To all the Participants of fhe Liberal Roundtable held in Hyderabad on 6-7 September, 2007
From: Sauvik Chakraverti
1. Since we hold that all solutions lie in the market, and no solutions lie in this State, our political strategy must be one of chipping away at government restrictions and controls: the first of which must be the customs department. Therefore, our first direct political intervention must be aimed at free trade.
2. My idea is simplicity itself: First, we engage in pamphleteering, and circulate Frederic Bastiat's "Candlemakers' Petition" in each and every coastal town on our western seaboard – from Kutch and Porbandar down to Cochin. With the engagement of some local agent provocateurs, the mass of the city will immediately conceive free trade as in their own self-interest – as also their "ancient tradition". Furthermore, they will all see the customs department as an obstruction that should be removed. This widespread "opinion" will be our greatest strength, apart from the clarity of our views. Two other essays of Batsiat against "reciprocity" in trade should be circulated as well. There is also my "Walled-in Ideas: We No Longer Need Economists", about The Wall around the port of Mangalore. Two of my recent "Antidote" columns also endorse free trade with simplicity and clarity. All these should be translated into the local languages and put into the public domain in each and every one of these coastal port cities and towns.
3. Next, we "facilitate" trade between any one of these port cities and Dubai. Merchants in the Indian city will pay for merchandise in Dubai which will be loaded on to a ship called "RAINBOW WARRIOR HAJI MASTAN " that will then set sail for that city. In the meantime, the climate of "opinion" in that city will be one of joy and optimism – that "my ship is coming in". When the ship arrives, I do believe the customs department will get out of the way, as the entire mass of that city approaches the port shouting "Rukawat Hatao". This "event" will be reported in the media.
4. The rest will be the stuff of history: a thousand ships will set sail for all these liberated ports of India; they will be followed by thousands of cargo planes headed for the inland cities and towns. These "merchant ships" will dominate public discourse and the "pirate ship" of the State will steal away from the scene. As was said of one of the last Mughal Emperors: "Poor old Shah Alam / He rules from Delhi to Palam," Instead of "Dilli Chalo" the cry will be "Dilli Chhoro" as the Great Konkan Gold Rush makes people respond to economic incentives and shift bag-and-baggage to the hundreds of booming coastal towns that will mushroom overnight.
5. There is another advantage: We need not raise any funds. The merchants will themselves pay for the cargo, freight etc.
6. Lastly, this "idea" came to me during the meet. I had not conceived of such an idea before. So thank you all for stimulating my mind so beautifully.
7. Next on the "Hit List": the excise department.
8. Then, the RTO… and so on and so forth.
9. "Liberty or Death", said Patrick Henry. That should be our battle-cry.
Friday, September 14, 2007
Thursday, September 13, 2007
THE MORE THE MERRIER
SAUVIK CHAKRAVERTI
I am pasting below an extract from my new book:
NATURAL ORDER - ESSAYS EXPLORING CIVIL GOVERNMENT & THE RULE OF LAW
This extract is from the first chapter that describes the natural order, from a section called 'the more the merrier': that is, a view fundamentally opposed to those neo-Malthusians who declare that humanity faces a 'population problem':
"It needs to be emphasized that the secret of success in the competitive environment of the natural order is to go on adding more and more 'friendly strangers' to the overall order. This can be understood at many levels.
For example: the apple growers of Kulu have very little to gain if they trade their apples among themselves. There are far greater gains to be had if these apples could be sold in far-away cities like Bombay or Calcutta , where no apples grow, and where they are highly prized. If fruiterers in these cities could be included in the Kulu order, gains would significantly increase.
Another example: Suppose we are all competing fruit-sellers in a city market. Do we gain if only our regular local customers drop by? Or do we gain if exceeding numbers of 'friendly strangers' drop by for our wares, people from Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Kazhakistan and all the other stans, including Pakistan (but friendly strangers only)? If we look deep, in the market, we sellers actually hate each other – we compete relentlessly. Our overall 'community' would be enriched (and our purses too!) only if we add more and more outsiders to it. Xenophobia is devoid of economic logic. It is actually uncivilized.
At another level, the more the number of people in a city, the bigger the market, and the greater the scope for highly specialized niches in the social 'division of labour'. This means more products and services being added to the general pool from which all can draw: that is, greater wealth.
Further, with more and more migrants, local property prices increase, and the city flourishes. The US housing bubble would never explode if the US declared free immigration. Americans would also have domestic help. Thus, a future of competing cities – competing, that is, for citizens – makes complete economic sense. It is this competition that will keep local city governments on their toes, not 'democracy'.
What this means for India is that we have huge gains to make from tourism (the biggest industry in the world) – if we remain friendly with all 'friendly strangers'. Further, we must also welcome foreigners to our real estate markets, encouraging them to settle down within our overall order. Our institutions must protect all individuals, irrespective of faith or nationality. Our country will only gain – in profits as well as real, usable knowledge – if we as a people reject narrow nationalism. Globalization is the way to go." (End of quote)
It follows that if 'friendly strangers' are good for India, then our own children must be made even more welcome, for they are the ones we love, and whom we value more than all material wealth, and who will be our support in old age, better than any pension scheme governments can think up.
Lastly, the california gold rush occurred because of an economic incentive.
Uniulateral free trade will also work like an economic incentive, prompting many people to shift to the coast and build more and more new cities and towns there.
Finally, we Indians will possess 'HABITAT' in what is actually a very beautiful country.
BOOM SHANKAR!
I am pasting below an extract from my new book:
NATURAL ORDER - ESSAYS EXPLORING CIVIL GOVERNMENT & THE RULE OF LAW
This extract is from the first chapter that describes the natural order, from a section called 'the more the merrier': that is, a view fundamentally opposed to those neo-Malthusians who declare that humanity faces a 'population problem':
"It needs to be emphasized that the secret of success in the competitive environment of the natural order is to go on adding more and more 'friendly strangers' to the overall order. This can be understood at many levels.
For example: the apple growers of Kulu have very little to gain if they trade their apples among themselves. There are far greater gains to be had if these apples could be sold in far-away cities like Bombay or Calcutta , where no apples grow, and where they are highly prized. If fruiterers in these cities could be included in the Kulu order, gains would significantly increase.
Another example: Suppose we are all competing fruit-sellers in a city market. Do we gain if only our regular local customers drop by? Or do we gain if exceeding numbers of 'friendly strangers' drop by for our wares, people from Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Kazhakistan and all the other stans, including Pakistan (but friendly strangers only)? If we look deep, in the market, we sellers actually hate each other – we compete relentlessly. Our overall 'community' would be enriched (and our purses too!) only if we add more and more outsiders to it. Xenophobia is devoid of economic logic. It is actually uncivilized.
At another level, the more the number of people in a city, the bigger the market, and the greater the scope for highly specialized niches in the social 'division of labour'. This means more products and services being added to the general pool from which all can draw: that is, greater wealth.
Further, with more and more migrants, local property prices increase, and the city flourishes. The US housing bubble would never explode if the US declared free immigration. Americans would also have domestic help. Thus, a future of competing cities – competing, that is, for citizens – makes complete economic sense. It is this competition that will keep local city governments on their toes, not 'democracy'.
What this means for India is that we have huge gains to make from tourism (the biggest industry in the world) – if we remain friendly with all 'friendly strangers'. Further, we must also welcome foreigners to our real estate markets, encouraging them to settle down within our overall order. Our institutions must protect all individuals, irrespective of faith or nationality. Our country will only gain – in profits as well as real, usable knowledge – if we as a people reject narrow nationalism. Globalization is the way to go." (End of quote)
It follows that if 'friendly strangers' are good for India, then our own children must be made even more welcome, for they are the ones we love, and whom we value more than all material wealth, and who will be our support in old age, better than any pension scheme governments can think up.
Lastly, the california gold rush occurred because of an economic incentive.
Uniulateral free trade will also work like an economic incentive, prompting many people to shift to the coast and build more and more new cities and towns there.
Finally, we Indians will possess 'HABITAT' in what is actually a very beautiful country.
BOOM SHANKAR!
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
BAN COMMUNISM
SAUVIK CHAKRAVERTI
(For Devil's Advocate)
Communists despise private property and idealise commonly held property. But I'll bet Brinda and Prakash Karat don't share a toothbrush! So let us conduct a "reductio" thought experiment as to what would happen in a city or town if private property were abolished and all property declared to be held in common.
Well the first thing that would happen is that everyone would stop working. If someone needed something he would simply go to the house or shop where the object of his desire was located and demand it in the name of communist brotherhood. "How can you refuse me, comrade?" he would ask, "for we are all brothers now." Within a few days of the establishment of the communist fraternity, all shops would be stripped bare, as would be all the mansions of the rich. All economic activity would come to a standstill. The redistribution of all property in the name of communism would lead to the "leveling down" of all the members of the commune. Further, instead of the polite civilization that existed previously, bound by the "natural law" of private property, the commies would soon descend to barbarianism – snatch, grab, loot, scoot.
Observing markets easily reveals the natural law of property at work. When a fisherman returns from the sea, no one forcibly takes fish away from him because the ocean has not furnished him with a title deed to his catch. No one snatches bananas from any of the millions of fruit vendors throughout India – except for cops and monkeys. Look at any big market and you will see thousands engaging in the great game of trade, respecting private property rights. If this natural law was overthrown, man would be reduced to the status of ape, snatching bananas instead of paying for them.
Indian commies do not practice what they preach to the level of the above reductio ad absurdum. They idealise some supposedly commonly held properties, especially the state-owned industrial sector. However, these are all really "private properties" in the control of individuals or groups claiming to represent the public. The minister's official bungalow is his "private property". Wee (sic) the people cannot enter it freely. The PSU is the minister's fiefdom. Neither are "common property" in the sense that the term would be used for a public thoroughfare or a public park, which all can use. Thus, communism is so totally wrong, it should be banned.
(For Devil's Advocate)
Communists despise private property and idealise commonly held property. But I'll bet Brinda and Prakash Karat don't share a toothbrush! So let us conduct a "reductio" thought experiment as to what would happen in a city or town if private property were abolished and all property declared to be held in common.
Well the first thing that would happen is that everyone would stop working. If someone needed something he would simply go to the house or shop where the object of his desire was located and demand it in the name of communist brotherhood. "How can you refuse me, comrade?" he would ask, "for we are all brothers now." Within a few days of the establishment of the communist fraternity, all shops would be stripped bare, as would be all the mansions of the rich. All economic activity would come to a standstill. The redistribution of all property in the name of communism would lead to the "leveling down" of all the members of the commune. Further, instead of the polite civilization that existed previously, bound by the "natural law" of private property, the commies would soon descend to barbarianism – snatch, grab, loot, scoot.
Observing markets easily reveals the natural law of property at work. When a fisherman returns from the sea, no one forcibly takes fish away from him because the ocean has not furnished him with a title deed to his catch. No one snatches bananas from any of the millions of fruit vendors throughout India – except for cops and monkeys. Look at any big market and you will see thousands engaging in the great game of trade, respecting private property rights. If this natural law was overthrown, man would be reduced to the status of ape, snatching bananas instead of paying for them.
Indian commies do not practice what they preach to the level of the above reductio ad absurdum. They idealise some supposedly commonly held properties, especially the state-owned industrial sector. However, these are all really "private properties" in the control of individuals or groups claiming to represent the public. The minister's official bungalow is his "private property". Wee (sic) the people cannot enter it freely. The PSU is the minister's fiefdom. Neither are "common property" in the sense that the term would be used for a public thoroughfare or a public park, which all can use. Thus, communism is so totally wrong, it should be banned.
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Bihar Flood Victims Hungry
Bihar Flood Victims Hungry
HUNGRY FLOOD VICTIMS BLOCK BIHAR’S HIGHWAYS
By Manuwant Choudhary
Hunger forces flood victims in Bihar to block national highways leading to the capital Bihar, perhaps their only way to get their voices heard.This is a first hand report of the plight of Bihar’s flood victims as fresh areas are flooded.I was driving from my home in north Bihar to Patna and I personally witnessed eight road blockades within ten kilometers from Muzaffarpur to village Turkey, and initially there was no sign of the local police or administration.Protestors said there was no way I would get to Patna today and being a journalist one is not used to taking a safe route I decided come what may I might as well experience not so much the misery of the flood victims but at least that of a traveler in flooded Bihar.In todays Bihar the only way to get the government into action is not to call the politician or the police but the media and considering I myself was a TV reporter my first instinct was that this is national news and so I got the flash on all the news channels.In 40 minutes a local Senior Divisional Officer accompanied by policemen arrived and got on with his job to clear the road.He succeeded in clearing the first blockade within 5 minutes but then there was another blockade, then another, then another…Hundreds of women blocked the road at the fifth blockade..”Water is in our homes, cattle have been washed away..where do we live? Straw homes have been destroyed…we do not have anything left to eat,” said Sakli Devi of village Madhaul.Said Shivji Singh to the Muzaffarpur SDO, “If we did not block the roads..you sahibs will not have come but I understand even you have come because its your job. You must have got a telephone call from the chief minister. Where were you for five days? For five days these people have had nothing to eat.”On assurances of food another road block was cleared but at the sixth road block it was a nightmare as even cellphone signals were weak and there was no sign of any police…just angry mobs..even children carrying thick sticks and threatening private vehicles.And one agitator suddenly takes a decision that all those going to pray to Shiva on a pilgrimage be given right of way…so suddenly shouts of “Bol Bum” filled the air as vehicles forced their way out. A few Maruti 800s and autos were physically lifted aside to make way for the Bol Bum vehicles. And every time a Bol Bum vehicle found their passage out of the jam they would thank Shiva together amidst shouts.It felt like jungle raj (Rule of the Jungle)But Shiva helped us too and finally the lone SDO arrived and began talks in ernest.Barely half a km from this we could see even Shiva fails when it comes to floods…the Bol Bum vehicles were stuck in yet another blockade – the eigth one and no these protestors were more angry – they knew no God, only hunger.I spotted a dhaba (highway eatery) and took my chance…had a good meal and joined the blockade again.Even a heavy downpour did not deter the protestors. It felt like being on a road on the Arabian sea.Bihar’s chief minister Nitish Kumar says a 100 kilo foodgrains is being given to each flood victim but at least in Muzaffarpur there is no sign of his governance.A ten km route took me more than 6 hours to cross but for once my patience did not run out.
HUNGRY FLOOD VICTIMS BLOCK BIHAR’S HIGHWAYS
By Manuwant Choudhary
Hunger forces flood victims in Bihar to block national highways leading to the capital Bihar, perhaps their only way to get their voices heard.This is a first hand report of the plight of Bihar’s flood victims as fresh areas are flooded.I was driving from my home in north Bihar to Patna and I personally witnessed eight road blockades within ten kilometers from Muzaffarpur to village Turkey, and initially there was no sign of the local police or administration.Protestors said there was no way I would get to Patna today and being a journalist one is not used to taking a safe route I decided come what may I might as well experience not so much the misery of the flood victims but at least that of a traveler in flooded Bihar.In todays Bihar the only way to get the government into action is not to call the politician or the police but the media and considering I myself was a TV reporter my first instinct was that this is national news and so I got the flash on all the news channels.In 40 minutes a local Senior Divisional Officer accompanied by policemen arrived and got on with his job to clear the road.He succeeded in clearing the first blockade within 5 minutes but then there was another blockade, then another, then another…Hundreds of women blocked the road at the fifth blockade..”Water is in our homes, cattle have been washed away..where do we live? Straw homes have been destroyed…we do not have anything left to eat,” said Sakli Devi of village Madhaul.Said Shivji Singh to the Muzaffarpur SDO, “If we did not block the roads..you sahibs will not have come but I understand even you have come because its your job. You must have got a telephone call from the chief minister. Where were you for five days? For five days these people have had nothing to eat.”On assurances of food another road block was cleared but at the sixth road block it was a nightmare as even cellphone signals were weak and there was no sign of any police…just angry mobs..even children carrying thick sticks and threatening private vehicles.And one agitator suddenly takes a decision that all those going to pray to Shiva on a pilgrimage be given right of way…so suddenly shouts of “Bol Bum” filled the air as vehicles forced their way out. A few Maruti 800s and autos were physically lifted aside to make way for the Bol Bum vehicles. And every time a Bol Bum vehicle found their passage out of the jam they would thank Shiva together amidst shouts.It felt like jungle raj (Rule of the Jungle)But Shiva helped us too and finally the lone SDO arrived and began talks in ernest.Barely half a km from this we could see even Shiva fails when it comes to floods…the Bol Bum vehicles were stuck in yet another blockade – the eigth one and no these protestors were more angry – they knew no God, only hunger.I spotted a dhaba (highway eatery) and took my chance…had a good meal and joined the blockade again.Even a heavy downpour did not deter the protestors. It felt like being on a road on the Arabian sea.Bihar’s chief minister Nitish Kumar says a 100 kilo foodgrains is being given to each flood victim but at least in Muzaffarpur there is no sign of his governance.A ten km route took me more than 6 hours to cross but for once my patience did not run out.
Monday, August 20, 2007
AntidoteA natural social order
AntidoteA natural social order
Thursday August 16 2007 17:48
IST Sauvik Chakraverti
Go to any Indian bazaar, in the cities or the mofussils, and you will see innumerable hordes exchanging goods without the presence of any policemen or recourse to either civil or criminal law. This 'natural social order' that already exists is the true subject matter of any science of society. There is a need for a science of society precisely because there is an order without design. If the order was the product of a central planner or a central legislature, then there would be no need for a science of society, because the particular arrangements of the planner or the legislature would explain and account for the order. The reason why this natural social order exists is because the elements, individuals like you and me, obey unwritten and even unknown rules when we go about our lives surviving through the processes of market exchange. The true social science, therefore, proceeds with the rule-following individual and thereafter attempts to derive theorems applicable to the whole. A true science of society must be based on individualism as well as subjectivism: that is, the mind of the thinking, acting human being. Once the individual is understood, then only can we begin to understand the big picture: society. An example of such an approach is history. To arrive at the big picture of, say, the industrial revolution, the good historian will study the elements first: the politics of the age; the literature and arts; the individual entrepreneurs and their daring ventures; the squalid conditions of the new industrial towns etc. Thereafter, he will 'compose' a picture of that age. The false social science applies 'polylogic' and conjures up conflicts between groups, which are then used to foment strife: fascism, racism, socialism, communism, trade unionism and Keynesianism are all examples of polylogic, false ideas of society based on group-think and aggregation. In reality, the very factual existence of the natural order is proof that the elements co-exist in harmony; and that just as God has made the movements of the celestial spheres harmonious, so also He has made the social world one in which individuals interact harmoniously through market exchanges. If we apply the individualistic method to our understanding of Indian society, we are left with a sobering conclusion: that there is a great deal of hope for us because almost all of us are rule-following animals plying their individual boats in the great waters. We are a civilised people with a deeply ingrained commercial culture – which we do not understand, nor appreciate. This shows that the science of society is very much in its infancy. This is precisely because, neither in Economics, nor Political Science, nor Law, is this rule following individual the central focus of attention. There is, instead, something peculiarly socialistic in its conception: Sociology! Let us now sit back and imagine ourselves all as boatman-peddlers on the Dal Lake. For those who haven't seen Srinagar, let me explain: as you idly sip kahwa on your house-boat deck, boatman after boatman pulls along selling goods as diverse as flowers and perfumes, leatherware and cookies. (I bought some charas, but that's another story!) This natural social order is present as much on the Dal Lake as anywhere else in the country, where the people follow unwritten rules of just conduct during their market exchanges. If all of society was composed of such people, if such a way of life was the universal ethic and the highest moral code, then humankind would have reached its zenith and perfection, and government would be unnecessary. Some impartial judges, some learned lawyers – and that would be all. If this is an impossible ideal, so be it: but the true social scientist must visualise it, and direct all moral and intellectual faculties towards its attainment. Let us now turn our attention to the government. All the false social scientists who apply polylogic call upon this government to solve all the ills they believe society is possessed of. If people are poor, the government is to act. If people are unemployed, or sick, or whatever, call in the government. They all see the very same society – all of us in our individual boats on the Dal Lake – as full of imperfections, and they see the government as composed of perfectionists. But who are the individuals in the government? They are ministers, bureaucrats, policemen, generals, diplomats etc. How do they survive? They all survive because government tax collectors extort money from us. There are, thus, on our idyllic Dal Lake, many armed pirates who are snatching away at our honest gains. That is the government. The true Political Science, the highest principles of Jurisprudence, and the noblest ideals of Democracy concern themselves principally with the limits to this coercion, and the only just purposes for which it can be used. Those who have never considered these limits have created a Frankenstein. Mary Shelley's monster was created by science; ours is a creature of a very false social science. This is the 'predatory state' and its predations are proved by the sorry fact that we get precious little in exchange for all the taxes we cough up. This government is not the solution; this government is the real problem. Our blindness to our predicament is compounded by the fact that our science of society has been unable to distinguish clearly between a business organisation powered by the profit motive and a political organisation powered by the 'vote motive'. We know what drives businessmen, but we are blind to what motives drive the processes of politics, into which the bureaucracy is hopelessly enmeshed. What are the motives that make people form these political groups? Our children are taught that it is selfless service, but even they do not believe this humbug any more. The situation is grimmer because the government is their teacher. But, as Dylan sang, ''There must be some way outta here,'' and I'm looking for it.
Thursday August 16 2007 17:48
IST Sauvik Chakraverti
Go to any Indian bazaar, in the cities or the mofussils, and you will see innumerable hordes exchanging goods without the presence of any policemen or recourse to either civil or criminal law. This 'natural social order' that already exists is the true subject matter of any science of society. There is a need for a science of society precisely because there is an order without design. If the order was the product of a central planner or a central legislature, then there would be no need for a science of society, because the particular arrangements of the planner or the legislature would explain and account for the order. The reason why this natural social order exists is because the elements, individuals like you and me, obey unwritten and even unknown rules when we go about our lives surviving through the processes of market exchange. The true social science, therefore, proceeds with the rule-following individual and thereafter attempts to derive theorems applicable to the whole. A true science of society must be based on individualism as well as subjectivism: that is, the mind of the thinking, acting human being. Once the individual is understood, then only can we begin to understand the big picture: society. An example of such an approach is history. To arrive at the big picture of, say, the industrial revolution, the good historian will study the elements first: the politics of the age; the literature and arts; the individual entrepreneurs and their daring ventures; the squalid conditions of the new industrial towns etc. Thereafter, he will 'compose' a picture of that age. The false social science applies 'polylogic' and conjures up conflicts between groups, which are then used to foment strife: fascism, racism, socialism, communism, trade unionism and Keynesianism are all examples of polylogic, false ideas of society based on group-think and aggregation. In reality, the very factual existence of the natural order is proof that the elements co-exist in harmony; and that just as God has made the movements of the celestial spheres harmonious, so also He has made the social world one in which individuals interact harmoniously through market exchanges. If we apply the individualistic method to our understanding of Indian society, we are left with a sobering conclusion: that there is a great deal of hope for us because almost all of us are rule-following animals plying their individual boats in the great waters. We are a civilised people with a deeply ingrained commercial culture – which we do not understand, nor appreciate. This shows that the science of society is very much in its infancy. This is precisely because, neither in Economics, nor Political Science, nor Law, is this rule following individual the central focus of attention. There is, instead, something peculiarly socialistic in its conception: Sociology! Let us now sit back and imagine ourselves all as boatman-peddlers on the Dal Lake. For those who haven't seen Srinagar, let me explain: as you idly sip kahwa on your house-boat deck, boatman after boatman pulls along selling goods as diverse as flowers and perfumes, leatherware and cookies. (I bought some charas, but that's another story!) This natural social order is present as much on the Dal Lake as anywhere else in the country, where the people follow unwritten rules of just conduct during their market exchanges. If all of society was composed of such people, if such a way of life was the universal ethic and the highest moral code, then humankind would have reached its zenith and perfection, and government would be unnecessary. Some impartial judges, some learned lawyers – and that would be all. If this is an impossible ideal, so be it: but the true social scientist must visualise it, and direct all moral and intellectual faculties towards its attainment. Let us now turn our attention to the government. All the false social scientists who apply polylogic call upon this government to solve all the ills they believe society is possessed of. If people are poor, the government is to act. If people are unemployed, or sick, or whatever, call in the government. They all see the very same society – all of us in our individual boats on the Dal Lake – as full of imperfections, and they see the government as composed of perfectionists. But who are the individuals in the government? They are ministers, bureaucrats, policemen, generals, diplomats etc. How do they survive? They all survive because government tax collectors extort money from us. There are, thus, on our idyllic Dal Lake, many armed pirates who are snatching away at our honest gains. That is the government. The true Political Science, the highest principles of Jurisprudence, and the noblest ideals of Democracy concern themselves principally with the limits to this coercion, and the only just purposes for which it can be used. Those who have never considered these limits have created a Frankenstein. Mary Shelley's monster was created by science; ours is a creature of a very false social science. This is the 'predatory state' and its predations are proved by the sorry fact that we get precious little in exchange for all the taxes we cough up. This government is not the solution; this government is the real problem. Our blindness to our predicament is compounded by the fact that our science of society has been unable to distinguish clearly between a business organisation powered by the profit motive and a political organisation powered by the 'vote motive'. We know what drives businessmen, but we are blind to what motives drive the processes of politics, into which the bureaucracy is hopelessly enmeshed. What are the motives that make people form these political groups? Our children are taught that it is selfless service, but even they do not believe this humbug any more. The situation is grimmer because the government is their teacher. But, as Dylan sang, ''There must be some way outta here,'' and I'm looking for it.
Monday, August 13, 2007
GOA MUST SECEDE
GOA MUST SECEDE
SAUVIK CHAKRAVERTI
I hang around in Goa these days, drinking feni every evening. At just 50 bucks a bottle. You cannot get feni in Delhi. There is no trade between Goa and Delhi, where the retail trade of alcoholic beverages is a state monopoly-cum-monopsony: the most kleptocratic official policy ever invented. Sonia Gandhi just came to Goa, and inaugurated an IT something-or-the-other. But Goan feni she did not buy. What is the point of this "Union of India"? Reminds me of that line from Morrison: "Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mine". Goa must therefore secede. The question to ask then is: What do we do after that?
Goa is a tourist paradise, so "foreign exchange" is abundant, though the quality of this money is suspect, as I have pointed out in many of my writings. Tourism is the biggest industry in the world. Why do tourists come to Goa? The answer: Mainly to smoke good, cheap cannabis. I have proposed to some friends that we set up a company called The Honourable Bhola Unlimited Company Ltd. to manufacture and sell Bhola Spliffs: Ganesh ka Baap ka bidi. Also on the compnay's product list will be Bhola Cola: a bhang ki thandai whose recipe will be a company secret. Subscriptions to this company will only be accepted in gold. All this gold will be deposited in the The Honourable Bhola Unlimited Bank Ltd., which will keep a 100 per cent reserve and issue notes against it, which Goans can use: Sound Money.
If The Honourable Bhola Unlimited Company Ltd. and The Honourable Bhola Unlimited Bank Ltd. act like the Honourable East India Company, then these companies can take over the administration and expend some of their profits, which will surely be considerable, on "public goods" like roads – far wider than the " Goa constrictors" of today. I live in south Goa, and getting to north Goa is impossible. If these honourable companies invest in roads, courts and policing, and perform the latter two jobs well, the good people of Goa will welcome anarcho-capitalism and anarcho-capitalist government. There need not be any taxation.
Such a regime will also have to seek international recognition, for which purpose I have proposed that one diplomat be sent to King Hassan of Morocco, carrying gifts of feni, Bhola Spliffs and Bhola Cola, and pure gold to trade for King Hassan Hashish. This will enable The Honourable Bhola Unlimited Company to manufacture King Hassan Spliffs, which will also be hugely popular among the tourists here. The song: Marrakesh Express! "All on board that train!"
SAUVIK CHAKRAVERTI
I hang around in Goa these days, drinking feni every evening. At just 50 bucks a bottle. You cannot get feni in Delhi. There is no trade between Goa and Delhi, where the retail trade of alcoholic beverages is a state monopoly-cum-monopsony: the most kleptocratic official policy ever invented. Sonia Gandhi just came to Goa, and inaugurated an IT something-or-the-other. But Goan feni she did not buy. What is the point of this "Union of India"? Reminds me of that line from Morrison: "Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mine". Goa must therefore secede. The question to ask then is: What do we do after that?
Goa is a tourist paradise, so "foreign exchange" is abundant, though the quality of this money is suspect, as I have pointed out in many of my writings. Tourism is the biggest industry in the world. Why do tourists come to Goa? The answer: Mainly to smoke good, cheap cannabis. I have proposed to some friends that we set up a company called The Honourable Bhola Unlimited Company Ltd. to manufacture and sell Bhola Spliffs: Ganesh ka Baap ka bidi. Also on the compnay's product list will be Bhola Cola: a bhang ki thandai whose recipe will be a company secret. Subscriptions to this company will only be accepted in gold. All this gold will be deposited in the The Honourable Bhola Unlimited Bank Ltd., which will keep a 100 per cent reserve and issue notes against it, which Goans can use: Sound Money.
If The Honourable Bhola Unlimited Company Ltd. and The Honourable Bhola Unlimited Bank Ltd. act like the Honourable East India Company, then these companies can take over the administration and expend some of their profits, which will surely be considerable, on "public goods" like roads – far wider than the " Goa constrictors" of today. I live in south Goa, and getting to north Goa is impossible. If these honourable companies invest in roads, courts and policing, and perform the latter two jobs well, the good people of Goa will welcome anarcho-capitalism and anarcho-capitalist government. There need not be any taxation.
Such a regime will also have to seek international recognition, for which purpose I have proposed that one diplomat be sent to King Hassan of Morocco, carrying gifts of feni, Bhola Spliffs and Bhola Cola, and pure gold to trade for King Hassan Hashish. This will enable The Honourable Bhola Unlimited Company to manufacture King Hassan Spliffs, which will also be hugely popular among the tourists here. The song: Marrakesh Express! "All on board that train!"
Thursday, August 9, 2007
The New Bully: Ministers flexing muscle
The government seems to be in Big Brother mode, seeking to intervene in a range of issues from underwear ads to smoking in the workplace.
Seetha reports
The drawing room door in sociologist Dipankar Gupta's Delhi home bears a sticker: thank you for not smoking. But Gupta gets ballistic when one mentions health and family welfare minister Anbumani Ramadoss' latest salvo in his anti-smoking war - banning smoking at the workplace. Homes are workplaces of servants, so this may mean no smoking at home. "This is my home. I don't tell others to do the same in their homes," exclaims Gupta.
Ramadoss' crusade against smoking is matched only by his drive against fast foods and soft drinks. In May, acting on a missive from the human resource development ministry (prompted by a letter from Ramadoss), the University Grants Commission wrote to all universities asking them to withdraw these "health hazards" from college canteens.
If Ramadoss is trying to dictate what people should eat and drink, information and broadcasting minister Priya Ranjan Das Munshi is deciding what they should see on television. Some 10 days ago, the information and broadcasting ministry told television channels to stop airing two underwear advertisements, after they had been cleared by the Consumer Complaints Council of the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI).
Such intervention is happening throughout the government. When cement prices surged in 2006, first industry minister Kamal Nath and later finance minister P. Chidambaram summoned cement companies and asked them to reduce prices. "We went armed with facts and figures that showed there was little we could do, but no one was prepared to listen," complains an industry representative. Finally the industry agreed to keep prices unchanged, though some companies later increased them. Similar pressure was put on steel producers, who raised prices in March and later agreed to a smaller hike.
Ramadoss' proposed compulsory registration of pregnancies to check female foeticide and monitor expectant mothers' health is perhaps the most intrusive of policies. "It is a violation of a woman's privacy," explodes Ranjana Kumari, of the Delhi-based Centre for Social Research. Women who may want to hide their pregnancy will not be able to do so. "How can," she asks, "someone else decide on whether or not a woman should abort her child?" The answer to forced female foeticide, she says, is breaking the doctors-politician-bureaucrat nexus that keeps sex selection clinics in business. And there are enough mechanisms to monitor pregnant women's health. "If these are not working, address that. Why interfere in my personal decisions?"
so has the state become an overenthusiastic nanny? "A nanny state is caring, looks after you. This is a bully state, which says I know what is good for you and will make you behave," retorts Gupta. "This behaviour," says Shiv Sena MP Suresh Prabhu, who was power minister in the NDA government, "is out of sync with the Indian reality. After 15 years of economic independence people want to decide their own lives."
"Yes, we are coming across as an interventionist government," a senior Congress leader admits.
Minister of state in the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) Prithviraj Chavan says defensively, "Many of these issues are on the borderline between public and private arenas." If junk food and smoking are causing serious health problems, should the health minister not be concerned? After all, other countries discourage smoking through high taxation, among other things.
The information and broadcasting ministry feels its action against the ads and AXN and FTV earlier this year fall in this grey area. "We are not acting on whims and fancies but on specific complaints," says an official. Adds he: "Can the government watch silently if objectionable content is aired just because it has been cleared by an industry body? The government has to protect children from offensive visuals."
So why is government meddling on the upswing? "The Congress always had a controlling psyche. It is now being reinforced by the presence of the Left," says economist Bibek Debroy, who sees a throwback to the Indira Gandhi era of controls.
But state intervention in the economy during the 1970s was a carefully thought out strategy to punish industrialists who supported the Congress old guard when the party split and to create a class of entrepreneurs loyal to Mrs Gandhi. "Now there seems to be no pattern," laments a secretary to the government. "There is no one who is countering this. There are no signs from the PMO," notes Debroy.
Instead, the Prime Minister's now famous remarks lamenting high CEO salaries are being seen as encouraging intervention. "He may not have meant it, but it brought back memories of the time the Companies Act regulated corporate salaries," says Prabhu, "and it gave the impression that the signals are coming from the top."
The congress leader, however, blames the individual quirks of ministers and their desire to earn brownie points by grandstanding on prices, indulging in moral policing or pampering their vote banks. "Unfortunately," he laments, "in a coalition government there is a limit to whom the Prime Minister can tick off." In other words, ministers tend to act independently, without bothering about the Prime Minister.
But it's not about this government alone. In any country with a small middle class, notes Gupta, the elite tends to assume it knows best and must take decisions for the masses.
Politicians, laments Prabhu, believe that they know the pulse of the people better than the rest of society. Politicians also want to control people's minds, one reason why no government has ever attempted to reduce control of education or of the electronic media.
So should governments then step back completely? "It is the government's job to keep certain things in place," says Gupta. "But regulation has to be transparent and respect individual rights." Agrees a senior minister, "Till we have some well thought out regulatory systems in place we will have to tolerate some idiosyncrasies."
The Telegraph,
Sunday, 5 August 2007
http://telegraphindia.com/1070805/asp/7days/story_8151197.asp
Seetha reports
The drawing room door in sociologist Dipankar Gupta's Delhi home bears a sticker: thank you for not smoking. But Gupta gets ballistic when one mentions health and family welfare minister Anbumani Ramadoss' latest salvo in his anti-smoking war - banning smoking at the workplace. Homes are workplaces of servants, so this may mean no smoking at home. "This is my home. I don't tell others to do the same in their homes," exclaims Gupta.
Ramadoss' crusade against smoking is matched only by his drive against fast foods and soft drinks. In May, acting on a missive from the human resource development ministry (prompted by a letter from Ramadoss), the University Grants Commission wrote to all universities asking them to withdraw these "health hazards" from college canteens.
If Ramadoss is trying to dictate what people should eat and drink, information and broadcasting minister Priya Ranjan Das Munshi is deciding what they should see on television. Some 10 days ago, the information and broadcasting ministry told television channels to stop airing two underwear advertisements, after they had been cleared by the Consumer Complaints Council of the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI).
Such intervention is happening throughout the government. When cement prices surged in 2006, first industry minister Kamal Nath and later finance minister P. Chidambaram summoned cement companies and asked them to reduce prices. "We went armed with facts and figures that showed there was little we could do, but no one was prepared to listen," complains an industry representative. Finally the industry agreed to keep prices unchanged, though some companies later increased them. Similar pressure was put on steel producers, who raised prices in March and later agreed to a smaller hike.
Ramadoss' proposed compulsory registration of pregnancies to check female foeticide and monitor expectant mothers' health is perhaps the most intrusive of policies. "It is a violation of a woman's privacy," explodes Ranjana Kumari, of the Delhi-based Centre for Social Research. Women who may want to hide their pregnancy will not be able to do so. "How can," she asks, "someone else decide on whether or not a woman should abort her child?" The answer to forced female foeticide, she says, is breaking the doctors-politician-bureaucrat nexus that keeps sex selection clinics in business. And there are enough mechanisms to monitor pregnant women's health. "If these are not working, address that. Why interfere in my personal decisions?"
so has the state become an overenthusiastic nanny? "A nanny state is caring, looks after you. This is a bully state, which says I know what is good for you and will make you behave," retorts Gupta. "This behaviour," says Shiv Sena MP Suresh Prabhu, who was power minister in the NDA government, "is out of sync with the Indian reality. After 15 years of economic independence people want to decide their own lives."
"Yes, we are coming across as an interventionist government," a senior Congress leader admits.
Minister of state in the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) Prithviraj Chavan says defensively, "Many of these issues are on the borderline between public and private arenas." If junk food and smoking are causing serious health problems, should the health minister not be concerned? After all, other countries discourage smoking through high taxation, among other things.
The information and broadcasting ministry feels its action against the ads and AXN and FTV earlier this year fall in this grey area. "We are not acting on whims and fancies but on specific complaints," says an official. Adds he: "Can the government watch silently if objectionable content is aired just because it has been cleared by an industry body? The government has to protect children from offensive visuals."
So why is government meddling on the upswing? "The Congress always had a controlling psyche. It is now being reinforced by the presence of the Left," says economist Bibek Debroy, who sees a throwback to the Indira Gandhi era of controls.
But state intervention in the economy during the 1970s was a carefully thought out strategy to punish industrialists who supported the Congress old guard when the party split and to create a class of entrepreneurs loyal to Mrs Gandhi. "Now there seems to be no pattern," laments a secretary to the government. "There is no one who is countering this. There are no signs from the PMO," notes Debroy.
Instead, the Prime Minister's now famous remarks lamenting high CEO salaries are being seen as encouraging intervention. "He may not have meant it, but it brought back memories of the time the Companies Act regulated corporate salaries," says Prabhu, "and it gave the impression that the signals are coming from the top."
The congress leader, however, blames the individual quirks of ministers and their desire to earn brownie points by grandstanding on prices, indulging in moral policing or pampering their vote banks. "Unfortunately," he laments, "in a coalition government there is a limit to whom the Prime Minister can tick off." In other words, ministers tend to act independently, without bothering about the Prime Minister.
But it's not about this government alone. In any country with a small middle class, notes Gupta, the elite tends to assume it knows best and must take decisions for the masses.
Politicians, laments Prabhu, believe that they know the pulse of the people better than the rest of society. Politicians also want to control people's minds, one reason why no government has ever attempted to reduce control of education or of the electronic media.
So should governments then step back completely? "It is the government's job to keep certain things in place," says Gupta. "But regulation has to be transparent and respect individual rights." Agrees a senior minister, "Till we have some well thought out regulatory systems in place we will have to tolerate some idiosyncrasies."
The Telegraph,
Sunday, 5 August 2007
http://telegraphindia.com/1070805/asp/7days/story_8151197.asp
Xenophobia, Kashmiri style!
BETWEEN THE LINES
Xenophobia, Kashmiri style!
By Arjimand Hussain Talib
It is a Catch 22 kind of situation hardly ever seen in Kashmir's chequered history. Even as both militant groups as well as Syed Ali Shah Geelani have toned down their call to migrant laborers to leave Kashmir, hundreds of laborers and small business holders, most of whom are from north and north-eastern India, are packing up their bags for home. To the outside world, Kashmir today represents an addition to the long list of nations and ethnic groups that have engulfed themselves in the fires of xenophobia. However, for a place like Kashmir, anything close to xenophobia, if not xenophobia per se, is a tragic irony in itself. For a tiny and powerless nation witnessing the worst kind of oppression and repression since ages now, the transformation of its image from the subjugated to the tyrant is cruelly unjust. Kashmiris have always been thought as the last ones to be chauvinists. But why are today flocks of migrant laborers being driven out from the Valley? How did a people who are celebrated and cherished throughout the world for their warmth and hospitality are today feeling insecure and reacting? If one were to remove one's jingoistic spectacles for a while we would see two simple but profound reasons. From a majority of 72.41 per cent in 1941 to 64.19 per cent of the total population as reported in 2001 census Muslims in Jammu & Kashmir are gripped by the constant fear of "demographic engineering" which might well reduce Muslims in Kashmir to a minority. The rate at which non-State subjects - Article 370 of the Indian Constitution notwithstanding - are able to get J&K's citizenship and have been able to dilute the original demographic medley here to the people of the State is alarming too. Although in theory Article 370 was supposed to be a guarantor of J&K's identity after its assimilation into the Indian Union, the ease with which non State-subjects can get land or other properties on a 90-year lease has also been a source of disquiet too. But why is the anger directed towards poor laborers who will neither get a Permanent Resident Certificate (PRC), nor buy land on lease or become part of demographic engineering? People today in Kashmir ask the question why did they come in such huge numbers in the first place? The answers lie much beyond where most of the people are looking for today. The answers lie between the lines of the larger context of Kashmir 's political economy. Let us call spade a spade.Since my childhood my father has told me interesting stories of Kashmir's former Prime Minister, G M Bakshi, who coincidentally was our close neighbor in our old family house in Srinagar's Chattabal area. What one understood from his stories and the history books is that after the imprisonment of Kashmir's popular leader - Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah - and the installation of Bakshi's puppet regime, the latter was given one single mandate: ingrain corruption into the blood veins of the Kashmiri people by first bribing them with government jobs and contracts, then dividing them and subsequently "winning over them." So once during an on-the-spot compensation drive to houses being dismantled during a road widening operation in Srinagar city, when a Kashmiri Pandit got lesser compensation and asked Bakshi Sahab why it was so when his Muslim neighbor got better compensation, Bakshi's reply is said to have been more than an expression of his humorous wit, "Listen my dear! You are already an Indian. Your this neighbor demands Pakistan and my task is to make him an Indian. That is the reason he gets more." More than four decades down the line, the same blood having been injected into Kashmiri veins is running in the veins of another generation of Kashmiris even today. What one could understand from history books, those were the times when the policy makers on Kashmir would find Kautilya's Arthshastras very handy in creating situation of "stability" here. Apart from subsidies, the ruling political class was mandated to assimilate dissenting and the discontented voices into government services. That is what has actually happened. Living with a government job became the sole objective of an ordinary Kashmiri's life in both urban as well as rural areas. In the process all creative thinking and private enterprise was destroyed. A culture of mediocrity and workless ness took deep roots. Whenever some critical and creative thinking tried to take shape, the conditions so created in the whole political economy made them end up in the government system with a premature death note. In nutshell, it was a political economy which was designed to kill creative private enterprise and breed dependency. That is what explains why lakhs of skilled and unskilled laborers have flooded Kashmir as our own people wait for a government job until death and do not work. That is the reason that despite injecting this kind of government spending, Kashmir ends up back injecting more than double of the financial resources into the Indian economic system in the form of imports than what it gets in the form of so-called subsidies and liberal financial assistance. In economics, it is said that when a society's living standards reach a certain degree of prosperity it sheds low income yielding jobs, explained by a backward slope curve. Is Kashmir on that curve now? The vacuum created by the Kashmiris in the low-end odd-job segments was just all natural to be filled in by migrant laborers, because a vast majority of our educated and low educated segment was waiting for government jobs. Kashmir has a vibrant construction business. Did we have enough people to do the jobs there? Is the migrant inflow driven by demand or it is the supply which is driving the demand? When Europe was in the midst of an economic boom after its industrial revolution, it opened the flood gates for immigrants - a huge chunk of whom were Muslims - to fill in the low-end jobs. Then it was mostly about having cheap labor, sparing the Europeans from doing the kind of low-end jobs which they abhorred. Several historians have written that then the Europeans - who were historically and culturally very conscious of their racial distinctiveness - would hardly bother about who and where the immigrants belonged to. Then it was hardly a concern that the immigrants were coming into Europe with a big cultural baggage and belief systems, which finally went to alter Europe's cultural and religious mosaic to a good extent. Many radical European parties and ideologues - like the British Nationalist Party (BNP) in Britain - today deplore the open-gate policy to the non-European immigrants. These immigrants - mostly Muslims and South Asians - are today a significant racial and religious grouping in Europe. But no matter what, the cultural costs, the economic imperatives in all countries and the inevitable realities of globalisation make almost all societies accept immigrants today. Although countries like Australia have taken very radical positions on immigration now, on occasions even letting ship loads of immigrants and refugees vanish in the seas, the fact is that legal immigration to Australia is a reality today. The gruesome rape and murder of a 14-year old girl in north Kashmir in July precipitated the call for all migrant laborers to leave Kashmir. This has come after years of simmering discontent with the migrant laborers bringing in crime, diseases and moral practices which are seen not in conformity with Kashmiri culture and values. Yet, the compelling need of migrant laborers has been making the Kashmiris bear them out in spite of the simmering anger. There is no doubt that migrant laborers have brought in many social ills to Kashmir which were not part of Kashmiri traditional social set up. There is also no doubt that both society and local administration needs to check the criminal activities of migrant laborers. But in economic and moral terms, can we afford to lose them going back for good? What would happen to thousands of Kashmiris living in India and other parts of the world if they were to be sent back home on similar grounds? From barbers to brick kiln workers, from laborers on paddy fields of Kashmir's countryside to the workers building border roads in Kashmir, migrant laborers are there everywhere. Jingoistic bravado apart, what would happen if overnight we would have no workers to work in low-end jobs? Do we have enough work-force to fill in the demand? What would happen to the construction activity? The fact is that there is a profound economic dimension to the presence of the huge number of the migrant laborers in Kashmir. The major reason being that they are coming here because there is a huge demand for them. Despite a raging conflict, what attracts them are higher wages, good working conditions, friendly employers and pleasant weather here. There is another simple economic explanation to this: it is the demand which has been driving the supply of laborers to Kashmir and not the vice versa. What an outright outflow of migrant laborers would do is make Kashmiris as oppressors in the eyes of the world, no matter the subjugation they are going through themselves. Political and social awakening is required to address greater ills: ethnic and demographic engineering, lease out of land for 90 years and other macro issues. These poor laborers are not going to get Permanent Resident Certificates of our State. Let us do not lose sight of the manner we Kashmiris are projected today. Beyond the misleading news coverage of India's national media on Kashmir there are a million stories of our hospitality and peaceful co-existence which have remained shrouded somewhere. For instance, there are nearly 3000 non-Kashmiri students - mostly females - getting their education training in dozens of education training colleges in Kashmir. They are here since years, even in the midst of the conflict. Srinagar's National Institute of Technology (NIT) has a students union whose head is a non-local and two-thirds of its body is comprised of non-locals. Dozens of roads of border areas, being maintained by the Border Roads Organisation (BRO), are constructed and maintained by non-Kashmiris. The multi-billion rupees fruit trade of Kashmir is done through non-locals who visit the nook and corner of Kashmir in search of contracts. All of India's major private companies, mainly telecom giants like Airtel and Aircel have non-Kashmiris at their helm. Almost all central government undertakings, including public telecom company, BSNL and railway construction company - IRCON - in Kashmir are run by non-locals, who are living side by side with their local hosts peacefully. Almost all our sweet shops are run by non-locals. The goal gappas are a reality in Kashmir because of these migrants. The kiosks selling variety of roadside snacks from baked pulses to samosas are all run by non locals. To send all of these back would be a blot on our rich traditions of hospitality, tolerance and peaceful existence. Kashmiris would do better by not letting their enemies paint a greater demon out of them. We live in an intense world of inter-dependence and let us continue to create examples of peaceful co-existence and tolerance. But the response to Census reports surely need people put their heads together. *(The columnist can be e-mailed at arjimand@gmail.com).--
Arjimand Hussain Talib
Project ManagerKashmir Region
Action Aid International (India)
Xenophobia, Kashmiri style!
By Arjimand Hussain Talib
It is a Catch 22 kind of situation hardly ever seen in Kashmir's chequered history. Even as both militant groups as well as Syed Ali Shah Geelani have toned down their call to migrant laborers to leave Kashmir, hundreds of laborers and small business holders, most of whom are from north and north-eastern India, are packing up their bags for home. To the outside world, Kashmir today represents an addition to the long list of nations and ethnic groups that have engulfed themselves in the fires of xenophobia. However, for a place like Kashmir, anything close to xenophobia, if not xenophobia per se, is a tragic irony in itself. For a tiny and powerless nation witnessing the worst kind of oppression and repression since ages now, the transformation of its image from the subjugated to the tyrant is cruelly unjust. Kashmiris have always been thought as the last ones to be chauvinists. But why are today flocks of migrant laborers being driven out from the Valley? How did a people who are celebrated and cherished throughout the world for their warmth and hospitality are today feeling insecure and reacting? If one were to remove one's jingoistic spectacles for a while we would see two simple but profound reasons. From a majority of 72.41 per cent in 1941 to 64.19 per cent of the total population as reported in 2001 census Muslims in Jammu & Kashmir are gripped by the constant fear of "demographic engineering" which might well reduce Muslims in Kashmir to a minority. The rate at which non-State subjects - Article 370 of the Indian Constitution notwithstanding - are able to get J&K's citizenship and have been able to dilute the original demographic medley here to the people of the State is alarming too. Although in theory Article 370 was supposed to be a guarantor of J&K's identity after its assimilation into the Indian Union, the ease with which non State-subjects can get land or other properties on a 90-year lease has also been a source of disquiet too. But why is the anger directed towards poor laborers who will neither get a Permanent Resident Certificate (PRC), nor buy land on lease or become part of demographic engineering? People today in Kashmir ask the question why did they come in such huge numbers in the first place? The answers lie much beyond where most of the people are looking for today. The answers lie between the lines of the larger context of Kashmir 's political economy. Let us call spade a spade.Since my childhood my father has told me interesting stories of Kashmir's former Prime Minister, G M Bakshi, who coincidentally was our close neighbor in our old family house in Srinagar's Chattabal area. What one understood from his stories and the history books is that after the imprisonment of Kashmir's popular leader - Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah - and the installation of Bakshi's puppet regime, the latter was given one single mandate: ingrain corruption into the blood veins of the Kashmiri people by first bribing them with government jobs and contracts, then dividing them and subsequently "winning over them." So once during an on-the-spot compensation drive to houses being dismantled during a road widening operation in Srinagar city, when a Kashmiri Pandit got lesser compensation and asked Bakshi Sahab why it was so when his Muslim neighbor got better compensation, Bakshi's reply is said to have been more than an expression of his humorous wit, "Listen my dear! You are already an Indian. Your this neighbor demands Pakistan and my task is to make him an Indian. That is the reason he gets more." More than four decades down the line, the same blood having been injected into Kashmiri veins is running in the veins of another generation of Kashmiris even today. What one could understand from history books, those were the times when the policy makers on Kashmir would find Kautilya's Arthshastras very handy in creating situation of "stability" here. Apart from subsidies, the ruling political class was mandated to assimilate dissenting and the discontented voices into government services. That is what has actually happened. Living with a government job became the sole objective of an ordinary Kashmiri's life in both urban as well as rural areas. In the process all creative thinking and private enterprise was destroyed. A culture of mediocrity and workless ness took deep roots. Whenever some critical and creative thinking tried to take shape, the conditions so created in the whole political economy made them end up in the government system with a premature death note. In nutshell, it was a political economy which was designed to kill creative private enterprise and breed dependency. That is what explains why lakhs of skilled and unskilled laborers have flooded Kashmir as our own people wait for a government job until death and do not work. That is the reason that despite injecting this kind of government spending, Kashmir ends up back injecting more than double of the financial resources into the Indian economic system in the form of imports than what it gets in the form of so-called subsidies and liberal financial assistance. In economics, it is said that when a society's living standards reach a certain degree of prosperity it sheds low income yielding jobs, explained by a backward slope curve. Is Kashmir on that curve now? The vacuum created by the Kashmiris in the low-end odd-job segments was just all natural to be filled in by migrant laborers, because a vast majority of our educated and low educated segment was waiting for government jobs. Kashmir has a vibrant construction business. Did we have enough people to do the jobs there? Is the migrant inflow driven by demand or it is the supply which is driving the demand? When Europe was in the midst of an economic boom after its industrial revolution, it opened the flood gates for immigrants - a huge chunk of whom were Muslims - to fill in the low-end jobs. Then it was mostly about having cheap labor, sparing the Europeans from doing the kind of low-end jobs which they abhorred. Several historians have written that then the Europeans - who were historically and culturally very conscious of their racial distinctiveness - would hardly bother about who and where the immigrants belonged to. Then it was hardly a concern that the immigrants were coming into Europe with a big cultural baggage and belief systems, which finally went to alter Europe's cultural and religious mosaic to a good extent. Many radical European parties and ideologues - like the British Nationalist Party (BNP) in Britain - today deplore the open-gate policy to the non-European immigrants. These immigrants - mostly Muslims and South Asians - are today a significant racial and religious grouping in Europe. But no matter what, the cultural costs, the economic imperatives in all countries and the inevitable realities of globalisation make almost all societies accept immigrants today. Although countries like Australia have taken very radical positions on immigration now, on occasions even letting ship loads of immigrants and refugees vanish in the seas, the fact is that legal immigration to Australia is a reality today. The gruesome rape and murder of a 14-year old girl in north Kashmir in July precipitated the call for all migrant laborers to leave Kashmir. This has come after years of simmering discontent with the migrant laborers bringing in crime, diseases and moral practices which are seen not in conformity with Kashmiri culture and values. Yet, the compelling need of migrant laborers has been making the Kashmiris bear them out in spite of the simmering anger. There is no doubt that migrant laborers have brought in many social ills to Kashmir which were not part of Kashmiri traditional social set up. There is also no doubt that both society and local administration needs to check the criminal activities of migrant laborers. But in economic and moral terms, can we afford to lose them going back for good? What would happen to thousands of Kashmiris living in India and other parts of the world if they were to be sent back home on similar grounds? From barbers to brick kiln workers, from laborers on paddy fields of Kashmir's countryside to the workers building border roads in Kashmir, migrant laborers are there everywhere. Jingoistic bravado apart, what would happen if overnight we would have no workers to work in low-end jobs? Do we have enough work-force to fill in the demand? What would happen to the construction activity? The fact is that there is a profound economic dimension to the presence of the huge number of the migrant laborers in Kashmir. The major reason being that they are coming here because there is a huge demand for them. Despite a raging conflict, what attracts them are higher wages, good working conditions, friendly employers and pleasant weather here. There is another simple economic explanation to this: it is the demand which has been driving the supply of laborers to Kashmir and not the vice versa. What an outright outflow of migrant laborers would do is make Kashmiris as oppressors in the eyes of the world, no matter the subjugation they are going through themselves. Political and social awakening is required to address greater ills: ethnic and demographic engineering, lease out of land for 90 years and other macro issues. These poor laborers are not going to get Permanent Resident Certificates of our State. Let us do not lose sight of the manner we Kashmiris are projected today. Beyond the misleading news coverage of India's national media on Kashmir there are a million stories of our hospitality and peaceful co-existence which have remained shrouded somewhere. For instance, there are nearly 3000 non-Kashmiri students - mostly females - getting their education training in dozens of education training colleges in Kashmir. They are here since years, even in the midst of the conflict. Srinagar's National Institute of Technology (NIT) has a students union whose head is a non-local and two-thirds of its body is comprised of non-locals. Dozens of roads of border areas, being maintained by the Border Roads Organisation (BRO), are constructed and maintained by non-Kashmiris. The multi-billion rupees fruit trade of Kashmir is done through non-locals who visit the nook and corner of Kashmir in search of contracts. All of India's major private companies, mainly telecom giants like Airtel and Aircel have non-Kashmiris at their helm. Almost all central government undertakings, including public telecom company, BSNL and railway construction company - IRCON - in Kashmir are run by non-locals, who are living side by side with their local hosts peacefully. Almost all our sweet shops are run by non-locals. The goal gappas are a reality in Kashmir because of these migrants. The kiosks selling variety of roadside snacks from baked pulses to samosas are all run by non locals. To send all of these back would be a blot on our rich traditions of hospitality, tolerance and peaceful existence. Kashmiris would do better by not letting their enemies paint a greater demon out of them. We live in an intense world of inter-dependence and let us continue to create examples of peaceful co-existence and tolerance. But the response to Census reports surely need people put their heads together. *(The columnist can be e-mailed at arjimand@gmail.com).--
Arjimand Hussain Talib
Project ManagerKashmir Region
Action Aid International (India)
Monday, August 6, 2007
The reality of right to information
The reality of right to information
NAVAZ KOTWAL
A revelatory session with the officers who are supposed to implement the Right to Information Act.
Photo: The Hindu Photo Library The need to know: The “Information board” at a Panchayat office.
“Madam, yeh jo Nagrik hein na woh sabse bada nuisance hein kyunki woh sarkar ko apna kaam nahin karne deta hein.” This is the considered opinion of my trainee public information officer at the village lev el. He’s had to sit through a whole day listening to me going on about the importance of the new Right to Information Act, open government, fullest disclosure, reducing corruption, helping the poor and he is sure the heat’s gone to my head. But now enough is enough. He thinks I am naïve and wants to set me straight. Damn the citizen. He doesn’t care just as long as they don’t come asking things.Nothing has changed
It’s been more than 20 months since the “legendary” law was passed. Governance is supposed to change. But the oxygen of democracy hasn’t woken up the lower officialdom. Mai baap is still comatose. Government swears they have all been to training. I am just giving them a bit more — it’s all in the name of the people’s government. But the 50-odd — and believe me they are odd — officials are not about to give up their so long held ignorance without a strong fight.
The first hour tells me they know nothing about the Act. They don’t know what information can be given; they don’t know what should be withheld; they have little ideas about fees, rules, applications, formats, timelines or penalties. The second hour tells me that all they want to know is how not to give information, what information cannot be given and can information be denied to some people. They are not even willing to consider providing the information that is supposed to be published by government departments all over the country by law.Government property
They honestly believe that all information belongs to the government and should be held closely by its guardians. They can’t imagine how citizens are entitled to it. I explain: They are public servants. They collect information only for public purposes — not for their own purposes. Information is collected, organised, collated, and stored with public money, which also pays for their salaries. I repeat, you are public servants. The public is the owner of the information. The idea is radical. But it sinks like a stone. They stare back at me. I may have logic. They have power. They are unconvinced.
They try another tack — the well-trodden path of all public servants from judge to police to collector to mamlatdar. “We are overburdened. We have a hundred things to do. Now this additional burden of providing information. Government is busy making laws — implementation falls upon us. Our service conditions are bad, we have no infrastructure, no facilities, one order from our senior and leave all other work and attend to him. And now an information request comes in and we have to start fulfilling the request.”
They viewed the Act with deep suspicion and requesters of information with even more fear and loathing. Villagers, they explained to me patiently, are not all that innocent. Twenty years’ experience convinces that in fact they were downright wicked. It’s the baddies who come around asking awkward questions. The good ones beg humbly and get it from them anyways. The others only ask so they can sell the information and they were damned if they were going to be trained into helping aam nagriks (ordinary people) make money at their expense. Of course the fact that they made money on nearly every small transaction like providing a villager a free below-poverty-line application form was passed off lightly as a perk of a dull job and tedious existence. I point out that I myself, madam from the city, have asked for information: about birth certificates, about ration cards, about public works in my neighbourhood. I tell them about one incident.
It took me a dozen visits to the office before I could actually give in my application. Either the officer was not there, or his clerk was away or there was no electricity. Finally when I got the power in the chair, his duty was clear: “Madam,” he said, “a successful officer is one who never says no and never does anything”. That way he never gets into trouble. Madam duniya aasha pe jeeti hein. You also keep the faith. You may just get the information one day.” With a little bribe of course I could always get the information. But if it was the kind of information that would show up malpractices then it was never going to be given. At my story’s end there was no comment. Perhaps my audience was pondering the wisdom of the Successful Officer or filing him away as a model for future use. Duty-bound to disclose
The afternoon was wearing on. I was getting impatient with the stone-walling and excuses. Did they know they had a duty to disclose, I asked. Did they know about Section IV and proactive disclosure: that is information which departments must make available even without any request? Information about a department’s organisation, functions and duties, the power and duties of its officers with their remunerations, the procedure followed in the decision making process, channels of supervision and accountability, the norms set by it for the discharge of its functions, the rules, regulations, instructions, manuals and records, held by it or under its control or used by its employees for discharging its functions and a statement of the categories of documents that are held by it or under its control was to be prepared and made available and accessible to all by October12, 2005. Every department was given 120 days to get this information ready.
Did they know I asked? Clearly they did not. Well, I said slowly. Did they know that they could be hauled up before the state information commissioner and may personally have to pay a fine that can go from Rs. 250 to Rs. 25,000. There was a slow stirring. This was information to be absorbed. The sudden angst in those sluggish eyes, I have to say, gave me a moment’s pleasure. But then I thought, how could it be different. Old habits
Here, sitting before me was 4,000 years of certainty that power belongs to rulers. Their entire training only reinforced their position as legitimate power holders. It taught them to differentiate between “us” and “them” and carry that mindset through decades in service. Even now no one in authority was telling them any different and here I was asserting my right to question their behaviour. It was pure effrontery. But, like it or not, the law is the law. It is here to stay. Disobey at your peril. I thought I had made a difference. But then on second thoughts I was quite sure that I had not.
Navaz Kotwal is Programme Coordinator, Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative.
NAVAZ KOTWAL
A revelatory session with the officers who are supposed to implement the Right to Information Act.
Photo: The Hindu Photo Library The need to know: The “Information board” at a Panchayat office.
“Madam, yeh jo Nagrik hein na woh sabse bada nuisance hein kyunki woh sarkar ko apna kaam nahin karne deta hein.” This is the considered opinion of my trainee public information officer at the village lev el. He’s had to sit through a whole day listening to me going on about the importance of the new Right to Information Act, open government, fullest disclosure, reducing corruption, helping the poor and he is sure the heat’s gone to my head. But now enough is enough. He thinks I am naïve and wants to set me straight. Damn the citizen. He doesn’t care just as long as they don’t come asking things.Nothing has changed
It’s been more than 20 months since the “legendary” law was passed. Governance is supposed to change. But the oxygen of democracy hasn’t woken up the lower officialdom. Mai baap is still comatose. Government swears they have all been to training. I am just giving them a bit more — it’s all in the name of the people’s government. But the 50-odd — and believe me they are odd — officials are not about to give up their so long held ignorance without a strong fight.
The first hour tells me they know nothing about the Act. They don’t know what information can be given; they don’t know what should be withheld; they have little ideas about fees, rules, applications, formats, timelines or penalties. The second hour tells me that all they want to know is how not to give information, what information cannot be given and can information be denied to some people. They are not even willing to consider providing the information that is supposed to be published by government departments all over the country by law.Government property
They honestly believe that all information belongs to the government and should be held closely by its guardians. They can’t imagine how citizens are entitled to it. I explain: They are public servants. They collect information only for public purposes — not for their own purposes. Information is collected, organised, collated, and stored with public money, which also pays for their salaries. I repeat, you are public servants. The public is the owner of the information. The idea is radical. But it sinks like a stone. They stare back at me. I may have logic. They have power. They are unconvinced.
They try another tack — the well-trodden path of all public servants from judge to police to collector to mamlatdar. “We are overburdened. We have a hundred things to do. Now this additional burden of providing information. Government is busy making laws — implementation falls upon us. Our service conditions are bad, we have no infrastructure, no facilities, one order from our senior and leave all other work and attend to him. And now an information request comes in and we have to start fulfilling the request.”
They viewed the Act with deep suspicion and requesters of information with even more fear and loathing. Villagers, they explained to me patiently, are not all that innocent. Twenty years’ experience convinces that in fact they were downright wicked. It’s the baddies who come around asking awkward questions. The good ones beg humbly and get it from them anyways. The others only ask so they can sell the information and they were damned if they were going to be trained into helping aam nagriks (ordinary people) make money at their expense. Of course the fact that they made money on nearly every small transaction like providing a villager a free below-poverty-line application form was passed off lightly as a perk of a dull job and tedious existence. I point out that I myself, madam from the city, have asked for information: about birth certificates, about ration cards, about public works in my neighbourhood. I tell them about one incident.
It took me a dozen visits to the office before I could actually give in my application. Either the officer was not there, or his clerk was away or there was no electricity. Finally when I got the power in the chair, his duty was clear: “Madam,” he said, “a successful officer is one who never says no and never does anything”. That way he never gets into trouble. Madam duniya aasha pe jeeti hein. You also keep the faith. You may just get the information one day.” With a little bribe of course I could always get the information. But if it was the kind of information that would show up malpractices then it was never going to be given. At my story’s end there was no comment. Perhaps my audience was pondering the wisdom of the Successful Officer or filing him away as a model for future use. Duty-bound to disclose
The afternoon was wearing on. I was getting impatient with the stone-walling and excuses. Did they know they had a duty to disclose, I asked. Did they know about Section IV and proactive disclosure: that is information which departments must make available even without any request? Information about a department’s organisation, functions and duties, the power and duties of its officers with their remunerations, the procedure followed in the decision making process, channels of supervision and accountability, the norms set by it for the discharge of its functions, the rules, regulations, instructions, manuals and records, held by it or under its control or used by its employees for discharging its functions and a statement of the categories of documents that are held by it or under its control was to be prepared and made available and accessible to all by October12, 2005. Every department was given 120 days to get this information ready.
Did they know I asked? Clearly they did not. Well, I said slowly. Did they know that they could be hauled up before the state information commissioner and may personally have to pay a fine that can go from Rs. 250 to Rs. 25,000. There was a slow stirring. This was information to be absorbed. The sudden angst in those sluggish eyes, I have to say, gave me a moment’s pleasure. But then I thought, how could it be different. Old habits
Here, sitting before me was 4,000 years of certainty that power belongs to rulers. Their entire training only reinforced their position as legitimate power holders. It taught them to differentiate between “us” and “them” and carry that mindset through decades in service. Even now no one in authority was telling them any different and here I was asserting my right to question their behaviour. It was pure effrontery. But, like it or not, the law is the law. It is here to stay. Disobey at your peril. I thought I had made a difference. But then on second thoughts I was quite sure that I had not.
Navaz Kotwal is Programme Coordinator, Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative.
Saturday, August 4, 2007
Article by Sauvik Chakraverti
THE CROP
SAUVIK CHAKRAVERTI
June 26 was World Drugs Day. I found out from a government advert. So I did my patriotic bit and smoked a mighty spliff, or three. Since tax money is spent persecuting "drug traffickers", I also decided to give succour to my friendly drug trafficker and stock up. But the traffic was horrible! It took two hours to cover the 20 km between me and my crony. I concluded that this must be the strategy of our keystoned kops: to cause such enormous traffic jams that, why drug traffic, all traffic would come to a standstill! Very clever. Quite like a navy blocking all the sea routes of the merchant marine. Our economists think alike.
My drug trafficker hails from the Kumaon: tiger country. Throughout their long history, the Kumaonis have been growing quality charas and smoking it. That is why Jim Corbett had to go there to shoot the Kumaoni-eating tigers – because the Kumaonis were too stoned to be anything but easy meat! Which brings me to the idea being floated by my other crony, Barun Mitra, that tigers should be farmed. The Chinese are doing it. Imagine the stink! No Kumaoni I know is interested in this kinky "animal husbandry". They are all terrified of tigers and get bad vibes from them. But they love the holy smoke, and the good vibes it delivers. So do I – and there are millions like me, and growing. Now, look at the money we pay for the smoke – much more per ounce than first flush Darjeeling – and you will realize that the commercial farming and free sale of cannabis is what every right-minded citizen should support. Many "farmer leaders" in Indian politics wail about the plight of cotton or onion farmers – but no one sheds a tear for the ganja and charas farmers, whose fields must always be inaccessible and remote, away from spying eyes, who have neither irrigation nor fertilizers, nor scientific agronomic techniques, and who make a pittance from the sale of their extremely valuable crops, prized by connoisseurs the world over. If the bureau behind the offending advert was sacked, it is these farmers who would gain the most. So let the Chinese farm tigers if they will. In India let us immediately convert "the weed" into "The Crop"! And Boom Shankar 2u2!
SAUVIK CHAKRAVERTI
June 26 was World Drugs Day. I found out from a government advert. So I did my patriotic bit and smoked a mighty spliff, or three. Since tax money is spent persecuting "drug traffickers", I also decided to give succour to my friendly drug trafficker and stock up. But the traffic was horrible! It took two hours to cover the 20 km between me and my crony. I concluded that this must be the strategy of our keystoned kops: to cause such enormous traffic jams that, why drug traffic, all traffic would come to a standstill! Very clever. Quite like a navy blocking all the sea routes of the merchant marine. Our economists think alike.
My drug trafficker hails from the Kumaon: tiger country. Throughout their long history, the Kumaonis have been growing quality charas and smoking it. That is why Jim Corbett had to go there to shoot the Kumaoni-eating tigers – because the Kumaonis were too stoned to be anything but easy meat! Which brings me to the idea being floated by my other crony, Barun Mitra, that tigers should be farmed. The Chinese are doing it. Imagine the stink! No Kumaoni I know is interested in this kinky "animal husbandry". They are all terrified of tigers and get bad vibes from them. But they love the holy smoke, and the good vibes it delivers. So do I – and there are millions like me, and growing. Now, look at the money we pay for the smoke – much more per ounce than first flush Darjeeling – and you will realize that the commercial farming and free sale of cannabis is what every right-minded citizen should support. Many "farmer leaders" in Indian politics wail about the plight of cotton or onion farmers – but no one sheds a tear for the ganja and charas farmers, whose fields must always be inaccessible and remote, away from spying eyes, who have neither irrigation nor fertilizers, nor scientific agronomic techniques, and who make a pittance from the sale of their extremely valuable crops, prized by connoisseurs the world over. If the bureau behind the offending advert was sacked, it is these farmers who would gain the most. So let the Chinese farm tigers if they will. In India let us immediately convert "the weed" into "The Crop"! And Boom Shankar 2u2!
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Liberal politics in India
No liberal political party?
The legitimacy of capitalism is unlikely to be accepted by the general electorate unless corruption is restricted, writes Niranjan Rajadhyaksha in the Mint, on 11 July 2007.
Why doesn’t India have a liberal, free-market political party?
The lack of such a party is a paradox, since India has seen the benefits of an open economy since 1991. So there should ideally be politicians out there who are keen to embrace the twin goals of an open economy and an open society—and reap electoral dividends. Yet, the political rhetoric we keep hearing is uncomfortably statist.
Over the past few weeks, several commentators and letter writers have discussed this issue in this newspaper. S.V. Raju, for example, has been fighting a long battle in the courts because the current law stipulates that every political party in India needs to swear allegiance to socialism. This he refuses to do—and hence cannot get the Swatantra Party, the lone voice against Nehruvian socialism in the 1960s, registered in our democratic republic.
But I think the issue is far deeper than such absurd legal requirements. It is rooted in social attitudes towards capitalism: The fault lies not in our politicians but in ourselves. The problem is endemic in many other parts of the poor world. This is perhaps why hardly any developing country has an overtly pro-capitalism party, and also why economic reforms have often been introduced by stealth rather than through open debate in most of these countries, including India. (Some even argue, perversely I feel, that the military dictatorships in Latin America in the 1960s and the 1970s were essential because the democratic debate there was too left-wing for its own good.)
Getting to the root of these problems is essential if India has to build a new variant of the Swatantra Party— one that openly supports markets and globalization. A new academic paper, Why Doesn’t Capitalism Flow to Poor Countries, by Rafael Di Tella of Harvard Business School and Robert MacCulloch of Princeton University, offers an interesting explanation for the lack of pro-capitalist parties in countries such as ours. The two researchers say that the most important issue is corruption. It reduces the “moral legitimacy of business”. Citizens come to believe that success depends on luck or corruption, rather than on hard work and enterprise. Hence, there is always likely to be support for high taxes and regulation, even though these will harm long-term economic growth. “Existence of corrupt entrepreneurs hurts good entrepreneurs by reducing the general appeal of capitalism,” say Di Tella and MacCulloch.
Please read the complete article here.
The legitimacy of capitalism is unlikely to be accepted by the general electorate unless corruption is restricted, writes Niranjan Rajadhyaksha in the Mint, on 11 July 2007.
Why doesn’t India have a liberal, free-market political party?
The lack of such a party is a paradox, since India has seen the benefits of an open economy since 1991. So there should ideally be politicians out there who are keen to embrace the twin goals of an open economy and an open society—and reap electoral dividends. Yet, the political rhetoric we keep hearing is uncomfortably statist.
Over the past few weeks, several commentators and letter writers have discussed this issue in this newspaper. S.V. Raju, for example, has been fighting a long battle in the courts because the current law stipulates that every political party in India needs to swear allegiance to socialism. This he refuses to do—and hence cannot get the Swatantra Party, the lone voice against Nehruvian socialism in the 1960s, registered in our democratic republic.
But I think the issue is far deeper than such absurd legal requirements. It is rooted in social attitudes towards capitalism: The fault lies not in our politicians but in ourselves. The problem is endemic in many other parts of the poor world. This is perhaps why hardly any developing country has an overtly pro-capitalism party, and also why economic reforms have often been introduced by stealth rather than through open debate in most of these countries, including India. (Some even argue, perversely I feel, that the military dictatorships in Latin America in the 1960s and the 1970s were essential because the democratic debate there was too left-wing for its own good.)
Getting to the root of these problems is essential if India has to build a new variant of the Swatantra Party— one that openly supports markets and globalization. A new academic paper, Why Doesn’t Capitalism Flow to Poor Countries, by Rafael Di Tella of Harvard Business School and Robert MacCulloch of Princeton University, offers an interesting explanation for the lack of pro-capitalist parties in countries such as ours. The two researchers say that the most important issue is corruption. It reduces the “moral legitimacy of business”. Citizens come to believe that success depends on luck or corruption, rather than on hard work and enterprise. Hence, there is always likely to be support for high taxes and regulation, even though these will harm long-term economic growth. “Existence of corrupt entrepreneurs hurts good entrepreneurs by reducing the general appeal of capitalism,” say Di Tella and MacCulloch.
Please read the complete article here.
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Swatantra Party
Two articles in two days take a look at the Swatantra Party in the context of India today.
Andy Mukherjee writes in the Bloomberg news (28 June 2007) that India's Markets Need to Hear From Conservatives: The Swatantra Party
"The Indian middle class has over the past 15 years benefited greatly from economic freedoms grudgingly granted to it by the same politicians and bureaucrats who had for four decades run a ``license-permit raj'' under the garb of socialism. "It was only when the controlled system collapsed in a balance-of-payments crisis in 1990 that economic planners realized their mistakes and sought to correct them. Yet, the embrace of free markets is a reluctant one in India, as is evident in the ruling Congress Party's ambivalence about, among other things, selling government stakes in business enterprises."... ...
"It was only when the controlled system collapsed in a balance-of-payments crisis in 1990 that economic planners realized their mistakes and sought to correct them. Yet, the embrace of free markets is a reluctant one in India, as is evident in the ruling Congress Party's ambivalence about, among other things, selling government stakes in business enterprises... ...
"Without job creation, economic inequality is bound to rise in a country where half the people can't read or write and even more haven't been taught the skills needed for participation in the rapidly growing modern economy.
That, in turn, is fertile ground for left-wing extremism, which is already recognized by the government as probably the largest security threat facing the country today. ``It will require a traumatic shock to move the Generation Next,'' S V Raju says.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&sid=aDNHH6F8.fOk&refer=home
In the second article, Ashish Sharma and Pragya Singh analyses why "Everyone’s a socialist in one of the world’s fastest growing economies" in the Mint (26 June 2007) . The 1989 amendment to the Representation of the People Act says only political parties that swear their ideological allegiance to secularism, democracy and socialism can be registered. S.V. Raju has been waiting since 1994 for the Bombay high court to hear his case. He approached the court after failed efforts to convince the Election Commission of India to register his party, the Swatantra Party.Raju says that his friend and fellow litigant L.R. Sampat died without the case coming up. “I sometimes joke that the courts are now waiting for me to go,” Raju says.
Ravi Shankar Prasad, a national spokesperson of the BJP, says the Constitution of India has left socialism open to interpretation. “Historically, from Stalin and Pol Pot to Gandhi, socialism has embraced an array of approaches. To us, socialism means equity above all else. While the Congress debates how to distribute the bread, we want to increase the quantity of bread available for distribution,” he says...
Subhash C. Kashyap, an expert on the Constitution and a former secretary general of the Lok Sabha, says: “By no stretch of imagination or any dictionary definition can the policies of the present government, for instance, be called socialist.” The legal requirement to attest to socialism, he adds, is “fraud” and “poppycock”...
“We are hypocritical,” says Suresh Prabhu, a member of Parliament who belongs to the right-wing Shiv Sena party. “What we say we do not mean and what we want to say we never ever truly do. This is best manifested in our swearing by socialism,” he adds...
Historian Ramachandra Guha says this could be because with millions of poor in the country, no party wants to be identified as pro-rich...
Please read the complete article here.
Andy Mukherjee writes in the Bloomberg news (28 June 2007) that India's Markets Need to Hear From Conservatives: The Swatantra Party
"The Indian middle class has over the past 15 years benefited greatly from economic freedoms grudgingly granted to it by the same politicians and bureaucrats who had for four decades run a ``license-permit raj'' under the garb of socialism. "It was only when the controlled system collapsed in a balance-of-payments crisis in 1990 that economic planners realized their mistakes and sought to correct them. Yet, the embrace of free markets is a reluctant one in India, as is evident in the ruling Congress Party's ambivalence about, among other things, selling government stakes in business enterprises."... ...
"It was only when the controlled system collapsed in a balance-of-payments crisis in 1990 that economic planners realized their mistakes and sought to correct them. Yet, the embrace of free markets is a reluctant one in India, as is evident in the ruling Congress Party's ambivalence about, among other things, selling government stakes in business enterprises... ...
"Without job creation, economic inequality is bound to rise in a country where half the people can't read or write and even more haven't been taught the skills needed for participation in the rapidly growing modern economy.
That, in turn, is fertile ground for left-wing extremism, which is already recognized by the government as probably the largest security threat facing the country today. ``It will require a traumatic shock to move the Generation Next,'' S V Raju says.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&sid=aDNHH6F8.fOk&refer=home
In the second article, Ashish Sharma and Pragya Singh analyses why "Everyone’s a socialist in one of the world’s fastest growing economies" in the Mint (26 June 2007) . The 1989 amendment to the Representation of the People Act says only political parties that swear their ideological allegiance to secularism, democracy and socialism can be registered. S.V. Raju has been waiting since 1994 for the Bombay high court to hear his case. He approached the court after failed efforts to convince the Election Commission of India to register his party, the Swatantra Party.Raju says that his friend and fellow litigant L.R. Sampat died without the case coming up. “I sometimes joke that the courts are now waiting for me to go,” Raju says.
Ravi Shankar Prasad, a national spokesperson of the BJP, says the Constitution of India has left socialism open to interpretation. “Historically, from Stalin and Pol Pot to Gandhi, socialism has embraced an array of approaches. To us, socialism means equity above all else. While the Congress debates how to distribute the bread, we want to increase the quantity of bread available for distribution,” he says...
Subhash C. Kashyap, an expert on the Constitution and a former secretary general of the Lok Sabha, says: “By no stretch of imagination or any dictionary definition can the policies of the present government, for instance, be called socialist.” The legal requirement to attest to socialism, he adds, is “fraud” and “poppycock”...
“We are hypocritical,” says Suresh Prabhu, a member of Parliament who belongs to the right-wing Shiv Sena party. “What we say we do not mean and what we want to say we never ever truly do. This is best manifested in our swearing by socialism,” he adds...
Historian Ramachandra Guha says this could be because with millions of poor in the country, no party wants to be identified as pro-rich...
Please read the complete article here.
A liberal complaint
The threat to liberalism comes mostly from Indian liberals. They want a big government that constantly interferes with personal freedom. It puts barriers in the way of private enterprise, not realizing that people enrich themselves by trading with each other, and not by depending on charity. Their commitment to freedom is incomplete—they defended the free speech of M.F. Husain or Chandramohan against those Hindutva fanatics, but not of the Danish cartoonists or the publisher who was jailed for publishing a Sikh jokebook. They are driven by politics, not principle, writes Amit Varma in the Mint (28 June 2007) "A liberal complaint"
URL: http://www.livemint.com/2007/06/28000419/A-liberal-complaint.html
URL: http://www.livemint.com/2007/06/28000419/A-liberal-complaint.html
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Welcome to the world of Indian Liberals
Dear IFAN Members and Fnst,
I welcome all of you to join this blog. At the outset I must congratulate Barun and Seetha for creating this blog.
The very basic idea of creating this blog is that we all can learn and share our ideas,work and activities. Also this is a market place for our activities.
Since Indian FNST Alumni Network is being setup with a vision to ''achieve a liberal society'', we all have to work hard to bring our dream into reality. Our members from different parts of India are working hard in their projects and creating a light for others in the process of liberalism. I congratulate all of them. Simultaniously I welcome all our members to continously stay in touch and post your comments, your work, experience, achievements and even small activities which you have undertaken.
This network will surely bring lots of hopes and will provide an opprotunity to learn from each others work. We will appreciate your comments, ideas and thought about our group. Keep in touch and infrom all of us about the happeings.
With warm regards,
Ashraf Ahmed Shaikh
National Coordiantor,
Indian Fnst Alumni Network - IFAN
I welcome all of you to join this blog. At the outset I must congratulate Barun and Seetha for creating this blog.
The very basic idea of creating this blog is that we all can learn and share our ideas,work and activities. Also this is a market place for our activities.
Since Indian FNST Alumni Network is being setup with a vision to ''achieve a liberal society'', we all have to work hard to bring our dream into reality. Our members from different parts of India are working hard in their projects and creating a light for others in the process of liberalism. I congratulate all of them. Simultaniously I welcome all our members to continously stay in touch and post your comments, your work, experience, achievements and even small activities which you have undertaken.
This network will surely bring lots of hopes and will provide an opprotunity to learn from each others work. We will appreciate your comments, ideas and thought about our group. Keep in touch and infrom all of us about the happeings.
With warm regards,
Ashraf Ahmed Shaikh
National Coordiantor,
Indian Fnst Alumni Network - IFAN
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Welcome to the IFAN blog
Dear IFAN members,
This is my first attempt to set up a blog for our members. This could be adapted and modified, as the blog becomes a more effective medium for communication between the members. For some time we felt that a blog might be more effective means of communication than a email list. So I hope you will use it to share information, ideas, and help nurture this liberal network in India.
Please feel free to post your comments, and provide links to your blogs and websites.
Please allow me to take the first shot at information sharing. We have created a new web site www.InDefenceofLiberty.org This is a kind a web based liberal newspaper and media clippings that seek to promote liberal values and ideas in India, and across Asia. You could become a partner, and publish your own articles and recommend relevant articles. It has a user friendly CMS to help the partners publish their articles. The articles can be classified in major sections as per their subject. And there is a keyword feature that allows the articles to be searched more easily.
The difference between this web site, and this blog is that the web site has a more formal structure, and the published material are more or less stand alone articles. This blog I presume will be more informal in character, with network members being able to quickly know about others, and jot down their grief comments in the process of a dialogue.
That is all for now. Let me see how this comes out on the blog.
To liberalism,
Barun Mitra
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