JUSTICE IN INDIA IS BECOMING LIKE RUSSIAN ROULETTE

   It was that great writer, Kingsley Amis, who said:  "If you can't annoy somebody there is little point in writing." Which is precisely the raison d'etre for someone like me writing blogs. Life is pretty pointless if you don't have a Bentley in your garage, or a suicide vest in your suitcase, or Kangana Runout on your arm, or a degree in Entire Political Science, or a pilot car in front of you- nobody knows you exist, and they wouldn't give a shit even if they knew. So you get  your own back by writing blogs and annoying these same twerps, see?

  Only a blogger- the Samuel Pepys of today- can do that. Unlike a columnist or journalist or "public commentator" or established writer, a blogger does not have to bother about fearful editors with one ear tuned to the PMO, or keep one eye cocked on the Booker's long list, or keep both open for a possible nomination to the Rajya Sabha. He is a free bird, a pigeon which can splatter his dubious wisdom on any statue. The statue this week happens to be that of Themis, the goddess of justice in Greek mythology and now universally accepted as the symbol of Justice. Because the more I look the more I find that her scales have become tilted, the sword has become double edged and the blindfold has taken on a saffron hue and developed a few peep holes. Invoking justice in India today is like playing Russian roulette- a game of chance, an uncertain outcome, and a better chance of being arrested if you are innocent than if you are guilty.

  Anyone who has taken the trouble to get to know me (not many, I must admit) knows that I prefer single malt to single women- the former ages better and doesn't have a bite. So it was with extreme reluctance that I recently had to refuse the gift of a bottle of Glenmorangie by a friend returning from watching the change of guard in 10, Downing Street, which has now replaced the change of guards in Buckingham Palace as the prime tourist attraction in London. You see, he had smuggled in a few bottles without paying duty, which was technically a crime. So the offered gift was a proceed of crime, for which the ED could arrest me, seize the bottle, and freeze my bank accounts. Ask Jaqueline Fernandez; she's on her way to the clinker by now, along with the cat costing forty lakhs gifted her by the con-man Suresh. It remains to be seen which of the two has the proverbial nine lives.

  But seriously, this law ( The Prevention Of Money Laundering Act) states that if you accept anything which is allegedly the proceeds of a crime, you are complicit , even if you have no knowledge of any violation of the law. For example, if you buy a flat from someone who has built/bought it with money suspected to be tainted, then your flat can be seized, even though your own bonafides are clear. Ditto with your money if you sell your flat to such person. And since it will take about ten years for you to get bail (unless you are an Arnab Goswami or Nupur Sharma) and another ten for the case to be decided, you'll never see either again. So now you know why the ED is now the most dreaded agency in the country, and why the BJP can form governments even when it loses in elections. The PMLA is the gift that keeps on giving- to the powers that B(JP). The highest courts have upheld this law. The law may or may not be an ass, but it can surely deliver one hell of a kick.

  Then again, you would expect that a decision by a High Court or even the Supreme Court would be respected by the courts at least, unless it is set aside by a reasoned judgment, right? Wrong- this is Russian roulette, remember? Three recent instances indicate how fickle and inconsistent our courts are becoming. 

  In the case of remission of the Bilkis Bano convicts the Bombay High Court ruled that since the trial was conducted in Maharashtra, it was the Maharashtra government that should decide their remission pleas. An eminently logical decision, but it was set aside by the Supreme Court, which, to add insult to the injuries already suffered by this poor woman, also added for good measure that the more lenient rules of 1992 ( and not the 2015 rules which debarred rapists and murderers from getting remission) would apply. This ensured their release, and has muddied the waters for future cases too.

  Take the case of the BCCI, which has practically become a branch office of the BJP. The Justice Lodha Committee in 2016 had recommended, inter alia, limiting the tenures of its office bearers to six years ( including in the state Associations) with a cooling off period in between, to introduce accountability and to avoid its capture by unholy interests. This was, naturally(!), challenged by BCCI  but twice, in 2016 and 2018, the Supreme Court upheld these recommendations. And then, suddenly, the same court reversed these two decisions last month for no sensible reason, ensuring the BJP takeover of perhaps the richest sporting body in the world. One ex- Chief Justice and two benches of the apex court over-ruled in a nano second, without a by your leave.

  The most recent instance of judicial shock and awe was provided by the extraordinary convening of an SC bench on a holiday to consider the NIA's appeal against another order of the Bombay High Court ( a serial culprit in such matters!) acquitting Prof. Sai Baba of the UAPA charges against him. The bench stayed the High Court order after just one hearing, and sent Sai Baba back to jail even before he could trundle his wheel chair out of its gates. Most independent legal scholars and jurists have opined that such an order is unprecedented. Why were the Hon'ble judges in such a tearing hurry? Could they not have heard the appeal of the NIA in its normal turn, and then decided? Can a man's rights be taken away in such a cavalier manner, without going into the merits of a case, without giving the defendant an opportunity to present his side of the case? Was Sai Baba, a man on a wheelchair with 90% permanent disability, such a threat to the Indian state that he deserved an ex-parte condemnation between the serving of soup and the main dish on a holiday?

  Similar bewildering judgments have become the order of the day of late, including the fact that one bench of the Delhi High court released Natasha Narwal and four others accused under UAPA in the Delhi riots case on bail, whereas another bench dismissed the bail application of a similarly accused Omar Khalid, languishing in jail for the last two years. Then again, in the Ram Mandir case the Supreme Court had, for a second time, upheld the constitutional validity of the Places Of Worship Act 1991, declaring it as a basic part of our legal structure. But it now appears to have done a shocking volte face: it has now admitted a number of petitions challenging the Act, stating that the Act does not forbid an inquiry to determine the character of the religious place. This is intriguing, to say the least, for the whole purpose of the Act was to freeze the religious character and status of the place as it stood in 1947: any inquiry now, 75 years later, can render the Act infructuous and unsettle the status in hundreds of cases.                                                                     There has to be some sanctity and permanence attached to court orders, some finality and closure in law, and reopening settled legal  rulings casually or opportunistically can only result in chaos and the perversion of justice. A citizenry has a right to expect justice based on general principles of law, not on the whims and interpretations of individual judges. Past judgements are supposed to provide valuable precedents, and to guide future judgments, but today they appear to count for nothing, with each judge ploughing his own furrow. This introduces a regrettable uncertainty in the administration of justice, leaving the litigant and his lawyer equally confused. It's easier these days to calculate your odds in a casino than in an Indian court of law.

   Even Russian roulette is more predictable than our justice system. In the former one at least knows that out of the six chambers in the revolver, only one has a bullet. In our legal system one can't even bet on the number of bullets, or on whether they are live or blanks. Or whose finger is on the trigger.

THE QUEUE- DRAWING A FINE LINE

    The Brits have perpetrated more than their fair share of colonial atrocities in India. But we didn't raise much of a stink about them at the time of our Independence, partly because most of us were not even born then, and partly because those who were, were mostly illiterate. There was also no Whatsapp then to help us along or Kangana Runout to remind us. But now we know all about them: destruction of local industries, forced indigo and opium plantations, the Madras famine of 1876-78, the Bengal famine of 1943, the Jalianwala Bagh massacre, the Radcliffe line and partition of India, the millions jailed, tortured, shot, etc. But one has to admire their consistency, for they did exactly the same wherever else they went- South Africa, Kenya, Australia, New Zealand. even North America where the Pilgrim Fathers went to pray but ended up preying (on the indigenous Indians).

   But I still have a sneaking admiration for them, and for one sole reason- the British invented the Queue, the single most civilised behavioral trait which distinguishes us from the great Apes. It's the queue which enables millions of people to shop, board trains and buses, go to cinemas, get their work done in offices, catch planes, watch soccer and cricket, without murdering each other in a temple- like stampede. The queue may even have saved more lives than the British snuffed out in their colonies!

   Interestingly, the queue (the line, not just the word) originated with the introduction of the urban transport system in the cities of Britain, and became firmly embedded in its civic life with the rationing introduced during WW1. It has even contributed to science- there is now a Queuing Theory, the mathematical study of waiting lines, created by a Danish engineer, A K Erlang, a hundred years ago. Shopping malls, airlines and other corporates spend a lot of time and money figuring out the most efficient manner of queuing. This has led to many variations of the standard straight line and queuing behaviour - queue chunking, skip and slip, serpentine queue, accordion queue, Wilma queueing method (for airlines) etc.

   We Indians of course have a very laissez faire attitude to queues, and consider it a waste of time, strictly for those without connections. Which is why I still remember my first taste of the British reverence for a queue. It happened in 1990, when I was posted as Private Secretary to Mr. I.K.Gujral, the External Affairs Minister. On a visit to the UK, our British Airlines flight landed at Heathrow about 45 minutes ahead of schedule; the Indian High Commissioner and the protocol staff had consequently not yet arrived to receive our party at the air-bridge, as was customary.

   Mr. Gujral and I de-boarded as ordinary mortals and proceeded to the immigration hall, where there were long queues at each counter. Seating the Minister on a bench, diplomatic passports in hand, I skipped a queue, jumped a yellow line and inserted myself at the counter, manned by a rather large lady who was not looking her best at this time in the early morning. Thrusting the passports and immigration forms at her, I said, with an air of self importance: "Madam, the Indian Minister of Foreign Affairs is sitting on that bench. Could you please stamp these passports?"

   The lady looked at me like I was a bad smell that she wished would  go away.

  "Sir," she thundered, "would you please go to the back of this queue and wait your turn !"

  "But he's the Minister for Foreign Affairs of India....." I stuttered.

  "I don't care if he's the Sultan of Brunei !" she roared back. "Get into that queue."

Fortunately, by this time the High Commissioner had arrived with the British protocol staff and took matters into their hands. I managed to save my job and the large lady proved indisputably why Britain managed to rule half the world for such a long time: the first rule in "Rule Britannia" was to stand in line.

  Most of my younger years were spent in standing in various queues: the ration shop, the railway booking office, the post office, cinema ticket counters, the electricity bill office, college admission counters. Even as an adult I grew a beard while standing in lines to buy my liquor, deposit my Income Tax returns, make an STD call to my parents in Kanpur. And these queues were nothing like the ones at Wimbledon or the Queen's funeral recently; they were more like the scrummage lines in a Rugby match, all shoulders and shoving, no quarter given.

   These days the digital revolution has changed most of that, and the only queues we land up in are the ones on the phone where a disembodied voice from Customer Service tells you: "All our executives are currently busy on other calls. Please stay on the line. Your custom is important to us." This is repeated ad-nauseam for about fifteen minutes, but at least one is sitting in the comfort of one's home, not being pounded on the midriff by the guy behind or elbowed in the face by the chappie in front. For a brief time in 2016 Mr. Modi, who as we know values tradition before anything else, attempted to take us back to the not-so-good old days when he forced about 150 million people to stand in the demonetisation queues before banks and ATMs every day for a month. Fortunately, he had bungled up as usual, within a short time the crooks had exchanged their old notes for new ones, and life returned to normal. As they say in Italy- Queue Sara Sara.

   The latest queues, post the death of Queen Elizabeth II, consist of former colonies of Britain seeking reparations and the return of their stolen artifacts in the British Museum which, according to John Oliver, is an active crime scene. India is also in line, demanding the return of the Kohinoor diamond.  The Kohinoor, as we all know, was forcibly wrested as a "gift" from Maharajah Duleep Singh, the younger son of Ranjit Singh and the last ruler of Punjab. He was only fifteen years old at the time. This was daylight robbery and we are certainly entitled to demand its return.

   But why is our outrage limited to the diamond ? Why are we not retrospectively indignant at the treatment meted out to the young Maharajah- separated from his mother, forcibly taken away to Britain and never allowed to return to Punjab, allowed to visit Nepal only once in his lifetime when his mother died. He himself died a lonely death in a hotel in Paris, a penniless pauper, and was buried in the small village of  Elveden in the Suffolk countryside as a Christian- the son and rightful heir of perhaps the only Indian ruler who made the British eat humble pie ?

  Why are we interested only in Duleep Singh's baubles and not the man himself ? Why has the Indian govt. not demanded back the remains of the last ruler of Punjab, so that he can finally be laid to rest in the land of his birth and his ancestors? Most surprising, why have the government and the proud people of Punjab, so conscious of their history and sacrifices, not raised this demand yet? The only feeble effort made so far has been by a Sikh charity, The Maharajah Duleep Singh Centenary Trust, but it has not been supported by either the Indian or the Punjab governments. The Kohinoor is, after all, an inanimate trinket but Duleep Singh is part of our lived history, and if we fail to remember him we betray and disown our own past. Looks like we are in the wrong queue on this one. 

IS MR. GADKARI OVERSPEEDING IN THE FAST LANE ?

      Why is Nitin Gadkari, the Minister for Road Transport and Highways, in such a tearing hurry? It certainly hasn't got him any brownie points with the Deadly Duo, from all accounts. He has tripled the pace of construction of NHs from 12 kms per day in 2014 to 37kms/day in 2021, ramming his machines through virgin forests, protected wildlife reserves, fragile mountain terrain, prime agricultural lands, without any thought to either the environment or individual livelihoods. Which would be at least partially justified, I suppose, if it led to an improvement in driving experience or safety, but both official figures and personal experience show that it has not. 

   NCRB (National Crime Records Bureau) data shows that the number of deaths in road accidents has gone up from 146,133 in 2015 to 155,622 in 2021, an increase of about 7%, even though Gadkari has built 58000 kms of new national highways during this period. At a personal level, it used to take me 8 hours to drive from Delhi to Shimla in 1982 (when I bought my first second-hand car-a Fiat Padmini); it now takes me 9 hours, even though the entire stretch is now a multi-toll expressway. From what I've been reading, it's the same for the Yamuna Expressway (Delhi-Agra-Kanpur-Lucknow) or the Mumbai-Pune highway too. Even though we now have to pay heavy tolls, about Rs. 1.50 per km, where earlier there was no such levy. Clearly, something is not right here: what has improved after the massive financial and environmental costs incurred?

   A recent blog by Dilip D'Souza, a retired computer engineer, gives us another dimension. Comparing USA, China and India, Dilip states that the number of accident deaths per million vehicles in these three countries is 141, 814 and 2247, respectively. Simply put, our death rate is 15 times that of the USA and 3 times that of China. Another paradox- in the USA there is one death for every 50 road accidents, in India someone dies in every second accident- a 25 fold increase. These are horrendous figures, and I do hope some brave soul conveys them to Nitin Gadkari and the NHA (National Highway Authority) satraps, so that the former stops boasting that by 2030 our road infrastructure shall rival that of the USA. Not with these number of deaths, it won't, sir.

   In his race to enter the Guinness Book of records, Gadkari forgets that an expressway or a highway is more than just a six lane stretch of asphalt or macadam, dotted with toll plazas- it is an eco system with many parts, and proper attention has to be paid to each of them. These include proper and timely maintenance, enforcing road discipline. internationally accepted road designs, proper signages, setting up a highway patrol system, establishing medical and trauma centres to attend to accident victims. Yes, they will cost money, but they will prevent accidents and save precious lives.

   Unfortunately, in its single-minded pursuit of kilometers constructed, the NHA appears to have lost sight of these vital components of a highway system. Upkeep of these roads is dismal: the NHA collects more than Rs. 40000 crore every year from tolls- where is this money going? Repairs, diversions, widening-all these are never ending exercises and carry on for ever: there are at least six "diversions" between Sonepat and Chandigarh, replacing three lanes with one, and they have been there for at least the last two years. Where is the urgency to complete these works, considering that the motorist is paying a toll of Rs. 400 between Delhi and Chandigarh and still averaging the same speed he did in 1980? The Kalka-Solan expressway (just about 45 kms) has been in the making for the last 8 years, and the constant landslides and subsidence on it have made it a dangerous zone to drive on, with fatalities on it occurring every year. In its hurry to loot the public the NHA starts collecting toll even before a road is completed; though this matter has gone to some courts, they remain mute spectators (probably because My Lords are exempted from paying toll ?)

   Our road designs are atrocious: two or three lanes suddenly being squeezed into one without warning, too many medians and exits, most of them unmarked, uncontrolled access, badly designed grade separators. Signages are considered a waste of money. All this grabbed headlines in the crash (and death) of Cyrus Mistry. The administration tried its utmost to blame the driver for over speeding, but investigations by the International Road Institute and Mercedez-Benz have revealed that the culprit was bad road design and lack of warning signages. (Gadkari's reaction was his usual knee-jerk SOP- mandate compulsory six air bags for all cars.) This is a red herring to divert attention from the NHAI and police's failings: it is better to PREVENT an accident in the first place, than to simply try and reduce its impact once it has occurred.

  Where are the highway police and patrols to discipline our notoriously errant drivers? You can drive for a hundred kms on an expressway and not meet a single patrol car. In any case the traffic police appear interested in only overspeeding. What about the trucks and buses hogging the extreme right lane, forcing motorists to do the dangerous overtake-from-the-left maneuver? What about the stationary vehicles parked on the left lane, without any warning signs. Just these two violations account for a large number of accidents. And then there are idiots driving on the wrong side or the wrong speed lane. Everything goes unchecked and unpunished-it's like the wild west on these highways.

  There is only one trauma centre sign on the entire 400 km stretch between Delhi and Shimla. I didn't see any on the Yamuna Expressway. No dedicated ambulances, either. No wonder our fatality rate is 25 times that of the USA. There is no "golden hour" for an accident victim, no Good Samaritan Act: by the time he reaches a hospital it is usually too late. Why cannot some of that Rs. 40000 crore be used for establishing dedicated highway police units (not just sparing two constables from the local police station) and basic trauma facilities every 50 kms or so to avail of that golden hour? Simply ramping up the length of highways built is no achievement, what matters is the quality of these highways, their engineering, their safety record.

   The second issue on which Mr. Gadkari has gone into overdrive is the collection of tolls. The current FastTag system is working fine, a vehicle now takes just 40 seconds to cross a toll instead of the earlier five to ten minutes, jams at a toll plaza are a thing of the past, leakage of revenue has completely stopped. The country saves Rs.2800 crore worth of fuel every year because vehicles do not have to idle at the plazas any more. Mr. Gadkari deserves credit for all this, but he wants more. You would think the govt. would be happy and not try to fix something which is working ? Wrong. Mr. Gadkari now wants to introduce a new system of toll collection- the New Automated Toll Collection System.

  The new system would consist of one of two options being considered: one, a GPS in your car which will enable tracking of your vehicle and automatically deduct the toll from a connected bank account. Two, an automatic number plate recognition system: cameras at toll plazas will read your number plate and deduct the toll from your bank account. For this a new number plate will have to be installed by you. Both options are problematic.

  Let's not mince words: we are living in a surveillance state and the GPS system will only make it easier for the govt. to track your movements. In short, this option cannot be trusted. Germany has a GPS system for tolls, but it took almost a decade of trial and error before it could be introduced. Mr. Gadkari wants to do it in one year, by 2023 ! This will be worse than the unholy haste of GST and Demonetisation combined. And remember, Germany has only 10000 kms of expressways and 50 million cars; we have 150000 and 250 million!                                                                                                                                                            As for option two (the new number plate), how is it any different from a FastTag ? Why make 250 million vehicle owners repeat the ordeal of the HSRP ( High Security Registration Plate)? It has taken years and crores to install the HSRPs, and just when it is settling down Gadkari wants us to install a new set of plates, for no apparent reason.

  But, the after- effects of Covid notwithstanding. I smell a possible rat. There are big bucks involved in the proposed scheme. It costs roughly Rs. 1000/- to install one of these new fangled plates; for 250 million vehicles that amounts to Rs. 25000 crores! This is what the public will have to dish out and what the chosen contractors will earn if Gadkari has his way. The GPS option will probably cost even more. There's a bonanza awaiting the fortunate and favoured few here.

  I am also not comfortable with linking my bank account with any of these toll systems; I prefer a separate wallet ( as in the FastTag scheme) where I can decide how much to put. This way I can limit any possible damage by way of wrong deductions, hacking and cyber theft, which is becoming all too common. If the security structure of UIAID has collapsed like a house of cards the toll guys cannot be much better.

   There are other arrows in Gadkari's quiver and he has made public announcements of them all- electric highways, completely replacing petroleum fuel with ethanol, vehicle scrappage policy ( announced in 2020 but not yet visible on the ground even two years later), six air bags. I'm afraid he is going too fast with his shock and awe tactics: every second month we have to contend with some new rule or amendment in the Motor Vehicles Act. The Minister should remember that ours is a poor country (no matter what his boss may claim), changes cost money, people need some time to adjust to them, our bureaucracy is not known for its efficiency, confusion about rules only gives greater opportunity for the police to exercise their predatory instincts. Go step by step, sir, take your foot off the accelerator and move over to the  left lane. It's slower, but its safer and will eventually get you to your destination in one piece.

OF PASSWORDS, PANTIES AND PATRIARCHS

    In the last five hundred years or so, mankind has progressed from martial rape to marital rape, except perhaps in Ukraine, Myanmar, and Haryana, where the old style still prevails. And, as further proof of our progress, we in India are still debating whether marital rape (MR) is rape simpliciter and should be a crime or not (at the moment it is not). And then there is that other perverted provision of law- "restoration of conjugal rights" which is nothing but juridically disguised and sanctioned marital rape in another form. The Supreme Court occasionally grapples with this question between long vacations and longer adjournments. The Union government has told the court that MR is the bedrock of marriages in India, proven by the fact that our divorce rate is one fifth of the USA. Mrs. Smriti Irani, the Minister for Women's Development has, of course, not addressed the subject, in keeping with her penchant for avoiding all issues not related to Rahul Gandhi or Silly Souls.. The patriarchal conscience keepers of our society are aghast that the question is even being asked, given that the Manusmriti asserts that a wife is the  property of the husband. The Income Tax department is yet to decide whether a wife is moveable or immoveable property (subject to depreciation), and whether capital gains tax will apply to a divorced woman on her remarriage, but I have no doubt the Chairman CBDT (Central Board of Direct Taxes) will apply his mind to these questions as soon as he gets his next extension in service.

   No matter. The issue will soon be taken out of our hands, thanks to technology and a few crazy nerds. I learn that a company in France has developed a range of panties protected by a password . The PPP ( Password Protected Panties) cannot be taken off without a valid password ! It's the famed chastity belt come of age: had this invention come a few hundred years earlier King Arthur could have gone on the Crusades and slaughtered a few more thousand heretics with an easier mind, having left Queen Guinevere to the tender care of Sir Launcelot. No doubt the PPP shall soon be available on Amazon and Flipkart in their forthcoming End of Marital Rape Sale. Protection for a wife is now assured: any attempt to forcibly extract the password from her, or to hack it, shall now be a crime under the Information Technology Act, even if the subsequent sex is legit.

   PIA (Pakistan International Airlines), I am convinced, had these PPPs in mind when they recently advised their cabin crew to wear "proper underwear" on duty. The social media outrage was totally uncalled for. Had PIA not been forced to withdraw this very caring advisory, they would in all probability have issued a second circular advising the air-hostesses to never share their passwords while in the cockpit, and to change the password after every, uh, layover.

   But, as usual, I have allowed myself to get diverted from the main thrust of my blog: this is not meant to be about panties, but about passwords. They have become the bane of my life; these days I am juggling about 50 passwords, and at my age that's not funny. One needs a password or a PIN for just about everything: bank accounts, gmail, microsoft, Fasttag, government agencies like Income Tax, gas supplier, Railway bookings,, Amazon, mutual funds, credit cards. And one has to change them frequently AND remember them.

   The average Indian has an English vocabulary of about 2000 words, and after about 10 years he'll run out of words for creating passwords. Then again, the blessed things are supposed to provide security, and one is advised never to write them down -really? Since no one other than Vishwanathan Anand can remember 50 passwords, and Doctor Alzheimer can knock on my doors anytime, I have my passwords written on slips of paper scattered all over the house; the multiplicity of slips is needed since I  also cannot remember where I have put a particular slip. It will not take a burglar-hacker more than ten minutes to get all my passwords and empty all my accounts, sell my car, mortgage my house for a loan, send a mail to Neerja that I am divorcing her, and order a copy of  Chetan Bhagat's Half Girlfriend  on my account, a book I have sworn I shall never read. So I've put a password protected lock on my main door, and I'm certainly not going to tell you where I have written down that particular password. You'll never find it, dear reader, not even if you look behind my mailbox.

   The only person who has nothing to fear about his passwords being hacked is Shashi Tharoor. It will take many lifetimes (and sets of dictionaries) for a hacker, weaned on two syllable Twitter words, to exhume Shashi's passwords. By the time the hacker discovers (by chance only, mind you) "lalochezia", Shashi would have moved on to "floccinaucinihilipilification." At this point the poor chap will happily kill himself, no doubt: either hang himself from a tap if he's in a police station in U.P., or jump from the sixth floor of a building if he's in Russia.

   But I'm beginning to learn a thing or two about passwords. I've learnt, for instance, that an ideal password is like a girlfriend- you never share it with anyone, you change it every six months, and you have to make sure that your wife never finds out about it. I think I'll just about survive my remaining years with this new-found knowledge, but what if St. Peter demands a password for entering the pearly gates? I'm told that for that other place down the road paved with good intentions one doesn't need a password, just the PAN card. That's not a problem, but the place is rather warm and crawling with politicians, lawyers, real estate developers and insurance agents. So methinks I'll log into my account with St. Peter: time to contact Shashi Tharoor for some neologism nuggets ?

THE SPIDER AND THE FLY- HOW NOT TO NEGOTIATE.

    "Will you walk into my parlour?" said the spider to the fly,

    " Tis the prettiest little parlour that ever you did spy."

   [ Mary Hewitt. 1829]

     

The road to the Hindu Rashtra, along with that other place most of us are headed for, is paved with good intentions. I refer, of course, to the August meeting which five noted Muslim members of civil society had held with Mr. Bhagwat, the RSS (Rashtriya Sewak Sangh) Sarsanghchalak. I have no doubt at all that Mr. Quraishi, Najib Jang et al had no ulterior motive, that their intentions were honest and that they sincerely wished to act as bridge between the minorities and the Hindutva forces. But it was a horrendous error of judgment nonetheless, both strategically and tactically.

   As a strategy it was short-sighted and surprisingly naive, given that these gentlemen are experienced in public life and have risen to the top of their professions: they should have known better. Firstly, why talk to the RSS at all ? It has no official standing, functions as an extra-constitutional force, and has no formal role in our governmental structure. When this question was put to  Quraishi by Karan Thapar he replied that the RSS was already a legitimate force and that therefore there was nothing wrong in talking to it. I would beg to differ with my senior colleague: the RSS may be a legal organisation, it may be the power behind the throne, but its larger legitimacy is in doubt, and has always been. It has been repeatedly banned, is suspected to specialise in stirring the communal pot, could be behind many of the excesses of the present regime, is distrusted by the minorities. There is a difference between legality and legitimacy- the former is a function of law, the latter of social acceptability across the board and not by just one community.

  The second strategic mistake was to talk with an organisation primarily responsible for the ongoing subjugation of the community to which these five gentlemen belong, beginning with the movement against the Babri Masjid. How could they have trusted the Sarsanghchalak, given his record of double speak? He had said, after the SC (Supreme Court) judgment on Babri Masjid, that the RSS would not campaign for "restoration" of any other temples- but has launched a movement against the mosques at Kashi, Mathura and God knows where else. He talks of a common Indian DNA but insists that Muslims in India should be known as Hindu Muslims. He talks of treating Muslims as bona fide citizens of India, but does nothing to stop his own govt. from practically disenfranchising them at every turn. Going to talk to such a person with his stated position, at HIS behest and in HIS office, amounts to abject surrender (not "appeasement" as another commentator has termed it, in my view). And those who surrender, or are seen to be supplicants, cannot set the terms of any treaty or agreement.

   Tactically too, it is apparent that our five friends have had the tables turned on them: it appears that there was no agreed upon agenda for the meeting. Consequently Bhagwat got the two assurances/ clarifications he wanted ( for whatever they are worth) on "kaffirs" and beef consumption, whereas our five interlocutors got nothing in return. The RSS Supremo had cleverly prepared his exit suit in advance: according to Quraishi/Jung, he expressed his helplessness by stating that he lacks support, that he has his limitations, that his word is not law, that he is subjected to criticism. Why then talk to him at all? A question asked by Karan Thapar, without any satisfactory reply.

The discussion seems to have been at a dialectical, almost philosophical, level and therefore doomed to failure. No attempt was made to take up the real life issues that matter to Muslims today, their serial persecution: CAA (Citizen Amendment Act), NRC (National Register of Citizens), hijab bans, Dharam Sansads, bulldozers, hate speech, demolition of madrasas. On none of these has  Bhagwat uttered a word in the past. Surely, any meaningful discussion should have posed these subjects to him, if only to know where he stands on them. Sadly, the opportunity to do so went abegging- why?

  I am loathe to say so, but after watching the interview with Karan Thapar, it seemed to me that, in order to justify their meeting, Quraishi-Jung sounded like apologists and interpreters for  Bhagwat. They excuse him for his non-committal stance, they would "like to believe" him even though they "can't read his mind", they find his body language reassuring(!). The fact that he listened to them with "rapt attention" and without any interruption, we are told, shows his sincerity. They even admire his sense of humour (though I don't in the least find that reassuring). The duo are constantly interpreting what the Sarsanghchalak said- or, more important, did not say- in order to extract from the ore a nugget of hope which is just not there.

   It is important to note that, (as far as I am aware), Mohan Bhagwat has not said a word about the meeting in public, or confirmed any of the conclusions/ interpretations of it that Quraish-Jung have revealed in their interview with Karan Thapar. He does not have to, he has got what he wanted. As far as he is concerned the meeting has served its purpose as a PR exercise. Our five friends have burnished his fading international image and given him a fresh lease of life as an ideologue sensitive to the concerns of the minorities, willing to engage with them, and willing to revisit his beliefs. None of that has been proven or even demonstrated. Which is why this meeting, a masterpiece of double speak on the part of  Bhagwat, should never have taken place. A fly should think twice before venturing into the spider's parlour.

THE BHARAT JODO YATRA- RAHUL GANDHI'S LONG WALK TO VINDICATION

    The BJP, as a political party, is many bad things in one, but it is not stupid. And right now its canny instinct is telling it that Rahul Gandhi's Bharat Jodo Yatra is not good news for 2024 or the coming state elections. The party's discomfiture and subdued sense of alarm has been evident in the desperate attempts to reduce the padyatra to Tee shirts, containers, shoes, and to mock it as Bharat Toro or Congress Jodo yatra. But the mockery and lampooning is not working this time, at least not over the one week that the procession has travelled so far in Tamil Nadu and Kerala. This is what is confounding the BJP and explains its desperation.

    The BJP has invested a lot of time and hundreds of crores over the last eight years to caricature Rahul Gandhi as a Pappu, a fumbling idiot, a part time politician, given to gaffes, incapable of the 24x7 exertion required in politics, an entitled dynast. It has been getting votes from this deliberately created falsehood, whereas the real fiction lies in the hyped up persona of none other than Mr. Modi himself. The Pappu was used to hide the fact that the emperor had no clothes, only his Mont Blanc pen, his Bvlgari dark glasses and  Movado watches.

   But Rahul Gandhi had no way to counter or dispel this viciously manufactured image of himself, because the BJP had also bought over practically the entire print and television media. In effect, he has been left with no effective channel of communication with the people. He can neither explain his policies to them, nor show that he is a quite different person from what the saffron party has painted him to be.

   A lesser man would have given up, like the Mayawatis, the Navin Patnaiks, the Jagan Reddys and the Naidus. But Rahul Gandhi has decided instead to leap frog back into the past and draw on one of India's most potent weapons of struggle- the padyatra or foot march. It was used with great effect by Gandhi, in the sixties by Vinoba Bhave for his Bhudan movement, and in the more recent past by Chandrashekhar and Jaiprakash Narayan. India- and, ironically, Hinduism itself- has always had great reverence for the padyatra, for it symbolises sacrifice, repentance, renunciation and austerity. It is associated with pilgrimages, holy men, non violent struggle against oppression. The Bharat Jodo Yatra is therefore drawing on hundreds of years of hoary tradition, memories of the freedom struggle, even one of the essential elements of Hinduism. No wonder the BJP is worried !- it has been hoist on its own petard, in a way.

  The Emperor is never without his royal plumage and trappings, he is afraid of being seen without them and keeps a distance from the people, visible only on distant stages, LCD screens and holograms, the distance bridged by TV cameras, teleprompters and trucked in supporters. In his new avatar he can never do what Rahul Gandhi is now doing through his Yatra- exposing himself to the crowds one on one, rubbing shoulders with the ordinary citizen, touching skin, tying a little girl's sandals, dancing with  tribal women. What perhaps has the BJP worried is that the Yatra will highlight in sharp contrast the difference between the Emperor and Rahul Gandhi. The voters will get to see for themselves Gandhi's innate qualities which the darbari  media has so far obscured- his basic decency and sincerity, the lack of any posturing or pretensions, his compassion, the non-oratorical conversations, his accessibility, the moral core which, paradoxically, makes him unfit for the Machiavellian politics of today.

                                   

                                  

  This, I feel, is the real message which the Bharat Jodo Yatra seeks to convey; the problems of inflation, unemployment, cronyism, Chinese intrusion, social discord will of course follow and will now sound more plausible to the people. And the strategy appears to be succeeding. It is being reported that 50000-70000 people are participating in the Yatra everyday, and the numbers keep going up everyday. At this rate, over 150 days, Rahul Gandhi will be able to personally connect with about 60 to 70 million people, a prospect that should take the BJP (and some obdurate, short-sighted Opposition leaders too) back to the drawing board.

  And I have no doubt that the midnight oil is being burnt in the BJP's war rooms to prepare a toolkit to counter the Yatra and disrupt it or at least to put the brakes on its momentum. Troglodytes like Sambit Patra and congenital dissimulators like Smriti Irani are already on the job. This tool kit will  contain both legal and extra legal machinations, including denial of police permission for the march, imposition of Sec. 144 CRPC, concocted security threats, instigated violence, organised counter protests. A couple of old cases (National Herald?) may be reopened so that Rahul Gandhi could be summoned again to Delhi and forced to leave the march. The process has already begun, with the NCPCR (National Commission for the Protection of Child Rights) issuing a notice to the Congress for "using" children in the march!

   The real test for Rahul Gandhi and his team will come when he enters BJP ruled states like Karnataka, MP, Maharashtra, Haryana and UP. It will be a two fold test: gauging the people's support, and the BJP's unscrupulousness. The latter will be in direct proportion to the former- the more the popular support, the more desperate the measures which will be adopted by the state administrations. The opposition will not be from the BJP alone- other "Opposition" leaders with egos larger than their vote shares will not welcome Rahul Gandhi upstaging them before 2024, and will try their utmost to revile and undermine the Yatra. The opening salvos have already been fired by Kejriwal and Mamata Banerjee. And then there are the opportunistic weevils within the Congress itself, the likes of Azad, Anand Sharma and Manish Tiwari playing their own one-upmanship games. The Congress is on the cusp of a watershed moment, and should not be provoked into reckless responses. It should be restrained, not respond in kind, like the forgettable "khaki nickers on fire" tweet. It should never take its eyes off the central and visceral message of the Yatra.

   What is this message, people ask, some derisively ? I think it was best answered by Rahul Gandhi himself when a journalist asked him this question:

" The message of the Bharat Jodo Yatra is humility, compassion and respect for people. We are not abusing anybody, not threatening anybody. We are walking with humility."

  I feel that was very well put. More than anything else, India needs a healing touch. It needs a compassionate leader, not an Ozymandias. This, I believe, is the message of the long walk. Rahul Gandhi is the messenger AND the message.

   It remains to be seen whether, 150 days from now, Rahul Gandhi's trust in himself and the people of India will be vindicated or not. But, whatever the outcome electorally, this reviled "dynast" is doing what no other politician in the country today has the guts to do: step out among the people, sans any filters or trappings, and live WITH them for five months. He stands head and shoulders above his peers in his unrelenting opposition to the Supreme Leader and his cohorts, and in his refusal to compromise with his core beliefs. Five months from now, I don't think Rahul Gandhi will have anything left to prove: it will be the citizens of India who will have to prove themselves, and where they stand.

REVDIS ARE FINE, BUT WHAT ABOUT THE JALEBIS ?

    Irony just died a thousand deaths, and Double-Speak became our third official language, with the launch of the Freebie jumla last month. It was, of course, no surprise that Mr. Modi would resort to this red herring in a game where the AAP was running away with the ball. Ball tampering is, after all, part of the BJP's SOP; the irony, however, lies elsewhere.

   It lies in the fact that the Supreme Court decided to examine the "Freebie culture" precisely at a time when it was being showered with a new lot of freebies itself ! Even as it issued notices to all and sundry to explain how it could be stopped, the government amended the Supreme Court Judges Rules rules to  make life a wee bit more comfortable for retired judges of the Court. Instead of the current fixed allowance of Rs. 39000/ and Rs. 70000 per month for retired Judges and Chief Justices of the SC, they would now be given a chauffeur and domestic help from the SC staff pool; in addition, the CJIs would also get one secretarial assistant and a six month extension of the official residence- free, of course.

   The ostensible reason is that old chestnut, expounded upon eloquently by the late Arun Jaitley in Parliament many years ago and since repeated ad nauseam to a nodding public- that judges (of the Apex court particularly) should be put beyond the pale of temptation by ensuring their financial independence after retirement: if their material wants are taken care of, the argument goes, their integrity would be assured and they would be less inclined to favour the government (or any other litigant) while on the bench. I don't buy this for a moment, no disrespect intended.

   Integrity is like virginity- you either have it or you don't. You can't buy it with sops or freebies. Judges too are public servants at the end of the day and get a generous pension of 50% of last pay drawn, plus periodic Dearness Allowance, which add up to roughly Rs. 1.50 lakhs per month. Unlike other public servants, they also have plenty of Constitutional protection from the executive. So why should there be special favours for them ? If a government has to pay extra to any government employee for him or her to honestly do a job he/she is recruited for then it may just as well pack up and hand over charge to ASSOCHAM or FICCI or to the double A's. Trying to buy honesty or integrity is a zero-sum game in which the price keeps going up and the quality of the product keeps going down.

   Secondly, this is all window dressing and I am sure the government too doesn't believe for a moment that these additional freebies for judges will do the job. Not that it wants an independent or impartial judiciary, either- that would be disastrous! But symbolism is good optics, and concern for judges' welfare will go down well with the gullible, of whom there's one born every minute. It also helps that this might make our judiciary a little better disposed towards the executive. Meanwhile, of course, the real inducements remain with the executive: appointments to Tribunals, Commissions, Governorships and the Rajya Sabha. Nobody is looking at these freebies (they come at tax payers' expense), not even the Supreme Court. For these offerings are the real challenges to integrity of judges (and other public servants), not the lack of a chauffeur or domestic help.

   Financial doles to the public are not the only freebies handed out by the government. The bureaucracy is also favoured with freebies, what I would call Jalebis (a term used by the noted economist Swaminathan Aiyer)- the revdis may or may not get you the votes, but it's the jalebis that keep you in power. The jalebi, a more convoluted and twisted item than the revdi, serves the same objective as the revdis- sugar coated inducements to ensure the retention of power by suborning the bureaucracy. In this category fall extensions of service, diplomatic appointments, out of turn promotions, appointments to Regulatory and other bodies post retirement. The competition for them among bureaucrats on the verge of superannuation ensures the ever- lasting loyalty of the chosen few subsequently.

   There is only one nostrum to remove temptation and inculcate integrity and probity among serving civil servants and the judiciary, and it is a simple one: discontinue the appointment of retirees to any position. There is no reason why serving judges and bureaucrats cannot be appointed  to all government bodies, be they Tribunals, Commissions, Regulatory agencies. Selection can be done by the UPSC (Union Public Service Commission) through open competition. There should be no extension of the retirement age. No one is indispensable or irreplaceable: if the country could survive the assassination of two Prime Ministers it can cope with the retirement of a Cabinet Secretary or an Enforcement Directorate or Central Bureau of Investigation head. Strictly enforce the two year cooling off period for bureaucrats and judges before they can take up private jobs or join political parties or be appointed as Governors or MPs or take up arbitration cases. Take away this power of patronage from the Executive/ leveraging of one's past position in government, and much of the rot will have been stopped.

   I hope the Supreme Court will take the freebie issue out of the "welfare versus sops" straitjacket in which the government wants to put it, and look at the larger issue, including its own indulgences. It is not only the humble revdi which should be examined (if at all), but the more important jalebi, which is becoming the staple diet of our judiciary and bureaucracy. The court might even like to look at the other sweetmeats like pensions and subsidies to MPs and MLAs, grandiose but worthless statues, Rs. 7000 crore planes and Rs. 8 crore cars for their eminences, corporate tax cuts and loan waivers, thousands of crores spent to bolster one man's image, and other assorted dishes on the jalebi platter. Moral bankruptcy is perhaps even more dangerous than financial bankruptcy and selective sanctimoniousness is abominable to any rational mind. As Confucius said: watch your jalebis and the revdis will take care of themselves.