Challenge to Indian Economy
By Faryal F Khan

IN a recent study in the recent issue of Foreign Policy, Yasheng Huang, associate professor at Sloan School of Management at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Tarun Khanna, professor at Harvard Business School have said, “India is not outperforming China overall, but it is doing better in certain key areas and that success may enable it to catch up with and perhaps even overtake China”. But studies suggest India’s desire to surpass China and even the USA ignores impact of the AIDS on its economic growth.

Some other studies suggest that the both India and China will excel the USA as the two countries produce more engineering graduates every year than the USA.

The engineering-education is untenable as both India and China grade even diploma holders as the engineers.

In his speech before the US Senate, the Indian Prime Minister tried to woo Corporate America by pointing out that ‘400 of the Fortune 500 companies were already in India’. He asked the US companies to come to India for ‘massive foreign direct investment, especially in infrastructure’. He was happy at prospects of cooperation between the USA and India in civil and dual-use fields of nuclear energy.

His optimism emanated from USA’s assurance of cooperation along with ‘friends and allies’ (apparently members of the Nuclear Suppliers’ Group) ‘to adjust international regimes to enable full civil nuclear cooperation and trade with India, including but not limited to, expeditious consideration of the supplies of fuel for safeguarded nuclear reactors at Tarapore.’ India believes that in the next 10 years it would be indisputably accepted as a superpower both in nuclear and corporate field.

America and its companies are rated as the world’s ‘most moving’ organisms. Before coming to India, the enthusiastic American multinationals should however remember that, it is internationally assessed, that India would go bankrupt in next five years (Rediff.com, “AIDS to hurt Indian biz in five years”, says World Economic Forum). The earlier assessment was that India would go bankrupt in 10 years because of AIDS (Financial Express, Reuters, July 13, ‘India to bankrupt in 10 years’).

The UN is already much concerned at alarming rise in AIDS cases in the Indian forces, both regular and the paramilitary. Frustrated by India’s apathy to the AIDS menace, the UN has agreed to pay cost of AIDS-preventing devices to India’s ‘1.3-million-strong military’ (‘Free condoms for troops, UN to foot bill’, New Delhi, April 29, 2005, Samachar.com).

According to UNAIDS, six of India’s 35 states have ‘generalized epidemics’. Assam Rifles Director General, Lt Gen Bhopinder Singh, has made it mandatory (October 6) for all its personnel to carry a packet of condoms. Singh has admitted that ‘more jawans were dying because of AIDS than to direct military action’.

He added, ‘We accept the menace and do not deny it in the force’. The trend is increasing as the first case was detected way back in 1992 while the last one only four days back (Sify.com, Shillong, October 06, “Carry condoms, Assam Rifles tells personnel”).

India has the second largest number (over five million) of HIV/AIDS-afflicted in the world after South Africa. Indian businesses, which participated in a survey by the World Economic Forum, have expressed the opinion that ‘the pandemic will have an impact on their business in the next five years’.

In its first ever survey of the Asian business response to the AIDS plague, the World Economic Forum said, ‘When asked about expected future impacts, concern is slightly greater, with 50 per cent expecting an effect on the business in the next five years...HIV/AIDS is causing more concern than both tuberculosis and malaria, and, although they believe the effects on the community will be greater than those on firms, Indian companies are slightly more concerned than other firms in the South and South-East Asia region’.

According to the report: Business and HIV/AIDS in Asia: Pushing Back the Tide, released during the recent China Business Summit 2005 ‘Indian firms are seriously concerned about the impact of HIV/AIDS. To ward off the AIDS threat, Indian companies claimed to have adopted formal or informal AIDS-preventing policies’.

Shrinivas Shanbhag, Medical Advisor of Reliance Industries Limited, said that “the HIV/AIDS has a significant economic impact on business and economies. Reliance has entered into collaboration with the government of Gujarat and non-governmental organizations to create unique public-private partnerships in combating the deadly diseases”.

It is not India’s regular forces, or Assam Rifles alone, which are in the grip of AIDS. AIDS cases are on the rise in India’s all paramilitary forces. In March, 773 HIV-positive cases were reported among Indian paramilitary forces personnel. The Central Reserve Police Force reported 358 cases, the highest number of HIV-positive cases in paramilitary forces.

The Assam Rifles reported 323 cases, followed by the Border Security Force, 200 cases, and the Central Industrial Security Force, 179 cases. The Indo-Tibetan Border Police reported 40 and the Sashastra Seema Bal three HIV-positive cases.

The Assam Rifles is deployed in all the insurgency-hit northeastern states, including Assam, Nagaland and Manipur. It is believed that the army personnel are spreading the virus at geometric-progression rate by molesting poor women in remote villages. The incidence of the AIDS is the highest in Nagaland and Manipur states (in Manipur, naked women, holding banners ‘army come and rape us’, had staged demonstrations against Assam Rifles.

Grave concern at alarming increase in AIDS cases in Indian armed forces (including paramilitary forces) was also expressed by various speakers at the fourth South Asian Regional Conference of Dermatology, Venerology and Leperology.

They pointed out that ‘studies carried out recently had shown that over 30 per cent of all HIV cases in armed forces personnel were detected only after they had reached the advanced category of infection’. Most of the AIDS cases in Indian military hospitals were detected during investigations of other diseases like tuberculosis and Herpes Zoster.

There was no tradition of voluntary disclosure of the disease among troops. Personnel avoided mentioning their disease for fear of becoming a pariah among their own peers and in the eyes of the seniors.

The lab facilities to detect AIDS cases were woefully inadequate. Regular armed forces had lab facilities to detect AIDS cases at the military hospitals, located in major Indian cities. The hospitals, accessible to paramilitary personnel posted at remote locations have no such facilities.

As such, the Indian government intends to set up a separate medical corps for India’s paramilitary outfits. Under the UN pressure, Indian government decided to set up a new medical corps for the paramilitary forces (Express News Service, September 14, new ‘medical corps’ for paramilitary force).

According to sociologists, the AIDS menace in Indian armed forces is a spillover effect of fast spread of the disease in various sections of civil society. It is good to be optimistic. However, it would be certainly even better for the Indian government to be realistic about excelling China and USA.●

© 2007 Faryal F Khan