I agree. I am a resident Indian who has lived and travelled outside.
But what you have described - the ruthlessness - is universal. In EU, SG, JP, SK, AU, UK etc and yes of course definitely in USA. Just that that ruthlessness is garbed in nicer clothes there.
In India medical sector pushing families to bankruptcy is seen as ruthlessness and abroad it’s called “oh, they didn’t have (the right) medical insurance” among many things. It becomes process, it becomes something of a “technical” aspect and it’s conveniently brushed aside as not being a social issue at all. Both are horrible.
And oh yes, the rich and the privileged are fine everywhere. They have passion, they have an unflinching desire to help others.
A rich friend of mine (from a boarding school I was in on a scholarship) used to volunteer in Africa during her college breaks. The expense was born by her father of course and the expense of one summer would often be more than what was my yearly salary for couple of years initially in my career.
What you see is not crumbling culture of India. Because if we go with this definition towards any change then every culture is constantly crumbling. What it is, I’d say, is rapid change in every aspect of this country. People rapidly trying to come out of poverty, trying to get big, and bigger.
I don’t claim to understand all this, because I don’t. This is too complex of a topic (a bunch of topics really) to be explained in a matter of a comment. I often see many nuances of this place, which are not even nuances to us, missed when seen from a romantically nostalgic lenses.
As for the Taj itself it’s a victim of a melee of things ranging for religious politics to rampant corruption. A lot of people in the current state and central Govt would rather see it razed to the ground and I’m not exaggerating. There’s been precedence for such phenomena in our country. And the experience of Taj, at least for me, has been filthy, crowded, smelly, hurried, and anything but romantic. It’s far from what all see in the glorified pictures when, usually when world leaders visit, probably the entire place is off limits for public and the compound was made photo ready just for the show.