Round The World

New Delhi, 2 February 2024

Macron & Modi

SYMBOLISM & SUBSTANCE

By Prof. (Dr.) D.K. Giri

(Secretary General, Assn for Democratic Socialism) 

French President Emanuel Macron was the Chief Guest on the 75^th Republic Day celebration of India, stepping in for American President Joe Biden, who had declined the invitation. In addition to growing proximity between France and India, Macron was perhaps reciprocating Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s presence at the Bastille Day celebration in Paris, on 14 July last year. Macron’s last-minute response to Modi’s invitation bespeaks French willingness to stand by India in symbolism as well as substance of India-France bilateralism. 

Interestingly, France, although a member of NATO as well as European Union, has been taking, at times, a strategic posture, independent of the United States. That is why it aligns with India’s ‘strategic autonomy’ in her foreign policy. New Delhi may not have common ground with USA and Russia, but it is on the same page with France. Modi-Macron interactions resulted in a joint statement that carries the convergence of perspectives like – condemnation of terror attack in Israel, the need for humanitarian assistance in Gaza and Ukraine, nuanced differences on the war in Ukraine, concerns over the attack in Red Sea, attitude towards Houthis and Hezbollah’s etc. 

What is of major interest is the reiteration of French support to the newly-planned India-Middle East-Europe Corridor (IMEC) during the G-20 Summit last September. Macron, once again, applauded the leadership of Modi, on successful conduct and conclusion of the Summit. Both leaders agreed that project IMEC would be of great strategic importance and would significantly enhance the potential and resilience of the flow of commerce and energy between India, the Middle East and Europe. To many observers, it is obvious that the proposed IMEC is an alternative to the Belt and Road Project of China. 

In the current volatile international political situation, France and India have decided to stand by each other. This is quite an encouraging development for both Paris and New Delhi as there is grave tension from Morocco to Iran, in South-East Asia due to Chinese hegemony. In South Asia, Beijing plans to encircle India by seducing her neighbours. China is ‘gobbling up’ Maldives inch-by-inch, having gripped Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh and Pakistan. Sri Lanka is resisting but as India is jittery, Colombo might also fall for China. For India to resist Chinese expansionism, it needs strong partners and France is proving to be one. Apparently, the French President instructed his officials in multiple sectors to allow India ‘no limit’ in accessing its technologies and know-how. 

Scanning the agreements arrived at during Macron’s visit, there were number of deals done. In principle, France decided to support India in developing top-of-the-line defence platforms such as fighter aircraft engines, nuclear attack submarines, underwater drones, all of which are to be locally made. The idea is to make India self-reliant with a robust industrial base. A Letter of Intent on defence partnership was signed between Union Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of the Armed Forces of France. Another unprecedented defence agreement for Space, which has not been reported widely, was signed between the two countries. 

From the available information, as President Macron was at the ‘At home’ reception in Rashtrapati Bhawan, this important deal was signed by the French Defence Minister Sebastian Locornu and India’s National Security Advisor Ajit Doval on 26 January. This agreement will facilitate protection of communication and surveillance satellites and will make the battlefield more transparent in air, land and sea. This agreement will also help develop and launch military satellites to protect the national security of both countries. Moreover, this will not only protect the space assets of India but track the movement of adversaries. Similarly, another important agreement was signed for South-West Indian Ocean. This will build on joint surveillance missions carried out from the French Island territory of La Reunion. 

More important for New Delhi, it was decided to jointly manufacture in India and to export the products to third countries. As an example of collaboration in third countries, it was decided to set up a solar academy in Senegal under the star-C programme of international programme of International Solar Alliance, which was primarily jointly created by India and France. Overall, in industrial defence cooperation, both countries would co-design, co-develop and co-produce defence hardware for the air, land and the sea. 

A Memorandum of Agreement between Tata Advanced Systems Ltd (TASL) and Airbus was signed to set up an assembly of civilian helicopters in India. A Declaration of Intent was signed between Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and the Ministry of Labour and Solidarity of France for cooperation in the field of health and medicine. There was a renewal of agreement between the Union Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs and the Ministry of Ecological Transition and Territorial Cohesion of France on the cooperation in the field of sustainable urban development. 

For Indian students, good news is in store. President Macron declared that he would like to have 30,000 Indian students by 2030. He said, “When this target is met, I will be the happiest President”. There would be special Classes Internationales for Indian students to learn French, necessary for admission into various colleges and universities. Macron said that this was a new initiative called French for All, French for Better Future. France will continue to offer scholarships to meritorious Indian students to be able to study there. So far, India is the largest beneficiary of French scholarships. Furthermore, France will offer five-year short stay Schengen Visa for alumni of French educational institutions. 

Modi spread a red carpet for Macron by receiving him personally in Jaipur and asking his Foreign Minister to accompany Macron from his arrival to departure. Macron landed in Jaipur and was taken to Jantar Mantar, a world heritage site since 2010. Modi and Macron had tea at a Jaipur teal stall on 25 January, where Macron paid for it by using the UPI. Both had a road show from Jantar Mantar to Sanganeri state with a stopover at Hawa Mahal. Macron was impressed by the huge turnout of people to greet them as well as the pro-incumbency of Modi government weeks before the elections. 

Overall, Macron’s visit was a success from the Indian point of view as well as for Macron who is trying to re-establish his political popularity after a shaky start to his second term. The reception and the publicity he got from India may stand in good stead for him back home. However, a closure look at the two-day visit of the French President shows a lot of symbolism as well as some substance. Interestingly, quite a few observers argue that any warmth and goodwill coming India’s way is a function of the defence deals that India makes with those countries. France is India’s second largest arm supplier and of course, has been the closest partner in Europe. 

While there may be multiple interpretations of India-French relations including the latest visit by French President, which, in fact, is the third one by Macron, France is a solid partner of India. At the end of the day that is what should count for New Delhi in its undeclared rivalry with Beijing. ---INFA 

(Copyright, India News & Feature Alliance)

Spotlight

New Delhi, 1 February 2024

Environmental Balance & Growth

POPULATION MAIN CONSTRAINT

By Dr S.S Chhina

(Senior Fellow, Institute of Social Sciences, New Delhi) 

India surpassed China in the race of population on March 3, 2023, and is still growing at the rate of 0.68 per cent annually. If not checked it would become a nation of 1.66 billion by 2050 and have a cascading effect on both environment and development.  

While the United Nations report on population puts India as a nation of 1.42 billion against 1.41 billion of China, the country is bearing three times more burden than its neighbour. Note that density of population in China is just 148.58 per sq.km as against 431.11 of India. Even in the past, four decades ago, India was over-burdened because of the lack of resources, whereas China has plenty. Geographical area of India is just 2.4 per cent of the world, whereas the population constitutes about 17.7 per cent. Even the water resources are only 4 per cent of the world. 

Since 1980, the era of Sanjay Gandhi, India could not adopt a policy to address this big rise in population. There were proposals such as the two-child norm, but these were not pursued. Looking at the burden on the resources, the country needs to adopt a prudent and effective policy to control population, otherwise it would continue to create havoc instead of it becoming a blessing. 

The perpetual rise in the import of food articles including pulses, and oil seeds and wasting trillions of foreign exchange on the one hand, and depleting average size of holdings even below to one acre on the other would, further thrive its constraints to import and the real development for prosperity stands discarded. Looking at the availability of water as a necessity of life, the scenario is most discouraging and would emerge as a major problem in the future. 

In 1950, the per capita availability of water was 5300 cubic feet, whereas in most of the countries it was below 2000 cubic feet. But with the rapid rise in population, it became only 2300 cubic feet in 1991, which is still not satisfactory. But in 2020 it depleted to 1500 cubic feet, and still declining. According to experts, the countries which are having per capita water availability below 1700 cubic feet are under lot of stress. Today, not only in cities but even in villages the water shortage is reaching alarming levels.  

Prior to 1970, though 70 per cent of the population was engaged in agriculture, the country was compelled to import food, thus not only spending huge amount of foreign exchange but putting burden on the purse strings. The green revolution ushered in the late 60s, was based on more and more use of chemicals, albeit staggering results were obtained on the yield front and dozens of chemicals had to be resorted to every year because of the application of the law of diminishing marginal returns in agriculture. 

The chemicals started penetrating air, water, and soil and subsequently food. The toxins of these chemicals remained as residues in food and are causing ailments. The application of chemicals has become a constraint only because of the huge needs of food that is the result of over burden of population on land. 

The burden of population had created an imbalance in the natural environment. The application of chemicals or fertilizers require adequate irrigation water to yield best results so the areas where the ground water was available easily, tubewells were installed to pump out the water. In Punjab and Haryana 60 per cent of irrigation is dependent on ground water. In 1960, in Punjab there were only 5000 tubewells, whereas at present this number has risen to 1.4 million, pumping out water day and night. 

The water level has depleted to over 150 feet in most of the areas. Water has become undrinkable in some area because of the penetration of chemicals along with depleting water table. So many birds have extinguished along with very useful micro-organism in earth, which were helpful to raise the level of fertility. The rain circle has been disrupted, and now untimely and unseasonal rains are frequent, causing damage to the crops. 

While India adopted planning for development in 1950, top priority was given to agriculture instead of industry, although the country was much backward in industrialisation. This was largely because of the scarcity of food for an over-burdened population. India thus remained much behind in industrialisation, and industrial goods had to be imported, which caused the slow growth of industry impacting employment.  Today the number of unemployed is about 80 million. 

The priority to generate employment, industrial goods and services, social security and moreover the need to shift population from farming to non-farming professions was discarded due to the constraint of feeding the billions and farming took centre stage. The country also remained far behind on the front of providing social security as the main factor for consideration was food, given the huge and over-populated country. Other social evils, particularly child labour, raised its ugly head as unemployment or under employment forced families to get maximum earning hands. 

Population is a natural resource of the country, but if it is not productive, it becomes a burden. Even the unemployed in large number require to satisfy their daily needs, where the country had to depend either on foreign imports or had to discard those needs. Unemployment, over-crowding, shortage of houses, child labour, among other social evils in the society etc. are the off shoots of this huge size of population. 

There are two popular theories on population. The first, the Malthusian theory of population, that states that if the population would not be controlled by artificial means, then the natural checks such as famine, epidemic, floods etc. would check this rise. Similarly, the optimum theory of population states that the size of population is optimum for the country, where the per capita output is maximum. According to both these theories, the size of population in India is much higher than the optimum and must be addressed at priority.---INFA 

(Copyright, India News & Feature Alliance)

Open Forum

New Delhi, 31 January 2024

Religious Tourism

BIG BOOST AFTER AYODHYA

By Dhurjati Mukherjee 

Religious tourism, which has always attracted both domestic and foreign tourists, is expected to get a big boost in the coming years. There are expectations that this will attract more and more tourists. Spiritual tourism has evolved as a concept and is significantly contributing to the overall revival of India’s tourism industry. With the consecration of the Ram temple in Ayodhya, demand trends indicate increased interest for the destination from customers across segments with an uptick of 150 per cent. 

According to the research wing of State Bank of India expects the total expenditure by tourists, both domestic and foreign, in Uttar Pradesh may cross Rs 4 lakh crore mark by the end of this year. SBI Ecowrap estimates that Yogi Adityanath government earn an additional tax revenue of Rs 20,000-25,000 crore due to a huge spurt in several tourists during fiscal year 2025. 

Global brokerage firm Jefferies has predicted in a report that the Ram temple could lead to “unlocking of India’s tourism potential” by attracting over 50 million tourists a year. It said the grand opening of the temple “is a big religious event. It also comes with a large economic impact as India gets a new tourist spot which could attract over 50 million tourists per year. A Rs 85,000-crore makeover (new airport, revamped railway station, township, improved road connectivity etc) will likely drive a multiplier effect with new hotels & other economic activities. It can also set a template for infra driven growth for tourism.”   

The Modi government has started improving infrastructure and most of the pilgrim centres are now a better place compared to what they were a decade ago. Data reveals that there has been a 97 per cent growth in searches for spiritual destinations on the platform in the last two years, and the searches for Ayodhya from India increased by more than 1,800 per cent since the inauguration announcement, with the peak searches on December 30, which was when the Ayodhya airport was inaugurated. 

According to figures released by the Ministry of Tourism in March 2023, places of religious tourism earned Rs 134,543 crore in 2022, up from Rs 65,070 crore in 2021. It can thus be presumed that spiritual/ religious tourism is a significant player in India’s travel recovery after the post pandemic years. 

Way back in 2015, the government launched the ‘Pilgrimage Rejuvenation And Spiritual Augmentation Drive’ (PRASAD) scheme of the tourism ministry and in 2016 focussed on developing pilgrimage sites across India for enriching the religious tourism experience. It aimed to integrate pilgrimage destinations in a planned and sustainable manner to provide a complete religious tourism experience through better and easier transportation systems -- roadways, railways and waterways. 

Moreover, the demand for visitors’ spiritual journeys is no longer restricted to traditional pilgrimages but a combination of spiritual breaks with unique local experiences and outdoor adventures like white-water rafting and night trekking in Vaishno Devi, bungee jumping in Rishikesh, boating on the river Ganga, visiting a heritage crafts village in Puri or learning a local art like Kalayaripayattu in Kerala. According to SOTC, hotel occupancy in these destinations is almost around 100 per cent on weekends and holy dates, while on average occupancy levels stand at 60-80 per cent. 

Coming to Ayodhya, it has witnessed a surge in hotel construction and development. Currently, the city has approximately 17 hotels with around 600 rooms. To meet the anticipated increase in tourist arrivals, 73 new hotels are in the pipeline with 40 of them already under construction, as per a report. Several renowned hotel chains and hospitality companies, including IHCL (Indian Hotels Company Limited), Marriott International, Wyndham, and OYO Rooms, are planning on creating more hotels in Ayodhya. The hospitality projects are expected to add significant room capacity to accommodate the growing number of tourists and pilgrims that are expected to visit Ayodhya. 

Phase I of Ayodhya's the new airport is operational, becoming a milestone in facilitating air travel to and from the city. This has been built at a cost of approximately $175 million and has an annual handling capacity of 1 million passengers. Meanwhile, the town’s tourist footfall has already shot up from nearly 3.5 lakh in 2019 to over 2 crore in both 2022 and 2023. Experts in this sector feel that the Ayodhya-Varanasi-Prayagraj triangle could drive Uttar Pradesh’ trillion-dollar economy dream. This could possibly surpass the Delhi-Agra-Jaipur tourism circuit shortly. 

In popular tourist places such as Rishikesh, Varanasi, Ujjain and Vrindavan, hostels are being set up to attract tourists along with improving infrastructure. Recently the Jagannath Heritage Corridor was inaugurated by the Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik. Transformation of the iconic temple site is intended to improve facilities for visitors and pilgrims. The revitalisation of the Kashi Vishwanath corridor also led to a huge spurt in tourist growth. 

It is evident that even general tourism sites in many states are being given a religious touch. Though this may be a good measure to attract more tourists, specially in a deeply religious country like India, these centres need to have other places of attraction such as museums, monuments, children’s parks etc. 

The pandemic has changed the perception of travellers and there has been a shift in consumer behaviour. While spiritual tourism was once associated with the senior citizen segment, over the past two years, there has been a significant uptick in demand from multi-generational families, couples/honeymooners, groups of friends and millennials as well. Reports coming in from Ayodhya indicate that young people are visiting the temple in large numbers. Does it indicate that Modi has instilled a religious fervour among the young generation? 

An important aspect that needs to be pointed out is that promotion of religious tourism is necessary as it has a multiplier effect in creation of jobs and overall development of the region. But religious tourism should not mean just promoting the Hindu places of worship. The Muslim and Christian religious places as also those of other communities like Sikhs and Jains should also be developed through a judicious plan. 

However, tourism in India does need to catch up still. The contribution of this sector to India’s GDP is just around 6.8 per cent and India is positioned below most of the emerging and developed economies. The last Union budget of 2023 had allocated ₹2400 crore to the tourism sector, but it cannot be denied that requirements are much more. It is, however, encouraging to note that the private sector has been coming in a big way to invest in this sector, specially manifest in the investments at Ayodhya. 

Ayodhya it is said could even surpass the Vatican City and Mecca in terms of the number of visiting devotees, if infrastructure and stay facilities are upped on the same trajectory over the coming months. On the first day alone there were 5 lakh visitors to the temple. The Tirupati Balaji in Andhra Pradesh attracts 2.5 crore devotees yearly, similar to Mecca in Saudi Arabia, and the Vatican gets about 90 lakh visitors annually. The other top destinations are the Vaishno Devi temple in Jammu & Kashmir which gets 80 lakh people yearly, whereas the Taj Mahal attracts 70 lakh people. Indeed, development of tourism, both religious or spiritual, would bring in valuable foreign exchange and lead to economic development.---INFA 

(Copyright, India News & Feature Alliance)

Political Diary

New Delhi, 30 January 2024

BJP MASTERSTROKE

OPP NEEDS NEW LANGUAGE

By Poonam I Kaushish 

The caste genie unleashed by our polity nearly three decades ago is back in the heart of political discourse as vote-banks on caste lines are easier to build. Post Ram Lalla idol’s consecration and call for expanding “our consciousness from Dev to Desh…beginning of a new chakra,” Prime Minister Modi played another masterstroke by awarding Bharat Ratna to Bihar’s socialist OBC (Backward class) icon and messiah of social justice late former Chief Minister  Karpoori Thakur. 

From “Ram kaaj” to “garib kaaj” the BJP blended its Hindutva agenda with the social justice plank and hopes to make a big dent in the non-dominant backward castes votes, especially EBCs (Extremely Backward class) by honouring Thakur. Specially, in Bihar where it has been unsuccessful in wooing the community to its side thanks to sway of entrenched backward satraps Nitish and Lalu who owe their rise to adroit political and administrative measures aimed at EBCs.

Besides, this would not only help BJP to counter effects of Bihar’s recent caste survey, offset Congress’s repeated demand for nationwide caste census but importantly counter the two Yadav community stalwarts Bihar’s RJD Lalu & family and UP’s Samajwadi Akhilesh’s OBC politics by showcasing the Party as its champion including EBC’s and MBC’s (Most Backward Class) by making a direct appeal to them. Especially the non-Yadav cluster of about 200 EBC’s such as nai to which Thakur belonged.

True, even prior to this, the Party was reaching out to Dalits and OBC but currently it hopes to consolidate all Hindu votes under the Hindu inclusivity umbrella. As it stands, BJP has the highest support of OBCs which has grown exponentially from 7% in 1971 to 22% in 2009 and doubled to 44% in 2019. The NDA received 54% OBC support in 2019. 

As Modi hails from this community, the Party’s claim of higher representation to OBCs in ticket allocations and at the Centre alongside formation of  Justice Rohini OBC Commission to address their issues through the Constitutional framework have helped it get OBC support. There are 28 OBC Ministers in the Union Cabinet, 80 MPs and several OBC Governors including President Murmu who is tribal. 

Alongside there is a buzz BJP’s larger strategy is to either snatch JD(U)’s Nitish back into NDA fold as majority of these castes are presently in JD(U) or break up the Party and alliance whereby BJP becomes a viable option for them. It rubbishes Opposition gripes as sour grapes as it is not the first time an award is being given for the ruling Party to take credit.

BJP has also focussed its efforts on non-dominant OBCs and MBC, which have been ignored by Opposition. This strategy has helped it in 2019 general elections across all socio-economic classes amongst OBCs, except middle class. Resulting in SP being reduced from 35 MPs in 2004 to just 5 in 2019; RJD from 22 seats in 1999 and 2004 to zilch in 2019; RLD from 5 seats in 2009 to nil in 2019. Consequently, out of every 100 BJP voters 49 belong to OBC community. A fact which bugs INDIA.

A bolt out of the blue for Opposition INDIA bloc, for Congress it is a double whammy. One, both Mamata’s TMC in West Bengal and Kejriwal’s AAP in Punjab have decided to go it alone in polls. Two, even though it tepidly welcomed the award, it dismissed it as “politics of symbolism” and politically motivated with an eye on the upcoming elections.

“The country needs real justice and caste census would be true tribute to Thakur,” said Rahul. While JD(U)’s Nitish has rushed to lay claim over his legacy and  tried to take credit for Thakur’s tribute, RJD dubbed the decision as driven by “BJP’s political compulsions and a gimmick’.”

Undeniably, the honour bestowed on Thakur popularly known as Jannayak, who hails from EBC will impact the political landscape as Parties are vying for OBC and EBC voters as they account for 63% and 36% population in Bihar’s caste survey. Coupled with Ram temple, tables have turned for INDIA bloc which has been sending out confusing signals over the mandir. They will now have to figure out a new language to respond to BJP’s direct appeal which Modi has taken beyond the realm of religion to caste. It will need clarity on why it is keen on displacing BJP.

Thakur belonging to a poor family left an indelible mark on Bihar’s deprived section and is credited with not only the rise of backward caste politics but was first to push for their empowerment. Pioneer of the ‘Karpoori formula’, the two-time Chief Minister gave 26% reservation to OBC’s and communities which eventually set the tone for 1990 Mandal Commission recommendation and later caste census with its layered reservation formula for EBC’s and MBC’s.

Known for his integrity, probity, simple living he removed English as a compulsory subject as students from poor families found it tough, introduced prohibition but with a soft touch. Unfortunately he was pushed to the background by his disciples Lalu, Nitish and late Ram Vilas Paswan whose RJD, JD(U), LJP emerged as  influential political and electoral  regional Parties.

At another level it is an example of political hypocrisy in politics.  Clearly, in the Kafkaesque world where caste identity is sticky baggage, difficult to dislodge in social settings and where caste vs caste fight and decide one’s fate no Party wants to jeopardize its caste vote banks. Wherein, the fight for getting the upper hand and votes has been reduced to politics of optics and perception, underscoring present reality and exposes the socio-political undercurrents at play.

Leading to rising tensions between castes over perceived injustices and demand for quotas stem from unfulfilled aspirations of employment and upward mobility. Simultaneously, quotas have failed to either solve the job problem or promote inclusion. 

In INDIA bloc’s thinking when caste becomes central to livelihood issues which are centered on identification and reservation, they feel there is a greater chance it will have greater electoral pull than religion. Congress’s Rahul has already sounded the bugle “Jitne abadi utna haq,” to garner votes and somehow dislodge Modi while Nitish has called for lifting 50% reservation ceiling.

On the face of it, Opposition leaders assert goal of caste census is OBCs welfare, Sic. It’s a ploy to divide Hindu votes on caste lines to weaken BJP in 2024 elections. Said a senior Congress leader, “Caste census would open another flank and create problems for  BJP. The axis would be pro-Modi vs anti-Modi and we will try to mobilise OBCs. This will be Mandal 2.0, different from Mandal 1.0 which involved aggressive OBC mobilization.”

Failing to realize politicisation of caste is a double-edged sword. Caste needs politics as much as politics need caste. When caste groupings make politics their sphere of activities they get a chance to assert their identity and strive for power and position. True, none can fault granting equal opportunities to all. But whether this would translate into equal outcome is debatable. 

Questionably, will not caste further fractionalize national politics? Will the run-up to 2024 elections be fought on caste basis? What the BJP and Opposition come up with will have consequences not just for INDIA bloc’s electoral fortunes but future of polity itself. Will they take the bait? The run-up to Election 2024 just got interesting.  ---- INFA 

(Copyright, India News & Feature Alliance)