IT IS TIME TO BAN PUNDITS IN INDIA

I have become a very big fan of two Americans in recent times. Simply because they hold established pundits in utter contempt. One of them is statistician and number cruncher Nate Silver who is chucking his ‘prestigious’ job with the venerable New York Times to join the ‘oh so downmarket’ ESPN. In 2012, President Barack Obama “lost” the first debate to Republican challenger Mitt Romney so badly that most pundits – and opinion polls – started predicting an Obama loss. So pervasive was this “Obama will lose” aura created by myths that many Obama fans became disconsolate. Nate Silverwho claims no expertise on political matters and issueswas perhaps the only one who kept insisting that Obama will win, and win convincingly. Most pundits laughed at his so called stupidity; many accused him of bias and prejudice. In the end, Obama won, and won convincingly. This is what Silver has to say about political pundits in America: “I would argue that MOST political pundits are completely useless; the outliers are the few who are worth reading. Plus the political pundits take themselves very seriously...”

I couldn’t help recalling these lines when I was forced (by a fractured hip bone) to watch hours of television where pundits were analysing latest opinion polls on the Indian political scene. The glittering cast of pundits adorning the TV channels was so formidable that it would be heresy to question their unquestionable wisdom. But Nate Silver kept coming back at me. And it dawned on me that MOST pundits were talking nonsense. The opinion polls indicate that the Congress is going to get battered in the coming elections because of rising prices, poor governance and corruption. You don’t need opinion polls to arrive at that conclusion; just talk to non-pundits in the form of attendants and nurses in hospitals, taxi drivers, maid servants, dhobis, street hawkers, newspaper vendors...and you can figure out. The opinion polls also seem to indicate that the BJP will not benefit and the elections will result in a fractured mandate and a hung Parliament. India’s best pundits then gave their expert opinions on issues ranging from caste to Muslim votes to either the unsuitability or improbability of Narendra Modi becoming Prime Minister.

Ever since this magazine was launched in 2005, there has not been a single electoral verdict in India that has delivered a fractured mandate. And of course, there has not been a single verdict that has not exposed the pundits as no better than astrologers and tarot card readers.

In 2011, venerable media outfits and even more venerable pundits – backed by opinion polls – kept saying that Jayalalithaa Jayaram and AIADMK will win the Tamil Nadu assembly elections but won’t find it easy because of the ‘formidable’ alliance between the DMK and the Congress and the populist schemes announced by them. In the event, Jayalalithaa simply decimated her opponents. Then there were quite a few morons who suggested in early 2012 that no one could form a government in Uttar Pradesh without the support of the Congress. As hysterical reporters marvelled at the crowds gathered to hear the crown prince Rahul Gandhi, opinion polls and pundits pontificated on a fractured mandate, a hung UP assembly and the possible reemergence of the Congress. The UP voter, like Nate Silver, was laughing all along. In Punjab, the pundits were discussing the cabinet formation by Congress leader Amarinder Singh hours before the results were announced. The venerable pundits were discussing how the revolt by Manpreet Badal, the nephew of Akali Dal leader and chief minister Prakash Singh Badal, who formed his own party would badly damage the ruling alliance of BJP and Akali Dal. When the results were announced, some pundits blamed the voters for their lack of wisdom; just as many pundits have branded the whole state of Gujarat as “communal” because the damned voters there keep voting for Narendra Modi!

I simply did not hear one simple thing: that the Indian voter is repeatedly delivering decisive mandates and it will be either the UPA or the NDA in 2014. I am sure pundits on TV channels will have fancy explanations when the electoral verdict of 2014 throws egg on their faces. Just in case you think my words, in the tradition of Digvijaya Singh, reveal that I am a product of an RSS conspiracy, please recall what our pundits were saying before the 2009 Lok Sabha elections. Almost everyone predicted that the Left parties and the “Third Front” would be the winners. Within hours of the results being announced, when the Congress and the UPA won a clear mandate, the same pundits started discussing how good a Prime Minister Rahul Gandhi could be!

I was forced to watch another “Made for Pundits” carnival on television; this one about Amartya Sen versus Jagdish Bhagwati and the Kerala versus Gujarat models of development. Added to this was the debate about poverty – with some Congress leaders claiming you could eat a full meal for Rs.12 or even Rs.5. The pundits are very clear: it is a ‘global, neo-imperialist, corporate’ conspiracy to claim that poverty has declined in India. Then again, people like Modi who tout the Gujarat model of development are false messiahs and frauds because it is Kerala with its superior human development results that is the true road map for India. (You can add Bihar and the Nitish Kumar model to this now. And don’t forget the Bangladesh model because pundits make Indians like me ashamed by showing better human development results in Bangladesh!!!).

I then recalled the other American who can add me to his list of fans [Not that he will care!] – Nassim Nicholas Taleb, author of ‘Black Swan’ and the man who became famous because he was one of the rare ones who actually anticipated the great collapse of 2008. He has written another book called the ‘Anti-Fragile’ which you really must read if you have the time and the mental stamina; not to speak of having an open mind. In the book, Taleb systematically trashes the “pundits” of the world and their wisdom with actual evidence. And this is what he writes about globally respected New York Times columnist Thomas Freidman of the “World is Flat” fame and Joseph Stiglitz, one of the most revered pundits of our times and another Economics Nobel Prize Winner like Amartya Sen: “There is something more severe than the problem with Thomas Friedman, which can be generalised to someone causing action without being completely unaccountable for his words....had Stiglitz been a businessman with his own money on the line, he would have been blown up, terminated. Or had he been in nature, his genes would have been made extinct so people with such misunderstanding of probability would eventually disappear from our DNA”.

I really wish India encouraged “contrarian” voices like this! I do not have the expertise of the pundits when it comes to the poverty war being played out in the media. But I have grown up in Chattisgarh and Odisha and I have personally seen the decline of poverty in the places I have lived in and visited again and again. Alone who says poverty has not declined in the towns and villages that I know intimately, or that it has worsened, is a fraud. Anyone who has lived in these areas knows that it is the Congress who encouraged the plunder and exploitation of the natives. There is no serious analysis required here because the Congress has ruled most of India for most of its existence as an independent country. But I can claim no knowledge of India as a whole. Of course, there is one thing that strikes me when I (SMS your views with your name and topic to 0-9818101234) hear about the wonderful stories of development in Kerala, Bangladesh and Bihar. The most practical way to check human behaviour is to look at how they actually behave. So I keep thinking, if the Kerala model is so great, why do so many from that state keep looking for a better life elsewhere? And then I think, what would happen to Kerala if the nurses, electricians, carpenters, doctors, software engineers and many other professionals stopped sending money “back home”? Besides, if as pronounced by the father of all pundits Amartya Sen, if things are so hunky dory in Bangladesh, why do we so many citizens of that ‘humanly developed’ country want to cross over to India? Of course, Indian pundits say that illegal immigration from Bangladesh is a conspiracy hatched by the RSS types! I interact with pundits like this and think: these are the same guys who kept praising Communism and the Soviet Union even as people from the blessed Communist countries displayed a stupid tendency to migrate to ‘Imperialistic’ domains. These are the same guys who became pundits specialising in environment, inclusive growth, secularism and....

Need I say more?

IT IS TIME TO BAN PUNDITS IN INDIA

DREAMING ABOUT THE DREAM DEBATE

And so the expected has happened. The Mother of all Mai-Baap sarkars in the world has passed an ordinance clearing the Food Security Bill. At the stroke of a pen, Sonia Gandhi will realize the dream expressed by the grand father-in-law Jawaharlal Nehru at the stroke of midnight in 1947. About 800 million grateful Indians will now marvel at her kind spirit as they get virtually free food from the government (Of course tens of thousands of bureaucrats, contractors and suppliers will soon demand that the Pope declare her a Saint for the untold manna from heaven that she is going to shower on them). After organizing the signature campaign and sending the petition to Rome via Federal Express, this smaller group will carry the Gita or Quran or Bible or the Guru Granth Sahib and flock to temples, mosques, churches and gurudwaras with just a single prayer to their God. “Please guide these 800 million idiots to polling stations and tell them that salvation is guaranteed if they kiss the Hand that feeds them.” And what about the ungrateful who are carping at this once in a millennium gesture of largesse and noblesse oblige? What of their plaintive cries that this will bankrupt an already bankrupt government? What of their warnings that the poor will continue to starve and be malnourished like they have despite more than four decades of similar programs and welfare schemes. Off the record madam’s minions will smile and say they are playing something called Power Games, and not Hunger Games. Acolytes of the crown prince who have an MBA degree will invite applications from employees of the global Pizza chain that coined the slogan: Hungry Kya? Simultaneously, applications will be invited from employees of a species called NGOs (Neo Godly Organisations) who will holler and scream that Modi is culpable of genocide because he doesn’t support the Food Security Bill. Many pundits in TV studios will discuss how cops in Gujarat killed the Bill in a fake encounter. Of since the Bill has divine blessings, it was miraculously resurrected. To cap it all, Pawan Kumar Bansal will be reinstated as the Railway Minister to ensure that all those millions of tons of food grains are transported in the proper “bags”, the Railway Board will create a new post for a senior bureaucrat to oversee this ship of salvation that will be akin to Noah’s Ark. Interested parties will be encouraged to contact certain nephews. The term ‘Gravy Train’ will acquire a new meaning. And of course, the caged parrot will come in handy to fix some potentially ungrateful souls who have the capacity to lure away many of those 800 million souls who might otherwise kiss the Hand that feeds them.

Since India has gone completely batty and crazy, I think even I am entitled to sing a few loonie tunes. But mind you, the tunes might sound loony to you, but they actually provide a glimpse of the future that awaits India. You see, Madam Gandhi not only has the support of sycophants, fixers, hacks and assorted jholawalas, she has the “intellectual” support of a Nobel Prize winning economist cum philosopher. Yes, we are talking about that argumentative Indian Amartya Sen. When the Parliament was repeatedly disrupted by the coal and the railway scam in April, 2013, it looked as if the UPA government would not be able to pass the Food Security Bill. Amartya Sen jumped into the fray with a delicious display of outrage and basically slammed the opposition parties – mainly the BJP – for blocking such an important piece of legislation. He thundered: “The case for passing this Bill is overwhelming...I would prefer this Bill to no bill at all... Those busting parliamentary discussion should be held responsible for not solving the problem of hunger in the country...we need to ask: who will be held responsible for the deaths of millions of malnourished children in the country?” The obvious questions anyone with common sense would ask is: the Congress has ruled India for about 54 out of 65 years since independence in 1947. What has the party done to even minimize hunger, forget eliminating it? The second question is: the UPA under Madam Sonia had nine years to get a Bill like this passed by the Parliament. Why issue an ordinance when a Parliament session is just a few weeks away? The answer is obvious: political gains. And it is an enormous help if the Godfather of jholawallas lends a helping hand by slamming non-Congress parties. But more important than these political hunger games is the mindset of such Left leaning “liberals” who think that the reforms process has made life worse for India’s poor and hence more and more extravagant welfare schemes are required. This idea of India and this vision of India has dominated mainstream discourse for decades.

But there are people who offer an alternative vision. For instance, Jagdish Bhagwati whose ideology is completely at odds with that of Amartya Sen. In a speech delivered to the Indian Parliament in 2010, Bhagwati tore apart the Amartya Sen school of thought by saying: “But then, the naysayers, among them the socialists in the currently ruling Congress Party, have rejected the miracle produced by the (1991) reforms by suggesting darkly that the growth lacks a human face and that it is not inclusive, that the gains have accrued to the rich wile the poor have been immiserized, that inequality has increased and that India stands condemned before the world. Perhaps the most articulate critics are the “progressive” novelists of India, chief among them Pankaj Mishra whom the Op-Ed page editors of The New York Times regularly and almost exclusively incite to write about the Indian economy, a privilege they do not seem to extend symmetrically to American novelists to give us their profound thoughts on the US economy. While Mishra’s analysis is eloquent and captivating, (it) is really fiction masquerading as non-fiction. The fact is that several analyses have sown that enhanced growth rate has been food for reducing poverty while it has not increased inequality measured meaningfully and that large majorities of virtually all underprivileged groups polled say that their financial situation has not worsened and significant numbers say that it has improved”.

The whole of India is talking about the imminent face off and showdown between Narendra Modi and Rahul Gandhi. In reality, Modi and Rahul are mere symbols who represent two divergent ideas of India. The two ideas have been best articulated by Amartya Sen and Jagdhish Bhagwati. As students, both were contemporaries at Cambridge University (Manmohan Singh was another contemporary) and Sen moved towards the Left while Bhagwati moved towards the right. It would indeed be a dream cum true for the two to have a public debate about their divergent visions of India’s future. Many economists and analysts have even demanded that the two engage in a verbal duel. Sadly, that has not happened, though Bhagwati seems very keen on it because he told The Economic Times in an interview: “Of course I have been against pro poor policies. From my first job in the Indian Planning Commission in the early 1960s, I have been working on how to reduce poverty. What I have objected to are the specific anti poverty policies that Professor Sen has backed, in one way or another. Those policies have demonstrated actually increased poverty! You must ask Professor Sen, and not me, why he will not engage in a debate with me, even though he has been invited by others. After all, he is the one who used the phrase argumentative Indian...”

Will the Nobel winning philosopher rise to the bait and the occasion? We are all waiting with bated breath. But we know where Sen’s preferences lie when it comes to politics. When asked about dynasties in Indian politics, he said: “Would Rahul someday make a good Prime Minister? It is quite possible. I know him a certain amount. I once actually spent a day with him and I was very impressed...I think he is very talented. It was clear to me that he was committed to India’s development”.

Food for thought, isn’t it?!

DREAMING ABOUT THE DREAM DEBATE

THE STUPID HYSTERIA OVER NARENDRA MODI

And so the noise, the trading of barbs, the hyperbole and the hysteria has begun. It is now certain that Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi will play a key and decisive role in formulating the BJP strategy for the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. It is also certain that both his die hard supporters and his die hard opponents will raise decibel levels to a crescendo of cacophony, allegations, counter allegations and recriminations. For Modi fans, the man is a Messiah who will miraculously bring about good governance to the country. For those who are implacably opposed to Modi, the man is a fascist and a “Maut ka Saudagar” who is a clear and present danger to the very Idea of India. Logic, facts, common sense and even a semblance of sanity vanishes when these two groups are pitted against each other. His fierce opponents inhabit the world of academia, mainstream media and activism. For decades, these secular warriors have dominated the discourse on history, politics, society and what not in English media. Not all the secular warriors are open or even closet supporters of the Congress. But they do share a pathological dislike for Modi and are convinced it is their fundamental right to expose him. His fans mostly inhabit the world of Internet Hindus who revel in sniping at mainstream media icons and academic giants whenever they criticise Modi. For them, Modi is a saviour who will release India from the clutches of secular fundamentalists and an establishment that is beholden to the Gandhi family. For his supporters, the very idea of Modi becoming the Prime Minister is akin to salvation; for his opponents, it is as good as Apocalypse. This hysterical war of words will be played out on television screens, in newspaper and magazine pages and in the brave new world of the Internet. This hysteric positioning of ‘with us’ or ‘against us’ rhetoric has taken the absurd to absurd, and often laughable levels.

But almost everybody seems to be a missing a key point here. I can openly bet that a majority of Indian citizens and voters are yet to form a concrete opinion about Narendra Modi. Look at someone like me. When his supporters go on and on about Modi magic in terms of development and good governance, I wonder at the hype and also wonder why other chief ministers who have delivered governance are not anointed as messiahs. When his fans keep on and on about how he has won three consecutive assembly elections, I wonder why we forget that Naveen Patnaik and Shiela Dixit have done it before Modi. The converse also applies. When Modi baiters go on and on about the “genocide” in 2002 in Gujarat, I wonder why these secular warriors do not talk as passionately about the massacre of Muslims in Assam, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Maharashtra when the Congress has ruled the States. As far as I am concerned: post-Independence India has witnessed two genocides: in Nellie, Assam in 1983 and in Delhi in 1984. In both the events, the Congress was implicitly or explicitly complicit. People like me are convinced that Modi can never escape moral responsibility for the Gujarat 2002 riots. But we are also convinced that the track record of the Congress is even more brutal and horrific when it comes to dealing with minorities. So when secular warriors keep harping only on Modi, people like me start wondering what their real agenda is. Take another example, when some people praise Modi for high growth rates and industrialisation of Gujarat, his sworn enemies dismiss the praise by saying Gujarat was always a developed state and Modi is getting undue attention. Perhaps they are right. And yet, when people die of swine flu in Gujarat, the same people descend like a pack of wolves and hold Modi personally responsible and culpable for those deaths. The fact of the matter is that both his fans and opponents are equally responsible for creating the larger than life image of Modi. Secular warriors gleefully do victory laps when the Wharton Business School and the University of Pennsylvania withdraw an invitation to Modi. Modi fans start swooning over his address to students of Sri Ram College of Commerce as if no Indian politician has ever given a more important speech.

In all this gibberish, balderdash and nonsense, we seem to forget that there are Indians who neither love nor hate Modi. Yes, they are very aware of his steady rise as the most powerful leader of the BJP. Yes, they are also aware of the daily onslaught of charges and abuse that he faces from secular warriors. But believe me, no matter ho passionately you dream about for or against Modi rhetoric, most Indians have not yet made their minds. Lets us look at some facts first. Gujarat 2002 was neither the first nor the last riot that embarrassed and ashamed India. But there is one difference here: no other riot and its aftermath has been so persistently and relentlessly investigated by all manner of agencies and institutions including the Supreme Court of India. No other chief minister of India has been so persistently investigated either, no matter what spin doctors would have you believe. And by no means are all the investigations over. There is still a possibility that Modi might be found legally culpable. If that happens, he can only blame his own alleged acts of omission or commission. But aren’t we forgetting something here: surely law stipulates that a man is innocent till found guilty and convicted by a court of law? No matter what your ideological fervour or prejudice, surely it is a fact that no chief minister in India has faced one decade of scrutiny and investigation than this man.

The second indisputable fact is applicable to both his hysterical supporters and opponents. His supporters think it is a matter of time before he becomes the Prime Minister and saves India. His opponents think he will destroy India in the unlikely event that he becomes the Prime Minister. Come on guys: why don’t you leave it to the voters of India to decide? Both his opponents and supporters can expect nasty surprises from the Indian voter.

Till then, can you please pipe down this hysteria and get on with life?

THE STUPID HYSTERIA OVER NARENDRA MODI

Playing the fiddle and crying wolf

Why has India failed to overhaul, modernise and transform its infrastructure sector? The answer is threefold – poor policy making, poor regulatory oversight, and extreme levels of crony capitalism!

THERE is such a torrent of information, news, PR stuff that passes as news, analysis, opinion and pseudo punditry that it becomes almost impossible to stitch together the seemingly diverse strands to weave a coherent picture. But once you just making a list of the seemingly unrelated events, you cannot escape looking at the big picture. And the big picture is a frightening one of the entirely unnecessary and destructive implosion of India’s ambitions to take its infrastructure at least above Third World levels. Just consider the following news reports or opinion pieces that you might have read in newspapers- more often white than pink-in recent times:

1. In the second half of 2012, it was reported that India actually lost about 60 million mobile connections. So instead of marching towards a subscriber base of one billion, India now has less than 900 million phone subscribers. The reason given is that mobile service providers are disconnecting ‘inactive’ numbers to boost bottomlines. Of course, you must have also read that MTS abruptly disconnected 1.8 million customers by shutting down its services in Mumbai claiming it was forced to do so because of Supreme Court orders.

2. Some time late last year and early this year, the infrastructure group GMR announced that it is withdrawing from a prestigious and crucial highway project that is supposed to link Kishannagar in Rajasthan with Ahmedabad. GMR officials stated that the group was withdrawing from the project because the National Highways Authority of India was taking too long to acquire land for the highway project. In contrast, NHAI officials complained that the group is withdrawing because it is facing a financial crisis and is using tardy land acquisition as an excuse. Another infrastructure group from the state of Andhra Pradesh, GVK also withdrew from similar highway projects.

3. Sometime in July 2012, the entire northern and eastern grids of India virtually collapsed resulting in massive power cuts and outages across vast swathes of India. Life literally came to a standstill as even trains stopped dead in the tracks. As is wont in India, there was a furious blame game with the Power Grid Corporation accusing some states of irresponsibly overdrawing power from the national grid. Around the same time, you must have read news reports or rumours that the Gandhi family had requested the Akhilesh Yadav government in Uttar Pradesh to ensure uninterrupted power for Amethi and Rae Bareilly as loyal voters were up in arms against prolonged power cuts. Of course, you must be aware that soon after the collapse of the power grid that made India a laughing stock, the Union Power Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde was ‘promoted’ to the post of Union Home Minister in a cabinet reshuffle.

4. Television news channels that telecast live a press conference addressed by Aam Aadmi Party stalwarts Arvind Kejriwal and Prashant Bhushan have been reportedly served defamation notices by Reliance Industries Ltd. During the press conference, Kejriwal and Bhushan had made a series of allegations against Reliance Industries related to the KG basin gas project and accused the central government of protecting the interests of Reliance Industries at the cost of national interest. Most of you would have either seen the press conference or read about it in newspapers. But the drama of the live telecast diverted our attention from a crucial fact: according to the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons, gas output from this critical source is slated to decline from last year’s level of about 37 million standard cubic meters per day to about 27 mmsd in 2012-13 and even further to about 22 million mmsd by 2013- 14. A host of power and fertiliser plants dependent on gas from the KG basin are effectively crippled. Meanwhile, there is a running battle going on between the CAG and Reliance Industries over audit of the project, with no resolution in sight. You might recall that Sushil Kumar Shinde was given the Home portfolio after the power grid disaster. In this case, after persistent rumors that the then Petroleum Minister S. Jaipal Reddy was being tough on Reliance Industries Ltd, he was shifted as Minister of Science and Technology.

5. Just recently, the Supreme Court of India pulled up the Central Bureau of Investigation for the tardy pace at which it was investigating the alleged coal block allocation scam. The CAG had opened a virtual can of worms in 2012 when it accused authorities of massive irregularities in allocations of coal blocks. There are many who seem to think that the alleged coal allocation scam is even bigger than the 2G scam, though media interest in the issue seems to have tapered off after an initial flurry of reports and speculations. But once again, allegations and counter allegations over the alleged coal bloc allocation scam had diverted our attention from a crucial and deeply distressing fact: according to a recent Reuters story, India imported more than 72 million tonne of coal in the period April-December 2012. That is an almost 50% jump compared to last year. The same Reuters story quotes analysts saying that coal imports during fiscal 2012-13 will be about 107 million tonne and climb further to 115 million tonne by 2013-14. That is because domestic coal production is simply failing to keep pace with growing demand. By the way, India has the third largest reserves of coal in the world and such massive imports are putting a further strain on India’s already serious trade and current account deficits.

6. Some of you might have read a surprise story in February 2012 which stated that Kingfisher Airlines surprised employees by paying one month salary to its employees. Employees of the airline claim that they have not received salaries since May 2012. Of course, we all know that Kingfisher Airlines is effectively grounded and shut down. There are reports that banks that have lent money to the airline are sure they can recover only a part of the amount even if the courts liquidate the airline. In many ways, the virtual demise of this high profile and once celebrated airline is symptomatic of how the once soaring civil aviation sector in the country is in danger of a crash landing. According to a study by the Centre for Monitoring the Indian Economy based on data released by Airports Authority of India, passenger traffic will actually decline by 2.5% in 2012-13 as compared to the previous year. This is mainly because of a steep fall in domestic air traffic.

7. The Chief Minister of Delhi, Sheila Dixit, was featured in newspapers on February 25, 2013, for a strange reason. She was quoted as apparently saying those residents of Delhi who complain of high power tariffs should consume only what they can afford. When the distribution of power was privatised in Delhi in 2002, there was hope that private firms will ensure that the then figure if 55% T&D loss – an euphemism for theft – would be drastically reduced. That in turn would actually lead to lower tariffs for consumers in Delhi. Of course nothing of that sort has happened and power shortages as well as high tariffs have become a political hot potato for the Sheila Dixit government. But Delhi is only symptomatic of the entire country. According to the Central Electricity Authority, India is looking at a power deficit of more than 10% in the current year. Power cuts range from about one hour a week in states like Gujarat to about 30 hours a week in states like Tamil Nadu. Mind you, both are industrialised states. The less said about the so-called poor states, the better. The reason given by the authority is critical shortages of coal and gas – two things we have already mentioned above.

8. In 2012, Union Commerce Minister Anand Sharma admitted to Parliament that only 154 out of 587 Special Economic Zones approved under a 2005 policy were operational. In contrast to the promise of creating millions of jobs and creating China style manufacturing jobs, the actual number of jobs created was just about 800,000. The minister stated that SEZs accounted for about a quarter of exports from India. What he didn’t add is that most of these export earnings came from software firms that had shifted base to SEZs to available tax exemptions. Even a child knows that even a fraction of the Chinese miracle has not been repeated by Indian SEZs, with most of them becoming speculative real estate deals.

9. Things were not looking so bad once upon a time. When Atal Bihari Vajpayee was the Prime Minister of India, he implemented a cess on sale of petroleum products to exclusively finance the expansion and modernisation of India’s highways, including the prestigious Golden Quadrilateral project. He gave the responsibility to implementing the scheme to Major General B. C. Khanduri. Even critics of BJP and the then NDA government reluctantly admit that the highway modernisation project was one of the genuine success stories delivered by the Vajpayee government. Around the time the NDA lost power in 2004, India was adding about 18 kilometers of spanning new highways every day. Today, that figure has dropped to a measly 2 or 3 kilometers at best.

Clearly there is something seriously wrong with the infrastructure sector on India. One top level industry analyst recently told me why he thought that the recent policy to allow FDI in the retail sector is more of a joke than a revolutionary step. He simply laughed at the idea that global chains like Wal-Mart will invest huge amounts and transform India agriculture as well as food processing industries. His logic: Wal-Mart is not going to invest money to build power plants that will allow cold storages to function. Nor will it invest dollars in building roads that will connect the rural hinterland to urban markets. He further said that one of the key reasons for the rate of GDP growth crashing from more than 9% a year to just about 5% a year now is because of India’s appalling and inexcusable failure to overhaul, modernise and transform the infrastructure sector. According to him, this failure is going to haunt India for many many more years to come. That is because infrastructure projects take years to come to fruition and even a dramatically charged up UPA regime cannot do much in the immediate future in terms of concrete results.

What actually went wrong? The answer, without beating about the bush, is threefold. The first is poor policy making. The second is poor regulatory oversight. And the third is extreme levels of crony capitalism. Look at how the UPA government adopted policies to allocate spectrum in telecom and coal blocs on the mining sector. The policies were inherently flawed and bound to generate controversy and confusion. The results are there for all to see. Something similar happened with a policy decision by the civil aviation ministry to allow airlines only with at least five years experience of domestic flying to launch global operations. Something worse is happening with the proposed Land Acquisition Bill that will make it a nightmare for investors to acquire land for any infrastructure project. There doesn’t seem to be any hope too of this government paying heed to common sense voices and adopt sensible and transparent policies. The second key reason for this unfolding nightmare is poor regulation. The Delhi Electricity Regulatory Authority is a classic case. One year, the body accuses the private power distribution firms of unethical behaviour and refuses to entertain their demands for a fare hike. The next year, it mysteriously allows an even bigger hike despite widespread protests. The Directorate General of Civil Aviation has similarly failed to look either after the interests of the consumers or behave in a consistent and rational manner. We all know what has been happening and what is happening with the telecom regulator TRAI. Then again, it did appear as if the regulator for the petroleum industry the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons was sleeping even as gas production from the KG basin started falling alarmingly.

But poor policy making and poor regulation are mere manifestations. The real reason is crony capitalism. There have been so many allegations of scams during this regime that it is difficult to keep track of all of them. They seem to come out as regularly as pot boilers starring Akhsay Kumar. But there is one common strand in almost all the allegations of the scams. They are related to the infrastructure. Power, SEZ, telecom, highways, coal blocks, gas fields and civil aviation seem to to be sectors that have been the worst affected by scams. The sad thing is: there seems to be no end to this brazen practice of crony capitalism. The implosion of India’s infrastructure sector will continue.

Playing the fiddle and crying wolf

WHO SAYS MODI BHAI AND RAHUL BABA ARE THE ONLY CHOICES FOR PRIME MINISTER?

Congress leaders were triumphant after results of the Gujarat assembly elections were announced. Senior leader P. Chidambaram said in virtually as many words that Congress had won because it had restricted Modi and BJP to barely 115 out of 182 seats. For Modi fans, the script was entirely different. His third successive election victory made him a strong contender to be the BJP candidate for Prime Minister. In Jaipur recently, nervous Congressmen heaved a sigh of relief and shed tears of joy when Rahul Baba finally agreed to lead the Congress in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. Since then, we have seen an overdose of articles and columns comparing the two as potential prime ministers. If you go by excitable media reports, 2014 could well be an American Presidential style election where voters will have to choose between Modi Bhai and Rahul Baba.

But I most humbly disagree. If you look deep and hard, India has literally a wild variety of choices when it comes to who should be the Prime Minister. Come on, if Deve Gowda, the late I. K. Gujral and Manmohan Singh can become Prime Minister, surely almost anybody can. And I am not talking about the likes of Mulayam Singh Yadav, Nitish Kumar and Jayalalitha as strong contenders. In the true spirit of democracy, I cast my net wide and far and came up with a very rich catch of choices. Here is a not so comprehensive list of gifted, talented, visionary and messianic Indians who have superb qualifications to be the next Prime Minister of India:

Asaram Bapu: Who better than this fountain of Vedic Wisdom and champion of gender equality and female empowerment. I am not so sure about what his domestic and economic policy agenda would be. But I am absolutely convinced this great man will do a superb job of making all our borders safe and secure. You see, almost all his female devotees will be dispatched to our borders. Dancing to the tunes of devotional songs, they will all keep asking real and alleged enemies to treat them like sisters. The Pakistani soldiers will be so inspired that they will start beheading themselves. The Chinese would be so shell shocked that they would promptly give up all claims on Tibet. And there will commence a citizen movement in Bangladesh that will demand the return of all illegal migrants from India. Each cabinet meeting will be a Satsang where Asaram Babu will drop further pearls of wisdom.

Akbaruddin Owaisi: This mind blowing orator and contender for the Nobel Peace Prize will firmly have a simple domestic agenda. His first decision as Prime Minister will be to declare the birth anniversary of the last Nizam of Hyderabad as a national holiday. His second decision would be even more historic. He will decree that all police stations in India be shut down for 15 minutes once every week. That will enable the 25 crore Muslims of India to show the 100 crore Hindus of India who the real Boss is. Even as Hindus and Muslims indulge in a new national pastime and sport called This Week in Riots, the new age Nizam will go to London as a medical tourist. This will greatly improve relations between the former Imperial Power and the new Caliphate. Owaisi will also announce a weekly award worth Rs.100 million for a slogan writing contest where you will be encouraged to denigrate Hinduism. Hordes of media celebrities and secular activists and academicians will literally kill each other to become participants.

Poonam Pandey: This new Light of Asia will bring about revolutionary and unthinkable changes in India and perhaps even in the world at the drop of a strap. You see, every time Hafiz Saeed makes a menacing threat against India, this leader will make an even more menacing threat. She will threaten to “reveal all” to the world and expose the duplicity of the Pakistani state. Every time China says it must have Arunachal Pradesh, this icon will promise to “bare all” if China persists with its perfidy. And each time America disappoints India by not sentencing the likes of David Headley to death, she will summon an emergency cabinet meeting in the showers. The agenda, of course, would be to “expose it all” for the world to see. Poonam Pandey will also create history by leading the first ever all woman government. Sunny Leone would be our permanent representative to the United Nations. Sherlyn Chopra would be our Ambassador to the United States. Rakhi Sawant would be the Union Minister of Home and Mallika Sherawat would be the Union Minister for Health and Education. All of them will regularly tie Rakhi to Asaram Bapu. You know which Rakhi I am talking about.

N. Srinivasan: This visionary and selfless leader will take so many bold steps that the Indian economy will grow bigger than that of China within a decade. And his imprint would be stamped both across domestic and foreign policy frontiers. To begin with, he will organize something called the ICL – Indian Caste League. Upper caste and OBC chieftains and leaders of Khap Panchayats would be allowed to bid for teams. The floor price for the auction would be one billion American dollars. In each match, the man of the match would be the one who kills the most lower castes, Dalits and tribes within a stipulated time period. The winning team, of course, would be the one with the best kill record. Bihar, Haryana and Maharashtra would be the natural contenders to play host for the finals. There will be one other condition: all teams have to sign a bond that will make Sunil Gavaskar and Ravi Shastri the permanent commentators. Srinivasan will implement equally revolutionary policies in the foreign policy and defence sectors. He will organize an open auction of the Indian armed forces at a glittering event in Dubai. Indian companies will not be allowed to participate. Only multinationals, particularly those from China, will do so and the event would be telecast live on all channels of the Star Network. This franchise will be called IDL – India Defence League. There will be a third franchise called ISL – India Suicide League. In this, bidders will be encouraged to push more and more farmers to commit suicide. You must have guessed by now that Sharad Pawar would be the Chief Mentor of this franchise.

Rohit Shetty: Bollywood is the heartbeat of India and is capable of throwing up some sterling candidates for the post of Prime Minister. I can think of the duo of Javed Akhtar and Shabana Azmi who would make poetry recitation mandatory in cabinet meetings. I can think of Mahesh Bhatt who would offer valuable advice to Barack Obama even as he is shooting his next soft porn venture. But the vote actually goes to Rohit Shetty. When he is Prime Minister, he will release yet another sequel of Golmal every time India faces a crisis – either domestic or foreign.

Arnab Goswami: This is a simple and straightforward choice to vote for. This fearless leader has already declared war so many times on Pakistan, China, America and sundry others that wars would become history when he takes over. As a television anchor, he has bamboozled panelists and mesmerized Indians by repeating just one sentence tirelessly and endlessly: The nation demands an answer. When he becomes Prime Minister, he will change his daily chant which will become: I demand an answer from the nation.

I am sure fellow Indians have even better suggestions and choices. Please do email and SMS your valuable suggestions. India needs you.

WHO SAYS MODI BHAI AND RAHUL BABA ARE THE ONLY CHOICES FOR PRIME MINISTER?

WHY HE WILL BE EVEN MORE DANGEROUS FOR INDIA IN 2013

This man has already achieved what no other non-member of the Gandhi family has ever done. The closest to his record is Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who was Prime Minister for six consecutive years between 1998 and 2004. P. V. Narasimha Rao is another non- Gandhi who completed 5 uninterrupted years as the Prime Minister. The next best is a Gandhi family member Rajiv Gandhi, who led the government between 1984 and 1989. No other Prime Minister – except Jawaharhal Nehru and Indira Gandhi – has survived five uninterrupted years as Prime Minister. Nehru was PM continuously from 1947 till his death in 1964. Indira Gandhi was PM between 1966 and 1984, except for a two and half year exile between 1977 and end-1979. The way things are changing in Indian society and economy in terms of aspirations and expectations, even die-hard supporters of Congress will snigger at the suggestion that Rahul Gandhi could be Prime Minister for 10 consecutive years beginning 2014. So there is absolutely no doubt that, in a factual context, Manmohan Singh has already secured his place in history. It is a different matter that an ‘unelectable’ bureaucrat completing 10 successive years as Prime Minister reflects on the quality and the depth of Indian democracy. But credit must be given. Manmohan Singh will almost certainly complete 10 years as PM. But will history talk about him and his lengthy tenure the way it will keep dissecting the track record of Nehru and Indira? For that matter, forget Nehru and Indira, will he ever acquire the stature that even Vajpayee has assured for himself? Let’s look at it in another, more blunt manner: will history ever talk about the legacy left behind by Manmohan Singh? Quite frankly, history books will confine him to a supporting role at best as they analyze the legacy of Sonia Gandhi. Sad, but Dr. Singh will leave behind no legacy: faceless bureaucrats who selflessly do the bidding of political masters never do so. And yet the man, the economist, the bureaucrat, the courtier and the reluctant politician knows that he has achieved something phenomenal by becoming Prime Minister for two consecutive terms. And even faceless bureaucrats have egos and dreams. There is no doubt whatsoever that Dr. Singh knows his days as Prime Minister are numbered. He knows that even if the UPA manages to win another term in 2014 and Rahul Gandhi decides he is better

off enacting the role of Sonia Gandhi by pulling the strings from behind the scenes, it is another courtier who would be anointed Prime Minister. He also knows that fawning Congressmen will instantly delete him from even contemporary footnotes the moment another courtier takes his post. I mean, if they don’t care a fig about him even now when he is the Prime Minister, what chance would he have as an elderly statesman without even the fig leaf of perceived power and authority? Surely, it must be rankling. It would rankle any normal human being with normal feelings and human emotions. And Dr. Singh is undoubtedly the embodiment of middle class normalcy. This is where India begins to enter very dangerous times. Dr. Singh would be determined to leave at least some legacy behind. He is not a fool. He knows there is no chance of a political legacy of the kind left behind by Nehru, Indira and Vajpayee. He also knows that history books will credit not him, but Narasimha Rao as the architect of economic reforms. In fact, in terms of economic performance, his long tenure as PM would be torn to shreds by objective historians. Do remember, he was aware of all this even back in 2008 when it was not certain that the UPA would be voted back to power.

So he sought to leave his personal legacy behind through the Indo-US nuclear deal. His crowning moment was the George W. Bush visit to India and the signing of the controversial deal. So determined was he to leave at least this legacy behind that the normally diffident and reticent man staked everything on the deal. He literally left his party bosses, including Sonia Gandhi, with no option but to cobble together a majority in the Parliament when the Left, which supported UPA-1, withdrew support over the nuclear deal. We then had the disgrace of the cash for votes scam, something that is yet to be honestly investigated. His deal with Sonia Gandhi was clear: he would chase a foreign policy legacy al la Nehru and not murmur as Congress politicians unleashed economically dangerous populism like farm loan waivers and assorted welfare schemes that now look like bottomless holes. The deal worked. But not even partisans can say yet if the Indo-US nuclear deal is a success. The fact is, it will probably be at least 2020 before even one nuclear power plant as envisaged by the deal comes up. And post the Fukushima nuclear meltdown in Japan, and the stubborn resistance – motivated or not – to the 25-year old Kundakullam nuclear plant, it is anybody’s guess if all the hype about nuclear energy solving India’s power sector problems will actually come true.

Like his tenure was coming to an end in 2008, Dr. Singh knows that 2013 will be the last year of his tenure; this time for good. He still can’t leave a political legacy behind. There is nothing in the domestic arena where he can leave a mark: that would be reserved for the Gandhi family. So out of compulsion, Dr. Singh is again looking through the foreign policy prism to ensure that he leaves behind at least a modicum of a legacy.

It doesn’t take rocket science to figure out which direction he is headed. It has been clear for quite some time that Dr. Singh is eyeing Pakistan as his enduring legacy. I mean, if a Prime Minister can actually mend relations with Pakistan to the point where even the Kashmir issue would appear solved, his place in history would be doubly assured. It is that temptation that is driving him and his government to adopt policies and take postures that will do incalculable damage to India’s long terms interests and security.

But before we come to that, let us look at the devastatingly dangerous implications of the deal he seems to have struck with his political bosses this time. Unlike 2008, when high growth rates and buoyant tax revenues had given the government enough resources to play Santa with, the situation is going to be alarmingly different in 2013. The India growth story is in a state of coma, if not already dead. The fiscal deficit is unsustainable. International ratings agencies are threatening to downgrade India’s sovereign debt to junk status. Indian entrepreneurs are voting with their money and feet by preferring to invest in overseas markets. In 2013, India will badly need good economic policy making to rescue it out of the current mess. But rest assured, Dr. Singh will not bat an economist eyelid as his political bosses unleash a tsunami of welfare schemes to ensure that the political odds will be stacked in favour of Rahul Gandhi in 2014. Believe me, he might have personal and private regrets and remorse, but he will not lift an eyebrow in protest as the Indian economy is sucker punched by populism in 2013. Nor will he protest when brazen forms of crony capitalism – FDI in retail, FDI in civil aviation style – will be pushed in the name of bold economic reforms. No Sir: Dr. Singh may know his economics, but he is currently obsessed with history and his shaky place in it. Do even die-hard supporters of the Dynasty and the UPA realize the massive damage all this will do to future economic growth in India? And how poor economic growth will kill dreams of tens of millions of poor Indians who are struggling to join the ranks of the lower middle class? And what would Dr. Singh gain through this Faustian bargain? Does he honestly think that the military establishment of Pakistan and the ruling elite of that country are genuinely interested in a genuine peace deal with India? Why, their very rationale for existence will wither away if India actually changes from being the eternal enemy to a friendly neighbour! To expect the ruling elite of Pakistan to willingly commit hara kiri to allow Dr. Singh an enduring legacy is so naive that it would be laughable, were it not so dangerous. Look at what Rehman Malik said during and after his “friendly” visit to India. He juxtaposed 26/11 with the demolition of Babri Masjid. He said Jundal is an Indian agent. He said there is no evidence against the LeT and its chief. He said that India is instigating separatism in Balochistan. He said everything that the ruling elite of Pakistan have been saying for six decades and more. I shudder to think if a desperate Dr. Singh offers a friendly gesture in Siachen.

And don’t forget the most viciously cynical political calculation behind this race for a Pakistan legacy. Mending fences with Pakistan will encourage Indian Muslims to vote for the UPA in 2014. Believe me, many Congressmen are actually thinking along those lines.

God help India.

WHY HE WILL BE EVEN MORE DANGEROUS FOR INDIA IN 2013

UNDERESTIMATING THE INDIAN VOTER AGAIN AND AGAIN AND...

The so called mainstream media is at it again – making a fool of itself and displaying unending contempt for the native intelligence of the Indian voter. Once again, we are being told by pundits and sycophantic and servile courtiers masquerading as columnists that the Congress and the UPA have got their mojo back and look set to win the Lok Sabha elections due in 2014. The reasons offered are many. For one, the BJP is in a mess and has failed to capitalize on the serial scams haunting the Congress since 2010. Then again, the voter is wary of a rag tag Third or Fourth Front government propped up by outside support and will reluctantly vote again for the Congress. The most servile are writing about how Rahul Gandhi and his computer baba log are drawing up a “fool” proof strategy to woo voters. The pink papers have been screaming hoarse about the return of P. Chidambaram as the Finance Minister and how he will get the economy back on a high growth path. A related part of this delusional narrative is hailing the decision to allow FDI in retail and capping the use of subsidized LPG cylinders at six a year as proof that the UPA government is determined to push for “reforms”. Of course, the game changer is supposed to be what Jairam Ramesh so cutely described as “Aapka paisa, Aapke Haath”. Yes, I am talking about the decision to resort to cash transfer of subsidies to beneficiaries using the Aadhar scheme. So powerful is the alleged impact of this game changing decision that even mainstream media professionals who are critical of the Congress and the Gandhi dynasty are complaining that the ruling party is resorting to bribing the voters to win another election. In all of this, there seems to be a near unanimity that the Congress will pull off yet another stunning victory. They draw parallels with 2009 when the NREGA scheme was used as a bribe to the Indian voters to win elections. Of course, there are many who are still saying that the Indian voter is still so angry, so outraged and so pissed off with the corruption, hubris and arrogance of this government that they are determined to vote against the Congress. But such voices have been drowned in the cacophony of predicting yet another Congress victory.

I can only marvel and laugh at such malarkey and nonsense. For ages, the New Delhi-based mainstream media has utterly failed to read the intentions of the Indian voter. It has a habit of getting it wrong almost every time. And yet, it persists in such hogwash. Allow me to quote columnist Tavleen Singh who was a young reporter in 1977 when Indira Gandhi lifted the Emergency and called for elections. She writes:

“It became clear that Mrs.Gandhi wanted to restore her image as a democratic leader and this could only happen if the coming elections were seen to be fair. Within days of the elections being announced, most of the opposition leaders who were still in jail were released. They were no longer worth keeping in jail since nobody, not even the opposition leaders themselves, thought in January 1977 that Mrs.Gandhi had the slightest chance of losing this election. Every report, even from her own intelligence agencies, indicated that she might lose a few seats; but that there was no chance of a total defeat.”

That was 35 years ago. Since then, in election after election, the mainstream media has almost always forecasted it wrong – the only notable exception being 1984, when Rajiv Gandhi won a historic mandate after the assassination of Indira Gandhi.

It would be easy to conclude that most of the mainstream media is blindly and abjectly supportive of the Congress and the Gandhi dynasty when it comes to forecasting election results. A hell of a lot of our mainstream media is guilty of that. But the bigger crime is its failure to read voter intentions. Just go back to the spring of 2004 and you will realize what I am talking about. Let me give you just

one example. The much talked about research agency AC Nielsen was commissioned by NDTV and The Indian Express to conduct an opinion poll and make a forecast for the 2004 Lok Sabha elections. In a largest of its kind survey, around 40,000 respondents were asked about their voting intentions. The forecast was that the then ruling NDA would win between 287 to 307 seats and rule India for another five years. The BJP was projected to win around 200 seats while the Congress was projected to win around 100 seats. Let me give you one more example from the same year when assembly elections were held along with Lok Sabha elections in Andhra Pradesh. A prestigious survey that featured in the Outlook magazine had the following forecast for the state. The then ruling Telugu Desam was given around 165 seats while the Congress and its allies were given around 125 seats. So NDTV said in 2004 that the NDA would rule India for another five years and Outlook said in 2004 that Chandrababu Naidu and his party would rule Andhra Pradesh for another five years. We all know what the actual results were.

Now, even a moron would not dare to suggest that the two prestigious mainstream media outlets are hostile to the Congress. In fact, many would suggest that their sympathies clearly lie with the Congress and that they have no love lost for the BJP. And yet, for all their sympathies and leanings, they failed to read or gauge the mood of the electorate in 2004. And I am not singling out NDTV and Outlook. Virtually the entire Delhi-based mainstream media had the same opinion.

Why did this happen and why does the mainstream media still fail to get it? The answer is two fold. The first, it is deeply rooted in the Durbar politics of Delhi and has no clue about what really is happening in the rest of India. Second, it is susceptible to smart spin masters and courtiers of the day who have their own axe to grind. This was sickeningly revealed during the coverage of the 2012 assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh. Just pause for a moment and think about the manner in which the mainstream media covered the election campaign conducted by heir apparent Rahul Gandhi. There was unbelievable talk about how the UP voter could actually give more than 150 seats to the Congress and possibly make it the largest party in the state assembly. The less hysterical and shameless parts of the mainstream media talked about how the Akhilesh Yadav-led Samajwadi Party would emerge as the largest party, but would need the support of a vastly improved and powerful Congress to be able to rule UP. I read some of the newspaper articles of that time and saw some TV stories on You- Tube. I tell you, it was embarrassing, downright embarrassing. For good measure, I read up many articles penned during the run up to the Tamil Nadu assembly elections in 2011. They were even more embarrassing, because many actually said that the ruling DMK-Congress alliance would actually negate voter anger against scams by bribing the voters with goodies and gifts. And we all know what happened when the results of the assembly elections in Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh were announced.

And yet, the Delhi-centric mainstream media is back to its old tricks again by showing utter disregard for the voter, for contemporary history and for facts. Angry voters in India have always thrown out governments. When they are really angry, they don’t conduct stupid debates and ponder philosophically about the viability of alternatives. They just want to teach a lesson to the ruling party, the consequences be dammed. They did that in 1977, in 1980 when they were betrayed by the Janata Party, in 1989 and in 1996. It is both presumptuous and foolish of the mainstream media to think that the Indian voter was not aware of the possibility of unstable governments when she voted in anger.

Allow me to point out another silly thread in this drumbeat about revived Congress prospects. The pundits say that NREGA was a huge factor in the 2009 election victory of the Congress. They are plain wrong. It was the urban middle class aspirational vote that gave the Congress a mandate in 2009. The fact is – the Congress did poorly in rural areas and overwhelmingly well in cities and urban areas. Can we at least see the 2009 vote in perspective? Could it be that when a genuine crisis looms, voters across the world tend to vote for incumbents? Could it be that Kargil helped the NDA in 1999 and 26/11 helped UPA in 2009?

But sadly, there is no attempt to do any serious analysis. But I am quite clear of one thing. The Indian voter is about as angry as she was in 1977 and 1989. And this time, the manner in which inflation has derailed household budgets and dreams has further fueled the anger. I am also clear about another thing. The mainstream media will keep projecting Rahul Gandhi as the Prime Minister in waiting. Till the voter delivers her stinging slap in 2014.

Well, some things never change.

UNDERESTIMATING THE INDIAN VOTER AGAIN AND AGAIN AND...

WHY THE NUMBERS ARE STACKED AGAINST THE CONGRESS IN 2014

It’s an old cliché no doubt, but elections often are about numbers, mathematics and cold calculations. Yes, charisma, ideology, policies and campaigning strategy do matter. But at the end of the day, it really boils down to numbers. That is the reason why the Republican challenger Mitt Romney looks all set to lose badly to Barack Obama on November 6 when Americans vote for a new President. He is losing despite the terrible economic situation in the United States since Obama took over in January 2009. Obama should have lost, but it is numbers that are working for him. Republican ideology, particularly the hard line attitude of the faithful, has alienated huge chunks of voters. Women, students, blacks and Hispanics are overwhelmingly against Republicans and will vote for Obama. The number of these groups of voters will surely outnumber the angry white voters who will vote for Romney.

Of course India is vastly different from US. And of course, elections are still – at least officially – far away in 2014. But even at this early a stage, it is easy to see why the numbers appear stacked against the Congress in 2014. And that is the reason why Sonia Gandhi and her advisors and strategists are a worried lot. I am not talking just about the impact of the serial scams like Commonwealth Games, 2G, airport privatisation, Coalgate and the latest irrigation scam in Maharashtra. I am not talking just about the venomous bite of inflation that is destroying household budgets. I am not talking just about the manner in which Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh has become the butt of jokes and cruel humour despite the recent and futile efforts of some sections of the media to portray him as a decisive leader. I am not talking just about the damage that reluctant allies like Mulayam Yadav, Mayawati, Sharad Pawar and Karunanidhi will inflict during the run up to 2014 even as they prop up the tottering UPA regime. All these things will have an impact on Congress’ fortunes in 2014. No doubt about that. But it is the curse of cold, hard numbers that could have a more dangerous impact.

Before we get into the analysis of the cold, hard numbers, let us first take a cold, hard look at the factors that led to the triumph of the Congress and the UPA in 2009. Everybody talks about how the jholawallah advisors of Sonia Gandhi who comprise the National Advisory Council crafted the Congress victory of 2009 by coming up with schemes like NREGA. Then there was the Rs.600 billion farm loan waiver announced in 2009. If you believe these played a decisive role in 2009, you are misinformed and wrong. Overwhelmingly rural states – where you would expect to find grateful beneficiaries of NREGA and farm loan amnesties – like Odisha, Chattisgarh, Bihar, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh did not give a lot of seats to the Congress. Including Uttar Pradesh, the Congress managed just 46 out of 195 seats from these states in 2009. In fact, the Congress and the UPA did amazingly well in urban constituencies in 2009. It won 13 out of the 13 Lok Sabha seats on offer in Delhi and Mumbai. That performance was last seen perhaps in 1984 when Rajiv Gandhi swept India in the aftermath of the assassination of Indira Gandhi. So fact number one is that Congress did fabulously in urban centers.

Fact number two is the massive vote against the Left in West Bengal and Kerala that gave Congress and the UPA 39 out of 62 seats in 2009 in these two states. Fact number three is the strong alliances that gave a lot of seats to the UPA in 2009. In West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Maharashtra, the Congress and the UPA managed to win a massive 98 out of 159 seats in 2009. And who can forget fact number four – YSR Reddy who, along with the Majlis-e- Ittehadul Muslimeen (MIM), gave the Congress a spectacular 34 out of 42 seats in Andhra. In 2009, YSR was clearly the incumbent hero who simply swept aside all opposition despite loud whispers of numerous scams and instances of crony capitalism. The last factor is the suicidal behaviour of the BJP that gave the Congress 20 out of 25 seats in Rajasthan in 2009.

Add up all these facts and it is easy to figure out how the Congress won 206 Lok Sabha seats and how the UPA won a decisive majority in 2009.

And now comes the curse of cold numbers. Sonia Gandhi and her advisors are painfully aware that there is simply no way that the urban voter will repeat her 2009 preferences. A series of scams have unquestionably and badly dented the image of the Congress amongst urban voters. Sure, governments facing charges of corruption have been re-elected. Consider YSR Reddy of the Congress in 2009 and the Akali Dal- BJP combine in Punjab in 2012. But this time, the stench of corruption and its fallout is so pervasive that the Congress is almost certainly staring at a Bofors like situation. Mind you, Rajiv Gandhi was deeply popular across the nation in 1989 when his party slumped from 413 odd seats to about 150 odd seats. He was certainly more popular than Rahul Gandhi is today. Add the ravaging effect of inflation to the series of scams and you have one hell of an angry urban voter.

Despite the best efforts of this government, or perhaps because of its utter lack of sincere efforts, food inflation stubbornly stays above the double-digit mark. This has created havoc with household budgets. Add a very high interest rate regime and the soaring cost of home and retail loans and you worsen the mood of the urban electorate. The latest and absolutely stupid decision to ration LPG cylinders is yet another blow. Quite simply, the Congress has blown away its urban chances. Can you honestly see the Congress winning 13 out of 13 seats from Delhi and Mumbai in 2014? Even die hard Congress supporters will think you are a nut case if you believe so. Why the articulate spokesperson of the Congress Manish Tiwari will be damned lucky if can manage to retain his Ludhiana seat!

Then let’s come to the allies. Mamata Bannerji has already walked away. So the Congress can kiss goodbye to West Bengal in 2014, both for itself and the UPA. At the time of going to press, the crisis triggered by the resignation of Maharahstra Deputy Chief Minister and Sharad Pawar’s nephew Ajit Pawar because of the irrigation scam had not been resolved. The NCP and the Congress have always been uneasy allies. The unease and distrust will widen during the run up to 2014. What about Tamil Nadu? Well, it is not just Karunanidhi but the entire DMK cadre which is hopping mad at the Congress for the manner in which DMK leaders like Kanimozhi and D. Raja were jailed for months for the 2G scam while not a single Congress leader was touched.

In a recent State of the Nation survey conducted by our sister publication The Sunday Indian, some of the results were extraordinary. To a question as to whom they would prefer as the next Prime Minister of India, an overwhelming majority of DMK supporters said they would prefer Narendra Modi over Rahul Gandhi. Do remember, the Congress and the UPA had won 98 out of 159 seats in Kerala, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal and Maharashtra. That appears virtually impossible today. Why, the Congress and the UPA will be lucky to retain even 50 out of this 98.

Now comes the last bit of the cold, hard numbers. The Congress has to make up big time in other states and with other voters, if urban voters and allies will lead to a huge fall in numbers. But where exactly will these numbers come from? There are only three states where the Congress has any hope or chance of improving its tally. They are Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Karnataka which together account for 53 seats. The Congress won just 8 out of these 53 in 2009. A superb performance will lead to a gain of about 22 seats. But then, the Congress has 33 out of 42 seats in Andhra, 9 out of 10 in Haryana, 20 out of 25 in Rajasthan, 8 out of 13 in Punjab and 5 out of 5 in Uttarakhand.

Of course, 2014 is still far away. But as these cold, hard and unforgiving numbers clearly suggest, Sonia Gandhi and her advisors know that the bells have started tolling for the immediate future of the Congress and Rahul Gandhi. Of course spectacular comebacks are always possible in politics. It is entirely possible that Narendra Modi loses Gujarat and the Prime Minister actually becomes decisive, assertive and articulate!

WHY THE NUMBERS ARE STACKED AGAINST THE CONGRESS IN 2014

HOW DR. MANMOHAN SINGH BEATS V.P. SINGH HANDS DOWN...

It was really a no contest till recently. The late V.P. Singh was the undisputed winner of this trophy. He also remains the classic example of a middle class hero who became a middle class villain. Till he became the Prime Minister, V.P. Singh was the anti-corruption crusader and messiah who rode on the infamy of the Bofors scam. Of course, Indians soon realised that pious crusaders do not always become good leaders. Mercifully, his tenure did not last long enough for V.P. Singh to inflict irreparable damage to India.

I used the words “till recently” because there was some lingering, forlorn hope that the current Prime Minister would at least do something that would enable V.P. Singh to retain the crown. But then, forlorn hopes always remain hopeless. I realised this when I read newspaper stories about how a Supreme Court Bench has yet again criticised the PMO. This time, the rap on the knuckles is because the Prime Minister has failed to convene a meeting of the Cauvery River Authority despite reminders. Allow me to use the words of the Bench: “What do you mean by this? It is shocking that you require the consent of all the states even for a date of a meeting? Is the PM to see his convenience or the convenience of the members? It is surprising that the PMO is asking the convenience of everybody before fixing the meeting.” Just imagine. The Prime Minister is the head of the Cauvery River Authority set up to tackle the often ugly dispute between Tamil Nadu and Karnataka over the sharing of Cauvery waters. What conclusion can you draw from the fact that he is not able to set up a meeting with some chief ministers? Either he is truly helpless and powerless, or he is indifferent and callous. Either ways, it bodes ill for India.

This incident and the rap on the knuckles by the Supreme Court is not front page news. Nor will it lead our television anchors to froth at the mouth. Yet, in a small but very significant way, it reflects the disappointment and disaster that Dr. Manmohan Singh has been. In 2009, he was a true blue middle class hero because the Congress won virtually all urban seats in the Lok Sabha elections, including seven out of seven in Delhi. Today, that halo has been torn to shreds. Of course, the middle class Indian is very fickle and unreliable. And later historians might have more charitable things to say about the tenure of Manmohan Singh. The more charitable may say that Indians expected too much from him and hence the disappointment and anger.

But for me, there are some crucial reasons why Dr. Manmohan Singh has become the worst Prime Minister India has ever had.

The most important reason is that he has presided over an insidious process that has transformed India into a total banana republic. Nothing has been left untouched in this era of loot and plunder; nothing is sacrosanct. Just a few examples will suffice, though the tales of crony capitalism written in his tenure would fill up entire books. BSNL and Air India have been systematically run to the ground and destroyed through incomprehensible policies and decisions. I am not saying that the Prime Minister personally took the conspiracy call to do this. That is childish. But the fact is that private sector players have immensely benefited from the troubles of these two public sector giants. And I won’t be surprised if – as the cacophony over Air India gathers momentum – the two are eventually “privatised” at throwaway prices, their assets and value eroded deliberately. It is in this era of Dr. Manmohan Singh that India has thrown up more dollar billionaires than even China. It is during his tenure that crony capitalism has become de facto policy. Let me quote a few lines from the book Breakout Nations written by Ruchir Sharma to illustrate what has happened under Dr Singh: “Crony capitalism is a cancer that undermines competition and slows economic growth. That is why the United States confronted the problem and moved to take down the robber barons... The Dow index of the top thirty US industrial companies is in constant flux and, on average, replaces half its members every fifteen years. India’s market used to generate heavy turnover too, but in late 2011, twenty seven – 90 percent – of the top thirty companies tracked by the benchmark Sensex index were holdovers 2006. Back in 2006, the comparable figure was just 68 percent... Nine out of the top ten Indian billionaires on the Forbes 2010 are holdovers from the 2006 list, while the 2006 list had only five holdovers. As of today, many of India’s super rich still inspire national pride, not resentment, and they can travel the country with no fear for their safety; but this genial state of affairs can change quickly.” In effect, India has become a true banana republic where the ruling religion is crony capitalism and the ruling chant is scam. This is astonishing because the UPA regime never fails to remind all of us that its heart beats genuinely and passionately for the aam aadmi.

Just one more example to conclude this observation. You might recall how the then Governor of Andhra Pradesh and veteran Congress leader N.D. Tiwari was seen frolicking with nubile nymphets. Do you know how this scandalous footage found its way into the media? The brothel owner who allegedly supplied the girls to Tiwari wanted revenge. Why? Because N.D. Tiwari had not kept his promise of getting a few mining licenses for her! Mera Bharat Mahan!

The second reason why Dr. Singh has been such a monumental failure is his inability or unwillingness or both to move even an inch ahead on administrative reforms. Back in 2004 when he was appointed Prime Minister, Dr. Singh had singled out administrative reforms as his most important priority. And why not? Governance in India is in an appalling state because the entire administrative framework has virtually collapsed. There is simply no accountability and both the tehsildar and the secretary level IAS officer treat the citizens as subjects to be lorded over. Our sister publication The Sunday Indian has done a story on how the IAS lobby has stolen the country. One would have thought that Dr. Singh would be well acquainted with the perils of Indian bureaucracy since he was himself a bureaucrat for most of his adult and working life. But in the last eight years, he has not lifted a finger to make even small, cosmetic changes to India’s rotting steel frame. The consequence has been brutal and devastating: the quality of governance is at an all time low and India’s record in delivering health, education and sanitation is actually worse than ever before. He has been unable or unwilling to even prevent bureaucrats holding sensitive posts to retire and take plum private sector assignments in a brazen defiance of norms and law.

The third and most devastating failure – in fact, the key reason behind all other failures – has been his inability or unwillingness or both, to display some spine. So pathetic has been his track record in this regard that his personal reputation as a man of integrity has become a joke. The charitable would say that our current regime of coalition politics does not allow a Prime Minister all the power that he should have because allies dictate terms. True. In the NDA regime, Suresh Prabhu was widely acknowledged as a brilliant Power Minister. Yet, Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee was helpless when Shiv Sena decided that Suresh Prabhu must be sacked. Despite such compulsions, Vajpayee had a clear run this far and no further approach. And even troublesome allies knew that and respected his authority. Can anyone say that about Dr. Singh? The other charitable thing we say about him is that real power resides with Sonia Gandhi and Dr. Singh is actually doing the best he can of a difficult job. That is bunkum. Sonia Gandhi is a very intelligent and astute politician. There is no way she would have asked for the head of Dr. Singh if he had put his foot down on at least some crucial issues. It is not Sonia Gandhi who has made Dr. Singh a puppet; it is Dr. Singh who has become a puppet and eventually and inevitably the lamest of lame ducks.

Let’s all anxiously wait for 2014 for this agony to be over. It is India’s misfortune that 2014 still looks very, very far away.

HOW DR. MANMOHAN SINGH BEATS V.P. SINGH HANDS DOWN...

ARE WE HEADING AGAIN FOR THE SHAH BANO, BABRI MASJID ERA?

Ominous, objectionable, offensive, obnoxious and odious were five epithets used by some ‘secular’ friends when I tried to raise the issue. Another one said that my dislike and distaste for UPA-2 which he reluctantly shared has started colouring my perceptions and world view. Of course, there are many who say I am basically a closet Khakhi Chaddi masquerading as a liberal. So be it. But there are times when discomforting and disturbing questions have to be raised, no matter how unpalatable they sound. Otherwise, we are condemned to keep repeating history, never as a farce and always as a tragedy.

Let’s start with some facts first. Barring some ‘stray’ incidents, India has been spared the specter of communal riots since 2002 – the one exception being Kandhamal in Orissa in 2008. A lot of us had started thinking – I now realise stupidly – that Hindus and Muslims had both realised that they were being used as cannon fodder by political and vested interests through ‘engineered’ communal riots. We thought, gone were the vitriolic and vicious days of Shah Bano and Babri Masjid. We thought we are maturing as a multi-ethnic, multi-religious society and democracy. Looks like we thought wrong.

It started with Gopalgarh in Rajasthan where communal violence and police firing led to many deaths. Predictably and parrot like, we blamed the RSS types for it. Then communal violence erupted in Hyderabad, which has an inglorious history of communal violence. We again blamed the RSS types for it. Then came communal riots near Mathura in Uttar Pradesh soon after the ‘ultra-secular’ Samajwadi Party came to power. Incidentally, both Rajasthan and Andhra Pradesh have Congress governments. Then came communal riots in Bareilly in Uttar Pradesh. And now we have communal riots in Congressruled Assam. I won’t be surprised to hear the likes of Digvijay Singh foaming at the mouth that the RSS types have instigated Bodo tribals, who are largely Hindu, to riot against illegal Bangladeshi immigrants, who are largely Muslim. In between all this, we have seen Digvijay Singh offer the moon, the sky and the stars to Muslim voters in the recently held assembly elections in UP. Of course, we had Salman Khurshid allegedly claiming that the Empress of India had actually cried after alleged terrorists were shot dead in the Batla House encounter. In between, we witnessed thundering silence from secular warriors and large sections of mainstream media when a so-called Grand Mufti of Kashmir ordered a Christian priest to appear in his “court” to answer charges that he was converting innocent young Muslims. The priest was subsequently arrested and locked up by the J&K government and since has been effectively banished from the valley. In between, we had the higher judiciary slamming the Andhra Pradesh government decision to “reserve” a sub-quota for Muslims within the “reserved” category as unconstitutional. And how can we forget the ultimate in between – the Draft Communal Violence Bill prepared by the deluded National Advisory Council that basically says that the majority community is automatically the offender and the accused if there is communal violence and the minority community automatically the victim. Now if this were law, the government would be duty-bound to arrest and prosecute Bodo tribals from various relief camps. Nobody seems to have the actual facts but even secular warriors are reluctantly admitting that both Bodo tribals and illegal Bangladeshi immigrants have been victims in massive numbers in this latest instance of history repeating itself as tragedy.

You might ask: why I am sounding like Sadhvi Rithambara or as a propaganda tool for the RSS. Well, let me clarify. I think the RSS world view is totally wrong and unsuited to the Indian civilisational ethos. Till it retains its ideology of portraying Mulsims as the ‘other’, it will never gain the respect of a majority of Hindus. And I think, it is delusional to say that poor Mulsim peasants, artisans and workers are “invading” Assam as part of a grand ISI hatched conspiracy to conquer India. The primary reason for Bangladeshis entering India illegally is economic. You really need to check yourself into a lunatic asylum if you think a desperately poor Bangladeshi dying to feed his family is a Jihadi who has planned and plotted his invasion of India. It is like saying Biharis planned and plotted an invasion of Mumbai. Or to say that Spanish speaking people from Mexico and other Latin American countries have planned and plotted an invasion of Arizona, Texas and California so that they can reclaim the land their ancestors had lost to the White people. [American states like California and Texas were actually provinces of Mexico for hundreds of years before they became part of the United States.] But let us not forget: identity does play a part. Immigrants have been known to cheer Mexico in Texas and California when the Mexican team beats the American team in soccer. Some of my friends there tell me that immigrants often say that what the Whites captured through guns and subterfuge will be recaptured through demographics as Spanish speaking Catholics eventually outnumber the White Anglo Saxon Protestants. Something similar happens in Assam when illegal immigrants use religion and state complicity and duplicity to start thinking less as migrants in search of livelihood and more as a group whose faith and identity is in danger. Of course, by winking at illegal immigration, the Indian State is also sending a message to people in Bangladesh that they can come and get voter I-cards and grab land and opportunities. Would you – in a similar situation – forego the opportunity?

So there I have confessed that a lot of RSS and VHP types are loonies. The problem is, I think a lot of our secular warriors are worse than loonies and even more dangerous. Their basic problem is selective secularism. They absolutely refuse to apply the same yardsticks to minorities; the yardsticks they use to condemn most Hindus as blood thirsty and bigoted oppressors of minorities. And they are so blinded by their hatred for the BJP and the likes of Narendra Modi that they prefer to look the other way when a Congress leader or government is culpable or when minorities, like fundamentalist Muslims in the Kashmir valley, want to impose Sharia. Or when fundamentalist Catholics persecute a rationalist for saying loudly that the Church is hoodwinking people. The real problem is: this kind of selective secularism makes the loony Hindutva types even stronger.

That is where I come to those days of Shah Bano when thethen Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi used the brute majority of his party in the Parliament to overturn a Supreme Court verdict that said even Muslim women in India are entitled to alimony and maintenance after divorce. Not much had been heard about the VHP and Bajrang Dal before that. The so called Ram Mandir movement was still a fringe affair that an (L) December 6, 1992; Ayodhya: Hindu nationalists (supporters of VHP, Shiv Sena and BJP) tearing down the Babri Masjid mosque. In the nationwide riots caused, more than 2,000 people were killed; (R) August 18, 2010; Bareilly: Riots and curfews on a regular basis symbolise the fierce and noisy antagonism between the Hindus and the Muslims in this city (SMS your views with your name and topic to 0-9818101234) overwhelming majority of Hindus preferred to ignore. But what happened after Shah Bano? VHP, Bajrang Dal and Ram Janambhoomi suddenly became mainstream. Thousands of bureaucrats, armed forces personnel and others started loudly talking about Hindus getting second class treatment in their own country and started joining the BJP. All this actually helped the BJP capture power in Delhi. Of course, secular warriors say that all those bureaucrats and army officers who joined the BJP were actually bigots who came out of their closets. Many were, no doubt. But to say that a guy like Maj. Gen. (Retd.) B.C. Khandhuri – the man who has been responsible for the National Highways success – is also a closet bigot means you need psychiatric treatment. But then, there are secular warriors who firmly believe that a majority of voters in Gujarat who keep voting for Narendra Modi are bigots.

My fear is very simple: the UPA regime has seen the writing on the wall. Suddenly, there is a real possibility that the Congress might face political exile for at least five years, if not more. Desperate situations call for desperate measures. And my fear is that this UPA regime will try damn hard to ‘scare’ minorities into voting for the Congress since they wouldn’t want a hostile government at the centre led by the BJP. It doesn’t matter at all, if most Muslims haven’t got any decent opportunities at anything since 1947. Lip service and scaremongering are deemed to be enough. What this kind of posturing does is to encourage fundamentalist Muslims as well as fundamentalist Hindus. If you think that is cock and bull, just try and answer why Hindu-Muslim riots are breaking out all over India since last year after almost a decade of ‘peace’? If you think only the RSS types are responsible, then why were the RSS types not successful for almost a decade and what has suddenly made them such a potent force?

India, and the Congress are once again playing with fire. It will consume many more innocent Muslim and Hindu lives if we don’t stop this dangerous game right now. But then, if even the Partition and hundreds of riots after that have not taught us any lesson, I guess we Indians deserve the bleak future that awaits us.

ARE WE HEADING AGAIN FOR THE SHAH BANO, BABRI MASJID ERA?

TONGUE IN CHEEK: HOW THE NAC CAN SAVE THE UPA IN 2014

The clock is ticking for the Congress and the UPA regime in India. Battered by scams and bruised by humiliating electoral defeats, the party knows that the party may be over. And that come 2014 and the Indian voter might deliver another resounding slap and perhaps even a few kicks for good measure. But then as they say, even a week is a long time in politics and desperate situations can be turned around with a bit of pluck and lots of luck. Pranab Mukherjee of course will lend more than a helping ‘Hand’. But Congress leaders know that Pranabda needs a good hand to be able to lend a helping hand. Personally, I have great admiration for the Congress, in particular for its ability to hang on to power. Since I think mere admiration may not be enough for the man ‘destined’ to be India’s Prime Minister Rahul Gandhi to actually become Prime Minister, let me do my patriotic bit by offering some free advice even to those who are beyond advice.

All my suggestions revolve around that mind blowing invention of Sonia Gandhi called the National Advisory Council (NAC). That is because advice is best given to advisors. The NAC has been a pioneer of sorts when it comes to drafting laws that resemble Midsummer Night’s Dreams. The sheer range of their imagination defies imagination. So here are a few more laws that be drafted by the NAC to help Pranabda lend a helping hand to the “Hand” in 2014:

The Motilal Nehru Bill on Lawyers and Law – Now, the great, great grandfather was a very famous and successful lawyer so it is befitting that this law be dedicated to his name. Once it is passed by the Parliament, this law will seek to monitor and regulate the behaviour of lawyers. Though the details of the proposed law are too complicated for simple folks like you to understand, let me summarise a few highlights so you get the gist and the drift. Lawyers will not be allowed to file any kind of PILs; only the aam aadmi will have that right. Lawyers like Manish Tiwari who also happens to be a Congress spokesperson can easily defend this provision and insist on idiotic TV shows that it is not at all targeted at Shanti Bhushan and Prashant Bhushan. Another lawyer P. Chidambaram who happens to be the Home Minister can always smile beatifically and insist in a stentorian tone that the provision has nothing to do with a pesky pest and fellow Tam- Brahm called Subramanyam Swamy. In fact, both the great lawyers can argue with flourish that the drivers of the Bhushans and Swamy will be entitled to file any number of PILs as long as the driver was never employed by another great lawyer named Abhishek Manu Singhvi. A corollary to this provision will be a stipulation that the drivers of any lawyer be perpetually banned from recording any secret and salacious footage.

The Jawaharlal Nehru Bill for Chinese Checkers and Whispers: Since the great grandfather was a great champion of democracy and since his place is assured even in Chinese history, it is befitting that this proposed law be named after him. This law will mark a new high in the annals of free speech and freedom. This law came as an inspiration recently to the NAC members when they stumbled across a media report that said China has banned Bloomberg because it had the temerity and the effrontery to suggest that the family of the new leader of China is worth a few hundred million dollars. That kind of story is totally against free speech and freedom. Under this law, all scams worth more than one million dollars will be exempt from media scrutiny and activist interest. In the interests of free speech, the media and activists will be required to hold loud and meaningful debates in TV studios about constables and clerks who have been arrested on charges of corruption. To protect the ability of journalists to fearlessly pursue their profession without fear or favour, this law will also stipulate that journalists will voluntarily refrain from writing about fellow journalists who get too cosy with politicians and the powers that be. All journalists who fail to comply with this freedom enhancing provision of the Jawaharlal Nehru Act will be required to read the collected works of Arundhati Roy and make sense of it. One more pathbreaking provision of this new law will stipulate that all journalists who write something positive about Narendra Modi will be automatically deported to China where positive stories are better appreciated.

The Indira Gandhi Bill for Family Planning: Since the grandmother symbolised the eternal Indian mantra that Family comes First, it is befitting that this new law be named after that great woman. Mind you, don’t start having naughty thoughts. Family Planning here is not the type of family planning that her great son Sanjay Gandhi encouraged fellow Indians to practice with a little help from cops and that fancy thing balled sterilisation. Family planning here basically means that Indians will be better prepared to prepare for a rosy future for the families after this new law comes into effect. Shorn of the legal jargon and bureaucratic mumbo jumbo, this law will stipulate that it will be mandatory for the sons and daughters of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha MPs to contest elections to the same seats once the parents call it a day or kick thebucket. The ungrateful and unpatriotic progeny who refuse to comply with this historic provision will be required to draft affidavits for patriotic Indians like Teesta Setalvad. Of course, accidents of history may lead to some Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha MPs not being able to produce any progeny. In that case, the NAC will be authorised to ‘Hand’ pick a nephew or niece who fits the Bill. There is another magnificent provision in this law. Elections will continue to be held repeatedly till stupid voters see wisdom and vote unanimously for the son, daughter, niece or nephew. As a result, corruption will be completely eliminated from the country since there will be no further need to organise black money to fight elections. In any case, under the new Jawaharlal Nehru Act, all deals worth more than one million dollars will be exempt from media and activist scrutiny.

The Sanjay Gandhi Act on Gangs and Gangsters: Since it was the uncle who took historic steps to curb the menace of goons and save Indian democracy during the Emergency, it is befitting that this new law be named after the illustrious leader. This law will forever eliminate the danger of goons and gangsters from Indian society. All goons who are considered history shelters with a track record of senseless violence will be required to join the Youth Congress and stay there till they are 75 years old. If they manage to live that long, some of these patriotic Indians will be eligible to become Cabinet ministers. All patriotic Indians who have stolen millions and millions will be given the option of joining the DMK. Pickpockets will have the option of joining the RJD. This historic new law will have huge benefits which simple folks like you cannot comprehend. Since expenditures on policemen, courts, police stations and jails will be virtually eliminated, the NAC will be able to dream up new projects and schemes for the aam aadmi.

The Rajiv Gandhi Naani Yaad Dila Denge Act: Since the father immortalised the term “Naani Yaad Dila Denge” along with something called Bofors, it is befitting that this wonderful law be named after him. This is quite a straightforward law and will help India rebuild the great institution called the Indian family. Any Indian who even mistakenly says or writes anything critical about either India or the Family (It’s the same thing really) will be required to spend quality time with maternal grandmothers. This way, the institution called the family will be saved, the Family will not be embarrassed and secular warriors like Mani Shankar Aiyar will launch a series of television soap operas where the arch villain will be Narendra Modi and his arch henchman will be Baba Ramdev. Anna Hazare too will put in guest appearances.

I am convinced this new set of laws will ensure that the Indian voter does not even accidentally dispose what God has proposed – that the Yuvraj will lead India to new heights of glory.

TONGUE IN CHEEK: HOW THE NAC CAN SAVE THE UPA IN 2014