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Grammar
of Politics Cussed politicians and insulting speeches don't embellish India's democracy.
Disturbing as they may be, these trends are admittedly not new. Even so, election time is as good a moment as any to turn the microscope on the quality of India's democracy. Where there should be debate, there is invective; where there should be issues, there is name calling. Election campaigns in India are indeed a tamasha -- a celebration of base instincts. This relentless assault on the citizen's sensibilities will continue -- right through the election process, right into the parliamentary one. After all, what has the Lok Sabha been reduced to if not an assembly of the most raucous Indians? Is there any solution beyond this agonising? To be honest nothing other than self-regulation will work, not even intensive monitoring by the Election Commission. As the social base of the power structure has broadened, politics has ceased to be a genteel preserve. This mass character is India's strength. Don't belittle it with the language -- and the mindset -- of the bazaar. Public Disservice
Two lessons flow from all this. The first is yet another reminder that India's chalta hai attitude is its biggest undoing. The second is more focused and limited to the UPSC. An impartial civil service -- even if the term may sound an oxymoron in the Indian context -- requires an independent, meritocratic recruitment mechanism. As such the presence of the UPSC as a body with constitutionally guaranteed autonomy is unquestionable. Even so, as the guardian of the "steel frame", the decline of the UPSC mirrors the politicisation of the civil services. In theory, the members of the UPSC are appointed by the President. In practice, the government decides. In recent times, not every choice has been above board. P.V. Narasimha Rao selected a politician -- something unprecedented -- and almost all prime ministers have treated the UPSC as a sinecure for favourite retiring bureaucrats. In its structure and with its army of clerks, the UPSC resembles just about any government office in Delhi. It is not a model of efficiency for the Indian babu. At a time when there is near consensus on the need to trim and streamline the bureaucracy, shouldn't the UPSC begin by making an example itself? |
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It is something of a paradox that India prides itself on its vibrant
democracy even as it slips into an increasingly intolerant polity. Surely democracy is not
just about holding elections at regular intervals? The right to free expression, the
injunction that one must respect the other person's point of view, a certain civility and
decorum: these too are cornerstones of a democratic society. How does India measure up
against such standards? Not very favourably, if the current poll campaign is anything to
go by. There has been personal attack, gratuitous reference to film stars and other beings
more suited to a tabloid newspaper than an election speech, an inability to withstand
dissent or disagreement. It has all reached such a stage that an opinion poll is credible
only if it indicates success for your party. Otherwise it is biased, manufactured by the
opponent and should be subjected to such restrictions that the very idea of a pre-election
opinion survey would be rendered impossible. So much for the liberal spirit. 
In a country that blunders while conferring its
highest award for gallantry, nothing is sacrosanct. At one level therefore it should
surprise none that the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) made a mess of the civil
services' examination results recently. For the first time in memory it released a list of
successful candidates, only to update it soon after. The most dramatic change was in the
fortunes of the candidate who found his rank leapfrogging from 278 to 26 -- and his
professional horizons broadening from a humble allied cadre to the elite IAS. In a system
where rank at point of entry shapes much of the rest of an officer's career, such changes
are monumental. The civil service could do without this type of excitement.