Last few months have seen a grotesque display of obscene wealth in India, a country with well-documented levels of extreme poverty, hunger and unemployment. Indian billionaire Mukesh Ambani has splurged hundreds of millions of dollars on his son's wedding attended by top politicians including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Hollywood and Bollywood celebrities and Ambani's fellow billionaires who have accumulated vast amounts of wealth in one of the world's most unequal countries. Experts blame it on Mr. Modi's policies promoting crony capitalism. Viral Acharya, former deputy governor of Reserve Bank of India, told the BBC that their ability to acquire large distressed companies, a growing appetite for mergers and acquisitions, and India's conscious industrial policy of creating "national champions via preferential allocation of projects and in some cases regulatory agencies turning a blind eye to predatory pricing".
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| Indian Prime Minister Modi at the Ambani Wedding in Mumbai. Source: ANI |
Between 2014-15 and 2022-23 on Mr. Modi's watch, the rapid rise in inequality in India has been particularly striking in terms of wealth concentration, according to World Inequality Lab. The top 1% now control over 40% of total wealth in India, up from 12.5% in 1980, and they earn 22.6% of total pre-tax income, up from 7.3% in 1980. Almost 90% of the country's billionaire wealth has been found concentrated in the hands of the upper castes. The Inequality Report concludes: "This spectacular rise of inequality (in India) makes the “Billionaire Raj” headed by India’s modern bourgeoise more unequal than the British Raj headed by the colonialist forces. It also squarely places India among the most unequal countries in the world".
Bollywood, the powerful Indian film industry, has become a key enabler of BJP's billionaire-friendly and Islamophobic policies. In a piece titled “India's theatrical politics: Bollywood, billionaires and the BJP", authors Sehr Rushmeen and Wanya Sidhu write: "By shaping narratives that subtly endorse “Hindutva” ideologies, sometimes even employing Muslim actors to deliver skewed messages, Bollywood contributes to a socio-political echo chamber in favor of Modi’s BJP...... Bollywood movies transcend mere entertainment; they convey narratives cleverly crafted to align with the BJP’s political agenda. By consistently portraying Muslims and Pakistan in a negative spotlight, these Indian blockbusters perpetuate a cycle of fear and nationalistic fervor to garner votes for the BJP while discarding the imperative of forging national unity".
Meanwhile, India's child-wasting rate of 18.7% is the highest in the world, according to the Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2023 released last year. The South Asian country’s child wasting rate is higher than that of war-torn Yemen (at 14.4%) and Sudan (at 13.7%), which are ranked second and third in the world. Pakistan's child wasting rate is 8%. It represents the share of children under age five who have low weight for their height, reflecting acute undernutrition. The child wasting rate of the South Asia region is 14.8%, the highest of any world region and more than twice the child wasting rate of Africa. India is home to a quarter of the world's most undernourished people. According to the United Nations, India has nearly 195 million undernourished people. This is more than any other country, including China.
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| India Tops in Child Wasting Rate. Source: The Wire |
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| India Tops the World in Child Wasting. Source: Global Hunger Index 2023 |
India's Hindu Nationalist government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi wants to project India as a superpower launching moon missions and hosting G20 summits. Since the GHI 2023 report runs counter to this PR exercise, New Delhi has rejected its findings. But its own National Family Health Survey 5 (NFHS 5) says that "Thirty-six percent of children under age five years are stunted; 19 percent are wasted; 32 percent are underweight; and 3 percent are overweight. Children born to mothers with no schooling and children in the lowest wealth quintile are most likely to be undernourished".
Overall, India ranks at the 111th position out of 124 countries, with neighboring Pakistan (102nd), Bangladesh (81st), Nepal (69th) and Sri Lanka (60th) faring better than India in the index. India has slipped four notches from its 107th position in 2022.
India has slipped 4 places, from 107 in 2022 to 111 in 2023, on GHI. Pakistan's ranking has also slipped 3 places, from 99 to 102. It is not a huge surprise since the country is still facing the aftermath of the disastrous floods of 2022. It is also suffering from a serious economic crisis. Meanwhile, India's Modi government is making claims to being the world's fastest growing economy. And yet, Indian children are the most malnourished in the world.
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| India Malnutrition Indicator Trends. Source GHI 2023 |
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There's a close relationship between hunger and poverty. At the $3.65 poverty line, India accounts for 40% of the slight upward revision of the global poverty rate from 23.6% to 24.1%, according to the World Bank September 2023 Global Poverty Update. It is the same update that made the following recent headline in the Indian and Pakistani media about Pakistan: "Pakistan's 40% Population Lives Below Poverty Line, Says World Bank". Fact: 45.9% of Indians and 39.4% of Pakistanis live below the $3.65 a day poverty line as of September, 2023, according to the latest World Bank global poverty update that takes into account the impact of inflation on poverty rates. But neither the Pakistani media nor India's compliant "Godi Media" reported it. Nor did they question why poverty in India is growing despite the Modi government's claim to be "the world's fastest growing economy".
Related Links:
Haq's Musings
South Asia Investor Review
Pakistan Among World's Largest Food Producers
Food in Pakistan 2nd Cheapest in the World
India in Crisis: Unemployment and Hunger Persist After COVID
India Rising, Pakistan Collapsing
Record Number of Indians Seeking Asylum in US
Vast Majority of Pakistanis Support Imran Khan's Handling of Covid19 Crisis
Incomes of Poorest Pakistanis Growing Faster Than Their Richest Counterparts
Pakistanis Consuming More Calories, Fruits & Vegetables Per Capita
How Grim is Pakistan's Social Sector Progress?
Pakistan Fares Marginally Better Than India On Disease Burdens
COVID Lockdown Decimates India's Middle Class
Pakistan Child Health Indicators
Pakistan's Balance of Payments Crisis
How Has India Built Large Forex Reserves Despite Perennial Trade Deficits
Riaz Haq's Youtube Channel
16 comments:
The Ambani Wedding Was a Grotesque Spectacle
The glitzy ceremonies underscored India’s dark new confluence of money and Hindu extremism.
by Fatima Bhutto in Zeteo
https://zeteo.com/p/ambani-wedding-spectacle-india-celebrities-modi?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=2325511&post_id=146639078&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=false&r=18y6l3&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
What brings together Shah Rukh Khan, Kim Kardashian, Bill Gates, John Cena, and Boris Johnson? The marriage of Anant Ambani, son of the richest man in India, and Radhika Merchant in a wedding so expensive and tasteless it will go down in history.
The family is certainly no stranger to Versailles-style opulence. They live in Antilla, the world’s most expensive private residence, which can survive a magnitude 8.0 earthquake on the Richter scale. It is a 27-story monstrosity that cost between $1 to 2 billion to construct, has six floors of parking, a helipad, an ice cream parlor, its own temple, and a permanent staff of 600 servants. It takes a serious amount of shamelessness to flaunt one's hideous wealth in one of the most unequal countries in the world.Though it is the second largest food producer after China, India is home to a quarter of the world’s underfed, with approximately 190 million hungry people. The poorest Indian states have infant mortality rates that supersede sub-Saharan Africa, according to Oxfam, and every second, about two Indians are pushed into poverty because of rising healthcare costs.
This most recent Ambani wedding is not just significant in its extreme vulgarity; in their unrestrained flash, the Ambanis are the human embodiment of India’s dark confluence of money and right-wing Hindu extremism that has grown under Modi’s rule. Ahead of his nuptials, Anant was blessed by Mohan Bhagwat, the head of the Rashtriya Swamsevak Sangh (RSS), a quasi-fascist paramilitary organization that is the ideological heart of Hindutva, right-wing Hindu supremacy. Ambani senior is known to be a close associate of Modi – the prime minister is himself a lifelong RSS member – and the family was front and center at Modi’s inauguration of the Ram Temple earlier this year, a Hindu temple built on the grounds of a 16th-century mosque torn to the ground brick by brick by Indians in an orgy of violence in 1992. Modi was a star guest at the recent wedding festivities.
A Stunning Rebuke to Narendra Modi’s Divisive, Anti-Muslim Rhetoric
by Saba Naqvi
https://frontline.thehindu.com/election-2024/lok-sabha-election-results-2024-bjp-hindu-muslim-constitution-narendra-modi-india-bloc-nda/article68266835.ece
“Love has illuminated my body
My inner self has brightened
My words now have the fragrance of musk”
—Kabir, 15th-century poet-philosopher from Varanasi
In the past decade, there appeared to be no limits to the exclusion-cum-violence, real and psychological, against India’s Muslims that the Narendra Modi regime and its ecosystem would not push. It seemed that many people did not care enough to oppose the segregation and profiling of minorities. It had, therefore, occasionally appeared to this commentator that the two-nation theory of Mohammad Ali Jinnah was being ghoulishly played out, as parts of India seemed to be a de facto Hindu Rashtra and a counter to Pakistan, an Islamic state.
We were embracing an ideology that diminished the ideas on which our independent nation was founded. It was not illogical to conclude that in the BJP-dominant parts of India, the nation’s largest minority was doomed as a people. Modi only reinforced these fears in the course of the 2024 campaign when he insulted and profiled Muslims in an almost manic way and sought to stoke fears about them snatching all the nation’s resources.
There appeared to be no end to the metaphorical and literal process of kicking an entire community on the backside, as a Delhi policeman infamously did to men bent in namaz (prayer) in the national capital on March 8.
The result of the 2024 election, therefore, is a seismic moment for Indian Muslims that restores faith in the fundamentals of democracy. Perhaps we can breathe easy again, take breath in and out in some comfort so that all people can again be safe in their homeland. Not just Muslims, but the dissenters, the protesters, the media, the activists, and the ordinary citizens who dare to oppose.
The conversation has opened up in fascinating ways. One long message suggests that the open targeting of Muslims by the Prime Minister in many campaign speeches did not just scare the country’s largest minority; the words, casually thrown around about mutton, mangalsutra, Muslims, infiltrators, traitors, were heard loud and clear and repelled many Hindus as well. It also occurred to many voters to ask if this was all the mighty Modi had to say after a decade in power.
I, too, found anecdotal evidence of indifference and/or revulsion to the Hindu versus Muslim fulminations at the top. In 48 degrees Celsius heat on the Varanasi ghats during the last leg of the election campaign, a pundit told me that he worried about what Modi wants to turn him and his children into: “Are we to be the people whose identity and politics is to be decided by how much we can hate Muslims? Is that what our mantras and philosophy are about?” Prophetically, on the same day, the mahant of a temple in the city said that there was always a limit to some things. “This Hindu versus Muslim will not work. It will backfire.”
And then the result came, and a friend called from Varanasi where Modi’s victory margin had sharply come down. Our Kashi, he said, is the city of Lord Siva and of Sant Kabir; it is the home of Muslim weavers and Ustad Bismillah Khan; “Modi was just a visitor—for the last time.” He also shared the nugget that the Prime Minister had the narrowest lead in the Assembly segment where the Kashi corridor was constructed.
The huge hole in the BJP’s numbers came from Uttar Pradesh, and some BJP supporters have said that it was because all the State’s Muslims (20 percent of the population) ganged up and voted with their hands and feet against Modi. Sure, Muslims voted against the BJP, but the sucker punch was delivered by Hindus for various reasons, such as their economic condition, the increased perception of Modi being a pro-rich figure (yes, electoral bonds were at the back of people’s minds), and Dalits choosing the INDIA bloc for the strategic reason of defeating the BJP.
Pakistan has managed to "win" yet another IMF bailout, its ruling hybrid setup has made its intentions clear to keep the country's most popular political leader behind bars for the forseeable future (on one trumped up charge or another irrespective of his acquittal by courts) and even get his party banned outright by hook or crook, and all that interested you enough to put the effort to write an article on was the wedding gala of a filthy rich business family in the neighbouring country and the stark contrast it presented to it's poverty and inequality? I must say I find it hard to understand your priorities (and obsessions) as a Pakistani-American. The picture of a person who is commenting on the neighbour's dilapidated house while his own rickety home is threatening to collapse behind him at any moment is what comes to my mind.
Ignore the Indian "nouveau riche" Ambanis and Adanis and their ostentatious display of wealth, and spare a little more of your thought for your homeland and write about the multitude of crises that it is facing at the moment. With the stringent belt-tightening measures that accompanies an IMF bailout, the Pakistani public who have already been reeling under crushing inflation for the past few years is expected to become poorer, while the ongoing political crisis seems to have no end in sight either. Scoring a couple of points more than India in a few indices is poor consolation for a country whose political and economic edifice is built on such shaky and flimsy foundations. Doesn't that worry you even as much as India's inequality or the Ambani wedding?
Riaz, something like this below link is hard to associate with Pakistan:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/07/15/germany-scientists-lure-better-job-offers-india-high-skills/
Zen: "something like this below link is hard to associate with Pakistan"
It's in your mind. Here's the reality:
I see examples Pakistani scientists and engineers in Germany.
Dr. Asifa Akhtar, a Karachi-born biologist, is the executive director of the prestigious Max Planck Institute of Immunobiology and Epigenetics in Freiburg, Germany.
Sajjad Khan, my fellow alum from NED University in Karachi, has been leading the German car industry's transition to electric vehicles. He has done so at BMW and Mercedes. Currently, he is a board member at Porsche.
Here's more from Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pakistanis_in_Germany
Many young Pakistanis have come to Germany recently as students of science and technology in prestigious universities. The German government has established German Academic Exchange Service in Islamabad.[2] These highly educated Pakistanis are serving in various sectors of the German economy.[3]
In 2021, 2,055 Pakistanis were naturalized as German citizens.[4] Almost a third of all Pakistanis in Germany live in Hesse. There are approximately 1900 Pakistanis living in the northern city-state of Hamburg, about 1500 in Frankfurt am Main and almost 1400 in Berlin and its suburbs.[5] In 2009, the German government estimated the number of people of Pakistani descent residing in Germany at 76,173.[6]
The tradition of Pakistanis coming to Germany for higher education was pioneered by the famous poet and philosopher Muhammad Iqbal. In 1907 Iqbal traveled to Germany to pursue a doctorate from the Faculty of Philosophy of the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich. Working under the supervision of Friedrich Hommel, Iqbal published a thesis entitled The Development of Metaphysics in Persia.[7]
Brofesor sb,
Here's the reality:
Some more reality for you:
https://tribune.com.pk/story/2480881/pakistan-27th-in-global-population-growth
The results also officially confirmed that 39.5% people above the age of 10 years were illiterate and 36% or 25.4 million children were out of schools.
Regards
Majumdar: "Some more reality for you"
At least we know the reality because has actually conducted a national census....a digital census. In Modi's India, no one knows the reality.
Postponing India’s census is terrible for the country
But it may suit Narendra Modi just fine
https://www.economist.com/asia/2023/01/05/postponing-indias-census-is-terrible-for-the-country
Narendra Modi often overstates his achievements. For example, the Hindu-nationalist prime minister’s claim that all Indian villages have been electrified on his watch glosses over the definition: only public buildings and 10% of households need a connection for the village to count as such. And three years after Mr Modi declared India “open-defecation free”, millions of villagers are still purging al fresco. An absence of up-to-date census information makes it harder to check such inflated claims. It is also a disaster for the vast array of policymaking reliant on solid population and development data.
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Three years ago India’s government was scheduled to pose its citizens a long list of basic but important questions. How many people live in your house? What is it made of? Do you have a toilet? A car? An internet connection? The answers would refresh data from the country’s previous census in 2011, which, given India’s rapid development, were wildly out of date. Because of India’s covid-19 lockdown, however, the questions were never asked.
Almost three years later, and though India has officially left the pandemic behind, there has been no attempt to reschedule the decennial census. It may not happen until after parliamentary elections in 2024, or at all. Opposition politicians and development experts smell a rat.
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For a while policymakers can tide themselves over with estimates, but eventually these need to be corrected with accurate numbers. “Right now we’re relying on data from the 2011 census, but we know our results will be off by a lot because things have changed so much since then,” says Pronab Sen, a former chairman of the National Statistical Commission who works on the household-consumption survey. And bad data lead to bad policy. A study in 2020 estimated that some 100m people may have missed out on food aid to which they were entitled because the distribution system uses decade-old numbers.
Similarly, it is important to know how many children live in an area before building schools and hiring teachers. The educational misfiring caused by the absence of such knowledge is particularly acute in fast-growing cities such as Delhi or Bangalore, says Narayanan Unni, who is advising the government on the census. “We basically don’t know how many people live in these places now, so proper planning for public services is really hard.”
The home ministry, which is in charge of the census, continues to blame its postponement on the pandemic, most recently in response to a parliamentary question on December 13th. It said the delay would continue “until further orders”, giving no time-frame for a resumption of data-gathering. Many statisticians and social scientists are mystified by this explanation: it is over a year since India resumed holding elections and other big political events.
"It's in your mind. Here's the reality:
I see examples Pakistani scientists and engineers in Germany.
Dr. Asifa Akhtar, a Karachi-born biologist, is the executive director of the prestigious Max Planck Institute of Immunobiology and Epigenetics in Freiburg, Germany.
Sajjad Khan, my fellow alum from NED University in Karachi, has been leading the German car industry's transition to electric vehicles. He has done so at BMW and Mercedes. Currently, he is a board member at Porsche."
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i've heard about sajjad khan and that's fine. You see isolated Srilankans, Bangladeshis etc. Most famous among the latter is youtube cofounder who was born in germany, but had (well qualified) Bangladeshi papa. But in your Blog, you are usually talking about phenomena, not about isolated individuals. When you write frequently about wasting of human capital, I think Pakistan stands out even more. That is why there is no such phenomenon such as influx of scientists and engineers.
Arnaud Bertrand
@RnaudBertrand
This is actually a very significant difference between India and China.
Never would a Chinese billionaire dare have such an ostentatious wedding, because they understand how indecent it'd be and how badly it'd be perceived by pretty much everyone. And never would a senior party leader - let alone Xi - attend such an event as it'd immediately sound the death knell of their career.
There are many extremely wealthy Chinese but wealth has to be discreet: if as a billionaire you were to start vulgarly flaunting your wealth or becoming too arrogant, it's a virtual certainty you'll quickly regret it.
It's interestingly very similar to France: we too culturally despise wealthy people who show off and hold money as a value in and of itself. Maybe even more so than the Chinese actually (although, unlike in China, the wealthy hold a lot of sway over the French government).
It's actually an interesting topic of study: why is it ok in some cultures to be so ostentatious (like India and the US) and not in others (China or France)?
https://x.com/RnaudBertrand/status/1814640626287452495
Ambani is the exception.Indian hyperrich (Family worth greater than 10 billion usd)are usually as discreet with their money as Europeans or East Asians.Tata Group is worth 375 Billion USD around twice that of Ambani's Reliance Industries.You never hear a Tata scion publicly flaunting his or her wealth.Same for Birla,Mahindra,Godrej ,Premji...
The common feeling in India about this is..'No class' but then we have to remember the Ambani wealth is a 1980s phenomenon (Mukesh Ambani grew up in a chawl along with his 3 siblings) whereas Tata and others of this class excluding the IT billionaires have been rich for more than a century so new money vs old money..
Let me state my proposition right off the bat – we Indians are the most racist people on earth! I was reminded of this stark truth when Sam Pitroda made that controversial statement regarding the physical characteristics of people from different parts of the country.
by Mathew John
https://thewire.in/society/why-indians-are-the-most-racist-people-on-earth
Pitroda belongs to that incorrigible species of individuals who refuse to abide by the tried and tested dictum that it is better to keep your mouth shut and let people think you are a fool rather than open it and remove all doubt. Clearly lacking the acumen to anticipate that in this heated election season, even the most benign statements will be misconstrued by political opponents, Pitroda drew a simple racial, but certainly not racist, comparison among our people from different regions: “We could hold together a country as diverse as India – where people on East look like Chinese, people on West look like Arabs, people in North look like maybe white and people in South look like Africans. It doesn’t matter. We are all brothers and sisters.”
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The ugliest racist reaction was that of the Prime Minister of the country who demonstrated the lowest common denominator of racist thinking with his denunciation of Pitroda for equating people from the South with the African. The self-proclaimed divine being/thespian/politician expressed thunderous outrage that the “Shehzada (Rahul)” and his Congress acolytes were “disrespecting our countrymen based on the colour of their skin. Modi will definitely not tolerate it”. By implication, he was insinuating that to be compared to the dark-skinned Africans amounted to disrespect of our countrymen. For Modi, black is not beautiful. And he further exposed his crude racism by accusing the Congress of not supporting Draupadi Murmu’s candidature for President because they thought she was African – “her skin is dark so she must be defeated”. Significantly, Modi seemed okay with the other comparisons drawn by Pitroda. To be associated with the Whites, or the Chinese or the Arabs is kosher but in Modi’s reckoning, to be linked to the Africans is an insult. How appallingly racist is that?
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On the issue of racism, we have a lot to be ashamed of. In her profoundly insightful book on racism titled Caste, Isabel Wilkerson describes the hierarchies of power that sets the presumed supremacy of one group against the supposed inferiority of another, that harnesses race, class and colour to divide and subjugate people. We in India have the dubious distinction of not only providing the moniker for the book but being linked with Nazi Germany and America as the dominant locations that have bolstered the racist power structures and hierarchies that divide us today
Wilkerson points to uncanny similarities between India and America. Both have adopted social hierarchies that reinforce the differences between the highest and the lowest, keeping the dominant castes separate, apart and above those deemed lower. Both exiled their indigenous people – the Adivasis in India, the Native Americans in the United States – to remote lands and to the unseen margins of society, apart from using terror and force to keep them there.
To put it bluntly, our centuries-old, iniquitous caste system is the mothership that has provided the inspiration for Nazi Germany and racist America. This egregious concept of social hierarchy goes back millennia and is thousands of years older than European racism and division by skin colour. But caste is not our only social deformity. Our racism is a many-coloured monster that goes beyond caste, embracing discrimination based on religion, on the colour of one’s skin and even one’s facial characteristics.
Financial Times
https://www.ft.com/content/95526229-6fd1-447d-ac39-dc1f094b8fa7
Rajiv Radhakrishnan says that spending $600mn on the Ambani wedding is a sign that India is becoming an elite nation (“Ambani wedding frenzy signals India is among elite”, Letters, July 17). He says that next on the agenda must be for India to host an extravagant Olympics ceremony.
Another agenda for India would be to provide freedom for trafficked girls, meals for undernourished children and clean water for its citizens. A fraction of the money spent on Anant Ambani’s wedding could rescue thousands of children trapped in the slums of Kolkata or New Delhi. Investing in children from an early age could help to reverse skyrocketing income inequality in India.
Willem Thorbecke
Senior Fellow, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry, Tokyo, Japan
Bhavika Kapoor
@BhavikaKapoor5
In the last 10 years, his TV channels have been airing non-stop hate agendas, misleading debates against muslims, targeting opposition, his companies are looting the nation's assets with both hands, huge loans from Govt banks, and he has been involved in twisting government policies only in his favour.
Is he less than any anti-national terrorist?
What do you think?
https://x.com/BhavikaKapoor5/status/1819699569539576087
Dear Sir and members of this blog
Actually PM Modi is not educated and sensible enough to even know and understand that middle class and labour level population of the country plays an important role in the development and progress of the country. It is these poor labours that are involved in the construction work and the middle class population which is mostly educated in fact acts as a driving force in the economy of the country. It is they who work hard I'm companies and pay tax. Rich and business class in 3d world countries generally don't pay tax.
Shrinking middle class hitting FMCG firms
https://www.financialexpress.com/business/industry-shrinking-middle-class-hitting-fmcg-firms-nestle-india-3646982/
The FMCG sector is facing sluggish demand as it is becoming polarised with the middle class shrinking but simultaneously there being high demand for premium products, Nestle India chairman and managing director Suresh Narayanan said on Tuesday. He added that in bigger cities, a channel shift is also being noticed with people preferring e-commerce and quick commerce.
Speaking to a select group of reporters at the company’s Samalkha facility, Narayanan said, “there used to be a middle segment which used to be the segment most of us FMCG companies used to operate in, which is the middle class of the country. That seems to be shrinking. And there is a completely, purely price-quality-be-damned-led segment, which also seems to be doing reasonably well”. As a result, companies offering fair to reasonable value in the middle segment are finding their fortunes temporarily shrinking, he added.
Nestle’s demand pattern also reflects this. Narayanan said that the company’s chocolate business was among the worst hit due to the slowdown. Yet, its premium chocolates were among the best performers in terms of growth.
He said that earlier this situation used to last for a quarter and then bounce back, but now it has lasted for two-three quarters.
Last week, Nestle India, reported its slowest quarterly growth in eight years. The company said it was primarily due to weak demand and high raw material costs.
“The pressure points are coming from mega cities and metros,” Narayanan said. “It is almost like we operating in two Indias,” he added.
The categories that have taken the biggest hit are milks & nutrition, and chocolate and confectionery. However, its core products like Maggi, KitKat and Milkmaid continue to grow at double digits.
IIM graduate startup CEO says 2,000 richest families own 18% of India’s wealth: ‘This is insane’ | Trending - Hindustan Times
https://www.hindustantimes.com/trending/iim-graduate-startup-ceo-says-2-000-richest-families-own-18-of-india-s-wealth-this-is-insane-101736132025805.html
The founder and CEO of Bombay Shaving Company reflected on India’s wealth inequality in a LinkedIn post, calling the gap between the rich and poor “insane.” In his critique of modern work culture, Shantanu Deshpande said economic inequality forces people into jobs they dislike. He said that the majority of Indians work not for job satisfaction but for survival.
Deshpande also claimed that 2,000 families own 18% of India’s wealth while paying only 1.8% of taxes. He said that these families are guilty of promoting the idea that hard work will lead to success because it serves their end goal. HT.com could not independently verify this data.
“Most people don't like their jobs”
“One of the tragic and late realizations I've had is - most people don't like their jobs,” the CEO of Bombay Shaving Company wrote in his LinkedIn post.
“If everyone in India was given sustenance money and financial security their current jobs give them, 99% won't show up to work the next day.”
Deshpande theorised that this dislike for work permeates class and sectors - whether it is gig workers or government employees or professionals in “fun and employee friendly startups” like his very own, most people would quit if they did not have to earn a living.
“Work is a majboori to provide for spouse, children, elderly parents, dependent siblings,” he wrote.
Questioning the inequity
Shantanu Deshpande further said that for centuries, it has been considered normal to tear people away from their families from morning to night, ostensibly to provide for these very families.
More and more, however, he has found himself questioning the logic of such a work culture.
“To usurp someone away from their homes and families all day from morning to night, sometimes for days and weeks, with a hanging carrot of a paycheck - we just assume it's alright to do that cos that's what's been happening for 250+ years.
“That's how nations have been built. So we do it. But increasingly I've found myself questioning the inequity of this,” the founder and CEO wrote on LinkedIn.
Deshpande highlighted the wealth disparity that exists within India.
On the question of wealth inequality, he provided some “insane” statistics. Deshpande said that 18% of national wealth is concentrated among the country’s 2,000 richest families.
He admitted that he was not too sure about the accuracy of the numbers but said that these families definitely don’t pay even 1.8% of taxes.
“2000 families in India own 18% of our national wealth. That's just INSANE. Not sure of the numbers but they definitely do not pay even 1.8% of the taxes,” the IIM graduate founder reflected.
“These families and other 'equity builders' like me (v v miniscule version haha) are guilty of peddling a 'work hard and climb up' narrative because it's self serving of course, but also what other option is there? We don't know any other way,” he added.
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