By K. RAMAKOTISWARA RAU

Shaping the Future

In many directions, and through the combined effort of many minds, Independent India is seeking to shape the future. Those who watch the process of a free people exerting their strength are apt to be critical and even patronising. Looking at it from outside, the initial mistakes and the lack of co-ordination in our endeavours appear to be far more important than the actual progress achieved by large masses of men under the leadership of a few individuals, gifted with vision but new to the task. Every undertaking, from river valley projects to rural dispensaries and from universities to primary schools, needs trained personnel imbued with the spirit of service. It is the combination of technical efficiency with patriotic zeal which will ensure the fulfilment of the hopes of the makers of our plans. The inertia due to centuries of foreign rule must be overcome in a few years, and the energies so largely directed to the winning of freedom now canalised to constructive purposes.

It is not in the sphere of material progress only that India is forging ahead, though that is the necessary foundation and beginning of all other progress. Alongside of our national Five Year Plans, one notices with pleasure the birth of National Academies of Art and Letters, Music and Dance. These are the relatively intangible achievements of the mind and the spirit, and even Governments with the pest of motives can only touch the fringe of a great problem,–that of enabling the people of a vast continent to rediscover their soul through the pursuit of beauty in their everyday lives. This spirit of beauty is ‘far yet near’, even as the sages described the Atman. Costly schools and hospitals are definitely useful, but if the planners and designers have no eye to beauty, these structures may be the means of spreading the cult of ugliness. What are called ‘modern’ buildings have sometimes a very depressing effect. The lack of ‘form’ and the monotony of design will be apparent from a comparison with the neighbouring temples, old and ruined but yet the embodiments of a great tradition of art. The village architects and artisans, as E.B. Havell once pointed out, have even today the skill to perceive the beauty in simple things. And by affording them a chance to revive the art traditions which are fast dying out, the rural extension schemes will acquire added value and bring an element of joy into the lives of the whole population. There is now an insistence on the importance of leisure for the worker in field and factory, and for the tired members of the lower middle class. How that leisure will be employed is a matter of significance for the future. It is here that the Academies and their branches can play a notable part.

In addition to shaping her own future, India is seeking to add her weight on to the side of peace and freedom. The ending of colonialism is her immediate objective, and the establishment of friendly relations between nations, her ultimate aim. The Colombo Conference of South-East Asian Ministers, the meeting between the Indian and Chinese Prime Ministers at Delhi, the successful efforts of Indian diplomats to achieve a cease-fire agreement in Indo-China, are the clearest indications of the role of peace-maker which India is playing in the international sphere, without aligning herself with either of the power blocs or bidding for leadership in her own right. Nehru, the nation’s hero, has achieved distinction as a far-seeing world statesman. At home and abroad, he is shaping the future in the way the Father of the Nation would have desired.

Problems of the Andhra State

With the inauguration of the High Court at Guntur, and the securing of the President’s assent to the Sri Venkateswara University Bill, a definite stage has been reached in the history of the new State of Andhra. The controversies regarding the location of the Capital created a situation of great uncertainty, and little progress was possible in regard to the many matters that demanded the attention of the Cabinet and the Legislature. A cleavage between the coastal Districts and Rayalaseema was threatened, and even now the rival groups are apt to foster a bitterness which is not only unnecessary but fraught with danger to the future of the State. These regional rivalries cut across party loyalties, so that the Congress which forms the largest single group is rendered powerless to implement its policies in consonance with the ideals of the parent organisation. Four out of the seven Miaisters belong to the Congress. Of the rest, Sri Prakasam, the Chief Minister, threw off his allegiance to the All India Praja Socialist Party, and today he is a no-party man. His towering personality, and the unique services he rendered to the Country through three decades, made it impossible for any Congress Party leader in Andhra to form a Cabinet without this veteran ex-Congressman. Technically, Sri Prakasam is an associate member of the Congress Legislature Party. Sri T. Viswanatham, who may be described as the right-hand man of the Chief Minister, was also a member of the Praja Socialist Party, but now he is the head of a small group of legislators who form the Andhra Praja Party, as distinguished from the Praja Socialist Party headed by the Raja of Vizianagaram and Continuing to be affiliated to the All-India Party of which Acharya Kripalani is the leader. The seventh Minister, Sri Thimma Reddi, belonged to Sri N. G. Ranga’s Krishikar Lok Party but was expelled from it when be accepted a ministership against the mandate of the Party.

It will thus be clear that the non-Congress section of the Cabinet consists of individuals who were originally Congressmen, and then members of Parties which severed their connection with the congress for temperamental rather than ideological reasons. Now there is no Party strength behind them. There can be no Unified command and no settled programme for a Cabinet so oddly constituted. The Communists and their sympathisers form the main Opposition, and, on crucial occasions, the division lists in the Legislature reveal the confusion resulting from ad hoc alliances between groups whose common aim is to discredit the Ministry, without taking into consideration the efforts of Sri Prakasam and his Colleagues to give some stability to the infant State.

But that stability is now easier of achievement than it was some months ago. There is some measure of agreement on the main problems confronting the State. The Nandikonda Project, the promotion of land reforms, the formation of Visalandhra and the rectification of the boundaries of the present State, are matters on which there is no divergence of opinion. But Prohibition is still an open question. While the Ministry is taking time to consider the recommendations of the Ramamurty Committee, ex-Minister Sri Latchanna is leading a movement of so-called Satyagraha in the interests of ex-toddy tappers. The Congress cannot altogether scrap Prohibition, but there can be no constitutional objection to a revision of its policy in the light of the experience gained in recent years. Temperance rather than Prohibition is the way that commends itself to a very large section of the public in Andhra irrespective of Party affiliations. There is a definite feeling that drinking in moderation is not a crime of the same category as theft or murder. Peaceful propaganda, spread over years, is needed to create the atmosphere for total Prohibition.

The State of Andhra is the first new State to be carved out after Independence. It marks the realisation of a forty-year old dream of ardent Congressmen and Nationalists of an earlier generation. On the successful functioning of this new State depends the success of democratic institutions in the new set-up. If the men at the top in Andhra can bury their quarrels, the patriotism and the undoubted ability of the people of the State can achieve great results.

There is a proposal to form a ‘Ministerialist’ combination of legislators, to ensure the passage of measures sponsored by the Ministry. Without a dependable majority, no Government can function for long. It is right that all non-Communist legislators should come together and provide the needed majority. Eventually, and before the next elections, they can all merge in the Congress.

A Press Council for India

Among the major recommendations of the Press Commission is the one relating to the constitution of a Press Council–a statutory body with well-defined functions, and representative of working journalists, newspaper proprietors, the Universities, and literary bodies. The Chairman is to be nominated by the Chief justice of India from among the Judges or ex-Judges of a High Court. The Council is expected to “safeguard the freedom of the. Press”, to “build up a code in accordance with the highest professional standards”, to “improve the methods of recruitment, education and training for the profession”. As a corollary to the constitution of the Press Council, the Commission consider that “there is no necessity for a machinery for advising Government on the administration of Press laws, and the continued existence of the present Advisory and Consultative Committees is not recommended”.

The freedom of the Press, like the independence of the judiciary, is an article of faith with all those who cherish Parliamentary Democracy after the British model. The Press in India has developed a great tradition of efficiency and integrity thanks to the pioneering services of stalwarts like Motilal Ghose, Kalinath Roy, C.Y. Chintamani and A. Rangaswami Iyengar. In their days, the freedom that the Press needed was freedom from encroachments on its liberty by a foreign Bureaucracy. But today there is a growing menace from another quarter,–the money power represented by the Press Barons who run chains of newspapers and exploit the best talent in the country to advance their own interests. It was this new feature in the public life of India which led to the formation of bodies like the All-India Federation of Working Journalists, charged with the duty of safeguarding freedom of expression on the one hand, and security of tenure and reasonable working conditions on the other. The idealists among the profession were opposed to a conception of journalism which would degrade it from a vocation to a trade, and fought shy of Trade Unionism. The Commission have sought to reconcile these points of view and to protect the interests of the ‘employees’ in regard to pay, bonus, provident fund, leave, and discipline. It is wise of the Commission to seek to entrust the Press Council with supervisory powers in all these matters.

The full text of the Commission’s Report is not yet available: only a summary of the recommendations has been published. And the public is warned not to indulge in premature criticism before reading the Report and getting at the reasoning behind any recommendation. But there will be general satisfaction that the Commission have addressed themselves to the many complex problems of the Press in India with the utmost care, and with due regard to the formation of a band of journalists who will be proud of their profession and maintain high standards. An august institution like the proposed Press Council ought to occupy a position similar to that of the highest Judicial Tribunals.

¹July 20

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