Quality of Political Discourse in 2014

There are three things nauseating about the ongoing election campaign:

1. Extreme partisanship filled with hatred. While partisanship is something you would expect in an election season, the amount of hatred spewed out would surprise even a King Cobra. If you happen to be a not-infrequent visitor to Facebook and if you have some 100 friends there, this would be self-evident for you. If you watch TimesNow channel at 9 PM everyday, you will get visual & auditory proof.

2. Focus on petty personal matters and absolute silence on policies, ideologies and action plans. Of course, relevant topics do appear once in a while, but you get to hear about them in bits and pieces, just like the side performance of Jokers in Circus when the main artists are getting prepared for the main items. When Narendra Modi spends time arguing with Priyanka Gandhi (who is neither a contestant nor any party leader, at least officially) over I-don't-know-what, I think the point is self-evident again. Of course, when the party that is projected to be in power, publishes their election manifesto on the exact day the voters went to polling booths, what else can we expect to happen? While dense debates have never been a norm in Indian politics, my memory (going back to 1991) tells me that the discussions were never this petty in the recent times.


3. Emergence of the voice of a large section of de-politicized, de-historied and frustrated youth and middle-aged men as the default voice of Indian politics. I am not differentiating between urban and rural youth here. In terms of the general characteristics of this population, I don't think that such a differentiation holds sufficient ground.

I find the third phenomenon very peculiar as compared to the other two and, in some sense, as the driving force for the other two. There is a case for arguing that it was this factor that introduced venom into partisanship and frivolity into the debate. This is the case that I argue, and my case rests on the characteristics of this section of society.

This is a strange category of people.

They are very educated and intelligent, yet not informed and wise. They have conquered the abstract heights of mathematics, mastered various fields of applied science, or are proficient practitioners of social sciences. They hold many certificates, diplomas and degrees and have studied in many institutions during their learner-ship. Prestigious or otherwise. Domestic or Foreign. Yet, they find it difficult to understand what holds a society together. The abstract words of constitution does not appear meaningful to them. Not for them the inductive reasoning from history (of this nation or anywhere). They think that civilization only moves forward. They are not able to see the large black patches in the human timeline.

They are very communicative, yet not introspective. They are proficient in many languages and can talk about anything for hours. Neither the occasion nor the stage choke their throats. They like to have endless discussions and they don't fall short of topics ever. Yet, they can't seem to sit quietly for an hour and contemplate. Not for them the silence of the sages. Not for them the dark hours of confusion. Not for them hard research and painful readings from references.

They are very ambitious, yet not patient. They want to achieve growth, progress & harmony now. They want to see Autobahns across the country yesterday. Now or Never is their slogan. They prefer to sit on the road and scream for change. Sprint is what they prefer, not Marathon. Yet, laying a foundation and patiently arranging the building blocks is not for them. Acknowledging heavy cultural baggage hanging on their shoulders is even unthinkable. They can't stop during the run to acknowledge that the baggage is dragging them down. They don't have time to put the baggage down and separate the shoes from the stones. They don't want to throw out the stones and put on the shoes and then begin to run.

They are very patriotic and brazen, yet not civil and fearless. They love their families, their surroundings and their nation. They vociferously defend their positions in media and sing loud songs. They demand respect for the country, family and self and go any stretch to ensure it. Yet, they do not respect the other. For them, the other is a filthy pig, to be scorned, beaten to death and be fried and eaten. They are brazen enough to call colleagues abusive words in Facebook for a political position, but afraid of even raising the topic when they go for coffee together. They are audacious to debate and reach conclusions in 140 characters, but avoid reading a 1000 word article lest it could change their 140-character perception. They regard civility very highly, yet they don't think it is applicable to self. They assume that a nation can be built by applying your agenda on the other.

And they are frustrated. By scams. By looters. Frustration has fired up their intelligence, but the calming guidance of wisdom is not available. Disappointment has hurt their ambitions and that makes them even more impatient. Lost dreams have pushed them to the brink of audacity, but the courage to face the truth is not present. Sadness makes them wail, yet they can't contemplate.

In a nation building exercise like election, hatred is a paradoxical presence. In an evaluative and corrective exercise like election, frivolity is a paradoxical presence. Long before the campaign kick started, this section of people occupied the center of Indian politics with thoughts resulting from the their own inner paradoxes. Paradox raises from paradox. When your major voter-base is paradoxical, what else the discourse be expected to be?

Update 1: Just saw that NYT editorial also has expressed similar thoughts. "The intolerant, anti-intellectual mood sweeping the nation is frightening." Hatred and Frivolity, that is. Read NYT. 

Eagerness to communalize

I will have to note a very curious phenomenon in the media (mainstream as well as social) regarding the Western Ghat protests. There is an eagerness to pain the protests as if coming from the Catholic church.

I happened to watch a news channel in which the reporter was asking a priest about the position of the Church in this whole thing. The priest corrected him saying, "it is not the Church; it is the farmers. Just because I am a priest does not mean that I am talking for Church right now". The reporter meekly nodded and quickly moved away.

I find this obsession to communalize this whole thing very nauseating, especially coming from those quarters who allegedly uphold the secular tradition of India. In every protest, you can see people from every community gathered together. But the media do not want to see it. They want to project as if it is a communal issue. Same case even with social media.

What could be the reason? In my mind, there is only one thing behind it - divide and conquer. The same tactic that British used against Indians during the freedom struggle. The hope is that, by discrediting the protests as communal, it would die down. Nobody wants to acknowledge the most obvious fact that the most organized community in that area is the Christians, hence it is very natural to see them leading the whole thing.

I can only say, how pathetic the media & pro-report forces have become. Once this whole episode ends, I hope they will sit back, think over this ugly game they played and at least feel shameful. So that they won't repeat this for another issue.

A critique of Kasturirangan Report - Interim Conclusion

Let me conclude (an interim basis) and understand the views of my friends (if anybody cares to give feedback).

I am told that we live in a democracy. My understanding of conflict resolution within democracy has the following logical steps: Understanding the issue through dialogues => Looking for proposals for resolution => Resolve (through iterative dialogues and revisions) => Implement.

In the case of the Western Ghat reports, I see a different trend. This is how it happened: A few experts came up with recommendations => Elite politicians thought they understood the pulse of the people => Elites and Experts discussed within themselves and refined the proposals => They went for Implementation (Of course, feedback from the public was requested and it was given. It is a different matter altogether that nothing changed before and after inviting public feedback).

There is a term for this kind of governance. ARISTOCRACY.

I belong to a city where a metro rail is being planned. I did not see many people getting into streets protesting it. Why? It is not that there was no property issues. But people were compensated REASONABLY. If crores can be spend as compensation for a mere railway project in a City, then why is it that nobody is talking about it in such a big project in the Rural area? Again, when a project is planned in the city, appropriate consultations were done before going ahead with it, and people, realizing the importance of the project supported willingly. Why is it that nothing is done when it came to the Western Ghat reports? There could be only a few reasons 1) Authorities realized they cannot convince people because it is anti-people and cannot be compensated enough 2) Authorities did not care because they thought the people are stupid 3) Authorities knew the risk, but thought of playing a cheating game so that if they get away, they can save a lot. You may find the correct answer for yourself. For me, it is a combination of everything at some levels. Now that it has backfired, still I think they will get away with Option 3, simply because the people in the Ghats cannot protest beyond a level. And there is always an option to suppress it with media, other powerful lobbies and ,worst case, force.

My humble suggestion is this. Lets put both the reports on hold. Let the discussions begin through proper channels, let there by proposals and revision and finalized action plan. Then go for implementation. Let us go back to the democratic way of doing things.

Whatever I have suggested is just from my thought process. What the larger community in those places want may be something more or less or different. I am not a mouthpiece for them. For example, if ESA is redefined in a manner that addresses a lot of concerns, probably there need not be any change to other recommendations.

A note: there are arguments flying around if the government has actually implemented the report or not, whether this is a law or not. Some people quote some section of law, other people quote a different section of law. I don't have a damn clue which is what. All I know is that, only after people started getting into the streets that the authorities has woken up and started discussing it. As far as I am concerned, all these arguments are just peripheral.  My critique is not on any notification issued by MoEF, it is on the Kasturirangan report, and it holds whether the final notification is already issued or if it is going to come in another 2 or 4 or 6 months. I don't have a dog in that political race.

A last note:
The funniest takeaway from this whole episode for me is the realization that those living outside India in centralized AC homes, spending their entire weekends shopping in larger than life shopping malls in cities, spending entire day in air-conditioned offices and commenting on facebook claim that they are the people who loves Western Ghats; while those who wake up everyday to work on their land in those hills with vegetables, crops and domestic animals are the enemies of Western Ghats. Wow!!!

A critique of Kasturirangan Report - Part 5

Recommendations 12 through 17

No comments.


Recommendations 18 through 29 (Green incentives)

No comments, although incentivizing organic farming (28) is not an easy task. There is every chance that people will be either inadequately compensated or will end up stopping farming altogether. HLWG can simply state that the Organic outputs should be branded and sold. But who will create the market for these organic output, and how will the farmers access it? There are a lot of implementation hurdles around this recommendation and this can potentially derail a lot of livelihoods. Since this recommendation is vague on its details, I can't comment any further. But that itself is a problem. In principle, I don't have an issue, but I don't see how it can be put into practice without creating livelihood troubles for the people. And should I even talk about the track record of the governments in implementing any incentive scheme successfully?

Recommendations 30 through 36

No comments

A critique of Kasturirangan Report - Part 4

8) All ‘Red’ category industries should be strictly banned. As the list of
industries categorized as ‘orange’ includes many activities like food and fruit
processing, there will not be a complete prohibition on this category. But all
efforts should be made to promote industries with low environmental
impacts.

Now, this is where I have a very serious problem. When I first read this recommendation, I did not think much about it, mainly because I was (as any other gullible Indian) thinking that RED means something really dangerous, hence may be it is okay to let it go. But then, I wanted to know what are these industries. I got a categorization list at the Centure, applicable across India.  Here it is: http://envfor.nic.in/legis/ucp/ucpsch8.html

Now, I tried to figure out a corresponding list at the state level (Kerala for me). Excuse me for my internet skills, I couldn't find one. So, I had to go to the Kerala State Pollution Control Board and look at the actual applications in the last half year 2012 to figure out what could potentially be this list for Kerala.
http://www.keralapcb.org/writereaddata/Consent%20Details%202012.htm

I have to admit that my analysis is not complete in this. But I think whatever I found is good enough to say a few things:

1) Laboratories, clinics or even simple hospitals.
2) Milk processing and Diary farms
3) Slaughter houses and meat processing, chicken farms
4) Mobile towers

Now, I would like to take a pause and go to recommendation 9 & 10 directly:

9) Building and construction projects of 20,000 m2 and above should not be
allowed. Townships and area development projects should be prohibited.

10) All other infrastructure and development projects/schemes should be
subject to environment clearance under Category ‘A’ projects under EIA
Notification 2006. All these projects will be considered by the Central government under Category A.

Let us read these three recommendations together.

I don't need to talk about Clinics/Hospitals, as if you can't understand the fathom of the implication of its absence, you are being inhuman towards those people. Diary is a big secondary income for many of the farmers living in Western Ghats, without which they cannot sustain. Likewise, meat is not only a dietary thing, it is also an income. No more advancement in telecommunication, the next generation will remain a step behind the rest of the country.  Then, the rest of the industries (I have talked about only the common denominators. I am pretty sure the impact of not having the other types of industries will also be huge, but I can't produce any solid reasoning here, that's just my ignorance, please note).

Also, note the vagueness surrounding the Orange category. Another opportunity for bureaucrats to pick up bribes and politicians and other local power holders to make life difficult for ordinary people.

In case of infrastructure development, you need to get approval from the highest of authorities. In a state where even the most important state highways and national highways take decades to build and years to maintain, what chance does a project from an ESA territory hold?

Likewise, you can't have big towns. They can  keep their petty shops, but not entitled to visit a well-developed town. You know why? Because we (the others) want to keep visiting them, and we think they only way we can achieve that is by making them not to do it.

In a nutshell, these three recommendations tells me one thing very straight - the farmers should do ONLY farming. Which is very innocent at first. But, if you think about, you realize that it means another thing - if you are a tribal, you can continue to be a tribal. If you are not a tribal, you have two options: either slowly convert to a tribal, or leave the place. The complete area will grind to a halt slowly over a couple of decades. Some people will chose to stay, but most of the next generation will need to find other places to build their lives.

But where will they go? CITIES. More people, more pollution, more everything. We can all live in a state of endless polluted nirvana. Having got rid of devilish farmers who used to produce environment-nasty crops and feed us, we then become totally dependent on TN/Andhra/Karnataka etc for various things. Then we will keep cribbing that we are not getting vegetables to eat for Onam. We import everything. That requires transportation. But we cant build highways because of increased population density in the lower areas. And we get into a cycle of  chaos. But, you know, all this migration, transportation & pollution is good for environment, because we presumably saved Western Ghats.

My suggestions:

1) It is important for every Keralite to recognize that continued habitation and development in the Western Ghats is a MUST to distribute the extreme population density of the state and to avoid any further load on our social and physical infrastructure with an already broken backbone. A mass immigration (even if it is gradual) is not going to help any environment anywhere.

2) To achieve that, certain basic necessities like the ones I listed above should be exempted in the recommendation #8. The other Red & Orange industries can have special permissions.

3) The restrictions on Infrastructure projects should be further categorized so that things like local roads and important transportation facilities are not constrained.

4) Social infrastructural institutions like educational institutions and hospitals, even if they go beyond the stipulated area, should be exempted and townships that serve such institutions around them should be allowed.

5) If at all we need to bring in further restrictions, the affected areas should be financially compensated. Because they have put in their blood and sweat in that land. They are entitled to the rewards of that effort as much as anybody anywhere. The compensation can come in various shapes, like pension funds or reservations in higher educational institutions or direct cash transfer or anything else. In any case, the implementation should happen after the consent is received from the interested parties, not before that.