China's success in India's sacred space

Indians right across the vast subcontinent and, indeed worldwide, last week celebrated Diwali, the festival of lights, Hinduism's biggest festival, with fervour, a blaze of lights and thunderous blasts of firecrackers.

But, perhaps unknown to most devotees of Lakshmi, goddess of wealth, and Ganesh, the elephant god revered as the remover of obstacles, this year had a special Chinese flavour.

That is because many of the fairy lights, sparklers, firecrackers and even images of the idols themselves were made in China.

China's participation in Diwali through its exports signals a triumph for international trade, particularly when Sino-Indian political relations are strained.

But Chinese success also points to corresponding Indian failure. It is not a simple matter that Chinese ingenuity and trading skills penetrated the sacred sphere in India, but also that Indian craftsmen, industrialists and traders had business snatched from their own backyard.

India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, up and coming leader Rahul Gandhi and planning chief Montek Singh Ahluwalia need to put their heads together and urgently look at India's economic shortcomings and to go beyond the conventional economic categories in trying to find remedies.