Day: April 20, 2009

Make No Little Plans — Revisited

One of the consistent themes of this blog has been that India should think big. My favorite quote in this context is from Daniel Burnham, the fabled Chicago architect who said that we should think big:

Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men’s blood and probably themselves will not be realized. Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will never die, but long after we are gone will be a living thing, asserting itself with ever-growing insistency. Remember that our sons and grandsons are going to do things that would stagger us. Let your watchword be order and your beacon beauty. Think big.

Continue reading “Make No Little Plans — Revisited”

Shourie on Indian Money in Tax Havens

For 55 years, the Congress has been the party in government of India. India has been a command and control socialist economy, which implies that politicians who controlled the license-permit-quota-control raj had the opportunity and the means to collect rents from businesses and put them away off-shore. This is not the most surprising thing in the whole world.

I am sure that if I had the opportunity to grab billions of dollars, I would have been sorely tempted. I most certainly don’t claim to be totally incorruptible. If the system permits it, and if the temptation is large enough, who can blame another for giving in? The important thing then is to make sure that such tempting opportunities don’t arise in the first place. The institutions we build matter more than the character (or lack thereof) of individuals involved in government.

Arun Shourie has done a masterful deconstruction of the arguments that the Congress put forth in response to Shri Advani’s recent insistence that the Congress-led UPA government has been dragging its feet on the issue of following up on the matter. Shourie is a master of the written word and his logic is impeccable. So even if one does not know too much of the story, just reading his deconstruction is enough for one to get the facts.

Below the fold are some excerpts from the piece by Shourie, “Congress Caught in its Own Web.”: Continue reading “Shourie on Indian Money in Tax Havens”