THE SPOILED BRAT OF DELHI

The performance of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the Delhi elections is impressive but not unprecedented. There have been more remarkable precedents in the past. The huge victory of the Janata Party in the elections to the Lok Sabha after the lifting of the Emergency, the decimation of the Congress by the DMK in what was then known as Madras state, and the coming to power in Assam by the Asom Gana Parishad (AGP), a party formed by the activists of the All Assam Students Union, are few instances that come easily to mind. All these parties came to power by concentrating on a single point plan: the Janata Party to end  Indira Gandhi's rule, the DMK to protect Tamil from the Hindi onslaught, and the AGP to keep Assam for the Assamese. The AAP too had pinned its electoral strategy on a single slogan: eradicate corruption! In the 16-point AAP manifesto the first was its, " Commitment to passing (the) Delhi Jan Lokpal Bill within 15 days of coming to power."

Obviously, the slogan was appealing. Otherwise the AAP would not have managed to get 30 percent of the votes polled as against the BJP's 33 percent and the Congress's 25 percent. For a rookie party this victory is certainly impressive. But is it a strong indicator that the anti-corruption wave sentiment has gripped the masses? The voting percentage advises caution. The votes polled by the BJP and the Congress indicate three facts: one, the vast majority  their followers (more than 50 percent of the voters) have not brought into AAP's tirade against their parties; two, they do not place a premium on AAP's promise to usher in a corruption-free Delhi; and three, the youth vote does not seem to be disproportionately in favour of the AAP.

Unfortunately, Kejriwal & Co. do not see the results this way. They have confused an impressive victory for a great one. This is not merely an outburst fuelled by a post-poll exuberance. The moral agenda that drives the AAP's leadership, to the exclusion of everything else, has made them zealots. They actually believe that taking a strong anti-corruption stance is the alpha and omega of politics and that everything else falls in between or out.

The other issues included in their manifesto - power, water, sewage, public transport, etc. - and the suggested solutions to these problem areas are based on the premise that the root cause of every problem is corruption. For example, "Delhi’s consumers have been getting inflated bills due to malpractices by (distribution companies) Discoms. AAP promises a reduction of consumers’ electricity expenditure by 50%. This will be done by ordering an audit of Discoms, rectifying inflated bills and getting electricity bills checked by independent agencies." That an ex-Indian Revenue Service officer would see an audit as a panacea for high power bills is as natural as any former General stressing the lack of discipline as the source of all problems in a company, city, or country!

Zealotry in electoral politics can take a party only so far and no further. The art of politics especially in a democracy is the practice of giving and taking, or as Churchill put it, ' the art of the possible'. At the time of writing, the Congress has indicated that it is willing to unconditionally accept an AAP government in Delhi. The AAP's zealotry will not allow it to unconditionally accept this offer. Hence the 18 conditions listed by the AAP to accept the unconditional support of the Congress. The list is  based by and large on AAP's election manifesto. 

In a democracy every party fights an election on its own manifestos and if and when one party forms a government with the support of another, then the norm is to draw up an agreed common programme. The AAP does not respect this practice. Like a spoiled brat it will only play under its own rules.

A zealot is a zealot is a zealot...until time and age  hopefully catches up with him before it's too late.

ONE SWALLOW DOES NOT MAKE A SUMMER

Most of the media, both electronic and print, have labelled the just concluded elections to five state assemblies as "the semi-finals" to the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. This is an inept turn of phrase for many reasons. First, India has a long history of elections where the results of state elections do not necessarily match the one for the Lok Sabha. Secondly, the four states in the Hindi belt have slightly more than 73 seats in the Lok Sabha. Even if the BJP makes a clean sweep in all these states in the coming parliament elections this would net it less than 14 per cent of the total seats. If we factor in the Aam Aadmi Party whose performance in Delhi has been unprecedented and the BJP's no show in Mizoram the percentage for it would be less.

The truth is that while the Congress is a party with a country-wide organisation the BJP is limited to the Hindi-belt, an exception being Karnataka where it has an on/off presence with its former chief minister, Yeddyurappa, and some of his cabinet colleagues leading their own party in opposition to the mother party. But election fever is much like the mating season among animals when indiscriminate coupling rules; BJP could still tie the knot with Yeddyurappa.

Political expediency almost always trumps morality before and after elections. Since elections to five states have already thrown up a hung house in one - Delhi - there is every likelihood that would be the case in the coming polls for the Lok Sabha. In this situation the BJP would have to strike deals with a motley bunch of regional parties, most of whom are not its natural allies in any ideological sense. Managing this crowd of prima donnas is not easy. Vajpayee could do it because he had the manners of an aristocrat and the intuition of a poet. Narendra Modi who speaks the language of the 
marketplace and prides himself on his so-called macho approach will meet more than his match with a Jayalalithaa or a Mamta. These ladies like to fight.

The Congress is better placed. Its broad secular outlook and left-of-centre policies give it a wide array of suitors before and after the Lok Sabha elections. The problem is that most of these possible allies have their agendas which is either caste or class-based and those may not always be in keeping with the overall aim of the government. The Congress has been around long enough to learn the tactics of surviving this type of political bargaining or in the worst case, blackmail. Witness the Nuclear Bill, Mamta's posturing, and the DMK's threat. Modi does not have this track record. Advani does. The summer when it comes will be a season of discontent.

IN THE NAME OF THE FARMER FOR BIG BUSINESS

The opposition Left Democratic Front and the Kerala Congress-M (a member of the ruling United Democratic Front) have joined hands to fight the Kasturirangan report on environmental controls in  the Western Ghats. This could be just a step in a courtship dance or a ploy by either partners to gain some political mileage. What is interesting is that while the Kerala Catholic Bishop's Conference has come out against the Kasturirangan report the RSS is backing it. Environmental issues have always been divisive in India; in the Kerala model it can also have a communal twist.

The original inhabitants of the Western Ghats are tribal people. They have been reduced to a minority because of poverty-induced malnutrition and ill health, and the influx of settlers from the plains who have contributed to dispossess them. The majority of the settlers are Christians - a vote bank for the Kerala Congress-M and the sheep for the shepherds in the Bishop's Conference. Hence the opposition of the Bishop's Conference and the Kerala Congress-M to the Kasturirangan report seemingly has a logic to it. Likewise the support to it voiced by the organisation of tribal people led by C.K. Janu. The opposition by the Left Democratic Front and the support by the RSS are plainly attempts to fish in troubled waters.

Though all the opponents of the report has alleged that it is anti-farmer and has used this to bring out protesting farmers and their families to the street, they have avoided discussing the very short list of prohibitions in the report. There is a reason for this lapse. None of the five listed prohibitions in the Kasturirangan report has anything to do with farming. On the contrary, it prohibits really large-scale constructions of over tens of thousands sq. metres, quarries, mining, etc.. None of these activities are remotely connected to farming; they are of deep interest to big business Though the agitation against the Kasturirangan report is ostensibly in the name of the farmer it is for big business prohibits really large-scale constructions of over tens of thousands sq. metres, quarries, mining, etc.. None of these activities are remotely connected to farming; instead they are of deep interest to low value adding extractive business, and to those farmers hoping to exit farming after selling their land to such businesses.

If the prohibitions come to stay the real losers will be those who are already operating quarries, mines, etc. in the Western Ghats, those who were hoping to participate in the gang-rape of the region, and those farmers who want to sell out to these interests. Not farmers who want to farm; they stand to benefit from a clean environment. Though the agitation against the Kasturirangan report is ostensibly in the name of the farmer it is to protect the interests of the extractive nature-killing businesses.

THE BATTLE OF THE BLOCKADE

The Battle of the Secretariat Blockade in Trivandrum which began with a bang, and took on epic proportions for slightly more than a day in the limited space of television, has ended with a whimper. When CPI-M State Secretary Pinarayi Vijayan led his hordes to block access to the Secretariat and Chief Minister Oomen Chandy summoned his police forces and the Centre's to defend his citadel a battle royal was expected ... that is, until the two antagonists supposedly found a formula to convert a dead end situation to a face-saving retreat.

The 'formula' is to institute a judicial enquiry into the Solar Scam (see previous post) under a sitting judge of the Kerala high court. To be fair, before the blockade began Chandy had offered to order a judicial enquiry after the on-going police investigations were concluded. At that time the offer was refused by Pinarayi & Co. on the ground that without Chandy's resignation a judicial enquiry was an empty gesture. The irony is that suddenly what was described as an empty gesture by the CPI-M has become a magic wand that will unlock the mystery of the solar scam, and a judicial enquiry without the conclusion of the police investigations has become acceptable to Chandy.

The all round change of heart has been caused some surprise within the media, though this development was inevitable: after all, has any chief minister relinquished office because a large crowd of people asks him to? This was the prime slogan of the Left Democratic Front and it had the strong and unappealing flavour of an ultimatum, and ultimatums rarely work except in a revolutionary situation. Despite all the red flags (and caps!) Kerala is far from such a situation; the only revolution here is an on-going consumerist revolution.

Therefore the real question is why did the chief protagonists in the Blockade Drama take extreme positions for so long and then abandon them without any qualms soon after the show hit the road? The answer lies in inner party dynamics. The chief protagonists in this drama have one thing in common: both Chief Minister Oomen Chandy and CPI-M State Secretary Pinarayi Vijayan have more enemies within their respective parties and among their allies than outside. The Blockade Drama has put both of them centre-stage, making Chandy appear as a resolute leader and allowing Pinarayi to showcase his organisational skills. Between the two this innings goes to Chandy who has managed to silence his critics within his party and its allies. This means that Pinarayi will be on the offensive when the terms of reference of the judicial enquiry are decided. In short, the truce is temporary.

The spotlight on the Blockade has pushed into darkness two key issues highlighted by the Solar Scam. One, why should ministers (who are part of the Executive) have non-governmental people working in their office as personal staff, when a search in the personnel database at the Secretariat could easily have yielded thousands of eligible candidates for the job that a Joppen (an accused who was working on Chandy's office) was supposed to be doing, unless of course it is the kind of job that requires a really 'personal' touch! But to be fair to Chandy the politicisation of the Chief Minister's Office (CMO) pre-dates his arrival on the political scene and he is only guilty of carrying on a practice embraced by all political parties in the past. It is precisely for this reason that not one party has questioned the propriety of party members being inducted into the CMO. Perhaps the judicial enquiry could lay down some ground rules on this subject even though they may never be implemented.

The second issue which no one seems to be concerned about is why those who fall for such scams are called 'businessmen' by the media and politicians. They seem to have forgotten the old saying: A fool and his money are soon parted.

Pity the land where such people are called businessmen.

PROGRESS IN KERALA

Two women and a man with a supporting cast consisting of bit players in politics working from the sanctity of the chief minister's office, are hogging the headlines in Kerala in what is alleged to be the greatest con in recent history. The accusation against the trio and their accomplices is that they have either used the chief minister's name or were backed by that political worthy to con businessmen to invest in a bogus company promoting solar power. (Like most narratives in the state there are variations in the story depending upon who is the narrator.)

Whichever version one goes with, and the innumerable scams reported from Kerala, the inescapable fact is that a large section of those who pass themselves off as businessmen in the state lack even the smallest portion of business acumen. Otherwise, how could they have handed over large sums of cash without verifying the asset and credit base of Team Solar?

This oversight is matched by the chief minister Oomen Chandy's blindness to the goings on in his official household where different members functioned as facilitators for Team Solar. Even if we take his protestation of innocence at face value, the fact that he was unaware about what was happening under his own nose is an eloquent comment on his incompetence. For that one reason he should quit.

The Team Solar case is not a unique one. Even as the Solar case is consuming many column centimetres of newsprint and launching multiple charges of the breaking news brigade on TV channels, a foreign currency scam reportedly amounting to over Rs. 400 crore is playing to full house in Trichur district. In this scam too, according to a newspaper the players used "forged letters and photographs of the chief minister and union ministers to dupe the investors". This brings us to the second fact of doing business in the state: show your proximity to the powers-that-be to allay doubts and get purse strings opened.

This technique is not new. For many years pseudo-beggars have been using forged letters from hospitals and religious heads to collect money for treating unpronounceable illnesses. What is different today is that men and women in fashionable clothes use politicians' photos to dupe supposedly smart businessmen!

It is another aspect of the Kerala Model. In a perverse way this change over the years could be called progress.

NAWAZ SHARIF: WALK SOFTLY AND DON'T CARRY THE BIG STICK

The victory of the Marcos clan in the Philippines and Nawaz Sharif's party in Pakistan reveal a phenomenon familiar to Indians and a puzzle to all anti-corruption crusaders. Widespread corruption marked the rule of Marcos (husband of Imelda of 'the 1001 shoes fame') and Sharif who first became Pakistan's prime minister (1990-93) with the army's help and in his second term (1997-99) was ousted by an army coup. Yet this stain has had no impact on their recent victories. There could be many reasons for this phenomenon. Either the voters cared a damn about these charges because the tolerance of corruption is the norm in most societies, or the alternative to Marcos and Nawaz were less appealing. All in all the outlook for the victory of a mass upsurge against corruption does not look too promising, unless and until the electorate's demand for political rights is matched by its sense of civic responsibility.

Imran Khan must have understood this by now. His party campaigned under the anti-corruption banner and instead of the tsunami of votes he predicted he has had to be satisfied with a distant second position which is still a great improvement from the last election. The victor Nawaz Sharif too has his share of problems. Though his party, the PML-N, has become the largest single party in the National Assembly it is still short of a simple majority and will need partners to form a government. That should not be a problems now because the allure of office tends to overcome ideological differences when euphoria is in the air. How long this bonhomie will last is another question.

There is much to be euphoric about. First, the fact that the military allowed the government to complete its full term (though without much to show for it) is a historical milestone. Secondly, this election recorded the highest voting percentage ever with a memorable showing by the young, first time voters. Thirdly, barring the fundamentalist parties every party in the fray campaigned to get the vote out. Finally, the military stayed put in the barracks.

Sharif should ensure that it stays there. Last time when he had a two-thirds majority he thought that was enough to tame the military. That was a grave miscalculation and he ended up in exile. With just a thin working majority now he surely will have to walk on egg shells. This means that even on Indo-Pak relations he should avoid the grand gesture and work for incremental changes because, without the military's support Sharif will be unable to achieve much on that score or tackle the problem of internal terrorism and its external ramifications.


To complicate matters the seats that his party has won are mainly from the Punjab province, while the remaining provinces are in the hands of other parties. In a normal polity this should not pose a serious problem. But Pakistan can hardly be called that. It is a state comprising different nationalities supposedly held together by a common religion. This is a nice thought but in the real world nationalism and common economic interests provide the glue. A smart businessman like Sharif should not have a problem understanding that.

THE ONLY LIGHT IS THE BACK-LIT TV SCREEN

A picture is worth a thousand words is not just the first lesson that a print journalist learns. It also reflects a historical truth: script and words came after the picture. Language, both spoken and written, pre-supposes the capability for abstract reasoning and memorising often arbitrary rules.  Not so with pictures. An infant who is incapable of writing 'mother' or 'father' can draw matchstick figures to represent her parents. While we can only engage aurally with a strange language, a piece of art that is abstract or has no perceivable visual meaning can still release powerful memories and enlighten the mind. 

It is the universal appeal of the image that gives the edge to television journalism over the print media. Though speed of delivery did play a significant role in the growth of TV, the print media is trying to bridge this handicap by entering the worldwide web and supplementing text with videos. 

The video is a moving image. This much everyone knows. In India the primary form of the moving image is cinema. While we are celebrating a century of Indian cinema this year let us remember that this industry would not have thrived so long without its remarkable ability to entertain people of all classes. Cinema is the ultimate democratic art form; with only a price differential in tickets it is the great equaliser. 

Indian television journalism lacks the technical sophistication of the hundred-year-old industry. But it makes up for this by borrowing the dramatic language and declamatory style of cinema. This is one crucial area in which print and TV journalism differ. In the former, especially as practised in the great newspapers and magazines of the world, adjectives are used in a report only if they are required for clarity's sake and not to editorialise. When clarity is tossed out and editorialising takes centre stage then reason is replaced by sound and more sound. Is this a case of an empty drum making the most 
noise?

Commercial television  began as a platform for entertainment and lifestyle, modelling its serials and song and dance on mainstream Indian cinema, and indigenising Western TV shows. This works because of the Indian genius for creative copying;  much like producing dandiya  raas costumes for Barbie dolls during the Navaratri. 

Television journalism, born later because of the monopolistic broadcasting rules of the government, had quite a few role models to copy. However  it chose to borrow from them neither their style nor substance and re-fashion them to create a vibrant model of news broadcasting. Instead what we have is a well-lit little theatre of Indian middle class theatricality --  loud, passionate, arrogant, and ultimately meaningless; actually very Indian male even though many TV matriarchs can out perform them. Unlike the average  Indian cinema where the heroes and villains have to shout in order to be noticed, in our television journalism even the heroines shout. 

The only light is the back-lit TV screen.

THE MEDIA AND THE MIDDLE CLASS

NEW DELHI: The affidavit filed by CBI Director Ranjit Sinha on May 6 in the Supreme Court says,

four " significant changes" were made in three paragraphs of three draft status reports of two Preliminary Enquiries (PE) by the Law Minister, and officials of the Prime Minister's Office and the Coal Ministry.

Two of the changes pertained to 'tentative findings'. According to the affidavit, "since both these changes pertained to tentative findings of the CBI, which would be arrived at with further clarity on more enquiries, the same were acceptable." The third change pertained to the " deletion of a sentence about the scope of enquiry with respect to [the] legality of allocation while the amendments in law were in process, was done by the Minister of Law." &(Clearly, the Law Minister understood that'amendments in process', or changes in law that may or may not happen, cannot impinge on an economic action in the present which is well within the four corners of the current law however ill-conceived it may be.) The fourth and final change was "about the non-existence of approved guidelines for allocation of coal blocks [that] was incorporated at the instance of officials of the PMO and the Ministry of Coal, as the same was factually correct."

In sum, the "significant" changes "were acceptable" and " factually correct", according to the CBI' s Director. But somewhere in the short distance between Tilak Marg where the Supreme Court is, and Bahadurshah Zafar Marg where most of the dailies in Delhi are located only the word "significant" came into the headlines. And that is symptomatic of the grave changes that are taking place in a large section of the media in this country.

The media in any country does not exist in a vacuum. It is sustained by its readership. In India this

would technically mean the literate population, that is, at current levels 74 per cent or roughly three- fourth of the population. But all those who can sign their name (generally taken to signal literacy) do not necessarily read any printed matter, a fact which will be attested to by the circulation departments of most media houses and the phenomenal proliferation of TV channels (and that is a story by itself !). In other words there is a huge disconnect between literacy levels and readership in India. Inevitably this means that the media's clients are mostly from the middle class.

Barring a few notable exceptions most media houses try to bridge this divide by catering to the

lowest common denominator within its readership constituency. Thus the sense of impending doom shared across languages and cultures by the middle class, its open or hidden bigotry, and the belief that a strong leader can whip everybody into shape and deliver us from evil underlines much of what the media propagates. When a Anna Hazare holds up an all powerful Lokpal or a handful of judges

think that the CBI should report to them, they are articulating the infantile sentiments of this class.

The tragedy is that the media is playing footsie with these flighty desires.

PLAYING THE FIELD

NEW DELHI: When the Supreme Court of India tells the leading investigating agency in the country that it should report to it directly on an alleged corruption case, the public and most of the media hail the order as a blow for justice. Without denying for a moment that corruption has to be rooted out let us look at the issue from a different angle.

The agency in question is the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) which was born in 1941 as the Special Police Establishment (SPE) to check war profiteering. At that time it came under the War Department. After the end of the Second World War the SPE was retained to investigate and prevent corruption within the Central Government. For this purpose In 1946 the Delhi Special Police Establishment Act was enacted and the superintendency of the SPE was vested with the Home Department. On April 1,1963 the SPE was renamed the Central Bureau of Investigation. Over the years the investigatory mandate of the CBI covered every public sector undertaking in the country.            
However in keeping with the federal character of the Constitution the CBI cannot investigate cases in the states without the sanction of the concerned state governments. The prevailing rules of administration  place the CBI under the Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions. Traditionally this ministry is attached to the Prime Minister's Office (PMO). The CBI also reports to the Ministry of Law on a case-by-case basis because the ultimate resolution of the cases have to be sought in the court room, and this ministry is the clearing house for all legal matters that concern the government. Offences which would come under the Prevention of Corruption  Act, 1988, are, however, investigated by the CBI under the superintendency of the Central Vigilance Commission.    

When the Supreme Court decided to override this established practice it won many brownie points  from a large section of the populace, some of the media, and of course, the Opposition. They see the  court's overreach as a justifiable course of action in the glorious war against corruption! This is plain shortsightedness that overlooks the fact that corruption will not be eradicated by weakening the constitutionally mandated separation of powers between the different branches of government in a parliamentary system-- namely, the Legislature, the Executive, and the Judiciary. What is actually required are urgent steps to strengthen them so that they have the wherewithal to check the growth of corruption. 

Underlying the Court's action is the sentiment that the other two branches of the government are incompetent or unwilling to fight corruption, and that it alone is qualified to direct the war. But what exactly are the qualification? Unlike the Legislature who are elected by the people and the Executive headed by ministers who report to it, the Supreme Court is a body that is, for want of a better word, self-perpetuating. There can be more than one view whether this state method of constituting the Supreme Court is healthy. But there can be no doubt that a small body (comprising mostly men!) cannot be both a referee and a player. Then the game would be a truly messy one.