B.RAMAN
The Government of Prime Minister Dr.Manmohan Singh
and the Congress Party headed by Smt.Sonia Gandhi continue to be clueless on
how to deal with the situation arising from the mass outrage of the youth of
the country in the wake of the gang rape of a 23-year-old girl in New Delhi.
2. There are multiple causes for the mass
outrage----
· The
failure of the police to prevent repeated crimes against women,
· the
shockingly inept and brutal manner in which the police dealt with crowds of
youth protesting against the incident,
· the
inability of the Delhi State Government headed by Smt.Sheela Dikshit to
understand the seriousness of the situation and the magnitude of the public anger
and respond to it appropriately,
· the
lack of unity of action between the Ministry of Home Affairs of the Government
of India, which controls the Delhi Police through the Lt.Governor, the
Lt.Governor, who is responsible for law and order and crime control in Delhi,
and Smt.Sheela Dikshit, who, as the Chief Minister, is responsible for the
proper governance of Delhi,
· the
total lack of command and control over the functioning of the Police,
· the
insensitivity of Shri Sushil Kumar
Shinde, the Home Minister, who lacks the ability for sophisticated communication
and portfolio management,
· a
Prime Minister, who neither rules nor governs nor controls and who is devoid of
any warmth in his interactions either in Parliament or with the public,
· a
Congress President who exercises vast powers without a proper understanding and
appreciation of the feelings and sentiments of the people of this country,
specially the youth, and
· the absence of competent political advisers to
the Government, who could make good the deficiencies of the political
leadership and provide the necessary correctives in dealing with internasl
crisis situations.
3.Mechanisms like the Political Affairs Committee
of the Cabinet, the Cabinet Committee on Security, the Secretaries’ Committee,
the Joint Intelligence Committee, the National Security Council Secretariat (NSCS)
and the National Security Advisory Board (NSAB), which were set up over a
period of time to provide a continuous flow of crisis-management,
strategic-thinking and policy-making inputs to the Prime Minister and his
Cabinet have not been functioning as they used to do under the previous Prime
Ministers.
4. The de jure power and decision-making vacuum in
the Prime Minister’s office and the de facto accumulation of power in circles
close to Smt.Sonia Gandhi have added to the command and control confusion. During
a discussion on the current situation among retired government servants who had
served under previous Prime Ministers, someone posed the questions: Who is
taking the key decisions? Where are the key decisions being taken—in the
Congress headquarters or in the PMO? Who is responsible for ensuring the
clarity and sophistication of public communications and interactions? Who
monitors the developments and suggests action and policy options to the PM?
There were no answers available.
5. There is a paralysis of governance in New Delhi.
Unless the existence of this paralysis is admitted and rectified, things are
not likely to improve. The Government and the Congress do not seem to be unduly
concerned over the public anger and the paralysis because the opposition has
not been able to come out with an alternate policy frame-work. The BJP itself
is in a state of semi organizational paralysis.
6. Shri Narendra Modi, the Chief Minister of
Gujarat, has come out with an alternate style of governance in Gujarat, but his
party and its present leadership have not been able to give this alternate
style of governance a pan-Indian projection.
7. This state of affairs is unlikely to be
rectified by fresh elections to the Lok Sabha, whether held now or in 2014. The
country is in for a long period of misgovernance and administrative paralysis till there is realization in the Congress and
the country over the evils of dynasty rule and over the need to get out of its
grip ( 25-12-12)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd),
Cabinet Secretariat, Govt of india, New Delhi, and, presently, Director,
Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate of the Chennai Centre for
China Studies.E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com
and Twitter : @SORBONNE75 )
5 comments:
This is what our IPS officers are.
https://twitter.com/AshutoshNSingh/status/283263863011569664/photo/1
Sir,
As always, your analysis of the present situation is absolutely correct. The dynasty rule will continue , no doubt.Its very pathetic that we Indians have no one better than an Italian lady to rule us.Every decision of the UPA Govt. is guided and directed by her.Dynasty rule will go on for another few hundred years,I guess. There is no alternative.The BJP is wallowing in the mud with no definite aim and has no clue as to how to get into the PMs seat in the next election.Their confusion and chaos within the party will ensure the victory of the Congress once again and then we will see RG in the PMs seat with his mother calling the shots.He will sit in the seat for at least three terms with his mother running the country.He will keep blundering along with his mother holding the reins of power. Raman Sir, you and I will never see the end of the dynastic rule in our life times. NAMO will continue to rule NAMO land but can never get anywhere near the capital.Nor can the other local chieftains of TN, UP,Bihar,etc ever get within stone throwing distance of the capital. LK Advani will stand a chance to get onto the PMs chair provided he lives to be a hundred and forty five at least.
Like a blind elephant blundering through the forest in search of sunshine, our country will keep going a couple of hundred years before the blundering blind elephant falls into a river and drowns.Amen.Meanwhile, till you keep writing on your blog site, I shall keep faithfully reading them.May you live to be a hundred so that I can get to read something written by an intelligent person.
Dear Mr. Raman,
Your observations reflect disappointment to say the least. But things just don't happen. Comments signalling that things were better earlier and are now much worse do not capture that fact that the situation was allowed to deteriorate from when they were better.
I am sure dynastic rule is a big factor. But can the bureaucracy, the educated and handpicked class selected to lead the country and provide governance continuity, be free from all blame? Have they not, for their individual gains, compromised on the quality of leadership that the nation deserved? Most state governments and a large number of state owned entities are bankrupt. (How bankruptcy brings social good is beyond me.)Our porous borders have caused more deaths in internal conflicts than most nations see in full blown civil wars. Our courts have more cases pending than most countries have seen in their entire existence. The bureaucracy, instead to providing leadership allowed itself to be degenerate into babudom. It is the officers of this country which have let this nation down - the most educated and elite class. And the officers of the era gone allowed that to happen if they did not participate actively in it. They let the nation's armour develop chinks and what do you think is the utility and worth of such an armour?
We were good is an excuse. Our institutions did not reach their present state in a day or decade. We did not reach this situation where officers open defend their corruption in a day. Officers have long known the corrupt, the disease, among themselves. And they have consciously failed to act against it. They let it grow. How much effort has been made in the last 60 years by officers to ensure quality and integrity among themselves?
Mr. Raman, the nation is directionless because those with the responsibility to ensure continuity and order have failed my country. I did no wrong is no good in any society. If I saw injustice and failed to act, for any reason, I am party to all injustices perpetrated because justice was delayed or denied. The impunity that we see in the eyes of criminals and corrupt is because our officers, present and past, have failed us - not because we have dynastic rule.
Failure to see the outcome inspite of access to all the state's resources poor capability of the general. It cannot be an excuse.
Mr. Raman, we are where we are. And leadership will emerge. If the political class and bureaucracy have failed us then from someone else. For people are looking for a leader - a fighter. But it not just dynastic rule that has lead us here. It is babudom.
Your Analysis of the present day crisis is absolutely correct.The situation could perhaps been different if,on the very first day our leaders had come out in support of the national anger and the popular agony being expressed in demonstrations and followed it with some substantive measures to set things right..They unfortunately misread the situation as a confrontation and have been making mistakes after mistakes ever since.
The popular hostility is understandable as is the popular disillusionment.
I do not see any immediate cure for the present ailment.All political parties are equally to blame for their insensitive handling of the situation.
I thought Modi has cult personality?
Post a Comment