– Col RP Shrivastava (Retd) –
Human civilization has grown steadfastly over centuries making life much comfortable today. Sadly, a sizeable population still remains deprived of fruits of this growth which, of course, is shameful and needs to be taken care of.
From the days of “ Jiski Lathiuski Bhains” (amounting to “He rules who carries a Baton/Stick”), the human societies grew into larger, somewhat better organized and more accountable administrative entities like Jamindars/ Landlords, Kingdoms and Countries with the passage of time. Yet, all along the history of mankind, WILL of certain individuals has ruled over all their subjects till the concept of Democracy dawned-in and participation of masses in deciding their own future became fairly more transparent and visible. Although, it is true only for more enlightened, affluent and informed societies, while most democracies in third world are still governed like traditional Kings and Monarchs.
In the mean time, phenomenal growth of Science and Technology from historical invention of ‘a Wheel’ to present day boom in ‘Electronic Science’ has indeed done wonders in all walks of human life, be it House Building to Aviation, Transportation to Medical Support, Home Appliances to Communication, Entertainment to Information Technology and whatever you can think of.
But, the picture is not just as rosy as it appears. This growth story is incomplete without recall of horrifying atomic explosions of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, without remembering the martyrs of 9/11, without mention of massacre of innumerable gas chamber victims in Hitler’s captivity. Inspiteof all these and more human errors, even now the danger of large scale destruction looms large with stockpiling of nuclear weapons alone (just to name only one grey area) with select nations which is good enough to wipe out life from our lovely planet many times over.
Sheer imagination of such weapons falling in the hands of terrorists or some rogue states (No names yet!) is simply spine chilling. And such a situation is not just a figment of wild imagination. It may only be a matter of time, but is simply inevitable in today’s world order where political and national interests remain supreme over interests of global humanity. Attempt of leakage of sensitive nuclear weapon technology by the ill-famous top Pakistaninuclear scientist Abdul QadeerKhan, is just an indication / testimony of this fact. Worse still, more and more nations, some with suspected credibility, are striving hard and are in great haste to acquire weapons of mass destruction alongwith intercontinental launching systems. As the nuclear club increases, will it really be possible to check nuclear proliferation with conflicting interests of different countries?
That be that, can the inevitable holocaust be avoided? How?
As always, if there is a problem – there is a solution. But time is at premium lest it gets too late. Here are a few suggestions :-
Sovereignty of Nations :- The Sovereignty of individual nations was intended to avoid interference in affairs of others and also to extend free hand to each country to effectively fulfill aspirations of their people based on their respective cultural values, religious beliefs and local conditions. That was the time when any country could not have jeopardised the very existence of the humanity as a whole, except for limited effects of wars. Now, with evolution of intercontinental ballistic missiles of unprecedented and unimaginable accuracies and capability to carry nuclear, biological and chemical warheads of phenomenal destructive powers, all the borders have become penetrable inspite of tall claims of development of mechanisms for timely interception by some high tech nations. Hence the time is now ripe to have a relook at the existing world order and evolve a safer governing system for the planet as a whole. Creation of United Nations was an attempt in this direction, but it has fallen to the ‘Big Brother’ attitude of some of the powers that be. The solution lies in ‘Our Globe’ philosophy and thinking beyond ‘Our National Interests’ ideology particularly in respect of dispute management and weaponry of mass destruction. Individual countries need to be disarmed of such weapons. Authority to safeguard, preserve, develop, improve, destroy or use them (in exceptional conditions) needs to be vested in global bodies of broader base formed out of various democratic nations and thus, ensuring global participation in safety of all, rising above the narrow national concept. Obviously strict, rigid and transparent working mechanism will have to be developed for this global body. To keep it from undue influence of some, all participating nations must agree to shed off certain percentage of their GDP towards such an entity in exchange of safety from global holocaust, similar to the income tax paid by individuals or corporates for developmental activities. Considering huge expenses on defence by individual nations, this contribution will ultimately work out pretty economical.
Strengthen Democracy :- Strength of a real democracy is the public at large, more so those who are weakest either financially, educationally or socially. Their enlightenment and awareness of Govt’s functioning or inactivity is the essential requirement for ensuring a responsible Govt, re-electing or rejecting an existing establishment, and to monitor it’s performance continually. In present day scenario, dissemination of information is largely in the hands of national governments or the large corporate houses which again are susceptible to manipulation by the governments of the day. Thus the people invariably get a biased, one sided opinion on issues of vital significance, which is grossly inappropriate for flourishing democratic governance. A classic case is that of suppressing the names of those who amassed huge black money in foreign banks by the Indian Govt. These names have been intimated by the swissGovt to their Indian Counterparts,but Indian Govt is now hiding these names from Indian public – the real owner of all that wealth, under the garb of some international agreement. Question remains as to who gave this authority to the Govt to negotiate international agreements to keep the real masters in the dark.
Similar mis-information or dis-information are often resorted to in relation to foreign affairs. More so, in cases of un-friendly neighbours. While the people of two un-friendly nations would love to live in peace and save infructuous budgets on hostile and dominating activities in favour of growth oriented programs, the Govts would often generate tensions to exploit the patriotic sentiments of their people invariably to distract public attention from some or the other sensitive issues of immediate concern or to cover up their glaring failures.
Surprisingly, the solutions to such seemingly complex problems are rather simple. Common public is the master of any democracy. “Trust in their judgement” is the essence of democracy. Just reinforce that trust, honour and respect their judgement. To attain this goal, Let all countries expose their people to at least 2 telecasts of the neighbouring countries. One, their national news channel and the other, most popular channel as per annual viewership survey. Trust you me, public will reject all the garbage, will be better informed hence shall participate more keenly in democratic affairs especially in respect of any international disputes. Finally and even more importantly, the Governments will become more responsible and transparent.
Criminalisation in Politics :- Politicians at all levels are undisputedly the most power wielding lot. And so should they be. But in absence of any responsibility and accountability, the very noble and honest idea of democracy has been hijacked by criminals who now form a large section of these politicians. They ought to be decent, knowledgeable, honest and perfect gentlemen with unflinching integrity and sincere desire to serve the people to ensure that the fruits of democratic governance reach all, specially the most needy population. They can’t be greedy, power hungry men with criminal backgrounds. As a step in that direction, anyone with a pending charge sheet against him must be debarred from contesting any election or hold any public office. To obviate any possible motivated/ political vendetta, such people may, at best, be allowed one year’s time to expedite settlement of any allegations in the charge sheet and come out clean failing which they should simply seize to hold any public office or contest any elections. This one step alone can change the dirty face of politics. Thus, with decent people in authority, the world would become a better, safer and prospering place to live in.
People may initially disapproveor reject these ideas as theoretical, but so was it when changes from ‘JiskiLathiUskiBhains’ to ‘Concept of Democracy’ were delvedupon. But a truthful, honest and good-for-all idea can’t be suppressed for long. If you like the concept, just say so and s pread the word. Don’t ever bother it’s practicality. No one can stop it’s implementation.
Wish you all Happiness, Peace and Prosperity
Col R P Shrivastava (Retd)
I completed my degree in Civil Engineering from Maulana Azad College of Technology Bhopal (Then an REC and now an NIT) in 1975 and joined the Indian Armed Forces soon after in the Corps of Engineers. I retired in 2011 and am settled at Jabalpur (M.P.)
Having had a fairly good exposure over far and wide spreads of the country during my job with Indian Army and to the national and international events by virtue of my service in various capacities, I feel it’s time to payback to the society by sharing my views based on such this experience and close observation of functioning of various Govt/ Non Govt bodies for betterment of the society. I have been therefore writing on blogs and also contributing to the proceedings of the ‘Society for Brotherhood and Peace’ towards this end.
While it is unquestionable that the growth has been continual and phenomenal over past decades and centuries, it is equally true that benefits have reached only to a small slot at the top specially in developing and under-developed nations. I strongly feel that a large segment of society is left out to fend for themselves with the dawn of the era of globalisation and industrialisation which is oriented towards greater profit making at the cost of the huge deprived/ under-privileged class who also should get opportunity to grow, participate in developmental policies and planning and thus tap the immense human resource creatively.
Contact : +91-9713255369 (Mob); 0761-2627202 (Home)
Email :rpshri@yahoo.co.in
*Disclaimer : The views expressed by the author in this feature are entirely his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of INVC .
