An Alternative to Modi’s Demonetization Plan – Without the Pain and the Deaths

An Alternative to Modi’s Demonetization Plan – Without the Pain and the Deaths

Written by Dr. Seshadri Kumar, 25 November, 2016

Copyright © Dr. Seshadri Kumar. All Rights Reserved.

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Summary:

The money-exchange scheme announced in India by PM Modi on the evening of November 8, 2016, has caused tremendous hardship to the people of the country. More than 50 people have died as a result of the policy, while countless people have been forced into extreme hardship. Much more suffering is to come.

Three questions immediately present themselves. One, does the scheme solve the stated objectives of eliminating black money and counterfeit money? Two, does the country have the capacity to absorb the shock of removal of 86% of the cash stocks in the country and their slow replacement, either by stocks of new money or a cashless economy – a process likely to take months? Three, and most importantly, does a better alternative exist?

There has been much debate on the first aspect – viz., whether the scheme under implementation can solve the black money and counterfeit problem. I will only discuss this briefly, and focus on the second and third questions.

I show in this article that the country simply does not have the capacity to absorb the shock of the removal of 86% of the cash stocks in the country.

Further, I also show that a much better alternative to the government’s scheme exists – a scheme that does not focus on chasing stocks of black money, but on completely eliminating black money and counterfeit money, once and for all, in a painless process that does not involve people starving, losing their livelihoods, or dying.

Large portions of this article recently appeared in a column that I wrote in Frontline magazine – the entire section titled “Flaws of the Demonetization Scheme” is taken verbatim from the aforementioned Frontline article: this article expands on that column in order to provide a comprehensive look at the problem, and a better solution than the one the government has implemented.

The Announcement

On November 8, PM Modi announced a money-exchange scheme, the stated objectives of which were twofold:

1. Elimination of hoarded stocks of black money

2. Neutralization of the circulation of counterfeit money

Later interactions with the government through press conferences revealed a third objective: A move of the country to a cashless economy.

According to Modi's speech on the evening of the 8th of November, all existing Rs. 500 and Rs. 1,000 notes would cease to be legal tender by the end of the day; banks and ATMs would be shut for the next 2 days to stock them with new Rs. 2,000 notes and notes of other lower denominations; and after that, banks would start accepting cash deposits and return up to Rs. 4,000 per person in exchange, the rest remaining in their bank accounts; and ATMs would disburse up to Rs. 2,000 per card per day, up to a total of Rs. 20,000 per week. (These limits have changed since and are very dynamic, with new policies being announced virtually every day, which points to a complete lack of planning.)

The impression given was that people would be inconvenienced for just two days and then the bank branches, working late hours and weekends, along with well-stocked ATMs, would relieve any stress or anxiety on the part of the public.

Since then, there has been much hardship experienced by the public because of this move, and these have been documented very well by other articles in the media. Many have also asked if the move really addresses the larger problem of black money in the country; whether this move is really likely to stop black money; and whether the introduction of the Rs. 2000 note will not actually increase the hoarding of black money. There have also been debates on how much actual financial benefit is likely to accrue to the government.

I will not discuss any of these issues here. My concern is more fundamental – whether the move to take out the Rs. 500 and Rs. 1000 notes out of circulation and replacing them with new notes was carefully considered in light of the existing infrastructure, and whether alternatives exist.

Flaws of the Demonetization Scheme

The decision to remove the Rs. 500 and Rs. 1000 notes left most Indians in the lurch. This was because 86% of all the currency printed by the government was in the form of Rs. 500 and Rs. 1000 notes (by value). According to the annual report of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) dated 29 August 2016, as of March 2016 the currency notes in circulation had a total value of Rs. 16.42 trillion (or lakh crores). Of these, 86.4%, or Rs. 14.18 trillion was in Rs. 500 and Rs. 1000 notes. This was the amount sucked out of the system at midnight on November 8. It was estimated that, of this amount, about 25%, or Rs. 3.5 trillion, was black, meaning that people possessing it would not deposit it in the bank for fear of attracting huge penalties or jail time. That would mean that the amount of money in circulation that would now need to be deposited in banks and exchanged for new notes is approximately Rs. 10.64 trillion. This is to be done entirely through bank branches and ATMs.

In press interactions since the demonetization move was taken, the FM has informed the people that this move is part of a larger plan to move to a cashless economy, and urged people to start using electronic banking, mobile payment, and credit and debit cards. The attempts by people to exchange their now-worthless money for new, usable notes hit another roadblock as ATMs needed to be recalibrated to accept the new notes, a process the FM estimated as needing another three weeks. In yet another interaction, PM Modi informed the nation that he expected the hardship to continue until December 30^th at the latest.

But is this realistic? Are the two major legs on which the demonetization scheme stands, viz., for citizens to deposit old notes in banks and withdraw their money using either bank account withdrawals or ATM withdrawals, or the transition to a cashless economy for 50 days, relying only on ATMs, bank branches, smartphones, credit and debit cards, realistic at this time? What percentage of Indians actually do have access to these?

The Global Financial Inclusion report, prepared by the World Bank, gives a lot of useful information to answer these questions. The data shows that while things are improving, they are nowhere near where they need to be. For instance, the percentage of those 15 years or above who had a bank account rose from 35% in 2011 to 53% in 2014. The number of ATMs per 100,000 Indians, on average, was around 18. This compares unfavourably to other countries like 66 in South Africa, 129 in Brazil, and 184 in Russia. Clearly India is a lot more unprepared to deal with a situation where 86% of the cash vanishes overnight than any of these nations. Figure 1 shows the availability of ATMs in several countries over the last decade.

Figure 1. Availability of ATMs in Different Countries

Credit and debit card usage does not fare much better. The Global Financial Inclusion report says that in 2014, only 11% of Indians 15 or above made a payment using a debit card, and only 3.4% used a credit card; and only 2.2% used a mobile phone to make payments. Further, it says that in 2014, only 6.4% borrowed from a financial institution, whereas 12.6% borrowed from a private lender; 6.6% borrowed from a store by buying on credit; 5.4% borrowed from an employer; and 32.3% borrowed from family or friends. The Indian economy is therefore dominated by cash and unaccounted transactions, and most people are quite unfamiliar with electronic means of payment and withdrawal. Only 20% received their wages at a bank. Less than 0.2% of Indians used a mobile phone to pay utility bills; just over 4% of all Indians used a bank account for business purposes; just under 4% of Indians used a bank account to receive government transfers; and only 6.7% used checks to make payments.

What is very clear from these figures is that a large majority of Indians are not even in the formal banking/financial net, let alone specialized forms of it such as internet banking and mobile banking using smartphones. Further, it should be kept in mind that these figures, dismal as they are, do not reflect the true desperation of the situation today, because they are average figures for India and do not reflect the urban/rural divide.

Figure 2, taken from the RBI’s “Report of the Committee on Medium-Term Path on Financial Inclusion,” dated 28 December 2015, shows that the bank branch density in rural areas is less than half of the bank branch density in urban areas. Rural India is largely cash-driven. One reason for this is that agricultural income is exempt from income tax, and a lot of transactions are done with cash alone. This is not black money.

Figure 2. Variation in Bank Branch Density in Rural and Urban India

So, the irony of the situation is that bank branches and ATMs are far fewer in the rural areas, but the percentage of wealth that is held in cash in rural India is much greater than what is held as cash in urban India, where people use banks to store their money – and now these rural Indians will have to contend with getting their larger stores of money in and out of banks with little experience doing so and this during a liquidity crisis!

The Jan Dhan Yojana has created a lot of new bank accounts in India, but a lot of them are zero-balance accounts, and people have not yet taken to using them.

It should be clear from the above that rural India was woefully unprepared for the shock of the withdrawal of 86% of liquid currency on November 8, and is unlikely to recover from this situation any time soon.

One of the main thrusts of the economic policy of this government is the JAM troika – standing for Jan-Dhan Yojana, Aadhar unique identification, and Mobile. The RBI’s Economic Survey of India 2015-2016 discusses, in Chapter 3, the JAM approach in detail and presents a JAM preparedness index – i.e., how ready is India for a world in which benefits will be transmitted electronically to bank accounts, verified by Aadhar cards, and accessed by mobile phones – in other words, a cashless economy, of the kind people have been forced to confront themselves today. A JAM preparedness index of 100% indicates full preparation, and 0% indicates complete unpreparedness. 

Figure 3 shows the JAM preparedness index for urban India, and Figure 4 shows the index for rural India. It should be very clear that India, especially rural India, is neither ready for a JAM world, nor was it ready for the world of November 9, 2016.

Figure 3. JAM Preparedness Index for Urban India

Figure 4. JAM Preparedness Index for Rural India

This is going to lead to unbelievable suffering in the next 50 days. People are going to starve and die – many already have; people are going to continue to be refused medical treatment for life-threatening illnesses and pregnancies for lack of liquid cash; and farmers are going to suffer as they cannot sell their produce or buy seeds. Business is going to come to a standstill in both rural and urban India. The worst effects of this measure will be felt by those with the least capacity to absorb these shocks.

An Alternative Solution

One of the arguments put forth by the Government and its supporters is that there was no alternative to all this pain and chaos – that this was the only way.

“Do you not want black money and counterfeit money to be ended?” they thunder. 

Indeed, we do. Every right-thinking person in this country would like a more honest system in which there is no black money and no counterfeit money. But there are many ways to skin a cat. The way the Government has chosen is full of fatal flaws.

Is there a better alternative? Yes, there is – a painless alternative that will not result in anyone losing their livelihoods, their health, or their lives. And I will discuss that here.

It is clear that all these problems experienced by the people are because of the fact that the system simply does not have the infrastructure for people to exchange their money and get new notes in a reasonable time-frame. That is because the necessary tools, viz., online banking, internet connections, smartphones, physical banks and ATMs, and credit and debit cards, are simply not widespread enough. In other words, the problems have happened because the government has put the cart before the horse.

Therefore, the better alternative would have been for the government to first build the necessary infrastructure – to invest in last-mile connectivity for banks; to invest in cheap smartphones (as they did with the Akash tablet) so that every Indian could afford one to engage in financial business; to ensure national internet connectivity; to get every Indian in the banking net; to make all Indians use only debit and credit cards for purchases; and to make all Indians use mobile apps such as PayTM or apps using the new Unified Payments Interface (UPI) to make even the smallest purchases, such as buying vegetables on the street.

This will take time and have to be done in a calibrated manner, by both investing in the infrastructure as well as working on people’s inertia, by gradually closing off alternative means of payment such as cash in sector after sector.

So the government could announce, for example, that all supermarkets and malls would no longer accept cash for amounts greater than Rs. 500 after six months; that in the next one year, the Railways will stop accepting cash for tickets and only accept electronic payments such as credit cards, debit cards, internet banking, mobile wallets such as PayTM or Mobikwik, and payment banks under the UPI; that in six months after that, no government office will accept cash for any transaction; and so on.

This will force more people to go cashless – but it will give them sufficient time to prepare for a cashless economy – to open bank accounts, to get debit and credit cards, to obtain cheap smartphones subsidized by the government, to learn how to use apps such as PayTM or UPI-based apps, to use ATM kiosks for internet banking to pay bills, and so on. Since it will not be an overnight change, it gives people time to learn these new tools and make an orderly transition. There will be no panic and no one will die of shock. If there is a wedding or an operation, people have six months or a year to plan an alternative way of payment, rather than be surprised by a last-minute pulling of the rug under their feet.

Once this is done, cash will die a natural death and there will be no need for a demonetization drive. This also automatically removes the threat of counterfeit money – since the economy is cashless, there is no worry about counterfeit bills. Also, since everything is electronic, nothing can be hidden. Everything is tracked, and there is no black money. People will not offer cash bribes because nobody will accept something that cannot buy anything.

This is exactly what one of the most advanced countries in the world, Sweden, is actually doing – by ensuring that everyone has internet connectivity and the necessary devices, they are eliminating cash. But this is not something that you can do overnight. It takes years, and is gradual. All the objectives of the government are achieved – eliminating of black money (not just a stash, but even the generation of black money); eliminating of counterfeit money; bringing everyone under the tax net; and moving India to a cashless economy. All this without a single person dying.

But it does not fetch you dramatic headlines.

References

1.       World Bank Data on Financial Inclusion. http://databank.worldbank.org/data/databases.aspx

2.      RBI Report on Financial Inclusion. https://rbi.org.in/scripts/PublicationReportDetails.aspx?ID=836#CH1

3.      Economic Survey of India 2015-16. http://indiabudget.nic.in/survey.asp

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For other articles by Dr. Seshadri Kumar, please visit http://www.leftbrainwave.com

Disclaimer: All the opinions expressed in this article are the opinions of Dr. Seshadri Kumar alone and should not be construed to mean the opinions of any other person or organization, unless explicitly stated otherwise in the article.

The Morning After: Lessons From the 2016 US Presidential Election

The Morning After: Lessons From the 2016 US Presidential Election

Written by Dr. Seshadri Kumar, 09 November, 2016

Copyright © 2016 Dr. Seshadri Kumar.  All Rights Reserved.

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Executive Summary:

Donald Trump is going to be the 45^th President of the USA. Today’s election results have given him a comprehensive victory. This article discusses the reasons for his victory and the lessons that we must learn from his victory, and briefly talks about the implications of a Trump Presidency for the US and the rest of the world.

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Why Trump Won

On September 3, 2016, I wrote a blog post in which I explained why I believed that Donald Trump would win the election. I had hoped to publish the article in a national magazine in India, but the editors there balked at the content of the article – because I was predicting a Trump victory when no other journalist anywhere was willing to say the same. So I published it on my own blog.

In this article, I explained that the main reason for his victory would be that Americans are disillusioned with mainstream US politicians, both Republicans and Democrats, after 16 years of continual job losses. I explained that both Republicans and Democrats had been lying to the American people and telling them that things were going to get better, whereas in fact they were doing everything in their power to make things worse. The reason things were getting worse for the American people was that American politicians – Congressmen and women, senators and Presidents – were all doing their best to help American corporations make money – and corporations making money often meant sacrificing the common American worker – companies only care about finding the best talent at the lowest price, not about keeping jobs in America. I explained that these job losses were an inevitable consequence of globalization – that this was happening because of rapid changes in communication technology and the opening and liberalization of markets in China and India, the need for factories to be moved overseas not only to exploit cheaper labour but also to serve bigger markets in China and India.

My conclusion was that things would not improve for the average American for a long time, and American politicians did not have the requisite honesty to level with the American people. The people of the country figured out they were being lied to by people in the establishment, and lost trust.

Into this situation, two outsiders came in – Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump. Both made huge inroads into their parties’ bases. Trump demolished the competition in the Republican primaries. With a lot of connivance from the DNC and pressure from powerful donors, the Democratic Party managed to defeat Bernie Sanders, believing that a socialist would not be acceptable as President and that Hillary Clinton would be a winning candidate against Trump.

But Clinton was viewed by the American working class as the ultimate insider and part of the conspiracy to export American jobs and impoverish American workers. Trump latched on to the economic issues and savaged the establishment - both Republicans and Democrats -  for American job losses, and used this to win the election. This also involved demonizing those to whom Americans were losing their jobs – foreigners. So a strong undercurrent of racism and xenophobia came along for the ride as Trump tapped blue-collar Americans’ angst to propel his campaign.

Of course, Trump has no realistic solutions to the problem, but in their frustration, people didn’t care. They voted for Trump as an outsider because they could not trust any of the insiders. Bill Clinton had let them down, as had George W. Bush, as had Barack Obama. They could trust no one within the system. Had Bernie Sanders been the Democratic candidate instead of Clinton, Trump would not have had the advantage of being an outsider, because his opponent would have had the same advantage. But Hillary represented to frustrated Americans exactly what they thought was wrong with America.

And that is why Trump won.

While Trump did not win with the margin I predicted (360 electoral votes), he has still won convincingly. He looks set to win at least 305 electoral votes (including Michigan), and maybe more. This in spite of several scandals involving Trump, most notably several women accusing him of sexual molestation, soon after an audio recording emerged showing Trump bragging about sexual assault, all within the last month. It is conceivable that Trump’s numbers could have been significantly higher had it not been for these setbacks.

Lessons to Learn from Trump’s Victory

1.      Economic unrest was the key issue in this election. All these days, while watching CNN (the only American channel I get to watch in India), people who were concerned about job losses were always described in CNN panel discussions as racist blue collar unemployed uneducated white folks. Their concerns were never taken seriously – until today! After the election result, every CNN analyst is talking about job losses as though they only understood this issue today. The exit polls reinforce this conclusion. Asked what they thought was the most important issue facing the nation, 52% of voters responded saying that the economy was the most important issue. This compares to 13% identifying immigration, 13% identifying foreign policy, and 18% identifying terrorism. In the same polls, 42% said that the main effect of international trade was to take US jobs away, as opposed to 38% who said that international trade creates US jobs.

2.     Polls are imperfect by themselves. A lot of people treat polls as sacred. This was one of the most common reactions to my earlier article where I prophesied a Trump victory: “How can you predict a result that goes against what Nate Silver (of fivethirtyeight.com) says? He says Trump only has a 27% chance of winning!” The problem is that Silver is only a statistician. His command of statistics is formidable indeed, and I would not presume to challenge him on that.

However, what is missing is the political calculation. Why did Trump win even though fivethirtyeight.com and realclearpolitics.com said he would lose? Because those models are based purely on statistics. In other words, at the time of the poll, they said that many more people supported Clinton than they did Trump; and they projected from previous election results to say that from that point on, Trump could not possibly win the election. There are two errors in this conclusion.

First, the idea that the poll is supposed to represent a perfect sample. In practice, it never does, despite the best attempts. The idea that a sample of 1000 people could be a reliable guide to what a nation of 250 million thinks is a flawed assumption. Random sampling is a good idea, but in a sample of 1000 people, how many black people can you have? Will richer black people think the same way as poorer blacks? Will black men think the same way as black women? Will a 20-year old think the same way as a 60-year old? Will the poll include all these demographic groups within the black sample? NO. This is not to say that polls are useless; it is only to bring some caution that polls are not perfect – that the margin of error is much greater than the 3% (or similar number) that is usually quoted as the margin of error of that poll. Clearly, after the election results, we can now say that most polls that predicted Hillary Clinton would win this election have a 100% margin of error.

Second, past trends on polls were not a good guide to this election because the fundamentals had changed. The logic of previous elections was inapplicable here because people had lost trust in the mainstream parties – they could not, therefore, be expected to behave as in the past. The reason for this is not statistical; it is political.

3.     The Occupy movement was a very important bellwether of the popular mood and the distrust of the people. It lasted for only 5 months between September 2011 and February 2012; and politicians thought that since they were able to successfully break the back of the movement and disperse the crowds without giving them anything, they had solved the problem. But you don’t solve problems by force – the disaffection did not go away but kept simmering under the surface. The trust deficit between the politicians in power and those they were governing widened as nobody did anything to address the concerns of the disenfranchised. People continued to lose jobs, and jobs continued to be exported for the benefit of the corporations on Wall Street. It would be foolish to continue to sweep this under the rug as it was done in 2012. Cynical management-speak such as “Americans need retraining to be more competitive” will not wash any longer. It was because of these reasons that Sanders became very popular – he tapped into the public mood and was able to articulate their concerns in the primary campaign. Unfortunately, no one in power listened to him. The Democratic Party adopted a dogmatic posture and decided that a socialist could not be the President of the USA. The US, after all, was the global champion of capitalism. What this dogma fails to recognize is that capitalism, as it exists in the US, has failed most Americans. Sanders' message was and is an important one, and the American establishment would do well to heed it. This is not to say that capitalism should be abandoned; but it certainly needs to be significantly modified.

4.     Democratic supporters were constantly in denial about Trump, saying that blacks and Latinos would not vote for him because of how he had described illegal immigrants to the USA from Mexico and for the general perception about him as a bigot. But you do not win an election so comprehensively if none of these people vote for you. In fact, the exit polls from the election showed that Trump won 8% of the black vote, 29% of the Latino vote, 29% of the Asian vote, and 37% of votes of other races. Overall, Trump got 21% of the entire non-white vote. What does that tell me? That people were more concerned with his core message regarding jobs and the economy. Racism was not the key to Trump’s victory; economic issues were.

5.     A similar line of thinking blinded Democrats into thinking that women would never vote for Trump because of his sexist and misogynist behaviour in the past. He had in the past described a woman as a “piece of ass” and was known for sexually objectifying women. This history, coupled with his comments about Alicia Machado and allegations from several women about sexual assault in the wake of the publication of a conversation he had years ago with Billy Bush in which he bragged about sexually assaulting women, led Democrats to believe that women would never vote for him.

But these predictions were, as in the case of race, equally wrong. Again, data from the exit polls show that 53% of white women voted for Trump, compared to 43% for Clinton; and 26% of Latino women voted for Trump. If Latina women were so terribly offended by Trump’s offensive comments about both women and about Mexicans, what explains this? Why did 53% of all white women vote for Trump if they were so put off by his attitudes towards women? Also, across all races, 42% of all women voted for Trump. The mainstream narrative is clearly wrong.

Perhaps the best explanation is that Americans are fairly pragmatic people. In spite of most people disapproving of Clinton’s bad behaviour in the Lewinsky episode while he was President, he was and remains a very popular figure. It was said during the 2000 campaign that, in spite of his scandal, if Clinton had been eligible to run for the Presidency again, he would have won. This is because most Americans viewed this as a personal matter between Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, and Monica Lewinsky. They were only worried about the state of the economy. Unemployment was at historic lows then and the economy had been booming for 8 years.

The same pragmatic attitude is true now of Americans. Trump may be a bigot and misogynist, but people are more concerned about how he will run the country. He focused on the jobs piece and that resonated more strongly with people than the reports of his sexual offenses and bigotry.

6.     The media has not exactly covered itself with glory, with most of them forgetting their primary duty to report and analyse, and instead re-interpreting their jobs as propaganda agents for Hillary Clinton. Nothing was worse for me than watching CNN daily and finding their reporting to be totally pro-Clinton. It almost seemed like they were themselves believing the alternative version of reality that they were spinning. Unfortunately, when you do not cover an event, especially one of this magnitude, with the appropriate objectivity, what happens is that you are completely nonplussed by the outcome, as is evident from the reactions of various CNN anchors and panellists today.

Just repeating that a candidate is going to lose does not ensure that he will lose. CNN needed to search for the truth, which it clearly did not. Most polling agencies also did not care. This election should call into serious question both the use of polls as well as the ethics of media organizations.

There was highly inadequate discussion of the candidates’ policies. It becomes impossible to objectively discuss policy prescriptions when, as a media organization, you refuse to even acknowledge the claims of one of the candidates, viz., that there are serious problems on the job front and the export of jobs overseas. If you are going to treat that statement as Trump propaganda (which media tended to do), then you are not going to discuss which candidate’s proposals are better. But this requires a willingness to admit that things under the current administration are not exactly rosy. If you are reluctant to admit that because such an admission might affect the prospects of one of the candidates, you cannot give viewers a fair discussion of issues and the positions of candidates. For example, if you are going to characterize those complaining about job losses as racist rednecks, you cannot ever discuss the job losses issue fairly.

7.     It is hard to understand why the Democratic Party and the media were so busy inventing reasons for why Trump was winning when he was giving the reasons quite explicitly himself. So, for example, instead of focusing on the obvious answer that he was winning because he was focusing on Americans’ economic difficulties and their frustration in their declining living standards and in the export of jobs, both Democrats and the media went out of their way to invent other reasons – Trump supporters were racist, xenophobic, rednecks, uneducated. They would have had a lot more success had they given answers to the questions Trump was posing to the people. Instead, Hillary Clinton kept saying “America doesn’t need to be great again, we are already great” – which is a perfect example of denial.

Why did the Democrats do this? A simple reason is that creating strawman arguments is an expedient device to win arguments. It was easy to explain on TV debates why Trump was winning – just say that all his followers are racist white unemployed men, and ignore all the women and people of colour that actually did support Trump. The problem is that such logic is fine when you are living in your own bubble; it is inadequate to deal with the situation, as it is now, when reality comes crashing down on you. Hillary tried to do the same thing with her “basket of deplorables” comment.

Concluding Thoughts

For better or worse, Donald Trump is the President of the USA. As I wrote in September, I am no fan of Donald Trump. He is a highly flawed individual. He successfully understood in this election cycle the mood of the American people and their chief concerns, although I do not believe he will do much to solve the underlying problems – because he cannot. The juggernaut of globalization will continue to move inexorably, and neither Trump nor anyone else can do much to stop it. American jobs will continue to be exported simply as a response to global competition. Any attempts to interfere with free trade will only be to America’s detriment and make things worse than they already are. I have explained this in detail in my other article.

What does Trump’s ascent to the highest office of the land mean for the USA?

Well, it is certainly not good news for progressives. The progressive agenda that Obama broke ground on is most likely going to be reversed – Trump has himself promised that. So Trump is going to do his best to make gay marriages illegal again; repeal Obamacare, as he said; appoint at least one – maybe two or three – very conservative Supreme Court Justices who will interpret the Constitution literally - something that will affect America for decades; oppose abortion; and increase gun rights without any background checks – all these are explicit promises from Trump. With a majority in both the House and Senate (which many establishment Republicans doubted), he will find it easy to push through his domestic agenda.

Trump will find it harder to change international agreements because of the wide-ranging consequences: NAFTA, NATO, the Iran deal, and other obligations where the US cannot unilaterally withdraw without serious consequences. What a candidate promises on the campaign trail and what he can actually deliver are two different things. The wall with Mexico he promised is most likely going to be a pipe dream.

Trump’s dramatic victory will definitely change the make-up of the Republican Party. This is a victory that he has fashioned almost single-handedly. Several prominent Republicans publicly spoke against him and said they could not support him and would vote for his opponent. By routing Clinton in such impressive fashion, Trump has made a statement that he is now the big dog in the Republican Party – that he doesn’t need the party – the party needs him. The fact that so many Senators and Congressmen won their races riding Trump’s coat-tails adds to his authority. He will definitely fashion the party according to his need. People like Paul Ryan need to make up to Trump after being so hostile during the campaign – and Trump might still dump Ryan at the opportune time. Trump’s inner coterie of Chris Christie, Rudy Giuliani, Mike Huckabee, and others will now be calling the shots. Success has its perks.

Trump has promised to reduce America’s involvement in overseas wars – a pledge that would be very welcome in the rest of the world. But whether he can actually deliver on this promise is doubtful, if history is any guide. US foreign policy has remained remarkably consistent no matter who is in the White House.

Trump wrote a book on the art of the deal. He is going to have to learn the art of compromise in international relations.

We are going to live in interesting times for at least the next four years.

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Disclaimer: All the opinions expressed in this article are the opinions of Dr. Seshadri Kumar alone and should not be construed to mean the opinions of any other person or organization, unless explicitly stated otherwise in the article.

Vaigai - A Short Story

Vaigai – A Short Story

Written by Dr. Seshadri Kumar, 24 September, 2016

Copyright © 2016 Dr. Seshadri Kumar.  All Rights Reserved.

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This is my second attempt at fiction. I wrote this to enter a writing contest. I did not win, but I thought it might be worth sharing. I hope you like it.

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Subramanian got up from his chair. He was in the boardroom in his flagship restaurant-cum-head office, the “Vel Murugan” in the Mylapore area of Chennai, the capital city of the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It was 10 pm, just past closing time.

He had just finished tallying the receipts, along with his senior managers, and analysing the results of the past year of all his restaurants: his 20 restaurant branches in Chennai, the remaining 20 branches in the rest of the state of Tamil Nadu, the 30 other branches in leading cities in India, and the two dozen international branches in the Middle East, the USA, and the UK.

South Indian vegetarian fare was constantly increasing in popularity the world over, because of its nutritious value and its vegetarian nature, and Subramanian’s “Vel Murugan” was at the top of the heap when it came to the South Indian restaurant business.

Subramanian congratulated his managers, ended the meeting, and reflected. Business was good. It always had been, thought Subramanian to himself, ever since he started being an entrepreneur in the food business, 25 years ago.

Twenty-five years ago…

He had grown up in the town of Rameswaram, in the southern part of the state of Tamil Nadu, the closest point to Sri Lanka. When he was a kid, there was nothing to live for in that place. Rameswaram had only two things – a temple and fishing. As a person born into poverty and into a low caste, mobility was not easy for him, and he grew up as a help in a tea stall. Later he started his own fast food joint, focusing on Tamil vegetarian food – idlis, steamed rice and lentil cakes; vadas, deep fried lentil doughnuts; dosas, lentil-rice pan-fried crepes; accompanied by sambars, fiery sauces of tamarind and chilli powder; and chutneys, made of coconut, coriander leaves, and tomato paste. Another popular accompaniment was a dry spice powder often referred to as “gunpowder” because of the punch it packed. Then there were the spicy rice mixes – coconut rice, tamarind rice, and lemon rice – always ready to be packed for people in a hurry.

The local townspeople frequented his joint and it was quite popular, but Subramanian was not happy. He wanted to do bigger things. A couple of years after he started his own fast food restaurant, his uncles and aunts insisted he get married (his parents had died when he was young and he was raised by an uncle and aunt and his grandmother), and found him a bride through the “arranged marriage” system. Sitamma was a girl distantly related to him – they could only marry within the caste and their community preferred a known family, and this family was well-known to them.

The marriage was a happy one, and within a year Sitamma was expecting. But Subramanian was not happy staying in Rameswaram. His ambitions were bigger. He wanted to see the big world, hit the big time. A sleepy fishing town could not contain the turbulence within him. So, with his pregnant wife, he decided to take the ferry on the Vaigai river from Rameswaram to Madurai, the nearest big town, as a transit point to Chennai, his eventual destination, where the fortunes of the high and mighty were being made.

It had been a very good monsoon that year, and the Vaigai was full with water. As his luck would have it, the ferry was hit by an unexpectedly fierce evening storm as the ferry approached Madurai, and most of the passengers drowned when the ferry capsized. Subramanian, meant for better things, miraculously survived, but Sitamma, the only person to ever mean anything to him – the only person he ever loved, even more than himself – along with their child that she was bearing – went missing.

In Madurai, Subramanian waited for months to find out if any news of his wife had been reported, but after 4 months of searching, the authorities told him there was no point in waiting – that he might as well do the final funeral rites for her. They had scoured the entire length of the river. A heartbroken Subramanian went back to Rameswaram, performed the last rites for his wife, and swore never to come back to the place that had cursed him with such bad luck. From now on, the only place he would call home was Chennai.

Restaurant King

With all his savings that he had brought with him after selling his restaurant in Rameswaram, Subramanian bought a place in Mylapore in Chennai for his restaurant. Chennai was a bustling city and the hub of business in South India. An urban centre like it was full of hungry people looking for a quick meal. Subramanian also knew that his upwardly mobile patrons came predominantly from the upper castes, and so made sure to keep the place running as per their standards – pure vegetarian food, no alcohol, sparkling clean. Whoever he hired got told that these principles were non-negotiable. Plus, there was to be no haggling and service had to be outstanding. Honesty was a value he would never compromise on.

In return, Subramanian took care of them. Of ALL their needs. He got workers from rural areas who had just migrated to the city, who did not have a home, provided them lodging, took care of their medical needs, their children’s education, employment, and marriage, their retirement – everything. In return, he asked for absolute loyalty and perfect performance from his employees. No other restaurateur offered such amazing benefits to his employees.

The workers loved him; the quality of his food was outstanding; the service was fantastic; naturally, the business was a roaring success. In the first five years, he expanded from his flagship restaurant in Mylapore to 5 new restaurants all over Chennai. In the next 5 years, 15 more restaurants followed. In the next 5 years, he expanded all over India, and in the next 10 years, he turned his attention to the world.

But there was a darker side to him. He had learned about succeeding in business, and his ambition took him to greater and greater heights; but on the personal side, the loss of his wife devastated him so much that he never married again, because he believed that all he loved was doomed – his parents had died when he was just ten – and then the tragedy of his wife and his yet-to-be-born baby drowning in the Vaigai. He took to drink to drown the loneliness, and found comfort in whores when the physical need was too great.

Success also meant friends in high places, and this meant people from diverse occupations such as politics and crime. The vice equation in his life meant he did not limit his lust for whores. A few times a woman in his restaurant had caught his fancy, and he had had his way with her, sometimes using his money to get his way and sometimes using threats after forcing himself on her. His loyal deputy in the business, Sankaran, made sure matters were kept entirely hush-hush, and his connections with politicians and criminals served him well in these indiscretions.

Most of his employees were unaware of his trysts; the few who knew explained it away as the product of a life of loneliness and forgave his conduct in light of his otherwise impeccable behaviour – for, apart from this occasional vice, his behaviour towards both his employees and towards the general public was impeccable. He had established three colleges in the city and run a few centres to help destitute women stand on their own, and was generally considered one of the upstanding citizens of Chennai.

And Then, Jayanthi…

Subramanian continued pacing in his office after the managers had left. Normally he would walk to his home, just a block away from the restaurant, and go to sleep after a meeting like this. But today he could not.

He was thinking about Jayanthi and what had transpired this morning.

Jayanthi and her husband, Muthuvel, had come to his restaurant in Mylapore three months ago, looking for a job. The cooks had put them through a few tests to see how good their skills were, and the duo had passed all the tests with flying colours. The final decision on hiring senior cooks at the restaurant was always Subramanian’s own, as the chief cook, Palani, knew. The test was for him to sample a dinner they had prepared for them.

Subramanian had a policy of not meeting the applicants until he had tasted the food first.

“Palani, serve the rasam.”

“Yes, sir.” Palani knew his boss well. Many a time he had said, “Palani, a cook who cannot prepare good rasam cannot be called a good chef, no matter what else he does.” Rasam is a tamarind-based spicy soup that is eaten with rice and also often drunk, one of the standard features of Tamil cuisine.

“Exquisite. Now the sambar…hmm, this has a unique freshness all its own…the tamarind and the red chilli powder are perfectly matched. And the fenugreek flavouring is subtle.”

And so it went, until all the items had been sampled. At the end, he said, “bring the cooks in.”

In came Jayanthi and Muthuvel.

Subramanian was too stunned to say anything. Jayanthi seemed more beautiful than anyone Subramanian had ever seen. More than beauty, there was something magical about her that he could not take his eyes off her – he could not understand why. But keeping in mind that her husband was also there, he controlled himself with a great effort and said,

“Your cooking is outstanding. Where are you from?”

“Manamadurai, sir,” replied Muthuvel.

“Ah, Manamadurai…” replied Subramanian, closing his eyes. Manamadurai was a town that was on the river between Rameswaram and Madurai, and it was after they had passed that town that the boat had capsized…

He tried not to think about it. The reminder of the loss he had tried to forget his whole life had killed his appetite for any more questions.

“Well, you two are hired,” he said abruptly. “Palani will take care of everything else. Congratulations!” he said hurriedly and rose, signalling an end to the interview. Some memories that should have remained buried had been exhumed, and he wanted them to go back into the ground.

The Tryst…

Subramanian not get Jayanthi out of his mind. Why was he so drawn to her? After fighting his feelings for a while, he decided he would make her another of his conquests. But whenever he wanted to make his move, Muthuvel was always there. They did not suspect anything, but he was never getting the perfect opportunity.

And then, after three months, he had thought of a plan that morning. He called Palani and told him, “Palani, the season for the small mangoes for the pickles is starting. We need the best quality. Send Muthuvel to the villages today – he knows where to go – to get the best for the restaurants. Shouldn’t take him more than 4-5 days.”

Palani had taken care of that. Around noon, Subramanian called in Jayanthi and said, “We are having a family function tomorrow at my mansion on Old Mahabalipuram Road. I want you to personally prepare food for the guests there – your cooking is the best I have seen and I want nothing less for my guests. Be there by 2 pm to start preparing.” Jayanthi, suspecting nothing, agreed.

Subramanian could not sleep the whole night. He was thinking of his upcoming tryst with Jayanthi the next day. He did not come to the restaurant in the morning; instead, he went to the stylist, got his hair styled, got a manicure, and then went straight to his mansion around noon. On the way, he bought vegetables and other supplies and brought it with him to the mansion for the “function” that he had asked Jayanthi to come cook for so there would be no suspicion when she arrived.

She came promptly at 2 pm. “Come in,” he said, smiling broadly.

She looked at the empty house and said, “No one is here, master?”

“No, no, they will all start coming in at 5 pm, and I want everything to be ready by then. Let me show you into the kitchen.”

He took her to the kitchen and told her what needed to be prepared, told her what he had procured and how he wanted it done. She got to work.

He went back to the living room and poured himself a drink to calm himself down and prepare himself for the next move.

An hour later, he tiptoed into the kitchen. Jayanthi was looking gorgeous as she wiped the sweat from her brow, stirring the sauces. As always, she wore jasmine in her hair, which drove Subramanian crazy with desire. As she was stirring the sauce, Subramanian came from behind and, one hand holding her waist and another holding her hand, said, “That’s how it is done, my dear.”

Jayanthi recoiled with horror and turned around to see Subramanian. “Master!” she screamed.

“Not master. You should call me ‘Subbu’ from now on.”

“What are you saying?”

“Isn’t it obvious? I want you. I desire you. I wish to feel your body around mine. I have not been able to forget you since the day I first saw you.”

“But I am married to Muthuvel!”

“Ah, don’t worry about him. He need not know. Satisfy me, and the world is yours. Just give yourself to me once in a while, and see where I take you.”

“Aren’t you ashamed of talking like this? I am young enough to be your daughter!”

“Come now, don’t play hard to get now. Many women would kill to be in your place,” said Subramanian, moving towards her.

Knowing she needed to act quickly, Jayanthi picked up a large kitchen knife and said, “Don’t you dare!”

Subramanian laughed. “My dear, I am a veteran at these things. Why are you being childish?”

But she wouldn’t budge. Subramanian decided he had had enough. He would take her forcefully. He tore off her saree, and was about to pin her down, when she lost her balance. The knife in her hand accidentally turned around and impaled her on the chest as she fell to the ground.

She was dead.

Subramanian was stunned. He never wanted things to end this way.

It was not the first time he had seen an unnatural death. There had been a couple of women over the years who had been stubborn and would not give themselves willingly to him – and bad things had happened. He was not unnerved by Jayanthi’s death. But he was truly sad to see Jayanthi die. A pity. She could have had such a great life.

He prepared to make the call to Sankaran to take care of the mess. Suddenly he noticed that her handbag had fallen down and everything in it had fallen out. He should put everything back in her bag – or there would be trouble with the police. Sankaran would take care of things, but why take chances?

As he was collecting her things, he suddenly noticed an old, faded photograph, with the Tamil word for mother written on it: “Amma.” Curious, he looked at it … and the blood drained from his face.

It was a very pregnant Sitamma.

Subramanian’s head was spinning. Jayanthi was Sitamma’s daughter?

It all made sense to him now. Manamadurai…so Sitamma had survived and been saved in Manamadurai … so she died giving birth to Jayanthi … why else did Jayanthi have no other photo? But… he had waited for four months … how did they not find her? And if she had survived, why did she not try to contact her family? Did she lose her memory? Who took this photograph?

He would never know now. The only person who knew the answers – his own daughter – was dead on the floor before him.

He should have been the one to drown in the Vaigai.

There was only one thing to do.

He went to the living room, opened his bag, found his gun, and put the barrel to his mouth. “Please forgive me, Sitamma,” he said to himself, tears flowing down his face, as he pulled the trigger.

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Disclaimer: This is entirely a work of fiction. Any resemblance to any persons living or dead is purely coincidental. The story, all names, characters, and incidents portrayed in this short story are fictitious. No identification with actual persons, places, buildings, and products is intended or should be inferred.