Posted by: John Elliott | February 8, 2010

Rahul shows the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty is firmly embedded………

…….so why airbrush Narasimha Rao out of history? 

Rahul Gandhi’s triumphant foray into Mumbai last Friday, where he successfully challenged the street power of Maharashtra’s chauvinist Shiv Sena politicians, was a significant step forward in his emergence as a national figure. By using local trains instead of a planned helicopter to cross the city, he showed more courage than most of India’s prestige-oriented politicians would contemplate. Together with his message that “India is for all Indians”, this undermined the Shiv Sena’s sometimes violent campaign to exclude north Indians from jobs in booming Mumbai.

This underlined the political standing of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty, led by the family trio of Sonia Gandhi, leader of the Congress Party and the governing coalition, Rahul, and his sister Priyanka. The strength of this trio, supported by top politicians who now do not dare challenge their dominance, was well illustrated by an intriguing list of the 100 most powerful Indians published on January 31 by the Indian Express newspaper.

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I was planning to write a post about this 100 list last week before Rahul Gandhi’s Mumbai tour (right) because, though the Indian media regularly produces lists of top people with little apparent research or firm criteria, the Indian Express list is noteworthy – for two main reasons.

One is extent to which the dynasty is embedded, which leads me on to the thought of why the family still apparently feels unable to give Narasimha Rao, Congress prime minister from 1991 to 1996, his rightful place in history – especially as the instigator of India’s 1991 economic reforms, and the initiator of prime minister Manmohan Singh’s political career.

The other noteworthy reason is the absence near the top of the list of foreign policy experts. At number 30, there is political newcomer and star tweeter Sashi Tharoor, a former senior United Nations official and now a  junior minister in the External Affairs Ministry. Then at 36 there is Shivshankar Menon, a former foreign secretary who has just become national security adviser. Neither the foreign minister or foreign secretary are included, which underlines the prime minister Manmohan Singh’s intention to be his own foreign minister, aided by Menon, especially on India’s relationship with Pakistan, where India has just offered talks.

But the absence of any broader-based top foreign policy makers or strategists underlines India’s problem that, while it wishes to have a significant and positive influence internationally, it has had no coherent long-term policies since the fading of the Non-Aligned Movement, nor the necessary diplomatic manpower in the external affairs ministry. More on that another time.

Top slots

Going back to the dynasty or “the family” as it is frequently known, at number 1 in the Express list there is Rahul Gandhi, 39-year old heir apparent to the leadership of India’s Congress Party and thus in line to be prime minister in the not too distant future. Sonia is at number 3, with Manmohan Singh, a family loyalist, slotted in between them. Then there is Rahul’s 38-year old sister Priyanka at 14, and his 31-year old closest aide, Kanishka Singh, at 23 – the latter, it’s worth noting, three slots ahead of the prime minister’s veteran principal secretary T.K.A.Nair.

Rahul has had the No 1 slot for two years. I’d have put Sonia there because of her potential veto power over any government policy though the Express’s senior editorial team, who drew up the list, have however presumably spotted Rahul’s growing influence over what Sonia says and does, and the space that she is leaving for him to occupy. Rahul has sensibly refused to be locked away in a government department and is busy rebuilding Congress’s tattered organization at the grass roots in states such as Uttar Pradesh and Bihar – a good thing to do while he can spare the time before taking on bigger responsibilities – as well as making Mumbai-style forays elsewhere.

Also significant is Priyanka moving up from number 30 to her 14. The Express says she’s there because she is close to her brother, and her influence grows with his. I’d have added her emergence running Rajiv Gandhi Foundation, which focuses on development issues. Founded in 1991, it has also operated as a policy think tank but, along with its stylish modern building in central Delhi, it has decayed and needs reviving. Priyanka’s very active involvement there, along with her organisational activities in Sonia’s and Rahul’s political constituencies, indicates a steadily growing public role.

A hoarding at Congress's 125th celebrations (Indian Express picture)

So why, now the family’s current and future position at the centre of India’s politics is so secure, can’t they acknowledge Narasimha Rao’s important contribution, especially since he neatly filled a dynastic void between Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination and Sonia’s entry into active politics?
 
At the Congress Party’s 125th celebrations just over two months ago, all of India’s Congress prime ministers – those from the dynasty plus Lal Bahadur Shastri and Manmohan Singh – were paraded in pictures and mentioned in speeches, except for Rao. 

Instead, Sonia Gandhi emphasized the role of Rajiv when he was prime minister from 1984 to 1989 and said that he “left his personal imprint on the party’s manifesto of 1991”. While it is correct that Rajiv, who was assassinated during the 1991 general election campaign, expanded the reform path tentatively started by his mother Indira Gandhi, his contribution was far less significant than Rao’s.
 
It was Rao who had the political courage to launch wide-ranging reforms when India was hit by a major financial crisis in 1991, instead of just tinkering enough to keep the international financial community content. He then picked Singh to lead the reforms as his finance minister. He should also be remembered for two important initiatives in foreign  affairs – introducing India’s “look east” policy, and seizing an opportunity to establish diplomatic relations with Israel.

Of course, he also made mistakes – most importantly in the context of this post, not keeping Sonia Gandhi as an ally, or at least making her feel secure. He also failed in 1991 to curb the Bharatiya Janata Party’s yatra that resulted in the demolition of a mosque in the city of Ayodhya, sparking religious riots across the country. And he initiated a self-defeating crisis over corruption and hawala (illegal international money transfers) just before the 1996 general election.

It might be understandable if Rao’s portraits do not stand as high at Congress Party functions as the dynasty’s, and that praise is less fulsome. But the negatives do not warrant his exclusion from the Congress leadership’s version of history.

Surely Rahul Gandhi, who is trying to attract new young talent into a more democratically run Congress Party, will understand this. Recruits might be attracted more if he can show that praise for achievements goes to all Congress leaders, maybe even to critics – and what better way to demonstrate that than to rehabilitate Rao.

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Posted by: John Elliott | January 28, 2010

Enthusiastic literary and art events celebrate India’s success

“Every successful economy needs a tangible celebration,” Rajeev Sethi, a leading promoter of India’s arts and artists, told me a few years ago when I was writing an article on the then-booming art market for London’s Royal Academy magazine. He was referring to the huge success being enjoyed by artists old and young, famous and not-yet-famous, in those days of rocketing art prices.

His remark could equally well refer to two major world-recognised cultural events, both run by enthusiasts. They both have an enormous sense of energy, celebrate India’s success, and are open to all.

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One is the five-day Jaipur Literary Festival (left) that I wrote about a few days ago. It closed on Monday night, having attracted an amazing total of 32,000 to 35,000 people, including hundreds of schoolchildren, to the informal but stylish old ambiance of Jaipur’s Diggi Palace hotel.  That was a huge increase from around 12,000 last year, and there wasn’t enough space, or seating.

The organisers are now planning for even more next year, seating 6,000 people at any one time – this time it was about 2,700. “We want to keep the informal atmosphere but make sure we can accommodate the numbers,” says Sanjoy Roy, whose Teamwork Productions manages the festival.

The other is the India Art Summit that was held in Delhi last August and drew 40,000 visitors to Delhi’s (appalling) Pragati Maiden exhibition grounds. It opened up access for people, young and old, many of whom would be reluctant to walk into the forbidding arena of many art galleries.

There’s a difference of course between these events. The art market boom was mainly driven not by a love of paintings but by a merger of India’s celebratory culture with growing materialism. Art added value, in terms of wealth as well as image, for newly rich Indians abroad and at home. “People want icons that you can show off – you can’t put stocks and shares on your walls,” Sethi sadly told me. “Art is recognised now as a commodity, a product for investment, rather than something in daily life”.

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But that boom did, before it collapsed, arouse many people’s interest in India’s art and artists, an interest that has grown since prices fell sharply over the past 18 months. That was evident at the Art Summit (right) and no doubt will be again when the event is held next in a year’s time.

Both Jaipur and the Art Summit are notable for their informality and for the way that leading authors and artists mingle with the crowds.

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Just as artists like Subodh Gupta and Jitish Kallat (left) were around the Art Summit, so were poets and authors such as Gulzar (reading on the opening day below left) , Javed Akhtar and Chetan Bhagat at Jaipur along with important Dalit (scheduled caste) writers specially organised by Namita Gokhale, one of the co-directors, and foreign writers (with a disproportionate number of entertaining Scotsmen – pic below) corralled by William Dalrymple, a Scot and the other co-director.

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The Jaipur festival’s success means that, while it has become a major event for literary folk and book lovers, it is also now a target in India’s prestige-conscious society for those who regard themselves as leaders of the social elite, especially from Delhi. A few attempts have been made by social society brokers to carve out a role so that they can share in the glory, but they have generally been rebutted and have mostly mingled with the crowds – despite some attempts to secure prominent front row seats for themselves and their friends, and to stage exclusive social events. This is noteworthy in a country where prestige and patronage count for so much and do so much damage.

Once successful, events like the art summit and Jaipur festival also inevitably attract the attention of bureaucrats and politicians eager to benefit in terms of both prestige and other rewards. They also need to be kept at bay because the uniqueness of both events is that they have been conceived and are run by committed enthusiasts – Gokhale and Dalrymple with Roy at Jaipur, while the Arts Summit emerged from an idea by Neha Kirpal, a young marketing and conference organiser and is backed by Sunil Gautam who runs Hanmer MS&L Communications.

Social divide

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The Jaipur festival’s sessions also highlighted the vast social divide between the horrors of life for the Dalits at the bottom of India’s social strata and the lives and liaisons of royalty and dynasty in Bhutan, India and Britain.

Her Majesty Ashi Dorji Wangmo Wangchuck, queen mother in the remote Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan, who has written “A Portrait of Bhutan”, talked (right) about her life growing up in a remote mountain village milking cows, working in the vegetable garden and learning to weave. Her husband, King Jigme Singye Wangchuck, introduced both the notion of Gross National Happiness (GNH) and democracy before giving way to his son at the end of 2008.

Two Indian authors discussed the difference between writing history and a historical novel in terms of their books on two Indian men who fascinated Queen Victoria. Navtej Sarna, an author and Indian diplomat (currently ambassador to Israel), talked about his novel, “The Exile”, on the life of Maharaja Duleep Singh who became prominent in Victoria’s court when the queen was in her 30s.

Shrabani Basu, a journalist, read from her “Victoria and Abdul”, a biography of Abdul Karim, a servant who became Victoria’s influential and often disruptive adviser on India. Basu said Karim was “a good looking, extravagantly dressed servant ….hated by the Queen’s household both for his race and class”. Basu had multiple sources to draw on for her biography but Sarna had less and, in his historical novel, had to create conversations.

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Princess Diana’s perhaps most reputable biographer, Tina Brown, former editor of Vanity Fair and The Tatler, who now runs “The Daily Beast” website from the US, discussed her “The Diana Chronicles”. Diana was “always looking for love….but no man could have assuaged her…She would freak them out by stalking them”.

Then Nayantara Sehgal, an author and Jawaharlal Nehru’s niece, hit on a more local controversy when she said that Sonia Gandhi, the Italian-born leader of India’s Congress Party and the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty, was blocking the publication of love letters between Nehru and Edwina Mountbatten, wife of British India’s last viceroy. Sehgal was in conversation with Catherine Clemont, French author of “Edwina and Nehru – a novel”. Whether the Nehru and Mountbatten “really went to bed is pure conjecture” said Sehgal. “No-one really knows about it except them”.

On an even lighter note, four Scottish writers – Andrew O’Hagan, Niall Ferguson, Alexander McCall Smith and William Dalrymple (above) – raised most laughs in a session called “Under the Kilt” with remarks that denigrated their home country (which had controversially donated £10,000 to the festival), as well as Britain and Ireland.

It started with Ferguson, who defended a recent article that dubbed Scotland as “the Belarus of Western Europe” because of its alcoholism, self-pity, and low life. He contrasted that with Scotland’s contribution abroad. “Once you’d left school you’d go and run England and then run the world,” said Ferguson who drew on his best seller “The Ascent of Money” to assert that the Scots were heavily responsible for the world’s financial crash.

What all this had to do with a literature festival in India no one was quite sure, but it was good entertainment – even the British High Commissioner and Irish Ambassador, both of whom were there, kept laughing.

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Posted by: John Elliott | January 24, 2010

Books and crowds in sunny Jaipur

If anyone doubts the future of books in the age of dumbing down television and internet with its social media, see what has been happening in India at Jaipur Literary Festival which started on Thursday. Some 15,000 people had by last night checked in during the first three days of the five-day festival, which is in its fifth year and is both Asia’s biggest such event and the biggest free lit fest worldwide.  

The 15,000 inevitably included some of Delhi’s social set who can’t let such an event pass without being seen, but it was dominated by crowds, young (including swarms of schoolchildren) and old, all anxious to hear over 200 speakers – including India’s great novelists and poets, as well as big names from abroad.  

As Namita Gokhale, one of the festival’s two co-directors told Phil Reeves of America’s National Public Radio, “This shows that we are not just argumentative Indians but that people want a relief from the banal stupidity that surrounds what they read in newspapers and see in tv”.  

Diggi Palace's Durbar Hall

This was originally conceived as an Indian festival celebrating local language as well as Indian English writing, but it now also brings in leading international figures – there is a Nobel laureate and Booker and Pulitzer prize winners among the famous names that include Wole Soyinka, Roberto Calasso, Hanif Kureishi, Niall Ferguson, Roddy Doyle, Anne Enright, Tina Brown (who has had a reporting team writing for her Daily Beast website and is in the big pic below), Claire Tomalin, and Michael Frayn.  

Wole Soyinka, the Nigerian Nobel laureate, charmed and captured his audience reading and talking about “The Road”, his novel that seeks some spiritual meaning to life. He’s also a political activist and bemoaned the growth of religious-based terrorism. “It’s no longer a question of ‘I’m right, you’re wrong’ but ‘I’m right, you’re dead’ “, he said, adding jokingly, and to loud applause, that all such religious terrorists should be put into a missile. “Fire them into space and leave us sinners behind”.  

Niall Ferguson, the historian, annoyed many people with blunt Bush-like rebuttal of “Freedom for Sale”, a book on the counterpoints of wealth and democracy by John Kampfner, former editor of the UK’s now-ailing “New Statesman” weekly magazine, but then fascinated a later session talking (above in the Durbar Hall) about the recent financial crisis which is the subject of his best-selling “The Ascent of Money” book.  

The festival organisers have been promoting the work of Dalit (scheduled caste) writers whose powerful literary work reflects their frustrations, pain and anger. Kancha Iliaiah, told how his latest book, “Post Hindu India”, argues that Hinduism is a declining religion because “spiritual fascism is its core value”, based on the inequality and “barbaric treatment” of the caste system. Complementing this was a passionate discussion on Naxalite Maoist rebels and the appalling way that Indian authorities treat the rural poor.  

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I’ve found myself drawn to a series of sessions linked with royalty and dynasty in Bhutan, India and Britain, including Queen Victoria’s fascination for two very different Indian men and the supposed love (sex?) life of Jawaharlal Nehru and Edwina Mountbatten, wife of India’s first post-independence viceroy. I sadly missed a session on erotica which would have rounded the theme off nicely.  More on all of that in a later post.  

Now this amazing festival, which has become world famous in such a short time, is getting almost too large with twice the number of people turning up than can be seated for the three-parallel sessions that run through the day. In the evening, there’s magnificent Indian and fusion music.  

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The co-directors are the irrepressible Willie Dalrymple, who’s made Delhi his book-writing home and has just written “Nine Lives”,  and Namita Gokhale, a well known Indian author and publisher (with Penguin) of books translated into Indian languages. Her brilliantly illustrated (and written) “The Puffin Mahabharata” was published a few months ago, explaining the twists and turns of this ancient epic in flowing style. 

There’s a continual twelve-month international ‘v’ local tug of war between them on who should go into the programme (and be flown expensively from abroad) – but it’s constructive tension that ultimately leads to a crowd-pulling balance.

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This famous old pink Moghul city, the capital of the Indian desert state of Rajasthan, is a good place for such an event, combining the magic of India’s history and all the fun – and chaos – of a modem Indian city as well. The events take place at the Diggi Palace hotel, a charmingly faded pile built in the 1860s as a grand town house or haveli for a rural Rajasthan ruler. The city is full of these old havelis – I’m writing this sitting in my roof top room (right) of the Alsisar, a mini palace on the edge of the old city.

The organisers have learned a tough lesson – if you run a festival in a country which is a terrorism target and has thick fog in winter, prepare for the worst. More than a dozen speakers were held up abroad, and at least two didn’t make it, because of problems obtaining Indian visas, which are becoming more difficult as anti-terrorism measures are put in place. Then, on the day before the opening, about 100 people, both speakers and delegates, were stranded at Delhi airport for several hours, unable to take off the 250kms flight to Jaipur.

As darkness fell and flights stopped, two of the key first-day speakers were still stuck there – Her Majesty Ashi Dorji Wangmo Wangchuck, the queen mother of the remote Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan, who was due to speak at 2.30pm today, and Girish Karnad, a famous Indian playwright, film-maker and actor, who was due to deliver the opening address on Entertaining India.

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But, while the organisers agonised and worked their mobile phones to organise beds in Delhi (the chaotic careering-truck-ridden Delhi-Jaipur highway is not safe at night), there was a celebration at the nearby Narain Niwas Palace hotel, another rather grand old home of another rural raja.

Fiona Caulfield, an Australian who had a successful career in America as a branding and futurist consultant till she moved to India about six years ago, was launching “Love Jaipur”, the latest in her series of “Love Travel Guides”.

No, these aren’t guides to old maharajas’ harems, nor more modern versions of the same, but what Caulfied describes as “passionately curated guides for the discerning luxury vagabond”, covering everything from the best restaurants to street food hideouts and a host of places to “shop, be pampered, get fit, and explore”. Jaipur follows similar handloom cloth covered guides on Bangalore, Mumbai and Delhi – she’s sold over 12,000 books so far.

Yesterday Tony Wheeler, founder of the iconic Lonely Planet guides, told us how he first visited India in 1972 on the hippie trail and how that led to his ubiquitous series of guidebooks. He sold out a few years ago to BBC Worldwide and he explained how that had sharpened the debate over whether the BBC was going too far beyond its public broadcasting remit – something that is highly topical in the UK today.

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A final thought from Javed Akhtar (right), a famous Indian poet, that came during a discussion (pic of open air stage above) on the future of books in the world of the internet and on Kindle computers. Navtej Sarna, a novelist (and Indian diplomat) had noted that in John Masters’ famous novel, “The Night Runners of Bengal”, news was spread by the runners who “spread the message of the mutiny by carrying chappatis from village to village”. Now such news would travel in a second on the internet.

Akhtar looked ahead to a time when “knowledge and books will be injected into your brain electronically”, with no need for computers or mobile phones. He thought that was probably a long way in the future – but people talking later wondered if it really was that far off.

Also see: https://ridingtheelephant.wordpress.com/2010/01/28/enthusiastic-literary-and-art-events-celebrate-india%e2%80%99s-success/

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Posted by: John Elliott | January 18, 2010

Jyoti Basu – the Communist prime minister that India needed but never had

India desperately needs charismatic and respected political leaders who can lead coherent policy-based opposition to the Congress Party and its coalition governments.

Only two men have qualified for this statesman role in recent years. One is Jyoti Basu of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), who died yesterday aged 95. The other is Atal Bihari Vajpayee, 85, a former prime minister and leader of the Bharatiya Janata party (BJP), who is in ill health and is no longer politically active.

Both Vajpayee and Basu (below) could have ranked alongside earlier leaders such as Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi, but they never managed to achieve the same stature because they were held back by their parties’ limitations.

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Vajpayee provided the Hindu-nationalist BJP with an acceptable friendly face, fudging and slowing down its harsher policies and leading a coalition government from 1998 to 2004.

But, though he undoubtedly had statesmen status and is sorely missed by the now-directionless BJP, his party’s lack of nationwide-acceptability limited his role. (His colleague at the top of the BJP,  Lal Krishna Advani, 82, never gained the same level of respect as a statesman and is now sidelined).

Basu was similarly hemmed in by the CPI(M) which threw away an historic opportunity to grow and lead the country when it refused in 1996 to allow him to become prime minister of a coalition government that was then being formed. (The job went to two far less significant politicians, each for a year – Deve Gowda from Karnataka and then Inder Kumar Gujral from Punjab). That confined Basu to his base in West Bengal, where he was chief minister for 23 years till he retired in 2000, remaining active in party politics till recently.

The political development of India’s Left, and indeed of the country’s whole political landscape, could have been different if the CPI(M) polit bureau had allowed Basu to take the job. Basu later described it as a “historic blunder” because the opportunity would not be repeated, adding “We thought that even if we last for (just) one year in that coalition, with myself as prime minister and our party joining it, then people would understand……what we are all about”.

 Many people might think that India was lucky to be spared learning what the CPI(M) was “all about”, but the country needs a coherent national Leftist party or grouping and does not currently have one. The Congress is proud of parading what it regards as its socialist roots, but the party haphazardly pushes economic liberalisation and other policies that are often geared more to pleasing vested interests and filling the politicians’ pockets than following a constructive socialist agenda.

As Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen, who knew Basu well, said yesterday, making him prime minister would have helped that to integrate the CPI(M) with India’s national politics. He added that Basu would have been a “good leader” – a point made by many commentators in the last couple of days. Other friends who knew him talk of a charming companion with a dry sense of humour, a love of whisky – and of PG Wodehouse.

The popular image of the CPI(M) led-Left at the time was of a Luddite party that blocked economic reforms and foreign investment, and encouraged labour strife. But Basu was leading West Bengal into a new phase of co-operation with capitalism and foreign investment, and curbing militant trade unionism. That is the approach he would have brought to Delhi – where the Left continues to oppose economic reforms because it is not in power. (Elsewhere its only power base is in Kerala where it plays a largely negative role in state politics).

While he was West Bengal’s chief minister, Basu introduced important reforms to help the poor, especially land reform and the development of panchayats (local village councils). That helped the CPI(M) and its allies to stay in power – buttressed by extensive ballot-rigging and repressive and often violent power tactics that have become evident over the years – especially in crises over use of agricultural land for industry and in last year’s general election campaign.

The Left’s failure to govern effectively in recent years has also allowed a Maoist-inspired Naxalite rebellion, which covers over a third of India’s administrative districts, to regain a hold over parts of West Bengal where it began as a peasant revolt 40 years ago. 

Basu’s gradual withdrawal from politics in the past few years has left a gap at the top of the CPI(M) that his successor, Buddhadeb Bhattacharya, has proved himself unable to fill. The Left is rapidly losing support and will find it hard to hold onto power in state assembly elections next year – especially because, for the first time for decades, it will not have Basu to lean on.

Basu’s legacy – dictated by his party and his successors – is sadly therefore one of lost opportunities: the prime minister who never was; the party leader who was not able to build a national base; and a West Bengal government whose failings have opened the way for a violent rebellion. But he will still be remembered as one of India’s great politicians.

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Posted by: John Elliott | January 7, 2010

Tata bids for leadership of India’s auto industry

India’s emergence as a significant player as both a customer and manufacturer in the world’s autos industry has been confirmed this week at Delhi’s 10th Auto Expo, where over 2,000 companies from 30 countries are displaying their wares. They include most of the world’s car manufacturers, several of which have launched new models in the past couple of days with all the hoopla of such events.

Ratan Tata this week

The Expo also marks the emergence – albeit somewhat precariously – of Tata Motors as India’s broadest-based and most interesting auto manufacturer, with products that range from buses and trucks through smaller commercial vehicles and conventional saloon cars to stylish models from Jaguar and Land Rover (JLR), and the tiny Nano that was first displayed at the last motor show two years ago.

India’s market leader for cars is Maruti Suzuki, which was founded 26 years ago as a joint venture between Maruti, then Indian government owned, and Suzuki of Japan.  That link-up made Maruti Suzuki the catalyst for the development of the Indian auto industry that is on show this week.

But, when I toured the show two days ago, it was clear that it is Tata Motors that is gearing up to mark out the future.

Maruti has a large stand near the entrance and all its cars were on display, backed up when I was there with a lonely-looking but entertaining jazz band on a stage overlooking jazzed up versions of its models. Walking through the exhibition grounds, international motor manufacturers such as Chrysler, BMW, Toyota, and Volkswagen were launching new models and concept cars.

A Nano-style taxi

But it was Tata that dominated with an amazing array of products that included a new Jaguar’s JX , launched elsewhere last year. There was also a Nano-like mini-taxi called Magic Iris, due to launch within the next year, with a passenger door on only one side and flap-down passenger windows.
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This is impressive for a long-established truck company (now the world’s fourth largest) that was mocked by other Indian auto manufacturers when it first started making cars in the 1990s, was criticised for the poor quality and unreliability of its small Indica saloon in 1998, was harried by setbacks on the Nano, was reported to have mishandled its relations last year with the UK government over aid for JLR, has been pilloried in recent weeks for its low-slung buses that keep catching fire on Delhi roads, and has only a 13.6% share of India’s car market compared with Maruti’s 50% and Hyundai’s 16%.

Ratan Tata, head of the Tata group, and chairman of Tata Motors, acknowledged the reputation for poor quality when he was asked at a press conference on Tuesday about a products needing “heavy maintenance”. He suggested the reputation came partly from “vested interests” (competitors) and “people who use (the cars) less”, explaining that taxi drivers plying the Indica and Indigo models do 100,000 kms or more a year and seem content.

He also said that Japanese manufacturers were similarly criticised when they started making cars – rather an unfortunate comparison, given the appalling reputation that Japanese cars had a few decades ago.

“We are a fairly new company trying to establish ourselves in as many (segments) as possible,” said Tata, who is more personally involved with Tata Motors than any other group company. He could have added that, despite generating $14bn revenues (2008-09), the company has a heavily bureaucratic and hierarchical management that still does not always recognise the need for quality, despite the efforts of Ravi Kant, the vice chairman who has run the business for Ratan Tata for several years, and other top executives.

Ratan Tata now has three main challenges – to build a popular car brand with the cachet of Hyundai and the customer loyalty of Maruti, to turn round JLR, and to make a success of the delayed Nano.

Arguably, he should never have bought loss-making JLR from Ford in 2008 because the once-iconic brands had defied would-be rescuers for years.  Apparently, he did not have many supporters within his company for such a risky buy but, seeing them at the show this week, it began to make sense.

There seemed to be a constructive synergy between him and JLR management at the show, with both talking about what Tata called the once iconic models “making their own destinies…..rekindling their roots”. Tata also seemed willing to ride out losses because “in this part of the world you buy (a company) to live with it and develop it into something”. JLR had been bought not just as a short-term ploy, nor just “to add to turnover or egos”, but also for its potential and what could be gained in terms of “enormous skill and capabilities”.

I wasn’t a Nano fan when it was launched in March last year, and I still am not. I’ve only see one on the cluttered roads of the Delhi and it looked not only tiny but also desperately vulnerable – which it is measured when against US safety standards. Only about 20,000 have been delivered to dealers, and production has yet to start at the main factory in Gujarat that has been built since local opposition led Tata to abandon its plant in West Bengal.

Ratan Tata, who is 72 and due to retire in a couple of years, also has to name a successor. The current favourite is Noel Tata, a shy and little-seen cousin who runs Tata’s retail stores. The choice is important of course for the entire group, but it is vital for Tata Motors where Ratan Tata personally binds the business together and has been the inspiration for its growth – especially buying JLR and developing the Nano that have yet to prove themselves. And on that depends the future role of Tata Motors as the leader of India’s auto industry.

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Posted in India, India manufacturing, Ratan Tata, Tata, Tata Motors, West Bengal | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Posted by: John Elliott | December 29, 2009

Tharoor twitters on India’s clumsy visa curbs

Some politicians have an uncanny knack of saying the right thing publicly at the wrong time. Shashi Tharoor, a former top UN official who is now India’s junior foreign minister – and a famous Tweeter (as I wrote in September) – is a leading example. He only became an MP earlier this year and his new political career will probably suffer if he doesn’t curb his tweeting.

For now however, let’s praise him for pointing out how illogical the Indian government has been by clumsily toughening its tourist and business visa rules just because a suspected terrorist visited India several times over several years months on such visas.

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“R we going 2allow terrorists 2make us less welcoming?” Tharoor (left) asked, in tweet-speak on his Twitter page which has over 540,000 followers (readers).

“Imprt to recognize that security must not become an excuse 2change our cntry 4d worse…… Making it more difficult 2 visit India, return here frequently or stay long hurts large nbrs of innocents, costs us millions of$ & alienates……

“Dilemma of our age: tough visa restrictions in hope of btr security or openness &liberality to encourage tourism& goodwill? I prefer latter.”

According to reports, Tharoor was reflecting reservations in India’s External Affairs Ministry about the Home Ministry’s visa restrictions which, after weeks of muddle, seem to mean that foreigners holding long-term multiple entry visas must leave the country for at least two months every three months, and stay away for the same period if they leave voluntarily earlier.

The government has added that exceptions could be made for travellers who submit itinerary details to the visa authorities, but that would undoubtedly lead to endless hassles with India’s often obstructionist foreigners’ registration offices (FRROs) which are already overcrowded, inefficient and often unfriendly.

The restrictions have been suddenly introduced because a suspected terrorist, David Headley (or Daood Sayed Gilani), who has been arrested in America, travelled frequently to India on a business visa in the run-up to terror attacks in Mumbai 13 months ago. He allegedly also ran a small business in Mumbai. Other visa-busting cases include low-wage Chinese workers who have been employed on tourist visas. This all led to a knee-jerk reaction by the Home Ministry which introduced the new rules.

But the misuse of these visas by long-term residents has been widely known for years. When I appeared on an Indian tv news channel (NDTV’s 24/7) last week, K. Padmanabhiah, who was the home secretary in the 1990s, admitted he had known about long-stayers on tourist visas who went to the states of Nagaland  and Kashmir “to write books”. I suggested that since this proved the Home Ministry had known about the visas being misused for many years, there was no excuse for a knee-jerk reaction now.

Both the UK and US governments have complained, mainly about a lack of policy clarity and consistency. The US Embassy’s website talks about “inconsistent implementation of the new rule.”

These rules risk worsening India’s long-established reputation as an uncomfortable and unfriendly tourist destination where officials are more interested in hassling travellers and foreign residents than in smoothing out their problems.

The rules are also illogical. How will having to leave the country curb would-be terrorists, who can easily travel to a nearby country and operate from there or, more probably, bribe an Indian official to be allowed to return immediately? And why must a visitor leave for two months? Why not just apply for an extension?

As G. Parthasarathy, a retired senior ambassador, remarked on television yesterday, terrorists who attacked Mumbai last year did not come on visas, nor did others who staged earlier attacks and an aircraft hijacking.

In any case, what is point in introducing such restrictions in a country where the bureaucracy is so easily buyable – as Parthasarathy also said, corrupt officials even sell passports and “every policeman is on the take”.

Problems of harassment begin when would-be visitors try to obtain visas abroad. In the past  few months I have heard several stories of problems. One visitor says that India’s Paris and London visa offices do not require the same supporting documents, while others complain of endless delays.

A story from the UK tells of sheer misery of a young visitor who was inefficiently pushed around for nearly three weeks by India’s visa officials in London. An  internet application system did not work, an application was lost, officials gave conflicting messages, the applicant was told to contact the wrong office, a pre-paid courier service for returning the passport was not used, and the passport was almost returned to the wrong address.

Virtually every country of course treats visitors appallingly. I hear many complaints for example about how unhelpful and arrogant the UK’s outsourcing company in Delhi can be, and the US seems to do its best to deter visitors. In a Gulf countrya few weeks ago, an immigration official rudely tossed my passport back at me when I suggested that a $28 fee was high for a 36-hour stopover.

But that is no reason for a country like India, whose culture is to be open and welcoming, and which needs to develop its tourism and international business links, to behave as the home ministry is now doing.

Tharoor was right in what he said, though he was of course inadvisedly breaking ranks. As his boss said yesterday, he should air his comments within the government, not on Twitter. But let’s hope he survives so that he can continue tweetingly to mock irrational government.

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Posted in India, India British relations, India police, India politicians, India tourism, India UK | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Posted by: John Elliott | December 24, 2009

A Christmas message from the King of Bhutan

“The image of a shared planet must always be present in our minds – and especially in the minds of those who are in positions of leadership.    

“Only when we are willing to bear the embarrassment of being a little innocent will we be able to say – ‘Let us place the interest of humanity, not national populations and constituencies, above all else’ “……….    

novice monks in Bhutan

   ………….King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck hadn’t of course intended it to be a Christmas message when he spoke in Delhi last night.    

This 28-year old Buddhist monarch was explaining the “development with values” goals of Gross National Happiness (GNH) that were set some 30 or so years ago by his father, King Jigme Singye Wangchuck.    

The then king’s aim was to try to keep the tiny Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan, which is sandwiched between China and India, as a peaceful, harmonious and independent nation – as he explained to me when I interviewed him 22 years ago.    

But it is a good message for Christmas from the King, who has been on a visit to India, and was giving a lecture titled “Changing World and Timeless Values” in memory of Madhavrao Scindia, a former Congress party leader.    

Bhutan's King looking at one of his photos yesterday

Earlier yesterday he opened an exhibition (left) of photos from Bhutan, many taken by him, including those above and below.    

In a neat turn of phrase coming just after the Copenhagen climate change summit, he added: “We need shared human endeavour not just negotiated change”.
 
“I believe that any real and lasting solution to global issues can only come through a universal wave of human empathy, desire and passion for the common good,” he said.   

“Governments might mediate problems at the global level, but its effects are felt by people, like you and me…….we tend to forget that in protecting our own constituencies, we jeopardize the world and thus ourselves and our own future generations…….Let us place the interest of humanity, not national populations and constituencies, above all else. Let us take political risks and strong decisions in addressing the needs of humanity.”  

 Merry Christmas! – John      

  

Buddhist prayer flags in Bhutan

Dec 26 – I have edited some of  the quotations above to bring them in line with the text of the King’s speech which is on Facbook  at http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=853040356&ref=ts#/notes.php?id=43817623259 – je  

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Posted by: John Elliott | December 18, 2009

Hyderabad sinks from software to scams

India’s southern city of Hyderabad is becoming one of India’s most potent symbols of the greed and corruption that link politicians and businessmen. For the third time in a year, the state has been rocked by a crisis that exposes those linkages – this time over whether Andhra Pradesh should be split in two with the creation of a new state of Telangana based around Hyderabad (white area in map below).

This is a far cry from the glory and international fame of the past 15 or so years when this prosperous capital of the state of Andhra Pradesh became an international symbol of India’s dramatic growth in software, second only to Bangalore as a thriving location for information technology investment. Companies located there include Google and Microsoft, and Bill Clinton visited as US president.

The first of the state’s crises came a year ago with the collapse of Satyam, a leading Hyderabad-based software company that was owned by the family of its then chairman, Ramalinga Raju. The Rajus were closely linked with various politicians, including the state’s Congress chief minister, Y S Rajasekhar Reddy (YSR), who died in a helicopter crash in September, as well as his predecessor, Chandrababu Naidu.

Politicians are widely believed to have invested their black money in both Satyam and in Maytas Infrastructure, an associated company that received favours on contracts from the state government and drained funds out of Satyam. Both companies (Satyam has now been sold) are now being investigated for massive fraud, and Raju has been detained in jail since January.

Next came YSR’s sudden death and an immediate attempt by his politically inexperienced 37-year old son, Y.S.Jaganmohan Reddy, to become theief minister.

Businessmen like Raju came from Andhra’s coastal regions. They mostly belong to the Reddy and Kamma upper castes that must now be ranked along with India’s more famous business castes and communities such as the Marwaris of the north and the Chettiars of the south.

The Telangana people’s wish for some sort of constitutional identity has been around for over 50 years, and has been fudged and rebuffed by successive Indian governments. But last week (December 9) the central government gave way and agreed to create Telangana in order to end a fast by a local politician and activist, K. Chandrashekhar Rao (KCR), leader of Telangana Rashtriya Samiti, who was risking his life to revive his crumbling political image.

That humane but politically clumsy decision led to violent demonstrations in Hyderabad, plus resignation threats by about half the members of the legislative assembly. This paralysed the state government and sparked follow-on bifurcation claims from other states all over India.

But observers of India’s frequently muddled and confusing political scene need not fear any imminent Balkanisation of India’s 28 states. Having prevented the death of the fasting politician, the government is back to fudge, and hopes to stall the Telangana claims indefinitely, maybe even until the state’s next assembly elections in 2014. Meanwhile, other states’ claims to be split will be examined, and some may push ahead a little – but there is no crisis, despite blanket and over-excited media coverage.

Unlike most other bifurcation claims, the battle over Telangana is about wealth, not language or ethnic divisions, nor dramatic differences in geography. It would also the first time that the capital of a state has gone with the new entity – normally the breakaway has to start afresh.

The people of coastal Andhra have benefited economically since the days of British rule when there was extensive investment in irrigation, but the Telangana region lagged behind under the thumb of the Nizam of Hyderabad. When Hyderabad began to flourish in the 1990s as an IT centre, wealthy landowners from the coastal region flocked to the city to develop real estate and infrastructure projects, lining up with local politicians such as YSR and his cronies to secure contracts and licences. This is the wealth that they fear the creation of Telangana would put at risk.

The reputation of Hyderabad and Andhra has been severely damaged by this series of crises. It is causing concern among both Indian and international investors who had not known – or had ignored – the political-business linkages and scams.

The state now has an uncertain political future. The death of YSR has removed an able political leader who was an effective Congress chief minister. Now the Congress Party is split over who his successor should be, as well as over the Telangana issue.

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Posted by: John Elliott | December 11, 2009

India to protect the environment from damaging development projects

“We are not going to compromise ecological security in the name of development……The Ministry of Environment and Forests is going to be quite fundamentalist on these issues” – Jairam Ramesh, environment minister

India’s energetic and enthusiastic environment minister has many critics, which is not surprising given his appetite for wading into controversies. As if his battles over India’s climate change policy (see my blog post two days ago) are not enough, he is now building up an assault on environmental approvals and wildlife conservation that will bring him up against tough and often rough political and business opponents who are accustomed to flouting regulations.

As I wrote in that post, Jairam Ramesh is India’s first non-corrupt, policy-oriented and knowledgeable environment minister for a decade. He is determined to clean up a ministry that has been allowing India’s environment and wildlife to be plundered and to decay in the ten years it has been headed by nominees from a regional Tamil Nadu-based party, the Dravida Munnettra Kazhagam (DMK). And he is backed by Sonia Gandhi, president of the ruling Congress Party, and Manmohan Singh, the prime minister.

“Not since Indira Gandhi have we seen so much positive focus on wildlife issues,” says Belinda Wright of the Wildlife Protection Society of India, referring to the country’s former prime minister.

Jairam Ramesh at Sariska tiger reserve, July 2009

Two announcements made by Ramesh on Wednesday (December 9) at a Wildlife Institute of India conference in Delhi underline how meticulous and tough he is hoping to be.

First, he said that he would not allow two coal-mining projects linked to an Adani Group 2000MW power project, and located 10-12kms from near Maharashtra’s Tadoba Andhari tiger reserve, to go ahead. Initial environmental approval (terms of reference or TOR) was granted last year, but the mines would be within a proposed buffer zone of the reserve. Sonia Gandhi took up the cause in August and Ramesh said on Wednesday they could not go ahead.

This pits him against powerful business and political forces. The Gujarat-based Adani trading and infrastructure group has notoriously strong government links (especially on coal imports where it dominates). Its power project is located in Gondia, the home town of Praful Patel, India’s business-oriented aviation minister, who has complained to Ramesh about the decision.

According to reports, Patel has said that while protection of environment is important, industrial development too was equally important.

Ramesh challenged that when he said on Wednesday, while referring to this project, “We are not going to compromise ecological security in the name of development……..The Ministry of Environment and Forests is going to be quite fundamentalist on these issues”.

He also intends to stop a 231km river-linking canal project between Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh. “I was shocked to find that Panna Tiger Reserve is involved in the Ken-Betwa river link which is the only project (on inter-linking India’s rivers) that has progressed so far,” he said.

When Ramesh was appointed in May, many observers assumed that his job was to speed up big project approvals, which have for years been hampered by often mischievous and corrupt environmental blockages. That speed-up has been an unfulfilled aim of the prime minister’s office (PMO) for most of this decade.

But Ramesh’s pro-environment approach is stalling or stopping several projects, not speeding them up  – so I asked him how he could explain this apparent dichotomy.

“No dichotomy,” he said in a quick e-mail reply. “Both the Congress president and the prime minister deeply concerned with environment and forest issues as well. Balance is crucial – sometimes it is a NO and sometimes it has to be a YES, BUT”.

That brief answer is packed with messages. He acknowledges the need to speed up project approvals, but is striking a balance between that and protecting the environment – as he showed in the remark about “not going to compromise ecological security in the name of development”. And, as I said, he has the backing of Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh.

On Wednesday, he outlined some of his other plans:

–      Amending 1972 wildlife legislation early next year, which would include “steeply increasing penalties which are laughable” so that they match those in, for example, foreign e change and money laundering legislation. Also protecting biologists and other academics from the ire of “bad” wildlife officials.
–      Making wildlife management a more attractive civil service career, maybe by creating a formal specialisation within the Indian Administrative Service (an issue, he said, first raised by Indira Gandhi in 1972).
–      Providing state government’s with a direct stake in tiger conservation and the government’s 26-year old, but ailing, Project Tiger. Maybe by providing them with funds to boost the occupations and livelihoods of local people who are moved out of sanctuaries to nearby areas – possibly with the help of the World Bank.
–      Improve the handling of human-animal conflict, which currently often turns local people against wildlife conservation.

He also had some dire statistics to hand out. Of Project Tiger’s 38 areas, only 12 are in “relatively good condition” while nine are “satisfactory but could be better” and 17 are in a “very very precarious state”. Last year the government said the total number of tigers in India was down to 1,400, and that was probably an over-estimate.

World Bank project “institutionalised corruption”

Ramesh’s initiatives are welcomed by wildlife experts, apart from the possible involvement of the World Bank, which is condemned by many environmentalists in India. 

Belinda Wright  blames it for “financing the devastation of huge swathes of tiger habitat without any accountability or comment,” and adds: “Along with its fossil fuel projects, dams and highways, the Bank is not – and never has been – good news for the tiger”.

It does seem odd that India is bending to pressures to allow the World Bank to become involved in wildlife conservation. The Bank has no expertise that is not already available in the country, or that could be brought in from specialist conservation organisations abroad, and its record in forest management is dismal.

“The Bank’s forestry programmes in India single-handedly institutionalised corruption in the Forest Department, and took it took its eye off the ball as far as protection and forest management is concerned,” says one environmentalist.

As I mentioned in my post two days ago, Ramesh is sometimes criticised for being too prone to fall into line with the wishes of the US government. It would be a pity if that leads him to allow the World Bank into an area where it arguably is not needed – unless he can put together a cogent argument about why the bank’s involvement would be good for India.

Just saying, as some observers are doing, that Robert Zoellick, the World Bank president, is pushing for a role in India because he is personally interested in tigers,  is surely not enough.

Despite that controversy however, Ramesh has to be regarded as one of the main stars of the current government – and just what India’s environment needs.

Earlier posts on wildlife and the environment on this blog:
India to protect environment from damaging projects Dec 11, 2009
Jairam Ramesh sets pace on climate change and environment Dec 9, 2009
Serious contamination 25 yrs after Bhopal’s gas leak – new study  Dec 1, 2009
Posco on a learning curve about India’s “social process” Sept 17, 2008
Greenpeace targets Tata over rare sea turtles May 29, 2008
Demand from China kills India’s vanishing tigers Feb 13, 2008

 

 

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Posted by: John Elliott | December 9, 2009

Jairam Ramesh sets the pace on India’s climate change and environment policies

“India has not caused the problem of global warming. But try and make sure that India is part of the solution. Be constructive; be proactive” – prime minister Manmohan Singh to Jairam Ramesh, May 29, 2009    

The debate in India about what to propose at the Copenhagen climate change conference has become a battleground about how open and go-ahead India should or should not be as it grows into an internationally significant economy.    

On one side are economic policy reformers who want India to adopt a positive leadership role, driving reforms that are good for both the country and for its stance in international negotiations. At Copenhagen, this means voluintarily making positive proposals to reduce damaging emissions, while refusing to accept legally binding targets or inspections.    

On the other side are officials (some retired) from the external affairs, environment and other ministries who want India to remain, old-style, on the fringes of international debate, irritatingly complaining about the the developed world’s faults while looking for hand-outs from  anyone who happens to pass by. Primarily they fear that US policies are aimed at impeding India’s economic growth. At Copenhagen, that would mean telling the developed world to put its climate change house in order before asking for much from developing countries, while also demanding substantial financial aid for climate change technologies.    

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  Leading for the reformers, with strong backing from Manmohan Singh, the prime minister, and Sonia Gandhi who leads the ruling Congress Party, is a new figure in India’s ministerial ranks. He is Jairam Ramesh (left), India’s first committed environment minister in a decade who, after spending most of the past 20 years or so as a government adviser, has suddenly emerged as one of the main drivers of policy in India’s new government. In terms of energy and application he ranks alongside Palaniappan Chidambaram, the home minister, and Kapil Sibal, the human resources minister.    

Most of Ramesh’s ministerial predecessors over the past ten years or so have seen the Ministry of  Environment and Forests as a cash cow to be milked for their own and their political party’s coffers, and have had scant interest in developing or implementing policy.  

Ecology before Development  

Ramesh has changed that in just seven months, strictly applying environmental regulations to industrial and other projects instead of issuing approvals for the highest kickbacks, and trying to improve wildlife conservation and the ministry’s work in other areas.    

Speaking at a wildlife conference in Delhi this morning, he announced that he has rejected a coal mining project than would have damaged a wildlife sanctuary and said: “We are not going to compromise ecological security in the name of development”.  

On climate change, he relies on the support of Montek Singh Alhuwalia, a veteran government economics adviser who runs the Planning Commission, as well as the prime minister.    

In parliament last Thursday, Ramesh said: “On the international arena, when I took over as minister for environment and forests on the 29th of May, the prime minister’s instructions to me were: ‘India has not caused the problem of global warming. But try and make sure that India is part of the solution. Be constructive; be proactive’.”    

The speech, which is well worth reading, has become a focal point in the debate between the progressives and the rest.    

Ramesh began by stressing that it is in India’s own interest to tackle climate change, irrespective of Copenhagen, because of the country’s primary economic dependence on monsoons and massive potential damage from shrinking Himalayan glaciers and other factors.    

He then said that the Planning Commission had concluded that, since India’s emission intensity had declined by 17.06% between 1990 and 2005, it could do a 20-25% reduction between 2005 and 2020. He then hardened the 20-25% into a proposal, declaring: “My personal belief is that India must negotiate from a position of strength; that India must negotiate from a position of leadership.”    

That generated a stream of criticism, especially from retired senior government officials who act as negotiators in India’s Copenhagen team – there appears to be a generational divide on this issue with, for example, younger MPs backing Ramesh.  

Negotiators rebel  

Claiming they had not been consulted, two of the negotiators refused to fly to Copenhagen, and made sure that got into the newspapers, till they had received assurances from Ramesh that, among other points, the 20-25% was not to be binding. (A foreign diplomat said to me over the weekend that in the west they would have been removed from the team for breaking ranks!). There were allegations that Ramesh, who is reputed to be “pro America”, was doing what the US government wanted by bringing India into line.    

Consequently, India’s position at the Copenhagen is now in a muddle, which may not be cleared up until the prime minister arrives at the summit at the end of next week.    

Ramesh clearly does not have the respect of the officials, who presumably assume that his views – and maybe he himself – can be swept aside, as he has been before. This is the first time in a career of 20 years in the corridors of power, focused mostly on economic policy, that Ramesh has had the opportunity himself to deliver – and the problem with being an adviser for so long is that one is always seen in that role.    

I have always regarded Ramesh as an economic reformer with nationalist edges. I first met him in the mid-late 1980s when he was advising Abid Hussain, a member of the Planning Commission that was then being run by Manmohan Singh. In 1991 Ramesh was an adviser in the Prime Minister’s Office of Narasimha Rao as India’s economic reforms were unleashed. In 1996 he was in the Finance Ministry with the then finance Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram, acting as his adviser and office gate-keeper.    

After that, his jobs included representing foreign companies investing in India, and then heading the economic policy unit of the Congress Party and advising Sonia Gandhi. He held junior and not very influential ministerial posts for commerce and power in the 2004-09 Congress-led government.
 
Ramesh has suffered till now from neither being a member of India’s civil service nor having a political base, so he has been a soft target when his abilities, high personal visibility, ebullience, and sometimes arrogant lack of tact have eclipsed and annoyed older more staid players. That led him to be ousted from the PMO in 1991, and into many skirmishes since then, which continued in the 2004-09 government.    

Now, aged 55, Ramesh has come into his own, and the intellect and commitment that impressed Husain in the 1980s, and others in the 1990s, are coming to the aid of India’s environment.    

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Ramesh watchers and critics are however waiting for him to trip himself up, as he did briefly when he visited the Union Carbide Bhopal gas leak site (right) in September and picked up some potentially toxic waste, saying “I’m still alive and not coughing”.    

In his parliamentary speech last week, he gently advised some young MPs: “Do not be too bold at such a young age. It will create many problems for you. Go with the grain of conventional thinking before you become too much of an out-of-the-box thinker. Thinking out of the box in our country does not pay in the long run. You have to be in the box and occasionally get out of the box and come back into the box.”    

That seems to be a lesson he has yet fully to learn himself, so let’s see whether he finishes inside the box or out of it by the end of next week.
 
One thing is certain however. India will benefit enormously if he emerges from Copenhagen with the enhanced political strength that he needs to tackle India’s wider environmental problems – work that will upset far more powerful people and interests than a few semi-retired official negotiators.

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