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ShareThe images of underclad, impoverished tribals flaunting their power do not trigger the same revulsion as those of armed religious fanatics at a hate fest. The reaction to tribal excesses in the forested nooks of the country thus remains muted, reflecting to some extent our own moral dilemma about the existential issues at ground zero.
The images tug at our sense of fairness and justice, unlike religion which draws out raw and irrational passion. What is more important, they appeal to our own sense of powerlessness. It's a sticky situation out there. People trusted to be innocent and unobtrusive are waging a war against their own government. And politicians, as usual, are taking the flak.
Maoists are around to add fuel to the fire. But are we missing a deeper malaise here? Have we studied the culpability of the role played by the bureaucracy in this well enough? Admitted, it is cumbersome to see politicians separated from the bureaucracy, but when Maoist-backed tribals abduct and eliminate policemen, attack police stations and flaunt primitive weapons in a show of strength, it is not the policeman per se that is the target. It is what he represents: the bureaucracy and its overwhelming power, not exactly the politicians.
The role of the bureaucracy behind the tribal alienation in post-Independence India has been consistently underestimated. Manned by educated people, and with incredible reach and resources, it could have been catalytic in changing India. But it has not. Blame it on the lack of drive and enough good intention, but what it has turned out to be is a behemoth inspiring awe and fear rather than an engine driving progress.
Think of the sense of helplessness as you walk into an office. When the indifferent babu keeps you waiting, makes you cower and dismisses you like a fly on his tea cup, it is the system you end up cursing. A smattering of English and some name-dropping does help here, but it leaves your self-esteem seriously dented. Imagine being a tribal with little knowledge of the required officialese and walking into an office anywhere in India.
It's the arrogance that is galling. If you put into this perspective India's land reform records and failure of the delivery mechanism in all forms in hilly areas and throw in the industry obsession of governments and the consequent land acquisition threats, the resultant anger should not be difficult to understand.
In the bureaucratic pantheon, even the smallest deities wield incredible power. The peon -- let us call him the god of the gateway -- for instance controls your access to the officer. The clerk is easily the deity of the files and the master of the red tape and this is just the bottom of the hierarchy.
Add up all the powers of all the deities in the pantheon and put in the immunities they enjoy. Then compare it with the aggregate of powers that ordinary individuals have. What you have is a proverbial David versus Goliath situation, where Goliath calls all the shots.
In this Kafkaesque scenario, few barring the rich and otherwise powerful, come
out unscathed. Indeed, this has been going on for so long that the present fightback should not look unexpected. It should not be surprising too if the rural India erupts someday. Call it the revenge of the fringe -- fringe as defined by the relative distance from power. And what if the struggle moves from the edges to the Centre, to the state and national capitals?
As non-participant observers, we will still be in a moral bind, caught in the fairness-justice debate. Is the situation inevitable? Given that the same constants -- bureaucratic apathy, arrogance and power -- are still in play, the answer is yes.
In the 'us versus them' matrix in the hinterland, Maoists are incidental. Till the power equations remain unchanged, people will always turn to outfits professing to be sympathetic to them. This scenario makes the efficacy of any harsh and punitive action against the tribals highly suspect.
Is there a way out? Yes. De-power the bureaucracy or at least redistribute power to make people less respectful to it. This entails dismantling of the pantheon and doing away with the small gods. It is necessary because it is alienating the very people it is supposed to serve, creating enemies everywhere. Transferring political power to people is useful but limited in impact; it still does not diminish the power of the bureaucracy.
The current exigency calls for introspection. Poverty is something people can live with, but not indignity.
