Breakfast at terrorist-decorated Taj, with Ratan Tata and Mukesh Ambani on either side -- what triumphant symbolism to crown Hillary Clinton’s public relations tour de force in India. But did it work? It did make possible one impossibility; uniting the BJP and the Communists in a common cause. They were equally agitated, as indeed were some ruling party MPs, over the “hidden details” of the agreements the American lady finalised with our Government.
What offended them, and a lot of others, was the way America insists on American laws overriding the laws of other sovereign nations. They want our business – billions of dollars worth military equipment. But when we buy them, we must also buy the superiority of American laws which demand the right of inspection by American officials of our equipment and their deployment. Even the Indian Prime Minister’s special aircraft is subject to American inspection/approval from time to time because a US company supplied it.
The problem here is an attitude of mind. Remember the saying, “What is good for General Motors is good for the world”. Well, it now stands proved that it was not even good for General Motors which has collapsed. But the attitude of mind has not changed. What the US Congress resolves for America is binding on the world.
There is a further problem. The high-falutin attitude works only with orderly countries that have their own functioning parliamentary and legal systems. It never worked with Pakistan, for example. Massive quantities of American arms were supplied to Pakistan to strengthen its democratic forces. But most of the weaponry was used against India. America did not or could not take action under its end-user laws. Pakistan is smart enough to know that America recognises only West-ward looking terrorists. So they mounted a serious campaign against the Swat Talibans and won applause from the likes of Hillary. Which left Pakistan free to carry on merrily with east-ward looking terrorists. (V.K.Krishna Menon used to scorn Americans for assuming that their guns supplied to Pakistan could only fire in one direction).
Why is it that India appears unable to call this kind of bluff? Is it just a matter of Manmohan Singh’s avowed admiration for America? Or is there, additionally, a lingering colonial mentality in our bowing to the West as a matter of habit?
Our history since independence is studded with events that suggest such a predilection on our part. We internationalised the Kashmir issue (when there was no need to do so) because Nehru was easily influenced by the Mountbattens. Imagine China taking the Tibet issue to the UN. In 1994 in the wake of the Bhopal gas tragedy, we allowed Union Carbide boss Anderson to walk free. Indian law was rendered toothless. In 1995 after a foreign aircraft dropped arms in the remote area of Purulia, five Latvian and one British crew were finally sentenced. But all of them were given executive pardon and allowed to go home. Will the American system allow any such leniency to jailed fashion designer Anand Jon who is widely believed to have been framed by business rivals in Los Angeles?
Six decades after independence, we are still to learn how to stand up for our dignity. Imagine how dramatically equations will change if we do a few things the American way. Give our business, for example, to European suppliers of weapons and nuclear plants who do not have humiliating end-user specifications. And ensure that a departing American dignitary or two are body-searched at our airport. That’s a language that will be instantly understood.
Showing posts with label Manmohan Singh. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Manmohan Singh. Show all posts
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Diffident us V/s combative them
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Why is our national leadership so diffident? Even as they talk of India as an emerging world power, why do they buckle under small-time Australian goons? Why do they forget that even the Christian George Bush never turned the other cheek? He gave’m hell.
By any standard, the violence against Indian students in Australia is nasty business. What lends an astonishing edge to it is the Indian Government’s routine, pedestrian, unfeeling handling of it. Indeed, non-assertiveness seems to be a characteristic of the Manmohan-Sonia leadership.
By contrast, Australia took a combative position. First, police bosses remained almost indifferent, refusing to see any racial angle in the repeated attacks on Indian students. At the political level, high-ranking leaders chose to express themselves against violence in general terms while declaring Australia as “the safest country in the world” for students.
On top of this exercise in nationalistic self-justification, the Australian Prime Minister turned provocative last week. He indirectly accused unnamed Indian politicians of seeking to inflame passions. And then he said that Australians in India had also been violently attacked. In the last decade, he said, there were 20 such cases.
Ill-advised words from an inexperienced Prime Minister. White thugs in Australia may well interpret this belligerence as a call to even up the score. (Against 20 Australians attacked in India, only a dozen Indians have so far been attacked in Australia. So another eight can “legitimately” be attacked. Then what about the interest outstanding from a decade ago?)
The strongest statement from the Indian Prime Minister is that “we are appalled” by the attacks. The External Affairs Minister wasn’t even appalled; he just asked Indian students to “concentrate on their studies”. What a noble race we are, combining the virtues of Mahatma Gandhi and Jesus Christ, and turning the other cheek to our tormentors.
Just as Indian students are contributing massively to Australian economy today, Malaysian students were the mainstay of British revenues from education in the 1980’s. Seeing it an easy way to boost the national income, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher ordered a big increase in the fees of overseas students. Malaysian families felt cheated and exploited. Their Government then announced the “Look East” policy. Imports from and industrial collaboration with Britain were cut down significantly and Japan given preferential treatment. Hit where it hurt, the famous Iron Lady lost her iron and withdrew the fees increase on Malaysian students.
Malaysia then was governed by neither Mahatma Gandhi nor Jesus Christ, but by the no-nonsense Mahathir Mohammed. He was feared by the West but admired by Malaysians whose quality of life reached international standards during the twenty years of his stewardship. Manmohan Singh is loved by the West, especially by the likes of George Bush. So they feel free to do what is in their national interest and ask us to tag along. And we do.
Even Indian business houses show more assertiveness. From Arcelor to Jaguar, world famous companies have become Indian-owned against stiff resistance. Indian entrepreneurs seldom receive the governmental backing American and Japanese companies routinely receive. In fact, companies like Essar and Reliance have faced problems in major markets like Iran because of American pressure and lack of counterveiling Indian support.
Developing an Indian presence in the Iranian oil scenario would have pointedly benefited India’s national interest. But we surrendered to American national interests even on the critical Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline. America’s policy towards Iran may get friendly tomorrow. By then we will have been overtaken by China and Russia and even Europe on the Iranian oil front.
By contrast, Australia took a combative position. First, police bosses remained almost indifferent, refusing to see any racial angle in the repeated attacks on Indian students. At the political level, high-ranking leaders chose to express themselves against violence in general terms while declaring Australia as “the safest country in the world” for students.
On top of this exercise in nationalistic self-justification, the Australian Prime Minister turned provocative last week. He indirectly accused unnamed Indian politicians of seeking to inflame passions. And then he said that Australians in India had also been violently attacked. In the last decade, he said, there were 20 such cases.
Ill-advised words from an inexperienced Prime Minister. White thugs in Australia may well interpret this belligerence as a call to even up the score. (Against 20 Australians attacked in India, only a dozen Indians have so far been attacked in Australia. So another eight can “legitimately” be attacked. Then what about the interest outstanding from a decade ago?)
The strongest statement from the Indian Prime Minister is that “we are appalled” by the attacks. The External Affairs Minister wasn’t even appalled; he just asked Indian students to “concentrate on their studies”. What a noble race we are, combining the virtues of Mahatma Gandhi and Jesus Christ, and turning the other cheek to our tormentors.
Just as Indian students are contributing massively to Australian economy today, Malaysian students were the mainstay of British revenues from education in the 1980’s. Seeing it an easy way to boost the national income, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher ordered a big increase in the fees of overseas students. Malaysian families felt cheated and exploited. Their Government then announced the “Look East” policy. Imports from and industrial collaboration with Britain were cut down significantly and Japan given preferential treatment. Hit where it hurt, the famous Iron Lady lost her iron and withdrew the fees increase on Malaysian students.
Malaysia then was governed by neither Mahatma Gandhi nor Jesus Christ, but by the no-nonsense Mahathir Mohammed. He was feared by the West but admired by Malaysians whose quality of life reached international standards during the twenty years of his stewardship. Manmohan Singh is loved by the West, especially by the likes of George Bush. So they feel free to do what is in their national interest and ask us to tag along. And we do.
Even Indian business houses show more assertiveness. From Arcelor to Jaguar, world famous companies have become Indian-owned against stiff resistance. Indian entrepreneurs seldom receive the governmental backing American and Japanese companies routinely receive. In fact, companies like Essar and Reliance have faced problems in major markets like Iran because of American pressure and lack of counterveiling Indian support.
Developing an Indian presence in the Iranian oil scenario would have pointedly benefited India’s national interest. But we surrendered to American national interests even on the critical Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline. America’s policy towards Iran may get friendly tomorrow. By then we will have been overtaken by China and Russia and even Europe on the Iranian oil front.
Why is our national leadership so diffident? Even as they talk of India as an emerging world power, why do they buckle under small-time Australian goons? Why do they forget that even the Christian George Bush never turned the other cheek? He gave’m hell.
.
Sunday, May 17, 2009
Watch out: The country is churning
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Two factors have led to the enviable position the Congress is in today – and its popularity is not one of them. The real factors are that (a) the BJP has lost its acceptability in the imagination of the general public and (b) the Left has collapsed as an ideological platform. The prominence the Congress has achieved as a consequence is sure to be a passing phase. India is in the midst of a vast churning process. Uncertainties, shifting alignments and ad hoc patchups are part of such a transition. Two or three more game-changing elections like this and we will have moved from a dynastic system closer to a mature democracy.
That BJP’s sun was setting was clear towards the end of Vajpayee’s term. With hindsight even his critics would now agree that it was Vajpayee who made BJP acceptable to people outside the Hindutva core. He was politically moderate besides being personally popular as writer and poet. By contrast Advani was inextricably identified with hardline Hindutva. He was perhaps the first to recognise this as a liability. Hence his attempt to soften his image with stratagems like the Jinnah-was-secular speech. But it boomeranged.
The spectre raised during this campaign, that Narendra Modi is the one to follow Advani, will have scared more people away from the BJP. The fundamental reality remains that India, which of course is a Hindu-majority country, has not given the BJP blanket victory at any time other than during the Vajpayee interlude. This is because the majority of the people the BJP claims to represent obviously do not subscribe to the Hindutva brand of intolerance. That is the best guarantee of India’s future as a democracy.
For the BJP to regain public confidence, it will have to re-invent itself. This will require visionary leaders of the kind the BJP is not currently blessed with. Those it has are unable to think beyond the likes of Modi. Unfortunately this proclivity prevents the BJP from developing into a balanced right-of-centre party for which a need exists in India.
The need exists for a truly left-of-centre party as well. It is one of the tragedies of India that from the time of the Congress Socialist Party, the leftwing in the country has always lacked coherent, farsighted leadership. With the 1948 Communist Party policy of “armed revolution now”, the Left lost ground across the country. The base it retained in Bengal and Kerala have been steadily eroded. In three decades of unchallenged power, the Left Front Government in Bengal was unable to address basic issues like poverty and infrastructure. When it finally made an effort towards industrial progress, it was so heavy-handed that it only took an eccentrically led formulation like Trinamool Congress to prick its balloon.
The CPM in Kerala for its part turned into an unabashed corporate enterprise with mafia squads to enforce its power over others, including other leftwing groups. The infighting between the party leader and the party’s chief minister had reached obscene proportions. The party’s arrogant and dictatorial ways were causing perceptible disgust among the people. But the Politburo had no eyes to see what all others could see. The result is that Prakash Karat can no longer save India from the clutches of America.
Can Manmohan Singh? The Congress is in danger of getting entrenched in its dynastic ways and the dealmaking for which its managers are famous. This time it will be directly accountable for its commissions and omissions. To that extent it is on the firing line. By giving a fairly clear mandate to one party, the people have won this election. Whether that party will win remains to be seen.
That BJP’s sun was setting was clear towards the end of Vajpayee’s term. With hindsight even his critics would now agree that it was Vajpayee who made BJP acceptable to people outside the Hindutva core. He was politically moderate besides being personally popular as writer and poet. By contrast Advani was inextricably identified with hardline Hindutva. He was perhaps the first to recognise this as a liability. Hence his attempt to soften his image with stratagems like the Jinnah-was-secular speech. But it boomeranged.
The spectre raised during this campaign, that Narendra Modi is the one to follow Advani, will have scared more people away from the BJP. The fundamental reality remains that India, which of course is a Hindu-majority country, has not given the BJP blanket victory at any time other than during the Vajpayee interlude. This is because the majority of the people the BJP claims to represent obviously do not subscribe to the Hindutva brand of intolerance. That is the best guarantee of India’s future as a democracy.
For the BJP to regain public confidence, it will have to re-invent itself. This will require visionary leaders of the kind the BJP is not currently blessed with. Those it has are unable to think beyond the likes of Modi. Unfortunately this proclivity prevents the BJP from developing into a balanced right-of-centre party for which a need exists in India.
The need exists for a truly left-of-centre party as well. It is one of the tragedies of India that from the time of the Congress Socialist Party, the leftwing in the country has always lacked coherent, farsighted leadership. With the 1948 Communist Party policy of “armed revolution now”, the Left lost ground across the country. The base it retained in Bengal and Kerala have been steadily eroded. In three decades of unchallenged power, the Left Front Government in Bengal was unable to address basic issues like poverty and infrastructure. When it finally made an effort towards industrial progress, it was so heavy-handed that it only took an eccentrically led formulation like Trinamool Congress to prick its balloon.
The CPM in Kerala for its part turned into an unabashed corporate enterprise with mafia squads to enforce its power over others, including other leftwing groups. The infighting between the party leader and the party’s chief minister had reached obscene proportions. The party’s arrogant and dictatorial ways were causing perceptible disgust among the people. But the Politburo had no eyes to see what all others could see. The result is that Prakash Karat can no longer save India from the clutches of America.
Can Manmohan Singh? The Congress is in danger of getting entrenched in its dynastic ways and the dealmaking for which its managers are famous. This time it will be directly accountable for its commissions and omissions. To that extent it is on the firing line. By giving a fairly clear mandate to one party, the people have won this election. Whether that party will win remains to be seen.
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Sunday, February 22, 2009
Bush is not Clinton; Singh is not Sen
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George Bush for Bharat Ratna! The Congress Party's official spokesman floated this balloon publicly in Delhi, so it may well come true. It may be the Congress's idea of honouring Bush. But it will also dishonour the people of India in the eyes of the world. What's more, it will dishonour the people of the United States who have persistently declared their strong disapproval of the man. How cut off from public opinion can the Congress be.
Fortunately, G.B. himself is saying nothing, doing nothing these days. That's not the American style. Bill Clinton is still in the centre of things. Jimmy Carter even got a Nobel Prize for his global activities.
What ex-Presidents usually do is write their memoirs. Clinton wrote a rather indifferent one, but got 10 to 12 million dollars for his effort. Then he hit the highly paying speech circuit. For one of those "leadership summits" in Delhi he was paid $150,000 by an Indian publishing group. Ronald Reagan made $2 million from a single speaking tour of Japan.
In America there are professional agents who arrange these book and speech deals. They have assessed that there is no demand for Bush in these fields. Remember, on retirement his most memorable statement was that when he looked into the mirror the next morning, he was going to like what he saw. Who wants to hear or read such self-justifying drivel? (Except Congress patriots in Delhi.)
Not that Bush is going to be hard up. He is a wealthy man anyway. George Washington was wealthy enough to decline his annual salary of $25,000 (600,000 in today's terms). John Kennedy donated all his remuneration to charities.
But being able to earn well after retirement is nowadays a matter of prestige. Bush can still make a few millions through what is called private equity consultancy. This is a system by which crony capitalists pay politicians sumptuously for opening doors and providing connections. Henry Kissinger is still making good money through this route.
Indian politicians are denied any of these recognised means of making money. That may be why kickbacks have become their preferred route. That may also be why none of them retires. The only Prime Minister after Nehru who tried to become an author was P.V.Narasimha Rao. But he made no great impact with his "Insider" tales. The likes of Morarji Desai wrote empty memoirs which people did not even become aware of.
This may be linked to the generally uneducated status of our politicians. Even in the Nehru family, Jawaharlal was an exception. From Motilal to Indira to Rajiv to Sanjay, nobody finished a university course and nobody was intellectually inclined. Narasimha Rao was a scholar. But the politician in him crippled the intellectual in him.
Manmohan Singh, highly educated and highly intellectual, has the capacity to write a few books that would be valuable historically. But he won't. The politician in him has grown so much that he wouldn't dream of rocking any boat, let alone Soniaji's. Our only hopes lie with the Amartya Sens who are free of political dependence and therefore give us some food for our souls.
Fortunately, G.B. himself is saying nothing, doing nothing these days. That's not the American style. Bill Clinton is still in the centre of things. Jimmy Carter even got a Nobel Prize for his global activities.
What ex-Presidents usually do is write their memoirs. Clinton wrote a rather indifferent one, but got 10 to 12 million dollars for his effort. Then he hit the highly paying speech circuit. For one of those "leadership summits" in Delhi he was paid $150,000 by an Indian publishing group. Ronald Reagan made $2 million from a single speaking tour of Japan.
In America there are professional agents who arrange these book and speech deals. They have assessed that there is no demand for Bush in these fields. Remember, on retirement his most memorable statement was that when he looked into the mirror the next morning, he was going to like what he saw. Who wants to hear or read such self-justifying drivel? (Except Congress patriots in Delhi.)
Not that Bush is going to be hard up. He is a wealthy man anyway. George Washington was wealthy enough to decline his annual salary of $25,000 (600,000 in today's terms). John Kennedy donated all his remuneration to charities.
But being able to earn well after retirement is nowadays a matter of prestige. Bush can still make a few millions through what is called private equity consultancy. This is a system by which crony capitalists pay politicians sumptuously for opening doors and providing connections. Henry Kissinger is still making good money through this route.
Indian politicians are denied any of these recognised means of making money. That may be why kickbacks have become their preferred route. That may also be why none of them retires. The only Prime Minister after Nehru who tried to become an author was P.V.Narasimha Rao. But he made no great impact with his "Insider" tales. The likes of Morarji Desai wrote empty memoirs which people did not even become aware of.
This may be linked to the generally uneducated status of our politicians. Even in the Nehru family, Jawaharlal was an exception. From Motilal to Indira to Rajiv to Sanjay, nobody finished a university course and nobody was intellectually inclined. Narasimha Rao was a scholar. But the politician in him crippled the intellectual in him.
Manmohan Singh, highly educated and highly intellectual, has the capacity to write a few books that would be valuable historically. But he won't. The politician in him has grown so much that he wouldn't dream of rocking any boat, let alone Soniaji's. Our only hopes lie with the Amartya Sens who are free of political dependence and therefore give us some food for our souls.
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