GODS, HAMMURABI AND KEJRIWAL- REFLECTIONS ON THE "NEW" INDIA.

  I'm not a very religious person but have impeccable scriptural credentials which would impress any east Delhi arsonist- as a Saryupari Brahmin I sit at the top of the theological heap and my ancestors are even mentioned in the registers of Bhrigu Rishi at Varanasi and Rishikesh. I'm hoping that Mr. Amit Shah will permit this register as  permissible evidence to prove that I am an Indian when the N archy- sorry, NRC- also becomes law with the blessings of the Supreme Court. Like Rahul Gandhi in happier times, once upon a time I too wore a "janau" or sacred thread around my scrawny neck; I even used to wind it around my left ear in the time honored fashion to announce that I was now proceeding for my daily ablutions to the toilet. ( I never understood the logic of this ritual but suspect it was to keep it out of the way at the moment of reckoning). But I had to jettison the janau when I went to hostel as it became a grave risk to life and limb: the sub-adolescent unbelievers would give it a mighty tug just as gravity was about to take over on the toilet seat, unsettling a potential future Chief Secretary. In hindsight ( the correct word under the circumstances, you would agree) I need not have bothered because I never came within genuflecting distance of becoming a Chief Secretary.

  It's a good thing that we reportedly have 32 crore gods in our pantheon, because there is a very real danger in these revivalist days that we may run short of gods. Every political party or leader is laying claim to his own god, and since we have about 2200 hundred registered parties ( and they are multiplying like the corona virus and causing as many deaths), gods will soon be in short supply. BJP has patented Ram, Rahul Gandhi has declared that Shiva is his, Kejriwal has appropriated Hanumanji, Chandrashekar Azad swears by Bhim, Samajwadi Party has just built a temple in Etawah to expropriate Vishnu, the Shiv Sena has monopolised Ganesha, Tej Pratap Yadav of the RJD has merged with Lord Krishna, Kamalnath has claimed Sita, AIADMK which till recently was without a god has nominated Jayalalitha for that hallowed position. There is a scramble these days to find a god, for that way lies, not salavation, but votes, the currency of power. In the good old days Mammon was good enough but in the age of Amit Malviya and Prashant Kishore brand distinction and recall is necessary. But here is something to mull over- why is it that the more gods we have in the fray the more ungodly our politics becomes?

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  The law, we are told, is not just an ass but an ass which is constantly evolving- from the principles laid down by the Athenian Draco to the code of Hammurabi to the Napoleonic code to the rationale of our own Supreme Court recently in a habeas corpus petition: If you've waited for so long for freedom, what difference does another two weeks make? If, dear reader, it is your impression that jurisprudence in India is evolving in the reverse direction, you have reason to so believe. Grave constitutional issues such as amendments to the constitution, dismembering of a state, detention of hundreds without charges or trials, legislation based on religious preferences- these are now matters of no legal consequence and can be deferred for weeks and months, while the building of a temple will brook no delay and an inconvenient High Court judge must demit charge immediately. The "adjournment" and the "urgent mention" are the new instruments of justice in the evolution of law.

   And what about the FIR ( first information report)? It is 9/10ths of the law these days, used as a tool to punish and to protect, all of course without any trial taking place: the new norm is to file ( or refuse to file) FIRs, arrest( or refuse to arrest) those named, and then just forget about the whole bloody thing. Take, for example, the 27th of February, 2020. It should have been declared by the UN as the International Day of the FIR, going by the sheer number filed in Delhi: 148 FIRs relating to the Delhi riots, notices for filing FIRs against Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi, Manish Sisodia, Salman Khurshid, Asauddin Owaisi, actor Swara Bhaskar, eminent lawyer Mahmood Pracha, radio jockey Sayema. The filing of FIRs against Union Minister Anurag Thakur, Parvesh Singh Verma and Kapil Mishra has been deferred for four weeks, because of the dictates of our evolving law: when ruling party figures are involved then FIRs should not be filed immediately after the alleged offence but at an "appropriate time". Of course, the FIRs are just a smoke screen behind which the real perpetrators of the violence will disappear. As Marie Antoinette might have said- If you can't give them justice, give them FIRs.

   Am I alone in thinking that the quality of justice in this country is in inverse proportion to the number of FIRs filed?

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   Just what is Mr. Kejriwal up to these days? It does not behove a three time Chief Minister who has just won 62 out of 70 seats to act like a wimp and to continue to straddle a rotting fence. His behaviour during and after the Delhi riots can be described as ambivalent at best and opportunistic at worst. He and his party should have been on the ground from day one, demanding that the police act immediately, that the Home Ministry send in the para military. Where is the condemnation of the Home Minister and the demand for his resignation? He has been quick to make a U turn and sanction the prosecution of Kanhaiya Kumar for sedition but is yet to become a party to the case in the High Court to demand the registration of FIRs against BJP leaders for hate speech and for inciting the riots. He cannot be unaware that the two SITs set up to investigate the riots are nothing but a cover up, given that the two police officers heading them have doubtful credentials from the JNU/ Shaheen Bagh incidents, and one of them was even divested of his charge by the Election Commission recently because of his political bias. Why then has he not demanded a judicial inquiry or even petitioned the High Court for one?

   Kejriwal should realise that he is no Mahatma Gandhi and that his place during the riots was not at Rajghat but at Bhajanpura or Karawalnagar. When people are being killed in their dozens what we need is a resolute leader, not a Good Samaritan merely announcing compensation. His careful balancing act may have been necessary during the elections, but now he must cease juggling the balls and grasp the nettle. He should come out in unambiguous opposition to the ruling party's hate agenda, and to the implementation of NRC/NPR. Other Chief Ministers with a far weaker mandate have done so already. He must not fritter away the faith the people of Delhi have reposed in him. In at least one respect he must emulate the BJP- just as the latter does not give a damn about the 20% minority vote, Kejriwal too should dump the 38% of the BJP's core vote: he will never ever get them anyway, not even if he aspires to be a "chhota Modi". He has his 56% and it is for those voters that he must work.

I don't expect that Mr. Kejriwal has read the sayings of Confucius but he would do well to heed one of them at least: Man who walk in middle of road get run over very soon.

  

GETTING A (NON)SENSE OF THE BUDGET.

   My mathematical skills have always been in doubt; I do not have a head for figures , except the hour glass ones, and the sands of time are running out even for those. I recently turned 69 and the number vaguely stirred memories of  this number I had read about many years ago in a book called "The Sensuous Man". Unfortunately, whether it's 69 or 99, I am unable to wrap my head around it now. Notwithstanding this deficiency, however, I served in the finance department of Himachal for close to six years, and worked on as many budgets, which has contributed in no small measure to the state becoming a basket case. Consequently, when Finance Secretaries in Shimla retire nowadays they are allowed to take their begging bowls with them as  parting gifts in case the pension suddenly dries up like the mythical Saraswati river. This brief intro should convince  the reader that I am fully qualified to analyse the budget recently presented by Mrs. Sitharaman, before she collapsed along with the Sensex at the end of her marathon talkathon.

  I am not surprised at all: if it took her two and a half hours to read her speech can you imagine how long it took her to write it? It was a masterly piece, a combination of Amish Tripathi and Agatha Christie. The former's influence was evident in the hoary quotes from ancient India- Tirukkural, Thiruvalluvar, Kalidas, Aauvaiyar and the references to the Indus Valley Civilisation.. The Agatha Christie genre was visible in the whodunit nature of the budget, the unsolved mysteries in it- where will the revenues of Rs. 24 lakh crore come from given the taxation mess we are in? How will the govt. rake in Rs. 2.10 lakh crore from disinvestment when it couldn't get even 10% of that in the current year? Why do we need a government at all if all essential services are going to be privatised? Why does the Sensex behave like an under sexed man, always needing a "stimulus" in order to rise? What happens to Vikas if the budget is slashed where it is most needed- MNREGA, education, vocational skilling, PM Kisan ? Why did the FM mention " nominal GDP" of 10% when what the public needs to know is the " real GDP"? Nominal GDP is to economics what the padded bra is to haute coutre: it just bumps up the figure but hides the sagging truth. Even I am dumb enough to know that nominal includes inflation, and that since the latest inflation rate is 7.33%, our REAL GDP will therefore be only 2.67%. But that should make the govt. happy, shouldn't it, because it is after all the Hindu rate of growth- a return to past glories not seen for these last 40 years? There are many more mysteries and unanswered questions in this budget which will require more than a Hercule Poirot to unravel- a Shashikanta Das, perhaps, or a Subramaniam Swamy ?

  A budget is basically a road map for going broke in a methodical manner, without letting the cat out of the bag ( or "bahi" nowadays), and the choice before Mrs. Sitharaman was whether to fudge the BE ( Bullshit Estimates) or the RE ( Rigged Estimates). To put it in Hamlet's words: to BE or not to RE? Which is why data had to be obtained from the Wikipedia; actually, since no one believes our statistics any more the Chief Economic Advisor really had no choice. And so, based on this ethereal data, we shall now have 100 new airports to enable the likes of Nirav Modi and Choksi to fly out more easily, but the Swachh Bharat budget has been reduced by Rs. 300 crore: I can now again look forward to the phalanx of puissant posteriors on the rail tracks when I go to Shimla by the morning Shatabdi. The Income Tax code now contains more slabs than there are in Mr. Mukesh Ambani's 27 storey house, or in our own Sanjauli, that haven of apple orchardists. Smoking is now more injurious to your wallet than to your health- I've struck a deal with my bank to  buy cigarettes on EMIs. The only thing not taxed is sex, but only till 5G and IOT arrive, and till CBDT can decide whether the sex slabs should be based on duration or frequency or calories expended. But there are questions here too: will the tax apply to one or both partners? Will there be any sexemptions? Will NRIs have to pay the tax if they have sex in India? I'm hoping there will be a discount or rebate for senior citizens. It may be a notional benefit for most of us but it might just stir up the animal spirits, you know: we Indians never turn up our noses at anything which is free.

  In order to compensate for its junking of every statistic on the economy generated by its own agencies- consumption, employment, prices, manufacturing, NPAs- the government has now disowned every accepted school of economic thought and come out with its own unique swadeshi one- THALINOMICS. Henceforth, our progress will not be judged by the pesky GDP but by the cost of the foodstuffs on our "thalis" or plates. And according to our freshly minted Chief Economic Advisor the cost of a thali today is 29% less than what it was in 2015( veg) and 18% less for non-veg. Ergo, people are far better off today than they were 4 years ago! I don't know what he eats (humble pie?) or drinks ( gau mutra?) or who he hangs out with ( Baba Ramdev?) but he's certainly got his economic knickers in an almighty twist. If the thalis are getting cheaper, then how come we keep falling on the Hunger Index ? No wonder the poor FM almost fainted while reading this out. There's only so much of cooking up of figures one can do, whether they are served on a thali or in a budget document.

  But the direction of the budget is clear and I don't need Google maps to figure out where we are headed- selling off the family jewels ( i.e. whatever is left of them: see the list of absconding jewellers in Ms Mahua Moitra's tweet of 5th February, it reads like a who's who of Gujarat): Air India, Railways, L.I.C, BPCL, CONCOR- all will now be put in hock in a Flipkart inspired End Of Reason sale, but here is the delicious master stroke: who on earth will buy them, since everyone is broke? Who else but the two Big A's, who have added billions to their wealth in the last five years while the rest of the country has gone to the dogs, or cows, as the case may be. In fact, inspired by this budget, I have a suggestion for the PM and the FM- instead of privatising the govt. in bits and pieces do it wholesale, the entire govt. at one go. Gentlemen, stand not upon the order of your going but GO!- the President, the Council of Ministers, Parliament- let them go the way of Article 370, and hand over the govt. to our elite club of those 63 billionaires whose combined wealth exceeds the sum of the Union budget ( The Oxfam Report released at Davos at the WEF on 19.1.2020). Most of the national wealth has been cornered by them anyway ( our richest 1% hold more than four times the wealth held by the 953 million wretches who make up 70% of our population- Oxfam again!). This would make de jure what currently is defacto, and I'm sure the Supreme Court would have no qualms about approving it, given which side it is on these days. These guys would ensure we become a five trillion dollar- or five trillion tonne, as our weighty Home Minister clarified at a recent TV conclave- economy by 2024, for the simple reason that all of it would belong to them anyway. 

   To sum up then, it was a literary budget which can be classified in the Fiction category, along with the works of Chetan Bhagat. It can be best described by an 80's cartoon of the inimitable RK Laxman, where the housewife is shown reprimanding the Common Man: " Don't be so critical.... actually, it's a good budget if you don't view it from the economic angle!" 

DELHI ELECTIONS--THE POISON HAS RUN ITS COURSE.

                               DELHI  ELECTIONS-- THE POISON HAS RUN ITS COURSE.

   A poison can only be combated one way- by the infected body producing its own antibodies to counter the venom. The struggle is painful and not easy and at times appears futile, but there comes a tipping point: the venom peaks, the fever breaks, and the body expels the poison. I would like to believe that this is what has happened to India, the tipping point being the Delhi elections which the AAP has won handsomely.

  This is no run- of- the- mill victory; not since the BJP has come to power at the center in 2014 has an opposition party returned to power, bucking anti- incumbency and with a two thirds majority, in back to back elections. Kejriwal had to contend with an absolutely unprecedented level of hatred, official violence, personal abuse, misuse of police machinery, communalism and naked lies that were unleashed by the BJP. Never was so much fire power brought to bear on 1400 sq. kms of territory: the entire union cabinet, 200 MPs, 7 Chief Ministers, 46 rallies by the Home Minister himself, even the Prime Minister. The largest political party in the world, backed by an unlimited war chest of electoral bonds, against a relative minnow only seven years old has been humbled. This is a bigger victory than in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Jharkhand for many reasons.

  AAP fought this election alone, whereas even the BJP had to fight with three partners, as had the Congress too in the other states it won. The margin of victory is staggering, for the second time running. This was the first election post the Article 370 and CAA/ NRC "master strokes" of the BJP and was supposed to have been an endorsement of these draconian measures. The hubris of the BJP was matched by the somnolence of the Congress which, by not having an understanding with the AAP, practically gifted almost half its vote share to the BJP, nothwithstanding which the AAP retained its own vote share to win. The AAP had to fight a lonely battle, vindicating Tagore's exhortation of   "ekla cholo re". It would be educative to focus on a few points of interest that indicate that the anaconda's coils may be loosening.

   The results unequivocally confirm that the BJP's hate speeches, abuse, shameless polarisation and incitement to violence did not work. AAP's vote share of 54% establishes that Hindus in large numbers voted for the party. The clearest( and most shocking for the BJP) indicator was the voting pattern in Okhla, where Shaheen Bagh- that alleged hub of terrorism and "mini-Pakistan"- is located. Okhla has a population of 300,000 of which 40% are minorities. A total of 136000 votes were cast of which Amanatullah Khan of AAP got 109017 votes and his BJP rival Braham Singh received 20520. Even if we assume that 80% of the Muslims voted ( a staggeringly high and unlikely figure), and that all of them voted for Amanatullah Khan, their votes do not add up to more than about 90000 votes. Which means that about 20000 Hindus also voted for him- the same number as for Braham Singh. This is the most favorable calculation for the BJP- in all probability the number of Hindus who voted for Khan is probably double this number. The same pattern is visible across all the seven or eight Muslim dominated seats. Quite clearly, the attempted polarisation did not work, and the Home Minister admitted as much on 13th Feb when he rued the use of extreme and hate filled language by the BJP campaigners. He should, of course, include himself in that black list.

   Of equal concern for the BJP, and hope for India, is that the BJP's vote share was significantly lower than AAP's across all 7 Parliamentary constituencies- it did not prevail among any cross section of society, whether by cast, profession, region, religion, income or sex, showing that the disenchantment with its arrogance and vitriol is widespread. It should worry in particular that even in New Delhi and Central Delhi it failed to win even one seat; New Delhi, especially, because 80% of its voters are govt. servants and their families- if they too are estranged it does not say much for Mr. Modi and his cabinet. Not only are they losing the states, they are also losing the civil servants.

   The (still supine) media is obligingly peddling the BJP line that the party lost because of Kejriwal's "freebies", a lackluster local party cadre, failure to project a CM face; and that the trouncing is not a reflection on either the BJP's insensitive policies or on the Modi-Shah duo. Nothing could be further from the truth. While the first three reasons are valid, there can be no doubt that this is a loss personally for, and on account of, Messers Modi and Shah. Their intransigence, arrogance, lack of any compassion, contempt for the rule of law, refusal to engage in any discussion, abuse of the state's powers- as reflected in the CAA, NRC, NPR, Kashmir- have substantially eroded the people's trust in them. This was evident in the Jharkhand results and has now been ratified in Delhi. The people are increasingly uneasy and worried about the ever increasing doses of poison being injected into our system. This politics of majoritarianism and confrontation has gone too far and for too long, and the average Indian- of all religions and denominations- is beginning to push back against it. They want a synthesizer, not a divider, and Kejriwal's genius lies in having realised this. He has sought to bridge the binaries which have dominated all politics till now, more so since 2014. He will, therefore, encourage business while budgeting big for welfare of the poor, call himself a " son of Delhi" while making life easier for the migrants in the slums, oppose CAA and NRC while supporting the withdrawal of Article 370, refuse to go to Shaheen Bagh even as his Deputy Chief Minister says his party stands with the protesters, recite the Hanuman Chalisa but not the remix of Jai Shri Ram, proudly proclaim his personal religion while refusing to impose it on others and make it state policy.

   The BJP/ RSS fighting machine needs an enemy and a target to exist- Kejriwal refuses to be either. He is a will o' the wisp who cannot be pinned down, he will not allow himself to be stereotyped or poured into a mould of the BJP's making- anti national, anti Hindu, liberal, urban Naxal, pro-Pakistani and so on. Without these labels, the BJP finds it hard to target him, let alone vanquish him. Kejriwal may just have found the perfect antidote to the BJP in this traditionally syncretic nation- be a leader for all seasons and reasons, not just for the winter of discontent. There is much in this formula for other parties to emulate, if only they could jettison their personal egos and ambitions.  

RADICALISATION IS NOT A ONE WAY STREET.

                               

   " Radicalisation"- the action or process of causing someone to adopt radical( extreme) positions on political or social issues. ( Cambridge dictionary.)

   The conventional or popular belief  in India ( as also globally) is that radicalisation is associated with only one religious community, the adherents of Islam. How wrong this perception is can be seen in our country over the last few years where an uncharacteristic but toxic fundamentalism appears to have seized the euphemistically termed "majority community", especially in the north and west of the country. Driven by an ideology which has acquired political and executive legitimacy, this "reverse" radicalisation has now become almost state policy and has seeped deep into our social fabric. But whereas earlier it was an insidious infection slowly permeating the organs of this republic, over the last two months, post Article 370 and CAA/NRC, it has now erupted into a full blown pestilence which its carrier-hosts no longer bother to disguise but flaunt as a badge of honour. The radicalisation of the majority community is now seen as essential to protect the motherland from the "traitors".

  This has been a work in progress since 2015, the idea being to persuade the majority that they are under threat from an "other" whose loyalty is not to India. The constant barrage of vilification, hate, fake news and reinterpretation of history has been largely successful, as repeated electoral successes of the BJP prove. For radicalisation to succeed it is essential to create an enemy, and the community of 200 million with the same religion as Pakistan fits the bill perfectly- it has been defacto made an extension of that country, and has therefore become the prime enemy. But with this enemy has been merged anyone who stands up for their rights or criticises the government- liberals, intellectuals, urban naxals, "sickulars": the enemy thus fully conforms to the hydra headed monster to be found in all Hindu mythology- for example, Ravana- which of course has to be slain before Ram Rajya can arrive. The script is complete.

  I am quite amazed at how radicalised my co-religionists have become- well educated, financially secure, widely travelled, privileged families have swallowed the poison being dished out by the BJP and amplified by a craven media; they are willing to believe every lie loaded on Whatsapp and Twitter by the party's IT cell, suspending their disbelief and eager to teach "them" a lesson for all the imagined historical wrongs perpetrated by their ancestors. The govt. takes the lead in this catechism by creating dubious legislation and the patriots follow it up by lynching, desecration and riots. And the BJP periodically hoovers up the votes.

  Even by the low standards of our politicians, however, the ruling party's campaigning style for the February Delhi elections reveals a radicalisation that has plumbed the depths. The protests at Shaheen Bagh and elsewhere have been made the metaphor for anti-nationalism and betrayal. A Minister openly calls for shooting of the "traitors", a MP warns that "they" will enter your homes and rape your womenfolk, another terms the election as a Pakistan vs India match, a Chief Minister thunders that his govt. will not give "them" biryani ( as Kejriwal does) but give them bullets. He has to be taken seriously because his police has just killed 21 such enemies. The Prime Minister, no less, fans the fanaticism by alleging that Shaheen Bagh is not a protest but an "experiment"- the innuendo leaving no room to doubt what this experiment is about. And no one bats an eyelid- not the Election Commission, not the Supreme Court, not my Hindu neighbours in my Housing Society, not my colleagues in the IAS, not even most of my own family.

   It is one thing for politicians to become radicalised, but when organs and agencies of the government and state also adopt such ideologies, then the danger becomes very real. And this appears to be happening with the police forces in some states, particularly the crucial Uttar Pradesh and Delhi. We have learnt to live with the lack of professionalism, ignorance and heavy handedness of the police, but their behaviour in these two states over the last two months goes beyond incompetence and sycophancy into the realm of radicalisation. The savagery with which the students of Jamia Millia ( a minority institution) were beaten up to the accompaniment of racial and religious invectives, revilement and challenges, even a mosque trashed, leaves no doubt that the motivation was to teach these "enemies" a lesson. The brutal conduct of the police in UP where 21 people were shot ( all Muslims, as per media reports) has been even more unambiguous and clear. The homes of members of the minority community were raided in town after town, their cars and belongings vandalised, hundred arrested ( now being released by the courts for want of any evidence), dozens arrested and roughed up, notices served for compensation for " damage" to public properties without due process of the law. One SP of a district was even recorded telling Muslims to go to Pakistan, advice for which he was even praised by Ministers. The Chief Minister himself threatened revenge: the police was only too happy to follow this cue.

  No one disputes that the police are required at times to use force to control a situation. But such use of force must always be proportionate to the danger posed, must not be excessive and should not be motivated by a desire to exact vengeance or to "teach them a lesson". It should cease to be employed when the danger posed is over. Nor should the object of the action be regarded as an enemy just because he or she professes a different religion. The display of force should be "non violent" as explained in a recent article by an officer who was the Delhi police Commissioner at the time of the Mandal agitation in the early nineties. But the bestiality and viciousness displayed by the Delhi and UP police to counter the CAA/ NRC protests mirror an emerging  radicalisation in their thinking not seen before. And it is spreading to other states: in Karnataka a nine year old girl student of a school is charged with sedition, and her teacher and mother arrested, for taking part in a play on the CAA ! Debates and seminars on the subject are disallowed, an Arts India exhibition raided by police in Delhi because someone there was wearing a dress resembling dresses worn in Shaheen Bagh, another JNU scholar arrested for sedition for calling for a blockade of roads in Assam. Never before has the sedition law been wielded so indiscriminately by a rampaging police in BJP ruled states, all in flagrant defiance of the law laid down by the Supreme Court time and again.

   The problem, however, is not that the police or politicians are showing increasing symptoms of radicalisation. The real threat, and challenge, is that one in three Indians support this pervasive paranoia, going by the BJP's vote share. It is evident in the anti-CAA rallies, the three shooting incidents outside Shaheen Bagh, calls for boycott of shops and restaurants owned by Muslims, the eviction of a lady tenant from her Lajpatnagar flat because she dared to protest at an Amit Shah rally, the trolling of Deepika Padukone and withdrawal of endorsement contracts because she stood up for the JNU students.. And the support for this bigoted narrative runs across economic and social stratifications, making it that much more difficult to counter. It's bad enough for a minority community to be radicalised, for that disrupts a society. It is infinitely worse, however, for a majority community to be radicalised, for that can completely change a country's constitutional values, character, ethos and transform it into an unintended mutant. We face this very real danger and possibility today.

   

FUDGED FIGURES, SOLEMN PROMISES, DISAPPEARING TREES.

    Caught up in the maelstrom  of divisive politics, India is silently but surely sliding into an environmental abyss under Mr. Modi's watch. The latest EPI ( Environmental Performance Index) report released on the sidelines of the WEF conclave at Davos puts us at third from the bottom- at 177 out of 180 countries, a decline of 36 places since 2016 ( when we were at 141). We do even worse in the index of air quality, at 178 out of 180. The country is turning toxic in just about every indicator- its waters, air, pollution, health- but of particular concern is what the governments- centre and states- are doing do its green cover and forests.

   According to a new study by the WRI ( World Resources Institute) the country lost 1.6 million hectares of tree cover, and 16 million trees, between 2001 and 2018, of which 9.4 million trees were felled in just the last four years. In terms of climate change implications the effect of this large scale deforestation is disastrous: since each mature tree can absorb 22kg of carbon dioxide in a year, in four years we have added almost 900 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per year to our air ( which could otherwise have been sequestered by these 9.4 million trees). But nobody in the government appears to be concerned, beyond regurgitating cooked up figures to show that our green cover is going up, not down, as all independent agencies stress. The UN has expressed reservations about our methodology for computing forest cover by including commercial plantations, orchards and taking a 2 meter height of trees instead of the internationally accepted figure of 5 meters. ( Inspite of our fudging, the area under Moderately Dense Forests, which make up the bulk of the carbon sink, has declined by 10000 sq. kms between 2013 and 2019 ( Forest Survey of India figures). But this is a standard operating procedure for this govt., whether on the economy, tiger count, crimes, suicides or anything that may reflect adversely on its performance.

   The long term implications of what it is doing to the country's forest cover, however, is extremely worrying. The UPA, for all its other faults, was alive to the imperative of protecting the natural environment and had put in place a robust mechanism to ensure this, including "no-go" areas for mining, the Forests Right Act, regulations for coastal zones, eco-zone buffers for Protected Areas, a National Green Tribunal ( only the third in the world),etc. But the present BJP regime has devoted the last five years to dismantling this safety net to the point where the Ministry of Environment and Forest is but a pet poodle on a tight leash, tasked with ensuring "ease of business" rather than saving the environment. Two recent proposals will further decimate the environment.

  Under the garb of strengthening compensatory afforestation it has proposed to allow "production forests" or commercial plantations in degraded forest areas, under the PPP route. This is nothing but an insidious attempt to favour private entities and to manipulate the forest cover figures. It is an attempt to monetise forests and a failure to recognise that forests provide not only timber but also bio-diversity, water, livelihood for tribals, which will be at grave risk from the monoculture nature of commercial plantations. It will also fragment continuous blocks of forests, disturbing wildlife and their corridors, and allow the ingress of "outsiders" with the resultant fall out of poaching, theft of NTFP, etc.

   Instead of coming out with a revised forest policy to replace the current 1988 policy which cannot cope with today's challenges, the govt. is instead initiating ad-hoc measures to  allow further commercial intrusion into pristine native forests. A prime example is the Saranda- Chaibasa forests in Jharkhand's Singbhum district- India's largest contiguous Sal tract spread over 82000 hectares or 820 square miles. Not only does it function as a huge carbon sink, it has abundant bio-diversity, wildlife and is a source for livelihood for marginalised tribals.  Discounting  these concerns, the govt. has now sought a reassessment and review of its mining plan, earlier prepared by ICFRE which had classified it as a no-go area for mining. This will open the doors to commercial exploitation of other swathes of forests for mining, power and other projects.

  Saranda-Chaibasa is not an isolated case: 500 projects in forests and Protected Areas have been cleared by the National Wildlife Board between 2014 and 2018, which is one reason why the country has lost 120000 hectares of primary forest in the last five years. Other examples of similar desecration are:

[1] Diversion of 1038 hectares of forest land in Sambalpur and Jharsuguda districts of Odisha for an NLC/ Adani coal mining project. This involves felling of 1.30 lakh trees ( of which 40000 have already been felled) and displacement of 1894 tribal families. The villagers allege that the mandatory Gram Sabha consent has been forged.

[2] In the Western Ghats of Karnataka 2 million trees are at risk from 20 power projects. These include a 2000MW power project in the Sharavathy valley sanctuary, one of the last remaining habitats of the lion tailed macaque, an IUCN notified endangered species. 500 acres of verdant tropical forests are being diverted for the purpose. Another 150 acres is being denuded in the Anshi National Park in the Eco-sensitive Zone of the Ghats, and 177 hectares adjacent to the Kali tiger reserve, for a power line.

[3] 106000 trees will be felled, and 14 natural lakes filled in, for the Jewar airport in NOIDA in the Delhi NCR area, already perhaps the most polluted tract in the world.

[4] The Hasdeo Anand forests in Chattisgarh stretch for 170000 hectares and are perhaps the last remaining contiguous forest patches in central India. They provide environmental services and values which are incalculable in mere monetary terms. 30 coal blocks have been identified within it but till now it was a "no-go" area for mining. The BJP govt., however, true to form has now granted environmental clearance for open cast mining to commence on one of the blocks, Parsa, and has approved diversion of 841 hectares in the very heart of the forest. It will not be long before the other blocks are also taken up. This is the beginning of the end of these forests. Incidentally, guess which company will operate the mine? Rajasthan Collieries, Ltd.- a unit of Adani Enterprises Ltd.

   Why are our governments and policy makers so blind to the world around us, and to the unfolding climate induced apocalypse waiting in the wings? As I've said before, the debate is no longer about striking a balance between development and the natural environment; that balance has already been skewed in favour of the former- the issue which we should now recognize is about restoring that balance. The world took a pledge at the recently concluded WEF at Davos to plant one trillion trees, and here we are, busily chopping down the ones that remain. Has Mr. Modi accomplished his environmental goals by claiming the Champion of the Earth award in 2018 at the UN? How on the same earth will he fulfill his grand announcement of reclaiming an additional 5 million hectares of degraded forest area by 2030? Or of sequestering an additional two billion tonnes of carbon dioxide by the same date?

   Climate change and environmental disaster cannot be averted by fudging figures, winning awards or making tall promises. Unfortunately, till now we have had evidence of little else. What will it take to start saving our trees?