Is India China’s Biggest Threat？ - Subramanian Swamy
Episode Stats
Length
1 hour and 8 minutes
Words per Minute
155.58842
Hate Speech Sentences
104
Summary
Dr. Subramanian swamy is an author, politician, economist, statistician, and the former Union Cabinet Minister under the Prime Minister Raja Sabah. He s done a lot of different work in the government in India, including stints in the U.S. and Harvard. He has a PhD in Economics from Harvard and is a member of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government.
Transcript
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If India wanted to overtake China and the United States, it can do so.
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If India were to develop its educational system properly,
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we could overtake China in the next 10, 15 years.
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India needs 1.2 million doses of vaccine shots.
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There's only one place you can go to to get 1.2 billion,
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Doesn't that kind of validate the power of China has over the world,
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I disagree because we are the largest producer of vaccines.
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We need a solid alliance with the United States in the present juncture,
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India doesn't have the weapons system we need to deal with China.
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and it sounds like you're the last one they haven't eliminated.
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The United States doesn't have the staying power once they make a decision.
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I don't think that we have to worry about China.
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My guest today is Dr. Subramanian Swamy from India,
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who is an author, politician, economist, statistician,
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and the former union cabinet to Raja Sabah under the member of parliament.
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And he's done a lot of different work with their government.
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There are a lot of different work in the government there.
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And you may not know him or his face in the U.S. or other places, but in India,
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Former professor also at IIT, which I had a chance to speak over there a couple of years ago,
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and specifically in the topic of mathematical economics.
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With that being said, sir, thank you so much for being a guest on Valuetainment.
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So I got to tell you, I sit there, I watch one of your videos,
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and I go to the second one, third one, fourth one, fifth one.
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My algorithms right now think I'm your number one fan because I've been watching your stuff.
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But if you don't mind taking a quick minute and giving an intro to the audience for them to
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know what your background is before we get into the topics, I think that'd be great for the audience.
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Well, I started as an academic, and I came back to India, which very few people do,
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because I was also in the faculty at Harvard, and to leave all that, and being a student of
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two famous or most famous economists, Samuelson and Kuznets, I left it all, came back,
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I said I won't work in India. But I had, unfortunately, the ideology that India can
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only progress through a market economy, and we were those days very pro-Soviet socialism,
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and so the intellectuals all ganged up to see that I didn't teach at any university for a long time.
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So by the time I did three years at IIT Delhi as a full professor, they sacked me.
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And of course, I fought it in the court, and after 21 years, I won the case. But by then,
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I'd become a cabinet minister. And so I said, I'm not going back to the place which didn't want me.
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And I made them pay all my back salary at 8% interest, which was much more than I would have
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got if I was getting my graduate and pension. So I entered politics in the parliament at a very
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young age. I've been six times to parliament. And each time I chose not my native town,
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but chose Bombay. I got elected twice from Bombay. I went twice from the central state of UP,
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and then once from my hometown, Madurai in Tamil Nadu. And now I am actually a nominee of the
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president, which is a prestigious appointment for my eminence in economics in the upper house of
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parliament. That's how I am. I am, of course, very strong in economics, which is market-oriented.
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And of course, I've got a tremendous reputation in the country, I think, for having opposed
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dictatorship of Mrs. Gandhi and succeeding. And I've done now 50 years of politics in India.
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So for the American folks, if you were to say, you would be dot, dot, dot of US, who would be the
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comparable to who you are in the US? I know it's kind of a tough one to do because everybody has
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their own individual identity, but who would be comparable to someone like you in the US?
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Well, in terms of putting across ideas and then, you know, which are unpalatable, but
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in an agreeable way, I would say I would compare myself mostly with John Ronald Reagan.
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Got it. I figured that when I was reading some of the views, I figured that I would put you as a
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Milton Friedman, Ronald Reagan type of a person, maybe those two, some of the views that you have.
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So can you walk us through, I mean, if you look at the numbers today, India went from not being in
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the top 10 of GDP, they were not a name that was being talked about, then they went into top 10,
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then you moved into number five, then you dropped to number seven, then I think right now you're
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number six GDP, but India has come up. Walk us through the history of what's happened to India,
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specifically, say, the last 60 years. What changes has India gone through the last 60 years?
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Well, first of all, the GDP calculation you are relying on is on the basis of the exchange rates
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which prevailed in the market. But we economists don't use that. We use what is called the purchasing
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power parity rate, which means if I'm going to evaluate tomatoes in my, or pizzas in my GDP,
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either I will use the American price or the Indian price because the quality is the same.
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So the valuation goes up and we are actually in absolute GDP, now the third largest in the world.
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And not fifth or sixth, which is subject to the exchange rate, the exchange rate devalues,
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GDP also goes down. So I think India has come a long way because we were really exploited and
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completely drained of resources during the British period. Before that, we had the Islamic invasions, which
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destroyed our country in many ways. And then after the independence, we began really the bottom of the
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heat. And over the years, we would have gone much faster and much further had we not adopted the
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Soviet socialism for the first 40 years. And now in the last six years, unfortunately, our prime minister
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is innocent of economics. So he has been doing a lot of ad hoc things which have failed. And if you look at
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our GDP graph, it's been, this growth rate has been declining consistently from 2016. And now it's in
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minus because of the corona, but we were down to just 3% in the last quarter before the corona pandemic,
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virus pandemic came. So we need, we can turn around and we can grow very fast. Because the amount of
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potential we have is enormous, I could evaluate, I'll deliberate on that during the course of the
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interview. But I would say that if India wanted to overtake China, it can do so. And if India wanted
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to challenge the United States, which is the United States, the main strength is your ability to innovate
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and bring in new innovations and raise the productivity of capital and labor. And we have shown,
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our Indians in the United States have shown that we got as much brains as the Americans. So therefore,
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if India were to develop its educational system properly, I think we could be a challenge to the
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United States and overtake China in the next 10, 15 years. That's a pretty bold statement to make,
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to say overtake China in the next 10 to 15 years, which we'll get into that here in a minute. But prior
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to getting into that, you know, in the US, Gandhi is seen as a hero. Who is Gandhi to you?
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Mahatma Gandhi is, was a man who actually converted the fight for freedom from just petitioners that we
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had before, highly educated people who went to Cambridge and Oxford, and you know, qualified at the
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bar of law. And, but he may convert, he himself was of course trained in the, I mean, educated in
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England, he became a barrister, he went and practiced in South Africa for some time. But he has completely
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transformed himself, he started wearing Indian clothes, and that too, of the poor farmer. And then
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he converted this fight for independence into a mass movement. And he had the ideas which, you know,
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we found it very difficult in a modern world to practice. But his, his direction was super. He wanted
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India to stand on its own feet. And he thought that we had the resources to do that, which he was right.
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But I think subsequently, his successor, or his nominated successor in, in the government, Mr. Nehru,
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didn't follow anything of his ideology. And so he's just remains as a kind of an emotional figure, as
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one who got his freedom, but not that his ideology has been given a go by.
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Fair enough. So, so let's go back to what you were talking. The only reason I bring that up, because
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60 years, you know, us Americans, we go to school, you read the books, you like quotes,
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all over Instagram, you're thinking, wow, it's 100% all good. But maybe there's a different
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perspective. I've had a chance to visit Mumbai, and I had a chance to go to one of his homes that
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I believe is now a museum and get a chance to walk through and see what the place looked like.
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It was very interesting to learn. There's a picture, I believe, of Obama there visiting his
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place of living. They have a picture in the museum of Obama being there. But you speak very bluntly of
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PM Modi. You've called him out. You've said he's a great politician, but a naive economist. There's
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other words you use, but you haven't necessarily complimented him on the economy side. But it
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sounds like you guys have known each other from the 70s. There's a relationship there between the
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two of you. And you will also recommend it that you think you should be his finance minister.
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If you were his finance minister today, with what they have going on in the economy, with your level
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of confidence to say where India can overtake China in the next 10 or 15 years, you mentioned
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education, but I kind of want you to go a little bit deeper. What are some recommendations you would
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make for India to make adjustments in order to compete with China and potentially US?
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In the first place, you see, it's well known to economists. I never said he's under the phrase
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used about his knowledge of economics. I said he doesn't know any economics, which is much harsher.
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It's much harsher than I, yes, I was trying to be a little bit more subtle.
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So, you see, the question today, after this corona of one and a half years or whatever,
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is that we have essentially what our finance ministry, which is also a lot of low IQ people
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have been packed into it because they are obedient. This is one of the weakness of Modi. He is a friend
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of mine. I've known him for a long time, but he just likes people to work for him and not become an
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independent pole. So, I'm being kept out on that ground. I don't mind because I'm doing so many
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other things. But the fact is that today we have what we call as a gross demand shortage.
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And that demand shortage has come because the working class, the middle income groups,
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they've all lost incomes. And the migrant workers are all out of employment.
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And if you can see some of the manifestations, go to an automobile showroom, you'll find cars and
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cars lined up. You'll be surprised. Why? Because there's no demand. So, the economic growth has to
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be first positioned, how are you going to augment this demand? And there are two ways of doing it.
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One is put like your Americans did, starting with Trump and then now with Biden. You're putting money
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into the hands of the people. People are getting checks in their own bank accounts in the United
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States. I mean, those who couldn't go to work. And that kept your demand up. And so, it's not such a bad
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situation in the United States. But here, there was across the board, except of course, the very rich,
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where there was a sharp fall in demand. So, our policy should have been to see how we can
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put money into the hands of people. What other things we can do to increase demand? One of the
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things I've suggested is that the income tax in our country is not paid in agriculture, because all
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agriculture incomes are exempt from income tax. In the urban areas, there is a cutoff point. And above
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that, only you pay income tax. And that, the total amount is not more than two to three percent of
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our revenue. So, I'm saying that, and then these laws are so complicated that people have to hire
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chartered accountants and so on to, you know, just to convince the income tax inspector that you are not,
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you're not fudging your accounts. And there are cases, and our cases have been there. People are
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harassed. And they spend an enormous amount of time preparing income tax returns. So, I've said when
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you're getting such a small amount from income tax, abolish it. And it doesn't matter, the rich will be
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benefited by that. But the middle class also, which does bulk of the savings, you know, in our country,
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unlike the United States. The United States, if you will be surprised to know that the household
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saving is negative, because most people are borrowing, and they don't save. In India, 80 percent
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of our total savings comes from the households, because people are very, you know, they want to
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provide for the future. And so, we, our people, save a lot. Now, you should encourage them. Then you find
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that the interest rates in the United States, you can get a loan for 2 percent. But in India,
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it's not less than 12 percent. And then with the amount of corruption and the banks and so on,
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If you put money in a term deposit, you get only 6 percent rent. You know, I mean, interest rate,
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interest payments. So, you should raise that to 9 percent. And so that people, you know, find that
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saving is worthwhile and not just, you know, buying gold and keeping it in stock. So, I would say that I
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would begin by freeing the demand forces by either way. There's another third one. You build a road
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and print notes and give them wages. That becomes demand too. And, you know, we are still living in
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the past about the gold standard and all that. The money you print is owed to yourself. Hey, there's a
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debt. Okay. It's a big debt, but you owe it to yourself. Nobody's going to come and liquidate you.
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So, there's no harm when there's a demand shortage to print notes liberally so that you can pay people
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for public works and so on. So, therefore, I would begin by focusing on generating employment
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and putting money into the hands of people so it becomes a demand. Lower the interest rates
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because the interest rates are too high and they have a negative thing, especially in the small and
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medium industry, which is about 60% of our industry. They are finding very hard to get capital
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and they are all closing down and that creates unemployment.
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So, you said, so interest rates in US, if I want to go borrow something, rates right now are 2%,
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let's just say, give or take. It's nothing. The money is free right now if you want to get it so cheap.
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But in India, you said 12% to 15% because the bank is also gouging, adding additional 2% or 3%.
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We said savings is 6%. So, a saving account in India right now pays 6% to...
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Yes. It's a term deposit. That means you have to put it in for five years.
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Five years. Okay. So, it's even a five-year 6%. That's a lot higher than US. US doesn't have
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a fixed annuity or even a bond you get nowadays for five years. You're lucky if you're looking at a
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percent to 2%. So, six is a bigger number. But you're saying lower the interest rates,
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bring it down, make money a little bit easier, get rid of taxes. If India gets rid of taxes,
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how does the government generate revenue or in order to be able to sustain military,
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all the other things? How does India do that? Well, there are two ways. One is, of course,
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the indirect taxes, sales tax, excise tax, tax on when you purchase, these will continue.
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And they're, in fact, the bulk of the taxes we are getting today. I mean, income tax gets you
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hardly anything except harassment. Second is that we, in our country, we need, if you lower the
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interest rate in borrowing, people will get the money. They'll be happy to pay that kind of lower
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interest rates. I'm not talking about the interest rates that you get on a fixed deposit. That I would
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call as the rate of return. But in terms of interest rate on loans, that if you lower it, you will find
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people will borrow money. And that's how you put money into the people's hands.
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What gives you confidence to believe that India can compete with China and US in the next 10 or 15 years?
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U.S. I'll answer second. First, let me answer China. What was the growth rate between India and China
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between 1950 and 1980? About the same, 3.5% per year, which is dismally low. And then what the Chinese
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did, especially because of Teng Xiaoping, he improved his relations with the United States.
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And told the United States, you're buying so many consumer durables from Japan and South Korea and so
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on. And in these countries, now they're getting prosperous and the wage rates are going up. And so
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earlier on, you know, Motorola was more expensive than, say, Toyota. I mean, not one of these Panasonic,
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et cetera. And now Motorola is out of the business completely. And these people's prices are going up.
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And what they proposed was that let these nations, which can be influenced by you,
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give us semi-processed goods. And we will add value to it and then export it to the United States
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at the same cheap price as you were getting before. So now take Lenovo. Taiwan gives you the circuits and
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the base. It comes to China and there they put in the keyboard and they put the glass and then the case
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and then put Lenovo made in China. It's not really made in China. So this switch trade, if you look at
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the Chinese statistics, they are always in a deficit of trade with the East Asian countries, but in a huge
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surplus of trade payments, of course, payments out of trade with the Europeans and the Americans.
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So this switch trade is now they're running out of steam on that because Chinese labor is also
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becoming very expensive and their non-adherence to intellectual property rights and so on.
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These East Asian countries are willing to look at an alternative and India can be that alternative,
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but India needs to remove all the, what, this cobwebs that we have inherited from the British rule,
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you know, regulation on this, regulation on that. This simplification of regulation, Mr. Modi didn't do,
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he made it even more complicated in my opinion. And you simplify that and make it possible for
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foreign investors from Japan and South Korea and the Philippines and, you know, Taiwan to come
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with the minimum hassles. If you want to buy land today in India to build a factory, it takes you six
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years to get the land. Why is that? So, yeah, because there'll be court case, somebody will file it.
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Are you being serious? Are you being serious? Yes, yes, yes, yes. You try and buy land in India.
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I mean, I'm talking about to build a factory, you see. So there's a lot of problems. Then the
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left-wing trade unions will also come in. Most people, you talk to any foreign investment,
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that's the problem they have. That's why they go to cities and do IT matters because in Bangalore,
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you can get an apartment and the Indians have cheap labor. And, you know, we produce a lot of
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good IT products, I mean, the information technology products. So I'm saying that
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if you do this, simplify, people will come with the money and they'll get a very good rate of return.
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But the hassles are the ones which are stopping them from coming. In many cases, many of these
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developed countries have decided to go to other countries. Take, for example,
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when I was Commerce Minister, I had gone to this Brussels for the conference on WTO, creation of a
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WTO. And we got textile, which the Americans had the most, you know, most, you know, oppressive
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tariff rates. We got the, I got in fact, in a bilateral meeting with the Americans,
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that they would lower these rates for our garments and so on to come. But we didn't get the benefit of
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it. China and Bangladesh got it. And we are still nowhere in this. So this because the textile
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industries don't have the incentive to export. So I'm saying the potential, same thing with agriculture.
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We have, you know, as much arable land as China, but we produce only one quarter of what China
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produces on a plot of land. They were in fact produced three crops a year. We produce in only 25%
00:24:04.400
more than one crop. We can easily because India, at least we don't have snow. And we have 12 months
00:24:10.560
of the year, you can do agriculture. We have 150 million cows, and we give an average of 200 litres
00:24:17.920
per year. One Israeli cow gives you 11,000 litres per year. So I think the India's potential is tremendous.
00:24:25.680
And we need to do it. And electricity can be given cheap if you convert the thorium into uranium. And
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nuclear reactors put all over the country, you will produce enough, not only for yourself to give it
00:24:39.680
away free, but you can give it to your neighbours too. So India is a land of potential and it's a question of tapping that.
00:24:46.880
So, so if I look at that, that's, that's interesting on what you're saying. I did not know about taking
00:24:52.880
six years to take buy land and build a, you know, plant on it. But, you know, if you look at population
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wise, okay, you look at population wise, if we take and combine, I believe it's US, plus Canada, plus all of
00:25:08.560
Europe, plus Australia, plus all of New Zealand, plus all of South America, we have 1.432 billion people.
00:25:16.560
Okay, I'll say that one more time, US, Canada, all of Europe, all of South America, Australia, New Zealand, 1.432
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billion people, China alone is 1.439 billion people, India is 1.366. Okay, so, so automatically, you have a lot more
00:25:34.080
enhanced inventory wise to be able to grow that. Now the fertility rate has slowed down tremendously in China over the
00:25:40.240
years, you know, they went from 6.11 and 55, I think they're at, I don't know, 1.69 today.
00:25:46.480
Obviously, some of the laws they came out with that you can't have, you know, all these other laws that
00:25:49.840
they had, they changed it. So it's grown, slowed down a little bit. And the median age has gone up from
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being 21, 19 years old, it's like 38 now, which I think is what they wanted. But now it's kind of
00:26:00.400
scaring them a little bit long term about what could happen. But go back to the playbook of what
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China did. From your perspective, you have 1.366. They have 1.439. US is at 330 million. The numbers
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just came back from the Census Bureau. What was the playbook China used to compete in a marketplace?
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In your eyes, what is the playbook US used to be the dominant force in a marketplace? What was both
00:26:27.760
of their playbooks? Because it's a different playbook. Well, of course. As I told you,
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they don't produce anything in China. The semi-processed goods come from East Asia. They only
00:26:42.720
add value to it and export it to the United States. It's industrial development. I don't think any
00:26:52.640
country should be replicated the way. And today, China has a problem. They're calling it rebalancing.
00:26:58.560
They use all these fancy words. But the fact is that today, China is running into a saturation
00:27:03.760
because their labor has become very expensive. And it's going to be very difficult to bring in raw
00:27:10.240
materials or semi-processed goods from East Asia and convert it into exportable goods for the United
00:27:18.480
States and Europe. So I don't want to repeat the Chinese thing except in a marginal sort of way.
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I mean, we are capable of producing in our country. We don't need semi-processed goods from East Asia.
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But if East Asia wants to export, of course, it would be advantageous for us because we can use our
00:27:38.720
resources for something else. But India's potential is much more than China. China is, in fact,
00:27:46.640
its agricultural yield per acre is near saturation point. Its industrial thing is based on tomorrow,
00:27:56.480
the American companies pack up and leave and saying, no, we are no more interested in this processing.
00:28:02.480
China would have a very big problem in their country. What they have done is they have mastered
00:28:09.280
the art of selling abroad. They are great salesmen and they have brought in a lot of resources. They
00:28:16.880
have been able to sell some of their products more easily. Even today, India, we are importing
00:28:22.480
manufactured products from China and you just export iron ore and this kind of thing. So China's cleverness is
00:28:32.960
not in terms of using its own resources. In fact, most of China is, I think, barren. If you go to Gansu province
00:28:42.800
or Urumichi or Tibet, you can see. Whereas India is, you know, throughout the country, you have
00:28:52.240
greenery and ability to manufacture, but our yield per acre is one of the lowest in the world. Our
00:29:01.440
experimental plots in the Indian Agricultural Research Institute is six times what we get in the
00:29:09.280
farmers get. And we have neglected the farmers because we followed the Soviet pattern. And the Soviet
00:29:14.720
pattern was extract resources from agriculture and finance heavy industrialization. And in the sense that
00:29:21.840
the British also broke the back of the of the agricultures, but we also did for the first 40 years.
00:29:28.080
It's only barely now we are in a position where some parts of India are producing bumper crops like
00:29:34.960
Punjab, which is of course now in agitation, South India and the district of Punjab like that. So where is the
00:29:43.360
problem for India? We don't have the right policies. We don't lack anything else. If you want water,
00:29:50.160
desalination of seawater, you've got the longest coastline any big nation is having, you see.
00:29:58.720
Desalination of seawater, the Israelis have done a wonderful job on that.
00:30:05.040
And we have 60 percent of thorium in our country. If the uranium gets exhausted, which is expected in
00:30:11.040
another 20 years, it will be India, which will be dominating the nuclear fuel. So what is it that
00:30:17.280
India next? And our people have got brains. They've shown it in America. They've shown it in so many
00:30:21.840
European countries. They're not able to show it in India because we have got this bureaucratic
00:30:25.840
structure, which suffocates our people and doesn't give them due credit. If somebody does something,
00:30:33.120
then then his boss wants to take the credit. You know, you said if America was to leave China
00:30:38.880
tomorrow to China would be, in layman's terms, screwed if America was to leave China. But here's
00:30:44.960
a question for you. If you look at the world's manufacturing superpower, you know, China's here,
00:30:52.240
then you got US, then you got Japan, Germany, then it's India, right? Meaning they have manufacturing,
00:30:57.200
they're dominating the marketplace, whether it's chips, pharmacy, you know, people are trying,
00:31:01.920
80% of all the pharmacy being produced there. Don't you think America kind of empowered China
00:31:09.280
so much that it got the world to rely way too much on China, which is now harder to lean away
00:31:17.440
and get away from China? Because what you're saying is it makes sense when you say if America decides to
00:31:22.960
pack their lunch and leave tomorrow and just say, you know, we're out of here. That's true. But I don't
00:31:27.920
think America can do that because now they're too reliant on the Chinese economy and that's given
00:31:33.040
China the power. Well, see, first of all, one historical event, the Americans, Kunta Kosini,
00:31:42.240
and none of us would have. In fact, I had to pinch myself to believe it has happened. That is the
00:31:46.800
unraveling of the Soviet Union. China was a counter. It made sense. They had very bad relations with the
00:31:54.560
Soviet Union. So the United States saw this as a strategic advantage and therefore assisted that
00:32:01.600
the way the Americans assisted the Chinese for their development is unbelievable, particularly
00:32:06.720
because you gave them so much market access in your own country. And so they benefited by that.
00:32:14.240
And now they may talk tough and so on. But if some of the democratic countries got together,
00:32:24.160
they will be in real right soon. China would be. Yeah, China would. OK, so let's talk about
00:32:30.160
coronavirus. You know, the cases you're in India. We hear about the news. It's the seven day average
00:32:38.400
in February in cases was 11,145 a day. The seven day average right now as of May 9th is 389,000
00:32:47.840
cases a day. The seven day average on death is nearly 4,000, 39, 41. Right. And we're seeing the
00:32:54.480
story. I'm mentoring, helping out this one company in India. I sit on their board and I'm talking to
00:33:00.640
them and I said, what does it look like? He says, you don't even know how bad it is right now. They're in
00:33:03.680
the capital where most of the COVID is taking place. Workers going home. Nobody's buying. You know,
00:33:09.920
there's a lot of fear there. Right. OK. So then a number comes out saying, well, Modi wasn't
00:33:15.200
responsible. He said he's going to get more vaccines out. He didn't. Doesn't this validate?
00:33:20.960
Because the number that came out is China. India needs 1.2 million doses of vaccine shots. Right.
00:33:28.320
1.2 billion. That's a big number. 1.2 billion. And there's only one place you can go to to get 1.2
00:33:36.400
billion. And you know who that is. I mean, that's what a lot of people are talking about. It's
00:33:40.800
China. Doesn't that kind of validate the power of power China has over the world? Or you disagree
00:33:47.440
with that? I disagree because we are the largest producer of vaccines, not China. So if you're the
00:33:54.480
largest producer of vaccines. We became complacent because by end of December and January of this year,
00:34:03.840
2021, it looked as if the corona is gone. And the prime minister went and boasted that I have solved
00:34:10.960
the problem of corona. I've defeated them in the World Economic Survey, World Economic Conference or
00:34:16.080
whatever it's called in Switzerland. And he, of course, it was online, but his speech, he said,
00:34:23.520
I have solved this problem. I'm ready to assist any other country who wants to solve the problem.
00:34:28.000
And out of the blue, this second wave came. And we had forgotten. See, there is a lot of,
00:34:37.200
he said, we are a democracy. So we've got a lot of lobbies. And the British, Oxford,
00:34:45.280
at Saad Zenica or whatever it's called, they wanted it to be manufactured in India.
00:34:52.240
There was an Indian company, which was doing by a different route. They were producing these vaccines,
00:35:01.920
which are far safer, tested, and effective too. And I took that there. But originally,
00:35:12.000
when the prime minister announced that the contract is going, he only announced this AstraZeneca
00:35:17.920
vaccine produced in Pune. And now the owner has gone off to London and he's sitting there
00:35:26.320
because there have been so many, I mean, there must have been 200 deaths in that, whereas in this
00:35:32.080
other one, Covaxin produced entirely domestically, there has been hardly any. So we became complacent and
00:35:43.200
we are paying the price for that complacency. And this attempt to want to grab credit and then
00:35:50.960
project yourself in the world, this weakness of politicians, you know, it is partly responsible.
00:35:56.400
Because nobody wanted to, as I utter a word of caution, I was, of course, I was in, I'm the
00:36:01.440
parliamentary committee on health. So I was the one who fought and got the Covaxin to be cleared on the
00:36:08.880
same day. And now the government is putting all his faith in this Covaxin because the other one is,
00:36:14.480
you know, we don't know where it is. When the owner himself has gone away to Britain,
00:36:20.080
we don't know what's going to happen. So we, yes, we are behind, we are responsible for what happened.
00:36:26.320
In a matter like oxygen, I'm surprised a country like India, not being able to supply oxygen,
00:36:33.120
because we didn't make, make arrangements because oxygen requires a lot of, you know,
00:36:37.680
trucking and the transportation and cylinders and so on. And none of that was being thought of,
00:36:43.520
just having enough oxygen is not enough. So, so in, in what, so you're saying as far as the vaccine
00:36:49.520
goes, India doesn't at all rely on China for any of the vaccine, because you can produce, you're the
00:36:53.360
largest manufacturer. What, what does India rely on China with? Because if there's one thing India did
00:37:00.080
in the last 12 months, you guys banned TikTok, all these apps, I think on one week, it was 100 apps
00:37:06.480
that were fully banned of China and India, which I applaud for them to take that position because
00:37:12.160
nobody else is willing to take that position. A lot of people are scared. Trump almost did something
00:37:16.880
where he forced them to want to sell TikTok, but you know, it was kind of confusing how that ended up
00:37:21.280
taking place. What, what does India rely on China with? And if it's nothing, what, how does, how does
00:37:30.960
India view China? Does India view China as an ally or does it view as the, you know, number one enemy it faces?
00:37:39.680
Well, first of all, let me start with your last point. Chinese have crossed a mutually agreed
00:37:47.360
line of actual control. We drew a line in 1993 saying that there are disputes on whose land is whose land
00:37:59.360
and we will, you know, take the present situation, the status quo, and we'll draw a line where there's
00:38:05.680
no disputes. And in that the Chinese got a big chunk of Kashmir, the part of Kashmir, which is now
00:38:12.800
called a separate state called Ladakh. But over the period of the previous government, they had been
00:38:20.800
silently coming into our land. And this continued even after we came to power. Now, I do not know
00:38:29.120
whether the prime minister knew about it. I can't believe that he wouldn't have known. He had 18 meetings,
00:38:35.680
one to one Xi Jinping, one to one, while either in India or in China, turn by turn. And suddenly,
00:38:45.920
out of the blue, we come to learn that they have come and occupied our land. And it's about 2000
00:38:52.640
square kilometers. And now they are, you know, they are, they are increasing their forces. I think they
00:38:59.360
are, they are, they are thinking, I don't know whether they got a date, but they're certainly going to
00:39:03.200
have another attack. And the attack was actually by the Chinese aimed at eliminating India from the
00:39:11.520
global map, that we are number two. I mean, we are in the second category of nations, not in the first
00:39:17.680
category. The first category is only United States and China. And India is waffling because we are not
00:39:26.320
able to, we have been, you know, brainwashed earlier that we should be non-aligned, non-aligned with what,
00:39:33.440
with whom. And we should have a clear policy that today, the weapon systems are the best in the United
00:39:42.480
States. We don't want US troops in India, because our troops are sufficient to deal with China. But we
00:39:49.680
certainly need the weapon systems that the US is willing to give. Certainly, I would like to see,
00:39:58.160
like to see your F-35 being given to us. You gave it to Turkey, I think. But I don't know what is the
00:40:07.920
magnet. The Indians have decided to sign a contract and pay a hundred thousand crores
00:40:16.880
to the Russians for S-400. Now, S-400's electronics are entirely Chinese. Second, I don't know if the
00:40:26.080
world realizes the Russians, in effect, are a junior partner of China. They can't go against China.
00:40:34.160
They are bankrupt, and the Chinese have been financing them. And so, therefore, today we need
00:40:41.440
clarity. We can defeat the Chinese. We have the weapons. We have the wherewithal to engage in
00:40:50.880
warfare, because the logistics is in favor of India. The Chinese have to come from a long distance
00:40:56.240
and through Tibet, and then cross a mountain, then come down. So, we can defeat them. And in fact,
00:41:04.400
hand-to-hand combat, we have already defeated them. But the fact is, now it's going to be the weapon
00:41:10.640
system. And we need to, therefore, have a clear understanding of the United States. The main
00:41:17.280
problem with the Indian politicians is we are too emotional. If you praise them, they think, oh,
00:41:22.480
we are now arrived. They are the greatest in the world. Whereas the Americans are all practical people.
00:41:27.760
I've lived with them. I know everything is give and take. What's in it for me, or what I'll give you,
00:41:33.360
and what I want from you. Now, that kind of language, you should speak to the Americans.
00:41:38.560
And Americans, I know, want to give up some of their responsibilities in, say, the Indo-Pacific.
00:41:52.480
I think we are in a position to take it. Tomorrow, if India and Indonesia came together, the Chinese
00:41:57.360
won't be able to go through the Malacca Strait. They can't come from their eastern coast and go to
00:42:03.120
the West because we can stop them there. So we have that kind of thing. But the Chinese are
00:42:10.800
very hardworking people. They have got the Sri Lankans on their side. They've got the Bangladeshis
00:42:16.880
on their side. All our neighboring countries are today. If they are not pro-Chinese, they certainly
00:42:22.880
don't want to annoy them. We are in a terrible situation.
00:42:26.400
So do you think China sees you? So in a way, they're eliminating enemies, one by one by one.
00:42:36.240
And it sounds like you're the last one they haven't eliminated before they go after the big
00:42:40.000
guys. And you know what the big guys. So I think you are in the way of US. Because right now, India is,
00:42:46.640
they have three choices. They have three choices. Either, number one, India is going to side with
00:42:54.560
US. Either India is going to side with China. Or either India is going to say, we're not siding
00:43:00.400
with anybody. We can stand on our own two feet. It sounds like it's one of those three options.
00:43:06.320
Long term, what do you think is going to be happening? Because when the coronavirus started
00:43:11.280
spreading in India, you saw Chinese diplomats all the way at the top tweeting. Their tweet is Weibo.
00:43:17.200
I don't know if you saw what they said about India. It says, look what's going on in India,
00:43:20.480
and look what we're doing. We're shooting rockets up in the space, and we're going to Mars. We're
00:43:24.080
doing all this other stuff. Yeah, and we have burning bodies.
00:43:25.920
Yes, they're burning bodies. So what do you think, long term, is going to be India's position? Not just
00:43:33.040
the right thing to take, but what do you foresee taking place with India? US, China, or we can stand
00:43:37.920
alone. If India can get stacked together on the economic policy, we will be able to stand our own
00:43:48.800
in 10 years. But India doesn't have the weapon system we need to deal with China. And Americans
00:43:59.280
obviously can't send their troops here to fight the Chinese. So we need a solid alliance with the
00:44:07.840
United States in the present juncture, at least for 10 years. And we have got into something called
00:44:13.200
the Quad, but our government is dilly-dallying on how much to commit, how much not to commit.
00:44:21.200
And China is not an option. As long as the present leadership is there, there could be a change.
00:44:26.240
Mao Zedong changed and Deng Xiaoping came. Everything changed. And so if Xi Jinping goes and somebody else comes
00:44:34.480
who is not like Xi Jinping, then I think we can, we have a historically a very long relationship with
00:44:41.920
China. And at man to man, there is a lot of, you know, love and respect for each other. We admire the
00:44:50.560
Chinese for all the things that they admire our culture. In fact, in 1936, I put this in my book,
00:44:57.280
the president of Beijing University, who later was an ambassador for the Republic of China, the
00:45:04.720
Chiang Kai-shek for China. He came to Harvard invited to speak at the tricentennial function.
00:45:12.160
And they asked him to speak on any topic that is of great importance to China. And what was the topic?
00:45:17.680
The Indianization of China, a case of peaceful borrowing for 300 years. And I've given all the
00:45:26.320
references. You can access it through the Widener Library of Harvard. So this speech, he says that the
00:45:34.640
Indians were mesmerized us with their concepts of God and, you know, the various incidents that took
00:45:46.480
place and how the gods intervene, how they help the human being. He said they were snowed in by that.
00:45:51.920
And he was not happy about it. He said, we have to exercise it out. And of course, the communists came and
00:45:58.160
it all went. But even today, when there is no hostility, I've been to China many times. I really
00:46:07.280
like China. I know their culture. I like their food, even especially. But they have treated me with
00:46:15.440
great respect. But today, we have a political problem. After all, I am an Indian nationalist to
00:46:21.120
begin with. And friendship can't be something that they can say, no, no, no, we should continue to be
00:46:27.200
friends with China, even if they grab our territory, that we can't do. So we are going to have problems
00:46:33.040
for 10 years. We need the Americans, particularly in the weapon system. If we change our economic policy
00:46:41.840
and bring in what is, you know, which means what? Be clear about your objectives. Be clear about your
00:46:50.160
priorities. Be clear about your strategy. And you'll be clear about how you're going to mobilize your
00:46:55.200
resources. And you can grow at 10% per year for 10 years, and you will be already abreast of China.
00:47:03.120
And then on, you can overtake and then it becomes you and the Americans. So, and that will be a friendly
00:47:10.560
match. It won't be a hostile match because you are a democracy. And we have got so many Indians in the
00:47:16.000
United States. I can't see a situation where India and the United States will be ever in a hostile
00:47:21.680
position. We can have, you know, we can have exchange abuses and things like that. But the fact is
00:47:28.480
that we need to have clarity. We have a problem with the Chinese sitting on our territory. And we
00:47:36.160
can't go with the Russians because they are no more the Soviet Union. They are now a junior partner of
00:47:40.880
China. And therefore, where the squad is quite, of course, those other Australia and Japan, they're,
00:47:49.360
well, they're really allies of the Americans. So it's really India and the United States. So India,
00:47:54.480
with this huge population, huge military, is not the capacity to take on China, especially in that
00:48:04.160
terrain. And we don't, we have no interest in crossing the mountains and capturing Chinese
00:48:09.200
property, Chinese territory. And that is the way forward. But I don't know whether our prime minister
00:48:17.440
has got this kind of mindset. Because he has even today not said that the Chinese have aggressed and
00:48:24.640
come and occupied our territory. Not even once. You're a Reagan fan. So you know how Reagan said,
00:48:32.880
we're one generation away from losing our freedom. Do you think India is one generation away from being
00:48:37.920
owned by China? Of losing what? One generation away of being owned by China. Because you said 18
00:48:46.400
meetings with Xi, one-on-one Modi had, some in India, some in China, but it's one-on-one face-to-face.
00:48:53.280
And they're still buying land and gradually, you know, moving into India. Do you think because
00:49:00.160
China typically is a long-term thinker, they're patient for Modi to not win an election? So the
00:49:05.760
next guy comes and they can hopefully win that person over to allow them to start investing into
00:49:10.800
China? You know what I'm asking, right? I mean, I think you know what I'm asking.
00:49:14.640
I know that. I don't think that the case of Modi is out of love for China. That he is
00:49:22.080
that there's some other factors. Since I don't know, I mean, I've not been properly briefed on it,
00:49:29.440
so I can't say. But he has been consistently avoiding taking a confrontationist position with China.
00:49:37.360
He's been consistently denying. In fact, they use the media, our government use the media to make out
00:49:43.120
with Chinese are actually withdrawn and gone back till the satellite photos came and made a joke of it.
00:49:50.320
So I would say that the Indian psychology is such that we have a long history, by the way.
00:50:00.320
These Islamic forces ruled us for 600 years and the British ruled us for 200 years, all brutally,
00:50:07.280
but we survived them. As Iran was a Zoroastrian country, the Islamic forces took them over. In 15
00:50:16.400
years, they made them 100 percent Islamic. Same thing with Babylon and other parts which are now called
00:50:24.720
Iraq, Egypt. Even the Christians took 50 years for Europe. But in our case, 600 years and 200 years,
00:50:34.720
and you're still 82 percent of what you were, that is the Hindu population. So we may look passive,
00:50:44.800
but we are not passive. We have fought and overcome many, many, many reverses, and we have come out on top.
00:50:56.960
We had a case in 1965 when the Americans used to make fun of us that we are living from ship to mouth
00:51:04.000
because there was a failure of the agricultural crop. And so the Americans had to send under a scheme
00:51:09.840
called the PL 480 grain. They used to send grain by ship to India. And they said that India is living
00:51:17.680
from ship to mouth. If one ship doesn't come, there'll be starvation. And there were predictions that in 10 years,
00:51:24.320
India will have food riots and people will eat each other up, written by a State Department official
00:51:30.960
called World Famine. It's called World Famine. You can access it through Google. So that India has
00:51:39.360
then, in a short period of 10 years, got agriculture, what they call as green revolution. And today,
00:51:45.360
we are exporters of grain at the cheapest price in the world. If we get market access, we'll be selling
00:51:51.200
wheat to America, which of course the Americans won't allow. But if we could, we would be able to
00:51:57.440
sell you all the wheat you want. So I think the potential of India can be any time in both if you
00:52:04.880
have the perspective, you have the thinking and the self-confidence that we can do it ourselves.
00:52:12.320
And we can. I don't think that we have to worry about China. In fact, China has to worry about us.
00:52:19.600
You really believe that? Absolutely. Because if history goes, we are the ones who
00:52:27.280
went to China, all our religious leaders went, and you please read what Hushu says, Dr. Hushu.
00:52:34.240
He has said precisely this. They just came here and they gave us wonderful concepts and we just fell
00:52:41.760
for it. Never again we should. In fact, Hushu went to the other extreme and wanted China to become
00:52:48.880
Christian so that we never have another Hindu invasion. It seems like it's the game of who can
00:52:59.120
get the most people to think like them, right? Americans think in a certain way. Indians think
00:53:06.960
in a certain way. The Chinese think in a certain way. Then you have religions. You know, Christians
00:53:12.160
think in a certain way. You know, Sikhs think in a certain way. Buddhists think in a certain way.
00:53:17.440
Muslims think in a certain way. It's the imposing of the way of thinking to see who can win at the end.
00:53:24.480
So is it more philosophies or is it more religious beliefs to be imposed? This is a
00:53:30.960
complete different conversation because I think India is number two country in the world population
00:53:35.680
wise for Muslims. It's shy of 200 million. I want to say 195, 196 million, give or take. And I think
00:53:41.280
number one is Indonesia is like 216, 220 million people that they have there in regards to the Muslim
00:53:48.320
population. What concerns you more? Do certain religious ideologies being imposed on the Indian
00:53:56.960
population or does the, you know, more philosophy of Chinese trying to get folks in India to think
00:54:04.160
like them? What concerns you more long term? You know, in over the last, maybe I should say,
00:54:13.120
a thousand years, the Hindu religion has got compartmentalized into concepts which are not
00:54:23.760
there in our scriptures. For instance, this Brahmin, you know, the warrior class called the Kshatriya,
00:54:32.560
the commercial class called the Vaishya and the farmers called Shudra and this untouchables that
00:54:39.680
has grown. This is not there in our scriptures and it's not birth based. We today make it birth based.
00:54:49.120
I'm called a Brahmin because my parents were Brahmins. Okay. But Brahmin is a characteristic. If you are
00:54:57.120
given up all the material aspirations, except the minimal that you need, but concentrate on knowledge,
00:55:05.440
that is called a Brahmin. If you pick up the sword and defend the country, you are then called Kshatriya.
00:55:11.520
Your father may be a Brahmin, but you will not be a Brahmin. So that has got, you know, it has
00:55:19.200
degenerated into a birth concept and the country has got divided. So this Hindu movement, which about
00:55:26.480
everybody is getting a little panicky about, is not directed at the Muslims, is directed at ourselves,
00:55:34.480
unite. Yeah, there are crazy people in our country. There are crazy people in the United States. They
00:55:40.160
say all kinds of things about the blacks. I don't think that that's the mainstream American thinking.
00:55:45.840
So in India, we are, those of us in particular in the BJP, we are thinking in terms of bringing about a
00:55:54.640
renaissance where we become a one community without threatening anybody else because of our unity.
00:56:06.640
And the only religion in the world I know, and by the way, in our constitution, we include amongst Hindus,
00:56:14.560
we include Buddhists, Sikhs, and Jains, and none of the three object to it. So this Sikh separatism is
00:56:25.680
only some guys in San Jose, California. But in India, the Sikhs are 20% of our army. And the Hindus,
00:56:36.320
so-called Hindus, as differentiated from Sikhs, if the Sikh gurus had not lifted the sword,
00:56:42.240
we would have all been finished. So we owe, I mean, we have that kind of reverence for the Sikh,
00:56:48.880
Sikh, you know, of the people who led the Sikh movement with Singh. Sikh is a, you know, it doesn't
00:56:57.520
believe in any divisions at all. It's a very, very, if I may use or misuse the word Catholic,
00:57:03.840
it's a, they are very Catholic in the outlook. Now the war that was predicted by Professor Huntington
00:57:09.280
of Harvard, called the Clash of Civilizations, was that Christians and Hindus will combine against Muslims.
00:57:19.440
Because Muslims is an international religion. And, but that problem is not there, because the Indian
00:57:27.120
Muslims, I would say 95%, they look like us, they are us, because they are all converted people.
00:57:34.800
They have come from some, from Mars or something. And their social habits are very similar to us.
00:57:42.080
My own daughter is married to a Muslim, but I can tell him, I can tell the difference.
00:57:46.160
It's only when the, these mullahs and so on, financed by money from abroad, who want to create this
00:57:54.480
separateness. Yes, there are, there's a lot of prejudice. There's no question about it. It has to be
00:58:01.440
dealt with very strongly. But the blackening of this Hindu movement in the United States
00:58:08.720
is not based on solid facts. We are not aiming at anybody else. We are saying, we are crusted.
00:58:19.280
We have, for years, we have, we have become ossified. So, we want now to go back to our
00:58:26.000
scriptures in which all religions lead to God. We have committed to that in our constitution. So,
00:58:34.080
they, when you say Hindu, you are, you are automatically assuming that that Hindu will say,
00:58:40.160
all religions lead to God, my way, your way, and so on. That's what happened when, when a Jewish
00:58:46.320
delegation came, the chief rabbi came here. And I was there in the Indian delegation, when the, our, our,
00:58:54.560
our religious leaders decided to meet them, meet the religious leaders of, of Judaism. And
00:59:04.720
they had a problem with us saying that you are a multi polytheistic. We are, you know,
00:59:09.840
we are only one God. I said, we also have one God, but our manifestations are different.
00:59:15.520
They take different forms, but the God is only one. So, I mean, these are the things that need to be
00:59:26.960
The only reason I'm bringing this up is because you did an interview with Showtime and you were
00:59:30.400
talking about, you said, wherever the Muslim population is large, there's trouble. And you
00:59:37.440
gave a percentage of 30%. If a country's Muslim population becomes over 30%, that country is in
00:59:43.280
danger. Why do you, why do you believe that? Because like you said, you said something very
00:59:47.120
interesting. You said 95% of the Muslims in India are converts. It's not like somebody else came in,
00:59:54.880
they converted. So they're like you, they're the only difference, they believe in Muslims. So,
00:59:59.760
but they live together, they go to school together. So what, what concerns you the most?
01:00:03.920
So I am, I know that the Muslim population will never be 30% in India. The maximum would be 15%
01:00:14.080
because they are also subject to the same. The population growth rate has been going down.
01:00:20.240
It's now 1.8%. And both Hindus have gone down faster because we are economically better off than
01:00:26.400
the Muslims today. And the Muslim population is also going down. Their growth rates are going down,
01:00:32.720
not as sharply as the Hindus, but it has gone down. And in terms of educated Muslims who we find it's
01:00:44.000
very easy to work with them. We have got them in various places. We have got, even in the BJP,
01:00:49.120
which is supposed to be anti-Muslim, we have got ministers who are Muslims. And so it gets, you know,
01:00:57.600
the black and white presentation of these things is worth the difficulties.
01:01:01.440
I certainly believe that in the countries that are having trouble, take for example,
01:01:07.680
the Palestinian-Israel conflict that's going on. What is the problem? The Palestinians already have
01:01:17.360
one country, one country which is called Jordan, 55%, 55% are Palestinians. So they got it, they got a
01:01:33.360
authority, Palestinian authority. And if they were agreeing to exist to the, agreeing to Israel being
01:01:41.680
accepted as a given fact, tomorrow they will be recognized as a country. And now you see the UAE,
01:01:52.240
Bahrain, so many countries have now started having diplomatic relations with Israel. Look at Egypt,
01:01:59.600
not a single conflict after the Israelis gave up Senai. So I am not saying that, I'm just saying that in
01:02:09.040
countries where you have this problem, because the ideology of Islam says that there are three parts
01:02:17.440
to the world. One is called Darul Islam, where the Muslims are in overwhelming majority and rule.
01:02:23.760
That's called Darul Islam. That's called Darul Islam. Then there is a Darul Haram. This is all in Quran,
01:02:31.520
and in the Hadiths, and the Sira, it's all there in writing. If there is the Muslim population,
01:02:42.560
is a minority, and the majority, and the majority is all amorphous, you know, fighting amongst each other,
01:02:50.640
then he says the object of Muslims, this is what is the direction given, the object of Muslims is to
01:02:58.240
slowly go into a majority. And that's called Darul Haram. And then there is the third thing called Darul
01:03:06.000
Ahad, like New Zealand or Australia, where you are a minority, but the majority is united. And there they
01:03:18.000
say comply. So they will not agree to uniform civil code, that is one man, one woman, which Hindus have,
01:03:27.040
they will say, no, no, no, you can't allow you. We will have four wives. You can't stop us. We have
01:03:31.440
our own separate thing. But in Australia, they have agreed. In the United States, they have agreed.
01:03:37.840
Why can't they agree in India? So there are the, you know, these clerics, they read from the Quran.
01:03:46.560
The Quran was written long, long time ago. There's been no, it's not, you're not allowed to amend it.
01:03:52.640
So these are preached. So therefore, I think the, when I said 30%, I had no idea that this
01:04:00.640
will be applied to India. It's not India. India cannot be. They have been from the day of partition,
01:04:06.240
after Pakistan was created, they have been 12%. Today, there may be 14% or 15% because the census was,
01:04:13.680
the last census said there were 14. So I don't know whether they're now for 15 or 16. There's no doubt
01:04:19.440
that because of poverty. Because if you look at the Muslims of Kerala, they have fewer children
01:04:25.600
than the Muslims of UP. Why? Because the UP Muslim is poor compared to the Kerala Muslim.
01:04:32.080
Same thing, the number of children that Hindus in Kerala have is much less than the number of children
01:04:39.920
that UP, Hindus in UP have because Hindu, UP is a poorer place. And the Hindus are also poor on
01:04:47.680
per capita basis. And so they, as economic growth, the thing goes, continues, you will find that all
01:04:55.520
these countries do want that fewer children, so they can educate them and bring them up and to have
01:05:00.960
a better standard of life than they have. And in India, we have no problem. We have got Muslims in
01:05:05.520
the army, we got Muslims in the, our number two man on our intelligence is Muslim. You have Muslims,
01:05:12.640
ministers. And this is just, you know, the, the, the people who, a handful of leftists and others who
01:05:21.200
make a demonstration, get international press. And then we are given lectures, uh, from, uh, from, uh,
01:05:33.280
Last question for you before we wrap up is you, you seem very insightful. What is the biggest threat
01:05:38.480
U.S. faces from your perspective as an outsider, not India, not Russia, not China? What's U.S.'s biggest threat
01:05:45.120
U.S. is, uh, biggest threat according to me is not your, any of your internal problems because I have
01:05:54.240
seen, having lived in the United States almost continuously for a period of seven years and then
01:06:00.480
in and out, in and out, I've been coming to teach at, back at Harvard. Uh, United States is a problem
01:06:07.040
solving countries. And, uh, when I was there, they were, uh, in the sixties, oh my God, the Vietnam War,
01:06:16.240
then the, the, uh, those days they used to call themselves Negroes. Now they call them black Africans
01:06:22.160
or something. Uh, and, uh, they were on streets and were beaten up. They couldn't climb on the bus and,
01:06:29.440
you know, so on. And now when I look back on America, and when I go to America, I am amazed
01:06:35.920
the amount of progress you make. So you have a problem solving problem. I, I don't expect any
01:06:40.720
difficulty in your social problem. Even Trump may come and Trump may go, but it's not going to change
01:06:46.240
your, uh, uh, demography or your political democracy. The thing that I am finding which is disturbing
01:06:56.320
is that United States doesn't have the staying power once they make a decision.
01:07:01.680
You pulled out of Vietnam, dumped everybody. And then luckily for you, the Vietnamese are anti-Chinese.
01:07:08.960
So they, you know, now they are your friends. Now you're going to leave Afghanistan. Now, Afghanistan,
01:07:17.680
you went there. You didn't say that I'm going there just to take a revenge. You said, no, no,
01:07:22.720
we are going to transfer it into democracy and so on. A lot of people trusting you came and joined with
01:07:28.080
you. They took English education. The women dropped their, all their, uh, uh, part of the pardas and
01:07:35.360
I was, we call it in our country is all these, uh, garments, uh, and became, uh, modern women spoke English.
01:07:42.800
And suddenly you just say, no, Taliban can take over. I mean, this is not the way to generate confidence
01:07:52.000
that you can rely on the United States on a long-term basis. Everything is cost and benefit.
01:07:59.200
Very interesting. Sir, thank you so much for your time. I have really enjoyed it. And I hope the
01:08:04.400
audience has enjoyed it just as much as I did. Okay. I hope you learn more about India because
01:08:09.920
India is going to play a very big role long-term 5, 10, 15 years from now. US staying strong because
01:08:15.520
China is trying to get India to be on sale like many other countries are to them. And India saying,
01:08:21.200
no, I think we can hang, uh, uh, and, uh, compete with you directly. And you kind of saw what he had
01:08:25.440
to say. Curious to know what you took away from this. By the way, if you've never seen my, uh,
01:08:29.200
visit, we did vlog style when I was in India, take a look at this because it also has a part of me
01:08:33.760
meeting with Divyong Turaki. He was the youngest billionaire at the time. And I gave a speech to 5,000
01:08:38.240
students at IIT, which, you know, uh, he used to be a professor at for math. So if you've never
01:08:44.000
seen that, click over here. And if you've never seen my interview with the former chairman of the
01:08:48.960
state bank of India, 400, I think 240,000 employees, Arundhati Bacharya, click over here to watch that
01:08:55.840
interview as well. Take care, everybody. Bye-bye.