Fear of unknown stalks land

Gurbachan Jagat

A Collapsed economy, a spreading pandemic, a divided country and enemies at the border — any one of these would be a disaster; taken together, it’s a catastrophe which will require tremendous leadership and willpower from our elected representatives to steer this nation out of troubled waters. Yet, the reaction from Delhi on the crisis reminds me of the Nawabs sitting playing their board games and saying, ‘Dilli door ast.’ Or maybe not, for politics continues as state governments are overthrown and agendas of distraction and division are pursued. What of the country and its unemployed millions… tens of millions? Yes, tens of millions because that is the reality we are facing — everything from the small kiryana store to the MSMEs lies shattered, even some of the big houses and banks have their foundations shaken and staff have been laid off in wholesale quantities.

You can sense it now, the fear — the country reeks of it. It’s in the eyes of the unemployed waiting at labour chowks knowing that there is no work, in the office workers dreading the pink slip. It’s in the eyes of the frontline workers fighting coronavirus and those who have been exposed to it, knowing very little support if at all will come. It’s in the eyes of the families of soldiers whose young men are heading to the hostile borders in the higher reaches of the Himalayas, where life itself is a struggle. Yes, fear, it surrounds us now.

Our youth and the fact that the median age of the Indian population is in the twenties was supposed to be our asset, now it could become our biggest problem, because unemployed youth form that most volatile ingredient on which everything from civil strife, riots, crime and political movements can be built. It’s a powder keg waiting to be exploited and lit.

‘Youth’ is the bedrock on which nations are built or flounder. For a nation to be on the road to progress, it should have a solid foundation of a well-educated, healthy, well-employed and disciplined youth. This can only be built through well-thought-out educational systems and a health policy for all, especially the poor. Educationists and industrialists have to sit together to formulate long-term employment needs and tailor educational policies accordingly. Millions of arts graduates are unemployable and money spent on them goes down the drain. Unfortunately, at no point in the history of Independent India has any government given sufficient thought to this, with the result that the youth dividend is turning into a liability.

In recent years, the situation has grown worse with the unravelling of the economy. Brain waves and midnight interventions have taken the place of policy. We no longer know as to how policy is formulated in these times of ‘the eclipse of institutions’. All reliable institutions, including the RBI, have given sufficient warnings, but the corridors of power remain silent, as also the Opposition.

An ominous silence has descended upon the land, a silence overlaid with the fear of the unknown. What does this portend for our youth dividend? What do I see when I look at the youth today — faces without hope. I saw this hopelessness during militancy in Punjab, in J&K, Manipur and other parts of the North-East. In utter despair and sometimes at the prompting of enemy countries, they have turned to the gun to fight the State, they have turned to extortion, they have turned to drugs for a few moments of stolen ecstasy. The inevitable happened and the State won, or did it? For, thousands of young men perished and the youth dividend stood diminished. The protests died, the youth were still unemployed and no special efforts were made to bend them to the national cause.

As a result, they became more embittered and some took recourse to drugs and others to fundamentalism and arms. Still others started to look towards foreign shores and a better life. They left in hordes to the UK, USA, Canada, Australia, the Gulf. They fulfilled the lower-level needs of these economies. A few had access to higher education and did well. However, these countries no longer want them and in addition to turning out those already there, they are refusing to take new entrants. The jobs abroad are gone, and the villages and towns in the North and South are awash with these freshly unemployed. So now we have the unemployed youth fresh out of colleges, rendered unemployed by the failing economy. The media is not presenting the case of the unemployed and the social media spreads only mischief.

We see no signs of constructive planning for generating jobs on a massive scale for the next decade at least. Both private and public sectors have folded their tents indefinitely. Whatever little hope was left, the pandemic has wiped out. In one fell swoop, it emptied out towns and cities, pulled the plug on industry, nay brought the whole country, economy, government to a standstill. The all-enveloping silence spoke of our silent fears, of our fervent prayers. The Opposition parties are but mute spectators — I suggest that they keep on wearing their masks even after the pandemic is over.

I only hope that the government and Opposition parties sit together and at least seriously discuss the problems and, if possible, find solutions. We are lucky so far that protests have not hit the streets. It will only be a matter of time if the drift continues or the planning for mayhem continues. No one will know when the silence was broken and finally the street spoke. God forbid, let us not turn the dividend into a curse, let us not let them go the way of drugs and violence. Let us break the cocoon of silence and fear, let the people speak, let the government and Opposition speak, let the editors and anchors speak, let the youth speak. Let us break this vicious hold of silence and fear, let us converse with each other. Talking to each other will be the first step out of all our problems. Let the government not silence the people, let it encourage discourse. Finally, let us give our youth a chance.

— The writer is ex-chairman of UPSC, former Manipur Governor and served as J&K DGP 

Join Whatsapp Channel of The Tribune for latest updates.