“Statues of liberty” – Shobhaa De

Shobhaa De

I swear I am not joking. After a vroom vroom visit to Mayaland to watch India’s virgin Formula One at the world-class Buddh International Circuit (BIC), I am ready to personally carve a brand new, larger-than-lifesize statue of Mayawati and erect it at a prominent junction in Mumbai. That lady is something else!

Ms Mayawati is my babe-of-the-moment. After pulling off that coup (F1), Ms Mayawati’s stock has zoomed at a speed faster than Sebastian Vettel’s mean machine could rev up. Suddenly, all those snotty F1 fans from Delhi, Mumbai and other cities have had to suck in their breaths and say, “Wow! How did she do it? How?” Mind you, no matter who else was involved (yes, Shri Jaiprakash Gaur, we know it’s you!), it was Ms Mayawati who walked away with all the credit. And hello! Nobody wants to get into the nitty-gritty. A few legal eagles, in on the myriad contracts, whispered not everything was all that kosher and that there were several wheels within wheels and deals within deals, with a whole lot of “black in the lentils”. Does anybody really care? Naah! With stories galore about Ms Mayawati’s family members allegedly getting pretty juicy prime cuts on virtually every brick and bag of cement used, nobody blinked or minded. The reaction has been cool and blasé. “Let them also make money, yaar. But at least India delivered big time for a change. Look at what happened with Commonwealth Games. Paisa khaaya aur kuch bhi nahin kiya. It was such a disgrace.” Point.

We are very sweet and considerate that way. We expect our leaders to keep their family members khush. It’s a given. If Asif Ali Zardari was known in Pakistan as Mr 10 Per Cent, Ms Mayawati’s gang falls into the Messrs 30 Per Cent. Janey do. At least Ms Mayawati fixed the Doubting Thomases who had predicted she’d fall flat on her face with the F1. Advantage Behenji. As anybody who made a pit stop at the Buddh Circuit will readily confirm, this was an absolute coup. And the response (even from sceptics) has been an unconditional thumbs up. Let’s not get ethics and values into the picture. Nor the staggering cost of getting the track and infrastructure off the ground. Point is, Buddh took fans by surprise. But more importantly, it took the motor-racing world’s breath away.
The most interesting aspect of attending the historic Indian F1 was the long drive to the distant venue. A drive that took people past the famous `3,000 crore park with “those” statues that have generated so much criticism and scorn. I passed the park four times. At one point our car was stuck right opposite the notorious elephants, lining the gigantic Dalit Prerna Hall. The first reaction to the elephants and the imposing Stupa-style structure was very positive. The design was pleasing, aesthetic and wonderfully conceived. What had I expected? I’ll be candid and tell you — I had imagined the much-discussed park to be a totally hideous complex crammed with ugly statues. Instead, what I saw was a magnificent ground dotted with handsome monuments made out of local stone and built in a holistic style devoid of any ostentation. Ms Mayawati certainly got this right, as well! As to why she is “wasting” so much money on those statues. Because she is smart! She has vision. What she has cleverly invested in (the park) reflects the aspirations and hopes of dalits. It’s a beautiful space dalits can finally call their own. A space they have never had. Never! A space that provides a strong sense of identity… that they can feel proud of. Intuitively and instinctively, Ms Mayawati must have known that if she wants to leave behind a worthwhile, memorable legacy for future generations to enjoy, it had to be on this scale and on these terms. Good for her.

When one looks around India (a country obsessed by symbols of power in the form of statues), whose figures do we see? Here’s a rough checklist: topping it is, of course, Mahatma Gandhi. Followed by Jawaharlal Nehru, Netaji, Shivaji and the odd Maharaja. You may find a Jhansi Ki Rani, Lal Bahadur Shastri, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Rabindranath Tagore and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. B.R. Ambedkar stands tall in more and more cities these days. Then on to countless Indira and Rajiv Gandhi representations. Nearly every important, modern landmark is named after one or the other member of the Gandhi family — the mother, son or grandfather. Airports and other public buildings are all taken by the trio. What about Mumbai’s Rajiv Gandhi Sea Link, which should have legitimately been named after Ambedkar, who was born in Worli, where it is located… but wasn’t? What about the acres and acres of land in Delhi devoted to various “sthals”? How come nobody finds all of this “wasteful, extravagant, meaningless”?

Ms Mayawati is no fool. It is all about those numbers. She is looking ahead at the big picture, and what she’s seeing is obviously good. She is not waiting for anyone to erect her statues… she’s doing the job herself. She is shrewd enough to realise the power of the statue-politics. The more you erect, the stronger the positioning. Why wait till you are dead and gone for followers to get those statues up?

Ms Mayawati is assiduously building her own personality cult. Let’s just hope her statues don’t suffer the same fate as those of others who did the same. Till then, let her bask in her international fame, posing with the handsome and young F1 champions. She’s finally in the fast track… who can stop her now?

Readers can send feedback to http://www.shobhaade.blogspot.com

Ambedkar: A Radical Economist

A new resonance In his views on crucial issues pertaining to economic development, Dr. B.R. Ambedkar comes across as a radical economist who would have staunchly opposed the neoliberal reforms being carried out in India since the 1990s. VENKATESH ATHREYA DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR was among the most outstanding intellectuals of India in the 20th century in the best sense of the word. Paul Baran, an eminent Marxist economist, had made a distinction in one of his essays between an “intellect worker” and an intellectual. The former, according to him, is one who uses his intellect for making a living whereas the latter is one who uses it for critical analysis and social transformation. Dr. Ambedkar fits Baran’s definition of an intellectual very well. Dr. Ambedkar is also an outstanding example of what Antonio Gramsci called an organic intellectual, that is, one who represents and articulates the interests of an entire social class. While Dr. Ambedkar is justly famous for being the architect of India’s Constitution and for being a doughty champion of the interests of the Scheduled Castes, his views on a number of crucial issues pertaining to economic development are not so well known. Dr. Ambedkar was a strong proponent of land reforms and of a prominent role for the state in economic development. He recognised the inequities in an unfettered capitalist economy. His views on these issues are found scattered in several writings; of these the most important ones are his essay, “Small Holdings in India and Their Remedies” and an article, “States and Minorities”. In these writings, Dr. Ambedkar elaborates his views on land reforms and on the kind of economic order that is best suited to the needs of the people. Dr. Ambedkar stresses the need for thoroughgoing land reforms, noting that smallness or largeness of an agricultural holding is not determined by its physical extent alone but by the intensity of cultivation as reflected in the amounts of productive investment made on the land and the amounts of all other inputs used, including labour. He also stresses the need for industrialisation so as to move surplus labour from agriculture to other productive occupations, accompanied by large capital investments in agriculture to raise yields. He sees an extremely important role for the state in such transformation of agriculture and advocates the nationalisation of land and the leasing out of land to groups of cultivators, who are to be encouraged to form cooperatives in order to promote agriculture. Intervening in a discussion in the Bombay Legislative Council on October 10, 1927, Dr. Ambedkar argued that the solution to the agrarian question “lies not in increasing the size of farms, but in having intensive cultivation that is employing more capital and more labour on the farms such as we have.” (These and all subsequent quotations are taken from the collection of Dr. Ambedkar’s writings, published by the Government of Maharashtra in 1979). Further on, he says: “The better method is to introduce cooperative agriculture and to compel owners of small strips to join in cultivation.” During the process of framing the Constitution of the Republic of India, Dr. Ambedkar proposed to include certain provisions on fundamental rights, specifically a clause to the effect that the state shall provide protection against economic exploitation. Among other things, this clause proposed that: * Key industries shall be owned and run by the state; * Basic but non-key industries shall be owned by the state and run by the state or by corporations established by it; * Agriculture shall be a state industry, and be organised by the state taking over all land and letting it out for cultivation in suitable standard sizes to residents of villages; these shall be cultivated as collective farms by groups of families. As part of his proposals, Dr. Ambedkar provided detailed explanatory notes on the measures to protect the citizen against economic exploitation. He stated: “The main purpose behind the clause is to put an obligation on the state to plan the economic life of the people on lines which would lead to highest point of productivity without closing every avenue to private enterprise, and also provide for the equitable distribution of wealth. The plan set out in the clause proposes state ownership in agriculture with a collectivised method of cultivation and a modified form of state socialism in the field of industry. It places squarely on the shoulders of the state the obligation to supply the capital necessary for agriculture as well as for industry.” Dr. Ambedkar recognises the importance of insurance in providing the state with “the resources necessary for financing its economic planning, in the absence of which it would have to resort to borrowing from the money market at high rates of interest” and proposes the nationalisation of insurance. He categorically stated: “State socialism is essential for the rapid industrialisation of India. Private enterprise cannot do it and if it did, it would produce those inequalities of wealth which private capitalism has produced in Europe and which should be a warning to Indians.” ANTICIPATING criticism against his proposals that they went too far, Dr.. Ambedkar argues that political democracy implied that “the individual should not be required to relinquish any of his constitutional rights as a condition precedent to the receipt of a privilege” and that “the state shall not delegate powers to private persons to govern others”. He points out that “the system of social economy based on private enterprise and pursuit of personal gain violates these requirements”. Responding to the libertarian argument that where the state refrains from intervention in private affairs – economic and social – the residue is liberty, Dr. Ambedkar says: “It is true that where the state refrains from intervention what remains is liberty. To whom and for whom is this liberty? Obviously this liberty is liberty to the landlords to increase rents, for capitalists to increase hours of work and reduce rate of wages.” Further, he says: “In an economic system employing armies of workers, producing goods en masse at regular intervals, someone must make rules so that workers will work and the wheels of industry run on. If the state does not do it, the private employer will. In other words, what is called liberty from the control of the state is another name for the dictatorship of the private employer.” India’s experience with neoliberal reforms since 1990 shows that Dr. Ambedkar’s apprehensions regarding the implications of the unfettered operation of monopoly capital, both domestic and foreign, were far from misplaced. As has been documented and written about extensively, during this period of neoliberal reforms, there has been no breakthrough in the rate of economic growth. At the same time, there has been a distinct slowing down of the rate of growth of employment and practically no decline in the proportion of people below the poverty line. Agriculture has been in a crisis for some time now and the rate of growth of industry has also been declining for several years now. At the same time, despite a slower growth of foodgrains output, the government is saddled with huge excess stocks, which it seeks to sell abroad or to domestic private trade at very low prices. The government and its economists, instead of recognising that the crisis is the product in large part of the policies of liberalisation, privatisation and globalisation, propose a set of so-called second-generation reforms. At the centre of these reforms is the complete elimination of employment security. The war cry of the liberalisers is: “Away with all controls and the state, and let the market rule.” In this context, one cannot but recall Dr. Ambedkar’s words that liberty from state control is another name for the dictatorship of the private employer. Whether on labour reforms or on agrarian policy or on the question of the insurance sector or the role of the public sector in the context of development, Dr. Ambedkar’s views are in direct opposition to those of neoliberal policies. It is indeed a pity that self-styled leaders of Dalit movements, who invoke Dr. Ambedkar’s name day in and day out, do not examine carefully his views on key issues of economic policy and their contemporary relevance for the struggles of the oppressed. One may not expect much from those Dalit-based political forces which think nothing of cohabiting with the Sangh Parivar, but even many sections of the Dalit movement which proclaim a radical stance on social (and sometimes economic) issues do not raise the question of land or of the role of the state in the sharp manner in which Dr. Ambedkar does. Dr. Venkatesh Athreya is Professor and Head of the Department of Economics, Bharathidasan University, Tiruchi. Courtesy: http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl1915/19151150.htm Volume 19 – Issue 15, July 20 – August 02, 2002

Gandhian lookalike good for the messiah business, bad for democracy

Manan Vatsyayana/AFP/Getty Images

Anti-corruption activist Anna Hazare walks away from the stage on the 11th day of his hunger strike at Ram Lila grounds in New Delhi on August 26, 2011.

Araminta Wordsworth  Aug 26, 2011 – 5:43 PM ET

Full Comment’s Araminta Wordsworth brings you a daily round-up of quality punditry from across the globe. Today: Few people would disagree with the need to root out corruption in modern India. That’s why Anna Hazare’s campaign has struck such a chord across the world’s largest democracy.

The Hindu conservative Anna Hazare, who’s often compared with the liberation hero Mahatma Gandhi, has said he will fast until death unless the government adopts his suggestions in toto. Enthusiastic crowds have rallied around the 74-year-old, chanting, “Anna is India, India is Anna.”

Now cooler heads are making their views know — they fear democracy is being washed away by a messianic cult-like leader.

Hazare’s proposals to end corruption by setting up an independent agency — Lokpal — would heap another layer of bureaucracy on a country already tied up in red tape, they argue. These people would be unelected and appointed by Hazare and his high-caste associates, a completely undemocratic process. At Northern Voices Online, Gail Omvedt asks,

Why are such masses of people following Anna Hazare, when it is now clear that his Lokpal bill is an authoritarian, centralized and undemocratically pushed proposal?

The Lokpal Bill itself is very authoritarian, in putting non-elected people of high class-caste background over elected officials and government bureaucrats (but not, as people have noted, over corporations!). “Pal” means “guardian,” and in many ways the proposal recalls Plato’s Guardians —The philosopher-kings who would rule the State.

The movement wants to keep the state, in an even more centralized form, but replace its current rulers with a new set.

An editorial in The Hindu picks up on the authoritarian nature of Hazare’s proposals:

While his means may be Gandhian, Anna Hazare’s demands are certainly not. Contrary to Gandhiji’s ideas about the decentralization of power, the Jan Lokpal Bill is a draconian, anti-corruption law, in which a panel of carefully chosen people will administer a giant bureaucracy, with thousands of employees, with the power to police everybody from the Prime Minister, the judiciary, members of Parliament, and all of the bureaucracy, down to the lowest government official. The Lokpal will have the powers of investigation, surveillance, and prosecution. Except for the fact that it won’t have its own prisons, it will function as an independent administration, meant to counter the bloated, unaccountable, corrupt one that we already have. Two oligarchies, instead of just one.

The British news magazine The Economist is worried by what it sees as Hazare’s messianic tendencies:

To craft a campaign against corruption into a movement around a single figure is faintly troubling. The claim that “Anna is India, India is Anna” sounds close to cult-speak. As it happens, the Supreme Court, the auditor-general, a panoply of civil activists and a more assertive press have all helped to hold the corrupt to account this year. Several powerful figures have been jailed.

Other doubts exist about Mr Hazare. Some Muslim leaders are suspicious of the nationalist, and what they see as at times Hindu-dominated, tone and imagery of his campaign. Low-caste Dalits … also question his stand …

The most revered Dalit leader, the late B.R. Ambedkar, chief draftsman of India’s constitution, has been much quoted this week for an early warning about the “grammar of anarchy,” by which he meant using Gandhi-style fasts to impose your will on a democratic government. Hunger strikes, a form of blackmail, might have been justified against the British, but not against elected leaders.

Descendants of Gandhi himself agree, reports Anjana Pasricha for the Voice of America:

Gandhi’s great grandson, Tushar Gandhi, says there are crucial differences in the way the two leaders have used fasting as an instrument of protest. Mahatma Gandhi is also known in India as “bapu” or father.

“With Anna it is more of an attempt to browbeat the government into absolute surrender and submission. It definitely is an attempt to arm twist.,” Gandhi said. “With Bapu it was in his own words he said that my fast is an act of love to bring a friend back on the straight and narrow and not an attempt to vanquish an enemy.”

In an opinion piece in The Hindu, Prabhat Patnaik points out Hazare has become increasingly hardline as his campaign gathered steam:

[His demands have moved] from “we have a democratic right to protest and place our views in public,” which is an unexceptionable proposition, to “Anna will keep fasting until his bill is adopted or amended with his permission,” which amounts to holding a gun to the head of the [government], and by implication of Parliament, and dictating that the bill it has produced must be passed, or else mayhem will follow.

The government’s flip-flops are indicative of incompetence; the Anna group’s flip-flops arise because of the compulsions of a particular style of politics on which it is embarked, which can be called “messianism” and which is fundamentally anti-democratic. The fact that it is striking a chord among the people, if at all it is (one cannot entirely trust the media on this), should be a source of serious concern, for it underscores the pre-modernity of our society and the shallowness of the roots of our democracy.

National Post

compiled by Araminta Wordsworth
awordsworth@nationalpost.com

Posted in: Full Comment, World Politics  Tags: Araminta Wordsworth, Full Comment Abroad, corruption, India, democracy, Anna Hazare, messianism, Mahatma Gandhi, Lokpal Bill

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