Chhattisgarh 2008 (2): A Kingdom of Lies

There is an old adage that goes something like this: you can fool all of the people some of the time, some of the people all of the time but not all of the people all of the time. This adage, however, doesn’t seem to apply to Dr. Raman Singh, the chief minister of Chhattisgarh.

The clearest example of this is his much-publicized, government-sponsored Vikas Yatra: frankly, it is beyond me how he can go to the people, riding gallantly atop a customized state-of-the-art air-conditioned Rath, when he has betrayed them by not fulfilling one word of his party’s Sankalp Patr? Either he is totally and absolutely shameless or worse, he thinks that Chhattisgarhiyas, by nature, are fools. Anybody in his shoes should have hid his face in shame. Instead, he has decided to spend tens of crores of the state’s- and the people’s- money in telling Lies a hundred times in the hope that they would somehow become the truth.

This is perhaps for the first time that the state machinery- and funds- have been so brazenly used for what is a purely political campaign. To me, this is not only evidence of Dr. Singh's excessive reliance on the bureaucracy- his partner-in-crime, so to speak- to see his party reelected; but more significantly, it shows the BJP’s inability to undertake a full-fledged political campaign on its own. Personally, I doubt if Dr. Singh can draw a crowd in the excess of 1000 on his own, and without active state assistance. What’s more, the enactment of the Vikas Yatra clearly shows that he shares this doubt.

The state’s mainstream media, it seems, too suffer from what can charitably be called collective amnesia: rather than sing paens to the chief minister (Vikas Purush, my foot!), it is their duty to remind those in power of the promises they’d made before coming to power- and happily forgotten since. Did not, for instance, Dr. Singh promise among other things, a jersey cow to every tribal family; Rs. 500 monthly unemployment stipend to every youth; and waiver of farmers’ debts, irrigation tax and electricity bills?

It is these tall promises that brought him to power in the first place. In four years, he has done absolutely nothing to fulfill them. This, in my opinion, constitutes a Historic Betrayal of the People of Chhattisgarh- and especially the tribals, the dalits, the youth and the poor, the ones to whom these promises were specifically made. Unfortunately, these people are, because of their peculiar conditions, unable to give voice to their resentment, their anguish, and under these circumstances, the media and the opposition should have emerged as their spokesperson. In the past four years, neither has managed to do so.

Dr. Singh’s Great- and possibly only- Hope is the success of his Rs. 3 per kilo rice scheme, which he launched in obvious desperation less than a year before elections. (His other Hope, i.e., absence of a united opposition has, especially in light of recent decisions made by the Congress High Command, turned out to be a myth.) If I were in his shoes, I wouldn’t be quite as confident.

I’ve toured the state extensively. Chhattisgarhiyas, by nature, are rice eaters. Dr. Singh’s measly quota of 35 kilos per month wouldn’t last a family of four, even a BPL (below poverty line) family, a week. More than anything else, this shows just how little Dr. Singh- and the chaps in khaki shorts who’re plotting his comeback strategy- understand us. Moreover, at least 40% of those having BPL cards had their names struck off during the 2004 statewide revision of BPL lists. In villages like Laata (which is very near our ancestral village of Jogisaar), there are only 5 BPL-card holders among the 400 odd families who live there (!) In Basantpur, for instance, 14 persons who’ve been issued BPL cards haven’t got an ounce of rice to date. The rice that is distributed under this scheme is undoubtedly substandard, and the packets inevitably weigh less than 35 kilos. It would infact not be farfetched to assume that at least 30% of the rice finds it way to the black market. Not surprisingly then, most BPL families are forced to buy their remaining rice requirement from the black market, where the rates have increased threefold to as high as Rs. 18 a kilo ever since this scheme started, thanks to the hoarding & blackmarketeering it has given rise to. In the ultimate analysis, it appears that as with most of Dr. Singh’s schemes, this one too is intended not for the benefit of the poor but to fill the already overstuffed pockets of his corrupt sponsors.

Curiously, Dr. Singh’s propaganda-managers, such as they are, proclaim a “Fear-free administration” (bhay mukt sarkar) as yet another of his strong points. They would certainly have a tough time convincing the over 80000 tribals of South Bastar, who Dr. Singh’s SPOs forcefully uprooted from their homes before packing them like cattle into inhuman makeshift concentration camps and thousands others who are molested, raped and killed outright; the hundreds of city women and girls who no longer feel safe to venture out of their homes; the three dalit women who’re raped every day (according to the Government’s own figures); the shopkeepers and businessmen who have to pay protection money to local goondas (not to mention the minister’s brother, and the local thanedaar); the hundreds of farmers who’ve been forced to commit suicide; the dalit boys who are beaten to death in police custody; the mother who had her infant-child stolen from the capital, Raipur’s biggest government hospital; the residents of Dantewada and Jashpur on the night of the jailbreaks…The list is endless. Indeed, it would not be farfetched to say that in the last four years, Chhattisgarh has turned into the most dangerous state in the country, especially if you’re a tribal, a dalit or a woman. The only persons who are truly fearless are the profiteers, the bureaucrats and the criminals- who rightly believe that they can get away with anything.

Dr. Singh’s other advantage is money: he hopes to overwhelm our entire campaign with funds, as he tried to do in Kota. But as Kota showed, money- even ten times as much- just isn’t enough when it comes to winning elections. What he needs instead is People’s Confidence and Trust, and these, unfortunately (for him anyway) cannot be bought.

AJ

There is a rather interesting post-script to this post. To read it, go here.