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Business Standard Blogs » Blog Archive » Plodders, not racehorses, on the podium

A hope for tomorrow

India’s foreign secretary, Nirupama Rao's visit to Pakistan would constitute the first formal talks between the two countries since November 2008, when talks were suspended after the Mumbai attack on 26/11 by Pakistan based militants. 

A hectic schedule of high flying diplomacy precedes the Islamabad visit ;  Ms. Rao has just concluded a three day visit to Myanmar, as part of a delegation led by External Affairs Minister SM Krishna, to establish new relations with the military led government of that country. She is scheduled to leave for Pakistan for the foreign secretary talks next morning. Ms Rao and her Pakistani counterpart Salman Bashir are to discuss "peace and security, Jammu and Kashmir as well as friendly exchanges”. 

The foreign secretaries are expected to discuss the trust deficit that exists between the two countries and how to bridge it, the Kashmir issue, which, according to Pakistan, lies at the heart of tension between the two countries. India however differs, and feels that Kashmir is an integral part of India, and a matter to be resolved first between itself and the Kashmiri's and then Pakistan and the Kashmiri's of Pakistan Occupied Kashmir. Analysts however rightly feel that there will be no dramatic breakthrough, “It is a revival of the peace process", said Mutahir Ahmed, Professor at the University of Karachi.

The peace and friendship talks assume greater significance at a personal level for Ms Rao, as just today, New Delhi announced her appointment as the next Indian Ambassador to Washington. Buoyed by her enhanced stature, the possibility of a display of greater initiative cannot be ruled out.

However, the issue of Pakistan's 'Azad Kashmir' is much more complex than it appears. Whilst India is quite clear that Jammu & Kashmir is an integral part of India, Pakistan insidiously hides behind the veil of calling Pak occupied Kashmir (POK) as Azad Jammu Kashmir (AJK). While AJK now has its ‘own’ elected legislature, however ineffective, candidates applying to run for the legislature are made to sign a declaration beforehand, which reads as:

“I solemnly declare that I believe in the Ideology of Pakistan, the Ideology of State’s Accession to Pakistan and the integrity and sovereignty of Pakistan.”

thereby blowing the cover of Pakistan that the territories held and controlled by them in Kashmir, is 'Azad'. The debate between the foreign secretaries therefore gets even more contentious, with both countries holding on to their respective positions and territories and not willing to concede to the aspirations of the Kashmiri people.

However both sides seem to be eager to create the right atmosphere for the talks. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has intervened to get the mercy petition hastened of Pakistan's virologist, Dr. Kahleel Chishty, imprisoned in India for 18 years on a murder charge. To add more goodwill, young boys and men aged between 10 to 21 years imprisoned in India for overstaying their visas will also be released. Pakistan on its part, will hand over the sailors who were part of the MV Suez crew, and their release obtained by Ansar Burney, the very respected Human Rights activist of Pakistan. 

Further, there appears a discernable shift in the 'India centric' strategy of Pakistan. Often described as an army with a state, the military over the the last 63 years, focused obsessively on its rivalry with India. However, lately, large elements within that military appear to be switching obsessions, and the United States is replacing India as a country wanting to keep Pakistan in a state of chaos.  Last month, Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States, Hussain Haqqani, addressing a large gathering of officers at Pakistan's National Defence University, asked the audience who, in their opinion, was the major threat to Pakistan: Internal terrorism, India or America? An over whelming majority felt it was America. This shift from the 'India Centric' enemy policy may be construed as 'advantage India' and therefore an opportunity for improving relations.

 Perhaps, somewhere in the back of the minds of policy makers could also lie the uneasy feeling that the rest of the world considers Pakistan as a dangerous place to be in. The Foreign Policy magazine in its Failed States list, has positioned Pakistan as 12th, just above Yemen. Another list published shows India's neighbours, Nepal, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Pakistan as failed states, may again prod Pakistan to improve its global image as a failing state. 

The Pakistan of yesteryear, when partition created the state, and the Pakistan of today are two unrecognizable images. Created with no real religious taboos, it has de generated into a bigoted state with neo religious militant groups, each preaching their own versions of enemy and hatred. It now time for the country to take charge of its mend fences with its neighbour, and focus on trade and people to people contact, rather than build nuclear arsenals. India can be a better friend than an adversary, and any opportunity to improve ties, such as the secretary level talks, should be seized upon, to walk the slow road to salvation from perdition that haunts the two countries.  

The duplicity of civil society

One cannot but draw comparisons between various events occuring in our country, for instance,

The Baba Ramdev episode,which is currently unfolding,

The Binayak Sen life sentence in Chattisgarh on charges of sedition

Do we live in the same country? Consider the following :

- Binayak Sen, an eminent doctor, gave up the choice of a lucrative practice and a cushy life, in order to provide public health care to the tribals in the deep interiors of Chattisgarh, doubling up as a human rights activist, gets charged for sedition and is sentenced for life.

- Irom Sharmila of Manipur has been fasting for the last 10 years in for the  repeal of AFSPA in Manipur, margainlised, her cause remains completely ignored, and consigned to 'no action required' status by the central and state govts.

- Maverick yoga guru Ramdev decides to launch an agitation to get black money stashed away overseas back to the country, by going on a fast unto death, gets the red carpet treatment from the central government.

The list is endless, the inequities in the two India's we live in, the disconnect between the rulers and the ruled cannot be greater, and growing. There is a complete erosion of a sense of balance, and we are governed by double, triple,& quadruple standards. The same law is interpreted in many different ways to suit the situation or person it is being interpreted for. How else can you account for Irom Sharlima languishing 10 years, and a lunatic yoga teacher being accorded a hero's welcome? Binayak Sen being handed down a life sentence for merely possessing some maoist seditious literature, which anyway is in the public domain?

The government, the keystone of society, is supposed to discharge its duties by good governance, protecting its citizens by maintaining law and order, dispensing justice, managing the economy and strengthening its institutions. It is only when they fail in their duties, that peoples movements come in to fill the vacuum, and in this case it it what we euphemistically call 'civil society'. However civil society in its attempt to correct the wrongs of a government that has abdicated its role, adopts the very same attitude they came to oppose, i.e. that is of authoritarianism and intolerance. Anna Hazare's fast for instance, was glaring example of intolerance. Holding a gun to the head of a confused and shaky government, he pushed his demands through on the Lokpal bill, without any locus standi. Ramdev also, with no people's mandate, can be best classified as  grate crasher to the party, hoping to cash on to the wave of self righteousness that has engulfed the middle class Indian. He too, is displaying a brand intolerance and authoritarianism, making his agitation sound ominously like a banana republic with kangaroo courts, when he suggests quick fix justice such as death sentence to economic offenders and a yogic cure for sexual deviant  preferences.

Civil society by definition is an abstract concept. Disparate groups claiming ownership of 'the' civil society, and offering their brand of solutions to perceived problems, now emerging as a trend is dangerous. Such groups flourish under conditions of a lack of rule of law and weak governance. The challenge now is to restore the rule of law, and expose the duplicity of the ramdevs, claiming to be torchbearers of 'civil society'.

In the meanwhile, the protests continue, a confused yoga brand is attempting to repackage and relaunch itself, ramdev Ver.2, June'11 is releasing - hold your breath, and close one nostril !

jet baba, Jettisoned !

When we were kids ( which is a very, very long time ago !!), I remember our maid used to say 'drink your milk, or the snake baba will come and take you away'. Each meal time we were confronted with a newer, and ostensibly a scarier baba, a snake baba, a wood smelling baba..... the list continues, I assume it was the fancy of the maid at that moment that conjured up the name with the hope it would make us gulp our milk down, and leave her free to chat with the other household help.

Cut to the present day : Baba Ramdev a new age yoga guru, jets into Delhi in his personal plane, to lead an agitation. Four cabinet rank ministers are waiting to receive him. A weak government all trembly in the knees, is on the back foot, and at pains to stop the baba from going ahead with his plans to agitate.

It indeed is a sad commentary of the times we live in, that yoga gurus and small time social crusaders are seizing the center stage of attention in a country of 1.2 billion people. The UPA, a duly elected democratic alliance of political parties headed by the Congress, chastened by its encounter with the last such episode of the earlier graft crusader, Anna Hazare, who fasted, and threatened to do so till death, would best like to avoid a confrontation of the same nature. It is therefore bending over backwards to persuade Baba Ramdev from going ahead with his proposed fast starting on the 4th of June.

Where do the Hazares and the Ramdevs derive their support from? The answer is nowhere. In a democracy, individuals derive their support from the people, either as elected representatives in the hierarchy of institutions, starting from the Panchayats to the Rajya Sabha, or by being mass leaders of a political party, or as an individual. When such elected representatives push for change, they have the mandate of the people, who have empowered them to do so. In the case of Ms Hazare and Ramdev, the have no such mandate, and are acting purely on their own accord, as self appointed guardians of public probity. An  un empowered middle class, politically naive, and wanting change, cheers them along, till such time as it looses novelty value, only to then drop it to the next politically fashionable thing to do. ('I'm going to the sit in for tribals in Orrisa dear, like to join me?')

On a personal evaluation of the baba, Ramdev does not emerge as squeaky clean as he'd like to project himself to be, to lead a movement on probity in public life. A tax man's assessment of this net worth puts him and his organisation at around Rs 200 crores or so, however informed sources value him at Rs 1000 crores plus. His yoga centers teach massive numbers with no real systems of reporting financial accruals, and as such the vast sums of money they generate remain largely unaccounted for, and has become the personal fiefdom of the promoter. Further, with him foraying overseas, he too could be one of those Indians who have their funds carefully tucked away in some numbered bank account. His ayurvedic medicine business too, came under a heavy cloud in 2007 when Brinda Karat of the CPM had some medicines analysed, and found it to contain amongst other harmful substances, crushed human bones!

Coming to the present agitation, what is quite obvious is that the Congress is missing the big picture. Corruption has invaded all sections of our economy and lives, the aam admi is tired of brushes with graft in his daily existence. The government, however continues remain blissfully somnolent, content in letting the present state of affairs drift, and besides the odd cosmetic attempt, has not taken any real steps to weed out corruption. As a result black money, slush money, money stashed overseas, have become fertile grounds for the likes of annas & babas to stage protests and achieve personal political stardom.

The government must in the first place, must tackle corruption, black money, and the 'cause celebre' of the present agitation, money stashed overseas, on a with a war footing. Rather than sending ministers to airports to receive the jet setting baba, and pander to his whim and fancies, they should take decisive control of the situation, thereby leaving such agitations with no legs to stand on. Once they begin this exercise in full earnest, the annas and babas will loose their credo, and whimper back to their original vocation, i.e. to oversee the water needs of  their village, or to teach yoga, as the case may be, and leave reforms to the relationship between the electorate and the elected.

Sorry Ramdev, this time round you cant get the mileage you seek. You will not be catapulted to the political center stage which you so unabashedly seek - The India of today is smart enough not to get conned twice by the same ploy, and for all your jetting around baba, India will jettison you !