OPINION

The anti- Covid vaccination drive has rolled on. With the highest number of infections in the world after the United States, India is developing two indigenous COVID-19 vaccines.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi reviewed the preparedness for Covid-19 vaccination programme on Saturday and claimed to inoculate 300 million of its 1.35 billion people free of charge in the first six to eight months of this year. While the pandemic may have added a new item on the political agenda of our country, with both the ruling establishment and the opposition undoing each other, the silver lining is that the vaccination drive would be supervised by Union Health Minister Dr Harshvardhan.

In September last year, with pandemic getting out of hand, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, probably realizing the brickbats which awaited the government, fielded Dr Harshvardhan as its face in the Covid-related matters. Till then, since the onset of the epidemic, Dr Harshvardhan had been conspicuous with his absence in the public space.

Delhi’s deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia was in Dehradun earlier this week to engage Uttarakhand’s education minister Madan Kaushik into a debate. Somedays back he had traveled to Lucknow to engage his Uttar Pradesh counterpart in a similar discussion.

Since the beginning of the last month, the leadership of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the ruling outfit in Delhi, has all of a sudden started to visit different states going to polls in the next year or so and throwing muck on the ruling establishments there.

It started with one of its prominent legislators inviting the power minister of Goa for a debate on electricity tariff. Then its second most prominent leader, the Deputy Chief Minister of national Capital, Manish Sisodia started hopping between Lucknow, Haldwani and Dehradun tom-toming the Delhi model of governance and throwing gauntlets at his counterparts in the two states.

It’s another prominent legislator Atishi Marlena was in Gujarat unveiling party’s plans to contest, first the local body polls and then the state assembly polls. In Delhi, as written in these columns earlier, they have been working overtime to woo agitating farmers laying siege of the national Capital.

AAP leaders have also traveled to Punjab promising ‘legal’ help for cases booked against the agitating farmers. Punjab too goes to polls in just about a year’s time and its one state, outside Delhi, where AAP has a reasonable presence. Why such rush to visit the capitals outside their own state?

Certainly, the farmers from the regions which ushered in Green Revolution in the 1960s, could also have been harbingers of the second green revolution. Unfortunately, that has not happened so far, leaving nation’s agriculture in a state of stalemate.       

Changing the status quo invites protest, breaking inertia leads to friction, howsoever good the intention. Same can be said about the situation arising out of the notification of the new farm laws and the consequent siege of the national Capital. As of now impasse continues with the determined protesting farmers refusing so far to give in to the allurements and pressures of the government alike.

Those who favour the new farm laws are of the opinion that if the Modi government went back on its promise of agriculture reforms it would lose out on its 1991 moment, when the PV Narasimha Rao régime introduced the economic reforms. This also raises the question why such resistance to farm reforms when the economic reforms of the 1990s had a comparatively easier ride. This indeed calls for a comparison.

In matters affecting a society there are several adjuncts and perceptions from economic, political and social points of view. It has to be remembered that none of the three factors can ever work in isolation and they must complement each other. The farm laws for sure may accrue long term benefits to the farmers but does it address their short-term fears? This is the problem at hand, and this could be explained through a comparison vis-à-vis the Narasimha Rao-Manmohan Singh Reforms of 1991.

Of the many Yuletide memories of the national Capital, one which has a remarkable impact was to be the part of the first metro ride 18 years ago. Delhi Metro having completed 18 years of operation, is all set to step into adulthood with Prime Minister Narendra Modi scheduled to launch the driverless coaches on December 28.

The ride on the morning of December 24, 2002 on the 8.4 kilometre long Shahdara — Tis Hazari section was culmination of ‘Great Expectations’. Like Victorian novelist Charles Dickens’ novel with the same title (Great Expectations), Delhi Metro too was a runaway success, when it was thrown open for passenger service on December 25, 2002.

The success of the service was never in doubt, as it incased the vision of Delhi Metro’s founding Managing Director K Sreedharan, who brought a cultural change into the way infrastructure projects were executed in the national Capital. Sreedharan was hugely lucky too as he had another notable visionary Sheila Dikshit, as Chief Minister of Delhi, as his boss.

Dikshit in her own way was bringing a cultural change in the way politics was practiced in the national Capital. She understood the changing social and political milieu and the demand for a modern transport system, which would be much more ‘effective’ than the Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) buses.

The word Pandemonium was first used by English poet John Milton in his epic Paradise Lost. Milton is rather credited with inventing the word to signify a complete disorder, noise and breakdown of protocols. Over the centuries it has come to signify wild and disorderly behaviour of the law makers and people entrusted with the responsibility of governance.

Last week in its consistent attempt to woo the agitating farmers of Punjab, the Arvind Kejriwal-led Delhi Government summoned a special session of Delhi assembly to discuss the farm bills. This was largely done as a counter to the similar session held by the Punjab Assembly, which passed bills to counter the Central act.

The Punjab bills are waiting to become law as it needs approval of not just the Governor but also the President. That’s certainly not going to happen till we have the Narendra Modi government at the Centre in place but it also cannot be denied that this move has given a boost to Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amrinder Singh’s image of being pro-farmer politician.