I Trust My India

People around the world are distrusting of their governments. Declining trust has deep roots and is being caused by many factors – “Capture by the Politicians”, “Capture by the Elite”, and “Hypocrisy of the Professionals”.

Today “Capture by the Politicians” is a reality. It is a myth that there are three organs of State – the legislature, the executive and the judiciary – and all three are equal and independent. Politicians wish to be elected as legislators and citizens elect them as legislators. But the legislators become the heads of Executive. Executive then shapes the course of legislature and keeps trying to control the judiciary.  Politicians as legislators and Executive are then able to forge a corrupt nexus with the business and the elite. They together control the law and its enforcement. There has been a litany of betrayals of people’s trust through such nexus. From corruption in government and in state-owned enterprises, financial controls and governance are compromised because many executive appointments to boards and committees are political and not based on competence, experience and integrity.

Businesses of the Elite have hidden the deepest corruption and injustice in our democracy since the 1990s. Globalization has been a double-edged sword. The world is richer because of it, but it has advanced an economic order that has resulted in growing inequality and striking division between the haves and have-nots. It leaves hundreds of millions behind, not least when inequality perpetuates the power of elites whilst hollowing out the hopes of many people for their children’s futures. Smoky cabins of such deprived people are not the porticoes of good moral, ethical and social conduct for they do not see any reward in such behaviour except further loss of opportunity and more injustice coming their way. The fate of the ordinary citizens has been “captured by the Elite.”

Professionals like the Doctors, Lawyers, Engineers, Chartered Accountants, and journalists are the guardians of the citizens, who have sworn to uphold ethics in their profession. Unfortunately our own people, when they got a chance to build the nation as professionals, rather than being true to their professions, became servants of the Elite and the Politician. The professionals either became complete accomplices in the process of Capture by the politician and capture by the elite or just kept silent. Truth hurts but silence kills. That is one of the things that have really hurt the country. They did not pause for one moment and ask themselves how they could break the code of their professional ethics, their oath, and the responsibility they have to protect the people and not ally with the traitors who have captured our state and corporations. This is the height of hypocrisy; and now some of them want to come to lecture us about leadership and accountability. There are many politicians, elites and professionals who have carried the dagger of betrayal and plunged it deep into our backs.

Governments both at the national and the state level need to model change from the inside out to build trust with citizens. Some of the great change initiatives of the government designed as inside-out models include Aadhaar, OROP for the Defense Personnel, surgical strike, JanDhan, and the GST. Unfortunately however, the more visible change initiatives of the Government that have been outside-in and not inside-out models are Demonetization, Make-in-India, Skills-Development, Bullet-train and Action against the Black-money, all leading to skepticism and distrust among the citizens.

People have solutions – but too often they are not being heard. The dearth of informed public debate and collective action to solve challenges has perpetuated the sense of disenfranchisement. People’s space to respectfully debate and disagree is constrained by a lack of opportunity and meaningful arenas in which to do so. In many cases, dissenting voices are met with heightened crackdowns – at worst, violently.

The complex challenges our country faces call upon formidable leadership from our government. But government alone cannot solve them all. The government needs the ideas, wisdom and commitment of people. We know more is possible. It has to be more action than hanging a portrait of the Mahatma or Ambedkar or Upadhyay in the office or the boardroom.