Coca Cola

Coca-Cola’s farewell to Kerala

Image courtsey: alibaba.com

Should not have rushed in to this state when no one else dared to tread. Good bye Coke! Wish you good and trouble-free business in Orissa under the youthful CM Mr. Naveen Patnaik!

The Coke is finally bidding farewell to this land of obscurantism. They have decided to dismantle their production unit at Plachimada in Palakkad district, Kerala, the plant will be relocated in Orissa state in North India coming under the “bemaru” banner. The word bemaru (word in Hindi means diseased) is a short form for Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan Orissa and Utter Pradesh. The word “Bemaru is quite meaningful as all these states are dogged by poverty and illiteracy.

It was the activist and Janata Party minister Mr. George Fernandez who first waged a war against the “colas” and made them close shop and go. Everybody knows such activism led India with less than one billion dollars as foreign exchange reserve and had to pledge reserve gold for paying imports. Later the reformist Mr. Manmohan Singh re invited them to India along with numerous other multinationals. All those who accepted the invitations were prudent enough to avoid the state of Kerala as they guessed the ground realities correctly.

Image courtsey: esprit.maxg.info

What happened to Coke is hard to guess they mistook the invitation by the Marxists (the same party who now raise cudgels against the company) as genuine. The consequences we all have seen the company was forced to vacate after spending a lot of money on litigations and measures to appease the local people who were instigated by the Marxists and so called activists.

The company could not get the court orders in its favor to get implemented as the local government came to power also happened to be Marxists and the council did everything to get rid of the factory. Their allegations were that the company draws ground water and pollutes the village by its effluents. Moreover it was alleged that their products contain pesticides in alarming rates.

All the pleas of the company fell in to deaf ears; the accusing local bodies never accepted the company’s invitations to sort out the problems and kept on doing everything to see the company downs its shutters. Several local people lost their jobs and the state as well as the local body stands to lose substantial revenue by means of tax and other incomes. When stray activists devoid of responsibilities come to wield enormous power and neglect the court which is only empowered to issue judgments anything can happen.

People of Kerala are not activists and they have no hatred towards multinationals, they consume products which are good in quality whether it is made by local or others. The colas are sold in Kerala as much it is sold elsewhere. But they are not organized and don’t pay much attention to these activists.

The presence of Coke is considered as the symbol of American imperialism by the so called Marxists and this stuff is being sold in abundance in China – in anyway better communists than them- do not matter to these people. Chinese government knows the worth of the multinationals and they let them flourish and let their people gain the benefit, is why China is growing to be world’s largest economy.

Image courtsey: my.opera.com

What the government of Kerala has done can they name any company that has come to invest here actually done it why have they gone back? If everybody runs away from one there must be something objectionable, instead blaming them for running away is not the way.

There must be serious introspection on the part of the government otherwise youth of Kerala will be destined to flock to other parts of the world and suffer discriminations there, all for want of some commonsense on the part of the rulers. The deal the Coke has got from this state will definitely remain as a scar on the face of the government for years to come.