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PROSPECT

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27.09.07

CORRECTING THE CORRECTORS 1st September 2007 While you’re worrying about the correct use of invaluable words such as “decimate” (“Will’s Words,”August), you might keep a closer eye on your contributors. In September’s “Washington Watch,”Tumbler writes of Alan Greenspan that “the chorus of accusations against him is rising to a crescendo.” Presumably, Tumbler means “a climax,”since “crescendo” in Italian means “increasing,” as all musicians know. If anything can rise to an increasing, I’d like to see a picture of it. Derek Robinson Bristol

LEAVING BAGHDAD 29th August 2007 I can only praise the courage of Nadia (“Leaving Baghdad,” September) for sharing her trauma, and the more so because she has not concealed her identity. Most of us who have endured similar experiences tend to shrink away from the world in our endeavour to come to terms with our personal tragedies. There is an incredible similarity between what happened to the Hayalis and what happened to my family. The Hunting Club, the mujahedin, the computers, “collaboration”with the US, Shia, ransom, masked men— all are in my story too. I was luckier then Mohammed, however. The payment of a ransom of $250,000 secured my release.

Twelve months after being released, I and my family, now stranded outside Iraq, are trying hard to rebuild our lives. The Hayali story gives me a dose of strength. Name and address withheld

INDIA’S NEW MIDDLE CLASS 1 14th September 2007 Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad’s essay (September) offers the kind of argument most observers of India would have made until May 2004. At that moment, though, assumptions about the apathetic behaviour of India’s middle class were contradicted by an election which confounded the expectations of most analysts. A BJP government which had celebrated middle-class wealth without helping the poor was beaten by a Congress/centre-left alliance claiming India would only get richer if income inequalities were reduced. In 2004 Congress’s victory was orchestrated by the poor-butnot-destitute whom RamPrasad talks about, those whose “lives are most likely to be transformed by state action.”But they were aided by the middle class. In places like Delhi, the BJP was defeated where the middle classes were uncomfortable stepping over street-sleepers on their way out to spend in new malls and supermarkets; happy in their prosperity, the middle class nonetheless don’t like the idea that they are rich at the expense of the poor. India’s last elections prove that many of the country’s

middle classes still do cling to the idea of a socially just India articulated by nationalist leaders like Nehru and Gandhi in the years before independence. They also show that India’s problem isn’t a middle class who don’t care about the poor; it’s a political system which maintains a massive gap between egalitarian aspirations and unequal realities. Jon E Wilson Kings College, London

INDIA’S NEW MIDDLE CLASS 2 2nd September 2007 Twenty years ago, my father earned 5,000 rupees a month in Mumbai—out of which we paid 2,500 on a housing loan. My choices as I entered graduation were stark—if I did not get at least 94 per cent in my exams, I would have to pay a “donation”in an engineering college, which my parents could ill afford. Jobs were hard to find. While not deprived, we gave little time to thinking about helping others. We were fairly typical of the Indian middle class at the time. Things have changed for my family—we

have been beneficiaries of the recent economic boom. I and many of my colleagues are very aware of the social and economic situation in India. Most people I know donate to charities. Many of my colleagues, having achieved a certain level of financial security, have quit to work in social organisations. And we are still “middle class.”Yes, many of us do indulge in “conspicuous consumption”— does one exclude the other? Do people in western countries not have parties while there are homeless people outside? I have spent seven years outside India, mostly in Europe and the US, and have no doubt that the average Indian has no less social awareness than people anywhere else. Samir Seth Bangalore, India

DRAMA WITHOUT THEATRE 5th September 2007 Chris Wilkinson’s article on site-specific theatre (September) contains a grave inaccuracy about the sitespecific work of the late John McGrath, stating that “McGrath himself did not

“I can’t find my Troubles”

6 Prospect OCTOBER2007