Monthly Archives: January 2021

The BJP has conducted 25 webinars in the last week of December 2020 to propagate the idea of one nation, one election. This came in the background of Prime Minister Narendra Modi making one of his periodic pronouncements about the need for one nation, one election. The latest was at the 80th Presiding Officers Conference on November 26, which happened to be the Constitution Day.

The BJP webinars trotted out the now well-known arguments for the need for simultaneous elections of the Lok Sabha and state Assembly elections: that it will save a lot of expenditure; repeated elections bring the Model Code of Conduct into play which hampers development work and divert officials attention and so on.

In one of the webinars, Bhupendra Yadav, a general secretary of BJP, stated, Election is just a means in democracy, but repeated elections show that it has become the only objective of a democracy. Governance lags behind.

The underlining message is that too many elections are not good for democracy; more important is governance. This is in line with what the CEO of Niti Aayog, Amitabh Kant, said that there is too much democracy in India with regard to the farmers struggle. The message is as clear as daylight the call for one nation, one election is a logical extension of one nation, one leader and the leader has declared that this is not a matter of debate but a necessity for India.

The holding of elections at all levels together (some BJP leaders want the local body elections to be held also along with state and national elections) and the constitutional changes that will be required to bring it about will fundamentally change the character of parliamentary democracy and destroy federalism in the country. To hold the Lok Sabha and state Assembly elections together would require tampering with the constitutional scheme of accountability of the government to the legislature.

Under the Constitution, if a government is voted out on a no-confidence motion, or loses a vote on a Money Bill, it is bound to resign and if no alternative government can be formed, the House is dissolved and a mid-term election is held. There is no fixity of tenure enshrined in the Constitution either for the Lok Sabha, or, for the state Assemblies.

A set of proposals have been made by the Niti Aayog in its discussion paper in 2017 and the draft report of the Law Commission in 2018. They all amount to shortening of the tenure of some of the existing state Assemblies, or, extending the life of some, so that they can be synchronised with Lok Sabha elections, or, at least to hold only two sets of elections in a five-year period. Both, the reduction of the term of an Assembly, or, its extension are profoundly anti-democratic and violate the basic rights of citizens to elect their legislators.

To avoid mid-term dissolution of the House and consequent elections, fixity of tenure is prescribed. The implications of this are dangerous. In one of the proposals in the Niti Aayog paper, it is stated that if the dissolution of the Lok Sabha cannot be avoided and the remainder of the term of the Lok Sabha is not long, then a provision can be made for the President to carry out the administration of the country on the aid and advise of a Council of Ministers to be appointed by him/her till the next House is constituted.

This outrageous proposal would make the President head of the executive. This is bringing in an Executive President through the backdoor. The same approach is suggested for state Assemblies, where the governor can take over the administration for a short period.

Fixity of tenure would mean that a ruling party which has a stable majority in the House cannot recommend for dissolution of the House and hold early elections. It is also proposed by the Law Commission Report that if a no-confidence motion is moved in the Lok Sabha, it must be accompanied by a resolution naming the new leader to run the alternative government. This is termed as constructive vote of no confidence.

What this means is that even if a government is voted out by the members of the House, there has to be some alternative government, or, even a coalition government which is unrepresentative of the peoples choice. Primacy is given to stability through fixity of tenure and the electoral choice becomes irrelevant.

Centralised control of state legislatures and state governments will be established in such a system. After truncating the powers of dissolution in the event of a government losing its majority, the fixed time of five years would require the formation of an alternative government. Such a government would be dependent on the sole whim of the governor who can decide which leader to call upon to form a government. The fixed term will also be a license for legislators to switch sides wholesale without the fear of facing an election.

With governors like Jagdeep Dhankar, Bhagat Singh Koshyari and Arif Mohammad Khan, one can only imagine the havoc that would be created when they act as partisan instruments of the centre.

To bring about simultaneous elections to Parliament and state assemblies, there will have to be a major constitutional overhaul. There will have to be amendments to the Constitution in Article 83 (duration of House), Article 85 (dissolution of the Lok Sabha), Article 172 (duration of state legislatures), Article 174 (dissolution of state legislatures), Article 356 (failure of constitutional machinery) apart from amendments to the Representation of the People Act and other Rules.

The BJP has been consistently putting out the idea of one nation, one election since it appeared in its election manifesto in 2014. Both the President and Vice President of India have endorsed this concept in their official capacities. The current thrust and campaign of the BJP presages a serious effort in this direction. It will be a mistake to think that the constitutional amendments and changes to enable this would pose major obstacles to the ruling partys authoritarian drive. We have witnessed the constitutional chicanery which was indulged in to dismantle the state of Jammu & Kashmir.

Prakash Karat is Member, Polit Bureau of CPI (M).

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Threat to democracy and federalism - Greater Kashmir

The nation woke up yesterday to reports and photographs of a cross-section of police and special constabulary officers and their passing-out parade at the Police College in Lagos.

The authorities in Nigeria would like the people of Nigeria to accept their fact that the present administration has launched community policing in the country. This newspaper would like to reiterate its long-held view that what was launched on Tuesday is not what we have consistently advocated.

The governing party in their manifesto we have consistently quoted here promised restructuring and their document generated in fulfillment of this includes the state police, not community policing faade the federal police seems to be foisting on a docile federation without federalism.As we have repeatedly noted, the recurrent issue of federalism within the contextual discussion of restructuring has become a metaphor for the curious failure of state actors to do the right thing about nation-building at the right time.The issues that have been shaping and even triggering discussions on the much-needed federalism have been dominating political debates across the country.In fact, it is fast becoming a Frankensteins monster a thing that becomes terrifying or destructive to its maker.The governing party promised a qualified one they even called true federalism.They prepared the blueprint in January 2018 and told the nation publicly.

But sadly, execution the discipline of getting things done has been curiously elusive as both the president and the vice president have been speaking in tongues about the same public-interest issue called federalism.They have been conceptually divided about the crossroads they both hit on the volatile issue they cant eventually escape as state policing is an idea whose time has indeed come.

The reasons are again not too fat to seek. The current level of violence and insecurity in the country, calls for new thinking about our security policy and architecture. But the clincher in all this begins with federalism, a restructuring genre that will allow different regions to tackle insecurity and other concomitant challenges with their local policing arrangement. Kidnapping, marauding killer-herders in the Middle Belt, and perennial acts of brigandage in other parts of the country have made it imperative for us to go back to the drawing board and do things in a different and better way.

This newspaper believes that as a federation, as proclaimed in the 1999 Constitution, we ought to begin the process of creating different levels of policing in the country in consonance with the spirit of federalism.

By definition, the police force is expected to perform investigations, detection of crimes, and protection of the citizenry as routine duties.This onerous assignment makes them first line in the security apparatus of the country.They are legally in charge of internal security. And so, they are usually expected to be close to the environment where they maintain law and order and protect lives and property.Besides, the police officers and operatives need credibility, respectability, and acceptability in the community or town where they serve.

Sadly, the Nigeria Police as currently constituted is not near any of these ideals. The average policeman in the country is poorly remunerated, despised by the people, seen as friends of criminals, poorly armed, and very corrupt.The nation is still smarting from a devastating protest (#EndSARS) mounted by young Nigerians who could no longer endure their brutality. The police force hasnt recovered from the opprobrium the remarkable protest triggered for their image. Even the Nigerian soldiers drafted to quell the revolt of the youth because the police could not cope, are still facing a presidential commission of inquiry on why they had to fire shots at young protesters at an open tollgate.

Often our policemen are seen as aliens or an occupation force because they receive instructions from commanders who are politically, geographically, and culturally distant from the people.

They are also seen as agents of a Federal Government that are virtually resented by the people in different states.As a result, the police-is-your-friend slogan of the Nigeria Police is treated with derision and received with disdain.As much as possible, whether citizens are right before the law or not, they simply avoid the police as much as possible.

We are deconstructing a countrys police setting whose men and officers collect gratification from both the complainant and the accused.The effect of these anomalies is that we have a very crude and inept police force in a flawed federation.

The Inspector-General takes instructions from the President of the country even if the orders are inimical to the overall interest of the nation. Indeed, he (IGP) is beholden to the President. For, as we know, our public officers would rather be loyal to the appointing body than the Constitution.

At the state level, although the elected governor is described as the chief security officer of the state, the police commissioner is not obliged to take orders from him. It has come to be that State Commissioners of Police are often at odds with State Governors on security matters. This inanity cannot and should not be allowed to continue.It is against this background that we once again reiterate our call on the Federal Government to tinker with the political structure of the country.And so Abuja can begin this with legal decentralisation of police operations as once suggested by the Vice President. The unitary system that gave birth to the unwieldy federal police has failed the nation. It is not sustainable anymore.

As this newspaper has often noted, the states, particularly the ones that can afford it, standing as constituent parts of the federation should be allowed by law to have their own police force.

The elected representatives in the National Assembly once saw the wisdom behind this advice and opted for the creation of State Police.This has not been a reality as the presidency has been unyielding to the political restructuring suggestion that can save the nation from the brink it is at the moment.

Some cynics have expressed fears that state governors would use the police under their control to threaten and intimidate opponents.This argument does not hold water. The rule of law and independence will be thus tested if there are abuses of power. Its introduction should be part of our political development. Until we give it a trial we cannot be so sure of its effectiveness or otherwise.

At the moment, the country is under policed. With a population of 180 million citizens, Nigeria has 350,572 men and women, at a ratio of 205 per 100,000.A significant percentage of these men are attached as guards to holders of public office and some wealthy private citizens.These officers are under the control of an IG that is located in Abuja, the nations capital.The result is that there is a palpable alienation. Policemen in the states do not see it as a constitutional duty to protect the citizenry.Elsewhere in the world, for example, in the United States or the United Kingdom, the police command is localised.The Sheriff is the local police chief whose tenure in office is dependent on a good performance.The U.S. has a total of 794, 300 policemen across the country at a ratio of 254 per 100,000. TheNew York City alone has the NYPD with a force strength of 40, 400 officers.These police officers are not under a general or federal command.Therefore, the duty bearers in the country should not get it twisted, the future of our nation depends on how its current managers handle the clamour for federalism. And so institutionalisation of state police in this context is critical to the survival of our convoluted federation whose leadership seems unconcerned about federalism, which is now a desideratum.

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Federalism is the answer, after all - Part 11Opinion - Guardian

DHARAN, JANUARY 7

Province 1 Chief Minister Sherdhan Rai has described the provincial structure as the essence of federalism.

We were familiar with the central and local levels, but the provincial structure is rather a new practice, said the chief minister.

He was speaking at the Ministry of Financial Affairs and Planning today.

Just as the provincial structure is the heart of federalism, MFAP is the heart of the provincial government. I have come to know that this heart of the provincial government is not doing well, he said, upon being briefed about the financial scenario of the province.

I have got to know how this heart that was performing well in the first year landed in this chronic condition in the second year; now that weve diagnosed the problem, the process of healing the ailing heart has started, he added.

During his presence at the ministry today, Rai instructed the staffers at the ministry to set right all the wrongs happening in the ministry.

The latest political development in the country might have brought some confusion, but I urge all of you to perform your duty with full sincerity, he said.

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Provincial structure is heart of federalism, says CM Rai - The Himalayan Times

Members of OFC: From left Bekele Gerba, vice chairman, Merera Gudina, Chairman, Jawar Mohammed, member, Hamza Borana, member, and Dejene Tafa, 2nd vice chairman in charge of political affairs. All but Merera are currently facing both, terrorism and criminal charges . Picture: Bale Robe during campaign trip in 2019. Social media

By Medihane Ekubamichael@Medihane

Addis Abeba, January 09/2021 Opposition party Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC) has released yet another statement last night saying that the party will find it very difficult to participate in the coming general elections scheduled to take place on June 05/2021.

The statement, the second in as many weeks, said that repeated the calls that it will be very difficult for us to participate in the election, as our leaders, members and supporters, who would be participating, coordinating and observing, have been arrested and others have been displaced and our offices have been forcibly closed.

The party has made a similar call on December 09 last year in which it said it finds it extremely hard to take part in coming elections under the existing conditions in the country whereby many of its leadership as well as rank and file members remained jailed, most of its offices are closed by the government, and the free movements of its members are restricted.

As the OFC has repeatedly expressed in the past, it finds it extremely difficult to take part in the election when the majority of its members from federal to Kebelle (small districts) level who are competing, coordinating, and observing elections are imprisoned, and majority of its offices, except for its headquarters, are closed.

The OFC has requested an immediate effort to reach at a national consensus before holding the elections, a call it repeated in its latest release yesterday despite falling on deaf ears.

In addition to calls for national consensuses and the release of its members, OFCs latest statement also warned that the growing calls by right-wing forces that oppose the constitution and the multinational federalism [and] push forward with threat to it was reverberating among those in control of the scepter of power who are also seen working to reverse the federal structure. it said, and cautioned OFC understands that this is a dangerous move.

It is to be recalled that on September 30 last year OFC had called for genuine national dialogue and warned that Ethiopia has entered a new year with all its heavy political burdens with both hope and despair. And without a shadow of doubt, the hoped-for democratic transition is disturbingly failing.

The expansion of the political space is crucial for our political problems as well as for free, fair and democratic elections!

Statement from the Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC) on current affairs of our country

Since its inception, the Oromo Federal Congress has been anorganization that believes in peaceful dialogue and negotiation and hasstressed the need for dialogue, discussion and negotiation to solve ourcountrys political problems. It isknown that it has been working for free, fair and democratic elections with theaim of holding public office.Accordingly, many of our members have made great sacrifices in our yearsof bitter struggle against the EPRDF-led government for the democratization ofthe federal system, interference in the autonomy of the states and theabolition of the caretaker administration.

OFC leaders, members, and supporters from the center to thelower echelons were killed, arrested, tortured, deported, and persecuted. Still today, countless OFC members andsupporters, from the top to the bottom, are being tortured and imprisoned invarious concentration camps, including police stations, special forces camps,corporate offices, prisons, and classrooms, simply because they stand up for therights and freedoms of their people.

On the other hand, using the current Ethiopian crisis, right-wing forces have begun to push political parties established based on the constitution and identity out of the political space by claiming that the the multinational federalism we got in its shape is too much.There are more and more organizations working on condemning the question of nations together with the TPLF, forgetting that it was raised before the formation of the TPLF.We say that these right-wing forces should be warned on time.

The purpose of the Oromo Federalist Congress is to ensure that the people of the Oromia region are represented only in the federal system of the people and in democratic elections, and that their basic democratic right to self-determination, without being ashamed of their identity, neither being lesser nor greater than anyone, is respected in accordance with international principles. However, while the right-wing forces that oppose the constitution and the multinational federalism push forward with threat to it, those in control of the scepter of power are also seen working to reverse the federal structure. OFC understands that this is a dangerous move.

OFC has been urging to resolve political differences through national dialogue, fearing that a war alternative could harm our poor country and benefit of our people, and thereby hasten the downfall of our country. Neither the government nor the ruling party are listening to us.

What is more surprising is that the government, the ruling party, and the National Electoral Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) have set a timeline for the sixth general election, leaving aside efforts to bring about national consensus that has been ongoing for three years from Addis Abeba to Arba Minch and Bishoftu. It is known that competing parties, the Ethiopian people, and international observers have denied that all five previous elections were free, fair, credible, and did not meet international standards.In the current situation, with the treatment of the government and its allies, it seems naive to expect the next election to be free, fair and credible.

Therefore: The Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC) has called for participatory negotiations and discussions on the complex problems of our country and the transition to democracy despite falling on deaf ears, the part will still present the following questions and suggestions.

1. The FDRE government, in accordance with the human and democratic rights enshrined in the Constitution and the international law adopted by our country, should immediately release our party leaders, members, supporters and other sections of the society who have been imprisoned for their political positions and ensure that political parties operate freely. We also strongly urge that our offices, which have been closed by government forces, be reopened. We would like to inform the people of Ethiopia and all concerned bodied that it will be very difficult for us to participate in the election, as our leaders, members and supporters, who would be participating, coordinating and observing, have been arrested and others have been displaced and our offices have been forcibly closed.

2. We urge the government and the ruling party to urgentlyfacilitate the situation so that the leaders and members of the police, specialforces and militias engaged in different parts of the country workindependently of party politics and respect the democratic and human rights ofcitizens.

3. The state-run media is only reflecting the interests ofthe ruling party. Some so-called privatemedia outlets that have close ties to the government sing a single melodycalling for the government to use force to destroy ethnic and nationalistparties. Such an approach will not benefit our country. Therefore, we respectfully request all mediaoutlets to work diligently to provide information to Ethiopians so that thepublic can understand the general situation of our country and fulfill theirprofessional duties.

4. Law is enacted to protect and guarantee the security of citizens, whereas development and prosperity are unthinkable by just only saying them repeatedly in a country where law and order are not respected. Extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrests, displacements, and intimidation are taking place in various areas outside of the provisions of the Constitution. The police rearrests a citizen whose release of had been ordered by the courts under unidentified authorization. Government officials who commit crimes under the guise of government shall not be prosecuted. There are very few, though. We therefore call on the courts, the criminal investigation department and the police to be independent of any party or group and to support the efforts to build good governance and democracy.

5. We entrust the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC)to monitor the inhumane and undemocratic activities in various parts of thecountry and fulfill its legal obligations and play its role in saving ourpeople from massacre.

6. We are at a critical juncture in which our countryspolitical forces can narrow our differences and create a national consensus andachieve a successful democratic transition.We urge the government, the ruling party and the National ElectoralBoard of Ethiopia to put an end to their policy of holding free, fair and acceptableelections and to create a conducive political environment.

In conclusion: What we want to leave to the people of Ethiopia and history is that we have failed to develop and modernize our politics for the past fifty years and we have been struggling from one crisis to another, from one transition to another. The result is being seen. Unfortunately because we have not learned from our recent history, we are in a situation where our priests, sheikhs, Aba Gedas, and elders find it difficult to bring about national consensus for the past three years. We are seeing the pros and cons with the Ethiopian people.

For the past three years, we are struggling with a dream of bringing about a peaceful, free and fair election without a national consensus and agreement on a common roadmap for a successful democratic transition. Therefore, to avoid that this is not becoming a fools marathon,our organization respectfully calls on all Ethiopian political forces and the Ethiopian people, who are truly organized for the rights and freedoms of your people, to work together to save our country from this difficult time.

There is no alternative than a national consensus to bring a successful democratic transition!

Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC)

Finfinne: January 8, 2021

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News: OFC says, again,very difficult to participate in election under current conditions; cautions threat to multinational federalism dangerous move -...

The Modi government and the BJP are planning another serious assault on the Constitution and the very basis of parliamentary democracy in India. The BJP has conducted 25 webinars in the last week of December 2020 to propagate the idea of one nation, one election. This came in the background of Prime Minister Narendra Modi making one of his periodic pronouncements about the need for one nation, one election. The latest was at the 80th Presiding Officers Conference on November 26, which happened to be the Constitution Day.

The BJP webinars trotted out the now well-known arguments for the need for simultaneous elections of the Lok Sabha and state Assembly elections: that it will save a lot of expenditure; repeated elections bring the Model Code of Conduct into play which hampers development work and divert officials attention and so on.

In one of the webinars, Bhupendra Yadav, a general secretary of BJP, stated, Election is just a means in democracy, but repeated elections show that it has become the only objective of a democracy. Governance lags behind.

The underlining message is that too many elections are not good for democracy; more important is governance. This is in line with what the CEO of Niti Aayog, Amitabh Kant, said that there is too much democracy in India with regard to the farmers struggle. The message is as clear as daylight the call for one nation, one election is a logical extension of one nation, one leader and the leader has declared that this is not a matter of debate but a necessity for India.

Read more:

BJPs agenda of one nation, one election is a threat to democracy and federalism - National Herald

2020 has been a bad year for the health of Indians and for the health of Indian democracy too. The Modi-Shah regime, which is authoritarian by instinct and belief, has used the pandemic to further undermine the processes of constitutional democracy and strengthen its hold over State and society. In pursuit of its ambitions, the regime has launched a multi-pronged attack on the Indian Parliament, Indian federalism, the Indian press and Indian civil society organisations. Let us consider these in turn.

In the years he was chief minister of Gujarat, Narendra Modi displayed a consistent contempt for legislative procedure. A report compiled after he had been a decade in office showed that of all the chief ministers of Gujarat since the states formation, Modi convened the least assembly sittings.

Months would pass in which the assembly would not meet; when it did, a day would be enough to dispose of matters at hand, with much time spent mourning members who had passed away. As is well known, apart from disregarding inputs from MLAs from the Opposition and even from his own party, Chief Minister Modi rarely consulted his own cabinet about major policy decisions.

Modi has carried this contempt for consultation with him to New Delhi. For him, Parliament is a place to make the odd stirring speech in, not a chamber for deliberative decision-making. The partisan attitude adopted by the Speaker of the Lok Sabha and the chairman of the Rajya Sabha is very much in line with their leaders way of thinking. Their deputies act in the same way.

Consider the manner in which the farm bills were passed through the Rajya Sabha, with the deputy-chairman of the House, Harivansh, violating all the rules and norms of Parliament by refusing to allow actual voting, and making the bills into law on the basis of his own sense of the House.

Of this departure from democratic practice, PDT Achary, the former secretary-general of the Lok Sabha, wrote, Parliaments systems are designed to enable the opposition to have its say and the government to have its way. If the former is not possible, parliament as a democratic institution cannot survive for long.

Those who are Modi bhakts, or who believe that the ends justify the means, have disregarded these violations and welcomed the bills as historic. On the other hand, supporters of the farm bills with more scruples and a deeper understanding of history have honourably alerted us to the awful consequences of such contempt for Parliament.

Thus, as the senior lawyer, Arvind Datar, writes, The enormous economic loss and the dislocation of normal life around Delhi could have been wholly avoided if the Bills had not been bulldozed through Parliament. The agitation teaches us the importance of following parliamentary procedure not just in letter but in spirit as well.

Union ministers may put the blame on urban Naxals, Khalistanis, and Opposition parties, but, as Datar points out, it is the extraordinary haste with which the farm bills were pushed through both the Houses [that] has created the present crisis, which can only exacerbate the economic woes caused by the pandemic.

More recently, the government cancelled the winter session of Parliament citing the pandemic, even as the Union home minister was addressing large political rallies in Assam and West Bengal.

As chief minister of Gujarat, Narendra Modi claimed to believe in co-operative federalism. As prime minister, he has sought to savagely curtail the rights and responsibilities of states. Again, the farm bill can serve as an example. As Harish Damodaran has pointed out, since the Constitution clearly places both agriculture and markets on the state list, on these matters the Centre can encourage, incentivise, persuade and cajole states. However, it cannot legislate on its own.

Nonetheless, through a creative (mis)interpretation of an item in the concurrent list which covers trade and commerce in foodstuffs, the Centre had these bills passed, through the dubious procedure in Parliament described above, and without consulting the states at all.

The pandemic has witnessed a more general attack on the federal principle. The powers of the Centre have been strengthened through colonial-era laws and the National Disaster Management Act. Meanwhile, state governments run by Opposition parties have been undermined by bribing, cajoling, or intimidating legislators to switch their allegiance to the Bharatiya Janata Party.

A true marker of how much the BJP cares for power and how little for the health of Indians was that the prime minister waited for the swearing-in of the new government in Madhya Pradesh before imposing a draconian lockdown at four hours notice.

In its attack on federalism, the BJP has particularly targeted two large states West Bengal and Maharashtra. Here, governors more loyal to the ruling party at the Centre than to the Constitution and Central investigative agencies more loyal to their ministers than to the law have been used by the Modi-Shah regime to harass the non-BJP governments that currently rule these states. This intimidation has become so brazen that the BJPs once loyal and long-term ally, the Shiv Sena, was compelled to state: What if our Prime Minister is taking a special interest in destabilising State governments? The Prime Minister belongs to the country. The country stands as a federation. Even the states which do not have BJP governments, those states also talk about national interest. This feeling is being killed.

In his years as chief minister of Gujarat, Narendra Modi was deeply distrustful of even the most non-political of civil society organisations. He has carried this distrust over to New Delhi. The year, 2020, had seen a tightening of the already extensive curbs on non-governmental organisations. The new amendment to the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act, argues one analyst, is designed to facilitate arbitrary, vindictive action by the authorities.

By curbing and confining NGOs, the bill shall have far-reaching consequences on the fields of education, health, peoples livelihoods, gender justice and indeed democracy in India.

Narendra Modi has never much liked journalists who think for themselves, as his refusal to hold a press conference in six-and-a-half years as prime minister shows. The year, 2020, saw growing attacks on the independence of the press in India. In the first two months after the lockdown was imposed in late March, some 55 journalists faced FIRs, physical intimidation, and arrest. The highest number of attacks on journalists were in Uttar Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, and Himachal Pradesh, which are all ruled or controlled by the BJP.

As a report by the Free Speech Collective noted, The year 2020 has been a bad one for journalists in India The killing and attacks on journalists have continued unabated. While self-censorship within the media remained an open secret, the government sought to increase regulation of the media, with media policies, funding and administrative mechanisms for online media.

India now occupies the 142nd place on the World Press Freedom Index, ranking well below Nepal, Afghanistan and Sri Lanka, though the fact that we are three places above Pakistan may provide some consolation to deshbhakts.

Apart from attacks on Parliament, federalism, civil society organisations and the press, 2020 had also seen a further stigmatisation of Indias large and vulnerable Muslim minority. This stigmatisation has been overseen by two of the most powerful politicians in India. The hand of the home minister, Amit Shah, is most visible in the BJPs Bengal campaign and in the polices partisan handling of the Delhi riots and their aftermath and the hand of Uttar Pradeshs chief minister, Adityanath, in the incarceration of a growing number of Muslim men on charges that are shady, flimsy, or non-existent.

Notwithstanding the prime ministers recent speech at the Aligarh Muslim University, it is clearly Adityanaths majoritarianism that represents the deep, inner feelings of the party faithful, as manifest in the eagerness of other BJP chief ministers to enact the discriminatory laws and practices adopted in UP.

When the new laws regarding agriculture and labour were passed, there was a chorus of applause from free-market columnists crowing, the crisis has not been wasted. The chorus was credulous, because sustained economic growth requires both a level playing field and the rule of law. Neither does, or can, exist, in the Modi-Shah regime.

Capitalists who contribute more to the secretive electoral bonds scheme shall get preferential treatment over those who dont. Politicians who defect from other parties to the BJP miraculously have all corruption cases against them dropped. The police, the bureaucracy and even the courts allegedly act in the interests of their political masters rather than according to the law.

To hold the State and the private sector accountable, one needs the transparent gaze of a free press, informed debate in Parliament, and independent civil society organisations. With what transpired in 2020, we have even less of these than previously. Finally, one cannot have social harmony if the State and the ruling party treat those who are not Hindus as inferior to those who are.

For the prime minister and his party, political power, ideological control, and personal glory take precedence over the economic and social well-being of Indias citizens. They have, therefore, used, or rather abused, the crisis to weaken the institutions of Indian democracy and the traditions of Indian pluralism so as to further the construction of an authoritarian and majoritarian State, which they seek far more diligently than anything else.

Ramachandra Guhas The Commonwealth of Cricket has just been published. His email address is ramachandraguha@yahoo.in.

This article first appeared in The Telegraph.

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Ramachandra Guha: Under cover of Covid-19, Modi regime has stepped up its attack on Indian democracy - Scroll.in

Sharing details on why he was forced to remove JP Rajkhowa as the governor of Arunachal Pradesh in 2016, former President Pranab Mukherjee in his memoir wrote at some point though, I had expressed my displeasure to the home minister (Rajnath Singh) on the governors conduct. Everybody wanted to wait for the Supreme Courts verdict. I was expecting, as others were, of some interim order, but when it did not come, I had to act. The verdict, when it came, indicted the governor on all counts, but Rajkhowa did not quit. I told the home minister that if the governor did not act, I would have to in other words, ask the governor to quit.

Writing on the subject of federalism and on powers of the governor, Mukherjee in the fourth volume of his autobiography The Presidential Years: 2012-2017, wrote, must confess that I was unhappy with the governors action. I have always maintained that the governor is not the ruler of a state; he acts on the aid and advice of the Council of Ministers. The governor does not even belong to the state, so how can he take on the mantle of a ruler!

Mukherjee wrote in his book that India had never really been a federal state. He added, The federal structure as we understand it today, simply refers to a broad arrangement symbolizing a healthy relationship between the Centre and the states. Over the years, federalism has taken many forms, the more recent being 'cooperative federalism' and 'competitive federalism'.

The episode Mukherjee mentioned here was about the constitutional crisis that arose in Arunachal Pradesh in late 2015 when the then speaker of the state assembly, Nabam Rebia, against whom an impeachment motion had been moved, disqualified 14 Congress MLAs.

The case went to Guwahati High Court followed by the Supreme Court, during which Presidents Rule was imposed in the state. The Congress which ruled the state at that time was eventually trumped by the BJP when Prema Khandu joined the BJP-led alliance with over 40 MLAs. Mukherjee went on to remove Rajkhowa as the governor of the state.

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India Had Never Really Been a Federal State, Wrote Pranab Mukherjee in Memoir 'The Presidential Years' - News18

By Express News Service

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The new farm laws hurt the farmers and the state, saidGovernor Arif Mohammed Khan on Friday while reading out Kerala government's opposition to the three agriculture laws passed by the Centre.

Arif Mohammed Khan, while reading out the policy address, said "the farmers will lose bargaining powers and income loss at the cost of corporate with the amendment of Essential Commodities Act. It willalso impact a consumer state such as Kerala."

While supporting the farmers'protestingagainst the three new agri laws, the governor in his address asked the Centre to address the policy lacuna that affected thecommercial crop farming in Kerala.

INTERVIEW | Air your views but don't provoke conflicts, says Kerala Governor to state government

The state legislative assembly on Thursday unanimously passed a resolution to reject the farm laws enacted by the Centre. Both LDF and UDF were at loggerheads with the Governor for his decision to turn down the state government's request to convene a special session on August 23.

The issue was resolved after he later gave the nod later.

The Kerala government's policy read out by Governor Arif Mohammed Khan was also critical of Centre for compromising federalism in the country. While asking the Central government to respect the federal system in the country the state policy freedom for states and local bodies to function effectively in their respective space.

ALSO READ |Opposition boycotts Kerala Governor Arif Mohammed Khan's policy address in assembly

The Life Mission project, which is a flagship housing programme of the LDF government found an indirect mention in the address as it accused the central agencies of impeding major projects and demoralising honest officers involved in it, in violation of the Cooperative federalism.

The reference was into the enquiries conducted by Enforcement Directorate probe into the suspected bribery in Life Mission project in Vadakancherry, enquiries into K-FON optical network project etc.

The opposition UDF boycotted the policy address ten minutes into the Governor's address as a mark of protest againt the Kerala government and Governor.

His speech was interrupted by constant sloganeering from the opposition prompting the Governor to pause twice.

You have raised made enough slogans. Please let me do my constitutional duty. Do not interrupt me, the Governor told the UDF MLAs. The Opposition leader Ramesh Chennithala rose from the seat and spoke against the government, terming it as the most corrupt.

The address began with the impact of Covid-19 on the social and economic situation of the state. The economic impact is estimated at Rs 80,000 crore deficit in state GDP. It gave detailed account of the pandemic fight by the state government.

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'New laws hurt farmers': Governor reads Kerala's resolution against Centres' agri policies in assembly - The New Indian Express

It is hard to change long-standing narratives. The popular understanding of complex subjects often includes ideas that are well-past their sell-by date, an yet persist either because they are intuitive, compelling, have seeped into the media or because someone has a vested interest in maintaining that impression.

Take, for example, the idea that high turnout in Indian elections is a sign of anti-incumbency. Not only does the data not back it up, experts seem to think it emerges from a couple of elections in 1967 and 1977, about a half-decade ago.

They can even be internalised, like Indians believing they are middle class no matter where their income falls on the spectrum.

One of the questions we likes to ask most on our newsletter the Political Fix which features an interview with experts and scholars on Indian policy, politics and beyond every Friday, is about misconceptions. Specifically what misconceptions do you encounter all the time from the public at large, from journalists and even from experts and scholars.

The answers are always interesting. So for the start of the year, we thought we would compile some of them for you to return to. You can read the entire archive of Friday Q&As here.

Do send in suggestions for who you would like us to feature next or the misconceptions about a subject that you encounter over and over by emailing rohan@scroll.in

Rahul Verma is a Fellow at the Centre for Policy Research, and co-author along with Pradeep Chhibber of Ideology and Identity: The Changing Party Systems of India. I spoke to Verma about popular understandings of Indian politics and how theyre often wrong. Read the entire interview here.

What misconceptions about Indian politics do you find yourself correcting all the time?

There are lots of them. Lots of them. Despite contrary evidence and good evidence in the public domain, people continue to work with the old wisdom, which has been challenged. As we discussed in the beginning, take this whole relationship between caste and vote. Just open your eyes. Across the world, this happens. Im not saying that there are no bad effects and elements of this caste-vote relationship in India. But why do you get so worked up? Think deeply why this exists.

This conversation is loaded against the lower class and the marginalised. Upper castes also act as a voting block for the BJP in many parts of this country, or dominant castes do for regional parties in many parts of the country, but the conversation is always about some Yadav-OBCs, some Dalits and some Muslims, right? So this misconception has another layer of misconceptions loaded towards one group.

Take the silent voter theory [to explain polling errors]. This is one of the most bogus theories of Indian politics. This has no basis. But in every election you hear, we went there, the voters are not speaking up. Yes, some people are actually strategically silent. They dont want to be seen. But a lot of them actually dont know what to do. And they are looking for cues. Theyre trying to talk to their relatives, theyre trying to talk to their family members. Theyre trying to talk to their village elders.

There is a section of voters who decide whom to vote for while standing in the queue. The hawa at the polling booth.

Then, many people, including Milan Vaishnav, have given evidence on this relationship between turnout and anti-incumbency, that there is no relationship. But it keeps coming back in election after election.

Then this whole business about factionalism. I grew up reading in the newspapers someone always blaming gutbaazi, factionalism, for losing. So when you lose, its basically anti-incumbency and factionalism. And when you win, these two things dont matter.

See, parties are made up of factions. There are always going to be competing power interests. The degree of factionalism may make you win or lose an election, but that does not happen in every election.

Manan Ahmed Asif, an associate professor at Columbia University who also founded the blog Chapati Mystery, examines in his new book, The Loss of Hindustan; The Invention of India, the ways in which colonial histories of the subcontinent, often using a simplistic religious lens, overshadowed and overwhelmed a very different understanding of Hindustan held by medieval scholars.

Read the whole interview here.

The whole of the book is about misconceptions, so this question is a bit harder, but Id still like to ask: What is the one misconception that you find yourself having to correct all the time?

I think it is one thing that Ive made a part of both books, which is this idea of Muslim presence in the subcontinent being perceived as [that of] outsiders.

In both India and in Pakistan. In India, because of the Hindutva [project]. In Pakistan, they say, we are descended from Arabs, and have nothing to do with the subcontinent.

So this idea of outsiderness, both in Pakistan and India. How does it work? You see disciplinary scholarship, studies that are wedded to this analytical framework.

The thing I notice the most is how colonial categories of difference and a national emphasis on difference is not questioned. We dont put it in front and say this doesnt make sense.

Louise Tillin is director of the India Institute at the Kings College London, and author of Indian Federalism. I spoke to her about the interaction between the Centre and states in India, and how the countrys federal compact operates differently from other prominent federations.

Read the whole interview here.

Is there one misconception about Indian federalism that you find yourself frequently having to correct?

I took a bit of slack a good 10 years ago for suggesting that Indian federalism had not quite come to terms with asymmetry in the way that proponents of asymmetric federalism often assume. It was often said that the Article 370 and Kashmirs autonomous status in the Indian Union, along with the autonomy provisions in North East India, meant that India stood out as a country that had managed to design forms of asymmetry that has enabled it to accommodate the idea that certain regions should have a special status within the Constitution.

This is a debate that has played out in many other countries. There is a long-running debate of whether Quebec should be recognised as having a special status in Canada, or Catalonia in the Spanish case.

I wrote an article back in 2007 and I said, well, yes, India does have these forms of autonomy in the Constitution, but its a mistake to think they are unproblematically embedded. And Article 370 is often being obeyed more in the breach and eroded essentially over time and perhaps we ought to be a little more cautious in how well we understand India as representing a form of asymmetric federalism.

I was slightly lambasted then for those views. But I feel recent events have borne them out.

Ananth Krishnan is a journalist and author of Indias China Challenge, which tells the story of how the country arrived at this particular moment in the Xi Jinping era and what that might mean for New Delhi. I spoke to Krishnan about 2020s tensions on the disputed border between the two countries, how trade has not led to closer connections and why he set out to convey a sense of the plurality of voices that are present in China.

Read the whole interview here.

Is there one thing that you see among Indian scholars, media, even fellow experts that you think is the biggest misconception when it comes to China?

Id say that one pet peeve of mine is, its not really a deep misconception, but I wish we would stop paying as much attention to the Global Times as we do every day. Its understandable, given the fact that there arent many English-language sources from China. But the idea that everything that they say is signed off by the top leadership is something I find quite amusing.

Declan Walsh is a New York Times journalist and author of The Nine Lives of Pakistan, which tells the story of the country through nine fascinating portraits while also recounting his own time there including being expelled by the government for unspecified reasons in 2013. I spoke to Walsh about the violent period that he was witness to in Pakistan, how foreign correspondence has changed and how he sees the country from the outside.

Read the whole interview here.

Having spent nine years there and left, do you now find yourself correcting misconceptions about the way people even experts and scholars see Pakistan?

I think for foreigners in the post 9/11 period, there was a tendency to view Pakistan exclusively through a national security prism. And I think that sometimes provided for very impoverished policymaking, where foreign countries, for instance, supported Pervez Musharraf, just as they had supported General Zia for their own narrow perceived national security interest.

And I think in the medium term that has been a destabilising dynamic for Pakistan. It has led to bad decisions, and it has not helped the cause of good governance in the country. Thats not to excuse the sometimes gross failings and corruption of civilian leaders. And they certainly have been terrible. But, you know, in Pakistan, there is bad politics and fascinating politics, but sometimes very dispiriting politics in a kind of narrow sense.

But, there are also bigger, wider forces at play about the balance of power within the country and about the country, kind of having an opportunity or having the space to solidify its own identity as a country that is formally titled an Islamic Republic, but has large minorities, and in reality actually sees itself as a much more pluralistic place.

I think for a lot of Pakistanis anyway, they do, but that view is under threat from really regressive forces that are always looking for an opportunity to seize space, whether its through blasphemy, whether its through the issue of militant jihad, whether its sometimes just through conventional politics, and there is this battle for the soul of Pakistan thats always ongoing.

Originally posted here:

What does everyone keep getting wrong about India (and China and Pakistan)? - Scroll.in