India This Week

Indian citizenship for Sri Lankan refugees; handshake and a boot in West Bengal; Bihar’s bank ban; Kashmir protest; and creating second-class doctors

Whenever Sri Lankan refugees of Tamil origin reach Dhanushkodi in Tamil Nadu in the dead of the night, their hearts feel lighter. It doesn’t matter that they’ve left their homes behind, or that they are now refugees in a foreign land, or that they are herded into makeshift camps, where they will survive on petty government doles. They still feel a sense of freedom and security. For this is Tamil Nadu, where people speak their language, where there is no question of the Sri Lankan army harming them. They are glad to not be witness to rapes, killings, abductions and violence.

And, neither the killing of Prabhakaran nor the crushing of his militant outfit has helped in any way to stem the flow of refugees into Tamil Nadu, which started in the early 1980s. In the last six months alone, as many as 3,720 refugees reached Rameswaram as a result of the continuing ethnic divide in the island country.

As per available statistics, as many as 73,572 refugees stay in 115 camps across Tamil Nadu and more than 30,000 reside outside the camps. Among them, 2,500 are graduates and 21,000 are school-going students. For many, the dingy camps in Tamil Nadu seem far better than returning to their homeland, and fear.

It was, therefore, unsurprising that the refugees welcomed a resolution adopted by the state’s ruling Dravida Munnetra Kazhakam (DMK) asking the Union ministry to give citizenship to Sri Lankan Tamils on Indian soil. The party also urged the Centre to ensure their livelihood and security.
At present, since they came to India illegally, their presence here goes against the Indian Citizenship Act.

DMK’s demand has, however, further strained its relationship with the Congress. Though the latter’s national leaders are yet to respond, the TNPCC, along with regional satraps Jayalalithaaa and Vijayakaanth, accused Karunanidhi of trivialising the ethnic strife in Sri Lanka. For the moment, it seems, the refugees will continue to be illegal residents surviving on government doles.

Sending mixed messages is not uncommon in politics, but when the CPM does this, curiosity arises as to how far it can succeed in playing a double game. With CPM general secretary Prakash Karat still assuming an anti-Congress position, it seems to have been left to West Bengal CM Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee to carry forward the CPM’s desperate bid to drive a wedge between the grand old party and its ally Trinamool Congress. Note his meeting with the PM on 12 October and Home Minister P Chidambaram the previous day, as well as his proactive attitude towards the Centre’s anti-Naxal drive. The mission at the moment looks impossible. Yet, most feel only the success of this double game—in a bid to divide the anti-Left vote—can save the CPM from imminent collapse in West Bengal. But maybe unity of action and thought would help more.

Bihar’s Deputy CM Sushil Kumar Modi has asked all government departments to not deposit money with any of ICICI Bank’s 16 branches in the state. “It was very unfortunate that despite our repeated reminders, ICICI Bank made no effort to improve its credit disbursal record. The quantum of loans disbursed by ICICI Bank was much short of the expected amount. The banks are supposed to disburse loans in proportion to the amounts deposited by the people in the banks. And ICICI Bank, which should have disbursed loans of Rs 296 crore, managed to distribute a measly amount of only Rs 27.08 crore by way of loans. This is just not acceptable to us,” Modi, who also holds the finance portfolio, recently told the Bihar Assembly. An ICICI Bank spokesperson declined to comment.

The border town of Kupwara in Kashmir Valley saw a different kind of protest the other day. During the last two decades of militancy,
the town has seen about 2,000 protests and bandh calls, all of them separatist in tone and tenor. But now, for the first time ever in all these years, the people took to the streets, not demanding freedom but jobs.

On 12 October, the entire district shut down, and protestors, who included intellectuals, legislators and businessmen, demanded reservation in jobs for locals in the district. The bandh was called following the selection of candidates for district-cadre jobs from other districts, particularly Jammu.

Notwithstanding the fact that this protest can again create a rift between Jammu and Kashmir (the way it did during the Amarnath agitation last year, and on the issue of building a central university), it is significant as it sends the same message which the Kashmiris had sent in the last Assembly election.

There are other positive notes from the peace process that is being initiated by the Centre with Kashmir’s separatist leadership. It is time to realise that talks with the separatist leadership and delivering on development and jobs will have to go hand in hand.

There was a fear that New Delhi might become complacent after the Assembly election turnout, but the poor turnout again in the Lok Sabha election this summer was a reminder that the people are for the moment willing to de-link governance and politics. It’s the best time for New Delhi to take both head-on, and show some results before the next summer comes and the Valley erupts again over some protest or the other.

The other thing New Delhi needs to keep in mind is regional balance. The Amarnath protests had a ripple effect in Jammu, and the divide between the hills and plains has become the widest in a long time. New Delhi’s moves need to not only placate the separatist leadership, deliver development,  resettle Kashmiri Pandits, but also make sure that these don’t alienate the people of Jammu.

Thousands of former militants who have surrendered also need to be resettled in conventional jobs. This is only the beginning of a post-conflict situation, and peace needs a lot more work. And like a Kashmiri journalist remarked, the people in Kupwara might come out again on the streets if the opportunity for a pro-freedom protest is presented to them. But New Delhi should be patient. It should push ahead with the dialogue. This is what is expected of mature countries everywhere.

The Union Ministry for Health has decided to produce second-class doctors for the country’s second-class citizens: village doctors for folks in the villages. The Medical Council of India (MCI) has been roped in and it is ready with the syllabi for an MBBS(rural) course.

First, a bit about the proposal: 50 students from each state, preferably from the villages, will be selected, based on their Class XII results, to undergo the course in rural settings. They will have to serve in the villages for no less than ten years before they can even apply for post-graduation.

Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad reasons that 0nce doctors study in the cities, they don’t want to go back to the villages and incentives don’t always work. Azad’s predecessor had kept himself busy trying to get actors to stop smoking on screen and catalysing
the fight over caste-based reservations. Now, Azad’s brilliant idea is set to create a class distinction among doctors.

Why do you need incentives to get doctors to serve in the villages, Mr Azad? Most of India’s doctors are produced in state-run medical colleges, with adequate help from tax payers’ money. Consider these statistics: an undergraduate student at AIIMS pays less than Rs 1,000 every year as fees and hostel charges, while it takes Rs 1.7 crore of the tax-payer’s money to turn him into an MBBS degree-holder. And a study conducted by AIIMS shows that more than half of its graduates are working abroad.

Doesn’t this arithmetic throw up the simple need for the Government to make a brief period of rural service for doctors produced with our money, compulsory?

BiharBuddhadeb BhattacharjeerefugeesSri LankaWest Bengal