The Information War

Till 2014 and still, as course books are gradually revised, there was no information in government approved Indian history of the period before the arrival of Babur.

The demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya on 6^th December 1992 by Karsevaks, largely from the late Balasaheb Thackeray led Shiv Sena, turned the political tide. What was a beginning for the Moghuls became, centuries later, a beginning for politically powerful Hindutva.

The gone mosque was built in 1528-29, not by Moghul Emperor Babur, but by Mir Baqi, one of his leading generals. But it was Babur who ordered it built on top of the ancient temple to mark the very spot and birth place of revered Lord Ram.  (This building of mosques on top of existing temples became something of an insulting fetish for the Moghuls and other Islamic rulers in India).

That the same sarkari historians suggested that Lord Ram was a mythical figure that never existed in fact, is the kind of malicious lie that gave many a noxious flourish to their twisted version.

From the very start, the Moghuls and other Islamic rulers were out to demolish Hinduism and convert its adherents. To a substantial extent they succeeded in this mission, particularly amongst the poor and Dalits. But unlike many ancient polytheistic religions like that of the Greeks and Romans that fell before the sword of the Christians and Muslims, Hinduism survived, even if many of its edifices did not.

It triumphantly thrives to this day. In India, Hindus still constitute over 75% of the population, coursing ahead at over 1.40 billion.  Tiny Nepal, now buffeted by Chinese Communism and imperialism, is the only other Hindu majority country.

But this innate bloodthirstiness of the Abrahamic religions is not how Leftist-Islamic historians such as Irfan Habib, Ramachandra Guha, Romila Thapar and lesser known legions depicted the Moghuls, Nizams, Sultans such as Tipu. Instead, they were projected as agents of civilisation, nation-building, and peaceful coexistence for 400 years, ousted unfortunately by the British. All the brutal slaughter and forced conversion was airbrushed out of the story.

Even the imperial British who blew 1857 patriots out of cannons and killed a garden full of unarmed men, women, and children at Jallianwala Bagh, were regarded fondly by Brown Sahib Indian politicians and administrators. So much so, that London’s approval mattered more than any other, including that of  Moscow and Washington. It was quixotic but true.

The British, who barely acknowledged the Indian contribution in blood and glory to both the world wars. Who destroyed all indigenous industry and looted India’s billions for 200 years.

It is only under Prime Minister Modi that the importance of the UK in our  international diplomacy is much reduced. Now we regard them as vendors and merchants out to sell their wares to us. Nothing more. The Commonwealth is an empty construct of little value. We do not care for their unsolicited advice on our internal affairs. We are wary of their back-stabbing cunning and chicanery. But, we are polite. It doesn’t cost anything, as our Gujarati prime minister well knows.

That the British and the Portuguese did their own killing, induced and forced conversions, is only now being widely exposed and resisted. But still, the Christian numbers are small (2.3%), when compared to those of the Muslims (15%) at around 200 million.

Today, a massive new temple and associated facilities are being built on 100 acres emanating from the modest footprint of the original temple in Ayodhya. Models of this temple complex are being shown off abroad. Most soon, in Dubai, to coincide with Prime Minister Modi’s visit on 6^th January 2022. He will be there principally to sign a momentous free-trade agreement with the UAE. He will also inaugurate the India Pavilion at the Dubai Trade Fair displaying the grand model and other matters.

How things have changed, from when anything that looked beyond the Islamic rulers was both out of favour and preferably out of print. Academics and scholars who tried to fly in the face of this unwritten rule were shunned. Their books were ignored. Their careers were wilfully ruined. Foreign writers who denigrated Hinduism were given prominence.

 But the rebel academics, scholars, Hindu Gurus, did not battle the misinformation and propaganda in vain. They pointed towards a huge treasure chest of heritage, tradition, glory, pride and knowledge suppressed from broad public knowledge.

Even today, despite the establishment of the OTT platform, high budget, high-technology, glossy productions of the Mahabharata and Ramayana for example, have not yet arrived. But there was a new series on Babur.

Routine distortions and insults to Hinduism are woven into all sorts of films,  TV and OTT serials. That Bollywood also derives substantial funds from Pakistan’s ISI via the underworld based abroad is another factor for the persistent hate-mongering. Top writers, actors, and directors in Bollywood are  still eager to promote the narrative of Islamic goodness and superiority at the expense of the venal Hindu. But, fortunately, the fan base is now dwindling as awareness of their manipulations has grown. The well known Khans are discredited and ageing. The Box Office is not ringing to the old formula.  Muslims with jihadi sympathies playing Hindu characters in their films are beginning to anger their audiences. Patriotic films such as Uri and Udham Singh are doing well.

But as the Hindu hate propaganda becomes more strident, it is almost as if there is a palpable fear that the game is nearly up. Wokism is not able to provide effective covering fire like before.

The new, unbiased and refreshing film work is coming from the South, less deracinated by the years of selective patronage. Films like Bahubali were smash hits and depict a very different gloriously Hindu sensibility.

The advent of social media has helped to give publicity to much of our history, tradition and architecture (beyond the Taj Mahal), in bite-sized posts. In a time when attention spans are limited and book reading is largely out of favour, this is most useful.

The prime minister’s proud Hinduism, depicted most recently for the nation at the inauguration of the Kashi-Vishwanath Corridor is deeply inspiring to millions. People are beginning to be proud of their Hindu faith after being trained since birth to regard it as so much obscurantist ritual.

Watching a saffron clad monk like Yogi Adityanath make such a stellar job of running Uttar Pradesh is an eye opener. It is possible to combine being a Hindu monk with ably administering the biggest and most difficult state in the country.

There is a long way to go. Universities are starting new degree courses in Hindu Studies, Ayurveda, Sanskrit. Alongside all the modernisation of infrastructure, medical facilities, technology, digitisation, mechanisation, there is also a major push at rebuilding, renovation and conservation of our temples. Pilgrimage sites are being provided new facilities, connectivity and access as never before.

Why an ostensibly Hindu leadership that took over at independence should be quite so ruthless against their own co-religionists over a sustained period of at least five decades since is something of a mystery. They have even tried to concoct a false edifice of Hindu Terror, involving the merciless torture of over a dozen innocents only a decade or so ago.

It is not just the cooked up Malegaon Blast Case, but the horrific mayhem of 26/11 sought to be blamed on Hindu Terror by the UPA. There was possibly some joint planning involved. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh refused to sanction any form of military retaliation against Pakistan citing ‘non-state actors’.

Putting the trenchant, almost traitorous attitudes and policies down to Congress/UPA notions of secularism does not seem like a satisfactory explanation. Were they out to demolish Sanatan Dharma? To work from within and succeed, where external forces have failed? Are they working for multiple anti-India forces from abroad even now? Many current accounts seem to suggest as much.  

Why is India’s fifth column growing and looking so sinister? Is all the financing coming from George Soros? Or does a basket of donors- Christian evangelists, Pakistan, China, Khalistanis, Leftist billionaires, secret service organisations, overground foreign institutions, make more sense? Why are so many forces trying to keep Hindu revivalist India down? Is it a back-handed compliment born of fear?

As we enter 2022, it is clear that a great Hindu revival is underway. Kashi-Vishwanath has opened the gates to another pathway at Mathura-Vrindavan.  Many other religious projects are on the anvil.

The most obvious way to strengthen Hinduism is to pay attention to its temples and practice its Dharma. The arguments on the Indian Constitution, Veer Savarkar, the RSS, Secularism, Communalism, are just so much partisan blah blah. They don’t advance the Hindu cause.

Working on the temples and celebrating the religion cannot be properly argued against by the Muslims and Christians because they have always worn their religion as their primary identity.

So let us welcome one and all to a New India determined to reclaim its identity and lost ground, even as it makes unprecedented progress towards the future.    

(1,507 words)

December 30^th, 2021

For: Sirfnews

Gautam Mukherjee

 

Economic Prospects For India in 2022

India crossed 1.40 billion in population on Christmas Day 2021.At these levels, population is a definite drag on progress, putting pressure on resources natural and monetary. Any amount of growth is contending with a birth every second, even if we don’t like our babies trafficked by unscrupulous elements in our midst. This is followed by a death in every three seconds. We are slowing the rate of population growth, but the juggernaut will still be unrelenting (taking us to 1.70 billion), for the best part of this century. However, to be the fastest growing economy in the world is both a saviour and no small thing. But other rich countries have ‘stable’ populations that haven’t grown in decades. They don’t have or particularly need our economic growth rates to live a prosperous life in the main.

 To grow faster we need economic reform. And the good thing about economic reform is that it can rarely be reversed. It provides benefits and opens vistas. The country’s response to the global desire to relocate here instead of China has already begun to prove economically beneficial. It brings in new technology and expertise, and provides fresh employment.

The prospect of a high-end semiconductor industry being established in India is  most encouraging. Pledges from large business houses are in unprecedented tens of thousands of crores, apart from the government facilitations and incentives, start-ups and design studious.

Various IPOs supporting the new Start-Ups and Unicorns are new avenues for growth. Though a long way behind America and China, India has become the third biggest unicorn generating country. Divestments of government owned enterprises are also growing our stock and debt markets northwards of $ 3 trillion.

Likewise, an Aatmanirbhar and joint-venturing Defence manufacturing and space satellite/missile making industry, growing rapidly, will transform our economic and strategic capabilities. In fact, in many of these new areas, initial estimates of contribution and growth may well be overtaken.

This government’s impressive efforts in modernising and creating new infrastructure, electrical power, mining and mineral production, alternative energy, 5G connectivity on the anvil, all contribute in real terms to the ease of doing business. They contribute to improved logistics and connectivity. The same applies to modernised railway systems, new city metros, sea transport, better airport infrastructure. Digitisation has grown at such a pace that it is unmatched by other countries in both size and scale.

Improved agricultural infrastructure, seeds, fertilizers and practices at various states are not only resulting in better farmer incomes, but fostering exports at a new level of growth.

The impact of dynamic diplomacy has improved our security and opened up joint venture cooperation with several countries. India has become, perhaps for the first time, a truly favoured destination, aided and abetted by the leading nations of this world in every region.

There are optimistic forecasts of GDP growth in fiscal 2022, ranging from the prime minister’s advisory council’s 7.5%, to 9.1% (Goldman Sachs) and 8.5% (IMF). This is most welcome after successive waves of the paralysing and expensive Covid pandemic and its variations. Omicron is not yet done with.

Different prescriptions are being offered to the government, some say raise interest rates, others advocate boosted capital expenditure. Is inflation from high fuel prices a persistent threat?

It is common sense to expect a surge from sectors such as real estate, hospitality, aviation, all brought to a near standstill during successive lockdowns. Real estate, fuelled in part by black money, is also the second largest employer.

Not much focussed on, is the advent of a series of assembly elections in five states in 2022. And then some more in 2023, before the general elections in 2024. These will all result in large expenditures and consumption led growth.

The IMF is very bullish on India, with its Chief Economist Gita Gopinath moving up to Deputy Managing Director this year. Gopinath expects a rush of FDI investment, for India’s political stability, fiscal responsibility including repayment of loans on time, and massive demand projections. Of course, India’s successive Union Budgets and legislation must support the process and keep up the momentum. The World Bank is similarly positioned.

The fact is, India should be experiencing double-digit growth year-on-year for several going forward. The reason this remains elusive is because of an ideological undertow in bureaucratic and political quarters that is suspicious of economic reform. This government has consistently tried to balance its reformist and economic growth inducing moves with massive poverty alleviation schemes. Still, we have put some of the over-staffing, inefficiency, price controls, subsidies, non-mechanisation, losses, shortages of essential goods and services, the licence-permit Raj, behind us.  

But obtuse trade unionism is very much with us. They are, when financed by the Left, ranged against bank merger and privatisation, PSU divestment as in Air India, dilution of the government’s stake in large state enterprises such as the LIC. These forces do not want loss-making BSNL sold off. They don’t want labour or land reform.

The judiciary, in dire need of reform itself, supports most leftist and status quoist positions. It tacitly supported the Farmer protests that successfully blocked reform favouring the small and marginal farmers. The judiciary has successfully blocked its own reform even as millions of cases await judgement.

China and Pakistan do not want to let India make progress. They are aided by anti-national forces supported by foreign Islamists, Church funds, Chinese/Leftist monies, insurgents, terrorists, Maoists, separatists, certain opposition political parties. Democracy itself and the Indian Constitution are being twisted to suit a bizarre break-India narrative.

These forces combined, want to see India under expensive military pressure on its borders. They help by also creating broad-based domestic unrest on an elevated basis. It is, as if, the more the economic progress India makes, the more these people intensify their efforts.

So, even as all economic logic dictates that India is bound to march onwards and upwards, it cannot do so smoothly without confronting and vanquishing the negative forces that besiege it. This will need resolute administration and the continued electoral support of the majority of the Indian people.

A key point of departure viewed both as a positive by many and a negative by those opposed, is that this government is strongly and unabashedly Hindu nationalist. It is rapidly creating new political and cultural narratives.

The sizeable 200 million Muslims of India are worried about their erstwhile position of privilege. This, even though their level of education is at an abysmal 2% of their number. How can they hope to grasp at the benefits that flow from education beyond the madarasa? Other minorities, such as the Christians and now the Khalistani Sikhs too, have taken a petulant stance. They all fear Hindu domination. Restrictions being placed on induced or forced conversion is also bothering them.

And yet, internationally, India is regarded, admiringly,  as a wise and peaceful Hindu country despite its secular pretensions. There seems little chance of a threatened majority, irked by aggressive minorityism, backing down any time soon.

A new reality is being engineered. All Indians will have to find their own place in it.  This too is grist to the economic mil and the sooner people fall in line the betterl.  As for China and Pakistan, things are likely to come to a head in the near future. And when they do, should India prevail militarily, as it is expected to by many strategic think-tanks, it will enter a new trajectory, unfettered by the Sword of Damocles hanging over its head.

The writing on the wall is that the bulk of the international community, despite shrill condemnation from certain fringes, is more than willing to do business with India. After the jolt that many have received from China based losses, the sincerity of the Indian offers are being appreciated.

The numbers projected in any economic assessment and forecast always speak of a potential. But it is the determination of the government to see it through that counts both in the short and long term.

 Progress in a democracy as raucous as ours, cannot be a cakewalk. Opposition has to be ground down over time. However, we have already received the transformative benefits of bold policies for three decades since 1991.There is a broad consensus in favour of modernisation, infrastructure and economic reform, that will take this country to the kind of maximum prosperity possible for a people so numerous.    

(1,392 words)

December 29^th, 2021

For: The Sunday Guardian

Gautam Mukherjee

 

The Rise Of Hindu Pride

 So this is Christmas and what have you done? -John Lennon

 In a recent India News TV conclave in New Delhi, BJP’s Sudhanshu Trivedi pointed out to the Jinnaesque and extremely vocal AIMIM supremo Assauddin Owaisi, that only 2% of Indian Muslims, from amongst some 15% of the population, were educated. This, down from 24% at independence. Trivedi contrasted this illiteracy and consequent lack of contribution to the nation’s progress with that of the Parsis, that constitute a dwindling 0.1% of the population.

Owaisi mumbled that the educated and privileged Muslims went to Pakistan at partition. He did not answer why seven decades since independence have not produced educated Muslims while almost every other community stands in contrast to this. Not that looking at the failed state of Pakistan today provides any comfort in Owaisi’s defence.

For long, the likes of Owaisi were, and still are, assisted by those political parties that feed off Muslim vote banks. The posing that involves the laying of chaddars and the reciting of namaaz at mosques, wearing clothes echoing those of common Muslims, such as caps, black waistcoats and  white chooridars. The shameless shunning of sindoor amongst the visible women of the household. The  craven photo-ops with long-beared maulvis and maulanas.  

This may still be working to an extent but for how long more? Birth rates amongst Muslims will not return a Muslim majority state even in the whole of this century. Pockets of concentration will not make for an overall picture. The politics of regional pride, gender and blatant populist grants will not do the trick nationally.

But, if anything, it is the  broad-thinking Hindu way that is garnering the admiration of the International community, including those Muslims in Arabia, Africa, the Asia-Pacific. These are Muslims not carrying the cross of conversion. They have a clear sense of their birth identity, and are not confused by having been converted from Hinduism under the Islamic sword.

It is dawning on the more discerning followers and inheritors of Abrahamic religions that their temporal history is undeniably soaked in blood. This has bred a widespread atheism and agnosticism in the West, with many people finding themselves in Church only when they are dead in a coffin - for the funeral service.

It is true that only the Hindu religion and some of its spinoffs has no back story of conquest, domestic or foreign, except for the sporadic resistance to Mughal aggrandisement. This is providing a natural attraction for people who want the depth and wisdom of the oldest religion in the world that has survived every attempt to wipe it out. These things lived in the realm of theory for decades but today it has gained provenance. There is greater global  knowledge of Sanatan Dharma, Yoga, Indian culture, music, dance, ancient Ayurveda, science, great civilisations that existed hundreds of years before others, with their architecture and ruins as mute witness.

And so now, under the aegis of a Hindu nationalist government, we see a roll back of both the Nehruvian ethos of Marxism, Mughal prominence and suppression of Hindus as obscurantists. The old order is fading fast. The pseudo-Christian celebration of Christmas by deracinated and Westernised Hindus is realised today as a British Raj hangover. It is of course, a legitimate occasion for Christians themselves. And to participate with them in food, cakes and so forth is akin to them taking part in Diwali or Durga Puja in turn. The tonal difference is unmistakeable.  There is no voiding of Hinduism as a pagan and misguided majoritarian danger. Today the shoe is on the other foot. It is Nehruvian secularism that is increasingly thought to be bogus.

 Official Iftar parties have been stopped. So have the donning of skull caps and ruling party politicians trotting off to mosques. Temple visits and attendance at pujas has gained considerable prominence in their stead, with the prime minister and several BJP chief ministers leading from the front. Control over temple monies are being returned to the priests, as in a recent decree concerning the  Char Dhams.

 That temple funds should be accessed by the government is a strange impertinence given that the wealth of the Christian institutions and that of the Muslims is not touched. It is also a fact that the Church and the Wakf are the biggest landowners in India still.

 Over the last seven years, a number of strides have been taken to restore Hindu pride. This not only serves a civilisational purpose long suppressed and neglected, but in due course it has every potential to get the country out of the clutches of mass block voting from the Communist-Populist-Islamist combine. Fortunately, this is persistent and successful only in West Bengal, Kerala and to an extent in the half-state of Delhi.  

Cumulatively, the Hindu revival moves not only reveal a momentum but a clear road to the future. The temple at Ayodhya is being built. The Kashi Vishwanath Corridor has been inaugurated. The road access and facilities at the Char Dhams are being transformed. There is to be a ropeway to Kedarnath. A Shankar Acharya statue has been established there. A massive statue of Lord Ram is being built in Ayodhya. Other statues to major deities are also springing up all over the country.  Train services to pilgrimage circuits including those that concern the Buddhists, have been established. Destroyed temples are being rebuilt in Kashmir, and now there is an intent announced to do so in Goa, where they were destroyed by the Portuguese.

The special status of the erstwhile State of Jammu & Kashmir, a more or less Islamic state within a state, has been revoked. A new delimitation exercise is enfranchising sections of the embedded long-term population left out during the decades of Sunni domination in the Kashmir Valley. Karnataka has just passed legislation to outlaw induced or forced conversion, principally of Hindus into Christianity. Other states at risk are likely to follow suit.

Triple Talaq has been outlawed in its most abused form. The marriage age for girls has been raised to 21 and this is intended to be for all religions. Mosques which have encroached on major temples at Varanasi and Mathura are likely to be removed or repurposed. Mosques and Islamic monuments which have been usurped from earlier Hindu edifices or built on destroyed temples are also being looked at. Other temples, ravaged by time, neglect and paucity of funds are also now on the restoration and renovation lists. Earlier only the Islamic structures used to receive government attention to an extent. They still do in places where the Islamic vote is considered crucial.

Today, if the Aga Khan Foundation, for example, wants to do some more continued good in this regard they are most welcome.

 Mughal names to our best roads, our great and ancient cities are being replaced. Allahabad in Uttar Pradesh has already become Prayagraj. Faizabad district has been renamed Ayodhya, and its railway station has become Ayodhya Cantonment . Mughalsarai  has been renamed Deen Dayal Upadhyaya station. Ahmedabad in Gujarat may soon be renamed Karnavati. The name for Hyderabad may be changed to Bhagyanagar, though native Owaisi stoutly opposes the move. Aurangabad in Maharashtra, likewise may be changed to Sambhajinagar though Aghadi constituent Congress opposes the move.   

Name changes of cities and even states based on native sentiments and de-anglicisation, such as Bombay into Mumbai and Bangalore into Bengaluru have been ongoing for quite some time. But the trend away from starting the historical clock with the Mughals has only begun since 2014.

Progressively, it is expected that either invoking Muslim grievance, as in Owaisi, or pandering to Christian and Muslim vote blocks, will not return those who practice it into power, or even the reckoning.

This, because of the once thought impossible consolidation of the Hindu majority vote riding over the schisms of caste, region and language.

It is then that Sudhangshu Trivedi’s argument will begin to prevail over that of Assauddin Owaisi. Muslims must educate themselves and join the mainstream. It is not politic to emphasise their differences. If they are behind today, it is largely a consequence of political pampering, a Madrassa based outlook, and lack of initiative. A minority that is 200 million strong cannot excuse itself indefinitely.   

(1,374 words)

December 24^th, 2021

For: Firstpost

Gautam Mukherjee

 

The Expected Meltdown of the Afghan-Pakistan Axis In 2022

It was noteworthy that despite Prime Minister Imran Khan’s recent doomsday appeal for ‘engagement’ at the Organisation of Islamic Countries (OIC), not one country pledged anything to Afghanistan. The OIC is not alone. After the latest Taliban takeover, very few countries have stepped up to recognise the new regime. Even China is not jumping in both feet first.

Josep Borrell, the EU’s foreign policy chief said ‘Afghanistan is experiencing a serious humanitarian crisis and a socio-economic collapse is looming’. But perceptions of the Taliban, its sponsor Pakistan, and Pakistan’s ‘all-weather’ ally China, have hardened. To be acceptable, the Taliban would have to comply with conditions that are alien to its make-up. And no one trusts that it will stick to commitments, if made, either.

Pakistan however has made quite a policy of it, treating Afghanistan as its depth area, and using the relationship with the Taliban to leverage its own position. Today, both are in danger of an implosion, particularly with the Chinese economy and reach also deeply compromised. The Pakistani Taliban and others could not only attack Pakistani assets but increasingly deracinate the idea of Pakistan. This especially when the Taliban, IS, Pakistan Taliban and other groups in Afghanistan starve, with Pakistan unable to provide any succour.

Pakistan has tried to strike out in different directions after it lost the money provided by both the US and Saudi Arabia. After America, Saudi Arabia and the UAE drew closer to India and Israel, its side-lining became marked. This without counting QUAD, AUKUS and India’s enduring special relationship with Russia which all add up nicely.

Pakistan formed a troika of bankrupts in Malaysia, Turkey and itself. It was designed to wean away Sunni Islamic authority from Saudi Arabia towards Turkey. Turkey aspired to be the new caliphate. But the effort was doomed.

With its failing economy, Erdogan has had to make a policy shift. Turkey has decided to sell 100 of its NATO grade drones to India. This followed by a joint venture for more. It has also stopped talking about sponsoring a jihad in Kashmir. Malaysia similarly not only deposed their anti-India nonagerian President Mahathir Mohamed, but is grateful for its vital palm oil exports being restored.

Turkey has already joined Pakistan on the 39 country Financial Action Task Force (FATF) grey list owing to its own support of terrorism. This label makes it difficult to borrow internationally.

The Emirate of Qatar, the host of the Taliban’s negotiations with the Americans and others, ostensibly to soften Taliban attitudes, is being considered for the FATF grey list too. But smelling the kahwa, Qatar has made new overtures  offering to sell crude  and natural gas on favourable terms to India. Qatar is also making up with the Mohamed Bin Salman (MBS) led Saudi Arabia.

There is much financial chaos in Afghanistan. Nothing is forthcoming except a trickle of humanitarian aid.  No development funds are on offer. The Americans have refused to return Afghan monies placed with them by the erstwhile regime.

Meanwhile, in Pakistan the revolt of the Balochis at Gwadar refuses to die down. The so-called ceasefire with the Pakistan Taliban is also showing strain. A recent explosion in Karachi, ostensibly due to trapped gas in a sewer, killed over a dozen and injured 44. The Pakistani Rangers who came to the rescue at the affected bank, first helped themselves to the money as they had not been paid in three months. Meanwhile another 17 injured died from the delay. A Pakistani fishing boat was caught off the coast of Gujarat by the Indian Navy with 400 Kg of Heroin on board. This kind of arrest has become frequent. While the Government of Pakistan is bankrupt, its terrorism slush funds seem to emanate from drug and gun-running.

Afghanistan’s mineral resources and its possible inclusion in Xi Jinping’s  Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), interests China, but only in principle. The Chinese are worried about their Sunni Uighers in Xinkiang teaming up with the Taliban. And can  they now afford yet another sink-hole for development funds?

Pakistan’s parlous state is only getting worse.  The stage is set for the most handy distraction. Things may be coming to a head shortly. The National Intelligence Council’s (NIC) Strategic Futures Group, a US think-tank, fears terror attacks and miscalculation could trigger a war between China, India, and Pakistan within five years.

Another sizeable Pakistani misadventure against India, either off the LoC, or along the international border could flare up, supported by embedded Chinese resources. A similar situation exists on the LaC with China, near Bhutan at Doklam near the ‘Chicken Neck’, where access to the North East could be cut-off. Chinese backed insurgency in the North East is partially offset by good relations with the junta in Myanmar and the government of Bangladesh. We could do with five years to strengthen our hand as the NIC report says, but will we get it? China needs a military breakthrough in both India and Taiwan to demonstrate their regional hegemony, and putting it off does not make it more likely.

China will seek to create one or more fronts of conflict to divide the Indian forces and make territorial gains. It has recently passed its Land Borders Law which seeks to unilaterally impose land borders on India and others. It is trying the same thing in the maritime zone as well. Perhaps this precedent will come in handy for India. What is good for the goose is good for the gander.

This time, any three-country war will seek to be decisive, as there is much at stake. And it will certainly be expensive for all concerned. While all three are nuclear powers, it is not a viable military option. China’s strategic interests including the China Pakistan Economic Corridor(CPEC), Siachen, Tibet, Bhutan theatres are at stake. Pakistan is probably at its weakest in terms of resources and friends. But it may be egged on to aggression believing in its chances with Chinese help.

If the conflict happens in the J&K area of the LoC, it presents an opportunity for India to reclaim PoK including Gilgit-Baltistan.  This will also provide additional access to the Siachen area. This restoration of Indian territory would dismember the $ 60 billion CPEC in the bargain. Because Xinkiang would be cut-off from the body of Pakistan.

It would also be tempting for India to assist the restive Balochis to destroy the port of Gwadar at the other end of the CPEC. Simultaneously we must push the Chinese back along the LaC and from the Doklam area, and hold on to the territory gained. Our advantage is military prowess hardened by battle and solid logistical advantages. This will prevail against equipment, tactical inferiority, the wages of geography, distance and inexperience.

(1,124 words)

December 22^nd, 2021

For: Firstpost

Gautam Mukherjee   

  The Semiconductor Opportunity

In the 21^st Century, the Great Game is being played out digitally, in Cyberspace. There are two major manufacturers that control its cutting-edge semiconductor heartbeat, namely Taiwan and South Korea.

 In the context of the Indian Cabinet approval for a Rs. 76,000 crore incentive for the desired Aatmanirbhar Semiconductor market, a vast new opportunity is  about to be unleashed.  India has an import bill of nearly $100 billion in semiconductors for scores of industries.

The effort is to establish a comprehensive capability, inclusive of indigenous design, fabrication, testing and packaging. A very sophisticated R&D infrastructure will need to be established, to not only replicate what is being made at present, but to develop even more sophisticated products in future. And vast amounts of clean water and cheap electricity needed in the manufacturing process.

Semiconductors are an expensive business. Start-Ups need a government push, and large corporates too look to policy clarity before venturing into something investment- intensive like this. So now, this lacuna has begun to be addressed at the right time. High technology companies in the field are keen to relocate the outsourced electronic manufacturing from China.

They are fearful of intellectual property theft, especially as China has not been very good at semiconductor manufacture. This outweighs the benefits of low-cost manufacturing incorporating imported semiconductors. Taiwan cannot sell the technology and plant. Its government has already placed restrictions. Collectively, along with Japan, the US, Europe must reduce dependencies or perhaps uproot lock stock and barrel. It’s that, or be vulnerable to future pressures, shortages in the supply chain, and possible Chinese sanctions. 

India’s modest policy formulation presently aims to take the Indian electronic manufacturing industry, consisting mainly of Smart Phones, at $ 75 billion currently, to an impressive $ 300 billion by 2027.

With its vast numbers, India is a major consumer of imported electronic chips in automobiles, defence equipment, appliances, white goods, medical devices, in addition to phones and computers. It has a veritable IT army of young, technologically savvy innovators. With government incentives and backing, there is every reason to expect a new and vibrant Semiconductor ecosystem mushrooming here. The Tata Group is reportedly already in talks with Taiwan manufacturers. Other major corporates in addition to the Unicorns and Start- Up universe is readying to enter the fray.

China is the world’s biggest manufacturer of Silicon. Eight million metric tonnes was manufactured globally in 2020, of which China produced 5.4 million tonnes of this metalloid. Other producers are Norway and Brazil.  This raw material accounted for a value of $6.3 billion in 2019. Silicon is obtained in a reduction process in which Quartz and Coke is smelted in blast furnaces. But the massive value addition, it is seen, is in the subsequent processes to make Silicon Wafers and Semiconductors. Some Silicon is also used in the manufacture of solar panels, aluminium and other materials.

The world demand for Silicon Wafers is upwards of 21.9 billion square centimetres for mobile and smart phones alone. Another 11.3 billion square centimetres was snapped up by desktop, notebook, and server PCs, in 2018.

Ready to use Semiconductors, the heart of the matter, are a $ 552.9 billion global market, growing at 25.6 % year-on-year. That means it is expected to double in four years, and keep doing so  every four years for the medium-term future. It implies there is enough of the pie to go around beyond the current manufacturers - Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, China, some specialist producers in Europe, and of course, the US.

The bulk of these Semiconductors at present go into Mobiles and Smart Phones because every adult on earth wants one. The rest go into everything else electronic, some of it not high-end chip. Almost every device nowadays, major to minor, has electronic circuitry.

But Artificial Intelligence (AI), built into hardware, and robotics, are the future of automation. It alone will consume about $ 65 billion worth of semiconductors by 2025. Indian Start-Ups are busy designing AI architecture already. These young people could well break fresh ground in this field.  All of this may contribute substantially towards India’s ambition to become a $5 trillion economy by 2025.

A large number of English-speaking,  qualified and professional IT manpower at a reasonable cost is something that countries such as Vietnam, Bangladesh and others in  similarly low-cost Asia-Pacific cannot compete with. They can, of course, try and replicate the labour-intensive Chinese assembly model. But India is going for the semiconductors now. Well begun is half done.

The present leaders in the high-end semiconductor producing market are Intel  at $72.8 billion revenue in 2020, and Samsung at $57.7 billion. Samsung already manufactures millions of Android smartphones in India, and has a head start in terms of its knowledge of the Indian environment. Other South Korean companies such as Hyundai and Kia are prominent in the automotive sector. Apple manufactures and sources substantially in Taiwan (semiconductors) and China ( lesser components, assembly), but has started an India plant too.

Taiwan today has a $115 billion contract chip-making and Semiconductor industry, with OEM wafer manufacturing and complete industry supply chain. It is vulnerable because Red China is both threatening and only 100 km. away. It began its semiconductor industry in 1974. In 1987 it pioneered the fabless foundry model. By 2002, it had 40 fabs in operation. In 2007, its semiconductor industry stood second only to Japan. In 2020, Taiwan became the market leader.

Today it supplies 63% of the semiconductor market. South Korea is next with 17%. India is actively wooing Taiwan as it dilutes its own commitment to the One China Policy.  The time has come when Taiwan could well collaborate with India, as America’s storied RCA did with it, in 1974.

And later when Morris Chang, now worth $3 billion at 90 years old, was passed over for the top job in Texas Instruments. He returned to Taiwan in 1987. Chang established Taiwan as a semiconductor super power, using the contract manufacturing route based on design only ‘fabless’ establishments. He started in his mid-fifties and it has only been 34 years since. India won’t have to reinvent the wheel. It will grow a lot faster.

(1,026 words)

December 17^th, 2021

For: Firstpost

Gautam Mukherjee

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Agricultural Reform Is Highly Political

When the Indian Constitution was written, it placed Agriculture on the State and Concurrent List, making it both a State subject and a Central one. Albeit with the preponderance on the States’ authority to legislate on agriculture. The clue on how to proceed after the three farm laws were withdrawn recently by the Centre lies in this fact.  

It may be best to leave it to the States, in the broad interests of  India’s quasi-federalism. However, since 50% of the population still live in rural areas, anything to do with agricultural reform is a political hot potato. States and the Centre as well, tend to throw some relief money via yojanas at it, rather than do something more constructive. The farmer votes are too important.

However, now that the Centre has given up, the States can, individually or severally, implement some parts, or even the whole of the three farm laws withdrawn. This is the theory of it, with modifications to suit their own  requirements. There is a serious danger however of letting agricultural reform stagnate, rather than disturb the hornet’s nest afresh.

It is broadly true that the bulk of the states and union territories have not protested the reformist farm laws. But neither have they been particularly vocal in their support.

Indian agriculture has long been in an existential crisis, even as there have been bumper and surplus crops. Paradoxically, there have been hundreds, if not thousands of farmer suicides, in states such as Maharashtra. This despite frequent waivers of farm loans as a stop-gap measure. Droughts and floods play havoc as well.

The present scenario suggests that Indian agriculture suffers from chronic problems that a democratic set up cannot solve. But this may provide the second clue. It is unlikely that any reform designed to benefit the small farmer can be implemented without the concurrence of their de facto bosses.

In the case of these recent protests, Opposition political parties, other interests such as alleged Khalistanis, have jumped on the bandwagon.But they haven’t managed to take over.

That the latest position of the protestors is to go home from the various borders of Delhi, and review the situation in January 2022, is heartening. This has come about after written assurances from the central government that all their demands, have been met.  The protestors  camped out for the last 15 months, stormed the Red Fort, and  allegedly lost several hundred lives. Many rounds of talks prior to this final resolution proved fruitless.

The intent of the three central laws was to empower the small farmer to sell his produce wherever he wanted. This, beyond government-controlled state mandis, via commission agents, using digital platforms, corporate contracts, and other means as necessary. While farmers from several states reported beneficial sales as a consequence, adding value to the central government’s desire to double farm income, the protestors from three states had a different view.

These were farmers and associated people, mainly from Punjab, but also from Haryana and Western Uttar Pradesh. They said, among other things, that the three farm laws would lead to a relentless corporatisation of agriculture. The small farmers would have, over time, taken dictation on prices and crops from business houses that would become very influential. There was also suspicion that the Minimum Support Price (MSP) system would be withdrawn in favour of this free-market environment. This would destroy the livelihoods of the commission agents, and place great hardships on small farmers, dependent on the agents for loans and leverage with the state and central government.

In fact, the withdrawing farmers want a widening of the MSP structures. Basically, the desire is that the government must guarantee agricultural offtake and income for all produce in perpetuity, even if it distorts retail pricing of food items.

The distortion is not just in pricing. In Punjab, a major, if inappropriate paddy producer, from times when there was a shortage, is now facing crisis level water shortages plus pollution evils from stubble-burning. Also, the paddy grown in essentially dry state Punjab, is inferior to that from Madhya Pradesh and other better rain-fed states. Punjab ends up importing this good paddy from other states for its own consumption, even as it sells its sub-standard paddy to the government at MSP. However, fierce vested interests prevent any change in crop patterns.

In several other states, another high-water consumption crop, sugarcane, is produced in huge supply owing to MSP support. Exports are difficult because of generally lower international prices. Local consumption plus factory demand from those who make molasses and ethanol is insufficient. Payments to farmers are inordinately delayed. The government is now making efforts to absorb the extra sugarcane to make bio-fuel to blend with petrol. This will cut imports of petroleum in due course if all associated issues are tackled.

In Mughal and British Raj times, almost all taxation involved impositions on the peasants who worked the land for their overlords. This and tolls for access and safe passage by road or waterways were principal sources of revenue. There were also conquests of territory and demands for indemnity from the defeated or weaker kingdoms.  

These agrarian taxes were demanded and collected from the land owners, the jagirdars, zamindars and higher nobility. Sometimes they were taken in produce and grain. At other times they were required to be sold and the resultant gold and silver directed upwards. The structure therefore always had a dominant collector on top of the peasant farmers. The British too had their Collectors who sat above, and took the tithes from the landlords.

When Zamindaris were abolished in the fifties under the influence of Fabian Socialism, so was agrarian taxation. The politicised and connected took over instead as de facto overlords. The peasants neither had the leadership nor the spine to fend for themselves.

They didn’t then and do not now. The Modi government too decided the political cost was not worth it. ‘No good deed goes unpunished’ as the saying goes. But our antiquated poor farmers seem oblivious.

(1,001 words)

December 10^th, 2021

For: Firstpost

Gautam Mukherjee

 

He Says Come Over And Bring A Bag

He says come over and bring a bag. What, we have to move bodies? No he’s found a sideboard full of bottles of Chivas Regal. Whose? You know, the house he’s looking after, next to the park. Friend’s gone abroad. Rich fellow. His friend’s stash. He’s stealing the booze? Well, he’s called us and a few others. Wants us to take some away. We should go. And yes, there’s some kind of event in the park as well, a wedding or a musical performance or something. There’ll be a lot of people there. I think we ought to take a bottle or two from our side and offer it about. Its good to steal his friend’s booze but it looks better if we share some of ours. And so we went. We saw the sideboard open. No booze lying about. Maybe we were late. It didn’t seem right to ask. We walked into the park. Sure enough. Lots of people. I took out a bottle to share with folks on our table. Then the chap comes to ask us back to the house. We go but all the booze is gone. There’s nothing to put in the bag. Others at the park must have got wind of it. I went to the toilet. The sink was broken. Drunks. Went back to our table in the park. Our bottle was gone. This was not turning out right. Time to leave. Back to the car hoping I’d find it there. Good I didn’t bring the wife in the middle of all this greed. Got in and set off. Feeling stupid about it all. Couldn’t lay my hands on a single drink while the whole place was drunk. Never pursue this pie in the sky stuff again. A bottle down in the bargain. Chivas indeed. Not a fan.

 

November 28^th, 2021

Gautam Mukherjee

 

 Declining Fertility Will Be A Great Boon In The Long Run

 Being the most populous of countries is an economic no-no. The good news on population control has arrived at last, close to our 75^th year of Independence. The latest National Family Health Survey(NFHS), the 5^th in series, released by the Ministry of Health on 24^th November 2021, indicates Indians have stabilised their numbers on average, at just about replacement rate.

There is, in addition, a sharp bias in some states and UTs towards declining population. Overall, and in all regions, female births have increased holistically.

2.1 children per child bearing woman is globally considered to be the ‘no growth’ statistic. India overall now has 2.0. Some states have rates as low as 1.6.  The highest has a rate of 3, with several states returning a range between 2 and 3.

Fortunately for India, 65% of the population are younger than 35 and 50% are younger than 25 at present. This will change as the population ages rapidly post 2035. Then the edge to our often discussed ‘demographic dividend’  will reduce, but as the world changes rapidly through technological innovation, this will not matter.

We need to absorb that this is the era of mechanisation growing as fast as supercomputing. The earlier models based loosely on the Industrial Revolution of the 19^th century onwards are out of date. Today we are in the age of factories and trains that run themselves, with very small human staff requirements. Competitiveness and efficiency dictate this. This is the age of robotics, artificial intelligence, preventive medicines, cloning, surrogacy, gene splicing, drones, digital commerce, software-based controls. In short, the dominance of high technology and not population in everything. The labour-intensive models are going obsolete in most areas of endeavour.

In India, we already have a problem with rampant unemployment and under employment. And to an extent, jobless growth. Skilling and reskilling to take on new roles constantly will be imperative for both the young and not so young. 

This does not mean that present momentum from more fecund states with high growth rates of between 2 to 3 per child-bearing woman, won’t stop us overtaking China as the most populous country by 2031, a decade later than earlier expected.

It is further estimated we will reach figures of 1.50 billion by 2036, and 1.7 to 1.8 billion by 2050. The decline, per current projections can come only after that. However, the survey shows a holistic decline in the birth rate in all cases from the earlier survey of 2011. We need to accelerate this.

Part of this present reduction in population trends can be attributed to a 67% contraceptive usage, again sharply up from earlier figures of 54% in 2011. Greater health awareness in women, spacing of children, better nutrition,  medical care,  connectivity, aspiration towards education and upward mobility for progeny, have also changed things greatly.

Too many mouths to feed may not be India’s threat going forward. We have surplus production of foodgrains today. Storage, inventory management, distribution, will have to be improved. Currently, there is much waste, further vitiated by mandatory MSPs in many instances resulting in inappropriate water intensive crops being grown in unnecessary abundance, such as paddy and sugarcane. MSPs distort market economics, but few involved care about this.

India is a net exporter of foodgrain, but the quality is not very good. Water, including irrigated water, ground water, rainwater is under immense pressure. Ditto electricity, often unpaid for by farmers. This is not going to get better with more people around with urban and manufacturing hubs also demanding more and more.

India is now a leading producer of milk, cereal, pulses, vegetables, fruit, cotton, sugarcane, fish, poultry and livestock in the world. But there are  too many underemployed farmers. Land holdings are tiny. The recent NFHS survey 2021 expects 60% of the population to stay rural in 2036 even after the broadly declining trend in population. This is not a happy 21^st century statistic.

The US works its productive mechanised farms, albeit subsidised, with just 4% just of its population of around 334 million stabilised for decades now.

The population growth in India however has been stabilised at last without having to resort to draconian measures like China’s One Child Policy. But it needs a declining trend across the board of the minimum obtained so far, which is just 1.6.  

India’s population has more than trebled to 1.39 billion in the 75 years since Independence. This is already 17.7% of the world population. This percentage will grow unless our own slowdown in population is accelerated. 

The dream of a decent standard of living as obtained in the developed countries can only come with a sharp rise in per capita income. Life expectancy has soared. The death rate has declined. Millions have been lifted above the poverty line. All this is good.

Despite stellar GDP expectations of 9% year-on-year, the highest in the world for a major economy, making one child per second is a huge problem.

At present India has the 5th largest economy, at about $ 3 trillion, but even when it gets to 3rd, after the US and China, expected by 2030, there will be a strong divide between haves and have-nots. There will be more billionaires, millionaires, upper and middle class, but also more paupers. As things stand, unless the next survey shows a much rosier picture, a net reduction in population will occur only in the last decades of the 21^st century.

For countries in Europe with small 20^th century populations in the first place, and zero population growth for decades since, wolves of the forest have reclaimed deserted villages. Immigration from poor, often war-torn countries such as Syria are the norm. But this causes societal rifts, religious tension and culture shocks.

But this is certainly not going to be India’s problem.  But as population keeps growing, so will conflict between followers of different religions,  cultural practice and linguistic diversity. People will live cheek by jowl as the fastest population growth will be in urban India. Life will become far more competitive with resources always outstripping demand. So let us hope the good news on declining population is a case of well begun is half done.

 

(1,021 words)

November 26^th, 2021

For: Firstpost

Gautam Mukherjee

 

 

 

Cryptocurrency: Its Time Has Come

Cryptocurrency is the Guy Fawkes to sovereign legal tender. This 21^st century avatar is the disruptive spawn of the digital age, now using stage three of  internet efficiency and proliferation, dubbed Web3. It offers a global currency that goes by thousands of names. But none of them have underlying assets like national currencies. Neither is their value guaranteed. Its reckoning comes from an investment frenzy of speculation and the times it lands from cyberspace to transact with conventional currency.

This virtual Guy Fawkes used the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto for its alleged inventor. It does not want to blow up the King and the House of Lords. It simply wants to operate as it is, anonymously, without regulation, across the digital universe. A self-driving train without a central bank at its apex.

Ten odd years since Bitcoin, the best known of the cryptocurrencies started in 2009, Indians own 60% of the world’s cryptocurrencies via 15 million people, trading, investing, or creating blocks for the chain in a process named mining.

Large cryptocurrency exchanges such as WazirX, CoinDCX, Giottus, Zebpay and Bitbns here are partnered by Punjab National Bank, IDFC First Bank, Federal Bank, Deutsche Bank, Bank of India, Bank of Maharashtra, Indian Bank. This lot clocked trading volumes of $ 977.68 million on the spot market on the 24^th of November 2021.The biggest banks such as SBI, HDFC and ICICI  Bank have stayed away so far.

Foreign firms such as Tiger Global, Sequioa Capital, b Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, Paradigm, Ribbit Capital, pumped in $ 500 million  into India’s cryptocurrency and blockchain technology in 2021. This has taken the Indian valuation to $ 1.9 billion, up from $ 500 million six months ago.

It is not all speculation. Tata Steel has executed a Standard Chartered Bank/Contour blockchain-enabled, paperless export order, to a metals major in Bangladesh. This follows on from an HSBC platform enabled trade finance transaction with a UAE based company in April 2021. These fraud-proof, confidential, and safe blockchain transactions, could be completed in hours instead of days, bypassing a heap of paperwork. Blockchain technology offers a collective of users that perform their own gatekeeping and custodial functions.

But all is not well in paradise. Valuations of the some 6,000 odd cryptocurrencies in operation are volatile, and do not operate with safety nets of any kind. The big ones are Bitcoin, Ethereum, Tether, Solana, Cardano, Polkadot, Avalanche. A New York based website CoinDesk provides news on cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin valuation at its highest ever was $69,000 earlier this November. It was at $55, 460.96 on 24^th November 2021.

 There is an effort to market cryptocurrencies as a get-rich-quick scheme for gullible investors. This could come back to bite the government in the absence of regulation.

However, news of coming Indian government legislation in the winter session of parliament also panicked  up to a 20% decline in value.A similar knee-jerk reaction followed on from remarks made by the RBI governor in April 2021.

It is a computer-generated phenomenon, using a  book-building process it calls ‘mining’. It is a peer-to-peer payment system and operates internationally with no exchange rate arbitrage. Bitcoin is used to buy goods and services at networked online stores, turns into cash at designated Bitcoin ATMs, and can even transact at some brick-and-mortar establishments. Many people use it as an investment to speculate on its ups and downs. Bitcoin balances are kept in encrypted online ledgers. It descends from cyberspace to cash in its chips for hard currency, or in exchange for goods and services.

Truth be told, no government can actually stop it, given that they are all becoming more and more dependent on the digital universe. It has created its own crypto platform on a raft of computers. Like an amoeba, it can break away, multiply and reform in fresh clusters, if threatened. Countries worry about its run-away potential to be used for ‘illegal transactions’, even as they grapple with ways to put a saddle and bridle on it.  But a hamfisted approach could drive it out of reach into the encrypted Dark Web.

If you can’t beat it, you may have to join it. This seems to be what India proposes to do, with the issue of its own RBI issued cryptocurrency. Some are already naming it Bharatcoin. It will probably muck in on the ‘private sector’ Bitcoin and friends user platforms. This will give it a large slice of the cryptocurrency pie, infiltrate this anonymous universe to better understand how it works, and gain the opportunity to make further advances.

Attempting to invent its own international delivery system will kill it dead in the water, especially if other governments decide to also launch. Besides Niti Aayog is already proposing ‘full-stack digital banks’ to end physical branches run entirely on the Web3 internet. It cites the success of UPI with over Rs. 4 lakh crores in value of transactions, while Aadhar based authentications have reached 55 crores.

Prescient El Salvador, the first country to do so, has accepted Bitcoin, the first and most famous of the cryptocurrencies, as legal tender from June 2021. It works alongside normal money for purchases and payments. Cuba and Ukraine are also in the process.

The US, mainly with a view to harness it for taxation has classified it, not as currency but a ‘Money Services Business’ (MSB). It already operates legitimately in the US ‘Derivatives’ market. The American Internal Revenue Service (IRS) or taxation arm, classifies Bitcoin as ‘property’. And where the US goes, most of the free world must follow.

Canada calls Bitcoin a ‘Commodity’. Australia classifies it as an ‘Asset’. The EU also allow its use, and has exempted it from Value Added Tax (VAT).  Britain has put Bitcoin under some tax regulations. Germany is regarded as the Crypto capital of Europe. Many of its stores  have been accepting Bitcoin for several years now. Recently, Germany has passed a law to allow special funds to allocate 20% of their capital in crypto assets. India is about to try regulating them, with a view to taxing them as assets, put in protective provisions to safeguard the unwary, and perhaps try to popularise the sarkari offering by banning private cryptocurrencies.

Interestingly, both China and Russia, large totalitarian systems, have banned cryptocurrencies. How they will enforce such a ban offshore remains to be seen. Minnows such as Vietnam, Bolivia, Columbia and Ecuador have also turned their backs on Bitcoin. 

Bitcoin is the potential darling of black money, a digital hawala on the brink of legitimacy worldwide. It can be used anonymously by intelligence services, evangelists, angel investors, international NGOs, tax-dodgers, criminals, drug cartels, terrorists, and anybody willing to take some risk for possible profit. Like the internet, it is a freeing agent. There is no guarantee than Indians will use ‘Bharatcoin’ when they want to do something naughty or illegal. The only way to regulate it is by following suspicious digital trails and nab the money when it lands in the conventional monetary universe.

 It seems like many moons ago when Shri Ajit Panja, then Minister of Information and Broadcasting (I&B), responded to an ignorant clamour in parliament that wanted Satellite TV banned. Pernicious content, said the naysayers. It will spoil the morals of our children and youth. And this when there was just Star TV available in addition to DD. There was no internet beyond slow ‘dial-up’ in rare clusters.

Panja, in turn, said it couldn’t be done. This country was served by a satellite in space that had a giant  ‘footprint’ ranging from Singapore to the Arabian Gulf, with India in-between. It was a far cry from the technology used by terrestrial TV. Anyone could make a dish antenna in a roadside workshop in the event the government was tempted to ban their manufacture. Now, in the age of OTT and streaming, and yes, Web3, this Panja story seems unreal.

In Afghanistan, then also under Mullah Omar’s Taliban, people made dish antennas to access banned pornography. You were hung if you were caught there, but this did not deter people.

Cryptocurrency is here to stay. It has already knocked a few spots off the concept of sovereignty, and will only advance its game in future. Blockchain works. So does Mining. We may be headed towards a World Currency. All one can do is join the fray and try to duke it out in the free market in the interim.

(1,399 words)

November 25^th, 2021

For: The Sunday Guardian

Gautam Mukherjee