Editorials - 15-07-2022

There needs to be serious participation by the market forces together with the government

At a time when the Central government says it is liberalising India’s economy, its economic policymaking on the external front has been marked by rising protectionism. With policies such as Atmanirbhar Bharat, there seems to be a conscious effort to protect the domestic economy from foreign competition. This raises questions on whether the government’s external protectionism is compatible with its promise of liberalising India’s economy. In a discussion moderated byPrashanth Perumal J. , Biswajit Dhar and Ajay Shah talk about model of industrial policy that should be the way forward. Excerpts:

Is the government’s external protectionism compatible with its broader liberalisation agenda?

Biswajit Dhar:The kind of protectionism we are seeing in the name of Atmanirbhar Bharat is disappointing because while there is a case for having an industrial policy, where you invest in industries that you think could be globally competitive, what is happening in India is there is a long list of sectors in which the government has embarked on import substitution that encourages domestic production. What is problematic is that you’re not talking about efficiencies which will make these sectors globally competitive. The emphasis is on producing in India rather than on efficiency.

Ajay Shah:I want to put out two ideas. One, different countries should specialise in producing different things, and it is not easy for policymakers to understand what India will be good at and what India will be bad at. These are things for markets to discover. I always like to remind us of the story from the 1970s, when policymakers in New Delhi thought that electronics export was going to be a good thing. So, they created the Santacruz Electronic Export Processing Zone (SEEPZ) in Bombay and removed customs duties. By removing protectionism, they thought they were doing a favour to the electronics industry. And 30 years later, when you look back, what came out on top were the software industry and the diamond processing industry. So, the government’s industrial policy was wrong. It was not in electronics where there was a fabulous opportunity for India; it was in software and diamonds. The point is, the market economy knows how to discover these things, policymakers don’t.

The second idea is a very simple intuition: every time you cut customs duties, every time you remove elements of protectionism, firms in India which are users of those goods become more competitive. So, we grow exports from India by making raw materials cheaper. Again, one man’s output is another man’s input. Policymakers cannot tell what they should be backing. So, the wild strategy is to just remove all barriers to globalisation. That is the best path for us as a country.

Is the Centre’s external protectionism merely a reflection of its domestic economic policies?

BD:Yes. We have been hearing about getting red tape out of the way for 30 years, but instead of getting it out of the way, I think it’s just piling on. Ease of doing business is a major issue. It’s clear that if the government doesn’t get its act together domestically, including the institutions and all, it’s not going to get any kind of investment — foreign investment or domestic. That’s going to be a huge problem. There’s been this discussion going on for the past 33 years as to why China or other Southeast Asian countries have been attracting foreign investment, while in India, with successive governments saying we have the most investor-friendly policy, investors are not investing long term. So, external and domestic reforms have to go hand in hand.

AS:There are many pieces to the problem that need to be sorted out. But we have to be strategic when we think about where the bottlenecks are. We need to debate the important bottlenecks that are impeding India’s participation in global supply chains and in the world of globalised production. And I want to link this with the labour market where we need to figure out where those domestic bottlenecks are that are holding back large-scale labour-intensive investment in India.

Doesn’t discretionary government policy in the name of Atmanirbhar Bharat bring along with it the risk of possible favouritism towards special interest groups?

AS:It’s easy to impute motives and worry about corruption, but I actually worry about one basic thing, which is that nobody knows the future. It is very difficult to look at the future and figure out which Indian industry is going to do well and which is going to do badly. I mentioned the example of the SEEPZ. Those were some of the smartest people in the country at that time who were involved in economic policymaking. But they were not able to figure out that opportunity in India lay in software and diamonds, and not in electronics. So, I think that the market economy is a great method of discovery. It is a tool for figuring out what works and what doesn’t. It involves taking risks. Many private people have to try many things. Some will work, some will not work. It is not in the nature of bureaucracies to experiment. Industrial policy requires having a high level of knowledge, forecasting capability, and intellectual capacity in government. And you know, frankly, nobody in the world has the ability to forecast what’s going to happen five or 10 years out in the future. I feel we should all be modest and say that we don’t know. Let the market economy do the job of risk-taking, making mistakes, etc. Many firms will go bankrupt, and many industries will shut down. That’s okay. That’s how we find out what works and what doesn’t.

BD:I think policy should be made by the government and industries having a dialogue. This has been the reason behind the success story of many Southeast Asian countries. They have not just let the market do whatever it wanted to. There was serious participation by the industry, or the market forces, together with the government. The government has to play the important role of a facilitator. And that kind of a dialogue really took place in Japan, [South] Korea, and many Southeast Asian countries. Singapore is another example. That is the way India should go. We tried to rely just on market forces for the better part of the last 30 years, but we didn’t make much headway. And in the process, we found that most productive sectors have been lagging behind. So, the moment the economy was exposed to foreign competition, we started finding the lack of depth in different sectors across the board. To overcome this, the government needs to hear what the players on the ground need, and respond adequately. To my mind, that is the model of industrial policy that is the way forward.

Why shouldn’t the Indian consumer be allowed to buy foreign goods if they are cheaper and better?

AS:That is an act of government coercion, where the government stands in the middle and interferes with the ability of an Indian consumer to buy something from abroad or the ability of an Indian firm to buy something from abroad or the ability of an engineering firm to raise capital from a cheaper source abroad, and so on. And I really feel uncomfortable with the readiness and the willingness of policymakers to use the coercive power of the state in such fashion. People know what’s best for them. If a person wants to buy something from a vendor outside the country, why is it better when the government interferes? I feel that’s a fundamental question of freedom that needs to be brought on the table.

BD:I do think that ad hoc protectionism is not really the way forward because ultimately we are living in a market economy and there has to be the freedom to choose. But I think we are actually talking about something more fundamental in the sense that we are looking at issues relating to falling competitiveness of Indian industry. What kind of a road map are you going to be following to get around the problem? The situation is increasingly becoming grim because due to the lack of competitiveness we are seeing the Indian economy suffer. If this situation continues, it would be very difficult to keep the macro fundamentals in check. Things are going to go pretty awry. I would say we need to look at how we are going to be on a more sustained pathway as far as our balance of payments is concerned. Our current account deficit is already threatening to go out of control. You need to have a government and industry partnership. The industry needs to identify the pain points, and they should ask the government to address these issues. For instance, the innovation sector the world over has needed a lot of government support. We saw what happened during the pandemic. Most of the major vaccines that were produced by these big pharmaceutical giants had substantial government backing. The government needs to play the role of a facilitator, and that’s a very important role without which I don't think we are going to get into a sustained pathway.

AS:I agree, but then we have to confront the difficulties of state capacity in India. We are an underdeveloped country, and the capabilities in state structures are quite limited. In many ways we have actually not fared well in the last 20 years. So, we should be very cautious about what kind of mandate we wish to give the Indian state given its limitations.

Are we getting closer to the pre-1991 era of trade protectionism?

BD:It’s not about how far or how close we are to the pre-1991 policy climate. I think it’s about the trend and the trend seems to be towards the Nehruvian model of self-reliance. You can call it Atmanirbhar Bharat or by any other name, but it’s self-reliance at the end of the day. The second thing that worries me about the Production-Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme are is that incentives are linked to certain capacities. That reminded me of a policy that was followed during the industrial licensing era, which was called the minimum economic scale. The government was telling the industry what could be the minimum economic scale and then directing the industry to produce along those lines. The PLI and its incentives at different levels smack of that kind of a policy. It’s the direction, not really the distance, that worries me. If you’re following this direction, there is a danger of reaching that someday, and that could be problematic in my view.

AS:One measure that we should be thinking about is the weighted average tariff rate which is compiled by the World Bank. The rough picture is that there’s been no significant change in that number (6%) since 2008. So I don’t think there’s been a significant movement away from where we were earlier. That said, there are many other elements of protectionism which are not just about tariffs. Most importantly, it is about equal treatment of foreign companies. I feel that a lot of the regulatory system is moving in ways where national champions get policy support and foreign companies do not. I think that is the more worrisome thing to think about.

The industry needs to identify the pain points, and they should ask the government to address these issues. For instance, the innovation sector the world over has needed a lot of government support.

Biswajit Dhar



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Political glory is by no means assured for Edappadi K. Palaniswami, owing to several external threats to the AIADMK

With the consolidation of political power in the hands of Edappadi K. Palaniswami, former Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, who has been elected as interim General Secretary of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK), a complex process of paradigmatic transition in Dravidian politics is more or less complete, and a new era is set to begin in earnest.

It was clear that a profound change was coming, starting in late 2016, with the passing of former AIADMK chief Jayalalithaa. When the era of M. Karunanidhi, former President of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), also passed into the history books in late 2018, there was little doubt that the 50-year Dravidian mobilisation project would cease to be dependent purely on the whims and fancies of strongman — and strong-woman — leaders. Now, performance in office and the delivery of good governance, policies that matter to the citizenry’s daily lives, matter more than ever before.

To better understand the prognosis for this unique social movement, which has produced unprecedented socio-economic outcomes, including poverty alleviation, nutritional achievements, and pedagogical innovation in primary education, without ignoring the imperatives of economic growth and industrial development, it is worth considering why the balance of power in State politics has come to such a pass.

Centralisation of power

The recent meeting of the AIADMK General Council, which saw the apotheosis of Mr. Palaniswami and the reconfiguration of the top posts within the party structure, offers hints about the direction in which the leadership plans to steer the organisation in the years ahead. The ground was set for epochal transformation, first through the Council’s unanimous repeal of Rule 20, which had since its introduction in 2017 assured that Jayalalithaa would remain the “eternal General Secretary” of the party. The rescinding of this rule deals a double blow to the old ethos of the AIADMK.

On the one hand it implicitly acknowledges, more than five years after Jayalalithaa’s death, that she was not so much a god as much as her name — “Amma” — continues to be a politically useful rallying cry to mobilise women, the destitute, and other vulnerable groups, and minorities in the State; and the symbol of the party’s promise to deliver to them the mass welfare policies that have historically been the AIADMK’s wont.

On the other, and through the mechanism of the new Rule 20A, which sets out the qualifying criteria for the now-revived post of General Secretary in terms of minimum length of party membership and service in senior office-bearing capacities at the party’s Chennai headquarters, the latest changes ensure that only Mr. Palaniswami shall hold the reins of the AIADMK organisation, going forward.

Notwithstanding several incidents of violence in Chennai and some regions across the State linked to this reconfiguration of power within the AIADMK, the rise of Mr. Palaniswami has largely been a bloodless coup. Yet a democratic coup it was, for it brings to an abrupt end an unstable era of dual vectors of power within the party, an arrangement that was a necessary compromise to accommodate both Mr. Palaniswami and Mr. Panneerselvam at the apex of the State government and not throw away the electoral victory that Jayalalithaa had bestowed as a final act before her health declined.

New era, new rules

This brings us to the question of why the ecosystem that Mr. Palaniswami now finds himself in is different from the one that his predecessors enjoyed. During the nearly four years that the duumvirate held sway after Jayalalithaa’s demise, Mr. Palaniswami made a mark for himself from the Chief Ministerial seat, primarily by going beyond the long-standing impulse toward competitive populism in Tamil Nadu politics to support good governance. This meant ensuring that the State government delivered robustly on everything from crop insurance for farmers in drought-affected regions of Tamil Nadu and the second Global Investors Meet held in 2019, to procuring and distributing safety gear and managing critical goods supplies during a brutal first year of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Yet this apparent commitment to a high standard of performance in delivering substantive, pro-people, pro-growth policies was not so much a choice as it was a compulsion of the political environment. Given the sheer autocratic style of party administration of Jayalalithaa, who deliberately degraded multiple rungs of the green shoots of leadership beneath her, the likes of Mr. Palaniswami and Mr. Panneerselvam never stood a chance at wielding whole-party control that was essential to keep the flock together and prevent squabbling, factionalism, and dissent from causing deep fractures in the organisational structure, with potentially catastrophic consequences for the AIADMK’s grip on power.

It must also be said that for the best part of the half-century that M.G. Ramachandran, Karunanidhi and Jayalalithaa ruled Tamil Nadu, grand corruption in high office was rampant, leading to party luminaries acquiring vast amounts of illicit private wealth. The people of Tamil Nadu, earlier resigned to the Faustian bargain of receiving mass welfare goods while allowing their masters to loot the public exchequer, have now woken up to a new reality, where they demand greater accountability from the government and reward strong performers.

In this new context, Mr. Palaniswami, has had to forge a consensus among various caste and regional leaders from across the State, which was built both on his power to persuade but also on shrewdness in distributing the largess of government and striking bargains toward maintaining stability of rule.

While it is a different matter that the AIADMK was ousted from power in the 2021 State Assembly election — an outcome that also reflects voter’s concerns about the party’s and Mr. Panneerselvam’s perceived closeness to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) — what matters most in the present context for the party is that those years in government were Mr. Palaniwami’s opportunity to demonstrate his skill in the subtle art of political accommodation.

The proof of that pudding lies in the fact that now a majority of office-bearers and district secretaries within the party have placed their confidence in his ability to lead the AIADMK single-handedly into the future, taking on the mantle of main opposition in the State, and challenger to the DMK in the 2024 Lok Sabha election and the 2026 State Assembly election.

Back to competitive populism

However, a future of political glory is by no means assured for Mr. Palaniswami, and his talent as a broker of political arrangements will be tested to the limit, owing to several external threats to the AIADMK. First, Mr. Panneerselvam is bent on exhausting every legal avenue for appeal of the General Council’s actions and will leverage his influence with the BJP leadership to push hard on this count. Second, even if he runs out of legal options, Mr. Panneerselvam’s proximity to the BJP makes it impossible to rule out the use of raids by the Income Tax Department or Enforcement Directorate to destabilise the functioning of the AIADMK under Mr. Palaniswami. Third, it is possible that along with V.K. Sasikala, Jayalalithaa’s confidant, her nephew T.T.V. Dhinakaran, and his party, the Amma Makkal Munnettra Kazagam, Mr. Panneerselvam may seek to build a coalition to capture the vote of the Thevar caste that dominates some sections of the southern districts of Tamil Nadu, potentially eating into the vote share of the AIADMK.

Even if he survives these likely hurdles brought by Mr. Panneerselvam, Mr. Palaniswami’s final challenge will be to clarify to voters what ideology and policies the AIADMK stands for in the aftermath of Jayalalithaa — with the two-pronged objective of clearly delineating his party from the DMK and of taking a firmer line against Hindutva politics seeping into the chinks in the armour of Dravidian exceptionalism.

Whatever the details of the strategies Mr. Palaniswami adopts in this regard, one thing is clear — the politics of competitive populism will rise once again with each major Dravidian party headed by a single leader holding a mandate to steer the ship as they deem fit. In the process, even while it remains a challenge for Dravidian party leaders to effectively stem grand corruption in public office, it is likely that there will remain a broad focus on growth-spurring policies and mass welfare schemes for the poorest sections.

narayan@thehindu.co.in



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Unless there is political inclusion of the disabled, the goal of inclusiveness and empowerment will remain elusive

The Department of Empowerment of Person with Disabilities (DoEPwD) recently released the draft of the national policy for persons with disabilities (“Policy”) — public comments have been invited till July 15, 2022 (at: panda.dk@nic.in). The necessity for a new policy which replaces the 2006 policy was felt because of multiple factors such as India’s signing of the United Nations Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities; enactment of a new disability legislation (Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act 2016) which increased the number of disabilities from seven conditions to 21 and being a party to the Incheon Strategy for Asian and Pacific Decade of Persons with Disabilities, 2013-2022 (“Incheon commitment”). The last was prepared under the aegis of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP) which identifies 10 goals for Asia-Pacific countries to ensure the inclusion and the empowerment of persons with disabilities and conformity with the Sustainable Development Goals 2030.

These commitments have changed the discourse around disability by shifting the focus from the individual to society, i.e., from a medical model of disability to a social or human rights model of disability.

The principle of the draft policy is to showcase the Government’s commitment to the inclusion and empowerment of persons with disabilities by providing a mechanism that ensures their full participation in society.

In furtherance of this commitment, the policy document highlights a detailed commitment to education, health, skill development and employment, sports and culture, social security, accessibility and other institutional mechanisms. However, a glaring omission is the absence of any commitment to the political uplift of persons with disabilities.

About political participation

Article 29 of the Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities mandates that state parties should “ensure that persons with disabilities can effectively and fully participate in political and public life on an equal basis with others, directly or through freely chosen representatives....” The Incheon goals also promote participation in political processes and in decision making. The Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act 2016 embodies these principles within its fold. The anti-discrimination commitment under this Act recognises the political domain wherein disabled people should be allowed to realise their human rights and fundamental freedoms. The documents fail to take cognisance of such mandates.

Political empowerment and the inclusion of the disabled are an issue that has not found traction in India’s democratic discussion. India does not have any policy commitment that is aimed at enhancing the political participation of disabled people.

The exclusion of disabled people from the political space happens at all levels of the political process in the country, and in different ways. For instance, the inaccessibility of the voting process, barriers to participation in party politics or a lack of representation at the local, State or national levels have all aggravated the marginalisation of the disabled.

Ground realities, no data

Section 11 of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act prescribes that “The Election Commission of India and the State Election Commissions shall ensure that all polling stations are accessible to persons with disabilities and all materials related to the electoral process are easily understandable by and accessible to them”. Although this mandate has been in existence for a few years, the disabled people still report accessibility issues before and on election day. There is often a lack of accessible polling booths in many locations. There is still no widespread adaptation of braille electronic voting machines and even wheelchair services at all polling centres. The Election Commission of India has developed its own procedures for handling PwDs during the electoral process.

Political parties in India still do not find the disabled as the large electorate to specifically address their needs.

The lack of live aggregate data on the exact number of the disabled people in every constituency only furthers their marginalisation. The lack of accessible space for party meetings, inaccessible transport for campaigning or an attitudinal barrier among voters and party leaders can be termed as contributing factors. Thus, we seldom see disability being highlighted in the manifestos of parties.

Inadequate representation

Representation plays an imperative role in furthering the interests of the marginalised community. Our Constitution makers recognised this when they provided for reservation for Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribes in the legislature. Disabled people are not represented enough at all three levels of governance. The response to a right to information filing by this writer to the Parliamentary Affairs Ministry showed that the Government does not maintain data on the disability aspect of members. The first visually disabled Member of Parliament in independent India, Sadhan Gupta, hardly finds mention in our political or disability discourse. We have often failed to acknowledge disabled political personalities who have overcome the myriad barriers in India’s political space.

However, few States have begun the initiative at local levels to increase participation. For instance, Chhattisgarh started the initiative of nominating at least one disabled person in each panchayat. If a disabled person is not elected then they are nominated as a panchayat member as per changes in the law concerned. This is a step that has increased the participation of the disabled in the political space at local level.

‘Make the right real’

The goal of the policy document — of inclusiveness and empowerment — cannot be achieved without political inclusion. The policy can follow a four-pronged approach: building the capacity of disabled people’s organisations and ‘empowering their members through training in the electoral system, government structure, and basic organisational and advocacy skills’; the creation, amendment or removal of legal and regulatory frameworks by lawmakers and election bodies to encourage the political participation of the disabled; inclusion of civil societies to ‘conduct domestic election observation or voter education campaigns’; and a framework for political parties to ‘conduct a meaningful outreach to persons with disabilities when creating election campaign strategies and developing policy positions’.

The document lays emphasis on the point that central and State governments must work together with other stakeholders to “make the right real”. This right can be made real only when it includes political rights/political participation within it. This will only conform to the universal principle on disability, i.e., “Nothing about us. Without us.”

Shashank Pandey is a Javed Abidi Fellow at the National Centre for Promotion of Employment for Disabled People (NCPEDP). He was a Legislative Assistant to Members of Parliament (LAMP) Fellow



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Parliament — and reporters — faces a dilemma with regard to language in this digital age

Language not only changes across region but also profession. For instance, it is common to see the usage ‘for your kind perusal’ in government letters. We dismiss this as ‘bureaucratese’. Similarly, Parliament, too, has its own list of absurd and archaic phrases. The one that never fails to make me laugh is the passionate appeal for peace by the Chair when there is a pandemonium: “The Chair is standing on its legs...” Another phrase, “I beg to lay papers....”, was often used in parliamentary proceedings. In 2017, Rajya Sabha Chairman Venkaiah Naidu discouraged this phrase saying parliamentarians in a free nation should not have to “beg” to do their routine work.

Today there is much debate on language again after the Lok Sabha Secretariat compiled a list of 151 words, which have been expunged in 2021 and 2020 in Parliaments across the Commonwealth countries and State Assemblies in India. The list includes words such as ‘dodgy’, ‘betrayal’, ‘dog’, ‘frighten’, ‘hack’, ‘hypocrisy’, ‘irresponsible’, ‘liar’, ‘murder’ and ‘shame’. It also includes commonplace words such as ‘penguin’, ‘goose’, ‘fudge’, ‘grubby’, ‘saleswoman’, ‘species’ and ‘yapping’. Even a word as benign as ‘mate’ has made it to the list. As per the document, it was expunged in New South Wales in August 2020. Many of these words may look harmless, but in a heated exchange between parliamentarians, they may not exactly be virtuous.

The list of Hindi phrases is far more potent and includes words that have entered the political lexicon post-2014, such as ‘jumla jeevi (a person who makes false promises)’. In the first two decades of the Indian Parliament, English was the primary language used for parliamentary work. This changed as the social composition of Parliament changed from the 1970s onwards. At present, as many as 30 languages are used by parliamentarians during speeches, with many insisting on speaking their mother tongue during crucial debates. Perhaps, the next such compilation will also have words expunged from different regional languages.

The current compilation has especially caused consternation among Opposition parties which see this as an attempt to restrict their vocabulary. The government argues that this list is at best only “instructive” and not “definitive”. The preface of the document states that the context in which these words were used is far more important than the words themselves. Ultimately, the final call of whether a word is “unparliamentary” or not lies with the presiding officer of the House.

This brings us to a problem that Parliament faces in today’s digital age. The proceedings of both Houses of Parliament are relayed in real time on TV channels and YouTube. There have been instances where live transmission has been halted on the Chair’s orders. To circumvent this, many members have recorded the proceedings on their mobile phone cameras. These recordings have also routinely made it to the evening debates on TV channels. Many Opposition members have been censured and even suspended for such misdemeanours, but that hasn’t stopped these videos from circulating. It is also common for members to circulate video clips of their own speeches among journalists and on WhatsApp groups with their followers.

Opposition speeches are often provocative. There are many instances of the Chair intervening and expunging words or phrases that it finds “objectionable”. Herein lies the problem. The order of the Chair is often relayed by late evening to reporters, but by then, the video clip would have already been circulated many times over. Print reporters are careful and abide by the orders, but in a digital ecosystem, this is not easy. And though print reporters adhere to the terms of engagement, we are faced with a dilemma when such words create a political storm and do the rounds on social media. While the debate rages on, we continue to walk the fine line between watching the action while also sticking to the rules.

sobhanak.nair@thehindu.co.in



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With Gotabaya quitting, new leadership should heed people’s aspirations in Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka’s President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has resigned at last, but not before keeping the country guessing for two days. In a not-unexpected turn of events, the beleaguered executive head of Sri Lanka fled by an Air Force plane, reached the Maldives and thereafter went to Singapore, presumably on his way to another country. Evidently hedging against the possibility of being turned back by any of these countries, he did not submit his resignation on July 13 as promised. As he sent in his resignation Thursday evening, it was clear he was holding out so that he would not lose his presidential immunity from prosecution until he reached safe haven. Given the widespread wrath against him, being in Colombo without the shield of office was not an option for him. Instead, he appointed Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe to discharge the President’s functions in his absence, using a provision in the Constitution which allows such an arrangement if the incumbent has to leave the country or is otherwise unable to perform his duties. Mr. Wickremesinghe is now unlikely to respond to calls for his resignation, as the country’s Constitution provides that the current Prime Minister shall act as President until a new one is elected. While the legislature is to be convened soon for formally electing a new President, there are questions over whether the mass uprising will abate, as its protagonists have been asking for Mr. Wickremesinghe’s resignation too, seeing him as equally discredited. It is perhaps in anticipation of an intensification of the protest that Mr. Wickremesinghe has asked the military to do whatever is needed to restore order. But order is not born of bloodshed; confrontation must be avoided, and efforts made to heed the demands of the people.

The world has been amazed by the unprecedented display of righteous anger and courage by the citizens of Sri Lanka, as they channelled the widespread fury against the devastation caused by the economic crisis on their day-to-day existence. As civil society came together, it is apt to see this as a revolutionary moment in which an avaricious and apathetic political class has been humbled by people united by suffering. While external observers see this as a moment of truth for authoritarian leaders, power-hungry politicians and their ilk, it remains to be seen if political leaders in Sri Lanka themselves have drawn any lesson from it. Reports suggest that jockeying for power is going on on one side even as images of protesters overwhelming offices and residences associated with the rulers are going viral. Sri Lankans may expect that a change of regime will mean a new order that would usher in constitutional changes, policy reforms and reverse the trend of public interest being sacrificed for political ends. The next President should recognise this legitimate aspiration and refrain from any attempt to maintain the status quo, cover up the misdeeds that led the country to the current crisis or preserve the ill-gotten gains of office.



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India needs to help women getgreater access to jobs and resources

The struggle to achieve gender equality and bridge the gap between men and women is a long and difficult one. India has got another opportunity to do much better for half of its population with the Global Gender Gap Index for 2022, released by the World Economic Forum on Wednesday, placing it at 135 out of 146 countries. But the new data — India’s ranking in 2021 was 140 out of 156 countries — hardly brings cheer as India has fared the worst in at least one of the parameters — ‘health and survival’ — in which it took the last spot. The Global Gender Gap Index benchmarks the current state and evolution of gender parity across four dimensions: economic participation and opportunity; educational attainment; health and survival, and political empowerment. India ranks poorly among its neighbours and is behind Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, the Maldives and Bhutan. Only Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan perform worse than India in the region. In 2022, coming on the back of a pandemic, war and economic crises, the global gender gap has been closed by 68.1%, which means at the current rate of progress it will take 132 years to reach full parity. Among all the regions, it will take the longest for South Asia to reach the target — 197 years — “due to a broad stagnation in gender parity scores ... in the region”.

There have been enough numbers from the ground to indicate that India, with a female population of approximately 66 crore, has faltered on the road to gender parity. In the pandemic years, as incomes shrank, women faced hurdles on every front, from food, health, and education for the girl child to jobs. The latest NFHS data (2019-2021) show that 57% of women (15-49 age bracket) are anaemic, up from 53% in 2015-16; though 88.7% of married women participate in key household decisions, only 25.4% of women, aged 15-49 years, who worked in the last 12 months (2019-2021), were paid in cash. Women having a bank account or savings account that they themselves use have increased to 78.6%, with schemes such as the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana helping, but women participation in the labour force has shrunk. According to Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) data, in 2016-17 about 15% women were employed or looking for jobs; this metric dipped to 9.2% in 2021-22. The best way to improve India’s abysmal ranking is to do it right by women. For that, it is imperative to increase representation of women in leadership positions at all levels so that women get greater access to jobs and resources. It is up to the Government to move beyond tokenisms and help women overcome staggering economic and social barriers.



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New Delhi, July 14: Following the Simla agreement, the Information and Broadcasting Ministry has instructed its media units to stop all programmes that are likely to create ill-feeling between India and Pakistan, according to official sources. The instructions say that programmes put out hereafter should in fact, “faithfully reflect India’s sincere desire for a durable peace with Pakistan.” As an example, an exhibition entitled “India Meets the Challenge,” which was going on in the country even during the Simla talks, has been discontinued on telegraphic instructions from the Government. Similarly, the Defence Ministry has abandoned the idea of holding an exhibition of photographs of the last war as part of the silver jubilee Independence celebrations planned for the next month in the capital.

The Prime Minister, Mrs. Indira Gandhi had, in fact, taken unilateral decision just before the Murree emissary-level talks that all programmes broadcast on All India Radio network and the Delhi television centre should have a constructive approach towards Pakistan.

The Pakistan emissaries at the Murree talks had also informed the Indian side of their country’s intention to taper off their anti-India radio and TV programmes and to stop them altogether on a date to be fixed later.



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A Himachal Pradesh State Transport Corporation bus carrying over 50 persons and going from Sawat in Kullu district to Kalka hurtled down the road into the Sutlej river near Luri village.

A Himachal Pradesh State Transport Corporation bus carrying over 50 persons and going from Sawat in Kullu district to Kalka hurtled down the road into the Sutlej river near Luri village. There were no traces of any bodies or the bus which was washed away in the fast flowing river. The ill-fated bus was a 42-seater but reportedly carried over 50 passengers. Chief Minister Ram Lal has announced Rs 20,000 as relief to dependents of the dead passengers under the passenger insurance scheme. A member of each bereaved family will be offered employment in the organised sector. Injured passengers, if any, will be given Rs 5,000 each as relief, reports UNI.

PM snubs dissidents

Prime Minister Indira Gandhi has made it clear that she will not change the chief ministers in any of the Congress(I)-ruled states for the time being. Angry over the spurt in the open dissidence, Mrs Gandhi has told a number of State Congress (I) leaders who have come to the capital that she will put down all types of indiscipline in the party at any cost. She is believed to have warned them that if this trend is not checked, the Congress (I) will have the same fate as the Janata Party. She has told the state leaders that if they have any grievance against any chief minister, they can bring it to the notice of the central leaders. Under no circumstances, open campaigns against chief ministers will be tolerated.

Kuo Oil deal

The controversial Kuo Oil deal once again sparked off a fiery debate in the Rajya Sabha. The debate ended with the Deputy Chairman, Shyam Lal Yadav, expunging his own words against a member, Hukumdeo Narain Yadav (Lok Dal). In the stormy discussion on the issue during zero hour, Chairman M Hidayatullah ruled that there was no breach of privilege against the PM, the secretary in the Petroleum Ministry and the executive editor of the Indian express, arising out of Arun Shourie’s article in IE on July 10 titled, “The case of the missing file”.



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Any government, after all, can turn a deaf ear to the concerns of the electorate, and an unresponsive government becomes an incompetent one.

Parliament is the highest law-making body in India. But such a limited definition of the institution that is central to a deliberative democracy would certainly be an act of vishwasghat, a betrayal of its lofty purpose. Ha! The cynical reader will say, derisively. What lofty purpose, when the benches of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha are filled with chamchas and chelas and representatives more interested in drama and childish retorts than addressing corruption. Treasury benches are filled with jumlajeevis, the Opposition with disruptive anarchists.

The cynic, as always, can take some pleasure in the hypocrisy of leaders, and point to their dohra charitra. But parliamentary privilege, which grants almost unassailable protection to the free speech of members, is not just an excuse to create drama in the House. It is a way to ensure that the government does not abuse its power, that even the most popular leader faces questions – unlike a dictator. Any government, after all, can turn a deaf ear to the concerns of the electorate, and an unresponsive government becomes an incompetent one. Parliament is one forum that helps ensure that citizens don’t end up with a behri sarkar.

But what of the girgits and Khalistanis? Why should these insulting and sometimes polemical terms not be declared “unparliamentary”? Like the vast number of people they represent, leaders too can lie or tell the truth, be cowardly or brave. But for every Shakuni who twists parliamentary privilege, there is a Yudhishtir who follows the precepts of his dharma. Like poetic license, parliamentary privilege may lead to some bad rhymes, but it also allows the possibility of wit in the face of arrogance, accountability in the face of power. There is nothing more “unparliamentary” than censoring parliamentarians.



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The Uber Files are a classic example of how Big Tech manages to get ahead of the curve, and how policy often has to play catch-up.

On July 5, 2010, the first request for a ride was placed on the cab hailing platform, Uber. Less than two years later, Uber had expanded globally, with the app going live in Paris. The company now operates in more than 70 countries and 10,000 cities. Along the way, it also became the world’s most valued start-up. The platform’s global appeal and success can be traced to the sheer ease with which it allows for cabs to be hailed, often at odd hours. Coupled with a competitive pricing model, this makes for an attractive proposition for consumers across the world. And then, there is employment generation, with the company “employing” millions of drivers across the world. In India alone it has served around 9.5 crore riders, and has nearly six lakh driver partners. Yet, even as the company has reshaped public transport, it has been embroiled in controversy. By operating in the regulatory grey zones and blindspots, by taking on entrenched taxi services and unions, and by doing little to assuage consumer concerns, Uber has managed to get caught in the crosshairs of governments, drivers and riders.

Over the past few days, an investigation by this paper, carried out in collaboration with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, has painted a less than flattering image of the manner in which the ride-sharing platform has conducted itself over the years. The investigation details how the company tried to bypass regulators and cut corners as it navigated the loopholes in law in its drive to expand at breathtaking pace. The Uber Files are a classic example of how Big Tech manages to get ahead of the curve, and how policy often has to play catch-up. Consider, for instance, the revelation that the company has employed technology to stay ahead of law enforcement — the investigation has revealed how tools like “greyball” and “geofencing” were deployed “to keep Uber rides away from prying policemen and government officials”. Or how despite riders and drivers lying at the heart of the platform, it rode roughshod over the concerns of both. As the investigation has revealed, “critical elements of the new safety features” that were meant to be put in place after the rape incident in Delhi in December 2014 have still not been implemented.

However, such concerns are not India-specific. For instance, the classification of drivers, and as a consequence their treatment, is globally a contentious issue. Treating them as workers rather than self-employed, as the UK Supreme Court has ruled, would entitle them to minimum wages and other benefits. Or take the concerns over data privacy — the ride-sharing platform holds a treasure trove of information on the ride-hailers. While governments may be tempted to respond to such disclosures by imposing draconian rules, regulation should be framed with a light touch so as not to throttle innovation. At the same time, the sheer pace of innovation and the manner in which tech firms have exposed gaps in the regulatory structures underlines the need for governments to be more nimble in their approach as they attempt to regulate the new age behemoths.



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The unfortunate fact seems to be this: The BJP is throwing terms that are heavily loaded and highly charged at Ansari and hoping that something — the innuendo, if not the substance — sticks.

The allegations levelled by the BJP’s official spokesperson against former Vice President Hamid Ansari cast extremely unflattering light on the BJP, not its intended target. Ansari has had a distinguished career as a diplomat and occupied high constitutional office with grace and dignity. For India’s ruling party now to cast a slur on him on the basis of unsubstantiated and perhaps unsubstantiable claims made by a little-known Pakistan journalist in a YouTube interview, or the word of a former R&AW operative, is a move both shabby and unseemly. The accusations against Ansari are that he invited a Pakistani spy-journalist, Nusrat Mirza, to a conference on terrorism in India while he was V-P in 2010, and that the journalist used the trip to collect information which he later shared with the ISI, and that as ambassador of India to Iran he compromised national interest. Pointing out the gaping holes in the case sought to be made against Ansari is an exercise in stating the obvious, and engaging with the bizarre. As Ansari himself has pointed out, invitations to conferences such as the one on terrorism in 2010 are sent out by the organisers on the advice of the government. In the interview that the BJP has seized upon, Mirza also makes claims such as these — that America had caused the earthquake in Pakistan in 2005, and floods in the same country in 2010, and the tsunami in Fukushima in 2011.

The unfortunate fact seems to be this: The BJP is throwing terms that are heavily loaded and highly charged at Ansari and hoping that something — the innuendo, if not the substance — sticks. “Terrorism”, “national interest”, “Pakistan”, “ISI”, “sensitive and classified” — in a time of polarised and distrustful politics, these are the building blocks of sinister stories that are often constructed from thin air. They collapse, eventually, but not without leaving a residue that is hurtful to their victim, regardless of his or her innocence. The attempt to tar the reputation of a distinguished public figure, following not long after Nupur Sharma’s rant against the Prophet, only lends credence to the apprehension that for all its rhetoric of inclusive politics, the BJP, or a significant section of the party, keeps returning to minority-baiting, and the rest of the party is ok with this, if not collusive.

The BJP must realise that it demeans the mandate it got in 2014, reaffirmed in 2019, when it participates in, or sanctions, the coarsening of public political discourse. It has power and, by all accounts, still enjoys the people’s trust. To conquer, it does not need to stoop so low.



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Subrata Mitra writes: NATO, aware of the very real threat of Russia’s nuclear option, cannot do more. And Russia, in possession of territory won at enormous cost, cannot do less. But there is a window of opportunity for India.

Over the past four and a half months, since the beginning of the Russian “special military operation” in February, the war in Ukraine has become the leitmotif of politics in the West. Solidarity with Ukraine and resistance against the incursion of Russian forces into Ukrainian territory are the main refrain of the Western media. The NATO, EU and G-7 have sprung into action, offering support of various kinds — from the supply of arms, intelligence, cash and logistics and training of Ukrainian troops, to imposing severe sanctions intended to “cripple” the Russian economy. Western troops have not been directly involved in combat so far but mercenaries of Western provenance are actively engaged, and some have actually been caught in action. Weakening Russia is the hidden agenda of the Ukraine war. President Joe Biden of the United States — who has vowed to stand with Ukraine “as long as it takes” — and Prime Minister Boris Johnson of the UK have been the leading spirits behind the mobilisation of the West on “both sides of the Atlantic”, to confront the “common enemy”.

The West has been at war before, in Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and Syria. But this is different. This is a war on European soil and a war of attrition that has pitted Western firepower against Russia. Unlike other wars, this one has snapped the flow of global trade, sports and cultural and scientific exchanges. The understanding at the end of the Cold War in 1989-1990 that NATO would not expand to the east was the bedrock of that new era. However, successive NATO expansions and the emergence of a more resolute leadership in the Russian Federation which has looked with alarm at the shrinking of its sphere of influence have radically altered the equations. Russian President Vladimir Putin articulated these apprehensions in a meeting with top intelligence officials in 2007 in his speech to the Munich Security Conference. But these warning signals did not elicit any effective, reciprocal moves at accommodating the apprehensions, nor were any new security arrangements made that could instil trust and confidence among adversaries. Seen in terms of structural realism, the war in Ukraine was a tragedy on hold that had to break out, sooner or later.

The war has not gone well for either party. The Russian blitzkrieg — with enormous lines of tanks crawling menacingly toward the capital city, with vastly extended supply lines — failed in the early attempts to take Kyiv and topple the Ukrainian regime. The Ukrainians, whose President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has emerged as the main symbol of resistance to what they have successfully projected as blatant aggression, have been able to hold on to their main cities. Western firepower, cash, intelligence and training have been successful in slowing down the Russian advance, confined so far to the East and the South. The war that most expected to come to a quick resolution has turned out to be a war of attrition, reminiscent of the brutal trench warfare and artillery duels of the First World War, evocative of the horrors that Erich Maria Remarque describes in All Quiet on the Western Front. The media brings the horrors of the war into daily life, reviving living memory of the wholesale destruction of cities in the Second World War and the subliminal fear of the depredations of the Red Army in occupied Germany and Nazi atrocities in Russia and France.

The war in Ukraine has rung the death knell of globalisation. Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany — a reluctant war leader who had previously been a conscientious objector — has now been goaded into radically altering German policy with regard to military spending, pledging 100 billion euros into upgrading the armed forces and sending German weapons to Ukraine. He has aptly described the current phase in world politics as a Zeitenwende — a “watershed”, the change of an era. The weaponisation of trade by both the West and Russia, euphemistically described as “sanctions”, are actually war in other forms, which still cost lives. The wholesale confiscation of assets in Western banks and financial institutions and the very public delivery of lethal weapons take the edge off the moral rhetoric of war to regain peace — they are steadily undermining trust in global institutions. Inflation caused by the sanctions has started biting into the budgets of low-income households all over the world. And rising gas prices have already started inducing fears of a winter of discontent in Europe. A less visible effect of the sanctions is the impact on the environment. Substituting oil and gas with coal is a potentially dangerous trade-off which will turn the clock back on the painstaking efforts to rein in global warming.

Except for the military-industrial complex of the United States and its global subsidiaries, which are cashing in on the vast sums of taxpayer money made available to them by western governments, there are no winners in this war. One can already discern the wavering of public support in continental Europe for the continuation of the war and a growing divergence among Germany, France and the UK. For the war machine in the United States, a proxy war against Russia, with the added advantage of support from NATO and Western countries which it did not have in its earlier efforts, is a golden opportunity. But as things stand, NATO, aware of the very real threat of Russia’s nuclear option, cannot do more. And Russia, in possession of territory won at enormous cost, cannot do less. The tug of war between the US-led supply of arms and intelligence and the resourceful and resilient Russia, with its own memories of similar challenges in the Second World War, can only drag on, indefinitely.

The time for resuming negotiations is now. There might be a window of opportunity for India, which has consistently held dialogue and diplomacy as the only solution, to take the initiative towards mediation. Under Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru in 1953, post-independence India, a fledgling in world politics, had stepped in as a mediator in the Korean conflict. With the dexterity that current Indian diplomacy has shown – successfully repatriating vast numbers of Indians from Ukraine at the outbreak of the war, keeping a line open to Russia and the United States, and retaining its strategic room to manoeuvre — Modi’s India has the potential to get the warring parties to the negotiation table. Some Ukrainian and Russian lives might still be saved.

The writer is Emeritus professor, Heidelberg University and Adjunct Professor, Dublin City University.



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R Mahalakshmi writes: His demise comes at a time when the community of historians world over is beleaguered by forces that seek to invent histories and sources that suit their ideological make-up. His passing leaves a huge void

The passing of B D Chattopadhyaya (1939-2022) is a big blow to the community of historians in India. A pillar of the Centre for Historical Studies in JNU for more than three decades, Chattopadhyaya nurtured generations of students who carried forward his ideas. He was elected the general president of the 75th Platinum Jubilee Session of the Indian History Congress in 2014, awarded the H C Raychaudhuri Birth Centenary Gold Medal by the Asiatic Society of Bengal in 2002, and received the Institut De France’s prestigious Prix Duchalais of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres in 1978. He taught briefly at Burdwan University and Visva Bharati, Shantiniketan and was visiting professor at several institutions across the world such as Chicago University, Heidelberg University and Leipzig University.

A renowned scholar, with an intimate knowledge of the literary, numismatic, epigraphic and archaeological sources, Chattopadhyaya was among those who blazed the trail for a secular and inclusive historiography that was mindful of India’s plural traditions. He was also unequivocal about upholding modern, rational, and constitutional values in our academic pursuits and personal lives. Beginning with his masterly study of the coins and currency systems of south India, submitted for a doctoral degree at Cambridge in the 1960s, his rigorous scholarship was recognised in all his projects. He opened up new themes for analysis such as historical geography, delved into neglected historical aspects, especially as gleaned from epigraphical sources, and presented innovative frameworks for the understanding of the ancient past. His emphasis on the processual framework led him to part ways with the established wisdom, best articulated by R S Sharma, on the rise of feudalism in the first millennium in India. The Making of Early Medieval India (1994), a collection of Chattopadhyaya’s essays, has become a landmark in the historiography of early India, and every graduate student of history would be familiar with his arguments regarding political integration, the rise of the monarchical state, religious ideology and institutions, and regional formation between the sixth and 13th centuries CE. Studying Early India: Archaeology, Texts and Historical Issues (2003) presented his command over a huge gamut of sources, and raised important questions related to de-contextualised reading of sources and political and chauvinistic attempts at distorting history.

This distortion was clearly behind one of his most brilliant works, Representing the Other: Sanskrit Sources and the Muslims (1998). Looking at the crucial period between the eighth to 14th centuries, Chattopadhyaya critiqued the positing of a Hindu-Muslim binary in Indian history, which he ably demonstrated was entrenched in a colonial periodisation that associated the former with the ancient and latter with the medieval period. Not sparing well-known Indologists like Sheldon Pollock, who reiterated the colonial position on the development of “cultural faultlines” in the medieval period, Chattopadhyaya revealed from a close reading of literary and epigraphic sources the myriad ways in which the Muslim as “other” was represented, with religious identity (Musalmana) being only one among the many identity markers such as region (Parasika, Tajika, Garjana, Turushka) and generic identities (Yavana and Mleccha).

The lead essay in the volume, The Concept of Bharatavarsha and Other Essays (2018) raised concerns about the conflation of identities and the telescoping of the present into the past. From denoting a tribal identity, to a geo-cultural marker with specific territorial boundaries, and later an expansive Subcontinental identity to its place in a cosmographic schema, the semantic shifts relating to Bharatavarsha as a conceptual category were highlighted by Chattopadhyaya. He was deeply concerned that the collapsing of the idea of India with Bharatavarsha was feeding into the communal project of identifying the ancient and the medieval periods with  Hindu and Muslim rulers.

Chattopadhyaya, like many of his generation, contributed to the development of a strong home-grown tradition of academic excellence. At the same time, they were sensitive to the trends, interpretive frames and methodological challenges raised in different parts of the globe. His demise comes at a time when the community of historians world over is beleaguered by forces that seek to invent historiesto  suit their ideological make-up.

The writer is professor, Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University



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Poojan Sahil and Abraar Ahmed write: Doing away with concepts has not only become a way of censorship of thoughts but has also taken us away from the path set out by the NEP to becoming an “educational superpower”

Mathematics, from a distance, looks harmless as compared to literature and social science, which can “shape the minds of a generation”. However, we do not agree. Mathematics shapes minds in its own ways: It offers attention, logical reasoning, work ethic, understanding and explaining matters, rigorous writing, comprehending situations, and deciding what is important information. Its students grow up to hold various positions, understand local and global issues, offer solutions, and foresee other problems that may arise in time. Many grow up to become filmmakers, engineers, civil servants, contractors, environmentalists, and farmers and business owners. A well-rounded exposure to mathematics enables them to make informed decisions in various scenarios.

Imagine what happens when we tamper with the material that shapes students’ minds. There is a completeness in the mathematics syllabus. There is also completeness in each topic that is chosen as part of the syllabus. There is a set boundary inside which a topic begins, ends, and exists. Mindless surgical strikes on these boundaries are a disservice to the subject.

In Grade 9, the concepts of plotting points and equations on the graph have been removed. This helps the learner to form familiarity with a mathematical graph and understand how it looks visually. Not only does this decision take away the opportunity from the learners to comprehend concepts visually, but it also forms a fear of statistics, pictorial representation of data and understanding of mathematical trends.

In Grade 10, problems that are reducible to the form of linear equations have been removed. This lesson gives the foundation of the mathematical approach to understanding relativity. The proof of Pythagoras’ theorem was also removed from the grade 10 examination syllabus. Imagine the plight of a legend considered a god in his time, when his most famous contribution to the field has been nullified. Removing the proof for such a theorem, which has been treated as essential to studying high-school mathematics, curbs inquisitiveness and encourages accepting statements without finding out the “why” behind them.

In Grade 12, forming differential equations, the Mean Value Theorem and Rolle’s Theorem have been axed. Several skills that are expected of a student of mathematics exiting school are developed by these concepts. Modelling various scenarios of the world and universe are done through differential equations. These skills have major applications in forensic science, medical science, electricity, population analysis, and stock market analysis. As a matter of fact, the formation of differential equations plays an important role in understanding Covid-19 trends.

The students are the ones primarily affected by such decisions. They are the ones for whom the syllabus is created in the first place. Passionate, well-meaning policymakers and educationists had dedicated themselves to determining the content of the mathematics students should study and what they should avoid. However, many of those educationists may not be around now.

In the name of decision-making in favour of the general populace, mindless action has been undertaken to benefit nobody in particular, except perhaps our political masters. A national conversation led to a situation where curtailing the syllabus seemed the most glorious, suitable, democratic and empathetic solution. We cannot deny that deletions have been met with a general sense of relief and satisfaction from parents and students. An elongated phase of the Covid perhaps pandemic deserved a response like that. Or did it? We decided to attack some seeds of intellect in the fear that our students would not be up to managing a full “syllabus assault”.

Many of these students, when they grow up, will look back and ask: Why were we treated as weaklings in the face of adversity? A full syllabus would have been their way of showing national solidarity. A sense of a job well done and executed is a necessary attribute that is taught by completing a syllabus and assessing it on a national level. At a young age, students learn how to get respect from the adults around them. They also learn great achievements do not come from shortcuts.

The “full syllabus, come what may” theory may sound bombastic. If better pedagogues of mathematics had been consulted, they might have suggested a different kind of curtailing. Many of those in favour of rigour would have rather the students face the academic battle and lose than fight a skewed, cunning skirmish.

One cannot neglect the fact that the other curricula like the International Baccalaureate and the Cambridge Examination did not cut any portion of their mathematics syllabus. And in these examinations, the students have to appear for a syllabus studied over two years. When the CBSE and other state boards are aspiring to match steps with other great global examination boards, they need to match their daring in this aspect as well.

The CBSE sets a precedent for other academic boards and this reduction in the syllabus has given a negative nudge. The trend of doing away with concepts has not only become a way of censorship of thoughts and classroom discussions but has also taken us away from the path set out by the NEP to becoming an “educational superpower”.

The CBSE must realise that teachers in our country want to be treated as valid stakeholders in decisions that involve students.

The writers teach mathematics at a Noida school



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VS Krishnan writes: It can bring together senior officers from the Centre and states in an institutional forum registered under the Society Act. This forum could also provide a common point of contact for trade and industry to redress the grievances on non-policy matters

The last five years of the GST journey have been like the samudra manthan that began with the unwanted elements of transition, but slowly yielded the nectar of higher revenues. Many of those who complained about the teething problems of GST perhaps failed to recollect what the indirect tax situation was prior to the implementation of GST: The multiplicity of the Centre and state levies that masked the actual incidence of tax on products, the debilitating effects of the entry tax and the uncertainty of tax rates.

Today, in contrast, we have a single tax across the country combined with a stability in rates and a common technology platform in the form of a GSTN where key business processes of registration, payment of duties and filing of returns are done online in a transparent manner. The ease of payments has improved over time with the technical glitches having been slowly sorted out, leading to a record number of GST registrants – increasing from 1.08 crore in April 2018 to 1.36 crore in 2022. The revenue gains have been significant. If we compare the data of 2020-2021 to 2021-2022, the proportion of GST collected to GSDP (Gross State Domestic Product) rose from 5.8 per cent to 6.4 per cent. If we factor in the three-percentage point decline in the incidence of GST duty from 14.8 to 11.8 per cent as suggested by the RBI, the actual proportion in 2021-2022 would have been 7.4 per cent of the GDP (according to a recent article by Arvind Subramanian and Josh Felman). If this momentum is maintained, the GST collections would help the country to move towards a tax/GDP ratio of 20 per cent in the medium term which would be a great achievement.

A lot of this improvement can be traced to stricter compliance flowing from three factors. First, denial of input credit to the buyer without the supplier uploading the invoice. Second, the introduction of e-invoicing. And third the introduction of e-waybills for transporters for value exceeding Rs 50,000 per consignment. Another less acknowledged factor is greater coordination between the Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBIC) and Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) in compliance verification. An equally significant achievement is the broad justification of the optimism that GST being the destination-based tax would help in fiscal equity for the augmentation of revenues of the states that consume less.

The micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) sector has been affected by the GST reforms because the large units have been reluctant to buy from them in the absence of input duty credit. An important measure here would be to amend the law to provide that all units buying from unregistered GST suppliers would have to pay duty on a reverse charge basis. In order to provide greater procedural comfort to the larger units, the provision relating to the issue of e-way bills and other regulatory procedures must be simplified where purchases are from a smaller unit whose turnover is below a threshold. To further incentivise the larger units and encourage them to trade on the TReDS platform, (the institutional mechanism to facilitate the discounting of invoices for MSMEs from corporate buyers through multiple financiers), the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) can provide higher credit ratings to such units. This will incentivise them to grow.

While the revenue gains have come through better compliance, the next surge in GST revenues will have to come from an increase in the average incidence of GST duties. The recommendation of the committee by the GST council will, therefore, be important. The challenge would be to do it in a manner which is least inflationary. This will require a combination of measures — phasing out of exemptions, raising of the merit rate from the present level of 5 per cent and merging the 12 per cent rate with the standard rate, whether to 16 per cent or 18 per cent. Together with the rate rationalisation exercise, the government will have to look into other GST reforms to trigger economic growth. This will perhaps require including natural gas/ATF under GST in the first round. Further reforms in the factor markets — land, real estate and energy — would require their inclusion in the GST. This is essential because while the economic reforms of the 1990s restructured the product market, the factor market reforms were incomplete.

Finally, GST 2.0 reforms require the creation of federal institutions. We need to create another institution in the form of a GST state secretariat that can bring together senior officers from the Centre and states in an institutional forum registered under the Society Act. This forum could also provide a common point of contact for trade and industry to redress the grievances on non-policy matters. This would demonstrate that despite the recent dissonance, India’s federal institutions are still strong and that the Indian polity is based on cooperative federalism as an innate principle.

The writer is National Leader, Tax and Economic Policy Group, EY India. Views expressed are personal



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Chakshu Roy writes: In a political discussion, curtailing 'unparliamentary' expressions, without considering the context, will unnecessarily stifle the voices of MPs.

Hemant Tukaram Godse is the Lok Sabha Member of Parliament (MP) representing Nashik, Maharashtra. When the voters of Nashik first sent him to Parliament in 2014, he found himself in a peculiar position. His surname was considered unparliamentary. Parliamentary rules specify that presiding officers can delete words from the day’s proceedings that they consider defamatory, indecent, unparliamentary or undignified.

In 1956, a Lok Sabha MP referred to Mahatma Gandhi’s assassin Nathuram Godse during the debate on a bill. The presiding officer deleted the name from the day’s written record, and the parliament secretariat added it to its compilation of unparliamentary expressions. Shortly after Hemant Godse was elected, the presiding officer of Rajya Sabha deleted the word “Godse” from the House proceedings. It prompted the MP to write to the presiding officers of both Houses, arguing that they should not hold his surname to be unparliamentary.

In the early days of parliamentary functioning in England, members would challenge one another to a duel if they felt dishonoured by another member’s speech. It led to the Speaker of the House of Commons removing the offending words from the written proceedings. In 1873, the constitutional theorist Erskine May started recording words and expressions that the Speaker considered unparliamentary in an eponymous guide to parliamentary procedure. Later editions of the book laid down the principle of parliamentary language. It states, “good temper and moderation are the characteristics of parliamentary language. Parliamentary language is never more desirable than when a member is canvassing the opinions and conduct of his opponents in debate.”

MPs have freedom of speech in Parliament. But the presiding officers of Parliament have the final authority on what gets recorded in the day’s proceedings. For example, in 2020, when the Prime Minister was replying to the debate on the Motion of Thanks to the President’s address, he used a word that the Chairman of Rajya Sabha deleted from the day’s proceedings. MPs can also draw attention to any unparliamentary words and urge the chair to delete them. Parliament television also edits its video recording of the debate to reflect the deletion. Any reporting of the parliamentary discussion that includes the deleted portion is a breach of parliamentary privilege and invites the ire of the House. Deleted words are then added by the parliament secretariat to its compilation of unparliamentary expressions.

In any language, the context in which an individual uses a word is critical. In 1983, in the House of Commons, an MP used the word “fascist” to describe a colleague. The Speaker struck it from the record and held, “whether a word should be regarded as unparliamentary depends on the context in which it is used. Context is all-important. “Context” means how the word is said, the circumstances in which it is said and when it is said. In the context yesterday I am satisfied that the use of the word fascist was intended to give offence to a member and amounted to a reflection on his honour”.

The current controversy surrounding the addition of unparliamentary words in a Lok Sabha publication raises three questions. First, is a list of restricted words helpful in maintaining decency in parliamentary debates? Second, will such a list help in promoting or stifling discussion? And third, do we trust our MPs to have a dignified debate in Parliament or do we need to provide them with a guidebook of expressions that are not to be used?

Technological advances have ensured that Parliament can no longer control how its proceedings are recorded and disseminated. As a result, even if Parliament edits its record, the unparliamentary expression will be available online. In such a scenario, a compilation of the words classified as unparliamentary will not deter an MP from using them and act as a ready reference for using such words on the floor of the House. Parliament is all about the cut and thrust of debate. And in a political discussion, a restriction of unparliamentary expression, without considering context, will unnecessarily stifle the voices of MPs. And lastly, we don’t have a choice but to trust MPs to act as role models when they debate in Parliament.

Returning to Hemant Godse, the Speaker of Lok Sabha held that the usage of the word was per se not unparliamentary.

The writer is head of outreach PRS Legislative Research



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Mani Shankar Aiyar writes: The Lankan leadership’s hubris and echo chamber of mutual praise led the nation into an economic crisis.

When I first met Mahinda Rajapaksa at a conference of women panchayat members at Avdhash Kaushal’s training institute in Dehradun in the mid-Nineties, he was a modest backbencher in the Sri Lankan parliament with an impassioned interest in local self-government which he believed was the only way to govern his fractious nation. Empowering the people for self-government seemed to be his primary preoccupation. When he became PM, he invited me, as Minister of Panchayati Raj, to Colombo to address a mammoth meeting of elected local government representatives gathered from all over the island-nation in the impressive Bandaranaike Hall (their equivalent of our Vigyan Bhawan) and obliged most of his cabinet ministers to also attend. This was followed by a detailed interaction with a group of experts he had put together to draft an amendment to the Sri Lankan constitution that drew its inspiration from our 73rd and 74th amendments, initiated by Rajiv Gandhi.

While his arch political opponent, Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga, warned me repeatedly to not trust the old fox, I continued my cordial relationship with Mahinda because I saw no reason to get entangled in the coils of our island neighbour’s internal affairs.

Soon thereafter, however, Mahinda lost all interest in panchayat raj in Sri Lanka as he became obsessed with terminating — by brutal military action — the ongoing three-decades-long insurgency led by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Once he inducted his brothers, Gotabaya and Basil, into his active circle, the only priority became military action to root out the LTTE, whatever the cost in lives, limb and property to the local Tamil population. This was much applauded by the Sinhala Buddhist population at large. He thought he was now destined to rule his realm forever.

The 2015 elections came to Mahinda as a big blow. Contrary to all his expectations, a combined Opposition, put together largely at Kumaratunga’s initiative, led to his defeat, and he retired out of sight and out of touch, growling like an injured tiger. Astonishingly, the Rajapaksas returned when splits within the coalition stitched together in 2015-16 by Kumaratunga started unravelling at the seams, offering Gotabaya the opportunity of becoming president in November 2019, followed by elections in August 2020, where Mahinda triumphed overwhelmingly.

Drunk with power, Mahinda brazenly set up a government with himself as prime minister; his brother Gotabaya as president; his other brother Basil, as finance minister; and his son, Namal, as yet another Rajapaksa minister with the sports and youth affairs portfolio. Another brother, Chamal, became minister of irrigation, and Chamal’s son, Shasheendra, was accommodated as MoS Agriculture. Besides, Mahinda’s brother-in-law, Nishantha Wickramasinghe, was appointed head of Sri Lankan Airlines. And Mahinda’s other son, Yoshitha, was elevated to the powerful post of the prime minister’s chief of staff. Nothing now, Mahinda seemed to believe, could stop him and his family, especially as the Tamil insurgency appeared to have been definitively wiped out, the Opposition was in total disarray and Kumaratunga had retired from active politics.

He seems not to have heeded the Greek saying, “Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad”.

Faced with a threatening overhang of unpaid debts amounting to over $51 billion, the Rajapaksas thought they had found a magic potion in organic farming and, without giving a thought to the time and training it would take to switch to nation-wide organic cultivation, virtually stopped Sri Lanka’s massive imports of chemical fertiliser. This sharply impacted rice cultivation, the staple of the Sri Lankan diet, raising food prices to dizzying, unprecedented levels. It also sank the output and, therefore, the export earnings from tea, their principal source of foreign exchange.

Mismanagement of Covid led to such a wide spread of the pandemic that tourism, the single-most-important source of foreign exchange, came to a virtual standstill. Remittances from Sri Lanka’s large expatriate community started drying up. For want of foreign exchange, imports of oil and petroleum products also fell far short of requirements leading to long frustrating queues at petrol stations and food stores.

The central bank is now left with reserves of no more than $25 million when Sri Lanka requires at least a billion dollars a month to keep itself afloat. Mahinda at first refused to go to the IMF, probably because he feared international reprimand for his economic policies that started with massive tax cuts that bled the Sri Lankan treasury. He thought his Chinese friends would bail him out, but they have been circumspect, not committing themselves to more than promising to view with sympathy the restructuring of the huge debt owed to them. Unthinking borrowing from China, symbolised by the white elephant of the Hambantota port in Mahinda’s constituency, has disproportionately contributed to the present crisis.

India has come to the rescue with some $3.5 billion in emergency aid, but what a drop in the bucket this is may be seen from the fact that Sri Lanka needs a minimum of a billion dollars a month in international currency to import limited essential supplies of fuel, milk, medicines and even food items for its population, who have for months been struggling with acute shortages and long queues. Now, at long last, an approach has been made to the IMF, but the negotiations may take months. Inflation meantime has exceeded 50 per cent and threatens to rise to 70 per cent.

That is what has brought the masses onto Galle Face and the streets to demonstrate for long months, and now to occupy a number of government buildings including the Presidential Palace. Had Mahinda stuck to his original resolve to make panchayat raj the focus of his government, he would have received the feedback from the people and could have acted before they were obliged to take to the streets. Hubris has been his lot, and that of his family, because military victory against the LTTE unhinged his priorities. Instead of elected representatives at the local level, his family became his sounding board. This is what happens if the leadership lives in an echo chamber of mutual praise and backslapping. Sri Lanka’s excellent record on human development — by far the best of any country of our region — is being dismantled because Mahinda gave up his initial prioritisation of people’s power through democratic institutions of self-government. It is a lesson for all South Asian governments, including our own, to learn.

The writer is a former Union minister



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RBI this week initiated measures to allow rupee settlement of cross-border trade deals. It’s still work-in-progress but the essence is that Indian banks can act as custodians of funds in international transactions settled in rupees. These measures need to be located in the context of the immediate need to cope with developments in the foreign currency market and the long-term opportunities present in the gradual shift in the currency composition of global foreign exchange reserves.

Global commodity prices have dipped since the level witnessed in May. For India, this augurs well. The average price of an Indian basket of crude in July was $106, about 9% below June. However, it has been partially offset by the weakening of the rupee against the dollar on account of global reallocation of capital after prominent central banks started increasing interest rates. Since January, foreign portfolio outflows have crossed $30 billion. In addition to market intervention, RBI adopted other measures to cope with the rupee depreciation. Last week, it liberalised forex inflows. Now, it’s provided a window to settle trades in rupees.

This window serves two purposes. Right now, it helps India grab opportunities such as discounts on Russian oil.  For example, India imported $1.3 billion of Russian crude in April, making it the fourth largest source. A year ago, there were no crude imports from Russia. Rupee settlement allows Indian firms to circumvent Western sanctions that bite because of their dominance over the global financial system. Long-term, there are likely to be more opportunities to internationalise the rupee on account of a shift in the composition of global foreign exchange reserves. The US dollar’s hold is slowly receding – it’s about 59% now from a level of 70% two decades ago.

This trend will continue as countries de-risk holdings. To illustrate, the Bank of Israel plans to reallocate a part of its US dollar holdings to currencies of Australia, Canada, China and Japan. India needs to seize the opportunity ahead. GoI now needs to complement the effort initiated by RBI through relevant policy tweaks.



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A list of ‘unparliamentary’ words and phrases, published by the Lok Sabha secretariat, saw opposition leaders accusing the government of trying to gag them. This was a bit odd – to use a Parliament-appropriate expression – as publishing such words has been happening since 1950s. The list is not a diktat, it’s based on rulings by presiding officers in parliamentary and assembly proceedings in India and Commonwealth countries. And none of the words is banned, clarified LS speaker Om Birla. Presiding officers will expunge remarks they deem unacceptable. Therefore, it’s not really a gag order. Also, there are easy workarounds for many words listed as unparliamentary. Some critics are exercised that words like “incompetent” have been deemed inappropriate. Why not say “competence is in question” instead – it makes the same point but doesn’t sound like a sweeping judgment.

That said, while suggesting expunging of words and phrases, parliamentary secretariats should not entirely take a mechanical approach. House discussions must also reflect the liveliness that animates politics in a voluble and sometimes volatile democracy. MPs can also help by reminding themselves that the five minutes of news television coverage they get for using unparliamentary words do nothing for their legislative career.

Ultimately, a Parliament is judged by the quality of its debate and its law-making. Some of the recent sessions of Parliament have witnessed record “productivity”, even exceeding 100%. That disruptions have been few is good. And when debates do happen, some MPs, on both sides, have made quality interventions. What’s needed in greater measure is extensive deliberations in smaller parliamentary committees and deeper House debates on complex issues. Only this week the Supreme Court flagged a hole in the Juvenile Justice Act amended in 2015. This allowed trial of a minor as an adult for heinous offences. The law hadn’t mandated preliminary assessment by a child psychologist, making SC wonder how judges or social workers can competently assess a minor’s mental capacity and ability to understand consequences. Ensuring such legislative slips don’t happen should be a first priority for MPs.



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It is increasingly clear that world must shift their economy to more sustainable pathways. However, not all countries are equally placed to make this transition, and I2U2 (Israel, India, US, UAE) grouping presents an important opportunity to rectify the situation.

Not to sound all gloom'n'doom, but the world is caught up in a perfect storm. The climate crisis, a war in Europe, the long tail of Covid and changing geopolitical realities have given rise to energy and food insecurity. While energy insecurity is being experienced by most countries in varying degrees, food security is going to be a central issue in Africa, Latin America, East Asia and West Asia. It is increasingly clear that world must shift their economy to more sustainable pathways. However, not all countries are equally placed to make this transition, and I2U2 (Israel, India, US, UAE) grouping presents an important opportunity to rectify the situation.

I2U2 is an effort to channel investments and leverage innovation for new initiatives in water, energy, transportation, space, health and food security. The goal is near- and long-term food and energy security. To this end, the UAE will invest $2 billion to develop integrated agricultural parks across India with the support of the US and Israeli private sector. This has the potential to sustainably increase India's food yields threefold in just five years, and will help address food insecurity in the region. The other project is in clean energy - a hybrid renewable energy project comprising 300 MW of wind and solar capacity complemented by a battery energy storage system in Gujarat.

Success of I2U2's efforts is critical, especially in light of the changing geopolitical scenario. It brings together two regions where stability and peace are often under threat - West Asia and the Indo-Pacific. Addressing complex issues such as climate change and the need to reduce environmental impact require countries to work together in mutual benefit and gain. I2U2 moves in that direction.
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There is a body of research that establishes a strong correlation between labour force skills, as measured in standardised tests of cognitive development, and long-term economic growth. The OECD reckons around half of the growth in GDP of its member nations is generated by wage earners with college education.

Millions of children worldwide have lost out on academic attainments they could reasonably be expected to possess had they been in classrooms over the course of the pandemic. Unicef estimates the drop in education levels has rendered up to 70% of 10-year-olds in developing countries incapable of comprehending simple text. Two-thirds of students in grade three tested below their level in 2021 in a Texas study, up from half in 2019. Although data is not immediately available, there is little to suggest education outcomes in India during the past two years will be significantly different from the international experience. These learning losses are more acute among younger and poorer students. Dislocated low-income households face a greater risk of children dropping out of school.

There is a body of research that establishes a strong correlation between labour force skills, as measured in standardised tests of cognitive development, and long-term economic growth. The OECD reckons around half of the growth in GDP of its member nations is generated by wage earners with college education. In the last decade of their working lives, college graduates can expect to earn twice as much as a high school dropout in advanced economies. Increased loss in literacy and numeracy in primary and secondary education feeds into diminished outcomes in tertiary education, the critical component of labour force income growth that has been outrunning GDP growth in several knowledge-based economies.

As governments get over the immediate policy hump of securing health and livelihood following the pandemic, attention must swivel to the potential income losses suffered on account of education. Global economic output has fallen off its pre-Covid perch. Climbing out involves paying attention to the cognitive abilities of very young children. This calls for increased public outlays on primary education and arresting declines in enrolment rates. India, as the fastest-growing major economy, will have to do some heavy lifting in primary education.
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The run-up to the monsoon session is proving to be unusually stormy. First, Opposition parties accused the government of trying to gag free speech in Parliament after the Lok Sabha secretariat issued a list of “unparliamentary words”. That the exercise was decades-old or that there was no effective ban on any word (a fact clarified late on Thursday by Lok Sabha speaker Om Birla) was of little consequence in front of a barrage of outrage by some Opposition leaders and civil society members. A day later, a notification by the Rajya Sabha secretariat that demonstrations, protests, dharnas, fast, or religious ceremonies are not allowed in the precincts of Parliament has kicked up a similar row. Again, the authorities clarified that it is an old rule and doesn’t bar members from registering their protest on the floor of the House but it failed to placate some Opposition members who see it as a way to curb their right to free expression.

At one level, these rows seem trite. After all, in both cases, exercises that had run for years without sparking any controversy suddenly found themselves as the subject of the Opposition’s ire. But at another, they point towards a breakdown of the democratic compact between the government and the Opposition and a loss of trust. As the seat of democracy, Parliament has functioned as a forum for deliberation and compromise for drafting laws and steering government policy. Yet, in recent decades, its ability to make ideologically and politically divergent politicians find common ground has eroded. Increasingly, bills are being passed with little debate or space for discussion, fewer pieces of legislation are being referred to parliamentary committees for deeper and more critical assessment, and electoral hostilities are spilling over to the floor of the House. In the last monsoon session, 19 bills were passed without debate. And in the second term of the United Progressive Alliance government, 20 bills were approved in five minutes or less, according to data from PRS Legislative Research.

This points to worrying structural infirmities in the lawmaking process, where governments and the Opposition are finding it difficult to bridge the trust deficit opened up by political hostilities and electoral barbs, in an environment where one party dominates the polity and others feel their space squeezed. This is a recipe for pandemonium in the House, and will need the government to adopt an accommodative stance and the Opposition to be more reasonable to defuse tensions.



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If the standard (economic) Left critique is to be believed, India’s economic policy turned “neoliberal” ever since Manmohan Singh presented his first Budget in 1991.

The word “neoliberal” is generally used to describe the pro-market and anti-State conservative turn in economic policies which started with the Reagan-Thatcher era in the 1970s and 1980s in the West. This was a rupture from the Keynesian demand management phase which began after the second world war, an era which is often termed as the golden age of capitalism.

If one goes by what the self-proclaimed “neoliberals” say, India’s economic policy is best described as neoliberalism in progress with intermittent roadblocks. Many others believe that the current regime in India has evolved an unusual but effective mix of pushing reforms and welfare at the same time and the debate over neoliberalism or lack of it in Indian economic policy is not even relevant anymore. The truth, as is often the case, might be slightly more complicated.

Four pillars of Indian neoliberalism..

Most people agree that the four most important milestones on India’s road to neoliberalism are, in chronological order, the announcement of new industrial policy in 1991, India joining the World Trade organisation (WTO) in 1995, enactment of Fiscal Responsibility and Budgetary Management (FRBM) Act in 2003 and the adoption of inflation targeting framework as the anchor of monetary policy in 2016. Each of these policy decisions serves a specific purpose.

The first laid the ground for free enterprise and dismantled the licence-quota raj in the economy. The second ensured the integration of Indian economy into the global trade system. The third made counter-cyclical Keynesian demand management via the government spending route illegal. And the fourth offers a promise that any spike in inflation even without Keynesian demand management will be nipped in the bud via demand deflation through high interest rates.

...And how they are subverted

The question to ask, however, is the following. Is India as neoliberal in de facto terms, as may appear in de jure terms? Let us look at some recent statements and facts.

On July 7, the food secretary of the government of India said that the government had directed edible oil producers to reduce their prices by up to R10 per litre within a week. The government intervening in the demand-supply mechanism of the free market to influence prices is the original sin, as far as free-marketers go.

India’s record of placing arbitrary trade restrictions, especially on food items, is perhaps the most dubious in the world and a mockery of any commitment to free trade. That the government announced a wheat import ban almost immediately after everybody, including the Prime Minister, was talking about Indian exports feeding the world, is just another example of this policy inconsistency.

The FRBM Act, at least at the level of the Centre, has ceased to matter for all practical purposes for a long time. Most independent economists had started publishing two estimates, on-budget and off-budget, of the fiscal deficit in the pre-pandemic period. While most of the off-budget items have been dispensed with after the pandemic, nobody is even talking about a tentative timeline of the fiscal deficit reaching 3% levels, as is enshrined in the FRBM Act.

Everybody, including the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), agrees that it did not act as per its inflation targeting mandate when inflation started surging after the pandemic. Rather than file a report to the government, which is what the mandate asks of the RBI in case it misses its inflation target, the RBI governor proclaimed that the central bank was not “hostage to any rule book”, in a way justifying the central’s bank’s decision to violate what is now its constitutional mandate.

Each of these examples, strikes at the core of the four important milestones on India’s road to neoliberalism. To be sure, these events must be seen as an exception rather than the rule. In each of these fields, the government and the RBI still proclaim a deep commitment to the ideas of neoliberalism, even if it is couched as a commitment to reforms.

Explaining the inconsistency

So, what is one to make of this contradiction in economic policy making in India? Is India neoliberal or is it not neoliberal?

The best answer to this question can be given by invoking a Hindi word, which has actually made its way to the Oxford English Dictionary. What Indian economic policy is practising is neoliberalism with jugaad, i.e. a workaround around the puritan neoliberal policy framework where the State does not intervene in markets and containing inflation and fiscal deficits is the be all and end all of macroeconomic policy.

As is always the case with jugaad, there is a reason why economic policy in India has deployed these workarounds.

Understanding this requires a slight detour into the basic macroeconomic conceptualisation of the Indian economy and the way forward.

If one were to cut through the clutter of all political economy jargon, there are three main objectives which economic policy tries to pursue in any modern economy — achieve reasonable growth, protect macroeconomic stability and maintain democratic acceptability of the political regime while pursuing the first two goals.

Economists believe that it is impossible to pursue these three goals at the same time.

One of the best articulations of this argument has come from Harvard economist Dani Rodrik who has argued that a country cannot pursue national sovereignty, democracy and hyper globalisation at the same, time and one of these must be sacrificed in order to pursue the other two goals. India’s intermittent deviations from the established principles of neoliberal or laissez faire capitalism are best understood in this framework.

Even when fiscal deficit and inflation levels are not at levels where they would pose a tangible threat to macroeconomic stability – even economists and commentators close to the policymaking establishment have repeatedly questioned whether the 3% fiscal deficit and 4% inflation target should be treated as sacrosanct – a breach of these levels upsets global finance capital because excess inflation can derail calculations of return on financial assets. The global obsession with long term sovereign bond yields is the biggest reflection of this fact.

While it is important to recognise these concerns in the policy framework, the political arm of the government is often more pragmatic in balancing these commitments with economic objectives which matter for a large number of voters.

Various examples can be given where realpolitik considerations trigger a departure from commitment to values of hyper globalisation. Intermittent export bans, especially on food items, which violate our commitment to free trade, are meant to prevent domestic anger over inflation. Doubling down on counter-cyclical measures, notwithstanding an ideological aversion to them, and increased spending on the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), to prevent large scale destitution, is another such example.

To be sure, there is more than adequate evidence to argue that the global (neoliberal) consensus around hyper globalisation is not something cast in stone. Aggressive fiscal stimuluses deployed by advanced countries after the pandemic is evidence of this.

Where domestic capital complicates the story

The deviations from neoliberalism are primarily on account of political economy considerations relating to mass of voters. But it would be naïve to believe that concerns of the poor majority are the only factor to reckon with in a democracy such as India.

While India can take reasonable pride in the fact that it has maintained a democratic system, barring the brief interruption of the Emergency, it is also a fact that there is a complicated link between sources of political funding and support for some of the most successful political parties in India and policies.

The bulk of political funding is sourced from big business in the country. To be sure, India can also take remarkable pride in the fact that foreign players, neither political nor financial, still have very little influence in Indian polity. As is the case everywhere, the asymmetry in political finance and support for ruling parties brings its own destabilising forces to India’s political economy paradigm.

It is here that India’s tryst with neoliberalism in the last three decades has brought the biggest change. While the typical quid pro quo between politics and big business was what can be loosely described as corruption (tax evasion and circumventing the restrictions under the license-quota raj) in the pre-reform period, it has shifted to facilitation of formalisation of the economy in the current phase, where big business expects the political regime to open up hitherto unavailable markets for it via two routes. These include making the informal sector unviable (so that the formal sector can replace it) and plugging large-scale infrastructure gaps in the economy through direct or indirect capital spending.

It is hardly surprising that the current government, which is led by a party which enjoys unprecedented political funding from big business in India, as reflected in data from electoral bonds, is pursuing both these objectives with a lot of vigour.

To be sure, formalisation of the economy in itself is a sound objective — but the manner in which it is done and the transitional steps towards it leaves behind losers and winners. Pursuing such a strategy, thus, complicates the political balancing act because it also puts a squeeze on mass incomes, as we have seen in the aftermath of policies such as demonetisation and Goods and Services Tax.

The departure from UPA’s political economy

In hindsight, one of the biggest political economy failures of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government was to not see the eruption of formal versus informal sector binary in politics. In believing that the fruits of growth will continue to pay for an ever expanding umbrella of welfare endowments, the UPA assumed that the growth boom will last forever. Having led the poor on the garden path of welfare spending, the UPA found it difficult to roll back the fiscal stimulus after the 2008 crisis and ended up creating a partial wage-price spiral which was a major trigger for macroeconomic instability. Not only did it spook global financial capital, it also made the domestic capitalist class very anxious.

To be sure, factors other than welfare spending such as the land acquisition act, which made it significantly difficult to take up large scale projects, also played a role in the alienation of big capital from the Congress.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) under the leadership of Narendra Modi has been aware of this contradiction from day one and taken a twin approach to handle this challenge.

The fist is a qualitative change in the nature of welfare provisioning where it is focused more on asset enhancement – it ranges from houses to toilets to now tap water – rather than income enhancement. Through this approach, the BJP hopes to inculcate political loyalty via improving living standards without disturbing labour-capital balance where the former gains in bargaining power when the State provides assured employment or regular income support.

The second has been advocating legislation which pushes the envelope of policy reforms for big business as much as possible. In many such attempts, the regime is pragmatic enough to backtrack when it fears a political backlash. The ordinance to dilute the land acquisition act, three farm laws are some examples. On many other fronts, such as reduction in corporation tax rates, divestment of LIC and the proposed privatisation of public sector banks, the policy paradigm has moved significantly in favour of the private sector.

Will such a strategy work?

This strategy seems to be working, at the moment, not so much because of its inherent virtues but due to the failure of the political opposition which either sees the neoliberal turn in India’s economic policy as a linear path from 1991 onwards or is unable to create a proactive movement demanding relief from the economic headwinds of forced formalisation policy direction.

If things do not change, the opposition will have to continue to take satisfaction in intermittent reactive victories against certain government policies, which would generate enthusiasm in civil society circles but do little to change the realpolitik trajectory in India.

Every Friday, HT’s data and political economy editor, Roshan Kishore, combines his commitment to data and passion for qualitative analysis in a column for HT Premium, Terms of Trade. With a focus on one big number and one big issue, he will go behind the headlines to ask a question and address political economy issues and social puzzles facing contemporary India.

The views expressed are personal



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When an official meeting of India, Israel, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and the United States (US) was announced last October, it was greeted with a degree of surprise in West Asia, in New Delhi, and especially in Washington. The meeting of the four countries’ leaders this week, during US President Joe Biden’s visit to Israel, gives the grouping – dubbed I2U2 – a greater profile and an initial agenda focused on two areas: Food security and clean energy.

In Washington, at least, India’s involvement has elicited some surprise. This reflects the silos in which US foreign policy is often conducted: West Asia and South Asia have generally been treated distinctly. Now, somewhat belatedly, the size of the Indian diaspora in the Gulf, India’s role as a major energy market, and New Delhi’s defence and security relations in West Asia are all becoming better appreciated.

More importantly, the coming together of these four countries reflects some new realities. One, bilateral relations among all four have thickened in recent years to the point of their enjoying broad-based partnerships. West Asia is a region full of strategic contradictions, shifting coalitions, and tactical partnerships, so it is remarkable to hear working-level officials from all four countries talking of high levels of trust in each other.

Two, I2U2 reflects new geopolitical shifts. US ties with Israel and the Gulf Arab states have a long history, and India’s relations with Israel have grown since the 1990s. The two new developments have involved the rapid turnaround in India’s relations with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and other Gulf Arab states since about 2015 and – more dramatically – the sudden public diplomatic and commercial rapprochement between the UAE and Israel embodied by the Abraham Accords.

Three, there is a further imperative on the part of Abu Dhabi, Jerusalem, and New Delhi: Keeping the US regionally engaged. Unlike other efforts at “minilateral” coalition building in recent years, the US was more of a latecomer to I2U2. The complexities and uncertainties of US domestic politics mean that for some partners, ensuring a productive US role in West Asia after two decades of post-9/11 wars is part of the calculus for preserving regional stability.

While there is undoubtedly a strategic logic to this four-sided partnership, there are – at present – trenchant disagreements among the four on great power politics. For India and the US, China continues to loom as their biggest strategic challenge. For India, this is apparent in the continuing border stand-off, economic and trade differences, regional security competition, and multilateral divergences. For the US, China is now recognised as long-term peer competition. But China is still more of an opportunity for the UAE – whether on energy exports or technology – and Israel, on civilian technologies, trade, and infrastructure. For now, Abu Dhabi and Jerusalem are cautious about being drawn into intensified competition in the Indo-Pacific.

If there are differences on China, there are even wider ones on Russia. As the Russia-Ukraine war rumbles along, India, Israel, and the UAE find themselves adopting similar approaches. The US is, in fact, the outlier. Starting to develop this important quadrilateral partnership on the basis of emerging great power competition is certain to prove frustrating, if not futile. It is worth recalling the fate of the Indo-Pacific Quad in its first iteration after 2008.

Instead, the group has wisely sought to develop its partnership from the ground up. Strengthening cooperation in a range of technical fields – water and food security, energy and transportation, health, and space – makes eminent sense. Following the blueprint of Quad by having identified working groups to achieve specific outcomes in a certain timeframe will signal a seriousness and indicate that the group will not just be a talk shop. The initial leaders’ joint statement does precisely that, unveiling $2 billion to integrated food parks in India and a hybrid renewable energy project for 300 megawatts of wind and solar capacity.

In time, a lot more could be done. Strengthening the start-up and innovation ecosystem between the four countries would make eminent sense. The US has investment and a research and development infrastructure, Israel enjoys advantages in applied science and technology, the UAE is experimenting with competitive policies to attract and incubate start-ups, and India has human resources and talent at scale.

A further area that might be worth exploring, should some of the efforts at technical cooperation take off, would be in third countries and regions, especially sub-Saharan Africa. Demographically, Africa will be the fastest-growing region in the coming decades. Once again, all four I2U2 partners bring strengths to the table, whether in terms of diplomatic resources, investment and financing, technical expertise, or people-to-people links.

A leadership-level initiative involving India, Israel, the UAE, and the US focused on fostering a ground-up partnership makes eminent sense, given regional volatility and convergent interests. But once basic cooperation gets underway, and the group has something to show for their efforts, exploring ways to combine their innovation ecosystems and partner in other regions would represent natural next steps.

Dhruva Jaishankar is executive director, ORF America

The views expressed are personal



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On July 11, the United Nations’ Population Division released the 2022 edition of its World Population Prospects report, which stated that India is likely to overtake China as the world’s most populous country in 2023. The report made headlines across the media, with several television channels holding debates on the issue. Many characterised the report as evidence that India’s population is exploding and could only be controlled through a stringent law. Some tried to blame the Muslim community for driving the numbers, and some political leaders demanded a population control law.

Unfortunately, none of these misconceptions are new. Time and again, the discourse around coercive population policies has gained momentum with widespread misinformation around the growth of the Muslim population.

The theory of India’s so-called population explosion is not supported by data and evidence. India has witnessed a significant decline in its population growth rate in the last 50 years. In 1972, our annual population growth rate stood at 2.3%. It has now dropped to less than 1%. Over the same period, the Total Fertility Rate (TFR) — the average number of children born to a woman during her reproductive years — has decreased from about 5.4 to less than 2.1. In other words, the country has attained replacement fertility rate, defined as the fertility rate at which a population exactly replaces itself from one generation to the next.

Despite the decline in growth rate and TFR, India’s population will continue to grow in absolute numbers for some time, owing to the high proportion of young people in the population. Currently, every fifth person in India is an adolescent (aged between 10 and 19) and every third a young person (aged between 10 and 24). Even if these young couples produce only one or two children, it will still result in a quantum increase in population size. However, the numbers will stabilise as the population ages.

According to a 2020 study by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), University of Washington, Seattle, published in The Lancet, India is expected to reach its peak population of 1.6 billion by 2048. India is also projected to have a continued steep decline in TFR, which will drop to 1.3 in 2100, when our population would be about 1.1 billion. So, the notion that India’s population will continue to grow exponentially and indefinitely is untrue.

The slowdown in population growth has been witnessed across communities, and contrary to common perception, there’s no threat of the Muslim population growing faster and overtaking the Hindus. In fact, the fertility gap between Hindus and Muslims is narrowing. According to data from the fifth round of the National Family Health Survey (2019-21), the TFR among Muslims has seen the sharpest decline among all religious communities over the past two decades. The fertility rate among Muslims has dropped to 2.3 during the 2019-2021 period, while in 1992-93, Muslims had a fertility rate of 4.4. Among Hindus, the fertility rate has dropped from 3.3 in 1992-93 to 1.94 in the latest survey. There is a direct correlation between TFR and development indicators such as literacy levels of women, employment, income, and access to health services. For instance, the TFR of Muslims in Tamil Nadu stands at 1.93, while for Hindus in Bihar, it stands at 2.88. The fertility differentials among religious groups in India are due to the differences in the stages of demographic transition that these communities are in, and in the level of education, health, nutrition, employment, and development opportunities available to them.

Stringent population-control measures have historically had many harmful consequences — such as sex selective practices in places with widespread son preference, a phenomenon prevalent in India. China had to eventually abandon its one-child policy after finding itself in the midst of a population crisis and an abnormally high male-to-female sex ratio. During the Emergency era, a widespread mass vasectomy programme by the Indira Gandhi-led government was the cause of gross violation of civil liberties.

In the 1977 general elections, these sterilisations became a major issue, and Indira Gandhi was voted out, resulting in the formation of India’s first non-Congress government at the Centre. During the Emergency, we saw a popular rejection of a coercive population control policy. India should continue focusing on a rights-based approach to family planning, which it committed to, along with 178 other governments, at the International Conference on Population Development in 1994.

According to NFHS-5, approximately 22 million Indian women have an unmet need for family planning, which means that while they may want to stop or delay childbearing, they are unable to do so due to the various barriers they face in accessing contraception. Going forward, our focus should be on providing women of all communities access to family planning services, comprehensive sex education to adolescents, and changing regressive social norms that compromise the reproductive autonomy of women.

Adequate measures must be taken to capitalise on our large young population through investments in education, health, and creating economic opportunities for young people, which would help us harness what economists call the demographic dividend. Population is not simply about numbers, it is about the people.

Poonam Muttreja is executive director, Population Foundation of India

The views expressed are personal



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This May, Labour Party councillor Mohinder Kaur Midha was elected mayor for the West London borough of Ealing, becoming the first woman of Dalit descent to be elected mayor anywhere in Britain. This Punjab-born well-educated woman shattered the glass ceiling after years of serving Southall’s multicultural community. Her elevation marked an important moment in a country where sections of the South Asian diaspora strongly identify with their castes. Campaigners have long raised awareness about the perpetuation of caste and caste-based discrimination here. Around the time Midha arrived in England, in 1976, followers of Dr BR Ambedkar took to the streets outraged by an article in the Bedfordshire Times that called “untouchables” “a subhuman class” -- as if untouchability hadn’t been abolished by the Indian Constitution. The register of charities for England and Wales are replete with charitable registrations that have Brahmin, Jat, Valmik, Ravidassia, and Ramgarhia in their descriptions. Likewise, for mandirs and gurdwaras. The Sikh Report 2018 (a study of the country’s Sikhs, tabled in Parliament every year) found nearly 50% of British Sikh respondents believed in the caste system and 13% considered it very important.

Over the last 20 years, non-government organisations such as the Anti Caste Discrimination Alliance and government-commissioned research have established definitive evidence of caste and caste-based discrimination in Britain. We have equality laws providing protection against, for example, race, disability and gender discrimination. Caste-based discrimination is no different, but legal protections on this subject have always been polarising.

After listening to victims, the Labour Party government made provisions in the Equality Act 2010 to add caste discrimination to the law. But the Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition that succeeded them dragged their heels until April 2013, when the British parliament made it a duty on the government to implement the law.

In 2018, the government announced, following feedback based on what equality campaigners have argued was a flawed public consultation, that it will repeal that part of the legislation. They argue caste is covered under race in the equality legislation and that legal cases can be taken forward under the principles of the Tirkey v Chandhok Employment Tribunal. This employment case saw Permila Tirkey, recruited as a servant from Bihar in India, win what is referred to as the first caste discrimination case in Britain in 2015. The law is supported by the UK’s independent regulator, the Equality and Human Rights Commission, which champions equality in Britain. Since Tirkey, there have been further legal cases which the ACDA has supported. Almost all victims have settled out of court, and therefore, their victories can never become case law. Clarity in the law is the remedy to bring about change in casteist behaviour, not prohibitively expensive court cases and the chimera of case law.

In a global world, can you expect a person travelling from India to leave their caste and descent behind when they board a plane to Manchester or Memphis? As Britain moves towards getting a new prime minister, the perniciousness of caste discrimination and exploitation has yet to be annihilated.

Santosh Dass, MBE, is chair of the ACDA and president of the Federation of Ambedkarite and Buddhist Organisations. Hurst Publishers is publishing her co-edited volume, Ambedkar in London, in October 2022. One of the chapters documents the campaign to outlaw caste discrimination in Britain

The views expressed are personal



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