Excelsior... Nation

India and Britain, a splendid saga of love-hate relationship

JODHPUR, Nov 14: The extreme courtesy and respect extended by the royal families of Rajasthan to Prince Charles during his recent visit to the state revived the grandeur of a bygone era— the British Raj.

But the Indo-British engagement does not always echo similar sentiments elsewhere, speaking of the extraordinary love-hate relationship between the two greatest democracies of the world.

Indeed, the fallout of the raj is such that, more than 50 years later, it crops up from time to time, both in India and Britain. A VIP’s visit often sparks off the debate between apologists and their opponents on the impact of the raj. The intense Indo-British affair is brought to the centre stage. There is also talk about what the two countries could do together in the present times.

The visit of the prince of wales rekindled once again the unusually cordial ties between the Indian royals and the British.

The Prince was greeted everywhere in the former princely states of Jaipur and Jodhpur by folk musicians and with the play of shehnai and drums, vedic chants and marwari style ‘aarti’.

‘Purdah’-clad women in Rajasthani dresses watched the Prince from the slits in the walls of the historic Mehrangarh fort in Jodhpur, just as the wives of the Rajput Maharajas did when there was an important visitor to the palace.

Gaj Singh, the scion of the ruling family of Marwar, who played host to the British royal, in welcoming him was merely reviving the historical relations of the Rathore clan with the British royal family. For Charles was not the only Prince who had visited Jodhpur.

In 1921, the then Prince of Wales had visited what is now popularly known as the cultural capital of Rajasthan.

Mark Tully, the famous former BBC correspondent in Delhi, who has made India his home, thinks that the visit of Prince Charles was a great success.

"He met a lot of people and most Indians appreciate the Prince, who is fond of India. Prince Charles takes a lot of interest in development and does not have a standard western view on the subject. He is an extremely thoughtful person," Tully says.

John Elliot, a new Delhi-based British journalist who formerly worked with the Financial Times and is now affiliated with several publications, also feels that the visit of the heir to the British throne, was a remarkable success in boosting ties with India. It demonstrated the royal family’s caring attitude.

The physical side of the story is easy to see, the mental less obvious. The royal visitor’s fifth passage to India brought to the fore the debate between the apologists and their opponents. The debate permeates various levels of society - intellectuals, diplomatic circles, common people, bureaucracy and the business community - with different degrees of articulation.

Whatever its ills, the apologists argue, the raj was a stupendous achievement and left India the world’s largest democracy, its citizens protected by the rule of law and united by the English language. At this point it is customary for them to mention the awesome Indian railway network, roads, dams and bridges, and to highlight the selfless and able administrators of the Indian Civil Service who put all their energies and sometimes even gave their lives to make India a better place.

India, the apologists conclude, would have been a lot worse off without the British empire, whether left to its own devices or fallen into the clutches of another imperial power. The empire existed to civilise and uplift its subjects, or so its champions claimed. It should be grateful.

Dr Rakesh Saxena, a reader of history at Delhi University, says:"The British administration in India had a long standing contribution in terms of the revenue reform, legal structures, parliamentary system of governance and the civil reform. These systems prevalent today are essentially a continuity of the past.

"The Criminal Law, the Indian Penal Code (1867), the Criminal Procedure Code, the Indian Evidence Act (1872), the Indian Contract Act (1972), the Posts and Telegraph Act, and the Workman Compensation Act and many others are essentially the same which were enacted by the British, barring minor changes. The legal system is the legacy of the past. The Centre-State relations are a replica of the Government of India Act, 1935," Dr Saxena adds.

The critics of the raj reply that nothing can excuse the subjugation of millions of people, the repeated instances of abominable treatment and constant culture of racial disdain, the exploitation of a land whose economy was skewed towards imperial wants rather than local needs.

The real legacy of the raj, they maintain as they hit the stride, was the partition, a tragic consequence of Britain’s ‘divide and rule’ tactics. This left India an artificially divided nation, which was hopelessly stratified, obsessed with hierarchy and grounded down by bureaucracy, still trying to shed its in-built inferiority complex, the consequence of servility and abuse. Forget gratitude, India is owed a very big apology.

Dr Ashwini Mahajan of the Swadeshi Jagran Manch says: "Britishers not only drained away our wealth but also left the country with deep-rooted problems, which we may not be able to solve, thanks to their divide and rule policy. To legitimise their rule in India, they even propounded the theory of the ‘white man’s burden’.

"The view that Britishers provided unification of India and a unified rule is a misguided one as this was done to facilitate their loot from the country. The argument that India was not a nation and only consisted of states is fallacious. India was a nation and is a nation and will remain one because of its cultural unity," says Dr Mahajan, a reader in the P G DAV College of Delhi university.

"The fact of the matter is that the empire left a deep impact on both Indians and the English. The moot question is how did Britain, a small island nation in north Atlantic, leave such a big mark on India, a subcontinent of Asia as large and varied as Europe, home to over a billion people, professing many faiths and speaking something like 700 different languages," says Dr Renu Sethi, a reader in Delhi University and an expert in constitutional history.

Deep in the Indian countryside one is liable to stumble across a crumbling building that seems to have been incongruously transplanted from England. One will do a similar double take whenever one encounters a Marooned Gothic Church, a set of bagpipers in the expert hands of a spruce bandsman or even a purple wrapped Cadbury’s dairy milk chocolate on the corners of the streets. Young boys and girls still sing John Lennon’s ‘imagine’ and the Beatles are as popular in India as anywhere else. Any number of books, films or family stores touch in their various ways on this Indian affair.

In fact, the complex legacy of the empire remains wherever it existed. British historians say that the physical and psychological impact was enormous everywhere, including in Britain. That England is now a multi-racial nation is a direct consequence of its having become an imperial power. The possession of an empire profoundly influenced the way the British thought of themselves and the rest of the world.

The loss of India was felt most keenly by the men and women who had lived here. The rearguard of 1947 and previous exiles found it extremely hard to accept the emotional breaks with a country and a people with which they had come to love and to which they had given so much of their lives. Almost 50 years later, newspaper announcements of various Indian reunion dinners, usually regimental, in London clubs, are a testament to their sense of Camaraderie and Nostalgia for the raj.

It has been argued that the present day demography, economy and political life of North America and much of Asia, the Middle East, Africa and the Pacific owes much to British rule and influence.

"English is the lingua Franca of the world, and governance, everyday lives and habits of mind of hundreds of millions of people have been shaped by prolonged contact with Britain and its values," says Dr Saxena.

Indians today watch with interest great Britain’s geopolitical role in the global scheme of things, which has undergone many radical changes over the past four centuries. Once a maritime superpower and ruler of half of the world, Britain’s current position as an isolated, economically fragile island squabbling with her European neighbours is something many Indians find hard to grasp.

This is notwithstanding the fact that Britain is still afforded a nominal status through memberships of groups such as G7 and the retention of a permanent seat in the UN Security Council.

Mark Tully says: "Indo- British relations today are very good and nothing special needs to be done to augment them. Most Indians retain an affection for the raj. Imperialism is disapproved today.

But it has to be seen from the eyes of the time. Colonialism is not desirable but many Britishers were good hearted individuals and people of integrity and had a lot of goodwill for the people of India.’’

The British national, who now makes programmes for the BBC, has just written a book, ‘India In Slow Motion’.

British High Commissioner-designate Michael Arthur thinks that partnership opportunities for the UK and India are almost endless. Trade and investment relations need to be cemented with strong cultural ties.

John Elliot too feels trade, investment and cultural ties need to be strengthened. He refers to the great contribution being made by the Indian diaspora to the British society.

"The one-and-a-half million strong Indian origin community in the United Kingdom plays a particularly important part in the Indo-British relationship. The traditional relationship has today acquired a new maturity and depth. Moreover, in keeping with the changing global scenario, it has acquired a contemporary dimension," says Mr K C Pant, Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission and co-Chairman of the Indo-UK round table.

"There is a wealth of commonality between our two countries as evident in our institutions of law, education and administration. We share a commitment to Parliamentary democracy and a free and Vibrant press. Underpinning all these commonalities are the English language, the game of cricket and the curry industry," he says.

Mr Pant points out that bilateral trade is on the upswing and has crossed the five billion pound mark. The target set by the two Governments is to achieve an annual turnover of seven billion pounds by 2003. The flow of actual direct investment, however, seems to have declined in the last couple of years while the number of joint collaborations remains stagnant.

"Cooperation in education is also progressing steadily. The uk is today the third destination for Indian students. We observe considerable untapped potential for bilateral cooperation, particularly in commercial and economic fields. Our interaction in areas such as science and technology, energy and infrastructure, to name but a few, has also remained at a nascent stage," Mr Pant says.

"Indo-British relations are near perfect," says Mr Tarun Das, Director-General of the confederation of Indian industry,

"The challenge now is to develop an agenda for deeper and wider cooperation in trade, investment and the services sector. A new huge dimension ahead is the emerging and growing Indian investment into Britain and India steadily becoming an employment generator to access the European Union market," Mr Das adds. (UNI)

Fiscal defecit can derail growth on long
term:Finance Ministry

NEW DELHI, Nov 14: The Finance Ministry is of the view that the robust growth rate of 6.5 to seven per cent likely to be achieved in 2003-04, will accelerate in the medium term but the pressure point remains the burgeoning fiscal deficit which needs to be brought down by five to six per cent over the next five to six years.

The much higher growth rate in the medium term would take place as the growth rate in the region of seven per cent this fiscal was attributable not just to good monsoons but more a result of the reforms carried out in recent years. "The growth is not due to just atmospherics but due to solid changes in the economy," the sources said.

"The higher growth is a response of better policies and better response to policies by the private sector," a Finance Ministry source said adding that this was getting manifested by way of expansion of capacities, setting up of new capacities, booming stock market, higher profitability of corporates particularly due to the low interest rate regime and improvment in the financial sector due to the reforms undertaken in recent years.

More importantly, the growth is broad based and taking place in the regions due the state’s going the way of the Centre in carrying out reforms and introducing legislation on the lines of the fiscal responsibility and Budget Management Act, which seeks to restrict the borrowings of the Government in a phased manner. The states which have passed similar legislation include Kerala, Karanataka and Maharashtra and Punjab will soon introduce a legislation in this regard.

The future reform agenda would focus on fiscal consolidation, furthering reforms in the infrastructure sector, such as power, increase in public expenditure on education, reduction in tariff rates and privatisation.

FDI flows have improved with 6.2 billion dollars having been brought into the country during the last four months.

The improvement in the fiscal deficit was expected not so much from compression in expenditure but more by way of increasing tax to GDP ratio.

The tax to GDP ratio in the medium term was expected to go up by three to four per cent due to modernisation of the tax administration and introduction of Value Added Tax in the next six months or so. Revenues were likely to go up as a result of the new tax regime in line with international experience and the earlier experience of cenvat, when the revenue curve steeply moved up.

The source, which admitted that even though no official estimates were available, said the black economy could be in the region of 25 per cent of the GDP and the size of this segment was more or less the same level as that of other countries.

Reforms will continue in direct and indirect taxes with custom duties being brought to single digit level in the next few years.

The improvement in the manufacturing sector, the sources noted, now also encompasses the public sector and was a result of corporate restructuring. An important element was improvment in the bottomlines due to reduction in costs largely a result of interest rate reduction by five to six per cent over the past few years.

"The profitability of the much maligned public sector had improved the evidence of this being that increase in equity prices of PSU stocks was higher than the increase in the BSE index," the source said.

The source said reforms had brought down poverty levels and employment was on the increase, even though more in the unorgansied sector than in the organsied sector. Another good news was that wage levels were on the increase.

The source said it was a misconception that the reforms has widended the gap between the better off and backward states as more and more State Governments are joining the advanced states. "More and more states are getting into the reform mode," the source said.

The national highway programme was a success story contributing to employment generation, rural connectivity and spread of growth. (UNI)

Police not to prevent newsmen from
entering hospitals: HC

KOLKATA, Nov 14: The Calcutta High Court today asked the West Bengal Government to direct the police authorities not to prevent journalists from entering state-run hospitals.

The directive was issued after the state told the Court that it had not imposed any ban on the entry of newsmen into hospitals and that it had only urged the scribes to exercise restraint.

State Advocate-General Balai Roy, submitted before the division bench of Chief Justice A K Mathur and Justice A Banerjee that Chief Minister Buddhadev Bhattacharjee had not issued any order imposing a ban on the entry of media persons into Government hospital premises.

"However, realizing the need for regulating the entry of outsiders in hospitals, particularly in the wards and treatment rooms, the Chief Minister has made an appeal to the media for exercising restraint in this regard," the AG said.

He submitted that on November 3, Bhattacharjee had requested the members of the press club, Kolkata, to discuss and give their suggestions for regulating the entry of media persons into the hospital premises. "So far no response has been received," the AG said.

A number of newsmen were beaten up at a state-run hospital on November 1 night allegedly by junior doctors when the journalists went there to collect news following tension over the death of a patient allegedly due to negligence.

Appearing for two petitioners who urged the Court to direct the state to allow free movement of journalists in hospitals for gathering information, advocates Suprodip Roy and Dhillon Sarkar submitted that though the state was claiming there was no ban on entry of journalists, the police personnel posted at state-run hospitals were not allowing the media to enter the hospital premises.

Disposing of the petitions after hearing both the parties, the bench asked the State to direct the police not to stop journalists from entering hospitals, but also asked the media to exercise restraint.

Death of several patients due to alleged negligence at Government hospitals had led to a hue and cry and a media blitz over the last one month.

A number of newsmen were severely beaten up and their equipment, including cameras, were broken at R G Kar Medical College and hospital on November 1 night.

A State Government move to restrict the entry of journalists in state-run hospitals thereafter led to protest from all quarters. (PTI)

Haryana gets tough on drug companies
charging high rates

CHANDIGARH, Nov 14: The Haryana Health Department has introduced a multi-pronged strategy for effective implementation of drug control programme, which includes linking of drug control wing with all drug control authorities in the country, strengthening of state’s drug testing laboratory, legal action against those drug manufacturing companies which allegedly allow exorbitant profit margin to retailers and tightening noose on quacks.

Director General Health Service, Dr Baljit Singh Dahiya said here today that the strategy had been adopted to ensure that the patients get quality medicines at a reasonable price.

He said that the drug control wing of the department was being computerised tolink it with all drug contrrol authorities in the country through intgernet so as to handle drug control problems more effectively and swiftly.

Also, it would help in checking movement of suprious drugs in the market, he said.

He said that the drug testing laboratory at the state headquarters was being upgraded and strengthened to enable it handle modern drugs effectivly.

He said that the department had got prosecutions launched against five reputed drug manufacturing companies for allegedly cheating the consumers by allowing exorbitant profit margins to the tune of 600 to 900 per cent to the retailers.

These companies included Okassa Private Limited, Mumbai; Cipla Limited, Mumbai; Ranbaxy labs, Delhi; Lupin limited, Mumbai and Cadila Pharmaceuticals.

Dahiya said that a state wide campaign was initiated earlier this year to check the high prices of medicines being charged by the drug manufacturing companies from the patients.

A list of 254 commonly used medicines was circulated amongst the chemist shops in the state suggesting retail prices of these drugs so that the consumers get the drugs at a resonable price, he said.

Dahiya said that the department had also launched a special campaign against the so called medical practitioners to check the mushrooming of quacks.

All the civil surgeons in Haryana had been directed to check such quacks by specially constituted teams comprising drug inspectors, ayurvedic medical officers and medical officers in their respective areas.

As many as 34 cases had so far been launched in the Court of law against such unregistered medical practitioners as they were found selling allopathic drugs without any licence.

He said that 71 offenders of Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940 were booked by the inspectorate staff of the department and prosecutions had been launched aginst them.

He said that the inspectorate staff of the department had inspected 3848 chemist shops and 649 factories so far during the current year.

Also, 221 medical practitioners and 69 Government institutions were also checked by them. (PTI)

Opposition boycotts foundation day function

RANCHI, Nov 14: Almost all the opposition parties have decided to abstain from the Government sponsored third Jharkhand Foundation Day celebration to be held here tomorrow.

They alleged that the Government has no right to celebrate the foundation day as it failed to fulfil of the people dreams who fought for the creation of the tribal state.

Jharkhand Mukti Morcha MLA and opposition leader Stephen Marandi stated that his party would boycott the Government sponsored function.

The State’s Foundation Day is on November 15 which also the birthday of Birsa Munda, revered by the Adivasis.

"But during the past three years, the State Government has shown disrespect to God Birsa Munda by celebrating the foundation day on this day," he said. He added his party would celebrate God Birsa birthday tomorrow organisating functions at Birsa’s village Ulihatu in which party supremo Sibu Soren would participate.

Meanwhile, Chief Minister Arjun Munda has stated that his Government was in favour of giving more power to the villages for speedy economic development.

On the eve of the celebration the Chief Minister announced that 2003-04 would be a year of decentralisation of power. "Villagers would be provided power to decide their development and rights would be in their hands," he added.

He told newsmen last evening that on the foundation day a total of 32,500 educated unemployed youths would be appointed in various departments to fill up vacancies.

The Chief Minister also announced that his Government was committed to holding the Panchayat Election before the Parliamentary polls. (UNI)

Chinese film ‘warriors on heaven earth’ to
kickstart IFFM 2003

MUMBAI, Nov 14: Chinese film ‘warriors on heaven earth’, which also has music by maestro A R Rahman, will kickstart the 6th International Film Festival of Mumbai (IFFM) 2003, beginning here on November 20.

The seven-day long festival, which is to be held at two venues, will showcase as many as 80 films are 28 countries.

Oscar winner ‘No Man’s Land’ and ‘Khamosh Pani’ for which actress Kiron Kher won the ‘best actress’ trophy in the international competition section at the locarno film festival earlier this year are among the award winning international films to be screened in the world cinema section at the festival.

Manish Jha’s ‘Matrubhoomi-a nation without women’, which won the ‘Prix Du Jury’ award at the Cannes film festival last year, will be the closing film.

Shekhar Kapur’s ‘four feathers’ will be featured in the film India worldwide section which had earlier introduced NRI films like Nagesh Kuknoor’s ‘Hyderabad blues’, south Indian actress Revathy’s ‘Mitr-my friend’, Mira Nair’s ‘Monsoon wedding’ and Gurinder Chhada’s ‘what’s cooking’ as well as ‘American desi’.

Addressing a press conference here yesterday, Govind Swaroop, managing trustee of Mumbai Academy of Moving Images (MAMI), organisors of the festival said that noted film maker Vijay Anand would be honoured for his contribution to Indian cinema while legendary music composer Naushad would be felicitated for his outstanding contribution to the Indian film music scene. Actress-director Aparna Sen, who won this year’s national award for best direction and screenplay for ‘Mr Mrs Iyer’, would be the guest of honour at the Imax, Wadala in central Mumbai, the venue of the festival.

The Y B Chavan auditorium in south Mumbai would be the second venue.

Mr Swaroop said that MAMI has had a fairly impressive record of showing some brilliant films. "We have shown these films even before they were recognised and we hope that this year too will not be any different. The selection of films will enrich the cinematic experience of the viewers", he added.

"The highlight this year is the fact that the competitive Indian films section is being judged by an international jury. Noted playwright and screenplay writer of acclaimed films like Ardha Satya, Akrosh, Manthan, Nishant, Vijay Tendulkar will head the jury. The other members of the jury comprise representatives from France, Italy and Switzerland. As many as 13 Indian films are competing in this section", Mr Swaroop said.

‘Sagarmatha’, a Slovak film, will be screened to celebrate the 50 years of scaling the Mount Everest. This year, a retrospective of Hungarian director Zoltan Fabri will be screened at the festival as this year marks his 10th death anniversary. There will be a special focus on Italy and the section ‘river to river new Italian eyes’ is designed to introduce young Italian directors.

Another section is ‘blurring boundaries’ where contemporary swiss films will be screened. There is a package of French films titled ‘French connection’. All the films are being produced by Marin Karmitz and directed by filmmakers like Claude Chabrol among others. Mr Swaroop said that to keep pace with the technological advances in cinema, a digital section has been introduced, which includes films on Digi-Beta, Beta SP, DVD and VCD. The section includes "the speaking hands" on tabla maestro Ustad Zakir Hussain.

Then there is an ‘India worldwide’ section on NRI films featuring four feature films and two short films. Besides, the screening of films, there will be a script-writing workshop and a seminar in collaboration with international school of business and media. (UNI)