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June 16, 1998
SPECIALS
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How Readers responded to Pritish Nandy's recent columns
Date sent: Fri, 19 Jun 1998 18:13:39 -0400 "The Regal Room was crowded with politicians of all hues, businessmen, journalists, bankers, fixers, bureaucrats and friends of the Ambanis." Pritish Nandy accuses Nehru of doublespeak, while he himself is guilty of that. Has he forgotten the godlike interview he had with Rajiv Gandhi (The Illustrated Weekly of India) where the 'fixers and the power brokers' were accused of having taken away power from the people? Has Ambani's Regal Room conferred any divinity to these fixers and bureaucrats? Suresh Mahalingam
Date sent: Thu, 18 Jun 1998 14:20:02 -0400 I recently happened to read the column on Dhirubhai Ambani. In my view, the language was perfect and the words were well-framed. I really enjoy reading his columns. The way he has expressed the efforts of Dhirubhai Ambani tells us that a man can achieve anything in the world with his self-determination, no matter how many obstacles are there in his path. Nidhi Gandhi
Date sent: Thu, 18 Jun 1998 13:35:02 -0700 I am surprised to see you contesting for a Rajya Sabha seat taking support from the BJP! In your previous articles you criticised all politicians from various parties calling them thugs, thieves, betrayers etc.. Now you have joined the bandwagon! What is your role now? I have a lot of respect for you as a journalist and on some thought provoking articles! But after reading this ... Anyhow, do something good for India and Indian politics. Best of luck. Gorti Brahma Nandam
Date sent: Wed, 17 Jun 1998 20:06:18 +0400 Please put your hands off anything related to business or business journalism. No 10 points of yours, please. Rediff is better off without you writing on business. Mercy, Pritish mercy. Just to be serious, please go over the article once again putting the logical button on. Don't you find this article incoherent, inconclusive and trash in a bag. Pritish, your poetry on Rediff will (?) make my day. Nikhil
Date sent: Wed, 17 Jun 1998 20:51:30 +0530 EXCELLENT CONTENT AND PRESENTATION.
Date sent: Sat, 13 Jun 1998 19:44:22 -0400 Pritish Da, More power to you, in the Rajya Sabha. I am an alumni of ISI Calcutta. Any help from the USA, just let me know. Amarnath
Date sent: Sat, 13 Jun 1998 17:13:19 JST The article (in general all the articles by Mr Nandy ) sounds very pessimistic. According to Mr Nandy, there does not seem to be anything good in India. As for the topic in discussion, it is somewhat true, when he mentions that the international products in India are just a matter of choice. But let us look at the Asian Tigers. Their economies are now in the dumps. Thanks to globalisation. Globalisation of the economy, put in the right perspective, means that stronger economies make money at the cost of developing nations. Indian economic policies were probably the only reason that India did manage to survive the Asian crisis. I would say that Swadeshi is everything to do with being proud. Being proud of the country, being proud of the country's products. Unfortunately, very few Indians agree with this -- and Mr Nandy seems to be one of them. Anup
Date sent: Sat, 13 Jun 1998 11:06:46 -0400 This guy deserves backing for a senate seat by the reactionary right wing of the Republicans in US. Unfortunately, he was born in India.
Date sent: Sat, 13 Jun 1998 15:05:44 PDT I have read other articles by the author in the past, and they were extremely good. He is very thorough in his approach to the matter. He nails the point, and the interviewee. I hold him in great regard as a reputed journalist. However I do not understand his adolescent obsession to the word "SEXY." I have had a chance of reading some good articles by some renowned journalists over the Internet and in magazines. But no writer has used this undergrad word so excessively. The English language offers many synonyms (appealing, attractive etc.).
Date sent: Thu, 11 Jun 1998 15:59:04 -0700 Pritish as usual jumps to some inane conclusions. Nobody denies what he writes, (an ordinary high school graduate would have written just the same). He thinks India is the Indian middle class. What about the rest of the crowd? Who is going to protect them? Who is going to protect the farmers from the fleecing MNCs with their stupid patents? Who is going to give the poor folks inexpensive drugs if the the MNCs start initially dumping drugs, and ruin the India drug industry (which will naturally fade away) and then inflate the prices? He thinks of Pepsi and Coke and Reebok and cars... Hmm, get a life Pritish and come down to the reality of life around. Venkat
Date sent: Thu, 11 Jun 1998 11:57:32 -0700 I do agree partly with your Swadeshi interpretation. I also agree with the fact that Indian consumers are cheated so badly. But, if you look at the Indian political status, and the level of literacy among the people, it looks very dangerous the way politicians are cheating Indian consumers. It is painful to hear politicians making mockery of "iodised salt," treating consumers as a flock of sheep to make their political rallies a success. I feel, NO country can achieve 'quality' without fierce competition. Bomma Krishna
Date sent: Thu, 11 Jun 1998 11:07:19 -0400 That's what I would call "Hitting the nail right on the head." Good one by Pritish Nandy. Let's face it. As consumers, we have been at the pity of these so-called businessmen, who dish out crap, most of the time. How many of us reading this would not prefer foreign brands? They give us a greater choice and much better quality. All these years we were living in an environment where we had no choice. But slowly that's changing for the better. When we spend our hard earned money on something, we better get its worth. Srikanth
Date sent: Thu, 11 Jun 1998 08:25:39 -0400 Swadeshi has no role to play in this. It is just a red herring. You make a helluva lot of sense. Always enjoy Pritish Nandy's columns. Unbiased, honest and welcoming to the rational mind. Thank you.
Date sent: Wed, 10 Jun 1998 15:42:12 -0700 Pritish has to set aside the "British-Ghulami" complex. Western nations and Japan have prospered because they have valued their "Swedish." They have turned their domestic goods into world class merchandise. Not to mention much of western wealth has been built on ideas stolen from India during the British Raj. Coca-Cola is a good example. Isn't it well known that the secret formula is nothing but a recipe published in Calcutta during the Raj? What about the missiles? India and Pakistan today face the scorn of "developed nations" because they have dared to excel at a technology that they gave to the world? The Western world first encountered missiles in India when the British fought Tipu Sultan. The South Indian Sultan used missiles against the British. If your travel to France or Japan, you would see the pride in "local produce." French display "local produce" sign everywhere to promote local production of goods. What India needs is not hard cash but retargeting local intellectual capital into bringing local produce to the 21st century quality standard. The world is still fascinated by India's goods as it was 500 years ago when quest for India had Christopher Columbus discover the "New World" now the Americas. Western wealth is based on successful marketing of quality made products. Why buy Nike which are made by slave labour in Indonesia? Much of US merchandise is now built in Chinese factories managed by the People's Liberation Army. Anjali Fields
Date sent: Wed, 10 Jun 1998 22:51:00 -0700 This article echoes what I have been feeling for the last several years. I almost felt this article was written by me. As a consumer I believe, that if I spend Rs 5, I should get the best bang for the buck. I do not care whose coffers I fill -- an Indian company or a multinational. The Padmini car example is a classic one. I doubt if this company can manufacture five zero defect cars in a month!! The refrigerator market is another example: No improvement in product features/quality for decades. Only recently they moved to the the frost free category This also reminds me of an incident in the '70s. Someone I knew had a businessman visiting India to explore business opportunities in India. For every request he had one response -- "No, you cannot do this because it will hurt the local industry." After several requests being turned down, he said: "Well, your government is definitely very concerned about protecting the local industry. What about your poor consumers?" The Indian companies have been taking the Indian consumer for a ride. A well written piece!
Date sent: Wed, 10 Jun 1998 11:38:11 -0700 The first part of this article was very nicely written but while concluding the pros and cons of Swadeshi the author seemed very much biased. He gave views only about the negative part of Swadeshi. In order to get good products for the Indian middle class, doors for competition should be opened. Yes, competition most of the time has a good effect on the end user. It reduces profit margins of the manufacturers and improves the quality of the products. But then how in India can we get good products? Well, we have two choices -- buy from outside by some big shot MNC or make them right there in India. Of course,, while making products entirely in India, we cannot compete with infinite R&D expenditure that MNCs have. So saying that we can build world class products which will compete with MNCs products in no time, would be ridiculous. But at the same time, it is not a good idea to give all the power in the hand of MNCs. Fine, they have good products and we all will start buying them ... eventually our local companies will be closed. And one fine day either the MNCs go out of India or they start charging lots of money for the same product (comes inflation and profit/loss of the company, international politics..) then we will go nowhere. So the best way is to get technology from those companies by having joint ventures, and enable our local companies to make world class products. One good example is Thums up. It had a pretty good quality. So much so that I haven't met any person who said... yeah Coke or Pepsi were far superior than Thums up. Then if Coke starts giving 'buy-one-get-one-free' type of offer which they can afford but Parle cannot; Parle will die unnecessarily. That is the negative aspect of total open competition; a stronger guy can kill competitors, not necessarily based on superior product. I would say that it is best to allow MNCs to come into India in a controlled way (by collaborations/JVs), simplify the process of business in India (simplification/removal of licence-raj), good government support for small businesses ... so that one day we also will have some world class brands which will be 'Made in India.'
Date sent: Wed, 10 Jun 1998 13:27:44 -0400 I think you are right that Indian industry has fleeced us forever. But you are partly wrong in that opening up to global MNCs is going to solve our problems. If MNCs manufacture everything elsewhere and sell it here, we will lose jobs and then products or no products we will have no money to buy them. Let us see, why we were getting fleeced by the Indian industry. The reason is that there was unnecessary regulation that made the costs of competing with these companies very high. The biggest deterrent to a Tata competitor are: licensing and capital. Our banks don't lend money to engineers; they lend to the sons and daughters of the rich (industrialists, farmers, whatever). And the interests rate are huge. Now if deregulation brings in foreign companies -- along with deregulation they will run over local industry like a bulldozer. Because they have capital -- lots of it and cheap. BPL and Videocon would never have existed if Sony and Sanyo were allowed to do business here in the 80's. What we FIRST need is deregulation for Indians. So that people like me and you can compete against the Tatas. Then, as we slowly become competitive, open the market to foreign companies. Another example: Banks. We never let non-PSU banks grow. Before we let Citibank and Grindlays capture the market (with their unlimited capital flows and tech savvy-iness), we need to give local non-PSU banks a chance. So first deregulate and then open to the world not the other way round. And give it any name you want Swadeshi or whatever. You don't want India to turn into Russia -- they opened up completely so that now no one has jobs. If opening the market means the market will vanish. Better remain a closed market.
Anshu Sharma
Date sent: Wed, 10 Jun 1998 10:39:47 -0400 I think Mr Nandy has hit the nail on the head. However, I don't agree with him when he says: "They cannot face the challenge of international brands, which are better, cheaper, more cost efficient, more environment friendly ..." - Indians compete on equal terms with their Western (and Far eastern) counterparts here in the US and win. Of course Indian businesses would prefer not to have to, by using the politics of Swadeshi if need be, as Mr Nandy rightly points out. Open the markets, let them fight it out. In the long run this will not only be beneficial to the Indian middle classes, currently the "biggest losers," but for Indian industry as well. When they learn to compete in an open market they have the whole world in which to hawk their wares, not just in our backyard.
Santhanam Srinivasan
Date sent: Wed, 10 Jun 1998 10:04:28 -0400 Well said Pritish. Maybe for the first time I agree with your views. It is agreed that if we get good quality goods right here in India why will we prefer imported goods. The problem is faced by US as well. Their sales figures of motor vehicles shows Honda and Toyota are higher than Ford or Chevy, even though Japanese cars are expensive. Just because once you buy good quality product you do not spend money in maintaining it often. I still feel that Thums Up is a much better cola then others and prefer to drink it over any other cola. And no one is forcing you to drink imported cola, its your choice. But maybe in some cases, the global giant will completely abolish the old product after collaboration and you cannot buy old (preferred) product even if you wish. We need to address this issue. Don't you think so? Why do not we make such rules in case of MNCs that if they collaborate with any Indian company -- "At least for next five years they cannot replace an old product (keeping the same percentage of both old and new product in market)," and then depending on the survey they can stop marketing the one that has lower response than X%. Give me a choice and if I get good service from Swadeshi, I will ALWAYS prefer Swadeshi. Ajinkya
Date sent: Wed, 10 Jun 1998 13:24:27 +0400 Pritish Nandy probably considers the word Swadeshi from the point of view of a multi-millionaire living in the Malabar Hills, Bombay. Most probably he does not have a picture of the business scenario in rural India. He does not know that rural India is fed and serviced by small scale industries. Rural consumerism has a very different look. Those necessities are met by companies who have undertaken a lot of entrepreneurship. Till date in those areas people say 'mujhe sastawala lux dena.' The reason is they watch Lux commercial on television and get sold to that idea. When they go to buy it they find Lux quite expensive. So, they settle for something cheaper. Hindustan Lever cannot make their prestigious brand cheap by lowering the price. So, the demand for a cheaper Lux is met by a regional entrepreneur by introducing a soap packaged in a very similar way as Lux. Maybe as per the marketing theories of the West there has to be a very distinct brand with different values to meet the demand from the rural woman with less money. But think it from the point of view of the woman. She watches ads on television which are probably targeted towards the urban well-off women. But she does not know that and experiences the ad. She wants to use it. This precisely generates the demand. You look at any consumer goods category and you will find that there is heavy demand to consume the brand image but the money required is not available. That is exactly where these regional entrepreneurs come in. I know some traders in the heart of Bombay who launch similar looking models of moulded luggage the moment VIP launches some new model. They are cheaper and at the same time satisfy the needs of the consumer. Pritish Nandy will react to the first paragraph by saying that this fellow is defending falsified goods manufacturers. But he himself has written in his article that the consumer should have the final rights to choose. And there is exactly why these manufacturers come into existence. Our governments have never supported small scale industries the right way. If they would have done that these entrepreneurs would have become owners of real brands. Obviously there are lot of exceptions -- look at Nirma, NDDB, Reliance, Escort, Tatas, NEPC, Essar, Mittals, Bajaj, Hero, Birla, Shalimar, HM, Kirloskar, etc. They all started at a very small level. If proper support is offered there will be thousands of them. Probably very few will enter the Fortune 500. But they all combined will make India much richer. They will generate jobs for innumerable people. The wealth will also stay in India. Swadeshi is not about burning foreign goods or saving India from MNC-colonialisation. Swadeshi is about encouraging domestic entrepreneurship. Regarding banks he sounds very funny. Common people cannot pay service charge for foreign banks. But at the same time, they are not against spending some time in queue to get the service at a lower price. Swadeshi will probably better the services of nationalised banks at the same service fee. Swadeshi does not mean patronising non-performers, Swadeshi is about supporting the potential entrepreneur. The market has its own rules- it always makes room for development. What can be questioned is the implementation of Swadeshi in a concrete form.
Date sent: Wed, 10 Jun 1998 10:23:57 +0530 Well written indeed. But Pritish should have been more explicit and named the perpetrators of this hoax on the Indian population. The advocates of Swadeshi are those who were at their most indignant public self when America announced the sanctions. Unfortunately, Rahul Bajaj could barely suppress his grin when he ranted and raved about US sanctions on television. Fortunately, the Indian consumer has already been exposed to the alternative available. Once we "know" how the fat and ugly Ambassador compares to the sleek Opel Astra, we will simply not buy the Ambassador even if the better alternative is not available. Instead, there will be tremendous resentment build up within the minds of the consumer - the vast Indian middle class -- which may lead to serious consequences for the party in power at the next poll. Two hundred years of colonial rule has created an inborn resentment against any force that seeks to dictate what we should do and not do, as long as it is lawful. |
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