Brand values made in India

Whether it is air-conditioners, home appliances, entertainment electronics, and even fast-moving consumer goods, the dominant competitors remain foreign

In the late eighties when Rajiv Gandhi’s proto-liberalisation saw a bunch of tie-ups between Indian commercial vehicle makers and Japanese giants, the trend was embraced wholeheartedly by the ramshackle cottage industries around Calcutta, as it was called then. All of a sudden on the pavement shops around Burrabazar, cheap household appliances acquired “Japanese” brand names. The local purveyors of these (mostly dud) products were strictly honourable. They did not purloin venerable labels such as, say, Nissan or Sony. Instead, they chose vaguely Japanese-sounding names, such as “Ishibishi” or “Makanishi” and so on. 

It is not known whether these businesses lasted or