Editorial, "POLITICS OF ANARCHY" in LAW ANIMATED WORLD, 31 January 2015, Vol. 11, Part 1, No. 2 issue.

POLITICS OF ANARCHY

seems to be prevalent in the State of Telangana day in and day out right from its inception and that has turned now into a kind of mental disorder with all sorts of crazy schemes being mooted by the chauvinist, eccentric Chief Minister who is acting as though the state is his personal fief. Whereas our Constitution exhorts all citizens ‘to develop the scientific temper, humanism and the spirit of inquiry and reform’, this gentleman decides to abandon the grand Secretariat buildings in the prime location of Hyderabad perched amidst the scenic beauty of the majestic Hussain Sagar Lake for what primarily stings to him as ‘vaastu dosha’ [errors of (quack) architecture] to the Erragadda Chest Hospital venue depriving the denizens with much lung-space and direly needed health facilities already existing there. And still there is no dearth of ‘Doo Doo Basavannas’ [ready nod-heads] among a substantial section of populace fired with the passions of regional chauvinism. It is forgotten that decades ago superstitious renovations of the present Secretariat Buildings had been initiated by his political guru NTR himself and ever since going on under various Chief Ministers resulting in wasteful expenditure of crores of rupees of public moneys every time and now the Sishya [disciple] wants to do one or two up on his guru by totally discarding the site itself – perhaps with a hidden agenda of turning it over to greedy real estate dealers fetching the corrupt politicians hundreds of crores of commissions and kickbacks as is being widely rumored. And precisely those sections of society donning black coats and white bands who are expected to protect and promote the rule of law and safeguard people’s interests are seen marching in the streets defying and shutting down the courts of law in the name of agitation for a separate High Court for Telangana which, in any way, is to happen once the common capital facility is exhausted – all this ostensibly for a few judgeships supposedly denied to their lot. All this despite the existence of specific provisions for a common High Court in the A.P. Reorganization Act 2014 per Article 231 of the Constitution of India and the continuance of such common High Court being of real benefit to the masses and classes [including advocates] of Telangana. §§§

OCCUPY ILLEGALLY ENCROACHED AND BUILT BUNGALOWS ON KRISHNA RIVER BANK!

PEOPLE! OCCUPY ILLEGALLY ENCROACHED AND BUILT BUNGALOWS ON KRISHNA RIVER BANK! START THE OCCUPY BUNGALOWS MOVEMENT IN TELUGU LAND!

If poor and deprived people occupy small plots of 50-200 sq yards for residential and living purposes that is treated as a crime and they are mercilessly evicted even after decades of residence and building their homes. But it seems all is proper and legal for these BADA BABUS who encroach and occupy thousands of square yards and build big bungalows to live in luxurious conditions.

So I give a call to all poor and deprived people. Go in thousands and lakhs and forcibly OCCUPY THE ILLEGALLY BUILT KRISHNA RIVER BANK ENCROACHMENT BUNGALOWS!

I know I have no party or following but as a conscientious democratic progressive secular citizen I think my call will have some value and some influence. If it carries, I will be very much pleased.

I. MALLIKARJUNA SHARMA, Advocate
Editor, LAW ANIMATED WORLD, Hyderabad.

Editorial, "The World Bows in Reverence" - in LAW ANIMATED WORLD, 15 January 2015, Vol. 11, Part 1, No. 1 issue

THE WORLD BOWS IN REVERENCE

to the intrepid French Martyrs – the Editor, cartoonists, press staff and Ahmed (the Muslim policeman), the twelve apostles for liberty – who laid down their lives in the dastardly terrorist attack on 7 January 2015 by two religious fanatic gunmen in Paris, supposedly belonging to the dreaded terrorist organization, al-Qaeda. More than three million people including 40 world leaders led by the French President, François Hollande, and including the leaders of both the warring states – Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel and Mohammed Abbas of Palestinian Authority – paid glowing tributes in Paris to the memory of these martyrs, particularly the fearless editor ‘Charb’ and other cartoonists of Charlie Hebdo - many of them atheist leftists, who persevered in their struggle for liberty amidst all death threats. The fanatics forgot to note that any religion and any community culture has to keep pace with changing times and cannot and should not stick to its old rigid customs, traditions, etc. which have become a big fetter and burden for its progress as also to the rest of humanity. Some people do think Mohammed might have been progressive in some respects but was also regressive in other respects, like in hating polytheism, in concentrating on jihads, and his treatment of Jews, kafirs, etc. So, some reformers/critics may begin with and persist in criticism or even mockery of this prophet himself. Anyway, depiction of Mohammed’s figure was not an offence, let alone a sacrilege, even in early Islamic times as a number of paintings of that period, officially encouraged and exhibited, show. So, if some journals make a mockery of Mohammed – especially if they are by non-Muslims – there is no need for Muslim orthodox to be so irate and jerky. They should learn to take it all as a part of the process for securing and enjoying more and more freedom of speech and human rights in present times that includes freedom to offend even. In extreme cases of hate-speech/arts, they can take resort to statutory provisions in the laws of the land [in which they reside] for stringent/needed action against persons committing such offences rather than resort to wild shouting and ruthless killings. We join the millions in the world paying tributes to the Charlie Hebdo martyrs and vow to fight for freedom of speech and expression.  §§§

Editorial, A THINK TANK MINUS PLANNING, in LAW ANIMATED WORLD, 31-12-2014 issue, Vol. 10, Part 2, No. 24

A THINK TANK MINUS PLANNING

The idea of a centralized planning for India originated in the course of our freedom struggle with Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, elected as Congress President amidst fierce opposition from Gandhi himself, setting up a National Planning Committee in the 1938 Haripura Congress sessions, interestingly, with Jawaharlal Nehru as Chairman. Post-independence, Nehru set up the Planning Commission as a non-statutory advisory body in 1950 to fulfill the obligations under the directive principles embodied in Article 38 of the Constitution. Ever since we have gone through 12 five year plans framed basically with the idea and vision that it is the State sector that has to play a pivotal and driving role in our economy and also to ensure the citizens a minimum level of comfortable living with the constitutionally guaranteed freedoms. It was no surprise that with our Constitution itself formulated as a basically unitary structure, the Commission should boil down to a centralized and bureaucratic structure much to the dismay of state units. However, the National Development Council that was there since 1952 was a bit vitalized and an Inter-State Council was also formed in 1990, under the authority of Article 263 - these to an extent intended to mollify the hurt sentiments of the state units and give them more say in national economic development. But we had come to a strange pass where constitutional chiefs of governments of states had to virtually beg the planning bureaucrats for more funds, allocations, etc. and Montek declaring poverty line at mere Rs. 28/- per day! Further, the private sector has progressed by leaps and bounds with market economy taking a major, domineering role. Within four months of his coming to power, the new Premier has announced the decision to scrap the Planning Commission and now wants to give the new year gift of this NITI (National Institute for Transforming India) Aayog, again a non-statutory body, defined as a ‘think tank’, declaring it would be a model of ‘cooperative federalism’ but which seems too unwieldy as also a repetition exercise. In our opinion, it would have been better to revamp the Planning Commission and make it a useful adjunct to the Inter-State Council, enlarging the powers and duties of the Council, than take such a drastic course which seems mainly intended to vigorously push the greedy corporate agenda and may not benefit the masses in general any much. §§§

Wish you a Happy New Year and Prosperous Pongal (Sankranti) 2015!

Editorial, A FRIEND, PHILOSOPHER AND GUIDE, in LAW ANIMATED WORLD, 15 December 2014 issue, Vol. 10, Part 2, No. 23

A FRIEND, PHILOSOPHER AND GUIDE

of all of us liberty-lovers and rights-buffs is no more now. Justice Krishna Iyer, was all along his life, an indomitable fighter for humane socialism, an indefatigable human rights activist and a world-famous jurist. This editor very much remembers his kind and cooperative attitude towards all things progressive and gratefully recollects how he has been very much associated with the activities of the Marxist Study Forum convened by this editor and came at his own expense to Hyderabad to inaugurate a national seminar on Revolution and Socialism held by the Forum in November 1996. In his illuminating foreword to the first volume of this editor’s 'In Retrospect' [Sagas of heroism and sacrifice of Indian revolutionaries during freedom struggle] he had paid tributes to the “glorious procession of self-sacrificing spirits with radical vision and liberationist passion who lit the flame of struggle for Indian independence,” acknowledged that “our freedom from foreign rule is mainly achieved thanks to immense sacrifices and matchless acts of [heroism] by innumerable national revolutionaries. Even the non-violent movement under Mahatma Gandhi’s hegemony derived its inspiration and potential for success from the great who were tortured and hanged;” and finally expressed his parting poignant thought that “Had the succeeding Left activists, nationalist politicos and crowd of socialist pretenders kept alive a spark of the vision, mission and passion of the galaxy of revolutionaries covered in this book [Bhagat Singh and his ilk rising against all forms colonial], the merchants of money-making, seat-seeking enterprise and brokers of power would not have promoted the moral collapse and re-colonization collaboration we behold now in operation in India. India’s enemies are as much within as without.” He always lived up to the views, ideals and duties as mentioned succinctly in those lines. This editor particularly acknowledges his valuable aid in consenting to be one of our editorial advisers and contributing several educative articles for publication in this journal. We mourn his demise very much, but he lived a full and complete life and fell like a ripe fruit. As the great sloka runs: "Jaatasya hi dhruvo mrutyuh, Dhruvam janma mrutasyaca, tasmaad aparihaaryarthea na tvam Sochitumarhasi" - that way one should not worry too much and certainly 'he will be reborn' i.e. the zeal and spirit of service to humanity he cherished and displayed will always be living and his inspiration will give birth to innumerable activists for the cause of human rights and social justice and to achieve the ideal of humanitarian democratic socialism.   §§§

Editorial, LESSONS OF OCTOBER, in 15 November 2014 October Revolution Special issue, Vol. 10, Part 2, No. 21 issue

LESSONS OF OCTOBER

In his historic polemic under this caption Leon Trotsky might have dealt mainly with the course of the proletarian revolution as it was then rife in Russia, on the genius of a Lenin who could gauge the real heat of the then convulsions to make a sudden shift in the leader party’s line and steer it toward victory in the revolution, as also warned against right deviationist, oppressive policies and measures of certain sections of revolutionaries themselves, etc. but here we are more concerned with the great lessons that historic Socialist Revolution left for the humankind as a whole. It was this revolution which for the first time in the world decisively overthrew and declared the demise of the then rampant coarse capitalist development modes in Russia and other backward regions under its control and ushered in a real rule of the masses – a sort of democratic dictatorship of the workers and peasants. New forms of state organization were developed, universal adult franchise for all including women and discriminated races and tribes was granted; the entire land was nationalized but mainly distributed to the poor and needy among the peasantry while protecting the interests of the non-exploitative sections too. All the industries nationalized and collective property made the chief norm with private property confined to personal assets that ought not to allow for exploitation of other humans. The get-rich-quick-anyhow mentality was decried and universal social welfare declared as the prime motif of the revolution. Stupendous efforts were made by the ruling party as well as the dedicated masses for war against counter revolutionary forces and for socialist construction on a gigantic scale and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics emerged as the brilliant beacon for the toilng people all over the world and as a bastion for the fighting forces against all forms of oppression and injustices in all countries. Colonialism was unequivocally condemned and pre & post World War II we saw the enormous contributions of the USSR for the defeat of Fascism and end of colonialism. Of course, totalitarian excesses did occur with not proletarian democracy but a new form of oppression and suppression of human rights and initiatives thriving in the garb of state socialism and all that, with the changing circumstances, contributed to the decline and fall of the Socialist Camp. But this great experiment in human history and its glorious contributions to the cause of socialism, democracy and human welfare still serve as an undying inspiration to the people of the world who now have to take to new measures for building a humane socialist society, with guaranteed human rights and liberties, for sustainable development and universal peace. §§§

Editorial, ADVERSE CONSEQUENCES OF BIFURCATION, in 31 October 2014, Vol. 10, Part 2, No. 20 issue

ADVERSE CONSEQUENCES OF BIFURCATION

have emerged within months of the unfortunate and unwarranted partition of the Annapoorna State. As rightly forewarned by the former CM of united AP, ‘water wars (disputes)’ and ‘current kashtalu (troubles)’ are engulfing the regions, especially Telangana. For the spate of recent peasant suicides in Telangana, already commented upon in these columns earlier, the ‘current crisis’ is a main contributory factor. The excessive consumption of electricity by Telangana people is a main reason. The populist measure of free electricity to farmers has exacerbated the problem for, otherwise, the peasants would have perhaps continued or switched over to other less water-needing crops than paddy – for the cultivation of which these plateau lands, but for the supply of irrigation facilities at enormous cost, are not that suited. Well, the crisis has also brought to notice the phenomenal development of electricity generation in Telangana which shows no discrimination but more favor to this region in the united State. Except for the private power plants and non-conventional and renewable energy sources, all other power indicators in Telangana show high rise – it now possesses 6251.3 MW out of 12425.3 MW i.e. 50.3% of such electricity production of the united AP, and a disproportionately high share in power from hydel sector and central power generating stations [with but 42% of the total population in the united State]. However, the Goebbelsian propaganda by the separatists, continuing to this day, has depicted as if great injustices are, and are still being, done to Telangana in this sphere also – mainly to divert attention from real solutions to which they might not have even applied their minds properly. It is to be stressed that from the very low level of energy consumption with only 11 villages electrified [in contrast to 147 in Rayalaseema and 398 in coastal Andhra] in 1955-56, Telangana has now achieved total rural electrification even, but surely, as Gandhiji always stressed, there are not enough resources in the world to satisfy all the greed of the people. The real solution to such crisis lies not in quarrelling with the other Telugu State but cooperating in an amicable manner and, more important, concentrating on development of minor and medium irrigation schemes as are best suited to the topography and environmental conditions of this region and transforming the mode of agricultural production to one chiefly attuned to cultivation of semi-arid regional crops [metta pantalu], horticulture, floriculture, etc. §§§