Is technology good, or bad, for us?

What we have always suspected is partly true. Companies do manufacture products with limited lifespan so that customers keep buying their products. The Centennial light bulb is still burning after 115 years in a fire station in Livermore California and the Queen Mother's refrigerator is still working after 64 years at the Castle of Mey in Scotland. Its doors are 6 inches thick as opposed to the thin plastic of today. So are the companies ripping us off? Not always. Some products such as washing machines and cars have parts moving at high speeds which make them wear out and making goods lighter makes them cheaper which allows the vast majority of people to afford these luxuries. Children's clothes and shoes need to be replaced every few months so do not need to last a long time. Manufacturing household goods creates employment for millions of people, creating wealth. People will buy a luxury watch for an enormous sum of money because it denotes status but if they make a razor blade to last a lifetime at a cost of Rs 1000 each how many of us would buy it? Perhaps no one. Today, even illiterate laborers own smartphones which have more technology than an Orion rocket. Unfortunately, technology does not increase intelligence, as shown by the number of deaths from selfies. Also it is creating mountains of waste, toxic to the environment. Not just goods, we use services as well. With rapidly changing technologies we would expect an equally rapid turnover in the companies which provide us with these technologies. After all, with almost unlimited computing power, one would expect new companies to come up with new ideas, challenging the older ones. Already teenagers are moving away from Facebook, which is apperently being used by older people. But the older companies, like Google, Apple and Facebook, are thriving because of their size and ability to buy up start-ups because of their financial clout. Thus, teenagers may think that Facebook is not cool anymore but when they use Instagram they are using Facebook, which bought up the company for $1 billion. Unfortunately, human beings have an infinite capacity to pervert every scientific advance for warfare and killing. The wheel allowed people to travel great distances but also allowed the creation of the chariot. Navigation made it safer to sail the oceans but also made the slave trade possible. And while we chat on Sype or Whatsapp a whole army of cyber-warriors are at work, trying to hack into to government and commercial data. Even as we use technology to devise more lethal weapons Mother Nature tries to heal the wounds we leave behind. Technology has certainly enriched our lives. Will it kill us?

A steel frame or a straitjacket?

The government has accepted the recommendations of the Seventh Pay Commission, more than doubling the salaries of our ruthless masters, the civil service. A salary of Rs 7,000 per month jumps to Rs 18,000 and a salary of Rs 90,000 per month jumps to an eye-watering Rs 250,000. Civil servants are fond of comparing their salaries with the private sector, conveniently ignoring the humongous hidden benefits, which are free medical care for life, including treatment abroad at taxpayers expense, with attendant, pension for life, which will also jump with this award, and, the most humongous of all, they are never sacked, unless someone has been absent from duty for 24 years. Cost to the taxpayer? Over Rs 1 trillion, which will put a strain on the budget deficit and increase inflation. Politicians are putting a brave face on it by saying that it will increase demand, which will stimulate growth, and increase tax revenues, both direct, because they will be paying income tax at a higher rate, and indirect, because they will spend more on goods and services. We can understand paying higher salaries to the army, who risk their lives for the nation, and the police, who risk their lives to keep us safe, but to give such enormous salaries to a bunch of autocrats, who sit in air-conditioned offices which we enter with folded hands, after going 'through proper channel', begging for services which are ours by right. Or 'shake hands' under the table. Are we being too harsh? An officer of the Indian Administrative Service, the aristocrats of the civil service, writes a spirited defence of his colleagues. The lower ranks are corrupt but cannot be punished because they are unionised. Business fellows slander honest officers if denied lucrative government contracts or expensive land. He lists honest officers who were punished for daring to take on criminal politicians. But then he asks us to understand "the puissant interplay of self-interest, perceived self-interest, self-preservation, ideology, maybe even inchoate experiences that shape his thoughts and actions". Sorry, that is no excuse. Get out and take your chances in the private sector. What is the excuse for mistreating disabled athletes or wasting Rs 1 billion aid for flood victims on food and drinks? The CBI reckons that over 2,400 top officials are corrupt. No wonder that the Indian bureaucracy is rated the worst in Asia. Because status quo is so beneficial to them they resist any reform on the specious excuse that they maybe investigated, leading to 'policy paralysis'. The IAS is a continuation of the ICS and still functions as a colonial power. Even Nehru could not reform it. The only way is to close the IAS school in Mussoorie. Appoint officers directly and train them on the job, as is done in all other professions. Apparently, Sardar Partel called the IAS the steel frame of India. They have become a straitjacket on the nation.

Why are they surprised?

There were angry exchanges at the European Parliament yesterday where members used undiplomatic language to express their anger at Nigel Farage of the UK Independence Party, who along with Boris Johnson and Michael Gove of the Conservative Party, was responsible for the UK's exit from the European Union, dubbed Brexit. Farage defended himself strongly when he derided other members that they never " had proper jobs " in ther lives. Sounds like India where politicians hang on into decrepit old age because, hey, India is a democracy and people voted for them. But when people boot them out they still wangle their way into the dumping ground of rejected politicians, the Rajya Sabha. " But the main reason the UK voted out was that you have by stealth and by deception without telling the truth to the people of Europe continue to impose on them a political union," accused Farage. The European Union started off as the European Economic Community of 6 nations, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg, also known as the Common Market. Germany and Italy were the Axis powers and the others were part of the Allies in World War II. Germany was divided into 4 zones of occupation by the US, Britain, France and the Soviet Union and so would have been glad to become part of a trading bloc with their erstwhile enemies. The European Union was established in 1993 by the Maastricht Treaty. Now Germany is the largest economy in Europe, the fourth largest in the world, with the highest trade surplus in the world which gives it the clout to dominate the Union. Starting as an economic union it has become a highly political organisation as it has rapidly admitted new states born from the disintegration of former communist countries in Europe, apparently to enhance peace, so that the EU was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2012. Which is not true because most members of the EU are also members of NATO, a supranational organisation for genocides. Sanctions on Russia was an unnecessary act of aggression for a peaceful entity. Unrestrained movement of people created pockets of stress. " A British plumber is not likely to welcome the entry of an experienced Romanian plumber into the local labour market as this clearly implies a one-way movement in his wages," writes a professor. Globalization has benefited the wealthy while the poor have suffered. Thus, Apple transfers money from the US to manufacture its iconic iPhone in many countries but does not take US workers to those countries. It withholds a large amount of money abroad to prevent paying taxes in the US. Shareholders and company executives gain while ordinary folks lose out. Brexit done, President Trump to follow?

Why are they so confused?

A columnist from the US writes that " Trump's bluster helps radical Islam ". As part of the surge against the Al Qaeda by George W Bush the US military formed an alliance with the sheikhs in Anbar province in Iraq who were strong believers in Islam. This was possible because Bush " did not describe juhadists in explicitly Islamic terms ". If he had then it is probable that the sheikhs would not have cooperated with the Americans. Is that right? This is the same US army which had used white phosphorus on the civilian population in Fallujah, which is in Anbar province, in 2004, under the leadership of Bush. Surely, it is more probable that the US paid the sheikhs in dollar bills like they did with Saddam's generals, to betray him. Saddam's officers are now helping devise war strategy for ISIS while many of the same Sunni sheikhs have pledged allegiance to ISIS. Apart from money, it is also possible that the sheikhs saw the US as a lesser evil than the Shia majority in the south and hoped that the US would protect them from Shia rule. They must have felt terribly betrayed by the quick pull of US troops under Obama. In response to Donald Trump's use of the words "radical Islam" Obama said," We are not at war with Islam. We are at war with people who have perverted Islam." The view, that Trump's words are more dangerous than thousands of innocent civilians killed by indiscriminate drone strikes ordered by Obama, means that all terrorists are fools. A recent strike on an Al Shabaab training base in Somalia apparently killed 150 'suspected' terrorists. Is it possible that the camp had no cooks, drivers, wives or children? The strike was described as "defensive" by the US. How can it be defensive when they blow up a bunch of civilians in another country thousands of miles away from the US? " At the end of his second term, Obama is trying to recreate in Syria the success of Bush's alliance with the Anbari sheikhs," writes the article. Is he? He seriously underestimated the threat of ISIS, calling them "junior varsity" in 2012. It is hard to know what he has been trying in Syria. The US has been actively supporting some groups fighting Bashar al Assad while Turkey, which is a member of NATO, has been making money by helping ISIS smuggle looted Syrian oil. It is only after Russia started targeting ISIS that the US took it seriously. Russian bombing of oil trucks infuriated Turkey which shot down a Russian jet returning from a bombing mission. Russia refuses to make any difference betwen 'good terrorists' and 'bad terrorists', like the US, which leads to confrontation. Finally, the article says," Senior war planners understand that the prospect of a Kurdish force liberating Raqqa risks alienating the local population..." Not true. It is Turkey which sees Kurds as enemies and is bombing Kurds in Syria. Seems that the correspondent has no clue about the Middle East. Neither does Obama. Nor Trump.

How much worse does it have to get before it gets better?

The Vix index, or the volatility index, has jumped 49.33% to 25.76, but it is still below 30, which would indicate extreme volatility. The euro has fallen to 1.10 to the dollar, from around 1.14 and the pound has fallen to 1.34 to the dollar, from 1.50, from just before the Brexit vote. In hindsight, it seems that the Federal Reserve was wise not to raise interest rate at its last meeting on 15 June. The Eurozone, comprising of 19 countries, Sweden, Switzerland, Denmark and Japan have negative interest rates so a rate rise in the US would have put financial markets in confusion. Negative interest rates are meant to weaken the currency, which increases exports by making them cheaper, and increase inflation. Is it working? Probably not. The European Central Bank has been buying back government bonds, worth $90 billion per month, to increase liquidity in banks, in an effort to force them to lend to businesses because negative interest rate means they have to pay to park money with the central bank, which hurts their profits, but has now resorted to buying junk corporate bonds because there are no more government bonds left to buy. OECD, a grouping of 34 countries, fears that members are trapped in low growth trajectory and are not making the structural adjustments needed to stimulate growth. David Cameron tried a program of austerity to reduce government spending and budget deficit after the financial crash of 2008 but that caused enormous public anger, because they blamed falling living standards on globalization and increased spending on immigrants, which made people vote for Brexit. After all, Greece is a part of the Eurozone and has been made to suffer extreme hardship by Germany so that educated people are having to search through rubbish bins to find food, as Germany has built up a huge current account surplus, helped by the weak euro. Older people in Britain voted for Brexit because they did not see why Germany should be the power in Europe when their generation had to make huge sacrifices for World War II while 72% of those between 18 and 24 years voted to remain a part of Europe. Is it any wonder that ordinary people everywhere are fed up of globalization, which they see as helping the rich to increase their wealth by investing wherever returns are good while folks back home remained poor. Since record low interest rates and quatitative easing have not worked is it time to try something different? Low interest rates trap money in losing companies, depressing growth. If interest rates are raised bad companies will fail which will free up money to lend to productive concerns. No politician will allow companies to fail when unemployment rates are already high. Until there is another crisis. We wait till then.

India is the most entertaining country in the world.

Journalists in India have been excited about the US presidential election and the referendum on leaving the EU in Britain so they have neglected the entertainment in India. Bihar Police have arrested 3 students who came first in their respective streams in school leaving exams but could not answer simple questions put to them by journalists. Attention has been centred mostly on 17 year old Ruby Rai, who said that political science is about cooking. This is Bihar where Ms Rabri Devi was Chief Minister for around 8 years in total despite being completely illiterate, so obviously degrees do not matter. What is Ms Ruby Rai's crime? Her parents paid the bribes, examiners took the bribes and someone wrote the exams in her stead. She benefited passively. Her crime is that she was being an obedient daughter, as is expected in the Indian patriarchal system. After all, the Bihar government has money to buy presents for politicians but not to pay teachers, so why will they teach. In Delhi a 17 year old, convicted of murdering a child, was released after 2 months, only to murder an old lady. The most brutal of the 3 rapists in the 2012 gang -rape in Delhi was released after 3 years. His name was never released and he was known simply as 'the Juvenile', whereas Ms Rai has her photographs plastered everywhere. Meanwhile, Delhi Chief Minister, Odd-Even Kejriwal is becoming increasingly bizarre everyday. Yesterday, the Ghazipur Vegetable Market Association filed a police complaint about some threatening behavior by the Deputy Chief Minister, Manish Sisodia. Kejriwal tweeted that Sisodia would surrender to the Prime Minister so 65 AAP politicians marched towards the the PM's residence this morning. Kejriwal apparently has a degree from IIT but seems unaware that the PM has no authority to arrest anyone. Kejriwal and Sisodia both ran NGOs, which is how they met. According to the Delhi High Court 99% of NGOs are fraud and money making devices. Oh dear. When a MLA of his party was arrested for molesting women Kejriwal accused the Prime Minister of imposing Emergency on Delhi. Would he have had the guts to abuse Indira Gandhi in such foul language during the real Emergency in 1975? After the Brexit referendum in Britain Kejriwal wants a similar referendum in Delhi. Is he intending to secede from India? Another great leader, Rahul Gandhi is apparently in London. Wonder if he voted in the Brexit poll. He taunted Modi on the failed NSG bid on Twitter. Why is he happy? Surely, if he is an Indian citizen he should be unhappy. Unless, of course, he is a British citizen or he really is Raul Vinci. No need to look anywhere else, all the entertainment is here.

Could we profit from the confusion?

After the turmoil of Britain's exit from the European Union, known as Brexit, we have miles of analysis this morning. The Leave side won by concentrating on uncontrolled migration, not just from the Middle East, but mainly from eastern Europe. Were they being selfish? Nobel Prize winner, Angus Deaton has studied global poverty and writes that there is genuine suffering in rich countries, like the US. " International development aid is based on the Robin Hood principle: take from the rich and give to the poor," he writes. Currently $135 billion are transferred from rich to poor countries. This is known as "cosmopolitan prioritarianism". This makes sense because a dollar or a euro goes twice or three times further in a poor country than in a rich one. The problem is that " those of us who make these judgements are not exactly well placed to assess the costs". The poor in the US have suffered from globalization. How badly? "....several million Americans - black, white and Hispanic - now live in households with per capita income of less that $2 a day, essentially the same standard that the World Bank uses to define destitution-level poverty in India or Africa. Finding shelter in the United States on that income is so difficult that $2-a-day poverty is almost certainly much worse in the US than $2-a-day poverty in India and Africa." People get angry when they read lurid accounts of aid money going to dictators who are hostile to their country. While they are reading such articles they are told that the government has to reduce spending to reduce its debts so their services must be cut. Local councils have drastically reduced services, directly affecting poor people who are dependent on such services. Does austerity result in increased growth in the economy? Seems that the International Monetary Fund which was a strong believer in austerity now believes that fiscal expansion is much better. A report from 2012 says," ( Economic ) activity has disappointed in a number of economies undertaking fiscal consolidation....So a natural question is whether the negative short-term effects of fiscal cutbacks have been larger than (we) expected because fiscal multipliers were underestimated....(our new) results suggest that actual fiscal multipliers were larger that (our) forecasters assumed." That is why Donald Trump has so much support in the US. What about India? Our exports have been falling for 17 months and are a small part of the economy. It was difficult to negotiate with Europe as a whole so our businesses may benefit. If increasing protectionism causes a hard landing for the Chinese economy so that there is widespread civil unrest in China it will be heaven-sent for us. Its all in the stars.

Is it a rejection of Brussels or a rebellion against the elite?

Britain has just voted to leave the European Union. Within the UK there is a strong divide with England and Wales voting Leave and London, probably because of vast numbers of immigrants, Scotland and Northern Ireland voting Remain. What was this referendum all about? Already there is speculation about who wins and who loses but it may not be that simple. Prime Minister David Cameron called the referendum in 2014 because he wanted to unite his party, the Conservatives, for general elections in 2015. He also wanted to blunt the challenge of the UK Independence Party and its leader Nigel Farage who wanted the UK to leave the EU. In 2014 there was a referendum on independence in Scotland which was defeated because the Scots were told that an independent Scotland would have to renegotiate its membership of the EU. In 2015 the Conservatives won absolute majority in general election by scaring English voters that a coalition between Labour and the Scottish National Party would give the Scots veto power over the English despite being a smaller country. Having given his word Cameron decided to hold the referendum on 23 June, probably sure that the British will vote to remain a part of the EU. Well, they have voted to leave. Now what? Markets all over the world are falling, the pound has fallen to 1985 level and the Euro has dropped sharply, as traders seek safety in the dollar. Markets do not like uncertainty so volatility will persist for a while but will stabilise once politicians start working out the detailed steps of the break up. There will be unintended consequences. Having won an election by promising the referendum Cameron will probably have to resign, Nigel Farage will find his support disappearing as the reason for his party becomes moot, and the Scots will want independence from Britain to stay as member of the EU. A Sinn Fein leader has already called for a united Ireland, because his party had campaigned for Remain. Britain is a country where political correctness has reached such an extreme level that children as young as 4 years of age were given a choice of genders that they would like to belong to. So, was it racism that made people vote to leave the European Union? It was probably economics. The working class have not recovered from the crash of 2008. They see migrants flooding into Europe and are afraid that migrants will take their jobs. Also they do not trust their politicians. The irony is that the champions of the working class, both Boris Johnson and Michael Gove are educated in Oxford which is apparent in their English pronounciation. Will Brexit improve the fortunes of the poor? We shall see. It is a bold experiment.

If the US is concerned why are we so casual?

Although the official inflation rate in the US was 0.7% last year Americans put it at a much higher level, some as high as 10%. Why? Because the official rate is based on aggregates of different groups of goods and services, while individuals use particular product in each group whose price might have risen much more. Also prices vary in different areas, so household experiences differ. While the Federal Reserve in the US is very sensitive to inflation the authorities in India are casually indifferent. Yesterday a report from the State Bank of India suggested that the RBI should target 5% as the lowest rate for retail inflation. One reason why present Governor of the Reserve Bank, Raghuram Rajan was treated so shabbily, that he was forced to resign, is that he is seen as an 'inflation hawk'. Just a couple of days back he said that you cannot have " low inflation and lower interest rates ". Why this diametric opposite views on inflation and interest rate? Because they help the largest borrower, which is the government. If the bond yields fall the government pays less to service its debts and inflation erodes the value of the past debts. Thus when the Congress was running large fiscal deficits the debt to GDP ratio was falling because of high inflation. Citibank calculated that the debt to GDP ratio fell from 90% in 2003-04 to 68.5% in 2013-14. Low interest rate helps the rich to borrow cheap, because they can provide collateral, and buy up assets which makes them richer. Thus, very low interest rates after the crisis in 2008 has made rich people richer, so that 1% of people now hold $78.8 trillion, which is 47% of the total global wealth. The total value of real estate has reached $217 trillion, which is 2.7 times the world GDP. The middle class loses because savings earn less interest and the poor lose because high prices decrease their standard of living. Thus high inflation is a tax on the middle class and the poor and low interest rates help to transfer wealth from the middle class to the rich. Lower interest rates force people into physical assets, such as gold and real estate, to protect against inflation, while financial savings rate falls. The Bank of International Settlements warned that low interest rates lead to misallocation of capital because of easy borrowing. That has happened in India where business fellows have borrowed vast amounts, which they are unable to repay, so that banks are sitting on around Rs 6 trillion of bad loans. Like in the US, the inflation expectation of Indian households is far higher than the actual rate of retail inflation which was 5.76% in May. That is why Rajan said," We are abandoning the ways of the past that benefited the few at the expense of the many." That is why the few are furious and Rajan has to go. Scum.

This scarcity is not a management problem.

As Indians it is shaming to read that India has the largest number of poor people in the world. The reason people are poor is because they are not employed in productive, well paid jobs. There are fewer jobs because investment has fallen, people have lost jobs because exports have fallen 17 months in a row and there is an enormous deficit of skilled job seekers, so that companies are having to re-employ retired staff. So, how many people are unemployed? " There are 13 million people in the workforce, available for work, who are at present unemployed, 30% of them women. In addition, there are around 52 million people, 65% of them women, in 'disguised unemployment', such low-productivity work that withdrawing them would make little difference to to the level of output. Then there another 52 million, all women, who are not in the labour force but would be available for work if there were adequate opportunities for productive employment. Thus there are 117 million people, 78% of them women, who need to be absorbed into new and more productive jobs," writes a professor. The GDP will expand by 27% if women constitute half the workforce, said Christine Lagarde. The solution is simple: create more productive jobs for women and soon India will be a rich country. It may not be that simple. In Japan the number of women in the workforce has increased to 70.1% but the economy is still stagnating. Because women took jobs that men lost so the number of working men declined. Ominously, a report says that there will be fewer productive jobs by 2022 so that half a billion people will be stuck in agriculture, there fortunes dependent on the fickle monsoon. To create more jobs we need to increase our manufacturing but there are many hurdles, such as lack of skills, insufficient investment, difficulty of doing business, rigidity in labour laws and inadequate social security systems. Apparently, all our problems can be solved by '5S' solutions. What are they? " First, understand the System. Then project plausible Scenarios of the future states of the system. Thereafter, Steer Synergistic Solutions," writes a former member of the now defunct Planning Commission. What will this do? " The system model focuses on the interactions among forces. By focusing on the interactions, it anticipates fixes that can backfire, which conventional mangement systems approaches that pursue solutions in silos are often blind to." Quite, crystal clear. Why such alphabetical gymnastics? Because the author is trying desperately to be politically correct. He is avoiding the only solution that will surely work and that is: Reduce the population. If you cannot increase one side of the equation reduce the other side. It will balance.

If the roots of the economy are rotten, how will you make it grow?

After weeks of insults the Governor of the Reserve Bank, Raghuram Rajan announced on 18 June that he will not be seeking a second term when this one ends on 4 September, 2016. If Rajan is not really an Indian at heart and is seeking to wreck the economy, as Subramaniam Swamy alleges, he would have announced his decision of Monday morning and watched in glee as the stock market tanked and the rupee plummeted in value. Instead he announced his decision on Saturday, when markets were closed, giving the government plenty of time to use depositors money as it forced the SBI to act on foreign exchange, to keep the rupee steady, and to use life insurance money as it forced the LIC to buy shares being offloaded by foreign investors. In panic the government hastily announced new rules for Foreign Direct Investment which will apprently bring in a flood of dollars and create millions of jobs. We remember the FDI in multi-brand retail by the Congress, that was supposed to be a 'game changer'. We are to allow 100% foreign control of airlines, which means bye-bye Air India, and 74% control in existing pharmaceutical firms, which will enable the giants from the US and Europe to buy up our companies and put up prices. Wonderful. The other charge against Rajan is that he is a Congress agent, because he was appointed by the Congress and has kept interest rate unnecessarily high, thereby preventing new investment. The fear was that he was a Congress Trojan horse, who will choke off economic growth, so that the BJP loses the general election in 2019 and the Congress can form a coalition government with Rajan as the default Prime Minister, much as Manmohan Singh was from 2004-2014, while the real power will rest with Sonia Gandhi. In which case perhaps Mr Modi will remember the old advice," Keep your friends close and your enemies closer." As long Rajan was the Governor of the RBI he was forced to follow some decorum but as a professor in the US he can say or write anything he wants. And the Americans will listen. Who really benefits from Rajan's departure? Banks, which are hiding Rs 13 trillion of bad loans, and steel, real estate and infrastructure companies which have huge loans that they do not wish to repay. Israel had a problem with huge companies, owned by certain families, which controlled a vast range of businesses and had power to influence policy. As Governor of Bank of Israel, Stanley Fischer took on one such powerful business group, and won. Because the Prime Minister, Netanyahu supported him. Rajan lost to the crooks. Mr Modi is fond of reciting Sanskrit verses. We are not as learned as him but would like to remind him of one line which says," Swadeshe pujyate raja, vidvan sarvatra pujyate." Which means, a king is respected only in his own country, while a scholar is respected everywhere. Beware of chamchas.

If there is equality can you have leadership?

For 70 years after World War II political liberalism became the established norm for the world, especially in western countries. Social services for the disadvantaged, feminism, rights for homosexuals and minority rights were written into constitutions. The Soviet Union broke up, with domino effect on Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia, and globalisation, under the supervision of the World Trade Organization, was supposed to bring wealth to every citizen of the world. Now the picture is completely changed, creating enormous rage among liberal intellectuals. " Every major power is struggling with economic, social, and political churning," writes a professor. " The global economic outlook is made more uncertain by the retreat of free trade." And," The major powers are also expecting the rise of clacking, madcap conservatives - religious fundamentalists, racists, hypernationalists, cultists, homophobes, anti-abortionists and misogynists." Anyone who is not a liberal, in other words. There is apparently a 1 in 5, or a 20%, chance of a fringe candidate grabbing power in a major western country. Although confident that common sense will prevail and people will deposit their faith in the far superior intellect of liberals the present situation is alarming. But when people vote in large numbers for Donald Trump they are labeled as " racist, sexist, xenophobic " and a " confederacy of dunces ". Not much respect for democracy there. Young people are angry as they see " social injustice on an unprecedented scale, massive inequities, and a loss of trust in elites - define our political moment, and rightly so ". For the first time since 1880 more adults are living with their parents than are living with a spouse or partner. This is because salaries have not kept pace with the rise in real estate prices, as the rich buy up more assests by borrowing at virtually no interest. The question is: Whose fault is it? If liberals have been running the rich countries then they should take responsibility for today's mess. If people lose jobs because China is dumping steel on world markets then it is reasonable to blame globalization for their misfortune. They vote for those who talk about protecting domestic industries behind high tariffs and tearing up trade deals. A study started in Britain in 1946 shows how the children of today have much less chance of climbing up the social ladder than just after the war. Economists have studied how to balance efficiency and welfare, but they do not formulate policy. Donald Trump is a racist because he proposes to restrict entry of Muslims into the US but Obama is a humanitarian even though he has killed thousands of innocent civilians, all Muslims, using drones. If everyone is equal there cannot be one leader. There in lies the problem with equality.

Bricks in the wall maybe, but not to be used as brickbats.

Here we go again. Another committee of so-called experts to suggest changes to school education. Our poor children have become guinea pigs for experiments, not for their benefit, but for small-minded political reasons. So what does this learned board recommend? It suggests a " futuristic curriculum ". What does that mean? Does it mean teaching computer programing, robotics or the basis of space travel? At the same time the committee recommends reducing " curriculum load " and encouraging " self learning ". How are children supposed to teach themselves 'futuristic' stuff? Majority of our children go to government schools where teachers are of poor standard, are used for supervising elections to municipalities, assemblies and parliament, and for ensuring midday meals are cooked properly, or face prison if any child suffers food poisoning. The learned committee recognises that learning in mother-tongue is the best but then goes on to propose that all children must learn Hindi, English and Sanskrit. Why Hindi? What about children in Assam, Gujarat or Tamil Nadu? India has 22 official languages, each with rich literature, music and culture. Granted Hindi has the largest number of speakers, because of the highest fertility rates in Hindi speaking states, and is widely understood, because of the popularity of Bollywood movies, but children with different mother-tongues will be at a natural disadvantage if forced to study in Hindi. " While the mother tongue can continue to be the medium of instruction, the study of Hindi is desirable to bring all Indians together as citizens of a single nation," says the report. This is clearly a political statement, to be condemned without hesitation. Tamil Nadu will not tolerate imposition of either Hindi or Sanskrit. They believe that Tamil is an older language than Sanskrit. Lastly, they recommend that students should be allowed to take Class XII Board exams from the internet, on demand. With millions of children how will anyone supervise candidates to prevent cheating? The main debate is about whether children should be failed or allowed to progress even if they have learnt less than their peers. What is most amazing is that all these concerned people do not seem to understand that each child has different capabilities and so some will need more attention than others, which is not possible when numbers are overwhelming. Clearly, the system needs to improve, but not by dumbing it down, which will hold back the brilliant students. After all 400 years ago Shakespeare went to an elite Grammar school. Finally, showing the prejudice and politics in our education system, a principal writes that children fail because " We are a caste-based hierarchical society ". Now he tells us. So, get rid of Hindus and the problem is solved. So easy.

We Indians have nothing to hide.

According to a Supreme Court lawyer an employee of Essar Group, an industrial conglomerate, has revealed that the company was tapping phones of several ministers and businessmen between 2001 and 2006. The whistleblower has since denied any links with the lawyer, who says that he has proof of being hired by him. We are used to all this in India. Politicians say something, withdraw it the next day and blame the press for quoting him out of context the day after. Albasit Khan, the alleged whistleblower, has accused the lawyer, Suren Uppal, of " sensing an opportunity to extract money from many corporate bigwigs, you created and concocted this story ". Uppal says that " Essar has won over Albasit Khan ". With money or threats or both? Do these revelations have any importance at all? In India, no. We had the drama of the Radia tapes which implicated politicians, top business fellows and journalists, who are household names. What happened? Nothing. Case closed. Essar apparently has a laid down policy of identifying VIPs, who will be helpful to the company, and providing them with 'hospitality', paying their medical bills and offering employment to their relatives. A survey showed that 66% of businesses believe that some form of bribery is acceptable. Hence, 80% of Indians believe that businesses are corrupt. An even larger number will agree that politicians and civil servants are corrupt. So, nothing happens. Bofors, 2G, Commonwealth Games, coal mines allocation, AgustaWestland, the list of scams is unending. Has anyone big gone to prison yet? No. Only the ordinary folks of Campa Cola compound lost their homes. The Mitrokhin archives reveal how the Soviets paid bribes to ministers in Indira Gandhi's government and maybe to her as well. This kind of revelation is usually followed by the same drama everytime. Opponents scream Congress is corrupt while Congress retorts that so are the others. Then all politicians agree that they are innocent until proven guilty. Which never happens because our munificient judges continue cases forever by which time many of the actors are dead and the nation has forgotten what happened in the distant past. A dispute regarding a property has taken 36 years to resolve. As for bugging phones, it is no big deal. The US National Security Agency can, and probably does, bug our politicians and civil servants at will. Since they store their black money in western banks they are open books to foreign powers anyway. Chinese hackers copy all our government's data at will. Google and Facebook know more about us than we know about ourselves. Maybe that is why the Father of the Nation went about in a loin cloth: A naked man has nothing to hide. Neither, it seems, does a naked nation.

The best way to ask for our money is to be polite.

While we support the Prime Minister in his efforts to reform the economy and his efforts to change the sclerotic mindset of glorifying poverty and we understand that India cannot become rich without top-class infrastructure, which cannot be done without lots of money, we cannot agree with his assessment that vast numbers of Indians are cheating on taxes. In a speech to tax officials he asked them to increase the number of taxpayers from 54 million to 100 million while being taxpayer friendly. That is like asking dentists to be gentle while pulling teeth. How is it the fault of tax officials when the government itself sees citizens as serfs to be punished unless they obey orders, however unreasonable they maybe. An article on 14 June warned us that advance tax for individuals had been advanced from 30 September to 15 June and anyone failing to comply would have to pay interest at 1% per month. Even China does not treat citizens with such brutal lack of respect. How can we be paying less tax when the Income Tax department had to refund Rs 1.22 trillion in excess collections? Since most refunds are in thousands of rupees imagine the number of officers being paid to do this useless job. If tax officers are urged to look for more taxpayers they are tempted to browbeat people. Hasan Ali Khan, a businessman in Pune, was asked to pay Rs 1.66 trillion in taxes, which was reduced to just Rs 30 million by the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal. The extent of wrong tax demands can be measured from the Rs 7 trillion in disputed taxes that the government will probably have to write off. Rich people have an army of lawyers and accountants to look for loopholes while we, the people, are helpless. If the government really wants to increase the tax base then it should help us to pay only what is legitimate income tax. For that everyone should have just one account number, preferably in a public sector bank. If a person wants to open another account in another bank or in a different city the permanent account number will be incorporated in the new account so that all information is automatically transmitted to the original bank. It will save a lot of bother by eliminating Know Your Customer formalities. Tax officers will be posted in each of these holding banks and will collect only the amount that is payable. They will also advise people on how to minimise taxes legally so that we do not have to pay accountants. The government may charge 1-2% of tax paid as fees for advice. This adversarial system was designed by the British. Our government should be trying to serve our interests. Only if it respects us.

Will a big shock help the world economy?

The European Central Bank is going to buy corporate bonds including those of Volkswagen AG, which cheated on its emissions tests and is facing billions of dollars in fines, and Telecom Italia, which Moody's and S&P regard as junk borrower. The ECB has been buying $90 billion of government bonds every month and analysts think that there are fewer bonds left to buy. Buying bonds by the central bank pushed yields down to 0.02% on German 10 year bonds. Recently, yields turned negative as fears of Brexit have grown. Compare that with a yield of 7.517% on benchmark 10 year bonds issued by the Government of India. The ECB cut interest rates to negative in 2014 and increased that to -0.40% in March of this year. The ECB wants European governments to increase spending to stimulate growth and increase prices but Germany is adamant in its refusal. In fact Germany is doing just the opposite by imposing severe austerity on countries whose economies are in recession, such as Greece. It is not just that German debts were written off by the Allied nations, it also gains because the common currency means that its goods are priced the same in 19 countries that have adopted the Euro and the weak Euro helps its exports so that it posted a record current account surplus of 30.4 billion Euros ($34.6 billion) in March, up from 21.1 billion Euros in February. The US feels that Germany is getting an unfair advantage from a weak Euro. The Bank of Japan also seems to be running out of government bonds to buy back in its program of quantitative easing and had introduced negative interest rates in January of this year. Japan's nominal GDP has been stuck at 500 trillion yen for about 25 years, which means it is stagnating but not contracting, as Brazil or Greece. Everything the government and central bank have tried has failed but it remains third richest country in the world, after the US and China. Of course, Japan is a small country with a homogeneous population, which is rapidly growing old because of very low birth rate, but a shrinking population means that per capita GDP is actually rising. When crisis hit Japan it was already a wealthy nation, whereas countries like China are caught in a middle income trap, the global economy was expanding, while now growth is anemic, and Japan was able to weaken the yen to increase exports, but now other countries are competing in weakening their currencies. The Federal Reserve in the US again kept rates on hold yesterday. Central banks cannot formulate policies, only governments can. But governments are constituted by politicians who are paralysed by the fear of losing elections. Experts keep on complaining but no one is listening. Perhaps a jolt, like the Brexit, will galvanise them. We'll see.

Which side do we take in this debate?

On 23 June Britain votes on whether to stay in the European Union in a referendum, which has been labeled Brexit. The Prime Minister, David Cameron is in the Remain camp. He says that the economy will suffer if Britain leaves the EU while the Leave side says that the only way to stop immigration is to get out. With 8 days to go the Leave side has a 7-point lead in opinion polls. So, who are the protagonists? " For the  EU are the prime minister and the leader of the opposition, the governor of the bank of England, the Confederation of British Industry and the Trade Union Congress, the World Bank and the IMF, along with Barak Obama and other international leaders. On the opposite side are those the New Statesman describes as the 'Brexit Odd Squad," writes Mark Tully. So, who are these odd fellows? " ....Boris Johnson, Donald Trump, Putin and Nigel Farage. Farage is the leader of the extreme-right UK Independence Party." You can almost smell rotten eggs. " It is trumpery that is attracting the 'Out' support. Like Trump, the Brexit campaigners are concentrating heavily on immigration, saying Britain must regain control of her borders by ending free movement of of EU citizens." If all these people are so odious why are so many ordinary people supporting them? Because they feel betrayed by the establishment controlled by the elite. " Whether it is dealing with Greece or with Brexit or Donald Trump, elites are batting for their interests and doing so brazenly. The IMF is very much part of that. For them, Trump is an outsider who owes them nothing and hence needs to be stopped. Similarly, Brexit may or may not be good for the Brits. They do not care about it. They know that it is disruptive to their interests and hence must be stopped," writes a consultant. " The only tool of persuasion that they have is scare tactics. That is what they deploy under the circumstances. Their contempt for the intelligence of the public is ill-concealed." The trouble is that the rich and powerful live in expensive houses where they have no contact with immigrants, whereas the poor believe that they are losing out on their entitlements because of immigrants. Cameron faced angry voters at EU debates. The incomprehension of the elite is expressed in strong language. " Democracy may be the preferred form of government, but it is not guaranteed to produce only tolerant and liberal outcomes.....Xenophobia, bigotry and sub-national and ethnic sentiment are never far from the surface when adversity strikes," is an angry response. Or maybe it is just fear of poverty and anger at exclusion. Remember the French Revolution? The shooting in Florida cannot be appeased by oil from the Middle-East. Labeling the justified anger as xenophobia only widens the gap between the elite and the poor. Whose side do we take?

Why can we not do the right things?

Venezuela has the largest proven oil reserves in the world. The economy is in such dire straits that there are food riots where people are looting food shops. The currency has collapsed to 1050 to the dollar in the black market while the official rate is 9.95 to the dollar. President Nicolas Maduro blames the opposition for hoarding food and the US for conspiring to topple his government. Since Venezuela imports all consumer products, including food, the collapse in the currency has caused inflation to rise to 524%. The opposition has collected millions of signatures calling for a referendum on Maduro but he is refusing. He has filed a case against a referendum in the Supreme Court where he is sure to win because he replaced 12 judges with his stooges when his party lost the elections for Congress. Although India has never suffered such a crisis, probably because we do not have oil, we should not forget the famine in the 60s, when we were rescued by the US, and the Emergency when Indira Gandhi appointed AN Ray as Chief Justice, superseding 3 judges more senior to him. Hugo Chavez resorted to fixed prices, which pushed goods into the black market, and resorted to subsidies, which took away the incentive for production. One day's minimum wage will buy 227 grams of beef, or 12 eggs, or 1,000 litres of petrol, or 5,100 kWh of electricity, enough to light up a small town. Instead of economic reforms Chavez proceeded to nationalise everything, from farms to supermarkets, banks, telecom, manufacturing companies and supermarkets. Production fell off while corruption boomed. The result is what we see today. This is not a fairy tale or something that happened in the past, like the Cultural Revolution in China. China seems to have learnt a lesson from the ravages of that period but people in India seem have learnt nothing from our history. A former professor writes that there is a crisis in agriculture, a crisis in manufacturing and a crisis in infrastructure. So what are his solutions to all the problems we face? " The role of the government, and the importance of public action, cannot be stressed enough. Without it, growth cannot be sustained, let alone be transformed into development that improves the well-being of the people," he writes. " ...the history of capitalism suggests that success at economic development is observed mostly in countries where governments and markets complement each other and adapt to one another..." The professor forgets that socialism was written into our constitution by Indira Gandhi, the government controls a lot of industries, and we have a plethora of social schemes to distribute handouts to the poor. The mystery is that why he did not write such an article during the 10 years of Congress raj when the economy was being trashed. The knowledge is already there. Just look.

A thousand cuts, one embrace at a time.

There can be no doubt that China is our biggest, most dangerous and most powerful enemy. It is doing everything in its power to stop India making any progress. Not just India, China is a threat to all its neighbors, including Vietnam, Japan, Taiwan and Philippines. Outgoing President of Philippines, Benigno Aquino twice compared the Chinese government to that of Nazi Germany. China's friends are Pakistan, the biggest state sponsor of terrorism in the world, whose business is controlled by its rapacious army, North Korea, a brutal dictatorship, ruled by a fat despot, and Zimbabwe, another brutal dictatorship, ruled by a geriatric despot. It is not surprising that China is blocking India's entry into the Nuclear Suppliers Group which was apparently formed after India's first nuclear weapon test in 1974. Three countries, the US, Russia and China, with the largest arsenal of nuclear weapons are members along with tiny countries like, Finland, Denmark and Iceland, which have none. This group was designed to stop countries from acquiring fissile material to build bombs but has not been able to stop Pakistan and North Korea from making their own atom bombs, with Iran on the threshold of making one. Prime Minister Modi is keen on renewable and nuclear energy which will allow us to meet our enormous hunger for electricity, while meeting our obligations under the climate change agreement. Out of the top 10 producers of uranium Uzbekistan, Namibia and Niger are not members of this group and so could meet our requirements of uranium but Modi wants an assured supply. India has just become a member of the Missile Technology Control Regime and also wants to become member of the Wassenaar Arrangement, which was set up to control dual-use technology for conventional arms and Australia Group, which was set up to control the production of chemical and biological weapons. Modi has obtained the support of the US, Mexico and Switzerland but China and Turkey are adamant in their opposition. China's military strength is underpinned by its economy, which is the second largest in the world after the US. We are no match for it in any department so we have to resort to 'death by a thousand cuts', just like China's stooge, Pakistan is trying to do to India. As China's economy slows down stress inside will grow. The Communist Party is terrified of losing control if large numbers of workers lose their jobs. So it tries to stimulate growth through more investment, fueled by debt, which has seen corporate debt balloon to 145% of the GDP. At the same time bubbles are building up which will burst at some point. We should increase pressure by building business with Vietnam, Japan and Taiwan. If Donald Trump wins in November that will increase the pressure further. If China implodes it will be a day to celebrate. We hope.

Does social media make us more stupid?

For us, of a certain age, the entire social media seems extremely stupid. Why would you post your second marriage on Facebook where it maybe discovered by your wife? Human beings are born inside walls, we grow up surrounded by walls, at home, in school and at work, and most people, except Hindus, are buried in caskets after death. Why then do we expose ourselves naked, sometimes literally, on social media? Are all human beings either exhibitionists or voyeurs? Weird behavior attracts weird people. Trolls are those who write threatening, hateful or abusive messages, protected by the anonymity of social media. Why is there so much anger? It maybe because people feel that no one listens to them. A study in Britain found that 55% of journalists saw themselves as Leftists, while only 18% are to the Right. In the US 4 times as many journalists are Democrats as there are Republicans. In India it seems that over 90% of journalists are Leftist, anti-BJP, minority-loving fanatics, completely intolerant of any other opinion. Sonia Gandhi can abuse Modi, calling him 'maut ka saudagar', which means 'one who deals in death', but a cartoon of Rahul Gandhi, showing him hiding from Modi, is removed. It is this lack of power or control that infuriates people. Messages on social media have to be brief. You cannot write an essay on the pros and cons of any issue whereas a few choice words of abuse immediately convey the anger. There is no excuse for threatening rape or violence but if you believe in freedom of expression you have to allow others to have their say. It seems that political correctness has become so extreme that it has become an intellectual prison. We have every right to dislike someone, and try to avoid that person, but even that dislike is being described as 'microaggression'. The tendency of liberals to label people as racist, sexist or nationalist is also abuse. If we say that feminism is a form of sexism we will be immediately labeled as misogynist. When suffragettes started agitating for the right to vote all politicians were men so it was men who voted to change constitutions to allow women to vote. Racism is bad but is tribalism in Africa not a form of racism? There seems to be a movement to make everyone uniform, regardless of gender, intellectual capability or cultural differences. Communism was an experiment in making everyone economically and socially equal. It failed spectacularly. People are different. Politics must include everyone and respect difference of opinion without being politically correct. Perhaps, people just need to have acknowledgement that their grievances have been respectfully considered. In the UK the Prime Minister is facing abuse on migration. In India, we will be in prison if we raise our voices against politicians. Hence the abuse on social media.

The sun could be the solution to droughts in India.

The Sun is a ball of hydrogen which has been around for about 4.6 billion years and is the source of life on earth. Surya Namaskar, or homage to the Sun, has been practiced in India for thousands of years. India has pressing reasons to harness the energy of the sun. We have 400 million people without reliable electricity supply, we have to reduce our energy bill, because we have to import most of our oil and gas, and reliance on fossil fuels is driving pollution to dangerous levels in many areas. The government is determined to increase production of solar power from 6.7 GW, or gigawatts, at present to 100 GW by 2022. The technology is still evolving and it will cost an estimated $140-160 billion, but it will also stimulate innovation and create new business opportunities. " We will see a rise of storage technologies, automation systems and a widespread industry as distributed rooftop solar projects take off. It will lead to the creation of a new ecosystem and support a vendor market for chemicals, glass and other materials used in solar manufacturing," said Santosh Kamath, of KPMG in India. As the world contemplates the arrival of peak oil and the terrifying prospect of irreversible global warming enormous amount of research is going on into how to harness the energy of the sun. There is research into bio-solar cells where bacteria are used to produce electricity, electricity from photosynthesis, electricity from light, floating houses, floating solar panels to override the scarcity of land, transmitting solar power without wires from space, power from energy harvesting trees, assured power by tracking the sun, boosting solar power by light sensitive nanoparticles and  concentrated photovoltaic cells. Sadly none of this research is taking place in India. India needs to manufacture solar panels and photovoltaic cells locally, which will save $42 billion and create 50,000 direct jobs and 125,000 indirect jobs by 2030. In January President Hollande of France laid the foundation stone of the International Solar Alliance, an alliance of 122 countries situated between the 2 Tropics, in Gurgaon in India. The government wants India to be at the center of global research on solar energy. With its vast population crammed into a small amount of space land acquisition is the biggest problem. Rajasthan has plenty of open land with sunlight throughout the year but Andhra, Telengana and Tamil Nadu are also building solar farms. If solar panels are built on the roof of every house we could generate a lot of electricity. In cities like Mumbai or Delhi most people live in flats so who pays to install the panels and who benefits from the electricity produced. The biggest problem with solar energy is that it is erratic, depending on the weather, so electricity suppliers are having to work on how to manage sudden surges or fading of power. We suffered from drought for 2 consecutive years. If we could produce unlimited cheap electricity from the sun we could desalinate sea water for all our needs. Homage to the sun will be truly deserved.

When desperation becomes a masterstroke.

666 is the number of the Beast according to the Book of Revelations. We, Indians do not have any such number but 6.6.66 was a very significant day for us because on that day the rupee was devalued by 57%, from Rs 4.76 to Rs 7.50 against the dollar. Since then it has been on a downward course until today when it has reached about Rs 67 to the dollar. As the rupee loses value it loses its buying power, so imports become more expensive, which means we have to spend more on our shopping. In 2013, India imported 144.3 million tons of crude oil, the cost of which will keep increasing as the rupee becomes weaker. The increasing price of crude is passed on to customers, which increases transport costs and hence the cost of goods. That leads to inflation. Since independence we have been running retail inflation at above 5% with drops into deflation in 1968 and 1975. Constantly increasing prices means that the buying power of the rupee is getting eroded, which is manifested in its exchange value against the dollar. On 28 August 2013, it fell to 69, creating absolute panic in markets and among politicians. If all this information is available to all surely our politicians should be using every effort to bring retail inflation down to low levels which will help the poor by keeping prices low? The problem is that price rises can be controlled either by reducing demand or by increasing supply. To increase supply means a huge increase in manufacture, which will need massive investments in infrastructure, such as electricity, roads and ports. Unfortunately, building infrastructure costs a lot of money and the benefits are obtained after many years, much before the term of the government ends. Politicians in India have understood that elections are won by distributing handouts to the poor and not by making the nation stronger. So, they spend government revenues on handouts, without increasing output, which leads to an explosion in prices, the rupee falls, which is when panic sets in and expenditure is severely cut to reduce fiscal deficit and interest rate is raised to control inflation. Having dropped to 4.83% in March retail inflation jumped to 5.39% in April and is expected to be higher in May. In his latest policy statement the Reserve Bank Governor held interest rate at 6.5% because of uncertainty about the inflation level. " We will have to figure out ways to attain 5% target set for Jan 2017," he said. Bond yields are also predicting a high inflation level. Why do we not learn from the past? Because a lot of people are dependent on sycophancy to politicians for their status. Some find the devaluation of the rupee by Indira Gandhi a "masterstroke". No matter that inflation rose from 5.8% to 6.7%. Depends on whether you are looking up, or down, isn't it?

Ambition is fantastic, even if the goal is very far.

The President of the US speaks to the joint session of the Congress in his State of the Union address. Yesterday Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi stood at the same podium to address a joint session of both the House and the Senate, chaired by the Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan and Vice President Joe Biden. He started off by quoting Abraham Lincoln and then went on to applaud US sacrifice on D-Day by quoting words from the American National Anthem," I applaud....India applauds, the great sacrifices of the men and women from 'The Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave' in service of mankind." Then he started clapping, which was very unusual. This got him his first standing ovation. He then talked about the Indian Constitution saying," For my government, the Constitution is its real holy book." Which was perhaps a gentle dig at the Congress which had denied him a visa in 2005 because of riots in Gujarat in 2002. This in a country where Obama would never be allowed to run for president had he not converted to Christianity. Modi had a little dig at the Congress Party in India when he said," I am informed that the working of the US

Congress is harmonious. I am also told that you are well-known for your bipartisanship. Well you are not alone. Time and again, I have also witnessed a similar spirit in the Indian Parliament, especially in the Upper House. So, as you can see, we have many shared practices." The joke was well appreciated but must have stung back here. After all, Indian politicians are not known for their sense of humor. Although his pronunciation is not English as She is Spoke he spoke with confidence and not as a supplicant from a poor country with millions of poor people, which has sustained our socialist politicians for 68 years. He gave the Americans a clear list of what he wants to do. A roof over every head, skilling millions of youth, electricity in every home and 100 smart cities. The US is known for its American Dream where the 'pursuit of happiness' is written into its Declaration of Independence, so they appreciate ambition, even if it is difficult to achieve. He did not talk about the famine in 1965 which was relieved by the charity of the US government but he referred to Norman Borlaug and the Green Revolution, which has made India self sufficient in food. This was not a Prime Minister having to devalue the rupee by 57% when western countries stopped giving us alms after the war with Pakistan in 1965, or the one who had to sell 67 tonnes of our gold reserves in 1991. His reference to maritime security was an indirect reference to China while his naming of terrorist groups was an open reference to Pakistan. For someone who used to sell tea on trains it was bravura performance.