Cashless Carnival

I was quite surprised to read in today’s newspapers the excerpts of our Prime Minister’s speech which he delivered at the opening day of the CII conference and the socialist tone his speech had.

“the need to avoid high salaries for executives, discourage conspicuous consumption, even keep profits “within the limits of decency””

“In a country with extreme poverty, industry needs to be moderate in the emolument levels it adopts,” Singh said. “Rising income and wealth inequalities, if not matched by a corresponding rise of incomes across the nation, can lead to social unrest”

‘Conspicuous consumption’,'moderate emolument levels’. I find it hard to believe that these words are coming from the man who is widely regarded as the architect of the country’s economic reform programme. Immaterial, of however I look at these statements, it still does not make any sense to me.

My reasons for disagreement:

On one hand .. OK … , even if the corporate honchos agree to what you are saying and become magnanimous, would that make India prosperous and bridge the gap that is being referred to?

On the other hand .. Instead of suggesting this to the corporate honchos, why don’t we start with the people who we have elected. I am just picking an example here [am sure, there are much better ones]. Why do we see such a mismatch in your own speech and deeds. This website tells me that your own assets run to the tune of a few crores.

What say Sir?