½FREEDOM ! आधी आज़ादी

New Year: "२००९ के व्यक्ति" और "२०१० में छत्तीसगढ़"

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 16:30:00 +0000

दो नई परम्पराएं
वैसे तो ३१ दिसम्बर और १ जनवरी ग्रेगोरियन कैलेंडर के अन्य ३६३ दिनों की तरह सिर्फ दो तारीखें है. प्राकृतिक रूप से ये दूसरे दिनों से अलग नहीं हैं: दोनों दिन सुबह सूरज उगता है, और आकाश का अपना सफ़र पूरा कर शाम को ढल जाता है; चाँद-सितारे उसकी जगह ले लेते हैं.

देखा जाए तो इन दोनों तारीखों का महत्व मात्र मानव प्रजाति तक ही सीमित है और इस प्रजाति-विशेष पर भी इनका प्रभाव केवल मानसिक होता है. फिर भी इस मानसिक प्रभाव का अपना महत्त्व है: दोनों दिनों में अतीत और भविष्य का अनोखा सम्मिश्रण है: हर साल ३१ दिसम्बर की रात को जब ठीक १२ बजता है, तब उस एक क्षण में बीते हुए साल के गुजरने और नए साल के आने से जुड़ी सैकड़ों-अनगिनत भावनाओं का एकाएक समावेश हो जाता है.

इस तथ्य को ध्यान में रखते हुए, मैं इस वर्ष से ब्लॉग पर दो नई परम्पराओं की शुरुआत कर रहा हूँ. पहली: अतीत को सलाम करते हुए, हर वर्ष उस व्यक्ति को "साल के व्यक्ति" के खिताब से नवाज़ा जाएगा जिसने हमारे प्रदेश, छत्तीसगढ़, को सर्वाधिक प्रभावित किया है. दूसरी: आने वाले साल में क्या-क्या होगा, उसकी भविष्यवाणी (और साल के अंत में, उस भविष्यवाणी का बेबाक विश्लेषण!).

भविष्य में इन दोनों पहलूओं पर आपके सुझाव आमंत्रित रहेंगे; और उन्हें ब्लॉग पर प्रमुखता से प्रकाशित भी किया जाएगा.

(१)
२००९ के व्यक्ति
२००९ के "साल के व्यक्ति" का खिताब संयुक्त रूप से श्री नरेश डाकलिया, श्रीमती किरणमयी नायक और श्रीमती वाणी राव को दिया जाता है. इन तीनों ने अपनी-अपनी व्यक्तिगत छवि और संबंधों के कारण न केवल राजनैतिक अनुमानों को बल्कि दशकों के इतिहास को भी सर के बल पलट कर रख दिया, और राजनैतिक रूप से छत्तीसगढ़ के सबसे महत्वपूर्ण शहर, राजनांदगांव, जो की स्वयं राज्य के मुख्यमंत्री का विधान सभा क्षेत्र है, और प्रदेश के दो सबसे बड़े शहर, रायपुर और बिलासपुर, के वासियों का विशवास हासिल कर वहां के प्रथम नागरिक चुने गए.

प्रदेश के एक नेता ने हाल ही में इस ओर मेरा ध्यान आकर्षित किया कि इन तीनों में ख़ास बात यह है कि वे प्रदेश के किसी भी बड़े नेता के "पिछलग्गू" नहीं कहे जा सकते; उनका स्वयं का अस्तित्व है, अपनी खुद की पहचान है. यही वजह है कि उन्हें बरसों से सार्वजनिक जीवन में सक्रिय होने के बावजूद कभी भी किसी चुनाव में पार्टी का उम्मीदवार नहीं बनाया गया.

और जब टिकट दी गयी तो शायद यह सोचकर कि वैसे भी इन सीटों में कांग्रेस का जीतना न केवल मुश्किल है बल्कि नामुनकिन. आखिरकार, पिछले बीस सालों से कांग्रेस के उम्मीदवार रायपुर और बिलासपुर शहरों में क्रमशः ३०००० और १५००० मतों से ज्यादा के अंतर से हारते आ रहे थे; और जहाँ तक राजनांदगांव की बात है, तो यहाँ हाल ही में मुख्य मंत्री जी लगभग ४०००० वोटों से जीते हैं. मुझे लगता है कि इस बात का फायदा भी इन तीनों को मिला: एक तरफ तो सत्ता के नशे में धुत भाजपाई अति-आत्मविश्वास से ग्रसित रहे; वहीं दूसरी तरफ कांग्रेस में उनके विरोधीयों ने यह सोचकर कि वैसे भी वे हार रहे हैं, भीतरघात में ज्यादा सक्रिय रहना जरूरी महसूस नहीं किया.

इस बात से हमें तीन महत्वपूर्ण सीख मिलती है. पहली: बड़े नेताओं के आगे-पीछे घूमना इतना जरूरी नहीं है. दूसरी: जनता के बीच सक्रिय बने रहना, उनके सुख-दुःख में भागीदारी रखना, राजनीति में अधिक महत्व रखता है. तीसरी: धीरज रखना, और कभी भी अपना धैर्य न खोना, पद मिले या न मिले. राजनीति के इस दौड़ में श्री नरेश डाकलिया, श्रीमती किरणमयी नायक और श्रीमती वाणी राव ने यह साबित कर दिया कि जीत कछुए की ही होती है.

(२)
२०१० में छत्तीसगढ़
A. राजनीति:
(१) भाजपा आलाकमान में २००९ के अंत में हुए परिवर्तन का प्रभाव प्रदेश की राजनीति पर पड़ेगा तो जरूर पर प्रदेश के नेतृत्व में परिवर्तन होने की संभावना २०१० में क्षीण ही रहेंगी. श्री राजनाथ सिंह का जो डॉ. रमन सिंह को अभयदान प्राप्त था, अब वो नहीं रहेगा. इस से उन्हें विफल करने में और उनकी विफलताओं का फायदा लेने में उनके विरोधी २० अशोक रोड में सक्रिय तो होंगे, लेकिन केंद्रीय स्थर पर कमज़ोर भाजपा अनुशासन को ज्यादा महत्त्व देते हुए, मुख्य मंत्री और उनके विरोधियों (जिनकी संख्या में इजाफा होगा), दोनों पर नकेल कसने और उनके बीच संतुलन बनाने के प्रयास में लगी रहेगी.

(२) कांग्रेस में पीढ़ी-परिवर्तन का दौर और तेज होगा. नए-नौजवान चहरों को महत्त्व दिया जाएगा; उनका चयन ऊपर से नहीं होगा, बल्कि पार्टी के युवा सदस्य सीधे चुनाव के माध्यम से करेंगे.

(३) पंचायत चुनाव में अधिकतर पदाधिकारी दुबारा निर्वाचित नहीं होंगे. ज्यादा तर पढ़े-लिखे नौजवान लोग ही चुने जायेंगे. भविष्य में पार्टी और पैसे का कम, व्यक्ति की निजी छवि और संबंधों का ज्यादा प्रभाव होगा.

(४) छत्तीसगढ़ स्वाभिमान मंच दुर्ग की राजनीति में अंततः अपना खाता खोलेगी.

B. कानूनी व्यवस्था/ प्रशासन:
(१) नक्सलवाद पर सीधा फौजी आक्रमण केंद्रीय बलों के नेतृत्व में बोला जाएगा, इसमें सफलता भी मिलेगी. केंद्र सलवा जुडूम से समर्थन वापस लेगा, वो एक विफल प्रयोग के रूप में इतिहास के पन्नो में दफ़न हो जाएगा. मानव-अधिकार के उल्लंघनों की वारदातें बढ़ेंगी, मीडिया उन्हें उजागर करने में कमज़ोर साबित होगी, लेकिन वहां सक्रिय सामाजिक संस्थायों की बातों को केंद्र गंभीरता से लेगा. निर्दोष आदिवासी मारे जायेंगे. शहरी क्षेत्र में प्रदेश की पहली बड़ी नक्सली घटना होगी. डॉ. बिनायक सेन बेगुनाह साबित होंगे.

(२) बड़े शहरों में गुंडा-गर्दी और बढ़ेगी. बेरोजगार युवाओं की संख्या इनमें ज्यादा रहेगी.

(३) प्रशासन और हावी होगा: सूचा के अधिकार अधिनियम के तहत सूचना लेने की प्रक्रिया को और कठिन बनाया जाएगा; केंद्र द्वारा प्रशासन को और अधिक जवाबदेह बनाने के कानूनी प्रयासों का भी प्रदेश में यही अंजाम होगा; प्रशासनिक खर्चों और भ्रष्टाचार में इजाफा होगा. लेकिन इन सब के विरोध में दायर जनहित याचिकाओं की सुनवाई का कोई असर नहीं होगा.

C. अर्थव्यवस्था:
(१) पानी, सिचाई और पीने दोनों, की बेहद कमी होगी. इस से कृषि पर तो सीधा प्रभाव पड़ेगा ही, साथ-साथ बड़े शहरों में भी त्राहि मचेगी. सरकार इस भीषण समस्या से निपटने में पूरी तरह विफल रहेगी.

(२) जितने भी अब तक की खदानें (कोयला, लोहा) बड़े-बड़े उद्योगों को आबंटित करी गयी हैं, उनमे से शायद ही एक-दो ही स्टील और बिजली का उत्पात शुरू कर पाएंगी. बाकी सब प्रशासन से साथ-गाँठ करके कोयले इत्यादि की काला-बाजारी ही करते रहेंगे. इसका सीधा-सीधा नुकसान प्रदेश के युवाओं को होगा: न नए उद्योग खुलेंगे, न उन्हें रोज़गार मिलेगा.

(३) भू-माफिया के आपस के खेल में जमीनों और घरों के भाव जम के बढ़ेंगे लेकिन इनमे घर बनाने वालों और रहने वालों की कमी रहेगी. अधिकतर जमीन और घर खाली ही रहेंगे.

D. संस्कृति:
(१) छत्तीसगढ़ी फिल्मों की संख्या तो बढ़ेगी, लेकिन २००९ की सुपरहिट, मया, का कोई मुकाबला नहीं कर पायेगा. छत्तीसगढ़ी गानों की टी.वी. चैनलों और वीसीडी के माध्यम से ग्रामीण क्षेत्रों में धूम बनी रहेगी.

(२) क्षेत्रीय टी.वी. चैनलों में कर के अभाव से प्रोग्राम्मिंग का स्थर गिरेगा. केबल माफिया के केन्द्रीयकरण के प्रयासों से केबल-वार होगी, जिसका भार सीधे उपभोक्ताओं पर पड़ेगा.

(३) मीडिया पर सरकारी तंत्र हावी रहेगा. इसके दो प्रमुख कारण रहेंगे: पहला, विपक्ष की सरकार की आलोचना करने में कमजोरी; दूसरा, गैर-सरकारी स्रोतों से आय के अभाव में सरकारी मदद पर छत्तीसगढ़ी मीडिया की बरकरार निर्भरता.

Sketches: Voices from the Fin de siècle

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 07:33:00 +0000

Chandrakant Kashyap sent me the following email:

"your blog post reminded me of some of your sketches that i have. So sending them and i hope you will find them useful."

Naturally I had forgotten all about these sketches, all of which were drawn at the Fin de siècle.

Many thanks to Chandrakant for having carefully preserved them all these years- given the upheavals my own life has gone through during this past decade, I know I certainly couldn't have!- and for sending them to me now when finding time to sketch, or even scribble, seems like an almost inconceivable luxury.

AJIT JOGI AT THE LBSNAA, c. 1969

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 18:01:00 +0000

The Lal Bahadur Shashtri National Academy of Administration (LBSNAA), incubator of Union and Central services officers all across the nation and abroad, completed its 50th anniversary this year. A CD of archival photographs has been released to commemorate the occasion.

While browsing through the CD, I was pleasantly surprised to spot Papa in at least 5 of the 50 photos it contains. He was enrolled as an Indian Administrative Service (IAS)-trainee at the LBSNAA way back in 1969-70. And from what I've been told about him by his batchmates- including, most recently, His Excellency the Governor of Chhattisgarh, Mr Narasimhan- Papa was already showing symptoms of where he was headed: he made something of a record by serving three consecutive terms as President of the Academy's Mess Committee (the only elected office among trainees), topped his class in equestrian sports (horse riding, polo etc.) and shooting, and scandalized everybody by inviting the then very young- and if the photos are anything to go by, very pretty- Odissi danseuse, Ms. Sonal Mansingh, to dine at the high-table, which had thus far played host to only those above the age of 65. These photos, I believe, convey the joie de vivre of that time.

Many thanks to Mr. Gaurav Dwivedi, Deputy Director of LBSNAA, and Dr. Alaudin Farishta, our family doctor, for making the CD available. To download these photos, please visit my Gallery.

An Interview with An Advocate: एक वकील से साक्षात्कार

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 15:22:00 +0000

The Editorial Board of the daily, Chhattisgarh Watch, led by its erudite editor, Mr Ramavtar Tiwari, interviewed me recently on various aspects of my life. The interview was published in its edition of 6.10.2009. It is reproduced here with his very kind permission.

अमित जोगी का नाम एक समय खासा चर्चित रहा है. विवादों और संघर्षों का अमित के साथ चोली-दामन का साथ रहा है. एक समय वे प्रदेश में शक्ति के दूसरे केंद्र के रूप में जाने जाते थे. उस दौर में अमित की तूती बोलती थी, यह कहना गलत नहीं होगा. हालांकि इन बातों से वे इनकार भी करते हैं. श्री जोगी के पास स्पष्ट सोच है और वे अपनी बातों को बड़े सलीके से रखते हैं. "छत्तीसगढ़ वॉच" ने उनके जीवन के अलग-अलग पहलुओं को स्पर्श करने की कोशिश की है.

आप शादी कब कर रहे हैं?
नए जीवन की नई शुरुआत है. पहले इरादा सेटल होने का है. माता-पिता जब आदेश देंगे, शादी कर लेंगे. वे ही रिश्ता तय करेंगे. मेरा मानना है कि शादी दो विभिन्न परिवारों का सम्बन्ध है, जिसमे पहले बड़ों की सहमती होनी चाहिए. उसके बाद हमारी सहमती की बात आती है.

कैसी दुल्हन की कल्पना है?
घरेलू हो और माता-पिता की सेवा करे.

आपके आदर्श कौन हैं?
व्यक्तिगत जीवन में मेरे पिता जी ही मेरे आदर्श हैं. उनमें जबरदस्त विल-पॉवर है. उनसे मैं नीचे से ऊपर उठने की प्रेरणा प्राप्त करता हूँ. वैचारिक रूप से पंडित जवाहर लाल नेहरु मेरे आदर्श हैं. अनेकता में एकता की विचारधारा को उन्ही ने साकार किया है. देश स्वतंत्रता के पहले से ही अलग-अलग भाषा-बोली, वर्गों, वर्णों और क्षेत्रों में बंटा था. नेहरु जी ने ही सही मायनों में भारतीयता का निर्माण किया है.

पिता के किन गुणों से प्रभावित हैं?
पिता जी की दृढ़ इच्छा शक्ति से मैं बहुत प्रभावित हूँ. सोचता हूँ की वे इतनी शक्ति कहाँ से इकट्ठी करते हैं! वे प्रदेश की जनता से खुद को सीधा जुड़ा महसूस करते हैं. इसे मैं "excessive self identification" कहता हूँ. लोगों से सीधे तौर पर जुड़ने की यह प्रवृत्ति ही शायद उनकी इच्छा शक्ति बनती है. वे कहते भी हैं की मेरे दोनों पाँव नहीं है तो क्या हुआ, छत्तीसगढ़ की दो करोड़ जनता के चार करोड़ पाँव मेरे ही हैं. उन्हें ये ताकत जनता से मिलती है और मैं इन्ही बातों से प्रभावित हूँ.

पिता की लोकप्रियता के बारे में क्या कहते हैं?
छत्तीसगढ़ ने उन्हें बहुत प्यार दिया है.

आप भी लोकप्रिय हैं.
हो सकता है, लोग यह सोचते हैं, पर उनसे तुलना मैं नहीं कर सकता.

छत्तीसगढ़ से कांग्रेस क्यों उखड़ी?
उखड़ गई यह कहना ठीक नहीं है, यह कहना चाहिए की लड़खड़ा गई है. विशेष रूप से आदिवासी इलाकों में कांग्रेस संगठन से कमजोर है. कांग्रेस के ४ मोर्चा संगठनों की अपेक्षा RSS की ५७ संस्थाएं हैं जो इन इलाकों में गहरी पैठ बनाने में लगी हुई हैं. संकल्प कोचिंग, एकल विद्यालय, वनवासी कल्याण और वाल्मीकि आश्रम, और सरस्वती शिशु स्कूल आदि के माध्यम से वे लोग काम कर रहे हैं. वे २४ घंटे, सातों दिन और बारहों महीने सक्रीय हैं. लेकिन कांग्रेस के संगठन फील्ड में नहीं दिखते. फिर भी यह बात भी नकारी नहीं जा सकती की कांग्रेस, और विशेषकर नेहरु-गांधी परिवार, का यहाँ आज भी प्रभाव है. पर हमारा संगठन इसका लाभ नहीं ले पा रहा है. कांग्रेस को संघ से सीखना पड़ेगा, काम करना पड़ेगा.

मेरा मानना है की कांग्रेस संगठन के रूप में कम, एक जनांदोलन के रूप में ज्यादा लोकप्रिय है. कांग्रेस अब फिर उठने की प्रक्रिया में चल पड़ी है, और राहुल जी इस अभियान के सूत्रधार के रूप में उभरे हैं. वे संगठन के ढाँचे को मजबूत करने में लगे हैं. पंजाब, उत्तराखंड, गुजरात, पुदुचेरी और छत्तीसगढ़ में युवा संगठनों के चुनाव नीचे स्थर से पूरी लोकतांत्रिक प्रक्रिया से हुए हैं. इस से पार्टी में आतंरिक लोकतंत्र आ रहा है. छत्तीसगढ़ में भी हाल ही में NSUI के चुनाव निर्वाचन पद्धति से संपन्न हुए हैं. सिर्फ ४० दिनों में ८०००० छात्र-सदस्य बनाए गए. इन छात्रों ने लगभग ४८०० प्रतिनिधियों का चयन किया, और उन्होनें जिला, प्रदेश और राष्ट्रीय स्थर पर अपने प्रतिनिधियों का चुनाव किया है. यह राहुल जी और कांग्रेस की एक बड़ी उपलब्धि है. इन सभी चुनावों को पार्टी ने नहीं बल्कि भारत के पूर्व मुख्य चुनाव आयुक्त, श्री लिंगदोह, की संस्था, FAME, ने करवाए. राहुल गाँधी का प्रयोग सफल रहा है.

कांग्रेस में गुटबाजी पर आप क्या कहेंगे?
कांग्रेस सिर्फ नेहरु-गाँधी परिवार के बैनर के तले है. कोई भी व्यक्ति का कोई गुट नहीं है. कांग्रेसजनों का वास्ता सिर्फ इस एक परिवार से है, और किसी से नहीं. वे ही सर्वोपरि हैं. पूरे देश में सिर्फ इस एक परिवार के प्रति जबरदस्त अपनत्व का भाव है. राहुल जी की सक्रियता से पार्टी में आंतरिक लोकतंत्र कायम होने की प्रक्रिया शुरू हो चुकी है. आतंरिक चुनावों से पार्टी मजबूत होगी. "Youth Transforming" (युवा परिवर्तन) अभियान के तहत आने वाले दो सालों में सभी प्रदेशों में चुनाव निपटा लिए जायेंगे. और जहाँ तक गुटबाजी का सवाल है तो मैं चाहूँगा कि यह ख़त्म हो. मैं समझता हूँ कि पार्टी में युवा नेतृत्व को, NSUI और युवा कांग्रेस के माध्यम से उभारने की जो कोशिश शुरू की है, उससे भी गुटबाजी पर रोक लगेगा.

आने वाले स्थानीय निकाय चुनावों के सन्दर्भ में क्या रणनीति होगी?
स्थानीय निकाय चुनाव में युवाओं को आगे आना होगा. इन चुनावों में पार्टी और मुद्दों की अपेक्षा व्यक्तिगत छवि ज्यादा मायने रखती है. लोग व्यक्ति देखकर वोट करते हैं, ऐसे लोगों को चुनते हैं जो उनके सुख-दुःख, दुःख-दर्द में शामिल होते हैं, जिनका सीधा सततः संपर्क उनसे होता है. (इस प्रसंग में अमित जोगी ने बृजमोहन अग्रवाल की व्यवहारिकता, मिलनसारिता की खूब तारीफ़ की. उन्होंने कहा कि श्री अग्रवाल न सिर्फ शादी-ब्याह के मौके पर उपस्थित रहते हैं बल्कि करनी-मरनी के मौके पर भी उपस्थित रहते हैं. चुनाव में पार्टी नहीं, बृजमोहन जी जीतते हैं.)

आखिर युवा आगे कैसे आयेंगे?
मेरी सोच है कि युवाओं को स्थानीय चुनाव में ज्यादा से ज्यादा मौका दिया जाना चाहिए. कांग्रेस में जीतने की क्षमता और युवा होना, चुनावों में मापदंड के रूप में अपनाए जाने चाहिए.

क्या युवाओं के लिए आरक्षण होगा?
ऐसा फिक्स नहीं है.

अजीत जोगी दुष्प्रचार के शिकार हुए हैं. क्या आप सहमत हैं?
राज्य बनने के बाद उन्हें प्रदेश का नेतृत्व मिला. तब तक प्रदेश पर कुछ लोगों का एकछत्र राज था. तमाम महत्वपूर्ण पदों में उनका दबदबा था. इस वर्ग में, "speaking class" में, अजीत जोगी जी की स्वीकार्यता नहीं बन पाई. विशेष रूप से राजधानी में.

जोगी जी पर तानाशाही के आरोप भी लगाये जाते रहे हैं. आप क्या सोचते हैं?
जोगी जी यह मानते हैं कि दो करोड़ छत्तीसगढ़ के वासी उनके साथ हैं. जनता से उनका यह प्रेम कभी-कभी कमजोरी भी बन जाता है. वे अन्याय को जब कभी व्यक्तिगत रूप से लेते हैं, और उस पर प्रतिक्रया व्यक्त करते हैं, तब लोग उन्हें हिटलर कह देते हैं. ठीक वैसे ही जब फ्रांस के सम्राट लुइ चौदह कहा करते थे, "l'etat c'est moi" (मैं राज्य हूँ). जोगी जी भी खुद को छत्तीसगढ़ से उतना ही जुड़ा महसूस करते हैं. लोग इस गहरे प्यार को दुसरे ढंग से देखते और समझते हैं. मैं तो मानता हूँ कि आज राजनीति में ध्यानचंद का ज़माना नहीं रह गया. इस डी से उस डी तक अकेले गेंद ले जाने का अब चलन नहीं है. छोटे-छोटे पास देने का ज़माना है. इसके लिए टीम वर्क जरूरी है. संतुलन, समन्वय और टीम वर्क होना चाहिए. सभी को महत्व देने की जरूरत है.

भाजपा और RSS के बारे में क्या विचार है?
संघ की सादगी ख़त्म हो गयी है. व्यक्तिवाद के सामने, संघ और भाजपा दोनों दब से गए हैं. ठाकरे जी जैसी सरलता और सादगी ख़त्म हो गई है. कहने का मतलब है, संघ और भाजपा विचारधारा से हटकर अब व्यक्ति-केन्द्रित ज्यादा हो रहे है.

कहा जाता है रमन सिंह के सौम्य चेहरे ने दुबारा भाजपा की वापसी की है.
मैंने पहले ही कहा है कि जोगी जी दुष्प्रचार का शिकार हुए हैं. फिर कारण चाहे जो भी हो, भाजपा को दुबारा जनादेश तो मिला है. जनादेश का मतलब सौ खून मुआफ!

अजीत जोगी और रमन सिंह में क्या अंतर है?
सिर्फ किस्मत का. रमन सिंह जी की तकदीर ज्यादा बुलंद है. कुछ पद राजनीति में ऐसे होते हैं, जैसे मुख्यमंत्री, प्रधानमंत्री और राष्ट्रपति, जो सिर्फ तकदीर से मिलते हैं. संघर्ष से विधायक, सांसद या फिर मंत्री तो बना जा सकता है, लेकिन प्रधानमंत्री-मुख्यमंत्री जैसे पदों के लिए भाग्य का सहारा भी जरूरी है. भाजपा में रमन सिंह जी से वरिष्ट, अनुभवी और ज्यादा संघर्षशील लोग हैं पर भाग्य ने उनका साथ नहीं दिया.

लोग कहते हैं कि जोगी परिवार के रणनीतिकार आप हैं. आप क्या कहते हैं?
मैं कांग्रेस का सदस्य हूँ. मरवाही का मतदाता हूँ. अन्य कांग्रेसजनों की तरह वे मेरे सुझावों को भी सुनते हैं.

लोग राजनीति को गन्दी कहते हैं. आपके क्या विचार हैं?
मैं ऐसा नहीं मानता. भारत चाणक्य का देश है. आज भी राजनीति के बहुत से नियम और नीतियाँ घोषित और अघोषित रूप से चाणक्य-विष्णुगुप्त-कौटिल्य की बताई हुई चल रही है. राजनीति को समाज सेवा से अलग रख कर देखे जाने कि जरूरत है. राजनीति परिवर्तन लाने का सबसे तेज और सशक्त माध्यम है.

क्या आप चुनाव लड़ना चाहते हैं?
राजनीति में जब भी आऊँगा, सार्वजनिक जनादेश लेकर ही आऊँगा. जनता की स्वीकृति अंतिम और अनिवार्य है.

आपकी महत्वाकान्शाएं क्या हैं?
महत्वाकान्शाएं तो बहुत थी, पर जेल से लौटने के बाद वे सारी ख़त्म हो गयी. कीमती कपडों, घड़ी और जूतों का शौक था, अब वह भी नहीं रहा. अब ऐसे मेहेंगे शौक पालने की आत्मा गवाही नहीं देती.

आपकी ज़िन्दगी का दुखद पल कौन सा है?
पिता जी की भयंकर दुर्घटना और मेरा जेल जाना. जेल में मैंने जिंदगी का पाठ पढ़ा है. दुखी को निकट से देखा, समझा. कुल मिलाकर जेल में मेरा दूसरा जन्म हुआ है.

क्या गुस्सा आता है?
अब काफी हद तक वो भी नियंत्रित हो गया है. जरूरी हुआ तो कुछ अत्यंत ही करीबी लोगों के सामने उजागर करता हूँ. मन में अब ऐसी भावना ही नहीं रही कि किसी पर गुस्सा करूं.

अपराध बढ़ रहे हैं, आप क्या सोचते हैं?
हर क्षेत्र में अपराध बढ़ा है. कानून-व्यवस्था और प्रशासन के अलावा और भी कारण हैं. अपराधियों के बरी हो जाने का दोष वकीलों को नहीं देना चाहिए. जो कोर्ट से बरी हो जाएँ, उन्हें निर्दोष मानना ही सभ्य व्यवहार है. कोर्ट के निर्णय से पहले ही फैसले न हों. हमारी न्याय-प्रणाली बहुत सुदृढ़ है, हमें उसपे भरोसा रखना चाहिए. अब तो त्वरित न्याय के लिए फास्ट ट्रैक कोर्ट बनाये जा रहे हैं, ग्राम अदालतों का गठन किया जा रहा है, कोर्ट के बाहर विवाद अनिवारण के तरीकों को कानूनी प्रोत्साहन मिल रहा है.

देश की न्याय-पध्दति सुस्त रफ़्तार है. आप क्या सहमत हैं?
चाहे जो हो, पर लोगों का भरोसा आज भी न्यायपालिका पर है. साधन की कमी न्याय में देरी की वजह है. देश की अदालतों में न्यायधीशों के हजारों पद आज भी रिक्त हैं. यह सरकार की जिम्मेदारी है कि इन पदों पर भरती प्रक्रिया शुरू हो, सक्षम लोगों का चयन हो. कोर्ट के समक्ष छोटे-मोटे विवादों की संख्या भी बढ़ी है. बहुत से ऐसे मामलों में लोक अदालतें कारगार हो सकती हैं.

बड़े बाप का बेटा होना कैसा लगता है?
लाभ है तो हानि भी है. मुझ पर आपराधिक मामला भी नहीं चलता. पर फिर लोगों का, विशेषकर से युवा वर्ग का, प्यार भी नहीं मिल पाता.

पहली कमाई का आपने क्या किया था?
पिता जी के हाथों में रख दिया. उनके चेहरे पर आये संतोष और गर्व के भाव देखकर बहुत ख़ुशी हुई थी. अब घर-खर्च में भी हिस्सेदारी निभाने लगा हूँ. बिजली और फोन का बिल का भुगतान मेरे हिस्से आ गया है.

आजकल आपके ब्लॉग में कोई नई बात नहीं आ रही है.
आजकल कोर्ट में ही व्यस्त हो गया हूँ. इसलिए बाकी गतिविधियों को ज्यादा समय नहीं दे पा रहा हूँ. जल्द ही ब्लॉग के लिए भी समय निकालने की कोशिश करूंगा.

सुना है आपने किताब भी लिखी है.
हाँ. जेल में चिंतन-मनन का मौका मिला. जेल डाईरी लिखी, जल्द ही छपेगी. इसमें जेल में मैंने जो देखा, जो महसूस किया, उसे इमानदारी से लिखा. इसके छपने के बाद हो सकता है कि बहुत से लोगों को अड़चन भी होगी. जेल में नाटक भी लिखा, और कविताएँ भी.

कोर्ट कि जिंदगी कैसी लग रही है?
रोज़गार के लिए मैंने वकालत को अपनाया है. इसलिए पूरी तन्मयता से वकालत कर रहा हूँ. पहले कानून मेरा पीछा करता था, अब मैं कानून का पीछा कर रहा हूँ. मुकद्दमे के दौरान, कठघरे में, ही मैं कानून की बहुत सी बारीकियों को जान सका. ये मेरी प्रैक्टिकल ट्रेनिंग थी. अब कोर्ट में जिरह-बहस के दौरान विशवास आता जा रहा है, सभी का सहयोग और आर्शीवाद भी मिल रहा है. वैसे वकालत मेरा पेशा है. हर वर्ग के, हर किस्म के क्लाइंट हैं. भाजपा के भी बहुत से लोग मेरे मुवक्किल हैं.

जसवंत सिंह की किताब पर आपके क्या विचार हैं?
इस किताब को मैं इतिहास मानता हूँ. ये एक शोध-परक पुस्तक है. इसे मैं आधे से ज्यादा पढ़ चुका हूँ. अडवाणी जी की आत्मकथा, My Country, My Life, भी पढ़ चूका हूँ. जसवंत सिंह जी के विचार अडवाणी जी से मेल खाते हैं.

त्यौहार कौन सा पसंद है?
होली, ईद और बड़ा दिन ख़ास तौर पर पसंद हैं. पर सभी त्यौहारों को मनाता हूँ. एक दिन का सांकेतिक रोजा रखता हूँ, जन्माष्टमी पर उपवास करता हूँ, पूरी आस्था से नवरात्रि, होली-दिवाली मनाता हूँ. मैंने प्रायः सभी धर्मों का अध्ययन किया है. सभी धर्मों के त्यौहार और सिद्धांत आपसी भाईचारे की सीख देते हैं. इसे धर्मशास्त्री गोल्डन रूल कहते हैं.

कैसा भोजन पसंद है?
लोग जिंदा रहने के लिए खाते हैं, और मैं खाने के लिए जिंदा हूँ! ("Il faut vivre pour manger et ne pas manger pour vivre": Moliere, Le Malade imaginaire) शाकाहारी और मासाहारी, दोनों का बराबर शौक है. मेरी भोजन-प्रियता देखकर पिता जी कई बार कहते हैं कि मेरी जिंदगी लंच और डिनर तक ही सीमित है. मेरी अपनी सोच है कि मैं खाने या नाश्ते की टेबल पर अपनी बात ज्यादा सही ढंग से रख सकता हूँ. आमने-सामने चर्चा यहीं अपनत्व भरे माहौल में ज्यादा आत्मीयता से होती है जबकि जनसभाओं में सीधा संवाद नहीं हो पाता. माइक के सामने खड़े होकर भाषण देने से संवाद कायम नहीं होता, एकालाप होता है. बोलना ख़त्म होते ही संपर्क टूट जाता है.

फिल्मे देखते हैं?
हाँ, मगर हिंदी के मुकाबले विदेशी फिल्मे ज्यादा देखता हूँ. नायिकाओं में वहीदा रहमान जी बेहद पसंद हैं, उनकी टाइमलेस ब्यूटी है. नायकों में बलराज साहनी जी और खलनायकों में अमरीश पूरी जी पसंदीदा कलाकार हैं.

इन दिनों आपके क्या शौक हैं?
लिखना और पेन्टिंग करना मुझे पसंद है.

अपनी विशेष उपलब्धि किसे मानते हैं?
अभी तक ऐसी कोई उपलब्धि नहीं है जो उल्लेखनीय हो.

A Small Step for NSUI, A Giant Leap for Congress

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 14:11:00 +0000

The recently concluded NSUI elections in Chhattisgarh herald a new beginning not only for students, but also, I hope, for the Congress party as a whole: thus far, appointments to party posts were made from ‘up above’; now, for the first time ever, those ‘down below’ have been allowed to choose who should represent & lead them. To paraphrase modern India’s architect-in-chief, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, “voices, long suppressed, have begun to find utterance.”

The elections itself were something of a revelation for Congresspersons all over Chhattisgarh: they have offered a glimpse of things to come. In less than 45 days, 78000 students from 308 colleges & university departments were enrolled. They voted to elect 4846 delegates (including members of their respective college committees), who in turn congregated at three division-level Conventions (Raipur, Bastar & Bilaspur) to elect 99 district committee members, 8 office-bearers of the state committee, and 2 national representatives. The entire process of electioneering was conducted by an independent Election Authority comprising of Observers, PRO, DROs & AROs, most of them from outside the state, & supervised by the Foundation for Advanced Management of Elections (FAME) headed by no less a personage than Mr. Lyngdoh, a former chief election commissioner (CEC) of India. FAME, I’m told, reports directly to the office of Mr. Rahul Gandhi, the AICC General Secretary in-charge of NSUI.

Secret of Success

Sanjeev Shukla, the president-elect, and Tikesh Pratap Singh, the national delegate-elect, are both sincere students, dedicated to the cause of student-welfare. I am happy to say that I know both of them personally, and in the case of Sanjeev, intimately, as we went to Law College together (or as he told the Press, “Amit bhaiya was my junior by a year”). He is, in many ways, the younger brother I never had- but always wanted.

As such, I would like to point out three things about them. First, both hail from middle-class, non-political families. Consequently, of the 20-odd contestants in the fray for state & national committees, they were in fact the only ones who didn’t- couldn’t afford to- put one single hoarding advertising their candidature at the three Conventions. During campaigning, they somewhat cheekily penned their names on the backside of other candidates’ glossy pamphlets (since they obviously didn’t have many printed of their own). To house outstation students for the night before the convention, they took recourse to Dharamshalas (while their colleagues booked high-end resorts). Secondly, even though they have been very active grassroots workers (Sanjeev, in fact, has been working tirelessly for the past 9 years), neither has held high political office in the NSUI before, and therefore, cannot be said to be ‘political’ in the orthodox sense. At Sanjeev’s first press conference at Raipur, the Media were pleasantly surprised to see that he turned up in a scooter. They did not, however, take very kindly to the fact that he had forgotten to serve them the customary tea & samosas (which had to purchased post-haste from a nearby tea stall).

Thirdly- and from the point of view of candidates, most significantly- Sanjeev & Tikesh worked as a team. Unlike others, they actually traveled to colleges, talked directly to students (instead of self-styled ‘student leaders’) to find out who among them were the most popular, & fielded college and district committee candidates in all 17 districts where elections were held (whereas their closest rivals didn’t bother to field any in most districts, preferring instead to seek votes only for themselves): needless to say, all these college & district-level candidates helped get votes for them, by word of mouth publicity (& not, mind you, by putting up hoardings in commercial areas etc.). Also- and this is very important- they didn’t merely ask people to vote for them personally: they canvassed students to vote for both of them as a team. Tikesh therefore ensured that Sanjeev got votes from his home-division, Bilaspur, while Sanjeev worked hard to see that the Raipur students voted for Tikesh. Furthermore, they were also the only two contestants who took the trouble of fielding women & students from the depressed communities representing all parts of the state, as a consequence of which the latter were elected unopposed (!).

Consequently, not only is the present elected-committee truly representative in character with 2 SC students, 1 ST & 1 OBC student, and 2 women students, but 5 out of 8 state committee office-bearers have already worked with- and for- each other during the elections (as opposed to against each other), and I’m confident that this spirit of cooperation would translate into an efficient- and effective- working of the student organization as a whole.

I believe that there are three important lessons to be learnt here, especially for those in other states where similar intra-organizational elections are being held: one, candidates must go directly to the electorate & as far as possible, dispense with the services of middlemen; two, they must work as a team, and the bigger & more representative the composition of their teams, the better; and three, the deployment of resources- TV & newspaper ads, SMSs, hoardings, glitzy pamphlets, Parker pen-sets and other miscellaneous gifts- and the outright purchasing of votes is, at least as far as student politics in Chhattisgarh is concerned, still no match for good old fashioned word-of-mouth publicity, personal relationships and most importantly, selfless team work.

Twins of Student Politics

I’ve already advocated elsewhere that students ought not to get involved in general politics; they should restrict themselves to addressing issues that directly concern them. This would, in my opinion, broadly consist of two things: Education & Employment.

Truth be told, the plight of Education- and especially, higher education- in Chhattisgarh is pathetic. For instance, in the past 5 years, the incumbent state government has opened no less than 5 universities (3 of them on the same date): not one of them is operational; for all facts and purposes, they exist only on paper. Not one person- not even a peon- has been appointed despite 1900 vacant posts for teachers; not one brick has been laid anywhere; Vice Chancellors simply lounge about their bungalows in Raipur with no work to do. Students have nowhere to go; there is no one to teach them. The Indian Medical Association (IMA) recently found the state government’s arrangement to setup a Medical College at Jagdalpur wholly unsatisfactory, and refused to accord it recognition. (Contrast this to the Hidyatullah National Law University (HNLU), which has recently been voted as the top law institute in the country by Outlook, and the State Institute for Medical Sciences (SIMS) at Bilaspur. Both were setup by my father’s government.)

The Universities Grant Commission (UGC) has long before sanctioned funds for all the above, but they remain unutilized despite numerous reminders & even one stern warning threatening to take back the funds if not utilized immediately. Likewise, although an Indian Institute of Management (IIM) at Raipur has been sanctioned by the Union Ministry of Human Resources Development (HRD) during the last Budget, the state administration is yet to provide land for the same. Not only that, a Vice Chancellor who has been found guilty of embezzling ten million rupees meant for education by no less an authority than the Principal Secretary of the Higher Education Ministry of the state government, is allowed to go scot free only because of the geriatric-gentleman’s deep connections with the RSS-outfit, Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP).

As far as private professional colleges- dental & engineering- are concerned, the excessive “donations” charged by them make it all but impossible for local students to find admissions. There ought to some kind of statutory quota for them backed, if necessary, by subsidies & grants. Computer literacy and English must be made compulsory at the school-level.

Most significantly, efforts must be made to directly link Education to Employment. After all, what good is education if post-graduate students from Chhattisgarh have to earn out a living as manual laborers in Mumbai & Delhi? It is my firm belief that the state government, given its dismal track record, should refrain from itself opening professional colleges; rather it should prevail upon other entrepreneurs- especially, those setting up major industries and power stations in the state- to not only open professional institutes but also give students jobs after they’ve graduated. This would be beneficial both for the students as well as for the companies concerned. Likewise, wherever possible, derelict government school buildings should be handed over to private parties, who would no doubt run them more efficiently.

The role of government should be restricted, therefore, to three things: one, prescribing, monitoring & strict enforcement of education standards (student to teacher ratio, attendance, curriculum, entrance tests, exams etc.), not least to attract reputed companies to do on-campus recruitments; two, subsidizing costs of education & issuing grants to students, particularly those who can’t afford an expensive education, if necessary, by making them sign a Bond wherein they would spend a minimum number of years working for the government/funding company on a contract basis; & three, enacting statutory provisions to ensure a minimum-level of intake of local students, especially in professional and vocational institutes, and also a minimum-level of intake of local graduates in companies operating in the state. As with everything else, what this state government lacks in Education is, above all else, a Vision. The NSUI, which now speaks for a majority of students of this state, must, therefore, supply it with one; and then ensure that it is enforced, first by cooperation, failing which, through mass-agitation.

The Long Road Ahead

I would suggest then that the NSUI focus on the following five areas:

(1) It ought to start by asking its 308 college committees to conduct an on-the-spot survey on the standard of education being imparted in their respective colleges, taking particular note of such factors as staff & student attendance record, teacher to student ratio, staff-student relations, teaching staff’s performance evaluation, condition of infrastructure, sanction & utilization of funds (if necessary by getting information under the UPA-enacted Right To Information (RTI) Act), number of students who have found post-education employment & where etc. All 78000 members should be encouraged to send in their inputs: they should remain connected with each other through SMSs as, in any case, most of them have already submitted their contact numbers along with their membership papers. Based on this, a “White Paper on the State of Education & Employment in Chhattisgarh” should be prepared, identifying both the problematic areas & suggesting remedies. This document should be submitted to the concerned college authorities (both state & central) for necessary & time-bound action, and should become the foundation of its future political program & student-agitation.

(2) Simultaneously, the NSUI, in compliance with its Open Membership Policy, should also look into increasing its membership database by setting for itself achievable targets, and recognizing & rewarding those members who do the most recruitments.

(3) It should also encourage its members to engage in productive social work. A student database of blood groups should also be prepared, and submitted to local hospitals, primary healthcare centers & the Red Cross; blood donation camps should be organized in colleges with the aid of the Red Cross; members should be encouraged to fill organ-donation forms; safe sex education should also be taken up by distributing contraceptives and other literature in colleges, possibly in coordination with NACO and other similar NGOs; books should be collected and donated to various libraries; audio books should be prepared for the blind; a separate workforce of student-volunteers should be prepared to regularly work with various social service organizations such as day-care centers for special children, old people’s homes etc; inter-college sports & games should be organized throughout the year to increase healthy sportsmanship among students; cultural programs, such as street plays and debating tournaments that promote inter-faith harmony and force the mind to think, should be staged regularly.

(4) Employment Assistance Centres should be setup by various district committees, which would provide useful information with respect to both employment & microfinance opportunities, as well as help students, or groups of students, to actually find suitable work of their choice. Student-entrepreneurs should also be encouraged to find gainful self-employment, if possible by facilitating them to procure loans for setting up small businesses. Other non-political student organizations like the Professional Students’ Organization (PSO) should be roped in to assist with this work.

(5) State & district committee members should be assigned specific responsibilities, and their performance regularly evaluated. Office bearers should be encouraged to tour their assigned areas regularly, and elected delegates should be sent out to help with the organization of elections in other states. This would no doubt give them ample exposure.

All in all, I believe that a great new beginning has been made, and I wish all those elected- as well as those who weren’t- all the very best. The Future belongs to them; I pray that they will make the best of it.

Women's Cricket!

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 17:57:00 +0000

Television news coverage of the finals of the women's all-India inter-state tournament organized by the Women's Cricket Association of India (WCAI) at Bhilai: in an exciting photo-finish, the home-team, Chhattisgarh, beat the girls from Maharashtra.

My mother, Dr. Renu Jogi, is the current President of WCAI. To read press-coverage of the event, click on Read More.

NSUI Elections in Chhattisgarh: आई रे आई, एन.एस.यू.आई.

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 21:38:00 +0000

नोट: लेखक सन १९९८ से २००२ तक जवाहरलाल नेहरु विश्वविद्यालय, नई दिल्ली, में एन.एस.यू.आई. के सक्रीय सदस्य के रूप में कार्यरत रहे. इस लेख को दैनिक नई दुनिया द्वारा १८.७.२००९ को प्रकाशित किया गया था.

छोटी सी आशा
छत्तीसगढ़ में कांग्रेस के छात्र संगठन, एन.एस.यू.आई., के चुनाव हो रहे हैं. उत्तराखंड के बाद छत्तीसगढ़ दूसरा राज्य है जिसे पार्टी ने चुनाव के लिए चुना है, जो अपने आप में हमारे लिए गर्व की बात है: कांग्रेस, कांग्रेस की विचारधारा, और कांग्रेस के युवा नेतृत्व, जिसके प्रतीक स्वयं राहुल गाँधी हैं, से सीधे जुड़ने का अवसर हमारे प्रदेश के छात्रों को मिला है. इसका पूरा पूरा लाभ उनको लेना चाहिए.

इस प्रक्रिया से प्रदेश में पार्टी में जो मायूसी के बादल छाय हुए हैं, हटना शुरू होंगे, और एक ऐसे नए नेतृत्व, जिसका सीधा सम्बन्ध यहाँ के छात्र जीवन से है, का जन्म होगा.

संगठन चुनाव पार्टी के लिए कितना महत्व रखते हैं, इसका अंदाजा केवल इस एक बात से लगाया जा सकता है: लोक सभा की शानदार जीत के ठीक बाद जब उस जीत के सूत्रधार, श्री राहुल गाँधी, से पुछा गया कि उनके जीवन की सबसे बड़ी उपलब्धि वे क्या मानते हैं, तो उन्होंने दो-टूक जवाब दिया: उत्तराखंड, पंजाब और गुजरात में हुए कांग्रेस के युवा संगठनों के चुनाव.

उनके इस कथन के पीछे बहुत ही सरल किन्तु दूरगामी सोच निहित है.

हल्ला बोल
वामपंथियों और आर.एस.एस. की तरह कांग्रेस कभी भी काडर पर आधारित पार्टी नहीं रही है. मेरा तो यहाँ तक मानना है कि कांग्रेस कभी भी पार्टी/संगठन के रूप में सफल नहीं रही है: महात्मा गाँधी से लेकर सोनिया गाँधी तक, कांग्रेस ने जब भी एक जनांदोलन का रूप धारण किया है, तभी उसे सफलता हासिल हुई है. और किसी भी जनांदोलन का निर्माण तभी हो सकता है जब जनता अपने नेतृत्व का चयन स्वयं करे, न कि उस पर ऊपर से 'नेता' थोपे जाएँ.

लगभग पिछले एक दशक से कांग्रेस, और विशेषकर कांग्रेस के युवा संगठनों, में नेतृत्व का निर्णय पार्टी के बड़े नेताओं से पूछकर किये जाने की परम्परा बन गई थी. इसका नतीजा यह रहा कि पार्टी में अधिकतर लोग संगठन से कम, और अपने नेताओं के प्रति अधिक समर्पित थे; संगठन - या जनता- की चिन्ता न करके वे अपने आकाओं की खुशामद करने में ज्यादा लगे रहे. और इसका खामियाजा पार्टी को भुगतना पड़ा. ऐसे ऐसे नेताओं को पार्टी में जिम्मेदारी मिली जिनका संगठन और जनता, दोनों से दूर दूर तक का कोई लगाव नहीं था.

ज़रा होल्ले होल्ले...हम भी पीछे हैं तुम्हारे!
सवाल ये उठता है कि चुनाव- जो कि सही मायने में चुनाव हो न कि जैसे वर्तमान में वोटर/डेलीगेट पहले से तय करके प्रदेश में करवाए जाते हैं- केवल कांग्रेस के युवा संगठनों में क्यों कराये जा रहे हैं? ऐसे चुनाव मुख्य संगठन, कांग्रेस, में क्यों नहीं हो रहे हैं? मेरी समझ से इसका कारण यह है कि यदि कांग्रेस में इस प्रकार के चुनाव एकदम से कराये जाते हैं, तो शायद पूरी व्यवस्थता अस्त-व्यस्त हो जायेगी.

पंडित नेहरू के करीबी रहे अंग्रेज़ समाजवादी-इतिहासकार, अर्नाल्ड तोय्न्बी, के अनुसार सफल परिवर्तन धीरे-धीरे, सोच समझकर, नई-पुरानी चुनौतियों से जून्झते हुए, अपनी गलतियों से सीख लेकर, उनको सुधार कर, एक-एक सीड़ी चढ़ कर, होता है. श्री राहुल गाँधी इस बात को भली-भाँती समझते हैं. इसलिए देश के विभिन्न प्रान्तों में, एक-एक कर, पार्टी के युवा संगठनों के चुनाव करवा कर, वे संभल-संभल के, धीरे-धीरे, सम्पूर्ण परिवर्तन की ओर बढ़ रहे हैं.

आखिरकार, आज के छात्र और युवा नेता ही तो कल कांग्रेस के मुख्य संगठन का नेतृत्व करेंगे: अगर संसद को ही देख लें, तो उसमें कम से कम ३४ ऐसे सांसद हैं जो कांग्रेस के युवा संगठनों में आज भी सक्रीय रूप से सदस्य हैं.

जाग, मुसाफिर, जाग ज़रा
लोकतंत्र का मतलब मात्र चुनाव से नहीं है. प्रिन्सटन विश्वविद्यालय के चिन्तक, सुनील खिलनानी, ने अपने शोध, "ऐन आईडिया ऑफ़ इंडिया", में लिखा है कि भारतीय लोकतंत्र शायद इसलिए इतना विकसित नहीं हो पाया है क्योंकि हमने अब तक अपने लोकतंत्र को 'चुनावों के पंचवर्षीय तमाशे' से ऊपर उठने ही नहीं दिया है: चुनाव के साथ-साथ आवश्यक है, लोकतांत्रिक संस्थाओं और संस्कृति, जैसे कि संसदीय प्रणाली और बहस, का विकास, जिसका अभाव अब भी हमारे देश में है.

युवा संगठनों के चुनावों में भी इस अभाव को महसूस किया जा सकता है. पार्टी के आतंरिक चुनाव होने के कारण, छात्र नेता मुद्दों पर नहीं, बल्कि अपने-अपने व्यक्तित्व- जिसमे उनके बड़े नेताओं से सम्बन्ध और वोटों को एन-केन-प्रकारण प्रभावित करने की अन्य समस्त क्षमताएं समाहित हैं- के बलबूते पर चुनाव लड़ते हैं. ऐसे में, स्वाभाविक तौर से ऐसे छात्र जिन्हें आला नेताओं का वरदहस्त प्राप्त नहीं है, या फिर वे धन-बल से कमजोर हैं, दूसरों की अपेक्षा कमजोर पड़ जाते हैं. (इन चुनावों में सदस्यता-फीस १० रूपये है, जिसे छात्रों को स्वयं देना चाहिए, न कि किसी दूसरे को जो कि खुद चुनाव लड़ने-लड़वाने में इच्छुक हो.)

इस समस्या का समाधान एक ही है: छात्रों को अपना वोट देते समय जागरूक रहना पड़ेगा. वे ऐसे व्यक्ति को चुने जो उनके सुख-दुःख में, उनके साथ रहा हो; और जो भविष्य में भी उनके हितों की रक्षा करने के लिए संघर्ष करने में पीछे न हटे चाहे चुनौती कितनी बड़ी ही क्यों न हो. मुझे इस बात का गर्व है कि मैं ऐसे कई छात्र-नेताओं को जानता हूँ; उनके साथ मुझे काम करने के अवसर भी समय समय पर मिलते रहे हैं. लेकिन ऐसे नेताओं को मुझसे कहीं बहतर वर्तमान में छात्र जीवन के संघर्ष से गुज़र रहे युवा, जानते हैं.

ये चुनाव महज़ एक तमाशा न बन जाए, इसका विशेष ध्यान रखना होगा.

गांधी बनाम जिन्नाह
अंत में, मैं आपका ध्यान छात्र राजनीति की दो प्रमुख विचारधाराओं की ओर आकर्षित करना चाहूंगा: स्वतन्त्रता संग्राम के दौरान जब राष्ट्रपिता, महात्मा गाँधी, ने छात्रों को अपनी-अपनी पढ़ाई छोड़कर, भारत छोड़ो आन्दोलन में पूरी तरह से भाग लेने का आह्वान किया था, तब उनके विरोधी और भविष्य के पकिस्तान के क़ैद-ए-आज़म, मोहम्मद अली जिन्नाह, ने यह टिप्पणी करी थी कि छात्र पहले अपनी पढ़ाई ख़त्म करके अपने-अपने पैरों पर खड़े हो जाएँ, फिर किसी आन्दोलन में भाग लें.

मैं समझता हूँ कि इन दोनों के बीच का रास्ता, सही रास्ता है- जिसे बौद्ध-चिंतन में "मध्यम मार्ग" की संज्ञा दी गई है. छात्रों को आन्दोलन करना चाहिए, लेकिन जो भी आन्दोलन वे करें, उनके अपने छात्र-जीवन- विशेषकर पढ़ाई- से सीधे सम्बंधित रहे. मसलन उनका कॉलेज फीस में वृद्धी के खिलाफ आन्दोलन करना सही है, लेकिन धान ख़रीदी में हुए प्रदेशव्यापी घोटाले की जांच की मांग करने के लिए उनका अपनी क्लास छोड़कर जेल जाना, या फिर मुख्यमंत्री के पुतले जलाना, मेरी समझ से उचित नहीं होगा. ये काम युवा कांग्रेस, और कांग्रेस के दुसरे मोर्चा संगठनों, का है, न कि छात्रों का.

छात्र राजनीति- और उसके जरिए, प्रदेश की भविष्य की राजनीति- में जो परिवर्तन का प्रयोग प्रारंभ हुआ है, उसका मैं स्वागत करता हूँ. और सभी मेरे छात्र-छात्रा नौजवान साथियों को इस प्रयोग की अपार सफलता के लिए अपनी शुभकामना देता हूँ.

On An Advocate's First Birthday

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 06:49:00 +0000

Papa's poem for me: 12:34:56, 7.8.9

१२:३४:५६| ७|८|९

इस जन्मदिन पर विशेष

स्वाभिमान व संघर्ष के पंख लगाकर
सघन काले मेघों को चीरकर
उकाब बन, उड़ जा पुत्र.

महत्वकान्शाओं का नाम तेरा ही है

अविरल, अहर्निश

उड़ता चल, बढ़ता चल.

अपनी तन्मयता की छवि
अपनी एकाग्रता का हठ
अब देख रहा हूँ तुझमे, हर पल

साहस है कहाँ मंजिल में

जो दूर जा सके तुझसे

मिलेगी अवश्य, मिलेगी शीघ्र.

-पापा.

A New Life

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 03:23:00 +0000

The above photograph is from my Law College's Annual Function at Raipur, in which I was awarded the Gold Medal for standing first in the University. You can view more pictures on my mobile gallery, thanks to Ismail Ahmed.

On 15th July (2009), the Bar Council of India formally accepted me as a Member.

My life, as a Lawyer, finally begins!

AJ

PS- Comments to this post can also be viewed here, here and here. Thank you all, for your wonderful words of encouragement!

Chhattisgarh 2009: Anatomy Of Yet Another Defeat

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 12:38:00 +0000

I. An Anomaly

Ever since its commentary on the Kota bye-election in November 2006, this Blog has endeavored to offer its Readers candid- and sometimes controversial- analyses of elections in Chhattisgarh: there is no reason to discontinue this practice.

In this post, I seek to answer the most obvious question: when the rest of the nation- most notably Uttar Pradesh, its largest state and also, the definitive precursor of the shape of India’s future politics- has witnessed an unexpected groundswell of grassroots-support for the once ‘confined-to-the Pages of History’ Congress party, what makes Chhattisgarh the quintessential national anomaly? More to the point, why is it that we’ve managed to return only 1 Congress MP to the Lok Sabha (out of a total of 11) twice in a row (2004, 2009), especially when we seem to fare so much better in assembly elections that take place hardly 4 months before (2003, 2008)?

In order to answer this, let me share some lessons I learnt from Bilaspur.

As my mother’s campaign manager, I accept in toto the responsibility for her defeat. What’s infinitely worse is that even though I had a premonition of things to come, I was absolutely helpless to do anything worthwhile to prevent it.

After doing my rounds of booths on polling day (April 16th 2009), I went to call on Shailesh Nitin Trivedi, my father’s longtime political secretary who was admitted at Bilaspur’s Apollo Hospital after having been carjacked at Bilha, less than two kilometers from the new High Court complex; then forced at gunpoint to get into another vehicle where he was repeatedly beaten by goons (two of whom are now under arrest) and left for dead on an abandoned highway near Korba the night before. His ribs were broken along with his nose; his face was bruised & swollen, lips cut and teeth splintered; the white of his eyes had turned rusty; and there were visible abrasions on his chest and upper back.

Well, let’s just say that SNT wasn’t in the pink of health (although pink- or more precisely, a bloody crimson- was the color of his overall appearance). Under the circumstances, I was surprised to find that his first query, made with great difficulty and under considerable agony, concerned the election.

I told him point-blank that nothing short of a miracle could save us.

II. Where’ve all the Chhattisgarhi-Congresspersons gone?

My Cassandra-like prediction was based primarily on two factors:

1. EMIGRATION: Since Mummy’s ticket was announced only at the last moment- and on top of that, from a place none of us expected even in our wildest dreams to contest from- we had less than twelve days left to campaign. (After all, hadn’t we nursed Papa’s erstwhile parliamentary constituency, Mahasamund, for the past five years only to discover that Mummy was to contest from Bilaspur, some two hundred kilometers away?)

Under the circumstances, it was first & foremost necessary to ensure that the district party organization reaches every voter’s doorsteps. I therefore made it a point to distribute voter-slips at least twice before polling along with a simple feedback form seeking certain basic information about the composition of each booth such as (a) number of households; (b) number of deceased voters; & (c) number of absentee-voters.

When we got the entries in these forms tabulated, the statistics were shocking: more than 2,30,312 of the about 7,00,000 present voters were absentees. In one village near Beltara, 348 of a total of 760 voters weren’t there. I personally went to that village to verify if the figures were right. Most of them, as it turned out, were farmers. When I further inquired as to the whereabouts of these absentees-agriculturists, I was told that they had all gone out in search of work. Apparently, this phenomenon is prevalent in but in no way restricted to the central riverine basins of Chhattisgarh.

The mass exodus, I believe, is chiefly because of the poor ground-level implementation of NREGA in Chhattisgarh’s rural hinterland. (In a letter to the Election Commission of India written shortly after polling, the state’s chief secretary admitted that programs like the NREGA had been put on hold for the past six months because of a more or less continuous imposition of the Model Code of Conduct. He, therefore, requested in earnest relaxation of the Conduct rules.) Emigration in Chhattisgarh follows an annual pattern: with no work in sight, rural workers have little option but to leave their homes & hearths after the harvest of kharif crops to seek work elsewhere in order to sustain their families; and they return shortly before the onset of the monsoons. During this parched interregnum (January-June), fields lie barren and villages everywhere look deserted.

I was surprised when a noted economist from JNU (my alma mater) studying India’s unorganized labor market told me that wages across the nation, especially in metropolitan cities, actually come down during the summer months chiefly because of the this annual influx of rural laborers, many of who come from Chhattisgarh. The fact that Chhattisgarh shares its boundary with at least six other big states- Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra- is also a big incentive for seasonal agricultural workers to go out to work in relatively higher-wage markets. The inertial of socio-cultural practice- emigration has been going on for so long that we actually have folksongs about it- also favors an annual mass exodus.

After having grappled with the evidence for too long and in the absence of any other satisfactory explanation to account for the statewide discrepancy in the Assembly and General election results, both of which take place immediately one after the other (and will continue to be held in the same sequential manner if Governments at the state and centre continue to complete their full terms), there is only one conclusion to be arrived at: most of those who emigrate during the months of January to June are- if by nothing else, then by the sheer force of habit- inclined to vote for the Congress. As the above discussion shows, they’re still in their homes- relatively relaxed and upbeat after having sold their harvests- in time to cast their votes in November’s Assembly election; but- and this is the real point I wish to make- they’re all clearly not around to exercise their franchise in April’s General election.

2. COLLAPSE OF THE PATRON-CLIENT NETWORK: To understand what this phrase means, it’s important to first revisit a bit of history, and in particular, Congress history. Before the Mahatma, Congress was a movement mostly of well-meaning intellectuals who believed in Memorandum-politics pitted (during the so-called ‘Extremist phase’ at least) against diehard revolutionaries who subscribed to an ultra-patriotic if somewhat crude Bomb-politics. It was only after Gandhi’s advent on the national stage in early 1920s that India’s freedom struggle truly became a world-class mass movement. Judith Martin, the Cambridge historian, believes that this had a lot to do with what she calls the ‘patron-client network’ that served as the foundation of this mass movement. Put simply, the Mahatma’s leadership was based on the unequivocal support of rural landlords (zamindars, jagirdars, bhomicharis et al) and the emergent-class of Indian industrialists in urban areas (Tatas, Birlas, Modis, Bajajes- all openly financed Gandhi’s anti-establishmentarian politics).

Both these ‘classes’ were, in effect, his chief ‘clients’; and Gandhi in turn became their principal patron by openly espousing causes that created in them a common interest to provide active assistance to Gandhi’s movement: his open advocacy of exempting agriculture from taxation in a free India, for example, naturally endeared him to the landed gentry whereas his call for Swadeshi, which led to a nationwide boycott of imported goods, naturally benefited Indian industry, especially the textile industry. Not only that, both these classes saw in Gandhi, their surest hope against reining in the Congress’ mostly socialist youth leadership (including of course Pandit Nehru, who was severely criticized by his mentor for passing the Socialist Resolution in 1928’s Lahore Congress Session). In return, they acted as the conduit between the Mahatma & the masses of India over whom they exercised a great deal of influence.

With certain realignments (which I shall not go into here) this patron-client network has served the Congress party remarkably well over the past six decades: more to the point, it has helped us remain in the fight against more organized cadre-based rivals, both to the Left and the Right (the Communists and the BJP). Yet, in Chhattisgarh, this network has collapsed completely during the past five years.

To put it crudely, Congresspersons need regular infusions of power- patronage is a more apt term- to keep ticking; without it, they simply tend to wither away. For the past five years, we’ve been out of power in the state; not only that, we (as in the Congress in Chhattisgarh) remained without representation in the Union as well where incidentally the Congress was in power. This is in sharp contrast to what happened in neighboring Madhya Pradesh, which elected 4 Congress MPs in the last general election but ended up having no less than 5 ministers in the union cabinet. Not surprisingly, the Congress’ performance in that state has improved significantly since Congresspersons there had access to ‘patrons’ they could turn to.

In Chhattisgarh, on the other hand, the ability of our leaders to provide patronage to party workers was severely eroded, if not totally destroyed during this time period, and more so after the assembly election last year, when they lost all hope of retuning to power for the next five years as well. (Unfortunately, a majority of party workers in the state viewed the one leader who did have some kind of official authority- the Leader of Opposition- as a crony of the state government rather than as a patron of the Congress.) In more realistic terms, this meant that the Congress leadership remained totally helpless in getting their workers’ children admitted into decent schools and colleges, or in finding them jobs; it could not help them get contracts; and when somebody in their family fell sick, it was in no position whatsoever to get them financial assistance from the government relief funds.

Here, it is also pertinent to mention that unlike a big state like Madhya Pradesh, the level of political interference in smaller states like Chhattisgarh is significantly higher: in fact, as anyone living here knows only too well, it is extremely difficult for anyone to get things done even at the panchayat level without some kind of political tweaking ‘from above’. Under these circumstances, even the most ardent party persons in the state have been compelled to look for alternatives- not out of disloyalty to the party but out of sheer compulsion: the necessity of survival. For instance, if the local BJP bigwig called one of our (hypothetical) party workers in the middle of the campaign to tell him that he was perhaps working a little too hard, he would in all likelihood reply that he was merely going through the motions of attending meetings etc. while reassuring the bigwig that he would do ‘nothing out of the way’. In the rare event that this worker did actually persist- like the brave Mr. Trivedi- then an altogether different fate awaited them!

Not surprisingly then, this peculiar situation has led to a total demoralization of the party cadre in Chhattisgarh. The pervasive feeling among Congresspersons is that the state has ceased to exist for ‘Delhi’: that they no longer matter in the overall scheme of things. The Lok Sabha results- when the Congress has won an astounding majority despite the party’s dismal showing in Chhattisgarh- only seem to confirm this feeling. As a Congressman, I believe it is imperative that these deep-rooted ‘systemic’ grievances be redressed urgently.

To that end, I offer the following cursory suggestions.

III. SOS

It is clear from the above discussion that the election cycle, as it currently exists with assembly elections in November-December followed by nationwide general elections in April-May, has put the Congress at a significant disadvantage in Chhattisgarh for the simple reason that a majority of our traditional voters are absent when it’s time to vote in the latter. There are, as I see it, only two ways to change this election cycle: one, change the timing of the general election (which given the current mandate at the Centre, is quite unimaginable); two, change the timing of the assembly election.

But merely changing its timing would not suffice: the conditions for holding assembly elections must also change in order to ensure that the electioneering process is truly fair, and voters, especially those who are currently enslaved in Salwa Judum camps, can exercise their franchise freely. The Constitution contains adequate provisions for doing both; and requisites for enforcing these provisions are not entirely absent in Chhattisgarh especially in light of the ongoing genocide in the (forgotten) tribal regions of Bastar. Moreover, as we’ve learnt only too well from the situation prevalent in Jharkhand and much of the north-east, political stability in small states is not only an exception to the rule but in most cases, it isn’t even a virtue: the redressal of people’s grievances against their governments more often than not leads to a ‘maximum solution’ within the constitutional framework.

And in any case, there is simply no third option.

Secondly, the capacity of the Congress state leadership to function as effective patrons should be revived. This can be done most easily by giving the state representation in the Union Government as well as the party high command, and then- and this is far more important- ensuring that this political representation translates into a rebuilding of the now shattered patron-client network across the length and breadth of the state.

Unfortunately, Congress state leaders have once again taken ultimately meaningless finger-pointing. Infighting has always been a factor in the Congress, and in all probability, it will remain so for many, many more years to come. Yet, this is not a factor unique to Chhattisgarh or even to the Congress (as the recent developments in the once-disciplined but now ‘volcanic’ BJP has shown only too well). We’ve learnt to live with it, and have emerged stronger despite- or in some cases when infighting has led to constructive competition rather than incessant backbiting, even because of- it.

The time has come for us, therefore, to stop playing the blame game. We can begin by accepting that first and foremost there are certain factors- apart from the rampant infighting- that have led to our present plight. Secondly, we must realize that these factors have nothing to do with individuals; they’re, as I have endeavored to show above, ‘systemic’. Lastly, only a comprehensive strategy that rises above the narrow confines of personality-politics- and investigates the ‘why’ rather than the ‘who’ of the problem- can help us tackle these systemic causes, and lay the foundations of a Congress resurgence in Chhattisgarh.

A Blog's Life.एक ब्लॉग की ज़िन्दगी

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 19:35:00 +0000

BIRTH PANGS (2006-07) जन्म यातनाएं

May 26 2006:
The first post of this blog, containing excerpts from my Jail Diary, The Ballad of Raipur Gaol, is published exactly twenty-six days after I am released on bail. The blog is christened Undertrial.

इस ब्लॉग की पहली पोस्ट, जिसमें मेरी जेल डायरी, "द बैलड ऑफ़ रायपुर जेल" (रायपुर जेल का गाथागीत), के कुछ अंश हैं, का मेरे जमानत पर रिहा होने के ठीक छब्बीस दिन बाद प्रकाशन होता है. ब्लॉग का नामकरण "अन्डरत्रायल" (विचाराधीन) किया जाता है.

November 2 2006:
Hindi makes its first appearance on this blog albeit in a fairly rudimentary form: Hindi posts such as this one are painstakingly composed on Adobe, then converted and published as .jpg images. The outcome is simply not worth the effort as readers have to click on each image to enlarge it in order to make the text readable.

हिंदी की इब्तदा ब्लॉग पर होती है, यद्यपि बेहद मौलिक रूप में: अडोब पर लिखे पोस्ट को .jpg में परिवर्तित करके प्रकाशित किया जाता है; पाठकों को अक्षरों को पढ़ने के लिए अलग-अलग चित्रों पर बार-बार क्लिक करना पड़ता है, जैसे कि इस पोस्ट में. इसलिए महनत के अनुसार फल नहीं मिल पाता.

January 12 2007:
A video of me delivering my first Chhattisgarhi speech is posted. This is the first Chhattisgarhi video on the internet of its kind.

मेरे छत्तीसगढ़ी बोली में दिए गए पहले भाषण के वीडियो को पोस्ट किया जाता है. अपनी तरह का यह इन्टरनेट पर पहला छत्तीसगढ़ी वीडियो है.

April 31-May 1 2007:
During my month-long incarceration, Dr. Saibel Farishta posts on this blog under the nom de plume, Tiger. This is the only time when this blog has two authors. Shortly after my acquittal, the "Tiger Posts" are lost forever when Saibel accidentally (?) deletes them.

इस एक महने जब मैं अचानक फिर जेल में रहा, तब डॉक्टर सैबल फ़रिश्ता इस ब्लॉग पर "टायगर" के नाम से पोस्ट करना जारी रखते हैं. केवल यही समय है जब ब्लॉग के दो लेखक रहते हैं. मेरे बरी होने के कुछ ही समय बाद, सभी "टायगर पोस्ट" हमेशा-हमेशा के लिए तब नष्ट हो जाते है जब सैबल उन्हें गलती से (?) मिटा देते हैं.

October 1 2007:
The first full Hindi post is published using Google Transliterate. The occasion is Mahatma Gandhi's birth anniversary.

सम्पूर्ण रूप से हिंदी की पोस्ट का पहला प्रकाशन होता है, गूगल Transliterate के कारण. अवसर गाँधी जयंती का है.

FIRST RENAISSANCE (2007-08) पहला पुनर्जन्म

December 2 2007:
After my acquittal in May 2007, the title of this blog, Undertrial, loses its meaning. Consequently, the blog is renamed ½FREEDOMS! After a month-long readers-poll, it is given a new look to make room for a variety of new gizmos, which had begun to clutter the lone sidebar: the standard two-column template is replaced with a three-column template by tweaking with Blogger's HTML code. Also, the main color scheme is changed from white-on-black to black-on-white to make the often-lengthy text less stressful to the eyes; and instead of complete texts of each post appearing on the main page, only excerpts are posted with a friendly 'Read More' link.

मई २००७ में मेरे बरी होने के बाद इस ब्लॉग का शीर्षक अपना अर्थ खो बैठता है. "विचाराधीन" की जगह अब इसका नाम "आधी आज़ादियाँ" कर दिया जाता है; साथ ही इसे नई शक्ल भी दी जाती है: नए-नए उपकरणों के लिए जगह बनाने के लिए ब्लोगर के टेम्पलेट के साथ छेड़खानी करके एक के बजाय दो साइडबार निर्मित किये जातें हैं; काले पर सफ़ेद की जगह सफ़ेद पर काले कलर स्कीम को रखा जाता है, ताकि लम्बे पोस्ट पढ़ते हुए पाठकों की आँखों पर जोर न पड़े; और मुख्य पन्ने पर "आगे और पढ़ें" लिंक के साथ केवल पोस्ट के कुछ अंश न की पूरे पोस्ट प्रस्तुत किये जाते हैं.

July 16 2007:
A Disclaimer is posted at the end of the main page. Among other things, it announces this blog's re-commitment to continue with its zero-censorship policy; and forbids publication of its contents without the author's prior consent. The latter part, as is evident from this and other posts, is rarely respected.

ब्लॉग नीति की सूचना ब्लॉग पर मुख्य पृष्ट के अंत में दी जाती है: इसमें ब्लॉग में शुरू से चली आ रही जीरो सेंसरशिप नीति को औपचारिक रूप से घोषित किया जाता है, साथ ही बिना लेखक की पूर्व अनुमति के इसके अंशों के प्रकाशन पर प्रतिबन्ध भी लगाया जाता है. हालांकि इस दुसरे पहलू का कोई गंभीरता से पालन नहीं करता, जैसा कि इस पोस्ट से स्पष्ट हो जाता है.

SECOND RENAISSANCE (2009) दूसरा पुनर्जन्म

January 21 2009:
A separate Hindi blog on the politics of Chhattisgarh, छ्त्तीसगढ़िया सबले बढ़िया!, is started.

छत्तीसगढ़ की राजनीति पर हिंदी में एक अलग ब्लॉग, छ्त्तीसगढ़िया सबले बढ़िया!, की स्थापना होती है.

February 13 2009:
Following an Indian Express feature on this blog, in which it was mistakenly referred to as ½FREEDOM!, the name of the blog is changed for a second time to correspond to that error. The 's' is dropped from its name. The reason: although there are several kinds of freedoms, I realize that both its presence and absence are experienced as a unified whole.

इंडियन एक्सप्रेस में इस ब्लॉग के बारे में एक खबर, जिसमें इसका नाम गलती से आधी आज़ादी लिख दिया जाता है, के प्रकाशन के बाद उस गलती को ठीक साबित करने के लिए इसका दूसरा नामकरण होता है: 'याँ' को हटा दिया जाता है. कारण: हालांकि आज़ादी के कई प्रकार होते हैं, पर जब उसे और उसके अभाव, दोनों को महसूस किया जाता है, तो मुझे अहसास हुआ की वो सब एक ही लगते हैं.

March 1 2009:
Google's Friends Connect feature is added, making it possible for me to keep in touch with my friends- and critics- over this blog.

गूगल के फ्रेंड्स कनेक्ट उपकरण का ब्लॉग पर आगमन होता है, इस उम्मीद के साथ कि सखा और समालोचक, दोनों अब ब्लॉग के जरिए मेरे, और एक दुसरे के भी, संपर्क में बने रहेंगे.

March 5 2009:
½FREEDOM! finally makes its second rebirth with a new minimalist look. Only the bare essentials are retained in the two sidebars; the rest of the features appear as links in the header. Also, it becomes more Hindi-friendly.

ब्लॉग के दुसरे पुनर्जन्म की कड़ी समाप्त होती है, एक न्यूनतम शक्ल के साथ. सिर्फ बेहद जरूरी उपकरणों को ही साइडबार में बकाया रखा जाता है; बाकी सब हेडर में लिंक के रूप में दिखाई देते हैं. साथ ही, इसे और अधिक हिन्दी के अनुकूल बनाया जाता है.

(हिंदी में अनुवादित ये संक्षिप्त इतिहास इस बात का गवाह है!)

Obituary: लखीराम अग्रवाल- एक श्रद्धांजली

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 12:45:00 +0000

I am, as always, thankful to Mr. Shailesh Nitin Trivedi- or as he now refers to himself "Mr. Shoogle" (to contrast himself from Google Translator)- for helping me with the translation. The English version of this post can be read here.

इस पोस्ट को अब आप मेरे हिंदी में लिखा छत्तीसगढ़ की राजनीति पर ब्लॉग,

छ्त्तीसगढ़िया सबले बढ़िया!, में भी पढ़ सकते हैं.

एक युग का शांतिपूर्ण समापन
मैं अक्सर यह सोचता हूँ कि क्या छत्तीसगढ़ के शासक दल के भीष्म-पितामह, लखीराम अग्रवाल, अपनी मृत्यु के समय संतुष्ट थे? लगभग दो बरस पहले, सन् २००७ में, जब मैं उनसे मिलने उनके खरसिया निवास पर गया था, तब वे खुश तो नहीं थे. मैं मानता हूँ कि इस नाखुशी का कुछ हिस्सा उस समय हाल ही में उनके पुत्र, अमर अग्रवाल, को राज्य मंत्रिमंडल से हटाये जाने से सम्बंधित था. (ऐसा लगता है कि इस मामले में उनसे विचार विमर्श नहीं किया गया था.) लेकिन इस नाखुशी का ज्यादा बड़ा कारण न केवल छत्तीसगढ़ में बल्कि समूचे भारत में भाजपा का कांग्रेसीकरण हो जाना था. आखिरकार, समकालीन संघ साहित्य में इस बात की दुहाई बार बार पढ़ने को मिलती है. इस वाक्यांश का लाल कृष्ण अडवानी की आत्मकथा और आर.एस.एस. के मासिक मुखपत्र "पांचजन्य" (Organiser) के सम्पादकीयों में उपयोग बढ़ता ही जा रहा है.

उस मुलाकात में हम अकेले नहीं थे. इसके पहले सन् २००३ में जब मैं उनसे मिला था, तब चर्चा के विषय का अनुमान लगाने में प्रेस ने कोई कोर कसर नहीं छोड़ी थी. इस से हम दोनों को बेहद शर्मिंदगी का सामना करना पड़ा था क्योंकि उस नितांत अनौपचारिक बातचीत में राजनैतिक जोड़तोड़ की चर्चा कहीं थी ही नहीं. इसलिए इस बार मैंने इस मुलाकात में उपस्थित रहने के लिए प्रेस को आमंत्रित कर लिया था. बिना लागलपेट के हुई हमारी बातचीत में उन्होंने राज्य सरकार के कुछ नेताओं को 'औरंगजेब' की उपाधि देकर खलबली मचा दी थी. (यहाँ, उन्होंने बड़ी आसानी से हिन्दू समाज के पितृहंताओं के उदाहरणों की अनदेखी कर दी थी.) सर्वाधिक विस्मयजनक तो यह रहा कि किसी ने इस बारे में एक शब्द भी नहीं लिखकर मेरे इस विश्वास को और दृड़ बना दिया कि यदि दोगुलेपन और अनावश्यक गोपनीयता के बजाय कूटनीति खुलेपन और स्पष्टवादिता के साथ की जाए तो वह उनती बुरी नहीं है. उस समय कांग्रेस की कोटा उपचुनाव में जीत के बाद वे भाजपा के सत्ता में वापसी को लेकर आश्वस्त नहीं थे. इसके लिए वे युवाओं में बुजुर्गों के प्रति सम्मान की कमी को सीधे-सीधे जिम्मेदार मानते थे. इसके मतलब को समझ पाना ज्यादा कठिन नहीं था.

मेरे पिता जी अक्सर मुझसे कहते हैं कि छत्तीसगढ़ में जनसंघ-भाजपा की इमारत को खड़े करने का श्रेय पूरी तरह से श्री अग्रवाल और उनके लम्बे समय के सहयोगी रहे कुशाभाऊ ठाकरे को जाता है. इन दोनों ने उस युग की कांग्रेस की अजेय मशीनरी की पूरी शक्ति के खिलाफ काम करते हुए, हर संभव कठिनाइयों से जूझते हुए, नए रंगरूटों की तलाश में राजमाता ग्वालियर द्वारा दी गयी एक टूटी-फूटी खटारा जीप में अविभाजित मध्य प्रदेश के सुदूर अंचलों का दौरा करके, वर्त्तमान सत्ताधारी दल की नींव रखी. प्रश्न अब यह उठता है कि क्या उनकी पार्टी ने उन्हें अंततः छोड़ दिया था?

ऐसा लगा कि वे ऐसा ही सोचते थे. लेकिन यह अलगाव व्यक्तिगत से कहीं अधिक सैद्धांतिक था. अपने अन्य दक्षिणपंथी समकालीन सहयोगियों की ही तरह उन्होंने कांग्रेस के तथाकथित वंशवाद से ग्रस्त गलते हुए और उनके अनुसार अंततः निरर्थक ढांचे के विकल्प के निर्माण के ध्येय से अपनी लम्बी कष्टपूर्ण जीवन यात्रा शुरू की थी. इसमें उन्हें सफलता भी मिली. लेकिन बेहद विडम्बना पूर्ण. छत्तीसगढ़ और मध्य प्रदेश में जो विकल्प सत्ता में आया, वह उसी संस्कृति का एक दूसरा स्वरुप है, जिसे बदलने के लिए उन्होंने ता-उम्र जद्दो-जहद की थी.

सत्ता की प्रवृत्ति के तीन उदाहरण
इस सन्दर्भ में चैरमैन माव की क्रांति पर प्रोफेसर तान चुंग के ञानविषयक मूल्यांकन का ख़याल आता है. क्रांति के पहले और क्रांति के बाद की चीन की राजनीति की संरचना का विश्लेषण करते हुए उन्होंने पाया कि नवनिर्मित पोलितब्यूरो के सदस्य करीब-करीब उन्ही घरानों से थे जिन्होनें पूर्वर्ती मांचू सम्राटों को शासनाधिकारी दिए थे.

और पास में देखे तो मुझे याद है कि मेरे पिता जी के एक मित्र ने रायपुर में आयोजित विभिन्न मुख्यमंत्रियों के स्वागत समारोहों के कुछ फोटो देखाए थे. पहली नज़र में उन पीले पड़ चुके चित्रों में कुछ भी विशेष रूप से उल्लेखनीय नहीं था. गौर करने पर मुझे पता लगा कि सभी चित्रों में केवल मुख्यमंत्री का चेहरा बदला है, उनके आसपास ऊर्जावान याचना की विभिन्न मुद्राओं में तैनात लोग और उनकी भावभंगिमाएं सभी फोटो में बिलकुल एक जैसे हैं. लगभग दो दशकों के अंतराल में लिए गए विभिन्न चित्रों को देखकर ऐसा लगा जैसे शाश्वत और निरंतर स्वागतकर्ताओं के इस ऐतिहासिक समूह ने किसी जादू के बल पर समय के साथ-साथ आयु को ययाति की तरह जीत लिया है.

इस चिरयुवा प्रजाति के बचाव में मैं हरयाणा के एक पूर्व मुख्यमंत्री के बेटे के द्वारा मुझे सुनाया गया एक छोटा सा वाकया प्रस्तुत करना चाहता हूँ. पहली बार कार्यभार ग्रहण करने के बाद जब उनके पिता सुबह सैर पर निकले, तो उनके साथ एक ऐसा आदमी लग लिया जो उनसे भी पहले यह जान जाता था कि वे क्या चाहते हैं. स्वाभाविक रूप से समय के साथ-साथ यह साथ गहरी दोस्ती में बदल गया. उनके शब्दों में ही कहें तो वे लोग दो जिस्म एक जान हो गए थे. फिर जब वे सत्ता से हटे, तो इस आदमी का कहीं अता-पता ही नहीं चला. सालों बाद वे फिर से सत्ता में लौटे. और फिर सुबह की सैर के समय उन्होंने उसी व्यक्ति को अपने साथ पाया. पीड़ा और विस्मय के साथ उन्होंने उससे पूछा कि "मैं सोचता था कि हम लोग बहुत अच्छे मित्र थे. इतने साल तुम कहाँ चले गए थे?"

बेहद भोलेपन से उस व्यक्ति ने कहा: "चला गया था? चले तो आप गए थे, हुज़ूर. मैं तो यहीं था."

असहज मुखिया
उपरोक्त तीनों उदाहरण सत्ता की वास्तविक प्रकृति पर रौशनी डालते हैं. संक्षेप में कहें तो सत्ता में ऐसी ईश्वरीय-क्षमता है कि किसी को भी अपनी छवी में ढ़ाल लेती है. सत्ता में आने के बाद भाजपा प्रलोभनों के मंत्रमुग्ध कर देने वाले इस सम्मोहन से नहीं बच सकी. उदाहरण स्वरुप, कई मायनो में स्वर्गीय प्रमोद महाजन का किसी भी अन्य जीवित कांग्रेसी से अधिक कांग्रेसीकरण हो गया था. कांग्रेसी सत्ता में बने रहने को एक कला मानते हैं; लेकिन श्री महाजन ने उसे एक अत्याधुनिक विज्ञान में तब्दील कर दिया, और इस प्रक्रिया में देश में राजनीति करने के तौर-तरीकों को हमेशा-हमेशा के लिए बदल दिया. (छत्तीसगढ़ में भाजपा की सत्ता में वापसी का श्रेय इस बदलाव को ही जाता है.)

श्री अग्रवाल ने इस बदलाव की आहट को भली-भाँती समझ लिया था. सीधे-सीधे शब्दों में कहें तो इसका अर्थ पुराने नेताओं के साथ-साथ आर.एस.एस. के सरसंघचालकों, केशव हेडगेवार और माधव गोलवलकर, के पुराने विचारों और कार्यपद्धति को हाल ही में बनी भाजपा की राज्य सरकारों के मंत्रियों द्वारा दरकिनार किया जाना था, जिसे समकालीन राजनैतिक समीक्षक भाजपा और संघ के बीच बढ़ती दूरियों की संज्ञा देतें हैं. आखिर, लखीराम जी कैसे भूल सकते थे कि उनका स्वयं का बेटा भी एक मंत्री है?

विशेष रूप से यह आखिरी पहलू उन्हें परेशान करता था. एक बार उन्होंने मुझे बताया कि जब भी पार्टी की बैठकों में संभावित उम्मीदवार के रूप में उनके बेटे के नाम पर विचार किया जाता था, तो वे चुपचाप उस कमरे से बहार निकल जाते थे ताकि निर्णय पर किसी तरह का प्रभाव न पड़े. उनका मानना था कि अगर उनके बेटे को पार्टी कि टिकिट दी जाती है, तो उसकी योग्यता के कारण न कि खून के रिश्ते के कारण. स्पष्ट रूप से वे वंशवादी होने के आरोपों से बचना चाहते थे. आखिरकार, उनके लिए सारी ज़िन्दगी के परिश्रम का अर्थ अपने वंश के अभ्युदय से कहीं बहुत अधिक था. मानो वो घोषणा करना चाहते थे कि "कोई यह नहीं कह सकता कि मैंने सब कुछ अपने बेटों के लिए किया."

गैर-वंशवादी
मेरे दृष्टिकोण में इस सम्बन्ध में उनकी आशंकाएं पूरी तरह से बेबुनियाद थीं. वास्तव में उनके केवल एक बेटे ने राजनीति में प्रवेश किया और एक ऐसे क्षेत्र से लगातार जीत हासिल की जहाँ उनके पिता का कोई ज्यादा प्रभाव नहीं था; एक ऐसा क्षेत्र जो पहले कांग्रेस का गढ़ माना जाता था. बाकी बेटे परिवार के गुडाखू व्यवसाय में लगे रहे. उनकी जीवन भर की महनत से यदि किसी परिवार को लाभ मिला तो वह उनका निजी परिवार नहीं बल्कि वह परिवार था जिसे आर.एस.एस. के विचारकों ने 'संघ परिवार' की संज्ञा दी है. संघ के लिए बेहद उपयोगी साबित हुई अपनी पुस्तक "हम और हमारी राष्ट्रीयता की परिभाषा" (We or our Nationhood Defined) में श्री गोलवलकर ने लिखा है कि "संघ समाज में संगठन नहीं, समाज का संगठन है."

श्री लखीराम को छत्तीसगढ़ में संघ परिवार के अविवादित मुखिया बने रहना का पूरा अधिकार था. आखिरकार, यदि उन्होंने यहाँ के दूरस्त अंचलों की यात्रा नहीं की होती- जशपुर जाकर वहां के युवा राजकुमार, दिलीप सिंह जूदेव, को भाजपा से जुड़ने के लिए तैयार नहीं किया होता या कवर्धा जाकर वैसे ही एक और युवा आयुर्वेदिक चिकित्सक, डॉक्टर रमण सिंह, को आर.एस.एस. की शाखाओं में शामिल होने के लिए प्रेरित नहीं किया होता- तो भाजपा कभी सत्ता में नहीं आ पाती. लेकिन उनके यही चेले अपने गुरु के खिलाफ होते रहे.

मैंने पहली बार इसे तब महसूस किया जब सन् २००१ में १२ भाजपा विधायकों ने कांग्रेस में शामिल होने का फैसला लिया, जो कि भारतीय इतिहास में अपनी तरह का पहला और आखिरी उदाहरण है. सबसे ज्यादा चौकाने वाली बात तो यह थी कि उनमे से अधिकतर लोगों ने अपने दल-बदल का सबसे प्रमुख कारण जो बताया, वह केवल दो शब्दों का था: लखीराम अग्रवाल. उनकी शिकायत थी कि पार्टी के विधायक होने के बावजूद जब वे अपने गुरु के पाँव छूते थे, तब वे उनकी तरफ देखने की जरूरत भी नहीं समझते थे. इस से इन विधायकों को बेहद पीड़ा होती थी. जब मैंने 'लखी अंकल' को यह बताया, तो वे यह कहकर हंस दिए कि "यदि ऐसा था तो उन्हें मेरे पाँव छूने की जरूरत नहीं थी."

जिसे लोगों ने बेपरवाह घमंड समझा, वह वाकई में एक स्वनिर्मित व्यक्ति का आत्म-सम्मान था. उनकी दुनिया में उन्हें किये जा रहे अभिवादनों का उत्तर देने या स्वीकार करने की कोई आवश्यकता नहीं थी. शायद वे इन अभिवादनों को आदर का एक ऐसा फर्जी प्रदर्शन मानते थे जो उनकी कृपा से राजनैतिक अस्तित्व में आये लोगों के द्वारा और ज्यादा लाभ लेने की कोशिश मात्र थी. उनके अनुमान से यदि वे लोग वाकई में स्वीकरोक्ति की अपेक्षा रखते थे, तो यह नितांत हास्यापद था.

मैं इस दृष्टिकोण से सहमत नहीं हूँ. यह अच्छी राजनीति भी नहीं है. मैं एक ऐसे परिवार से हूँ जिसका उपकार करने और उपकार लेने का एक लंबा इतिहास है. उपकार के बदले में आभार की अपेक्षा रखना- उसे अपना अधिकार समझना- अव्यावहारिकता का परिचायक है. वास्तविकता तो यह है कि अक्सर लोग उनको किये गए उपकार को इश्वर-प्रदत्त मानने लगते हैं; कभी-कभी वे उसे अपनी महनत का फल भी समझ लेते हैं. समकालीन मूल्यों को स्वीकार न करके श्री अग्रवाल अपने उस भोलेपन का सबूत दिया जो उनकी पीढ़ी के लोगों में असामान्य नहीं है. इस प्रक्रिया में उनके अपने कई चेलों से सम्बन्ध बिगड़ गए, जो आज सरकार और संगठन, दोनों में महत्वपूर्ण पदों पर आसीन हैं.

व्यक्तिगत-राजनीतिज्ञ
हम में से जिन लोगों को आगे लाने में उनका कोई योगदान नहीं था, या जिनपर उनके उपकार नहीं थे, उनके प्रति वे संकोच में डाल देने की सीमा तक विनम्र थे. राज्य सभा के मेरे पिता जी के लम्बे समय तक सहयोगी होने के बावजूद, उम्र में मुझसे लगभग आधी सदी बड़े होने के बावजूद, और हर मायने में मुझसे बेहतर होने के बावजूद, जब भी मैं उनसे मिलता था, वे मुझे बेहद आदर से "अमित जी" कहकर पुकारते थे.

मैं मनाता हूँ की वे एक अच्छे समालोचक भी थे. एक बार उन्होंने मुझसे कहा था कि वे सोचते हैं कि संभवतः मेरे पिता जी मध्य प्रदेश के सुविख्यात मुख्यमंत्री और उनके सबसे पुराने राजनैतिक गुरु, अर्जुन सिंह, से भी बेहतर प्रशाषक थे. लेकिन उन्होंने यह भी कहा कि मेरे पिता जी को महान बनने से उनकी दूसरों से सलाह-मशविरा न करने की प्रवृत्ति ने रोका. मैं आज यह नहीं कह सकता कि मेरे पिता जी की कार्यप्रणाली के सम्बन्ध में उनका यह दृष्टिकोण कितना सही था. लेकिन शायद श्री अग्रवाल के सुप्रसिद्ध प्रचार तंत्र से प्रभावित जनमानस की धारणा तो ये ही है. हालांकि इस सलाह की सदाशयता से कोई इनकार नहीं कर सकता है. आखिरकार, सलाह-मशविरा करना स्वयं में महत्त्व रखता है; उस से सहमती होना या न होना दीगर बात है.

किसी भी स्थिति में मैं इस बात की कल्पना भी नहीं कर सकता हूँ कि राज्य का कोई अन्य भाजपा नेता अपने किसी राजनैतिक प्रतिद्वंदी के बारे में इस तरह की टिपण्णी करे, और उसके बेटे को सत्ता में वापसी के लिए सकारात्मक सलाह देने की सीमा तक चला जाए. यह शायद इसलिए था क्योंकि श्री अग्रवाल मेरे पिता जी को सिर्फ एक ऐसा विरोधी नहीं मानते थे जिसे लड़कर नेस्तनाबूत कर देना है बल्कि मैं मानता हूँ कि वे मेरे पिता जी को एक साथी और एक मित्र की तरह समझते थे. क्योंकि उन्होंने अपने जीवन का अधिकाँश हिस्सा संघर्षों में बिताया था, अतः वे सत्ता संघर्ष की उस उहापोह से दूर रहते थे जो "सत्ता परमोधर्म" की नीति पर चलने वालों के अंतर्मन में उत्पन्न होने वाली निहायत ही अहमकाना असुरक्षा को जन्म देती है.

इसलिए उनकी दुनिया में करो या मरो किस्म के सत्ता के कुटिल खेलों के लिए जगह नहीं थी. बल्कि जिन लोगों से वे सहमत नहीं रहते थे, उनसे भी परिचय और मेल-मुलाकात की गुंजाइश बनी रहती थी. उनके लिए राजनीति कभी व्यक्तिगत रंजिशों का रूप नहीं लेती थी. (उनसे कुछ कम लेकिन कुछ हद तक यह गुण उनके पुत्र को भी विरासत में मिला है.) इस से भी बड़कर वे व्यक्तिगत संबंधों को राजनीति से ऊपर रखते थे. उनकी बहु के अंतिम-संस्कार के समय पिछले बरस उन्होंने मुझसे कहा था कि उनके मित्र, श्री ठाकरे, के निधन के बाद पार्टी मीटिंग या अन्य किसी कारण से भी उनका दिल्ली जाने का मन नहीं होता है. उनकी पार्टी के नई दिल्ली के अशोक रोड स्थित राष्ट्रीय मुख्यालय में उन्हें अपने दिवंगत मित्र की बेहद याद आती है क्योंकि श्री ठाकरे ने संगठन के लिए समर्पित होकर वहां एक ब्रह्मचारी के रूप में एक ही कमरे में अपना अधिकाँश जीवन बिता दिया, शायद इसलिए क्योंकि उनके पास जाने के लिए कोई दूसरा ठौर या कारण नहीं था.

यह कहा जाता है कि किसी व्यक्ति के जीवन की सार्थकता का अनुमान उसके अंतिम-संस्कार में सम्मिलित लोगों से लगाया जा सकता है. श्री अग्रवाल एक अतूलनीय संगठक होने के अलावा न तो किसी पद में थे, न ही किसी विषय के विशेषज्ञ या शिक्षाशास्त्री या कोई बड़े कलाकार थे. इस के बावजूद उनकी पार्टी और उसके बाहर के भी, और वे भी जिन्हें राजनीति से कोई लेना-देना नहीं है, ऐसे जीवन के विभिन्न क्षेत्रों के लोग, उनके प्रति अपना सम्मान व्यक्त करने के लिए आये थे, जिनके जीवनों को अपने कार्यों से उन्होंने छुआ था, और जिन्हें उन्होंने राहत पहुंचाई थी. वे लोग मुख्य रूप से इसलिए आये थे क्योंकि वे उन्हें जानते थे और उनसे स्नेह करते थे, व्यक्तिगत रूप से.

दीर्घकालीन व्यक्तिगत संबंधों के लिए सैधांतिक या राजनैतिक रूप से एकमत होना अनिवार्य नहीं है. राजनैतिक विरोधी भी अच्छे व्यक्तिगत मित्र हो सकते है. हमारी पीढ़ी के राजनीतिज्ञों को श्री अग्रवाल द्वारा दी गयी यह सबसे महत्वपूर्ण सीख है. छत्तीसगढ़ के लिए यह उनकी सबसे स्थायी विरासत भी है.

Best Pictures at this Year's Oscars: The Winter of Discontent & An Unruly Millionaire

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 20:10:00 +0000

In this post, I review the four other films nominated for Best Picture at the 81st Academy Awards (due to be held day after tomorrow, on February 22nd): FROST/NIXON, THE READER, MILK and THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON. I've also included DOUBT because even though it hasn’t been nominated for Best Picture, all four of its principal performers are up for acting awards. SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE has already been commented upon elsewhere. You can also read my film reviews at FLIXSTER and the IMDB websites.

1. FROST/NIXON: THE EYES SPEAK
You don't have to look like Nixon to portray him. That point was already proven by Sir Anthony Hopkins in Oliver Stone's film of the same name. But while Mr. Stone's film was a biopic, this one focuses on only one- and also, what was to become the last- public chapter in the disgraced president's life.

In that sense, Frank Langella's role is far more difficult: he had to convey the entire meaning of a man's life by mostly sitting at an interview, and using nothing more than words and- this, I believe, is the key to understanding his performance- expressions; in particular, the way he uses his eyes. No, he doesn't cry or stare; he doesn't even look away; what he does is that he doesn't look at you. And that's telling a lot about the man he portrays. In the famous interviews, Mr. Langella's verbal evasiveness just doesn't sync with what his eyes are screaming aloud. David Frost, it would seem, already had his confession long before President Nixon uttered those famous lines; long before the interviews started, even.

I guess Frost's real brilliance lay in realizing this before anyone else- and then, risking everything he had to get the interviews. In making this aspect clear, Ron Howard's film makes a contribution no history book or archival footage possibly can. Nixon's confession wasn't redemptive for the American nation only; more importantly, it was an act of self-redemption for the man who made it.

Langella/Nixon doesn't admit this, but we can read it very clearly in his eyes.

2. THE READER: MS. WINSLET’S SECRET
The Reader belongs to Kate Winslet: she is quite simply superb. Everybody else, Ralph Fiennes included, slip into oblivion. The sex scenes are- how does one put it?- both erotic and disturbing. When the Kid (played by David Kross) asks her if she- a much older woman- loves him, she nods. But the nod is everything. It means no and yes and also 'are you kidding me?', all at once.

Her past is demonic, no doubt, but I suspect that the viewer will (like me) come out of the movie sympathizing with her. After seeing the film, the question that perplexed me was why did she kill herself? The most obvious answer is Guilt. Yet, I can't help feeling that it might be something else also. Why for instance didn't this Guilt consume her before? And whether this Guilt also included her abandoning- not loving- the Kid, which, as we discover, leaves him permanently petrified- passive and polite? But she couldn't have known all that, could she? Perhaps- and this is the only answer I could come up with- she was ashamed of not being able to read, so ashamed in fact that she chose to spend the rest of her life in prison than let people know this. Like Salman Rushdie wrote in 'Shame', if you tell the secret, it invites shame; if you don't, you are stuck with guilt. Kate's character chooses guilt.

That she couldn't read was the only secret she wished to keep as her own, having no qualms about admitting to her other more horrific misdeeds: it was indeed the defining characteristic of who she was, the one thing that made her, and what eventually becomes our key to understanding her. Ironically enough, once that secret is gone- she does eventually teach herself to read and write with the help of audio-tapes of books Ralph Fiennes' character sends her- she no longer knows her place in the world...

But we can never know the answer for certain, and that is what makes The Reader such a great, beautifully multi-layered- and might I add, secretive?- film.

3. MILK: PROPAGANDA-PICTURE
The thing with biopics is that they tend to focus too much on their subjects even to the point of obsession, and in the process, they often ignore the fact that there are always at least two sides to every story. Milk is no different- and perhaps, it should not be. But when you go to see a Gus Van Sant film, difference is what you have come to expect (remember his mesmerizing opus on Columbine, Elephant): there is an unmistakable hypnotic quality about them. Milk is anything but hypnotic; at times, it becomes outright jarring.

And of course, it relies too much on the performance of Sean Penn: that is its principal strength but also, in my opinion, its main weakness. There is no doubt that Mr. Penn is a superb actor, the kind who quietly slips into his character's skin. In Milk, he doesn't seek to re-interpret- or worse, re-invent- his real-life subject; instead he blends himself seamlessly into his character. So yes: you can still discern traces of Mr. Penn's temperamental volatility in the determined if somewhat power-driven gay-rights crusader, Mr. Milk. This makes the film so much more interesting- as also the simmering tension between his character and Josh Brolin's, which lies at the heart of Milk.

And yet Milk is really about Milk, the politician, and tells us very little about his personal life. For instance, his lover (played by James Franco) is at best, two-dimensional. When he leaves him, we don't really know why. The script simply doesn't allow this aspect of Mr. Milk to develop.

More to the point: by focusing almost exclusively on his several failed election campaigns, what Mr. Van Sant offers us is not so much a movie as a propaganda film.

4. THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON: ONE GUMP TOO MANY
I love epics. Movies should be made like that: sweeping tales that light up the big screen. But they're not, at least not the ones that the Academy seems to like these days. The Reader, Milk and Frost/Nixon- all of which have been nominated for Best Picture at this year's Oscars- are more HBO-style made-for-TV movies than Epics (which is not to say that they aren't well-made). The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is unabashedly epic, and had it not been for Slumdog Millionaire, it would have, despite its shortcomings, been my favorite film of the year.

If Looks could kill?
I've always suspected that the really great looking actors & actresses suffer from an acting-handicap: their perfect good looks lead us to think of them in terms of gods & goddesses, and therefore any effort by them to play human beings is seen as flawed. This works well for those who can't act at all- like Bollywood’s own Salman Khan- as it compensates amply for their lack of talent; but for those who can act- and I mean, really act- it's nothing short of a curse. Sadly, Brad Pitt falls in the latter category. He is perhaps the most underrated actor of our time- principally because of his extraordinary good looks. No wonder he opted to act in a film in which the first-shot of him is as a horribly deformed baby that even his father doesn't want. And then of course, he begins to grow younger and also, more and more like the actual Brad Bitt...

The trick, I guess, was for Mr. Pitt to look the various ages he portrays in- and as- Benjamin Button. The wizardry of special effects can only do so much; the rest was up to him, really. (Remember Dustin Hoffman in the 1970 film, Little Big Man- back when they didn’t have this kind of technology.) He has terrific company in the form of three extremely gifted actresses: his mother (Taraji Henson), the love of his life (Cate Blanchett), and his fling (Tilda Swinton). Julia Ormond plays his daughter, but she hardly ever leaves the room. In any event, we remember them all having done such kinds of roles before- but not so for Mr. Pitt. (Not that he hasn't but we just don't remember it.)

The entire premise of the film, taken from a 1920s short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald, seems to me to be needlessly weird; despite going through great pains to make it look believable, it simply isn't. After all, wouldn't a man who defies the most fundamental law of nature- that we must all grow old and die- attract our news-obsessed society's attention? Mr. Button, however, does not, leading a relatively uneventful unnoticed existence. Also, the whole business of a 90 year old man falling in love with a 9 year old girl edges a bit too close to bigotry for my taste.

But the single greatest flaw with this film is that we've already seen it before. Not one with the same title of course, but the way the tale is told. In case you are wondering, let me give you a clue. Two words: Eric Roth. He was the guy who wrote the screenplay for Robert Zemeckis' Forrest Gump. The only real difference between the two films is that while Mr. Gump grows older; Mr. Button becomes younger. Everything else- every single scene, every single character they come into contact with, every single shot, even the plot- are almost identical.

The Academy has already honored Forrest Gump once before; there is, in my opinion, no point in doing so again.

5.DOUBT: ALL THE FILM’S A STAGE
Great theatre doesn't necessarily make for great cinema. Doubt proves this. (The Lion In Winter, however, doesn’t.) Despite brilliant all-round performances by a sterling cast- for instance, every time Meryl Streep looked into the camera and I mean really looked, that icy stare, something inside me froze, the temperature dropped- there were a couple of times when I found myself thinking 'when will all this end'.

After all, the story doesn't really move, and all the action, so to speak, is intellectual. The expected duel between Hoffman and Streep never really materialized- with the former quietly slipping away. The central question of the film- can love be a sufficient justification for lust?- remains strangely unanswered. The film does little to influence the viewers' views; it ends up merely reinforcing them. (For me, the answer is No, and Doubt hasn't created any doubts in my mind about that.)

The moment of catharsis, when it does finally come, arrives in the form of a dialogue that Ms. Streep's character has with Viola Davis, who plays the mother of the black boy she believes Hoffman's character has 'made advances at.' It's a short scene, but boy does it surprise! Both actresses hold no punches back: morality, it seems, has no place for a mother who only wants her child to get away from the world she has brought him into. There can be no certainty about things like that. Material is prized over the moral, giving way to a new unorthodox kind of morality. Wasn't that incidentally also the theme of Vatican-II being held at the same time as the events this film depicts?

In the end, Doubt is all that remains.

6. Slumdog Millionaire: And the Oscar Goes to...
For millions like me raised on a staple-diet of commercial Hindi cinema, there’s nothing particularly novel about its plot: the relatively lukewarm response it has gotten from Indian filmgoers compared to the rapturous applause elsewhere is proof of this. Its rags-to-riches tale could well be a cinematic-metaphor for India’s own rise during the period in which Jamal, Salim and Latika's lives unfold. In so many ways, it is the story of India as well as those who have lived here through the tumultuous past two decades.

Its phenomenal ‘rules-breaking success’- to paraphrase the longtime film-critic, Roger Ebert- therefore owes equally if not more to the disenchanted times the world suddenly finds itself thrust into as it does to the movie’s delightful intrinsic-charm: after all, what better medicine than a good healthy dose of unbridled Hope wrapped in wondrously uplifting Jai-hos to cure the globe of its seemingly insurmountable Recession-blues? All the other films nominated for Best Picture at this year’s Oscars reflect the Gloom around- but also, within- us; none with the solitary exception of this film offers a way-out: even- or, especially- if the way-out is an implausibly exhilaratingly happy ending. And that is precisely what makes it work.

I leave you with this particular mise-en-scène: as Jamal weaves his way through Mumbai’s reptilian traffic to answer that one last remaining two million-rupee question, a wrinkly old beggar knocks at his car-window. Thinking she has come to ask for money he ignores her at first only to be confronted with the realization that she doesn’t want his money at all; on the contrary, she wants him to win it all. “Béta,” she beams to Jamal as he is driven away, “jeet ke aana.” [Son, win & come.] His victory, after all, would be hers as well.

Much as Slumdog Millionaire’s victory on Oscar Night would be India’s- and also of Underdogs everywhere.

Film: स्लमदौग मिलियनैर की सफलता का हमारे लिए अर्थ?

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 20:03:00 +0000

Click here to read the English translation of this post. The translation was done using Google Translate.
मेरे जैसे हजारों-लाखों लोगों जिनके लिए व्यावसायिक हिंदी सिनेमा रोज़मर्रा की ज़िन्दगी का एक प्रधान आहार बन गया है, उनके लिए स्लमदौग मिलियनैर की कहानी के बारे में विशेष रूप से नया कुछ भी नहीं है: भारतीय दर्शकों की फीकी प्रतिक्रिया की तुलना जब इस फ़िल्म को अन्य जगह मिली मनमौजी प्रशंसा से करते हैं, तो यह बात बेहद स्पष्ट हो जाती है. इस फ़िल्म में दर्शित गरीबी से अमीरी के सफर की कहानी एक तरह से भारत के खुद के उस युग की सिनेमाई-गाथा है, जिसमें जमाल, सलीम और लतिका के संयुक्त जीवन का खुलासा होता है. कई मायनों में यह हम सभी भारत वासियों की कहानी भी है जो यहाँ पिछले दो दशकों के तूफानी दौर में पले-बड़े हैं.

इसकी अभूतपूर्व "सभी नियमों को तोड़ देने वाली सफलता" (जैसा कि लंबे समय से रहे फिल्म समीक्षक, रोजर ईबर्ट, इस फ़िल्म पर अपने लेख में कहते हैं) के लिए मैं वर्त्तमान दुनिया की अचानक हुई दयनीय हालत को उतना ही नहीं बल्कि शायद उस से भी ज्यादा जिम्मेदार मानता हूँ जितना कि इस फ़िल्म के हर्षजनक आंतरिक-आकर्षण को: आख़िर, मंदी के इस दौर का जय-हो के अद्भुत स्वरों में लिपटी बेधड़क आशा की एक स्वस्थ ताज़ी खुराक से ज्यादा बेहतर इलाज और हो भी क्या सकता है? इस वर्ष के ऑस्कर में अन्य सभी 'सर्वश्रेष्ठ फ़िल्म पुरस्कार' के लिए नामांकित फिल्में हमारे आसपास- और भीतर- की निराशा को प्रतिबिंबित करती हैं; इस एक फ़िल्म को छोड़, इनमें से कोई भी हालात से बाहर निकलने का रास्ता नहीं दर्शाती; हालांकि-या फिर ये कहें कि विशेषकर जब- ये रास्ता एक अकल्पनीय प्राणपोषक सुखद-अंत (Happy Ending) के रूप में ही क्यों न प्रस्तुत किया गया हो! स्लमदौग मिलियनैर की अप्रत्याशित सफलता का निश्चित रूप से यही सबसे महत्वपूर्ण राज़ है.

मैं आपसे इस एक विशेष दृश्य के साथ विदा लेता हूँ: जब जमाल मुंबई के साँप-नुमा यातायात से जून्झता हुआ उस आखिरी दो करोड़ रुपए के सवाल का जवाब देने के लिए जाता रहता है, तब एक बुढ़िया-भिखारिन उसकी कार की खिड़की पर एकाएक खटखटाती है. पहले तो उसे लगता है कि वो उस से पैसे माँगने आई है, इसलिए उसे कोई तव्वजू नहीं देता; बाद में अहसास होता है कि वह उसके पैसे नहीं चाहती; इसके ठीक विपरीत, वो सिर्फ़ ये चाहती है कि जमाल सारे पैसे ख़ुद जीत ले. "बेटा," वो जाते हुए जमाल को मुस्कराते हुए कहती है, "जीत के आना." जमाल की जीत आख़िर उसकी जीत भी तो होगी. ठीक वैसे जैसे स्लमदौग मिलियनैर की ऑस्कर की रात की जीत भारत की जीत होगी- और साथ ही दुनिया भर के सभी दिलदार आशावादी-उपेक्षितों की भी.

Slumdog Millionaire: What it means to us?

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 19:27:00 +0000

इसका हिन्दी अनुवाद यहाँ पढ़ें.

Note: You can also comment on this post at the IMDB website. Registration to IMDB is free.

For millions like me raised on a staple-diet of commercial Hindi cinema, there’s nothing particularly novel about its plot: the relatively lukewarm response it has gotten from Indian filmgoers compared to the rapturous applause elsewhere is proof of this. Its rags-to-riches tale could well be a cinematic-metaphor for India’s own rise during the period in which Jamal, Salim and Latika's lives unfold. In so many ways, it is the story of India as well as those who have lived here through the tumultuous past two decades.

Its phenomenal ‘rules-breaking success’- to paraphrase the longtime film-critic, Roger Ebert- therefore owes equally if not more to the disenchanted times the world suddenly finds itself thrust into as it does to the movie’s delightful intrinsic-charm: after all, what better medicine than a good healthy dose of unbridled Hope wrapped in wondrously uplifting Jai-hos to cure the globe of its seemingly insurmountable Recession-blues? All the other films nominated for Best Picture at this year’s Oscars reflect the Gloom around- but also, within- us; none with the solitary exception of this film offers a way-out: even- or, especially- if the way-out is an implausibly exhilaratingly happy ending. And that is precisely what makes it work.

I leave you with this particular mise-en-scène: as Jamal weaves his way through Mumbai’s reptilian traffic to answer that one last remaining two million-rupee question, a wrinkly old beggar knocks at his car-window. Thinking she has come to ask for money he ignores her at first only to be confronted with the realization that she doesn’t want his money at all; on the contrary, she wants him to win it all. “Béta,” she beams to Jamal as he is driven away, “jeet ke aana.” [Son, win & come.] His victory, after all, would be hers as well. Much as Slumdog Millionaire’s victory on Oscar Night would be India’s- and also of Underdogs everywhere.

Obituary: Lakhiram Agrawal

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 21:03:00 +0000

इसका हिंदी अनुवाद यहाँ पढ़ें.
The Quiet Passage of An Era
I’ve often wondered if Lakhiram Agrawal, the Doyen of Chhattisgarh’s ruling party, died contended? When I last called on him at his Kharsia residence almost two years ago (2007), he wasn’t exactly happy. Part of this unhappiness, I presume, had to do with his son, Amar Agrawal’s recent ouster from the state Cabinet (I had the distinct feeling that he had not been consulted in the matter); but for the most part, it had to do with the way things had turned out not just with his party in Chhattisgarh- ‘the Congressification of the Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP)’, after all, is a common lament to be found in contemporary RSS-polemic, most famously in LK Advani’s autobiography and with increasing regularity, in the editorials of its monthly mouthpiece, The Organizer- but also with the State of Politics in India.

We weren’t alone in that meeting. On a previous occasion that I had met him in 2003, the Press had a field day speculating on what was discussed. This had caused great embarrassment to both of us, especially since political machinations were the last thing on the agenda in what was an extremely informal tête-à-tête. This time, therefore, I invited the Press to be present at the meeting. During the course of our rather candid conversation, he created quite a stir by using the soubriquet ‘Aurangzeb’ (conveniently ignoring the numerous Hindu instances of patricide) to describe some of the leaders of the present state administration. (Funnily enough, nobody wrote a word about this, bolstering my belief that realpolitik, if conducted openly and frankly rather than surreptitiously and duplicitously, isn’t such a bad thing.) At the time- I believe it was just after the Congress’ victory in the Kota bye-election- he wasn’t very confident of the Government coming back to power. For this he blamed, more than anything else, the lack of respect today’s youth have for the old. It wasn’t very difficult to read the meaning of what he said.

The Question that begs to be asked then is this: did his party- the one he almost single-handedly built from scratch against all conceivable odds and facing the full brunt of the then formidable Congress machinery, often traveling on a rickety jeep loaned to him by the Rajmata of Gwalior to remote corners of (the then undivided) Madhya Pradesh along with his longtime companion, Kushabhau Thakre in the hope of winning fresh recruits to forge the Jan Sangh-BJP’s superstructure, so to speak- abandon him in the end?

He seemed to think so: but the abandonment was only partly personal; it was ideological. Like most of his right-wing compatriots, he had begun his long, often arduous, journey hoping to create an alternative to what they believed to be the dynastic-sycophantic and ultimately redundant culture of the Congress. In this, they- he- succeeded superbly; but it was a pyrrhic victory. The alternative that has come into being- that governs today’s Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh- is at best, another, more grotesque, version of that same culture it sought so desperately to replace.

Three Illustrations on the Nature of Power
In this context, Prof. Tan Chung’s perceptive assessment of Chairman Mao’s Revolution comes to mind: analyzing the composition of pre- and post-revolutionary Chinese polities, he found that those running the country as newly-consecrated members of the Politburo were almost exactly the same set of people from the same families that supplied Mandarins to the deposed Manchu Emperors.

Closer home, I recall a friend of my father’s showing me a set of pictures depicting the welcome of various chief ministers to Raipur. At first glance, there appeared to be nothing particularly remarkable about those grainy-yellowing photographs. On closer inspection, I discovered that only the chief minister’s face had changed; everybody around him was exactly the same, offering almost exactly the same poses of energetic supplication. In the photographs, taken over the course of almost two decades, it appeared that this historic party of perpetual welcomers had stoically, even magically, refused to age.

In defense of this ever-youthful breed, I offer the following story narrated to me by the son of a former chief minister of Haryana: on his first morning walk upon assuming office, his father was joined by a certain man who seemed to know what he wanted even before he knew it himself; naturally, over the course of his tenure, this newfound companionship grew into a deep friendship; they became, to use his own word, inseparable. Then, when he fell out of office, there was not one word from this man. Years passed, and he eventually made it back to power. Once again, on his morning walk, he discovered this man suddenly bestride him. Distraught but also bemused, he said to him, “I thought we were very good friends. Where did you go for these many years?” “Go?” the man innocently asked.

“I didn’t go anywhere, Huzoor. It was you who went.”

The Uneasy Patriarch
The above three illustrations illuminate the true nature of power; more precisely, its God-like capacity to cast those in it in its own image. Alas, the BJP, when it did finally come into power, could not escape the bewitching allure of its entrapments. For instance, in many ways, the late Pramod Mahajan became more ‘Congressi’ than any Congressman alive: while the latter consider Power as an Art, Mr. Mahajan developed it into a sophisticated Science, and in the process, transformed forever the way politics is conducted in the country. (The BJP incidentally owes a lot to this transformation for its comeback in Chhattisgarh.)

Mr. Agrawal saw it only too well: in more tangible terms, this implied the sidelining of the Old Guard- and also, the Old Methods & Ideas of RSS Sarsanghachalaks, Keshava Hedgewar and Madhav Golwalkar- by those sworn-in as ministers in recently formed BJP-led governments all over India (or what contemporary political commentators term as the rift between the Sangh & the BJP). His son, he could scarcely forget, was also a minister.

This last aspect, in particular, troubled him: he told me once that whenever his son’s name was discussed as a prospective candidate at party meetings, he quietly left the room so as not to influence the decision in any way. If his son was to be given his party’s ticket, it had to be solely on the basis of merit; not ties of blood. Clearly, he didn’t want to be accused of being a closeted-dynast. After all, his life’s work had meant so much more than the mere aggrandizement of his progeny. It was as if he wanted to proclaim: “Let no one say, I did it all for my sons.”

Non-Dynast
His apprehensions in this case were, in my opinion, totally unfounded. In fact, only one of his sons entered politics, winning a string of elections from a constituency where his father had very little influence and which was until then considered a Congress bastion. The others continue with his family’s tobacco business. If at all his ‘family’ benefited from his life’s work, it was in the largest sense of the word: the sense in which the RSS ideologues have defined it as the “Sangh Parivar”: “the Sangh,” pontificated Mr. Golwalkar in his seminal work We Or Our Nationhood Defined, “is not an organization within society.” “It is the organization of society itself.”

Mr. Lakhiram Agrawal ought to have, by right, remained the undisputed Patriarch of this all-encompassing Parivar in Chhattisgarh. After all, had it not been for those endless journeys to the back of beyond- Jashpur, for instance, where he relentlessly kept egging a young prince, Dilip Singh Judeo to ‘convert’ from Congress; or to Kawardha, where he impressed upon an equally youthful Ayurvedic physician, Raman Singh, to attend RSS shakhas- there simply wouldn’t be a BJP in government, ever. But for some reason, his protégées kept turning against their mentor.

I witnessed this first-hand when twelve BJP legislators defected to the Congress in late 2001 in what was to be the first- and also, the last- such incident in Indian History. The dominant reason they gave for their defection, shockingly enough, comprised of two words: Lakhiram Agrawal. Quite a few of them complained that despite being party MLAs, he didn’t even care to look down upon them when they touched his feet; this, they said, hurt them no end. When I later told this to Lakhi Uncle (as I called him), he simply laughed. “If that is so,” he said, “then they shouldn’t have bothered to touch my feet.”

Now that I think of it, I believe that what people saw as aloof Arrogance was in fact the Self-respect of a self-made man. In his world, he was clearly under no obligation to reciprocate, or even acknowledge, the obeisance- perhaps he thought of it as nothing more than a phony display of respect; a ruse for obtaining further favors- of those he had, quite literally, called into political existence from out of nowhere. That they- his creatures, really- should expect him to do so was, in his estimation, laughable.

I don’t necessarily subscribe to his point of view. More than anything else, it simply doesn’t make for good politics. As someone who belongs to a family with a fairly long record of doling-out- and in turn, getting- favors, I know only too well that one shouldn’t take them for granted: people, after all, don’t remember the favor; they merely think of it as their God-given right, something they themselves have earned on their own. In not accepting this contemporary value, Mr. Agrawal displayed a naivety not uncommon with men of his generation; and in the process, soured relations with several of his protégées, many of whom are in powerful positions today both within the government and the organization.

A Personal Politician
As for the rest- those of us who weren’t made by, or obligated to, him, for instance- he was courteous to the core, even embarrassingly so. Every time I met him, he always, always addressed me with the honorific “Amit ji” even though he was my father’s longtime colleague in the Rajya Sabha (Council of States); my senior by almost half a century; and my better in every way.

He was also, I believe, a fair critic: he once told me that he thought my father was, in all probability, a better administrator than Arjun Singh, the legendary chief minister of Madhya Pradesh and my father’s earliest mentor; but he also told me that what prevented Papa from becoming really great was his obstinacy to consult others, even those in his Cabinet. Now, I am in no position to say how far this assessment is true of my father’s style of functioning- although the current public opinion, in part fuelled by Mr. Agrawal’s phenomenal propaganda machine, does tend to support this inference- but there is absolutely no denying the sagacity of his advice. After all, the act of consultation is itself significant; it doesn’t matter if it gives rise to consent or not.

In any event, I can’t imagine any other BJP leader of the state making this kind of observation about a political rival, even going to the extent of offering constructive advice to his son to enable a comeback. This is perhaps because Mr. Agrawal didn’t see my father simply as an opponent- a bête noire- to be taken out and destroyed. On the contrary, I imagine he thought of him as a colleague and a friend. Having struggled for the most part of his life, he was not wedded to the machinations of power, which perforce breed the most absurd insecurities in those who wish for nothing more than to cling on to it at any cost.

His world was, therefore, comprised not of do-or-die sort of crafty power plays but of people who even if they didn’t share your point of view, were at any rate, worthy of acquaintanceship. To him, the political never became personal. (To a lesser degree, I see this quality in his son.) Even more, he prized the personal over the political. At his daughter-in-law's funeral last year, he confided to me that after his friend, Kushabhau Thakre’s demise, he didn’t really have the heart to go to Delhi, party meetings or no party meetings: the Ashok Road office, where his party is headquartered at Delhi, reminded him of his late friend especially since the latter- a bachelor wholly committed to his organization- used to live there in a single room, presumably having nowhere else to go.

A man’s life, it is said, can be judged by the people who attend his funeral. Mr. Agrawal held no formal position of power; except as an organizer without compare, he excelled in no particular field; he was neither an academic nor was he an artist. Yet, people from all walks of life- both from within his party and outside as well as those who have nothing to do with politics at all- came from near and far to pay their homage to him; these are people whose lives he had touched and comforted. They came principally because they knew and loved him, personally.

Ideological- or even political- affinity is not a requisite of enduring personal relationships: political enemies can also be personal friends. This is perhaps the most valuable lesson Mr. Agrawal has to offer to politicians of our generation. It is also his most enduring legacy to Chhattisgarh.

Barack Obama: A Man For All Seasons

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 22:48:00 +0000

He Came From Nowhere
Barack Obama isn’t so much Black or even half-Black as he is a Mirror, on which a nation, once great but now in the throes of an unprecedented identity crisis, sees the reflection of its diverse, divergent desires. Until two years ago, he was a global non-entity; a name often confused with its (then) more familiar if somewhat notorious homonym, Osama (after the Al Qaeda leader, Mr. Bin Laden).

Yet it is precisely this fact- of his discreet, even dignified, obscurity- which paradoxically enough accounts for Mr. Obama’s meteoric metamorphosis as the world’s most recognizable, talked-about Face: ever an artful politician, he pulled off electoral history’s greatest coup by turning what appeared to be his most debilitating weakness into his greatest strength: capitalizing on his Obscurity, he suddenly became all things to all people.

His infinitely more famous rivals- Mrs. Clinton and Mr. McCain, to name two more unfortunate ones- simply didn’t have that sort of advantage. Having been in public life for decades- in Mr. McCain’s case, for almost as long as Mr. Obama’s earthly life- their every action and every utterance had been dissected, discussed, debated, deified and demonized to death; more to the point, most people had already formed their variegated Opinions of them and those that didn’t probably couldn’t care less. Mr. Obama- and his excellent campaign team- had the astuteness to make the most of this. He began by making those who didn’t- couldn’t- care, care.

Like Karl Rowe (George W. Bush’s wizard of a mentor), who based his protégé’s victories by tapping into America’s hitherto untapped and instinctually conservative exurbias, Mr. Obama’s team reached out to an entirely new demographic: the hitherto politically nonchalant but temperamentally liberal Generation Y; the sort of chaps who hang out at Starbuck’s and inhabit fast-mushrooming social networking websites like Facebook; the kind that are desperately looking for a Purpose, any purpose. Mr. Obama gave them a Purpose: he- Mr. Obama- was it.

And The Money Kept Rollin’ In
Mrs. Clinton and Mr. McCain meanwhile were busily wooing the Establishment with its tempting $2500-a-plate fund-raisers. In retrospect, that wasn’t very clever: America, after all, is a land that thrives on Las Vegas, and Vegas is a place that thrives on slot-machines, which account for more than 70% of its takings, and not on high-rollers (who in any case prefer to head for Monte Carlo and now increasingly to Macau). That, I guess, is the Cardinal Rule of how the world works: Ignore the little people who persistently, patiently put coins into insatiable slots, and you’ve no business left; get the slot-machines ringing, and the high-rollers follow. In the Gamble that is Politics, Mr. Obama went straight to the slot-machines, and- there’s no better way to put this- he hit the jackpot, big-time.

Every time he needed money- and rest assured, he needed loads of it to establish a campaign machine to rival that of the formidable Clintonistas as well as the GOP’s (Grand Old Party is how the Republican Party is more commonly known)- he simply went to the tens of millions of mostly youthful members logged on to his webpage on Facebook, and lo and behold, the money kept rolling in: by donating a few dollars each, they suddenly found involvement, purpose and hope; and the trickle of online dollars almost magically transformed itself into a flood of several millions. But that wasn’t all: Mr. Obama also ensured that their participation didn’t end with the dollar; like some post-modern Messiah, he urged his minions to go out, commune at homely gatherings, and spread the Word deploying the very latest media modern technology has to offer.

John 1:1
And that brings me to the single most important aspect of Mr. Obama’s campaign: before everything else- even before the untapped demographic and the money- there was the Word, which set everything in motion. Actually, there were Two Words. Change and Hope, Hope and Change. At first, they sound awfully clichéd. We’ve heard politicians of all persuasions utter them countless times before; their etymology is primordial, buried deep into our species’ collective unconscious as a palliative to fear and fossilization. Yet, when Mr. Obama uttered them- and this wasn’t a very uncommon occurrence, to say the least- it struck a cord in those mysterious places that set butterflies magically aflutter in our bellies.

Poetry aside, it is important, I think, to understand just why that happened. Here, we must perforce employ the tools bequeathed to us by Jacques Derrida and examine three things: what was said and why (content and context); who said it (author); and what was meant and how the meaning thereof was perceived by those who heard it (or to use Quentin Skinner’s terminology, the ‘intended illocutionary force’).

Osama begat Obama
To first understand the significance of the content, we must necessarily look to the context. This was provided most obviously by the Bush Years, marked as they were by a spiraling descent into war, penury and global ridicule. This was an era (hopefully now ending) permeated by what I’ve elsewhere called Osama-phobia after the chief cause- the sine qua non- of President Bush’s abject but involuntary reversal from his first campaign’s big-on-morals-and-small-on-government stance. Fear, or more precisely, the fear of Fear, fed into- and authored- every decision he took. (His Vice President, the much more hated and aloof Dick Cheney, didn’t do anything to assuage these fears.) The two parameters of American Supremacy alluded to by Henry Kissinger in his monumental treatise on Diplomacy- military might and economic prowess- were both put to severe test by the quagmire of the double-invasions of Afghanistan & Iraq, and a widening and ultimately insurmountable Deficit- the typically American habit of spending more than they earn- that has brought about a global recession.

In the memorable words of the Eagle’s song, Iraq, in effect, became Mr. Bush’s Hotel California: You can checkout any time you like, But you can never leave! Despite his rather premature “Mission Accomplished” glee, the war in Iraq procrastinated indefinitely. From the start, the Invasion of Iraq was doomed: his justification for the invasion- that Saddam Hussein, the then Tirkiti despot of Iraq, possessed weapons of mass destruction (WMD), which he hoped perhaps to use against America in league with Al Qaeda- turned out to be, to put it mildly, untrue; his method of conducting that invasion- against the express wishes of the international community- ended up alienating even America’s closest friends (with the notable exception of Britain’s Tony Blair, who inturn ended up losing his own chair); and his hope that the invasion would somehow usher in an era of democracy in the Middle East wasn’t quite realized to the extent that he had expected.

In the Case of Jefferson v Hamilton
But despite all this, Mr. Bush’s worst enemy wasn’t Osama bin Laden, the Taliban or even Saddam Hussein: it was the American People themselves. No wartime American President with the possible exception of Franklin Delano Roosevelt has for long enjoyed his fellow-citizens’- and the Congress’- unflinching support: despite their rather militaristic national anthem, Americans have never been comfortable with the sight of body-bags of slain soldiers wrapped in star-spangled banners arriving home. At heart, they remain Jeffersonians (after Thomas Jefferson), content to be an island (albeit a rather large one!) blissfully unaware of what’s happening beyond their shores and hoping that they wouldn’t need a government to govern them at all. Let us not forget that when Mr. Bush first emerged on the scene, he too was something of a Jeffersonian in the ideals he so passionately espoused.

But he too, like most Americans, was confronted with a distinctly Hamiltonian reality (after Alexander Hamilton): the almost instinctual need of the American Establishment- Noam Chomsky’s military-industrial complex- to look for new enemies when old ones are gone, as epitomized in the ironically self-fulfilling prophecy of Samuel Huntington’s Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of the New World Order. In this sense atleast, Huntington gave a fresh, new lease of life to Hamilton. And what a lease that was! President Bush, the quintessential Jeffersonian, became a die-hard disciple of Hamilton in what was to be his life’s second epiphany (the first one took him from Booze to the Bible). Of course, it would be wrong to put all the blame on the Establishmentarian Inertia of Washington: Mr. Bin Laden, in all fairness, deserves much of the credit for Mr. Bush’s conversion.

His attack on the Twin Towers (9/11) only amplified Mr. Bush’s innate sense of Christian morality: his world was suddenly divided into black & white, good & the axis of evil, and under the circumstances, Crusade was the logical outcome of Jihad. Morality breeds decisiveness; lack of it makes one indecisive. This is America’s lesson gleaned from its last two Presidents, Mr. Bush and Mr. Clinton. I’ve often wondered what Mr. Clinton would’ve done had he been President on 9/11. Sure, he wouldn’t have invaded Iraq, WMDs or no WMDs (remember his dilly-dallying on Kosovo, Congo and the rest); he would certainly have ruled out going it alone, without the backing of the world community (God knows, Mr. Hussein counted on that!); he might not even have considered an outright invasion of Afghanistan, toying first with Diplomacy or being content with the destruction of Mr. Bin Laden’s person. But the question that begs to be answered is this: would Al Qaeda be as thoroughly destroyed as it is now; and would 9/11 have been the last terrorist attack on American soil?

As far as the Bush Legacy is concerned, I believe in two things: one, that it was Mr. Bush’s pandering to his Jeffersonian instincts that ultimately led to his failure in Iraq. He wanted to invade Iraq, destroy Saddam and get out as quickly as possible with a minimum of force and cost; the idea that nations don’t just build themselves after being invaded and destroyed didn’t quite cross his Jeffersonian mind (apparently he forgot all about post-second world war Western Europe and Japan, both of which required prolonged infusions of American money, manpower and foresight to rebuild themselves). The success of the Surge in Iraq- today’s provincial elections have brought true democracy to the Middle East for the first time in history, and Mr. Bush should be given due credit for it- shows that the middle-of-the-road approach is at fault. Had Mr. Bush not been bullied by public opinion and his own mindset to limit the costs to America in the first instance, his country wouldn’t have ended up spending so much- in terms of blood, sweat, toil and money- in Iraq, and thousands of innocent lives might’ve been saved. In short, if he is to be blamed, it should be for doing too little; not too much. Secondly, I also believe that it is too early to pronounce judgment on the Bush Legacy: History will have to wait for things to settle down in Iraq before arriving at any sort of decision; hopefully, it will look more kindly upon the Bush Years than our own generation. (To see what I mean, take a look at HBO's award-winning mini-series on John Adams, America's mostly-forgotten and much-misunderstood second President.)

No Specifics Please, We're American
But I’m getting ahead of myself: it is precisely from the as-yet-unsettled dust of the Bush Years that an obscure entity like Mr. Obama has emerged to take on the world; the Present, and not History, is responsible for that. Hope and Change- the Two Words- stand for everything the Bush Years did not; they are, in a way, the anti-thesis of everything those Years have come symbolize today. They’re also, interestingly enough, the Lowest Common Denominator (LCD)- that indescribable abstract- which binds together today’s America. Looking back at the rhetoric of his campaign- both before and after the Primaries- it appears that Mr. Obama said very little indeed: he said that things were bad and that change was needed (without elaborating on the how of it); he said that America needed to get out of Iraq soon (again, without letting us in on the how and when); he said that he was for the New (but not against the Old); he said that the poor deserved to be taken care of by the state and the rich didn’t have to be taxed needlessly to do that (not letting us in on the secret of just where he was going to get the money from to do that); and he said that there was Despair everywhere, and he was the Hope that would drive it away (again, not telling just how he hoped to do that). In short, he said Everything without saying Anything.

It was this artful avoidance of the pitfalls of getting into the specifics of things- something which his rivals simply couldn’t resist in their desire to show that they knew it all- that made Mr. Obama’s Words so appealing to so many not just in America but around the world. The Color of his skin also helped. In electing their first Black President, America belied its earlier Image as a Hypocritical Hegemon that systematically excluded its non-White population from everyday governance while pretending to be the very Beacon of Liberty. Till the very fag end of campaigning, my father, so used to this Image, believed in all sincerity that “they would never elect a Black man as President.” But they did precisely that- and in doing so, they busted the myth that President Lincoln even after waging war on his own people for the sake of ending slavery couldn’t. And who better than a President Obama- half-black, half-white, half-Muslim, half-Christian, half-African, all-American- to send out the Message that America has Changed; or to use Mr. Obama’s own historic words, “Change Has Come to America.”

A Napoleon in America?
Truth be told, after the nine angst-ridden years of Osama-phobia, America- and the world- has quite simply been swept off its feet by Obama-mania. Mr. Obama likes to compare himself with his illustrious forbearer, Abraham Lincoln. Like him, President Lincoln, who hadn’t won a single election before, was a relative non-entity amidst more celebrated personages such as Stephen Douglas; and like Mr. Obama, he owed his victory chiefly to his charismatic powers of oratory. But while his rise was most certainly unexpected, it was by no stretch of imagination heroic. (The heroism part was to come much later, when the outcome of the Civil War against the Confederacy became apparent.) It did not for instance signal the fruition of centuries of anti-racist struggle as Mr. Obama’s has done for many. Fear- and not Hope- marked President Lincoln’s first Inauguration.

In all probability, future-day historians would find more fascinating similarities between our Age and that of Napoleon after the 18th Brumaire: Bonaparte’s rise not only marked the ending of Jacobin Terreur- and momentarily, the Ancien Regime (which was to reassert itself one last time at the historic Vienna Congress of 1815)- but also ushered in an era of Hope throughout the Western World, prompting among others the composer Beethoven to compose & dedicate his majestically beautiful ‘Eroica’ symphony to ‘Napoleon Bonaparte, the Child of Revolution’.

It was only much later that the by-now completely deaf composer regretted his dedication: by then, the Child of Revolution had crowned himself Emperor, invaded much of Europe and installed his siblings as kings and queens: the Ancien Regime was back in full swing. I’m sure that President Obama would do nothing of the sort, and the comparison is totally undeserved. But then again, come to think of it, who could’ve thought that Mr. Bush would do the things he did?

After all, being all things to all people is no easy task. As Mr. Obama knows only too well, you inevitably end up disappointing someone: “One thing you can be sure of,” he told his fellow-diners at the Congress on the day of his Inauguration, “I will make mistakes.”

Let’s hope they are few and far in-between. America- and the world- can’t afford too many.

Godspeed, Mr. Obama!

Comment: The Legacy of George W.

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 22:48:00 +0000

Note:The following is an excerpt from the article "Barack Obama: A Man for All Seasons". Given the latter's length, I felt that Mr. Bush at the very least deserves a separate post of his own.

Last thing I remember, I was
Running for the door
I had to find the passage back
To the place I was before
"Relax," said the night man,
We are programmed to receive.
You can checkout any time you like,
But you can never leave!

The Eagles, Hotel California

The Bush Years were marked by a spiraling descent into war, penury and global ridicule of U.S.A. This was an era (hopefully now ending) permeated by what might be called Osama-phobia after the chief cause- the sine qua non- of President Bush’s abject but admittedly involuntary reversal from his first campaign’s now somewhat archaic big-on-morals-and-small-on-government stance. Fear, or more precisely, the fear of Fear, fed into- and authored- every decision he took. (His Vice President, the much more vilified Dick Cheney, didn’t do anything to assuage these fears.)

The two parameters of American Supremacy alluded to by Henry Kissinger in his monumental treatise on Diplomacy- military might and economic prowess- were both put to severe test by the quagmire of the Afghanistan-Iraq double-invasion; Iraq, and a widening and ultimately insurmountable Deficit- the typically American habit of spending more than they earn- that has brought about a global recession.   

In the memorable words of the Eagle’s song, Iraq, in effect, became Mr. Bush’s Hotel California: You can checkout any time you like, But you can never leave! Despite his rather premature “Mission Accomplished” glee, the war in Iraq procrastinated indefinitely. From the start, the Invasion of Iraq was doomed: his justification for the invasion- that Saddam Hussein, the then Tirkiti despot of Iraq, possessed weapons of mass destruction (WMD), which he hoped perhaps to use against America in league with Al Qaeda- turned out to be, to put it mildly, untrue; his method of conducting that invasion- against the express wishes of the international community- ended up alienating even America’s closest friends (with the notable exception of Britain’s Tony Blair, who inturn ended up losing his own chair); and his hope that the invasion would somehow usher in an era of democracy in the Middle East wasn’t quite realized to the extent that he had expected.  

In the Case of Jefferson v Hamilton 
But despite all this, Mr. Bush’s worst enemy wasn’t Osama bin Laden, the Taliban or even Saddam Hussein: it was the American People themselves. No wartime American President with the possible exception of Franklin Delano Roosevelt has for long enjoyed his fellow-citizens’- and the Congress’- unflinching support: despite their rather militaristic national anthem, Americans have never been comfortable with the sight of body-bags of slain soldiers wrapped in star-spangled banners arriving home. At heart, they remain Jeffersonians (after Thomas Jefferson), content to be an island (albeit a rather large one!) blissfully unaware of what’s happening beyond their shores and hoping that they wouldn’t need a government to govern them at all. Let us not forget that when Mr. Bush first emerged on the scene, he too was something of a Jeffersonian in the ideals he so passionately espoused.   

But he too, like most Americans, was confronted with a distinctly Hamiltonian reality (after Alexander Hamilton): the almost instinctual need of the American Establishment- Noam Chomsky’s military-industrial complex- to look for new enemies when old ones are gone, as epitomized in the ironically self-fulfilling prophecy of Samuel Huntington’s Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of the New World Order. In this sense atleast, Huntington gave a fresh, new lease of life to Hamilton. And what a lease that was! President Bush, the quintessential Jeffersonian, became a die-hard disciple of Hamilton in what was to be his life’s second epiphany (the first one took him from Booze to the Bible). Of course, it would be wrong to put all the blame on the Establishmentarian Inertia of Washington: Mr. Bin Laden, in all fairness, deserves much of the credit for Mr. Bush’s conversion.   

His attack on the Twin Towers (9/11) only amplified Mr. Bush’s innate sense of Christian morality: his world was suddenly divided into black & white, good & the axis of evil, and under the circumstances, Crusade was the logical outcome of Jihad. Morality breeds decisiveness; lack of it makes one indecisive. This is America’s lesson gleaned from its last two Presidents, Mr. Bush and Mr. Clinton. I’ve often wondered what Mr. Clinton would’ve done had he been President on 9/11. Sure, he wouldn’t have invaded Iraq, WMDs or no WMDs (remember his dilly-dallying on Kosovo, Congo and the rest); he would certainly have ruled out going it alone, without the backing of the world community (God knows, Mr. Hussein counted on that!); he might not even have considered an outright invasion of Afghanistan, toying first with Diplomacy or being content with the destruction of Mr. Bin Laden’s person. But the question that begs to be answered is this: would Al Qaeda be as thoroughly destroyed as it is now; and would 9/11 have been the last terrorist attack on American soil?   

With respect to the Bush Years, I offer the following two observations: one, that it was Mr. Bush’s pandering to his Jeffersonian instincts that ultimately led to his failure in Iraq. He wanted to invade Iraq, destroy Saddam and get out as quickly as possible with a minimum of force and cost; the idea that nations don’t just build themselves after being invaded and destroyed didn’t quite cross his Jeffersonian mind (apparently he forgot all about post-second world war Western Europe and Japan, both of which required prolonged infusions of American money, manpower and foresight to rebuild themselves).

The success of the Surge in Iraq- today’s provincial elections have brought true democracy to the Middle East for the first time in history, and Mr. Bush should be given due credit for it- shows that the middle-of-the-road approach is at fault. Had Mr. Bush not been bullied by public opinion and his own mindset to limit the costs to America in the first instance, his country wouldn’t have ended up spending so much- in terms of blood, sweat, toil and money- in Iraq, and thousands of innocent lives might’ve been saved. In short, if he is to be blamed, it should be for doing too little; not too much.

Secondly, I believe it is too premature to pronounce judgment on the Bush Legacy: History will have to wait for things to settle down in Iraq before arriving at any sort of decision; hopefully, it would look more kindly upon the Bush Years than our own generation.

(To see what I mean, take a look at HBO's award-winning mini-series on John Adams, America's mostly-forgotten and much-misunderstood second President.) 

Tiger Tiger Burning Bright...

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 16:41:00 +0000

The last time we were in Kanha, the closest we came to spotting a tiger were a couple of pug-marks. This time however we got lucky when we least expected it: a Tigress very conveniently parked herself on the dirt-track, whereupon she proceeded to strike a number of rather 'sexy' poses for our viewing pleasure. This video- peppered with SNT's highly imaginative running-commentary- captures our excitement at making this totally unexpected discovery. The footage has been shot by Dr. Saibel Farishta.

Chhattisgarh 2008 (५ अ): हम क्यों हारे ?

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 17:13:00 +0000

Click here to read the English version of this post. Many thanks to Mr. Shailesh Nitin Trivedi for assisting me with the translation.

पिछले महीने का अधिकांश हिस्सा एक दूसरे पर उँगलियाँ उठाने में ही बीत गया. एक पार्टी की तरह हमें इस बात पर ध्यान देना चाहिए था कि हमारे हार के लिए कौन से कारक उत्तरदायी हैं लेकिन हमने इस बात पर ध्यान दिया कि किस पर आरोप मड़े जा सकते हैं. ऐसी सोच के द्वारा अपने राजनैतिक विरोधियों से हिसाब तो चुकता किया जा सकता है लेकिन साथ ही साथ इससे आगामी लोक सभा चुनावों में पार्टी की संभावनों पर विपरीत प्रभाव भी पड़ रहा है. मेरे दृष्टिकोण से प्रमुख रूप से पाँच कारक हैं (बस्तर में पार्टी का सफाया, सतनामियों की संगठन में उपेक्षा, राकपा से गठबंधन, टिकट वितरण में देर, और "जोकोछो" नीति):

अ. बस्तर में पार्टी का सफाया
पहला और सबसे प्रमुख कारण बस्तर के आदिवासी अंचल में हमारा पूरी तरह से सफाया हो जाना है, जहाँ हम बारह सीटों में से ग्यारह में हार गए. इसके दो कारण हैं. एक, गलत उम्मीदवारों का चयन. उदाहरण स्वरुप इन चार मामलों पर गौर करें:

१. एक महिला १९९० से लगातार चुनाव हार रही है. जिन चार चुनावों में उन्हें टिकट दी गई उनमें से दो में उनकी जमानत भी जप्त हो गई. उनके सगे भाई अपने गाँव में सरपंच चुनाव हार गए; जनपद चुनाव में उनकी बहु की भी जमानत जप्त हो गई. इन सब के बावजूद उन्हें पांचवी बार कांग्रेस के उस दावेदार की टिकट काट कर उम्मीदवार बनाया गया, जो पिछला चुनाव मात्र १००० वोटों से हारा था, और चुनाव हारने के बावजूद क्षेत्र में विपक्ष में सक्रिय भूमिका निभाता रहा.
२. नारायणपुर विधान सभा क्षेत्र में भानपुरी, मर्देपार और नारायणपुर, ये तीन ब्लाक आते हैं. भानपुरी और मर्देपार में १,३०,००० से अधिक मतदाता हैं; नारायणपुर इन दोनों ब्लाकों से १५० किलोमीटर से अधिक की दूरी पर हैं, और घने जंगलों में नक्सली प्रभावित क्षेत्र में हैं जहाँ सिर्फ़ १३००० मतदाता हैं. हमने नारायणपुर के व्यक्ति को टिकट दी.
३. बसपा और भाजपा के बाद हाल ही में वापस लौटे एक आदतन दल बदलू नेता जिन्होनें दल बदल के इस दौर में लड़ा गया हर चुनाव हारा है, उनकी दिल्ली में रहने वाली ऐसी बिटिया को टिकट दे दी गई जो स्थानीय बोली का एक शब्द भी नहीं बोल सकती थी.
४. एक सीट में जैन मतदाताओं की संख्या सिर्फ़ ५०० है, हमने यह जानते हुए भी कि भाजपा का उम्मीदवार भी इसी समुदाय से है, एक जैनी को उम्मीदवार बनाया.

यह बेहद स्पष्ट है कि इन चारों मामलों में हमारा चयन तर्क से परे था. यही बात कम से कम दो और विधान सभा क्षेत्रों, कोंडागांव और केशकाल, के बारे में भी कही जा सकती है, जहाँ जाने पहचाने चहरों की जगह पार्टी ने तुलनात्मक रूप से अनजान व्यक्तियों को उम्मीदवार बनाना पसंद किया. यही कारण रहा की उत्तर बस्तर (जगदलपुर, नारायणपुर और कांकेर जिलों) में हमें हार का मुख देखना पड़ा.

दक्षिण बस्तर में हार का कारण सरकार समर्थित सलवा जुडूम मुहीम बनी, जिसके कारण ७०००० से अधिक आदिवासियों को लगभग ६०० गांवों से उजाड़कर सड़क किनारे बने २६ कैम्पों में लाकर अमानवीय हालत में रहने के लिए मजबूर कर दिया, और हजारों निर्दोष आदिवासियों को मौत के घाट उतार दिया गया. ८ जुलाई २००६ को मैंने सलवा जुडूम के बारे में अपनी टिप्पणी में लिखा था:

"सलवा जुडूम का आदिवासी हितों से कोई लेना-देना नहीं है और इसके पीछे तीन प्रमुख कारक काम कर रहे हैं:
* राजनैतिक: चुनाव के समय खाली कराय गए गांवों में कोई मतदान केन्द्र नहीं खुलेंगे. इन ६-७ 'कोंशंत्रेशन कैम्पों' की सुरक्षित सीमा के भीतर मतदान केन्द्र बनाए जायेंगे. (अंततः यह संख्या बढ़कर २६ हो गयी) ऐसे स्वतंत्र और निष्पक्ष वातावरण में कराये गए चुनाव का परिणाम जान ने के लिए किसी विशेषज्ञ की आवश्यकता नही हैं. सोचिये, यदि नाज़ियों के द्वारा यहूदियों के लिए बनाए गए यातना शिविरों में मतदान कराया गया होता तो क्या हिटलर की नेशनल सोशिलिस्ट पार्टी ने चुनावों में एक तरफा जीत हासिल नहीं की होती? हिटलर ने तो इन शिविरार्थियों को वोट देने के काबिल नहीं समझा था, लेकिन यह सरकार आदिवासियों को अपने एक वोटबैंक के अलावा कुछ और समझने के लिए तैयार ही नहीं है. सलवा जुडूम इस वोटबैंक को भुनाने का सबसे सुनिश्चित तरीका है.

* सांस्कृतिक: शिविरों के नियंत्रित वातावरण के भीतर बड़ी संख्या में मौजूद आदिवासी संघ परिवार के लिए रात दिन काम करके अपने सांचों में ढले आदिवासियों के ऐसे कथित सुसंस्कृत नमूने तैयार करने का सुअवसर देतें हैं जिन्हें बार-बार हर बार यह बताया जाता है की वे झूठे देवताओं की पूजा कर रहे हैं, दूषित भोजन खा रहे हैं, पुरानी बेतुकी परम्पराओं और प्रथाओं का पालन कर रहे हैं. इस प्रकार उन्हें अपनी पहले की जीवन पद्धति को पाशानकालीन और क्रूर बताया जाता है और इस प्रकार धीरे धीरे लेकिन सुनिश्चित तरीके से वे लोग आर.एस.एस के फर्जी-हिंदुत्व का एक हिस्सा बनने लगते हैं. इस प्रकार भौगोलिक और राजनैतिक से कहीं अधिक बढ़कर आदिवासियों का इन शिविरों में रहने के कारण सान्सक्रैतिक विस्थापन जो मुझे बेहद परेशान करता है. इस प्रकार कैम्पों में रहने वाले आदिवासियों को स्थायी रूप से एक हीन भावना का झूठमूठ में शिकार होना पड़ेगा और एक प्रकार की कुत्तों जैसी ज़िन्दगी जीने के लिए मजबूर होना पड़ेगा, जहाँ उन्हें हमेशा यह बताया जायेगा की उन्हें क्या करना चाहिए, क्या महसूस करना चाहिए और क्या सोचना चाहिए. इस प्रक्रिया में आदिवासियों की स्वतन्त्रता बली चढ़ा दी गई है.

* आर्थिक: आदिवासियों को ध्यान में रखकर बनायी गई अन्य सरकारी योजनाओं की तरह सलवा जुडूम के शिविरों ने एक अलग तरह के उद्योग को जन्म दिया है. सरकारी खजाने से रोज खर्च किए जाने वाले करोड़ों रुपये ७०००० आदिवासियों के भोजन, स्वास्थ, शिक्षा और आवास की जगह, दलालों की मंडली द्वारा अपने प्रशासनिक और राजनैतिक संरक्षकों की मिलीभगत से उड़ाए जा रहे हैं. सीधे सीधे शब्दों में कहें तो इतने विशाल आकर्षक और लाभदायी व्यवसाय को समाप्त करना इनमें से किसी के भी हित में नहीं है."

अब मैं कुछ कुछ कासान्द्रा की तरह महसूस करने के लिए मजबूर हूँ, जो भविष्य को जानने के बावजूद उसके बारे में कुछ भी न कर पाने के लिए अभिशापित थी. सच्चाई तो यह है कि सलवा जुडूम के कारण भाजपा को १९५२ में आम चुनाव शुरू होने के बाद से पहली बार दक्षिण बस्तर में पांव जमाने का मौका मिल सका. एक ऐसे क्षेत्र में जहाँ हमेशा चुनावी संघर्ष कांग्रेस और वामपंथियों के बीच होता रहा है, पहली बार भाजपा ने तीन में से दो सीटें सीधे सीधे जीत ली हैं और तीसरी सीट में भी हम उन्हें सिर्फ़ १९० वोटों से हरा सके. सलवा जुडूम के मुद्दे पर कांग्रेस ने अपनी स्थिति स्पष्ट करने से परहेज किया. कांग्रेस विधायक दल के नेता सलवा जुडूम की मुहीम का नेतृत्व कर रहे थे जिसे राज्य और केन्द्र सरकारों, दोनों का समर्थन प्राप्त था, जबकि मेरे पिता के नेतृत्व में पार्टी के निर्वाचित जन प्रतिनिधियों का एक बड़ा समूह ऊपर बताये गए कारणों से इसके विरोध में था. मेरे दृष्टिकोण में हमें इस दीर्धकालीन अस्पष्टता की बहुत बड़ी कीमत चुकानी पड़ी है.

मेरा यह मानना है कि बस्तर का संघर्ष चुनावों से कहीं आगे बढ़कर आदिवासी-भारत की आत्मा के लिए संघर्ष है. एक ओर भाजपा और उसके सहयोगी सरस्वती शिशु मंदिरों, एकल विद्यालयों, और वनवासी कल्याण आश्रमों के वृहद् नेटवर्क के द्वारा राज्य प्रशासन के सक्रिय समर्थन के बल पर बस्तर के दूरस्त अंचलों में भी पूर्णकालिक कार्य कर रहे हैं जबकि हमारे पास इसका मुकाबला करने के लिए कुछ भी नहीं है. सही अर्थों में तो हमने उन्हें उनकी मनमानी करने के लिए मैदान खाली छोड़ दिया है. इन सबके बावजूद हमारा अभी भी संघर्ष में मौजूद रहना आश्चर्यजनक है. आखिरकार १२ में से ३ सीटों में हम बहुत कम अन्तर से हारे. अंतागढ़ में ९० वोटों से (मुख्य रूप से मतगणना के दौरान की गई धांधली के कारण), बस्तर में १२०० वोटों से, और कोंडागांव में २७७० वोटों से. मेरे लिए इसका अर्थ यह है कि इन विधान सभा क्षेत्रों में लोग वाकई में बदलाव चाहते थे लेकिन हम उन्हें समुचित विकल्प उपलब्ध कराने में नाकाम रहे.

बस्तर में हमारी लगातार दूसरी हार से मिला सर्वाधिक महत्वपूर्ण सबक यह है कि लड़ाई को शिक्षा और संस्कृति के उन क्षेत्रों में ले जाने की जरूरत है जहाँ भाजपा-आर.एस.एस.-विहिप और उनके सहयोगियों को खुली छूट मिली हुई है. अगर यह लड़ाई जल्द ही शुरू नहीं की गई तो हम लोग घृणा में विश्वास रखने वाली साम्प्रदायिक ताकतों के हाथों बस्तर और शायद पूरे आदिवासी-भारत को खो बैठेंगे.

ब. सतनामियों की उपेक्षा
हमारी हार के लिए दूसरा सर्वाधिक महत्वपूर्ण कारक पार्टी संगठन के भीतर सतनामी समुदाय की की गई घोर उपेक्षा के परिणाम स्वरुप बसपा का बढ़ता हुआ प्रभाव है, जिसे वर्त्तमान में की जा रही हार की राजनैतिक समीक्षा में जानबूजकर नज़रन्दाज़ किया जा रहा है. जबकि २००३ के विधान सभा चुनावों में सतनामी समुदाय ने कांग्रेस का जमकर साथ दिया था, जिसके परिणाम स्वरूप बसपा का मत प्रतिशत १९९८ के ५.६५% से घटकर २००३ में ४.४% हो गया था; बसपा ने जिन ५४ सीटों में चुनाव लड़ा था उनमें से ४६ में उसके उम्मीदवारों की जमानत जप्त हो गई थी. इसके बावजूद २५,००,००० संख्या वाले इस समुदाय को राज्य, जिला या ब्लाक स्थर पर पार्टी संगठन में विगत ५ वर्षों में कोई प्रतिनिधित्व देने की आवश्यकता भी महसूस न करना खेद का विषय है.

पथरिया ब्लाक का उदाहरण लें, जहाँ ४ बरस पहले ब्लाक कांग्रेस कमिटी के अध्यक्ष का निधन हो जाने पर स्थानीय विधायक ने सतनामी समुदाय के एक सम्मानित व्यक्ति का नाम इस पद को भरने के लिए प्रस्तावित किया लेकिन वह पद अभी भी रिक्त है. इसी तरह एक भी जिला कांग्रेस कमिटी अध्यक्ष सतनामी नहीं है; प्रदेश कांग्रेस कमिटी में भी उन्हें प्रतिनिधित्व नहीं दिया गया. कांग्रेस के चारों मोर्चा संगठनों (सेवा दल, युवा कांग्रेस, एन.एस.यु.आई. और महिला कांग्रेस) के राज्य प्रमुखों में से एक भी इस समुदाय का नहीं है. इस बेहद दुर्भाग्यजनक प्रवृत्ति का परिणाम सतनामियों का बसपा की ओर पलायन रहा है.

इस पलायन के परिणाम कांग्रेस के लिए बेहद घातक सिद्ध हुए हैं. बसपा ने जिन १७ सीटों में ८००० से अधिक वोट लिए, उनमे से कम से कम ११ सीटों में बसपा के उम्मीदवार हमारी पार्टी की बेहद कम मतों से पराजय के लिए सीधे-सीधे जिम्मेदार रहे हैं: बिलासपुर जिले में मुंगेली (अ.जा), तखतपुर, बिल्हा, बेलतरा और मस्तुरी (अ.जा); दुर्ग जिले में नवागढ़ (अ.जा); जांजगीर जिले में अकलतरा, जांजगीर-चांपा, पामगढ़ (अ.जा) और चंदरपुर; तथा रायपुर जिले में बलोदा बाज़ार. मुझे यह कहने में कोई परहेज नहीं है कि यदि इस प्रवृत्ति को तत्काल नहीं रोका गया तो आगामी लोक सभा चुनावों में सतनामी समुदाय कांग्रेस को पूरी तरह छोड़कर बसपा के साथ जा सकता है.

स. राकपा से गठबंधन
तीसरा प्रमुख कारक पार्टी का छत्तीसगढ़ में राकपा जैसी नेत्रित्वविहीन और कार्यकर्ता-विहीन पार्टी के साथ गठबंधन रहा. स्थानीय पार्टी इकाइयों के जबरदस्त विरोध के बावजूद हमने ३ सीटें राकपा के लिए छोड़ दी, जिनमे से पहली हमने जीती थी और वहां से वर्त्तमान विधायक कांग्रेस का था (मनेन्द्रगढ़); दूसरी, सामरी जहाँ से उनके उम्मीदवार की सिर्फ़ कुछ १०० वोट पाने के बाद जमानत जप्त हो गई थी; और तीसरी, उनके प्रदेश अध्यक्ष की, जिसकी पिछले चुनाव में अन्तिम समय में कांग्रेस टिकट कट गयी थी, और वह चुन लिया गया था. यह उम्मीदवार बेहद आसानी से कांग्रेस टिकट पर चंदरपुर सीट से चुनाव लड़ने के लिए तैयार हो सकता था.

इस गटबंधन की घोषणा के साथ ही हमने इन तीनों सीटों को भाजपा को उपहार में दे दिया. और ज्यादा बुरी बात यह है कि हमारे इस सहयोगी दल का वास्तविक गठबंधन कांग्रेस के साथ नहीं वरन भाजपा के साथ नज़र आता है. निम्न उदाहरणों से यह पूरी तरह से स्पष्ट हो जायेगा:

१. मनेन्द्रगढ़ सीट मुख्य रूप से चिरमिरी और मनेन्द्रगढ़, इन दो शहरों से मिलकर बनी है. क्योंकि दोनों ही शहर नए जिले का मुख्यालय बनना चाहते थे, अतः उनके बीच एक पुरानी प्रतिद्वंदता है. ७२००० मतदाताओं वाला चिरमिरी शहर २१००० मतदाताओं वाले मनेन्द्रगढ़ से चार गुना बड़ा है. इन परिस्थितियों में उम्मीदवार को स्वाभाविक रूप से चिरमिरी से होना चाहिए. इस गणित को पूरी तरह नज़रन्दाज़ करते हुए राकपा ने मनेन्द्रगढ़ के रहने वाले को अपना उम्मीदवार बनाया जबकि भाजपा के चिरमिरी के एक बेहद सदाहरण उम्मीदवार ने आसानी से चुनाव जीत लिया.
२. इसी तरह सामरी एक जनजाति क्षेत्र है जहाँ लगभग ७५% मतदाता कंवर समुदाय के हैं जबकि उरांव मात्र १०% हैं. उरांव में भी इसाई-उरांव की संख्या ५% से भी कम है. इस सीट को जीतने की इच्छुक किसी भी पार्टी को अपना टिकट एक कंवर को ही देना था. लेकिन फिर से राकपा ने इन सारी बातों को दरकिनार रख अपना टिकट एक इसाई-उरांव को दिया. भाजपा को मिले ५०००० वोटों के मुकाबले उसके उम्मीदवार को मात्र ८००० वोट मिले और वह चौथे स्थान पर रहा.
३. गठबंधन के नियमों के ख़िलाफ़ जाकर राकपा ने कम से कम १० सीटों से अपने उम्मीदवार खड़े किए जिनमे से चार में हम हार गए. इस प्रकार इस गठबंधन का जो थोड़ा बहुत लाभ कांग्रेस को मिल सकता था, वो भी नहीं मिला.

जिस क्षण इन तीनों उम्मीदवारों की घोषणा की गई, इन सीटों पर भाजपा की विजय उसी समय तय हो गई थी. इस गठबंधन का विरोध करते हुए २५ अक्टूबर २००८ को एक विस्तृत नोट के अंत में मेरे पिता ने लिखा:

"उपरोक्त तथ्यों को देखते हुए यह मेरा- और राज्य के अधिकांश जमीनी कार्यकर्ताओं का- दृढ़ अभिमत है की छत्तीसगढ़ में किसी भी अन्य राजनैतिक दल से गठ्बंदन की कोई आवश्यकता नहीं है. अगर हम सभी ९० सीटों पर चुनाव नहीं लड़ते ओर भाजपा सभी ९० सीटों पर लड़ती है तो इससे हमारी कमजोरी ओर लड़ाई शुरू होने के पहले ही हार स्वीकार कर लेने का संदेश जायेगा."

डी. टिकट वितरण में देर
चौथा कारक सिर्फ़ छत्तीसगढ़ के ही लिए लागू नहीं होता है. पूरे देश में हमारी पार्टी इसी तरह की व्यवस्था से चलती है. आलाकमान की चुनाव से कम से कम दो माह पहले टिकटें तय कर देने की मंशा के विपरीत प्रत्याशियों की घोषणा अन्तिम क्षणों में ही की गई. ५० दिन ओर ५० रातों तक चले अंतहीन ओर ज्यादातर मुद्दाविहीन चर्चाओं के बाद ही हम अन्तिम निर्णय पर पहुँच सके, जिसका अर्थ है की हर विधान सभा सीट पर हम लोगों ने औसत १५ घंटों की चर्चा की!

पार्टी के राज्य के नेता, सभी ९० सीटों के टिकटार्थी ओर उनके समर्थक, इस दौरान दिल्ली में ही जमे रहे, ओर इस महत्वपूर्ण समय में हमने मैदान को भाजपा के लिए तब खुला छोड़ दिया जब राज्य में विधान सभा चुनावों की अधिसूचना जारी हो चुकी थी.

अपनी-अपनी टिकटों के लिए इतनी लम्बी लड़ाई से थक चुके हमारे प्रत्याशियों के पास चुनाव प्रचार के लिए १२ दिन से भी कम समय बचा था. इस बीच भाजपा ने ८ हेलीकॉप्टरों के द्वारा अपने स्टार प्रचारकों ओर लगभग पूरी राष्ट्रीय कार्यकारणी को चुनाव प्रचार में झोंक दिया जबकि हमारे लोग दिल्ली की ठंडी सर्दियों में ठिठुरते हुए आक्रोशित हो रहे थे. यह तो सीधे-सीधे काफ्का की किताबों से उठाया हुआ एक दृश्य प्रतीत होता है.

ई. जोकोछो नीति
सबसे अंत में मैं इस हार के लिए जोकोछो नीति को बड़ी हद तक जिम्मेदार मानता हूँ. इस नीति को दिसम्बर २००३ में हुए चुनावों में आज से ठीक ५ बरस पहले हुई हमारी हार के बाद दुर्ग के एक वरिष्ट नेता की पहल पर लागू किया गया था, जिनकी स्वयं की चुनावी क्षमता (या इस क्षमता की कमी) किसी से छुपी हुई नहीं है. यह नीति अभी तक जारी है.

सीधे-सीधे कहें तो जोकोछो नीति का अर्थ है कि छत्तीसगढ़ में पार्टी के सारे पद "जोगी को छोड़कर" (जो-को-छो) किसी को भी दिए जाएँ. परिणाम स्वरुप मेरे पिता, या उनके सहयोगी माने जाने वाले किसी भी व्यक्ति को, ब्लाक, जिला और राज्य स्थर पर पार्टी संगठन में कोई पद नहीं दिया गया. २००४ में हुए लोक सभा चुनावों में प्रदेश के एक मात्र कांग्रेस सांसद होने के बावजूद उन्हें अपने लोक सभा क्षेत्र में भी अपनी पसंद का एक भी ब्लाक कांग्रेस अध्यक्ष नहीं बनाने दिया गया. छत्तीसगढ़ से निर्वाचित एकमात्र लोक सभा सदस्य होने के बावजूद उन्हें केन्द्र में स्थान नहीं दिया गया. जैसे यह सब उन्हें पूरी तरह बरबाद करने के लिए काफ़ी नहीं था, मुझे केन्द्र में अपनी पार्टी के सत्ता में होने के बावजूद एक केंद्रीय जांच एजेंसी द्वारा जेल में ठूस दिया गया; उनके भी ख़िलाफ़ झूठे निराधार मामले पंजीबद्ध किए गए (यह दीगर बात है की इनमे से एक भी न्यायपालिका की जांच में सही साबित नहीं हुआ).

उन्हें कोटा (२००६) ओर राजनांदगांव (२००७) उपचुनावों की जवाबदारी सौपी गई तो इनमे कांग्रेस को शानदार सफलता मिली; २००७ में ही हुए खैरागढ़, मालखरौदा ओर केशकाल उपचुनावों से उन्हें बाहर रखा गया तो पार्टी की शर्मनाक पराजय भी हुई. लेकिन इसके बावजूद इस नीति में कोई बदलाव नहीं आया. २००८ के चुनावों में टिकट वितरण प्रक्रिया से उन्हें जानबूजकर अलग रखने के लिए स्क्रीनिंग कमिटी ओर केंद्रीय चुनाव समिति की बैठकों से बहार रखा गया. बारम्बार निवेदन करने के बावजूद राज्य की जरह भी जानकारी न रखने वालों या बेहद कम जानकारी रखने वालों पर सारे अहम फैसले लेने की जवाबदारी डाल दी गई.

जोकोछो नीति का सबसे स्पष्ट प्रदर्शन तब देखने को मिला जब उन्हें कांग्रेस विधायक दल का नेता चुनने के लिए अधिकांश विधायकों द्वारा हस्ताक्षर युक्त पत्र होने के बावजूद उनकी घोर उपेक्षा की गई; जैसे यह काफ़ी नहीं था, एक ऐसे व्यक्ति को नेता प्रतिपक्ष बनाया गया जिसकी इस पद पर नियुक्ति के लिए मेरे पिता ५ बरसों तक लगातार प्रयासरत रहे. ५ बरसों बाद नियुक्ति तब की गई जब उन्होंने सार्वजनिक रूप से मेरे पिता से अपने-आप को दूर कर लिया. किसी भी राजनैतिक सम्मीक्षक के लिए यह स्पष्ट हो जाना चाहिए की जोकोछो नीति का उद्देश्य पार्टी में 'जोगी' के प्रभाव को सुनियोजित तरीके से कम करके छत्तीसगढ़ में एक वैकल्पिक नेतृत्व विकसित करना है.

यह बताने की आवश्यकता नहीं है की जोकोछो नीति अपने उद्देश्यों को पूरा करने में नाकामयाब रही है.

एक 'जोगी' का जवाब
५ वर्षों तक पार्टी को चलाने की जवाबदारी जिन विकल्पों को सौपी गई उन्होनें न केवल पार्टी को बरबाद कर दिया बल्कि वे सारे नेता और उनकी तमाम संतानें ख़ुद के चुनाव सिर्फ़ इसलिए हार गए क्योंकि कांग्रेस के कार्यकर्ताओं और आम जनता के बीच भी इन लोगों की राज्य की भाजपा सरकार से मिलीभगत की चर्चाएं आम थी. वे लोग एक प्रभावी विपक्ष की भूमिका निभाने में पूरी तरह से नाकाम रहे. (अगर वे लोग जीत गए होते तो शायद आज राज्य में कांग्रेस की सरकार होती.) अपने बचाव में कहने के लिए इन लोगों के पास सिर्फ़ यह है की अपनी शर्मनाक हारों के लिए वे स्वयं नहीं वरन 'जोगी' जिम्मेदार है.

अगर यह बात सही है, तो सवाल यह उठाता है की क्यों अपनी और पार्टी की हार के लिए मेरे पिता को जिम्मेदार ठहरा रहे इन नेताओं ने अपनी चुनाव प्रचार सामग्री में ओर विज्ञापनों में उनकी तस्वीरों का भरपूर ओर खुलकर उपयोग किया:

अगर वे जितना बताते हैं, मेरे पिता उतने ही 'अलोकप्रिय' हैं, तो उनके पोस्टरों की शोभा बढ़ाने के लिए राज्य के जिस एकमात्र नेता की तस्वीरें सजी हैं, वो मेरे पिता की ही क्यों है? यह एक निहायत ही बेशर्म किस्म की ओची राजनीति का जीता-जागता उदाहरण है जिसमे अतिमहत्वकान्शा ओर कृतघ्नता के साथ-साथ मंद-बुद्धि ओर प्रतिभाहीनता का सम्मिश्रण देखने को मिलता है.

बेहद विनम्रता के साथ मैं ये कहना चाहता हूँ की हो सकता है की मेरे पिता राज्य के लोकप्रिय नेताओं में से एक हैं, लेकिन मैं यह नहीं मानता की वे इतने शक्तिशाली हैं की जिन क्षेत्रों में वे एक बार भी नहीं गए, वहां भी वे यह फैसला कर सकते हैं की किसे जीतना चाहिए ओर किसे हारना चाहिए. अगर मामला ऐसा है (हालांकी मैं आश्वस्त करता हूँ की ऐसा नहीं है) तो जोकोछो नीति को त्यागने का इससे बहतर ओर कोई तर्क हो ही नहीं सकता.

अगर तर्क के लिए यह मान भी लिया जाए की उन्होनें अपने विरोधीयों की हार तय करने के लिए काम किया तो कम से कम उनके विरोधीयों से यह तो पूछा ही जाना चाहिए की उन लोगों ने स्वयं सहित कितने लोगों की जीत सुनिश्चित की? तथाकथित प्रदेश स्थर के नेता होने के बावजूद उनमे से एक भी अपने निर्वाचन क्षेत्र को छोड़कर किसी भी अन्य उम्मीदवार के लिए एक भी दिन प्रचार करने क्यों नहीं गया, ओर अपने-अपने क्षेत्रों में पूरी ताकत झोंक देने के बावजूद फिर भी क्यों हार गया? इसके ठीक विपरीत मेरे पिता एक बार भी अपने निर्वाचन क्षेत्र में नहीं गए ओर पूरे समय पार्टी के उम्मीदवारों के लिए दीगर क्षेत्रों में प्रचार करते रहने के बावजूद, इन सर्दियों में जिन ६ राज्यों में चुनाव हुए, उनमे सर्वाधिक मतों के अन्तर से चुनाव जीत गए. किसी को भी यह नहीं भूलना चाहिए की पिछले पाँच बरसों में मेरे पिता के पास सिर्फ़ महासमुंद के लोक सभा सदस्य का ही पद था ओर इस लोक सभा क्षेत्र के अंतर्गत आने वाले महासमुंद ओर धमतरी जिलों की हर एक सीट के साथ-साथ राजिम में भी कांग्रेस को जीत मिली है. इन सभी क्षेत्रों पर पहले भाजपा का कब्जा था. इन उदाहरणों से मेरे पिता की लोकप्रियता को लेकर उठाये गए सवालों का सही जवाब मिल जाता है.

कांग्रेस या भाजपा के किसी भी अन्य नेता से अधिक जनसभाएं लिए ओर रोड-शो उन्होनें किए, इस तथ्य से तो कोई भी इनकार नहीं कर सकता. १४ दिनों से भी कम समय में उन्होनें ८७ विधान सभा में से ७४ में १८६ से अधिक कार्यक्रमों में भाग लेने के लिए हर दिन व्हिल्चायर पर १८ घंटों से अधिक समय बिताया.

उन्होनें ये सब अपने स्वास्थ्य की कीमत पर डॉक्टरों की सलाह के ख़िलाफ़ जाकर किया. हाल ही में हम लोगों ने दिल्ली के एस्कोर्ट और अपोलो अस्पतालों में २० दिन सिर्फ़ यह सुनिश्चित करने के लिए लगाए की वे फिर से अपनी सामान्य ज़िन्दगी जीना शुरू कर सकें. यह कहना पर्याप्त होना चाहिए की जब डॉक्टरों ने उनकी मेडिकल रिपोर्ट देखी तो उन्हें इस बात पर ताजुब हुआ की वे इन सब के बावजूद कैसे जीवत रह सके. उनकी ज़िन्दगी का एकमात्र उद्देश्य यह था की वे छत्तीसगढ़ में कांग्रेस की सरकार बनते हुए देखें और उन्होनें इसके लिए अपना सब कुछ दांव पर लगा दिया.

इन सबके बावजूद यदि तथाकथित नेता अपनी कमियों और गलतियों के लिए उन्हें उत्तरदायी ठहराते हैं तो उन्हें अमेरिका की आजादी की लड़ाई के दौरान बेंजामिन फ्रान्कलिन द्वारा अपने सहयोगियों से कही गई बात याद रखनी चाहिए: "यदि अब हम सब एक साथ नहीं रह सके तो सबका अलग-अलग सूली पे लटकना तय है." (We must indeed all hang together or most assuredly we shall all hang separately.)

अंत में
छत्तीसगढ़ का जनादेश कांग्रेस को नकारना नहीं है; हमें एक क्षण के लिए यह नहीं भूलना चाहिए की हमें स्पष्ट बहुमत से सिर्फ़ ६ सीटें कम मिली- ऐसी सीटें जिन्हें हमने अपनी कमियों के कारण गवांया; न की किसी काल्पनिक "चाऊर वाले बाबा" की लहर के कारण. (अगर ऐसी कोई लहर होती तो हमारा पूरी तरह से सफाया होता) यह स्पष्ट है की छत्तीसगढ़ की जनता हमसे एक ऐसे सशक्त विपक्ष की भूमिका निभाने की अपेक्षा रखती है जो सरकार को सीधे-सीधे उसके सारे कामों और कमियों के लिए जवाबदेही पर मजबूर करे. पिछली बार हम इस कर्तव्य के पालन में बुरी तरह से विफल रहे थे. कम से कम इस बार तो हम उन्हें निराश न करें.

साथ ही साथ हमें यह भी समझना होगा की कांग्रेसजनों के लिए आने वाला समय बेहद कठिन साबित होगा: हमारे ज़मीनी कार्यकर्ताओं में से बहुत से लोग राज्य सरकार के द्वारा सुनियोजित तरीके से बदले की भावना के साथ निशाना बनाए जा रहे हैं. भाजपा शासन के और पाँच सालों के बाद इस बात की संभावनाएं हैं की सरकार और संघ के बीच कोई फर्क नहीं रह जायेगा. अतः एक दूसरे पर खुले आम आरोप मढ़ने के बजाये हमें मूल रूप से तीन चीज़ों पर ध्यान देना चाहिए: बस्तर की आत्मा के लिए संघर्ष में विजय प्राप्त करना; सतनामियों को वापस कांग्रेस से जोड़ना; और प्रदेश में पार्टी संगठन के पुनर्निर्माण के दौरान जनादेश को समझकर, उसका सम्मान करना. यदि हम ऐसा नहीं कर पाते, तो हमें उत्तर प्रदेश और बिहार के रास्ते पर जाने से कोई नहीं रोक सकता; और हमारी भविष्य की पीढियां- हमारी अजन्मी संतानें- हमें कभी माफ़ नहीं करेंगी.

Chhattisgarh 2008 (5): Why We Lost?

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 17:41:00 +0000

इसका हिन्दी अनुवाद यहाँ पढ़े.

Note: No part of this text should be published either wholly or in part without the author's prior and explicit consent.

Typically, much of the past month has been spent in mostly pointless finger pointing: rather than pondering over WHAT factors are responsible for our defeat in Chhattisgarh, we- as a Party- are more focused on WHO is to blame. Such an approach can only lead to inquisitorial witch-hunting, which would do harm than good to our prospects in the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections. In my opinion, there are five factors (vis-à-vis our wipeout in Bastar, sidelining of Satnamis, alliance with the NCP, delay in ticket-distribution & the ABJ Policy):

A. WIPEOUT IN BASTAR
First and foremost, is our total wipeout in the tribal region of Bastar, where we lost 11 of the 12 seats. There are two reasons for this. One, the illogical choice of party candidates. To illustrate, consider the following four cases:

(1) A lady has been persistently losing every single election she contested since 1990: in 2 of 4, she forfeited her deposit. Less than four years ago (2004), her real brother failed to win the Sarpanch election; her daughter-in-law forfeited her deposit in the Janpad election. Yet she is given the party ticket for the fifth consecutive time against an aspirant who lost his last election by about 1000 votes, and remained fairly active as the voice of the Opposition since.
(2) There are three blocks in a constituency: Bhanpuri, Mardepar & Narayanpur. Bhanpuri & Mardepar have more than 1,30,000 voters; Narayanpur, which is 150 kilometers from these two blocks & lies in the heart of thickly-forested Naxalite territory, has 13,000 voters. A person from Narayanpur is given the ticket.
(3) A chronic party-shifter recently returns to the party by way of BSP & BJP after having lost every single election he contested in the interregnum. His Delhi-based daughter, who can’t speak a word of the local dialect, is allotted the party ticket.
(4) In a seat where there are only about 500 Jain voters, we give a ticket to a Jaini knowing that the BJP candidate is also from this community.

It is woefully obvious that in each of these four instances, we inexplicably made choices that defy not only logic but also that rarest of things, common sense. The same is true for at least two other constituencies, Kondagaon & Keshkal, where party tickets were given to relatively unknown persons over more established figures.

While this reason accounts for much of North Bastar (Jagdalpur, Narayanpur & Kanker districts), the second reason explains our defeat in the South (Dantewada & Bijapur districts): it is the state-sponsored Salwa Judum (SJ) movement, which has led to the forceful uprooting of over 70000 tribals from about 600 villages, and their displacement to about 26 makeshift roadside ‘camps’, where they continue to live in inhuman conditions, as well as the merciless slaughter of thousands of innocent tribals. Writing on July 8 2006, I had offered the following observation about SJ:

“Further sustenance of SJ is based on its own three-fold logic, and has nothing to do with tribal-interests:  
• POLITICAL: Come election-time, and there will be no polling stations in evacuated villages. Instead they will be set-up well within the guarded perimeter of these 6-7 concentration camps. (This number eventually increased to 26) And it doesn't take a psephologist to predict the electoral outcome under such ‘free, fair and impartial’ conditions. Does it? Think about it. Had elections been ‘conducted’ in Auschwitz, wouldn’t the National Socialists (Nazis) have swept the polls? Thankfully, unlike Der Fuhrer- who didn’t consider his refugees worthy of the vote- this regime views the tribals as- and only as- a votebank. And SJ, as it happens, is the surest way to encash this votebank en block. 
• CULTURAL: Concentration of vast tribal populations in the controlled environment of camps provides an easy assembly-line for the Sangh troika and its affiliates to work overtime in order to factory-produce indoctrinated specimens: a people repeatedly told that they are worshipping ‘false’ gods, eating ‘polluted’ foods, following ‘promiscuous’ practices and ‘anachronistic’ customs; and systematically made to feel ashamed about their (former) ‘primitive and barbaric’ way of life; thus slowly but surely falling in line with the (pseudo) ‘hindutva’ pogrom of the RSS. Much more than the geopolitical displacement, it is this sense of ‘cultural displacement’, which will come from living in camps, that worries me. Henceforth, camp-inmates will be permanently scarred by a false sense of ‘inferiority-complex’, and adapted to a type of doggish existence where they will be always told what to do and feel and think. Free will has been the greatest casualty. 
• ECONOMIC: As with all tribal-targeted government schemes, SJ camps have given birth to their own peculiar industry. Tens of millions of rupees spent daily by the state-exchequer to provide housing, food, health-care and schooling to the over 70,000 tribals is being siphoned off by a clique of middlemen, in cohorts with their bureaucratic and political patrons. Put simply, it is not in their interest to wind-up such an enormously lucrative & profitable business.”

Now, I can’t help feeling a bit like Cassandra, doomed to see the future and yet unable to do anything about it. The fact is that the BJP has, thanks to SJ, gained a foothold in South Bastar for the first time since elections commenced in 1952: in a region where the contest had always been between Communists (CPI) and Congress, they have won two out of three seats outright and we’ve managed to defeat them in the third by a measly margin of 190 votes. Needless to say, the BJP votes all came from SJ camps, which together accounted for more than 70% polling in these three seats. The Congress simply avoided defining its position on the issue, perhaps hoping to have the cake & eat it too: its CLP leader headed this movement, which had the full backing of the state as well as the Union governments, whereas another faction, led by my father & having the unequivocal support of an overwhelming majority of the party’s elected representatives in the state, opposed it for the reasons I’ve mentioned above. In my opinion, this procrastinated ambiguity has cost us dearly.

I believe that the battle for Bastar goes deeper than elections; it is a battle for the very Soul of Tribal India. While the BJP & its affiliates- its extensive network of Saraswati Shishu Mandirs, Ekal Vidyalayas & Vanvasi Kalyan Ashrams- work fulltime in even the remotest areas of Bastar with the unequivocal backing of the state administration, we’ve nothing, absolutely nothing, to counter this. In a sense, we’ve left the field open to them to do as they will. It is therefore surprising that despite all this, we’re still in the game: we did, after all, lose 3 of these 12 seats by very narrow margins: Antagarh by 90 votes (mainly because of rigging done during counting), Bastar by 1200 votes and Kondagaon by 2770 votes. To me, it is clear that people in these 3 constituencies did want change, but to put it simply, we failed to offer them viable alternatives.

More significantly, the most crucial lesson from our second consecutive loss of Bastar is the absolute necessity of taking the fight into the educational and cultural fields, where the BJP-RSS-VHP troika and its affiliates have a field day. If this is not done soon, we might end up losing Bastar- and perhaps, all of tribal India- to the communal forces of Hate forever.

B. SIDELINING OF SATNAMIS
The second most significant factor- and one which the current Inquisitorial polemic tends of ignore- is the rising influence of the BSP rising influence of the BSP due to the total sidelining of the Satnami (SC) community within the party even though they had strongly stood by the Congress in 2003’s Assembly elections (thus accounting for a decline in BSP’s voteshare from from 5.65% in 1998 to 4.4% in 2003; even more significantly, it had lost its deposit in 46 of the 54 seats from where it contested): it is indeed shocking that not one person from this community numbering more than 25,00,000 found representation at the block, district or state levels of the party organization during the past five years.

Take the case of Patharia block: after the death of the incumbent Block Congress Committee (BCC) president more than four years ago, the local MLA urged that a respected member of the Satnami community be appointed to fill the vacancy; to date, that post is vacant. Likewise, not one District Congress Committee (DCC) president is a Satnami nor have they found any representation in the reconstituted Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC); also, none of state heads of frontal organizations (Seva Dal, Youth Congress, NSUI & Mahila Congress) come from this community. The exodus to the BSP seems, therefore, to be a natural outcome of this most unfortunate trend.

The consequences for the Congress have, to put it blatantly, been fatal: in atleast 11 of the 17 seats where they took more than 8000 votes, the BSP’s candidates directly contributed to our party’s defeat by relatively narrow margins: Mungeli (SC), Takhatpur, Bilha, Beltara & Masturi (SC) in Bilaspur district; Nawagarh (SC) in Durg district; Akaltara, Janjgir-Champa, Pamgarh (SC) & Chanderpur in Janjgir district; and Baloda Bazar in Raipur district. At the risk of sounding alarmist, if this trend is not stopped forthwith, it might permanently lead to the Satnamis leaving the Congress en mass for the BSP in the impending Lok Sabha elections.

C. ALLIANCE WITH NCP
The third factor is the party’s alliance with the NCP, which is both a leaderless and cadre-less party in Chhattisgarh. Against overwhelming opposition from local party units, we left 3 seats for the NCP: one which we had won & had our sitting MLA (Manendragarh); a second where they had lost their deposit, barely getting a few hundred votes (Samri); and the third from where their state president, a Congress rebel who was denied ticket at the very last instance, had been elected but would quite readily have agreed to contest on the Congress symbol (Chanderpur). I can’t help feeling that the moment we announced this alliance, we gifted these 3 seats to the BJP. What is infinitely worse, our ally’s real alliance seems to have been with the BJP, not with Congress. The following illustrations should make this amply clear:

(1) Manendragarh constituency is essentially a conglomerate of two cities, Chirmiri and Manendragarh. There is a traditional rivalry between the two cities because both were keen to become headquarter of the new district. Chirmiri (72000 voters) is about 4 times bigger than Manendragarh (21000 voters). Under the circumstances, the natural choice of candidate should have fallen to someone from Chirmiri. The NCP, in total defiance of this logic, gave its ticket to a resident from Manendragarh while the BJP candidate, who was a virtual nobody from Chirmiri, easily swept the polls.
(2) Likewise, Samri is a tribal constituency where Kanwars constitute almost 75% of the electorate; Uraons are only about 10%. Of the Uraons, less than 5% are Christian Uraons. Any party wishing to win this seat would have given its ticket to a Kanwar; but again, the NCP, defying all common sense, gave it to a Christian Uraon. Not surprisingly, its candidate got about 8000 votes as opposed to the BJP’s almost 50,000, and ended up finishing fourth.
(3) Also, in sheer disregard of the ethics of alliance, the NCP fielded its candidates in at least 10 seats (of which we ended up losing in 4), thus defeating whatever little purpose there was of having this alliance in the first place.

Thus it was the from the moment these three candidates were announced, the BJP’s victory in them had already become a fiat accompli. At the end of an extensive note opposing this alliance written on 25th October 2008, my father observed: “in view of the foregoing, it is my considered view- as indeed the overwhelming opinion among most grassroots Congresspersons in the state- that there is absolutely no need to enter into any alliance with any party in Chhattisgarh. If we do not contest all the 90 seats ourselves, and BJP contests all 90, it will send a message of weakness and acceptance of defeat even before the beginning of the battle.”

D. DELAY IN TICKET ALLOCATION
The fourth factor is not exclusive to Chhattisgarh; it is systemic in the way our party is run all over the country. Despite the explicit wish of the party High Command that tickets be decided at least two months in advance, they were announced only at the very last instance. It took almost 50 days- and nights- of endless & mostly pointless rounds of meetings to reach that decision (which means that we averaged about 15 hours deliberating over each seat!).

Even more disturbingly, since the entire party structure- state leaders, ticket aspirants and their supporters from all the 90 seats of the state- was at Delhi for this entire duration, we had more or less left the field empty for the BJP at this most critical juncture when elections to the state assembly had already been notified.

Our candidates, already exhausted with having to fight such a procrastinated battle for their respective tickets, had less than 12 days to campaign. The BJP meanwhile had engaged no less than eight helicopters, which were busy touring every nook and corner of the state with their star-campaigners and almost the entire national executive of that party, while our people were sulking away in the cold Delhi winter. In my opinion, this is a scenario straight out of Kafka!

E. THE ABJ POLICY
Last but not the least, I hold the “ABJ” Policy responsible. This Policy was instituted exactly five years ago in the aftermath of our defeat in December 2003 primarily at the behest of a senior leader from Durg (whose own electoral ability or lack thereof is not in doubt); it continues unabated to this day.

Put simply, the ABJ Policy implies that all positions in the party in Chhattisgarh should be given to Anybody but Jogi (hence, ABJ): consequently, my father, or for that matter, anyone perceived to be aligned with him, were all denied positions at the block, district and state levels of the party structure. Even after being elected as the sole Congress MP from the state in 2004, he wasn’t permitted to have even one BCC president of his choice, even in his own Lok Sabha constituency. Also, as the lone Lok Sabha MP of the party from Chhattisgarh, he found no place in the Union. As if this wasn’t enough, in order to destroy him completely, I was hounded into jail by the CBI, a Central Government agency at a time when our party was in power in the Centre; also, frivolous cases against him were registered. (Thankfully, none of these have stood the test of the Judiciary.)

The Congress’ impressive victories in the Kota (2006) and Rajnandgaon bye-elections (2007), for which he was given the main responsibility, and its shameful defeats in Khairagarh, Malkharoda and Keshkal bye-elections (2007), from which he was kept out deliberately, also did precious little to change this Policy. In the ticket selection process, he was systematically excluded from the deliberations of both the Screening Committee as well as the Central Election Committee at Delhi despite repeated requests while those with little or no understanding of the state were asked to take vital decisions.

The most obvious display of the ABJ Policy came when despite an overwhelming majority of MLAs having signed a document urging his election as Leader of the Congress Legislative Party (CLP), he was totally ignored; and as if that were not enough, a person he had been repeatedly asking be made CLP Leader for the past five years was appointed only when- and perhaps because- he had publicly distanced himself from my father. It should be clear to any political observer that the purpose of the ABJ Policy is to create an alternative leadership to ‘Jogi’ by systematically weakening his influence within the party.

Not to put too fine a point, it has failed to fulfill this purpose: those ‘alternatives’ entrusted with the task of running the party for the past five years have ended up ruining it; not only that, these so-called leaders & their progenies have all failed to win their own elections primarily because of a widespread impression prevalent not only among party workers but also the public that by being hand-in-glove with the state government, they had failed in their duty as an effective Opposition. (I can’t help observing that had they won, we would very well be in government.) The only thing they’ve to say in their defense is that ‘Jogi’- and not they themselves- is to be held responsible.

If that were indeed the case, then there is no reason why certain leaders who now openly accuse my father for their- and the party’s- defeat would have put-up the following posters (& appeals) during their campaigns:

I would like to ask them why he is sole state leader to grace their posters when- as they say- he is indeed so “unpopular”. More than anything else, this is evidence of a most shameless sort of hypocrisy, one that combines ingratitude & over-ambition with a total dearth of talent & the lowest kind of intellect.

Now, with due modesty, my father may be one of the more popular leaders of the state but I do not think that he is so powerful as to pinpoint who should win & who shouldn’t- more so in areas where he didn’t once visit. Indeed, if this is the case (which I assure you is not), then there can be no surer, or better, argument for reversing the ABJ Policy.

Moreover, even admitting for the sake of argument that he did cause the defeat of his detractors, the question that begs to be asked of them is this: how many persons (including themselves) did they help win? Despite being (so-called) “state leaders”, not one of them left their respective constituencies for a single day to campaign for anyone else, and still lost; in contrast, my father (or for that matter, anyone from my family) didn’t go once to his constituency and yet ended up winning that seat with the highest margin in all of the six states that went to polls this winter. One should also not forget that the only office he occupied during these past five years was that of MP from Mahasamund: the Congress won each and every seat in both the districts of this Lok Sabha (Dhamtari & Mahasamund) as well as Rajim, all of which were previously held by the BJP. The above illustrations put to rest the question of my father’s popularity.

Yet another undeniable fact is that he took more public meetings & did more road shows than any other leader (both from the Congress as well as the BJP) in Chhattisgarh: in less than fourteen days, he addressed 186 meetings in 74 of the 87 constituencies where his party’s candidates contested, traveling more than 18 hours a day on a wheelchair. He did all this against doctors’ advice, and at great cost to his health: we recently spent twenty days at the Escorts & Apollo hospitals in Delhi to ensure that he is able to resume his normal life; suffice it to say that when the doctors saw his medical reports, they were surprised that he was still alive. His sole objective in life was to see that the Congress forms its government in Chhattisgarh, and without doubt, he gave it his all.

If, despite all this, these so-called leaders blame him for their own follies, then frankly, I would like to remind them of something Benjamin Franklin presciently told his compatriots during the American War of Independence: “we must, indeed, all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately.”

IN CONCLUSION
The Mandate of Chhattisgarh is in no way a total rejection of the Congress: we should not for one moment forget that we've fallen barely six seats short of a majority- seats we lost mainly due to our own shortcomings & not due to any fictitious 'chaur-waale baba' wave (which, if it did indeed exist, would surely have led to our complete wipeout). It is clear, therefore, that the People of Chhattisgarh expect us to fulfill the role of a Strong Opposition, one that will hold the Government directly accountable to them for all its acts and omissions. Last time round, we failed miserably in this duty. Let us not let them down this time.

At the same time, we should be aware that the times ahead are not going to be easy for Congresspersons in Chhattisgarh, especially our grassroots workers, several of whom are already being systematically targeted by this state administration with renewed vengeance: in another five years of BJP rule, chances are that there will be no difference between Sarkar (government) and Sangh. So instead of accusing each other publicly, we should now focus on three things primarily: winning the Battle for the Soul of Bastar; getting the Satnamis back into our fold; and respecting people’s mandate as we rebuild our party’s organization in the state. If we don’t, then there is no doubt that we would all be going the way of UP & Bihar, and future generations- our unborn children- will never forgive us.

AJ

Chhattisgarh 2008 (4): Thoughts on the Eve of the Verdict

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 11:06:00 +0000

In less than a week, all will be revealed: to paraphrase the Great Dickens, we would know for certain whether we are headed straight for heaven or going direct the other way. By most estimates- and here, I am not talking of ‘surveys’ published by various media houses (these, I shall deal with separately)- it is a tough call; even more to the point, we’re told that Independents, the BSP & the CPI would, in all probability, play a decisive role in the formation of Chhattisgarh’s third government. Not surprisingly, both major parties- the ruling BJP as well as the Congress- are already wooing them in earnest.

Even now- more than ten days after the second round of polling ended- it is difficult to decipher the precise vectors that led more than 70% of the state’s electorate to cast its votes- a significantly higher figure than in any of the other five election-going states (Madhya Pradesh, Delhi, Mizoram, Rajasthan and Jammu & Kashmir). Could this extraordinary polling percentage be only due to (a) an increase in the number of polling booths in every constituency, which made it easier for people to go and vote & (b) heightened awareness among voters thanks to an intensive media campaign, as many have surmised; or- and this is the really uncertain variable with the potential of upsetting all existing political calculations- were there other Issues- perhaps even an overriding Issue to beat all other issues- at play in the electorate’s mind? If so, what might they- it- be?

The two dominant versions currently on offer reflect, more than anything else, wishful thinking on the part of both major political parties: the BJP would have us believe that people went to the booths singing “Chaaur Waale Baba ki Jai” (Long Live the Rice-waale Baba) in an obvious reference to what they perceive to be the immense popularity of Dr. Raman Singh’s Rs. 3 per kilo rice scheme launched six months before the elections. The Congress on the other hand seems to draw comfort from the basic tenet of classical psephology: that a high voter turnout is indicative of a strong anti-incumbency undercurrent.

The BJP’s claim can be disputed for a variety of reasons. One, “chaaur waale baba”- a title the BJP claims the people of the state have lovingly bestowed on Dr. Raman Singh- isn’t really something any Chhattisgarhiya would say for the simple reason that “waale” is as alien to the Chhattisgarhi dialect as Dr. Singh’s Uttar Pradeshi- Pratapgarhiya- roots. Two, as I have already discussed in an earlier post, this scheme isn’t as big a success as it has been made out to be.

The way it works, a minuscule number of BPL (below poverty line) families in every village are given 35 kilos of rice every month at the rate of Rs. 3 per kilo. While this sounds very nice on paper, the fact is that since most Chhattisgarhi households are exclusively rice eaters, 35 kilos of rice would last a family of four barely ten days (and here I am assuming that they’re all frugal in their dietary habits). To meet their requirements for the remaining twenty days, they’re compelled to buy rice at prevalent market rates. Now, this is where the Scheme behind the scheme kicks in: the only rice available is in the black market, and it is sold at not less than Rs. 16 per kilo. In the ultimate cost-benefit analysis, therefore, the only true beneficiary is the blackmarketeer, who is inevitably a loyal party worker of the BJP. Moreover, even if one were to assume that 35 kilos is sufficient for every family, there is no denying the fact that only one in fifty families actually ‘benefits’ from this scheme; even so, most of these families, given the skewed manner in which BPL cards are allotted, aren’t really poor. In the many places that we campaigned, I couldn’t help noticing that the dominant complaint was that while the well-to-do families- those with a close relationship with the village Sarpanch, for instance- are getting their quota of 35 kilos of rice, the really deserving- and needy- ones simply aren’t. This, in my opinion, has led to even more discontent.

Maybe what I’ve just said above is mere conjecture; maybe Dr. Singh’s Rice Scheme has really worked wonders for the BJP. But as far as one could tell from what one saw- and heard- during the campaign, there were no visible signs of it. If indeed Dr. Raman Singh has metamorphosed into a larger-than-life cult figure- the hugely popular ‘chaaur waale baba’, as the BJP & a large section of the state’s media would have us believe- then surely it would only be reasonable to assume that people by the tens of thousands would be rushing from near and far to catch a glimpse of him, to hear him speak, maybe even to touch him in the hope of getting healed. Yet, for all that, the attendance at his preannounced public meetings were at best, a damp squib, not crossing fifteen hundred anywhere even when the BJP’s campaign-planners were careful to hold them at market places on weekly market days.

This phenomenon wasn’t confined to Dr. Singh: his party’s prime ministerial candidate and key campaigner, Mr. Lal Krishna Advani, left Raipur visibly perturbed when his rallies failed to draw crowds. (I’m reliably told that not more than seven hundred persons were present at his Katora Talab meeting very near where I live, and he had to wait for more than two hours before there was sufficient crowd for him to address at Jagdalpur.) The fate of Mr. Narendra Modi, whose feat Dr. Raman Singh hopes to no doubt emulate, was no different. His meeting at Kanker (north Bastar) wasn’t exactly what he- or for that matter anyone- expected.

Could it, therefore, be that all the mass-outpourings of adulation for our beloved ‘chaaur waale baba’ was totally undetectable to the average human eye (except perhaps those of Navbharat reporters)? If so, why? Were the people, for instance, afraid- nay, terrified- of showing their affection for him and his wonderful government? What could be the reason for this Deafening Quiet?

There is sadly only one answer to this: Dr. Raman Singh- Chhattisgarh’s ‘chaaur waale baba’- is purely a Creation of the Media. I can’t remember a time when the media- or a large section of it anyway- was so totally one-sided. No, actually I can: in 2004, right before the last Lok Sabha election, under remarkably similar circumstances. Infact I remember I’ve written something about it already on this Blog; so, what I say here might tend to be repetitive. Let me tell you a tale, then. Sometime back, Mr. Kanak Tiwari, a leading lawyer of the High Court and a widely respected columnist, submitted his weekly article to Mr. Sunil Maheshwari, the proprietor of a local eveninger who I like to think of as the self-appointed permanent advisor-in-chief to the chief minister irrespective of who the latter may be. When he discovered that his article had not been published, he quite reasonably asked Mr. Maheshwari why. The answer he got, he says, irrevocably shook his faith in the ‘sanctity of the media’: he was told pointblank that his article could not be published because it was apparently too critical of the chief minister. ‘Chhattisgarh’, Mr. Maheshwari’s publication created from money robbed from ‘Deshbandhu’ (a highly respected newspaper he worked for earlier, and milked for all it was worth), is small potatoes compared to Navbharat, once the biggest circulated newspaper of the state. For a princely sum of money- running no doubt into several crores of rupees- the BJP quite simply transformed it into its principal mouthpiece. Infact so blatant was this newspaper in its one-sided coverage of the campaign that many old-timers, who admired it for its neutral, hands-on reportage, decided to stop subscribing to it altogether.

The aforementioned publications thankfully reflect the ‘in extemis’ cases. As for the rest of the media (not all but most anyway), our candidates felt it was impossible to get them to write anything about their campaigns without paying for it. Given the fact that we’re not in power & more to the point, we- as a party- don’t have the crores it requires to be written about favorably in the press, it was, therefore, only natural to see a distinctively pro-BJP bias in the media coverage of the election in Chhattisgarh. How much has this worked to the BJP’s advantage- and by implication, to our disadvantage- would depend on whether the electorate’s opinion is purely media-determined (in which case, we are clearly the losers in the media game) or whether the electorate does infact realize that the media’s role is first and foremost to report on what is objectively, and that if- and when- it fails to do so, it loses its moral credibility.

Put simply, the media in Chhattisgarh, acting in collusion with the BJP, made Dr. Raman Singh & his government into something that he clearly was not: Chaaur Waale Baba. The Question is whether the people have accepted this media-created Image of his, and made it their own? Agreed, the Congress-led Opposition didn’t do its damndest best to put this government in the dock, as it jolly well should have done during the past five years, but that doesn’t mean that the Sins of this Regime should be forgotten & forgiven merely because nobody is shouting about them from the rooftops. I firmly believe that an Ineffective Opposition can be no justification for the continued existence of a Failed Government: the advantages of Democracy (in which each citizen has a voice) far outweigh the many ills of parliamentary procedure (where only select & at times manageable elected representatives have any say). Equally firmly, I also believe that this belief is not mine alone: it is shared by millions of others in the state.

*

The fact of the matter is that the BJP (unlike the Media) had realized long ago that it was facing an anti-incumbency wave: why else would it deny party tickets to eighteen of its sitting MLAs? Even more obviously, the chief minister himself shifted constituency, choosing not to contest from Dongargaon, which he has been representing these past five years! That subsequently this very obvious fact should be forgotten- and contrary claims of a massive pro-incumbency wave asserted not just by the demagogues of the party but also echoed in large sections of the media- is in itself peculiar, to say the least. This brings me to my next point. The incumbency factor- whether pro or anti- was at play at two levels: at the state level (which the ruling party, much of the administration as well as the media are if not denying, then at least not talking about); and also, at the local level, where people were judging the performance of those they had previously elected.

Propaganda of the kind we witnessed in Chhattisgarh can only dampen anti-incumbency at the state level; it does precious little as far as the local level is concerned, where the electorate is more likely to have first-hand knowledge of ground realities. Come to think of it, the more we approach the grassroots, the less effective propaganda as a campaign-mechanism becomes. So, yes, while last two month’s Media blitzkrieg might have helped salvage Dr. Raman Singh’s reputation as a non-starter non-performer by presenting him instead as an inoffensive Gentleman-ruler- this incidentally is Dr. Singh’s preferred public persona- it has, in my opinion, done little to change the perception of elected-representatives & also the various party candidates before their constituents; and, more to the point, it is precisely this first-hand knowledge of candidates, which is clearly not subject to media-influences, that would play the paramount role in determining which way a voter ultimately votes.

This is why the choice of party candidates becomes all-important. As a Congressman, I was perplexed (along with several of my party persons, I should think) about the time- and the manner- it took to decide on our party’s ninety candidates. I believe we spend in all fifty days- and nights- in endless rounds of meetings in Delhi before a list could be finalized: this would imply an average of fifteen hours of deliberations per candidate selected. Not only that, during all this time, the entire party- all of the state leaders with hundreds of followers in tow, at least twenty ticket-aspirants per constituency, each with at least a dozen supporters (taking the total into thousands of key party workers from all over Chhattisgarh)- had shifted bag & baggage to Delhi, leaving the field totally empty for more than two months just before the election. Typically enough, tickets were announced hours before the deadlines. But in retrospect, I think we- and by we, I mean the party- didn’t do such a bad job after all.

The Goof-up percentage was about 10%, which isn’t bad at all by our standards. Alright, the NCP alliance was totally uncalled for, especially in the two seats we left for them in Ambikapur division (Manendragarh, Samri), as I’m sure the results would no doubt reveal. Also, we could’ve done a whole lot better in North Bastar, where our candidates are, in all likelihood, destined to slip to third place in at least two otherwise totally winnable constituencies (Kanker, Bhanupratappur): in one, we gave the ticket to someone who has repeatedly lost four elections since 1990; and in the other, we gave to someone totally new. Consequently, we now face the prospect of Congress-rebels (rather than official Congress candidates) taking on the BJP directly.

However, at most other places, we were successful in getting the rebels to withdraw in favor of official party candidates, which in itself is no mean achievement. And while on the subject of rebels, let me point out that this is possibly for the first time that we have as many- if not more- BJP-rebels contesting: most curiously, in one constituency, the RSS fielded its candidate against the BJP’s nominee (Vaishali). This brings me to yet another ‘misperception’ created by the state media in collusion with the BJP: that of total disunity in the Congress. Infact, the reverse is true. Given that it is widely believed that Mr. Vidya Charan Shukla is my father’s bête-noire, it is highly creditable for the two to have met not once, but four times, in the duration of less than two weeks to iron out their differences, and arrive at a broad mutual understanding to work together towards bringing the party back to power in the state.

Nothing of the sort can be said of the BJP, where every leader of some stature- Mr. Tarachand Sahu, Mr. Shiv Pratap Singh, Mr. Ramesh Bais, Mr. Nand Kumar Sai, to name only four sitting BJP MPs- are openly opposing what they rightfully perceive as the intra-party Tyranny of Dr. Raman Singh as he has systematically destroyed all state-level leadership not his own in an attempt to manufacture his hegemony. In the case of Mr. Sahu, he actually personally protested at a police station demanding the arrest of BJP workers loyal to Mr. PP Pandey, the incumbent Speaker & BJP candidate from Bhilai; likewise, Mr. Shiv Pratap Singh’s son, Vijay, who is also the elected Jila Panchayat president of Ambikapur, is in the fray from Bhatgaon as a rebel candidate.

The setup at Ekatm Parisar, the BJP’s state headquarters at Raipur, provided positive proof of this all-pervasive sense of paranoia in that party’s decision-making mechanism during this election. The think-tank, which included only one local leader, Mr. Soudan Singh, was put-up on the third floor; beddings were placed on the stairway leading to that floor, all occupied by RSS-workers from outside the state; the chain-gates outside the entrance to the floor were closed shut, and the only access was through a solitary elevator, again manned by outsider RSS-workers. To further counter dissent, three hundred RSS-workers, especially trained at Nagpur and sent via Indore, were deployed all over the state, with specific emphasis on those constituencies where sitting party MLAs had been denied tickets. Personally, I feel that this almost-neurotic setup is most unbecoming of any party that seeks to function in a democracy like ours.

Yet, for some peculiar reason, the media remains remarkably selective in its coverage of this fact, which is there for all to see. Instead when the PCC president and the two working presidents of the party decide to go to Delhi on separate planes- as they may well do in the natural course- the media portrays it as yet another proof of the intra-party discord: could it be that they expect that the only way the three gentlemen can give a message of unity is by traveling not only on the same plane but perhaps by sitting in the same seat!

Admittedly, a lot of this has to do with the respective ‘cultures’ of both parties. In a truly democratic fashion, everything about the Congress is transparent: things get discussed, things get out. No such degree of freedom exists in the BJP (as indeed in the RSS): party bigwigs decide, everybody else is expected to follow, nobody talks, period. Discipline is the flimsy codename given to this absolute lack of intra-party democracy. But all that is changing, and I saw it very clearly during these elections. In the aftermath of the India Shining Debacle, Mr. Advani had famously lamented what he described as the ‘Congressification of the BJP’. That process, I believe, has reached its apogee in Chhattisgarh during this election.

The BJP, once a party of disciplined cadres, is behaving in many ways like the Congress; and vice-versa. It is curious sort of role-reversal: while grassroots Congress workers were going door-to-door quietly distributing voter slips (realizing perhaps that if they didn’t do so, there’s no way they could survive another five years of this BJP regime even if their leaders may well manage to do so, some of them quite comfortably even), their BJP counterparts, drunk in the excesses of power, could be seen crisscrossing highways in air-conditioned Scorpios fitted with loudspeakers, only stopping by to disburse booze, cash, saris, blankets and other such bounties from the Loot they collected during their five years of Misrule.

For a change, we were the ones taking the beatings, and consequently, I hope, the voter’s sympathy.

*

This article couldn’t possibly be complete if I don’t mention my father, Mr. Ajit Jogi. As I see it, my principal role in this particular election was to ensure that he gets to as many places- and talks to (how he speaks at public meetings is more in the format of a dialogue one has with a close friend and less in the way of a formalistic speech) as many people- as is humanly possible.

By sheer dearth of willpower- there is simply no other explanation- he addressed more than 115 public meetings in 74 (of 90) constituencies in less than fifteen days, sleeping for less than four hours everyday. The maximum time he gave to any constituency was Durg City (from where Mr. Arun Vora is contesting), where he addressed three public meetings and did a road show as well. He took only one last-day public meeting at Kota, my mother’s constituency. As far as Marwahi is concerned, both he and I were forbidden by the people there from coming even for a day, and consequently he didn’t get to go- let alone campaign- in his own constituency at all.

In contrast to this, the chief minister, as his party’s chief campaigner, took less than 90 meetings in more than twenty-five days (he got more campaign time as his party took about two days to finalize its list of candidates while we took fifty), and spent more than four days campaigning in his own constituency (Rajnandgaon), barely making it in time to cast his own vote in his hometown, Kawardha.

Of course, Dr. Singh did try to make an issue of my father’s statement, made several months ago, that he would like to contest against the chief minister from any constituency of the latter’s choosing: however, he did so only after the last date of filing of nominations had ended, when he was quite certain that my father infact would not be able to contest against him. This was because the Congress high command felt, quite rightly, that confining Papa to one constituency- which is what he would have been had he directly taken on the CM- wasn’t a particularly sensible move especially since no one else from his party- the PCC president, two working presidents, the LOP and other state leaders included- was going to be campaigning.

This last aspect too I found somewhat perplexing: why is it that the state chief of the Congress, his one other co-chief and the Leader of Opposition, who all obviously played such a pivotal role in the candidate selection process, didn’t move out one itsy-bitsy bit outside of their respective constituencies to campaign for other party candidates, even those they had gotten the tickets for? How can one claim leadership of the entire state, as some of them no doubt would, when they are so threatened in their own homes to move out & seek support for others?

Coming back to Papa, he labeled the chief minister- the Media’s ‘Chaaur waale Baba’- “Labra Raja” (Liar King): the epitaph isn’t a personal insult, as the BJP leader Mr. Ravi Shankar Prasad complained to the Election Commission, but a reminder to the people of the many, many promises that he, as the chief minister, has failed to keep. No jersey-cow for every tribal family, no Rs. 500 monthly stipends for unemployed youth of the state, no waiver of electricity bills, irrigation taxes & farmers’ loans, to name only a few.

My father’s question really was this: can we trust this man- again? Soon, very soon, the answer would be clear, and we- you & I- would know whether we’re going to heaven or whether we’re headed straight in the other direction.

AJ

ICH BIN EIN MUMBAIKAR

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 21:20:00 +0000

For three nights and two days now, a city- and a nation- have been held hostage: the precise identity and motive of the perpetrators remains uncertain; their methodology, however, is (regrettably) no longer in doubt: for the umpteenth time, hundreds of unarmed civilians- business travelers, restaurant goers, innocent bystanders, hotel guests & staff- have fallen victim to a meticulously-planned & carefully-coordinated cross-border terrorist attack in the heart of India’s financial capital, Mumbai.

Most significantly, it has exposed the weak underbelly- the absolute vulnerability- of our nation’s security apparatus.

A Different Class of Attacks
The Attack on Mumbai is being televised nonstop. As a blogger, I shall attempt here to put what we are seeing in perspective.   

First: the Victims of the Attacks. This isn’t for the first time that the world's Maximum City has come under fire: at least two bomb blasts- one at the Stock Exchange and another on Mumbai’s local trains- have resulted in an equal, if not more, number of deaths. What makes this particular set of attacks different- apart of course from its inherent Drama (to which I shall come to later)- are its Victims, or more precisely, the class of its Victims. Those killed earlier were, to put it blatantly, commoners in an extraordinary situation: the sort of people who live in faraway suburbs and commute in second-class local trains; not exactly the sort who would put up in USD 250 a night suite, or spend an average monthly wage on fine dining at Tiffin, a trendy new restaurant at The Oberoi that was witness to a veritable bloodbath on the night of the attacks.

In this case, the victims are not-quite-common people caught up in what is alarmingly becoming an only too common situation. A lot of the people who were taken hostage & killed during the past forty-eight hours belonged to the so-called Class of Untouchables: those who we- and by we, I mean our Collective Imagination- thought were above, among other things, being attacked by terrorists; the glass-housed Glitterati, so to speak. Now: the glass is broken & we realize- much to our discomfort- that even these hallowed creatures aren’t safe & truth be told, this terrifies us more than any of the previous attacks.

Secondly: the Media’s Role in taking the high-voltage Drama- rapid rounds of crossfire between policemen and terrorists ensconced in sushi-bars, masked commandos descending on rooftops from helicopters, guests waving for help from behind glass windows of their twenty-first floor suites, grenade launchers & AK-47s, bodies of brave warriors wrapped in tricolors, relieved evacuees- into every Indian household with a television set, has, for better & worse, made every Indian- both in India & abroad- a direct participant in the unfolding tragedy. Suddenly, every other news, including the death of a former prime minister, is no longer news. Suddenly, we’re all- you & I- Victims under siege, whether we’re in Mumbai or not. Our feeling of helplessness is- has become- universal: no one is- can be- safe. On the positive side, this creates in us- a largely divided nation- a sense of ‘Unity in Fear’: suddenly, each one of us is saying “Ich Bin Ein Mumbaikar.”

Thirdly: on the flip side, this pervasive sense of Paranoia creates in all of us, an overwhelming need to blame someone, anyone. And the easiest scapegoat: Politicians, of course. It is no secret that the Union Home Minister- and by implication, the Government of India- already suffers from something of a credibility crisis: he was widely ridiculed for reportedly having changed his dress thrice within an hour’s span of Delhi being bombed some months ago; his defense, that this ‘serial-dressing’ wasn’t exactly a vice, did little to assuage a slightly misplaced comparison with a certain Nero, who allegedly played the flute while Rome burned. Apparently, this metaphor has been extended to incorporate all politicians as a species. “Keep Out”, “Get Lost”: these are the overwhelming messages to them. It is they who’ve in the public imagination failed to protect us as a nation. Even worse, we feel they would only be too eager to use this Tragedy for political capital. A case in point is the Gujarat chief minister, Narendra Modi’s sudden- and thoroughly unproductive- appearance before The Oberoi this afternoon.

In my opinion, this last aspect merits further discussion.

They Shoot Politicians, Don’t They
For the terrorists- the wannabe fidayeen- the prospect of the Attacks might well have looked like a brochure for a perfect vacation: a Cruise across the quiet blue waters of the Arabian Sea followed by two days & nights of Massacre at a plush Mumbai hotel. Breakfast included & Jannat guaranteed. Bad joke aside, it is precisely this- the ease with which they did it all- that disturbs me most. It is almost as if we- to be more precise, the Awesome Might of the Indian state- put up absolutely no resistance at all. We might just as well have extended them an Invitation.

Less than forty hours into the Attacks, the GOI admitted that it wasn’t equipped to guard its coastline: forty terrorists, armed to the hilt with AK-47s, RDX, hand-grenades & satellite phones, had snuck undetected aboard stolen fishing boats into India’s financial capital without the Marine Police, the Coast Guard or the Customs getting wind of things. Yet: this is merely symptomatic of a massive & deep-rooted Intelligence failure. The different agencies involved in the intelligence business- not just those in India but across the world- simply failed to connect the dots in real-time before it was too late: a stolen boat in Gujarat; six missing fishermen, one of who was later found dead; hi-tech jihadi recruitment & training centers brazenly operating out of Faridkot; calls made to the (erstwhile) L-e-T network in Karachi from satellite phones; sightings of suspicious-looking dinghies by fishermen off the coast of Mumbai.

Intelligence, after all, is more an Art- and less a Science- of stopping things before they happen. By its very nature, therefore, Intelligence cannot be foolproof. We, as a nation, must be prepared to face further possibilities of such failures.

What happened in Mumbai- what is happening in Mumbai even now- has the appearance of an effective but also, a painfully improvised, response to a particular challenge: for the first time in Independent India’s history, the nation’s security forces involving the NSG, the Mumbai Police, Maharashtra’s ATS (Anti-terrorist Squad), the Army, Navy and the Airforce put up a unified response in the face of a sustained, highly coordinated attack carried out from at least three well-supplied ‘control rooms’ in the heart of Mumbai’s commercial-administrative district lasting no less than forty-eight hours (and still not showing signs of ending).

There are important lessons to be learnt from this. More than anything else, the manner in which the situation in Mumbai is being ‘contained’ gives us reason for Hope: we aren’t as ill-prepared as we had feared; indeed, our security forces have shown remarkable fortitude in the face of terrifying calamities.

The politicians, if simply because they’ve let them (the forces) do their job without becoming too much of a nuisance, deserve a second chance to get their act in order & not, mind you, for milking this Tragedy for political mileage.

AJ

Chhattisgarh 2008 (3): Murder of Democracy by State Home Minister

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 13:50:00 +0000

A most disturbing incident has occurred in Ramanujganj-7 (ST) constituency, which has shaken the very foundations of democracy in Chhattisgarh: Shri Ram Vichar Netam, state home minister & BJP candidate from that constituency, is even now, at the time of writing of this post (1830 hrs), personally present inside polling booths number 22 & 23 (Pachawal), where he has been actively rigging the EVMs in his favor for the past two hours. The Congress candidate, Shri Brihaspat Singh (telephone number: 9407618630, 9406221282), who is also present on the spot, was physically beaten up by the hon’ble home minister & his armed security officers, and thrown out of the booth. He is present at Pachawal now, and can furnish an eye witness account of what is happening there.

All this has been communicated to the Collector & RO, Ambikapur, and the SP, Balrampur, at least one hour ago, but no action has been taken. Shri Badrinarayan Meena, the SP, is a known supporter of the hon’ble home minister, and was personally posted by the latter in his home district some months ago for exactly such an occasion.

On the contrary, Shri Alok Shukla, the chief electoral officer of the state, has denied this incident altogether in a televised press conference at the exact same time when the hon’ble minister is personally rigging the EVMs. All this shows the complicity of the state administration in aiding the ruling party to subvert democracy in Chhattisgarh.

I hope that justice will prevail, and the voices of the villagers of Pachawal will not be allowed to be stifled by the very person entrusted by our Constitution to protect them: at every cost, repolls must take place in the aforementioned polling booths.

AJ

Post Script:
Brihaspati Singh lost by 4000 votes. He trailed by more than 2200 from Pachawal. Despite numerous complaints, no repoll was ordered.

Ram Vichar Netam has been divested of the Home portfolio although he continues to be a minister in the current government.

Comment: Amarnath- Part II

amitaishwaryajogi@gmail.com (Amit Aishwarya Jogi.अमित ऐश्वर्य जोगी) — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 14:57:00 +0000

What's in an And?
As an ardent admirer of Jared Diamond’s ongoing treatise (expounded in a series of best-selling books beginning with ‘Guns, Germs, Steel’), I have come to believe that Geography, more than any other factor, is indeed the fundamental vector in shaping the course of Human History: when we speak of the state of Jammu & Kashmir (J&K), the epicenter of the Amarnath Controversy, the operative words are neither ‘J’ nor ‘K’; it is, infact, the quintessential ‘&’. This ‘&’ seeks to drive an irreconcilable wedge between the two; and Minority Appeasement, that cunning little creature about which we discussed in the last post, is, as it turns out, the double-edged sword that has brought this about.

For as long as one can remember, these two regions, connected only by an umbilical cord of the Jammu-Srinagar national highway painstakingly tunneled through mountains, have functioned as disparate geopolitical entities: a Hindu-dominated J on the plains, and a Muslim-dominated K in the Valley. Ergo, when the J&K government handed over 100 acres of forest land to the Shrine Board, the Muslim-majority in Kashmir saw it as appeasement of the Hindu-majority in Jammu, possibly with an eye towards an impending Assembly election; when they took it back, the rest of the country saw it as an effort to once again appease the already over-appeased Kashmiri Muslims. Despite this somewhat hasty governmental-afterthought- to take back the allotted land thereby removing the immediate cause of Kashmiri discontent- the Valley continues to boil: in the words of a separatist pro-Pakistan Hurriyat leader, Syed Gilani, the land itself has become a ‘non-issue’. If so, what then is the issue? Clearly, this somewhat simplistic communal distinction isn’t adequate to explain what’s happening in- and to- J&K.

For the first time, the (Indian) state seems to be at a total & utter loss: sure, it was a mistake to give land to the Shrine Board in the first place, now we can all see that; but wasn’t that decision revoked, and the mistake rectified? Why, then, aren’t things settling down? Why, for instance, are millions of Kashmiris suddenly marching all over Srinagar hurling green-colored Pakistani flags, wishing each other ‘belated Happy Independence day’ on 15th August? Why have they all set their watches thirty minutes behind? Don’t they- can’t they- see that that these Pakis have done nothing for Kashmiris except to smuggle them guns & bombs to blow each other to smithereens? Surely, they ought to understand that we, the Indians, are their true friends, their only well-wishers.

And that is the exact point of this whole Controversy: the Kashmiris do not see us, the Indians, as their friends; on the contrary, we’re perceived as the Enemy; even more worryingly, Pakistan is viewed as the Good Guy. Suddenly, this business of Minority Appeasement isn’t confined to India alone; it has quite simply gone transnational.

Sheesh Mahal
To understand why- despite the state government’s best efforts to assuage the Kashmiri sentiment in the Amarnath land-allocation controversy; despite the imposition of Article 370 that guarantees Kashmir’s special status; despite the tens of billions of rupees spend by the GOI to develop the Valley- we Indians have become villains in the eyes of countless ordinary Kashmiris, and not just extremist-jihadis, it is important to look at what followed the government’s decision to take back the land: a nationwide Bandh was called by the BJP to gain political capital from that decision, citing it as yet another example of Congress’ efforts at Minority Appeasement; thousands of saffron flag-hurling Hindu hardliners, led by the VHP-RSS combine under the banner of a swiftly-assembled ‘Amarnath Sangharsh Samiti’, took to the streets in Jammu; and most dangerously, the Jammu-Srinagar highway- that most delicate umbilical cord- was blockaded, effectively cutting-off the Valley from rest of the country. In the midst of all this anti-Kashmiri sentiment across the nation, 500,000 Hindus quietly completed their annual Amarnath pilgrimage, unmolested & unharmed.

Now, under these circumstances, what would you think if you were a Kashmiri living in the Valley? Wouldn’t you feel that an entire nation was suddenly gunning for you; trying to starve you to death by cutting-off the sole supply-line to the Valley; and, in short, threatening your very existence? The presence of half a million armed-to-the-teeth battle-ready troops in Indian Army uniforms with not the best sort of human-rights record to speak of, living in your midst for the past two decades would only aggravate your sense of alienation, even hostility, to Mother India. Add to this the fact that what used to be trickle of barely 20,000 pilgrims every year from the mainland less than fifteen years ago has become a flood of 500,000; not only that, suddenly, these pilgrims- or those managing their annual pilgrimage anyway- are claiming your land, land that is clearly not theirs, and what’s more, your government is only too keen to hand it to them; today, it is land for the Yatra; tomorrow, it will be land for other things, and very soon, you- and by you, I mean people who’ve lived in the Valley since forever- will have become exiles in your own homeland.

In contrast, you would see a mute Pakistan- which has of late been much too involved in its own political mess to give little more than ‘moral support’ to the ‘struggle’ in Kashmir- to be the very incarnation of the Mahdi, the Promised Deliverer; or atleast, as a fellow Muslim in the struggle to establish the Dar-ul-Islam. And this is precisely how ordinary Kashmiris- students, wives, houseboat wallahs, apple pluckers, children- are beginning to see their world.

For the first time, the struggle in Kashmir has gone non-violent; and not because of any particular fascination for the Mahatma either. It’s simply because it’s simply not possible for millions of ordinary civilians to procure AK-47s & turn up armed at rallies: a mass movement, if it is really that, has, therefore, definitely got to be non-violent because of logistical considerations. There is, ironically enough, peace in numbers. Also, for the first time since 1989, the militant-jihadis- the Lashkar-e-Toibas and the Jaish-e-Mohammeds of this godforsaken world- have taken a backseat, quite content to let unarmed civilians take to the frontlines. And for the first time, the GOI- and its half a million troops stationed in the Valley- don’t know what to do. What, for instance, should be the ideal strategic response to an unarmed pregnant woman climbing up a pole to take down the tricolor and hoist a green Pakistani crescent in its place? Arrest her? Shoot her? Perhaps. But what if, for instance, she is not alone; what if there are 300,000 other unarmed women, children and men cheering her from below? What is the ideal strategic response, then? Do we shoot all of them too?

In the inevitable blame-game of History, who will ultimately be held responsible for putting us- India- squarely in the accused-box: the half-baked thinking of the state government that led it first to give land to the Amarnath Shrine Board, only to take it back a couple of days later; the RSS troika (RSS-VHP-BJP combine), which made such a nationwide ruckus out of that decision, and ultimately, instigated the Blockade of the Valley; the Ministry of Home Affairs- and the GOI- which thought that the Blockade wasn’t such a bad idea after all, and that it may, in the end, actually help quiet things down, take the steam out of the struggle, so to speak? The answers, I’m afraid, are not going to be easy.

If and when History does indeed decide to pronounce judgment on us- Indians, Kashmiris, Hindus, Muslims, secularists, communalists, civilians, military- it would most probably don the dress of the Prince in the last scene of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, and say: “A curse on all your houses!”

(To be concluded)