Moving the People
Beware!! This is a long winded article about a lot of things. Starts with a comparion of the Indian and US judiciaries, and goes on to further define my political views. You've been warned... it's a ramble and not at all structured. In spirit, it is a sequel to my earlier post "Civic Sense". Ok... let's get to it now.
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Justice Yogesh Kumar Sabharwal took over as the Chief Justice of India recently. Coincidentally, John G Roberts became the Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court a month or so past. Of late the Roberts nomination, the Harriet Miers controversy and the recent nomination of Samuel Alito to the US apex court have brought a whole bunch of issues to the limelight (again) in the US. So this is one of those occasions where comparing the world's two largest democracies - and perhaps the largest independent judiciaries - becomes especially fun to do...
The great thing about the US is, everything is debated hotly, in a no holds barred television circus. From the nomination to the swearing in of the Chief Justice, the spotlight was firmly focussed on how the Judge would perform. He was quizzed about the hot button topics - abortion, gun control, civil rights. Lobbyists and interest groups voiced approval or screamed dissent. The Chief Justice of the US requires three-fifth approval from the 100 member Senate, so the whole thing is a political jamboree.
The day before the Indian Chief Justice was sworn in, national headlines talked about Mahendra Singh Dhoni's electrifying 183 against Sri Lanka. I don't really follow Indian newspapers here, but I'm assuming the process behind the nomination of the Justice was covered at best marginally - although, the actual nomination did credit a polite headline. I have been hard pressed in the past few days to find a comprehensive website that describes the structure and function of the Indian Judiciary - and of course I ignored my high school Civics classes as I confessed before. At this point, I know the system in the US better than in my own nation - India leaves law to the lawyers.
It is one of those things, some would say, that shows how long a way India has to go - or more specifically it's citizens have to go - to become an advanced, mature system of dynamic governance. Right now, we (the public conscious) obsess with the executive and the legislature and are ignorant of the judiciary! (I could be wrong... this is an opinion, not based on research. Besides, I would be the first to admit I've lived with my eyes closed to my nations realities for much of my life. Maybe I still am.)
On the other hand, the United States is rather petty in some things. African american men were described as "3/5th of a man" by the US Constitution and accorded commensurate rights for hundreds of years in this country (until the 1960s). No matter how the Church and the State may be separated here, the Christian ethos permeates the legal system.
India accorded citizenship, and the right of franchise, to all its citizens from day one. But then we were drawing on a global experience in democracy of around two hundred years. Besides, we haven't really abolished our hierarchical caste system - it is alive and well in rural India - and in urban India it exists sub-surface, disguised as an economical hierarchy.
We legalized abortion in 1971, but that was done because of a burgeoning population - and I don't think anyone really bothers about it too much because our primary religion is not based on sex as sin, and our realities force us to put a lower premium on life - consciously or subconsciously. We did make illegal any prenatal determination of the gender of the baby - something done as matter of course almost, here in the US - again, in response to our own social realities.
On the death penalty, read this Amnesty International report dated 6 September 2005. In 1983 the Apex court ruled that the death penalty is applicable only in the "rarest of rare" cases. One of the last known executions carried out was that of Dhananjay Chatterjee by the State of West Bengal, for the rape and murder of a schoolgoing kid. President APJ Abdul Kalam recently said it was time to abolish the penalty. Reading the Amnesty report is an eye opener - shows how mixed and conflicting a record we have on this issue.
Here's another great example of how we are ignorant of our judiciary - If I ask any one you readers, or a common man on the street, what the term is for life imprisonment in India, you will probably come up with the Bollywood-ized answer of 14 years. Right? Wrong! Read this Indian Express article about a Supreme Court decision in September 05.
On gun control - another hot topic in the US - we have an almost draconian record. I'm sure we've heard about how India has fewer gun crimes than the US. We are quick to point to the Columbine incident and talk about how it can never happen in India.
But then I was exploring our gun control laws the other day, on a lark, and I found a pretty funky quote. From our banner-general of pacifism, Mahatma Gandhi. "Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the Act depriving a whole nation of arms, as the blackest" - From "My Experiments with Truth". Heh... Gandhi was against gun control. He was a pacifist, but he would not keep you from buying a gun, if that's what you wanted to do. He saw that prevention as a form of control - of subservience - of slavery.
Yet when the legislature, the judiciary and the executive all put their heads together to make an almost draconian (love that word. It's perfect!) socialist state, we borrowed our gun control laws from our dear friends the Bolsheviks. Perhaps because India was build on the presumption of a citizenry that could not be trusted?
On a tangent... that is one of my big beefs with Socialism. It presumes it is ruling a bunch of idiots, while simultaneously enshrining them as the vague "State" working toward the "common good". Which is surprising, because in general, I believe people are idiots too. : )
Anyway, coming partway back to the topic - I'm not saying gun control is bad - but nor am I saying it is good. Read this op-ed piece for instance... it's heavily biased, but it is probably the perfect counterpoint to our average, presumably anti-gun sensibilities. We should debate this hotly in India, don't you think...?
We have so many draconian laws inherited from closed repressive societies pertaining to say, torture. Security forces in India have a virtually free run on people in their custody. Any intellectual debate on the issues involved is usually dismissed by a bellicose line or two in a J P Dutta movie. We cheer when a bellicose Sunny Deol talks about people who complain of human rights violations in Kashmir as wimps who are not patriotic enough. Sigh...
Anyway... I'm getting carried away here. I found out so much new stuff I had never bothered about in under an hour of Google time, I kind of over-wrote here. The bottomline is twofold.
1. Both India and the US have these issues that really have no straight answers. Death penalty, gun control, abortion, euthanasia... these are issues that need to be talked about, because they are issues that have no clear rights and wrongs. The US does a better job at talking about it for whatever reason. Us Indians still need to grow into realizing these issues are important - the Judiciary is important. We are of course distracted by other hot button topics like communalism or economics, but one day we will be able to worry about these things too. I hope that day comes soon.
2. It's weird, but personally, the more ambiguous my views get, the more I feel grown up. And one of my biggest realizations as part of this growing up is:
India is a repressed nation. Not because we aren't given fundamental rights. But because the State really does at a very fundamental level censor the public conscious. Law-making goes largely unquestioned. The people are too hungry to bother about human rights. I'm not saying its all bad in India... but it isn't all good either.
Sadly the legislature - from local government to Parliament - is a shitty system, not in structure or spirit, but in participation. The executive is a horse race, or a commodities bourse. The judiciary is draconian. We need a movement of the people... nothing anarchist or socialist... but a moderate, democratic movement that raises issues, creates debates and pressures the three branches of governance to play it straight. A movement that uses the fourth estate - the press, or more modernly, the media - to keep things headed in the right direction.
Irony of ironies... Such a "fifth estate" exists. (The first four of my definition of estates being the executive, legislature, judiciary, and media). And a part of it has played out right under my nose for much of my life.
My dad is an activist himself, and has been associated in recent years with the NAPM - the National Association of People's Movements. One of the biggest forums where these issues I got heated up about above were discussed was the World Social Forum that my dad attended as a social/ environmental activist. I remember not really being enthused about it as he was. Subconsciously, I have always been reluctant to associate with these folks. And now, I think I can finally say why with some conviction.
I see what they want to do... and what they actually do. I can also see how badly they do it. (Once again, we are deep in opinion territory here... this is not based on research). Seriously... these guys just make a circus out of debates. Gathering together and shouting slogans is all well and good... but are you piercing through the fog that surrounds the common man?
The fifth estate doesn't need Medha Patkar to drown in the Narmada... we need a Barkha Dutt to ignite public interest in issues. We don't need a pack of noise-makers against the WTO; we need habeas corpus writs followed up by properly marketed (and thus newly created) celebrities. We need movies, books, magazines that target the youth, but still stay away from the socialist vocabulary of "inquilab"/ revolution and khadi and shabnam bags and vows of poverty, which are anathema to a lot of young people.
What we need, is a movement of savvy, marketable (and marketed) celebrity activists in suits and carrying briefcases and laptops. People that are not whimsical, but balanced. Not overtly passionate (bordering on rabid!), but understated and go-getting. Focussing on the small wins... waiting for the killer strokes... having a coherent and realistic agenda. Marshalling finance from the right sources. Fiercely independent, and determinedly working from outside the first three estates. And yeah, we need to somehow make this a viable career for the smartest kids in India.
Hmm... enough rambling for now. Something to think about... something to work on...
7 comments:
Hrishi,
Wow!!! Can't believe I read this post twice... First time cursory, second time more deliberate, because I liked what I was reading. I would have to say, I agree with your assessment that things get discussed more here in the US than back in India. And while I would love to see changes happening in all three branches of the Indian government. I think it is difficult thing to do...
(Like you stated in your blog, this is where I am going on to opinion territory...) Because the mentality still resides in India where if a constitution change was even attempted, it gets floored because it was originally written by Dr. Ambedkar... Imagine going another 25-30 years where his deification would be so much that such changes would not even be thought about.
But some good thought provocative stuff...
Hey Hrishi,
A very nice post. It is indeed fun to compare the systems of US and India- interestingly even I had tried to google the chief justice nomination method in India- but to no avail.
btw - this is my first comment on your blog- pertinent to add a few words about the blog in general:)
Some of your articles are VERY thought provoking- I esp liked the one about spending time alone, at different spots in abad.Kinda got me nostalgic.
Goes without saying, you write exceptionally well. I just wish you would give the meanings of all the looong words you use- I hate reaching out for the dictionary every time!!
Hrishi,
It is a good thing that you have come around to ponder on these things. You are living in an uncontested era of capitalist economy, what with the balancing Soviet power having slipped into oblivion. So the contemptuous reference to Socialism in your blog is understandable. I was born prior to the independence. I remember that for the freedom fighters of India, freedom meant not just unsaddling a foreign political rule, but was an opportunity to bring about emancipation of the poorer – the peasants and the workers of India. Socialism, in the first place, was infused in the Indian political thought during the period from 1927 to 1936 as a tool to fight the age-old inequality – both social and economical - that prevailed in India. At that time, fascism and Nazism were regarded to be the expressions of imperialism and capitalism practiced by the foreign powers. The Russian revolution had aroused interest among many a young Indian nationalists, from M.N.Roy to Jawaharlal Nehru. So the Marxist and socialist ideas filtered down in India.
However, the elite rulers of the newly independent India chose to wave the banner of socialism with one hand and implement the western model of development with the other. When one looks back at the fifty-year-long course of development in India, one sees very little scope for the upliftment of the poor peasants and workers who still constitute a vast majority in India. It can not be overlooked that agriculture is the sole device of livelihood for the majority of people with a rural base. India has not subsidized the agriculture as in the US. About 85% of farming in India is rain-fed, and 90% farmers have small land holdings. The prevailing development paradigm has failed to empower this vast majority of farming community. The natural resources in villages have been exploited and have depleted for want of support. The livelihoods of the village folk and adivasis are destroyed. The poor are rendered further poorer. They are abandoning their villages and bastis to migrate to the small and large cities. The cities’ populations are bulging beyond manageability, causing the city systems of drinking water, employment and shelter getting overburdened. So poverty, unemployment, corruption, crime, unattended garbage, slums, tuberculosis and AIDS are constantly on the rise. A vast majority of common poor citizens of India is being progressively marginalized, with very little or no benefits of the present day development percolating down to them.
So, who will speak for them? Surely, the 2% rich Indian people will never bother for them. The 20-odd percent higher middle class persons like Barkha Dutt may carry out the savvy campaigns to enlighten the people, but what people after all? The Governments that are on the tethers of the World Bank, the International Monitory Fund, the Asian Development Bank and the WTO, OR the politicians who do not miss an opportunity to pilfer out money even from the food-for-oil deals, OR the technocrats and bureaucrats who, in fact, are the parasites (without accountability) on the ever-multiplying multi-crore development projects, OR the journalists who write about farmers’ suicides and Karishma Kapoor’s marital problems with equal fervour? These people may run the fifth estate you write about, but only when they have enough leisure. The adivasis and small farmers have their very existence threatened today. I feel that they have only the people like Medha Patkar to fall back upon. Think about it.
Btw, Narmada Bachao Andolan is entering the 21st year of its existence on 26th Nov. I’ll be joining their rally at Badwani (Madhya Pradesh) on that day.
- Baba
Dad,
This is perhaps a continuation of the we started at the dinner table a couple of years back! So it's time for a few disclaimers...
1. I know I'm hitting raw nerves with you left, right, and er... radical left - and I love how we can debate this healthily... So thanks for that.
2. Let me make it clear that it was not intended to either demean or belittle the work of the NBA or NAPM. If nothing else, my opinion on how they work is rather moot because they are actually out there and working on these issues while I comment from the lap of luxury. My problem with them isn't in the work they do, but in the way they connect to the public conscious. In that sense, I'm criticizing them from more a marketing perspective than anything else.
Then again, although I do live in an age of unchecked capitalism, I cannot bring myself to agree with a socialist viewpoint. Which brings up two more disclaimers! (Today's the day for them!)
a. I'm not against socialism in any rabid sort of way - in spite of my Ayn Rand phase (which is now long past, I think). I just don't think it works.
b. Soviet socialism - or Leninism or whatever - is not my only touchstone for socialism.
So here's a promise - I'm going to write an opinion on Socialism, and why I think it doesn't work...
Let's debate on!
Very Very interesting and thought provoking Discussion. I am watching this space for more.
Hey,
Incidentally, on the eve of Diwali, FOUR farmers in Yawatmal district of Vidarbha (India) committed suicide. The number of farmers committing suicide has gone well over two thousand now. When one looks at the places where these suicides occurred, one gets an eerie feeling up the spine. These suicides occurred in the states of Maharashtra, Andhra, Karnatak, Keral and Punjab. These were the states which had unquestioningly accepted the doctrine of Green Revolution and the Western model of Development. These are the states where the World Bank, IMF, WTO have been operating and governing everything from infrastructure development to farm management. For years now, the small farmers in these states have been instigated to harvest triple amount of crops than the normal one. To achieve this they were made to go for genetically engineered seed, greater doses of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, excess irrigation, more power and more fuel for their waterpumps. Their lands were purgated of all the natural nutrients, and were brought incessantly under cultivation without even a season's traditional break. Resultantly, the lands stopped germinating the seed without the heavy doses of water and chemical suppliment. The costs of those things, the water, power, fuel, fertilizers and pesticides escalated beyond affordability, particularly so after 1995 - the year of advent of globalisation of trade and liberalisation of economy in India. The farmers practicing the Green Revolution were thrown in a whirlpool of debt that they could not possibly repay. So, the easiest way out for them was to commit suicide. Whither globalisation!
Ok... so two posts then! One on Socialism, and one on Globalization... Bring it ON! :)
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