Bihar: A New State of Mind

I have been meaning to stay a lot more connected to my hometown. Despite intentions though, physical visits have been few and far between. Thus, it was a direct call to action when the W alerted me to my expected housebound status for the next few weeks. I planned a trip in a jiffy, managing to cover Patna, Muzaffarpur, and our ancestral village — all in the space of one weekend.

Hurried as it was, the trip's mood was ponderous, and overall much upbeat. In fact, I came away with my intent to travel Patna-wards markedly stronger. This reinforcement, admittedly, is partly on emotional counts. Yet, Bihar's near-unique socioeconomic theatre too contributes to my renewed resolve.

For the record, I have long believed my beloved native state (often including Jharkhand in the bargain) to be a microcosm of India at large. Indeed, its fertile Gangetic plains or mineral-rich badlands present, firsthand, a quintessential paradox: penury amidst plenty. Of late, in Bihar, like in India, nature's bounty has fought and lost a daily battle with the grime and toil of life in poverty. Equally (and perhaps inevitably), beyond the obvious despondency and squalor, a subterranean strife constantly tested the overt social détente, the undercurrents often erupting in murderous class wars.

Talk history, and the microcosm argument is actually an understatement. Bihar's leadership — in thought or worldly terms — is sans parallel. Yet, some years ago, an otherwise discerning (non-Bihari) friend had scoffed at my assertion that Patna (Patliputra) was the capital of 'India' longer than any city but Delhi. For Doubting Thomases such as he, try googling the following to get a sense of what I say: the Buddha, Mahavir, or Guru Gonind Singh; Balmiki, Vishwamitra, Aryabhatt, Panini, Gargi, Maitreyi, Vatsyayan, Banabhatt, or Chanakya; and certainly the Guptas, Mauryas, Ashoka, or Sher Shah (the list is by no means exhaustive.)

I believe too that there was more to my aforementioned friend's mirth. The unfortunate, but undeniable, truth was that Bihar had simply lost the plot over the years. Always in the news for the wrong reasons, it was tough to associate glory or excellence with the state. Appreciate too that through the 90s and this millennium's first few years, the Indian nation was burying its Nehruvian policy overhang in favour of globalisation and the free market. As sarkari sloth made way for private enterprise, the air was rich with the promise of prosperity, not hollow socialist shibboleths. In this period, the land of Nalanda and the Lichchhavi republic — which gave India its first coinage, trade arteries, and Arthashastra — was going the other way. As if under a sorcerer's spell, Bihar turned into a family's fiefdom, discovering new heights of lawlessness, negative growth rates, and wanton polarisation of an already fractious society.

At another level, with liberalisation, cable TV came to town. Likely looking for comic appeal, the media lapped up Shri Laloo Prasad and his country bumpkin caricature. Bihar's strongman readily obliged, with bytes or antics more befitting a Bollywood comic than otherwise. Arguably, this was deliberate: playing up his rustic roots for lowest common denominator appeal. Regardless, he made a virtue of the ludicrous. With a clear development-is-anathema stance (discordant with the rest of India) and longevity in power, this perpetuated a rather sorry image of Biharis: buffoons who wouldn't know (or didn't deserve) any better.

For most of this period, I was still deeply rooted in Bihar, yet spent significant time outside the state. At its worst, I felt my compatriots had given up hope; that the pithy but patently unfair caricature had grown larger than life. Bihar had gone from being a state to becoming a state of mind.

I hoped, too, that some day, regardless of the dispensation's colour, my home state's fortunes would rest with a believer in a progressive political agenda. Bihar would then feel the difference, reward the change, and break the defeatist psyche. On this trip, driving on a new rural road as an alternative route to my village, I felt my idea's time had come (much better than merely talking of Nitish Kumar and Elections 2010; equally hoping that having reaped benefits, the NDA regime will push for more in Round 2). Its zindagi mili hai dobara!

Cinema Cinema

I love movies. At the risk of jeopardising domestic bliss, I can add that I haven’t seen enough lately. Lest I be misunderstood — IPTV is a godsend — but in a weekend I'm perfectly capable of watching two to four, maybe more — a prospect at which the W isn't exactly chuffed. Again, it is not as if good cinema is my sole preserve in the household. The difference lies entirely in my preference for remote control-driven (some may aver it’s the couch) variety versus the more social cinematic experience in a theatre.

Interestingly, I grew up to almost no moviegoing, nor much interest in films. Through school, cinema was regulated like fresh air on a chilly winter night — kept out if possible, or heavily rationed at least. I reckon this was mostly in keeping with a general bias towards discipline in our upbringing (to which I owe a number of my latter-day milestones). Economics may have played a part too (thrift is good); concern over my grades most likely did. Thus, I averaged less than two films a year in the 'hall' (as we called them) in this period. These too were mostly thanks to a friend who consistently planned one as his birthday outing; and the rare parentally endorsed gems (Dweep Ka Rahasya was one such — I loved it).

Of course, I caught a few on TV (courtesy neighbours, till we acquired our own in '84) but this too was not without a twist. Given that staying out late was not an option, several of these films were incomplete, missing the 'climax'! I vividly remember the festive air in our middle-class community too, when Doordarshan decided to telecast movies on Thursday evenings, thus doubling frequency to a joyous twice weekly (the first such offering was Vachan, and I believe I have good reason to forget all about it, save the name). In short, the uninspired offerings and fragmented viewership did little to stoke my cinegoer buds — though an ill-understood Achanak and half-seen Ittefaq did plant seeds of love for the crime-mystery-thriller genre that I have been unable to shake off since.

Later, the VCR came to town. It brought with it a rudimentary element of choice. Grainy picture quality (not that DD was much different) was a small price to pay for the ability to watch what you wanted, when you wanted, and how you wanted. Naturally, video libraries, parlours etc mushroomed all over town. At home, the Pater made decisions of his own though (likely inspired by my not-always-inspiring scholastic record) and this contraption only entered the Jha household once the son had been packed off to college!

Most of my movie-on-video, thus, was with friends. I emerged much enlightened from these soirees (I can hear your wicked smile, reader!) not the least of which was exposure to cinema beyond mainstream Hindi (a Khamosh or Prahar amidst The Godfather and The Medusa Touch). Not entirely unrelated, this included QSQT, a milestone in the sense that I saw it and understood it (ah those vague, innocent, vicarious pleasures)!

Come college. My means stayed modest but the joys of freedom more than made up for it, strained only by early stirrings of a sense of responsibility. Films played a part in this general process of self-discovery as always — occasionally as input, but often as a companion in the journey. The plot stayed true at B-School too, save for a mild sharpening of the pen.

The intervening years have taught me how much I delight in having (almost one too) many balls in the air. As in life, so in movies — or literature and friendships — eclecticism reigns supreme. Yet, I can watch almost any film once, and a few many times, to this day. And hence, the sovereign power of the remote control.

Asleep at the Wheel

One of the most telling descriptions of the bureaucracy in the 1970s went thus: "if you can, don't move; if you must, move slowly; if pushed, move in circles; if cornered, appoint a committee!" One can say this most certainly of our economic policy. Despite years of evidence, governments in India hung on to an anachronistic Nehruvian model, mouthing hollow garibi-hatao type slogans, till being forced off our backs two decades ago. Few know this better than our venerable PM. As a key apparatchik in the erstwhile growth-sapping regime — something Congress propagandists wantonly gloss over — Dr Manmohan Singh wilfully fashioned policies that eventually had us staring down the barrel of a gun in 1991.

Should it, therefore, surprise us that, when the bottom falls off the Rupee, or GDP growth plummets to its lowest in almost a decade as it has today, the GOI is a deer caught in the headlights? Dr Singh would have us believe this is all thanks to the global economic slowdown or Eurozone woes (external locus of control; not leadership). Notably he calls out the RBI's tight-fisted monetary stance even though structural problems need a fiscal and not monetary response. Indeed, the central bank has little elbow room in the face of oil price risks or the current account gap (widest since 1980). I would argue, on the other hand, that the RBI is doing its damnedest to keep inflation in check.

In context, it is important to peel the onion (!) on our inflation problem. Food is a structural shortage story. Agricultural growth at 4-5% is simply inadequate to meet the demands of a burgeoning 1.2B population with real incomes rising 5%. Next, MNREGA pushes up rural wages (10% YOY in Jan 2010, accelerated to 14% now) to unprecedented levels as GOI continues to dole out money with low to no link to productive use. Then the government raises MSP adding further fuel to the fire. Consequent rise in rural wages soon translates to urban wage inflation — via construction and informal workers.

This cycle of food and wage inflation combining to increase input costs for goods has turned our inflation into a structural one. It can, of course, be tackled. The path lies through supply chain efficiency and productivity. These, however, need a strong policy response, not today's status-quoist bias that is happier with incremental versus exponential change. Likewise, the GOI cannot print its way out of the quagmire, continuing to push populist policies in the run up to elections in 2014. With fiscal deficit spiralling out of control, there is only so much the RBI can do. If he is half the economic genius he is touted to be, then Dr Manmohan Singh knows this. The real question is will he act — will he bell the cat?