By Bharat Gupt
At the very start of the
21st Century, not only the demise of
Sociaism but also the inadequacy of Consumerist Globalism is becoming
increasingly evident. Most Western
strategists portray the conflict
scenario as a cultural clash, a well known model being that of Samuel
Huntington. His strategy was basically
to create a West versus the Rest, paradigm which one way of the other, wishes
to preserve a non-democratic hegemony of the Euro-American technocrats with
leukoethnic (white-ethnic) and Christian overtones. Hence his portraiture of Islam as a consolidated force and that
of India as a
"lonely Hindu
nation" without a strong diasporic support dependent for its
survival on American goodwill. Barely
two years after a lecture by Huntington expressing the above sentiments
delivered at the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation (Feb1998), India demolished not only
the myth of its loneliness by convincing the world its need for a nuclear
deterant, but also , its diaspora, demonstrated its major push in global
economy through info-tech and other skills.
Far from a lonely nation, India is being recognised and sought
after as a vast repository of skilled labour of all levels.
The 19th century migration
of indentured labour was meant to fill the gap created by the abolishment of
slavery in the British colonies of Africa, Pacific and South America. The same trend continued till in the fifties
migration to Europe emerged as a new trend. This became a significant impact on
recipient societies in the seventies when a fresh
generation of professionals
and semi-professionals entered the technological and medical streams in Europe
and North America and achieved many eminent and enviable positions.2 This
change makes the Indiaspora, only 0.5% of the total American population a
socially visible group that can influence public life , at least to a some
degree. It is also a permanent change
as the large educated high degree holders will continue to make their places
not out of mere financial need but the
stong desire to carve a place of eminence in the technocratic societies of the world. What was once called the brain drain has proved to be a brain implant.
The Closet-Cultured Diaspora
of Nehruvian Era.
Before the Independence
there was an expectation fom the diasporic or expatriate Indians to speak forth
strongly and even work for the Freedom Struggle. But in the fifties under the
approach to the international affairs as forstered by Nehru, the diaspora was
advised to be a quiet law abiding mass politically in low-key and faithful to
the established norms of the adopted societies. India was too weak till the
sixties to even protest against the displacement of its people in Africa or to anything but agreeable to the policy
of the Melting pot in America. The
diaspora was in any case too insecure to think beyond making the two ends meet.
As a result, a whole generation adopted a schizophrenic life-style in which the
public space became oppressively alien and the private home stagnantly
native. Culture was relegated to a
cupboard status as survived as
nostalgia and heirlooms. The gap
between the adopt-ed country and the home country was very wide.
Nationality, now less
Topographic, more Emotional.
In the so called new world
order, the concept of nationality has undergone a sea change. With the emergence of the European Union,
nationalism has been redefined not only for the nation states of Europe but even for the people of Asian and African continents. In the very
Euro-American societies that developed the concept of nationalism, the
construct of ethnicity has come to almost replace the basic building block of
nationalism.
We have a situation in which
borders may be defined by the older nationalism, while the social fabric is
divided in into 'ethnic', categories. Every nation is therefore, seen as
multi-ethnic conglomerate. With this
devaluation of the nationhood and the privileging of ethnicity, the new
communication technology is making the
cultural-ethnic bonds so strong that expatriate populations can now live in a
close emotional proximity to the native land though physically on the other
side of the globe. The emotional bonds are easier to maintain in the age of
internet, TV, emails, faxes and phones than of letters and newspapers. In this new scenario, it all depends upon
GOI, whether it is able to reawaken the emotional links of Indiaspora or continue
with the Nehruvian apathy. I hope that the newly formed panel by the Foreign
Ministry on NRIs and PIOs who are believed to about 25 million in all, will take major steps in this direction
which are better though out that the erstwhile "Festival of India"
fiascos.
Diasporic transition from economic
to cultural workforce.
The migration of the work
force from the so called ethnic world into the West has taken place at a very large scale. The "natives" are no longer out
there in the lands where the white man could
have borne their burden at a safe distance. They are now permanently
lodged in London, New York, Paris, Chicago and in so many other bastions of
Western commerce. What is worse, they have brought with them not only the
cultural Other, but also a host of political
conflicts that rage
in their lands of origin.
This redistribution of populations is taking place not only on account of the
adventurous seeking greener pastures but much more so on account of populations
getting displaced by war and internal strife. There are an estimated one and a
half million refugees, mostly from Asian countries, now residing in Europe,
says a report from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees. There is little doubt that in coming years, though the developed
nations may close their doors on immigrants, they would not be able to contain
the number of refugees which is going to increase as internal conflicts within
the nations on their borders or even across sea straights are on the
rise3. Not only the wealthier nations
but the the poorer ones are also going to receive refugee populations. A slow trickle of migrants from Bangladesh
and Sri Lanka into India has been an irreversable trend in the last two
decades.
As the older notion of national
loyalty is breaking, in the coming years people would not hesitate to apply for
refugee status when the going gets tough or insecure in their motherlands. They
will depend more and more on members of their community settled in better off
nations to support them directly or covertly. Formation of NGOs at a large
scale, with infotechs at their command has begun to play a major role in
private and non-governmental group communication. This has rapidly brought about a politicisation of the ethnic
communities who are paying less attention to updating the practices of their
living cultures but more to institutionalized agitation to seek advantages
within specially within the Eurocentric cultural mileu of standardized and
individualized consumerism. Power of the information technologies has provided
new political strategies. To strengthen
their political push, these communities will increasingly highlight their
cultural heritage and besides being economic they will become cultural work
forces. The GOI and the Indian people have now has to stand up to the challenge
of providing cultural support to its diaspora in an unprecedented way.
If it merely looks upon them
as bankers , investors and creditors,
it shall be a grevious pitfall.
We have already started to reduce them into economic milk cows. If the relationship is merely economic it
not shall it be an enduring as markets are not upbeat all the time. Besides it
does not give them a special status different from investors and creditors of
other nationalities.
Indiasporas: of Africa, Far
East, Gulf and Euro-American Space. The Indian State policy of relating to the diaspora has not been need
specific but only a vague treatment of
them all as nostalgic expatr-iates. The
kind of equations that African Indiaspora needs to establ-ish is very different
form that required by the East Asian or
American Indiasporians. Once the GOI has located their specific
needs, the various State Governents in
India will need to act differently also involving the state NGOs. Everything should not be left to the Centre
and the MEA as this tends to create too generalised
solutions that reduce
effictiveness. States like Punjab,
Kerala, Gujarat and Tamil Nadu
need to make special efforts as people from these regions have a major
presence abroad. The states can benefit
most from their ex-citizens in the field of education who can help revive many
institutions from schools to Universities. The diasporians themselves have a
lot to gain from better educational centres for sake of their own children.
Seeing the pitiable conditions of Universities in Gujarat, I have always
wondered why no money has never been invested by the billionaaire expatriates.
The same applies to Kerala. The kind of pride that diasporians feel in their regional
identities can be made more meaningful if specific projects of cultural
involvement are realized.
The movement of the skilled
Indians to other lands has barely begun to gather momentum. As the number of educated unemployed Indians
continues to rise, the Push to move shall mount. But so will the Pull from post-industrial societies of Europe and America as the laboring age-group is declining in the
local populations. But the Cyber-Rush can
be as dehumanizing as was
the Gold-Rush of wild West, if adequate
protections are not sought for the people through new nondiscriminatory and
humanitarian immigration laws of the receiving countries. The GOI must take this task seriously and
ask for safeguards through diplomatic channels and global forums. One can clearly see a backlash in the
offing against migrants and
steps to handle must be worked out in advance.
In the Gulf region, the treatment meted out to Indians is already in
contravention of human rights. The
custody of passport with the employer, restrictions on communications, near inhuman behavior with women working as
house-help, are some of the issues that
need to
be taken up internationally
without fear of souring diplomatic ties with Gulf nations.
Establishing Indian Heritage
in Global Space.
The Indiaspora needs to be
convinced that in order to survive as independent people in the adopted lands
they need to grow with their heritage not just merely cling to it. Apart from many strategies for hightening
their security-comfort, they need to intervene in the educational systems of adopted lands. So far only
parallel tracks of cultural visibility such as temples and gurdwaras
have been established. But the real
dialogue with the inhabitants of land can come after some room has been made in
the curriculum for Indian philosophies and cultural beliefs. This is going to be a major task
that calls for persistent
and planned effort using the latest
technologies for a long time.
Cultural Consonance or
Sanskriti Samvaada.
The above plea for
establishing Indian heritage must not allow any cultural evangelism to creep
in. On the contrary it should rest on the idea of a cultural consonance and a policy of give and take. But
this enterprise must also seek to establish a positive pluralism as
against the contemporary negative relativism,
that there exists a common ground between cultures because commonality
and not differences are the raisond'etre of all communication and coexistence.
If communication is to be something more than exchange of goods or
info-commodity, then we may benefit most from turning to an old Indian
definition of communication, called 'samvaada'. "Ekatrasya tu anyatra
darsanam samvaadah" ( Reflection of a thing in one space when seen in another space, is called
samvaada ). This is done by locating a
core of vibrant similiarity between diverse cultures that exists beneath all
differences and which, instead of being wiped out by the individual differences, sustains itself and the
differences as well. To provide a simile, it is like the consonance
between many musical notes, which are always independent but are always capable of generating a
mutual resonance by virtue of their common grounding in a given scale. Within our pluralism we need to explore our
common scale. The diasporic role in
this endeavor should never be
underestimated.
NOTES
1. Gupt , Bharat .
"West Versus the Rest is the New Cold War Rhetoric." Times of India ,
Edit page, 23-4-97.
2. Radia, Chandu , a IT professional from Texas gave me the following list of the business
successfulls in the USA :
+ Victor Menezes is the President of CITICORP, the world's largest
bank and financial institution.
+ Rono Dutta is the CEO of United Airlines, the world's largest
airline
+ Rajat Gupta is the Managing Director of the management
consulting conglomerate, McKinsey & Co.
+ Vijay Goradia is the CEO of a very large petrochemical co. in
Houston
+ Shailesh Mehta is the CEO of Providian, a billion-dollar plus
U.S. Financial corporation
+ Jamshed Wadia is the Managing Director of Arthur Anderson &
Co., one of the western world's premier accounting and consulting companies
+ Rakesh Gangwal is the CEO of U.S. Airways, the 6th largest
airline (out of 400+) in the U.S.
+ Rana Talwar is the CEO of the international behemoth banking
empire, Standard Chartered Bank, PLC
+ Gujuraj Deshpande is the CEO of Sycamore, a $30 billion
communications company
+ Ramani Nayar is the CEO of
Hartford Insurance & Financial Group. One of the world's largest Insurance carriers and
financial services companies for the past dozen or so years.
+ In the sciences arena, Arun Netravali is the President of Bell
Labs, recognized for decades as the biggest and one of the most prestigious
research & Development Center in the world
+ In the field of arts, Walt Disney paid Manoj Shyamalan $2.5
million for the screenplay of Bruce
Willis starer, Sixth Sense.
+ In the
"literary" world, the Managing Editor of the prestigious quarterly,
Foreign Affairs, is Fareed Zakaria.
3. At present per day 800 US visas are being issued to Pakistani nationals and an equally large
number of illegal persons are leaving country
through various channels. Indian
Express ( 22.9.00).
--
Bharat Gupt
Associate Professor, Delhi
University,
PO Box 8518, Ashok Vihar,
Delhi 110052 INDIA.
mobile:9810077914
home phones 91+11+724 1490, fax/TEL 741-5658,
email: bharatgupt@vsnl.com
homepage: http://personal.vsnl.com/bharatgupt