Thank You, but No, Thank You, Mr Kaushik Basu.

Kaushik Basu is so much in awe of his “novel” and “radical” idea to stop corrupt behaviour of public servants, that one does not have the heart to administer even a small dose of pragmatic reality.  Intellectuals tend to be simple-minded folks locating their premises and theses in a world which readily agrees to be quantified and categorised, where human beings behave according to the rules of game theory etc.  But ordinary people know that much of human behaviour is resistant to such predictive models. 

Kaushik Basu’s idea is very simple.  Allow the bribe-taker to accept his bribe.  After the criminal act has been accomplished and the objective of the bribe-giver has been achieved, the state, which will henceforth be in a perpetual state of conspiracy with every bribe-giver of the land (only “harassment bribe” givers) will immediately don the role of the avenger and not only prosecute the bribe-taker on the bribe-givers testimony, but will also recover the bribe paid and restore it to the bribe-giver.  An all-encompassing gigantic trap shall be in place for the public servants of all shades and in all situations all the year round.  Kaushik Basu’s idea does indeed revolutionise the delivery of public service and henceforth the burden of harassment shall be carried by the hapless public servant instead of the honest citizen, as it would be evident presently.  “Revolution”, says Bernard Shaw, “does not end tyranny; it merely shifts the burden to other shoulders.”

From illustrations given in his paper it appears that when a citizen is compelled to give bribe to the public servant who is withholding to deliver something which by rights should be delivered unto him, this qualifies to be called a “harassment bribe”.  A relationship of trust and mutuality comes in to play out of sheer necessity, because the law as it exists now makes both the parties to the transaction equally culpable.  The proposed legislation, says Basu, will break this relation of trust and set up a relation of sheer opportunism - an “orthogonal” one - where the bribe-giver will be at the taker’s throat after his objective has been achieved.  The all important distinction between harassment and non-harassment bribe has been only touched upon and, as of now, constitutes bribe given for securing development contracts etc. 

The other very important fact which has not been specified is this – does the bribe-giver get to retain the fruits of his bribe-giving, or is that nullified, once a claim is made about the fruits of bribery?Considering Basu is so enamoured of the idea, by implication, it would seem that the the bribe-giver gets to retain it, or else why should he collaborate so enthusiastically.  We also presume that suitable amendments shall be made in respect of the offences of criminal conspiracy and abetment so that the act of “harassment bribe” and “bribe-taking” fall into two distinct discursive worlds of responsible civic behaviour and criminal conduct respectively.  Some tweaking of the provisions of chapter on “general exception” in the Indian Penal Code will also be in order and the current legal provision of punishing malicious complaints and laws relating to the seizure, forfeiture and confiscation of property will have to be suitably updated . 

Now let us imagine some scenarios in a real world situation where the anti-corruption law as proposed by Basu has come into force. 

Scenario I

A, a casual labour, complains that he paid a bribe of `100 to the public servant to release his wages amounting to `1000.  This complaint makes the authorised public servant liable to be imprisoned for bribe-taking, and the bribe-giver entitled for being restored the `100 which he paid as bribe after confiscating it from the public servant.  The enquiry reveals that A had been employed in some activity in the town but decided to take advantage of the fact that his name appears in the muster roll of his panchayat etc.  He paid a bribe of `100 to get `1000 for no work at all. 

Generally, a significant percentage of illegal gratification especially in activities like MNREGA belongs to this category. 

It is the state which is very often at the receiving end of such commerce because nowhere is there such a thing as a free lunch.  Incentivised by this law A may like to get back the initial investment made by way of bribe as well.  It also opens the way for overcompensation, using it as a weapon of black mail. 

Scenario II

A, an aspirant for some appointment, lodges a complaint that he has been forced to pay a harassment bribe of `100,000 to the concerned authority to issue his appointment letter which he had unauthorisedly held up.  On enquiry it turns out that A was actually nowhere in the list and he paid a bribe to get his name fraudulently included.  Taking advantage of this law now he wants his “seed money” back. 

In a variation on this theme, immediately on appointment, he uses it as a weapon of blackmail to escape some disciplinary proceeding, enquiry, punishment etc.  In another weirder scenario a group of cadets decide to have fun with the concerned authority and collectively allege that they had paid harassment bribe to get in.  The bribe-giver, we must remember is free from any liability and the police are duty bound to institute a cognizable case. 

Scenario III

A, the CEO of a telecom company, decides to buy his way through spectrum bidding.  He makes an irresistible offer of bribe to the competent authority thus making himself guilty of an offence under Sec.  13 (1) d of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 as it exists today.  In the new regime, he files a complaint pleading harassment bribe, making a fool proof case for why he was compelled to do so.  The chartered accountants, investment bankers etc.  can always make a case that such crippling financial commitments had been made in the firm belief that he will win the bid in a transparent bidding.  But sensing that the decision may unfairly go against him, he had been compelled to pay a heavy bribe.  By merely registering the complaint he secures exoneration from any future enquiry under criminal misconduct.  He gets to retain his illegally secured contract.  At the same time, he has made a strong claim for the recovery of initial investment that he made in the form of bribe to the concerned public servant.  In the hands of a competent lawyer the most impregnable wall of distinction between harassment bribe and non harassment bribe will collapse like a house of cards. 

Even if he does not win the contract, he could use the complaint of harassment bribe to indemnify him for the lost opportunity and to punish the public servant for not having obliged him, because nowhere does Basu suggest that unhonoured commitments in a bribery deal shall not be treated as harassment bribe.  This is the paradigm and any commercial deal can be fitted neatly into it. 

Those of us who have any experience of dealing with corruption and vigilance complaints can vouch that the greatest drain on any such organisation is by way of the unconscionably large number of bogus, mischievous and motivated complaints which have to be dealt with nevertheless.  In many organisations, it is now mandatory for the complainant to file an affidavit and also give an undertaking that he would produce material evidence to prove his charges once the enquiry is afoot.  But in practice, in the majority of cases, all that the complainant is interested in is the initiation of the enquiry which discomfits the public servant.  Such a measure will effectively bring to a halt not only commercial decision making, but decision-making of any kind where an accusation of bribery can be credibly raised.  Those in the know will tell you that after the investigation into animal husbandry scam, public spending in Bihar plummeted because any one who had so much as put pen to paper in concerned files raised presumptions of bribe-taking in the mind of investigator.  Post-scam, except for the barest housekeeping expenses, nothing much was spent and a large number of civil servants evaded taking any financial decision.  How much more difficult the situation would be in the new regime where public servants can be exposed to the charge of bribe-taking involving compulsory investigation and at no cost to the accuser. 

Mr Kaushik Basu is doing a good job in his area of expertise.  There is still a lot of scope for more good work and his being distracted to fields of drafting new laws will be a great loss to the common weal. 

The Battle against Corruption - Part II

This is the second part of the article: The Battle against Corruption.

But first let me make my position absolutely clear. I am wholeheartedly in favour of this movement that Anna Hazare jee has launched. As the right person to lead this movement, he brings up the third element in the triad - the man, the moment and the milieu.  But we are aware of another movement dissipate itself without achieving most of its objectives, and many stringent remedial legislations have proved worse than the disease.  This, as well as the other parts that will follow,will elucidate what was contained as brief remarks in the introductory piece. It would be impertinent of me to offer suggestions where the best minds of the country are at work but in the last installment I do intend to offer some practical suggestions.

How does one view the present movement against corruption?  As a symptom of a deep systemic crisis?  As a diffuse longing, on a societal scale, for redemption from our current problems by a mythical messianic character?  As a supreme example of the laziness and evasion of individual responsibility?  As the ultimate triumph of what Umberto Eco calls “Event as Mise en scene and Life as Scene - settings?  Is it a populist movement or a highly elitist one, run by a collectivism?  Or is it a little of both - a movement which feeds at the populist spring but is deeply elitist in its aspirations.  In this post, and the others that will follow, I will try to come to grips with my own confused and muddled thinking on these issues.

Seeking an analogy from the field of philosophy of science, it can be said that any system is designed to cope with all manners of situations that arise on a daily basis.  But there comes a time when the system finds it difficult to cope with arising challenges.  No matter how you tweak it, the problem remains insoluble.  This is the sign that we are now colliding against the boundaries; signal to make a paradigm shift, to abandon the theory and adopt a new and more capacious hypothesis.  Our political crisis in wake of pervasive and ubiquitous corruption in public life is more or less headed for this trajectory.

Democratic traditions are not native to our culture - I know Vaishali and Licchavi etc would be flung in my face.  It is not rooted in history or tradition.  Nevertheless, democracy did not evolve here by a process of trial and error, experiments and conventions as it did in Britain.  We have not grown with democracy; there is no evidence of sustained engagement of our society and democratic institutions.  We are not citizens by a natural process of  political evolution.  Ours – We the People of India – was a conscious and deliberate act of choice to be governed by an agreed set of political institutions.  Our national identification was with the constitution itself and it sought to generalize, diffuse and sublimate what was once held as an obligation to God and other narrow and sectarian loyalties that divide us, into an obligation to our secular republic.  The covenant between the Citizen and the Nation was direct; unmediated by the facts of religion, caste, creed or gender and it was expected that, in the conduct of the public affairs, the nation must survive as the principal object of affection and despair, and no new allegiance must be formed to replace it.  It is a debatable statement to make, but it does not detract from its validity to say that Indian nationalism was a concept which was alien to many of us, and inadequately developed at best.  The Indian constitution is what provides us our self definition.

The Lokpal bill is a tacit suggestion that we are now colliding against the boundary, that the potential of the system has been exhausted and we are approaching the conditions of political entropy.  Perhaps it is a time to make a move on, and the Lokpal Bill is the answer.  The Lokpal Bill is daring in its conception and there are no precedents to it.  But one may like to know why  have the legislations designed to cope with corruption in the public sphere have been found to be inadequate.

In my humble opinion, it is not the inadequacy of the legislation; the problem has been the lack of uniform application because, faced with the mighty economic offender, those charged to apply it develop cold feet, distort it or simply play truant.  To quote just one pithy example:  During the course of the investigation of an offence, the arrest of the local chief minister became necessary but the State Police could not be relied upon to affect it.  As a result, the Army had to be summoned by the High Court, leading to unavoidable controversy?  All because the then DGP could not be trusted to get the warrant of arrest executed.  Institutions have to be vested with authority and it is for the powerful who consecrate it and uphold its writ, whatever the consequence.  Stories abound in the Indian tradition where Gods have voluntarily surrendered to the power of supposedly invincible weapons.

While intellectuals and political pundits may debate the abstract questions   of political theory, I shall limit myself to my own area of experience. It will bear reiteration that nothing on as grand a scale as the Lokpal Bill has ever been attempted before but   let us consider some issues   on the diminutive scale. The   Prevention of Corruption Act 1988 was supposed to be a revolutionary improvement on the PC Act 1947; the definition of public servant was made so capacious as to include almost every one – persons associated with co operative bodies, universities, educational, scientific, cultural educational institutions receiving public funds, UPSC state PSCs banks, MLAs, MPs., whoever was being paid out of or handling public funds. The mere possession of assets disproportionate to known sources   was an offence, without any need to establish a specific act of bribery or corruption. The explanation added to the new section 13 (1) e requires only that income which has been declared according to the prescribed rules etc to qualify as known sources of income.   Income derived legally but undeclared, undervalued income, assets acquired but without prior permission or subsequent intimation became outlawed. It was considered   revolutionary in its scope, reach and ambit, the authentic thunderbolt of gods. Twenty three years down the line it is just another provision, which neither deters nor is as widely used as it should have been, given that amassing   of disproportionate asset by public servants is a rule rather than exception.

Now we have just about everybody declaring his property but not one has been challenged  in the absence of an adequate vigilance machinery.  The idea behind the move may have been that if only the ill-gotten worth of the corrupt were known, it would prove a detterent?  If citizens know that one of their favourite leaders, who was worth 10 lacs in 2004, is worth 500 crores today, or a public figure who is believed to have taken a few thousand crores in one deal is only worth a few crores, does that make the masses pour out into the streets?  Nobody to my knowledge has been prosecuted on the basis of these disclosures.  Does not it mean, then, that each one of us public servants is living within one’s means?  The task of bringing disproportionate wealth to light has been democratized and it is the duty of every citizen to scan the property of the public servant and discover undeclared wealth and unmask him.  This has not been done either.  Are we a less corrupt society merely because a more draconian law has been put in place?   In the absence of wide ranging popular support    merely criminalizing  a conduct or prescribing more deterrent punishment can not  ensure socially useful behaviour.

Another spectacular example would be the Dowry Act, legislated under tremendous media coverage of dowry deaths and activism by pressure groups.  This was a time when dowry was jogging the conscience like nothing else.  It was the number one social evil; therefore, the full might of law - civil, criminal and special legislative acts - was deployed against it.  The act casts the burden of proof on to the accused.   It can be confidently said that the society did not change its mind about the giving and taking of dowry because of the multiplicity of legal remedies, but to our misplaced reformist zeal we owe the incarceration of innumerable innocent old and decrepit men and women, landing up in jail.  The Dowry Act - dowry was as much of a social evil in the eyes of the community as corruption is today - is the most misused act in the history of Indian jurisprudence.  Incidentally, this is the only crime in which the police can claim bribe not only with impunity but with honour - to arrest those who stand even falsely accused at the behest of the complainant.  The new leniency in granting anticipatory bail in many courts is a judicial recognition of this fact.  What is being emphasized is that, try as we might, we cannot run a society by decrees alone.  The excess can only inure us against the evil, even inculcate a sense of fatalism.

I would like to draw upon my experience - banal and exercised in unspectacular setting, in comparison to the grandness of the theme envisaged in the Lokpal Bill, to reinforce this point.  I had been directed by the Hon'ble Patna High Court to investigate a case of academic fraud, which the the normal hierarchy of police was not able to undertake, maybe, because the accused persons were powerful persons.  The investigation led us to the academic underworld, and several Vice-Chancellors, a retired High Court judge, an IPS officer and others were arraigned.  Encouraged by the investigation, the Hon’ble High Court directed me to broad-base the investigation.  Having gained a valuable insight, we proceeded confidently but we hit a tunnel at the end of the light.  What we came up against was not an evidence of random deviant behaviour, but academic irregularity and illegality on an insurrectionary scale.  And you certainly cannot deal with an insurrection with normal laws.  “Should we go about registering cases in their hundreds”, my report to the High Court wondered “maybe in their hundreds of thousands, considering that other universities are waiting to reveal their priceless quota of well known secrets.  Such an enterprise would nullify the very concept of investigation and fair trial because the sheer volume of work which no agency, however diligent can perform.” Then, “there is another problem - and it is no moral quibbling; it is a purely juridical issue.  In what order shall the potential delinquents be called to account … given the various limitations of human resources…  those involved in matters taken up first are likely to be disadvantaged compared to those who are taken up later” etc.  To the best of my knowledge, the matter is still pending and, on a regular basis, crimes with the same modus operandi are revealed and investigated, and the high hopes, fuelled by media hype, of a clean-up of the campuses has gone sour.  Nobody in Bihar, I think, takes the issues of academic fraud seriously, now.

This brings me to my next worry.  The leadership of the movement is in very competent hands - as of now.  Any one of them can do full justice to the office of Lokpal.  But while one legislates and brings into being such agencies, omnipotent in their sway, one has to ask God or Nature - take your pick - to keep us supplied on a regular basis  with such emnent figures.  The matter does not end there.  For the Lokpal to be effective and credible, it has to have an apparatus of investigation commensurate to the task.  But what if nature defaults or God fails to execute the orders on time?  What if we are saddled with another Thomas?  The experience with many of the occupants of high constitutional posts appears to have validated the Peter Principle – sooner or later we will arrive at the Thomas level.  Thomas on a puny symbolic scale was a parlour farce; Thomas on a grand scale would be a national catastrophe.  

My worry is that the grander the ambition, the more spectacular the failures, leading to massive withdrawal symptoms.  In a democracy, critical debate is of the essence.  In this case, that opportunity has been lost, because Television arrived here before everyone else did, banishing  good sense and rational debate.  Therefore, the issue must be put to much wider consultation, more extensive debate, keeping in mind the history of earlier initiatives and the fears expressed in many quarters. We must not be afraid of failure, but at the same time, we must not be oblivious of the grave consequences of failure.

The Battle Against Corruption: How many divisions do we have?

Both hands are skilled in doing evil, the ruler demands gifts, the judge accepts bribes, the        powerful dictate what they desire - they all conspire together”. 

The Book of Micah 7:3 The Old Testament

Anna Hazare Jee’s indefinite fast on the issue of the Lokpal bill underlines the starkness of the situation.  There is a growing perception that despite the urgency of the situation the institutional response to the problem of all pervasive corruption has been inadequate.  Instead of a grim determination to fight corruption or a cogent strategy to contain it, what has been in evidence is  brazen compromise for survival.  Corruption in public life, we may recall, was one of the main planks of the bloodier, longer lasting JP movement.  Regimes have changed several times and yet decades later the same issues are being revisited and the malady if anything has become more virulent.  So while discussing the current crisis one must constantly be aware of the historicity of the problem. 

Anna Hazare Jee is galvanizing public opinion not only on the immediate issue of the Lokpal Bill, but against corruption in public life in general.  The response has been overwhelming and everybody seems to be in a great hurry to come on board.  It is a little surprising, considering the fact that  everyone is with Hazare Jee- politicians of all hues, film stars, merchant bankers and corporate leaders, social activists, civil servants, academicians ,  and yet  the enemy is still looming large.  Therefore, one must take stock of our strengths and weaknesses recognise our friends from enemies and beware of opportunists and fifth columnists, carnival lovers and the feisty publicity seekers. 

Democracy attributes good sense and judgment to its citizenry at large and it is supposed to exercise its control over the day to day functioning of the government through public opinion,(as if there is a body of opinion, fully formed, ubiquitous and all knowing, which once alerted to wrongdoing, will come down like a ton of bricks and ensure immediate remedial measures. ) That, alas! is not true.  Generally speaking people are ignorant and indifferent, people are resistant to mobilization and sustained activism.  Wrapped in their own petty little concerns and anxieties they are easily satisfied with cosmetic changes.  As a worst case they get used to everything – just about everything.  This is where the charismatic leader comes in. 

The fourth estate is one of the seminal institutions of an open society.  As its watchdog, it guards our interest by keeping an alert and ever watchful eye on the functioning of the three estates.  Its criticism has no coercive, corrective function but it creates a climate of opinion in which the government decisions could be tested on the touchstone of legitimacy and public interest.  The nature of its job demands that while holding a mirror to the other three estates it must subject to the public scrutiny because its moral authority depends on the basis of the impartiality and public spiritedness of its stance.

A society can never be – has never been – run by decrees.  To enforce the obedience of its constituents to a certain conduct, the appeal of “unwritten laws” is more important than the coercive powers of law.  Many of us have violent quarrel with our spouses but very few resort to violence, not because they are afraid of the police, but because they fear what their neighbours will say.  Public stigmatization, branding and ostracism are time honoured methods of enforcing socially useful behaviour.  Sustained campaign of exposure in the media, highlighting their wrong doing is very useful deterrent against white collar offenders and other wrong doers.  But the stereotype of the untidy, unshaven, journalist unmindful of threats and impervious to the lure of profit, reinforced through countless films and folklore has now been replaced with the “Radia Tapes” variety of wheeler-dealer.  Never since our independence has media been the target of such generalized distrust. 

It is the political class which is finally responsible for the institutional remedies.  It is they who feed the agenda in legislative forum.  Their attitude can be best summed up by the draft Lokpal Bill.  It has been more than forty years and more in the making and when finally it does arrive, it is a case of too little too late, as Anna Hazare ji would have us believe, and the tokenism of the gesture is in an appallingly cynical disregard of public aspirations. 

 As far as one can remember, in its battle against corruption, the political class always frames the issue in polemical rather than constructive, moral terms.  It is always –“worse immoralities have been seen in your regime”;”My corruption is good, yours is bad.” The issue has never been couched in simple terms – that all corruption is venal and equally reprehensible.  There is no scope for moral relativism or comparative, competitive excuses. 

Needless to say the political class has been so deeply mired in corruption that if it were to fight its battle seriously, it would be equivalent to the mythical bard sawing off the branch he was sitting on.  Therefore, its phony battles are staged, to the accompaniment of the necessary sound and fury, more in order to distract the mildly inquisitive public.  The cut and thrust in the debating forum are in the nature of a highly stylized form of combat which in Mark Danner’s vivid imagery is , “….  like the battles between certain ruminant animals whose horns are set at such an angle that they are incapable of hurting one another.  But though it is unreal it is not meaningless….” 

The quota of public servants arrested “red handed” for accepting bribe, or unearthing of the disproportionate assets of the occasional civil servant, measured in terms of flats jewellery and bank balance helps to keep the constituents peaceful and pacified.  But when it comes to the full scale depredations of robber barons in cahoots with the political elite, investigation is hard pressed to find by ways and blind alleys to hide in. 

All these decorous gestures are part of what Leo Strauss would call the “necessary lie”.  Democratic elites are aware of the actual state of things but they are obliged to keep the people in a state of blessed ignorance.  But truth has a way of getting out and the public odium that renowned political leaders were heaped upon the moment they tried to hitch their wagon to the cause is proof enough that the political class also stands thoroughly discredited.  Its minion the bureaucracy, never the darling of the people, has been given up on, long ago. 

The response of people at large is even more ambiguous because it is rooted in the fact that they are themselves “half victims, half accomplice, like everyone.”   Their lack of combativeness and venom, the extraordinary passivity of the people stems from the fact that they tend to be comfortable with the idea that corruption is an inescapable fact of governance and political morality. 

Hoederer’s admonition to Hugo (who refuses to “dirty” his hands) in Jean Paul Sartre’s play Dirty Hands would induce a curious sense of déjà vu in those of us who have tried to take a stand against the contemporary wisdom:

“You cling so tightly to your purity, my lad!   How terrified you are of sullying your hands.  Well, go ahead then, stay pure!   What good will it do, and why even bother coming here among us?  Purity is a concept of fakirs and friars.  But you, the intellectuals, the bourgeois anarchists, you invoke purity as your rationalization for doing nothing.  Do nothing, don’t move, and wrap your arms tight around your body, put on your gloves.  As for myself, my hands are dirty.  I have plunged my arms up to the elbows in excrement and blood.  And what else should one do?  Do you suppose that it is possible to govern innocently?”   

The ambiguity in the public attitude towards ill-gotten money is the result of our peculiar situation.  Our economy is half white and half black, half over-ground and half underground.  We condemn black money but deal in it, nevertheless.  Under our very eyes, criminals and gangsters acquire wealth, then political power, then more wealth and with it acceptability and social esteem.  Political banditry as a mode of creation of surplus value has long been accepted as a legitimate vocation.  To displace the awareness of these contradictions, we have devised various overt and covert strategies to acknowledge and accommodate the criminality with in our midst.  Lawyers, chartered accountants, investment advisors, honestly work for the legitimization of dishonest earnings by politicians, government officials, corporate CEOs, etc.  Dirty money courses through our formal and informal financial system in different ways, with different consequences.  We do not seek to know hard enough about the offshore funds being routed in our economy for fear of discovering their actual provenance.  We are so enamoured, even over awed with power and manipulation that we tend to ignore what David Bell calls “the economic fulcrum underneath”. 

But these are truths not revealed to us.  In an age when God has abdicated in favour of 24/7 cable TV, we live in presence of media rather than in presence of God, and truth or fact-hood is not an independently verifiable, objective state of being.  Fact-hood has to be conferred.  Even gossip, when aired by the media, commands greater credibility than established fact.  Criminals are being revealed as the conduits for the ill-gotten funds of political stalwarts; political stalwarts are being unmasked as the source of strength and immunity that they enjoyed in the eyes of the enforcement agencies but the media presentation of the issue lends to the whole issue a stance of moral neutrality. 

 To  intensify the asymmetry further  forces larger than all of us taken together – the forces of history- seem to have overtaken us.  Bukharin’s premonitory fears of the development of "state capitalist trusts”, where the state bureaucracy is reduced to being an agent of capital accumulation may  be on its way to being fulfilled.   The 2G scam is the most compelling and detailed validation of this thesis.  To lend a dramatic irony  to the desperate nature of the battle against corruption now that it has been joined in right earnest, some of the best lawyers, the sword arm of the civil society, have been claimed by the  other side and a lawyer of right credentials and requisite merit is hard to come by for prosecuting an important scam! 

Leviathan lives in a state of sin, rulers are by nature profligate and rakish.  Corruption has been a trapping of power, regrettable but unavoidable, throughout the ages.  In the days before media saturation, the distant rumours of corruption in high places never got beyond rumour.  But now the high and mighty are in the open glare of publicity thanks to cable TV.  The current crisis is that all the people, even the poor to whom traditionally the role of remaining honest has been assigned, have lost their purity.  A corrosive cynicism has eroded not only their self belief, but their faith in the entire array of institutions.  All that they are left with is their cold unfocussed anger.  Their helplessness or lack of belief is not as much a cause for worry as the fact that “when people stop trusting the elites, they perceive that the throne is empty, that the decision is now theirs.”  I heard   Jasmine Revolution and Tahrir Square mentioned in this context because they have now become the staple of public discourse.  The radicalization of the masses is a good thing, provided the issues are clearly formulated, achievable and as free of rhetoric and ethical absolutes as possible.  Tahrir Square is not an unmitigated blessing. 

To Be Continued…

Mr. Spock in Khaki

(This piece was written in 1988 and has not been updated.)

It seems that when God made him, going by the prevalent myth that God made us all, He was in a pretty awful mood.  Or maybe, He was not paying enough attention to the work at hand.  Whatever the reason, the overall impression that he creates on first encounter is a testament to God's ambivalence.  His fingers look more like heavy stubs, his jaw would have done credit to a bulldog, and the interchange of his lips with a skunk could have gone unnoticed by either of the creatures.  His gait, his guffawing laughter, the way he clears his throat, the vehemence with which he clamps his incisors and molars on bits of inert eatables in formal dinners in the police mess, compel you to seek models of comparison in other species.  This Police Officer, he would accept no definition of himself other than that he is a policeman, was indeed a mythical figure.  Even though I never had the occasion to work under him, the broad outlines about his career and personality are too well known to need any personal observation of endorsement.

He was more a machine than a man, a thoroughly time kept assemblage of functions who lived by- and for- his work.  He would get up early in the morning, perform his morning rituals of ablutions and oblations and then sit down to work.  The densely populated office would gradually be emptied till there was no one except his personal staff left.  Yielding to their muted but urgent pleading that it was time to go home he would give up at long last.  As a sop he was given a black box full of files.  This routine continued for years.  One suspected somehow he would outlast the creation itself.

He knew the nuts and bolts of his profession: could quote verse and chapter from the Book - The Police Manual - and could generally make mincemeat of anyone trying to cross swords with him on points of detail or regulation.  Subordinates and superiors alike lived in mortal terror of him because he could screw people in next to no time and sometimes he would do it upside down.  To call him a workaholic and a slave driver would be an understatement.  He had put duty in the place where most of us humble creatures would put happiness.  He was a robot whose physiological functions were remarkably akin to human beings.  The only character I can think of comparing him with is Mr. Spock from the original Star Trek.  So Mr. Spock would not let emotions or compassion influence his decisions.  He would tick off other ranks on furlough for being improperly dressed, chastise senior officers for not properly keeping an account of service stamps, and teach the finer points of law to his own superiors.  In open largely attended meetings he could discipline Superintendents of Police and others for impecunious deployment of manpower and tell them some home truths about how their reserve lines were being managed or how the reserve Sergeant Majors were pulling wool over their eyes.  And how correct he was!  It was a familiar sight-him decimating stalwarts from the field. 

He was meticulous about inspections because the Book said that a supervising officer should undertake regular inspections.  The news of his proposed inspections led to large-scale exodus of officers from their assignments and an epidemic of illnesses would sweep the family lines and barracks.  The lucky ones, those who could run away on one pretext or the other, did.  Those condemned to their posts prayed for the calamity to pass off with minimum damage to their persons, positions, ego and status. 

One of the widely prevalent myths about him was that he had a Medusa like stare and whoever dared to look him into the eyes was bound to be suspended-and no questions asked mind you!  One of my colleagues narrated this story to me.  I have no reasons to believe that he was lying because he is posted in the Special Branch and the amount of lies that he must be having to speak in the line of duty ought to have satiated this natural human tendency it to improvise stories just for the heck of it. 

An inspection was in progress.  The whole office looked like a place visited by an earthquake of magnitude 9 on the Richter scale.  In an effort to grab the asked for report or figure or whatever, racks were overturned, almirahs turned upside down, and papers were scattered on the floor, in one big heap.  Even after two hours the Superintendent of Police was gamely hanging on to his chair while one of the lowly functionaries was being given the third degree.  The barrage of questions wouldn't stop until Mr. Spock discovered that the lowly officer, even though he was addressing him, continued to contemplate the toe of his boots.  He peered at the boots.  Well!  They were regulation pattern, in good order and well polished.  He was further mystified and demanded to know the reason why he did not face him while answering the questions.  The officer contemplated his boots, even though he was visibly shaking.  The fire that burnt on its own was fed with more fuel and he threatened to suspend him or perhaps declared that he stood suspended!  The urgent coaxing of the Superintendent of Police also proved equally unproductive and the subordinate officer stood frozen in his stance.  The gentlemen gradually reached his boiling point and the lid of the pressure cooker blew.  He screamed and the deep baritone of his voice sent shock waves through the heart of all those present.  Would it be en mass suspension, transportation for life for all of them, or plain and simple liquidation by the firing squad?   

The Superintendent of Police looked almost beseechingly at his subordinate, while all those assisting at the inspection prayed silently for the target of the rage to look up.  He did not look up but those looking intently at him did notice a faint trickle seeping forth from his trousers.  Since the source of the leak was hidden from human eye, people generally presumed that perhaps under the stress his bladder had given way.  Nobody ever tried to find out, but the volcano of rage suddenly became silent – from incandescent heat it crashed to room temperature in an instant.  

Then by degrees his scowl softened, he let escape an abridged and low pitched version of his famous guffawing laughter and when he became fully seized of the nature of calamity, he burst into the authentic thing.  Eyewitnesses have narrated that he also repeatedly slapped his thighs.  As if on cue, and in descending order of seniority, the SP followed by the next man senior, down to the lowliest policeman present, joined the chorus.  My friend who narrated the story, an excellent ranconteur himself, added for good measure that every one present there almost expected the report of three gun shots.  Jo dar gaya, samjho mar gaya.  But the proceedings came to an abrupt anticlimactic end.  The inspection was called off, a rare and memorable event because Mr. Spock had never broken his routine.

He was a man of many myths and one consuming desire.  To give in his very best by way of professional work and wherever he was posted he became a bit of a legend.  He could elicit awe and obedience automatically, he could almost command the elemental forces of nature.  But he was a miserable failure in his other roles.  He could be pretty ruthless-cold blooded brutal and inhuman.  He is reputed to have been part of many hair rising encounters in extremist prone district but the bloody events did not take him off his meals even for a day because he thought he was doing his duty. 

I had read somewhere that In Marxist Russia, in a city square, an official bulletin calculated to debunk the myth of the indestructibility of soul and other non materialistic claims tabulated in detail, the constitutive  elements of the human body: like nitrogen oxygen, iron, zinc etc and so forth.  Finally it said that when consumed by flames it yielded this much amount of charcoal but evidence of a soul was not found.  I think if they had investigated this gentleman they would have been in for an even greater surprise.  They would not have found any evidence of a heart as well. 

He was a pretty heartless sort of a fellow, not because blood and gore did not affect his mood or normal activities.  Not even because he didn't love is wife-which is perfectly natural, after all.  In fact the lady went round the bend, was driven to insanity, coping with a husband like him.  He was heartless because he did not love his neighbour’s wife.  The most compelling evidence, the evidence which clinched the issue for me came by during a police week. 

This Police Chief was a very gregarious, affable person, handsome and chivalrous.  There were some unsavoury rumours about his integrity but that did not detract from his qualities of leadership or from his appeal in the police force.  In uniformed services every bit of it activity, is touched in the hue of the leader.  Saintly policemen have been known to make parties and celebrations more dull and boring than enjoyable.  But this police week was memorable. 

The police stadium was the venue.  Capacious and cosy, it gave ample scope for circulation as well as savouring the kebabs and other dainties from the many food stalls.  The winter chill had been touched by the pleasurable warmth of the many sigdis and tandoodrs and more so by the great bonhomie of the occasion.  Those of us who loved to have a drop or two indulged themselves in the lobby of the old IP mess.  All in all the mood of the moment could have motivated even the inert furniture to mirth and merriment. 

Many couples were dancing to the tunes of the Police Band - I think the only time I have seen dancing in police parties- and before I could realize I was dragged to the dancing floor by an eminently graceful lady, the wife of a senior officer.  I warned her that my best performances till date had been from the side lines and that I had this uncanny ability of turning every dance to rock and roll – waltzing couples begin to rock under the impact of my gyrations or trip and roll on the floor, their feet keep getting into a tangle.  I was saved by this kind benefactor.  Or so I thought till I learnt better.

This gentleman was utterly lost, an alien to a world of leisure and celebration he did not know the value of this purposeless activity.  He himself was here because the police week was an official event and the invitation had issued under the orders of the Police Chief, but his resources of professional accomplishment were no help.  The Police manual was silent on how to deal with a situation like this.  Mr. Spock saw in me his opportunity to whet the sense of his identity.  He thought I needed some critical advice.  He took me aside, unmoved by coy smiles and warm hellos of the ladies floating around.  He was no dribbler and shot the ball straight away in to my half.  I had just been transferred “prematurely”, - my own definition, however, was that I was mature for transfer once I had taken charge of any new assignment.  He proceeded to explain to me in detail what I should have done and how best I should have fended or defended my position.  One must be fair and apolitical but one must also engage in politics just enough to defend oneself from politics.  Actually he did not put the issue in such a Chekhovian term but he said words to that effect.  Here was this man, I thought, holding me from the pulsating world of dance and music right in front of me, pontificating on a world gone by.  

I broke loose.  How, I wouldn’t know, but I did break loose. 

(... to be continued)

The Wild Goose Chase

(It was quite a job, editing out the sexual and the scatological, not to mention the scathingly vitriolic from “Friends, Foes etc.”, so I have culled an account of things - call it fictional if you like - for my gentle readers.  This is a vignette picked up at random.  If anyone fancies resemblance to the character described herein, he may please himself.  I take no responsibility.)

  

At the same station, we had some comic relief in the shape of another of my superiors.  This character seemed to have materialized straight out of some Rabelaisian farce.  Fat, paunchy, and perpetually hungry, he blamed his obesity on the two prolific cows that he owned.  He had a tremendous appetite, and during visits to my station he would really ply himself with goodies.  I made it a point to invite him over for meals, whatever the time of his arrival.  His opening gambit was, of course, “I have had my fill at home”, but his entire being gave lie to his statement.  It demanded to be fed, to be loaded to the brim.  But he was honest enough.  Immediately after his meals, he would visit the loo and promptly deposit the best part of what he had consumed.  My wife – poor victim of my urge to be hospitable – always treated him as a thing; as one gigantic waste and biogas producing machine.  

Notwithstanding his comical appearance, he was imbued with a Spenglarian sense of destiny.  He looked upon himself as a later day Alexander, Charlemagne and Chanakya, all rolled into one.  He took his work seriously; but he looked at the problems that it presented, through the prism of his many idée fixe.  This led to great quixotic adventures with him at the head of a marching column of sniggering, joking and half-reluctant followers.  His exploits in the area of mistaken identity must await some later day Shakespeare to immortalize him.  Such was his tenacity to his idée fixe that in one remote village, all the persons bearing a particular name abandoned their homes and ran away - fearing interrogation or arrest.  The ostensible reason was that a person with the above name was wanted in a criminal case.  In another village, people stopped riding ponies because riding a pony rendered them suspect in the eyes of my boss.  Some outlaws had reportedly used ponies in the commission of a crime and this particular incident got fixed in his mind in such a manner that the association of man and pony became, for him, the surest sign of criminality.  The gentleman always saw things in generic terms.  If one event had a particular outcome, the class of all such events must have the same ending.  So on and so forth.  And often enough he made reality confirm to his idea of reality.  It left in its wake some avoidable embarrassments; many clues that went a begging, and sleepless nights of futile adventures for all of us.  

He was in his elements during one of the visits of the prime minister to his area of responsibility.  Leaving the surging mass of people to the care of his juniors, he walked up the considerable distance to the VVIP, stood to attention and barked “Good morning, sir”.  The exalted lady was none too pleased at his mixing of genders and asked him to go and do his duty.  But he came back grinning from ear to ear, satisfied with his performance.  

Once he kept the entire hierarchy - from the Chief Minister to the IGP (as the head of police was designated in those years) - on the tenterhooks, by interpreting literal ducks, with the metaphorical ones – some big catch.  This episode needs some re-telling, even though it has become part of police folklore.  

It was a cold winter night, a little more than three decades ago, in an obscure little place in the most backward part of the state.  Those of us who have served in the remote areas of North-Eastern Bihar would have an idea how the winter chill and fog transform the place into a surreal locale.  In the evenings, the countryside seemed to float upon invisible stilts of fog and thin air, and the three dimensions of space got horribly mixed up.  The high road, smooth and eminently motorable, flanked by the low lying fields, spread on and on like a black ribbon, and like a ribbon it effortlessly curled up - sometimes, unexpectedly.  One had to be careful in conditions where visibility, late in the night, could be as little as only a few feet.  You drove more by instincts and gut sense.  The villages were few and far between but they showed no signs of human habitation, as the people around got up with the sun and their activities came to a complete halt with the sunset.  Centuries seemed to have left them by.  Electricity was a rarity in the countryside and reserved for the district and the sub-divisional headquarters.  The whole countryside was submerged in primeval darkness.  The policeman was more like a lone voyager on a lonely planet, or when moving in groups for raids etc., dressed in overcoats and jackets, they appeared to be marauders from the outer space.  

On that cold winter night, I got a call from my boss.  He was conspiratorial as usual, and asked me to get ready fast and assemble as many armed personnel as I could muster instantly.  In the days prior to the automated exchange, the utility of the telephone set was only marginal.  It was, at best, an amplifier - a mechanical augment to natural lung power, because one shouted so hard in the mouthpiece to be heard on the other end.  The circle of confidence, as far as the sharing of sensitive information was concerned, included the operator of the exchange as a necessary party.  So we barked our instructions and received it in the canine form of speech as a matter of course.  But my boss was an exception.  He would whisper in the mouthpiece, and the subordinates had to decipher the susurrations on the other end.  I guessed that we were to raid a particular village three districts away at 4:00 in the morning.  Nothing more.  The objective was not spelt out.  He did not share his intelligence with anyone.  He was a firm believer in the saying: three can keep a secret, if two of them are dead; the trouble was, sometimes he hid it from himself as well.  He said he would be there in a jiffy.  

It was 8 in the evening, we had a drive of about sixty kilometres on metalled road, then about three kilometres on the sandy kas -lined fields (kas is a hardy shrub which grew wild in the riverine areas).  From there we had to cross a river in a country boat and then, by various modes of locomotion, travel another 18 kilometers.  A near-impossible task, given the conditions.  But with him, you could not reason.  The physical constraints apart, everyone knew the worth of his intelligence assets.  But we had no choice in this matter.  It was a one-way street.  We only carried out orders.  

The entire fleet of three jeeps – one each borrowed from my local civilian counterpart and the Executive Engineer of the irrigation department, and my own official jeep - and the FC vehicle of the police station were lined up and loaded with about 35 or 37 reluctant policemen - chowkidars, writer constables, sub-inspectors, all of them deeply convinced of a futile night’s adventure. 

The boss did not keep us waiting for long, and we were on the move just a little past 9:00 PM.  I remember having made a long entry in my diary about the charge of the asinine brigade.  Even the motor vehicles shared the mood of the menagerie and the forward control vehicle would splutter , then threaten to come to a grinding halt but would miraculously pull up and pick up speed – as  much as it could, given its vintage model and the dense thick fog.  After a couple of hours, it was clear that we were going to miss the tryst, whatsoever it was .  The mood of the medley was anything but pleasant.  

Just three kilometres short of the river – or rather the dhar, as an extinct stream was called – we sighted a contraption which appeared to be advancing towards us, in the middle of the road, ambling its way into infinity.  We surmised it to be a bullock cart in the dim light of a lantern, which was hanging by the small bamboo canopy.  Neither the urgent honking of the vehicles, nor the manifest of important dignitaries on board the jeeps, affected its slow and steady progress.  Wrapped in a nirvanic calm, it trudged its way.  Orders were promptly given to discipline the bullock-cart driver, but it transpired that he was asleep.  A half-asleep, half-confused inspector was ordered to take over the reins - or whatever was the term for the mechanics for navigating the bullock cart - and turn it in the reverse direction.  Having performed this task, he marched with a great swagger, as if he had just broken an Olympic record, saluted the boss and took his seat at the back of the jeep.  This one incident recharged my boss and we were exhorted to move on with renewed vigour on our voyage.  

The ambience was a perfect setting for movies in the Woh Kaun Thi (Who Was She?) genre and I always wondered if I would bump into some eminently beautiful and mysterious woman, wrapped in pure white sari, sleepwalking with a candle in her hand.  However all that one found was some fisherman, out with his net, or some other unfortunate creature with a lota (a small metal pot to carry water for ablutions etc) in his hand, victim of an unruly and indisciplined bowel.  In the eyes of policemen, such figures were ex-officio suspicious, strange incongruities, stragglers from the ordinary work-a-day world, which had obligingly receded undercover for the dialectical contest of thieves and cops to be played out.  The police men would invariably demand to know what was the fellow was doing out at that time of the night.  But this was preceded by some very informal greeting, which suggested an unusual degree of familiarity with him, extending to their knowledge of his incestuous relations with his mother, sister or daughter.  These preliminary courtesies were followed by some light hearted, almost playful, pummeling.  Some of the sundry slaps and jabs went only to show the boss that they were not callow or cowards.  I think each one of us had his own fantasy, and found it betrayed.  The vigorous mode of questioning was in large measure fuelled by this collective frustration.  But this bullock cart scene was unscripted, and full credit to the boss that he wrote an impromptu role for us then and there.  

To cut a long story short, we arrived at our destination about five hours late, exhausted and famished, ready to disintegrate at the mere touch of a human hand.  Our contact was a rich local landowner who used to host duck-shooting trips for police officers from the State Headquarters and influential civilians from the State Secretariat.  He was visibly surprised.  It appears that he had sent a QST invitation to my boss through the local Thana about the arrival of the migratory Siberian ducks, the geese and graylags, the teals and the pintails.  My boss, who lived on a single level of obsession, deconstructed the laconic message “the ducks have arrived” as some metaphorical big catch.  The boss could never be accused of nursing even an incipient inclination for poetry, but his misreading of a literal statement for a metaphorical one had led us to this situation.  

I think our cognitive faculties were not at their best, because immediately this bit of news did not quite make sense to many of us.  We just looked blank and barmy.  But when the import of the message seeped in, the undifferentiated and listless bundles of khaki stained by mud and slush, and wisps of kas and other vegetations suddenly achieved critical mass.  Murder and mayhem was uppermost on our minds and the boss did sense the mood of rebellion.  But the hospitality of the obliging host did a lot to assuage our frayed temper.  Our hunger stilled we gradually returned to being our humble disciplined selves.