THE INDIA CONTEST

Bentley at the Red Light: Old Poverty, New Wealth

For the first time, the electorate faces a clear ideological choice. The Congress is the architect of liberalisation that unleashed the animal spirits of competition and innovation in the economy. The ensuing economic boom peaked in 2004; in the following decade, the economy grew at an average of 8% a year. This is evident as many sectors, including telecom, automobiles, pharmaceuticals and IT, became globally competitive.

Somewhere down the line, this growth story came up against some cruel facts: a large population afflicted by poverty and illiteracy, high malnutrition and abysmal public health. In stark contrast, world-class private schools, private hospitals, private estates, private planes, private roads and private banks blossomed.
There was always disparity, but never in your face. The pathetic picture of a car worth over a crore, waiting at a red light, besieged by begging children, is a new phenomenon. There have always been beggars, never Bentleys and Jaguars. Over the years, the rich became richer. This was not the outcome that Manmohan Singh, as finance minister, envisioned in 1991.

A year later, the BJP changed the debate with its sacking of the Babri Masjid. Suddenly, the debate was about Hindutva and the Ram temple. In the tumultuous decade that followed, the opened economy was hijacked by crony capitalists and middlemen. Mistaking this to be genuine reforms, the NDA government launched a highvoltage “India Shining” campaign. They even called an early election, hoping to cash in. In the event, a Congress-led coalition came to power in 2004 on an inclusive growth manifesto and was reelected in 2009.

Now, Narendra Modi, the new RSS mascot, has turned the BJP around to make it a US-style Republican party, stalling reforms in the legislature, promoting laissez faire and protectionist policies in the same breath, railing against government welfare spending, espousing a hardline but whimsical foreign policy. He speaks to an urban, upper-middle class audience and believes there are enough votes there to see him through.
Modi and his supporters believe he can form a government in 2014. It’s hard to believe, though, that his agenda of gated communities, luxury cars and conspicuous consumption will garner votes from the urban and rural poor, Dalits, tribals and Muslims who form the bulk of the young population. Meanwhile, the Congress has again arrayed itself in support of the excluded. More than his mother, Sonia Gandhi, who nudged the government into adopting a welfare-based legislative agenda, Rahul Gandhi is vocal about the skewed priorities.

The Indian business elite is up in arms against the Congress welfare agenda. They say India can’t afford it; they demand business-friendly policies that encourage growth, never mind the disparity. Senior ministers in the government are at pains to point out an inclusive agenda is not anti-growth and point to the national manufacturing policy that aims, in the next 10 years, to boost the share of manufacturing to 25% from 15% and, in the process, to create 100 million jobs.

In the face of heightened disparity, no political party can embrace trickledown economics and expect to form a government. Hence, the Congress lays emphasis on welfare along with its track record of growth. Modi’s noisy campaign, on the other hand, is based on disputable claims about growth and governance; the underlying message, however, is an unmistakable one of Hindu chauvinism.

Modi hopes to ascend on many contradictory platforms: authoritarian capitalism, muscular nationalism as a subliminal plank against minorities. In voting the Congress back in 2004 and again in 2009, the electorate turned its back on the BJP’s growth hype. The question now is whether voters will buy Modi’s high-voltage pitch. The idea behind the multilayered campaign is to fudge his track record that is sullied by allegations of his involvement in the 2002 Gujarat riots.

These charges have proved difficult to shake. Modi’s controversial role in the riots also attracted global concern. Major western countries instituted a diplomatic boycott; the US revoked his travel visa and is yet to restore it. Will the US presidential-style campaign help overcome the stain of 2002?

This article appeared in The Economic Times, November 5, 2013.

The India Contest

A new age of unreason

On a television talk show recently in which I was a participant, the question posed was “Have opposition politicians misunderstood the nature of lobbying?” The moderator went straight for the jugular, asking the BJP spokesman to defend the assertion of a senior leader of his party, who had asserted in Parliament that lobbying is illegal in India.

The anchor said his due diligence had satisfied him that lobbying is not illegal. Somewhat disingenuously and with the brash confidence of a man who knows little, the BJP participant contradicted him, saying there is no law that makes lobbying legal. To which the anchor responded: laws make things illegal, not legal. The BJP man was having none of it. “Why are you standing up for a corrupt company like Walmart?” he asked the journalist. “How can the spokesman of a leading political party accuse an international firm of corruption on prime time national TV?” I interjected. The BJP stalwart was undeterred and continued his rant, insisting lobbying is illegal and no different from corruption. It was plain that he knew very little about business processes and public policy apart from a few stray facts he may have picked up from newspapers.

Later, Delhi’s middle classes led by Left-leaning student unions took to the streets to protest the rape of a woman on a bus in the capital. Their demand was for the police chief, the chief minister and the Union home minister to resign. Granted, the police in Delhi are not very high on anyone’s security assurance list, and that one may have reservations about the Congress governments in the state of Delhi and at the Centre. But, the heinous crime was committed by violent psychopaths, like the shooter in Newtown, Connecticut. I didn’t hear any calls for Obama’s head or of the state governor or police chief. Crimes are mostly dealt with in retrospect, except in the Tom Cruise sci-fi film, Minority Report, which is about seers gifted with the ability to look into the future and prevent crime.

Crimes are committed the world over and sometimes law enforcement agencies are able to anticipate and prevent them. Mostly, they simply happen and police hunt down the perpetrators and turn them over to the criminal justice system for prosecution and, if proved guilty, punishment.

Then there’s the massive media hype about Narendra Modi winning a third term in Gujarat. The truth is he won by a smaller margin than five years ago; even his vote share has declined. Yet the talking heads and anchors of cable television and newspaper reporters would have us believe he will be the next prime minister of India. This is an individual who refuses to apologise for the riots that killed thousands in Gujarat when he was chief minister as well as home minister. While he has never been able to shake off allegations that he connived with mass violence, there’s no doubt he should be held responsible because he was the man in charge.

Every time this issue is raised in public, his supporters who are few but loud, raise the issue of the 1984 anti-Sikh riots in Delhi. Both incidents, 18 years apart, involved a lapse of governance leading to wanton loss of life and are condemnable. Except in the Gujarat case, the riots were followed by the systematic boycott of victims which pushed them into ghettos, a situation that persists to this day. Modi’s triumphalism and communalism is shameless and unapologetic as evident by his reference to Congress member Ahmed Patel as Ahmed mian.

A common thread runs through these narratives: lack of reasoned discourse. Between the media, opposition politicians and sundry activists outraged by some atrocity or corruption, debate has transformed into noise in which prejudice is the norm. The talking heads of television, pundits of print and those who attend exclusive parties in the capital, talk at each other without the slightest deference to reality. Did Walmart bribe government officials? Was Sheila Dikshit asleep when the heinous rape took place? Will Modi be the next prime minister? These are the questions being debated in public. Walmart may well have indulged in corrupt practices; there is an internal inquiry and some executives of the company have been suspended. The Delhi chief minister reacted with powers under her control — and that excludes the Delhi police — by scrubbing the licence of the operator on whose bus the woman was raped. And Modi actually lost ground in Gujarat; he still has a brute majority but his national ambitions have dimmed.

The Age of Unreason is upon us. People who would normally know better, including businessmen, members of the academy, activists, journalists and other groups which influence public opinion, seem to have lost their bearings. Pursuing their own limited agendas, they have put a crimp on Indian modernisation. As a concerned Indian citizen, “J’Accuse”, in the words of French writer Emile Zola. But while Zola complained about anti-Semitism in France, my complaint is about anti-Congressism. It seems to me that the entire political debate in India is focused on this grand old party. Those who hate it have forums to express themselves; those who are voiceless seem to vote for it, even in Gujarat.

The Age of Unreason is what 21st century’s second decade will be called in India. Everyone shouts and postures. And judgment seems to have fled to brutish beasts.

This article appeared in Education world magazine in January 2013 issue.

A new age of unreason

Advocacy of interest or corporate bribery?

"...to secure the public interest, it is vital that the government shine a light on the power brokerages and influences peddlers in Delhi and other states."

Though the BJP's noisemakers may not appreciate it, through their hysterical outbursts against Wal-Mart, they may have unwittingly sponsored a major reform in pursuit of good governance. In its misbegotten campaign against the American firm, the BJP threatened to disrupt Parliament again, as it has done repeatedly for the past nine years. This prompted Parliamentary Affairs minister Kamal Nath to agree to a public inquiry into the company’s lobbying activities in India. Though a spectacularly ignorant BJP spokesman suggested that the minister’s assent to an inquiry proved their point, the truth is that the UPA’s quick response saved the day and it appears that much overdue legislation will now be enacted.

The BJP’s empty-vessel strategy to corner the government on lobbying by Wal-Mart boomeranged in Parliament because of Mr Nath’s finesse. Reports say the government will appoint a retired judge to conduct the inquiry. Most likely, the exercise will stretch out and will hold no more sensation value; the BJP will find some other dubious platform from which to rant against the UPA government. As such, the inquiry will join the long list of commissions that have provided not much more than sinecures for superannuated law officers.

On the other hand, the government could actually use the inquiry to clean up the murk that surrounds lobbying in India. To secure the public interest, it is vital that the government shine a light on power brokerages and influence peddlers in Delhi and in the various states.

A thoughtful judge at the helm of the inquiry might recommend the establishment of a Parliamentary registry that provides credentials to lobbyists, individual as well as firms. In accepting such credentials, lobbyists would be required to disclose their clients and fees received. The registry could go a step further and demand from various government ministries, departments and agencies periodic reports on any contacts they may have had with lobbyists.

Recommendations of this nature could bring much needed transparency to the conduct of public affairs; you won’t have a BJP president Bangaru Laxman accepting bribes or a DMK minister A Raja playing fast and loose with the allocation of telecom spectrum. A whole horde of middlemen, the kind you see at power lunches in The Taj or cocktail parties at The Oberoi, will stand exposed. The business of lobbying could become professional and cleansed of the stain of corruption.

Lobbying is a time-honored practice that dates at least as far back as the signing of the Magna Carta in 13th-century England, from whence sprang the right of association and the right to petition authority, the cornerstones of the lobbying profession.

Closer to home and to the age, lobbying has had many beneficial outcomes. These include campaigns for universal primary education, against sex trafficking, to lower taxes on toiletries and cosmetics, to amend laws governing the business of financial services, courier firms and cable operators, among others. They have been successful and have benefited the public interest as much as the interests of those who sponsored them.

This article appeared in Hindustan Times on December 16, 2012.

Advocacy of interest or corporate bribery?

Asleep at The Wheel?

He drank heavily in his prime and still enjoys a nightly whiskey or two at 74. India's leader takes painkillers for his knees (which were replaced due to arthritis) and has trouble with his bladder, liver and his one remaining kidney. A taste for fried food and fatty sweets plays havoc with his cholesterol. He takes a three-hour snooze every afternoon on doctor's orders and is given to interminable silences, indecipherable ramblings and, not infrequently, falling asleep in meetings.

Atal Behari Vajpayee, then, would be an unusual candidate to control a nuclear arsenal. But for four years the Indian Prime Minister's grandfatherly hands have held the subcontinent back from tumbling into war. Despite the fact that he heads the pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), a constituency stuffed with extremists, Vajpayee has ambitiously pursued peace with neighbor and rival Pakistan, even traveling to the Pakistani cultural capital of Lahore in 1999, vainly hoping to bury the bloody animus of the past and start an era of good feelings.

With 1 million soldiers facing each other at high alert on the India-Pakistan border, those days seem long ago. At the same dangerous time, Vajpayee's stewardship is looking less and less comforting. The frail bachelor seems shaky and lost, less an aging sage than an ordinary old man. He forgets names, even of longtime colleague and current Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh, and during several recent meetings he appeared confused and inattentive. After a meeting with a Western Foreign Minister, his appearance was described by one attending diplomat as "half dead." At a rare press conference last month in Srinagar, the Prime Minister tottered to the podium. Indian TV crews are asked to film him from the waist up to avoid showing his shuffling gait to find he had trouble understanding questions, repeatedly relying on whispered prompts from Home Minister Lal Krishna Advani. Even then Vajpayee stumbled over his replies. "He is very alert when he is functional," says one BJP worker. "But there are very few hours like that." Adds one Western diplomat: "We have a lot of conversations about his health. Some of his mannerisms come down to his personal style. But some of it is definitely spacey stuff."

While no one questions that key decisions on national security and foreign policy are still made by Vajpayee, the focus is now turning to the two men behind the throne: Vajpayee's low-key National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra, and Vajpayee's hard-line BJP colleague of 50 years, 72-year-old Advani. The consensus among observers and diplomats is that the hawkish Advani is preparing to succeed Vajpayee at the next national elections due by late 2004. "There is no doubt he is the Prime Minister in waiting," remarks a diplomat.

In the meantime, Vajpayee has undergone a sudden conversion from peacemaker to warmonger primarily in response to political pressures. This year's standoff on the border shows the dovish Prime Minister has accepted the argument that war or the threat of it works. In comments that set off alarm bells around the world, Vajpayee last month spoke twice of an impending "decisive battle" against India's "enemy." Although he has repeatedly said that he does not want war, the Prime Minister has sound strategic reasons for ratcheting up the rhetoric. Since Sept. 11, he has found the international community more sympathetic to the idea of India waging its own war on terror against jihadis in the contended state of Jammu and Kashmir, where many of them have been inserted by Pakistan. And it plays well for India to keep the pot boiling: New Delhi can claim a victim's solidarity with the U.S., avoid addressing the awkward issue of its heavy-handed rule in Muslim-dominated Kashmir and just possibly get Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf to actually shut down the jihadi industry on his territory, ending what India calls a "proxy war."

Last week, Musharraf told visiting U.S Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage that he was going to put a permanent end to terrorist incursions into India. Vajpayee's government promised in turn some de-escalation measures, though a withdrawal of troops from the border has been ruled out. The big risk, however, is that no matter what Musharraf does, there are enough jihadis already in Kashmir to keep hammering India with suicide bombs and death squads. Four people were killed by terrorists Friday night in Kashmir, even as heavy shelling continued at the frontier and an unmanned Indian spy plane was shot down by the Pakistani air force. Any small spark can still push Vajpayee to deploy his soldiers in some punitive counterattack on Pakistan, which can lead to full-scale war.

Meanwhile, Vajpayee's colleagues carp that he's still not being hawkish enough. "Any Prime Minister that takes action against Pakistan will sweep the elections, but Vajpayee is reluctant and that will definitely damage the BJP," complains BJP hard-liner B.P. Singhal. "As the Prime Minister, for him, national interest is above party interest."

Tellingly, Vajpayee was forced to give up his moderate stance and attend to his party in response to a domestic disaster, not an international crisis. On Feb. 27, a group of Muslims firebombed a train in the western state of Gujarat murdering 58 Hindus. The reprisals against Muslims in Gujarat were fierce, unpoliced, and went on for weeks, killing some 2,000 according to human rights groups. (The official death toll, widely disbelieved, is half this.) On April 4, Vajpayee reacted with revulsion, urging Hindu rioters to rediscover "a sense of unity and brotherhood." Asked the published poet: "Burning alive men, women and children? Are we human or not? Or has a demon taken over us?" His office briefed newspapers on the likely candidates to replace Gujarat state leader Narendra Modi, a member of the BJP who was accused of complicity in the violence, or at least, ineptness in containing it. But scarcely a week later, on April 12, Vajpayee changed his tune. Nothing more was said about sacking Modi. And speaking to an audience in Goa, Vajpayee shocked the country by declaring: "These days militancy in the name of Islam leaves no room for tolerance. Wherever such Muslims live, they tend not to live in coexistence ... they want to spread their faith by resorting to terror and threats."

In the subcontinental context, that kind of statement is a license for the killings to continue. According to diplomatic sources, the burden of the crisis made Vajpayee unwell. Adds Vinod Mehta, editor-in-chief of the Indian weekly Outlook magazine, Advani and his supporters used the illness to gather the party's hard-line core and read him the riot act. "The party basically gave him no room to maneuver," says Mehta. "He knew he could have lost his job and he had neither the spirit nor the physical strength to fight back. So he just gave up his moderate stance and fell in line. Now he's just a party mascot, a puppet of the hard-liners."

With an enfeebled Vajpayee at the helm, the prospect of war with Pakistan becomes more real. "Advani would really like to finish this proxy war, and perhaps do a bit more," says one diplomat. India has none of the checks and balances designed during the cold war to prevent a nuclear launch in anger. (Although India's military is comfortingly professional, nonpolitical and obedient to civilian control. The country's nukes are controlled by government scientists, and deployment orders come from the Prime Minister's office alone.) For his part, Advani denies any undue influence, or even the tag of "hawk" although, characteristically, he describes communal violence under the BJP as "minimal," even after the shame of Gujarat. But asked about the possibility of attacking across the Line of Control in Kashmir, Advani answers that in his view India is already facing an "undeclared war" from the militants. His list of conditions that Musharraf must meet before peace talks can begin is lengthy. "As long as this undeclared war, this training, arming, financing of jihadis, and this infiltration and terrorism and sabotage continues," he says, "then any dialogue will be meaningless." And he hints that the international community has given tacit approval for action. "One major change in the last 10 days has been that the U.S., Britain and other coalition members have said publicly and forcefully that Pakistan should stop cross-border terrorism," he says. "Our Prime Minister took really radical initiatives in the past. There's no question of that now" in other words, of actively looking for peace. An Indian army source adds that unless India detects that promised shift in militant activity and capability in the next five weeks, the military expects an order to attack.

The body on the other end of the seesaw is Mishra, a 70-year-old career civil servant and diplomat, who functions as the equivalent of a White House chief of staff. The fact that Mishra has survived countless calls for his removal he's accused of wielding influence beyond his position is testament to his pivotal role, diplomats say. Mishra is considered to be the brains behind the peace overtures of the past. His influence with Vajpayee these days waxes when the two men get away from the capital and the rest of the BJP. At a regional security conference in the Kazakh capital of Almaty last week, the Prime Minister made a rare and unexpected conciliatory gesture when he proposed joint Indian-Pakistani patrols along the Line of Control to ensure an end to infiltration. All week Mishra was briefing India's national newspapers that the government had decided to tone down the rhetoric. And significantly, when Vajpayee returned to Delhi on Wednesday night, Mishra stayed behind for further talks. But, warns Outlook editor Mehta, Mishra is just an appointed government servant, however close he is to the boss. "Mishra's influence is directly proportional to Vajpayee's position. He has no party base. When Vajpayee goes down, Mishra goes with him."

Observers say that the BJP is hoping to use Vajpayee through the next general elections, but no further. The party currently rules in a coalition, with Vajpayee as the glue that holds it together. If it manages to win an absolute majority, it won't need him any longer. The Prime Minister has largely accepted this gradual decline. His great ambition on gaining office was to do for India-Pakistan relations what Nixon did for China and the U.S.: only a right-winger, went the argument, could take the country into a peace deal with the archenemy. And this Vajpayee wanted to do, to secure a place in the history books. Friends say this ambition is now dead. Much of the Prime Minister's energy is now devoted to the business of weight rather than weighty affairs of state. His staff coaxes the reluctant old man onto a treadmill for 10 minutes every day and encourages him to take short walks. His "family" longtime companion Rajkumari Kaul, who suffered a heart attack in March, and her daughter Namita ensures he is served only boiled vegetables and rice. But Vajpayee still insists on an evening drink or two. In the family cottage in the Himalayan foothills, says an aide, nothing can keep him away from deep-fried trout. "He promises to stick to his diet with doubled rigidity once he leaves," says an aide, "but the trout he must have." On a long flight abroad, Vajpayee compared his menu with other members of the government party. "He was terribly upset when he discovered he had been singled out for special treatment," says the aide, "and tried to browbeat the in-flight staff into serving him the general meal, which was spicier." Meanwhile, tension seems set to continue between India and Pakistan. But as Vajpayee's ability to steer a moderate course diminishes, he's spending the twilight of his political life where he wants to be out to lunch.

This article appeared at Time.com on June 10, 2002.
Asleep at The Wheel?

Power, Not Principles

Anti-Congressism is the common plank of those motivated by short-term political gain.


Peeling the onion of political ideology in India is an assault on reason. You have Hindutva rabble-rousers who held sway from 1998 to 2004. Then there is the intellectually bankrupt Left that met its Waterloo on the India-US strategic partnership agreement. Sitting on opposition benches, their one-point agenda is to defeat – which is difficult – or cause problems – which is easy – for the Congress. It is a matter of wonder how closely these two so-called inimical forces, the BJP and the Left, have combined time and again to oppose the Congress for short term political gain. 

There are also 1960s-style anarchic groups that include the Anna Hazare autocratic clique and Mamata Banerjee’s socially and intellectually challenged Trinamool Congress. Plunk into the mix the personality cults of Mayawati; the dynastic set-up of Mulayam Singh Yadav, Karunanidhi and Naveen Patnaik; the slippery appeal of Jayalalithaa and the holier-than-thou stance of Nitish Kumar. These are mercenary formations that will sway whichever way the wind blows, depending on the political advantage they can derive. 

It is not clear what any of these groups stand for except opposition to the Congress. In 1974, the great anarch Jayaprakash Narayan talked of “total revolution” and called on the army to revolt against the Indira Gandhi government; today Anna has subverted his fight against corruption into an anti-Congress political movement. Talk about deja vu. 

The foolishness of the Anna band of civil society buccaneers was exposed when the moving spirit, Arvind Kejriwal, was forced to issue a statement that they are not anti-Congress. Earlier, when cornered by thinking people on a television show, he said that India’s muchadmired parliamentary democracy is a fraud. Such increasingly shrill utterances suggest he is completely out of depth on the national stage. 

Meanwhile, BJP leader L K Advani led a rath yatra against money in Swiss banks in a nonetoo-subtle bid to cash in on Anna’s storm in a teacup against corruption. Of classic RSS vintage, he believes no one remembers his other 1990 Ram temple effort which led to communal riots. So where is the “glorious” temple he promised? He served as home minister and deputy prime minister for the six years the BJP-led coalition was in power. Advani’s confusion was complete when he went to Karachi and lauded Mohammed Ali Jinnah as a secular leader. 

There are many ideological fig leafs that political formations wear in their relentless grasp for power: socialism, casteism, social justice, identity, chauvinism, Hinduism. Scratch the surface and it all turns out to be an anti-Congress position. As such, political analysis in India is best conducted on a dyadic presumption: there is the Congress and there is everyone else. 

So let’s look at the Congress record. It has been the default option for the electorate. In the past quarter century, it suffered seminal defeats in the elections of 1989 and 1996. In each case, it was voted out of power on allegations of corruption. Each time, a coalition of parties was hastily put together that stood for nothing except opposition to the Congress. In both those defeats, any objective analyst could conclude the Congress lost because its governments undertook significant reforms that hurt the status quo. 

In 1989, an agglomeration of forces came together to restore the status quo of inequity and discrimination that Rajiv Gandhi had challenged. The motley crew of political parties that formed the opposition put together a makeshift government that did not last the full term; nor did they pursue the charges of corruption that brought them to power. 

In the ensuing decade, the BJP’s unbridled appeal to communalism brought it to power: first, for 13 days in 1996; then in two desperate coalitions in 1998 and 1999. The saffron dispensation lasted until 2004 and was then showed the door because of its misplaced nationalism that saw India conduct nuclear tests that were replayed tit-for-tat by Pakistan and because of its insensitive “India Shining” hype. 

Since then, the Congress has held sway. The key difference is the Congress’s approach to social harmony and economic development: the phrase “inclusive development” was introduced to the political vocabulary. In the interim, India, warts and all, grew to be a big player in the global dialogue. Most important, economic growth was accompanied by the largest-ever reduction in poverty. Today, thanks largely to the growth of the middle class, the Indian voice is heard in world forums. 

Unmindful of these achievements, the anti-Congress brigade has spread several falsehoods: the prime minister is opposed by Congress president Sonia Gandhi; Manmohan Singh is weak; Sonia is the real power. 

The truth is different: both Singh and Sonia are on the same page as they have always been. There has been in the history of the Congress no better combination. The former pushes reform in foreign and economic policy; the latter is the conscience to ensure there is a local sensitivity to these reforms. That is the operational definition of “inclusive growth”. 

It’s ironic that the anti-Congress formations should denigrate both leaders. Singh is a highly respected economist who forsook academic achievement to serve the country first as a bureaucrat, then as finance minister and prime minister. Sonia, who adopted this country as her home, foreswore the office of prime minister in 2004 and became the conscience of the government. 

The writer is a public affairs commentator.

Left and Right against the Centre


This article appeared in The Times of India on January 10, 2012.

Link:

http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Default/Scripting/ArticleWin.asp?From=Archive&Source=Page&Skin=TOINEW&BaseHref=CAP/2012/01/10&PageLabel=14&EntityId=Ar01400&ViewMode=HTML

Beyond the corruption battle

Let us not get carried away by the crusade of the self-appointed guardians of public interest

First, a "fast unto death" fueled by Information Technology; now, another one inspired by Yoga. Two of India's major exports have come home to roost, cheered by hyperventilating television news channels. Combating corruption is the larger cause that Anna Hazare and Baba Ramdev advocate. And damned be him that first cries, 'Hold, enough!'

Never mind the Constitution; a pox on all politicians, Hazare says. The good people of India are on the move. By the sheer goodness of their lifestyles, by the shining nobility of their intent, they will cleanse the body politic. Girding his high-minded campaign is a bare-knuckle political demand swaddled in Gandhian homespun: give my chosen people a say in the framing of the Lokpal bill.

Who elected you? We nominated ourselves by virtue of Magsaysay awards and membership in "peoples' movements." What about the Constitution? Ours is a higher cause.

Ramdev's demands are too absurd to be given any sort of respectability. His potent mix of religiosity and postmodernism threatens, nevertheless, to overwhelm the Hazare protest. His followers are true believers, seeking to achieve perfect communion of the self with the universal truth.

In contrast, the cappuccino-swilling denizens of cyberspace, who form the bulk of Hazare's supporters, are causerati; tomorrow they will turn their attention to the dangers of cellphone use or the hazards of nuclear power. Small wonder then that Hazare, despite being "unwell", has said he will be present at Delhi's Ramlila Maidan in solidarity with the godman.

The question arises though: if civil society activists inspired by grandiosity and true believers mesmerised by a godman can demand a say in the way laws are made and the government is run, then why not business associations like the CII and Ficci? Or trade unions? Or for that matter, Rotary and Lions Clubs? What makes Hazare and Ramdev and their acolytes so special?

What is alarming about the hunger strikes is that the people who support them seem to have no time for political processes and constitutional restraint. Indian democracy has managed to negotiate the mind-numbing diversity that could have splintered the country; the Constitution is a charter that legitimises and separates the role of the executive, the legislature and the judiciary. Despite the obvious governance deficit, there prevails a modicum of the rule of law.

Changes are needed to usher in the idea of a government not as a master but in service of the people. A corollary to the notion of government as master is that of bureaucrats and politicians as a rentier class that extorts money from hapless citizens to provide services and permissions as favours rather than as due process. This is the source of corruption in all socialist systems where the dead hand of government smothers entrepreneurship and opportunities to make a dignified living.

India took a giant step two decades ago when it scrapped the licence-permit raj. Its emergence as a significant global player can be traced back to the reforms of 1991. Loosening controls is easier than the second stage of reform: to provide effective governance. Political stability is a key element in second-stage reforms.

In the UPA's first turn, we had the unseemly spectacle of an arrogant Left combining with a peeved BJP in an effort to oust the government over a foreign policy initiative: the strategic partnership with the US. The UPA survived and in the 2009 election went on to win bigger. The Left and the BJP saw their influence shrink dramatically.

But political uncertainty persisted as the UPA was confronted with accusations of corruption in telecom deals, the Commonwealth Games and various other projects. Today's challenges come not from opposition political parties but self-appointed guardians of the public interest: righteous activists and now, a slippery godman. Dealing with such groups is problematic because they don't abide by the Constitution but owe allegiance to a "higher cause".

TV news channels and to a lesser extent, the print media are obsessed by these protests. They convey the impression of a corruption-singed government at sea in the face of this 'uprising'. Overwhelmed by deafening din of TV reporters without the slightest sense of objectivity, I fled to the sanity of international journalism. There I found the following stories:

• The Indian government has drawn up ambitious plans to double exports to $500 billion in the next three years. The trade-to-GDP ratio has already increased from 15% in 1990 to 35% today.
• With supportive government policies, India's pharmaceutical sector has emerged as a global force, supplying low-cost, high-quality off-patent medicine to the developed as well as developing nations.
• India has become the world center for 'frugal engineering', manufacturing low-cost products that are resistant to tough environments while maintaining high quality standards.

This is not to suggest that the protests should not be covered; only that it should not lead to a situation in which the adversarial nature of the relationship between the media and the government is twisted so much that a duly-elected government is portrayed an enemy of the people.

It would be fair if Indian journalists could also track other stories as well: of an India that is rapidly finding its metier on the world stage; of the rising aspirations of young India confronting the victim mindsets that enervate the older generation.

This article appeared in The Economic Times, June 4, 2011.

Copyright Rajiv Desai 2011

A Thoughtful Budget

Media Don’t Get It

Except for The Wall Street Journal and the very thoughtful program anchored by Prannoy Roy on NDTV, the budget got short shrift everywhere else in the media. The general assessment was it was a mediocre or bad budget. Which is as far from the truth as Alaska is from India.

Hours on television and pages in the newspapers were full of meaningless analyses. Some said there were no major reform announcements; others moaned about the tax provisions. One particularly egregious businesswallah, member of the tribe that shows up on television each February 28, ranted about the tax on “centrally air conditioned hospitals.”

The growth brigade was out in full force lamenting this, that and the other. The Left and jholewallahs also dismissed he budget as a continuation of the neoliberlal conspiracy to sell India to the West. The BJP, its credibility waning by the minute, made its usual noise.

The media, “civil” society groups, the Left and the Hindu nationalists couldn’t have got it more wrong. The media are ill-informed and incompetent. The activists are naysayers; the Left works on a discredited economics model and the BJP, aka the Hindu nationalists, are clueless.

Consider the following ten points taken straight out of the finance minister’s speech:

1. Food prices are high despite improved availability. The finance minister said this was because of shortcomings in the marketing and distribution system. Held in thrall by the government and random retailers and middlemen the marketing and distribution system is a problem. So the signal is they will open up to organized retail marketing.

2. Inflation management calls for a focus on agriculture. The need is to improve productivity. The finance minister’s message was to improve the quality of inputs including mechanization, nutrient-based fertilizers and biotech applications.

3. Also addressed in the budget was the need to remove bottlenecks in value-added farming, including horticulture, dairy, poultry and meat. This is of a piece with the findings of the S S Johl committee that was formed in the 1980s and recommended that at least 20 percent of farm land be given over to value-added crops.

4. The finance minister announced the formation of a public debt management agency. The idea is to depoliticize debt and curb populist spending.

5. Disinvestment of public sector units is a huge problem. Calling it the need to increase people’s ownership of these government owned companies, the minister said the government looked to raising 40,000 crore from the sale of their shares in the stock market.

6. Amendment of the banking regulation act is a major announcement. In its purview, private sector banks will be allowed to open more branches. As such, the so-called aam aadmi will not have to battle for banking services that are a problem in the nationalized banks.

7. Also announced was a plan to modernize the stamp and registration administration and the setting up of a central electronic registry for immovable properties. It is a strike in the heart of darkness because real estate is the major source of black money.

8. This is perhaps most important. The government will now do direct cash transfers to people below the poverty line. It’s a brilliant move to stop leakages from welfare schemes.

9. On the taxes front, the finance minister has left most levies untouched but has given a break to the bulk of taxpayers by increasing the exclusion amounts.

These are a few, and there are many more, of the budget’s highlights. It is abundantly clear the government knows what it’s doing.

The budget is beyond is beyond partisan politics and is a sophisticated response to the globalization of India’s economy.

It is clear that this government understands the issues and the problems. It is, as the finance minister said, a transition to a more transparent and result based economic management system.

I think it is a great budget for an increasingly sophisticated economy.

What do you think? Write me.

Copyright Rajiv Desai 2011

Pull-back from the brink

In one fell swoop, the world’s largest, most diverse electorate pulled the country back from the brink. In deference to the aspirations of the rising middle class, the centre held and gave the country a real chance against the barbarism that has threatened to sink it. Going into India’s 15th general election, posturing politicians and clueless media created a scare that India was doomed to uncertainty, its future mortgaged to small-time caste chieftains and fringe fascist groups.

Meanwhile, the BJP was at its hectoring loudest with its communal propaganda. The Left pretended to be a rallying point for petty regional satraps, who seemed to spring from every nook and cranny. Nobody gave the Congress a chance, writing it off as a spent force with no grassroots support.

The recently concluded first term of the UPA government was notable for the boorish behaviour of the opposition BJP and the churlish support of the Left parties. The BJP blatantly refused to let Parliament function with its vocal opposition and strong-arm tactics. The Left, an erstwhile UPA ally, embarked on a foolhardy course of confrontation with the prime minister that eventually led to a rupture.

Fortunately, timely backing of the Samajwadi Party helped the government win the confidence vote precipitated by the Left’s withdrawal of support over the Indo-US nuclear deal. But even then the BJP persisted with its dramatic obstructionism, producing legislators waving wads of money in the well of the house; money they claimed was offered to them to switch sides. Meanwhile, the Mayawati-led BSP circled over this melee like a vulture hoping to scavenge the remains of the political process.

Reflected in the boorish glare of media incompetence, the political imbroglio seemed like some dark and foreboding Shakespearean tragedy in which judgement had fled to brutish beasts and men had lost their reason. Many of us hoped for the best but feared the worst.

The clamour surrounding the general election obscured a fundamental reality: India has changed and the vast majority of its people are either actually or by aspiration, middle class. Thanks to the government’s inclusive policies, the number of stakeholders in the India growth project has increased dramatically. The 2009 election outcome allows us to hope that a critical mass has been achieved to stabilise the ship of state.

One thing is clear: old divides of caste and religion were bridged as the Congress chalked up support across caste and religious lines. It’s now obvious that voters are tired of posturing and brinkmanship; they’ve had it with screaming and shouting over non-issues; they have rejected twisted propaganda that a non-Congress, non-BJP alternative is a possibility. The confused media purveyed this line, adding to the noise and distortions of the campaign. But voters showed maturity and a deep concern for the future to vote in the Congress-led coalition.

As such, voters have plumped for stability over chaos, substance over frivolity, wisdom over cunning, decency over crudity. In the same fell swoop, voters have put paid to the political future of L.K. Advani, Mayawati, Mulayam Singh, Lalu Prasad, Ram Vilas Paswan, Jayalalitha, Arjun Singh and even Narendra Modi, whose low and abusive style turned people off everywhere and has drawn criticism from all quarters, including the BJP. These men and women were mainly responsible for the chaotic and confused politics of the two decades past.

Yet, perhaps the most significant outcome of the recent general election is that the people of India seem to have acknowledged that shallow and divisive politics is the prime reason behind the lack of development and the persistence of poverty across large swathes of the country. This new awareness is hugely welcome. Now there’s a real possibility that politics could become a facilitator of growth and equity rather than the corrupt and cynical power play it became in the last three decades of the 20th century.

The election result also has global consequences. To be sure, it enhances India’s standing in the world. In a rough neighbourhood pocked with the likes of Pakistan’s Taliban, Sri Lanka’s LTTE, Nepal’s Maoists and Bangladeshi Islamists, India is a haven of stability and progress. It boasts a rapidly expanding middle class that can become a leading engine of global economic growth. Investors understand that potential demand here could drive the global economy and keep it chugging for the next few decades.

Just think: despite fast-track growth in the telecom sector, penetration is barely 40 percent. Nearly 700 million Indians remain to be hooked on to the telecom grid. It’s the same with automobiles, power, transportation, construction, retail, civil aviation, agriculture and what have you. Is it any wonder the stock market took off into the stratosphere within minutes after it opened on the Monday after the election results were announced?

In the next two decades, India could leapfrog into the ranks of developed countries. The 2009 election outcome prophesies that the transformation has begun in earnest. It is wonderful that it was ushered in by the largest voter franchise in the world.


This Column Appeared in Education World, June 2009


Copyright Rajiv Desai 2009

From The Times of India, May 21, 2009

TOP ARTICLE The Decency Option
Election Result Is Key Step in India’s Political Evolution

21 May 2009, 0010 hrs IST, RAJIV DESAI

On Sunday, television viewers witnessed the denouement of the media's noisy and often distorted coverage of the elections to the 15th Lok Sabha.

Just an hour or so after counting began, it became clear the Congress was on its way to a renewed and enhanced mandate. Some saw this coming; indeed, it was there for all to see. The election had taken place under the most extraordinary circumstances: an acute global financial crisis and the aftermath of terror attacks in Mumbai late last year. It was fairly obvious that voters would plump for stability by providing a decisive verdict as they had in 1977 and 1984.

Like the one in 2009, those two elections were held at a time India felt its future was at stake. In 1977, voters decisively rejected Indira Gandhi after she suspended the Constitution, jailed political opponents and muzzled the press during her two-year Emergency. Seven years later, after she fell victim to the bullets of her Sikh bodyguards, the electorate gave her son Rajiv the biggest-ever mandate. These two extraordinary outcomes were useful in predicting the result of the most recent parliamentary election.

One of the most stirring moments in the post-result euphoria was when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh told reporters assembled at 10 Janpath, Sonia Gandhi's residence, "I urge all the political parties to forget their past disputes...We should stand one as a nation." The comment is important because it represents the return of civility in pairs. Unlike the triumphal note the BJP, the Left and various regional formations customarily sound on their various victories, Singh's sober tone signalled his intention to steer a conciliatory course in his next term. Under the new dispensation, public discourse would move beyond matters of probity to decency in public life. This is a major step in the evolution of the political system.

Sadly though, various self-important Congress factotums hit the high registers of arrogance in their dealings with former allies like Lalu Prasad and Mulayam Singh Yadav and with current supporters like the DMK.

This acrimonious beginning raises troubling questions about the future. The vindictive elements need to be reined in swiftly. Unchecked, their arrogance could undermine the new credibility the Grand Old Party has won. If the Congress is to implement what P Chidambaram called its "crisp" manifesto, it will need broad support from the non-Left, non-BJP members of Parliament.

So what's on tap? Take monetary policy. With the resurgence of investor confidence, the Reserve Bank is likely to cut interest rates to facilitate the flow of credit into the domestic economy. In the event, it must also provide incentives to banks to lend to businesses, especially cash-starved small and medium enterprises.

Concerning fiscal policy, huge investments are needed in surface and mass transport, civil aviation, sanitation, water supply, power generation and what have you. One obvious way to raise funds is to sell public sector assets. The railways, ports trusts and various other agencies own vast tracts of prized real estate that could fetch princely sums. The telecom department is widely known to have the biggest network of auto repair shops in India. The tourism ministry's crumbling hotels are obvious targets of divestment as are government-run airlines.

Hobbled by the Left and its fellow travellers in the Congress and its allies, the government hedged its bets on attracting foreign investment. Complex bureaucratic hurdles made FDI dwindle in sector after sector. In retail, insurance, pensions, civil aviation, you name it, opening up remained at best an unfulfilled promise. Ominously, the commerce ministry's Kamal Nath breezily told a television channel, "We already have a liberalised (FDI) regime." He followed that up with a clear no on retail sector reform.

On higher education, despite the National Knowledge Commission's recommendations, policy remained confused and corrupt, dominated by a venal bureaucracy (the All India Council on Technical Education comes to mind) and obtuse politicians. The sluggish human resources development ministry, by its acts of omission and commission, spawned the paradox of growing unemployment despite a huge demand for qualified personnel.

With trade, India adopted the spoiler's role at World Trade Organisation conferences, playing the victim of rapacious developed countries. The rhetoric employed was from another era, when India played a prominent role in the Group of 77, the commercial foil of the Non-aligned Movement. Without the Left calling the shots, its acolytes in the Congress-led ruling coalition will find themselves adrift. It is likely that India will pursue a more reasonable line.

On foreign policy, the strategic alliance with the US, embodied in the nuclear deal, achieved a long-standing objective: to overturn the discriminatory non-proliferation regime. In the neighbourhood, South Block welcomed US pressure on Pakistan seeking to curb its military's anti-India fixation and focus attention on domestic problems caused by a resurgent Taliban. In Sri Lanka, India supported Colombo's final assault on the LTTE ridding the region of a major terrorist force. In Bangladesh and Nepal, the approach has been somewhat mixed, lacking strategic focus.

Despite the show of hubris by vindictive apparatchiks in the Congress and nagging doubts about its leftist bloc, the overall message is that the election results are a game changer.

copyright rajiv desai 2009

Cutting Through the Election Noise

Confusion Has Made its Masterpiece

A burgeoning middle class, a slowing economy, a creeping intolerance, a terrorist challenge, and a growing voice in the world: these are the challenges and the opportunities that face the country as it prepares for the next general election. Yet the issues being raised in the campaign are largely about caste and religion; the debate is about yesterday, not even today.

The BJP is floundering over Varun Gandhi’s intemperate outburst against Muslims, afraid to alienate its communal “base” and worried about losing the new middle class support it has gained in the past decade. It went ballistic over the shoe-throwing incident at a Congress press conference and sought to revive, after 25 years, anger over the anti-Sikh riots that followed the assassination Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in 1984.

Perhaps the worst case of the BJP’s growing irrelevance is Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi, who, in a recent campaign speech, pejoratively called the Congress Party a 125-year-old woman. Modi is not just the fascist shame of Gujarat; he is obviously prejudiced towards women and old people. We know that like Shakespeare’s pathetic Macbeth, he harbors ambitions of being Prime Minister.

Given his intemperate ways, Modi is a poor player like bloody Macbeth, who “struts and frets his hour upon the stage …full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” Meanwhile, Gujarat, like Macbeth’s Scotland, “sinks beneath (his) yoke. It weeps. It bleeds and each new day a gash is added to her wounds.”

Commissars of the Left and bosses of various regional factions are pushing aggressively for a “Third Front” government that excludes both the Congress and the BJP. Chieftains of the various caste formations in the Hindi heartland are busy posturing over the prospect that their “Fourth Front” could emerge as a key power broker in the event of a hung Parliament. Neither front has a coherent strategy except to fish in troubled waters.

As always, the Congress maintains a stoic silence amid the din of its rivals; its game plan is to emerge as the single largest party and then gain adherents from the various fronts. Amazingly, it has never been forced to defend its record of governance in the past five years. Its economic policies have included questionable populist giveaways and timid monetary policies. Its foreign policy has been reactive and tactical in the face of challenges from all around the neighborhood including Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal.

More than at any other time, there seems to be a complete disconnect between politics and the new reality. The nearly 20 million new voters of 1991 vintage have grown up in an India where possibilities are endless. More important, they believe that tomorrow has to be better than today. This is in stark contrast to the generation of “Midnight’s Children.” We were wracked by uncertainty so we voted with our feet and pushed off overseas, ostensibly to study but truly to make our fortune.

Today’s children want to go to America like we did. The difference is they want to gain skills and expertise and come back home to lucrative jobs. Their worldview is different. Never mind if they are rural poor, urban slum dwellers or middle class youth. They have no patience; they want it all and they want it now. The political class simply doesn’t understand this driving force largely because it runs on a feudal ethic.

Also in evidence is a curiously cynical lethargy: not a single party has outlined a plan to deal with the rapidly growing middle class and the concomitant demands for good governance. Mindsets of yesteryear preclude the recognition of the middle class. The focus is exclusively on the poor, one segment of the population that is declining in number. This particular quirk is the single most powerful sign that the political class is out of touch with the rapidly changing demography.

Consequently, voters must decide without the benefit of an informed debate on the issues. This election is the first one in which men and women born in 1991 will cast their votes. This is a brand new generation that has grown up in an era of liberalization and globalization. Seen against the rise of a 300-million-strong middle class, it is clear that a consumer economy is taking root.

What’s worse, the media simply don’t get it. Thus we are told that Mayawati is a candidate for the top office. This is simply incredible. With the 30 or 40 odd seats she may garner, mostly in Uttar Pradesh, it is difficult to imagine such an outcome. Yes, V P Singh, Chandra Shekhar, H D Deve Gowda and I K Gujral did make it. All of them were supported on the outside by the Congress or the BJP. They ran rump governments that lasted few months.

It ain’t gonna happen with Mayawati, who wins sympathy as a Dalit woman but is nevertheless accused of milking her supporters to build statues of herself. Shamelessly, she has built herself a Xanadu-like palace called BSP House on Delhi’s pricey Sardar Patel Marg. Just because you happen to be a Dalit woman doesn’t mean you cannot be questioned on ethical considerations. It’s all very well to say that everyone’s corrupt in the political domain. But why should the same scrutiny not apply to her?

Whatever the pundits say, it is clear that neither Advani nor Mayawati, never mind the other pretenders, is about to become the next Prime Minister.

A Version of This Column Appeared in The Times of India, April 14, 2009

copyright rajiv desai 2009

Let's Take India Back

Enough of the Moffusil Madness

Sabina was a dear friend. She lived a large and full life until she died in the terrorist attack at the Taj in Bombay. She may have survived if the authorities had responded promptly. But Indian politicians and bureaucracy are a dysfunctional stew of mediocrity and incompetence. She never had a chance. It took the commandos of the elite National Security Group ten hours to get to Bombay and the state police forces that can’t even deal with the thugs of the various fascist senas were completely unequal to the task. The three top officials of the state’s anti terrorist squad were gunned down in a single attack. We were left with the sorry spectacle of pot-bellied cops armed with World War Two vintage 303 rifles trying to deal with terrorists equipped with modern weapons.

Then there’s my friend Lawrence Ferrao, a Jesuit priest, who heads the Xavier Institute of Communications, located on a campus that houses our alma mater, St Xavier’s High School and St Xavier’s College. He wrote an account, “An Eyewitness to Terror,” in which he described seeing two terrorists run past the campus to a nearby hospital and their killing spree. “Within our college stone walls, surrounded by hours of bloody violence, someone surely was watching over us. That same someone is now prodding us to work harder…to bring about change; to make a difference in our beloved India,” he wrote. For sure it wasn’t the Maharashtra govern-ment and its corrupt and inept police forces!

I also heard from Schubert Vaz, a pianist who played in the lobby of the Oberoi. He was saved and he believes it is a miracle. “Bombay suffers from two kinds of terrorists: the terrorists who come from outside the country and our political terrorists within the country. Our problems started with the Rath Yatra (conducted by Lal Krishna Advani) and the destruction of Babri Masjid. We are Indians; it does not matter whether we are Hindus, Christians, Muslims or Sikhs,” he wrote. He was cowering inside the hotel’s computer backup room while Gujarat chief minister, Narendra Modi, was outside, swaggering in front of television cameras, trying to score cheap political point at a time of national distress.

Meanwhile the thugs of the various senas, who terrorize the city with sporadic violence, were nowhere to be seen. They are back now, intimidating lawyers who seek to represent the sole captured terrorist. As such, they are militating against the finest traditions of our constitutional de-democracy. They are a reminder of the soft state with its weak-kneed politicians and venal bureaucrats, who run our seriously flawed system of gov-governance.

Even after three weeks, the political class is still unmindful of the distress of citizens. The Congress Party dithered over the replacement of the ineffectual Vilas Deshmukh and is now tying itself up in knots on how to deal with the “senior” leader from Maharashtra, A R Antulay, who suggested that the state’s top anti-terror official may have been killed by Hindu nationalists. For its part, the BJP fumbled on support of the bill creating the National Intelligence Agency until the redoubtable Arun Jaitley got into the act. The incorrigible Left shot itself in the foot again when its suave ideologue Sitaram Yechury foolishly said the Bombay events were a re-sult of the Indo-US nuclear deal

Meanwhile, unfocused citizen anger can easily be diverted. Indeed this is beginning to happen as the media and the privilegentsia are now pushing for a military conflict with Pakistan. That way questions about governance and calls for reform of the system are averted. Indeed, public anger needs to have a focus. To start with, let us ask that our heritage be liberated from the moffusil clutches of government. Politicians, bureaucrats and the media buy into populism while ignoring substantive issues of pol-icy. They have been quick to propose and accept, for example, the change of place names. Starting with Bombay, they have changed other names including: Victoria Terminus, Flora Fountain, Crawford Market, Queen’s Road and a hundred others. This supposedly is their notion of national-ism: tilting at colonial windmills.

Bombay has a history that predates the Shiv Sena, the BJP and even the Congress. When they changed the name of the city, its main railway sta-tion, its airport, its major roads and its many public institutions: the roads still remain pathetic; the airport is still a mess and the railway stations still chaotic. It’s time to challenge the chauvinists, who have terrorized Bombay.

Bombay’s slide started with the rise of moffusil populists in the 1950s. The Samayukta Maharashtra Samiti, precursor of the Shiv Sena, forced the division of the erstwhile Bombay state into Maharashtra and Gujarat. That‘s when the rule of thugs took over the city.

The terror attacks won’t change any political equations. No party cares about human lives. Don’t expect any serious efforts to reform governance. They would rather have a confrontation the failed state of Pakistan than change things internally. The only way to hit them, Congress, BJP, or Shiv Sena, is to strike at the roots of their populism. Let’s demand that the city be called Bombay again and the railway station and airports re-vert to their old, authentic names. It’s a seemingly small but symbolic first step that will upset their diversionary applecart that seems headed straight into a fourth war with Pakistan.


copyright rajiv desai december 2008