By Justice Markandey Katju-
(Justice Markandey Katju is a former Judge, Supreme Court of India, and former Chairman, Press Council of India. The views expressed are his own)
Dr. S. Faizi, the eminent Indian ecologist, reminds me of the English poet Shelley, whom Matthew Arnold described as “an ineffectual angel, beating in the void his luminous wings in vain.”
Dr Faizi has written an article titled ‘Towards an Asian Union’ published in Mainstream Weekly magazine.
In this article he has advocated formation of an Asian Union, patterned on the European Union, for political and economic cooperation of Asian countries. I submit Dr Faizi is day dreaming, and has no idea of realities.
The truth is contained in these articles I have written: 1 and 2
As mentioned therein, this world is really two worlds (1) the world of the developed countries, e.g. North America, Europe, Japan, Australia, Russia and China, and (2) the world of the underdeveloped countries, which includes India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and other neighboring
countries, as well as other countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America.
There is a secret, unwritten rule among the developed countries that underdeveloped countries must not to be allowed to become developed countries. This is because underdeveloped countries have cheap labor, and cost of labor is a big chunk of the total cost of production.
Countries with cheap labour have a distinct advantage over countries with expensive labor (provided they build a massive industrial base), since they can sell their goods at a cheaper price, and thus undersell the latter. For instance, China was earlier a poor, underdeveloped country, but after its Revolution in 1949, the leaders who came to power built up a massive industrial base in China. That massive industrial base, coupled with the cheap labor available in China, has enabled the Chinese to undersell the whole world in consumer goods.
Western supermarkets are packed with Chinese goods, which often sell at half the price at which Western manufacturers can sell (because western labor is expensive).
Labor in India is even cheaper than Chinese labour. So if India builds a massive industrial base, for which it has all the potential (as it has thousands of bright scientists, engineers and technicians, as well as immense natural resources), what will happen to the industries of the developed countries? Many of them will collapse, as they will not be able to face the competition of Indian industries, throwing millions of people out of their jobs.
Will the developed countries permit this ? No, they will not, and will oppose it tooth and nail. And how do they prevent it ? They do it by polarising society through their agents, spreading hatred between communities, and making Indians fight each other in the name of religion, caste, language and race.
The political leaders of underdeveloped countries are really puppets of the developed countries, as I have explained in my article ‘The puppets and the puppeteer’ (see this), and will do the bidding of their foreign masters. As regards Pakistan, I have explained in the article below that it is a fake, artificial country created by the British swindle called Partition, by partitioning India on the basis of the bogus two-nation theory, so that Hindus and Muslims in the subcontinent keep fighting each other, thus wasting their precious resources, and united India does not emerge as a modern industrial giant, like another China.
There can never be genuine friendship and good relations between India and Pakistan, because the very purpose of creating Pakistan was to ensure that there is hostility, not peace and friendship. If there is genuine friendship then the very purpose of creating Pakistan will be defeated and it will cease to exist as a separate state and will reunite with India. In fact India and Pakistan (and Bangladesh) are really one country, sharing the same culture, and were one since
Mughal times.
Indians and Pakistanis living abroad intermingle and socialise as if there had never been any Partition. The solution to our problems is not an Asian Union, as Dr Faizi in his unrealistic fancy proposes, but undoing that wicked Partition of 1947, and reunification of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh under a secular government led by modern minded leaders determined to rapidly industrialize and modernize the country, as was done in the 1920s by Mustafa Kemal in Turkey, or the Japanese leaders after the Meiji Restoration of 1868.
This cannot be achieved under parliamentary democracy, as experience has shown it runs largely on caste and communal lines. What will be the alternative has to be thought out by patriotic selfless leaders using their creativity.
