Foreign News: Advice of a Mutual Friend

• Share

Sirdar Jagjit ("J.J.") Singh, a successful Manhattan importer, a U.S. resident for 30 years, and head of the India League, has long been India's No. 1 self-appointed lobbyist in the U.S. In New Delhi last week, on his way home after a two months' visit to India and India's leaders (including Nehru), Singh spoke up in the sorrowful tones of a mutual friend.

India, he declared, should refuse to accept any more U.S. aid.

"The fact that India receives U.S. aid," said Singh, "creates certain expectancies in the U.S. which India is rightly not willing to meet. That in turn creates disappointment and bitterness in the U.S., thus worsening Indo-American relations . . . The fact is, U.S. taxpayers are sick and tired of shelling out their money to foreign countries and particularly to countries which are not in their corner. And India is not in their corner."

Added Singh: "I am equally against receiving aid from Communist countries." He was not opposed to U.S. firms selling machinery or industrial plants to India on "mutually suitable credit basis," or to U.S. capital investing in India "on our own terms"; he just did not want any more U.S. Government money. "Not only will most Americans welcome such a move, but it will increase our national prestige. Instead of being treated as 'ungrateful beggars,' we will be treated with more dignity and respect."