Kolkata’s Durga Pujas Are Keeping Urban Folk Culture Alive

Kolkata’s Durga Pujas Are Keeping Urban Folk Culture Alive

Jawhar Sircar

(Published in The Wire on 27.09.2017)

Do you want to walk through Bahubali’s overawing Mahishmati palace in north Kolkata, that is over five stories high? It has been done so wonderfully at over ten crore rupees that the super-hits film’s creator SS Chandramouli is truly bowled over. Or are you keen to shake hands with Mowgli and his Jungle Book friends Babloo, Baghera and others in an honest to goodness ‘forest’ within the metropolis of Kolkata, where one can see that hissing snake Kaa and the killer Sher Khan from a safe distance? Or, maybe, enter Ajanta Caves or even pose before the Eiffel Tower and Buckingham Palace? This is neither a con game nor a walk through some film studio with these look-alike props: they are as real as possible. Lakhs of humans have literally started crowding dozens of such sites all over the city, admiring and touching the life size statues that adorn Bahubali’s prized palace. Oh, we forgot to mention that it also houses Kolkata’s Sreebhumi Sporting Club’s Durga image, ready for worship. The Machua Bazaar Durga Puja Commitee is similarly busy with their Jungle Book forest, where thousands of kids have started pouring in for fun and of course to see the Durga Puja there. As is evident, Kolkata has gone crazy again, which it does each year during Bengal's Durga Puja season that celebrates the last four days of Navaratri. The entire mega-city of Kolkata metamorphoses into something that is a cross between an indigenous ‘Disneyland’ and a spirited Latin American fiesta, as billions of tiny multi-coloured lights transform a struggling city into a dreamland.

It is great fun for those who pine to walk for several hours of puja-hopping, in very high spirits, and actually be a part of one of the largest congregations of humanity. They do not mind the occasional pushing and shoving, as goggle-eyed visitors break into raptures at each ‘pandal’. This is what the temporary architecture of cloth, plywood and improvised materials that stand on wooden poles and bamboo rods are called. They are far removed from the humble and unimaginative shamianas that the rest of India puts up during their celebrations or big events. One may, of course, traverse short distances by cars, buses, trams or metro rail service, but then one has still to walk a bit to get close enough to savour the magnificence and innovations of each pandal and the ambience of the surroundings. For those who are short on the fitness quotient or are not fully equipped with the crazy bug that converts itself into a special enthusiasm that is essential for the millions who trudge from venue to venue, the television is the best option. One can see it all, in the cool comfort of one’s own home, though frankly it is not like being in Eden Gardens or at Lords, because one does get a bit of a second hand view of what is nothing short of the most spontaneous explosion of popular art that grips this huge metropolis.

‘Art installations’ on such a scale by so many untrained artists are difficult to match anywhere else in this country or abroad. The Bengalis, who are not usually rated as the most energetic of people, seem to draw large doses of vigour from some hidden reservoir of zeal, to give shape to their fertile and unbound creativity. In the bargain, we get to see a mind-boggling array of ‘theme’ pandals and uniquely-crafted images that are created from every conceivable material. Thus while a handful of obscurantists and the progressively increasing number of Hindutva-vadis  lump it, one group creates the goddess with coconut shells, the other from matchsticks, the third from broken glass bangles and yet another from betel nuts: each of them in perfect shape and proportion. Good old gangetic clay remains the favourite of the highly skilled idol makers of Kamartali, almost everything else is also tried out: papier mache, bamboo splints, nuts, seeds, beads, fabrics of all types, jute, flax, hemp, hay, paper, cardboard, wood, plastics, glass, ceramics, fibre-glass, shells, beads, razor blades, screws nuts, bolts — in fact, any substance that can be given shape to and can wow the viewers with its novelty or chutzpah of imagination. Many an outrageous modern artist would appear to be just dull in comparison and it is another matter altogether that these indigenous creators do not rank as creative artists outside Kolkata. Experimentation is not confined to styles, poses, gestures. Even the dress of the idols range from the usual silk or cotton to velvet, crepes of different fabrics, jute, paper, matchsticks, broken glass — in fact, any substance that could give the impression of novelty. Gone are the days when idols wore only the uniform traditional dress caulled daker-saaj that consists of pith, with bits of gold and silver foils and sequins glistening on them. It is free for all in each sector, whether it be the images, dresses, pandals, lighting, theme parks or sounds — it spreads to every area where there is opportunity for any outburst of originality.

The mammoth crowds as well as art lovers are given a treat each year as imagination and innovation are let loose with a sense of marketing and competition. If only a part of this zeal was put in to attract industries the state could have done wonders, but the creative Bengali visualiser would loathe the very thought of fattening the purses of capitalists that he is genetically programmed to hate. The imagery of the goddess attacking the demon that the scriptures enjoin is also subjected radical experimentation and thus Durga and her family could very well appear in stylishly tattered jeans while the demon just rocks on. From film stars to national heroes, from the politician to the ugly profiteer — the folk artists and clay-modellers have used all possible ‘models’, as Durga, Mahishasura, Kartik, Saraswati, et al. Even the iconographic and religious mandate that this goddess must have ten arms as she is the dasha-bhuja, and that each of these arms must bear its assigned weapon or instrument has been subjected to the artisan’s imagination or caprice — which would amount to ‘sacrilege’ elsewhere. In Kolkata, however, such acts have only drawn larger crowds and, in most cases, the desired admiration. So much so, that it is not an uncommon practice to arrange for a small regular image placed before the larger artistic creation which is the one to whom all prayers are to be directed and devotion showered upon, while the much-larger ‘art idols’ are only for public display. The adroit flexibility of scriptures joins hands with downright ingenuity, so that the catholicity of Kolkata’s citizens can be fully utilised for the most imaginative or outrageous expressions of artistic fancy.

Almost all the three thousand pujas are jealously different from each other and if one tries to see only the short list of eighty puja-pandals that the Kolkata Police has, with time and experience, marked as the top of the grade, one would need much more than the allotted four days. These are the days of Shasti, Sapatami, Ashtami and Navami of Navaratri, and the pujas officially end on Dusshera or Vijaya Dashami, when the shastras enjoin that the images must all be consigned to the holy Ganga, without any thought of what it does to the mother river’s health. But thanks to organisers who try every trick to hold back Durga for as many days as possible now getting mixed up with vote bank politicians, overburdened policemen and the courts, the pujas are unofficially extended beyond Dashami. The images are taken for immersion from the mega puja in easy instalments, for almost a week after the religiously sanctioned date, so that more and more people get to behold their magnificence, splendour or innovation, for which the organisers and artists spent at least six to nine months to prepare. Apart from Bahubali and Jungle Book, this year’s pujas have also conjured a mammoth White Thai Temple as well as several walks through serious themes like urbanisation, environmental hazards, cycle of life, time in human life and so on. Record crowds visit these ‘theme pandals’ as their presentations are farthest from the pedantic: they are just stunning in the use of visual imagery, digital projection, holograms, lights, sounds, materials used and the lot. And, all of this is done in the name of Ma Durga who presides over all her crazy children. A theme pandal that focuses on global warning has a simulated tornado that whooshes around so eerily and the setting has 8000 kilograms of glass crafted by the artisans who are camping there all the way from the ‘glass town’ of Firozabad in UP. The water display alone has some 2400 kilograms of glass. One can appreciate the stimulus to the economy that it gives and its model of job-oriented growth could easily be studied by PM’s new advisory council led by Bibek Debroy. Needless to mention, big and small lights play a unique role in enhancing themes, with wondrous animation that tell so many tales: from demonetisation to lesser demons.

 But, when did Kolkata begin this prolonged and emotional engagement with Durga that brings out so much creativity, completion and spirit? To be historically precise, the first community Durga puja of consequence was held in the autumn of 1910, at Balaram Basu Ghat Road in Baghbazar area of north Kolkata, which was in the heart of the old, aristocratic part of the city. It coincided with the 1910 session of the Indian National Congress in Kolkata, which explains how nationalist sentiment and fervour played such a critical role in getting common people together. Tilak’s model of using Ganapati for galvanising masses in service of the nation was the role model for Kolkata's community pujas but Bengalis have bouts of amnesia when it comes to giving credit to others. The township of Kolkata was set up by the East India Company some 220 years earlier, in 1690 and before it completed its first century it was declared to be the chief seat of British governance. After vanquishing the ruling powers of India in battles of Plassey and Buxar, by means fair or foul, the Company acquired  revenue rights and to rule it all, the Governor of Bengal was declared as the Governor General of India. The wily collaborators of the British in Kolkata like Raja Nabakrishna Deb and Raja Krishna Chandra were the first to celebrate the goddess of victory, Durga, in their palatial homes in 1758, immediately after the Battle of Plassey. To ‘enhance’ their social status, they invited the firangis over to their house for evenings of splendour during the Durga pujas, where dancing girls performed ostensibly before the goddess and wine flowed freely. The logic was that the devi was not averse to liquor as she herself took a few swigs before battling so many demons. There are, of course, a few precedents before these post-Plassey pujas, as we find that almost a century and a half earlier, Raja Kansa Narayan of Taherpur in eastern Bengal and some other Hindu chieftains had also organised grand celebrations during Durga pujas. They were thanking the goddess   for their providential break when the Mughals employed Hindus zemindars and finally ended the four centuries of Muslim monopoly in the revenue administration Bengal. But we have no historical records of continued observance since then as celebrations required a lot of money that only largely-profitable zemindaris could afford. Some of the first lot of Hindu land-holders could not continue large-scale worship later because of fickle fortune.  

After Plassey, however, we have an unbroken history of ostentatious Durga puja celebrations at the palaces of the Company’s nouveau riche Indian intermediaries, the munshis and banians. The practice of the laat (lord) sahibs gracing these events where nautch girls entertained the white man continued for the next one hundred and fifty years. The rich and the famous of the growing metropolis vied with each other to entertain the British, while Durga appeared to look away from crass and vulgar displays of wealth and ‘tastes’. Durga pujas soon became very expensive and exclusive pageants that the prosperous Bengali babu held at his residence to which the masses had only limited access to their goddess. In all fairness, a new culture of poetry, song, dance and theatre also flourished thanks to this patronage, as did the visual and plastic arts. ‘Commoners’ also tried to pool their resources together to worship Durga pujas in their own style and we have a record of one such attempt at Guptipara in Hooghly in the 1790s. But, realistically, one would have to wait for English education to spread and spawn new secular professions for the new bourgeois class to start gathering economic and social strength to carve an alternate lifestyle. This class bloomed in the latter half of the nineteenth century, when they also started displaying the first signs of nationalism as well.

During the heydays of zamindars too, the masses discovered their own avenues of entertainment that involved creative expression, especially during the festive season. They enjoyed their own extempore poetic contests kabi-gans and tarjaas that called for sharp wit and repartee and they had their ‘panchali’ songs, in praise of divinities, performed with a bit of pantomime.  They organised fascinating open air theatrical performances called ‘jatras’, with colourful costumes and an indigenous concert with violins that matched the melodramatic moments with high notes. Climaxes were greeted by the beats of drums and the clang of huge cymbals. Most interesting were the subaltern mock songs and dances  the ‘jhumur’ and ‘khemta’ and the salty and salacious lampoons of the high and mighty through  ‘shong’ performances, where they ripped apart the inequitable social order, with sheer rancid wit. These assertions of Kolkata’s urban folk culture, also required patronage — for though the merry claps of the downtrodden could gladden the performer’s heart, he needed something more substantial to fill his pocket and his stomach. The richer babus stepped in, with support for the tarja and the jatra — either for the sake of entertainment or for enhancing their own popularity. Like other urban centres, Kolkata developed its own subaltern culture through songs, jingles, artistic designs, street-shows and so on. This new distinctive ‘urban folk culture’ has been highlighted in Sumanta Banerji’s The Parlour and the Streets, that re-lives this phase so vividly.

These outpourings of the urban subaltern did not remain confined only to the performing arts. With the migration of the ‘patua’ scroll-painters from the rural areas to Kolkata (as most of the folk performers had done earlier) and their subsequent settlement near the popular Kalighat temple, there evolved another urban folk art-form in the city — the oft-mentioned ‘Kalighat pat’ paintings. Close on the heels of the ‘patuas’ followed the ‘Bat-tala’ woodcut engravers of north Kolkata — imitating the former’s style, improving the presentation, lowering their price and competing for the same client-base, who was  the rustic visitor, the poor pilgrim and the struggling city-dweller. The lithograph, the chromo-lithographs, the oleographs and their prints, like the colourful ‘Chorebagan’ prints, have evoked continuing admiration for their fidelity, imagination and simplicity — as well as sadness at the ‘demise’ of such pulsating folk arts in twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The clay-modellers of the city are still in demand but many scholars bemoan that folk art is ‘dead’ in Kolkata as cheap, mass-produced goods have killed the artisans’ creations in every conceivable sphere. While this is considerably correct, it is perhaps not wholly true, as it is my submission that the Durga puja celebrations are indeed living and pulsating expression of urban my folk culture. All the craftsmanship that enrich the pujas like the designing and execution of the massive, theme pandals with their exquisite interior frills and decoration are new avenues of folk art. The imaginative sculpting of the goddess and her retinue and the special lighting are all products of a refined urban folk culture. Even the songs, that include the traditional pre-puja Aagamoni songs and the prolific literature that are created are also cultural outpourings, though not necessarily of the folk variety. The dhunochi-naach dances that are done before the image, by balancing lighted urns of smoking and burning incense on one’s palms or between the teeth to the furious beat of the drums are surely a part of folk culture.

The Durga pujas of Kolkata are, thus, not just an annual festival or the carnival of the city, nor even the most vivid symbols of Bengali culture — they are, in fact, the best exhibitions of creative spirit that manifests itself through the popular arts and They are also the most appropriate occasion to be in the city of joy and freedom, to soar high on the wings of human spirit, that knows no bounds for four blessed days.

(Please Click Here to read the article on The Wire's Website)

The Rohingya Crisis Is A Test For The Human Race

The Rohingya Crisis Is A Test For The Human Race

                                                  Jawhar Sircar  

             (English version of  Bengali article published in ABP on 26.9.17)

Dark rumbling clouds from Myanmar have already cast their fearful shadows over the eastern part of this sub continent but even so,  India, that preaches VasudhaivaKutumbakam, wishes they just blow away. Fate may, however, not oblige as we face the biggest human rights crisis in recent times that may explode on our faces if we are not careful and positive. The whole world is shocked at the undisguised and endless genocide and the India has to take a firm and clear stand. One is not making a plea to open up our borders and set up refugee camps for the Rohingyas, but as the biggest country in this region, we really need to demonstrate our commitment to human values, that are definitely superior to the immediate requirements of diplomacy. Or else our credibility that has already been damaged will worsen among common people in other countries who view with horror many recent developments in what was earlier an enviable oasis of democracy, plurality, tolerance and liberal principles. Foreign policy is no more limited to Kissingers and their secret whispers, missions  and cocktails, but is wide open to the world, through TV and print. People now decide more and there is fury building up at the wanton slaughter of innocent Rohingya and the beheading of little children, irrespective of what religion they profess.

                 But then, who are the Rohingyas and what exactly is the problem? If we look at the map of this subcontinent we will find that in our extreme southeastern corner, below Tripura and Mizoram, lies the Chittagong area of Bangladesh. It extends south along the coastline like an arm around the Bay of Bengal and this arm continues even further southwards into Myanmar, through a narrow strip that runs along the Bay and looks at Odisha and Andhra Pradesh from across the waters. This is Arrakan or the Rakhine region that has been known to us as the land of the Maghs. The Rakhine kingdom had ruled the southeast of Bengal in the 16th-17th centuries, with Chittagong as their base. It was then that famous Bengali poets Daulat Kazi and Syed Alaol created their works based in beautiful Rakhine. In 1666, the Mughal governor and general Shaista Khan could finally drive the Rakhine-Maghs out and annexed Chittagong as well as all adjoining areas to Bengal. The Rakhine region of Myanmar was hardly considered as “foreign’ by Bengalis and in the next century, we find Shah Shujataking shelter in that kingdom with his large retinue,after he was  defeated  by his brother Aurangzeb. He was killed later by his hosts for mysterious reasons. The culture and the language of this region remained somewhat different and till today, most Bengalis can hardly understand the Chittagonian dialect which is so remarkably distinct from all others in the family. In fact, it is often derided as a rather strange and different frontier language. All said and done, the Chittagonian tongue is an extreme variant of Bengali and both Muslims and Hindus of Chittagong Division speak in it, as do the Barua-Buddhists and others in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. This dialect of Bengali is also the main language of the Rakhine region of Myanmar, that both Muslim Rohingyas and Buddhist Rakhines speak in, though they have a lot of other words punched into it. Though they also speak in the official language of Myanmar, they are considered by the Myanmarese as part of the Bengali-speaking people and the Muslim Rohingyas are emotionally quite close to Bangladesh.

           This is one of the chief reasons why the mainstream Buddhist Myanmarese have been persecuting them and encouraged the Buddhist Rakhines to pounce on their Muslim Rohingya neighbours like wild beasts. But history says that these two ethnic groups were once proud to be part of the same Rakhine kingdom that had fought many kings and armies of Myanmar, as well as those of India. Some desperate groups of fighters and sailors of these parts, not all, joined hands with Portuguese outlaws and pirates and constituted the dreaded Magh-Firangi raiders of Bengal. They went deep into the countryside, ravaging and kidnapping people, for p two hundred years till the late 18th century. Myanmar finally defeated the Rakhine kingdom in 1785 annexed the kingdom, but within forty year, they lost it to the British who added the Rakhine strip to its Indian domains. The British started settling a lot of people from the Indian mainland, especially from Chittagong and some from Noakhali in the Rakhine region, more so after they overpowered Myanmarese kingdom in the next few years. The point is that India may have forgotten Buddhist Rakhines and the Muslim Rohingyas of present day Myanmar, but to both these people, India and Bangladesh are an inseparable part of their history, for different reasons of course.

          During the Second World War, the Japanese occupied Myanmar and it was the turn of the British to be running away and then regrouping to fight this dirty war, by giving arms to both the Myanmarese and the Rakhines-Rohingyas. After Myanmar became independent in 1947, its new nationalism targeted not only prosperous Indian settlers but also Muslim Rohingyas, who were more enterprising. In 1962, Myanmar’s military ruler, General Ne Win played to mass sentiments and nationalised most industries which compelled Indians to leave. The military rulers then turned the heat on the entrepreneurial  Bengali Rohingya Muslims and encouraged the Buddhist Rakhines to raid, torture, pillage and kill their Muslim neighbours, in successive waves of violence. Myanmar also deprived Rohingyas of their citizenship rights and stopped basic amenities but when this did not uproot them, state-inspired riots were unleashed. The Rohingyas retaliated by forming  the  Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) who sought and received support from Muslim terrorist organisations in Pakistan and the Middle-east. There is information that many Rohingyas are linked to the ISIS and are indeed ‘terrorists’ but this is the full context. They have also attacked government and security outposts in Myanmar in retaliation, but these give the Myanmarese state further reasons to step up their genocide in the  Rakhine region.

           The situation is going out of hand and one had expected the Indian Prime Minister who visited Myanmar on the 6th and 7th of September this year to have counselled President Htin Kyaw and State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi to take some initiative for a ceasefire and try for a just political solution. We do not know if India has sent any message to the real culprit, General Ming Aung Hlang, who is masterminding this pre planned war on humanity, and Aung Suu Kyi has lost her image and the world’s support by appearing to be playing his pretty puppet. We definitely need to counter China’s major presence in Myanmar and its avowed plan to encircle India, by being nice but three facts are clear. Let us also be clear that India can never match China’s open ruthlessness and that we can never compete against their massive funding. But the third hard fact is that Myanmar also needs India quite a lot to balance the Chinese dragon, as they do not intend to be their stooge. Diplomacy has its requirements but so does humanity and India needs to emerge as a principled country that upholds its values over immediate gains. Its deals with an unpopular military regime is frowned upon by all and those who believe in history believe that regimes held by force have to go, sooner or later.

               Besides, ever since Myanmar was ruled by the military junta, it has never really been enamoured by India and though PM Modi signed 11 MoUs during his visit to that country, we have no news whether he raised the burning issue of genocide in Myanmar, that has already led to the exodus of four lakhs of Rohingyas to Bangladesh. This has not only disappointed democracy loving people all over the world, including the vast majority in India, it has  deeply offended the only neighbour who is still with India, i.e, Bangladesh. With an undeclared war going on in instalments on our west; a shattered relationship with Nepal in the north, and almost open India-hating in Sri Lanka, our only bet is with Bangladesh, that is anyway quite disappointed over water and other issues. Besides, India’s inability to stop and punish those guilty of sustained aggression on Indian Muslims is only weakening the secular forces in Bangladesh who fight a daily battle against Islamic extremism.  Can India afford to lose a steady friend like Bangladesh that is steadily being poisoned by Islamic extremism? The fact that India’s PM chose to lash out against ‘terrorism’ during his visit to Myanmar is interpreted to be against Rohingyas and that he did not mention the brutal military offensive against minorities has not gone down well. iUnending streams of terror-struck and maimed people cross the Naf river and pour into Bangladesh every day, and these include several raped women and mauled children who may never recover from this apocalypse. They carry tales and body marks of horror that make people shudder even on TV and social media. Bangladesh is literally struggling to feed and give shelter to this human tsunami from the Rakhine region, that has crossed four lakes weeks ago.

          The least India could have done was to reiterate United Nations’ unambiguous condemnation of the sustained ‘ethnic cleansing’ that Myanmar is engaged in, but India did not. The UN Security Council has chastised the ARSA for attacking the army, but has also condemned Myanmar for “excessive violence during the security operations". It also called for "immediate steps to end the violence in Rakhine, de-escalate the situation, re-establish law and order, ensure the protection of civilians". China had cleared this stand and India could just have taken a similar stand, instead of appearing to support only the junta in Myanmar. We need to support Bangladesh’s struggle against Islamic extremism as trouble makers like Turkey’s Erdogan and the ISIS are fishing in troubled waters, too dangerously near our borders. Even Buddhist Thailand has openly condemned Myanmar’s excesses in the name of Buddhism and so have Muslim Malaysia and Indonesia. India just cannot afford to hug General Ming Aung Hlang and his killers. A section of Rohingyas are taking help from Islamic terrorists abroad, but to condemn an entire people as terrorists without examining the deep roots is a shallow act. This myopic view does irreparable damage even within India and we need to step up a ‘Mission Humanity’ immediately. A part of what we spend on war could be invested in peace as well, so that war is avoided. India needs to send a planned series of plane loads and shipping fleets full of relief materials to Bangladesh so that it can provide better relief to the refugees. Or else other nations will step into our neighbourhood and breathe down our shoulders. Massive medical and financial aid can still save the day for India and retrieve its image from present one of being a clumsy, witless giant that hits entire populations with fat clubs, because  it cannot fix its arrows on those terrorists who need to be shot.

       As the world’s largest and most successful multi-cultural federation, India needs also to declare that it does not subscribe to narrow Islam-phobia and let us ask just one question. What would India’s attitude be if the Rohingyas were Hindus? 

(Please Click Here to read the Bengali article on ABP website)

The bureaucracy is ailing

Jawhar Sircar

(Published in The Telegraph,14th September,2017)

There is no point in denying that the Indian bureaucracy is one of the worst in the world and is widely notorious for its labyrinthine rules and genetic negativity. India is also among the most corrupt nations; surely a large part of the bureaucracy must have either connived in it or abdicated its tasks. On the Corruption Perceptions Index, India's rank is 79th, which is rather shameful, while, where 'the ease of doing business' is concerned, we have moved just a couple of notches but are still below 129 other nations. What amazes us, however, is that even so, several lakhs of young and not-so-young aspirants spend months and years to prepare and appear for the prestigious civil services examinations. They include a large number from the Indian Institutes of Technology, National Institutes of Technology, Indian Institutes of Management, medical colleges and rank-holders of Indian and foreign universities - for a job where they would earn a pittance. It is certainly not true that they enter the services to be a party to corruption, except for a very small section, and to most 'public service' is better than enriching a merchant. It confers greater responsibility and social prestige. In spite of such 'good boys' heading administration, India's ranking is 168th in the world where literacy rate in concerned; 131st in the Human Development Index while in the Global Hunger Index we are below 96 nations.

Before we proceed further in self condemnation, it may be appropriate to get some points clear. India's bureaucracy comprises approximately 48 lakh people, while all the top layers, with All India and Central Services put together, would constitute less than one per cent of these. This is not to imply that the senior services are not responsible, because if the income tax babu takes his mandatory cut before clearing each file, it does not matter if his boss is a saint. The more worrisome question is, why do the university 'toppers', who succeed in the Union Public Service Commission examinations, fail to deliver thereafter? Either some mysterious force holds them down or we just accept the terrible fact that personal zeal or honesty can hardly change a bottom-dominated politicized pyramid. The task of cleaning up is just too daunting, and unless the political masters are really keen to join forces in cleaning up, not just exploit every layer for what they can extract from each, it slides from bad to worse. Not a single posting can be executed without political lobbying and rules and systems are added on every year, mindlessly. Every attempt to reduce or simplify them is met with reprisals from the powerful clerical and inspector's establishment whose rapacity has only increased under the 'clean' government. The three fearsome Cs, the CBI, CVC and CAG, have failed, as they are unable to cleanse the system because of terribly dilatory procedures and many are kept busy with the master's vendetta. The fact that these 'holy cows' of rules and procedures could not prevent the biggest scams and swindling of public resources means absolutely nothing to babus.

Hierarchy and the subjugation to rank are so stifling and so merciless is the retribution if one tries to be too 'bright' or reaches out to citizens, that one has perforce to gulp down the ethos of compliance to rules and become a nameless, faceless cog. This mandated colourlessness makes administration drab, unfeeling and unresponsive, but it suits the back room operators; they draw their power from political bosses who dominate the public arena. In fact, the present Central government was petty enough to stop young officers from expressing their sympathy with worthy causes even over the social media. This self-imposed cloak also ensures that there are no 'role models' seen in public, which makes it tragically the only profession to do so. No one can be a 'hero': except for some police officers in movies, but then they are portrayed as villains as well. In an age of competitive one-upmanship, where even grave judges play to the gallery, this namelessness does extreme disservice to the public servant's public image as a lot of good work goes unnoticed. Frankly, an excess of this hush-hush business breeds complacence and hides both mediocrity and accountability. Disaster struck when the Right to Information Act was passed in 2005 and after a lot of hedging, filibustering and evasiveness, peace was made with cruel fate. But file notes became short and careful so as to pass the 'public scrutiny tests', while what one actually wanted to say was often conveyed over the phone or through removable yellow stick-on slips.

The classic bureaucrat who confused his political bosses in true Yes Minister style did exist decades ago, but once Indira Gandhi made her lightning strikes in the late 1960s, the political class simply took over and overpowered the bureaucracy. A few sagacious civil servants did voice honest opinions and paid the price, which deterred other less strong administrators and led to an effective surrender. The nation wanted it that way and frankly, democracy demands that the minister really rules. One has witnessed this transfer of power take place over the last quarter of a century until all ministers led by the chief minister or prime minister demand that the secretaries just find a way to carry out their plans. Or just get out. With increasing stagnation, the tenure of an average secretary in the government of India is less than two years, in which he wants no trouble and most concentrate their energy in ensuring that they get a five-year post-retirement job in some tribunals, constitutional bodies or somewhere else. Being 'agreeable' became the norm and, as the fate of joint and additional secretaries depended almost completely on the secretary and/or minister, the pendulum swung from compliance to subservience. But, to be fair, is there any profession left anywhere that encourages argument with the boss? Except that where public service is concerned, the costs of surrender have damaged the system a lot. Frequent transfers meant moving one's lifetime possessions from place to place and yet ensuring the education of children. This was or is too daunting a task to most, but believe me, every year many civil servants actually take on their bosses, whether they are political or their own 'adjustable' seniors.

The question is, can nothing be done? Let us look at inefficiency first. Article 311 of the Constitution has nurtured immunity and complacency but if fast-track judicial tribunals are constituted, other than the administrative tribunals that are meant for service grievances, some progress can be made to weed out the chronic shirkers and pass the message down the line. Besides, one can guarantee that the truth about corruption can be ferreted out quite easily if the government is really serious. Everyone in every office has a fair idea about who is corrupt and who has a glad eye. If a periodic secret ballot system is instituted every six months even the courts would be convinced with the solid data thus generated, through a system akin to the United States of America's Back Channel. Anti-corruption agencies can then concentrate their limited energies only on the shortlisted dirty officials and refrain from harassing, for decades on end, others who are usually victims of intra-office politics. There is some light provided one is willing to walk through the tunnel, not just call it dark. The results, after all, affect all of us.

Please Click Here to read the article on The Telegraph's Website

An Administrative Tragedy Called Demonetisation

An Administrative Tragedy Called Demonetisation

Jawhar Sircar

Ananda Bazar Patrika, Sept 7, 2017

English Translation

The fact that India’s GDP fell to a 3-year low of 5.7 % in the first quarter of this year is no cause for celebration and it hardly bothers most who have neither capital nor shares, as they await the next fix of spell binding oratory. What is worrisome is RBI’s confessional report that 99% percent of the 15.44 lakh crore rupees of demonetised 500 and 1000 rupee notes has come back into circulation. Surely, we now deserve a ‘bite’ from the PM, whichever part of the planet he is, about what need to do now. He was good enough to confide in the nation on 8th November 2016 that “the magnitude of cash in circulation is directly linked to the level of corruption. Inflation becomes worse through the deployment of cash earned in corrupt ways.” Within a week of the ‘big bang’, the whisperatti of Delhi and Mumbai, who know everything, were gossiping about a massive cleansing operation that was converting dark notes to white, and whether more money would return than what was in circulation. While the masses who had no bank account or access to Cards and ATMs suffered and so did their cash market, that led later to police firings on cash strapped farmers in MP, the middle class went through pain for the first few weeks and then plonked proxies to pick up cash on their behalf. The rich and the lords of back money employed smarter techniques by getting a section of bank employees to connive in accepting without question wads of black money and to convert them to legitimate notes and for a cut, of course. While it has surely secured a dubious niche for Narendra Modi, whose single minded obsession has been to ensure his position in history, it is also a case study in compounded administrative lapses.

           

     Banks bore the brunt of public anger and were totally flummoxed in complying with unheard of procedures but the poor banking secretary chose complete silence, as all the talking was done by the revenue secretary who was Modi’s chosen bureaucrat from Gujarat. If neither knew of the new crop of currency brokers that had suddenly mushroomed, it is tragic. If they knew and neither Modi nor the rest of his crusade-team could do nothing to stop them, that is worse. While a certain amount of groping in the dark is quite understandable, the sheer harassment that millions of honest citizens had to go through is really unforgettable. RBI’s revelation rubs salt in out wounds as we learn that instead of being caught, the black money gang has actually become lily white. In simple language, all that this disastrous policy of demonetisation managed was to legitimise a few lakh crore rupees of black money that even earns interest. Critical national decisions may call for some secrecy but to keep everyone in the dark, except very few who are trusted, is largely responsible for this fraud in the name of crusade against black money. Now that UP elections are won, can the people know why a fixed date could not be declared after which every person would need to explain how he possessed whatever 500 and 1000 rupee notes he had, without going through so much drama?

        The national government is not a pocket state that can be run by secrecy or coteries: it needs teamwork and trust in critical officials at all layers. Now that crores of productive man days have been lost in unnecessary cash queues, where over a hundred have died, can we fix responsibility on who was responsible for ensuring that all the much announced black money becoming legitimate currency? And all fears that the possessors of black money had in the past appears to have been replaced by comfort. The regularity with which rules were changed displayed a total unpreparedness and floundering that is so unprofessional.  Paradoxically, the mess now provides a perfect alibi to bankers who are now likely to be pinned down, as they can surely claim that x and y happened when rules a and b were in operation, before rule c came, and then complicate it beyond redemption. This explains why such a gigantic operation has hardly been carried out in recent memory anywhere, as a path that “angels have feared to tread”. Frankly, the very choice of ‘demonetisation’ appears to have been too brash it was just one of the several options dished out to new masters, quite routinely, by economists and babus who hardly knew the possible consequences. There is a remarkable absence of seasoned counsel that has been directly discouraged by the leader, but a dose of contrary advice from those experienced in administration and finance could at least have broken the monotonous platitudes of his hand-picked courtiers. 

          We need to understand seriously whether the RBI’s remonetisation and government’s demonetisation were in perfect sync, and whether the RBI’s normal ‘peace time’ mop up measures served equally well during the war time excess cash floods. From all available reports, RBI treated the whole operation under its normal rules and the benchmark was that on March 31, 2016, the currency with the public was ₹15.97 lakh crores, while just 3 days after Modi’s lightning, it was down by ₹ 70,000 crore. RBI’s annual report for 2016-17 says that by January 6, 2017, currency in circulation came down by ₹ 8.99 lakh crores “which resulted in a large increase in surplus liquidity with the banking system”. Among the steps that the RBI took, for instance, was to absorb ₹ 5,24 lakh crores by November 25, through ‘reverse repo’, i.e, sucking money away from cash-flushed banks; then mopping up another ₹4 lakh crores immediately thereafter by doubling the Incremental Cash Reserve Ratio (ICRR) and then using Cash Management Bills (CMBs) to take another ₹7.96 lakh crores till 4th January 2017. Now that we are totally re-monetised after all this theatrics, what happens to Modi’s primary argument, which was that the system has just too much money that benefits only corrupt tax evaders and terrorists? We need to know with computer figures the exact role of the much touted Jan Dhan accounts, as stories are heard. 

          But now, the FM has informed us that "the object of demonetisation was not confiscation of money” but to tackle the excessively high cash economy that surely needs to move to a cash-less economy or less-cash one. This could surely have been done without recourse to so much sensationalism and pain, with due notice and a ‘cut off’ date. We are now plagued by contradictory official claims that speak of an abysmal lack of coordination at the top layers of administration. Thus, while the PM says ₹1.75 lakh crore is highly suspicious, his Income Tax boys say that actually ₹ 2.89 lakh crore deposited by 9.72 lakh persons that stinks. Gone are those earlier calculations that at least ₹4 to ₹5 lakh crore of currency is tainted and could never be remonetized as we are now given much lower estimates. It takes just a nod to fix NDTV for a matter that really does not relate to government’s banks but people are still waiting for almost a year to see who goes to jail in this demonetisation drama. Or is this Act 2 Scene 2 being saved for the just before the 2019 elections?

(Please Click Here to read article in Bengali on ABP Website)