The Mid Day Meal Tragedy in Bihar: Callousness and Corruption

Two days dack, in a village Chapra located 65 kilometers from the capital Patna 25 schoolg children all below the age of 11 died after having taken their mid day meals in school. In India, the mid day meal is a major incentive for families from poorer sections of society to send their children to school. Origally conceived in the Southern state of Tamil Nadu by the Cheif Minister M G Ram,achandran, the mid day meal program caught on and even in the mis governed states like Uttar Pradesh and Bihar this welfare scheme is presently underway. The fiances for the scheme are part of the state budget and the school appoints a cook and an attender to run the mid day meal programme. However, in states like Bihar and Uttar Pradesh there is massive corruption even in this scheme. In fact Bihar has the dubious distinction of having had a Chief Minister, laloo Prasad Yadava who was caught taking the money ear marked for animal welfare. The now infamous Fodder Scam is reaching its final stages in the courts and will end up convicting laloo Prasad Yadava. Even athug like this Laloo Prasad was not able to kill all the 347 witnesses. The current Chief Minister, Nitish Kumar, a past master in the old style identity politics rode to power on the strength of a very fragile social coalition consisting of intermediate caste, landed caste and the higher castes. After taking over the reins of government for the second time, Nitish Kumar began to feel the weight of his victory, but interpreted it as an endorsement of his personal "charisma". And this wrong and ill conceived notion was his undoing. The tragedy in Bihar took place only because of mis governance. The last 2 years the state administration has been paralyzed due to national ambitions of Nitish Kumar. Ever since he declared his opposition to the Prime Ministerial candidature of Honnourable Narendra Modi, Nitish Kumar regime has been floundering. Corruption, mal administration, scams and scandals have become the order of the day. The death of the 22 school children is a testimony to the plight of Bihar under Nitish Kumar. The shocking facts have emerged from the news reports. The food itmes for preparing the noon meals were sourced from the shop of the husband of the Head Mistress of the school, a man who as it turns out is an activist of the Rasshtrya Janata dal whose leader is the fodder scam accused, :Laloo Prasad Yadava. The shameless state government sought to shift the blame to the RJD by implying that the RJD wasbehind the tragedy in order to undermine the regime of Nitish Kumar. The level to which politics has sunk in India can be understood from the fact that the Government refuses to see the tragedy as one caused by itts own failures, but is quick to see political conspiracies everywhere. Corruption in the mid day meal scheme is the real factor. Even after the children took ill, it took over six hours for the children to be shited to the Primary Health Centre and there there was no nurse or doctor and there were no drips to provide immediate releif. This sate of affairs prevailing in Bihar is a national shame and people must realise that identity politics will lead to the grave as it did for the 22 children The World Bank and the IMF have given loans, soft loans to Bihar but the utilization of these loans is so poor that the international funding agencies are now wary of giving loans to Bihar. The country as a whole has slid backwards under the rule of the Congress Party and its allies and if India needs better Governence it must vote for change..

Caste and Indian political parties

The recent decision of the Allahabad High Court banning "caste rallies" is a welcome step for two reasons. First, the Indian voter being a caste oriented individual finds himself unable to resist the pull and pressures of caste lobbies. Second, the social scientists in India have taken whole sale the post colonial theories which revolve around identity, identity formation and political mobilization on identity lines. What is shocking is that in the Indian context Identity politics is being seen as a sign of democratic functioning without understanding the divisive and violent role played by identity politics. Democracy in India has degenerated into a numerical game, a mere arithmetic of assembling caste voting blocks for one or the other alliance. In fact voters in India do not have much of a choice since ideology is underplayed and caste factors dominate the electoral battle. And after the promulgation of the Mandal Report the backward castes and the political parties associated with them have come to dominate the landscape and the language of post colonial social science legitimizes such politics. Cast based rallies are not only the basis of political mobilization but also an important marker of the strength of a political party and a very important bargaining chip in the distribution of tickets for the elections. In Tamil Nadu the caste based political parties like the DMK and the PMK openly indulge in violence in order to firm up political support. In the name of democracy violence is unleashed against an unsuspecting electorate and the people have no protection from criminals who have come to dominate the political space. The Allahabad High Court has taken a small step in the right direction and already the political parties have begun to make threatening noises. In Uttar Pradesh, as in Tamil Nadu, caste based politics dominates. The Samajwadi Party with its Yadava support base and the BSP with its dalit and more particularly the Jatav support base are openly indulging is violence against each other. Uttar Prasesh and Bihar are in the grip of caste mania and violence is now reaching alarming proportions. It is against this background that the Allahabad high court has issued its decision banning caste rallies. All political parties with the exception of the Communists and the BJP have condemned the Allahabad High Court order on the ground that it is an infringement of democratic right of free expression. The Supreme Court of India has taken another giant step towards cleaning up the political sewage in India. It is a shocking statistics that 40% of Indian MPs and MLAs are criminals and even after being convicted continue to occupy positions of power on the strength of the "appeal" process or the most ridiculous instrument of Indian jurisprudence "anticipatory stay". With the present judgement criminals who have been convicted cannot contest elections or occupy elected office. This is a welcome sign of things changing. The criminals who run India are unlikely to yield ground that easily and will try their best to undo the two judgements. I hope that they do not succeed.