Affluent young Indians cruise the fast lane

Affluent young Indians cruise the fast lane

By Clarence Fernandez

BOMBAY (Reuter): The strobe lights cut through the thick smoke in the swanky Bombay disco, picking out young people gyrating to the sounds of computer-synthesized metallic music with little discernible rhythm. A "rave" is in progress.

The young achievers of India's urban middle-class are flocking to beaches and discotheques for these night-long parties, rocking to Western music and mixing with Bombay's affluent chic set.

The craze was touched off early this year by the American soft drinks giant Pepsi, which sponsored what it dubbed "raves" in four major cities.

"It's a good way to relax and cool off after a hard day's work," said Uday Sharma, 30, an advertising executive. And he doesn't mind paying an entry fee of 750 rupees (US$24) to enjoy himself.

Brogues, liquor and jewel-studded wristwatches are among the other signs of the fast-accelerating wave of consumerism ushered in by economic reforms that began in 1991, and contrast sharply with the more ascetic times of independence leader Mahatma Gandhi.

The fast life is a distant dream for many like the hand-cart pullers at the city's Crawford Market, who earn only a few rupees a day and sleep in rows on the pavements every night.

But for the affluent, Indian tastes, under the impetus of reforms, are evolving rapidly. "Shoes will soon be sold like toothpaste," said Harkirat Singh, proprietor of Woodland Shoes, which saw turnover rise 50 per cent after it quadrupled production last year.

As they voice concern over rising consumerism, the rightwing opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and leftist groups find themselves on the same platform, with the BJP brandishing its slogan "Microchips, not potato chips".

"The economic reforms must be more sophisticated," said Prakash Karat of the Communist Party-Marxist. "Potato chips are just the most visible manifestation of the flaws in the policy."

He said popular discontent, increasing because the reforms failed to generate sufficient employment, would play a major role in the general elections scheduled for next year.

"The discontent stems from the adverse impact of the reforms, and its effects were demonstrated in the last round of assembly elections," Karat said. "The Congress lost every major state except Orissa."

Analysts interpreted the Congress defeat in five major states that voted at assembly elections recently as a reflection of popular disenchantment with the reforms, which have replaced the old mantra of subsidies and self-sufficiency.

The Rao government had indiscriminately invited investment to India in its desperation to boost the country's foreign-exchange reserves, Jay Dubashi, an economist and leader of the BJP, said.

"They will have to pay the political price for their wrong economic decisions," Dubashi said. "The government has learnt no lessons from its failure in the assembly elections."

But he felt Rao's government could improve its election prospects if it decided to restrict new investments to the infrastructure sector.

"Investment in roads and power rather than in consumer goods not used by the common man, will benefit everyone," he said.

Commerce Minister P. Chidambaram agreed that among the most visible results of liberalization was a proliferation of premium brands of consumer goods, particularly Western foods.

But rather than fueling discontent among the vast majority of Indians who cannot afford these goods, he told Reuters, they would help eliminate the market for smuggled items.

"There's no question of haves and have-nots," he said. "We're talking of a market of about 300 million people. That's larger than many countries. Just because most people can't afford them is no reason to deprive everybody of good-quality stuff."

India's population is 950 million, of which about 300 million are considered middle class and therefore wealthy enough to buy most consumer goods.

Congress Member of Parliamentarian Mani Shankar Aiyar took a different tack. "The foreign invasion of our consumer goods market is a myth. Foreign investment approvals in mass consumption items and services such as Kentucky Fried Chicken and Pizza Hut is less than two per cent of all approvals," he said.

"Much less than one-tenth of approved investment in industry and infrastructure is from outside the country, and actual investment has been less than one-twentieth," he added.