Letter From New Delhi: India Loses Patience With the Super-Rich - washingtonpost.com

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By Emily Wax
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, October 6, 2009

NEW DELHI -- In this developing nation, government officials have long enjoyed first-class air tickets, overnight stays at five-star hotels, and vast entourages of servants and security, in what is known here as "V-VIPism."

But with the global economy in peril and India in the middle of its worst drought in years, such displays of wealth have begun to anger the public, especially after the Indian media reported that Foreign Minister S.M. Krishna and his deputy, Shashi Tharoor, had been holed up for more than three months in two of the capital's most opulent five-star hotels while their pricey bungalows were being built.

The men said they were paying for the hotel stays out of their own pockets. But television pundits wondered how public servants could afford suites that can cost anywhere from $250 to more than $2,000 a night.

While the extravagance is not all that notable for India, the fact that it's become such a hot issue is. Many Indians say an "austerity drive" announced by the ruling party would never have even surfaced 10 years ago. There is more hope for genuine social mobility in India then ever before and more willingness to question those at the top who are seen as living lavishly on the public dime.

The two Foreign Ministry officials recently moved out of the hotels and into modest guesthouses. But that's when penny-pinching became political.

Suddenly, leaders of all ages and political parties began flying economy class, taking the train, eating roti rolls and lentils at roadside truck stops, and wearing khadi -- Mohandas Gandhi-esque homespun cottons, which are a symbol of commitment to the common man in Indian politics. All this was done with the cameras rolling, of course.

Pranab Mukherjee, the finance minister, flew economy class from Delhi to Kolkata. "It was quite enjoyable," Pranab told a scrum of TV reporters.

Soon after the hotel exposé, Sonia Gandhi, leader of the ruling Congress party, announced the austerity drive and flew economy class. She had also previously asked ministers to contribute 20 percent of their salaries toward drought relief.

Rahul Gandhi, the party's heir apparent and Sonia Gandhi's son, made front-page news when he took the train.

More recently, Rahul Gandhi made headlines when he visited a poor rural area and slept outside on a rope cot known as a charpai, refusing even a mosquito net. He then bathed at a hand pump, ate local vegetables and hung out with low-caste farmers.

But there is a question of just how sincere these efforts really are. Tharoor, minister of state for external affairs, went on Twitter and wrote that he would travel "cattle class out of solidarity to all our holy cows." He was chastised by leaders of the Congress party, who were reelected this year on a platform to lift hundreds of millions of Indians out of abject poverty.

Tharoor, a well-dressed man with a head of thick, shiny black hair, is popular in India and was well respected abroad when he was a U.N. undersecretary general. His defenders said that his comments were clearly a joke and that most Indians themselves aspire to fly first class.

The tabloid newspaper Mail Today ran a front-page story describing "sheepish Tharoor going to various offices through the day, to apparently apologize for his remarks. All in a country where less than one percent of the population travels by air."

Even as the politicians appear to be adopting more austere ways, they also know that deep beneath the feelings of young Indians and their aspirations to the middle class is an even stronger current of respect for the wealthy. In a nation built on centuries of caste-driven roles, the tolerance of those born to a higher position is strong.

"Rarely are the rich questioned," said Brahma Chellaney, a security expert with the New Delhi-based Center for Policy Research. "Egalitarianism is not from this part of the world. This is starting to change."

The Scottish-born William Dalrymple, who lives in India and is the author of several best-selling books on Indian history, weighed in on the hubbub: "In London you might expect the traffic to be held up for the queen or the prime minister, but that's it -- in Delhi, traffic will be held up for the minister of fertilizer distribution. All this makes for a greater contrast and culture of irritation between the haves and have-nots as compared to anywhere else I have lived," he wrote in the business newspaper Mint.

Government V-VIPs are known to shut down rush-hour traffic whizzing by with sirens blaring and red-and-blue lights flashing atop their official white sedans, complete with curtains to keep child beggars from peering into the car windows. They have separate lines at airports and are often ushered into luxury hotels with a phalanx of armed guards.

India is often described as the best place in the world to be rich and the worst place to be poor. It's not just V-VIPs who enjoy a life of privilege. Even most middle-class Indians have a staff of servants, including maids, cooks, laundry men, nannies, drivers and what are known as "peons," or fetchers of lunch.

Amit Gupta, 34, a manager of a food company, said it is up to elected officials to lead the change. Only if they do, he said, will modern Indians truly be able to move up the economic ladder.

"It's become our national reality show. But if our politicians go on TV and eat street food, we all know that they'll never be seen there again once this attention is over," Gupta said. "It makes good television, though."

Special correspondent Ayesha Manocha contributed to this report.