Visakhapatnam's naming fracas

What's in a name? Shakespeare famously wondered in Romeo and Juliet. For the Indian politician, a name is "everything". Naming or un-naming a city, a park, road/bridge/overpass or even an underpass gives a wonderful opportunity to a party to make political statements. That simple act alone might create a riot, a political upheaval or shake up a government.
In Visakhapatnam, the much awaited over bridge is almost ready and awaiting inauguration. Therein hangs an impending naming drama because the bridge has to be named before it is inaugurated. So the big question is, whose name will it bear?
It is not as simple a matter as it appears to be on the face of it. The party in power has to think long and hard, strategise and balance the sectarian, casteist and communal interests of various groups within the party before zeroing in on a name. The bridge may even be kept idle till a suitable name is arrived at! Never mind if villages are flooded, school buildings are collapsing or drains are overflowing! Our leaders are busy racking their brains over naming our over-bridge!
Why not the Mahatma or the local hero Alluri Seetha Ramaraju, a simple minded citizen might ask? Those are the names we would be proud of, and like to remember. But a political party knows better. The Mahatma's name would be overruled in the blink of an eye. True, the Mahatma got us freedom, but look at what he did to us?
He advocated ridiculous values like commitment to truth, conviction in ideology, simple lifestyle and more importantly, the absence of greed! As if that was not enough, he also disapproved of drinking! Which political party can survive today without distributing liquor bottles, particularly during election rallies? Moreover, does Gandhi represent a caste, group, or region? Can he move the masses and swing votes for the party? In fact, if he were alive today he would have been a major troublemaker; he would have organised satyagrahas against all the political parties. So his name would be dismissed out of hand right at the beginning. Same is the case with Alluri Seetha Ramaraju. What good will he be in an election year?
Next to be considered would be crowd-pulling party heavyweights of recent times. A great advantage is that such leaders do not carry ideological baggage. In the stray cases they did show flashes of commitment to people can be conveniently overlooked as aberrations.
Take the case of Rajiv Gandhi, the darling of the ruling party, for example. One would expect the party, which gave his name to a few hundred (if not more) institutions like universities, airports and the like, to live up to at least some of his ideals. Among Rajiv Gandhi's signal contributions was the importance he gave to local self government. He wanted to usher in a fundamental change in the country's democratic process.
He dreamt, rather naively perhaps, that he could revitalize the age-old panchayat system on the lines of Mahatma Gandhi's Gram Swaraj. He mooted the constitutional amendment, which later conferred constitutional status on local bodies, namely gram sabhas and municipalities, thereby ensuring grass-root participation in the Indian democracy. Empowering the gram sabhas and municipalities was intended to make developmental activities people-centric and not party or leader-centric.
However, the irony is that the very party that idolizes and exploits his name is trampling his dream. Recently the highest authority in the country took a decision that gram sabhas need not be consulted in certain developmental activities and a minister went public saying that gram sabhas are not relevant in the "modern context".
The modern Indian politician has reinvented himself. He taught himself to go with the flow. He is a man of all seasons, and is not sticky on ideology. Freed from such liabilities, he bends, twists and does ideological somersaults for his political betterment. He may appear to idolise a leader, but he does so only to the extent that fetches him votes and not beyond.
Getting back to the gram sabhas, Andhra Pradesh took the 73rd and 74th amendments seriously. Little did the authorities realize at that time as how effectively the gram sabhas would assert themselves. In March and April 2013, we watched the might of small villagers who registered spirited protests when the Anakapalle municipality started dumping its garbage in the fields of Achayyapeta under Sundarayyapeta panchayat. The villagers rose in protest and dragged Anakapalle to court.
The Anakapalle municipality was so taken aback that it shifted its operations to another village Koppaka. It was then the turn of Koppaka villagers to revolt and now the Anakapalle municipality realizes that such highhandedness will not be tolerated by the otherwise amiable villagers. The latest is that all the other neighbouring villages too are up in arms and the Anakapalle municipality is at a loss, not knowing what to do with the garbage their town generates!
Another instance of the growing might of local bodies is the fight that the historic town of Bheemunipatnam is putting up to resist its merger with Visakhapatnam.
The people put up a stiff resistance when the proposal was mooted and when the government tried pushing the merger in the teeth of opposition, the town went to court.
Had Rajiv Gandhi been alive, he would have been horrified to see how his pet project was being trampled upon by his men and, would have applauded the gram sabhas and municipalities for their courage. But what of his sycophants, who use his name but jettison his policies?
So, after 60 years of independence what have we, the people, inherited? A bunch of hollow and meaningless names, much fuss over naming structures, but not good governance, policies or institutions of excellence.
So watch out folks, the naming drama of the over-bridge, built with the taxpayer's money, is going to unfold soon; it will carry the name of a leader we do not care to remember.
Fifty years from now, if your grandson/daughter asks you what this or that man did to deserve to be remembered, you might be at a loss. That is Indian polity for you!
William Shakespeare got it all wrong! He should be sent to India to attend an orientation camp!
(The writer is a heritage and environmental activist)