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Correspondent

23 August 2024 at 4:29:04 pm

Missionary Masks

TU.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s maiden visit to India with a symbolic pilgrimage to Missionaries of Charity in Kolkata has sent out a message whose meaning it impossible to miss. The painfully familiar script is that India is a land of eternally suffering souls awaiting Western salvation. Rubio’s visit to the order founded by Mother Teresa comes amid sustained American pressure over the Indian government’s refusal to renew the organisation’s FCRA licence since 2021. The timing is not...

Missionary Masks

TU.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s maiden visit to India with a symbolic pilgrimage to Missionaries of Charity in Kolkata has sent out a message whose meaning it impossible to miss. The painfully familiar script is that India is a land of eternally suffering souls awaiting Western salvation. Rubio’s visit to the order founded by Mother Teresa comes amid sustained American pressure over the Indian government’s refusal to renew the organisation’s FCRA licence since 2021. The timing is not accidental; nor is the sudden concern from American lawmakers like Chris Smith, who now sermonise about “religious freedom” and “minority persecution” while demanding India loosen scrutiny over foreign-funded missionary organisations. India should reject this pressure outright. For decades, the Missionaries of Charity operated under a near-sacred halo carefully constructed by Western media and liberal institutions. Mother Teresa was transformed into a brand whose emotionally packaged images of wrinkled compassion amid Calcutta’s misery beamed into Western homes as proof of Christian moral superiority. Beneath the carefully cultivated mythology lay disturbing questions that were either ignored or aggressively suppressed. As the late journalist and polemicist Christopher Hitchens argued in ‘Hell’s Angel,’ Teresa’s empire was built not on solving poverty but on preserving it as spectacle. Hundreds of millions of dollars flowed into her organisation from across the globe. Yet Kolkata saw no transformation through world-class hospitals, research centres or modern public health institutions built with this money. Critics and former volunteers have repeatedly described the overcrowded facilities with poor sanitation, reused needles, inadequate medical care and even denial of pain relief. Teresa openly proclaimed that pain brought the poor closer to Christ. Naturally, this philosophy was only reserved for the destitute. When Teresa herself fell ill, she sought treatment in advanced private hospitals abroad. The contradictions did not end there. Teresa accepted honours and money from some of the world’s most unsavoury figures, including Haiti’s brutal Duvalier dictatorship. She defended fraudster Charles Keating even after prosecutors explained that his donations came from money stolen from ordinary citizens. What Rubio’s visit exposes is the deeper fraud of the global missionary industry in India. The issue is not individual Christians or genuine acts of charity. The real problem is the cynical merger of humanitarian work with religious conversion and foreign ideological influence. Schools, orphanages and charities become instruments of cultural penetration and poverty becomes an opportunity for proselytization. Vulnerable communities are taught to regard their ancestral traditions as backward relics in need of spiritual replacement. This is precisely why India’s FCRA regulations matter. No sovereign nation can allow unlimited foreign funding into opaque religious networks operating with ideological agendas. The hysteria from American politicians only confirms how deeply invested Western evangelical and church-linked ecosystems remain in India’s internal religious landscape. America lectures India on pluralism while aggressively lobbying on behalf of missionary organisations accused of financial opacity and regulatory violations. India is expected to tolerate foreign-funded religious activism indefinitely because questioning it risks offending Western ‘liberal’ sentimentality. Rubio’s Kolkata stop is a crude reminder that sections of the Western political establishment still view India through an old colonial lens - a land to be morally supervised and spiritually corrected. That door should be firmly shut.

Indian Shipbuilding A Must Win Marathon

Shipbuilding

With a coastline of 7500 KM, it is hard to imagine, that for the first 20 years (1947-1967) India had no ‘shipping ministry’. In 1967 a Shipping ministry “coupled” with ROAD transport was established. Since then, this ministry has been on a name changing ride, not once, not twice but six times. In 2009 the “ROAD Transport and Highways” was de-coupled and ‘Shipping’ ministry was formed. Turning point came in 2015 with a clear maritime vision for 2030 and 2047. Ministry was re-christened, aptly to Ministry of “Ports, Shipping and Waterways” in 2020.


Why is Shipbuilding important for a country?

a. A Shipyard becomes an opportunity hub and like a queen bee requires the support of an industrial colony to manufacture machinery and equipment.

b. National Shipyards support fleet renewal needs of the Navy.

c. Contributes to national GDP, increases inflow of FOREX.


Korea shipbuilding is 8% of GDP. Japan’s automobile industry is 2.9% of GDP. India’s shipbuilding a meagre 0.000578% of GDP. In context, India’s pharmaceutical industry, ranked third largest in the world is 1.72% of India’s GDP.


International Shipbuilding Market

The market is estimated to reach around USD 200 billion by 2029, growing at a CAGR of 4.84%. While India is at bottom with 0.07% of world share, behind Philippines 1.5% and Vietnam 1%, however on the positive side, India has done well in taking care of its defence needs, with 37 of 39 Naval ships being built in India yards. Rear Admiral S Shrikhande researching on maritime as a Fellow at Wollongong University, Australia, says “Shipbuilding in India needs both, serious incentivisation and dogged determination and not harping on being a big ship breaking country. That Garden Reach shipyard has a $54 million order for merchant ships from a German owner, is a good sign.”


Were Shipyards of 20th century in Flight mode?

Prominent shipyards in India were built in the colonial period. Mazagon Dock 1774, Garden reach 1884, Hindustan shipyard 1941 to cater to British navy and merchant fleet needs. Cochin shipyard 1972, Adani Katupalli 2013, Reliance Naval and Engineering, Rajula Gujarat 1997 and others have limited capacity, hence a lot more work to do. Capt. Subhangshu Dutt (Singapore) a mariner and now a shipowner, says “GOI should hold hands in any collaboration till the marriage with the foreign entity is reasonably stable. He also suggests that “new shipbuilding sites should be given to existing successful shipyards since they have decades of experience and talent. Consortium of 3 or more parties may also be good idea”.


Shipbuilding GOLD

As per SPLASH report the demand for LCO2 carriers could reach 2,500 ships by 2050. As per other estimates, 40% of global fleet of ships could have wind propulsion by 2050. A surge in such vessels is due to an unparallel waves of decarbonization in the shipping industry. Demand for ships with ‘carbon neutral’ badges, such as Dual fuel, Wind assisted, Nuclear fuel ships, Hydrogen powered ships, Liquified CO2 (LCO2) carrier, is outstripping supply. A must in the ‘bucket list’ of every Shipyard. Pinning down a standard ROI in shipbuilding is not easy, but experts suggest it could range from 4% to 15% for the high demand ‘carbon neutral’ ships. While an LNG new build vessel could cost US$ 250 million upwards.


International collaboration

On China’s shipbuilding success story, Manoj Pandalanghat (Singapore) a mariner and ship owner believes that “China has around 50 active Shipyards. Each have a few large dry docks. In each dock two or more large vessels are built simultaneously. Thus, a single yard is able to roll out 2/3 vessels/month, 36 vessels/year and 50 shipyards roll out 1800 vessels/year”.


China could be a jaldi-5, but India needs a sturdy Mount Fiji. Besides technology, Japanese bring the most important hand baggage of soft-skills and culture, essential for success from keel laying to delivery. Maruti’s is a standing example.


Food for thought for New Delhi

a. Expertise: Hire Naval Architects and shipbuilding experts with current international experience.

b. Government assistance: Land, Financial support, subsidies and timebound clearances.

c. Monitoring: PMO should monitor the first 5 to 10 years till Shipbuilding takes-off on this long-haul flight to destination 2047.


India’s Shipbuilding is expected to grow to $237 billion by year 2047. On a back of the envelope calculations this works out to about 4% of India’s 2047 projected GDP of $ 5 trillion. While cars are driven on roads, however the Ministry of roads and transport has little to do with “Automobile manufacturing”. On a similar note, ‘Shipbuilding’ as an industry has little to do with Ports, Shipping and Waterways, thus it may be worthwhile to consider a separate ‘Ship-building’ wing in the Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways headed by a dynamic cabinet rank minister. Since 2047 targets are stiff and an uphill task, so in all probabilities, the officials in Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways are likely to push beneath the carpet, delays and failures of Shipbuilding with sweet success stories of “Ports, Shipping and Waterways” and if this does happen then India will not only miss the Shipbuilding bus of 21st century but a lot more from a national security and strategic perspective.


(The author is a Shipping and Marine consultant. Member Singapore Shipping Association and empaneled with IMO as a specialist consultant. Views personal.)

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