Who Is The Fascist In Germany?

What is going on in Germany now is deeply ironic, given the left-leaning German coalition government’s penchant for criticising India at every turn. It does so, supported by its leftist media like Der Spiegel and DW, using slanted, prejudiced, badly-researched, false, and spurious information.

It calls India out on its alleged communalism, human-rights violations, the ‘occupation of Kashmir’, repression of Khalistanis, Hindu majoritarianism, persecution of minorities, including Christians and Muslims. They could not find a way to criticise India’s economic handling, because it will very soon overtake Germany, growing as it is, at a good rate of 7% p.a. compared to Germany’s 0.2%.

You would be forgiven to assume that Germany must be a paragon of virtue. And yet, it is clear that it cannot stomach criticism coming its own way. It cracks down just like the former Nazi fascists it accuses the Far-Right of admiring.

Nevertheless, the German left, government and media alike, tend to believe their own lies. It is seen they do not listen to our protests or mend their ways. Left-run Germany also does not care for India’s neutral stance on the Ukraine War, and indeed its close bilateral relationship with Russia.

So much so, that Germany has been reluctant to share high technology for submarines with India. This has changed now because of its economic desperation.  

Now Germany has taken a U turn and is very keen to collaborate with us on the submarines, despite a very close relationship with China, its largest trading partner. Which, of course, probably has something to do with the supercilious  anti-India stance in the first place.

On the other hand, highly admired German luxury cars are sold widely in India and are much in demand.

While Olaf Scholz is Chancellor now, and visited India recently during the G20 Summit in New Delhi, the four earlier terms of arch-leftist Angela Merkel were anti-Indian too. At the same time Germany’s trade with China boomed, albeit in China’s favour.

Merkel also let in millions of refugees from war-torn Syria, partially to address a labour shortage for the menial jobs. So, in a very real sense, it is the excesses of the long-serving Leftist governments that have given rise to the Right today.

Inevitably, the immigrants are now asserting themselves. Many have moved up the ladder from the menial jobs. Ones shortly off the boat are more rough and ready. They assert their Islamic identity quite vigorously, even violently, to the dismay of the local White population.

And yet, its Right Wing wants the Americans out and not just the immigrants, and friendship with Russia in its place. Perhaps it is they, now being persecuted by their own government, who understand the shape of the future rather better. Germany has been suffering, more than others, with high gas prices, after being forced by  an outdated NATO to cut off the Russian gas, for example.

The latest move of this left-liberal German government is to crack down on the anti-immigrant, anti-refugee, and anti-minority movement, mostly amongst growing numbers of White Germans.

Suddenly, two days ago, the government acted. It caused a sensation in the international media, when it shut down a right wing magazine, calling it anti-semitic to boot. It conducted fascist-style raids to close down the print, online and film organisation and ban its operations. It was blatant state-sponsored censorship. 

Earlier the German government, made up of three left-leaning parties, also froze the bank accounts of people who donated money to any group the government declared to be ‘far right’.  

The causes for the crack-down are probably deeper. The German Federal Government’s Interior Ministry, is rattled by an upswing in support for the Right Wing political party Alternative fur Deutschland (AfD). That is why it raided and shut down the most influential right wing Compact Magazine. It also shut down its associated film production company Conspect Film.

This action, which may be held illegal by the courts, also flies in the face of Germany’s ‘counterspeech doctrine’ that was meant to allow contrary viewpoints in the interests of democracy.

Raids were conducted at the offices and homes of Compact functionaries to confiscate assets and evidence.

Compact Magazine had a print run of 40,000 copies and a much larger online following of around 350,000. Justifying the closure, Interior Minister Nancy Faesar called Compact a ‘Mouthpiece of the far-right extremist scene’.

Compact was cited as a ‘nexus’ for various right wing extremist and xenophobic groups including not only the very popular AfD, but also the Pegida and Identitarian movements. AfD came second in the European parliamentary elections recently and ran at first place in most of the East German states. So it cannot be dismissed as irrelevant from the political landscape.

While the German government cited threats to the constitution by closing down and banning Compact and Conspect, it actually has an Article 5 that guarantees freedom of speech, expression, and opinion to its citizens.

How bogus rankings can be, is illustrated by the 2008 Freedom in the World  report by the US funded Freedom House  that gave Germany a score of ‘1’, the best possible, for both political rights and civil liberties. The German press freedom index number for 2024 was 83.84, ranking it 10^th globally.

The reason for banning and shutting down Compact now is thought to be because German federal elections are coming up soon and the Left Wing wants to weaken AfD.

Editor-in-chief Jurgen Elsasser of the erstwhile monthly Compact magazine liked to irk the government by using slogans like ‘Americans go home’ and ‘Friendship with Russia’ at events of the far right.  

The shut-down and ban is unlikely to quell the unhappiness of the general public with the way the leftist governments have been handling things, and their lacklustre performance. It may seem decisive now but it could come back to haunt them.

(972 words)

July 18^th, 2024

For: Firstpost/News18.com

Gautam Mukherjee

 

Reliance Jio Bharti Airtel and Now Adani Enterprises Compete To Roll Out 5G

Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel have completed an All-India rollout of 5G networks. They have cumulatively aggregated over 100 million 5G customers according to Julian Gorman Head of Asia Pacific (APAC), GSMA. Gorman was speaking at the 7^th edition of the ETTelecom 5G/6G Congress 2024 held in March at London. Both Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel have recently raised their rates, cartel-fashion, in an effort to be profitable.

The potential number of users in a country of 1.4 billion plus people is the great attraction. There are more than a billion phones in use already (1.18 billion per 2021 data). And a large proportion, even at the bottom of the pyramid, are smart phones, used at a minimum for entertainment streaming and the like. 5G will work faster and better. The gross revenue from the telecom industry was Rs 64, 801 crores ($8.74 billion) in the first quarter of FY 22 as per government data from then. At least another 500 million new internet users will be added in India in the five years from 2022 to 2027.

The prospects have recently lured the Adani Group also into the fray. This, after  it spent time denying that it intended to do so.

However, even with three big contenders, the competition is likely to intensify, and might grow uncomfortable. The pie is big enough to go around, and there is no absolute necessity to step on each other’s toes. Having said that, it will have to be a discovery process in tier 2,3, and 4 cities, even as jostling each other in the metro cities could benefit the consumer, if not the provider. The government will gain from further spectrum sales. Adani has only bought limited spectrum so far for its operations in Gujarat, and not enough to roll out a consumer foray.

Rural India too will be served much better than before, probably using satellite linkages, the cost of which will have to be absorbed by the companies till the  consumer numbers are large enough and viably clustered.

The other weak player in the current mix in India is Vodafone Idea (VI), back from the dead, but still ailing.  VI has succeeded in only rolling out a network in four circles it operates in, with the four vendors there. This is a minimum rollout obligation (MRO), to stay in the game, even though Vodafone Idea has not succeeded in rolling out a commercial network as yet.

 As of the end of 2023, some 5.6 billion people worldwide are using mobile telephony. Of these 58% are using broadband and 18% of these users are now using 5G. And the data usage per consumer in the second largest market for mobile telephony in the world and probably the cheapest, is growing exponentially.

The lucrative nature of the telecommunications beast has attracted both the Mukesh Ambani led Reliance Group and the Adanis. These groups are matched in size. Both are simultaneously in heavier businesses, the former anchored in petrochemicals and refining, and the latter in ports, infrastructure, transshipments. It is only Bharti Airtel that is mainly, and one might broadly suggest, only in telecommunications. Bharti has encountered some headwinds in its efforts to stay profitable, not being in a position to cross fertilise its yields.

India is rapidly establishing itself as the most digitalised country in the world. It is inexpensive, accurate, swift and relatively safe if all protocols are followed. More and more Indians are learning to trust the process, as the government vigorously promotes digital usage.

Mukesh Ambani was indeed an early entrant into telecommunications, but had to back off after the Reliance Group was divided between himself and his younger brother Anil. There was a seven-year period during which he could not compete with the Anil Ambani led Reliance Communications. At the end of this period, there was a second coming, christened Reliance Jio. Because of very competitive pricing and deep pockets, Reliance Jio soon built-up enviable numbers, both in terms of subscribers and market share. Reliance Communications meanwhile, sadly failed.  

Principal rival and survivor Bharti Airtel was helped by its win of the Mumbai and Delhi circles early in the day. Others, like Escotel, eventually collapsed after making heavy losses, because its/their circles were not so creamy. There were not many survivors out of a dozen that existed in 2016. Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance actually got a chance to launch afresh with free calls and cheap data. It soon gained a 40% market share.

Based on the Vodafone experience, presumably other international mobile telephony companies will stay away from India’s mass market, even in joint venture, because of its low rates. They may, at best become passive investors and leave the operations to the Indian operators.

The 6G rollout is also lurking in the wings, and happily, all three big players are able to take care of its demands. China had hoped to roll it out, along with 5G at cut-throat prices, not just in India but in Europe, America, and Canada. But it was not possible to allow it because of spying suspicions and security concerns. China would have done better to not be so predatory but it never seems to learn.

The Reliance Group has entered hospitality, retail, fashion, toys, hydrogen. Adani is in real estate development, green energy. Both are seeking multiple touch points with the consuming and aspirational public. The Ambani children are already at the helm of many of these new companies, with the 67 year old patriarch as overseer, patron and facilitator.

One can’t say about Bharti Airtel, because of its lack of diversification, but it is likely that both the Reliance Group and the Adanis will emerge soon as trillion dollar conglomerates. They will be willing and able to contribute even more to the mission of India becoming a developed country in all respects by 2047, our centenary year.

(976 words)

July 17^th, 2024

For: thesquirrels.in

Gautam Mukherjee

 

Mukesh And Nita Ambani Organise An Industrial Scale Sanatani Dharma Wedding With Glitzy Celebrations Over Four Months For National And International Guests

This was the mother and father of tradition observing, and yet modern, big fat Hindu Wedding. Perhaps this is a contradiction in terms, but as the saying goes ‘we are like this only’.

This wedding will be difficult to surpass in scale, size, banquetry, jewels, watches,  presents,wedding outfits, vehicles, jets on hire, star power, associated  razz-ma-tazz -  a potent messaging for years to come.  It is a wedding that has set a record on par with anything that went on in the reign of Louis IV, the Sun King, at Versailles, or at the coronation of the Emperor Bokassa I in the Central African Republic (CAR). Except, here, the essential difference is that the Ambanis will not go bankrupt. Far, very far, from it.

The wedding most deliberately flies in the face of Gandhian simplicity, Macaulay induced squeamishness, notions of taste and vulgarity sought to be imposed by some.

And yet, it ran true to the best traditions of Sanatan Dharma. The Ambanis conducted a Bhandara in Mumbai for four months that fed hundreds of people. They organised and paid for mass weddings of poor people with gifts of clothes, gold for the brides, and rupees one lakh each for the grooms.

Their own celebrations and wedding was unabashed, massive, exuberant and cost some $156 million. Some say, the preliminary bash at Jamnagar alone cost $150 million.

Mukesh and Nita Ambani, who head their second-generation business along with Mukesh’s mother Kokilaben, find themselves near the top of Indian industry. They have spent an estimated 0.5% of their wealth on the four month wedding extravaganza. But then, Mukesh Ambani, 67, is the richest man in Asia, and the 9^th richest man in the world, with a personal net worth of about $ 124 billion.

The wedding and celebrations were criticised by the usual suspects, who want India to be seen as an impoverished country and feel threatened by this strong show of  North Indian Hindu tradition and culture. The Ambanis however are used to it. They put on a similar show for the marriage of their daughter Isha in 2018, for which they had invited American entertainer Beyonce.

This wedding will take time to sink in for its full import, but it spoke to the world of the coming of age, not just of a leading industrial group, but of the Bharat of 2024. One that is on its way shortly to becoming the 3^rd largest economy in the world. One that will go from a $ 4 trillion in GDP to three times as much at the very least, fuelled by its 7% growth rate, the biggest amongst major economies in the world. A country that believes it will be a developed country in every respect by its centenary year 2047.

 The pre-wedding celebrations were kicked off at the Ambani petrochemical complex and city of Jamnagar. Dozens of national and international big-wigs came to it among the 1,200 guests. They included Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner.  This time, Rihanna came to perform, as did many Bollywood stars. Diljit Dosanjh  electrified the audience with his performance.

It is also there in Jamnagar that Anant Ambani, the groom, and the youngest Ambani son, works and lives as the resident Director in-charge. Anant Ambani has also created an animal hospital and sanctuary over 3,000 acres in the area. This too was unveiled to the public as an opener, with Anant emphasising it was a sanctuary for traumatised and injured animals, including elephants, and not a zoo.

The Ambanis have restored and rebuilt scores of Hindu temples in the Jamnanagar-Chorwad area in Gujarat, which they hail from. One or two of the temples were featured in the media recently, as part of the wedding build up.

The Ambanis are also major sponsors of Lord Krishna temples, including the Shrinathji Temple, at Nathdwara in Rajasthan. Here too, they made preliminary visits leading up to the auspicious occasion.

Wedding celebrations continued aboard a yacht in Italy, during a four-day cruise in June, from Palermo to the South of France with stops in Rome, Portofino, Genoa and Cannes for a series of parties. Several international singers including The Backsteet Boys and Kate Perry were engaged to entertain the selected eight hundred odd guests. Several restaurants were engaged to provide vegetarian fare such as focaccia, paneer tikka-beetroot, and goat-cheese kebabs. In addition there were lobster sandwiches.

Many locals however, were irate, at the taking over of Portofino exclusively for the Ambani guests. The Genovese complained about the loud music till nearly dawn.The Ambanis paid for the privilege, and all the local authorities were satisfied, if not the uninvited local media.

 And the wedding celebrations culminated in multi-day ceremonies and occasions in Mumbai in mid July.

Prime Minister Modi attended the Ashirwad, held the day after the nuptials.  The final celebrations were entertained by American singer Justin Beiber. The several days here were attended by most of India’s A list actors, others like John Cena, Kim Kardashian, politicians from the ruling party and the opposition, former British prime ministers Tony Blair and Boris Johnson, cricket superstars Sachin Tendulkar and Mahendar Singh Dhoni.

But contrast this with our earlier projections. Fortunately, long gone are the days when Prime Minister Nehru called in a snake charmer to amuse Jacqueline Kennedy in the 1960s - nearly twenty years after independence. A telling photograph of the event was followed up by Mrs Kennedy becoming a guest of the Maharaja of Jaipur to live in a palace, enjoy royal banquets and entertainments, and witness polo matches.

Nothing much was done, it seems, to change the Kiplingesque ‘Jungle Book’ style image of an India of Gunga Din, Fakirs on beds of nails, others who could climb an unsupported rope, and of course, tigers that roamed the forests, still allowed to be hunted by VIP guests from Britain. And yes, snake charmers for the King Cobras.

Prime Minister Nehru saw no contradiction between his ardent Fabian Socialist principles and admiration of Soviet five-year plans which India aped. Alongside, he established the first of top-class government financed higher education institutions, dams, heavy industry. Heavy industry was to take up the ‘commanding heights of the economy’, and be regarded as the modern ‘temples’.

Nehru was notoriously against promoting Hindu temples, Sanatan Dharma and its traditions, because he thought they were both majoritarian, and obscurantist to boot. He stoutly opposed the restoration of Somnath Temple destroyed by Islamic invaders, including Allauddin Khilji, for example. It still got done, with the help of first President of India, Rajendra Prasad and others.   

Subsequent years after Nehru, but persistent socialism inflicted shortages of everything, saw restrictions on the number of wedding guests, scarcity of milk that occasioned bans on milk based sweet meats for weddings and ceremonies. Things were so bad it is difficult to believe nowadays.  

Today we still have erstwhile Maharajahs, but they do much more than play polo and take pictures of wild animals they are banned from hunting. Some are politicians, others are hoteliers, conservationists and industrialists.

 Yes, we are proudly Hindu, but we are also doing everything possible to realise our potential in the modern world. The spectacular wedding of Anant Ambani and Radhika Merchant is a tribute to this fact.

(1,208 words)

July 14^th, 2024

For: Firstpost/News18.com

Gautam Mukherjee

 

The Original Sin Of A Badly Managed Brexit Eventually Led To The End Of Conservative Rule Of 14 years

The landslide Labour Party victory in Britain after 14 years could be beneficial for the India-UK relationship. Britain should be hungry for trade, industrial collaboration and new markets, and India could provide a very lucrative opportunity. The outgoing Tory government has failed to fill the trade vacuum after Brexit, even though the referendum and vote to exit came eight years ago.

With India, Rolls Royce has signed an agreement, but only as recently as January 2024, to work with India’s Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers Limited (GRSE), to manufacture MTU Series 4000 Marine Engines in India for the Indian Navy and Coast Guard. Rolls Royce makes a range of state-of-the-art naval application engines. This, at GRSE’s Diesel Engine manufacturing plant at Ranchi. Rolls Royce has also signed a seven-year agreement with Azad Engineering, based in Hyderabad, for it to manufacture critical components for its aircraft engines, again at end January 2024.  

More initiatives in line with India’s atmanirbhar defence manufacturing policy could be welcomed by New Delhi. Let us hope the incoming Labour government acts with more urgency than its predecessor. The FTA agreement should have been finalised at least a couple of Diwalis ago, but Keir Starmer has already referred to it as a priority on the campaign trail.

The ‘original sin’ as far as domestic politics in Britain is concerned, was committed by the Tories, when they held the 2016 referendum on Brexit. This act, under David Cameron as prime minister, was expected to result in a negative vote against leaving the EU. Instead, as is often the case in such yes or no binary votes, the United Kingdom voted to leave the EU. It was a narrow thing, 48% against to 52% for, but it illustrated the famous British class divide. The poor and working class voted to leave EU, the middle classes and above wanted to stay part of Europe.

David Cameron, an upper class ‘toff’, most recently acting as Rishi Sunak’s Foreign Minister, had also risked his arm with Scotland in a similar referendum in 2014. There, only 44% voted for Scottish independence, while an unprecedented 86% of the electorate voted in that referendum. And so, Cameron thought to repeat the feat with regard to the EU.

The Scottish vote had gone along the lines expected. It proved to be a setback for the separatists including Scotland’s then ‘First Minister’ Nicola Sturgeon and leader of the Scottish Nationalist Party (SNP). Sturgeon worked as head of SNP from Cameron’s day to the early part of Rishi Sunak’s prime ministership, but with no real traction for SNP’s separatist plank.  

Coming to today, in the 2024 election, the Labour Party took most of the Scottish seats, with the separatist SNP Party nearly wiped out, winning just 9 seats. Scotland definitely does not want to leave the United Kingdom.

David Cameron promptly resigned after the Brexit vote, and left the matter of negotiating Brexit with the EU to his successor. After that, Tory prime ministers came thick and fast trying to get out of the EU with reasonable terms. Of these, the oft described as ‘bizarre’ Boris Johnson was the most successful. But Britain has not recovered from this radical surgery still. And amongst other things that brought Tory rule to a decisive end 14 years later, Brexit is one of the thorniest thorns embedded deep in the flesh of subsequent economic woes.

Anti-incumbency is a hydra headed thing, and most analysts advance more recent causes such as high prices, unemployment, withdrawal of a host of subsidies that have made it harder to live. The government revenues have proved inadequate and further borrowings have become unsustainable.  Inflation is rampant, and prices have sky-rocketed. So much so, that ordinary people are struggling to put food on the table.

Illegal immigration, taking scarce jobs from those who most need them, is a hot button issue that the Tories have tried and failed to tackle.

Meanwhile, The Labour Party has been reforming itself. It got a new, centrist leader along the ‘New Labour’ lines of the very successful Tony Blair.

Keir Starmer, the PM elect, exudes a kind of stodgy dependability that lacks the Blair charm and silver tongue. It won Blair the Labour victory and prime ministership in 1997. But Starmer is well away from the dour resentfulness and anti-semitism of his Labour Party predecessor Jeremy Corbyn. He is, however, not that far in image from former Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown, 2007-2010. Brown was earlier a successful Chancellor of the Exchequer. He is credited with reforming Britain’s monetary and fiscal policy under Tony Blair.

The 61 year old Starmer is a barrister who has been a human rights lawyer. He has no truck with the radical element in his party, though he recognises that they too get elected by Labour voters. Still, it is his centrist ways that has given the Labour Party a landslide victory with  412 seats in a 625 seat lower house at Westminster. The Tories are likely to end with 121.

 Meanwhile even as he conceded defeat and congratulated Starmer and the Labour Party, Rishi Sunak won his seat at Richmond and Northallerton. So did the anti-immigrant right-wing former Tory minister Suella Braverman that Sunak fired for insubordination. This, even as most of the Tory ministers lost.

Hard Right Reform UK Party leader Nigel Farage won his seat at Clacton on the 8^th attempt. Along with three others from his party, he will now be heard not just in the media but at Westminster too. The Liberal Democrats are likely to end up with about 71 seats to make up the third largest block in the British parliament.

The people of Britain have voted for change, and the old orthodoxy that determined whether one was a Whig or Tory voter has become a thing of the past. The new mantra is perform or perish, and the British politician is getting used to an electorate without loyalists.

(990 words)

July 5^th, 2024

For:Firstpost/News18.com

Gautam Mukherjee