Public Servant

17 January 2020 | Bangalore

I skip breakfast waiting for hunger to arrive, and it arrives suddenly, in full force. The irritability is apparent on an empty stomach. Some research shows that people's IQ dips with hunger.

I'm here to pick up my bike from the service center and ride back to Mysore. Lal Bagh main road screams Commerce from both sides. Every inch of pavement and road are taken by people, and there is barely place to stand and no shade or ledge to sit. All the food options look junky and I'm thinking where can I find a plate of idlis to fuel me. There is MTR nearby, outside which a board says they are shut from 11 AM to 12:30 PM, after which lunch opens.

There is half an hour to kill on a hellhole of a road. I walk past Urvashi theater and the huge cut-outs of Mahesh Babu riding a bike and Allu Arjun trying to be stylish. Their smile and pretense of coolness irritates me at that moment. I walk up and down and I look at the clock and it's been only 17 minutes. I'm almost there - 13 minutes more. I see a scooter-for-rent from Bounce parked on the footpath, and I sit down.

A traffic policeman comes and asks me if it was my bike, I say no, and he asks me to get up pointing to my legs which were jutting out. I get up, and after he walks by, I sit again, this time with my legs closely held. He again walks past and says get up, I ask him why, and he says we're going to tow the bike. I stand on the side, and he says go stand at the bus stand. I ignore and move away a little, and he again approaches and asks me to wait at the bus stand. We argue briefly and I tell him that I'm not going to the bus stand, what is the crime in standing by the side of the road? There is no agreement, and I continue to stand, a little more worked up now.

The cop stops a scooter and points out a mistake in how the vehicle number is written in front. I see the scooter guy take out two bright green fifty ruppee notes, and I take out my phone and record. It's apparent that I'm incompetent at voyeuristic video recording, and the cop sees me and rushes to grab my phone, and I lock the screen before he grabs it from me. His superior rushes and they both start screaming at me while trying to unlock the phone, which they cannot. So they ask me to open it, and I oblige, and as I quickly try to delete the video, they grab my phone and prevent me from doing so.

They are really pissed off, and the senior cop puts my phone in his pocket and they're chanting in chorus that I should be taken to the police station. I tell them that I want to call my lawyer and ask for my phone, they shut down my request and get even more angry. We move to a little hand-slapping, shoving and wrangling as a crowd gathers. I tell them that I need the phone back, and that they can take me to the police station. The cop refuses again, and flags down an auto and we both get in.

Inside the auto we are like a fighting couple, each looking out of their side of the auto. He enquires what I do, and I mention coffee and Mysore. He asks what I'm doing here, and why I'm in Bangalore. I don't want to tell him about the bike, for it will give them something to harass me with, so I tell him that I'm waiting for a friend to pick me up. Then he spontaneously began screaming at me for recording a video, and by now I'm used to it, and I ignore and look out of the window as he screams and lets his anger out. We reach the police station in five minutes and he takes 20 ruppees from his wallet and hands over to the auto guy.

We walk into the Wilson Garden police station, and there is a more-senior cop there in khaki and khaki, at the entrance, with a register and surrounded by people. Two - three other cops are also interested in my case and they surround me as the constable narrates his ordeal of being filmed, and after he finishes I ask if I may speak, and tell the more-senior cop that the traffic cop was harassing me. The junior cop in conflict with me asks "You can't speak in Kannada?" I tell them that I'm Tamil and continue speaking in English. They all crowd to see the video, and every minute or two they have to ask me to unlock the phone.

The more-senior cop and the expanding gang of cops take me into a room where a menacing looking lady is sitting. She must be the Superintendent of Police or something like that, I'm thinking. She reminded me of the many teachers in school I've encountered, and for a moment I forgot that I'm now all grown up. Again we repeat what happened, the constable now remembering to add details like a CM convoy coming on that route and how I disobeyed his request to move and recorded the video. The video is played once more, and there is no curiosity over the money handed over in the video, rather I'm the one accused there, for having recorded the video. Even the strict looking lady had nothing to say about the video except that it needs to be deleted, and they do a vigorous job of pressing buttons.

I tell the lady that I'm being harassed by this cop for standing by the side of the road, and I took the video in self-defense. I rant against the cop, and my pitch must have gone up, because the lady brought down the hammer down and screamed at me: "You can't speak softly!?" I was taken aback, and felt that I'm back at it again 20 years after school - a dispute with some boy my age, and being screamed at by a lady sitting in judgement.

I tell the lady that he was being disrespectful. "What is the crime in standing by the side of the road? He was being disrespectful and harassing me for no provocation." She asks if by respect I mean he should address me as 'Sir' and fall at me feet while requesting. I use a tax-payer card that I usually loathe when someone else uses it - "Madam, I'm not a criminal... I'm a tax-paying citizen, why can I not stand by the side of the road? He didn't mention anything about CM coming..." and one cop from the gang of cops asks me why this junior cop would single me out of the crowd for harassment? "You should ask the cop why he singled me out, how can I answer that question over the cop's intent?"

They say that taking a video recording is illegal, and I can hear murmurs of "we'll book him under Obstruction of civil servant carrying out his duty", and I tell the lady that of all the things I'm accused of, I'll only admit one mistake - recording the cop on video, and for that I'm sorry. She asks me to tell sorry to the junior cop, and without blinking I turn to him and say sorry. They seem dissatisfied that all this is ending so timidly, so they ask me to write an Apology Letter and I'm smiling inside my head.

I sit down and write a letter, supervised by the junior cop. I mention that I recorded a video of the cop, 'which is illegal' and score off the illegal part. Why am I admitting to illegality of something that is not illegal? The junior cop sees it and tells me to rewrite the illegal part. He is searching for the word 'sorry' and I deprive him of the pleasure by writing 'I extend an apology', and he's not sure whether to complain again. Then he enthusiastically takes my letter to the more-senior cop, who tells the junior cop to keep it with him, and the letter is folded thrice and placed in his pocket, and I'm free to go.

After that I had 150 minutes of silence with my head on the ride back, and it gave me plenty of time to think. A few thoughts:

1. The Law

There is a Section 188 of the Indian Penal Code, which deals with 'Disobedience to order duly promulgated by Public Servant', which I'm assuming is what they meant by 'obstruction of civil servant carrying out his duty'. It's a relatively lenient section (in terms of detention powers and punishment), so it makes one wonder what are the other sections that the police uses in abuse of power to detain people. Going back to Section 188 and looking at data from the National Crimes Record Bureau for the year 2019, there were 22,907 cases registered under this section across the country. Out of this, Delhi accounted for 5,100 cases, Tamil Nadu 3,100+, Maharashtra 3,500+ and Gujarat 5,200+. Nearly 17,000 out of 22,907 cases under this section comes from just four States. It would seem that only people of these states are obstructing civil servants, and that states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar or Madhya Pradesh, which are otherwise high on crime, do not have many people who obstruct civil servants. A further reading of the data in the NCRB report shows that certain states use certain provisions to detain and arrest people who the people in power wish to silence. For example, Uttar Pradesh likes the Arms Act, West Bengal likes Attempt to Culpable Homicide, and so on. In the coming days I will do a dive into some important segments of the NCRB data, to show the intent and differences in means used by each state to suppress the civil rights of people.

2. The police have too much power to do whatever they want. Because they are forced into mute acceptance of whatever the elected government wishes, the police take out their frustrations and lack of agency and power on the people on the streets. The police are full of stress and tension - it's so evident in a small chat with anyone there. They are pissed with life, their duty, lack of agency, and the pain of mutely saluting and surrendering one's will to their superiors whose tails wag to political power. It's amusing that they call themselves 'Public Servants' in the IPC Section 188, while acting like goondas. The cop who took me in the auto to the police station surely suffered from hypertension. He was screaming out of control, and just about everything triggered him into an outburst. I feel sorry for people stuck in these jobs, but it only helps understand their incompetence and frustration, not the malice in their minds. It feels like this tension is a ticking time-bomb, and their minds are ripe for cracking.

3. The NIA act allows the central government to detain people for weeks and months, without any reason or charges. The state governments have their own ways to browbeat the public into submission. This kind of excesses in power bestowed to stressed out political pawns in the name of public servants is bound to be misused. This is justified under the ever-enlarging umbrella of 'National Interest'. We can use words like Security and Terror to justify even the most heinous of crimes by the police. Torture is legal as long as the person being tortured can be painted as sub-human, and from there is a short hop to treating the person like vermin, with the same courtesy extended as those given to mice and cockroaches. Since the majority and powerful are unaffected by these things, they remain mute spectators while certain segments of society are harassed and tortured into submission. We cannot accept this as normal, even as the government rewards itself with progressively greater powers to cement its control over power.

4. There is a girl in Mysore who was recently at a protest rally at the University of Mysore, with a placard saying 'Free Kashmir'. She has been booked under sedition, and the lawyers who form the Bar association in Mysore have passed a resolution to say that no lawyer will represent this girl. This is not merely null and void, but shameful and against the very fabric of the profession, in violation of an individual's right to legal representation in the justice system. There has been significant, unequivocal judgements setting clear rules to test the validity of the sedition clause when applied to any individual. Guilt demands a call for violence and subsequent violence, akin to a spark in a powder-keg. As unpleasant as seccession may sound to some people, it's a perfectly legal to express a desire to secede so long as it's done peacefully. The public conscience is shallow enough to morally legitimise this abuse of sedition by the State.

5. The police is petrified of video and social media. The State and it's police have set up thousands of CCTV cameras all over the city, with facial recognition and control rooms to make a surveillance state out of urban spaces. Yet, they don't allow any video of their own actions. This is like the British Monarchy selling opium into China two hundred years ago, while banning the same in their own country. People often ask: are we heading towards a surveillance state? I think we're already there. There is no milestone announcing it's arrival. We should all have video recording of interactions with 'Public Servants' of all kinds.

Yesterday was the first time that I've entered a police station as an 'accused'. It felt strange, and I felt powerless despite the privilege and power I enjoyed. I cannot imagine being from a lower caste or being a Muslim, especially in the cow belt of North India. We need to read the news, distrust the State, learn the law, and fight for civil rights - for everyone.

Question Everything

Over the last hundred years, many countries across the world have overthrown monarchies and embraced Democracy. In the timeline of settled human societies, Democracy is like an infant – barely fifty years old in the form that we now recognise.

In Monarchy, people had to accept whoever became King by inheritance. People couldn’t question anything, and they were left to the mercy and intellect of the King. All there was to do was practice acceptance.

After centuries of obedience, Democracy arrived to give newly recognised powers to the people – the power to vote, to choose their representatives, to question and challenge power, and fundamental rights that are inalienable and, until recently, unknown to people.

The primary motive of people is self-interest. Until Democracy came along, self-interest was confined to one’s position in the social pyramid and material well-being, both of which were correlated and hence the same. With Democracy, self-interest extended to fundamental rights. This is the most beautiful promise of Democracy. No matter where you are on the social pyramid, certain rights were equal and inalienable, and protecting this is self-interest.

With a King that one couldn’t overthrow, people had little choice except to back the King to seek material and social development. So whatever the King did, the people could only work on how to exploit the King’s decisions to garner wealth and social status. Because there was almost no chance of equal rights of any form, people accepted inequality in society as God’s design, and focused their energy on exploiting the rules of the Game to further their material self-interest.

In a Democracy, there is a popularity contest on the side of the candidates, and on the other side a utilitarian choice - of the best candidate from a set of imperfect choices. Here power is vested with a set of people who represent the interests and voice of the people. So each representative’s primary duty is to follow the Constitution in letter and spirit, and to act as the medium of communication of the people’s interests.

Let’s now look at the structure of power. In a Monarchy, power comes from birth, and it is assured and inalienable. There is no fear of losing power. While popularity is desirable, it’s not required to retain power. In a Democracy, those in power are vulnerable to the people’s wishes every five years (at most).  Since power is not assured, and the people in power have self-interest to retain power, there is a conflict, between their duty to the Constitution and the people they represent, and their  self-interest in retaining power. This conflict is the primary source of dysfunction in Democracies.

It’s not like the founding fathers and mothers of Democracy didn’t know this conflict. So they instituted checks and balances, like an independent judiciary and (less apparently) independent executive. Further checks include the securing of fundamental rights of the people (exceptions notwithstanding) and the absolute immunity from change enjoyed by the basic structure of the Constitution.

It seems like the founders of Democracy were acutely aware of how power could be misused to further the interests of power. Giving power to a few people thru elections is straight-forward. After that, it’s a slow, asymptotic march of checks and balances on this power conferred to a few.

Quite different from a Monarchy, where people sat back and accepted the consequences of the Monarch’s decisions, the people of a Democracy, thru their elected representatives, influence the policies of the Democratic State. The consequences of the decisions of the State are studied and discussed by the people, and their feedback is communicated regularly thru their elected representative.

Elections are utilitarian decisions made by people. If a voter has independent thought, it’s rare to find a candidate (or anybody) whose principles will be 100% in alignment with the voter’s. So the voter is forced to pick the best available candidate, and this is a utilitarian compromise that cannot be escaped. The elected representative represents the interests of all the people in the constituency, and not merely the ones who voted in their favour.

Having selected the candidate the people have conferred an excess of power in the representative, because power needs to be concentrated for agile decision-making. At this stage the focus shifts to the checks and balances to keep power accountable and working for the interests of the people and the Constitution, rather than the interests of power.

As soon as elections are over, people need to closely observe the people in power, regardless of one’s vote in favour or against. Politics is the system of representing people’s interests, and for that to work, every person must be political, and be constantly engaging with the state and society. People should be aware of what is happening around them, mix freely and discuss the policies of the state, consequences of these policies, educate themselves, and voice their opinions and interests free from fear or prejudice. People should organise social gatherings and form channels to exchange ideas. People in power should be constantly watched. It’s like how someone representing the country in a sport is under the spotlight. The powerful people in politics hold a great deal more influence over the hopes of the people, and face great temptation to work against the interests of the people and in the interest of their own power, so the system demands constant scrutiny.

Now to the question of morality. If you put any 1000 people thru the same conditioning and temptations to abuse power, there are going to be some who succumb to temptations and some who don’t. This doesn’t depend on which random set of 1000 people we pick. We don’t know who succumbs and who doesn’t, so the system is designed to distrust individuals in power. So there is an intrinsic doubt placed on people in power, because the temptation to abuse power is so tempting. It’s like airport security. Since one cannot tell the good guy from the bad, everyone is frisked, because there is an intrinsic distrust which can be allayed by close examination. One can be charming, educated, wealthy, beautiful or popular – it doesn’t matter. Everyone gets checked, and everyone understands that it’s not personal. All people in power deserve a similar distrust, and it’s not personal. It’s their job, and since they have excessive power, they need to be watched, and kept on a leash.

The people who do this questioning, perform labour essential for a Democracy to function as designed. People who are apolitical or indifferent enjoy the fruits of this questioning by others.

In India, most people’s entire lives are consumed in a fight to survive. There is no respite from the drudgery of relentless manual labour which pays just enough to keep one alive to provide the next day’s labour. It’s near impossible to have the time or mind to explore anything beyond survival.

The people who are higher up on the social pyramid are consumed in consumption. There is a constant bombardment of things to consume, ways to show off and gain social acceptance. The means employed is advertising and marketing gimmicks that exploit human psychology. Sportsmen and actors don’t consume cola (not even for an advertisement), yet they urge people to drink cola. All kinds of things are sold by famous people lending their faces to products and services they have no expertise in. People are constantly urged to look ‘pretty’, wear expensive clothes and jewellery, and work on their social status. Cinema and television are filled with people pretending to be someone they’re not, and most humans cannot distinguish and keep separate what they see on screen and real life. We are clearly influenced by whatever we see on a screen even if it’s explicit that they’re pretending. We feed junk to the minds of people tired from the drudgery of work and the endless struggle to survive or consume.

All of this needs to change for a questioning mind. People should have enough to free themselves from this cycle of labour, survival and consumption filling up their lives. We should stop feeding junk to the mind, and only then is there empty space for the molten lava of knowledge to flow, and form rich volcanic earth from which shoots of independent thought, scientific temper and a questioning mind can grow.

It doesn’t matter who you vote for, question everything and everyone.