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Al-Ahram Weekly 3 - 9 February 2000 Issue No. 467 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 3 - 9 February 2000 Issue No. 467
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Special Profile Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Agony and aspiration
By Gamal Nkrumah
"Our satellites shoot up from the midst of the hovels of the poor," Indian President Shri K R Narayanan told his one billion people last week. Speaking at celebrations marking the Republic Day Golden Jubilee last Wednesday, Narayanan invited his listeners to make this a time for "honest self-analysis and self-questioning". "The unabashed, vulgar indulgence in conspicuous consumption by the nouveau-riche has left the underclass seething in frustration," he informed a coterie of dignitaries, both local and foreign, including Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo who was attending as guest of honour
"We have one of the world's largest reservoirs of technical personnel, but also the world's largest number of illiterates; the world's largest middle class, but also the largest number of people living below the poverty line, and the largest number of children suffering from malnutrition," Narayanan insisted. In particular, he dwelt on the status of women and the deplorable condition of India's Dalits, or untouchables, whom he described as "our greatest national shame."
Over the last century, India has been inextricably intertwined with global efforts to sustain development and curb poverty. It has also been associated with a quest for social, political and economic justice at both the local and international levels, being closely identified with the Non-Aligned Movement and "Third World" concerns. Together with what Narayanan termed "the sister continent of Africa", India has come to symbolise for many people the challenges and aspirations of the developing nations of the South. Yet the perception from abroad jibes with the atmosphere of denial within the country, what Narayanan called "the absence of even political rhetoric on these social ills."
His comments jar with the received truth of the day: that if economies the world over keep growing at the right pace, then problems like those of the Dalits and the tribal peoples of India will just melt away. Yet for now, despite the promise of a new information age which will break down barriers and forge a world society, identity politics is gripping the entire world, not just India.
It is in this context that the destruction of the film set on which internationally-acclaimed director Deepa Mehta was working by activists of the ruling Bharatiya Jananta Party (BJP) came as a shocking reminder of the social tensions that bedevil the sub-continent. Mehta is currently directing a film, Water, set in the city of Varanasi (Benares), a Hindu pilgrimage centre on the sacred River Ganges, which deals with the the fate of widows at the turn of the last century as they attempt to live a normal life. Water follows the equally elemental Fire, which described a lesbian relationship between two unhappily married women.
Mehta, whose films are regarded as too controversial in India, now resides permanently in Canada, having received death threats from the ultranationalist paramilitary organisation Shiv Sena. Still, what sets India apart is less the violence that her work has encountered there, than the fact that Mehta is able to work at all. After reviewing the scripts for his last two films, the Censor Board decided to let both projects proceed.
If attendance at the unprecedented "India evening" at the World Economic Forum's meeting in Davos last Friday is anything to go by, then many political and business leaders from the West are beginning to eye India with growing interest. Each year, a different country is selected as the focus of proceedings, and India certainly seemed to steal the show. With its economy growing at an unprecedented rate of 6.8 per cent in 1998-99, this new century may well belong to India, and not as many have predicted to China.
However, not all nations can be so lucky. "Today, India has one foot firmly planted in the 21st century; Pakistan has both feet planted in the past," wrote Stanley Weiss, the founder and chairman of Business Executives for National Security, in a recent edition of the International Herald Tribune.
"The World Bank and the IMF estimate that India will be the world's fourth largest economy early this century," Weiss explained. "It has the second biggest pool of English-speaking, scientific manpower after the United States. Its software exports should increase from $4 billion today to $50 billion by 2008."
With the end of the Cold War, the West has increasingly sought to woo India with smooth words, in sharp contrast to the unceremonious abandonment of Pakistan, which has been cast off like an old mistress. Democratic Congressman Frank Pallone, an old India hand and former co-chairman of the India Caucus, recently sent a strongly-worded letter to US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, urging her to designate Pakistan as a state sponsoring terrorism.
The major reason behind the West's change of heart would seem to be India's economic potential. Like Egypt, India started to deregulate its economy in 1991. But India is also widely seen as the only country the West may be able to use to counter-balance the growing military and economic might of China. At the Republic Day celebrations last week, the new Agni-II ballistic missile, which can carry a nuclear warhead over 3,000 km, was proudly on display. However, Indian officials stress that despite the outstanding border dispute ,New Delhi is actively seeking closer ties with Beijing.
The growing economic confidence also seems to be encouraging a more conciliatory attitude towards Pakistan -- or at, a desire not to remain "locked into a mind set of obsessive hostility towards Pakistan," as India's Ambassador to Egypt Shiv Shankar Mukherjee, told Al-Ahram Weekly recently. Mukherjee also expressed concern at what he termed the "nexus between Afghanistan's ruling Taliban regime and Pakistan." He urged Egypt and other Arab countries to advise Islamabad that it is in its own interest to desist from fighting a war by proxy in Kashmir.
Over 1,000 were killed on each side in the so-called "Kargil incident" in May-June of last year, a conflict which brought India and Pakistan perilously close to a fourth war. "Kargil was a major breech of confidence," Ambassador Mukherjee said. When Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihar Vajpayee met his Pakistani opposite number in Lahore, the event was applauded as a historic occasion. However, fate has since proved cruel to former Pakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif, who was ousted in a military takeover three months ago. Last week, Sharif was formally charged with a series of offences that carry the death sentence, if he is found guilty, including terrorism, hijacking and conspiracy to murder. Sharif has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
Ominously, Pakistan's new ruler Gen Pervez Mushharaf was given the red carpet treatment when he visited China earlier this month. This was the general's first visit to a non-Muslim country since he seized power on 12 October 1999. The visit went off smoothly, despite growing fears in Beijing that Islamabad may be indirectly supporting Muslim separatists in the predominantly Muslim Xingxiang province.
Pakistan's military have a long tradition of intervening directly in the political arena, having toppled civilian governments in 1958, 1971 and 1977, as well as last year. Unfortunately, the former civilian administrations of the country were rarely object lessons in democracy themselves. Less than 17 per cent of Pakistan's 140 million people voted in the last election of 1997, when Sharif won a landslide victory. Many of the country's problems stem from its dogged determination not to reform the feudal system of land holdings, a task that India embarked upon right after independence.
It may be a difficult truth to accept, but it is by burying their differences and joining hands, that both India and Pakistan can best strengthen their positions in the international arena. Such a strategy may still seem a long way off. But it is only by putting their rivalry behind them, and focusing on economic development, that Islamabad will emerge as a regional player, rather than just a superpower pawn, and that India will satisfy its legitimate aspiration to be recognised as a world power in its own right.
