On the road to Liberty

The growing scandal over a newly built apartment tower in Mumbai, and the collapse of an old building in Delhi on the night of November 15, killing over 60 people reflect the peril that haunts Indians everyday - lack of secure property right, and strangulating regulation. The result is the pyramid of corruption that weighs heavily on citizens, and retards India's progress. This kind of systemic corruption cannot be dealt with by symbolic resignation of a minister. A shorter version of this article has been published in the Wall Street Journal , on 17 November 2010. Just a week ago President Barack Obama received repeated applause from Indian Parliamentarians for saying that India has risen, not merely rising! In the week since, Indians have been witness to the scourge that has held India back, corruption, with a capital C. President Obama’s host in Mumbai, Mr Ashok Chavan, Chief Minister of Maharashtra, resigned due to serious allegations of malpractices surrounding an apartment ...

President Barack Obama will be coming to India later this week. He is the third US president to visit India in this decade, and the only one to have done it so early in his term. Yet, the visit has not triggered any great popular interest. In my article titled " In Bush's footsteps in India " in the Walls Street Journal Online, published on November 2, 2010, I outline the possible issues on the agenda, and the reason for the lack of expectation from this visit. In a longer version of the article " Obama calls on India: Is anyone listening? " I contrast the different political contexts between President Obama's visit now, and that of his predecessor President Bush in 2006. I suggest that President Bush and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh shared a political vision for India, and that enabled the two leaders to stake so much political capital on issues such as the civilian nuclear deal that the two signed. In contrast, India does not seem to figure significant...

This week India would be awaiting the verdict of a court in a title suit.  But it is much more than a property dispute. It is a contest between rule of law and politicisation of religion. The dispute has come to symbolise different visions of India. Should Indians today be burdened by the past, or should India move forward, drawing the proper lesson from the past, while preparing for the future. In contrast to the frenzy surrounding this dispute twenty years ago, the prevailing disinterest in this issue is a sign of progress, and an illustration of how far the people have moved on. A shorter version of this article, " India Has Moved on From Its Mosque Controversy " , appeared in The Wall Street Journal Asia on SEPTEMBER 21, 2010 At one level, it is a dispute over land, which is quite a common occurrence. After all it is said that 80% of court cases in lower judiciary relate to land. The verdict is coming sixty years after the original suit was filed. But that too is no...

The multi-billion dollar Vedanta bauxite mining project in Orissa has been been mired in controversy. Recently the Ministry of Environment and Forest issued show cause notice to the company for violating various provisions of the Forest Rights Act, and suspended their mining permission. Following is my latest oped on this issue. I look at the debate from the perspective of land and mineral rights, and say that these should belong to the people who live there. This article was published in the Wall Street Journal under the title, " Landing India's Next Big Investment " , on September 8, 2010. Endemic poverty amid environmental riches has been the fate of most indigenous tribes in India for generations. There are perhaps 90 million so-called "tribals" in India today, 80% of whom live in the central belt from the states of Orissa in the East to eastern Gujarat in the West, to Madhya Pradesh in the North and Andhra Pradesh in the South. Most of these people live in...

This is the Chinese year of the tiger and people are interested in saving the tiger from extinction more than ever. Several conferences are being held, and a lot of money is being thrown at saving the tiger, but all this can't work if the Government can't mitigate the conflict between locals and wild animals. The lack of agricultural productivity forces farmers to encroach on the habitat of the tigers. This has to be resolved. China and India can save the tigers by cooperating with each other. A shorter version of my article was published in The Wall Street Journal on August 25th. Asia’s economic potential was first demonstrated by the four tiger economies. In recent decade, the focus has shifted to China, India and others. While economies are growing, the real tigers in the wild are living a precarious existence. It is time to reap the environmental dividend from growing prosperity, and save the tiger from extinction. This is the Chinese Year of the Tiger! Undoubtedly, the fo...

The excitement of the forthcoming Commonwealth Games is building up in Delhi. The spot light is not on sporting performance, but the construction delays, cost overruns, and allegations of corruption. These are symptoms which have affected many other projects. I believe, the legacy of these games could be that all such projects would be put under similar scrutiny. Below there is a table giving the official break up of expenditure on account of the games, and related development project. A version of this article was published in the Wall Street Journal Online, on 10 Aug 2010, titled " India's Political Games ". Indian politicians played games in Parliament, this week, as they debated the chaos surrounding the Commonwealth Games set to open in Delhi, on October 3. While dozens of members of Parliament from many political parties had their say, the chairman of the CWG organizing committee, Mr Suresh Kalmadi, who is also a MP from the ruling Congress party, chose not to sp...

Two crouching tigers, some hidden dragons The winds of change between the two giants could impact not only the environment but also politics. In this article published in the special issue (July-August 2010) of the "India China Chronicle", I look at the possible implications of the cooperation between these two countries at the climate conference in Copenhagen, last year. I believe a much bigger opportunity lies in the field of wildlife conservation, particularly in saving the tiger. Following is the text of the article. Over the past half century, relations between the two Asian giants have been on a roller coaster ride. In recent years too the two countries have seen sentiments swing wildly on issues ranging from trade to Tibet, coloured periodically by the border issue. Despite its history of turbulence, the two neighbours together made history at the climate summit in Copenhagen in December 2009, for the first time, the world got a glimpse of the possibl...