Kejriwal is India's inadvertent hero
Arvind Kejriwal's quixotic attempt to impose traffic restrictions on Delhi has emerged from a bureaucratic knee-jerk decision imposed, half in panic, on an interesting story about citizenship and governance.
Kejriwal himself is the inadvertent hero. He has an intuitive sense about people and democracy which makes him one of the most interesting chief ministers and also an indicator for the future.
The odd-even transport model was a social experiment and like most experiments, it was tentative, even hurried. What made it an exciting moment in democracy was the people, the way citizens responded and the toughness with which the decisions were taken. The large amount imposed as fine was impressive, but what was more impressive was that the whole debate was public.
Technical issues were discussed by citizens, doubts were openly expressed, and by becoming a wonderful panchayat of debates, critiques and ideas, Delhi showed the way to the future. Cynics could whittle down the meaning and impact of it all by saying it is a mere 15-day experiment but these 15 days showed India what Delhi and democracy is capable of.
Strategy
My celebration of the experiment begins with the sheer openness of it. Kejriwal announced his recipe while being honest enough to admit that maybe he did not know how to cook the dish fully. He was tentatively vulnerable but he accepted responsibility.
His police officers thought he was naïve sensing he did not fully understand the law and order issues involved with the plan. Yet by admitting difficulties, he got the media and the people involved. Little panchayats of discussion were visible all over Delhi. Adults were reworking time tables the way children plan their classes.
There was enthusiasm, confusion and yet a strange confidence that something new was coming into being. Car emissions was no longer a technical or a bureaucratic issue but one where governance and citizenship combined to decide issues of lifestyle, democracy and the future.
The professional and the amateur combined impressively and for once media, instead of waxing pious or expertising, became both pedagogue and storyteller. By outlining all sides of the story it created grounds for discussions, for different weighing of the pros and cons of discussion. The odd-even project was a major experiment in the exercise of democracy. Democracy in India is always haunted by corruption and nepotism.
By coming down heavy on violators with hefty fines, the message was clear. Issues of waivers for professionals like doctors, lawyers, for women, the caveats required and the exceptions to the rule were discussed transparently.
Thirdly, pictures of VIPs like judges and politicians discussing carpooling gave a different sense to the project. Pictures of deputy CM Manish Sisodia or even pictures of judges cycling to work showed that the elite was as involved as the ordinary people.
What all this did was it showed that the question of privilege, the spread of VIPs is an issue that Delhi has to solve. Tacitly the odd-even message emphasised it as a lottery, a game of luck rather than a matter of status. By raising questions on taxing families with two or three cars - justice acquired a different texture. It was an exercise in civics which even the earlier CNG experiment could not pull off.
Questions
Yet some of the questions of the public still remain. First is the question of public transport. Second, how to reconcile the car as a private commodity within a theory of public goods. Third, ecology needs a concept where public goods can be reconciled with air and water being open and common commodities for the public. The emissions debate in a pedagogic sense emphasised that technical issues are not merely technocratic but also raise questions of value framework in terms of equality, fairness, access and justice. The odd-even fortnight also raised questions about science.
Firstly, it showed that our institutions are naïve about science. The court asking for a report after 15 days makes one wonder about their ecological sensibility, given their reading of the odd-even debate as a law under duress, an issue of rights or a scientific controversy.
We are not even sure if our scientists are clear about the sources of pollution, the causes and the impact. In fact, this would be a good time for the public to learn about the nature of ecology and about science in a society under risk.
Risks
Sociologist Ulrich Beck in a classic series of essays has shown that science is no longer a predictable affair; that systems are so complex that the old idea of mechanical cause and effect does not apply anymore; that an event in one place can cause damage in another and therefore legal or scientific responsibility might be difficult to fix.
A risk society, as Beck pointed out, is not the old 19th century society where science was predictable and certain. Now one lives in a society where knowledge is uncertain and therefore citizens have to understand that the old mechanical models of science, on which our courts and bureaucracy operate, is irrelevant today. The very nature of ecology has transformed the natures of governance, democracy and responsibility.
The emissions debate might be more crucial for India than what discussions have so far indicated.
It also helps show that many current ideas of urbanisation are brittle. Consider the idea of the smart city. The concept is devised basically from the ideas of information technology. It needs to be reworked so that a smart city can become an ecologically-intelligent city open to risks and complexities.
In fact this is part of the fruitfulness of the current debate - issues which were in the background or in shadow spaces have come out in the open. Kejriwal's role need not be central.
He has played catalyst and that is enough. He has added concertedly and inadvertently to the future of Indian democracy. And that is the beauty of an open polity.
(Courtesy of Mail Today.)