Takes on Montek Ahluwalia!
The targets and the implications of his open talk can’t be missed!
Kamal Nath has now spoken out. So openly. He is perhaps one of the first to reflect the frustrations of the aam aadmi with the way the UPA-II is dithering. The media, we mean ,the rather discerning media and the very few discerning, not obliging establishment media barons, media commentators have noted the rather purposeless exercise of power by the Prime Minister and his too many advisers and the end result is as one leading commentator called “a year of living indecisively”.
Some of the fruits of indecisions are the series of setbacks and the scandals that marked the one year regime of the UPA-II.
Word smiths and word players may find unending use of words and phrases to describe the current polity and the exercise of power. Some have called it as structural weaknesses, the existence of the dual centres of power, two power centres etc.
Even the new creation of the National Advisory Council is looked upon with much skepticism, an NAC, now? At this juncture of so much confusion and lackluster performance.
Every other minister has something to give positively, we have to acknowledge. But at the same time every other major minister also has much to account for. As Mr.M.J.Akbar, the veteran editor has commented
I think Kamal Nath has done a signal service to the country. He has exposed the weakness of the present regime.
There has to be a mid-course correction in the present ruling combine.
There are signs the PMO is weakening in its performance index.
There are too many armchair advisers near the PMO if not near the PM himself.
As another commentator has noted there are some recognisable eight committees and others around the PM.
Some of the unknown committees that are named in the commentary are the Prime Minister’s Council on Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, MSMEs, quite a mouthful!
As the commentator notes there is practically no news about what this MSMEs committee has done so far. So too the other ones, put in a series, the Delivery Monitoring Unit, The PM’s National Skills Development, Trade and Economic Relations Committee, with all the private sector heavy weights, the PM’s Trade and Industry council and, one on PM’s Council on Climate Change, with 26 members, the last but the most talked about and reported about is the PM’s Economic Advisory Council, the last but the most powerful seems to be the latest headed by Sonia Gandhi, the national Advisory Council, with a heavy budget and large number of members.
With all these heavy weight around his neck, what the Prime Minister has done so far?
It might sound uncharitable to pick the most sensitive issues involved here. But a national duty, in the public interest calls for some reflections.
A government, any government must be driven by some shared vision, shared ideals and beliefs.
There is public uneasiness and some disillusion with the performance of this government. There is so much corruption at the top of the hierarchy.
There is no concern or mention of this topic.
The Prime Minister or Sonia Gandhi or for that matter, the other member of the too, namely Mr.Rahul Gandhi, have not talked about what is agitating the public mind.
Corruption, at the top is what is causing so much unease.
Some of the key ministers, ministries are directly accused by such high level corruption.
We need not mention the ministers or ministries. Any visitor, from the humble to the powerful person or persons to the Central government offices today can certify how the corruption prevails so pervasively in the Central government offices. This is a very unpleasant topic and so we too don’t want to dwell any further
In our perception, this speaks for the poor image of this otherwise well-meaning and well-intended government.
Then comes the dual centre of power issue.
We must reduce the dual and rival centres of power and decsion making.
One first obvious step seems to be to bring in Mr.Rahul Gandhi into the government at once. It looks so obvious and so inevitable and so do it now.
Rahul Gandhi even as a member of the Cabinet would surely restore some hope and some confidence that things would improve further, it won’t deteriorate at any case.
So, the first step seems obvious and some additions and if not eliminations could restore some balance.
There are so many portfolios are also kept vacant. One obvious case is that of culture. Please for heaven’s sake fill up the vacancies in the government. Here too we restrain from going into some of the badly managed sectors, for instance, like archeology and our museums.
The one sector we have not touched is the state of the Indian National Congress.
The party is not full of talents or capabilities. It is the reverse.
So, democratise the party units in the states. The party at the Centre also needs some new talent centres. Create some cells, for drawing up new ideas for new policies. One or two is enough. For IT applications, foreign affairs, one for even ideology R&D etc.
The party units, the PCCs must be democratised and the independent observers to the states too must be specially and carefully chosen. To add on to the burdens of people already are ministers is not delivering results.
What is the point of denominating the same persons, known corrupt names in the respective states? So on and on…
Image source : flickr.com