Will India become richer by reducing the middle class?

 "If the Indian middle class was doing much thinking it would realise that our challenges are climate change, water scarcity, pollution (of air soil and water), rural distress, drought and famine, primary education and primary health care," wrote Prof K Bajpai. "We in the Indian middle class are very influential. We manage the affairs of the upper class, and we employ and direct the lower classes. We are the country's executive arm in all walks of life." "What we think matters." Does it? It is fashionable to blame the middle class for all the ills of India. S Srivastava is incensed that the middle class has retreated into gated communities where they use their Resident Welfare Associations to influence policy. "This new form of activism, enacted through lycra-clad bicycle enthusiasts, leisure activists, environmentalists, bird watchers and 'ordinary mums and dads' who want a better life in the city," is his offensive description. Taunting the middle class M Joseph wrote, "What they think is austerity is still vulgar in their impoverished nation. Also, to the poor, it is the upper middle class that is the most visible section of the rich, because the ionosphere of the super-rich is beyond what their eyes can see." While every other nation on earth wants to expand its middle class the chattering class in India wants to drag it down. Consumption of meat and eggs is rising among the poorest and the lowest castes in India, showing that the poor aspire to a higher life style. "The low-income segment group has a high fertility rate of 3.2, compared to the high-income level at 1.5," found the National Family Health Survey of 2015-16. On the other hand, many in the middle class are choosing not to have any children, known as DINK or double-income-no-kids, and about 13 million people are choosing to stay single to enjoy a higher life style. The middle class receives very poor services for all the taxes it pays, because there are no official standards for services, as there are for goods, wrote Kher and Gupta. "PM Narendra Modi's decision to cancel the tender of 85 percent of currency in circulation was greeted with delight in some quarters and anger in others", wrote R Sriram, but "The political and intellectual class, the same class that could not read the political tea leaves in favor of demonetisation .... is now telling you that the exercise is a failure." Exactly. The BJP won elections in UP and Uttarakhand because the poor thought that demonetization would harm the middle class but two years later farmers are still suffering because of low prices for their produce and a collapse in rural wages, wrote R Kishore. This constant vilification of the middle class by bleeding hearts allows politicians to use taxpayer money on handouts, even if bad for the economy. They start misusing taxpayer money 'to help the poor' and then use our money on themselves. Pulling the middle class down will not help the poor. It will only increase poverty.