Dhaka and Delhi: A tale of two cities

WHEN Delhi was the capital of British India, a conglomerate of British colonies and princely states, Dhaka, quintessentially, was a sleepy and tranquil divisional headquarters of Bengal (of course, with the glaring exception of 1905-1911, when Dhaka was heralding its prominence as the new capital of a new province of Eastern Bengal and Assam). In those days Dhaka, being part of Bengal, used to think at least twenty four hours earlier than the whole of India (obviously including Delhi), if Gokhle was correct. In the course of history, Delhi emerged as the capital of independent India and Dhaka as the capital of Bangladesh. Obviously, Bangladesh inherited the legacy of Bengal as the only Bengali speaking independent country. Delhi has emerged as the not only the capital of India, now it is the city where Arundhati Roy, the conscience of our time, and most recently Pawan Kumar Bansal and Ashwani Kumar are living. Though Dhaka still enjoys a half hour's advantage over Delhi in the international time zone, it is now Delhi who has turned the table -- thinking at least twenty four years ahead of Bangladesh.

It is quite a puzzle why Arundhuti Roy is so important? Is this because she was the awardee of the much coveted 1998 Man Booker Prize for fiction for her novel The God of Small Things (1997) or for her political activism in environmental and human rights causes? In case of environmental and human rights causes, the list is quite tall, provocative and in some cases equally and strongly denounced by both Congress and BJP -- from Narmada Dam project (saying that the dam will displace half a million people, with little or no compensation, and will not provide the projected irrigation, drinking water and other benefits), the US military invasion of Afghanistan (with the argument that the war was in retaliation for 9/11), criticism of Israel (in 2006, along with Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, and others, Arundhuti Roy signed a letter in The Guardian called the 2006 Lebanon War a 'war crime' and accused Israel of 'state terror') and support to the independence of Kashmir. But what took Arundhuti Roy to the height of guardian angel of our times is when she denounced the plea that 'the collective conscience of the society will be satisfied if the capital punishment is awarded to the offender' in case of the hanging of Afzal Guru.

The case of Pawan Kumar Bansal, the Railway Minister is quite interesting. There was no charge against him. It was his nephew, Vijay Singla, allegedly extracted 900 million rupees from an official of the railway's policy making board and was caught by the police. But the case against Law minister Ashwani Kumar is unique. In all eagerness he doctored CBI report on coal scam (undermining the autonomy of CBI) on coal block allocation to the Supreme Court. But why did they resign or more crudely were sacked? It was the opposition in the Parliament who made this possible. The opposition was so vociferous and made the proceedings of the Parliament so difficult that something had to be done. In the process the Parliament sessions have to be prorogued two days early.

In the not so distant past, the most brilliant and articulate politician of India, Shashi Tharoor, had to quit his cabinet post on certain misdemeanor charges and Telecom minister Andimuthu Raja had also to quit for causing a loss of about £22bn to the exchequer by failing to follow proper procedure in the award of licences to run mobile phone networks in India in 2008. Interestingly the audit report of Indian C&AG triggered the downfall of both Ashwani Kumar and Andimuthu Raja.

With so much so about Delhi, what about Dhaka? Dhaka has also its own protagonists, its own bunch of Ministers who are performing no worse than Pawan Kumar Bansal, Ashwani Kumar and Andimuthu Raja. It has Ministers with almost equivalent records and still keeping their jobs, braving the media with all wit and humour. Dhaka only lacks two. It has no Arundhuti Roy to denounce those who attempt to 'simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple'. And who in Dhaka has the moral and intellectual courage to urge 'to respect strength, never power'! In the absence of Arundhuti Roy Dhaka is crawling before the power, never caring about strength.

More notably Dhaka lacks a Parliament that is broadly bipartisan involving treasury and opposition where both elect Speaker and Deputy Speaker respectively. Dhaka lacks a Parliament that works, that makes the government accountable, compel it to be more transparent and sack errant Ministers. Thus the government fails to be inclusive in governance and representative in character. With Parliament non-functioning, the basic tenet of accountability to the people in the Parliamentary democracy is absent and Dhaka is suffering from a total 'regulatory capture' where government prefers to remain insulated and distant from the people's interest. As such the regulatory role of the government is withering. With these dashed away the hopes and aspirations of the people for the protection of law. Thus Dhaka lags behind Delhi in at least twenty four years and Delhi remains ever elusive. Is Delhi really so far away!

The writer is former civil servant. E-mail: [email protected]