With the recent coup d'état in the neighbouring country, Indian security calculus does not get unduly upset, moral posturing aside
Seen from the prism of values and sovereign moralities, the tripping of democracy by the Junta in Myanmar should concern India. Seen from the prism of realism, realpolitik and practical leverages, the change of governance in Myanmar really doesn’t matter. While this realisation may be morally untenable, lessons from history would remind India that it has suffered more than gained whenever it defined bilateral relations on the basis of “moral” position, viz; formalising ties with Israel as late as in 1992. A more nuanced approach of retaining “moral” positions is practised by democracies like the US, who have no qualms in allying with autocratic Sheikhdoms in the Middle East, whilst still posturing for democratic reforms therein — basically, fronting “national interest” over enthusiasm for democracy or liberality in other regimes.
Whereas such overt romance with ideological concerns led India to publicly support the supposedly pro-democracy moorings of Aung San Suu Kyi for decades, much to the consternation of Myanmar’s Junta who faced no such conundrum in dealing with China, alternatively. Importantly, even though the Junta had perennial suspicion of China meddling in its ethnic-based insurgencies such as the United Wa State Army (as opposed to harbouring any such concern towards India) — the “moral” intransigence expressed by India and, conversely, the ease of doing business with China ensured the relative comfort of dealing with Beijing for the Junta. The vanity and inefficacy of India’s misplaced “morality” in foreign policy was obvious when Suu Kyi barely reciprocated India’s unstinted support to her, during her days in the Opposition, as she was coldly practical and transactional in persisting with the China tilt as it served her interests better vis-à-vis India, “morality” be damned.
The “opening up” of the economy in the early 1990s had a spillover impact beyond the realm of economics as it ushered in a governance culture of much-needed pragmatism and “self-interest”, which expanded into Indian diplomatese. In 2004, Junta strongman Gen Than Shwe visited India and signed an assurance that “Myanmar would not permit its territory to be used by any hostile element for harming Indian interests”. Even from a deeply hyphenated Indo-Chinese perspective of one-upmanship, Than Shwe had expressed categorical support to India’s candidature for permanent membership of the UN Security Council. The murmurs of Chinese “influence” notwithstanding, the Junta was conversant with the Chinese tact of keeping the kettle boiling along its restive borders with Myanmar to have a constant leverage in Naypyidaw. India perceptibly harboured no such expansionist instincts. Soon the Junta denied oxygen to multiple India-facing insurgent groups along the 1600-km Indo-Myanmar border, a crucial step that aided the quelling of various North-eastern insurgencies. Than Shwe returned to India in 2010, reconfirming the “balance” achieved in Indian diplomacy to handle its own interests along with ideological posturing seamlessly.
In 2011, Than Shwe passed on the Junta’s leadership to his protégé Gen Min Aung Hlaing, who navigated the delicate transition to democracy while still holding key levers. Aung Hlaing visited India in 2017 and confabulated extensively with its security establishment. By now, Indians had realised the parallel and irreplaceable heft of the Myanmar Generals, concurrently with its civilian Government. Since then, India upped its military sales, investments and engagements with Myanmar. Last year, India gave it a prized Kilo-class submarine that had been refitted, the first ever supply of such a platform from India to any country. The Myanmar Military (Tatmadaw) acknowledged and reciprocated India’s overtures, in the full know of its larger intent to checkmate China from making deeper inroads. Thereafter, a rare combined visit by the Indian Army chief and the Foreign Secretary to Myanmar was suggestive of the deliberate outreach, irrespective of the brewing turf wars between the Myanmar Generals and the civilian Government. Now the Tatmadaw has shed all pretences of running a parallel show and ended the diarchy.
Beyond the hoopla surrounding the 2015 surgical strike against insurgent groups based in Myanmar, the clear understanding with the Junta had resulted in similar strikes in 1995 and 2006, and a formal agreement facilitating cross-border access had been signed in 2010. Myanmar is keen to focus its military attention and redeploy troops on its anti-insurgency operations in the Northern and Eastern borders with China, which hosts most of the anti-Myanmar groups. However, China’s stakes and investments in Myanmar remain unmatched and, unlike India, it does not shy away from taking an amoral position in favour of Naypyidaw, such as boycotting talks on the Rohingya issue in the Security Council. Yet, despite China’s continued beneficence, Myanmar remains sceptical of Beijing’s game. India had come a long way in understanding the region’s fragility and in the merits of retaining the equation with forces like the Junta. Additionally, the Indian Army chief has tenured personally in Myanmar as India’s Defence Attaché and therefore would be well versed with the local dynamics and stakeholders. With the recent coup d’état in Myanmar, Indian security calculus does not get unduly upset, moral posturing aside.
(The writer, a military veteran, is a former Lt Governor of Andaman & Nicobar Islands and Puducherry. The views expressed are personal.)
An anti-intellectual attitude is often part and parcel of a politically influential middle-class that has a strong dislike for what it sees as ‘political elite’
One point that supporters of Prime Minister Imran Khan really like to assert is that, “he is a self-made man.” They insist that the country should be led by people like him and not by those who were “born into wealth and power.” According to the American historian Richard Hofstadter, such views are largely aired by the middle-classes. To Hofstadter, this view also has an element of “anti-intellectualism.” He says that, as the middle-class manages to attain political influence, it develops a strong dislike for what it sees as “political elite.” But since this elite has more access to better avenues of education, the middle-class also develops an anti-intellectual attitude, insisting that, as a ruler, a self-made man is better than a better educated man. Khan’s core support comes from Pakistan’s middle-classes. And even though he graduated from the prestigious Oxford University, he is more articulate when speaking about cricket — a sport that turned him into a star — than about anything related to what he is supposed to be addressing as the country’s Prime Minister.
But many of his supporters do not have a problem with this, especially in contrast to his equally well-educated opponents, Bilawal Bhutto and Maryam Nawaz, who sound a lot more articulate in matters of politics. To Khan’s supporters, these two are “dynastic elite” who cannot relate to the sentiments of the common man. It’s another matter that Khan is not the kind of self-made man that his supporters would like people to believe. He came from a well-to-do family that had roots in the country’s military-bureaucracy establishment. He went to prestigious educational institutions and spent most of his youth as a socialite in London. Indeed, whereas the Bhutto and Sharif offsprings were born into power which is aiding their climb in politics, Khan’s political ambitions were carefully nurtured by the military establishment.
Nevertheless, perhaps conscious of the fact that his personality is not suited to support an intellectual bent, Khan has positioned himself as a self-made man who appeals to the ways of the common man. He doesn’t. For example, wearing the national dress and using common everyday Urdu does not cut it anymore. It did when ZA Bhutto did the same. But years after his demise in 1979, such populist antics have become a cliche. The difference between the two is that Bhutto was a bonafide intellectual. Even his idea to present himself as a “people’s man” was born from a rigorous intellectual scheme. However, Khan does appeal to that particular middle-class disposition that Hofstadter was writing about. When he attempts to sound profound, his views usually appear to be a mishmash of theories of certain Islamic and so-called “post-Colonial” scholars. The result is rhetoric that actually ends up smacking of anti-intellectualism.
So what is anti-intellectualism? It is understood to be a view that is hostile to intellectuals. According to Walter Houghton, the term’s first known usage dates back to 1881 in England, when science and ideas such as the “separation of religion and the State”, and the “supremacy of reason” had gained momentum. This triggered resentment in certain sections of British society who began to suspect that intellectuals were formulating these ideas to undermine the importance of theology and long-held traditions. According to the American historian Robert Cross, as populism started to become a major theme in American politics in the early 20th Century, some mainstream politicians politicised anti-intellectualism as a way to portray themselves as men of the people. For example, US Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and Woodward Wilson insisted that “character was more important than intellect.”
Across the 20th Century, the politicised strand of anti-intellectualism was active in various regions. Communist regimes in China, the Soviet Union and Cambodia systematically eliminated intellectuals after describing them as remnants of overthrown bourgeoisie cultures. In Germany, the far-Right intelligentsia differentiated between “passive intellectuals” and “active intellectuals.” Apparently, passive intellectuals were abstract and thus useless whereas the active ones were “men of action.” Hundreds of passive intellectuals were harassed or killed in Nazi Germany.
According to the US historian of science Michael Shermer, a more curious idea of anti-intellectualism began to develop within Western academia as “postmodernism” had begun to hijack various academic disciplines in the 1990s. Postmodernism emerged in the 20th Century as a critique of modernism and derided it as a destructive force that had used its ideas of secularism, democracy, economic progress, science and reason as tools of subjugation. “Post-colonialism” or the critique of the remnants of Western colonialism was very much a product of postmodernism as well.
Imran Khan is a classic example of how “postmodernism” and “post-colonialism” have become cynical anti-intellectual pursuits. Khan often reminds us that social and economic progress should not be undertaken to please the West because that smacks of a colonial mindset. So, as his regime presides over a nosediving economy and severe political polarisation, Khan was recently reported as discussing with his Ministers whether he should mandate the wearing of the dupatta (a stole) by all women TV anchors. Go figure.
The views expressed are personal.
Courtesy: Dawn
It's a risk but genuine conservatives have no future in a party under Donald Trump anyway
If the Republican Party splits, what name should the breakaway party use? The Conservative Party, maybe? This question has not become a burning issue yet, because it’s far from clear that the Republican Party really will split. After all, a majority out of the 50 Republican senators are going to vote against impeaching former President Donald Trump in the trial that opened in the Senate. That doesn’t sound like they are getting ready to chuck him out of the party. There’s Rand Paul, the Kentucky Republican senator who took the lead in demanding that the charge against Trump of “incitement of insurrection against the Republic” be set aside. “Impeachment is for removal from office and the accused here has already left office,” he said, parroting the party’s excuse for refusing to convict Trump without actually condoning the attempted coup. But on January 6, just hours after the mob had left the Capitol building, Paul spoke strongly against the idea that anybody in Congress should try to reverse the election outcome certified by the States, the very thing that Trump had sent the mob to force the Congress to do. The man is clearly conflicted, and so is his party. But there’s a deeper story here. Compare what the Republican Party did in the House of Representatives on February 3 in a secret vote and then what it did on January 4 in an open public vote.
Last Wednesday the Republican members of the House, voting in closed caucus, confirmed Republican Liz Cheney as third senior-most Republican in the lower chamber even though she had “betrayed” Donald Trump by voting for his impeachment. The vote wasn’t even close: 145 in favour of keeping her in post, only 61 against. The following day, in an open vote on whether Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene, a fanatical Trump loyalist, should keep her seat on several congressional committees despite her shocking and controversial views, the Republicans voted to keep her in place by 199 to 11. Greene believes that the California wildfires were set by Jewish laser beams from space and shares Q-Anon conspiracy theories. She lost her committee seats anyway, because all the Democrats voted to force her out. But in a secret vote, most of those Republican Congressmen would also have disowned her, probably by the same two-to-one majority they gave in support of Liz Cheney. The Republican members of Congress may be weak and cowardly, but most are not wicked. In an open vote they felt they had to back Greene, because otherwise Trump’s loyalists back in their home districts would ensure that they never got elected again. But they’d love to dump him if they could do it safely.
It won’t be that easy, because Trump is terrifying if you are within reach of his wrath, as all but a few of these men and women are. But those two wildly contradictory votes are telling us that the Republican Party will probably split. What remains to be settled is which successor will survive in the long term. When political parties split, it doesn’t usually end well for the faction that appears to have stormed out. The ones who stay behind in the “old” party keep the bank accounts and the donor lists and they also tend to look more mature, which can be a big political advantage in a turbulent time. So the first priority for the sane wing of the Republicans must be to provoke a split as soon as possible — and make sure that it looks like the Trumpites did it. That shouldn’t be hard to arrange with Trump at the helm. It’s a risk, but genuine conservatives have no future in a party that’s under his thumb anyway. Wouldn’t that split the vote on the right? Yes, but it’s too late to worry about that. Maybe the Democrats will win again in the mid-term elections in 2022, but if the split happens soon the civil war could be over and the Republican Party rebuilt on a better foundation by 2024. There’s a good chance that Trump will be full gaga by then but still hanging on, which would help the process along.
(Gwynne Dyer's new book is 'Growing Pains: The Future of Democracy and Work.' The views expressed are personal.)
Before the pandemic, the WHO had predicted that by 2020, around 20 per cent of India's population would suffer from mental illnesses. Now, this number is expected to go up
Experts believe that there will be a surge in cases of mental illness in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic due to the lasting mental and emotional impact of physical distancing, quarantine and socio-economic factors. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), every 40 seconds a person dies by suicide. A paper by the Indian Council of Medical Research showed that in 2017, a whopping 197 million Indians were suffering from mental disorders, of whom 46 million had depressive disorders and 45 million had anxiety disorders. The spread of the Coronavirus only aggravated the situation. So deep is the fear of the virus that people with no history of mental illness have developed serious psychological problems for the first time, including borderline personality disorder, psychosis, mood disorder, depression and psychotic episodes, as a result of the social distancing and quarantining that is required. Anxiety, irritability, anger, insomnia, stress and emotional exhaustion stand out as being very common during the pandemic as evidenced by the increased number of suicides across the world. India is no exception to this crisis.
The prolonged and unprecedented countrywide lockdowns, restricted movement and limited availability of public services led to increased loneliness, stress and anxiety, stranding many people in rental apartments or boarding houses away from home. According to a survey conducted by the Indian Psychiatric Society, within a week of the lockdown, the number of reported cases of mental illness in India rose by 20 per cent. A report by the WHO reveals that 7.5 per cent of the Indian population suffers from some form of mental disorder and it accounted for nearly 15 per cent of the global mental, neurological and substance abuse disorder burden. Before the pandemic, the WHO had predicted that by 2020, around 20 per cent of India's population would suffer from mental illnesses. Now, with the country in the grip of the contagion, this number is expected to go up. India's National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro-Sciences (NIMHANS) reveals that nearly 150 million Indians need active intervention, whereas fewer than 30 million get it.
Different people were affected differently by the pandemic. Many were stuck at home with disoriented families or abusive relationships. This can be juxtaposed with several others who were able to reconnect with their families and loved ones better during the lockdown, yet the consequences of the pandemic like loss of jobs, fear of death and so on, led to anxiety. According to the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy, there has been a sharp rise in unemployment to 27.11 per cent with daily wage workers (urban poor and migrant labourers) being the worst hit. According to a survey conducted by Impact and Policy Research Institute (IMPRI), 56 per cent of the urban poor were found to be anxious about their financial future. This was not only limited to individuals, even families committed suicide due to financial stress. Frontline healthcare workers experienced stress and burnout due to the shortage of supplies and rapidly increasing cases. Delayed payments and reduced incomes are adding to the stress. With schools closed for nearly ten months the lives of millions of students in India are in a limbo, leading to lack of personal space and separation from their friends. Even though the senior children have been able to go back to school, the younger students are still stuck at home. The digital divide also led to feelings of deprivation, resulting in increased incidents of suicides among students. People with disabilities and senior citizens too are feeling vulnerable to the virus and fear gaps in healthcare, isolation and dependency on their loved ones. Hence, India’s mental health burden is set to increase.
Sadly, mental health treatment is expensive due to a huge gap in demand and supply of qualified professionals for those seeking help. Even health insurance does not adequately cover mental illness treatment despite the existence of the Mental Healthcare Act, 2017, where offering insurance for mental health ailments has been made mandatory by law. Outpatient treatment, therapies and counselling cost thousands, which effectively excludes the middle and lower income groups. Moreover, there exists inadequate knowledge or awareness about the subject, which makes the situation dire. Plus, India has the added challenge of stigma attached to mental health that can be classified into two: Public stigma and self-stigma.
Public stigma involves the prejudices and beliefs endorsed by the common man. This, in general influences personal feelings. Public stigma such as fear, exclusion and authoritarianism lead to the exclusion of mentally ill people from mainstream society. Research has shown that people are less likely to pity persons with mental illness, instead reacting to psychiatric disability with anger and believing that help is not deserved. Sadly, public stigma translates into self-stigma where an individual's self-confidence is eroded due to constant exclusion and fear and they start harming themselves. This results in suicides and sometimes murders of others in extreme cases. Stigma results in reluctance to seek help or treatment, lack of understanding by the family, friends, co-workers or others, fewer opportunities for work, school, social activities, trouble finding housing, bullying, physical violence or harassment. The stereotype attached with the treatment of mental illness — where it is believed that everyone with a mental disorder has to be admitted to a mental asylum — is stopping people from seeking proper treatment. The most worrying factor is that people in India are dealing with two pandemics. One is the virus, the other is the “infodemic” that has dominated all social media platforms and has resulted in increased time spent online. Increasingly new crimes, trends and terms are being identified due to the extreme use of social media. The lives of people are being run by social media which encourages jealousy, hatred and is breeding a judgmental group of people. According to a study conducted by the Population Foundation of India, among the youth of three States during the lockdown and subsequent reopening of the economy, 68 per cent respondents in Uttar Pradesh reported an increase in social media use. Of those respondents who reported feeling depressed, social media use was higher at 92 per cent. These figures show that people in India are dealing with dual pandemics.
The significance of ensuring dissemination of correct information and dispelling myths and pseudo-scientific practices cannot be emphasised enough. At the same time, global grassroots policy experiences suggest that in a country like India, health-related information alone helps little. It is imperative to bring behavioural changes to reap maximum benefits from public health interventions. To what extent such changes can be brought about in a short period is debatable, yet remains critical as the outbreak is expected to linger till the end of this year.
Social and behavioural change communication (SBCC) may be employed as a potential strategy to increase awareness of the effectiveness and the necessity of preventive measures. SBCC employs mass media, community-level activities, interpersonal communication, information and communications technology and new media to carry out its objectives. Such evidence-based communication programmes can help enhance knowledge, shift attitudes and change public behaviour. Fighting the COVID-19 crisis and the mental health woes that it has brought with it essentially requires a holistic approach that sufficiently integrates infrastructural, social, behavioural and psychological aspects to prepare for any emergency response.
Mishra is Administrative Advisor and Gupta is Assistant Director, Impact and Policy Research Institute. The views expressed are personal.
KP, Vaughan’s jibes after England’s win in the first Test are not in good taste, to say the least
It’s always fun to have one’s wit around, and a little banter on and off the field never hurt anyone. In fact, it is an integral and enjoyable part of the goings-on inside any crowded stadium but, as we saw in Australia too, sometimes matters tend to go out of hand and quickly take a turn for the worse. It’s quite acceptable for any sporting fan or player to indulge in some harmless fun while playing with the mind of their opposite number, but heckling, taunting or putting out things indiscreetly is another ball game altogether. A couple of developments emanating from the touring English cricket team’s camp came sort of close to leaving an unsavoury taste in the mouth when the Test series is only one match old. While cricket commentator and former England international player Kevin Pietersen poked fun at India losing the Chepauk Test in a Hindi tweet, his compatriot, Michael Vaughan, a former England skipper, targeted Team India’s gesture of presenting a jersey signed by all team members to Australian player Nathan Lyon to mark his 100th Test match during the recent tour Down Under, and wondered if the same treatment wasn’t provided to Joe Root just because India had lost the match.
Soon after India lost the match to the visiting team, Pietersen gleefully took to Twitter and wrote in Hindi to underline that his January 19 prediction had come true: “India, yaad hai maine pehele hi chetawani di thi ke itna jashn na manaye jab aapne Australia ko unke ghar pe haraya tha (India, you remember I had warned you already not to celebrate so much when you defeated Australia at their home.)” Striking an ominous note, he then noted that “the real team” would arrive in a few days “from whom you’ll be defeated at your own home”. Similarly, Vaughan ribbed the hosts when on February 9 he indiscreetly put out a question: “India gifted @NathLyon421 a signed shirt for his 100th Test at the end of the Gabba Win ... Did @root66 receive one today after the loss ?? Not sure if it happened ? Can anyone confirm ?” The cricket-crazy Indian fans paid the duo back in the same vein, telling Vaughan “They gifted him the Test match instead”, and “You don’t go on to ask gifts from others”; and reminding Pietersen not to repeat the folly that many Australian cricket pundits had made after India’s first loss: “You may have won the match but Series is not over yet” and “We always welcome our guests with grace”. Comments made in good taste are always welcome but, it must be remembered at all times that, after all, it’s not called the gentlemen’s game for nothing.
The speeches by PM Modi and Congress leader Azad reflect the strength of democracy
Critics might accuse him of running roughshod over the Opposition, not being accommodative of contrarian viewpoints and being too assertive at times, but Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s emotive speech in the Rajya Sabha proved again that he is a sensible person driven by strong emotions and love for millions of countrymen whom he addresses as “bhaiyo aur behno”. The way he choked up a couple of times while bidding farewell to leader of the Opposition Ghulam Nabi Azad is what makes him stand out. Azad, too, echoed the sentiments and welled up visibly. What happened in the House of Elders is enough to reflect the true strength of our parliamentary democracy. However, the display of such emotions or camaraderie and respect for leaders cutting across party line is not unprecedented. For one, Modi himself — after being elected leader of the BJP parliamentary party in May 2014, in other words the PM-elect — choked up while responding to LK Advani’s speech where the senior leader said that Modi had done a kripa (favour) on the party. Even earlier, in 1994, then Prime Minister PV Narasimha Rao requested Atal Bihari Vajpayee, a member of the Opposition at the time, to lead the Indian delegation at a crucial United Nations (UN) meeting in Geneva, and Vajpayee agreed and played an important role at the session. Had the resolution against India passed, the country would have been put under economic sanctions. These leaders, belonging to rival parties, disagreed politically but put India first.
It may be unconceivable for those who believe in the politics of allegations and counter-allegations, and take the political discourse to a new low every day. However, Modi and Azad — sitting across each other in the Upper House — shared the spirit of working together in national interest, which made them transcend party or petty politics. The farewell speeches were the day’s highlight as these drowned the MPs and millions of television viewers in a sea of emotions. “I am concerned that whoever is appointed to his (Azad’s) position may not be able to match up to him,” Modi said. Visibly overwhelmed, the PM had to pause for a few sips of water while recalling how Azad, then the Chief Minister of J&K, called him up (Modi was the Gujarat CM) in 2006 to inform him about a terror attack in the Valley that claimed the lives of several Gujarati tourists. Azad also referred to the incident in emotionally charged words, and said that when he reads about the situation in Pakistan, he feels proud to be a “Hindustani Muslim”. Political pundits are free to interpret the speeches any way they like; they may argue that those were only “crocodile tears” and seasoned politicians like Modi and Azad know well how to use the “emotional quotient” for political mileage. However, we need not take such pessimistic and cynical assumptions seriously as long as leaders with emotion in their hearts continue to spearhead our democracy. We need not worry, we are in safe hands.
Time and again in history, a great age is almost always followed by a time of darkness. That is where the aviation industry finds itself now
In the first couple of months of 2020, your columnist made two trips to the West Coast of the United States. Each time he boarded flights that took over 14 hours, a couple of flights even passed over, as near makes no difference, the North Pole. Travel that once took days and several transfers with the potential of lost luggage and what not, now took just one, maybe two flights, in relative luxury even in Economy Class, thanks to inflight WiFi and a better choice of movies than most streaming platforms.
Sure, the food still could taste bland but that possibly had more to do with the human body’s physiology at higher altitudes where taste buds often go for a toss. But the most fascinating thing was that in early 2020, these ultra long-haul flights had become almost ordinary. Indeed, while rumours of an impending pandemic started to filter out, global air travel was on a massive high. It was growing at an unprecedented pace and a shortage of aircraft after the grounding of the Boeing 737 MAX was the biggest concern.
Now, while it is far too soon to sound the death knell for very long-haul flights as Air India has just started a Bengaluru to San Francisco flight, something that would have been technologically impossible just a decade ago, global air travel is today in a quagmire. Thousands of planes are grounded across the world with demand having collapsed in the wake of the pandemic. International travel, which had been truly democratised with lower fares and increased connectivity, is now on life support. It isn’t as if there are no more flights; with strict quarantine measures and several countries restricting travel to citizens and legal residents, travel has become essentially one for emergencies and repatriation. Of course, there are some who have to travel for business, particularly in an age of globalised workforces, but that is now being done without families.
Will air travel recover from this devastating hit? There are many ways to look at it, but one has to understand that there are different types of air travel. It is evident from the numbers emerging that the Indian economy is on the upswing and local business travel will almost certainly recover. Once all the States fully open up, one can expect air travel to regain some normalcy by the middle of 2021. Of course, there are other factors: While evidence points to a decreasing caseload of COVID-19 and the vaccination rollout has been impressive in India, the emergence of new variants, particularly in Brazil and South Africa against which existing vaccines are less effective, is alarming. If one of these variants is able to spread inside India, it could again lead to havoc. That said, domestic air travel will emerge healthier post-pandemic, not just because of business demand but also leisure demand as travellers after a year of being cooped up at home will want to travel and, with foreign destinations closed off, domestic tourism is bound to pick up.
But as for international air travel, it could be several months, even a year or two, before things come even close to recovery. There are however a few trends that might change, the first being more direct connectivity thanks to nations having different rules for transit passengers.
While this might again change going forward, particularly as a vaccine is deployed, this fundamental change, coupled with the emergence of modern aircraft, will pose an existential threat to airlines that have for years survived primarily thanks to connecting passengers.
There is also the likelihood of a “vaccine passport”. Anyone travelling to Sub-Saharan Africa or certain Latin American countries needs to show that they have taken a yellow fever shot; now this requirement will likely be global. Popular destinations, like in South-East Asia, have travellers from many countries and preventing them from interacting is impossible. While COVID-19 rages on in North America and Western Europe, the only way to protect both citizens and tourists from bringing in the virus is some sort of vaccine passport. This might actually be a good time for India to explore the opportunity to embed its passports with RFID chips that can store vaccination information.
Then, of course, there comes the very concept of necessary travel. This pandemic has made us all realise that working from home is an option for many people. Work travel and large conferences are not going to go away, but will big shows such as motor shows take place or will the ‘2020 Auto Expo’ at Greater Noida go down in history as the “last big show”? The huge trade shows, even for the airline industry such as the events in Farnborough and Paris, might never be the same and that will take a toll on business-class travel. Low-cost international leisure travel might come back roaring thanks to the introduction of new aircraft such as Airbus’s A321XLR, of which several are on order by India’s largest airline, IndiGo.
But we do not really know how we, air passengers who love travelling, will react in a few months, once a considerable number of people have been vaccinated. We still don’t know whether nations will have quarantine rules up in place if the virus evolves into a deadlier form. But one thing is certain, aviation is in a dark place right now and it could be another year before there is any hope of recovery.
(The author is Managing Editor, The Pioneer. The views expressed are personal.)
This question warrants the attention of all citizens of India. Losing hope in the judiciary isn’t a solution to all that plagues our justice delivery system
The Chief Justice of India (CJI) recently said that January 28 must be celebrated as the Supreme Court Day to mark the occasion when the highest court of Independent India first assembled in chambers, then situated in the Parliament complex in 1950. The Supreme Court was established on January 26, under Article 124 of the Constitution, however, its first sitting was held on January 28. Several media reports from that day show how this institution was remarked upon as the “guardian of liberty” and one that would exercise its powers without any influence, bias, fear or favour.
The apex court, which is often regarded as the most powerful top court in the world, took up this role of the “sentinel of human rights” in a new democratic India and it exercised its powers to deliver several landmark judgments upholding the basic fundamental rights of citizens against the State’s arbitrary, unfair and unjust actions. The court also ushered in an era of “constitutional dynamism” which helped the Constitution evolve with society and its changing circumstances.
Whether it was the ruling in the Maneka Gandhi vs Union of India case, where the apex court held that not just procedural due process but also substantive due process had to be followed by the State and that its actions must pass the “just, fair and reasonable test”, or the ruling in the Keshavananda Bharati vs State of Kerala case, wherein the top court restricted the power of the Parliament to amend the Constitution and held that the “basic structure of the Constitution” could not be abrogated even by a constitutional amendment.
When the 39th Constitutional Amendment sought to place the election of the President, the Prime Minister, the Vice-President and the Speaker of the Lok Sabha beyond the scrutiny of constitutional courts, it was the Supreme Court that struck down the law, thereby upholding the basic structure doctrine. In cases like Olga Tellis, Bandhua Mukti Morcha, Vishaka vs State of Rajasthan, Common Cause vs Union of India, NALSA vs Union of India, Navtej Singh Johar, Joseph Shine and the Sabarimala judgment among others, the Supreme Court time and again reiterated its commitment to the goal of building a “just society”, one where every individual irrespective of their caste, creed, sex, religion or place of birth has the right to live with dignity and freedom. The court has had a glorious history of making positive interventions and initiating revolutionary changes in India’s democratic culture. Celebrating its foundation day is indeed a step in the right direction.
But right when you thought that all is good with the courts in India, there’s a caveat. First, delivering justice isn’t a duty solely entrusted to the judiciary and second, it cannot be conducted in isolation. The justice delivery mechanism is dependent on several factors and cooperation among the three major organs of the State: The executive, legislatures and the judiciary along with certain non-State actors as well. Unless all these institutions collaborate to achieve a common goal, delivering justice will remain a distant dream.
The India Justice Report, an initiative of Tata Trusts and several others does a commendable job in highlighting the gaps and areas that need reform within our justice delivery system. The report assesses the performance of our institutions based on four pillars i.e., police, judiciary, legal aid societies and the prison system. It inter alia highlights several glaring problems in these institutions. It states that women make up just 29 per cent of sitting judges in India, whilst in High Courts (HCs) their strength is just 11 per cent on the Bench. Moreover, at least five HCs are functioning without a single woman judge. Sadly, vacancies of judges in our HCs stand at 33 per cent. Even though 80 per cent of our population is entitled to receive legal aid, only 1.5 crore people have received it since 1995. Our prison occupancy is at 119 per cent and two-thirds of our prison inmates are undertrial prisoners and over four crore cases are pending in several courts across the country.
Access to institutions of justice remains skewed for the entirety of our rural population even today. The report also shows how the judiciary has not been able to efficiently utilise funds that were allocated to it by the 13th and 14th Finance Commissions. The 13th Finance Commission, for instance, allocated Rs 5,000 crore to the judiciary, out of which only 20 per cent was utilised.
These data point at uncomfortable trends in our justice administration and towards intersectional issues of institutional failure and perpetration of oppression for every stakeholder. We all remember when the 43rd CJI, TS Thakur, cried before Prime Minister Modi in 2016, during a public conference, while highlighting several issues plaguing the judiciary. He had said that judges are forced to work in pitiful circumstances and stressful conditions with minimum infrastructure.
The Attorney-General of India also recently called for setting up of a “Court of Appeals” to reduce the workload of the apex court. The India Justice Report also makes several suggestions to interrupt the status quo. Ensuring doorstep delivery of justice by making it an essential service, enforcing a planned budgeting mechanism, upskilling legal aid and Nyaya panchayats, prioritising cases based on their urgency and impact and measuring public satisfaction are few of the suggestions. Justice Madan Lokur, a former Supreme Court judge, during the release of the report said that a cost-benefit analysis and continuous social auditing is key to ensuring institutional and administrative efficiency.
However, there is a silver lining too. According to the report, Chhattisgarh has emerged as a trendsetter. It began with a notification released by the Chhattisgarh HC in 2017 which required the lower courts to dispose cases pending for more than five years on a priority basis. A monitoring committee headed by a sitting judge was set up at the HC level. For district-wise monitoring, respective District Courts were asked to form their monitoring committees and a weekly review of the progress was mandated. All compoundable cases where parties were willing to compromise in Lok Adalats were disposed-off. For this purpose, Lok Adalats were organised daily after regular court hours. The monitoring committee at the District Court-level would conduct meetings with the district and police administration regularly to ensure timely enforcement of summons and warrants issued by them. New Magistrates were assisted and trained by senior judges to ensure fair trial and adherence to laws and procedures. To incentivise judges, appropriate units were awarded to them for disposing off cases before five years. Bail petitions were dealt with within a week and cases of undertrial prisoners were decided in a time-bound manner. Infrastructural development was ensured by building new courtrooms in major districts like Raipur and Durg. All this cumulatively led to a decline in the percentage of pending cases, from 10 per cent in 2019 to four per cent in 2020.
The apex court might certainly have a past worth glorifying, but its credibility isn’t going to remain for long if it sells its history as a soothing balm for the damages done by it and other organisations in current times. India ranks 69th in the Rule of Law Index, 139th in the Global Peace Index, 112 in Global Gender Gap Report, 51 in Democracy and 142 in World Press Freedom Report.
We are forced to ask: Has justice been delivered or is it a myth in the times we live in? This question warrants the attention of all citizens of India. Losing hope in the judiciary isn’t a solution, as in the words of Rabindranath Tagore: “Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings when dawn is still dark.”
Tiwary is from the National Law University, Visakhapatnam, and Dewangan is from the National Law University, Raipur. The views expressed are personal.
India must strengthen R&D for leveraging the fruits of innovation-led endogenous economic growth
The Economic Survey projects that India’s real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) would register a growth of 11 per cent in 2021-22. It reflects a faster recovery for the economy which has been crippled by the pandemic. Driven by the visible dynamism of economic activities with the roll out of the Corona vaccines, the survey highlights that the growth will further be reinforced by various reforms and easing of regulations, rising infrastructural investments, spur in manufacturing sector through the productivity linked incentive schemes.
The survey also underlines how India’s rapid surge on the Global Innovation Index (GII) from 81 in 2015 to 48 in 2020 among 131 countries was realised during the last five years. It also reflects the correlation between high-income economies and the high innovation index, which corroborates the Solow model on endogenous economic growth. Drawing reference to the GII 2020 report, the survey further drills down on sub-parameters of the overall innovation index, capturing how India fares on the seven parameters of innovation like 61st in institutions, 60th in human capital and research, 75th in infrastructure, 31st in market sophistication, 55th in business sophistication, 27th in knowledge and technology outputs and 64th in creative outputs.
This indicates that barring knowledge and technology outputs, we are lagging across other parameters. We must invest more and work in a synergistic mode to enhance our global positioning in institutions, human capital and research, infrastructure and business sophistication. Moreover, India’s spending in Research and Development (R&D) has been low at around 0.7 per cent of the GDP, which is noticeably lower than the top five R&D spenders globally in 2017. Like 4.3 per cent for the Republic of Korea, 4.2 per cent for Israel, 3.3 per cent for Japan and 3.2 per cent for both Switzerland and Finland and even lower than the R&D spend by other BRIC countries. This must be raised to a reasonable level of two per cent to rev up innovation momentum in the country.
The more contrasting factor according to the survey is that the Government spends 56 per cent of the gross expenditure on R&D, which is three times the average contributed by governments in the top ten economies, while the private sector contributes much less (about 37 per cent) in comparison to their counterparts in the top ten economies (68 per cent). In terms of the share of total R&D personnel, public sector contributes 36 per cent, the highest among top 10 economies, while the private sector’s contribution to the total R&D personnel is 30 per cent, which is far less than the average 50 per cent of the top 10 economies. The hallmark of India, according to the GII 2020 survey, is the knowledge diffusion sub-pillar, which ranks 10, of knowledge and technology outputs. And the most prominent dimension under this sub-pillar is the ICT services exports where India ranks first in the world.
While the Indian IT industry has displayed a tremendous performance among global counterparts, the other industries are falling back on scores. The other industry verticals should focus on research and innovation, adopt emerging technologies, infuse process and business sophistication. It’s imperative now to empower startups to co-create innovations in collaboration with the industry in a more synergistic manner. The Indian startup ecosystem has defied the pandemic and created a record number of 12 unicorns in 2020. This is a testimony to the innovation mettle of Indian startups. What’s critical for India now is to bring in synergy between the Government and the private sector to collaborate and build a systemic innovation culture across the board to foster translational R&D by increasing investment, connecting academia and industry to address real-life industrial challenges.
(The writer is Director General, Software Technology Parks of India. The views expressed are personal)
While the NEP had strongly advocated expenditure on the sector to be at least six per cent of the GDP, the same has been three-four per cent
Given the socio-economic impact of the pandemic, all eyes were on the Finance Minister (FM) and her handling of the twin challenges of stimulating demand and supply, amid falling revenues. Since monetary stimulus has not been effective in boosting investment demand, the onus of recovery is now more on fiscal measures and supply-inducing reforms. A V-shaped economic recovery requires promoting demand in sectors such as infrastructure and the rural economy. While agriculture and rural development have understandably been given a big push in the Union Budget, rather regrettably education has not received the same priority.
This is despite the fact that the education sector was severely impacted by the pandemic, too. The contagion hampered the teaching-learning processes across all age groups as pedagogy went online. As per the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER), 2020, though the percentage of rural children owning a smartphone went up from 36.5 per cent in 2018 to 61.8 per cent in 2020, nonetheless it indicates that a large digital divide still exists.
Similarly, schools and colleges remain deficient in Information Technology (IT)-enabled infrastructure. With hybrid teaching-learning expected to be the new normal, undoubtedly enormous expansion in digital technology is envisaged. Additionally, to avert the possibility of India’s demographic dividend becoming a devastating catastrophe, imparting quality education remains important. The new National Education Policy (NEP), 2020, reinforces the viewpoint.
With the evolving future of work, human potential for lifelong learning has assumed greater importance. Skilling, reskilling and upskilling has become mandatory for the existing workforce. Undoubtedly, investment in education is crucial for human capital formation. Despite being a merit good, necessitating Government provision and active intervention, the education sector has been largely neglected. For the financial year (FY) 2021-2022, there has been a 6.13 per cent decline in allocation of funds towards it as compared to the Budgeted Estimates (BE) of 2020-21. However, compared to the Revised Estimate (RE) of 2020-21, there has been a 9.5 per cent increase in allocation for 2021-22. Of the total allocation of Rs 93,224 crore to the sector, Rs 54,874 crore is allocated to the Department of School Education and Literacy (a drop of 8.31 per cent) and the remaining Rs 38,350 crore to higher education (a drop of 2.83 per cent in comparison to the BE of the previous year). Further, the RE for expenditure on education for 2020-21 witnessed a decline of 14.32 per cent vis-à-vis the BE.
Additionally, while the NEP had strongly propagated expenditure on the sector to be at least six per cent of the GDP, the same has been between three-four per cent in India. For comparison, expenditure on education relative to the GDP is six per cent or more in Australia, Chile, Israel, New Zealand, Norway, the UK and the US. It lies between three-four per cent in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Japan and the Russian Federation. The average for the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries is 4.9 per cent. For OECD countries, it is about11 per cent. For Chile, Brazil, Mexico, Switzerland, New Zealand, Korea, and Denmark, it is as high as 17 per cent.
With hybrid education set to become the new normal even in a post-Corona world, simply investing in technology is not sufficient. A technology road map needs to be designed for planned action to enable institutions to evolve from the stage of “doing digital” to “being digital.” Despite its importance, the Budget does not promote digitalisation per se. In fact, allocation to IT and the telecom sector declined as a proportion of the total expenditure from 1.95 per cent (2020-21 BE) to 0.93 per cent (2020-21 RE). However, for Digital India e-learning, the funds earmarked have gone up by over 100 per cent and stand at Rs 645 crore. Further, under this scheme, ‘National Mission on Education Through ICT’ as well as Massive Open Online Courses envisaged an overwhelming rise of over 200 per cent and 167 per cent respectively and stand at Rs 150 crore and Rs 200 crore each. Nonetheless, a greater thrust would be required in the years ahead. In addition to allocations, both total and compositional, what matters for productivity is governance. In terms of policy reforms, the proposal to amend the Apprenticeship Act is commendable and can generate opportunities for employability and financing of higher education. The Government’s focus on increasing collaboration with foreign institutions in Japan and the UAE for skill training partnerships is also praiseworthy. Additionally, setting up of a single higher education regulator to streamline governance structures in higher education is commendable. Also, the allocation of Rs 50,000 crore over five years will encourage research, development and innovation.
To impart holistic development, new models of engagement such as learning consortiums and coalitions comprising of diverse stakeholders need to be established for scalable, sustainable and inclusive blended education. Hopefully, an enabling policy environment shall make this a reality in the years to come.
Kaur is Principal and Sarna is Assistant Professor, Shri Ram College of Commerce, University of Delhi. The views expressed are personal.
We just had the warmest January in 62 years. Isn’t it time to show more responsibility towards nature?
If the temperatures in January are anything to go by, the nation should brace itself for a sizzling summer ahead. Because, despite a few cold days that left India shivering, the minimum temperature recorded in the country last month was the warmest January in 62 years. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) says that South India experienced the warmest January in 121 years, with temperatures touching 22.33°C. Earlier, the South had experienced 22.14°C in 1919 and 21.93°C in 2020, making these the second and third warmest months. Central India was the warmest at 14.82°C in the last 38 years after 1982 saw the mercury touching 14.92°C, while 1958 with 15.06°C was the warmest between 1901 and 2021. However, the maximum temperatures in January were below normal, the IMD said, and this January could not break the record of 1919 because, at 15°C, it remains the warmest January recorded. But this is hardly any reason to rejoice as, slowly and surely, we are beginning to feel the effects of climate change. For instance, the summers have been hotter than ever before because the country’s average temperature rose by around 0.7°C between 1901 and 2018.
It is projected to rise further by approximately 4.4°C by the end of this century, if a 2020 report by researchers from the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM), Pune, is to be believed. Worryingly, this increase in surface temperatures will reportedly result in droughts for some regions and intense rainfall and severe cyclones in others, causing floods in large parts of India. Experts are of the opinion that these changes in climate will have a long term socio-economic impact on the lives of citizens and also affect the country’s relations with its neighbours. Given all these warnings, one would expect that the Government and the people would be a lot more aware of their responsibility towards the environment but that hardly seems to be the case. So we must then be prepared to bear the consequences, like the one we had to face recently in Chamoli, where the impact on the environment in a sensitive zone was ignored at our own peril. If we continue to pinch environmental pennies, we will continue to incur the wrath of nature, which has the power to eventually rid itself of one of the most destructive yet vulnerable species to walk the Earth.
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