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Monday,
May 27, 2002, Chandigarh, India  
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Why Pak missile test now Deuba is out
Compulsions of India & Pak rulers |
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Windows of opportunity on economic front
A tall order & challenge for public schools
Arthritis: foods that cause & cure it
Pakhal, humble Oriya diet, redefined!
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Why Pak missile test now The test-firing of Hatf-V (Ghauri) and Hatf-III (Ghaznavi) surface-to-surface ballistic missiles by Pakistan at a time when war clouds are yet to disappear from the horizon raises certain questions. Is it aimed at demonstrating the non-conventional (nuclear, to be precise) strike power of a belligerent neighbour diplomatically cornered by India? Does this amount to sending a message to the world community that Pakistan is ready to use the weapon of mass destruction if the situation so demands? After all, the Ghauri missile, believed to be a Pakistani version of North Korea's Nodong-II missile system, is capable of delivering nuclear warheads covering a distance between 1500 km and 2000 km. Does the Pervez Musharraf government want to tell the world, particularly the USA, to do everything possible to restrain India from launching a military strike at Pakistan, even if it is a limited one, as the action might lead to an all-out war between the two regional nuclear powers? Or is the whole exercise meant to silence the ruling General's critics (political, religious and others) who have been accusing him of having brought their country to the edge of a precipice endangering its very existence? Looking at the whole show in the context of General Musharraf's latest pronouncements under international pressure that "Pakistan or any territory under its control" would not be allowed to be used for spreading terrorism, it is believed that the missile test has been carried out to prepare the ground for initiating drastic steps against Kashmir-centric terrorist networks. It goes without saying that all this must have been planned with American approval. Pakistani newspapers have reported that "sweeping measures" against militant outfits, some of them already banned, have been finalised. Certain key ministries, including those dealing with finance and law and justice, and the State Bank of Pakistan have already been sounded about an impending action. Of course, it is a difficult ball game for General Musharraf. He and his predecessors have mindlessly used Kashmir as an intoxicant for the public to hide their failures on politico-economic and other fronts. They all knew that this could lead their country to breaking point, but they never bothered about the obvious result. India has succeeded in mounting considerable pressure on the Musharraf regime, which can no longer sustain itself as well as Pakistan without abandoning the Kashmir obsession. The time has come for Pakistan to be realistic enough and give a new look to its Kashmir policy. The pressure on Islamabad is expected to increase further when British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw arrives in New Delhi today. The UK leader's visit will be followed by US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, who is reaching India on June 6. India has given two months' notice to the world community to force General Musharraf to destroy the terrorist industry's infrastructure in Pakistan, but that is not enough. New Delhi should insist on an effective and transparent international mechanism to monitor and verify the implementation of the commitments made by the wily General disguisedly or otherwise. Verification of his anti-terrorism measures should be a precondition before India decides to withdraw its forces from the border or make any other de-escalation move. |
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Infighting has been an abiding feature of the ruling Nepali Congress, but rarely has the matter come out in the open as it does now. The decision of Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba to extend the state of emergency declared in November last year and dissolve Parliament on realising that he won’t be able to get its approval for this extension has caused a turmoil in the country. His party has expelled him for three years for “violating democratic values, norms and practices”. This step was taken after three of his ministerial colleagues resigned against his decision. However, 33 other ministers rose to his defence asking party chief G.P. Koirala to withdraw the suspension of the Prime Minister. The latter responded by expelling him.That is a clear indicator that the party is vertically divided and this clash of egos can cause a political upheaval. The Opposition, which was already seething with anger against the extension of the emergency because it suspended some civil liberties and the subsequent dissolution of Parliament, could not have asked for a better opportunity to humiliate the government. Mr Deuba has been insistent that not extending the state of emergency will demoralise the security forces and affect the battle against the Maoist rebels. The political duel in Kathmandu will indeed take the attention away from the Maoist violence that is the biggest menace facing the country. The unsettled situation will embolden the rebels to sharpen their attacks on the government forces. The political one-upmanship has made sure that the general administration gets ignored. As it is, people’s problems are grossly neglected in Nepal. The current state of drift will further alienate the public, thereby making the ground ripe for Maoist uprising, especially in the border areas. Unfortunately, Nepalese politicians have not displayed far-sightedness in excessive measure in the past. Petty squabbling has let them neglect the larger issues. The controversy that has arisen now is serious enough to put the kingdom’s fledgling multi-party democracy in jeopardy. It has been announced that elections will be held in November but the prevailing situation is so gloomy that most politicians are of the view that it just won’t be possible to hold the polls. Ironically, instead of tackling the actual problems at hand, several politicians have been tilting at the windmills. A few of them have even tried to spread the canard that India has been extending its tacit support to Maoist activists. Nothing could be farther from the truth. India has been a victim of this violence itself and has been going out of its way to extend a helping hand to its neighbour. Only if the politicians bury their own differences can they tackle the common enemy that is staring them in the eye. |
Compulsions of India & Pak rulers It seems to me that the rulers of both India and Pakistan find a confrontation on the border, and the threat of hostilities useful to maintain stability. In India it takes us away from the debacle of Gujarat, and the threat of a change of government held out by the Left initiative. For General Musharraf it is undoubtedly a boom. He has barely settled down in the chair, his own officers are breathing down his neck, the clergy holding a dagger to his heart for helping the Americans, and the politicians all ganging up against him. If India can be projected as the enemy, some kind of unity in Pakistan is possible. Both sides are helping each other by rough talk. It is the poor that have to pay the price in both countries. If Gen Pervez Musharraf were to talk candidly, he would say, “I have not yet been able to get proper control over Pakistan. Everything is chaotic, the economy is a shambles, the police is letting me down. A hundred doctors have been killed in Karachi and they can’t tell me who is doing it. Killing the French gave us a major setback, and now the British are playing up as usual. I have my hands full of political termites, and Indians say you are not able to control jehadis. Do you think I would send them, of all things, to shoot up families at an Army camp in Jammu? It is a sin, and I as an army officer, would not commit it. These terrorists are a law unto themselves. Fattened on foreign money, they are a nuisance as much to me as to India. If only they would give me time, I can lock them all up. I really wish I could have a frank chat with Mr Vajpayee. If only we could talk frankly with each other and work out a new era of India-Pakistan relations. I may have made mistakes in Agra, a soldier never understands politics, and if I appear to be too friendly, my own chaps would throw me out of the window. We need some show of enmity to appear reliable.” The Prime Minister of India sat pensively in his chair, ruminating over the shame of Gujarat. “What can I say to clear my name? I am harried by my party, my partners in the NDA, and every blessed editor wants to have a crack at me for words I never used. What has really made me feel depressed is the shame that the Government of Gujarat has brought on us. Anyway, the problem with Pakistan will probably take people’s minds away from all these matters. Today the border is active with rockets and mortars blowing fire. The cost, they tell me, will be damnable, and if at the same time we have steeply rising oil prices, a severe drought, and another state goes the Gujarat way, it may be difficult for us. Mr Soli Sorabjee going would be a real loss to me.” General Musharraf and our Prime Minister may like to push away from their thoughts the safety of millions who live below the poverty line, worrying about starvation from day to day. That is the core issue for both. There are no options in a poor subcontinent. General Musharraf and Mr Vajpayee will be blamed in history for a confrontation which both know cannot be taken to its limits but which keeps both of them happy and secure. If war is not an option, why keep the armed forces on the border for months? Has anyone calculated the cost of this method of frightening an adversary? Even the cost of one shell is enough to keep a poor family happy for a year. Apart from the cost, will the escalation on the border not give an impetus to communalism? Do we want more Gujarats, more punishment of totally innocent people, and more international censure? We want to take all options, diplomatic, commercial, military. The easiest one of sending men into strike at the camps in PoK was shot down by the then Prime Minister to whom it was suggested. He said, “What will the world say?” I suppose it would be the same today. Diplomatic pressure, they say, is our best bet. After many trips abroad we will come to the conclusion that the cost was serious — the result did not affect General Musharraf. It is true the General lacks consistency. Perhaps, he has to keep changing his stand because his country is unstable, called a failed state, and he is considered a free-booter by politicians. He does not seem to know that a man is trusted in the world only if he sticks to one woman, and keeps his word. The first condition he has fulfilled; the second he has yet to learn. Yet, can you blame him if he has to deal with the Taliban, Al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden in hiding and a host of criminals posing as religious leaders who would like to replace him with someone so fundamentalist that he can hardly be seen above the earth. We have to give General Musharraf time to deal with jehadis. He will have to do it; he had promised to do it. At least we have to hear what he has to say. President Bush will keep him on the mark, I am sure. We have to find methods of working with the General. Instead of that, if we go round trying to create opposition for him, we will never be able to develop friendly ties with a neighbour. We have begun to distrust General Musharraf and want him to distrust us. Is that good strategy? We want to threaten and raise hopes of a conflict, and then say that it was only a pretence. When the Americans say conciliate, they may not know that we need an outward show of discord for our political well-being. When the telephone lines between Mr Colin Powell and Mr Jaswant Singh keep jangling over anxious enquiries about what our intentions are, I wonder if they know that a little bickering is all that we want to do. We won’t go beyond talking about a new strategy or rely on the statements of men whose knowledge of war is limited to film “Haqiqat” and the border that they hear about but have never seen. Mr George Bush, Mr Condoleeza Rice (what a lovely name), Mr Colin Powell, Ms Christina Rocca — the names sound like the titles of a new MGM film, “The Conciliators”. Instead of prolonged diplomatic exchanges, can we have a three-corned meeting between Mr Bush, General Musharraf and Mr Vajpayee and make sure that misunderstandings are cleared, that plans are made for containing the jehadis, and we begin to talk about poverty and development again. Behind all the bragging about war there is a growing feeling that our strategy of dealing with infiltration and terrorism has failed. That is a totally wrong concept that we are spreading. It does not take into account the fact that in every case the terrorists have been defeated. They have paid with death every time. The main factor which should determine our strategy is the attitude of the people of the Kashmir valley. The murder of Hurriyat leader Abdul Ghani Lone will give another blow to the militants, and we can look forward to the day when the people of the valley will themselves
rise and help immobilise every militant that is among them. We do not need anything more than that to deal with terrorism. |
Windows of opportunity on economic front Transparency International, which some time ago ranked India as one of the most corrupt countries in the world, would have given this “honour” 150 years ago to Great Britain where public offices were up for sale. Graft and nepotism were rampant, so much so that several former employees of the erstwhile East India Company became MPs in this fashion. Even the judiciary and the armed forces could not remain unscathed. Today Britain ranks as one of the cleanest countries in the world. Why and wherefore would warrant a separate study. Suffice it to say that it was a slow, educative and evolutionary process. Rise of the entrepreneurial class with the Industrial Revolution, impact of puritanism and Protestant work ethics, the French revolution, followed by multifarious reforms coupled with the heightened awareness for a change, and much else, transformed it totally. We the people, who inherited the British institutions and their systems, failed to empower the people, inter alia, socio-economically. Without the prerequisites in place, our systems did not deliver. Be it as it may, we have come a long way. Every problem can be solved if there is the requisite will to address it. Let us talk of a few windows of opportunity in an otherwise grim scenario. Infrastructure reform seems to have lost the urgency it commanded earlier, thanks to the ongoing recession. This is the right time to usher in substantial infrastructure reforms what with the falling interest rates and the lowered cost of capital. The American canal boom in the 1830s and the railroad boom of the 1870s, during the periods of weak prices, should serve as good examples. Besides the services sector, infrastructure is one area where labour can be productively employed. Construction activity, especially housing, highways and rural roads offer considerable potential for employment across the country. Given our comfortable forex reserves, it would be wise to invest in infrastructure and related development projects — power, ports, railways. This win-win situation makes for a virtuous circle. A vicious cycle, on the other hand, would be caused by inefficient infrastructure, the extra production/distribution cost, delayed delivery schedule, overstocked inventory and shrinking bottomlines. Let us make correct choices. Levy of user charges on public utilities and phased withdrawal of subsidies have been our betes noires. Proponents of free water and free power are, in fact, answerable for double whammy. Not only did they make us all broke and beggars, they did not earn popularity either. The so-called populist measures have seldom made anyone popular. Today’s tenuous coalition governments testify to this. According to a study, the total subsidies amount to 14 per cent of the GDP (as the situation existed till January this year), equal to the total tax revenue. If they are slashed by half the GDP will grow by 2 per cent. How long can we allow the short-term to remain the enemy of the long-term? Coming to agriculture, obsolete methods and practices have perpetuated rural poverty. Whereas the extant policies of procurement and storage need to be reviewed, the government would do well to give a fillip to the food processing industries to prevent distress sales during the period of glut, among others. Similarly, corporatisation of agriculture would facilitate better utilisation of resources by husbanding technology and market to the hilt. This is a labour-intensive area too. Labour reforms are crucial to the competitiveness of our economy. China has successfully made employment a contract between the worker and the management. Why can’t we? It is a pity of proportions that the political class has so far failed to “market” the market to the masses. Doublespeak on the state-market debate has become counter-productive. Poverty is a scourge. This is nothing but the absence of economic achievement. And economic achievements are made in markets. Who else but we should know it better, having had our tryst with the state-sponsored socialism? It is true that the last decade of liberalisation has benefited not so much the have-nots, as the have-somes who have seen unprecedented upward mobility. But that is no reason to halt the process. Let us explore an alternative vision. In the ultimate analysis, it is the political class which has to make the correct choices. In a democracy, technocrats or specialists cannot make fundamental policy choices. Politicians may not be the best qualified people but at least they are answerable to the people. Let them settle it, but soon. Who doesn’t know that none of our problems is intractable, and we don’t have to reinvent the wheel. We lack nothing but the requisite will to act and implement. |
A tall order & challenge for public schools India’s public schools are always in the public eye. Their privileged alumni may not care too much for or have much to do with the public by choice, but for the middle class millions their style and system are the ones to ape and imitate for their own climb up the social and economic ladder. Doon, Sanawar, Mayo and others of their kind are a class apart, at least that’s how they are perceived to be. This may arouse strong bouts of anger and envy in the public mind, but they do remain role-models and a world unto themselves. Each of their worlds is an extremely privileged one with hundreds of acres of campus and a minimum of a lakh for annual fees and associated expenditure. These schools would hesitate to admit it, but they are also a caste apart. Most of their students are either drawn from the twice-born castes or from communities and classes who like to see themselves in a mould of high-casteist behaviour and attitudes. While adopting and practising such attitudes, they also like to deny them in order to maintain a politically correct public posture. If at some stage someone were to suggest that these schools should be asked to reserve a minimum percentage of admissions for those who are from beyond the twice-born castes, it would certainly cause chronic turmoil in their collective blood pressure. Even though the language and behaviour of public school types is often crude and sexist, their fluency with spoken English enables the alumni to be referred to as gentlemen. More and more of these gentlemen-in-the-making while at school, and those in the fast lanes of the business world exhibit certain characteristics peculiar to themselves. One, there is a strong suggestion of an already achieved or potential obesity in them. Two, when having a get-together amongst themselves, they like to be photographed with a glass in hand. Three, they like to stand by each other in business and politics even if it should end up financing and arming hoodlums to protect their self-interest. Four, they like to marry each other’s sisters from the same school, from Welham, or in the last resort their spouses should at lest be from Modern or DPS. And five, at some stage of their life, they expect to be noticed and rewarded for doing their bit to promote the game of golf even if their families break up and a few thousand peasants should lose out on a few thousand acres of ancestral land. For the past couple of years the Doon School has been engaged in an exercise to look ahead and plan for the 21st century. Meetings and interactions have been held, suggestions invited. The emphasis has been on campus renovation, demolishing accommodation for service staff, employing service staff through contractors and upgrading teaching skills. The alumni has been keen for the school to be recognised as a distinctive brand of efficiency and superiority. Any talk of trying to reform and change the structures of discipline, hierarchy and internal governance, any talk of re-thinking their educational aims and objectives by incorporating the ideas of Tagore, Sri Aurobindo, Gandhi and J. Krishnamuriti; any talk of sensitising students to human rights and inculcating a critical awareness of ruling establishments — nationally and internationally — all such talk is considered to be superfluous and simply waved away by the retired CEOs, generals and luminaries from the media who constitute the alumni’s brains-trust. Our public schools are very fearful of winds of change. They like to filter and bar unorthodox ideas from other role-models with strong screens and spikes inserted into their cultural and ideological framework. They are afraid of non-conformist, unconventional ideas and behaviour. They are afraid to subject themselves to analysis and discourse from educationists and thinkers, who might not be privy to their social mores, their utilitarian and authoritarian ways of conducting school life. The other hallmarks of these schools are competitive tension, the urge to always be in win-win situation, fear of authority, a general atmosphere of bullying and taking undue advantage of privilege. Another is a tendency for greedy indulgence. When Doon celebrates its Founder’s Day, at least half a dozen invitation cards sally forth from the Headmaster to a clutch of teas, lunches, cocktails and dinners. There is no taboo on the variety and quantity of alcoholic beverages, cigarettes and cigars. The staff too may smoke and drink in their homes on the campus whenever they want. It is also not uncommon for parents to make generous offerings of these beverages to staff members. There is a strong resemblance of the social life within these schools to what goes on in clubs, hotels and army messes in the outside world. There is in all these schools a shady underground world of the world of booze, fags, pressure for sexual favours, theft (as confiscation of personal belongings of the weak by the strong), and envy of those who get away with these aberrations with a halo around their persona. An interesting, though delicate, situation exists in the Lawrence School (established in 1847 as an asylum) on the hill of Sanawar, near Kasauli. After alleged corruption and failure of leadership on the part of two recent heads (on drawn from Doon, the other an alumni of Sanawar itself), Sanawar now has an Englishman as Headmaster. The ethos and ambience of the school are very British as are many of its traditions. In the old days there was also a military element in school, but this has now been virtually watered down to extinction. As it is today, here is a school that is typical of the schizophrenia and state of philosophical limbo that have been characteristic of Indian public schools. There is little that is Indian about them except that it is mainly Indians who study and teach in them. Yet in Sanawar, sections of the staff and some parents and ex-students feel uncomfortable about having an English head. The Englishman in question is a no-nonsense task-master who has chalked out a five-year school development plan, the man has a sense of humour, is humane, an accomplished mathematician, IT freak, musician and a theatre person. Pretty good credentials, you would think, to head a school anywhere in the world. However, because of the kind of school Sanawar is, because of the restricted world-view of its alumni, because of an inability to make contact and interact beyound the public school fraternity inside and outside the country, English or no Englishman as head, a Sanawar, a Doon or Mayo find it difficult to break free, to draw inspiration and enlightenment from the salt, earth, and grassroots of India. For ultimately the universal values of piety, compassion and excellence are germinated not in greenhouses or ivory towers, but from within temples and gymnasiums of learning that belong in the soil from which they have been built. Public schools are institutions of privilege. They owe it to develop and propagate an ethos not of snobbery and one-upmanship, but of humility and service. This is tall order, but a challenge the Doon and Sanawars should take up. |
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Arthritis: foods that cause & cure it Like it or not, none of us is getting any younger. And while the passage of time may bring with it desirable qualities such as wisdom and maturity, its effects on our physical health are generally less desirable. The ageing process takes its toll on the body, upping our chances of succumbing to all manner of unpleasant symptoms and ailments. One condition to which we can be prone as we age is arthritis. Wear and tear of cartilage tissue in the joints can give rise to a condition called
osteoarthritis, which usually manifests as pain and stiffness in major weight-bearing joints such as the hips, knees and spine. Compared to heavyweight conditions like heart disease and cancer, osteoarthritis gets scant attention. Yet, while it may not kill, even a relatively minor problem with it can be a major issue: a painful hip or knee may cause considerable discomfort, and can quite easily put the brakes on our ability to enjoy full, active lives. The pain and stiffness that accompanies arthritis is essentially the result of a process known as inflammation. Certain foods, namely red meat, dairy products, and processed and fried foods tend to encourage inflammation in the body, and sufferers of osteoarthritis should give such foods a wide berth. At the same time, it may help to increase consumption of foods known to have natural anti-inflammatory action in the body. The omega-3 fats found in oily fish
(eg, salmon, trout, mackerel, herring and sardines) and walnuts seem to be important in this respect. Another useful natural agent for osteoarthritis is ginger, which has been shown to reduce the production of inflammatory substances in the body. Ginger tea, made by steeping some freshly grated, chopped or sliced root ginger in hot water for five or 10 minutes, makes an ideal brew for sufferers of
osteoarthritis. The Observer |
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Pakhal, humble Oriya diet, redefined! For long failing to find a place on the dining tables of the classes, Pakhal or watered rice, today has been embraced by the well-to-do in Orissa. The humble staple diet of villagers and those with rural roots in cities, Pakhal’s potent qualities are suddenly being discovered even as the mercury shot up to unprecedented levels in the state this summer. Pakhal has even found a place in the menu chart of hotels and restaurants in the cities of Orissa, including Bhubaneswar and Puri. “Pakhal has been in great demand and we are here to provide what our clients want,” said the manager of a popular restaurant in a posh colony here. It is being served to about 100 customers daily since the temperatures soared, he said. The watered rice, which is taken with assortment of fried ‘badi’, vegetables or fish, is now being prescribed by doctors as an antidote to sun-stroke. “We have been relishing Pakhal for ages, now they are projecting it as if it is a new discovery,” said a housewife commenting on the inclusion of Pakhal to dos and don’ts being advertised by the government to ward off the heat.
PTI Fighting cataract with tea Cataract of the human eye lens accounts for over 42 per cent of blindness around the world. There are about 17 million people today who are cataract blind and it is estimated that there are 28,000 new cataract cases everyday. People over 50 years of age are most susceptible to this disease. Nutrition and cataract are clearly linked. Those with a nutrition-rich diet of fruits and vegetables seem less prone to cataracts. Experiments performed by a molecular biologist, Dr Dorairanjan Balasubramanian, at L.V. Prasad Eye Institute show that antioxidants in tea may help fight cataracts. Dr Balasubramanian notes that the Chinese, among the world’s heaviest tea drinkers, have a below average incidence of cataracts. Tea (both green and black) is a rich source of antioxidants called flavanoids. There is a growing body of evidence which confirms that antioxidants in our diet help to prevent and repair the damage caused by free radical attack. The antioxidative property of tea helps relieve the oxidative stress in the eye lens, says a Brooke Bond press release.
TNS |
‘Where have I come from, where did you pick me up? the baby asked its mother. She answered half crying, half laughing and clasping the baby to her breast,— ‘You were hidden in my heart as its desire, my darling. You were in the dolls of my childhood’s games; and when with clay I made the image of my god every morning. I made and unmade you then. You were enshrined with our household deity, in his worship I worshipped you. In all my hopes and my loves, in my life, in the life of my mother you have lived. In the lap of the deathless Spirit who rules our home you have been nursed for ages. When in girlhood my heart was opening its petals, you hovered as a fragrance about it. Your tender softness bloomed in my youthful limbs, like a glow in the sky before the sunrise. Heaven’s first darling, twin-born with the morning light, you have floated down the stream of the world’s life, and at last you have stranded on my heart. As I gaze on your face, mystery overwhelms me; you who belong to all have become mine. For fear of losing you I hold you tight to my breast. What magic has snared the world’s treasure in these slender arms of mine? —Rabindranath Tagore *** If thou covetest riches, ask not but for contentment, which is an immense treasure. —Sheikh Saadi, Gulistan *** Contentment confers bliss and happiness. —Baba Hardev Singh, Gems of Truth.
*** He who is contented is rich. —Lao Tse, the Character of Tao (tr. Lin
Yutang)
*** If you would know contentment, let your deeds be few. —Democritus. Cited in Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations. |
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