Indian Pharmaceutical Industry is already controlled by US / Europe, and now it is Retail Sector's turn - FDI round the corner

Dear Dr.Joshi,

Namaskaar,

I am sure that this finds you doing good.

Last year i had detailed discussions with you on FDI and i sent you a note on not opening the retail sector to FDI. Till last year , you were the Chairman, Parliamentary Standing committee on commerce .

This year the issue is out again . It is shocking that UPA is even considering to open the Retail sector for FDI. Just consider ;

Total retail market is Rs. 1.2 Lac crore. Isn’t that too tempting for recession hit economies like US/ Europe and U.K. to fight recession through markets abroad ? They cleverly call us as an emerging / developing economy

To foreigners , this is a market but for us (Indians) it is 40 % of our GDP. You can expect that in the next few years , a good percentage of 40 % of our GDP will be in the hands of foreigners !! . We have 15 million retailers , thereby directly employing at least 30 million people and indirectly 6 times more i.e. 90 million .

Only 4 % of our retailers have an area of 500 Sq. Ft.

Food constitute 70 % of our retail trade

The UPA’s discussion paper is a wrong start as it has by-passed the parliamentary standing committee’s report tabled in both houses in June 2009. Consisting of more than 40 Member of parliaments . The committee had taken into account the report submitted by ICRIER

British MP David Amess recently said that the Indian Government to tread"very carefully" if it opened up the multi-brand retail sector to FDI because the entry of companies like UK-based retailer Tesco would"literally change the fabric of life in India" by endangering small shops. Amess chairs the British All Party Parliamentary Group on Small Shops (APPGoSS).

The government is currently holding consultations on allowing companies such as US-based Wal-Mart, France's Carrefour and Tesco to come in. Critics have urged the government to insert safety clauses following protests from small independent retailers that potentially face closure."Britain was a nation of small shopkeepers," Amess."All of that has changed and this is because of the supermarkets, led by Tesco. It is impossible for small shop keepers, who have so much to offer, to compete with the prices of the supermarkets".

APPGoSS Secretary Bob Russell MP, added "the expansion of supermarkets in Britain has been to the serious detriment of small shops, there is no question about this".
One in six small stores in Britain have gone out of business in the last decade, the group said.
Atul Patel, an Indian origin Briton who runs Pelican News, a small store in North West London. said his family-run business was now struggling to survive, with sales of meat, groceries and fresh fruit having dropped by at least a fifth after Tesco opened a store hear his.
Largest Indian pharmaceutical companies like Ranbaxy and Nicholas Piramal have already changed hands and are no more with Indians . With the recent acquisition of Piramal with Abbott , MNC’s control more than 50 % of the Indian Pharmaceutical industry , and more acquisitions are likely to follow soon.

My personal belief is that, the when the large foreign retailers come in , the fight will not just be between large and small retailers but between large and medium retailers . Small retailers will die for sure . Needless to mention , when the elephants fight , the grass ( small retailers ) gets trampled !!

Dr. Joshi , please take it up at the appropriate levels .

Recently , it was reported that acute poverty prevails in 8 Indian states ( 421 million people in Bihar , Chhattisgarh , Jharkhand , Madhya Pradesh, Orissa , Rajasthan , Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal which together account for more poor people than in the 26 poorest African nations combined ( 410 Million ), a new ‘multi dimensional’ measure of the global poverty said According to the MPI- Multidimensional Poverty Index , developed and applied by the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative with UNDP support

Also, i hear that Economy is growing at approximately 8 %. I need to tell our Dr. Manmohan Singh, the economist that the literal meaning of Economy is “Community’s system of wealth creation” and not just growth of a few sectors, as is in the case of India and we call it Indian Economy ? So Indian "economy" is not growing , but a few sectors that are in a 'few hands' are growing !!

Dr.Joshi , you have profound knowledge of each and every aspect of history , culture and wealth creation and distribution , that is even acknowledged by Congress leaders in power.

Let’s work to change all this . I am hoping to meet you soon.

Thanks with best regards

Rajendra Pratap Gupta
Email : office@rajendragupta.in