The corruption of a republic

Eminent Indian psychoanalyst and social commentator Dr Ashis Nandy found himself in the middle of a controversy recently after he made a few remarks on corruption at a session entitled ‘The Republic of Ideas’ at the Jaipur literary festival, 24– 28 January 2013. Author and publisher of Tehelka magazine Tarun Tejpal spoke of corruption as an equalising force, to which Dr Nandy said: Just a response to this part, very briefly. He’s not saying the most important part of the story, which will shock you and it will be a very undignified and, how should I put it, almost vulgar statement on my part. It is a fact that most of the corrupt come from the OBCs (Other Backward Classes) and the Scheduled Castes and now increasingly Scheduled Tribes and as long as this is the case, the Indian republic will survive. A journalist present at the panel took up this statement, which was later endlessly replayed on a 24-hour television news channel. Dalit organisations and activists protested against Dr Nandy. Not surprisingly, considering the upcoming elections in some key states, some politicians jumped into the fray and called for Dr Nandy’s arrest. In India anti-Dalit speech is punishable under the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act 1989, and is a non-bailable offence. There were demonstrations and police complaints were filed against him in three different locations. Fearing physical harm and the possibility of imprisonment, Dr Nandy and his family went to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court of India did grant a stay order on the arrest warrants against him, but at the same time the Chief Justice of India told Dr Nandy’s lawyer ‘Whatever your intent, you can’t go on making statements. Tell your client he has no license to make such comments.’ The Indian social media and blogsphere exploded, with various arguments emerging on behalf of and against Dr Nandy. The most common complaint against Dr Nandy is that he was casteist, and that he had stereotyped Dalits. Such complaints came even from those defending him. A passionate critique by Anoop Kumar outlined Dalit oppression in India and accused specific media personalities of defending Dr Nandy instead of interrogating ‘upper caste anxieties’. There are blogs that, while disagreeing with Dr Nandy, argue for his right to express his opinion and to ‘be wrong’. There are those who argue that his remarks were made in humour, and lament the dearth of an understanding of wit, satire or irony.6 While the case seems to be closed after the Supreme Court judgment, there is still debate about whether this was a victory for freedom of speech or another instance of the way in which the upper castes in India can get away with any derogatory statement against the lower castes. The freedom of speech argument is unsatisfying. The difference between ‘provocative speech that forces you to think’ and ‘provocative speech that is intended to hurt, denigrate or provoke’ is very context dependent. The intention of any speaker is not only difficult to prove, but also difficult to know. I would like to base my defence of Dr Nandy neither on his right to say what was on his mind, nor on his intention. Instead, I would suggest that his remarks should be understood through a discussion of corruption, and the way in which Dr Nandy uses the term. • Shvetal Vyas is a PhD student in the International Centre for Muslim and non-Muslim Understanding, University of South Australia

Airy wavepackets are Perelomov coherent states

Accelerating non-spreading wavepackets in nonrelativistic free particle system, with probability distribution having an Airy function profile, were discovered by Berry and Balazs (1979), and have been subsequently realised in several optical experiments. It is shown that these wavepackets are actually Perelomov coherent states. It is found that the Galilean invariance of the Schrodinger equation plays a key role in making these states unique and giving rise to their unusual propagation properties.Comment: LaTeX 2e, 12 pages, no figures. Slightly revised to improve presentation and incorporate minor corrections. To appear in Am. J. Phy

A-models in three and four dimensions

We introduce and study a new 3d Topological Field Theory which can be associated to any compact real manifold X. This TFT is analogous to the 2d A-model and reduces to it upon compactification on an interval with suitable boundary conditions. It plays a role in 3d mirror symmetry as well as in the physical approach to the geometric Langlands duality. A similar TFT can be defined in four dimensions.Comment: 16 pages, late