'This US polls rewrote history of the world'

India's Minister for Overseas Indian Affairs and Parliamentary Affairs Vayalar Ravi, keynoting the 15th biannual convention of the National Federation of Indian Associations, said the election of Senator Barack Obama as the new President of the United States had rewritten not just the history of America, but the history of the world.

 

"We are meeting at a time here in Seattle, when the people of this country -- the people of the United States --have written not only the history of America, but the history of the world," he said.

 

Ravi said, "President-elect Obama is a hope and inspiration for the new generation of the world and I people that people all over the world look at him as a new person committed to change--hope for change."

 

He reiterated that besides "an inspiring and profound message to the world," Obama's election as the 44th President of the United States, was also "a message of inclusive and equitable growth, of peace and prosperity".

 

Ravi told the NFIA members and delegates attending the convention from across the country that "as citizens and residents of this great nation, all of you have an important role to play in shaping the future success of the United States".

 

He said the "United States is today home to the largest Indian expatriate population in the world -- Indo-Americans now number over two million.

 

Ravi also said, "The Indian Diaspora is today estimated at about 30 million and spread across 130 countries.

 

He said that when he first came to the US three years ago, the Indian Diaspora was 25 million. "In three years, five million more (have been added), throughout the world."

 

Then to much laughter, Ravi said, "Already we landed in the moon (Chandrayaan 1), so I don't know when they (the Indian Diaspora) are landing there."

 

But in all seriousness, he said, "The story of the great Indian Diaspora is truly the story of ordinary people with extraordinary courage and enterprise --to

which all of you belong. It is a story of struggle and success."

 

Ravi spoke of how "overseas Indians have transformed the economies of the countries that they chose to go to. And today, they comprise one of the largest, most diverse, best educated communities wherever they reside, which of course, you know, but I'll repeat what you know."

 

And then he went on the enumerate the success of the Indian American community both in terms of having the highest media income in the US to their professional success, and once again, with his signature wry humor quipped, "There are over 200,000 Indo-American millionaires --and I am targeting them later."

 

"And, at the end of the speech, I'll tell them what I want them to do," he added to loud laughter.

 

Ravi also gave his take on the current financial crisis and the Wall Street meltdown, taking a hefty swipe at the deregulation in the United States that had led to a virtual free-for-all ignited by the sub-prime crisis that have now spread to retail credit markets, the banking system and the bail-out package at the expense of the US taxpayer.

 

"We are witness to the biggest taxpayer bailouts of international banks and corporates across the US and Europe, unprecedented in history," he said. "But India had an advantage."

 

Ravi argued that thanks to the nationalization of insurance in 1956 by then Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, "LIC is the strongest finance institution today without even a scrap on it for more than 50 years."

 

"Now, the banks have been nationalized and 27 nationalized banks and Reserve Bank –the Central Bank -- is functioning with a regulated framework. It's not a free-for-all. It's a regulated framework because Government of India believes –and you as part of the Diaspora will also agree—that public money must be safe in the hands of the government."

 

Ravi said it is "the bounden duty of the government to protect the public money. That's what we are doing in India—did in India. That is why we could survive any economic tsunami that we pass through."