One might then hypothesise, with reasonable circumstantial evidence, that lobbying by the Indian business community has worked and that's why, despite her objectionable conduct and manifest incompetence, Priti Patel can do no wrong, and has somehow warranted a promotion to the Home Office. It smells like a backroom deal in exchange for the Indian business community (or parts of it) supporting Brexit. Boris Johnson and Priti Patel said the food sector would be able to employ more chefs from south Asia.
Both Priti Patel and Boris Johnson made a big show of the Save Our Curry Houses campaign set up by Vote Leave. They said they would ensure the industry would be able to get more chefs from South Asia by relaxing immigration rules.
This is where Brexiteers become victims of their own bullshit. I do not imagine for a nanosecond that the message sent at the ballot box was to close down freedom of European movement so we could import more curry chefs from the back hills of dysfunctional third world provinces, but having embraced the weak narrative that the EU immigration regime was exclusionary and racist (See, look! we really aren't racist), the pretext is there for the Tories to make good on their grubby little deal with the Indians.
Being that the Tories need the Indian vote in key inner city marginals, and are only too happy to accept donations from Indian millionaires, it makes sense to put a British Indian in a position of influence. It cannot be a coincidence that it just happens to be the Home Office. While the Labour party sucks up to Muslims, the Tories are exploiting the Indian vote.
This is something EUreferendum.com has explored recently, noting that we are drifting to a point where national elections will be decided in a handful of constituencies based on the ethnic minority vote where issues such as Kashmir will have more influence on the outcome than local bus services or GP funding. A major vulnerability in our democracy.
As to Patel, the Tories love her. She is awfully useful. She's a Brexiter (insofar as she believes in anything at all, ambitious career woman that she is), but one with brown skin which is doubly useful. And then with Indians presently having it in for Pakistani Muslims, they have an agenda in common. But the enemy of the enemy (to coin a clumsy phrase) is certainly not our friend. Allowing India a proxy foothold on the inside of our government is a mistake.
As the UK starts to run with its Global Britain agenda, seeking any FTA we can get, attentions will soon turn to India. The left have been busy hyperventilating over a trade deal with the USA - which doesn't especially keep me awake at night, and probably won't happen, but the real worry is climbing into bed with India.
India is not a good country to do business with. Central to any supply chain is trust. Efficient logistics depends on eliminating customs formalities such as inspections and audits. That can happen when both parties trust each others inspectors and standards but that is unlikely given India's track record, especially in the food sector.
Food adulteration is acute. This is the process in which the quality of food is lowered either by the addition of inferior quality material to bulk out the weight, or by extraction of valuable ingredients. It includes intentional addition or substitution of the substances, but also biological and chemical contamination during growth, storage, processing, transport and distribution of food products. In India it is an epidemic.
Far worse than this is fake and adulterated medicines, often lethal, which again is a serious concern. As much as procedures are not followed and standards auditing is poor, local officials are very often easily bribed and paperwork is often forged.
Reading around the subject we have seen that Indian officials very often have fake qualifications bought off the black market so there is little possibility of recognising Indian safety systems and inspections as equal - and the lack of security at ports often means goods are substituted or simply stolen.
Meanwhile, for all that we're complaining about the EU's demands for a level playing field, that is a demand we almost certainly will ask of India. Western consumers tend to be fussy about animal welfare standards and labour conditions. We want to know that the clothes we wear are not made by child slave labourers and that workers get a fair day's pay. The UK would likely demand that India commits to the conventions set out by the International Labour Organisation. And that isn't going to happen. They may adopt them, but they won't be meaningfully enforced.
Similarly on trade in services the UK would be opening itself up to a wholesale theft of intellectual property. India is also unlikely to honour commitments on data protection. In 2017 data theft increased by 783% in India. If you speak to anyone who has ever outsourced UK software development to India, their advice is "don't". They're dishonest actors and there is no saving to be had. There is no polite way of saying it but India is a corrupt country from top to bottom. It is a caveat emptor society ever keen to exploit the unwary customer.
This is why the current trajectory on Brexit is a serious worry. Without a deal with the EU, safeguarding nearly half of our trade, we can't be too choosy about who we do deals with to make up the export shortfall. It is entirely possible that the Tories are unwittingly doing a deal with the devil by cosying up to the Indian "community". Closer ties with South Asia generally could turn out to be a security threat and a domestic liability. If Huawei was cause for a national panic then the state and industrial espionage that goes with Indian commerce, particularly in defence, is something we should be on high alert to.
There is more than a whiff of corruption between the Tories and various Indian businessmen who in all likelihood are lining up with the other vultures to cash in on a hard Brexit. I'd certainly like to have a nosey at Rees-Mogg's portfolio. Since, for obvious reasons, we will protect our own market from Indian exports, the only thing we have to trade with that India (a remittances economy) wants, is visas. Right wingers may well be cock-a-hoop that Patel is making all the right noises, but only a fool would trust the Tories. They'll drop their immigration red lines with India if they can line their own pockets.
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