Modi government has damaged the rights-based legislative framework without spelling out what will replace it.
No
one in the last two decades has come to power with greater euphoria
than the Narendra Modi sarkar. It has taken less than a year for that
euphoria to recede and change to disappointment. There are sufficient
reasons for this change. The celebrations of the first year in office of
this government are in sharp contrast to the plight of the common
person.
The callousness of the government is most noticeable in
its attitude to social sector issues. It does not seem to realise that
rights-based legislation were not a UPA creation, but a reflection of
the aspirations of millions of Indians struggling to procure the most
basic entitlements. In its desire to establish itself by discarding past
achievements, the current government is making a cardinal mistake.
Nothing could be more symptomatic of this narrow partisan approach than
the prime minister’s statement on the MGNREGA in Parliament. It is
shocking that the PM could promise to build a programme only to
establish its monumental failure. This statement sent a strong message
down the line to discredit and mismanage the programme. It is a failure
not only of leadership but of vision and governance. The PM’s rhetoric
sounds hollow even to his own party. The Madhya Pradesh chief minister
has publicly stated that the MGNREGA is one of the best programmes in
independent India.
Rights-based legislation like the forest
rights act, right to food, right to education and right to information,
passed in the last 10 years, did not merely provide economic and social
entitlements to the poor. They were an attempt by India’s poorest
citizens to claim delivery of basic services and ensure accountability.
The people’s right to participate to ensure delivery and to monitor
these programmes arose from numerous failures. Rights-based legislation
are an attempt by people to demand a share of governance. The demand for
transparency, the right to question, audit development programmes and
their implementation, arose from this. This framework is being
undermined through budget cuts and the attempt to replace rights with
cash transfers, which are much more in a paradigm of doles and handouts.
Bank accounts without money and spurious promises through contributory
pension and insurance schemes cannot replace the crippling of existing
programmes. Even as earlier programmes and laws are ridiculed, there is
no vision or direction for what is to replace them.
There is, in
fact, no roadmap this government has to offer for the social sector. If
this government felt that the earlier legislation were a complete
failure, it should have issued a white paper on the shortcomings and
provided a blueprint for how these would be overcome. This would at
least have provided the people of this country an idea of what they
could expect and where they could hold the government to account.
Much
of rural India has found itself reeling under a loss of social sector
entitlements and scrambling to save whatever resourcesit has. In the
farming community, many might not be personally affected by the land
acquisition ordinance, but most are affected by market-driven policies
on minimum support prices and inefficiencies in the provision of
fertilisers, irrigation, etc. The obstinacy of the government in
repeatedly reimposing the ordinance has only confirmed the rural
sector’s fears that these are the days of “company raj” and “bure din”.
The
government has probably begun to realise that the MGNREGA is one of the
less expensive ways to provide basic support, especially in times of
distress. But the PM’s earlier message has been internalised by the
system to such an extent that even the PMO’s later assurance to extend
support for the MGNREGA has not been able to change things on the
ground. People are still unable to get work. What could be a more
decisive example of poor governance?
The attack on participatory
governance has been even more surprising. While there was a stated
ideological bias against social sector entitlements, the rhetoric on
transparency, accountability, anti-corruption and improved efficiency
seemed unequivocal. However, by repeated and deliberate acts of omission
and commission, this government has made sure that a carefully
constructed transparency framework has been comprehensively undermined.
The accountability laws waiting to be implemented and passed have been
pushed into amendments and committees.
The non-appointment of the
chief information commissioner and three other commissioners cannot be
justified on any legitimate ground. Despite repeated protests, the
government has brazened it out to undermine the credibility of the
information commission. The whistleblower protection and Lokpal laws
were passed with great difficulty. They have been weakened through
proposed amendments and further delayed by sending them to standing
committees.
The grievance redressal law (a kind of RTI part II)
would have ensured accountability of all government servants and been
crucial to ensuring efficiency and service delivery. Instead,
institutions more responsive in engaging with the people have been
replaced by exclusive structures. The argument of efficiency remains a
myth as the entire system functions with extraordinary centralisation,
opacity and lack of public accountability. The fact that this is a “Modi
sarkar” and not the “NDA or BJP sarkar” is proclaimed repeatedly and
deliberately. It is testimony to the undemocratic nature of the
government’s current internal politics. Critics gave the BJP credit for
its (comparative) internal democracy. The ruling party is now defined in
the feudal mould of a single ruler, rather than a party that functions
collectively and democratically. The chaiwalla image has been replaced
by that of a sartorially conscious leader with a designer suit. All
decisions are taken by the PM, and he is constantly travelling abroad.
This has led to a dysfunctional single-leader system where questions of
the people do not get answered and find no platform.
Finally, the
attack on activists, NGOs and other dissenters on development politics
is unwise and deeply damaging to our democratic framework. People
committed to the welfare of marginalised communities and the environment
find themselves branded as “anti-national”, with a completely warped
sense of what truenationalinterest is. We can only hope that the
people will assert their rights and demand that promises be kept and
that we will see a more inclusive and plural India.
The writers are with the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan. Roy was a member of the UPA’s National Advisory Council until May 2013