الرئيسية
MUMBAI, India (AP) — Ajay Piramal is sitting on a mountain of cash.
Yet the billionaire Indian tycoon, working in one of the world's fastest
growing economies, is struggling to figure out what to do with the
money.
The problem isn't opportunity, he said. It's India.
"Every large investment, there was no transparency," Piramal said.
His
dilemma is a worrying sign for India. With the country mired in
corruption, bureaucratic red tape and unclear and changing government
policies, many of the men who made their billions here are saying maybe
it's time to quit India. It's got to be easier to do business elsewhere.
In
May last year, Piramal's healthcare business sold its generic drug
operations to U.S. pharmaceutical giant Abbott Laboratories for $3.8
billion. Piramal, a tall big man in a country that still measures
prosperity by girth, was eager to set that cash pile to work. He wanted
to expand one of his chemical plants, but was told it would take five
years.
"The same plant could be set up in China in two years," he said. "I love India, but my customer is not going to wait."
India,
still a beacon of relatively fast growth despite a troubled world
economy, should be a magnet for capital. Instead, since the beginning of
2010, the amount that Indians have invested in businesses overseas has
exceeded the amount foreigners are investing in India, according to
central bank figures.
In part this reflects the confidence and
aptitude of India's maturing companies and the current malaise in the
global economy and financial markets. But it also reflects deep problems
at home. India's big coporations may be cash rich but the failure to
invest that money domestically is bad news for a developing country that
needs capital to build the roads, power plants and food warehouses that
could help lift hundreds of millions out of dire poverty.
The
frustration of India's business elite with corruption, political
paralysis, log-jammed approvals, regulatory flip-flops, lack of access
to natural resources and land acquisition battles — to pick a few of the
top complaints — has reached a pitch perhaps not heard since India
began liberalizing its economy in the early 1990s.
Yet the billionaire Indian tycoon, working in one of the world's fastest
growing economies, is struggling to figure out what to do with the
money.
The problem isn't opportunity, he said. It's India.
"Every large investment, there was no transparency," Piramal said.
His
dilemma is a worrying sign for India. With the country mired in
corruption, bureaucratic red tape and unclear and changing government
policies, many of the men who made their billions here are saying maybe
it's time to quit India. It's got to be easier to do business elsewhere.
In
May last year, Piramal's healthcare business sold its generic drug
operations to U.S. pharmaceutical giant Abbott Laboratories for $3.8
billion. Piramal, a tall big man in a country that still measures
prosperity by girth, was eager to set that cash pile to work. He wanted
to expand one of his chemical plants, but was told it would take five
years.
"The same plant could be set up in China in two years," he said. "I love India, but my customer is not going to wait."
India,
still a beacon of relatively fast growth despite a troubled world
economy, should be a magnet for capital. Instead, since the beginning of
2010, the amount that Indians have invested in businesses overseas has
exceeded the amount foreigners are investing in India, according to
central bank figures.
In part this reflects the confidence and
aptitude of India's maturing companies and the current malaise in the
global economy and financial markets. But it also reflects deep problems
at home. India's big coporations may be cash rich but the failure to
invest that money domestically is bad news for a developing country that
needs capital to build the roads, power plants and food warehouses that
could help lift hundreds of millions out of dire poverty.
The
frustration of India's business elite with corruption, political
paralysis, log-jammed approvals, regulatory flip-flops, lack of access
to natural resources and land acquisition battles — to pick a few of the
top complaints — has reached a pitch perhaps not heard since India
began liberalizing its economy in the early 1990s.