Trinamool Congress Party supporters, covered in green paint to show their party allegiance, celebrate outside the residence of the leader Mamata Banerjee in Kolkata yesterday, after she crushed the ruling Communist Party of India (Marxist) at elections, taking 200 seats to the latter's 70. Jayanta Shaw / AFP
Trinamool Congress Party supporters, covered in green paint to show their party allegiance, celebrate outside the residence of the leader Mamata Banerjee in Kolkata yesterday, after she crushed the ruShow more

Communists ousted in Indian election



KOLKATA, INDIA // The world's longest-serving democratically elected Communist government came to an end yesterday with a crushing defeat for India's Marxists in the West Bengal state elections.

The Left Front government, led by the Communist Party of India (Marxist) or CPI (M), has ruled the state uninterrupted for 34 years, but has recently faced a surge of popular anger at the stagnation of the economy and a series of violent attacks on villagers.

The results showed a huge swing to the Trinamool Congress Party, led by the populist figure of Mamata Banerjee and allied to the ruling Congress party in New Delhi. It took 200 seats compared with the CPI (M)'s 70.

Ms Banerjee addressed an ecstatic crowd - many of them splattered with green paint to show their party colours - outside her Kolkata home. She said: "This is the victory of the democracy, it is the victory of the people. This is a second independence day for Bengal."

Results were also announced in three other state elections yesterday.

There was more bad news for the CPI (M), whose government in Kerala narrowly lost out to the Congress party.

The most damaging result for the central government was in Tamil Nadu, where the Congress-allied Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) party was almost wiped out by the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) in a vote that was widely seen as a referendum on recent corruption scandals. A member of the DMK, the former telecoms minister A Raja, has been charged with underselling mobile phone licences at a cost of US$39 billion (Dh143.13bn) to the exchequer. He is currently in jail awaiting trial.

In the north-eastern state of Assam, the incumbent Congress party swept to a resounding victory, which Tarun Gogoi, the chief minister, credited to his success in containing numerous separatist insurgencies that have plagued the state for more than 20 years.

But it was the result in West Bengal that has the widest implications for India. Much of the Communist defeat has been blamed on two infamous incidents in the towns of Nandigram and Singur between 2006 and 2008, where government attempts to acquire land for the construction of chemical plants and a Tata car-maker factory met strong resistance from local villagers.

In December 2006, members of the CPI (M) were accused of raping and burning to death a teenage girl involved in the agitation at Singur. Three months later, 14 people were killed at Nandigram when police opened fire on protesters.

The towns quickly became symbolic across India for the growing rural resistance to industrialisation, and Ms Banerjee skilfully positioned herself as a champion of the movements.

It was a dramatic fall from grace for the Marxists, who had carefully cultivated a reputation as the defenders of the poor and oppressed. For decades, the party rode a wave of popular adoration for the radical land reforms it introduced shortly after coming to power in 1977. Under a policy known as Operation Barga, the government distributed thousands of acres of surplus farmland to landless peasants, breaking the grip of feudal landowners and creating a new class of propertied peasants. The party combined this with a widespread decentralisation of power to village councils and the introduction of new agricultural techniques - particularly a high-yield form of rice known as "boro".

"The impact of all these measures was witnessed in later years, particularly during the period from the mid-1980s to 1990s, when the state recorded the highest rate of growth of agricultural production in the country and rural poverty diminished dramatically," said Buddhadeb Ghosh, a former civil servant and now senior fellow at the Institute of Social Sciences in Kolkata.

But after the initial rush, the reform movement began to stagnate.

"By the time it was elected for the second term, the Left seemed to have exhausted all its ideas," said Mr Ghosh. "From 1982 onwards, its major aim was to stay in power."

There were further problems to come when India began liberalising its economy in the early 1990s.

"The opening up of trade meant an end to subsidies from the central government on things like fertiliser and diesel," said Abhirup Sarkar, a professor of economics at the Indian Statistical Institute in Kolkata. "It also led to increasing competition from foreign markets like Thailand."

By the turn of the century, 14 per cent of those who had been given land under Operation Barga had abandoned it in search of employment elsewhere. But there were few opportunities to be found.

A combination of militant trade unions, unscrupulous employment practices and efforts by the federal government to undermine its Communist opponents had led to a steady decline in West Bengal's industrial sector.

Since the 1980s, it is estimated that 56,000 factories have closed across the state, forcing hundreds of thousands into precarious occupations as rickshaw pullers, cleaners and other unregulated parts of the informal sector.

While the state's GDP has continued to tick along just below the national average - buoyed by a modest IT sector that employs only a small section of highly educated graduates - it has been overtaken by the southern states where the bulk of India's recent services boom has been focused. West Bengal has also amassed huge debts, estimated at close to US$44 billion (Dh162bn) at the end of last year.

Underlying many of the government's failures were disastrous attempts to reform the social character of the state, particularly through education. "The party abolished English from the curriculum of primary classes and tried to replace the popular textbooks by books written by academics loyal to the party," Mr Ghosh said.

"Its textbook projects were criticised as an attempt to brainwash children with Communist ideas."

Although these measures were later abandoned, the CPI (M) became a victim of its own success in politicising and organising its members. CPI (M) cadres and unions infiltrated almost every sphere of political and social life. Loyalty to the party became more important than merit and qualifications, with adverse implications for everything from theatre groups to its once-renowned universities, and even the health sector.

"Eighty per cent of the pharmaceutical market in West Bengal consists of unscientific, irrational and even banned drug formulations," said Jana Swap, the joint secretary of the Health Services Association, an advocacy group in Kolkata. "But because the drug companies do deals with the doctors' unions, and because they are affiliated to the party, the government doesn't do anything about it."

Many are sceptical that the Trinamool Congress will be able to reverse the state's decline, despite Ms Banerjee's promise to "make Kolkata look like London very soon". But there is hope that an end to partisan politics will at least free the state from the stifling control of party loyalists.

"Trinamool has its partisans like anyone," said Prof Sarkar.

"But I expect better governance, not because it's more efficient but because its organisation can never be as powerful as the Communists were."

21 Lessons for the 21st Century

Yuval Noah Harari, Jonathan Cape
 

THE LIGHT

Director: Tom Tykwer

Starring: Tala Al Deen, Nicolette Krebitz, Lars Eidinger

Rating: 3/5

The Sand Castle

Director: Matty Brown

Stars: Nadine Labaki, Ziad Bakri, Zain Al Rafeea, Riman Al Rafeea

Rating: 2.5/5

Poacher
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What it means to be a conservationist

Who is Enric Sala?

Enric Sala is an expert on marine conservation and is currently the National Geographic Society's Explorer-in-Residence. His love of the sea started with his childhood in Spain, inspired by the example of the legendary diver Jacques Cousteau. He has been a university professor of Oceanography in the US, as well as working at the Spanish National Council for Scientific Research and is a member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Biodiversity and the Bio-Economy. He has dedicated his life to protecting life in the oceans. Enric describes himself as a flexitarian who only eats meat occasionally.

What is biodiversity?

According to the United Nations Environment Programme, all life on earth – including in its forests and oceans – forms a “rich tapestry of interconnecting and interdependent forces”. Biodiversity on earth today is the product of four billion years of evolution and consists of many millions of distinct biological species. The term ‘biodiversity’ is relatively new, popularised since the 1980s and coinciding with an understanding of the growing threats to the natural world including habitat loss, pollution and climate change. The loss of biodiversity itself is dangerous because it contributes to clean, consistent water flows, food security, protection from floods and storms and a stable climate. The natural world can be an ally in combating global climate change but to do so it must be protected. Nations are working to achieve this, including setting targets to be reached by 2020 for the protection of the natural state of 17 per cent of the land and 10 per cent of the oceans. However, these are well short of what is needed, according to experts, with half the land needed to be in a natural state to help avert disaster.

COMPANY PROFILE
Name: HyperSpace
 
Started: 2020
 
Founders: Alexander Heller, Rama Allen and Desi Gonzalez
 
Based: Dubai, UAE
 
Sector: Entertainment 
 
Number of staff: 210 
 
Investment raised: $75 million from investors including Galaxy Interactive, Riyadh Season, Sega Ventures and Apis Venture Partners
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.

Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.

Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.

“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.

Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.

From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.

Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.

BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.

Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.

Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.

“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.

“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.

“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”

The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”

Paatal Lok season two

Directors: Avinash Arun, Prosit Roy 

Stars: Jaideep Ahlawat, Ishwak Singh, Lc Sekhose, Merenla Imsong

Rating: 4.5/5

How to protect yourself when air quality drops

Install an air filter in your home.

Close your windows and turn on the AC.

Shower or bath after being outside.

Wear a face mask.

Stay indoors when conditions are particularly poor.

If driving, turn your engine off when stationary.

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The Cairo Statement

 1: Commit to countering all types of terrorism and extremism in all their manifestations

2: Denounce violence and the rhetoric of hatred

3: Adhere to the full compliance with the Riyadh accord of 2014 and the subsequent meeting and executive procedures approved in 2014 by the GCC  

4: Comply with all recommendations of the Summit between the US and Muslim countries held in May 2017 in Saudi Arabia.

5: Refrain from interfering in the internal affairs of countries and of supporting rogue entities.

6: Carry out the responsibility of all the countries with the international community to counter all manifestations of extremism and terrorism that threaten international peace and security

The specs

Engine: 4.0-litre, twin-turbocharged V8

Transmission: nine-speed automatic

Power: 630bhp

Torque: 900Nm

Price: Dh810,000

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If you go
Where to stay: Courtyard by Marriott Titusville Kennedy Space Centre has unparalleled views of the Indian River. Alligators can be spotted from hotel room balconies, as can several rocket launch sites. The hotel also boasts cool space-themed decor.

When to go: Florida is best experienced during the winter months, from November to May, before the humidity kicks in.

How to get there: Emirates currently flies from Dubai to Orlando five times a week.