In a classic case of flag following trade, America’s first green field oil refinery in 50 years is to be constructed and operationalised by Reliance Industries at an astronomical project cost of $300 billion under the supervision of Mukesh Ambani, Chairman of the company. This unprecedented contract has restored India in the good books of America and in particular, its mercurial President Donald J. Trump. On this issue of momentous significance, India’s champagne socialists and their cheer leader in Parliament for whom Ambani-Adani — India’s most successful businessmen — are anti-national hate figures, are silent.

Like the Bourbon dynasty of 16th century France who learnt nothing and forgot nothing, this lot led by the latest  peripatetic scion of the Nehru-Indira dynasty seems to have learned nothing from the sad history of post-independence India after great-grandad Jawaharlal Nehru imposed inorganic neta-babu socialism upon newly free India, and for over 50 years annual GDP growth averaged 3.5 percent (against the global average of 5 percent).

Fortunately in the 1970s, Mukesh’s late father, super entrepreneur Dhirubhai Ambani, devised the strategy of going over the heads of the neta-babu brotherhood directly to the public to raise funding for his great projects. For this ingenuity, champagne socialists and their media chorus labelled him corrupt. After Dhirubhai’s demise in 2002, Mukesh has built RIL into a global powerhouse corporation (annual revenue: Rs.10 lakh crore), transforming RIL’s petrochemicals division into one of the most advanced crude oil refining complexes worldwide. Hence the invitation from President Trump.

Despite this, Rahul Nehru-Gandhi continues to ascribe Mukesh’s incredible success to favours received from Prime Minister Modi. Even though Russia and China have jettisoned socialism, in the Bourbon tradition, this champagne socialist and his “intellectual” chorus have learned nothing from the history of bankrupt socialism.