DHARNA IN THE TOWN – Iss Par Bhee Sawaal Kar

A motley bunch of self-inspired professionals came together last week in Chandigarh's Sector 17, angry at the rape of a girl by five cops of Chandigarh Police. For five hours, they talked. FIVE HOURS. Five hours that redefined the idea of a protest. Many of them belonged to the media, but they refused to ask their friends in the media to cover the dharna. Their aim was different. They wanted to talk to the city. They wanted to listen to the city. This is a brief reportage from Ground Zero.

Nischay Pal

For years now, I have been watching one or the other interest group sitting on a dharna in Chandigarh's Sector 17. In most cases, the dharna would have a life of its own, an island amidst a sea of shoppers and casual strollers in the plaza. A group of 4-14 people would sit on a durrie, a couple of quick-printed A3 size posters announcing their demand, a bunch of press photographers would arrive on the scene since someone from the dharna-group had would call and request for a photograph.

Next to the fountain atop a tasteless cemented structure that would have as much water as the signs of having suffered the vagaries of weather in its short life of half a century, the dharna-group would become astonishingly active with the arrival of the lensmen from various newspapers. "Zindabad - Murdabad" would reverberate through the air. One enterprising man would pick up a poster and hold it aloft in his hands. With their template photographs clicked, the golden silence would return. The grateful agitationists would request the "press photographers" to have a cup of tea from a nearby kiosk. "You have a press release, too?" a photographer would ask. "Shaam nu bhej devange ji," he would be told. Job done. Agitation over for the day, with enough time left for lunch. The highest display of responsibility would be about who rolls the durrie and keeps it in his car.

Agitation-protest-dharna-morcha-opposition-murdabad-zindabad-fight for a cause – jo hunm se takrayega – hamari maange poori karo – kender sarkar hai hai-punjab sarkar murdabad – inkalab –shaheed bhagat singh – better wage scale on 8-14-20 basis – vocational teachers-berozgaar ETT teachers-anganwadi workers-cpi-cpi(m) – falana group-dhimka group.

This was such a beautiful mould of agitation in Chandigarh. Every step time tested. Every day fruitful. After all, the next day's newspapers do carry that picture. The raised fist. The anger on the face. The Hamari Mange Poori Karo poster. And under the great umbrella of a big banner, what they ostensibly think is in the mould of RK Studios or Raj Shri Productions -- Lok Sangharsh Morcha, XYZ Employee Union (Regd), or whatever other platform they gather on.

In 65 years, I have not seen a train coming on this platform.

I wanted to watch this up close and personal. So, one fine day when there was a nip in the air, and the sun seemed generous, I decided to hog a spot in the town plaza, yards away from a group of 43 teachers sitting cross legged on a rug. The 44th was on the mike. "Sathiyo...". The man seemed fairly adept at his business. The speech came to him as second nature. He was talking about promotions being blocked, wanted ban on contractual recruitment of teachers and said his and his associates' prime purpose was to safeguard the school system.

Hundreds of people were filing past them, not one paid attention, not one sat with them for a minute, not one asked why were 44 men (there were no women) so angry that they had left everything to sit in a protest in the town square.

"Poori karo!" "Poor karo!" Suddenly, the group was super-animated. I could not fathom what demand it was that they wanted fulfilled. And it was then that I saw five people lurking nearby, with suspiciously bulging black duffel bags slung from their shoulders. Out came their cameras, quickly they snapped the action. Game over. In the next five minutes, everyone had vanished, and I was left to admire the role that the plaza plays in the city's discourse.

Next day, the photograph duly appeared in virtually all the newspapers. Clearly, various interest groups have perfected the dharna technique.

Last week, when news appeared that a minor girl was raped by five policemen repeatedly over a period of several days, a few inspired souls thought there should be an expression of outrage, a display of anger, a mark of protest, a voice of the city, an exhibition of solidarity with the victim. With affiliations too loose and no worked out networks, getting a bunch of people together at one selected spot in the town at a pre-determined point was a task too easy and too difficult at the same time. What would be the demand? Should they have a banner? How else does one protest? May be they can grab a piece of paper and scrawl a shrieky slogan on it, hold it aloft, and shout a Murdabad – fist clenched, air punched?

How do you protest in a world that has become so noisy?

In a particularly weak moment, I thought it was no use punching the town square air with your fists. I knew the fate of 44 teachers. Not the parents of a single child had cared to join them; instead, many had preferred to buy a pair of chappals from the discount sale at Sant Shoe Store nearby.

The 44 teachers were equally pissed off with the media, but they couldn’t afford to say that in their press release. They couldn’t afford to annoy the photographers by even hinting at how much space the media gives to genuine issues of the people. Of course, the issue figures in their own discussions, but not in the press release.

But some people just do not get tired. A sociology professor from Panjab University, who is there in the chowk, in a TV studio, at a dharna in the university, at a meeting in Gurgaon, every time you bring a people-connect issue to the fore. A former registrar of a medical sciences university who belies age and successfully connects to the young, his anger and logic both intact. A journalist who straddles the world of media, activism and politics with equal aplomb. A film maker who dabbles in television but manages to debunk the dumbing down theory. Each brings his friends, too. A lawyer who recently turned into an Aam Aadmi Party leader but whose ability to critique has not weakened in his new avataar. One call and they all find time to land at the chowk. They always manage to do so. They have routines, vocations, families, and still rejig priorities. A Thapar University don drove from Patiala the other evening to be part of a slogan shouting group at the PU, and then stayed back to intently listen to the young student leaders of the PU.

It was a Friday, and Sector 17 plaza is on any day a hustling bustling place. The group was soon into a routine – Murdabad, Zindabad. A few slogans directed against the police, another few towards the administration. Chandigarh Prashaasan Murdabad. Insaaf. And also, that old redoubtable made a re-appearance – Inquilab Zindabad.

And then the lawyer-turned-politician turned into a quick thinking strategist. He went next door into a shop and bought/brought a megaphone, microphone in hand, the loud speaker hanging from the shoulder. Powered by eight dry batteries and drenched-in-passion spirit, the motley group soon had a voice. A louder voice. MURDABAD...ZINDABAD...INQUILAB!

And then it all turned altogether on to a different track. Something happened to the dharna. Panjab University academic, Janaki Srinivasan, who makes extremely nuanced arguments in political science, was on that megaphone. The group had now grown to some 500 people, Janaki in the centre, mike in hand. She was explaining deeper and complex notions of patriarchy. To the people in the chowk? Yes. Next, it was Daljit Ami's turn to take over. Dharnas have a grammar, set by decades of professional dharna masters. Daljit respects few stereotypes. He thought chowk is the place for a serious discussion. He is like that. He even thinks TV studios are a place for seriously approaching complex issues instead of dumbing down these. Something unnerving was happening in Sector 17. The 500 odd people were seriously listening to Daljit Ami as he explained why we should not call the rapists, beasts. "Beasts do not rape, men do. Nature has no role in it. Nature does not make these men. Our society makes men rapists." Oh My God!

Bravery has many forms, but trying to get a serious dialogue going in the chowk would have seemed foolishness to me. But then, were the braves not often called foolish all through human civilisational experience?

Off and on, slogans kept cajoling new people to join the crowd. So a student from Panjab University thought of raising what he thought was the most meaningful slogan – “Pittri Satta Murdabad.” A couple of journalists in the chowk seemed very confused. This was the first time they had heard of such a slogan. Whatever happened to the classic dharna they were used to covering?

"Rape is not a crime against women." Now, I thought this one was certainly new, and one that will make the women in the crowd, though hugely marginal presence, take out their slippers and beat the hell out of the speaker. "This is deliberately reducing the intensity of the crime. When a woman is sexually harassed, is it not a problem for her husband, her father, her boy friend, and if you have a heart, yours? Rape is a crime against humanity. Every rape is a rape of the kind of society you wanted your children to have." And people were listening.

"Rape maa ki gaali se shuru hota hai."

"Start questioning your dad. It starts from home."

"If you fail to stand up, YOU murdabad."

I wanted to feel offended, but then thought of all the times I did not stand up. I felt so Murdabad.

"For every weak moment in my life when I did not stop because I felt I was outnumbered, and those harassing the girl were a big group, mujh par bhee laanat hai." Was this man speaking about me?

The group was talking to itself. It was speaking to the city. The city was talking to itself. This was a dialogue in the metropolis.

"Do not remain silent, Nirbhaya is watching." The poster was enough to break through the hestitation. "Rape is a crime; Silence is Rape # 2." Now, that made it difficult not to rise to the sloganeering bunch's call. "Aap naare ka jawab nahi do ge tau hamaari awaaz dab jaye gi." This group was not even saying they are a power. They were saying they were weak.

A policeman called me aside. “Sir ji, yeh mat samjhiyo hum aap ke saath nahi hain. Ghar par to hamaare bhee yahi baa thee ho rahi hai.” For a moment, I was tempted to count the cops also among our listeners.

Every now and then, slogans would take over. And then, a new slogan pierced through the hearts. "Sawaal Kar..Sawaal Kar". Question what? "Satta par sawaal kar," "Political parties par sawaal kar," "Media par sawaal kar," "Sampadak par sawaal kar." We were all responding with full gusto – "Sawaal kar, sawaal kar."

Then, the questions started becoming difficult. "Khud par sawaal kar," "Maa par sawaal kar," "Baap par sawaal kar."

But then, they seemed easier compared to what was coming next. "Phir sawaal par sawaal kar," "Phir jawab par sawaal kar," "Har baat par sawaal kar," "Har jawaab par sawaal kar."

Daljit Ami was on the loose. And he had got the pulse

of the people. It had already been four hours, four non-stop hours of a city talking to itself. There were moments in between when the crowd would dissipate, we would be left down to 100 odd people. A few slogans would again bring a bunch of fresh faces, all gathering around. There was no discipline. Who is to speak? For how long? Contradictions were aplenty.

"Women bodies are being commoditised. Look at our advertisements, how they denigrate women," someone who had got the megaphone was saying. Soon, the next speaker was slamming him: "When the answer is that simple – NO – which part of it confuses you? N? or O? No means no. The height of the skirt has nothing to do with it. Do not talk of their clothes. They rape the burqa clad ones, they rape infant girls, they rape matronly old women, they rape literally insane women in homes for mentally retarded. So stop this argument about what women should wear."

The mega phone had changed hands -- "What do you mean by saying 'They rape.'?" Rapist does not come from outside. And he pointed out to another poster.

"Next rapist will not come from the police. He will come from mine or your family, or our street, or the street next to it."

A lot of Chandigarh cops looked on, anger writ large on their faces. Few thought it was because five of their ilk had shamed them. Most thought the Chandigarh Police Murdabad sloganeering was enraging them. Meanwhile, another speaker was on the mega phone.

"Naak hamari bhee kaati huyee hai -- Aap ke paanch pakre gaye hain, hamaari bradari ka chamkta heera ghatiya kola nikla hai, Tarun Tejpal ne patarkaari ki naak kaat hai. Yeh larrayee naak bachaane ki hai."

Students from Kendri Gurdwara Singh Sabha also said their piece. “Our teacher said go and join the voice of the people,” one of them said. A young PU student, Divya, was angry that the debate explodes in the town square only when a rape happens. “What about my daily life? I step out from my home, walk through the market, go shopping, search for groceries... male gaze panning my every moment.” I was looking a little farther away, a young couple going hand-in-hand, a score pair of eyes following them.

By now, five hours had passed. The conversation was not stopping. It took some quick thinking on the part of Prof Manjit Singh to ask Ekam Moonak, a youngster with a mellifluous voice, to sing a song, and people joined in. The song was a perfect end to the dharna, to a dialogue, to a conversation.

This was a dharna? At times, I felt this was a seminar out in the chowk. I noticed Prof Meera Nanda (The God Market) standing at the edge of the crowd. I saw Prof Kuldeep Puri diligently watching every mood of the crowd. The few moments for which he spoke, I thought a sage has come to the town square. Prof Akshay Kumar took to the mike and seemed worried that in the broadspectrum of issues from Soni Sori to Manipur Manorama Mothers to Irom Sharmila to the state using rape as a weapon of intimidation and humiliation, we must not take the pressure off the Chandigarh Police. Rajiv Godara kept his counsel, watching everything, aware that talk about Aam Aadmi Party was happening on its own. Sarbjit Dhaliwal of The Tribune hung around for a long time. Khushal Lali, another inspired journalist, was there, too. “We are from Pukar, please always call us for such a cause, we will be there,” a bunch of youngsters were telling me about their NGO. “Why didn’t you call Tarlochan Singh of Punjabi Tribune? He is the one who writes really wonderfully about genuine issues?” Tarlochan is a friend; I was happy he was Zindabad even when absent. “Where’s Hamir Singh? How come he is not here?” someone asked me accusingly, as if I was guilty why one good man was less. “He was here most of the day, and he was an inspiration to us for even thinking of gathering here,” I responded. “Bande hee gine-chune ne ji shehar vich!” another piped up.

“Dhhayee totru.”

But I was thinking about this dharna and the dharna of the 44 teachers.

Only one of them could be called a dharna.

It is time for all of us to do a re-think. We have tried for decades those sit-on-a-durrie, raise-a-few-slogans, get-a-photo-clicked, issue-a-press-release dharnas. And we have tried this – no photos, no press releases, no durrie. A conversation with the city. A dialogue among ourselves. Prof Manjit Singh calls it Lok Awaz.

That's perhaps because there were 'Lok' in it, and they heard their 'Awaaz'. It has to be more intelligent than MURDABAD-ZINDABAD-INQUILAB.

That's the only way to ensure that somethings remain Murdabad, others Zindabad, and one day, we have an Inquilab.

Sawaal Kar... Dharna Par Bhee Sawaal Kar.


P.S. A journalist friend from Jalandhar suggested that the piece is perhaps too long, but then, when asked why should writers fall into media-induced word limits, agreed, saying, "Word length par bhee sawaal kar." The chowk is reaching across, friends.

TEHELKA ETC. You know the story too well, but do you know this?

Nischay Pal

By now, you know the story all too well. Already, the chatter is dying down. The TV channels need the OB vans somewhere else. Results of the semi-finals of electoral politics will soon be on the anvil. "Delhi without Shiela Dikshit?" –the headlines will scream soon. Madhya Pradesh is too big a state to spare any OB van for a girl crying hoarse that justice dispensing machinery is working in flawed ways.

But still, you know the story all too well.

You may not have known the story in slightly different circumstances.

What if it was the editor of a lesser known fly-by-night portal?

What if it were not Tehelka but some other magazine, one that did not have the history of having stung big guns of Indian politics?

What if the girl were not someone who would have been working in Tehelka but an unemployed woman hired only to assist in looking after certain logistical arrangements during the ThinkFest in Goa, not something as fancy as chaperoning a Hollywood star?

What if she had been too shocked in the initial moments or the few days following the incident, and had not confided in anyone about what happened?

What if a couple of friends that such a girl (not the former Tehelka employee but our unemployed girl in contractual arrangement with Tehelka) confided in had been afraid to later speak out? Or one had contradicted her version? After all, even in the actual case, talk about there being many "versions" did not take long to emerge.

But still, you know the story all too well.

This was a girl who came from a family where her father was a journalist and a former colleague of Tarun Tejpal. This was a girl who had known some of India's top journalists first hand even as a child. This was a girl who was working in a top-of-the-line journalism brand like Tehelka. This was a girl who was professionally so excellent that she could be entrusted with chaperoning Robert de Nero and his daughter around Goa.

As I said, you already know the story all too well.

This was a girl whose communication skills surpassed many of the rookie journalists who come from small towns across India, landing in cities like Delhi or Mumbai, all starry-eyed and fired with ideas of impressing the bosses and giving their best, taking for granted that their bosses who run newspapers and magazines and TV channels will stand up to oppose every single wrong.

This was a girl who could muster the courage to write in horryfying detail what she had suffered in that godforsaken lift, and later as lies and innenduoes and obfuscation and outright pressure took over.

This was a girl who, at a young age, had forged friendships close enough and strong enough that they endured the crunch-test. Her friends chose to stand by her, bear witness, resign from their jobs, not to waver. Not everyone is that fortunate in finding friends such as these. Not many journalistic pieces have given them their due. Each one of them proved to be as brave as the girl who decided not to stay silent.

Of course, you that story all too well.

Now, think of a girl at a small shop, working as a sales girl. Think of it being a shop that sells women undergarments. Let's sound more polite and call it lingerie. It becomes easy to have "conversations heavily loaded with context". You don't even need references to "rain" and "thunderclouds".

Think of a female nurse at a small-time hospital where references to body parts can become "heavily loaded with context", particularly if Punjab's killer roads become lazy some night, not sending too many blood-soaked patients, and the senior male nurse has little to do but make casual comment or "indulge in light-hearted banter." Please do not cry off and accuse me of defaming the pious profession of medicine. Why can't a male nurse on a full-of-free-time night indulge in a little banter the like of which they do in certain other organisations? What a "poor understanding" of nurse-nurse relationship in a small time clinic in a small time town in the dead of the night?

Think of a primary school teacher in any Punjab town where English medium schools have been mushrooming in every third street, employing teachers at monthly salaries equal to what the coffee-serving barista makes in tips in a week at any decent coffee lounge. If I am wrong in that particular calculation, I wonder if the teacher will point it out. My experience is that their visits to these coffee lounges are a bit too infrequent. But I am sure the light hearted banter comes easy at the expense of a young woman teacher for whom the low-paying job is the only lifeline unless she wants to travel by bus everyday for an hour and a half to the school in a nearby town where she will get better salary. And then, where is the guarantee that someone will not indulge in light hearted banter there?

And if you would rather picture a teacher who goes to these coffee joints, and is not posted in any small town but a city as swank as Chandigarh, you will notice that many of these coffee joints have posters that can trigger/prompt context-loaded conversations. All one needs to remark is that it is not just the coffee that is hot. Presumably, context will take over and banter can be tried. No need to keep the lift in circulation. If it leads to uproar, arguments can be marshalled at will -- no fiduciary relationship, it was an open place, not a lift, there were people around, and besides, what was she doing these having coffee post-school timings?

But then, you know such stories all too well.

You know of the ones that happened at Tehelka. Or the one in which the girl was an intern with a former Supreme Court judge. Or the ones in which the girl was a JNU student and working at Indian International Film Festival in Goa. These girls were empowered. They were all in fiduciary relationship. They could communicate. They were in cities where OB vans can be marshalled for a high eyeballs story. They could each write a complaint in English. They had enough confidence to communicate with sharp journalists. They could muster the courage to fiercely keep their identities secret.

But TV channels cannot spare camera teams for incidents at shops, in small time clinics, or private schools. Local neighbourhood cop may not be as tough as Inspector Sunita Sawant of Goa police. And the woman nurse/salesgirl/teacher may not have the added advantage of the country's top anchors breathing down the neck of the accused and his apologists night after night after night.

Of course, you also know how the story turned even in Goa.

Even Tarun Tejpal could not resist the temptation of indulging in character assassination. His references to the girl partying after his assault seemed to be so much in tune with what an Asaram might have come up with. In fact, remember that Tejpal's comment on the girl partying was based as per legal advice. Well, Tejpal is in good company. There was no dearth of people who thought it was alright to pump a bullet into a girl who refuses to give you a drink after the bar closes -- "After all, what was Jessica Lal doing there, serving drinks?"

Prurient interest in the story was in keeping with Tejpal's "lapse of judgment". Those who know I have friends who have earlier worked in Tehelka were calling to ask where they can find the name of the girl. Some told me they were able to look up her picture on the internet. "Do you have the complete mail? The actual mail?" a senior reporter working with a top newspaper with edition in Chandigarh asked me. This after much of what the mail contained had become public knowledge.

But I am sure you know that part of the story well, also. Worse, the salesgirl/nurse/teacher also know that story. That’s why you don’t read about it all the time, or your daily newspaper would be full of such episodes every single day. Less than rape, it is not news. And you know that too, don’t you?

So has it become easier after Tehelka-Tejpal-Supreme Court judge intern-JNU student/IFFI episode for the salesgirl/nurse/teacher to raise their voice if someone suffers a lapse of judgement?

Let that be your bantering subject tonight.

For all those having, possessing, or having read or circulated the Tehelka girl's mail, just try to picture someone who know closely -- a sister, a wife, a mother, a close friend, a girl friend, a friend's close friend, a cousin, a cousin's close friend -- in that lift. Now try and visualise if any of you would have the sense, the courage and the persistence to write that mail.

You know the answer to that too well, don't you?

The only thing that I would want to know is from where does a girl so molested and so traumatised find such calmness in her heart to say just the right thing in just the right words to just the right persons and confide in just the right friends, and then stay the course of the truth and dignity and everything that one elusive thing that each one of us must aspire for - the courage to refuse to be cowed down when one is right? From where?

Neither you nor I know the exact answer to that, and you and I both know that, too well.

Let's All Become Political

Because We All Would Love To Be Environmentalists

To be an environmentalist

is to be political. To ask

about teacher-student ratio 

in government primary schools 

is to be political. To try and 

understand what genetically 

modified foods can do to our

future is to be political. To 

question our law makers about

big dams, about the need for super 

highways, about the malls dotting 

our cities, about the SEZ’s 

everywhere, is political. On this 

environment day, let's all resolve

to be political.

Being political is about being human. 

Rajneeti is not about a Bollywood film. 

It is about us.

Nischay Pal

PUNJAB NEEDS TO become relevant. Every Punjabi wishes for that. "But are we not relevant already," one may ask. The simple answer is, we were. At one time, we were the food grain providers extra ordinary. And on top of that, we are a border state. As long as South Asia remained an unstable zone, we were very relevant.

Academics, students joining a protest against BT BRINJAL at
Panjab University, Chandigarh

Now, with agriculture in stagnation and many other states catching up and becoming food grain providers to the national granary, Punjab is losing its prime relevance.
We are well on our way to become a super power, at least in the region we inhabit. With India and Pakistan no more hyphenated by the world, and certainly not by the United States, we can well forget a full scale war scenario in the near or even distant future.
So even that one aspect of life that made us seriously relevant is now fading away.
With just 13 MPs in the Lok Sabha in coalition times, and with three parties to share the numbers, Punjab is no more relevant even in the one House that matters.
That brings us face to face with a worrying reality: Punjab's intervention in the Indian national political scene is virtually missing.
Unfortunately, an impression seems to have been generated, more because of the force of circumstances than any serious application of mind, that an intervention is possible only through the arena of electoral politics. That leaves only the mainstream hankerers after party tickets as any serious interventionists.
It is time people in Punjab ponder seriously about our missing civil society. Is it not possible to remain relevant without spending scarce and precious resources in election campaigning?
A whole number of engaged institutions involved in the social and religious domain stay away from the elections, as do many bodies in the field of education, culture and intellectual exercises. This is a phenomena seen the world over. Why should Punjab's men of letters, academicians, activists, NGOs not prefer to avoid being dragged into the dirty cesspool of electoral politics?
Some will call it the right approach as our politicians have little use for men of intellect or those making any real contribution towards the community and society but it will be naive to think that such a deduction is absolutely right.
A community's political life is more nuanced and subtle than a simple rejection of the election process or a decision to stay away from it, at least proactively, and confine oneself to merely trudging to the polling booth and casting our votes.
Democracy is not merely about casting the vote. That is a reductionist view of democracy that the politicians have or love. Entrenched interests in Punjab have deliberately reduced the definition of democracy to a so-called gift to the people of an ability to vote every five years. Punjabis need to interpret the democratic notions more broadly and see the ways in which one can engage oneself with the democratic process.
We see in Punjab that the political parties often do not take a stand on issues that impact our lives but make much noise about certain other issues. This happens because we do not have engaged activists and a concerned media that asks the right questions.
For example, what is the Akali Dal's stand on Foreign Direct Investment caps in media sector? Or the Samajwadi Party's stand on the Sri Lanka question? What do we know about the Bahujan Samaj Party's stand on the Kashmir issue? Will Sardar Rattan Singh Ajnala please tell us his view on the big dams, since he has a vote in Parliament? And what is Navjot Singh Sidhu's view on Copenhagen's failures?
Parties at the state level think they can afford to simply stay mum and not have a view on most matters and they have coached their electorate in such ways that there is no pressure on them to spell out their policy.
But must that be the Punjabis' approach? Should we not question more sharply so that at least we force political parties to send better equipped men and women to Parliament who can draft laws and vote on them with some visible grey matter usage?
All we need to do is to make ourselves aware of the issues and then understand that  electoral politics is not the only way to make an intervention in politics. Of the many ways of making a meaningful change through politics, the electoral politics is only one. There are umpteen examples of how a meaningful change can be made in the realm of ideation and in pursuing policy matters. A movement on the political front may not necessarily come through the electoral arena. Our politicians, or at least most of them, are masters of the political electoral arena which has place only for the corrupted and the degenerate. We are all aware of the role of money, muscle and mafia in the elections, and the story remains the same not just in the Lok Sabha polls but also Assembly, municipal committees and even panchayat elections.
Let us look at the ways in which people have impacted the political debate in India without being sucked into the vortex of dirty electioneering. Look at the work of Aruna Roy, a Chennai-born self-less Indian political and social activist who quit the IAS in mid-70s and is known for her campaigns to better the lives of the rural poor and empowered millions in Rajasthan through successful enactment of Rajasthan Right to Information Act and is largely credited with the success of RTI Act across India. This Magsaysay Award winner has impacted the course of political debate in India more than anyone among us.
Consider Jean Drèze, a development economist of Belgian origin who along with Amartya Sen has extensively engaged with issues of rural poverty, famine, policy reforms etc and has empowered millions with his relentless work on an employment guarantee scheme in India which ensures work for the poor.
All those who are behind a scheme like the NREGA are people who have made a significant contribution towards saving hundreds of thousands of lives and are giving hope to millions. It is easy to sit back and blast NREGA if one if one is devoid of the notions of poverty but for those who know Indian politics, it should be clear that the RTI and NREGA are two center pieces of a work that has been pushed by people essentially outside the electoral arena.
Men like Rajendra Singh, the well known water conservationist from Alwar, Rajasthan who won the Ramon Magsaysay Award for community leadership for his pioneering work in water management and holy men like Baba Balbir Singh Seechewal and Sant Sewa Singh of Khadoor Sahib can impact the terms of political debate in Punjab more than the lip service being paid by the politicians to the falling ground water table and the state of our rivers.
Where are the civil society activists working to save Punjab? Had a political party been working single-mindedly to focus on the state of our government-run schools, it would have meant more for the people than the filibustering on umpteen issues. We hardly have a proactive NGO other than Seechewal's efforts or that of the Kheti Virasat Mission on the environment front.
Politics is changing, and also changing are the ways in which one is seen as political. For far too long we have remained stuck in a groove in which talking about certain issues is considered politics and rest be damned.
It is time that we became political, time that we understood that Rajinder Singh's ideas of saving and harvesting water, Seechewal's resistance to dumping industrial waste into rivers, all the talk about environment, Umendra Dutt's loud protests against Bt Brinjal and chemical fertilisers are not just about environment; they are hugely political interventions. These actions will be deciding our politics. Punjab's politicians are pushing the envelope on the neo-liberal urban centric model of development which is leaving out and aside the teeming millions. Across India, more than eight million people have been pushed out of agriculture and there is no record or study of where they went and what they are doing. In Punjab, apathy has replaced the feeling of ennui which replaced the feeling of guilt whenever the number of people who committed suicide is mentioned. Every 30 minutes in India, one farmer has been committing suicide since 1997 (that is, ever since the government started collecting data). That the data itself is highly conservative and deliberately understated is a separate story. In Punjab, one farmer commits suicide every day, as per the latest data being compiled by the Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana.
Those who have been demanding land reforms, the farmers who know the best how to save the environment are at the receiving end. The corporate media in Punjab has remained completely silent after the day light murder of a tall farmer leader.
Has any political party made an issue of the fact that thousands seemed to have committed suicide at a time when Punjab revenue records, cited by the state government, showed merely 130 suicides? To be an environmentalist is to be political. To ask about teacher-student ratio in government primary schools is to be political. To try and understand what genetically modified foods can do to our future is to be political.
On this environment day, let's all resolve to be political.

(Readers can obtain old issue of PUNJAB TODAY  by writing to Editor-in-Chief, mentioning the issue number or the article. You can 

Politics Sans Morality

Bir Devinder Singh

The unrest among different sections of the society and the bloodshed being indulged in violence engineered by terrorist outfits is a challenge that the leadership in our country faces today. It is indicative of a deep rooted malaise of intolerance. What breeds intolerance and who is responsible for this? Why the golden principles of democracy seem going asunder? Have the people lost faith in the values the democratic set up represents? The answer is certainly 'No'. One needs to think dispassionately with clinical precision.
    The fact that it is happening at a time when people at the top of our political pyramid are doubtlessly the gems of our times is all the more ironic. We have people leading the country who have demonstrated beyond even a whiff of doubt qualities of selflessness and monumental integrity.

The speech on the inauguration of the State of Nagaland on December 1, 1963 by late Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishanan, the second President of India, clearly lays down the ground rules of governance: "The rule of law and government by the consent of the governed are the essence of democracy. Government must be the custodian of the general welfare of the people and not of any special interest. The government must capture the hearts and the minds of the people…."  In the days of yore, our national leaders used to keep a direct line to the people, a direct channel of communication. They did not let the so-called "threat perceptions" to come between them and the people. Perhaps it was because of such an approach that the people also reciprocated. They would suffer the vagaries of nature to welcome their leaders, not because someone had organized and arranged a roadshow but because someone was out to get to know the people intimately.
Today, the leaders in top governmental posts are playing into the hands of such people who have established a proximity through shady methods but whom the people have not accepted because of their black deeds. These are the second rung leaders who have attained this position through "number two" deals in trade and business. They are looking for more comfortable abodes and are trying their hand at politics as their chosen vocation. They are throwing crores into the business of politics and are managing to get into state legislatures or the Parliament. Once there, the nexus between politics and money becomes only stronger. They become proxy for their feudal political bosses. Such an approach to politics isolates the teeming millions who were to be stakeholders in democracy.
The leaders on the top rung are thus lost to the people whom they govern. When people cry because of policies that inflict untold miseries on them, their voice does not even reach the political top hierarchy because the entire system of communication channels collapses by then.
 The above new class of neo-rich politicians is joined by the bureaucrats as well as people in the judiciary. Even the bureaucrats are being convicted for amassing ill-gotten wealth whereas the political leaders in the country who set the wheels of corruption into motion and make no secret of it by displaying the ill-gotten fortunes, go scot free.
If a whistle blower raises an alarm, more often than not it is the whistle blower himself who gets the stick, a tribute to the kind of pimping that has crept into the system. Even the charges as serious as wholesale massacre of minorities take decades to bring the perpetrators of such heinous crime to justice. Appallingly, the people going to the Courts in the hope for justice get judgments but not justice. Generations after generations feel trampled in their fight in the courts due to the snail-paced process of justice delivery system. Those who can manage money to pay the hefty fees of lawyers render the doctrine of "Equality before Law" redundant for the poor underprivileged classes in the country.
I wish there were no sympathizers for the demons of corruption but that seems to be a wishful thinking. The cancerous growth of corruption in the system has eaten up the vitals of all the three organs of the democratic government i.e. the Legislature, the Executive and the Judiciary. Fortunately, the only silver lining exists due to the emergence of the fourth pillar - the Press. It has braved all allurements and maintained the confidence of the masses, fearlessly unearthing the scams and scandals paralyzing the working of the other three wings of the Government. The clean politics itself is becoming a utopian wish. The vitiated atmosphere all around makes the honest living a curse. The confluence of circumstances surrounding a common man has convinced the people that except money, no other consideration works for someone who has legitimate aspirations to play a role in politics. The things have now reached such a pass where the people have started hating the very term 'politician'. This clearly is the outcome of a vacuum between the people and their leaders. In this paradigm of politics without morality, we are seeing the emergence and empowerment of pseudo-leaders who are far removed from ground realities and are busy amassing wealth and comforts. Their pursuits are marked by insensitivity towards the concerns of their electorate.
Such a class of leaders has no qualms about the fact that they are facing trial for corruption charges in courts. Instead, they are happy to  attend such court hearings by arriving in chartered aircrafts. On display is not humility before law but the abundance of their resources. Rousing receptions that clearly take millions to be arranged have become the order of the day. That receptiosn mark the entry of the leader into the court premises or while he walks out after n'th such appearance says something about our politics.
 The first casualty in this entire scheme of things is the ground level worker, the first line of interaction of the party with the people. He has no contact with the top leader. He knows what's wrong but the channel through which that information was to flow upwards stands destroyed. The spirited workers of parties, all parties, feel cheated, disgruntled and starved of ideological living because their voice is lost in the din of these money minting political bosses.
 Names like that of Mahatma Gandhi, Jawahar Lal Nehru, Lal Bahadur Shashtri, Sardar Patel and Maulana Azad are invoked by those who do not even have a passing acquaintance with the ideals espoused by these leaders. The Mafiosi only besmirch the names of these saints by uttering them from their lips.
Every unrest in the country is viewed from a rather queer angle. Instead of looking at the root cause of the social problems, the neo rich politicians coin different and ready catch phrases that offer ready-made solutions to their bosses by dubbing unrests with clichéd terms like Naxalites, Maoists, Militancy etc.. This makes it possible to turn a blind eye without seeming even guilty for failure to comprehend the real cause of such unrests.
 Leaders have lost contact with the masses because of walls created by minions who have managed to become their lieutenants through unfair and unprincipled routes. Once the aspirations of the masses find no apt expression in the system of governance, they are propelled to adopt the last painful resort - violence.
 It is with much humility that I beg and solicit the kind indulgence of the leaders of the political parties to read the writing on the wall. It is possible for you to dust away this new class of neo-rich political feudals and put an end to political slavery. If you do not act now, even this option will be lost since these parasites are becoming increasingly strong. The leaders must realize that such a class of politicians is injecting the venom of hubris which is overwhelmingly present in their working attitude. A golden rule for any leader is to preserve his humility which is possible only in the field with the men one is privileged to lead. Give a sympathetic hearing to the critics within the party who take the cudgels to call a spade a spade. Hail those who call a spade a bloody shovel. Sometimes voice of dissent is motivated by the practical wisdom and manifestation of the conscience of the critic and does not always qualify to be treated within the parameters of contempt by the authorities that be.
If the most legitimate aspirations of people even after 60 years of independence remain unsatisfied, the nation may plunge headlong into civil war between the 'haves' and the 'have-nots". You will not even get to know the bitter realities gnawing away at the roots of the political system should you chose to listen and see only what is served through a system of sieves set up by political minions. Be bold, venture out and establish direct public contact. Out there are people dying to be heard.
The voice of disagreement is proving to be a curse for humble and committed workers in the present day political system. The sifting of information should be done at level of the people who are known for their integrity and not left to the interpretation of a coterie of vested interests who often gather around the leadership. It is time the humble workers are made part of the thought process as against the system of decision making where the politicians, the contractors, the bus permit wallah, the cement wallah, the sand quarrying syndicate and the liquor vend monolpolists sit together to decide how to make the state progress. Their idea of progress is not the people's idea of progress.
 When an individual blunders, it is unfortunate and it affects the fortunes of a family but when a leader as a ruler fails, his failure has the potential to adversely affect the future of the nation and such a failure becomes a national tragedy. We need to remedy the situation we are apprehending today. The morality and value system must find its due place in the stream of our polity. Otherwise, we are doomed today, and shall stay doomed tomorrow.