India was ranked thirteenth in the world on Forbes Tax Misery and Reform Index. Lowest n the list were UAE, Qatar, Hongkong, Cyprus and Singapore. Highest were France, Belgium, China, Sweden, and Italy. Nine of the top ten places were occupied by European countries. What Forbes probably did not take into account was the returns on tax. True Europeans pay a lot of tax but they have the luxury of social services, good roads, uninterrupted electricity and clean water for twentyfour hours. Consider water. Areas in Delhi get only ten minutes' of trickle everyday. Everyone has bought large plastic tanks to collect whatever water that comes. Water pumps are then used to raise the water to another tank on the roof of the house. Water has to be bought from tankers at Rs. 100 for 1000 litres. Since the purity of water is dubious every one has a purifying system at home, charcoal filters for the poor and reverse osmosis systems for the rich. Regular power failure means everyone has a generator or invertor to run a few lights and fans. If food rots in the fridge tough luck. Voltage fluctuations result in burning of electric implements such as fridges and televisions. Broken roads wear out car tyres and broken suspensions are common. Children die regularly by falling into open manholes callously left open by municipal workers. We deserve to be first on that list. Forbes please note.