There are raids underway in a few cities to check if the food they store or make is safe for me. They are unearthing factories that make fake milk with shampoo and emulsifier; networks that recycle expired food using counterfeit labels; kilograms of meat covered in fungus; and expired milk. I would have mentioned rats in the kitchen if I were writing for a foreign publication.
What surprises me is not any of this, but that there are raids across cities and they are not extortion. They began in Maharashtra because of a government officer who is said to be so honest that he has been transferred 25 times in 21 years.
In May, Tukaram Mundhe, who often upsets politicians and courts, and is a rockstar among many Maharashtrians for that reason, took over as Maharashtra Food and Drug Administration commissioner. He soon had hundreds of food establishments in the state raided, and his influence may be behind raids in Bengaluru too. Restaurants in several cities are surely cleaning up.
Some people are calling his actions high-handed. But that is exactly how I want my food inspector to be. Err on the side of being authoritarian. After all, I do eat out.
I am deeply moved every time someone from the government tries to protect me; I am also confused. Why are they being so diligent? Why do good things happen in India?
We spend a lot of time analysing what’s wrong with us and all our answers are right. That is the thing about disorder. You can do something wrong in a million ways, probably in every way a human being can do a thing wrong. Thus, every analysis of why there is disorder is probably true. But why do good things happen in the country?
It is the same bafflement that has me transfixed when I see guys filling a pothole or carving out a free left turn (on the sweet assumption that vehicles in the left lane wish to turn left). Why do they do this, who sent them, who benefits apart from the mere public?
Maybe there is money to be made by government servants in public works. But then I can show you lanes in the heart of Gurugram where the road has vanished, for months, and nothing gets done about it. If road repairs happen because of commissions, what explains half of Gurugram? So maybe even in corruption, we are badly organized—it’s a patchwork of unfolding chaos.
Also, I feel some good things happen because it is important for an administration to maintain bare minimum functionality so as to not draw too much attention. This is among the reasons why some roads are roads and others are puddles.
Amateur Indians, acquainted with the word ‘cynicism,’ may rebuke me: “Can’t you just accept good things happen?” I try to imagine a meeting in a municipal office in Gurugram where they discuss how to make my life better. I cannot picture it.
In the past, there were food inspections, but the cases I have known were a form of extortion. All indications are that Tukaram Mundhe is not a part of any such system. He is an important anomaly, not only in a corrupt system but in the conventional explanations for why good things happen here.
Many of the explanations that seem obvious are not wrong but not as significant as we are expected to accept. Democracy, for instance, and the notion that politicians want to impress voters.
This is not without basis, but then a whole lot of things that matter to one’s quality of life and life itself are not electoral issues because elections are as complicated as human beings, and people don’t always vote for what is good for society or themselves.
Also, there are non-democracies that appear more humane than India and clearly have a better quality of life.
A less obvious but influential reason is that good things happen here when powerful blocs collide, like when the rich try to take on the richer, middle castes try to bring down upper castes, or defeated politicians attempt to tackle their oppressors through social movements.
Also, a lot of India’s visible good occurs because of a peculiar nature of the state. It is big on rescues. India might be the very cause of a tragedy, but once a tragedy has occurred, it is excellent at rescuing.
If potholes cause an accident, India works hard to save lives and not do much about the potholes; if a child falls into a drain, the government works earnestly to save the kid, but drains remain open. If there is a landslide because of foolish policies, India does all it can to rescue the trapped.
Recall covid. India’s response made me think it really wanted me alive, but I never got that sense once I stepped onto the road after the pandemic was over. The economic reforms of Manmohan Singh, too, were a rescue from a crisis India could have averted.
Mundhe is not a part of any of these phenomena. He represents the power of eccentrics in a rotten system. India has traditionally benefitted from unusual personalities, especially among bureaucrats. He has a record of doing his job well. He has had unauthorized structures demolished, gone after illegal hoardings, made footpaths usable, ensured that villagers get water without having to rely on tankers and tried to fix public transport.
Politicians have complained that he doesn’t listen to them. But they could only transfer him, as they did 25 times. And in more than one city, ordinary citizens blocked his path to stop him from leaving. Politicians rarely get such love.
When a system is rotten, a diligent person endures by digging deep into the quirks of his own personality.
Some good things happen in India because some people are eccentric.
The author is a journalist, novelist and screenwriter. His latest book is ‘Why the Poor Don’t Kill Us.’