Quixotic Mistakes of Bimal Gurung

                                                                                    *Saumitra Mohan

            The winds of change are sweeping across the Darjeeling hills. History seems to have come a full circle for Mr. Bimal Gurung who seemed to be completely out of depth with the ground realities and popular mood in is bailiwick. The split in the GJMM (Gorkha Jan Mukti Morcha) and the rising voices of dissent as reigning now are nothing but a damning indictment and reflection on his leadership style. The latter had been thoughtlessly hurting the interests of his own constituents and thereby his own by frequent resort to agitational politics.

            The Hill economy suffered badly as a result of his ‘antics and shenanigans’ to force Darjeeling people to live under the constant threat of an agitation. The confrontationist approach laced with almost daily dose of strikes, bandhs and agitations played ducks and drakes with the local economy. Such unthinking and hair-brained politics hugely hurt the principal pillars of Darjeeling’s economy including education, tea and tourism.

            Today, if people are up in arms against him and his ill-thought agitational politics, then only he is to blame for it. Today, Mr Gurung finds himself increasingly isolated and in wilderness. A society as educated and sophisticated as Darjeeling definitely does not deserve a leader like him who can’t feel the pulse of his own people and can’t marry the regional with the national interests. Gorkhaland is definitely an emotive issue for the people, but emotions should always be tempered and informed by realism to balance the local and larger interests. It is here that Mr. Gurung failed severely.

            Mr. Gurung ought to have focused on better development and governance in the immediate aftermath of a long-drawn movement which eventually resulted in the formation of Gorkhaland Territorial Administration (GTA). It would have been very much advisable for Mr Gurung to consolidate on the gains made during the movement preceding the formation of GTA and for this a prolonged peace would have been in order. However, he never allowed the local economy to settle down.

            People had just come out of a long-drawn agitational politics and wanted a ‘prolonged peace’ to sustain and build on their life and livelihood. But Mr. Gurung never allowed a ‘movement-fatigued’ people the luxury of the same and kept the Damocles’ Sword of strikes and bandhs hanging over the people. But a garbled sense of politics and his own uninformed self led him into scuppering the very boat he was sailing in. Today, he is in splendid isolation and a declared offender for the inanities of repeated infraction of laws.

            Now, let's discuss some of the ideas Mr. Gurung chased to paint himself into the corner. The hill areas of Darjeeling (Gorkhaland movement is primarily confined to the three hill sub-divisions of Darjeeling and Kalimpong districts of West Bengal district namely Darjeeling Sadar, Kurseong and Kalimpong) has a population of around 10 lakhs of which around seven lakhs people can roughly fall into the category of Gorkhas, the remaining being Lepchas, Bhutias, Marwaris, Biharis, Tibetans and other non-Gorkha communities. So, the proponents of this movement are actually seeking a separate state for these seven lakh people, the others perforce being part of the movement with no choice being available to them. In fact, the Lepchas have already been expressly complaining of being shortchanged by the Gorkhaland champions. The term 'Gorkhaland' itself is not a hold-all concept and ergo, does not do justice to the identities of the various other ethnic communities as residing in Darjeeling. 

            So, if a recognition were to be given to a statehood demand for a people of seven to nine lakh population, then how many constituent states or provinces should we be having in this country of over 130 crore people. If our mighty Gorkhas were to be given a separate state, then how many states are we actually bargaining for in a country where we have over 5000 ethnic communities and castes with around 850 languages. If this demand is recognized, then what justification shall we have to deny a state for the Yadavas, the Jats, the Rajputs, the  Santhals, the Meenas and what not, with most of them having a sizable population, in fact, many of them being much more numerous than the Gorkhas.

            In fact, there are already movements on for the formation of a Kamtapur (comprising areas of Assam and North Bengal) and Greater Cochbehar (comprising most of North Bengal) in West Bengal, Bodoland  and Karbi-Anglong in Assam,  Harit Pradesh, Bundelkhand and Purvanchal in Uttar Pradesh, Mithilanchal in Bihar, Vidarbha in Maharashtra and Saurashtra in Gujarat.

            Again, the demand for ceding the contiguous mouzas or areas with sizable Gorkha population attacks the very concept of pluralism which is the hallmark of our salad-bowl or Ganga-Jamuni co-existential culture. Mr. Gurung desires that all the nearby areas with substantial Nepali speaking population also be given to the proposed Gorkhaland state. Even if we ignore this most important factor of our societal pluralism being compromised as a result of such a parochial demand for a while, still such a demand is very difficult to be accepted for some practical considerations.

            First, this is plainly wrong to assume that all the Nepali speaking people are ipso facto Gorkhas or want Gorkhaland.  Secondly, most of the demanded areas have a predominant majority of the people other than the Nepali speaking population. Thirdly, even some of the areas where the Nepali speaking people are in majority are mostly enclaves within another district or other community dominated areas. Annexing these areas to the demanded Gorkhaland state is administratively not a feasible proposition as also observed by the Justice Shyamal Sen Commission which was constituted to explore the feasibility of such inclusions.

            Also, the Nepali speaking population in most of these mouzas is estimated to be not more than 20-30 per cent meaning thereby that by ceding such areas to the new entity, a great disservice shall be done to the desire of the other communities who are in majority in those mouzas. Besides, once we recognize such a demand, a Pandora's Box shall be opened. It not only jeopardizes the plural character of our society by artificially trying to make it monochromatic, but also opens the flood-gates for similar such demands from different parts of the country.

            After all, every state has some population of one or the other ethno-linguistic groups which can suitably be demanded by other states. By this logic, all the Bengali speaking areas of Assam should come to West Bengal or the Hindi speaking or tribal dominated areas of latter should go to Bihar or Jharkhand respectively. By the same logic, the entire Hindi heartland of North India should become a huge monolithic state. The resultant outcome of acceding to such a demand may indeed be very chaotic. It is a very archaic and regressive thinking which ought not to be given any further encouragement.

            Again, the alleged historical exploitation of Darjeeling by the state of West Bengal does not hold because Darjeeling has the best of social development indicators in the country and is definitely among the best in West Bengal. As per the West Bengal Human Development Report, 2004 prepared under the supervision of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Darjeeling was ranked 2^nd and 4^th in terms of the gender and human development indices respectively,  among all the districts of West Bengal.

            If underdevelopment and exploitation of Darjeeling can be cited as a justification for statehood, then Darjeeling ought to fall much behind in the queue for promotion to statehood as there are many more regions in the country which would have the first claim to statehood.  Be it the income, literacy rates, educational attainments, nutritional status, percentage of BPL (below poverty line) population, longevity, infant and maternal mortality, overall health status of people and infrastructures, Darjeeling fares much better compared to most parts of the country or the different districts of the state of West Bengal. Be it noted that Darjeeling has for the past more than three decades been under such autonomous local self-government bodies as Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council (DGHC) and GTA.

            But still, if the statehood proponents believe that Darjeeling needs more development, then statehood is definitely no solution. We are all well conversant with the experiences of some of the already existing states whose development record is just pathetic, to say the least. Jharkhand became a state against the same background of alleged underdevelopment, but even after a lapse of more than a decade's time, it is still much far off from realization of the developmental goals it set out to achieve way back in the year 2000. Jharkhand today fares very badly among the newly created states. The fact remains that the ilks of Mr. Gurung should actually be talking of good governance and good administration than anything else. A statehood trapping sans the desideratum of good governance will achieve nothing but zilch.

            Then, given its size, both demographically and geographically, Darjeeling already receives a disproportionate per capita share of resources compared to many other parts of the country. And a substantial share of these resources come from the state of West Bengal meaning thereby that West Bengal has traditionally been providing disproportionate resources to Darjeeling, often at the expense of the more backward and deserving areas of the state. The extant Gorkhaland Territorial Administration's revenue from all sources is assumed to be not more than three crores annually. If we also include the revenue received by the state government from such sources as land, excise, transport, professional and sales tax, then at most the figure is likely to go up to  around 30 crore rupees. At the most and at its best, tapping all the obtaining and potential sources of revenue, it can barely go up to 100 crore rupees annually in the most ideal of situations. In the shorter run, however, a 50 crore rupee annual revenue appears a more practical figure.

            Moreover, GTA reportedly has a non-plan expenditure of around 600 crores at the moment which with plan and schematic expenses would come to around 1400 crores. If at all the three hill sub-divisions become the cherished Gorkhaland state, the combined plan and non-plan expenditure is likely to shoot up to, at least, 2000 crores factoring the expenses for general and police administration, not to speak of various attendant expenses which come with the formation of a new state. So, if a region which has the best of developmental indicators and which has the revenue generation potential of only around 50-100 crore rupees, why should they be getting a disproportionate 2000 crores at the expense of the more deserving parts of the countries, particularly those areas of Chhattisgarh, West Bengal, Orissa, Bihar, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and other states reeling under extremist or other menace.

            Mr. Gurung should have done his homework better to show that Darjeeling is in a position to bear all the non-plan and, at least, a portion of the plan expenses of the proposed Gorkhaland state before demanding the same. If such a new entity expects to be spoon-fed through the Central government's doles, would not there be similar justified demands from different parts of the country. And if we allow this for one particular region, can we deny the same to others. We ought to understand that an eponymous Gorkhaland state is not just about emotional wishes of our countrymen in Darjeeling, but has much far-reaching insidious implications for the rest of the country as the same would only spur more and more such demands.

            If Telangana has today become a state, it is because of its geographical compactness, a suitable demographic size, administrative viability and self-sufficient resources. But the same does not apply to many such demands elsewhere including Gorkhaland. If all of us keep demanding statehood on such grounds, then our state-building process shall never come to an end, not to speak of the nation-building process. Mr. Gurung should have actually aimed at making the GTA work successfully, which came into being through a tripartite agreement between the Central Government, the Government of West Bengal and the dominant hill party i.e. Gorkha Jan Mukti Morcha (GJMM) on 18th July, 2011. GTA is an autonomous and empowered body which can be suitably harnessed to fulfill the developmental aspirations of the local people, if development is what they are looking for.

            In an article published on 4^th August, 2012 in The Statesman, this author had strongly recommended that the GTA “should avoid the ‘Big Schemes-Big Projects’ focus of the erstwhile DGHC and should, instead, target such schemes and programmes, as have wider outreach and directly impact the quality of life of the hoi polloi,” an advice not heeded by Mr Gurung to his own chagrin, thereby bringing his comeuppance. It would be more in the fitness of things that GTA be afforded an opportunity to become the bellwether of Darjeeling’s development to ensure a peaceful and progressive life for our brothers and sisters there.

            Of all the things Darjeeling needs now utmost is a visionary and enlightened leadership which understands the needs and pulse of the local people to synergize the energies and interests of the motley interest groups in the hills to bring in better governance and development which would be in sync with the larger national interests. One would expect the incoming helmsmen of GTA to focus more on correcting the basics including repairing the damages done to the hill economy owing to recent ill-timed uprisings at the behest of Mr. Gurung. Well-planned development and good governance are the budge-words for Darjeeling and its new administrators. Entire country is waiting to see the Queen of the Hill smile.

*The author is a former District Magistrate of Darjeeling and presently working as CEO, KMDA. The views expressed here are personal and don’t reflect those of the Government.