LOTUS INTERRUPTUS ?

   It should come as no surprise that, under the influence of our latest soul-mate Israel, Raisina Hill has now become our version of Mount Sinai, from where regular proclamations are issued by the presiding Prophet. The latest- that BJP shall win more than 370 seats and NDA 400+  in the coming Parliamentary elections- is, however,  pregnant with connotations and implications. Is this eleventh Commandment a sign of confidence, a well prepared alibi, or a smokescreen for something worse?

  I cannot see any legitimate justification for any such confidence. At its present tally of 303 the BJP has plateaued out in the West and its Hindi heartland stronghold: it cannot improve its tally here. It's prospects are no better in the East and South than they were in 2019- in fact, they have deteriorated in Karnataka, Telangana and in the North-east with Congress wins in the first two and the fires in Manipur in the latter. If at all, the BJP is likely LOSE a substantial number of seats: according to the data crunching site  run by Ajay Prakash, WHAT DOES THIS DATA SAY, the BJP's total tally is likely to come down by 40 seats, at the very least.

  Certain recent developments have not favoured the BJP either. Its insidious efforts came a cropper in Jharkhand where the JMM retained its government, notwithstanding the machinations of the ED and Raj Bhavan. In Bihar Tejaswi Yadav appears to have emerged stronger after Nitish Kumar's defection. In Chandigarh the INDIA alliance has emerged victorious in the Mayoral elections and the PM's party stands fully exposed. The striking down of the Electoral bonds may not amount to much in real terms because the BJP has already pocketed Rupees 6500 crores thanks to the delay by the Supreme Court in deciding the case, but it is a big moral defeat for the government, exposing once again the unconstitutional means it adopts to win elections. That the party is smarting from this judgment is evident from the PM's mocking remarks that today, even if Sudama were to give some rice to Krishna, someone would file a PIL and the court would strike it down! Even the brazen retaliation of blocking the bank accounts of the Congress two days later was struck down by the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal in short order.                                                                                                Seat sharing among the INDIA alliance partners is not the failure that the bought- out media would have us believe: it is proceeding apace and has been hammered out in U.P, Delhi and Maharashtra, and appears likely in Haryana and Goa. The decision to go their separate ways in Bengal and Punjab makes sense tactically as it will split the anti-incumbency votes. Don't let NDTV and INDIA TODAY convince you otherwise with their slanted coverage and Mood Of The Nation Polls- they reflect more the moods of Msrs Adani and Aroon Purie than that of the common public. 

  The revived farmers' agitation is bad news for the ruling party too, and will become even worse if violence ensues, as appears likely, given that the government has learnt no lessons from the 2021 agitation. It's reliance on brute force as a panacea for all protests cannot deliver for ever and the people are beginning to recognize it for the tyrannical regime it is. There is widespread sympathy for the farmers this time, except perhaps among the pampered elites of Delhi who do not even know the difference between MSP and MRP, and can't be bothered so long as their Zomato delivery arrives on time.

  The government's febrile actions over the last couple of months also do not demonstrate that it is acting from a position of confidence; on the contrary, they display a certain desperation and nervousness. The frantic campaign to engineer defections of all and sundry have degraded the BJP from a washing machine to a garbage bin: it is now collecting all kinds of trash from other parties, people it branded as  corrupt repeatedly, including the likes of  Ajit Pawar and Ashok Chavan. Very soon, having collected all the rubbish from other parties, it will become a patchwork quilt of opportunists and lose its strong ideological character. According to an analysis carried out by the digital platform, Knocking News, out of 303 MPs in the party only 134 are original BJP types, the rest are all imports from other parties. It is becoming a "Congress yukt" party in rapid order.

  The fear of losing is prompting other knee jerk reactions: the constant targeting of Rahul Gandhi's BJY-2 (which was not the case in BJY-1), the resumed personal attacks on him and his family, the renewed attempts at polarised violence in Haldwani, the frantic rush to introduce the Common Civil Codes in BJP ruled states, the raising of the specter of CAA and NRC by the Home Minister again, the reported de-activation of Aadhar cards as alleged by the West Bengal Chief Minister, the wholesale conferment of Bharat Ratnas in order to appropriate the memory of dead legends even as the party spurns all that they stood for. The list goes on, but it indicates one thing, as surely as the Mayoral elections in Chandigarh indicated brazen rigging of votes: that these are not the actions of a party confident of not only a victory, but of a two thirds majority! The BJP may be facing a reality check, finally, and in the process is committing one blunder after another. With each such fiasco it is denting its image even further. 

  It's election narrative this time sounds decidedly hollow and devoid of any substance; it offers nothing but the three M's- Mandir, Masjid and Muslim, a refrain which is beginning to sound jaded and repetitive. Real economic improvement has bypassed 90% of the country's population and this shows in just about every human development matrix. The so-called Modi's Guarantees are nothing but discredited Jumlas after cosmetic plastic surgery. So, one comes back to the question one posed at the beginning of this piece: What makes the BJP so confident of a landslide victory in spite of all these adverse indications ?

  The clues, perhaps, are to be found in the manner in which the ground is being prepared- the constant refrain of 400+ seats, the slanted pre-poll surveys endorsing these estimates, and the amplification of these predictions by an obliging media. So that when the 400+ IS declared after the polling, people would not question it because they had already been pre-conditioned to expect it! Could it be that the BJP has a joker up its sleeve? The EVMs perhaps? A national roll out of the Chandigarh Mayoral model, under the benevolent gaze of the Election Commission?

 I really don't know. But I am reminded of that intriguing quote from Arthur Conan Doyle: 

"When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."

Think about it. And worry.

THE UNDERBELLY OF THE FLYING MACHINE

   I'm finding that, as I get along in years, I'm becoming more and more of a contrarian, preferring to don the mantle of an "advocatus Diaboli" than an "advocatus Dei". And the reason is simple enough: one can no longer trust what one hears, or believe what one reads. The obvious is often misleading, as the Pope discovered when he was doing crosswords on a flight. He was presented with a missing first letter in the word "- U N T" and the clue was "relating to a woman". He blushingly filled in the missing letter, till a senior Cardinal whispered in his ear: " No, NO, your Holiness, the word is AUNT." See what I mean? (I cannot verify this story, it's just one of the Whatsapp gems floating around, and I mean no offence, but it does convey that men will be men, even if they have taken  unholy orders).

  Mankind has invented many things we, and the planet, would probably have been much better off if these had never seen the light of day: the atomic bomb, toilet paper, SUVs, politicians, the ballistic missile, the electric razor and so on-you can make your own list. To this list I propose to add flying and planes, for I can see no tangible real benefits which the flying machine has conferred on us, nor has it  made the world a better place (unlike other discoveries like penicillin, democracy, the printing press, the wheel, electricity etc.) And the sheer scale of this disaster is matched only by the speed at which it has occurred.

  Just a hundred and twenty years ago, in the words of Bill Bryson, the entire global civil aviation industry consisted of two mechanics and a wooden plane in a bicycle shed in Ohio. Today it comprises 39000 planes (not including light aircraft and helicopters) and 40000 airports. It emits 1.40 billion tonnes of CO2 a year, just about 2% of total global emissions. Almost 4.50 billion people fly every year, most just for the heck of it- for pleasure, to visit relatives they never liked in the first place, for honeymoons which will end in a divorce before they can cash in their frequent flyer miles, to spend precisely 10 seconds ogling at the Mona Lisa before they are pushed on by the 20 million other tourists who visit the Louvre every year, or taking a selfie on Mount Everest after being carried there by sherpas at a cost of US$ 50000. The projected figure of flyers for 2040 is 8 billion- can you even begin to visualise the environmental impact of this catastrophe?

  Let us view this in microcosm, to understand how this is benefitting the super-rich primarily. Elon Musk flies 250000 kms a year in his private jets (not because he needs to, but because he can afford to). He generates 1800 tonnes of CO2 (from just his flying, mind you) every year, which is, hold your breath, 250 times the per capita of China, 1000 times of India, and 90000 times that of Burundi!  Other celebrities like Taylor Swift and Oprah Winfrey are not far behind. The top ten global celebrities probably generate more green house gases than many countries like Somalia, Tonga and, yes, Burundi.

  There are other costs and inequities involved. The 40000 airports cover, at a rough estimate, about 400000 sq. miles of land, one third the size of India. (The largest airport in the world, Al Fahd in Saudi Arabia, covers 700 sq, kms; our own upcoming Jewar near Delhi will need 51 sq kms when complete). All this is land diverted from agriculture, which could have been used for growing food crops in a world where 40% of the people go to bed hungry. And consider also the millions who have been displaced to make way for these beds of concrete, the refugees of capitalism.

  How does this crap benefit either human kind or the planet?

  In fact, if you ask me (which I notice you haven't but that will not deter me), it has done the reverse, in addition to the humongous pollution it generates. Places and countries are being devastated by the millions who fly there like locusts- Bali, Venice, Barcelona, Dubrovnik, Mount Everest, Machi Pichu, our own Goa, Manali and Shimla (and, shortly, Lakshadweep), Mounts Fuji and Everest (which will soon have more poop than snow on its slopes), and so on. Dangerous viruses can now spread all over the world in just a few days thanks to flyers. Mallya, Modi, Choksi and others of their ilk would have been in Tihar now had it not been for British Airways or KLM or whichever airline they chose to skip out with billions on our moneys. We would have been seeing much more of Sunny Leone's hairpin curves here in India if she did not have the opportunity to fly off to Canada just when the nation sighed in unison "Yeh Dil Maange More." As it is, we have to be satisfied by observing Mr. Modi switching roles (and costumes) from vishwaguru to head priest to head honcho. Not exactly the same thing, you will agree, even if you are a bhakt.

  I stopped flying in 2006 and have not taken a flight since then and do not intend to do so if I can help it. The legendary Maharajah of our once national airline now looks more like Suresh the con-man, what with passengers being asked to pay separately for window/aisle seats, for water and snacks, for leg room: very soon they will also have to shell out for visits to the toilet. Flying in India is now an adventure sport: if someone does not beat you up in the cabin, or the air hostess does not spill scalding tea on your child, you are likely to be roused from your slumbers by someone urinating on you. Fine dining has been raised to a new level with worms or chicken in your vegetarian meal and a-la-carte meals being spread out on the tarmac for that runway experience. You can also expect to get screwed for free while ordering your dish, as an Indigo passenger on a Bangalore- Chennai flight on the 1st of February 2024 found out when he discovered a metal screw in his spinach-corn burger. The sauna is also complimentary, as you sweat for hours in a locked plane on the tarmac while the airline tries (not too hard) to locate the missing pilot, or when you are stranded in a malfunctioning airbridge for hours without even an apology, or forced to complete your journey on a toilet seat because the toilet door won'T open. A passenger never knows when he can expect to depart or to arrive, or whether his flight will clear the "smell test"- another Indigo flight from Delhi to Mumbai had to turn back on the 9th of this month because of an unspecified "foul smell" (is it time to make our planes ODF (Open Defecation Free) too? And, through all this, said airline is reported to have declared a profit of Rs. 7000 crore in the last quarter! Proof enough that there is more than one fool being born every minute.

  No, sir, I'm done with flying and prefer to travel by the humble train and on foot- it's good for both the planet, my wallet and my health. If God really wanted us to fly he would have given us wings, or at least some tail feathers. And don't let any economist- those practitioners of a dismal science- tell you that flying is good for the economy. For these chaps all that matters is the GDP; for them, it's good for the economy if you break your leg and have to go to an expensive hospital-it adds to national consumption/expenditure. A pandemic is good also because Pfizer can then make another 40 billion dollars from its vaccines. The war in Ukraine and the genocide in Gaza are good for the global economy because they generate tens of billions for the arms industry. Overpopulation is good because it adds to the labour force, never mind if we can feed the additional billions or not. Economists are rectal endoscopists- they always take a narrow view of the world from the wrong end.

  Make up your own minds, folks. Listen to the Devil's Advocate- his services are pro-bono.

RESIDENT WELFARE ASSOCIATIONS -- THE NEW VIGILANTES ON THE BLOCK.

  Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of our neo-colonial rulers to "decolonise" our mental spaces, some vestiges of it remain. Have you noticed how, the moment someone is given a uniform, or a baton, or a public office, he starts wielding his "authority" with indiscriminate abandon and capriciousness, as if to make up for having been at the receiving end himself for years ? (And I'm not talking here of petty government officials who are in a league of their own, but of your average non-sarkari Joe). Harken back to your own experience, dear reader, with the not-so-friendly neighbourhood cop, the parking attendant, the security guard, the toll plaza guy, the air-line staffer, the bank clerk, the ration shop dealer, the mobile service center chap, the vigilante "gau rakshak" goon, or any other person with a suppressed or low self esteem who suddenly finds himself empowered to lord it over his fellow citizens. The latest entrant to this sorry tribe is the RWA (Resident Welfare Association) or the AOA (Apartment Owners' Association).

  These elected bodies have been established by law to manage their colonies and housing developments, but of late have acquired an extra judicial, parastatal identity, issuing edicts and orders they have no business doing, like petty tyrants. They are totally unmindful of the laws of the land and violate them with impunity. Increasingly, RWAs have disallowed residence/ tenancy of bachelors, student groups, single women, pet owners, live-in couples, even female visitors. Residents who object or complain have their power or water cut off, entry restricted and are slapped with unjustified fines.                                                      The high (low?) point of this was reached last week when a New Delhi RWA ordered the daughter of Mr. Mani Shankar Aiyar, ex-Congress Minister and MP, to vacate her flat in the colony and move out ! The provocation ? A social media post she had put up, criticising the Ram Mandir consecration on the 22nd January and going on a three day fast to protest against it. A purely private opinion and a personal gesture in a still putative free country, you would think? Wrong.

  The pot bellies of the RWA , donning the mantle of protectors of the Faith, decided that Ms. Aiyar was indulging in hate speech, insulting the Hindu religion and inciting disrespect towards it. She had to go, even though she is reportedly not a resident of that particular RWA, though her father is! This brazen and illegal assumption of an undelegated authority by these medieval burghers marks a paradigm shift and escalation in the role of the RWAs- one towards bare faced bigotry and sectarianism, which is not only disturbing, but is also dangerous in its implications.

  In a prevailing atmosphere of intolerance, majoritarianism and religious triumphalism, emboldened by regressive laws like the anti-conversion Acts, the Uniform Civil Code of Uttarakhand and the impending CAA (Citizenship Amendment Act) and NRC (National Register of Citizens), this assumption of extra-legal authority by the RWAs and AOAs is ominous. They are gradually becoming the self-appointed gate-keepers of morality, culture and political discourse- a role that the law does not confer on them. Unfortunately, the recent spurt in laws that stigmatize inter-faith marriages or live-in relationships or conversions come in handy for these RWAs to harass those who have adopted such relationships or identities. The time is not far off when these busybodies may determine what their members eat, how they dress, to which Gods they pray. If not checked they could well demand, in due course of time, the production of marriage certificates, prohibit live-in residents or couples in an inter-faith marriage, bar members of a particular religious denomination or hailing from a particular region from living in their societies, compel participation in specific religious functions, expel residents for being critical of government policies, insist on proof of citizenship, dictate how many children an apartment owner can have. Why, they may even insist that all their members vote for a particular party! It would be vigilantism of the worst type. Needless to say, they could legitimately expect the full support of the local police in certain states. 

  Citizens are already subject to all kinds of surveillance, privacy intrusions and indoctrination by the government; the RWAs could take it to a whole new level. This trend must be resisted before it goes out of hand. State governments must step in now, through their district administrations and Registrars of Cooperative Societies, to draw red lines for the RWAs and penalise those who cross them. A man's house was once his castle, it is now under siege.

SHIMLA--DOOMED BY A LEGAL "TECHNICALITY"

   When the epitaph of Shimla is written in the not too distant future, as is inevitable, it will be recorded that its death warrant was issued on the 11th of January, 2024, when the Supreme Court chose to go by legal technicalities and assurances of the state govt. rather than on merits of a case, ignoring in the process ground realities and the opinions of any number of experts and environmentalists. Some background first to put the matter in perspective.

                                        

 

    

                        [Collapsed buildings in Shimla. Photo courtesy the TRIBUNE, Chandigarh]

  In November 2017, acting on a PIL by a concerned citizen regarding the rapidly deteriorating environmental conditions in Shimla, the National Green Tribunal had imposed severe restrictions on future constructions in the city, including a ban on any new construction in the vital core and heritage zones and in the 17 Green Belts which are thick forested areas; it restricted buildings in the rest of the town to two and a half storeys. It did so on the evidence of rampant violations of the town's Interim Development Plan, destruction of the green cover, the seismic vulnerability of the city, unrestrained building activity on steep slopes, the risks to the citizens, and the government's repeatedly demonstrated inability/unwillingness to control these activities.

  The state government filed an appeal in the HP High Court but it did not get a stay of the NGT's order. Environmentalists and the older residents of Shimla heaved a sigh of relief, hoping that now at least this once lovely town had been given a chance to recover from the ham handed and short sighted "development: inflicted on it over decades. But these hopes were dashed when the government suddenly published a draft of a new Shimla Development Plan 41 (SDP41) in June, 2022 . This document, probably the most suicidal decree by any govt. in the last 40 years, overturned every direction of the NGT and practically threw it in the wastebin. Purportedly a blue print for Shimla for 2041, it provided, in brief:

* Tripling the population of Shimla to seven lakhs by 2040.

* Opening of the 17 Green Belts, comprising 400 hectares of the only remaining green cover in the town, for construction.

* Permitting construction in the Core and Heritage zones.

* Allowing buildings upto 5 storeys in the remaining zones, in place of the existing 2.5+1.

* A vision of going "vertical" in pursuit of its expansion plan.

* It failed to take into account, or deliberately ignored, the seismic vulnerability of the city, its depleting green cover, the lack of space or open areas, the geographical limitations on building more roads, the lack of parking space, and the effect of the increased traffic volume that any expansion would entail, the existing constraints in ensuring supply of basic needs like power, water and garbage disposal systems.

   The draft SDP 41 was immediately challenged by one Ms Minocha in the NGT as violating the NGT order of 2017, which struck it down. The state govt. predictably filed another appeal, this time in the Supreme Court  which first allowed the state to notify the SDP but not implement it for one month (does this make any sense to you?), and finally on Jan 11, 2024 set aside both the NGT orders and declared the Plan legally valid.

  It did so, not on merits (which the NGT had considered at length) but on a technicality and a brief, prima facie overview of the SDP, supported by platitudes that sound lofty but are not convincing. It did not go into a detailed examination of the points made by either the petitioners of the NGT. To justify its  decision the Court held as follows[ my layman's response to each point made by the Court is given in italics in the brackets following them):

* The NGT  had usurped legislative functions by blocking the SDP.                                                            * It had indulged in judicial overreach and ignored the doctrine of separation of powers.

 [ Both the above observations are ad-hominem arguments that evade the real issue and seek to hide behind the thicket of legalese. The NGT is a statutory body that is tasked with protecting the natural environment and enforcing the rights of the citizens to a healthy, unpolluted and safe life- in fact, these rights are an extension of the fundamental right to life, as the SC itself has stated on many occasions. Moreover, if the higher judiciary can indulge in suspiciously similar "overreach" in ensuring reemployment for its members post retirement in various Tribunals and Commissions,  in providing perks and facilities for them, and in creatively interpreting the Constitution to justify the striking down of the NJAC (National Judicial Appointments Commission), then surely it could have shown the same creativity on an issue that effects the lives of lakhs of people? (Not for a minute am I suggesting that the examples cited above were wrong-I generally agree with those orders- but what I AM stressing is that judicial interpretation should keep in mind the merits of a case and the public cause, which has not been done in this case.]

* Statutory plans, once formulated, should not be altered by judicial bodies unless there is a constitutional basis to question their constitutionality or legality.

[ The SDP 41 was clearly, and blatantly, in violation of the NGT order of 2017, which  had not been stayed by any higher court. Therefore, the Plan was certainly invalid legally, if not a contempt of the court itself. The intervention of the NGT was also justified by the broader interpretation of the right to life, as already mentioned in the para above.]

* It emphasised on the need to balance development with environmental protection.

 [ This is pure lip service platitude, nothing else, and exposes the real weakness of the Supreme Court judgment- its total failure, or unwillingness, to examine the merits of the case. The NGT , on the other hand, had done so in great detail and had even appointed an expert committee to review Shimla's environmental status. For the situation in Shimla (and indeed the rest of Himachal) is no longer one of maintaining a balance between development and the environment (as the SC seems to think) but one of correcting the existing imbalance which is dangerously skewed in favour of "development". Strong and immediate affirmative action is needed to restore this balance; the SDP 41 further skews and distorts this balance and it is unfortunate that the apex court could not see the woods for the trees, even though there are not many trees left in this sorry town]. 

*The SC added, as a sop to the concerned citizens of the town, that they could separately raise challenges to specific provisions of the SDP, particularly on environmental or ecological concerns.

[ But this is exactly what was done by the petitioners before the NGT, twice, which upheld these challenges! The SC order simply avoids taking the correct decision and only encourages further litigation!] 

  What is astonishing is that the SC simply ignored the mountain of evidence that proves that the SDP shall only make a bad situation worse for Shimla. Some of these are:

* A recent report of the SDMA (State Disaster Management Authority) that landslides in HP have gone up three times in just the last 3 years and are attributable to over construction and inadequate drainage.

* A Disaster Management Plan prepared by the Municipal Corporation, Shimla in 2012, and an EIA carried out by the Deptt. of Environment in 2013, both of which recommended against any further dilution or relaxation in the Town Planning Rules.

* The report of an Expert Committee appointed by the NGT in 2017, consisting of technical experts from NDMA, MOEF, NEERI, Wadia Institute, among others, which observed/recommended, inter-alia:

   - Shimla is in seismic zone IV, 85% of its area lies in landslide prone areas, most constructions were on unstable slopes of 45* to 75*, only 20% of the buildings met the standards of earthquake proof construction.

  - In the event of an earthquake 39% of the buildings would collapse, resulting in a minimum of 20000 deaths. It admitted this could be an underestimation.

  - Shimla had exceeded its carrying capacity long ago and needed to be decongested.

  - No construction should be allowed in the Green Belts, Core and Heritage areas and more areas should be brought under the No Construction restriction.

  - The existing 17 Green Belts should be expanded and more area brought under forest cover.

* To these recommendations one must add that Shimla has no capacity to absorb any more vehicular traffic- it has about 100,000 vehicles of its own and between 10000-20000 more enter it every day during the tourist season. ( During the last Christmas week 100,000 cars entered the town). Yet, it has parking for only about 6000 cars. Any expansion of the town would completely choke it.

*  There are 17000 illegal buildings in the town, an indication of the govt's inability to enforce its building plans, even if it were interested in doing so. The new SDP will result in the regularisation of almost all of them, and encourage even more violations.

* The town's majestic deodars are dying of vehicular pollution, construction dust, compaction of soil due to increasing anthropogenic activity, under cutting of their roots and the changing climate; they have stopped regenerating. Hundreds are felled every year under some excuse or the other, but primarily to make way for more buildings and roads. Without them Shimla will just be seven huge rocks.

If any more proof was needed, the rains of 2023 have provided it. The town was practically immobilised and cut off from the world for almost two weeks, all roads were blocked by landslides, power knocked off. Hundreds off trees were uprooted, dozens of building collapsed, at least 50 lives lost. Further confirmation of the potential for further havoc was provided by neighbouring Uttarakhand and Joshimath.

  Surely this indisputable mass of evidence should have persuaded the apex court to not stand on  "technicalities" but to realise the massive potential for disaster that the SDP41 contains within itself.  In my view, it was incumbent on the Court to have posed some queries to the state govt. for instance: Does it make sense to go "vertical" at 7000 feet elevation in the Himalayas, on topography which is prone to landslides and is a seismic zone? Will not construction in the Green Belts further denude the city of its already disappearing green cover? Do the hills of Shimla have the carrying capacity to sustain an increase in population of another  four lakhs ? Where is the space to accommodate another 100000 vehicles, considering there is no road space or parking area in the town? How will the additional garbage and rubbish be disposed off, given that the Municipal Corporation is unable to manage even the existing waste, which has choked the town's hills and natural waterways? Has the govt. even considered the impact of an earthquake on such a sprawling urban sprawl, and its readiness to respond to it?                                                                         The larger public interest demanded that the case needed further interrogation, and, while staying the SDP41, the Court could have remanded the matter to the High Court for a more detailed examination on merits. In my humble view, the SC had an opportunity to display some vision and prescribe a template for urban development in the mountains. Unfortunately, it has chosen to follow the path of least resistance. Its order is disappointing and a warrant of death for Shimla and many of its residents. This once-beautiful, historic town certainly deserved better. 

  

A NEW LOW FOR THE I.A.S

   There could be no better-if that is indeed the right word-  indication of the  progressive decay of the ethos of our civil services than a Facebook post this week by a very senior IAS officer of the Maharashtra cadre. One Manisha Patankar Mhaiskar, Addl Chief Secretary, in a very opportunistically timed post after the consecration of the Ram temple at Ayodhya, revealed how, as a probationer in Mussoorie she and some colleagues celebrated the demolition of the Babri Masjid on 6th December 1992 by distributing sweets and eating kesar pedas. It was, she adds, a "secret" meeting, perhaps revealing the conspiratorial nature of the meeting. (A sharp contrast to the very blatant manner in which she has now gone public- a sure measure of the changing times!). To further ingratiate herself with the powers in Delhi and Nagpur she also brought in the Bharat-India divide, by claiming that her group was from "small town India" and the Lutyen's Delhi types in the Academy did not share her sentiments. She had been issued a disciplinary notice by the Administration at that time but we are not aware of what happened to that. Presumably nothing, since she has been elevated to the rarefied heights of the Apex scale and clearly entertains even loftier ambitions. Her post has attracted a lot of attention on social media and a flutter in the IAS fold.

  What Ms Mhaiskar did 32 years ago should be of no relevance now, especially as she was a young probationer then, still sowing her wild oats. What her personal religious or political affiliation is presently should also be on no concern to us: she is certainly entitled to them as a free citizen of a (still) free nation. It is when she goes public with them, in the most brazen and don't- give- a- damn manner, that we should start worrying. The concern, therefore, should be that she has the confidence to publicly proclaim and reiterate those feelings in 2024, after having taken an oath to a (still) secular Constitution and having ostensibly served it for 32 years. There are a number of points to be noted here:

* A serving public servant is celebrating and applauding something which has been declared to be a crime by the Supreme Court. I am not talking here of what she did in 1992, but the fact that in her post she maintains that she holds the firm belief that what happened on the 6th of December, 1992, was "something powerful, something auspicious, something positive." In fact, she goes on to describe it as "seminal".

* By drawing a contrast between "small towns" and Lutyen's Delhi in a mocking manner she is again feeding into the right wing narrative that the idea of secularism is an elitist concept nurtured in the metros, and that it is  "small towners" like her who represent the true ethos of India. This is the kind of music the bhakts like to hear. (Incidentally, Ms Mhaiskar is no small towner- she comes from Nagpur, which has a population of 3 million and is the second capital of Maharashtra!).

* There is, in her post, an obvious ambiguity about her belief in pluralism and secularism. This does not sit well with the oath she took to uphold the Constitution of India.

* That she can publicly go on record with her feelings and beliefs with such aplomb and impunity clearly indicates that she is confident no action will be taken against her, unlike the notice issued to her in 1992. (She can, obversely, expect a lot of support on social media, a manifold increase in the number of followers. a few approving phone calls from Delhi, and envious glances from her colleagues who would be kicking themselves for not having thought of a similar strategem).

* The timing of the post indicates that Ms Mhaiskar's repeat epiphany is not a spontaneous Wordsworthian "my heart leaps up in delight" moment, but more a Shakespearean "a tide in the affairs of men which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune" moment.  It appears to be a well thought out move; one could be excused for thinking that she has observed the rising tide in the Saryu river and decided to take the plunge. The conduct rules can wait.                                                                                                                              * * This well-timed confession is also a measure of the deterioration of our civil services. It is bad enough that more and more retired civil servants (not just the reemployed ones) and defense forces veterans are jumping on to the majoritarian band wagon, but it is now abundantly clear that the rot has spread even to the serving officers- this is an ill wind that can blow no good. For it is the apolitical, religion-neutral and non-partisan civil services and the army (not the politicians) which have held this country together for 75 years through wars, riots, changes of government and insurrections. Their capacity to continue to do so in the even more tumultous times ahead will be seriously eroded and comprised if they begin to align themselves with particular religious beliefs and political ideologies in their public life. A democratic government functions on the basis of trust between the public servants and the public, on the belief that civil servants are impartial and apolitical; once large sections of the public lose this trust, the efficacy of governance itself gets compromised.

  On the plus side, of course, Ms Mhaiskar has suddenly improved her chances of becoming Chief Secretary of Maharashtra, but she will have made a Faustian bargain to do so. I ,for one,  would not have much trust in the kind of administration she would be heading. My primary worry, however, is this: now that the sacred Lakshman Rekha has been crossed, will there now be a stampede by others to do the same, in the classic FOMO or lemming pattern?

OF SHANKARACHARYAS AND CAMERACHARYAS

 

  This last week has established that plumbing the depths of the ridiculous and the bizarre is not only our national pastime, it is also now the leitmotif of our society and ruling regime. The other day I decided I needed a "kurta", not one of those fancy and expensive Myntra creations, but something more befitting a pensioner who has not received his last four DA instalments because his state govt. has decided to buy cowdung and cow urine with the money instead in order to win elections. So off I went to the local market; there were kurtas aplenty but only in one colour- yellow. The shopkeepers told me that they were "jajman" kurtas, in honour of the Ram Mandir consecration next week! Which explains why we should not be too hard on the Chief Justice of India for turning up in a saffron kurta at a temple recently- he really had no choice of colour. The fact that this was preceded by the Supreme Court delivering a couple of disappointing judgments in favour of the government was, of course, merely a coincidence.

  Staying with the curious goings-on in Ayodhya, it appears that we now have a fifth Shankaracharya, located in Delhi- no wonder the original four are feeling threatened. The affairs of the Hindu faith shall no longer be conducted on the Collegium pattern  but on the Master of the Roster model: there are no "Kaun Banega Crorepati" prizes for guessing who this gentleman is. But one has to admit he fully deserves his pre-eminent position for his sheer gall and inventiveness, and the ability to smoothly sail over contradictions: the inauguration of the new Parliament building last year, which was patently a political occasion, was effortlessly converted into a religious event, while the consecration of the Ram Mandir, which should be a purely religious ceremony, has been converted into a mega political event! Politics and religion have been seamlessly blended into one supreme individual, very soon the Shankaracharyas too shall be dispatched to the Marg Darshak Mandal which does appear to be getting a bit top heavy. Actually, the four genuine Shankaracharyas should never have entertained hopes of presiding over the Mandir consecration, for an "ubermensch" like our venerated PM, who has never let a single train be inaugurated by the Railway Minister or an Expressway by the Transport Minister, was certainly not going to allow this spiritual thunder to be stolen from him by a couple of sulking saints.

   Or by a battered Constitution, for that matter, now on a ventilator under the Bharat Ayushman scheme. Article 370 may have been deleted in full public glare, but Article 27 (which prohibits the state from using the taxpayers' money for the promotion and maintenance of any religion) has been given the quietus, well, quietly. The icing on the "prasad" is the government's order declaring a half day holiday for all central govt. and PSU employees on the 22nd of January. By my calculations this shall cost the exchequer Rs. 250 crores. Expect these folks to go chanting Jai Shri Ram all the way to the local "theka" on the 22nd, and to the polling booth subsequently. I have no doubt that this holiday will now become an annual feature.

   And suddenly Ayodhya has become the El Dorado for our own remora-like corporates who have a remarkable resemblance to this species of fish that hang about the jaws of sharks for the crumbs: land prices have tripled, plans have been launched to build hotels, condominiums, malls, airports, old age homes, homestays to cater to the 40 lakh visitors expected every month. One airline, which has a reputation for locking up its passengers in its planes and airbridges for hours on end and serving them a-la-carte meals on airport tarmacs, converted its Ayodhya flights into morality plays, dressing up its crew in Ramayan costumes: the pilot became Ram, Sita and Laxman received the boarding passengers at the gate. There was no sign of Hanumanji-he was probably on another mission to set on fire that other impudent island which had the temerity to mock God's chosen One. The Disneyfication of Ayodhya is almost complete. Wait for Akshay Kumar a.k.a Akhand Kumar to make his next movie on it, just as soon as he finishes his prolonged genuflections to the powers that see, or for Amitav Bachchan's next quiz show Kaun Banega Shankarcharya ? 

   All those who laboured for years to make the Ram temple happen will, of course, not be there: this is in the best traditions of the bird after which our country may well be named now- in cuckooland, after all, the real work is done by someone but the credit claimed by someone else. And so the likes of Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi will not grace the occasion, the poor labourers who have given their blood and sweat for its construction will be kept miles away, the worshippers of the temple will be outside while the usurpers will be inside. But for me the unkindest cut is the non-invitation to that flag bearer of nari shakti, if not nari bhakti, from my state- Kangana Ranaut. Ayodhya could have done with her oomph, and her temporary absence from Himachal would also have had the beneficial effect of slowing down the melting of the glaciers there. Methinks the BJP has missed a trick here- it could have used her scholarship in history to get her to revise the date of Independence once again, to 22nd January 2024. What about the earlier announced date of 2014?, you may well ask; well that would now become the year of the Quit Thinking movement. But I can understand the Supreme Leader's quandary- even with all the AI tools at Mr. Amit Malviya's disposal he would have had a tough time keeping the cameras focused on the fifth Shankaracharya once the Rampaging Ranaut entered the frame. Algorithms have their limitations too, you know. A.I may be artificial, but its not stupid.

 [ NOTE: I believe that, subsequent to Ms Ranaut descending from the mountains like a furious torrent, she has now been invited to the consecration, and has been gushing about it all over social media. This is bound to strengthen her chances of getting a ticket from Manali for the ensuing elections, and this has the other hopefuls from there worried like hell. The Congress may consider putting up Sunny Leone from there if it hopes to stand any chance. ]  

BOOK REVIEW : THE MAN WE ALL FORGOT

                 

         NOWHERE  MAN

         AUTHOR- SHIVALIK BAKSHI              

         216 PAGES

        PUBLISHED BY PENGUIN VEER 2023  [Available on Amazon}

  This is a book about courage, betrayal and hope. It is a book about someone we all- the Army, the governments of the time, society, the media- forgot. All, that is, except his family, especially his two sisters, and this book is an attempt to keep his memory, and the silence surrounding his disappearance, alive. Captain Kamal Bakshi, a 25 year old officer of the 5 Sikh Battalion , was last seen on the 6th of December, 1971 at his command post 303 in the Chhamb sector on the border with Pakistan, surrounded by an enemy battalion, tanks bearing down on his post, his platoon decimated. Company Havildar Ajit Singh, who had been ordered by Bakshi to retreat back to HQ, turned round for one last look and saw the Captain leap out of his trench and rush towards the enemy, firing all the time with his Sten machine gun. Since then he has disappeared into the maws of officialdom, declared dead, or missing, or a POW at different times. All efforts by his family to uncover the truth about him- indeed, even if he is still alive at the age of 77- have petered out into the arid desert of bureaucratic indifference, stoic silence and impotent diplomacy. For officialdom he is just a faceless number on some file buried deep in an army cabinet. This book (by his nephew) is an attempt to reveal the face behind this number, the introverted boy who grew up in an army family, the young man who wanted to do his family and his country proud, a soldier who loved books and nature.

  Kamal Bakshi was born in Rawalpindi in undivided Punjab in 1946, studied in Dagshai and Sherwood College, Nainital, joined the NDA (National Defence Academy) and was commissioned into the Indian army in 1966. The author has given us a glimpse- it was a short life of just 25 years that he was dealing with, after all- of Kamal's life by interviewing his family, school friends, course mates, colleagues and superior officers. The picture we get is of a young man with extraordinary- sometimes contradictory-  traits: studious, fond of reading. a nature lover, adventurous (he once walked from Chandigarh to Shimla), a fitness freak with a spartan lifestyle, a man who loved challenges and would never give up. generous and giving to a fault- travelling on a train one bitterly cold night, he just gave away his sleeping bag to a shivering co- passenger who had none. Born into an army family (his father was a Colonel) he was always destined for the defence forces, his first choice was the Air Force but poor eyesight did not allow that. 

  Kamal Bakshi was initially declared killed in action and was also posthumously awarded a "mention in despatches", but subsequently, partly due to the unceasing efforts of his father, was categorised as "missing in action". In 1978, during the course of a statement in Parliament, the Minister of State for External Affairs admitted that he was secretly being held in captivity by Pakistan. The latter, of course, does not admit it, but the author speculates that Pakistan had probably held back the names of six or seven Indian POWs from the International Red Cross in 1972-74 when the exchange of prisoners took place. It apparently did so as an insurance against India (which had captured 90000 POWs in Bangladesh) acceding to the Bangladesh demand to hand over about a hundred Pakistani soldiers and officers to stand trial for atrocities committed. Ultimately, of course, this demand was dropped on the condition that Pakistan recognize this new country, which it did. But Pakistan has never accepted that it had given an incomplete list of POWs, or that some still remain in its jails. India's frosty relations with the country do not make it easy to negotiate a solution to this vexed issue.

  But the issue of the missing Indian POWs, including Captain Bakshi, in Pakistani jails continues to haunt their families. Anecdotal evidence continues to surface from time to time of their presence in Pakistani jails. These include notes and letters smuggled out by some POW; one such letter by a Major Suri to his father from a jail in Karachi mentions that there are a total of twenty Indian POWs in that jail. An ordinary Indian criminal who had spent ten years in a Pakistani jail, told Indian officials when he was repatriated in June 1978 that he had met an Indian army officer named Kamal Bakshi in jail. There are even reports and eye witness accounts that Pakistan had sent some Indian POWs to Oman, but  neither the Indian nor the Oman governments have ever confirmed this. 

  Kamal's parents have since passed away, waiting for their only son to somehow, miraculously, come walking down the driveway of their house in remote Mcluskieganj in Bihar. His sisters, Kiki and Niki, continue to pursue efforts to find out the truth about the soldier his country forgot, to attain that closure which has eluded them for the last 55 years. Successive Indian governments seem to have given up on our missing POWs even as they vigorously pursue extraditions of criminals and hunt anti-nationals abroad; even if a fraction of these resources and energy were to be spent on tracing out our missing soldiers it would provide comfort to their grieving families. A soldier, if alive, has the right to be acknowledged and protected by his nation, and if dead, the right to an honourable grave in his own country. This is all the closure that his sisters and friends want. They somehow hold on to the assurance given by the Buddha:

"Three things cannot be long hidden: the sun, the moon, and the truth."