The Indian Scene

I

The Delhi agreement between India and Pakistan which concluded on August 28 after a great deal of bargaining is the one outstanding event in the quarter July-September. It settled two of the issues which arose out of the war of 1971 leaving two other issues for settlement after negotiations with Bangladesh. The issues settled were the repatriation of the 90,000 Pakistani prisoners of war in the custody of India and of the Bengali civilians interned in Pakistan. The issues left for subsequent negotiations are the exact number of non-Bengalis in Bangladesh to be repatriated to Pakistan and the trial of 195 Pakistani officers accused by Bangladesh of having committed war crimes of a highly serious character.

The Pakistani prisoners of war should have been freed in the normal course immediately after the war. India, however, did not do so mainly because she wanted to use them as hostages for obtaining Pakistan’s recognition of Bangladesh. At the time of Simla agreement in 1972 Bhutto undertook to recognise Bangladesh at an early date. But he put it off, perhaps, owing to certain domestic difficulties with which he was faced. He did not also show any great keenness to have the prisoners of war restored to freedom. India therefore had to revise its views on using them as a bargaining counter to get recognition for Bangladesh. She had to incur a huge expenditure in maintaining them, an expenditure which Bangladesh was not willing to share. Bhutto also took to carrying on an anti-Indian campaign in the international world on this issue. It was then that India persuaded Bangladesh to agree to the repatriation of the prisoners of war, irrespective of her being recognised by Bhutto. In the agreement concluded as a result of this, the two countries expressed their willingness to repatriate on humanitarian grounds the prisoners of war except those to be tried for war crimes, provided that Pakistan agreed to send to Bangladesh the Bengali civilians interned by her and take the non-Bengalis in Bangladesh who opted for Pakistani citizenship. It was expected that humanitarian grounds would make an effective appeal to Bhutto. But he took several months to give due consideration to the proposals put forward by
India and Bangladesh.

Finally he agreed to hold discussions on the proposals. They were first discussed at Islamabad and later in Delhi. The Delhi agreement was the outcome of these discussions. At one time it appeared that they would end in a stalemate as Bhutto was not prepared to give up his stand on the issue of trials for war crimes and the exact number of non-Bengalis in Bangladesh to be repatriated. Wiser counsels prevailed in the end. It was agreed to repatriate all the prisoners of war and the Bengali civilians in Pakistan. There was further agreement that about 50,000 out of a total of nearly 3,00,000 non-Bengalis in Bangladesh should be immediately repatriated and the question of the trial of war criminals and the additional number of non-Bengalis to be repatriated to be settled later through negotiations in which Bangladesh should participate along with India and Pakistan.

India is glad that it is able to get rid of the prisoners of war. As Bangladesh is not prepared to participate in a tri-partite conference until her sovereign equality is recognised by Pakistan, the expectation now is that Bhutto would grant recognition at an early date. This is however uncertain. He can afford to wait indefinitely for the settlement of these two questions. He hopes that, just as on the issue of repatriation of prisoners of war India and Bangladesh revised their earlier stands, they would do the same in respect of these two questions also. It looks as if his hopes will be fulfilled.

The Delhi agreement has not brought about the normalisation of relations between India and Pakistan. Bhutto continues to harp on the Kashmir issue. This is the major bone of contention between the two countries. Unless he gives up his demand that there should be a plebiscite to settle the position of Kashmir, there is no chance of any kind of compromise between him and India. Another point on which he has been laying emphasis these months is that there should be military parity between India and Pakistan and he has been trying to negotiate with the United States and China and to some extent even with Soviet Russia to secure this objective. But he is not likely to succeed as all these powers feel that it is unrealistic for Pakistan with a population of only forty millions to try to secure parity with India with her population of five hundred and fifty millions and with her immensely superior material resources. India and Bangladesh may have therefore to reconcile themselves to this atmosphere of tensions without which Pakistan is not able to live.

II

There is not much that is encouraging in the domestic scene. Even those who by temperament are most optimistic feel that the situation is daily worsening instead of showing signs of improvement. Its outward symbols are the phenomenal rise in prices especially of articles of food and other essentials and the increase in the number of unemployed–both uneducated and educated. Economists point out that this is due to stagnation of the country’s economy during the last four or five years, the failure of crops because of drought in the last two years and much more to increasing resort to deficit financing by governments both at the Centre and in the States. Whatever the reasons be all classes of people, except the most affluent and those with black money have found it difficult to cope with the rising prices.

As a consequence of this, food riots have taken place in several states. Godowns of wholesalers, the shops of retailers, railway wagons and several other places where food grains were stored were looted and the forces of law and order found themselves helpless in dealing with the culprits in spite of their resort to shooting and other acts of terror.

Political parties except the party in power took advantage of this situation and in most cases for their own purposes. They did not stop merely with holding protest meetings and taking out processions but took the law into their own hands and carried out what they called a de-hoarding Campaign. They broke open shops, took hold of stocks in them, and sold them to the passers-by at what they called reasonable prices. In certain localities they created a reign of terror and businessmen and shopkeepers were reduced to a state of helplessness. Power slipped away in such localities from the hands of Government officials into the hands of party leaders and agitators.

This raises a fundamental question. How was it that these leaders and agitators have been able to carry out the process of de-hoarding while officials armed with legitimate authority were unable to find out who the hoarders were and take hold of the grain and other essentials they hoarded? The answer to this question lies in the large amount of corruption which has overtaken all ranks of those who are endowed with legitimate authority. They do not care for the public good. They are in league with hoarders and blacktnarketeers because this enables them to grow rich. This is the case with not only the members of the civil services of all grades–from top to bottom–but also of ministers and the large number of politicians who constitute the ruling elite. In several states where food riots took place and political parties like the CPI, CPM and even the Congress (O) and pressure groups like Shiva Sena of Bombay played an active role in the de-hoarding process the vigilance organisations of Government became subsequently active and newspapers have reported that they seized stocks surreptitiously kept by hoarders and made them available for distribution to consumers through fair price shops. This shows that it is not beyond the capacity of governments to deal with the phenomenon of rising prices and come to the rescue of consumers to some extent at least. It may not be easy to deal with the more fundamental issues like economic stagnation and unemployment but a similar difficulty does not exist in preventing the hoarding of stocks and making them available to consumers. Men in authority have miserably failed in discharging their responsibilities as public servants. This is not due so much to their being incompetent as to their being dishonest.

The Prime Minister has been telling us that corruption is not peculiar to our country and it is found throughout the world. She has also been telling us that it is an old phenomenon in our public life, the only difference being that more publicity is given to it now than in the past. All this may be true, but this does not afford consolation to the millions of people in the country who have to face untold suffering due to the rise in prices. She has to take drastic action against erring politicians however high-placed they may be and against public servants who misuse power to promote their own ends and care little for the interest of the public at large. Otherwise the danger is that the country will drift into anarchy and chaos and the rule of the jungle–the rule that might is right–will prevail.

There is an intimate connection between the growing strength of agitators and the increase in the number of unemployed. It is the unemployed that automatically swell the ranks of agitatoras. Not being able to earn their living by honest work for no fault of their own, they are compelled to join the ranks of agitators and get something paid in return. Let us not forget that among those who participate in processions, and in de-hoarding campaigns and in all other agitations, there are large numbers of paid professional agitators. They have no other means of livelihood and like a drowning man they take hold of any straw that comes in their way.

These agitations also reveal to us how demoralised the political parties in the country have become. They have not been able to build up their strength among the people either through their policies and programmes or through honest constructive work. They are weak in numbers and are in no position to come to power at the Centre or in any of the States. There are only very few exceptions to this like the DMK in Tamil Nadu and the CPI in Kerala. They have therefore become frustrated and are anxious to catch the public eye by taking to some agitation or other. They in Consequence create problems of law and order and make the process of government and administration unnecessarily difficult. They only strengthen the forces leading to chaos and anarchy.

We have thus the moral failure of those who are in possession of legitimate authority–the party in power and the administrators who serve under them–and the sense of frustration and irresponsibility which have overtaken the parties in opposition. The country has therefore to face not only an economic but also a moral crisis.

One aspect of this moral crisis is the resort to blackmail and sabotage by Government employees of all ranks to compel Government to concede their demands whether reasonable or unreasonable, whether they are in conformity with public interest or in conflict with it. We had three such incidents in the quarter–July to September. First there was the locomen’s strike in Railways which led to the paralysis of passenger and goods traffic for a number of days. Apart from the inconvenience which it caused to passengers and the blow which it struck against several industries which depended upon the supply of coal and other essentials for their smooth running, it interfered with the supply of food grains to drought affected areas and inflicted a loss of more than eighty crores of rupees on Railways. The main demand of the locomen was that their hours of daily work should be reduced from fourteen to eight. This was based on the recommendation of a committee appointed by Government sometime earlier. Government should have taken action on it but it preferred to keep quiet as it always does until the situation becomes impossible. Ultimately it yielded to the demand of the locomen not so much because it was convinced of the rationality behind the demand but because it had no force to carryon the fight with the locomen. It was more or less in the position of a belligerent country which is subject to bombing and other kinds of destruction by the enemy forces and which ultimately surrenders because it is unable to resist those forces.

There was also the strike of the interns and the doctors employed in the municipal hospitals of Bombay Corporation for three weeks. They wanted higher stipends and allowances. They did not care for the lot of the patients in the hospitals under suffering. They fought to the bitter end until the authorities agreed to give a favourable consideration to their demands. It speaks ill of the authorities that they did not create all these years a tribunal through which disputes of this character could be settled through negotiation.

More serious perhaps than these was the sabotage resorted to by power engineers in Delhi and U. P. These are officials running a most essential service and also drawing fairly high salaries. One of their demands was that the charges of corruption brought against the President of the Federation of Electric Engineers, who was an employee of the Punjab Government, should be withdrawn, a demand which no Government can concede. There were the courts of law to decide in the usual course whether the charges were true or false but the power engineers wanted to take the law into their own hands and compel the Government to yield to them by plunging the city of Delhi in darkness and by obstructing power supply to numerous industrial and other concerns. Another of their demands was that power engineers should be given a place of parity with the members of the Indian Administrative Service. This is an issue on which there is room for difference of opinion. It is an issue as to whether a department–even though it is technical in character–should be headed by a generalist like a member of I.A.S. or by a specialist. Academicians as well as men involved in practical affairs have discussed this issue and most persons are of the view that a generalist should be preferred to a specialist. Power engineers should not have resorted to a strike or sabotage, occupying as they do highly responsible positions to get such a controversial issue settled at the point of the sword as it were and by holding the whole community to ransom. We have to aim not only at right ends but also use the right means to achieve them. The use of sabotage and blackmail for achieving a controversial objective has no justification.

But this is least realised by Government employees. They happen to occupy key positions in the life of the country. Through strikes they can bring to a standstill all administration. They are disposed to take undue advantage of this strategic position which they hold unmindful of the loss they inflict on the community as a whole. How long is this to go on? It is one thing for workers in a factory producing non-essential goods to strike but those in charge of public administration and running essential services should think twice, thrice and even four times before they adopt a similar course. Our Government has become too soft in dealing with them. It must learn to be a little hard and devise a suitable machinery to settle issues like these and keep ready a band of trained people to take the place of those on strike.

Let us remember in this connection that in the post-independence period there has been a phenomenal growth in the number of Government employees and in the emoluments they receive. Successive pay commissions have recommended such increase in the matter of emoluments. There has, however, been no corresponding increase in the efficiency, in quickness of disposal of papers and files or in integrity. In some states like Kerala as much as 96 per cent of the revenues raised by taxing the common man is spent on the salaries of Government personnel and there is very little that is available for development. And yet the employees make all sorts of demands and want to enforce them by holding the whole community which bears the burden of expenditure on their salaries to ransom. There is none to sympathize with the tax-payer, with the consumer and with unorganised labour. It is the organised labour–and Government employees belong to this selection–that is in a position to exploit the country at large.

One other feature of the Indian scene which should cause concern to all the responsible sections of society is the growing involvement of students in political activities of an extremely destructive character. During the quarter under review they diverted their attention to the de-hoarding campaign and in some states displayed greater activity than even the political parties. They also broke into rioting and came into clash with the police in Bangalore, Mandya and several other localities of the Mysore State–all this because of the death of a student while in police custody in Hasan. They resorted to large-scale stone-throwing against buses, cars and other vehicles and to arson which has now become an integral part of student violence. Much of this happened even after the Government assured them that they would undertake a judicial enquiry into the death of the student at Hasan. Finally the authorities ordered the closure of the Bangalore University and its constituent colleges.

This is becoming a recurring phenomenon in many parts of the country. The cause for concern lies in the wider and long term implications of this phenomenon. The implication consists in what will happen to the students as individual human beings and to society of which they constitute an important section if they refuse as they are now doing to play the role which for ages they have been expected to play.

As an educational philosopher puts it, man is only physiologically human at birth. In everything else he is like any other animal. It is through education informally received during infancy from his parents, the other members in the family and his immediate neighbourhood that he becomes really human and cultivates the simple virtues of gentleness, kindliness, respect and reverence, the virtues which enable him to behave like a human being towards other human beings. This process is continued and systematised through formal education in schools and colleges when students pass through them. If as students young men and women refuse to get educated by neglecting their studies and engaging themselves in all sorts of non-academic pursuits, which at that stage in their lives are of no relevance to them, their progress towards humanization is arrested and the brute in man gets strengthened.

All societies for thousands of years have made arrangements for the education of the youth as this is necessary to maintain the continuity of the life of society–a life which is based on a set of inherited beliefs, conventions, forms of worship, and modes of behaviour in the economic, political and other fields of public life. Every generation has to be formally educated in all this. This is why in our country our ancestors recognised the stage of Brahmacharya–the stage of studenthood–as an essential stage in a man’s life and as an essential preliminary to the efficient discharge of his duties as a householder and citizen in the next stage of his life. No improvement in social life is possible unless its foundations are first preserved and the training which students get is intended to preserve these foundations. There may be many evils and wrongs in society and it may be quite necessary to remove them by radical methods. It is education, however, that enables men and women to know what these evils and wrongs are and what methods should be adopted to eradicate them.

The refusal of young men and women to play their role as students thus amounts to their deliberately undermining the foundations of society and ushering in a period of chaos and anarchy. These are the deeper implications of student involvement in political activities of an agitational character and their indulgence in violence. This is why it has become a cause of concern. Let us hope that the situation will improve and students concentrate their attention on things of significance to them and to the larger society to which they belong.
9th October, 1973