On March 24, a Sessions Court in Delhi denied bail to Umar Khalid as part of a set of cases that have commonly come to be known as “the Delhi riots cases”. The case of the police was that Mr. Khalid was one of the conspirators behind the February 2020 violence in Delhi, which had claimed more than 50 lives. For this, Mr. Khalid, along with many others, was charge-sheeted under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), 1967, and jailed pending trial. Mr. Khalid has been in jail for over 500 days. The trial has not yet begun.
Much has been written about the serious problems with the manner in which the Delhi Police has conducted its investigation, and prosecution of the Delhi riots: in particular, its selective targeting of activists who were involved with the protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act of 2019, which was the alleged trigger for the violence, while refraining from prosecuting individuals who are on record delivering incendiary speeches. The denial of bail to Mr. Khalid highlights an equally serious problem: the broken nature of India’s criminal justice system.
Bail hearing becomes trial
First, consider these facts. Mr. Khalid’s bail application was filed in July 2021. The order denying bail was passed eight months later, after multiple hours-long hearings, multiple adjournments, and three deferrals of the order itself. It is important to ask why an application for bail took so many hearings and eight months to decide: in criminal law, the purpose of bail is to ensure that an individual is not unjustly denied their liberty while the trial against them is still proceeding and their guilt has not yet been established. As such, in normal circumstances, courts are supposed to consider whether an accused is a flight risk, or is likely to tamper with evidence or intimidate witnesses. If neither of those dangers exist, there is no purpose in denying an individual their freedom before their guilt has been established in a court. This, in other words, is the real meaning of the hoary phrase ‘innocent until proven guilty’.
This is where the notorious UAPA comes in. Shorn of legalese, the UAPA prohibits a judge from granting an individual bail if, on a perusal of the police diary or the police report, the judge is of the opinion that there are “reasonable grounds for believing that the accusation is …prima facie true.” The effect of this, as the criminal legal scholar Abhinav Sekhri has pointed out, is that the UAPA introduces elements of the criminal trial into the question of bail. There are traces of this in the Indian Penal Code as well, for bail under serious non-UAPA offences. This hints at a larger problem with the criminal justice system, of which the UAPA is only the starkest example. Questions of guilt or innocence are meant to be determined at the end of a trial, after evidence has been sifted, witnesses examined and cross-examined, and arguments completed. The question of guilt or innocence at the stage of bail short-circuits that essential procedure.
But that is not the only problem with turning bail hearings into mini-trials. The problem is also that this mini-trial — to borrow a colourful phrase from the U.S. Supreme Court — licenses “one side … to fight freestyle, while requiring the other to follow the Marquis of Queensberry Rules (i.e., the rules of professional boxing)”. What the judge has before them is entirely one side of the case: the police version. In a trial, the defence would be entitled to cross-examine the prosecution’s witnesses, determine inconsistencies in their testimony, examine its own witnesses, present its own evidence, and otherwise demonstrate that the case against the accused has not been made out beyond reasonable doubt. In a bail hearing, the defence can do none of that. The starting point of the bail hearing is the presumption that everything in the police report is true. Based on that presumption, all the two sides can then argue about is whether according to these “facts”, the legal ingredients of the offence are fulfilled — or, in some rare cases, about whether the facts themselves are self-contradictory or flat-out implausible, so that no reliance can be placed on them even at the stage of bail. To use an analogy, it is like holding a debate between two sides, stopping it after one side finishes, allowing the other side to pose two or three questions but not say anything more, and then deciding whether the motion passes or falls.
Such a system might possibly be defensible in a situation where criminal justice was swift, efficient, and trustworthy. If, for example, criminal trials habitually concluded within six months, it might just be possible to argue that in terrorism cases, six months of pretrial incarceration is a painful but proportionate price to pay (in my opinion, it is still unjustifiable, but there is at least a case to be made). However, that is not the case in India: a UAPA trial takes years — often more than 10 years. In such a situation, the court’s decision on bail,de facto, becomes the decision on the case: the denial of bail means that a person is likely to spend a decade or more behind bars, as the trial winds on. And given the UAPA’s abysmally low conviction rates, the trial will likely end in acquittal.
This, thus, explains why bail hearings take so long, and are so convoluted (although there is still little excuse for the eight-month-long process in Mr. Khalid’s case). Both the defence and the prosecution know that the outcome of the bail hearing is, for all practical effects, the outcome of the case itself. The result of the denial of bail is, functionally, the same as the result of a finding of guilt: a decade-plus in jail. But, as we have seen, while the denial of bail is effectively a finding of guilt, it has none of the safeguards that the criminal law puts into place before an actual finding of guilt. The accused is first gagged from contesting the police’s version and is then condemned for not being able to disprove the police’s case.
Rank injustice
In a notorious judgment inNational Investigation Agency v. Zahoor Ahmad Shah Watali (2019), the Supreme Court made a bad situation even worse by forbidding the lower courts from scrutinising in depth even the police case. This leads to absurd situations like Mr. Khalid’s bail order. A reading of the bail order shows that the court reproduces various allegations against Mr. Khalid — some of them hearsay, and therefore inadmissible during the trial, and some extremely implausible; dismisses the defence’s challenges to them without any engagement; and then denies bail. Lawyers and legal scholars may disagree over whether the UAPA actually requires the courts to become stenographers for the prosecution, even under existing legal doctrine. The point, however, is that for all the reasons we have discussed above, the result is rank injustice.
Reforming the criminal justice system is the task of many years. In the immediate future, however, it is at least possible to curtail the manner in which the UAPA plays havoc with the lives of so many individuals. Striking down or reading down its bail prohibitions and subjecting the police case to stricter scrutiny during bail hearings would be a start. It remains to be seen whether the judiciary has the will and the inclination to do so.
Gautam Bhatia is a Delhi-based lawyer
The Nepal Prime Minister, Sher Bahadur Deuba, paid a long-awaited visit to India last week (April 1-3). Sworn in in July 2021, this was his first bilateral visit abroad, in keeping with tradition. The outcome might appear modest but what is significant is that India and Nepal effectively managed to steer clear of divisive issues. At 75, Mr. Deuba is a political veteran and first became Prime Minister in 1995. Now in his fifth stint, he is no stranger to the complex relationship between the two countries.
Positive outcomes
Among the highlights was the operationalisation of the 35 kilometre cross-border rail link from Jayanagar (Bihar) to Kurtha (Nepal). Two further phases will extend it to Bijalpura and Bardibas. The Rs. 787 crore project had been ready for over a year but operationalisation was held up because of the necessary administrative requirements in Nepal to set up a company that could recruit staff. The Konkan Railway Corporation will provide the necessary technical support initially.
The second project that was inaugurated was the 90 km long 132 kV double circuit transmission line connecting Tila (Solukhumbu) to Mirchaiya (Siraha) close to the Indian border. Constructed with an Exim Bank concessional loan of Rs. 200 crore, there are a dozen hydroelectric projects planned in the Solu corridor for which the Nepal Electricity Authority has concluded PPAs of 325 MW.
In addition, agreements providing technical cooperation in the railway sector, Nepal’s induction into the International Solar Alliance, and between Indian Oil Corporation and Nepal Oil Corporation on ensuring regular supplies of petroleum products were also signed.
The Mahakali Treaty, signed in 1996 during Mr. Deuba’s first visit as Prime Minister, covers the Sarada and Tanakpur barrages as well as the 6,700 MW (approximately) Pancheshwar Multipurpose project. Both sides have agreed to push for an early finalisation of the detailed project report. The ambitious $7 billion project needs political will to move it forward. The joint vision statement on power sector cooperation recognises the opportunities for joint development power generation projects together with cross border transmission linkages and coordination between the national grids; it can provide the momentum.
On February 27, Mr. Deuba pushed through the ratification of the agreement with the U.S. Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), despite the reservations of his coalition partners, the Maoists and the UML (Unified-Socialist). The agreement provides a grant of $500 million for building 318 km of high voltage transmission lines along with sub-stations and the maintenance of 300 km of the East-West highway. The Chinese Embassy in Kathmandu had actively sought to sabotage the agreement by planting stories that it was part of the U.S.’s Indo-Pacific strategy aimed at containing China. The agreement had been signed in 2017, during Mr. Deuba’s fourth stint as Prime Minister, and was awaiting ratification. Together with the Pancheshwar project, it provides welcome synergy.
China’s growing role
During the monarchy, China maintained a link with the Palace and its concerns were primarily related to keeping tabs on the Tibetan refugee community. With the abolition of the monarchy, China has shifted attention to the political parties and to institutions such as the Army and Armed Police Force and considers Nepal an important element in its growing South Asian footprint.
In recent years, India’s relations with Nepal have had both ‘highs’ and ‘lows’. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has often spoken of the “neighbourhood first” policy. He started with a highly successful visit in August 2014 but then saw the relationship take a nosedive in 2015, with India first getting blamed for interfering in the Constitution drafting process and then for an “unofficial blockade” that generated widespread resentment against India. It reinforced the notion that Nepali nationalism and anti-Indianism were two sides of the same coin that Mr. Deuba’s predecessor, Mr. K.P. Sharma Oli, exploited successfully.
In 2016, Mr. Oli visited Beijing to negotiate an Agreement on Transit Transportation. Three years later, a Protocol was concluded with China providing access to four sea ports and three land ports. The first ever visit of the Chinese Defence Minister took place in March 2017, followed by joint military exercises a month later. A military grant of $32 million was also announced.
China has overtaken India as the largest source of foreign direct investment. In 2019, China’s President Xi Jinping visited Kathmandu. Annual development assistance has been hiked to $120 million. Today, China is also engaged with airport expansion projects at Pokhara and Lumbini. Rather than compete with China, India needs to up its own game.
The growing Chinese presence means that India cannot afford to let issues linger but reach out actively to find resolution.
Managing differences
Over the years, a number of differences have emerged between India and Nepal that need attention. The political narrative has changed in both countries and these issues can no longer be swept under the carpet or subsumed by invoking a ‘special relationship’ based on ties of a shared culture, language and religion. Part of the success of Mr. Deuba’s visit was that none of the differences was allowed to dominate the visit. Yet, to build upon the positive mood, it is necessary these issues be discussed, behind closed doors and at Track 2 and Track 1.5 channels.
As one of the oldest bonds, the 1950 Treaty of Peace and Friendship was originally sought by the Nepali authorities in 1949 to continue the special links they had with British India. It provides for an open border and for Nepali nationals to have the right to work in India. But today, it is viewed as a sign of an unequal relationship, and an Indian imposition. The idea of revising and updating it has found mention in Joint Statements since the mid-1990s. It has been discussed sporadically, but in a desultory manner, by the Foreign Secretaries in 1997, and even at the ministerial level at the 2014 Joint Commission.
In 2016, an eight-member Eminent Persons Group was set up to discuss it. The report is available with both governments but the perception in Kathmandu is that it should be formally presented to the two governments. As long as it is clearly understood that this is only a report by well-intentioned experts in their individual capacity and not binding on governments, it should be possible for the two Foreign Ministers to acknowledge it publicly. It could even be made public to kickstart Track 2 conversations.
Demonetisation is another irritant. In November 2016, India withdrew Rs. 15.44 trillion of high value (Rs. 1,000 and Rs. 500) currency notes. Today, over Rs. 15.3 trillion has been returned in the form of fresh currency. Yet, many Nepali nationals who were legally entitled to hold Rs. 25,000 of Indian currency (given that the Nepali rupee is pegged to the Indian rupee) were left high and dry. The Nepal Rashtra Bank, which is the central bank, holds Rs. 7 crore and estimates of public holdings are Rs. 500 crore. After more than five years, it should certainly be possible to resolve this to mutual satisfaction.
On the boundaries
In 2019, Mr. Oli, facing domestic opposition within his party, needed a distraction and found one in the form of the Kalapani boundary issue. These boundaries had been fixed in 1816 by the British, and India inherited the areas over which the British had exercised territorial control in 1947. While 98% of the India-Nepal boundary was demarcated, two areas, Susta and Kalapani remained in limbo. In November 2019, India issued new maps following the division of the State of Jammu and Kashmir as Union Territories, Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh. Though the new Indian map did not affect the India-Nepal boundary in any material way, Mr. Oli expanded the Kalapani area dispute. By whipping up nationalist sentiment, he got a new map of Nepal endorsed by the legislature through a constitutional amendment. While it did not alter the situation on the ground, it soured relations with India and added a new and emotive irritant.
The need today is to avoid rhetoric on territorial nationalism and lay the groundwork for quiet dialogue where both sides display sensitivity as they explore what is feasible. India needs to be a sensitive and generous partner for the “neighbourhood first” policy to take root.
Rakesh Sood is a former Ambassador to Nepal and presently Distinguished Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation
The Chief Justice of India (CJI), Justice N.V. Ramana, must be lauded for his candid appraisal recently of the pathetic state of India’s investigating agencies. Last week in Delhi, while delivering the annual (and the 19th edition) D.P. Kohli Memorial Talk organised by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), the CJI minced no words in condemning the utter subordination of agencies to the executive and its disastrous consequences for the cause of justice.
D.P. Kohli was the first Director of the CBI after the agency was renamed the CBI in 1963 from the earlier Special Police Establishment. A man of impeccable character, he was faceless and fearless, and a model to be emulated by his successors.
Judiciary’s gaze is crucial
The CJI has not said anything new at the lecture that we in India do not already know. But coming as it did from the head of the Indian judiciary, his stern warning that investigating agencies will pay a heavy price for their utter willingness to stoop to please politicians should be taken seriously by all outfits, especially the CBI, which has had a patchy record with regard to political interference in sensitive investigations. The CJI called upon investigators to stand up to unethical pressures in order not to betray the trust reposed in them by the public. He even dropped a hint that if middle- and senior-level investigators deviated from the path of objectivity and neutrality, they would pay for it dearly. We have already seen how the Supreme Court of India and High Courts have often admonished investigators for their sloppiness and deviation from ethics. Therefore, we need a strong Supreme Court and equally strong High Courts to keep our investigators on the straight and narrow path.
Some change
There is no denying the fact that the CBI has been grossly misused by successive governments. This is why in December 1997, another fearless judge, Justice J.S. Verma had lambasted the then CBI Director in the so-called Hawala case, rebuking him for stalling the investigation at will, thereby sending inappropriate signals to his subordinates in the crucial investigation.
Justice Verma was so provoked by state of affairs that he went on to prescribe a new clinical procedure for the selection of the CBI chief, giving him also a much needed and fixed tenure of two years during which he could not be removed by the government. It may not be an exaggeration to say that earlier, CBI Directors were changed at will almost like how one would wear new garments every day. This mandatory tenure was meant to insulate the CBI Director from the caprice of the executive. This process has since been expanded to include the CJI in the selection panel.
It will be incorrect to assert that all this has transformed the CBI into an apolitical and objective body. Meticulous supervision by the Supreme Court in some important cases has made more than a marginal difference to the honesty of investigation. There is palpable fear among CBI officers that the judiciary could intervene were an aggrieved person to prove that an investigator had been arbitrary and dishonest. It will be unfair to the CBI to say that its investigation has not acquired any greater uprightness than before even after the many reprimands it had received from the higher judiciary. My view is also that the allegation of political interference has been blown out of proportion, because only about 10% of cases handled by the CBI have political overtones.
A bright spot and lows
The CBI now has some of the brightest Indian Police Service officers in its higher echelons. None of them may be expected to be reckless and sacrifice their careers by bending to unethical pressures from their Director or from the government’s echelons. However, it is not enough if the middle-rung supervisors alone are straightforward. There needs to be a strong and virtuous leader who will not only be honest but also stick his neck out to protect his deputies if and when confronted by an unscrupulous political heavyweight. If the CBI has to tread the path of virtue, it should have the strongest leader with a distinct belief in the law and ethics.
Unfortunately, in recent years, at least two Directors brought ignominy to the CBI. This has proved that whatever the courts may do to enforce discipline and adherence to the law, there are the odd leaders who could subvert the system. Little can be done to move away from this unfortunate situation unless there are bold and enlightened persons heading investigation agencies, and who will be firm with the executive if it tries to intimidate junior officers.
My own experience is that if one stands up and explains to a Prime Minister why a particular course of action suggested by a junior Minister or someone in the ruling party was unacceptable, then one has shown the right path to one’s subordinates within the organisation. It is equally true that a Prime Minister will support you nine times out of 10 if you present your view in a rational and reasonable manner. If a Director is unable to display even this element of courage he should not be heading the organisation. If this honest approach to investigation does not get fused internally, mere tinkering with the criminal law and the procedure to appoint heads of important criminal justice organisations will be of no avail.
It is not that the CJI and the other judges are unaware of some investigating officers swerving from the right path at the instance of a small-time politician. But they are helpless in their efforts to stem the rot because many in the higher judiciary do not want to exceed their brief and upset things.
There have also been some big fish who have been caught in the net of investigators — a former Chief Minister of Bihar and a former Home Minister of Maharashtra, are examples. But given the magnitude of the problem, the steps taken so far to check dishonesty in the higher echelons of the government are only cosmetic. This is why I am still cynical: however much the judiciary stands by law enforcement outfits, little will change in terms of the public servant (including popular and elected Ministers) curbing the unabated corruption in the country.
What is needed
Finally, I do not endorse the CJI’s proposal of an umbrella organisation that will oversee all investigating agencies. This idea was meant to avoid having multiple agencies looking into the same set of allegations. Apart from its impracticality, such a novel body could generate its own problems — of turf wars and ego clashes. I would rather have the focus on weeding out the dishonest among officers and rewarding those who have shown and proven themselves to be honest and professionally innovative.
R.K. Raghavan is a former CBI Director who now teaches Policing and Criminal Justice at the Jindal Global University, Sonepat, Haryana
At a recent meeting in New Delhi, Prime Minister Narendra Modi was almost forced to give a brief lecture on geological history to his colleagues while highlighting the importance of integrating the Indian and Australian economies in contemporary times. By way of a metaphor, he pointed out how India and Australia were part of the same supercontinent, the Gondwanaland, until both drifted apart during the Jurassic age. For a variety of reasons, almost till the beginning of this century, New Delhi and Canberra remained apart much after the original tectonic shifts had originally split them.
A historic deal
A pivotal moment in history for the two countries was struck on April 2, when Australia and India struck a trade deal after two decades of efforts. Mr. Modi described it as a “watershed moment for bilateral relations”. The India-Australia Economic Co-operation and Trade Agreement (IndAus ECTA) eliminates tariffs on more than 85% of Australian goods exports to India (valued at more than $12.6 billion a year).
With a GDP expected to grow at 9% in 2021-22, India is the world’s fastest growing major economy. Today, the growth opportunities for Australian businesses are larger in India than in any other market. Over the five years leading up to the pandemic, two-way trade and investment between Australia and India doubled. Now, IndAus ECTA is “expected to increase bilateral trade from AUD$36.7 billion to AUD$60 billion,” according to Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal.
Through IndAus ECTA, tariffs on a range of Australian exports to India, including coal, lentils, sheep meat, wool, lobsters and rare earths, will be eliminated. The deal also includes a phased reduction of tariffs on wine and agricultural products including avocados, cherries, nuts and blueberries. This is welcoming news to Australian businesses, particularly in the face of economic sanctions on a range of Australian produce they faced from China last year.
The deal also extends to enhancing services exports and strengthening our people-to-people links, including a quota for chefs and yoga teachers, post-study work visa of 2-4 years for Indian students on a reciprocal basis, mutual recognition of professional services and other licensed/regulated occupations, and work and holiday visa arrangements for young professionals. The role of the Indian diaspora as a key national economic asset should not be underestimated in this deal. Data from the India Economic Strategy Update confirm that nearly one in five overseas students in Australia are from India, making full fee-paying Indian students the largest group of overseas students.
But as a former Indian Ambassador to Australia tweeted, it is the strategic message of this ECTA that is as important as its economic content. With the turbulence faced by both nations in the Indo-Pacific region, the convergence of economic and geopolitical risks is real. ECTA is a clear response to those changing dynamics that both countries face. And the fact that India today counts on the support of Australia through the Quad and maritime security and now through a trade agreement shows the diversification of its strategic and economic approach.
A deal despite challenges
Yet the Russian invasion of Ukraine remains a ‘balancing act’ for India. Half of its arms imports come from Russia and some 70% of its military hardware is Russian-made. The need for India’s military diversification is now greater than ever. Australia is limited in its delivery on this front. And whilst India would no doubt like to rely less on Russia, the U.S. is not stepping up to supply India with its latest missiles.
It is a testament to the growing resilience and bandwidth of bilateral ties that despite differences over India’s reticence in condemning the war in Ukraine and its purchase of heavily discounted Russian oil, the trade deal was brought to a closure with remarkable alacrity. In the past, Canberra’s fierce response to India’s 1988 nuclear tests and the Indian media’s over-the-top reaction to attacks on Indian students in Melbourne in 2009-2010 had almost derailed ties.
While both countries have come from different places, they seem to have arrived at the same place, practising economic liberalisation at their own pace. Hailing from opposite sides of power blocs during the Cold War, they now have shared norms and democratic principles and support a rules-based order. While they will continue to face headwinds that create new geopolitical and economic uncertainties, the footings for a stronger relationship have been set. Their mutual commitment to economic advancement through IndAus ECTA is symbolic of how far the relationship has come. That means the future for both nations’ peoples is full of promise and opportunity.
Lisa Singh is CEO, Australia India Institute (AII), former senator for Tasmania and the first woman of Indian heritage to be elected to the federal parliament; Amitabh Mattoo is Professor at JNU, Honorary Professor, University of Melbourne, and founding Director of the AII
One does not require a keen political eye to detect the disingenuity, lethargy and arrogance behind Mayawati’s assessment of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP)’s humiliating defeat in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections. The party lost almost 10% of its vote share from 2017 and was reduced to one seat. This means it failed to attract voters across caste and religion.
The upsurge of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s majoritarian narrative notwithstanding, the BSP’s consistent decline can be attributed primarily to Ms. Mayawati’s own failures. This includes her dilution of the Bahujan narrative, poorly strategised appeasement of the minority ‘upper castes’, authoritative style, and mismanagement of organisation. Rather than correcting these deficiencies, Ms. Mayawati chose to blame the Muslims not just for her defeat and the BJP’s victory, but also for, in her view, influencing the voting pattern of the Hindus. According to her, because Muslims mobilised almosten blocbehind the Samajwadi Party (SP)-led alliance, the Hindus favoured the BJP, despite harbouring discontentment towards the party, as they feared the rule of goondas and corrupt leaders under the SP. Even if 50% of the State’s 19.5% Muslims had voted for the BSP, the Hindu voters, especially the Brahmins, who were unhappy with the BJP would have voted for the BSP, she noted.
This bizarre postulation appears to be her attempt to shift the blame from herself. But it also displays how parties claiming to espouse social justice for the backward and downtrodden Hindu castes rely significantly on Muslim support. Over the last three decades, Muslim voters have regularly backed the BSP even though Ms. Mayawati played ball with the BJP and never maintained a firm political stand against the Hindu Right. In the 2022 election, the Muslims, who feel subjugated under BJP rule, chose the best electoral option for themselves: the SP-led alliance. The Akhilesh Yadav-led alliance ran an aggressive campaign, turning the election into a two-way polarised contest.
Ms. Mayawati, who has been an absentee politician for a decade, was slow to start her campaign. She failed to position herself as a credible opposition leader and mismanaged the backward caste and Dalit leadership that she had at her disposal. She ceded the Bahujan space and alienated Muslims through her dubious political stance. She tried to lure Muslim voters by repeatedly mentioning the number of candidates she had fielded from the community, but did nothing to earn their trust. She inducted elements of Hindutva into her campaign, a definite way to repel the Muslims.
Ms. Mayawati’s defeat is a reminder of the limits of her transactional electoral strategy in the absence of an organic ideology, narrative, mass connect or leadership. If she wants to save her party, Ms. Maywati must ask why Dalits, including her own community (Jatavs), are not voting for her, as they did earlier, and are attracted to an RSS-led Hindu nationalism instead. What she has done to bridge the gap between Jatav and non-Jatav Dalits? Why don’t Other Backward Classes view her as an option? Why does she think ‘upper castes’ will vote for a party whose foundation opposes their hegemony?
Ms. Mayawati has been unable to infuse the BSP’s Ambedkarite ideology into a wider base of downtrodden communities. By blaming Muslims for her failed campaigns and juxtaposing it with the loyalty of Jatavs, she risks creating a long-term divide between Dalits and Muslims. It is time the Dalit intelligentsia ask tougher questions of her, hold her accountable, and demand that she addresses the true reasons for the BSP’s seemingly irreversible decline.
omar.rashid@thehindu.co.in
The Central Water Commission (CWC)’s proposal to let the Mullaperiyar dam’s Supervisory Committee continue for a year essentially means status quo continues. The proposal makes the Chief Secretaries of Tamil Nadu and Kerala accountable and provides for the participation of technical experts as panel members. The proposed arrangement, presented before the Supreme Court on Tuesday, has become necessary as the CWC is of the view that the National Dam Safety Authority (NDSA), the regulatory body envisaged under the recently enacted Dam Safety Act, will require one year to become fully functional. On Thursday, the two States are expected to inform the Court of their response. Given the features of the 126-year-old Mullaperiyar dam and the controversies surrounding its lime and mortar structure, both States would have nothing much to complain about regarding sticking to the existing arrangement for some more time although they differ in the way they approach the dam. Located in Kerala, it is used by TN for multiple purposes. While TN is keen on getting the strengthening work completed to raise the water level to 152 ft from 142 ft, Kerala wants a new dam built. In the backdrop of landslides in Kerala after heavy rain, fears, though misplaced, have arisen over the dam’s structural stability. Regardless of these apprehensions being addressed through technical and scientific bodies, the issue of safety crops up time and again. What this underlines is that there should be no room for complacency about the dam’s safety. It is for this purpose that the apex court too has been addressing the issue of having a stronger institutional mechanism than the existing Supervisory Committee which has been rendered almost toothless.
Ideally speaking, the authority would have been well suited to handle issues concerning the Mullaperiyar, as the Act empowers the body to perform the role of the State Dam Safety Organisation (SDSO) in this context because the NDSA assumes the role of SDSO for a dam located in one State and owned by another. But, as more time is required to have the authority fully in place, the Centre has chosen to rely on the existing structure, with the respective Chief Secretaries being made accountable. With a sub-committee functioning under the Supervisory Committee and one more panel under the National Disaster Management Authority, the oversight mechanism appears to be fine. Still, however well-designed the scheme might be, it is for the authorities to make sure their actions instil public confidence during the monsoon, when the issue of safety in Kerala acquires precedence. It is also their duty to ensure there is no panic and to deal with scaremongers.
Schemes designed for social good do well on intent, but their success depends on whether they are built on principles of sustainability and work within structures of accountability. While the Centre’s intent to provide ‘integrated benefits to children and women’ is behind the comprehensive revamping of the Department of Women and Children’s schemes, is this a rejig constructed with rules that will ensure maximising benefit for shareholders — women and children? Mission Vatsalya, which has been operationalised, is one of the new triad of schemes along with Mission Shakti, and Poshan 2.0, that aims at securing a healthy and happy childhood for every child. Components under Mission Vatsalya include statutory bodies; service delivery structures; institutional care/services; non-institutional community-based care; emergency outreach services; training and capacity building. The impact of this on one of the pillars of India’s child protection services, the ChildLine, has been giving child rights activists sleepless nights. ChildLine (1098), the 24-hour toll free helpline for children in distress, will be manned by the Home Affairs Ministry under Mission Vatsalya, Union Minister Smriti Irani said last year, citing the need to ‘preserve data sensitivity’.
ChildLine has been in operation for over 25 years, growing gradually to become one of the largest global networks to assist and rescue children in distress. It has functioned as a public-private partnership between the government and civil society organisations to provide a first-responder safety net, and kick start the process of rescue and rehabilitation of children. A road map to implement the scheme is not yet available, but it is understood that police personnel will first answer the call, handing over implementation to NGOs later. This flies in the face of the facts invoked while setting up the ChildLine in 1996 — children do not feel comfortable confiding in police personnel. It also sought to reduce the burden on the police force, by invoking their assistance only if the circumstances necessitated it. This was proven beyond doubt during a short-lived experiment in Chennai around 2003 when ChildLine calls were diverted to All Women Police Stations (AWPS) — they were inundated with calls, hampering regular work. Sometimes, all the children wanted was to spend some time talking to someone, or they were making multiple blank calls before they picked up the courage to tell all. In many cases, police intervention was not needed at all. The old system was hurriedly revived, and order restored. The Centre will do well to incorporate these responses as it sets out a road map for a key aspect of child protection. Above all, it must consider the issue from the perspective of the key beneficiary of this scheme — the child — and make sure that his/her safety, security and happiness are ensured in a bond born of trust, necessarily going beyond the letter of the law.
Saigon, April 6: The U.S. Military Command announced to-day that the U.S. warplanes and 7th Fleet destroyers had resumed full-scale raids on North Vietnam on personal orders from President Nixon in retaliation for the offensive in South Vietnam, even as the communist offensive continued in three of South Vietnam’s four military regions. The command spokesman said the bombing, aimed at military targets north of the demilitarisation zone (DMZ), would be of “limited duration”. Its purpose was to protect the lives of American forces remaining in South Vietnam, he said. Meanwhile, the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong continued their attacks on Government positions on the northern front, in the Central Highlands and in the region between Saigon and the Cambodian frontier. Reports from the northern front spoke of fierce fighting in the Dong Ha region, around the city of Quang Tri and to the west and south-west of the old imperial city of Hue. Heavy communist artillery attacks were reported at several points in the Central Highlands, and fierce fighting took place around the Tan Canh base near Dakto, and around Kontum. Far to the south, 10,000 North Vietnamese and the National Liberation Front (NLF) troops laid seige to most of Binh Long province, whose capital city of An Loc is 96 kms. north of Saigon.
The run-up to the recently held Punjab elections saw political parties making tall promises to right wrongs in the state — the transfer of Chandigarh to Punjab was not one of them. The Aam Aadmi Party that swept the polls, winning 92 of the 117 seats, promised to revamp the economy, agriculture, industry, health, and education of the state. In turn, the people have been expecting big ticket announcements from the new government. But the Bhagwant Mann government’s reaction to the Union government notification applying central service rules to the employees of Chandigarh, the joint capital of Punjab and Haryana, comes as a let down.
Soon after the notification that followed Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s visit to Chandigarh, the Bhagwant Mann government called a special assembly session on April 1, and passed a resolution seeking immediate transfer of Chandigarh to the state. The resolution has opened a Pandora’s box, with both Haryana and Chandigarh also calling similar sessions. In its emergency Vidhan Sabha session on Tuesday, Haryana raked up all the unresolved issues between the two neighbours since their birth in 1966, and urged the Centre to transfer the contentious SYL canal to the state. With the two states squabbling about its status, the Chandigarh Municipal Corporation has also jumped into the fray by calling a special house meeting on Thursday to reiterate its continuation as a Union Territory. With this acrimonious exchange coming only days after the installation of a new government, it threatens to push back the hopes and expectations that lay beneath the large AAP mandate — of change from the traditional politics that would deliver the state from its multiple crises. From agrarian distress, unemployment and exodus of students, to an industry in flight, inept education, and unaffordable healthcare to the sliding law and order — innumerable issues are crying out for the attention of Chief Minister Mann.
Instead of expending his energy on emotive issues, CM Mann must get his priorities right. He had promised to hit the ground running, said he would make every day count. He should do that. Punjab has many well-wishers who want to see it regain its lost glory. He should explore and implement the solutions they offer. Given the magnitude of the challenge he faces, five years is a short time. A systemic overhaul requires constant work, and monitoring. The grandstanding can wait.
It is clear that Elon Musk, the billionaire founder of Tesla and SpaceX, fancies himself as a bit of a Bruce Wayne: Like Batman, he sees injustice when it affects him but does not seem to have a commensurate appreciation for the power and privilege that wealth affords him, more often than not playing victim. What he probably does not realise is that the apparent petulance, the vainglorious pride, behind his purchase of a large chunk of Twitter’s stock does not make him look like a superhero – but just a rich man trying to buy his way out of criticism and accountability.
As of late last month, Musk is Twitter’s largest individual shareholder and an active member of its Board. His recent history on the microblogging platform has been chequered at best. He has used his Twitter account — Musk has over 80 million followers — to question pandemic measures, call an explorer a “pedo” and perhaps most significantly, involve himself in disputes with US regulators over his tweets being used to raise the price of Tesla stock. To be fair, Musk is also an activist about larger issues. But more often than not, his activism seems self-serving: The last major political conflict he was engaged in was about billionaires being over-taxed.
Till recently, Musk was threatening to start his own social media platform — a la Trump — perhaps as a way to escape the criticism he has been facing. But why build when you can buy? Since his purchase of Twitter stock, he has floated polls on whether Twitter is biased and whether tweets should come with an “edit” option — the latter is reportedly being rolled out by the company. Some of these actions and updates may indeed be welcome. But the problem with Batman, even when he does catch the criminal, is that wealthy vigilantes can always make sure that the rules don’t apply to them.
The 80-year old Lok Dal President Charan Singh dramatically announced his retirement from active politics in a desperate bid to put down a revolt by party colleagues, including Devi Lal and Biju Patnaik, on the question of Opposition unity. The announcement was made by him about the same time as Devi Lal was introduced at the Janata Party headquarters as the chairman of the reception committee for the April 13 convention of the Janata, Lok Dal and Congress (S) leaders and workers at Chandigarh to take a decision on a joint programme of action on the coming Assembly elections in several states. Charan Singh, however, dropped hints that his action was neither irrevocable nor motivated by the desire to promote Opposition unity.
British planes are carrying out a top secret airlift to the South Atlantic in connection with the Falkland crisis, according to an informed Portuguese military source. British transport planes headed south have been spotted in Madeira in Portugal. The Hercules C-130 transports at the rate of one every three hours are flying in high altitude flight lanes bared to civilian aircraft, the source said. He said that the airlift’s destination was mid-ocean island such as Ascension Island, half-way between the African coast and the northeastern shoulder of South America.
Mrs Gandhi has expressed concern that people are being divided in Jammu and Kashmir along communal lines. Addressing a packed parade ground audience of 40,000 people in Jammu, Mrs Gandhi said that people should fight communalism at any cost because it will weaken the nation. She refused the state chief minister Sheikh Abdullah’s charge that the Centre is trying to topple him.
The directive by the mayor of the BJP-ruled South Delhi Municipal Corporation on shutting down meat shops during the nine-day festival of Navratri is retrograde, the controversy it has kicked up is dispiriting. In a country of many religions and festivals, the mayor’s directive seeks to cramp fundamental rights and freedoms – the individual’s right to choose what she eats and when, and also, importantly, her right to livelihood. The row can be seen as the latest part of a dismal and spreading pattern of majoritarian excess, and the targeting of the minority community – a line runs through the attempt to proscribe the hijab in the classroom in Karnataka, and the proposed ban on meat during Navratri in Delhi. The mayor’s directive must be snubbed by the BJP which rules Delhi’s three civic bodies. If the BJP fails to do the right thing, however, the court must step in.
In a series of rulings, courts have held that the right to choose one’s food is an intrinsic part of the right to privacy and personal liberty. In the landmark Puttaswamy ruling in 2017, upholding the right to privacy as a fundamental right, the Supreme Court held that “the choice of food habits” is an aspect of privacy that must be protected. Earlier, even when it upheld temporary restrictions on the sale of meat in Ahmedabad in another judgement in 2008, the SC recognised that “what one eats is one’s personal affair and it is a part of his right to privacy which is included in Article 21 of our Constitution.” It also spoke against infringement of the individual’s right to livelihood: “After all, butchers are practising a trade and it is their fundamental right under Article 19(1)(g) of the Constitution which is guaranteed to all citizens of India. Moreover, it is not a matter of the proprietor of the butchery shop alone. There may be also several workmen therein who may become unemployed if the slaughterhouses are closed for a considerable period of time… ”. More recently, in Shaikh Zahid Mukthar v State of Maharashtra (2017), the Bombay High Court struck down Section 5D of the Maharashtra Animal Preservation Act, 1976 which put a virtual ban on the possession and consumption of beef in the state. “A citizen has a right to lead a meaningful life within the four corners of his house as well as outside his house. This intrusion on the personal life of an individual is prohibited by the right to privacy which is part of personal liberty guaranteed by Article 21. The State cannot prevent a citizen from possessing and consuming a particular type of food which is not injurious to health (or obnoxious) … if the State tells the citizens not to eat a particular type of food or prevents the citizens from possessing and consuming a particular type of food, it will certainly be an infringement of a right to privacy…,” wrote Justice AS Oka, now a judge of the Supreme Court.
The mayor’s directive does not just affect the shops and citizens of South Delhi. Its deleterious effect runs wider and deeper. As the custodian of citizens’ rights and liberties in a diverse democracy, the court has played a seminal role in expanding the space for freedoms. It must now step in, draw the constitutional red line in Delhi.
During the Spanish Inquisition, it was often the telltale fragrance of food being cooked in olive oil that led the authorities to the houses of their victims. These were almost always the Conversos (Jewish converts to Catholicism) and Moriscos (Spanish Muslims) who had remained stubbornly stuck in their old dietary habits and therefore, according to the inquisitorial logic, also their heretical beliefs. Good Catholics, the so-called cristiano viejos (old Christians), cooked their food in lard. They ate pork, eels, cuttlefish and rabbit and, unlike the cristiano nuevos (Jews and Muslims who had recently converted) had no use for ingredients like saffron, coriander, cinnamon and almonds. And so, servants and other conveniently placed persons – butchers, grocers etc – were instructed to watch out for and report anyone using the forbidden ingredients, flouting Christian culinary convention by making unleavened bread or cooking dishes like long-stewed sheep’s head, and following “heretical” dietary restrictions, like the Jewish prohibition on mixing meat with dairy. In 15th-century Spain, even what you didn’t eat could get you burned at the stake.
New India isn’t close to touching the height of food-based othering that Old Spain did at the peak of the Inquisition. However, recent events have caused some anxiety. Take the attempt to force meat shops in Delhi to stay shut during the ongoing Navratri festival, coming on the heels of the call to boycott halal meat issued by Hindu outfits such as the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Bajrang Dal in Karnataka and the characterisation of halal food as “economic jihad” by BJP national general secretary C T Ravi. There was also an attempt in November last year in several cities in Gujarat to restrict street vendors from selling meat and eggs.
In a letter directing the closure of meat shops during Navratri, the South MCD mayor Mukkesh Suryaan wrote, “People forgo even the use of onion and garlic, and the sight of meat being sold in open or near temples makes them uncomfortable.” A similar logic, premised on “hurt sentiments” was used against street vendors selling meat and eggs in Gujarat. Those outraged might bubble over with questions: What about onion and garlic sellers, then, why only meat shops? What about non-Hindus who are being deprived of meat and fish during a festival they don’t even observe? What about the livelihoods of butchers, meat retailers and even restaurants and ancillary service providers like delivery boys and transporters? What about the majority of Hindus who, because of their caste or other intersecting identities, either don’t observe Navratri or don’t adhere to the prescribed dietary restrictions?
But the unvarnished fact is that none of these questions matters because this latest imposition, like others in the past, is not beholden to any rationale acceptable to those who value such things as personal choice and individual rights. It is driven solely by the desire to place a singular, pan-Indian Hindu identity over all the others that exist in this country. That this identity has little basis in lived reality is well-documented, including in Isn’t This Plate Indian?, a pioneering work led by sociologist Sharmila Rege in documenting Dalit food practices in Maharashtra. It is in service of this larger identity that the various bans and restrictions, such as the beef bans in several states, are imposed. Indeed, they are the very scaffolding on which this idea of pan-Indianness is constructed.
To go back to the Inquisition, it should be noted that it was part of the larger project of defining the newly-unified Spain after the Reconquista was completed in the 15th century. An essential part of this project was identifying all those who rightfully belonged in this new kingdom, a task that couldn’t be accomplished without first identifying those who didn’t belong, that is, the enemy. The Moors had already been expelled and in the absence of external enemies, as the Italian novelist and semiotician Umberto Eco pointed out in his essay ‘Inventing the Enemy’, an internal one is always invented. In 15th-century Spain, these internal enemies were the Conversos and the Moriscos. It is disturbing that internal enemies could be marked out in New India as well.
This column first appeared in the print edition on April 7, 2022 under the title ‘Food for anxiety’. pooja.pillai@expressindia.com
The entire future of the Indian judicial process is being put at stake in the “faith vs Constitution” controversy. The primary task of constitutional politics is to transmute a partisan controversy into a reasoned public debate. Allegations of “judicial overreach” greet any adjudicative “reasonable accommodation”, especially when it engages the constitutional right to education under Article 21-A.
The Karnataka High Court (KHC) recently advanced the doctrine of “qualified public space” in the hijab case – something not usually noticed in the critical discourse engaging with the essential practice of religion or the rights to dignity, culture, and privacy. Even when it remains a contentious doctrine, it is worthy of emphasis that the KHC allows wearing hijab on the school campus or other public spaces, while disallowing the hijab in classrooms. This judicial feat, however, is marred by disallowing even “hijab of structure and colour that suit to the prescribed dress code”. The KHC is determined to prevent “non-uniformity in the matter of uniforms”, and an undesirable “sense of ‘social separateness”.
Why so, especially when empirical studies demonstrating this “separateness” are scarce? Intuitively, it invokes the fundamental duty of all citizens to ensure that “common brotherhood” is not affected by the hijab. But why are other religious symbols allowed (wearing kumkum, turban, beard, tilak, or cross) — whether as religious essentials or cultural preferences?
Identities are both ascribed and fluid. But I learnt from Shah Bano (as interviewed by Dr Seema Sakhare) that she was not a “napak aurat” (an impious woman) when she affirmed both her religious identity and deployed the modern law as a means to secure the rights of an Indian Muslim woman citizen. So did about 50,000 Muslim women who signed a petition to the prime minister demanding a law that would abolish instant triple talaq. She also taught me about the processes or practices of identification and there exist at least three related human rights: The human right to have an identity, to acquire different identities, and to manage conflicts of identity.
The KHC cites a passage from my book, The Future of Human Rights, which reminds us that freedom of conscience precedes the right to religion. The Constitution recognises that each citizen has a right to a moral faculty called conscience, which helps to choose or change a religion, or renounce all religion. Conscientious choices do not lead to separateness. Identity only makes social sense when difference is recognised and respected. Article 51-A enjoins as a fundamental duty of all citizens to “value and preserve the rich heritage of our composite culture”. A composite culture is a “culture of many cultures”, not a “culture of no cultures”.
The KHC does not have much to do with practices “derogatory to the dignity of women”. And, intriguingly, it remains silent on the duty to “value and preserve the rich heritage of our composite culture”.
Should all the new rights to dignity, privacy, and the right to be and to remain different be trumped by a single-minded insistence on the integrity of a uniform? May the ends of a uniform not have been met equally by other strategies of imparting learning? Do other ways exist to foster “engagement” with the “foundational” trinitarian values — dignity, equality, and liberty? And is respect for dress as symbolic speech not enshrined in the right to free speech and expression?
The hijab controversy ought not to make further make cracks in constitutionalism. Does suffering the nightmare of partisan constitutionalism, serving propaganda and power in competitive quasi-liberal politics, presage our common futures? Or does the struggle to realise the dreams of equality and constitutional plurality (equality of all) offer a better alternative?
The Supreme Court should strive to extricate itself from the crossfire of internal and external dissent since the Sabarimala decision. A resultant piquant situation has led two CJIs — CJI Rajan Gogoi (November 14, 2019) and S A Bobde (on January 13, 2020) — to make a reference to a larger Bench, now to comprise nine judges.
The Court has now to consider not just the Sabrimala review, constitutionality of Dawoodi Bohra female genital mutilation practices, the entry of non-Parsi women (married inter-faith) into the fire temple, and of Muslim women into mosques but also the larger questions about the scope and ambit of religious
freedom. Unsurprisingly, this encyclopedic matter is still to be heard.
If the KHC decision were upheld now, would it necessarily preempt some issues before the SCI larger Bench? How may the apex judicial outcomes on the ambit of Article 25 affect the KHC decision? How adroitly such questions are managed will carry a fateful impact on law, power, and justice.
Any credible threshold evidence that certain organisations promote an agenda for separation threatening the roots of public order, and unity and integrity of India, merits strict and swift judicial scrutiny. So do the chilling effects of the misuse of the law on freedom of speech and dissent and wrongful prosecutions.
The KHC was right in hoping that such allegations will be met swiftly. But prevention of the unconscionable othering of Indian citizens by governance cultures and the demonising of protesting publics should be high on any governance agenda. And civil society intolerance must pause to give the right of way to priorities of just social peace.
Constitutional governance entails rectitude, and responsibility, in the exercise of power. We should recall what Justice J Chelameswar [para 39, Puttaswamy case] insightfully said: “The choice of appearance and apparel are also aspects of the rights of privacy. The freedom of certain groups of subjects to determine their appearance and apparel are protected” and “need not necessarily be based on religious beliefs falling under Article 25.”
This column first appeared in the print edition on April 7, 2022 under the title ‘The right to be different’. The writer is professor of law Emeritus, University of Warwick, and former vice-chancellor of Universities of South Gujarat and Delhi
On March 23, when Parliament passed Jammu and Kashmir’s budget, it was its third budget after the reorganisation of the erstwhile state. While the budget itself stands out in some aspects, it is best looked at as a key element in a strategy of transformation that began three years ago with the writing down of Articles 370 and 35A and the full integration of the erstwhile state with the Union.
Firstly, the overall size of the budget witnessed a sharp rise last year when it registered a nearly 51 per cent increase over the previous year. The current year’s budget size has seen a more modest increase of 11 per cent, but the cumulative increase since the reorganisation of the erstwhile state is a significant 67 per cent, accounting for an additional Rs 45,532 crore of resources.
A simple analysis would show that total spending in the budget as a ratio of the Union Territory’s Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) for 2022-23 is projected to be more than 55 per cent. The corresponding figure for a comparative hill state like Himachal Pradesh is only 28 per cent. This traditionally high figure, a distinct feature of the J&K economy, indicates not just an abnormally high dependence on public expenditure (largely financed by the Centre) but also a historical failure to develop a strong private sector capable of generating either taxable revenues or productive employment.
Given this context, what can be the transformative strategy that will address the traditional weaknesses in the economy and wean it away from its dependence on an oversized government propped by central largesse?
The key to any economic revival and to ending the near-obsessive quest for government employment is the development of the private sector. This, in turn, has at least three major requirements – infrastructure, human capital and a favourable policy and regulatory environment. Let us look at how these concerns are being addressed.
First, even a casual look at the capex trends would indicate a jump of nearly 179 per cent compared to the 2020-21 figures. When central government expenditure on roads and railways is taken into account, the actual capital expenditure is nearly double the amount reflected in the UT’s budget. But large outlays count for little if poorly spent, as in the past. That those inefficiencies are now behind us is borne out not just by the flurry of large power, road and infrastructure projects being executed but also by the completion of decades-old languishing projects.
But growth is capex dependent only in part. In certain sectors, especially service sectors like tourism, smart budgetary provisioning can yield disproportionately high returns. While tourism has been traditionally associated with J&K, the erstwhile state surprisingly never figured even among the top 10 states in this sector. By providing support for the development of 75 new destinations, the budget seeks to expand the tourism pie while bringing in more equity in this employment-elastic sector. Revival of traditional fairs in remote areas, incentivising rural homestays, targeted public investment in roads and urban infrastructure are aimed at expanding the tourism even while increasing the carrying capacity of these destinations and building local capacities. This seems to be working — tourist inflows in J&K hit a seven-year high in November last year.
The budget’s accent on horticulture addresses both productivity and income issues of the sector. The thrust on cold storage capacity expansion, increase in fruit productivity through high intensity orcharding, support to high value-low volume agro-products like aromatic and cash crops are all budget initiatives. In convergence with other initiatives like GI certification for saffron and basmati and rural road building to create access of vegetables and other crops to markets, these are meaningful efforts. Indeed if productivity is increased to international standards, it can lead to quadrupling the size of this sector and if supplemented by value addition to fruit (currently very low), it can significantly increase growth and employment.
Finally, the New Industrial Development Scheme for J&K announced in 2021 is not just the most attractive of its kind, but also learns from the misses of the past. Its promise of a higher incentive for investment in remote areas will help balanced development while enabling J&K to leverage its land abundance in areas hitherto neglected. The emphasis on the employment generation metric while allocating land will discourage “screwdriver” industries. The addition of a
services component will encourage sunrise sectors like IT/ITES, health, medical tourism, films and education.
While all these elements will add to productive capacity, the uniqueness of the strategy lies in leveraging India’s global reach, such as the recent trade agreement with the UAE to seek markets, investments and tourists. Given the proximity and familiarity of UAE with J&K, its Gulf strategy seeks to build on these links and potentialities.
Lastly, a sustained security effort has ensured that acts of terror have been pushed below a level where they can no longer significantly impact the investment climate.
For too long the J&K economy has been weighed down by its constraints. Many of which were simply the result of bad policies. Now, led by a clear policy direction, an economic transformation is underway.
If executed well, this transformation will see a new J&K that will host the discerning traveller looking for exciting destinations to tour and explore. It will produce fruit and fruit products that will be objet de désir of any global citizen. It will offer to the world its handicrafts that are the product of millennia of experience and culture. It will eventually generate over one-third of India’s hydropower. Its health, wellness and education ecosystem will be non pareil in the country. It also has the potential to host many of the IT, ITES, pharmaceutical, textile and electronics industries.
It is but rarely that the future beckons thus. This moment is not ours to lose.
This column first appeared in the print edition on April 7, 2022 under the title ‘Budgeting for the future’. Kansal is a senior IAS officer in J&K and Sengupta is Professor of Economics at the University of Jammu. Views are personal
Till very recently, women’s representation on the world stage was often a token gesture and a photo-op at best. But that doesn’t hold true anymore. Women are no longer seat-fillers; they finally have a seat at the table, having earned that spot through merit and hard work.
Gender-equality, parity, empowerment and inclusivity are the leitmotifs of global dialogues today. In India, we know that development and progress in any form cannot be achieved if we don’t put women at the centre of every policy decision that is made at the highest levels of government.
For too long, women had been ignored and forgotten, with government schemes bypassing their inclusion and benefit. Women in rural areas – already historically disadvantaged – had been further pushed back into invisibility. Prime Minister Narendra Modi not only introduced social welfare schemes and policies that put women at the helm, he went a step further to ensure women could independently access opportunities, without depending on their husbands, fathers, or brothers. Since 2014, programmes and schemes that have been introduced have been well planned, providing scope for women to benefit as equal and independent partners in India’s progress.
Women accounted for almost half the total number (49.6 per cent) of enrollments between 2019 and 2021 under the Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana — the largest health assurance scheme of its kind in the world that targets 50 crore Indians. The health benefits package of this scheme has 141 procedures for women, including 136 packages under obstetrics and gynaecology – the second-most utilised service after general medicine across 15 states. So far women have accounted for 42 per cent of the total number of beneficiaries who have availed treatment. This includes nearly three crore screenings for breast cancer and over two crore screenings for cervical cancer till June 2021. The Beti Bachao Beti Padhao programme is today playing an important role in ensuring the survival, protection, and education of the girl child.
Keeping the focus on women’s health and empowering them to make decisions that affect their lives, the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana which was launched within two years of the BJP government assuming office was designed specifically for the adult women population in rural and backward settings who were still using traditional cooking fuels such as firewood, cow-dung cakes, and coal — one of the main causes of indoor pollution that disproportionately affects women. Under the scheme, nine crore LPG connections have been released (till January 31, 2022), surpassing the initial target of eight crore connections by 2020, which was met in 2019. An independent study by the World Resources Institute India found that, as a result of greater uptake of LPG cylinders in India, 1.5 lakh pollution-related deaths were prevented, and indoor pollution deaths were reduced by 13 per cent in 2019.
In 21st century India, women must be financially empowered and have equal access and opportunities. Anything less would be unacceptable. Policies and programmes have been tailored to encourage women to participate in schemes and join the workforce. Out of the 2.5 crore houses that have been built under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana, the flagship affordable, housing initiative, women will have co-ownership rights to two crore of those houses. Similarly, to encourage entrepreneurship in India, the government also launched the Pradhan Mantri MUDRA scheme in 2015 which provided loans up to Rs 10 lakh to small enterprises. Sixty-eight per cent beneficiaries of the 32 crore loans that were given are women. Similarly, the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana has been a priority programme for this government to ensure financial literacy and universal access to banking services, ensuring at least one bank account per family along with providing opportunities to avail credit, insurance, and pension schemes. As of March 2022, 45 crore Jan Dhan accounts have been opened of which more than half (56 per cent) or 25 crore belong to women.
Over the past eight years, much has been achieved in India to put women on an equal socio-economic footing, and our dedication and endeavour to make policies and programmes centred around women will continue.
In January 2014, even before he became the Prime Minister, Modi spoke of women as nation-builders. His commitment to that statement has remained steadfast and strong. Prime Minister Modi recognises that for India to flourish, women must scale new summits and be equal partners in driving progress. For this, our government’s programmes and policies will continue to create an environment where women can access equal opportunities that are rightfully theirs.
This column first appeared in the print edition on April 7, 2022 under the title ‘With equality as its credo’. The writer is the Minister of Women and Child Development, Government of India
The macro impact on India from the commodity price shock is significant and well known. If oil prices remain elevated, it could drag growth down, raise inflation, and widen the twin fiscal and current account deficits. What is not as obvious is the more granular impact of higher oil prices on firms and consumers, which in turn could become the leading driver of growth trends.
Not all firms will be impacted equally by the oil price shock. Through the pandemic, large and listed firms have performed relatively better than small and informal firms. And early indicators show that the oil price shock is intensifying this divergence. Let us explain.
Our study of the RBI’s database of around 2,700 firms shows that during the pandemic, large firms have taken market share from smaller firms. Their profitability has also risen while that of small firms has not. This is likely to be a result of several factors benefiting large firms more — their ability to cut costs, a lower interest rate environment, and access to buoyant capital markets.
The underperformance of small firms comes in two distinct phases — one, the lockdown periods (in early 2020 and early 2021), and, two, the commodity price shock period (commodity prices have been rising since mid-2021). Small firms, particularly in the informal sector, typically have smaller cash buffers to withstand long periods of turmoil. Several weeks in the lockdown is likely to have hurt them much more than large firms. And just as they were rebounding, the commodity price shock hit and pushed them back into underperformance.
For two reasons, we think the commodity price shock will hurt small firms more than large firms. One, India has become more energy-efficient, and this trend has been led more by the large firms who have taken more efficiency-enhancing steps than the small firms. Two, large firms, by their sheer size, may have more bargaining power when buying raw materials. They can also pass on more of the input cost increases to consumers.
It is clear from the corporate results that the burden of rising input costs since mid-2021 has been higher for small firms. Survey results show that many have been pushed to shut shop in recent months, when prices have been rising. It is, therefore, safe to say that high inflation is hurting the bottom of the pyramid more.
It’s not just the large firms that have done well, it’s also their employees. Staff costs of large firms have overshot pre-pandemic levels by a meaningful margin. On the other hand, staff costs of small firms have stagnated at pre-pandemic levels, implying a fall in the real purchasing power of their employees. The recently conducted ICE survey shows that the poorest 20 per cent in India have seen a 53 per cent decline in their incomes between 2016 and 2021, while the richest 20 per cent have seen a 39 per cent increase.
So what proportion of Indians have borne the brunt of the double shock?
Twenty per cent of the labour force works in the formal sector and has benefitted from improved jobs and wages. Both the outperformance of the larger formal sector firms and the wealth effect from buoyant stock markets have played a role. Job listings at agencies like Naukri.com have recently overshot pre-pandemic levels.
Eighty per cent of the labour force works in the informal sector, equally split between agricultural and non-agricultural workers. The latter group is typically associated with small and informal firms.
Agricultural workers did well in the first half of the pandemic, given good monsoons, an exemption from the lockdown, and government welfare spending in rural India. Thereafter, wages in this sector began to slow from mid-2021, led again by a variety of factors — a slowdown in MGNREGA works, volatile monsoon rains, weaker construction wages, and higher rural inflation.
Non-agricultural workers didn’t do well in the first half of the pandemic. But as the lockdowns ended, their fortunes began to improve gradually. With the commodity price shock, the risk is that this nascent improvement reverses. This group, divided equally between rural and urban India, is perhaps the most vulnerable at this point. All this has implications for GDP growth.
We have a lot of good data in India to help track the formal sector. But we don’t have as much real-time data for the informal sector. In the short run, the statistics office assumes that the trends in the formal sector are a good proxy for the informal sector. But, in periods when the informal sector underperforms the formal sector, this assumption can lead to an overestimation of GDP. Meanwhile, if the weakness in the informal sector persists, it eventually shows up as lower demand (even hurting the prospects of the formal sector) and growth.
The good news is that the right policy mix can help control inflation and limit that pain endured by the informal sector.
There are two policy objectives (safeguarding growth and controlling inflation), and two instruments (fiscal policy and monetary policy). An appropriate strategy, whereby fiscal policy set by the government focuses on growth and monetary policy set by the RBI focuses on inflation can achieve an optimal outcome.
On the fiscal policy front, remaining generous with social welfare spending and sticking to capex plans outlined in the budget, while meeting higher fertiliser subsidy demands and trimming oil taxes, can be supportive of growth. Yes, the fiscal deficit may slip. Thankfully, the RBI can help here, by selling dollars (as necessitated by a widening trade deficit), and making space for government bond purchases.
On the monetary policy front, the RBI can help limit the second round impact of higher input prices by gradually tightening monetary policy — normalising the rate corridor (by raising the reverse repo rate), changing the stance from accommodative to neutral, and gradually hiking the repo rate. The government can help here by lowering the excise duty on oil, thereby limiting the rise in pump prices.
To conclude, we have an interesting situation at hand whereby India’s future business confidence indices are buoyant, but future consumer confidence indices are sluggish. Which of the two is correct? Will business prospects decline or will consumer confidence rise? The right policy mix can help achieve the optimal outcome, even in difficult times.
This column first appeared in the print edition on April 7, 2022 under the title ‘Unequal burden of pain’. The writer is Chief India Economist, HSBC
Recorded Future Inc., a threat intelligence firm, this week said that suspected state-sponsored Chinese hackers have targeted India’s power infrastructure in recent months. The firm believes it to be a case of cyber-espionage.
Digitalisation of economic and social activity has gathered pace during the pandemic. Along with the creation of new opportunities, it also spawns new threats. Crippling infrastructure or stealing information from remote locations is one of the threats that has been occurring with increasing frequency.
In India, the government’s Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) tracks and monitors cyber security incidents. According to CERT-In, a total of 14.02 lakh cyber security incidents were recorded in 2021. In the first two months of 2022, 2.12 lakh cyber security incidents were recorded.
CERT-In also plays a lead role in the response by issuing advisories and keeping track of threats that may have emerged in some other country. Separately, a designated institute such as the National Power Training Institute equips power infrastructure companies with training to safeguard their assets from cyber-attacks. This mode of attack is growing the world over as both state-sponsored groups and criminal gangs engage in it. Justice is also harder to enforce as many attacks emerge from outside national boundaries. There is a pressing need for both governments and private organisations to invest more in terms of both resources and attention in establishing safeguards against cyber incidents. Cyber- attacks can sometimes be more devastating than other forms as digitalisation is intertwined with expanding networks.
With Covid taking peculiar turns in some countries and another highly transmissible mutant dubbed XE surfacing, India must refocus attention on vaccination. GoI must motivate the laggards in the vaccination drive like the Northeast (minus Assam) and Jharkhand. The proportions of double-dosed in Bihar, Punjab, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu also significantly trail the national average of 82%. Rank misinformation, conspiracy theories and religious superstitions coupled with remoteness have hit the Northeast states badly. Here those double-dosed are just 58%. Jharkhand officials attributed the state’s low figure of 57% to migration.
Nearly 20 crore people in the 15+ population are yet to get both doses. Vaccine hesitancy and complacency appear to dog the precaution dose programme too. Merely because Covid infections are presently down doesn’t mean protection will endure. Just 1.23 crore 60+ citizens have taken boosters against 11.5 crore in this age group who were double-dosed. In remote areas and states without adequate hospital facilities, the risks of contracting serious illness amid uncontrolled Covid spread need to be conveyed properly. With NIV researchers stating that all adults need boosters, NTAGI must take a decision without delay.
CMC Vellore’s finding that a Covishield dose after two Covaxin doses is safe with sixfold rise in antibodies makes it the appropriate candidate as booster for Covaxin recipients. SII can easily accelerate Covishield’s production for this purpose. Earlier this week, SII’s Covovax was approved for the 12+ age group. But information on bulk orders placed for this vaccine isn’t in the public domain. Covovax also showed high antibody and neutralising responses in UK mix-and-match trials as a booster following two doses of AstraZeneca/Covishield. Covovax’s dual utility for child and booster vaccination mustn’t be squandered.
Whether it is scientific data or vaccine supplies, lack of adequate communication over eligibility for boosters does disservice to sub-60 citizens waiting for government’s booster strategy. The feeling of wellbeing that a booster accords to its recipients returning to work and commute amidst crowds mustn’t be ignored. Government can even make allowances for personal medicine as in the case of flu shots to allow all adults double-dosed over six months ago to take a booster, perhaps after securing medical advice. Not just citizens, even for vaccine companies with jabs ready for rollout or in the development pipeline, more clarity on India’s vaccination programme will be appreciated.
One of the geo-economic consequences of the war in Ukraine is the likely setback to China’s Belt and Road Initiative. The latter has been a flagship project of Xi Jinping and touted as a century-defining initiative aimed at restoring China’s central role in global trade and connectivity. But one of the main BRI routes that links China to the lucrative EU market passes through the vast Russian landmass. In fact, even Ukraine had wanted to be part of this trade and transit route to Europe that sought to build upon the old Soviet rail network. However, the Ukraine war and Western sanctions on Russia mean this BRI route may no longer be viable.
True, China could still use the sea route to Europe. But BRI is not just about trade and infrastructure. It is also about exporting Chinese debt abroad through opaque structuring of loans and investments, enhancing Chinese strategic influence in target countries, increasing the Chinese Communist Party’s control over minority-ethnicity areas in western China, and creating alternate land-based energy routes for China to overcome the age-old Malacca Dilemma. BRI was hitting potholes even before the Ukraine war broke out. As the current economic crises in Sri Lanka and Pakistan – two countries that took on substantial Chinese loans – show, BRI hasn’t been the miracle economic booster it was advertised to be. Rather, the model of providing loans without due diligence has led to poor economic governance.
Similarly, Chinese projects in Africa have often seen complaints about Chinese firms not hiring enough locals, leading to clashes in some instances. With the US, EU and G7 sanctioning Russia and increasing strategic competition with China, BRI looks in for rough weather. India should use this opportunity to work with the US on trusted infrastructure projects such as the Blue Dot Network and Build Back Better World to counter China’s designs in South Asia.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) working paper, 'Pandemic, Poverty and Inequality: Evidence from India', released on Tuesday makes instructive reading. It posits a new method to measure poverty. Usually, in the absence of data, consumption figures are updated with the corresponding growth in national accounts. Such estimates do not incorporate the effect of fiscal interventions, such as in-kind transfers, which reduce household consumption expenditure. The impact becomes starker when the transfer is food, an essential item of expenditure, thereby treatable as income.
The pandemic led to massive disruptions - migrant workers in urban areas lost jobs and had to make it back home under difficult circumstances. The loss in income, even if they found work, led to rise in poverty, particularly extreme poverty (less than $1.90 purchasing power parity per person per day) if they had to spend on food. The Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana free ration programme put in place during the first wave of Covid helped keep a large section of the population afloat. The programme ensured that households did not redirect meagre incomes or savings towards food. In-kind transfers of food have been central to India's redistributive policy since the 1980s, but with limited impact on extreme poverty. The IMF paper assesses that GoI was successful in benefits reaching the target population. It built on the 2013 Food Security Act and used Aadhaar effectively.
The paper does not make the case that poverty in India is a thing of the past, only that extreme poverty has stayed below 1% for the last three years. That is no mean achievement. If India is able to hold on to the implementation systems that overcame legacy distribution glitches and malpractices, self-congratulations will be well-deserved. This exercise needs to be replicated at state and intra-state level to address issues of regional imbalance and inequity.
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Housing demand accelerated during the previous quarter with Mumbai and the National Capital Region leading the unlock play, according to property portal Magicbricks. Sequential and year-on-year growth nationwide comes against the backdrop of declining unsold inventories and new property launches exceeding pre-pandemic levels. Developers have also begun to cautiously pass on to homebuyers increases in costs of inputs like steel and cement that have been affected by global supply chain disruptions. The quarterly performance accompanied a sequential uptick in price, supported by improvements in project delivery and rising consumer confidence. But construction costs will face bigger pressure once elevated energy prices filter through higher freight.
Housing demand in India is reviving after a decade of incomes rising while apartment prices stagnated due to a supply glut. Improved regulation of the sector has delivered, with builders becoming more accountable. The pandemic improved affordability further by lowering interest rates. As urbanisation recovers its long-term trend, banks are trying to enlarge their retail book when corporate lending is slow. The upcycle is showing up in valuations of real estate stocks that began running up last year. But the upside is capped by cost inflation, for which the industry has been seeking relief from GoI.
Builders are trying to avert the risk of inflation jeopardising the recovery by staggering house price increases. But they may not be able to absorb the cocktail of high construction, fuel and, eventually, credit costs. The industry is particularly vulnerable to interest rates, which weigh on both demand and supply. India has broken ranks with central bankers of advanced and other emerging economies in reversing monetary easing. But RBI's growth and inflation February estimates could undergo revision on account of the Russia-Ukraine conflict and ensuing economic sanctions.
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Wrenching images of migrant workers pouring out on national highways, their possessions bundled on their heads, children in tow, shook civil society and governments into action two summers ago. A key policy response was the one-nation one-ration programme, which sought to do away with requirements that a beneficiary could only obtain supplies in the area jurisdiction where the ration card was issued. The scheme was meant to ameliorate the fear of starvation which, along with concerns of rising rent and looming unemployment, had pushed many labourers on the days-long trek back to their homes.
The scheme was rolled out in stages last year. On Wednesday, official data showed that it was a success in at least the national Capital, which recorded a million transactions in its nine months of operation. The number of transactions grew from 16,150 in July 2021 to 209,668 in March. This comes weeks after the government told Parliament that roughly 770 million people have been covered under the scheme nationally. Though no national data is available, since Delhi is a major destination for migrant labour, the success of the scheme indicates that it is erasing, at least partially, food insecurities that stalked economic migration for decades. More can be done – targeted social safety nets, reducing vulnerability with basic regulation of work hours and pay, and reducing hurdles in accessing health and education – and the government has announced plans for low-cost housing and a database, which will make targeted subsidies easier. But, for now, strengthening the ration system and ensuring no migrant goes hungry is a solid first step.
Two recent working papers, one by economists Sutirtha Sinha Roy and Roy van der Weide, at the World Bank, and another co-authored by Surjit Bhalla, an executive director at the IMF along with Arvind Virmani and Karan Bhasin have given alternative estimates for poverty in India for the period after 2011. There are no official poverty numbers after 2011 in India. Both papers agree that extreme poverty levels ($1.9 purchasing power parity line) in India have fallen from where they were in 2011-12. This goes against what the leaked findings of the 2017-18 Consumption Expenditure Survey (CES) suggested. The papers differ on the magnitude of poverty. Bhalla and his co-authors argue that extreme poverty has almost vanished, whereas the WB paper argues that it is still around 10%.
What explains this large difference? As with all statistics, the explanation is the method which has been used. Roy and Roy have worked on Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) data to generate a substitute for CES numbers. Bhalla et al have relied on their old method of using National Account Statistics data as they have always believed that CES underestimates consumption spending and hence overestimates poverty. Apart from the different poverty numbers, what is the larger takeaway from these papers? One, private data is not a substitute for CES data. Roy and Roy demonstrate once again that Consumer Pyramid Household Survey (CPHS) data from CMIE undercounts the relatively less well-off in many ways. This underlines the need for holding a new CES as soon as possible. Two, while it is nobody’s case that CES data is infallible, the government and its statistical bodies should make an honest effort to promote a transparent and informed debate on the growing gap between CES and NAS numbers instead of trying to discredit CES. This is not just about poverty numbers. CES data is crucial for updating statistics such as GDP and CPI series as well as differences on account of rural-urban and class issues.
Last but not the least, Bhalla and his co-authors are right in arguing that abolition of extreme poverty as per their data should not mean an end of anti-poverty programmes in India. They rightly argue that the government should raise the poverty line to $3.2 PPP. The Indian State can do a lot more to help those at the bottom of the pyramid. The current regime will most likely agree with Bhalla’s arguments — after all, it has reinvented the relationship between politics and welfare.
The central assumption underlying the Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill, 2022 (“Bill”) is that more technology will help solve crimes more effectively and reliably. It permits forced collection, indefinite storage, profiling, databasing and sharing of a wide range of physical, biological and behavioural “measurements” for undefined purposes. The list of measurements in the Bill includes fingerprints, footprints, palmprints, photographs, iris and retina scans, signatures and handwriting. Additionally, the category of “biological samples and their analysis” could potentially include any bodily substance or feature, with any testing done on it, irrespective of its forensic value. Similarly, “behavioural attributes”, which remain undefined, could cover any kind of psychological, neuro-psychological or physiological examination connected to understanding a person’s behaviour. Given its scope, the debate on grave constitutional concerns must be informed by a close analysis of its technological premise.
Technology can go wrong. The Bill creates a system with virtually no fetters on taking and processing of measurements from any arrestee, detainee, convicted offender, or any person whose measurement may be considered “expedient” (i.e. convenient or useful) for any investigation. Before building such a vast system, one should consider if there are any scientifically valid techniques with recognised standards for analysing the wide range of measurements covered. The Bill appears oblivious to the growing body of scientific research which raises concerns regarding the validity and reliability of many pattern matching techniques for comparing measurements. Even the “advanced countries” that the Bill refers to are taking cognisance of these concerns to amend their own investigative and evidentiary practices. For instance, the 2016 report of the US President’s Council of Advisors on Science & Technology analysed existing scientific literature to examine the validity of six forensic methods, including fingerprint comparison, for which it noted the possibility of a false positive rate of one in 18 cases. Similarly, the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2017 concluded that fingerprint comparison is prone to error and contextual bias, and there is no scientific proof to state that every individual’s fingerprints are unique. Following these developments, the US Department of Justice issued guidelines for latent print examiners, prohibiting them from making claims that two prints originated from the same source, or that latent print examination is “infallible with zero error rate”. Therefore, before embarking on a mindless expansion of collecting measurements, consider the existing scientific proof (or lack thereof) for the level of individualisation possible from using these measurements and whether it would support the “unique identification” of perpetrators.
The Bill justifies building vast databases of different types of measurements since they are “unique” to individuals and would, therefore, allow identification of the offender through comparison with evidence collected during investigations. The usefulness of a forensic database is guided by the level of individualisation possible by running the unknown samples against the entries of known individuals in the database. However, for several measurements covered within the Bill, such as footprints, palmprints, iris and retina scans, signature and handwriting, there is no data or scientific research to calculate their rarity and substantiate their discriminatory value. For example, if an unknown handwriting sample shows a million possible hits on the database, what would be the utility of such a search? While arguably, reliable comparison between the features of the suspect with the unknown sample collected during investigations may have corroborative value, this is already underway by collecting measurements from arrestees in individual cases. There exists no justification for building the massive forensic databases envisaged under the Bill.
The Bill also ignores the fact that forensic evidence can often be irrelevant or even misleading, depending on the context of the case. Instead of requiring probable cause to support the collection of measurements, the Bill grants unguided discretion to police or prison officers and magistrates, which may not assist reliable and fair investigations in any way. This gains significance as there are no established scientific protocols for forensic examination or clear legal standards for examination of expert evidence. Instead of directly addressing the issues with India’s weak forensics infrastructure, the Bill only intrudes upon privacy behind the ruse of promoting security and aiding investigations.
Shreya Rastogi heads the work on forensics and death penalty litigation at Project 39A, National Law University, Delhi
The views expressed are personal
The Kashmir Files has brought into focus one of the darkest chapters of recent Indian history, and, in the process, rattled those who were either complicit in the mayhem that hit the Valley post- 1989 or in its wily cover-up during all these years. The Files details, in a raw and lacerating form, how an entire ancient culture was killed by those who invoked radical Islam to validate their agenda of ethnic cleansing.
Movies, as a medium, suffer from several limitations, particularly while dealing with multi-faceted issues or historical injustices. So does The Files. A three odd hour film can hardly be expected to encapsulate a tragedy with all its intertwined dimensions, its historical and cultural context, nuances and offer tangible solutions.
The Files is rather a pithy narration of how the hapless Pandits were killed, maimed, their women dishonoured and raped, houses torched, and places of worship and businesses pulverised, leading to their exodus even as the entire system – courts, Constitution, law-enforcing agencies and media – watched these gut-wrenching developments with a mysterious indifference. This multi-organ failure of society underlines one important reality – constitutional guarantees are worthless in the absence of a conducive ecosystem.
Why did civil society, which internationalises an unfortunate mob lynching (such as those of Akhlaq or Junaid) go into hibernation over the decimation of an ancient culture and ethnic cleansing of an entire community? Why did the system which secured successful convictions of the 2002 Gujarat riots and 2008 Mumbai terror attacks accused, fail in the Valley? Or why were none of the accused convicted, particularly when many of them unabashedly boasted about their exploits in public forums?
In a media interview, Farooq Ahmed Dar (Bitta Karate), admitted to killing more than 20 Kashmiri Pandits. He was so relaxed and casual about his misdeeds that he nonchalantly added, “Maybe more than 30-40”. It was only last week (30 years after the crime) that he finally faced trial in the Srinagar sessions court on a plea by the family of Satish Tickoo, one of Karate’s countless victims.
Apart from several other crimes, Yasin Malik is accused of an attack on a group of Indian Air Force (IAF) personnel in Rawalpora, Srinagar, on January 25,1990. During the unprovoked random shooting, four IAF personnel were killed. It took the system 30 years to charge Malik and six others for the dastardly crime.
It’s not difficult to see why and how the Indian State failed the Kashmiri Hindus. On February 17, 2006, then Prime Minister (PM) Manmohan Singh invited Yasin Malik to a meeting at his official residence in New Delhi, as part of his outreach programme. Malik, who should have been in prison paying for his crimes, was instead lionised at the PM’s house. He was sold as a “youth icon” by a section of the media. For many, he was the “poster boy” of “Kashmiri aspirations”. The message to law enforcement agencies was loud and clear.
The Indian State collapsed in Kashmir because the Valley ecosystem was, and still is, highly infested with Islamist toxicity. The process started with the takeover of the state by Sheikh Abdullah in 1947, and peaked in 1989-90. During all these eventful years, Left-Liberals provided the intellectual underpinning to separatists’ divisive narrative, successfully kept a lid over their heinous crimes and romanticised their fight for azadi (freedom).
What’s the genesis of the Kashmir crisis? A series of wrong decisions by the central leadership, its vacillation and ostrich-like attitude, all shaped by an erroneous interpretation of the concept of secularism. The first mistake was to call for a ceasefire when the Indian Army had almost succeeded in chasing away the Pakistani infiltrators from the Valley; and taking the matter to the United Nations in 1948. The second was forcing Maharaja Hari Singh to abdicate and hand over the state to Sheikh Abdullah, a rank communalist. Jawaharlal Nehru ultimately realised his mistake, dismissed and arrested the Sheikh on August 7, 1953. But, by that time, irrevocable damage was done.
There has been a lot of disinformation about Jammu & Kashmir. The state had no special status at the time of its merger with the Indian Union. The Instrument of Accession which the Maharaja signed on October 26,1947, was exactly the same (including all punctuations) as was inked by the Union with the rest of the 560-odd princely states.
Article 370 was included in the Constitution on October 17, 1949, (a year after the merger) under pressure from the Sheikh and Article 35A was surreptitiously added through a presidential notification on May 14, 1954. Obviously, The Files fails to deal with these vexed issues because of the constraints of the medium. But it surely bares the terror “toolkit”, including slogans, methodology, and theological moorings responsible for the macabre dance of death and destruction. The Left-Liberal network has sought to secrete these hideouts details all the while.
Can one seriously hold a three-hour movie responsible for “hate politics” and “Islamophobia”, as suggested by Rajdeep Sardesai in his column in these pages on March 25? The movie doesn’t generate hate, it merely mirrors it. It’s the same theology which propelled the Moplah riots in 1920s, forced Partition on India in 1947, liquidated the Hindus and Sikhs of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh, and is responsible for what has befallen the Hindus of Kashmir. Shooting the messenger offers no solution.
Balbir Punj is a former Member of Parliament and a columnist
The views expressed are personal
These aren’t the best of times for cricketers-turned-netas in the subcontinent. In Pakistan, Imran Khan has been forced out of the prime ministerial chair after losing a parliamentary majority. In India, Navjot Singh Sidhu has resigned as Punjab Congress chief after the party’s electoral debacle in the recent assembly elections. Yet, while the political context of Pakistan and Punjab are vastly different, there are striking similarities in the rise and fall of the two sports stars that reveal the limits of personality-centric politics.
Take Khan first. He came to power in Pakistan in 2018 as the charismatic hero who promised to end the dominance of the country’s dynastic and corrupt elites and build a naya (new) Pakistan. For a citizenry disenchanted with traditional politicians, Khan aroused expectations as a potential game-changer. He was widely perceived to be the all-powerful Pakistan army’s “chosen one”: The puppeteers in uniform could ride on Khan’s appeal to remote-control the government without threatening his chair.
Sidhu, too, was made Punjab Congress president with the assured backing of the Congress’s First Family. Sidhu’s access to the Gandhis meant that he was guaranteed pre-eminent status within the factionalised state unit that had just ousted its veteran chief minister (CM), Amarinder Singh. Sidhu’s photograph with Priyanka Gandhi Vadra was circulated to legitimise his sudden elevation. Like Khan, Sidhu could claim to be an anti-establishment hero who was taking on the ancient regime of Punjab’s family-centric, big money politics.
So why did the star value and anti-corruption crusader credentials that the Khan-Sidhu duo brought to their politics not translate into something more substantive? The short answer would suggest that politics is played on a very different pitch to cricket, one where there are no set rules of engagement. In cricket, an iconic captain or celebrated player can lead from the front and use the sheer force of personal achievement to make a crucial difference. Politics is vastly more complicated and requires individuals to wear multiple hats, become bridge-builders, nurture collective energies and strengthen institutional capacities, and not just satiate personal ego and vaulting ambition.
In a sense, both Khan and Sidhu are alumni of the Donald Trump school of disruptionist politics, larger-than-life figures whose commitment to the self is often greater than their loyalty to an organisation. In Pakistan, the Tehreek-e-Insaaf founded by Khan in 1996 is a party solely identified with the personality cult of the supreme leader, a sporting legend who led his country to its first and only World Cup success. With his post-retirement philanthropic work in setting up a cancer hospital, Khan saw himself as a man of destiny, someone who would be unshackled by the baggage of Pakistan’s turbulent politics.
Sidhu is not quite in the Khan category either as a cricketer or a politician. Khan struggled for years to build his party, unlike Sidhu who smoothly moved from the Bharatiya Janata Party to the Congress. But the motormouth Sardar’s self-image is of a similar superhuman figure. For Sidhu, the Congress organisation was incidental: He could override internal structures and even the CM’s office to establish himself as Punjab’s ultimate saviour.
The mistake that Khan and Sidhu made – as did Trump – is failing to recognise that there are limits to stark individualism replacing institutional cohesion in a democratic set-up. In the United States (US), Trump incited people to disrespect an electoral verdict, spurring violence last January. Khan, too, is urging street protests by making unsubstantiated claims of a “foreign conspiracy”. A sulking Sidhu, in the run-up to the elections, repeatedly threatened to resign from his post if his demands were not met.
In the process, they all overreached to the point of no return. Trump won the US presidential election as a rank outsider, but he couldn’t unite his Republican Party to stand by him in a crisis. Khan may have been a cult figure in Pakistan, but he forgot that his survival eventually depended on not crossing red lines set by the army. And, Sidhu should have realised that his future was entwined with that of his party: Repeatedly attacking the CM was always a recipe for a disaster.
Which is why it is important to recognise the limits of unbridled personality-driven politics that attempts to bypass democratic checks and balances by focusing solely on personal appeal. The rise of populist leaders in the subcontinent and beyond might bring in new actors and a certain freshness into the political system, but if those individuals fail to provide effective governance, they risk pushing democracy into further recession because of a loss of public faith in the political class. Writing off any politician is hazardous, but Khan and Sidhu by getting bowled out because of their missteps have perhaps made it even more difficult for any future sporting hero to make the giant leap into politics. Which is a pity at a time when politics in both countries desperately needs new faces and ideas.
Post-script: Of the many Khan stories, my favourite is when he tried to stamp out match-fixing as captain. In the late 80s, with rumours swirling of several Pakistani players having taken money to “fix” a final in Sharjah, Khan called an urgent meeting in the dressing room and said he was betting all the Pakistan team’s prize money earned so far on winning the match. Sure enough, the team won the game. If only political power play was as straightforward as a cricket match!
Rajdeep Sardesai is a senior journalist and author
The views expressed are personal
Three months ago, the world lost EO Wilson, one of the world’s leading biologists. Wilson was an expert on sociobiology and ants, and a champion of biodiversity. In 2016, Wilson wrote the book, Half Earth: The Struggle to Save the Rest of Life. The book has served as a rallying cry for conservationists to preserve more of the planet. It is unfortunate but true that a human-driven sixth mass extinction is occurring on earth right now. It is possible that the earth contains tens of millions of different species of plants and animals of which, one million or more are faced with extinction.
When most people think of preserving animals, they think of large animals like tigers and pandas. When they imagine bringing back extinct species, they think of mammoths or perhaps some species of dinosaur. Insects do not captivate the imagination of most people in positive ways.
It is a shame because of the 2.5 million species that have been characterised on the planet, around 40% are insects. Around 400,000 beetle species have been described, but that might only be a fraction of those that exist. There may, in fact, be a new species of beetle waiting to be discovered in your garden.
Most of us who live in urban environments do not think of insects in a positive light, but rather as squishy or creepy creatures that bite us, spread disease, ruin our food, and eat through the wood in our homes. But these negative associations hide the fact that we rely on insects to survive. In his new book, Silent Earth: Averting the Insect Apocalypse, entomologist Dave Goulson, sounds the alarm on a catastrophe that most of us are unaware of.
The numbers are shocking. Insects may have declined by 75% in the past 50 years. And they are continuing to disappear in a manner that is detrimental to human welfare and to the environment of the planet we inhabit. Goulson writes “we need insects to pollinate our crops, recycle dung, leaves and corpses, keep the soil healthy, control pests, and much, much more. Many larger animals such as birds, fish and frogs rely on insects for food. Wildflowers rely on them for pollination. As insects become more scarce, our world will slowly grind to a halt, for it cannot function without them.”
Goulson catalogues some of the sobering losses. Populations of the monarch butterfly are collapsing in North America. Bees are being decimated in Europe and North America. In parts of China, there are no insect pollinators left. Goulson has also witnessed farmers in Bengal hand pollinating squash plants in the absence of insect visitors. If the present seems grim, in the absence of concerted efforts to preserve wild ecosystems and limiting the use of pesticides, things will only get worse.
Around 87% of plants rely on animals for pollination, and in most cases those animals are insects. Without insects, the world would lose a sizeable number of colourful flowers and important crop plants. There would be no chilli peppers, cucumbers, pumpkins, coffee, tomatoes, or chocolate, for example.
Goulson offers an analogy shared by biologist Paul Ehrlich, who compares an ecological community to an airplane and an individual species to a rivet on its wings. Since there are many insect species in an ecosystem, we can imagine that they are like many rivets that keep an airplane afloat. We don’t know what all of the rivets do for the airplane, but removing many of them will invariably lead to catastrophic failure – something we face with the wholesale decimation of insect species.
We do not know how many millions of insect species there actually are on the planet. In many cases, we know of declining insect numbers due to their effects on populations of larger animals that feed on them, such as birds.
What choices do we have then? We can broaden awareness of the problem of insect loss, reduce indiscriminate use of pesticides, and grow urban gardens that are inviting to insects. We can also inculcate in younger generations an appreciation of the environment and the need to be good stewards of the planet we share and all its species. Bugs have been around for hundreds of millions of years and they’re cool.
But even these measures have limitations. Wilson understood that we can’t save what we don’t know. He proposed legally safeguarding half of the planet’s land and oceans. Building on this goal, many organizations have proposed protecting at least 30% of the planet by 2030. It is an ambitious target in the face of population growth, the decimation of natural ecosystems, and climate-exacerbated catastrophes such as wildfires and coral-reef destruction.
But as Wilson wrote, “We are stewards of the living world. We’ve learned enough to accept this simple and easy to use moral precept: do no further harm.”
Anirban Mahapatra, a scientist by training, is the author of COVID-19: Separating Fact From Fiction
The views expressed are personal
New Delhi: The crisis that has engulfed Pakistan has about it a ring from the tumultuous 1990s when too a Khan and a Sharif were locked in a power tussle that shook the country, the difference being the given first names of the protagonists in the drama.
The Khan at the centre of the storm then was President Ghulam Ishaq from whom the elder among the Sharif brothers, the now self-exiled Nawaz Sharif (NS) refused to take “dictation” as Prime Minister.
That’s not the only parallel. Groomed by the Pakistani deep State, NS, the scion of Lahore’s foremost business family, had preceded Imran Khan (IK) as the establishment’s foster child. His political baptism in Punjab was the brainwork of General Ziaul Haq, the military dictator who mentored him till his death in a plane crash in 1988. The closing phase of that eventful year saw Benazir Bhutto’s rise to power. Her regime was cut short in less than two years.
Destiny and the deep state that’s a continuum in Pakistan came together in 1990 to ensure NS’s elevation as PM after Bhutto’s dismissal by Ghulam Ishaq Khan (GIK) for “corruption and horse-trading.”
That was when the Presidency was the establishment’s most potent symbol empowered by the Constitution’s since abrogated article 58-2(B) to send governments packing. The stock joke about civilian leaders in Islamabad those days was “58-2(B) or not to be!”
Nawaz Sharif’s 1993 revolt against GIK marked his transition to a rebel from being the establishment’s baby. The war he declared on the presidency in a nationally televised address made him GIK’s second victim in five years after Bhutto. The constitutional pistol, 58 2 (B) was the same, only the victim different.
Imran was a Sharif clone rolled out from the army’s factory
For his part, IK, a cricketing hero turned anti-corruption crusader who claims to be the forbearer of “aam aadmi” politics in the subcontinent, was nothing but another NS rolled out from the army’s political factory. The alliances his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) forged and the majority it assembled after the 2018 polls in the national assembly and Punjab wouldn’t have been possible without some forceful nudging from the gumboots in Rawalpindi. For example — among his post-election allies were the fauj’s stock cheerleaders, notably a breakaway Muslim League faction, the PML (Q).
In a desperate bid to mobilise the numbers, he failed to marshal — before getting the no-trust vote unilaterally rejected by the chair in the national assembly — IK offered the Q-League’s Pervez Ilahi the chief ministership in Punjab as a price for the support of his five NA members. The move has caused another constitutional logjam with Ilahi unable to show numbers and d PML-N electing Shahbaz Sharif’s son Humza as the ‘Punjab CM’ at a hotel in Lahore.
Be that as it may, like the installation of IK’s “hybrid regime,” Nawaz Sharif’s 1990 rise on the national scene was as much a handiwork of the Army which rebooted with men and material the Islami Jamhoori Ittehad (IJI), a religious-political alliance it had founded in the 1980s to stall Bhutto. At the centre of that front was the Pakistan Muslim League, the N-faction of which is navigated now by the Sharif clan, with IK’s bête noire Shahbaz Sharif at the helm, given that the latter’s elder brother and the party’s main rallying force is in England.
Means to the end contradiction
Much of the mass appeal NS later acquired among the poor and middle-classes got plinth from his 1993 calling out of the overbearing establishment. The crucial difference between his fight and that of IK is that he waged and won a constitutional battle against the powerful presidency.
Unlike the PTI leader who ventured to force early polls by blatantly subverting a parliamentary vote he was bound to lose, Sharif won a historic Supreme Court verdict to return as PM. As the impasse lingered after the judicial order, the then army chief, Abdul Waheed Kakar intervened to make GIK demit office as a quid pro quo for early polls.
NS could have avoided going into elections by striking a middle ground with a constitutionally chastised GIK. But he didn’t, explaining to this writer at the time that co-habiting with the presidency could compromise the popular base he had created as one who fought the unpopular establishment.
IK’s ambition is no different; his comeuppance being the patently unfair means he has adopted to his supposedly laudable end-goals. He rejects his opponents as a bunch of corrupt politicians who seek immunity for their crimes and are guided by a foreign power (read the United States) that wants him out. The narrative he is building mixes religion with national pride to show Washington as having singled him out for his “independent” foreign policy while remaining soft on the identical Indian position on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
With his rigid position against the US and the West for what he terms their “partisan” approach to Pakistan, IK hasn’t endeared himself to the army that’s the ultimate referee in any political battle. On the face of it, he looks like a burnt-out case for Rawalpindi that’s smarting still from the affront he caused to Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa by delaying the appointment of the new ISI chief.
Can Imran win in Court and against the army?
Much of what happens in future depends on the view of the Supreme Court, which has taken suo motu notice of the assembly’s dissolution without a trust vote. The political flux of the PM’s making has come at a time when the county’s facing an economic emergency no different from Sri Lanka.
Pakistan’s foreign exchange reserves are depleting amid rising exchange rates that make hugely unsustainable the government subsidy on oil and other commodities. The road ahead isn’t easy, what with the promised International Monetary Fund (IMF) bailout put on hold. Such is the gravity of the crisis that voices have arisen from the PML (N) and PPP asking for the army’s formal take on a diplomatic cable IK is using to paint the entire Opposition as proxies in an American plot against him.
Comparisons are odious but IK’s leadership style forces one to draw parallels with Navjot Sidhu, his Indian friend from their cricketing years whose self-righteous rhetoric buried the Congress he led in the recent Punjab elections. Caged by their self-image of honesty, they see a charlatan in every critic or opponent.
Here too, perhaps, there are lessons to draw from the adventures of Nawaz Sharif. The elections that followed his faceoff with GIK saw Bhutto winning a second term and NS waiting for his second shot at power which came in 1997. As the Pakistan People’s Party leader was dismissed mid-term by Farooq Leghari, a party colleague she promoted to the presidency, NS’s first action on regaining power was to dismantle the constitutional axe of 58 2(b) the establishment so often brought down on elected regimes.
In that sense, the elbow room IK used to deny premiership to Shahbaz through a rubber-stamp presidency was created by the latter’s elder brother. It remains to be seen whether the PTI headman will be as successful in the court of law as his exiled predecessor was in 1993.
Till he was barred from practising politics or being the president of his party, NS fought four successive army chiefs for his position on the totem pole as an elected premier. The generals he was ranged against included Asif Nawaz Janjua, Abdul Waheed Kakar, Jehangir Karamat and Pervez Musharraf. As NS had done away with article 58 2(B), Musharraf had to oust him through a coup in 1999.
Yet, the PML (N) veteran was third time lucky to be PM from 2013-17, the curtains drawn on his career by the very Supreme Court which reinstalled him in office 24 years ago. What did him in was the taint of profit and profligacy.
Can IK who remains popular among younger voters, be the fighter Nawaz Sharif was? Or will his first brush with the law be his last?
HT’s veteran political editor, Vinod Sharma, brings together his four-decade-long experience of closely tracking Indian politics, his intimate knowledge of the actors who dominate the political theatre, and his keen eye which can juxtapose the past and the present in his weekly column, Distantly Close
vinodsharma@hindustantimes.com
The views expressed are personal
The born again version of Jana Sangh, the Bharatiya Janata Party celebrated its 42nd year of coming into existence at near peak success. Its story of rags to success is best epitomised by the personal story of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, its most powerful leader ever; from a mere two Lok Sabha MPs in 1984 to two consecutive Central governments with absolutely majority and a near proportionate sway over the states, reflecting in its having over 100 MPs in the Upper House.
The BJP, which claims with credibility of being the world’s largest political party, has indeed come a long way; from the Jana Sangh days when for decades it found little support amongst the people to a point where it has almost delivered on all its key promises — construction of a Ram temple in Ayodhya, removal of Article 370 (and 35a) — and few citizens in the country really doubt that the Uniform Civil Code is a matter of when rather than if.
Post Independence, with the mammoth and dominant Congress Party acquiring a left of centre, social democratic space, there was always a space for more right wing parties, be it of liberal social and economically libertarian hues, or one with a greater cultural and religious grounding, with a pragmatic socialist welfare mindset in economics. Quite clearly the latter, the BJP was born after the failure of the Jana Sangh, and the fall of the first non-Congress alliance government post Emergency.
Since it was essentially birthed in a political context of opposing the Congress, but unwilling to sacrifice the membership of the RSS, the BJP was essentially always going to be a Hindutva party, unwilling to let go of its nationalistic and cultural worldview, and instead, be patiently willing to transform the people to accept its ideology.
The long game of patience has paid off. The party and its parent RSS’s esemplastic integration of a cultural nationalism, clean politics sans nepotism and corruption, and an undercurrent of continually boiling the communal cauldron has put it in prime position.
The rise of the BJP, coinciding with the rapid decline of the Grand Old Party, has once again created the pre-Emergency like political situation, when India was described as a single party dominated, multi-party democracy.
The success or failure of any political party, and its ideology, depends on the people and, therefore, should only be celebrated. The rise of the BJP has left ample anxiety and problematic flux in the country, going beyond management of economy or growth or loss of jobs, which trace back to the questions that defined the Partition and the Constitutional birth of modern India.
The right to diversity of political views ends at the doorstep of the defining values of the Republic; and trying to create a society with a tangentially different mindset and values should be beyond the scope of politics.
The BJP must rededicate itself to India, allowing for every hue and variant worldview, every form of diversity to peacefully exist and thrive; now, that would be a wonderful gift to give to itself on its anniversary.
Housing Development Finance Corporation (HDFC), the entity that had become synonymous with housing loans in the country even before Indians dreamt of liberalisation, would become a part of history when it merges with its own offshoot HDFC Bank in the next year and a half.
Though HDFC chairman Deepak Parekh described the merger as the son taking over the business of the father, it indicates much deeper systemic changes in the Indian financial sector which forced both the HDFC entities to dust off a merger proposal that was discussed and discarded two years ago.
Many entities operated as non-banking finance companies because this model would subject them to lighter RBI regulations as compared to regular banks.
Typically, NBFCs were not required to make regulatory provisions such as cash reserve ratio and statutory liquidity ratio and were not subjected to stringent reporting compliances for non-performing assets, etc. They, therefore, preferred to operate as non-banking companies in spite of the higher cost of funds.
However, after Infrastructure Leasing & Financial Services (IL&FS), one of the largest non-banking companies, turned bankrupt, the Reserve Bank of India started tightening norms for NBFCs to bring them on par with banks, leaving little incentive for large NBFCs to operate independently. After the merger, the combined entity can access low-cost deposits for financing the ever-growing demand for housing loans.
The combined entity will be a financial giant with a loan book of Rs.17.9 lakh crore — more than double that of the second-largest private lender ICICI Bank. After the merger, the combined entity’s loan book would be Rs.8.64 lakh crore less than India’s largest lender State Bank of India (SBI) which lent Rs.26.64 trillion at the end of December 2021.
While the merger is subject to RBI’s approval of HDFC’s request for staggered compliances, the central bank should ensure that changing regulatory dynamics do not rob the vibrancy of the Indian financial sector and do not make an average Indian’s dream of owning a house a mere dream.
Crossing the thresholds of tolerance, whether economic or social, can garner votes in the short term. But in the long term, this can destroy a nation.
As I write comes the news that the political and economic crisis in Sri Lanka is worsening, sometimes by the hour. The Sri Lankan rupee has plunged to a record low to become the world’s worst-performing currency as the island nation grapples with looming debt payments, nationwide protests and an economic emergency affecting everyday life.
What lessons do these developments hold for India?
Sri Lanka’s crisis came up in a recent four-hour meeting that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had with some senior bureaucrats. The media reports note that a few officials flagged fears of India going the Sri Lanka way if some states continue with “populist schemes” which in their view were not economically sustainable. The officials reportedly said that the announcements made by some state governments, such as Punjab, Delhi, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal, are unsustainable and that solutions need to be found. They went on to warn that competition among political parties to outdo each other in offering “freebies” before every election will have serious repercussions on the finances of the Central and state governments over the long run.
The debate over the politics of freebies is not new. Clearly, no individual or state or country can live beyond its means for too long. However, the lack of consensus on what distinguishes a “freebie” from a scheme in the public interest, especially in times of economic distress, makes the discourse a lot more nuanced than some might like.
That this list has only Opposition-ruled states has not gone unnoticed. The reality is that neither populism nor indebtedness is unique to Opposition-ruled states.
Many states, including those where the BJP is now in power, have run up steep debts. In a report titled “State Finances: A Study of Budgets of 2021-22”, the Reserve Bank of India has flagged the worrying level of debt and the debt-to-GDP ratio of states. States with high debts include several Opposition-ruled states such as Punjab, Rajasthan, West Bengal. They also include Uttar Pradesh, where the BJP has bounced back to power in the recent Assembly elections. Some argue that if a state is experiencing economic growth, it is very likely that there are social priorities which need resources and that leads to the debt levels going up. This argument should be applied even-handedly, to all the states.
What complicates matters further is the absence of a consensus among political parties on what constitutes a “freebie”. Is free water or free electricity a freebie or a measure in the public interest?
In Punjab, the Aam Aadmi Party has promised 300 units of free power to every household and a Rs 1,000 monthly allowance for every woman. In Uttar Pradesh, the BJP has promised free electricity for irrigation and grants to set up borewells, tubewells, ponds and tanks. In Tamil Nadu, laudable results were achieved in the field of education through the free mid-day meal scheme, free bus passes, free cycles, etc, along with other affirmative action.
The fact is that in the election season, each political party promises such schemes. Should we be more circumspect in the language we use?
Dr Arvind Mayaram, a former finance secretary, said on Twitter that a Group of Secretaries must “list wasteful expenditure”, which in his view, was a much more robust categorisation, and this should include wasteful expenditure not just by the state governments but also by the Central government. Quantifying it will be truly reflective of what is “busting the Indian economy”.
Unsurprisingly, defining wasteful expenditure is as tricky as defining freebies. As Dr Mayaram points out: “There is no definition of either in the administration. Each given benefit is justified as public purpose.” For example, statues, he points out, are justified in the government files as tourism earners.
Lest we forget, the Government of India contributed Rs 3,000 crores for the Statue of Unity in Gujarat.
While the normalisation of the politics of freebies and running up huge debts and fiscal deficits by some states is being discussed threadbare at high-level meetings, there is also the normalisation of the politics of hate and exclusion that needs urgent attention.
The normalisation of hate often goes hand-in-hand with normalisation of the “otherisation” of the minorities.
A hate rally in New Delhi has been in the news in recent days. The Delhi police booked Yati Narsinghanand along with several other speakers for their incendiary speeches at a “Hindu Mahapanchayat” in the nation’s capital last weekend. The police claim it had not given permission for the event, but bafflingly, or perhaps not so bafflingly, the organisers went ahead with the “Mahapanchayat Sabha” anyway.
This is not the first time Narsinghanand has been in the dock for making inflammatory speeches about the minorities. The recent hate speech was made while he was on bail over another hate speech in Haridwar. Significantly, soon after booking the organisers and speakers of last weekend’s rally for alleged inflammatory speeches, the police also registered a separate FIR, citing the Twitter handles of a journalist and a media organisation, for allegedly “spreading rumours and inciting hatred”. The crowd at the rally had manhandled journalists. The tweets had identified the religion of those doing the manhandling and those who were being beaten up.
The normalisation of the politics of unsustainable economic measures and the normalisation of the politics of exclusion and deepening of social fissures are intertwined. An old essay by economist Arvind Subramanian, former chief economic adviser to the Government of India, makes this point forcefully in the context of Sri Lanka. “Sri Lanka suffers from cleavages along many different lines, notably ideology, ethnicity, language, and religion. Michael Ondaatje’s gorgeously sensitive novel, Anil’s Ghost, captures the human, personal consequences of these conflicts,” Mr Subramaniam notes.
“Societies with stable social and economic compacts between citizens and the state tend to have healthy rates of tax collection, reflecting a broad willingness to share the burden of paying for the services the state provides,” he points out. This is a grim warning to all countries playing majoritarian politics and ignoring the cost of deepening fissures.
Good governance means knowing the difference between profligacy and spending money in a way that provides long-term benefits to the public. It also means knowing the difference between statements that can yield short-term political benefits but will corrode social harmony in the long term.
It’s a crisis. Critics often say that India has too much bureaucracy. But actually, as admitted by the Centre, the problem is that there are not enough babus. Minister of state for PMO and personnel Jitendra Singh recently informed Parliament that there is a shortage of 1,515 IAS officers.
Recently, a parliamentary standing committee had also recommended to the department of personnel and training (DoPT) to “significantly increase” the annual intake of IAS officers given “the evolving needs of Indian administration”.
The shortage, perhaps, explains why there are not enough IAS officers on Central deputation or even in the states. Clearly, the initiatives taken by the Centre to increase the number of IAS officers haven’t worked, even though the annual intake of IAS officers was increased to 180 and IPS officers from 150 to 200 in 2020. Vacancies have also been filled by inducting officers from the state services, which apparently is against the rules which state that non-cadre officers cannot be posted to cadre posts.
The civil service rules state that 22 per cent of the total sanctioned strength of IAS officers, which is 6,709, should be deputed to the Centre but currently only six per cent of IAS officers are on Central deputation.
Now sources have informed DKB that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has now formed a four-member committee, headed by former DoPT secretary C. Chandramouli to analyze the reasons for the dearth of babus and offer solutions. However, it is unlikely to be an easy task. DoPT officials believe that simply increasing intake will not fix this crisis. It could create hurdles in postings and promotions of babus.
Ex-babus in Yogi’s Cabinet 2.0
Taking VRS just before the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections turned out to be a good move for ex-IPS officer Asim Arun. He fought the poll on a BJP ticket and has now been sworn in as a minister of state (independent charge) in the new Yogi Adityanath government.
A 1994-batch officer, he probably paid his “dues” when he was the head of the state anti-terror squad (ATS) and as police commissioner of Kanpur.
Another retired babu, whose progress was closely watched by observers, A.K. Sharma who has worked closely at the Centre and was reportedly sent to UP by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to assist the chief minister, has been made a Cabinet minister. Their appointment is even more interesting given that Yogi has dropped many big names and former ministers from the Cabinet. Clearly, these ex-babus now wield a bigger influence than your regular BJP netas in the state.
Cooperative federalism will have to wait
The game of political one-upmanship between the Centre and Maharashtra is escalating and putting a further strain on the already fraying Centre-state relations. In the latest salvo, the Mumbai Police’s Economic Offences Wing (EOW) has started a probe against a few Enforcement Directorate (ED) officers for alleged extortion.
Sources have informed DKB that the EOW move comes just a day after the ED provisionally attached immovable properties belonging to a relative of chief minister Uddhav Thackeray in a money laundering case. The EOW is also pushing ahead with an inquiry into the alleged role of a senior BJP leader’s son in a land deal. However, Maharashtra is not the only state to challenge the Centre on its jurisdiction to investigate alleged serious crimes in the states. The CBI and ED are the obvious targets of the state’s ire. And on this issue, it is of one mind with two other non-BJP governments, in West Bengal and Kerala.
That there has been a breakdown in trust between the Centre and the Opposition-ruled states has been evident for some time now. The effect is now being felt in the administrative machinery. Getting bogged down by political manoeuvres is hurting the Central and state agencies alike. Instead of doing their mandated work, they are investigating each other. And initiating rival probes against officers is hardly where it will end. Cooperative federalism remains a distant dream.