Money and the Englishman by Nirad C. Chaudhari- An Analysis

 

Nirad C Chaudhuri at the opening of the chapter says that he did now not give a good deal of interest to the economic stipulations and issues of England due to the fact he was no longer in a position to recognize them. He is now not only ignorant of the challenge but even contemptuous of it. But at the same time, he stresses the truth that economics as a problem can't be prevented because it has its position in day-to-day human life and plays an important position in deciding the improvement of a country. He points out that he will talk about the Englishman’s relations with money from a moral standpoint.

 Nirad C Chaudhari explains that it is very difficult to get information from the English about their habits with money. Here hypocrisy rules the roost. He had to resort to indirect means to get the suitable information out of an Englishman.

 In the chapter Nirad C Chaudhuri sings the praise of the Englishman for his general ‘non-attachment’ to money; and, at the same time, compares and contrasts it with what Chaudhuri terms ‘religious symptoms of the love of cash in the Hindu Society’. There have been no non-secular signs and symptoms of cash in an English home, in contrast to in India where, at home and in shops, Lakshmi or Ganesh is worshipped. He failed to find in the residence of an English family a non-public shrine for a god or goddess of money and such a shrine is exactly the component one can't escape noticing in each normal Hindu home. In the shops, too, he missed the photo of any god who was probable to be a counterpart of 'Ganesa’.

 

About the religious practices at home, he has this to say: ‘‘Our religiosity covers every factor of money-making, including the dishonest and violent. There were no more dedicated worshippers of the Goddess Kali than the Thugs.” And in contrast “Christianity does not seem to have been directly involved in financial transactions, and so far, as I have read the Anglican liturgy I do not find in it any reference to money-making although there are prayers for protection against natural calamities.”

 About the Indian pundits he says, there is no different country in the world today in which the tribe of pundits known as economists is held in greater honor. He asserts that India has become an El Dorado for every type of economist from each part of the world. We have formed here an economic cult which is a combination of American, English, German, French, Soviet, and Japanese economies. In fact, as Chaudhuri asserts, the economic cult is so closely related to the religious cult in the Hindu society that it prompts him to comment: “Ever since the Rigvedic age we have had economic gods and we shall continue to have them. Just as we do not even now leave medical treatment solely to the doctor or the surgeon, but requisition the priest and the astrologer. So also, we call upon the gods to help us in our economic and technological ventures even in what is described in current economic jargon as the public sector. For instance, when the great dam at Bhakra was formally opened there were Vedic rites to ensure its success.” In the personal sphere, Indians still rely upon the occult powers for their success.

 

He also asserts that in his society money-making is an open conspiracy, if it is a conspiracy at all. We do not, however, regard it as such. In his eyes, it is an occupation that can be avowed with pride by every honest and honorable man. Indeed, as long as we remain in the world we are expected to put money above everything else.

 

Chaudhuri failed to see in the Englishman’s mindset to money the sordidness he finds amongst Indians. According to him, it is unthinkable to find in India the smoothness with which English humans put through their economic transactions. They pay their dues immediately and regularly, very readily part with money and without a second’s thought, trust individuals in money matters. All this offers a strong contrast to our society in which Chaudhuri says, the willingness to pay decreases as the ability to pay increases. Chaudhuri used to be exceedingly impressed by the industrial honesty of the English people. They comply with the principle that the love of money, in order to be enjoyed, needs to be restricted. Moreover, the Englishman believes in dwelling in style. He is no longer involved in hoarding money like the Indian. 

 

The author tells us that spending is the positive urge of the English people. For them spending is ideal and frugality is the practical correlative of that ideal. But for Indians, hoarding is a pleasure as well a virtue and spending, a strict duty but normally a pain. The English always expected to live in style and they were careless about money.

 

What excites him is the fact that the banks and shops are so lenient and honest in cash matters. Commercial honesty in England amazes him. He calls it a virtue of the highest order. But English people refrain from all types of ‘shop-talk. But in India ``money-making is an open conspiracy.” In a lighter vein, Nirad Chaudhuri remarks that money-making is as significant as love-making in the West.

 

English society deems it very undignified to openly discuss monetary problems and strategies of acquisition, a very unusual habit in humans who are described universally as shopkeepers and capitalistic. But this displays certain negative elements of the English character. The financial world is truly divided into two: the party of spenders and the party of savers. The difference is between the misers and the spendthrifts. But this is the case from the point of the income of view- “...love for cash in order to be enjoyed need to be restricted”.  The scene is one-of-a-kind when it comes to spending- “On this side, there was as a whole lot assertiveness as there was once secrecy on the other ''. Nirad Chaudhuri perceives spending to be the fantastic urge of the English people and saving as a corrective measure. He offers an insight into the psyche of Indians and the English in relation to money. For the Indians, hoarding is a pleasure. Unlike the English, we can't spend money in a planned and deliberate manner. Money is synonymous with temptation, passion, and panic.

 

The range and abundance of commodities in a shop amaze a man who has in no way been exposed to the thinking of ‘choosing’ from amongst items- “I suppose I need to have gone mad if I had to figure out about clothes, or furniture, or glass, or china”. There is a hierarchy in spending too. London has its very own share of low-cost and pricey stores. But Cambridge is for the middle-range. The English middle-class is not comfortable in a Bond-street shop. They feel shy because of their sartorial style, which is now not up to its mark when in contrast to those of the immaculately attired shop assistants. But the traveller in Nirad Chaudhuri enjoys to its heart’s content- “I can hardly ever say how it gladdened the heart of a spendthrift in both principal and...my means...to find myself in a country in which spending was once respectable. I appreciated the English people for their devotion to spending that's the way the cash goes”. Nirad Chaudhuri’s experience with the English financial affair is an eye-opener. He feels that people in England are fond of ‘style-in-living’. There is continually a desire for a high standard of living. So, “the fine use of money is to spend it on the desirable things of life”. A notion that is an anathema to the Indian mindset.