Tale of Two States

Author: The Editorial
Publication: The Times of India
Date: February 5, 2001
 
The silver lining to the death and destruction visited upon Gujarat is surety the electrifying response to the tragedy. For evidence, just look at the juxtaposition of both aspects on television channels and in newspaper reports. For every image of untold devastation, there's been an equally potent opposite: Hope has indeed followed in the footsteps of despair. Entire villages along the path of the killer quake have been flattened, the town of Bhuj has little left of it, and large parts of bustling Ahmedabad have turned into rubble. Turn the picture around and you have Indians from across the globe offering to chip in with donations, industrialists coming forward to adopt whole regions. And international missions going overboard with despatches of personnel and relief. What's it about the Gujarat calamity that has touched people in this fashion? For a start, many of the affected are from the educated class. In the highrises that tumbled, corporate executives, businessmen and professionals perished. The lucky survivors among them are camping in the open and waiting in queues for relief. It's the sort of thing that happens to others, and predictably, the reaction in middle-class homes everywhere is, "God, it could have been you or me." What, then, sets Gujarat apart from the hundreds of calamities before it is the complete urban identification with the victims? Gujarat, more than any other state, represented the upwardly mobile, computer-literate Indian. What better indication of this than the desperate flood of e-mail queries crowding the message boards of newspaper websites?

Indeed, private mobilisation of support has been the outstanding feature of the Gujarat quake. Voluntary effort has moved into places where government has not reached thanks to its customary inertia. The contrast with the Orissa cyclone couldn't have been more glaring. As against Gujarat's inbuilt advantages - good infrastructure, NRI connection and the Gujarati's innate sense of enterprise - Orissa was hamstrung on all accounts. It was the stereotype calamity: An already backward state ravaged further by a lethal cyclone; the already wretched suffering a double blow. The picture was such as to evoke compassion but not empathy. The government did its bit to add to the sense of hopelessness by reacting mechanically to the immense tragedy, when what was needed was a heartfelt and coordinated response. Left by and large to fend for themselves, many of Orissa's affected fell victim to unscrupulous elements who took advantage of their helplessness. Today, we have no idea how much relief actually reached the people. There are no accounts of homes rebuilt and pimps and touts are trafficking in women and girls. Why is it that Gujarat shows signs of revival so soon after the quake, while Orissa, a year after the cyclone, is still in despair? The answer is simple - Gujarat is the wellspring of private enterprise. Worldwide the Gujarati entrepreneur is a symbol of hard work and initiative, something even the Indian government has had to recognise. Orissa, on the other hand, depends on government hand-out which by definition is not conducive to rapid reconstruction. There are two entirely different lessons to be learnt here and the sooner we do it the better, especially given the subcontinent's vulnerability to natural disasters.
 

Back                          Top