Minoo' * . ' Masani
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MINOO' *. ' MASANI A Tribute to The Founder of A Quarterly of Liberal Ideas d - - .. November 20, 1995 MINOO MASANI A Tribute to The Founder of , F A Quarterly of Liberal Ideas November 20,1995 with thanks, the following for Mr. Masani's writings and speeches, extracts of which are published in this volume. They are: The Oxford University Press, for the chapters titled Hindostan Hamara - from Our India The Future - from We Indians The Shrinking World - from The Growing Human Family Planning - from Picture of A Plun The Macmillan Co. of India Ltd., for the chapter titled Jayaprakash Narayan - from JP - Mission Partly Accomplished Vikas Publishing House Pvt. Ltd., for the chapter titled The Emergency - from Against the Tide Arnold Heinemann - for various extracts relating to his earlier writings, from Bliss Was It In That Dawn Mr. R. K. Laxman and - for the two cartoons that appeared in The The Times of India Times of India, reproduced in this volume. Mr. Neville Maxwell and - for the map reproduced from India's China Jaico Publishing House War. The sources of the other articles are: Life International of 28 September 1959 for the chapter titled, The Swatantra Party a From a speech delivered in the Lok Sabha on November 15, 1965 during the discussion on International Affairs, for the chapter titled, Foreign Policy Extracts from Mr. Masani's Fourth Rajaji Birthday Lecture delivered in Bangalore in January 1969, for the chapter titled, Citizenship Speech from the Chair to the General Council of the Swatantra Party, in Bombay on 17th April, 1971, for the chapter titled, Swatantra's Electoral Disaster. The publishers would like to express their gratitude to the advertisers, who responded to our appeal for advertising support, without which this volume could not have been published Mrs. Tina D'Souza and Mrs. Kashmira Rao, for their administrative support, which enabled the editor, despite being bed-ridden, to put the volume together Mr. Narendra Kotak of Rishiraj's Print Xpress, and Mr. M. G. Talwadekar, for their active assistance and co-operation, in enabling this volume to be published on time. Published by S. V. Raju for Freedom First, Army & Navy Building, 3rd Floor, 148, Mahatma Gandhi Road, Bombay 400 001. Typeset at Rishiraj's Print Xpress, 59, Dr. V. B. Gandhi Marg, Bombay 400 001. Phones: 2842619-2046018. Prinked at New Rajkamal Printing Press, A-302, Byculla Sewice Industries, Dadoji Konddeo Cross Marg, Byculla, Bombay 400 027. Between Ourselves ... When Minoo Masani turned eighty in 1985, the Democratic Research Service published a book of essays in his honour and appropriately titled it "Freedom and Dissed'. Now, 10 years later, when Freedom First's Founder is turning ninety, we won- dered what would be the most appropriate way to honour him. It is almost 24 years since he stepped down from the Presidentship of the Swatantra Party and all but quit politics. Though he continued to be active in a number of public activities, he has been effectively out of the limelight, except for a brief period when he was Chairman of the Minorities Commission. To those who are in their 'twenties and Contents 'thirties, the name Minoo Masani is quite unlikely to ring a bell. Why not, we thought, publish a volume Hindostan hamiiri ............................................ 1 containing extracts from his writings and speeches, which would be an introduction to the younger Reconsidering Socialism .................................. 7 generation of a public figure, and a politician to boot, Planning ............................................................. 15 who set an example by personal behaviour, of a politician, who earned a reputation for probity in Mixed Economy ........................................ 21 public life; who scorned office if it threatened to compromise his principles, and who looked up public The Shrinking World ..................................... 29 life as an opportunity to serve the people, and not Preventive Detention ...................................... 35 as an opportunity for personal aggrandizement - all qualities which the present generation would find The Swatantra Party ....................................... 39 hard to believe, so disgustingly corrupt and venal have our public life become. Foreign Policy .................................................. 43 We are aware how happy Mr. Masani is in Citizenship ......................................................... 51 the company of the young and the spirited. And Swatantra's Electoral Disaster ...................... 59 so we begin and end this volume with extracts from the two books he wrote for India's youth - Our Indicr, The Indian Constitution ................................ 65 written in 1940 and We Tndians, the last book he wrote in 1989. In between is a wealth of knowledge and The Emergency ................................................ 69 wisdom, which one will rarely find in today's Jayaprakash ~ara~an................................. I... 73 politicians. We do hope you will find something of value in these pages. Leadership ......................................................... 77 Minoo Masani, we are proud of you, and we The Right to Die with Dignity ................... 79 promise you that Freedom First which you founded in June 1952, will as long as we are in publication, On Turning 80 81 ........................................... uphold _the liberal traditions and values you cherish The Minorities .: ................................................ 83 and which you have sought to so tirelessly promote among the Indim people. Corruption ......................................................... 87 S. V. Raju Kashmir ............................................................ 91 Editor November 20, 1995. The Future ........................................................ 95 ice sort of castles to build in the air, I think I have overheard some of you say Nas you have been reading this book. Don't burn cow dung! Form co-operative farms! Don't import cloth! Turn more iron ore into steel! Elec- trify the country! Make all machines that are needed! Do this, do that - and India will be a paradise of plenty. Which is all very well but who is going to get all this done, you wonder. Yes, who? You certainly have caught the bull by the horns there. My answer, in case you'd like to know is, 'YOU'. Yes, you, Young Sir, and you Little Lady, you alone can fit together the odd pieces of the puzzle with which this book started. You alone can make a lovely picture out'of them. After all, this is your counry - or it's going to be - and if you don't, who d'you think will? 'But how?' you ask. Well, how do people all over the world manage their affairs, run trains, carry letters, irrigate the land and control'the flow of goods in and out of their countries? They do it through their governments. The State or Gov- ernment is the machine or instrument which does - or at least, should do, because it does not always do so - what you and I and all those who live in a country want to be done. Unfortunately, governments are almost al- ways slow and lazy and do only as much work as the people force them to do. If the people are slack or indifferent, so is the government. As someone has said, 'every nation gets the govern- ment it deserves'. So you see how much depends on what sort of citizens you are going to become, what you know about your country and what you understand of its problems. This little book has tried to get you started towards such an understanding. I wonder what you have learnt from it? I'll tell you something I've learnt from it - that we Indians are allowing what we possess to run to waste in a very foolish way. That is because we do not try to plan our country's life. We live higgledy-piggledy, from day to day and from hand to mouth, and you've seen into what a mess we've got ourselves. When we have a government of our own, other hand, there are people, and Mahatma and hi lei us hope one of the first things it will do is to is one of them -who are horrified at such a prospect start on a Plan which will stop the waste we see and want people to make what they want in their tdday and get the most out of our country and own homes. our people for their own benefit. 'If you don't have a gigantic iron and steel such' a plan takes years to prepare, though, industry, how will you have arms with which to before we can get it going. That is why something fight a war?' asks the Friend of the Machines. is already being done to prepare such a plan. The 'But we don't want to fight any war. We National Planning Committee, with Pandit should resist any invasion of our country non- Jawaharlal Nehru as its president, has among its violently,' replied the Back-to-the-Village Man, members, men and women who are politicians, rather sensibly. college professors, scientists, engineers and indus- trialists. 'If we have machines to help us, we do not have to work such long hours, add so we have One of the many difficulties those who make more leisure to rest and enjoy the good things of a plan have to face is that not all the things that life' the Modernist continues. need to be done can be done together. Each of the big changes that are necessary costs money 'Leisure is dangerous and results in immor- and energy, and there isn't enough of either in tality. Don't forget that. Satan finds some mischief India to make all of them possible at the same still for idle hands to do1,parries the other grimly. time. You can't do this and that and the other all in the same year. The question keeps on bobbing 'Then why not do away with the charkha and up - shall we first do this or that? the plough also, so that we have to work with our bare hands twenty-four hours a day to keep Then again, those who plan have to ask alive? laughs the Modernist.