Connecting Singapore’s Temasek to the Chinese government is just indulging in idle conspiracy theories. Singapore, least of all Temasek, does not take any cues from China. Singapore (and ASEAN in general) see China as an economic and geopolitical threat, and see India as an counter-balance.

Indeed, Singapore’s greater economic engagement with India has as much to do with this need to counter-balance China as it has to do with investment opportunity.

Connecting Singapore’s Temasek to the Chinese government is just indulging in idle conspiracy theories. Singapore, least of all Temasek, does not take any cues from China. Singapore (and ASEAN in general) see China as an economic and geopolitical threat, and see India as an counter-balance.

Indeed, Singapore’s greater economic engagement with India has as much to do with this need to counter-balance China as it has to do with investment opportunity.

There was a news report in Rediff about a year back which criticised the FDI inflows in India. There was no way it could be monitored and hence the big hoopla behind the same. China needs to subvert India in many ways. Primarily through border skirmishes( it still raids Arunachal and surrunding areas), Tibet, and encoraging Pakistan. Indians have been stupid enough to open up their infrastructure to foreigners- China would want to have a pie in that too.

Plus of ocurse, introduce their own standards. Hence, they are investing heavily in the new generation Internet( which would give them substantial royalties after it is patented) and equipment manufacture. It is following the same policies as to what the “western world” did for agriculture-subsidies. Hence, the cheap doesnt mean the best. Think about it. BSNL has been dumb enough to merrily shove down Huawei modems through our throats.

There was a news report in Rediff about a year back which criticised the FDI inflows in India. There was no way it could be monitored and hence the big hoopla behind the same. China needs to subvert India in many ways. Primarily through border skirmishes( it still raids Arunachal and surrunding areas), Tibet, and encoraging Pakistan. Indians have been stupid enough to open up their infrastructure to foreigners- China would want to have a pie in that too.

Plus of ocurse, introduce their own standards. Hence, they are investing heavily in the new generation Internet( which would give them substantial royalties after it is patented) and equipment manufacture. It is following the same policies as to what the “western world” did for agriculture-subsidies. Hence, the cheap doesnt mean the best. Think about it. BSNL has been dumb enough to merrily shove down Huawei modems through our throats.

Singapore telecom firms are run very efficiently. They have mighty ambitions and have invested all over Asia (Singtel Optus in Australia, plus a few more in Indonesia and Philippines). It is not a backdoor for Chinese firms to enter into India. Singtel has invested directly in Bharti. Temasek (Singapore government’s VC / private equity fund) is a big shareholder in SingTel. Similarly Temasek has a big shareholding in ST Technologies telemedia which has invested in idea cellular (along with JV partner telekom malaysia). There is definitely a conflict of interest here as Temasek directly / indirectly has stake in two telecom operators in India.

S’pore as a country (Temasek to be more precise) has been very aggressive on investing in India. They have a foothold in sectors like budget airlines, pharma, IT, biotech, banking.

You have a nice blog. Keep up the good work.

Singapore telecom firms are run very efficiently. They have mighty ambitions and have invested all over Asia (Singtel Optus in Australia, plus a few more in Indonesia and Philippines). It is not a backdoor for Chinese firms to enter into India. Singtel has invested directly in Bharti. Temasek (Singapore government’s VC / private equity fund) is a big shareholder in SingTel. Similarly Temasek has a big shareholding in ST Technologies telemedia which has invested in idea cellular (along with JV partner telekom malaysia). There is definitely a conflict of interest here as Temasek directly / indirectly has stake in two telecom operators in India.

S’pore as a country (Temasek to be more precise) has been very aggressive on investing in India. They have a foothold in sectors like budget airlines, pharma, IT, biotech, banking.

You have a nice blog. Keep up the good work.