The short answer to the question ‘what is wrong with saffronising education?’ is ‘really nothing... well... except that ….’
In his address earlier this month at the inauguration of the South Asian Institute of Peace and Reconciliation, on the Dev Sanskriti Vishwavidyalaya campus in Haridwar, Uttarakhand, the Vice-President of India, M. Venkaiah Naidu, argued for a major overhaul of the Macaulay system of education which he rightly observed is both dominant in, and damaging to, India. It produces in us a sense of inferiority, replaces our traditional education in thebhashas with the alien curricula of the English, gives us a colonial mindset, makes us ignorant of our heritage, and, most of all, disconnects us from the rich body of ideas and philosophies that constitute our ancient civilisation.
A resonance earlier
In making this claim, Mr. Venkaiah Naidu has joined a stellar list of public persons who, over the decades, have made a similar argument. Rabindranath Tagore, a moving force of the National Education Movement in the early 1900s, fashioned an innovative nationalist curriculum in Visva Bharati, the great university he established. Eminent Indians such as Amartya Sen, Satyajit Ray, and Mahasweta Devi were educated there. Further, K.C. Bhattacharya in his seminal lecture (October 1931), ‘Swaraj in Ideas’, also spoke of the enslavement of our minds by western education which produced ‘shadow minds’ instead of ‘real minds’. This had to be overcome. Abu-ur-Rashid Moulvi, even earlier in 1888, in theAsiatic Quarterly Review , argued for higher education in Punjab to be delinked from Calcutta University because the university was exhibiting an ‘anglicizing tendency’ which would lead to the ‘denationalization of the younger generation of Punjabis’. The creation of Punjab University, he hoped, would resist such anglicisation since the literatures and sciences would now be taught in the ‘vernaculars and classical languages’. Arguing for an Indian system of education has, therefore, been an important part of the public debate in India for over a century. Mr. Venkaiah Naidu was not the first. But he is in good company.
He is right when he ascribes to the Macaulay system the production of a sense of inferiority among us Indians. This is an idea common to other anti-colonial thinkers such as Aimé Césaire and Frantz Fanon. He is also right when he warns against us becoming ‘mental cripples’, to use Tagore’s term, because we imitate alien ideas and adopt them uncritically. His case of the Macaulay system producing ‘amnesia and erasure’ is also persuasive as is the fear of ‘denationalization’, an idea espoused by T.B. Cunha when he argued against Portuguese colonialism. However, for us not to see Mr. Venkaiah Naidu’s address as merely rhetorical would require him to give us a road map of how to decolonise this Macaulay system, make it more Indian. Honest saffronisation would primarily require sincerity of intent since it would confront many conundrums and challenges along the way. Let me indicate just a few.
An inclusive list
Let me begin with the first challenge. Dr. S. Radhakrishnan, whose knowledge of the depth and the quality of Indian civilisation is second to none (for which he was appointed as the Spalding Professor of Eastern Religions and Ethics at Oxford University), recommended in chapter eight of the 1949 report of the University Education Commission (he was Chairman), that religious education (call it saffronisation) be introduced in our universities. He suggested that the class day begin with a few minutes of silent meditation and that students in the first-year degree course be introduced to the lives of great thinkers such as ‘Gautama the Buddha, Confucius, Zoroaster, Socrates, Jesus, Somkara, Ramanuja, Madhava, Mohammad, Kabir, Nanak, Gandhi’. This is Dr. Radhakrishanan’s own list. It is very inclusive and shows the openness of his curious mind. By including the founders of major religions in his list, Radhakrishnan was affirming their value for an Indian education. Would Mr. Venkaiah Naidu’s saffronisation be similarly open-minded?
About diverse narratives
His inclusive list leads to the larger question that saffronisation would have to address. Call it the second challenge. It would need to decide which themes and topics should be included and which excluded in such a saffron education. For example would A.K.Ramanujan’s essay ‘Three Hundred Ramayanas’ be included? If one really wants to overcome the amnesia of a Macaulay education, as Mr. Venkaiah Naidu suggests, to ‘feel proud of our heritage’, then Ramanujan’s essay would have to be included. Ramanujan’s scholarship on the folk tales of India, just like Dr. S. Radhakrishnan, has few equals. His essay celebrates the rich performative and narrative practices of the living epic, the Ramayana. Would saffronisation accept this diversity of narratives? Would it smile at the idea, in one of the performances he describes, of Sita berating Ram who was advising her not to come to the forest, by asking him whether he has seen any performances where Sita does not accompany Ram? Is such philosophical playfulness allowed, if not encouraged? How we answer this important question of inclusion will depend on how we position ourselves on India’s cultural diversity.
This leads to the third challenge. Would the model for recovery and reconstruction of India’s ancient culture, which is what saffronisation does, be that of Dinanath Batra who in a long letter to Smriti Irani, when she was HRD (Education) Minister, set it out, or would it be that of D.P. Chattopadhyaya’s Project of History of Indian Science, Philosophy and Culture (PHISPC) which has already published several volumes of India’s intellectual achievements? The former espouses Vidya Bharati’s project of cultural assimilation, a thin but toxic agenda, while the latter is a substantive philosophical response to Macaulay, who, had he read the PHISPC volumes would not have the temerity to write, in his 1835 ‘Minute on Education’, that a ‘single shelf of a good European library was worth the whole native literature of India and Arabia’.
On Indianisation
So does Mr. Venkaiah Naidu’s saffronisation side with Dinanath Batra or D.P. Chattopadhyaya? If by saffronisation Mr. Venkaiah Naidu really means Indianisation, it would include both the orthodox and the heterodox traditions of India, the Brahmanical schools and their Buddhist and Jaina challenges. It would include the great architectural practices of the Mughals well as the Sufi and Bhakti movements.
Here, Indianisation would have many colours besides saffron.
Moving to science
Moving from the humanities and social sciences, to the STEM educational stream, i.e., Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, then what would Indianisation entail? Would it just involve the simple task of translating the best science textbooks of the world into the various Indian languages, as they do in Japan, since scientific knowledge is universal? Or would it mean advocating some crazy theories as those propounded at the 106th Indian Science Congress in January 2019 where, it was claimed, that we in India were making test tube babies thousands of years ago and that Albert Einstein did not understand relativity. Indianisation must decide if science is only a western product, or is universal. Is Mr. Venkaiah Naidu suggesting that there is a distinctive Indian science? After all this STEM proficiency in India, a product of Macaulay’s system of education, has produced the Nadellas and Pichais of the world. Or am I holding the wrong STEM?
And, finally, the paradox. Does saffronisation endorse the decision of the vice-chancellor to permanently station a Central Industrial Security Force camp inside Visva Bharati, the only university in India that has established a nationalist curriculum? The vice-chancellor did this because of student protests. The Government of India supported him. If his conception of saffronisation endorses this decision then, sad to say, Macaulay has triumphed over Tagore. Macaulay may have designed the system of education for India but he was also the author of the Indian Penal Code. We decry Macaulay on education, rightly so, but (sadly) enthusiastically embrace Macaulay on the Indian penal system.
Peter Ronald deSouza is the D.D. Kosambi Visiting Professor at Goa University. The views expressed are personal
Sri Lanka is gearing up to host the Fifth Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) Summit, now in its silver jubilee year (the summit is being held in virtual/hybrid mode on March 30, and Sri Lanka is the current BIMSTEC chair). This special occasion makes it imperative for BIMSTEC leaders to reinforce their commitments and efforts in building the momentum of collaborations in the Bay of Bengal region for the security and development of all.
This summit is expected to build the required momentum of collaborations among the member states — Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Thailand — as there has been commendable teamwork among them and a finalisation of several agreements to enhance regional strategic and economic integration. The unique ecology of BIMSTEC is witnessing enriched political support and commitment from India.
Undoubtedly, BIMSTEC has special significance for India in a changing mental map of the region. India has made the Bay of Bengal integral to India’s ‘Neighbourhood First’ and ‘Act East’ policies which can accelerate the process of regional integration. BIMSTEC matters for India and the region.
An area of importance
Finalising the BIMSTEC Charter; BIMSTEC Master Plan for Transport Connectivity; BIMSTEC Convention on Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters; BIMSTEC Technology Transfer Facility (TTF); cooperation between diplomatic academies/training institutions; and a template of Memorandum of Association for the future establishment of BIMSTEC centres/entities present signs of optimism as well as the comeback of the Bay of Bengal as a new economic and strategic space.
Further, the economic and strategic significance of the Bay of Bengal is growing rapidly with a re-emergence of the idea of the ‘Indo-Pacific’ region. This notion assumes that the growing economic, geopolitical and security connections between the Western Pacific and the Indian Ocean regions are creating a shared strategic space. The Bay of Bengal is evolving as the centre of the Indo-Pacific region again. The renewed focus has given a new lease of life to the developmental efforts in the region, in particular BIMSTEC.
As the BIMSTEC process turns 25 years, it is all set to make visible progress through advancing concrete cooperation among the member states. They have invested some fresh energy in the last couple of years to make BIMSTEC a valuable institution for regional integration and collaboration.
A bridge between Asias
BIMSTEC has huge potential as a natural platform for development cooperation in a rapidly changing geopolitical calculus and can leverage its unique position as a pivot in the Indo-Pacific region. There has been tangible progress in BIMSTEC cooperation in several areas that include security, counter-terrorism, intelligence sharing, cybersecurity and coastal security, and transport connectivity and tourism, among others.
The growing value of BIMSTEC and its attempt to generate synergy through collective efforts by member states can be understood, for three key reasons. First, there is a greater appreciation of BIMSTEC’s potential due to geographical contiguity, abundant natural and human resources, and rich historical linkages and a cultural heritage for promoting deeper cooperation in the region. Indeed, with a changed narrative and approach, the Bay of Bengal has the potential to become the epicentre of the Indo-Pacific idea — a place where the strategic interests of the major powers of East and South Asia intersect. Political support and strong commitment from all member countries are crucial in making BIMSTEC a dynamic and effective regional organisation.
Need for connectivity
Second, BIMSTEC serves as a bridge between two major high-growth centres of Asia — South and Southeast Asia. Connectivity is essential to develop a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable Bay of Bengal region. Therefore, BIMSTEC needs to address two dimensions of connectivity – one, upgrading and dovetailing national connectivity into a regional road map; and two, development of both hard and soft infrastructures.
The BIMSTEC Master Plan for Transport Connectivity will provide the necessary boost to connectivity. There is growing involvement of educational institutions, industries and business chambers through various forums and conclaves which are helping to enhance cooperation in the areas of education, trade and investments, information technology and communication among others. Resisting the temptation to make lofty promises, the BIMSTEC leaders have focused on priority areas through a concrete action plan on time.
India’s role
Third, the BIMSTEC Secretariat coordinates, monitors and facilitates the implementation of BIMSTEC activities and programmes. The leaders must agree to strengthen the institutional capacity of the BIMSTEC Secretariat. Approval of a charter for BIMSTEC during the summit will further augment its visibility and stature in international fora. Likewise, India has implemented its promise to set up a Centre for Bay of Bengal Studies (CBS) at Nalanda University, Bihar for research on art, culture and other subjects related to the Bay of Bengal. The quest for economic growth and the development of the BIMSTEC region can be achieved with single-minded focus and cooperation among the member counties. In this endeavour, India has a key role in accelerating regional cooperation under the BIMSTEC framework and in making it vibrant, stronger and result-oriented.
Rajeev Ranjan Chaturvedy is Associate Professor and Coordinator of the Centre for Bay of Bengal Studies at Nalanda University, Bihar
Fifty years ago, a book titledThe Limits to Growth , authored by a group of economic modellers, was published as part of a project on the predicament of mankind. The project was sponsored by the Club of Rome, an organisation founded in 1968 primarily by an Italian industrialist, Aurelio Peccei, and comprising leaders from various fields of human activity. The Club evolved from the concept of problematique, which was that the growing global problems of environmental deterioration, depleting natural resources, pollution, overpopulation, inequality, ill-health, crime, war, and religious attitudes, among others, which are inimical to the human well-being, are inter-related and require a system-based approach. This data-driven study was pioneered by the System Dynamics group at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), led by Donella H. Meadows. It used a first-generation computer and codes and was far ahead of its time in its methodological approach. Still, what stumped the people of the day was its mind-blowing conclusion that the world system could collapse by 2070 given the human-induced changes in the environment combined with traditional economic growth models. The report, which recommended altering the growth model, which is rooted in the over-exploitation of finite natural resources, was also a wake-up call for action, as we do not have much time to lose.
Predictions
This book soon became a subject of vehement criticism for its ‘doomsday’ prediction. However, the lead author of the thesis denied the allegation and said that it was not written to “predict doom but to challenge people to find ways of living that are consistent with the laws of the planet”. On the conclusions of this book, the journalNature , in its editorial dated March 10, 1972, reflecting the cynicism prevalent among the academic circles towards the book, called it ‘Another Whiff of Doomsday’. The earlier ‘whiff of doomsday’ referred to another book, World Dynamics, by J.W. Forrester of MIT, that, for the first time, developed the computer code for system analysis and was a forerunner toThe Limits to Growth. The critics in those early days, when computer literacy was minimal, said that the inferences of the book were unconvincing and that the authors ignored what they believed to be the self-correcting capabilities of the Earth systems.
But they were ignorant of the tipping points in any complex system — the thresholds where a tiny change can push a system into an entirely new state. This is because the scientific validity of tipping points came much later. The stable environmental conditions during the last 10,000 years, called the Holocene, helped humanity to thrive, but because of the exponential increase in the rate of change, we would reach the tipping point fast. Human activities, unprecedented in the geological past, were quickly predominating natural forces in shaping the environment.
Trend of 50 years
We are almost halfway to the 100-year mark predicted inThe Limits to Growth , and there is a consensus that most of the fundamental factors discussed in the book have come true. Given the exponential growth of the population in parts of the world, the strain on precious natural resources has become acute, widening the gap between the haves and have-nots. The trend line presented inThe Limits to Growth indicated that the global population might cross the seven billion-mark by the turn of the 20th century. The formal number available for the year 2000 was 6.11 billion, not considering the errors in understating the population in many poor countries. The formal number now is 7.9 billion. The population of impoverished regions of the world has gone up.
Indeed, technology has made some unbelievable progress in the last half a century. The report demonstrated that the process of economic growth, structurally based on Gross National Product (GDP) as a marker of growth, is inexorably widening the absolute gap between the rich and the poor along with the number of undernourished people. Not a single trend projected in the book has gone off the track in nearly 50 years. This realisation is reflected inNature ’s editorial of March 16, 2022, commemorating the book’s 50th year, and advocates for global-level discussions on the GDP-based measures of economic performance.
WhenThe Limits to Growth was first published, environmental awareness was minimal, and huge knowledge gaps existed on the problems related to pollution. This book was the first to raise the issue of pollution, including the rising level of carbon dioxide emissions from the use of conventional sources of energy. The physical sciences later proved that the computer models on the relationship between environmental degradation and quality of life, introduced inThe Limits of Growth , were fundamentally correct. For instance, almost coinciding with the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Johan Rockström and others, in a feature article dated September 24, 2009, inNature , cautioned that we do not have the luxury of treating each of the planetary boundaries in isolation as they are coupled. This means that if the Amazon forests are drastically reduced, it could influence the stability of mountain glaciers in far-off Tibet. Scientific research has shown how humanity has already transgressed three of the Earth system processes — climate change, rate of biodiversity loss, and the nitrogen cycle — and is fast approaching the boundaries for global freshwater use, change in land use, and ocean acidification.
Contrarian concepts
The Limits to Growth shaped human outlook on key existential issues towards the latter part of the 20th century. This is spilling over to the present times. In the end, the book put forward the “concept of a society in a steady state of economic and ecological equilibrium” and admitted that it requires a “Copernican revolution of mind” to attain those objectives. Most importantly, by implication, it helped raise doubts on the current economic models, which are purely based on GDP, which encourages profligacy, depletion of non-renewable resources and rising emissions. Contrarian concepts like “de-growth” and “post-growth” are gaining momentum among economic thinkers to tackle biophysical processes such as climate change. But political thinkers believe that monumental challenges exist as “de-growth” societies are organised around fundamentally different cultural, social, economic, political, and technological concepts as compared to those organised around the ideology of growth, both from the capitalistic and Marxian points of view. Even parts of Gandhian principles, including the concept of human cooperatives, assume importance in the context of de-growth options. AsThe Limits to Growth emphasises, the question is not only “whether the human species will survive, but whether it can survive without falling into a state of worthless existence”.
C.P. Rajendran is an adjunct professor at the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bengaluru and author of the book, ‘Earthquakes of the Indian Subcontinent’
India’s criminal justice regime is beset with problems which seem ingrained in not only the constitutive fabric of institutions, but also in the psyche of their functionaries. Much like we have learned to live with the pandemic, we must learn to live with such problems. As Professor Andrew Ashworth said, “A just and coherent criminal justice system is an unrealistic expectation of the people”. It is not our case that we must stop attempting to rid ourselves of such problems, but to ensure that our institutional responses reflect an acceptance of the depth of their roots.
The problems that are here to stay
The first such problem is the disposal of pending cases. There are more than 4.4 crore cases pending before the judiciary. It is unlikely that this problem will go away any time soon. Second, justice mechanisms will remain inaccessible to marginalised classes of citizens. As Amartya Sen said, our justice system follows a transcendental institutionalist approach where the focus is on getting the institutional arrangements right without regard to the world that emerges from such arrangement. In such a world, where the focus has been upon institution building rather than capacity building, marginalisation of vulnerable sections of society is inevitable.
The third is the problem of abuse of power by the police. The colonial mindset with which the institution was created is persistent. It determines and governs the manner in which the police discharge their functions. Our stress on crime control values too promotes such abuse of power. To hope that such abuse will end is just wishful thinking unless we are prepared to overhaul the police system overnight. Fourth, crime prevention is a utopian goal of our criminal justice system. Achieving a hundred per cent rate of success in crime prevention through either laws or policing is an unattainable ideal. Successive empirical research studies have shown that higher punishment has little impact on lowering crime rates. Similarly, initiatives such as community policing mechanisms and situational crime prevention are yet to deliver any concrete results.
Fifth, diversionary principles in the treatment of offenders are yet to materialise. Even as several Law Commissions and committees have recommended non-custodial measures of punishment of offenders, these are yet to translate into practice. Even when we have a problem of overcrowding of prisons, custodial punishments are seen by the governments as a more effective measure. Sixth, there is a dearth of reliable state-sponsored data collection, maintenance and analysis mechanisms. The National Crime Records Bureau’s data mark the extent of such data collection and analysis. The methodologies adopted by the reports can be criticised on multiple grounds. Little effort is made by the state to map the perceptions of justice by the victims and the common man. The state also does not seem to realise that there is a dearth of reliable data.
It must be noted that problems are not limited to the ones highlighted. Reforms in criminal laws and criminal justice, however, seem to have been recommended and conducted with the assumption that these problems will go away with time and effort. Our experience shows that this is not true. On the contrary, it must be assumed that these problems are here to stay unless drastic changes are made concurrently at the institutional, social and individual levels.
Accepting issues
Accepting these problems as assumptions is likely to have a favourable impact on the way we plan our institutional reforms and responses. To illustrate, if we accept that our institutional arrangements cannot guarantee access to justice for the most vulnerable sections of society, our approach would automatically shift towards building the capacity of such sections to tap into the criminal justice system. Similarly, it is only when we assume that abuse of power by the police is not going anywhere and that imposing mere ethical obligations on police officers will not resolve the problem can we move into the realm of developing independent investigative procedures and stern punitive sanctions against errant police officers. If we accept that the problem of pendency of cases has acquired such huge proportions that we cannot dispose of all of these cases in 10 lifetimes, maybe we would be able to rein in our tendency to over-criminalise conduct.
Any and all recommendations made by researchers and reformists must be made after considering these problems to be a reality. Any project aimed at criminal justice reform must instead accept the problems we have as assumptions. Only then can we can shift the discourse to bringing about holistic reforms in our criminal justice system.
G.S. Bajpai is Vice-Chancellor at the Rajiv Gandhi National University of Law, Punjab. Ankit Kaushik is an Assistant Professor at RGNUL, Punjab
An ongoing survey has sharply divided public opinion in Kerala, with the Opposition parties led by the Congress and a section of people alleging it to be a part of the land acquisition process for a proposed semi-high speed railway project along the State’s geographical length.
The social, economic and environmental feasibility of the Rs. 63,941 crore standalone SilverLine rail corridor — the Centre has not accorded its approval as yet — has already been called into question by experts, political opponents and concerned environmentalists. The Government, however, insists that what is under way is a social impact study and has got a shot in the arm when the Supreme Court of India, on March 28, refused to grant a stay on the survey.
Amidst widespread protests, the Kerala Rail Development Corporation Ltd. — a Centre-State joint venture known as K-Rail, which is to execute the project — and the State Revenue Department have together surveyed a 175-km stretch of the project’s 530-km long corridor and planted about 6,100 survey stones, with large contingents of police providing security.
Opposition’s stand
But the way the survey has been conducted so far has raised many eyebrows as the standoff between the protesters and the police have led to unsavoury scenes at several places especially in central Kerala. There is no disputing that given the unenviable history of rehabilitation of people displaced on account of development projects in Kerala, people are genuinely concerned about losing their land holdings. It is also a fact that there is resultant political opposition to the project, with the Congress, having sensed an opportunity to create a groundswell of support, forming a ‘Karuthal Pada’ (vigilant force) in some places to stall stone-laying. The Bharatiya Janata Party’s opposition to the project has been largely subdued if not ambivalent, thanks to the Centre’s wait-and-watch policy.
In a written reply to Adoor Prakash, MP, Union Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw called the detailed project report (DPR) submitted by K-Rail incomplete and said that the Centre had sought technical documents pertaining to the “alignment plan, particulars of private land and railway land, crossings over existing railway network” and the like. But the Centre has not pulled the plug on the project. “It has just sought additional information, which will be provided,” was what a top K-Rail official said.
There is unease even within the CPI(M), the lead partner in the ruling dispensation, over the stone-laying with the police in attendance, putting the Government on the defensive. The insensitive remarks of some leaders, drawing parallels between the protests and the one that felled the first Communist government in Kerala, undue show of haste in pushing the project and use of force to lay survey stones in people’s small holdings have all done little to allay the fears of the people. The onus is on the Government to clear the air on land acquisition and rehabilitation and compensation.
While the Government has time and again reiterated that the people will be taken into confidence before acquiring land for the project, it should also be clear on the environmental question, more so because the State has not really rebuilt itself from the ravages wrought by the successive floods of 2018 and 2019. Since several experts have raised apprehensions about the viability of the corridor as a standalone line, that should be addressed as well. Finally, given its finances, it is not prudent for Kerala government to bankroll the project entirely on its own.
While the survey can go on, the people need to be reassured. And the State should realise that a project of this magnitude takes time to fructify. Rushing it disregarding concerns can be suicidal.
anandan.s@thehindu.co.in
The decision to conduct a Common University Entrance Test (CUET) for admission in undergraduate programmes in all University Grants Commission-funded Central Universities (CUs) from 2022-23 has triggered concerns. No doubt, the proposal is influenced by the National Education Policy, which advocates common entrance examinations by the National Testing Agency for undergraduate and graduate admissions and fellowships. The concept as such is not alien to the CUs. Over a dozen CUs admit students to undergraduate programmes using Central Universities Common Entrance Test (CUCET) scores. The proposed CUET, in 13 languages, seeks to make it mandatory for 45 CUs — there are 54 such institutions — to conduct admissions using a single national level test score. This would spare aspirants from taking multiple entrance tests and also eliminate unfair advantage gained from disproportionate scores in class XII. Critics are evidently viewing this development through the prism of the Narendra Modi government’s obsession with pushing the ‘one nation, one standard’ maxim in different sectors. But as early as 1984, the Madhuri R. Shah Committee, looking into the working of CUs, recommended a national merit examination. In the instant case, the UGC has clarified the existing scheme of reservations in individual universities would not be disturbed.
Yet, the CUET may not qualify as a wholesome determinant of merit given the educational and regional disparities in India. While a vast majority study in State Boards, the test would be based on the NCERT syllabus, followed largely in CBSE schools. The policy limits the Class XII marks as a qualification benchmark and not a co-determinant of merit. With the test being introduced just ahead of an admission season, students, whose learning process was disrupted by COVID-19, may find it challenging. Education Ministers from Tamil Nadu, Meghalaya and Arunachal Pradesh have flagged some legitimate concerns. In the North-east, the argument about the test possibly affecting the interest of State domiciles to secure admission in a university in the region cannot be ignored. There are genuine apprehensions about CUET serving as a precursor to introducing a nationwide entrance test for all undergraduate courses — the UGC has said all institutions are free to use the test scores for admissions. It has been sufficiently demonstrated that common entrance tests spawn the coaching industry and induce cost-heavy hybrid courses from class VI onwards, creating a divide between the haves and have-nots. The country has miles to go in enabling access to entry-level higher education and bridging the gender and economic gap in its university portals. In such circumstances, it needs to be dispassionately examined if prescribing a single entrance test as a sole determinant of merit, either for CUs or for the higher education system as a whole, is pragmatic.
The recent arrest of a 25-year-old Muslim woman at Mudhol in Bagalkot district of Karnataka for an innocuous message on Pakistan’s Republic Day is yet another instance of the perverse misuse of the law by authorities. If it was the provision relating to sedition that was invoked mindlessly in the past, including once for a play enacted by primary schoolchildren, the latest one involves an alleged attempt at creating enmity among different groups. Kuthma Sheikh was granted bail on the same day of her arrest, but the incident is no less disconcerting as it indicates the ease with which members of the minority community can be arrested without sufficient cause, often at the behest of overzealous activists with a disproportionate clout in the administration. In this case, the madrassa student had said, “May God bless every nation with peace, unity and harmony” on March 23, but a local Hindu activist complained to the police that she was creating enmity among communities by wishing people on Pakistan Day. With unsurprising promptitude, the police booked her under penal sections relating to promoting enmity between different groups. As to how her wishes would have attracted either Section 153A or 505(2) of the IPC is something only the police can explain. The district police have claimed that the arrest was aimed at preserving peace and maintaining order, but it is quite apparent that they acted in a cavalier manner without ascertaining whether there was any substance in the complaint.
Ever since a controversy broke out over girl students wearing the hijab, there seems to be a tendency among right-wing groups to foment trouble targeted at Muslims. These groups have called for a ban on Muslim traders and vendors doing business as part of temple fairs. Even though the State government is citing a law that prohibits non-Hindus from getting property in the vicinity of the temple on lease, it is doubtful whether the rules cover temporary stalls on special occasions. It is regrettable that the State government is not doing enough to stem the impression that its administration is hostile towards minorities. Unwarranted arrests, especially for trivial reasons and on communally motivated complaints, result in unfair incarceration, ruined lives and immensely delayed justice. For a regime that takes strong exception to strident criticism about its human rights and religious tolerance record, the Union government should be equally concerned about the possible damage that such incidents may cause to its global image. The Centre may not have anything to do with law and order, but it may have to advise certain States to restrain the police from perfunctory use of the power to arrest to please majoritarian groups and individuals.
United Nations, March 29.: The United Nations Commission on Human Rights yesterday adopted by acclamation a resolution sponsored by India and two other countries directing the Commission to consider the feasibility of observing an international year on eradication of poverty — “Garibi Hatao”. The resolution was piloted by the Indian delegate, Mrs. Leela Damodara Menon, and its cosponsors were Chile and Poland. Pakistan lent support to the resolution which also requested the Regional Economic Commissions for Asia, Africa, Latin America, Europe and West Asia to include in their deliberations a review of the progress made by the countries of the regions in the implementation of the Declaration of Human Rights. India introduced the idea of an International Year on Eradication of Poverty following a suggestion made by Mrs. Menon at the start of the Commission’s current session. She had recalled the economic goal of “Garibi Hatao” set by the Prime Minister, Mrs. Indira Gandhi, for India. Mrs. Menon said the year could be observed by starting discussions on the means of achieving the goal and she felt that this would help in evolving ultimately a programme of international action. — PTI
Despite cross-voting in two states in the final round, the Congress (I) emerged with a marginal gain in the Rajya Sabha biennial elections by capturing a total of 47 seats from 14 states against the retirement of 46 party members. With this tally, the party’s strength goes to 120 in the Upper House with an effective strength of 234. Four members are to be nominated to the House by the president, but six other seats will still be vacant. The third and final leg of polling involved 45 seats from nine states. The Congress (I) took 36 seats against equal number of retiring members. Of these, nine were from UP, five each from Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra, three from Rajasthan, two from Punjab and one each from Haryana and Himachal Pradesh.
Press Report Delayed
The signing of the long-awaited report of the Press Commission is being put off by a few days following the failure of the last minute efforts by its chairman K K Mathews to get the references to the government’s attitude towards the press during the emergency deleted from a dissenting note given by several members.
Overloaded Flights
Members of the Lok Sabha expressed anxiety about reports of overloading in Indian Airlines flights and wondered whether the airlines was flouting all safety norms and heading the DTC way. While conceding that the Ranchi-Patna flight on February 11 had carried seven excess passengers, the Minister of State for Tourism and Aviation, Khurshid Alam Khan, assured agitated members that everything possible was being done to ensure the safety of passengers. The services of the pilot of the aircraft and the traffic assistant, who overbooked the flight at Ranchi, had been suspended.
The perks of being a strongman-dictator are hardly small. You can run an entire country on your whim, and not have to face questions if you end up wrecking lives or economies. Even your most bizarrely irrational firmans are masterstrokes. There is the unlimited supply of unquestioned obedience, not to mention the surround sound of eulogy that follows you everywhere. It’s almost as if you were the star of your own movie. Trust North Korean leader Kim Jong-un — the scourge of reactionary Western culture and darling of third edit writers around the world — to go one up on the competition. The Great Leader has cast himself in a video of the launch of the country’s massive inter-continental ballistic missile, Hwasong-17.
In true 1980s Hollywood movie style, Kim swaggers in, in dark aviators and black leather jackets, flanked by two military-men who are there to strictly play the role of the sidekicks. Even the monster missile that slowly emerges from a hangar and meekly follows the lead is a prop in this one-man show. Haters will hate, of course. People with time to waste on the internet — now that’s something that would never happen behind North Korea’s great firewall — have overlaid the video with Gangnam Style and other frivolities. American security experts are sceptical if the massive missile in the video is the one that was actually launched on March 24 — or just the old trick of regurgitating old footage.
But why blame Kim Jong-un alone? Till he lasted, Donald Trump gave Kim a good run for his money in the Narcissism Olympics. The self-love of populists has made a bracing comeback in recent years, whether in the free world or outside. The persona is the propaganda. The bigger, the angrier, the better. And a missile or two in the backdrop harmed no one.
This editorial first appeared in the print edition on March 30, 2022 under the title ‘Shots fired’.
The Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill, 2022, a crucial legislation that provides a legal framework for investigative agencies to use modern techniques and technology to solve crimes, has been introduced in the Lok Sabha. It will facilitate collection of sensitive personal and biological data of individuals by the police and creation of a database that could retain the information for upto 75 years. In effect, it entrusts the police — starting from the rank of a head constable who will collect and process this data — with navigating the fine line between the inviolable personal space of an individual and the state’s legitimate interests. For a law that collides with the right against self-incrimination and right to privacy, several terms in the Bill are too broad or too vague.
Replacing the 1920 Identification of Prisoners Act, the proposed law considerably expands its scope and reach. First, it expands the nature of data points it can collect from an individual — from finger impressions, foot-print impressions and photographs in the 1920 law to now include finger-impressions, palm-print impressions, foot-print impressions, photographs, iris and retina scans, physical, biological samples and their analysis, behavioural attributes including signatures, handwriting or any other examination prescribed in the Code of Criminal Procedure. While the phrase biological samples is not described further, it could involve bodily invasions such as drawing of blood and hair, collection of DNA samples. These are acts that currently require the written sanction of a magistrate. Second, the Bill casts a wide net in terms of those whose data can be collected. The proviso (exception to the law) in Section 3 of the Bill essentially says while the police can collect data from any person, only a select category — such as convicts, those under preventive detention, those required to submit a surety bond — can be compelled by the police. While juvenile offenders are outside the remit of a police station, the Bill leaves some ambiguity on collection of data for minors between 16 to 18 years, who cannot consent to collection of personal data but can be tried for serious offences.
In the absence of a data protection framework that is long pending, the proposed law raises questions on protecting rights of the data principal and on the risks of profiling. Any encroachment on personal space must pass the test of constitutionality as laid down by the Supreme Court. It is important for the state to iron out the looseness and ambiguity in law without delay.
This editorial first appeared in the print edition on March 30, 2022 under the title ‘Too loose, too vague’.
Two BJP legislators in Karnataka have asked the state government to act against the “wrong” and “undemocratic” restrictions imposed on Muslim traders participating in temple festivals. In neighbouring Kerala, Sangh Parivar affiliates have termed the decision of the Koodalmanikyam temple administration to deny permission to a Bharatnatyam dancer for performing in the temple premises because she is a non-Hindu as against Hindu culture and tradition — ironically, the temple is administered by the CPM-led government’s nominees. These two responses, which contradict the dominant or conservative party line or view, frame an important message — political parties are no monoliths and, in a diverse democracy, cracks are good. They can open up spaces for difficult conversations, and let in more light.
The dissenting voices in the Karnataka BJP are still a minuscule minority, of course. A H Vishwanath, a recent entrant in the BJP, was a Congress minister in the 1990s and later headed the Janata Dal (Secular) in the state. A senior OBC leader, he is now a marginal player in the BJP. The other leader who spoke out, Anil Benake, represents Belagavi North, a Muslim-dominated constituency in North Karnataka. However, the angry reaction of Vishwanath, who is close to former chief minister and senior BJP leader B S Yediyurappa — he called the ban on Muslim traders “madness” — could resonate with leaders who have been less strident in their style of politics and more accommodative of religious minorities in government. The marginalisation of Yediyurappa in the state BJP and the appointment of Basavaraj Bommai as CM can be said to have empowered the more conservative sections within Karnataka’s ruling party. Vishwanath and Benake may have flagged the disquiet in a section of the Karnataka BJP, therefore, over the rise of radical elements and agendas. A hint of a similar backlash against a more restrictive approach to Hindu customs and traditions is visible in the Kerala temple episode. In a bid to facilitate the Sanskritisation and codification of diverse Hindu faith traditions, a section of the Sangh Parivar leadership in Kerala has been speaking out against rituals and customs that they deem as regressive and violative of egalitarian values. This section had argued for removing gender discrimination at the Sabarimala Ayyappa shrine and, initially, supported the Supreme Court ruling, before falling in line with the populist, conservative view that favoured the continuation of the temple custom. The support for Mansiya VP, the dancer who was born in a Muslim household but now identifies as an atheist, has to be viewed in this context.
Irrespective of how it plays out, the tendency to challenge the conservative consensus must be welcomed. It facilitates debate, opens up possibilities of a middle ground. Politics, at its best, is a negotiation that allows multiple viewpoints to express themselves and to flourish, and forges consensus through dialogue. Dissent and difference may slow down the work of governance and politics, but they enrich the outcomes immeasurably.
This editorial first appeared in the print edition on March 30, 2022 under the title ‘Light in the cracks’.
Today, I begin an official visit to one of the most important countries in world geopolitics: The Republic of India.
My goal is to continue to strengthen our bilateral relationship through a strategic partnership based on greater political dialogue, cooperation, and economic exchange. It is in our greatest interest to foster collaborative initiatives in pharmaceutical manufacturing and in aerospace, sectors where India is a global leader.
In 2021, Mexico and India commemorated 71 years of the establishment of diplomatic relations, and nowadays we recognise each other as interlocutors of our respective regions.
I will have the pleasure of meeting with my counterpart and great friend, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, with whom I share the enthusiasm for a much closer relationship between our countries. This visit will strengthen the presence of Mexico in South Asia.
Mexico and India are members of the G-20, which brings together 20 of the largest economies in the world and whose presidency in 2023 will be assumed by India. Likewise, both countries are non-permanent members of the United Nations Security Council this year. In both forums, we will contribute decisively to world peace and security, and will put poverty reduction at the centre of the multilateral debate.
The health sector is another cornerstone of our exchanges. One of the hardest lessons that the Covid-19 pandemic gave us was the need to expand production capacities and diversify the supply of medicines. Therefore, Mexico will strengthen its cooperation with India as one of the leading global producers of medicines. We will also seek joint pharmaceutical manufacturing.
My meetings with the Minister of Health and Family Welfare, the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, the Indian Council of Medical Research, as well as with Indian pharmaceutical companies, will be the first step in that direction.
Another key focus area of cooperation will be aerospace. Although it was started less than a decade ago, this has enormous potential for the Mexican Space Agency and for regional initiatives such as the recently established Latin American and Caribbean Space Agency (ALCE) of which Mexico is the founder. To this end, I will speak with the Minister of State for Science and Technology, and the President of the Indian Space Research Organisation, ISRO, and will be accompanied by Mexican academics who will talk with their counterparts to explore new horizons for knowledge exchange.
In the economic sphere, Mexico’s links with India, the sixth-largest economy in the world and our tenth-largest trading partner, undoubtedly offers a wide range of prospects for our productive sectors, especially in the agro-food sector as well as investment opportunities in new border technologies, and information and communication, where India occupies a preeminent place.
For this purpose, I will meet with the Minister of Commerce and Industry, and in Mumbai, I will lead a business forum accompanied by representatives of Mexican companies.
With this visit, we hope to lay the foundations for deepening the relationship between Mexico and India. Our links with India have evolved positively in recent years, demonstrating the complementarities between our ancient countries, rich in history and diversity. In this spirit, we will take a firm step towards a tangible alliance to showcase this evolution, which could result in mutual benefits.
(The writer is the Foreign Minister of Mexico)
What are the lessons one can draw from the recent assembly elections in five states? Two conclusions are obvious. First, the Congress party’s footprint across the country has shrunk further and the family that monopolises the party is now just one push away from oblivion. Second, the BJP has decisively won record pro-incumbency votes in four of these five states. These four pro-incumbency verdicts are not an aberration. After the early decades of independent India, the BJP has the best record of pro-incumbency verdicts — both at the Centre and the state level.
So, what explains this phenomenal success of the BJP in repeatedly winning the trust of the people across the length and breadth of the country?
A viral photo from Minister of Women and Child Development Smriti Irani’s Twitter timeline, taken during the swearing-in ceremony of Yogi Adityanath, holds an important clue. The picture shows Nitin Gadkari, Amit Shah, Rajnath Singh and J P Nadda in one frame, along with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. One current and three former presidents of the party are sitting with a prime minister who has won the biggest return mandate in five decades, at the swearing-in ceremony of a second-time chief minister. None of them is from the same family, not one of them is even a second-generation politician. They are all first-generation karyakartas who have risen to the very top by sheer hard work. All of them come from humble backgrounds and represent diverse social bases and castes. From Maharashtra to Gujarat and from Himachal Pradesh to Uttar Pradesh, they represent the diversity of India. In their idiom and mindset, they are rooted in the Indian civilisational ethos, rather than trying to find validity through imported concepts. And, most importantly, all are high achievers in their personal lives, yet they all subsume their individual egos in the larger cause of their party as a vehicle for national development.
What are the ideals that we expect from our political parties in a normative democracy?
First, political parties must enable the best talent in each generation to rise to the top based on their hard work and commitment. Second, they must represent the diversity of the country in all its forms — regional and societal. Third, political parties must foster a common national purpose rather than act as personal advancement vehicles. Fourth, they must put the nation first while the personal interest of the political activist must be the last priority. Fifth, parties must hold some timeless values, irrespective of the transitional nature of political power. Sixth, political power must not be the end goal, but merely a means to change society and the nation for the better.
Commentators are excited if a political party exhibits even one or two of these six traits. But consider the BJP. Is there any other political party in the country which comes even close to it in broadly imbuing all of these traits of an ideal political party? When every other party, without exception, has reduced itself to being the personal vehicle of a family or an individual, it is the BJP alone that stands tall, representing the true ideals of the freedom fighters who fought for a democratic nation.
The history of the BJP itself is its message. The Jana Sangh, the precursor to the BJP, was formed for a cause that was neither regional nor parochial nor based on a personal grouse. Political power of any significance eluded the founders for many decades. And yet, the party never wavered from its ideological path. The founders never chose greener pastures for quick political gratification. The BJP leadership and thousands of faceless workers chose to work hard on the ground rather than compromise on their principles. It is this ideological commitment, and the character imbibed from the ideals of the RSS, that makes the BJP the only political party in India to have never split. It is the only political party in India that has six living former national presidents, all still with the party. All of them had selflessly stepped aside when the time came for the next generation.
Sushma Swaraj’s last tweet thanked PM Modi for fulfilling a long-cherished dream within her lifetime — the abrogation of Article 370. She was not a minister then, not even a party office-bearer. Yet, it is the national achievement that excited her, not her personal position. That is how the BJP has changed India fundamentally — by changing its politics. The BJP has offered a template to the romantics, showing them that it is possible in politics to put principles above power and yet be successful. The BJP collectively, and PM Modi personally, represent the ideals that we expect from our political parties and politicians. That is why the BJP repeatedly inspires trust in the people. For, the BJP is the only party that makes the people feel that it is one of them. For it is from among them. If they can do it, others can too. If there is one message that we can distil from the recent elections, it is that the voters, for all of the above reasons and more, are saying, “#IamTheBJP”.
This column first appeared in the print edition on March 30, 2022 under the title ‘The clue in the picture’. The writer is CEO, Bluekraft Digital Foundation and was earlier director (content) MyGov
Today, the global media is focused on the war in Ukraine, with images and footage of death, destruction, agony and despair being beamed live for everyone who cares to see the havoc that a war causes. On February 24, as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began, NATO activated its multinational response force for the first time in the military alliance’s 73-year history. “NATO is responding to this crisis with speed and unity,” said Jens Stoltenberg, secretary-general of the grouping. “We must reset our collective defence and deterrence for the longer term; today we tasked our military commanders to develop options across all domains,” he said later.
In an extraordinary meeting of NATO members, formal requests were made by officials of eight Eastern European and Baltic nations on February 24, including Poland, to invoke Article 4 of NATO’s 1949 treaty. Article 4 allows any member nation to call for a consultation of the organisation’s governing body when “the territorial integrity, political independence, or security of any of the parties is threatened”. It was invoked the last time in February 2020 by Turkey after Syrian government forces killed dozens of Turkish soldiers. Across the Atlantic, the US President said: “The United States will not send troops to Ukraine, which is not a member of NATO but defend every inch of NATO territory with the full force of American power.”
Later, Ukraine’s proposal to impose a no-fly zone to deter Russian air attacks and Poland’s offer of sending MIG fighters to Ukraine were summarily turned down, as these would constitute acts of war against Russia.
On the other side, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned the West in the first week of the invasion that “whoever tries to hinder us” in Ukraine would face consequences, “you have never seen in your history”. He also ordered Russia’s military on February 27 to put its deterrence forces, which include nuclear weapons, on “special alert”. He explained to his defence chiefs that this was because of “aggressive statements” by the West, amid widespread condemnation of his invasion of Ukraine.
Russia had annexed the Crimean peninsula in 2014 and has now launched a full offensive on Ukraine despite sanctions being in place and the threat of more punitive sanctions. Therefore, any escalation beyond this should have been at NATO’s initiative by configuring a more robust and bold response. Perhaps NATO wanted to avoid a direct confrontation with Russia, which led to self-imposed restraint and a sort of mental paralysis of its military commanders. NATO lost the mind game by overestimating the Russian reaction to its response. On the other hand, Russia always underestimates the West’s willingness to take risks and raises the threshold. In this case, Russia would not have taken any precipitate, overwhelming or irrational actions. This meek surrender during a grave contingency is likely to have long-term detrimental ramifications for NATO’s credibility, deterrence and collective European defence.
While Ukraine is not a formal member and NATO is not obligated to defend its territorial integrity, four of its members — Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania — share borders with Ukraine. The precautionary deployment of NATO forces to its Eastern borders should have been more dissuasive after 2014, irrespective of economic considerations. In the present scenario, NATO should have arrayed viable force levels along its borders for deterrence and posed a “threat in being” to restrict Russia’s freedom of action – which it currently enjoys and can, therefore, conduct operations with impunity.
Before undertaking this deployment of forces, NATO should have invoked Article 5, which outlines a common pledge from all NATO countries that they will come to one another’s defence if one of them is attacked. It has been invoked only once — in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States.
NATO should have also provided more useful weapons and equipment to Ukraine, which would have helped to fortify the staying power of the resistance forces. These should have included man-portable surface-to-air missiles, anti-tank weapons, weaponised UAVs, lasers and jamming equipment, among others.
Moreover, policy decisions like sending troops to Ukraine, the imposition of a no-fly zone and the provision of fighter aircraft should not have been debated under the media glare. This conveyed an impression of fear and inaction to avoid provocation and escalation. The lack of a well-thought-out plan for political and strategic messaging by NATO emboldened the other side to disregard its threats and actions as hollow and symbolic.
To mitigate the deprivations faced by civilians caught in combat, NATO could have undertaken humanitarian missions by sea and air to demonstrate its will and uphold the values that the West propagates. Such missions need to be supported by a narrative of justice. There are many more options for demonstrative action that can be executed to show intent, commitment and resolve. No doubt this will heighten risk but calculated risks need to be taken to retain the initiative and overcome passivity and inaction.
In the future, NATO will need to have a declared deterrence policy with identifiable red lines to act as trigger points for a credible response. Rhetoric and symbolic responses seem hollow and do not dissuade. However, credibility does not require a response to be particularly painful. To execute such a range of options, NATO countries will have to enhance their defence budgets and the combat capabilities of their militaries, which have been neglected for decades based on erroneous threat perceptions indicating a low probability of war.
This column first appeared in the print edition on March 30, 2022 under the title ‘A Ukraine lessor for NATO’. The writer is a former vice-chief of the Indian Army staff and Southern Army Commander
Chinese foreign minister and state councillor Wang Yi’s visit to India on March 24-25, the first by a senior Chinese official since the military standoff in eastern Ladakh in 2020, was low-key and shorn of expectations. Arranged at short notice as part of Wang’s tour of Pakistan, Afghanistan and Nepal, his touchdown in New Delhi appeared to be an add-on to the itinerary. Contrary to the media hype, this was not the first time that he was meeting his Indian counterpart, S Jaishankar, since the bloody incident at Galwan in June 2020. Nor was it a “resumption of dialogue”. Unlike the aftermath of the India-China border war in 1962 and the shorter hiatus after India’s nuclear tests in 1998, dialogue between India and China has continued at multiple levels despite the standoff along the Line of Actual Control (LAC). Before Wang Yi’s visit, the two foreign ministers met thrice in person, once in Moscow in 2020 and twice in Dushanbe in 2021, apart from engaging in virtual conversations.
That the Chinese side should have proposed a visit by Wang to India as part of his tour of South Asia is unsurprising, given that it is standard practice for visits by Chinese leaders to cover several countries. Wang Yi’s participation as “guest” at the 48th Session of the OIC Council of Foreign Ministers (CFM) hosted by Islamabad on March 22-23 is the first such attendance by any Chinese foreign minister. The tour served several objectives for China.
First, it was an effort to convey to the world that China is a big power assuming a leadership role in engaging the region to develop consensus on important issues such as Afghanistan and Ukraine. Second, it was aimed at ensuring the success of the in-person BRICS summit later this year. Third, Beijing intended to consolidate the impression that China and India have a shared interest in ensuring that Russia is not isolated, and further, to suggest that there is a rift between the US and India over Ukraine.
Fourth, by becoming the first P-5 country to send a foreign minister to visit Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover, China sought to convey to the international community that it is a “responsible” power in contrast to the US, which withdrew from Afghanistan and has since subordinated Asian security to its priorities in Europe, thus making it an unreliable partner. Fifth, Wang’s participation at the OIC CFM meeting signalled China’s desire to be seen as a strong and sympathetic backer of the Islamic world, making common cause against stereotyping by the West.
A stand-alone visit by Wang to India, in any case, would have been difficult to set up in the absence of a clearly agreed-upon agenda, adequate preparation and demonstrable outcomes from India’s point of view, especially on the core issue of disengagement in the border areas.
Wang’s visit ought to have provided a healing touch and a chance to rebuild trust. It did little to thaw the deep freeze in bilateral ties. By all accounts, he stuck to the boilerplate formulation that “the border issue should be put in its proper place in bilateral ties”, a euphemism for demanding India’s acquiescence in China’s unilateralism without linkage to other fields, including trade, which continues to lean disproportionately in China’s favour. His Indian interlocutors no doubt hammered home the point that peace is a prerequisite for normal ties.
There exists a wide chasm in positions on bilateral issues and on strategic themes such as the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), the Indo-Pacific and the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue. As it is, the multilateral space for cooperation between India and China has shrunk in recent years with Beijing gratuitously interfering in India’s internal affairs and attempting to rake up the Kashmir issue at the UN Security Council. By making an insensitive reference to Kashmir at the OIC CFM meeting in Pakistan, and playing to the gallery there, Wang precluded any chance of forward movement.
For China, itself in occupation of Kashmir’s territory in Aksai Chin and the Shaksgam valley, such machinations are perhaps a means to divert attention away from the treatment of its own Islamic and other minorities. In Xinjiang, there is little evidence on the ground of the respect for the “Islamic civilisation” and “Islamic wisdom” that Wang Yi alluded to while in Pakistan.
Given the ongoing crisis in Ukraine, China is keen to signal to countries in the region that the idea of the Indo-Pacific is a red line for China, akin to NATO expansion for Russia. It has not gone unnoticed in Beijing that Nepal’s parliament recently approved a $ 500 million US government aid programme under the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), which provides an alternative to infrastructure and developmental finance under the BRI.
Recently, Chinese scholars have encouragingly referred to India’s “strategic autonomy” as a key factor in New Delhi successfully resisting US pressure to toe the line on Ukraine. Such guile is unlikely to alter New Delhi’s appreciation of the hard reality of adverse Chinese policies, its expanding strategic and military ties with Pakistan and its growing shadow in South Asia and the Indian Ocean region. The lack of agreement on disengagement at the remaining friction points in the border areas may make it difficult for visits at the apex level to resume.
There is much greater international appreciation today of India’s principled position on the war in Ukraine than there is of China’s strategic ties to Russia. The global situation is complex. The security imbroglio in Europe is likely to endure. At this juncture, one wonders if there is any merit in India participating in either the in-person BRICS summit or the 19th Meeting of Foreign Ministers of the RIC (Russia-India-China) grouping to be hosted by China later this year.
This column first appeared in the print edition on March 30, 2022 under the title ‘Not far enough’. The writer, a former diplomat, is a China specialist currently serving as the Director-General of the Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses. Views are personal
“What has the year been like for you?” That was my opening question for most of the families and young children I met online during the pandemic in my work as a paediatrician. I was prepared for stories of loss. Many of my patients’ families had lost jobs and near and dear ones. Peace of mind, the blissful, invincible feeling only a teenager can have — they lost that too. But I started to notice something else. Some of the children looked happier. They smiled more and shared more with me. I asked my Class VIII patient, “How come you look so much more relaxed than before?” She told me what a relief it was that in online classes, there were no classmates to notice she hadn’t completed her assignments or that she needed extra help from the teacher. I wasn’t prepared for Arjun, one of my patients on the autism spectrum, to say: “This was the best year of my life!”
One “not-so-verbal” young man started a blog to share his stories — ranging from miscommunication and not being understood to bullying and exclusion. I talked to my patient-turned-friend Aditya, a 20-year-old autistic engineering student. Paradoxically, he got better at social skills once he stopped going to college in person. “I finally had time to rest and grow as a person, without the stress of having to ‘practice’ social skills,” he explained. Aditya loved his classes and wanted to learn but couldn’t until college went online. “I could finally learn without the anxiety of having to talk to and talk like other people,” he said.
What must it be like for children who wake up dreading another day in school, knowing that yet again they won’t complete their classwork or be picked for the football team? They watch the class bully tormenting some kid and hold their breath, praying that the bell will ring before it’s their turn. Courage is just another name for having no choice.
But the pandemic was a reprieve. No kids, no teachers, no deadlines, no noise. Days of bliss when the whole family is at home. Endless possibilities unfold — a blog to share your writing, a 3-D printer to make the coolest spinning tops, birdwatching with your sister. None of this was “in the syllabus”.
My own school experience was different. I literally couldn’t wait to get there each day — I knew I was good at it. But even then, I knew it wasn’t the same for everyone. My sister was shy and didn’t excel academically. She dreaded report card day and the disappointment on my father’s face when he saw her results. But once she left school, freed from an environment that stifled her growth, she discovered her strengths and came into her own.
The pandemic gave some of my patients a “get out of jail free” card. We did some research on its impact on children — we thought we would find evidence that the pandemic was harder on kids with disabilities than on those without. It’s not clear from the results that it was.
But what is evident is that for children with disabilities, the opportunities to participate in life — play, be outdoors, have fun with friends — were fewer to begin with. Unsurprisingly, even before the pandemic, kids with disabilities, most of whom then attended school, were more likely to be anxious and sad. School is where the anxiety monster lives. No wonder, then, that for some kids, the pandemic made life better by keeping them out of school.
The real question our research raises is this: What is the point of trying to understand pandemic-imposed isolation if we just go back to where we were when schools reopen? There has been much written about the need to help children recover the “learning loss” they experienced.
For children with disabilities, we need not only to help them recover from the loss but also sustain the gain of freedom from fear. If not going to school has given them their first taste of learning in a safe and happy place, then the adults in their lives — parents and education professionals — have to commit to making schools safe and happy now that they are heading back.
This column first appeared in the print edition on March 30, 2022 under the title ‘For whom crisis was reprieve’. The writer, a developmental paediatrician in Mumbai, is founder of the NGO Ummeed
Flabbergasted. There is no other word for how I felt reading a recent interview with the Minister of State for Electronics and Information Technology, Rajeev Chandrasekhar. The honourable minister objected to the silencing of Russian state media by Big Tech, bemoaning the “weaponisation” of digital platforms. Apparently, he has no objections to the weaponisation taking place in the form of thermobaric rockets raining down on innocent Ukrainians, while the Russian state media rains down lies upon its people. It is bad enough that India must equivocate and look away from Vladimir Putin’s murderous assault on Ukraine; we have all heard the reasons — arms supplies, hydrocarbons and Raj Kapoor — that bind Russia and India. Surely, this isn’t the most appropriate of times to point to the economic and digital sanctions on Russia and use this global crisis to tout a pet project of “atmanirbhar” or sovereign internet for India, as Chandrashekhar is doing.
The minister may want to do his homework on the content peddled on Russia’s version of the sovereign internet to appreciate the farce that it can rapidly become. Putin has used his propaganda engine to create a fantasy about what is going on next door. The Kremlin-controlled media have orchestrated a narrative about genocide against the Russian-speaking population in Ukraine and reports of Russian soldiers being welcomed as liberators by grateful Ukrainians. No images of the ruins of Mariupol or of millions of refugees are shared with Russian viewers. Terms such as “war” or “invasion,” are criminalised. Independent media have been taken off the air along with Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
How far does the minister propose India ought to go to stand up for its sovereign internet? Will it be just about establishing regulations governing data localisation, building cyber security defences along with data protection and governance or does he have plans to orchestrate a parallel internet along the lines of China, North Korea and, now, Russia and other digital outcasts? He is reported to have also expressed great confidence in India’s ability to carry on if it were ever cut off from other key networks — such as the SWIFT service used to execute international banking transactions — if, as he says, India ever found itself in a position similar to Russia. There seems to be something profoundly wrong in making contingency plans in case today’s India becomes tomorrow’s Russia.
Already, there are too many worrying parallels between Russia’s and India’s attempts to shake free of the US Big Tech’s hegemony. This is ironic given that the granddaddy of hegemons, Google, was co-founded by a Moscow-born and is presently led by a Madurai-born. In February of this year, as the invasion of Ukraine commenced, Russian authorities issued warnings to Google and other major platforms to comply with a so-called “landing law” requiring each to set up legal entities in Russia with employees in-country. These employees would be subject to fines and arrest if they did not comply with the government’s orders to take down any content the government deemed unworthy of public consumption.
Now, where might we have seen this landing law playbook used before? India, of course, where a similar mandate had been put in place in February 2021, requiring the major platforms to have several officials in India to address the government’s complaints: A chief compliance officer, a nodal contact person and a resident grievance officer, along with an office with an Indian address. Platforms were given three months to comply and the chief compliance officer would be criminally liable for content on the platform.
Besides the shared fondness for enforcing local office addresses, Russia and India also seem to have in common a predilection for singling out one of the major platforms for special treatment: Twitter. Even before it — along with several other platforms — was banned altogether this month, the Russian government had started slowing access to Twitter about a year before. The excuse? The Russian regulator, Roskomnadzor, had accused Twitter of failing to remove content relating to illegal drug use, child pornography and encouraging teen suicide.
Likewise, in India, Twitter felt the heat of the state’s attention last year. In May 2021, its offices in New Delhi were raided by a police squad normally focused on investigating terrorism and organised crime. No doubt, posts about the farmers’ protests had something to do with the visit by the police. The government had demanded the blocking of 500 accounts, including those of journalists, activists, opposition leaders and of JazzyB, a rapper. Twitter did so, and then eventually reversed course only to be slapped with a non-compliance notice.
My guess is that Twitter makes for an ideal target in both countries. It is not that widely used, so blocking it or slowing it down does not necessarily provoke public outrage. It is used by the elite, precisely the kind of annoying people the government would prefer to silence. It is a prominent platform, so any action taken on Twitter sends a signal to the other digital platforms to fall in line or else.
It is time for India’s path to diverge from that of Russia’s. As things stand, India must walk a tightrope: Not condemning Russia while not condoning its atrocities; acknowledging the agony of Ukraine, while averting its eyes from the unfolding disaster; remaining a bystander to history or risking being trapped — as White House spokesperson Jen Psaki put it — on the wrong side of history. It is inspiring to see — if one’s version of the internet permits it — ordinary Ukrainians picking up arms for the first time in their lives to defend their cities, to protect what is left of their lives and livelihoods and to keep an open internet running in their country.
This is one chance that Chandrashekhar and other senior government officials in India have to be unequivocal about three principles:
First, democracies must stand by the idea that media that spreads disinformation in order to keep an unjustified war going must be curbed.
Second, “Atmanirbhar Internet” is an oxymoron; the internet, by definition, is a globally connected digital common. Knowledge relies on the freedom of expression and the freedom to draw upon others.
Third, if India must really push for self-reliance, it might be better off making plans to break free of its disproportionate reliance on Russian weapons and hydrocarbons. It might also help India freely express what it feels for Ukraine and its people, and equivocate less about how it feels about Russia.
This column first appeared in the print edition on March 30, 2022 under the title ‘Atmanirbhar internet’. The writer is Dean of Global Business at The Fletcher School at Tufts University
The Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill authorising the collection, storage and analysis of biological samples, biometrics and physical measurements of convicts, arrested persons and those in preventive detention is let down by bad drafting. The Identification of Prisoners Act, 1920, which the Bill seeks to replace restricts itself to finger/foot prints of arrested persons and their storage only for convicted persons, needed an upgrade. Agencies like FBI have moved on to advanced biometrics. And such data certainly has crime-fighting uses.
But this positive intent is defeated by the Bill’s provisions. Take the carte blanche to police officers in sample collection. While those arrested for offences carrying less than seven years imprisonment or not facing sexual crimes against women or children can refuse to give samples, actual policing in India rarely gives such leeway to ordinary citizens to withhold their consent. With computing power no longer a finite phenomenon, data collection eased by handheld devices, and all state governments competing to build multidimensional databases, there may be no holding back the thana cop. A better legislative design would have inverted the process to mandate police officers to secure a magistrate’s order to collect samples.
Lumping those in preventive detention, who are essentially held on apprehension of breach of public order even before committing any act of criminality, with convicts and those arrested for major offences, has rightly irked opposition parliamentarians. Centre mustn’t see this as the usual pushback against anything it proposes; India has a long history of state governments using police departments to hound opponents. The Bill has simply not provided enough checks and balances to prevent abuse of its provisions by police to harass or implicate innocent persons. Also, it neither dwells on unauthorised access to stored data through hacking, nor on misuse of data by the police.
Even dubious techniques like narco-analysis, which the Supreme Court ruled inadmissible as evidence, or prone-to-abuse facial recognition can become commonplace. The Bill’s definition of “measurements” surpasses biometrics and biological data to offer a wide berth for “any other examination referred to in Section 53 and 53A of Criminal Procedure Code”. These two CrPC sections are, in turn, loosely worded to allow for “such other tests which a registered medical practitioner thinks necessary”.
Finally, while the Bill’s bet on big data to increase conviction rate is understandable, there’s no government action on bolstering fundamentals like more forensic facilities. In 2019, only 27% of India’s cops reported always having access to forensic technology at thanas. And courts across India bemoan delays caused by too few forensic science labs.
With CODA winning this year’s Best Picture Oscar, the Hollywood establishment’s battle to keep small screen films out of the big screen league was decisively lost. The closest runner-up was also from a streaming platform. Both CODA and The Power of the Dog did have a theatrical release, but very limited. While powerful studio executives and filmmakers like Steven Spielberg have ensured that the Oscar requirement of a theatrical release persists, streaming platforms have creatively found a hybrid route around it. This is indicative of the larger creative revolution spurred by them.
The pandemic’s lockdowns drove new audiences to small screens, looking for entertainment, passing time and even maintaining sanity. Will this relationship stay strong even as we return to theatres? In India the OTT explosion of diverse content has revealed a richness of supply and demand, which once seen cannot be unseen. Having grown to over 40 platform providers from two in a decade, this entire ecosystem is exuding irrepressible energy, enthusiasm and confidence. Actors to writers, directors to cinematographers, more work and more experimentation are new normals. You name a genre, there is a show or many in it. And this booming local content has a global audience. Delhi Crime tasted Emmy success. Hoping for a Squid Game-like global hit from India is no pipedream.
Studio or production house backed theatrical releases face more market uncertainty in terms of recouping costs or making profits – that often constrains experimentation. Streaming platforms can take more creative risks because their business models allow them to spread bets widely. An estimated 47% of OTT originals in India were in Hindi in 2021, and the rest were in other vernaculars and in English. It’s good that cinema theatres are open. But expect many more CODAs to good movies on streaming platforms.
The renewed emphasis on regional cooperation at the 5th Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (Bimstec) meet is timely. This is not only because of the recent developments in Europe and questions it has raised about the stability of the world order, but also in the context of the turmoil underway in this year's chair Sri Lanka as well as the political chaos in neighbouring Pakistan. India's leadership is critical.
The importance of regional cooperation and support is something that Sri Lanka is well aware of. India has stepped in to help the country tide over its current economic hardships. As the leading economy of the region, India has taken the lead. New Delhi will be providing $1 million in aid to augment the Bimstec secretariat.
The grouping has been a work in progress since 1997. The adoption of a charter on Wednesday, giving the group a formally stated purpose, principles and architecture is a major step in ensuring a strong network that will work to improve the resilience and economies of the region. The signing of three legal instruments - mutual legal assistance in criminal matters, mutual cooperation between diplomatic academies, and establishment of Bimstec technology transfer facility in Colombo - give concrete basis to the direction the member states intend to travel. The idea is to enhance trade, investment, tourism, technology and energy in the Bay of Bengal region. Improving resilience to combat poverty, climate change, natural disasters and pandemics is another important plank. A robust Bimstec is also critical to ensuring a free and open Indo-Pacific region - to providing an alternative to efforts being made by a belligerent China in the immediate neighbourhood and beyond.
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The headline macroeconomic number in 2021-22 is gross domestic product - GDP. This is estimated to grow by 8.9% in a sharp turnaround from the 6.6% decline of the prior year induced by countrywide lockdowns during the first wave of the coronavirus pandemic. Retail inflation at the end of a fiscal year marked by global demand revival and energy supply disruptions is higher than the 6% upper threshold of the Reserve Bank of India's policy band, but not inordinately so from the 5.5% of March 2021. Investment demand, pushed by the government, has recovered its pre-pandemic level and merchandise exports have overshot.
The fiscal deficit has been cut back from 9.2% in 2020-21 to 6.9% in 2021-22 as welfare spending needs eased and tax revenue exceeded estimates due to the economic recovery. The current account deficit swung from a surplus and is expected to close the year at around 1.6% of GDP on spiking crude oil prices. Interest rates have remained flat over the year, although bond yields are beginning to edge up as central bankers begin drawing down liquidity. India has had a relatively soft landing from crisis mode in fiscal and monetary policy over the course of 2021-22.
India's crisis management has been on a par with other large economies. But its reforms record suffered over the year. Financial sector privatisation has slowed down, even though the country has whittled down its bad loans. Disinvestment ambitions have been tempered by market dynamics. Yet, the government managed to get Air India off its hands and is poised to list Life Insurance Corporation (LIC). Market reforms were held hostage by a small section of farmers and had to be dialled back. The focus on building transport infrastructure may deliver jobs, but not on a scale to arrest falling labour participation rates. Consumption is languishing because of loss of income, and tapering welfare could extend the hardship. India is entering a new fiscal year that holds out the possibility of an oil shock, disruptions from the tail-end of the pandemic and capital flight.
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Quick commerce is in the news for the venture capital pouring into a business spawned during the pandemic in which delivery of goods, typically groceries, is accomplished within minutes of an online order being placed. It is also drawing regulatory attention over the safety of delivery partners.
Reliance Retail is the latest to begin trials of instant grocery delivery that has been tested to varying degrees by BigBasket, Blinkit, Instamart, Flipkart and Zepto. In play is interest by the Tatas, Zomato, Swiggy, Ola and Walmart. A cumulative war chest of over $1 billion has reportedly been readied for what could, by some estimates, be a $5 billion opportunity in three years.
At this point, quick commerce is cash burn. The path to profit needs to go beyond funding, implementation and the selling proposition. Margins are low and analytics holds the key to a rising assortment of higher-value products. Hyperlocal dark stores need data-driven solutions to control inventory management costs, which now eat away almost all the profit on a basket order.
The value perception limits the scope of charging delivery fees. But premium services for, say, peak time orders could eventually become a revenue stream. The service offering has to be differentiated for a shifting client base and app ergonomics, and personalised promotions need to keep pushing convenience shopping. Warehousing efficiencies can be improved through tie-ups with kirana stores.
Most players moving in laterally are relying on either their client acquisition funnel or their developed supply chains. Quick commerce for now remains a niche segment in select high-density metropolitan pockets, thereby limiting its potential. And somebody has to find a way to make profits in this game.
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The invention of the office - from the Latin opus (work) + facere (do) = officium (performance of work) - was necessitated by the inability of work to be done remotely. Until very recently, the prevalent technology was simply not available or very limited to allow work away from office.
If you had to conduct stocktaking, copy documents or engage in a brainstorming session, one had to be physically close to the tools of work and co-workers. Even as the technology was becoming increasingly available, it was the forced disruption of a pandemic that finally showed that office, like the stock exchange trading floor, as a shared physical-only space was no longer essential to carry out work. Today, as Covid restrictions thankfully recede, the push that had become the shove of working from home (WFH) is becoming a nudge for working from anywhere (WFA).
Neither can all work be conducted WFA nor do all workers prefer remote working. Several reasons for the primacy of the 'face-to-face' work model are trotted out - 'water-cooler' engagements; ideas flying 'better' at corporeally attended meeting; company values welded only under 'one roof, one team' norms.
But studies, including pre-pandemic ones conducted by the likes of Harvard Business School's Prithwiraj Choudhury, have shown that WFA is a 'win-win for workers, companies and for society'. WFA slashes time and energy expended in commutes; allows workers the of their work surroundings that may actually improve their quantitative and qualitative output; provides less crowded space for those who choose office as their comfort work zone. Most importantly, for companies, it allows HFA - hiring from anywhere, thereby breaking the talent pool distance barrier.
The new hybrid work culture is still a work-in-progress. Floor managers will have to be trained to manage a different kind of floor. Company values will need to flourish in a digital-deeper environment. The idea of work-life balance itself has to be rejigged. But the bottomline is work optimisation. For which WFA, without the stress of a pandemic around, makes a damn good pitch.
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The ways in which investigative agencies identify criminals and suspects have drastically changed over the course of the 21st century. With technological advances — including biometric identification, footprint impressions, photographs, physical and biological samples and fingerprint analysis — agencies are vying for effective, reliable and accurate ways to ascertain a person’s identity to evolve a new, modern crime-control model. The Union government, this week, introduced in Parliament a new draft legislation — the Criminal Procedure (Identification) Bill 2022 — which allows law enforcement authorities to collect, store and analyse details, including biometrics, of all convicts and detained persons. The Union minister of state for home affairs, Ajay Mishra, said the new law was needed to make way for modern techniques to capture and record appropriate body measurements, pointing out that the existing law (which the new bill is to repeal and replace) dates back to 1920 and allowed only fingerprint and footprint impressions of a limited category of convicted persons. Mr Mishra said the new bill would make the identification of accused persons easier, which, in turn, will increase prosecution and conviction rates in courts.
The Centre’s move, however, met with serious concern from the Opposition and civil society over possible contraventions of constitutional rights, chiefly the right to privacy and the right against self-incrimination. Amid a growing awareness for personal privacy and data protection, an argument can be made that the proposed law, which obligates not only convicts but also those detained under preventive laws or suspected of committing an offence to give body measurements, would infringe the right of bodily autonomy as well as the right to be forgotten as a facet of privacy rights. Another crucial concern relates to the compliance of the bill with Article 20(3) of the Constitution, which explicitly states that no person accused of any offence shall be compelled to be a witness against himself. It has been contended that the bill, therefore, goes beyond the House’s legislative competence and must be struck down. The provision that implies the use of force to take measurements violates the rights of the prisoners laid down in a body of Supreme Court judgments.
The question thus arises if the new crime-control model envisaged by the Centre satisfies the due- process model mandated by the Constitution. In its present form, the bill throws up some crucial questions of compliance with the constitutional rights of convicts and accused and those who may be political protesters with genuine demands.
Adolescents feel worse about their lives the more they use social media, a study published in Nature Communications earlier this week found. The effect is particularly pronounced in girls between 11 and 13, and boys between 14 and 15– at these ages, the more they go online on services such as Instagram and TikTok, the worse they feel about themselves the following year. These are ages when social development and self-perceptions are shaped. There is already evidence that toxic social media exposure leads to depression, anxiety and low self-esteem in children. Last year, a whistleblower who worked at Facebook released documents that showed the company found its popular image sharing service Instagram made body image issues worse for “one in three girls”. Among teens who reported suicidal thoughts, 13% of British users and 6% of American users traced it to Instagram, one document from Facebook’s (now Meta) own research showed.
In tandem with the rise in smartphone and internet penetration in recent years has been an increase in reports of teenagers struggling with issues of mental health, and of authorities attempting to address these. China famously passed an order allowing under-18s to play video games only three hours a week during stipulated hours of the weekend. In the US, the surgeon general called for research on the relationship between technology and youth mental health. Worryingly for a country like India, these conversations are rare in the Global South and scientific evidence of how these factors affect children even more scant. These are problems that need the intervention of all sections of society: Academia, parents, teachers and, crucially, technology companies that sit on tremendous amounts of population scale data. Understanding the true extent and the mechanics of the problem has to be the first step before we can begin to help our young.
The system is rigged. It always has been.
The system that allows powerful men to run the world, with little to no consequences for their actions; where toxic masculinity rears its ugly head at every turn, but onward they go, with little care about the mess they leave behind.
Three days ago, at the 2022 Academy Awards, the world watched — on repeat — one of Hollywood's biggest stars, Will Smith, assault a much less famous Chris Rock on stage when he joked about Smith's wife, actor Jada Pinkett Smith.
As the video made its rounds, memes were sketched, .gifs were made, comparisons were drawn, (more) jokes were cracked, and with every post that recreated the moment to find humour in it, the less of an issue it seemed to become on the internet.
Hot-takes were flung around faster than folks could think them through, sometimes conflating one issue with another. And while the world stepped aside from their regular lives to analyse Smith slapping a fellow artiste, what was lost among the most popular posts that my algorithm lets me see was the incident itself — of a man who assaulted another man on live television.
You may say I'm triggered; that I'm hopping onto the bandwagon of social media specialists who dissect the lives of these celebrities to determine which is worse — a Black man's benign joke about a Black woman's bald head (caused by an autoimmune disease) or that, in hitting a man, Smith "was defending his wife" (a reaction so deeply immersed in toxic masculinity, embedded in our patriarchies, that I simply cannot defend it). But I am not. I do not wish to tread there.
Instead, I want to talk about a powerful man (with a net worth of $350 million), who walked onto a live telecast of an international phenomenon, to hit another man because he didn't like the joke he cracked. I want to talk about violence as a primitive, and yet, typical assertion of power in a civilised society.
What soon followed only worsened the situation: The standing ovation that Smith received, when he won the award for best actor in a lead role as Richard Williams in King Richard. The crowd — full of revered actors whom many of us admire, even idolise — raised their glasses to Smith, and the show went on as planned.
Now, if you've watched the downfall of the Oscars as I have — infamous for goof ups, undeserving winners, a gross lack of representation — you wouldn't have been too surprised that another blunder hit the show. But from issues of inclusion to outright violence, the Academy's downfall comes from its silent complicity.
This is Hollywood in all its (ugly) glory. We must remember, it did not matter with Harvey Weinstein who once ran Hollywood and has been involved in 81 Oscar wins.
It did not matter with Gary Oldman.
Or Woody Allen.
Or Casey Affleck.
Or Marlon Brando.
Or Jack Nicholson.
Or Morgan Freeman.
Or Sean Penn.
Or Kevin Spacey.
Or Richard Dreyfuss.
Or John Wayne.
And I've only named some of the Oscar-winning and nominated actors who have violent pasts (and presents) — of physical, sexual, verbal, and emotional assault of varying degrees. And so, one of the biggest industries in the world has got us thinking that violence may actually be an acceptable expression of (toxic) manhood.
This is not to say that these men do not deserve a second chance after they chose to assault people. Retributive punishment is never the answer. What terrifies me most about the Smith incident is how quick we are to defend it or move past violence (much like we have done in the past), which only perpetuates it. (Note here that Will Smith's following on Instagram grew by almost two million followers in under 48 hours after the incident.)
As a young girl growing up at the turn of the millennium, apart from watching movies that continually changed my perspectives, shaped my personality, and moulded me in strange ways, Hollywood was also my lens into a world of people who were well within reach of a 70mm screen but inaccessible from where I stood. I always knew their power makes them unreachable, but I always wondered: Does that make them unquestionable?
We have continued, for years now, to watch our heroes rise to glorious heights on screen, and fall from grace off-screen, and yet, we keep watching. We choose, when it's convenient (for us and them), to separate art from the artist: Will Smith isn't the "Fresh Prince of Bel-Air". He isn't Dr Robert Neville who will invent the vaccine that wins the war against nocturnal beasts (I Am Legend). He isn't Chris Gardner who struggles with his young son to battle homelessness while he tries to sell his invention to big corporations (The Pursuit of Happyness). He is an actor, paid millions of dollars — whose power and fame we have contributed to — who hit a man three days ago.
So, what's stopping us from calling them out for wrongful behaviour? Why don't we condemn their acts of violence? Are the pedestals we built for them now too high for us to reach? Or have we become a people who feed off of them, making acceptable, not just their unbelievable exclusivity, but also the impunity that comes with it?
The system is rigged. It always has been. But we are the system. The fans, the fraternity, the filmmakers, and the film viewers. We have rigged this system, so that men walk around scot-free, promoting and monetising their brands and lifestyles for all of us to consume. We are hooked on keeping up with their lives. And then we justify their violence because our idols — both the Will Smiths, and the auditorium of spectators and applauders — have told us to. If Will Smith so swiftly and calculatedly slapped Chris Rock without a moment's hesitation, I can't help but wonder if he's done it before. Violence, the most extreme expression of power, doesn't stem from nothing.
Will Smith hit Chris Rock, went back to his seat, swore at him, and then minutes later, won an award for which the whole auditorium gave him a standing ovation. And in watching that, I was reminded of every single time a man has gotten away with violence simply because of the power that he holds.
I thought of MeToo.
I thought of domestic violence survivors.
I thought of young children whose fathers hit them.
I thought of violent boyfriends.
I thought of the bullies in my school.
And then I went full circle, because I finally thought of Ronan Farrow's unputdownable book, Catch and Kill, on Weinstein. And I couldn't help but realise that many of the actors who gave Smith a standing ovation minutes after he assaulted someone, applauded Weinstein until the very end of his career. Completely different degrees of violence, and yet, what unites them is their immunity (which finally ended when Weinstein was arrested).
I'd like to believe that someday, we as a people will rise to a crescendo, when it will be all too much — when too much power has been wielded, too much violence has been inflicted, and when too much toxic masculinity has been displayed.
Today, however, is not that day.
marika.gabriel@htdigital.in
The views expressed are personal
Even the British government thought of taking another look at their Police Act, 1861, after 40 years. The Frazer Commission of 1902 devoted an entire chapter on corruption, efficiency, popular opinion, oppressive conduct of the police and reforms in its 205-page report. A century and quarter later, Prime Minister (PM) Narendra Modi raised the same issues: Calling for advanced training, attitudinal changes, induction of technology, and imbibing new skills. The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Home Affairs has also come out with its report on police training, modernisation and reforms.
But the question neither the PM nor the House committee addressed is why earlier recommendations by a plethora of committees on police reforms have not been implemented. What are the impediments, and how can they be removed? This exercise, perhaps, would have been more meaningful since the proposals for reforms refer to the same issues.
Just after Independence, while the Constitution was being written and instruments of democracy being strengthened, police reforms remained low on the priority list. This, despite the bloodbath witnessed during the Partition and the need to put law and order and crime control on a sound footing. Great confidence, surprisingly, was displayed in the old rent-seeking system run by thanedars and tehsildars, instead of revising the Police Act, 1861, and devising afresh a police regime for free India.
The biggest impediment to reform is that police is a state subject, and chief ministers (CMs) are not inclined or under any pressure to effect significant changes in the system. Police valour or atrocity is a peripheral matter during elections. CMs are more concerned about transfers of police officers and perturbed over complaints against the police reaching state capitals. Other politicians ensure that their trusted officers are posted as superintendents of police (SPs), deputy superintendents of police (DSPs), and station house officers in their areas. The threat of transfer to a police officer impedes his unbiased judgment of a situation and consequent (in)action. Thus, any case with even a remote connection with the powers that be impacts investigations adversely, and also the image of the police.
Recognising the deep malady, and to ensure a degree of autonomy, Supreme Court-directed reforms in 2006, laid down rules for police transfers. But this is being circumvented by the state authorities. Even transfers and postings of directors-general of police (DGP) are mired in politics. This remains an intractable issue with the constant tussle between laid down norms for transfers and political choices.
Strong and visionary police leadership, an enabling secretariat and political sagacity are three major ingredients for police reforms. But such harmony is rare. Over the years, from the Dharma Vira commission to the Ribeiro committee recommendations, none has been fully implemented.
In 2005, PM Manmohan Singh launched the National Police Mission. The mission subsumed seven micro missions with objectives of enhancing the skills and competence of police officers at the grassroots level. From attitudinal changes, modernisation to gender-based crimes, every aspect was covered. The ministry of home affairs (MHA), responsible for implementation, supervised it for three years and then handed it over to the Bureau of Police Research and Development (BPRD). The latter pursued it zealously, but the micro mission projects could never clear the MHA. Whether the mission collapsed due to the intransigence of bureaucrats or politics is a matter of inquiry.
A bulky, unwieldy secretariat, lacking the requisite expertise or enabling attitude, does no good to the police. Perhaps the most important deliberations on critical police issues occur in the annual DGP conference, culminating in recommendations. Unfortunately, these again await the ministry’s nod for years.
The present MHA lacks the professional skills and will too. The only answer is an internal security ministry carved out of the present one and helmed by a rank professional. The central police chiefs entrusted with the leadership of millions can undoubtedly be trusted with all the financial and other powers of supervision.
There are two aspects of police reforms. The first deals with autonomy, police structure, accountability, resourcefulness, lying within the realm of the political executive, and the second dealing with skills, competence, technology and attitudinal changes. It’s the second that lies squarely in the domain of police leadership.
The choice of police leaders has also left much to be desired. Many police chiefs have not given BPRD’s studies on internal reforms due attention due to a lack of professional skills or preoccupation with other matters. Police leaders must question the value added to the investigation and prosecution by various supervisory levels, and check who allows the use of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act or sedition cases in an indiscriminate manner. The present police regime, therefore, is characterised by individual acts of brilliance by committed Indian Police Service officers, while large swathes of the country witness an average to below par performance.
Police reforms languish because of the lack of political will, weak police leadership and an inefficient bureaucracy. Therefore, PM Modi would be well advised to do the following: First, take the lead by enacting the Model Police Act 2006, drafted by Soli Sorabjee, in Union Territories and at least in states ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), while making an appeal for other states to follow suit. Second, appoint a rank professional in the Prime Minister’s Office to oversee and ensure implementation of all the recommendations of various police commissions and DGP conferences. Police reforms must be another critical national mission to be accomplished before the next general elections in 2024.
Yashovardhan Azad is chairman, Deepstrat, a former Central Information Commissioner, and a retired IPS officer who has served as secretary, security, and special director, Intelligence Bureau
The views expressed are personal
Last week, Union home minister Amit Shah introduced a new bill in the Lok Sabha to unify the three municipal corporations of Delhi (MCDs). While the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) says that the bill was brought to rid the MCD of its perennial financial crisis, the contents of the bill and the circumstances in which it was drafted and tabled in Parliament, in a tearing hurry, is a cause of concern. They spell the death of democracy in Delhi’s local bodies.
First, let’s understand the scale of the financial crisis in MCD. The combined annual income of the three corporations from its revenue sources is ₹6,725 crore; whereas the total annual salary and pension bill is ₹8,940 crore — a difference of ₹2,200 crore. By its own account, the BJP has projected a financial gain from the unification of the MCDs at ₹200 crore a year — by largely reducing staff and establishment costs. But the numbers simply do not add up.
It was always evident that to improve their financial condition, MCDs need a top-to-bottom reform. While the Delhi government’s revenues have soared two-and-a-half times in the last seven years of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government, the incomes of MCD have either stayed static or decreased. Take the case of property tax — of the 1.2 million properties in North MCD, only 400,000 are under the tax net after 15 years of BJP rule. Revenue collections from hoardings and advertisements have declined steadily, inversely proportional to the number of hoardings displaying the BJP’s campaign slogans for free.
It is clear that the drama around presenting the new MCD bill in Parliament as a panacea is nothing but a grand lie. An attempt to cover the unchecked corruption and financial mismanagement of the MCD under 15 years of BJP rule that has left Delhi with the legacy of the tallest garbage mountains in India, the lowest scores in the Centre’s Swachh Bharat city rankings, and a reputation of perhaps being the most corrupt municipal body. The writing on the wall is clear — the people of Delhi are fed up and the BJP was staring at yet another AAP tsunami in MCD polls. The BJP’s subsequent steps take away any semblance of doubt that it is ready to launch a full-fledged assault on the idea of democracy to avoid an electoral wipe-out.
For the first time, the Union home ministry wrote to the State Election Commissioner one hour before the election schedule was to be announced, asking the body to postpone the elections indefinitely. For the first time, the Election Commissioner decided to “comply” with the direction unilaterally and without consulting opposition parties. For the first time, the central government rushed into drafting a bill to amend a local body Act, which constitutionally falls under the state legislature’s mandate, without any consultation with the state government. And for the first time, the central government has sought to replace all the functions of the state government in the revised MCD bill with the central government, leaving no role or participation of the state government in the smooth functioning of the municipal body.
If this bill is approved, the relationship of the Delhi government with MCD will be the same as that of the Tamil Nadu government — a constitutional travesty that only the BJP can conceive.
The MCD bill tabled by the Centre in the Lok Sabha makes no mention of any reform or road map for financial recovery. It was expected that the Centre would finally put the MCD on a par with all other municipal bodies in India, which get a direct grant from the Central Finance Commission of ₹488 per person per annum, which adds up to a significant ₹4,087 crore per year for MCD. But the BJP continued to deny the people of Delhi this right. So instead, the bill’s only substantive amendment is to reduce the number of wards from 272 to 250. There is no logic or explanation for this except that it forces MCD to undergo a delimitation process, pushing MCD elections by at least a year.
This series of undemocratic steps is nothing but a continuation of the Centre’s assault on the democratic mandate of the AAP government in Delhi. From forcibly taking away the anti-corruption bureau and services department in 2015 to stalling key schemes such as mohalla clinics, CCTVs and the doorstep delivery of ration scheme for years, and passing the blatantly unconstitutional Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi (Amendment) Bill, 2021, declaring the lieutenant-governor as the “government”, the BJP has left no stone unturned in the last seven years to stop the AAP government from exercising its democratic mandate.
It is in this light that the introduction of the MCD unification bill must be seen. For the first time since the Emergency, a party has made a brazen attempt to cancel elections and snatch powers from opposition governments to avoid an electoral defeat. The BJP is trying to get away with the murder of democracy in Delhi’s local bodies in broad daylight. The judiciary and the people of Delhi shouldn’t allow this.
Jasmine Shah is the vice-chairperson, Dialogue & Development Commission of Delhi
The views expressed are personal
There was a time when passionate vindication had to be written about women’s rights. While there has been significant progress since then, there are still several areas of concern. One of these is the lack of women in leadership roles in higher education in India.
Out of 54 central universities in India, only seven have women vice-chancellors. Not one of the 23 Indian Institutes of Technology has a woman director. And yet, it is not because there is a scarcity of women in higher education. According to the 2021 All India Survey of Higher Education, women hold 27.3% of professor and equivalent faculty positions, 36.8% of reader and associate professor faculty positions and 42.6% of lecturer and assistant professor faculty positions.
The increasing number of women at the entry-level is driving the change for better gender balance in senior positions in academia. While this will be a significant gain in teaching and research, it will not address the issue of scarcity of women in academic leadership. India’s new National Education Policy (NEP) “recognises the special and critical role that women play in society”, but giving women more opportunities in leadership roles in higher education requires a new mindset.
The lack of women in leadership roles is a global problem. For example, in the 130 elite research universities in the United States (US), only 22% of presidents are women. It was once said that women in higher education prefer teaching and research, not administrative and leadership responsibilities. But statistics again tell us a different story: 40% of deans and provosts in the US are women. But at the topmost level (president), it’s just 22%.
In India, women don’t reach leadership positions not because family responsibilities tend to hold them back, but due to a lack of opportunities. To reach a leadership position, mentorship through workshops and case studies is also required. Such mentorship modules must highlight that higher education leadership is not just a matter of administrative problem solving but also an opportunity to creatively shape future pathways. Once this creative potential is recognised, more talented women will be eager to take up the challenge. Moreover, for any leader to successfully lead an academic institution, it is essential to realise that all stakeholders — students, faculty, administrative staff, or its founding members — have a crucial role in the smooth running and betterment of the institution. Therefore, it is vital to strike the right balance so that all parties are represented for the smooth functioning of an academic institution.
Overall, while academia has seen a recognisable shift in its attitude towards women in leadership positions, two significant challenges need to be addressed. First, a policy and mechanism must be devised that consciously considers women for higher education leadership positions while judging their candidature on the grounds of qualifications, ability, and leadership potential alongside men being considered for such positions.
Second, it is essential to create an environment of understanding and respect for women leaders within the organisation. This would enable women in academic leadership positions to contribute to the institution. At the heart of it, the onus of bringing women into leadership positions falls on the institutions, governments and the larger society and their willingness to recognise the fact that in combination with passion, intellect and determination, women bring an inherent ability to balance multiple tasks which makes them fit to be leaders that the Indian academia needs.
Malabika Sarkar is vice-chancellor, Ashoka University
The views expressed are personal
To solve the climate crisis, the world will need to reduce the emission of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. This will require a rethink in all aspects of life because carbon is the backbone of the global economy.
Last year, Larry Fink, the CEO and chairman of BlackRock, the world’s largest asset management company, predicted that addressing the climate crisis would become the next big business opportunity. “It is my belief that the next 1,000 unicorns — companies that have a market valuation over a billion dollars — won’t be a search engine, won’t be a media company, they’ll be businesses developing green hydrogen, green agriculture, green steel and green cement,” said Fink.
It is cheaper to not add carbon dioxide to the atmosphere than to pull it out, and mitigation will remain essential to any plan to decarbonise the world. The sooner we can decarbonise the economy by shifting to renewable energy, the better. However, since the Industrial Revolution, we have already added a lot of carbon dioxide to the environment. The fact is there’s no one-sized solution or a switch to flip to immediately transition the world: We will need multiple technologies deployed rapidly at scale to address the greatest challenge that we have ever faced.
One of these ideas is carbon capture in which carbon dioxide released from the burning of fossil fuels is stopped from escaping from smokestacks into the atmosphere. In contrast to this kind of carbon capture at an industrial point source is direct air capture which is essentially pulling carbon dioxide out from the air. Capturing carbon dioxide is only half the battle since it needs to be concentrated and put to some industrial use or geologically stored somewhere where it can’t escape back into the atmosphere.
Trees are an excellent store of carbon and planting them is an easy thing to do. However, maintaining trees requires care and manpower, and the carbon stored in them, like in many natural reservoirs, is less permanent. Forest ecosystems are dynamic environments and the actual amount of carbon captured depends on the types of trees and the maturity of the forest.
On the other hand, technological solutions that pull carbon dioxide from the air are very costly in terms of the capture of carbon dioxide, but they may be more stable in terms of the geological storage of carbon. Once carbon capture plants are set up and working at scale, they tend to require fewer people for upkeep.
I’ve reviewed some of the most innovative carbon capture pilot plants and the technologies they employ. First, the good news. The chemistry of carbon capture is simple enough to understand.
For example, one plant run by the Canadian company Carbon Engineering uses large fans to draw in air to a wet contactor containing potassium hydroxide. Carbon dioxide reacts with this alkaline solution to yield potassium carbonate and water. In a subsequent reaction, solid pellets of calcium carbonate are formed upon reaction with calcium hydroxide. Carbon dioxide is captured and released for storage by heating up the carbonate in oxygen and natural gas. It’s a closed system that can be explained to a high-school chemistry class.
In fact, carbon capture happens naturally too. The White Cliffs of Dover in England are made up of chalk, which is a store of carbon dioxide that has occurred over a long time.
But here’s the problem. We do not have millions of years to capture all the carbon dioxide we have already released. Billions of tonnes of carbon dioxide will need to be removed from the atmosphere to prevent a climate catastrophe.
This brings me to the second issue. The concentration of carbon dioxide is increasing in the atmosphere. However, carbon dioxide still only makes up only a fraction of air. Direct air capture plants run huge fans that suck in a lot of air and force it onto liquid or solid contactors that filter out carbon dioxide. Then, carbon dioxide is removed from the filters so they can be used again. A massive amount of energy is required to run the fans and to regenerate the materials for reuse. Passive flow of air would draw less energy, but it would be too slow to capture sufficient carbon dioxide to make a big dent.
Revealingly, a scientific article by Ryan Long-Innes and Henning Struchtrup of the University of Victoria in Canada that was published in Cell Reports Physical Science on March 16 found that most of the energy supplied to a Carbon Engineering direct air capture plant isn’t used productively. Only about 8% of energy supplied is used for the separation of carbon dioxide from atmospheric air, the rest is lost mainly as heat. It turns out that when trying to suck out carbon dioxide from the air, thermodynamics is not our friend.
A further challenge is that natural gas is used to run the direct air capture process. The use of renewable energy sources would require technological modifications to the plant but would result in sustainable operations. In an ideal future, we will not need to use fossil fuels to capture carbon dioxide released from burning fossil fuels.
Then there’s the question of cost. Carbon Engineering’s process costs between $94 and $232 per ton of carbon dioxide captured. Another company, Climeworks has a plant that captures carbon dioxide for around $600 per ton. In the United States, there’s a tax credit for companies at around $50 per ton of carbon dioxide. For comparison, some forests are estimated to capture carbon dioxide at under $50 per ton, but it’s not an apples-to-apples comparison. A tree might live for a hundred years; geologically stored carbon could well stay for thousands.
If rebates are the carrot, then governments also have the stick of carbon taxes on industries that emit greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. In addition, companies may be able to sell carbon dioxide for use in making products in a carbon marketplace. Right now, fresh fossil fuels are the main source for many of these materials, but that could change in the future.
That said, we will not be able to reuse most of the carbon dioxide we pull from the air. Instead, we will need to force it underground or under the sea in places where it can’t leak into the atmosphere. There is precedent here and Norway recently greenlit a proposal to inject millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide into the North Sea.
Overall, while the technology for direct air capture shows that it is possible to pull carbon dioxide from the air, improvements are needed. Some of these improvements might come from scaling up plants. Others will have to come from more efficient design of systems for greater energy conservation.
With the right incentives in place, innovation will spur better and cheaper ways to suck out carbon dioxide from the air and store it. But right now, capturing carbon dioxide costs more than not releasing it in the first place.
Anirban Mahapatra, a scientist by training, is the author of COVID-19: Separating Fact from Fiction
The views expressed are personal
The barbarity of Bogtui, near Rampurhat in West Bengal’s Birbhum district, is not just unacceptable, it is an instance of the use of violence to settle political scores going totally out of control. That is not to argue that the use of controlled and targeted violence is either acceptable or excusable in the competitive politics of electoral democracies.
Yet, violence and murderous attacks are routinely used, especially in West Bengal, against political competitors as a mode of settling scores and signalling their relative positions, and this has unfortunately been the practice for decades.
The winner or defender establishes himself as the reigning local oligarch and political power centre. There is a hierarchy within which these oligarchs and power centres manage to operate.
And then there is the politics of victimhood. The CPI(M), which had ruled the state for 34 years, had played it against the Congress, and the Congress played it against the CPI(M). Mamata Banerjee has played it against both, at different times. The BJP, as the newbie in the state’s politics, mulched it before and after the May 2021 elections. The recent scuffle between the BJP’s Leader of the Opposition Suvendu Adhikari and his colleagues and Trinamul Congress legislators in the West Bengal Assembly has become almost routine for almost all state Assemblies and even Parliament for some time. The difference is that it happened in West Bengal and went viral. The BJP is clearly working hard, albeit taking shortcuts, to underline its victim status to highlight the TMC’s practice of using violence to settle political scores.
To disconnect herself from the out-of-control hierarchy of political power centres and local oligarchs engaged in murderous competition, Mamata Banerjee has adroitly shifted her public communications from being dismissive on the one hand and constructing an alternative narrative of conspiracy on the other. She has done so to underline her position as the only power centre, the fountainhead of all political and government authority, fully accountable to the “people” and responsible for delivering justice and compensation to victims. She has made herself the embodiment of the rule of law, reiterated her familial connection with the people, especially women, as the “Didi” and announced that a hotline will be set up for oppressed and fearful people to complain to her directly.
This version of hotline politics is a strategic move. Used effectively on the eve of the 2021 state Assembly elections, the hotline between Didi and the individual aggrieved voter revived the direct link that had got frayed in 2019, resulting in heavy losses for the Trinamul Congress in the Lok Sabha elections and fuelling the BJP’s meteoric rise to challenger status.
Regaining control in a ramshackle organisation, where discipline is low and control is loose and sporadic, is definitely a challenge. Ms Banerjee has been aware of the internal conflicts and has in the aftermath of May 2021 repeatedly warned her party that she will not tolerate activities that damage the TMC’s reputation. Her warnings pre-Bogtui went unheeded, even after she pointedly spoke out during and after the recent statewide municipal elections.
The challenge for Ms Banerjee is to whip the party and her government, especially the police, into a semblance of order, to restore confidence in her leadership. To do that, the chief minister has, grudgingly, welcomed the investigation into the Bogtui incident by the Central Bureau of Investigation even though she had set up a Special Investigation Team led by the top brass of the West Bengal police. By gracefully conceding space to the CBI in Bogtui, Ms Banerjee has sidestepped the snare that Narendra Modi had placed in her way by offering all support from the Centre. For a leader who has consistently opposed the encroachment of the Centre on state matters, especially on law and order and authority over the police, Mamata Banerjee’s overt message of cooperation with the CBI is a tactical move that will give her room to manipulate the narrative after the investigation is over.
As a populist leader in an elected democracy, Mamata Banerjee is fully conscious that her mandate has to be frequently validated though the popular vote. However authoritarian her style may be, and that was on full display at Bogtui when she ordered the arrest of a TMC district leader because voters in Bogtui blamed him for the atrocities, she knows that voter support is essential for her survival and her ambitions to play a role in national politics in 2024 and beyond.
Deplorable as it may be, it is pointless to try and trace the origins of why West Bengal’s politics is more prone to violence than other states. Violence is used to defend local political turf, which means it reinforces the prevailing power equations. Violence is used as a signal of aggressive expansion by the local power centre aiming to enlarge his territory. Violence is a performance designed to deliver multiple messages to locals who interpret and make sense of it in their own ways.
Participation in political violence in West Bengal is part of the rites of initiation and a marker of status, especially for the non-elites in urban and rural areas. The participant then becomes either a local hero, a go-to person for people on the margins trying to access government services and benefits, entry into the local informal economy, get relief, or the local thug, who is best avoided.
There is a social sanction for the use of violence in politics and for settling disputes, even family conflicts.
And then there was Mamata Banerjee, who as a victim of violence against her person, became a symbol of all victims. On her political journey to power in 2011, Ms Banerjee fought back, acquired the status of a hero and the reputation of a street fighter. Her brand image was a fearless leader who fought on the front lines.
Ms Banerjee’s response to the Bogtui killings marks her transition from streetfighter and victim. As chief minister, as a possible aspirant for the prime ministership in 2024, if the unborn alliance of anti-BJP parties becomes a reality, Mamata Banerjee cannot afford to alienate a small pocket of voters in Bogtui because she is aware that voters aggrieved by her party’s local oligarchs and power centres across West Bengal will decipher her response and read meanings in them that may jeopardise the Trinamul Congress’ popularity and her brand as its supreme leader. She needs to establish control, over a politically corrupt administration and a dysfunctional party to position herself as a wholesome alternative to a toxic incumbent.
The appointment of Amarjit Sinha, former Union secretary for rural development and, more significantly, former adviser to Prime Minister Narendra Modi as member of the Public Enterprises Selection Board (PESB), has been watched keenly by babus. Not only does Mr Sinha fill a key gap in the board, but many have taken it as an optimistic sign.
Mr Sinha has joined Mallika Srinivasan who is the chairperson of PESB and who, just a few months ago, had requested the Centre to relieve her of her excessive burden at PESB and the Centre had complied by changing the resolution on the functioning of the public sector head hunter. With Mr Sinha coming on board, a section of senior babus sees in his appointment a “message” from the PMO itself. It is hoped that his experience as a former Union secretary and adviser to Mr Modi, Mr Sinha brings competence and seniority as well as the confidence of the administration in making PESB an independent body.
It seems as if Mr Sinha’s selection for the post was decided in the context of Mallika Srinivasan seeking to be free of demanding routine responsibilities at PESB. It is believed that Mr Sinha will now take up a bulk of that load. And he has the green light from the highest authority.
A badly handled transfer
It took a directive from the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) for the Haryana government to withdraw the transfer order of S.S. Saini, assistant conservator of forests, Panchkula, issued in December last year, posting him as divisional forest officer, Kaithal, displacing Ranbir Singh Dhull, who is deputy conservator of forests, Kaithal.
The decision to withdraw the transfer order came only after CAT directed the state chief secretary Sanjeev Kaushal to file an affidavit in the matter after Mr Dhull challenged the order in CAT. In his petition, Mr Dhull claimed that his transfer was not approved by the Civil Service Board and that Mr Saini was posted to Kaithal without issuing Mr Dhull’s further posting order. Curiously, the state government initially claimed that Mr Dhull had been transferred to Kaithal “mistakenly”!
With the tribunal accepting Mr Dhull’s argument, the government has retracted and withdrawn Mr Saini’s transfer order. Meanwhile, it remains to be seen whether it will now take a call on whether Mr Dhull will stay in his current posting or be transferred, hopefully without further “error” and more embarrassment. That will be decided once Mr Kaushal files the government’s affidavit in this bungled transfer case.
Bihar faces contempt action over DGP’s appointment
The Nitish Kumar government in Bihar finds itself in a fix, after defying a Supreme Court ruling on the appointment of the director-general of police (DGP). Not only will its appointee S.K. Singhal have to go, but the government itself faces a contempt case for ignoring the ruling of the apex court while appointing Mr Singhal as officiating DGP.
Sources have informed DKB that a state government has to send a list of eligible candidates to Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) to shortlist them before naming the DGP. The Bihar government ignored this procedure. Further, in earlier rulings the Supreme Court had given clear direction to administrators of all states and Union Territories not to appoint an officiating DGP. But the Nitish government ignored these when naming Mr Singhal as officiating DGP. Now it will have to explain its stance to the court.