By, Firoz.T.Totanawala
The Bangalore Metro Reporter
LONG WAY TO GO INDIA
INDEPENDENT INDIA COMPLETES 63 YEARS OF AGE
India completed 63 years of its independence on 15th August this year. While 63 years may be an entire lifetime for some humans, it is indeed a short period for a nation. It is an appropriate time for us to review our progress and justify our worth for independence. We have to introspect over our duties to the nation and not merely try to assert our rights.
One of the greatest achievements of India is that it has remained democratic all these 63 years and is regarded as the biggest Democracy in the world. While other Nations, who gained freedom or became independents, lost their democratic status, India went ahead and established foolproof democracy which can be a role model for the world.
It was a fact that Mahatma Gandhi, a true democrat, brought up an army of great men and women who treated democracy as their breath. When India became independent, we were fortunate to have great democratic leaders. Jawaharlal Nehru, the first Prime Minister of Independent India had laid a strong base for democracy in India.
We have free and fair elections, an independent judiciary, free press and great parliamentarians. All these are a must for democracy and we have it in plenty. It is another matter that the quality of political leadership has started degrading in the recent past.
Do these plus points suffice for all round development of the country and its people? India despite its true democracy has not been able to provide prosperity to its people. Jawaharlal Nehru who laid the foundation for Industrialization and agrarian reforms was instrumental in India becoming an industrialized country. At the same time the big dams and other related irrigation schemes also helped India become an agricultural country. Nehru wanted both industries and irrigation to prosper so that the Indians can have employment and good food production.
While the Industrialization achieved its purpose, the agricultural projects could not provide the desired results. The reason was that the land holding was concentrated among negligible section of the society and therefore small and micro farmers were not benefitted. Moreover 70% of the agriculturists did not own a single plot of land. It was only after the sixties, that the government took major steps in land reforms and Vinoba Bhave’s Bhoodan Movement also made lakhs of agricultural workers get some piece of land as their own.
UNCULTIVATING INDIA
At the end of 63 years, we are witnessing a steady decline of industries and the agricultural production is also at its low ebb. The unimaginable urbanization has resulted in decline of agriculture activities. The hard fact is that agricultural production constitutes only 17% of the GDP and we still prefer to call ourselves an agricultural country! There is absolutely no hope of the agriculture getting priority among the people in the near future.
LOVE THY NEIGHBOUR
It is another matter that India has to spend a large portion of its budget towards defense as it is besieged by enemy countries on its borders. Pakistan, China, Bangladesh etc. are not prepared to allow India live in peace. If we had to spend less on defense in case of friendly neighbours, many poverty alienation schemes could have been taken up. But that is not the ground reality as of now. India has to increase its defense expenditure by 20-25 percent every year.
KNOWLEDGE IS POWER
Education has become the biggest drawback of the Independent India. It is not only the drawback but the biggest challenge of post Independence. Despite the best efforts, the literacy rate has not touched even 60%. Only recently the government introduced compulsory primary education to every child. Even though compulsory education was in force since many decades, it remained only on paper. Poverty is the root cause for this situation. In fact, in spite of central and state governments introducing Midday meals, bicycles and other inducements to make poor children to come to school, it may take many years to make the country, a totally literate.
TIME OF IT/BT
Of course, India has made giant leaps in science and Technology. Indian scientists and Technocrats are second to none in the world and recognized the world over. The Information Technology of the recent origin has made India proud. Indian IT industry is no.1 in the world and has provided employment to millions of young and talented in a matter of 10-15 years.
The BT sector is also helping the country to become world no.1 in Research and development of Bio technology. In fact, BT is the future of India for some more years to come. It is important to recall that IT and BT sectors are in the hands of private enterprises and this private sector has seen tremendous growth in the past decade. The IT industry which was hit badly by the global recession of last year is slowly getting back on the track. Interestingly, the IT-BT boom has attracted students to a large extent much so that the basic science engineering etc. have no takers in the past decade.
THE DARK STORY
Power is another sector that is yet to rise to the occasion. There is indeed an acute power shortage all over the country. The country is mainly dependent on Hydel and Thermal power production and has not explored the nuclear energy to increase the power generation. The word nuclear itself has become synonymous with destruction as the same has been used by many countries for war and other related activities. People forget to notice the other side of the nuclear energy. The scope for using the nuclear energy in power production is vast and some states are gradually veering towards it.
UNDER THE TABLE CHALLENGE
And the challenge to the very basics of democracy which has survived for 63 years is the cancer of corruption. This has entered into the veins of the democratic India. In the past three decades, corruption has creeped into every organ of the establishment. One can imagine the level and reach of the corruption by the fact that two late Prime Minister were accused of corruption. Politics which was once a respected forum for social service has now become a highly lucrative commercial venture. Unscrupulous businessmen and even criminals have easy access to political power, while politicians with clean image and honesty, have become a rarity.
The bureaucracy which once was the pride of the country has now been completely politicized. They now cater to the needs of their political masters rather than the people of the country. The corruption level in the bureaucracy also has come to rotten level. The honest among them is considered an outcaste but we still do have ‘honest’ officials though negligible in numbers.
Corruption has established its dominance in defense also. Even judiciary is not spared. There was a case of a Supreme Court Judge escaping the impeachment by the Parliament by a whisker on corruption charges. The judiciary which should be ‘above’ everything is getting tainted because of the dark horses. In fact, in the recent past, many judges have been dismissed from service on corruption and inefficiency grounds. That itself is a sad commentary.
The spurt in corruption level was because of the political corruption which percolates to the lowest. The politician has to spend crores to get elected as MLA and he has to pay ‘funds’ to the party and its leaders to become a minister. He further has to recover the cost and has to amass money to fight the next election and also has to make arrangements towards his family. Gone are the days when party workers who were honest were issued tickets to contest the elections and the election expenses were minimal. In fact, if such a person is given the ticket, the party cadres used to pool funds, to bear the minimum expenses. Such persons used to remain honest and corrupt politicians were a rarity till the seventies. And Now? We have to conduct an elaborate search to find honest politicians!
In the recent years, many lobbies who have minted crores and crores and who used to patronage the politicians have themselves purchased political power for themselves. If one were to take a look at the legislators and parliamentarians, one can find at least 50% of them belonging to various lobbies - Granites, mines, capitation, excise etc. There is no denying the fact. When this being the case, how one could expect corruption to be rooted out as these lobbies are the other side of the corruption.
The all pervading and engulfing corruption has become the greatest challenge to not only India but to the basic structures of democracy. One only hopes the emergence of a new leadership with honesty, integrity and far sightedness to save the country from corruption. As they say, one has to live on hopes. And on this Independence Day, we can at least hope for good tidings!
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