How much is enough?

The good news from India is not only that those with 10 houses (cars and planes for that matter) now have twenty, but these achievements make the headlines. This could mean many things - they are an indicator of how well the economy is doing, that there is no other news worth reporting, that these players are becoming the ‘who’s who’ in the world map, that they want to do more things with money other than accumulate it (never share it though), that the only criteria for success is the number zeroes to a name, that the media thinks they are the next role models or they a more interesting economic index than the Nifty 50 and other such indices.

They may not all be true, but they are all making the transition to becoming truths and relevant today. A friend of mine tells me about this 24 year old who wants to own a Maybach by the age of thirty. There is a growing belief that the degree of success is directly proportional to the ability to flaunt it. Sure, as children success was guaranteed to get a prize, a mention in the roll call, or a gift from the parents, the size of the prize did not matter, what was of consequence was a new standard was recognized.

Does this point to a lack of imagination of the current work force? For everyone to choose and even recognize the same criteria for success points to either a society getting dumb (okay numb) or society taking the simplest way out (success is valid only if it can be economically measured and therefore recognizable and if others aspire to it). So we have advertisements that hark on success in terms of a big car, a big house or reports such as those mentioned. Take for example the stories that ran when Tendulkar got a Ferrari- papers made it out to be that one world champion was recognizing another, but the fact of the matter was that Schumacher had very little idea of cricket and for that matter Tendulkar. But there wasn’t a peep when Tendulkar refused to pay customs duty on the car, the government had to acquiesce and allow the car to come in without any duty – which means that Indians lost out on money that would have benefited them – in some ways the car belongs to every Indian and therefore it wouldn’t be a crime if each one of us went put a little dent into the car. But the point is because we Indians thought that getting a car as a gift was evidence of this mans success he was allowed to make demands on the government that actually should have put him and everyone else to shame.

But getting back to our lack of imagination in defining success, it has consequences in just about everything we do. Take for example the case of Medha Patekar does society consider her and her achievements as a success. How many parents would want their children to emulate her? How many parents would state proudly that their children work for her organization, or for that matter how many youth would work for her cause? Now take the case of the Ambani brothers and get the same questions answered. It has become so bad that Pogo, a children’s TV channel, asks children to choose actors and their movies for awards – both which have no relation to children, and then the likes of MTV Youth Icon awards have nominees like Orkut, a Rang De Basanti (a movie) and the only human Abhishek Bachan in their list of nominees – Orkut won, the previous awardees included Anil Ambani (a businessman), Shah Rukh Khan (an actor), Rahul Dravid and Dhoni (cricketers).

And recently there were headlines around India about the billion dollars spent by a few mega rich Indians to buy cricket teams in cities around India. The Indian Premier League created by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) is truly a defining moment in Indian history – never has so much money been spent by so few Indians on so few Indians. No body has questioned the need for the BCCI to create another league when there are already cricket leagues. Nobody has questioned the appropriateness for these few people to spend so much money on a group of players who are already extremely well off.

Nobody does it because everybody wants to emulate this form of success. There does not seem to be a price that one has to pay when one is so rich.

It is not good enough that these people are feted when they pay taxes – the reason they can pay so much in tax is because there are others who are not earning an income, because there are others who sleep in slums, because there are others who cannot afford to send their children to school.

Fortune and fame go hand in hand and maybe the Indian government should provide other avenues for these fortunate ones to add to their fame. These rich should spend a certain percentage of their money on the public good and they can name the roads, the free schools and hospitals they build after themselves. This for one would ensure that these things would never go into decay because the egos of the rich would ensure that their names were not associated with anything moribund, more importantly because this would truly make India a country which is built on the foundations of equity, justice and equality.