Theoretically, another platform — the telecom network — can work equally well. By this theory, distance is irrelevant, with communications technology making geography inconsequential. But when at stake is, say, the $12 billion buyout of Corus by Tata Steel, and where returns are in hundreds of millions, eye-to-eye negotiation becomes necessary. Even if one set of eyes is blue and the other black. Money doesn’t have any colour and moneymen reflect this material Oneness on the negotiating table.

For one black moment let us assume that Mumbai-IFC is and will remain a dream. Even then, we cannot allow petty politics to hijack the economic success of a city that’s vital to us and watch it burn from the metros of Delhi or Bangalore, large cities like Jaipur or Bhubaneswar, small towns of Sikar and Dhar, villages like Hansdehar and Chavakkad. Here’s why.

More than one in four of India’s largest companies have their registered offices in Mumbai, almost two out of five have their headquarters there. All told, these companies generate a turnover of almost Rs 11 trillion (45 per cent of the total sample) and command a market capitalisation of Rs 17.5 trillion (33 per cent). These companies manage millions of workers who are scattered across India, and not restricted to Mumbai.

And they can’t be — from its Maker Chambers head office, Reliance can’t build a Jamnagar refinery in Mumbai; Tata Steel functioning out of Bombay House can’t run its steel plant in Mumbai; not all of Ballard Estate-based Larsen and Tubro’s projects are in Mumbai; not all State Bank of India’s loans are scattered around Madam Cama Road. RBI, SEBI, NSE, UTI, ICICI — these are not institutions of, for or by Mumbai; they belong to India.

... contd.