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A Tale of Two Indias
By Justice Markandey Katju
These days, there is a lot of disputation and wrangling in India on the media and elsewhere about the notice sent by the Government of India to the Delhi Gymkhana Club to vacate the 27.3 acres of prime land on which it stands, which was given to it on lease on a nominal rent by the British government 113 years ago.
The matter reveals that there are, in fact two Indias in India today, the India of the elite and affluent who socialize in Gymkhana Clubs ( there is a Gymkhana Club in most towns in India ) and other such clubs, and the India of the rest ( who constitute the vast majority of Indians ), and who are regarded as riffraff, rabble and hoi polloi by the former.
I am not going into the legality of the notice sent by the government to the club, as the matter is sub judice in the Delhi High Court.
But what I wish to say, on the basis of my own several visits to the club, is that it is frequented, and its members are, affluent businessmen, high ranking serving or retired bureaucrats and military officers, important Indian politicians, and other wealthy so called 'elite' of society, and their families, who care two hoots for the vast majority of Indians who are poor. They come there to eat good food, drink excellent liquor ( often imported, and consequently very expensive ), indulge in gossip, and generally entertain themselves and make merry, while totally indifferent and insensitive to the terrible sufferings of the Indian masses.
They are part of the Brown sahebs and Epstein class of India
It can be said about them, as Talleyrand said of the Bourbons of France " they saw nothing, heard nothing, and forgot nothing "
The Delhi Gymkhana Club is a colonial relic. Our British rulers, such as British officers in the ICS and military, established such clubs in most towns in India where they could socialise, drink, eat, and dance with their ladies in the evenings, after the day's work. Till Indian Independence in 1947 the membership was restricted to Britishers, except for a few senior Indian ICS officers and princes from princely states in India. Later, the 'elite' of Indian society was also admitted, though the membership was very restricted.
The Delhi Gymkhana Club and other such clubs further illustrate what I had said earlier in an article
As for the notice sent by the Government of India to the club, it seems to be just a populist gimmick to show that the Government of India is on the side of the common people and against the elite in society, when in fact the elite has flourished enormously under its rule. Nine Indian individuals today own as much wealth as that owned by the bottom half of India's 1430 million population.
So despite such populist steps, the situation is unlikely to change for a long time.
(Justice Katju is a retired Judge of the Supreme Court of India and a former Chairman of the Press Council of India. These are his personal views.)
