P A G E
Saturday, December 11, 1999
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E D I T O R I A L P A G E |
Saturday, December 11, 1999 |
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A
setback to reforms
JUDICIAL
ACCOUNTABILITY |
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Govt’s
bad housekeeping
More
culture vultures than culture
Indian
Observer Service
December 11,
1924 |
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A setback to reforms IN what reads like a stinging rebuke of proverbial bureaucratic and judicial delays, US energy company Cogentrix has pulled out of the Mangalore power project. The thermal power plant may yet come up since the Hong Kong-based China Light and Power International (CLP) will stay on and perhaps the Government of Karnataka will fill the breach. Yet the angry walkout by Cogentrix is a severe setback to the Centre’s hopes of attracting massive foreign investment in the power sector. Any chance of faster industrial development hinges on ready availability of electricity and as it is, the peak hour shortage is as high as 13 per cent and is going up. The Central Government is putting up a brave face, saying philosophically that development goes on and other promoters will come. To justify this bravado, it trots out statistics. Projects to generate 6000 MW are coming up and plans for another 27,000 MW are “in the pipeline”. All very comforting but the point is until Thursday Cogentrix was a committed partner in power generation but now it seems to have just vanished. The US firm is particularly peeved at long delays at three points. The Ministry of Environment took a full year to conditionally clear the project in 1996. The Power Ministry is yet to offer counter-guarantee without which the company cannot raise loans. The signing was originally fixed for December, 1997. The Supreme Court completed hearing on a case of a suspected kickback of Rs 100 crore in January this year but has not delivered the judgement. Cogentrix has pointed to these delays to complain that the seven-year-old project has become unviable and it does not want to sink more money in it beyond the nearly $ 100 million it has already spent. The Union Power Ministry
is clueless on many key questions. There is much bombast
from the Cabinet Minister but little constructive action.
The forced purchase of the NHPC (National Hydel Power
Corporation) by the big sister NTPC (Thermal Corporation)
is only a minor irritant. He incessantly talks of
privatisation as a quick fix but has not even started
developing initial ideas. A day before Cogentrix issued
its quit notice, the Minister told Parliament that the
energy sector needed a capital outlay of Rs 11,00,000
crore and that the ninth Plan had set apart only
one-tenth of it. Except for threatening state electricity
boards with massive power cuts and ridiculing them for
chronic losses, he has done little by way of pushing
through reforms. This thinking has percolated to the
officialdom. Senior officers are busy reassuring
reporters that Cogentrix will stay put as it does not
have an option. They advance three arguments. One, the
Supreme Court has indicated to its lawyer, Mr Fali
Nariman, that the verdict will be out in a few days. Once
this last obstacle is cleared, it will have to go ahead
if only to avoid litigation from share-holders back home.
Two, it will not lose money since the agreement with the
state government is on a cost plus profit basis. Three,
with the CLP deciding to continue with the Mangalore
project and increasing its stake from the present 40 per
cent and US firm General Electric showing interest in
investing in it, the temptation to press on with the
“win-win” plant will be irresistible. Implied
in this thinking is over-confidence in the country’s
choice as the first destination of investment in power
generation. The Ministry should take one hard look at the
experience of Pakistan, once the preferred country of
independent power producers and today the country from
where everyone wants to migrate. |
On expected lines IF the headlines about the expulsion of Mr Kalyan Singh from the Bharatiya Janata Party are not quite as screaming as his curriculum vitae ordained, it is only because there was an inevitability about the action. Of late, Mr Kalyan Singh had not only crossed the “Lakshman rekha” but had strayed so far out of it that it would have required more courage for the party leadership to let him continue than to throw him out. His brand of politics would have been admirable if he had conducted himself with dignity and decorum. But by his brash conduct, he had already annoyed far too many people not only in the BJP but also in other parties and even among the masses. His fulminations against Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee were nothing more than the shouts of a desperate, angry man. In the end, such tactics prove to be counter-productive. The opening of too many fronts does no credit to his political sagacity. Perhaps he had too high a notion about his own standing in politics. There is no denying that he was important for the BJP. Ever since the controversy started, the former Chief Minister has focussed on the role he played in the growth of the BJP in the state. But he would never admit that he was instrumental also in its decline in recent years. His abrasive style and various scandals were not a figment of the imagination of his detractors, although there may have been some exaggeration here and there. Nor was his governance anything to boast of, and that is just a polite way of saying that it was uninspiring. At one stage, he stated everyone believed that the abandoning of the Ram Mandir card led to the decline of the saffron party in the crucial State. Now he himself has discarded the Ayodhya issue. Perhaps, this is a tactical move. Equally significant is his severing of the links with the RSS. Apparently, he is keeping his options wide open. It is probably a matter of time before he joins hands with leaders like Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav to the chagrin of the BJP leaders. The political situation
in the caste-infected atmosphere is so precarious that a
player like Mr Kalyan Singh can occasionally tilt the
balance one way or the other in the days to come. As
such, the expelled leader may enjoy a lot of nuisance
value. But if he nurtures the dreams of becoming a king
or even a powerful kingmaker, he is having too rosy a
notion. His problem is that he wants to play the Mandal
and Kamandal cards simultaneously and that might limit
his acceptability. But to his “credit”, he has
already done tremendous damage to the BJP. Its image of
being a disciplined party has been eroded and the failure
to replace him with an eye-catching person as Chief
Minister has also come in for uncharitable reference.
Expelling him may not mark the beginning of the end of
the BJP (that is one of the quotable one-liners which
drop from the mouth of Mr Kalyan Singh at a fantastic
speed these days) but the whole episode has surely dented
the party armour badly. Perhaps he can draw vicarious
pleasure from that “achievement”. Be that as it
may, UP politics is in for yet another exciting phase. |
For comprehensive peace IT seems before Mr Bill Clinton completes his second term as US President, he is determined to accomplish the task of bringing about comprehensive peace in the volatile West Asian region. He had undertaken the highly tricky project with the signing of the Oslo accord in 1993. Today he should be in great hurry as he has very little time left. Circumstances appear to favour him. While things are moving on expected lines on the Israeli-Palestinian front — of course, with hiccups — there are feelers from the Syrian President, Mr Hafez al-Assad, that he wishes to clinch a quick deal with Israel on the two issues that have turned them into enemies: the Golan Heights and Lebanon.The USA has seized the opportunity and the Secretary of State, Ms Madeleine Albright, is already on the job. If America succeeds in even bringing about the softening of attitudes between the two major adversaries in West Asia, it will be an achievement of sorts. They had been engaged in talks nearly four years ago, making use of the new climate created by the Oslo peace process, but the parleys got suspended as neither side could make compromises to let the dialogue continue. This provides fresh proof of how much hatred the Israelis and the Syrians have for each other. After going through Ms Albright’s statement made in Jerusalem on Wednesday one can guess that she is confident of persuading Prime Minister Yehud Barak and President Assad to resume the stalled talks. But there are, perhaps, some roadblocks to be crossed. Since the delicate nature of the matter demands the maintenance of utmost secrecy, she has not disclosed the details of what transpired between her and the two West Asian leaders when she met them in Damascus and Jerusalem. But her use of the expression “good progress” makes one believe that her latest tour of the region is not going to be as fruitless as it appeared in the beginning. In any case, Ms
Albright’s preference would be to first ensure the
implementation of the Wye river accord between the
Israelis and the Palestinians as soon as possible. She
has to prepare the ground by mid-February for an overall
agreement between the two sides and that is why she
issued a veiled warning to the Barak government
immediately after landing in Riyadh, the Saudi Arabian
capital, that the continuing settlement activity in the
West Bank area was a “complicating factor”,
which could spoil the favourable atmosphere for
negotiations. Her spokesman, Mr James Rubin, dealt with
the Palestinian side in the same manner by declaring that
“we do not think the Palestinian side should impose
any preconditions on specific issues”. The American
worry was the result of the exchange of hot words between
Israel and the Palestinians over the issue of Israeli
pullback from the West Bank, where Jewish settlement
activity got intensified after the installation of the
Barak government, contrary to the expectations. Prime
Minister Barak’s latest assurance to halt the
settlement programme till February has not satisfied the
Palestinians, who describe it as “vague” and
“insufficient”. However, the settlement issue
is unlikely to engage much attention after Mr
Barak’s declaration. Ms Albright has to deal with
certain other problems also like the Palestinian demand
for making East Jerusalem as the capital of their
homeland, demarcation of the final borders, apportioning
of water resources and deciding the fate of refugees. All
these can be successfully tackled in course of time. Yet
one cannot be sure of comprehensive peace so long as the
Golan Heights and Lebanese knots are not untied. If
President Clinton wants to ensure for himself a special
place in history, he must take the question of resolving
the Israeli-Syrian disputes with the seriousness it
deserves. |
JUDICIAL ACCOUNTABILITY CLEARLY a battle of nerves is going on between the executive and the judiciary. While the Prime Minister and the Law Minister have left the judiciary, and the country, in no doubt that they have every intention to introduce in Parliament a Bill on a National Judicial Commission, the Chief Justice of India, Dr A.S. Anand, has not only pleaded for a fair chance being given to the Supreme Court ruling, as modified by its opinion given on a presidential reference, but has followed it up by concretising a code of ethics for judges. It needs to be noted that one of the avowed purposes of the proposed National Judicial Commission is to give it the power to formulate a code of ethics for judges. By resurrecting the 1997 report of the J S Verma Committee, already adopted by a Full Court of the Supreme Court and by its belated adoption by the recent conference of the Chief Justices of the High Courts, a signal has been sent to the executive that the judiciary is capable of putting its own house in order. The timing of the leak of the deliberations of the High Court Chief Justices conference is as important as the decisions taken by it. One cannot ignore the fact that, all these years, the deliberations of such conferences have been kept a closely guarded secret. How come then that there are now deliberate leaks not only on the decisions taken by the conference, but also on the salient features of the speech delivered by the Chief Justice of India, Dr A S Anand? It is not clear from newspaper reports whether the “restatement of values of judicial life”, as adopted by Chief Justice of the High Courts, is a carbon copy of the Verma formulation, or it has been further improved upon, but the fact remains, that the Chief Justice of India has indicated that the “in-house procedure for the higher judiciary”, including those indicated in “restatement of values of judicial life” will be circulated to the High Court Chief Justices in order to ascertain the response of the judges, as well as their own. The High Court Chief Justices have decided on an “in-house procedure” which provide for remedial action against judges who by their acts of omission and commission do not follow the universally accepted values of judicial life. It needs to be noted that, while full details of the “restatement of values” have been made known to the Press, precious little has been disclosed about the “in house” procedures. Even the Government will be told about it only when the response of the Chief Justices and the judges are known. It is high time the judges of the higher judiciary realised that if justice is not a cloistered virtue, nor are the administrative decisions of the judges. If these are to be made available to the people, it should be done in an open and credible manner. For instance, the Registrar of the Supreme Court, or whoever functions as a rapporteur of the Chief Justices Conference should have publicly announced a gist of the conference proceedings and possibly answered legitimate question that flow from the decisions. Perhaps this is too radical a suggestion to be made to a conservative institution, but “judicial accountability”, in which the CJI firmly believes, implies full communication of decisions to the people. The procedure by which these decisions are taken may not be disclosed but there should be no secrecy about their contents. The contents of the restatement of values are not only unexceptional but laudable. The only wonder is that these had to be stated. For instance, it is not a done thing, in the Indian context, that a lawyer son, or daughter should live with parent judge or appear before him in cases. I have said in the Indian context, because I once asked a famous British constitutional expert what the practice in the UK was. He said there would be no objection whatever to a lawyer son appearing before a father judge and no finger pointed at. Nor would there be any serious objection to a judge attending a seminar funded by businessmen. The assumption in both cases is that the judge would show no favour to his progenies or businessmen. Which reminds me of an incident of which I have personal knowledge. The eminent lawyer, Mr P.R. Das, was a great party giver and a fine host. Wine simply flowed. On one occasion Chief Justice Harris attended the party. The next morning Mr Das had to appear in a case before the Chief Justice and he pleaded for time. The Chief Justice said “no” to the request and remarked that if Mr Das had kept late hours in the party so had he. And if he was present in court on the appointed time so could the distinguished lawyer. Mr Das had to hurry to the court. To return to the main point, even though belated the “restatement of values” is a welcome development. The only wonder is why it took the High Court Chief Justices full two years to actively consider it. An “in-house” procedure to deal with those who violate the code of ethics is desirable. But even the two combined do not obviate the need to form a National Judicial Commission in order to decide on higher judicial appointments and transfers. The reason is simple. While admittedly the judiciary has proved to be a more credible institution than the political executive and the legislatures, the appointment of the higher judiciary has always been a thorny problem, especially after Mrs Gandhi came to power. A lot has been said and written about how judges to the higher courts were appointed and whose nominees they were. In Mrs Gandhi’s time the new appointees were the nominees of the Law Minister of Mr Siddhartha Shankar Ray, and only for form’s sake, one or two of the Chief Justice of India. (See “we have a Republic, can we keep it?,” by Mr Justice J. Reddy”) The Supreme Court’s decision in the first judges case too has been dissected and the animosities between Mr Justice Bhagwati and Chief Justice Chandrachud noted. The surrender by the majority of the judges in the case to the political executive on the final right of appointment, though legally wrong, and subsequently overruled by a larger Bench of the Supreme Court itself, only gave vent to the pent-up feelings of the judges. Let me illustrate. I had written a series of articles criticising the judgement. The heading of one of the articles read: “People’s judges, My Lord”? The reference was to Mr Justice Venkatramiah’s assertion in the judgement, that only when judges were appointed by the people’s representatives could they be called people’s judges. Mr Justice Venkatramiah never forgot that heading. After retirement, he referred to my heading and observed: “If you do not want us to be people’s judges, do you want us to be Kaniah’s children (Mr Justice Kaniah was the first Chief Justice of India). He then went on to assert that he could prove with facts and figures how appointments initially were made to the Supreme Court in a manner that would rule out judges of certain geographical areas in the country ever acquiring the highest position. It is well known that Chief Justice Ahmedi took his own time in recommending the name of Mr Justice J.S. Verma, who in turn had to be asked by President Narayanan to name his successor. Chief Justice Punchhi behaved so arbitrarily that the President had to seek the Supreme Court’s advisory opinion on the grey areas in the second judges case. The point is that the second judges case did provide for a collegium. It simply did not work. After the presidential reference, there is a wider collegium, but by all accounts, even judges of the higher courts, especially those involved in transfers and promotions, are not happy about the manner in which the system is working. The only way out appears to be to have a National Judicial Commission. However, it must be ensured the remedy is not worse than the disease. The composition of the NJC must be decided carefully and after a full national debate. The government’s weakness in the formation of the NJC is that, in its last term, when the presidential reference was made, the Attorney-General assured the court that the Government was not seeking a review of the judgement, but only a clarification of certain points, and that the court’s opinion would be respected and implemented. With what face the same
government can go back on it now? I would not rule out
further litigation on the issue. |
Hydropower development plan-2012 TO meet the peak demand of 1,76,650 MW power by the end of the Eleventh Plan, the country needs capacity addition of about 86156 MW up to Eighth Plan as projected by the Central Electricity Authority. A 15-year period for such a quantum jump is unrealistic in view of the long gestation period for power projects, enormous investment cost (more than Rs 10,00,000 crore) and inadequate as well as insufficient transmission network besides other social and environmental constraints. About 58000 MW capacity addition is intended from unutilised hydropower potential to improve the dwindling hydro-thermal mix from the present 25:75 to 45:55 in future. A reliable backup to the thermal plants would be possible through development of hydropower with sufficient storage capacity in the dams in order to stave off lean season water shortage. At the time of Independence, the hydropower-installed capacity in the country was barely 560 MW and during 50 years it has increased to 21800 MW. Most of the projects undertaken during this period were better located and techno-economically more attractive implying that new options would pose bigger challenges. The Himalayan region, particularly northeastern part, and Himachal Pradesh with untapped potential of 32000 MW and 17000 MW, respectively, hold most of the promise for hydropower development in future. Hardly any financial institution or private investors have ventured into hydropower sector in the Northeast. Only NEEPCO and NHPC have been able to complete a few small projects of 355 MW capacity and the present hydropower installed capacity of the entire region, including state sector projects, is 592 MW. During the Ninth Plan, NEEPCO may be able to add another about 500 MW if all ongoing projects are completed on schedule. Neither NEEPCO nor NHPC have new major projects which could be completed in Tenth and Eleventh Plans. These public sector undertakings are not keen to investigate new projects themselves in remote and difficult localities and generally look for readymade project proposals. For want of a shelf of projects they are not in a position to seek and negotiate financial aid from other agencies and also do not have enough financial capacity of their own to implement such mega projects in the Northeast as may boost hydropower generation to a respectable level close to the envisaged targets. In view of endemic problem of flood, hydropower generation in the Northeast should essentially provide for adequate flood cushion in the storage reservoir for multiple benefits. However, an agreement between basin states on various inter-state major projects and also the insurgency problem in the region are going to make things difficult though not impossible. The status of hydropower development in Himachal Pradesh is comparatively better with the present installed capacity of 3700 MW and several new projects in the pipeline. The Nathpa-Jhakri 1500 MW run-off-the river project is recipient of institutional funding and despite local finance and vigilance related problems, slated for completion during Ninth Plan. The Chief Minister, Mr P.K. Dhumal, has already fixed two years’ deadline for commissioning the project. The HPSEB is implementing three small projects borrowing funds from Power Finance Corporation and banks etc. JP Industries has been given 300 MW Baspa stage II on BOOT basis and work already commenced. Seven more projects were identified in 1991-93 for implementation in similar way but are still languishing in procedural rut and the private entrepreneurs gradually losing interest in the proposals. Parvati hydropower project with the proposed capacity of 2051 MW has been given to NHPC for implementation. Work on the 800-MW Kol Dam and the 600-MW Rampur project is expected to commence in due course. Three mini hydropower schemes given on a turnkey basis and 319 more identified by HIMURJA have not been able to elicit good response for business with private investors. Some of these initiatives may help Himachal Pradesh to complete a few projects upto Eleventh Plan but by no stretch of imagination, the achievements in hydropower sector for the country as a whole can exceed one third of the over-ambitious targets. There is already a tussle between the NHPC and the NTPC; the latter intending to buy the former for Rs 4500 crore and as a rejoinder to it, the former offering about Rs 7700 crore to buy the latter. Who buys whom may not concern the common man but the process is further going to affect new projects and ultimately the achievements. It may be pertinent to state the capacity addition and further improvements in power sector require serious thinking and good deal of clarity at planning and implementation stages. Being highly capital intensive with investment spread over a long period, the tieups on new ventures should be such as could ensure long-term cash flow for steady progress of projects. A further review of existing concessions, incentives, procedures relating to exploitation of hydropower and assured sale of power at attractive rates may be necessary to kindle enthusiasm among prospective investors. They would also need hassle free, non-corrupt and committed officialdom devoid of traditional dominance by its ranks. Only then the country can be sure of marching ahead towards a better quality of life for the citizen in new millennium. (The author is a
retired Chairman, Brahmaputra Board). |
Indian
Observer Service WHAT brings three All India Service officers, serving in the far corners of the country, to a beautiful, but “god forsaken” forest rest house in Chikballapur? For the reason, the scene shifts to a mela in a five-star hotel in Delhi, where many such officers were waiting in queues, anxiously awaiting their destiny for the month of September. These were the members of the ‘Indian Observer Service’ drafted for the General Election, 1999. The atmosphere was as charged as at the time of our cadre/state allotment. There were smiles on the faces of those who had been allotted to the safe southern states and condolences on those who had to face the travails of Bihar or the border states. We left the hotel, some happy, some morose, clutching identical bags containing the guidelines issued by the Election Commission. The staff of the hotel was heard remarking that there must have been a major well-attended conference of medical representatives. So there we were in the same remote but picturesque boat. The weather was cool and we asked for tea. After enthusiastically nodding their heads, the staff disappeared. After half an hour, they reappeared with a tray of cups, which initially looked empty. When we looked deep into the cup, we found some dark brown liquid, which they called tea. There were only three sips of tea but our cups were whisked away while we had just taken two sips. We felt that it must be a measure to improve our health. After commiserating with each other and going through the election guidelines, we finally slept at midnight. We had been instructed to start at seven O’clock, but we were woken up much before this by the barking of dogs in the guest house, who did not like the idea of their abode being taken over by us. Having failed on the tea front, we asked for coffee in the morning. One of us wanted coffee without sugar to which the staff nodded knowingly. The cups came back with same amount of brown liquid escorted by the deputy Tehsildar, who asked which one of us wanted “less coffee”. We all said emphatically that we wanted more, not less. It took us some time to realise that “less coffee” is the terminology of sugarless coffee — a term which has now been added to our vocabulary, forever. During the visit, we had to handle a law and order incident at Bagepalli which in this part of the country is called “gullata”. During the on-the-spot enquiry we were impressed by the frankness of the people — but this was carried to the limit, when a person came before us, saluted and asked us to give him a copy of the report which we were sending to the Election Commission. We looked at him — then at each other — before he explained that he was collecting intelligence for his State Government. The second person who appeared before us was even more interesting. Having sat down before us, he announced that he was from the local press and wanted a briefing about the incident. We managed to complete the enquiry — in a mixture of English, Tamil, Hindi, Telugu and a bit of dance “mudras”. In between, our hectic schedule which required familiarising ourselves with the constituency by touring and interaction with all concerned, we had also managed some sightseeing. We visited Nandi hills, which was part of Chikballapur, a hill resort where we literally went for a ”walk in the clouds”. When we went round the place, we were shown the famous “Tipu drop”, a spot on the rock from which Tipu Sultan pushed down his enemies. To our utter surprise, the drop was designed not for one, but to dispose of three people at a time — coincidentally, the same as the number of observers in the parliamentary constituency. At this, one of us remarked that it may serve all the observers of country, except Bellary, which had five observers. We also went to Kolar, where we could see the last remnants of the British empire in India — an old country club with a fossilied caretaker, a golf course that was more brown than green and some quaint cottages with antique wooden furniture. The most visible reminder of the ‘Raj’ days was one of our tehsildar, who turned up for our meeting; wearing his old wedding suit and a tie — when outside temperature was 35°C. And whenever we had
doubts, we could always consult our “senior”
colleague in the Indian Observer Service in the adjoining
district, who had been an observer, nine times before.
The induction to this service is through the parliament
elections, assembly elections or even by-elections where
the observers are appointed. Now it has almost become an
annual feature. At present, we have two seniorities
attached to us — one is our — batch or year of
allotment and the other our seniority in Indian Observer
Service i.e. the number of elections conducted by us. |
Govt’s bad housekeeping
YOU cannot imagine what it felt like to be sitting at the World Economic Forum’s India Summit last week listening to the appalling state of our economy and finding out that our MPs were causing an uproar, yet again, about Ayodhya. I am not saying that Ayodhya should be forgotten but surely in a country where the fiscal deficit could go up to as much as 9% this year, we should have at least one parliamentary debate. The fact is that out internal debt now eats up about 50% of the total government revenues. This is seriously bad housekeeping. In a housewife’s terms what this means is that if she has Rs 50,000 to spend in a month, she spends Rs 25,000 on paying interest on loans that she may have taken. And then has to spend another Rs 15,000 on paying salaries and buying a month’s ration. She is then left with Rs 5,000 to spend on her children’s education and healthcare. You do not need me to tell you that there is something very wrong with the way she is handling her accounts. This is exactly what our government is doing on a much more serious scale. The worrying thing is that not only do our MPs seem unworried about this but so does the media. Newspaper headlines were full of the ‘uproar’ over Ayodhaya whereas the deliberations at the India Summit barely found mention in the press. Do we not deserve to be one of the poorest countries in the world? Every year, at the summit, the World Economic Forum’s Claude Smadja provides an overview of the Indian economy. Here are some of the facts he had to state this year. “At the Central Government level, four factors are creating a negative fiscal impact: the expenditures generated by the elections, the devastation created by the cyclone in Orissa, the war in Kashmir last summer and the increase in international oil prices. In fact, the target of a 4% fiscal deficit at the Central Government level is now completely out of reach. Expenditures for the first half of the fiscal year have been considerably higher than the same period last year, overshooting the Budget target, while the increase in revenues has been much slower. As a result, the deficit for the first half of the year is already two-thirds the whole year’s target. By the end of October, net borrowings by the government has already exceeding the budget for the full year”. He had other things to say. He pointed out that despite the power sector having been opened to private investment since 1991, India had been able to meet only 55% of the objective of creating 57000 mw of additional power by the year 2000. On roads, that other vital component of development, he said: “Two figures can illustrate the acuity of the problem: while in the past 50 years freight traffic and passenger traffic have increased about 70 times and the number of registered vehicles has multiplied almost by one hundred, India’s road network has only increased seven times”. Let us come to education. Smadja pointed out that although primary education was still considered less important by our policy-makers than higher education, even the latter had collapsed because fees remained a meagre Rs 20 a month. None of these facts are new but when you hear them lumped together in an overview you begin to despair that we will ever be a prosperous country, especially not when Parliament never seems to get incensed by these matters. Especially not when Parliament never seems to debate anything that has to do with economy. In the two weeks that it has been in session we have seen ‘uproars’ over Rajiv Gandhi’s name being included in the Bofors charge sheet and over the seventh anniversary of Ayodhaya. Even here we never actually got down to a debate, all we had was noise and noisy walkouts. Having covered several Budget sessions may I add that when it comes down to passing the government’s demands for money and its allocation there has almost never been a real debate. Usually, there is the same pattern of noise and noisy walkouts and then the House almost empties out while the Bills get passed. The result is that nobody has seriously questioned the government on its bloated bureaucracy. Nobody, for that matter, makes a noise about the fact that the public sector continues to eat more than Rs 150,000 crores of taxpayers’ money every year without giving us any profit. Meanwhile, we have an education system that is in such decline that it is easier for Indian students to go to college abroad than it is in India. Primary education is an even worse mess. Most government schools function without even basic needs being met. In rural areas where, as we are constantly being reminded, real India lives the average school lacks even such essentials as teachers, textbooks, blackboards and school buildings. Where is the money going to come from unless we can force the government to improve its housekeeping? Yet, come elections time, and every two-bit politician across the country gives speeches on the hustings that bang endlessly on about the ‘alleviation of poverty’. It will never be alleviated as long as governments spend more on paying interest on loans and salaries than on anything that can be described even vaguely as development. Finally, a word about the press the its failure to draw attention to the country’s real problems. At the India Summit there was some discussion on why the media did not make more effort to explain economic reforms to the average Indian. The consensus among journalists was that it was for the government to make more effort and that all we could do was report on what it was doing? Are we doing this? Are
we, drawing adequate attention to the fact that the
government is wasting taxpayers’ money on the wrong
things? Clearly, we are not. Most of our newspapers
continue to be obsessed with petty political wranglings
and those endless ‘uproars’ in Parliament.
Again, at election time, we see reports which emphasise
that people want schools, roads, electricity and
healthcare. No sooner is the election over, though, and
we go back to analysing whether Mulayam Singh smiled at
Sonia Gandhi or not and whether Laloo Yadav’s
daughter’s wedding is going to be investigated by
the tax authorities. Do you agree then that we are among
the poorest countries in the world because we deserve to
be? |
More culture vultures than culture
CONSIDERING we are never tired of boasting about our ancient culture and there is also a good deal to boast about in our modern culture, the coverage of culture on radio and TV is quite appalling. Add to this the fact that there is neither individuality nor originality in that coverage and we have one of the great missed opportunities of the Indian media. Let us begin with classical music and dance. The National Programme of Music on All India Radio, instituted by Dr Narayana Menon, a musicologist and broadcaster and DG of AIR, started with a bang. Our topmost classical musicians were proud to be heard on it, and with alternate weeks of Hindustani and Carnatic music, one half of musical India got to know the other half. It even led to cross-fertilisation, with jugal bandhis between tabla and ghatam and veena and sarod maestros. Over the years, both the presentation and the quality of musicians has fallen drastically, because one soon runs out of top musicians, one has to discover up-and-coming ones and the presentation has to be musically stimulating. Then the National Programmes of dance on DD has sunk so low that the joke goes that you only have to be an IAS wife, no matter how ancient and heavy-footed, preferably with connections with concerned ministries, and you are on. As for the anchors, dressed as if they are going to a wedding, if not as the bride, the less said the better. Then there are cultural discussions and interviews, and they invariably follow an artist or film personality in town. Every channel picks up the same person and asks the same stock questions. The amount of hagiography involved is sickening. Ending with the obligatory handshake, even with Indian women who do not normally indulge in shaking paws. Anything approaching dissent or depth discussion is out if one is Simi Garewal one at least asks cloying questions, with much laughter thrown in about the artist’s personal life. One even asks Rupert Murdoch to sing a song. If one is Ms Mona Bhattacharya and her male side-kick on Subah Savere, one has the labour-saving device of a live musician perform briefly in the studio every day, preferably without accompaniment, with constant wah-wahs and raucous inexplicable laughter from Ms Bhattacharya. Which is why I welcome a new cultural programme which is daringly and deliberately different. Another Sunil this time, Sunil Mehra, better known in the print media for his outspoken exposes of fashionable frauds, occasional TV appearances and perhaps this is his first venture into production. It is on DD’s News Channel, still a little wobbly in transmission and not particularly noted for any cultural bravado. It comes on Sundays at 11.05 a.m. And what I like about the programme called Centre Stage, is that it is so different and has unmistakable style. To begin with Mehra has shed the monotonous suit and tie and sahibi accent for a casual and snug black outfit which immediately relaxes the atmosphere. Then he flees the studio to comment from an empty theatre with stark black seats and best of all, shoots most of his personalities and visuals on location. He himself does not hog the limelight but keeps his personalities in full focus except when interviewing, and even there, the cutting is discreet and keeps him there only when required. His music is also apt and discreet. In the programme I watched, he used different approaches. He allowed Vivan Sundaram uninterrupted, subjective monologues. With Rahul Khanna they were the same age-groups, chivvying each other with a dash of gin and tonic. But Mehra was at his best with Shobha De. There was no De-worship here, but a tough, combative approach without being either rude or biased. It frequently had Shobha on the defensive, because Mehra had boned up on her long career and used quotes from memory. The whole exercise was a mixture of entertainment and serious literary analysis. It is difficult to believe Mehra has not had training or long experience in TV. The programme deserves a better slot on a better channel and at least repeats on other national channels. Gaffe of the week:
Typical of the slap-dash manner in which young ingenues
take on culture was an item in News Hour on Star News on
Tuesday night. It was glaringly apparent that the
reporter had not seen the films or even read the
brochure. Because in her flimsy review of the film
East-West she said the film was about “The end of
the cold war and the fall of the Berlin Wall” when
the synopsis of the film in the brochure clearly
begins:” June 1946. Stalin launches a propaganda
drive for Russian refugees in the West”. So the
whole point of the film was lost and viewers
irresponsibly misled Symbolic of the steady decline of
cultural coverage by generalists in News Hour? |
December
11, 1924 WE have already referred to Mahatma Gandhi’s statement to an Associated Press representative that there was absolutely no truth in the statement of a Bombay newspaper that he had offered the Liberals the withdrawal of the spinning franchise and the limitation of the word Swaraj to the dominion status, and that what he had as a matter of fact told Mr Chintamani and other Moderate leaders was that if they desired these things, they should join the Congress and press for the acceptance of their views. As we have said, we deeply regret this statement. If the Mahatma wants a United Congress, as he undoubtedly does, it is now perfectly clear that the withdrawal of the spinning franchise is an essential part of the only condition on which he can have it. In this case, at any
rate, there is no point in saying that if the Liberals
desired the change they should join the Congress and
press for the acceptance of their view, for the Congress
itself is yet to accept, indeed even to consider, the
Mahatma’s proposal. |
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