Dear PM Modi, This Is How Dr. Bhimrao Ambedkar Would Have Unlocked India

Nobody quite knows how to dismount a tiger, especially one that is wounded and hungry. A similar challenge confronted Prime Minister Narendra Modi last week, at the end of Lockdown 4.0. India’s crippled economy – which, in fact, was even more crippled than thought earlier since the government itself wrote down previous quarters’ declared growth by an unprecedented quantum of basis points – was wounded, hungry, and angry, very angry. So the Modi government swiftly leaped off the beast, hoping to stun it with speed and distract it with new prey (aka state governments). Virtually everything was opened up in a single shot. Inter-state traffic, intra-district movement, factories, shops, malls, restaurants, rail and domestic airlines – an unbelieving nation, dulled by staying indoors for nine weeks, was taken aback at the pace and audacity (almost desperation) with which commerce was being prised open.

But the government’s nervousness was clear from the prosaic choice of words, labelling such a sweeping action as Opening 1.0. In keeping with past form, one would have expected the Modi government to make it a grand gesture with an even grander nomenclature. I can never be as good as them in coining aspirational slogans, but perhaps something like Nav-Nirmaan (Economic Renaissance) 1.0 or some such.

Federalism To ‘Whimsical-ism’

Unfortunately, this ‘spirit of federalism’ quickly descended into ‘whimsical-ism’. Freed from the centre’s yolk, every chief minister took off on his own trip … the result was CHAOS, in capital letters. The National Capital Region, which is at the tri-section of three states, and therefore at the whims and fancies of three chief ministers, saw a bizarre spectacle. Before the opening up, Arvind Kejriwal’s Delhi pushed for a liberal order, while Haryana and Uttar Pradesh were votaries of clamping down and closing borders. Suddenly, when Haryana opened up after Lockdown 4.0, Delhi snapped shut. But in another about-turn, first Delhi said no incoming rail or air passenger would be quarantined, only to flip days later and stipulate a seven-day incarceration. The capital’s vicissitudes did not end here. Earlier, it wanted shops to open alternately on odd and even days; but now it wanted everybody, including barbershops and salons, to open on all days. Passenger cars, autos, and e-rickshaws could carry an unlimited load.

But before you think only Delhi was having fun playing ‘I, me, myself’, check out Mumbai and Kolkata. Shops could open, but not restaurants and malls. Film shoots could start, but places of worship had to stay shut. Private offices could work with 100 percent staff, while government offices were capped at 70 percent (Why? Why?).

I’ve given above a tiny snapshot of the miasma of rules, orders, and u-turns, all of which have left the economy virtually at standstill, despite the much-vaunted Opening 1.0. Okay, it’s not as bad as during the lockdown, but neither is it anywhere near “open” too.

Re-Opening 1.0, The Ambedkar Way

Which begs the question: having failed to open up after Lockdown 4.0, how should we conduct Re-Opening 1.0? Must we abandon the principles of federalism and decentralisation, and revert to command and control? Is there no other way?

Yes, there is, but first, all governments—central, state, and local—should take a deep breath, step back from the chaos of conflicting rules, and pick up Constitution 1.0 from Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar’s original manuscript. In there, Federalism is codified in three buckets:

• A central list where the union government’s writ is supreme;
• A concurrent list which asks the union and state governments to put their heads together to manufacture a consensus; and finally,
• A state list that gives complete authority to the provincial government to make laws.

Central List: Inter-state movement must squarely belong to this list. Once the center has ordered ‘free movement’, then no state should be allowed to arbitrarily seal its borders – just as no state can say that trains won’t ply through or flights cannot overfly ‘my territory’! Also, once the central government creates a negative list of economic activities, then everything outside of that should be open, without the spectacle of alcohol stores being open here but not there, barbershops being closed although malls are open, electrical stores can open on odd but book stores on even days etc. There should be no further arguments, tweaking, or ambiguity – subject only to overriding restrictions in containment zones (see later).

Concurrent List: Here the central and state governments must come to a consensus on the rules for the safe conduct of businesses. For example, the number of shoppers permitted per square feet, how many riders per passenger vehicle etc.

State List: this is where the states shall enjoy complete autonomy. For example, in deciding on containment/vulnerable zones with severely curtailed activity. There should be no interference or backseat driving by the central government here.

A Constitutional Commission for Covid-19 Eradication Fund

Finally, we need to settle the issue which is at the heart of constitutionalism, viz the sharing of resources and costs. Covid-19 is not a calamity that any individual state has created for itself. It’s a national crisis which is manifesting itself in different states as per their density of population and economic success/accessibility.

It’s critical to create a national pool or fund – say, the Covid-19 Eradication Fund – which should then be allocated according to the threat that each state is battling. A constitutional authority, along the lines of the GST Council or Finance Commission, should be created as a neutral arbiter. That should ensure constitutional fair-play and overcome the current suspicion about political bias in the allocation of central aid.

This is how Dr. Bhimrao Ambedkar, the ultimate compiler/author of India’s Constitution, would have done it.

Raghav Bahl is the co-founder and chairman of Quintillion Media, including BloombergQuint. He is the author of three books, viz ‘Superpower?: The Amazing Race Between China’s Hare and India’s Tortoise’, ‘Super Economies: America, India, China & The Future Of The World’, and ‘Super Century: What India Must Do to Rise by 2050’.