What is Progress? – The Arundhati Roy-Maoist saga

As I read through Arundhati Roy’s magnum opus article in The Outlook on the Maoists and their plight, I was struck by one thought which was probably the underlying fundamental of the entire issue – What is progress? Rather, how do you define progress?

Some examples of progress are universally agreed upon. For example,

-   The elimination of child labor. It is hard for us to imagine the evil of putting children to work in the coal mines at age six.

-   Better health. Almost all countries are experiencing an increase in lifespan and a reduction in the fraction of their time people spend ill.

-   Increased personal mobility – in the form of better transportation as well as improved modes of communication.

-   Improved quality of living – in terms of housing, food, education etc.

-   Construction of dams for storage of water as well as electricity generation.

Why do we define the examples above as progress? Simply because, it resulted in a greater good for the greatest number of people.

This, by definition, implies that progress is a tradeoff. Almost all the time, progress results in some people/region paying the price.

For example,

- When a dam is built, certain regions get submerged. People in the region will get displaced. Is building a dam an ecological disaster? Why should people who get displaced pay the price when they are neither a part of the decision-making or the benefits that accrue out of building a dam? Is building a dam ‘progress’?

- Landline telephones served most purposes in the 1980s and 90s. There was also a thriving industry of telephone operators/wire fixers/pole installers who used to get regular income from the landline telephone business. Science advanced, mobiles got manufactured by the million and in a matter of few years,  this entire industry of telephone operators/wire fixers/pole installers got wiped out. Is that progress? (Oh yeah, we can all call it ‘creative destruction’ when we are not the affected party alright!)

- Reservations were required during the time India became a Republic to bring in people who were disadvantaged economically as well as socially into the mainstream. Reservations continue till today. Who is to say whether it resulted in progress or not? The ‘General Category’ people however, still pay the price. Were/are ‘Reservations’ progress then?

Coming back to Arudhati Roy’s article, is the Government at fault for granting lands to national and international mining companies that might result in increased employment in the entire region and thereby improve the standard of living? Or, is the Government at fault for grabbing lands from these tribals-turned-maoists, without any sufficient compensation or alternatives and granting them to the mining companies? For a moment, imagine your house was ‘grabbed’ by the Government and the reason given was that there would be a lab that would be constructed in that place, whose sole objective was to come up with a huge medical discovery that would improve thousands of lives – would you give up your house for the greater good? Would you go for legal recourse? (good luck with that!)? Would you complain to all and sundry, media included? Would anyone give a rat’s ass about your complaint? If the answer to all of these questions is a resounding ‘No’, are Maoists then justified to resort to violence to prove their point? (More often than not, the only differentiating factor between developed and developing countries is the way they treat ‘property rights’ – physical or intellectual and a proper legal recourse around this right. In my opinion, ‘Right to Property’ is probably a more important right than the ‘Right to Vote’, but that is a subject of a different blog post).

Progress can be defined, eventually, by who benefits as well as who suffers. As with all things in life, it is a matter of perspective. Is progress that which results in employment and improved quality of living or is progress the disappearance of the familiar, of what we value most and hold dear? Tough question – and there are definitely no easy answers.

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