Thread by @KumarSeshadri

This tweet by a retired wealthy industrialist with too much time on his hands and no idea what to do with it illustrates what is wrong with India.

He extols the virtues of a clay water storage unit, the surahi, from the mid-20th century.

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https://twitter.com/anandmahindra/status/1655898324992671744?t=E7sWvMMU2PmZdf8FFPNFsQ&s=19

Of course, while he lives in unimaginable luxury, the likes of which we can't dream of.

It's a foolish comparison, because the surahi can only store and cool water by a few degrees, whereas the fridge can cool anything, preserve food, and make ice (needed for his scotch).

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But that didn't stop Indian twitterati from going ga-ga over his tweet. Why?

Because if there's one thing guaranteed to give you applause in India today, it is hearkening to the past.
Our grandparents had the most wonderful life. Our country was great in the good old days.
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That's why #Modi talks about India having had airplanes and plastic surgery and stem cells in Vedic times.

Indians need to believe in such fairy tales because they have nothing to be proud of today. We are a has-been country that comes last in the sack race.

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There's a deep insecurity among Indians. They believe that, simply because we are the largest country in the world by population, we should be considered a superpower.

But people don't respect you for your size. They respect you if you have something to offer the world.

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Indians know that we are not respected in the world, and this frustrates them. They want a permanent seat at the #UNSC. It's a silly aspiration. Indians are caught up in empty symbolism and status symbols. They aspire for status, not substance.

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Indians do not believe in creating great things or excelling at their jobs (by and large; exceptions exist, of course). Everyone wants to be a manager and order other people around; nobody wants to do great work themselves.

This is why Indians are not innovative.

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Innovation is not easy. It is extremely hard. Indians don't like to work hard. Maybe because they have historically lived in a fertile land in which food grew abundantly, allowing them to export it and become prosperous. Someone millenia ago figured out how to grow food.

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Knowing how to grow food abundantly is innovative, but that was done by some ancestors a few thousand years ago. Indians have been content to live with that knowledge.

Meanwhile the rest of the world moved on, and developed things like cannon, artillery, and machines.

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Because of their conceit and arrogance, Indians (in days past, that was only Hindus) didn't try to learn these new advances. When India was leading the world in knowledge, the rest of the world tried to learn from us. But when we were behind, we didn't care to learn.

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Both #Chinese and #Arabic scholars translated the works of the great mathematician of #Ujjain, #Brahmagupta , and learned from them. #AlKhwarizmi used the works of Brahmagupta. Chinese monks like #Xuanzang and #Faxian and Europeans like #MarcoPolo visited India.

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But when the Chinese invented paper or gunpowder, when the Turks invented cannon, when the British invented steam engines, when Newton discovered the laws of motion, Indian kings didn't send emissaries to those nations to learn. Because we knew it all.

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Because everything was in our holy books. Of course, that was nonsense, and we got our asses handed to us on a platter by every invader. Why? Because of our ignorance. We didn't have any translations of the Principia or Stephenson's patent.

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When Babur came with his cannons, the Rajputs didn't know what hit them. The British were able to wipe out our textile industry because they had invented the powerloom, which was orders of magnitude more efficient than the handlooms we used.

Why? Technological inferiority.
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So, if history has taught us anything, it is that if we do not keep up with the latest technological trends, we will become a slave nation.

And that is exactly what is happening today. We are slaves of all the major technology leaders - the US, China, Russia, Israel...

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This is the reason for India's current #NonAligned status. It doesn't come from a position of principle, because to assert principle you first need strength. India is fundamentally weak.

India is not aligned with either the #USA, #China, or #Russia. Why?

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Because India needs things from all these countries, but it has very little to offer them in return.

India needs oil from Russia. It needs cheap consumer goods from China. It needs computers and advanced tech from the US.

But we have huge #tradeimbalances with all.

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That's because we have nothing to offer these countries in return. #Ford and #Toyota and #Honda and #Renault and #MG cars are seen everywhere in India, but you don't see #Mahindra cars on American roads.

Why? Because it is inferior technology. But good enough for India.

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Instead of focusing on excellence and trying to make cars of such quality that the world will buy and drive only Indian cars, @anandmahindra asks us to use #surahi instead of refrigerators.

And people applaud.

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But what else would you expect from a country where textbooks have been rewritten to remove lessons on evolution? Where unverified ideas such as Ayurveda are thought to be at the same level (or higher than) evidence-based medicine?

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Where people believe that some guy in Pune invented flight before the Wright Brothers, with zero evidence?

Ignorance and lack of scientific thinking brought us slavery in the past. For 70 years since independence, India embarked on a path of science and technology.

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But now we are going backwards, and that can only mean slavery. We are going to be everyone's whipping boy. We cannot pay Russia for the oil we want from them. If you don't export anything of value, how will you buy things from others?

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So go ahead, listen to Mr. Mahindra, buy a surahi instead of a fridge.

And don't forget to buy your Chinese Diwali lights.

And continue to be IT Coolies for Western companies.

It's tragic that someone who should try to use his wealth to create innovation is talking thus.
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The difference between our ignorant ancestors who became slaves and us is that they didn't know what had happened in China, Turkey, and Europe. Today, we know everything that is happening in the world, and yet choose to be blind.

The end result is the same: Slavery.

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On second thought, maybe he is right.

We should get used to surahis and forget about refrigerators, because soon we will be too poor to afford refrigerators.

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