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We are Like that
Only: Understanding the Logic of Consumer India
Ever since economic reforms, India has come to be seen by manufacturers in terms of the number of mouths or the hands that can consume their products, and since, as the author aptly puts it, "the great Indian rope trick of numbers" plays a significant part in determining their success. Hence they need to understand a market that has no parallel. Many multinational companies (MNCs) have come to grief when they come across Indian consumers who don’t respond as consumers have done in other countries. They are also handicapped by their inability to appreciate the continuity with innovative change that has always been the hallmark of this ancient land. The author delves deep into the Indian consciousness to explain away the contradictions that goes into the making of a people who worship Ram and Krishna as separate entities and yet accept their being the incarnation of Lord Vishnu, thereby reconciling all the contradictions and contrasts in their character. She also recognises the fallacy that as more and more women begun to move out of their homes to create a niche of their own, they will bring back that attitude back to their homes and radically transform its management. This does not happen as she is as comfortable in her contradictory roles as we are with the idea of Parvati, Durga and Kali being the three faces of the same goddess. In fact, this is the strength of the author as she is at all times aware of the possibility of the Indian consumer not being swayed by what is being offered by the West. This, however, is not to suggest that the book is only about the psycho-socio responses of the Indian consumer. She is rich on facts and figures and richer in understanding that since there are various classifications of consumers because of the high numbers, the companies need to identify the class they wish to cater and then draw their strategies accordingly. Often companies in search of ‘East India’ fail to appreciate the contradiction between figures of consumption and income and the fact that this is the only society in which Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth, is worshiped with great fanfare and yet where a large number of people continue to frown upon the display of wealth. The good news that she brings to people in search of the Indian market is that the Gandhian generation is dwindling, the midnight generation accepts the pleasures of life albeit with a little sense of guilt but the number of those who have taken to consumerism is burgeoning. The new and multi-layered India might continue to be steeped in tradition but one cannot help but notice that this does not stop it from assimilating change. Thus, ‘aarti’ is performed by the click of the mouse and the belief in astrology strengthened by the easy casting of the horoscope by a computer. It might be difficult for coke to displace water from our definition of hospitality but then the adoption of the ‘alloo-tiki’ by a MacDonald is an example of how to go about the consumer India. In fact, there is a lesson to be learned from history. There would have been no blood bath of 1857 if the English women had not put a spanner in the growing number of white Mughals. India will change on its own terms and sooner the CEOs of MNCs learn this, the better it would be for them.
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Rama
