Occ a s i o n a l Publication 20

IICHukumat-e-Hind: Reflections on the Governance of

by Gopalkrishna Gandhi

In d i a In t e r n a t i o n a l Ce n t r e 40, Ma x Mu e l l e r Ma r g , Ne w De l h i -110 003 Te l .: 24619431 Fa x : 24627751

Occ a s i o n a l Publication 20 IIC Hukumat-e-Hind: Reflections on the Governance of India The views expressed in this publication are solely those of the author and not of the India International Centre. The Occasional Publication series is published for the India International Centre by Cmde.(Retd.) R. Datta. Designed and produced by FACET Design. Tel.: 91-11-24616720, 24624336. Hukumat-e-Hind: Reflections on the Governance of India*

will not attempt to theorize on the subject nor unveil solutions, for I have none. I I will only share some impressions. The first of which is a conversation, only partly dramatized, between an auto-driver and his passenger, near Rajpath:

‘Aaj traffic itnii der se kyuun atkii hui hai?’.

‘Kaun jaane jii, hogaa kisii kaa janam-din yaa maran-din….’

‘Itnaa samay barbaad…’

‘Kisko parvaah hai ? Dilli jo hai…Phoolwaalon ki sair lagii rahtii hai’.

‘Mujhe saarhe chhah se pahle-pahle pahunchnaa hai…IIC.’

‘Achchaa, IIC? Laekchar hogaa…barey laekchar sunaa hai hote hain vahaan, laekchar pe laekchar…pataa nahiin awaam ko kyaa faedaa…Aap laekchar dene jaa rahe ho yaa sun-ne?’

‘Er…’

‘Rahne diijiye…mujhe to voh hi kiraayaa milegaa… Arey, layt aa gayii’.

* Lecture delivered at the IIC on 1 September by Gopalkrishna Gandhi as the 5th Governance Lecture 2010

1 I

Hindostan mein tiin haqiiqaten hain:

Pehli haqiiqat hai is hii aam aadmii kii, Awaam-e-Hind kii. Duusrii, Siyaasat-e-Hind kii, aur teesrii, Hukumat-e-Hind kii.

Samajhiye kii Ashok Chakra jo hai, hamaaraa National Emblem, usmen tiin babbar sher jo hain, ve yahii tiin haqiiqaten hain – Awaam, Siyaasat aur Hukumat.

All three – the people of India, India’s political life, and the Indian State are, like the three lions on our emblem, majestic alike. But each facing a different direction.

II

Awaam-e-Hind

Touring the Kannada countryside in 1927, Mahatma Gandhi asked a poor villager: ‘Who rules Mysore?’. The answer was ‘Some God’. If an average Indian were asked today ‘Who rules India?’, the answer is likely to be: ‘God knows’. That two-word answer says more than any lecture can. He is perplexed, the aam aadmii is. Perplexed by the condition of his surroundings. And by his own condition:

Vah uljhaa huaa hai.

Merii koi manzil bhii hai ya nahiin?

Koi kahtaa hai usko ‘Tere baap-daadaa kii manzil thii azaadii, terii manzil, hamaare vatan kii manzil aaj hai , ‘Taraqqui’!

Achchhaa? Baat to sahii lagtii hai usko.

Phir, jab tain-tuun, tain-tuun kartii hui lal-batti vaalii gaarii yaa sote hue sahib ko le jaatii hui Mercedez Benz usko tuutii huii patrii par charhaa detii hai to vah sochtaa hai: ‘Taraqqui? Kiskii taraqqui? Kaisii taraqqui?’

Aisaa nahiin ki uskii khud kii taraqqui nahiin hui hai. Uskii jeb main uske baap- daadaa se rupaiye ziyaadah hain, lekin qiimatein? Vah bhii ziyaadah, khariidne kii taaquat ziyaadah, to khariidne kii chiizen ziyaadah, dekhne ke nazaare bhii ziyaadah…

2 Yah larkaa self-employed hai, achchhe libaas pehne huaa hai, baal sanvaare hue hai, mobile phone uskaa aur vah mobile phone kaa hissaa hai. Gaane pasand hain usey, filmi gaane, naye-puraane.

Par uskaa dimagh uljhaa-uljhaa hai, dil bujhaa-bujhaa. Bus mein dhakke khaate hue vah khud ko Raj Kapoor vaalaa gaanaa gungunaate hue paataa hai (apne edition mein):

Meraa juutaa naqlii Gucci

Yah patloon Chiinii sastii

Muhn mein laal guthkaa juicy

Lekin dil hai – Registaanii

Meraa juutaa…

And then, reverting to the brilliant original in Shailendra’s words and Mukesh’s voice, he could ask:

Manzil kahaan?

Kahaan ruknaa hai?

And answer, with the humour and sadness of resignation:

Uuparvaalaa jaane,

Uuparvaalaa jaane.

Phir, strap se latakte hue jab vah Commonwealth Games kii nayii chamaktii stadium ko dekhtaa hai to sochtaa hai. ‘Medal jiit ne chaahiye humein, kahiin mezbaanii ke chakkar mein medalon ko na bhuul jaayen…First class gaanaa banaayaa hai Rahman ne…lyrics bhii great aur music to…vaah… jiyo, uttho, barho…’

Kyaa kuchh nahiin barh rahaa hai Hindostan mein?

Everything grows in Awaam-e-Hind. Its population, of course, grows the fastest. Thanks to the startling rise in average life-expectancy at birth, and a falling death-rate. Its prosperity grows, in huge strides.

3 The assets of the richest man in Europe today, Lakshminivas Mittal, grow exponentially. He keeps changing places with another Indian, Mukesh Ambani between positions 3, 4 and 5 among the world’s richest. ‘Pehle aap’, says one to the other, ‘nahiin, nahiin, pehle aap…’ replies the ‘other’. Mutual courtesies are observed by them for they are competitors, not brothers. Assets grow, litigation grows. Does our poverty grow too? Statistics vary. The Union Planning Commission might not accept Dr. Arjun Sengupta’s figures unquestioningly. But being 134 in the Human Development Index, behind ravaged is a statistic that speaks for itself. Ranking 66th among the world’s 88 hungriest countries is one that more than speaks for itself. When the ceiling climbs and the floor sinks, that which is in between, expands. There, in that mid-space, dwells and swells the Indian middle- class. At 25 per cent of our population, it powers growth, strength.

That story is told in a number of highly readable books today like – commercial break here – ‘The Great Indian Middle Class by Pavan K. Varma available in new hard cover at $31.99, paperback $9.95, used copy 0.95 cents; Indian List Price Rs. 299, Flipkart price Rs. 223, home delivery, free.’

Awaam-e-Hind’s global presence grows, its image glows, draws admiration for all the ‘I’s of India you can think of – intelligence, intellect, initiative, innovation, information, infotainment, industry, investment, and of course IT, no longer confused with Income Tax. We should and we do bask in that glory.

Not unoften, that other ‘I’ – integrity – shows up feeling neglected by all the other roaring ‘I’s and looking them straight in the eye flings that forgotten line from the song ‘Sajan re jhooth mat bolo khudaa ke paas jaanaa hai, na haathii hai, na ghoraa hai vahaan paidal hii jaanaa hai…’

Among our industries, the automobile one grows fast, real fast. The smaller in size, the bigger in numbers.The tally of vehicles on India’s roads is up from a mere 30,06,000 in 1951 to ninety million plus today. Their speed rises as well as does, inevitably, the number of road accidents. We have beaten ’s record in road crash fatalities, and stand at world position number one.

Taraqqui agar hamaarii raah-e-vatan hai, to vah raah utnii saaf bhii nahiin. Taraqqui ke bhi koi tariique hone chaahiye; aage barhne ke dastuur.

4 And what about crime? Violence is crime’s signature. And that signature, in its many twists and loops, grows. And it often becomes oblique. Psychological violence continues to be encountered by vulnerable women. Commercial endorsements by our super-stars of so-called skin-lighteners increase the vulnerability of girls in our colour-prejudiced society. An excellent new law has shown a return fist to domestic violence. But that villain is yet to see the strong arm of the law. Does the sense of security in our minority communities, especially among their poorer sections grow?

Yahaan bhii uljhan hai. Ek tarf aaj mulk mein itnii samajh to aa gayii hai ki communal dange hamaarii sifat ke khilaaf hain, lekin iskaa matlab yah nahiin hai ki Hindustan ki minorities ke dil-o-dimagh mein voh itmenaan hai, voh sukuun, jo ki har insaan mein honaa chaahiye. Kyaa Awaam-e-Hind mein kiraae par ghar dhuundhte sabko ek hii tarah milte hain? Kyaa Awaam-e-Hind mein raat ko sone se pehle duaa kartii huiin un vaalidaao mein fiqr kii aah nahiin hotii? Kyaa Awaam- e-Hind mein majority khud ko ‘hum’ aur minority quam ke hamvatanon ko ‘voh’ kah ke nahiin bulaatii?

Yahaan ‘minority quam’ se meraa matlab sirf Muslim community se nahiin hai. Muslim majority districts mein non-Muslim insaan minority kaa ho jaataa hai. ‘Hum’ aur ‘ve’ insaan nahiin, jagahein hain, jo ki aapas mein jagah badal letiin hain, jaisaa ki Kashmir Valley mein Kashmiri Pandit aur vahaan ke Sikh jaante hain.

If there is a real sense of insecurity among vulnerable sections of minority communities, it can be found inter se within those communities as well by liberals, dissenters, non-conformists. Javed Akhtar is his own person. All of us know what that frank man has experienced. Intolerance, of course, is no monopoly of theologies. It is to be found in political communities too, where a difference of opinion can lead to excommunication, Papal style. I do not need to give examples.

Awaam-e-Hind kii sifat liberal hai. Lekin Indian liberalism jo hai, vah active nahiin, vah muultaha passive hai. Indian illiberalism jo hai, haashiye main hote hue bhii, be-hadd active hai, over-active hai. Awaam-e-Hind kii sabse barii qudratan, biological, genetic minority jo hai, vah hai Hindostan ki auraten; uskii sabse barii mazhabii minority jo hai, vah hai Hindostan ke Muslim; uskii sabse barii khayaalii

5 yaa ‘vaichaarik’ minority jo hai vah har mazhab, har party, har majlis, guft-a-guu, seminar, akhbaarii column, blog, Facebook, Twitter aur adde mein paaye jaatii hai, aur vah hai Hindostan ke active liberals kii ikaaiyaan.

The active Indian liberal questions, objects and raises a finger to protest because in a liberal society that is the natural thing to do. And when he does that, he can court danger. If an Indian who RTIs a department or a project and gets his answer, he is a persevering questioner. But when he pays for his perseverance with his life, our liberal and open democracy stands brazenly assaulted.

Uljhan, jhunjhlaahat, mayuusii, fiqr aur biich biich mein darr...Yeh hain Awaam-e- Hind kaa mizaaj.

Aisaa nahiin hai ki hum Awaam-e-Hind kii nasl khush honaa jaantii nahiin… jaantii kyuun nahiin, jaantii hai, jaise kii sasuraal se jab behan yaa betii kii khush- khabrii aatii hai, lambii khaamoshii ke baad Khaarii se larke kii bhejii raqam haath pahunchtii hai, mahiinon kii mehnat ke baad jab fasl kat-tii hai, Eid-divaali mein factory-maalik se hamein provident fund kaa baqaayaa miltaa hai, saniime mein jab dil bahaltaa hai, onek diin pore aamraa jokhun Uttam Kumar-Suchitra Sen-er chhobi dekhaa sujog paayii, A.R. Rehman-ukku enrikku Oscar vazhanga paduhirutho anrikku,aapro Irfan etle ki aapro Vadodaro no chhokro Irfan Pathan jyaare pace-bowling kare ane te pan daabaa haathe ane India- maan Man of the Match bane, Abhinav Bindra jab nishaanaa lagaataa hai,Vijendra Singh apnaa ghuusaa aur Sushil Kumar apnii baazuu ke zor dikhaate hain, aur hamaarii Saina Nehwal jab chirii uchhaaltii hai.Un sab mauquon par humen khushii hii kyaa hotii hai, hamaare rongte khare ho jaate hai.

Hum khushi ko jaante-pehchaante hain sahib, lekin kyaa kahen… khushiiaan humein bhuul gayiin hain.

So hum mayuus rahte hain, darey-darey se, baaz baar ghussaa hote hain. Aur sach puuchhiye to humain lagtaa hai ‘Bas – chhoro, rahne doin baton ko… hamaarii kisko parii hai?’

Except when traumas such as regularly witnessed in Kashmir and the one that has agonized Manipur for so long, and except when the chronic enervations of tribal and dalit India rapidly move from individual to collective rage, the prominent mood

6 of Awaam-e-Hind is a pained dejection and cynical resignation, a ‘Who Cares?’ ness.

Which brings me to:

III

Siyaasat-e-Hind

An incisive existential answer of the kind Gandhiji got in Mysore can come from this cynical resignation.

‘Aap bataaen, yahaan kiskaa raaj chal rahaa hai?’

‘Kiskaa raaj?…siidhii sii baat hai bhaai…’.

‘Yaani…?’

‘Sabse baraa rupaiyaa bhaai, sabse baraa rupaiyaa’.

Like so much else, money grows in our beloved land; it rules. It rules like ‘Some God’. It rules through the moneyed man but even more through the moneying or monetizing of our lives. In 1950, deposits – simple bank accounts – in India amounted to Rs. 888 crores. Today they amount to over Rs. 750, 000 crores. In 1950, the currency in circulation in India was Rs. 1,247 crores. Today it is Rs. 5,17,434 crores. And we are talking of accounted money.

But there is something even more important about money in India than its growth, its enhanced availability, its heightened visibility. And that is the change in its role and action. Money is no longer just an instrument of exchange; it is now a device for delivery.

Money can secure employment, admissions, promotions, preferments, transfers, exonerations. It can create delays, spur speed. Money can permeate that which was until only the other day, the preserve of pure enjoyment – sport. Cricket is today as much about money as it is about the gentleman’s game – we can call it Mocket or Croney. It can threaten to tarnish the izzat and imaan of our nation’s collective integrity by appearing like pustules on a global sports event. Money can and does do worse. It can abduct, assault. It can finance hurt, it can fund harm, it can injure and manage to look injured. It can purchase death.

7 There is another thing that is growing in its spread and strength and may be said to be trying to ‘rule’ Hindostan. And which contributes not to cynical resignation, but to fear and anxiety. And that ‘thing’ is, with narcotics, a close cousin of money, namely, the illegal small fire-arm. Hindostan has not one million, not four million, not ten million but, at a conservative estimate, 40 million illegal small arms floating around all over the land.

Mischief, of course, does not come from illegal arms alone. The incidents of police or paramilitary firings and encounters in which the incident has later been judged unjustified and unlawful have been around the use of legal arms. So, going beyond the phenomenon of illegal arms in India, the question to ponder is the larger one of weapons and the ‘culture’ of weapons entering the blood-stream of our lives. It has done so in some parts of India devastatingly.

Comments and advice on Jammu and Kashmir keep pace, often even precede events in that state. It is easier to recommend dialogue in Kashmir than to enter into it. But I will recommend it from another perspective. There has to be a dialogue within the rest of India about the situation in that precious part of our land, if only to give ourselves the psychological, intellectual and moral resources to say anything to the people of the valley. Consider this conversation with a full-time patriot:

‘Aapney sahii kahaa hai ki Kashmir Hindostan ka hissaa hai, aur rahegaa …’

‘Bilkul ji, Bharat ka atuut bhaag, inalignable…’

‘Inalienable…’

‘Haan ji, inalignable…’

‘Aap jab yah farmaate hein, tab aapkaa matlab Kashmir ki zamiin se hai yaa Kashmir ke logon se bhi…’

‘Donon se ji, kamaal kaa savaal puuchh rahe ho…zamiin ko insaan se alag thode hii kiyaa jaa saktaa…’

‘To aapko yah to zaruur maluum hogaa hi ki Kashmir kii ghaatii mein logon kii aabaadi kitnii hai…’

8 ‘General knowledge kaa test le rahe ho kyaa?’

‘Nahiin, aisii baat nahiin, par soch ke liye sahii jaankaarii acchhi hotii hai…’

‘Chhoriye ji, knowledge kuchh kaam nahiin karti jahaan emotion kii baat aati hai, desh ke pride kii, izzat kii…Aur vahaan ke problem ke bare mein aur savaal puuchhne hon to mujh se nahiin neighbouring country se puuchho…’

‘Pakistan se to saarii duniyaa savaal puuchh rahii hai, lekin humein bhii khud se kuchh savaal puuchhne chaahiye…’

‘Laekchar mat do mujhe…’

In the years past, the brave Mridula Sarabhai moved to Kashmir to hear its voice and relay it to the rest of the country. I call her brave not just because she had earlier personally and dangerously for herself rescued abducted women of both communities during the Partition riots, but because when she went to Srinagar she was reviled and called a traitor. Today’s dialogues tread a very different path and they explore even more radical solutions than she had thought of. Later, another brave Indian, attempted dialogue, not just in Srinagar but, with Pandit Nehru’s and Indira Gandhi’s knowledge, in Pakistan and most importantly within India. He did not lack critics.

With the Governor of Jammu and Kashmir in the chair, I will be worse than foolish to make any suggestions about what may or may not be done in that state, but this much I could suggest that dialogue is needed within Awaam-e-Hind, about what links and what distances our fellow-citizens there from ourselves. If we were to do that, who knows, we might discover that a favourite film song in the valley may well be ‘Koi to aataa, do baat kartaa, koi to kahtaa hello! Ghar naa bulaataa par yah to kahtaa kuchh duur tak sang chalo…’

It has been suggested by Rajeev Sethi that there should be an autonomous television channel for Jammu and Kashmir in which the youth of that State are key participants, engaging with their counterparts elsewhere in the country for the benefit of a national understanding of the issues agitating the Kashmiri populace, and also putting on the waves the best in Kashmir’s plural heritage. Such a channel would be difficult to set up, even more difficult to run. I can anticipate a hundred reservations like ‘will it not get hi-jacked for an anti-Indian agenda, if that

9 happens how will we restrain it without being accused of muzzling free expression, will it not inflame passions…? All those consequences are likely, but Hukumat- e-Hind has tried bolder things and successfully, as for instance the holding of elections in Kashmir.

IV

Elections are our pride. The Election Commission deserves our approbation for monumental patience, above all else, in the manner in which it keeps its cool, stays the course with the election laws, and after the catharsis of polling and counting, delivers the mandate which we have defined in the assurance of confidentiality, fairness and freedom.

But the Commission knows, better than others, how money, authorized and unauthorized, and human biceps and triceps, authorized in the armed personnel billeted to election duty and unauthorized in others, can play a role in the proceedings.

Small arms like the pistol, the hand grenade, the rocket-propelled grenade, the landmine and the sub-machine gun are associated with the ubiquitous mustandaa. Which political party has been able to keep the ‘mustandaa’ out?’

‘Jiskaa dandaa uskii bhains’ has become ‘jiskaa mustandaa uskii Benz (Mercedes Benz)’.

Currency notes come into the election bazaar: first in container and cargo quantities, then in truck-loads, going into wholesale, small retail and finally in attaché, thailaa, jholaa and jeb-sized portions, every five years at the least and often oftener than that. They originate either legally, through licit company donations or come from a myriad sources which, as Professor Amit Bhaduri explained recently to a audience, necessarily and unavoidably go back to our natural resources such as mines, forests and land. Illegal transactions in all these yield harvests of black cash.

I wish the Reserve Bank of India depicted on the large denominations of our currency any person from the scroll of our great Kings and Emperors who commanded mints and treasuries or better still, chose non-human images. But if it had to carry the

10 likeness of Mahatma Gandhi, I wish it did so only on the coin of the smallest denomination, the one rupee coin which cannot cover large, inappropriate and concealed transactions of money for, among other dubious uses, the buying and selling of weapons of murder.

Elections hotey hain, bahutere saaf-suthare, imaandaar. Aur mein yah khushii se aur daave se kah saktaa huun ki kayii naujavaanon ne haal ke chunaavon mein jo jiiten haasil kariin hain, vah baa-safaai se, neki aur imaandaarii se kariin hai. Yah bahut achhaa lakshan hai. Lekin kaun inkaar kar saktaa hai ki kuchh elections zor- shor se bhii aagey chalte hue shor-sharaabe mein pahunch jaate hain, aur kuchh khuun-kharaabe tak bhii. Hamaarii Election Commission aise mauqon mein dakhl kartii hai aur haalat ko aur bigarne se roktii hai. Par mote taur par chunaavon mein aaj jiit na rukh kii hoti hai na ravaiyye ki, jiit hoti hai rupaiye kii.

The problem of money and elections is, of course, not peculiar to India. I came across a memorable quote from Mark Hanna in The Hindu of 20 October, 2007:

‘There are two things that are important in politics. The first is money, and I can’t remember what the second one is’. I believe the time has come for the laws in respect of the funding of our elections to be brought bravely and transparently under the public scanner once again focused on the working of Section 293A of the Companies Act. But going beyond study, hard and exemplary action needs to be taken by those who are empowered to do so, whenever and wherever funds in excess of permissible quantums are patently employed.

Simultaneously, government and political parties should hearken to the public mood and disengage senior politicians, and certainly those who are in public office, from responsibilities in cash-rich sports federations. Their dual charge can only be to the detriment of either the sport or of the public office concerned. The public is no fool, it knows who is where for what.

Our new CEC’s determined statement to the effect that he will address the question of money in elections is therefore deeply satisfying and hope-giving. We need to redeem our elections from the vice-like grip over it of money, for elections are precious to us, as is money in its rightful place and role. And, indeed, so is every licit firearm in the defence of the country and the protection of its people.

11 V

I do not want the return of some notional age of innocence. I would like to see the naivete of freedom’s infancy turn experience into wisdom. The hallmark of maturity is the ability to own errors.

Unnees sau arhtaalis kii baat hai.

March ka mahiinaa. Gandhiji ko hum se chhine abhi teen mahiine bhii puure nahiin hue the. Sevagram mein Bapu ke anuyaayiyon kii baithak huii. Bare-bare leader log aaye, unmen Panditiji bhii. Ve boley: ‘….Dimaagh mein ek tarah kii pareshaanii hai. Kai baaton se uljhaa rahtaa huun. Samay bahut kam miltaa hai. Ittefaak se chand minit milte bhii hain, to dil mein vichaar aataa hai ki derh baras se government mein rahe, kuchh kiyaa, bahut kuchh nahiin kiyaa, sahii kiyaa, ghalat bhii kiyaa, jo kuchh kiyaa usey dekh kar dil khush nahiin hotaa…. Magar yah vichaar bhii pure nahiin ho paate…koi na koi barii crisis saamne aa jaatii hai…’

Aaj kyuun hum aise khule dil kii baat nahiin sunte hain? Kisii paksh mein nahiin, vipaksh mein nahiin, pratipakhsh mein nahii, kahiin bhii nahiin.

Panditji ne jin pareshaaniyon kii baat kahii vah aaj bhii hain, tab se ziyaadah. Sirf samay nahiin hai kisii ko dil kholkar haqiqaton ko dekhne ke liye.

Kaisii haqiiqaten?

In March 1948, in the Sevagram meeting that took place in Sevagram, credibility was already an issue. Pandit Nehru said at that gathering: … Saari chiizon ko milaakar vichaar karne ka mauqua nahin miltaa… Ab tak Congress Angrezii hukumat kaa muquabilaa kartii thii. Ab usey hukumat kaa muquabilaa karne ka kaam nahiin, balki hukumat ka kaam karnaa hai…Isliye maine arz kiyaa ki in savaalon ko phir se nayii fizaa kii roshnii mein sochnaa hogaa…’ Panditji tells us in those words that hukumat kaa kaam karnaa hai to saarii chiizon ko milaakar sochnaa hogaa aur unhen hamein nayii fizaa kii roshnii mein dekhnaa hogaa…

To be sure, every time our Parliament has been re-constituted and a new government formed, even from within the same party, it has tried to do something new, be something different. But the excitement lasts no more than a few months, sometimes just a few weeks or even days. Then routine takes over.

12 Nayii fizaaon kii roshnii se bhii humein taqliif hotii hai.Hum uske tukre-tukre kar dete hain. Small wonder that C.V. Raman found that the spectrum of light scattered by various substances has new lines or bands outside of the original band of light. That was the Raman Spectrum. Our political spectrum diffuses the unpolluted beam of hope as it passes through the waters of political choice, into a million competing colours. Our society—do we all not know it?—is splintered into majority-minority, minority-subminority, community-sub-community, caste-subcaste, avarna-savarna. But the opportunistic exploitation of that splintering disgraces Siyaasat-e-Hind. The latest form of this exploitation is the retrieval, suddenly from a forgotten past, of the splintering splinter of splintered splinters – namely, gotra-sagotra being ordained on modern couples by village venerables. Even in his most pessimistic contemplations of the Hindu Code Bill, Dr. B. R. Ambedkar could not have imagined that sixty years after India’s becoming a Republic, it will see honour killings in the name of this atavistic recoil.

Which brings me to the last of the three ‘Sher’.

VI

Hukumat-e-Hind

The legislators of India, our law-makers, have given to us through our Constitutional amendments, notably 73 and 74, and several new laws and enactments that have changed India’s life rhythms. Some of the finest, most humanitarian, compassionate and even revolutionary laws that protect the weak, the jeopardized, and the vulnerable, especially our women, have come from the community of India’s politicians. When we despair of the politics of individual politicians we must remember this larger picture.

It is also notable that it is our Parliament that has enabled the Enemy Property Bill meant to replace an Ordinance with the same incredible title, put on hold for further examination. My faith in the destiny of Indian self-correction has been strengthened by the news that there is serious re-thinking going on about it. Another piece of legislation before our parliament has been powered by world opinion. It is a Bill to restrain the monster called torture. We should be making torture impossible. Instead, the bill raises the bar of the definition of torture, thereby indemnifying such

13 acts as leave no mark on the individual’s body. Obviously those who have vetted this bill are unaware of certain pieces of furniture and appliances in lock-ups, and of the infinite possibilities of the spoken word. I trust the Bill will reverse all attempts to let torture slip through definitional openings.

The Indian policeman does not make an easy hero and the Dictionary of Swear Words is far too accessible to him. But let us also acknowledge the fact he too is the easy butt of jokes in our free country. In how many countries are policemen shown in negative light as in our cinema, in our stories, even in our media?

So, I would like to believe that the day will come when a policeman passing by a thelawala will not send shivers down the poor vendor’s spine, nor an IT Inspector’s unexpected visit send the shop assistant in a commercial establishment go running to arrange chaai. I would like to believe that the day will come when a decent chair with a backrest and armrests replaces the interrogation seat beneath a naked bulb.

The day will come – not very far from now! – I am sure when the civil and police administrations will be able to draw a distinction between civil rights activists, writers and sociologists on the one hand and those who are waging a war against the Indian State, when no tribal is presumed to be a Naxal, his home to be a Naxal hideout, his land a ‘territory lost to Maoist influence’, leading to the innocent man or woman’s interrogation and displacement. This can, and will happen, thanks to the growing sensitivity of the State to public opinion and to questions of image.

Why do I say I believe this will happen? Not because, as in the song, I believe in sunshine but because I believe it is better to try to quench one’s thirst – in this case the thirst for good, clean and transparent governance – with aqua pura rather than with the vinegar of cynicism.

Talking of things pure, I will make a house-keeping observation in passing. We have to own one fact, humbly. Keeping premises clean is meant to be, in the majority of our homes, the affair of the woman of the house or of a hired pair of hands. The man will wash his cycle, motor cycle or car but not the floor, not the doorstep, certainly not the toilet. The jhaaruu is not a man’s instrument of work, unless he is a sanitary worker by profession. Magnify this to the premises of government, at all levels. And what do we see?

14 Siirhiyon mein, diivaaron mein paan-tambaakuu kii piik, mezon, kursiiyon, telephoneon mein kaalikh, chhat par jaale. Aur is gard aur gandaghi ke uupar havaa jo hai, us mein jam kar baithii rahtii hai, buu. Kabhii kabhii lagtaa hai ki hamaare mantraalayon mein muutraalaya nahiin, muutraalayon mein mantraalaya hain.

Is hii se jurii huii hain aur aham baatein, sirf atmospheric pollution aur SPMs hii nahiin, balkii insanitation-based zoonotic diseases like dengue, chikungunya, H1N1. Is hii se jurii huiin hamaare coasts aur hamaare fragile littoral States ko oil-spills ke khatre se bachaae rakhnaa.

Ek Jairam Ramesh akelaa kitnaa kar sakataa hai? Lekin yah bhii maan-naa hogaa ki us neek aadmii se kitnaa ho saktaa hai, iskii bhii misaal dii hai.

Panditji ke alfaaz mein yah ‘sab ko milaakar’ aur ‘sab ko milkar’ hii ho saktaa hai.

We have a National Water Mission that is doing exceedingly important work. But have Hukumat-e-Hind and the state governments really prepared Awaam- e-Hind about that grim and growing reality, very literally, Pyaas-e-Hind? Will there be water enough, ten, fifteen, twenty years from now, to quench drinking water needs, farming needs and agricultural needs? I am thinking of a time when a ten litre bambaa of retailed water may cost Rs. 500 or more and a one litre bottle of water between Rs. 50 and Rs. 100. Like the block-wise zonation of oil fields for extraction by allottee-companies, will river-beds and river-plains come to be allotted in blocks to Bisleri, Kinley, Aquafina? What will the poor do then? Drink muddied water from ponds or raid the sites of water- extraction or factories where bottled water is made, in order to ‘liberate’ them from what will surely get to be called the ‘colonization of water resources’? Will the words from Bankim’s immortal song, ‘sujalaam, suphalaam’ be contrasted by those from a profoundly moving song sung by another Bangla speaker, the great Tripuran, S. D. Burman: ‘Allah megh de, paani de, saayaa de, de, Allah megh de, Shyama meghde, paanii de…’ ? Entry 18 under the State List reads : ‘Land, that is to say, rights in or over land, land tenures, including the relation of landlord and tenant, and the collection of rents ; transfer and alienation of agricultural land; land improvement; and agricultural loans; colonization’.

15 ‘Colonization?’. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, the very word is used, innocently, and perhaps with settlement colonies for refugees and the like in mind, but nonetheless, there it is in our Constitution, specified as a subject-charge and therefore a prerogative and indeed, a responsibility of state governments: ‘Colonization’.

What is the chief characteristic of a colony? It is the loss of rights over natural resources by the people of that area and the acquiring of those rights by new entrants.

A gentleman for whom I have unbounded respect and regard as my mentor, Ambassador Thomas Abraham recently drew my attention to a report in the Tiruvananthapuram edition of The Hindu of 24 July, 2010 which said : ‘The had enacted a historic Central Act in 1975 to solve the problem of land alienation. The Kerala Government led by C. Achutha Menon brought The Kerala Scheduled Tribes Act of 1975. This was passed unanimously in the Assembly. But it was not implemented and no land was restored. This Act (itself) was annulled (by) the LDF government…’ Referring to the provisions of the Constitution that were placed there to protect the tribal communities from fraudulent practices, Thomas Abraham then says ‘What needs to be done is to see that these provisions are implemented’. A simple enough wish. The recent decision on Vedanta taken so transparently and boldly, for upholding the laws of the land fills me with hope.

Professsor Nirmalangshu Mukherji has pointed out recently, that the action by the State on Vedanta is not an isolated instance of the law being upheld: there being before us the arrest of Madhu Koda, the Supreme Court’s strictures on the Bellary mines issue, the national attention to Posco and to the implementation of PESA and the Forest Rights Act. For all these the work of civil resistance has to be acknowledged and applauded. Without that the State and the Judiciary would not have and could not have acted as they did.

Meanwhile, the irony of ‘Colonization’ being part of an Entry in our Constitution having been missed not only by the Constituent Assembly but by successive Lok Sabhas which have amended the Constitution a hundred times, and by the Constitution Review Commission, it is time now to amend the relevant Entry in our Constitution and drop ‘colonization’ from our agenda. But more important than that: to begin to end the entry of new and dispossessing exploitations on land. And

16 a good place to start will be by examining the contemporary relevance and role of the Land Acquisition Act, and the scope of that riddle of a phrase which is at the base of the Act, ‘public purpose’. It is fortuitous that the Government of India has brought forward an amendment bill that can rectify the anomalies and injustices which that act contains and causes. Discussions on the bill must ask: Is the Land Acquisition Act of 1894 taking us unwittingly towards what is sometimes described as the Corporate State?

VII

As they debate this very important bill, I would like to place before our lawmakers something which fifty-two year old Mahatma Gandhi had to say, believe it or not, on the subject of land acquisition by the State. The scholarly S.N. Sahu of the Rajya Sabha secretariat, brought to my notice recently this remarkable statement made in 1921, when land had been acquired by the Bombay Presidency in Mulshipeta, near Poona for a dam being built by the House of Tatas to augment electric supply for the city of Bombay. This is probably the first instance of Section 4 of the L.A. Act being used by the State, then the British raj, for a corporate project.

A satyagraha was launched by the people dispossessed under Senapati Bapat. I am sure you will be as surprised as I was by the topicality of what Gandhiji said on the occasion. I quote the words of the Mahatma as given in the Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol. 20:

My heart goes out to these poor people… I wish the great House of the Tatas, instead of standing on their legal rights, will reason with the people themselves, and do whatever they wish in consultation with them. I have some experience of Land Acquisition Acts… The dispossessed never got the exact equivalent. What is the value of all boons that the Tata scheme claims to confer upon India, if it is to be at the unwilling expense of even one poor man? …I suggest to the custodians of the great name that they would more truly advance India’s interest if they will defer to the wishes of their weak and helpless countrymen.

You may call him extreme, you may call him utopian, you cannot accuse Gandhi of being out of date!

Gandhi however, is never too convenient. He says, in the very next sentence, something which those who support these rights must never forget : ‘…but I can

17 never join hands with those who are ready to kill others, be it even for the cause of truth.’ No wonder, Maoists cannot take Gandhi.

VIII

Most civil protesters, be they sociologists, writers, academics, who have made it their task to study and espouse the cause of the dispossessed, instinctively and viscerally despise violence. They not only do not justify Maoist violence, they condemn it. I however do feel that some of them have under-estimated the co-optive tactics of this variety of violence, which notoriously converts silence into acquiescence, receptivity into acceptance and any olive-branch into a bouquet of appreciation. These individuals would have greatly enhanced their effectiveness as campaigners against the exploitation of tribals and their rights by commercial interests if they had given the same attention to the exploitation of a whole generation of tribals, especially tribal youth, by the violent schemata of the Maoist method.

Meanwhile, the cycle of unjust loss and unfair gain goes on, as does that of violence and counter-violence. This is not a commentary on our prosecuting agencies or on those who are in charge of administering our codes of civil and criminal procedure. It is not a commentary on our magistracy, or on our police. It is a commentary on a six decades’ old lurch in the matter of land.

IX

During a recent discussion with P. Sainath on the criticality, notwithstanding the non-justiceability, of the Directive Principles of State Policy, I discovered with some surprise that the word ‘governance’ occurs but once in the Constitution of India, and that only in the Directive Principles. I do not know what the significance of this is, but there it is.

The Directive Principles, says the Constitution, shall not be enforceable by any Court ‘but are nevertheless fundamental in the governance of the country’. The chapter goes on to say that ‘it shall be the duty of the State to apply these principles in making laws.’

Unless proportion and perspective inform the investing of money and our development strategies are re-configurated in a way that makes an MoE ‘No’ as binding as that of the CEC’s, Hukumat-e-Hind will have a redoubtable rival in Hukumat-e-Rupaiyya.

18 X

We need our law enforcers, no less than we need our valiant Armed Forces. But we need also to find out why it is that the nation takes pride in seeing a uniformed force’s phenomenal courage in fighting Maoist terror and sees with disbelief, men from the same or similar force being stoned by enraged people in Kashmir. Unless they are better motivated, better provisioned and, most importantly, regularly counseled by those professionally qualified to do so, how will our security personnel come forward in the required numbers or having come, how and why will they stay? And how will they win and keep the confidence of the diverse people of Hindustan? One hopes that the new Police Act that is under discussion and the proposed CrPC Amendment being piloted by Home Minister Chidambaram will address these issues and give criminal law enforcement more than an image make- over, a metamorphosis.

XI

When in 1984, our first cosmonaut Squadron Leader Rakesh Sharma was safely launched in his Soyuz T 11 vessel and had got into the rhythm of his orbiting, he was called by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on a satellite-link. She asked him how India looked from outer space. Thirty-four year old Rakesh Sharma had no prepared answer, no pre-arranged text with him. He said, spontaneously: ‘Saarey Jahaan Se Achhaa’.

Rakesh Sharma was of course quoting the first line of Iqbal’s great song remembered by many stirring lines like ‘Mazhab nahiin sikhaataa aapas mein bair rakhnaa’. But not everyone remembers another great line in it: ‘Iqbal! koi mahram apnaa nahiin jahaan mein, maluum kyaa kisii ko dard-e-nihaan hamaaraa?’

Jahaan kii baat to duur, apnon ko bhi Hind ke dardon kaa puuraa ehsaas nahiin. Is kii muul vajah hai, the absence of access including psychological and emotional access to Hukumat-e-Hind’s edifice, despite 97 entry-points in the Union List.

XII

Aruna Roy’s determined efforts with her team in Rajasthan, got us the Right to Information Act. I take a kind of ‘in house’ pride in that act for Aruna was in the

19 same batch in the IAS as I and so is our first Chief Information Commissioner, Wajahat Habibullah. But, declaration of interest over, I must say that in my view, the RTI Act is the single most revolutionary enactment to have been made since independence for good governance. Working for and through access, pahunch and sunvaai RTI is necessarily concerned with all the three ‘sher’ – Awaam, Siyaasat and Hukumat.

As is Nandan Nilekani’s scheme for Aadhaar, officially operationalized two days ago. This plan to unify the peoplehood of India in a national register with every individual bearing an all-purpose ‘life-number’ number is fascinating for its sheer audacity. I would like to have one number, a master number, subsuming all other ones from A,B,C to Z. But it should enable me to access the Hukumat, rather than enable agencies of the Hukumat to access me. Aadhaar will profit by engaging the country in a discussion on how it can be made both efficacious and conscientious.

Zameer-e-Hind

Hamaare National Emblem mein teen sheron kaa maine zikr kiyaa thaa. Par in teenon ke piichhe, jo dikh nahiin rahaa hai, pehle sher ke thiik piichhe gum ho gayaa hai, lekin hai zaruur, an-dekhaa hii sahi, ek chauthaa sher, balki main sochnaa chaahuungaa ki vah Sher nahiin, shernii hai, the fourth leonine presence in the Lion Capital of the Emperor Asoka Devaanaamapiya Piyadassi. Awaam-e- Hind, Siyaasat-e-Hind aur Hukumat-e-Hind ke saath Zameer-e-Hind. Hindi mein isey kahnaa ho to, ‘Bharat kaa Antah-karan’.

You could ask ‘Zameer-e-Hind sirf ek ruuh hai yaa uski koi shaql bhii hai?’ Ba’quaedaa hai. The Directive Principles of State Policy are integral to it. The Supreme Court of India, the Election Commission of India, the Comptroller and Auditor General of India, the Chief Vigilance Commissioner, the Chief Information Commissioner, the National Human Rights Commission, the National Women’s Commission, the Commission for Scheduled Castes and Tribes, the Minorities Commission and those bodies that parallel and mirror these in the States which also have their Lok Ayuktas, comprise the externals of Zameer-e-Hind. And it is to them that Aawaam-e-Hind looks and turns to when troubled by questions of character and conduct in Siyaasat-e-Hind and in Humukat-e-Hind. These bodies are often loosely described as Constitutional Authorities, and so they are. But I like to see them as institutions of conscience. In the

20 continuing independence and fair-mindedness of these institutions of conscience, in their being ever alert, ever-responsive, self-critical, self-examining and not self- justifying or self-exculpating, rest the self-correcting mechanisms of our state and, hence, the image and the reputation of our Republic.

All the institutions of conscience that I have described as embodying Zameer-e-Hind are essentially retrospective in their operations. They identify, rectify wrongdoing. Conscience, however, is not retrospective alone. Its work is not post facto as much as it is, to borrow a phrase from grammar, in the present continuous.

Zameer-e-Hind has to be at work, to borrow a phrase from television, ‘24x7’.

The UPA governments I and II have brought in some pioneering pieces of legislation, in which I would include the enactments on domestic violence, on under-trials and of course the RTI and RTE Acts. But one legislation which has remained on the anvil for too long – not one year, not ten years, but full forty years – is that pertaining to the activating of the institution of Lok Pal. I find it interesting that no political party seems to have been over-anxious about it.

Faiz Ahmed ‘Faiz’ has a great line: ‘Shahar-e-jaanaa mein ab baa-safaa kaun hai?’ It is important that this enactment be either taken forward or, if Siyaasat-e- Hind is uncomfortable with the idea of a Lok Pal , then Hukumat-e-Hind must tell Awaam-e-Hind why electors can be booked under common laws for graft, but not the elected.

XIII

In his farewell Republic Day address, way back in 1967, Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan spoke of ‘widespread inefficiency and the gross mismanagement of resources’. High-profile corruption had already performed its arangetram by then, in the form of the Mundhra scandal and the Defence Ministry-related ‘jeep’ affair, but it had not yet broken into the tandava that we know. The erosion of a work-ethic in the institutions of governance where some do the work of ten and ten do the work of less than one was even by then a hard fact. And the ability to think ‘sab milaakar’ in ‘a nayii fizaa kii roshnii mein’was even then, missing.

21 Like Gandhi in 1921 and Nehru in 1948, Radhakrishnan was speaking from observation. And speaking as he was from the highest seat of Hukumat-e-Hind, he was in fact giving a voice to Zameer-e-Hind.

The fourth invisible lion on our emblem needs now to show its potential that is also its prerogative, prospectively and powerfully. This is not something that only the institutions of conscience have to do. This is something that Hukumat-e-Hind in its daily functions must do by interiorizing Zameer-e-Hind into itself, as Nehru and Radhakrishnan did, instinctively and with Awaam-e-Hind understanding that.

We all know that the national anthem, was written by Tagore in a welter of conflicting emotions. The text of the official version is an abridged one. The full unabridged version, unknown to most, has the following sombre lines:

Ghora timira ghana nibida nishiithe, piirita muurchhita deshe, duhswapne, aatanke, rakshaa korile anke, sneha-mayi tumi maataa.

Roughly translated, the lines invoke the benign Mother to come to the aid of our land which is in deep darkness, which is afflicted, comatose, seeing nightmares of terror. The lines are not, as I said, part of our anthem, but they are part of our experience. The Awaam’s experience of its Siyaasat and of its various and successive Hukumats.

But in the same excluded portion of the Jana Gana Mana text, Tagore shows a remarkable mood swing, a mood recovery with lines that are an all-time absolute favourite of mine, for they hold out hope, assurance. The lines say: ‘The night will end, the dawn will break, with the sun glowing, there, far, and yet bright, on the broad forehead of the mountains on our East’: ‘Raatri prabhaatila udila robi-chhobi puurva udayagiri bhaale’.

Gopalkrishna Gandhi is former Governor, West Bengal.

22

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