Don’t dismiss the poor as ‘parasites’

JUSTICE BR Gavai, a Supreme Court judge, will occupy the seat of the Chief Justice in the near future. The Gavais are a well-known and respected family hailing from Vidarbha, Maharashtra. The Gavais were prominent in the Republican Party of India (RPI). When the party split, one of the factions was led by this family.

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In the light of this background, it is difficult to envisage Justice Gavai as being an enemy of the poor and the dispossessed. The RPI was the party of Dr BR Ambedkar’s supporters. As a young student in Bombay (now Mumbai), I remember watching numerous open trucks with RPI supporters driving past my home in Byculla, rooting for RPI candidates in Lok Sabha and Assembly elections.

Yet, along with my friends and colleagues in the Constitution Conduct Group, I sent a letter to Justice Gavai, voicing our collective disappointment because he used the word ‘parasites’ for homeless people recently while hearing a civil writ petition seeking adequate shelter facilities for them.

In the course of the hearing, Justice Gavai made the following oral remarks, “Sorry to say, by not making these people part of mainstream society, are we not creating a class of parasites? Because of freebies, when elections are declared, people are not willing to work. They are getting free ration without doing any work. Would it not be better to make them part of mainstream society so that they can contribute to the nation?”

In the Communist country of Romania, where I lived for four years (1989-93), people were provided with a job according to his or her capacity and paid a minimum wage that covered expenses for food, clothing and accommodation. There was, of course, a difference in the standards of housing provided to the Nomenklatura and government officials.

That arrangement was not appreciated by the bulk of the population. Such diktats could be enforced only in a regimented form of governance prevalent in Communist regimes. I do not think Justice Gavai was thinking of such a solution to our problems of unemployment and poverty.

Most commentaries on the good judge’s remarks were centred on the mention of ‘parasites’. Justice Gavai chose the wrong word and I am sure he must have realised this by now. His real lament can be gauged by his subsequent diatribe about “freebies declared just before elections”, a form of bribery that is fast becoming acceptable in India as a fact of life. Just like day-to-day corruption has become acceptable.

Even in advanced democracies like the US, coupons or other forms of social security cover have been in use. Even illegal immigrants are not left to starve or die of cold. They are housed and fed till they are deported. The problem in our country is that the poor and the unemployed are just too numerous to count. Shelters for the homeless in cities like Delhi are a must, especially during the winter months when temperatures reach close to zero.

I refuse to believe that Justice Gavai is indifferent to the plight of our compatriots who have been condemned to a life of penury. Reading between the lines of his observations made in the open court, I am inclined to believe that his disgust was directed at those in a position to guide economic activity in a direction that opens up avenues of employment for most residents of India and enables them to contribute to our progress. This is a tall order, but what is needed are signs that the government is keen to tackle the problem. At present, we notice no such signs; the ruling party’s entire attention is concentrated on winning elections.

My friend, Avay Shukla, is a former IAS officer of the Himachal Pradesh cadre. I have not met him, but I read his blogs every week. They are a delight to read, not only because of the felicity of language but also because of the subtle fun he pokes at those who need to be prodded. His take on Justice Gavai’s use of the word ‘parasites’ is legitimate (‘It’s now official, we are a nation of parasites’). But the good judge should not be judged, much less condemned, for that single “slip of the tongue”. He has given some good judgments, but human nature being what it is, we pick on just one, albeit unacceptable, error to pillory him.

I have never met Justice Gavai, unlike many of my junior colleagues who have served in Vidarbha. Not one has an unkind word for him. In the IPS, there was MG Gavai, who was the Commissioner of Police, Mumbai, for a brief period prior to my appointment to that post. His elder brother was in the IAS. He was the Chief Secretary to the Maharashtra Government when I was tasked with heading the Police Commissionerate.

On the day after I assumed charge in February 1982, Chief Secretary Gavai phoned me and told me to accompany him to Delhi to meet the Union Home Secretary and the Cabinet Secretary. I was told that I had been picked for the job in preference to six seniors because the government had decided to tackle the police union that was playing havoc with the discipline of the force. Only Maharashtra was prepared to take on the unions, I was informed. Other states, such as Uttar Pradesh, were reluctant to touch the ‘hot iron’ for fear of being singed. To cut a long story short, we had trouble carrying out our plan, but were successful within 24 hours!

I met another member of the extended Gavai family in Warsaw. SM Gavai was an IFS officer posted as First Secretary in our embassy in Warsaw. Poland is a very Catholic country. The Pope, John Paul II, hailed from Krakow in Poland. My wife, who hated to travel, was mildly enthusiastic about visiting Poland as she was a good Catholic. Gavai had us over for dinner at his home. He was the last Gavai I met during my service years.