Republic Day: A balance sheet
Republic Day, January 25, and Independence Day, August 15, are points on the calendar for the Nation’s accounting, especially as the two dates are almost evenly spaced. Materially, India has done rather well: living standards across the broad spectrum of the population have risen appreciably since fundamental economic reforms were initiated in mid-July 1991. The situation then was dire. The sudden rise in oil prices had bankrupted the national exchequer, and the Finance Minister was required to accompany the country’s gold reserves to London to deposit before a badly needed international loan was issued.
Having peered into the abyss, then Congress Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao, bit the bullet, asked the former Reserve Bank of India Governor Dr Manmohan Singh to take charge as Finance Minister and get rid of the sacred cows that had hobbled India to what derisively was described as the ‘Hindu rate of growth.’ The old licence and permit raj was dismantled, amidst howls of protest from the BJP and Communist benches in Parliament. The economy spurted upward into an approximate 6-6.5 per cent growth. When the first BJP government under Atal Bihari Vajpayee took office around March 1998, remaining in power until 2004, the reforms agenda remained in place, with growth steady rather than spectacular. Congress returned to power in mid 2004, with Dr Manmohan Singh as Prime Minister. Economic growth reached a new 8-9.5 per cent. India weathered the global economic crisis of 2008, with slowing growth in the aftermath. In the 2014 general election, Congress was demolished, with its 200 plus seats in Parliament reduced to a paltry 44.
The new BJP government with Prime Minister Narendra Modi commanded an absolute majority in the House. Economic reforms continued apace. Foreign investment took a quantum jump, as controls and regulations were simplified, and some abolished. India’s place in Ease of Doing Business, according to the World Bank, rose to 77, as opposed to the earlier 130th place among 192 sovereign countries. The present momentum should take India to 50 th position in the not too distant future. India is poised to overtake Britain as the the world’s fifth largest economy. It is already the world’s fastest growing large economy, having recently surpassed China in top position. World Bank and International Monetary Fund projections for the next few years tell of an ascending growth cycle. Destitution has declined to 20 per cent and decreasing, although general poverty is unacceptably high. Dollar billionaires are remarkably high, pointing to disturbingly wide income differentials.
Prime Minister has done well on the whole in his government’s management of the economy. In hindsight it may have done better. Prime Minister Modi has steered Indian foreign policy deftly; perhaps defence expenditure could do with an increase in the context of China’s rise and regional turbulence. India’s achievements in space have been noteworthy and further frontiers, including manned missions are now within India’s reach.
That said, the political discourse in India is disturbingly spiteful and frenzied. Some BJP leaders’s attacks on opponents, notably the Congress leadership present and past are unbecoming of a matured democracy. A robust democracy is based on respect for the opinions of opponents. This, sadly, has been lacking. The BJP fringe, and even the mainstream on occasions, have been associated with Congress’ outbusrts are increasingly becoming unscceptable. Intellectual and obscurantist absurdities contesting the discoveries of Newton, Einstein and Darwin, and by extension the work of Indian scientists, who have, and are, working in related fields. Calls for the banning of books and films reached a crescendo in BJP-ruled States, before the Supreme Court intervened with verdicts upholding the Constitutional sanctities of free speech and thought as fundamental rights of all Indian citizens. Liberty and development are inclusive; recognizing this truth will make them an enduring way of Indian life.
Challenges of global disorder
In an interconnected world, isolation is a non-starter. Events in one corner of the globe can reverberate in its farthest corners. Venezuela, an oil-rich country in the north of South America is in turmoil. Its head of state President Nicolas Maduro has been challenged by the Speaker of the country’s Parliament, Juan Guido, with a declaration that he was the rightful President, even if unelected. Venezuela’s economic woes are as deep as the consequential social turbulence. The United States, which has a long, disquieting record of hemispheric interventions – witness the overthrow of the Allende regime in Chile, the military coup in Brazil in the 1970s, the attempted overthrow of Maduro’s predecessor Hugo Chavis, to name but a few examples. The US announced its recognition of Juan Guido as Venezuela’s new President on the specious ground of promoting democracy and human rights of Venezuelans. US satraps on the continent and in Europe lined up cravenly in support of the measure. Mexico, Bolivia and Cuba affirmed their support for President Maduro. At a farther remove so have Russia, China and Turkey.
Imagine a state recognizing, say, Hilary Clinton, the Democratic party candidate who lost the US presidential election to Donald Trump, arguing that she had received more popular votes than her rival. French President Emmanuel Macron defended the attempted coup against Maduro when, ironically, France is rocked daily by Yellow Shirt protesters calling for the removal Macron. The Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini has called on the French people to replace Macron, much to the annoyance of Paris. The US-orchestrated charade is truly breathtaking in its cynicism. France, once a collaborator of Nazi Germany through its infamous Vichy regime, sent its Jewish population voluntarily to the Nazi death camps, yet sits today in the UN Security Council as a permanent Great Power pontificating on human rights, even as it shores up its venal authority in West and Central Africa.
Should the outcome of the forthcoming Indian general election be unpalatable to US and Europe, what then? The US is wooing Pakistan with the carrot of free trade and more, if it would play ball on Afghanistan; The Times of India, on cue, (editorial, January 25) argued for open negotiations between India and the Pakistan military for the betterment of Indo-Pakistan ties. As Pakistan has had military governments in the past, the advice was strikingly rancid.
The worldly-wise Modi government and the Opposition Congress party and others would do well to initiate a dialogue on how best to safeguard India’s sovereignty in face of possible threats. Referring to Venezuela, President Trump from his Oval Office in the White House pronounced, ‘all options are on the table’. Cosying up to Uncle Sam on the plea of shared democratic values and institutions has its perils. The founding fathers of the American Republic were slave owners of blacks; successive administrations oversaw the decimation of the country’s native Indian population. A global order of ruling Herrenvolk lording over subjected Bantustans is scarcely fit for sale. Caveat Emptor!
Cricketers rally to stricken star
Jacob Martin, 46, a stalwart who played for Baroda and captained the side when it won the Ranji Trophy in 2001, was part of the Indian squad in ten ODIs. He was seriously injured in a road accident and was put on a life support system. The hospital expenses were heavy and his wife soon ran out of the family’s savings. The search for financial assistance is never easy with family pride involved. However, desperate situations call for desperate remedies, hence the Martin family gave the go-ahead to a friend Sanjay Patel, a former secretary of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and the Baroda Cricket Association, to seek help for the stricken cricketer fighting for his life. Hearing of his plight, ex-cricketers rallied to the plight of Martin’s wife and family. They include Ravi Shastri, currently coach of the Indian Test team and once a distinguished Test cricketer himself, Saurav Ganguly, Test batsman and captain, Zaheer Khan, Irfan and Yusuf Pathan, Krunal Pandya, all of whom have played in Indian colours, in Tests or ODIs.
In all, Jacob Martin, middle order batsman, aggregated over 9,000 runs if First Class cricket at a healthy average of 46.66. We wish him a speedy recovery from his terrible ordeal.
