A History of India’s Roadblocks

Book

Title: Caged Tiger: How too much government is holding Indians back

Author: Subhashish Bhadra

Publisher: Bloomsbury 2023

Pages: 303

For over two centuries the British held India captive. And then Indian politicians did the same. This book shows you how India’s leaders held their own country captive almost all through – with the exception of the first few decades.

77 years is not too short a period of time for a nation, especially one that is as huge as India, to reclaim itself from the ravages of history. What has India achieved in fact? “Governments have failed to provide the basic needs of life, such as clean air and water. India has 22 of the 30 most polluted cities in the world, with a child dying every 3 minutes from inhaling toxic pollutants. Also, India has failed to translate its remarkable economic gains into better lives for its most vulnerable; 35 percent of children under five are stunted…” Now, even Bangladesh is doing better than India though it “is poorer with thrice the population density.”

No, this book is not about statistics at all. Its 9 chapters look at 9 staggering problems that haunt India even today when it claims to be on the way to becoming a world leader. Economy is the first of those. In Sep 2017, 11-year-old Santoshi Kumari of Jharkhand died of starvation after having not eaten for four days. The subsidised food they were getting until then was stopped because their ration card was not linked with Aadhar. The school was closed, so  Santoshi could not get the free midday meal either.

Santoshi is just a symbol in the book. A symbol for the miserable poverty that still haunts the country in spite of its erecting the tallest statue in the world or the most splendid temple. A symbol for the utter lack of vision among the country’s leaders. A symbol for the countless unfulfilled promises made before every election. A symbol of a failed nation.

In this failed nation, the government is more eager to pry into the private lives of its citizens. Titled ‘The Panopticon’, chapter 2 shows how the government has set up surveillance over the citizens of India. “A 2014 report stated that between 7500 and 9000 new orders for interception (of phone calls) were issued by the Indian government every month” [emphasis added]. We know how many journalists, whistle-blowers, social media critics, activists and others were arrested in the past ten years. We know how the Israeli spying technology called Pegasus was misused by our top leaders.

The control that the government exerts on social media forms the subject of the next chapter, ‘Controlled Cacophony.’ Shaheen Dhada, a 21-year-old girl from Palghar in Maharashtra was arrested merely for asking a question on the need to shut down all public life just because a political leader (Bal Thackeray) had died. Respect cannot be forced, she wrote. And our politicians didn’t like that. What is the worth of an ordinary citizen of this country? Shaheena asked. She got the answer in the jail.

Our jails can be as good as Hitler’s concentration camps. That’s chapter 4: ‘His Master’s Police.’ The author argues that the Indian police behave even today just like their British counterparts of pre-Independence days. The police take care of the government’s interests. And the interests of others in power, may be in the opposition. Or in certain mafia groups. Don’t forget that nearly half of our parliamentarians are criminals too.

Even culture is not left untouched by the criminal politics. Salil Chaturvedi becomes a symbol for our new leaders’ cultural obsessions. Chapter 5 begins with his anecdote. Salil is a disabled person and a disability activist. He did not stand up from his wheelchair when the national anthem was sung because he could not. It was the year 2016 when our new nationalist government had ordered to have the national anthem sung in cinema halls to inculcate patriotism among citizens. Salil was beaten up by the nationalists. Like Santoshi and Shaheena above, Salil becomes a symbol in the book.

Eventually, the parliament itself became a big joke in the country. Most of the time the Prime Minister was away abroad. When he was here, he dismissed the opposition and passed all the Bills. The book doesn’t mention the Prime Minister’s later claim to divinity because the book was written before that.

The last two chapters attempt to suggest some solutions and remedies. One such suggestion, among many, is a sortition instead of election. The representatives of the people will be chosen by lots from among citizens eligible for holding public offices. We can save a lot of time and money that is spent on elections. Probably, we will have better governance too. The author lists other benefits of such a system which was in practice in ancient Athens and in the Tamil civilisation.

There is hope in the last pages of the book. There is invitation to the youth to take their political responsibilities a bit more seriously. We need to educate ourselves better. And then communicate those ideas to people around us. Then join hands with those who share our views and act collectively for a better nation. We can make a better India.

The author is an optimist. Let me share his optimism. With you.