The Peninsula Foundation

Category: Opinion/Commentary

  • Why India risks a quantum tech brain drain

    Why India risks a quantum tech brain drain

    Clear career progression would help India’s quantum workforce and avoid a brain drain overseas

    India could lose its best quantum tech talent if the industry doesn’t get its act together.

    Quantum technology has the potential to revolutionise our lives through speeds which once seemed like science fiction.

    India is one of a few nations with national quantum initiatives and it stands on the threshold of potentially enormous technological and social benefits.

    The National Quantum Mission, approved by the national cabinet in April, is a timely government initiative that has the potential to catapult India to a global leader leading in quantum research and technologies if leveraged correctly.

    Its main areas of research are quantum computing, secure quantum communications, quantum sensing and metrology and quantum materials.

    The challenge for India is how it ensures it gets the best out of the mission.

    The benefits of the technology can benefit many aspects of society through processing power, accuracy and speed and can positively impact health, drug research, finance and economics.

    Similarly, quantum security can revolutionise security in strategic communication sectors including defence, banking, health records and personal data.

    Quantum sensors can enable better GPS services through atomic clocks and high-precision imaging while quantum materials research can act as an enabler for more quantum technologies.

    But the Indian quantum ecosystem is still academia-centric.

    India’s Department of Science and Technology had set up a pilot programme on Quantum Enabled Science and Technologies — a precursor to the National Quantum Mission.

    As a result, India has a large number of young and energetic researchers, working at places such as RRI Bangalore, TIFR and IIT Delhi who have put an infrastructure in place for the next generation quantum experiments with capabilities in different quantum technology platforms. These include quantum security through free space, fibres as well-integrated photonics, quantum sensing and metrology.

    The prospects and impact of quantum technologies will be hugely strategic. Predictions suggest quantum computing will have a profound impact on financial services, logistics, transportation, aerospace and automotive, materials science, energy, agriculture, pharmaceuticals and healthcare, and cybersecurity. All of these areas are strategic on macroeconomic and national security scales.

    Even as it has taken significant policy initiative to kickstart research into quantum technologies, India will need to craft a national strategy with a long-term perspective and nurture and develop its research work force.

    Clear career progression would help India’s quantum workforce. The risk of brain drain, where local talent moves overseas for better opportunities, could be a real possibility if different industries which can benefit from the technology fail to recognise its transformative capabilities and how it can help create jobs and opportunities.

    While there are multiple labs working in different quantum sectors, the career path of students and post-doctoral researchers remains unclear as there are not enough positions in the academic sector.

    One problem is industry and academia are competing with each other for quantum research funding which is why equal emphasis on quantum technology development in the industrial sector could help.

    While India does have some quantum start-ups, more lab-to-market innovations which would make the technology practically useful could give the field momentum. Currently, the big industrial firms in India are not yet committed to quantum technology.

    The lack of homegrown technologies like optical, optomechanical and electronic components for precision research is another impediment. Most of these are imported, resulting in financial drain and long delays in research.

    The National Quantum Mission could help fix a number of these problems.

    Hurdles could be turned into opportunities if more start-ups and established industries were to manufacture high-end quantum technology enabling products in India.

    Another major deterrent is the lack of coordination. Multiple efforts to develop and research the technology, across government and start-ups, do not seem to have coherence and still lack maturity. People involved in quantum research are hopeful the mission will help address this.

    Like most other countries, India has witnessed plenty of hype about quantum research. While this may help provide a short-term boost to the field, excessive hype can lead to unrealistic expectations.

    Continuing to build a skilled workforce and a clear career progression plan for those involved in research and development of quantum technologies can help secure India’s future in this space.

    There is a distinction between magic and miracles and while believing in one, one should not start expecting the latter as that can only lead to disappointment in the long run.

     

    This article was originally published under Creative Commons by 360info™.

     

  • The Atomic Executioner’s Lament

    The Atomic Executioner’s Lament

    While the world focuses on the trials and travails of the scientists who invented the atomic bomb, little attention is paid to the hard positions taken by the nuclear executioners, the men called upon to drop these bombs in time of war.

     

    Crew of the Enola Gay, returning from their atomic bombing mission over Hiroshima, Japan. At center is navigator Capt. Theodore Van Kirk; to the right, in foreground, is flight commander Col. Paul Tibbetts. (Wikimedia Commons, Public domain)

     

    There is an interesting scene in Chris Nolan’s film Oppenheimer, one which could easily get lost in the complexity of telling the story of the man considered to be the father of the American atomic bomb, J. Robert Oppenheimer.

    The Trinity test of the first nuclear device has been successfully completed, and Oppenheimer is watching as two men in military uniform are packing up one of Oppenheimer’s “gadgets” for shipment out of Los Alamos to an undisclosed destination.

    Oppenheimer talks to them about the optimum height for the detonation of the weapon above ground, but is cut off by one of the soldiers, who, smiling, declares “We’ve got it from here.”

    Such men existed, although the scene in the movie — and the dialogue — was almost certainly the product of a scriptwriter’s imagination. The U.S. military went to great lengths to keep the method of delivery of the atomic bomb a secret, not to be shared with either Oppenheimer or his scientists.

    Formed on March 6, 1945, the 1st Ordnance Squadron, Special (Aviation) was part of the 509th Composite Group, commanded by then-Lieutenant Colonel Paul Tibbets. Prior to being organized into the 1st Ordnance Squadron, the men of the unit were assigned to a U.S. Army ordnance squadron stationed a Wendover, Utah, where Tibbets and the rest of the 509th Composite Group were based.

    Mission map for the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Aug. 6 and Aug. 9, 1945. Scale is not consistent due to the curvature of the Earth. Angles and locations are approximate. Kokura was included as the original target for Aug. 9 but weather obscured visibility; Nagasaki was chosen instead. (Mr.98, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain)

    While Oppenheimer and his scientists designed the nuclear device, the mechanism of delivery — the bomb itself — was designed by specialists assigned to the 509th. It was the job of the men of the 1st Ordnance Squadron to build these bombs from scratch.

    The bomb dropped on Hiroshima by Paul Tibbets, flying a B-29 named the Enola Gay, was assembled on the Pacific Island of Tinian by the 1st Ordnance Squadron.

    Concerned about the possibility of the B-29 crashing on takeoff, thereby triggering the explosive charge that would send the uranium slug into the uranium core (the so-called gun device), the decision was made that the final assembly of the bomb would be done only after the Enola Gay took off.

    One of the 1st Ordnance Squadron technicians placed the uranium slug into the bomb at 7,000 feet over the Pacific Ocean.

    The bomb worked as designed, killing more than 80,000 Japanese in an instant; hundreds of thousands more died afterwards from the radiation released by the weapon.

    For the pilot and crew of the Enola Gay, there was no remorse over killing so many people. “I knew we did the right thing because when I knew we’d be doing that I thought, yes, we’re going to kill a lot of people, but by God we’re going to save a lot of lives,’ Tibbets recounted to Studs Terkel in 2002. He added:

    “We won’t have to invade [Japan]. You’re gonna kill innocent people at the same time, but we’ve never fought a damn war anywhere in the world where they didn’t kill innocent people,” Tibbets told Terkel. “If the newspapers would just cut out the shit: ‘You’ve killed so many civilians.’ That’s their tough luck for being there.

    An atomic bomb victim with burns, Ninoshima Quarantine Office, Aug. 7, 1945. (Onuka Masami, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain)

    Major Charles Sweeney, the pilot of Bockscar, the B-29 that dropped the second American atomic bomb on the city of Nagasaki on Aug. 9, 1945, held similar convictions about his role in killing 35,000 Japanese instantly.

    “I saw these beautiful young men who were being slaughtered by an evil, evil military force,” Sweeney recounted in 1995. “There’s no question in my mind that President Truman made the right decision.” However, Sweeney noted, “As the man who commanded the last atomic mission, I pray that I retain that singular distinction.”

    History records the remorse felt by Oppenheimer and his Soviet counterpart, Andrei Sakharov, and the punishment they both suffered at the hands of their respective governments. They suffered from designer’s remorse, a regret — stated after the fact — that what they had built should not be used, but somehow locked away from the world, as if the Pandora’s Box of nuclear weaponization had never been opened.

    Having designed their respective weapons, however, both Oppenheimer and Sakharov lost control of their creations, turning them over to military establishments which did not participate in the intellectual and moral machinations of bringing such a weapon into existence, but rather the cold, hard reality of using these weapons to achieve a purpose and goal which, as had been the case for Tibbets and Sweeney, seemed justified.

    Ignoring the Executioner

    Brigadier General Charles W. Sweeney, pilot of the aircraft that dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki. (Public domain, Wikimedia Commons)

    This is the executioners’ lament, a contradiction of emotions where the perceived need for justice outweighs the costs associated.

    While the world focuses on the trials and travails of Oppenheimer and Sakharov, they remain silent about the hard positions taken by the nuclear executioners, the men called upon to drop these bombs in time of war.  There have only been two such men, and they remained resolute in their judgement that it was the right thing to do.

    The executioner’s lament is overlooked by most people involved in supporting nuclear disarmament. This is a mistake, because the executioner, as was pointed out to Oppenheimer by the men of the 1stOrdnance Squadron, is in control.

    They possess the weapons, and they are the ones who will be called upon to deliver the weapons. Their loyalty and dedication to the task are constantly tested in order to ensure that, when the time comes to execute orders, they will do so without question.

    Image of a younger Petrov from a family album.
    (Stanislav Petrov’s Personal Library, Wikimedia Commons, CC0)

     

     

    Those opposed to nuclear weapons often point to the example of Stanislav Petrov, a former lieutenant colonel of the Soviet Air Defense Forces who, in 1983, twice made a decision to delay reporting the suspected launch of U.S. missiles towards the Soviet Union, believing (rightly) that the launch detection was a result of malfunctioning equipment.

    But the fact is that Petrov was an outlier who himself admitted that had another officer been on duty that fateful day, they would have reported the American missile launches per protocol.

    Those who will execute the orders to use nuclear weapons in any future nuclear conflict will, in fact, execute those orders. They are trained, like Tibbets and Sweeney, to believe in the righteousness of their cause.

    Dmitry Medvedev, the former Russian prime minister and president who currently serves as the deputy chairman of the Russian National Security Council, has publicly warned the Western supporters of Ukraine that Russia would “have to” use nuclear weapons if Ukrainian forces were to succeed in their goal of recapturing the former territories of Ukraine that have been claimed by Russia in the aftermath of referenda held in September 2022.

    “Imagine,” Medvedev said, “if the offensive, which is backed by NATO, was a success and they tore off a part of our land, then we would be forced to use a nuclear weapon according to the rules of a decree from the president of Russia. There would simply be no other option.”

    Some in the West view Medvedev’s statement to be an empty threat; U.S. President Joe Biden said last month that there is no real prospect of Russian President Vladimir Putin ordering the use of nuclear weapons against either Ukraine or the West.

    “Not only the West, but China and the rest of the world have said: ‘don’t go there,’ ” Biden said following the NATO Summit in Vilnius.

    Ignoring Russian Doctrine

    But Biden, like other doubters, emphasizes substance over process, denying the role played by the executioner in implementing justice defined on their terms, not that of those being subjected to execution.

    Russia has a nuclear doctrine that mandates that nuclear weapons are to be used “when the very existence of the state is put under threat.” According to Medvedev, “there would simply be no other option,” ironically noting that “our enemies should pray” for a Russian victory, as the only way to make sure “that a global nuclear fire is not ignited.”

    The Russians who would execute the orders to launch nuclear weapons against the West would be operating with the same moral clarity as had Paul Tibbets and Charles Sweeney some 88 years ago. The executioner’s lament holds that they will be saddened by their decision but convinced that they had no other choice.

    Proving them wrong will be impossible because, unlike the war with Japan, where the survivors were given the luxury of reflection and accountability, there will be no survivors in any future nuclear conflict.

    The onus, therefore, is on the average citizen to get involved in processes that separate the tools of our collective demise — nuclear weapons — from those who will be called upon to use them.

    Meaningful nuclear disarmament is the only hope humankind has for its continued survival.

    The time to begin pushing for this is now, and there is no better place to start than on Aug. 6, 2023 — the 78th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima, when like-minded persons will gather outside the United Nations to begin a dialogue about disarmament that will hopefully resonate enough to have an impact of the 2024 elections.

     

    This article was published earlier in consortiumnews.com

    The views expressed are the author’s own.

    Feature Image: The devastated city of Hiroshima after the atomic bomb blast – bbc.com

  • The South Asia Nuclear Zero

    The South Asia Nuclear Zero

    The nuclear tests, of May 1998, by India and Pakistan, marked an epochal juncture for South Asia. The Doomsday Clock maintained by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, jumped from 11:43 to 11:51, or just “9 minutes to midnight.”

    While, in India, the “Shakti” tests, do find celebratory mention, Pakistan observes the Chagai series of nuclear tests, as a national day, termed “Yom-e-Taqbir.” On the 25th anniversary of this event, Lt Gen Khalid Kidwai (Retd), currently, advisor, to Pakistan’s National Command Authority (NCA), delivered an address at the Arms Control and Disarmament Centre of the Institute of Strategic Studies, Islamabad.

    Kidwai, who served, for 14 years, as the Director-General of Pakistan’s Strategic Plans Division (SPD), was at the heart of Pakistan’s NCA, and oversaw the operationalisation of its nuclear deterrent. Although his talk was for public consumption, given the historic absence of an Indo-Pak nuclear dialogue, some of Kidwai’s statements – if taken at face value – contain worrisome undertones, which need analysis.

    After mentioning the rationale for Pakistan embarking on nuclear weaponization (“humiliation of the 1971 War followed by India’s nuclear test of May 1974”) Kidwai proceeded to enlighten the audience about the implications of Pakistan’s new policy of Full Spectrum Deterrence (FSD) and how it kept, “India’s aggressive designs, including the Indian military’s Cold Start Doctrine, in check.”

    While retaining the fig leaf of Credible Minimum Deterrence (CMD), Kidwai went on to mention the “horizontal dimension” of Pakistan’s nuclear inventory, held by the individual Strategic Force Commands of the Army, Navy and Air Force. The “vertical dimension,” of the Pak deterrent, he said, encapsulated “adequate range coverage from zero meters to 2750 km, as well as nuclear weapons of destructive yields at three tiers: strategic, operational and tactical.”

    While the missile range of 2750 km, corresponds, roughly, to the distance from a launch-point in south-east Sindh, to the Andaman Islands, and indicates the “India-specificity” of the Shaheen III missile, it is the mention of “zero metres” that is intriguing. Pakistan already has the 60 km range, “Nasr” missile, projected as a response to India’s Cold Start doctrine. Therefore, unless used as a colloquialism, Kidwai’s mention of “zero metres” range could only imply a pursuit of ultra short-range, tactical nuclear weapons (TNW), like artillery shells, land mines, and short-range missiles, armed with small warheads, of yields between 0.1 to 1 kiloton (equivalent of 100 to 1000 tons of TNT).

    By shifting from CMD to FSD, with the threat of nuclear first use, to defend against an Indian conventional military thrust, Pakistan is aping the, discredited, US-NATO Cold War concept of Flexible Response. Fearing their inability to withstand a massive Warsaw Pact armoured offensive, this 1967 doctrine saw the US and NATO allies deploy a large number of TNW to units in the field.

    However, the dangers of escalation arising from the use of TNW were soon highlighted, by US Secretary Defence, Robert McNamara’s, public confession: “It is not clear how theater nuclear war could actually be exe­cuted without incurring a very serious risk of escalating to general nuclear war.” This marked a turning point in US-NATO nuclear strategy.

    Kidwai’s speech contains three statements of note. Firstly, he attempts to dilute India’s declared policy of “massive retaliation” (MR), in response to a nuclear strike, by claiming that Pakistan possesses an entire range of survivable nuclear warheads of desired yield, in adequate numbers, to respond to India’s MR. He adds, “Pakistan’s counter-massive retaliation can therefore be as severe (as India’s) if not more.”

    Far more significant is Kidwai’s declaration that, since Pakistan’s missiles can threaten the full extent of the Indian landmass and island territories, “…there is no place for India’s strategic weapons to hide” (emphasis added).

    Secondly, in an attempt to downplay India’s (inchoate) ballistic missile defence (BMD), he declares that in a “target-rich India”, Pakistan is at liberty to expand the envelope and choose from counter-value, counterforce and battlefield targets, “notwithstanding the indigenous Indian BMD or the Russian S-400” (air-defence systems).

    Far more significant is Kidwai’s declaration that, since Pakistan’s missiles can threaten the full extent of the Indian landmass and island territories, “…there is no place for India’s strategic weapons to hide” (emphasis added). The assumption, so far, was that, given its limitations in terms of missile accuracy, real-time surveillance and targeting information, Pakistan would follow a “counter-value” or “counter-city” targeting strategy. The specific targeting of India’s nuclear arsenal, especially, if undertaken by conventional (non-nuclear) missiles, would add a new dimension to the India-Pakistan nuclear conundrum.

    Delivered in the midst of Pakistan’s acute financial crisis, as well as the ongoing political turmoil and civil-military tensions, one may be tempted to dismiss Lt Gen Kidwai’s recent discourse. However, as the longest-serving, former head of the SPD and architect of Pakistan’s nuclear deterrent, his views are widely heard and deserve our attention.

    Having voluntarily pledged “no first use” (NFU), India’s 2003 Nuclear Doctrine, espoused a “credible minimum deterrent” and promised “massive retaliation,” in response to a nuclear first strike. Since then, our two adversaries, China and Pakistan, have expanded and upgraded their nuclear arsenals, presumably, with corresponding updating of doctrines. India’s strategic enclave has, however, not only maintained a stoic silence and doctrinal status quo but also defended the latter.

    BJP’s 2014 Election Manifesto, had undertaken to “revise and update” India’s nuclear doctrine and to “make it relevant to current times,” but this promise has not been kept. Thus, India, currently, faces a moral dilemma as well as a question of “proportionality”: will the loss of a few tanks or soldiers to a Pakistani nuclear artillery salvo, on its own soil, prompt India to destroy a Pakistani city of a few million souls? Since India, too, has developed a family of tactical missiles, capable of counterforce strikes, does it indicate a shift away from CMD and NFU, calling for a response from our adversaries?

    These are just some of the manifold reasons why there is a most urgent need for the initiation of a sustained nuclear dialogue between India and Pakistan, insulated from the vagaries of politics. Such an interaction, by reducing mutual suspicion and enhancing transparency, might slow down the nuclear arms race and mindless build-up of arsenals.

    This article was published earlier in Indian Express.

  • The myth of Magna Carta: The struggle still goes on

    The myth of Magna Carta: The struggle still goes on

    The rise of democratic, elected Parliaments in England and Scotland just 50 years after the Magna Carta is not a coincidence but a consequence of that demand to share power. It is from the Magna Carta that the English writ of habeas corpus evolved, safeguarding individuals and their freedoms against unjust and unlawful imprisonment with the right to appeal.

    We now take our liberties and rights for granted, and the way of life it guarantees us is inherent. But what we now have has come after a long evolution process, and often they flowed out of something else quite unintended. The Magna Carta is a case in point. The English-speaking world recently celebrated over 800 years of the Magna Carta or Great Charter, which is synonymous with fundamental rights and the rule of law that are the cornerstones of modern democracy. Much of the world believes the Magna Carta came out of an eruption of a long-suppressed yearning among ordinary people for protection against the monarch and nobility. But it is not so.

    The Magna Carta was thus not a grand demand for equality, basic freedoms or the rule of law, but just a narrow demand for restricting the ruler’s powers, to ring-fence the interests of the elite.

     

    It came out of an intra-elite struggle between 40 barons and their ruler. England’s King John had emptied the royal treasuries in a fruitless war with France, and the barons were unwilling to meet his demands for higher taxes. The consequence was the Magna Carta — to protect the barons from the King’s demands. The demand to be judged by their peers was another protection. It was not meant for ordinary people, but only for barons. The Magna Carta was thus not a grand demand for equality, basic freedoms or the rule of law, but just a narrow demand for restricting the ruler’s powers, to ring-fence the interests of the elite.

    But the Magna Carta’s myth endured and was invoked whenever and wherever people struggled against injustice and freedom. Mahatma Gandhi invoked it in South Africa when he fought for racial equality, and emancipators and freedom fighters like Nelson Mandela, Jawaharlal Nehru, Ho Chi Minh, Fidel Castro and Martin Luther King Jr invoked it when they were being tried for sedition by oppressive regimes. Like the English barons, they too were arguing for limiting the oppressive and unjust powers of rulers, but not just for themselves and their peers, but for all their peoples. The story of modern democracy is about the long journey from the rights of a few to the rights of all.

    Another myth that endures is that the twin notions of democracy and the rule of law somehow originated with the Magna Carta. The fact is that the King rejected the Magna Carta soon after it was presented to him. But John avoided the consequences of the barons’ indignation by dying and thereby perpetuating the myth.

    The first democracies long preceded the 1215 Magna Carta. As early as the sixth century BC several “independent republics” existed in India as sanghas and ganas. Their main characteristics were a raja, elected or hereditary, and a deliberative assembly. These assemblies met regularly and passed laws pertaining to finances, administration and justice. The raja and other officials obeyed the decisions of these assemblies. While these assemblies mostly comprised the nobility and landowners, in some cases they included all free men. But the Brahminical system prevailed, in that the monarch always had to be a Kshatriya. While Licchavis, who held sway over the Kathmandu Valley in today’s Nepal and a major part of northern Bihar, were governed by an assembly of about 7,000 rajas, who in turn were the heads of all major families, others like the Shakyas, the clan to which Gautama Buddha belonged, had assemblies open to all people, rich or poor, and noble or common.

    Socrates and his pupil, Plato, deliberated and expounded on the role of a citizen within a community and laid down the foundations of the political philosophy that flourished in Athens and spread to most of the world in the next two and a half millennia.

    The greatest contribution to the evolution of democracy as a philosophy was in Athens, where great philosophers like Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle lit up public discourse with their brilliance and original thinking. Socrates and his pupil, Plato, deliberated and expounded on the role of a citizen within a community and laid down the foundations of the political philosophy that flourished in Athens and spread to most of the world in the next two and a half millennia. Aristotle, who counted among his students Alexander the Great, dwelt more on systems of government and who first qualified liberty as the fundamental principle of democracy.

    Aristotle wrote in Politics: “Now a fundamental principle of the democratic form of constitution is liberty — that is what is usually asserted, implying that only under this constitution do men participate in liberty, for they assert this as the aim of every democracy. But one factor of liberty is to govern and be governed in turn; for the popular principle of justice is to have equality according to number, not worth, and if this is the principle of justice prevailing, the multitude must of necessity be sovereign and the decision of the majority must be final and must constitute justice, for they say that each citizen must have an equal share; so it results that in democracies the poor are more powerful than the rich, because there are more of them, and whatever is decided by the majority is sovereign.”

    This principle that “whatever is decided by the majority is sovereign” has always had to contend with the rights of individuals. In the US, created after a great debate among the founding fathers as a democracy, it was by majority will that slavery flourished till the Civil War. It took another century before equal rights for black people became the majority will. This constant struggle for individual rights against the will of the collective has been the central story of the evolution of the modern democratic state.  Free India, by contrast, provided for all these rights and liberties from the beginning in its Constitution. The Magna Carta, because it sought to limit the powers of the ruler, perhaps still has a place in our hearts and minds. To most citizens in democratic states, our life is also a constant struggle against the assertion of collective will to trample individual liberties or the rights of smaller groups.

    This principle that “whatever is decided by the majority is sovereign” has always had to contend with the rights of individuals.

    The rise of democratic, elected Parliaments in England and Scotland just 50 years after the Magna Carta is not a coincidence but a consequence of that demand to share power. It is from the Magna Carta that the English writ of habeas corpus evolved, safeguarding individuals and their freedoms against unjust and unlawful imprisonment with the right to appeal. It is from this emergence of petitioning for the production of the body that Parliaments in due course became to be increasingly used as a forum to address all the concerns and grievances of ordinary people.

    Thus, whatever be Magna Carta’s first intent, its consequences greatly expanded over centuries into a charter, which guarantees individual liberties, equality and justice to all, irrespective of race, religion and class. But that struggle is far from over. It goes on, and only its forms change as human values and means change.

    This article was published earlier in the Asian Age.

    Feature Image Credit: Britannica

     

  • BRICS++: The West tries playing ‘catch-up’, but it’s too late

    BRICS++: The West tries playing ‘catch-up’, but it’s too late

    Until recently, the West has largely derided the BRICS project. But it finally is awaking to the fact that the BRICS initiative possesses the potential to turn both geo-politics, and the international monetary system, upside-down.

    The seismic Geo-Political event of this era is the explosion of BRICS membership and of even bigger potential BRICS membership. This movement has crossed a key threshold. It has transited from ‘vanilla’ multipolarity to being an anti-colonial expression — a shift that should not be underestimated. It is an ethos drawing energy from deep layers of passionate feeling that was stifled in the immediate post-war years, but which is re-surfacing to invest the multi-polar framework with evident dynamism.

    There are currently eight nations that have formally applied for membership and 17 others that have expressed interest in joining. If Saudi Arabia and Russia are both members, that is two of the three largest energy producers in the one camp.

    If Russia, China, Brazil and India are all members, there will be four of the seven largest countries in the world measured by landmass — possessing 30% of the Earth’s dry surface and related natural resources — as BRICS members.

    Almost 50% of the world’s wheat and rice production, as well as 15% of the world’s gold reserves, are in the BRICS.

    Meanwhile, China, India, Brazil, and Russia are four of the nine highest-population countries on the planet with a combined population of 3.2 billion people or 40% of the Earth’s population.

    “China, India, Brazil, Russia and Saudi Arabia have a combined GDP of $29 trillion or 28% of nominal global GDP. If one uses purchasing power parity to measure GDP, then the BRICS share is over 54%. Russia and China have two of the three largest nuclear arsenals in the world”.

    “By every measure then — population, landmass, energy output, GDP, food output and nuclear weapons — BRICS is not just another multilateral debating society. They are a substantial and credible alternative to Western hegemony”, Jim Rickards asserts.

    With a new trading currency framework likely to be fore-shadowed in August at the BRICS summit, the currency will descend upon a highly receptive audience. It will fall into an increasingly sophisticated network of capital and communications. This network will greatly enhance its chances of success.

    The key mistake is the failure to distinguish between the respective roles of a payment (trading) currency and a reserve currency. Payment currencies are used in trade for goods and services. Nations can trade in whatever payment currency they want; it doesn’t have to be dollars. However, in so doing – in a large way – the demand for the dollar incrementally is drained away. Ultimately this loss of foreign demand for dollars circumscribes the ability of the US to go on spending well above its income.

    What has defined a reserve currency has been a large, well-developed sovereign bond market. No country in the world comes close to the US Treasury bond market in terms of breadth and convertibility.

    And Western finance personnel, therefore, snort in derision at the prospects of the US dollar ever losing its hegemony. But they forget perhaps that there was no US bond market until WW1 when  Woodrow Wilson authorized Liberty Bonds to help finance the war. There were bond rallies and Liberty Bond parades in every major city. It became a patriotic duty to buy Liberty Bonds. The effort worked, and it birthed the US bond market.

    In short, the way to create an instant reserve currency is to create an instant bond market using your own citizens as willing buyers. As Jim Rickards earlier noted, were the BRICS to ‘use a patriotic model’ (by drawing on today’s anti-colonial spirit sweeping the BRICS countries) it would be possible to create international reserve assets denominated in the BRICS+ (trading) currency.

    Also, the recent Bank for International Settlements (BIS)-led experiments in real-time and digital Central Bank foreign exchange transactions promises to transform such a project – and to lessen substantially the need for a large reserve-asset reservoir.

    Until recently, the West has largely derided the BRICS project. But it finally is awaking to the fact that the BRICS initiative possesses the potential to turn both geo-politics and the international monetary system, upside-down.

    This month, the Chair of the Eurasia Group, Cliff Kupchan, wrote in Foreign Policy that “6 Swing States Will Decide the Future of Geopolitics”

    “Middle powers today have more agency than at any time since World War II. These are countries with significant leverage in geopolitics. Much more interesting [however] are the six leading middle powers of the global south: Brazil, India, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, and Turkey. These swing states of the global south are not fully aligned with either superpower and are therefore free to create new power dynamics. These six also serve as a good barometer for broader geopolitical trends”.

     

    “… the question remains whether the BRICS states are going to become a more formal institution under China’s direction … that prospect is a clear challenge to the West…But the threat is unlikely to materialize. These countries may have tacked away from the United States — but that’s different from joining a Chinese-directed, Russian-assisted body actively opposing the United States. As of now, BRICS has not shown the ability to develop and implement a common agenda, so there is very little institutional strength for China to co-opt”

    The blinkers are on. The Western Establishment just doesn’t ‘get it’. Kupchan’s article’s conclusion: “the US has been playing catch-up – and not doing very well at even that”. It needs a well-crafted strategy toward each of the key Swing States (to halt their ‘tacking away’ from the US, towards the Russia-China axis), he warns. Arm-twisting, threats and coercion, presumably, as usual.

    ‘Catching-up’?  The horse already has bolted. The stable is empty.

     

    Feature Image: Indian Express

    This article was published earlier in Al Mayadeen English.

  • An Asia-Pacific NATO: fanning the flames of war

    An Asia-Pacific NATO: fanning the flames of war

     

    Former President Trump sidelined NATO to such an extent that European members were disillusioned with American leadership and NATO was in a state of fragmentation. With Biden’s presidency unleashing its Ukraine strategy and war against Russia, NATO has solidified with blind subservience to American leadership. Building on imagined threats from Russia and China, the US is now seeking to make a NATO alliance format for security across Asia as well. On the eve of the 33rd summit at Vilnius on 11-12 July 2023, Türkiye dropped its objections for Sweden to become the 33rd member of NATO, abandoning its 150-year tradition of proud neutrality and peace in favour of war-mongering. With an eye on Asia, the summit invited four Asian countries – Japan, South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand – as observers at the summit. The summit statement is, as expected, replete with anti-Russian rhetoric but more importantly extensive in its focus on the ‘China threat’ thus paving the way for NATO’s role in Asia. Jeffrey Sachs, in a speech in Australia in early July (reproduced below), has warned forcefully about the peril that NATO poses to global peace and security.                                           – TPF Editorial Team

    “My country, the U.S., is unrecognisable. I’m not sure who runs the country. I do not believe it is the president.”, says Jeffrey Sachs in a speech at a Saving Humanity and Planet Earth (SHAPE) seminar, Melbourne, Australia. “U.S. actions are putting us on a path to war with China in the same way that U.S. actions did in Ukraine.”

    “the idea of opening NATO offices in Asia is mind-boggling in its foolishness. Please tell the Japanese to stop this reckless action.”

    Jeffrey Sachs
    Speech to Shape (Saving Humanity and Planet Earth)
    July 5, 2023

    Good afternoon to everybody. I want to thank you for inviting me and to thank SHAPE for its leadership. I just had the privilege to listen to Alison Broinowski and Chung-in Moon. We have been treated to brilliant and insightful statements. I absolutely agree with all that has been said. The world has gone mad but especially the Anglo-Saxon world, I’m afraid. I don’t know whether there is any sense in our little English-speaking corner of the world. I’m of course speaking of the United States, UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

    There’s something profoundly disheartening about the politics of our countries right now. The deep madness, I’m afraid, is British Imperial thinking that has been taken over by the United States. My country, the U.S., is unrecognisable now compared even to 20 or 30 years ago. I’m not sure, to tell you the truth, who runs the country. I do not believe it is the president of the United States right now. We are run by generals, by our security establishment. The public is privy to nothing. The lies that are told about foreign policy are daily and pervasive by a mainstream media that I can barely listen to or read anymore. The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal and the main television outlets are 100 per cent repeating government propaganda by the day, and it’s almost impossible to break through.

    it’s about a madness of the United States to keep U.S. hegemony, a militarised foreign policy dominated by the thinking of generals who are mediocre intellects, personally greedy, and without any sense because their only modus operandi is to make war.

    What is this about? Well, as you’ve heard, it’s about a madness of the United States to keep U.S. hegemony, a militarised foreign policy dominated by the thinking of generals who are mediocre intellects, personally greedy, and without any sense because their only modus operandi is to make war.

    And they are cheer-led by Britain, which is unfortunately, in my adult life, increasingly pathetic in being a cheerleader for the United States for U.S. hegemony and for war. Whatever the U.S. says, Britain will say it ten times more enthusiastically. The U.K. leadership could not love the war in Ukraine more. It is the great Second Crimean War for the British media and for the British political leadership.

    Now, how Australia and New Zealand fall for this idiocy is really a deep question for me and for you. People should know better. But I’m afraid that it is the Five Eyes and the security establishment that told the politicians, to the extent that the politicians are involved in this, ‘well this is how we have to do it’. This is our Security State and I don’t think our politicians necessarily have much role in this. By the way, the public has no role in U.S. foreign policy at all. We have no debate, no discussion, no deliberation, no debates over voting the hundred, now $113 billion, but in fact much more money spent on the Ukraine War.

    So far there’s not been an hour of organised debate even in the Congress on this, much less in the public, but my guess is that your security establishment is really the driver of this in Australia, and they explain to the Prime Minister and others: ‘you know this is the utmost National Security, and this is what America has told us. Let us, your security apparatus, explain what we’re seeing. Of course, you cannot divulge this to the broader public, but this is, at the essence, a struggle for survival in the world’.

    Everything I see myself, and I’m now 43 years in this activity as an economic advisor all over the world, suggests that this message is nonsense. One thing that would be interesting for people to look at, in order to understand these developments, is a very telling article by a former colleague of mine at Harvard, Ambassador Robert Blackwell and Ashley Tellis, written for the Council on Foreign Relations in March 2015. I want to read a couple excerpts from it because it laid out the plan of what’s happening right now pretty directly. This is how things work in the U.S., in which future plans are laid out to the establishment in such reports.

    “Since its founding, the United States has consistently pursued a grand strategy focused on acquiring and maintaining preeminent power over various rivals. First on the North American continent, then in the Western Hemisphere, and finally, globally. Preserving U.S. primacy in the global system ought to remain the central objective of U.S. grand strategy in the 21st century.”    

     – Robert Blackwill and Ashley Tellis in a March 2015 article for Council on Foreign Relations.

    We’re basically told in 2015 what’s going to happen in US-China relations. The deterioration of relations was planned — it’s not ad hoc. So, here’s what Blackwell and Tellis wrote in 2015. First, “Since its founding, the United States has consistently pursued a grand strategy focused on acquiring and maintaining preeminent power over various rivals. First on the North American continent, then in the Western Hemisphere, and finally, globally.” And then they argue that “preserving U.S. primacy in the global system ought to remain the central objective of U.S. grand strategy in the 21st century.”

    So, what’s the U.S. goal? The goal is very straightforward, it is the primacy of the United States globally. Blackwell and Tellis lay out the game plan for China. They tell us what to do.

    Here’s the list, though I’m only excerpting: “Creating new preferential trading arrangements among U.S. friends and allies to increase their mutual gains through instruments that consciously exclude China.” This is the game that Obama already started with TPP, though he couldn’t get it through domestic political opposition. Second, “create, in partnership with U.S. allies, a technology control regime vis-à-vis Beijing,” to block China’s strategic capabilities. Third, build up “power-political capacities of U.S. friends and allies on China’s periphery,” and “improving the capability of U.S. military forces to effectively project power along the Asian rimlands despite any Chinese opposition.”

    This foreshadowing of US policies by way of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) is well-known in recent history.

    What I find especially remarkable about this list is that it was made in 2015. It’s the step-by-step plan of action actually being carried out. This foreshadowing of US policies by way of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) is well-known in recent history. In 1997 in the CFR’s journal Foreign Affairs, Zbigniew Brzezinski laid out with precision the intended timeline for NATO enlargement and specifically the intention to include Ukraine in that NATO enlargement. Of course, that NATO enlargement plan has led us directly to the Ukraine War, which is indeed a proxy Russia-US war over NATO enlargement.

    Now the friends and geniuses that brought you the Ukraine War are on their way to bringing you a new war in your neighbourhood. As Professor Moon noted, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is starting to open its offices in East Asia, which is not exactly the North Atlantic.

    So, this is where we are. It’s not absolutely simple to see through for one main reason, at least in the U.S. I’m not sure what it’s like in Australia but I expect that it’s pretty much the same as in the U.S., where we have no honesty or public deliberation about any of this. The policies are owned entirely by the security establishment, the military-industrial complex, the network of “think tanks” which are in fact non-think tanks in Washington, with almost all funded by the military-industrial complex.

    The military-industrial complex and its corporate lobby have taken over the East Coast universities where I teach. I taught at Harvard for more than 20 years, and now I teach at Columbia University. The influence of the intelligence agencies on the campuses is unprecedented, in my experience. All of this has happened without much public notice, almost a silent coup. There is no debate, no public politics, no honesty, no documents revealed. Everything is secret, confidential and a bit mysterious. Since I happen to be an economist who engages with the heads of state and ministers around the world, I hear a lot of things and see a lot of things that help me to pierce through the official “narratives” and pervasive lies.

    You will not find any of this in our public discourse. And just a word, if I may, about the Ukraine War. The war was completely predictable, and resulted from a U.S. plan for hegemony based on NATO enlargement that dates back to the early 1990’s. The U.S. strategy was to bring Ukraine into the U.S. military orbit. Brzezinski, again in 1997 in his book The Global Chess Board, laid out the strategy. Russia without Ukraine is nothing, he argued. Ukraine, he wrote, is the geographical pivot for Eurasia. Interestingly, Brzezinski warned American policymakers to ensure that they don’t push Russia and China into an alliance. In fact, that would be so antithetical to U.S. interests that Brzezinski clearly believed that it would never happen. But it has, because U.S. foreign policy is incompetent as well as profoundly dangerous and misconceived.

    During 1990-91, I happen to have been an advisor to Gorbachev, and during 1991-94, to Boris Yeltsin and Leonid Kuchma, spanning the late days of perestroika and the early days of Russian and Ukrainian independence after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. I watched very closely what was happening. I saw that the United States was absolutely uninterested in any way in helping Russia to stabilise.

    The idea of the U.S. security establishment from the early 1990s was U.S.-led unipolarity or U.S. hegemony. In the early 1990s, the U.S. rejected measures to help stabilise the Soviet economy and then the Russian economy, while it also began planning NATO enlargement, in direct contradiction to what the U.S. and Germany had promised Gorbachev and Yeltsin. So, the issue of NATO enlargement, including to Ukraine, is part of a U.S. game plan that started in the early 1990s, and eventually led to the Ukraine war.

    By the way, the U.S. was deeply involved in the overthrow of Ukraine’s pro-Russian president in 2014. Yes, this was a coup, and to an important extent, a regime change operation of the United States. I happen to have seen a part of it, and I know that U.S. money poured into supporting the Maidan. Such U.S. meddling was disgusting and destabilising, and all part of the game plan to enlarge NATO to Ukraine and Georgia.

    When one looks at the map it’s indeed Brzezinski’s 1997 idea: surround Russia in the Black Sea region. Ukraine, Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey and Georgia would all be members of NATO. That would be the end of Russian power projection in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East. So it went for these “security” geniuses.

    Putin put forward diplomatic responses that were repeatedly rejected by the U.S. and its NATO allies, including the Minsk II Agreement endorsed by the U.N Security Council, but then ignored by Ukraine.

    On December 17, 2021, Putin put on the table a perfectly reasonable document as the basis for negotiation, A Draft U.S.-Russia Security Agreement. At the core was Russia’s call for an end to NATO expansion. Tragically, the U.S. blew it off. I called the White House at the end of December 2021, spoke with one of our top security officials, and pleaded, “Negotiate. Stop the NATO enlargement. You have a chance to avoid war.” Of course, to no avail. The United States’ formal response to Putin was that NATO enlargement was non-negotiable with Russia, a matter in which Russia has absolutely no say.

    This is a mind-boggling way to pursue foreign affairs because it is a direct road to war. I hope everybody understands this war in Ukraine was close to ending as early as March 2022 with a negotiated agreement just one month after Russia invaded on February 24th. The negotiated agreement was stopped by the U.S. because it was based on Ukraine’s neutrality. The U.S. told Ukraine to fight on, end negotiations, and reject neutrality.

    And so we are in a war that continues to escalate towards possible nuclear war, which is what would happen if Russia were to suffer deep defeats on the battlefield. Russia is not losing on the battlefield just now, but if it did, it would likely escalate to nuclear war. Russia is not going to be pushed out of the Donbas and Crimea and meekly go home with apologies. Russia is going to escalate if it needs to escalate. So, we are right now in a spiral that is extremely dangerous.

    Japan plays utterly into this spiral. And Australia does as well. It’s so sad to watch Australia accepting to be used in this reckless way. To pay a fortune for new military bases in a reckless, provocative, and costly way, that will feed the U.S. military-industrial complex while weighing heavily on Australia.

     

    Such U.S. actions are putting us on a path to war with China in the same way that U.S. actions did in Ukraine. Only an Asia-Pacific war would be even more disastrous. The whole idea of the U.S. and its allies fighting China is mind-boggling in its implications, its stupidity and its recklessness. All of this is utterly divorced from Australia’s real security interests. China is not a threat to Australia. It is not a threat to the world.

    I don’t know of a single Chinese overseas invasion in its history, by the way, except when the Mongols briefly ruled China and tried to invade Japan. Other than the Mongol invasion, defeated by a typhoon, China has not launched overseas wars. It’s just not part of China’s statecraft, nor would such wars be in China’s national interest.

    What worries me about the world is a deeply neurotic United States (in)security leadership that aims to be number one, but that can’t be number one in the way that it believes. This is pathetic, yet is applauded each day in London, a place that still dreams of the glory of global empire from a long bygone era.

    RCEP is the correct concept for the region to bring together China, Korea, Japan, the ten ASEAN countries, Australia and New Zealand in a coherent framework, especially around the climate challenge, energy policy, trade policy, and infrastructure and investment policy. A well-functioning RCEP would do a world of good, not only for the 15 countries in RCEP but for the entire world.

    Permit me, in conclusion, to take one minute to say what should be done.

    First, the war in Ukraine could end the day Biden steps up and says NATO will not enlarge to Ukraine. The basis for a negotiated security arrangement has been there for 30 years, but has been rejected so far by the U.S.

    Second, the idea of opening NATO offices in Asia is mind-boggling in its foolishness. Please tell the Japanese to stop this reckless action.

    Third, the U.S. approach to arming Taiwan is profoundly dangerous, provocative and deliberately so.

    Fourth, what is needed most in the Asia-Pacific is regional dialogue amongst Asia-Pacific nations.

    Fifth, the Asia-Pacific should build on RCEP [Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement]. RCEP is the correct concept for the region to bring together China, Korea, Japan, the ten ASEAN countries, Australia and New Zealand in a coherent framework, especially around the climate challenge, energy policy, trade policy, and infrastructure and investment policy. A well-functioning RCEP would do a world of good, not only for the 15 countries in RCEP but for the entire world.

    Sorry to have run on so long but it’s so important what SHAPE is doing. You’re completely on the right track and all best wishes to your efforts.

     

    This transcript of Jeffrey Sach’s speech was published earlier in Pearls and Irritations.

    Feature Image Credit: bnn.network

    Cartoon Credit: Global Times

  • Manipur Violence: Understanding North East India is essential for viable Solutions

    Manipur Violence: Understanding North East India is essential for viable Solutions

    Whenever an ethnic clash or terrorist attack occurs in India’s Northeast, there is a beeline of “national media” reporters to the region for a quick report. Many energetic journalists move to the site of the incident to get “firsthand” information while many others air all kinds of” Breaking News” from cities like Guwahati or even from the national capital. In such a situation one can even see the emergence of “experts” who give their views from the comfort of their homes. These experts who had gained experience by serving in the region at some time in their careers do have adequate background knowledge, but they are at times out of sync with the ground realities. Ministers and political leaders also descend on the violence-hit region but many have political agenda and very often end up making unsolicited, unrealistic, and even provocative remarks. This trend is not new and is an increasing tendency for the past several decades.

    Unfortunately, such flying visits do not help. Sometimes such reporting that makes headlines in electronic and print media and is generally accepted as authentic may not convey the ground reality as some inputs may be biased or doctored depending upon the source of the information.

     

    Unlike other states of the country, the Northeast of India is unique with its cultural and geopolitical characteristics. The region shares 96% of its border internationally with four countries including China, and is an extremely complex region with more than 200 ethnic groups with distinct cultures, food habits, languages, or dialects. Amongst all the northeastern states, Manipur is the most complex state with more than thirty-five ethnic groups. The state shares a large part of its boundary with Myanmar (398 Kilometers) presently ruled by the Military junta.  Manipur also shares a boundary of 96 Km with Mizoram,205 km with Assam and 204km with Nagaland. The state has a diverse demography.  Nagas (24%) and Kukis (16%) are mostly Christians whereas Hindu Meities and Muslims constitute 53% and 6% of the population respectively.

     While India’s border with Pakistan and Bangladesh is fenced, the border with Myanmar is not. There is also a policy of Free Move Regime (FMR) which allows Citizens of both countries to come up to 16 Kilometers within each other’s territory without a visa or passport documentation. Though the aim of FMR is noble as it allows better interaction amongst people who are mostly from the same ethnic tribe,  it is prone to exploitation by militants, as well as smugglers.

    Myanmar military’s operations against rebel groups have forced many tribals particularly Chin-Kuki to enter Indian states particularly Mizoram and Manipur for safety. However, Meities allege that infiltration of Chin-Kuki, as well as rebels to Manipur from Myanmar, is part of a grand design to occupy land and carry out nefarious activities like land grabbing, arms smuggling, drug trafficking etc.  As per an unconfirmed report, approximately 35000 Chin/Kuki refugees from Myanmar have taken shelter in Mizoram and another about 5000 have taken refuge in Manipur.

    The smuggling of drugs, timber, areca nut, cheap Chinese clothes, and electronic items from Myanmar into Manipur and further to other parts of the country is a lucrative business. There is fierce competition to control the lucrative drug trade. While Kuki tribes are primarily involved in poppy cultivation, almost all other ethnic groups are involved in the drug trade in some form or other. It is learnt that fertilizer (urea) provided for distribution to farmers is diverted for poppy cultivation by vested interests with the connivance of Government officials.

     There are a large number of small or big militant groups active in Manipur, each vying for influence and claiming to be the “protectors” of the interest of the respective ethnic groups. Many of these groups, particularly Kuki militant groups, are under Suspension of Operation (SoO) with the Central Government.  Approximately 2000 Kuki militants representing about 26 different Kuki Militant groups are lodged in Designated Camps set up in various Hill districts of the state. The allegations by Meities that the Kuki militants are abetting and instigating Kukis to carry out violence against them cannot be ruled out. Similarly, Kukis allege the involvement of Meitei militants in the ongoing ethnic violence. The ethnic violence which has been continuing since 3rd May 2023 has not seen a substantial reduction despite Union Home Minister Amit Shah and others’ appeal. The Nagas are closely observing the emerging situations. In such a delicate environment all that is needed is just a spark to aggravate an already volatile situation.

    Despite many differences, the various ethnic groups have learnt to live together in Manipur. However, a number of actions in the recent past by the present ruling dispensation in the state has led to resentment amongst tribals mainly Kukis. These include eviction of Kuki encroachers from forest land, action against Kukis involved in poppy cultivation etc.    While these appear to be genuine actions of an elected Government, Kukis feel that they have been deliberately targeted. A section of Meities has now demanded that NRC (National Register of Citizens) should be made for Manipur state as they feel that immigration of Chin/Kukis from Myanmar has substantially increased. Thus, the trust deficit between Kuki and Meities had already reached a peak. It will take substantial effort from everyone from the Government machinery to the common citizen to restore confidence and goodwill amongst the ethnic tribes.

     The direction of the Imphal High Court on 27 March 2023  given out publicly on 19th April directing the Manipur Government to consider  ST status for Meities triggered a  large-scale violence on 3rd May. Incidentally, Muralidaran who was appointed Acting Chief Judge of Manipur High Court on 6th February 2023 had given the very important judgment within two months of his assuming office. The Supreme Court however on 17th May 2023, criticizing the Manipur High Court judgement as ‘factually wrong’, expressed the need to nullify the order of the Manipur High Court. It is worth noting that the President of the country is the constitutional authority vested with the power of declaring a Caste or Tribe as SC or ST. The case to declare Meities as ST was first filed in 2013 (MutumChuramaniMetitei versus the State of Manipur).

    According to the census records of 1891, 1901 and 1931, the Meitei was listed as a Scheduled Tribe, however, since 1951 were removed from the ST list of the Indian Union without any information or communication to the people of Manipur. In 1949, the Ministry of Tribal Affairs, Government of India constituted a minority commission to verify the social status of Meities. There are reasons to believe that many Meities were not keen on the ST tag as they probably felt that they were of a higher class and being accepted as tribal will lower their social status. However, a faction of low caste Meities enjoys OBC and SC status.

    Meities are probably now realizing the folly committed by their elders for not advocating for ST status.  Incidentally, like Nagas and Kukis, Meities are also from Mongoloid genetic backgrounds. However, in the 19th century, under the influence of Bengali Hindus, Meities adopted Hindu culture, accepted Vaishnavism, and hence, are influenced by caste and social stratification patterns.

    The pressure on land in the Manipur valley where other tribes (being ST) could own land as well as enjoy other benefits in terms of education and employment made the present generation of Meities feel insecure.  They realized that only if they were granted ST status could they buy land in the hills or compete in jobs with other tribes. In a civil writ petition filed by a section of Meites in Manipur High Court in April 2022, the High Court on 27th March 2023 had directed the state government to submit the recommendation to the Ministry of Tribal Affairs to include the Meities in the ST list.

    While both the tribes, namely Kukis and Nagas protested on 3rd May against the High Court’s directions, the protest by Kukis turned violent. It is also a singular failure of Biren Singh’s Government for not anticipating the law-and-order breakdown and accordingly taking effective measures to prevent the chaos.

    In Manipur, the tribals enjoy some benefits under Article 371C of the constitution as well as the Manipur Hill Area District Autonomous Council Act of 1972. However, Kukis have been demanding a separate Autonomous Council on similar lines of the Bodoland Territorial Council operative in Bodo-dominated areas of Assam.  Some Kukis have gone to the extent of demanding “Kuki land”, a separate state to be carved out of Manipur.  On the other hand, the demand of the Nagas is for the integration of Naga Areas of Manipur with Nagaland (Greater Nagaland). Therefore, the issues in Manipur are very complex.   Many other tribes in the Northeast have been raising demand either for ST status or Autonomous council or even for separate states.  Hence, the Centre needs to be very cautious in resolving the current Manipur imbroglio as the decisions can have ramifications in the other Northeast states.

    The Central Government, though sincere in its efforts at solving the problems of the Northeast, has made many mistakes in the past simply because of the politicians’ lack of patience to understand the intricacies of the region. One glaring example was the extension of the Ceasefire with NSCN (IM) to the state of Manipur in 2001. The Government had signed a Ceasefire agreement with dominant NSCN (IM) groups in 1997 which was confined to the state of Nagaland. However, under pressure from the NSCN (IM), the Govt in 2001 extended the Ceasefire to Manipur by incorporating the words “Without Territorial Limits”.  The Central Government’s decision, taken without understanding the psyche of Meities and without consulting the Manipur government, led to large-scale violence leading to the killing of thirteen protestors in police firing on 18 June 2001. The Government had no option but to withdraw the Ceasefire from Manipur. However, it took decades to normalize the relations between the Nagas and the Meities.

    Similarly, the “Assam Accord” signed by the Central Government with the All-Assam Student Union (AASU) in 1985 has been a non-starter even after almost forty years of signing the accord. The Assam Accord talks of “Detection, Deletion (from Voters List) and Deportation of illegal Bangladeshis who have entered Assam post-1971.  These illegal Bangladeshis cannot be deported to Bangladesh as there is no deportation agreement with Bangladesh. Moreover, Bangladesh denies that her citizens have infiltrated Assam or any other state. The government has signed an accord which it finds difficult to implement.

    The Manipur situation is becoming tricky with neighbouring state Mizoram getting involved in the Manipur issue. Mizos belonging to Chin tribes just as Kukis are providing all help to their brethren who have taken refuge in that state. Now a section of the people particularly from Mizoram are trying to bring a religious angle to the issue saying that Christians have been deliberately targeted in Manipur.   A section of Mizo politicians is now supporting the Kukis’ demand for Autonomous Council/ separate state that will further complicate the issue. Incidentally, a few newspapers published in Israel have also talked about the safety and security of the Jews in Manipur. Similarly, the role of RSS in the present violence has become conspicuous.

     Both Kukis and Meiteis are attempting to internationalise the issue which is essentially an internal issue of the country. On 30th June 2023, World Kuki-Zo Intellectual Council (WKZIC) submitted a memorandum to the Prime Minister of Israel seeking urgent intervention for the protection of the Kuki people. On 6th July 2023, the US Ambassador to India, Eric Garcetti, stated that the United States is ready to assist India in resolving the current ongoing issue.

     It is creditable that other ethnic tribes, particularly Nagas of Manipur have shown great restraint however, they are concerned about the possible political fallout of the ethnic clashes.  Their concern is that any solution between Kukis and Meities should not in any way put the Nagas in any disadvantageous position.

     The allegation by a section of Meitie leaders that Assam Rifles has been partial to Kukis appears to be politically motivated to malign India’s oldest Para Military Force.  The security forces, particularly the Assam Rifles, have been working round the clock to maintain peace in the state.  Assam Rifles has rescued Meities from Kuki-dominated hill districts and similarly had rescued Kukis from Meitei-dominated valleys. It is hoped that the Central Government does not give in to the demand of some BJP leaders of Manipur to withdraw Assam Rifles from the state. On the contrary, there are allegations that at times Manipur Administration, in particular, the state police have been biased. It is pertinent to note that sizeable arms were looted from many police stations by miscreants which indicates the nexus of police with the miscreants, especially at the lower level.

      Despite Home Minister’s appeal to surrender arms looted from many police stations, only a few have been deposited. COCOMI (Coordinating Committee of Manipur Integrity), in a statement on 07th June 2023, rejected Home Minister Amit Shah’s appeal to surrender looted arms and resolved not to allow Security Forces to launch operations to recover looted weapons. Such actions at this critical time are bound to aggravate the situation. The organization COCOMI has recently declared “Manipuri’s National War against Chin Kuki Narco terrorism”. Terming the entire Chin- Kukis as a narco-terrorist group will further widen the gap.  It is to be noted that the spoils of the drug trade are enjoyed by most of the tribes including smugglers based in places outside the Northeast region,

    The immediate aim, particularly of the Governments at the Centre as well as at the State, should be to win back the trust and confidence of people of all communities.  The civil society, the media and common Meitei as well as the Kuki people must play a responsible role keeping in mind the sensitivities of all communities. Panel discussions are good but putting one tribal group against another in the TV debate will further antagonize the common people. Similarly, people on social media must exercise utmost restraint.   A long-term solution will need great deliberation.  Patience and restraint are the key words at his juncture.

     

    The views expressed are the author’s own.

  • The Asymmetric Indo-US Technology Agreement Points to India’s Weak R&D Culture

    The Asymmetric Indo-US Technology Agreement Points to India’s Weak R&D Culture

    Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s state visit to the USA resulted in four significant agreements and the visit is hailed as one of very important gains for India and Indo-US strategic partnership. The focus has been on defence industrial and technology partnership. Media and many strategic experts are seeing the agreements as major breakthroughs for technology transfers to India, reflecting a very superficial analysis and a lack of understanding of what really entails technology transfer. Professor Arun Kumar sees these agreements as a sign of India’s technological weakness and USA’s smart manoeuvring to leverage India for long-term defence and technology client. The visit has yielded major business gains for USA’s military industrial complex and the silicon valley. Post the euphoria of the visit, Arun Kumar says its time for India to carefully evaluate the relevant technology and strategic policy angles.

     

    The Indo-US joint statement issued a few days back says that the two governments will “facilitate greater technology sharing, co-development and co-production opportunities between the US and the Indian industry, government and academic institutions.” This has been hailed as the creation of a new technology bridge that will reshape relations between the two countries

    General Electric (GE) is offering to give 80% of the technology required for the F414 jet engine, which will be co-produced with Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL). In 2012, when the negotiations had started, GE had offered India 58%. India needs this engine for the Light Combat Aircraft Mark 2 (LCA Mk2) jets.

    The Indian Air Force has been using LCA Mk1A but is not particularly happy with it. It asked for improvements in it. Kaveri, the indigenous engine for the LCA under development since 1986, has not been successful. The engine development has failed to reach the first flight.

    So, India has been using the F404 engine in the LCA Mk1, which is 40 years old. The F414 is also a 30-year-old vintage engine. GE is said to be offering 12 key technologies required in modern jet engine manufacturing which India has not been able to master over the last 40 years. The US has moved on to more powerful fighter jet engines with newer technologies, like the Pratt & Whitney F135 and GE XA100.

    India is being allowed into the US-led critical mineral club. It will acquire the highly rated MQ-9B high-altitude long-endurance unmanned aerial vehicles. Micron Technologies will set up a semiconductor assembly and test facility in Gujarat by 2024, where it is hoped that the chips will eventually be manufactured. The investment deal of $2.75 billion is sweetened with the Union government giving 50% and Gujarat contributing 20%. India is also being allowed into the US-led critical mineral club.

    There will be cooperation in space exploration and India will join the US-led Artemis Accords. ISRO and NASA will collaborate and an Indian astronaut will be sent to the International Space Station. INDUS-X will be launched for joint innovation in defence technologies. Global universities will be enabled to set up campuses in each other’s countries, whatever it may imply for atmanirbharta.

    What does it amount to?

    The list is impressive. But, is it not one-sided, with India getting technologies it has not been able to develop by itself.

    Though the latest technology is not being given by the US, what is offered is superior to what India currently has. So, it is not just optics. But the real test will be how much India’s technological capability will get upgraded.

    Discussing the New Economic Policies launched in 1991, the diplomat got riled at my complaining that the US was offering us potato chips and fizz drinks but not high technology, and shouted, “Technology is a house we have built and we will never let you enter it.”

    What is being offered is a far cry from what one senior US diplomat had told me at a dinner in 1992. Discussing the New Economic Policies launched in 1991, the diplomat got riled at my complaining that the US was offering us potato chips and fizz drinks but not high technology, and shouted, “Technology is a house we have built and we will never let you enter it.”

    Everyone present there was stunned, but that was the reality.

    The issue is, does making a product in India mean a transfer of technology to Indians? Will it enable India to develop the next level of technology?

    India has assembled and produced MiG-21 jets since the 1960s and Su-30MKI jets since the 1990s. But most critical parts of the Su-30 come from Russia. India set up the Mishra Dhatu Nigam in 1973 to produce the critical alloys needed and production started in 1982, but self-sufficiency in critical alloys has not been achieved.

    So, production using borrowed technology does not mean absorption and development of the technology. Technology development requires ‘know-how’ and ‘know-why’.

    When an item is produced, we can see how it is produced and then copy that. But we also need to know how it is being done and importantly, why something is being done in a certain way. Advanced technology owners don’t share this knowledge with others.

    Technology is a moving frontier

    There are three levels of technology at any given point in time – high, intermediate, and low.

    The high technology of yesterday becomes the intermediate technology of today and the low technology of tomorrow. So, if India now produces what the advanced countries produced in the 1950s, it produces the low-technology products of today (say, coal and bicycles).

    If India produces what was produced in the advanced countries in the 1980s (say, cars and colour TV), it produces the intermediate technology products of today. It is not to say that some high technology is not used in low and intermediate-technology production.

    The high technologies of today are aerospace, nanotechnology, AI, microchips and so on. India is lagging behind in these technologies, like in producing passenger aircraft, sending people into space, making microchips, quantum computing, and so on.

    The advanced countries do not part with these technologies. The World Trade Organisation, with its provisions for TRIPS and TRIMS (Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights and Trade-Related Investment Measures), consolidated the hold of advanced countries on intermediate and low technologies that can be acquired by paying royalties. But high technology is closely held and not shared.

    Advancements in technology

    So, how can nations that lag behind in technology catch up with advanced nations? The Nobel laureate Kenneth Arrow pointed to ‘learning by doing’ – the idea that in the process of production, one learns.

    So, the use of a product does not automatically lead to the capacity to produce it, unless the technology is absorbed and developed. That requires R&D.

    Schumpeter suggested that technology moves through stages of invention, innovation and adaptation. So, the use of a product does not automatically lead to the capacity to produce it, unless the technology is absorbed and developed. That requires R&D.

    Flying the latest Airbus A321neo does not mean we can produce it. Hundreds of MiG-21 and Su-30 have been produced in India. But we have not been able to produce fighter jet engines, and India’s Kaveri engine is not yet successful. We routinely use laptops and mobile phones, and they are also assembled in India, but it does not mean that we can produce microchips or hard disks.

    Enormous resources are required to do R&D for advanced technologies and to produce them at an industrial scale. It requires a whole environment which is often missing in developing countries and certainly in India.

    Enormous resources are required to do R&D for advanced technologies and to produce them at an industrial scale. It requires a whole environment which is often missing in developing countries and certainly in India.

    Production at an experimental level can take place. In 1973, I produced epitaxial thin films for my graduate work. But producing them at an industrial scale is a different ballgame. Experts have been brought from the US, but that has not helped since high technology is now largely a collective endeavour.

    For more complex technologies, say, aerospace or complex software, there is ‘learning by using’. When an aircraft crashes or malware infects software, it is the producer who learns from the failure, not the user. Again, the R&D environment is important.

    In brief, using a product does not mean we can produce it. Further, producing some items does not mean that we can develop them further. Both require R&D capabilities, which thrive in a culture of research. That is why developing countries suffer from the ‘disadvantage of a late start’.

    A need for a focus on research and development

    R&D culture thrives when innovation is encouraged. Government policies are crucial since they determine whether the free flow of ideas is enabled or not. Also of crucial importance is whether thought leaders or sycophants are appointed to lead institutions, whether criticism is welcomed or suppressed, and whether the government changes its policies often under pressure from vested interests.

    Unstable policies increase the risk of doing research, thereby undermining it and dissuading the industry. The result is the repeated import of technology.

    The software policy of 1987, by opening the sector up to international firms, undermined whatever little research was being carried out then and turned most companies in the field into importers of foreign products, and later into manpower suppliers. Some of these companies became highly profitable, but have they produced any world-class software that is used in daily life?

    Expenditure on R&D is an indication of the priority accorded to it. India spends a lowly 0.75% of its GDP on R&D. Neither the government nor the private sector prioritises it. Businesses find it easier to manipulate policies using cronyism. Those who are close to the rulers do not need to innovate, while others know that they will lose out. So, neither focus on R&D.

    Innovation also depends on the availability of associated technologies – it creates an environment. An example is Silicon Valley, which has been at the forefront of innovation. It has also happened around universities where a lot of research capabilities have developed and synergy between business and academia becomes possible.

    This requires both parties to be attuned to research. In India, around some of the best-known universities like Delhi University, Allahabad University and Jawaharlal Nehru University, coaching institutions have mushroomed and not innovative businesses. None of these institutions are producing any great research, nor do businesses require research if they can import technology.

    A feudal setup

    Technology is an idea. In India, most authority figures don’t like being questioned. For instance, bright students asking questions are seen as troublemakers in most schools. The emphasis is largely on completing coursework for examinations. Learning is by rote, with most students unable to absorb the material taught.

    So, most examinations have standard questions requiring reproduction of what is taught in the class, rather than application of what is learned. My students at JNU pleaded against open-book exams. Our class of physics in 1967 had toppers from various higher secondary boards. We chose physics over IIT. We rebelled against such teaching and initiated reform, but ultimately most of us left physics – a huge loss to the subject.

    Advances in knowledge require critiquing its existing state – that is, by challenging the orthodoxy and status quo. So, the creative independent thinkers who generate socially relevant knowledge also challenge the authorities at their institutions and get characterised as troublemakers. The authorities largely curb autonomy within the institution and that curtails innovativeness.

    In brief, dissent – which is the essence of knowledge generation – is treated as a malaise to be eliminated. These are the manifestations of a feudal and hierarchical society which limits the advancement of ideas. Another crucial aspect of generating ideas is learning to accept failure. The Michelson–Morley experiment was successful in proving that there is no aether only after hundreds of failed experiments.

    Conclusion

    The willingness of the US to provide India with some technology without expecting reciprocity is gratifying. Such magnanimity has not been shown earlier and it is obviously for political (strategic) reasons. The asymmetry underlines our inability to develop technology on our own. The US is not giving India cutting-edge technologies that could make us a Vishwaguru.

    India needs to address its weakness in R&D. As in the past, co-producing a jet engine, flying drones or packaging and testing chips will not get us to the next level of technology, and we will remain dependent on imports later on.

    This can be corrected only through a fundamental change in our R&D culture that would enable technology absorption and development. That would require granting autonomy to academia and getting out of the feudal mindset that presently undermines scientific temper and hobbles our system of education.

     

    This article was published earlier in thewire.in

    Feature Image Credit: thestatesman.com

     

  • The War in Ukraine Was Provoked—and Why That Matters to Achieve Peace

    The War in Ukraine Was Provoked—and Why That Matters to Achieve Peace

    By recognizing that the question of NATO enlargement is at the center of this war, we understand why U.S. weaponry will not end this war. Only diplomatic efforts can do that.

    George Orwell wrote in 1984 that “Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.” Governments work relentlessly to distort public perceptions of the past. Regarding the Ukraine War, the Biden administration has repeatedly and falsely claimed that the Ukraine War started with an unprovoked attack by Russia on Ukraine on February 24, 2022. In fact, the war was provoked by the U.S. in ways that leading U.S. diplomats anticipated for decades in the lead-up to the war, meaning that the war could have been avoided and should now be stopped through negotiations.

    Recognizing that the war was provoked helps us to understand how to stop it. It doesn’t justify Russia’s invasion. A far better approach for Russia might have been to step up diplomacy with Europe and with the non-Western world to explain and oppose U.S. militarism and unilateralism. In fact, the relentless U.S. push to expand NATO is widely opposed throughout the world, so Russian diplomacy rather than war would likely have been effective.

    The Biden team uses the word “unprovoked” incessantly, most recently in Biden’s major speech on the first-year anniversary of the war, in a recent NATO statement, and in the most recent G7 statement. Mainstream media friendly to Biden simply parrot the White House. TheNew York Times is the lead culprit, describing the invasion as “unprovoked” no fewer than 26 times, in five editorials, 14 opinion columns by NYT writers, and seven guest op-eds!

    There were in fact two main U.S. provocations. The first was the U.S. intention to expand NATO to Ukraine and Georgia in order to surround Russia in the Black Sea region by NATO countries (Ukraine, Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, and Georgia, in counterclockwise order). The second was the U.S. role in installing a Russophobic regime in Ukraine by the violent overthrow of Ukraine’s pro-Russian President, Viktor Yanukovych, in February 2014. The shooting war in Ukraine began with Yanukovych’s overthrow nine years ago, not in February 2022 as the U.S. government, NATO, and the G7 leaders would have us believe.

    The key to peace in Ukraine is through negotiations based on Ukraine’s neutrality and NATO non-enlargement.

    Biden and his foreign policy team refuse to discuss these roots of the war. To recognize them would undermine the administration in three ways. First, it would expose the fact that the war could have been avoided, or stopped early, sparing Ukraine its current devastation and the U.S. more than $100 billion in outlays to date. Second, it would expose President Biden’s personal role in the war as a participant in the overthrow of Yanukovych, and before that as a staunch backer of the military-industrial complex and very early advocate of NATO enlargement. Third, it would push Biden to the negotiating table, undermining the administration’s continued push for NATO expansion.

    The archives show irrefutably that the U.S. and German governments repeatedly promised to Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev that NATO would not move “one inch eastward” when the Soviet Union disbanded the Warsaw Pact military alliance. Nonetheless, U.S. planning for NATO expansion began early in the 1990s, well before Vladimir Putin was Russia’s president. In 1997, national security expert Zbigniew Brzezinski spelled out the NATO expansion timeline with remarkable precision.

    U.S. diplomats and Ukraine’s own leaders knew well that NATO enlargement could lead to war. The great US scholar-statesman George Kennan called NATO enlargement a “fateful error,” writing in the New York Times that, “Such a decision may be expected to inflame the nationalistic, anti-Western and militaristic tendencies in Russian opinion; to have an adverse effect on the development of Russian democracy; to restore the atmosphere of the cold war to East-West relations, and to impel Russian foreign policy in directions decidedly not to our liking.”

    President Bill Clinton’s Secretary of Defense William Perry considered resigning in protest against NATO enlargement. In reminiscing about this crucial moment in the mid-1990s, Perry said the following in 2016: “Our first action that really set us off in a bad direction was when NATO started to expand, bringing in eastern European nations, some of them bordering Russia. At that time, we were working closely with Russia and they were beginning to get used to the idea that NATO could be a friend rather than an enemy … but they were very uncomfortable about having NATO right up on their border and they made a strong appeal for us not to go ahead with that.”

    In 2008, then U.S. Ambassador to Russia, and now CIA Director, William Burns, sent a cable to Washington warning at length of grave risks of NATO enlargement: “Ukraine and Georgia’s NATO aspirations not only touch a raw nerve in Russia, they engender serious concerns about the consequences for stability in the region. Not only does Russia perceive encirclement, and efforts to undermine Russia’s influence in the region, but it also fears unpredictable and uncontrolled consequences which would seriously affect Russian security interests. Experts tell us that Russia is particularly worried that the strong divisions in Ukraine over NATO membership, with much of the ethnic-Russian community against membership, could lead to a major split, involving violence or at worst, civil war. In that eventuality, Russia would have to decide whether to intervene; a decision Russia does not want to have to face.”

    Ukraine’s leaders knew clearly that pressing for NATO enlargement to Ukraine would mean war. Former Zelensky advisor Oleksiy Arestovych declared in a 2019 interview “that our price for joining NATO is a big war with Russia.”

    Nuland makes clear on the call that she was coordinating closely with then Vice President Biden and his national security advisor Jake Sullivan, the same Biden-Nuland-Sullivan team now at the center of U.S. policy vis-à-vis Ukraine.

    During 2010-2013, Yanukovych pushed neutrality, in line with Ukrainian public opinion. The U.S. worked covertly to overthrow Yanukovych, as captured vividly in the tape of then U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt planning the post-Yanukovych government weeks before the violent overthrow of Yanukovych. Nuland makes clear on the call that she was coordinating closely with then Vice President Biden and his national security advisor Jake Sullivan, the same Biden-Nuland-Sullivan team now at the center of U.S. policy vis-à-vis Ukraine.

    After Yanukovych’s overthrow, the war broke out in the Donbas, while Russia claimed Crimea. The new Ukrainian government appealed for NATO membership, and the U.S. armed and helped restructure the Ukrainian army to make it interoperable with NATO. In 2021, NATO and the Biden Administration strongly recommitted to Ukraine’s future in NATO.

    In the immediate lead-up to Russia’s invasion, NATO enlargement was center stage. Putin’s draft US-Russia Treaty (December 17, 2021) called for a halt to NATO enlargement. Russia’s leaders put NATO enlargement as the cause of war in Russia’s National Security Council meeting on February 21, 2022. In his address to the nation that day, Putin declared NATO enlargement to be a central reason for the invasion.

    Historian Geoffrey Roberts recently wrote: “Could war have been prevented by a Russian-Western deal that halted NATO expansion and neutralised Ukraine in return for solid guarantees of Ukrainian independence and sovereignty? Quite possibly.” In March 2022, Russia and Ukraine reported progress towards a quick negotiated end to the war based on Ukraine’s neutrality. According to Naftali Bennett, former Prime Minister of Israel, who was a mediator, an agreement was close to being reached before the U.S., U.K., and France blocked it.

    While the Biden administration declares Russia’s invasion to be unprovoked, Russia pursued diplomatic options in 2021 to avoid war, while Biden rejected diplomacy, insisting that Russia had no say whatsoever on the question of NATO enlargement. And Russia pushed diplomacy in March 2022, while the Biden team again blocked a diplomatic end to the war.

    By recognizing that the question of NATO enlargement is at the center of this war, we understand why U.S. weaponry will not end this war. Russia will escalate as necessary to prevent NATO enlargement to Ukraine. The key to peace in Ukraine is through negotiations based on Ukraine’s neutrality and NATO non-enlargement. The Biden administration’s insistence on NATO enlargement to Ukraine has made Ukraine a victim of misconceived and unachievable U.S. military aspirations. It’s time for the provocations to stop, and for negotiations to restore peace to Ukraine.

    This article was published earlier in commondreams.org and is republished under Creative Commons(CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    Feature Image Credit: columbian.com

  • Inculcating Pride In the People: Can This Be The Way Forward?

    Inculcating Pride In the People: Can This Be The Way Forward?

    Atmanirbharta, self-reliance, is a complex idea. India has strived for it since its Independence. Colonial rule had caused a deterioration in India’s socio-economic conditions which led to mass poverty.

    In a recent interview, Mr. Nripen Mishra, Chairperson of the Committee to construct the Ram Janmabhumi Temple said, `Our youth are very sensitive to the call that India must become a big power  … I think we have to inject this … the temple as one more reason for being proud’.

    Clearly, the ruling establishment has set a goal of inculcating a sense of pride among the citizens, especially the youth. Building the grand Ram Janambhumi Temple is one more way of doing that. So were the building of the tallest statue, a grand Central vista, Parliament House, etc..

    Atmanirbharta and Vishwaguru

    The slogans of Atmanirbharta and India as Vishwaguru have been used continuously to inculcate pride. The package of Rs. 22 lakh crore announced in May 2020 soon after the start of the pandemic was called Atmanirbhar. Greater self-reliance is sought by raising customs duties since at least 2017. Reminds one of the 1960s ideas that Indian industries need protection from imports. India is currently heavily dependent on the import of armament. So, indigenous defense production is sought to be increased to reduce this dependence and also to enable exports to earn foreign exchange.

    But, if we are dependent on others for critical supplies, are we already Vishwaguru? Maybe atmanirbharta could make us Vishwaguru in the future. Are we doing the right things to achieve it

    The `Vishwa guru’ status is currently claimed on the basis of soft power, like, yoga and film music. In economic terms we claim to be the fastest-growing large economy and that our production has surpassed that of our colonial master, Britain, to make us the 5th largest world economy. But the true measure of prosperity is per capita income which is abysmally low. For the poor and unemployed what does being vishwaguru mean?

    Premature claims of being vishwaguru breed complacency. Do other nations accept our claim? In January 2021 at WEF the PM announced that the world could learn from India how to handle the pandemic. By March, the country suffered grievously in the second wave.

    Self-Reliance

    Atmanirbharta, self-reliance, is a complex idea. India has strived for it since its Independence. Colonial rule had caused a deterioration in India’s socio-economic conditions which led to mass poverty. India lagged way behind the advanced countries in 1947. To gain independence, the national movement used the idea of self-reliance to raise people’s consciousness against colonization. Gandhi suggested `Swaraj’ or self-rule and said, `There are no people on earth who would not prefer their own bad government to the good government of an alien power’. This idea persisted among the leadership after independence since India had to contend with neo-colonialism and given its backwardness, India depended on other nations for aid, technology, etc.

    The notion of self-reliance had to be differently interpreted in a different context. In a globalizing world, it may be in the nation’s interest to import in a big way and exchange ideas with others. But, if other nations try to capture their markets, as they often do, self-reliance may require protecting the home market.

    Globalization and Atmanirbharta

    Is globalization consistent with Atmanirbharta? Colonization was also globalization. Political independence does not imply insularity but the ability to deal with other nations to serve the national interest. India gained considerable autonomy in policy to pursue a path in its self-interest through industrialization, development of social and physical infrastructure, etc. The public sector and a reasonable technology base were developed to gain a modicum of economic independence. Pressures from the international financial institutions to follow their agenda or to allow consumerism were warded off till 1980.

    The big shift came in 1991 with the new economic policies which were imposed by the IMF as conditionalities. Atmanirbharta which was slowly eroded post the mid-1970s got breached.

    Can Borrowing Lead to Atmanirbharta?

    In a globalizing world, dealing with other nations as equals requires a rapid generation of technology and socially relevant knowledge. This is not possible without a strong education and R&D infrastructure which we are lacking in.

    The government has reversed direction since 2017 and is attempting greater self-reliance. But, is the strategy for achieving it right? In a globalizing world, dealing with other nations as equals requires a rapid generation of technology and socially relevant knowledge. This is not possible without a strong education and R&D infrastructure which we are lacking in. The government claims that the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 will help in this direction. But its emphasis on inviting the top foreign universities to come to India, something UGC is pushing, can only further undermine indigenous strengths.

    Schemes to get foreign faculty and borrow syllabi from foreign universities have existed but they undermine Indian academia’s autonomy. India has long had faculty members who earned their degrees abroad. If that could not impart dynamism to Indian institutions would the recent steps succeed? The idea that originality can be copied is a contradiction in terms. Even if some good foreign Universities do come, they can only be a shadow of the original.

    It would also relegate Indian institutions and academia to second-rate status. Foreign faculty will only come on privileged terms not available to Indian academics. The lesson for good students would be to go abroad and from there return to Indian institutions. That would deprive Indian institutions of good students for research thereby adversely impacting research in India. Further, India has its own unique problems that are unlikely to be the concerns of foreign institutions and academics.

    The change in focus of Indian institutions would further undermine the generation of relevant knowledge, the absence of which has been a cause of the lack of dynamism in Indian institutions. Indian academics have largely been `derived’ intellectuals, borrowing ideas from the West and recycling them in India. This trend would be reinforced to the detriment of those who were generating socially relevant knowledge because their work would be largely characterized as not of international standard and discounted in recruitment and promotions.

    The disadvantage of a Late Start

    It could be argued that one should not reinvent the wheel; therefore, there is no harm in borrowing ideas from abroad. In growth literature it is called `advantage of a late start’ – technology already developed becomes available to the late starters. A pre-requisite for this strategy to succeed, in a fast changing world, is a strong research environment in the borrowing country. Without that the borrowing country could become permanently dependent, leading to a `disadvantage of a late start’. This is true for most developing countries, including India.

    With NEP 2020, a new experiment has started without addressing the root cause of the failure of earlier policies. Our institutions of higher learning operate in a feudal mode where the autonomy and originality of academics are undermined.

    In India with every pay commission, steps to strengthen teaching and research in institutions of higher education were put into place but they have not delivered in the absence of basic reforms. With NEP 2020, a new experiment has started without addressing the root cause of the failure of earlier policies. Our institutions of higher learning operate in a feudal mode where the autonomy and originality of academics are undermined. Independence in thought is seen as a malaise to be eliminated little realizing that that is the key to new knowledge generation. No wonder, those Indians who deliver when in foreign institutions fail to do so working in India.

     

     

    In brief, borrowing from abroad without changing the systems in the country will not lead to atmanirbharta. The deficiencies in our education system need to be rectified before the strategy to borrow can succeed. Are we not putting the cart before the horse when the leadership talks of atmanirbharta while doing everything to curtail originality in thought and seeking compliance with their diktats?

    The slogan of Vishwaguru and atmanirbharta have not yet instilled pride in the nation, how will building a big temple do so? Will the poor and unemployed become proud citizens forgetting their misery? During the colonial period, perhaps religiosity was greater but pride was missing.

    This article was published earlier in hwnews.in
    Views expressed are author’s own.

    Feature Image Credit: newslaundry.com

    Students in Foreign University Image: business-standard.com