India Banao!

(Cross-posted at The Broad Mind)

The Women’s Reservation Bill has been hotly debated and divisive since 1996, and it was finally cleared by the Rajya Sabha amid much drama in the Upper House and the national media.

Reservations are never desirable. The Bill will not really solve any of the problems that its most vocal proponents claim it to be a panacea for. Nevertheless, there may be some good things that come out of it in the longer run.

This Indian Express article from May 1997 talks of the heckling by MPs from Bihar in particular, and how Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Atal Bihari Vajpayee insisted on admitting the bill and having a vote after discussion amid the pandemonium. Vajpayee insisted that those opposed to the Bill would be allowed to express their views on record during the debate, and the Bill must not be cleared without debate. Incidentally, the Women’s Reservation Bill was first introduced by Vajpayee in 1996 as a private member’s bill.

Yesterday, it was Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley who insisted that a full discussion be held before game-changing legislation like the Women’s Reservation Bill is passed.

How little things have changed.

The Bill has evoked sharp criticism from both ends of the political spectrum. In their typical strident style, Mulayam Singh Yadav and Lalu Prasad Yadav decry it for marginalizing Muslim and Dalit women, insisting on special provisions for those classes.

Swapan Dasgupta has expressly called the Bill “illiberal”. Independent candidate for the South Mumbai during the 2009 General Election and India country head of ABN Amro Meera Sanyal said political parties who want to support the Bill should voluntarily allow more women to contest, instead of demanding a Constitutional change. With 55% of the seats reserved in Parliament, it is very reasonable to ask whether merit may be compromised.

There are some features of the Bill which specifically make it different from the 22% reservation of seats for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. The Women’s Reservation Bill allows for rotation among constituencies, instead of designating certain constituencies women-only. In other words, 181 of the 543 seats allocated for women will be chosen at random from across the nation, and the mix will change with every General Election. The rotation system has its critics.

But it can be transformative because it forces change - certain leaders and parties are so entrenched that they operate a mafia-style government and exercise absolute power in some constituencies. The element of dynamism in the Women’s Reservation Bill, if retained and implemented, will coerce a change. Ultimately, parties that work for their constituencies will be re-elected, whether the seats are contested by men or women. People would vote for the party rather than the specific candidate.

Moreover, BJP spokesman Rajiv Pratap Rudy made a subtle point on national television about increasing reservations. Rudy said that soon reservations will reach such a suffocatingly-high level that people will start questioning the very legitimacy and purpose of the approach, whether reservations are made on the basis of gender, caste, religion or other category. He has a point - the reservation system might self-destruct if it is pushed beyond a certain point. Maybe the Women’s Reservation Bill is a step in that direction.

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In his recent Budget speech, the finance minister reiterated the government’s plans to make India “slum-free” within five years. This mantra is now being chanted in many urban-related conferences. However, this raises a number of questions. What does a “slum-free” India really mean? Is the removal of slums really desirable? Most importantly, what needs to be done to improve the lives of the millions of urban poor? In this article, I will argue that public policy should focus less on getting rid of slums and more on rethinking property rights, especially those of the poor.

The flow of urban poor
The conventional view for making our cities slum-free is that we should build low-cost housing and shift the existing slum-dwellers into them. There is a serious flaw in this solution because the urban poor are not a static group but a flow.

In the last two years, I have travelled across many parts of rural India. The message is very clear. The children of farmers no longer want to stay on in their farms. No government scheme is going to hold back the change in aspirations. The country’s cities need to prepare for the influx. In an earlier column, I had argued that slums play an important role in the phase of rapid urbanisation by absorbing and naturalising the new migrants into the urban landscape (see Slums defy a concrete answer in Business Standard, December 9, 2009). As hundreds of millions of people are absorbed into urban India, slums and small mofussil towns will be needed as routers in this process. If we simply get rid of today’s slums, we will merely get new ones.

The point is that we should concentrate on alleviating urban poverty rather than getting rid of slums. The former is the problem and the latter is merely the symptom. Peruvian economist Hernando de Soto has been arguing for years that the solution lies in strengthening the property rights of the poor. This is usually interpreted as formalisation of squatter rights. This may make sense in Latin America, which has a relatively stable population of urban poor and whose economy is growing slowly. However, this is too narrow an interpretation for a high-growth economy like India where booming urban centres are sucking in millions of new migrants.

The first problem with recognising squatter rights is that we create problems of governance by potentially encouraging land-grab. We not only have to think about today’s urban poor, but also about the incentive structure presented to the next generation of migrants. Second, the formalisation is usually done on the basis of a cut-off date. This often recognises the rights of better-off old-timers against those of poorer newcomers. Finally, and most importantly, in next generation cities like Gurgaon, the poor live in the “urban villages” where property rights are very clearly defined and any tampering would cause serious social upheaval. So, what should we do?

Beyond merely ownership
In my view, we need to rethink the property rights of the urban poor as being much more than the ownership of real estate. This is especially true when we have a pipeline of migrants who do not have any existing claim on the city’s land. Therefore, alleviation of urban poverty must focus on those property rights that will benefit these migrants and allow them to climb the economic ladder. There are three broad categories of such interventions:

Identity as a property right: The single-most important, and sometimes only, asset of a poor migrant is her identity. Without any form of identification, it is very difficult for a newcomer to fit into the urban landscape — no gas connection, no mobile phone, no voter rights, no credit and so on. It is nearly impossible for such an individual to apply for jobs in the formal economy or sometimes even as domestic help. Thus, a reliable and robust system of identification is invaluable. This is why Nandan Nilekeni’s Unique Identity Number scheme may turn out to be a major intervention.

Access to the ‘commons’: The urban poor rely heavily on the “commons” to lead their lives. Therefore, much of their property rights relate to access to public amenities rather than to private space. These include access to public transport, public toilets, public health, parks/open spaces, pedestrian networks and so on. These user rights are far more important to the poor than merely providing a “housing” solution for the individual. Urban design and public investment needs to be reoriented to focus on the commons.

Legal infrastructure: All rights, including property rights, exist only within a legal framework. Urban laws and their application need to be oriented towards protecting the legitimate needs of the urban poor, especially in areas related to livelihood. For instance, street hawkers need to be recognised and incorporated into the legal and architectural framework of the city. Rather than see hawkers merely as a nuisance, we should see them as part of the ecosystem of a vibrant city. What they need is transparent regulation not banishment. The current approach taken by most municipal authorities is merely leading to the proliferation of illegal hawkers and to corruption.

If these frameworks are put in place, the urban poor will themselves find ways to move up the value chain. Indeed, the slums themselves will evolve and upgrade (as is happening anyway in many of the older urban villages of Delhi).

To conclude, we need to strengthen property rights that can be leveraged by the pipeline of future migrants. In Latin America, it may make sense to interpret property rights as mostly relating to land titles and squatter rights. The population of urban poor in Latin America is relatively static — the countries are already fairy urbanised and their economies are growing slowly. In India, the throbbing economy is sucking millions of new migrants. We need to think of property rights in ways that allow these new migrants to enter and climb the system.

This article has been published in Business Standard on March 10,2010.

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This is an editorial that Mr. N. Ram of THE HINDU penned himself on hearing that painter Mr. M. F. Husain had been conferred Qatari citizenship.

This is the edit that ‘New IndPress’ wrote, mocking Indian democracy.

These are the replies that Mrs. Hilda Raja, now domiciled in Vadodara, penned to both THE HINDU and ‘New IndPress’ in her blog.

Check out the comments that the editorial of ‘New IndPress’ drew.

Besides her blog posts and the comments in the ‘New IndPress’, check out this edit in SIFY as well. Vir Sanghvi offers a healthy perspective too.

The readers of these newspapers are aware of the hypocrisy and inconsistencies of the so-called secular elites of India.

At the minimum, Mr. Hussain should have had the decency to apologize for having caused (intended or unintended) hurt to the sentiments of many.

I did not know that he had supported Mrs. Indira Gandhi’s emergency. What happened to the importance of civil rights, then?

Suffice to say that Mr. Husain has finally arrived at a right place for himself and for many (like Yours Truly) who did not see art or taste in what he painted. I doubt if it is a sad day for India as Mr. N. Ram chose to call it.

Mr. Ram was speaking for himself and a very small minority.

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(Cross posted at http://tgs.nationalinterest.in/2010/02/27/collage-of-views-on-the-indian-budget-for-2010-11/)

I shall start with mine. You can find it here. India’s Finance Minister presented the fiscal budget for 2010-11 on Friday, February 26th. He promised a vision document. It did not quite amount to that, to put it mildly. Given what had happened in Greece and given the fact that this was no ‘election year’ in India, bold strokes were both needed and expected. But, they did not come. As M. J. Akbar puts it, he promised vision but gave revision.

The header that Economic Times gives to the views of Swaminathan Aiyar is misleading. In my view, Swami Aiyar focuses on the key assumption behind the budget. Any budget statement can be evaluated on its specific measures and/or on the underlying assumptions behind the macro targets.

The budget assumes 8-8.5% real growth and 4% inflation, giving 12.5% nominal GDP growth. This very optimistic scenario assumes that the global economy will not slow down. If it does, all bets on deficit reduction are off. [More here].

In my piece in MINT, I had focused on this too. The nominal GDP growth assumptions for the next three fiscal years are 12.5%, 13.0% and 13.5% respectively. A good way to get there would be to achieve 8.5% to 9.0% real GDP growth and an inflation rate of between 4% and 5%. What has the budget done to achieve these combinations? Second, what has the budget done to guard against the risk of these assumptions not materializing and de-railing the fiscal deficit reduction targets? Third, what has the budget done to ensure that all the outlays are going to result in outcomes?

Writing in ‘Business Standard’, Jahangir Aziz voices similar sentiments:

But if the government truly thinks that the recovery is fragile, wouldn’t it have been wiser to be more conservative as it was last year?… As we have seen recently, the global recovery can turn up nasty surprises and create enough anxiety to keep domestic financial markets volatile. Relying on a narrow set of adjusters is plain risky. If a few things go wrong, the budget will look shaky….So in the coming months we will be living on a prayer for continued high growth, high global liquidity, low global risk aversion and low oil prices. [More here]

Staying with ‘Business Standard’, I find Mr. Ninan’s comments understated but it is not difficult for any one to grasp the underlying message. The Finance Minister has been lucky. He has to stay lucky. Not too different from Jahangir Aziz’s message. I must say that, based on some of his recent comments, Mr. Ninan’s form has returned.

Ajit Ranade, inspired by Sachin Tendulkar’s terrific double-hundred in a one-day match recently against South Africa, trains himself to look at the positives. It would be silly to dismiss his comments as cheer-mongering:

After twenty years of India’s reforms, nay his debut, Sachin recently scored four test centuries and an awesome ODI double ton. His best is not over. Assuming his journey is mimicking India’s economic journey, with GST and DTC round the corner, look for a high scoring economy in the coming years. [More here]

I was surprised to find MINT sounding positive on the budget. Both the edit and Niranjan’s comments convey satisfaction with the work of the Finance Minister. The edit calls it a fine blend of pragmatism and vision. Actually, on closer look, Niranjan’s comments are more guarded and neutral than the headline suggests.

Shekhar Gupta of Indian Express subsumes his positive comments on the budget in an overall panegyric on the Prime Minister based on, what he sees as, the developments in the last seven days.

While he is positive based on recent developments, over in ‘Economic Times’ Professor Arvind Panagariya warns of complacency and backsliding on economic reforms. He points to three developments that make him worry. One is the ban on imported machinery and equipment for power sector, second is minimum wages in the organised sector and the third is the ban on Bt. Brinjal that Jairam Ramesh, the Minister for Environment announced recently.

Regardless of whether these developments turn out to be damaging and/or irreversible, I agree with him on one thing: there is a certain sense of complacency on the possibility of higher economic growth rates. To an extent, the budget is an example of that complacency.

Finally, it was delightful to see the Finance Minister of the ’secular’ UPA government invoking the blessings of Lord Indra to help deliver a broad-based recovery in the coming months. That is what many mean by the essential Hinduness of India, not the ‘Hindutva’ propounded by VHP and Bajrang Dal.

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(Cross-posted at The Broad Mind)

In my post at Wall Street Journal’s India Chief Mentor blog, I write:

I don’t think we should be content with a GDP growth rate of 7% or 9%. Our true potential is at 12%-plus, for two reasons – India’s GDP stands at about $1.2 trillion and we are starting from a low base. Secondly, India’s demographic profile is also very amenable to support high-growth rates. But the specter of government-control and short-sighted and politically-driven policy making year after year is holding the country back. We saw glimpses of what is achievable when we had truly reformist and visionary Prime Ministers P.V. Narasimha Rao and Atal Bihari Vajpayee guiding policy-making. They were supported ably by cabinet ministers like Manmohan Singh, Yashwant Sinha and Arun Shourie. Without those years of breakthrough liberalization, nobody would ever think of classifying India as a world-power, and we’ve just scratched the surface.

India’s demographics are both a big opportunity and a significant risk – over 240 million people will enter the workforce over the course of the next two decades. This translates to about 10 lac people entering the labour pool on average, every month for the next 20 years.

The combined population of UK, Germany, France and Spain stands at about 240 million.

The numbers are staggering and unprecedented in human history. This budget does not create an environment for all those people to start businesses or be productively employed.

What will all these youth do?

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In my post at the WSJ India Chief Mentor blog, I touch upon why public policy is critical to sustain and grow an entrepreneurial ecosystem:

http://blogs.wsj.com/india-chief-mentor/2010/02/24/what-the-budget-means-for-entrepreneurs/

The most outstanding example of prudent policy-making in recent years has been in wireless telecommunications. As Sanjeev Aga, managing director of Idea Cellular, said recently, the New Telecom Policy (NTP) announced in 1999 was a “watershed event” which sowed the seeds for the meteoric rise of India’s wireless telecoms sector.

Private equity firm Warburg Pincus invested $80 million for a 20% stake in Bharti Airtel in 1999. Warburg Pincus and Sunil Mittal spotted the opportunity early and the rest, as they say, is history. Bharti’s current market capitalization stands at over $20 billion. Over the course of the last decade, the company has grown by leaps, and has just announced a deal to acquire major telecom assets in Africa The NTP policy’s thrust on competition has ensured that consumers enjoy lower and lower service rates. Mobile telephony has been among the most dynamic sectors, creating wealth and generating employment. Mobile value-added services has been a hotbed for entrepreneurial activity and venture capital investment. None of it would be possible without 1999’s NTP.

It is important to note that the NTP was not a happy accident of fate. Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha referred to the NTP repeatedly in his budget speeches. Prime Minister Vajpayee and Telecoms Minister Pramod Mahajan deserve full credit for framing visionary policy for the then-sunrise sector, allowing competition and the growth of private enterprise to fulfill the telecom needs of everyone from rickshaw pullers to billionaires.

Many in India take economic growth and development for granted - what we must remember is that entrepreneurs and businesspeople operate in an environment, and the government must create a conducive environment for them so that growth is sustainable and equitable. The NDA government’s telecom policy achieved it. It can be done in other sectors too, it is simply a question of political will.

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(Cross-posted at http://tgs.nationalinterest.in/2010/02/20/gujarat-kerala-and-good-news/)

In the ‘India Today’ issue dated Feb. 8, 2010, there are two different articles with two common themes: one common theme is Gujarat and the other common theme is that of checkdams that Gujarat has pursued relentlessly. The first one about the second Green Revolution in Gujarat is a box-item in the cover story discussing price rise.

What impressed Swaminathan most was the Modi Government’s decision to give soil health cards to farmers so that they could assess the quality of land. Steps were also taken to improve the quality of seeds, raise the groundwater table by building almost a lakh check dams within a decade in Kutch, Saurashtra and north Gujarat besides extensive use of technology by bringing scientists and farmers on one platform.

Kutch, that never knew what Kesar mango was, now produces and exports it. Similarly, the region is now cultivating Arabian dates. The state increased its cotton yield sixfold in nine years from 175 kg per hectare to 798 kg, more than the world average of 787 kg. [More here]

If one reads the special quotes from other Chief Ministers and public officials, I am not sure they are getting the real causes behind the price rise. It is about productivity and that is what constrains supply of essential commodities.

Other factors like hoarding or speculative activity in commodity exchanges might play a part but they come into play only because there is underlying scarcity. In other markets in the world where there are commodity futures, agricultural commodities do not always go up in price. In the early part of 2008, they did. Then they collapsed because harvests were ample in 2009.

The growth rate in the output of six core infrastructure industries in December 2009 was 6.0% as opposed to 0.7% in December 2008. 6.0% is not enough for an economy growing at a nominal rate of around 13% to 15%. That is the problem to focus on. BTW, I was not aware that the Ministry of Finance publishes a monthly economic report. I got this statistic from that report. A good initiative. Looks like it has been going on, for quite some time. Unfortunately (for myself), I was not aware of it until recently.

The other story is that of development beating back Maoists in the hilly district of Dang in South Gujarat. Here too, check out the role of checkdams.

Today, the dairy centre at Kosimda collects a litre of milk each from 150 families of the village and sends it to the Sumul dairy in Surat, providing income to the villagers. It also has 17 borewells, 35 open wells and a school up to Class VII with computers. Outmigration from the village in search of jobs has come down substantially. The villagers used to grow only millets, but now have flowing fields of pulses. A small reservoir caters to the crop. Not just Kosimda, almost all 311 villages in Dang have 24-hour power. Over 700 check dams in the district ensure water for the district. Till the mid-’90s, the dairy industry was almost unknown in Dang, where the cattle quality is poor. Today, it collects 30,000 litres of milk a day. At Rs 15 a litre, sales translate into Rs 4.5 lakh per day. [More here]

This news item, on the face of it, looked like a good story. It is about the turnaround in public sector profitability in Kerala. The ten-item checklist of success, on the face of it, does not look like a ‘free enterprise’ approach. Some of it is but most of it is not. The good things are the cross-political synergy, co-operation from the labour unions and the increase in salaries and perks given to the Chief Executives. Well, let us not quibble too much.

In my view, this is the best news of all. Traffic in India captures all that is worst in us or brings out the worst in us in India. If some one could show that it could be made better, then there is hope for our country. The news-item shows how Angamali, a small municipality in rural Ernakulam district has brought about a sea-change in the attitudes of pedestrians and vehicle-users. Wonderful stuff.

Update: It was good to read that Swaminathan Aiyar visited Bihar last week to verify if numbers lie. He first reported in January that Bihar was growing at ‘Chinese’ rates. His visit confirms that it is true. That is the good news. The bad news is that Nitish Kumar, the Bihar Chief Minister, has lost many by-elections. Second, if Laloo Prasad Yadav returned to Patna as the State Chief Minister, Swami Aiyar is not sure that the Bihar miracle would continue. The third minor disappointment is that Nitish Kumar turned a bit soft on Maoists, somewhat needlessly.

Development with a big stick in hand is the best approach. Soft approach is not interpreted generously but as a sign of weakness. That is as true in geopolitics as it is in national politics. Either Indian politicians do not get it or they do not care. When and what would make them care?

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My good friend D. V. Sridharan used to update his wonderful website www.goodnewsindia.com. It was a balm amidst all the bad news that one got from the sensation-seeking media.

He has stopped updating the site and is working on a project, which is a great value addition to society. In short, his project is all about sustainable farming.

I would not be able to step into his shoes. He used to expend personal energy, time and money in checking out good news stories before writing about them with great flair and humour.

I would just highlight a few that came to my attention in the last few days:

1. This is about fast-track justice for rape accused. They were sons of police officials!

2. Young friend Harsh Gupta is doing a fieldwork evaluating NREGA implementation as part of a special assignment for MIT Poverty Action Lab. Nothing like empirical verification to ascertain what works and what does not and how. He sent a mail on this. It is a gem.

He was chatting with an IAS officer from Chattisgarh who has a PhD in Public Policy from Princeton University. He is now on sabbatical. The IAS officer from Chattisgarh told him that, in his home state, ration card holders now get SMSes that their quota of grains have left the PDS godown for the fair price shop, so that the ration shop guy can’t cheat (at least, as easily)! Wow! That is fantastic stuff

I came across this article on this topic although what it writes about and what my friend is reported to have heard are slightly different. This sounds like quite an impressive feat:

The state has been awarded in the category of excellence in government process re-engineering. The department was selected for the national award for fully computerising the civil supply system across the state. Among other features, the system will provide automatic calculation and release of monthly allotment of public distribution system (PDS) schemes to 10,400 fare price shops.

This URL from the National Informatics Centre provides further information.

3. Read in the Tamil magazine, ‘Kalki’ dated 31st January 2010 about Malliyampattu Panchayat (Trichi district, on the way between Trichirapalli and Kumara Vayaloor – famous for Murugan temple) and its dynamic and clean leader, Kathirvel. Streetlights work, water tank is full with clean water, Panchayat schools work and teachers teach, roads are like runways etc. It was pleasing to read.

I called my long-time friend Ilango Ramaswamy, former President of Kuthambakkam Panchayat to find out if he knew Mr. Kathirvel. He did not but he was very keen for me to send him a scanned version of the magazine article. I would do so.

Then, I spoke to the ‘Kalki’ office. They gave me the telephone number of the reporter who wrote the story. He gave me the contact number of the Panchayat President, Mr. Kathirvel. He was very pleased to hear from an overseas Indian calling to convey his pleasure and best wishes for his good work. He said that it motivated him no-end.

He belongs to the DMK. He said that his father had brought him up with very strong foundations in ethics and dharma and that those are his guides in his role as the Panchayat President.

One of the good things he does is to make sure that he taps into all the State and Central government schemes (including MPLAD) for implementing welfare initiatives for his Panchayat.

He has promised to send me articles/reports prepared by students on the work he has done. I have promised to visit him soon.

If any one is interested in visiting him, let me know.

4. This article in IBN Live is very refreshing. Accountability within government can come from public scrutiny. Despite all its limitations, the Right to Information legislation facilitates, public. See the next bullet on a RTI initiative, in which Yours Truly played a role.

The article makes for refreshing reading for many reasons: One is that the gentleman, Shri. Prajapati Trivedi wrote to the government. He persisted. The government accepted his offer to help in performance measurement. He seems to know how to work with government officials:

“You have to keep your ego aside. I literally went to all secretaries, met them, enquired what they did. It helped. People are waiting for someone to break the ice. They are willing to help, give me tips on what to do and how to do. My networks help a lot. “

He is also realistic about what he can achieve. I think his instincts on how this would help are sound: “the biggest motivation will come from naming and shaming.”

As an aside, I guess those who are looking for a topic for a seminar can find one in this observation of his: “To my mind the debate between private and public efficiency is not so much about the ownership as much as about competition. You unleash the power of competition and see how it works”.

5. I have contributed with partial funding for this initiative brought to my attention by friend Nitin Pai who had met with Shri. D. Dhanuraj of Centre for Public Policy Research in Ernakulam (Cochin) in 2007. It is an RTI-Wiki project. It aims to create a database of RTI queries and responses so that it becomes progressively easier for RTI users and authorities, to use pre-existing information.

Their website was launched on Thursday. The links to other RTI sites is rather useful.

6. I would like to link to this article by Prof. Vaidyanathan (of IIM Bangalore) that complained about how banks calculate interest on savings accounts based on the minimum balance in the account between the 10th and the last calendar day of the month and is thus ripping off savings account holders. He notes that what Indian banks are doing is not common international practice.

He hoped that the RBI would stick to the deadline it gave to the Indian Banks’ Association to change to the daily balance method for calculating interest payment on savings account. The deadline is April 1^st of this year. Predictably, IBA was opposed to the move.

But, it looks like RBI has stuck to its guns. Good show.

7. According to the ‘Business Standard’ the government increased the price of urea and gave freedom to the industry to fix prices of other fertilizers. That is a bold move. It deserves praise and support from all right-thinking people regardless of their party affiliation.

In a recent speech, the new BJP President said that his party would have no hesitation in extending support to the Central government and non-BJP governments in various states, whenever and wherever they were taking the nation forward.

This was an opportunity to put those words into action.

The following exchange between Shri. Yashwant Sinha and a journalist on CNBC-TV 18 is not very encouraging either:

Q: Kirit Parikh report has been submitted, the BJP, the NDA government had tried to move towards the partial dismantling of the APM, will you support a price rise if the government were to move ahead with some of the recommendations of Kirit Parikh report?

A: We had on the April 1, 2002 announced the deregulation of the petroleum sector which was completely undone by the first UPA government. Now, we have the Kirit Parikh report, it is not breaking new ground, they are not repeating the old formula. When we dismantled and whenever there was price rise, the Congress party representative did not come and garland us at Vijay Chowk, so we are not going to garland them at Vijay Chowk.

Q: Are you going to take darnas and morchas opposing it?

A: Why not. This is politics and they did exactly the same thing to us. Why shouldn’t we give it back?

Q: It is a fair game?

A: It is a fair game.

Q: You will give it back?

A: We will oppose price rise.

The full interview is here.

8. To wrap this post up, I link to the latest Gallup poll of Americans on the countries they like (h.t: Rohit Pradhan). India comes sixth behind Canada, Germany, Britain, Japan and Israel.

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It was a special morning. I received two very important and wonderful emails from Madhu Kishwar, the founder-editor of ‘Manushi’, the magazine, the Trustee of ‘Manushi Sangathan’, social activist, occasional Op-ed writer and many other things.

Since I received them as a member of the ‘Manushi’ e-group, it is not that easy to provide a link to the emails. You can become a member too, however, by visiting www.manushi.in and clicking on ‘Join e-group’.

I am still sorting the emails out in my head. I guess it is a life-long process!

The comments that follow below are in response to the email on the historic judgement of the Delhi High Court on the plight of rickshaw pullers in the Capital City/State.

The government of India (or, for that matter, that of many countries in the world) does not restrict us from owning as many motor vehicles as we want and, of course, the law-abiding citizens that we are, we do not restrict ourselves too. We pollute. That is, we make full use of the un-priced right to pollute.

But, that privilege is not extended to all. No, it is not about the right to pollute. Even the right to own as many vehicles as one can afford to. Such is the fate of rickshaw-pullers (owners cum pliers) in the capital city of Delhi (and many other cities in India? - I do not know). They are licensed to own one only!

For many of us, this is one more opportunity to shake our head at the inequities in the world for a minute or longer and then proceed to contributing to perpetuating it further.

Not so for Madhu Kishwar and ‘Manushi’. For more than 13 years, they have fought ceaselessly, tirelessly and even at risk to personal lives, on occasions, for the cycle rickshaw puller’s rights.

More broadly, it is about fundamental right. Political or economic reforms is about the practical realization of the fundamental right to engage in gainful and legitimate economic activity, unfettered and unrestricted by the State or by any one else.

Economic reforms are not about consumer choice. It is not about comparing the sizes of the shopping malls in Mumbai, Chennai and Bangalore with that of similar concrete structures in Dubai and Singapore, the brand names available inside them for the consuming class and whether the Indian state empowers them to buy those items without having to dip more into their bulging wallets than their cousins and friends in Singapore and Dubai have to.

Reforms are about public welfare. Madhu Kishwar understood that.
Perhaps, the only social reformer or even policymaker who bothered to understand that, when it is convenient not to do so.

In 2001, PM Vajpayee issued a directive to the MCD to implement changes in the laws and rules that govern (or, ruin) the lives of rickshaw pullers and pavement vendors. To no avail, of course.

That did not stop Madhu and her volunteers. Efforts continued.

Now, in a historic judgement, the Delhi High Court has quashed the rules restricting the ownership of a rickshaw owner-plyer to one rickshaw.
This is an amazing victory but it is also only a milestone. The journey probably never ends.

The judgement is attached.

(2) The text that comes below is the email I sent to my mailing list on seeing the Charter of the All India Ganga-Yamuna Panchayat that was held between 8th February and 10th February.

Please see the attached PDF document for the Action plan emanating from the Panchayat.

This is amazing and inspiring work. We can only nod and shake our heads in wonder at the commitment that other are showing. After that, we are back to our mundane pursuits and even more mundane and meaningless battles of ego, settled on the racefields of material acquisitions, where the pitstops are lunch, dinner and drinking sessions in which the racers exchange and compare notes on their latest accomplishments/acquisitions.

About most of us, ‘trapped’ is the word that comes to mind.

Myriad emotions come to the surface when one reads that protesting against illegal mining on Ganga riverbed is a criminal activity in Bharat!

(3) Any one wishing to contribute to the stellar work of ‘Manushi’ should visit the website (www.manushi.in) for details on how to go about it.

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The city must now choose between two very different futures

To whom does Mumbai belong? This is a question that has simmered for years and has now blown up into a major national controversy. For Mumbai, it is a question that is fundamental to its very existence as India’s pre-eminent financial, commercial and cultural hub. At a time that India is re-emerging as a major player on the world stage, its response to the above question will decide whether Mumbai will run with Singapore, New York and London or will languish as tomorrow’s Kolkata. The slope is slippery.

The age of global cities
The world is not flat as Thomas Friedman would have us believe. It is spiky, with large concentrations of population and economic activity clustered around a network of cities. These cities act as inter-connected nodes in the social, economic and cultural network that characterises the post-globalisation world. At the pinnacle of the hierarchy of cities are a handful of “Global Cities”. These hubs have become so important that the 21st century will probably be known as the “Age of Global Cities”. Indeed, it can be argued that London is today more important as a centre of finance and commerce than it was during the height of British Empire.

Most leading global cities of today are in the West — most notably London and New York, but also smaller hubs like San Francisco, Boston and Paris. However, there are now centres like Singapore and Hong Kong in Asia, as well as new competitors like Shanghai. A country derives enormous economic advantages (not to mention cultural influence and soft-power) from being host to a global city. As an aspiring world power, India needs its own global city.

What makes a successful global city?
In recent years, researchers have studied the phenomenon of global cities and have tried to explain their success. Each city has its special advantages — good universities, location, historical links, institutions and so on. However, a common theme is their openness to new ideas, external cultural influences and “outsiders”. Imagine New York without the waves of immigrants – Irish, Italian, Jews and, more recently, Asians and Latin Americans. Similarly, consider the relative trajectories of Tokyo and Singapore.

Till the early 90s, Tokyo was the most important urban hub in Asia. It was miles ahead of Hong Kong and Singapore. Yet, Tokyo is today merely a large Japanese city that has little influence on the rest of Asia. We cannot just blame this on Japan’s economic decline. After all, London has survived Britain’s decline to remain the world’s premier financial hub.

In contrast to Tokyo, tiny Singapore has self-consciously attracted foreign talent, invested in culture and created international linkages. The results are plainly visible. Singapore is not just one of the world’s largest ports, it is a formidable centre for banking/finance, education and even medical treatment. Once considered too straight-laced, it now enjoys the most vibrant night-life in Asia (sorry Hong Kong). More than 10 million foreign tourists visit it every year — double the number received by India, a country with 250 times the city-state’s population.

The decline of Kolkata tells the same story. Till the mid-60s, the city was the most important cultural, intellectual and commercial centre in India. Its industrial hinterland was the largest in Asia, excluding Japan. The city was a multi-cultural mix of Bengalis, Marwaris, Biharis, Anglo-Indians, Europeans, Jews and Armenians. It even had a vibrant China-town. However, attitudes changed from the 60s — multinationals were squeezed out, new technologies were discouraged and the teaching of English was banned. Even the works of Rabindranath Tagore could only be performed according to strictly-prescribed formulae. The result was not a renaissance of Bengali culture. Instead, Bengal has never again produced individuals of the caliber of Tagore, Satyajit Ray, Vidyasagar, Vivekanand or Subhash Bose.

The lessons of Kolkata are important for Mumbai, especially since its own rise was partly helped by its rival’s decline in the 60s. Many of the companies that drive Mumbai’s current success were originally headquartered in Kolkata, and, in some cases, are still registered there. The self-proclaimed protectors of the Marathi Manoos may want to consider what happened to the Bengali Bhadralok. Today, the Bengali middle class (including me) lives in “exile” in Bangalore, Delhi-Gurgaon, New York, London and even Mumbai. We were not exiled by foreign rule or by the invasion of migrants but by close-mindedness and the lack of imagination.

Our heavy-weight champion
Two generations after it lost its empire, London allows Britain to have a disproportionate influence on international matters. China already has two serious financial centres in Hong Kong and Shanghai. Its capital Beijing has been an Olympic host. If India wants to play on the world stage, it needs at least one heavy-weight global city that can be a financial and cultural nerve centre. Mumbai is the obvious candidate with its combination of financial muscle and Bollywood. With just 1.6 per cent of the country’s population, the city dominates India’s economic and cultural life.

Mumbai’s future is part of national strategy and we cannot allow local politics to derail it.

Nonetheless, we should recognise that legitimate local aspirations need to be accommodated. This is not just an issue for Mumbai. We are entering and era of rapid urbanisation that will see 350 million people absorbed into urban India in the next three decades. Frictions between locals and migrants will soon arise in Bangalore and Gurgaon, and eventually even in Lucknow and Patna. We need to create mechanisms that help the “locals” compete in the rapidly-changing urban environment (for instance, by investing in vocational training), while at the same time making it clear that street violence will not be tolerated.

I hope that Mumbai will eventually make the right choice. If not, the mega-city of Delhi-Noida-Gurgaon will have to take on the burden of becoming India’s heavy-weight champion. Perhaps, Kolkata will grab the opportunity to make a comeback!

This article has been published in Business Standard on February 2010

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