Chetan, in the comments to the previous post, points to a funny article that adds yet another item to Nehru’s catalogue of failures – his attempt to abolish peons from government offices. His bureaucrats defeated the move the way they always do – by setting up a committee to study it.
Year: 2008
Pragati in June
The June 2008 edition of Pragati is out and I shamefully realise that in the last two months I have announced the publication of Pragati without making an atrocious pun. How could I have not made a pun in May? Anyway, please grab your copy of the June Pragati before it becomes Juna.
All the articles are awesomely good this time, even though one of them has been written by Aadisht. I will never forgive him for sending an article on the importance of Financial Sector Reform that was double the nominal word limit. I deserve a medal for cutting it down to its current size, so don’t make my effort go waste. Go read it. It explains the Percy Mistry and the Rajan committee reports very well. More importantly, he explains very lucidly why financial reform is important if we wish to reduce inequality and enable inclusive growth.
Difficult Democracy
Karthik extends my point about intra-party democracy to point out that the same problem applies to countries too. He is right. On the same note the Dilbert blog talks of the problems you face if you have ended up as the dictator of a major country. You do not have a career path and you cannot retire. Yes, it is hard to sympathize with dictators, but think of someone like poor Kim Jong Il, who has had dictatorship thrust on him. There is really no easy way out, especially if you are also incompetent.
Nominations Invited
I have wanted to this for long, but his recent post has forced the issue. Please send in your nominations for the weirdest Dilip D’Souza post. By weird, I mean just plain weird. I don’t mean a post you disagree strongly with. I mean a post that is so weird that… ok screw it. Let me explain with an example:
The Decline And Fall of the Indian National Congress
This post will probably come back to haunt me. Later this year, there will be elections in BJP ruled states, and there is a chance that anti-incumbency will bring the Congress back to power there. Next year there will be a general election and the Congress may yet win it, and you guys will come back to this post and mock me for it. But what the hell, here is my view. For what it is worth, I held the same view after the 2004 elections.
I believe that the Congress is in irreversible decline. It may win one election and lose the next, but the trend is towards a decline. In a decade, it will be like Saltanat-e-Shah Alam: Az Dilli ta Palam. (The Sultanate of Shah Alam, a latter day Mughal “emperor” that stretched all the way from Delhi to Palam – then a village on the outskirts.)
Urban Predictions
“…the impact of this [delimitation] commission on India’s politics will be at least as far reaching as that of the Mandal commission.”
Now that we have seen the impact of the delimitation and increased representation for urban areas in the Karnataka election results, there will be increased talk of this phenomenon, but I just want to place on record that I had talked of this back in January 2008. I am not sure if I was the first one to talk of this, but just in case I was, let the date be noted.
I must also point out that I am not sure what the impact will be. I have been speculating quite a bit and much of the speculation will prove to be wrong. I am more likely to be correct about generalities (“national parties will benefit”) than about the particulars (“BJP will benefit”). My reasoning is more likely to be correct than the conclusions, because a small error in reasoning is likely to result in large errors in conclusions. But I am most confident about the statement made above – i.e. in time, the impact of urbanization on India’s politics will be as large, if not larger than the impact due to the Mandal politics introduced by V P Singh.
Non-migration of Maharashtrian Food
I had wanted to give this response to Gaurav’s post, but Neel has already done it. Gaurav thinks that the lack of Marathi migration explains why the Maharashtrian thali has not become as popular as the Gujarati thali. But, as Neel points out, his theory does not explain why Maharashtrian food has not become popular even in Mumbai outside the Marathi dominated areas. More interestingly, Maharashtrian food has not moved out of its downmarket niche, even though there is a strong Maharashtrian middle and upper class. This last fact brings us back to the Marathi non-entrepreneurial spirit theory. It suggests to us that owners of Maharashtrian restaurants are content with what they are and do not want to scale up. This is the most likely explanation, but two alternatives are:
- Maharashtrian diners are different from Gujju diners, in that when they dine out, they aren’t looking for Maharashtrian food.
- There is something about Maharashtrian food that does not lend itself to moving upscale – I think this last is very unlikely.
Rajiv Gandhi and Hindustani Classical Music
Today is the anniversary of Rajiv Gandhi’s death, an event I would have blissfully ignored if the cable had not gone out in the morning and we had to switch to Doordarshan for a brief period. Entirely coincidentally, today I decided to change the CD in my car’s music system that was playing the same set of Kishore Kumar songs again and again. I felt like having some Hindustani vocal. That naturally brings up the question: How much damage did the government do to Indian classical music by switching to it during periods of “national mouring”?
Bush Too Fights Inflation
I have been remiss in pointing out that George W Bush too has caught on to what I have been pointing out. It is the prosperity of the middle class that causes inflation. If you have a few rich people and lots of poor people, the poor would be free of inflation. It is the middle class in India and China that causes the problem. Ajay Shah explains better.
Look! I Can Do Economics Too!
My heartfelt commiseration to the unfortunate soul who complimented Dilip D’Souza on his “sound economic training”. It has been said in the Mahabharata that a lie that achieves a good purpose will save you from hell. But this false compliment not only did not do any good to society, it has also not made the recipient happy. The unfortunate soul has now been blamed for not keeping track of and complimenting Dilip for every instance in which he allegedly displayed his sound economic training.
Incidentally, if you wish to know the right answer to the problem in Dilip’s post, here it is:
Botswana And Zimbabwe
Two countries, neighbours, started off with similar levels of economic development. One has economic freedom and good governance. Another has repression. One is prospering. The other is experiencing ridiculous levels of inflation, poverty and economic discontent. A familiar story. (via Ajay Shah)
Intra-Party Democracy And Nuclear Disarmament
There are structural reasons why we do not have intra-party democracy in India, but I think that cultural reasons are important too. Internal democracy is like nuclear disarmament – you can’t do it unilaterally.
In India, the cultural norm is that if you openly speak out against the leader of the party, you are not just disagreeing, but signalling a revolt. Reporters will breathlessly ask the critic if he is preparing to quit the party. News channels will quote sources close to the “two camps” which will talk of how the morale of the party rank and file has been affected by the events. If you try to claim that there really aren’t any plans to split the party and the disagreements were just that – disagreements, the papers will speculate that the two camps are on the way to a patch up.