[Reader-list] Happy Sunday :) Library and Garbage bins

[Rakesh Iyer]

Dear Jeebesh (and all)

While the heat in this list could have been tackled by means of more
personal chats and more respect of both sides' views from the other
sides, here I wish to express my views on the first issue you have
raised.

Any issue, be it water, roads, health, education, or even a public
library, can be addressed. However, there are umpteen points regarding
as to why it is not an issue. And they are numerous in our system of
democracy (or as in Gulaal they say, it's just autocracy in the name
of democracy).

The first issue here is about the way our democratic system works. It
is a system which is half full and half empty, meaning that it is 50%
democratic and 50% not, if one were to quote Ramachandra Guha from his
book 'India After Gandhi'. And it certainly is. We do have a system
which has elections and the transition of power after elections is
also smooth. However, that's it. Our system begins and ends with
elections. After that, nobody cares. We never look at things beyond
elections. Any criticism of a government takes place only with the
point of view of elections.

What this means is that only those issues which are important from the
election point of view, would be addressed. But the question arises,
as to then which issues are important, if they are there at all? Here,
our media and the grassroots are totally at crossroads. The media
feels the PM or the CM at the state level are more important issues
than say water supply, health or education. On the other hand, the
candidates realize that is not necessarily the case, and they
concentrate on the kind of developmental works undertaken and some or
the other sops being given.

And what are these developmental works actually? The issues of
livelihood. The issues of roti, kapda and makan. And if one may add to
it, in a certain way they are related to bijli, sadak aur paani. These
are the issues which are uppermost in the minds of the people. One
must understand that with the kind of society we are, a caste and
religion-biased society, where Brahmins wouldn't eat with Muslims or
Dalits, where now even the OBC's live separately from them and where
inter-caste marriages are even now abhorred, at least in rural areas,
the kind of politicians who would emerge would also concentrate only
on giving doles to their supporters or caste/religion members as cash
or some kind of incentive.

With the competition between people of different castes and religions
for such govt. doles and rewards like jobs, rather than them fighting
together for a common cause (long back this happened under Gandhi's
movements), and with the kind of society we are (where people revel in
having contacts with the powerful and the rich rather than following
rules), all want a common minimum level of existence, from where
education is excluded.

Also, no political party has been imaginative enough to put health and
education as basic issues in their campaigns and trying to corner the
incumbent governments either during elections or during other times
through mass based movements. Neither have non-political organizations
played a successful role in this part during such times to ensure that
such issues are addressed, which does not mean that they haven't
tried; it simply means they haven't tried enough or the results are
not enough.

People in general also have little patience to understand the
complexity of issues. That is why we have experts to understand them.
But one must remember that things should also be made palatable to the
electorate to back you. In this case, Manmohan Singh is a huge
failure, precisely because he has never contested an election himself.
And Advani may have an advantage here mainly because he has won a Lok
Sabha election before this at least, so he could understand possibly
how to make an issue and its solution palatable to the public. (This
is a possibility, not necessarily the actuality).

The second issue we have forgotten is in our society who is doing
what. The poor don't have the power to actually undertake movements on
their own and fight a battle which can yield results. I don't mean to
say that the poor can't undertake movements. The poor in many states
may have actually done so, but one must remember that in today's
times, when our politicians are image-conscious, things which are not
popular are not going to make much headway. Therefore, one must
realize that unless such things are popular or in the mainstream
media, it is very difficult to get the point across.

Moreover, the poor are more concerned with their livelihoods, which is
the most important issue for them. Things like library are non-issues
from their point of view.

The rich on the other hand do have the power, so also the middle
class. The media is also on this side. However, we have tended to
concentrate more on issues which are not going to help the poor at
all. Forget that, we have not even concentrated on issues which can
help the society at large. Even in the voting campaigns, people are
being encouraged to vote. But the moot point remains this: if all the
candidates are corrupt, what is the point of voting, even if for the
least corrupt candidate? After all, corruption be it of Re. 1 or lakhs
can and should not be tolerated. If terrorism is not tolerated, how
come corruption is tolerated?

Similarly, Hindutva seems also to be an issue going by some great
Rediff articles and views expressed on them. Malls and removal of
slums are issues, even though people don't try to understand at all
the situational changes which can take place by having malls at
certain places, or even the problems in slums and how they can be
corrected without removing them. And of course, we have some other
nonsense things to talk about.

Conclusion:

The library is a public good, and ultimately the library will benefit
the public. The problem is that the rich don't want to fight for it as
they think it's useless to involve themselves in such fights which are
unprofitable (or non-money yielding). The poor don't fight for it as
they have more important issues to look at. The media doesn't take it
up as it's not a 'TRP-giving' news to be looked at, or it is too
serious. And our politicians being image-conscious, believe that
these are not the things which will fetch them votes.

So the library is a non-starter in our cities.

And so, we don't have spaces in public to debate with on a personal
level by and large.

Regards

Rakesh