World not ready for Indian Products?

[Soundguy]

Can we say.. Lucas, prince of darkness!


Soundguy

 

[ToadHill]

Soundguy: by the time I bought the car had Ford electric's.

I'm waiting with baited breath for the Mahindra diesel pickup, you can bet I'll be in the market for one.

 

[N80]

I heard the Mahindra diesel pick-up was only going to come with an automatic transmission. No thanks.

 

[xlr82v2]

I'm really interested in the Mahindra pickup as well, but like N80, I'd prefer a 5 or 6 speed manual. But, I'll definitely go drive one after they arrive. My old '96 Ford Ranger with 238K miles is getting tired...

 

[hayden]

A friend told me "if you want a British sports car, by a Miata and pour a quart of oil over the engine"

 

[GaryCrowell]

I understand the Jaguar dealers point. What type of clips does the US media ever play of India. You always see these heavily clothed people living in overcrowded cities that look like they are all made of dirt. Unless they turn on the Discovery chanel and watch some of the shows there where it shows the other side of these places then how many people really know what India is like.

My job occasionally takes me to India, along with much of the rest of the world. Unfortunately, the media portrayal of conditions in India is understated if anything. India's a dump to put it mildly, there's incredible poverty and the sanitation conditions are horrible. The cities are really overcrowded with minimal infastructure for the poorer residents and their caste system ensures that the poor will remain that way forever. The government is incredibly corrupt and nothing gets done without bribing the right official. It's a really disfunctional society with few redeeming qualities in my opinion. I can very easily see why Jaguar wouldn't want to be associated with India, if you'd been there you would see that also.

India is a lot like China in many ways, abundant cheap labour and a rising manufacturing system that'll build you anything for the right amount of $$$. Indian quality standards aren't any better than China, both will build you anything to your price point. Both are incredibly screwed up countries but to tell the truth I think India is probably the worse of the two. Their caste system is like the apartheid system taken to the 10th degree, but you don't hear a lot about it much because it's not based upon racial discrimination but rather social status which you're locked into at birth and will never change during your lifetime. Sure there are rich people in India and the Discovery Channel is always running a show on the Taj Mahal, but trust me, that's not the norm. The norm is unbelievable poverty combined with extreme corruption. India would have to come up a couple of notches to be considered third world in my mind.

 

[N80]

Well, I've never been to India. And I'm not denying the corruption, poverty or caste system. But India is very clearly not a third world country. I have partners and friends from India. India is a bit confounding to the American mind. While the third world side of India does exist, it is at least equally 'balanced' by an extremely modern, high tech, sophisticated and wealthy side. Don't forget, India is a nuclear country and has had nuclear weapons for many years. Indian medicine is on par with the best in the world in terms of sophistication, technology and talent.

Sure, the country is a bit of a paradox, but third world it is not.

I think the most interesting aspects regarding India and China are that they are much like us, just about 125 years behind. We went through our industrial age. Slavery in the south. Child labor and brutal abuses of labor in the north. The robber barons. The monopolies. Incredible governmental corruption. Raping the environment. It took all that to get us where we are now and yet we want to look down our noses at China and India and are inclined to want to deny them that phase of their own history. A phase that we went through and which got us here.

And lest we get too snooty about quality. There was a day, not too long ago, that the American automobile was a joke.

 

[mjfox6]

...Incredible governmental corruption. Raping the environment. It took all that to get us where we are now...

These used to be worse than they are now? I've been paid with pork money for years and lived in West Virginia and Mississippi. I guess I'm more than a little skeptical about those getting better.

 

[dmccarty]

- Do you have to bribe a government official to build a house?
- Get a septic permit?
- Get water?
- Access sewer?
- Get the trash picked up?
- Do you worry that the POlice will pull you over and demand money? If you don't pay they beat you? And this is considered "normal"
- Do elected official consider bribes part of how they are paid?

I can remember when air pollution was really a bad problem. Air quality these days is very good compared to 30 years ago.

I can also remember when the roads had LOTS of garbage in the right of way.

Waterways where mostly polluted all over the US. People swim around New York City today. 30 years ago you would not do so. Dumping raw sewage in a waterway is a crime today. Years ago it was normal. The same was done with chemicals.

Are there still problems? Yes and there always will be but the US does not have the level of corruption that most countries of the world have as a system. The ex leader of the NC legislature was corrupt and he is going to prision. I think he is already there and he owes at least a million dollars in fines. I don't think he will recover from this physically, mentally or finacially. Oh well. We have had other public officials get caught and they have been ruined by their actions. In other countries these type of people are doing what is expected.

Things are much better today in this country than yesterday but you would not know it from the Chicken Littles and the various medias.

Later,
Dan

 

[California]

But India is very clearly not a third world country. I have partners and friends from India. India is a bit confounding to the American mind. While the third world side of India does exist, it is at least equally 'balanced' by an extremely modern, high tech, sophisticated and wealthy side. ... Indian medicine is on par with the best in the world in terms of sophistication, technology and talent. Sure, the country is a bit of a paradox, but third world it is not.

... the media portrayal of conditions in India is understated if anything. India's a dump to put it mildly, there's incredible poverty and the sanitation conditions are horrible. The cities are really overcrowded with minimal infrastructure for the poorer residents and their caste system ensures that the poor will remain that way forever. The government is incredibly corrupt and nothing gets done without bribing the right official. It's a really disfunctional society with few redeeming qualities in my opinion.

I have a third view, which I think encompasses both of the above: India impressed me as infinitely more complex than the US or Europe. What I saw was a half dozen major civilizations living all on top of one another in the same physical space yet isolated from one another by caste, color, language. Remember their population is 4 - 5 times greater than the US. I saw one India as comfortable as our Western lives, enjoying world-class medicine, consumer goods, travel etc. The life of that guy's driver or cook would be at a level free of a fear of hunger, but not prosperous. Maybe our farm laborers would be a comparison. The number of people enjoying modern India is huge, and growing fast. I think it may equal the US in my kids' lifetime. But this culture easily recognized by Westerners exists on top of, in the midst of, incredible chaos of the poorer separate classes, multiple classes, who they don't speak to and who in fact don't speak to one another. The lives of the poorest seem to me little changed from the poor of 3,000 years ago. I would say some, in huge numbers, are nearly the poorest people on the planet.

So the two views expressed above aren't contradictory, but rather examine different strata in that more complex society.

Here are some photos I took in 2004.
Albumatic Album

And a link to my other India sets.
India Pix