We are seeing the blooming of an election. But there is a strange stillness in the air – the doldrums. The word signifies a stupor, in which everything is listless, stagnant and immobilised.
Gopalkrishna Gandhi
The In India, in ever so many ways, this is the best of times. Our democracy is blossoming. While in countries around us, democracy has taken bruising and even battering, our elections are in progress. Millions are participating in the proceedings. They know how to re-endorse earlier verdicts; equally, how to reverse them. We are a democracy with a powerful monarch – the voter. And our media is the monarch’s security guard.
A lot of progress has taken place across the country, but the fruits of development have not percolated down to the lowest denominator. Tribune file photograph
And yet, our democracy is deeply flawed. Size and scale do not in themselves validate a democracy. Quality is must. The voter is powerful but his power is subverted by blandishment. Money is at our democracy’s throat. It originates either legally, through licit company donations, or comes from myriad sources which go back to our natural resources such as mines, forests and land. Illegal transactions in all these yield harvests of black cash and this is disgorged on people in ‘jhopad-pattis’. It is on these that politicians descend at election time, laden with cash and hooch, to buy votes. Dr Ambedkar had spoken of how this India may well explode and blow up our constitutional edifice.
There is a quote from Mark Hanna: “There are two things that are important in politics. The first is money, and I can’t remember what the second one is”. The second thing is bullying. Certain kinds of services are co-opted near election time by candidates. These are ‘goonda’ services. ‘Goondas’ are a part of society. They are a floating resource, and their skill is intimidation. Their wherewithal, via money and narcotics, is the illegal firearm. By an estimate, there are 40 million illegal small arms floating around all over the land.
The money game
The Election Commission has to be congratulated for being fearless despite all this. Our uniformed services, headed by the police and various paramilitary agencies, need to be saluted for keeping law-breakers in check. But who is to check the collapse of true, far-sighted leadership and its degeneration into ‘leaderbaazi’?
We are seeing the blooming of an election. But there is a strange stillness in the air. Marine geographers have a word for it – the doldrums. The word signifies a stupor, in which everything is listless, stagnant and immobilised.
Dictators have been wafted up by people voting democratically. The ballot box can receive the faith of innocence and emit a genie. It can receive trust unseeingly, disgorge its betrayal unblinkingly. That receptacle, now a machine, is neutral to the ethics of its arithmetic. It is concerned only with numbers. Sections of the media have become trumpeters of what they see as the coming change. We had heard of paid news. But this is free advertising. The high noon of the free Press in India makes its own eclipse-by-ink and through the small screen. So, this best of times for democracy can become the worst of times for democracy as well.
Our economy is startling if you do not want to see its other side. If you see that side, you will see it is schizophrenic. Corporate greed has crossed all bounds, as has corporate tastelessness. We used to talk of black money as a parallel economy and so it continues to be.
Who is to ask why, in such a situation, farmers commit suicide, dispossessed rural poor migrate across the country, why infant mortality, malnutrition, childbirth-related deaths and foeticide remain stubborn ogres?
Yes, the mobile telephone is a fantastic asset. But while we make the calls, someone makes the money. 2G Spectrum is a description that arouses deep pride, and deep distrust.
Science policy opaque
And as for science, something is missing. I believe there is, and it is called a transparent and accessible science policy. Today, science policy is seen as something of a mystery, a state-secret, almost. Its nurturing is as if in an SEZ, a privileged area, gated and cordoned off. This is unfortunate because science has worked wonders for us, reduced drudgery, enhanced ergonomic ease, improved productivity and saved lives. Transparency apart, I wonder why it is that Indian science is yet to make an impact on what Nehru used to call the scientific temper. Superstition has increased exponentially. Such are the guilty consciences and insecurities of our political class that next to lawyers, the expertise most consulted by politicians is that of astrologers.
Ethical drought
Our classical and folk arts command respect worldwide. But India has the foulest reputation for the way its men in the national Capital, particularly, gawk at, grope and molest women visitors from overseas. This is another manifestation of the way huge numbers of our men are pre-dispositioned vis-à-vis the female body. If a single artist from India were to experience anything like that in Paris, New York or Berlin, all hell would break loose in India. We are going through an ethical drought, a desertification of the finer sensibilities of civilisational living. Some decades ago, there was the odd Dhirendra Brahmachari and Chandraswami as godmen. Now you find them everywhere.
One of the great blessings of our Republic is the freedom and stature of our judicial system. The independence and high calibre of our judiciary is something to be proud of although sometimes it can shock us by turning the clock back by judgments like the one on Section 377, IPC.
One area of utter darkness is our prisons. Changing their name to correctional homes is a right step but it can be self-fulfilling. Our correctional homes are bursting with under-trials, many of who may well be not guilty. I would have thought some of our VIPs who have spent spells of varying duration in these homes would have come up with innovative ideas for reform. But no, their priorities are obviously different. Under a recent amendment to the CrPC, certain categories of undertrials can be enlarged on a personal bond, ‘Can be’ is one thing, ‘have been’ is another. Why should this provision not be used?
We may be the land that has given birth to the Buddha, Mahavira and Gandhi. But let us not deceive ourselves into believing that we are a non-violent people. Every city and town has jails, ‘thanas’ and lock-ups. Torture seems to be part of an entrance ritual. This is a blot that can only go if the police establishment comes up with the leadership needed to stop it.
The issue of undertrials and of torture cannot be taken up in isolation without acknowledging a major fact. A major wedge of the eclipse over India’s noon is the debilitation over the criminal justice system. It has all but collapsed.
Attempts to preserve the legitimacy of the system, however, have produced ironic phenomena such as scapegoating. Another side-effect of panic legitimising, namely, the tendency towards social control and control of political differences through the use of criminal law is deplorable. This is the single-most misuse of an instrumentality, which makes null and void all claims for democratic dissent and institutional independence.
CBI autonomy
The result is there is the CBI where the police cannot work, the SIT where the CBI is also feared to be compromised Or, narco-analysis where routine investigation has lost its way and so the ghoul called torture and the impunity that sanction gives to agencies of state remain as they are.And too much action by reaction — too much store being placed on social latencies, as distinct from judicial discrimination. How much is an Aarushi verdict or an Afzal hanging influenced by yesterday’s, today’s and tomorrow’s possible headline?
Every village in India has heard of the RTI and, what is more, it has used RTI, sometimes frivolously, sometimes perversely but, in the main part, transformationally and cleansingly. The RTI-trained public is no longer going to take corruption as a standard feature of the administration. It will expect, prod and make the CBI an instrument of change.
It is important that the CBI establishes a partnership with the people. The CBI is clothed in opacity, then ornamented by secrecy and finally perfumed by mystery. For a short time, the CBI came under the RTI Act. The heavens did not fall during that time. But the triple wrappings of opacity, secrecy and mystery made it move to be taken out of the purview of the Act.
The CBI is about investigations into corruption and certain crimes. It is not a security or intelligence agency. And even if some aspects of its investigations need protection against disclosure, there are enough provisions under the Act’s exemption clauses to have come to the CBI’s aid. Especially when the CBI has to contend with the politically powerful, it can only gain by having an overarching partnership with the ultimate rulers in a democracy, the people.
This is where the question of its autonomy comes in. It should not be under the government, for then it would have no autonomy. But it should be accountable to the Republic. It should be under the Lok Pal, just as the Army is under the Defence Minister. The CBI Director should be a phenomenal instrument, not a self-operating robot.
On the apprehension that an autonomous CBI could become reckless, all political incumbents of office are on the same page. The fear is not unfounded but is given currency to evade the issue of autonomy. The India which could speak its mind to Indira Gandhi’s Emergency and defeat her is not going to let a police official who grows too big for his halo get away with it.
The CBI investigations are often directed against very senior government officials and politicians who wield great influence. They have to be handled judiciously and without fear or favour. This is why the CBI requires autonomy and an assurance of protection against the capriciousness of highly placed individuals. Unfortunately, successive governments have been reluctant to sanction it autonomy.
But thanks to Supreme Court interventions, the CBI has come to have a certain modicum of autonomy in operations. And yet there are anomalies like the single directive which requires government permission to conduct preliminary inquiries against officers of the rank of Joint Secretary and above, government sanction for prosecution and government permission to prefer appeals against court acquittals. Whether to settle personal scores against political adversaries or to force independent civil servants to fall in line with an unscrupulous executive, pressure does get to be exerted over the CBI. No political party is a saint in this matter. But the CBI must resist the unethical overtures. In the transition between today’s CBI and a truly autonomous CBI under a Lok Pal, the CBI should be able to say ‘no’ to politicians. The CBI has to be the nation’s inner monitor. What I am advocating is true autonomy with accountability to the Republic, not to the power centres of the day. CBI officers need to be respected, not held in awe or fear. There have been complaints of lack of integrity among officials themselves. Disciplinary action has been taken against delinquent officials, but this has had only limited impact.
Right and wrong
Our economy is startling if you do not want to see its other side. If you see that side, you will see it is schizophrenic. Corporate greed has crossed all bounds, as has corporate tastelessness. Black money is now a parallel economy.
As for science, something is missing — a transparent and accessible science policy. Today, science policy is seen as something of a mystery, a state-secret.
The RTI-trained public is no longer going to take corruption as a standard feature of the administration. It will expect, prod and make the CBI an instrument of change.
— Excerpts from a lecture titled “Eclipse at Noon: Shadows over India’s Conscience” delivered by the writer, a former Governor of West Bengal, at the 15th DP Kohli Memorial Lecture in Delhi on April 15.
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