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EDITORIAL

NOIDA/DELHI

THE HINDU FRIDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2016

The salience of the Singur verdict A more progressive Central law on land acquisition is now in place, but several States have already either amended the new law or enacted legislation of their own F R I D AY , O C T O B E R 7 , 2 0 1 6

Chief Minister in a hurry

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ihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar will clearly leave no stone unturned in giving his prohibition policy a legislative punch. Within days of the Patna High Court striking a blow to the “total prohibition” regime in the State, the government notified the Bihar Prohibition and Excise Act, 2016, and approached the Supreme Court to challenge the High Court order. The haste throws some light on Mr. Kumar’s political strategy, which is aimed at distinguishing himself in a crowded landscape. Prohibition was his main campaign outreach to women voters in the 2015 Assembly elections. Having won the votes of women in earlier elections on schemes such as bicycles for schoolgirls, prohibition gave his Janata Dal (United) an added moral aura — he was fighting a no-holds-barred election against his former ally, the BJP, and he was fighting in alliance with Lalu Prasad’s Rashtriya Janata Dal. In the event, he was returned to the Chief Minister’s post, but with the RJD getting a greater number of MLAs than the JD(U). Mr. Kumar’s natural claim to the big post draws from his personal credibility, seen to be more potent than his party’s. This connect with a wide cross-section of the public, as a politician empathetic to aspirations for a dignified, socially and educationally empowered life, had him in the fray for a larger national role during his BJP-allied days, and so too in his current anti-BJP politics. The prohibition plank, with its Gandhian overtones and empathetic message to women, gives Mr. Kumar a chance to arrogate to himself the mantle of a moral campaigner nationally. In the immediate term, it allows him to set himself apart from the RJD’s rougher politics, and change the subject soon after his government found itself emitting the wrong message on law and order, particularly when Mohammad Shahabuddin was briefly out on bail. By attempting to overcome the High Court order, Mr. Kumar may have underlined his assertiveness, but he has, in the process, missed the opportunity the court gave him to reconsider the harsh punishments outlined in the previous law, with all the questions they pose for civil liberties, as well as the very architecture of the legislation.The prohibition regime forces the deployment of the police to seal the State’s border, and away from more mindful policing within, which was the change Mr. Kumar’s long chief ministership promised. The punishment worked into the current lawgives the police greater opportunity for rent-seeking. This may alienate the very constituencies that keep him in the running for a role larger than his party’s electoral footprint.

equality in land ownership. Ultimately, in 1978, Parliament enacted the 44th amendment to the Constitution and, through it, obliterated both Article 19(1) (f) and Article 31, consigning, in the process, the right to property to a mere non-fundamental status. The ostensible reason for this amendment was the need to provide the state with wide latitude to enable it to achieve land reforms. But the changes had the efect of only further nurturing a culture of inequality. As the continued use of the 1894 Act has shown us, both the Union and the various State governments have routinely acquired land for the benefit of private industry, always couching their laws though in the Orwellian language of “public purpose”. Inevitably, these acquisitions have tended to work to the benefit of the rich, often at grave costs incurred by small farmers.

SUHRITH PARTHASARATHY

On August 31, the Supreme Court in Kedar Nath Yadav v. State of West Bengal delivered one of the most momentous decisions of the year. It invalidated the expropriation of land in Singur by the erstwhile Left Front government in Bengal, and ordered that the acquired properties be returned to their original landowners. In their separate judgments, Justices Gopala Gowda and Arun Kumar Mishra diverged on critical questions of law. But crucially they agreed on the core issue at stake: the government’s acquisition of land for the purported use by Tata Motors Limited to construct a car factory, they held, was in violation of the procedural mandates of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894. Today, this colonial-era law might stand repealed by the loftily named Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act of 2013 (LARR Act), but still, the court’s ruling, especially Justice Gowda’s judgment, ought to resonate with significance. For it raises important concerns about the extent of the state’s supposedly sovereign power to acquire property, and the nature of what constitutes a “public purpose” permitting such taking. Working around the law Under the 1894 statute there were broadly two forms of recognised expropriation: one, acquisition for public purpose for governmental use, and two, forced transfer of land from private individuals to corporations for the latter’s commercial use. In the case of acquisitions intended to benefit companies, a special procedure was prescribed in Part VII of the Land Acquisition Act, which incorporated additional safeguards to ensure that governments don’t abuse their avowed power of eminent domain. Curiously though, when in 2006 the Communist Party of India (Marxist)-led regime in West Bengal acquired a tract of nearly 1,000 acres of land in Singur, a town located in the State’s Hooghly district, the government altogether ignored the binding requirements of Part VII. Instead, it acquired these lands, which were specifically identified by Tata Motors for constructing a manufacturing plant that would produce the Nano, envisioned as the world’s cheapest car, through a State-owned entity, the West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation. At the time, the government

ILLUSTRATION: SURENDRA

We have today a selective preservation of property rights, where the least advantaged bears the greatest burden in terms of relinquishing ownership argued that this acquisition was in furtherance of the State’s new industrial policy, and since the plant would create jobs for hundreds of people it also fulfilled a public purpose. In 2008, the Calcutta High Court agreed with the State. But many small and marginal farmers, who had refused to accept compensation, filed appeals in the Supreme Court. Property rights and the state India’s constitutional history is littered with contests such as these, over the scope of an individual’s right to property. In its original form, the Constitution, through Article 19(1)(f), guaranteed to all citizens a freedom, subject to reasonable restrictions in public interest, to acquire, hold and dispose of property. Concomitantly, in Article 31, it also vested in the state an explicit power to expropriate property for a public purpose by paying compensation to the landowner, provided such acquisition was backed by suitable legislation. The promise that these rights provided enabled the judiciary, in the immediate years after the Constitution came into force, to review virtually every act of acquisition. But judicial interventions only further strengthened the government’s resolve to dilute property rights, through measures that were meant to enable the state to bring about greater

The latitude of ‘public purpose’ For its part, the Supreme Court, encumbered by accusations of excessive intervention, has been happy to allow this expansion of the state’s power of eminent domain. It has generally ruled that even a token contribution by the government towards the cost of acquisition is suicient to escape the requirements of Part VII. Preposterously, in one such case, the court held that “the contribution of Rs.1 from the public exchequer cannot be dubbed as illusory so as to invalidate the acquisition”. Matters reached a crescendo when in 2003, the court found that an acquisition of land to establish a “diamond park”, comprising various units for cutting and polishing diamonds, was valid as it would generate a “good deal of foreign exchange” and would create “employment potential”. In the ultimate analysis, the court wrote, “what is considered to be an acquisition for facilitating the setting up of an industry in private sector could get imbued with the character of public purpose acquisition if only the Government comes forward to sanction the payment of a nominal sum towards compensation.” Therefore, when hearing the challenge of the farmers who had lost their lands in Singur, the Supreme Court was faced with a mountain of precedent that had allowed a precipitous expansion of the meaning of public purpose. While Justice Mishra accepted the erstwhile CPI(M)-led government’s argument to the limited extent that the expropriation was intended for the benefit of the public — in line with previously decided judgments — Justice Gowda was far more suspicious. Through a scrupulous analysis of Cabinet memoranda and letters ex-

CARTOONSCAPE

Stamping down on prejudice

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he revival of the HIV and AIDS (Prevention and Control) Bill, 2014, and the Union Cabinet’s approval for provisions that make discrimination against people living with the virus punishable, are positive steps. Such laws, however, can only deliver benefits within the overall constraints imposed by an underfunded public health system. Where the legislation can make some diference, with active monitoring by HIV/AIDS support groups, is in ensuring that acquiring the infection does not mean an end to education, employment, access to housing and healthcare due to discrimination. The success of the anti-discrimination aspects hinges on the readiness of governments to accept the inquiry findings of ombudsmen, to be appointed under the law, and provide relief. Since the new law is intended to both stop the spread of the disease and help those who have become infected get antiretroviral therapy as well as equal opportunity, it will take a high degree of commitment to provide efective drugs to all those in need. In August, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare put the number of people getting free treatment nationally at 9,65,000, of which 53,400 are children. This must be viewed against the most recent estimate last year, that 2.1 million people live with HIV in India, of whom 7,90,000 are women. Regional variations in access to diagnosis and treatment must be addressed. The legislation and the structure of complaints redress that it proposes should provide some relief to thousands of families that face discrimination in admitting children to school, an infected individual getting a job, or treatment in hospital. Unlike many other diseases, however, HIV/AIDS has received global attention and funding, thus building up pressure on governments to come up with supportive policies. Communities will now have the opportunity to ensure that the strongest element of the prospective law, assuring confidentiality of HIV status, is enforced. A breach could invite imprisonment and a fine. Yet, the proposals approved by the Cabinet fail on one important count: the insurance industry is allowed to use actuarial calculations to limit access to products to people with HIV. The Centre’s initiative ispalpably weak, since a universal system would not discriminate against people with any form of illness, and would fully embrace the goal of health and welfare for all.National AIDS Control Organisation data for 2015 indicate that while there is an overall decline in HIV prevalence among visitors to antenatal clinics, there was a rise in nine States. The government must get down to business and close such gaps. CM YK

changed between the State government and Tata Motors, he concluded that the lands in question were acquired solely for the benefit of the company. Hence, the attempt by the government to circumvent the special procedures of Part VII through a claim that the lands were acquired in public purpose, in Justice Gowda’s ruling, was a colourable exercise of power. “Such an acquisition, if allowed to sustain,” he wrote, “would lead to the attempt to justify any and every acquisition of land of the most vulnerable sections of the society in the name of ‘public purpose’ to promote socio-economic development.” To a limited extent, some of the concerns that Justice Gowda has raised have already been allayed by the enactment of the LARR Act in 2013. The statute not only defines public purpose with greater clarity, but also mandates that where acquisitions are made for the benefit of private companies, the prior consent of at least 80 per cent of the affected landowners ought to be secured. But this legislation doesn’t negate the value in Justice Gowda’s judgment, not least because the power to make laws on acquisitions vests both with the Union and the State governments. A judgment as guiding light As events since 2013 have shown us, not only is the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government keen on rolling back some of the benefits that the central law ofers, several States — Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan and Gujarat, among others — have already either amended the new law or enacted legislation of their own, creating sui generis processes that permit takings even in the absence of a direct public purpose. In other States such as Telangana, plans are afoot to amend the land law in such a manner as to do away with the requirement of consent when acquiring property for private companies so long as the acquisition is for a public purpose. Many of these State laws ofend the Constitution’s guarantee of equal treatment, but unless the courts make express declarations to such an efect, they are likely to be widely deployed to acquire land by eschewing the LARR Act and by extending the meaning of public purpose to absurd lengths. Particularly since the 44th amendment to the Constitution, diferent governments in India have behaved with an apparent belief that their authority is boundless. Possession of land is taken on a whim, payment of compensation, often a meagre amount, is routinely delayed, and public hearings prior to any acquisition, if conducted, are treated as inconvenient formalities. The LARR Act was never going to be a panacea to all these evils; it’s barely revolutionary when you consider that it does little to topple the state’s supposed sovereign hold over all land. But in comparative terms it is certainly a progressive legislation. At the very least it redefines the manner in which the state ought to exercise its immense power to take property. The effort by diferent State governments to negate this enactment’s core promise is therefore a matter of regret. When viewed thus, Justice Gowda’s judgment has to be seen as not only a positive airmation of the law, but also as one that could guide the Supreme Court towards interpreting the Constitution in its finest light. There is nothing implicitly wrong in adopting a welfare-based conception of the right to property, where the state sees it as its duty to regulate ownership of land, among other resources. After all, in every state where a right to property is considered sacrosanct, those classes of people without property have little to benefit from. But what we have today in India is a selective preservation of property rights, where the least advantaged amongst us also bears the greatest burden in terms of relinquishing ownership of land. No reasonable theory of justice can validate this terrifying anomaly. Suhrith Parthasarathy is an advocate practising at the Madras High Court.

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Burden of proof The ruling government’s glorification of the Indian Army’s surgical strikes and the opposition parties’ scepticism of the same show how political interests take precedence over the sovereignty and security of the nation (“Avoid chest-thumping on surgical strikes, says PM”, Oct.6). Parties want to cash in on the operation before the elections in U.P. and Punjab. By making a sensitive issue, in which the dignity and pride of the nation are at stake, a political agenda, parties are showing how unethical they have become. Instead of focussing on political interests, attention should be diverted towards future security challenges. Mudit Katiyar, Lucknow

Questioning the Army’s surgical strikes may have helped the naysayers savour the satisfaction of embarrassing the ruling party, but it has in the process inflicted considerable damage on several fronts (“Three shades of denial”, Oct. 6). One, these people have dealt a severe blow to India’s eforts to mobilise international opinion against Pakistan’s sponsorship of terror as an instrument of state policy because nations that speak in

diferent voices on matters of security and defence evoke contempt rather than sympathy. Two, the sceptics have indirectly helped the Pakistani Army and the government tell their people that India’s claim of a tactical attack stands ‘exposed’ as many Indians are themselves not convinced of it. Three, this must be demoralising for the Army. It is ironical that when the whole world is ready to consider the oicial version of the attacks as credible, some Indians will go to any extent to score political points even if it compromises the nation’s fight against Pakistan’s proxy war. V.N. Mukundarajan, Thiruvananthapuram

The surgical strikes are under scrutiny as they transcended the nationalistic cause and are being used for political mileage. What news channels call ‘distrusting’ our Army and ‘disrespecting’ our martyrs are actually discourses that need to take place in a democracy. The freedom to ask tough questions of public authorities, whoever they may be, diferentiates us from Pakistan. The government could call for a joint session of Parliament and confidentially show the footage to legislators across parties. Then they could pass a resolution on the

success of the surgical strikes. This will not only solve the security concerns about making the strike video public but will also reinforce trust in the Opposition and the public. Ghanisht Yasu, Lucknow

These types of operations have their own covert and confidential strategies. Sharing videos of them will reveal the know-how of the mission, which needs to be kept clandestine in the nation’s interest. Sharing the video will let the enemy nation know the secret of such attacks and that will weaken our country. The decision taken by the Indian Army is correct. Kaushik Pandey, Varanasi

Some journalists and carping critics of the military action have been starved of details of the surgical strikes. There is no compelling reason for the government to furnish details on how the strikes were carried out. It is not as though it is imperative that sensitive information must be revealed to the public. The intentional denial of any shade does not make the account spurious. Military action does not require people’s certification and approval. Though

one may agree that chest-thumping is unwarranted as it may lead to unnecessary provocation, it is wrong to find fault with the government’s obduracy to share the details of what transpired. On the contrary, let us acknowledge and accept the fact that the strikes were intended to negate the threat from the other side of the LoC. V. Lakshmanan, Tirupur

A step forward Approval of the long-awaited amendments to the HIV Bill is welcome and will help HIV-positive people enjoy the same rights as other people (“Bill to protect HIV community from bias gets approval”, Oct.6). It is sad that people still don’t know that HIV spreads through transmission of bodily fluids or through syringes and needle use and not because people mingle with one another. The Bill is a step forward, but the problem unfortunately lies in people’s attitude. To bring about a change in attitude will take a longer time. V. Visweswara Rao, Vizianagaram

This is a rather delayed but a muchneeded and positive step. Besides

sufering physically, an HIV patient also becomes a social patient. It is this social discrimination that makes the disease more painful. The final passage of the law will mainly put forward the point that HIV is just like any other disease. Sahil Garg, Sangrur

Making a good biopic A true biographer must extensively research the subject and be willing to divulge both known and unknown details of the person in question (“Chronicle of a celebrity retold”, Oct.6). A mere chronicling of someone’s life does not qualify to be a biography. Mere reproduction of a few sterling moments on the cricket field, as is the case in M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story, does not lift the biopic. It is only natural that the sketchy creation is a bit of a disappointment even though the diehard cricket buf may be happy with it. M.S. Subbulakshmi’s biography by T.J.S. George titled MS: A Life In Music and A.K. Ramanujan’s biography by Robert Kanigel titled The Man Who Knew Infinity: A Life of the Genius Ramanujan are examples of good biographies. V. Lakshmanan, Tirupur ND-ND

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WORLD VIEW

Farewell to NAM A summit of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) without the Indian Prime Minister is like Hamlet without the Prince of Denmark and that is what was enacted in Venezuela recently. The only other time when an Indian Prime Minister stayed home was in 1979, when T.P. the historic Havana summit took place. Prime Minister SREENIVASAN Charan Singh’s absence, however, had nothing to do with NAM; this time, the absence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi had a political message. Sources close to the Prime Minister have taken pains to explain that his absence was deliberate as he did not find NAM to be important enough for him to spend a couple of days in distant Venezuela. Therefore, the explanation given by the head of the Indian delegation, Vice President Hamid Ansari, that the summit was not a conference of Prime Ministers and, therefore, Indian participation was adequate did not carry conviction. Flawed assumptions about NAM Non-alignment has not been in the vocabulary of Prime Minister Modi. He has been on a quest for selective alignments to suit his needs for India’s development and security. His advisers have now begun to rationalise India’s distancing from NAM. One argument is that NAM did not have any binding principles and that it was a marriage of convenience among disparate countries. This argument arises from the narrow, literary interpretation of non-alignment. Many commentators had felt, right from the beginning, that the word ‘non-alignment’ conveyed the wrong notion that it was not aligning with the power blocs and that the be-all and end-all of non-alignment was to remain unaligned. But the quintessence of non-alignment was freedom of judgment and action and it remained valid, Non-alignment has not been in whether there was one bloc or the vocabulary of PM Modi. But two. Seen in that context, nonIndia does not have to military alliances can also be within the ambit of non-aligndenounce non-alignment to ment, which was subsequently follow its present foreign policy characterised as ‘strategic autonomy’. In other words, India does not have to denounce non-alignment to follow its present foreign policy. Another argument being heard is that NAM countries did not come to our help on any of the critical occasions when India needed solidarity, such as the Chinese aggression in 1962 or the Bangladesh war in 1971. Even in the latest struggle against terror, NAM has not come to assist India in any way. But the whole philosophy of NAM is that it remains united on larger global issues, even if does not side with a member on a specific issue. India itself has followed this approach, whenever the members had problems with others either inside or outside the movement. NAM positions have always been the reflection of the lowest common denominator in any given situation. That NAM has no ideal or ideology as a glue is a wrong assumption. Though the criteria for NAM membership are general, anti-colonialism, anti-imperialism and anti-racism were essential attributes of NAM countries. There was a consensus on nuclear disarmament also till India broke ranks by keeping out of the Non-Proliferation Treaty. The diversity reflected in both Singapore and Cuba being NAM members has been its strength. Therefore, Egypt signing the Camp David Accords with Israel in 1978 or India signing the Treaty of Peace, Friendship and Cooperation with the Soviet Union in 1971 did not result in any disruption of membership. A heritage we can leverage All said and done, the golden age in India’s foreign policy was in the first 15 years after Independence, when NAM provided a constituency for India because of our non-violent victory over the British and the leadership it provided to the newly independent countries. Our problems were diferent from the small and impoverished nations that thronged the movement, but Jawaharlal Nehru’s vision and statesmanship inspired them. We did not seek to resolve our problems through the machinery of dispute resolution in NAM, but actively assisted those who sought such assistance. India led the NAM efort to resolve the Iran-Iraq dispute. As expected, political issues continued to engage NAM and we benefitted from its activism occasionally. In fact, it was through NAM that we operated to counter the eforts to expand the UN Security Council by including just Germany and Japan as permanent members. NAM submitted its own proposal and ensured that no quick fix was permitted. The question we need to ask is whether our continued involvement with NAM would stand in the way of our 21st century ambitions. The very informal nature of NAM permits members to operate individually. It also has the facility of members reserving their positions, as we did on the non-proliferation positions of NAM. Our new nearness to the U.S. is not a red rag in NAM and our ability to be helpful in formulating U.S. policies gives us an advantage. No NAM country may agree to isolate Pakistan, but the NAM forum will be an efective instrument to project our anti-terrorist sentiments. NAM is particularly important in elections at the UN, including the possible identification of new permanent members of the Security Council. The NAM position may not be decisive, but in the normal process of consultations, every grouping will get its own weightage and it is convenient to have a lobby behind us. NAM today, like the Commonwealth has always been, is a heritage we need not discard. The decision to say farewell to NAM is very much in keeping with the new transactional nature of the foreign policy we are developing. NAM was a part of our larger vision for the world, but today it is seen as inconsequential to our present preoccupations. This transformation will not be lost on the world community. T.P. Sreenivasan, former Ambassador of India and Governor for India of the International Atomic Energy Agency, is Director General, Kerala International Centre.

FROM THE ARCHIVES (dated October 7, 1966)

Repayments to Aid Consortium The Union Finance Minister, Mr. Sachindra Chaudhuri, who returned from the United States to-day [October 5] said that the members of the Aid India Consortium were likely to agree to the rescheduling of debt repayments by India. Canada had already agreed. Britain was keen

to do it and wanted other members of the Consortium also to do likewise. Mr. Chaudhuri said that the United States would probably follow suit when Britain acts. It is expected that the Consortium will meet on November 8 or 9 when it would discuss rescheduling as well as project aid for the Fourth Plan, although it may not come to a decision on either straightway.

CORRECTIONS AND CLARIFICATIONS >> There was an error in a report, “Filmy memes make a clean sweep in Kolkata” (Life page, October 6, 2016). The main actors in the film, Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro, were Naseeruddin Shah and Ravi Baswani and not Sudhir Mishra.

It is the policy of The Hindu to correct significant errors as soon as possible. Please specify the edition (place of publication), date and page. The Readers’ Editor’s oice can be contacted by Telephone: +91-44-28418297/28576300 (11 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday to Friday); Fax: +91-44-28552963; E-mail:[email protected] Mail: Readers’ Editor, The Hindu, Kasturi Buildings, 859 & 860 Anna Salai, Chennai 600 002, India. All communication must carry the full postal address and telephone number. No personal visits. The Terms of Reference for the Readers’ Editor are on www.thehindu.com CM YK

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PERSPECTIVE

NOIDA/DELHI

Instinct is no excuse Go down that road, and you give the green light for people like Donald Trump to get away with all kinds of nastiness TABISH KHAIR

For years I have been worried about the trend to use genetics or evolution to explain everything about human beings and their societies. Now, I believe strongly in the body — that is, in biology as a significant part of culture, and vice versa. And I believe as strongly in evolution. No, belief is not the right word. One needs to believe in Adam and Eve. One does not need to believe in evolution: opening one’s eyes and mind would suice. So that is not my problem. My problem is with the way genetics and, once again, Darwinism is used in certain circles. Genes and traits The misuse of genetics is easier to explain as it happens all the time in the media. Remember all those reports on the ‘discovery’ of a gene for criminality, cancer, blondeness, etc.? It is an unholy mix, and often at a wicked slant to the complex truth. While sometimes a specific gene is responsible for a particular, usually very limited, trait — such as some cancers — usually complex traits involve a number of genes. Moreover, the same genes can be responsible for diferent traits. Finally, just because one has a gene for ‘something,’ it does not mean that one will develop that trait. All this is not necessarily coming from the reactionary Right. For instance, the Left has foregrounded the biological and genetic grounding of sexuality to fight for good causes like transgender rights. However, even here one can run the danger of essentialising, because while alternative sexualities have biological roots, they do not depend solely on them. Biology is an important part of the social, cultural and personal lives of human beings, but it is seldom exhaustive or unilateral. In his excellent book, The Gene: An Intimate History, Siddhartha Mukherjee illustrates that, at a general level, “history, society and culture collide and intersect with genetics, like tides. Some waves cancel each other, while others reinforce each other. No force is particularly strong — but their combined effect produces the rippled landscape that we call an individual’s identity.” What the common discourse about genes and inheritance does is simple: it turns complexity into compulsion. It

COMPULSIVE: ”Donald Trump belittles his opponents, is sexist and racist, and tells lies without being considered dishonest in many circles.” Mr. Trump at a campaign rally in Henderson, Nevada. PHOTO: AFP suggests that we are the way we are solely due to deeply ingrained and directly operational biological factors. Some recent uses of Darwinism point in that direction too. One example would be the recent trend of literary Darwinism. This is a useful sub-category of literary criticism: for instance, it makes sense to point out that horror fiction appeals to readers partly due to evolutionary reasons, as we are afraid of things that once threatened our existence. Fangs, for instance, or snakes. Even here, though, simplistic forays into literary Darwinism run into cultural roadblocks: for instance, we cuddle our pet cats despite their fangs, and in India snakes are not just worshipped but even given erotic dimensions (as in the myth of irresistible ‘snake women’). Moreover, to claim that human beings compose poems just as birds tweet songs is to make a valid point, but to say nothing about the poems. Unless, of course, as the best literary Darwinists do, one factors in the evolution of the human mind, and this can hardly be done, as Mr. Mukherjee illustrates even with reference to something so obviously biological as sexuality, without factoring in history, society and culture at an equivalent level. As is the case with some of the misuse of ‘genes’, literary Darwinism is not just a ‘rightist’ trend: for instance, its most militant proponents in American aca-

What the common discourse about genes and inheritance does is simple: it turns complexity into compulsion demia seem to be reacting to Christian fundamentalism by espousing Darwinian evolution. And yet, whether from the Left or the Right, literary Darwinism can be too easily be reduced to a version of compulsion: we are the way we are because of evolutionary biological factors which explain away culture and society, and are not essentially modified or changed by them. This privileging of compulsion is not something restricted to the media or to soft humanities dons desperate to borrow the respectability of ‘hard science.’ Even a scientist and an excellent science writer can fall into this trap. The very title of Richard Dawkins’s The Selfish Gene serves to illustrate it. One need not quarrel with the content of that influential book, which is a scientific matter best left to scientists. I am talking of the assumptions that accrete in the title alone. Soon after publishing his bestselling book, Mr. Dawkins said in interviews that genes can be seen as selfish or altruistic — it depends on where you are looking from. However, the title of his book was not The Altruistic Gene. It

was The Selfish Gene. I would make so bold as to suggest that had the book been called The Altruistic Gene, it would not have gained a tenth of the attention it did — especially in the mainstream media. Mark the dates. The book was published in 1976. Selfishness was becoming cool then: Ronald Reagan came to power in 1981; Margaret Thatcher in 1979. Let alone the misleading metaphor of ‘selfhood’ attached to a bundle of chemicals in a cell, Mr. Dawkins’s book was read as suggesting biological compulsion. Selfishness defines us as human beings, the ascending neoliberals were shouting from every rooftop (and many still are) in the 1970s and 1980s. We are compelled to denude nature, pollute spaces, exploit other human beings, accumulate vast wealth in the midst of extreme poverty, etc. — because we are, ah, compulsively selfish. That was not exactly what Mr. Dawkins said in the book — his metaphor of ‘selfishness’ was diferent if deeply flawed — but that is how he was read, and that is the main reason it became such a bestseller. Compulsion as freedom The Korean-German philosopher, Byung-Chul Han, notes in a recent book, Psychopolitik (not available in English yet), that neoliberalism is distinguished by its rhetoric of compulsion as freedom. By turning the worker into a kind of solitary entrepreneur, neoliberalism has tied us to relentless, compulsive productivity. But even at a simpler level, I can argue that we are being compelled by neoliberal thinking to sell our labour, work extra, consume, obey the ‘logic of the market,’ and so on — all in the name of our freedom. In short, neoliberalism confuses freedom with its exact opposite, compulsion. It is this logic that is sustained by the return to a fetishisation of instincts in the media discourse of ‘genes’ and related matters, even when, as is the case with literary Darwinism, the intention is something else. Once accepted, this logic enthrones neoliberalism; it also justifies a lot of injustice and exploitation. After all, we are just being compelled by our instincts, no? We can ‘honestly’ accept that and belittle our opponents, pollute the earth, be sexist or racist, tell blatant lies, etc. without, like Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, ever being considered dishonest in such circles. Tabish Khair is an Indian novelist and academic who teaches in Denmark.

A post-American West Asia? Far from making a clean break with the past, Barack Obama restored the ruthless realism of Cold War politics in the region single resolution critical of Israel pass the UN Security Council. Besides, Washington recently announced a $38billion military aid package to Israel for 10 years, the largest of its kind. Mr. Obama did the same with the Saudis, offering them a $60-billion arms deal at a time when Riyadh was bombing Yemen.

STANLY JOHNY

Seven and a half years ago, while addressing an audience of 3,000 people in Cairo University, Barack Obama ofered a “new beginning” to the Islamic world, sought to overcome “years of mistrust” and threw his weight behind the IsraelPalestine peace process. Though he didn’t lay out any policy paradigm, hopes were high that the new U.S. President would correct the mistakes of his predecessors and open a new chapter in America’s relations with West Asia and North Africa. With only months left for Mr. Obama to leave the White House, has he radically altered U.S. foreign policy? Those who believe he did, including both his critics and defenders, list several reasons. Mr. Obama made peace with Iran, a country whose leaders still call America “the Great Satan”; his administration went beyond the traditional equations of America’s alliances in the region by being critical of Israel and ignoring Saudi Arabia’s concerns over the Iran deal; he drew down troops from Iraq; and he refused to attack the Syrian regime despite enormous pressure both from his domestic critics and regional allies. These have prompted some to call Mr. Obama an ideological liberal committed to peace, while others say the U.S. retreated from West Asia under his watch. Iraq and Iran Compared to the administration of George W. Bush, Mr. Obama’s approach was certainly diferent. Mr. Bush was a more aggressive (and less strategic) player who did not have to deal with any major regional challenges other than the ones he helped set of. On the other side, Mr. Obama inherited a war in Iraq, a dangerous stalemate in Iran, and growing threat of jihadism from several countries in the region. And, not to forget, the Arab protests and crises in its aftermath. In the larger scheme of foreign policy, the Obama administration also had to deal with a rising, ambitious China and a resurgent, vengeful Russia. So a new policy paradigm was inevitable. Take the case of Iraq. The war had

STICKING TO“President PLAN: Barack Obama drew down the troops from Iraq, but retained the leverage over Iraqi politics by other means.” File photo of the President greeting troops during a visit to Camp Victory, outside Baghdad. PHOTO: AFP turned unpopular in America during Mr. Bush’s presidency itself. It was Mr. Bush who set a December 2011 deadline to withdraw “all U.S. forces” from “all Iraqi territory”. Mr. Obama stuck to the plan — he drew down the troops, but retained the leverage over Iraqi politics by other means — because winding down a disastrous, unpopular war in West Asia fit into his foreign policy narrative of regaining the trust of the Islamic world and giving greater attention to other challenges. The U.S. withdrawal came under major criticism only after the Islamic State (IS) took over Iraqi cities in early 2014. Critics say the withdrawal was too early and put Iraqi security at risk. But such arguments overlook the fact that Iraq witnessed sectarian civil war and massive bloodshed in 2006-07 at the peak of the American invasion. So the presence of U.S. troops per se doesn’t deter jihadist violence in the country. On the other side, there are several reasons, such as the sectarianism of the Iraqi government and the chaos in Syria, that led to the rise of the IS. America’s Iraq war and the rise of Shias to power in Baghdad had made Iran’s regional presence stronger. Therefore, even as administration oicials said all options were on the table in tackling the Iranian nuclear crisis, the

He used direct force when it was less risky, diplomacy when no other options were available, and proxy wars when U.S. interests were at stake only viable option Mr. Obama had was diplomacy. So he employed a carrotand-stick approach — imposing stringent sanctions while simultaneously offering an olive branch to Iranian rulers. It worked as the Iranians, already strained by economic pains and fears of a public unrest, responded positively. Here the key criticism is that the deal makes Iran, which is at odds with America’s two greatest allies in the region, Israel and Saudi Arabia, stronger. But Mr. Obama did not fundamentally alter America’s traditional alliances in the region with the Iran deal. True, the agreement and the subsequent removal of sanctions make Iran a stronger power. But it has delayed Iran becoming a nuclear country at least by 10 years, leaving Israel the only nucleararmed state in the region. And to mollify Israel’s concerns, the administration tactically turned a blind eye towards Israel’s atrocities against the Palestinians. Since 1967, this is the first administration that hasn’t let even a

A balancing act This ofshore balancing was evident in Mr. Obama’s Syria policy as well. His critics would say his reluctance to interfere in Syria has deepened the country’s crisis. But that argument is ahistorical. Mr. Obama is not a president ideologically opposed to military interventions. He used force in Libya, and is partly responsible for the chaos it is now going through. Mr. Obama’s dictum is to use force if the risks are minimal. Attacking Libya was a relatively less risky business, but Syria is diferent. It’s located at the heart of West Asia, is an ally of Russia and a closer partner of Iran. Any direct attack on Syria will escalate the crisis dangerously. On the other side, the picture on a post-Bashar al-Assad Syria has never been clear as the regime’s opponents still remain a divided lot and include deadly jihadists as well. Mr. Obama avoided only a direct confrontation. The U.S. has been actively present in the Syrian crisis from the very beginning through its proxies. Still, the key reason the U.S. and Russia were negotiating a ceasefire was that sections of the anti-Assad rebels were supported and controlled by the Americans, like the Assad regime is backed by the Russians. If one were to piece together these bits into a larger picture, it would show Mr. Obama as a President who used direct force when it was less risky, championed diplomacy when no other options were available, resorted to proxy wars when American interests were at stake and continued to defend the aggressions and human rights violations of U.S. allies in the region. This is hardly idealism. Nor does it reflect any new beginning to the people in the region. America is not retreating from West Asia either. What Mr. Obama has done is to restore the ruthless realism of Cold War politics in America’s West Asia policy, taking the reckless aggressor back to a multifaceted hegemon. [email protected] ND-ND