Britain pressed to rethink aid after India snubs
British Prime Minister David Cameron is facing growing calls to cut huge aid handouts to India after a series of perceived snubs.
Britain was stunned this month when New Delhi announced a big contract to buy French warplanes instead of the UK-backed Eurofighter Typhoon, despite intense efforts by the British government to boost trade.
Angry lawmakers then stepped up pressure on Cameron to axe the more than £1-billion ($1.6-billion, 1.2-billion euro) aid budget for India after reports that the Indian finance minister described the handouts as "a peanut".
Cameron -- who led a huge business delegation to India soon after taking office in 2010 -- has pledged to press New Delhi to reverse its decision on the warplanes.
More: http://news.yahoo.com/britain-rethinks-aid-india-snubs-041107269.html
= new reply since forum marked as read
LONDON — Prime Minister David Cameron is facing growing calls to cut huge aid handouts to India after a series of perceived snubs.
Britain was stunned this month when New Delhi announced a big contract to buy French warplanes instead of the UK-backed Eurofighter Typhoon, despite intense efforts by the British government to boost trade.
Angry lawmakers then stepped up pressure on Cameron to axe the more than £1-billion aid budget for India after reports that the Indian finance minister described the handouts as "a peanut".
Cameron -- who led a huge business delegation to India soon after taking office in 2010 -- has pledged to press New Delhi to reverse its decision on the warplanes.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iDQMrtNU5tjT0jw1WcRN8G03NbXQ?docId=CNG.b7b84d73ae0e2b3179e9deb594bd393e.261
Reposted with original AFP link because I found the Yahoo one erratic.
Original mention of subject here :
If India doesn't want our aid, stop it now, Cameron told after country labels £280m-a-year donations as 'peanuts'
David Cameron was under intense pressure last night to slash the £1billion in aid Britain gives to India after the country said it no longer wanted the money.
India's finance minister Pranab Mukherjee said the booming country should 'voluntarily' give up the £280million a year it receives from Britain.
He told the Indian parliament: 'We do not require the aid. It is a peanut in our total development spending.'
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2096628/British-foreign-aid-India-tells-Britain-dont-need-peanuts-offer-us.html#ixzz1m9n9nd1t
...on second look this is almost more analysis. But, meh, 3 people have already found it to be of interest and twittered it. Still interesting story in that this whole scrum basically seems to be over weapons sales. India has not just Pakistan as a security threat, but China too: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/indiahome/indianews/article-2092841/China-plays-bully-Arunachal-Beijing-tells-Delhi-work-Eastern-sector-formula.html
I may have ragged on some Daily Mail coverage in the distant past myself over I/P coverage. 
Indian Company Tata is the largest Industrial Employer in England, employing 45000 people. They also own jaguar, Land RoverTetley and Corus. Furthermore they were the only major Company to expand and hire more people while other British Companies were shrinking their workforce in the past decade.The fact that they continually get ranked annually as one of the top 5 companies to work in England does not hurt either.
That’s a lot of gloom – and, an unlikely hero can be found in an Indian brand name – Tata.
Tata, which has spent $15 billion buying Tetley, Corus and Jaguar Land Rover, has not only bucked the trend, but contrary to fears in the UK, has stayed focused in the UK and retained the original names and brands – and has grown and added numbers to the workforce it inherited through these acquisitions...Hell the Indian food-industry in Britain itself has more revenue than all of British Steel companies combined.
“Tata UK is now the country’s biggest manufacturer, with almost 40,000 workers — just ahead of British Aerospace. Bring in Tata’s service industries, such as consultancy, and the payroll tops 45,000. Its presence in Britain is part of a growing trend. Britain is second only to America as a destination for investment by emerging-market firms, many of them from India,” says The Economist.
http://www.firstpost.com/business/thank-tata-brand-india-takes-on-more-shine-in-uk-84141.html
The British MP's who complained show their ugly colonial face. India "Should" buy the Eurofighter cos they paid what? a measly 200ish million per year as aid?(around 2 bil over ten years) seriously?? This is a joke. India has paid nearly 3 Billion in Aid in the past decade to Afghanistan alone!.
In 2011 India wanted Britain to stop its aid, and apparently the British leaders asked them to keep on receiving aid because stopping it would entail "loss of face" after selling "foreign aid" to their public. Maybe the British MP's should also be informed that it was the British who robbed India blind during their centuries of colonial rule...reducing a country that had about 25% of the world's GDP before they arrived, to a measly 2% by the time they left.
notice how the Indian GDP share takes a nosedive coinciding with the formation of the British Colonial rule.
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Time for the old MP's to wake up and smell the Chai, and remember that this is not the British Raj anymore.