Indian soft power sways China

From films to food to fashion, Indianness is gradually acquiring brand equity

HONG KONG: “You Indian?” asked the old man in Beijing, who had only minutes earlier invited me — a passing stranger — into his courtyard home to give me shelter from the rain. “I know Indian song.” 

Here it comes, I told myself: given his age, I figured I was in for yet another rendition of the title number from Awara, an old — and abiding — favourite among the Chinese for unfathomable reasons. If you’re an Indian in China, sooner or later someone, typically over age 60, wants to croon “Awa-la hu” to do their bit for “Zhongua-Indu pangyau” (China-Indian friendship). 

But this time I was in for a surprise. The gloriously wrinkled old man, who must have been 70 if a day, swayed his septuagenarian hips and belted out a pulsating disco tune from Kal Ho Na Ho. “I’ve seen the movie three times,” he said, grinning toothlessly. 

That Bollywood ‘soft power’ is winning hearts and minds in China isn’t really a surprise: after all, it’s hugely popular all over the world. But today, India is gaining visibility in China across the entire cultural spectrum. From films to food to fashion, Indianness is gradually acquiring brand equity in China. 

“In China, there’s a heightened interest in all things Indian,” says NIIT (China) president Prakash Menon, one of the ‘old China hands’ in Shanghai. “Today, if you go to an Indian restaurant in Beijing or Shanghai — and even in Tier 2 cities — at least a third of the customers will be Chinese people. And if you go to a club or a discotheque, you’ll hear AR Rahman for sure.” 

Sensing a growing market for Indian culture, Anita Garg and Jyoti Ramesh, who run Jade Group International, an event management firm in Hong Kong, plan to take more events to Shanghai and Shenzhen. 

One Indian who has profited hugely by promoting Brand India is Munuswamy ‘Antony’ Gnanavelu, who runs a $70 million food empire in China, including 22 franchises of the Indian Kitchen chain of restaurants. “I want Chinese people to get addicted to the curry,” says Antony. “And then I want to promote Indian cuisine all over the world.”

MH Pastakia, who owns Taj Pavilion, an Indian-cuisine restaurant in Beijing’s business district, says that Chinese food preferences, like those of Indians’, is deep-seated. Which is why he considers it his crowning glory that in 2004 the Taj Pavilion was adjudged Beijing’s best by readers of a city magazine. 

Indian fashion designers too are gaining a foothold in China. A while ago, Ritu Beri presented her designs in Beijing, and Menon recalls that it had a huge impact. “You couldn’t go to a high-end party in Shanghai without seeing her label,” he says. 

In 2004, Koshish Ek Aasha, a popular 24-episode TV serial produced by Balaji Telefilms, debuted in China, courtesy of Shanxi TV station and Beijing Nuerhong advertising company. The soap-operatic tale of a marriage that goes horribly wrong when the protagonist realises on her wedding night that husband has a mental illness proved uncharacteristically popular. 

Tragic as the new-bride’s experience is, it also means that “Indian culture” in China today stands for much more than just infinite renditions of “Awa-la hu”. For that, I give many thanks. And not just on rainy evenings in Beijing.