Twenty-seven year old Utpal Biswas works as a car driver. He has been working for a car hire company for the the past seven years. His parents wanted him to study and do a government job, which never happened as his father lost his job when Utpal was only four years old.
Debal Biswas, Utpal's father, used to lead a team of about hundred people in Belgharia's one-time well known textile factory the Mohini Mills, which closed down permanently in 1988. Since then the Durga Puja there has stopped, most of the workers were forced to take up meanial jobs for living and some even committed suicide. Utpal can't even recollect the Durga Puja days at the mill complex. He was barely four then when it all stopped. Now the deserted mill complex stands like as if it is in ruins. Utpal's father became a rickshaw puller to sustain his family and whatever money he earned was not enough to send Utpal to a good school. As a teenager, Utpal learnt driving to relieve his father from pulling rickshaws.
On a recent trip to Kolkata, Utpal was driving us from Belgharia to Bandel. While driving past the Durgapur Expressway, near Singur,I asked him what he thought about Mamata Banerjee. From Utpal's enthusiasm and energy it seemed as though he was waiting for the question to be asked, especially near the place which built Banerjee's political fortune for years to come.
"Didi will bring about real change", quipped Utpal, the glimmer in his eyes showing the real conviction unlike the rhetoric that political elements are used to. I tried to understand what he meant by 'real change' and there was no defintive answer but only a sense of euphoria and hope.
"But how is it going to affect you, what will happen to Mohini Mills where your father worked for years and yet didn't get his dues!"
My sense of suspicion or being a devil's advocate, failed to make any change in Utpal and he said, "Didi-r kachhe khabar chole gechhe. Mohini Mill-e rail-er karkhana habe". (Banerjee is aware of Mohini Mills and will set up a railway factory there.) My questioning the validity of such an expectation was, however, not 'hopeless' enough to dampen his hopes.
Utpal was not the only one who was euphoric about Mamata Banerjee. A fruit vendor at Dunlop or a man selling cheap dresses outside Baghbazar Bata also spoke in similar vein.It seemed as if the dispossessed were more hopeful than others and I could not figure out why. A senior colleague, who has been a well known correspondent in India for years, feels, "the people of Bengal were desperate for change".
Will the people of Bengal move to a higher trajectory of democratic polity or practice? Will the new government ensure better governance?
Governance is the buzz word for Banerjee these days. Her unannounced visits to government offices, hospitals, schools, market places are making people happy although the real reason behind such happiness is not very clear to me yet. Are they happy because they hope that good days would return or they are pleased that those who were reaping the benefits of being paid their salaries for not doing enough work or extorting the ordinary man are being pulled up?
From the surface though it seems that people are pleased with the effort to ensure governance and bring it back within the public domain. The danger of expecting too much on governance is that both the government and the governed tend to confuse between 'democratic governance' and governance which is not necessarily participatory and democratic.
Democracy and governance are probably both mutually exclusive. Governance is no pre-requisite for democracy and the vice versa is also probably true. One can ensure governance without stains of democracy.(Even a military regime can ensure governance without any obligation for democracy.) The best example is probably the emergency days of Indira Gandhi. So when a US Congressional report praises Narendra Modi for governance, they tend to overlook his pluralistic credentials or lack of it, which also raises serious questions about their understanding of democracy.
I am not in any way comparing Modi and Banerjee but I can see in her a desperation to ensure governance without much concern for participatory practices. Remember the way she announced closure of schools a day after students drenched to the core celebrated the 150th birth anniversary of Rabindranath Thakur or the way she keeps on announcing welfare projects in the state. They are definitely intended to bring about welfare but there is no mechanism or any evidence to ensure that the objectives are desired and would be achieved.
Banerjee prefers the 'top-down' approach of development but the 'bottom-up' path is a more participatory one and hence mindful of the essence of democracy. Democracy definitely has many deficits but whether governance bereft of democratic values is desireable calls for a much wider debate.
All comments are personal and have no bearing on my present or past places of work. Comments on the post are welcome at the blog site.
Wednesday
Tuesday
SOAS I live for thee
After a heart wrenching few weeks on making a personal choice between the two premier educational institutes in London, I decided to go for the King's College KCL over the School of Oriental and African Studies SOAS. This is of course no aspersion on the proficiency of SOAS as an academic institute of repute, not only within the United Kingdom but also worldwide. SOAS was my entrypoint to the world of academics in Britain and the decision to choose KCL has been largely guided by what the Bloombusry institution taught me in two years. As a hetrodox academic institute, SOAS taught me to challenge the mainstream and try things which situate thinking in a different perspective. The choice of KCL was only to witness the alternative to what I imbibed from the SOAS.
SOAS has literally been a melting pot of alternative thinking and the intellectuals there aren't shy of practising what they preach. One would thus see academics delivering lectures not in pin-stripped suites, as is the usual practice in most western institutions, but wearing Pink Floyd T-shirts and faded Jeans. The campus would witness a sprectrum of thoughts ranging from the Old Socialist school, vehmently opposing any reduction in the role of government, to making a case for the meanial migrant workers, who often face deportation threats, and finally queing up to have themselves fed by the 'karma food' provided free by the International Society for Krishna Conciousness (ISKCON).
It is not only the image of enacting the alternative that stood SOAS apart, the academics, undoubtedly some of the best in the world, also provided the intellectual succour behind the emobodiment of such a hetrodox thinking.
Being a student of the Department of Development Studies, I had the pleasure of interacting with some of the wonderful minds, ranging from acclaimed academics like
Subir Sinha to Gilbert Achcar. Subir Sinha influenced much of my recent thinking, especially his improvisation on discursive analysis provides a rare insight into the roles of civil society and social movements within the domain of global politics, and Gilbert Achcar is an epitome of knowledge.
Although I studied Keynesian economics at the undergraduate level in India, but it reached a fruition beyond the IS-LM Curve Analysis only after Alfredo Saad Filho explained the political economy of its rise and demise. Jens Lerche with his breadth of knowledge on agrarian change and class relations in South Asia would often meticulously attend some of my trivial queries on land following the developments in Singur and Nandigram.
Paolo Novak was my first admissions tutor at the SOAS. Coming from a South Asian background we are not generally used to seeing teachers as friends but as days progressed Paolo with his warmth and informality turned our relationship into more of friendship and similar was the case with Dae-oup Chang, who joined the SOAS in the same year as I did.
My experience at the SOAS has been more of a journey, as Henry Bernstein would use the metaphor to describe 'development', into the world of knowledge guided only by the pleasure of learning, made possible by the academics and also by a team of dedicated staff in the faculty led by Jack Footitt. I leave SOAS, with a heavy heart, only to put to test if I have rightly picked up the essence of what this hetrodox institution stands for.
All comments are personal and have no bearing on my present or past places of work. Comments on the post are welcome at the blogsite.
SOAS has literally been a melting pot of alternative thinking and the intellectuals there aren't shy of practising what they preach. One would thus see academics delivering lectures not in pin-stripped suites, as is the usual practice in most western institutions, but wearing Pink Floyd T-shirts and faded Jeans. The campus would witness a sprectrum of thoughts ranging from the Old Socialist school, vehmently opposing any reduction in the role of government, to making a case for the meanial migrant workers, who often face deportation threats, and finally queing up to have themselves fed by the 'karma food' provided free by the International Society for Krishna Conciousness (ISKCON).
It is not only the image of enacting the alternative that stood SOAS apart, the academics, undoubtedly some of the best in the world, also provided the intellectual succour behind the emobodiment of such a hetrodox thinking.
Being a student of the Department of Development Studies, I had the pleasure of interacting with some of the wonderful minds, ranging from acclaimed academics like
Subir Sinha to Gilbert Achcar. Subir Sinha influenced much of my recent thinking, especially his improvisation on discursive analysis provides a rare insight into the roles of civil society and social movements within the domain of global politics, and Gilbert Achcar is an epitome of knowledge.
Although I studied Keynesian economics at the undergraduate level in India, but it reached a fruition beyond the IS-LM Curve Analysis only after Alfredo Saad Filho explained the political economy of its rise and demise. Jens Lerche with his breadth of knowledge on agrarian change and class relations in South Asia would often meticulously attend some of my trivial queries on land following the developments in Singur and Nandigram.
Paolo Novak was my first admissions tutor at the SOAS. Coming from a South Asian background we are not generally used to seeing teachers as friends but as days progressed Paolo with his warmth and informality turned our relationship into more of friendship and similar was the case with Dae-oup Chang, who joined the SOAS in the same year as I did.
My experience at the SOAS has been more of a journey, as Henry Bernstein would use the metaphor to describe 'development', into the world of knowledge guided only by the pleasure of learning, made possible by the academics and also by a team of dedicated staff in the faculty led by Jack Footitt. I leave SOAS, with a heavy heart, only to put to test if I have rightly picked up the essence of what this hetrodox institution stands for.
All comments are personal and have no bearing on my present or past places of work. Comments on the post are welcome at the blogsite.
Monday
"Duniya Dot Com"
It was a weekend of song and dance and also a drift down memory lane. At a Bengali cultural programme here in London, I came across quite a few people after a span of many years. As one recollects the years gone by, there is a feeling of nostalgia and also a sense that the world is changing everyday and getting even smaller.
Who would have thought that one day I would come across Samit-da here in London. Samit Ray is now the Managing Director of the Rice Group and we share the same root of growing up at Jatindas Nagar in Belgharia. Although, he is a few years senior to me, yet as young boys we were associated with the same Udayan Club for years. Seeing the organisation headed by Samit-da making strides in India, I sometimes felt if we could come across but never dreamt that it would come true of all places in London and that too possibly after almost three decades.
The two people who influenced me most in taking up journalism as a career almost two decades ago were my two great friends Ritwik Mukherjee and Debasish Choudhury . Ritwik had joined the profession during our college days and almost regularly we used to walk to the office of Kolkata, a daily which is now defunct, at Lenin Sarani. It was there at the Kolkata office that I came across Kunal-da. Kunal Ghosh, now the Executive Editor of Sangbad Pratidin,a Bengali daily published from Kolkata, and the Chief Executive Officer of Channel 10, a same city-based television channel. More than two decades ago he was one of our windows to the world of journalism and we would be mesmerised by the exciting stories he would tell us about shoulder-rubbing with people at the helm and getting hold of those in power, especially the Congress politics with which he was then very organically linked.
While in Kolkata, I came across Kunal-da a few times later but not so much ever since joining journalism myself. Probably, the last time we met was during a demonstration at Esplanade East, one time well known rallying point for protestors and demonstrators in Kolkata, in 1995, which he was covering possibly for Aajkaal, another Bengali daily. As I get to read the articles written by Kunal-da for Sangbad Pratidin, here in London, thanks to the internet, and with the political metamorphosis that has taken place in the Indian state of Bengal, it was a pleasure meeting him here in London after over 15 years.
Nearly 20 years ago when I first joined journalism, we were a group of 20, selected to revive an ailing Bengali newspaper, Jugantar, with a rich history. It was during those days when the print media had not been shadowed by the glitz and glamour of television journalism. Veteran journalist, late Niranjan Sengupta was entrusted with the responsibility of training us. It was during the training stint of three months at the St. Xavier's College in Kolkata that four of us - Anindya Chattopadhyay, Joydip Chakraborty, Santanu Mukhopadhyay and I - got very close. Every evening after our training sessions we used to cling like a group and it was so conspicuous that one of the fellow trainees then and now the Assistant Editor of the Anandabazar Patrika, a Kolkata-based Bengali daily, Ishani Dutta Ray chose to write a creative piece on the group "Ekti Bakul gachh ebong charte chhele" , meaning one Bakul tree and four boys. I still remember a Bakul tree on the Park Street footpath just outside the college.
Since my leaving Jugantar for The Financial Express in 1994 the four of us were not as close as before because of practical reasons but we were still in touch. In 1997, when I returned from Delhi, to join the Press Trust of India in Kolkata, I heard that Anindya has taken up a career in singing and set up a Bengali band called Chandrabindoo.
Just before leaving for London in 1999, Anindya presented me with a cassette of one of their popular numbers. Since then we hardly met, except for a brief stint in 2001. Anindya and his group have since grown to be one of the popular Bengali bands. It was only through his performance at London that we got to meet each other after a span of over ten years.
All these meetings, with the three very successful people in their respective fields,are sure to incite nostalgia but at the same time it gives me a cosy feeling of how small the world is becoming with every passing day. Technology and its advancement have transformed the world in such a way that even a foreign land is no longer alien. At the same time aspirations are skyrocketing in a globalised world with increased opportunities. Many professional Indians are realising that the world is there for them to grab. As I am sipped with nostalgia after drifting down memory lane for the past two days, I can only think of a popular number by Anindya and his band Duniya Dot Com. Those who understand Bengali would definitely appreciate the wonderful lyrics of the song. Even those who don't, and hence deprived of such a wonderful performance, also realise how the worldwide web has literally transformed this globe into a virtual village.
I hope Anindya and his band wouldn't mind me using the title of one of their popular numbers as the title of this post. It is me basking in reflected glory.
All comments are personal and have no bearing on my present or past places of work. Comments on the post are welcome at the blog site.
Who would have thought that one day I would come across Samit-da here in London. Samit Ray is now the Managing Director of the Rice Group and we share the same root of growing up at Jatindas Nagar in Belgharia. Although, he is a few years senior to me, yet as young boys we were associated with the same Udayan Club for years. Seeing the organisation headed by Samit-da making strides in India, I sometimes felt if we could come across but never dreamt that it would come true of all places in London and that too possibly after almost three decades.
The two people who influenced me most in taking up journalism as a career almost two decades ago were my two great friends Ritwik Mukherjee and Debasish Choudhury . Ritwik had joined the profession during our college days and almost regularly we used to walk to the office of Kolkata, a daily which is now defunct, at Lenin Sarani. It was there at the Kolkata office that I came across Kunal-da. Kunal Ghosh, now the Executive Editor of Sangbad Pratidin,a Bengali daily published from Kolkata, and the Chief Executive Officer of Channel 10, a same city-based television channel. More than two decades ago he was one of our windows to the world of journalism and we would be mesmerised by the exciting stories he would tell us about shoulder-rubbing with people at the helm and getting hold of those in power, especially the Congress politics with which he was then very organically linked.
While in Kolkata, I came across Kunal-da a few times later but not so much ever since joining journalism myself. Probably, the last time we met was during a demonstration at Esplanade East, one time well known rallying point for protestors and demonstrators in Kolkata, in 1995, which he was covering possibly for Aajkaal, another Bengali daily. As I get to read the articles written by Kunal-da for Sangbad Pratidin, here in London, thanks to the internet, and with the political metamorphosis that has taken place in the Indian state of Bengal, it was a pleasure meeting him here in London after over 15 years.
Nearly 20 years ago when I first joined journalism, we were a group of 20, selected to revive an ailing Bengali newspaper, Jugantar, with a rich history. It was during those days when the print media had not been shadowed by the glitz and glamour of television journalism. Veteran journalist, late Niranjan Sengupta was entrusted with the responsibility of training us. It was during the training stint of three months at the St. Xavier's College in Kolkata that four of us - Anindya Chattopadhyay, Joydip Chakraborty, Santanu Mukhopadhyay and I - got very close. Every evening after our training sessions we used to cling like a group and it was so conspicuous that one of the fellow trainees then and now the Assistant Editor of the Anandabazar Patrika, a Kolkata-based Bengali daily, Ishani Dutta Ray chose to write a creative piece on the group "Ekti Bakul gachh ebong charte chhele" , meaning one Bakul tree and four boys. I still remember a Bakul tree on the Park Street footpath just outside the college.
Since my leaving Jugantar for The Financial Express in 1994 the four of us were not as close as before because of practical reasons but we were still in touch. In 1997, when I returned from Delhi, to join the Press Trust of India in Kolkata, I heard that Anindya has taken up a career in singing and set up a Bengali band called Chandrabindoo.
Just before leaving for London in 1999, Anindya presented me with a cassette of one of their popular numbers. Since then we hardly met, except for a brief stint in 2001. Anindya and his group have since grown to be one of the popular Bengali bands. It was only through his performance at London that we got to meet each other after a span of over ten years.
All these meetings, with the three very successful people in their respective fields,are sure to incite nostalgia but at the same time it gives me a cosy feeling of how small the world is becoming with every passing day. Technology and its advancement have transformed the world in such a way that even a foreign land is no longer alien. At the same time aspirations are skyrocketing in a globalised world with increased opportunities. Many professional Indians are realising that the world is there for them to grab. As I am sipped with nostalgia after drifting down memory lane for the past two days, I can only think of a popular number by Anindya and his band Duniya Dot Com. Those who understand Bengali would definitely appreciate the wonderful lyrics of the song. Even those who don't, and hence deprived of such a wonderful performance, also realise how the worldwide web has literally transformed this globe into a virtual village.
I hope Anindya and his band wouldn't mind me using the title of one of their popular numbers as the title of this post. It is me basking in reflected glory.
All comments are personal and have no bearing on my present or past places of work. Comments on the post are welcome at the blog site.
Tuesday
Bankruptcy is the cure for Cancer
'Cancer Cures Smoking' - this was the advert which caught my eyes over three decades ago on a family trip to Guwahati, as it is now called. Little did I understand the importance or the appeal of such a campaign and my only connect to it was a close relation of mine accompanying me, who was a chain smoker. The creativity of the advert was not good enough though to make my relative quit smoking, which he finally did after many years following lung infection.
As a ten year old boy then, cancer was very much alien to me, nor was I aware about its dreadfulness and the trauma it causes not only to the infected but also to the affected families. However, the trauma had befallen us a few years later when another close relation was diagnosed with cancer. As a teenager, I could estimate the anxiety that had gripped my family members then. Thanks to a timely intervention by the famous oncologist Dr Abani Chanda that the relative survived, despite being frail.
About 26 years later the trauma has returned again to our extended family and this time with a much grievous impact. The patient was diagnosed late and had to be shuttled between doctors and nursing homes, either because of lack of adequate facilities or with the expectation of improving the chances of her survival. Each movement was accompanied by a frustration of the delay in getting the treatment started and the rising cost in medical bill. When the choice is between spending more money and the hope (even if it is faint) of increasing the longevity of a loved person, the relatives are literally left with no option.
This is probably a typical story of any cancer patient in India. Every movement from one doctor to another involves a series of medical tests costing thousands of rupees. Although each test is carried out in clinical laboratories recognised by the government or any statutory or regulatory body, every doctor or a nursing home or a private hospital would demand a fresh set of the same examinations costing not only the patients and their families even more money but also draining out huge resources. My mother worked in a government laboratory for over three decades and I am fully aware about the cost of some of the tests that patients, suffering from life threatening diseases have to under go.
I wonder how the successive clinical tests are linked to the diagnosis or the treatment of the patients, especially when all of them are carried out in recognised pathological laboratories, or if there is a quid pro quo like in any other business. If there are failings then the concerned laboratory can be held accountable and brought to book. Often there are instances when two different medical practitioners have asked for similar tests to be carried out from the same laboratory and it beggars belief that these are guided by reasons beyond the remit of medical science. I have many friends who have taken up the noble profession of saving peoples’ lives. If they find time to read this blog and have an argument different from mine then I am ready to stand corrected.
While researching for this blog, I found that some private medical institutes, which took off in the major metropolis in India over the past decade, including some set up by non-resident Indians and foreigners, have been beneficiaries of discounted land prices and other infrastructural facilities with the promise of serving the poor. I wonder if there is any mechanism of auditing how many poor people they serve each year.
My fellow student at the School of Oriental and African Studies, Sheena Sumaria has done a wonderful piece of research on the “financialisation of health care and pensions” in developing countries for the Bretton Woods Project.
The report argues “that the privatisation reforms have failed to adequately address the social risks of old age, poverty and poor health. Far from increasing efficiency, the reforms have proved costly and have drained public resources through lavish tax incentives and significant administrative and regulatory expenses.”
The report also underlines that despite the failure of the privatisation reforms to benefit the majority, “the national governments – pressed by local elites, multilateral agencies and global corporate and financial interests – have contributed significant public resources towards enacting the reforms”.
Lack of accountability of private medical institutes and failure of the government to provide adequate services in state-run hospitals are actually leading to the pauperisation of those who suffer from life threatening diseases like cancer, so much so that, as a recent story done for the Anandabazar Patrika by Parijat Bandyopadhyay demonstrates, the families living in the lower end of the economic strata are not even willing to treat their loved ones, virtually pushing them to the throes of death.
I owe the idea behind this post to my colleague Alastair Lawson-Tancred.
The Anti-Smoking advertisement entitled "Cancer Cures Smoking" was created for the Cancer Patients Aid Association by O&M's Pushpinder Singh and Sagar Mahabaleshwarkar with the Creative Director - Mr. Piyush Pandey at the helm in 2003. It was awarded the Gold Lion in the category 'Outdoor Public Health' at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival held in Cannes, France in June 2003.
As a ten year old boy then, cancer was very much alien to me, nor was I aware about its dreadfulness and the trauma it causes not only to the infected but also to the affected families. However, the trauma had befallen us a few years later when another close relation was diagnosed with cancer. As a teenager, I could estimate the anxiety that had gripped my family members then. Thanks to a timely intervention by the famous oncologist Dr Abani Chanda that the relative survived, despite being frail.
About 26 years later the trauma has returned again to our extended family and this time with a much grievous impact. The patient was diagnosed late and had to be shuttled between doctors and nursing homes, either because of lack of adequate facilities or with the expectation of improving the chances of her survival. Each movement was accompanied by a frustration of the delay in getting the treatment started and the rising cost in medical bill. When the choice is between spending more money and the hope (even if it is faint) of increasing the longevity of a loved person, the relatives are literally left with no option.
This is probably a typical story of any cancer patient in India. Every movement from one doctor to another involves a series of medical tests costing thousands of rupees. Although each test is carried out in clinical laboratories recognised by the government or any statutory or regulatory body, every doctor or a nursing home or a private hospital would demand a fresh set of the same examinations costing not only the patients and their families even more money but also draining out huge resources. My mother worked in a government laboratory for over three decades and I am fully aware about the cost of some of the tests that patients, suffering from life threatening diseases have to under go.
I wonder how the successive clinical tests are linked to the diagnosis or the treatment of the patients, especially when all of them are carried out in recognised pathological laboratories, or if there is a quid pro quo like in any other business. If there are failings then the concerned laboratory can be held accountable and brought to book. Often there are instances when two different medical practitioners have asked for similar tests to be carried out from the same laboratory and it beggars belief that these are guided by reasons beyond the remit of medical science. I have many friends who have taken up the noble profession of saving peoples’ lives. If they find time to read this blog and have an argument different from mine then I am ready to stand corrected.
While researching for this blog, I found that some private medical institutes, which took off in the major metropolis in India over the past decade, including some set up by non-resident Indians and foreigners, have been beneficiaries of discounted land prices and other infrastructural facilities with the promise of serving the poor. I wonder if there is any mechanism of auditing how many poor people they serve each year.
My fellow student at the School of Oriental and African Studies, Sheena Sumaria has done a wonderful piece of research on the “financialisation of health care and pensions” in developing countries for the Bretton Woods Project.
The report argues “that the privatisation reforms have failed to adequately address the social risks of old age, poverty and poor health. Far from increasing efficiency, the reforms have proved costly and have drained public resources through lavish tax incentives and significant administrative and regulatory expenses.”
The report also underlines that despite the failure of the privatisation reforms to benefit the majority, “the national governments – pressed by local elites, multilateral agencies and global corporate and financial interests – have contributed significant public resources towards enacting the reforms”.
Lack of accountability of private medical institutes and failure of the government to provide adequate services in state-run hospitals are actually leading to the pauperisation of those who suffer from life threatening diseases like cancer, so much so that, as a recent story done for the Anandabazar Patrika by Parijat Bandyopadhyay demonstrates, the families living in the lower end of the economic strata are not even willing to treat their loved ones, virtually pushing them to the throes of death.
I owe the idea behind this post to my colleague Alastair Lawson-Tancred.
The Anti-Smoking advertisement entitled "Cancer Cures Smoking" was created for the Cancer Patients Aid Association by O&M's Pushpinder Singh and Sagar Mahabaleshwarkar with the Creative Director - Mr. Piyush Pandey at the helm in 2003. It was awarded the Gold Lion in the category 'Outdoor Public Health' at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival held in Cannes, France in June 2003.
Monday
Thinking Civil Society with reason: Responding to some comments
There have been quite a few responses to my blog, 'Thinking Civil Society with reason'. Many comments were made in Face book and Twitter, where I post my blogs regularly, and some had even taken the trouble of personally emailing me with their thoughts. This was a pleasant surprise for me as the blog was broadly discursive. It would be much appreciated if future comments were made at the blog site, in the specified area below each post.
My intention was not to be patronising and provide an academic deliberation on the evolution of civil society and how it operates in the Indian context, but to come up with a broad idea within which the concept of civil society, as it is seen today, is situated.
The objective of such an analysis was to highlight the fact that the acrimony that is overshadowing the debate over the role of the civil society in India is actually weakening the phenomenon from within. The reason behind such an apprehension is the fact that such acrimony is not guided by intellectual necessity and is merely a personal one.
The logic behind such an observation stems from the fact that all the components of the acrimony have reached their pre-eminence because of the broader (global) discourse of the civil society being situated to replace the state in some areas of operation.
I do not think that the civil society movement is yet to get concrete shape in India. Although in its present context, the pre-eminence was a western influence but with the course of time it has developed organically cutting across the rural-urban divide. However, I do accept that at a very conceptual stage civil society was an urban phenomenon.
The mention of a weak executive is also not acceptable; since my understanding is that the Indian executive is very monolithic and hence is resistant to any structural changes at least in the power relations within the society.
Finally, I would like to thank everybody who took the time to read my blog and contributed to the debate. It is very encouraging and would definitely stimulate any future thinking.
My intention was not to be patronising and provide an academic deliberation on the evolution of civil society and how it operates in the Indian context, but to come up with a broad idea within which the concept of civil society, as it is seen today, is situated.
The objective of such an analysis was to highlight the fact that the acrimony that is overshadowing the debate over the role of the civil society in India is actually weakening the phenomenon from within. The reason behind such an apprehension is the fact that such acrimony is not guided by intellectual necessity and is merely a personal one.
The logic behind such an observation stems from the fact that all the components of the acrimony have reached their pre-eminence because of the broader (global) discourse of the civil society being situated to replace the state in some areas of operation.
I do not think that the civil society movement is yet to get concrete shape in India. Although in its present context, the pre-eminence was a western influence but with the course of time it has developed organically cutting across the rural-urban divide. However, I do accept that at a very conceptual stage civil society was an urban phenomenon.
The mention of a weak executive is also not acceptable; since my understanding is that the Indian executive is very monolithic and hence is resistant to any structural changes at least in the power relations within the society.
Finally, I would like to thank everybody who took the time to read my blog and contributed to the debate. It is very encouraging and would definitely stimulate any future thinking.
Tuesday
Thinking Civil Society with reason
India is witnessing a debate on the role of civil society in what is being termed by many as the country’s “fight against corruption”. More than anything else, Anna Hazare’s movement has succeeded in bringing back the issue of corruption in India, especially at the top, as a national talking point. I have no qualms in admitting that the public reaction to the movement launched by the 74-year old activist came as a pleasant surprise to me. My understanding was that a large section of the Indians have started to live with corruption, accepting it as a fact of life. This emanated from my perception that now for a large number of Indians, ‘end justifies the means’. I consider this an outcome of ‘competitive capitalism’ and one could link it with ‘neo-liberalism’ – the dominant politico-economic discourse influencing much of the Indian society.
‘Competitive Capitalism ’ and its relationship to neo-liberalism is not the contention of this post. However, I thought it would be useful to explain the backdrop before linking it to the reasons behind the advent of the civil society, which is broadly a global phenomenon. (By 'competitive capitalism' I mean capitalism as a socio-political and economic doctrine which promotes competition in each and every sphere of human life.)
The possible relationship between Arvind Kejriwal, a guiding force behind Hazare’s movement, and the Ford Foundation, has raised a hue and cry in India, so much so that Arundhati Roy, who can very well be described as part of the civil society, where Kejriwal also belongs, went to the extent of drawing a conclusion that ‘foreign money’ ‘is being used to drum up popular support in favour of the so called drive against corruption in the country'. An influential English news weekly has also carried stories on the subject, although I am not totally sure about the exact nature of such a relationship, if any.
Even if such a relationship exists, nobody would disagree that corruption is a vice and needs to be stamped out. It has been part of the post-independent Indian society for the past over six decades and nothing much has changed, despite calls to combat it from various quarters and promises made by successive governments to take the issue head on. I see no problem in using foreign funds to stamp out corruption as part of the ‘good governance agenda’. After all, India has now grown much bigger and its sovereign influence transcends much beyond the national boundaries. Secondly, notwithstanding the background of organisations like the Ford Foundation (they or their parent organisations are exploitative on the one hand and philanthropic on the other), resources and expertise at their disposal have been used in many developing countries to ensure ‘democratic governance’ and hence it is not unique of sorts.
Civil society, being the intermediary between an individual and the state, has been part of the broad intellectual discourse for a very long time. Even before western modernity, civil society existed. One can be tempted to draw an analogy between the advisors of the kings and emperors of ancient and medieval India as being representatives of what we now call the ‘civil society’. Can’t we consider the Navaratna in Akbar’s court, including people like Birbal, as being the intermediaries between the state and the individual? However, it took a different form in the bourgeoisie society, in the aftermath of the western modernity and their role got diminished during the post world war period with the advent of statism, when nation-states had an overarching role in almost every sphere of human life.
With the rise of neo-liberalism, the influence of the nation states has been much diminished both in terms of reach and the roles they performed during much of the second half of the last century. Dominance of the private sector and attaching a monetised value to each and every function the state had performed for decades became a guiding principle of the neo-liberals, till such time when thinkers like Joseph Stiglitz realised that the private sector could not fully make up for the state. It was possibly during the later part of the last century that the World Bank (note Stiglitz was the Chief Economist of the World Bank during the period 1997 to 2000) situated the civil society in the mainstream discourse as an alternative to carry out some roles which were earlier done by the state.
I think it is extremely important to see and analyse the role of the civil society in the backdrop of its re-emergence in the mainstream discourse as an alternative to the state, not in its entirety as a fundamental institution in society but in a functional form holding the service providers to account. Whether the civil society can match up to the state is a different debate altogether but it would be naïve if one overlooks the pretext within which neo-liberalism situates the civil society. The pre-eminence of organisations like the Ford Foundation or civil society representatives like Kejriwal and Roy and their fight against corruption or movement in support of the Right to Information (RTI) are outcomes emanating from such an outlook.(Who would have imagined civil society performing such a role when the state had an overarching presence.) Seeing what Kejriwal and the Ford Foundation are doing as something out of the blue implies missing out the larger context within which civil society is situated in the wider discourse of neo-liberalism. Such a myopic vision could only lead to acrimony, hindering any healthy debate on working out the parameters within which the civil society could function in the Indian society.
*Much of my thinking on Civil Society is influenced by Subir Sinha of the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London.
‘Competitive Capitalism ’ and its relationship to neo-liberalism is not the contention of this post. However, I thought it would be useful to explain the backdrop before linking it to the reasons behind the advent of the civil society, which is broadly a global phenomenon. (By 'competitive capitalism' I mean capitalism as a socio-political and economic doctrine which promotes competition in each and every sphere of human life.)
The possible relationship between Arvind Kejriwal, a guiding force behind Hazare’s movement, and the Ford Foundation, has raised a hue and cry in India, so much so that Arundhati Roy, who can very well be described as part of the civil society, where Kejriwal also belongs, went to the extent of drawing a conclusion that ‘foreign money’ ‘is being used to drum up popular support in favour of the so called drive against corruption in the country'. An influential English news weekly has also carried stories on the subject, although I am not totally sure about the exact nature of such a relationship, if any.
Even if such a relationship exists, nobody would disagree that corruption is a vice and needs to be stamped out. It has been part of the post-independent Indian society for the past over six decades and nothing much has changed, despite calls to combat it from various quarters and promises made by successive governments to take the issue head on. I see no problem in using foreign funds to stamp out corruption as part of the ‘good governance agenda’. After all, India has now grown much bigger and its sovereign influence transcends much beyond the national boundaries. Secondly, notwithstanding the background of organisations like the Ford Foundation (they or their parent organisations are exploitative on the one hand and philanthropic on the other), resources and expertise at their disposal have been used in many developing countries to ensure ‘democratic governance’ and hence it is not unique of sorts.
Civil society, being the intermediary between an individual and the state, has been part of the broad intellectual discourse for a very long time. Even before western modernity, civil society existed. One can be tempted to draw an analogy between the advisors of the kings and emperors of ancient and medieval India as being representatives of what we now call the ‘civil society’. Can’t we consider the Navaratna in Akbar’s court, including people like Birbal, as being the intermediaries between the state and the individual? However, it took a different form in the bourgeoisie society, in the aftermath of the western modernity and their role got diminished during the post world war period with the advent of statism, when nation-states had an overarching role in almost every sphere of human life.
With the rise of neo-liberalism, the influence of the nation states has been much diminished both in terms of reach and the roles they performed during much of the second half of the last century. Dominance of the private sector and attaching a monetised value to each and every function the state had performed for decades became a guiding principle of the neo-liberals, till such time when thinkers like Joseph Stiglitz realised that the private sector could not fully make up for the state. It was possibly during the later part of the last century that the World Bank (note Stiglitz was the Chief Economist of the World Bank during the period 1997 to 2000) situated the civil society in the mainstream discourse as an alternative to carry out some roles which were earlier done by the state.
I think it is extremely important to see and analyse the role of the civil society in the backdrop of its re-emergence in the mainstream discourse as an alternative to the state, not in its entirety as a fundamental institution in society but in a functional form holding the service providers to account. Whether the civil society can match up to the state is a different debate altogether but it would be naïve if one overlooks the pretext within which neo-liberalism situates the civil society. The pre-eminence of organisations like the Ford Foundation or civil society representatives like Kejriwal and Roy and their fight against corruption or movement in support of the Right to Information (RTI) are outcomes emanating from such an outlook.(Who would have imagined civil society performing such a role when the state had an overarching presence.) Seeing what Kejriwal and the Ford Foundation are doing as something out of the blue implies missing out the larger context within which civil society is situated in the wider discourse of neo-liberalism. Such a myopic vision could only lead to acrimony, hindering any healthy debate on working out the parameters within which the civil society could function in the Indian society.
*Much of my thinking on Civil Society is influenced by Subir Sinha of the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London.
Friday
Great men think alike
The West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Bandyopadhyay may be ‘ridiculed’ for her plans to turn Kolkata, the place where I belong, to London, the city where I have been living for over a decade now, but her way of thinking has now found a taker in no less than the US President Barack Obama. Apart from being ‘harbingers of change’ in their own constituencies, Bandyopadhyay’s economic policy of going on a spending spree without much concern for the health of the exchequer has now evinced interest for the Democrat President, who despite lot of hope and aspiration, is struggling to ensure a second term in office.
The rare Obama speech, delivered before the US Congress (on Thursday US Time, kept me awake till the early hours and a drowsy journey to work this morning lured me to frame a queer comparison between the two, which might be unfamiliar for any average person living outside West Bengal or without any clear knowledge about the state Chief Minister.
The speech that Obama delivered last night lacked much in detail, but the underlying message was crystal clear, ‘spend and get out of the economic mess' that the US and much of the western world is in. While there is a deliberate attempt to practice austerity (and carry out cuts) in the changed environment in Europe, yet Obama has taken recourse to the Keynesian way of creating demand through government spending. The impact of the stimulus packages, which the US and many other governments around the world announced after the demise of the Lehman Brothers, amidst the fear of a double dip recession, are debatable (although that was probably more of a historical necessity) but that did not deter President Obama from treading a path, which any conservative would find dangerous and self-defeating.
However, this is not the only manifestation of the desperation that Obama is facing in the run up to the presidential polls. In his much animated speech Thursday night, he couldn’t even resist the temptation of mentioning that the next round of elections were actually round the corner. “The next (presidential) election is 14 months away but the American people have no patience to wait that long”, quipped Obama. See the similarity in the rhetoric that Bandyopadhyay uses justifying her hasty approach: “I want move quickly and ready to learn from mistakes rather than do nothing”. Like Obama, Bandyopadhyay also wants to ensure jobs for the frontline staff, the teachers, nurses etc. build infrastructure projects (Obama calls for modernising airports and Bandyopadhyay wants to build new roads, hospitals etc.), plug government wastage and tax those who can afford to pay more (Obama mentions about Warren Buffett paying less tax than even his secretary).
Apart from the economic elements, there is also a shrewd political side to the whole saga. Despite being a Democrat, Obama has called for tax cuts which is very difficult for the Republicans to ignore and if they, because of their majority in the House of Representatives, try to block the President’s plan then there is a fear that the opposition would expose themselves to the American people (at least that is what the strategists in the White House are betting on.) On a similar vein, Bandyopadhyay can also combat any resistance to her plans, either from her opposition, including the CPI-M, or from her alliance partner the Congress, as being anti-development. At least the strategists from both sides are possibly thinking that the whole saga puts them in a virtual win-win situation.
However, the objective of this post is not to draw similarities between two personality cults operating in different circumstances or to compare Bandyopadhyay with Obama but to highlight what one of the greatest and influential economists of all times John Maynard Keynes, despite being a votary of the free market, observed during his time, that “even the government could fill in the shoes of business by investing in public works and hiring the unemployed”.
In an age when Keynesianism, as an economic doctrine, is considered to be exhausted and when the state plays only a secondary role to the private sector, Keynes might turn in his grave and say, “one day I saved Capitalism from Communist onslaughts and today I am back to save the whole world”.
Who knows?
The rare Obama speech, delivered before the US Congress (on Thursday US Time, kept me awake till the early hours and a drowsy journey to work this morning lured me to frame a queer comparison between the two, which might be unfamiliar for any average person living outside West Bengal or without any clear knowledge about the state Chief Minister.
The speech that Obama delivered last night lacked much in detail, but the underlying message was crystal clear, ‘spend and get out of the economic mess' that the US and much of the western world is in. While there is a deliberate attempt to practice austerity (and carry out cuts) in the changed environment in Europe, yet Obama has taken recourse to the Keynesian way of creating demand through government spending. The impact of the stimulus packages, which the US and many other governments around the world announced after the demise of the Lehman Brothers, amidst the fear of a double dip recession, are debatable (although that was probably more of a historical necessity) but that did not deter President Obama from treading a path, which any conservative would find dangerous and self-defeating.
However, this is not the only manifestation of the desperation that Obama is facing in the run up to the presidential polls. In his much animated speech Thursday night, he couldn’t even resist the temptation of mentioning that the next round of elections were actually round the corner. “The next (presidential) election is 14 months away but the American people have no patience to wait that long”, quipped Obama. See the similarity in the rhetoric that Bandyopadhyay uses justifying her hasty approach: “I want move quickly and ready to learn from mistakes rather than do nothing”. Like Obama, Bandyopadhyay also wants to ensure jobs for the frontline staff, the teachers, nurses etc. build infrastructure projects (Obama calls for modernising airports and Bandyopadhyay wants to build new roads, hospitals etc.), plug government wastage and tax those who can afford to pay more (Obama mentions about Warren Buffett paying less tax than even his secretary).
Apart from the economic elements, there is also a shrewd political side to the whole saga. Despite being a Democrat, Obama has called for tax cuts which is very difficult for the Republicans to ignore and if they, because of their majority in the House of Representatives, try to block the President’s plan then there is a fear that the opposition would expose themselves to the American people (at least that is what the strategists in the White House are betting on.) On a similar vein, Bandyopadhyay can also combat any resistance to her plans, either from her opposition, including the CPI-M, or from her alliance partner the Congress, as being anti-development. At least the strategists from both sides are possibly thinking that the whole saga puts them in a virtual win-win situation.
However, the objective of this post is not to draw similarities between two personality cults operating in different circumstances or to compare Bandyopadhyay with Obama but to highlight what one of the greatest and influential economists of all times John Maynard Keynes, despite being a votary of the free market, observed during his time, that “even the government could fill in the shoes of business by investing in public works and hiring the unemployed”.
In an age when Keynesianism, as an economic doctrine, is considered to be exhausted and when the state plays only a secondary role to the private sector, Keynes might turn in his grave and say, “one day I saved Capitalism from Communist onslaughts and today I am back to save the whole world”.
Who knows?
Can Keynes save Obama's job
From my notes while listening to President Barrack Obama's rare but desperate address to the joint session of the US Congress.
Obama takes resort to Keynesiansim but is it enough to save his job for another term. Keynes once claimed to have saved Capitalism from Communist onslought but will the economist in his grave be able to save the presidency of a Democrat, who so far gave market an upper hand over government. Critics of Keynesianism say that it has now exhausted as an economic philosophy with the weakening of the nation state. Will Obama's efforts help the intuitive economist to make a come back as a forebearer of an economic doctrine?
China's surplus pays for US budget deficits. Despite what Obama says to persuade his vote bank, there is no way the US will take over China as the world's manufacturing hub. Following Giovanni Arrighi one can now very well say Adam Smith has reached Beijing and the days of the American Empire is finally over.
It has been a long night as the world watched another typical Obama speech in a rare address to the joint session of the US Congress. Despite the Obama type rhetoric the speech was weak on details. President Obama sounded in a hurry without much groundwork.
'Jobs Act' spells out more jobs for the jobless Americans but nobody knows who will foot the bill in a country which is neck deep in deficit. Obama's plans would make China economically stronger and US would seem like a power of the past.
Huge budget deficit an enormous problem for Obama on the economic front. However, a much bigger problem lies in the dominant political economy analysis of the current state of the world. Obama takes resort to Keynesianism to save his presideny but would the strategy work when the concept of 'nation state' has significantly weakened.
A quick ponter to what I tried to explain so far comes from a BBC interview with Arjuna Mahendran of the HSBC Private Bank,'' no reason for the bourses to be enthused from Obama speech''. Possibly the Asian bourses would slip a few points as they open trading on Friday
Obama takes resort to Keynesiansim but is it enough to save his job for another term. Keynes once claimed to have saved Capitalism from Communist onslought but will the economist in his grave be able to save the presidency of a Democrat, who so far gave market an upper hand over government. Critics of Keynesianism say that it has now exhausted as an economic philosophy with the weakening of the nation state. Will Obama's efforts help the intuitive economist to make a come back as a forebearer of an economic doctrine?
China's surplus pays for US budget deficits. Despite what Obama says to persuade his vote bank, there is no way the US will take over China as the world's manufacturing hub. Following Giovanni Arrighi one can now very well say Adam Smith has reached Beijing and the days of the American Empire is finally over.
It has been a long night as the world watched another typical Obama speech in a rare address to the joint session of the US Congress. Despite the Obama type rhetoric the speech was weak on details. President Obama sounded in a hurry without much groundwork.
'Jobs Act' spells out more jobs for the jobless Americans but nobody knows who will foot the bill in a country which is neck deep in deficit. Obama's plans would make China economically stronger and US would seem like a power of the past.
Huge budget deficit an enormous problem for Obama on the economic front. However, a much bigger problem lies in the dominant political economy analysis of the current state of the world. Obama takes resort to Keynesianism to save his presideny but would the strategy work when the concept of 'nation state' has significantly weakened.
A quick ponter to what I tried to explain so far comes from a BBC interview with Arjuna Mahendran of the HSBC Private Bank,'' no reason for the bourses to be enthused from Obama speech''. Possibly the Asian bourses would slip a few points as they open trading on Friday
Wednesday
People's surge needed to fight security failure
All day long on Wednesday, the blast near the High Court premises in New Delhi has been the highlight of the international media. In between meetings, my ringing BlackBerry updated every miniscule details of the fact that a very important Indian establishment was again under attack. Such attacks has become so frequent these days that it becomes difficult to maintain a proper chronology of events, so much so that during the previous blast at Mumbai my cousin, although a resident of the commercial capital of India, was not aware of such an incident till I called him up from London.
Terror attacks are not infrequent in India and the danger is that everyone, from the security apparatus to the administration to the ordinary people, gets used to it. They take it as a destiny with the politicians making a mockery of themselves by indulging in childlike blame games. What the BJP is saying today was the usual retort of the Congress when they were out of the treasury benches in parliament. It is a pity that politicians fight for political gains while ordinary people suffer. After every attack, as grisly pictures fill the prime time slots of all the Indian television channels, melancholy grips the heart for the lost lives; someone somewhere must have lost their near and dear ones.
One of Mark Tully’s books is titled: ‘No full stops in India''. Although written in a different context it seems that actually there is no full stop of terror and violence in a country which is known and adored worldwide for love, brotherhood, non violence and peace. Reading about the ghastly blasts and seeing the bloody pictures, I often wonder what is the justification of having such a robust security apparatus if it is brought down to its knees at regular intervals. I was in Delhi recently and had to undergo six layers of security checks within a period of two hours, despite being in the airport lounge all the time. Each time the khaki-clad security men searched my bags and used a metal detector on my body, I was filled with anguish. I heard a disgruntled fellow passenger telling to a security man, what I wanted to communicate. ''You can’t do anything to the terrorists and are unnecessarily harassing us’’, quipped the fellow passenger at the swanky Terminal 3 of the Delhi airport.
Like any other country, the security apparatus in India is also very insensitive and arrogant. Despite all the discomfort and uneasiness of the passengers, the stone faced security men are in no mood to comply with the minimum decorum of civilities. They behave as if they are the masters and we the ordinary people their subjects. In the context of what has happened today at Delhi, the readers might be aghast with my way of seeing things. However, it should be noted that an insensitive attitude on the part of the security apparatus only makes things worse and any ordinary citizen fails to understand the moral necessity of complying with the security arrangements.
Given the intensity of the attacks on India in recent times and the potent of instability and anger worldwide for various reasons, it is a foregone conclusion that terrorism, violence and bloodshed cannot be controlled only by the security mechanism. What is necessary is the ‘people’s surge’ or as celebrated BBC presenter Nik Gowing refers to in a different context as the ‘civilian surge’, where the responsibility of the necessary security level would be bestowed on the people. It would put the people under an ethico-moral obligation to ensure physical security for the society at large. Such a social arrangement would possibly transcend beyond physical security and ensure greater stability within the wider societal space.
Terror attacks are not infrequent in India and the danger is that everyone, from the security apparatus to the administration to the ordinary people, gets used to it. They take it as a destiny with the politicians making a mockery of themselves by indulging in childlike blame games. What the BJP is saying today was the usual retort of the Congress when they were out of the treasury benches in parliament. It is a pity that politicians fight for political gains while ordinary people suffer. After every attack, as grisly pictures fill the prime time slots of all the Indian television channels, melancholy grips the heart for the lost lives; someone somewhere must have lost their near and dear ones.
One of Mark Tully’s books is titled: ‘No full stops in India''. Although written in a different context it seems that actually there is no full stop of terror and violence in a country which is known and adored worldwide for love, brotherhood, non violence and peace. Reading about the ghastly blasts and seeing the bloody pictures, I often wonder what is the justification of having such a robust security apparatus if it is brought down to its knees at regular intervals. I was in Delhi recently and had to undergo six layers of security checks within a period of two hours, despite being in the airport lounge all the time. Each time the khaki-clad security men searched my bags and used a metal detector on my body, I was filled with anguish. I heard a disgruntled fellow passenger telling to a security man, what I wanted to communicate. ''You can’t do anything to the terrorists and are unnecessarily harassing us’’, quipped the fellow passenger at the swanky Terminal 3 of the Delhi airport.
Like any other country, the security apparatus in India is also very insensitive and arrogant. Despite all the discomfort and uneasiness of the passengers, the stone faced security men are in no mood to comply with the minimum decorum of civilities. They behave as if they are the masters and we the ordinary people their subjects. In the context of what has happened today at Delhi, the readers might be aghast with my way of seeing things. However, it should be noted that an insensitive attitude on the part of the security apparatus only makes things worse and any ordinary citizen fails to understand the moral necessity of complying with the security arrangements.
Given the intensity of the attacks on India in recent times and the potent of instability and anger worldwide for various reasons, it is a foregone conclusion that terrorism, violence and bloodshed cannot be controlled only by the security mechanism. What is necessary is the ‘people’s surge’ or as celebrated BBC presenter Nik Gowing refers to in a different context as the ‘civilian surge’, where the responsibility of the necessary security level would be bestowed on the people. It would put the people under an ethico-moral obligation to ensure physical security for the society at large. Such a social arrangement would possibly transcend beyond physical security and ensure greater stability within the wider societal space.
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