HISTORY OF INDIAN DEEP STATE PART 1
At the stroke of midnight hour on August 15 ,1947 the word slept while India awoke to life and freedom- Jawaharlal Nehru
India: The civilisational state
According to Samuel Huntington there exists a number of civilizational states in the world . These have district culture and philosophy since the beginning of human history . The future of world politics will be determined by how well the civilizational entities interact with each other. Western civilization is characterised by individual liberty,rule of law,Christianity,Chinese civilization by the Middle Kingdom and Confucius philosophy,Islamic civilization by universal equality and brotherhood, Indian civilization by tolerance of all faiths and philosophy of Dharma and so on.
However these different culures have imbibed certain undesirable features over a period of time which will likely lead to conflicts. The Indian civilization has since ages been stratified by caste , the Abrahamic religions of Christianity and Islam believes in one God and is intolerant of other religious beliefs, the Chinese civilization wants a return to a state where China would dominate the world.
The printing revolution led directly to renaissance in west. Later scientific knowledge led to the Industrial Revolution. The western civilization could not only conquer the other civilisations but also was able to propagate the superiority of its values over others. Thus India till early twentieth century was a colony of Britain . Economically taxes impoverished the farmers who constituted the vast majority. The rate of extraction was so high that there was food scarcity and repeated famines. Simultaneously the British deep state did not allow heavy industry like steel to be established by Indians. The textiles industry was heavily taxed while British textiles flooded the Indian market.
Initially the British were reluctant to establish railways in India. But the threat of Russia from North propelled them to do so for rapid mobilisation of troops.
The Christian missionaries established a number of high quality hospital, schools and colleges in India. Unfortunately their motivation to convert was a major underlying factor. The British moreover tried to denigrate Indian culture as inferior and tried to remove any pride in Indians about their civilization
Most regrettably the British tried a divide and rule policy in India. They encouraged separate electorates for Muslims during gradual movement to self rule. The Muslim league rabidly started communal propaganda against age old tolerance of Indian civilization. As a result Muslims elected them out of fear of rule by a Hindu majority in post independance India. To force partition the Muslim league went for Direct action day in kolkata and started mass killing of Hindus. Soon there were riots everywhere and during the time of partition millions died and many more were displaced as beggars to a new place.
Integration of feudal states
At time of independance there were 565 princely states apart from numerous zamindar estates and jagiris. They had a choice of remaining independent or joining either the former British territories of India or Pakistan. Sardar Patel the home minister of India persuaded states within Indian territory to merge with India. Hyderabad ,Bhopal ,Junagadh were inside India . They had a Hindu population but a Muslim ruler and were large states. Their ruler wanted to join Pakistan ignoring the wishes of the Hindu population. Sardar Patel used threat of Indian army to change their mind. In Hyderabad the Nizam started persecuting Hindus with the help of Muslim razakers. Ultimately Indian army entered Hyderabad .The princely state of Jammu and Kashmir was the last large princely state. It had a dominant Muslim population ruled by a Hindu king and the state was contiguous to both India and Pakistan. Sheikh Abdullah was a popular Muslim leader of Kashmirwho wanted integration with India. Immediately after independance the Muslim areas of Poonch and Northern territories rebelled against the king . Pakistan in a bid to force integration with itself hatched a insurgency of pashtoons from it’s territory ,who moved inside Kashmir killing ,looting and raping the local Hindu,Muslim population and raping Christian nuns. The king of Kashmir desperately asked Indian military help. But Nehru insisted on handing power to local Muslim leader sheikh Abdullah first . Thereafter Indian army moved into Kashmir and threw out the insurgents .
The integration of princely states was essential to create a strong national state. This initial stage of state formation is required to establish rule of law.Thus European nation states centralized power through strong kingdoms before the commercial or Industrial Revolution could take place This stage is absent in many newly independant countries where regional warlords prevent any viable state to establish rule of over its territory.
Democracy and failure of Nehruvian planning
At independance the Indian nation was a country of peasants who were desperately poor from two centuries of forcible heavy taxation . There were only a few industries which had been permitted by the British.To rapidly grow the economy a few things were required : Capital for establishing industries which the peasants did not possess, technical know how and engineers which was absent and markets for selling manufactured products which again the poor majority could buy.
In Europe the advancement took initially in agriculture. The Enclosure laws threw out peasants from land and large farms utilised economics of scale to increase agricultural productivity. This created a rich peasantry which created demand for manufactured goods. They also provided capital for establishing industries.Througout 18th and19th century in England democracy was confined to the propertied classes and there was no democratic rights of workers orwomen .
Jawaharlal Nehru wanted to industrialise India rapidly. For this he established soviet type planned economy. The Mahalanobis plan envisaged public investment in heavy industries through taxation. The consumer durables were open to private big capitalists. However small scale industries were reserved for labour intensive sector.It was supposed that industrial investment would create its own demand for products. Simultaneously IITs were established to produce quality engineers .
The planned economy led to rapid industrialisation. However while soviet Russia or later South Korea industrialised under dictatorship India was a democracy. In a dictatorship orders are followed allowing plans to be coordinated. In India the capitalist class sabotaged the production assigned to them. While in Korea capitalists were forced to invest in industries which required long term planning such was not possible in India. As a result there was chronic shortfall in targets
In agriculture there was no investment. The peasants remained poor and unable to buy manufacturing products. The land was held by absentee landlords who had no interest in tilling them. Again democracy prevented land reforms as the congress party was dominated by landlords.
The labour intensive sector was reserved for small scale sector. As a result these sectors could not have economics of scale and become competitive in global markets.These sectors like toys,furniture have high capital output ratios compared to capital intensive heavy industry. India with scarce capital would have achieved high economic growth if invested massively in labour intensive industry. This was the path followed by Korea and later China.
Social differentiation and politics of appeasement
As an economy grows more and more groups develop economic and political power. This differentiation took place first on the basis of language. There was a demand to change colonial state borders and make them along linguistic basis. There was a risk of separatist movements in this but the compromise was made within the various regional linguistic factions of the congress party itself. Later local politicians in a bid to gain power have been instigating agitations for more states . Some of these were agitation by Bal Thackeray for separate Maharashtra and demand for punjabi suba. Today there are demand by local politicians for Gorkhaland ,purbanchal and so on.
The other political differentiation was empowerment of women . A Hindu code bill was passed giving equal rights to women in inheritance,divorce . However the congress did not have the courage to reform Muslim personal law. Muslim women kept on suffering from triple talaq. Polygamy and a host of injustices till today. The congress also brought Hindu places of worship under public control. Again minority institutions were excluded from this.
Ack:Post independent India ,a perspective. State and and capital in independent India,institutions and accumulations.Clash of civilisations and the remaking of world order
Comments
Post a Comment