By SANJEEV CHOPRA, IAS, Director at the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration (LBSNAA), Mussoorie and Honorary Curator, Valley of Words Literature and Arts Festival, Dehradun. Before joining the Academy he was the Additional Chief Secretary, Departments of Industry, Commerce & Enterprises, Government of West Bengal and Director General, Administrative Training Institute, Kolkata. He is the recipient of the Robert S McNamara Fellowship of the World Bank and the Hubert H Humphrey Fellowship at the University of Cornell. Author of several books on governance, livelihood and SAARC. He is currently working on MAPPING THE INDIAN STATES: Aspirations, Assertions, & Adjustments. He can be reached at choprasanjeev@gmail.com
At the very outset, let me compliment and congratulate Divyanshu Patel of the Rahul Sankritayayan Manch and Lalit Aditya of the House Journal Society for getting together ‘Readings on Social Justice’. It is important, for us as administrators to be aware, not just about the provisions of the law, but also the historical context and the current ‘lived-in -reality’.
M K Gandhi । B R Ambedkar
As more and more young women and men from the engineering and professional streams are joining the civil services, it is important to go beyond the texts prescribed in the UPSC syllabi, and explore the writings of the thought-leaders who have shaped India. Who better than Gandhi and Ambedkar to start the conversations. The impact of both these individuals is legion and though their world views, ideological dispensations and political strategies were quite apart, both had much more in common than their acolytes would want us to accept. For unlike the mainstream Congress leaders, both held social reform within society, and the abolition of untouchability as more important than the freedom of India from the British yoke. In their unique ways, they articulated their thoughts, responded to each other and shaped the course of history.
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Of the two articles by Ambedkar, my personal preference is Waiting for a Visa for while ‘Annihilation of Caste’ is a polemic, Visa shows how deep was the entrenchment of the caste system, not just among the Hindus, but also among the Parsis and Muslims. Jyotirao Phule’s memorandum to the Hunter question is very significant for it raises important questions about the nature and type of education being imparted. It is now becoming clearer that access to, and control of education is institutional power, and the dominant castes actually strengthened their own position when education was first introduced and was lapped up by those who were already better endowed. Like Macaulay’s Minute on education, this paper is a mission statement of a grassroots social reformer on the place of education in India.
Yogendra Yadav’s piece on the dialogue that never took place between Ambedkar and Lohia also makes one question on why these two thinkers were not part of the mainstream discourse in social sciences in universities like the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU). While the empirical evidence on discrimantion against the Dalits, and also the cover up attempts by reference to impartiality, merit and equality is brought out in Jodhka’s paper, the larger question is: why was the study not done elsewhere? The inclusion of the paper on Pasmanda movement which shows that the vast majority of Muslims are not Ashraf is also very significant. One realizes that the conventional trope through which we understand Muslims is actually the trope of the creamy layer among the Muslims. This is far removed from majority concerns of skills, livelihoods and an eco-system which favours entrepreneurship.
Maharaj Sahuji’s Elementary education Bill of 1917 (Kolhapur) making it compulsory for parents to enroll their children both boys and girls from the ages of seven to fourteen was in many ways a precursor to the Right to Education Act passed by the Parliament in 2010. Thus, there were exemplars in India for nearly a century, and the question begs us: why was there no follow up to this across the country? I am only happy to note that over the last few years, the Academy has been focusing on primary education in a big way, for we are convinced of the transformative potential of this intervention.
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There is a close competition between the States Reorganization Commission and the Mandal Commission on which report has been read and commented on by more people. Both these have impacted the political dynamic of the country, and this impact is in the present continuous! I have read both, but certainly the Mandal report is more contemporary and contextual. However, what you have in this selection is the report of the expert committee for specifying the criteria for identification of socially advanced persons among the socially and educationally backward classes. This committee which included the legendary bureaucrat PS Krishnan, drew up the criterion of what in popular parlance is now called the ‘creamy layer’. I am glad that these readings also contain the text of some of the most important legislations on social issues, as well as the summation of court cases, especially the Tanu Kashyap and the Jayprakash Yadav case. These are extremely relevant, as you will also be involved in the process of issuing entitlement certificates, and it is better that you have clarity about this.
IAS Officers committed to upholding Liberty, Equality and Fraternity as enshrined in the Preamble to the Constitution (Picture Courtesy: LBSNAA and Getty Images)
Let me now talk of the 58: The reference is to fifty-eight bright women of 2019 who have made this the batch with the highest number of lady officers in the IAS. Each one of them featured in the short movie that showed a special trait, and the celebration continues. However, as pointed out in the radio show on women in leadership positions, we should also look at inter sectionality issues, and in this context the article on Dalit feminism becomes so meaningful, because just as Ranajit Guha’s rhetorical question on whether the subaltern can speak, the counter sentence is: can we, or do we listen to the Dalit woman, whose world is so different from the world of the feminist who can challenge patriarchy, for she has the education, means, resources and the network of contacts to support her. Can we, for example, compare Sushila Takbhoure’s autobiography Shikanje ka Dard with Jhumpa Lahiri’s Lowlands or Bachi Karkaria’s tongue-in-cheek columns?
Let me confess that when the issue of entry of Divyangs to the IAS was concerned, I suffered from the prevalent prejudice and refrain how will a visually or orthopaedically challenged person handle law and order. I realize today that we need officers who have presence of mind and the conviction to uphold the rule of law. We are certainly not looking for Robin Hoods. My interaction with officers over the last two years show how wrong I was. I have been personally inspired by my Officer Trainees and I would like to make a special mention of Ankurjeet, whose regularity at the Gymnasium was an inspiration for his entire batch and the faculty. This year, Sparsh, Rupesh and K Simhachallam have integrated themselves so well that it is well nigh impossible to think of the 2019 batch without them!
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We now come to an issue which we were happy to hide under the carpet. The issue of sexuality, gender, LBGT community and the legal framework post abrogation of Article 377. Yuval Noah Harari and Gautam Bhan show that a person’s preferred sexual orientation is a matter of right, and though much ground has been covered, we cannot rest on our laurels, for there is much more to be accomplished.
Last, but not the least, let us all realize that we are privileged to belong to this Service. True, some of us were born into privilege, and others had to walk the extra mile to get here. But now that we have arrived, let us make a firm commitment to ensure that the Preamble to the Constitution, especially the three pillars of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity will be upheld by all of us, in letter, spirit and, most of all, in action.
Opinions expressed in this article are of the author’s and do not represent the policy of The Edition. The writers are solely responsible for any claim arising out of the contents of their articles.
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