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Monday,
April 8, 2002, Chandigarh, India  
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The case of panchayats Delhi's transport muddle
Indian polity in crisis |
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An unauthorised autobiography
PPSC chief’s case: Punjab’s debt to Sardar Patel
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The case of panchayats THERE is no denying the fact that village panchayats, if properly taken care of, can change the very face of the country in the shortest period possible. They constitute the grassroots of India's democratic edifice, and hence a special responsibility on the nation to strengthen them financially and otherwise. In view of their potential from development and other angles, the two-day all-India Panchayat Adhyaksha Sammelan that concluded in New Delhi on Friday stressed the need for amending the Constitution to make the panchayats financially and functionally autonomous institutions. Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, who inaugurated the conference, also supported the demand. So, what is the problem? The Prime Minister should initiate the necessary steps right now to achieve the laudable objectives. The first step in this direction, as suggested by the gathering, can be a special meeting of the National Development Council, a conference of the Chief Ministers or an all-party meeting. Whatever is necessary should be done without further loss of time. Already 54 years have elapsed since Independence with the panchayats in our villages, where real India still lives, getting only lip-service. It was the late Rajiv Gandhi, the youngest Prime Minister India has ever had, who took considerable interest in improving the health of these basic democratic institutions and empowered them by amending the Constitution. But what he did was not enough. India's village panchayats have an amazing numerical strength with their 34 lakh elected representatives, 10 lakh of them being women. But they are good for nothing so far as development work is concerned because of their financial weakness. Then there are parallel agencies like the District Rural Development Authority which create only hindrances in the way of functioning of the panchayats. The time has come to enable the panchayats to play their rightful role in providing drinking water supply to their respective areas, setting up rural health centres at an extensive scale and the construction of link roads, besides ensuring proper functioning of village schools. Urban India is undergoing rapid transformation following advancements in areas like telecommunications. The rest of the country should also be made to feel that its problems are getting the desired attention. The rural requirements are enormous, and one must be realistic to admit that adequate funds cannot be made available from the state exchequer. Therefore, the panchayats have to find a way to generate financial resources at their own end too, as the Prime Minister has rightly pointed out. This is not an impossible task provided there is a will to accomplish it. Panchayat members have to change their mindset. They must, of course, be legally empowered to undertake fund generation programmes with an inbuilt arrangement for its proper
utilisation. |
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Delhi's transport muddle THE Supreme Court's decision to reject the Centre's request for extension of the deadline to run diesel buses in the nation's Capital and impose a token fine on even the government is another positive demonstration of activism by the judiciary. Originally, too, it took a public interest petition to have the court intervene. This was a few years ago and the Supreme Court mandated the use of lead-free petrol in Delhi. There is absolutely no doubt in anyone's mind that there has been a visible difference in Delhi's environment since the rigorous enforcement of the anti-pollution norms, especially the ones that cover motorised vehicles. However, the problem remains since Delhi has the largest number of vehicles in any metropolitan city. This, coupled with the laxity in the enforcement of the apex court's judgements, has contributed to what environmentalists call "a Bhopal happening in Delhi every day". Energy generated from hydrocarbon fuels does have an unfortunate byproduct in the pollution that it causes. And over the years it has been realised the world over that there is no free ride, hence the focus on non-polluting fuels such as compressed natural gas (CNG). The environmental journey costs more, but look at what it saves us in the long run — the primary benefit being the health of the citizens. In this context, the role of diesel is to be specially singled out since it is said to be carcinogenic, causing cancer. The biggest users of diesel in Delhi are the buses and they provide a lifeline to millions of daily commuters. Unfortunately, the bogey of inconveniencing the commuters has often been used to make the court extend its deadline. Even the response of the Centre and the Delhi government and the bus operators has consisted of a series of knee-jerk reactions, with each successive extension from the court being treated as a "reprieve" for relaxation rather than a chance to further improve the admittedly week infrastructure of CNG distribution and management. The argument regarding the commuters' hardship has been advanced too often to be credible, and there have been murmurs about a nexus between the big money the bus operations represent and certain vested interests within the Ministry of Petroleum that is required to provide CNG. There is no doubt that buses have to queue up for long periods just to fill gas. Time is money for bus operators, as also for anyone else, and it is the government's responsibility to provide proper, well-stocked CNG distribution system. This is what should have been done by now, but the truth is that every time the court granted an extension, lethargy set in. We cannot but help sympathise with the commuters of Delhi who are facing hardships because of the lack of proper planning and execution of the pervious orders of the Supreme Court. At the same time, the apex court has to be commended for its role in safeguarding the long-term interests of the citizens. |
Indian polity in crisis THE Indian polity is undergoing a serious crisis because of the ongoing communal disturbances in Gujarat. Communal violence in Ahmedabad, Vadodara and many other areas, including some tribal belts in the state, has been continuing since February 28. Surely this state of affairs is unprecedented. If there is a will to put down this madness with an iron hand, there is a way and that is to post competent and impartial officers in the affected areas and give them a free hand to bring the situation under control. Regrettably, just the opposite is taking place: as it appears, not only is there no will on the part of the Chief Minister and his Cabinet colleagues to do so but also the government is transferring out competent officers who have done good work in controlling the riots. The transfers obviously were at the instance of RSS and VHP activists, running amuck in the state. This is the first time a dedicated RSS pracharak, steeped in the ideology of the RSS and entirely devoted to implementing its goals, and a bachelor with all the time in the world to attend to his chosen tasks, has been seen in action as Chief Minister. That is Mr Narendra Modi in the volatile state of Gujarat. I recall the visit of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan in 1969 when he made a brief detour to Gujarat as it had witnessed serious communal riots a few weeks earlier. On return from Gujarat, Badshah Khan spoke at a public meeting at the Ram Leela grounds in Delhi when he lambasted the Congress party, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and the people of India as a whole for their failure to live up to the ideals and expectations of the Father of the Nation. Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan even threatened to go on a fast, and it was with great difficulty that Indira Gandhi was able to persuade him to abandon the idea. This more than three decades’ old event is narrated to show how Gujarat has always been a volatile and communally sensitive state. A state like Gujarat should have a sensible, wise and forward-looking Chief Minister, and Mr Narendra Modi is not the man for this task. The tragedy of it all is that instead of severely reprimanding him or holding out the threat of being sacked, he has been mollycoddled, not only by the Sangh Parivar but also by the BJP President. The attitude of the Prime Minister and the Home Minster was also not something which unduly worried the Chief Minister. Even after his first meeting with the Prime Minister in Delhi at the end of one full month after the riots started in Gujarat, he did not take strong action to end the communal clashes, arson and loot. Even on the eve of the Prime Minister’s visit on April 4 communal riots and arson had taken place in Ahmedabad and elsewhere. Incidentally, should the Prime Minister have waited for more than a month to visit Gujarat? It is incredible that he did not consider necessary to make a dash to Gujarat in the first few days and speak to the state’s officers, including the police authorities, visit the relief camps, hear the affected people’s grievances and give them assurances, etc. The Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) visited Gujarat, and his report was released to the Press on April 2. Although he did not severely indict the Chief Minister, his observations make it clear that the Gujarat Government failed to take effective steps. He recommended CBI investigation of some of the ghastly events, which almost qualify to be called as acts of genocide. Indeed some analysts have already characterised the Gujarat communal holocaust as a pogrom and genocide. Instead of upholding the NHRC findings, the Sangh Parivar is extremely critical of its recommendations. The international fallout of these events is alarming. It has effectively killed the prospects of foreign investments flowing in, not to speak of tourist traffic coming to a halt. Most importantly, India’s name as the largest democracy has suffered grievously. Our diplomats as well as Indian nationals living abroad are unable to show their faces to foreign friends during interactions at social functions. Indian diplomats are unable to explain to their counterparts why the events in Gujarat are taking place in this manner. If the Muslim countries in West Asia as well as South Asia are not as yet accusing India of genocide of the Muslim minority, it is because of the perception, of the people at large that the communal riots are confined only to one state and the Central government by and large is wedded to secularism and upholding of minority rights. But the damage is done, and it may be a long time before India is able to retrieve its fair name in the international arena. The communal holocaust in Gujarat, the attitude of the Chief Minister and the way the BJP-dominated NDA government has dealt with the events have all led to serious and ominous forebodings for the future of the country. One thing is clear: the BJP is not able to and will not be able to cut its umbilical chord, freeing itself from the control of the RSS. We have seen again and again how the RSS is the final arbiter in so many administrative and political matters. The first example of this was Prime Minister Vajpayee’s inability, after having openly announced, to induct Mr Jaswant Singh as his Finance Minister in his first government. Presently, the RSS is reportedly keen to get Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha shifted, not because of his budgetary policies but because of the perception that his budget was largely responsible for the defeat of the BJP in the Delhi municipal elections. The RSS is also effectively shielding Mr Modi from being sacked, which is now the demand of all the opposition parties. All these would lead to the inevitable conclusion, that the BJP has not given up its basic Hindutva agenda and the fact, that the NDA agenda is being followed is only because the BJP is in a minority and cannot run the government without the support of the self-serving coalition partners numbering about 20. Every action brings about certain reaction sooner or later. There are credible reports that militant and fundamentalist Islamic elements, who are already entrenched in so many places in India, are likely to wreak vengeance on the Hindu majority for the Gujarat massacre. The recent attack on the Raghunath temple in Jammu was possibly the forerunner and there are forebodings that similar attacks might take place at important religious centres in the near future. Remember the Bombay serial bombings which took place three months after the demolition of Babri Masjid? The administration and the people should brace themselves to anticipate and deal with the expected development effectively. The recent utterances of Dr Pravin Togadiya, General Secretary, VHP, show how the Hindu extremist mind is working. When asked if Gujarat was Hindutva’s laboratory, he retorted what was wrong in Gujarat being a laboratory of Hindutva. If Muslims could have laboratories (madrasas) to terrorise Bharat, indulge in ethnic cleansing of Hindus in Kashmir, etc, should not Indians have laboratories to defend themselves?. He asserted that Godhra was a manifestation of the Talibanisaton of a greater section of the Muslim community and that it will be repeated in every part of India where, since Partition, Muslims had more rights than Hindus. He claimed that the Indian polity had failed to protect Hindus and hence the Hindu society became aggressive and took the law into its own hands. “If Godhra is repeated, Gujarat will be repeated in every corner of Bharat”, Dr Togadiya said. In his interview to The Time magazine (April 8), he said that Islam is an armed doctrine, that Hindus feel there is no one to protect them and so they have started to take the law into their own hands. “The country is heading toward anarchy”, he said. He is absolutely right there and the country is indeed heading for a disaster, the way things are unravelling. Will those in authority wake up and realise the danger? The writer is a former Governor of West Bengal and Sikkim. |
An unauthorised autobiography I
was born in a hospital. Brought up in a home. Married in a “mandir”. As a tiny toddler, I was told to stand, walk and talk. When I was slightly grown up, I had to sit and keep my mouth shut. Today, I am expected to be a home bird. What am I? My mother’s baby? Or the wife’s slave? As a child, I went to school. The teachers were busy with tuitions. And I could play. Then to a college. The teachers were often on strike. Agitating for higher scales of pay. Finally, at the university, it was wonderful. I had more of holidays. Less of lectures. It was great fun. Gradually, I had graduated. The “inscrutable workings of providence” then took me to the profession of law. I became a part of the robed brethren. Got occupied. Also enough to live on. Then I moved from the matters of money to matrimony. I was married. Not to the girl I had thought of. The caste, customs and family honour had intervened. I was married to the girl, my mother had chosen. I must acknowledge she has a good choice. Despite her admission that even she had faltered. Though, as she boasts, only once. I wish, she was right. But that is history. Today, I look back. First the home. My father was busy with his job. And my mother with her kids. No cards, club or kitty parties. No ayah to proxy for her. Thus, I could play only when permitted. Drink and eat just what she offered. Not what I liked. No wonder, I have not become a man-eater. Only a bookworm. And I can live without a drop of drink. Despite the fact that statiistically, the world has more old drunks than old doctors. The school, college and university? My parents chose these for me. Even the subjects and the courses. Also the clothes. “Do not dress up like a dandy” was the simple diktat. No choice. No option. I had to obediently obey. As a child, I was allowed to accept gifts. Only candles and cookies. No candies or cokes. Bad for the teeth. The talk was candid. Never candied. There were rigorous rules. No rewards. Not even pocket money. Demanding discipline. Ruthlessly imposed and executed by my mother. On everyone. Mercifully, even on my father. And she never spared herself. Before marriage, I was free to do anything. Just anything my mother permitted. Then, only what my wife told me. Like my father, I have learnt my lesson. Today, I have realised that the secret of harmony at home is to say — “Haar Maani”. I accept defeat. So, the life has moved. Today, I talk to my God in Sanskrit. To my wife in Hindi. To my colleagues in Punjabi. To my children? They do not understand anything except their “Hinglish”. A combination of Hindi, English and what not. My wife has a degree in medicine and surgery. She works. Remains busy. So, the children are free. To drink “coke”. To eat noodles. To do what they like. To play when they want to. Still, they get cranky. Why can’t the parents give the same attention that I got? I feel concerned. As my mother used to. And still does. Like her, even I want my children to be disciplined. To eat slowly. To live honestly. To work hard. To tell no lie. To live for days on simple food and water. To have values. Not valuables. No love for money. But I find no time for them. Today, what am I? Obviously, a robot. Leading a mechanical existence. Living with strain and stress. Trying to hide the truth from even myself. Still, I want my children to emulate me. Be like me. Just as my mother has always wished. Has nothing changed? Despite the passing of a generation? Would my children too be slaves of circumstances? Like me? Life is a long lesson. But man never learns. |
PPSC chief’s case: Punjab’s debt to Sardar Patel “THE effect of a system of open competition,” Macaulay’s brother-in-law and co-author of the famous Northcote-Trevelyan report, Sir Charles Trevelyan, wrote in 1854, “will be to secure for the public offices generally and especially for the principal offices the best portion of the best educated of our youth.” Supported by Bentham, John Stuart Mill and Charles Dickens, and bitterly opposed, among others, by Disraeli and Anthony Trollope, with Thomas Carlyle “thundering from the sidelines”, Trevelyan’s zealous advocacy of open competitive examinations as the only means of entry to the civil service forms the historic basis of the establishment of the institution known as the Public Service Commission. An institution whose credibility journalist-turned-Punjab Public Service Commission chairman Ravinder Pal Singh Sidhu, now in jail for jobbery, has the historic distinction of shattering beyond repair. “The general principle... which we advocate,” said the Northcote-Trevelyan report, generally regarded, in Prof H.J. Hanham’s words, as the charter of the modern civil service, “is that the public service should be carried on by the admission... of a carefully selected body of young men....” “The first step towards carrying this principle into effect,” it said, “should be the establishment of a proper system of examination before appointment....” “We accordingly recommend (said the report) that a Central Board should be constituted for conducting the examination of all candidates for the public service whom it may be thought right to subject to such a test. Such board should be composed of men holding an independent position, and capable of commanding general confidence.” The board should be headed, it added, by an “officer of the rank of Privy Councillor, and it should either include, or have the means of obtaining the assistance of, persons experienced in the education of the youth of the upper and middle classes, and persons who are familiar with the conduct of official business. It should be made imperative upon candidates for admission to any appointment (except in certain special cases...) to pass a proper examination before the Board, and obtain from them a certificate of doing so.” Translated into English law by an Order in Council of June 4, 1870, published in the London Gazette on June 7, the recommendation, visualising the concept or institution of the Public Service Commission in terms still remarkably contemporaneous, was subsequently acted upon by the imperial regime in India as well though after a gap of five decades. Captioned “Public Service Commission”, Section 96C of the Government of India Act, 1919, based on the report of the Royal Commission on the Superior Civil Services in India (published in 1918), provided for the appointment of a five-member body by the Secretary of State in Council for discharging such functions as may be assigned to it in regard to the “recruitment and control of public services in India”. It took another seven years, however, and protracted discussion on the subject between Whitehall and Simla, for the first Public Service Commission (India), as it was first called, to be actually constituted, with Sir Ross Barker as Chairman. The Commission was rechristened as the Federal Public Service Commission when the Government of India Act, 1935, came into force in 1937. Chapter III of Part X of the 1935 Act, comprising Sections 264 to 268, provided for a Public Service Commission at the Centre and a Public Service Commission in each province. Chapter II of Part XIV of the Constitution, comprising Articles 315 to 323, the provisions relating to the Public Service Commission, some of which I discussed last week as well, is modelled closely on these provisions of the 1935 Act. With one important difference. As noted by D.D. Basu in his two-volume “Commentary on the Constitution of India” published in the 1950s and out of print since as long as memory can stretch — the only true magnum opus of the otherwise highly prolific author, all his subsequent works being, with great respect, no more than popularisers — the provision, in Article 317, for the removal and suspension of members of the Public Service Commission, is entirely new and has no parallel in the 1935 Act. In the context of l’affaire Ravinder Pal Singh Sidhu, it is interesting, immensely interesting, to note that Article 317 is the result of a compromise between two of the tallest among our founding fathers, Sardar Patel and B.R. Ambedkar. The official positions held by both of them are well known. Patel was the Union Home Minister, Ambedkar the Chairman of the Drafting Committee of the Constituent Assembly. “With regard to the provisions relating to the Public Service Commission,” wrote Ambedkar on July 27, 1949, in a special note to the Drafting Committee, “the difference between myself and my colleague, the Hon’ble Home Minister, centres round two questions.” The note has been reproduced in full by B. Shiva Rao in the fourth volume of his mammoth five-volume work on the framing of India’s Constitution. “The proposal of the Home Department,” said Ambedkar, “is that it should be open to the President or the Governor (which means the Executive) to remove a member of the Public Service Commission on six months’ notice without being required to show cause.” “My (own) proposal,” he continued, “is that a member of the Public Service Commission should be liable to be removed from office in like manner and like grounds as a Judge of a High Court or of the Supreme Court.” Like, that is (if Ambedkar had had his way), the Comptroller and Auditor-General of India and the Chief Election Commissioner, both of whom, as I wrote last time, can be removed only by impeachment, with no provision at all for suspension pending removal. “To avoid these two extreme positions,” said Ambedkar, “I am prepared to have the following formula as a via media”. One, that a member of the Public Service Commission may be removed by the President or Governor on the ground of misbehaviour on report made to that effect by the Supreme Court. Two, that the President or Governor may suspend any member for misbehaviour, provided that a statement of the cause of suspension is laid before the appropriate legislature within seven days. If, within the next sixty days, the appropriate legislature prayed for his restoration, the suspended member would be so restored. If no such prayer was made, however, the President or Governor could proceed to declare the office of the member vacant. Article 317 of the Constitution, as finally adopted, embodies point one of this compromise formula, with the minor difference that the power of removal (upon enquiry by the Supreme Court) is limited to the President. Even more significantly, it permits suspension (pending inquiry) as per point two, at the hands both of the President and the Governor, as the case may be, without the limiting condition of submitting the suspension for legislative approval. It is obvious that the via media proposed by Ambedkar under the pressure of the Union Home Ministry was further watered down by the latter insofar as it related to suspension. Given the enormity and immediacy of Ravinder Pal Singh Sidhu’s case, the Punjab Government cannot thank Sardar Patel enough for the pragmatism with which he helped shape this crucial provision in India’s founding charter. |
I have no doubt that it is a part of the destiny of the human race, in its gradual improvement, to leave off eating animals, as surely as the savage tribes have left off eating each other when they came in contact with the more civilised. — Thoreau, Walden: “Higher Laws” *
* * Butchery and bloodshed is a great disgrace to civilisation and culture. Killing of animals for food is a great blunder; and the mentality it engenders is fraught with potential dangers for the life of humanity, a recognition of which made George Bernard Shaw say that as long as men torture and slay animals and eat their flesh, we shall have war. The chemical components of different foods vibrate at varying rates. Each particle of food is a mass of energy. The intake of certain food-stuffs sets up discordant vibrations in the physical body which throw the mind into a state of oscillation and disequilibrium. — Swami Shivananda, Bliss Divine, chapter 66 *
* * Life in its infinite forms exists as one organic unity. We are part of it; the part should feel reverence for the whole. That is the idea of vegetarianism. It simply means: Do not destroy life. It simply means: life is god — avoid destroying it, otherwise you will be destroying the very ecology.... When you eat animals, you are more under the law of necessity. You are heavy, you gravitate more towards the earth. When you are a vegetarian you are light and you are more under the law of grace... What you eat you become. If you eat something which is fundamentally based on murder, on violence, you cannot rise above the law of necessity. You will remain more or less an animal... One who is inimical to God’s creatures cannot be very friendly towards God either. If you destroy Picasso’s painting you cannot be very respectful to Picasso.... all the creatures belong to God. God lives in them, God breathes in them, they are his manifestations, just as you are. — Osho, Philosophia Perennis, Vol. II |
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