INDIA

The Modi Years: Dismantling Democracy, Brick by Brick

P Raman | 27 Mar 2024

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Among some of Modi’s firsts, his 10-year regime was marked by the shortest Lok Sabha sittings, endless judicial interventions, Supreme Court strictures, gubernatorial meddling and FCRA cancellation of 20,000 NGOs.

A selfie point featuring Prime Minister Narendra Modi installed at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus railway station in Mumbai in August. Image Courtesy: Twitter/ @Central_Railway 

Let’s begin with Parliament, which is the foundation of what Narendra Modi describes as the ‘Mother of Democracy.’ During the G20 Summit in India, a booklet was published and an exhibition was held on the virtues of democracy.

The visuals of Modi kneeling at Parliament’s doorstep when he first entered the building as Prime Minister in May 2014 are still fresh. He broke down and was in tears. 

Then, during his second tenure, Parliament was shifted to a new magnificent building, which the Prime Minister — not the President who, along with the two Houses constitute Parliament — inaugurated in September last year with great pomp and show.

All such song and drama was to conceal a harsh truth: the Modi regime’s consistent attempts to devalue Parliament as the powerhouse of a vibrant democracy.

The Prime Minister’s Office answered just 13 questions in Parliament till 2022, as compared to Manmohan Singh’s 85 questions during the 10 years of the United Progressive Alliance government.

Let’s look into how during the Modi decades, Parliament lost its role as a forum of deliberative democracy. 

• As per PRS Research, the 17th Lok Sabha was the shortest since 1952. Of the Lok Sabhas that completed full term, the 16th House (also under Modi) had just 331 sittings, the lowest number. 
• Modi’s 17th Lok Sabha had the lowest number of Bills subjected to committee scrutiny — 37 of 210 Bills or 17.6 %. It was 25% during the 16th Lok Sabha. No Bill was referred to committees during the last Winter session of Parliament. The figures for the previous Manmohan Singh decade were 60% and 70%, respectively. This sharp decline shows the present regime’s disdain for scrutiny.
• Similarly, there was a big fall in the number of short duration discussions during the 17th Lok Sabha. Such discussions allow members to express their views.
• The 17th Lok Sabha was without a Deputy Speaker throughout its tenure.
• For the first time, Parliament under Modi witnessed a record number of arbitrary suspensions — almost 20 % of the Lok Sabha during the Winter session.
• The PM himself was present in the Lok Sabha for just four hours during 2021.

All his predecessors, including Atal Bihari Vajpayee, made it a point to be present during all important days, often taking notes and intervening in debates.

Independent India has never gone into general elections with so many Opposition state ministers, including a Chief Minister, political workers and social activists, humanitarian workers and media persons languishing as undertrial prisoners. Many were in jail for over eight years. Octogenarian Father Stan Swamy died in prison, while it was Supreme Court that freed an ailing Varavara Rao (in the Bhima Koregaon case). Activist Gautam Navlakha’s term in the same case was reduced to house arrest on court orders.

Former JNU scholar Umar Khalid, for instance, has had 14 adjournments in SC, and was forced to withdraw his bail petition from the top court and go back to the trial court.

Former Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soran is in jail. The Enforcement Directorate is gunning for another CM, Arvind Kejriwal, who has also been put in jail. The Modi regime has put several senior opposition state ministers in jail in different states on charges filed by ED/CBI.

Like a true elected authoritarian, the incumbent PM has changed the whole ecosystem of governance, brick by brick, grabbing for himself the control of all levers of administration.

Let’s look at what happened during his 10-year rule:

• No PM in India has himself laid so many foundation stones and inaugurated so many projects as Modi: Each of the 82 Vande Bharat trains, many physically and some virtually, Na Mo Bharat trains,, every Central project in states, including defence, even the ordinary launches. He himself announced the names of India’s astronauts and stole the limelight.
• l  No regime in the past has arm-twisted the judiciary so brazenly. Barely three months after coming to power, Modi tried to snatch the power of appointments and transfer of judges to himself by passing the National Judicial Appointments and Transfers Bill in August, 2014. But the Supreme Court struck it down and restored the collegium system.
• l  The Modi regime tried to frustrate the collegium system by resorting to a ‘pick and choose’ approach to notifying the names recommended by the collegium. At times, around 50 names recommended by the collegium were pending with the government. The Supreme Court had to come down hard.

 The government even tried to manipulate the roster system allegedly to tweak verdicts in its favour.

• India has never witnessed so many public interest litigations in Supreme Court and High Courts — a clear symptom of the excesses or inaction by the Modi government. Aggrieved citizens are left with no way but to knock at the judiciary’s door. Every other day, the Supreme Court and high courts intervene, sometimes favourably, and often justifying the government.
• Another first for Modi was his attempt at politicisation of the armed forces. Last year’s Combined Commanders’ Conference was held not at military station but at the Kushabhau Thakre Centre, with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) idol Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel as the backdrop. Next to the gate of the venue was a big picture of Modi flanked by Rajnath Singh (Defence Minister) and the then Madhya Pradesh CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan. 
• Last year, 822 Modi selfie points were put up at different points in military establishments. This was on orders by the Defence Ministry. This had never happened in the past.
• We have already dealt with systematic cult creation by setting up Modi colleges, schools, NaMo lotus, NaMo trains, temples, Modi chalisa and naming welfare schemes after him. A Modi critic-turned cheer leader has also mooted establishing Modi study centres in every district in India. Now someone in Maharashtra, hold your breath, is working on a ‘Modi script.’
• If encounter killing is an old practice, bulldozer justice, bulk closure of madrasas and attacks on Muslim establishments are Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath’s innovation to target minorities. Other BJP-ruled states, like Madhya Pradesh, are also vigorously adopting these methods. The latest entrant in this “extra-judicial punishment” is cancellation of passports and visas of supporters of the protesting farmers.
• Modi’s other record relates to the harassment of political rivals and minorities. The Lok Sabha was told that 8,947 people were arrested, 701 cases of sedition were registered under the anti-terror UAPA (Unlawful Activities Prevention Act) and 5,024 cases filed under UAPA between 2018 and 2022. This does not include arrests by ED, NIA, CBI, tax department and the now the narcotics board.
• Modi has broken all records in personal publicity at the Central and BJP state governments’ expense. Even in normal times, it is routine to carry full-page or half-page ads in print media and digital media. With elections too close, the second week of March witnessed a sudden spurt in advertisements with Modi’s pictures (on March 10, Times of India had seven pages and Indian Express six pages). On March12, six full pages in IE and seven pages in ToI). There are also plans for massive outdoor displays like hoardings.
• Now we are told that at least 10 Bollywood films, including the just released Article 370, amplifying Modi’s image are set to swamp the theatres all over the country — just in time for the elections.

Wait for more such big budget propaganda.

• Never in the past has the Centre so blatantly let loose Governors on Opposition state governments. They have harassed the states by withholding Bills passed by the Assemblies, thus necessitating Supreme Court intervention. This has happened in Kerala and Tamil Nadu. They have dismissed Vice-Chancellors, which has led to protests in every Opposition state, including West Bengal. Kerala Governor Arif Mohammad Khan also indulged in street fighting.
• Another first for the Modi government: Every NGO and think- tank that dares to criticise his government’s actions has faced ire. This includes the prestigious Centre for Policy Research. Some had to close down. The FCRA (Foreign Currency Regulation Act) licences of a record number of 20,000 NGOs and think-tanks have been cancelled.
• For the first time in India, the Modi regime’s tax officials arbitrarily seized Rs. 64 crore from the main Opposition party’s bank account. This poll-eve swoop was on the premise of a delay in submitting accounts. As expected, the income tax appellate tribunal refused to intervene. This raises the question: Why were BJP and its allies spared of similar action.

This was followed by the seizure of a Rs. 10.29 crore draft linked to the Trinamool Congress by ED involving a business group. The next target was Rashtriya Janata Dal or RJD. The ED arrested Lalu Yadav’s ‘associate’ Subhash Yadav in connection with alleged money laundering and seized ‘unexplained’ cash of Rs 2.37 crore. The Election Commission, unusually, has engaged ED to undertake such pre-poll seizures.

The incumbent PM has an inherent aversion for public scrutiny. Unlike his predecessors, he has never held any press conference or even the annual where media persons used to grill the PM. Instead, arm-twisting media owners seemed to be a preferred option.

• Two years ago, Modi broke a record when he opted for a Rs. 12 crore Mercedes Benz Maybach S650. The other BJP PM Vajpayee was the one who switched from Hindustan Motors’ Ambassador to the armoured BMW7 series. But Manmohan Singh, who took over as PM next, had preferred ordinary cars and allotted the high-end vehicles to tourism and diplomatic pools.
• The Modi regime’s latest target is Google’s Gemini chatbot, the Artificial Intelligence, for describing him as a ‘fascist’. A caller asked the machine whether Modi was a fascist to which it said ‘yes’ in a roundabout way. Then all hell broke loose and the entire government of India machinery targeted its owners who quickly withdrew Gemini from market. 

The list is too long: silencing the statutory watchdogs like CAG  or Comptroller and Auditor general, data fudging the latest being consumer expenditure survey figures, imposing PM schemes that are in concurrent list on states, starving Opposition states of funds and so on.

The writer is a veteran journalist. The views expressed are personal.

India’s MIRV Missile: Deterrence or Higher Risk?

D Raghunandan | 18 Mar 2024

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Possession of MIRV missiles is a double-edged sword. It may provide greater deterrence, but may also drive up the risks of nuclear conflict.

Image Courtesy: X/@DRDO_India

On March 11, 2024 India successfully conducted its first test of a new Agni-V missile with Multiple Independently-targetable Re-entry Vehicle (MIRV) technology, together termed the “Divyastra (celestial weapon) Mission.”

To those unfamiliar with the arcane world and terminology of nuclear weapons and missiles for their delivery, an MIRV missile carries on a single rocket several warheads, each of which can be programmed to travel in different directions at varying speeds to strike at multiple targets several hundreds of kilometres apart. This hugely increases the damage inflicted by a single MIRV missile, and makes it more difficult for adversaries to track and shoot down the warheads.

As expected, there was a loud media chorus of chest-thumping nationalist pride at this display of technological and military prowess. However, as may have happened a decade or more ago, there has been little informed discussion on the costs and benefits of this shift in India’s strategic capability and perhaps also in its nuclear doctrine.

In technology terms, India now joins a handful of countries, namely the US, Russia, the UK, France and China, who have MIRV technology. With this, India has taken a giant leap forward as regards several technologies and systems, such as smaller warheads, advanced sensors and guidance systems, and commensurate programming, tracking and control systems. These represent significant advances with both military and civilian applications.

India is, however, yet to produce and operationally induct MIRV missiles into its nuclear arsenal on different platforms. The other countries named have both land- and submarine-based MIRV missile systems. India faces major challenges in operationalising and deploying MIRV missiles.

In strategic terms, however, the gains are not so obvious. There is good evidence and considerable discussion in strategic circles to suggest that possession of MIRV missiles is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, MIRVs seemingly bestow greater deterrence. On the other hand, they push rivals to adopt more aggressive nuclear postures so as to counter this advantage. MIRVs may, therefore, also drive up the risks of nuclear conflict and increase security threats.

THE TECHNOLOGY                    

Few details are available in the public domain about the MIRV missile or what the test revealed. However, in the absence of definitive information from DRDO, a broad idea of different aspects may be put together from different sources.

The first thing to note is that we do not know the range of the missile, nor the number of warheads or their weight that the MIRV missile is designed to carry.

The main missile is the Agni-V, the proven latest generation missile in the Agni series. The missile is three-stage. The maiden user trial of the 50-tonne Agni-V with a single 1.5 tonne warhead in operational configuration was conducted in 2021. The Agni-V has since entered service and has been inducted under the Strategic Forces Command.

The missile was believed to have a range of 5,000-5,500 km, just enough to qualify as a long-range Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile (ICBM). However, this has never been confirmed and the Agni-V’s range continues to be classified.

Subsequent information from retired top-ranking DRDO (Defence Research and Development Organisation) scientists associated with the missile development puts the range at closer to 7,000 km, especially after several modifications such as use of composite materials to lower the missile weight and a lower weight warhead.

Researchers in other countries have said DRDO is downplaying the range so as to allay international concerns, and that actual range may even be 8,000 km, sufficient to reach all parts of the neighbourhood.

The MIRV Agni-V is a three-stage missile with a modified nose-cone to accommodate multiple warheads. The missile also carries indigenously developed advanced sensors and guidance systems for greater accuracy of warhead delivery. DRDO scientists have revealed that single-digit accuracy, meaning a strike under less than 10 metres from the designated target point, had been achieved. The test last week was conducted over a range of 3,500 m as per the NOTAM or Notice to Airmen which countries are obliged to issue when conducting a missile test. DRDO is currently compiling the test data from various tracking ships and other stations. It is believed DRDO does not plan to conduct any further tests.

CHALLENGES OF MIRV WEAPONISATION

The Agni-V, which had already transitioned from a rail-launcher to a road-based launcher, now uses a canister-launch system. This gives greater mobility and flexibility, and enables safely storing the missile and warheads for many years inside the canister, which releases the missile through an explosive charge, all steps being completed within a few minutes.  This aspect of land-based delivery systems probably requires little or no modification.

However, there is no information yet in the public domain as to whether it is planned to also equip India’s nuclear-capable submarines with MIRV missiles.

It is known that India intends to operationalise the full triad of nuclear platforms i.e., land, air and sea-based. Submarine-based MIRV missiles would pose an even greater threat to adversaries, since they add another layer to the difficulty in tracking and targeting missiles fired from under water.  

The range of the MIRVs would be affected by how many warheads are mounted in the MIRV missiles and how much the add-on weight is.

This is related to the extent of miniaturisation of the nuclear warheads. Clearly, some degree of miniaturisation has already been achieved, since a MIRV nose-cone must be able to accommodate several warheads. This has hardly been discussed so far in the MIRV context.

A more problematic issue is the additional fissile material, chiefly plutonium, which would be required for the new MIRV missiles. India is already constrained by a shortage of plutonium from its BARC Dhruva reactor and a small quantity of waste plutonium from its power plants, especially after India placed 14 nuclear reactors using imported fuel out of its total 22 reactors under IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) inspection and safeguards as part of the Indo-US nuclear deal.

Decision regarding IAEA safeguards for the four additional sets of approved reactors at Kaiga (Karnataka), Gorakhpur (Haryana), Chutka (MP) and Banswara (Rajasthan) is yet to be taken. This may call for plutonium from India’s Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor near Kalpakkam (Tamil Nadu), where core loading has recently commenced in preparation for commercial operations, only the second in the world after Russia.          

DETERRENCE OR HIGHER RISK?                  

All this sounds good, viewed purely in technological terms as national achievements. But we are talking about nuclear weapons here. The international history of development of nuclear weapons and their delivery systems, right from the first nuclear bomb dropped by the US on Hiroshima thinking it would bring them unchallenged superpower status, teaches us that there is no absolute security guaranteed by possession of nuclear weapons and ever-improving delivery systems.

In the case of MIRVs, some analysts believe it will raise India’s deterrent capability. India already has a no first-use policy, meaning India depends on the threat of inflicting disproportionate damage on an adversary in the event of a pre-emptive strike by the latter. MIRV missiles striking multiple targets simultaneously provide that.

However, other analysts believe that our western neighbour, which depends on a first-strike deterrence to offset its comparative weakness in conventional forces, would now be even more driven towards a pre-emptive strike, especially against MIRV facilities, thus increasing the risk of a nuclear exchange.  This is termed the “use it, or lose it” calculus meaning that a country with limited nuclear arsenal, sensing danger of losing even that, would prefer to use it rather than see it destroyed.

In the case of India’s already far more powerful northern neighbour, India’s MIRVs now pose a greater threat than before, driving that neighbour to deploy even greater counter-measures, further increasing threat levels for India. In both cases, security risks increase, not decrease.

The calculus of nuclear deterrence means that every new advance by one power brings a further counter from an adversarial power. Deterrence only keeps shifting to more advanced weapons on all sides, and hence to higher levels of risk, till finally the aptly-named Mutually Assured Destruction or MAD comes into play. That is why global non-proliferation measures have failed so far, in the face of some countries wanting monopoly nuclear weapons status, driving others to also seek possession of this currency of power. The only answer is full global nuclear disarmament.

The writer is with the Delhi Science Forum and All India People’s Science Network. The views are personal.

Undermining of India’s Democratic Traditions ‘Alarming’, Say Scholars, Writers, Including Amartya Sen

Newsclick Report | 27 Mar 2024

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Open letter draws global attention to “prolonged incarceration without trial of writers, journalists and social activists, often without so much as a charge-sheet against them.”

New Delhi: Several scholars, academics, writers abroad have expressed deep concern over the ‘undermining” of democratic traditions in the country, drawing the world’s attention to the “prolonged incarceration without trial of a large number of writers, journalists and social activists, often without so much as a charge-sheet against them.”

“This amounts to undermining the Constitution and overturning the structures of democracy,” read an open letter.

The statement, including a separate one by Nobel laureate Amartya Sen, cites the example of Newsclick editor—in chief Prabir Purkayastha, 75, activists charged in the Bhima Koregaon case, the Delhi communal violence case among others.

“This extended incarceration without trial has been given legislative backing, through an amendment to the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act passed by the Indian parliament.   But legislative backing provides no justification for such incarceration,” said the statement signed by writer Amitava Ghosh, Wendy Brown, Gayatri Chakravarty Spivak, Amartya Sen, Martha C. Nussbaum, among others.

“India has long been admired internationally as an exemplary democracy, and the largest in the world. Any abridgement of democracy in India is tragic, not only for the people of India, but for all of humanity. We write this letter to alert international opinion to these recent alarming developments in that country and to urge those holding positions of responsibility in the various organs of the Indian state, in particular the judiciary, to ensure that the abridgements we are currently witnessing are reversed, and that no encroachment occurs on the fundamental rights of its citizens,” reads the letter.

 

Read the full statement below:

 

A STATEMENT ON THE UNDERMINING OF

ELEMENTARY FREEDOMS IN INDIA

We, the signatories to this statement, write with the greatest of concern because we admire the democratic structures that India embraced since gaining Independence from colonial rule, including a set of Constitutionally-guaranteed fundamental rights for every citizen.  This entire democratic tradition is being fundamentally undermined by some recent developments in that country.  We write at this particular moment to draw the world’s attention to how this is being done by the prolonged incarceration without trial of a large number of writers, journalists and social activists, often without so much as a charge-sheet against them. All that these individuals have done is to criticize the present government in India.

Prabir Purkayastha, a 75-year old senior journalist, author, and founding editor of the independent news portal Newsclick, whose office and home were repeatedly searched for weeks on end for incriminating evidence without any being found, has been arrested and, despite being imprisoned for nearly six months, is yet to be served a charge-sheet; the harmful effects of such an action on media independence are obvious for everyone to see.   

Others have been incarcerated even longer, such as those arrested in the Bheema-Koregaon case who (with the exception of those whom the courts have released on bail on medical or technical-legal grounds) have been languishing in prison for over five years without any trial. 

Likewise, many accused in the Delhi riots case have been in prison for over three years without any trial –and often without complete charge sheets brought against them; some, who have been charged, but with no trial in sight, have spent even longer in jail than the maximum legal sentence warranted by the charges against them.

This extended incarceration without trial has been given legislative backing, through an amendment to the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act passed by the Indian parliament.   But legislative backing provides no justification for such incarceration. Indeed, to use it as a justification amounts to saying that Constitutionally-guaranteed fundamental rights can be abrogated through a legislative majority; that, notwithstanding Constitutional provisions, someone can be imprisoned for any length of time by a government enjoying a legislative majority. This amounts to undermining the Constitution and overturning the structures of democracy.

India has long been admired internationally as an exemplary democracy, and the largest in the world . Any abridgement of democracy in India is tragic, not only for the people of India, but for all of humanity. We write this letter to alert international opinion to these recent alarming developments in that country and to urge those holding positions of responsibility in the various organs of the Indian state, in particular the judiciary, to ensure that the abridgements we are currently witnessing are reversed, and that no encroachment occurs on the fundamental rights of its citizens. Those holding such positions of responsibility will be remembered by posterity if they honourably stand up for Indian democracy.

 

Signed:

1.Amitav Ghosh, Novelist and Author, New York.

2.Wendy Brown, UPS Foundation Professor, Institute for Advanced Studies, Princeton.

3. Judith Butler, Maxine Elliot Professor, Department of Comparative Literature, and the Program of Critical Theory, University of California, Berkeley.

4.Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, University Professor, Columbia University, New York.

5.Sheldon Pollock, Arvind Raghunathan Professor Emeritus of South Asian Studies, Columbia University, New York.

6.Martha C. Nussbaum, Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Philosophy, University of Chicago, Chicago.

7.Steven Lukes, Professor of Politics and Sociology, New York University, New York.

8.David Bromwich, Sterling Professor of English, Yale University, New Haven.

9. Marjorie Cohn, Professor, Thomas Jefferson School of Law, San Diego; former president, National Lawyers Guild, U.S.A.

10. Jonathan Cole, John Mitchell Mason Professor,
Provost & Dean of Faculties (1989-2003),
Columbia University, New York.

11. Janet Gyatso, Hershey Professor of Buddhist Studies and  Associate Dean for Faculty and Academic Affairs, Divinity School, Harvard University, Cambridge.

12. Carol Rovane, Violin Family Professor of Philosophy, Columbia University, New York.

13. Jan Werner-Muller, Roger Williams Straus Professor of Social Sciences, Princeton University, Princeton.

14. Charles Taylor, Emeritus Chichele Professor of Social and Political Theory, Oxford University; and Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at University of Montreal.

15.Akeel Bilgrami, Sidney Morgenbesser Professor of Philosophy; Professor, Committee on Global Thought,
Columbia University, New York.

16. David Shulman,  Renee Lang Professor of Humanistic Studies, Hebrew University, Jerusalem.

 

Statement by Amartya Sen

 Some friends of mine have recently written a cogent statement on the violation of elementary freedoms in contemporary India, and, even though I do not, as a rule, sign joint letters, I would like to add my voice to theirs. So this is written as a general statement addressed to my fellow citizens.

 Under British rule, Indians were often arrested and imprisoned without trial, and some were kept in prison for a long time. (As many of my family members were trying hard to free India from colonial rule, several of them experienced this kind of treatment of imprisonment without trial.) As a young man, I had hoped that as India became independent, this unjust system, in use in colonial India, would stop. This has not, alas, happened, and the unsupportable practice of arresting and keeping accused human beings in prison without trying them has continued in free and democratic India.

 Along with others who are rightly outraged by this injustice, I must also strongly express my sense of indignation at this basic violation of human freedom in my own country, whose claim to being a democracy is strongly negated by such practice.

 There are, of course, many other unjust uses of compelling law that continue in India, despite our hope of building a fairly governed country, but imprisonment without trial and without fairness in the treatment of human beings is certainly among the worst injustices that the country has made into a regular arrangement. We should very much hope that the judicial system of India will have the good sense to eliminate barbarities of this kind.

 Amartya Sen

Thomas W. Lamont University Professor, and Professor of Economics and Philosophy, Harvard University, Cambridge.