Corruption in high places is a malaise that is easy to diagnose but difficult to cure. Even in the rare cases they are arraigned before a court, top politicians often pay their way through legal battles, and spend little or no time in incarceration.
And as with the churning, it is evident (as in case of the mystical ‘Samudra Manthan – ‘Churning of the sea’)‘ that there will be at least two significant byproducts- one is of the “nector” and one is of the “poison”. Which is what- only the time will tell as the political sea of Tamilnadu keeps on chruning.
The conviction of AIADMK general secretary V.K. Sasikala in the disproportionate assets case involving her close friend, former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa, as the prime accused, is a significant marker in India’s legal and political history.
The charges against Jayalalithaa abated following her death last December, but Ms. Sasikala had to face the full wrath of the Supreme Court, which has upheld the trial court order in toto, leaving her to spend four years in prison.
As Justice Amitava Roy wrote in his concurring order, “corruption is a vice of insatiable avarice for self-aggrandisement by the unscrupulous, taking unfair advantage of their power and authority.”
While there is no denying that the judgment has strengthened confidence in the justice delivery system, it is mystifying that the ruling has come more than eight months after the two-member Bench concluded hearing arguments in the case.
All the more so, since the basic thrust of the judgment only endorsed the position taken by the trial court in Bengaluru, which held all the accused in the case guilty. Given that the Supreme Court had pressed the Karnataka High Court to hear the appeal expeditiously, there was no justification in such an inordinate delay.
Politically, this could not have come at a worse time for Ms. Sasikala, who was making a determined bid for power, staking claim to form the government after displacing one-time loyalist O. Panneerselvam.
Governor Ch. Vidyasagar Rao had held off inviting Ms. Sasikala to form the government despite her demonstrating the support of a majority of the members of the legislature precisely because he anticipated such a situation.
Now, however, the options before him are a lot clearer. If the newly elected leader of the AIADMK Legislature Party, Edappadi Palaniswami, is able to show the support of at least 117 MLAs, he will have to be sworn in as Chief Minister.
Though there are allegations that the MLAs were kept forcibly at a resort by the Sasikala camp, Mr. Panneerselvam is nowhere close to splitting the AIADMK legislature party despite the support of the rank and file. Notwithstanding the legal setback, Ms. Sasikala may be able to trump Mr. Panneerselvam politically. But her success in keeping the MLAs together may depend on the Governor’s next move; whatever that is, Tamil Nadu is destined for more political churn.
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Steve Ovett, the famous British middle-distance athlete, won the 800-metres gold medal at the Moscow Olympics of 1980. Just a few days later, he was about to win a 5,000-metres race at London’s Crystal Palace. Known for his burst of acceleration on the home stretch, he had supreme confidence in his ability to out-sprint rivals. With the final 100 metres remaining,
[wptelegram-join-channel link=”https://t.me/s/upsctree” text=”Join @upsctree on Telegram”]Ovett waved to the crowd and raised a hand in triumph. But he had celebrated a bit too early. At the finishing line, Ireland’s John Treacy edged past Ovett. For those few moments, Ovett had lost his sense of reality and ignored the possibility of a negative event.
This analogy works well for the India story and our policy failures , including during the ongoing covid pandemic. While we have never been as well prepared or had significant successes in terms of growth stability as Ovett did in his illustrious running career, we tend to celebrate too early. Indeed, we have done so many times before.
It is as if we’re convinced that India is destined for greater heights, come what may, and so we never run through the finish line. Do we and our policymakers suffer from a collective optimism bias, which, as the Nobel Prize winner Daniel Kahneman once wrote, “may well be the most significant of the cognitive biases”? The optimism bias arises from mistaken beliefs which form expectations that are better than the reality. It makes us underestimate chances of a negative outcome and ignore warnings repeatedly.
The Indian economy had a dream run for five years from 2003-04 to 2007-08, with an average annual growth rate of around 9%. Many believed that India was on its way to clocking consistent double-digit growth and comparisons with China were rife. It was conveniently overlooked that this output expansion had come mainly came from a few sectors: automobiles, telecom and business services.
Indians were made to believe that we could sprint without high-quality education, healthcare, infrastructure or banking sectors, which form the backbone of any stable economy. The plan was to build them as we went along, but then in the euphoria of short-term success, it got lost.
India’s exports of goods grew from $20 billion in 1990-91 to over $310 billion in 2019-20. Looking at these absolute figures it would seem as if India has arrived on the world stage. However, India’s share of global trade has moved up only marginally. Even now, the country accounts for less than 2% of the world’s goods exports.
More importantly, hidden behind this performance was the role played by one sector that should have never made it to India’s list of exports—refined petroleum. The share of refined petroleum exports in India’s goods exports increased from 1.4% in 1996-97 to over 18% in 2011-12.
An import-intensive sector with low labour intensity, exports of refined petroleum zoomed because of the then policy regime of a retail price ceiling on petroleum products in the domestic market. While we have done well in the export of services, our share is still less than 4% of world exports.
India seemed to emerge from the 2008 global financial crisis relatively unscathed. But, a temporary demand push had played a role in the revival—the incomes of many households, both rural and urban, had shot up. Fiscal stimulus to the rural economy and implementation of the Sixth Pay Commission scales had led to the salaries of around 20% of organized-sector employees jumping up. We celebrated, but once again, neither did we resolve the crisis brewing elsewhere in India’s banking sector, nor did we improve our capacity for healthcare or quality education.
Employment saw little economy-wide growth in our boom years. Manufacturing jobs, if anything, shrank. But we continued to celebrate. Youth flocked to low-productivity service-sector jobs, such as those in hotels and restaurants, security and other services. The dependence on such jobs on one hand and high-skilled services on the other was bound to make Indian society more unequal.
And then, there is agriculture, an elephant in the room. If and when farm-sector reforms get implemented, celebrations would once again be premature. The vast majority of India’s farmers have small plots of land, and though these farms are at least as productive as larger ones, net absolute incomes from small plots can only be meagre.
A further rise in farm productivity and consequent increase in supply, if not matched by a demand rise, especially with access to export markets, would result in downward pressure on market prices for farm produce and a further decline in the net incomes of small farmers.
We should learn from what John Treacy did right. He didn’t give up, and pushed for the finish line like it was his only chance at winning. Treacy had years of long-distance practice. The same goes for our economy. A long grind is required to build up its base before we can win and celebrate. And Ovett did not blame anyone for his loss. We play the blame game. Everyone else, right from China and the US to ‘greedy corporates’, seems to be responsible for our failures.
We have lowered absolute poverty levels and had technology-based successes like Aadhaar and digital access to public services. But there are no short cuts to good quality and adequate healthcare and education services. We must remain optimistic but stay firmly away from the optimism bias.
In the end, it is not about how we start, but how we finish. The disastrous second wave of covid and our inability to manage it is a ghastly reminder of this fact.