Arun Shrivastava CMC

Classical economic hit men [EHM] were trained sociopaths; they destroyed a target country with massive corruption of an installed elite and plunder of its resources and eventually the viability as a sovereign entity. It seems that the post modern home-grown EHMs, like the ‘globally respected’ Indian Prime Minister, are far more dangerous than any of the previous generations that ever strode any country in the past. Global respectability aside, he heads the most corrupt regime India has ever seen and has compromised national security itself.

The sheer scale, depth, and spread of corruption are mind-boggling. Very briefly:

• The German Government handed over the names of 18 Indians with black money worth Rs 520 million [US$11.5 million] with LGT bank of Liechtenstein to the Indian Government. The list included 12 trusts and 26 beneficiaries perhaps fronting for important people. This was the beginning and those on the ball were quite sure that the official government report is hiding much more than revealing. [1][2]
• In May 2010, the Swiss banks disclosed that Indians have more black money than rest of the world combined. Indians topped the list with almost US$1500 billion in black money in Swiss banks, followed by Russian $470 billion, the British $390 billion, the Ukrainians $100 billion and the Chinese with $96 billion.
• The Delhi Commonwealth Games of 2010 cost the tax-payers Rs. 900 billion [about US$ 20 billion] at least 20 times the original estimate. For comparison’s sake, the spectacular Beijing Olympics cost US$32 billion and Glasgow Commonwealth game-2014 will cost about US$840 million. How much money was looted can at best be guesstimated at around US$19 billion because the city is falling apart.
• In the spectrum allocation scam [the so-called 2G scam] involving nearly all cell phone operators in India, the Comptroller and Auditor General [CAG], who oversee Government accounting, revealed that the Government decision caused a loss of Rs 1700 billion [about US$ 38 billion] to the exchequer.
• According to the Global Financial Integrity-India Report published November, 2010, ‘India lost $ 462 billion in illicit flows from 1948 to 2008. It further said that India’s black money economy [is] estimated at 50% of India’s GDP, or about $640 billion [end-2008 figure]. [3]
• In January, 2011, Julian Assange dropped the bomb. He said that he has details of many Indian names [politicians, businessmen and bureaucrats and criminals]. Daily Mail revealed that sacked Julius Baer executive Rudolf Elmer has an extensive list of tax-evaders from various countries including many across Asia. According to Assange there are 40 Indians placed in the list which has sent shivers down the spine of many in Delhi’s power corridors. [4][5]
• Sometime ago, someone circulated a list of 29 Indian names holding US$348 billion with names and numbers of the accounts in offshore banks. Wikileaks denied on FaceBook that it had placed the list. It is strange that Assange has thus far chosen not to place the list on website despite his claims [April, 2011] that the current Indian mass protests against corruption was inspired by his leaks. [6][7] That raises serious questions on his integrity. In a televised interview on an Indian channel, Elmer was uncomfortable and fobbed off serious questions.
• About 2,300 investigations involving high level corruption remain unsolved for more than a decade. The Central Bureau of Investigation [CBI] has at least 1,000 cases pending for more than 15 years and 381 cases for more than two decades. Former joint director of CBI K Madhavan says "the pile-up happens due to various tactics used by influential accused.”
• Another recent report from France says that the French Government has a list of 600 Indians holding secret accounts in the Swiss Bank. The French Government has, according to one source, given the list to the Government of India, Ministry of Finance, but the Finance Minister, derisively called “eunuch” in the power corridors of Delhi, has consistently refused to disclose the names.[8]
• The entire rural India is up in arms for what is well known as “the great land loot.” Again guesstimates indicate that as many as 2.7 million hectares have been forcibly taken away from poor farmers by Multi-national corporations, builders, businesses, politicians, and criminals, many with links to Dawood Ibrahim known for his links with Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence [ISI]. Since 1947, Indian farmers have lost over 60 million acres of good land, according to another estimate.

Day after day reports of illicit money deposited secretly in overseas bank accounts by wealthy Indians and corporations, with estimates ranging from US$612.6 billion to $1.72 trillion, angered the Supreme Court so much so that it suo moto ordered a special investigation into the scams. [9] Many large firms are involved in billion dollar scams but apart from a few arrests, the big fishes are freely roaming. It is going to be a tough ask for the Courts. At least one Indian firm [Reliance], steeped in corrupt corporate practices with an in-house intelligence organization to boot, is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations; others are similarly well connected. While Manmohan Singh has yet to take a firm stand on corruption of the powerful, he thinks Rs 20 [about 40 cents] per person per day expenditure is good enough for Indians to be called “Above Poverty Line.” That is some economic firmness.

The political ineptitude morphs into the accepted globalised loot of nations and their resources.

Undermining manufacturing capability and security

Although sick of political and bureaucratic corruption, Indians don’t know that this Prime Minister is actually undermining India’s manufacturing capability, food security and defense capability. A confidential memo from India’s security analysts says that 26% of India’s industrial output is dependent on China which will increase to 75% in the next five years. China is making decisive inroads in India’s energy and telecommunication sectors with liberal sops to Chinese exporters and easy credit to Indian importers of Chinese products. Chinese banks have already started functioning in India. [10] Policy directives and discussions reveal an insidious agenda to destroy the manufacturing capability of public sector enterprises despite the fact that in seven out of fifteen key sectors, their profit performance is far ahead of the nearest private sector competitor and consistently better than the industry average. [11] The persistent border violations by China [the entire Indo-Chinese border remains undefined to this day], recent threats to Indian oil exploration projects off the Vietnamese coast, Chinese objections and veto of Asian Development Bank investment proposals in India, and interference in international waters are distinct threats to India’s commercial and security concerns. However, for Manmohan Singh these are non-issues.

It is worth noting that the civilian manufacturing capability of USA, UK, and Australia was systematically undermined by financial speculators and criminal banksters. In the US and UK other than aerospace and defense industry, most manufacturing activity has been moved to Asia; Australia perhaps has managed to retain just one item-its famous blue jeans. Now the 50-bankster-cabal [includes one Chinese now] controlling every aspect of economic, political, social, educational, scientific and technological, and cultural life, is compromising India’s capability with an EHM in the right place. [12]

It is hard to recall, particularly since 1991 when Manmohan was installed as the Finance Minister, any strategic aspect of economic, political, military, agriculture [particularly seeds and the much needed investments for small and medium farmers], and R&D activities in each area of national interest, in which the Western Alliance System is not deeply embedded. In an hour-long televised debate on nuclear energy issue, a former expert of India’s nuclear establishment revealed that Manmohan has already promised US$40 billion worth of businesses to the cartel that produces nuclear reactors; the presenter never “picked” that vital revelation and perhaps someone “warned him” on air not to return to the expert again. Has the Indian Prime Minister already promised dissolution of India’s sovereignty to his masters? Next two years will show the true colors of home-grown EHMs.

Since May 1991, when the first instruments compromising national security were signed followed by WTO and Agreement on Agriculture [AoA allowing EU and US to subsidize own farmers to the extent of nearly 400 billion dollars and forcing open India’s market] destroying India’s farmers, inroads into national defense and security framework, Indo-US nuclear deal and, finally, steady penetration of the western intelligence agencies, the truth has gone largely unreported. All this would not be possible without India’s own economic hit men, and that one man where the buck stops, Mr. Manmohan Singh, the Prime Minister of India, playing a stellar role which even John Perkins wouldn’t have dreamt of. [13]

References:

[1] http://www.tehelka.com/story_main48.asp?filename=Ne120211TheList.asp

[2] http://planet6oclock.com/planet6oclock/content/18-indians-black-money-list-52-crores-lgt-bank-liechtenstein

[3] The Drivers and Dynamics of Illicit Financial Flows from India: 1948-2008; Dev Kar; Global Financial Integrity; November 2010; pages 18-19.

[4] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1348859/WikiLeaks-Banker-Rudolf-Elmer-arrested-revealing-tax-evaders-account-details.html#ixzz1UJz7d0z0

[5] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1347950/WikiLeaks-reveal-Swiss-bank-account-details-tax-evader-celebrities-politicians.html

[6] WARNING: WikiLeaks and Indian black money: The following is a FAKE image and never appeared on WikiLeaks; http://i.imgur.com/bO3dF.png; i.imgur.com
[7] http://planet6oclock.com/planet6oclock/content/18-indians-black-money-list-52-crores-lgt-bank-liechtenstein

[8] http://www.rediff.com/news/report/centre-sitting-on-list-of-600-indians-with-swiss-accounts/20110819.htm

[9] http://daily.bhaskar.com/article/NAT-TOP-swiss-banker-expose-secret-ac-revealed-with-indian-names-1770301.html

[10] Dainik Jagran; 20/09/2011 [This is a leading vernacular daily in India]

[11] Author’s analysis based on data given in Public Enterprises Survey, 2009-10, Volume 1.

[12] See author’s article “Was 9/11 necessary?” http://www.salem-news.com/articles/september032011/911-necessity-ar.php

[13] Perkins, J; ‘Confessions of an Economic Hit Man’; 2003

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© Copyright: Arun Shrivastava CMC, MA, MBA, MBIM, is an accredited management consultant, author of many books, reports, policy papers and articles and regular contributor to several news websites (www.globalresearch.ca, www.thepeoplesvoice.org, www.mynews.in/ etc). A former officer of Economic Development Unit Birmingham, UK] and former visiting professor of Strategic Management and Business Policy at International Management Institute, New Delhi (1990-94), he is a founder-member of Himalayan Policy Campaign Committee. He lives in Delhi and can be reached at arun1951@yahoo.com.