It has become a predictable pattern ever since Pervez Musharraf as chief of the Pakistani army instigated the the Kargil War.  Barely a week after the announcement that India and Pakistan would resume the talks that were put on hold after the Mumbai attacks, comes a bomb attack.  See link.  This time the target is the city of Pune.  As in Mumbai, the target of the attacks was a location where foreigners congregated.  Even though the perpetrators have not been identified, the site of the attack was surveyed by David Headley, the Chicago man of Pakistani origin who is being investigated for his connection with Mumbai attacks.  See link.

The attacks promptly brought calls to suspend talks with Pakistan, which the Indian government has said will continue.  Personally, I see the talks as a charade played out for public (particularly Western) consumption.  President Zardari’s government simply does not have the power to make the compromises necessary for a lasting peace treaty and does not control the Pakistani security establishment.  Islamabad still tries to distinguish the jihadi movement in Afghanistan from the proxies launched against India.  India is never going to accede to a demand to sever Kashmir from the Union of India, at best the Kashmiris on the Indian side of the LOC can look forward to a type of enhanced autonomy (which should probably be extended to the other states of India).  If Zulfikar Ali Bhutto at the height of his power did not have the ability to recognize the LOC as the international border with India (when he signed the Simla Accord), his widely despised son in law (Asif Zardari) who genuinely seems to want peace with India will not be able to do so either.

So the impasse will continue.  A few months from now Pakistan will complain the Indians are not serious about negotiations.  India will respond that the jihadi network still flourishes in Pakistan.  A terrorist strike that tests India’s patience will occur.  Pakistan will make some token arrests and bans to deflect attention.  One difference from the Musharraf years is that Pakistan stands alone and bereft of world sympathy as a result of its role in midwifing global terrorism.  As the Indian economy grows stronger and as Pakistan crumbles the balance of power is inexorably tilting in New Delhi’s favor.

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Many observers have noted that one of the unintended side effects of weakening European nation states in the cause of European integration has been to give the long suppressed sub nationalities their opportunity to claim greater autonomy.  For example the Catalans and the Basques in Spain, some Scots (and increasingly many English) in the United Kingdom do not see the advantage of being a constituent part of the national unit when they could instead get the protection of the super-national European Union.

This has been most evident in Belgium.  Created in 1830 after a Catholic and often French speaking region revolted  against the Dutch dominated United Kingdom of the Netherlands, the country has always been divided among the French speaking Wallonia in the south and the Dutch speaking Flanders in the north.  Last year there were serious concerns that the country that houses the headquarters of the EU would dissolve. (For analysis of possible scenarios of dissolution see here, for the experiences of a bemused American tourist making sense of the situation in Brussels see here).  An artificial country that some joke is united only by its soccer team and monarchy in a region that has almost never been united, Belgium may have outlived its purpose.

The secessionist trend started by Woodrow Wilson’s famous calls for self determination 90 years ago is not one I look on with much favor.  I can understand it in national units that suppress regional languages and cultures (like France) or where the majority community oppresses the minority and exploits the resources in the minority region (Pakistan in Baluchistan; Sudan with its southern half), but in many of these European countries such a situation does not exist.

What often exists is rank selfishness.  In Belgium a once dominant community is now the economic underclass taking more than its fair share of state resources.  In Italy some in the more prosperous North would rather get rid of the far poorer South (if that was where Italy would end up, they might as well have left poor Francis II on his throne).  It is a sentiment sometimes expressed in the United States where residents of certain states are convinced they are subsidizing everybody else (some with more justification than others).   It is also evident in India as noted by the recent brouhaha in Maharashtra.  See link.

It is a short sighted approach that ignores the inevitable swings of history.  Belgium where poorer Flanders is now economically dominant is a fine example of this.  A cacophony of small states will eventually bring with it far more intransigent battles over national resources (notably water and in the case of England and Scotland oil reserves), inherited debt and other conflicts and a much harder job to divide aid at the European level.  They would be better off working towards a common national purpose while retaining their regional culture (that includes you too Quebec).

But then I do not speak from the perspective of a paranoid or threatened minority.

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Iran has now come out and repeated India’s position on Afghanistan vis a vis the good Taliban.  See link.  Iran’s motivations are pretty clear since there never has been any love lost between Iran and the Taliban, the former considering the Taliban as backward fanatics and the latter considering the Iranians as schismatic heretics.  Given Washington’s inclination to disregard anything Iran says, this will not prevent the Karzai government from seeking a rapprochement with elements of the Taliban.  But any increase in Taliban influence in Kabul raises the chance of Iranian meddling and counter-meddling from Pakistan.  The vicious cycle continues.

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A recent Foreign Policy article highlights a danger to stability in Afghanistan not often discussed – the toxic relationship between India and Pakistan.  See link.  This dates back to the partition of the subcontinent in 1947.  Afghanistan (even under the Pakistani created and supported Taliban) never accepted the Durand Line drawn by the British as the border between the two countries.  This line divides the Pashtun people between the two countries.  As a result every government in Kabul (other than the Taliban) has had a frosty relationship with Pakistan and a warm one with India.  Paranoid about facing hostile states on both flanks, Pakistan has always sought to install a more pliant regime in Kabul.

Durand Line border between Afghanistan and Pakistan (in red). The blue area represents the predominant Pashtun and Baloch area.

It is one of the reasons why Pakistan has proved so unwilling to dump its Taliban clients and has eagerly pushed the idea of a reconciliation with the “Good Taliban.”  India having faced a tide of Pakistani sponsored Islamic terrorism in the past decades sees this as a distinction without a difference.

India has been one of the major aid contributors to rebuilding Afghanistan.  This has, as usual, stirred paranoia about Indian intentions in Pakistan with wilder theories speculating that India intends to install military bases in the region once the Americans leave.  In 2008, these fears appear to have prompted an attack on the Indian embassy in Kabul allegedly sponsored by Pakistan’s intelligence agencies.  See link.

Given its ethnic divisions, Afghanistan is always likely to be a weak state subject to meddling by its neighbors.  The Indo-Pakistani tussle is yet another destabilizing influence that imperils any attempt to pacify Afghanistan.  And then there is Iranian meddling in the western part of the country.  The world community should prepare contingency plans if (or maybe when) things fall apart after the United States departs the region.

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Barely a week after I commended the Indian constitutional set up and politicians for marching towards a common nation purpose (see link) comes a piece of rank demagoguery arising out of cynical political opportunism.  As with any culturally diverse nation, India has had to deal with various ethnic groups feeling threatened from time to time.  The early 1960s saw a dispute over language where the southern state of Tamil Nadu successfully opposed the imposition of Hindi as a national language.  Assorted regional grievances spawned separatist movements along India’s periphery in Kashmir, Punjab and Assam.  The Assamese insurgency is relevant to the events of the past week as it arose from concerns over illegal Bangladeshi immigrants taking away local jobs (not to mention like any good neighbors Assam and Bengal have had about 1300 years of mutual enmity).  The rise of regional parties caused some concerns about the balkanization of India, but apart from making sure that immigrants learned the local language in schools an active campaign of discrimination was never proposed by any major political party.  Until last week.

The western Indian state of Maharashtra has been India’s industrial and financial powerhouse.  Its capital Mumbai is the most cosmopolitan city in India.  As the home of India’s financial markets and the Hindi film industry Bollywood, it is at once India’s New York and Los Angeles.  Since the 1960s it has been the magnet drawing fortune, dream and job seekers from across India.  The competition from outsiders and a perception that the immigrants only hired their own has always created an undercurrent of tension.  It is this tension and the perceived plight of the “Marathi manoos” (the Marathi man) that the Shiv Sena a local right wing party founded by former cartoonist Bal Thackeray has historically tapped into.  Thackeray has a history of baiting Muslims and others and controversially claiming Hitler as a hero, but until last week had not crossed beyond a certain line.

But times have changed.  A succession struggle over the ailing Thackeray has split his party.  Thackeray anointed his son Uddhav as his successor.  This caused Thackeray’s thuggish but more charismatic nephew Raj Thackeray to split off and form his own party, the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena.  For the last two years Raj Thackeray has stirred up protests and occasional violence against North Indian immigrants in Maharashtra.  It had the unusual effect of making the Shiv Sena look like a mature party.  However, the 2009 Indian parliamentary and Maharashtra elections showed that Raj Thackeray had tapped into an undercurrent of resentment.  His MNS split the Shiv Sena vote costing it seats in parliament and the state assembly.

Threatened by the emergence of the MNS, the elder Thackeray has decided imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.  Starting with his comments on the cricket dispute noted in this blog yesterday he has ramped up the volume by asserting that cosmopolitan Mumbai belonged to Marathis.  See link.  Fuel was thrown on the fire when the Congress party which rules Maharashtra suddenly issued a directive (since withdrawn) that all Mumbai taxi drivers needed to speak Marathi.  See link.  The xenophobic oneupmanship is escalating with Raj Thackeray asserting that jobs in Maharashtra must go only to people of Marathi descent (not just people who spoke Marathi).  See link.

This is a line no political party in India has crossed so far.  It has also caused serious rifts in the Shiv Sena’s already strained alliance with the national Bharatiya Janata Party and the Hindu nationalist organization, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh.  See here and here.

One heartening feature of this has been the united front put forward by every other political grouping to the Shiv Sena and MNS’s insanity.  Less heartening is the threat by local demagogues else where to engage in retaliatory attacks on Maharashtrians in their states for attacks by the Shiv Sena/MNS.  The Shiv Sena’s stance is hypocritical for a political party that has railed against Article 370 of the Indian constitution granting special rights to (Muslim majority) Jammu and Kashmir (one guess on what fuels the opposition to Article 370).  Indian nationalists can be forgiven for wondering if the uncle-nephew duo are in fact Manchurian candidates trying to achieve what Pakistan sponsored terrorists have not managed for the past 25 years.

While the bluster of the Thackerays’ practically amounts to a lot of hot air at present, a dangerous line has been crossed.  Without electoral repudiation of such tactics it will encourage demagogues in other parts of India.  While the increasing percentage of India’s labor force crossing state lines for work will cause some tensions, it is the best way to encourage national integration in a country that sometimes resembles the Tower of Babel.  The past week also demonstrates the delicate balance Indian democracy must maintain to achieve its dreams of becoming a world power.

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Ever since the notorious Bodyline series in 1932-33 caused a diplomatic incident between England and Australia, politics has rarely stayed away from the game.  In stark contrast to many other team sports, international cricket has generally been played at the national level with various domestic leagues within cricket playing countries.  While some like English county cricket occasionally brought in a few foreign players, domestic cricket as the name suggests generally consisted of teams stocked with local lads.

Until the formation of the Indian Premier League two years ago, cricket did not have a private league (and even this one was started by the Indian cricket board with private team owners) akin to the various soccer, baseball, basketball and ice hockey leagues around the world.    The new IPL also had to reach an accommodation with various national cricket boards to make sure that players would be available for international tournaments.  A very different setup than that which exists in the United States where the MLB and NHL seriously consider not making their baseball and hockey players available for the Olympics.

But these controversies pale before the brouhaha sweeping the subcontinent today.  It started when the latest IPL player auction failed to select a single player from World Twenty20 champion Pakistan.  See link.  This promptly brought tit for tat exchanges between the Pakistani and Indian governments.  Pakistan alleging that this was orchestrated by an Indian government not serious about peace with Pakistan and the Indian government retorting that they had placed no restrictions on the operations of the private league Pakistan should look to themselves as to why the snub occurred.  The Pakistani media has resorted to its typical bout of conspiracy theories involving the Indian spy agency RAW, the local mafia and hard right nationalist politicians.  See link.  Stung by the snub, Pakistan has revoked future participation by its players in the IPL.  See link.

I think Occam’s razor rather than any deep conspiracy to humiliate Pakistan probably provides the likeliest explanation.  Emotions in India still run high from the 2008 Mumbai attacks and the half-hearted Pakistani attempts to suppress the terror groups Pakistan spawned. The 2009 IPL season was played in South Africa due to concerns for player security (not helped by the attack on the Sri Lankan team visiting Pakistan).  It is likely that the IPL owners simply did not want to deal with the security hassles involved with Pakistani players.

Then there is the issue of local xenophobes disrupting play.  Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray has already lashed out at film actor Shah Rukh Khan (the owner of an IPL team) for suggesting that he would have signed a Pakistani player.  See link.  While purists can hope for the old Olympic ideal of suspending hostilities during a major athletic event, the reality never lives up to the ideal.  Right wing nuts like the Shiv Sena have been disrupting Indian-Pakistani cricket matches scheduled to be played in India for the past 20 years.

It is hard not to sympathize with IPL owners for wanting to avoid this headaches.  It is not the only one they have had to deal with.  Thackeray has also turned his fire on the Australian cricketers as scapegoats for the rash of attacks on Indian students in Australia in the past year.  Now the Australians are considering skipping the lucre offered by the IPL.  See link.  A group in the Telangana region agitating for statehood within the Indian union is promising to disrupt local matches as this would distract from their pet cause.  See link.

While Pakistan sulks and opportunists and xenophobes bask in the sun, the toxic mix of nationalism, xenophobia and idiocy threaten to deny cricket fans an entertaining sports spectacle.

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The Indian constitution (and the Indian republic) celebrated its 60th birthday today on January 26, 2010.  Apart from a 2 year suspension when Indira Gandhi imposed a national Emergency, the Indian constitution has been the foundation of the world’s largest democracy.  It is no small achievement.  At its birth few thought that democracy could flourish in a poor country with deep cultural, linguistic and religious divides and with such a large illiterate population.  But the creaky wheels of Indian democracy have kept on churning and have so far overcome some structural flaws within the constitution’s federal layout (see link), an over-centralization imposed as a reaction to the partition of India and from the insecurities and authoritarian tendencies of Indira Gandhi.

A lot of the credit must go to India’s first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru.  Ever since the dismantling of the license raj and the beginning of free market reforms in India in 1991, it has become fashionable to criticize Nehru.  However, unlike many of the early leaders of the newly independent countries of Asia and Africa, Nehru was at heart a believer of democracy and its institutions.  He did not attempt to turn his ruling party into a gaggle of sycophants, create a cult of personality or attempt to create a political dynasty by aggressively promoting his daughter Indira.  The ultimate respect for constitutional norms survived Indira Gandhi’s failure on all these three points (and even the Emergency was imposed based on a constitutional provision).  And even with this failure, Indira Gandhi like her father did take steps that created a national identity.

As Kashmiri Brahmins who grew up in the North Indian heartland, Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi projected an Indian identity.  Buttressed by the boost to their reputation by their history in the independence struggle they belonged to India in a manner that few leaders other than Mahatma Gandhi could.  While this did have the deleterious effect of choking the growth of an alternative set of leaders, it delayed the rise of regional satraps  until a core Indian national identity was nurtured.  India has suffered secessionist movements along the periphery, but with the rise of coalition politics reliant on regional support some of this tension has eased.  This has eased the concerns (more often raised in Western media about the fragmentation of India).

Finally credit must be given to the professionalism of the Indian armed forces and their willingness to obey civilian authority.  In most newly independent countries, Nehru’s neglect of the army in the 1950s followed by the debacle at the hands of the Chinese in the 1962 war would have sparked a coup.  It did not happen.  Western media raised similar fears of a coup in the aftermath of Indira Gandhi’s assassination, a thought not seriously considered domestically within India.  Today such an eventuality seems unthinkable.

And so India’s democratic republic continues to move on into is projected rise as a new world power.  There are issues of concern.  The division of revenues (as noted in the article linked above) is and will continue to be a source of tension between haves and have nots within India.  India has punted the issue of reapportioning parliamentary seats till 2026.  When reapportionment does happen, it will cause tension as the more prosperous states (which have done a better job implementing family planning policies) lose parliamentary seats (and as a result political power) to poorer states.  Indian democracy, like many young democracies, is often rooted in support of personalities as opposed to policies and political dynasties dot the landscape.  This phenomenon is not unknown in the United States, but the next step to the maturation of Indian democracy has to be the strengthening of parties based on political ideologies rather than vehicles for personalities.

So far India’s politicians have generally shown a sense of flexibility in working towards a common national purpose.  As long as that continues, the passage time will buttress the sense of Indian national identity and the Republic of India will continue to thrive.  So here are birthday wishes to the longest written constitution in the world.

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Jyoti Basu died this Sunday.  The nonagenarian had been ailing for some time.  The usual round of obituaries, paeans and critiques have poured in.  See here, here, here, here, here and here.  In 1977, the English educated Basu initiated the longest running elected rule by communists (which likely will draw to a close next year).  The common theme in the articles on Basu since his death generally refer to the following:

• His unusual length of tenure,
• The land reforms initiated in Bengal that broke the feudal hold on society,
• His secular outlook that saw few religious riots on his watch,
• And finally the historic moment in 1996 when he bowed to the command of his party’s politburo and turned down the prime minster’s job.

The more critical articles also refer to the industrial stagnation, if not regression, that occurred on his watch.

Basu in many ways is an overrated figure.  His importance is inflated by the collapse of all opposition parties in West Bengal, aided by the general unwillingness of the Congress party to challenge the reds on their home turf and the communists ruthless utilization of the instruments of state to quash dissent.  This is in stark contrast to the other communist bastion in Kerala, where Communist and Congress led coalitions alternate power with mind numbing regularity.

However, the untrammeled power Basu and his communist colleagues had locally, ultimately showcased the ideological bankruptcy and incompetence of the communist movement in India.

Land reform in Bengal was long overdue, and that early accomplishment marks the high water mark of communist rule in West Bengal.  Unlike Kerala, the other social indicators remain average.  The Bengali peasant is still poverty stricken, businesses have fled the state and Kolkata’s status as the cultural capital of India has long since been taken over by Mumbai.  The violent collapse of the communist party’s attempt to entice the Tata Motor Company to build a plant at Nandigram, symbolizes why businesses are not keen to enter Bengal.

The impact Basu would have had in the rejected prime ministership (he later cryptically referred to the rejection as a historic blunder) is also overrated.  Basu would have headed a ramshackle coalition united by the pursuit of power and a loathing of the Hindu nationalist Bharaitya Janata Party (subsequent events would show that many of the constituents of the coalitions valued power over their loathing of the BJP).  The coalition was supported from the outside by the just deposed Congress party which was smarting from its electoral humiliation and itching for the opportunity to force a new election.  It is hard to see how Basu’s tenure as prime minister would have been markedly different or longer than what actually transpired.  The BJP would have still made the necessary electoral adjustments and Basu’s mismanagement of West Bengal’s economy hardly supports the theory that any good governance on his part would have prevented the BJP’s ultimate rise to power.

The humbling of Bengal’s communists in India’s parliamentary elections last year has given rise to hope that their  33 year old grip on power may come to a close in the next state elections.  However, with the successor likely to be the mercurial populist Mamata Banerjee, it is hard to see West Bengal’s lot improving anytime soon.

Meanwhile, one of the last of India’s “gentlemanly” politicians of a bygone era has passed on, fortunate that he will not see the collapse of the creaky edifice he nurtured in West Bengal for so many years.

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The ruckus about the creation of a new Telangana state in India brought to the forefront the issue of “small” vs. “big” states in India.  Federal polity in India has one marked difference that that in the United States.  The United States of America was created by a compact among its constituent states which preceded the national entity.  As a result, even though the constitution permits the splitting or merging of states (Article 4, Section 3, Clause 1) with two exceptions (Maine which was carved out from Massachusetts to create a free state to balance Missouri under the Missouri compromise and West Virginia which seceded from Virginia at the start of the civil war) the American states (territories are a different matter) have been relatively sacrosanct.

This was not the case in India.  The mish mash of the provinces of British India and the princely states that acceded to the India at independence made the reorganization of states essential.  Even though the trauma of partition ensured that the power of states would be curbed (more on that later), in the 1950s the fateful decision was made to reorganize the states on linguistic grounds rather than administrative efficiency.  Larger states have always brought with them a concern that the political influential areas would reap state largess while the less fortunate areas would be ignored.  As a result, demands for breaking up some of the larger states have simmered in the background since the reorganization of the states.

A decade ago the agitators for smaller states found some hope.  Uttarkhand and Jharkhand were carved out of the two most populous states in India.  Chattisgarh was carved out of the geographically largest state in India.  This brought the demand for Telangana to the forefront.  A Telugu speaking region merged into Andhra Pradesh, Telangana previously was part of the former princely state of Hyderabad.  While some of the princely states like Mysore, Baroda and Gwalior were relatively well administered, Hyderabad was not.  The region remained a resource poor economic and educational backwater.  Apart from the capital Hyderabad, a large portion of the province has felt ignored in favor of the more prosperous coastal regions of the state.  The argument was that a Telangana state would create with a more responsive local government which will boost regional development.

Unfortunately the  backing for the position is mixed. Read the rest of this entry »

• Urban development killing the pigeon rearing tradition in Bangladesh.  Having seen the amount and stench of droppings the birds nicknamed rats with wings can create, somehow I don’t think the other city dwellers are too unhappy.
• Getting pregnant is now a court martial offense.  Only celibate married soldiers need apply for this General’s army.
• More climate change in India.  The rainfall in the wettest place in the world is dropping rapidly.
• Britain looks at modifying its onerous libel laws.  There is a reason why the brilliant South Park episode on Scientology ended with a threat to sue in England.
• Religious fundamentalism in Israel.  Rabbis say that loyalty to God trumps the orders given by the state (of course they interpret God’s word).  Why exactly are the American right wing so eager to give these religious zealots a free pass?  How exactly are they different than the so called “Islamofascists”?

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The New York Times has a an interesting read about Pakistan’s unwillingness to take on its pet Afghan militant as part of its posturing for a post American Afghan future.  After riding the militant tiger and finding it hard to get off Pakistan is not yet willing to learn its lessons from the past.  Instead as many observers including this blog have noted, it remains steeped in denial and paranoia about Indian intentions in Afghanistan.  It is much easier to engage in tit for tat blame of India (with no real evidence presented) rather than face up to the mess they have made of their country.  While the Pakistani establishment fiddles, its country burns.

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After an unexpected hiatus from blogging activities, kick starting the first post of the week with some thoughts on events that would have merited longer posts at the time.

• I liked the general tenor of Barack Obama’s speech but was amused to see some of the blinders come off on the left and the right as a result.  Liberals unhappy about the decision on Afghanistan saw the president expound a doctrine of just war which in some ways could have been delivered by George W. Bush. Conservatives who had convinced themselves that Obama was a weak anti-war liberal seem to have heard for the first time that the President does not rule out war (they seem to have forgotten his comment in the campaign that he was only against “stupid wars” (though he left may argue that the Afghan escalation IS a stupid war).  Time will tell whether the “Obama Doctrine” fares better than the “Bush Doctrine.”  With its understanding of the limitations of American power, it does have a greater chance of success.
• The Indian government dropped a bombshell with the creation of a new state.  Will discuss the virtues and pitfalls of smaller states in the Indian constitutional context later this week, but words cannot describe how badly the decision making process was bungled.  First the government gave in to emotional blackmail of a hunger strike, then nobody seems to have discussed the decision with the local government and laid the groundwork, and the critical question of who gets Hyderabad still remains unanswered.  The abrupt decision making process has also suddenly brought to the forefront demands for at least 9 new states.  Before the virtues of these demands are assessed, first the Indian government deserves brickbats for sheer incompetence.
• The Iranian regime returns Shirin Ebadi’s Nobel peace prize medal.  Previous blog here.
• One of the two Chicago men arrested for planning a terrorist attack in Denmark seems to be singing about his involvement in the 26/11 Mumbai attacks.  Not surprisingly, India wants him extradited.

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Indian authorities (with silent Bangladeshi cooperation) appear to have arrested the head of the United Liberation Front of Asom.  ULFA now appears a spent force and hopefully the mistakes of the past that gave rise to the insurgency will not be repeated.  While the Indian constitution explicitly protects minority religions, cultures and languages and the Indian government has generally not actively discriminated against minorities, India has been plagued by repeated insurgencies and secessionist movements along its periphery.  This was often created by excessive centralization in the aftermath of partition and particularly in the Indira Gandhi years.  The central government also repeatedly dismissed opposition governments in sensitive states like Punjab and Jammu & Kashmir.  While this was also carried out in different parts of the country, needless to say states with large minority populations took umbrage.

The insurgency in Assam was different in that unlike Kashmir, Punjab or Nagaland the state is largely Hindu.  Assam, like Kashmir, has historically very much been a part of the Indian cultural mileu but due to geographical location was somewhat isolated on the periphery.  The name of the state itself comes from the Ahoms who conquered the ancient Indian region of Kamarupa.  While the Ahoms would defeat Mughal invasion attempts their civil war plagued kingdom was eventually conquered by Burma.  A few years later the British annexed Assam after the First Anglo-Burmese War.

Assam like Punjab saw its territory drastically reduced after independence when Mizoram, Nagaland, Meghalaya and Arunachal Pradesh were carved out of the state.  Even now certain tribal gorups like the Bodos have agitated for their own states.  If this was a bruise to the Assamese ego, the Indian government made it worse.  Even though Assam contains most of India’s land based oil reserves the refineries (and the resulting jobs) were relocated to electorally more promising states.  From the 1970s illegal immigration from Bangladesh threatened the religious and demographic make up of Assam, a problem aggravated by unscrupulous politicians enrolling these politicians on the electoral rolls.  By the 1980s Assam was the site of a simmering insurgency.

Countries don’t often get a chance to fix repeated mistakes.  However, the decline of the Indian National Congress and the emergence of coalition politics at the national level in India has helped ease some of the regional unrest.  Article 356 of the Indian constitution that was repeatedly misused in the past has rarely been used in the last 15 years.  This has allowed Indian state governments to rise and fall on their own merits without New Delhi being used as a scape goat.  The decline of ULFA is an opportunity to finish the transition from the bullet to the ballot to resolve Assam’s problems.

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Suketu Mehta with a passionate column on how 25 years after the Bhopal gas disaster legal immunity from corporate structures, government apathy and the unspoken fact of a lower value assigned to deaths in certain places have contributed to the continuing environmental and human catastrophe in the area.  Some of the charges against Union Carbide fit into the caricatured stereotype of  the evil multi-national that will have superior safety standards in the West but will ignore them in the third world.  The Indian government also fully lives up to its stereotypes of incompetence and bureaucratic apathy.

Bhopal also presents the delicate balance between a company’s legal and moral obligations.  Right now the legalists are winning.  So while the activists complain, the Indian government dithers, Dow claims legal immunity the contamination in the area continues, people still fall sick and die and as usual nothing gets done.  The dead in Bhopal are currently the collateral damage to India’s aspirations for the future for which future profits will not be endangered.

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Barack Obama’s recent trip to China has received much criticism for its failure to achieve much of substance, giving a short-shrift to human rights issues and even raising a minor storm in India from an otherwise innocuous press release.  However, the trip may not have been entirely wasted.  Richard Wolfe notes that lost in the press coverage (and he charitably does not mention the American media’s obsession with Sarah Palin’s new ghost-written book) were agreements reached regarding emissions targets.  This along with talks held with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh during his state visit last week (which also helped defuse the brouhaha over the joint statement with China) could help break the deadlock at the upcoming Copenhagen talks.

The Chinese visit may have also contributed to the China joining the recent censure of Iran by the IAEA.  The deliverables may not be as groundbreaking as previous presidential visits abroad but address two upcoming issues on the President’s foreign policy slate.  Success in Copenhagen could reaffirm the goodwill that exists for the administration on the ground in Europe.  Bringing India and China into any global agreement to cut emissions will blunt one of the major criticisms of the Kyoto Protocol.  Likewise any Chinese help on Iran is to be welcomed.  These are small steps at present, but they could lead to greater rewards down the road.

Its been one year since the shocking images of the assault on Mumbai were flashed worldwide.  Time magazine reviews how India’s security situation domestically still leaves it as a soft target.  One of the few things the Indian government can take some pride in is that even its creaky justice system is bringing the accused to prompt trial.  But then unlike 9/11 the Mumbai attacks unfortunately were merely the latest and most public of the myriad terrorist events in India in the last 25 years.  The Indian judicial and legal system has far more experience dealing with such cases and the pitfall of draconian anti-terrorism statutes (TADA and POTA).  Unfortunately after each outrage like the Mumbai attacks the next draconian statute hits the books.

As the anniversary of the attacks approached and as it prepared for unwelcome attention to the paucity of any meaningful cooperation, Pakistan “rounded up the usual suspects.”  Count me a cynic on the likelihood that anything meaningful will come out of this.  While Pakistan has belatedly launched its assault on the Taliban, it remains unwilling or unable to clean up the terrorist  support infrastructure it created in the last 25 years.  However, 26/11 should also have hammered home just how isolated Pakistan stands in the international arena at present while its rival with all its flaws is increasingly accepted as a major international player.

Fore previous posts in this category click here.

The next rumination in this series focuses on what I term as an accidental empire – Mughal Empire.  For the descendants of a bunch of Central Asian marauders, the Mughals have been indelibly entwined with the image of India.  From the Taj Mahal, to the Mughlai cuisine that is the staple of Indian restaurants across the world, to the loan word Mogul that has been incorporated into the English language the cultural influence of the Mughals survives to this day.

Yet the Mughals were in many ways an accident.  The survival of their Empires territorial integrity for so long is in marked contrast to their Timurid cousins.  The prevalence of polygamy and concubinage caused recurrent succession problems across most Islamic dynasties.  The Ottomans would solve this by a mass slaughter of the siblings of the new monarch (Mehmed III would notoriously commence his reign by executing 19 of his siblings).  After this blood letting almost brought the dynasty to an end following the death of Murad IV (his only surviving heir was his insane brother Ibrahim), the Ottomans would formalize the policy started by their father Ahmed I.  Henceforth princes would be locked in the Kafes (literally the Cage), a section of the harem where they were under surveillance and often with concubines too old to get pregnant, and the succession to the throne rotated through seniority.  While this stopped the blood letting, it eventually resulted in the succession of emasculated, unprepared and often psychologically disturbed men who oversaw the Ottoman Empire’s long decline.

The Timurids did things differently.  Traditionally each prince received an appanage to rule.  The obvious result was a fragmentation of authority and near constant fratricidal strife following the death of the founder of the house Timur-e-lang (Tamerlane).  Weakened by civil war, the fragmented Timurid states would be mopped up by the emerging Safavid Empire of Persia in the west and the Shaybanid Uzbeks from the east.  This pressure from both ends ultimately forced the founder of the Mughal dynasty Zahir ud din Muhammad Babur to abandon his dream of restoring Timur’s empire from Samarkand and head east where the disorder in the Delhi Sultanate under the incompetent Ibrahim Lodi opened up new venues of action.  Accidental opportunity #1 Read the rest of this entry »

By demanding the return of Mother Teresa’s remains to the land of her ancestry, Albania has ruffled some feathers in the city where the diminutive nun conducted her mission.  Not surprisingly the request has been summarily rebuffed.  But it raises a question of national identity and ethnic pride.

To what extent should one bask in the accomplishments of ethnic kin that were almost entirely achieved in another country?

2009 Chemistry Nobel Laureate Venkatraman Ramakrishnan caused some heartburn in India when he publicly wondered why so many people in India kept contacting him to offer congratulations.  Most such emigres do not share Dr. Ramakrishnan’s humility and are only too eager to soak up all the adulation they can get.  Likewise the people granting the adulation often merely seek to bask in the reflected glory from their ethnic kin.  A more positive use would be to use the ready made role model to inspire and encourage future accomplishments on the home front.

The Economist details the simmering tensions between China and India and the ongoing struggle to resolve the century long dispute over the McMahon Line.  Ever since India’s defeat in its 1962 war with China, the two countries have eyed each other warily.  Pakistan ever eager to seek a counterweight against India has latched on to the Chinese lifeline, while India during the Cold War veered towards the Soviet Union.  In recent years some American policymakers have sought out India as a counterweight to the emerging Chinese superpower.

None of this is in the long term interest of either country.  Both have restive minority regions and threats to their stability from regions that have not shared in their economic boom.  The dispute at present is also over a remote sparsely populated region which few Chinese or Indians have bothered to visit, but as the Economist notes is complicated by ties to Tibet.  Hopefully calmer heads will prevail and the countries will avoid a armed confrontation driven solely by notions of national pride.

How to deal with emerging economies has been a huge stumbling block in climate change negotiations.  The Kyoto treaty foundered in the United States because it did not place requirements on India and China.  India and China point out that their per capita pollution is a fraction of western countries and they would need assistance in terms of technology transfer.  This position has been cynically exploited by resource rich countries like Saudi Arabia.  However, faced with the impact of global warming the Indian environmental minister is internally lobbing around a proposal to kick start negotiations.  However, as the article suggests that none of this will work without American leadership.  And American leadership is imperiled by climate change deniers (See a slideshow of some of the most vocal deniers) many of whom who control the ideology of its opposition party and a national chamber of commerce too short sighted to explore the opportunities that a clean energy policy could provide.

With global warming melting the Himalayan glaciers an interesting read on a local attempt to limit the fallout.   Water will be a major flash point in South Asia in the coming decades as the perennial rivers like the Ganga, Yamuna and the Indus could become seasonal rivers and the rain patterns that feed agriculture and aquifers across the subcontinent change.  The Economist discussed this issue a month back.  A friend has often joked about India’s constant position as an emerging power – that it is full of “potential energy” rather than “kinetic energy.”  In addition to the other domestic, structural and regional issues India needs to solve, this looming water crisis adds to its development burden.

A follow up to the preceding post regarding Pakistan.  The New York Times is reporting about the divides within the Pakistani establishment about conditions attached to aid from the United States.  Ever since its first military coup in 1958 the Pakistani army has held a stranglehold over its political life.  Civilian attempts to rein in the security establishments have been promptly snuffed out.  While the current head of the Pakistani Army has shown a disinclination to interfere with the day to day workings of the civilian regime, it has still protected its turf – notably after the attacks on Mumbai last November when it squashed President Zardari’s offer to send the head of the ISI to India for talks.

It is understandable why Washington does not wish to give the Pakistani military a free hand.  The dictatorship of Pervez Musharraf diverted the aid provided after 9/11 to beef up Pakistani military preparedness against India instead of tackling extremists.  However, the opposition appears to arise more from nationalistic saber rattling rather than concerns about what the Pakistani Army will be prevented from doing.  Add to that national pride bruised by American bombing of targets within Pakistani borders.

With its economy in shambles Pakistan is unlikely to refuse American aid and my guess is that after a suitable amount of bluster and the requisite face saving compromises the money will be accepted.  But it does raise an important point regarding Pakistan’s future.  Future military chiefs may not be professional soldiers who stay out of civilian affairs.  Ultimately a democracy is not created by a public franchise but by the willingness of institutions to accept the rule of law and the mandate granted by the franchise.  If Pakistan is genuinely to become a democracy civilian control of its military is a necessity, however venal the public leadership is perceived to be.  In this regard the epithet “Mr. Ten Percent” bestowed on President Zardari during his wife’s tenure as Prime Minister and the stench of corruption attached to the other national leader, former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, does not help. Read the rest of this entry »

Many successful rulers and administrators have often failed to grasp the importance of good public relations.  As a result, an otherwise competent or successful tenure in office has been marred by rising unpopularity. Others have excelled far too well on the propaganda side of governance until the inevitable disclosure that the emperor wore no clothes. Very few rulers have managed to find a fine blend of the two and the very success of the public relations campaign makes an honest appraisal difficult.

This is not (yet) an appraisal of Barack Obama. That book is still being written. This is the first in a series of appraisals of rulers through history and whether their reputations are deserved, undeserved or over inflated.

The Emperor Ashoka is a fine example of this. The Wikipedia entry on his life contains a list of the usual platitudes about his reign and how his reign was a golden age of peace and prosperity. The only problem is that almost all the extant data of his reign comes from pillars and rock inscriptions placed by Ashoka across his vast empire. The third Mauryan emperor knew the value of propaganda. Read the rest of this entry »