📰 Wounded mountains: on Himachal landslide tragedy
Tourist tragedy in Himachal Pradesh points to the importance of preserving ecology
•The tragic death of nine tourists in a landslip in Kinnaur district of Himachal Pradesh is another pointer to the fragility of the ecology of the Himalayan States. Extraordinarily heavy rain pummelled the State recently, leaving the hill slopes unstable and causing floods in built-up areas including Dharamshala. The descending boulders from destabilised terrain, which crushed a bridge like a matchstick, are a source of worry even for cautious local residents, and for unwary visitors, such as the tourists travelling in a van, they can turn into sudden disaster. Himachal is famed for its scenic vistas and welcoming summer climate, and drew a few hundred thousand tourists in June this year as States began relaxing the controls for COVID-19. There was justified alarm at the prospect of a fresh surge in infections, prompting Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur to appeal for COVID-appropriate behaviour. Unfortunately, there was not enough vigil against travel to risky areas, in the wake of a disastrous year for tourism, resulting in the mishap in Kinnaur’s Basteri area. What should worry Himachal, and neighbouring Uttarakhand, is that the States may be entering a phase of irreversible decline because of losses to their ecology; frequent landslides may become inevitable. Bootstrapping an incompatible model of development in the hills, represented by big hydroelectric projects and large-scale construction activity involving destruction of forests and damming of rivers, is an invitation to harm.
•Mega hydropower, which Himachal Pradesh is working to tap as a significant source of “green” power that substitutes energy from fossil fuels, could alter several aspects of ecology, rendering it vulnerable to the effects of extreme events such as cloudbursts, flash floods, landslides and earthquakes. The parliamentary Standing Committee on Energy during 2018-19 noted that the State could more than double its existing harnessed hydropower potential of 10,547 MW. Kinnaur is a focus point for such development, centred around the potential of the glacially-fed Sutlej valley, but one scientific estimate warns that avaricious tapping of the river through all planned projects would impound nearly a quarter of its waters in dams, and divert a staggering 72% through tunnels. Other researchers, studying the 2015 Nepal earthquake, point to high seismicity causing fatal landslides and severe damage to hydropower structures in the Himalayas; the cost of power produced was underestimated, while the potential was overestimated. Evidently, it is impossible to assign a real value to the costs to people and communities, together with the loss of pristine forests that weak afforestation programmes cannot replace. As catastrophic weather events inflict frequent, heavy losses, Himachal Pradesh and other Himalayan States can only watch their ecological base erode. Changing course may yet preserve a lot of their natural riches.
India’s regulatory regime needs a radical overhaul
•A recent event in Kerala, though far from the industrial centres of India, may hold a clue to understanding the malaise crippling the nation’s industry. This event took the form of one of the State’s major employers making a much publicised investment outside Kerala. What is unusual about this is that the company had earlier announced that it would make an even larger investment within the State itself.
•The negative publicity given to its departure by the company was considered unnecessary by the State government and experts have pointed out that the original promise of investing this larger amount in the State is incredible, as its volume is several times the firm’s market capitalisation. The investor, however, announced that he had been hounded out by the regulatory authorities. Independently, journalists have confirmed that the company’s premises had been subjected to 11 inspections in one month by the concerned government departments, and its CEO had stated on public television that he had been charged with over 70 compliance failures following these.
•In a swift move, Kerala’s Minister for Industries appeared on public television, where he opened himself to questioning. He stated categorically that the inspections had been in response to alleged violation of human rights and labour laws by the company, and that they had not been ordered by the Industries Ministry of the State. We have no reason to disbelieve him, but are left wondering about the legitimacy of a regulatory arrangement under which the elected government of the day has no say on inspections, even if some of them are related to court rulings.
•The picture of an ungoverned bureaucracy that emerges from this incident is breathtaking in its implication for the kind of democracy that we are living in. But it is not difficult to see where this originates from. It was the governance model during colonial rule in India. In an insightful commentary on his compatriots of the East India Company, the economist Adam Smith had observed that their only concern was to build a fortune by any means and to get out of the country as fast as possible, no matter what the consequences for its inhabitants. However, even this understanding of the rationale of colonialism is not enough to appreciate its debilitating consequences for India. To hold India, the British invented an intermediary class standing between themselves and the natives. For the latter, there was no redress against the depredations of this class, whose excesses the colonial regime tolerated as a small price for retaining their colony.
Crippling effect
•The colonial administrative apparatus has been retained intact in Independent India. Of course, this was not inevitable. The toxic measures that enslaved Indians could have been removed forthwith, but for reasons that are not difficult to comprehend, India’s political class kept them. Now, it has the Supreme Court asking why stick with a sedition law that had been used to immobilise Indians. While many understand the absurdity of the sedition law today, and the more aware among them can see how it kills our democracy, the crippling effect of colonial practices that govern economic activity have gone unscrutinised. Random inspection of a company’s premises by State functionaries sits at their pinnacle, preventing India’s industry from achieving its potential.
•On the 30th anniversary of the economic reforms, a puzzle that needs resolution is that while they have been focused on the manufacturing sector, the manufacturing sector has not expanded relative to the economy. Its share has remained quite the same. We may just have received a clue from Kerala to comprehend this outcome. While the elegantly crafted trade and industry reforms have addressed the policy regime, they have not addressed the conditions under which production takes place in this country. This may have held back investment, standing in the way of the expansion of the manufacturing sector as intended. India’s regulatory regime needs a radical overhaul.
📰 An emigration Bill that does not go far enough
The new Bill is better than the Emigration Act 1983, but more reforms are needed to protect Indian workers
•In early June 2021, the Ministry of External Affairs invited public inputs to the Emigration Bill 2021 (https://bit.ly/2VerwzX and https://bit.ly/2ULrNdS). The Bill could be introduced in Parliament soon and presents a long overdue opportunity to reform the recruitment process for nationals seeking employment abroad.
Exploitative conditions
•For years, independent investigations into migrant worker conditions have underlined serious exploitative practices which include large recruitment charges, contract substitution, deception, retention of passports, non-payment or underpayment of wages, poor living conditions, discrimination and other forms of ill-treatment. In recent months, media reports have highlighted how the majority of migrant worker deaths in the Arab Gulf States/West Asia are attributed to heart attacks and respiratory failures, whose causes are unexplained and poorly understood. Labour migration is governed by the Emigration Act, 1983 (https://bit.ly/3i4gfvd and https://bit.ly/2VcJm6s) which sets up a mechanism for hiring through government-certified recruiting agents — individuals or public or private agencies. It outlines obligations for agents to conduct due diligence of prospective employers, sets up a cap on service fees, and establishes a government review of worker travel and employment documents (known as emigration clearances) to 18 countries mainly in West Asian states and South-East Asian countries (https://bit.ly/2WmmfHp).
Improvements, drawbacks
•The Emigration Bill 2021 is an improvement over the 1983 Act. It launches a new emigration policy division, establishes help desks and welfare committees, requires manpower agencies to conduct pre-departure briefings for migrants, and increases accountability of brokers and other intermediaries who are also involved in labour hiring. But the Bill does not go far enough.
•First, the 2021 Bill’s purpose “to consolidate and amend the law relating to emigration of citizens of India”, lacks a human rights framework aimed at securing the rights of migrants and their families. Progressive labour regimes do so. For example, in a country such as the Philippines, it explicitly recognises the contributions of Filipino workers and “the dignity and fundamental human rights and freedoms of the Filipino citizens”.
•Another significant drawback is that the Bill permits manpower agencies to charge workers’ service fees, and even allows agents to set their own limits. International labour standards such as International Labour Organization (ILO) Private Employment Agencies Convention No. 181 and the ILO general principles and operational guidelines for fair recruitment recognises that it is employers, not workers who should bear recruitment payments including the costs of their visas, air travel, medical exams, and service charges to recruiters. Large-scale surveys by the ILO and the World Bank show that Indian workers pay exorbitant charges for their jobs and that poorer workers pay progressively larger fees — Indians in Saudi Arabia paid on average $1,507 in recruitment charges; their counterparts in Qatar paid $1,156 (https://bit.ly/3zzxLxh).
•To some, recruitment charges might appear like a justified service fee, but the tens of thousands of rupees that workers pay far exceed the real cost of recruitment. When low wage migrants pick up the tab it makes them vulnerable to indebtedness and exploitation. Worker-paid recruitment fees eat into their savings, force them to take high-interest loans, live on shoe-string budgets, and in the worst cases of abuse, leave workers in situations of debt bondage — a form of forced labour.
•But perhaps the Bill’s most glaring inclusion is that it permits government authorities to punish workers by cancelling or suspending their passports and imposing fines up to ₹50,000 for violating any of the Bill’s provisions. When enforced, it can be used as a tool to crackdown on workers who migrate through unregistered brokers or via irregular arrangements such as on tourist visas. Criminalising the choices migrant workers make either because they are unaware of the law, under the influence of their recruiters, or simply desperate to find a decent job is deplorable, runs contradictory to the purpose of protecting migrants and their families, and violates international human rights standards. Recruiters and public officials could misuse the law to instil fear among workers and report or threaten to report them. Migrants in an irregular situation who fear that they could be fined or have their passports revoked, are also less likely to make complaints or pursue remedies for abuses faced.
Scant gender dimensions
•This Bill does not also adequately reflect the gender dimensions of labour migration where women have limited agency in recruitment compared to their counterparts and are more likely to be employed in marginalised and informal sectors and/or isolated occupations in which labour, physical, psychological, and sexual abuse are common. The Bill also provides limited space for worker representation or civil society engagement in the policy and welfare bodies that it sets up.
•To ensure that labour recruitment works for the tens of thousands of Indian women and men who migrate outside our borders each year, the Ministry of External Affairs must start at the top, and draft a clearer purpose which explicitly recognises the contributions of Indian workers, the unique challenges they face, and uphold the dignity and human rights of migrants and their families. Then it must address the specific provisions that diverge from this purpose.
📰 Evaluating India’s options in Afghanistan
With the West done with Afghanistan, New Delhi needs to adopt a layered approach in finding a political solution
•It is not a coincidence that the United States is exiting Afghanistan at the same time that the focus of its foreign policy is shifting to East Asia. There is growing consensus in Washington DC that the U.S., instead of staying engaged in the lost wars, which adds little value to American power, should now urgently prepare itself for the unfolding geopolitical contest with China. America’s strategic response to China’s rise is its Indo-Pacific strategy, which seeks to build a bloc of Indian and Pacific Ocean democracies aimed at containing China’s rise and challenging its high-functioning single party dictatorship. The U.S. wants India to play a key role in this bloc, which along with Australia and Japan, make up the so-called Quad grouping.
•But there is one problem. India, unlike the other members, is the only continental Asian power in the Quad, which shares a contested land border with China and is vulnerable to the geopolitical changes in the Eurasian landmass. The U.S. may have retreated from Afghanistan as part of a grand strategy to take on China in maritime Asia, in which it needs India’s involvement, and India might find it tempting to join the ranks, especially after China’s aggression on the Line of Actual Control last year. But the irony is that the American withdrawal and the vacuum it leaves in Afghanistan and continental Asia in general — which is being filled by China and Russia — is reinforcing India’s identity as a continental Asian power.
•Barring a brief interregnum in the 1990s, India has historically enjoyed good ties with Afghanistan, which go back to the 1950 Treaty of Friendship. Indian interests and influence suffered when the Taliban, backed by Pakistan, captured Kabul in 1996. But India was back in action as soon as the Taliban were ousted from power after the U.S. invasion in 2001. It has made huge investments and commitments ever since, which run into over $3 billion, and cultivated strong economic and defence ties with the Afghan government. Now, it is again staring at uncertainty with the U.S. pullback having effectively changed the balance of power in Afghanistan and the Taliban making rapid territorial gains.
•The U.S.’s strategic objectives in Afghanistan were limited, as U.S. President Joe Biden himself pointed out earlier this month — killing Osama bin Laden and disrupting al-Qaeda networks. Defeating the Taliban and nation-building were part of the neoconservative ideological project, which has evidently failed. This means, the U.S., having met its realist objectives, can abandon the Afghan government and exit the theatre — which is what Mr. Biden is doing. But India cannot. It has to protect its investments, prevent Afghanistan from becoming another safe haven for anti-India terrorist groups, and also check Pakistan deepening its influence in Kabul.
Talking with the Taliban
•So what should India do? One option, as many commentators have already pointed out, is to hold talks with the Taliban. India has already established contacts with the Taliban in Doha. Talking to them would allow New Delhi to seek security guarantees from the insurgents in return for continued development assistance or other pledges (in the 1990s, India had backed the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance) as well as explore the possibility of the Taliban’s autonomy from Pakistan. At this point, talking to the Taliban looks inevitable. But India should not overlook the deep ties between Pakistan’s security establishment and the Haqqani Network, a major faction within the Taliban that’s driving the successful campaigns on the battlefield. The U.S. overlooked it while fighting the Taliban along with Pakistan, and it paid a heavy price for it. There is no guarantee that India’s quest for engagement with the Taliban would produce a desirable outcome. So India should broad-base its options. While talking to the Taliban to protect its interests, New Delhi should also enhance aid to Afghanistan’s legitimate government and security forces and work with other regional powers for long-term stability in the country.
Kabul versus the Taliban
•True, the Taliban now control or contest most of Afghanistan’s countryside. But still, it is not a foregone conclusion that they could take Kabul easily. The Afghan military has some 200,000 battle-hardened soldiers, including the highly trained special forces. In the cities, which saw relative freedoms and rights compared to the dark period of the Taliban regime, the government, despite its infighting, corruption and incompetence, still commands support. There is no Northern Alliance this time. The Taliban have already taken northern districts, including Badakhshan and Takhar. The only force that is standing up to the Taliban is the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces. India should urgently step up training Afghan forces and provide military hardware, intelligence and logistical and financial support so that Kabul can continue to defend the cities. New Delhi should also coordinate with other regional powers to support the Afghan government because if the government forces crumble before the Taliban, the prospects for a political settlement would be narrowed. Why should a winning Taliban make concessions?
Regional solution
•There is a convergence of interests between India and three key regional players — China, Russia and Iran — in seeing a political settlement in Afghanistan. These three countries have already opened public, direct talks with the Taliban. But these contacts are largely tactical in nature. For China, whose restive Xinjiang province shares a border with Afghanistan, a jihadist-oriented Taliban regime would not serve its internal interests. Russia, which fears that instability would spill over into the former Soviet Republics, has already moved to secure its Central Asian perimeter. For the Shia theocratic Iran, a Sunni Deobandi Taliban with which it had almost gone to war in 1998, will continue to remain an ideological, sectarian and strategic challenge. None of these countries would like to see the Taliban taking over Kabul militarily, which means there would be an isolated Sunni Islamist regime in a country with fractured ethnic equations. There would neither be legitimacy for a Taliban regime nor peace in Afghanistan.
•India, to break this impasse, should take a layered approach. Its immediate goal should be the safety and security of its personnel and investments. The long-term goal should be finding a political solution to the crisis. And if a political solution is not achieved, it should seek non-conventional methods, like what it did in the 1990s, to offer support to its allies within Afghanistan and retain some influence. None of this can be achieved unless it works together with the regional powers.
•Russia has cultivated links with the Taliban in recent years. India would need Russia’s support in any form of direct engagement with the Taliban. When it comes to Afghanistan, Iran is an irreplaceable country. It shares a long border with Afghanistan and has built contacts through several stakeholders in the country, especially the ethnic minorities. The original objective of India’s Chabahar project in Iran was to create a direct access to Afghanistan, bypassing Pakistan. This direct access is critical for India in all different scenarios — move supplies to Kabul in larger quantities, retain its presence in the event of a civil war or carry out covert operations if the Taliban take power by force. But India, under pressure from the U.S., slowed down on the Chabahar connectivity projects, which finally prompted Iran to drop India and go ahead. Building strategic ties with Iran, irrespective of the U.S.’s policy towards the Islamic Republic, is essential for India’s Afghan bets. Finally, India should talk with China, with the objective of finding a political settlement and lasting stability in Afghanistan.
•Central to this approach is India striking the right balance between its continental realities and the U.S.’s pivot to maritime Asia. The U.S., and the West in general, are done with Afghanistan. India, as one of the countries that would be impacted by the consequences of American withdrawal, has to work with Eurasian powers to protect its interests and stabilise Afghanistan.
