Working Out Rehabilitation Package for Land-Losers
*Saumitra Mohan
While the negativism surrounding the land acquisitions for developmental purposes around the country may have hogged newspaper headlines in recent times, a huge land acquisition success story in Darjeeling-Jalpaiguri region for a new township has escaped deserved media attention. The reason for the same seems to be the fact that the entire range of issues relating to land acquisition and rehabilitation of the land losers has been executed and handled too well to warrant salacious banner headlines. Even though the entire land acquisition process here actually started much earlier than the ones at Singur and Nandigram, still the land acquisition process at Kawakhali, Porajhar, Tiknikatha, Boro Potturam, Chhotto Potturam and other adjoining areas at the intersection of these two districts of Darjeeling and Jalpaiguri for the proposed new township by Bengal Unitech Universal Group (BUUG) has been a success story.
Notwithstanding Singur, Nandigram and numerous other hitches and glitches galore on way to final land acquisition, Siliguri Jalpaiguri Development Authority (SJDA) could actually work out an acceptable rehabilitation package through persistent consultations with all the interested stake-holders including land losers and political parties. It was SJDA which entered into a public private partnership (PPP) with BUUG after the latter succeeded in bagging the project through a competitive bidding process by way of Expression of Interest (EOI) for development of a new township at the proposed site. The sundry details of the rehabilitation process have been very painstakingly worked out through regular negotiations and consultations with all the stake-holders. While SJDA had to agree to whittle down its profits from the project by making the rehabilitation package much more liberal than the one warranted under the hoary but draconian Land Acquisition Act, 1894, it still made social gains in terms of roping in a good financial investment with huge employment potential. To make the rehabilitation package more broad-based and acceptable, BUUG has also agreed to shoulder a portion of the rehabilitation package, which was actually not part of the original Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) entered into between SJDA and BUUG.
It was because of the very fact that SJDA took care and pain to rope in and take on board each and every interested group or faction, almost on their terms, that the entire land acquisition process has gone on for a wee bit longer time than was warranted, but with the hindsight one can say with confidence and satisfaction that given the prevailing mood and circumstances, all this delay or procrastination has been worth its while. The entire long-drawn and complex land acquisition process at the proposed new township site has been completed without much of a problem though minor hiccups and roadblocks have definitely been experienced.
And substantive amount of the credit for this near miraculous feat goes to the local political leadership, though SJDA also took a lot of pain and initiative to work out such an ingenuous package to the satisfaction of all. SJDA constituted a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) in the form of a Rehabilitation Advisory Committee with representation from all concerned including land losers and other stake-holders to discuss and work out a detailed rehabilitation package for the land-losers of the proposed new township project. The Committee is supposed to oversee and supervise the various activities relating to rehabilitation.
The selection of land for the proposed township itself was done very carefully. The land selected is the one which has largely been non-agricultural, abandoned and wasteland where no economic activity was noticed for the past several years. A total of 302 acres of land has been acquired for the purpose. Of this 302 acres, 232 acres have been identified for the proposed new township, while about 70 acre land has been earmarked for different socially-productive schemes including rehabilitation of the land losers. These 70 acres include 36 acre land for rehabilitation of the land losers and the rest for construction of educational, health, sports and other socio-cultural-economic infrastructures for the rehabilitated people and also for other local people.
SJDA has agreed to give not only the legal dues as mentioned under the LA Act, 1894, but has also agreed to provide other benefits and compensation as have been mutually agreed among all stake-holders. Not only this, apart from promising a liberal rehabilitation package for the land losers, SJDA has also agreed to undertake the development and upgradation of the necessary physical and social infrastructures of the surrounding hinterland including rural and suburban areas by way of electrification, construction of roads, drainage systems, water supply and school buildings. Much of the promised works has already been undertaken and completed.
SJDA has taken special care to secure the benefits and interests of small and marginal land-holders who had to lose lands for the proposed township project. Many effective, but assured positive benefits have been worked out for the small land-holders. For the people having built houses at more than 10 cottah (one cottah amounts to 720 sq ft in West Bengal) of land, two cottah of developed land with attendant infrastructures are being given without any charges while another three cottah of the same land are to provided at the acquisition price or alternatively, ready flat at subsidized price has been promised apart from compensating for the full cost of the land price as assessed by LA Department.
Those in possession of less than a decimal (435 sq ft) of land are being provided similarly developed land of the same amount without any charges. The families, who have been living on encroached government land for a long time and who supposedly have no legal claims to the lands in possession or to the compensation being offered, are also being provided with two cottah of alternative land or a flat (380 sq ft) without any charges.
Those in legal possession of one to three decimal (less than two cottah) of land are being given one and a half cottah of land free. Those in legal possession of up to five to ten cottah of the acquired land are being given two cottah free land and a cottah at the acquisition price or alternatively a flat (750 sq ft) at a subsidized price. The families being given rehabilitation plots of a size bigger than two cottah would not be charged anything for the first two cottah, but the rest shall be charged at the acquisition price.
All these rehabilitation plots being offered are developed plots and have become prime lands because of the proposed township in the vicinity and also because of the infrastructural works undertaken or proposed to be undertaken by SJDA. The real market value of the offered plots exceeds the original land value of the lost plots by many times over. SJDA has also promised to take necessary initiative for exemption of the land registration charges, if possible or to shoulder the entire financial burden for the same.
Some of the land losers who do not otherwise qualify for allotment of any plot or those willing to take a flat in exchange of a plot shall be given the same at a markedly subsidized rates including 75,000 rupees for a flat of 380 sq ft size, two lakh rupees for a flat of 500 sq ft size and three lakh rupees for a flat of 750 sq ft size. 80,000 rupees as a grant shall be given to those destitute and BPL land losers who have been living on the acquired lands legally or illegally for construction of the house on the rehabilitation plots given.
If the acquired plot is held jointly in two names, then both could be granted a separate plot as per the package prepared for the purpose subject to final approval and satisfaction of the Rehabilitation Committee created for the purpose. Again, all those people who have been holding or possessing government lands illegally shall be compensated with 60 per cent of the land cost as assessed by the LA Department notwithstanding the ‘moral hazard’ problem implied in such a policy initiative.
Again, the acquisition land value is to be distributed in the ratio of 80:20 between those people who have been in illegal possession of such lands as are legally registered in someone else’s land and those who are the legal owners after the two submit an agreement specially entered into between them for the purpose. The compensation for the structures built on the land, being possessed legally, have been compensated as per the LA Act which itself has been interpreted very liberally and to the maximum benefit of the land losers. Those who had built makeshift structures on illegally possessed government land are also being compensated liberally in the range of 5000 to 20,000 rupees apart from the alternative piece of land. The land losers are also being provided with Rs. 4000/- for shifting the household effects to the new site.
Large tracts of lands have already been identified and earmarked at the rehabilitation site for the development and promotion of economic activities including small industries, trades and businesses. Two children from all land losing families shall be given an educational scholarship of Rs. 1500 per annum up to graduation. Scholarships are also being given at the post-graduate level for undertaking any specialized or vocational training including engineering, medicine or MBA. The shops or houses identified till 2007 on the project site have been compensated with provisioning of a built shop at a subsidized rate.
All land losers are also entitled to health benefits including reimbursement for the cost of treatment or medical care. All these social benefits are, however, limited only up to first generation and shall be given only after the same is claimed in writing from SJDA. The land losers’ cooperatives are also major stake-holders in the proposed construction works in the way as they shall be the only authorised agencies who shall be given priority in supplying the required sand, earth and stone chips for the purposes of all the construction works at the proposed new township site or the rehabilitation site.
All the rehabilitation plots are to be registered either in the name of husband or the wife. The plots, given free, shall not be eligible for transfer before ten years. All these plots or flats are being distributed through an open and transparent lottery. Scholarships are also to be provided for any vocational training to the BPL families. Self help groups are also to be provided with training and equipment. The land losers are also to be given priority in any employment opportunities created at the project site. The land losers, over 65 years of age, are being given old age pension.
The land losers are to be issued special identity cards for availing all these benefits. Any special demand or needs of the destitute land losers shall be sympathetically considered by the Rehabilitation Committee. The land losers shall be entitled to an extra 10 per cent of the land value assessed if they willingly consent to the same by way of a Consent Award. An unemployed widow is to be given a two cottah of plot without any charges. Besides, socially marginalised including physically or mentally handicapped, unemployed, unmarried women of over 35 years of age, widow or abandoned women are also to be provided with a shop.
What is significant in all this is the fact that in spite of working out a liberal rehabilitation package for the land losers, SJDA shall still be left with enough surplus funds. All this surplus money is already being ploughed back to beef up the physical infrastructures and public amenities in the Siliguri Jalpaiguri Planning Area (SJPA) which shall further result in positive multiplier effects for the local economy in particular and for the economy of the state in general. Arguably, one should go ahead with such projects even if there are no savings out of such projects because of working out a liberal rehabilitation package. After all, the project itself is a great social pay-off as they not only provide strength to the local economy by way of investment, but by further generation of employment opportunities and the resultant spiral of demand and supply chain. In fine, the successful pulling of any such project is always a win-win situation provided the benefits outweigh or equal the costs involved.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Tackling Naxalism in West Bengal
*Saumitra Mohan
Amidst so many of our internal security problems, the home-grown naxalism, prodded and abetted by external forces, keeps rearing its head from time to time in the most uglier ways than we can imagine. And all these expressions of their nefarious intent to tear down our painstakingly-built liberal democratic edifice have made it imperative for us to fix this problem right away without wasting anytime. One such expression of Naxal’s evil design on Indian state was the recent attack on the convoy including the Chief Minister and the Union Steel Minister at Salboni in West Medinipur in West Bengal in November last year.
The blowing up of a railway station by the Maoist Communist Centre on the Orissa-Jharkhand border and the relatively less damaging attack on another may are other significant expressions of Naxal fury. Outrage on obscure wayside stations, whether in Bengal’s Purulia or Orissa’s Bhalulata and Chandiposh recently by the naxals point to the audacity of the anti-national elements in carrying out such vandalism with clinical dexeterity. Such manifestations of extremist activity need to be examined in the larger context.
The Chief Minister Mr Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and Union Steel Minister Mr Ram Vilas Paswan had a narrow escape when a landmine exploded within minutes of their convoy passing through on NH-60 near Salboni in West Medinipur on November last year. A spare pilot car of the convoy was, however, caught in the explosion, resulting in injuries to six police personnel, including two policewomen. The incident took place at Baroa, 17 km from Salboni, from where the Chief Minister, Mr Paswan, State Industry Minister Mr Nirupam Sen and industrialist Mr Sajjan Jindal were returning after laying the foundation stone for the proposed Jindal Steel Works plant.
The injured including Kartik Maity, Ranjit Mondal, Rabindra Nath Mahato, Yudhisthir Mahato, Fulmoni Mandi and Alaka Chakraborty were rushed to Medinipur Medical College and Hospital with splinter injuries. It is believed that Maoists planted the mine a few days back. The incident was supposedly quite daring in the sense that the same took place notwithstanding the deployment of over 1,200 security force personnel, including, CRPF, BSF and the state armed police to secure the area. It were the Naxals, active in the area, who were behind the attack. They had also blown up a state health department vehicle on 22 October in Belpahari resulting in the death of a doctor and had killed a CPI-M leader the previous day in West Medinipur.
Maoists who were hiding on either side of the highway near the blast site are also said to have fired several rounds towards the convoy. A probe has already been ordered to find out whether there was any intelligence failure. The enquiry team is also supposed to look into whether there was any neglect on the part of the policemen who had conducted anti-sabotage and anti-landmine checking in the area ahead of the CM’s trip.
In another incident on December 23 last year, the Naxals indiscriminately fired upon the policemen to reinforce their presence in the area while the policemen could not retaliate to avoid killing villagers in a busy weekly bazaar. “The perpetrators had merged with the market crowd. Had they been fired at, the bullets would have also hit many innocent villagers,” said Kuldip Singh, Inspector-General of Police (Western Range). Dressed in ordinary clothes in the crowded haat (bazaar), over 30 Maoists had fired at four policemen when they arrived at the construction site of a community hall to relieve their colleagues on the previous shift. Two constables were killed and a third was seriously injured. Their rifles were taken away. There were at least three women among the attackers, who were selling vegetables at the haat before the strike. Within minutes, some men and women got on motorcycles and sped away through the market towards the Jharkhand border. The police had been posted at the construction site after Maoists threatened to blow up the community hall being built by the panchayat six km from the Jharkhand border.
The Naxals are increasingly getting bolder in their acts, thinking ahead and acting smarter than us. This is definitely a time for some soul-searching for us. The incident points to the imperatives of further beefing up our intelligence gathering and processing by the state and the central intelligence machineries. The Naxals have this uncanny knack of picking holes through our security arrangements and make us look vulnerable to their radical motivations.
While the Prime Minister has already termed Naxalism as the greatest internal security threat, we need better counter strategies and mechanism including better coordination and intelligence sharing among the states falling in the so-called Red Corridor where Naxals are said to be active. Along with Purulia and Bankura, West Medinipur is part of the Red Corridor. It is a Maoist bastion contiguous to Jharkhand, the hotbed of Left radicalism. The inter-state border serves as an exit point after every act of dare-devilry by the Maoists.
It is long acknowledged that these districts need more attention in terms of more developmental initiatives. However, what is surprising is the failure on the part of the Maoists to see reason. While the government has been making every effort to ratchet up the developmental process in these under-developed regions, the Maoists are just not allowing the administration to do the needful in the area. With no positive plan of their own, the Naxals are forcing the administration to waste its energy and time by such meaningless act of theirs.
*Saumitra Mohan
Amidst so many of our internal security problems, the home-grown naxalism, prodded and abetted by external forces, keeps rearing its head from time to time in the most uglier ways than we can imagine. And all these expressions of their nefarious intent to tear down our painstakingly-built liberal democratic edifice have made it imperative for us to fix this problem right away without wasting anytime. One such expression of Naxal’s evil design on Indian state was the recent attack on the convoy including the Chief Minister and the Union Steel Minister at Salboni in West Medinipur in West Bengal in November last year.
The blowing up of a railway station by the Maoist Communist Centre on the Orissa-Jharkhand border and the relatively less damaging attack on another may are other significant expressions of Naxal fury. Outrage on obscure wayside stations, whether in Bengal’s Purulia or Orissa’s Bhalulata and Chandiposh recently by the naxals point to the audacity of the anti-national elements in carrying out such vandalism with clinical dexeterity. Such manifestations of extremist activity need to be examined in the larger context.
The Chief Minister Mr Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and Union Steel Minister Mr Ram Vilas Paswan had a narrow escape when a landmine exploded within minutes of their convoy passing through on NH-60 near Salboni in West Medinipur on November last year. A spare pilot car of the convoy was, however, caught in the explosion, resulting in injuries to six police personnel, including two policewomen. The incident took place at Baroa, 17 km from Salboni, from where the Chief Minister, Mr Paswan, State Industry Minister Mr Nirupam Sen and industrialist Mr Sajjan Jindal were returning after laying the foundation stone for the proposed Jindal Steel Works plant.
The injured including Kartik Maity, Ranjit Mondal, Rabindra Nath Mahato, Yudhisthir Mahato, Fulmoni Mandi and Alaka Chakraborty were rushed to Medinipur Medical College and Hospital with splinter injuries. It is believed that Maoists planted the mine a few days back. The incident was supposedly quite daring in the sense that the same took place notwithstanding the deployment of over 1,200 security force personnel, including, CRPF, BSF and the state armed police to secure the area. It were the Naxals, active in the area, who were behind the attack. They had also blown up a state health department vehicle on 22 October in Belpahari resulting in the death of a doctor and had killed a CPI-M leader the previous day in West Medinipur.
Maoists who were hiding on either side of the highway near the blast site are also said to have fired several rounds towards the convoy. A probe has already been ordered to find out whether there was any intelligence failure. The enquiry team is also supposed to look into whether there was any neglect on the part of the policemen who had conducted anti-sabotage and anti-landmine checking in the area ahead of the CM’s trip.
In another incident on December 23 last year, the Naxals indiscriminately fired upon the policemen to reinforce their presence in the area while the policemen could not retaliate to avoid killing villagers in a busy weekly bazaar. “The perpetrators had merged with the market crowd. Had they been fired at, the bullets would have also hit many innocent villagers,” said Kuldip Singh, Inspector-General of Police (Western Range). Dressed in ordinary clothes in the crowded haat (bazaar), over 30 Maoists had fired at four policemen when they arrived at the construction site of a community hall to relieve their colleagues on the previous shift. Two constables were killed and a third was seriously injured. Their rifles were taken away. There were at least three women among the attackers, who were selling vegetables at the haat before the strike. Within minutes, some men and women got on motorcycles and sped away through the market towards the Jharkhand border. The police had been posted at the construction site after Maoists threatened to blow up the community hall being built by the panchayat six km from the Jharkhand border.
The Naxals are increasingly getting bolder in their acts, thinking ahead and acting smarter than us. This is definitely a time for some soul-searching for us. The incident points to the imperatives of further beefing up our intelligence gathering and processing by the state and the central intelligence machineries. The Naxals have this uncanny knack of picking holes through our security arrangements and make us look vulnerable to their radical motivations.
While the Prime Minister has already termed Naxalism as the greatest internal security threat, we need better counter strategies and mechanism including better coordination and intelligence sharing among the states falling in the so-called Red Corridor where Naxals are said to be active. Along with Purulia and Bankura, West Medinipur is part of the Red Corridor. It is a Maoist bastion contiguous to Jharkhand, the hotbed of Left radicalism. The inter-state border serves as an exit point after every act of dare-devilry by the Maoists.
It is long acknowledged that these districts need more attention in terms of more developmental initiatives. However, what is surprising is the failure on the part of the Maoists to see reason. While the government has been making every effort to ratchet up the developmental process in these under-developed regions, the Maoists are just not allowing the administration to do the needful in the area. With no positive plan of their own, the Naxals are forcing the administration to waste its energy and time by such meaningless act of theirs.
Friday, January 30, 2009
Understanding Popular Angst Against Politics
*Saumitra Mohan
The attack on Mumbai and its aftermath had resulted in a lot of drama and symbolisms with popular shock and disgust being experienced against politics and politicians. But, it needs no reiteration to say that no country can be run without a leader or many leaders at different levels howsoever they may be. Whatever political system we may have, the leaders shall always be required and so they shall continue to exist. This is more truthful for a democratic country like ours.
While much of this antipathy and revulsion may be seemingly justified, the same is definitely not wholesome for the health of our polity. After all, it is the political class or leadership from which are elected the peoples’ representatives who finally go on to form our government. A country without acceptable and responsible political leadership is actually an invitation to anarchy and chaos of the worst kind. While this revulsion seemed to be against all kinds of political leaders, this was actually targeted against a particular set of leaders who could practically be changed and replaced by the same people who have taken cudgels against them.
Have not the same people chosen and elected the leaders they are protesting against? The politics of a country is actually the reflection of the character of the larger society as our political class is actually a sub-set of the same. We get what we deserve. So, if we are not pleased with a particular set of leaders, it is well nigh in our hands to change and replace the same. The issue at hand is not of finding fault and pointing fingers, but that of finding and ferreting out problems and fixing the same.
This outrage against politicians is also an outrage against politics, but here again, the common man is on the wrong foot because we also cannot do without politics. Someone has rightly said, ‘whatever we may do or say, we may not be interested in politics, but politics is interested in us’. And politics is not only about all the wrong things that we have come to identify it with, but it is actually about all the positive things we do not associate it with. Etymologically speaking, politics originated from the Greek word ‘polis’, referring to the ‘city-state’ of Greece. Hence, politics means activities or affairs relating to the welfare of the ‘city-state’. Now the same has come to be identified with the acts and activities pertaining to the welfare of the modern sovereign state. Ergo, politics is the very basis of our lives and we just cannot do without it. It is just so essential to our living.
Politics operates at every level, starting from an inter-personal relationship in a family to a business organisation to the political system as we have come to know it. We just cannot do without it. After all, it provides us the basic life-blood for organizing our community living by instilling a sense of order and regulation throughout our corporate and communal living. In fact, the people busy protesting against politicians, perhaps don’t realise that they themselves are indulging in politics by such acts of theirs. By leading hundreds of thousands of people across Indian cities and towns, they had quietly taken over the role of a political leader. And whether they accept it or not, their act was very much political.
In all this, the ‘Homo Politicus’ or the members of our political class also have to understand the sentiment lying behind these protests and hate campaigns against them. They too have a duty to take their cue and set their house in order. After all, modern liberal democracy is increasingly getting more complex and difficult to handle. Now the means of information and communication have penetrated the civil society so deeply that a citizen even in the remotest village is reasonably informed about the happenings in different corners of the country. Now, s/he is also more capable of culling and processing information and analysing the same to find out the truth in his/her own way. As Abraham Lincoln had said, ‘you could fool some people most of the time or most people some of the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time’.
So, the time has actually come for our political class to come together to not only change the way things happen but to also change the way they have been doing their politics. The time has come to change the way they have been recruiting members for their organisations. Our politics and political culture still do not encourage young and promising men and women to plump for politics as a career. Politics, which throws up political leaders who eventually lead the country, is still not considered good enough to be taken as a career option. Still, the majority of political recruits are those who fail to make a mark academically or in other fields.
The reactions of some members of our political class in the wake of this revulsion and protest by counter-maligning these expressions of protests were also not in order as one would have expected them to be much nuanced and sobered than they actually were. After all, being leaders they are supposed to shape and lead from the front rather than coming out with another set of negatives as a counter to publicly-expressed sense of outrage. Politics, like any other thing, comes in a package. If you have loved the popular adulation and admiration, then you ought to be ready for the kind of revulsion and outrage as were noticed in recent times.
The tendency of a section of our political class to build the war hysteria is also not in order as that may not take us anywhere. It is more than true and established that a neighbouring country has been bent on ‘bleeding India through thousand cuts’. But the fact also remains that if we can set our own house in order, they could never do anything to us. After all, the terrorists who allegedly came from Pakistan came through our sea lanes, walked our roads, entered our hotels and finally executed their appointed tasks. And if they could all do these with ease, do not we ourselves have to blame somewhere.
We have accepted and acknowledged the security and intelligence lapses which happened and we have to guard against the same if we are to ward off their recurrence in future. Our preventive and pre-emptive actions including our intelligence gathering and processing have to be better and more effective than they have been. The proposed setting up of the ‘National Investigation Agency’ and reinforcement of other relevant laws further are definitely steps in the right direction.
While we need to cautious all the times, the terrorist needs just a single opportunity or one oversight on our part to strike all over again. So, we can never afford to lower our guard. But even with all our resources, it is just not possible to man and police each and every inch of the length and breadth of this country. So more than anything else, we need a conscientious and responsible citizen who needs to be careful and cautious all the times. After all, these are not normal times. We can not only blame our political class or the Government and free ourselves of all our responsibilities that devolve upon us as a citizen of this country. After all, it is the people who are the real leaders in a democracy.
One feels that that concept of ‘Neighbourhood Watch’ and ‘Community Policing’ needs to be operationalized more than is done presently. The National Cadet Corps, National Service Scheme and our Civil Defence systems should be further reinforced and be made more broad-based. Their beefing up would mean educating and training common citizens for the purposes of reinforcing our internal security system. Having more watchful and responsible citizens should solve much of our problems. We also need to upgrade the basic security measures. It should be made compulsory for the crowded establishments including markets, malls, hotels, cafeteria, restaurants, hospitals and education centres to put in place basic security measures including installation of security gates, latest metal/explosive detectors, installation of close-circuit cameras and a system of identity check besides building a city surveillance system by the local police.
*Saumitra Mohan
The attack on Mumbai and its aftermath had resulted in a lot of drama and symbolisms with popular shock and disgust being experienced against politics and politicians. But, it needs no reiteration to say that no country can be run without a leader or many leaders at different levels howsoever they may be. Whatever political system we may have, the leaders shall always be required and so they shall continue to exist. This is more truthful for a democratic country like ours.
While much of this antipathy and revulsion may be seemingly justified, the same is definitely not wholesome for the health of our polity. After all, it is the political class or leadership from which are elected the peoples’ representatives who finally go on to form our government. A country without acceptable and responsible political leadership is actually an invitation to anarchy and chaos of the worst kind. While this revulsion seemed to be against all kinds of political leaders, this was actually targeted against a particular set of leaders who could practically be changed and replaced by the same people who have taken cudgels against them.
Have not the same people chosen and elected the leaders they are protesting against? The politics of a country is actually the reflection of the character of the larger society as our political class is actually a sub-set of the same. We get what we deserve. So, if we are not pleased with a particular set of leaders, it is well nigh in our hands to change and replace the same. The issue at hand is not of finding fault and pointing fingers, but that of finding and ferreting out problems and fixing the same.
This outrage against politicians is also an outrage against politics, but here again, the common man is on the wrong foot because we also cannot do without politics. Someone has rightly said, ‘whatever we may do or say, we may not be interested in politics, but politics is interested in us’. And politics is not only about all the wrong things that we have come to identify it with, but it is actually about all the positive things we do not associate it with. Etymologically speaking, politics originated from the Greek word ‘polis’, referring to the ‘city-state’ of Greece. Hence, politics means activities or affairs relating to the welfare of the ‘city-state’. Now the same has come to be identified with the acts and activities pertaining to the welfare of the modern sovereign state. Ergo, politics is the very basis of our lives and we just cannot do without it. It is just so essential to our living.
Politics operates at every level, starting from an inter-personal relationship in a family to a business organisation to the political system as we have come to know it. We just cannot do without it. After all, it provides us the basic life-blood for organizing our community living by instilling a sense of order and regulation throughout our corporate and communal living. In fact, the people busy protesting against politicians, perhaps don’t realise that they themselves are indulging in politics by such acts of theirs. By leading hundreds of thousands of people across Indian cities and towns, they had quietly taken over the role of a political leader. And whether they accept it or not, their act was very much political.
In all this, the ‘Homo Politicus’ or the members of our political class also have to understand the sentiment lying behind these protests and hate campaigns against them. They too have a duty to take their cue and set their house in order. After all, modern liberal democracy is increasingly getting more complex and difficult to handle. Now the means of information and communication have penetrated the civil society so deeply that a citizen even in the remotest village is reasonably informed about the happenings in different corners of the country. Now, s/he is also more capable of culling and processing information and analysing the same to find out the truth in his/her own way. As Abraham Lincoln had said, ‘you could fool some people most of the time or most people some of the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time’.
So, the time has actually come for our political class to come together to not only change the way things happen but to also change the way they have been doing their politics. The time has come to change the way they have been recruiting members for their organisations. Our politics and political culture still do not encourage young and promising men and women to plump for politics as a career. Politics, which throws up political leaders who eventually lead the country, is still not considered good enough to be taken as a career option. Still, the majority of political recruits are those who fail to make a mark academically or in other fields.
The reactions of some members of our political class in the wake of this revulsion and protest by counter-maligning these expressions of protests were also not in order as one would have expected them to be much nuanced and sobered than they actually were. After all, being leaders they are supposed to shape and lead from the front rather than coming out with another set of negatives as a counter to publicly-expressed sense of outrage. Politics, like any other thing, comes in a package. If you have loved the popular adulation and admiration, then you ought to be ready for the kind of revulsion and outrage as were noticed in recent times.
The tendency of a section of our political class to build the war hysteria is also not in order as that may not take us anywhere. It is more than true and established that a neighbouring country has been bent on ‘bleeding India through thousand cuts’. But the fact also remains that if we can set our own house in order, they could never do anything to us. After all, the terrorists who allegedly came from Pakistan came through our sea lanes, walked our roads, entered our hotels and finally executed their appointed tasks. And if they could all do these with ease, do not we ourselves have to blame somewhere.
We have accepted and acknowledged the security and intelligence lapses which happened and we have to guard against the same if we are to ward off their recurrence in future. Our preventive and pre-emptive actions including our intelligence gathering and processing have to be better and more effective than they have been. The proposed setting up of the ‘National Investigation Agency’ and reinforcement of other relevant laws further are definitely steps in the right direction.
While we need to cautious all the times, the terrorist needs just a single opportunity or one oversight on our part to strike all over again. So, we can never afford to lower our guard. But even with all our resources, it is just not possible to man and police each and every inch of the length and breadth of this country. So more than anything else, we need a conscientious and responsible citizen who needs to be careful and cautious all the times. After all, these are not normal times. We can not only blame our political class or the Government and free ourselves of all our responsibilities that devolve upon us as a citizen of this country. After all, it is the people who are the real leaders in a democracy.
One feels that that concept of ‘Neighbourhood Watch’ and ‘Community Policing’ needs to be operationalized more than is done presently. The National Cadet Corps, National Service Scheme and our Civil Defence systems should be further reinforced and be made more broad-based. Their beefing up would mean educating and training common citizens for the purposes of reinforcing our internal security system. Having more watchful and responsible citizens should solve much of our problems. We also need to upgrade the basic security measures. It should be made compulsory for the crowded establishments including markets, malls, hotels, cafeteria, restaurants, hospitals and education centres to put in place basic security measures including installation of security gates, latest metal/explosive detectors, installation of close-circuit cameras and a system of identity check besides building a city surveillance system by the local police.
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
New Religion for New Times: Some Reflections
Saumitra Mohan
Even as India grapples with the after-effects of a raging economic recession, one very positive but significant development in the country has gone markedly unnoticed. This relates to the recent declaration and signing of a ‘fatwa’ against terror by the 6000 odd Muslim clerics under the leadership of Darul Uloom Deoband. This has been done with the intent to disentangle and dissociate terror from ‘Jihad’. That is a message for non-Muslims who are driven to a negativism about Islam by their misplaced identification of this faith with terror. This also sends a strong message to those of the faith who are not well up on the scriptures and, therefore, may be led into violence by the twisted reasoning of extremists who identify ‘terror’ with ‘Jihad’.
These 6000 clerics also seem to have taken a conscious decision to establish counselling centres for the Muslim youths to wean them away from terrorism. This act would significantly help tackle the so-called menace of Islamic fundamentalism, if at all such a thing exists. After all, fundamentalism of any genre cannot and ought not to be logically associated with any particular religion as that goes against anything and everything that a religion stands for.
The religious fundamentalism generally stems from a confused communalism which has really been a bane of our times. Here, by communalism one means ‘the tendency to associate oneself with the perceived welfare and promotion of one’s community by any means’, thereby enlarging the scope of communalism to also include casteism, regionalism, linguistic chauvinism and of course, religious fundamentalism among others. It is this pathological communalism of one or the other hue which usually informs the basic contents of politics and politicking of a significant section of the political class in our country. And one really feels that unless and until one can tackle and fix this aspect of our political culture, our nation building process remains endangered, to say the least.
Today, it is religious fundamentalism of one or the other genus which is the major threat to international peace and security as well as visualised by Samuel Huntington in his ‘Clash of Civilizations’ thesis. If Islamic fundamentalism within and without our country has been a major problem, then Hindu fundamentalism as a counter to the former is also no less of a problem to be fixed in time before it shapes up for uglier turns. At least, that is what seems to be the message from the latest revelations into the Malegaon blasts. As a country, we have been witness to the most hideous forms of religious communalism from time to time, be it during the birth of this country, in the aftermath of Indira Gandhi’s assassination in 1984 or in 1990, 1992, 2002, now in Kandhamal in Orissa or at other times in the forms of smaller and sporadic conflagrations.
Caste, linguistic or regionalist riots have also been a routine, but cancerous fixture of our body politic which immediately needs to be surgically excised in the better interest of the health of our beloved nation. It is because of this negative, noxious and macabre quality attributed to religion that Karl Marx called ‘religion as an opium of the masses’ which a section of our political class has always found convenient to harness for their petty politicking as a sedative potion to numb the basic senses of hoi polloi to further their nefarious and incendiary agenda.
Philosophically speaking, it is believed by many that multiple mutants of religion germinated and grew in different parts of the world because of the fact that different societies developed in different parts of the world detached from each other. These societies desperately wanting to end the ‘nasty, brutish and poor’ Hobbesian state of nature needed something to regulate and regiment their daily lives with as also to explain the various questions, scruples, doubts and nature’s mysteries. It is to fill this void that religion came to be developed, but owing to absence of adequate means of communications and transportations among different societies, there developed different types of religions. Hence, the existence of multiple religions in our societies. And all these religions have been playing a role since then, often larger than one ever expected them to.
Today, religion has come to suffuse and infuse the major part of human ontology, often playing larger than life roles, really unwarranted for our times. One feels that as human society is more developed now, has resolved many of nature’s mysteries, overcome its many depredations and now that the means of transportations and communications have afforded us an excellent opportunity to cull out the best aspects and features of sundry world religions, the time has come to revise and modify not only the contents of religion, but also the roles it has been playing. It we don’t reinvent the religion to better suit the genius of our times then, it would be sooner than later that religion, which rendered yeoman’s service to humanity at different points of time, would not only prove to be a major impediment in the growth of the human society, but shall actually preside over the destruction of the same.
One really feels that religion has played enough havoc with our lives to deserve further continuance in the form in which it exists and subsists now. The sensible sections of our political class along with equally sensible sections of the religious leaders have a major role to play here. The way religion influences our day-to-day lives today, it is well nigh impossible to uproot and extirpate it completely, but it can definitely be shaped up differently to better suit our needs. The attempts have been made in our very own country by the ilks of Gautam Buddha, Mahavira, Kabir, or other great philosophers including Bahaullah the world over, but all have succeeded partially because of one or the other reasons. In fact, all such attempts actually helped spawn more religions than reducing and telescoping different religions into one overarching metaphysical code for the human being.
We need to rediscover the religion, if not reinvent it in the form of a more humane and humanitarian tool to allow the human society to lead a peaceful corporate life. We ought not to allow, any longer, different religions to continue competing with each other for the supremacy and greatness of one or the other, thereby creating powder keg of a situation which could ignite a major conflagration to engulf the relatively young intelligent life on this Blue Planet. One does feel that one can not completely tear religion away from one’s life because of the inability of science to provide many answers and explanations and because of the purgatory and other functional roles it plays. For example, religion has a positive role to play in the way it creates and provides various social occasions for the adherents to come together to celebrate the beauty of human life. Such functional roles are important to promote a corporate and community living as well as to exercise basic regimentation and regulation over more than necessary deviant individualism and bohemianism in human societies.
But beyond this, if we allow religion to dictate and regulate even the secular aspects of our living, then it would start playing the kind of havoc it has been playing for quite some time, hence the need for its rediscovery. One really feels that the existence of numerous religions is not advisable and healthy for our times. We can very well combine and collate the best features of different religions of this world to have a single overarching religion. It would not only banish the need for religious bigotry and incendiary fundamentalism from our midst, but would also fix the many baneful complexities associated with it. However, doing so definitely does not mean immediately removing all the culturally and socially functional features including festivals that have come to be associated with different religions. In fact, they can very well continue in their improved and sanitized adaptations as parts of the new world religion.
Saumitra Mohan
Even as India grapples with the after-effects of a raging economic recession, one very positive but significant development in the country has gone markedly unnoticed. This relates to the recent declaration and signing of a ‘fatwa’ against terror by the 6000 odd Muslim clerics under the leadership of Darul Uloom Deoband. This has been done with the intent to disentangle and dissociate terror from ‘Jihad’. That is a message for non-Muslims who are driven to a negativism about Islam by their misplaced identification of this faith with terror. This also sends a strong message to those of the faith who are not well up on the scriptures and, therefore, may be led into violence by the twisted reasoning of extremists who identify ‘terror’ with ‘Jihad’.
These 6000 clerics also seem to have taken a conscious decision to establish counselling centres for the Muslim youths to wean them away from terrorism. This act would significantly help tackle the so-called menace of Islamic fundamentalism, if at all such a thing exists. After all, fundamentalism of any genre cannot and ought not to be logically associated with any particular religion as that goes against anything and everything that a religion stands for.
The religious fundamentalism generally stems from a confused communalism which has really been a bane of our times. Here, by communalism one means ‘the tendency to associate oneself with the perceived welfare and promotion of one’s community by any means’, thereby enlarging the scope of communalism to also include casteism, regionalism, linguistic chauvinism and of course, religious fundamentalism among others. It is this pathological communalism of one or the other hue which usually informs the basic contents of politics and politicking of a significant section of the political class in our country. And one really feels that unless and until one can tackle and fix this aspect of our political culture, our nation building process remains endangered, to say the least.
Today, it is religious fundamentalism of one or the other genus which is the major threat to international peace and security as well as visualised by Samuel Huntington in his ‘Clash of Civilizations’ thesis. If Islamic fundamentalism within and without our country has been a major problem, then Hindu fundamentalism as a counter to the former is also no less of a problem to be fixed in time before it shapes up for uglier turns. At least, that is what seems to be the message from the latest revelations into the Malegaon blasts. As a country, we have been witness to the most hideous forms of religious communalism from time to time, be it during the birth of this country, in the aftermath of Indira Gandhi’s assassination in 1984 or in 1990, 1992, 2002, now in Kandhamal in Orissa or at other times in the forms of smaller and sporadic conflagrations.
Caste, linguistic or regionalist riots have also been a routine, but cancerous fixture of our body politic which immediately needs to be surgically excised in the better interest of the health of our beloved nation. It is because of this negative, noxious and macabre quality attributed to religion that Karl Marx called ‘religion as an opium of the masses’ which a section of our political class has always found convenient to harness for their petty politicking as a sedative potion to numb the basic senses of hoi polloi to further their nefarious and incendiary agenda.
Philosophically speaking, it is believed by many that multiple mutants of religion germinated and grew in different parts of the world because of the fact that different societies developed in different parts of the world detached from each other. These societies desperately wanting to end the ‘nasty, brutish and poor’ Hobbesian state of nature needed something to regulate and regiment their daily lives with as also to explain the various questions, scruples, doubts and nature’s mysteries. It is to fill this void that religion came to be developed, but owing to absence of adequate means of communications and transportations among different societies, there developed different types of religions. Hence, the existence of multiple religions in our societies. And all these religions have been playing a role since then, often larger than one ever expected them to.
Today, religion has come to suffuse and infuse the major part of human ontology, often playing larger than life roles, really unwarranted for our times. One feels that as human society is more developed now, has resolved many of nature’s mysteries, overcome its many depredations and now that the means of transportations and communications have afforded us an excellent opportunity to cull out the best aspects and features of sundry world religions, the time has come to revise and modify not only the contents of religion, but also the roles it has been playing. It we don’t reinvent the religion to better suit the genius of our times then, it would be sooner than later that religion, which rendered yeoman’s service to humanity at different points of time, would not only prove to be a major impediment in the growth of the human society, but shall actually preside over the destruction of the same.
One really feels that religion has played enough havoc with our lives to deserve further continuance in the form in which it exists and subsists now. The sensible sections of our political class along with equally sensible sections of the religious leaders have a major role to play here. The way religion influences our day-to-day lives today, it is well nigh impossible to uproot and extirpate it completely, but it can definitely be shaped up differently to better suit our needs. The attempts have been made in our very own country by the ilks of Gautam Buddha, Mahavira, Kabir, or other great philosophers including Bahaullah the world over, but all have succeeded partially because of one or the other reasons. In fact, all such attempts actually helped spawn more religions than reducing and telescoping different religions into one overarching metaphysical code for the human being.
We need to rediscover the religion, if not reinvent it in the form of a more humane and humanitarian tool to allow the human society to lead a peaceful corporate life. We ought not to allow, any longer, different religions to continue competing with each other for the supremacy and greatness of one or the other, thereby creating powder keg of a situation which could ignite a major conflagration to engulf the relatively young intelligent life on this Blue Planet. One does feel that one can not completely tear religion away from one’s life because of the inability of science to provide many answers and explanations and because of the purgatory and other functional roles it plays. For example, religion has a positive role to play in the way it creates and provides various social occasions for the adherents to come together to celebrate the beauty of human life. Such functional roles are important to promote a corporate and community living as well as to exercise basic regimentation and regulation over more than necessary deviant individualism and bohemianism in human societies.
But beyond this, if we allow religion to dictate and regulate even the secular aspects of our living, then it would start playing the kind of havoc it has been playing for quite some time, hence the need for its rediscovery. One really feels that the existence of numerous religions is not advisable and healthy for our times. We can very well combine and collate the best features of different religions of this world to have a single overarching religion. It would not only banish the need for religious bigotry and incendiary fundamentalism from our midst, but would also fix the many baneful complexities associated with it. However, doing so definitely does not mean immediately removing all the culturally and socially functional features including festivals that have come to be associated with different religions. In fact, they can very well continue in their improved and sanitized adaptations as parts of the new world religion.
Cooperative Globalism: Need of Our Times
*Saumitra Mohan
The raging economic recession the world over has shown and proven beyond doubts the dilemmas and pitfalls of unfettered globalization. Today, it is very much acknowledged and accepted that closed economy in a globalized liberal world is oxymoronic. So, more globalization is something which has been taken for granted. While all along we all thought that the Indian economy is well placed and inherently strong enough not to be affected by the US recession, but now we know that the complex economic independence a la Joseph Nye and Robert Keohane has grown intense and dense enough as to make it next to impossible to insulate one’s economy completely from being affected by the external factors.
What is surprising is the failure to recognise the fact that today a seemingly nationalist issue or a national crisis is not completely because of some internal factors, but is actually spurred and aggravated by the external factors which are often beyond our ken and control. Such crises provide the best opportunities to get our act together to put up the best policy responses. But the act of shutting one’s economy or closing up on more imports or framing stringent immigration policies is, in fact, prejudicial to the ethos of our times. Having liberalised and globalised our economies, we just cannot go back to the days of narrow nationalism.
The so-called ‘Washington Consensus’ around which the extant economic-financial architecture was constructed has actually been wanting in many respects. Western countries, who have been the principal promoters of the ‘open door’ neo-classical economic policies have themselves never been firm believers in their own ideology as reflected in their befuddled policy responses. While they have strongly espoused free movement of capital, they have always opposed free movement of labour. Again, while they have always promoted transfer of primary goods and natural resources from the South to the North, they have never been true votaries of transfer of technologies, as also reflected in their stringent patent laws. They desire unhindered access to our markets, but would not allow similar access to their markets and technologies, further mirrored in their different tariff and non-tariff barriers.
While they have been busy polluting the earth all these years by way of unsustainable consumerism, they now want the Third World to shoulder the major burden in the proposed ‘clean-up’ act without also wanting to share the requisite technology or financial resources needed for the purpose. Not only that, while they have all benefitted from a reckless and feckless colonial and neo-colonial economic development policy, they now want us to cut our consumption and stop growing without in any way agreeing to lower their stinking consumerism.
The West actually got inebriated at the ideological victory of liberal capitalism in the aftermath of the collapse of the former Soviet Union as symbolised in the theoretical assumptions of Francis Fukuyama namely ‘the End of History’. The West never realised that the capitalism of today is not really the unadulterated capitalism of Adam Smith and David Ricardo, but is actually its more tempered and sanitized self imbibing many features of communism and socialism. The best of the two systems have well harmonised in the form of democratic welfarism or welfare capitalism as it exists now in the so-called liberal capitalist societies. The recent economic crises of South-East Asia and the extant domino-like fall of big financial or industrial houses has further led some observers to point to the failure of the ‘State’ to play the role of an impartial and effective arbitrator to manage the anarchical world system though diametrically contrary views have also been equally stronger.
Today, the globalised world provides ample windows on rest of the world via demonstration effect to afford a comparative analysis and appreciation of one’s situation thereby arousing the sense of dissatisfaction and discontent among the not so privileged sections of the global population. While we have healthy, educated and economically well-off sections of the global society, we also have unenlightened, uneducated and very poor sections of the global majority. This also results in ‘development of underdevelopment’, something which the ECLA (Economic Committee of Latin America) school led by Andre Gunder Frank and his contemporaries identified long back. So, one thing that we all need to realise immediately is the fact that we can no longer afford the continued co-existence of islands of affluence and vast deserts of underdevelopment simultaneously as that opens the door to discords and disaffections. Religious terrorism, Naxalite extremism and separatist violence are examples of the same.
What one means to emphasise here is the fact that today the State is no longer a self-confident, self-reliant unit which can handle all its problems on its own and which can actually provide the proverbial security to all the nationals through its unquestioned monopoly over the use of coercive force. The ‘sovereign’ quality characterising the State has already come under severe attack from different quarters, so the very concept of ‘nation-state’ is on the retreat. Today, we have non-state actors within and without the state boundaries with many features of the State and who thereby severely compromise state’s capacity to secure its nationals, the basic purpose for which the citizens entered into a ‘Covenant’ with the State. Today, the inter-continental ballistic missiles, international organisations, international business organisations, international laws, global finance capital, multi-national and trans-national companies, internet and other sophisticated means of communication and transportation and many such factors don’t recognise national boundaries thereby severely denting the concept of sovereignty.
Against such a background, it is definitely not advisable to be unilateralist while trying to resolve one’s national problems. These problems are global in nature and have their origins in globalised external factors. They need global solutions rather than individualised nationalist approach as reflected in the protectionist behaviour of many countries. The penchant for unilateralist interventions in other countries internal affairs and employing a subservient United Nations to endorse the same is also unwholesome and calls for a change of attitude from those at the top of the international pecking order.
It is really high time that the North and the South got together to identify the core issues and problems facing the world today and come out with uniform approach for resolving the same. We not only have to ensure a sustainable development paradigm for promising a better future to the posterity, but also have to ensure that the same is done without encouraging unhealthy tendencies and forces as might necessitate the prophets of doom like Samuel Huntington to declaim a ‘clash of civilisations’ sooner than later. The West has long battened and fattened through colonial or neo-colonial policies and developed at the expense of the developing and underdeveloped countries. They cannot completely absolve themselves from their responsibility to shoulder the burden of providing the basic level of comfort and development for the underprivileged denizens of the South. Joseph Stiglitz has rightly identified the pitfalls of unfettered globalisation underscoring the need rendering it more humane, simultaneously also halting the dispossession of the poor and the indigent.
The truth remains that in an unequal world with unequal resources in unequal circumstances, we cannot ask different segments of global population to compete on equal footing. We have to guard against this misplaced egalitarianism and promote balanced development of the global society which results in the healthy survival of all without compromising the interests of the fragile environment. The corporate affluence of all shall mean enough purchasing power for all resulting in abundant demand creation and the resultant demand for supplies and thereby growth in employment opportunities. We need to appreciate that development of one is the development of all and the development of all is the development of one. One also feels that the time has come when we go beyond ‘statism’ or parochial ‘nationalism’ and move to genuine ‘internationalism’ in a spirit of cooperative globalism.
*Saumitra Mohan
The raging economic recession the world over has shown and proven beyond doubts the dilemmas and pitfalls of unfettered globalization. Today, it is very much acknowledged and accepted that closed economy in a globalized liberal world is oxymoronic. So, more globalization is something which has been taken for granted. While all along we all thought that the Indian economy is well placed and inherently strong enough not to be affected by the US recession, but now we know that the complex economic independence a la Joseph Nye and Robert Keohane has grown intense and dense enough as to make it next to impossible to insulate one’s economy completely from being affected by the external factors.
What is surprising is the failure to recognise the fact that today a seemingly nationalist issue or a national crisis is not completely because of some internal factors, but is actually spurred and aggravated by the external factors which are often beyond our ken and control. Such crises provide the best opportunities to get our act together to put up the best policy responses. But the act of shutting one’s economy or closing up on more imports or framing stringent immigration policies is, in fact, prejudicial to the ethos of our times. Having liberalised and globalised our economies, we just cannot go back to the days of narrow nationalism.
The so-called ‘Washington Consensus’ around which the extant economic-financial architecture was constructed has actually been wanting in many respects. Western countries, who have been the principal promoters of the ‘open door’ neo-classical economic policies have themselves never been firm believers in their own ideology as reflected in their befuddled policy responses. While they have strongly espoused free movement of capital, they have always opposed free movement of labour. Again, while they have always promoted transfer of primary goods and natural resources from the South to the North, they have never been true votaries of transfer of technologies, as also reflected in their stringent patent laws. They desire unhindered access to our markets, but would not allow similar access to their markets and technologies, further mirrored in their different tariff and non-tariff barriers.
While they have been busy polluting the earth all these years by way of unsustainable consumerism, they now want the Third World to shoulder the major burden in the proposed ‘clean-up’ act without also wanting to share the requisite technology or financial resources needed for the purpose. Not only that, while they have all benefitted from a reckless and feckless colonial and neo-colonial economic development policy, they now want us to cut our consumption and stop growing without in any way agreeing to lower their stinking consumerism.
The West actually got inebriated at the ideological victory of liberal capitalism in the aftermath of the collapse of the former Soviet Union as symbolised in the theoretical assumptions of Francis Fukuyama namely ‘the End of History’. The West never realised that the capitalism of today is not really the unadulterated capitalism of Adam Smith and David Ricardo, but is actually its more tempered and sanitized self imbibing many features of communism and socialism. The best of the two systems have well harmonised in the form of democratic welfarism or welfare capitalism as it exists now in the so-called liberal capitalist societies. The recent economic crises of South-East Asia and the extant domino-like fall of big financial or industrial houses has further led some observers to point to the failure of the ‘State’ to play the role of an impartial and effective arbitrator to manage the anarchical world system though diametrically contrary views have also been equally stronger.
Today, the globalised world provides ample windows on rest of the world via demonstration effect to afford a comparative analysis and appreciation of one’s situation thereby arousing the sense of dissatisfaction and discontent among the not so privileged sections of the global population. While we have healthy, educated and economically well-off sections of the global society, we also have unenlightened, uneducated and very poor sections of the global majority. This also results in ‘development of underdevelopment’, something which the ECLA (Economic Committee of Latin America) school led by Andre Gunder Frank and his contemporaries identified long back. So, one thing that we all need to realise immediately is the fact that we can no longer afford the continued co-existence of islands of affluence and vast deserts of underdevelopment simultaneously as that opens the door to discords and disaffections. Religious terrorism, Naxalite extremism and separatist violence are examples of the same.
What one means to emphasise here is the fact that today the State is no longer a self-confident, self-reliant unit which can handle all its problems on its own and which can actually provide the proverbial security to all the nationals through its unquestioned monopoly over the use of coercive force. The ‘sovereign’ quality characterising the State has already come under severe attack from different quarters, so the very concept of ‘nation-state’ is on the retreat. Today, we have non-state actors within and without the state boundaries with many features of the State and who thereby severely compromise state’s capacity to secure its nationals, the basic purpose for which the citizens entered into a ‘Covenant’ with the State. Today, the inter-continental ballistic missiles, international organisations, international business organisations, international laws, global finance capital, multi-national and trans-national companies, internet and other sophisticated means of communication and transportation and many such factors don’t recognise national boundaries thereby severely denting the concept of sovereignty.
Against such a background, it is definitely not advisable to be unilateralist while trying to resolve one’s national problems. These problems are global in nature and have their origins in globalised external factors. They need global solutions rather than individualised nationalist approach as reflected in the protectionist behaviour of many countries. The penchant for unilateralist interventions in other countries internal affairs and employing a subservient United Nations to endorse the same is also unwholesome and calls for a change of attitude from those at the top of the international pecking order.
It is really high time that the North and the South got together to identify the core issues and problems facing the world today and come out with uniform approach for resolving the same. We not only have to ensure a sustainable development paradigm for promising a better future to the posterity, but also have to ensure that the same is done without encouraging unhealthy tendencies and forces as might necessitate the prophets of doom like Samuel Huntington to declaim a ‘clash of civilisations’ sooner than later. The West has long battened and fattened through colonial or neo-colonial policies and developed at the expense of the developing and underdeveloped countries. They cannot completely absolve themselves from their responsibility to shoulder the burden of providing the basic level of comfort and development for the underprivileged denizens of the South. Joseph Stiglitz has rightly identified the pitfalls of unfettered globalisation underscoring the need rendering it more humane, simultaneously also halting the dispossession of the poor and the indigent.
The truth remains that in an unequal world with unequal resources in unequal circumstances, we cannot ask different segments of global population to compete on equal footing. We have to guard against this misplaced egalitarianism and promote balanced development of the global society which results in the healthy survival of all without compromising the interests of the fragile environment. The corporate affluence of all shall mean enough purchasing power for all resulting in abundant demand creation and the resultant demand for supplies and thereby growth in employment opportunities. We need to appreciate that development of one is the development of all and the development of all is the development of one. One also feels that the time has come when we go beyond ‘statism’ or parochial ‘nationalism’ and move to genuine ‘internationalism’ in a spirit of cooperative globalism.
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Reaping Demographic Dividends
Saumitra Mohan
Even though all of us everywhere in the country seem very busy discussing and debating the various dimensions and implications of the impending financial crisis, there is something to cheer about which is going unnoticed in all this. This relates to the demographic dividends which India shall soon be reaping notwithstanding all that talk of various kinds of complex problems stemming from an every growing population in the country.
But before we actually start doing so, there are certain issues which would require sorting out otherwise benefits of demographic dividends shall prove to be a mere wishful thinking, a will-o-the-wisp. We definitely have over a billion people and are told to be adding over 10 million more every year. The demographic dividends is said to accrue on account of the fact that very soon, we shall have less dependent population and more economically productive population, thereby spurring our economic growth further. This is more so at a time when many of the countries in the West are actually witnessing a negative population growth.
However, such an idea may remain a mere wishful thinking if we fail to make value addition to our human resources, if we fail to qualitatively improve our human resources to be used as a workforce in different fields for varied economic activities. After all, with small people with small capacities dotting the length and breadth of our country, we can never hope to be a great country. For being a great country and a great power, there shall be need for people with varied skills and capacities led by a visionary and dynamic leadership.
Today, it is believed that India is going to remain a young country for a long time to come, with very positive implications for our economic development. After all, we are going to have relatively very less economically dependent population on our scare resources than we have had all along. Moreover, we are also going to have more economically productive people. We are at such a crucial juncture of our demographic history when we shall have fewer children and less elderly population, who are generally not only economically unproductive, they are also a drain on our resources, at least, so believe some observers. However, in all this we are likely to have a predominant population engaged in different economic activities, much more in number than we have experienced so far, thereby adding further to the value creation.
Having less dependent population would result in substantive savings which could have otherwise been expended on their care. These savings could be used for undertaking more productive activities and making further investments in the economy with substantial multiplier effects. Having a reduced fertility rate for the women and having fewer children also mean that women are going to have more free time, thereby enabling them to join the productive workforce. Women constituting almost half of our population, their release from their conventional chores might prove to be a blessing in disguise thereby adding to the future economic growth of our country.
Not only this, having less population of children and elderly citizens to tend to would also mean availability of additional resources for the government which it was using for provisioning health and basic education facilities. These additional resources can further supplement government’s productive ventures, including putting up sound infrastructures for spurring economic growth. With surplus resources in the economy, many structural and institutional bottlenecks could be removed as supply side expansion takes place.
But for all this to materialise, the necessary software in the form of positive government policy and favourable ambience shall be required. Besides, social norms or ethics shall also play a critical role as Protestant Ethics did to Europe and the United States if venerable social scientist Max Weber is to be believed. Whether our women shall actually join the productive workforce or not, shall depend on the societal values and attitude which would require positive changes. The spirit or motivation to make money shall also be a crucial factor, quite away from the instinct of glorifying poverty which we have been doing all these years. So, the economic growth shall also depend on specific conditions in a particular country. The success of Marwari and Gujrati community in this country can be attributed, to a great extent, to their positive chrometophilic instincts.
It is believed that one-third of the economic growth we see in South-East Asia is because of their abilities to reap the demographic dividends at a right time in a right fashion. The governments in those countries could successfully provide the basic medical and educational facilities to their population, thereby adding quality to their human resources. This enabled the local population to contribute more productively by way of a more diversified economic activities and substantive value creation in their respective countries.
As a result of surplus disposable money with people on account of less spending on elderly and child population, people can actually spend more on their education and health, which would further add value and quality to the human capital. But one also feels that we shall require sustained spending to continuously upgrade our human resources. In fact, quite against the belief that elderly population is unproductive, one can actually utilise the services of elderly population for selective activities which can better suit their age and physical abilities.
Again, one also feels, at the risk of sounding blasphemous, that over obsession with the phenomenon of child labour is not good as it has been experienced that the children freed from different hazardous/non-hazardous activities get into a more piquant situation, with their families finding it hard to even feed or care for them popularly. A balance has to be found between the needs of providing a healthy childhood to our children and their abilities to sustain themselves economically. If a practical approach to child labour is adopted, then economic productivity of our populace might be more than otherwise possible.
The Neo-Malthusian analysis, however, dispute the demographic dividend argument. They believe that dependence of more population on the same resources can not help economic growth. But one disagrees with their argument. After all, our population density is much less than many of the South-Asian, South East Asian or East Asian countries including Japan and we are naturally much more endowed than many or all of them. The Revisionists also feels that population growth is not a hindrance to the economic development.
But it is not the absolute growth of working population, but the relative growth compared to the child and elderly population that creates scope for reaping demographic dividends. It is not that growth of working population only matters for economic growth. Real opportunity occurs due to a higher growth of working age population coupled with slow and even negative growth of dependent population.
Different states in India are at different stages of demographic transition, so the demographic dividends shall also be reaped variously by them, depending on their respective abilities, motivation and specific policies and social conditions in those states. Though, many feel that the positive linkage between economic growth and demographic dividends phenomenon is not conclusively proved. One just hopes that a right mix of policies and motivation may actually help us turning our huge population’s liability into an asset.
Saumitra Mohan
Even though all of us everywhere in the country seem very busy discussing and debating the various dimensions and implications of the impending financial crisis, there is something to cheer about which is going unnoticed in all this. This relates to the demographic dividends which India shall soon be reaping notwithstanding all that talk of various kinds of complex problems stemming from an every growing population in the country.
But before we actually start doing so, there are certain issues which would require sorting out otherwise benefits of demographic dividends shall prove to be a mere wishful thinking, a will-o-the-wisp. We definitely have over a billion people and are told to be adding over 10 million more every year. The demographic dividends is said to accrue on account of the fact that very soon, we shall have less dependent population and more economically productive population, thereby spurring our economic growth further. This is more so at a time when many of the countries in the West are actually witnessing a negative population growth.
However, such an idea may remain a mere wishful thinking if we fail to make value addition to our human resources, if we fail to qualitatively improve our human resources to be used as a workforce in different fields for varied economic activities. After all, with small people with small capacities dotting the length and breadth of our country, we can never hope to be a great country. For being a great country and a great power, there shall be need for people with varied skills and capacities led by a visionary and dynamic leadership.
Today, it is believed that India is going to remain a young country for a long time to come, with very positive implications for our economic development. After all, we are going to have relatively very less economically dependent population on our scare resources than we have had all along. Moreover, we are also going to have more economically productive people. We are at such a crucial juncture of our demographic history when we shall have fewer children and less elderly population, who are generally not only economically unproductive, they are also a drain on our resources, at least, so believe some observers. However, in all this we are likely to have a predominant population engaged in different economic activities, much more in number than we have experienced so far, thereby adding further to the value creation.
Having less dependent population would result in substantive savings which could have otherwise been expended on their care. These savings could be used for undertaking more productive activities and making further investments in the economy with substantial multiplier effects. Having a reduced fertility rate for the women and having fewer children also mean that women are going to have more free time, thereby enabling them to join the productive workforce. Women constituting almost half of our population, their release from their conventional chores might prove to be a blessing in disguise thereby adding to the future economic growth of our country.
Not only this, having less population of children and elderly citizens to tend to would also mean availability of additional resources for the government which it was using for provisioning health and basic education facilities. These additional resources can further supplement government’s productive ventures, including putting up sound infrastructures for spurring economic growth. With surplus resources in the economy, many structural and institutional bottlenecks could be removed as supply side expansion takes place.
But for all this to materialise, the necessary software in the form of positive government policy and favourable ambience shall be required. Besides, social norms or ethics shall also play a critical role as Protestant Ethics did to Europe and the United States if venerable social scientist Max Weber is to be believed. Whether our women shall actually join the productive workforce or not, shall depend on the societal values and attitude which would require positive changes. The spirit or motivation to make money shall also be a crucial factor, quite away from the instinct of glorifying poverty which we have been doing all these years. So, the economic growth shall also depend on specific conditions in a particular country. The success of Marwari and Gujrati community in this country can be attributed, to a great extent, to their positive chrometophilic instincts.
It is believed that one-third of the economic growth we see in South-East Asia is because of their abilities to reap the demographic dividends at a right time in a right fashion. The governments in those countries could successfully provide the basic medical and educational facilities to their population, thereby adding quality to their human resources. This enabled the local population to contribute more productively by way of a more diversified economic activities and substantive value creation in their respective countries.
As a result of surplus disposable money with people on account of less spending on elderly and child population, people can actually spend more on their education and health, which would further add value and quality to the human capital. But one also feels that we shall require sustained spending to continuously upgrade our human resources. In fact, quite against the belief that elderly population is unproductive, one can actually utilise the services of elderly population for selective activities which can better suit their age and physical abilities.
Again, one also feels, at the risk of sounding blasphemous, that over obsession with the phenomenon of child labour is not good as it has been experienced that the children freed from different hazardous/non-hazardous activities get into a more piquant situation, with their families finding it hard to even feed or care for them popularly. A balance has to be found between the needs of providing a healthy childhood to our children and their abilities to sustain themselves economically. If a practical approach to child labour is adopted, then economic productivity of our populace might be more than otherwise possible.
The Neo-Malthusian analysis, however, dispute the demographic dividend argument. They believe that dependence of more population on the same resources can not help economic growth. But one disagrees with their argument. After all, our population density is much less than many of the South-Asian, South East Asian or East Asian countries including Japan and we are naturally much more endowed than many or all of them. The Revisionists also feels that population growth is not a hindrance to the economic development.
But it is not the absolute growth of working population, but the relative growth compared to the child and elderly population that creates scope for reaping demographic dividends. It is not that growth of working population only matters for economic growth. Real opportunity occurs due to a higher growth of working age population coupled with slow and even negative growth of dependent population.
Different states in India are at different stages of demographic transition, so the demographic dividends shall also be reaped variously by them, depending on their respective abilities, motivation and specific policies and social conditions in those states. Though, many feel that the positive linkage between economic growth and demographic dividends phenomenon is not conclusively proved. One just hopes that a right mix of policies and motivation may actually help us turning our huge population’s liability into an asset.
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Politics and Politicking: Need for a Change
*Saumitra Mohan
Just when you thought that our state building and nation building processes are proceeding well and we are moving fast up the pecking order in the Comity of Nations, you have a slew of negative developments which shake your confidence. A look around the country presents the picture of a country under siege. Be it floods in Bihar, terrorism and secessionism in Jammu and Kashmir, North-East or elsewhere in the country, communal riots in Orissa, Dera Saccha Sauda bickering in Punjab, land acquisition agitations in West Bengal and elsewhere, simmering Naxal extremism in a good expanse of the country, problem of price rise, frequent resort to ‘bandh’ and ‘strikes’, or the recent terrorist strikes around the country, we seem beset with problems from all around.
In all this, it is the common man who is the actual loser. It is this Homo Ordinarius who is really at loss, but still managing to survive notwithstanding the mess he/she finds himself/herself in. And believe it or not, much of this mess is of our own making. Don’t we support and elect the same feckless Homo Politicus with unceasing regularity who has brought all this suffering to us through his/her political shenanigans and skulduggery. Just have a look at any problem around, it would appear that our political class is bent on suicidal one-upmanship and brinkmanship through which untold misery is wreaked on the hoi polloi.
Does our political class really think that a communal riot is politically rewarding, that it wins rich electoral dividends at the hustings? And even if it does, it definitely does the entire system an irreparable damage. Has not every such communal riot boomeranged and been visited by another reactive communal flare-up and bombings, resulting in huge damage to man, materials and our image as the Salad Bowl of a well-knit Nation?
Notwithstanding the judicial ban placed on the instrumentality of ‘bandh’, the political parties continue resorting to the same putting forth sundry arguments in its favour, the principal one being its being the only potent weapon in the hands of the working class. The recent bandh against price rise actually helped the cause of price rise by stopping production and blocking supplies. Do we really think that we do not have any better means for securing workers’ and citizens’ right but for organizing a ‘bandh’, a general strike, a ‘chakka jam’ or outright vandalism? Are we not hurting the interests of the same commoner in whose name we do all this? Surprisingly, many of these politicos agree and accept that these means are no longer relevant, still they fail to evolve a consensus to discontinue with the same.
Do the secessionists in Jammu and Kashmir, another mutant of our political class, really think that creation of a separate country or merger with Pakistan shall end all their problems? Had that been so, Pakistan should have been a developed and happy state by now. But Pakistan’s failure to be so and her subsequent balkanization proves in stark relief the fallacy of such a conception. Today, with state’s theoretical capacity to regulate and secure its borders steadily going down and when borders themselves are becoming irrelevant with more united regional groupings becoming a reality, we are still busy drawing more lines on the geographical map.
Coming back to the topic, as our next door neighbour has to shun and shed her day-dreaming about bleeding India through thousand cuts in her own better interests (has not it hurt itself more than India), our political class also need to reinvent themselves. They need to ferret out better alternatives to a ‘bandh’, ‘strike’, ‘chakka jam’, or outright political violence either in the shape of a communal riot or in any other form. These means need to be positive and productive which neither hurt nor damage our property or the common citizens’ right to carry on unhindered with their daily lives. They ought not to further sully our image as an emerging nation or twitches at our conscience of being the citizen of a country where such unwarranted and undesirables happen.
However, one still believes that India has been doing reasonably well compared to her many time twins in Asia, Africa and Latin America. After all, many of these countries disintegrated before they could complete their state building processes owing to the failure to resolve their internal conflicts. But India has so far gone from strength to strength to take her state-building and nation-building processes on a stronger footing through a mix of consociational social welfare politics. But we would only pull wool over our eyes if we think we can continue doing so notwithstanding all the self-created roadblocks en route.
Our bloated obsession and fixation with the nine per cent growth rate is already getting deflated in the wake of looming global recession. Our desire to be a super power definitely does not gel with our capacities, motivation and determination to get to that elevated and rarefied space. What China could showcase through the Olympic extravaganza was a sheer delight and one really doubts as to whether we could really replicate the same given an opportunity. The fact is that we have assigned a secondary place to the national pride which make the warp and weft of a great nation.
Our political class takes to street at the slightest hint of a disagreement. That bandh and strikes are remnants from the past and are no longer relevant to the interests of our larger polity is something they refuse to understand. Can we really continue to stage our protest and opposition in the way we have been doing all these years. We should not forget that we are a democracy where every issue could be and should be discussed, debated, negotiated and resolved across the table. But quite contrarily, our legislatures have become an arena for fisticuffs and one-to-one duel including outright sanguinary conflicts coming down to the lowest levels as seen in UP, West Bengal and elsewhere in recent times.
The funny part in all this is that the behaviour of the same political party is different while in and out of power. A stand taken by a political party when in power may not be the same while out of power. Out here, the basic tenet of opposition politics seems to be opposition for the sake of opposition, without delving deep into the merit or demerit of the issue. To them, they are duty-bound to oppose and protest against any policy or idea emanating from the treasury benches.
The fact remains that ethics and values have taken a back seat out here. In their bid to attain their baser objectives, the political class does not mind weakening state institutions using whom they are supposed to tackle state problems. These institutions get weakened due to constant interference and tinkering and lose their capacity to respond in times of need. In fact, some elements of our political class are willing to compromise and do anything that can take them to the seat of power including colluding and conniving with the baser elements of the society be it criminals, terrorists or Naxals. Here, the hoi polloi is always on discount, the interest of the politicking elite is what matters most.
Is not it high time when our political class thought of better ways and means to conduct politics through? How long would we continue with the same antediluvian, horse and buggy methods of doing politics? If the politics is really supposed to be about welfare of the citizens of a polity, then we have got the very conception of politics itself goofed up. And unless and until our political class really does something about mending its ways, we had better stop deluding ourselves to be one of the principal movers and shakers on the global scene. The citizens, too, have a duty to put such irresponsible political class in place. Otherwise, we shall cease to grow as a nation.
*Saumitra Mohan
Just when you thought that our state building and nation building processes are proceeding well and we are moving fast up the pecking order in the Comity of Nations, you have a slew of negative developments which shake your confidence. A look around the country presents the picture of a country under siege. Be it floods in Bihar, terrorism and secessionism in Jammu and Kashmir, North-East or elsewhere in the country, communal riots in Orissa, Dera Saccha Sauda bickering in Punjab, land acquisition agitations in West Bengal and elsewhere, simmering Naxal extremism in a good expanse of the country, problem of price rise, frequent resort to ‘bandh’ and ‘strikes’, or the recent terrorist strikes around the country, we seem beset with problems from all around.
In all this, it is the common man who is the actual loser. It is this Homo Ordinarius who is really at loss, but still managing to survive notwithstanding the mess he/she finds himself/herself in. And believe it or not, much of this mess is of our own making. Don’t we support and elect the same feckless Homo Politicus with unceasing regularity who has brought all this suffering to us through his/her political shenanigans and skulduggery. Just have a look at any problem around, it would appear that our political class is bent on suicidal one-upmanship and brinkmanship through which untold misery is wreaked on the hoi polloi.
Does our political class really think that a communal riot is politically rewarding, that it wins rich electoral dividends at the hustings? And even if it does, it definitely does the entire system an irreparable damage. Has not every such communal riot boomeranged and been visited by another reactive communal flare-up and bombings, resulting in huge damage to man, materials and our image as the Salad Bowl of a well-knit Nation?
Notwithstanding the judicial ban placed on the instrumentality of ‘bandh’, the political parties continue resorting to the same putting forth sundry arguments in its favour, the principal one being its being the only potent weapon in the hands of the working class. The recent bandh against price rise actually helped the cause of price rise by stopping production and blocking supplies. Do we really think that we do not have any better means for securing workers’ and citizens’ right but for organizing a ‘bandh’, a general strike, a ‘chakka jam’ or outright vandalism? Are we not hurting the interests of the same commoner in whose name we do all this? Surprisingly, many of these politicos agree and accept that these means are no longer relevant, still they fail to evolve a consensus to discontinue with the same.
Do the secessionists in Jammu and Kashmir, another mutant of our political class, really think that creation of a separate country or merger with Pakistan shall end all their problems? Had that been so, Pakistan should have been a developed and happy state by now. But Pakistan’s failure to be so and her subsequent balkanization proves in stark relief the fallacy of such a conception. Today, with state’s theoretical capacity to regulate and secure its borders steadily going down and when borders themselves are becoming irrelevant with more united regional groupings becoming a reality, we are still busy drawing more lines on the geographical map.
Coming back to the topic, as our next door neighbour has to shun and shed her day-dreaming about bleeding India through thousand cuts in her own better interests (has not it hurt itself more than India), our political class also need to reinvent themselves. They need to ferret out better alternatives to a ‘bandh’, ‘strike’, ‘chakka jam’, or outright political violence either in the shape of a communal riot or in any other form. These means need to be positive and productive which neither hurt nor damage our property or the common citizens’ right to carry on unhindered with their daily lives. They ought not to further sully our image as an emerging nation or twitches at our conscience of being the citizen of a country where such unwarranted and undesirables happen.
However, one still believes that India has been doing reasonably well compared to her many time twins in Asia, Africa and Latin America. After all, many of these countries disintegrated before they could complete their state building processes owing to the failure to resolve their internal conflicts. But India has so far gone from strength to strength to take her state-building and nation-building processes on a stronger footing through a mix of consociational social welfare politics. But we would only pull wool over our eyes if we think we can continue doing so notwithstanding all the self-created roadblocks en route.
Our bloated obsession and fixation with the nine per cent growth rate is already getting deflated in the wake of looming global recession. Our desire to be a super power definitely does not gel with our capacities, motivation and determination to get to that elevated and rarefied space. What China could showcase through the Olympic extravaganza was a sheer delight and one really doubts as to whether we could really replicate the same given an opportunity. The fact is that we have assigned a secondary place to the national pride which make the warp and weft of a great nation.
Our political class takes to street at the slightest hint of a disagreement. That bandh and strikes are remnants from the past and are no longer relevant to the interests of our larger polity is something they refuse to understand. Can we really continue to stage our protest and opposition in the way we have been doing all these years. We should not forget that we are a democracy where every issue could be and should be discussed, debated, negotiated and resolved across the table. But quite contrarily, our legislatures have become an arena for fisticuffs and one-to-one duel including outright sanguinary conflicts coming down to the lowest levels as seen in UP, West Bengal and elsewhere in recent times.
The funny part in all this is that the behaviour of the same political party is different while in and out of power. A stand taken by a political party when in power may not be the same while out of power. Out here, the basic tenet of opposition politics seems to be opposition for the sake of opposition, without delving deep into the merit or demerit of the issue. To them, they are duty-bound to oppose and protest against any policy or idea emanating from the treasury benches.
The fact remains that ethics and values have taken a back seat out here. In their bid to attain their baser objectives, the political class does not mind weakening state institutions using whom they are supposed to tackle state problems. These institutions get weakened due to constant interference and tinkering and lose their capacity to respond in times of need. In fact, some elements of our political class are willing to compromise and do anything that can take them to the seat of power including colluding and conniving with the baser elements of the society be it criminals, terrorists or Naxals. Here, the hoi polloi is always on discount, the interest of the politicking elite is what matters most.
Is not it high time when our political class thought of better ways and means to conduct politics through? How long would we continue with the same antediluvian, horse and buggy methods of doing politics? If the politics is really supposed to be about welfare of the citizens of a polity, then we have got the very conception of politics itself goofed up. And unless and until our political class really does something about mending its ways, we had better stop deluding ourselves to be one of the principal movers and shakers on the global scene. The citizens, too, have a duty to put such irresponsible political class in place. Otherwise, we shall cease to grow as a nation.
100 per cent FIR: Jalpaiguri shows the way
*Saumitra Mohan
We have long debated the problems ailing criminal justice system in our country with various committees and commissions recommending sundry measures to tone up the system. But of all the measures discussed, it is the police reforms which constitute the core of any such effort without which nothing substantial can be achieved. Notwithstanding the recent police reforms executed at the instance of the Supreme Court of India, there is still a lot which need to be done to enable the police organisation to carry out its duties and responsibilities with much more effectiveness and efficiency.
And the starting point for any police reform remains the way our police station functions as they still remain the cutting edge of the law and order machinery in our country. If our police stations continue to function the way they have always been, all other reforms would come to nought. It is against this background that an experiment made in a remote North Bengal district of Jalpaiguri in Eastern India becomes important.
The law enforcers across the country seem to be unanimous that given the manpower, resources and infrastructure crunch afflicting the police organisation, it is neither advisable nor practicable to entertain all the public complaints at the police station. They feel that all such complaints need to be carefully sifted and sorted before being accepted in the form of an FIR (First Information Report). But the Jalpaiguri experiment, initiated and carried under the able stewardship of the present Superintendent of Police Sri Tripurari, a young IPS officer of 1998 batch, has proved them all wrong.
It was with effect from 01 July 2007 that this experiment kicked off in Jalpaiguri and accordingly instructions were issued to all the police stations to accept any and every FIR without any demur. Instructions were also issued, however, to ensure that no simultaneous arrests be made till inquiry and investigation are completed. Contrary to the fear of burden that such an approach might impose on the system, the entire system has responded very well with surprisingly positive results. Police is no longer shunned or avoided out here nor are the officers and rank complaining of increased work-load. Popular alienation or fear of police has come down, leading to increased public confidence in them.
Selective lodging of FIRs never reflected the true crime picture of the district which has become possible now. Against an average of 3000 cases reported between 2004-06, about 5300 cases were reported in the first year of reforms i.e. in 2007. The projected crime figure for 2008 is likely to be around 14000, quite staggering compared to the figures of the pre-reform period. Usually, a proportionately inverse relationship has been noticed between the cases lodged in the police stations and the court complaints. With police becoming liberal in accepting FIRs, the necessity of people lodging court complaint has come down resulting in reduction of the same. Compared to approx six per cent court complaints of total recorded cases during 2004-06, the figure was down to approx. 0.6 percent in 2007.
While the total crime figures for all the 17 police stations of 33 lakh-strong Jalpaiguri between 2002-06 was an average of about 2700, this figure was a staggering 6800 in 2007. But the projected figure for 2008 is likely to be 14000. While only about 600 cases of theft, on an annual average, were reported during 2004-06, the number was up at 1300 in 2007 and is likely to be upwards of 2000 by the end of 2008. Again, while an average of 550 crimes against women were reported during this period, the figure was more than double for 2007 and is projected to be around 2000 in 2008. The average figure for robbery, burglary and dacoity together were around 40 during the three years preceding the reforms, but it shot up to 60 in 2007 and is likely to be more than 80 at the end of 2008.
The arrest figures have also been greatly impacted. Earlier police were often indiscriminate in its preventive activities and arrests as it had mandatory quota to fulfil. So, the police would indiscriminately haul up people through non-FIR cases, inter alia, under such sections as 107, 109 and 110 Cr.PC and 290 IPC, but the need to cook up the book has come down substantially with police willing to register all crimes being reported in the district. While the persons arrested under section 290 IPC numbered more than 10,000 during 2004-06, the figure was down to around 6000 in 2007 and is likely to be around 2000 only in 2008.
Similarly, the people arrested under section 107 Cr.PC were around 7500 during the pre-reform period, the figure was down to around 6000 in 2007 and is likely to be less than 3000 in 2008. The overall arrest figure for the district which was more than 5000 during 2004-06, was down to 4,500 in 2007 and is likely to be less than 5000. Again, while accused surrender was an average of around 1300 between 2004-06, it was around 3,500 in 2007 and is projected to be around 4,500 in 2008. While the number of persons convicted during 2004-06 was around 125, it was almost unaffected in 2007 at 121, but is likely to improve substantively at over 200 in 2008 pointing to the improved quality of case disposal. This clearly indicates a positive relationship between a responsive police and the local crime figures.
Notwithstanding the registration of huge number of cases and the consequent increase in work for the local police, the case disposal has improved drastically. The case disposal was around 3000 during 2004-06, it was more than 4000 in 2007 and is likely to be more than 6000 in 2008. It amply shows that given a proper orientation, the same manpower can yield better results. Expedited case disposal and 100 per cent FIR registration have also resulted in fewer complaints made to human rights bodies like NHRC, a big relief for the local police. They were a measly 11 in 2007 and are likely to be the same in 2008 against a substantively higher figure for the pre-reforms period i.e. 25 between 2004-06.
With free registration of cases, the process of converting cognizable cases into non-cognizable cases has almost stopped as all such cases are now registered in the first instance itself. Similarly, such a development has also pre-empted the need for the interference with the police work by the local panchayats, political leaders and touts. Having adopted a pro-active and responsive approach to policing, the police itself no longer needs to misbehave or intimidate people for suppression or minimization of cases. It has also reduced the need for bribing police for lodging an FIR though the same cannot be said about an impartial and speedy investigation which is where the demand for more manpower, infrastructure and resources become justified. This experiment has also struck at the root of the nexus among the police, criminals, lawyers and politicos. One does feel the need to replicate similar experiments elsewhere in the country.
*Saumitra Mohan
We have long debated the problems ailing criminal justice system in our country with various committees and commissions recommending sundry measures to tone up the system. But of all the measures discussed, it is the police reforms which constitute the core of any such effort without which nothing substantial can be achieved. Notwithstanding the recent police reforms executed at the instance of the Supreme Court of India, there is still a lot which need to be done to enable the police organisation to carry out its duties and responsibilities with much more effectiveness and efficiency.
And the starting point for any police reform remains the way our police station functions as they still remain the cutting edge of the law and order machinery in our country. If our police stations continue to function the way they have always been, all other reforms would come to nought. It is against this background that an experiment made in a remote North Bengal district of Jalpaiguri in Eastern India becomes important.
The law enforcers across the country seem to be unanimous that given the manpower, resources and infrastructure crunch afflicting the police organisation, it is neither advisable nor practicable to entertain all the public complaints at the police station. They feel that all such complaints need to be carefully sifted and sorted before being accepted in the form of an FIR (First Information Report). But the Jalpaiguri experiment, initiated and carried under the able stewardship of the present Superintendent of Police Sri Tripurari, a young IPS officer of 1998 batch, has proved them all wrong.
It was with effect from 01 July 2007 that this experiment kicked off in Jalpaiguri and accordingly instructions were issued to all the police stations to accept any and every FIR without any demur. Instructions were also issued, however, to ensure that no simultaneous arrests be made till inquiry and investigation are completed. Contrary to the fear of burden that such an approach might impose on the system, the entire system has responded very well with surprisingly positive results. Police is no longer shunned or avoided out here nor are the officers and rank complaining of increased work-load. Popular alienation or fear of police has come down, leading to increased public confidence in them.
Selective lodging of FIRs never reflected the true crime picture of the district which has become possible now. Against an average of 3000 cases reported between 2004-06, about 5300 cases were reported in the first year of reforms i.e. in 2007. The projected crime figure for 2008 is likely to be around 14000, quite staggering compared to the figures of the pre-reform period. Usually, a proportionately inverse relationship has been noticed between the cases lodged in the police stations and the court complaints. With police becoming liberal in accepting FIRs, the necessity of people lodging court complaint has come down resulting in reduction of the same. Compared to approx six per cent court complaints of total recorded cases during 2004-06, the figure was down to approx. 0.6 percent in 2007.
While the total crime figures for all the 17 police stations of 33 lakh-strong Jalpaiguri between 2002-06 was an average of about 2700, this figure was a staggering 6800 in 2007. But the projected figure for 2008 is likely to be 14000. While only about 600 cases of theft, on an annual average, were reported during 2004-06, the number was up at 1300 in 2007 and is likely to be upwards of 2000 by the end of 2008. Again, while an average of 550 crimes against women were reported during this period, the figure was more than double for 2007 and is projected to be around 2000 in 2008. The average figure for robbery, burglary and dacoity together were around 40 during the three years preceding the reforms, but it shot up to 60 in 2007 and is likely to be more than 80 at the end of 2008.
The arrest figures have also been greatly impacted. Earlier police were often indiscriminate in its preventive activities and arrests as it had mandatory quota to fulfil. So, the police would indiscriminately haul up people through non-FIR cases, inter alia, under such sections as 107, 109 and 110 Cr.PC and 290 IPC, but the need to cook up the book has come down substantially with police willing to register all crimes being reported in the district. While the persons arrested under section 290 IPC numbered more than 10,000 during 2004-06, the figure was down to around 6000 in 2007 and is likely to be around 2000 only in 2008.
Similarly, the people arrested under section 107 Cr.PC were around 7500 during the pre-reform period, the figure was down to around 6000 in 2007 and is likely to be less than 3000 in 2008. The overall arrest figure for the district which was more than 5000 during 2004-06, was down to 4,500 in 2007 and is likely to be less than 5000. Again, while accused surrender was an average of around 1300 between 2004-06, it was around 3,500 in 2007 and is projected to be around 4,500 in 2008. While the number of persons convicted during 2004-06 was around 125, it was almost unaffected in 2007 at 121, but is likely to improve substantively at over 200 in 2008 pointing to the improved quality of case disposal. This clearly indicates a positive relationship between a responsive police and the local crime figures.
Notwithstanding the registration of huge number of cases and the consequent increase in work for the local police, the case disposal has improved drastically. The case disposal was around 3000 during 2004-06, it was more than 4000 in 2007 and is likely to be more than 6000 in 2008. It amply shows that given a proper orientation, the same manpower can yield better results. Expedited case disposal and 100 per cent FIR registration have also resulted in fewer complaints made to human rights bodies like NHRC, a big relief for the local police. They were a measly 11 in 2007 and are likely to be the same in 2008 against a substantively higher figure for the pre-reforms period i.e. 25 between 2004-06.
With free registration of cases, the process of converting cognizable cases into non-cognizable cases has almost stopped as all such cases are now registered in the first instance itself. Similarly, such a development has also pre-empted the need for the interference with the police work by the local panchayats, political leaders and touts. Having adopted a pro-active and responsive approach to policing, the police itself no longer needs to misbehave or intimidate people for suppression or minimization of cases. It has also reduced the need for bribing police for lodging an FIR though the same cannot be said about an impartial and speedy investigation which is where the demand for more manpower, infrastructure and resources become justified. This experiment has also struck at the root of the nexus among the police, criminals, lawyers and politicos. One does feel the need to replicate similar experiments elsewhere in the country.
Reforming the Prison Administration in India
*Saumitra Mohan
Of all the reforms required for the effective functioning of our law and justice system, prison reforms form an important part. Unless and until we initiate and take measures to bring our prison management in sync with the times, our law and justice system shall never be able to work to the optimum level required. The various issues requiring our urgent attention include physical condition of the prisons, condition and treatment of prisoners, training and re-orientation of prison personnel, modernisation of prisons, better correctional administration and management.
The Government of India constituted a Committee in December 2005 under the Chairmanship of the Director General, Bureau of Police Research and Development (BPRD) to prepare a draft policy paper on the strategy relating to prison reforms and correctional administration. The said Committee is said to have made many recommendations relating to Prison Reform and Correctional Administration, which if implemented would make a lot of difference to our prison administration and management.
Of the important recommendations, the Committee is believed to have recommended setting up a Department of Prisons and Correctional Services to deal with adult and young offenders. It has also recommended setting up a full time National Commission on Prisons. The Committee believes that the young offenders between 18 and 21 ought not to be confined in prisons meant for adult offenders as otherwise they usually become more prone to crimes while being in company of their more experienced and hardened counterparts. It similarly recommends that the persons arrested for politico-economic agitations for declared public causes should not be confined in prisons along with regular prisoners either. Some observers feel that bracketing the two together is quite unjustified given the fact quite often the latter come to be part of our government system later.
One another important issue relates to the over-crowding of our prisons as most of them are populated beyond their capacity. And the same can be done only by reducing the population of the under-trial prisoners by speedier trials in special fast track courts, Lok Adalats, trials in special courts and via video conferencing. However, it should be ensured that the prisoners should, in no way, be forced to plead guilty in such fast track courts in a hope to get lesser sentence without in anyway appreciating the implications of the same. What is surprising is the fact that many of them keep languishing in our jails long after they are acquitted because of lack of coordination between the court and the prison administration. Modern mechanism of information technology and e-governance should be pressed into service for improvements on this score.
Going by the reformative theory of deviance, the confinement of an offender to the prisons is meant to reform and rehabilitate him/her in the human society as a responsible citizen rather than continue penalising him/her even after marked positive changes are noticed in them. Hence, release of lifers and hardened criminals before their stipulated terms should also be given a serious thought. As far as possible, easier bail provisions, using section 436-A of the Cr.PC and use of the Probation of Offenders Act, 1958 should be considered. It would not only reward good behaviour of these prisoners, but shall also take care of the over-crowding of the prisons.
A serious thought should also be given to ensure that the prisoners are not denied the basic right of consultation with their lawyers. It should also be ensured that video conferencing, as proposed, should in no way impede on this basic right. If possible, the constitutional right to free legal aid, as envisaged in Article 39-A of the Indian Constitution, should be fully implemented, ensuring the same to the prisoners. One also feels a greater need for expedited appeal hearings, which could be possible only if the number of judges in the higher judiciary is increased.
Talking about basic amenities within the prisons, there is a lot which needs to be done to ameliorate the conditions in which the prisoners are supposed to live. Adequate sanitation, improved prison wages, all-round entertainment and better health check-up facilities are the minima required inside the jail if we really believe that the prison is a place for reforming and rehabilitating an individual rather than making him further hardened and untouchable for the society.
Group insurance, provisioning of bank loans and employment in government/private industries should also be contemplated as part of an overall rehabilitation package. It should be ensured that the old and sick prisoners do get a special diet as should be the case with the pregnant and lactating women prisoners and their special medical needs. Also, improvement in the modes of communication between the prison inmates and their families should be improved further, giving allowance for more privacy to the conversation between the two.
Also, a thought should be given to ensuring the conjugal rights of the prisoners. After all, penalising an individual for an offence does not mean depriving him/her completely from the very basic human rights including the conjugal rights. Another piquant issue relates to the political rights of the prisoners. It is quite surprising that a convicted person can contest a legislative or parliamentary election, but he/she does not have any voting rights available. Something should be done to remove this discrepancy in the present system.
In light of the recent incursions on our prisons by Naxalites and other such outlawed organisations to liberate inmates, we also need to give some importance to the prison security. Of the various security measures for preventing such jail breaks include the installation of a bio-metric system of access control as recommended for installation in all the nine prisons of the Tihar jail complex by S K Cain Committee formed in the wake of Shamsher Singh Rana’s famous escape from Tihar.
In this system, the fingerprints of all the prisoners and the jail staff are saved into a database. The entry and exit from the complex is permitted only if the fingerprints are matched. This system should be installed in all the jails across the country without any exception. Besides, simple security measures like installation of close circuit cameras, metal detectors and automatic security lock system should also be thought of for better security of our jails and for further pre-empting such daring jail breaks as seen during recent times.
Manpower shortage has been another bane of our prison system which needs to be beefed up for better prison management and security. Apart from reinforcing the manpower, the prison officials and rank also need to be given special training and orientation for further improving the prison security and also for making our prisons a better place, yoked to the cause of reforming and rehabilitating deviant members of the society. Women and juvenile offenders definitely need better and more sensitive treatment than they have got so far.
While better coordination with the police department is required for better prison administration and management, the same should in no way lead us to involve police in prison administration or management as that may have very dangerous implications, at least, that is what some experts feel. We should definitely explore alternatives to imprisonment, at least, for the under-trials. One does feel the need for extensive amendments to the colonial Prison Act of 1884 along with the need for various constituent states of the Indian Union to draft a uniform prison manual if we are to really implement some of the reforms as envisaged here. Also, before going about implementation of Committee’s recommendations, we also need to give a thought to various whys and wherefores of the failure to implement the sundry proposals of the Mulla Committee Report for improving the condition of prisons in India.
*Saumitra Mohan
Of all the reforms required for the effective functioning of our law and justice system, prison reforms form an important part. Unless and until we initiate and take measures to bring our prison management in sync with the times, our law and justice system shall never be able to work to the optimum level required. The various issues requiring our urgent attention include physical condition of the prisons, condition and treatment of prisoners, training and re-orientation of prison personnel, modernisation of prisons, better correctional administration and management.
The Government of India constituted a Committee in December 2005 under the Chairmanship of the Director General, Bureau of Police Research and Development (BPRD) to prepare a draft policy paper on the strategy relating to prison reforms and correctional administration. The said Committee is said to have made many recommendations relating to Prison Reform and Correctional Administration, which if implemented would make a lot of difference to our prison administration and management.
Of the important recommendations, the Committee is believed to have recommended setting up a Department of Prisons and Correctional Services to deal with adult and young offenders. It has also recommended setting up a full time National Commission on Prisons. The Committee believes that the young offenders between 18 and 21 ought not to be confined in prisons meant for adult offenders as otherwise they usually become more prone to crimes while being in company of their more experienced and hardened counterparts. It similarly recommends that the persons arrested for politico-economic agitations for declared public causes should not be confined in prisons along with regular prisoners either. Some observers feel that bracketing the two together is quite unjustified given the fact quite often the latter come to be part of our government system later.
One another important issue relates to the over-crowding of our prisons as most of them are populated beyond their capacity. And the same can be done only by reducing the population of the under-trial prisoners by speedier trials in special fast track courts, Lok Adalats, trials in special courts and via video conferencing. However, it should be ensured that the prisoners should, in no way, be forced to plead guilty in such fast track courts in a hope to get lesser sentence without in anyway appreciating the implications of the same. What is surprising is the fact that many of them keep languishing in our jails long after they are acquitted because of lack of coordination between the court and the prison administration. Modern mechanism of information technology and e-governance should be pressed into service for improvements on this score.
Going by the reformative theory of deviance, the confinement of an offender to the prisons is meant to reform and rehabilitate him/her in the human society as a responsible citizen rather than continue penalising him/her even after marked positive changes are noticed in them. Hence, release of lifers and hardened criminals before their stipulated terms should also be given a serious thought. As far as possible, easier bail provisions, using section 436-A of the Cr.PC and use of the Probation of Offenders Act, 1958 should be considered. It would not only reward good behaviour of these prisoners, but shall also take care of the over-crowding of the prisons.
A serious thought should also be given to ensure that the prisoners are not denied the basic right of consultation with their lawyers. It should also be ensured that video conferencing, as proposed, should in no way impede on this basic right. If possible, the constitutional right to free legal aid, as envisaged in Article 39-A of the Indian Constitution, should be fully implemented, ensuring the same to the prisoners. One also feels a greater need for expedited appeal hearings, which could be possible only if the number of judges in the higher judiciary is increased.
Talking about basic amenities within the prisons, there is a lot which needs to be done to ameliorate the conditions in which the prisoners are supposed to live. Adequate sanitation, improved prison wages, all-round entertainment and better health check-up facilities are the minima required inside the jail if we really believe that the prison is a place for reforming and rehabilitating an individual rather than making him further hardened and untouchable for the society.
Group insurance, provisioning of bank loans and employment in government/private industries should also be contemplated as part of an overall rehabilitation package. It should be ensured that the old and sick prisoners do get a special diet as should be the case with the pregnant and lactating women prisoners and their special medical needs. Also, improvement in the modes of communication between the prison inmates and their families should be improved further, giving allowance for more privacy to the conversation between the two.
Also, a thought should be given to ensuring the conjugal rights of the prisoners. After all, penalising an individual for an offence does not mean depriving him/her completely from the very basic human rights including the conjugal rights. Another piquant issue relates to the political rights of the prisoners. It is quite surprising that a convicted person can contest a legislative or parliamentary election, but he/she does not have any voting rights available. Something should be done to remove this discrepancy in the present system.
In light of the recent incursions on our prisons by Naxalites and other such outlawed organisations to liberate inmates, we also need to give some importance to the prison security. Of the various security measures for preventing such jail breaks include the installation of a bio-metric system of access control as recommended for installation in all the nine prisons of the Tihar jail complex by S K Cain Committee formed in the wake of Shamsher Singh Rana’s famous escape from Tihar.
In this system, the fingerprints of all the prisoners and the jail staff are saved into a database. The entry and exit from the complex is permitted only if the fingerprints are matched. This system should be installed in all the jails across the country without any exception. Besides, simple security measures like installation of close circuit cameras, metal detectors and automatic security lock system should also be thought of for better security of our jails and for further pre-empting such daring jail breaks as seen during recent times.
Manpower shortage has been another bane of our prison system which needs to be beefed up for better prison management and security. Apart from reinforcing the manpower, the prison officials and rank also need to be given special training and orientation for further improving the prison security and also for making our prisons a better place, yoked to the cause of reforming and rehabilitating deviant members of the society. Women and juvenile offenders definitely need better and more sensitive treatment than they have got so far.
While better coordination with the police department is required for better prison administration and management, the same should in no way lead us to involve police in prison administration or management as that may have very dangerous implications, at least, that is what some experts feel. We should definitely explore alternatives to imprisonment, at least, for the under-trials. One does feel the need for extensive amendments to the colonial Prison Act of 1884 along with the need for various constituent states of the Indian Union to draft a uniform prison manual if we are to really implement some of the reforms as envisaged here. Also, before going about implementation of Committee’s recommendations, we also need to give a thought to various whys and wherefores of the failure to implement the sundry proposals of the Mulla Committee Report for improving the condition of prisons in India.
Resolving Development Dilemmas
Saumitra Mohan
The concatenation of incidents at Singur, Nandigram or the recent Amarnath row in Jammu and Kashmir relating to matters pertaining land has amply underscored the dilemma that faces our polity today. However, the fact remains that land is the principal factor for any developmental initiative. This is also a fact that for any developed country, the percentage contribution of agriculture to the national economy seldom exceeds more than 4-5 per cent with the rest coming from secondary and tertiary sectors including industries and services.
In other words, a more than predominant chunk of our Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has to come from industry and services which could also provide support and sustenance for the primary sector including agriculture and mining, if we really wish to be a developed country. These sectors could never develop if a sizable amount of land is not made available to them for development. But we know very well by now as to how difficult has it become to obtain/acquire land for development in the wake of Byzantine opposition politics surrounding the same.
This has made elected governments all over the country quite loath to use force or strong-arm measures for land acquisition, even if in the name of ‘development’. But what is more problematic is not the attitude of the land owners, but that of the vested interests who in the name of so-called ‘land protection committee’ do everything to sabotage a good project. The situation becomes worse when these vested interests are joined by the opposition to further their petty political agenda.
In a good number of cases, even where the acquisition price and rehabilitation package are very generous, the resistance still remains. And more often than not, this resistance is stage-managed than rooted in genuine public upsurge to refuse land for development in lieu of a good compensation. An agitation or movement around land acquisition is often engineered by these vested interests who have their own axe to grind, either in the form of some petty political advantage or outright financial interests. One has come across many such people while negotiating land acquisition or its possession. These people directly or indirectly seek pecuniary advantage for themselves, without being, in any way, perturbed or concerned about the real interests of the land losers or land owners, both registered and unregistered.
And these land-related problems relate not only to new projects as extension of new-wave agitations and movements, but also to the old, ongoing projects. Many of us in the administration have come across people who, not even remotely concerned with the legally transferred land in question, would demand a share in the pie from the private or public developers. These demands are usually in the form of rights to supply materials for undertaken work, often at bloated prices, jobs or contracts for taking up such work or even outright bribes or protection money to allow the work to go on unhindered.
And all this happens in the name of people, and often under the aegis of one or the other political party, thereby making it difficult for the administration to make a real development on the actual project, as use of force or arrest is no longer an option. This is because of the fact that the locally dominant party or grouping often fears losing or diminishing its support base as a result thereof. And in all this, it is the development which suffers, thwarting further value additions and multiplier effects by way of which extra demands could be generated, which in turn could fuel strong economic growth in that particular region and in the country as a whole.
As the law or rules pre-empt and prevent more than allowed generosity which acceding or accommodating the demands of these vested interests, many administrators, with active blessing from the government, have found ingenuous ways to do the same while working out a rehabilitation package. And, here one potent solution lies in the land requiring bodies (read industries) being made to share the additional burden of rehabilitation which is actually not very bad. But one does feel that the same needs to be further regularised and regulated to pre-empt any scope for foul play.
In states bordering international boundaries, these land acquisitions take on another dimension. One has noticed that the moment a land acquisition plan is announced, one would immediately see vested interests including supporters of different political parties make hordes of people go and occupy the intended land unauthorisedly in a bid to negotiate or extract rehabilitation candies in future. While one can see such attempts as one of the ways of distributive justice, it is definitely not so. What is painful is the fact that in many cases such planted occupiers are illegal immigrants from across the border, without any political rights whatsoever, and who are more than willing to pounce on such opportunities for a consideration. It is these people who are usually the cannon fodder ready to be used for any subversive activities within and without the country, but that is a separate issue altogether.
Reinforcing our ‘Soft State’ image as Gunnar Myrdal would have said, strong arm measures are increasingly becoming out of question for the administration. Opposition is more than willing to fish in the troubled waters. However, the same party, while in power, sings a different tune. One does feel the need for a positive change in our political culture save any destructive or negative politics. Naxalites are another bunch of misguided people sans any ideological mooring and devoid of any positive agenda. They act more as the agent saboteurs of enemy forces than genuine cup-bearers of the poor and deprived.
In all such cases, it is the bureaucracy which is blamed for the goof-ups, developmental deadlocks or even non-utilisation of government money sanctioned for a particular project. But more often than not, things are beyond the ken and control of bureaucracy which often finds that its hands are tied. The vested interests (read political class) do their best to sabotage the project in one or the other way by putting forward resistance or undue demands. And most of such troubles relate again to land related matters. Either it is the proposed land acquisition for new projects or government lands where the work is to be executed, but the same has been profusely encroached through political shenanigans. All such troubles or problems would have to be settled or fixed before undertaking the project.
Today it has become increasingly difficult for the bureaucracy to work as per rules or laws. It is often forced to bend the rules/laws without the political class willing to share responsibility for the same. You either toe the line or should be willing to be shunted or sidelined. Hence, most of the smart-aleck bureaucrats learn very early in their career to be ‘practical’. Populism and reckless politics are making country bleed by way of making developmental sacrifices.
Many feel that too much of democracy is rendering our institutions ineffective and redundant. The constant media attention and interest in such matters and portraying the same in gory sensational details without much attention to the merit of the case also make things difficult for both the political class and the bureaucracy. The media also often indulges in yellow journalism, focusing more on the demands of the protesting mob, without analysing and bringing forth the implications of acceding to such unjustified demands. The spirit or merit behind the project is seldom highlighted.
While we definitely need to be more circumspect with regards to the quality, quantity and kind of land we acquire for development, the truth remains that with weak state, the strong vested interests cannot be tackled. And a strong state shall require rejuvenated and reinforced institutions including that of executive, legislature, bureaucracy and police duly supported by the constructive political culture of a responsible political class who shall not compromise our national interests in a bid to advance their own petty political agenda.
Saumitra Mohan
The concatenation of incidents at Singur, Nandigram or the recent Amarnath row in Jammu and Kashmir relating to matters pertaining land has amply underscored the dilemma that faces our polity today. However, the fact remains that land is the principal factor for any developmental initiative. This is also a fact that for any developed country, the percentage contribution of agriculture to the national economy seldom exceeds more than 4-5 per cent with the rest coming from secondary and tertiary sectors including industries and services.
In other words, a more than predominant chunk of our Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has to come from industry and services which could also provide support and sustenance for the primary sector including agriculture and mining, if we really wish to be a developed country. These sectors could never develop if a sizable amount of land is not made available to them for development. But we know very well by now as to how difficult has it become to obtain/acquire land for development in the wake of Byzantine opposition politics surrounding the same.
This has made elected governments all over the country quite loath to use force or strong-arm measures for land acquisition, even if in the name of ‘development’. But what is more problematic is not the attitude of the land owners, but that of the vested interests who in the name of so-called ‘land protection committee’ do everything to sabotage a good project. The situation becomes worse when these vested interests are joined by the opposition to further their petty political agenda.
In a good number of cases, even where the acquisition price and rehabilitation package are very generous, the resistance still remains. And more often than not, this resistance is stage-managed than rooted in genuine public upsurge to refuse land for development in lieu of a good compensation. An agitation or movement around land acquisition is often engineered by these vested interests who have their own axe to grind, either in the form of some petty political advantage or outright financial interests. One has come across many such people while negotiating land acquisition or its possession. These people directly or indirectly seek pecuniary advantage for themselves, without being, in any way, perturbed or concerned about the real interests of the land losers or land owners, both registered and unregistered.
And these land-related problems relate not only to new projects as extension of new-wave agitations and movements, but also to the old, ongoing projects. Many of us in the administration have come across people who, not even remotely concerned with the legally transferred land in question, would demand a share in the pie from the private or public developers. These demands are usually in the form of rights to supply materials for undertaken work, often at bloated prices, jobs or contracts for taking up such work or even outright bribes or protection money to allow the work to go on unhindered.
And all this happens in the name of people, and often under the aegis of one or the other political party, thereby making it difficult for the administration to make a real development on the actual project, as use of force or arrest is no longer an option. This is because of the fact that the locally dominant party or grouping often fears losing or diminishing its support base as a result thereof. And in all this, it is the development which suffers, thwarting further value additions and multiplier effects by way of which extra demands could be generated, which in turn could fuel strong economic growth in that particular region and in the country as a whole.
As the law or rules pre-empt and prevent more than allowed generosity which acceding or accommodating the demands of these vested interests, many administrators, with active blessing from the government, have found ingenuous ways to do the same while working out a rehabilitation package. And, here one potent solution lies in the land requiring bodies (read industries) being made to share the additional burden of rehabilitation which is actually not very bad. But one does feel that the same needs to be further regularised and regulated to pre-empt any scope for foul play.
In states bordering international boundaries, these land acquisitions take on another dimension. One has noticed that the moment a land acquisition plan is announced, one would immediately see vested interests including supporters of different political parties make hordes of people go and occupy the intended land unauthorisedly in a bid to negotiate or extract rehabilitation candies in future. While one can see such attempts as one of the ways of distributive justice, it is definitely not so. What is painful is the fact that in many cases such planted occupiers are illegal immigrants from across the border, without any political rights whatsoever, and who are more than willing to pounce on such opportunities for a consideration. It is these people who are usually the cannon fodder ready to be used for any subversive activities within and without the country, but that is a separate issue altogether.
Reinforcing our ‘Soft State’ image as Gunnar Myrdal would have said, strong arm measures are increasingly becoming out of question for the administration. Opposition is more than willing to fish in the troubled waters. However, the same party, while in power, sings a different tune. One does feel the need for a positive change in our political culture save any destructive or negative politics. Naxalites are another bunch of misguided people sans any ideological mooring and devoid of any positive agenda. They act more as the agent saboteurs of enemy forces than genuine cup-bearers of the poor and deprived.
In all such cases, it is the bureaucracy which is blamed for the goof-ups, developmental deadlocks or even non-utilisation of government money sanctioned for a particular project. But more often than not, things are beyond the ken and control of bureaucracy which often finds that its hands are tied. The vested interests (read political class) do their best to sabotage the project in one or the other way by putting forward resistance or undue demands. And most of such troubles relate again to land related matters. Either it is the proposed land acquisition for new projects or government lands where the work is to be executed, but the same has been profusely encroached through political shenanigans. All such troubles or problems would have to be settled or fixed before undertaking the project.
Today it has become increasingly difficult for the bureaucracy to work as per rules or laws. It is often forced to bend the rules/laws without the political class willing to share responsibility for the same. You either toe the line or should be willing to be shunted or sidelined. Hence, most of the smart-aleck bureaucrats learn very early in their career to be ‘practical’. Populism and reckless politics are making country bleed by way of making developmental sacrifices.
Many feel that too much of democracy is rendering our institutions ineffective and redundant. The constant media attention and interest in such matters and portraying the same in gory sensational details without much attention to the merit of the case also make things difficult for both the political class and the bureaucracy. The media also often indulges in yellow journalism, focusing more on the demands of the protesting mob, without analysing and bringing forth the implications of acceding to such unjustified demands. The spirit or merit behind the project is seldom highlighted.
While we definitely need to be more circumspect with regards to the quality, quantity and kind of land we acquire for development, the truth remains that with weak state, the strong vested interests cannot be tackled. And a strong state shall require rejuvenated and reinforced institutions including that of executive, legislature, bureaucracy and police duly supported by the constructive political culture of a responsible political class who shall not compromise our national interests in a bid to advance their own petty political agenda.
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Do We Need Cultural Policing?
*Saumitra Mohan
There has been a spurt of protests and red-faced expressions against the deemed moral and ethical degeneration in the Indian society in recent times. Be it the uproar over the so-called bawdy on-field shakes of the imported cheer leaders in the just concluded Indian Premier League cricket matches or the ban on bar girls in Maharashtra, the moral policemen, with their holier-than-thou approach, have always been up in the arms to register their protests. What happened to be occasional outpourings seem to have become quite routine and regular, with the Culture Vultures finding more and more causes to take cudgels for as if we have got devoid of the real and basic issues affecting the common man.
Be it Nelson Mandela’s paternal peck on Shabana Azmi, Richard Gere’s Knightly smackers to Shilpa Shetty, sartorial choices of our tennis sensation Sania Mirza, the romantic liberties taken by lovers in Meerut or elsewhere to meet openly in public parks or the annual ritualistic remonstrations against the celebration of Valentine Day, the Moral Brigade has come down heavily against the same to spoil the party. These Talibani tendencies to dictate the basic nuances of culture to the common man definitely do not gel with the broader framework of a liberal democratic society.
What is surprising is the fact that such incidents of cultural policing are being reported with unceasing regularity now a days, quite surprisingly at a time when we are talking of further liberalisation and consequent freedom of choice for the creature called ‘homo sapiens’. One Rizwanur Rahman from Kolkata fell prey to the same prying eyes of a vigilante moral brigade which culminated in his tragic death. The same pathological penchant of the loony fringe ensured the eventual shelving of the impending visit of Carla Bruni, in company of her more celebrated boy friend and the French President Nicolas Sarkozy. The protocol-related confusions finally had the French President making it all alone.
Such moral pangs take other hues in the form of attempts to ban smoking or drinking scenes on silver screen on the specious plea that the same promotes these vices among the common public, even though there are various other and more effective ways to promote healthy habits among the citizens. One has a sinking feeling that such non-issues emanate from an unwholesome desire to either hog some cheap publicity or to create some controversies in a bid to cater to a select audience for some unseen political advantage.
Since eccentricities and inanities know no boundaries, such cultural policemen could be found throughout the world. So, even artistic freedom of expression exercised by such people as Salman Rushdie, Taslima Nasreen, Maqbul Fida Hussain, Ashish Nandy and the famous European cartoonist who made a caricature of Prophet Muhammad have not been spared by these skin heads. Many of these people are the so called entrenched interests who try to regain their fast depleting acceptability or social respect by way of such dubious means.
While a section of our political class does batten and fatten on such class of politics, what surprises one is the tacit support extended to them by our intelligentsia by not registering their voice against such erratic, indiscriminate and misconceived curbs on the very basic human rights of the individual. How were one to dress up or who to marry ought to be best left to the sovereign desire of the individual in keeping with the law of the land. The numerous caste panchayats and their illegal fiats seeped in hoary moth-balled mores and customs have seen the execution or cold-blooded murders of many of the innocent men and women, something which should be shocking to the conscience of any civilised society. It is here that the state has to guard against any such incursion on individual freedom.
It is such cultural or intellectual policing that, on a different plane, also seems to dictate our reactions to such disparate phenomena as genetically modified food, human cloning or opening of retail chains. Believe it or not, all such reactions somehow and somewhere seem to stem either from entrenched vested interests or from a desire to bask in the evanescent media limelight to gain cheap brownie points in the political sweepstakes. But by doing so, we are only hurting the discourse of human development by blocking way to a more open and liberal society.
After all, if your motor car stops working or is environmentally polluting, you do not go back to the bullock cart. The best course of action would be to make the motor car more efficient or environment friendly rather than dumping it completely. So, when we have accepted so many other benefits of science and have already been interfering with nature enough, there should be theoretically no pangs to GMOs, cloning or stem cell research if the same could be used to better human life further without hurting the nature or compromising with the basic values. In fact, our ethics and values should also be living entities always evolving rather than being stuck in a time warp.
It is such feeling or tendency to benefit from ersatz popular revulsion or fear that has given birth to such entities as Taliban in Afghanistan and elsewhere. It is the bounden duty of the societal leaders to inform and educate the unschooled masses about the various facets of collective social life. But, an irresponsible section of our leadership is busy wasting popular energies on such futile issues rather than mobilising and channelling the same into productive causes.
One just hopes that such protestations and remonstrations shall only further the debate typical of a liberal democracy, giving way to a more eclectic culture by way of a healthy discourse and paradigm on such issues. This is actually symptomatic of an India still being mired in history if we are to believe the postulates as averred by Francis Fukuyama in his celebrates thesis namely ‘End of History’.
The minatory Delphic predictions by such prophets of doom as Samuel Huntington forecasting a ‘Clash of Civilisations’ may not eventually happen if one were to see the silver lining in the cloud. After all, as they say, every threat or difficulty is also an opportunity. So, such negative expressions should actually further the democratic discourse including the need to debate the amount of freedom to be granted to the common man. However, one does feel that quite often some of these artistic freedoms of expression go overboard. Often such expressions could be easily tempered by the practical considerations of public morality by attempting a balance between the two and by stopping short of turning liberty into license. As John Stuart Mill would have said, ‘Our freedom to move our hand stops where someone’s nose begins.’
That such freedom and liberties reinforced by fundamental human rights, as also enshrined in our Constitution and Universal Declaration of Human Rights, should not be completely unchecked and unrestrained is something we all accept. If at all we decide to restrain them in the enlightened public interest, what should be the reasonable limit or curb on the same? But before we can actually see that happening, we have to ensure that the misplaced arrogance of a few does not lead others to react in a way which not only compromises the basic human rights of the silent majority, but can also be more prejudicial to the gradual maturing of human society. However, this is also important for this silent majority to prevent and pre-empt this loony fringe from being able to set the warp and weft of our cultural agenda.
*Saumitra Mohan
There has been a spurt of protests and red-faced expressions against the deemed moral and ethical degeneration in the Indian society in recent times. Be it the uproar over the so-called bawdy on-field shakes of the imported cheer leaders in the just concluded Indian Premier League cricket matches or the ban on bar girls in Maharashtra, the moral policemen, with their holier-than-thou approach, have always been up in the arms to register their protests. What happened to be occasional outpourings seem to have become quite routine and regular, with the Culture Vultures finding more and more causes to take cudgels for as if we have got devoid of the real and basic issues affecting the common man.
Be it Nelson Mandela’s paternal peck on Shabana Azmi, Richard Gere’s Knightly smackers to Shilpa Shetty, sartorial choices of our tennis sensation Sania Mirza, the romantic liberties taken by lovers in Meerut or elsewhere to meet openly in public parks or the annual ritualistic remonstrations against the celebration of Valentine Day, the Moral Brigade has come down heavily against the same to spoil the party. These Talibani tendencies to dictate the basic nuances of culture to the common man definitely do not gel with the broader framework of a liberal democratic society.
What is surprising is the fact that such incidents of cultural policing are being reported with unceasing regularity now a days, quite surprisingly at a time when we are talking of further liberalisation and consequent freedom of choice for the creature called ‘homo sapiens’. One Rizwanur Rahman from Kolkata fell prey to the same prying eyes of a vigilante moral brigade which culminated in his tragic death. The same pathological penchant of the loony fringe ensured the eventual shelving of the impending visit of Carla Bruni, in company of her more celebrated boy friend and the French President Nicolas Sarkozy. The protocol-related confusions finally had the French President making it all alone.
Such moral pangs take other hues in the form of attempts to ban smoking or drinking scenes on silver screen on the specious plea that the same promotes these vices among the common public, even though there are various other and more effective ways to promote healthy habits among the citizens. One has a sinking feeling that such non-issues emanate from an unwholesome desire to either hog some cheap publicity or to create some controversies in a bid to cater to a select audience for some unseen political advantage.
Since eccentricities and inanities know no boundaries, such cultural policemen could be found throughout the world. So, even artistic freedom of expression exercised by such people as Salman Rushdie, Taslima Nasreen, Maqbul Fida Hussain, Ashish Nandy and the famous European cartoonist who made a caricature of Prophet Muhammad have not been spared by these skin heads. Many of these people are the so called entrenched interests who try to regain their fast depleting acceptability or social respect by way of such dubious means.
While a section of our political class does batten and fatten on such class of politics, what surprises one is the tacit support extended to them by our intelligentsia by not registering their voice against such erratic, indiscriminate and misconceived curbs on the very basic human rights of the individual. How were one to dress up or who to marry ought to be best left to the sovereign desire of the individual in keeping with the law of the land. The numerous caste panchayats and their illegal fiats seeped in hoary moth-balled mores and customs have seen the execution or cold-blooded murders of many of the innocent men and women, something which should be shocking to the conscience of any civilised society. It is here that the state has to guard against any such incursion on individual freedom.
It is such cultural or intellectual policing that, on a different plane, also seems to dictate our reactions to such disparate phenomena as genetically modified food, human cloning or opening of retail chains. Believe it or not, all such reactions somehow and somewhere seem to stem either from entrenched vested interests or from a desire to bask in the evanescent media limelight to gain cheap brownie points in the political sweepstakes. But by doing so, we are only hurting the discourse of human development by blocking way to a more open and liberal society.
After all, if your motor car stops working or is environmentally polluting, you do not go back to the bullock cart. The best course of action would be to make the motor car more efficient or environment friendly rather than dumping it completely. So, when we have accepted so many other benefits of science and have already been interfering with nature enough, there should be theoretically no pangs to GMOs, cloning or stem cell research if the same could be used to better human life further without hurting the nature or compromising with the basic values. In fact, our ethics and values should also be living entities always evolving rather than being stuck in a time warp.
It is such feeling or tendency to benefit from ersatz popular revulsion or fear that has given birth to such entities as Taliban in Afghanistan and elsewhere. It is the bounden duty of the societal leaders to inform and educate the unschooled masses about the various facets of collective social life. But, an irresponsible section of our leadership is busy wasting popular energies on such futile issues rather than mobilising and channelling the same into productive causes.
One just hopes that such protestations and remonstrations shall only further the debate typical of a liberal democracy, giving way to a more eclectic culture by way of a healthy discourse and paradigm on such issues. This is actually symptomatic of an India still being mired in history if we are to believe the postulates as averred by Francis Fukuyama in his celebrates thesis namely ‘End of History’.
The minatory Delphic predictions by such prophets of doom as Samuel Huntington forecasting a ‘Clash of Civilisations’ may not eventually happen if one were to see the silver lining in the cloud. After all, as they say, every threat or difficulty is also an opportunity. So, such negative expressions should actually further the democratic discourse including the need to debate the amount of freedom to be granted to the common man. However, one does feel that quite often some of these artistic freedoms of expression go overboard. Often such expressions could be easily tempered by the practical considerations of public morality by attempting a balance between the two and by stopping short of turning liberty into license. As John Stuart Mill would have said, ‘Our freedom to move our hand stops where someone’s nose begins.’
That such freedom and liberties reinforced by fundamental human rights, as also enshrined in our Constitution and Universal Declaration of Human Rights, should not be completely unchecked and unrestrained is something we all accept. If at all we decide to restrain them in the enlightened public interest, what should be the reasonable limit or curb on the same? But before we can actually see that happening, we have to ensure that the misplaced arrogance of a few does not lead others to react in a way which not only compromises the basic human rights of the silent majority, but can also be more prejudicial to the gradual maturing of human society. However, this is also important for this silent majority to prevent and pre-empt this loony fringe from being able to set the warp and weft of our cultural agenda.
Growing Naxalism: Need for a Unified Command
Saumitra Mohan
With the recent arrest of a few Maoists in India’s financial capital by the Maharashtra police, it is more than obvious that this menace is no longer confined to the jungles. The Maoists are increasingly penetrating bigger cities, trying to indoctrinate people and collecting funds for the organisation.
If intelligence reports are to be believed, then the Maoists are already ensconced and entrenched in major cities. It is suspected that that the Maoists may strike bigger cities before long as the same provides good publicity for their intended ‘New Democratic Revolution’. A good cache of sophisticated arms, explosives and detonators have often been recovered following the arrests of many of the suspected Maoists from many of the cities.
According to their new strategy, Maoists plan to target important urban centres in India. They seem to have drawn up detailed guidelines for their urban operations, thereby wishing to mobilise disgruntled elements including urban unemployed in favour of their ultimate ‘cause’ of eventual seizure of state power by way of a so-called people’s war. The naxals reportedly have plans to strike in the industrial belts of Bhilai-Ranchi-Dhanbad-Calcutta and Mumbai-Pune-Surat-Ahmedabad to take their battle into the heart of India.
There may be no immediate threat, but the fact remains that Maoists have been steadily working their plans of building bases and finding a foothold in bigger cities. For the moment, they seem to have confined their activities to propagating their ideology, setting up secret cells for frontal organisations and recruiting people. The Maoists have been trying to spread their movement among trade and labour unions, poor people and students.
The recent Naxal attack on police stations in Orissa’s Nayagarh district is the latest wake-up call for India’s security mandarins. The naxals are said to have looted about 1,100 weapons, including pistols, light machine guns, AK-47s, SLRs and INSAS rifles from the district and police training school armouries in Nayagarh. They struck again on Orissa-Andhra Pradesh border resulting in the death of at least 45 policemen belonging to the elite anti-naxal force, ‘Greyhounds’.
With every passing day, the Maoist guerrillas seem to be tightening their grip on the country, claiming some 500 lives every year. In some areas, the situation is so alarming that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh recently described the menace as a “virus” that threatens the very idea of India. He exhorted the states to pool their resources and crush the leftist rebellion once and for all.
It has been known for long that our police force is definitely not as equipped, trained and motivated as their naxal counterparts who are increasingly growing in strength in every sense of the term. The Maoists today are better organised, better armed, better trained and better motivated to execute their sinister agenda.
Now, the Union home ministry is planning to tackle this problem by helping the states raise 35 India Reserve Battalions (IRB) to crush the Maoist rebellion. The Centre is learnt to have decided to take many other serious steps to curb the menace. There are already four layers of monitoring mechanisms. Since these have proved inadequate, the Union government has decided to have a fifth layer - a task force to be chaired by the Cabinet Secretary to promote coordinated efforts across a range of development and security activities so that the Maoist menace can be tackled comprehensively and effectively.
There are some complex issues which need to be resolved before we can expect a better response to the Maoist menace. Since law and order is a state subject, the Centre can not take direct police action in the wake of an incident unless the situation is deemed to be so alarming as to require its involvement under Article 355 of the Indian Constitution. The article relates to central involvement in extra-ordinary cases of ‘internal disturbances’ making it difficult to run the government there in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution.
Even though the Centre has provided 33 battalions (over 33,000 personnel) of paramilitary forces to states for deployment in naxal-affected districts, this has proved to be insufficient given the fact that naxalism today affects almost 40 per cent geographical area of this country in one way or the other. Chhattisgarh, for example, has over 13,000 personnel out of the total deployment of central forces, but it has still reported more than 50 per cent of the total casualties (325 out of 601) in 2007.
Andhra Pradesh has shown the way by creating a specialised force called ‘Grey Hounds’ to fight the Maoists and achieved huge success in minimising casualties since its inception almost two years back. The local police, backed by the armed reserve forces, the Grey Hounds and a well-developed intelligence network, have succeeded in controlling the Maoist menace to a great extent.
With Grey Hounds on their heels, the Maoists have been on the run in Andhra Pradesh, but the forces have not been able to take on the might of the Maoist guerrillas effectively in states like Chhattisgarh, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal where they are still to find an effective antidote to the Maoist threat.
The Maoists easily slip into another state after attacking civilians and security personnel, knowing full well that they can get away with the same. The rebels seem to be taking advantage of the fact that the states still do not have a ‘unified command’ to fight them. Law and order being a state subject, such a ‘unified command’ is theoretically not possible. But one feels that there is now an urgent need to come out with a better coordinated action and strategy vis-à-vis the Maoists even if that means having a ‘unified command’ by somehow getting over the constitutional snag.
Though the number of casualties in Maoist violence has declined in 2007 (601) as compared to 2006 (678), statistics do not tell the entire story. Incidents like the recent jail-break in Chhattisgarh where rebels attacked a jail and escaped with hundreds of their comrades reveal that the Maoists are only getting bolder. The Nayagarh incident only corroborates this assumption.
It is difficult to say if the new strategy by the Centre will be able to check the growth of Naxals in the countryside and their growing influence in the urban centres. In the past, states have failed to coordinate police operations to tackle such issues. But this time, as the Maoists increase their influence, the states have no choice but to join hands.
Saumitra Mohan
With the recent arrest of a few Maoists in India’s financial capital by the Maharashtra police, it is more than obvious that this menace is no longer confined to the jungles. The Maoists are increasingly penetrating bigger cities, trying to indoctrinate people and collecting funds for the organisation.
If intelligence reports are to be believed, then the Maoists are already ensconced and entrenched in major cities. It is suspected that that the Maoists may strike bigger cities before long as the same provides good publicity for their intended ‘New Democratic Revolution’. A good cache of sophisticated arms, explosives and detonators have often been recovered following the arrests of many of the suspected Maoists from many of the cities.
According to their new strategy, Maoists plan to target important urban centres in India. They seem to have drawn up detailed guidelines for their urban operations, thereby wishing to mobilise disgruntled elements including urban unemployed in favour of their ultimate ‘cause’ of eventual seizure of state power by way of a so-called people’s war. The naxals reportedly have plans to strike in the industrial belts of Bhilai-Ranchi-Dhanbad-Calcutta and Mumbai-Pune-Surat-Ahmedabad to take their battle into the heart of India.
There may be no immediate threat, but the fact remains that Maoists have been steadily working their plans of building bases and finding a foothold in bigger cities. For the moment, they seem to have confined their activities to propagating their ideology, setting up secret cells for frontal organisations and recruiting people. The Maoists have been trying to spread their movement among trade and labour unions, poor people and students.
The recent Naxal attack on police stations in Orissa’s Nayagarh district is the latest wake-up call for India’s security mandarins. The naxals are said to have looted about 1,100 weapons, including pistols, light machine guns, AK-47s, SLRs and INSAS rifles from the district and police training school armouries in Nayagarh. They struck again on Orissa-Andhra Pradesh border resulting in the death of at least 45 policemen belonging to the elite anti-naxal force, ‘Greyhounds’.
With every passing day, the Maoist guerrillas seem to be tightening their grip on the country, claiming some 500 lives every year. In some areas, the situation is so alarming that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh recently described the menace as a “virus” that threatens the very idea of India. He exhorted the states to pool their resources and crush the leftist rebellion once and for all.
It has been known for long that our police force is definitely not as equipped, trained and motivated as their naxal counterparts who are increasingly growing in strength in every sense of the term. The Maoists today are better organised, better armed, better trained and better motivated to execute their sinister agenda.
Now, the Union home ministry is planning to tackle this problem by helping the states raise 35 India Reserve Battalions (IRB) to crush the Maoist rebellion. The Centre is learnt to have decided to take many other serious steps to curb the menace. There are already four layers of monitoring mechanisms. Since these have proved inadequate, the Union government has decided to have a fifth layer - a task force to be chaired by the Cabinet Secretary to promote coordinated efforts across a range of development and security activities so that the Maoist menace can be tackled comprehensively and effectively.
There are some complex issues which need to be resolved before we can expect a better response to the Maoist menace. Since law and order is a state subject, the Centre can not take direct police action in the wake of an incident unless the situation is deemed to be so alarming as to require its involvement under Article 355 of the Indian Constitution. The article relates to central involvement in extra-ordinary cases of ‘internal disturbances’ making it difficult to run the government there in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution.
Even though the Centre has provided 33 battalions (over 33,000 personnel) of paramilitary forces to states for deployment in naxal-affected districts, this has proved to be insufficient given the fact that naxalism today affects almost 40 per cent geographical area of this country in one way or the other. Chhattisgarh, for example, has over 13,000 personnel out of the total deployment of central forces, but it has still reported more than 50 per cent of the total casualties (325 out of 601) in 2007.
Andhra Pradesh has shown the way by creating a specialised force called ‘Grey Hounds’ to fight the Maoists and achieved huge success in minimising casualties since its inception almost two years back. The local police, backed by the armed reserve forces, the Grey Hounds and a well-developed intelligence network, have succeeded in controlling the Maoist menace to a great extent.
With Grey Hounds on their heels, the Maoists have been on the run in Andhra Pradesh, but the forces have not been able to take on the might of the Maoist guerrillas effectively in states like Chhattisgarh, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal where they are still to find an effective antidote to the Maoist threat.
The Maoists easily slip into another state after attacking civilians and security personnel, knowing full well that they can get away with the same. The rebels seem to be taking advantage of the fact that the states still do not have a ‘unified command’ to fight them. Law and order being a state subject, such a ‘unified command’ is theoretically not possible. But one feels that there is now an urgent need to come out with a better coordinated action and strategy vis-à-vis the Maoists even if that means having a ‘unified command’ by somehow getting over the constitutional snag.
Though the number of casualties in Maoist violence has declined in 2007 (601) as compared to 2006 (678), statistics do not tell the entire story. Incidents like the recent jail-break in Chhattisgarh where rebels attacked a jail and escaped with hundreds of their comrades reveal that the Maoists are only getting bolder. The Nayagarh incident only corroborates this assumption.
It is difficult to say if the new strategy by the Centre will be able to check the growth of Naxals in the countryside and their growing influence in the urban centres. In the past, states have failed to coordinate police operations to tackle such issues. But this time, as the Maoists increase their influence, the states have no choice but to join hands.
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Debating the idea of Federal Police Agency
*Saumitra Mohan
The perceived failure of our police machinery to deal with various cases of law and order satisfactorily has often led to demands for CBI inquiry in those cases. This, inter alia, points to the lack of popular confidence in our police and frequent calls to CBI for causing inquiries in matters as may strictly relate to matters in the state domain. This has not only dented the morale of the provincial police, but has also resulted in the central agency being overly burdened to do justice to its original briefs.
It is in this light that there has been mooted a proposal for a Federal Police Agency (FPA) to deal with such issues in state domain which go beyond the normal law and order or which require more specialised attention and investigation. The same shall also have positive pay-offs for our internal security.
The blame game between the Centre and many state governments as seen recently in the wake of critical law and order failures or terrorist bomb blasts is also supposed to be laid to rest by institution of such an agency. After the recent serial bomb blasts in Uttar Pradesh, while the Centre said that law and order being a state subject, it is the responsibility of the state government to be more vigilant, the state government blamed the centre for having not provided it with adequate intelligence inputs to this effect.
However, the Central Administrative Reforms Committee headed by Veerappa Moily has also recommended such an independent Crime Investigation Agency. The performance of this agency is proposed to be monitored by a ‘high powered collegium’ comprising the Chief Minister, Speaker of the Assembly, Chief Justice of the High Court and Leader of the Opposition.
The committee, inter alia, suggested a State Police Performance and Accountability Commission with the Chief Minister as the head, but also with many members from the civil society to review and evaluate the police performance. The Citizens’ Committee has also recommended specific measures for proper supervision of the police force.
The idea of a Federal Police Agency has been on board for a long time and now the Government of India is also learnt to be toying with such an idea. But before we go about this, there are many issues which need to be discussed and sorted out.
When we go about setting up such an agency, we should see to it that the jurisdictions of the state police and that of agencies like CBI and FPA remain clearly demarcated to avoid any duplication or overlapping of functions and duties, as far as possible. It needs to be ensured that inquiries and investigations as entrusted to these agencies become more automatic and systematic than be reactive entrustments to pre-empt any negative reflection on performance of the local police.
It has been noticed in recent past that the state governments or high courts have entrusted enquiries in high profile cases only after there has been a popular outcry demanding the same. The same was seen in Nandigram and Rizwanur Rahman cases where ongoing state police inquiries were discontinued or nixed in favour of inquiries by the central agency. Such an approach often has dampening impact on police morale.
We should also ensure that even while create such a central agency, we should not ignore and forget that there is no substitute to an efficient and effective police force as that still remains the most primary level where the State-citizens interface usually takes place. Hence, the provincial police needs to be spruced up further rather than marginalising it by whittling down its authority or overshadowing it by creation of parallel authorities.
Ergo, increased attention should continue to be paid to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the state police to restore the popular confidence therein. The state police needs to be made more professional and effective than it has been found to be so far. And to ensure this, the police must be allowed to function more independently and autonomously than it has been able to.
It is realising this that the Dharamvira Commission recommended complete police autonomy long back in the 1970s, but till date no serious thought has been given to this recommendation for the simple reason that it suits the interests of our political class. The cosmetic changes effected in police organisation recently consequent to the Supreme Court judgement have not made any substantive and qualitative difference to their service delivery. Proposal of the FPA also points to the dilettantism which informs the police reforms.
It remains a fact that since law and order is a state subject, frequent calls to CBI also results in erosion of the state authority and, thereby, of our federal structure. Even though our founding fathers never meant India to be a true federation as is obvious in the Constitutional appellation ‘Union of States’, centralisation of powers beyond a point is not advisable notwithstanding the centralising tendencies seen in federal countries across the world.
After all, Nandigram has brought to the fore a sinister side of the reality which needs to be addressed urgently for the better management of law and order situation with serious implications for our internal security. Most importantly, we need to realise that we can allow the institution of police to languish only at the peril of our system.
So, even while we go about creating FPA, it should be ensured that police functions remain unencumbered by interference from any quarters including insidious influence by the politicians and political parties. The police force not only needs to be made more professional, but it also needs be better trained and better motivated to deal with various demands and challenges of policing in an anomic society.
*Saumitra Mohan
The perceived failure of our police machinery to deal with various cases of law and order satisfactorily has often led to demands for CBI inquiry in those cases. This, inter alia, points to the lack of popular confidence in our police and frequent calls to CBI for causing inquiries in matters as may strictly relate to matters in the state domain. This has not only dented the morale of the provincial police, but has also resulted in the central agency being overly burdened to do justice to its original briefs.
It is in this light that there has been mooted a proposal for a Federal Police Agency (FPA) to deal with such issues in state domain which go beyond the normal law and order or which require more specialised attention and investigation. The same shall also have positive pay-offs for our internal security.
The blame game between the Centre and many state governments as seen recently in the wake of critical law and order failures or terrorist bomb blasts is also supposed to be laid to rest by institution of such an agency. After the recent serial bomb blasts in Uttar Pradesh, while the Centre said that law and order being a state subject, it is the responsibility of the state government to be more vigilant, the state government blamed the centre for having not provided it with adequate intelligence inputs to this effect.
However, the Central Administrative Reforms Committee headed by Veerappa Moily has also recommended such an independent Crime Investigation Agency. The performance of this agency is proposed to be monitored by a ‘high powered collegium’ comprising the Chief Minister, Speaker of the Assembly, Chief Justice of the High Court and Leader of the Opposition.
The committee, inter alia, suggested a State Police Performance and Accountability Commission with the Chief Minister as the head, but also with many members from the civil society to review and evaluate the police performance. The Citizens’ Committee has also recommended specific measures for proper supervision of the police force.
The idea of a Federal Police Agency has been on board for a long time and now the Government of India is also learnt to be toying with such an idea. But before we go about this, there are many issues which need to be discussed and sorted out.
When we go about setting up such an agency, we should see to it that the jurisdictions of the state police and that of agencies like CBI and FPA remain clearly demarcated to avoid any duplication or overlapping of functions and duties, as far as possible. It needs to be ensured that inquiries and investigations as entrusted to these agencies become more automatic and systematic than be reactive entrustments to pre-empt any negative reflection on performance of the local police.
It has been noticed in recent past that the state governments or high courts have entrusted enquiries in high profile cases only after there has been a popular outcry demanding the same. The same was seen in Nandigram and Rizwanur Rahman cases where ongoing state police inquiries were discontinued or nixed in favour of inquiries by the central agency. Such an approach often has dampening impact on police morale.
We should also ensure that even while create such a central agency, we should not ignore and forget that there is no substitute to an efficient and effective police force as that still remains the most primary level where the State-citizens interface usually takes place. Hence, the provincial police needs to be spruced up further rather than marginalising it by whittling down its authority or overshadowing it by creation of parallel authorities.
Ergo, increased attention should continue to be paid to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the state police to restore the popular confidence therein. The state police needs to be made more professional and effective than it has been found to be so far. And to ensure this, the police must be allowed to function more independently and autonomously than it has been able to.
It is realising this that the Dharamvira Commission recommended complete police autonomy long back in the 1970s, but till date no serious thought has been given to this recommendation for the simple reason that it suits the interests of our political class. The cosmetic changes effected in police organisation recently consequent to the Supreme Court judgement have not made any substantive and qualitative difference to their service delivery. Proposal of the FPA also points to the dilettantism which informs the police reforms.
It remains a fact that since law and order is a state subject, frequent calls to CBI also results in erosion of the state authority and, thereby, of our federal structure. Even though our founding fathers never meant India to be a true federation as is obvious in the Constitutional appellation ‘Union of States’, centralisation of powers beyond a point is not advisable notwithstanding the centralising tendencies seen in federal countries across the world.
After all, Nandigram has brought to the fore a sinister side of the reality which needs to be addressed urgently for the better management of law and order situation with serious implications for our internal security. Most importantly, we need to realise that we can allow the institution of police to languish only at the peril of our system.
So, even while we go about creating FPA, it should be ensured that police functions remain unencumbered by interference from any quarters including insidious influence by the politicians and political parties. The police force not only needs to be made more professional, but it also needs be better trained and better motivated to deal with various demands and challenges of policing in an anomic society.
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