Indian elite in Mammon's grip

The buying craze has spread all over the country, including the South, where Diwali was traditionally unimportant. In city after big city, there were gold festivals, diamond sales, and bazaars selling pricey cars.

At the centre of this is the metropolitan upper class, comprising about 6 percent of the population, according to the National Council of Applied Economic Research, with annual household incomes of Rs. 105,000-plus. Its disposable income has doubled or trebled, with the emergence of high-salary islands in services like information technology and call centres.

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With free imports of luxury goods, there is a bewildering variety of articles to buy--from chocolates to footwear (e.g. LVMH shoes costing Rs. 35,000), lingerie to cosmetics, and gadgets to cars.

No wonder consumer spending rose between 2001 and 2002 by an astounding 130 percent in respect of gifts, 108 percent on mobile phones and 68 percent on movies. The Indian consumer spent 58 percent more on clothing, 55 percent more on eating and 22 percent on vacations--in a single year.

The starkest expression of this consumerism is found in glitzy air-conditioned chrome-and-glass malls, replete with boutiques, restaurants, discos, bars and theatres. Some 240 mega-malls are under construction, in addition to the existing 20-odd. In Mumbai and Gurgaon (Delhi's super-rich suburb) alone, 43 mega-malls will open by December.

This consumerism's most important ingredient is change in the values of the elite, which has dedicatedly embraced hedonism, or the pursuit of pleasure. It believes pleasure is the greatest good, and that the highest pleasure lies in consuming--what I first called Acquisitive Hedonism 15 years ago.

Today, thousands of rich Indians are willing to buy an Omega watch for Rs. 1.5 lakhs, a Cartier ring for Rs. 5 lakhs or a designer dress for Rs. 65,000.

The consumer boom is extremely unevenly distributed. Thus, sales of air-conditioners, mid-sized cars (which now lead the automobile boom), television sets, washing machines, etc., are rising at 20 percent-plus, whereas sales of mass-consumption textiles and footwear are stagnant.

This is explained by the decade-long lowering of taxes on luxury goods, and by easy retail credit, which has expanded 35-fold in just two years! The rich are borrowing to spend. When they use a credit card, they pay interest of 36 percent.

Even more skewed is income-class distribution. The top twentieth of the population accounts for 30 percent-plus of all consumer spending. The bottom three-fourths together spend about the same.

This is a case of privilege building further upon privilege. The rich are seceding from the people. The masses are being left behind by a tiny minority which started with an unfair advantage of birth--and hence, opportunity. Grotesque inequalities are the new consumerism's greatest downside.

However, some conservatives see virtue in this. They argue that spending even by a small minority will produce greater overall growth--which will eventually trickle down.

This view is profoundly mistaken. Spending by itself doesn't create wealth. Equally necessary is saving and investment. A striking feature of the Asian Tigers is savings of 25 to 35 percent of GDP. In India, savings are falling, and the elite is too small to pull the majority upwards.

Besides, there's never trickle-down; rather, there's trickle-up, even flood-up. Growth alone cannot eradicate poverty: you need investment in people lacking social opportunity (because they were born underprivileged).

The negative consequences of Mammon worship are repulsive. The Greed Creed promotes aggressive behaviour against the community. People consume not because consumption is some basic need, but because it is socially constructed. You show yourself off to make others feel small.

People have to be persuaded to consume--through advertising and marketing. As Noam Chomsky argues, some $2 trillion, or five times India's GDP, is spent annually thus to persuade people in the United States.

Often, the persuasion is subtle. Hundreds of millions became smokers--and victims of cancer and other diseases--out of belief that smoking is about "freedom", glamour, being modern, "confident".

We South Asians have celebrated Diwali, Eid and Christmas for centuries. But it's only in the last 20 years that these have become mammoth shopping festivals, as has Valentine's Day or Mother's Day. We are being made to believe that the festival spirit lies in shopping, buying, acquiring.

This elite consumerism is utterly insensitive, and celebrates privilege of the in-your-face kind. This can only further strengthen elite arrogance and reinforce hierarchies in this horrendously unequal society where the majority lacks the necessities of civilised life: half the people are illiterate, 70 percent don't have bathrooms, only a fifth have concrete roofs.

Rampant consumerism leads to unspeakably brutal acts: from bride-burning to female foeticide. The connection between consumerism and "dowry deaths" (rather, murder) is well established.

The latest Census shows that female foeticide is particularly prevalent among the affluent. It is the richest localities of South Delhi and Mumbai that have the lowest sex-ratios in the 0-6 age-group. The case of a woman doctor who died after eight forced abortions because the foetus was female in each instance should be an eye-opener.

Consumerism's environmental costs are onerous too. Imagine the runaway proliferation of air-conditioners and automobiles, with their huge greenhouse gas emissions, waste and pollution. Our cities are already drowning in plastic waste. Matters will become much worse under unbridled consumerism.

The Greed Creed may satisfy the lust of a small minority. But it will visit untold social devastation. Gandhi was right to say there's enough in the world for everyone's need, but not for a single person's greed. Responsible citizenship means austerity, equality and setting limits upon greed.

Praful Bidwai is an eminent Indian columnist.