Re: Errata + Shashi

["Shashi Shekhar" <yossarin@hotmail.com>]

Dear Sanjeev + Ladies + Gentlemen

When I saw the subject "Errata + Shashi" I thought I was getting a mail
with all the spelling mistakes, missing words & incomplete sentences.
Pretty much like Sanjeev, I just type in a flow and when I am done I am
too exhausted to recheck it. :)

Sanjeev thanks for stretching your physical abilities to comment on my
reply. I sincerely appreciate it.

>May you live long enough to see that society established in India!
I hope so too, and much more than a life time I hope to see system
reform in 5-10 years and I am not going to rest till that happens.

>About
>yuppies believing in such things: I disagree. I can show you very old
>grandfathers in India who believe in such things. Rajaji was rather
>old when he broke up with Nehru to form a separate party opposed to
>socialism and promoting liberalism. JRD Tata was talking these things
>till the end of his life. I am very old too. I'll become a grandfather
>in about 20 years.
>

Ok on this, my reference to people of the older generations seems to
have implied that the previous generations per-se do not subscribe to
this school of thought. No that was not my intention, I perhaps chose
the wrong example. The point however I was trying to make and I referred

to in another mail today was this.

    - I did not refer to the Capitalism vs Socialism debate

    - I referred to the "Individual Centric-WorldView" the
      declaration talks about to the "Community-Centric" reality that
      makes up most of India.

    - I believe that one should not link a "Community-Centric" world
      view necessarily to "Socialism".

    - The community centric order India is very strong

    - Its not socialist in its nature or dynamics.

    - In fact today I see a race between communities trying to outdo
      each other.

    - The race is visibly for political dominance.
        e.g. Dalit Political Movement, The Yadav & Other OBCs
        emergence as Political forces in almost every
        state.

    - At a more higher level of abstraction its also a race to replace
      a de-facto world-view with theirs.
        e.g. The Dalit or Yadav movements philosophy or world-view
        is hardly scientific but has the sole objective of questioning
        and challenging the existing so called "Manuvadi" or
        "Brhamnaic Order".

   -  Both of these movements though find as their natural allies the
      Leftists, do not have a socialist agenda but an agenda which
      seeks to give them "Political Power" & hence "Economic Power".

   - Hence if you contrast each of these communities they are actually
     highly self centred and are all seeking self advancement but at
     a community level.

   - You talked of feudalism in India, yes the pre-Independence India
     was fuedal, but the present day society though still stratified
     along community lines is not feudal. Its not Fuedal because there
     is no heirarchy any more.

  - The hierarchy has blurred, all are equally empowered to struggle.

  - So as opposed to a free society where every individual is
    empowered to participate in the race for excellence, we have in
    India a race between communities which are equally empowered.

  - Hence the Fractured Mandates & Splintered Verdicts, 18 party
    coalitions and Hung Parliaments.

My question is, Given this social order :

  "How relevant are we to set an agenda for this society by thinking
   along fixed models of Capitalism & Socialism."

I am not well versed in Economics, I need to read all of them,
especially Adam Smith, but I am sure that we need to think beyond these
traditional models. The Inter-Community Dynamics are a fact and
they wont vanish anytime next century. We need a model which accounts
for the uniqueness of this social order.

I would love to be enlightened on this, I dont have an answer for this
but I want to know if the question is relevant or not.

regards
shashi


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