INDIA: Private Enterpriser

For a discouraging 2½ years, handsome Tiruvallur Thattaf Krishnamachari, Madras businessman, spoke up for private enterprise in India. As Nehru's able Minister for Commerce and Industry, Krishnamachari believed that "the private sector" could make a sizable contribution, even to Socialist-minded India. Last fall, when the government decided that India needed more steel mills, Krishnamachari proposed to give a contract to India's wealthy G. Birla interests. Pandit Nehru said no.

Nehru's government decided instead to let Russia put up the steel mill. Russia, keen to show the Indians that it can match the Westerners in industrial know-how, offered to put...