Beyond corruption

Anna Hazare's crusade against graft is only the first of many battles India must fight.

Will there be a national life after Anna? The Gandhian's satyagraha against rampant corruption has evoked a countrywide response unmatched by anything in the history of independent India, not even perhaps by Jayaprakash Narayan's 1974 movement against the increasing authoritarianism of Indira Gandhi's government.

JP's 'swarajist' campaign - initially spearheaded by students in Bihar but later spreading to include citizens from all walks of life, across the nation - caused the biggest political earthquake the country has ever witnessed when Indira Gandhi, backed into a corner, declared her infamous Emergency and overnight turned democratic India into a totalitarian dictatorship.

But though shrouded, the torch of freedom was not extinguished. And it burned brighter and fiercer than ever when in the general elections following the lifting of the Emergency, the collective wrath of the people voted Indira Gandhi out of office and brought in the Janata government.

The new dispensation, which got into internal wrangles almost from day one, was to pose its own challenges of cohesion. But the 'spirit of '77' made one thing clear: no one would again dare to try and stifle India's irrepressible democracy. The powers-that-be today will attempt to derail Anna's runaway movement at their own peril. Some critics have tried to put a verbal spoke in the wheels of the anti-corruption juggernaut by suggesting, among other things, that such extra-parliamentary forms of legislative activity would eventually derail democracy by encouraging irresponsible copycat movements which could be wilfully subversive of the rule of law.

Such sceptics, however, have been swiftly silenced by the overwhelming support that Anna's cause has generated, targeting as it does what is universally seen to be the nation's single most baneful affliction. Public disgust with all-pervasive graft has reached a pitch where corruption is perceived to be the root cause of all our myriad social, political and economic ills. The groundswell of opinion seems to be that if we can somehow exorcise the demon of corruption we will be freed of all the other evils that daily bedevil us.
 
Such a single-point agenda would be dangerously short-sighted. Corruption, in all its many manifestations, is without any question one of the most harmful of the toxins poisoning our body politic. But it is by no means the only one. Anna himself has already identified electoral reform as the next banner around which to rally his growing legions of followers. The criminalisation of politics, and the open use of muscle-and money-power to capture votes has made such reform a vital necessity which has been far too long delayed. Some of the electoral changes debated have been the right of recall and the voter's right to cancel their ballots in case they find all the candidates unsuitable in a particular constituency.

Such much-needed political reform, however, presupposes that the voter is free to make a truly informed choice. Illiteracy and the deep-rooted patriarchal system by which women voters are no more than rubber-stamp extensions of the male head of the household are only two of the major obstacles in the path to making the electoral process more truly representative.

Indeed not a few would say that to the extent - and it is a very large extent - that gender discrimination in effect disenfranchises the female half of the population India is at best a shambolic democracy. The progressive disempowerment of women is revealed by studies of sex-selective abortions which indicate that in 20 years' time India will have 20% more men than women. A clear case not of genocide, perhaps, but certainly of gendercide. And perpetrated, largely, by the urban middle class which is the most visible in championing Anna's cause.
 
Let's get rid of corruption by all means. But let's not forget the other - and far worse - monsters which lurk within us.

Gandhi and privacy...

'Gandhi was never a man to conceal his private life'

Gyan Prakash, professor of history at Princeton University, shares his ideas and views on the man we call Mahatma.

One of the controversies in 'Great Soul: Mahatma Gandhi and His Struggle With India' is the reference to the interesting friendship between Gandhi and Kallenbach. Gandhi has had many interesting relationships with sexuality and celibacy. Can you tell us more on that subject?

To be sure, Gandhi had a close, intimate relationship with Kallenbach. Joseph Lelyveld makes it clear that there is no evidence of a sexual relationship but suggests a homo-erotic one existed. To be scandalised by this is to know nothing about Gandhi's strong and open views on sexuality and love. Gandhi wrote openly and frequently about his struggles with physical desire in newspaper articles, letters and his diary. An unusual figure, he crossed many known boundaries of the public and the private.
 

Mard ko dard nahi hota

Boy oh boy! He is a monster when it comes to show of stunts, but is otherwise a softie which makes him adorable. There’s no limit to his daredevilry. My heart does a somersault; every time I see him hop on the TV set placed on a 4-feet tabletop from a 2-feet bed and then dive for the bean bag down on the floor. Like a skilled acrobat, he swiftly tucks his chin in his chest lest he bangs his head on the tiled floor. But, he is not lucky always. One slip and he falls flat. But, is quick to collect himself and sits there with hands folded across his chest, silently. “Did you hurt yourself?” I ask him with my heart in my mouth. “Nope,” comes a stoic reply. I know he is hurt badly, but doesn’t want to show his pain. Oh man, he’s not even four!

“Mard ko dard nahi hota,” rings an old friend’s humorous take on man’s innate behaviour of restraining himself from shedding tears when hurt. He bears the pain to the point of being superhuman -- no matter "how badly he has been beaten or how cruel the torture has been". But, “chot agar dil pe lagi ho to dard hota hai,” says a journo friend, “aur phir dil hi nahi, aankhen bhi zaar-zaar roti hain”. If a heartbroken man says that he is not wounded, he is not bruised and bleeding, then he is lying, he says, citing the case of his close friend, who broke a dozen hearts before meeting the same fate. Tears roll down his cheeks even today while nursing his wounds.
 
Salon terms the year 2010 as the year of tears for men. Citing an attorney, it states how male “machoism dominated early 70's. Men were not supposed to publicly display emotions as it was viewed as a sign of weakness. But stoicism gave way over the years to sensitivity as a desirable male trait, and by 2010, there were few fears for tears left among well-known American men”.

I have seen my father weep at the bidaai of my sister. I understand his crying as it was done at a time and in a particular circumstance that allowed him to lower his guard without the fear of ridicule. I am sure that he wouldn’t be moved enough by a good movie to let a drop out of his tear ducts. Not even by failure or embarrassment. How often we hear moms admonish their little boys, “Stop crying, be a man!” An oft-repeated phrase, ‘be a man’ means to look failure, frailty and fear squarely in the face, and not blink, says a feminist and a writer.
 
But down the years, men have become less inhibited in demonstrating emotions. In fact, we get to see more of this human side of the male now. What was once considered as unmanly, is now being viewed as a quality to have as an asset. The turnaround was ably captured in the Raymond’s ‘complete man’ ad series in 1990's. It broke the stereotypical image of a macho Indian man portrayed in Hindi films. “Raymond actually robbed the man of his mardangi,” says a columnist. And, instead emerged a “sensitive, vulnerable, versatile, caring, intellectual and fun” man. The next decade saw this softer side becoming more pronounced. Images of men crying openly began to fill the small screen space. TV actors left behind the likes of Archana, Tulsi and Parvati in the tear terrain. “It’s cool to cry as it shows that emotions are same for men and women,” says a TV actor. Not only on daily soaps, but also on the reality shows more and more men turned on the waterworks. Filmmaker Shekhar Kapur got so overwhelmed by the performance of a group of physically challenged kids on India’s Got Talent that he couldn’t control his sobbing. Sanjay Dutt -- the icon of macho Bollywood heroes -- wept on the Indian Idol 5 show after hearing the soul stirring AR Rahman’s Sufi number “Khwaja mere khwaja”.

Remember Qutubuddin Ansari! The face that flashed across the world as the face of the Gujarat riots -- eyes welling with tears, face covered with mud and dried blood, and hands folded in a plea for mercy. Or, cricketer Kapil Dev, who broke down on Karan Thapar’s show when asked if he had a role in match-fixing! And, can we ever forget our Men in Blue shedding the tears of joy and jubilation after winning the World Cup? Yes, the man has arrived – mard ko bhi dard hota hai…

The Pillitzer Prize

The Emperor of all maladies? The title clearly belongs to the cancer of politics.

Dr Siddhartha Mukherjee won the prestigious Pulitzer Prize for The Emperor of All Maladies, his 'elegant inquiry' into the history and continuing mystique of cancer. Wow. But, while reading about the New Delhi-born, New York-based oncologist's impressive literary achievement, it struck me that our entire news media is about maladies. And the unquestioned emperor of all these is politics.

It wasn't just a coincidence that the biggest headline of not just that day, but the whole week, was about a doctored CD, and the cancer of corruption which has been galloping unchecked across the body politic.

Serious illness means ambulance. Some lawyers are known as ambulance chasers, and there have been whispers that the Bhushan's have been doing just this in the guise of public interest. Their targets make no bones about these two busybodies being a pain in the neck. Some people have an even lower opinion of them. But they have to swallow their bitter PIL.

Like the subject of Dr Mukherjee's book, the Bhushan CD continues to confound the fraternity. Everyone has made it his business to diagnose it, including those who are accused of doctoring it. Pathologist Amar Singh has asked Shanti Bhushan to give a voice sample to establish proof of his paternity. Many suspect that the former SP leader is the one who should be taking the test.

Like allopathic medicos who dismiss any form of alternative medicine as hocus poke-us, the ruling politicos have branded Homeopath Hazare as a dangerous quack who will cause severe, long-term damage to the system. They say we must ignore his bogus white pills, and leave the treatment of corruption to those with a proper MP degree.

However, alarmed by the multiple organ failure caused by this galloping cancer, more and more people are beginning to place their faith in Anna-ji's grassroots prescription. So what if he's not that kind of pharma?

Shanti and Prashant Bhushan are a father and son team. This is common practice in law. As it is in medicine. Politics is even more genetically engineered. Biwi, bahu, beta are all symptoms or side effects. Since even chacha-bhanja causal links are found, the practice of this cancer is sometimes known as Uncology.

The deep-rooted cancers of the body politic have compromised its immunity, and also made it more susceptible to external factors. The very day that Dr Siddhartha Mukherjee was chosen for the Pulitzer, in faraway Ratnagiri, virulent protests against the Jaitapur plant exposed the already ravaged government to the hazards of unclear radiation.

Political maladies manifest themselves differently at different times. Parts of the country are now in the grip of a poll fever. Following textbook epidemiology, it was preceded by a rash of campaigning, blistering allegations, and bouts of violent attacks. Medical opinion differs on the best way to get it to subside or prevent it from assuming a virulent, or even fatal, form. But most agree that the best bet not only for diagnosis, but even treatment is the EC-ji.

Now that it is well established that politics is the emperor of all maladies, it follows that New Delhi's biggest hospital should be headed by a Dr Singh. Several expressers of mock concern have been suggesting that the Prime Medico himself needs a good orthopaedic surgeon to tackle his apparently weak knees and spine. The more aggressive say he needs complete replacement. Hopefully it won't come to that. We might mention that here, as in all hospitals, it's the Matron who actually calls the shots.

What after the Jasmine fades?

Democracy remains a distant goal in the Middle East, with many pitfalls on the way.

Images of democracy in motion make for intoxicating television. The kid next to the soldier with his tank at Tahrir Square, the exhausted rebel in a Libyan desert and women and children out in Bahrain's Pearl Square. Next stop, democracy, the footage suggests as anchors hurtle to keep pace with the compelling images and churn out the two-minute revolution theory.

The painful truth is that the path to Egypt, Libya, Syria and Yemen emerging as western-style democracies could be torturous and long. And even worse for places like Bahrain and other rich Emirates where civil society has suddenly discovered it has a political mind.

A look at the map of West Asia shows many straight lines drawn across the barren deserts by European powers and civil servants in London to create nations that suited the post-colonial foreign policy needs of colonisers. Little heed was paid to the demographic heterogeneity of the region where an artificial nationality negotiated with the local satrap was imposed on the people. Since then, most countries have lived under autocratic rulers at best and tyrannical at worst. Nasser in Egypt was anti-imperial but not a democrat.

By far the most peaceful and educated civil society in the region is that of Egypt's. But even there, few institutions exist. The heads of state have donned military colours and have exterminated critics and opposition with the help of an all-powerful secret police and perpetrated a regime of fear. Corruption is endemic, made evident by the Baksheesh culture that permeates all layers of officialdom; courts are arranged to favour the powerful and the upper middle class lives in negotiated comfort with the military. Will all this disappear in one fell swoop? Unlikely. Too many vested interests are entrenched, the biggest among them, the politico-military. Egypt is the best place to make the transition, though. It does have a parliament, a body of legislative rules and a set of laws that the courts can use.

Take the case of Libya, where US intervention looks menacingly like George Bush's regime change war in Iraq. Barack Obama has taken care to broaden Nato involvement but the first few rounds of US attacks muddied the waters and gave Muammar Gaddafi international oxygen to breathe fire against 'American Imperialists'. It's hard to sympathise with Gaddafi, but lifting all forms of control, undemocratic as they may be, will push Libya into violent chaos and reopen tribal faultlines. That the anarchy could be taken advantage of by Islamic extremists isn't unlikely, and dismantling the military overnight will remove a bulwark against mushrooming of terror outfits. The removal of the dictator will create a political vacuum in a country where no political elite barring Gaddafi loyalists has been allowed to flourish. Unlike Syria, where thanks to the Ba'ath Party, the political base is a tad wider, Libya has no second-rung of leadership to fall back on barring tribal leaders and military commanders.

In Syria, where tens of thousands are sitting in for Bashir Assad's ouster, the topography is even more complicated. Despite being overwhelmingly Sunni, Syria is a mosaic of competing faiths and cultures that have been papered over by a socialistic-sounding political system represented by the Ba'ath Party. If the order crumbles, it would expose chasms between the Christians, the Alawis, the Druze, the Ismailiyas and even the Greek Orthodox group. Flux in Syria could also lead to regional complications. The Damascus regime is viewed by many as a cat's paw for Iranian interests. Help to the Hezbollah in Lebanon, locked in a protracted war with Israel, also comes from Damascus and the Assads have a fair amount of clout in how the political structure in the fractured neighbour is arranged. It's insane to predict how things would shape up if Assad falls but violence is a fair certainty.

It's a shame that Bashir Assad didn't loosen up the political system fast enough to prevent this. The breakneck pace at which protests seem to be spreading won't leave him room for gradual change. That apart, the worst fear is that these regimes will fall in the hands of Islamic hardliners. That may or may not happen but the ground is fertile for such an outcome. In countries where regimes have been traditionally repressive, the mosques tend to transform into political arenas where dissidents and critics meet. That apart, the separation of the church and state isn't obligatory even in Islamic democracies.

Lastly, where the legitimacy of the existing ruler is destroyed by a public upsurge and there isn't any clear political succession in the works, clerics could assume leadership roles where none existed for them previously. Human societies crave order, and in situations of strife, clerics promising stability, whatever the terms of such an order are, could gain a mass following.

In Indonesia, when the 1997 Asian economic turmoil eroded dictator Suharto's credibility and finally caused his downfall, the leader of the tolerant Muslim country's largest religious movement, the Nahdnatul Ulama, Abdurrahman Wahid, was nominated as the successor. That Gus Dur, as he was popularly known, was a moderate leader with great respect for the minorities, helped Indonesia complete a transition to a modern parliamentary democracy that subsequently elected liberal leaders like Megawati Sukarnoputri as president. But that's not an outcome that's going to follow if in a vacuum, political space is usurped by religious hardliners with a conservative Islamic vision of civil society.