The real task ahead is to put in place a sound administration. And that’s a tall order for the CPI(M) government of West Bengal and their IAS baboos, who are all “party functionaries.”
In a recent column in Mint I had written that the IAS were the “original sinners in Singur”: they did not possess a land administration. I will now add that they are again the sinners in Midnapore, where the local administration seems to have totally collapsed.
But today, let us learn from history - of the time when Midnapore became one of the first districts to be administered by the Brits. The first officer to be posted there was Harry Verelst, who ought to go down as the founder of British district administration in India. In 1760, three “provinces” came under British rule: Midnapore, Burdwan and Chittagong. Verelst served in all of them, collecting revenue in the first ten years that added up to half-a-million pounds a year. His experience in administering these “provinces” (as the districts were then called) encouraged the Brits to extend their administration further – to a total of 39 districts. And it was the well-experienced Harry Verelst who supervised the process. His instructions to these first district officers reads as follows:
“Amongst the chief effects which are hoped for from your residence in that province… are to convince the Ryot [the peasant] that you will stand between him and the hand of oppression; that you will be his refuge and the redresser of his wrongs;… that honest and direct applications to you will never fail producing speedy and equitable decisions; that, after supplying the legal due of government, he may be secure in the enjoyment of the remainder; and finally to teach him a veneration and affection for the humane maxims of our government.”
These “humane maxims” came from England, where Whigs had been ruling for long, and where “Locke was still a prophet.” It was John Locke who wrote that “where there is no Property there is no Justice.” This is very different from the collectivism of the Marxists who now rule Bengal, who disdain Property and thereby cause Injustice to reign.
It should come as no surprise, therefore, that in his farewell address to the Company’s servants in Bengal, Warren Hastings said:
“It is on the virtue, not the ability, of their servants that the Company must rely for the permanence of their dominions.”
He then went on to add that the British officers in the districts had displayed “gentleness and moderation in their dealings with the native population.” And he praised them for it.
Today, the elite administrative cadres of our The State possess neither virtue nor ability. And they treat the native population with callousness, rudeness, and roughness. The wheel has turned a full circle.
It is in this context that the latest gimmick of our The State must be examined: the appointment of Nandan Nilekani of Infosys as cabinet minister in charge of a universal citizen ID project that is expected to cost 1,50,000 crore rupees. (One crore is 10 million.)
In my book, the first priority should be land titles.
This is how the British began their administration. The history books say that it was a task as huge as “mapping the waves of the ocean.” But it was done – by Verelst, by John Shore, by the great Munro in the south, and by all the rest. Today, we have satellite images – and the task is easy. It is this that the government must focus on, not the bogus idea of one more ID card for the citizenry.
Land titles explain the “mystery of Capital.” They must be Top Priority. Where land titles do not exist, it makes no sense to spend billions on citizen identification. Indeed, such records can be abused if wrong people get to capture The State – like the communal BJP, or the casteists.
The conclusion: We are now governed by bozos.
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