Please spend!!!

MONEY USAGE: MLA

MLAs need to use the funds

India might have 450 million paupers; it has never been a poor nation in the sense of availability of funds. But sadly, it has always been a poor performer when it comes to the efficient allocation of these funds. The capital city itself is a stark indicator of this unfortunate situation; so one can imagine the issues with the rest of the country. According to a report by CAG that was released in 2006, there were 34 Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs) of Delhi in the list of blacklisted MLAs, who hadn’t been able to utilise the funds allocated especially to them for their constituency development under the Assembly Constituency Development Programme (ACDP). The report stated that in the financial year of 2004-05, there were 3 MLAs who didn’t spend even a single penny for development. The remaining spent less than half of the amount that was allocated to them. Further researches reveal that even in the financial year of 2008-09, at least 12 MLAs haven’t fully utilised the funds allocated to them under ACDP and around Rs.75 lakh in funds have got lapsed. Similarly, in the state of Karnataka, a shocking 45% of the funds allocated under various drought or flood relief schemes remain unused. The state government had Rs.4.94 billion for drought and flood relief work, but it was able to spend only Rs.2.76 billion out of the same. In Tamil Nadu, information revealed under the RTI act depicts that an alarming 43% of the funds allocated to 15 MLAs remained unused in 2008. Around Rs.450 million had been allocated to those 15 MLAs. The scenario is pretty similar in most of the states. Actually, these MLAs are guilty of not doing the needful in envisioning the right kind of development projects and ensuring that they are successfully executed. This gives us a clear idea as to why most of these states face a dearth of modern infrastructure and facilities; besides lacking seriously in opportunities for the have-nots to improve their lot and lead better lives.

Terminally well

HEADS OF STATE: NO MORE

Sigh... I resign with a heavy ‘head’

Holding the highest office of the State is gradually becoming tougher by the day. While Obama’s swearing in as President of the world’s most advanced democracy and Dr. Manmohan Singh’s second term as the Prime Minister of the world’s largest democracy are some of the big achievements of democratic elections, the same year is also witnessing some of the erstwhile popular heads leaving office due to economic recession.

Facing sustained economic recession and lacking intelligent methods to resolve the situation, March 2009 saw Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek formally resigning, making the dream of a reformed European Union even harder as it is set to take a distinct position in ratifying the Lisbon Treaty. The economic crisis also had Latvian Prime Minister Ivars Godmanis being forced to resign after months of struggle on the Latvian political battleground.

Joining the inglorious recession casualty club is the Belgian Prime Minister Yves Leterme, who along with his government, resigned at the start of this year over a legal banking scandal amidst the breakup of Fortis Bank and its sale to BNP Paribas amidst the severe banking crisis. The recession and related industrial issues has also led to street demonstrations in Iceland forcing the Prime Minister Geir Haarde to reign. Hilariously, not to be left out, the Hungarian prime minister has also threatened to resign (though to his credit, he has not yet forwarded his formal resignation letter).

And on the other front, for a change, the UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown refused to resign despite his party’s shameful defence (or lack of it) of the expenditure bills of many MPs. What is the learning from all these? Jefferson, the author of America’s Declaration of Independence, had famously quoted, “A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where 51% may take away the rights of the other 49%..” Interestingly, there is not even one reference to ‘democracy’ in the said Declaration. Thankfully, there are a million references to democracy in all the reports we presented to you... Democracy lives, like how...

‘Which’ hunt?

IRAN: ELECTION

Iran’s done well as a democracy

Mahmoud Ahmedinejad is back on the seat of power, but victory celebrations have been dampened to an extent by a string of violent protests post the elections. The protesters, led by opposition party leader Mir Hossein Mousavi maintain that the election results were fraudulent. However, the authorities have ruled it out. While they admitted irregularities, they have maintained that they were not large enough to affect the landslide victory. So finally, he can afford to get back to business.

Global reaction has been mixed, though, and understandably so. Countries like India, China, Venezuela, Russia, Brazil, Sri Lanka and Pakistan (besides the Middle East) have appreciated and congratulated Ahmedinejad. Ironically, most of the western countries including the US, France, UK, Dutch were mute during the peaceful election and suddenly got into action as the violence spread. So much so that French President Nicholas Sarkozy branded the election result as a fraud and attributed the subsequent unrest as the result of Ahmedinejad’s failures in his first term. There were also many discreet protests against Obama’s as well as Sarkozy’s victory but these were never brought into limelight by the western media. Such petty gestures only show the Western world in a poor light, and elevate Ahmedinejad further in the eyes of the Iranian people.

In fact, Iran has proved to be a fine example of a democracy in this election. Going by voter turn out rate, Iran fared better than many successful democracies. Iran had voter turnout of 85%, slightly better than France, which had 84% in its 2007 presidential election and the US, which had a mere 61% voter turnout in 2008 presidential election. Rather than wasting their time in wishing Ahmedinejad away, the western world would do better to accept the reality and look to improve their relations with Iran.

Damn that rose!

POLITICAL PARTIES: OPPORTUNISM

A party is a party, by whatever name you call it, right? Yeah, right...

We wanted this one to be a frivolous piece (aren’t all of our articles?). It started with a strange trivial piece of history that took quite a lot of us quite a lot more double checks to confirm; but when we did, it put us on to something more trivial, something that possibly can’t add to your intellectual base this century – or the next. But given the irresistible urge we regularly have in bringing to you facts that generally can make even electricity (used here as a noun) go off to sleep, we decided any which way to present to you this trivia.

First, the curious historical fact playing shamelessly to the famous Shakespearian rose (...is a rose). During the regime of Richard M. Nixon, the 37th US president, finding Republican economic policies ineffective, Nixon borrowed all Democratic policies shamelessly, including Keynesian management theories. But that’s not where we come from or even half as eye opening as what happened next. Nixon, shockingly, went on to the extent of proposing that the Republican party name be changed to Conservative!! And why? Polls ostensibly showed, then, that a majority of the voters identified themselves as conservatives. Not that Nixon was known for thinking straight – but to imagine that you can fool masses with just a change in the party’s name... well, might probably be right. And it motivated us to look at all the Einsteins globally who have got it brilliantly right, seemingly!

Leading the butcher’s dozen is the State Peace and Development Council. Guess which country this peace loving party rules? Burma. It’s the name given by the ruling army to its own so-called party. Next in line is the People’s Front for Democracy and Justice, the ruling party of Eritrea, which strangely – or perhaps not so strangely – doesn’t allow any other party, and doesn’t seem to be that much in love with democracy either.

So what if Vladimir Putin has been accused by various observers and political bigwigs of operating Russia in a Mafia-like manner by not allowing civilians have their fair, democratic and free say? His political progeny Medvedev is not far behind when it comes to understanding Shakespeare. If United Russia is Putin’s ruling (rightist?) party, Medvedev supports various other interestingly named ‘opposition’ parties like Fair Russia (supposedly leftist, has recently shallowly repledged allegiance to Putin/Kremlin) and Civilian Power (used to claim that “freedom for every civilian” was their highest value; in 2008, once the sham was over, they supported Kremlin openly).

And how can we leave the Brits out of the discussion? If anyone can tell us how labour friendly has been UK’s famously ruling Labour Party, we’ll tell them how supremely patriotic has been Robert Mugabe’s National Union Patriotic Front. And if you had an issue with the name that the former Soviet dictator Saparmurat Niyazov gave to the only autocratic party existing in Turkmenistan – the Democratic Party of Turkmenistan – then you perhaps forget that there’s a wonderful li’l country down south somewhere run by the loving, harmonious and modestly impressive Kim brothers; it’s known as the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Well, Shakespeare could never have understood his own statement as well as we did. For a dictator, is a dictator, is a dictator, by whatever name you call his party...