Demonetization – Building Allies vs Forcing into Action

Ever since the demonetization decision was made public by the Union Government of India, on the 8th of November 2016, lot has been discussed about the pros and cons of the measure. However, not much has been discussed about the measure from the federalism angle. In this article, we try to look at the whole demonetization exercise from the federalism point of view.

Taxation Powers in a Federal Polity
In many mature democracies, the taxation powers are distributed between the states and the union (also called as ‘federal’) governments. Not just the indirect taxes, even the direct taxes like Income tax and Corporate tax powers are with the state governments too. In federal polities like USA, Canada or Australia, this is the norm.

In India however, the powers to levy direct taxes rest solely with the Union Government. This in itself is, over-centralization of powers. When nations like Canada and Australia with population of 20-30 million take fiscal federalism seriously, what stops the highly diverse nation with a population of 1.25 billion from taking fiscal federalism seriously?

The Black Money
In the previous paragraphs, we discussed about direct taxation powers. Because by definition, black money is the amount for which direct tax has not been paid. By retaining the power to levy direct taxes, the union government has kept to itself all the incentives to fight tax evasion. Had the state governments been provided with direct taxation powers, as is the case in mature democracies, the union would have found natural allies in all the state governments in the fight against tax evasion.

Building Allies vs Forcing into Action
The current approach, taken by the Union Government to catch tax evaders, is more like ‘Forcing’ the state governments into action. Quite naturally, when something is forced upon someone, the reluctance levels will be high and enthusiasm levels will be low. Needless to add, that in a federal setup, such moves are against the fundamental principles of federalism. The frequently heard term of “co-operative federalism” appears to be lacking any substance, considering the current approach.

For co-operation between any two elected governments, there must be an incentive at play. Had the direct taxation powers been in concurrent list, the resulting bounty from the fight against tax evasion would have been an incentive, for both the union and the state governments. To tackle tax evasion, whether it is the USA working with Switzerland, or Germany working with Panama, the approach one can see is that of ‘carrot & stick’. That is how co-operation is achieved, and is made effective. “Stick alone” approach, doesn’t build a strong and effective co-operation.

The demonetization exercise by the union government is akin to “stick-only” approach, and is evident that there was no effort to build consensus among the state governments and the union. This one exercise has strained the federalism-fabric so much, that we might start hearing the benefits of common currency across the union of India being questioned.

All Indian Languages Ought to Be Promoted in Fields of Science

Pic source: indiandiasporaclub.com

As per this report that appeared in the Economic Times dated 25th of August, world Hindi conference will be organized at the city of Bhopal in the month of September. The whole event is being sponsored and organized by the Government of India.Apart from its focus on literary activities in Hindi, strategies to promote the Hindi language in the fields of science and technology, foreign affairs, Information Technology and etc., will be debated in the event, says the report.

Promoting the usage of Hindi in the several fields of science is certainly good for Hindi, and its speakers. However, shouldn't the Union Government of India, which is a representative of all the linguistic communities of India, be equally concerned about other Indian languages? Why does the Union Government fund and organize events related to Hindi language alone? Shouldn't all Indian languages be used in science and technology? Why are non-Hindi languages of India not treated at par with Hindi?

These are the questions we all need to ponder!

Indian Union Can Become Antifragile Only by Decentralizing

Pic source: www.canadianbusiness.com

Nassim Nicolas Taleb is a Lebanese-American essayist, scholar and statistician, who shot to fame by his book Fooled by Randomness. The book dealt with human fallibility and was ranked as one of the 75 smartest books of all time by Fortune. He is also well known to have publicly criticized the risk management methods used by finance industry; when financial crisis occured in late-2000, he is said to have profited from it.

Mr. Taleb has been making a career out of understanding and dealing with randomness – his keen area of interest. His business has been to safeguard investors against crises by reaping rewards from rare and less-understood events. In his latest book, titled Antifragile, Mr. Taleb explores the fragility of systems. As the world we live in is random, volatile and disorderly, any system that cannot withstand the random events, Mr. Taleb calls them as fragile. Any system that thrives on such randomness has been classified as antifragile. One thing that is highlighted in all the famous books of Mr. Taleb (Fooled by randomness, Black Swan and Antifragile) is, randomness that is faced by humans daily since their living in wilderness hasn’t changed much even in the current world. In other words, randomness is as natural as rain.

What kind of systems are fragile and what are antifragile?
Based on his observation and research, Mr. Taleb has classified couple of systems as fragile and few as antifragile. The banking system based in New York is classified as fragile, while fail fast startup businesses of silicon valley are classified as antifragile.
As nimble startups of silicon valley encourage mistakes and thrive on them, an idea that cannot continue is cornered sooner and gets scrapped. At the same time, any idea that can continue gets validated sooner and goes on to be a winner; Google or Facebook for instance.
The investment banking system in New York cannot afford many mistakes. Hence, the system grows fragile as days pass. Even the ideas that cannot continue are covered up, and are allowed to exist. Such fragile systems yield to unforeseen random events and collapse; Lehman brothers for example.

How has Mr. Taleb classified the political systems?
In his book Antifragile, Mr. Taleb has called the centralized political system as fragile. He has also called the decentralized political system as antifragile. If one looks to history for centralized political system, the Soviet union is the one to hit the eye first. USSR came into existence in 1922, and was considered one of the world-leaders till the eighties. The centralized system of functioning did provide many results and USSR’s military might was respected around the world. However, as with every centralized political system, Soviet Union was fragile too. The fragility took the better of USSR in 1991, resulting in disintegration.
The American union is much decentralized when compared to the USSR. Since the American civil war that ended in 1865, the united states of America has been a world-leader in many fronts. This observation of the USSR and the USA goes onto validate Mr. Taleb’s thesis that more centralized a political system is, more fragile it is.

Is the Indian union Fragile? 
A centralized political system is what Jawaharlal Nehru envisioned for the Indian union. It is said that Mr. Nehru was very much impressed with the USSR’s centralized planning  and governance. That explains why Mr. Nehru favored setting up planning commission and initiated five-year plans, much like the USSR. This centralized political system continues to exist in the Indian union even today. With only one-third of subjects under the state list in Schedule 7, rest being in the centre-list or the concurrent list, majority of power and say is concentrated at the centre. That makes the Indian union very fragile. Being fragile, the Indian union is vulnerable to random events that will continue to occur in future as well. To make the Indian union antifragile, so that it thrives under randomness and grows strong, decentralization is the right step.

Otherwise, sooner or later, we all will be fooled by randomness.

(This piece had originally appeared in thefedetalist.in)

Undemocratic Amendments to the Constitution during the Emergency

Pic source: indiatoday.intoday.in

On 25th of June this year, the 40th year of the Union Government imposed state of emergency was remembered. There have been many discussions around the misdoings of the Union Government during the 21 months' long period of emergency. Several web portals ran stories highlighting what the citizens of present day India can learn from the period of emergency. What went missing in much of these articles/discussions were the changes to the constitution of India that were made during the emergency, and how these changes undermined the fabric of the constitution of India. Not only were the fundamental rights of the people compromised, powers of the states of the union were also taken away by moving some important subjects from the state list to the concurrent/union list. Education was one such major subject that was moved from the state list to the concurrent list, quite understandably without any debate. At Karnatique, we have always argued that education must be a state list, and in this article too a special emphasis has been laid to highlight the movement of education from state list to concurrent list.

Education in state list, as the constituent assembly had wanted
The constituent assembly chaired by B. R. Ambedkar had kept education in the state list. In the meetings of the constituent assembly, a member by name Purnima Banerjee had moved an amendment seeking to move education to the Union list. This move was supported by another member of the constituent assembly Brajeshwar Prasad. But, the move was countered strongly by another member by name Rohini Kumar Chaudhury. The move was finally not accepted by B. R. Ambedkar, and hence education remained in the state list. Rohini Kumar Chaudhury made a strong speech in the constituent assembly insisting that education be maintained in the state list, and a part of the same speech has been quoted below.

Sir, it seems to me to be an age since I spoke last. It is not that my tongue does not reach so long, but I loathe to speak in this House lest I impede the progress of the work here, but today the heart-throbbing speech of my honourable Friend Shrimati Purnima Banerji has aroused me from my slumbers. I come here not to appreciate the speech of my honourable Friend Shrimati Purnima Banerji but to oppose it with all the might that I posses. Sir, we have come nearly to the end of these Lists, I, II and III and what do we find ? What we find is that the position of the States are no longer States or Provinces, but they have been reduced to the position of municipal and other local bodies. All the powers have been taken away either in List I or List No. 3. It reminds me of the words in the Upanishad:

Poornasya Poornamadaya

Poornamevavasishyate. 

     After having taken out everything the same fullness remains : it is as if it is a full Moon. We are taking slices of the full Moon and yet the full Moon still continues as before. That is the position to which we have arrived after going through all these lists.' No power is left to the Provinces and the full Moon remains a full Moon as before.

The 42nd amendment
The 42nd amendment to the constitution of India was brought about during the days of the emergency. It is regarded as the most controversial of the amendments to the constitution, in India's history. Apart from editing the preamble of the constitution and attempting to reduce the powers of the Supreme court and the high courts of India, the 42nd amendment brought such sweeping changes to the constitution that many described the amendment as a mini-constitution. As part of this amendment, education was moved to concurrent list from the state list. It is nothing but a mockery of democracy that such sweeping amendments, ones that curtailed the powers of the courts and reduced the powers of the states, were made during the emergency period without any debate whatsoever among the representatives of the people of India.

The run up to the 42nd amendment
The constitution of India, as drafted by the members of the constituent assembly, had not let so much of power reside at the hands of one person. If the same form of the constitution had continued till 1975, the sweeping changes introduced as part of the 42nd amendment would have been impossible to make. The 24th amendment is what tilted the constitution from the original form towards the current form. If not for the changes made to the constitution as part of the 24th amendment, the 42nd amendment wouldn't have been possible, As part of the 24th amendment, the parliament was enabled to dilute the fundamental rights, yes, the fundamental rights of the people of India. Also, the courts were prevented from doing any review of the future amendments to the constitution that impact the fundamental rights of the people.
When the 24th amendment was made, those members of the constituent assembly who were alive at that time, came out and opposed the amendment. Several of the legal experts had called the 24th amendment as slaughter of the constitution.

Interestingly, both the 24th and the 48th amendments were made when the union of India was in a state of emergency. The 24th amendment was made in the year 1971, at a time when the Bangla Liberation War was going on and the relations between India and Pakistan were tense. The 48th amendment was introduced during the period of imposed emergency, in 1976.

There seems to be larger agreement that the imposition of 21 month long emergency, starting in the year 1975, was detrimental. There is also widespread disapproval of the 42nd amendment to the constitution. The present Union Government of India has made special efforts to highlight the excesses of the emergency period.

To undo the damages done to the constitution during the emergency, what remedial actions is the current Union Government planning, is not very clear. Honest attempts to correct those excesses will have to start from moving education back to the state list from the concurrent list. With that, all the centralization efforts in the field of education will also have to stop. The power to meddle with the fundamental rights of the people, needs to be taken away from the parliament. All the talk about emergency is good, but the remedial actions need to speak too.

Classicalization of Literary Form Erects Barriers to Mobilization

Pic Source: librarykvkasaulihp.wordpress.com

Several articles on Karnatique in the past have talked about the distance between colloquial Kannada and the literary form of Kannada. If you have not come across this topic before, you would get a fair understanding by reading this article.

In many of the discussions regarding the distance between colloquial Kannada and the literary form, the question invariably arises "is this something specific to Kannada?". The answer is "no". Some people have also suspected that because Kannada belongs to Dravidian family of languages, borrowing words from the Sanskrit language (belonging to Indo-European language family) for usage in literary form of Kannada is the reason for this distance. Well, it might come as a surprise to many that even the languages belonging to Indo-European family, Hindi for instance, have this enlarged gap between the colloquial and the literary forms. The gap is mainly due to giving up of the words regularly used in spoken forms to make way for words from the Sanskrit language. One research paper that was published in the year 1968 has captured this phenomenon. Language Hindi is the subject of study in that research paper. In this article, we shall understand the phenomenon, with the help of findings mentioned in the research paper.

Linguists Joshua A. Fishman, Charles A. Ferguson and Jyotirindra Das Gupta have come up with a book titled “Language Problems Of Developing Nations”. The book, first published in 1968, is a collection of research papers around the subject of socio-linguistics. In the book, there is a research paper titled “Language, Communication and Control in North India”, jointly written by Jyotirindra Das Gupta and John J. Gumperz.

The research paper talks about the developments around languages in the geographical area that fall under the present day states of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, in the Indian Union. The developments recorded in the research paper have occurred in the 1900s. The below pasted text is an excerpt from the research paper that sheds light on how the standardization efforts moved the literary form of Hindi far away from the colloquial forms.

The Hindi scholars have interpreted the task of language development as being synonymous with increasing classicalization. But classicalization implies that the literary language diverges sharply from the common speeches, thus causing an increasing separation between the media of elite communication and mass comprehension. Evidently, the Hindi scholars are less concerned with standardizing the language for popular use than for retaining its purity from the contamination of the outside influences. Hence the policy of elitist sanctity has been of greater salience to their conception of language planning than the policy of extension of mass communication.

In summary, the official Hindi that is being used in teaching and for governmental communications today is built to suit elite communication, rather than mass comprehension. As the written form of a language moves away from the spoken form, naturally the masses find it difficult to comprehend.

The authors of the research paper have also listed a couple of examples that have been sourced from sign boards intended for the public, and also from the text of the Indian Constitution. The examples listed below have been reproduced from the research paper.
Example 1:
- dhuumprapaan varjint hai (official text)
- smoking prohibited (English translation)
- sigret piinaa manaa hai (approximate equivalent in the colloquial)

Example 2:

- raastrapati kaa nirvacin eek aisee nirvaacik gan kee sadasy kareengee (official text)
- the president’s election will be done by electors chosen to include (English translation)
- raastrapati kaa cunaaoo eek aisee cunee huwee sadasy kareengee (approximate equivalent in the colloquial)

Apart from these two examples, the authors also cite the words used commonly in the literary Hindi and their counterparts in the colloquial Hindi. Some of those are:

- yadi for agar (if)

- kintu for magar (but) 

- atah for isliye (therefore)

- pratham for pahlaa (first)

By citing these examples, and highlighting the differences between the literary Hindi and the colloquial Hindi, the authors opine thus:

It seems evident that the new grammatical differences between colloquial and literary Hindi resulting from recent language reform materially add to the ordinary speaker’s task of learning literary Hindi. Many of the new rules are irregular in that they affect only certain parts of the vocabulary. Others affect deeply ingrained pronunciation patterns. Considerable exposure time is required before such rules can be mastered. Many native-speakers of Hindi, including some educated persons, feel uneasy about their control of literary Hindi. On the other hand, those who have been exposed to the present form of literary Hindi as part of their family background have considerable advantage in the educational system. New barriers to mobilization are being created, providing an opportunity for elite particularism to assert itself.

The situation is not much different in my mother-tongue Kannada. The present day literary form of Kannada language has drifted far from the colloquial Kannada. There are efforts to bring the literary form of Kannada as close to the spoken form as possible. Such efforts help undo the barriers to mobilization that have been erected. In the end, any language standardization process must strive to make the literary form suitable for mass communication. Mass communication will only succeed with mass comprehension, won't it?

Governors' Post in the States of India, a Colonial Legacy

Warren Hastings, the first Governor General of Bengal.
Pic source: www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au

Ever since the BJP led NDA government took control at Delhi last year, there were words doing rounds that UPA appointed governors will be asked to go. As things evolved, a few of the governors voluntarily stepped down while a few others locked horns with the union government over their transfers. Looking at these events one can’t resist thinking whether such an anti-federal post as the Governor is really necessary.

History of the post of Governor
A Governor’s post has a colonial history. British used a post called resident to boss over the princely states as well as the presidencies of India. The resident post was not unique to India, but was present across geographies ruled by British (as well as other European colonialists). This wiki excerpt elaborates on the role of residents and how they were chosen in the yesteryears:

Some official representatives of European colonial powers, while in theory diplomats, in practice exercised a degree of indirect rule. Some such Residents were former military officers, rather than career diplomats, who resided in smaller self-governing protectorates and tributary states and acted as political advisors to the rulers. A trusted Resident could even become the de facto prime minister to a native ruler. In other respects they acted as an ambassador of their own government, but at a lower level, since even large and rich native states were usually seen as inferior to Western nations. Instead of being a representative to a single ruler, a Resident could be posted to more than one native state, or to a grouping of states which the European power decided for its convenience. This could create an artificial geographical unit, as in Residency X in some parts of the British Indian Empire.

Power held by the Governors in the Indian Union

Pic source: wikipedia.org

Let us have a look at the recent Governor appointees to the state of Karnataka – Mr. Hansraj Bharadwaj, a former congress party member, appointed during the UPA regime; Mr. Vajubhai Vala, a former member of the BJP, appointed as the governor within 100 days of the NDA government taking over at Delhi. Looking at this pattern, it becomes clear that the methods of choosing governors hasn’t changed much since the British time. Originally claimed to be a post that ensures continuance of government at State level, this institution of governor defined in our constitution appears to be mostly used by central governments to meet their political ends.

The political leverage aside, the Constitution of India has given certain arbitrary powers to governor, though a governor is not directly elected by the people of the respective State. Article 163(2) from the Constitution :

If any question arises whether any matter is or is not a matter as respects which the Governor is by or under this Constitution required to act in his discretion, the decision of the Governor in his discretion shall be final, and the validity of anything done by the Governor shall not be called in question on the ground that he ought or ought not to have acted in his discretion.

The key takeaway from this article is, a Governor’s action shall not be questioned. This exposes a fundamental flaw, for there must be no person in a democracy who is immune to judicial scrutiny.

In Karnataka as well as other states of India, no matter who the people vote to power, the top most decision making powers reside with the one loyal to the establishment at Delhi. Positions occupied by appointment having greater powers than the elected representatives is something that doesn't gel well with the democracy.

The Governors, sometimes so disconnected from ground level realities, tend to look at all States uniformly. This approach stands out especially in linguistic matters, given the linguistic grounds for State formation in India. Within days of his appointment as governor of the state of Karnataka, Mr. Vajubhai Vala made a statement that he could manage his work in Karnataka through Hindi. This statement of his is a display of his disconnect from the people of Karnataka.

(This piece had originally appeared in thefederalist.in)

Larger Linguistic States Are Important for Democracy in India

source: blogs.lse.ac.uk

Over the past few months, there has been increased talk of dividing the state of Karnataka into two separate states. The division being talked about might result in two entities, the northern part of Karnataka and the southern part of Karnataka. Interestingly, all this talk is emanating from the sitting MLAs belonging to the two political parties that call themselves as 'national parties', the 'Indian national Congress' and the 'Bharatiya Janata Party'. Mr. Umesh Katti, sitting MLA from the BJP, and Mr. AS Patil Nadahalli, sitting MLA from the INC, are the two gentlemen who are at the forefront demanding separate statehood for the northern part of Karnataka.

Shift in the balance of power
While there is a lot of noise about smaller states being good for development, one has to be careful and consider the shift in the balance of power such division of the states is going to result in. The citizens of India will inevitably have to grapple with such an imbalance, if the larger states were to be further divided.

Why is balance of power important?
This is a question of democracy itself. One of the main reason why democratic practice has been successful across the world is, because of the development of a system of checks and balances to ensure that the political power is dispersed and decentralized. Democracy is a system built on the deeply held belief that government is best when its power to abuse is curbed and when it is held as close to the people as possible.

Let us now understand the current distribution of political power in the Indian Union, and the problems that are inherent under such a distribution.

Degree of centralization in the Indian Union
The power of the states and the Centre are defined by the constitution and the legislative powers are divided into three lists

• The union list - consists of 100 items on which the Union Government can legislate. 
• The concurrent list - consists of 47 items on which the state governments can legislate but the Union Government vests the power to override the state laws.
• The state list - consists of 61 items, on which the state governments can legislate. 

While the distribution of power is heavily tilted towards the Union Government in the ratio of 147 to 61, the articles 352 to 360 of the constitution contain provisions that tilt the balance of power all the more towards the Union Government. According to the Article 356 of the constitution of India, states must exercise their executive power in compliance with the laws made by the Union Government. Article 357 calls upon every state not to impede on the executive power of the Union within the states.

What problem can over-centralisation create for India?
With political power centralised at Delhi, the linguistic groups that carry clout at Delhi always have a larger say in policy matters. As was evident in the recent decision by the Union Government to reduce the import duty on raw-silk, the silk weavers from the state of Uttar Pradesh were benefited, while the silk farmers from the state of Karnataka were negatively impacted. The Union Government of India had to give in to the lobby from Uttar Pradesh, at the expense of well-being of the farmers from Karnataka.
Such policy-making inevitably brews resentment among the negatively impacted groups of people. Resentment among the citizens is a problem that no state can ignore.

With states reduced in size, the capability of the states to resist (or even reverse) the policies that impact their people will also reduce. By moving to split the larger states into smaller ones, and by continuing to run the administration in a centralized fashion, India does not seem to acknowledge the importance of balance of power. Larger linguistic states provide the much needed counter-weight to create the balance of power, and for the democracy to thrive. If you take out the counter-weight, all you have is imbalance, which can only lead to instability.

International Silk Route for India Is via the States

Source: www.thehindu.com

The farmers in Karnataka who rear silk worms are feeling the heat of cheap silk imports from China. The reason for this sudden surge in imports from China is, reduction in import duty on silk from 15% to 10%. This change in import duty was a decision of the Union Government of India.

As per this newspaper report, a delegation consisting of a few of the ministers from the Karnataka state government and all the MPs from Karnataka met several ministers of the union government recently, urging them to restore the import duty to earlier levels. As per the report, over 11 lakh farmers in the state of Karnataka have been impacted by this decision. Whether the Union Government decides to increase the import duty on silk to earlier levels or not, remains to be seen.  However, this episode in which the largest silk producing state in India felt the heat of cheaper Chinese imports and which made the representatives from the state to rush to Delhi seeking an intervention, tells a thing or two about the federalism being practised in the Indian union.

Should Delhi be taking a decision in this regard?
There are several farm produces that are mostly produced in only one state of the Indian union. Any decision impacting such a farm produce must be taken by the government that is closer to the people who toil to make the produce happen. For instance, any decision impacting coffee or silk in any way, must come from the government of Karnataka. The decisions which do not originate from the government that is closer to the people, will only lead to problems that call for fire-fighting measures later. Decisions by the Union Government sitting at Delhi without even building consensus among impacted states, will lead to such a goof up.

Any reversal in the import duty impacts India's image among the international trading community. India will come across as a nation which is inconsistent with its policies. Non-reversal will bleed the farmers inside India. Why has the union government gotten itself into such a fix? Centralized decision making process which is far removed from the people is the reason. It is time India takes federalism seriously, and implements it in true spirit.

Absence of Higher Education in People's Language Stifles Innovation

Pic source: www.cppr.in

The Wall Street Journal, an English language international newspaper, recently published a blog post titled "Do strong religious beliefs stifle innovation?"

The post is based on a research paper published by "National bureau of economic research, US", authors of which are Roland Bénabou, Davide Ticchi and Andrea Vindigni. The blog can be read here, and the research paper can be read here.

The research paper is of interest to us because, the authors have collected 'patents per capita' data from many nations across the globe. The data has been captured for the years 1980, 1990, 1995, 2000 and 2005. Data spanning over a 25 year period makes it robust for any analysis. Those nations with highest number of 'patents per capita' are considered leaders in innovation. The ones with comparatively lesser number of 'patents per capita' can be considered laggards in innovation. In this article, we shall not be exploring the possibilities of religiosity influencing innovation. Our main focus will be on the nations that have featured in the research paper, and the education system that those nations have built.

If we are to list the nations that have visibly higher number of 'patents per capita', as per data captured by authors of above mentioned research paper, the list would go like:

1.    Japan

2.    South Korea

3.    Germany

4.    United States

5.    Sweden

6.    Finland

7.    Great Britain

Other nations such as Denmark and France trail closely. All the nations listed above have built an education system where not just the primary schooling, even the higher education are provided in people's languages. To elaborate, in Japan one could even study engineering or medicine in Japanese medium. The Japanese or the Germans need not rely on English to obtain a degree (or masters) in engineering or medicine.

Let us also take a look at the nations that are much below the scale (at the bottom) in terms of 'patents per capita'. 

1.    Pakistan

2.    Bangladesh

3.    Indonesia

4.    Algeria

India is much closer to Algeria in terms of 'patents per capita', and India can be classified as a nation where innovation is rare. While Pakistan and Bangladesh rely on English as the language of instruction in higher education, Algeria relies on French.

Case of Indonesia is unique. Indonesia is home to 700 languages, and the official language of Indonesia is called 'Bahasa Indonesia', an artificially created language. As per this wikipedia entry, though 'Bahasa Indonesia' is extensively used in commerce, education, administration and media, most Indonesians speak other languages, such as Javanese, as their first language.

Though Indonesia has built higher education system that provides education in 'Bahasa Indonesia', the language used is still not people's language. It is analogous to making official Hindi as the language of education for whole of India.

While the leaders in innovation have built higher education systems in their people's languages, the laggards are either relying on languages of their erstwhile colonizers, or have built a higher education system which imparts education in an artificially constructed language. The educationists and linguists of the world have long argued, that education is very effective when imparted in mother-tongue. The data in the above mentioned research paper vindicates the fact that people's language is key to improving innovation and scientific progress of a society. Of course, there are other factors also that influence innovation and scientific spirit of a nation.

If India wishes to be a global leader in innovation, it is time India took its' people's languages seriously in education. The message is clear, provide higher education in people's language or remain a low-performer in terms of innovation,

Language Reforms Are Fundamental to Development and Equality

There are two different narratives that are widely heard in India nowadays. One is 'development' and the other is 'equity and equality'. There are schools of thought that favor one over the other. Furthermore, school of thought that vouches for 'development' accuses the other school of trying to achieve 'equity and equality' at the expense of 'development'. The accusations are vice versa too.

These two narratives have been built for so long, that there are political parties that have taken up these narratives as election issues. Even in the intelligentsia, these two schools are in existence.

Education precedes equity as well as development

Development, which involves industrialization and building prosperity, is not achievable without skilled human resource. Whether large scale manufacturing industries or building cutting edge technology, it is the people who build them. Education is the only way a society can build skilled human resource, unless the society wishes to import skilled workers. 

Consider the narrative of 'equity and equality', education is the only means through which an equitable society can be built. It is through education that all classes of people can be uplifted, and enabled. No matter what school of thought one belongs to, education (both primary as well as higher) is fundamental to accomplish what the school envisions.

Role of language in education

Every educationist in the world would unanimously agree that education is best imparted in one's mother-tongue. Both primary education and higher education, if available in one's mother-tongue, would only do good to the society. Higher education in people's language is important to ensure smooth transition from secondary education. Across the developed world, availability of higher education in people's language has ensured higher participation in terms of number of people enrolling. 

If we as a society, fail to build higher education institutes that provide education in people's language, we can never give raise to vast number of skilled workforce that development activities demand. If we as a society, continue to work with the current English-only elite system, majority of people will remain out of higher education institutes. With such an elite system, where only those who could cross the gate called English have access to higher education, building an equitable society will remain a distant dream.

In India, the very absence of such higher education institutes, speaks volumes about the lack of vision displayed by these two major schools of thought. Can you name one famous higher education institute in India that is known to provide world-class education in people's language? Be it any Indian language.

It is a tough job

Yes, building such institutes is a tough job. It demands a lot of time and effort. But, if India aspires to be a developed nation, this tough job has to be taken up. By not building higher education institutes in people's language, no nation has been able to develop ever. Even if India aspires to be an equitable nation, this tough job has to be taken up. With the current elite-system, most of the benefits of progress will remain limited to elite.

Enabling the languages

Now that we have understood the importance of education in people's language, a question might arise "isn't it enough if we translate the higher education textbooks to Indian languages?".

The answer is, "No, it is not that simple". For, the Indian languages lack corpus of words. Words that can explain the inclusive concepts discussed in higher studies. Corpus of words for any language cannot be built by simply borrowing the words from another language. Words have to be built to suit the nativity of that language, only then the words will serve the purpose of carrying and conveying the meaning to fellow speakers. 

Such corpus building tasks have been taken up by many language groups across the world. Corpus building is an important piece of language planning exercise, and also is one of the continuous tasks as the human ventures throw out new things and concepts every passing day. For further reading on language planning, please refer this book.

Lack of corpus in any language leads to absence of higher education in that particular language. Absence of higher education in any language, drastically slows down the process of corpus building. Hence, this sounds like a chicken and egg problem. To solve this problem, concerted efforts are needed. Corpus needs to be built for every Indian language, and it can only be built by the speakers of these languages.

Efforts in Kannada

Author is part of one such effort in Kannada. A web portal (honalu.net) wherein science and technology concepts are explained by using the newly coined Kannada root words. Many learned Kannadigas with expertise in fields of medicine, anatomy, automobile industry, software technology, physics and etc, are penning down their knowledge in Kannada. Even the much debated Kannada script reforms have been implemented in this portal. Script reforms is a way to make learning, reading and writing easier for the language speakers. For each language, room for script reforms is unique. Script reforms have already been implemented in several countries, South Korea for example, only to reap benefits.

For the past two years that honalu has been in existence, 125 people have contributed their articles, most of which are related to science. All the writers have acquired the knowledge through English. And, they are bringing the knowledge to their mother tongue Kannada. Not by mere translation and borrowing of words, but by coining new words that suit Kannada nativity. It is an experiment the elite are working on, that will eventually benefit the whole Kannadiga society. You might ask, "how can a web portal help the whole Kannadiga society?". Well, to solve the chicken and egg problem, we cannot just keep sitting on the problem, we need a start. Once the society as a whole, the intelligentsia, the political class, et al understand the importance of language reforms, much bigger attempts will be made. These efforts are fundamental to build what the two popular schools of thought aim to achieve.

(Image source: tdil.mit.gov.in)