The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

STD tariff set to fall

FRESH life has been breathed into the stalled reforms in the telecom sector. Trunk call facility will now be available from private companies, signalling the end of more than 50 years of government monopoly. Bitten by the opening-up bug, Communications Minister Ram Vilas Paswan wants to liberalise international trunk dialling by allowing private companies to set up competitive facilities. It is heady stuff, both the scope of reforms and the promised speed. Much thinking has gone into dismantling the government stranglehold on STD service. The eligibility criteria for entrants weed out non-serious candidates and also those without experience in this line. They will have to lay telephone lines in the area of operation within seven years or lose the cash deposit. In other words, the basic thrust is to expand the infrastructure and nearly triple the teledensity from the present 2.7 phones for every 1000 Indians to seven in the next five years. They can bring in foreign capital upto 49 per cent and Singapore Telecom has already announced that it will tie up with Bharti Tel. In the days to come, more foreign giants like British Telecom, Vivendi and AT&T should decide their Indian move. Significantly, the government thinks that some foreign investors may opt to provide only infrastructure like cables, bandwidth and towers and one set of them can fully own the network. One prospective long distance telephone provider feels that in the next few years investment totalling more than $ 35 billion will enter this country in this sector alone. What Indian companies bring in is additional. The biggest beneficiary of the new policy will be the telephone users. The trunk call rates will crash by 50 per cent, according to one calculation and by 75 per cent, according to another. Incidentally, India has the highest tariff structure.

It was not a painless change-over though. The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) put up a stiff fight until the last minute. It is loathe to let go a milch cow, and recycled one argument and invented a second. It protested that the resultant shrinkage of revenue will delay or scuttle its plans to take the telephone service to rural areas or unviable ones. This was its complaint last year when TRAI fixed a lower tariff for trunk calls. When there was no response, it changed tack and tried to block entrants into long distance business within circles. (There are 20 telephone circles in all and trunk traffic within these circles accounts for Rs 5000 crore out of the total revenue of Rs 12,000 crore.) Its reasoning was that basic telephone service providers would suffer and hence only truck call between circles should go to private operators. Interestingly, the DoT cousin, Department of Telecom Services is the basic service provider virtually in all circles, barring three where some work is done privately. It got the Telecom Commission to pass a resolution barring the entrants from the intra-circle services. It was at this point that the PMO intervened and the Prime Minister himself announced in the middle of last month that he would use his Independence Day speech to unveil new policies. Not all is lost to DoT. Intra-circle service providers have to first talk to DTS before starting their service. Last time the telecom scene dramatically changed was in 1994 before a scandal halted the process. That was solved after the BJP-led government allowed cellular telephone operators to shift to the revenue sharing system. The reforms train has started chugging again, although the Department of Telecommunications is nervous, wondering how much will be the fall in its revenue.

Indifferent UP Police

IN Uttar Pradesh and Bihar the members of the police force have earned the reputation of being the official face of the law-breakers. They are feared by law-abiding citizens because of their limitless capacity to harass them. Various police commissions have expressed concern over the brazen abuse of the uniform by the so-called guardians of the law. A recent proof of the criminal indifference of the police to performing their basic duty has come from the crime-infested belt of Farrukhabad, Kanpur and Etah. If one goes by the version of Ms Durga Bharti, a dismissed principal of a college run by the controversial Sakshi Maharaj, the police has refused to register a first information report of rape against the Samajwadi MP under pressure from his political mentor Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav. She has accused Sakshi Maharaj of having raped her and thereafter threatening her with dire consequences if she did not meet his demand for girls from the college under her charge. The police has so far refused to register a case of rape and criminal intimidation on the basis of the charges levelled by the former college principal against her former employer. There appears to be sufficient evidence to prove that the police is under tremendous political pressure from Samajwadi Party President Mulayam Singh Yadav not to touch Sakshi Maharaj. On August 5 IGP of Kanpur Ashish Mitra said that investigations in the case were at a final stage and that special teams had been sent to Etawah, Mainpuri and Farrukhabad for arresting Sakshi Maharaj. However, a few days later Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav entered the picture and thereafter the police developed cold feet.

The Durga Bharti-Sakshi Maharaj episode has once again brought into focus the general tendency of the police to take the side of the powerful instead of acting on the complaints of the members of the weaker sections of society. However, in the present case it would be unfair to blame only the police for not letting Ms Durga Bharti lodge a formal FIR against her alleged tormentor. It must be remembered that Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav, who is reportedly protecting Sakshi Maharaj, was responsible for withdrawing criminal cases against former Bandit Queen Phoolan Devi when he was Chief Minister of UP. She is now a Samajwadi Party member of the Lok Sabha. The dacoity and murder cases still pending against her have been put in the deep freeze. It is doubtful whether Ms Durga Bharti would get justice under the present dispensation because the Samajwadi Party chief has launched a counter-offensive for protecting Sakshi Maharaj. He has demanded the removal of the Etah District Magistrate and Superintendent of Police for "harassing the Maharaj". However, all is not lost for the dismissed college principal, provided her case is based on facts and is not an attempt to tarnish the image of Sakshi Maharaj. In October, 1999, the Supreme Court delivered a path-breaking judgment which allows a complainant to file an FIR even at a police station which has no territorial jurisdiction for investigating the complaint. All that the police station where the FIR is lodged is required to do is to forward the case to the one where the alleged crime has actually been committed. She should call for a copy of the judgement to examine the possibility of filing an FIR at a police station beyond the area of influence of the Samajwadis. The landmark ruling concerns the case of a woman who was thrown out of the house by her husband in Patiala. However, she filed the FIR at a police station in Delhi which resulted in the apex court verdict. Of course, the better option would be to take away from the police the "discretionary powers" in the matter of registering FIRs. In the event of the complaints being found to be false deterrent action should be initiated against the complainants.

India out of control
Atmosphere of disillusionment
by Poonam I. Kaushish

THOSE who hark back to the stable past are also frustrated by an ability to move ahead. Words which expose the lie of “Mera Bharat Mahan”. Even as Prime Minister Vajpayee routinely unfurls the national flag from the ramparts of Delhi’s Red Fort today weaving illusions of grandeur to the defeaning sound of silence. An eerie stillness filling the senses with the smell of death, mayhem and brutal carnage, held hostage by terrorists and vagabonds. Caught in the middle are a pulverised people waiting for divine intervention to soar their spirit of nationalism!

The carnage in Karnataka tell their own story of India’s 53rd tryst with destiny. Of Pakistan-sponsored terrorism at one end and jungle king Veerappan at the other. A sure give-away of free India out of control. Of simmering embers of internal turmoil while social schism splashes gore onto newspaper headlines, but only the most gruesome violence shocks. Law is disorder in many parts. A dysfunctional legal system has turned law-breakers into law-makers. Moral and ethical values have been replaced by naked force.

If the widening communal divide mirrors the deep crevices in national consensus and our secular image, the depredations of criminals and mafia dons provide proof that our social polity is now gripped by its cancerous tentacles. What has been left in its wake are moral degradation and decadence. Removal of poverty, ignorance, disease and inequality were loudly described as independent India’s basic goals. Yet they remain a pipedream.

Tragically, Indian democracy has not been about making the best choice, but about choosing the lesser evil. The electorate has known this principle and acted on it for decades. Political parties have adopted it as their credo — be it the BJP, the Congress, the Left Front, the Janata Dal, etc. But what does one do when the parties are in tatters. The cacophony of turf battles has never been so loud. There’s a lot of posturing, a lot of shouting and a lot of allegation-mongering. In the midst of all this, “slogan and stampede policy” is fashionable. But when it comes to the crunch, all blame it on the rotten and corrupt system. While India’s unity, stability and progress is threatened by default.

Kashmir epitomises this state of affairs. For over 11 years India’s Switzerland has been bleeding to slow death. Caught in the blinding maelstrom of Pakistan’s proxy war for its control. It needs no repetition that Islamabad, dominated by its military psyche has been suffering from the Kashmir syndrome since Independence. Successive Indian governments panacea has been limited to more of the same — money, men and military. Expandable commodities who have failed to buy peace all these years in the long run. Even as New Delhi pats itself over a pyrrhic victory over Pakistan in four wars in the short-term.

Prime Minister Vajpayee, like his predecessors, too took recourse to knee-jerk and quick-fix remedies to buy peace for the strife-torn state. His famous Lahore bus ride was punctured by Pakistan’s Kargil. Why, one wonders, did he think that his latest peace initiative with the Hizbul Mujahideen would meet a different fate? Clearly, an expectation only novices dream of. As the failed talks which had still to get off the ground show, New Delhi never learnt from its old mistakes. So eager was it to prove its accommodating credentials and its resolve to smoke the peace pipe that it burnt its own fingers badly. Costing the nation over 150 lives in the decade’s bloodiest carnage on August 1 and 2.

The confusion was evident from July 24 when the Hizb took New Delhi by surprise, announcing a ceasefire and its willingness to talk peace. What would be the parameters of talks? “Within the framework of the Constitution? No, we will talk; the talk will be without any pre-conditions — within the ambit of “insaniyat”, namely humanity, stated Mr Vajpayee.

The Hizb predictably sprung another surprise: the talks have to include Pakistan. New Delhi’s categorical refusal to do so was repaid in kind — by another bomb blast, killing over 12 people, including a young media photographer. In its over-zealousness to talk peace, New Delhi clearly failed to take even the basic security measures. Why wasn’t the Amarnath route sanitized and the cooperation of the local police and people sought? Who allowed the yatris on the 300-km-long route to become sitting ducks for the militants? Why weren’t the state government and the Defence establishment taken into confidence? Did New Delhi really believe that Islamabad would let peace descend on the valley? What was the guarantee that the militants were not just buying time to regroup? Is it a security or an administrative lapse? Who will bear the cross? No sign yet.

Ironically, even as New Delhi tries to come to grips with the Kashmir crisis, endemic since 1947 when barring it all the 562 princely states merged into a unified India, a further division of states has quietly taken place with the creation of Uttaranchal, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand out of UP, Madhya Pradesh and Bihar respectively. None has given thought to the post-bifurcation problems. What is the guarantee that this will end internal fissures and not stoke the already-smouldering fires of disputes over borders, cities and waterways. Punjab and Haryana continue to fight over Chandigarh, both want it as their capital. Besides over a dozen inter-state river water disputes have been pending for decades.

A more alarming problem is the autonomy bogie raised by Assam, Punjab and Tamil Nadu. The ruling AGP, the Akali Dal and the DMK, respectively, have already constituted committees to study in depth devolution of powers to their states, as recommended by the Sarkaria Commission on Centre-state relations. It has spelt out the importance of giving more financial and administrative powers to the states. Further, both the AGP and the DMK have asserted that the Centre should retain power only in the field of Defence, External Affairs, Communications and currency. What next?

Adding to the problems is the sharply deteriorating law and order situation in the country. Violence is now the rhetoric of the period. From Bihar, which has become a battleground of caste senas, armed brigades and ideological lumpens, to Bombay in the vice-like grip of mafia dons to New Delhi’s road rage. In far-flung Kerala, too, there is incredible political subversion of the rule of law. The probability of a political killer, an arsonist, a rioter or a failed assassin to be brought to book is an unbelievable 0.32 per cent, according to a report of the intelligence branch of the Kerala police.

And what about the new intolerant rage sweeping across the country. Turning religion into burning embers of hatred. Of Church blasting in Gujarat, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Goa, attacks on missionaries, Muslim-Hindu riots in Rajasthan and Muslim-Buddhist riots in Ladakh. Needless to say, the culprits are none other than our so-called “netas”. Little men who need gunmen to protect them from their own voters. The torch-bearers of the brutalisation and dehumanisation of the polity. Reeking of an overpowering stench of our decaying political culture. Where the criminalisation of politics has given way to the politicisation of crime and political criminals. We have come a full circle.

The sad truth is that over the years the face of political India has changed. It has turned ruthless and deadly. All in the grip of the gun culture. Either one is a friend or an enemy, such is the rigidity. With the unscrupulous manipulators emerging as rulers.

In this milieu of political disillusionment, principles are forsaken for personalities and identities. That, too, parochial leaders dominated by the mohalla mentality. There is no ideology and people get elected on the basis of a brand — caste, creed and religion. Just like a toothpaste. Witness the way advertising companies are packaging our “netas” to present a Colgate smile to the people. The inflated claims made by the toothpastes pale beside the inflated cacophony of politicians.

Unfortunately, the main concerns of our “netagan” have less to do with the welfare of people and more to do with their own guest for power and wealth through multiplication and division of caste and creed. Which is posing to be the biggest challenge, easy to identify but difficult to address. But underneath all this there is a struggle to decide, who will set the agenda for India, who will be the master of the house. Political regional formations like the TDP and the DMK have no time at all for the BJP’s Hindutva or Congress middle path policy. There are already significant overlapping of interests between the national and regional parties.

Looking ahead, the growth of national parties is fraught with problems. Both the BJP and the Congress are bound to come into conflict with the regional parties. Only one can grow, and often at the other’s expense. Besides, the regional groups have a unified command structure and a share of power in their own states. In fact, we are witnessing a race against time as regional groups push for more fiscal autonomy and liberal economy. Thus, in the long run we could be saddled with a situation where it matters less who rules India and matters much more how they coordinate the affairs of the states. Clearly, the pace of change is being set by regional groups with a different vision of India, a loose confederation, not a tightly knit union. In this milieu, what kind of stability India can as a unitary state look forward too.

The foreboding are in the air. Unfortunately, most Indians do not care. We have no national self-respect, pride or identity. Absence of national character and indiscipline has led to a creeping paralysis often dismissed as “systems failure”. Is India heading for what MaCaulay had prophesied: “India is just a geographical construct, only the parts are real, the whole is unreal”.

Telecom services: towards cartelisation?
by G. K. Pandey

ON the face of it, by not buckling to the Shiv Sena threat and by sacking Law Minister Ram Jethmalani, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee has proved that he is indeed the undisputed head of the coalition he cobbled together. Perhaps the surest sign that even the Congress has accepted his ascendancy is that on the anniversary of the Kargil conflict we didn’t hear the usual noises of how Mr Vajpayee was sleeping, or riding on a bus to Lahore when the Pakistani intruders crept in.

Yet, there is a feeling of unease that Mr Vajpayee is not fully on top of things at least as far as governance is concerned. There is a feeling that some of his trusted colleagues are taking liberties with his name to get their own work done. A couple of examples that come to mind immediately relate to the telecommunications sector. And all the adverse Press reports notwithstanding, these examples have little to do with Telecom Minister Ram Vilas Paswan and his deputy Tapan Sikdar trying to help out some of their friends like the Shashi Ruias and Vinay Rais. What they are doing is unethical. But, perhaps, it is too much to expect them of being ethical in a country where, as everywhere, political parties do require funds for campaigning and sustaining themselves.

What I am referring to here is two major policy pronouncements made by the Prime Minister less than a month ago. Announcements that won him plaudits as a reformer and made, appropriately, at a conference of Infotech Ministers of all state governments in the Capital in July.

Mr Vajpayee announced that, come Independence Day, he would throw open the national long-distance telecom market to the private sector, and that the public sector Videsh Sanchar Nigam Limited’s monopoly on providing gateways to internet service providers would also come to an end almost immediately.

Both moves were designed to hit state-owned firms, but were aimed at benefiting the customer. It is well-accepted, for instance, that once you have more competition in the national long-distance (generally called STD) market, prices will come down — in any case, it is well known that the Department of Telecommunications over-charges consumers on STD calls to subsidise them somewhat on local calls, and this will end once the market is opened up fully.

So what happens in this case? What happens is that when the policy is finally cleared by the Telecom Commission, it sets such stiff terms for private players that the market may just as well remain closed. For one, long-distance calls within a telecom circle or a state are not to be opened up to further competition. Now, given that this amounts to a business of around Rs 5,000 crore a year, this is surely a setback for potential entrants. This is justified by arguing that if this market was opened up, it would hit the private sector players who are operating in various states, but that’s a bit of eyewash. For, except for some limited progress in Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, there are no private players who have rolled out telecom networks in other states anyway. So, what’s really being done is to protect the DoT’s monopoly of intra-circle traffic in these states.

The policy then goes on to specify the elaborate local networks that private players must roll out in each state that they connect on the national grid. But why ask them to lay out an elaborate regional network when they can’t carry STD traffic on it anyway?

Curiously, the policy doesn’t even contemplate the possibility of allowing STD traffic to be carried on cellular networks, despite the fact that this is increasingly becoming more economical with the rapid and continuing fall in cellular equipment costs with each passing day.

It is quite clear also as to why this has been done by the country’s telecom bureaucracy. Simple, if you open up the market too fast, and completely, the value of the Department of Telecom and the about-to-be-created Department of Telecom Services will fall dramatically. Now that’s fine, but why not announce a schedule to privatise these two first, and simultaneously genuinely open up the market even if with a lag of a year or so?

The second announcement of VSNL has met a similar fate. Today VSNL gets some of its connections to the rest of the world through a French telecom firm called FLAG, and it has an exclusive agreement with FLAG whereby it gets connectivity through FLAG’s optic-fibre submarine cable, and then sells this to private sector players. What Mr Vajpayee sought to do was to allow FLAG to sell this to private players directly as well.

Great, but Press reports suggest that the manner in which this was done was nothing less than underhand. It appears that this announcement was first shown to the Telecom Ministry by senior officials in the PMO before the Prime Minister’s speech, and the ministry asked for it to be removed. Now, how or why this still appeared in his speech is something he should ask his officials. Clearly, if VSNL’s monopoly was to be cut short, this should have been done in an above-board manner, and may be VSNL needs to be compensated for the extra infrastructure it set up a few years ago when it entered into an exclusive agreement with FLAG. So, at whose behest was this done at, and why? There is no need to ask “by whom”, because it is quite clear that all this was done at the level of the Prime Minister’s Office!

Press reports on the behaviour of Telecom Minister Ram Vilas Paswan and his deputy Tapan Sikdar are also quite intriguing, and raise somewhat dangerous possibilities. The Prime Minister would be well advised to pay some attention to it. Let’s look at some of the deals that have caught the public eye in the past couple of weeks.

Shashi Ruias’ Essar Group has a firm called JT Mobiles which is the franchisee for the Punjab cellular licence. Now, JT has not paid its dues of Rs 415 crore and the interest on this. In the normal course, its licence should have been terminated. Sikdar and Paswan have been trying their best to get an extension for the firm despite the fact that as long ago as March, the Attorney-General had ruled that no further extension could be given. How does an extension help Ruia since he will have to pay penal interest anyway? Simple: it allows him more time to find a buyer for his licence.

In another case, a jelly-filled cable supplier, Sterlite Industries, has sought to be excused from fulfilling its obligations in a tender, arguing that it made a mistake and filled in a lower price while submitting its bid. By how much did it get its arithmetic wrong? A whopping 80 per cent! Now clearly, as the ministry’s bureaucrats have been arguing, this is a sign that there is a fair amount of cartelisation in equipment bids in the Telecom Ministry. Yet, instead of probing the matter, Sikdar has recommended that Sterlite’s bid should be ignored and that the next-lowest supplier’s bid be accepted as the lowest.

Who is to blame for poor governance?

PEOPLE in general are not satisfied with the quality of the country’s governance. There has been a gradual and disturbing decline in the performance of the system. Who is to blame for this disquieting state of affairs? There are some who hold the political class responsible for this. Others criticise the bureaucracy. Yet others find fault with the system as such. Many people feel that it is a combination of different factors that has paralysed the system of governance.

On this solemn occasion of Independence Day, The Tribune approached a cross-section of thinking people asking them to offer their views on the subject. Here are their thoughts in a condensed form:

Air Chief Marshal Arjan Singh (retired) says that it is not just one part of the system which is responsible for governance having gone haywire. It is a combination of all.

When a politician takes a decision, he consults the bureaucracy. But it is the politician who ultimately takes the decision. He is responsible for it. He is to answer to the public as well as to Parliament.

People in general are also responsible for the rot that has set in as it is they who decide who is to govern, who they vote for. It is the people who bring the politicians of their choice to power.

In all this, people must be assured that they are safe from any external threat and that law and order prevails in the country. When they cast their vote they must keep all this in mind.

Ms Amrita Pritam, a well-known poetess, feels that the government should have a strong and clear-cut policy to tackle violence. She says that people are being attacked and killed everyday. One cannot bear the sight of bodies on the television screen everyday. Citizens of India and Pakistan should raise their voice together to put an end to violence. Perhaps, the writers of the two countries need to give a call for peace and harmony. There are some sections in Pakistan who are dedicated to peace, she adds.

Mr Khushwant Singh says that the most telling comment on the state of the country’s governance is the ongoing negotiations with Veerappan who has killed over a hundred people. The government’s willingness to let him off shows its soft attitude. It has not been able to get hold of him. This shows that the administration is totally paralysed.

The government, in his view, needs to show more determination and a stronger will. It should stop making compromise. “We have done it long enough. We did it in the case of the Mufti’s daughter and the hijackers in Kandahar. Now we have the classical case of Veerappan”, he laments.

Dr Amrik Singh, a former Vice-Chancellor of Punjabi University, Patiala, attributes the poor state of governance to the failure of the political system. He is of the view that the electorate is responsible for electing the wrong persons to power. “This shows that we don’t prize excellence, good governance and legal governance.”

The rule of law that existed before 1947 was better than it is today. As long as we don’t reform the legal system, things will not change. We have to ensure equality before law. He attaches fundamental importance to the rule of law. The British Prime Minister’s son, he said was caught in an inebriated state. “In India, I cannot even think of a single MLA ever convicted for a traffic offence.”

Veteran art critic and national awardee Dr B.N. Goswamy held a host of factors responsible for the mire in which we have got stuck. “The real reason is the subversion of the system at the hands of a number of vested groups. Earlier, politics used to be a matter of giving up something for something else. Today, however, politics is a matter of power and money. The Gresham’s Law has come into operation. Another factor is that all the earlier ideals of serving one’s motherland have disappeared. Now people join politics for all the wrong reasons.”

Mr Goswamy added that in this condition, even the bureaucracy must share its part of the blame in the sense that instead of acting as a spine to the nation, it has sought to align itself with political parties, thus losing the moral quality it was famous for. “Even the average voter, to some extent, is responsible, for this because he lacks the fabric to resist the temptation. He also lacks the vision of his own territory of belief,” he said.

A former Punjab Chief Secretary, Mr P.H. Vaishnav, spoke on similar lines, stating that the real issue involved was that over a period of time the basic institution of a political party has been neglected. “The political leadership which we inherited has disappeared and our successors are people who are not idealistic. While they look at politics as a means of capturing power, the Gandhian principle of the means being sacred also stands sacrificed.” He also held the bureaucracy responsible in a way, stating that the bureaucrats by merely seeking shelter in the rewards of service were contributing to the existing political vacuum.

Sportsman Milkha Singh chose to limit the blame to the political system which, he said, had gone haywire. “Corruption has become the order of the day. Look at the way even our sportsmen are selling the respect we earned with the sweat of our brow. The same is the situation in every sphere of activity. We have destroyed all the ideals which the heroes of the freedom struggle left behind for us. While we run after money, the politician is having a field day.”

Visibly pained by unfruitful governance, veteran theatre artist Sardar Gursharan Singh said the entire system was out of tune with the basic principles of socialism. “Our system is not anti-people, it is anti-poor. The irony of the situation is that even after over half a century of Independence, we have not achieved a satisfactory level of social equality. The quality of life is deteriorating, courtesy the useless policies of the government.” In his opinion, the whole system was desperately crying for an overhaul. Commenting on the Kashmir imbroglio, he said the only way out was to seek a third-party intervention.

Dr Naresh, a renowned poet, said only our rotten system was to blame for all the ills of the country. “We have still not been able to break away from the feudal set-up which prevailed in the pre-Independence days. Earlier there were kings, now there are politicians who totally lack political will to cleanse the system. What we have is feudalism in the garb of democracy. That is the reason this disillusionment is spreading.” Pointing towards the policy of appeasement being practised in political circles, apart from the one of offering temporary solutions to outstanding problems, Dr Naresh said the average voter needed to be awakened. “Mass awakening is India’s only hope left.”

Mr Chander Mohan, a leading technocrat- industrialist, held the communal policies of the government in power responsible for the deterioration of the political structure. “They are propagating communalism in the garb of social justice. In fact, the present government is entirely responsible for the communal fire in which the country is caught,” he said, adding that the way out of the situation was to vote an idealist political party back to power.

Dr Noor Ahmad Baba, who teaches political science at the University of Kashmir, Srinagar, has this to say:

“The proposition on governance is somewhat simplistic as it assumes only the failures of the governing process. Successes and failures cannot be ascribed to any single agency or factor. Various factors together constrain or condition the working of the governing process. So the failures, if any, are generally the net result of a combination of forces that are rooted in our social, cultural, economic educational and political landscape.”

Dr Manzoor Fazili, a retired professor of political science and author of books on the history of Kashmir, says: “Without discipline, true freedom cannot survive. Indian experience with governance has been a partial success. During last 50 years of democratic and constitutional experience, the political leadership and the bureaucratic apparatus developed such a spiritual personality that both of them turned the enemies of the people. It has led the nation to the brink of greed and intrigues resulting in corruption and inefficiency.”

Dr B.A. Dabla, Head, Department of Sociology, University of Kashmir, Srinagar, says though governance was less important in the traditional-simple society, it became very crucial in the traditional-complex society at the global level. In the post-Independence period in India, governance emerged very important for over all development. But the reality is that we have failed to provide good governance. As a result, while the State has not proved responsive, the living conditions of the majority of our people have not improved substantially. This situation has emerged as a result of the cumulative effect of the actions of politicians, bureaucrats, professionals, technicians, academicians and other groups.

In the opinion of Dr Daljit Singh, a renowned eye surgeon, we are ruled by gentlemen of the first order, who are always at our beck and call if we can fulfil their ‘bid’. They are ably assisted by the servants of the people (in service) who will see that not a leaf moves while they pluck flowers. I wish one could ask for more. We are living in a real Satyug.

Mr Brij Bedi, a renowned social worker and husband of Mrs Kiran Bedi, admits that India at the moment is inflicted by a malaise called non-governance or bad governance. In fact, bad governance has led to so much of indiscipline in public life that one finds chaos everywhere. To blame just one authority won’t be justified. But I think the politician is the biggest culprit.

“Our civil servants are, in fact, our masters. They are the Mughals of modern India. But the biggest blame lies with us, the citizens of India, for non-governance. We have the habit of cribbing and criticising, but we don’t do anything for our ‘Desh’ being touted as ‘Mahan’. Sycophancy, it seems, has become our ‘dharma’.”

Mr Satya Pal Dang, a veteran CPI leader, known as a thinking politician, says that governance or lack of it depends on the ruling politicians and the bureaucracy, even though people can vote once in five years. India has been ruled after Independence by bourgeois parties. In the beginning bourgeois politicians are concerned with the long-term interests of the exploiting classes. To some extent, these coincided with the interests of the country. Corruption at the top rungs did damage everything, but on the whole there was no breakdown of the system of governance. As time passed, especially after the introduction of the policy of globalisation, liberalisation and privatisation, ruling politicians with a few exceptions became more and more concerned with making tonnes of money for themselves (while ensuring the continuation of the exploitative system). All their decisions were motivated by the objective of coming back to power. This led to a powerful nexus between them, a section of the police and criminals. The process was quickened with the growth of consumerism.

For ensuring proper governance, a powerful Left is needed. The Left must not only lead agitations for good governance. It must also have the objective of a Left democratic front, with the Left as a substantial force in it, taking over power in the country.

Non-governance has been the result of gradual erosion in the sanctity of the institutions that control the system in the country.

According to Dr Hari Om, Head, Department of History, Jammu University, the lack of commitment to the causes of the nation on the part of those at the helm of affairs has set the rot. The rulers are unscrupulous, barring a few exceptions, and are seen engaged in petty political games for retaining power.

He also does not spare those in the Opposition. He describes them as “opportunists” to the extent of following a one-point programme of dislodging the rulers of the day. In this process, people and their problems have been ignored, resulting in chaos, discontent and degradation of moral and political values.

A historian, he doubts the inherent strength in the system of governance. The system, in his opinion, has failed to come up to the expectations of the people because it can be interpreted either way or can be manipulated. Manipulation has become possible because the system is a replica of the one introduced by the British, based on the divide and rule doctrine.

Mr M.M. Khajooria, a former Director-General of Police, is of the veiw that the mess we are faced with is the result of a situation in which the system assumes a level of political awareness that is non-existent among the majority of the people in the country even after 52 years of Independence. The result of this lack of political awareness is that the system is being run by a minority in a multi-party system.

He blames politicians, bureaucrats and the system as such for nongovernance, perpetrating the feudal concept of ruler-ruled relationship. Social acceptability of corruption, maladministration and electoral malpractices have added to misgovernance. He points out that an independent, impartial and just bureaucracy can be the backbone of good governance. But over the past several decades the bureaucracy has surrendered its independent character and degenerated into a willing tool of unscrupulous politicians.

An eminent diabetologist, Dr Jitendra Singh, is of the opinion that the decline of national values among politicians, bureaucrats and the people has led to a situation in which a clean and effective government has become a distant dream. He thinks that people do not seem to be prepared to shoulder their responsibilities.

He says, “How can you think of good governance when the government has had no policy on Kashmir for the past over 50 years?”

Dr Rekha Chowdhary, Head of the Department of Political Science, Jammu University, says that politicians are interested in short-term gains. “They are not governing at all but are playing games to secure a better future for them and their progeny. Their actions are arbitrary, lacking accountability and a sense of responsibility.

Compiled by Syed Nooruzzaman with reports from Tripti Nath in New Delhi, Aditi Tandon in Chandigarh, Ehsan Fazili in Srinagar, Varinder Walia in Amritsar and M.L. Kak in Jammu.

SPIRITUAL NUGGETS

May our sacrifice be at hand

And pleasing to the gathered people!

For freedom and for perfect bliss we pray.

— Rig Veda, X, 100, 6

****

The world of Brahman belongs to those who find it by the practice of chastity and the study of Brahman. For them there is freedom in all the worlds.

— Chhandogaya Upanishad, VIII, 4

****

Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof.

— The Holy Bible: Leviticus, 25:10

****

Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

— The Holy Bible: II Corinthians 3:17

****

Freedom is not something that anybody can be given; freedom is something people take and people are as free as they want to be.

— James Baldwin, Nobody Knows My Name

****

The most powerful single force in the world today is neither communism nor capitalism, neither the H-bomb nor the guided missile — it is man’s eternal desire to be free and independent.

— John F. Kennedy in an address at Washington D.C., July 2, 1957

****

The natural liberty of men is to be free from any superior power on earth and not to be under the will or legislative authority of man but to have only the Law of nature for his rule.

— John Locke, II Civil Government, IV, 21

****

To renounce liberty is to renounce being a man.

— Jean-Jacques Rosseau, Social Contract, 1, 4

****

None can love freedom heartily but good men; the rest love not freedom but licence.

— John Milton, Tenure of Wings and Magistrates

****

If you cannot be free, be as free as you can.

— Ralph W. Emerson, Journals

****

Freedom is the greatest fruit of self-sufficiency.

— Epicurus, Letters, Principle Doctrines and Vatican Sayings

****

Emancipation from the bondage of the soil is no freedom for the tree.

— Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore, Fireflies

****

The only freedom that is of enduring importance is freedom of intelligence that is to say, freedom of observation and of judgement exercised in behalf of purposes that are intrinsically worthwhile.

— John Dewey, Experience and Education, V