Media and literary world in general always take the event of mass movement, agitation or mass dharna in a very positive way and on a high moral ground also. The reason behind this, it is being seen in the legacy of our long freedom movement as well it is also taken as one of the attractive features and tools of democracy and democratic politics of our independent country.
But when we really go into the deep details and reasoning of the all mass movements which happened in the country during its post independence period, we find that behind all this movement, there were either no serious concern for the masses or the outcome of all these mass movement were futile and went in vain. It was amply proved that these movements were organized for the sake of either projecting oneself as public leader or for getting the identity of a public leader and finally for the sake of augmenting the tempo of opposition's politics in the multiparty competitive democracy of the country.
On the contrast, the pronounced objective of mass movement were said to be different. When we go into its outcome, we find either it was instrumental in bringing disorder and political instability or it interrupted the steady growth path of the economy and public governance both. In a way these movements have been resulted a catastrophic situation for the society and nation both. The above argument arises only because we have seen the after affect of two big mass movement of the country. One mass movement, which took place during 1974 in Bihar and another Lokpal movement which took place in 2011. Apart from these, we have innumerable agitations which took place almost every day both on social and political front. When we diagnose the after affect of 1974 movement we find that this movement was fought for checking price rise, unemployment and corruption, which ultimately brought various opposition parties on one platform in form of Janta party.
This mass movement forced Smt. Indira Gandhi to enforce emergency in the country and in the 1977 elections, the ruling party got defeat by the newly formed Janta party. In the perspective of democracy, this event was good, because first time in the history of independence the opposition got power and it was good for the health of multiparty democracy of the country also. But, on the both organizational and governance front, this party had a great fiasco.
All merged allies of Janta party got separated and so governance agenda was become directionless and it consequently Janta govt. got fallen down and the slogan of total revolution propounded by its uniting force JP, just became a matter of mockery. Not only that this movement created bunch of that kind of leadership in our democracy, which were lumpen, identity centric, visionless and had no idea of good governance. We also saw the after affects of this movement in form of complete jungle raj in Bihar. We found plethora of incapable public representatives, which were the end products of these movements. Second mass movement, the 2011 Lokpal movement, which was fought for the great cause of removal of corruption in the society, which ultimately took the obstinate stand of its few leaders on the issue of formation of Lokpal.
Latter on it was proved that this movement was basically meant for the political purpose and some people have had high ambition of becoming public leader through this. Rest is before us. How AAM ADMI PARTY was formed and how it exploited the immediate anger of the people and it got the power and very suddenly it wanted to rule the whole country and so it left the Delhi and fought 2014 Loksabha elections.
So the question is, in between 1974 and 2011, what our public got in fact and how our society and nation benefitted out of it. Firstly, the 74 movement did not bring significant change in the fundamentals of the system so it could not check price rise, unemployment and corruption. In the same way, 2011 movement could not check corruption in the country. Not only that our democracy also got big jolt out of these events. We have consistent instable govt. (1977-1980) and (1989-1999) and we are witnessing the same thing in Delhi now.
Delhi had an election in Dec 13 and it is again in the election in feb 15 at the cost of crores of tax money of the public. What I am trying to say ,out of all these movements which were committed in a democratic fashion ultimately created havoc to the democracy, to the public(society) and also to the governance. But, it does not mean by blaming these movement I am going to support autocracy and trying to deter the process of masses participation in democracy or negating the expressing of dissatisfaction of public and their anger in this system.
We want to say how the imperfection of democracy and absence of our full proof system and prior to both of these, the half hearted designing of our democracy by our constitution makers, ultimately have been paving the way to organise such kind of public outcry in form of movement, agitation and dharna kind of things. These form of public outcry, which never able to fulfill its objectives and public involved with these agitations never got any tangible relief.
The thing is that, firstly, our democracy is not perfect; secondly, there is no systematic structural outlet to display the public anger. Thirdly, our bureaucratic governance was not given serious re look in the post independence period. During this period, the upper level political change was given importance and core governance bureaucracy was totally left on the same original British pattern, which was designed as per the convenience of British imperialism. In British India, the purpose of district administration was to suppress the public anger and to collect revenue from the public. After independence, it was just transfer of power in the hands of the main freedom movement party Congress which had full organizational structure all over the village of the country.
But, after independence, the way we adopted multi party democracy in the country through the constitution and constitutionalism, the most fair way to develop democracy was to start a new process of formation of various political parties in the country, then it would have a level playing field for the Indian polity. Congress party was framed and operated for the freedom struggle, so morally, it was not appropriate to make it lone stake holder of post independent government of India. Better, in India, we have had a national government in the country for the 10 years period comprising all freedom struggling political parties like congress, Muslim league and Hindu Mahasabha.
If it would have happen, first it would have halted the partition of the country and secondly it have had curbed the inception of democratic angerness in the country. What happened in India, there was one party rule for most of the years, which ultimately came under the influence of one family rule. The absence of healthy atmosphere for the multiparty democracy in a way created imperfection in our democracy. Second our constitution framer did not able to think this country is so heterogeneous, it has so much diversity in terms of language, culture, geography, caste and creed, if it is adopting democracy without some preventive measures, it will have full scope of nurturing of identity politics here which will ultimately act as a deterring agent for the fair, healthy and competitive functioning of democracy.
The imperfectness in our democracy on political front kept the issue of good governance on the back burner. The third factor was that in country like India, the democracy was not designed as an agent of good governance, rather as a forum of representative cracy for all kind of social sections. In the name of social justice and secularism either we have a full fledged identity politics in the country or it was the prevalence of a kind culture of political management in the country, which was based on adjustism of various sections of society in all three tier political structure of the country.
This process had jolted our good governance as well as the concept of actual social justice and true secularism. The identity politics were fully utilized in order to appease social justice and secularism both, which ultimately hampered the healthy and perfect growth of democracy and ultimately of the good governance. In the name of social justice the suppressed caste were emotionally exploited in terms of making their one or few representative in political coetry or some bit their few educated people in the bureaucracy through the policy of caste reservation. The mass empowerment of weaker sections of the society was almost left before these elements.
In the independent India, the absence of defined role and objectives of various organs of democracy enabled the destructive agitationist approach among the various sections of society. It is also true, that this agitationist approach in way were exposition of group of some clever, aware and conscious people. Most of the weaker sections in India even had no voice, no platform for forging unity. Our framed system was not bound to hear the voices of those who were not conscious about their rights, about their exploitations, about their minimum bare needs and etc. On the contrast, the conscious people got opportunity in this democracy through forming pressure groups, associations and trade unions. This is the reason our democracy have more takers for the organized trade unions; it had no takers for non-organized masses.
Therefore, we have always better working conditions for the organized work force and there were no takers for the unorganized, ignorant, illiterate and voice-lees. The imperfection of democracy as well as the absence of full proof system always gave opportunity to the clever kind of people; it has no system for the downtrodden. And I am firmly of the view this downtrodden class is not part of this movement. If some political or organizational groups say that by agitations or movement kind of things, they do show the common people's strength. I say they are showing the strength of either clever and self interest of the ambitious persons who want to find opportunity to become public leader in this democracy.
I do say, this system must give a mass and multi structured complaint redressal mechanism on all democratic layer of governance, on all bureaucratic levels in a day to day routine basis, so that ignorant, simple and voiceless people get outlet and clever people who are more interested for their extra benefit and high ambition, they should be curtailed. In fact, no any mass movement have yielded any tangible benefit to the society. If our system is perfect it will automatically take notice of all resentment, injustice, exploitation which occur in the society.
If, government makes a mechanism of complaint redressal on all block level, district level, capital level along with full compliance system, we will have no such futile mass movement. Secondly, the making of a full proof system, by inducting technology, framing policy, overhauling institutional structure, amending and simplifying laws, ensuring full and adequate sitting of legislative houses, making media constitutional status of fourth estate as an reporting and analyzing agent, prompt and quick judiciary, management oriented responsible bureaucracy and having established norm for nurturing public leadership must be carry on continuously.
Our all political parties must give top priority to the issue of good governance as well as curbing of identity politics. If, these things keep happening, then what is the need of nuisance of mass movement. We will have legislature and media to report all kind of resentment and dissatisfaction, which gets occur in the society and it, will be fully addressed by political and bureaucratic decision-making. In the absence of these, mass movement will take place as an offshoots of imperfect democracy and it will keep create nuisance in our system at the cost of bad beings of the society.
But when we really go into the deep details and reasoning of the all mass movements which happened in the country during its post independence period, we find that behind all this movement, there were either no serious concern for the masses or the outcome of all these mass movement were futile and went in vain. It was amply proved that these movements were organized for the sake of either projecting oneself as public leader or for getting the identity of a public leader and finally for the sake of augmenting the tempo of opposition's politics in the multiparty competitive democracy of the country.
On the contrast, the pronounced objective of mass movement were said to be different. When we go into its outcome, we find either it was instrumental in bringing disorder and political instability or it interrupted the steady growth path of the economy and public governance both. In a way these movements have been resulted a catastrophic situation for the society and nation both. The above argument arises only because we have seen the after affect of two big mass movement of the country. One mass movement, which took place during 1974 in Bihar and another Lokpal movement which took place in 2011. Apart from these, we have innumerable agitations which took place almost every day both on social and political front. When we diagnose the after affect of 1974 movement we find that this movement was fought for checking price rise, unemployment and corruption, which ultimately brought various opposition parties on one platform in form of Janta party.
This mass movement forced Smt. Indira Gandhi to enforce emergency in the country and in the 1977 elections, the ruling party got defeat by the newly formed Janta party. In the perspective of democracy, this event was good, because first time in the history of independence the opposition got power and it was good for the health of multiparty democracy of the country also. But, on the both organizational and governance front, this party had a great fiasco.
All merged allies of Janta party got separated and so governance agenda was become directionless and it consequently Janta govt. got fallen down and the slogan of total revolution propounded by its uniting force JP, just became a matter of mockery. Not only that this movement created bunch of that kind of leadership in our democracy, which were lumpen, identity centric, visionless and had no idea of good governance. We also saw the after affects of this movement in form of complete jungle raj in Bihar. We found plethora of incapable public representatives, which were the end products of these movements. Second mass movement, the 2011 Lokpal movement, which was fought for the great cause of removal of corruption in the society, which ultimately took the obstinate stand of its few leaders on the issue of formation of Lokpal.
Latter on it was proved that this movement was basically meant for the political purpose and some people have had high ambition of becoming public leader through this. Rest is before us. How AAM ADMI PARTY was formed and how it exploited the immediate anger of the people and it got the power and very suddenly it wanted to rule the whole country and so it left the Delhi and fought 2014 Loksabha elections.
So the question is, in between 1974 and 2011, what our public got in fact and how our society and nation benefitted out of it. Firstly, the 74 movement did not bring significant change in the fundamentals of the system so it could not check price rise, unemployment and corruption. In the same way, 2011 movement could not check corruption in the country. Not only that our democracy also got big jolt out of these events. We have consistent instable govt. (1977-1980) and (1989-1999) and we are witnessing the same thing in Delhi now.
Delhi had an election in Dec 13 and it is again in the election in feb 15 at the cost of crores of tax money of the public. What I am trying to say ,out of all these movements which were committed in a democratic fashion ultimately created havoc to the democracy, to the public(society) and also to the governance. But, it does not mean by blaming these movement I am going to support autocracy and trying to deter the process of masses participation in democracy or negating the expressing of dissatisfaction of public and their anger in this system.
We want to say how the imperfection of democracy and absence of our full proof system and prior to both of these, the half hearted designing of our democracy by our constitution makers, ultimately have been paving the way to organise such kind of public outcry in form of movement, agitation and dharna kind of things. These form of public outcry, which never able to fulfill its objectives and public involved with these agitations never got any tangible relief.
The thing is that, firstly, our democracy is not perfect; secondly, there is no systematic structural outlet to display the public anger. Thirdly, our bureaucratic governance was not given serious re look in the post independence period. During this period, the upper level political change was given importance and core governance bureaucracy was totally left on the same original British pattern, which was designed as per the convenience of British imperialism. In British India, the purpose of district administration was to suppress the public anger and to collect revenue from the public. After independence, it was just transfer of power in the hands of the main freedom movement party Congress which had full organizational structure all over the village of the country.
But, after independence, the way we adopted multi party democracy in the country through the constitution and constitutionalism, the most fair way to develop democracy was to start a new process of formation of various political parties in the country, then it would have a level playing field for the Indian polity. Congress party was framed and operated for the freedom struggle, so morally, it was not appropriate to make it lone stake holder of post independent government of India. Better, in India, we have had a national government in the country for the 10 years period comprising all freedom struggling political parties like congress, Muslim league and Hindu Mahasabha.
If it would have happen, first it would have halted the partition of the country and secondly it have had curbed the inception of democratic angerness in the country. What happened in India, there was one party rule for most of the years, which ultimately came under the influence of one family rule. The absence of healthy atmosphere for the multiparty democracy in a way created imperfection in our democracy. Second our constitution framer did not able to think this country is so heterogeneous, it has so much diversity in terms of language, culture, geography, caste and creed, if it is adopting democracy without some preventive measures, it will have full scope of nurturing of identity politics here which will ultimately act as a deterring agent for the fair, healthy and competitive functioning of democracy.
The imperfectness in our democracy on political front kept the issue of good governance on the back burner. The third factor was that in country like India, the democracy was not designed as an agent of good governance, rather as a forum of representative cracy for all kind of social sections. In the name of social justice and secularism either we have a full fledged identity politics in the country or it was the prevalence of a kind culture of political management in the country, which was based on adjustism of various sections of society in all three tier political structure of the country.
This process had jolted our good governance as well as the concept of actual social justice and true secularism. The identity politics were fully utilized in order to appease social justice and secularism both, which ultimately hampered the healthy and perfect growth of democracy and ultimately of the good governance. In the name of social justice the suppressed caste were emotionally exploited in terms of making their one or few representative in political coetry or some bit their few educated people in the bureaucracy through the policy of caste reservation. The mass empowerment of weaker sections of the society was almost left before these elements.
In the independent India, the absence of defined role and objectives of various organs of democracy enabled the destructive agitationist approach among the various sections of society. It is also true, that this agitationist approach in way were exposition of group of some clever, aware and conscious people. Most of the weaker sections in India even had no voice, no platform for forging unity. Our framed system was not bound to hear the voices of those who were not conscious about their rights, about their exploitations, about their minimum bare needs and etc. On the contrast, the conscious people got opportunity in this democracy through forming pressure groups, associations and trade unions. This is the reason our democracy have more takers for the organized trade unions; it had no takers for non-organized masses.
Therefore, we have always better working conditions for the organized work force and there were no takers for the unorganized, ignorant, illiterate and voice-lees. The imperfection of democracy as well as the absence of full proof system always gave opportunity to the clever kind of people; it has no system for the downtrodden. And I am firmly of the view this downtrodden class is not part of this movement. If some political or organizational groups say that by agitations or movement kind of things, they do show the common people's strength. I say they are showing the strength of either clever and self interest of the ambitious persons who want to find opportunity to become public leader in this democracy.
I do say, this system must give a mass and multi structured complaint redressal mechanism on all democratic layer of governance, on all bureaucratic levels in a day to day routine basis, so that ignorant, simple and voiceless people get outlet and clever people who are more interested for their extra benefit and high ambition, they should be curtailed. In fact, no any mass movement have yielded any tangible benefit to the society. If our system is perfect it will automatically take notice of all resentment, injustice, exploitation which occur in the society.
If, government makes a mechanism of complaint redressal on all block level, district level, capital level along with full compliance system, we will have no such futile mass movement. Secondly, the making of a full proof system, by inducting technology, framing policy, overhauling institutional structure, amending and simplifying laws, ensuring full and adequate sitting of legislative houses, making media constitutional status of fourth estate as an reporting and analyzing agent, prompt and quick judiciary, management oriented responsible bureaucracy and having established norm for nurturing public leadership must be carry on continuously.
Our all political parties must give top priority to the issue of good governance as well as curbing of identity politics. If, these things keep happening, then what is the need of nuisance of mass movement. We will have legislature and media to report all kind of resentment and dissatisfaction, which gets occur in the society and it, will be fully addressed by political and bureaucratic decision-making. In the absence of these, mass movement will take place as an offshoots of imperfect democracy and it will keep create nuisance in our system at the cost of bad beings of the society.
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