BOOK REVIEW
by
Manikant Singh
SEVEN
DECADES
of
INDEPENDENT
INDIA
ideas and reflections
edited by
VINOD RAI
and
AMITENDU PALIT
After the completion of seven decades
of Indian independence evaluation and
revaluation of achievements of Indian nation
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during post-independence era becomes a as
seven decades appears to be sufficient time
period for undoing the colonial legacy on
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socio-economic structure of India. This task
drew the attention of the scholars from
various fields. It was in this context that a
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well researched text named as ‘Seven
Decades of Independent India’ (Ideas
and Reflections) edited by Vinod Rai (ex
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CAG) and Amitendu Palit (a senior
research fellow and economist) hit book-
shops.
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The book consists of twenty five-
chapters. Except introductory chapter
composed by editors, twenty four chapters
based on different burning issues have been
shaped up by luminaries from various fields.
Just after opening the folder the reader faces
some interrogating questions i.e.
1. Has the democracy in India fulfilled the
aspirations of its people?
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2. Have institutions delivered?
3. Is the country secure on its external
borders?
4. When will India become an economic
power house?
Scholars from various fields tried to answer
these questions but aberration is also
noticeable here.
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In introductory chapter, Mr. Rai and
Mr. Palit states that public discussion
presents formidable intellectual challenge
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perceiving expectations and perception
associated with performance during post
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independence era. This task becomes more
daunting when we try to evaluate public
policy in expansive back drop of thousands
of years which produced Aryabhata in space
exploration, Chanakya in governance,
emperor Akbar in religious co-existence,
Ramanujam in mathematics, Gandhi in
Ahimsa and Tagore in humanity to name
only a few. Then editors made a general
survey of political and economic scenario of
India between early Congress era to present
era with a brief description of institutional
change.
The first chapter titled ‘India’s
External Security Challenges’ is covered
by Shiv Shankar Menon, the former
national security adviser. Menon is eager to
exchange his long experience in external
affairs through writing articles in
newspapers and journals. In his recently
published book, Choices, he describes all
the major policy decisions he was associated
with including India-US nuclear agreement,
the first ever boundary related agreement
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between India and China, India’s decision
not to use overt force against Pakistan in
response to 26/11 terrorist attack in
Mumbai, the 2009 defeat of the brutal civil
war in Sri Lanka and India’s disavowal of
the first use of the nuclear weapons.
But in this article, he has rather
taken a limited canvas. In place of starting
from early post independence phase he just
jumped to the post Cold War era and started
to survey political scenario which appears
to be much challenging for India to deal
with. He states today’s world is less
supportive and offers more difficult choices
than the binary ones of the Cold War. Nor
does it offer the economic opportunities of
the years before the world economic crisis
of 2018. Both world politics and world
economics are fragmenting and becoming
increasingly regional. Then he drew the
attention of the people to some major global
issues i.e. the rise of China and her quest
for primacy first in Asia then globally,
accelerated imbalance of power in Asia
Pacific due to withdrawal of USA, tensions
in Korean peninsula, growing
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regionalization with the emphasis on
natives appeal like America first or Great
Rejuvenation of China etc.
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Then he also gives focus on security
issues like National Security, International
Security and Internet and Communication
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Technology (ICT) and personal security. For
him the major threat to national security
today is internal security with external
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connections i.e. the export of terrorism,
religious fundamentalism as well as
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extreme socialism or Naxalism. Likewise for
him, information and communication
technology can’t cause less harm to social
cohension of India then any weapon.
The second one article has
formulated by D. Subbarao, Ex-governor of
Reserve Bank of India. The title of the article
is ‘India in a Globalised world
Maximizing benefits and Minimizing
Costs’. He remained to be a great advocate
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of open market policy and his stand remained
to be much controversial due to his
independent stand vis-à-vis government in
policy making.
He starts his article directly from 1991
reforms but it would have been better if he
could have been presented a brief sketch of
Nehruvian model of economy. In fact the
book premised to draw a sketch of the
development of seven decades but he has
confined this article within there decades
only. In this article he has given a brief idea
that how did India move from first generation
reforms (associated mostly with product
markets which are largely in the control of
central government) to second generation
reforms (centered in factor markets where
progress depend on active cooperation of
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states).
While evaluating globalization he
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declares that globalization is a double-edged
sword (This statement may form the topics
of essay paper as well). It offers immense
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opportunity but also poses challenges. He
mentions about lots of benefits of
globalization i.e. improvement in
productivity, higher exports, faster output
growth, greater foreign investment, larger
GDP Growth, better employment
opportunities. But at the same time the
globalization has its own cost as well. With
globalization, India’s macro-economic
fortunes got linked to the vagaries of global
forces. Entire industries can die because of
import competition causing extensive job
losses. Apart from that capital flows have
been a common and recurrent feature of
India’s macro-economic experiences over the
last ten years.
Next chapter, ‘India’s Elections
and Electoral Reforms at Seventy’
formulated by S.Y. Quraishi touches the
theme of election process as a pillar of
democracy in India. After T.N. Sheshan,
Quraishi remained to be an activist Election
Commissioner. Apart from that, he reflected
intellectual vibrancy to defend the pillar of
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democracy of India. His articles have been
published in various paper and journals from
time to time. He always rises upto occasion
and tried to pinpoint the hurdles in free
electioneering. Even in the article published
in the newspaper, Indian Express dated 11th
May, 2018, he raised a contemporary issue
of data theft with a purpose to influence the
outcome of election results. The title of the
article is ‘Election in the time of Cambridge
Analytica’. In this article he puts the idea that
stricter data protection laws are required to
ensure that political parties do not indulge
in practices that involve undue influencing
of voting behavior.
In the article of Electoral Reforms at
Seventy, Quraishi focuses in attention just
at introduction of universal adult suffrage in
the constitution of Indian republic. He
applauded the decision of our constitution
maker while giving a major complement to
them for this courage. He states that the
common people in India were politically
empowered to vote at a time when 84
percent Indians were illiterate and poor. So,
the voice of electoral democracy was
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variously termed ‘A giant leap forward’, a
bold enterprise, an unparalleled adventure.
The poor masses of India had voted in many
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elections before Switzerland allowed its
women to vote in 1971 and Australia did so
for its aborigines in 1967. The United
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Kingdom, the mother of modern
democracies, granted equal voting rights to
women only in 1932, about 100 years after
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its first elections on the other hand the
United States of America had its first
elections in 1789 but its women had to wait
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till 1920, till the 19 th amendment of the
constitution before being able to vote. He
also quoted Amartya Sen, Nobel Laureate,
who says that ‘A country does not become
fit for democracy, it becomes fit through
democracy.’
While highlighting the achievements
the Election Commission which successfully
conducted sixteen elections to Lok Sabha
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and over 400 elections to state legislature
assemblies and facilitated peaceful, orderly
and democratic transfer of power. He
simultaneously focused over electoral
reforms through the years. These were
following-
1. In 1952, separate ballot boxes were used
for candidates
2. In 1962, the marking system of voting
was introduced
3. The elector’s photo indemnity card
(EPIC) is by now a cherished possession
of all citizens
4. In 1982, EVMs were used on an
experimental basis. Since 1998, these
have been used for all general elections.
In 2013, EVMS incorporated a Voter
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Verifiable Paper Audit-Trial (VVPAT)
5. One major Instrument that contributes
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to peaceful free and fair elections in
India is the Model Code of Conduct
(MCC)
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6. For curbing corruption and use of black
money in elections, the commission has
also issued directions that candidates
must open a separate bank account for
all election expanses.
7. Election commissioned for the greater
partition of voters declared 25th January
as the National Voter’s Day (NVD) from
2011.
8. Excessive money power has led to the
clamour for state funding of elections,
which is not desirable simply for the
reason that it does not guarantee an end
to the inflow of black money to the
election arena.
The next one chapter gives coverage to
Indian media. It is titled as ‘Indian Media
1947 to 2017’ and it has been composed
by Robin Jeffry, a research professor. He
presents the study of the progress of Indian
media between 1947 and 2017.
He projects the British rule as deadly
opposed to the freedom of expression.
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During this period press could be censured
and printers and publishers were imprisoned.
But simultaneously, he accepts that the
situation was not much better even just after
independence. Post, telegraph, telephones
and radio were government monopolies
during this period. A Central Board of Film
Censors was set up in 1951. During this
period, English newspapers went far ahead
of English newspapers as English newspapers
rather maintained the support of affluent
clients therefore they could amass sufficient
funds through advertisements. The situation
gradually changed in 1970s with growth in
population and literacy therefore even Hindi
newspapers also got wider reach. In fact, 1979
was a landmark year for print when Hindi
daily circulations surpassed English.
Film was the only other than newspapers
where private investment was permitted and
it was having two advantages over print.
Firstly, it was pure entertainment and did not
require literate audiences. Secondly,
producers drew profit through selling tickets
while newspapers even required
advertisement for profit.
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The author also gives focus over
television and other electronic media. In
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1977, television sets were in their black and
white infancy. Colour TV was introduced only
in 1982 to telecast Asian Games. Then
television, delivered by satellite was a feature
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of gulf-war in 1991 and CNN beamed into
homes around the world.
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In one of the articles, ‘India-ASEAN
relations at seventy’, scholar Tan-Thai
Young, has highlighted the relations between
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India and Asia right from the period of
liberation on India. Indian independence
worked as a trigger for liberation of South
Asian countries as well. Lee Kuon Yew, who
later came to head the government of
Singapore, was much stirred after listening
to the ‘Tryst of Destiny’ speech by Nehru
when he was a student at Cambridge. He
admitted that “I belong to that generation of
Asian nationalists, who looked up to India’s
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freedom struggle and its leaders Mahatma
Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru.”
Then Tan divided the relations between
India and South East Asian nations in
various stages. The first stage commenced
during Nehruvian era. Even before
independence of India, Asian relations
conference was organized at New Delhi in
March, 1947. Then Bandung conference was
held at the capital of Indonesia in 1955.
Therefore, in one sense seeds of Look East
policy was shown during Nehruvian era
itself. But at the onset of cold war, a new
era started when under the influence of USA
South East Asian nation’s drifted away from
India. During this period, the relations
between India and communist Russia was
taken with much suspicion by South East
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Asian nations. Then started the third phase
at the end of Cold War and Disintegration
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of USSR, when US stance towards India
underwent a major convulsion. It was the
time when under the compulsion of the
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policy of economic liberalization and
changing perception of Indian defence,
India launched Look East policy in 1990s.
Then new economic opportunities and
rise of China helped further galvanization
of relations between India and South East
Asian nations. It became a prelude to Act
East Policy recently launched by India.
In the next of the chapter Dipankar
Gupta, a great sociologist, presented his
scholarly article ‘Normalising the
unique-explaining the persistence of
caste’. In this article he has tried to study
caste system from its earlier structure to
present era in brief. He differentiates
between caste as a ‘system’ and caste as an
‘identity’. It is generally believed that under
the caste system even poorer subaltern
castes willingly accepted the ascribed rank
of caste hierarchy. In this way, even
marginalized castes participated in their
own domination but the truth is quite
different. In fact, earlier in agriculture based
closed economy the ruling oligarchy run the
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caste system and used to assign the hierarchy
from above forcefully and marginalized
castes were compelled to follow it so there
was no question of accepting assigned
ranking willingly.
But after independence and the
abolition of Zamindari, the dominance of
landed oligarchy ended in traditional sense.
Then with growing commercialisation in
country, closed economy gave way to a new
economic relation. It certainly left its imprint
on caste system.
In fact, as a ‘system’, caste structure
crumbled with disintegration of close
economy and decline of rural oligarchy but
‘caste’ exists as an ‘identity’. Therefore even
the so-called lower caste started to compete
with higher caste for social domination. So,
different castes come forward with the ‘New
Story of Origin’, very like the story of varna
system mentioned in the Purush Sukta of the
Rigveda with only difference that, whereas
story of Purush Sukta is having the support
of scripture but this story of origin is oral in
nature. It is through this story the
marginalized castes used to uplift their
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position.
It means subaltern castes did not
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accept cast ranking willingly even earlier but
it was under the pressure of ruling oligarchy
they did so under compulsion.
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As a system caste structure was
exploitative but in its reincarnation it is
beneficial for marginal sections as it is on the
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basis of caste identity, polarization in
election politics has become possible. Above
all, in order to maximize the benefits in
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election politics federating tendencies in
caste started, Mr. Gupta asserted that there
are many known caste alliances-such as
between Kshatriyas, Adivisis and Muslims,
whose acronym ‘Kham’ gained near
conceptual status in the 1980s. Then there
was the other grand alliance between the
Ahirs, Jats, Gurjars and Rajputs known by
the acronym ‘A jgur.’
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One important article titled as
‘Towards sustainable, productive and
profitable Agriculture’, Ashok Gulati and
Gayatri Mohan express their concern over
the phenomenon that the focus of policy
makers and scientists has been land
productivity but issues concerning water
productivity are often relegated to the
background.
He puts further that with a
population of 1.3 billion today, which is likely
to overtake that of China by 2024, India has
more than 17 percent of world’s population.
In comparison, India has about 2 percent of
world’s overall area, about 11 percent of
arable land and 4 percent of global fresh
water supplies. He believes that through
better technologies, farming practice and
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through better water management more and
more land can be brought under irrigated
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area even at present reserve of fresh water.
The typical method of irrigation in India is
flood irrigation i.e. flooding the field, be it
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through pumping of ground water or using
canal waters. The water-use efficiency under
flood irrigation hovers around 65 percent.
Compared with conventional surface
irrigation methods, the drip irrigation
system exhibits almost 90 percent efficiency,
by bringing down water loss during
application.
It is interesting to note the recent
slogan ‘Har Khet Ko Pani’ (Water to every
field) and ‘more crop per drop’. The slogans
are matched by increased funding for water
in the last two union budgets, be it for major
or medium irrigation schemes through long-
term irrigation fund (Rs 4000 crore) with
NABARD, the Micro irrigation fund (Rs
5000 crore) or the Pradhan Mantri Krishi
Sinchayee Yojana.
Then Mr. Gulati even shows his concern
even for sustainable agriculture. He drew the
attention of the phenomenon that Punjab
with its largest contribution of wheat and
rice to the central pool has been feeding the
country’s poor but it is at huge cost of state’s
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ecology, especially due to paddy cultivation.
More precisely, Punjab consumes almost
two times more water than West Bengal and
almost three times more water than Bihar
for producing some amount of rice. The same
is true of sugarcane production in
Maharashtra. The sugarcane crop consumes
almost three times more irrigation water
than cotton, the major crop of the state.
Apart from the articles mentioned
above, some other important articles were
also published but due to the constraints of
time and place it is difficult to mention all of
them. But as the title of the book suggests
some more issues also need to be considered
such as empowerment of women and
spread of communalism etc.

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