Two CEOs 038; a nation

Why take the stories of two MNC CEOs as an instructive metaphor for a 60-year-old nation state that still plays host to desperate poverty? Because in Pepsico appointing Indra Nooyi as its global chief and RBI quibbling about the propriety of Naina Kidwai heading HSBC India we have two lessons prime ministers8217; speech writers, indeed prime ministers themselves, are too bound by sarkari tradition to consider. A few political markers aside, Dr Manmohan Singh8217;s Independence Day address could have been read out by any other PM, from any other party. All PMs sound more or less the same because all of them leave out the same things.

Unmentionable number one in ceremonial speeches is private enterprise. Is it because we still have 8216;socialist8217; in our official self-description that entrepreneurship carries such an unpleasant odour? To take note of Nooyi8217;s appointment as Pepsico CEO is politically incorrect not merely because some of the PM8217;s allies want to ban cola companies. The anti-business conventional wisdom the Indian state started with has survived 15 years of reforms. Business is supposedly about rich people getting richer. How untrue. In a modernising economy entrepreneurship is about people. Small enterprise, which is different from the sarkari perversion of the small scale sector, is a dynamic opportunity equaliser. When PMs talk about energising young Indians they should point out that the young need to be encouraged to look beyond getting jobs. There can be millions of small Indian entrepreneurs. There have to be, because there can8217;t be enough jobs for everyone. When Nooyi runs Pepsico global operations or a poorly educated young villager runs a soft drinks stall, both question the assumption that economic freedom is best guaranteed by government guaranteed help.

Perhaps because it can8217;t bring itself to celebrate business, official India finds such joy in petty interference. This PM was an RBI governor himself, and it would be interesting to know what he thinks of the RBI8217;s ridiculous ruling on Kidwai. If Kidwai can8217;t be a board member of Nestle because the latter is a potential borrower from HSBC, no bankers can be board members in any company, because all companies can borrow from banks. Doesn8217;t that sound absolutely absurd? The RBI is looking at corporate governance from the point of view of a file-pushing head clerk. This is mai-baap government 8212; government as a source of all wisdom and the dispenser of all favours 8212; at its worst. This is one of the things that holds India back. And this is the other thing PMs never mention in their I-Day speeches.