15 January 2013, 09:58 PM IST
In a remark directed at Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee - the most vociferous opponent of FDI in retail and of economic reforms in general - PM Manmohan Singh mentioned "outdated ideologies" that were holding India back. In response, Mamata replied that, as she stood for the common people, she was, and always would be, "backdated".
The exchange raises a debatable point: should 21st century India, as represented by its 'common people', necessarily be 'backdated'? Is being 'backdated' - resistant to change - a virtue to be promoted? Is it good for India to maintain its entrenched and age-old economic and social status quo, even if that status quo has failed, over 60 years after Independence, to exorcise the evils of poverty and oppression?
India stands at the crossroads of being a 'static society' - a polity that adheres to the status quo and rejects change - or a 'dynamic society', one that is open to change. Should India preserve its 'backdatedness' as something precious which it can't give up without losing an essential Indianness? Should we remain static, or should we embrace the dynamics of change?
It's not just about FDI in retail. It's about a mindset that refuses to accept change of any kind. It is about village khaps banning out-of-caste marriages and vindicating 'honour killings'. It is about continuing gender repression, the most bestial forms of which are female foeticide and rape. It is about the self-styled 'moral police' who beat up people for going to pubs or exchanging Valentine's Day greetings. It is about the government trying to muzzle free speech through Section 66A of the IT Act.
All these, to a greater or lesser extent, are examples of 'backdatedness', a refusal to acknowledge that things have changed - economically, socially, technologically - and that we need to keep pace with new ideas and new ways of doing things.
For millennia, feudal China was a static society where nothing changed. After the nationalist revolution, and the subsequent communist takeover, China became a dynamic - though not a democratic - society, adopting change at a sometimes literally murderous pace, which caused the deaths of millions under Mao's regime. It was a terrible price to pay, but today China is poised to overtake the US as the world's foremost economic power.
The lesson to be learnt from China's example is obvious: if we are not to keep reinventing the wheel, change is not only inevitable but beneficial, but its momentum must be moderated with caution. This, really, is what democracy is about: moderating the pace of change - social, economic and technological - so that the benefits of change are maximised and the adverse effects minimised.
There's a fundamental difference between a 'backdated', change-resistant static society, and a change-accepting, dynamic society. A dynamic society, through its willingness to accept change, can change the changes it has made: it can amend or repeal economic policies (including FDI in retail), it can fine-tune legislation to counter gender and caste discrimination, it can make new laws to curb industrial pollution, it can endorse freedom of expression while ensuring that it doesn't become a licence to libel.
A dynamic society can change its mind. A static or 'backdated' society can't change anything, beginning - and ending - with its mind.
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