My Letter Of Support To Former PM Paul Keating On Australia's China Policy, Copied To The Government

Former Australian PM Paul Keating created quite a stir recently when he criticised the Australian press for neglecting its professional duty and acting as a mouthpiece for the pro-US and anti-China establishment.

He got a bit of pushback from the affected parties for his remarks.

A few days later, I saw a tweet that solicited messages of support from Australians who agreed with Mr Keating, and the tweet also encouraged respondents to copy Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.

I decided it was best to stand up and make my voice heard, so I sent out the following email, copying both PM Albanese and Foreign Minister Penny Wong:

Subject: I support Paul Keating's stance on Australian policy re. China

To: susan.grusovin@aph.gov.au

CC: A.Albanese.MP@aph.gov.au, senator.wong@aph.gov.au (The copy to Albanese bounced, since he seems to have discontinued the use of this address, but Penny Wong's office acknowledged receipt of my mail.)

Hi,

As an Australian citizen and voter, I want to make my opinion clear (hence copying the PM and FM) that I am alarmed about my country being frogmarched into a coming proxy war being orchestrated by the United States against China.

1. China is not a threat to Australia. It is our largest trading partner. The Australian and Chinese economies are complementary, and Australia will continue to grow and prosper if we maintain cordial relations with China.

2. Any talk of Chinese invasion is rubbish. Not only does China not need to physically invade Australia when it can acquire Australian resources through trade at significantly lower cost, it is also logistically infeasible. This argument by the anti-China lobby is deliberately emotive but groundless.

3. All talk by the US of freedom, democracy and human rights is well-known to be selective and used for geopolitical reasons only. The US has never criticised Israel or Saudi Arabia for their appalling human rights records because they are allies. (Now that Saudi Arabia has defied the US by signing a deal with Iran under China's auspices, I expect its human rights record will be taken up by the US in a predictable manner.) Besides, when even the Organisation of Islamic Countries (OIC) has not complained about China's treatment of Uyghur Muslims, why is the West (which waged two decades of war against Muslim countries and killed millions of people in the War on Terror) so concerned about Muslims in China? It is apparent that the Uyghur Muslim issue is not a real one but just a handy stick to beat China with. Why is the treatment of Muslims by the Hindu right-wing government of India not mentioned by the same people who seem so concerned about the Uyghurs? Probably because India is considered an ally for now.

4. The US is only interested in preserving its hegemony, nothing else. It has no allies, only useful vassal states that it uses in proxy wars. If we are a truly sovereign nation, our foreign policy should be aimed at securing the interests of the Australian people, not at furthering the interests of the US.

5. We have seen how devastatingly Ukraine has been wrecked in the US's proxy war against Russia. Regardless of the moral posturing over Russia's "unprovoked aggression" (yeah, right), we know that the US has been deliberately stoking this conflict for years, and it became blatantly obvious with the 2014 Victoria Nuland-orchestrated coup that deposed a democratically elected Ukrainian government and installed successive puppet regimes. An elected Australian government has a sacred responsibility to ensure that Australia does not suffer a similar fate as Ukraine. We have this dire example before us, and cannot feign ignorance of the fate that awaits a US proxy.

6. It is alarming in the extreme to see the orchestrated establishment and media campaign reaching a crescendo on China. The US is stoking a conflict with China over Taiwan, engaging in deliberately provocative actions when it officially has a One-China Policy that only recognises the PRC. Not only is the sudden interest in Taiwan unwarranted, the prepping of Australia and Japan towards greater militarisation should ring alarm bells. If a war breaks out, it will be Australia and Japan that will do the actual fighting as US proxies. The US will not put boots on the ground. It will supply arms (on a strictly lend-lease basis, of course, which will keep our children and grandchildren in debt), but it will be Australian and Japanese soldiers who will actually lay down their lives.

7. Although we keep repeating the phrase "Lest we forget" when we talk about Gallipoli, it's clear that we have never learnt the basic lesson from that tragic episode - that Australia should stop fighting other countries' wars.

8. The Scott Morrison government was extremely irresponsible in destroying a hitherto harmonious relationship with China with ill-considered and unnecessary calls for a hostile investigation into the origins of Covid. The fallout in the form of Chinese trade sanctions on Australian goods, though costly to our citizens, was only economic. The Albanese government initially seemed to be repairing that damage and resetting relations with China, but recent actions have lurched in the opposite direction, and will drag us beyond a mere economic rift to actual military conflict.

9. The nuclear element of the AUKUS deal is particularly alarming. In the event of hostilities with China (which is what the war hawks are clamouring for), our government would have made Australia a target for a nuclear attack by escalating our military capability to a nuclear level. It is a shockingly irresponsible thing for a government to do.

10. Spending $368 billion of taxpayer money on this irresponsibly dangerous initiative is not just a waste. It is going to be funded through massive cuts to welfare, healthcare, education, infrastructure and other areas of the economy that require committed government support. This fiscal irresponsibility is shocking too.

11. There is much talk of Australian politics being illegally influenced by Chinese government interests (as with the Sam Dastyari episode), but the fact is that American influence on Australian politics is far, far greater, yet unremarked upon. The Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) is being given carte blanche to conduct its lobbying activities out in the open, when its chief sponsor is known to be the US arms industry. This organisation must be shut down, its foreign employees deported and its Australian employees investigated for crimes no less than treason. The interests of Australia and its citizens are not just being ignored but actively jeopardised in favour of those of a foreign country. This is a treasonable offence.

In sum, as a citizen, I am horrified that an elected government has so dramatically turned its back on the interests of its own people and succumbed to the pressure of a fading superpower that wants to use us as cannon fodder to maintain its hegemony. I am not privy to the threats the US must have used to get our government to comply, but they are no excuse for this egregious betrayal.

On a personal note, I am of Indian origin, not Chinese, and therefore my views cannot be dismissed as being motivated by cultural affinity towards China.

The government needs to know that its recent steps with regard to China are causing extreme alarm among its voting citizens, and there will be political repercussions if it does not reverse course immediately.

Ganesh Prasad

My Letter To PM-Elect Anthony Albanese (May 21, 2022)

I wrote a letter to Anthony Albanese on the eve of his election victory on May 21, 2022.

In it, I outlined my hopes and expectations as an Australian citizen for the path his government would take, in a decisive break from the disastrous direction of his predecessor Scott Morrison.

I'm making this public now because I'm disappointed that Albo seems to have been coopted by unelected powers, just as previous governments have been. This post by Bruce Haigh explains just how bad things have now become.

My letter:

Subject: Congratulations from a first-time Labor voter, and a manifesto challenge for you

Dear Albo,

Congratulations on your landslide victory!

Although I have been a loyal paid-up member of the Australian Democrats for over two decades, I crossed the floor today to vote for you, and I am now taking the liberty of writing to ask you to do certain things.

You have the mandate of the Australian people, Albo, and you can and should grasp the nettle and announce some bold changes in direction early on, while you still have the initiative and the momentum. All opposition will crumble if you display boldness and determination.

1. Reset the relationship with China:

It's high time Australia stopped fighting other countries' wars! We've fought Britain's wars in the last century, and we've since switched loyalties to fight America's wars. We have not covered ourselves in glory by joining the US in Vietnam, or in the invasion of Iraq. Australian foreign policy ought to be made in the interests of the Australian people, not in the interests of foreign governments.

The Morrison government has made an indecorous lurch towards the US by scrapping a deal with France, and signing up to a dangerous policy of nuclear confrontation with China by purchasing nuclear submarines. His government has also plunged us into a trade war with China, our biggest trading partner, in a further bid to please the US. In return for our pains, the US has thrown us under the bus by replacing Australian exports in the Chinese market with their own.

Enough!

I want you to re-establish communications with President Xi Jinping at the earliest and normalise our relations with Asia's most important power. We should be aware that we are just a middle-ranking power, and should therefore be extremely wary of being drawn into a conflict between superpowers that will only damage us. The task before the Australian government in this area is two-fold:

- Keep the country out of any conflict between the United States and China. It's not our war, and it would be highly irresponsible on the part of any Australian government to plunge us into a conflict that will only do us enormous damage. - Re-establish favourable trading relations with China so we can both increase revenue from our exports, and tackle domestic inflation through the import of affordable Chinese goods.

(I'm of Indian origin, not Chinese, so I have no personal bias in saying all of this.)

Oh, and there's this sneaky lobbying outfit for the American arms industry that pretends to be a respectable policy think tank, and which illegitimately influences Australian defence and foreign policy to the detriment of the interests of our own people. Yes, I'm talking about the ASPI (Australian Strategic Policy Institute). Declare this an illegal organisation and shut them down. Expel their foreign employees. Investigate their treasonous activities. They have been doing great damage to Australia's interests by controlling our governments and turning Australia into a US client state for their proxy conflicts.

2. Make a strong and unequivocal commitment to renewable energy:

You need to make an early statement that is symbolically powerful. I suggest you produce a lump of coal in parliament (like Morrison did), but throw it forcefully into a dustbin!

Follow that up with clear and ambitious targets to phase out fossil fuels from every sector of the economy.

Renewables are cost-effective and ready to go. The only thing missing is Federal Government support. It's time for you to change that, and dramatically. The foot-dragging by past governments has been utterly shameful.

3. Tackle housing affordability:

Everybody knows the dirty little secret of why housing affordability isn't being seriously tackled. The flip side of making houses affordable for new buyers is making asset prices stagnate or drop for existing home-owners. In other words, you can't please one set without displeasing the other.

So far, the home-owner crowd has been calling the shots because we're the establishment. But as a home-owner myself, let me tell you that I don't mind a stagnation or drop in asset prices if it will help hundreds of thousands of young individuals and couples buy their first home. It's shameful for a problem of affordability to be dragging on for so long in a supposedly prosperous country, and it's time a government did something about it.

Hint: we all know that tinkering with the demand side like providing first home-owner grants only fuels demand and leads to a further rise in prices. The only thing that will work to reduce prices is an increase in supply. Release more crown land, at a faster rate than before. It will absolutely piss off existing home-owners, but you'll be on the right side of history.

There are lots of other problems you'll have to tackle, of course. The old demons of inflation, unemployment and underinvestment in public services. But those are problems with known solutions, and need little imagination or courage from a leader.

The issues I've outlined require true leadership.

I have placed my trust in you with my vote, Albo. I hope you'll rise to the occasion.

All the best!

Ganesh C Prasad (Federal constituency of Mitchell, NSW)

Australia's Overdue "Re-Orientation"

"Ultra Asia" (Beyond Asia) is an apt anagram for Australia.

Geography pointedly and unsentimentally places Australia right at the southeastern corner of Asia, yet the country's cultural heart wanders wistfully in the mid-Atlantic, somewhere between the US and the UK. If it were possible for countries to move house, tectonic plates and all, that's the white picket-fenced neighbourhood Australia would choose to reside in. Alas, the tyranny of geography has no room for pity.

Australia is in serious need of "re-orientation" (pun fully intended). Map courtesy "thetruesize.com"

Now these are the most interesting times in over three centuries. The world order is being overturned before our living eyes. The future is Asian, and Australia's corner of the world has never seen this asserted so forcefully.

Former prime minister Paul Keating lectured for years to deaf ears that Australia needed to accept it was an Asian country, and that it needed to start behaving like one. His countrymen never bothered. And now, the future is here. Australia has been wrenchingly yanked back to Asia, away from the seppos and the poms, and forced once more to mingle, however uneasily, with Asian hordes of all hues.

Australian foreign policy over the past century has been quite simple-minded - to fight other countries' wars instead of looking towards the interests of its own citizens. First it fought in Britain's wars, then in America's.

The Gallipoli campaign during the First World War is a breathtaking example. Australian troops were sent to fight a European war. It wasn't even the understandable assignment of defending Britain against an attack by its enemies. It was an offensive campaign against Turkey, a country Australia had had no quarrel with. Over 8000 Australian soldiers gave their lives for a British war. To this day, the event is remembered in Australia as ANZAC Day, with the accompanying slogan, "Lest We Forget". Pity that Australians do forget to ask why they had to fight an offensive war against a country that had no quarrel with them, and shed their blood for another one that they just happened to identify with.

Lest we forget to ask why

The Second World War was a bit different, with Australian troops initially fighting at several overseas theatres in the service of the British Empire, and allying with the United States after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour. The only dramatic rift came in 1942, when Australian PM John Curtin defied Winston Churchill and brought Australian troops back to defend the home country instead of deploying them to Burma, as Churchill had wanted.

Soldiers of the British Commonwealth, sorted by colour

By the end of the Second World War, Australia had switched its loyalties across to the United States, faithfully sending troops first to Vietnam and then to Iraq, both ill-advised misadventures that could have been avoided. Canada proved a savvier country in that respect.

All of these go to show that Australia's heart has belonged in the Anglosphere, and if anyone thought the years since Iraq may have brought about a change in attitudes Down Under, these latest examples should disabuse them of that notion.

• Needlessly antagonising China to please the US, predictably inviting Chinese sanctions. (What did the US do to bail out Australia? It threw Australia under the bus and sold the same goods to China!)
• Cancelling a multi-billion dollar submarine deal with France in favour of getting US nuclear subs - 20 years in the future! The Anglosphere doesn't even care about other Western nations.

For a country situated in Asia's neighbourhood, Australia has shown a contemptuous refusal to belong.

Australia's attitude to Asia thus far has been quite unsubtle:

• We're white
• We're Western
• We're superior

But now, Australia is starting to hear Asia's message:

• You're in our backyard
• You're alone, and the odd one out
• There are far bigger players here than you

It will be interesting to watch the tenor of public discourse in Australia as the new reality begins to sink in.

History holds some pointers. The first Englishmen in India who came to trade were quick to learn Indian languages, adopt Indian modes of attire, and some even took Indian wives. But as Western power grew, cultural adaptability gave way to hauteur, and the received wisdom of Western superiority over the East took root. As history begins to right itself, my guess is that hauteur will once again yield to gracious accommodation.

From my experience living in this country for the past quarter century, my bet is that after a round of characteristic cursing, Australians will take to being Asians with gusto.

Quad Switch - How India Could Permanently Alter The Balance Of World Power (While Also Ensuring Its Own Best Interests)

A bolt from the blue

On April 7th 2021, less than a month after the first ever Quad Summit between the leaders of the US, India, Japan and Australia, the US Seventh Fleet issued a terse statement that it had "asserted navigational rights and freedoms approximately 130 nautical miles west of the Lakshadweep Islands, inside India's exclusive economic zone, without requesting India's prior consent, consistent with international law."

No doubt taken by surprise and embarrassed on the world stage by a country it had considered an ally, India lodged a muted protest, and the troubling episode raised questions about the alliance, especially the level of mutual respect on which it was based.

As a matter of principle, the US may have been right in asserting its freedom of navigation, since there is a difference between territorial waters and an exclusive economic zone. [Permission is required before a foreign ship enters a country's territorial waters. In contrast, an exclusive economic zone only means that a country has sole rights to exploit that area of the sea for economic gain, e.g., by fishing, drilling for offshore oil, etc. Merely sailing through a country's exclusive economic zone should not require permission.]

Setting aside questions of principle for the moment, what the US action demonstrated was its ready willingness to embarrass a country that was putatively a close ally in a strategically important grouping. The US perceived no negative consequences to itself from displeasing India, and the continuance of the relationship was taken for granted. That pointed diplomatic snub, and the lack of respect it implied, should be a reminder to India that its inclusion in the Quad is not a sign of its arrival on the global stage, but merely of its usefulness in the strategic plans of other nations.

With the wake-up call afforded by that splash of cold water by the US navy, what hard-headed analysis can India's policymakers carry out now?

Back to first principles

Here's my take on a hypothetical foreign policy shift by India that could be a geopolitical game-changer.

The big picture: Five centuries ago, with the age of colonialism, the West wrested power from the East, impoverishing and humiliating its great and rich civilisations, and has further succeeded in getting the rest of the world to play by rules that entrench rather than threaten Western power. However, Western power has been steadily flowing eastwards for a couple of decades now, and it could be argued that the only factor preventing a decisive restoration of the status quo ante is India's geopolitical ambivalence - its readiness to play handmaiden to the West against its fellow Eastern civilisations. There is no reason why the East should not reunite to dictate its own prosperity once again.

Let's start with some basic premises.

India has no fundamental quarrel with the leading powers of mainland Eurasia - China, Russia or Iran. These are all ancient civilisations that have co-existed for millennia. (A careful reading of history will show that India's current tensions with China are merely a border dispute that is very recent in that timescale, and further, of India's own making.)

In spite of cordial relations, India has no inherent alignment of interests with the countries of the West, and the relationship is in fact transactional. (For that matter, the national interests of Japan and Australia could also be more naturally aligned with those of China rather than the US, but that determination is for those countries to arrive at independently.)

Let us also agree on where the battle lines have been drawn.

China's swift rise over the last three decades has completely altered power equations around the world, but most emphatically in the Eurasian region. The most dramatic reset has been in Sino-Russian relations. At the time of the Chinese communist revolution in 1949, it was the former Soviet Union that was China's ally and senior partner. That relationship ruptured in 1969. Today, it has been restored, with Russia greatly diminished and willing to accept a junior role in its partnership with China. The two countries have been pushed into each other's arms because of open hostility from the US. The US has been aggressively arming Ukraine against Russia, and that could be a potential flashpoint in the near future.

Another major power in Asia is Iran, also an object of unbridled US hostility, including Trump's about-face that negated the normalisation promised by the Obama administration's civilian nuclear deal.

China, of course, has been identified by the US as their main geopolitical adversary today, and as independent analysts have pointed out, third countries have a stark "with us or against us" choice.

The China-Russia-Iran axis has been born of necessity, thanks to the unmistakeably hostile moves of the US against all of them.

The Quad alliance has a similar motivation, in that it is prompted by a shared fear of China.

As we can see, alliances are determined by geopolitical power struggles, and the current line-up of allies and adversaries has been determined as a result of the perspective and actions of the US.

It's instructive to consider that had India liberalised its economy earlier and grown faster than China, the US may have now enlisted China to help contain India. In geopolitics, there is no such thing as a "peaceful rise". All rising powers are inherently threatening to established powers. And hence there is no alliance that India "naturally" belongs to. 

India has independent agency

India does not have to blindly accept the cards that the US has dealt it and the world. It has the independent agency to look at geopolitics through its own lens, and determine for itself what sort of alliance would suit its interests best.

The battle lines having already been drawn, the composition of the two sides (apart from India) is now a given.

The questions India needs to ask itself are:

1. Where do the country's best interests lie? Should it remain in the US-led Quad? Should it be non-aligned between the blocs? Or should it switch sides?

As corollaries,

2. Are the democracies natural allies merely on account of their being democracies, or is this an appealing construct that helps the US? Remember that outside of the West, the US often finds it more convenient to form alliances with pliant dictatorships than with independent democracies.

3. Is India's perception of China as an adversary justified, or is this merely the result of unfortunate recent history and conditioned thinking?

I have in the past argued for Indian non-alignment between these two rival power blocs, but I now believe that the bolder option of switching sides should be seriously considered. Staying in the US-led Quad or being non-aligned are conventional options with largely predictable outcomes. In contrast, switching is a disruptive move with potentially large benefits for India, and the resulting shift in the balance of world power could itself mitigate the risks.

The battle lines as they have been drawn up suit the interests of the US, and a number of the consequences of India's current alignment with the US, most importantly the hostility of China, flow from that choice. On consideration, China is a threat to India only to the extent that India in turn positions itself as a threat to China. In other words, India can eliminate the threat from China by ceasing all acts of hostility and becoming an ally instead.

What the Chinese want is unquestioned recognition as the dominant power in Asia, but they are not interested in militarily invading or imposing a communist form of government on Asian countries. India does not need to fear Chinese interference in its internal affairs as a result of an alliance. As long as other countries cooperate with China, Beijing will allow them to coexist and even prosper. That's not a very different proposition from that offered by the United States!

There is thus no self-evident logic to India remaining in the US-led Quad. Forming a new Quad in alliance with China, Russia and Iran could in time begin to seem equally natural.

India's place - Perception and reality

While Indians tend to take great pride in the greatness of their own civilisation, some realism needs to temper that perception. In terms of relative power, India can only be a junior partner in either of these current groupings. It is grossly subservient to the US in the Quad (as has been so pointedly demonstrated by the Freedom of Navigation episode), and while it will be more influential within a China-led alliance, it will definitely be a junior partner.

In other words, India can never hope to be king. But it can be kingmaker. While its own power per se is limited, India is tremendously important in the world because it holds the balance of power.

India has the potential to bring about a very different world order, provided it alters its own mindset on two counts:

1. India needs to tell itself the truth about 1962. The Chinese did not stab India in the back after promising friendship. It was Nehru who rejected Zhou Enlai's peace deal in 1960, a deal that was extremely generous from today's perspective. It was Nehru (and his defence minister VK Krishna Menon) who needlessly provoked China with aggressive military intrusions that they called "Forward Policy". The Chinese merely counterattacked to teach Nehru a lesson, and then withdrew to the Line of Actual Control as before. The Chinese showed restraint in the face of unilateral Indian aggression. That was the true story of 1962.

2. India needs to accept the reality of its relative power with China. In the 1950s, and indeed, right up to the mid-1980s, there was rough parity between the two countries in economic and military terms, but the gap has widened to a factor of five in economic terms, with corresponding impacts on relative Comprehensive National Power. In any relationship with China, India will be the junior partner. It needs to acknowledge and accept that subordinate status.

Pax Sinica and a brave new world

Once India changes its current mindset, exciting options open up.

India can finally secure its land borders. 

The border dispute with China has always been about the mere demarcation of territory. Quite unlike the troubled relationship with Pakistan, no deeper historical resentments are involved. Zhou Enlai's generous offer in 1960 to give up all other Chinese claims in exchange for just Aksai Chin has probably lapsed. Settlement of the border dispute in today's world may require the giving up of Indian claims to Aksai Chin as well as the actual transfer of part of Arunachal Pradesh to China. Who knows, with shrewd bargaining, it may even be possible to get a much more favourable deal in exchange for the very considerable offer of an Indian defection! Once the prickly territorial questions are out of the way, the rest of the settlement will be a simple matter of agreeing the exact course of the Himalayan border, which in today's age, can be monitored to an accuracy of mere metres with GPS technology.

That will end the decades-long border dispute with China.

An additional factor in India's favour is that China also has an interest in seeing the India-Pakistan border dispute settled amicably, since the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, China's vital access route to the Indian Ocean, runs through the currently disputed region of Pakistan-controlled Kashmir. In the event of conflict between India and Pakistan, Chinese economic interests will be at severe risk, and China would like to eliminate that risk.

Pakistan is effectively a Chinese vassal state, and so it is politically feasible to turn the Line of Control between India and Pakistan into a mutually accepted border with China's blessing, and to have that agreement honoured by the Pakistani establishment. The giving up of claims to all of Kashmir will be a bitter pill for both India and Pakistan, but the benefits of a settlement will be enormous.

The end of hostilities with Pakistan will be a natural corollary of the normalisation of relations with China, and will be a huge relief to both India and Pakistan.

It is hard to overstate the impact of such developments, since insecure land borders have shaped India's perceptions ever since its independence as a modern nation.

This is just for starters.

The holy grail is a free trade zone comprising all of Eurasia, with greatly eased movement of goods and people, and the fastest growth in living standards for the largest number of people ever in world history. China lifted 800 million people from poverty in a single generation. India lifted 270 million people from poverty during a single decade. Together, and in concert with other countries, such economic miracles can be replicated throughout the Eurasian region.

Linking India's Golden Quadrilateral to China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) can unlock synergies that ripple beyond the two countries. Instead of competing for influence in other South- and South-East Asian states, India and China could collaborate in looping them into an economic free trade zone with seamless transport and communication infrastructure. For example, a land link from South India to Sri Lanka will be a reality if both India and China push for it.

All of Asia and much of Europe will become part of a giant economic zone, and every country in its ambit will see a spurt in growth and living standards.

Indians may remain reluctant to admit it, but they will owe their new era of prosperity to this Pax Sinica. They can of course take legitimate pride that they played a key role in bringing it about.

The repercussions

The natural question to ask is, will this shift not antagonise the US, and will it not have negative repercussions for India?

I believe that while the US is certain to be antagonised, it will find itself powerless to take hostile action against India. Virtually the whole of mainland Asia (including Russia) will be part of a united bloc under the leadership of China, and China will then act to protect its interests. India's defection will greatly improve China's own security situation, and together with Russia, China will in turn be able to provide a security guarantee to India against hostile US action.

It could be argued that India's defection carries risk as well as its own mitigation. The US could in fact find itself greatly diminished in power across the board as a result of this dramatic shift, and therefore less able to convey its displeasure in the terms the world has learnt to fear.

Europe may also decide to loosen its tight embrace of the US in the face of a united Asian alliance, which is also a much larger market than any other in the world. The incentive for trade could force Europe to break with the US and engage more positively with the Asian bloc. [There are signs that Europe is already beginning to walk a line independent of the US, as illustrated by this statement by Emmanuel Macron and by the joint statement by Macron and Angela Merkel.]

As for the remaining members of the erstwhile Quad, Australia and Japan will also be under tremendous pressure to distance themselves from the US.

As has been remarked, the Australian and Chinese economies are complementary, not competitive, in nature. Australia grows and prospers in tandem with China. It makes no sense for Australia to antagonise China, and there is tremendous internal pressure being put on the Australian government to step back from its adversarial position and normalise relations with China. My guess is that Australia will quietly fold in the next year or two regardless of what India does.

Japan is another country that needs to swallow its pride and do what is in its own best interests. Japan is a rapidly declining power, with an ageing demography and an economy that has been stagnating for well over two decades. Its path to continued prosperity lies in vigorous economic ties with China. The two things Japan needs to do first are these:

1. Apologise for the atrocities committed by its troops in World War II, such as the Nanjing massacre, and make reparations, however symbolic.

2. Give up its claims to the Senkaku (Diaoyu) islands. Unlike the Malvinas (Falkland) islands fought over by the UK and Argentina, these islands are uninhabited. Their "strategic" value is paradoxically negated by the fact that claiming them turns China into a powerful enemy, when it could be just a trading partner.

Over to you, India

All of these strategic pieces fall into place based on what India chooses to do. India can be a blocker, or an enabler, of the shift of power from the West back to the East, and the start of a new Eastern Golden Age.

The main impediments to such a foreign policy shift are in the Indian mind - an irrational fear of China, emotional baggage from a false narrative of the 1962 war, a misplaced pride in the second-to-none greatness of the Indian civilisation that precludes acceptance of a subordinate role in Asian affairs, a naive belief that democracies are natural allies when realpolitik has repeatedly demonstrated otherwise, and most importantly, policy inertia and the timidity to dream bold dreams.

[Also read my earlier post "How Indians Should Learn To Think About China".]

Squinting At India From Down Under

1. Proud Filer

Of late, some Indian friends of mine have started applying a badge to their profile pictures that says "Proud Filer". This refers, of course, to the fact that they have filed their taxes. The badge shows that India's Income Tax department is trying to provide positive reinforcement for this desired behaviour. All good and wholesome stuff.

It's just a bit amusing to me. I'm sure people will call this snobbery on my part, but I see nothing to be proud about in doing what is expected and the norm. I have been filing taxes all my working life, both in India and in Australia, and I never thought it was something I should pat myself on the back for, with a badge on my profile pic and everything.

A typical profile pic with the badge of honour

In Australia, one is allowed to start working (part-time) after the age of 14 years and 9 months. (Until that arbitrarily defined age, I suppose it would be considered child labour and hence illegal.) My son started to work part-time at a library at around that age, and he filed his first tax return at the age of 15. Of course, since his earnings were well below the taxable threshold, he paid no tax that year. This continued until he got his first full-time job after graduation at the age of 23, at which point his income crossed the tax-free threshold and he began to pay income tax. But he had had to file his returns every year from the age of 15! It's an offence not to file a tax return if you've earned any income during the year. Whether your income crosses the tax-free threshold or not is beside the point.

I can understand that in a country with a low tax base and a low level of tax compliance, it's necessary to encourage the filing of taxes with a feel-good incentive like a badge. I suppose it's "one small step for an individual taxpayer, but a giant leap for the tax department and the economy".

What other expected behaviours can one reward with badges, I wonder.

"Proud Non-Litterer"
"Proud Follower of Road Rules"
"Proud Non-Payer of Bribes to Officials"

Apologies again for sounding like a snob. I'm still not able to get over my amusement at this.

2. Jobs for Kids

That reminds me of another interesting difference between parental attitudes in Australia and India. Kids in Australia are expected to start working part-time from the allowed age of 14 years and 9 months, both to earn their own pocket money and to gain valuable work experience. The most valued jobs are customer-facing ones, since such experience is highly useful in a service economy. You will see high-school and college kids working at supermarket checkout counters, as clothing shop assistants, waiters, etc. It is not looked down upon.

I don't know what the attitudes of middle-class India are like today towards children from educated families working at such service jobs, but I certainly remember what it was like in my youth.

In 1984, one of my IIT classmates had applied for a graduate course at a US university and had also applied for a teaching assistantship to help cover his expenses. I was present when he read out the letter he received from a professor at that university. The professor regretted that there were no paid assistantships available, but he promised to help my friend get a job driving the university bus. We all had a big laugh at this, and my friend emphasised the point, saying, "My dad will never let me go to the US if he knows I'm going to be driving a bus!"

Educated, middle-class Indians used to consider it beneath their dignity to do anything but a white-collar job. I certainly hope those attitudes have changed.

3. Dignity of Labour

And this in turn reminds me of another interesting difference in value systems I have seen between India and Australia, viz., the position of tradespeople. Plumbers, electricians, pavers, roof restorers, tree loppers and others are very highly paid in Australia, and these professions are no less respectable than corporate or academic jobs. Indeed, skilled tradespeople are among the highest income earners in the country.

To take one very stark example, plumbers are most often called in to deal with blocked toilet drains, and their job necessarily brings them into frequent contact with human faeces. In India, such a job would be considered to be the lowest of the low, and the existence of the caste system bears witness to this pervasive social attitude. In Australia, thankfully, there is no stigma at all attached to this trade. It's a truly egalitarian society.

If anything, the snobbery in Australia runs the other way. In India, students who secure admission to an educational institution "on merit", i.e., by scoring high marks in an entrance test, tend to look down on their classmates who have secured admission by paying "capitation fees" or through a "management quota". Scholastic ability ("merit") has legitimacy that fee-paying ability does not.

In Australia, I have heard from Indian friends (whose children gained admission to private schools on a scholarship) that they were disdained by their classmates who were paying full fees. In a complete inversion of social strata, the students who were able to pay full fees were the children of highly-paid tradespeople, whereas the children of my highly educated friends working in academia and mid-level corporate positions were constrained by economics to seek financial assistance through scholarships, which then made them the object of their classmates' contempt.

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These are some of the interesting differences I've seen between the societies of my native country and my adoptive one.

If you liked this, check out a related post, Thoughts On Culture, Friendship And Hospitality.

The Fearsome Ghost Of Ayatollah Khomeini

Synopsis: Western countries are being silly to fear Iranian refugees on account of the threat of Islamic terror. Islamic terror is associated with Sunni Wahhabi Islam, not with the Shi'ite denomination of Islam that Iranians tend to follow. Australia should stop pleading with the US and simply absorb the Iranian refugees in its camps. The heavens will not fall.

The biggest news item of the last week was Donald Trump's phone call to Australia's Prime Minster Malcolm Turnbull, in which he ranted about the "dumb deal" that his predecessors had signed with Australia (to accept 1250 refugees from Australian refugee camps), and then hung up 25 minutes into a scheduled hour-long call, calling it his "worst call by far".

One could argue about how it actually went for Trump, but it almost certainly was Turnbull's "worst call by far"

At the heart of the dispute were about 2000 asylum seekers currently being held in detention at the two Australian offshore processing centres of Manus Island and Nauru.

On Nauru, of 1200 asylum seekers, 983 have been considered genuine refugees while 217 have not.
On Manus Island, of 859 asylum seekers, 669 have been considered genuine refugees, while 190 have not. That makes a total of 1652 (=983+669) genuine refugees.

Of the 1652 genuine refugees, the US (under Obama) agreed to take 1250. The remainder were to be resettled in Papua New Guinea and Cambodia. (Australia has harsh immigration laws that say that no one who gets onto a boat and attempts to reach Australia will ever be settled in Australia. They can only be settled in PNG or elsewhere, the so-called "Pacific Solution". It's a policy that has been quite effective in discouraging people smuggling.)

Although no hard figures seem to be available, Iranians seem to be the dominant cohort in both processing centres, with smaller contingents from Iraq and Somalia. All of these asylum seekers fall afoul of Trump's executive order banning the entry of people from 7 "countries of concern" (Iraq, Syria, Libya, Iran, Yemen, Somalia and Sudan).

As of the time of writing, the US seems to be reluctantly going ahead with the agreement, but only on the basis of "extreme vetting" of the refugees.

If the ostensible reason for this "extreme vetting" is fear of unwittingly importing terrorists, then there is a simple solution that suggests itself immediately - check that the Iranians are indeed Shi'ites and let them into Australia without further ado. My reasoning is explained below, as well as my theory about why this simple solution doesn't seem to strike Australian decision-makers.

The simple fact of the matter is that all the acts of "Islamic terror" perpetrated in recent times have been at the hands of Sunni Muslims subscribing to the hardline Wahhabi strain of Islam. Iranians are not even Sunni, and have not been implicated in acts of terror. There was one singular exception, although this had its own twist. In December 2014, a lone Iranian gunman (Man Haron Monis) took hostages in a siege at the Lindt Chocolate Cafe in Martin Place, Sydney. Two people apart from Monis himself were later killed in a shootout when police stormed the establishment. I admit I was surprised when I heard the initial reports that the gunman was Iranian, but the riddle was solved shortly thereafter. It was revealed that Monis had converted to Sunni Wahhabi Islam just a month earlier.

To my mind therefore, the West suffers from a fear of all Muslims, which irrationally includes Shi'ite Iranians. If there is anyone they need to be wary about, it is Sunni Muslims who ascribe to one of the hardline sects, such as the Wahhabis, Salafis, or Deobandis. Shi'ites simply do not pose a threat.

In addition, I tend to take a civilisational view of human history and cultural evolution, and therefore I accord a certain level of "pre-assigned respect" to the people descended from the ancient Persian civilisation. Persians are a distinct people from the Arabs, and are also distinct from people of the Turkish civilisation. As people belonging to the proud Persian civilisation, the Iranians are in general a cultured and educated people. Immigrants from Iran will be an asset to any society that takes them in.

I think it was the shock of Ayatollah Khomeini's 1979 revolution that has scarred a generation of Western decision-makers. To them, there is an unbroken continuum from Khomeini to Bin Laden and thereafter to ISIS. But this is a false association. The Iranian revolution was confined to Iran. Even the limited mischief that Iran has engaged in outside its borders has been in its immediate neighbourhood through Hezbollah. It has never sought to export its revolution to the West or attempted to establish a worldwide caliphate. Hence, even though Iran is painted as a villain by Israel and many of the Arab states, and this is lapped up by a gullible West, the truth is that there is no threat to the wider world either from Iran or from Iranian emigrants.

Rather than bow and scrape before Trump's administration in an attempt to hold the US to its agreement, I believe Australia should make a one-time exception to its "Pacific Solution" and simply absorb all the Iranian refugees without further process. The Sunni refugees will unfortunately have to proceed with the "extreme vetting" that the US insists upon.

If I'm Sceptical Of Multiculturalism, Am I A Bigot?

A recent article in The Wall Street Journal talked about "How Canada Got Immigration Right".

I posted a link to the article on Facebook along with the comment, "Australia is the same - a strong skills-based migration program means that most immigrants are legal, employable and employed, and integrated."

One of my contacts responded, "And yet racist and right wing. The re-emergence of One Nation, the new norm of conservatism making us spend $160 million at a time of fiscal constraint on a plebiscite most people don't want [a reference to a plebiscite on marriage equality]. The recent surveys showing a majority supports a stop to Muslim immigration - Australia is parochial and its multiculturalism is very superficial. You don't have to dig deep to find the taint of the white Australia policy."

This made me think a bit. While the comment resonated with me superficially, I was troubled because it seemed too simplistic a diagnosis. For example, I know many non-whites who would like to see a stop to Muslim immigration, so parochialism isn't necessarily a White Australia thing.

After I thought about it some more, I posted a lengthier response, which I reproduce below:

"While I find that I am in general a social liberal, I try to maintain an independence of thought (free of any ideology), so let me put on my devil's advocate hat here.

The duty of any elected government is to improve a country's economic well-being while preserving social harmony.

A combination of education/training schemes and a skilled immigration program are accepted contributors to economic growth.

Social harmony is a trickier beast. And here, let me say at the outset that multiculturalism is not an end in itself, nor is it a proven means to any end. To my mind, it seems to have become an ideological sacred cow that one may only oppose at the risk of being labelled a bigot or a racist. I'm not so sure that kind of reaction is justified. We need a more dispassionate study into the positive and negative influences of multiculturalism, and how it may be better managed, if that is at all possible.

There are studies, for example, that prove a correlation between the ethnic/cultural homogeneity of a suburb and the level of volunteerism in that suburb. Diverse neighbourhoods are less...neighbourly. So that's a clear downside of multiculturalism even without the phenomenon of ghettoisation. The presence of ghettos only makes multiculturalism less defensible. I have tried to find examples of the positive aspects of multiculturalism in practice (as opposed to theory), but apart from the ready availability of a more varied cuisine, I could find none.

I viscerally dislike Pauline Hanson and her party, but when I sat down to write a point-by-point rebuttal of her policy positions, I found it extremely hard to do so, in all honesty. If an ethnic minority person like myself with a dog in the race (pun intended) could not come up with a substantive rebuttal of Hanson's policy positions, is it any wonder that Australia-born whites should support her? I would therefore not leap to the conclusion that her supporters are bigots. They could very well be well-meaning, reasonable people who are genuinely concerned (and with reason) at the negative changes they perceive in their society.

I lay the blame at the door of the liberals for letting things slide to the point where bigotry is able to make common cause with legitimate criticism. 

Three examples:

1. In the late 90s, when Pauline Hanson first emerged as a popular voice, she raised the spectre of Asian migration. Her speech, although loudly denounced, did resonate. Entire suburbs, like Eastwood and Epping in Sydney, have been virtually taken over by Asian people. Of course, white people helped along with the ghettoisation by moving out (I understand that it's a well-documented phenomenon - whites move out when ethnic minorities in a suburb exceed 20%). All things considered, two aspects of ghettoisation rankled - that there were people in these suburbs who spoke no English and felt no need to learn English, and that a non-Asian (i.e., a white person) entering these suburbs felt like an outsider in their own country. One has to acknowledge the legitimacy of this reaction without labelling it bigotry. Liberals should have done more to discourage the self-seclusion of new migrants, and vigorously espoused integration programs and forced English language training as a part of naturalisation. It could have prevented ghettoisation and the resentment that propelled Hanson to initial popularity.

2. Liberals in any society seem well armed to tackle conservatism in their own societies, but they are strangely reluctant to take on illiberal conservatism in other societies (e.g., Islam). This is as true of India as it is of Australia and other Western societies. Liberals have strangely sided with religious conservatives among immigrant/minority populations even when those conservatives have denied basic freedoms to members of their own and the wider community. A prime example is the enforcement of the burqa on many Muslim women by their communities, often against their will. Another example is the violent targetting of apostates and perceived heretics within the Muslim community. The larger society (particularly the liberals) has failed to act to protect these "minorities within minorities". This is a dereliction of duty for which we are now paying the price. A strong defence of liberal principles by all parties in a host society, from the start, would have created a healthier multicultural society, and may have prevented much of the backlash we see today.

3. The spectre of Asian domination is again rising, this time because of the property buyout by overseas Chinese. There is a conspiracy of silence on this highly explosive issue. Housing is becoming unaffordable to ordinary Australians, while governments and the real estate and construction lobbies are conspiring with wealthy overseas Chinese to buy up properties and drive up real estate prices. Why would this not fuel resentment? Why are liberals reluctant to call out this issue that affects ordinary Australians?

In short, I would not be quick to label Australia a parochial, bigoted or racist society that has abandoned its liberal ideals. On the contrary, liberals have selectively abandoned the defence of liberal principles in the past, and what we are witnessing now is an understandable reaction. The reaction has to run its course until the pendulum swings back from the other extreme and hopefully settles in the middle.

My two cents."

This is clearly a debate that isn't going to go away. Much as liberals may hate it, conservatism is back in the mainstream. It's pointless trying to make it go away through name-calling ("racism", "bigotry"), etc. What we need is a more honest dialogue over multiculturalism, including whether it should be supported at all. During John Howard's time, there was a brief flicker of an idea that Australia should be multi-ethnic but not multicultural. In other words, discrimination against ethnic minorities will not be tolerated, but at the same time, immigrants must sign up to some core values and agree to give up certain others in order to be naturalised. I don't think that's necessarily a bad idea. While citizens of a democracy have the right to adopt any ideas they please (as long as those ideas do not translate into infringing on those of others), aspiring citizens do not have that inherent right. A country (especially a democracy) has the right to insist on the adoption of certain core values before extending citizenship to newcomers. It's not bigotry. It's just common sense.

Enemy Mine - The Ugliness Of Cultural Arrogance

Australia and India signed a defence agreement today during Indian PM Narendra Modi's visit to Canberra.

Narendra Modi and Tony Abbott in Canberra

A couple of thoughts went through my head as I read the news, the foremost being how Samuel Huntington's Clash of Civilisations had taken yet another interesting turn. The other was that this seemed to be a replay of that underrated science fiction movie starring Dennis Quaid and Louis Gossett, Jr., Enemy Mine.

Enemy Mine is a story of how two individuals belonging to different species (humans and Dracs) that are at war, are forced to cooperate when they both crash-land on a planet with a hostile environment and vicious native fauna. Suddenly, their own differences seem inconsequential, and they finally become good friends.

An ant-lion of enormous proportions is only one of the dangers facing our mutually antagonistic heroes

A pragmatic basis for cooperation: "You are ugly, Davidge. But there are things out there that are uglier than you."

Australia has not traditionally viewed India as a natural ally. Indeed, Australia considered the expansion of Indian naval power in the 80s to be a threat! (I was a student in India at the time, highly politically aware, I might add, and I remember being quite offended at the inexplicably hostile attitude of what I viewed as a fellow democracy.)

In retrospect, that was not surprising given the understanding now afforded by Huntington's thesis. As a naive student, I might have seen the world in terms of democracies and non-democracies, but I was not to know that civilisational identities run far deeper. Australia belongs to and identifies strongly with Western civilisation, and an even narrower sub-group within it called the Anglosphere. India is not only not a Western country but the proud flagship of the distinct and much older Indic civilisation. It does not belong in the club, and so any increase in its power would naturally be viewed as a threat by the members of the club.

However, in recent times, a shift in Western attitudes seems to have taken place. The threatening rise of yet another non-member of the Anglosphere club has resulted in the club relaxing its rules for membership, it would appear.

Something out there that is uglier to Western eyes than an Indian elephant

Witness Tony Abbott's address at Queen's College, Oxford in 2012:

As with all the countries that think and argue among themselves in English (that these days include Singapore and Hong Kong, Malaysia and even India), what we have in common is usually more important than anything that divides us.

It sounds to me like the grounds are being laid for an invitation to join the club.

Huntington had referred to Russia and India as "swing civilisations", meaning that they could either side with Western civilisation or with other non-Western civilisations such as the Sinic or Islamic ones. It appears that the threat from China (and perhaps from Islamism as well) is now high enough for the Anglosphere club to open its doors to India. Speaking English has given India a second-class passport into the Anglosphere club.

As evidence of this, note that even this welcome is being afforded on terms that are purely Western.

Tony Abbott said in his speech welcoming Modi in parliament,

Australians admired the way India won independence – not by rejecting the values learned from Britain, but by appealing to them; not by fighting the colonisers, but by working on their conscience.

The reader will discern that even when describing the seminal moment of India's rupture with Britain, Abbott is emphasising the influence of Britain on India, rather than acknowledging India's non-violent struggle to be based on its own inherent civilisational values. The land of Buddha and Mahavira, the culture whose homegrown philosophy of Yoga has Ahimsa (non-violence) as its first and foremost Yama (ethical rule), has no need for Britain's civilising influence! India was not just a civilisation in terms of physical infrastructure but civilised in a deeply human sense long before the badlands that became Britain could lay claim to any such description. After all, Gandhi did not owe his non-violent style of agitation to his training as a barrister in London. His legal training might have helped him craft specific strategies to take on the Empire, but his fundamental philosophy came out of his exposure to living examples of non-violence in his childhood, such as his mother who would not kill a scorpion. Viewed through this lens, the cultural blindness that the London-born Abbott displayed here was breathtaking. You can take the man out of Britain, but you cannot take Anglocentrism out of the man.

In Abbott's eyes, India acquires legitimacy only from its characterisation as an English-speaking country that has imbibed Western cultural values. There is no effort to accept India as an equal on its own unique civilisational terms. Any defence agreement signed is therefore to be viewed not as one between equals, but as an oath of allegiance administered by a Western nation to a non-Western one that agrees to submit to Western values.

It's a testament to the intellectual poverty of Australia's current crop of political leaders and commentators that no one has noticed this glaring statement of cultural arrogance, much less seen fit to point it out.

India and the West can do business with each other not because India is now Westernised, but because the human values independently evolved by each of them happen to be compatible. Enough is known about Western values, but not quite enough is known about Indic ones, it would seem. Indian civilisation has been based on philosophies that acknowledge unity in diversity (Rig Veda 1.164.46, "Truth is one but the sages speak of it by many names") and emphasise universal brotherhood (Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam, or "the world is one family") even as they encourage the exchange and conflict of ideas (Purva Paksha, or a form of debate that mandates looking through an opponent's eyes). The civilisation could not have survived and evolved otherwise. It deserves to be given its due, not a condescending pat on the head for learning human values from the West.

Australians admire the way India won independence [...] by appealing to [the values learnt from Britain]

Can you see why that sort of praise can be viewed as insulting?

Much is made of the idea that Western civilisation owes its character to its "Judeo-Christian" roots That concept does have validity, even if Judaism and Christianity were long at each other's throats, and the vaunted "separation of church and state" was nothing but the Hebraic and the Hellenic aspects of Western civilisation being forcibly kept apart like squabbling children. Civilisations influence peoples and the conduct of nation-states. The Indic civilisation with its homegrown principles of unity in diversity, universal brotherhood and the acceptance of other viewpoints, intrinsically influences modern India, whether by the mundane non-event of a billion diverse people not erupting into civil war but staying together as a united nation, or India's uniquely non-violent freedom struggle, or India's leadership of the Non-Aligned Movement during the Cold War. (The Judeo-Christian value of "Thou shalt have no other gods before me", in similar fashion, results in Bush-era policies like "You are either with us or against us".)

[None of the above is intended to imply that the Indic civilisation is perfect, or superior to Western civilisation. Three glaring Indian weaknesses are superstition, caste-based discrimination and the poor status of women in society. These require India to look at itself through Western eyes to effect a change. Thankfully, this purva paksha is already happening, albeit slowly.]

For India, today's defence agreement with Australia no doubt represents an important alliance from a national security perspective given its own apprehensions about China, but it is not to be taken as a sign of having "arrived" in any sense. India will only truly arrive when its allies demonstrate through word and deed that they acknowledge and respect it as a distinct non-Western civilisation with independently evolved human values.

An Immigrant's Take On Australia's Immigration Policies

"What if I had arrived to this country by boat?" asks Bharat Ramakrishna, a fellow Indian immigrant to Australia. (He's way more Australian than I am, by the way - I still say "arrive in" and "chat with", not "arrive to" and "chat to").

Bharat's plea for greater compassion and understanding is impassioned and the piece is well-written, but I can't agree with him. My own journey to Australia was rocky and littered with initial disappointment, but although I was determined to make it in the end, I never once considered the option of taking a boat and just landing up. This doesn't mean I don't empathise with refugees fleeing brutal regimes to save their lives. I do empathise, and quite strongly at that (I'm a regular donor to Amnesty International and add my signature to many humanitarian campaigns). It only means that I think people like Bharat are unable or unwilling to acknowledge the phenomenon of economic migrants posing as refugees to take unfair advantage of an advanced society's humaneness. As an economic migrant myself, I believe I have some locus standi to speak about that.

My story

I was taken by the idea of migrating to Australia in the early nineties when I saw a few friends and colleagues leaving India. One of them explained Australian migration to me in very simple and evocative US-centric terms (since most people with my background were more familiar with the journey of the Indian migrant to the US): "It's like a green card that you get before you travel."

The information on the brochure available at the Australian consulate in Mumbai was quite clear about the criteria for skilled migrants. As an IT professional, I would need to demonstrate either a recognised IT-related degree plus 3 years of post-qualification work experience in IT, or 8 years of IT experience if I didn't have an IT degree (the latter was a lot more dicey in its chances of success). I also needed to demonstrate adequate English-language skills and be of a certain age (the younger I was, the more points I would score.)

While I was young (under 30) with fluent English, I fell between two stools on the qualification and experience criteria. I had graduated from IIT Madras (which is an institute recognised in Australia), but my degree was in Civil Engineering, not Computer Science. So that clearly did not qualify. I had completed (and stood 3rd in) a one-year Post-Graduate Diploma in Software Technology from the well-known (well known in Mumbai at least) NCST (now called C-DAC), but this was not a university degree. If that did not suffice, I also had an MBA from the reputed IIM Ahmedabad, where I had taken a few Information Systems electives related to management, such as Management Information Systems (MIS) and Decision Support Systems (DSS). Again, while the institute is a recognised one in Australia, a "Systems MBA" was not likely to cut it as an IT degree. Finally, I had 4 years of experience in IT, which was more than the 3 years required for IT degree holders but well short of the 8 years required of those without an IT degree.

I decided to take the chance and apply for permanent residency as a skilled migrant anyway, because I hoped the persons reviewing my application would see that while I fell short in some areas, I had made up for them in others.

Alas, when the response came less than a month later, I had been rejected. My first attempt at migrating to Australia thus came to a bitter end. This was in 1991.

And here is another interesting side story. When some of my friends learnt of my rejection, they offered a kind of "sour grapes" consolation: "Australia is a racist country. They want only white people." [This image of Australia persists in India to this day, and the student attacks of 2009-2010 have not helped.]

But that convenient explanation did not wash with me. I knew that I didn't quite qualify, and the assessor had pointed that out. I thought the assessor's comments were actually quite respectful and fair. The door had been shut (in my face, as my friends would have it), but I was also told how it could be opened again if I was really keen. I needed to somehow acquire an IT degree and put in the required 3 years of post-qualification work experience.

I was really keen. And so I applied for study leave, without pay, from my employer (CMC Ltd, whose alumni unanimously have fond memories of its warm and people-friendly culture) and went back to school. CMC's management was kind enough to give me a letter of sponsorship to enable me to enter IIT again (in its Kanpur campus this time) and do a masters degree in computer science. Three semesters later (and with my bank balance at zero), I had met Australia's first criterion. I had an IT-related degree from a recognised university. This was at the end of 1993, a little over two years since my rejection.

I rejoined CMC and stayed there another year. Then I got a job with a bank in Dubai and left India in early 1995. I was married by then. By 1997, after two years in Dubai, I had met Australia's second criterion. I had 3 years of post-qualification work experience in IT.

I applied a second time for permanent residency as a skilled migrant, with my wife as the secondary applicant (as a non-Australian chartered accountant, she may not have qualified on her own).

This time, our application was accepted.

It proved to me that Australia was a fair country where "what you see is what you get". The rules are clear and reasonable, and are applied impartially. [After 15 years in the country, my views have only been reinforced.]

So we finally got our much-coveted "green card" before we travelled to Australia. This was in early 1998. Our arrival here was with a valid resident visa and therefore completely kosher. No people smugglers were involved and no boat journey was required. The plane ride was comfortable and our adjustment very smooth (with initial help from old friends from India now settled in Sydney).

Best of all, I had the satisfaction that I had gone about the process the "right" way. As a bonus, I had a masters degree in computer science from an IIT, something to be proud of in its own right.

The Immigration Debate in Australia

Let's return to the issue of "boat people" raised by Bharat's article, which is extremely emotive in Australia today. Those who oppose the entry of boat people make several arguments. Some say boat people are "queue jumpers" who unfairly take places away from other refugees who follow the process and apply from refugee camps abroad. Some believe Australia's resources are stretched and the arrival of immigrants will put an increased burden on public systems. Yet others are suspicious of foreigners who may not be able to integrate into Australian society, going by the experience with some migrants who are already here. All of these points are valid to some degree, but these arguments are also decried by their opponents as racism and xenophobia.

On the other side of this debate are those like Bharat Ramakrishna who argue for a more humane Australia that welcomes asylum seekers and treats them well, instead of cruelly turning them away. Their opponents call them naive, bleeding-heart liberals.

Where do I stand in this debate? Being an economic migrant myself, I viscerally understand the motivations of one, and I can readily see how different I am from a refugee who is fleeing persecution. All talk about "boat people" and "asylum seekers" fails to distinguish between these two groups of people (refugees and economic migrants), and this failure makes any subsequent debate pointless. We really need to start from an understanding of the dichotomy between these two groups of asylum seekers.

The humanitarian argument should only apply to refugees. With economic migrants, the conversation ought to be more businesslike. These people are not in danger of their lives. Neither are they being persecuted. Yes, they probably aren't enjoying as high a quality of life in their countries as they would enjoy if they were living in Australia. It's understandable why they would like to migrate. But Australia is quite justified in asking these people what they can do for the country in return for a berth here. If they can't offer something Australia wants, there's no deal. Let's not get sentimental about it. There's nothing "cruel" about turning away economic migrants who don't have something useful to offer to Australia. Australia is, by any objective measure, the best country in the world to live in, not just one of the best. Out of the world's 7 billion people, I'm sure more than 6 billion would jump at the chance to live here, including many from the so-called First World. Obviously, it isn't possible to indulge them all.

And so the discussion has to turn to how we distinguish between genuine refugees and "mere" economic migrants. Remember that we wouldn't even be having this debate if economic migrants were honest enough not to hide their motives.

The root cause of the immigration problem is when economic migrants pretend to be refugees in order to tap into humanitarian sentiment, instead of taking their honest chances with a businesslike assessment of their suitability.

We cannot complain that our systems are not perfect, because individuals are not perfect. The other debate going on at this time in Australia is that of a "boot camp" for unemployed youth who want to receive unemployment assistance. Again, we wouldn't even be having this debate if people were honest enough to apply for assistance only when they were genuinely unemployed, and to notify the government as soon as they had secured alternative employment. Dole packages could be quite generous and easy to obtain if everyone was honest. But people are not, in general, honest. That's why social security is often seen as a heartless system. To keep out the dishonest, whether we're talking about immigration or unemployment assistance, systems must develop bureaucratic features that then inconvenience honest and deserving people.

Then there is the real issue of limited resources. There are 45 million genuine refugees in the world today, and even with the best of intentions, Australia and other advanced societies cannot accommodate them all. A massive influx of people (even deserving ones) can lead to the collapse of systems. This is worsened by undeserving people (economic migrants) abusing the system. This is why it is not possible to keep the gates open to all and remain blind to who is coming in. An open gate is a temptation to everyone to enter.

As a child growing up in India, I used to be greatly saddened by the sight of beggars at temples and other public places we visited. It can be quite heart-wrenching to see a baby carried by a child not much older, and the guilt can be quite intense when you're eating and these children appear before you, gesturing towards their mouths and stomachs. 

Be steel, my heart

It is not that these people are not poor, but they have also mastered the art of milking sentiment. Give a coin to a single beggar, and you will regret it instantly. You will be besieged by a throng of others, all with arms outstretched and pleading piteously. A few such incidents, and you will inure yourself to saying a stern no to every beggar you come across. It is not that one is cruel, but one learns to protect oneself. If beggars did not aggressively besiege kind-hearted tourists to the point of making them regret their kindness, I guarantee they would see a lot more charity overall.

Individuals are not only not perfect, they are also too smart for their own good.

Whether it's aggressive beggars in India, dole-bludgers in Australia or economic migrants posing as refugees, the issue is the same - cynical people who abuse a humane system, overwhelm limited resources and end up hardening the hearts of even the well-meaning and generous, thereby causing needless suffering and pain to the genuinely needy.

Sugar kept on a table attracts ants. It's a law of nature. So what do we normally do? We take the sugar off the table altogether. But then even those who need it often have to go without. We need a system that is less of a blunt instrument.

This is why I like the Rudd government's "PNG Solution", as I wrote before. It provides a means of distinguishing between genuine refugees and economic migrants. PNG (Papua New Guinea) is no paradise, but to genuine refugees, it's better than the alternative, so they will still come. But PNG is a turn-off to economic migrants, so if the scheme is executed without loopholes, they will almost certainly stop coming. Is it a perfect system? No it's not, because genuine refugees are going to be greatly inconvenienced, perhaps even endangered in a different way, by being resettled in PNG.

But as long as individuals are imperfect, no system can be perfect. Bharat Ramakrishna and others of his kind are obviously humane and warm individuals (and I can only wish for more of them in our society), but their prescription of undiscriminating welcome to all comers is unworkable.