with improved ambition and focus. Others say that Rahul Gandhi seems to have gathered a better set of speech// twitter writers.

Throughout these 17 years, Rahul Gandhi has steadfastly stayed away from any office of Government, though de facto he has been calling a lot of the shots since becoming General Secretary in 2007, and Vice President in 2013. Nevertheless, he has contributed or presided over, it is alleged, 29 consecutive electoral losses.

He tried hard to reform the working of the Youth Wing and the student- based NSUI, change around State unit office-bearers, motivate grass-root workers etc. with intermittent talk of inner party democracy and elections. In practice, processes have stayed largely nominated, and attempts to induct political novices from disadvantaged sections have fallen flat.

Meanwhile, the 130 year old Congress itself is reduced to ruling just two large States, namely Punjab and Karnataka, with other small left-overs from a ravished presence in the North East.

In Parliament it has less than 50 seats in the Lok Sabha, and a dwindling leadership in the Rajya Sabha. Much however is made of an occasional Panchayat, Municipal or parliamentary bye-election seat win, clutched at as an possible indication of a turning of the tide.

This upcoming Presidential “election” suggests Rahul Gandhi has decided to go the distance despite the punishment. The timing also suggests that pulling it off for an ailing Sonia Gandhi might be running out.

Of course, as long as she occupies 10 Janpath, there will still exist a parallel centre of power, with yet another, in a much lower key around the Vadra residence too. 

It also means the further diminishment for Sonia Gandhi’s long-serving courtiers, with Sonia herself seeing to it that they are unable to sabotage her son. They may not be turfed out right away, but will certainly be supplanted by Rahul’s own coterie.

They too are Congress dynasts, who have been maturing on the vine alongside - Scindia, Deora, Hooda, Prasada, Pilot etc., and allies: Omar Abdullah, Akhilesh Yadav, Tejaswi Yadav and so on. Prince Charles may be forgiven twinges of pain, though this is only an abdication and passing of the baton in a political party in the Commonwealth.

But can this lot of suave and privileged scions challenge the Modi-Shah juggernaut for the remaining Assembly elections and the general elections in 2019? Can Rahul Gandhi make more effective decisions going forward?

With the sidelining of the Old Guard, most of the taint of serious corruption that hovers like a miasma over elderly former Union//State and Chief Ministers  from the Congress/UPA, and quite a few pliant functionaries/bureaucrats, will be jettisoned.

Of course, Rahul has the National Herald case of his own to contend with, and there could be one or two more. The main thing is to stay corruption free going forward.

Given this, and making consistent sense in pronouncements, the 40% of voters that are now urban, with 65% of them under 35, may well become enthusiastic in due course.

More so because India is headed towards becoming an urban society within “a generation”. Congress meanwhile is updating its “secular”, minority appeasing, ostensibly liberal outlook basted with a soft Hindutva to boot.

The urban youth could increasingly buy into the Rahul version of  “India” as opposed to Modi’s more rustic  appeal to  “Bharat”.  This, may not do the trick in 2019 or even 2024, but 2029 could well be theirs.

But, even this will remain a pipe dream unless Congress improves its showing in 2019. This means toning up its lousy lack of organization at Booth and Block level to rival anything the BJP and the RSS can bring to bear.

The old caste, class, and religion fissures, traditionally exploited by the Old Guard, have been bested by robust BJP’s Mahadalit support, and a new found resonance with Muslim women.

This even though the umpteenth version of Rahul Gandhi launched during the Gujarat campaign 2017 has done quite well so far. But, with Himachal Pradesh also slated to slip out of Congress hands, there is clearly no winning poll strategy in place.

What can a Rahul Gandhi led Congress wrest away from Modi going forward? Can it draw blood with his harping on lack of jobs, farmer suicides and low growth? Is it waiting to benefit from Modi’s mistakes?  While true enough, will people believe that Rahul can do better?

Still, those in the ruling combine that ridicule a gaffe-prone Rahul Gandhi and are cocksure of their chances may be as misguided as Congress  raking up the Chaiwala image yet again.

It is a fact that Modi and his Government have not been able to fulfill quite a few of their election promises. And yet, the voting public, from all accounts, has accepted the pain of structural changes, inspired by the untiring efforts of a squeaky clean Prime Minister and his Cabinet.

The Modi Government has not however scored very high on Governance. Much that has been accomplished is perceived to have been rammed through by Modi personally. 

Is the BJP then seen as low on bench strength compared to the Congress, even an untried new one?

It sometimes seems that way, despite the presence of a number of good ministers such as Sushma Swaraj ( who steered the ICJ win recently), Nitin Gadkari, Piyush Goyal, a terrifically successful Party President in Amit Shah, and a determined Arun Jaitley. But what about the dozens of others on board?

Fortunately, Modi has the ideological backing and approbation of the stalwarts in Nagpur. This helps him ignore vociferous and senior dissidents, and uncivilised fringe elements out to embarrass.

All this is apparent to the public too, alongside the good things done. There is vast infrastructure development underway, OROP was settled after 40 years in limbo, the 7^th Pay Commission was executed smoothly, some direct tax reform was done for the lowest rung of tax payers.

Then, the fiscal deficit and inflation has been admirably controlled, the Benami and Bankruptcy Laws were passed. The vast millions of the unbanked were included, the Aadhar card was used extensively to identify and link people to a largely digital system. There is much greater provision of electricity and cooking gas to the masses. 

Government Welfare Programmes are being effectively implemented and administered.  But Petrol and Diesel remains horribly over-taxed.

There is a feeling though, that much more is to come, and Modi must be given the chance to bring it about.

But what can Modi do in the remaining time to effect a resounding encore in 2019?

Sorting out the Ram Mandir at Ayodhya, festering for 21 years will be a proud moment, if it comes through. Removing  J&K’s special status under Article 35A and 370 will be very well received, particularly after confronting the Hurriyat and eliminating nearly 200 terrorists this year.

Modi has already warmed the cockles of patriotic Indian hearts by smacking Pakistan with the Surgical Strikes and standing up to China over OBOR and Doklam.

Still, the middle-classes, the traders, small to medium business in the unorganized sector, industry, real estate,  all feel ignored and let down.

Can Modi urgently address these sections of the disaffected? Can he do something to elicit cheers from them too in the coming Union budget 2018?

And he needs to do this as a self-starter, and not after being mocked and goaded by Rahul Gandhi. Unfortunately, the reduction of GST duties happened after a prolonged period of Gandhi calling it the “Gabbar Singh Tax”.

Modi’s lurch towards the poor also came about after Gandhi characterized the Modi Government as a “Suit Boot Sarkar”. No further David strikes should be allowed by Goliath, if he knows what’s good for him.

 For: The Sunday Guardian

(1,387 words)

November 22nd, 2017

Gautam Mukherjee

BOOK REVIEW: India@70 MODI @3.5: THE ELEPHANT GATHERS MOMENTUM WITH MODI AS MAHOUT

BOOK REVIEW

Title:  India @70 MODI @3.5-Capturing India’s Transformation Under Narendra Modi

Editors: Bibek Debroy & Ashok Malik

Publisher: Wisdom Tree/Dr. Syama Prasad Mookerjee Research Foundation, 2017

The Elephant  Gathers Momentum With Modi As Mahout

This book was released by the Finance Minister Arun Jaitley at the Nehru Memorial Auditorium amongst functions to commemorate the 3.5 year mark of the Modi Government. That the next days headlines spoke of  a former occupant of his high office applying for a job “at eighty”, was based on an incidental quip from Jaitley, and no fault whatsoever of this worthy collection.

It is made up of 18 essays written by that relatively rare breed of intellectuals from the right-of-centre, in a field generally crowded with ideological Leftists, and not just in India. It includes amongst its line-up, think-tank functionaries, journalists, bureaucrats, diplomats, and other Government officials.

The tone of the book is confident and upbeat throughout. But perhaps Prime Minister Modi put the emergence of the BJP best. It is now at centre-stage with a electoral majority for the first time in its history, and also after 30 years nationally.

He did so, in another context, that of Indo-American relations, by saying India was ready to get over “the hesitations of history”.

Swapan Dasgupta, now a Rajya Sabha MP, points out that the Modi led BJP has set about expanding its political base as of 2015. This is borne out by the increase in vote shares creeping up towards 40% on average, and in isolated cases, even higher than 50%, at subsequent Assembly elections.

The engineering of it saw a new emphasis on providing succour to the rural and urban poor, and the lower middle classes. This was combined with unprecedented public spending on infrastructure in the absence of much initiative from the debt-ridden private sector.

This increase in vote share, evident post demonetization, but before the advent of GST, is seen in the clutch of five states that went to the polls along with Uttar Pradesh.

It can well be contrasted with the share of the principal Opposition Congress declining  from some 28% at the last General Elections in 2014 (to BJP’s 31%), languishing, in some instances, into disastrous single-digits.

And Dasgupta also makes the telling point that Modi’s new politics, ( ably aided by chief election strategist and Party President Amit Shah), shows no compunction in hopping back and forth across the Right-Left divide.

I will skip over the tendency of most of the writers to dutifully cover the laundry list of achievements, natural in a commemorative volume of this type. These gains are mostly incremental in nature, with the exception of a vast improvement in electricity  and cooking gas provision to the poor. 

Much has been done through the tweaking of various Government programmes and the prevention of leakages. This is another hallmark of Modi economics/administration, but then, there are the bold moves too, (Surgical strikes, hot pursuit, standing up to China, banking the unbanked, demonetization, Benami Act, Bankruptcy Act, GST…).

A young and globally recognised Sanjeev Sanyal, Principal Economic Advisor to the Government of India, author of several readable books, is proud of the recent successes of the World Bank ranking improvement in the ease of doing business stakes, and the Moody upgrade( first in 13 years).

He is something of a city expert from his earlier experience in Singapore, and makes the point that India will soon become an urban majority country “within a generation”.  

This is, of course, the glide path of emerging economies growing into developed ones. It is however a long way from MK Gandhi’s “India lives in its villages”. But the challenges of managing an influx to total a billion city folk will be considerable.

Sanyal suggests that India will have to considerably pick up its game on “Urban Management”. He sees urban poverty not as static but a “dynamic flow”, and says all countries which are now much better developed had tremendous slums in the urbanization phase. This includes London and New York.

He suggests facilitating the rural to urban migration process, and encouraging the dynamism that slums with “shops, mini-factories, people moving in and out,” typify, at once bringing up visions of the Dharavi Slums in Mumbai, amongst the biggest in Asia. This means, keeping the organism alive and thriving through the transition, and much more than providing a roof over the migrant’s head with “low-cost housing”.

The essays on Health, Water, Sustainable Development, Tax Reform, while well laid out and argued, leave one less enthused, because most members of the general public can’t see any improvements visible on the ground. Ditto the much-publicized flop of the Swachh Bharat Mission, against a rising tide of filth, sewage, garbage and pollution. And the less said about the “Minimum Government Maximum Governance” slogan, probably the better. The Ministry of Defence remains a Tower of Babel where things are forever expected to happen but don’t.

The chapter on ASEAN and South East Asia by PM Heblikar is interesting because of the 11 heads of Government from the region slated to grace our Republic Day parade in January 2018. This, soon after Modi’s own visit to meet all of them at the Manila Summit recently. India’s attitude to South East Asia has been ambivalent and luke-warm for too long, despite policy professions of “Act East”. The efforts being made now for a better political and economic engagement with the region promise to yield good dividends.

Anirban Ganguly of SPMRF flags Modi’s desire to create a “New India”, a self-renewal, driven by: “ innovation, hard-work and creativity”.

Diplomat Veena Sikri highlights the remarkable rise in India’s “soft power” under Modi’s determined engagement with the countries of the world, some visited by an Indian Prime Minister after decades, some for the very first time.

Recent opinion polls show that the masses of India as well as the urban elite still repose great faith in Modi’s leadership, at a time when the “honeymoon period” is long over. And this by itself is the main message at the end of more than 3.5 years of the Modi Government.

For: The Sunday Pioneer BOOKS

(983 words)

November 19^th, 2017

Gautam Mukherjee

BOOK REVIEW: NITIN GOKHALE-SECURING INDIA THE MODI WAY

BOOK REVIEW

TITLE: SECURING INDIA THE MODI WAY

PATHANKOT SURGICAL STRIKES AND MORE

AUTHOR: NITIN A GOKHALE

PUBLISHER: BLOOMSBURY INDIA, 2017

PRICE:Rs. 499/- HARDBACK

No  More Playing At Mr. Nice Guy

Only once in a while does one come upon a book which is non-fiction, and on the defence/intelligence/security policy and establishment, but more compelling than its imagined counterpart.

This is thanks to the author Nitin Gokhale’s basic training as a journalist of over 30 years standing, rather than the fulminations of a typically stuffier “expert”.

For India, living for long in a Gandhian cum Nehruvian haze of confusion that our enemies have exploited, a change of attitude is most welcome.  

Of course, the Indira Gandhi years were an exception to the foreign policy naivete that preceded and succeeded it.

Prime Minister Modi is often likened to Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, both for his ability to garner votes like her, and refusing to be anybody’s push-over.

So the new resolve, coming from the highest political level, has evidently liberated the National Security establishment and the Armed Forces to do their jobs without hindrance, and show all what they are truly capable of.

It is making Pakistan and China less certain of what to expect from India after years of a predictable timidity and disgraceful unpreparedness in security terms.

Now all this is changing before their very eyes, as the surgical strikes through the LoC and the Doklam standoff demonstrated to each respectively.

Continued work on connectivity and border area infrastructure including train lines, roads and airports, placement of missiles and other military hardware, and the raising of Mountain Corps trained to operate at high altitude and difficult terrain, leaves no one in any doubt.

Combined with an energetic and muscular diplomacy  led by the Prime Minister that has gained a fresh understanding of India in the comity of nations, things have changed a great deal.

Gokhale’s book from start to finish reflects, with glowing approval, this new confidence, though it also underlines our bureaucratic approach. The audacious Surgical Strike, post the attack on an Army unit at Uri, is a departure from the norm typical of Modi.

Gokhale describes, in time-lined reporter format how India retaliated on 29 September 2016, sending soldiers into Pakistan occupied Kashmir (PoK) to wipe out some 80 terrorists/ Pakistan Army personnel without suffering any losses of its own.

The saving of the massive Pathankot Air Base, also in 2016, using effective multi-specialized units, based on timely and credible Intelligence is notable too.

Going further back into 2015, Gokhale describes the “hot pursuit tactics” employed using Special Forces. This, into Myanmar,  in retaliation for several ambushes suffered by Indian forces. The insurgents in Manipur and Nagaland typically slipped away into multiple camps some 10 km. inside Myanmar.  

The signal strikes here were followed up by visits by the Indian National Security Adviser (NSA) Ajit Doval, and the Foreign Secretary Jaishankar to obtain Myanmar’s endorsement to the actions taken into its territory.

Nitin Gokhale goes on to tour the diplomatic territory too, the fresh reengagement with West Asia - UAE, Saudi Arabia, Israel, as well as Iran.

It points to the tangible success of Chabahar as an India-Iran-Afghanistan initiative, joined also by Japan of late. With the first wheat shipment to Kabul via Chabahar reaching safely, Afghanistan has been quick to point out its sole dependence on Karachi Port is over.

This Government’s dealing with Maoist violence in 10 States in Central India is still a work in progress though, with liberal uses of both carrot and stick.  

There is the force, of the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) - CRPF, SSB, CISF, BSF and the ITPB under the leadership of the Home Ministry’s Rajnath Singh, plus the thrust towards “Vikas” via roads and infrastructure development.

Is it working?  Hearts and minds apart, the number of clashes have come down to 554, from 2,213 in 2010.  Civilians killed in 2010 were 720, including suspected “police informers” (320). This is down to 113 as on 15^th August 2017, with 63 of them being alleged informers. Similar declining trends are seen in the number of security forces killed, arms recovered, and so on.

The worst internal situation of this kind is certainly in the Kashmir Valley where frequent  attempts at appeasement have not yielded good results.

Modi’s policy of eliminating known terrorists and pulling apart the veil on Hurriyat complicity, has given Pakistan a fresh strategic headache. And this applies to new fronts sought to be opened by Pakistan’s ISI and others in Assam, West Bengal, Kerala (ISIS), and even Punjab (Khalistanis from Canada).

Gokhale has written a long chapter on “Standing up to China”. It encompasses India’s closer relationship with Japan, its refusal to participate in the CPEC citing the illegal use of PoK, the Dalai Lama’s visit to Tawang, the initiating of quickened development and infrastructure in Arunachal Pradesh, and of course, the stand-offs at Doklam and in Leh.

In addition, India has drawn closer to B IMSTEC, ASEAN, Australia.

There is military, economic, and high technology potential from drawing closer to Israel, America, France, Britain. India continues strong with Russia, and with a lot of the oil and uranium rich Central Asian Republics. There is no neglect of Beijing and BRICS, G-20 etc. either.

But China is no longer in a position to take an aggressive military posture with India.

The chapter on the Ministry of Defence reveals how the Indian establishment, both political and bureaucratic, has been and continues to be, the worst obstacle. They have made pig’s breakfast of Modi’s ambitious plans to manufacture in India state-of-the-art armaments and equipment in collaboration with the best in the world. It smacks of clashing and powerfully entrenched vested interests.

The book ends with a happy chapter on the accomplishments of the ISRO ( Indian Space Research Organisation), and a worried note on our capability to secure the cyber domain. This covers threats to power, banking, communications , transportation, all in the backdrop of persistent suspicion that  China is able to knock our fighters and helicopters out of the sky (in Arunachal Pradesh), because of their prowess at cyber-hacking.

For: The Sunday Pioneer BOOKS

(991 words)

November 15^th , 2017

Gautam Mukherjee