prasad1
Active member
We think that India lives in one time zone, from Jalandhar in the west to Jorhat in the east, five and a half hours ahead of London. But in fact Indians live in at least five world historical time zones if we go by the social, economic, political and technological features of different parts of the country. This is why understanding India and governing it are so difficult.
The first world historical time zone is to be found in two frontiers - in the mountains along the borderlands and in the dense forests of central India where the Naxalites flourish. In these two spaces, life is lived more or less as it was 500 years ago. The pace of life, the role of climatic seasons in determining the nature of existence, the relationship of individuals to each other and to the government, and the technologies at hand - all these are not very different from what they were in the 16th century.
The second time zone is to be found in rural, predominantly agricultural India, from the great northern plains to peninsular India, including the coastal areas from Gujarat at one end and Bengal at the other. Here, life is not very different than it was 100 years ago, in the early 20th century. There are some modern technologies available - new seeds, tractors and consumer goods including cars - but mostly for the rich feudalistic farmers.
Rural India 100 years ago was a fairly terrible place, somewhat like Europe of the dark ages and middle ages. It has not changed that much in terms of the seasonality of life, the attachment to the land, the terrible ignorance of ordinary people about the nature of the world we live in (indeed, the India we inhabit), the tight control over individuals by their communities and clans, and the power exerted on ordinary people by local landlords and upper castes.
The third time zone exists in the second- and third-tier towns of India. Life in these towns is perhaps like the major cities of India 50-60 years ago. The rhythm of life, the influence of the small local elite, the availability of consumer goods and modern home devices including communication and media devices, economic surpluses sufficient to allow people to travel within India quite extensively and to imagine the country as a nation to which they belong and which they can shape, the growing sense of individuality and agency that even ordinary people possess in relation to their communities and government - in short, something like modern citizenship exists here.
In world historical terms, this is where urban life was in say the early to mid-19th century in Europe - even if the comparison is not exact because the Europe of that era did not have television and the cellphone.
The fourth time zone is in the first-tier towns and big metros of India. In terms of their civic amenities including their cleanliness and efficiency, these do not compare with modern metros in the advanced countries, but there is something recognisably contemporary about them in so far as the speed and structure of life, even amongst slum-dwellers and the other urban poor and disadvantaged, is concerned.
The power of community and clan is weak, having been left behind in small towns and rural India. Time here is industrial time, nine to five. There is a restless, rootless freedom for many - and for the middle classes and the rich, there are many of the appurtenances of big city 21st century life.
Finally, there are Indians who live in a globalised time zone in which they could be anyplace in the world. They are cocooned in their apartments and houses, travel freely in India and outside the country, and are connected physically and virtually to everything that is happening on the planet more or less in real time. Theirs is a truly global 21st century sensibility, for good or for ill.
These five Indian worlds do relate to each other and interact to varying degrees. But they are also strangers to one another. How can politicians representing these five worlds agree on anything? And how can they govern? Truly, with great difficulty.
The first world historical time zone is to be found in two frontiers - in the mountains along the borderlands and in the dense forests of central India where the Naxalites flourish. In these two spaces, life is lived more or less as it was 500 years ago. The pace of life, the role of climatic seasons in determining the nature of existence, the relationship of individuals to each other and to the government, and the technologies at hand - all these are not very different from what they were in the 16th century.
The second time zone is to be found in rural, predominantly agricultural India, from the great northern plains to peninsular India, including the coastal areas from Gujarat at one end and Bengal at the other. Here, life is not very different than it was 100 years ago, in the early 20th century. There are some modern technologies available - new seeds, tractors and consumer goods including cars - but mostly for the rich feudalistic farmers.
Rural India 100 years ago was a fairly terrible place, somewhat like Europe of the dark ages and middle ages. It has not changed that much in terms of the seasonality of life, the attachment to the land, the terrible ignorance of ordinary people about the nature of the world we live in (indeed, the India we inhabit), the tight control over individuals by their communities and clans, and the power exerted on ordinary people by local landlords and upper castes.
The third time zone exists in the second- and third-tier towns of India. Life in these towns is perhaps like the major cities of India 50-60 years ago. The rhythm of life, the influence of the small local elite, the availability of consumer goods and modern home devices including communication and media devices, economic surpluses sufficient to allow people to travel within India quite extensively and to imagine the country as a nation to which they belong and which they can shape, the growing sense of individuality and agency that even ordinary people possess in relation to their communities and government - in short, something like modern citizenship exists here.
In world historical terms, this is where urban life was in say the early to mid-19th century in Europe - even if the comparison is not exact because the Europe of that era did not have television and the cellphone.
The fourth time zone is in the first-tier towns and big metros of India. In terms of their civic amenities including their cleanliness and efficiency, these do not compare with modern metros in the advanced countries, but there is something recognisably contemporary about them in so far as the speed and structure of life, even amongst slum-dwellers and the other urban poor and disadvantaged, is concerned.
The power of community and clan is weak, having been left behind in small towns and rural India. Time here is industrial time, nine to five. There is a restless, rootless freedom for many - and for the middle classes and the rich, there are many of the appurtenances of big city 21st century life.
Finally, there are Indians who live in a globalised time zone in which they could be anyplace in the world. They are cocooned in their apartments and houses, travel freely in India and outside the country, and are connected physically and virtually to everything that is happening on the planet more or less in real time. Theirs is a truly global 21st century sensibility, for good or for ill.
These five Indian worlds do relate to each other and interact to varying degrees. But they are also strangers to one another. How can politicians representing these five worlds agree on anything? And how can they govern? Truly, with great difficulty.
