An Extraordinary Choice

Another season of controversy surrounding the Padma and Bharat Ratna honours has ended. I don't intend to puff out when the dust is settling down, but would like to reflect on an issue or two that has crossed my mind ever since I picked up the centenary commemoration volume of SirMokshagundam Visvesvaraya (published in 1960) at a second-hand bookshop recently. I also found a hardbound edition of the speeches he made as Dewan of Mysore (published in 1917). 

Sir M.V. was among the first to be awarded the Bharat Ratna in 1955. Jawaharlal Nehru and Bhagawan Das were feted alongside him the same year. In 1954, the year of the award's inception, the honour went to S. Radhakrishnan, C. Rajagopalachari and C. V. Raman. Nearly 52 years ago, when the honour was bestowed on Sir M.V., and even today,this choice for Bharat Ratna comes across as a rare and extraordinary one. 

Why do I say so? There are some obvious and not so obvious reasons. If one takes a look at the list of 40 Bharat Ratnas, Sir M.V. is the only engineer on it-- and a purely professional engineer, for that matter. The list has been mostly predictable in the sense that it has either been a freedom fighter/statesman/politician/social reformer or a person from the arts who has been picked for the award. The only exception has been that of APJ Abdul Kalam, who was picked for his 'missile' experiments. JRD Tata was both an industrialist and philanthropist. C.V. Raman, Mother Teresa and Amartya Sen were awarded only after they had become Nobel laureates. But unlike the rest of the awardees, Sir M.V. was not at the centre of public adulation or recall when he was picked for the award. He was 95, long retired from active service and consultation. 

One wonders if he would have ever been picked had he been dead by 95. It appears that the vision of Visvesvaraya matched the Nehruvian dream of rapid industrialisation and the honour was, in part, agenda-building for the progress of young India. It was like making a case for a planned economy, whose architect, pamphleteer and propagandist was Visvesaraya. He had even beaten the Soviets in this planning model by speaking about it vigourously in the first decade of the 20th century and tirelessly practicing it during his tenure as chief engineer and Dewan of the Mysore state between November 1909 and December 1918. Much before this, he had campaigned for the idea with Mahadev Govind Ranade and Gopal Krishna Gokhale when he was a sanitary engineer with the Bombay Government in Poona for fourteen long years. Later though, in 1934, he collected his thoughts on the subject in the bookPlanned Economy for India (Bangalore Press). It is perhaps sheer coincidence that he was awarded the Bharat Ratna months before the results of India's first-five year plan was to be assessed. The symbolism of an award rarely appears so purposeful and complete.

'Economic planning' has today become an accepted idea, but in Sir M.V.'s time it was mocked and met with resistance. By the time it was understood as mandatory for growth, people had forgotten that Sir M.V. was the originator of the idea. In fact, Sir C.P. Ramaswami Aiyar, who as a member of the erstwhile Madras government discussed the sharing of the Cauvery waters with "tolerant disputant" Visvesvaraya, writes in his centenary tribute: "It has been a source of much concern to me that, during the last ten years, Sir M.V.'s advice and co-operation (meaning post-Independence period) were not more fully utilised in the planning programmes of thecentral government. But nevertheless, what we are now attempting is veritably the result of his example, of his unwearied preaching and his memorable achievements in many parts of this country in the fields of planning and social, industrial and economic regeneration."

Like the idea of economic planning, the idea of automatic sluice gates for reservoirs (patented without royalty by Sir M.V. in 1901) that has prevented floods, the very idea of big dams (the KRS dam on Cauvery being a case in point), block irrigation system, community development, vocational institutes, indigenous automobile andaeroplane factories etc. germinated in the mind of this frail man, at least a generation ahead of their time. It was around 1935 that Visvesvaraya had discussed the possibilities of automobile and aeroplane factories in India with people like Henry Ford and Lord Austin. But the then British government vetoed the projects. It was only after the Dunkirk disaster during the Second World War that an aircraft factory was permitted in Bangalore. At a time when we talk so much about urban renewal, it is seldom acknowledged that many Indian towns and cities owe their infrastructural foundation to the genius of this man. A city like Hyderabad has been permanently cured of the curse of the river Musi because of Osmansagar and Himayatsagar reservoirs planned by him. But why didn't the government think of naming the urban renewal mission (Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission) it launched a couple of years ago after him? 

It is precisely because of this oblivion, or perhaps inspite of it, that it appears a rare and extraordinary choice that he was picked for the Bharat Ratna with the charismatic first prime minister Nehru in 1955. One wonders if it was by design or default? Visvesvaraya was not affable. Sir Aiyar in fact points to the "alarming accounts with reference to his unapproachability and rigid formality." In an age of nationalist rhetoric, his charm was restricted to dry statistics. When homespun and handloom clothes was the national costume, Visvesvaraya never abandoned his three-piecesuits, the source of much folklore. According to a legend, to take a stroll in his own garden, he would be nattily dressed 'cap-a-pie and in his long coat and turban'. He has been photographed without a turban, but never without a suit. He was someone who quietly took upon himself to integrate India with the idea of the modern. 

Ironically, when he was awarded the Bharat Ratna, Visvesvaraya never actually fit the popular construct of anideal Indian. It was Gandhi, Nehru, Patel, Maulana and other Congress nationalists who were national heroes. Visvesvaraya was an extraordinary choice precisely because he was not a populist pick. It went far beyond political correctness. Being a Brahmin, even caste was not on his side. As early as 1916-17, the anti-Brahmin wave that was spreading from Madras to Mysore had pushed him to voluntarily retire as Dewan of the Mysore state. It is very unlikely that the Indian state will dare to make a mature and daring choice like this in a long time to come.