DECEMBER 28, 2016

By Naresh Minocha, Consulting Editor

"DREAMS are not seen when you sleep, dreams are those that don't let you sleep." This quote from Mr. Narendra Modi, when he served as Chief Minister of Gujarat, is an inspiration for 'Mind Manufacturing' focused entity named Gujarat Vittal Innovation City.

I visited this SEZ's website, which was perhaps last updated in 2010, because demonetization has put me in sleep-struggle mode. I have been facing huge problem in sleeping normally. Regular intake of a nerves-soothing medicine has proved ineffective. And this problem surfaced only after I started dreaming about queueless India as logical extension of Cashless India.

I am just not able to shake off from my mind Prime Minister's vision to transform India into a queueless wonder. This vision has helped me quash fear over prospects of India dislodging China as the world's most populous country by 2022

Before depicting queueless India in different spheres of life, let me quote what our beloved PM stated and which no country's CEO has perhaps ever dared to dream.

Ridiculing demonetization critics on 3rd December, Mr. Modi reportedly stated: "We had to stand in queue to buy sugar. We had to stand in queue to buy kerosene. We had to stand in queue to buy wheat. Thanks to those who ruled for 60 years, this country was wasting away in queues."

In obvious reference to queues outside the banks & ATMs since the announcement of demonetization, Mr. Modi said: "What I have done is to start a queue to end all queues."

I am unsure whether Finance Minister Arun Jaitley would deride me for not understanding that queueless means less queues. Don't forget he recently chided the Opposition for its inability to understand cashless as less cash.

How much less is indeed less and how much less is not less is a matter of subjectivity. With my mind filled with positive dreams, I dismiss 'less' as a word of no consequence.

Like all 125 crore demonetization-hooked fellow citizens, I am dreaming for Mr. Modi's Address to the Nation to end queue of unemployed and underemployed people within a specified timeframe.

No one, not even authors of the Indian Constitution, dared to include right to work (RTW) / right to employment as a fundamental right as they were overawed by the population explosion. The only exception was ex-PM late V.P. Singh, who proposed to amend the Constitution to incorporate RTW as a fundamental right with a big caveat that Government's responsibility to fulfill this right would hinge on "available resources."

His short-lived Government fell during November 1990, thereby crashing a billion dreams. Unlike Mr. Singh, Mr. Modi need not worry about resources as his Government expects huge growth in revenue from 'clean' GDP post-demonetization.

Would this tsunami of funds empower Modiji to offer unemployment allowance to persons who would remain unemployed due to factors ranging from global recession to scarcity of land, water, etc.?

There is no reason why unemployed or underemployed should not visualize their mobile as E-wallet-cum-bank branch for receipt of allowance in Digimonetization mode. I hope they would not forget to thank Times Now TV Channel for popularizing newly coined term 'Digimonetization'. And it goes without saying that they would respond enthusiastically on Modi App survey whether Times Now has outshined Doordarshan in credibility sweepstakes. I intend to participate in this survey as when it is organized.

What makes my sleep elusive is the anxiety as to when PM would unveil RTW initiative to silence the Opposition about this spin-off benefit of Demonetization. This initiative would help rekindle nostalgia over Berozgaari Hatao (Eradicate Unemployment), which was focus of NDA-I manifesto for 1999 Lok Sabha polls. Another spin-off benefit of demonetization would be Queueless justice for all. It is preposterous on my part to doubt whether the proceeds of Demonetization would be utilized to appoint more judges in all three tiers of judiciary, thereby paving the way for fast-track disposal of pending cases.

As disclosed by the Government in reply to question in Lok Sabha on 16th November 2016, as many as 61,436 cases were pending in the Supreme Court as on 31 st October 2016. A whopping 38.70 lakh cases were pending in the High Courts and 2.70 crore cases were pending in District and Subordinate Courts as on 31 st December 2015.

I have dismissed this drab official statistics as small inconvenience to litigants that is similar to the one caused by Demonetization. Over 100 deaths in cash queues and a few hundred deaths in queue for justice should not overshadow the national joy over Acche Din accruing from Demonetization.

I dream of throwing a party over the prospects of queue-free driving by unemployed-turned-professionals on roads paved with the seized ill-gotten wealth of the corrupt and the rich. The blue-collared workers can similarly expect jostle-free entry into high-speed metro trains.

Similarly, migrants from Bihar and Eastern UP can bank on 'Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana' (PMGKY) 2016 for rolling out bullet trains to return home for Chhat Puja. The annual recurrence of tragic deaths of stampeding migrants at New Delhi railway station would henceforth be taught to kids as legacy of corrupt persons who ruled India for 60 years.

The proceeds of PMGKY fund created out of black money would obviously be used to build dream apartments for migrants in Lutyen's Delhi. This would be a token gesture of appreciation to Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar for batting well for demonetization.

I dream of workers taking their selfie outside sprawling bungalow of India's 'Shramik No.1'as icing on demonetization cake. It goes without saying that Sadhus from Varanasi would have unfettered right to have Chai Pe Charcha with Fakir on virtues of renaming road to PM's official residence as Lok Kalyan Marg. The previous name (Race Course Road) implied black money generation from betting.

Parents should now rejoice over the prospects of not standing in queue for admission of their kids to pre-nursery school. So should students aspiring to enter IITs & IIMs, which would mushroom across the country post-Demonetization. I proudly dream of demonetization as synonym for demographic dividend.

With the demonetization benefits flowing like holy Ganga, the nightmare over population explosion would turn into a demographic opportunity for India to supply human resources to all countries across all continents.

With such prospects, Mr. Modi can wind up National Commission on Population (NCP) in the same way as he abolished Planning Commission. NCP is stigma on the emerging queueless India where pregnant mothers would walk in and walk out of queue-free hospitals as calmly as they do at shopping malls. In any case, PM-chaired NCP has not met since October 2010 and is as good as redundant.

I dream of NDA Government enshrining in the Constitution the reproductive right of citizens as a Fundamental Right, lest this be trampled over as Nasbandi (vasectomy) as happened during the 1975 emergency. At that time, Congress critics were forced to queue outside overcrowded jails.

Ex-PM Mrs. Indira Gandhi, who imposed the 1975 Emergency, would obviously be watching from heaven with disbelief India is emerging as queueless country under Modiji.

The hope for a new wave of baby boom reminds me of what Subramanian Swamy told in Rajya Sabha during December 1974 while participating in a debate on population control policy.

Mr. Swamy stated: "The Prime Minister herself recently told an Italian newspaper correspondent Oriana Fallaei that she would have liked to have 11 children but her husband was not in favour of it at all. Now, Sir, of course, the former President of India (Mr. V.V. Giri) has 14 children and I have already mentioned this. This might be that there is also further change in the attitude about the frequency and desirability of having lots of children."

There is no reason why queueless India should not celebrate Demonetization with emphatic exercise of reproductive right in the same way as they would exercise right to vote for Modiji during 2019 Lok Sabha polls. And I fantasize there would be no queues outside polling booths because they would be able to cast digital votes through their mobile phones. From Demonetization to queueless voting, India is indeed taking a big leap as visualized by BJP in its 2014 Lok Sabha poll manifesto.

As put by the manifesto, "We have to give the taste of a developed country to this very generation. We have to take a quantitative and qualitative leap. The time of knee jerk reactions and incremental changes has gone. What we need is a quantum jump and a total change."