When governance becomes Predatory

Vote bank politics in India is scared of one factor—the educated middle class. This has been explained to me time and again by people in politics, and increasingly with dismay that their vote bank politics based on caste and religion is losing out to issue and governance based elections in urban areas and some educated parts of India, especially when the mathematics of seats in Houses is calculated.

Two recent events, involving mainly urban India, spell out how this is shaping up.

First, “surge pricing” for better public transport on roads, be it taxis or buses. If I am willing to pay more for the safety of a better vehicle with air-conditioning, driven also by an ex-serviceman displaying his complete credentials, offering a secure service that keeps my friends and family informed by an online and/or SMS service of my movements, then why is it anybody else’s problem?

If Mother Dairy can make a national advertising campaign about its stalls manned by ex-servicemen selling better quality dairy and fresh produce at higher prices, then would that mean the local mandi controlled sellers can contest the people’s need to have a choice?

The reality of surge pricing in India is like this:-

Charging 5-10x for food and drinking water at airports? Okay.

Charging 5-10x for food and water on airplanes? Okay.

Charging 5-10x by looting touts at railway stations? Okay.

Charging 2x or more as tatkal on train tickets? Okay.

Charging 2x or more for luxury AC buses operated by STA? Okay.

Charging multiple times RC and dox charges at RTOs? Okay.

Charging huge tolls and taxes for lousy roads? Okay.

Charging whatever the muncepaltee feels like for parking? Okay.

Charging cash as bribes for everything? Okay.

Charging us taxes so that they can eat cheap in Raisina Hill? Okay.

Charging bus passengers toll and making them wait in hot summer sun while VVIP/VIP cars speed past free? Okay

But some hard working self-employed people also known as “cabbies”, especially ex-servicemen, are getting a chance to get out of slavery and own their own vehicles and some people who are willing to pay extra for “on demand” service are told that “surge pricing” for cabs is not okay, by a micro-minority who want to stay in the past of rickety vehicles and rapacious drivers? By the same logic we should go back to pre-motorised transport, to protect the rights of a micro-minority there too.

Something is wrong somewhere here. Please stand at airports and railway stations where app based vehicles are not available to also realise the truths and realities. Please compare the pre-paid rates with app based rates especially for inter-state rides to see and realise which lobbies are really behind this option that we have.

Instead of improving public transport of the bus and local train sort, our law-makers are trying to protect their goose that lays the golden eggs, the ridiculous laws that make last mile connectivity by road in India is not so citizen friendly.

It seems that people opining against and fighting new technology app based public transport don’t really use the options themselves, and pound away on keyboards from the safety of their own private or taxpayer funded transport, just as they did for the Provident Fund change in rules. People who made the changes in EPFO rules probably do not have to worry because they have secured their own pensions and in many cases have enough salted away already?
As an employee and then an employer, I considered maximum subscription to EPFO as a golden mantra, and was proved right time and again when youngsters who initially felt that their take-home package was being slashed later on in life wrote to me thanking me for being so strict on enforcing maximum EPFO. This is despite twice seeing my own EPFO go walkabout for a few years—there was enough resilence in the EPFO system to protect the employee. Once the shipping company I worked for folded up, another time the Indian MNC company I worked for got merged.

So what happened with EPFO riots in Bengaluru a few days ago?

My take is that “The South” is not going to accept feudal slavery based dictats from the rulers in “The North” when it comes to what are basic rights – viz, contract between governed and governance as far as savings go.

Read the full article: http://tinyurl.com/jb3egs2

About the Author: Veeresh Malik, is a fauji brat brought up all over the country. He escaped in 1973 to work as a seafarer globally, then came ashore in 1982 to a variety of stints in India and abroad, some successful, many not. In the last decade as the India head of a small Silicon Valley tech company, he now wants to spend the rest of his life doing not much more than offering unasked for advice and opinions. He has been married (to the same person) for the last 34 years, has two children, one son-in-law and is still looking for the perfect hair-style. He lives in Delhi and does not intend to learn how to set an alarm clock. Also publishing online at Amazon with 9 books to his name.