Cups of Tea & Living in Hope: Notes from the road

Two things stand out from my visit to Bharat last week: lots of (sometimes too sweet) tea and a palpable sense of hope.

I managed to squeeze in four semi-public meetings during my 4-city trip, and several private conversations centred on political reforms and prospects for change in India..

The first of these meetings – in Bengaluru – was organised by Janaagraha on the topic of “New Age Political Movements” in India. I shared a panel with Dr Shankar Prasad who is contesting as a Loksatta candidate in the upcoming BBMP elections. I spoke about Freedom Team of India (FTI) and how we hope to become the platform for change in Indian politics (will be uploading slides soon)

Two days later, I spent several hours with the latest batch of participants at the MIT School of Government in Pune. We discussed the difficulties of a career in politics and explored some of the factors behind terrorism

This was followed by a late evening (really late – 9pm!) talk in Pune to a large (about 200+!) group of enthusiastic youngsters (thanks to Dinesh and Amit for giving me the opportunity to speak).  My presentation was short but the enthusiasm in the room was palpable…

And I spent the last day of my visit at FTI’s first conference in Mumbai.

Two points came up repeatedly in all these discussions:

1. A failure of leadership and lack of leaders with vision, courage and integrity to lead India today
2. The need to be directly involved in politics to make any significant impact on the present situation in India

Although I was often accused of being too pessimistic during these discussions, I remain hopeful…not least because I see people asking questions about their leaders and about why politics in India does not attract the kind of people that other fields do. That itself is a big change…and I believe it is very positive.

The first step to change has to be the awareness (at a mass level) that things are not how they should be…and I think we in India are getting to that point.

You can find more photographs from some of these interactions on the blog’s page on Facebook and below are two excerpts from write-ups on the event in Bengaluru: one by Karthika on iJanaagraha and another by Pramod on his blog.

Some excerpts from Karthika’s post:

Mr Shantanu started his presentation with a dark prediction. According to him, in forty years, India can either be a successful economy or on the brink of complete turmoil. He casually asked a rhetorical question: Where are the leaders who will take us there? It is to fill this gap that he’s launching Freedom Team of India, a platform for individuals from any background who can join and believe in their philosophy which encourages classical liberalism, equal opportunity, maximum freedom and a minimum but strong and enabling government.

…As pointed by Dr.Prasad the mainstream parties are trapped in a vicious circle and neither capable nor willing to transform the nature of politics. This is where both  leaders think the new age political parties make sense. But the biggest challenge the new parties face is in attracting 300M middle class Indians to participate.

and an extract from Pramod’s post (titled, “A pleasant political evening”!):

…Shantanu believes that in a couple of decades, India will have a big enough middle class that classical liberalism can be a viable political plank. Until then, when most people are living hand-to-mouth, they won’t be interested in individual freedoms or restricting government. He also believes that by then the Internet and mobile will cut down publicity costs for any political party, and it’s possible to build a grassroots network that circumvents mainstream media….For now, Shantanu is only interested in getting people “to think, and to read” as he put it and engage in serious debate on political issues. He hopes that in a few years he’ll have MP’s running as liberals in some Lok Sabha seats. And Freedom Team will remain a non-electoral but political association of like-minded people.

…However Shantanu made an admittedly outrageous remark that he thinks increasing voter turnout is an over-rated concept and he wished people would be more aware of the issues instead. Well, I do wish that Jaagte Raho doesn’t get consumed in electoral politics and these young minds expose themselves to a wide range of ideologies also. As the moderator himself confessed, sometimes after a lot of campaigning they only see a marginal change in turnout and it’s not like better candidates are getting elected anyway.

…another person called Anand Bala (early 30’s?) who’s quit a decent private sector job and travelled all over India last year just in order to “politically sensitise” himself in a deeper way…mentioned that he’s changed many of his viewpoints after these journeys. He raised some opposition to Shantanu’s free market approach by arguing a role for government intervention too.And there was this other chap who had a foreign twang and asked very pertinent questions. Most memorably why does Shantanu’s plank not talk about healthcare and schooling? He introduced himself as a bachelors student in History, Econ and Political Science. I was stupefied to see a flesh and blood sample of this endangered species in Bangalore.

Later on, I spent some time in a group who were chatting with Shantanu mainly. In fact what piqued me to go for this talk was a reference to Hayek’s Fatal Conceit in the very first page of the FTI’s principles. He runs a blog called Satyameva Jayate and is currently shuttling b/w UK and India as he prepares to move back to India. I haven’t checked him out in any detail yet.

While it is clear that a lot of people desperately want change, few are keen (or able) to work towards bringing about that change.  There is also increasing fragmentation amongst the “New Age Political Movements” which cannot be good for anyone who is concerned about reform in the political system (Indeed, the Hope Summit is part of an effort to change this situation)

I can go on and on about this and the other meetings…but instead of boring you with the details of what happened, I would like to close this post with a bunch of (hopefully) thought-provoking questions (emphasis added)…

• Can you really have a “New Age Political Movement” in India without relying on instruments of the system?
• Can one have more impact and/or influence by joining a mainstream/estalished political party and getting them to implement the ideas and policies of “New Age Political Movements”?
• Can any such effort succeed without years of ground-level (or mass-based) activity and without having an organised cadre/organisation of committed members?
• How critical is the “content” of the message (as compared to the “communication”)?
• How can the “New Age Political Movements” get some quick wins?
• How important is to be perceived as “winnable”?
• Should parties target followers or leaders – or both?

…and finally (I’m being deliberately provocative):

Are we (as in all of us involved in some way or the other with “New Age Political Movements”) too “educated” for our own good?

Dwell on these…and do share your views & experiences. Jai Hind, Jai Bharat!

P.S. You can read some snippets from the Q&A at the Janaagraha event on their twitter page (look at the tweets from 15th Feb)

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