Should we spend money rescuing NRIs?

Non-resident Indians and Persons of Indian Origin do not pay tax in India for the money they earn. We are just grateful if they send money to family back home here, and view that as a great source of income to India. We are glad when they buy property in India, even if their intention is to sell it again shortly and take their money back to the countries they now belong to.

We are glad too to be of help to them when they are in distress. When Indians are in trouble in Egypt, it is right that we pull them out and bring them back safely to India.

But the question the Indian taxpayer is now asking is, who should pay for all this? The Indian government, using the taxpayers' money? The Indians who went there to make money, and have surely made enough of it to spend on securing their future? Or even the companies that sent Indians there to work on projects?

The newspapers report how upset Indians in Cairo are that they had to pay almost double the airfare to come to Mumbai on a special Air India flight arranged for them. They shelled out close to Rs 50,000 ($1,000) for a ticket.

'I am really disappointed at the Indian government,' the Indian-origin operations director of an Egyptian computer company was quoted as saying. 'At a time like this, Air India is charging more than double the normal fare!'

Air India is picking up passengers even if they don't have the money to pay the fare if they undertake to deposit the cash at the nearest passport office in India within five days of arrival. When these people went to Egypt to earn money, why should their exit from there be subsidised? If they suffered losses in Cairo, surely that was a business risk they took?

Likewise, if engineers sent to Egypt have to evacuate from there quickly, the company who sent them there should get them back. The situation of Indians who go to countries like Kuwait and Saudi Arabia should be treated differently, because these Indians hardly ever invest their money there. They send all their money home, and it goes into boosting the Indian economy. So, it is only right that the Indian embassy in Kuwait helps a few thousand illegal Indian immigrants to either resolve their illegal status or get deported back home safely.

The Indians who live in First World countries are loud in their insistence that they will not pay tax here. "If NRIs are taxed in India, they will simply stop sending money back to India or use various creative methods available," threatened Yogesh Chabria, a PIO and author of The Happionaire Way. "Even if they were to invest in Indian equities, they could form a company abroad and route money through Mauritius (or any other tax haven) and make sure it is completely tax-free. NRIs are already made to pay heavy taxes in their respective countries or work/residence. In addition to this, if they are to also pay taxes back home in India, they will simply stop sending money back home. A hardworking man leaves his home in search of work abroad, should he be punished even more for it?"

Fair enough. But, by the same coin, should the hardworking man who works hard in India, spends his money in India and contributes to the growth of the Indian economy, pay for the man who works abroad to be helped to come back home? Or even fight his battles for him?

"We should ensure that we stand up for them, when they are faced with discrimination, racism and security threats," continued Chabria. "Our government is too soft on a lot of issues internationally--if we don't stand up for our rights, we are committing the biggest sin. In the Gita we are taught that the biggest sin is to tolerate injustice."

But what really constitutes injustice? When Indians in search of the dollar dream enroll in a blatantly fraudulent American university that permits them to live all over the United States and work there run into trouble, should the Indian government really step in and help them? If some of them seem to have gone there purely with the intention of melting into the great Indian diaspora in the US, is the American government that wrong for slapping them on the ankle with radio collars?

Understandably, Indian Foreign Minister S M Krishna, who loves to talk about his days as a graduate student of Southern Methodist University, Dallas, is indignant. But many--if not most--Indians are not in favor of spending their hard-earned money on such causes.

M D Riti is a Bangalore-based journalist