Focus on implementing policy

This is the final year for achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) that were set for the period 1990-2015, and as clear indications are available on what can be achieved by the end of the period, a stocktaking can be undertaken. A UN report has done just that, and a mixed picture emerges. Targets in achievement have been exceeded in some areas, while they have not been in others. The targets themselves in some areas have been modest, so that achieving them fully or substantially should not raise the comfort level unduly. An enormous amount of work still remains to be done in terms of achieving minimum levels of development and policy should be geared to that. For example, the target of halving the number of people without sanitation will be almost achieved - but according to 2011-12 figures, 44 per cent of people were still without access to proper toilets.

The report card for the first goal, eradicating extreme poverty and hunger, is positive. The target of halving the proportion of people earning less than $1 a day has already been achieved. The concurrent goal of halving the proportion of people who suffer from hunger (measured by the prevalence of under-three underweight children) will miss the target, but only slightly. The second goal of reaching primary education to all will be substantially achieved as will be the survival ratio (those entering class I reaching class V) by looking at the enrolment figures, but all know by now, this is a poor indicator of how much of the reading and writing skills children actually acquire. The achievement in promoting the third goal of gender equality will be substantial - but that's thanks to targets being exceeded by three indicators (proportion of girls to boys in primary, secondary and tertiary education). In real terms, India will be a laggard - look at the proportion of women able to take up non-agricultural wage employment, with only 19 per cent being in that position in 2011-12.

When it comes to the fourth goal - of reducing child mortality - there is a real need to sit up and take notice. The targets of reducing by two-thirds the under-one and under-five mortality ratio, and those without measles immunisation, will all be missed by sizeable margins. It is in the area of maternal mortality, where also India's record has been poor, that the picture will be mixed and not wholly negative. The target of reducing by three-quarters the maternal mortality rate will be exceeded, but the achievement in raising the proportion of births attended by skilled personnel will be less than 80 per cent of the target.

The goal to reduce India's disease burden by combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases looks like being achieved - trends are positive. Similarly, the target for reducing the proportion of those without access to safe drinking water by half will be more than achieved through 90 per cent coverage. It is likely that in most fields - barring perhaps education and gender-based employment - more or less the right policies are in place. It is now a question of last-mile implementation.

Shifting global axis

The Chinese economy is slowing down, Russia's is tanking.Europe can't seem to get out of its debt and currency crisis, and Japan can't seem to get growth going. Brazil is troubled by more than lower oil prices, while in Europe it is not just Greece and Spain that are the problem. Italy's economy has shrunk every year for the last five years, and has enormous debt weighing down its future. The US economy has been the only bright spot in recent months, while Indian gross domestic product (GDP) numbers have just done a rope trick. Where is the world economy headed, especially when the central banks of the largest economies are serially pumping out enormous amounts of cash in a desperate effort to get growth going?

It helps to look at medium-term trends, over five years since the financial crisis of 2008 (international data comparisons are available only till 2013). Among the great developed economies of the world, the United States has grown, Japan has been stagnant and the European Union's GDP has shrunk. Between the three of them, overall GDP has expanded by barely three per cent in these five years. Indeed if you take the six largest economies of Europe, every one of them has seen GDP shrink (Germany only marginally so).

The BRICS economies offer a sharp contrast to this trend. Chinese GDP has doubled, and India's has grown more than 50 per cent. Brazil and Russia have grown, too, but more modestly. When all four BRICS economies are taken together, they grew 60 per cent in this period. Barring accidents, the combined BRICS GDP may become bigger than America's in a couple of years. Five years ago, they were less than two-thirds of the US economy.

The swing from the developed economies to the emerging markets is a broader trend, not confined to BRICS. Seven smaller emerging economies - like Indonesia and Mexico, Saudi Arabia and Argentina - saw their combined GDP grow by close to 40 per cent during this period. Most of them matched India's five-year growth, while Indonesia and Nigeria did even better. Indeed when you look at the African economies, they have had some of the best growth records of this period. Africa was the fastest growing continent in 2013, and a third of the sub-Saharan economies have been growing faster than six per cent.

It goes without saying that country rankings have changed. India was ranked 12th among the large economies in 2008, and moved up to 10th by 2013, overtaking Canada and Spain. In 2015 it could well be eighth, overtaking troubled Russia and shrinking Italy. Brazil meanwhile has moved up from 10th to seventh, and China has moved from third to second, while Russia has remained where it was, in ninth place. Canada and Spain have now dropped out of the top 10. This is not to suggest that no wealthy, trillion-dollar economy is doing well. Canada, Australia and South Korea have all grown in these five years. Nevertheless, the shift in momentum towards the emerging markets is undeniable.

If one were to look ahead to the next five years, these trends are almost certain to continue, despite China slowing down and Russia losing its way in a haze of tough-state nationalism. India's growth prospects have improved, and Indonesia (which recently overtook Turkey's economy in size) could join the trillion-dollar club before too long. The original BRICS countries should have been less politically correct when they included South Africa in their grouping and added Indonesia instead, even if that meant three Asian members and no African representation. With South Korea and Australia the two best-performing rich countries, there is little doubt that the swing towards Asia is even more marked than the rise of the emerging economies as a whole.

India, China and an opportunity

Keeping up the momentum in India-China relations, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj came back from her three-day visit to China with several deliverables — including a new Chinese openness in seeing India take up permanent membership of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC). Previously, the Chinese had linked SCO membership with a greater role for Beijing in the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC). Ms. Swaraj, during her first visit to China as External Affairs Minister, built on the three meetings Prime Minister Narendra Modi has had with Chinese President Xi Jinping. She also called on the Chinese President, a rare opportunity for any visiting Foreign Minister. Clearance for the early operationalisation of a new route to Kailash Mansarovar and a decision to hold a session of talks between the Special Representatives tasked by the two sides to resolve the boundary dispute, are other takeaways. Her trip was also part of preparations for Mr. Modi’s visit later in the year. As reported in the Chinese media, President Xi himself has set the agenda for taking bilateral ties to a new level by suggesting that the two countries seize the “opportunity of the century” by combining their development strategies. With a slowing economy and sluggish European recovery, China may be focussing on the Indian market. It also appears willing to invest, following Prime Minister Modi’s “Make in India” call.

It is in such a scenario of contact and consultation that “strong leaders” such as Mr. Modi and Mr. Xi can think about making some hard decisions when it comes to the decades-old boundary dispute that keeps surfacing during major bilateral visits. So far, the coalition nature of Indian governments has been seen as a major obstacle to the give-and-take, compromise approach on the border question. Today, Mr. Modi is in the happy situation where he can take a political call on issues, rising above intra-coalition pressures. In 2005, the Agreement on the Political Parameters and Guiding Principles for the Settlement of the Boundary Question signed by the two countries had raised hopes for an eventual settlement, but those have been belied. It would also seem that President Barack Obama’s successful visit to India around Republic Day has not dampened Beijing’s willingness to take relations with Delhi to the next level. Interestingly, India while talking to the U.S. and its other allies in the Asia-Pacific about safety in the sea-lanes, has agreed to set up a “consultation mechanism” on Asia-Pacific affairs with China and Russia. India’s diplomatic success lies in keeping several balls in the air at the same time

Essay2/2015

write an essay in 1000-1200 word .


Three dimensions of sustainability – economic, ecological and social. sustainable policies and idea of maximum  welfare are twin solution for future sustainability.

The price of indiscretion

Union Home Secretary Anil Goswami’s removal from office will help keep the Central Bureau of Investigation autonomous and independent

Union Home Secretary Anil Goswami’s removal from office is a bold move by the government and will be welcomed by all those who stand for an independent Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) — one that is allowed to discharge its functions freely and fearlessly. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Rajnath Singh deserve to be complimented for their swift decision. From all accounts, the act was not capricious; they chose to probe deeply into allegations that were swirling around in the New Delhi circles over the past few days before sacking Mr. Goswami. It is believed that the CBI Director produced enough material evidence to prove the impropriety of the Home Secretary in trying to stall the arrest of former Union Minister Matang Sinh in connection with the Saradha Scam. Mr. Sinh was widely known to be influential, even after the United Progressive Alliance government lost power at the Centre. This time, however, he ran out of luck while trying to intimidate the CBI. Mr. Goswami and Mr. Sinh are said to have known each other for several years. Obviously Mr. Sinh had called the Home Secretary to save himself the embarrassment of an arrest by the CBI, and it is likely that their conversation was recorded.

Unmitigated impropriety

Thereafter the facts become slightly fuzzy. The rumours on the grapevine are that Mr. Goswami called some senior CBI officers (probably not the Director himself) to plead his friend’s case. The officers spoken to by the Home Secretary thereafter conveyed this to the Director, who in turn promptly brought the whole episode to the notice of the Home Minister and the Prime Minister. It is still not known whether the Home Secretary acted on his own after knowing that his friend was in distress or he was a mere conduit through which some political bigwig — now not in power — was trying to save Mr. Sinh. The truth may never come out. In any case this was unmitigated impropriety on the part of a very senior civil servant who is culpable to the core.

“The CBI has become stronger with the knowledge that no one will dare to dictate terms to it in future”

Mind you, the charges against Mr. Sinh were not ordinary. He was being probed for serious criminal misconduct which merited an arrest and a custodial interrogation. It was for the CBI to make up its mind on this, and whatever it did was to be reviewed only by the courts and not by anyone else, including the executive. I am happy that the government lost no time in acting as it did.

In my view, Mr. Goswami’s indiscretion (to put it mildly) was both artless and unethical. He has justifiably paid a heavy price. The episode sends the right signal to both senior officers and non-officials in high places that they will come to grief if they ever try to deflect serious criminal investigations undertaken by the country’s highest law enforcement agency. I laud the current CBI Director for having brought the facts to the government’s notice. The normal tendency would have been to suppress such interference in CBI matters, especially when the person meddling is either a Minister or a senior civil servant.

Not many may know that the Home Secretary is a powerful entity in the capital and can play with the careers of senior police officers. Many senior officers genuflect before him for routine favours. It is true that many in Mr. Goswami’s position in the past had been great leaders and men of the highest integrity. But it is equally true that there have been a few aberrations — there have been erratic and egoistic officers who have abused their proximity to centres of power only to promote the cause of some favoured unscrupulous policemen, while at the same time destroying the careers of the not-so-unbending.

My own experience was not very pleasant; I had to deal with someone who chose to flout even what the Home Minister had granted the CBI by way of infrastructure support. I presumed he had a hang-up as far as the CBI was concerned, and he had to constantly settle scores with the organisation by denying it the support it required. We need a powerful Home Minister, both knowledgeable and plodding, and who will hold the Home Secretary to account, as Mr. Singh has done.

Not many know that the CBI is part of the Department of Personnel and Training which works under the Prime Minister. The Home Ministry is mainly a facilitator which lends support to the CBI in the form of manpower, especially by providing Indian Police Service officers borrowed from various States. Otherwise it has no authority over the CBI, especially in matters of anti-corruption work. (With respect to conventional crimes, the Ministry transfers cases received at the instance of States to the CBI or the National Investigation Agency for investigation.)

The CBI Director’s administrative head is the Prime Minister and no one else. (This is a legacy of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi who brought the agency under her control after moving it out of the Home Ministry. The objective was not exactly honourable.) That the Prime Minister is the controller deters many Ministers and civil servants from interfering in the agency’s investigations. If the CBI Director keeps the Home Minster informed of certain broad developments, it is purely as a matter of courtesy and certainly not as mandated by business rules. In my opinion, this is how it should be to avoid differing signals from being sent to the CBI.

Need for introspection
The CBI undoubtedly emerges credible from the unseemly episode. It has also become stronger with the knowledge that no one will dare to dictate terms to it in future. It is exactly this situation that calls for serious introspection on the part of the CBI leadership as to whether it deserves this majesty in the bureaucracy. CBI critics — there are far too many — would say that the organisation does not merit this kind of power or influence. The CBI Director and his top leadership have, therefore, a huge responsibility to ensure that their investigators do not run amuck. This is especially with regard to arrests of accused or suspects. The authority is enormous. It has to be exercised humanely, and with great care and caution. A hasty and unjustified arrest brings in more ignominy to an agency, especially at a time when it has suffered a leadership crisis. Two of its chiefs are under a cloud, and it is not known how the government is going to deal with them.

The cliché “Caesar’s wife should be above suspicion’ comes readily to my mind. Internal vigilance should be the watchword. Any failure on the part of the Director or his lieutenants to insist on the highest standards of integrity for themselves and for their ranks will be unpardonable. The loser from the CBI’s sloth and connivance with the corrupt will ultimately be the aam aadmi.

Women need freedom, not protection

The underlying image of the woman as ‘victim’ in the Delhi election campaigns has led to parties competing over who will push for a more policed and disciplined city

If the Freudian question “what women want?” were posed to the parties contesting the Delhi polls, their responses would be: “more police, more surveillance, more suspicion and control.” The underlying representation of women in Delhi’s electoral campaigns, election manifestos and the news is dominated by a talk of victimisation and helplessness. It is this underlying image of the ‘victim’ that has spurred campaigns where parties compete over who will push for a more policed Delhi, a more oppressively disciplined Delhi, a city perpetually threatened by and suspicious of crime. Following Professor Ratna Kapur, let us call this representation the “victim subject.”

Similar solutions
On issues of gender and sexuality, the Delhi voter does not, in fact, have a genuine choice at all. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) offer very similar solutions in their visions and manifestos to the gender question. A quick perusal of the AAP manifesto and the BJP’s public statements reveals their exclusive reliance on this victim rhetoric, which can ultimately be debilitating and limiting. Yet the parties are busy competing, not about who can promote more freedom but, rather, who can be more protective. The metonym of the latter is of speedy trials, security forces and CCTVs while the former is as simple as being able to take a peaceful midnight stroll in the streets of the city. One may argue that a policed society will eventually lead to a freer city but this is far from true. A protectionist imagination is entirely based on a perception of masculine superiority, and only breeds more fear, threat and alienation in society.

Political visions and manifestos

All the references to women in the 70-point AAP manifesto are based on this above-mentioned protectionist-victim rhetoric. The controversial Mohalla Sabha replaced by the Delhi Dialogue will now decide the action plan for a city “safe for women.” Because “unlit streets become scenes of crimes, particularly against women,” the AAP promises adequate street lighting. The AAP and the BJP are competing about who will install more CCTV cameras and the number is now in lakhs. They promise to set up fast-track courts dedicated to handling cases of sexual assault and other crimes against women, with courts “running in two shifts” and a special Women’s Security Force (“Mahila Suraksha Dal”) consisting of a 10,000 strong Home Guard and 5,000 bus marshals. Even Wi-Fi in Delhi is meant to “tie in with women’s safety initiatives.”

“A protectionist imagination is entirely based on a perception of masculine superiority, and only breeds more fear, threat and alienation in society”

Similarly, with regard to the BJP’s candidate, you can take Kiran Bedi out of the police, but not the police out of Kiran Bedi. She seems to lack any sense of imagination that goes beyond disciplining, policing and militarising the environment. Her 25-point blueprint promises community policing, increased patrolling, CCTVs, home guards, civil defence escorts on buses and ladies’ special buses. Not to forget self-defence training, safety kits with sprays and whistles, “widely publicised” punishments, quick FIRs, Special Women’s Security Force… the list just goes on. She then tweeted, “I look fwd2 [forward to] working w/[with] each of u [you] to make this 25-point program successful in keeping our women safe.”

Freedom and positive liberties

Of course, one can genuinely appreciate the fact that these campaigns have at least been gender-centric in their approach as compared to the blatantly violent campaigns in other parts of the country. But beyond appreciation, a more nuanced public debate is much needed. Our discussions must include a politics of freedom rather than a repressive politics that is threatened by any expression of desire and sexuality in the public sphere. A politics of freedom would not be obsessed with Ms Bedi’s 6-P’s (prisons, prosecution, outreach to people, parents, improving policing, including community policing, and the press.) or with C’s (crime, controls, CCTVs and courts). Such an imagination of a city can be suffocating and repressive. We need to discuss not protectionist measures or even negative liberties, but positive liberties. Positive liberty is the possibility of acting in autonomous ways and taking control of one’s life, as opposed to negative liberties, which is more about absence of constraints.

Approaching a politics of positive liberties will require a move away from a subjectivity that is exclusively of the “victim subject” into an alternative one. Following several prominent queer theorists, this alternative subjectivity needs to be a subject that can appreciate and accommodate a strong notion of desire. One finds an instance of this subjectivity, grounded in freedom and desire, in the prescient and progressive judgment of the Supreme Court in National Legal Services Authority v. Union of India & Ors. (2014).

The judges in this case suggested that “gender identity refers to each person’s deeply felt internal and individual experience of gender, which may or may not correspond with the sex assigned at birth, including the personal sense of the body which may involve a freely chosen, medication of bodily appearances or functions by medical, surgical or other means and other expressions of gender, including dress, speech and mannerisms.” As per the Supreme Court, gender identity therefore refers to “an individual’s self-identification as a man, woman, transgender or other identified category.”

Sexual violence is not an expression of desire, but an expression of power. Desire is a far more layered, ontological category that the logo-centric liberalism does not adequately understand. A politics grounded in such a ‘desiring subjectivity’ based on a notion of positive liberty will be far more fruitful than that of the ‘victim subject’ forever seeking protection and paternal oversight. Only a truly democratic and plural city will allow for the discourse to shift from the latter to the former.

Ground-breaking MRT procedure gets Parliamentary approval

Mitochondrial Replacement Therapy, a ground-breaking technique that uses genetic material from three different people to prevent certain inherited -- and hitherto untreatable -- genetic diseases from passing from the mother to her offspring, received a resounding mandate on Tursday in the House of Commons.

Parliament voted 382 to 128 for an amendment to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act, 2008, which will clear the path for licenses to be given to clinics to perform the procedure.

First country to approve this

Britain thus becomes the first country in the world to approve such a procedure, considered the only hope for women who carry defective mitochondria to have healthy children. It puts to rest a controversy that was opposed by the Church and faith groups for its potential to create three-parent designer babies.

The issue was sharply debated in the House, on grounds of ethics, medical safety, and regulatory parametres. Members voted according to conscience. The motion was moved by Jane Ellison, health minister, who said that the technique allows women with mitochondrial disorder to avert the “devastating and often fatal consequences” of the disease when passed on to their children.

The technique involves an IVF procedure in which the egg's defective mitochondrial DNA is replaced with healthy DNA from a female donor.

Countering criticism of the technique as a form of genetic modification and a leap into the unknown, the Minister said that mitochondrial DNA is made up of 0.054 per cent of a person’s overall DNA and had none of the nuclear DNA that determined personal characteristics and traits.

Professor Doug Turnbull, who led the team that developed the technique at the University of Newcastle said he was “delighted” with the vote, adding “I’m told it’s unusual to hear a genuine spontaneous whoop of joy from the public gallery when something’s voted through. That reflects how much this means for the patients.” (EOM)