Economists From India

"Dalits have faced a unique discrimination in our society that is fundamentally different from the problems of minority groups in general."

"The only parallel to the practice of untouchability was apartheid."

"“As I see it the main factor responsible for socio-economic backwardness of the minority communities, particularly the Muslim community is the lack of access to the common school system. This is particularly true in the case of the Muslim girls. During the current plan period and the next plan period, we must ensure that concrete schemes for setting up of secondary and higher secondary schools in the Blocks and Districts having predominantly Muslim population are indeed implemented with sharper focus on the Muslim girls. Widening of access of the Muslim girls in professional education, particularly medical and engineering courses should be a priority area of educational programmes.“"

"“Some minorities in India have done better than others. For example, in India, minority communities like the Jains and the Sikhs have fared relatively well from the process of social and economic development. However, other minorities, especially the Muslim community in certain parts of our country, have not had an equal share of the fruits of development. This has most recently been established by data provided in the Report of the High Level Committee on the Social, Economic and Educational Status of the Muslim Community of India, popularly known as Sachar Committee. It is incumbent upon any democratically elected government to redress such imbalances and eradicate such inequities. I assure you, our Government is indeed committed to doing this.“"

"The series of blasts... are shocking and cowardly attempts to spread a feeling of fear and terror among our citizens. My heart reaches out and grieves for all those affected by these blasts and who have lost their near and dear ones... "I am confident that the people of this great city have the will and courage to face this situation and will stand firm in their resolve to carry on their normal activities without succumbing to threats of terror. We will work to defeat the evil designs of terrorists and will not allow them to succeed."

"We will leave no stone unturned I reiterate, no stone unturned in ensuring that terrorist elements in India are neutralized and smashed," Singh told reporters in Bombay, also known as Mumbai. "These acts of terrorism are desperate acts of desperate individuals."

"I don’t get angry, I don’t want to use harsh words. They are our colleagues and we have to work with them. But they also have to learn to work with us."

"The explosion of financial innovation unaccompanied by credible systemic regulation has made the financial system vulnerable. The resulting crisis of confidence threatens global prosperity in the increasingly interdependent world in which we live. There is, therefore, a need for a new international initiative to bring structural reform in the world's financial system with more effective regulation and stronger systems of multilateral consultations and surveillance. This must be designed in as inclusive a manner as possible."

"The terrorists have the advantage of attacking by stealth, but there is no lack of firmness in dealing with this menace. All possible precautions are being taken."

""The role of Pakistan-based terrorist groups cannot be minimized, but the involvement of local elements in recent blasts adds a new dimension to the terrorist threat," Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said this month after the New Delhi bombings."

"These terrorist acts are aimed at destroying our social fabric, undermining communal harmony and demoralising our people."

"We will rise to the challenge and, I am confident, defeat these forces."

""Terrorism remains the single biggest threat to South Asia's stability."*"

""The recent attack on the Indian Embassy in Kabul and the serial blasts in Bangalore and Ahmedabad are grim reminders of the barbarity that still finds a place in South Asia."*"

""We must defend the values of pluralism, peaceful coexistence and the rule of law."*"

""We cannot afford to lose this battle against the ideology of hatred, fanaticism and those who want to destroy our society."*"

"Sikh extremism, separatism and militancy were a problem in India more than two decades ago. Today, Punjab is at peace and there is growth and prosperity. There are, however, some elements outside India, including in Canada, who try to keep this issue alive for their own purposes. In many cases, such elements have links to or are themselves wedded to terrorism."

"Sri Sathya Sai Baba as a preacher of the highest human values was an iconic figure for over five decades. He endeared himself to the people through various institutions, with headquarters at Prashanthi Nilayam, that promoted egalitarian values, education and public health."

"On 13th January of that year, the then Prime Minister had said, “All minority communities do not form a homogenous group. Some have done reasonably well, benefitting from the processes of social and economic development. However, other minorities, especially the Muslim community in certain parts of our country, have not had an equal share of the fruits of development. This has most recently been established by the data provided in the report of the Sachar Committee which our Government had set up.“"

"I honestly believe that history will be kinder to me than the contemporary media, or for that matter, the Opposition parties in Parliament."

"As for reservations not having been extended to members of religions that repudiate caste – Islam, Christianity, Sikhism – again, that is but make-believe. The chairman of the Minorities Commission, my friend Tarlochan Singh, sends me a list of fifty-eight castes and of fourteen tribal groups, Muslim members of which have been given reservations. Even those who convert to one of these religions, continue to remain entitled to reservation. The rule in Tamil Nadu is that if the name of the father falls in the lists of Backward Castes/Most Backward Castes/Scheduled Castes/Scheduled Tribes, then, even if the person has converted to another religion, he remains entitled to reservations. In Gujarat, members of Backward Castes continue to avail of not just reservations but even of advantages under the roster system after conversion – 137 castes and sub-castes have been listed as socially and educationally backward in the state; of these, twenty-eight belong to the Muslim community. In Karnataka, ‘caste at birth’ is the norm. In UP, several Muslim castes are included in the reservation list – Lalbegi, Mazhabis, even Ansaris. The position is no different in Madhya Pradesh, in West Bengal. The Indian Express correspondent in Kolkata reports that the government of the ostentatiously secular CPI(M) strained to have reservations in government service as well as educational institutions extended to Muslims qua Muslims, and directed the state Minorities Commission to ascertain how such reservation had been decreed in Andhra Pradesh. The plan has had to be deferred for the time being, he writes, Only because the Andhra Pradesh High Court has struck down the Andhra order as unconstitutional."

"We comfort ourselves: at least, the virus of reservations has not got into judicial appointments; at least, reservations have not been extended to Muslims and Christians. Both notions are just make-believe."

"Now, these are not stray phrases thrown in to light up a purple passage. They are stances, they are standpoints that indicate the direction in which that judgment will go, they are signposts which tell us where the reasoning being advanced in the text will eventually end. Such formulations have a significance beyond the particular judgment in which they figure. Succeeding benches can strike the same pose and gallop further in the same direction."

"On the other hand, when sticking to the text is what will advance the judgment, they become strict constructionists. Some of the most conspicuous instances of this can be found in judgments relating to Article 30, the article that deals with the ‘right of minorities to establish and administer educational institutions’. The country had been partitioned on the cry that Muslims will never be secure in a united India. The framers were naturally keen to reassure the minorities that they would be free to preserve their religion, language and culture. Accordingly, Article 29 was enacted guaranteeing them and assuring them of this freedom. In case they wanted to set up institutions for safeguarding their language, culture, religion, Article 30 was enacted assuring them that ‘All minorities, whether based on religion or language, shall have the right to establish and administer educational institutions of their choice.’ The context made the purpose clear: minorities would have the freedom to set up such institutions as they thought would best preserve their culture, religion, language. But, given what has been the climate of discourse since the framing of the Constitution, the judges became literalists. Minorities would have the right to set up and manage ‘educational institutions of their choice’ irrespective of the purpose for which the institution was set up. Thus, engineering colleges and dental colleges set up by a family of, say, Muslims would have freedoms from state regulation and oversight that engineering and dental colleges set up by run-of-the-mill Indians would not."

"The result has been as predictable as it is iniquitous and absurd: if Ram Sharan sets up an engineering college, the state as well as the university concerned can prescribe all sorts of things it must do; if Mohammed Aslam sets up an exact clone of that engineering college across the road, teaching exactly the same subjects, using exactly the same textbooks, neither the state nor the university can regulate its functioning!"

"The first derailment was caused by plucking the words ‘of their choice’ out of context, by tearing them away from the object for which Articles 29 and 30 gave minorities the right to set up and administer institutions. A normal engineering college or a college of dentistry can by no stretch be taken to be an institution that has been set up to help conserve the language, script or culture of the minority. Yet, provided the engineering or dentistry college has been set up by members of a minority, it was presumed to enjoy the protection of Articles 29 and 30, and thereby be beyond the reach of the state."

"I don't see the difference between the two. I feel they (the BJP and the Congress) are one party. They are jointly ruling. It is a dinner party. They meet at dinners. They meet socially. They decide on what has to be done about issues. First, the media should write about itself. It is extremely short-sighted about the media to black out these things. The Mitrokhin Archives revealed how (the then Soviet intelligence agency) the KGB boasted that they were able to plant 400 stories in such and such Indian newspapers. The Indian media blacked it out. Then, privatetreaties of The Times of India that other people have now adopted has been completely blacked out.... When the Press Council of India was forced to appoint a committee to look into the allegations about 'paid news', the Press Council itself suppressed the report."

"A contributing factor certainly must have been the contempt that Mao, Chou En-lai and others felt for India and Indians. This comes through again and again in conversation after conversation of the Chinese leaders. Chou and Kissinger agree on how India is the one that is causing the troubles in East Pakistan; on what China and US should together do to halt India in the tracks; they agree about not just what is ‘the Indian tradition’—deceit, blaming others—but just as much about the Indian character—marked by ingratitude.⁴ The contempt and coordination show through even more dramatically in the conversations that Kissinger later has with the permanent representative of China at the UN, Huang Hua, during which he asks Huang Hua to assure Chou En-lai that, should China take military action against India to divert it from pursuing its assault on Pakistan, the US will hold the Soviet Union at bay. Nixon, Pompidou and Kissinger are exchanging views about the state of the world. Nixon summarizes the Chinese assessments: ‘...the attitude of the Chinese towards their neighbours can be summed up in this way. The Russians they hate and fear now. The Japanese they fear later but do not hate. For the Indians they feel contempt but they are there and backed by the U.S.S.R.’"

"As the principal object of this brief book is to set out the evolution of India’s China-policy in Panditji’s own words, and to show how those assumptions and habits continue to endanger us today, I have kept annotations to the minimum. But what Panditji did and said and wrote in regard to China does deserve to be analyzed almost at the psychological and linguistic level! For his stance, his formulations, his rationalizations are rooted in habits, in mental processes. Not just his assumptions and premises persist among policy-makers, those very habits and mental processes persist. In the 1950s, they went unquestioned because of the lofty position that Panditji occupied in our lives and discourse. Today, they go equally unquestioned—though for a different reason: discourse has got so dumbed-down that no assumption or premise is examined as it should be. An illustration will bring home the consequence. Among the habits that persist, one is especially harmful as it rationalizes going-along at an almost subliminal level. This is the habit of slipping in a thought or sentence which excuses one from facing the facts. We see this in Pandit Nehru’s writings and spoken word at every turn. ..."

"The Dalai Lama is in India at India’s invitation. Panditji meets him on 26 and 28 November 1956. The Dalai Lama is distraught. Panditji jots down the points of their exchange. The Dalai Lama puts the figure of Chinese troops in Tibet at 120,000, the very figure for which Panditji had come down on Apa Pant. The foreign secretary inserts a paragraph in Panditji’s notings about the talks: ‘The Dalai Lama appealed to India for help. PM’s reply was that, apart from other considerations, India was not in a position to give any effective help to Tibet; nor were other countries in a position to do so. Dalai Lama should not resist land reforms.’ Instead of help, Panditji gives advice. He records the advice he gives: ‘D.L. should become the leader of the reform. Best way we can help is by maintaining friendly relations with China, otherwise China would fear our designs in Tibet.’ An excuse, and a presumptuous one—‘otherwise China would fear our designs in Tibet.’"

"The view that he disapproves is always unbalanced; or stuck in the past; or stuck in the cold war mould; or subjective and emotional..."

"He speaks at length, that is, but scarcely touches on any of the specific matters that members had raised."

"We can see the operational conclusion that flows from such reasoning. As the main advance has halted, there is nothing that we need to do. When the main advance resumes, the full picture is not clear. When it is completed, and the place is subjugated, there is nothing for us to do as, by then, the place has already been subjugated. For us to do or say anything will only enrage the occupiers, and bring even greater hardship on the poor Tibetans!"

"Recall, what he had told the Tibetans—that India would help diplomatically. That help now has come to mean that India will keep China in good humour even as it crushes Tibet, so that it may not crush Tibet more swiftly."

"Now, this is a favourite phrase of Panditji—‘the long-term view’—as is ‘the larger considerations’. Whenever he deploys the former, you can be sure that he is preparing the case for ceding ground. Whenever he deploys the latter, you can be sure that he is preparing the case for ceding specifically the country’s interest."

"The brutal—the customarily brutal—way in which the Chinese government suppressed the protests by Tibetans in Lhasa in the months preceding the 2008 Beijing Olympics once again drew attention to the enormous crime that the world has refused to see: the systematic way in which an entire people have been reduced to a minority in their own land; the cruelty with which they are being crushed; the equally systematic way in which their religion and ancient civilization are being erased. Protests by Tibetans in different cities across the world, joined as they were by large numbers of citizens of those countries, had the same effect. No government anywhere in the world did what the Manmohan Singh government did in Delhi, no government reacted in as craven and as frightened a manner as our government did. The Olympic Torch was to be relayed across just about two kilometres—from Vijay Chowk to India Gate. The government stationed over twenty thousand troops, paramilitary personnel, policemen and plainclothes men in and around that short stretch. Tibetan refugees were beaten and sequestered. Government offices were closed. Roads were blocked. The Metro was shut down. Even members of Parliament were stopped from going to their homes through the square that adjoins Parliament, the Vijay Chowk. Do you think that any of this was done out of love for the Olympics? It was done out of fear of China."

"High priority must be given to work among Hindu women, they say, "since they are the custodians of the faith"... (62)"

"Several groups have several reasons for manufacturing calumny - from money to idelogy to the crassest kind of politics. Many of these are well-organized, some, as we shall see, have well-knit, world-wide networks. And they have honed expertise in manufacturing atrocity-stories, in broadcasting them round the globe, and in putting their manufactures to profitable use. (13)"

"The contrast between the truth about the incidents and what they were made out to be should alert our newspapers and TV channels not to shoot off accounts without examining the facts. In particular, they must not go merely by the allegations of communalism-mongers.(13)"

"There indeed was a conspiracy it runs out, and a communal one at that. The whole thing was a concoction - by those whose agenda it is to paint Hindus as communalists on the rampage, and the RSS, BJP, etc., as organizations which are orchestrating a "pogrom". "Investigations, however revealed that what Sister Mary said in the FIR was not true," records Justice Wadhwa. "It was a made-up story. Investigations found that there was in fact no rape of Sister Mary... B.B. Panda, Director General of Police stated that the 'rape of the nun' case was projected and highlighted all over the world and was also projected as an attack on Christians when in fact it was not true, and the case turned out to be false." (9-10)"

"If you had been in India in late 1998-early 1999, and the English-language "national" newspapers had been your source of information about what was going on, you would have concluded that an extensive, well coordinated pogrom was on, that maniacal Hindu groups were going round raping nuns, attacking missionaries, burning down churches. (p 7)"

"“Eminent historians” is what they call one another, and what their fans call them. When they don’t have an answer to an opponent’s arguments, they pompously dismiss him as not having enough “eminence”. So when Arun Shourie wrote about some abuses in this sector, he called his book Eminent Historians. It is also a pun on an old book about prominent colonial-age personalities, Eminent Victorians."

"The first major criticism of the ‘left-liberal’ or ‘progressive’ historians was made by Arun Shourie with special reference to the state of the ICHR in their control.”"

"Thus, not just whitewash, hogwash too."

"The accompanying pages contain two columns: aushuddho – impurity, or error – and shuddho. One has just to glance through the changes to see the objective the progressives are trying to achieve through their ‘objective’, ‘rational’ approach to the writing of history."

"But today the fashion is to ascribe the extinction of Buddhism to the persecution of Buddhists by Hindus, to the destruction of their temples by the Hindus. One point is that the Marxist historians who have been perpetrating this falsehood have not been able to produce even an iota of evidence to substantiate the concoction. In one typical instance, Romila Thapar had cited three inscriptions. The indefatigable Sita Ram Goel looked them up. Two of these turned out to have absolutely no connection with Buddhist viharas or their destruction, and the one that did deal with an object being destroyed had been held by authorities to have been a concoction; in any event, it told a story which was as different from what the historian had insinuated as day from night."

"The example we would do well to keep in front of us is that of the Dalai Lama. He was giving a discourse on a Tibetan text about meditation. He read out a sentence, laughed and remarked, ‘Buddhist theories of creation, a disgrace! Must throw them out!’ He advises that we should keep a wastepaper basket nearby – whatever doesn’t accord with what we know now, we should cast into that basket. ‘Buddhism must face facts,’ that is what he teaches. Accordingly, he has opened Buddhist texts to minute examination. (...) That reflects confidence in one’s tradition. That is true service to the tradition. That is the way to preserve for the future ‘the pearl of great price’ in it."

"The press is a ready example of their efforts, and of the skills they have acquired in this field. They have taken care to steer their members and sympathizers into journalism. And within journalism, they have paid attention to even marginal niches. Consider books. A book by one of them has but to reach a paper, and suggestions of names of persons who would be specially suitable for reviewing it follow. As I mentioned, the editor who demurs, and is inclined to send the book to a person of a different hue is made to feel guilty, to feel that he is deliberately ensuring a biased, negative review. That selecting a person from their list may be ensuring a biased acclamation is talked out. The pressures of prevailing opinion are such, and editors so eager to evade avoidable trouble, that they swiftly select one of the recommended names... You have only to scan the books pages of newspapers and magazines over the past fifty years to see what a decisive effect even this simple stratagem has had. Their persons were in vital positions in the publishing houses: and so their kind of books were the ones that got published. They then reviewed, and prescribed each other’s books. On the basis of these publications and reviews they were able to get each other positions in universities and the like…. Even positions in institutions which most of us would not even suspect exist were put to intense use. How many among us would know of an agency of government which determines bulk purchases of books for government and other libraries. But they do! So that if you scan the kinds of books this organization has been ordering over the years, you will find them to be almost exclusively the shades of red and pink.... So, their books are selected for publication. They review each other’s books. Reputations are thereby built. Posts are thereby garnered. A new generation of students is weaned wearing the same pair of spectacles – and that means yet another generation of persons in the media, yet another generation of civil servants, of teachers in universities…."

"Their deceitful role in Ayodhya – which in the end harmed their clients more than anyone else – was just symptomatic. For fifty years this bunch has been suppressing facts and inventing lies. How concerned they pretend to be today about that objective of the ICHR – to promote objective and rational research into events of our past! How does this concern square with the guidelines issued by their West Bengal government in 1989 which Outlook itself had quoted – ‘Muslim rule should never attract any criticism. Destruction of temples by Muslim rulers and invaders should not be mentioned?’ But incorporating their wholesale fabrications of the destruction of Buddhist viharas, about the non-existent ‘Aryan invasion’, that is mandatory – to question them is to be communal, chauvinist! The capture of institutions like the ICHR has been bad enough, but in the end it has been a device. The major crime of these ‘historians’ has been this partisanship: suppresso veri, suggesto falsi."

"The West Bengal Board of Secondary Education had issued instructions in 1989 that ‘Muslim rule should never attract any criticism. Destruction of temples by Muslim rulers and invaders should not be mentioned.’"