Who Were The Original Crony-Jivis In India?
Linus tackles things head-on. He takes sides in his analysis and it fits excellently with our editorial policy. No 'maybe's' and 'allegedly' for him, only things in black and white.
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By Linus Garg
First publised on 2021-02-11 08:49:57
About the Author
Linus tackles things head-on. He takes sides in his analysis and it fits excellently with our editorial policy. No 'maybe's' and 'allegedly' for him, only things in black and white.
View all posts by this Author
It is ironical that a person, whose family and the political party they headed, made it a family business of developing cronies and selling India to a few by keeping restrictions on doing business and allowing monopolies to exist is now claiming that Prime Minister Modi is selling India to cronies.
Rahul Gandhi, in a bid to counter Modi's andolanjeevi jibe, has tweeted that "crony-jivi hai jo, desh bech raha hai who" (the one who exists by developing cronies is selling the country (to them)). But the record of the Congress from 1947 to 1991 shows that it was instrumental in making crony capitalism the hallmark of Indian business where only a privileged few (obviously who greased palms and filled coffers) got the nod to do business in a license-quota regime.
India finally got rid of that only when someone who did not belong to the Nehru-Gandhi family took over. It was left to P V Narashima Rao as Prime Minister and Manmohan Singh as Finance Minister to dismantle the crony set up and open up the Indian economy in the 1990s.
Rahul Gandhi has made it a habit to tie the NDA government to big business. His "suit boot ki sarkar" is still fresh in public memory. But the point is that throughout the period from 1947 to 1991, the way successive Congress governments promoted the interests of a few, often changing rules and policies to benefit them, shows that the original crony-jivis existed then.
But, as the Prime Minister rightly pointed out in parliament, it does not pay to bad mouth the private sector, especially when entrepreneurs are taking the lead to transform the Indian economy. Yes there are bad fish among them, as there are in any sector, and loan defaults and other scams happen frequently. But on the whole India is blessed with a vibrant and industrious private sector and Rahul Gandhi must desist from showing them in a bad light or castigating the government for helping them. The whole Ambani-Advani campaign is malicious as they are not the only ones who are prospering. India has a legion of entrepreneurs who are doing good work and are contributing in reviving the economy.
