Millions of impoverished Indians may inundate Russia

India dreams to get rid of tens and maybe even millions of its own citizens and deliver them to Russia. This idea was voiced yet again by Indian officials during the recent Moscow-Delhi video conference. The conference was organized by RIA Novosti and was dedicated to to the state of affairs in the BRICS organization (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa).

A question was raised during the conference about a possible immigration of a considerable part of the Indian population to Russia. Alexander Apokin, an expert with the Center for Macroeconomic Analysis particularly stated the following: "If some people in India will find money and labor resources to work in Russia, it will be a promising development of events. Hundreds of millions of people will be able to find work."

Tatiana Shaumyan, the director of the Center of Indian Research of the Institute of Oriental Studies, said that such methods are already being practiced towards the Chinese in the Far East of Russia. "The Chinese use that. They bring capital and people and they work here," she said.

The Indians may face certain problems if they move to Russia. Russian winters can be too cold for them, not to mention the fact that they do not know the Russian language, Shaumyan added.

It is not the first time when Indian officials talk about a possibility of sending millions of Indian nationals to Russia. In 2010, Indian officials offered to simplify the migration regulations with Russia. They also say that some countries suffer from climate change and need to redirect their human resources to other countries of the globe which suffer from the shortage of their own human resources.

Yevgeny Khakimullin, an expert on tourism to India, said in an interview with Pravda.Ru that if some Russian officials support the above-mentioned propositions, then it only means that those officials have never been to India.

"Those who say that hundreds of millions of Indian migrants will bring a lot of good to Russia have most likely never been to India. They don't know anything about the country either. First and foremost, the Indians can handle cold weather very well. One may not doubt about the fact that they will get along with Russian winters well. It is naïve to believe that there is no cold weather in India. It can be very cold there, especially near the Himalayas.

"The Indians are sounding out opportunities for the time being, but they will continue to promote their idea more decisively in the future. One way or another, Russia should say no to these ideas even if the country gets criticized for xenophobia. Water and land - all of that are strategically important national resources. These resources belong to our generations, which we have no right to bargain away. The last thing that Russia needs is to become a semblance to the filthy and stinky Indo-Gangetic plain. The memories of my visits to those Indian territories give me shivers.

"The persistent desire of the Indian side to get rid of hundreds of millions of people is very easy to understand. First and foremost, it goes about the population of the plains of Indus and Ganges rivers, which makes up 700,000 million. Most of those people live in horrific anti-sanitary conditions. You have to see it with your own eyes to realize that. Those who have not been to those areas can watch "The Slumdog Millionaire" to get the picture. In the movie, they build skyscrapers over the slums. In real life, though, the slums do not go anywhere, and Russia runs the risk of bringing all of that over.

"The situation has become even more serious due to the climate change. It became much hotter in India than before. Forty percent of Himalayan glaciers have disappeared. Droughts occur more frequently than before too. The Indians have nowhere to go. They face a serious threat of national famine, so they are trying to put the cart before the horse. They will continue to put pressure on Russia at this point. Why Russia you may wonder? Because Russia is virtually the only country in the world where there is a lot of uninhabited land that is good to live on.

"There are people in Russia who say that the decrease of the population is a national catastrophe. In this case, they believe, it could be good to attract migrants from other countries. But we have a lot of them already.

"The worst thing about it all the the fact that the Indians who may come to live in Russia are not needed in their homeland. Those IndianIndia dreams to get rid of tens and maybe even millions of its own citizens and deliver them to Russia. This idea was voiced yet again by Indian officials during the recent Moscow-Delhi video conference. The conference was organized by RIA Novosti and was dedicated to to the state of affairs in the BRICS organization (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa).

A question was raised during the conference about a possible immigration of a considerable part of the Indian population to Russia. Alexander Apokin, an expert with the Center for Macroeconomic Analysis particularly stated the following: "If some people in India will find money and labor resources to work in Russia, it will be a promising development of events. Hundreds of millions of people will be able to find work."

Tatiana Shaumyan, the director of the Center of Indian Research of the Institute of Oriental Studies, said that such methods are already being practiced towards the Chinese in the Far East of Russia. "The Chinese use that. They bring capital and people and they work here," she said.

The Indians may face certain problems if they move to Russia. Russian winters can be too cold for them, not to mention the fact that they do not know the Russian language, Shaumyan added.

It is not the first time when Indian officials talk about a possibility of sending millions of Indian nationals to Russia. In 2010, Indian officials offered to simplify the migration regulations with Russia. They also say that some countries suffer from climate change and need to redirect their human resources to other countries of the globe which suffer from the shortage of their own human resources.

Yevgeny Khakimullin, an expert on tourism to India, said in an interview with Pravda.Ru that if some Russian officials support the above-mentioned propositions, then it only means that those officials have never been to India.

"Those who say that hundreds of millions of Indian migrants will bring a lot of good to Russia have most likely never been to India. They don't know anything about the country either. First and foremost, the Indians can handle cold weather very well. One may not doubt about the fact that they will get along with Russian winters well. It is naïve to believe that there is no cold weather in India. It can be very cold there, especially near the Himalayas.

"The Indians are sounding out opportunities for the time being, but they will continue to promote their idea more decisively in the future. One way or another, Russia should say no to these ideas even if the country gets criticized for xenophobia. Water and land - all of that are strategically important national resources. These resources belong to our generations, which we have no right to bargain away. The last thing that Russia needs is to become a semblance to the filthy and stinky Indo-Gangetic plain. The memories of my visits to those Indian territories give me shivers.

"The persistent desire of the Indian side to get rid of hundreds of millions of people is very easy to understand. First and foremost, it goes about the population of the plains of Indus and Ganges rivers, which makes up 700,000 million. Most of those people live in horrific anti-sanitary conditions. You have to see it with your own eyes to realize that. Those who have not been to those areas can watch "The Slumdog Millionaire" to get the picture. In the movie, they build skyscrapers over the slums. In real life, though, the slums do not go anywhere, and Russia runs the risk of bringing all of that over.

"The situation has become even more serious due to the climate change. It became much hotter in India than before. Forty percent of Himalayan glaciers have disappeared. Droughts occur more frequently than before too. The Indians have nowhere to go. They face a serious threat of national famine, so they are trying to put the cart before the horse. They will continue to put pressure on Russia at this point. Why Russia you may wonder? Because Russia is virtually the only country in the world where there is a lot of uninhabited land that is good to live on.

"There are people in Russia who say that the decrease of the population is a national catastrophe. In this case, they believe, it could be good to attract migrants from other countries. But we have a lot of them already.

"The worst thing about it all the the fact that the Indians who may come to live in Russia are not needed in their homeland. Those Indians who can afford a better life travel to developed Western countries, such as Britain and Canada. Russia will only have to welcome endless crowds of impoverished inhabitants of the slums. If this idea comes true to life, it will kill Russia.

"The Indian government will try to get rid of the dangerous burden. There are many fundamentalists among Indian Muslims. It is simply enough to take a look at them to understand that. For example, practically all women over 12 years of age wear niqabs - the clothes that completely cover their face, body and even their fingers. The level of the inter-religious violence in the country is very high. All of that may come to Russia if Indians begin to migrate here.

"Taking into consideration the speed of the growth of the Indian population, one may say that they will inhabit everything in Russia very quickly. It is incredibly silly to believe that those people will be able to develop the Russian agriculture. Some apparently believe that the Russians can't do it. I'd say to this that they have very good harvests in Orenburg, in Kuban and on Don.

"Let's take, for example, other countries that lie on the altitudes similar to those of Russia. They are Canada, USA's Alaska and Scandinavia, for instance. The combined square of those countries is comparable to Russia's territory, with approximately the same amount of arable lands. However, there are only 60 million people living in those counties. It seems OK for them, they are happy about it, and their GDP is twice is large as that of Russia. Russia needs to learn the lessons that Britain has recently been given instead."

Sergei Balmasov

Pravda.Ru

Read the original in Russian