Thread.
The off-the-cuff promise in 2014 of "Rs 15 lakhs in every Indian's account" by bringing back Black Money allegedly stashed abroad, is very similar to the repeated promise that the Indian Rupee will soon be a strong internationally accepted currency.
The off-the-cuff promise in 2014 of "Rs 15 lakhs in every Indian's account" by bringing back Black Money allegedly stashed abroad, is very similar to the repeated promise that the Indian Rupee will soon be a strong internationally accepted currency.
The #15Lakhs promise was what wealthy Indians wanted to hear because #WhatsApp propaganda had convinced them of the obvious canard that vast wealth had been spirited out of India and stashed in Swiss Bank vaults. No rational person believed it but everyone dreamed of #15Lakhs
The promises and predictions of the Indian Rupee were just a reaction to the yearning by aspirational Indians to be able to travel and spend those 15Lakhs. Poor Indians - the majority - of course did not care whether a Rupee fetched 1 .2 US cents or 2 cents.
Into this mix of hope, dreams and expectations throw in the advent of Fintech and payments systems like UPI. Billions of transactions are made by UPI. Even small traders like the guy selling sugar cane juice at a street corner accept payment by mobile phone. Is this an advance?
In terms of technology, yes, But in welfare and devellopment terms it merely shifts the means of payment from cash to electronic. The #gannaRas guy has not graduated to selling wine. He has nothing to gain from the Rupee becoming an international currency.
Meanwhile tne internationally mobile Indian traveller finds that the Rupee is as internationally unknown as ever before. Indian bank cards dont work in retail outlets in London; and even NRIs find they cant use their plastic to pay out of their Indian bank accounts.
But the tax man has suddenly concluded that any Indian with a debit or credit card must be rich, crooked and dealing internationally. Tansferring money from a rupee account in India to pay for something abroad is still a hassle. But it is now also attracts tax.
How can the rupee be an international currency if it is not easily and seamlesstly and inexpensivlely tradable with other currencies? There is no clear map of how this ransition is to be made. but that does not stop the politicians from making wild promises
Promises that you can now pay for your #HaldiChaiLatte atop the Eiffel Tower from your UPI app on your phone and the money will be debited from your Rupee denominated Indian bank account - the same account that is still waiting for #15Lakhs. Has anyone actually done this?
None of this of course bothers or affects the sugarcane juice seller in Nagpur. He'd prefer tlo be paid in cash (one of them told me as much in Nagpur recently) but is content to be paid via his mobile phone app, if that is the only option.
If he does receive his windfall dividend of #15Lakhs, then the #GannaRas seller's wife too might dream of visiting Paris and buying that #HaldiChaiLatte and paying for it via a UPI App. By then it might well be possible but the foreign transaction tax might make get in the way.
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