NATIONAL INTEGRATION IN INDIA - A
critical study
Literally national integration
is a subject of national sovereignty and integrity. In reality it is spirit of
the nation, the essence of national polity and necessarily the bed rock of the
country’s stand among its equals. It cannot be in black and white only. It is
perceived from the national sentiment in its policies, politics, culture and
status in the world community. It is natural that in a country there will be
people from different religion, sect, social stigma, language political
philosophy, but when some issue relates to the nation there shall be unity in
spite of all diversities from within. It is also natural that all nations have
their own written rule of law as regards to their internal and external
policies and self governance. It is
required to be adhered to meticulously. No clandestine dealing as our neighbors
follows. The internal political system should necessarily be people friendly,
transparent and sustainable. The leaders and the bureaucracy are necessarily to
be devoted and ready to compromise with their greed and culture determination
to do something for the nation.
India has got the
distinction of being the greatest democracy in the world with a population of
more than 1.2 billion it has a federal state of governance comparable to some
extent with the USA. It has well defined central and state functions. The rule
of law of the country declares it as a sovereign, secular democratic republic.
The citizens are enjoined with fundamental rights as regards to equality before
the law, freedom of speech; education, decent living, and constitutional remedies
there shall be no discrimination on the ground of religion, race, caste, sex
and place of birth. There is clear cut directive principle of state policies to
maintain the centre and state relationship. In this country 1652 languages and
dialects are spoken. Out of those eight regional languages has received constitutional
status of official languages regionally. Although Hindi language has been the
lingua franca the constitution.official and court proceedings are
conducted in English language. Parsi and Arabic legal terms are yet
used in court proceedings. After 65 years of getting independence from the
British we yet hold British Parliamentary proceedings as conclusive proof under
our Evidence Act.Our penal code till date has some antique penal provisions which our foreign rulers had framed in mid nineteenth century. Although our nation is perceived as the Hindu main land,our Muslim
population is no less than any individual Muslim nation in the world community.
People from all religions in the world lives in this country with equal
dignity.
Our pre-historic era has got a rich
heritage both in the field of science, culture and education. As our ancients writings
depict, the science of law of gravity, Astronomy, ballistic missiles, atomic
theory, in vitro fertilization, use of helicopter and many things were known to
our ancestors. The God has several times preferred to take incarnation in this
holy country. We have the GITA which contains solutions for all worldly issues the mankind has yet faced. Our pre-independence history describes the
heroic deeds of our brave freedom fighters and the martyrs. We feel proud of our
leaders who had participated in our freedom movements. Our national anthem,
national emblem, patriotic songs and slogans continuously keep us remembering
our past heritage for national integration. National gallantry awards for our
soldiers police awards; bravery awards for the civilians are given each year to
recognize the excellences in their fields while padma awards are given for cultural excellence, Ekalabya award,
Rajiv Gandhi Khel-ratna awards are given for excellence in sports and many more.. These
felicitations are nothing but to energise the spirit of national integration.
Like other
democratic nations India has a “National integration council” functioning since 2nd June 1962 with a mandate to resolve the issues related to
the sovereignty and integrity of the nation. It has been constituted with 150
senior politicians and the Prime Minister on the chair. But it has only the
advisory capacity. Till date under its recommendation the Parliament has
enacted a regulation in the name and style of “The Unlawful Activities {Prevention}
Act to curb the divisive forces that are down grading the integrity, peace and
tranquility inside the territory.19th November, the birth
anniversary of the late Prime Minister Indera Gandhi is being celebrated as
“National Integration Day” in India. The day is celebrated with various brain
storming programs and fanfares in different forums to remind the necessity of the spirit of
unity among the existing diversities.
But in India there are peculiar
diversities which probably continuously acting as a negative force in the
pursuit of feeling united among the Indians. Even though the constitution of
the country does not support regional feeling, ghetto within religious groups’.The provision for reservation in the field of education, employment in certain government sanction persists
in India even after 65 years of getting independence divide the Indians among
within for which law and order problems very often arises affecting the peace
and tranquility in the society including loss of lives and properties. The vote
bank politics, bribing the voters, lack of transparency in amassing election
funds from the late 60s had made the Indian politics congenial for the entry of
greedy, corrupt and persons with criminal back ground. Many selected
representatives who proclaim themselves as revolutionaries in politics are
settling their arguments at the point of gun. There has been brazen use of
money in getting a party ticket and nepotism in the political parties has
gradually eroded the ailing Indian democracy. Now a day’s an expecting
contestant in Sarpanch election is venturing to spend millions of rupees.
During last four decades the Indian voters has not been able to select a single
party majority government. When corruption has earned stronghold inside the
politics the Indian bureaucracy has not been far behind. Most leaders are found
disinterested in reforms but to amass money for their future ambitions. The
leaders having certain determination to do something for nation building are pushed
to sides or struggling as puppets. The economic scandals of billions of rupees
from the government sponsored projects have upset the Indian voters who in
contrast has been developing sense of misbelieve towards the government
functioning.
According to the “Economist” magazine the
key economic reforms in India are seemingly stuck in the bog of messy coalition
politics while the government is struggling under avalanche of corruption
scandals.The politicians and the bureaucracy are combined in preventing the
country from fulfilling its vast economic potentials. The politicians who are
out of touch are portraying the country as a victim but not as a victor. “The
Times” magazine comments that, the nasty divisive political climate in India
has actually cooled down the economic growth of the nation while inflation is
remaining high. India now can only come out of this era with the entry of
dedicated and energetic leaders who are ready to compromise their greed and
lust for the sake of the country. Due to reservation politics for the members
from the indigenous castes and creed there has been dearth of good teachers,
scientists, doctors, engineers and economists in the prestigious educational
institutions like IITs, IIMs, IISc, AIIMS and many other such institutions of
international repute who are gasping with shortage of experts while many scholars in the discipline are leaving this country in search of similar jobs elsewhere and has been
showing their excellence in their professions. The economic reforms procedures
although are being planned excellently the country is virtually not getting the
desired benefits out of those plans. The gap between the rich and the poor is
continuously increasing while the middle class is expecting further openings in
the economy and the poor want the states to invest more in health care,
education, infrastructure and agriculture sector and to check corruption in
government.
Ironically when this country has
been spending trillions of rupees in poverty alleviation programs since 1975
and officially providing free nutritious food for 23 million children under the
age of five years and 4.8 million expecting mothers 300 days a year, 120
million school students are provided with mid day meal every school day, as per
UN report 47% of Indian children are suffering from malnutrition. This figure
stands at 35% for the drought stricken Ethiopia. The 2005 World Bank report
India stands at the 12th position of the wealthy nations with a
multi trillion US dollar economies. The Forbes recent publication has
identified 23 Indian billionaires with a net worth of 99 billion US dollars
more than that of Japan. But India is continuously witnessing hunger deaths,
unemployment among the emerging youths. These are said to be the tips of the ice
bergs. There exists an underground economy in which trillions of black money is
being amassed by the corrupt s which is being continuously stashed away to the
foreign banks while the tax payers are gasping with additional taxes and the
country is suffering from macro-economic imbalances. The government is
remaining tight lipped on the issue while an Ombudsman bill where a small man
can register any governmental apathy on him has been shuttling in our
Parliament since last 46 years to get a presidential accord. While this country
is spending millions of dollars of foreign exchange in importing food grains
and vegetables officially 40% of the in-house products get perished with the
cultivators for those could not reach the market in time. The amount of food
grain and vegetables get perished in India annually is almost 1.2 times the
total such produce in Australia.
Actually national integration is a
joint responsibility. Such feeling should be an urge of the citizens from
within. The selector cannot tolerate to be in darkness while the selected enjoy the fruits of democracy. Days are gone when people were content with “so
se ashi beiman phirbhi mera Bharat Mahan” syndrome. Unless the corruption is
put under control the mathematics of national integration would remain as a far dream and
would end up in National differentiation with all its limits and derivatives
