Logical Fallacy of Indians on the heels of non-absoluteness of Fundamental Rights

reference the Debate happening at the Blog page of Bhagirath Baria http://www.rathandeconomics.co.in/2012/02/are-fundamental-rights-absolute.html

My quest to the know the implications of the condition that Fundamental Rights are NOT absolute after I heard  our Presidentail Candidate Mr Pranab Mukherjee speaking this in TV News talk.

I am of the opinion that Indian Intellect comes to a sudden halt at such juncture of Logic, and rolls back into it's old state of feudal governance by assuming that there is not path ahead of this fact. It is life walking on a mathematical graph where a point of Discontinuity has resulted into interpretations that the curve has no value further onwards.
Indian philosophy overall suffers a jolt when there is failure in application of a philosophy derived from studies in pure mathematics, into the field of Sociology and Political Science.

Producing hereunder  a response I have made to the debate about the path ahead when the Fundamental Rights are not Absolute.

Rath, Thanks for your response. Being a regular blogger for quite a few year now, I would have all respect for your evolving state of mind from the time you wrote this blog to the present day. It often happens that we write a thing in a particular state of mind and then we pass over it, becoming oblivious of what made us write that! But then, an in-depth knowledge emerges from human Emotions only. That state-of-mind was that Emotional State from which some fountain of wisdom had come. Greater is the need that people record it down just as that Emotional state happen because, as you say (and I agree) that we forget it away within momemts , losing away all that Emotional Wisdom too. Emotional Wisdom is of transient nature. So, you have done a right work by atleast recording down whatever it was.

     

You say, and I quote:

I find this proposition vague & incorrect. It would be wrong to come on such a generalization about our interpretation of fundamental rights. Nationalism, and appeals to collective concepts is a characteristic feature of our History of freedom struggle, but not the only one. Moreover, the concept of fundamental rights too emerged slowly through struggle of various ideas during the freedom movement. These rights aren't merely some byproducts of intellectual cognition of few great politicians but lessons that we learnt during the struggle itself. Considering them nationalistic and absolute will be a gross negligence on the interpreter's part.

Rath, you are partially correct and partially mistaken. You are correct to that extent that intellectualism about the Fundamental Rights did not arrive merely by some arm-chair brainstorming , but also through the lessons learnt from the past. You are mistaken at your observations that these "lesson-learning" ever happened in India! In truth, Indians do not recognise fundamental rights as so basic ingriendients in their day-today lives. We do not honour free speech in offices too. We normally assume that 'boss is always right'. Our parliament believes that it has right to demand respect from us, while our constitution teaches us to respect the book of Constitution and the Parliament. So, in truth when the argument arrives at this conflation where It is taught and expected that Citizen should respect the Constitution, Parliament and National Symbols, and we meet a situation where Someone of stature such as Team Anna, Arvind Kejriwal , Om Puri, Anupam Kher, Ronen sen, Kiran Bedi,- is found not to be doing so, our Logic Colapses and we sink into Logical fallacy exposing our real understanding of what is nation and what are these national symbols.

LOGICAL FALLACY among Indians about the concept of Nation: We see the concept in, as the westerner like to describe it, in a "Socialist" way. That is, the Big Brother style of doing things-- The big brother is offering to his younger brother to make 'voluntary' amends and make-up with each other, lest he knows "what to do".  That is what the Westeners think of "Socialism" to be like. If people are not willing to vountarily respect the National Symbols, the Constitution and the Parliament, the socialist country does not recognise between the Positive Liberty and the Negative Liberty (To read more check the Wikipedia site on Liberty )and like to deal with them with the same high-handed as for an external threat to their nation. The debate of acceptable protest versus case of hidden external threat to nation ends in a Socialist State. The courts too halt down because the seizure of the Fundamental Rights is deemed correct TO ABSOLUTE. In another word, Since the Fundamental Rights are NOT absolute, the Seizure of Fundamental Rights becomes 'ABSOLUTELY correct' in all the situations. That is how a "Socialist" State becomes an evolved extension of a large geography "Feudalism".
         Quoting from the Wikipedia on Liberty about the Socialist Interpretation of Liberty:

The dichotomy of positive and negative liberty is considered specious by political philosophers in traditions such as socialism, social democracy, libertarian socialism, and Marxism^{[citation needed]}. Some of them argue that positive and negative liberty are indistinguishable in practice, while others claim that one kind of liberty cannot exist independently of the other. A common argument is that the preservation of negative liberty requires positive action on the part of the government or society to prevent some individuals from taking away the liberty of others.

India has that problem about it's understanding of Fundamental Rights. The problem can be better exposed to Intectual groups as worded in the speech of B R Ambedkar Himself " Fundamental Rights are like a GIFT of State to the CITIZENs". --This Gift concept being suggestive of the logic that State therefore has a right to take them away anytime under the condition of threat to state.

In comparison, the westeners see Fundamental Rights as the basic Terms and Condition of the Social Contract between the Citizens and the State. In peacetime situations ,when the state is not at wars against an external enemy, the State cannot take back away the Gift, even if the internal Agents are demanding a separation.

No wonder, this attitude created among the Indians due to the above Logical Fallacy can weaken our position about the affairs of State of Kashmir, and also about the understanding of the Naxalite Problem too. We are indirectly suggesting that Naxalism is a Military problem, not a consequence of the socio-economic failures of the State.


Wars of national liberation : talks of how there is a difference between the Western thinkers and the Third World and Eastern Thinkers on the issue of "nation". Perhaps , the third world thinkers (which includes we the Indians too) like to accept that Fundamental Rights are NOT absolute, but we do not accept that a "nation" is also NOT an absolute concept , created by a powerful emotional and voluntary act of human intellectualism
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wars_of_national_liberation)

Legal issues

International law generally holds that a people with a legal right to self-determination are entitled to wage wars of national liberation.^[6][7] While Western states tend to view wars of national liberation as civil wars, Third World and communist states tend to view them as international wars.^[6] This difference in classification leads to varying perceptions of which laws of war apply in such situations.^[6] However, there is general agreement among all states today in principle that the use of force to frustrate a people's legal right to self-determination is unlawful.^[6]