Is Bush’s statement on India stoking inflation far-fetched?

George Bush, the President of the United States of America had said that 350 million people in India are classified as Indian middle class and the comment was construed as Indians are eating too much.

KS Bajpai, Former Ambassador to the US, said “This is not true because we import only a small quantity of food grains that we need for consumption of the so-called middle class. Considering the small quantity of the import that India is making, it is not having any bearing on the volume price.”

According to Bajpai, George Bush is misplaced by quoting a wrong figure; the middle class is much lesser in number. Secondly the availability of food grain per head in India has dwindled down and has gone down to the 1977 level, he said. Therefore the extra demand of the Indian consumers had been responsible for pushing half of the price by the international market.

C Raja Mohan, Professor of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University of Singapore, said ” Bush was not saying that Indians were eating too much. The fact is that as India and China rise, the size is going to have an effect on the international market.”

Raja Mohan added that the problem is not what Bush has said, the problem is things came in some sections of the political class have developed they are unwilling to see that India is rising, India’s size now makes a difference to the world.

Gurudas Dasgupta, CPI Leader in Lok Sabha, said “It is a small fragment of the population who are having the benefit of growth.”

Excerpts from CNBC-TV18's exclusive interview with KS Bajpai, Gurudas Dasgupta, and C Raja Mohan:

Q: US President George Bush on the Indian middle class said, "Worldwide there is an increase in demand due to prosperity in developing world, which is good. However, this increases demand. For example, there are 350 million people in India who are classified as middle-class, which is bigger than America. So, when they starts getting wealth, they start demanding better nutrition and food, so demand is high and that causes prices to go up." Do you find something wrong with that?

Bajpai: No.

Q: Is it a perfectly acceptable sentiment expressed by the American President?

Bajpai: It is part of a study of what's happening in the world, or a comment rather. So, it is not out of place.

Q: You were one of the people who reacted angrily to Bush's comments. But isn't it a fact that when people who are deprived and have acquired means to buy, will do precisely that. If supply doesn't stretch to accommodate them, won't prices go up?

Dasgupta: This is not true because we import only a small quantity of foodgrains that we need for the consumption of the so-called middle-class. Considering the small quantity of import that India is making, which it will not be making in the near future, it is not having any bearing on the volume price.

Q: Last year, we attempted to import up to Rs 7 lakh tonne of wheat. In the end, we imported less. But we put out tenders on three separate occasions amounting to Rs 7 lakh tonne, which is a very sizeable import?

Dasgupta: That's correct. The present situation has improved. India is not going to be a constant buyer in the international market. Whatever we might be buying will only form a very small quantity of the total export of the international market. George Bush is misplaced by quoting a wrong figure. The middle-class in India does not amount to 350 million, it is much less. The availability of food grain per head in India has dwindled down. It has gone down to 1977 levels. Therefore, I am the last person to believe that the extra demand of Indian consumers has been responsible for pushing up half of the prices in international markets.

Q: Both the Left and large sections of the present India came to the conclusion that President Bush said that Indians were either eating too much or more than they should. Is that a correct interpretation of what the American President said?

Mohan: I don’t think so at all. I don’t think he was saying that Indians were eating too much. The fact is that as India and China rise, the size is going to have an effect on the international market.

Everyone knows that the rise in the Indian and Chinese demand for minerals have given a big boost to the African commodity exports. I think the problem here is not what Bush has said, the problem is things came in some sections of the political class have developed they are unwilling to see that India is rising, India’s size now makes a difference to the world. Everything from foods, commodities to oil that the section of the political class still wants to behave like a victim of a third world country, while our size is now going to make a difference to the world.

Q: Beyond economics George Bush was speaking in complementary terms both about the size and the economic power of the Indian middle class. I put it to you that there was more flattery than criticism in his comments?

Bajpai: He is well-known to have a soft spot for us. With regards to India he has been very favourable, particularly because of our democracy and our rise in the economic world.

Q: You found fault with the fact that Bush had claimed that the Indian middle class was 350 million. You insisted that it is a lot smaller and may be you are right. But that apart what Bush was saying was that this middle class regardless of its size is today eating better food and more nutrition than ever before. Shouldn’t we be pleased that the world is acknowledging this? Isn’t this a proof that India is advanced and progressed?

Dasgupta: Do we need a certificate from Bush about our progress and improvement in the quality of our intake?

Q: It is not a question of a certificate, it’s a question of a recognition of progress. Why is that sticking in your gullet?

Dasgupta: It is a small fragment of the population who are having the benefit of the growth. Therefore, it is being reflected in their own consumer life. This growth has not resulted in increased consumption for the Indian society.   

Q: You want Bush to talk about 80% of the population, which according to the Arjun Sengupta Committee, lives on just Rs 20 a day. He highlighted the negative aspects of India.

Dasgupta: It is neither his business nor ours. We do not ask him to comment on Indian progress. He has hurt India’s national feelings by saying that India has been responsible for the increase in price. He is trying to cover the shortfall in production of agricultural goods and commodities in his own country.

Q: This is not the only time that an innocuous comment by an American has riled India. Are we hypocrites who want to be close to America but at the same time do not want to be seen or recognized as being close?

Mohan: The Congress leadership panicked because of the continuous onslaught from the Left and the threat to pull the plug on this government.

Q: The real problem with the nuclear deal is that the only people in the world who can offer it to us are the Americans. Yet for many in India, that is the one reason why they do not like it.

Bajpai: That is the whole media-raised issue. The Opposition to the deal has not taken account of its vital importance for the US and the fact that the handling of it is raising very disturbing questions in the international community about India’s decision-making capacities.

Q: It now emerges from the Left’s position that if India can somehow get the deal without signing the 123 with Washington, the Left would be very happy for the nuclear deal. Isn’t that just unrealistic?

Dasgupta: Not at all. We are extremely skeptical about the deal itself. We do not believe that the nuclear power deal is going to improve Indian situation significantly.

Q: Prakash Karat said in an interview to the Times of India that we are not for the 123 with the United States.

Dasgupta: What Prakash Karat said was in his wisdom. But what I am questioning is the very content of nuclear power generation and the extent it is going to improve India’s power potential.

Q: Do you not like the deal?

Dasgupta: Not the deal. Whether it is America or anybody else, India has enough power potential to generate additional power without looking for an expensive atomic power bill.

Q: Many scientists have gone on record, particularly Srinivasan, the Former Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, questioning whether we have enough nuclear uranium to continue a programme beyond 10,000 mw. Is this whole attitude to America somehow explicable in terms of India’s anticolonial or anti-imperial history?

Mohan: It is the residue of the anticolonialism particularly on the Left. The problem is the Communists want us to remain a third world country and India unfortunately for them is becoming a large country with a potential to emerge as a great power. So, while the body has become fat, part of the mind continues to think small and that is where the disconnect is. If you look at the Indian society today, its engagement with America is deep. Everybody has a cousin or a brother-in-law in the US. But it is posturing that we have got used to for so many years.

Q: Do we have an America complex?

Bajpai: Absolutely. But there is a deep historical background. Nobody who grows up under colonial rule could be anything but a Leftist. In our case, we were heavily influenced by British Socialists.

Q: You are saying that history has given us a complex?

Bajpai: It began with that but then it was also sharpened by the fact that you are in the Cold War. We had distinct differences over India’s national interest. But what we have never learnt is how to deal with America.

Q: But has the world changed in the 60’s and 70’s? India’s interest has changed but we are still trapped in a complex that is now outdated.

Bajpai: There was an intellectual climate that was developed in those days where it was unpatriotic to think well of America and that persists.

Q: Are we caught up in an ideological time war? Do we end up seeing the world through spectacles that belongs to the 1950’s and 60’s rather than focusing on the reality of today?

Dasgupta: It is just the reverse. The whole world has changed and the people have changed. We don’t want to look at the world according to our own self-interest. With respect to America, we don’t have a complex but it is a suspicion.

Q: Why do we continue to be distrustful of America?

Mohan: The lack of practical sense in our political class and the unwillingness to deal with the world as it is. In the early 1950s, they fought the Korean War and there were millions of causalities most of them Chinese. But 20 years later China was an ally of United States against the Soviet Union.

You make alliances and friends depending on the circumstance, but here is our Left which is frozen in time. Have we fought war with United States? Has America killed a single Indian soldier? Is America sitting in India’s territory? Answer to all these questions is ‘no’. So, this is a victim mentality that we have cultivated against the United States. This is something that is residual in the Indian establishment and the media and the political class and is no longer true of the Indian civil society any more. The Indian civil society today interacts with the west or US far more than it does with China or Russia for that matter.   

Q: Is it forced Indian pride that sticks in our throat? Are we like adolescent children who insist upon saying ‘no’ when actually we should be saying ‘yes’?

Bajpai: I fear we have not overcome that tendency towards inferiority complex, which is part of the colonial experience. This is not just a complex about America, it is a lack of sense of proportion and dignity.

Q: In other words ‘we are the people who lack proportion’ and actually what you are saying is people lack good sound judgment?

Bajpai: Good sense altogether

Q: Are Indian politicians jealous of America and is that why you turn your back on any offer or help or assistance from America?

Dasgupta: Is there any need to be jealous of Mr Bush? Does he have any quality of which we should be jealous? He is the most hated person; he had been responsible for unleashing genocide in part of the world.

I am not speaking of America as a nation, I am speaking of the present American administration headed by Mr Bush, during the last several years, have been responsible for world wide crimes, responsible for acting against civilization, humanity, people and therefore it is not a question of being jealous. It is a question of hating them. I hate the American Administration and not the American people or the American nation.

Q: Do you hate President Bush?

Dasgupta: Of course and most of the Americans hate him.

Q: You repeatedly said that the Indian People Civil Society has a very different attitude to America compared to Indian politicians. Why are Indian politicians able to get away with this prejudicial reaction to America?

Mohan: They are not getting away with it; they are basically talking to themselves. There was a time when CPI was equally hateful of China because China was fighting the Soviet Union and this is a false sense of internationalism; that we have somehow got the contract to defend the world’s interest. The Communists of China tend to be pragmatic but the dominance of the Indian Left on the political discourse creates this distortion.