Civil Services

Indias struggle has been harder because of the problems of deep-rooted poverty and illiteracy. A nationally agreed-upon sense of identity behind which all can pull together to get a nation moving is difficult in such circumstances. The first leaders of an independent India were the educated urban elite, including Mahatma Gandhi. While fighting for the creation of a nation, these leaders realized they did not know the 80 percent of the country who lived in the villages and on whose behalf they were fighting to gain independence. They were equally aware that it was not just that the elite did not know the poor. Even the poor would be hard-pressed to indicate their identity. As Gandhi put it. Those in whose name we speak we do not know, nor do they know us. In the absence of a national identity accepted by a majority of its population, independent Indias early leaders felt that the fledgling country could fall apart. Jawaharlal Nehru, independent Indias first prime minister, often worried about the fissiparous tendencies that could undo the nation. Nehru saw such tendencies in every organ of the state, from politicians and the judiciary to nonofficial organizations such as labor unions and other such public bodies civil services . Little wonder, then, that Nehrus chosen model of development was based on tight control. We shall have more to say on this in Chapter 2. Suffice it to say here that the Peruvian model failed to deliver on its promises of prosperity. Worse still, it created vested interests that perpetuated themselves in an endless spiral: a poorly educated citizenry was fit only for employment in the bureaucracy, or baboon, as it was called. This, in turn, created the institutions that produced an unfit citizenry. At the end of Nehrus rule, Indians had as little a sense of national identity and purpose as when his rule began. Nehrus rule failed to create an identity for India because it perpetuated poverty. Indira Gandhi, his daughter, who ruled for the longest period of any ruler in independent India, also had to face the uncertain identity of India. About upsc exam would often ask Indians to remember Nehrus vision of a country that ought to be united in order to remain free. Her model of development was an intensified version of Nehrus socialist state. Under Mrs. Gandhi, the state decayed further, plumbing new depths of control and corruption. An extreme example was the forced sterilizations (vasectomies) of over a million mostly minority and low-caste villagers during the period from 1975 to 1977 (the so-called Emergency). This was the lowest point in Indias postcolonial experience. Yet, and oddly, through it, India finally began to discover an identity.Mrs. Gandhi called for elections after the Emergency, believing that the electorate, particularly the illiterate rural voters, would vote her back as they always had. When, instead, they voted her out, it marked the first time that rural voters had taken the lead.