Sir,

If India needs to survive in the 21st century it needs to swallow a bitter medicine of Economic Yatra and not “Ekta Yatra of BIP which was really a disguised Hindi, Hindu, Hindustan Yatra as supported by Arun Shourie in his article of Jan, 3, 1992, India Abroad opinion.

Since Indias independence in 1947, the country’s population has doubled from 400hundredmillion to 800 hundred million through bankrupt socialist policies of government subsidization and rationing of food and other essentials, protection of industry form foreign competition and high taxation, leading to a flourishing underground economy with little incentive for business houses to become world industrial giants,

Many of the country’s religious problems of Punjab & Kashmir are directly caused by economic problems of increased pressure on country’s limited resources by ever increasing population, Rung with an iron hand to suppress the aspiration of minorities has only resulted in greater hatred & antagonism towards India and individual States demanding independence or autonomy.

Indias miserable economic performance in the same period compared other Asian countries is quite evident: Indian rupee has depreciated approximately four times against the US dollar while the Japanese yen has appreciated three times against the US dollar.

The strong central government must decentralize power. Let the individual States compete with each other and the free market systems determine the course of Indias future. South Korea is a country no bigger than the state of Punjab but yet its exports are immensely more than the entire Indian nation of more than 20 States surely there is something drastically going wrong with the policies being pursued by the Congress party that has been ring India for most of the years. The country does not need the charisma. of power hungry & arrogant leaders of the past or Hindi, Hindu Hindustan *Yatra but tough economic policies Yatra in a society of free people with no food subsidies which will make India survive in a very competitive world.

Srinagar, Kashmir amidst tight security while the local people vehemently resented it proves that the flag has become a symbol of tyranny & oppression & not symbol of unity in diversity of the Indian people.

Harbir Singh Mahwah, NJ

Article extracted from this publication >> February 28, 1992