Russia's hidden capitalists

Almost a generation ago, Nikita Khrushchev predicted that communism would 'bury' capitalism under mountains of meat and butter. Not only have the Soviet Union and its allies remained heavily dependent on European free market butter and American bread but it have also failed to stamp out capitalism within their own borders.

As stunning as this may sound, there is a booming and burgeoning underground capitalist system of production and distribution that piggybacks on the official economy. Soviet capitalism has created goods that the state production has been unable to. And now, get ready for this: the private system has also produced hundreds of Soviet millionaires.

These sensational revelations about recalcitrant and successful capitalism within the Soviet Union will appear in a book to be published next spring by Simon and Schuster. The author is Konstantin Simis - a Soviet exile regarded by leading Sovietologists to be an authoritative first-hand source on the functioning of the Soviet underground economy. Simis, 61, was a successful lawyer who represented numerous cases before the Moscow courts.

India Today interviewed him in Arlington, Virginia, where he lives on a quiet tree-shaded street in a modest rented house. A small man with a pot-belly and a ready smile flashing gold-filled lower teeth, Simis speaks in hesitant English and continues to correct himself until he has perfected each sentence.