Part 3
By Ahmad Cameron,
The Politician
For today’s generation let me cite one politician and freedom fighter with whom I have interacted personally for years. He has remained the youngest Lok Sabha MP till 1985 general elections. His name is Shri Moti Lal Malviya who lives in a very modest house in the F Block of Model Town-I, Delhi! His son has been my classmate and close friend, so I used to visit their house very frequently. The drawing cum visitor’s room at the entrance had just four chairs without cushions, a diwan and a center table. There was no sofa in the whole house! Can anyone imagine a today’s MP having just an old Lambretta scooter, which always remained parked inside? All his four children studied in Government rather in private public schools. It is legislators such as Malviya Sahab who carried the first two decades of independent India’s politics on their shoulders. Unfortunately, whether it is the functioning of the Legislative assemblies in the Provinces or the Parliament at the Center, there are almost no more role models left for the younger generation to emulate such as Malviya Sahab. Since 1980s as coalition governments at provincial and center have become a reality, the number game decides who will and can get what in the end. Media starts writing the tug of war going on between the political partners for bagging coveted ministerial portfolios. Further, the politician is not sure if he/she will retain the seat as there is no certainty of completing the full five year term in the office. Costs of conduction of election campaigns have gone through the sky. Hence politics today is another form of entrepreneurship – the way an industrialist invests in a venture so do the politicians’ families. Pick up few of the successful political families and you will see within the larger family, its members have divided the political spoils in a very shrewd manner by ensuring all major political party have one of their family member as its active member.
Though there exists a Bill whereby an elected member cannot change a party on which he/she got elected invoking the laws of defection but the law is more on paper than practice. Two examples prove the point. If at the centre one saw a 13 day miracle of Vajpayee’s BJP government in power, it got beaten in its tracks by a 3 Day wonder of Congress supported government in Uttar Pradesh under Jagdambika Pal. But cherry on the cake came from Gujarat under Suresh Mehta’s Chief Ministership of BJP Government. The Chief Minister was in coma when a no confidence vote was contested on the floor of the assembly and through fictitious means BJP, which had experienced a split, was allowed to retain power!
On the other hand accepting bribe by political leadership is now considered no taboo. The role models were set by Narsimha Rao as Congress PM, Bangaru Laxman, L K Advani, Madhu Koda, Yeddyurappa of BJP, George Fernandes, Jaya Jaitley of Samta Party, Lallu of RJP, Raja of DMK, Shibu Soren of JMM etc who wrote political corruption history of India when their involvement in taking bribes came out in media. Courtesy of our judicial system in the end “nothing could be proved against these”! It does not end here alone. On grounds of morality our politicians have set global records and Silvio Berlusconi, the PM of Italy or Bill Clinton of USA, come nowhere near them. Take the example of Narain Dutt Tewari, a Congress stalwart of politician, a freedom fighter, many times holding CM and Cabinet Minister positions had to step down on being caught on tape indulging in group sex sting operation right inside the Governor’s residence!
Simultaneously, the nexus of politicians and hard core criminals in past 50 years has reached its lowest ebb. Today harboring and nurturing of criminals is being carried out by politicians of both the leading political parties. If Manu Sharma in Jessica Lal or Sushil Sharma in the Tandoor murder cases had Congress backgrounds, then Sunil Joshi, Col Purohit, Sadhvi Pragya, Aseemanand are from the BJP/RSS band. Not to forget Babu Bajrangi, who was sheltered by active connivance of Modi, the Chief Minister & his Ministers after Gujarat 2002 pogrom, is now sitting in the laps of Bal Thackrey by switching over to Shiv Sena. No wonder the saying “politics is the last refuge of scoundrels” indeed is true!
Fifth State
After independence, media or the fifth state in the form of Radio and TV remained under wraps to a large extent of the Government. DD and AIR had the monopoly. Indira Gandhi was the master in the art of using the masses to her advantage. After losing the 1977 elections and coming back in 1980 she ensured never to let her control on masses go astray. Therefore we must give the devil its due. Credit goes to her for the spread of TV throughout India by installation of Relay Towers. Imagine by Feb 1985 there was a relay transmission station functioning at a remote location such as Govindham at a distance of 5hrs of trek from the nearest road link, on way to Valley of Flowers from Govindghat in what is Uttrakhand province now. However, the print media remained in the hands of industrialists like Sahu Jain, Goenkas, Birlas etc. But the spread of TV through the exclusive funding from public exchequer resulted in making the rural illiterates “educated by comparison” as they could now see, for instance, the difference between their own rickety roads and open drains with excreta in comparison to the sewer systems in metros and provincial capitals. It took them almost a decade to rise, and rose they did as North India’s society in specific got gripped and divided from the middle in the Mandal Commission’s aftershocks. Yes, this rural section was still incapable of reading newspapers brought out by the corporate sector. But this information onslaught did create a fertile ground for the spread of consumerism amongst the district head quarters to start with through the TV commercials, thus enabling the urban moneyed class, read as upper castes, because they had been the major beneficiary of post independence goodies for all these decades, to cash in no sooner liberalization of economy took place with effect from 1991.
The Corporate sector took a note of this. With the change of federal government in 1989, Prasar Bharti Bill was brought in. Within years the same corporate sector which had never spent a penny to “educate by comparison” the rural masses got a shot in the arm and Times TV, NDTV, SUN TV, Sahara TV etc of all shades and colors got started. First Ramayan of Ramanand Sagar and later Mahabharat of BR TV started giving a fillip in a subtle manner to the Hindutva forces that were waiting in the flanks and took center stage by destroying the Babri Masjid on Dec 6, 1992 thus bringing the biggest shame to the post independent India.
Trend was started during Emergency of 1975 by Indian Express when it took up the kludges and became conscious keeper of the urban middle class in the form of Arun Shourie and Ram Jethmalani. Ram Nath Goenka, proprietor of Express Newspapers became the king maker in 1977 when Janta Party came to power. Live broadcast started by airing the Lok Sabha election results of 1989 generated journalists who within a decade became “king makers, and wheeler dealers” as evident from Radiia tapes and 2G scam. Ambitious journalists saw immense opportunity in exploiting their connections with politicians and corporate world. When I read the names of the wheeler dealer journalists in Radiia Tapes sitting here, I recalled how few of those used to sit on the 1st floor of this south Delhi house in 1990s and plan out the media manipulations. Interestingly this particular group of journalists had been inducted into the profession by none other than Advani when he was I & B Minister under Janta Party rule during 1977-79. Nevertheless, Indian media through the exemplary works of Tehelka, Onlooker, Seminar, EPW and Mainstream etc has kept the flame of investigative and people oriented journalism alive. Today these publications are in the forefront of upholding the responsibilities which the fifth state carries on its shoulders for any nation to be counted amongst a developed one.
Sports & Entertainment
Sports and games in post independent India started at a low key. The main sports events were cricket, tennis, field hockey and billiards where we had made some standing. Names such as Lala, Pataudi, Gavaskar, Bedi, Kapil Dev, Dhyan Chand, Govinda, Ramanathan, Amritraj, Wilson, Michael Ferreira, Prakash brought glory to the nation by being recognized as world class sportspersons in their respective domains. However with the game shifting from test cricket to one day at first in early 1980s and then to 20-20s by the turn of the century, the dynamics and stakeholders eye on the “big money rolling around” has made a phenomenal shift. Imagine, just last month Gautam Gambhir has bagged a contract of US$2.1 million for signing up the latest IPL!
Today the sports events are no more confined to a stadium and few sponsors alone. Rather, the commercialization has penetrated to the extent of having multiple sponsored stickers even on the dress players will be wearing during the event, the multiple hoardings carrying advertisements changing every quarter of a minute and being sold at per minute of display; the broadcasting rights all over the globe, the recording rights and distribution of CDs made thereof, the designated refreshments provider during the breaks, the prize sponsors etc have all over night raised the stakes in monetary terms to several 100 crores of rupees during each game!
The year 2010 started with the revelation about the IPL match fixing and team auction scandal. Shashi Tharoor a Congress Minister and ex-UN Diplomat’s active involvement and his inability to purchase an IPL team led to opening of the dealings going on in IPL. He was made to resign in the end from the Cabinet. While Lalit Modi, the ex Chairman of IPL, is a man on the run on multiple fronts once the scam related to IPL got exposed. Soon to follow it has been the CWG scandal. It opened another Pandora’s Box where the nexus of politicians, senior civil servants and corporate sector has added another feather in the corruption cap India has on its head. Speaking in parliament the Sports Minster admitted there will be a loss of Rs 97.68 billion to Indian exchequer! Reading about such scandals I was reminded of the lines of the famous Urdu Poet Akbar Allahabdi. He wrote as a satire when there was a Durbar organized at the accession of Queen Elizabeth II to the throne while India was a British colony viz,
Surkhi Sarak Par Kut_ti Dekhi
Bhir Mein Sa’ans Ghut_ti Dekhi
Atashbazi Chut_ti Dekhi
Muft Ki Daulat Lut_ti Dekhi
Indian music – classical and folk have made a very primary contributions to our cultural heritage. In the contemporary history Ustad Bare Ghulam Ali Khan, Kumar Gandharva, Vinayak Rao Patwardhan, Vilayat Khan, Ravi Shankar, Bismillah Khan, Subhalakshmi, Gangu Bai Hangal, Allauddin Khan, Begum Akhtar, Bhimsen Joshi, Dagar Brothers, Hari Prasad, Shiv Kumar, Sonal Man Singh, Birju Maharaj, Amjad Ali Khan etc brought honor and prestige to our music at International level. I always wondered between Western and Indian music which has an edge over the other as the former has a very strong tradition of written form which is totally absent in Indian music. Our musical heritage is primarily rooted on Guru-Shishya parampara. On moving to this part of the world I got the answer. I found there is hardly any western musical instrument which may have not been incorporated into Indian music orchestra and has not been used as if it has always been its integral part. But vice-versa is not true. SPIC MACKAY started during my days from IIT Delhi by Prof Kiran Seth made fundamental contribution in reinforcing the musical traditions amongst the youth. However with the opening up of the economy on one hand and commercialization through TV serials on the other, there is now a mad rush created by the urban generation to make a fast buck in the name of “Hinglish Music”!
Melodies of 1960s, 70s and 80s written by highly skilled & knowledgeable poets such as Sahir, Shailendra, Majrooh, Neeraj, Bakshi, Gulzar, Kaifi etc were composed by Burman, Naushad, Ravi, Roshan, Salil, Biswas, Madan Mohan, Nayyar and the famous set of duo pairs left an inedible mark. Recently Rahman raised it further to Oscar level. But the bottom line is the realization how fast has been the decay on this front. I recall sitting at the flat of the famous screen play writer of Mahabharat serial in Bombay in late 1980s when this rising Hindi Pop singer, who later sang even the poems of our poet PM, Vajpayeeji, was getting her lyrics corrected which were hardly making any poetic sense to me. It sounded nothing but picking up words which only linguistically rhymed and then trying to create lyrics out of them. Probably that was the beginning of the downfall of the great music and poetic tradition of India. I did not realize all that our forefathers had built would go down so fast and in such a short time.
The Last Word
After Independence two geographical areas were of most concern to the Central Government – first was Kashmir which till date is a very fragile matter and became the reason for first Indo-Pak War of 1947-48. The second was the complete North East region which used to be then called Assam along with two princely states of Manipur and Tripura. It is in these two geographical areas where the Police, Paramilitary and Armed forces with active patronage from Central government, violated and trampled the human and democratic rights of common Indian. The primary reasons of unrest in these areas in my understanding has been due to only cosmetic policies implemented for weaker sections and excessive exploitation of the resources of this region with hardly any investment going back in the development of the primary infrastructure of these regions. Two most sold spots in terms of tourisms have been Taj Mahal and Kashmir. Billions of Dollars have been earned in past 60 years. But how much of it was spent on these areas’ development becomes evident when one finds only now an express highway have been planned to connect Delhi to Agra while giving the farmers whose land is being acquired far lesser than what the private builders who will build and operate this tolled road will make money! While even after 60 years, Srinagar is not yet connected by train to the mainland and its only road connection which is the life line for even our defense personnel, gets blocked several times in a year! This, in specific, is yet another glaring example of the laxity on part of our IITs and IISc attempt to solve challenging indigenous engineering problems facing the common Indian.
Hence the post 1980 developments in the volatile states of India on a closer scrutiny will show a common thread running amongst those who handled Operation Blue Star, Kashmir Insurgency, Assam/ULFA and now Naxalite uprising in the central tribal areas of Indian state. The senior bureaucrats, Army officers, Paramilitary and Police personnel who had refined their skills in suppressing the legitimate rights of the common Indian were given assignments to handle when violent situations arose later in Kashmir, Punjab and North Eastern states. Surely, when I read about Dantewada massacre of 75 CRPF personnel, my heart went out in sympathy to the kith and kins of those who died, in the same intensity as I felt concerned when the innocent tribals have been butchered by police and Sulwa Judum for past several years. It is certainly no justification for the killings of CRPF personnel, but for a moment kindly ask the question, “Won’t the CRPF personnel been equally ruthless in killing had they been successful in cornering the tribals fighting against injustice perpetuated on them, in a reverse situation”? The de facto declaration of Chattisgarh tribal area as a war zone by the Central government makes me concludes ‘you cannot eat the cake and have it too’!
I had mentioned above how the Class IV posts of government and public sector organizations have been outsourced to contractors. On a closer scrutiny I found the owners of these private companies who now supply the cleaners, drivers, janitors, peons etc are by and large owned by the upper castes who took pre-mature retirements from government jobs to start such manpower companies. By outsourcing these jobs the political and economic power wielding section of India killed two birds with one stone viz., the government was relieved of giving provident fund, pension, annual increments and dearness allowance, pay commission arrears where applicable, earn leaves, medical leaves & benefits, casual leaves, gratuity, government accommodations, winter and summer uniforms, subsidized shoes, LTC, school & college fees concessions/refunds, almost interest free loans to buy a cycle or scooter, house building loan at the same rate which the other higher ranking officers are entitled to, maternity and paternity leaves to name a few. All such liabilities were conveniently passed on to the contractors who now provide this manpower of Class IV workers. So I asked this question to myself viz., do the contractors give all these in built provisions a government servant gets to its contractual labor? I need not give the explicit answer I found and leave it to the reader to make his/her own conclusions about these facts.
The reasons for outsourcing these posts have been obvious to me. The section of Indian masses that comes under such employment belongs to a sizeable section of the SC, STs, OBCs. By virtue of enabling this section enjoy such “freebies” which Class I, II & III employees consider its exclusive privilege, it was obvious this deprived section will be able to have a quasi economic stability which will eventually empower them to let their children pursue better education & careers within Class III, II and I sections of services, in a slow but gradual manner. This section will then progress at a snails speed, but its progress was assured had outsourcing not been implemented, thereby creating for certain a simmering volcano which would erupt like the pro Mandalites within a decade or two, to wrest the political power from the hands of those who had exploited this lot for centuries.
It is appalling that Dr Binayak Sen who speaks about the exploitation of tribals is termed as a Naxalite sympathizer and given life imprisonment by a judicial system of India which on issues of Bhopal gas tragedy, Gujarat genocide, Babri Masjid demolition or Col Purohit, Sadhvi Pragya, Aseemanand hand in terrorist acts maintains a weird stand. Arundahati Roy is ridiculed on the corporate media channels when she speaks about the atrocities committed by the State sponsored terrorism on the innocent, impoverished and poor tribals. Surprisingly exploitation of tribals has been carried out by the entire Indian political spectrum irrespective of its color or shades. When I read the interview of Dr N.C Saxena, a retired IAS officer, topper of his batch and a Supreme Court appointed expert on Forest and Environment, I felt elated to have had the opportunity to work as a faculty member at the IAS Academy under his Directorship.
In specific context of the two aluminum mining projects of Andhra Pradesh, Dr Saxena’s report has highlighted that the Central and the state governments have openly colluded with the company to (i) violate the forest laws, (ii) give a go by to the government’s constitutional obligation under the Fifth Schedule to enforce the rights of the Dongaria and Kuntia tribes, (iii) ignore the government’s constitutional responsibility under Article 48A to protect the environment, (iv) ignore the symbiotic link between the tribes and the ecology and threaten to disrupt that link without remorse and (v) marginalize two constitutional institutions, namely, the Gram Sabhas and the Tribal Advisory Council. No wonder then in Andhra Pradesh today, the Reddy Brothers have attained the notoriety of unaccountable proportions in illegal mining operations as reported by national media and TV channels.
Hence the forces of weaker sections become most potent only when the gap between social mobilization and the quality of political institutions widens. When a country’s political institutions are mature, they respond to demands from below, through a combination of accommodation, response and representation. When they are under-developed, serve only vested interests, are under the control of few, run in an unfair manner, do not care for the larger good of the masses then they shut the demands of the weaker section out in the hope they will go away – or be bought off by economic improvements. Rapid economic growth does not buy political stability on its own, unless political institutions are also allowed to develop and mature.
When the political bosses do not see and understand the writings on the wall as witnessed in Tunisia or Egypt and now in many Middle East countries, then it may be time to remind what its own poets such as Faiz Ahmad Faiz, had said on the eve of Independence in the poem Subah-e-Azadi!
Ye dagh dagh uajala, ye shab guzida sehar
Vo intezaar tha jis ka, ye vo sehar to nahin
Ye vo sehar to nahin jis ki aarzoo le kar
Chale they yaar ke mil jaiye gi kahin na kahin
Falak ke dasht mein taron ki akhiri manzil
Kahin to ho shab-e-sust mauj ka sahil
Kahin to ja ke ruke ga safina-e-gham-e-dil
The series concludes
“Impressions of an NRI about Indian State – Part 1”
“Impressions of an NRI about Indian State – Part 2”
(The author has served as a senior faculty member at the National Academy of Administration in Mussoorie. He has also worked as a Senior Scientist in the Ministry of Defense. He can be contacted at Email: [email protected])