Modi's BIG Warning Amid Oil Shock | "Going To Get Worse.." | Sucheta Dalal | Mohandas Pai | Barkha

Added: 2026-05-19

[00:00:11]In perhaps his plainest and most direct warning of the pain that lies ahead, the prime minister has spoken of how this decade could be a decade of disasters.

[00:00:26]The prime minister referenced the COVID pandemic wars and then said that now of course there is a global energy crisis.

[00:00:38]>> Industrialists like OD Kotk have also warned of how a shock a big shock is coming.

[00:00:46]These warnings have come amid a raging debate over the prime minister's appeal for austerity. A series of measures have been suggested by him. These include work from home, car pooling, avoiding buying gold, avoiding weddings abroad.

[00:01:05]These measures or appeals rather from the prime minister who has slashed his own personal convoy have led to a series of BJP ministers and chief ministers taking to riding the motorcycle or the metro in what many are saying are only photo ops. Where should the government's real attention be on the economy? In a moment from now we'll be talking to Sucha Dalal and Moundas Pay. I'm Barcad you're with the Mojo story. On the program today, the prime minister has made a very very direct appraisal of the global economic situation and the global energy crisis. He has spoken about this turning into a decade of disaster starting with of course the COVID pandemic followed by wars Russia Ukraine and then of course America's war on Iran that has yet to be resolved and the looming global energy crisis. His appeals for austerity have seen his political colleagues taking two images of the kind you see on your screen.

[00:02:04]Dendra Fnavves on a motorcycle, Moan Yadav in a metro, Nitan Katkari in a bus leading to a big debate over whether this is important symbolism or whether this is in fact mere photo optics. The prime minister over the last couple of days personally rebutted a television report that suggested that there would be a cess or that the government was exploring assess on foreign travel. He called the reports totally fake. But he has made twice now appeals for other measures of austerity, one that would lead to fuel saving, including car pooling and work from home. He's also asked citizens not to purchase gold. But where should the government's attention be as the rupee falls against the dollar and the markets of course reflect the anxiety in India? I want to welcome two very eminent guests today both of whom are of course experts in their spaces. I want to welcome senior journalists and editor Sujeta Dalal the managing editor of money life. Welcome ma'am to the program and also joining us is Moandaspai who's of course the chairman of Aaron Capital and also co-founder of emphasis and a venture capitalist. Moan, you can't can you hear us? Mo, can you hear us? Um, basically Moand Daspay also appealed or tweeted the prime minister when there were rumors and reports including on CNBC that there was going to be a cess on uh foreign travel and the prime minister actually uh moments later contradicted CNBC and said uh that that was not going to happen and that was a totally false report. Uh I'm hoping Moindaspay can reconnect with us.

[00:03:43]Sucha before we start the conversation with you I want to just play out the prime minister prime minister's statement where he says that this could well turn into a decade of disasters.

[00:03:52]Take a look.

[00:04:02]Happy energy crisis.

[00:04:27]for Satio.

[00:05:04]Resilient supply chain bat or Netherland milker a trusted transparent or future ready supply chain.

[00:05:28]All right. Uh those comments were of course made uh in Netherlands where the prime minister is currently on a tour.

[00:05:35]Moundas spy, I'm hoping Moan you can hear me. I was just saying uh in our introduction that in fact when this report first came out that was rebutted to be false by the prime minister himself uh on a possible cess on foreign travel. You were among those uh who actually tweeted him and said prime minister please don't do this. And uh actually moments later came that counter by the prime minister saying that the report on CNBC was totally false and CNBC then retracted uh that report. All right. The wider debate remains. The prime minister has made an appeal for austerity. Um so Cheta how do you how do you see one the health of the economy the state of the economy and two what do you make of this austerity debate that is ongoing?

[00:06:18]Uh >> could we unmute Sucha please? Yeah.

[00:06:23]Thanks. Uh the need for austerity is real. The problems are real. At this time the crux of it is got nothing to do with India. It is a war that we had no part in but we are significantly impacted and the worry is that that we willy-nilly are most significantly impacted because of our economic situation because of our dependence on oil edible oil crude oil fertilizer you know ura which is highly subsidized in India. So we are in a highly precarious position and the fact is that all of us are concerned even before Udai Kotak talked about getting ready for shocks even before the prime minister talked about austerity you know how people ran around you know those uh induction cookers were not available on Amazon one fine day the day the prime minister wanted to address the nation I think everybody ran to petrol pumps to stock up because they thought oil rationing is coming so we are aware that there's going to be a problem. We're aware that things are going to get worse because there's no sign of the war stopping.

[00:07:32]When it started, we hear that America and Israel thought it would end in three or four days and it's been a couple of months and we have to get ready for shocks. Point is that are we going to do signaling and symbolism or are we going to look at ground reality and ground reality is not ministers going on cycles and motorcycles because when we talk about car pooling we have to understand ground reality of whether that's going to work whether you have rules what is the harassment what is the corruption level do we have public transport it's all very well to say public transport and have photo ops of a chief minister comfortably in a local train but have you seen images of local trains or BT buses in Bombay? We spent 30,000 crores on a coastal road, but we don't have a thousand crores for BST, which was once one of the best transport systems in the world. That is public transport, right?

[00:08:29]If we had had all these things in place, we would have been in a better position to implement austerity. But without them where especially after covid we have actually allowed people to go and get two wheelers and cars and we suddenly telling them don't travel don't go to work you know we are all dependent on uh you know 10-minute deliveries for food and everything else how is it going to work other than in signaling and photo ops I'm completely unaware we are in for hard times that's for sure >> okay let me open this up for moasp moan um in the Hope that you can hear me. You have long, even as a as a supporter of the prime minister, long asked for more uh reforms uh to the tax policies. You can't hear me, Moan. Moan, can you hear me? Moan, can you hear me? No. Moan can't hear me. So, uh Moan, I don't know what to do about the fact that you can't hear me. Um I'm going to ask you to reconnect and hope that my producers can call you. Uh I'm going to keep the conversation going with you, Susetta.

[00:09:33]You're talking about the signaling, right? uh you're talking about the signaling, the photo ops. You know, my response to that would be it's not uncommon for for uh politicians in other parts of the world to actually cycle to work. Uh it's not uncommon for politicians in other parts of the world to actually take a metro to work. Uh but that is because there is a certain level of uh equality for lack of a better word. You know, Arishi Sonak and me could get onto the same tube in London and it would be the same experience. It would be a distinct experience here. I think if this actually led to cities becoming cycle friendly, metros becoming more accessible, it would be great. But if it's just going to remain a photo op, then it's terrible. A moan, hi, can you hear me?

[00:10:18]>> Yes, I can hear you.

[00:10:19]>> Go ahead, jump in because we've been trying to get a word in from you. I was saying you've often been slamming while being a supporter of the prime minister uh the the the you know what you call tax terrorism and this crisis could present an opportunity uh for that kind of reform uh you know for more economic activity even in a crisis. I want your take on the state of the economy and the appeals for austerity.

[00:10:43]>> Well till this oil crisis came about the economy was coasting along. We're doing well. The financial system was in good shape. Investment was happening. Jobs are being created. Now our biggest vulnerability for the last 50 years has been oil burka. You can go back 50 years and see how every time oil prices went, we went into a crisis. The currency tanked and we had to borrow money once from the IMF, not again. And we had to go through a lot of pain. And despite 50 years of being vulnerable, we have not learned our lessons. We are not invested more in exploration of oil. India is supposed to have a lot of oil along the coast. We're not investing enough. We create such condition the global measures just cannot come. We have tax terrorism where pig ministers who come we harass them so much then the justice system has failed. It takes forever to get things done. We are not invested enough in public transport. We need public transport for our cities. Our cities cannot run on private transport.

[00:11:36]There are no roads. For example, in my city of Bangalore, we need 15,000 vehicles. We got 7,000 vehicles. And our minister for transportation says that he will not allow private sector to come.

[00:11:48]Why can't we have private sector buses run? The job of the government is to make sure you have policies so that everybody gets public transport. But the government runs it a private center.

[00:11:57]What does it matter? Singapore runs it through private companies. Everybody runs through private companies. We want public transport. Doesn't matter who does it. But they don't do it because they're all old socially died in the old socialist. And many of them make money.

[00:12:09]It's all a b culture because when you have public sector, you can make money.

[00:12:13]They make money. They don't want to give it up. They don't care about the public.

[00:12:16]in Bangalore or metro is 5 years behind schedule. There are 10,000 cr cost escalation. They changed 22 CEOs in the last 23 24 years. They're all is officers. When I is officer becomes a CEO, he'll be transferred in two years.

[00:12:30]Everybody knows that. Where is the certaintity? Nobody cares. And the minister sits down and don't review and then we have this kind of fights. I mean the total mismanagement of public transportation all across India is terrible. Why couldn't we have 10 lakh electric buses being built in India in the next five seven years? I think it's important. No barka let us let me give some what we need to do. We have to get what is called peak oil. Oil is the biggest. We got to get peak oil. Peak oil means oil consumption does not increase. 60% of oil consumption comes from public transportation from transportation. So we must make sure in the next 5 years 40 to 50% of two wheelers are EV, 30 to 40% of of personal cars are EV. We got to make sure all buses become EV like we had electrified the entire train system over the last 10 years. We need on a mission mode with the prime minister monitoring the mission on a monthly bimonthly basis like the Gadishhati program and we have to spend money on oil exploration all across India. We have to fund public transportation from the central government so that mobility the oil spent on mobility comes down and even it comes down 10 15% will come down. China reached peak oil last year for transportation. Okay. And about 45% of vehicles sold in China for cars is EVs now. And China will reach peak oil for total oil in 2027. And China was the largest consumer of oil in terms of increase every year. India is the second largest in terms of increases. So if we also come to peak oil prices stabilize we need all these things in a war footing not these photo ops not somebody going in a bulock cart like they used to do earlier. Remember they used to go in a bulockart area hot horse cab.

[00:14:16]>> So you're not you're not you're not impressed with these chief ministers on motorcycles and ins.

[00:14:20]>> I'm not interested. I know what they are. They go back to the bad habits high consumption huge number of vehicles corruption go back very soon. They have a photo app because Modisan made a statement. So they all had to show Modisan that they the greatest followers etc etc. They'll go back to the bad habits. I think it's very important to have a national program to reach peak oil to make sure invest heavily in public transportation to make sure we have the metros completed in time all over the country so that we don't increase oil consumption and great and in the four to five years we actually bring it down and that will make less vulnerable. Last point burka now what I'm really shocked is nobody had made a let us say a futuristic scenario or a risk management where if LPG supplies comes down what happens to us 35 cr families use LPG government of India should have created more storage we don't have enough storage in LPG we scrambled we created a crisis etc we need at least storage of oil like all other countries maybe 120 150 days we are just 60 days I Japan has 270 days.

[00:15:26]America I think has 270 days. Europe has about 210 days or whatever it is. We need all this kind of a thing on a war footing and I think it's extremely important now to use the crisis to put all this in place monitor in two or three years show real progress.

[00:15:42]>> Okay. I think that's a very uh passionate but also very specific series of points you've made moan. Let me let's pick some of them up one by one. The fuel hike. So I'll come to you. The fuel hike of three rupees. Most people believe this is an installment. It's too little. It's too modest. It's not real.

[00:15:57]Uh obviously fuel hikes in any government are political measures. Do you how do you see the fuel hike? The oil companies are bleeding 30,000 crores every month. Uh before the hike, this three rupees isn't going to really get them much sucker. How do you look at the fuel hike?

[00:16:16]>> Sucha, >> you're asking me. Oh, I thought you continue.

[00:16:20]>> Yeah. Well, you know, I think let's go back to what Mr. Pi said in the first place. You know, he's outlined a series of measures. Fantastic. All of them very good. The problem is not what people know. I mean, there are lots of intelligent people like Mr. Pi who have the solutions. And believe me, it's not just industrialists and people in finance like him. There are activists who are talking sense. We've been talking about it for the last several years. There the government is not in listening mode. I mean once you dismiss us as parasites and cockroaches then it becomes orandol and jvies it's really difficult you created an environment where bureaucrats feel that they do not need to listen so for everything whatever Mr. pie outline you need a white paper you need a policy you need implementation from start to finish so for instance let's talk about my state and Bombay okay we've had fantastic infrastructure projects you had an adult setu which I as a journalist have been writing from you know from the '9s that this was proposed in 1965 this government finally did it okay you have a coastal road it's finally built but having done that they say why are you still critical for two reasons You built that whole 16 km marvel. You did not while even after you started construction, you knew it's happening, right? Did you not think of planning for the entry and exit? Why is that happening after it's built? You have a 250 toll there and you're now waking up and realizing that you have to fix the entry and exit because you made it redundant. It is not being used even at 5%. You want to reduce fuel. If that had worked, you would have reduced use of fuel to go to New Bombay or to go to Pune or whatever. You have a coastal road. Fantastic. Okay, they've done it very well. You feel like you're in one of the developed countries when you're traveling there. It breaks your heart to see there's not a single bus. There are beautiful bus stops. We talk about public transport. How difficult is it?

[00:18:24]And I 100% agree with Mr. Pi that we need public transport that includes private and government. So we've had 40 years of you know government monopolies whether it is MSRTC or BS BST saying nobody else but us. We've reached a stage where we say that no you have to have private players you have to have app-based transport and believe me this applies even for car pooling. Car pooling is a lovely buzz word. Do you know that the traffic police went after people who were pulling cars to travel to lower parel got after them said you're driving a taxi without permission and they're going to do it all over again. So one of the issues that Mr. Pi raises all the time and again where I agree with him is how the government goes after people. Okay. So anything innovative that is being done by the private sector whether it is these buses that went from Bombay to Pune where you could just book on an app and get picked up or you know people traveling from TA and what have you because public transport doesn't exist because you cannot travel like an animal in a local train in Bombay and believe me I have done it in the early days of my career.

[00:19:33]I know what it means because I have traveled like this. You cannot do it right. So if the government stands today and says go back to using public transport, it's not possible. Why are people using two wheelers in Bombay? I keep saying that for 5 months we have absolute sweaty weather and for another 5 months we have rains. We have a 15-day winter in Bombay. Do you think people like to use two two wheelers and wear those helmets? They are doing it because they have no other option. You think the government cannot see it? In fact, we boasting about the number of new cars and new motorcycles that are registered.

[00:20:08]And believe me, if you have decent public transport, everybody who has linkages will not travel on two wheelers because it's a nightmare. It's dangerous. The number of deaths that happen are humongous. But we have no policym. We don't have end-to-end thinking. We don't listen to every constituent even those who are talking sense because you just decide that everybody who has a point of view who is not a I officer has no brains and doesn't understand or has a vested interest. So ultimately it becomes about symbolism and that's what is going to happen about fuel. You asked about fuel.

[00:20:46]We do not have petrol. We do not have LNG and we are going to create a problem because already there are small eries people who used to supply das and babe who have closed down because the cost of cylinders has gone up. If it increases further and it has to increase further it's not going to stop you unless a war ends and then it's going to take six weeks. It is going to increase further because as you said 30,000 cr a month of losses are not sustainable. So it won't be a three rupee hike. It's going to be hiked further. You already have wholesale inflation at 8%. This is going to be reflected in consumer inflation and people are going to suffer and you have no policy and no thinking about how to deal with it except symbolism and talk.

[00:21:31]Okay. So clearly you know there are a lot of good ideas that both of you have put forth but you are both frustrated by the red tapism by the slowmoving bureaucracy. Modaspi I want to come to one of your favorite subjects tax terrorism. You just said tax terrorism is real. There are experts who have said even in this moment of crisis uh the government could have lowered taxes to bring back you know to to to create an incentive for foreign investors. Uh the government could could lower long-term capital gains tax even on fuel. Uh you know the hike was inevitable but there was the one model suggesting that you could slash taxes which means the government would have had to take the hit. I want you to talk about the tax policy and what change is possible even in this moment of crisis.

[00:22:16]>> You know burka I'll talk about one real issue gold. Last year we imported 72 billion dollar of gold. We have 30,000 tons of gold. Okay. Indians are going to buy gold. Indians want gold. You can't change the habit which has been there for centuries. What does government do when there's a foreignation crisis?

[00:22:35]Increase the tax import duty to 15%.

[00:22:37]What will happen? Smugglers will come, smuggling will start, everybody will be corrupted. All these polit the political leaders will be handin glove. They'll catch a few people. Instead of that, why suggested and wrote and said, why can't you say anybody who has had gold for more than two years officially if they sell it, it'll be free of capital against gain tax. We got 30,000 tons of gold with people. Let them sell it in the market and create a local supply. a local supply coming in means gold will be available and we will have lesser imports and we will not see hike in the price and we not have smuggling. The greatest threat to our democracy is smugglers. Remember long time ago Kharim Lala and Hajim Masan were heroes in Mumbai. They made movies out of them.

[00:23:19]They became heroes. They all funded the movies. They were great heroes in Mumbai. All the film actors born before them. They made movies of them. Made movies of thugs and smugglers. Can you believe it in this country? This is the respect that bad people get and why can't I do that? I hope Nimra Sithan is listening. Do that for one year. One year no capital gains on sale of gold provided you are shown gold in your books or whatever it is. So that gold local supply comes we got 30,000 tons of gold. We're very happy it is 5 trillion 4 trillion but for God's sake do that.

[00:23:49]And the second thing second thing what they should do is very clear to me that for foreign investors foreign investors have to take the India risk. What are the India risk? No lure of law. If taxmen can harass you, do whatever you want. They done it for years. You cannot have any remedy. Even the courts don't work. That's the India risk, right? 4 and a half%. Then the currency risk.

[00:24:12]Currency is depreciating three and a half, 4% a year every year since 1991 for many reasons. Now, why can't you tell them that look if you come and invest into India, we will not have capital gains. Let them give them capital gains. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. We poor Indians will pay 12% is fine for them give it because if they bring in dollars the benefit for us of inflow on dollars is very high and I tell you another thing our goods deficit last year our goods deficit were $335 billion $335 billion in goods that means imported more goods than exported with the extra $335 billion how much that is our part of GDP is about 9% maybe 88 8 and a half% of GDP and then on services thank god services because of remittances software and others we had a surplus of something like $245 billion I think about $90 billion of whole out of $90 billion of whole $15 billion is oil $72 billion is gold so we know where to go we have to reduce oil peak oil we have to reduce the import of gold not by increasing taxes by increasing local supply incentive the people why don't you inate the poor Indians let them sell the gold let them sell the gold let the money come to the market I think it's very important to understand the dynamics of this and do those big things and the third thing like I said we got to make sure the tax dispute burka read the budget document for this year in the rece budget such please read it 39 lakh crores is the taxes in dispute of which such 9 >> 39 lakh crores 39 lakh crores >> it is the budget document 19 lakh cr is the taxes in dispute where assess is not available the assets are not available such can you believe this such you know all this stuff well 19 lakh crores and 19 lakh crores is active tax dispute 80% last 5 years in 2014 JT promised us that tax will stop that disputes are 5 lakh 45,000 crores is increased to so much what is the finance minister doing if I was finance minister I will monitor the tax dispute every 15 days ask them to go after everybody and bring down the number of appeals the huge number of it communication level they don't give uh you know they don't obey the the tribunal they don't obey the high court they take their own time I had a case at alia company infoses when we won our stock option case supreme court for three years they did not give give they did not implement the supreme court decision we had to go to court and get a contempt order against them to implement it can you believe this and who cares the finance minister care finance minister must review all this tax tax collection should not end up in tax extortion. Now they're talking about going after people who have got appeals and all and trying to get money and you know you know burka in this new bill they given the power to the tax authorities to ask you for your password for a social media and everything and in case you don't they can break into it. I went before the parliamentary committee in Bangalore under uh you know that the panda j panda and I told jay going to somebody's house and raiding is an affront against the constitution the right to privacy it has to be the rarest of ra thing when you have total evidence why don't you create a policy where you want to go into somebody and raid you should go to the court and take an order >> so get a court order and go then there's some safety for the today you know what the law says the tax officer should have reason to suspect. He goes to a higher officer and the higher officer reason to believe and they sign off and they go raid your house. Now both of them are in the same department. I wanted data to say how many times the superior authority rejected a request for somebody to go for a raid. No data, nobody cares. What are the finance minister doing? The financer there to protect us from the taxpayers and throw us to the wolves. We have no protection in this country. You go to court it takes forever. We need administrative action. We need the finance minister to say we'll protect our our you know taxpayers. We need them. Prime Minister went to parliament and say he respects taxpayers. Taxpayers have to be respected. And let me tell you one more thing ba till 2025. Last three years the direct tax collection gross was 72 lakh crores. 72 lakh crores. It's gone up in double digits every year for three years. How much did they collect from the tax rates? Nobody knows. They don't give the data. How much of the tax rates money they it came in by cash into the kitty? Nobody knows the data. They will not give the data. They want to rate because they want to go after people and do rent seeking and all kind of stuff.

[00:28:56]And I got horror stories among my friends who charter account. They come home, they lock you up, they don't allow you to go, they don't allow medicine, they threaten you, make you sign documents. What kind of a country are we living in burka? How long can we live in the country like this? Who is there to protect us? I want a prime minister who talks about all of us to protect us from these people. You have to follow the law task collection difficult job. Yes, it is difficult job. But today you have so much of data because so much of electronic data collect all the data go to court and charge people. It's okay.

[00:29:26]But why raid people? Why intrude upon their privacy? And how many of the rates have been successful in court? I get my data say 70 75% of all cases in the higher courts goes against the department. It it goes again department the tax officer penalized for uh for you know wasting the time of the government in the court in the United States burka when I was at infos we filed tax in 45 countries no country treated us as shabily as India did I was threatened by the commission of commission of income tax in Bangalore she said I will I will block all your accounts I'll stop you from operating if you don't pay some things that the demand day which was wrong in law threatening of course we went and paid and took a photograph and said you must give us an appeal when we won they never gave the appeal never give the refund for a long period of time and thus who is who is to protect us bka what do we do we are helpless our MPs don't debate in parliament such that this 39 lakh crores which is there in the budget document please see the rece budget there are no debate only in parliament what do the opposition do they stop parliament that don't debate all this this is important there are 10 cr taxpayers so much of harassment there's no debate the finance minister doesn't bother doesn't talk about it promises but doesn't do it what are we supposed to do look all this thing talk to every MNC talk to every fund see it look there'll be tax disputes it's fine when the tax dispute within two or three it has to be solved and remember the vodafone case amended the income tax act of 1961 because Supreme Court said I sympathize the government on this issue of taxation but the law doesn't provide for it they went and amend the law to say the law provided for it from 1961 one who nobody will trust you if you go back with retrospective amendment even for this indexation benefit for capital gains they did a retro and said it's not a retro is a retro and that's why they have to come back and say that we'll allow indexation for real estate Maruti had to pay 800 cr tax on because they had lost indexation on securities they should send indexation till 31st of March they did not do it who is to talk to them who is to do them and you know the response is so bad I've gone to the tax authorities nupendra mushra was there in the PMO about that angel tax.

[00:31:39]Three times they change the law to do it. Every three times they did wrong.

[00:31:44]>> They deliberately put something there which prevented the benefit from coming.

[00:31:47]BKA you can't work like this. There are reports after report Kelka report every report on tax reform.

[00:31:54]We should have tax reform in administration. Make the tax officer who does unnecess litigation accountable. It must go into their CV so that you know they will be penalized. They do have to suffer and there has to be an ombbertsman where there today burka we live in fear all of us burka in business live in fear ed will come this fellow will come that fellow has come what do we do burka people are going 50,000 hnas left this country three lakh crores of buying power he's left this country they all go away they live in fear why should they live in fear this our country we should not live in fear our political leaders have to protect us our prime minister has to protect us our finance minister had to protect We have to face the law and the law has to work. Today in the Supreme Court senior lawyers stand up and say my lord they get justice they GET ST. WHAT ABOUT US? Can we afford all these senior advocates?

[00:32:47]No. Can we go to Delhi all the time to plead? No. It's very difficult. What do we do burka? What kind of a law is this?

[00:32:54]Burka we have to raise her voice in this country. Sucha has been doing it for so many years. I know the pain she goes through. She's been doing it for everybody. She's doing public service. I mean the pain the kind of ignor you know how people treat her is so shabby look we have to have a solution we are in a crisis I want a prime minister look at all this come with it and tax is a major issue why Indians don't come and give me one minute more you know what the biggest issue for India when you grow from 4 trillion to 10 trillion cost of capital take any country with $4 trillion GDP America United America and then China Germany Japan India UK and France which below or maybe there each one of them have got cost of capital 6 to 8%. What is the C of capital 11 to 13%. Why is that? Yes, government borrowing is high is coming down because there four and a half% 5% India risk anybody who wants to India want higher returns because of risk in order to get 13 14% the 11 to 13% return on equity if you want to invest here our cost of operation will go up our cost go up you'll be amazed NTPC earns 14% post tax return guaranteed in tariff for electricity people power grid corporation earns that we paying through a nose for all kind of inefficiencies we We become a high cost economy you know burka I'm I'm so pained I'm so suta I share sucha's pain because you know she spent all her time for public cost I don't spend all my time in public causes I get upset once in a while but she sees it she sees people coming and crying the banks are not giving the money back money is not transferred after that they harass you they close your account and what does RBI do you know look at RBI you write to RBI they don't reply to you know that then what do you do you go hide a Big four, big four. They walk up and down, get you what you want. You know, if you know somebody in RBI, they give you what you want. I've had it. I know people who got it. Okay, I'm telling the truth because I I don't make such loose statements. And you know, they don't reply. I went to governors, four governors. I gone tell them, why don't you give us the right to reply within 45 days? Give reply. 45 days to reply and follow the rules. Parliament gives liberalization, RBI takes it away.

[00:35:07]And one person went to Bangalore and told them you know this RBI circle is come you know they says we don't need approval you know what the officer told him and he told me look we interpreted the way we want who are you to tell us how to interpret the arrogance I went with Raghuram Rajan to Bangalore and Rauram Rajan called the RBS staff and said why don't you meet people and tell them what you know what the RB said staff said sir they come to us for problem to the big four we give solution the big four charge a high fee so why should you give a solution can you believe it in front of Raguram Rajan, governor of RBI. Look all these all these entities who believe their god you know aria the people living in main street in that building sucha think they're saving this country from all the marauders outside precious foreign exchange is being saved by the from all the marauders outside including in Delhi they're saving this country can you believe it you I mean the attitude of these people and the big four are corrupted the entire government system entire government system is corrupted everything goes through big four every lot of papers be paid for. You go to any government office, you see them there.

[00:36:13]What a secretary is doing. They should think they should meet people. Ministers should meet people. Ministers should listen to them. There's so many brilliant people in this country. Sucha is a case in point. She works. She has deep paper solution. There's so many people like that. Listen to them.

[00:36:27]They're all This is our country. This is our country. Listen to us. We are your voters, not the big >> I I I have rarely seen Moaspai this anguished. He's always been plain spoken but rarely this anguished. Uh I it's time for final comments. So Chait, I'll come to you and then close with Mr. Pi.

[00:36:44]I know you'll want to react to everything you've heard and I'll add a small question of my own. If you had 10 minutes with the prime minister or the finance minister to make one specific measure for this crisis, what would that be? Uh and I'm sure you'll want to react to everything you've heard from Moan Pay as well. Sucha >> so you know I agree with a lot of what he's saying and I think the one single point that I would make it's not related to just this present crisis it is a complete lack of accountability I mean justice Nagarata in a speech talked about how the government is the biggest litigant right why is our judicial system non-existent he Mr. Spy talked about high cost of litigation and it's true you know small and mediumsized companies just cannot even afford to go to court they just get destroyed at least the bigger ones can live to fight can afford the legal fees can afford the 10 year and 15 year delays but smaller companies just pulled up and I see heartbreaking stories of doctors engineers whose only mistake is that they did not understand that the system doesn't work. What the tax man does, what the bank does and the fact that there is zero accountability. So we had a right to information act. RBI does not reply to anything under the RTI. They just absolutely avoid it. So when we give white papers as he said we give a white paper, we offer solutions in money life foundation. We do not get a reply.

[00:38:14]Not even the curtsy or the decency of a reply. Barring I think Shaktikant Das who would engage with us as RBI governor. Governors also would not reply. And then we file RTI saying at least that way we get to know whether they have read it. They do not reply even to RTI. But don't forget that in the last we have had one party with a majority. We are no longer in a coalition. So 11 years later, it is heartbreaking to hear Mr. Mandas Pai say that the finance minister and the prime minister should listen to us. They are not even handicapped by the so-called coalition dharma and trying to keep people together. They are a majority. So why will they not make officials accountable? All the corruption is happening. Tax officials, GST officials, government officials who won't listen, who won't reply. You give white papers to is officers, they're not listening.

[00:39:08]They're occupying every place whether it is the sebi, you know, or IDA or whatever. Everyone is a retired government officer and remember retired is important because they have finished their career. They finished lobbing for everything and now it's a synicure. How much interest do they have in changing or doing anything? They are doing you know they're whing away time for that three years and lobbying for an extension. So you when all these independent regulators were set up they said they will have fixed terms with no extension. They have forgotten that for the last 15 20 years. You had two sebi- chairman with seven year 10 years. You created a system where everyone is only looking at perpetuating that little job power synicure pel that they have. The system will never change. There has to be accountability. There has to be judicial accountability. Cases have to get over in a period of two to three years which doesn't happen. Until that happens, you can only plead. And if you do not get that with a government which has a majority, when on earth will you get it?

[00:40:13]>> Okay. Uh Maspay, I'm going to give you the closing word. Um you know, if let me ask you the same question. You did tweet the prime minister to say this on foreign travel is a terrible idea. He said it was never in the in the works.

[00:40:26]It was a fake report. If you wanted to say three things to the prime minister right now, what would they be? Well, I will tell him remove capital gains on the sale of gold within the country of India by resident Indians who have it in the kata for one year. One year only so that you know imports come down remove that 15% or keep the 15% but reduce the capital gains. Second for all foreign institutional investors remove capital gains tax. Remove capital gains tax for five years for next 5 years. Anything invested in next five years till they sell it'll be grandfather no capital gains tax because this will give you immediate benefits immediate benefits because what we need is foreign currency. We are in a precarious situation burka because please remember if this continues for the next 3 to four months oil prices have to go up by 10 15 20 rupees per liter and that will create chaos and high inflation it'll hit everybody. All right. Then growth is coming down because exports are coming down and I think it'll be very bad for us. We'll meet we'll go to and then oil may dry up. Do you know for the first time in many years total global inventory of oil has come down. It's come down by 170 million tons 170 million barrels or something. It's not a large figure in daily consumption. But much of the oil that we got now was stored in tankers and much of the tankers are gone. I mean they all been giving oil away. So the next one or two months it doesn't solve we may face a gra crisis where we are not going to have enough fertilizer as it is there no fertilizer left much in the world we are not going to have enough oil for all the countries inflation will shoot up for all the entire for most of the world because there's a short supply of oil and there'll be a crisis and that's why the the prime minister said work from home he probably preparing us for 10 20% hike over the next two or three months if things go well he's been very kind to make sure that we don't face the music for the last two and a half months.

[00:42:17]by observing all the losses. Now it's come to an end. So we need drastic solution. These are some of the things that I would tell my prime minister to do. And if I get a meeting with him, I'm sure he listen to me. I want my finance minister to listen to. Our finance minister is our representative. She's not representing the bureaucrats. She has to represent us. Listen to us. Talk to us and then go do the right thing.

[00:42:40]They don't listen. The MPs and the ministers should talk to people who elected them. We are a representative democracy. They listen. They don't listen. Treat us as subjects. We are subjects. We are all subjects. Can you believe it? We are a free country ba.

[00:42:55]But we are subjects. The ministers don't listen to us. Listen to us. We see you.

[00:43:00]You are there as our representative.

[00:43:02]You are there for us. We are not there for you.

[00:43:06]>> Absolutely.

[00:43:08]>> Well, I hope you do get that meeting with the prime minister. Uh I hope I really hope Mundas spy because when you took a position on that cess on foreign tax moments later he kind of rebuted it.

[00:43:19]So I think you have some great >> I respect him great action. I'm sure he loves all of us. He wants to do the right thing for India. But you must have a cabinet of ministers who also respond and do many things. You can't have one man who has to respond when you minister want a financial resp.

[00:43:39]He's in a very privileged position. He is the only person who criticized and is not labeled a you know antinational cockroach parasite what have you right the rest of us are. The government does not listen and you know in fact they bar you. They systematically cut you off. So sensible suggestions are seen as you know criticism. I think this has to end and it can't be just one Mr. Pi who will talk and who will get a response on Twitter because that has not changed to policy as yet. That's just a response right and how many times is he going to figure out something tweet about it and you'll have a response to that. This is a country of 140 cr people and it cannot work like this where you have all this is symbolism right and the signaling is that anyone who criticizes anyone who questions is antinational so you have created a system where every MP MLA counselor corporator feels that I will not listen to anyone who is asking a question doesn't matter that the person has a positive solution that has to change at the top otherwise it can't be asking questions.

[00:44:51]>> Okay, Mr. Pi, uh let me really give you a closing 30 second because we do have to close. Uh you you said you hope you get a meeting with the prime minister and you believe he will listen uh uh he will listen to you >> hear me out >> or hear you out hear you out. Uh do you do you have a sense of optimism that we can in fact absorb this shock? Here's the really complicated part. The war doesn't have to restart for the economy to suffer. As long as the Hormus strait is closed, even if there's a one-year ceasefire, the economic damage is just as intense.

[00:45:26]>> So, just a last word to you. Yeah.

[00:45:28]>> We Indians have an infinite capacity to suffer and to take pain. It has not been lost. We have we have suffered we have suffered pain for so many centuries. We will take it. We will come out victorious. I'm very optimistic about my country. I'm very very optimistic. India will do well. Our children will do well.

[00:45:44]They'll have a better future than we we had because we have a better future than our parents. I think India will do well.

[00:45:51]We'll suffer. We'll go through but we'll do well. I'm very very optimistic.

[00:45:56]>> Okay. We leave it there. This has been a passionate and fierce conversation. A lot of agreement between Moandas Pay Sucha Dal all of our listeners. uh I don't think there can be any disagreement uh on the need for accessible public transport and efficient public transport, working public transport, people-friendly tax policy and citizens not needing to feel that they're scared of uh of the tax walla you know that knock on the door, the tax man's knock cannot be what drives uh fear in a country that is open for business and is businessfriendly. Uh and I think that has to be underlined and underscored many times over moddal.

[00:46:33]has been uh a pleasure. Thank you so much and take care. Bye-bye.

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