To revive an old friendship

The Russia-Pakistan joint exercises raise many questions. New Delhi has to rebuild ties on its strengths and common concerns with Moscow.

The Russian Embassy announced that their first-ever joint military exercises with Pakistan, that were initially to be held in the sensitive Gilgit-Baltistan area this week, would be shifted with due respect to Indian sensitivities. Why is India’s time-tested strategic partner engaging with Pakistan at this juncture? Is there a shift in Russian geostrategy and linkage with China that is impacting Moscow’s relations with India? Have India’s own foreign policy shifts and new relations set off a reaction in Russia? The Russia-Pakistan joint exercises raise many questions.

A Russia on the move

Under President Vladimir Putin, Russia has shown assertiveness in international affairs. It has taken a clear position on opposing Western intervention and militarist regime-change policies in Iraq and Libya and now in Syria. Russia has used counter-force in the fight against the Islamic State in backing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. It retook the province of Crimea that it had gifted Ukraine in 1954 due to (Soviet) historical reasons. This invited unilateral sanctions on Russia from the U.S. and the European Union. Demonised by the West, Russia has become a strategic partner of China and they have significant convergence of interests.

India as an emerging power has developed a strategic partnership with the U.S. There are real and perceived shifts in Indian armament policies where Russia dominated for years. India has opened up to the U.S., France, Israel, all of whom are gradually edging out the Russians in some sectors. Russia-India trade has not grown to great heights despite the encouragement of both states. Yet India has been supportive of Russian positions and has a careful and calibrated response to all Russian actions — in Chechnya, Syria, Ukraine and elsewhere, India has supported Russia.

The Russians, on their part, have dutifully backed the Indian position on Kashmir; they share Indian concerns on terrorism; they continue with deep collaborations, providing sensitive technologies, military equipment, nuclear power engines and much more to India. They have a partnership in energy. Yet a Russia dependent on arms and energy exports is constantly looking for new markets and Pakistan is a potential one. The planned exercises were an extension of this search.

Moscow’s Chinese concerns

The reality is that the world situation is one of multipolarity and consequent interdependency, contradictions, compromises and pressures. Countries across the spectrum are building multiple alliances. There is scope for both linkages and dependency. So China, who we think the U.S. is trying to ‘contain’ (and India could get a role in this), has got its yuan accepted as world currency by the International Monetary Fund and the New York branch of Bank of China has been designated as the clearing house for the Chinese official currency, the renminbi. China is leveraging its economy and relationships to build a hegemony (G-2) with the U.S. where both can share international financial domination.

Russia is well aware of this, and has its own concerns about the Chinese dominating Russian markets, exploiting Russian resources, and not backing Russian security concerns. China is enticing countries, including Russia, with its One Belt, One Road plan that will develop huge new linkages and develop trade routes. Pakistan is a satellite state for China. Russia has concerns about Central Asia vis-à-vis China and Pakistan.

In these circumstances, India has to rebuild on its strengths and common concerns with the Russians. They have to revitalise their earlier agreement on sharing intelligence for a joint strategy on terrorism. If India is concerned with state-sponsored terrorism from Pakistan, Russia is concerned with the backing that states are directly or indirectly giving to terror groups in West Asia and Central Asia. India will have to be more forthright in condemning states that on the pretext of regime change or local geopolitics are allowing the growth of terror groups in West Asia.

Balancing new and old allies

Russia and India have common positions and concerns in Afghanistan. Last week the Afghans, in a peace deal backed and welcomed by the U.S. and Pakistan, rehabilitated the mujahideen “butcher of Kabul” and India hater Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. This snubs the Indian and Russian policy of isolating all terrorists and instead has accommodated and compromised with who they wish to label ‘good Taliban’. This policy is an extension of using terrorists for strategic use. Indian and Russian anxieties on terrorism need to converge and bring about some positive outcome.

India has its own military exercises with the U.S. and has signed logistics agreements which can eventually give the U.S. access to Indian naval bases. Is India willing to do the same with Russia? Given the growing U.S.-Russia hostility, has India reassured Russia that this access will not jeopardise Russian interests? If not, it should do so.

India needs to deepen its scientific and technological relations with Russia since a base for this already exists. Often agreements are signed amidst bilateral rhetoric and are not sufficiently followed up. The Russia-India investments in the oil and gas sector and exports to third countries need to be energised. Joint manufacturing needs to be planned. A continuous engagement and follow-up plan need to be made.

India and Russia are engaged in several multilateral efforts that are greatly favoured by Russia such as the BRICS and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation. The BRICS meeting in a few weeks will give a great opportunity for the leaders of these countries to further deepen their engagements. Russia had proposed a Russia-India-China (RIC) forum. India is hesitant about this because of the unresolved issues with China. This has not moved ahead like the BRICS has. Our argument should be, if China can have compromises and contradictions with the U.S., then why not with India? India can use some creative means to build an RIC alliance.

India should use the interdependency and pressure-compromise strategies to leverage its interest to isolate Pakistan. A former U.S. Secretary of State had called Pakistan an international migraine, but then moved on to use it as the U.S. front line in Afghanistan and West Asia. No matter what India gives the U.S., this equation will not change. The U.S. will always have a dual approach to India and Pakistan, because it needs both. Russia, on the other hand, will not. But India has to actively ensure that and not take this strategic partnership for granted.

Leveraging multilateralism

India needs to move on in the international system. In some ways it has, but in other ways it is moving backwards. Its foreign policy is only an extension of its domestic politics. India has to fix its domestic issues to further social cohesion and make special efforts to build bridges between communities. India’s domestic politics has to move towards inclusive democracy, non-militarism, rights and the rule of law. This will give it an edge in the international system. Any dilution would damage it deeply. Indian foreign policy should focus on its strengths of working with the global South, opposing militarist interventions, building norms and depending on multilateralism. India cannot be in denial of its history even as it moves forward.

As far as Russia is concerned, it might appear that there is some strategic shift. But Russia has been pushed into that position. In reality, it knows that India is still its most reliable ally. It has no conflict of interest or anxiety about India as it does about others. India was instrumental in the construction of a multipolar international system. This system has benefitted India and Russia, not to speak of others like China. To retain this, India and Russia need to be active strategic and economic allies. But both will have to make an effort for this.

Anuradha M. Chenoy is a Professor at the Centre for Russian and Central Asian Studies, School of International Studies, JNU.

Keywords: India-Russia bilateral relations, Gilgit-Baltistan area, joint military exercise, Pakistan-Russia joint military exercise

Source_ The Hindu, 29-09-2016

It is time for a uniform asylum law

The debate surrounding Brahamdagh Bugti’s request for asylum in India has largely focussed on the foreign policy implications. Numerous legal issues deserve consideration.

India stands poised to make one of the most critical decisions with respect to its refugee policy, but without a domestic asylum law and without having signed the UN Refugee Convention of 1951. This has left India without a structured and institutionalised framework for addressing refugee inflows. At the same time, however, the country is known to have a broadly humanitarian approach to asylum, and is bound by both its own constitutional principles and customary international law. As the Home Ministry examines Baloch leader Brahamdagh Bugti’s asylum claim, the debate has so far largely centred on the foreign policy implications. There remain, however, numerous legal issues which demand serious consideration.

Unanswered questions

First, the manner in which the current asylum claim has been made raises the question of whether a person can apply for asylum in India from outside the country. International refugee law only states that a person needs to be outside his/her own country to seek asylum; it is silent on whether the person needs to be physically present in the territory of the country where s/he hopes to receive asylum or whether s/he can make such an application from a third country. This is a much debated issue in international law and countries have adopted varying policies in this regard. Having allowed Mr. Bugti to seek asylum from Switzerland, it is unclear whether India has made an exception in this case or is now open to asylum applications without physical presence within its national borders. This question needs to be settled.

Second, Mr. Bugti claimed in a recent interview that his asylum application to Switzerland was turned down on account of his party being put on a terror watch list by Pakistan. While this could be a politically motivated act by Pakistan, as per international refugee law, this does trigger the need for a prospective asylum country to examine whether Mr. Bugti has committed or been involved in activities referred to as crimes against humanity, war crimes, serious non-political crimes, and so on. A fundamental principle of international refugee law is to not grant asylum to such persons, as doing so would go against the humanitarian spirit of refugee protection. The civilian character of a refugee populace is paramount, and active combatants are excluded from the same. Therefore, Mr. Bugti’s activities as a Baloch leader need to be thoroughly examined.

Third, India’s approach towards the larger Baloch refugee community in the future is yet to be addressed. Does India intend to grant asylum to Mr. Bugti alone, or to other Baloch asylum-seekers as well, or on a case-by-case basis? Irrespective of the modality it chooses, the Indian state will have to invest in setting up both a policy mechanism as well as the physical infrastructure for management of this group.

Legal rights

Finally, if Mr. Bugti is granted asylum in India, what will his legal rights be? Since Indian law does not even mention the term ‘refugee’, there are no clearly defined rights and duties for refugees. In practice, there are multiple approaches towards the different refugee communities, so much so that there isn’t even a common form of documentation that is issued to them. The outcome of this is that they have widely disparate access to basic rights. For example, while Sri Lankans and Tibetans have government-issued IDs, the vast majority of Afghan and Burmese refugees have only the documentation given to them by the UN, which is not widely recognised. There is still no clarity in this regard, and the Baloch would be yet another group of refugees for whom a separate policy would have to be created.

The most pragmatic way to address these legal issues would be for India to adopt a uniform asylum law for all refugee communities. It would allow for the codification of India’s best practices with respect to asylum, which would, at the very least, eliminate the need to revisit its historical policies each time it faces a new question of refugee protection. A national asylum law would also reduce the need for parallel mechanisms, and put in place a structured system for asylum management in the future.

Roshni Shanker and Vasudha Reddy run the Ara Trust, a centre for refugee law and forced migration studies, based in New Delhi.

Keywords: uniform asylum law, refugee policy, Brahamdagh Bugti’s asylum claim

Source: The Hindu, 29-09-2016

God and Devotion

SADHGURU JAGGI VASUDEV





Nobody is `gifted'. You have to earn everything. Either you earn joyfully, or you earn miserably. That is all the choice there is. There are a variety of practices through which one earns. But the simplest way, the easiest way and also the most self-destructive way, is devotion.What is Grace, first of all? If you look at yourself as a machine -you have brains, body, everything. But what you call as `Grace' is the lubrication. Without lubrication you have a great engine but you get stuck at every point.Devotion would be the easiest way to become receptive to this Grace so that the process of life becomes graceful. The cunning mind, however, is unable to devote itself to anybody or anything. You can sing songs of devotion, but you have your own calculation: What has God done for me? Calculating minds cannot be devout.Trying to be devout will be just a waste of time, and life.
A devotee is not somebody's devotee. Devotion is a quality. Devotion means a certain single-pointedness -you are constantly focused towards one thing. To such a person, Grace will happen naturally and he becomes receptive. What or whom you are devoted to is not the issue. What you need to know is, God does not exist. But where there is a devotee, God exists.
So the power of devotion is such that it can create the Creator.

Transmit password via your body

New Tech A Safer Option Than Transmission Through Wi-Fi Or Bluetooth

Scientists have devised a way to send passwords through the human body rather than over airborne radio waves like Wi-Fi or Bluetooth which are vulnerable to hacking.University of Washington computer scientists and electrical engineers have devised a way to send secure passwords through the human body using benign, low-frequency transmissions generated by fingerprint sensors and touchpads on consumer devices. “If I want to open a door using an electronic smart lock, I can touch the knob and touch the fingerprint sensor on my phone and transmit my credentials through my body to open the door, without leaking that personal information over the air,“ explained Merhdad Hessar, a student at the university .Sending a secret code over radio waves like Wi-Fi or Bluetooth means anyone can eavesdrop.
“Fingerprint sensors have so far been used as an input device.We have shown for the first time that these sensors can be re-purposed to send out information confined to the body,“ said Shyam Gollakota, assistant professor at UW .The process employs a sequence of finger scans to encode and transmit data. The team achieved rates of 50 bits per second on laptop touchpads and 25 bits per second with fingerprint sensors -fast enough to send a password or code through the body and to a receiver within seconds. In tests with 10 different subjects, the researchers were able to generate usable on body transmissions on people of different heights, weights and body types. The system also worked when subjects were in motion.
“We showed that it works in different postures, like standing, sitting and sleeping. We can also get a strong signal throughout your body . The receivers can be anywhere -on your leg, chest, hands -and still work,“ said Vikram Iyer, a UW electrical engineering doctoral student.
Normally , sensors use these signals to receive input about your finger. However, the engineers devised a way to use these signals as output that corresponds to data contained in a password. When entered on a smartphone, data that authenticates your identity can travel securely through your body to a receiver embedded in a device that needs to confirm who you are.
The technology could also be useful for secure key transmissions to medical devices which seeks someone's identity before sending or sharing data.

Source: Times of India, 29-09-2016

Bimaru' shines in urban reforms

Dipak Dash

New Delhi:





Municipalities In Bihar, MP, Raj, UP Fare Better

Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh ­­ traditionally tagged as `Bimaru' states ­­ have made major progress in urban municipal reforms in recent years, while Delhi has not submitted any claim of reforms.States such as Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat, which have always performed better in such reforms, lead from the front again in the assessment by the urban development ministry .The assessment is based on documentary evidence after 23 states and Union territories submitted their claims for 436 of the 500 cities covered under urban renewal mission, AMRUT. The mandatory reforms under this scheme include e-governance, double entry accounting, water and energy audit and 90% collection of municipal taxes and user charges.
“The states that have made good progress in the past one year will be rewarded with financial incentives on Friday during the India Sanitation event,“ an urban development ministry official said. Good per formers will be rewarded a total of Rs 400 crore at the event, sources said.
Officials said the 436 cities and towns, including those with over one lakh population, have taken significant initiatives to enable e-governance, credit rating necessary for issue of municipal bonds, professionalisation of municipal cadre, augmenting revenue collection and efficient use of water and electricity .
On the whole, 329 of the 436 cities have shifted to double entry accounting ­­ which give a clearer picture of assets and liabilities ­­ and 345 have introduced energy and water audit. An official said 131 of the cities have achieved over 90% collection of user charge and 141 cities have recorded similar collection of municipal taxes. Increasing revenue base remains a tough task for municipal bodies.
Cities that collect 90% of municipal taxes and user charges include Lucknow, Allahabad, Mathura, Chandigarh, Raipur, Dewas, Kolhapur, Surat, Vadodara, Thiruvananthapuram, Mysuru, Tirupati, Vijayawada, Cuttack and Aizawl.
According to the assessment, 381 cities and towns have taken steps to bring young professionals in municipal bodies and 78% have initiated measures towards single window clearances.
Under JNNURM implemented during the UPA (2004-14), urban reforms were promoted in 65 cities.

Source: Times of India, 29-09-2016

How the Indus Treaty was signed

Notes from the unpublished diary of India’s Acting High Commissioner in Karachi, Pakistan, during the signing of the Indus Water Treaty in September 1960.

Amongst the more prominent of the problems that bedevilled relations between India and Pakistan was the Indus Waters dispute. This was a legacy of the Partition. The line dividing the two Punjabs cut right across the Indus canal systems developed over a hundred years. Pakistan found that the headwaters of the main canals were on the Indian side of the border. All the five tributaries of the Indus also originated in India and flowed through Indian territory in the upper reaches. Even before Partition, Sindh and Punjab had witnessed wrangles over the sharing of the waters of these rivers.

The situation worsened after the holocaust of the Partition. There were hysterical cries in Pakistan for taking up arms to defend their rights over the waters. Fortunately, an arbiter came forward in the garb of the World Bank that eventually succeeded in thrashing out a settlement. The main credit should go to Eugene Black, the World Bank president.

Demarcating boundaries

While the negotiations about the sharing of the canal waters were going on, officials from both countries were grappling with the demarcation of boundaries that had defied solution all those years. These disputes had arisen over the interpretation of the award of Radcliffe. Two teams were sent out by India to tackle the thorny problem [in 1959]. The discussions the Indians held with their Pakistani counterparts were in a spirit of friendship and cordiality hitherto unheard of in Pakistan. To a large extent, this was due to the fact that the leaders of the respective teams were old friends and college mates from pre-Partition Lahore. The leader on the Indian side was Sardar Swaran Singh; General Khalid Shaikh led the Pakistani team. Once these two men established their rapport, they left the details to their principal advisors: on the Indian side M.J. Desai, and on the other side Sikander Ali Baig. Once it was established that the main purpose of the exercise was to achieve maximum agreement and that neither side was out to steal an unfair advantage, it was easier to work out a solution. It was found that neither India nor Pakistan had an overwhelming case to be made on its stand on a particular dispute. One side gracefully conceded the other’s claim were valid, and that was that. In this way the two negotiating teams were able to settle a number of irritants in this field and pave the way for a period of real détente between the two countries.

However, some [issues] proved to be intractable. One of these was the dispute regarding the Rann of Kutch. As neither side gave way, it was decided to leave it for further negotiations through routine diplomatic channels. Subsequently, Pakistan was to take the law into its own hands and send a raiding force into the territory only to be halted by Indian Army units. The dispute was then put to international arbitration, as a result of which India agreed to give up a part of the disputed area to Pakistan.

Meanwhile, Ayub Khan had taken another bold step. This was the decision to stop over at Palam airport in New Delhi [in September, 1959] during one of his periodic visits to Dacca, to meet the Indian Prime Minister. He was no doubt prompted to do so by Rajeshwar Dayal, the Indian High Commissioner in Pakistan who had received prior approval from Delhi. The Pakistani President deserves full credit for following it through with good grace and aplomb. The Palam meeting, that lasted for nearly two hours, went well. At the end, a brief statement was issued in which the leaders emphasised the need to conduct relations in a rational and planned manner. It was also agreed that outstanding issues should be settled in accordance with justice and fair play, in a spirit of friendliness and cooperation. Later, when speaking to the Press, Ayub Khan stressed the need for re-appraisals, for forgetting and forgiving, and for a more realistic and rational approach to settling disputes that had tarnished relations between the two neighbour states. For a few moments, the ice seemed to be broken. Right-thinking people on both sides appeared to heave a sigh of relief.

Nehru’s visit to Pakistan

Soon it was clear that bigger things were in the offing. The protracted negotiations about the distribution of the canal waters were drawing to a close. The agreement on the canal waters was the biggest single achievement to date between the two countries, and it was decided to have it signed with due pomp and show. This provided an appropriate opportunity for the Indian Prime Minster to reciprocate Ayub Khan’s stopover at Palam and to demonstrate the friendly relations that were developing between the two countries. The historic visit of Pandit Nehru from September 19 to September 23, 1960, was to be his last visit to Pakistan.

While the arrangements of the visit were under discussion, Rajeshwar Dayal had to leave Pakistan. The task of organising Panditji’s visit fell on my shoulders. Fortunately, I had very able colleagues to help me.

Prime Minister Nehru’s visit commenced on a rather low key. The welcome at Karachi was formal and correct, but not enthusiastic. The decorations along the route from the airport to the presidential palace were minimal. By contrast, a lot of the local populace had gathered along the streets to have a glimpse of Panditji. But they did not cheer him. It was evident that the military authorities had ordained it that way.

The same evening was the signing of the Indus Waters Treaty. This was done with due decorum and solemnity. Nehru signed on behalf of India, Ayub Khan on behalf of Pakistan, and William Iliff, the vice-president of the World Bank, on behalf of the Bank. The treaty was based on the principle that after a transitional period of 10 years, extendable to 13 at the request of Pakistan, the three eastern rivers, Ravi, Beas and Sutlej, would be exclusively allocated to India, while the western rivers, Indus, Jhelum and Chenab, would be allocated exclusively to Pakistan except for certain limited uses by India in the upstream areas. During the transition period, Pakistan would undertake a system of works, part of which would replace from the western rivers such irrigation uses in Pakistan as had hitherto been met from the eastern rivers. While the system of works was under construction, India would continue to supply water from the eastern rivers according to the agreed programme. The Indus works programme was estimated to cost around $1,070 million, of which $870 million was to be spent in Pakistan. It was a colossal undertaking.

Once the signing ceremony was over everyone breathed a sigh of relief. What had been an insurmountable problem was out of the way. Could one proceed to other items on the agenda? This was the nagging question that troubled the advisers on either side. Panditji had brought a team of advisers that included Desai, the Commonwealth Secretary, an able administrator, and a tough negotiator. Ayub Khan had great respect for his abilities.

However, the discussions that followed proved to be desultory and unproductive. It was clear that neither side was prepared for any major concessions. We talked primarily of trade between the two countries and for cooperation in economic spheres. A number of ideas were thrown out. Ayub Khan in a generous mood offered to divert the waters of the Indus River to the parched areas of Rajasthan by erecting a barrage in the lower reaches of the river; also to supply the Sui natural gas from Balochistan to the Bombay area.

The Indian side in its turn agreed to consider sympathetically the proposal enabling Pakistan to run a through-train across India connecting Lahore and Dacca. Even cooperation and co-ordination in the military fields came under discussion. India expressed concern about Chinese activities on the northern border of Kashmir and emphasised the concern they felt about a possible threat to Pakistan also from them.

Ayub Khan, without batting an eyelid, shook his head gravely and promised to study the question with his military advisors. Little did the Indian side suspect that Pakistan would be handing over to the Chinese sizeable chunks of the territory in the northern part of Kashmir in return for China’s support of Pakistan’s claim for the annexation of Jammu and Kashmir.

In fact, all our bilateral discussions and grandiose schemes came to practically nothing because of Pakistan’s insistence that India should make substantial concessions with regard to Kashmir. Thereby ended another chapter in the unfulfilled agenda of cooperation between India and Pakistan.

K.V. Padmanabhan was in the Indian Foreign Service. Born in 1911, he passed away in 1992.

Keywords: Indus Water treaty, India-Pakistan Water treaty, India-Pakistan bilateral ties

Source: The Hindu, 28-09-2016

A story to two caste struggles

The Dalit fighting for rights still upholds the universality of citizenship. The dominant castes insisting on consolidating their privileges reduce democracy to the worst kind of parochial politics.

Politics cannot be studied as a mere set of facts as if they are little nuggets to be polished and examined on their own. Politics needs frameworks which provide ways for interpretation and understanding. One senses the need for this when one watches the sudden explosion of upper caste agitations. An ethnography of these demonstrations alone is not enough. One has to see them as statements of values, of the manner in which democracy is seen and assessed. One can see three visions of democracy contesting and overlapping with each other.

A politics of anxiety

The early socialist vision saw democracy as a place where rights to quality were worked out, where the marginal and minority groups used the democratic process to be empowered as citizens. Such a vision is captured in the careers of B.R. Ambedkar and Ram Manohar Lohia. The second kind of vision inaugurated after the Bharatiya Janata Party came to power was a majoritarian vision, where electoralism was a consolidation of numbers. The transition from democracy as a value to a fact of demography becomes obvious here. There is a third kind of contest emerging where democracy, like the market, becomes a competitive game, where right loses to might and democracy becomes a fragile Hobbesian word.

Here the battle is not for justice to the downtrodden but a search for consolidation and privilege. Quotas and reservation no longer embody a search for justice, but an interest group politics where the powerful seek to accumulate more power. There is a mirror inversion of concepts like justice, victimhood, fairness as these same concepts are used by higher castes in a new “Alice in Wonderland” way, where they insist words mean what they say.

There is a politics of anxiety played out by the upper class who see democracy not as a framework of universal values but as a basis for consolidating a parochial world. The contrast is stark between a Dalit or tribal battling for rights and the demands of upper castes such as Patels, Jats and Marathas. The logic of the scripts and the nature of political dramas is radically different. First, the Dalits’ protests for rights have the character of an appeal. They are seeking to go beyond deprivation. The upper caste protests convey a sense of threat, of aggression and violence. For Dalits, democracy is a value; for upper castes it appears relevant as long as it sustains them instrumentally in power. If democracy does not work, it can be discarded like an old piece of tissue or a rag.

The body languages of the two dramas are different. One acts as a shareholder threatening to sell his shares or dismiss the directors if the firm fails to show profit. The marginals speak the language of suffering, deprivation and pain. The dominant castes utter the language of privilege, of consolidation. Rights meet a mentality of consolidation. One creates a politics of consensus, protest and persuasion, the other engages in a game of threat, preferring democracy as a zero-sum game. The Dalit fighting for rights still upholds the universality of citizenship. The dominant castes insisting on consolidating their privileges reduce democracy to the worst kind of parochial politics, a bullyboy spectacle which makes democracy appear empty and ironic. One sees this drama enacted with ruthless clarity in the recent protest of Marathas.

Their political script is simple. On Sunday, September 11, lakhs of Marathas poured out into the streets of Pune, paralysing the city. They had two demands. The first was a demand to repeal the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, and the second a demand for a greater share in the reservation. The power of the Maratha groups is seen not only in their hold on the city but also in the indirect endorsement of Sharad Pawar, the Maratha leader, and Raj Thackeray, chief of the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena. An endorsement of the two leading godfathers of Maharashtra speaks of the sheer power of the community.

And of atrocity

Central to the first of the demands is what one calls the politics of atrocity. Critical to this is a categorical act of denial of caste atrocity. The scenario of violence is typical and predictable. A Dalit youth is usually stoned or lynched on grounds of suspicion. His alleged crime is an illicit relationship with an upper class/caste girl. When investigated, the allegations hide deeper conflicts over grazing land. Such Gairanland often cultivated by landless Dalits has now been regularised by the Maharashtra government.

The upper castes feel the Atrocities Act is often misused and want it repealed. Yet what few talk about is a stranger legal battle where upper castes in turn file counter-cases of robbery and dacoity embroiling Dalits in the entrails of law. What is clear in discussions about these battles is that there is little respect for the rule of law. By turning the question of atrocity into a law and order problem, Marathas hope to get the Act repealed.

There is a strange reversal of victimology with upper castes almost amnesiac about their own atrocities and vigilantism. They are demanding justice for a 14-year-old girl who was raped and killed allegedly by three Dalit youths. It is almost as if history is inverted and the roster of atrocities against Dalits forgotten.

A misleading silence

The second demand is that Marathas as a caste community be brought under the reservation category. It is almost bizarre to watch a dominant community with roughly 33 per cent of the population — and which has electorally dominated State politics, virtually controlled the powerful cooperative movement — now play helpless and vulnerable, demanding reservation. As a wag put it, they are demonstrating a politics of anxiety about their various fiefdoms, signalling a future decline in power. The electoral frame which they dominated almost zero-sum style is now fragmenting as Other Backward Classes and Dalits enter the power game. It is an attempt to buy insurance for the future realising full well that the current quotas are a bit inelastic and that the Supreme Court has not looked kindly at their demands.

Currently the protests involve a series of silent marches as a statement of their problems. But the silence is misleading. What one senses behind it is the need to use violence to reassert power. One senses that a dominant caste community which feels threatened acts as if it is far more vulnerable than the communities it has exploited. There is a double danger here. First, that the silence so far is staged and temporary. Second, it is clear that what is being signalled is the possibility of violence as dominant groups which lorded over electoral democracy now feel threatened. It is not rights one is worried about but the very fabric of democracy. An electoralism which tends to go beyond the constitutional rules of the game negates democracy.

Such an attitude is not peculiar to the Maratha struggle. A contempt for law and order, the threat of violence and the rise of violence have marked all these dominant caste battles. The horrendous violence inflicted by Jats on other communities and on property was the hallmark of the recent struggles for reservation in Haryana. The second factor which has not been fully investigated or publicised is the full involvement and connivance of the local police in the agitation. It is almost as if law and order and justice are the preserve of dominant castes. Democracy as an aberration cannot or should not alter the dominant structures of power radically.

Between the appeals and protests of Dalits and tribals and the arrogant demands for continued dominance lies the new problematic form of democracy in India. Democracy as a way of life is threatened by electoral democracy as a rule game. First, majoritarianism threatens the pluralism of Indian democracy. Second, dominance of castes in the system threatens any hope for rights, for a more equalitarian system. The challenge of the future lies in how democracy reinvents itself to handle these two contradictions. Otherwise, India faces the final irony — that of democracy as a mechanism quietly corroding the institutional values of democracy as a value system.

Shiv Visvanathan is Director, Centre for the Study of Knowledge Systems, O.P. Jindal Global University.

Keywords: Maratha community, two caste struggle, Dalit rights, upper caste agitations

Source: The Hindu, 28-09-2016