The evil of corruption
It seems strange that according to
Indian Constitution public servants cannot be prosecuted for charges of
corruption. Even if trapped red-handed a prior sanction is needed for such an
action. That makes corruption an in-built feature of constitutional system
prevailing in the country. The Minister concerned recently said: “The menace of
corruption is an important issue that is bothering the policy makers,
administrators and the general public for a long time. The prevalence of widespread
corruption and ineffective anti-corruption interventions in this country has
led to public cynicism. The fight against corruption is not only a moral
imperative but an economic necessity for a nation aspiring to emerge as a
global player. Corruption discourages investment (foreign/domestic), harnessing
of best technologies, resources etc. that requires transparency, fair play and
is an impediment for integration with the global economy. Fighting corruption
and building good governance are of paramount importance for achieving rapid
economic development.”
During the Nehru era the
Administration was highly protected from public view, and he never tolerated it
being exposed by the media—because his own image would get affected, he the
ruler of the system.
The Nanavati Case of cold murder could be a good
example of it, that a naval officer had to be protected or else the entire
naval functioning would come out in the open. It became a landmark case in the
sense that the jury system got abolished afterwards. Nanavati was a naval
commander and had shot dead Prem Ahuja who was his wife Sylvia’s paramour.
The High Court dismissed the
earlier acquittal by a Jury Trial and convicted the accused to imprisonment
under Sec. 302 of Indian Penal Code. He was charged for culpable homicide which
could carry a term of ten-year in prison. The government reduced it to three
years. Nanavati was defence attaché to VK Krishna Menon, the Indian High
Commissioner in the
The Mundhra Scam is another good example, thanks to
the uprightness of Feroze Gandhi, the son-in-law of Nehru. Nehru wished to handle
the matter quietly since it might show the government in a poor light. Feroze
Gandhi stood up to his convictions. Nehru might have been a good soul to fight
for the Independence of India, but it seems he was not in contact with the soul
of
Indians' Money in Swiss Bank
Let us read this along with this
the latest update about Indians' Money in Swiss Bank, it amounting to seven
trillion rupees. This is the highest amount lying outside any country, from
amongst 180 countries of the world, as if
Hyper-honesty is inconsistent with bourgeois democracy
This is so because what we witness
is the lack of contact with our souls and with the soul of the country. “Vedic
spirituality loses out in times of dishonesty,” says MJ Akbar in his Times of India column dated Sunday 13 September
2009. “It is common knowledge that the best way to argue your case in
Apropos of Vedic spirituality
becoming defunct, MJ Akbar’s The Siege
Within carries my comment as follows: “It is often said that democratic
system and corruption are interlinked. Yet there are national differences. In
The insistent reminders of governance failure
About the malaise of
The problems of social regeneration
are too many and are laden with a thousand evils, quite a number of them
springing from the history of the ancient past, from the mediaeval times of
inertia and tamas, or else grafted by the colonial powers who came to loot and
not to help develop the country. We have sharp professionals and experts in
analyzing all these complexities of the national life; but hardly are there
enlightened social reformers who live with the masses and who sacrifice all of
theirs for their welfare. A silent revolution has to take place, and perhaps it
is also taking place. Even while we could go into some of these aspects
howsoever cursorily it might be, it will be quite interesting to see things in
the other half that got created in the midnight of the when history turned a
new leaf excitement and expectation, hopefully leaving behind the dullness of
time and the frustration born from human littleness and frailty.
The
But she has regrets. The consulate
general staff doesn’t even acknowledge you. They look bored and disinterested.
The woman attending on you is equally distant and expressionless. The copying
machine has conked out. The unhelpful staff tinkers with it and gives up. “Today
the chancery is battered. An ugly dark oil painting covering one wall showing a
shepherd tending to his sheep takes one back to the medieval times. The two
light brackets look pathetic—one is upside down delicately balancing an energy
saver bulb while the other has the same old glass shade that looks as ugly and
antiquated as the painting itself. The paint is peeling on the walls and the
naked wires around the ceiling look awful. Bang in the middle is an elongated
ceiling light whose plastic cover has turned brown with age and dirt. It’s no
longer in use but has not been removed. Instead two naked white neon lights are
pinned up next to it that provide the big room light. The floor is covered with
a dark brown felt carpet that must not have been cleaned in decades and must be
home to millions of dust mites.”
And here is her Indian Raj
across Atlantic. She is commenting upon Professor Sumit Ganguly telling CNN
that it may well be “in our interest to sing Musharraf’s hosannas, but it is
far from clear to me that he can undertake a series of profound reforms to
rescue the Pakistani polity from its near-decrepit state.” His “our” was pretty
confusing and, when asked, he clarified by saying that he was speaking as an American.
Yes, Anjum Niaz is right to say that “Fustians like him can cry till the cows
come home about being American, talking like Americans, and acting like
Americans, but the bottom line is that the big white guys in the corporate
media are still loath to think of desis [of either brand] as Americans.”
Mumbai massacre revisited
Irfan Husain [irfan.husain@gmail.com] again of the
Karachi Dawn has a mature assessment of the extremism that is killing the
psyche of the world. In his Saturday column dated 4 July 2009 he scripts the
following heart-rending tale, and the curse that has fallen on mankind. “All
too often, natural disasters and human atrocities make only a fleeting
impression. Soon, one particular crisis is overtaken by another, and
relentlessly, the news cycle moves on. We were shown clips from CCTV cameras
that had captured the Mumbai massacre. Casually the killers shot everybody who moved.
At the VT railway station, where 52 people died, they massacred a family. When
I wrote a couple of columns after the atrocity last year, expressing sympathy for
the victims and condemning the killers and those behind them in Pakistan, I got
a flood of angry emails, demanding to know the proof that linked the terrorists
to Pakistan. The most chilling part of the documentary was the constant voice
contact between the terrorists and their handlers. Talking on cell phones, the
controllers urged on their pawns in Punjabi and Urdu, interspersed with the odd
English words and phrases. They certainly did not sound like graduates of a
madressah. Rather, they were professionals doing a job, instructing the young
terrorists to kill as many people as possible; urging them to move from one
target to another; and repeating that they must not allow themselves to be
captured. Soon after his arrest, Ajmal Kasab was questioned by the police. He
said his father had explained that the money would lift the family out of
poverty, and pay for his sisters’ weddings. How many more young men are being
sold to terror outfits across
Is
And this is a poser from Jawed
Naqvi [jawednaqvi@gmail.com] again of
the Dawn Monday, 14 September 2009: “Gen
Hossain Mohammed Ershad, the first host of Saarc in 1985, said bluntly in a TV
documentary sponsored by India’s foreign ministry that one of the main reasons
for creating the grouping was that India’s smaller neighbours were ‘allergic’
to the big neighbour. ‘So we decided to bring everyone together to deal with
the problem.’ Former US Senator and ex-ambassador to New Delhi Daniel Patrick
Moynihan proclaimed that
Jawed Naqvi continues: “I have yet
to come across a serious, objective discussion in any of the newspapers why
The important aspect is, there are
well-educated broad-minded noble souls in the subcontinent and the mistake lies
in mixing them up with the militant and retrograde individuals or groups that
are causing the havoc everywhere. If there is a mechanism by which this
‘progressive’ constituent can come into play, then many if not most of the
problems will just disappear like thin vapours. There could be cultural
exchanges; there could be freer communication, could be easy flow of trade and
commerce in the entire region as a single unit, even with the removal of
export-import duties. Media, in spite of the digital age, have remained aloof
from each other. Educational institutions can be opened out for each others’
students, and academic and professional members be encouraged meeting in order
to promote the respective fields. Of course, this does not mean that there are
not going to be checks against infiltration of anti-social elements. This may
look too idealistic, but is there any other way out? The problems cannot be
solved at the political level, cannot be solved at the military level, cannot
be solved by sticking to formalized religious dogmatism, cannot be solved by
importing western ideologies or systems, though all of them can to some degree
come to help. If there is a kind of oneness deep in the entire subcontinent,
then one has to discover the roots of it and nourish the growth on their
vigorous possibilities. There is certainly a truth in what Abraham Maslow had
said: "If you only have a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a
nail." If one sees each a soul’s possibility, then there can be happy
concordances of their being in harmonious relationship, individually and
collectively. The hope is that this will happen, and if it happens sooner than
later much of the human suffering we are experiencing today will be diminished.
Perhaps the method is well illustrated by the speech Mullah Nasruddin did not
deliver.
A speech that was not delivered
Mullah Nasruddin was a well known
and well respected figure who could impart gems of knowledge in a simple
language which a common man could easily grasp. It was about seven hundred
years ago Nasruddin was born in a small village who became famous with his
tales of wisdom. “The themes in the tales have become part of the folklore of a
number of nations and express the national imaginations of a variety of
cultures. The tales (like Aesop's fables) deal with concepts that have a
certain timelessness. They purvey a pithy folk wisdom that triumphs over all
trials and tribulations. The oldest manuscript of Nasruddin was found in 1571.”
Once, Nasruddin was invited to
address a gathering in a small town. But he was not very keen to do that.
However, after a lot of persuasion he agreed. He stood on the platform and
asked the audience if they knew what he was going to speak about. When the
answer came “No”, Nasruddin told them that he had no desire to speak to those who
don’t even know what he was going to speak. Saying so, he immediately left the
place. By now the people had grown wise and the next time when he was persuaded
to speak and when he had posed the same question, all said, “Yes”. But
Nasruddin was ready with his answer. “If they already knew what he was going to
speak,” he said, “then there was no necessity for him to speak.” And he left
the place without a moment’s pause. People felt belittled, but they invited him
the third time. Now half the audience said “Yes” and the other half “No”. The
Mullah was quick to respond by saying that, in that case, the half which knew
could explain to the other half which didn’t. Solution to the puzzle of the
subcontinental frustration and malaise perhaps lies in the speech that was not delivered.
It can be compellingly said that
there is a subcontinental approach towards life distinct from the western
approach. The question is if it can be recovered and enriched.
About a bag of gold
Here is a small anecdote about
Nasruddin when he was a small boy, a conversation with his father.
Nasruddin, my son, get up early in
the mornings.
Why father?
It is a good habit. Why, once I
rose at dawn and went for a walk. I found on the road a sack of gold.
How did you know it was not lost
the previous night?
That is not the point. In any case,
it had not been there the night before. I noticed that.
Then it isn't lucky for everyone to
get up early. The man who lost the gold must have been up earlier than you.
There is a story related with
Tagore when he was walking on a road in
And there is a more touching
illustration. Once, a pilgrim was on his way to Badrinath. On the way he felt
exhausted and also hungry. At a little distance he saw an old woman-pilgrim
having her meals. He approached her for food. She gladly shared whatever she
had with him. He felt satisfied and started walking. After walking a short
distance he came back again to her, saying “You have been very kind to give me
food. But I’m not sure if anyone will help me as I shall proceed on the journey.
Will you please give me some food to carry with me?” She didn’t have any. But
she pulled out a gold bangle from her hand and gave it to him. He was happy.
After walking quite a distance he came back once more to her and pleaded, “Please
take this bangle back. No, this bangle is of no use. Please give me that which
made you give me your ornament.”
Yes, that is the subcontinental
psyche and it is that which we must first recover. We must recover it, and
enrich it—because it is not a frozen psyche. There are hopeful signs and
perhaps these will become more and more distinct, more and more dynamic in our
life. Perhaps it is a question of time, and things will happen. Our part lies
in seeing these happen in a less painful and less tortuous way. The humanity in
us must awake to these indicators and take possession of us to mould our
destiny, our future.
Richness of the subcontinental psyche
There is that kind of wealth in
Another good news is that in the
A silent revolution but the government apathy
Jagdev Singh of Kalalwala village,
who chose growing other than traditional crops, has been facing the problem of
marketing his produce.
Jagdev went for organic farming in
six acres and planted rare variety of rose—Damask. Being highly perishable, the
flower can be used for extracting ark (distilled water) or rose oil only. He
had planted 21 quintals of rose buds in 2001.
He was getting good yield of
flowers, 15 quintals from an acre, but could extract only a litre of oil from entire
produce. The state government’s apathy in respect of marketing the produce has
distressed him.
Claiming the oil to be very
expensive, he said, “There is no fixed international price for it. But
customers abroad, tell THAT its price ranges between Rs 1.5-1.8
million a litre.”
Jagdev said, “The soil and climate
here are suitable for this crop and it does not need intensive care. But in the
absence of marketing, it is good for nothing.”
He said, “We have set up oil
extracting unit but marketing is the main problem. Till now, we could sell only
four bottles to an NRI from
“We have been trying to sell it via
the Internet but people hardly show interest. Even if someone is ready to buy
the oil, he offers very low price,” he added.
There are only few farmers having
this variety of rose in the state.
“Except motivating us for taking up
crop diversification, no department of the state government has come forward to
lend a helping hand,” he said, adding if the situation did not change he would
be forced to uproot the whole crop.
But here is something more
encouraging. The news comes from the BBC. An Indian civil servant, SM Raju, has
come up with a novel way of providing employment to millions of poor in the
eastern state of