Articles by Arun Ghosh

The Economy and the Budget Arun Ghosh IT is obviously not possible to attempt a detailed analysis of the budget immediately after the broad outlines are revealed in the budget speech; one needs to study the likely impact of the diverse expenditures proposed and the manner of raising resources for the same. Nonetheless some broad comments are in order since the Economic Survey presented four days prior to the budget contains useful information on the state of the economy, to which the overall aggregates (in the budget) can be related.

Productivity and Efficiency Myth and the Reality Arun Ghosh The latest generation capital equipment and technology are not necessarily optimal for Indian conditions; what is important is the absorption of technology, the proper utilisation of the capital equipment.

are of 'dubious origin', 'ruined and adventurous offshoots of the bourgeoisie', Vagabonds', 'discharged soldiers', 'discharged jailbirds', 'escaped galley slaves', 'swindlers', 'mountebanks', 'lazzaroni', 'pickpockets', 'tricksters'; 'gamblers', 'maqueareaus', 'brothel keepers', 'porters', 'Hterati', 'organ-grinders', 'rag-pickers', 'knife grinders', 'tinkers', 'beggars'. It is pointless to complain that this description is a little too much; social reality is social reality. A dynasty-based system operates on its wits; it needs a social base of support; the support comes from such specimens as Marx meticulously describes; decrepit literati, for example, university professors or burnt-out poets, are as much a part of this base as are procurers and professional goons. Throughout the month of November, the nation's capital was chock-a-block with the presence of these elements who sustain the ruling party; it leans on them, and they in turn derive their livelihood from it. It should not therefore surprise that, sooner or later, they come to be formally represented on the highest echelons of the nation's administration. The level of culture the union home minister has provided evidence of during his recent performance in the Lok Sabha is that of the social base on which the dynasty depends; his thoughts and modes of expression are, in other words, the truest reflection of the state of the party which bears the flag of the dynasty In any epoch, the ideology of the ruling classes emerges as the leading ideology. The culture of the ruling classes does too. It has, in our country.

of Tamil interests in Sri Lanka than the Tamils themselves was of little substantive significance. Even if the assumption was objective!) correct, it was atrocious to act in terms of that assumption. The moment the government of India began to tell the Jaffna, Batticaloa, l'rincomalcc and Amparai Tamils, through the language of the army bayonet, what was good for them, it was total alienation. The Indian 'Peace' Keeping Force may continue to shoot down a do/en or so of Tamil youth, or come to capture a cache of Tamil arms. That only clinches the point: it is now exposed as an army of occupation, comprehensively hated by those for whose sake it claims to have marched in. Our government's residual hope rested on a rushed election and installation of a Tamil administration in the merged province; this administration could bargain, after December, with the newly-elected president in Colombo. The IT'LL calculate otherwise, and they have the strength to prove thai it is their calculations which matter. From their desks in New Delhi, foreign service mandarins may order our troops to arrange elections in Sri Lanka's temporarily merged province. The IPKF cannot however bully the people into coming to the booths; they cannot bully a sufficient number of individuals to stand as candidates so as to give a veneer of respectability to the so-called elections; they cannot even find electoral officers locally to receive the nomination papers. It is specious to claim, as New Delhi keeps claiming, that all this is because the LTTE has succeeded in terrorising the population. Large-scale terrorisation has played a part, hut it is also terrorisation by the Indian troops which has largely helped to make up the Tamil mind in Sri Lanka. Just ask the Tamil United Liberation Front, the political entity in Sri Lanka which, till about two years ago, held views most proximate to those held by the government at India; leaders of the Front would now have no hesitation in admitting in private that they have become irrelevant, and, in the island's northern and eastern provinces, it is Prabhakaran and his followers who have emerged as the symbol of Tamil pride and TamiI dignity.

Management of Water Resources Arun Ghosh Soil management, water management and watershed development are essentially integrated operations wherein the co-operation of the local populace is an essential ingredient for the success of government programmes. Herein lies the essential weakness of the approach of the authorities concerned with the management of water resources.