During the conference Hamid Chendamangalur rightly pointed out that India is not really a secular-democracy in its substantive sense. Though we are procedurally secular and democratic, according to him, we are actually becoming a theocracy where the government is hostage to the dicta from the religious heads – the Indian ayattollahs from many belief systems.

But the seminar did not gave much emphasis to the debate on the kind of secularism which we need today – the western idea of secularism or an Indian style of secularism? The western idea is for blanket exclusion of religion from public sphere with no exceptions. But Indian conception of secularism is peculiar due to its multicultural, multi-religious composition. It stands for equal protection and equal patronage to every religion. Though it looks wonderful in theory what happens in practice is that State legitimise religion and belief without offering an opportunity to critically approach the concepts of religion in general and not any particular religion. The State is indoctrinating the children with a preconceived understanding that the concepts like God, religion etc. are absolute, unquestionable and hence legitimate.

Yes, it wasn’t morally correct and politically feasible to adopt the western conception of Secularism in the initial years of the Republic. But that doesn’t mean that State had to institutionalize religion by wiring it into the political psyche of the average Indian. This institutionalisation and legitimisation of religion in public sphere has led to the enslavement of the State to the theologians. Praveen Swami recently wrote in The Hindu : ‎”India cannot undo this harm until god and god’s will are ejected from our public life”. But what is happening or what has happened so far is just against this. Ideas like God and God’s will are increasingly heard in the public domain. Not only that radical voices which questioned the usurpation of public sphere by such metaphysical conceptions and related institutions has weakened in course of time but also that these forces has become immensely powerful so as to keep the governments under hostage conditions.

When someone talk bullshit in the name of religion there should be the freedom to call it bullshit. Sadly that is not the case now. Instead of religion getting ejected from the public sphere it is getting more and more involved in the public sphere. The only way out is to provide a secular space for the children to think about by using the inherent critical reasoning ability. Rather than compelling them to do YOGA, they should be granted the freedom of choice. Attempts in this direction, at least in Kerala, had been faced with vehement opposition.

If there is any one cause for which all “pillars” of the democracy work in tandem that would be for carving out more space for religion in the public domain. We have a judiciary which gave verdict on the lines of “faith” rather than constitution. Our media is instrumental in cementing the foundations of religious revivalism . Interestingly this revivalism has a negative gender bias together with a conducive nature towards market consumerism. That is why bull-shits like “Akshaya Thritheeya”  is being celebrated by media. When these media houses print 4 page supplements on the birthdays of the self-proclaimed Godmen (and women), how can we expect them to take a rational stand based upon critical reason?

So who can play a role? Without doubt the progressive political and social movements can make a change here. But they also has to show the courage to adopt a concrete stand on the kind of secularism they would like to follow. If they continue to say that by secularism they mean the cohabitation of many religions but silent on the influence of this thing called “religion” (all varieties combined) on the society and politics, we will have to say that they are also statusquo-ists.

Years passed without my consent. Neither do I wait for the parade to start nor get goosebumps these days. But the problem remains intact. No one bothers to think about these issues. Afterall you don’t get time to think about what exactly is this constitution. Your eyes, your ears, your thoughts, your emotions – all these have been hijacked by a nonsensical media. To be honest, the easiest way to strip off your intelligence and common-sense from you is to use the time tested and proven idea of nationalism. Nationalism (the negative conception of the term, to be precise) has always used the military as its front and weapon. The myth of a nation had been used by the fascists during the mid 20th century. Military power and might thus became a symbol of national pride. It was by projecting this power and might the fascist nationalists earned the consent of the people who they governed with a totalitarian administration. Gramsci called it the ‘hegemony’.

If nationalism was used, misused and abused to gather consent and legitimacy to a totalitarian government during those days, the present story is a little bit different. We are being told that nation means power and power by all means  equates to military power. More than the State, it is the media which creates this false consciousness. What is the rationale behind playing military-movies on this day when the only relevance for military is that they take part in a march past in front of their supreme commander, who has been elected in a Republican way? Putting it straight, military has very little significance on this anniversary day contrary to the conceptions which the media is trying to instil in the public-psyche of this country. Malayalam channels competed to telecast ‘Kurukshethram’, a film by Major Ravi about the commandos operating in Kashmir. A channel went further ahead and aired an interview with Major Ravi on the Republic Day 2012. All these are under the misconception that Republic Day has something to do with military and military only.  This kind of pseudo-nationalism which is carefully articulated and nurtured plays an important role in transforming the otherwise pragmatic and wise Indian to a warmonger immediately after a terrorist attack or something of that sort. We know the politics of warmongering. It is not my point to elaborate but I should remind you how Pokhran-II and Kargil were used successfully in elections.

If not military and its capabilities, what merits attention on this occasion? The Constitution – what else?  The largest of written constitutions in the world, The Constitution of India is a living document which stands tall as the document of our aspirations,symbol of our success as a democracy and, most importantly, a reminder of our failures as it contains many ideals which we failed miserably to achieve.  The preamble is sufficient to get this mixed feeling of aspiration, success and failure. This is precisely what the children should be told about.  The preamble talks about Justice even before Liberty, Equality and Fraternity.  Why is it so? Within Justice it is Social Justice which the constitution guarantees ahead of political or economic justice. Is it just a random placement or a well thought about one? What is meant by dignity of the individual? Why is it so important? Why is “dignity of the individual” neglected in the exhortations about the “unity and integrity of the nation” even though both concepts are from the same line?  Republic Day must be used to provoke the children (and adults too) with such questions.

WE, THE PEOPLE OF INDIA, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC and to secure to all its citizens:
JUSTICE, social, economic and political;
LIBERTY of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship;
EQUALITY of status and of opportunity;
and to promote among them all
FRATERNITY assuring the dignity of the individual and the unity and integrity of the Nation;
IN OUR CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY this twenty-sixth day of November, 1949, do HEREBY ADOPT, ENACT AND GIVE TO OURSELVES THIS CONSTITUTION.

It is when we think from this perspective we get a clear picture of the dangerous game of boasting military power as the sole symbol of national power and aspiration. None of the above mentioned category of media would be in favour of the ideals like “social justice” or “economic justice” and “dignity of the individual”. It is a systematic way of converting citizens to hardcore fundamentalist-nationalists and there by creating an environment of consent and legitimacy to more dangerous political agendas.

fig.1

If Kuku used the term racism in the strict sense of  racial discrimination, i.e. he being an African American was denied many services just because of his racial identity. Agreeing to his points, I would like to extract the word ‘systematic’,  which he used to describe the Indian attitude, and place it into a more domestic context. Think about the dark skinned millions in India. Of them many are Dalits. Aren’t we following a ‘systematic’ attitude of discrimination and intimidation towards them? Yes, I would say. This fact is so well known and agreed to that no one likes to talk about it any more !!! Yet, we continue to make fun of those dark skinned brothers and sisters.

Coming back to the point, I want to stress on ‘systematic’. Or rather I’d use the term institutionalized discrimination. Have a look at the pictures on this post. Those pictures were captured from an advertisement campaign currently undergoing in the leading news papers of India. I saw them in The Hindu. Briefly describing the purpose behind the ad: India Info Line (IIFL), a brokerage firm, launched this campaign for  Financial Literacy Agenda for Mass Empowerment (FLAME). The campaign which has 108 parts with one each printed every day. The ads carry a message, sometimes an advice to the people who are into the financial markets intended to make them financially literate or aware of the pitfalls. So far so good.

Fig. 2

But to understand the real issue one should observe these pictures carefully. In all of them why the so called villains are portrayed as dark skinned? “For effective communication..” or “to get this registered in the minds of people” might be the usual answers we get if asked. That is precisely where the issue is. Why do we love to see villains with these features and get ups. No, you cannot get away by justifying that this is just one standalone case and need not be given so much attention. If that was the case why this has been  repeated?  If Fig. 1 depicts the dark man with a moustache  peeping on to the other one to copy down the password, Fig. 2 has the same person attempting a credit card fraud. When it comes to Fig.3 his new avatar is of an “outstanding” portfolio manager!! Different in looks and attitude the designer has kept him at beyond arms length from others. The customer, poor guy with no common-sense, seems to make a ‘wrong’ decision by choosing our guy, the shabby haired, dark skinned man with a moustache and big eyes.  The other images also say the same story. The FLAME website has the complete set of these ads.

Fig 3

Now, the question here is what is the relationship between the skin colour (and consequent looks) and financial fraud. How do you correlate these two? Should we understand that everyone with these features are more or less financial criminals? Or is it that only they do such crimes?

You can see some more images in this post. Those very special dignitaries are known for their track record in financial irregularities and cheating. Unfortunately I don’t see a single person with such physical appearance as seen in those ads. Nor do I generalise that all non-dark skinned persons are engaged in fraudulent acts as these dignitaries did.

Hasan Ali Khan

These ads manifest an advertiser’s confidence that portraying a villain in such manner makes it a lot easier for his creation to penetrate into the minds of the indented recipients - that is we the people. Who is to be blamed?    The ad-designer?  the ad-director?  the firm IIFL? the newspaper? Everyone of us is to be blamed. All emperors are naked. . Why are we so prejudiced? That too in this so called knowledge-society !! How dare somebody draw like this and continue to do that?

The liberal values which we boast of seems to be dumb, deaf and blind against these atrocities. Unless we realize how the markets are playing this dirty game we would end up in deep trouble. Now, if you think why I am pulling the markets into this go back to your TV and wait for an ad. Mostly the ad will be of a cosmetic product. Those fairness cream ads, I mean it. No one cares the dark girl, no one wants to date her… interview panels turn her down..  she looks very gloomy.. a fairer one advises this magical product.. a few days time.. Alas!!  To everyone’s surprise she comes out of the shell in flying colours.. jobs, boy friends waiting in queue. Now, replace ‘she’ with ‘he’. The whole story still holds good. Man, this is the $150 million fairness cream industry of India.

All those dark fellows out there…  Go to hell..  or continue to steal, cheat..  be depressed about your complexion.. you want to get out of this? Try our new……

Ketan Parekh

Fig 5

Fig 4

The Indian media, especially the English news channels, are back with the battle cry. They have proved it again and again how brilliant they are in cultivation of news. I can’t understand why we are discussing the possibility of a Geronimo model strike in Pakistan targeting India’s most wanteds who are apparently at large in that soil. Everybody knows the political and military realities. Everyone from the euphoric news anchors to the military top brass. We know well why we should not resort to such ‘mis adventures’ (to borrow the words of Gen Kayani). And that pragmatism is precisely what acted as a deterrent whenever we had a strike plan in mind – be it in 2001 or 2008. We retreated from the border after Operation Parakram, a massive military buildup in the borders in 2001. Why? Definitely not because we were afraid of the other side, not at all because we had the slightest doubt in our ability. It was the N factor which ultimately acted as the deterrent. Forgetting all the political mileage which the nationalist BJP led govt had in mind during that deployment, we were (are) not in a position to go for a war and the decision to take the men back to the barracks was a wise one. It’s a reality. We can’t afford a war now. The battle cry by the media and the so called nationalistic upper middle class has to be analyzed against this grave reality.

What the mainstream media is doing is totally against the efforts of the Primeminister Dr. Manmohan Singh to find a way out in improving India’s bitter relationship with Pakistan. You want to grow, you need peace. You want peace you have to talk and not fight. And above all we do not have to imitate American actions which even they would be hesitant to repeat, even though Whitehouse has not ruled out such a possibility.

Now comes the question of National security. On what grounds you can be sure that a surgical strike on one or two top criminals like Mazood Azhar means India is safe thenceforth? Man, we need to work a lot within our territory before thinking about such adventures. Our intel, our corrupt delivery systems, slacky attitude to internal security, lawlessness in many spheres of administration and so on need huge attention. This is a country where a ration card was issued in the name of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (a year ago I think, in Andhra Pradesh). Do you think the terrorist menace exists just because there are brains working against India from across the border? No, that is not the only reason. We have to be vigil, we have to make our part clear first.

Operation Geronimo or the proposed surgical strikes targeting individuals within the territory of Pakistan is all the while misadventurous (as reminded by Kayani, despite all military unequations) and simply uncivilized revenge which will not have any positive outcome. It’s dangerous to regional stability and our own national interest. The media shouldn’t have taken up this issue in this manner as they are doing for the past couple of days. It’s yet another proof why we should not let the mainstream news media to define our national security program. Hopefully the political leadership will be able to show commonsense and promote all measures to bring peace to the region. That would include people to people contacts, trade and last but not least -no misadventures!

And now came the dazing comment. I was stupefied to hear this from a person like him who has at least gone to schools and apparently has above average intelligence.

He said, “Yes, yes..” then followed with the usual way of ‘agree a bit and disagree on the rest’ strategy, “but.. see you consider Bombay. The well settled or posh people who are much civilized are in an equal or sometimes better position when compared to US cities. I agree that the low-class, uncivilized are not so and they are way below but you look at the people who control the city or big business people, you know.. There are those slums, I know, but we can’t help them as they never want to get out of there and make use of the opportunities outside .. moreover they are all criminals”

The 3 major lessons are:

1. Rahul Gandhi won’t spare any opportunity:

To be precise it should be said that the strategists who does the choreography are keenly watching each and every happenings around the country and they will definitely set the stage for an action with Rahul in the lead role. So it was the worst political move from the Shiv Sena side to let him take the center stage, that too in their strongholds.

He made right use of the opportunity with clean and neat execution of a PR plan. Though I have reservations in admitting him as the ‘future’ or ‘hope’ I don’t hesitate to congratulate his strategists (if it’s himself then him). My reservations/concerns has nothing to do with what I’m going to write today.

2. pro ShivSena consolidation?

I strongly believe that it is premature to write off the Shiv Sena and the power of their dirty politics. The most scarce element among people is memory, especially when it comes to politics. They tend to believe that what they see is what is real. Fortunately or unfortunately that is not the case most of the times. The art or science of understanding  public consciousness and general will still remains untamed to most of the political scientists, let alone commons.

Many a times people tend to forget that Senas are still a power to reckon with in Maharashtra if the recent assembly election results are conveying any truth about the above mentioned general will. ShivSena had bagged 44 seats and their ally BJP 46.   MNS ended up with 13. And don’t forget that the Senas were fighting each other !!  Also the ideology of “Marathi Manoos” is not at all new though the targets were not ShahRukh Khan or Rahul Gandhi. All these figures and facts tell me that there was a strong affinity among the people towards the Sena theses as recently as October 2009 which is just 3 months ago. I agree that there was stronger affinity towards the INC+NCP alliance but it will be a mistake if we ignore the significant influence of the Senas in almost half of the electorate.

In fact things have turned to the Sena’s advantage, I think. They can keep their ranks closer to the party through this controversy. Above all the whole episode acted as a catalyst in amalgamating the cousins!! Now they can work together, stronger than ever, waiting for Pakistan cricket teams next visit or a PSC exam..

How can I leave the most crucial factor in the potential pro-ShivSena consolidation? It is nothing but the BJP’s stand. Albeit having a chief who hails from Maharashtra the BJP has shown political maturity to disapprove the Senas’ stand in this issue, and ONLY in this case. Don’t read it as a branch-off.. The RSS too, despite  the Nagpur factor, has disapproved the Thackereys’ stand. May be because they are not as ‘humble’ as the Senas to confine themselves in Maharashtra. (To the surprise of many, there is a state unit of ShivSena in Kerala..!!).

The bottom line is, I really doubt how much influence Rahul Gandhi’s visit to Mumbai had on the people on the other side of it.

3. So which is the biggest problem in today’s India?

It was the issue of Right to Expression which lead to the whole drama. I have no hesitation to call these as political stunts. A careful analysis on the development of this issue makes one thing clear. Rahul Gandhi tried to woo the Bihari students by mentioning the native place of the 26/11 NSG commandos. (By the way, do we know whether they were really from UP/Bihar? ) As expected it received warm reception from Mumbai ka Tigers.

Let me remind another set of headline catcher. Way back in August/September 2009, when a large part of India was starving due to an intense drought the media as well as the netizens were busy discussing the so called austerity drive!! There were couple of train journeys and economy class flights at that time too which nicely covered up the ground reality!!

This time it is the skyrocketing price rise. Food price inflation is not giving any signs of coming down. Government is in a blame game. “It will come down ” says the PM. But, not to my surprise, this is NOT AT ALL an issue among the urban elites. After all, who cares!!!!

Transparency and Congress will never go together. Forget about that party and it’s decision making being transparent to people like me who are totally outsiders but what about insiders?

Are they aware of the decision making process or the people who really take decisions?

How many of the ‘devotees’ know what constitutes the so called “High Command”?

How many Congressmen has counted the number of times the Congress Working Committee has met during the last one year or so. (in theory CWC is supposed to be the highest policy/decision making body of the party).

Have you ever heard a speech by the party president which you can guarantee as written by herself? I’m not talking about those ‘readings’ from an elevated platform.

Being a party with a loosely organized cadre, what is the source of huge amount of money it spent during general elections held earlier this year?(500 cr is the amount allegedly spent by the party). I hope no one will tell me that the whole amount was collected from public.

How can one expect this party with extreme centralization tendencies to drive India towards better living standards for which decentralized administration is the golden rule?

The winning formula for the congress:
1. The residue of fuedal era in the minds of many Indians and the resulting blind belief towards anyone from the Nehru family.
2. The presence of a Hindu fundamentalist opposition.
3. The financial support from corporates which on most occassions are under-the-table transactions.
Anything else???

It was never the intention of this post to discuss the policy pursued by the party even though there are areas of differences. Rather the focus was on the operational ambiguities and opaqueness which an Indian citizen should be worried about, for the Congress is still the ruling party of the country.

PF scam:
The ghost of the Ghaziabad PF scam in which several judges of the Allahabad High Court were allegedly involved continued to haunt the judiciary. It was one hard blow on the face of the judges’ credibility (and thereby that of judiciary) and gave strength to the increasing demand for reforms and accountability.

Assets declaration:
The most dramatic events which led to the tarnishing of the Supreme Court’s image and triggered intense public debate was the Judges’ asset declaration issue. The series of events were kicked off by a seemingly innocuous RTI petition by SC Aggarwal through Adv. Prashanth Bhushan asking whether “the judges are submitting details of their assets to CJI, as per a 1997 resolution, or not”. An issue which could have been otherwise handled by a yes or no response was mismanaged to the worst level and triggered the series of debates in public as well legal circles.

No intention to detail the events which finally led to the voluntary declaration of assets by the judges themselves but there are many who are skeptic on the positive outcome due to this act. Even though the judges declared their assets on the Supreme Court website, the lack of proper structure, any recurring process and clarity, not to mention the ambiguity, made it certain that the question of accountability will occupy centre stage in the year 2010 also.

Dinakaran controversy:
Justice Paul Dinakaran’s recommended elevation to Supreme Court followed the assets declaration issue. The whole episode which temporarily got settled by now fuelled two branches of debate: one was related to the credibility of the judges and their links with the malice of the society making them indifferent from their counterparts from legislature or executive. The other was the process of appointments, which the central government had a larger stake until a few years back but currently is a function of the collegium. The debate continues as we reach a year end. Justice Dinakaran is facing an impeachment motion in the parliament and the issue is in top gear.

Collegium supremacy:
Even though the title of this post used the word turbulence, there are aspects of this turbulence which will definitely benefit the judiciary as well as the Indian state in the long run. One of them is the collegium supremacy debate. The whole chapter of Justice Dinakaran’s elevation has the potential to establish the need for rigorous reforms in the appointment process and get it approved by the nation.

Strengthening demands for reforms:
All these happenings are strengthening the ever increasing demand for judicial reforms and greater accountability. Eminent lawyers like Prashanth Bhushan and organizations like Campaign for Judicial Accountability and Reforms are having the upper edge in the prolonged struggle for reforms and accountability. I would recommend readers to visit the CJAR website to know more about the demand for judicial reforms in India and various debates pertaining to that subject.

Altogether a very noisy and turbulent year for the judiciary. But given the history of Indian judiciary there are still hope in the minds of people on the judiciary’s commitment to justice but at the same time it is high time to instill fresh confidence in the social mind by adopting the mantras of transparency and accountability.

At the same time, in spite of all these verbose it  is a well known fact that the summit did not reach even closer to where it was expected to some months prior to the summit. But by the time the delegates reached Copenhagen it was almost certain that the best case scenario will be a ‘political declaration’ which is NOT legally binding. Another fundamental issue was that of  ”Common But Differentiated Responsibilities” which was predicted to be the bottlenecks in negotiations.

High profile diplomacy resulted in a last minute understanding – what term should be used to describe it is still debated though officially it is an ‘Accord’ – on which the conference later decided to ” take note of “.

The accord’s highlights:

The accord has not much freshness in terms of commitments. Unilateral announcements made a few weeks back were reiterated in an international conference, that’s all to the most part of it. The major outcome from the conference is the agreement to raise a fund of  US$ 30 billion in the next 3 years and to increase this to an annual fund of US$100 bn by year 2020. But the details are yet to be finalized.

The real issue of emission cuts did not reach a consensus and what we have in front of us is almost the same commitments made in a ‘political statement’ at La Aquila, Italy in July 2009 i.e. the 2 degree rise in temperature should be prevented. In addition to that almost all major emitters affirmed their unilateral emission cut plans. But the sad part of all this is none of the announced plans are sufficient to contain the GHG in the atmosphere from reaching a density of 450 ppm which is the estimated upper limit to keep the temperature rise below 2 degrees. More over the game of mathematics is being played a lot. When the estimations are based upon a 1990 level as denominator for % cut in emissions, many countries including India are talking about 2005 thereby conveniently ignoring the huge increase in emissions during those 15 years. Thought this is not much of a value for the scientists in IPCC, for the general public when debating the emission cuts this helps only to create confusion.

Technology transfer and IP Rights

Success of any global effort of mitigation and adaptation must require extensive use of technology, not the conventional ones but radically innovative.  But if we see it merely as a business opportunity to impose a monopoly through intellectual property rights and thereby ensuring a market in the future the chances of success are gloomy.  If the global community goes by a TRIPS like IPR regime, then it would be leading to a catastrophe much larger than the impact of TRIPS in the health care sector of many third world countries. After all if Issac Newton had filed a patent for discovering gravity, he would have become the richest person on earth.. (Just an analogy for the sake of an argument..  :D )

The estimated additional cost required for following a low-carbon trajectory of energy development is way higher than what most people think.
A nuclear power plant costs 6 times than a coal fueled one. Similarly the capital cost for producing power from Solar energy is 25 times when compared to coal based production. (Courtesy: Prabir Purkayasta, Frontline  Dec 5 2009)

The above two cases throw light into the extremely large cost of implementation of the low-carbon path. Also it highlights the need to emphasize the unfettered technology transfer apart from the financial assistance from the developed few to the under-developed lot. There is no surprise that this was not there in the top priorities there – the idea of re distribution was always suppressed.

Nevertheless to say, the conference was a failure in addressing this crucial and basic requirement.

The rise of BASIC:

The so called ‘emerging’ powers – India, China, Brazil and South Africa – worked so closely that none of them were ready to break that cohesion even under extreme diplomatic pressure from the United States. President Obama made several attempts to get a one on one with these leaders but they were firm on their stand of  ”all or none”. BASIC has lots of strategic significance but at the same time it is yet another proof of how divided the developing world is. Alliances are formed on a case by case basis alone and not on the basis of a wider international understanding. The drawback of this type of stop-gap associations is a sense of disbelief even when sitting together for a common cause. For instance, South Africa is not a party in BRIC.  India, Brazil and South Africa shares a trilateral platform called IBSA. There is SCO, there is G-77 and lot more. In spite of this BASIC was successful in being a powerful block which managed to check the developed world’s agenda of a deal based on equity put forward by Denmark but composed and orchestrated by US and UK.

What next?

It’s time to repeat this question which was asked many times in the history of International Climate Control efforts during the past 17 years right from the Earth Summit at Rio de Genero in 1992. Many historical junctures has been surpassed and the only promising step by the international community was the Kyoto Protocol of 1997 (which the US accepted but later refused to ratify as Bush failed to get  Congressional support). Having said this history, the scene is almost back to square one.  The Kyoto protocol is almost near its death though it was not butchered in Copenhagen as it was planned. Mankind can just hope that the accord will turn out to be the platform for ‘many aspects’ of the future talks. And more importantly some one has to constantly remind our leadership that there are not much time to talk. And that some one is every one among us. Before pointing the fingers to the leaders we are bound to ask ourselves the question: “How much am I contributing to this climate change and what portion of it is avoidable.”

And finally  if anyone ask me who really won the game in Copenhagen, I would answer “it is for sure the Earth is continuously losing though I don’t know of anyone winning”

“Why can’t people think of a ONE INDIA and strive for the excellence of this country as a whole and themselves in turn? Nobody is going to gain out of this except a few power-hungry politicians..” Popular response went on like this. Again, pretty much understandable. Before jumping to the scene and suggest alternate solutions or blaming whoever supported the bifurcation,we are liable to study more about the issue for several reasons. Firstly it gives us a better platform to approach this burning issue. Secondly, we can identify the other areas where there is potential for similar uprisings. Thirdly the golden formula – “What should be done” – can be arrived on.

The analysis of this separate statehood issue should be done on a wider panorama of divisive political movements across India and not just confined to Telengana movement. Geographic, demographic, economic, political and social dimensions should be kept in mind when doing such an analysis. Such an analysis, even if a lot of people has done it already, will enable us to be in a matured position to cook our own opinion on this issue.

A brief history of similar struggles

The major accusation on the demands for separate statehood at various parts of the country is that some political leaders are misleading the general public for petty political gains. However, the history of state formations in India proves this allegation is not hundred percent true. Be it the case of Jharkhand or Telengana or the upcoming issues of Bundelkhand or Vidarbha, there is a long history of struggle and political movements – though poorly organized – with genuine reasons. For instance the history of the demand for a separate Jharkhand state can be traced back to as early as 1930s. This tribal belt with its comparatively better organized Adivasis had been pressing for this demand dreaming of a relief from the prevailed (in fact, prevailing) exploitation and displacement in the name of large-scale mineral projects. Even though it’s a hard fact that their plight is the same without much improvement owing to the infighting and , it should not be ignored that there were socio-economic factors behind the demand for a separate state. In the case of Vidarbha political assurance was given as early as 1956 favourable to the separate state demand. Here too, the core issue is the economic backwardness of the common people in this agricultural area of Maharashtra and the subsequent social issues. Similar reasons are applicable to Bundelkhand too.

As we just saw, there are genuine reasons why the aspirations of the people took political shape and there is quite a long history behind these demands unlike what many people thinks. So the root cause cannot be attributed to petty political gains alone.

Demography and the red corridor:

The interesting feature which is common to all these geographic areas is the demography factor. Tribals, Adivasis, Farmers and other landless groups mostly under the SC or ST categories constitute the population. Continuous exploitation and negligence from the sequential governments has taken out the self-respect and dignity from the individuals. They have lost their belief in the system at least to a large extent. The Red Corridor of India can be seen overlapped with most of the disputed geographical areas. Why? There are parallel governments running in many districts. In short the situation is not that simple as the mainstream public like to believe.

Will a new state solve the problem?

As we understood, the root cause behind the increasing demands for new states is the mass feeling that they themselves and their resources in their land are being exploited for a rising urban class who are higher than them in all hierarchical orders – social, caste, economic, educational etc.
This consciousness together with the spirit of a small number of selfless mass leaders gave rise to popular movements in which the affected masses started mobilizing. At times this turned violent too. And the most obvious alternative which comes to their mind is to escape from the most immediate higher level government which they think is the sole culprit behind their daily issues and form their own government. This immediate ‘supervisor’ is the state government. Thus the demand for a new state is the most obvious alternative to the neglecting, exploiting and cruel State Government under which they believe there is no future.

Now the golden question, will the creation of a new state solve the problems? One has to admit that it will NOT. Because it is not just the state governments to be blamed. The existence of vast areas of resource-rich, human occupied land across India where human development is at the worst standard comparable to any poverty-stricken government-less territories in the world marks the failure of the successive governments at the centre also. Carving out a new state may not solve the issue because of 4 reasons:
i)     Factionalism may gain upper hand.
ii)     Even if the new state is resource rich, the dreams of getting a fair share may be a Utopian one. New groups of exploiters will emerge
as the prevailing economic system is in support to that.
iii) The aspirations of a mobilized mass is tough to be satisfied in most cases under the present Indian political scenarios.
iv)  There are no provisions in the Constitution to give preference to residents when it comes to public employment. (Otherwise the Andhra model
special provisions has to be made in the constitution, but how many?). Thus the employment aspirations of the region will hardly be fulfilled.
Private enterprises won’t even think of that option.

Thus in most cases, an easier route to prosperity is just a dream. It has to be emphasized that by prosperity I mean the social, economic and moral upbringing of all sections of the society especially the downtrodden ones and not merely the establishment of large-scale industries and high revenue for the state as a whole.

What can be a potential solution?

An extrapolation of the current scenario much into the future tense will bring in front of us a large number of states in India. This is not exaggeration to support my view points. A land like ours, with heterogeneity at its height in all respects, it is probable that demands for more states and autonomous territories will be shooting up in numbers in the future. There is no scarcity for reasons too.

If this has to be overcome, the uplifting of living standards is the simple formula. How this can be done? The answer lies in the root causes behind the separate state agitations – poor administration and neglect by the authorities towards a particular geographical area or a religious group or an ethnic group or a linguistic minority etc. for a long time. Geographical continuousness is a common factor in the problematic areas. So the issue of poor adminstration can be overcome by the strengthening of the local bodies.

Even thought the multi-tiered local self-governing institutions are in place for the past 17 years (73rd and 74th Constitution Amendment Acts 1992) it is a fact that the empowerment envisaged by the law was not implemented either because of the improper laws made by the state legislatures or because of the mishandling at lower levels whereby the local self governments did not get the autonomy and independence they deserved. The panchayati raj system, if properly implemented, gives the local population in taking part in the decision-making process and there by it introduces the concept of direct democracy at least to an extent. For more reference check out the People’s Planning program  of the Kerala Government. Even though the efficiency of such programs in the beginning are debatable, it serves the purpose of providing the much-needed ‘confidence in the system’ to the local population.

When the funds are distributed to the local bodies and they given the authority to spend as per the norms set by the state government, the population in that smaller area are getting the opportunity to control the happenings and they know whom to be blamed for inefficiency and how to punish them through the next elections. State assembly elections are far too high for the extremely poor to cast their protest or acceptance in the proper way.

The above statements are synonymous to the concept of Panchayat Raj. The implementation (in fact a rapid one) of this concept in the PROPER and DEMOCRATIC way is certainly going to improve the situation. Those who need a proof should check if there is any divisive demands in the states where the system is properly implemented. After all a small area is always the best to administer and financial management than a much larger area. Probably one reason why Aristotle is widely studied even today is his conception of tiny ‘city states’ as the best suitable ones for efficient administration.