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Saturday,
September 8, 2001, Chandigarh, India   |
Constitution and people’s will Not by economics alone Education: elusive consensus |
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A decade of new economic policy
A reluctant
stowaway
Wallowing in poverty still in
fashion
Lashkar-e-Jhangvi: the Zia
connection
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Constitution and people’s will FOR
far too long, wily politicians have been trampling on the spirit of the law by focussing only on its letter. In the process, all that is noble and desirable in the democratic system of governance has been polluted. One tool that has been used repeatedly to subvert the Constitution is the “verdict of the people”. The Supreme Court’s categorical observation in this regard has not come a day too soon. In fact, had it come several years ago, India would not have had to suffer a number of cunning leaders who virtually cocked a snook at the entire nation. The judiciary was not at fault for this. Nor was the Constitution to blame. It was just that some had stooped to a level which the Founding Fathers could not have visualised in their wildest dreams. Nor would it have been possible for the learned Judges who delivered previous judgements on the subject to realise that these would be quoted as a precedent by unscrupulous people who scan every legal tome only to find loopholes. The apex court has done Indian polity a lot of good by reminding it that the will of the people must stand coordinated to the Constitution and the people’s will would prevail if and only if it was not in conflict with the Constitution. The Jayalalithaa case in which this observation has been made is symbolic of the rot that has set in. She rules the roost in her typically imperious way despite her court conviction. As the Supreme Court says, today it is a sentence of two to three years. Tomorrow, it may be a sentence for life. Are we left with no standards at all? The unvarnished truth is that we are left with no standards at all indeed. Politics has been the last resort of scoundrels for so long that there is hardly anyone left who does not have a similar act of decadence to his or her credit. So, no one raises a voice of protest. The common man is hopelessly pinned to the ground and the judiciary just cannot be expected to look into a million cases of assault on the Constitution at the same time. Crass defiance of law is not confined to the Jayalalithaa case. The question that her counsel has asked purely in her defence must be answered by the entire nation: If a murderer can continue as a minister till the final court confirms his conviction, why should Ms Jayalalithaa be stopped merely on the basis of a trial court’s conviction? That is not a hypothetical query. There are elected representatives not only in various states but also at the Centre who should actually be behind bars. Two wrongs do not make one right. The Tamil Nadu Chief Minister has to go, and also all others of her ilk. Cleansing of public life has to be an all-pervasive operation. Now that the nation’s attention is focussed on this aspect, it should also do a bit of soul-searching whether it is enough to show the door to a tainted person. Should a sovereign republic be so helpless that such a person can easily replace himself or herself with a dummy Chief Minister and can merrily continue to operate the levers of power like before? The fraud on the Constitution that has already been perpetrated in Bihar may be repeated in Tamil Nadu. The search for an answer to the vexatious “what to do?” question cannot be postponed any further. |
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Not by economics alone IF
the government retreats from all commercial activities and scraps all regulations on commercial activities, there is a big reward to be had: a 10 per cent economic growth. That is a dazzling prize at a time when the economy is in a slowdown mode and the government is desperate to reverse the trend. The promise comes from an internationally known consultancy firm, McKinsey, with impeccable credentials. Every top Indian corporation which could afford the fees, has engaged this firm to prepare reconstruction plans to either boost sales and profit or to cut losses and recover lost ground. Of late McKinsey has set up a division to advise governments on how to run their economy. Its well-trained mindset jumps from every analysis and recommendation. It studies economics in total isolation and if the government accepts and acts on it in one go, the collateral political damage will be unacceptable. There is only one exception. The report asks the government not to rush through with labour reforms since it will lead to joblessness. In fact, a looming unemployment crisis is one of the core themes of the McKinsey report. The others are to bring unused and underutilised assets into productive use, improving productivity and allow normal market forces full play. This is best illustrated by what it says about land for residential use. It rightly says land prices in India are prohibitively costly simply because it is locked by zoning laws and a 30-year old urban land ceiling Act or the ownership rights are hazy thanks to the practice of sale by the power of attorney method. If these restrictions are out of the way and if stamp duty is slashed and if modern methods of construction are adopted, large apartment buildings will come up, bringing the price down by 40 per cent and providing employment to more than three million men. The logic is hazy for two reasons. One, all big cities in India are centres of government, industry, commerce and education. The pressure on housing is unbearable and the rent is thus very high. This reflects in a speculative price of land. Lack of comfortable and efficient mass transport system in all cities has stalled a rapid growth of satellite townships which would have curbed an uncontrolled rise in urban land prices. The other parts of the report are on similar lines, delinked from the Indian reality. Here economics is very much subservient to politics and social needs. With about 70 per cent of people poor or very poor an adventurous economic policy will unleash their electoral wrath and that should be avoided. The ideas in the McKinsey report are not new; the six reports of the Prime Minister’s Council on Trade and Industry have in their sectoral reports made similar proposals. But what is new is the virile commercial language and copious quantification. But these are of questionable economic value. |
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Education: elusive consensus THE
83rd Constitution Amendment Bill has been kept on hold for more than four years, putting the statutory milestone of time — the year 1960 — in the limbo of redundancy. No genuine sense of purpose or urgency has been shown and an impression is being created by the Union Government to the effect that no one should mind missing the bus over the past 53 years because India is going to jump headlong for providing an infrastructure for Universal Elementary Education, UEE for short, covering the relevant sections of its one billion people. UEE is to be achieved in "the mission mode". Call it "Sarva Shiksha Abhiyana (SSA)" or the Universal Education Movement. The infrastructure is to be pyramidal and three-tiered. The Prime Minister will lend his image to it to make the core idea credible! The envisaged quality will be good. The movement will "require" (not necessarily be "allotted") additional(?) resources worth Rs 63,000 crore. But, mind you, the time-frame will be specific — 10 more years! The UEE year will be 2010 and the main requirement for the revolution will be an impossible consensus among the three tiers. Whom is the Union Government, particularly the Ministry of Human Resource Development, fooling? Before coming to the recent detrimental efforts at the saffronisation or unscientific orientation of the educational process one has to remember that before 1976 education was exclusively the responsibility of the states. The Central Government was concerned only with certain areas like coordination and determination of standards in technical and higher education etc. In 1976, through a constitutional amendment, it was made a joint responsibility. Decisions regarding the organisation and structure of the system are mainly the concern of the states. But the Centre has kept the factors of quality and character in its own hands. The Human Resource Development Ministry (Department of Education) "shares" (or controls?) the process of planning. The Central Advisory Board set up before Independence (in 1935) is still active. The National Policy (1986) and the Programme of Action (1992) are mere names. The 12-unit conference, which opposed the BJP gimmicks recently, should get due appreciation for raising a sufficiently loud voice against the vitiation of the constitutional and secular atmosphere at whatever exists in the name of education at various levels. A national education policy needs a wide consensus. It is time to end the sources of fraud after fraud in an area which signifies light. |
A decade of new economic policy THERE was a major shift in India’s development strategy in July, 1991. The new strategy was termed New Economic Policy (NEP). It was mainly based on the IMF-World Bank’s structural adjustment programme (SAP). The major planks of the NEP were liberalisation, privatisation and globalisation (LPG) of the Indian economy whereas the earlier strategy was largely governed by the planned development with public sector at the commanding heights. GATT Agreements, 1994, and the consequential establishment of WTO with effect from January 1, 1995, gave a big push to the LPG or economic reforms. Economists have different positions on the achievements of economic reforms. To me, the performance of Indian economy — on major macro-economic parameters such as growth rate, employment, poverty and inequality and external sector — during the post-reform era is not better off than is the pre-reform era. The position has rather deteriorated on many counts. Since the reforms have completed a decade in July, 2001, it is appropriate time to make an evaluation.The methodology followed is the comparative analysis of the post-reform decade with the pre-reform decade on major macro-economic parameters. The average annual growth rate of the GDP (at factor cost) remained 6.4 per cent during 1992-93 and 2000-2001 compared to 5.4 per cent during 1980-81 and 1991-92. It was mainly due to higher growth rate in the tertiary sector during the post-reform decade (8.2 per cent) compared to (6.4 per cent) during the pre-reform decade. The sectoral growth rates in agriculture and its allied activities and in industry in the corresponding periods were 3.3 and 3.9 per cent and 6.5 and 6.3 per cent, respectively. The annual trend growth rate of the industrial production was, however, higher in pre-reform period (7.8 per cent) than that in the post-reform period (6.7 per cent). Besides, the inclusion of 1991-92 in the pre-reform period by the Planning Commission, instead of in the post-reform period, is not justified because nine months of this year fall in the reform period. Again, the growth rate of Net National Product (NNP) at 1993-94 prices was higher in the pre-reform period than in the post-reform period. The comparison of employment situation between the pre-reform decade and the post-reform decade depicts a dismal picture. The annual compound growth rate of employment during 1990-98 was 1.58 per cent compared to 3.13 per cent during 1980-90. The growth rate of employment in allied agricultural activities during the corresponding periods were 1.80 per cent and 5.62 per cent whereas in the non-agricultural activities the corresponding growth rates were — 2.15 per cent and 2.81 per cent, respectively. The employment in the rural and urban areas grew at 2.03 per cent and 3.99 per cent during 1987-88 and 1993-94 whereas the corresponding growth rates during 1993-94 and 1999-2000 were 0.67 per cent and 1.34 per cent, respectively. The growth rates of employment in the organised sector (both public and private) dwindled to 0.04 per cent in 1999 from 1.44 per cent in 1991. The decline was more sharp in the private sector (from 2.21 per cent in 1992 to 0.11 per cent in 1999) than in the public sector (from 1.52 per cent in 1991 to 0.19 per cent in 1996 and zero growth in 1999) according to Planning Commission estimates. Clearly, the Indian organised sector is now experiencing a jobless growth. Besides, there has been a shift towards informal production and employment. Such a shift is bound to increase income inequality with higher wages paid in the tradable skill-intensive sector and lower wages in the informal low-skill intensive sector. Moreover, the quality and nature of informal sector employment is far inferior to the employment in the organised sector. According to the Planning Commission of India the poverty ratio decreased from 30.51 per cent in 1993-94 to 26.10 per cent in 1999-2000, a fall of 4.41 per cent point. It cannot be boasted upon as a great success of reforms compared to 5.69 percentage point decline from 36.20 per cent in 1987-88 to 30.51 per cent in 1993-94. Even going by the Planning Commission estimate, the total number of people below poverty line remained almost the same in 1999-2000 as it was in 1993-94. Contrary to the statistical jugglery by the Planning Commission, the estimates of the NSSO show that incidence of rural poverty increased from 37.27 per cent in 1993-94 to 42.45 per cent in 1998 and that of urban poverty increased from 32.36 per cent to 34.58 per cent during the same period. Keeping in view the decline in employment growth rate in the economy in general and that in the agriculture and allied activities in particular, the NSSO estimates seem closer to reality. As about inequality, it has also increased during the reform period as is clear from the Ginni index distribution of consumption which rose from 33.8 in 1992 to 37.8 in 1997. The consumption of lowest 20 per cent population declined from 8.5 per cent in GNP in 1992 to 8.1 per cent in 1997. The corresponding percentages for highest 20 per cent population were 42.6 and 46.1, respectively. The phenomenal increase in the wheat and rice stock in India, from 13.2 million tonnes in January 1993 to 45 million tonnes in January, 2001, is another crude indicator of rising incidence of poverty. Argentina and Mexico, “beneficiaries” of SAP, also experienced higher incidence of poverty and inequalities after the reforms. In fact, growth with equity, generation of employment, promotion of social development and alleviation of poverty are the only criteria of the success of any programme of reforms. The old paradigm of growth with trickle-down benefits for the poor or the Kuznets’ hypothesis suggesting that inequality is good for growth cannot pass the above test of success. The unfavourable balance of trade, as per DGCIS statistics, increased from $ 3345 million in 1992-93 to $ 9613 million in 1999-2000. The trade deficit, as per the RBI statistics, was $ 5447 million in 1992-93 and $ 17098 million in 1999-2000. The share of Indian exports in the world exports was 0.6 per cent in 1990 and remained exactly the same in 1998. The average annual rate of growth of exports of 9.8 per cent, however, was higher during 1991-2000 than that of 8.3 per cent during 1981-90. Nevertheless, it was much lower than that of 1971-80 (15.6 per cent). The burgeoning foreign exchange reserves of nearly $ 38 billion in March, 2000, compared to $ 19 billion in 1993-94 is termed as a “great success” of reforms. A deeper analysis would, however, explode this myth. The net private remittances played a much more significant role in it. The short-term capital flows, a fair weather friend, accounted for 62.7 per cent of the foreign exchange reserves on an average during 1991-92 to 1999-2000. FDI did register an increase during the post-reform period but it was far below compared to China and many other developing countries. India’s external debt burden rose from Rs 1630 billion ($ 83.8 billion) in 1991 to Rs 4293 billion ($ 98.4 billion) in 2000. The per capita debt-burden on India rose from Rs 1926 in 1991 to Rs 4292 in 2000. As per the World Bank classification India is among top 15 indebted countries. It is evident from the foregoing discussion that the reforms did not have much to claim on major accounts such as employment, poverty, inequality, growth rate and external front. The IMF-World Bank-WTO-MNC prescribed LPG is all out to export rich countries’ recession and unemployment. Indian economy would have to face a stiff competition from foreign goods, foreign capital, foreign banks, insurance companies owned largely by the MNCs. The process of substituting foreign capital for Indian capital and foreign firms has already set in. It would imply more and more labour displacement, outright of profits, and management and control of the Indian economy by foreigners and IMF-World Bank experts. It is high time to learn from the recent experience of “Asian Tigers” and “Asian Dragons”. Going by the past experience of a large number of developing economies who adopted LPG since early 1980s, there is hardly any reason to believe that the emerging phase of LPG would help India and its people. At the most it may integrate the Indian rich with the global rich and would exclude the majority of the Indian people from the entire process and would push them to further deprivation and marginalisation. That would prove to be counter-productive. Thus, instead of following LPG blindly and vigorously, efforts must be made to mobilise internal resources, not by disinvestment but by rigorous fiscal management and tax collection. Instead of giving fiscal concessions to corporate sector and the upper income groups in the name of encouraging private initiative there should be an effective check on large amount of tax-evasion, misappropriation and wastage. According to an estimate the revenue loss as a result of liberalisation would amount to Rs 28000 crore in 2001-02. The theft component in the power sector alone amounts to a revenue loss of more than Rs 10000 crore. This is just a tip of the iceberg as the extent of theft, corruption and tax-evasion in Indian economy is far higher. In fact corruption is a regressive tax. It takes a toll on economic performance, undermines employment opportunities and clouds prospects of poverty reduction. The salvation of Indian people, thus, does not lie in blind implementations of LPG but in judicious and rigorous management of the economy and good governance. The writer is Associate Professor, Department of Economics, Punjabi University, Patiala. |
A reluctant
stowaway DURING those days I used to stay in Dhanraj Mahal close to the Gateway of India and happened to have some preliminary knowledge of spoken Japanese. I was serving in Naval Dockeyard, Mumbai. One Sunday morning two provostmen rang me up requesting me to attend to a case of a stowaway trying to jump off from a Japanese merchant ship. “Samochi Maru” on her way from Singapore to Miami had anchored off the Gateway of India the previous day with a cargo of zinc ingots. The alleged stowaway named Iqbal, a graduate in economics, had jumped from the ship and was arrested by the Colaba police in the presence of a naval patrol party, as the motorboat from the Japanese ship chased him. Earlier, at sea Iqbal was apprehended by the ship’s crew hiding behind three small wooden crates fastened on starboard side of poopdeck on the third day of leaving Singapore. The captain of the ship informed the Mumbai police about this. Iqbal was treated courteously during the voyage and was allowed to eat and live with crew in the lower deck. International maritime law requires that any stowaway on board, after detection, is to be treated humanely and irrespective of his intentions, is not to be rendered a destitute. Iqbal was to be handed over to the police at the ship’s first port of call, Mumbai. During preliminary investigation on board Iqbal revealed that he was a citizen of Singapore and was attempting to settle down in the USA through this illegal passage. He also named his girlfriend in Miami where he intended to settle down. Through the naval police I was asked officially to interpret and liase between the ship and the police in order to secure the repatriation of Iqbal back to Singapore. A chargesheet was prepared against him by the Mumbai police and he was produced before the metropolitan magistrate. All documents seized from him were also produced. These included his passport and two maps of sensitive areas in the USA. The magistrate found the documents incriminating enough to indicate Iqbal’s involvement in subversive activities. Surprisingly one of the local advocates volunteered to take up his case and alleged that Iqbal tried to leave Singapore as he was being harassed there for his political leanings and the Singapore government was actually preparing to prosecute him. Sensing delay in settlement of the case the ship sailed away for Miami as scheduled. The Singapore government deputed a senior immigration officer to refute Iqbal’s allegations. Finally, the magistrate found the stowaway guilty of violating visa regulations of his country and ordered his repatriation to Singapore. The case then shifted to the Singapore court and continued for a year more. More details were obtained from the USA address given by Iqbal during the investigation. The US Police acted speedily on the clues provided. Several premises were raided in Miami and other towns of America. The Singapore police investigated further into the dangerous activities of Iqbal. It also came to notice that earlier one similar stowaway was successful in leaving Singapore on a similar mission. During raids in Singapore unaccounted currency was seized. This had arrived n Singapore through dubious means. Some accomplices of Iqbal who helped him in boarding the merchant ship were also apprehended by the Singapore police. Iqbal finally confessed the charges against him and was awarded three years jail sentence. It is amazing to note that a person risking his life to reach the USA was later reluctant to accept repatriation to the USA as suggested by the Singapore court during the trial! Iqbal threatened to commit suicide if forcibly repatriated to the USA. |
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Wallowing in poverty still in
fashion THIS piece started to write itself in my head in a wayside restaurant between Mumbai and Alibagh where I stopped for lunch last weekend. It was, even by dhaba standards, a poor sort of place. Scrawny chickens squawked in a slushy yard and the makeshift shack in which the cooking took place had a filthy floor, more chickens scrabbling in the dirt and a stray dog chained by a grimy leash indicating that the shack doubled as the family home when the restaurant closed for the night. But, the lady of the house wore gold jewellery and shiny nail polish so she was clearly not poor. Why then did she need to live so poorly? Could it be because, in a small way, she was reflecting the mindset that developed under Nehruvian socialism: a mindset whose outstanding feature is a tendency to wallow in poverty? In the bad old days when we thought Nehruvian socialism was the only way forward wallowing in poverty was a national disease. We wore our poverty like a badge of honour. We were proudly poor because we believed firmly that we were only poor because we had been looted by foreign rulers. For decades we continued to believe that we would have been a rich country had we not been colonised. Our leaders encouraged this belief because they seemed incapable of finding solutions within Nehruvian socialism to our economic problems and were too scared to admit that it might have failed. It was only in the eighties that it began to dawn on some of our economists and political analysts that we were poor because of bad governance and misguided economic policies. Since then we have tried to look anew at our old beliefs, but because economic liberalisation is still an idea that blooms mainly in our big cities you only have to drive into the countryside anywhere in India to see that the old mindset is still intact. So even prosperous farmers hesitate to improve the way they live and prosperous restaurateurs would rather buy bold jewellery than improve their restaurants or their style of living. How can we expect it to be otherwise when the same mindset afflicts the Government of Maharashtra? Between Mumbai and Alibagh we drove through some of the most spectacular countryside I have ever seen. All around us were soft rolling hills, covered in moss-green foliage at this time of year, set against the stark, rectangular outcrops of rock that typify the Deccan Plateau. We drove charming, little, red-tiled villages, through forests of greenery before we finally got to the ocean. In another country — perhaps even another Indian state like Goa or Rajasthan — the entire route would have been lined with resorts, restaurants and wayside cafes. Here, all we saw were dhabas similar to the one that acted as muse for this article and the reason is that Maharashtra’s leaders have not shaken off the old mindset enough to start thinking of more modern ways of bringing prosperity to their people. If they had untold riches could have come from exploiting the state’s magnificent coastline alone. In Alibagh I saw signs of untold riches in the homes of Mumbai grandees. One businessman has made so much money from selling lamps and marble that he has built himself his own Bollywood version of an Italian palazzo on a promontory overlooking the sea. I saw Spanish style haciendas. Moroccon fantasies and much Punjabi baroque so there has clearly been a great deal of investment in this area but all of it has come from private sources. The government’s only contribution has been to obstruct development at every step. So, those who try to build private homes face constant harassment from municipal officials who throw all kinds of absurd rules at them and deny them municipal water and electricity — because that can only go to farmers — but at the same time they have allowed government institutions to litter the area with hideous, little holiday homes. It is one of the rules of Nehruvian socialism that anyone connected with the government can safely consider himself above the normal rules that apply to mere mortals. They also continue to believe in the socialist idea that the state knows best and since tourism is considered by our serious-minded bureaucrats as a frivolous way of bringing prosperity they frown upon it. So while India attracts no more than two million foreign tourists a year, China, despite Marxism and other ideological constraints, now attracts more than 30 million. Hong Kong alone attracts nearly that many and new kids on the block like Cambodia and Burma have probably overtaken us already. Cambodia has only just recovered from Pol Pot’s genocidal rule but already Angkor Wat is now so much on the tourist map of the world that there are several flights a day from Bangkok to Seim Reap. Please keep in mind that Goa, our hottest tourist destination, has no more than a couple of flights each from Mumbai and Delhi at the height of the tourist season. It is in building the infrastructure for tourism that the government has a role to play. But our officials prefer to obstruct and obfuscate and prevent change rather than facilitate it. The result is that a state like Orissa which, with its wonderful temples and beaches, should be attracting more tourists than Bali only last week reported more starvation deaths. And, as usual officials concentrated not on delivering food supplies to those who were dying of hunger but on denying that there had been starvation deaths. The poor villagers who died live in an area of unbelievable natural beauty and again a clever tourism minister would ensure that the infrastructure were provided to enable hoteliers and other entrepreneurs to invest in the area. But, of course, nothing is going to happen because Orissa as India’s poorest state (bar Bihar) remains trapped in a mindset that treats tourism as if it were some sort of frivolous activity. And, wallowing in poverty is very much still in fashion as can be seen from the number of times Orissa’s government sticks its begging bowl out for more funds from the Centre and from foreign aid agencies. When I returned to Mumbai, after a glorious weekend in Alibagh, I asked people if Maharashtra had a Minister of Tourism? Everyone I asked said that there must be one but nobody could remember his name. Why complain about Maharashtra, though, when almost every Indian state has been as neglectful in its way. The good news is that at the Centre we now have the indefatigable Jagmohan as Minister of Tourism. If he goes about his job as sincerely as he did with urban development (demolition some people say) then there may be some hope. But, there is not much he can do on his own because other ministries deal with such vital necessities as electricity, roads and water so it looks like we could be wallowing in our poverty for a long while to come. Sad when you consider that we could be wallowing in prosperity instead.
Lashkar-e-Jhangvi: the Zia
connection SECTARIAN and ethnic terrorism is a hotly debated subject in Pakistan these days. And the most dreaded outfit, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, one of the groups recently banned, consumes the maximum time and energy during such discussions. The ruling General perhaps gathered courage to take on the Lashkar primarily because of two reasons. One, it is generally believed that the US administration has clearly told the military regime in Islamabad that the sectarian militias must be disbanded before Pakistan can expect any financial assistance from Washington. Two, the Lashkar has been torn by fierce factionalism for some time and hence the opportunity to launch a crackdown on it. If the government succeeds in its drive against the Lashkar, it may feel encouraged to proceed against other sectarian and ethnic militias. But this is a debatable question as the government's move is so far confined to Sind province only. What is the origin of the Lashkar, a rabidly anti-Shia militant outfit? Has it ever had state patronage? Did it enjoy the support of any Head of Government? The emergence of the Lashkar has a strong connection with General Zia-ul-Haq's claim of establishing Nizam-e-Mustafa (an order on the pattern of the one that existed during the days of Prophet Mohammed in Madina, Saudi Arabia) in Pakistan, a populist move to retain power. This led to a serious difference of opinion between Sunnis and Shias on the issue of zakat. According to a study by Khaled Ahmed carried by Friday Times, "in 1980, an unprecedented procession of Shias, led by Mufti Jaafar Hussain, laid siege to Islamabad and forced General Zia to exempt the Shia community from the deduction of zakat. The concept of Sunni 'ushr' (due of the poor on land) is also rejected by Shia jurisprudence." After some time a strong anti-Shia movement began in Jhang district of Punjab. Khaled Ahmed says, "General Zia not only ignored it but saw it as his balancing act against the rebellious Shia community. This was worsened by Imam Khomeini's criticism of General Zia. The rise of Maulana Haq Nawaz Jhangvi in the stronghold of big Shia landlords in Punjab changed the sectarian scene in Pakistan. There is evidence that General Zia was warned of Jhangvi's anti-Shia and anti-Iran movement, but he ignored the warning and allowed it to blossom into a full-fledged religious party called the Anjuman-e-Sipah-e-Sahaba of Pakistan." The Sipah-e-Sahaba, which later gave birth to the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and the Jaish-e-Mohammed, is today headed by Maulana Azam Tariq, who was released from jail the other day. He was put behind bars on charges of terrorism after his support to Maulana Akram Awan's campaign to dislodge the Musharraf regime and impose Islamic shariat on Islamabad. During his imprisonment a number of Shia doctors, lawyers and other professionals were gunned down in Karachi and elsewhere. The Sipah-e-Sahaba, the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (currently it has two factions one headed by terrorist Riaz Basra and the other by Qari Asadullah alias Abdul Haye) and the Jaish-e-Mohammed (controlled by Maulana Masood Azhar) revere Maulana Haq Nawaz Jhangvi and have been actively involved in the killing of Shias in Sind. Maulana Tariq Azam's outfit (Sipah-e-Sahaba) is believed to have links with the MQM (Haqiqi), the Mohajir militant group opposed to the one headed by London-based Altaf Husain and once patronised by the Government of Pakistan. In the area from Karachi to Gilgit Maulana Tariq is supposed to be more powerful than even General Musharraf, according to Friday Times. A well-researched article by Azmat Abbas on the activities of the Lashkar, carried in The Herald magazine of August, has interesting details: "The increase in the incidents of sectarian killings in Karachi seems to have confirmed the fears of the Criminal Investigation Department (CID), Punjab, a special wing of the Punjab police established to combat terrorism, which reported the possibility of such an eventuality to its counterparts in Karachi several months ago. The CID's analysis was based on a split in the ranks of Pakistan's most dreaded terrorist organisation, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi. CID (Punjab) officials had warned the Karachi police that the LJ faction headed by Riaz Basra, the country's most wanted terrorist, may step up its activity in Karachi in a competitive show of strength vis-a-vis the Qari faction... "The LJ has been operating throughout Pakistan since its inception in 1994. It was founded by Riaz Basra when he developed differences with the SSP (Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan) soon after escaping from a court in Lahore, where he had been produced in connection with the murder of Sadiq Ganji, Director of the Iranian Culture Centre...The LJ split a few weeks ago when its acting Amir, Riaz Basra, announced his plan of starting a fresh round of sectarian killings to force the government to release the LJ's arrested leaders and declare their rival sect as infidels. However, Qari Asadullah, chairperson of the LJ's Majlis-e-Shoora, opposed the plan...This was the first time somebody from within the ranks of the organisation had challenged Basra's authority. But Qari Asadullah was no ordinary member. Apart from being the Majlis-e-Shoora chairperson, he also held charge of the LJ's training camps in Afghanistan, ostensibly the most powerful position in the organisation." A close study of the sectarian, ethnic and Kashmir-centric outfits run in the name of religion shows that soon they may turn Pakistan into another Afghanistan if allowed to operate in the manner they have been doing so far.
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It is the mind in us that yields to the laws made by us, but never the spirit in us. *** A traveller am I and a navigator, and everyday, I discover a new region within my soul. *** I said to Life: "I would hear death speak". And Life raised her voice a little higher and said, "You hear him now". *** Man is two men One is awake in darkness; the other is asleep in light. *** Beauty shines brighter in the heart of him who longs for it then in the eyes of him who sees it. — Kahlil Gibran, Sand and Foam *** It is more fitting for a man to laugh at life than to lament over it. — Seneca, Moral Essays:
"On Peace of Mind" *** Life is given to us We earn it by giving it. — Rabindranath Tagore, Lover's Gift *** Human life is but a series of footnotes to a vast obscure unfinished masterpiece. — Vladimir
Nabokov, Pale Fire: "Commentary" *** Life is like an onion which one peels crying. — French proverb *** Life: the permission to know death. — Djuna Barnes, Nightwood *** The body is only a flesh-covered cage of bones in which the bird of life stays for a time. — Paramahansa Yogananda, Man's Eternal Quest and Other Talks |
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