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| National Questions: Trajectories & Predicaments |
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The Northeast and Development In the context of the Northeast, and indeed several other parts of India, when one hears the term ‘development’ one cannot help shuddering. It is a euphemism for a phenomenon where contractors from outside cart away local resources for handsome profits; the carting away is facilitated by the development of ‘infrastructure’ through substantial inflows of Central government funds; and the local powerbrokers get ‘cuts’ from both the handsome profits and from the funds flowing in for ‘infrastructure’. The local people, of whom no more than a small fraction benefit from this process, are usually sullen at this intrusion from outside, and resentful at the carting away of resources; some ‘hotheads’ among them even become insurgents, but with no clearer idea of what they want, other than a general dislike of these ‘outsiders’. (Sometimes they are aided by some other bunch of ‘outsiders’ waiting in the wings). To pacify the insurgency the Central government announces ‘packages’ involving even larger amounts of funds, whose effect is to have even more of such ‘development’. And when such pacification does not work, or one group of pacified insurgents is simply replaced by another group, there is a general feeling of hurt all around: the New Delhi establishment is hurt that while ‘we do so much for them, they still do not like us’; the local people are cynical as much at the New Delhi establishment’s effort to ‘bribe’ them as at the fact that much of the ‘bribe’ gets siphoned off en route. And so the tragic cycle continues. |
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| For this reason they are both practical and impractical at the same time. They are practical enough for someone to feel tempted to try imposing them, but they are impractical in the sense that such imposition would play further havoc with the lives of the local people without achieving the desired objectives. For instance, linking up with the dynamic economies can cut both ways. It can get more investment into the region for catering to a big Asian or global market; but it can also be an instrument for local de-industrialization through the shifting of local demand from locally produced goods to imports from these dynamic Asian economies. And the region may have to pay for such imports by allowing the export of resources, either by the present contractors themselves or by contractors or capitalists from these dynamic economies who may be given a free hand in tapping such resources. In the latter case there would only have been the substitution of one set of ‘outsiders’ (from the rest of India) by another set drawn from the ASEAN. This possibility of de-industrialization through linking up with other economies is the reason why economists often insist that a condition for economic integration must be the free movement of labour within the integrated area. Of course even the satisfaction of this condition may not be enough to justify integration, since labour mobility, even when allowed legally, entails substantial tangible and intangible costs which have to be paid. But the view that merely linking up with a dynamic region would promote genuine development, or that such linking should be unambiguously welcome, cannot stand scrutiny. After all, even within these dynamic economies, there are regions of great backwardness and poverty, like the Northeast of Thailand. But it is not the specific suggestions so much as the methodology of ‘imposition’ that I wish to question. The proposal to introduce private property in land in tribal areas is one example. The point is not whether this is a good idea per se. The point is that it must be acceptable to the community in question; and even if it is acceptable, it should not become a means of allowing land to pass on eventually to the hands of unscrupulous rich buyers from outside. One may argue that since the ‘development’ of the Northeast would have to occur under the aegis of capitalism, creating the conditions for a capitalist transformation constitutes the appropriate development strategy for the Northeast; and this would necessarily have to be through impositions. But this logic is similar to what had informed the thinking of the colonial rulers and should not be replicated in today’s context, when the democratic aspirations of the people have got to be respected. To say this is not ‘reactionary’; it amounts only to a rejection of ‘social engineering’ over the heads of the people. I agree with Professor Iboton Singh’s emphasis on agriculture not only in the context of Manipur but even more generally (though I find his suggestion of a diversion of outlays from social sectors, which he considers ‘not directly productive’, unacceptable). But beyond specific agreements and disagreements, I believe that the issue of development in the Northeast cannot be detached from the question of greater democracy, of widening the scope for the voice of the majority to be heard to greater effect. And I am surprised that there is little discussion in this set of papers of the devolution of resources and decision-making to local self-government institutions. |
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