Interview with Vinay Shukla

Vinay Shukla is a journalist for the Press Trust of India who lives and works in the Russian capital.  He shared with us his opinion of Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov, who was appointed for a 5th term in office on Wednesday.

Russia Today: How long have you lived in Moscow? How much has the city changed since you've been here?

V.S.: It would be almost 40 years now that I know Moscow, because I came here in 1968 to study at Moscow State University. I spent my best years in Moscow. And it has certainly changed a great deal for the better. It’s more friendly to people living here.  But then we have also lost many things in Moscow, things that were really good but are no more.

RT: Speaking about Mayor Luzhkov, what positive and negative changes has he brought to the city? Is such a long stint in office good or bad for the city?

V.S.: One thing that I want to say about Mayor Luzhkov is that at the time of crisis in the country, when Russia was breaking up, he managed somehow to control the situation in the city, and Muscovites felt really quite comfortable. It takes things like that, you know, when a great country undergoes historical change. And at that time here in Moscow things were under control.  The transport system was more or less functioning, there was no breakdown in the civil infrastructure.  And his biggest achievement, I would say, was that he ensured a smooth transition from a communist to a capitalist system. Of course, there are a lot of things that could have been done better – this is life – but his greatest achievment was in managing the smooth transition from one system to another.

RT: How friendly is Moscow to foreigners?

V.S.: You see, this is a big question. It’s good for white people. But racism – you can feel it, I can feel it in Moscow. This is a new thing.  People who are not white feel quite uncomfortable walking in the night.  I know cases when there were attacks on people. And the question is who the foreigners are – the biggest number of foreigners are from former Soviet republics. And Moscow is certainly not friendly to them.