If politicians were able to shift the rhetoric from the vaguely coined phrase “economic reform” to the actual outcomes generated by such policy change, people may even vote in favour of market-friendly reform. After all, a very large number of people have benefited greatly from the competition that reform has brought — there is no better example of this than the telecom revolution of mobile phones, which has brought cheap and reliable communications services to all manner of people. The market can be a great leveller of age-old divides.

There is also no reason to believe that the average person in India is xenophobic and anti-FDI. After all, if McDonalds brings hygienic and cheap (even if terribly fattening) food (note the popularity of the Rs 7 ice cream) to those who can afford less (it is hardly the destination of the business elite) then people will welcome it.

In essence, market-based reform delivers a larger quantity of goods and services, of high quality, at competitive prices to all manner of people — all of which were absent in India’s socialist heyday. That’s what progressive politicians should highlight.

dhiraj.nayyar@expressindia.com