Opinion Hold the euphoria

This seems to be what the Supreme Court is doing,albeit with the best of intentions. Do consumers who bought mobile telephone services in good faith from the 2G companies need to be punished? Do the 900 million Indians who own cell phones need to suffer because the telecommunications industry will be thrown into turmoil on account of last week’s decision? Do those young people who have jobs in the companies who may become defunct need to suffer? Did the honourable judges ask themselves these questions?

Did they ask themselves whether they would not be adding more uncertainty to an already uncertain investment climate? Respectable foreign companies invested in our booming mobile phone industry because they thought their investments were safe. They are now being punished for being stupid enough to trust in India. This comes at a time when the investment climate has already been ruined by arbitrary and reckless decisions taken on specious ‘environmental’ grounds by the government. And,it comes at a time when on account of there not having been a single attempt at economic reforms for nearly a decade there is a growing sense among foreign investors that India is closed for business. If they start taking their money elsewhere,we cannot afford to build the roads,ports,train stations and other infrastructure that we cannot afford any more to do without.

The Supreme Court has added to the impression that India is an unreliable investment not just with the 2G decision but with its earlier decision to impose a blanket ban on iron ore mining in Bellary. This was done for environmental reasons but how is it possible to mine for iron ore without some damage to the environment? Would it not be better to put in place strict rules for reforesting areas degraded by mining? At least this way the Indian steel industry would not be in meltdown causing millions of people to lose their jobs.

The fight against corruption in public life is vital but so far there is no sign that we are getting anywhere near the root causes of corruption. These lie in the inexplicable discretionary powers that our ministers and officials enjoy and the layers of opaque procedures that clothe them. They lie in the massive ‘welfare’ programmes that our governments like to design and that generally serve to promote the welfare of the officials who manage them. They lie in the preposterous ‘perks’ that our elected representatives enjoy like palatial homes in Lutyens’ Delhi that our so alluring that even billionaire MPs refuse to leave once they are ensconced. They lie in our ‘political culture’ that is modeled on the colonial system of governance that we inherited from the British and that the people’s representatives are loath to change.

There is,though,a reason that is more important than any of these others for corruption in Indian public life and that is the failure of our justice system to render justice swiftly. Would the honourable Supreme Court like to tell us why it has taken more than twenty years to punish an earlier corrupt Telecommunications Minister by name of Sukh Ram? Why have we needed to wait till he is so old and forgotten that punishing him has become meaningless?

Follow Tavleen Singh on Twitter @ Tavleen_Singh