కొత్త బంగారు లోకం (kotta bangaru lokam)

Kotta Bangaru Lokam, Maaku Kavali Sontam!

(This new golden age, shall be our very own!)

A TV show on the new snazzy Hyderabad International Airport used this headline. There was palpable excitement in the media and the general population for the new 'world-class' airport in the city. One can sense the optimism that this is only the beginning of things to come.

I had to go to Chennai yesterday, and I have seen the airport. So here's a first hand report!

The drive to the airport was smooth. It took less than an hour to reach there in the early hours of the day. On some stretches of the road, you just glide along the road. It's that smooth. Things could definitely be better though, some stretches seem unsafe.

The airport itself was huge. The other airport gave no personal space. This one has separate gates for every flight. There was enough place to sit. There were book-stores, coffee places, breakfast places and the service was polite and costly.

I thought to myself -- Is this an Indian airport? It feels like a western one!

And that was a moment of epiphany for me. The airport did not feel Indian!

For all its glass facades, escalators, lifts, it lacked the Indian essence. The old airport thrust in your face the very colourful "Incredible India!" campaign. Yeah, this airport had the mandatory picture of a caparisoned elephant, but it was the only one I saw. I missed the riot of Indian culture in the airport.

Some stalls had caucasian women serving customers.

TV channels showed HBO movies. I missed tollywood and bollywood.

I had made up my mind, that this airport was not Indian.

When I returned from Chennai, I tried to reinforce this idea through everything I saw. On the whole, it did not feel Indian.

Then, as I came out of the airport towards parking, I noticed something - the very Indian red stains of pan colouring one of the majestic pillars.

The old airport is dead. Long live the old airport!

uttishTa Bharata

Over the last two days, I finished watching about twenty episodes of 'Chanakya'. I started watching the series to take my mind off the imminent results, which btw, were supposed to be out yesterday. But, it turns out UPSC was just being a tease.

The main theme of the series so far, has been 'uttishTa Bharata', which I think translates to 'wake up India'. This came as a surprise to me. To me Chanakya is synonymous with Arthashastra. But, Arthashastra played only a minor role so far in the series.

With Alexander's impending invasion of India, Chanakya exhorts the 'janapadas' to rise above their regional chauvinism and strive to serve 'ma Bharati'. He cautions his students to the danger of dividing residents of India on the basis of 'janapadas' (like Magadha, Lichchavi, Malav, Kekayi, Gandhara etc.) He advocates bridging people across the country through 'sanskriti' - which is above the local language and customs. He believed that only a unified India could rise to the challenge posed the Greek invaders.

In effect, what he has exhorted is the 'federal sentiment' - a prerequisite for states to come together to form a nation. It's the sentiment that binds America into a nation, and the lack of which leaves the EU only as a confederatoin.

However, none of the textbooks I used have cited Chanakya as one of the foremost proponents of the federal sentiment in India. Has the director used his creative license to ascribe more to Chanakya than there was?

Social audits and social sciences

Summary:
1. Social audit through NGOs is promising to be an effective tool for eliminating grass-root corruption in India.
2. India under-funds its social sciences programs in universities. Expanding Govt. support for the universities could have the beneficial effect of furthering social audits and thereby improving our governance.

Post
Here is an account of India's inefficient civil services. It makes for an interesting read. On the whole it presents a picture we know well - political interference and corruption plague India's administration.

Though the article calls it "a band-aid on a corpse", technology can play an important role in eliminating corruption and providing quality services to citizens. E-seva centres are but one example of how citizens can benefit from technology. Our police forces require immediate upgradation in terms of its technology usage, given the danger to internal security from various sources.

Given this, the lack of adequate budgetary provisions for technology upgradation in administration is saddening.

The article also points out how social audits help make the administration accountable to the citizens. Social audits are audits of government documents by social organizations. In the implementation of welfare programmes like National Rural Employement Guarantee Scheme, social audits ensure that the beneficiary list rolls are not fudged, that the payments to beneficiaries are adhering to statutory norms etc. NREGS, according to some social audits, has been effective in delivering its goods to the intended target beneficiaries. And, this scheme has been successful because of social audits.

Hence, there is a need to strengthen the system of social audits of welfare programmes in India. Clearly, citizens at the grass-roots lack adequate awareness about their rights and Government obligations to conduct social audits. Can we rely on the handful of NGOs to conduct social audits, popularize discrepancies and ensure redressal where necessary? Clearly, no.

Social audits, to be meaningful, should be conducted by the civil society independent of the Govt. and impartial to political parties. Hence Govt. funding NGOs to incentivise conducting social audits is a warped idea, and may not succeed.

However, if the Govt. chooses to fund universities and research programmes with a social audit component, it could have multiple benefits. Our universities are under-funded, research opportunities are scarce, especially in social sciences like Public Administration, Sociology, Anthropology etc. Enhanced Govt. funding to universities will first give a fillip to studies in these fields, and bring out research publications addressing issues that are uniquely Indian. Peer-reviewed publications and prestige of universities would deter any major manipulation of data from social audits.

Recently, the Govt. announced that it would set up multiple Central Universities in the country to address the lack of higher education infrastructure in the country. It is a laudable move, but much more needs to be done, and we need to fund universities to unleash the 'academic spirit' so dormant in our country.

Hence, I make a case for clubbing social audits and social science funding in India.

Sphoorti

I finally went to see Sphoorti - Srivyal's initiative for destitute kids.

One of the first things I said was, "man, this looks so real!" He must've been confused at that. The thing was, I hadn't seen the website or pictured what I was going to see. As I walked towards the place, through the sub-urban lanes, led by two scrawny kids, the modest surroundings began to sink in. There was random vegetation, cattle waste and no proper drainage.

The 'ashram' as the kids called it, is just a house-like place. The verandah was teeming with close to forty kids. All of them were poring into their books, with some kids helping their friends.

As I tried to understand the working of the place, the enormity of the job began to dawn. It's forty-plus number of kids we are talking about. Parents talk about one or two kids as responsibility. Health, nutrition, schooling for forty-plus kids is a huge task. The kids are all pretty young between five and eight years. Srivyal is thinking of renting a second place too to segregate boys from girls. "Kids will be in their pubescent age soon," he said.

Srivyal's sphoorti amazed me. He is thinking of expanding and taking in more kids. I promised to spread the word. My gang in the U.S. of A. is itching to give-back anyway!

Maintenance of parents

Indian Parliament recently passed a law providing for three months' imprisonment for those who abandon their parents. Everyone knows how well this will work in reality. Can a Govt. hope to coerce its people into caring for elders? How do Parliamentarians find time to make such legislations at all?

Some twelve hundred years ago, Adi Shankaracharya had also talked about the aged in "Bhaja Govindam."

Yaavadvittopaarjana saktah
Taavannijaparivaaro Raktah
Paschaajeevati Jarjjaradehe
Vaartaam Kopi Na Prichchati Gehe

which translates to "As long as one is fit and able to earn and support one's family, all the kith and kin and dependents attached are affectionate to him, no sooner one becomes old and infirm and one’s earnings cease, no one cares to enquire of his well-being even in one's own home."

Adi Shankaracharya advises that one should not misunderstand and live in illusion that popularity, consideration, affection and even reverence of other human beings is permanent or the very goal of life.


Incidentally, Jamuna Rani, a yesteryear play-back singer was saying today that very few among her generation people in movie business saved something for their old age. A single woman all her life, eloquently put forward a case for saving for one's own old age.

Let My Country Awake

I had read this poem by Rabindranath Tagore a few years back, and it always comes back in the context of India and rationality.

Where the mind is without fear
and the head held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been broken up
into fragments by narrow domestic walls;
Where words come out from the depth of truth;
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;
Where the clear stream of reason
has not lost its way
into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;
Where the mind is led forward
by Thee into ever-widening thought and action;
Into that heaven of freedom,
my Father, let my country awake!

However, to look at Indian habits from rationality perspective alone would be losing a holistic picture of health and happiness.

City of Djinns

Lately I have been reading blogs big on rationality. Those blogs with Indian authors lose no chance in pointing out the irrational practices so prevalent in India. It makes me cringe, to say the least, when I read them.

In "City of Djinns," by William Darlymple, there is an interesting passage related to this. Darlymple is intrigued with the belief of many Muslim, Hindu and Sikh Indians in Sufi charms. Some of the Sufi mystics to him are blatant fakes, making money on people's gullibility.

He asks his good friend, the wise Dr. Jaffrey, about this. He agrees that many are fakes and replies, "But Wiliam, my friend, you must remember one thing. Fake Sufis are like any other kind of counterfeit. Forgeries exist only because the real gold is so incredibly valuable.."