https://in.news.yahoo.com/amphtml/amartya-sen-only-bharat-ratna-112249020.html
I read the above news report with feelings of moral queasiness that often afflict me whenever I know I have to exercise judgment over a matter of ethical relativism … It’s called in Sanskrit as “dharma sankatam” — moral quandary.
The report says according to a finding under the RTI Act (Right to Information Act) , Prof. Amartya Sen , Nobel Laureate, helped himself to a perquisite that goes with his having been awarded the Bharath Ratna Award, the nation’s highest civilian award. The perk he availed is this : 21 free first-class air-tickets on Air India between 2015 and 2019 … the total monetary value of which remains undisclosed. Incidentally , the report finding also confirms that out of 34 other eminent Indians who are Bharath Ratna awardees, Prof. Sen is the only one who has helped himself to this Air India perquisite.
Air India, as we all know, is owned by the Government of India and so the cost of the 21 free-tickets Prof. Sen availed would have had to be wholly absorbed by the airline … which indirectly also gets charged to the Government… and ultimately gets borne by the Indian taxpayer .
The RTI finding says no monetary value can be ascribed to the 21 freebie-tickets provided to Prof. Sen… That’s strange since it doesn’t demand knowledge of rocket science to estimate the cost of a first-class round-trip airline ticket for travel from say Delhi to New York and back . The last time I travelled from Chennai to Newark, a cheap coach-class ticket cost me c. ₹.1.5L. I hear that a First Class ticket on the same flight would’ve cost me thrice as much … say ₹.5 Lacs per ticket including taxes and cess. So, I reckon the value of the 21 tickets Bharath Ratna Prof. Sen availed from Air India would be in the ball-park of a cool ₹. 105 Lacs …
No one should begrudge a country’s Bharath Ratna awardee ₹.105 Lacs. After all it is a perquisite the Government of India has entitled him to enjoy … and he certainly has the right to help himself to the privilege . Nothing wrong at all about it from the standpoint of transactional ethics.
But since the matter verges on pecuniary privileges funded by taxpayer money, I wonder if the matter does not also involve an element of moral hazard.
The commonplace definition of “Moral hazard” is a situation in which one party gets involved in a risky event knowing that it is protected against the risk and the other party will incur the cost. It arises when both the parties have incomplete information about each other.
“Moral hazard” in turn is rooted in fine considerations of what is called “Ethical Relativism””.
When we consider ethics to be not absolute but relative to the situation at hand .. that is called taking a position of “ethical relativism” on the matter.
If we define right from wrong based on how it affects us in a particular situation then we are regarded as conveniently adhering to the principal of ethical relativism and that is a dangerous path to take.
It means anyone can decide to walk away and rationalise an action of his or hers while I do not have the same the same latitude or flexibility.
Relativism holds that all points of view are equally valid and the individuals determines what is true and relative for them. You may have heard the expression: What’s right for you may not be what’s right for me. Ethical relativism ends often in moral chaos…. And that’s precisely why, as I said at the very beginning, it fills me up with moral queasiness …
If Prof. Sen availed the perquisite of the Bharat Ratna 21 times, it is his personal prerogative as a Barath Ratna awardee to do so. If there is nothing in the rule-book that says how many times or up to what limits of monetary value the perquisite can be enjoyed, well, Prof. Sen cannot be faulted at all for anything that may be even remotely suggestive of “moral impropriety” … As for any innuendo of moral turpitude, corruption or lapse … that too is simply out of the question.
The question however remains : Was there an inherent moral hazard in what Prof. Sen chose to do? We may ask ourselves, from the standpoint of ethics, under what circumstances does availing a perquisite become a matter of transactional right and when is it a matter of moral choice?
It is a well known principle in Ethics that it is actually knowing the difference between what you have a right to do …and what is right to do.
No one can question Prof. Sen’s right to have done what he did …But the much larger and far more troubling question is indeed what he must ask himself: WAS WHAT I DID … RIGHT TO DO ? And it is perhaps in how he answers that question will one be able to really measure the difference between an ordinary citizen of India and one who is its Bharat Ratna.
Sudarshan Madabushi