Wooing foreign investors at Davos would be no gondola ride for India

Each year in late January, the Davos altitude commands a rare air of power and privilege. This year in the absence of an imminent financial crisis, income inequalities have emerged as the world's biggest threat. But the world's most elite conclave will find it hard to escape the irony. 2500 world leaders from 100 countries, heads of state to global VIPs- British Prime Minister David Cameron, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Bill Gates, JP Morgan's Jamie Dimon to Hollywood A-listers Goldie Hawn and Matt Damon are a small sample of the curry that the World Economic Forum (WEF) will serve this year.

But with an average ticket to the event spiralling $40,000, and the WEF's own global risk report highlighting the growing wealth divide as the biggest geopolitical risk today, will those accused of fostering the gap be able to offer answers? If not addressed, the discontent threatens to explode into rage, a phenomenon not dissimilar to a global Arab Spring. Oxfam says 85 people today control the same amount of wealth as half the world's population. Many of those 85 will be here. Redemption will be an uncomfortable word.

There is another glaring inequality as well - gender. With only 1 in 7 delegates a woman, names such as Marisa Mayer, Sheryl Sandberg, Christine Lagarde and India's Indra Nooyi will be few and far between.

For the 125 member India delegation the challenge will be to make India heard. In recent years as the growth gap between India and the developed world has shrunk, so has India's voice faded from the global conversation.

Even with top ministers P. Chidambaram, Anand Sharma, Kamal Nath, Praful Patel, Jyotiraditya Scindia and business chiefs Mukesh Ambani, Cyrus Mistry, Azim Premji, Sunil Mittal present - convincing foreign investors will be no gondola ride. As a country with rising inequities in an election year, economic necessities overriding populist politics is a tough climb. Even at the Magic Mountain.

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