Our Insecurity Syndrome

These restrictions should worry us for many reasons. India loses its ability to capitalise on its soft power by keeping young scholars, in the formative stages of their careers, out. For decades academic interest in contemporary India declined in the US, because supervisors could not tell potential students in good faith that they would get the kind of research access anyone devoting their life to the study of India ought to get. Good scholars had their research careers cut short, because they were denied visas. In a number of cases scholars who were doing cutting edge work in areas where India would have benefited for instance, on patterns of migration were denied permission to attend conferences. The same security syndrome that led us to assume most American academics were CIA plants was of a piece with our policy towards students and academics from other South Asian countries as well. What we might have gained in security terms is debatable; what we lost in terms of building long-term relationships is immeasurable. A visa policy that cannot distinguish between a bunch of well-meaning students from world class universities on the one hand and terrorists/intelligence agency operatives on the other, is truly bizarre.

But the broader premises that underlie this visa denial and other restrictions are even more disturbing. One of the justifications the NDA gave for a restriction on certain kinds of research visas was to prevent the study of so-called sensitive subjects, like religion, communalism, and potentially controversial aspects of Indian culture. If you look closely at the research topics that were denied permission, they follow largely that pattern. For instance, it seems that if you want to study Indian Muslims, you are more likely to court trouble. The Indian state, whether run by the UPA or NDA, likes to set itself up as the custodian of what is intellectually in India8217;s interests.

It also infantilises Indian citizens, because it assumes that the production of knowledge in areas of identity and culture will be disruptive in ways that we cannot handle. Knowledge can be disruptive. But Gandhi8217;s exhortation to Indians to read Katherine Mayo8217;s Mother India, despite its being akin to a drain inspector8217;s report, was a far more robust display of cultural confidence than the restrictions promoted by our bureaucratic mandarins of culture. But for the state to consistently use the 8216;sensitive subject8217; argument is an assault not just on freedom of scholars, but our freedoms as citizens as well.

The ugly truth is that the NDA and the UPA are often more like each other in their abridgements of freedom. Forces in Gujarat may ban the screening of Parzania, but the 8216;sensitive subject8217; argument has often been used by the Congress to ban all manner of things. And if you wonder why there is not more outrage when freedom of expression is abridged in India, think of this: we have bought into the 8216;sensitive subject8217; argument much too easily. The Fulbright episode is not about visas for a bunch of American youngsters, it is about our insecurities and specious obsessions.

Patriotism may or may not be the last refuge of scoundrels. But security-based arguments are often the last refuge of those who want to control for the sake of control. That is the sentiment underlying the new FCRA act as well. But like that act, this restrictive visa regime institutes some bizarre hierarchies. For instance, it is relatively easy for consultants in the private sector to get access to India; and apparently scientists have an easier time with research visas than social scientists. Why single out the non-profit sector for special scrutiny, as opposed to the private sector? And why single out social science research for extra scrutiny? From a security point of view neither distinction makes sense. What is the logic that compels us to believe that a researcher is statistically more likely to be subversive than your average tourist or private sector consultant? There is something wrong when universities have to seek permission from the government on a routine basis to get clearance for researchers.

The point is simply this: our restrictive regimes on academic exchange, our easy tolerance of abridgements of freedom of expression, and the irrationality of so much of what happens in the name of security, are all of a piece. They reveal just how fragile our identities actually are, just how little we are willing to liberalise in sectors that matter most, and just how much attitude to intellectual exchange unites different parties than divides them. Our fear of foreign capital has diminished greatly, but our fear of the greater flow of research, ideas and personnel, it seems, lives on. Large nations, staking a claim to world leadership, cannot afford to reveal their small-mindedness. No wonder authoritarian China gets more foreign scholars and students by an order of magnitude than democratic India.

The writer is president, Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi