India After Independence: 1947-2000 (26 page)

A major weakness that crept in was the decline in educational standards. Despite recognition of the problem, except for the technology sector, the educational system was left untouched and unreformed and the quality of education continued to deteriorate, first in schools and then in colleges and universities. The ideological content of education also continued to be the same as in the colonial period.

Nehru was aware of the unsatisfactory progress in education and near the end of his prime ministership began to put greater emphasis on its development, especially of primary education, which, he now stressed,
should, be developed at any cost. ‘In the final analysis’, he wrote to the chief ministers in 1963, ‘right education open to all is perhaps the basic remedy for most of our ills.’ Also, ‘In spite of my strong desire for the growth of our industry, I am convinced that it is better to do without some industrial growth then to do without adequate education at the base.’
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Two major programmes for rural uplift, namely, the Community Development programme and Panchayati Raj, were introduced in 1952 and 1959. They were to lay the foundations of the welfare state in the villages. Though designed for the sake of agricultural development, they had more of a welfare content; their basic purpose was to change the face of rural India, to improve the quality of life of the people.

The Community Development programme was instituted on a limited scale in 1952 covering 55 development blocs, each bloc consisting of about 100 villages with a population of sixty to seventy thousand. By the mid-sixties most of the country was covered by a network of community blocs, employing more than 6,000 Block Development Officers (BDOs) and over 600,000 Village Level Workers (VLWs or Gram Sewaks ) to help implement the programme. The programme covered all aspects of rural life from improvement in agricultural methods to improvement in communications, health and education.

The emphasis of the programme was on self-reliance and self-help by the people, popular participation and responsibility. It was to be basically a people’s movement for their own welfare. As Nehru stated at the very outset of the programme in 1952, the basic objective was ‘to unleash forces from below among our people.’ While it was ‘necessary to plan, to direct, to organize and to coordinate; but it [was] even more necessary to create conditions in which a spontaneous growth from below [was] possible.’ While material achievements were expected, the programme was much more geared ‘to build up the community and the individual and to make the latter a builder of his own village centre and of India in the larger sense.’ ‘The primary matter is the human being involved,’ he added. Another major objective was to uplift the backward sections: ‘We must aim at progressively producing a measure of equality in opportunity and other things.’
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In 1952 and in the later years, Nehru repeatedly referred to the Community Development programme and the accompanying National Extension Service as representing ‘new dynamism’ and a ‘great revolution.’ and as ‘symbols of the resurgent spirit of India.’
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The programme achieved considerable results in extension work: better seeds, fertilizers, and so on, resulting in agricultural development in general and greater food production, in particular, construction of roads, tanks and walls, school and primary health centre buildings, and extension of educational and health facilities. Initially, there was also a great deal of popular enthusiasm, which, however, petered out with time.
It soon became apparent that the programme had failed in one of its basic objectives—that of involving the people as full participants in developmental activity. Not only did it not stimulate self-help, it increased expectations from and reliance on the government. It gradually acquired an official orientation, became part of the bureaucratic framework and came to be administered from above as a routine activity with the BDOs becoming replicas of the traditional sub-divisional officers and the Village Level Workers becoming administrative underlings. As Nehru put it later in 1963, while the entire programme was designed to get the peasant ‘out of the rut in which he has been living since ages past,’ the programme itself ‘has fallen into a rut.’
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The weaknesses of the programme had come to be known as early as 1957 when the Balwantrai Mehta Committee, asked to evaluate it, had strongly criticized its bureaucratization and its lack of popular involvement. As a remedy, the Committee recommended the democratic decentralization of the rural and district development administration. On the Committee’s recommendation, it was decided to introduce, all over the country, an integral system of democratic self-government with the village panchayat at its base. The new system, which came to be known as Panchayati Raj and was implemented in various states from 1959, was to consist of a three-tier, directly elected village or gram panchayats, and indirectly elected bloc-level panchayat samitis and district-level zilla parishads. The Community Development programme was to be integrated with the Panchayati Raj; considerable functions, resources and authority were to be devolved upon the three-tiered samitis to carry out schemes of development. Thus, the Panchayati Raj was intended to make up a major deficiency of the Community Development programme by providing for popular participation in the decision-making and implementation of the development process with the officials working under the guidance of the three-level samitis. Simultaneously, the countryside was covered by thousands of cooperative institutions such as cooperative banks, land mortgage banks and service and market cooperatives, which were also autonomous from the bureaucracy as they were managed by elected bodies.

Nehru’s enthusiasm was once again aroused as Panchayati Raj and cooperative institutions represented another radical step for change in society. They would transfer responsibility for development and rural adi-ninistration to the people and accelerate rural development. They would thus let as instruments for the empowerment of the people and would not only lead to greater self-reliance, but would also act as an educative tool, for bringing about a change in the outlook of the people. Above all, they would initiate the process of creating better human beings.

However, these hopes were belied. Though adopting Panchayati Raj in one form or another, the state governments showed little enthusiasm for it, devolved no real power on the panchayati samitis, curbed their powers and functions and starved them of funds. The bureaucracy too did not slacken its grip on rural administration at different levels. Panchayats were also politicized and used by politicians to gather factional support in the
villages. As a result, though foundations of a system of rural local self-government were laid, democratic decentralization as a whole was stunted and could not perform the role assigned to it by the Balwantrai Mehta Committee and Jawaharlal Nehru.

Moreover, the benefits of community development, new agricultural inputs and the extension services were mostly garnered by the rich peasants and capitalist farmers, who also came to dominate the Panchayati Raj institutions. The basic weakness of the Community Development programme, the Panchayati Raj and the cooperative movement was that they ignored the class division of the rural society where nearly half the population was landless or had marginal holdings and was thus quite powerless. The village was dominated socially and economically by the capitalist farmers and the rich and middle peasantry; and neither the dominant rural classes nor the bureaucrats could become agents of social transformation or popular participation.

India’s efforts to pursue an independent foreign policy was a highlight of post-1947 politics. A product of its long history and recent past, this policy was marked by a great deal of consistency and continuity. Despite revolutionary changes in the international situation, the broad parameters which were evolved during the freedom struggle and in the early years of independence still retain their validity. Jawaharlal Nehru stands as the architect of this not mean achievement. He realized that given her great civilization, India could not but aspire to the right to speak in her own voice. Her recent, hard-won freedom from the colonial yoke would also be meaningless unless it found expression in the international arena. Being subcontinental in size, too, ruled out an assumption of client status for India. An independent voice was not merely a choice, it was an imperative.

It was Nehru who gave this voice a shape in the form of the idea of non-alignment and an organizational cohesion through the non-aligned movement. The immediate context for emergence of this movement was the division of the world into two hostile blocs after World War II, one led by the US and the western powers and the other by the Soviet Union. Nehru’s understanding was that newly independent, poor countries of Asia and Africa had nothing to gain and everything to lose by falling for the temptation of joining the military blocs of the big powers. They would end up being used as pawns in contests for power of no relevance to them. Their needs were to fight poverty, and illiteracy and disease, and these could not be met by joining military blocs. On the contrary, India and other similarly placed countries needed peace and quiet to get on with the business of development. Their interests lay in expanding the ‘area of peace’, not of war, or hostility. India, therefore, neither joined nor approved of the Baghdad Pact, the Manila Treaty, SEATO, and CENTO which joined the countries of West and East Asia to the western power bloc.

But India went far beyond just neutrality or staying out of military
blocs. Nehru was quick to reject the charge of ‘immoral neutrality’ hurled at India by John Foster Dulles. Non-alignment meant having the freedom to decide each issue on its merits, to weigh what was right or wrong and then take a stand in favour of right. To quote:
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So far as all these evil forces of fascism, colonialism and racialism or the nuclear bomb and aggression and suppression are concerned, we stand most emphatically and unequivocally committed against them . . . We are unaligned only in relation to the cold war with its military pacts. We object to all this business of forcing the new nations of Asia and Africa into their cold war machine. Otherwise, we are free to condemn any development which we consider wrong or harmful to the world or ourselves and we use that freedom every time the occasion arises.

Non-alignment came to symbolize the struggle of India and other newly-independent nations to retain and strengthen their independence from colonialism and imperialism. India being the first to become independent, rightly gave the lead to other ex-colonies in this respect. And collectively these nations counted for a great deal. In the UN. for example, whose membership had swollen with their entry, the one country, one vote system enabled the non-aligned bloc, often helped by the Soviets, to check domination by the western bloc. Non-alignment, thus advanced the process of democratization of international relations.

A basic objective of Indian foreign policy, that of extending support to colonial and ex-colonial countries in their struggle against colonialism, was well served by the policy of non-alignment. Another objective, that of promoting world peace, was also facilitated by it. Nehru’s passionate opposition to war and the threat of nuclear conflict which loomed large after Hiroshima is well known. It grew out of his experience of non-violent struggle and his conviction in Gandhi who had resolved to make it his mission to fight and outlaw the atom bomb. Inspired by Gandhi, and supported by great intellectuals like Einstein and Bertrand Russell, Nehru made it India’s role to place the goal of peace, nuclear and general disarmament before the world.

At about this time when Nehru was pointing out the dangers of world extinction through nuclear conflict, Chairman Mao, it is believed, told Nehru in a conversation that a future nuclear war was only another stage in the inevitable march towards socialism, and that if 300 million Chinese died in it, another 300 million would survive! Nehru constantly emphasized that peaceful co-existence of countries with different ideologies, differing systems, was a necessity and believed that nobody had a monopoly on the truth and pluralism was a fact of life. To this end he outlined the five principles of peaceful coexistence, or Panch Sheel, for conducting relations among countries. These were mutual respect for each other’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, non-aggression, non-interference in each other’s internal affairs, equality and mutual benefit, and peaceful co-existence.

While Nehru tirelessly articulated his ideas about international conduct of nations in every available forum, there were some landmark moments in his quest. Before independence, in March 1947, at his inspiration, an Asian Relations Conference attended by more than twenty countries was held in Delhi. The tone of the conference was Asian independence and assertion on the world stage. While this conference concerned itself with general issues, the next one was called in response to a very specific problem: the Dutch attempt to re-colonize Indonesia in December 1948. Nehru invited states bordering the Indian Ocean, and most Asian countries as well as Australia came. The conference resolved to deny all facilities to Dutch shipping, and sent its resolutions to the UN. Within a week the Security Council resolved that a ceasefire be declared, and the Indonesian national government be restored. The de-colonization initiative was carried forward further at the Asian leaders’ conference in Colombo in 1954 and the Afro-Asian conference called by India and other Colombo powers in Bandung, Indonesia, in 1955. The conference was also a precursor to the Belgrade Non-aligned Conference, as it passed resolutions on world peace and the dangers of nuclear weapons. The pinnacle of Nehru’s efforts was reached in 1961 when he stood with Nasser of Egypt and Tito of Yugoslavia to call for nuclear disarmament and peace in Belgrade. By now he was convinced that the remanents of colonialism would give way soon and the next challenge the world faced was that of preventing a nuclear war.

A major function of Indian foreign policy was to promote and protect Indian economic interests and to facilitate her on the path that she had chosen for herself. Non-alignment, by not tying India to any one bloc, enabled her to develop economic ties with countries on both sides of the divide as and when she needed. She needed and got capital, technology, machines and food from the western countries. She also relied, especially after 1954, on the Soviet Union for building up her public sector industries, something which the US was reluctant to do.

For military equipment, India spread her net far and wide across the ideological divide. In the Nehru years alone she bought, for example, for the Air Force, 104 Toofani aircraft from France, 182 Hunters and 80 Canberras from UK, 110 Mysters from France, 16 AN-12s and 26 Mi-4 helicopters from the Soviet Union and 55 Fairchild Packets from the US. 230 Vampire aircraft were produced under licence from UK in India. For the Navy and Army as well, similar purchases were made. In addition, efforts were made to establish a defence production base and licences were obtained from various foreign countries to produce the following equipment: Gnat interceptor aircraft from UK, HS-748 transport aircraft from UK, Allouette Helicopters from France, MiG interceptors from Soviet Union, L-70 anti-aircraft guns from Sweden, Vijayanta tanks from UK, Shaktiman trucks from Germany, Nissan one-ton truck and Jonga-jeeps from Japan, Brandt mortars from France, 106 mm recoilless guns from US, Sterling carbines from UK, wireless sets from different countries.
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The variety of sources from which defence equipment alone was
acquired shows that India succeeded in maintaining sufficiently friendly relations with a large number of countries. Spreading her net wide also ensured that excessive dependence on any one country was avoided and better bargains could be driven since potential partners knew that rivals existed. In this way, many of the inherent weaknesses of a newly independent, underdeveloped and poor country were reduced. On the same lines, India maintained an active membership of various UN bodies as well as of the IMF and the World Bank. It is no small credit to India’s economic diplomacy that she has been the biggest recipient of concessiohal funding in absolute terms (not per capita) from multilateral international agencies.

Indian foreign policy sometimes linked apparently irreconciliable goals. For example, the Soviet Union and India initiated in 1963 and signed in August 1964, August 1965 and November 1965 major arms deals by which the Soviet Union became the largest arms supplier to India and Indo-Soviet relations entered a qualitatively new phase. At the same time, India decided to adopt the Green Revolution technology for agricultural development which was backed by the US. The arms deals with the Soviet Union and the Green Revolution which led to India becoming self-sufficient in food in a few years time increased India’s capacity to stand on her own feet and take a more independent stand in world affairs. Similarly, both the US and the Soviet Union at different times agreed to be paid in rupees, thus saving India precious hard currency.

India also maintained an active profile in multilateral bodies and sought continuously to use her presence there to her advantage. Soon after independence Nehru decided to stay within the Commonwealth for this very reason. Despite strong public opinion to the contrary, he felt that once India was independent and there was no question of Britain dominating over her, India could benefit from her presence in a multinational body. Besides, membership of the Commonwealth provided a certain security in a situation when India was yet to find out who her friends (and enemies) were going to be. India also played an active role in the UN peace-keeping forces in various parts of the world, often at heavy cost to Indian lives. A closer look at some of the international situations in which India played an active part would help illustrate the complex tasks dictated by her non-aligned foreign policy.

The end of World War II left Korea divided between a Communist North controlled by the Socialist camp and a South Korea dominated by the Western powers. K.P.S. Menon, who was elected Chairman of the United Nations Commission on Korea in late 1947, had in his report to the UN
appealed ‘to the great powers to let Korea be united’, warning that else ‘Korea may blow up’
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but it was to no avail. When North Korea invaded South Korea in 1950, India-supported the US in the UN Security Council, condemning North Korea as aggressor and calling for a ceasefire. But American pleasure was soon to turn into anger when they found that India abstained from voting on another resolution calling for assistance to South Korea and the setting up of a unified command for this purpose. India’s main concern was to prevent the entry of outside powers into the conflict. Nehru appealed to Truman and Stalin and received a warm response from the latter.

But meanwhile General MacArthur, at the head of US forces under UN command, after pushing North Korean forces out of South Korea, without the approval of the UN, crossed the 38th parallel into North Korea and continued towards the Yalu river that separated Korea from China. Chou En-lai, the Chinese prime minister warned the western powers through the Indian ambassador to China, K.M. Panikkar, of retaliation, but to no avail. (India was the only link between the West and East in Peking at that time.) China thereupon sent in waves of armed ‘volunteers’ and succeeded in pushing back American troops to south of the 38th parallel, which resulted in huge Chinese, Korean and American casualties. Nehru tried again at this point to bring about an end to the war by organizing a conference but the US queered the pitch with an ill-timed UN resolution declaring China the aggressor. India voted against it because it was clearly MacArthur and not China who was the aggressor in North Korea. A military stalemate ensued but despite India’s tireless efforts it took till June 1953 to get both sides to agree to a ceasefire and evolve an acceptable formula for the repatriation of prisoners of war. It was Krishna Menon who finally succeeded in fashioning a formula that the General Assembly of the UN and, after Stalin’s death, the Soviet bloc accepted. A Neutral Nations Repatriation Commission was set up with an Indian, General Thimayya, as its Chairman, and an Indian ‘Custodian Force’ under his charge was made responsible for the difficult task of repatriation of soldiers.

The Korean war had tested India’s faith in non-alignment and commitment to peace to the utmost, and she had not been found wanting. She stoically faced first Chinese and Soviet hostility because she voted to declare North Korea the initial aggressor. She then endured American wrath for refusing to go along with western intervention in the war, and for refusing to declare China the aggressor. In the midst of this, in 1950, China invaded Tibet and annexed it without any effort to keep India in the picture. Though upset, Nehru did not allow this to influence his stand on the Korean war. India continued to press the UN to recognize and give a seat to Communist China in the Security Council, especially now that the USSR had withdrawn from it in protest. India also badly needed food aid from the US to meet the near-famine conditions at home but did not allow this to blind it to US stance in Korea. She continued to press ahead even if success was not always apparent. In the end, India’s stand was
vindicated:both sides had to recognize the same boundary they had tried to change. The world now recognized the worth of non-alignment. It was difficult to dismiss it as mealy-mouthed, cowardly neutrality or as idealist hogwash. The USSR clearly began to see India in a different light. The Soviet prime minister, Bulganin, even told the Indian ambassador, K.P.S. Menon, that the USSR ‘fully appreciated India’s position in the Commonwealth and hoped that India would continue to remain in it.’ This was a big change from the time when the membership of the Commonwealth was seen as final proof of India’s succumbing to western imperialism!