New Delhi, 18 May 2007

Presidential Poll

SAY NO TO A SECOND TERM

By Poonam I Kaushish

Should the ‘People’s President’ Kalam get a second term? A question that has turned into a political hot potato. Both the UPA and NDA are sharply divided. The BJP still favours him as a consensus candidate. But the Congress makes no bones that it wants a Congress nominee in place of Kalam, whom it considers a ‘persona non grata’, post the Office of Profit Bill controversy and the embarrassment it caused to Sonia Gandhi. While the Left continues to hold its Presidential cards close to its chest, RJD’s Lalu is ambivalent towards a Congress nominee. The BJP also hoots for Vice President Bhairon Singh Shekhawat in case of a contest. Both the Samajwadi Party and Janata Dals still bet on Kalam. However, all eyes are now on made-in-India Mayawati Memsahib, following her historic triumph in UP. Which card will she play---Brahmin or Thakur? To put a stronger punch into her transition from Bahujan Samaj to Sarvajan politics. Or will she, too, opt for Kalam? Anything and any combination is possible today in India’s bizarre politics dominated by brazen opportunism and reckless pursuit of power.

Constitutional experts and thinking people hope that India will get a President of whom the country can be truly proud. They also hope that the convention of one term for the President will continue and that there won’t be a second term for Kalam. No, they are not opposed to Kalam personally. Barring a few unfortunate occurrences, he has conducted himself admirably. But they are rightly opposed in principle to a second term for the President, as it could encourage the incumbent during his first term to join hands with the Government of the day for mutual aggrandizement and compromise India’s best long- term interest. Contrary to popular belief, a President is vastly empowered under the Constitution to prevent the Government of the day from playing havoc with the country. Alas, even persons who should know better continue to take a simplistic view of the President’s power. Many erroneously view him as no more than a rubber stamp, except when he has to choose from among rival claimants a person who, in his opinion, could provide a stable Government.

Confusion continues because of the failure of free India to do what its first President, Dr. Rajendra Prasad recommended way back in November 1960. He wanted legal experts to make a scientific study of the powers and functions of the President and spell them out so as to leave no scope for any abuse. Dr. Prasad conceded that the Indian Constitution was based largely on the British Constitution. But he also pointed out that there were certain obvious differences. “The British Constitution”, he said, “is a unitary Constitution in which Parliament is supreme…Our Constitution is a federal constitution in which the powers and functions of the Union Parliament and the State Legislatures are clearly defined…” Again, “the Head of the State is an elected President who holds office for a term and can be removed for misconduct in accordance with the procedure laid down in the Constitution.”

In fact, Dr. Prasad, who had earlier presided over the Constituent Assembly, took up the issue of the President’s powers with Nehru first in 1950 soon after moving into Rashtrapati Bhavan. Nehru referred these points to the then Attorney-General, M.C. Setalvad, and the latter’s opinion is of no less interest today. Setalvad held that the President was essentially titular like the British monarch and was bound by the advice of his Council of Ministers. Like the crown, the President could exercise “the right to be consulted, the right to warn and the right to encourage.” Setalvad was also of the opinion that the President could dismiss a ministry and order fresh elections. The power to hold elections on his own discretion was not in accordance with the letter of the law. However, it could be exercised as a reserve power if the President felt strongly that Parliament did not reflect the political balance in the country. (Nine State Assemblies were dissolved in 1977 by the Janata Government following the Lok Sabha poll earlier that year in exercise of this power).

Much has happened since the first President put forward his views. In 1974, the Supreme Court made it clear in the Shamsher Singh case that the President was bound to act in accordance with the advice of his Council of Ministers. Two years later, Mrs. Gandhi got the Constitution amended so as to end all nagging doubts on the issue---doubts which eventually led to the great Congress split of 1969.  The Constitution 42^nd Amendment provided: “There shall be a Council of Ministers with the Prime Minister at the head to aid and advise the President who shall, in exercise of his functions, act in accordance with such advice.” Subsequently, the Constitution 44^th Amendment has clarified that the President is not tied hand and foot and that he can “require the Council of Ministers to reconsider such advice either generally or otherwise.” But this power is not unlimited. The amendment, introduced by the Janata Government, provides that the “President shall act in accordance with the advice tendered after such re-consideration.”

Several other points of controversy have been resolved and healthy conventions built over the years in regard to the office of the President. Rajen Babu, as Dr. Prasad was popularly known, was of the view, for instance, that the President as the Supreme Commander of the Defence Forces could send for the Service Chiefs and ask for information about defence matters. Setalvad, however, opined that the President could not send for the Service Chiefs. Instead, he could send for the Defence Minister and ask him to make inquiries.  At one stage, Rajen Babu strongly complained to Nehru that he often read of the appointments of Ambassadors and Governors in the Press and was officially informed only afterwards. This had its effect and an order was passed by the Cabinet stipulating that all the papers relating to top-level appointments be submitted to him before orders were issued. But a lot more remains to be done now that various meanings are being read into the Constitution and the President is generally expected to function impartially, objectively and independently vis a vis the Government.

Most experts are inclined to agree with Rajen Babu that the President has certain reserve, discretionary powers which flow from the oath of his office which is as follows: “I will faithfully execute the office of President and will to the best of my ability preserve, protect and defend the Constitution and the law and that I will devote myself to the service and well-being of the people of India.” The President also enjoys certain powers on three other counts. First, the President, like the British crown, can “exercise the right to be consulted, the right to warn and the right to encourage.” Second, the President has under Article 86 of the Constitution the right to “address either House of Parliament or both Houses assembled together, and for that purpose require the attendance of members”. He has also the right to “send messages to either House of Parliament whether with respect to a Bill then pending in Parliament or otherwise.” The House to which any message is so sent shall consider it with “all convenient despatch”. Third, the President has the power under Article 143 to consult the Supreme Court on any question of law or fact that may have arisen or was likely to arise.

The President has one other power which, has seldom been exercised. This is the power to question and the right to information, which incidentally gives Parliament its unrivalled authority over the Executive and makes the daily question-hour sacrosanct. Nehru called on Rajen Babu once a week to keep him informed. The President is thus empowered to uphold the Constitution and so also established conventions by asking questions---or by delaying the signing of any proclamation or other papers till the authorities satisfy him fully.  The President could put pertinent questions to the Centre before signing any document and demand full satisfaction. There is no time limit for him.

Thus, the President is not required to be a rubber stamp by the Constitution. He could be wholly Constitutional and yet act impartially, objectively and independently.  Among other things, he could always exercise his judgment and ask for any decision to be reconsidered by the Government Constitutionally, he could even go to Parliament and also seek the opinion of the Supreme Court on any issue of basic importance. All in all, the President enjoys vast powers. Remember, he is required to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution to the best of his ability and not that of his Council of Ministers. He can serve the country faithfully only so long as he functions independently and impartially in the best national interest. Temptation of a second term could jeopardize his independence and the national interest. Clearly, it is time to say a loud no to a second term for the President---by convention or by law..---INFA

(Copyright, India News and Feature Alliance)

POLITICAL DIARY

New Delhi, 23 February 2008

Sports Goes For A Six!

  ALL ABOUT MILLION DOLLAR BABIES  

By Poonam I Kaushish

It was billed as the mother of all auctions. Where 77 ‘men in blue’ were paraded as prized bulls. And Corporate India’s Mukesh Ambani, Vijay Mallya and Ness Wadia jostled with Bollywood stars Shahrukh Khan and Preity Zinta to get a slice of the action and own the czars of cricket. Each cricketer went under the hammer ranging anywhere from Rs 20 lakhs to Rs 6 crores. An auction which has clean bowled the way we play cricket for ever. All in a matter of seconds. Paisa phek tamasha dekh!  

Welcome to the Great Indian Bazaar of Indian cricket. Of big bucks and million dollar boys. Who could’ve imagined that the auctioning of 77 players for the five Indian Premier League teams would result in mass hysteria. Never mind, that the true blue-blooded sportsmen are horrified by this brazen gambling and commercialization at its crassest best.

In addition, it has kicked off a political controversy with the Left Front, Janata Dal President and Union Cabinet Minister Sharad Yadav and Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray lambasting the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and the Indian Premier League (IPL) as "a gambling game of industrialists and a shameless, obscene demonstration of money-power."

Think. The eight franchisees of the IPL forked out a combined Rs 7000-plus crore first to buy the team franchises. Then, they spent a whopping Rs.160 crore on purchasing players at the auction. Before this, the telecast rights were sold for a huge Rs.3,672 crore for 10 years and the title sponsorship for another Rs 200 crore for a five-year period.

Raising a moot point: when money becomes the driving force of the sixes, bumper, silly mid-off, first slip, LBW, googly et al what happens to the “desh ki izzat?”  Will Team India give its heart and soul to play for the country? Will being selected on it continue to be treated as the ultimate honour in the life of a cricketer? Or, will club identities come to replace national loyalties? After all, whoever pays the bucks gets the loyalty.

Has cricket in India entered the age of sponsored gambling where its stake-holders are abdicating their responsibility and letting the 'free-market' forces take control of the sport? Will it only create a super-elite category of overpaid, arrogant superstars at the cost of domestic cricket? Will the new cricket corporate czars have any emotional attachment to the sport? Importantly, will substance become the first casualty of the hoopla and hype of the auctioning? Will it widen the gap between cricket and other sports? 

True, the BCCI and IPL promoters dismiss these fears as much ado about nothing. Why is everyone raving and ranting about the cricketers earnings? What about other sports like Golf, tennis and car racing. The Jeeva Singh’s, Sania Mirza and Kartikhen, they assert. Besides, money raised would be spent to improve the standard of sports in India and also to promote other sports, specially at the grassroot-level.

How one wonders will paying Messers Dhoni, Tendulkar, Dravid and Ganguly, who already earn crores for playing a year's cricket for India and more from sponsorships, raise the standard of the sport? Rather, wouldn’t it widen the gap between the haves and have-nots in cricket and other sports?

Besides, the American experience, on which the IPL is based, clearly shows that players more often than not prefer their club over country thanks to the money being bank-rolled by it. In addition, club owners too become possessive as they want to protect their investments at any cost. And, more often than not refuse to release the players for matches played for the country. Besides, the recall value of club teams is more. People identify with the Chicago Bulls rather than the US Olympic basketball team or the New York Yankees instead of the US baseball team. 

Sadly, the auction has once again underscored the ugly reality that cricket has ceased to be a sport. It has become a mammoth corporate conglomerate which lacks transparency and is all about wielding power and money. Worse, it has become another pocket borough of our netagan. Wherein crores are spent in deals over-the-table and under-the-table in keenly fought elections for the control over the BCCI. Imagine, its kitty is virtually the same as the budget allocation of a Union Ministry.

Not just cricket, Indian sports as a whole is controlled by politicians and vested interests. The justification trotted out is that netagan are ‘experts’ in raising funds, even for khel-kood!  If the truth be told, sports today has per se degenerated from purely a sporting activity, physical prowess and competitiveness to downright object of a nexus between politics and bodies controlling it.   

The entry of paid sponsors for games and sportsmen has added an ugly dimension to an already murky arena. The decline of standards in sports is in direct proportion to the increase in the players’ affluence. Plainly, a sport gets corrupted when money is involved. From harmless betting in schools and colleges, it today has an international pattern. The racket is like a business between players, managers and bookies. They initiate betting, running into crores of rupees and funneled abroad via the hawala channel. The high-stake punting on winning teams has increased the greed and led to collecting inside information on a team’s strategy, forecasting the outcome to match fixing.

This all pervasive malady has grown to monstrous proportions and is now being referred to as a full-fledged industry and trade with a turn-over running into hundreds of crores.  With big money and bigger events, sports stars get big sponsors. With the IPL auctioning, celebrity endorsement of sports is simply mind-boggling.  

Some will argue that India is only following the ground rules set in the international arena. Where David Beckham and Michael Jordan, the world’s best football and basketball players respectively, made history with multi-million dollar tie-ups. Major sports goods manufacturers like Reebok, Adidas and Nike outbid each other to sponsor anything and everything from caps, footwear, T-shirts and balls etc they wore. And, the ‘sacred’ Wimbledon, the Australian, the US and French Open tennis tournaments and football, hockey and baseball competitions are simply following suit.

In this free-for-all vicious circle of avarice lies the forgotten Greek philosophy of sports: The health of a nation depends upon the proficiency of its youth in sports and games.  It led to the start of the Olympic movement in 1884, which won the support of even Hitler, who went out of his way to make it a grand spectacle in 1936 in Berlin.

It took wings in India under Nehru’s patronage who conceptualized the Asian Games Federation and organized the first “regional Olympiad” (Asian Games) in New Delhi in 1951.  His message was clear: “Play the game in the spirit of the game”.  The National Sports Federations too adhered to the Olympic ideals of amateur sports, namely, anyone found guilty of monetary benefit from sports was disqualified from participation in international competitions.  In fact, way back in the early 1960s, a woman athlete and a swimmer from Kolkata were disqualified for appearing in a Bata advertisement for sports shoes.

Tragically, all is forgotten.  Most of our sports bodies today are controlled and headed by ambitious people with powerful connections and clout: Varying from industrialists, businessmen, politicians to small-time managers.  They have little to contribute, but a lot to gain. Unlike the past, where sports patrons like the princely rulers of Patiala, Bikaner, Jaipur and Jodhpur graciously spent time and money for the healthy promotion of sports.

Sadly, the ball game started changing once black money started increasing with each passing year. So did the Government’s contribution, with budgets spiraling from Rs.13 crores during the Second Plan to about Rs.300 crores in the Ninth Plan. Sports, is now controlled by a Ministry at the Centre and in the States. But sports management continues to falter at all levels.

Finally, the million dollar question: How is the Government going to stall the domino effect? The day crores replaces honour as a player’s driving force Indian sport might as well say set-game-match. Let’s face it, rescuing sport from the Octopus-like grip of deceit and money will be a lot of sweat and tears. We need to stem the rot. Time to win and do a Chak De India! ---- INFA

(Copyright , India News & Feature Alliance)                  

POLITICAL DIARY

New Delhi, 16 February 2008 

Crisis Of Leadership

  WHERE ARE THE NATIONALISTS?

By Poonam I Kaushish

Remember the famous Roman saying: Nero fiddled while Rome burnt. So true of India today. See how our netagan contrive while the country burns. One look at Maharashtra says it all. The State stood mute testimony to three days of gory violence against all non-Maharashtrians unleashed by a small-time neta Raj Thackeray’s and his outfit Maharashtra Navnirman Sena. Even as the Centre and State Governments vacillated shamelessly for 13 days before going through the arrest-bail charade.

It would be easy to dismiss Raj Thackeray’s diatribe of wanting to rid Maharashtra of all North-Indians as a case of competitive populism at its crassest best. Or that it’s all about supporting regionalism. But, the tragedy of the episode is two-fold. First, how dare the MNS Chief cock a snook at the law and order and be allowed to get away with it.

Second, where was the Iqbal of the State? Its roab? Which allowed a piddly local outfit to run riot with India’s Commercial Capital and made its leader a national hero. When, in fact, Thackeray should have been told to shut up. That he wasn’t tells us the asli rajniti story. Of a ruling Congress leadership, which wanted to play both ends against the middle. One, counter ally NCP’s Sharad Pawar’s clout over Maharashtra and, two, use Thackeray’s new stature to eat into the Shiv Sena base and, eventually, benefit the Congress.

Exposing as never before, the acute crisis of leadership and paralysis of governance the country faces. Of pygmy leaders with small minds masquerading as giants. Bereft of any sense of nationalism who willy nilly abet competitive populism and vote-bank politics to batter down all semblance of leadership and chip away at established democratic institutions. Leadership today is all about political survival alone. Looking for genuine leaders is like looking for a needle in a haystack. Ask them about the nation. What nation, they ask?

Think. Isn’t it ridiculous that a country as vast as India and boasting of a billion-and-growing population is swinging like a yo-yo between hope and despair, thanks to the fracas between the ruling coalition partners, its adversaries and friends-turned-foes or vice versa. All bogged down by tantrums, one-upmanship and clash of egos. Especially in a scenario where polarization is now based on vote-bank politics and unbridled lust for power and money --- not on values, ethics or national agenda. Forget good, clean governance and national interest.

Look at the inexplicable configurations of the UPA. The enemies and friends are all rolled into one. The Congress and the Left parties, which account for 64 seats in the Lok Sabha, are arch rivals in three States: West Bengal, Kerala and Tripura. Both have been fighting each other tooth and nail in every election since Independence. Yet they came together at the Centre simply to keep the “communal BJP” out. The Congress and RJD are arch rivals in Bihar and Jharkhand and the NCP cannot see eye-to-eye with the Congress in Maharashtra. Ditto the case down South with the DMK & Co. Can Governments be formed and held together merely on the negative and ill-defined premise that my enemy’s enemy is a friend?

Today, the Left continues to have the Congress-led UPA profusely sweating over the Indo-US nuclear deal. Wherein Comrade Karat has once again threatened to pull the plug if the Government goes ahead with it. Making plain that the Grand Dame of Politics should be ready to go to the polls if it went ahead. This eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation between Manmohan Singh and the thorny Left has pushed the country into suspended animation.

The basic issue is not the Indo-US nuclear deal or whether the UPA Government stays or goes. Or, who is to blame and why. But it is the sad spectacle of today’s polity exposing their hollowness and hypocrisy of political commitment and subordinating national interest to personal egos and gain. If the Congress feels so strongly that the deal is the best thing for the country why doesn’t it call the CPM’s bluff and face the consequences? Sadly, as oft is the case, power breeds arrogance and absolute power breeds absolute arrogance.

Again, look at the Party’s relationship with the UP Chief Minister and BSP supremo Mayawati which swings like a pendulum. First, the Congress High Command read Sonia, tried very hard to have a pact with her prior to the State Assembly polls, failing which it decides to humour Mayawati and let her get away with outrageous anti-Congress diatribe. Now suddenly Sonia has woken up to the BSP’s electoral threat and has decided to deride her. But, when the Dalit icon dares the Congress to take action against her in the Taj corridor scam, the Party backs off.

So unlike the Congress leadership during Indira Gandhi’s time who epitomized the stuff leaders are made off, including the capacity to be a butcher when the need arose. Hailed as Durga after India’s victory in the 1971 war with Pakistan she was the only man in her Government. None dared oppose her and if someone did he would be cut to size in no time. Remember, like true leaders she gambled her political career by taking on the powerful Party Syndicate of senior leaders.

But more than that she was a true democrat and nationalist. True, she imposed Emergency in 1975 after the Allahabad High Court set aside her election, but she was uncomfortable with it. Recall, she not only lifted the Emergency but called for elections in 1977. After her defeat, she gracefully demitted office.

Sadly, her son Rajiv, who took over the reins, converted the Congress into an organization of ‘yes men’ who were loyal only to him. Pure sycophancy. Thus friends and rudderless leaders were handpicked by Rajiv to form his coterie and propelled on to the centre-stage. His wife Sonia carried the family banner forward and has perfected sycophancy and loyalty into Brand Congress. The most unpleasant aspect of all this is the withering of internal democracy.

The BJP too is on the decline. Vajpayee has been replaced by Advani, who may talk tough but lacks the charisma and oratory skills to weave a magic spell. Surrounded by ‘hot-house’ second rung leaders who trot around with an all-important air but are incapable of wining even a single municipal election. The Party President Rajnath Singh and his “coterie” of junior and inexperienced ‘yes men’ play the cat and mouse game with Advani.  Knives are even out for Modi who just resurrected the Party. 

Gone are the days of Brand BJP---collective leadership as opposed to individual control. Its reputation of being a highly disciplined cadre-based faction-free party is in tatters. Its killer instinct, that its leaders so assiduously described, has been killed by the vicissitudes of power.

What about the regional parties? With a mohalla mentality they lack a national perspective. Worse, with the national parties losing their clout with the electorate there is a very high premium on these parties which get traded and horse-traded many times over. The trading is made easier by the total collapse of the moral fabric of all parties in their naked lust for the gaddi. Unfortunately, the national parties have been caught in a web of their own making. By pandering and giving in to the blackmail of these regional vote banks. They have created a Frankenstein over which they have no control.

What next? India today once again is facing a Hobson’s choice. Gripped in the vicious tentacles of a petty power-at-all-cost polity the time has come to throw out the scoundrels and replace them with true nationalists who feel, think and breathe India.

A people, no doubt, get the leaders they deserve. But, at the end of the day, are we going to mortgage our conscience to “fair-weather fliers” and “hot-house leaders”? Are we going to allow leaders without nationalism to recklessly play havoc with India’s future?  The moot point: How long are we going to continue to look for giants among the pygmies and allow the latter to ride-roughshod over us? Time for people to look for real leaders. ---- INFA

(Copyright India News and Feature Alliance)      

POLITICAL DIARY

New Delhi, 9 February 2008 

Regionalism Raises Ugly Head 

SAY GOODBYE TO AMCHEE MUMBAI 

By Poonam I Kaushish 

India pre-1947 resounded to the battle cry of “throw out the British”. Sprinkled with a heavy dose of nationalism, all pledged to make the country more secular and united than ever before The Mera Bharat Mahan of 2008 is all about chucking the “outsider aam aadmi” from respective States and imposing an “insider curfew” on them. Peppered with loads of patriotic regional chaap, all promising to make their respective States more local and faithful than ever.  

By unleashing the ‘Maharashtra for Maharashtrians’ and ‘throw out the North Indians’ campaign, Raj Thackeray’s non-descript Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) let loose the spectre of regionalism in Mumbai and the rest of the State. Violence became the rhetoric for three gory days as cars and taxis of non-Maharashtrians were burnt, street food-stalls of poor UP bhaiyas and the Biharis were looted, shops owned by north Indians were forced to close down et al.  

Amidst this mayhem, trust our netagan to use this opportunity to play the ‘insider-outsider’ game to their electoral advantage. Some played safe. The country’s Home Minister Shivraj Patil, a Maharashtrian made the staid noises of ‘the State Government has been asked to maintain law and order’ and the Chief Minister tepidly asserted ‘we are studying the law to see if Thackeray can be arrested.’  

Others took potshots at each other. The RJD Chief Laloo dismissed the MNS chief as a “political novice,” Samajwadi’s Mulayam dubbed him “frustrated” and uncle and Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray dumped his nephew as “a chicken suffering from bird-flu of depression.” What to say of Ram Vilas Paswan’s Lok Janshakti which torched a Maharashtrian’s house in Ranchi. All thus exploiting the issue for their own selfish gains and maximize their political return, read votes. No matter that they only stoked the flames of hatred and pitted the aam Bharatvasi against each other – and revived the time old controversy of “sons of the soil” demand once again. 

Recall, regionalism first raised its ugly head in Tamil Nadu in the early 60s, where the alienation of the people from the Centre led to the birth of the DMK, which later split into the AIADMK and other groups. It then moved to Maharashtra where a little-known cartoonist Bal Thackeray became the self-styled champion of everything Marathi. He nurtured the Shiv Sena on the infamous `Marathi manus' standard, by which practically everyone in Mumbai was an `outsider' except the 28 per cent Maharashtrians. The first victims were the skilled labourers from the southern States who were branded as "lungi-wallas” and their businesses ruthlessly attacked. After them came the Gujarati entrepreneurs and now it’s the North Indian, UP bhaiya or Bihari migrant. 

Taking a leaf from Maharashtra saga, Assam burnt over the foreigners issue in the 70’s, when the All Assam Students Union (AASU) started a movement to oust all “illegal migrants from Bangladesh” from the State. This caught the imagination of the people and the ruling Congress government was voted out and the Asom Gana Parishad voted in. In nearby Nagaland too, the students want all non-Nagas out. Regionalism had arrived.  

In November 2003, India resounded to parochialism again, when Assamese stopped 20,000 Biharis from taking a recruitment test in Guwahati. The Biharis retaliated by stopping trains from the North East, dragged out the people, killed some and beat the rest. The Assamese hit back with a vengeance--- killing over 52 Biharis. The dreaded militant outfits ULFA and the All Bodo Students Union joined in the mayhem. Their slogan: “All Hindi speaking people must leave Assam”. “Catch the Assamese and kill them all,” countered the Biharis.  

Why blame the locals alone? Our polity too revels in playing the regional card. In the 1999 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP dubbed the Congress Lucknow candidate Karan Singh, former Sadr-i-Riyasat of J&K, an ‘outsider’ compared to ‘insider’ Vajpayee. Never mind that Lucknow is miles away from Gwalior, Vajpayee’s birthplace. Interestingly, the same Saffron Sangh again portrayed ‘Vajpayee the local’ in Himachal, by underscoring his love for Manali and the numerous visits made. Now shouldn’t that make him an outsider in Lucknow? Then we had the absurd case in Nainital, where the BJP candidate described his BSP rival as an outsider because he did not have a telephone in his name. “Is a telephone connection going to decide our local status?” the BSP contestant argued.  

So, regionalism mushroomed around the countryside with both people and parties making it their mantra. Former Prime Minister and kisan leader Charan Singh floated the farmer-oriented Janata Party and Devi Lal his Lok Dal in Haryana. Badal his Akali Dal in Punjab, N.T. Rama Rao his Telugu Desam in Andhra, Bengal’s Mamata Banerjee set up her Trinamool Congress and Biju Patnaik’s son, Naveen floated the Biju Janata Dal in Orissa. All with a common USP: “We are the locals who shall rule, Delhi is dur --- the outsider.”   

Additionally, Mandalisation gave a further impetus to regionalism and changed the politics of India. With the debut of the “Made in India” leaders like Mayawati, Mulayam, Ram Vilas Paswan, Laloo, etc. Their electorate no longer was willing to know-tow to the centrist parties and those foisted upon them. In their perception, who better than their own biradari, to understand, sympathise and articulate their voice at New Delhi. Confusion was confounded by the failure of the voter to draw a distinction between the responsibilities and powers of an MP and that of an MLA.  

Moreover, this gave a further fillip to the “sons of soil” issue. The local youth demanded “reservation” of jobs in their area, especially in regions where new industrial ventures like public sector plants or other projects coming up. In fact agitations have taken place for “their” share of jobs. However, Constitutionally, Article 16 is very clear on the issue. It provides: “There shall be equal opportunity for all citizens in matters relating to employment or appointment to any office under the State.” This has its genesis in the concept that there being only one citizenship for the entire country, it should carry with it the unfettered right and privilege to every corner of the nation.   

Sadly, over the years opinions have deferred between political leaders, right from the Constituent Assembly debate. Some leaders felt that the States should have the unfettered right to give employment to locals residing in the State. Not a few quibbled about the years of residence – should it be 10 or 50 years.  Others disagreed, as they felt that every citizen must be made to feel that he was a citizen of the country as a whole and not of a particular State.  

Dr. Ambedkar felt that if the States were granted the right to give jobs it would “subtract from the value of a common citizenship of India.” But he added a rider: “You cannot allow people who are flying from one province to another, from one State to another as mere birds of passage without any roots, without any connection with that and apply for posts and so to say take the plums and work away. Let us give the power to Parliament not the States to decide on the residence status for purpose of employment.” 

From then to now the controversy continues. There is no gainsaying that all citizens should have equal job opportunities across the country. The problem has arisen after locals have demanded their pound of flesh and to some extent rightly too. Arguably, why should people from outside a particular State apply for menial jobs? If outsiders corner jobs of sweepers or helpers as in the case of the Railways, where should the locals go for their bread and butter? Join the militants and take up guns? Does that promote national integration? In State after State where militancy rages, statistics have proved that it is the unemployed local youth who have taken to the gun as jobs have been cornered by outsiders. Both the North East States and Kashmir bear this out. 

The tragedy of it all is that our polity willy-nilly chipped away, with deadly precision, at the reality of a united and integrated India where regional aspirations play second fiddle to national unity. And, where every Indian has the right to live in any part of the country he chooses and get equal opportunities to earn a decent livelihood. In sum, an India that is equitable and offers a level-playing field for all classes, castes and communities.  

(Copyright India News & Feature Alliance)