FDI in Retail

This ridiculous confrontation  on FDI in multi brand retail in the parliament shows how pig headed and out of touch our political class is from the real India in whose name it claims to speak. Everybody tends to forget how bad things were for the average consumer during the wretched old days of our so called socialist economy when as a people we were literally thirsting for the good things in life. We would always try to look for any member of a family or extended family or friends of friends who was going to or coming from abroad so that we could lay our hands on that stereo or shampoo or that camera, I could go on. The point being that lots of goodies being taken for granted by people in other countries were simply not available to us at affordable prices and hence we had to make do with shoddy products which were home made and that too at outrageous prices.

It was only because some shackles of license permit raj was dismantled in 1991 and foreign competition was allowed that we realized what we had been missing. One of the last bastion of resistance is multi brand retail and it needs to be broken in order to ensure that the multiplicity of layer is removed and all the middlemen who jack up prices, are eliminated so that we have  a chance to have world class consumer experience for all and not just for some. I am aware that the FDI in retail may or may not work on the ground, we are not sure, but there are no guaranties in life. What we must keep in mind is that we have seen the same tired old policies that have failed repeatedly in the past. So let us not try to be afraid in doing something new, something radically different. Unless you try a new policy you would never know what will work and what will not.