Proactively tackling Swine Flu

With three more swine flu deaths in the space of a day, and many more cases streaming in from across the country, India is suddenly staring at the reality that the world has been preparing for since April 2009

The Centre, as well as the state governments, seem to be pressing the accelerator to tackle a deteriorating situation and contain the growing panic as fresh cases were reported from places like Delhi, Chennai, Goa and even Jaipur, while a few continued to battle for their lives in Mumbai and Pune.

This is a pandemic that WHO has worked with national Governments to tackle. It is unlikely that any Governmental action could have prevented its occurance in India but :

Why does it take a few hundred established cases to launch a website ?

Why does it take fatalities to add screening centers ?

Why , in the case of a pandemic, do we need to classify Government hospitals and private hospitals and the responsibilities attached to the respective status types ?

Why are simple facts not published every single day for public consumption ?

Why can daily briefings not happen in every Primary Health center ?

Why is it seeming like no one has been proactive here ? Why has the ramp up not happened on a war footing ?

Better late than never.

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Drought declared by the Doctor

On Saturday, 8th August,2009, the Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh said there was drought in 141 districts in the country and people must be prepared for a further rise in prices. There is a shortfall of six million hectares under paddy, this kharif season, owing to a deficient southwest monsoon.

So it’s official . The government has admitted to drought, price rise and a specific shortfall in kharif sowing.

Addressing a meeting of the State Chief Secretaries, Dr. Singh assured the states of the Centre’s full support for tackling drought. The States should quickly send detailed memoranda for assistance under the Calamity Relief Fund or the National Calamity Contingency Fund, he declared.

A meeting of all state Chief Secretaries is anyways a wasteful indulgence where also only doubt and lack of clarity has been displayed. What have they been told which could not have been guessed in their respective state capitals or indeed communicated over phone, fax or file ?

The response is neither proactive nor reactive. The PM’s expression of concern over drought conditions on August 8th is a bit too little and way too late.

Asking people to be prepared and alluding to calamity relief is bemusing.

Dr Singh preached to the choir declaring that “in no case should we allow citizens to go hungry,” and if need be, the government would take strong measures and intervene in the market. No news on what those could be. “We are helped by the fact that there were adequate food stocks owing to record production and procurement of foodgrains in 2007-08 and 2008-09.” he stated and that “We expect the State governments to intervene in procurement and act against hoarders.”

Dr. Singh wanted the States to operate a contingency plan for crops, drinking water, fodder, human and animal health and keep a close watch on food grain prices.

Qu says that from the earliest origin of government in this country, through successive reigns, occurrence of drought and resulting famine has been proactively monitored and actions taken

All forms of government in this country, even the dictatorial ones, had been receptive to the purpose of mitigating drought & alleviating suffering. Always, attempts were made to put in place a blue print and a well thought out cascading contingency plan.

For a 21st century Prime Minister aided by Super computers , latest Met technologies and global Information access to make pronouncements of this nature seems like a old village Mukhiya advising his community to trek over the hill in an attempt to survive.

Consider :

- Contingency scenarios , famine relief works scope and schedule , community water resources investments - Where is the master plan?

- Along with this prophecy of calamity, was it not incumbent upon the PM to disclose to the nation at least 10 concrete measures which are anyhow fairly ritualistic rather than bemoan lack of budget utilization etc and merely press the panic button?

- That this drought was anticipated is a matter of record. Mr Pawar had , from London, decided that it was enough of a rainy condition to call off the match (pun intended !) and left the prognosis to his lethargic mandarins. When exactly did it dawn upon the rulers that we were dry and desperate?

Finally, Union Agriculture and Food Minister Sharad Pawar blamed hoarding and speculation in the market for the “sudden” spurt in the prices of essential commodities, particularly pulses. He said that unless the States took action, the Centre would not be able to control the prices. We need effective response, not a lesson in Civics !!

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Assets ?

Assets

As candidates for political parties are named and file their nomination, we hear about their declaration of assets to the concerned magistrate while filing their nominations. Details of vehicles owned, agricultural and urban land, residential & commercial properties, weight of precious metals in their possession, all this and more is shared by the media.

So What?

Presumably this is not a precursor to scrutiny. It is merely an affidavit of sorts. Has the ill gotten wealth of a political aspirant ever been a disqualifier?

So what next ? Nothing.

This is because the Indian people recognize the tip of an iceberg without visualizing its entire proportions. They can smell the stench and imagine the load that has been tapped. They can laugh, smirk and shrug. They can look forward to a free meal too.

What about water, sanitation, electricity, roads, public transport, municipal waste, crime, corruption, environment, foreign affairs, education, science & technology, national security, justice ? What does that have to do with the declared assets of the candidate ?

More than 700 million people on India’s electoral rolls, a significant percentage first time voters. 7 national parties, 40 state level political parties ,980 registered unrecognised parties. This is the caravan marching to the gates of the 15th Lok Sabha with more than 6000 candidates expected to be in the fray. Assets …. who has the time ?

The Son, Grandson and Great Grandson votes for Hindi

“We have not eternal allies and we have not perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual and those interests it is our duty to follow “ Lord Palmerstone, British Prime Minister

Internalising this very logic, albeit not in the original context of diplomacy, our political class makes pre and post - poll alliances that perpetuate political interests – mostly personal, sometimes organisational but seldom ideological.

Rahul Gandhi - the son, grandson and great grandson of India’s past prime ministers is showing signs of making this logic stand on its head. Rightly so. It is in his long term interest. The UPA was a post poll alliance; it marked the Congress’s reluctant debut in presiding over a coalition. It did well. Well enough for it to be conceivable that it would legitimately seek to convert itself into a pre poll alliance and get votes on the basis of its performance? Commonly also referred to as ‘Congress +’ the allies were mostly representative of impositions, boundary conditions and ideological dyslexia that the Congress –India’s natural party of Governance – found irksome. It managed to minimise attrition, till it was avoidable. The Congress in 2009 is going it alone in the key Hindi heartland. That is a clear siren from the fog horn. Perhaps this young man , Congresses’ supreme leader in waiting (shy of 40 years, he is young by every definition) , is rolling the dice for a national revival. The questions are obviously about the timing and not the intent

If the Hindi heartland gamble does not pay off for Congress then in the couple of years that will follow with a very challenging economy, it may find itself saddled with the blame /incumbency .

Better to assess now and assert later!!

On Government sponsored Advertising pre-elections

Add warts

In all the national dailies that I read every morning as I sip my first cup of tea, I see many poorly laid out full page advertisements in plainly incompatible colours that tell me about the inauguration of rail lines, telephone exchanges, food processing parks and a dozen other things that are of no consequence to my daily life.

Inevitably, there is also a stamp album like line up of the passport size photographs of the movers and shakers of that ministry, state or Public Sector Enterprise. The rogue’s gallery actually indicates that power is multi tiered and often the placement level and size of the image clearly indicates the pecking order, no pun intended. "The art of government is the organization of idolatry." said George Bernard Shaw and, In fact, I wonder if it could give us guidance on how the 33 crore divinities in the Hindu Godly world could possibly be arranged.

Without an exception, these are all Hon’ble people. They are performing a public duty in informing me of a successful hundred days for a government in a state that I have never visited nor probably ever will.

Ask the question Why ? All sensible politicians ought to stay firmly in the midway zone between being hopelessly local and mindlessly global. In any case, there are probably less than two dozen political leaders in the entire country who have a claim to being leaders of even the state that they come from. Yet, it cannot be that this shrewd class of power players/seekers are poorly advised, misguided, or simply megalomaniacal in their drive for national advertorial led publicity . It is not an obscure obsession. They are hugely manipulative, thoroughly worldly and sharply focused on enlarging the perimeters of their personal power when they do this. Which is why, they hesitate not for a second in using state funds for targeted program publicity as an instrument of individual, family and party propaganda. They are operating strictly within the bounds of rationality. They probably have an eye on posterity .Surely, they are acutely aware that Indian voters accept their superego in proportion to the image carried in the advertisement. Indeed, they can justly make the implicit claim that their single-handed rule delivers effectively. They might even be able to point to improving standards of living, higher employment, reduced rates of crime, and an absence of civil discord. Not that these are criteria for winning again or even for being judged prior to a vote. May one entertain the sacrilegious thought that advertising budgets are not being spent but invested?

I am sure our bi-partisan journalistic fraternity is completely objective and no editorial warmth is ever generated by these insipid advertorials. It would be silly to think that media vehicles are to blame for a rather skewed share of spend. Isn’t Prime Time on English News channels exactly the right place for advertisements on Rural employment, pulse polio, pre requisite paper work for semi skilled labourers going to the Gulf .

Like al else, blame this on the politician. I suppose their advertised personas are not mere affectations. Probably it is their psychological compulsion in tricking themselves and others into believing that as merely themselves, they have a viable social role. That they are full of humility and infused with the spirit of team work in pursuing social good is manifest in the ubiquitous photo gallery. It is full of identity-diffusing properties. Believe it and watch on as this phenomenon reaches new highs with the approaching General Elections.

There are some things which are recession proof. Thank God.

America -Our Agony Aunt

According to the Artha Shastra, our best regarded treatise on statecraft, relations with other kings/states are to be established and carried out through ambassadors. It prescribes three types of ambassadors: the plenipotentiary, envoy with limited negotiating powers, and one who is merely a messenger. One sees that the distinctions are now blurred. There are at least half a dozen mission specific envoys and an equal number of statesmen sans portfolio crisscrossing the globe for the Western powers.
On perusing the media coverage post 26/11 in its entirety, if one was to plot a graph with media weight on the Y axis and duration of associated hype on the X axis, you would immediately recognize a pattern. Every time there was significant media coverage and all hopefuls were frothing with excitement, it was the red and blue of the star and stripes in the background. No one disputes the polar position of the United States and the pragmatism of convincing them of our case. Indeed it furthers a very relevant partnership made out of choice.
However, while a seemingly interminable procession of spent cartridges from the Bush administration made India their destination our government seems to have seen them as weapons of mass illusion. Somehow, we were rest assured that an impassioned plea to big brother would help our case against the neighbouring rogue state whose protégés were giving us a bloody nose. To what effect ? And why the need ? To whom did we submit ? For what leverage was the show and tell orchestrated ? Our leaders tell us all options are open, yet the menu of options seems to be like that of an American Diner – Keep it the Sunny side up.
Kautilya, our sage advisor, distinguished between six major approaches to foreign policy. The first a policy of maintaining peace with another state. The second , the policy of hostility which be followed if one is stronger than the enemy. The third, one of inaction most suitable when states are of equal strength. The fourth an outright invasion , a policy recommended for the very strong, The fifth recommended policy is of duality ,i.e. peace with one king/state while maintaining hostility towards another Only for the very weak and impotent was prescribed the sixth and last approach, i.e., seeking shelter with another king and waiting for better days . It is in the exclusive mandate of the sixth approach that we as a nation state seem to have put all our hopes.
The FBI may serve us nothing. In despair , we rely on externally owned instruments to deliver the coup de grace to an enemy that has previously been made so vulnerable with its crumbling reality. Are we so weak ? Think and keep watching as the Americans inspect the case.