USA has 50 States, India Need 150 States – 2, Better Governance
Dear Shadi,
USA has 50 states that have independent governance and more importantly also have 3140 counties with substantial powers to make laws and independently manage local governance including police.
Average size of ground level governance unit is 100,000 whereas a state like Bihar has governance unit for 10,00,000,000 people. (3xBihar = USA in population).
Temptation to take bribes in appointing say 10 teachers in a county is negligible but in the case of Bihar appointing 10,000 is huge – accountability minimum. That's how India has high level of corruption.
At local level even minute details become public but at big state level or PM level only the biggest scandals get notice. For example we come to know much Halwa was left after every temple function and how much the particular organizer took it home in a bucket. But there is no law to punish them – only alternative is some more powerful group may overthrow the corrupt association or society physically. In this process we generally find the new incumbent is even more corrupt.
(Constitution of associations and NGOs is such that head of them can dismiss any or most of the subordinates without any reasonable ground but impossible for subordinates to replace a Corrupt head. JDU for example had the worst constitution. There is no fixed tenure – some like MS Swaminathan may have controlled some NGOs for 50 years.)
There are three basic short comings in us, one is our caste system, second our lack of respect for better qualified or skilled and third low on honesty. But these disappear largely when NRIs arrive in USA. So it is the weak legal system that let exploiters violate constitutional rights to equality.
All these shortcomings are amplified when India has very large population, people can't make right choices – we have single Prime Minister for 1200 million, very powerful yet knows nothing of technology and development process and is cut off from ground reality and most of the planning and investment decisions are thrust on people under his leadership– unfortunately India had Prime Ministers from law or economic background. They certainly know nothing of the problems faced by people of different regions. Funds released for BAD projects are largely swindled on way.
For example at school class level we all know who the best is, at professional level people know who the best in factory or organization is but at political level better connectivity or better acceptability over rides competence.
Thus "Competence is Compromised" with growing size of a governing unit.
Further more when there are no governing authorities with local associations and societies, people are least concerned with their poor performance.
Even small Indian states are not efficiently managed though always better than large states. Recently carved out states Uttarkhund and Chhatisgarh are performing better than their larger patents but Jharkhund not – here we must not forget Mining Mafia was operating even before first coal mine licensed. It is the Central Agencies like Ministry of Environment and Department of Revenue Intelligence who failed to intercept working of Mining Mafia.
Thus failure of Jharkhand is wrongly Touted as show case of failure of small states when it was actually failure of central government and absence of Local Governments that let plunder of mineral resources.
Delhi vs California
USA not just has small states but also smaller Counties or Cities that are empowered to govern with people's participation. California has 58 counties and over 100 cities each with a governing unit. Delhi half in population is a state with no counties or cities within Delhi state. Municipal Corporation, an elected body covers almost the entire city state but with weak legislative functions; NDMC and Delhi Cantonment are much smaller. Here National Political parties control state and municipalities and direct participation of local participation is absent. Even election of Mayor is a manipulative political process.
Executives appointed to serve us are not accountable to us but Sheila Dixit – we have no control over the appointment of police officers or school teachers. You will be shocked to know there are tens of thousands of non existing MCD employees drawing over Rs.200 crores every year.
http://en.wikipedia .org/wiki/ County_(United_States)
In the United States, a county is a local level of government below the state (or federal territory). Counties are used in 48 of the 50 states, while Louisiana is divided into parishes and Alaska into boroughs. These are considered "county-equivalents ", as are some cities not designated as part of a county. The U.S. Census Bureau lists 3,140 counties or county-equivalent administrative units in total. There are on average 62 counties per state.
In most Midwestern and Northeastern states, counties are further subdivided into townships or towns and may contain other independent, self-governing municipalities. The site of a county's administration and courts is called the county seat.
Delhi needs 10 districts 20 Counties and 50 cities with full powers of governance like in USA to effectively turn into Clean and Vibrant state.
Obviously none of the political parties controlled by individuals would like to Split the huge states in to say 150 states 5000 counties or Districts and 10,000 cities with independent legislation and governance function.
Ravinder Singh
December13, 2009
Posted by: "shadi katyalsearch" shadikatyal@ yahoo.com
Fri Dec 11, 2009 7:20 pm (PST)
Dear Ravinder,
Thee is no way one can compare USA which is 3 times bigger than India and 2 of the States are not even connected to mainland but comparing the class of education, Law and Order, ethics to work and planning for the future is way ahead. I laugh when some of the educated people write that India can teach USA or is better like Bombay flood vs Katrina.
It is amazing when one thinks of USA, a nation of nothing but immigrants and how cohesive they have built this nation. How technically they have moved ahead of every other nation. The reason is simple it is the thought of those Leaders who wrote their Constitution and how it is still working with minimum amendments.
The Law and order is simple, there is no VIP or special class. You could be fishing with the President of some big company and he will not show his position on you. You had been here and know how things work here. Our problem is that we kept our English Raj system and thus need peons, driver and what not. You don't find any peons outside guarding his boss and his own territory. You have problem walk into your Congressman/ Senator office local branch or call and make an appointment. You need not have any bag of money and neither the elected member asks you whether you voted for him or donated any money to the party, Where as in India you must have lots of money to see the Minister or MP or MLA. You wish to establish a plant talk to state development and they will take you to sights and give you all the details of power supply, water and labour but in India we need to go with a special bank account. Why do we need Ministries of Trade, Industry, shipping,
Power, Agriculture and what not. British had those because they wanted to control industry and trade etc.
Is India truly a nation or just group of people living in a certain area. Recent joke here is that an American came back from trip from India and was asked how did he enjoy. He replied I liked it very much but I never met an Indian there. I met lot of people who were Punjabis, Guajarati's, Bengalis etc but no Indians.
Most of the people talk of Gandhi and how he got freedom as they had been misled and fact is that Gandhi not only decapitated India but even sown seed for future fracture of the nation. His acceptance and later division of states on Linguistic basis was the start and now following his methods of hunger strike to death are working well. I wonder how many others will take same steps and how quickly India is Balkanized?
The problem is not only lack of industry but lack of education but even lack of many educated and humble ministers. One is shocked the language and arrogance used by some of these ministers.
We are going to need new constitution and new rules that no party will distribute tickets to any one who is not resident of that area so that he/she is accountable to his constituents.
We have destroyed the nation by being brain washed by Gandhi/Nehru. Look what Nehru did to our industry and Trade. I can continue to write and give many examples but time has come to take either the whole nation in hand with Law and order or let the hunger strikes, nakabundi, bundhs and what not destroy the nation.
Maybe Churchil was correct that we will not be able to govern and flourish.
Regards
shadi
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
No comments:
Post a Comment