Cromwell In Lok Sabha

Oliver Cromwell was one of the signatories to the death warrant of King Charles I and established the Commonwealth. He declared himself the Lord Protector in 1653 for five years.

He dissolved the ‘Rump’ parliament and then formed his Barebones Parliament to which he assigned all power.

He gave the following speech on dissolving the Rump Parliament.

It is high time for me to put an end to your sitting in this place, which you have dishonoured by your contempt of all virtue, and defiled by your practice of every vice; ye are a factious crew, and enemies to all good government; ye are a pack of mercenary wretches, and would like Esau sell your country for a mess of potage, and like Judas betray your God for a few pieces of money; is there a single virtue now remaining amongst you? Is there one vice you do not possess? Ye have no more religion than my horse; gold is your God; which of you have not bartered your consciences for bribes? Is there a man amongst you that has the least care for the good of the Commonwealth? Ye sordid prostitutes have you not defiled this sacred place, and turned the Lord’s temple into a den of thieves, by your immoral principles and wicked practices? Ye are grown intolerably odious to the whole nation; you were deputed here by the people to get grievances redressed, are yourselves become the greatest grievance. Your country therefore calls upon me to cleanse this Augean stables, by putting a final period to your iniquitous proceedings in this house; and by which God’s help, and the strength he has given me, I am now come to do; I command ye therefore, upon the peril of your lives, to depart immediately out of this place; go, get you out! Make haste! Ye venal slaves begone! Go! Take away that shining bauble there, and lock up the doors. In the name of God, go!

Four hundred and fifty years later the words ring loud and true for our Loksabha.

Yeh Bombay Hai

The infrastructure in India is charitably described as lousy. The worst roads are unfortunately in Mumbai, the commercial capital and Bangalore, the IT showpiece city.

Patna today has better roads than either of them. I do not know who is responsible for this shoddy state of affairs-the centre, the state government or the local municipal corporations. It could be even the corrupt contractors and local politicians. But strangely, the general public does tolerate filth, potholes, stray animals and even unpaved roads in the middle of the city.

Mumbai takes the cake in filth and a lackadaisical attitude towards its own roads and cleanliness. So the city which has fabulous citizens, a rocking nightlife and immense professionalism has decrepit looking buildings, animal shit on roads and in many parts only mud and potholes.

Class Discriminations in India

There are very few societies more class-ridden than India. While the country focuses on caste, the discriminations based on class do not let merit and fairness prevail. Caste in educational institutions undermines the concept of merit. But class works beneath the superficial surface and insidiously destroys justice and merit.

Class in the Indian context is a nebulous and complex concept.You can feel it, you practice it but you cannot capture it properly. It is tied at a gross level to caste but also to economic wealth, family station, your English pronunciation and also the colour of your skin! So a poor man is going to be beaten up in the police station but a rich man will stay unharmed. It is very rare even in the most merit-based institutions in the country to see a driver's son being friends with a privileged doctor's child. We do not let people of a different class rise and the concept of merit is twisted to suit the dominant section's interests. In a more open society like the US, you find some of the most influential figures like Clinton,Oprah or even Larry Ellison come up from devastated families and economically deprived backgrounds. But the surreptitious discriminations practiced by Indians do not let any person from a lower class rise similarly, except in academics and research etc. where merit cannot be subjugated.

So the leaders in any part of life today come up from the same relatively privileged 5% of the population.

This is also because we sub-consciously tend to magnify the importance of anybody with the right background and do not really give due importance or respect to people of a lower class. This is part our cultural heritage. The minister's son or the industrialist's nephew will always get the blue-blooded treatment in class compared to the boy with the most merit. Marriages are closely tied to the status of families perpetuating class differences again. The great stories of our society are about kings and princes not about ordinary folk doing extraordinary things. God Rama was not born to a poor man but to a king. The heroes of Mahabharat are all from princely families. Karna grew up as the son of a charioteer and so he was not allowed to participate in the archery competition to win the hand of Draupadi. He wins another archery competition defeating the Pandavas and Kaurava brothers and the crowd is stunned by his prowess. But when they discover that he is not from royal blood, they stop applauding.

A country of a billion people has only a few figures like Rajni Kant,Lal Bahadur Shashtri or an Irfan Pathan who come from a different class and have managed to stand out. Some child from a deprived class, who wants to dream and achieve will always find odds like this daunting and will give up in his quest.

This makes the talents of a large part of the population unavailable for our growth. But there are no easy answers to this. Centuries of mindset and discrimination cannot be undone in a few years.

Regional Disparities

According to the 2001 census, only 43% of rural households (56% in urban) in India have electricity.The regional disparities are even more disturbing. The level of electrification in rural Punajb, HP and Haryana are 90, 95 and 79 percent. In contrast, the levels in rural WB, Assam and Orissa are 20, 17 and 19 percent respectively. Bihar has a level of 5.1 %.

The percentages of Punjab, HP and Haryana rural households getting tap water are 16, 38 and 83. The number of rural households getting tap water in WB, Assam and Orissa are 7, 5 and 3 percent respectively. The figure for Bihar is 1.38 %.

So much for being one country and so much for Jyoti Basu's 30 year reign due to the prosperity in rural Bengal.

How Good A leader Is Manmohan ?

In around a month, Manmohan Singh will reach the midpoint of his tenure as the Prime Minister. There will be assessments followed by bouquets and brickbats in equal measure. He has been successful in bringing down the communal temperature, sustaining the economic growth, forging a brave new foreign policy path, initiating some landmark acts like RTI, launching programmes like Bharat Nirman and the rural employment guarantee. He has alienated the urban educated sections because of the reservation policy, failed in convincing the left on several reform initiatives and not managed to make any headway on preventing terror.

But how good a leader is he? By common thinking and opinion polls, he is not a good leader. But going by research on leadership he is probably the best we ever had. The most influential theories on the personal characteristics of a leader have been by Plato, Warren Bennis and Jim Collins.

Plato propounded the concept of the ' philosopher king ‘. According to him the king should either be a wise man or a lover of wisdom. On this yardstick, India today has probably no politician better than Manmohan. And no past PM, barring Nehru comes close to him in knowledge and wisdom.

Warren Bennis emphasised the importance of self-knowledge and inner voice in becoming a leader. He also spoke about having vision, a broad education, curiosity, virtue and risk-taking as essential ingredients of a leader. It is difficult to assess any past PM on self-awareness and inner voice but amongst the other parameters aggregated, Manmohan scores more than any PM except Nehru. He however fails badly on risk-taking.

Jim Collins studied more than 1400 organisations over a thirty year period and arrived at the concept of 'level five' leadership. Level 5 leaders exhibit a paradoxical combination of personal humility and ferocious resolve. They are mostly shy but competent. Abraham Lincoln, possibly the greatest leader America has produced, was a typical level 5 leader. He was described as quiet, peaceful and shy by author Henry Adams. Level 5 leaders have always achieved more than the level 4 leader who is the charismatic and visionary type. Here again, Manmohan could do better on resolve but on the overall attribute he would rank higher than the earlier Indian PMs.

Many great leaders also develop an elaborate inner life due to hardships and traumas in their early years. Manmohan Singh grew up in poverty, battled against odds to do well in academics and then excelled as an economist. This broad experience of life in different facets makes him more complete as a human being than any of his predecessors.

The only dimensions where he falls short are risk-taking ability and resolve - definitely an outcome of his days as a bureaucrat. As a leader, he also has to operate more on instinct than on caution. Whenever he has risen beyond these limitations as in the nuclear pact with the US or the reforms as the finance minister, he has stood tall.