[Here is a short representative list. Green laws and community rights including rights of tribals guaranteed under the Forest Rights Act repeatedly trampled upon to grant go-ahead to mega eco-destructive industrial projects, almost as a matter of routine. Tarring dissenting NGOs as "anti-national" and launching an open war to strangulate them, mainly, by choking off legitimate fund flow on the basis of trumped up charges. State inactions, if not worse, in case of numerous attacks on churches, Ghar Wapsi, Love Jihad, vitriolic hate speeches by leaders, ministers and legislators from the saffron camp. Land acquisition bills / ordinances to snatch away peasants' lands to benefit corporates. Moves to whittle down labour laws to favour capital. Move to legalise child labour in specific sectors. Packing academic bodies with RSS appointees. Non-appointment of the CIC, CVC, Lokpal etc. MGNREGA and RTE being starved of funds. Health and education and other social welfare budgets slashed. Military budget hiked. Concentrating powers in the PMO.]
I/IV. http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/modi-and-his-chakravyuh/article7224435.ece Updated: May 20, 2015 20:17 IST Modi and his Chakravyuh PETER RONALD DESOUZA Illustration: Satwik Gade Illustration: Satwik Gade Peter Ronald deSouza Peter Ronald deSouza The Chakravyuh in the Mahabharata was a seven-ringed, impenetrable battle formation. In his first year, the Prime Minister has successfully broken through two circles. But there are five more to go. Abhimanyu was in Shubhadra's womb when he heard Lord Krishna reveal the secret of how to enter the Chakravyuha. But he did not learn how to exit it, and that is the reason why he was finally killed in fierce battle in the heart of the enemy's army. Not so Gandhiji, who triumphed over the Chakravyuh effortlessly. Not only was he able to enter and exit it with ease, he did so at a time and place of his choosing, dissolving it with ahimsa and creating independent India. Jawaharlal Nehru largely designed the Chakravyuh of the modern Indian state. Even though not as easily as Gandhiji, he did succeed in entering and exiting it -- democratic and secular India was the consequence. Indira Gandhi got trapped in the Chakravyuh. Like Abhimanyu, she got to the sixth circle, but was felled by the Emergency and, becoming increasingly authoritarian and paranoid, found the circles closing around her and she succumbed to the arrows from enemies both imagined and real. We could continue preparing a report card for all the Prime Ministers and their Chakravyuhas but the coming anniversary of Modi's first year in office is an opportunity to speculate on his chances of successfully negotiating the Chakravyuha of government. Abhimanyu heard Krishna saying that the trick was to attack and destroy the soldiers to the left and to the right, so that irrespective of which way the circle turned, one would be able to enter it. The Prime Minister has attacked the politics on the Left but is not quite decisive in his support for the economic policies of the Right. While the Left is rebelling against his social and cultural policies, the Right is beginning to grumble that nothing has changed on the economic front. 'Nothing is changed on the ground' said Mr. Deepak Parekh. In the Mahabharata, the Chakravyuh was a seven-spiralled, impenetrable battle formation. Let us see what the seven circles of Indian polity are. The seven circles At the outermost seventh circle is foreign policy. This is the country's interface with the world -- the neighbourhood, the region, and the global political and economic order. Here, Mr. Modi has been the most effective, gaining the attention of different international power groups and having them compete for India's friendship. From getting the UN to declare International Yoga Day on June 21 to having the US President as Chief Guest for Republic Day to establishing a BRICS development bank to land swaps with Bangladesh, Modi has passed the first circle by neutralising the Left and ignoring the Right. There is a distinct Nehruvian touch to his foreign policy. " Mr. Modi has now reached the third circle of governance. Here, the struggle has just begun, with some people-friendly initiatives, and some questionable decisions. " The second circle too Mr. Modi has been able to penetrate. This is building a political coalition for governance. By winning elections with a single party majority and ending the era of compromise and coalition politics and then winning several State elections, Mr. Modi has inaugurated a new phase of decisive national politics. Some political resistance remains, from within his party and without, but these won't stop him from going through this circle. His penchant of concentrating power in the PMO when collegial governance is required may present difficulties during the return journey, since the feedback mechanism of politics that is required to manage such a diverse polity will be considerably enfeebled, but there is little doubt that Mr. Modi has built a political coalition to give domestic politics a decisive turn. At this point of time he is limited only by his will and his imagination. Mr. Modi has now reached the third circle -- the instruments of governance. Here, the struggle has just begun. There are some good policies, such as the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (bank accounts), the Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana (life insurance), the Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana (accident insurance), and the Atal Pension Yojana (pension for the unorganised sector), but these have to be seen in tandem with plans to reverse the social impact assessment and consent clause of the Land Acquisition Bill, the hasty environmental clearances, and the near-zero interaction with the media in India. Thus, some very good initiatives that are people friendly, with some questionable decisions that are people hostile. It is unclear whether his moves to defeat the warriors on the Left will be as successful as in earlier circles. Equally, the warriors on the Right are voting with their feet. Corporate India is beginning to speak about a 'directionless' economic policy steeped in hyperbole. Mr. Modi's magic is losing its sheen. It is at the fourth circle -- the respect for democratic and parliamentary institutions -- that Modi's achievements begin to look thin. Ordinances are frequently resorted to. In his fortnightly letter to Chief Ministers, Nehru wrote on 16 August 1948, "Nevertheless, (ordinances are) a dangerous path to tread and governments get used to very special measures which they cannot do without later. For us, with our past record in regard to civil liberty, this is a particularly distasteful course." The ordinance has become Mr. Modi's instrument of choice not just in the very visible land acquisition issue but also with respect to his desire "to give a government job to just one superannuated officer". This emasculation of institutions can be seen in his returning the Supreme Court collegium's recommendations for elevation to the Bench of an eminent senior advocate; in the government's defence of Clause 66A of the IT Act, which was mercifully struck down by the courts; or in keeping important offices such as that of the Chief Information Commissioner vacant. In the fourth circle, Mr. Modi is making little headway. It is too early to determine whether he has the capability to strengthen institutions or undermine them -- with early evidence pointing to the latter tendency -- but we need another year to find out. The real test It is in the fifth circle that Mr. Modi begins to lose his capability to determine outcomes. This is the circle that concerns the public discourse of a plural society; the discourse required to build a modern democratic state. Entering it requires informed intervention, speech and actions that support and consolidate the critical temper required by the humanist aspirations of a modern India. By his silence, Mr. Modi has allowed the regressive elements among his supporters to determine the terms of public discourse. When the Chairman of the Indian Council of Historical Research says that 'What we teach today in schools and colleges lacks both moral and material content, which could mould character and conduct... Our history is deprived of Bharateeyata (Indianness)'; or when the RSS chief says that Mother Teresa's services were governed by conversion motives, Mr. Modi has remained silent, allowing public discourse to be dictated by a rabble-rousing minority. If Mr. Modi gets through the five circles described above, the real test will begin in the sixth (political philosophy) and seventh (personal ethics) circles. One cannot govern a pluralist country like India with a philosophy crafted in a shakha. At its core must be a commitment to secularism and social justice. Perhaps a different secularism than the partisan one practised by the Congress, but secularism nonetheless. A majoritarian mindset, which Mr. Modi seems comfortable with, is unfair to both the majority and the minority in the population. What are Mr. Modi's core beliefs? What is his understanding of the relationship between communities? What steps does he plan for the empowerment of women? And Adivasis? How does he see dignity achieved in a society fissured by caste? What is his view on the rule of law even if it penalises his closest advisors? These are not idle questions. They constitute the sixth circle where Indira Gandhi fell. Then, Mr. Modi will still have to face the seventh circle of personal ethics before finally emerging triumphant. (Peter Ronald deSouza is Professor, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies. The views are personal.) II/IV. http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/no-acche-din-for-higher-education/article7224444.ece MODI@365° No acche din for higher education ZOYA HASAN Besides cuts in state funding which is a critical area of concern, the BJP-led government's overall approach to education is destructive of autonomy, creativity and diversity. Not a single Indian institution of higher learning figures in the list of top 200 universities prepared by The Times Higher Education Supplement. These dismal rankings are quite often taken as a measure of the crisis of higher education in India, notwithstanding the obvious limitations of the ranking exercise. But all is not well with Indian universities. So far, the Narendra Modi government has done very little to address the crisis in higher education. The government started on a controversial note. Prime Minister Modi's selection to head the Ministry of Human Resources and Development (HRD) raised questions about the importance of education under this dispensation as it showed scant regard for education in spite of the fact that the Sangh Parivar takes education very seriously. Lower budgetary allocation The government's first Budget has not delivered achhe din for higher education in the country. The Union Budget for 2015-16 has reduced funds for higher education to the tune of Rs.3,900 crore in its revised budget estimates for the financial year 2014-15. The government has revised the figure to Rs.13,000 crore, as against Rs.16,900 crore for the plan allocation. The overall education budget of the Modi government is down from Rs.82,771 crore to Rs.69,074 crore. The government has also revised allocation for the Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan (RUSA) -- which is a Centrally Sponsored Scheme (CSS), launched in 2013 that aims at providing strategic funding to eligible state higher educational institutions -- to Rs.397 crore as against Rs.2,200 crore in the original Budget. Despite the trend of passing on the responsibility of education to the private sector, there is a strong case to expand state funding of education. The role of publicly funded education in the democratisation of access to higher education in India is indisputable. Treating the higher education system as a public good, the Indian state has been successful in providing access to institutions of higher learning to many groups which were hitherto not able to access it. This is only possible if there is adequate state funding and public regulation for the entire system of education from school to university. Far from expanding publicly funded universities with an increase in budgetary allocation of education, state funding is being steadily withdrawn from education in general and higher education in particular so that private capital, both Indian and foreign, can be encouraged. The privatisation of higher education is now an irreversible trend in India, where a majority of the institutions have been established by the private sector. In the midst of this trend, it is the arts and humanities that are being pushed aside. Move towards centralisation Besides cuts in state funding which is a critical area of concern, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government's overall approach to education is destructive of autonomy, creativity and diversity. The manner in which the state is intervening in higher education is causing concern among both teachers and students. There are alarming proposals to change the very nature of higher education. The most disturbing is the proposal to revive the Central Universities Act of 2009 which will require the Central universities to follow a common admission procedure and common syllabus. Even though the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) regime and the current National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government have been remarkably similar in their desire to introduce changes in the higher education system, most of the UPA's major proposals got drowned in the Parliament logjam which continued till the last session of the 15th Lok Sabha. Also, there was some debate and opposition within the UPA government which could be another reason why the government couldn't implement its agenda. This government is pursuing the reform agenda much more aggressively leaving little scope for dissent and disagreement. The Central University (CU) Act seeks to replace the existing Central universities with one single Act which would require all universities to follow a "common" admission and "common" syllabus along with "transferable" faculty. India's higher education system, serving a large and heterogeneous population, should ideally support a diverse and decentralised system. However, the CU Act will do the opposite; it aims at centralisation and homogenisation, ignoring the specificities and uniqueness of each university. Each University's Act has a specific context and mandate, and each has developed its own pattern of knowledge production and reproduction. For example, the Delhi University Act (1922) was in response to the need to provide for the educational needs of an emerging India and incorporates a wide college network. The founding ideas of the Jawaharlal Nehru University, on the other hand are quite different from other institutions. The impulse for the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) Act (1966) was to institutionalise the values and vision of "national integration, scientific temper, and humanism". These Acts have shaped their curriculum, academic ethos, teaching and research. Nullifying these Acts would be a blow against diversity and pluralism as well as to minimum autonomy without which a university cannot function and flourish. It will narrow the space for innovation and create a teaching culture where creativity and critical thinking will be curbed. No academic logic The Ministry of HRD's idea of "reform" is an egregious attempt to standardise higher education and research by introducing a common framework for Central universities based on the myth that uniformity will equalise quality and skills across universities. It is not at all clear that uniformity will help in upgrading new universities or the State universities, which is the ostensible aim of this exercise. Some of the good universities such as JNU or the Ambedkar University, Delhi, are successful precisely because they value heterogeneity and variation so that creativity and innovation can thrive. Many Central universities reflect India's extraordinary diversity in their faculty composition and student body, and, above all, they offer very different syllabi and courses which has helped in their academic growth. The CU Act advocates transfer of faculty between universities. Nowhere in the world are "transfers" between institutions practised. There is no academic logic here. Besides, transfers increase the possibility of vindictiveness as it can be used as a punitive measure to silence dissent and independent voices. It is evident that the government is eager to control and direct universities both at the Central and State level. For this the HRD Minister is pushing the idea of a Choice-Based Credit System (CBCS), first mooted by her predecessor, Murli Manohar Joshi, during the term of NDA-I, which would have a serious impact on the country's education system. The University Grants Commission (UGC) has formulated the new proposals for a CBCS, a common entrance test and a central ranking system ignoring the assurances given by the government and the UGC that it would hold wide consultations with all stakeholders before undertaking any subsequent educational reforms. A common syllabus is neither desirable nor feasible as this will diminish creativity and lower standards in order to conform to common standards. We need a university system that encourages diversity and decentralisation, not one that centralises authority or enforces lifeless uniformity. Even as the government has set the ball rolling for unveiling a new national education policy, there is no public debate or consultation at the behest of the Ministry. Major changes are being initiated and pushed without actually consulting the professionals involved even though there is growing unease and opposition within Central universities to the new education policy and the manner in which the exercise is being done. So far, the MHRD's consultations have been limited to posting information and asking people to post comments and filling out a mygov.in survey on higher education on the Ministry's website. The public was given a period of one month for responding to the "major reforms". Would any half-serious attempt at reform of the education system treat such momentous changes in this manner? The right-wing agenda The common syllabi system has to be seen in the context of attempts to saffronise the education sector, particularly at a time when the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) is spearheading the agenda of the present government. Even though the right-wing intelligentsia has failed to provide a credible account of India's past and present, the Sangh Parivar is nevertheless busy reorganising educational syllabi to reflect a view of history and society gleaned from mythology and religious texts, in effect giving an open licence to fantasise history. Within weeks of forming the government, the RSS held a meeting with the HRD Minister where it pushed for introduction of moral education, correcting distorted history being taught in educational institutions and giving proper representation to forgotten idols of the country from the pre- and post-Independence era. RSS ideologue, Dinanath Batra, unambiguously stated this: Political change has taken place, now there should be total revamp of education. Activists of Batra's Shiksha Bachao Andolan are reportedly firming up recommendations for a revamp of education; they believe the formal education system needs some key changes: a greater emphasis on Indian knowledge traditions and a blending of the material and the spiritual in the curriculum. Leaders of the BJP are on record announcing their intention to change the textbooks and syllabus. The larger Sangh agenda includes substantive changes both in the content of education and appointments in prestigious institutions. Their aim is to influence their working to reflect the Sangh's agenda by making key appointments of persons belonging to the RSS and affiliate bodies in various institutions like the Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR), the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR), the Nehru Memorial Museum & Library (NMML), the Indian Institutes of Technology, the Central universities, the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) and the State Council of Educational Research and Training (SCERT), etc, who will loyally execute such changes. Many of them will exercise influence on public policy, and will do so not due to their scholarship, but due to their proximity to the RSS. (Zoya Hasan, formerly Professor, Jawaharlal Nehru University, is ICSSR National Fellow, Council for Social Development, New Delhi.) III/IV. http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/promise-on-transparency-not-kept/article7224849.ece Updated: May 20, 2015 20:18 IST Promise on transparency not kept VIDYA VENKAT [Box] Without a head, functioning of Central Information Commission has come to a halt When the Bharatiya Janata Party won by a massive majority in the general election last year, one of the key election promises that brought it to power was transparency and accountability in governance. A year later, many of the electoral promises made on that front remain on paper -- the Lokpal Bill and the Grievance Redressal Bill, key transparency and accountability legislation, did not reach Parliament at all. Even the functioning of the Central Information Commission has come to a virtual halt without a functioning head. Right to Information activist Subhash Chandra Agarwal said the NDA government had disappointed information activists by ignoring or giving vague responses to RTI petitions. It was no longer possible for ordinary citizens to use the RTI Act effectively to hold the political establishment accountable as far as conduct and decision-making was concerned, he said. "For example, every year, I used to file an RTI petition on January 17 to find out about the Padma awards selection process and I used to get the response from the Prime Minister's Office within the stipulated time frame. This year too, I did the same thing and all I have is a response from the PMO that the process is not yet complete, while the award ceremony is over. Several of my RTI appeals are now pending before the CIC as complaints filed under Section (18)," he said. Grievance redress Another election promise was to strengthen the delivery of poverty alleviation programmes through time-bound service. However, the Grievance Redressal Bill, which promises to do exactly that and had lapsed during the previous government, has not been introduced in Parliament at all. Speaking in the Rajya Sabha on December 17, 2013, erstwhile Leader of the Opposition Arun Jaitley had said that "there was no political controversy surrounding the Grievance Redressal Bill." Other BJP leaders J.P. Nadda and Ravi Shankar Prasad too had spoken in favour of this Bill. Alok Rawat, head of the Department of Administrative Reforms & Public Grievances, told The Hindu that this Bill was being re-examined as "the earlier Bill had been drafted in a hurry." Mr. Rawat said the 'Pragati' initiative, an e-governance system, launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed public grievances with the PM or his office looking into public complaints via video conferencing with other relevant government authorities on a monthly basis. "Some 10-20 cases of delay in income-tax reimbursements have been looked into so far. The Centre is also looking into delayed projects as part of the initiative," he said. However, transparency activists point out that these initiatives cannot be a substitute for a legally binding provision for government service delivery as envisaged in the Grievance Redressal Bill. Lokpal Bill The BJP's 2014 election manifesto said: "We will set up an effective Lokpal institution." However, a year later, efforts are under way to rephrase the law in such a way that the families of civil servants will be left out of mandatory financial disclosures. This will make it harder for the anti-corruption ombudsman to track transfer of illegally amassed wealth to the family members of a corrupt civil servant, Amrita Johri, an activist associated with the National Campaign for People's Right to Information, pointed out. Congress MP E.M. Sudarsana Natchiappan, Chairman, Department-related Parliamentary Standing Committee on Personnel, Public Grievances, Law& Justice, and leading consultations on the Lokpal amendments, told The Hindu that the provisions of the Lokpal law must not be misused to "unnecessarily harass bureaucrats and their families" and that steps were being taken to ensure that this was not the case. He further said that that the reason why the Bill has not yet been tabled in Parliament is because the Prevention of Corruption Act (Amendment) Bill already tabled in Lok Sabha gave more powers to the Lokpal. Also the powers of the Lokpal were being widened with Group A, B, C, and D government officers coming under its purview. It was important to harmonise the present Lokpal Bill with provisions contained in other anti-corruption legislations. "One of the problems we confronted was that of agencies such as the CBI having to report to multiple masters; they have to be answerable to the Lokpal and the Vigilance Commission, which is an issue. These and other issues are being discussed right now and we want to come up with a Bill that is useful to both Parliament and government," he said. IV. http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/hashtags-that-modi-set-trending/article7224312.ece#im-image-0 Hashtags that trended under #ModiSarkar May 20, 2015 Here's a look at few hashtags that trended this year under the Modi regime, triggering some fairly heated online exchanges. Snipped -- Peace Is Doable -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Green Youth Movement" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send an email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/greenyouth. 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