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.19^th 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 12^th 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