As the five phase election makes its way across India, there is an overwhelming sense of the unreal as we watch satellite television and print media drone on about hackneyed, meaningless issues. The dominant issues in political discourse have never been so out of touch with the people as this time. From what we get to read and hear and see from India, you would get the sense General Election 2009 is happening in South Africa and the Indian Premier League is being played in India. The Indian Premier League now fully occupies one half of the entire media coverage, with the General Elections, the Global Recession (and perhaps the recovery) and the Indian obsession with H1-B visas crammed into the other.
Mercifully, democracy gives us a way out: there is nothing to worry about as long as people are in touch with the issues that affect their lives and their future. On a personal note, the Oracle must add that given the fact that India does not allow non residents to vote, my future is now fully in the hands of my fellow citizens.
So, what are the big issues, the big challenges? Despite being no fan of the UPA government, I believe that the Central Government has done a fairly good job of holding on, consolidating and building upon the achievements of the previous NDA government and has added several new dimensions to India's rise on its own. The one blessing that India enjoys, despite the fractious state of the ruling coalition and all possible future coalitions, is that all sides agree on the issue of further economic reform and growth. Even the Left Front eschews the old socialist model in states where it enjoys power; while all its pretensions at the Centre merely reflect the fact that the Polituburo is run by a bunch of self styled "leaders" with zero mass appeal.
This brings us to challenge no.1. Although there are several candidates for this, I daresay that the biggest challenge of all is to maintain the soaring mood of the Indian people that has been built up over the last ten years. The worldwide depression and the economic slowdown in India has certainly lowered the prestige of capitalism and free market as the model of growth and in India, as well as across the world, the cynical losers have come out of the woodwork. They are all upon us now, with the "I told you so" rubbish. These scoffers are bitter losers and they do not understand how capitalism works. When the wheels are turning fast and returns are high, the economy always manages to reward a few more people than actually deserve success. Every now and then, the wheels stop, the dirt is scraped off and the engine presses on. Any system of growth and change, left to itself, inevitably takes on a Darwinian character. Challenge No. 1 is to make sure Indians do not fall prey to the propaganda of prophets of doom. Rather, Indians need to see the Economic Recession as a time of power shifts, a time rife with opportunities for historically disadvantaged nations such as ours to change the prevailing hierarchies.
The second challenge, of course, is that of national security. This is not just about Islamic terrorism. India faces several other internal security threats and the ruling UPA Government has a negative score on this count. Time and again, the Prime Minister has promised to deal effectively with the Naxal violence in the interior and each time, we the people have been let down by his government. Desperate measures, such as Salwa Judum in Chhattisgarh, the appointement of "Special" police officers (SPOs) taken at the state level have received little Central support. Add to that a disgusting media industry that spends all its time condemning the Salwa Judum and other heavy handed anti-Naxal measures. As a result, the Government at the Centre receives a blanket waiver for inaction when it comes to national security issues.
And terrorism... more terrorism... more demands from Islam ... and more terrorism. In this case, the terrorists have friends and supporters right within the ruling establishment. Railway Minister Laloo Yadav proudly parades his Osama bin Laden lookalike, who does photo-ops and signs autographs for cheering supporters. Laloo's alliance partner Paswan ran a whole election campaign with a single point agenda: a Muslim Chief Minister for Bihar. Mulayam Singh Yadav, another man who plays the role of both ruling party and opposition, has unabashedly come out in favour of the banned terror outfit SIMI. The Prime Minister has openly expressed his personal view that Muslims should enjoy first rights to India's resources. Anti-terror legislation POTA has been struck off the statute book and special pensions and allowances have been announced for the families of terrorists killed in Kashmir. The Central anti-terror agency was never created and it now takes the National Security Guard 10 hours to make it from Delhi to Mumbai, i.e the sixth busiest route in the world (to be fair, the Government has now moved to give itself rights to take charge of any commercial flight for emergency purposes and will duly compensate the airline). The cacophony is building up to a fever pitch. India's cup of woes is full. Afzal guru is probably drinking to that....
Through all this, the media has been hot on the trail of "Hindu terrorists" and Loch Ness monsters. Witch hunts have taken place; sting operations have been carried out on people such as Madhu Srivastava to uncover hidden hands behind the Gujarat riots. The latest Hindu terrorist to fall into the trap is Varun Gandhi who was promptly arrested under the National Security Act. The Oracle urges all Indians to avidly look for Hindu terrorists in their midst and anyone who is even vaguely suspect should be dragged to the town square and stoned to death immediately. To be doubly certain, friends and family of the suspected person should also be stoned to death "just in case", except when those family members happen to be part of the Gandhi dynasty!
(Note: The call to violence in the preceding paragraph is meant in a purely sarcastic and figurative manner and is not intended to incite actual physical violence.)
The third great challenge is that of Indian voters demanding far more from their government than they get. Generally speaking, this is about infrastructure. The Government has done precious little to improve infrastructure in the last five years. The NDA government's ambitious road building project has been all but stopped right in its tracks and the mega plan to connect India's rivers has met the same fate. Twenty four hour electric supply is far too distant a dream in all states other than Gujarat. Admittedly, there are some difficult problems here. There are concerns over displacement of people, there are environmental concerns and budget problems. And there is also the question of how much responsibility the Government should assume in such matters. Certain attempts at privatisation have turned out to be nightmares, such as the disastrous venture with the Delhi Electricity board. As such, Challenge No. 3 is for the government to coax the Indian people and Indian enterprise, long used to going to the authorities for everything, into start looking for solutions on their own. Indian people have to snap out of the coma of the erstwhile socialist years. This is a challenge not exactly limited to the election, but what kind of government people elect will have a bearing upon how fast this process is. A system that adjusts to mediocrity instead of stigmatizing it is dangerous for our country.
Thus have we outlined the three major challenges facing India. Each of these is, in some sense, a "meta-challenge", i.e. a challenge that involves thinking the right way rather than doing, thus encompassing a whole genre of challenges. In the next part, we shall deliberate on whether the Indian voter is being fully perceptive to the challenge.
No comments:
Post a Comment