Rubik’s Cube of Power

The winds from Koodamkulam have already stopped flowing into our porticos. For many of us the issue is closed, or so have we been trained to live the hyperreal. The first phases of power generation are already on. ‘Experts’ have ‘ensured’ us that there won’t be any leak. Even if there is, we could be told that the effect won’t cross state borders!

But even after the chapter was closed for many of us, reminders come in at intervals and press on us to see how ‘cubulets’ of power fit together. It is difficult to work back the combinations, in the way the final patterns take effect. But it will be disastrous not to do so.

Presently, the ‘biggest’ nuclear deal is in the making, through the special economic zones in the Gujarat region. But before getting into the specifics of the joint venture between Westinghouse, Reliance Infrastructure and the state, let’s pause a bit on the symbolic and exemplary connotation of ‘Gujarat’.

Starting from the cover up campaigns following the communal riots that killed thousands, through ‘Vibrant Gujarat’, there have been concerted attempts to sell the state as a brand. Million dollar contracts were given to PR companies to do this clean up. The resultant model was a nexus of violence and wealth. It inaugurated the new algebra of growth. So there is a white wash on all the miserable social indices and histories of caste and communal violence from the region. Instead the ‘lion-brand’ is etched atop. The Weiden Kennedy’s Indian subsidiary along with Coke and Nike manufactured, for a lump sum, the logo for the nationalistic gimmick of the government. The model from Gujarat now casts a pall over the entire nation state; voted in thanks mostly to the combination of a miserable and corrupt system that left office and for the serious lack of any alternative.

Koodamkulam, in ways, represented the model that left office. Manmohanomics and state, tackled the crucial questions raised by people with GDP figures (something which the present ones also are not averse to) and personnel from the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro-Sciences (NIMHANS). As Praful Bidwai, then wrote, so “arrogant is India’s nuclear establishment that it brazenly brands its critics insane and in need of psychiatric treatment. It has asked the state-run National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro-Sciences (NIMHANS) to "counsel" the tens of thousands protesting against the Koodankulam nuclear power station in Tamil Nadu that it’s perfectly safe”. For the state, the whole resistance was nothing but a neurotic problem.  Elsewhere, like in and around the mining regions in Chattisgarh, Jharkhand or Odisha, where people have been further off the state, paramilitaries or militaries were deployed: the Salwa Judums, the Cobras, the Greyhounds (literally to hunt the ‘small creatures’ in the hills!).

The present state works in a different way, there is much more professionalism involved in cover-up campaigns (with or without ‘vibration’) and brand selling.  The state, the corporate, and finance capital, have been entering into dialogues at an increased pace throughout the 90s, albeit with some remaining, probably ‘unintentional’, checks and balances from a planned-developmental state. These checks and balances have now been totally gotten rid of.

Government out…Governance in: Read this with the efforts to formulate new land policies, to do away with social impact assessments, public private ventures through smart city networks, promotion of private ports and SEZs, private military arrangements, corporate farming and agreements with agribusiness companies (Monsantos…Cargills…the kind that was involved in illegal BT trials and food price inflations), as well as favourable terms set in patents and intellectual property agreements. It is not for nothing that the entrenched media celebrates and writes travelogues from New York to Nairobi or from Kremlin to Lahore.

So there won’t anything positive on the human front. The Koodamukulams will go on, and worse, there will be more in the offing. Agreements with companies like Areva from France, with very bad track records on safety, are on.  The French state gave shape to Areva mostly to export its nuclear technology, especially after the leaks and ‘small’ issues in its own backyard! After all who expects safety from private companies that seek ONLY profit and after such accidents like Fukushima? It is learned that the French government aimed to reduce its reliance on nuclear power by a third after Fukushima. So wouldn’t they love a warm hug from India!

Now, Westinghouse Electricals will enter into joint ventures with the Reliance Empire, with support of the state, in order to set up networks of nuclear reactors across Bavnagar area. Reliance infra founded in 2002 has revenue nearing 200 billion Indian rupees.  If one goes a bit back in history, there was the Pipavav- the first ‘private corporate facility’ to get clearance to be involved in military infrastructure. Not that state involvement and increased investment in military infrastructure in itself, was too nice or safe. But corporate involvement means something significant and something profoundly insecure.

Pipavav came in the scene towards the end of 90s, and thus exemplifies the impact of post nineties financial reforms. Even otherwise, the 90s end started working against people; not the least in the agricultural sector.

Bhavnagar, the early diamond cutting centre with some of the most precarious labour conditions, by 2003-2005 periods had the most number of agreements signed with huge private companies. In 2007, after the bloody- state -mediated pogroms in Gujarat, it was raised as an exemplar for development and that too with a totally privatized port. It went well along with the already burgeoning empires by other corporate vampires.  By 2015 beginning Reliance Infrastructure went on to acquire major shares of Pipavav, and later Anil Ambani took charge of the company. An ever more energized an entrenched Reliance is now getting together with United States based giant Westinghouse in the nuclear sector.

Try to see how the Rubik’s cube of power works out its colours once again. The state of governance twists and tweaks the governmental apparatus, in steps and in procedures that becomes more and more obscure. The celebrations of machismo, communal state of affairs, the violence of fascist groups that prowl the streets as well as destroy the cultural and educational infrastructure; all create a violent haze that effectively mars vision even further.

The March Against Land and Lives

In the past few months, the government of Kerala has been doing everything under its capacity, to maintain its record as a structure that plays fiddle to private capital. In the earlier posts ( http://punctuationsbymathew.blogspot.in/2015/12/shameless-and-uninhibited-2.html; http://punctuationsbymathew.blogspot.in/2015/12/shameless-and-uninhibited.html ) the moves to regularize conversion of paddy fields as well as the synchronized moves with an even more vicious central structure was pointed at. The latter is best exemplified in the case of red carpeting given to Adanis at Vizhinjam.

There was yet another move, paralleling the central plans to do away with Social Impact assessments, in allowing licenses to quarries. These quarries, if anyone cares to travel across the foothills and Ghat terrains in Kerala, have already altered the geo-ecological equilibrium formed through thousands of years. Now with the aforesaid move the government with arbitrary fixtures of dates (2012) and cut off limits on area (small medium large quarries…) sought to do away with environmental clearances. The nexus with private capital has always been justified in terms of development (‘vikasanam’ alias ‘expansion through congestion’) and labour (even if this does not take into account the impact on millions and future).

The Kerala High Court division bench’s setting aside of the aforesaid dangerous amendment (to provisions of the Kerala Minor Mineral Concession Rules, 2015) is a small breather. Relief also comes after the Thrissur district administration, by the use of Google images proved beyond doubt that 19 acres of land in Puzhakkal, Thrissur was filled up by one of the biggest anti-people corporate in Kerala, the Shobha group. This was very much in violation of the Kerala Conservation of Paddy land and Wetland Act, 2008; an act the present government is hell bent on destroying. Clearly the system works much more for the Lulus and the Shobhas than for the populations of voters.

Earlier the Kerala government, moved to regularise the reclamation and conversion of paddy fields taken before 2008, with a proclamation to collect additional Rs 200-crore revenue. They either do not care or are ignorant of the millions of crores (even though there is no need to bring in a monetary logic to such gross social impacts) worth of impact the cascading environmental destruction will produce.

On the other hand the central government, as represented in the prime ministers burgeoning foreign trips, is moving ahead with compromising the security and well being of millions. This is well exemplified in the commitments given with respect to stricter compliance to global Intellectual Property Rights rules under the TRIPS Agreement of the World Trade Organization (WTO). Events like these happen almost on an everyday basis under the embedded media fanfare. The upcoming Nairobi meeting of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) for negotiations towards an agreement to open up global trade has to be closely followed up.  There are plans afoot to address ‘issues’ like labour and environment. After all good governance and transparency is about creation of global value chains, competition and provisions for investment.

There are many…many more instances like that of the Forest Rights, Privatisation of Commons, or the Land clauses.

Recently the Bharatiya Janata Party, under the mandatory disclosures of donations that political parties has to make to the Election Commission of India, declared that it had received Rs. 437 crore between 2014-15 ( http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/bharti-aditya-birla-top-funders-of-bjp/article7960630.ece ). One can forget such statistical figures that this is twice the combined total declared by the five other national parties or that only the details of those donations over rupees 20,000 need to be declared. One cannot forget the mind boggling figures, thanks to the preceding regime. So a tradition is on! And now with the add-ons like fatwas on food habits! What is more important are the questions that one must ask: What do you expect to logically follow when a Birla, an Ambani, or a Bharti funds the biggest parties that then goes on to establish a government.

Do we need to expect anything more than the present spectacles to cover up the slavish commitment to private capital, whether at a national or global scale (the national and global criss-cross)? Add this on to what happens closer to view in Kerala. Do we expect anything more than the filling of lakes and wetlands for the Lulus and the Shobhas or the destruction of the Ghats for the real estate barons, from this state government?

Shameless and Uninhibited 2

Shameless and Uninhibited: One step after another...the government is bulldozing on with the commitment to destroy land and life...try to read what Harish Vasudevan points at...(10 October 2015, Facebook)


മാത്രുഭൂമിയുടെ ഇന്നത്തെ പ്രധാന വാർത്ത കണ്ട്‌ ഡോ.വി.എസ്‌ വിജയൻ വിളിച്ചു. "നീർത്തടങ്ങൾ ജനപങ്കാളിത്തത്തോടെ സംരക്ഷിക്കുന്നതിനായി ഉറക്കം കളഞ്ഞ്‌ ഇന്നലെ രാത്രിയിരുന്ന് ഒരു പ്രോജക്റ്റ്‌ തയ്യാറാക്കുകയായിരുന്നു. രാവിലെ പത്രം കണ്ട്‌ ഞാൻ തളർന്നുപോയി. ഉടനേ തന്നേ എന്തെങ്കിലും നമുക്ക്‌ ചെയ്യണ്ടേ ഹരീഷേ" എന്നു ചോദിച്ചു. കേരളാ പരിസ്ഥിതി ഐക്യ വേദിയുടെ പേരിൽ ഒരു പ്രതിഷേധക്കുറിപ്പും, ഒരു പരാതിയും അയയ്ക്കണം എന്ന് ഡോ.വിജയൻ പറഞ്ഞു. നീണ്ട 30 വർഷത്തെ ഗവേഷണ ജീവിതത്തിൽ ഏറ്റവും കൂടുതൽ കാലം നീർത്തടങ്ങളെ സംരക്ഷിക്കാനും അത്‌ മനുഷ്യർക്കുണ്ടാക്കുന്ന പ്രയോജനങ്ങൾ പ്രചരിപ്പിക്കാനും ശ്രമിച്ച, സെയിലന്റ്‌വാലിയെ സംരക്ഷിക്കുന്നതിൽ നിർണ്ണായക പങ്കുവഹിച്ച ആ വലിയ മനുഷ്യൻ, ഇതു പറയുമ്പോൾ അദ്ദേഹത്തിന്റെ തൊണ്ടയിടറി.

"മാഷേ, നമുക്ക്‌ മാത്രം ഇത്‌ തോന്നിയാൽ മതിയോ, ഈ നാട്ടിലെ ബഹുഭൂരിപക്ഷത്തിനും ഈ വാർത്ത കണ്ട്‌ അസ്വസ്ഥതയും തോന്നുന്നില്ലെങ്കിൽ, മാഷെന്തിനു ഈ വയസു കാലത്ത്‌ വിഷമിക്കണം? ജനാധിപത്യം തൊട്ടു തീണ്ടിയിട്ടില്ലാത്ത ഒരു സർക്കാരാണിത്‌. ഇത്തരമൊരു നിർണ്ണായക തീരുമാനം കോൺഗ്രസ്‌ പാർലമെന്ററി പാർട്ടി യോഗത്തിലോ, മുന്നണിയിലോ, നിയമസഭയിൽപ്പോലുമോ ചർച്ച ചെയ്തിട്ടില്ല. നേരത്തേ നടത്തിയ ചർച്ചകളിൽ യു.ഡി.എഫ്‌ ഉപസമിതി റിപ്പോർട്ട്‌ തന്നെ വയലുകൾ സംരക്ഷിക്കണമെന്നാണ്‌. അതിനുപോലും പുല്ലുവില കൊടുക്കുന്ന ഉമ്മൻചാണ്ടിയെപ്പോലെയുള്ള ഒരു ജനാധിപത്യവിരുദ്ധൻ പരിസ്ഥിതി ഐക്യവേദിയുടെ കത്തിനു കടലാസിന്റെ വിലപോലും നൽകില്ല. കെ.പി.സി.സി പ്രസിഡന്റായ സുധീരൻ എഴുതുന്ന കത്തുകളിടാൻ പ്രത്യേകം ചവറ്റുകുട്ട തന്നെയുണ്ടത്രേ മുഖ്യമന്ത്രിയുടെ ഓഫീസിൽ.
അതുകൊണ്ട്‌, നമുക്കൊരു കാര്യം ചെയ്യാം. ഈ നിയമം ഇങ്ങനെ ഇഞ്ചിഞ്ചായി കൊല്ലാതെ, മൊത്തത്തിൽ എടുത്തുകളയാൻ ഒരു ഭീമഹരജി ഗവർണ്ണർക്ക്‌ കൊടുക്കാം. വികസനത്തിനു കോട്ടമുണ്ടാക്കുന്ന നെൽവയൽ നീർത്തട സംരക്ഷണ നിയമം പൂർണ്ണമായി പിൻവലിക്കുക. പറ്റുമെങ്കിൽ, വന സംരക്ഷണ നിയമവും പിൻവലിക്കാൻ ആവശ്യപ്പെടുക. ഉടമസ്ഥർ അവർക്കിഷ്ടമുള്ളതുപോലെ നിലം കൃഷി ചെയ്യുകയോ നികത്തി വികസനം കൊണ്ടുവരികയോ ചെയ്യട്ടെ. ഒരു 3 വർഷത്തിനുള്ളിൽ കൃഷിവകുപ്പ്‌ നമുക്ക്‌ പിരിച്ചുവിടാം. അവരെ വികസന വകുപ്പാക്കി പുനർ നാമകരണം ചെയ്യാം. അങ്ങനെയൊരു ഹരജി തയ്യാറാക്കുന്നെങ്കിൽ വിജയൻ സാർ പറയൂ, ഞാൻ ആദ്യം ഒപ്പിടാം.
നാട്ടുകാർ കുടിവെള്ളം കിട്ടാതെ നേട്ടോട്ടമോടി പഠിക്കട്ടെ മാഷേ, അവരത്‌ അർഹിക്കുന്നു. "
അദ്ദേഹം മൗനമായി എല്ലാം കേട്ടു. വിയോജിച്ചു. "ഇല്ലാ, ഞാൻ എന്നെക്കൊണ്ടാവുന്നത്‌ ചെയ്യും. സെയിലന്റ്‌വാലിക്കാലത്ത്‌ ഇതിലും വലിയ പ്രതിസന്ധികൾ ഞാൻ അനുഭവിച്ചിട്ടുണ്ട്‌. ഈ പാതകം കണ്ടുകൊണ്ടിരിക്കാനാകില്ല. ഈ തീരുമാനത്തിന്റെ സാമ്പത്തിക അപകടങ്ങളും വികസന അപകടങ്ങളും ചൂണ്ടിക്കാട്ടി ഞാൻ മുഖ്യമന്ത്രിക്കൊരു കത്തെഴുതാൻ പോകുകയാണ്‌." മാഷ്‌ ഫോൺ വെച്ചു.
വിജയൻ സാറിനെ ദൈവം രക്ഷിക്കട്ടെ.

Shameless and Uninhibited...

Media with wide circulations put the govt. of Kerala assurances to the centre’s developmentalist procedures on track (with characteristic branding- like the Weiden Kennedy (?) generated lion-logo), as removing ‘legal hassles’ (നിയമകുരുക്കുകൾ അഴിക്കുക). Let’s think into what some of these ‘hassles’ are:

Quarries have been wreaking havoc across midlands in Kerala. Quarrying for building lobbies (it will be too stupid or naïve to think all this is done for the homeless) - red stone-lateritic formations-granite- have been transforming the whole morphologies of places and the water depletions and dust pollutions have already started to affect all forms of life. The resistances by people have been portrayed by the chief secretary’s office and planning offices in the state as one such ‘hassle’.

In the name of Vallarpadam Transshipment rhetoric, the non-viability of which-even from the profit maker’s point of view- the corporate evaluators have been talking about is now in place. The inhabitants in Moolampilly or several other places have never in history been in the developmentalist snapshots. The whole drama after all is much less about any transshipments (something which Colombo does at one eight cost!) and more about releasing more wetlands for real estate. And roadblock in letting such gross violations continue is another ‘hassle’.

Illegal high rises populate every nook and cranny of the state. Take a look at the gross CRZ violations in Ernakulam Marine drive. Not even a small breeze can soothe people because of the huge concrete walls made by builders. The Mangalavanam mangroves too (the others as we talk are being burned down with kerosene) will be gone in no time. Prestige DLF or LuLu after all is above law. They can even kill the Ramsar protected Vembanad, and generate profit. The objections posed by the fire force off late (the transfers of officials) and the delays in land registrations…all of these are also ‘hassles’ (ഈ നൂലാമാലകൾക്ക് നിയമഭേദഗതിയിലൂടെ പരിഹാരം കാണും).

There are bigger ‘hassles’ that the media and authorities will put forward to us in coming days: The wetlands act, the forest acts, the social impact assessments, labour laws…all of these have to be torn down in hurry. The ratings have to go up, we are being told. For whom does the democratically elected office talk? What are the forces and pressures that steer the desperation in employing advertisers, rating agencies, and international PR agencies to push forward such campaigns?

Gimmicks for People, Welfare for the Select:

Very often indexes of economic performance are presented as evidence of people's welfare by state orders. The gross domestic product (GDP) has been a favourite concept. The figures were often quoted and used by the officialdom as proof of welfare post 1990s. So when the GDP moved from 7 to 8 to 9, people are supposed to feel good. More specialized indexes like the Baseline Profitability Index, of which I talk about, are available for the present ruling establishment in India. I thought it is worthwhile putting such figures where they really belong and read them for what they really indicate.

Couple this with some of the biggest efforts to manage public relations (PR) one gets the huge scale of manufactured illusion people must live through. APCO worldwide for instance, with a record of multi-billion dollar lobbying in United States, promotion of Zionist conservative networks, with clientele of oligarchs like Mikhail Khodorkovsky, with track record of promoting climate-change denialists, as well as branding of Gujarat post riots; have got involved in the PR activities for Indian central government. There is also tailor made work to promote the present prime minister.

Increasingly the governmental apparatus feels a need to wield shields of PR stunts, to ward off any serious doubt. News and media get overwhelmed by the kudos they churn out for upcoming projects and restructurings. It is also in such contexts that I feel the need to try and put in an effort to understand such gimmicks for what they are.

The following perspective comes in the wake of immense campaigning done for the Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT) programme for urban infrastructure and the smart cities programme as envisaged by the central government in India. Gamuts of corporate developmental indexes are portrayed as proofs of and logic for the social validity of the aforesaid state programmes. Recently, as per major print news, India, way down at 6th on Baseline Profitability Index is now the topper. I do not have the illusion that people immediately get excited about such number games as much as when the first gimmicks of GDP growth were advertised as greater human success. Even then it is interesting to place such ecstatic news items under lens and enquire into these oft appearing figures.

Before anyone contemplates becoming loyal believers of the make in India lion deities, it will be worthwhile thinking a bit into what many of the parameters of achievements are about. This is a good way of putting them where they belong. This is also a way of preventing imaginations take wings of wax and flying to the sun. Another way is to get to the ground and see what the welfarist translations of such figure games are. The former is what I will try out with the baseline profitability score the state has 'achieved' as per news. What does it mean when a score of the kind created by an economist and Foreign Policy commentator Daniel Altman goes positive? And also how a state hell bent on following a certain trajectory can use such figures, as the GDPs were once used, to manufacture euphoria and hero worships.

Here Daniel Altman who created the index essentially sees how much value an asset has added on once an investment is made, say in India. The index compares how the local policies of the state and the local conditions would affect the same investment in other places. It also asks how the principal and the return on investment will change as a factor of the place where investments are made. This is the gist. 

                                  

Thus, at present, on this comparative scale, "India is the place to start". No doubt that Daniel Altman knows 'his economics' well; he uses the technique for soccer league ratings, global economics, and for the baseline index. For instance one of his favourite ways is to assess the 'worth' of players for billion dollar club markets or assessment of the relative quality of various soccer leagues using average age. He likes his comparative strategy. The same applies for comparing investor scenes. He must also be a good proponent of these perspectives where he teaches.

Let’s congratulate the economist, the holy investors and the promoting state structure in India and go on to see what all of these implies for us, and the much less fortunate millions who inhabit our places.

Few years back, during the term of the last government, what happened were sets of catastrophes as a function of global credit impacts. There were unheard scales of corporate corruption as well. The crisis of debt markets, the packaging and reselling of bad debts incurred by financial institutions, was felt everywhere, in varying scales. The human impact was too much. Millions lost jobs across the world. This is how fictitious capital (trillions) and volatile finance has clear material impacts that can only go from bad to worse

Remittance economies for instance (many in the Americas and a lot more like in Asia where service sector is predominant) suffered in characteristic ways. If this was actual starvations in places like Haiti dependent on US remittances, in places like ours, the worst was still warded a lot off.  This is because the system was yet to be made totally subject to the whims and fancies of investors and investor capital. Even then we managed to set free those responsible for the death of thousands in Bhopal. We even promised the Dow chemicals safe spaces of future investment.

In the last few decades with the neoliberal turn people witness increasing crisis. But the crisis of investors gets subsequently solved off locally at human costs. The Kingfishers can fly their jets and the Monsantos can keep terminating; only the farmers need to commit suicide.

The new dynamics of urbanization for instance is one of the ways in which crisis gets solved like this. Thus land and property markets have to be favourable to investors. Most of the developments like these are debt financed. But that is just fine! It is a well known truism that capitalist system is ridden with crisis. Crisis is necessary for capitalist systems survival. So there are problems all the time and there are solutions that in turn create a new problem- survival through crisis. Sorry, we are not talking about humanitarian crisis. That is a essential component for any kind of capitalist crisis fixation. The political power centres, once people put them in place through democratic elections,  have been taking action to get the system ready more in favour of the upcoming crisis.

The basic requirement of the aforesaid system is that it requires growth, no matter what. Never mistake growth for welfare. This is just the old GDP story; post Manmohanomic-reforms, of profit generation in new garb. So there is a need to have spaces of competitive ease across the world. And a place like India that both becomes conducive and holds perhaps the biggest market of consumers (on or off credit), that means jackpot (for capitalists, for investors...).

The new game makers and planners will now tell us that a certain rate of growth is acceptable and another rate is less so etc. Do not ask who decides these acceptability levels. Not us for sure! Instead this is the puppet show by a class that has to find security for the increasing amount of money that is entrusted in different state spaces. The too much money has to get invested to generate profits. Banks, for instance, over these years have become lenders (there is hardly an interest for your savings. Imagine one of those new generation loan monger banks).

The surplus that does not find its way out is an impending problem in a capitalist order. So games are to be played, new spaces are to be generated. Wars are one of the favourite games of superpowers and a kind with catastrophic human consequences. Another method is the generation of safe spaces for profit generation. The special economic zones and urban reordering became the state methods post 2000. But things were not quite professionally managed resulting in some of the state repressions coming out too much in open. The usual gimmicks of job generation (after depriving generations of natural and social infrastructure) did not quite work. People began to read about the people from Niyamgiri threatened by bauxite miners, the Reddy brothers mining activities, Vedanta, and many others across India. Millions who voted last time thought they voted for change. 

 

And yes, there is a difference now. Things are much more professionally managed. So there is a clamp down on organizations that report on human rights issues. There is a freeze on their funds. Better spaces for the circulation and generation of profit are getting created through smart cities: not one or two but hundreds on them, through private partnerships. If one reads the clauses and provisions, it becomes too clear for whom are these cities getting ready. There are more gimmicks that resonate nationalism like the make in India's which gets coupled with labour law changes. Labour has to be servile and ready to make things cheap. Labour must not stand in the way of profit. Land laws have to be made more favourable to any ambani or adani (and more of the class...) who has a plan! So get rid of the social impact assessments and environmental laws that stand in the way. Restructure the green tribunals. Do all of these and more and then go across the world and market the vibrant spaces. A better way is to put the patriotic tag and ideas like nationalism (Put some desi words in, to act a swadesi drama). Get in a bit more of media coverage and try to make people good about all of this.

Get such an order in and then economists like Altman will score up the country in the index. And if the state manages either to suppress and keep in place all the human costs incurred during growth, or account for them as collateral damages, they keep winning the game over people.