How Indian could have saven LEHMAN BROTHERS

I happened to run in to Nanubhai on Dalal Street. He was eatingKhaman Dhokla in a farsan shop..
'Kame chho, Nanubhai?'
'Saru chhe.'
He was looking glum but gestured me to join him.
As I bit into the tasty dhokla with tangy chutney on the Fridayafternoon,which was fast turning into a 'Manic Friday' as per Dalal Streetlingo,he was staring at the bull near the entrance, which overnight hadbecome a Russian bear hugging everybody that passed the Street.
Nanubhai is a well-respected Dalal Street dada with an answer toevery shareholder's query.
'What went wrong with Lehman Brothers?' I asked. 'Lots of things. If the founder brothers, Henry, Emanuel andMayer were alive this wouldn't have happened. Lehman Brothers were morethan a 150-year-old company. But yet, it had no Lehman in the company.Such a situation can never happen in India.'
'Are you trying to tell me an Indian would have handled thisdifferently?'
'Bilkul. If it was an Indian firm, Lehman Brothers would havefought as soon as their father died and divided in to three companies.They could have diversified into clothing, polystyrene, petrochemicals,vegetables, movie making, telecom, drilling oil, mobile phones,retailing, books,spectacles, gyms, wellness. In short, anything andeverything under the sun.They would have made money for themselves andtheir shareholders.'
'But when there is massive failure there would be no option butto file for bankruptcy?'
'Fail-wail chance hi nahin! Even if they encounter tough times,they would have friends like Mulayam Singh and Amar Singh to bail themout.They could finish off competition by befriending the finance ministerand getting duties levied on the imports of competition. They would fundand befriend ruling parties. Unfortunately for Lehman Brothers in 2008,without a Lehman on the board or some Indian business brothers at thetop, they couldn't open the survival kit to stay afloat.'
As we were sipping double kadak chai, I asked: 'Did anybodyanticipate this global meltdown?'
'Anticipate? Mazak chodo! I will tell you something. America hassome 45 Nobel laureates in economics from 1970. From 2000 alone there are15 Nobel laureates in econometrics sitting on company boards, treasurybenches and in places like Harvard, Stanford etc. Kisiko kuch patha nahintha!
How come none of these had any inkling to the disaster awaiting thebanking circles all over the world? Even the finance ministers of G-7talked of strong 'fundamentals' of world economy around this time lastyear! Two months back the only topic they were discussing was the rise inoil prices.'
'What will happen if it goes all on like this?'
'Some American economist will study this, write a new a theoryand get Nobel Prize next year, dekhna. Seriously, they forgot things likecontrol, double check, systems-in-place etc and brought in vague words
like Subprimes to give loans left, right and centre.'
'What will happen to the Indian market?'
'It's already having the Lehman Brothers' effect. Our financeminister seems to like the figure 60,000. While presenting the budgetearlier in the year he pledged Rs 60,000 crore to write off loans givento farmers.Now he is pumping Rs 60,000 crore to help out the banks! I don't know whathe will do next. He is again from Harvard!'
'What is the lesson to be learnt from the Lehman Brothers'episode?' I asked as we were leaving.
Nanubhai took a spoonful of saunf and said: 'You know, we have anold elementary rule for keeping hisab-kithab. Divide a page into'Left' and 'Right' with a line in the middle to denote Debit and Credit.In case of LB,as somebody said, nothing was right in the 'Left' andnothing was left in the 'Right',' concluded Nanubhai.