E D I T O R I A L   P A G E

EDITORIALS

A jail called Myanmar
Exactly one year after her release last May, Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi is back in jail. There are reports that she is injured in the head although the military junta has denied this. However, since the regime is an expert in peddling lies, the apprehensions about the health of the Nobel Laureate are justified.

Frontier Taliban
Those who think that the Taliban is dead as dodo should revise their opinion. The religious outfit that misinterpreted Islam to suit its agenda of the dark ages is re-emerging in Afghanistan’s immediate neighbourhood — Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province. It does not have the same name in this Pashtun-dominated state. 

LDC, what is that?
Marx must have turned in his grave over the obvious imbalance in the scale of coverage of two parallel meetings on the future of the global economy. The G8 conclave at Evian and the LDC trade ministers’ conference in Dhaka opened at about the same time. 

OPINION

Why some are so poor, some so rich
Hoodwinking in the name of reservation
A.J. Philip
I have not yet been able to understand the Biblical verse, “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the Kingdom of God” (Luke 6:20). Theologians have their own interpretations, which vary from person to person. But is poverty a blessed state? The poor know that there is nothing “blessed” about their life at least in this world. The diligent among them know that it is not necessary for a poor person to remain poor all his life. 

MIDDLE

The modern ‘Field Marshal’
Shriniwas Joshi
The countryside of Shimla in rains is a beautiful sight — velvet green meadows and corn plants with almost ready corncobs gracing the terraced fields. There are scarecrows too. With times, their shapes, sizes and style have changed. In olden days, four branches lopped from a beol tree (Grewia oppositifolia) were converted into the legs and feet of the scarecrow. 

Whistling through woods, the romance continues
Ruchika M. Khanna
An engineering feat. A nature lover's delight. A journey for both masses and classes. The Kalka-Shimla rail route, which completes its 100 years on November 9 this year, offers the perfect ambience of British nostalgia amidst lofty pines, lush greens and misty mountains. 

How the Simla route shaped up
It was in 1816 that the British government retained a part of the hill on which Shimla now stands after the close of the Gurkha war. The British established a cantonement at Sabathu and started the First Nasiri Battalion. Capt. Ross, its commandant, constructed for himself a log hut with a thatched roof here, which marked the beginning of Shimla.

All for the body Richard Luscombe
Vera Lawrence’s sudden death at the age of 53 stunned her friends and family. They had always known her as a fit and lively woman. Although she was overweight she had never suffered any serious health problems.

SPIRITUAL NUGGETS

EDITORIALS

A jail called Myanmar

Exactly one year after her release last May, Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi is back in jail. There are reports that she is injured in the head although the military junta has denied this. However, since the regime is an expert in peddling lies, the apprehensions about the health of the Nobel Laureate are justified. Her bravery in the face of the might of the ruthless generals is the stuff legends are made of. But even that has not brought democracy any closer to reality. The reason, perhaps, is that the world opinion does not go much beyond paying lip service. This time, although US President George W. Bush and UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan have expressed their indignation at her re-arrest on Friday on a flimsy charge, India has yet to do even that. Realpolitik seems to have dictated to it to develop a working relationship with the dictators. Myanmarese freedom fighters look up to India for support, but since some guerrillas also use Myanmarese territory to launch attacks on India, the latter has to take care of its own security concerns as well. That, however, does not mean that Delhi should not mount pressure on Yangon to give up its barbarity.

It is not only Aung San Suu Kyi who has been incarcerated. It is almost the whole populace of the country that has been similarly kept in chains. She has been in and out of jails for about half the time that she has spent in her homeland ever since her National League of Democracy swept the country's last election in 1990, romping home with 392 out of 485 seats. Many of her countrymen are worse off. The army rulers have all but burnt the bridges that connected the country with the rest of the world. They are so paranoid that one can neither listen to outside radio stations nor use the Internet. Life beyond the bamboo curtain can be a torture. Scarcity, poverty and isolation have taken their toll and the homeland of 45 million people, which at one time was the world’s largest rice producer, is today one of the poorest nations in the world. Senior army officers not only keep the common man under their jackboots, they are also systematically depriving everybody of his accumulated riches. Everyone dreads the midnight knock, which means a long stint behind bars if one is lucky and an unceremonial death if one is not. It is indeed a pity that such a state has continued for close to 13 years. Worse, the unsettled conditions have spawned terrorism. The smuggling of drugs goes hand in hand with this nefarious activity.

Frontier Taliban

Those who think that the Taliban is dead as dodo should revise their opinion. The religious outfit that misinterpreted Islam to suit its agenda of the dark ages is re-emerging in Afghanistan’s immediate neighbourhood — Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province. It does not have the same name in this Pashtun-dominated state. The Taliban’s hated agenda has found acceptance there. The provincial Assembly, following in the footsteps of the erstwhile Taliban regime, has adopted the Shariat Bill which will lead to the implementation of most of the laws which took Afghanistan centuries back. If the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal-led coalition government has its way, ailing women in the NWFP will be barred from visiting male doctors and girls will be deprived of the light of education in the absence of institutions exclusively meant for the fair sex. In fact, everything the Taliban regime did may be replicated in the NWFP. The contagion may quickly spread to another state, Baluchistan, also a tribal area bordering Afghanistan. The federal government in Islamabad is opposed to the dubious agenda of the NWFP regime, but only time will tell how far it can go to prevent the Talibanisation of the tribal province. This is unlikely to be a matter of priority for President Pervez Musharraf as he is negotiating a deal with the MMA over his continuance as the Chief of Army Staff as well. The MMA has slightly climbed down from its earlier position that the general should discard his uniform by August 14, Pakistan’s independence day, to remain the country’s President. Now the MMA has given him one year’s time to make up his mind, but the general is insisting on two years.

As part of his bargaining tactics, President Musharraf has engineered the resignation of all the district Nazims in the NWFP on the issue of curtailment of their powers by the state government. But this may not deter the MMA-led regime from changing its larger plan — implementation of what it calls the Shariat laws. The ruling alliance argues that the controversial Bill has no provision which goes against the Pakistan Constitution. But legal experts point out that the new law, besides giving a bad name to Islam, will jeopardise human rights of women and others, including the minorities. Development issues will also get sidelined by a religiously overenthusiastic government. In the process, the province, known for disguised Al-Qaeda presence, may become an ideal breeding ground for terrorism. If the world community ignores the alarming developments, it will do so at its own peril.

LDC, what is that?

Marx must have turned in his grave over the obvious imbalance in the scale of coverage of two parallel meetings on the future of the global economy. The G8 conclave at Evian and the LDC trade ministers’ conference in Dhaka opened at about the same time. While G8 hogged the limelight, few television channels bothered to cover the Dhaka meeting. Can the international community really afford to ignore the genuine economic concerns of the least developed countries (LDCs)? If yes, for how long? Evian may not have come to Dhaka, but Dhaka had a strong presence in Evian in the form of anti-rich protesters. The issues that were discussed at Dhaka were expressed more forcefully, often a shade violently, by the nearly 200,000 protesters. Had any G8 leader taken the trouble of flying out to Dhaka he would have had a more authentic data on what was wrong with the global economy. An economy that grows at the expense of the poor would be called exploitative, even if there was no Marx to expose to the world the exploitative face of a ruthlessly pro-capitalist world order. The policies of the G8 have caused environmental degradation. Yet, the biggest polluter, the US, has refused to sign either the Basel Convention against dumping and recycling of hazardous waste or the Kyoto Protocol on the reduction of greenhouse gases. The poor nations have to bear the consequences of the indulgences of the rich. The LDCs had a spokesman in President Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria at the G8 summit. He made a forceful plea for a more active involvement of the rich nations in eradicating poverty, hunger and disease from Africa and parts of Asia.

There was a passing reference to providing more funds for fighting AIDS at the G8 meeting. The main focus was on getting from US President George W. Bush a bit of the Iraq pie. But away from the media glare the LDC representatives and trade ministers from 49 countries did succeed in putting in place a 15-point Dhaka Declaration that should serve as a roadmap for the future. The LDCs agreed to evolve a mechanism that would ensure "a proportionate market share to each one of them, besides special and differential treatment of market access with flexible rules of origin and temporary movement of natural persons". Overall, the mood was glum because of the continued marginalisation and slow implementation of even the inadequate economic commitments by the rich nations to the LDCs. Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee returned happy from Evian because of the range of issues he was able to discuss with leaders of the rich nations. But a developing country like India may find more scope for doing business with the LDCs and on more attractive terms than are offered by the rich. Unhappily, there was no one to represent India at Dhaka.

OPINION

Why some are so poor, some so rich
Hoodwinking in the name of reservation
A.J. Philip

I have not yet been able to understand the Biblical verse, “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the Kingdom of God” (Luke 6:20). Theologians have their own interpretations, which vary from person to person. But is poverty a blessed state? The poor know that there is nothing “blessed” about their life at least in this world. The diligent among them know that it is not necessary for a poor person to remain poor all his life. By dint of hard work and perseverance, he can improve his condition and there are innumerable instances of it.

It was purely for this reason that the founding fathers of the Constitution did not consider it necessary to provide reservation for the economically backward, though such demands were indeed made in the Constituent Assembly. Educational and social backwardness are the only grounds on which reservations are extended. An attempt is now on to amend the Constitution with a view to providing reservation to the economically backward sections of upper castes also.

Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot took everyone by surprise when he announced last week 14 per cent reservation for the poor among the upper castes like the Rajputs and the Brahmins. In doing so, the Congress Chief Minister sought to pay the BJP back in its own coin. For starters, in the last Assembly elections, the BJP had tried to steal a march over the Congress when Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee accorded the Other Backward Class (OBC) status to the Jats. It is a different matter that it failed to deliver the goods to the BJP.

In the BJP’s bid to be one up on the Congress, the party has announced its readiness to set up a Commission for the Economically Backward Classes. The government will also have to get around the Supreme Court ruling in the Mandal case that the total quantum of reservation should not exceed 50 per cent. Given the fact that the BJP and the Congress together have the requisite strength in Parliament to amend the Constitution, their convergence on this issue is indeed disturbing.

It is often forgotten that reservation is granted to the Dalits and Other Backward Classes not because they are poor but because they have suffered discrimination for centuries and are, therefore, socially and educationally backward. There is no denying that they now have a sizeable presence in the bureaucracy thanks to the affirmative action of the state. But they are nowhere in the private sector. Is it because they are incompetent and cannot face competition? During the Centenary of Babasaheb Ambedkar, the V.P. Singh government wanted to nominate a Scheduled Caste journalist from among the hundreds of accredited correspondents in Delhi to a government committee but it could not do so because there was no such journalist. Even today, over a decade later, the situation in the national Capital is not much different.

What will be their condition if reservation is denied to them in government service? Whether the children of those who have once availed of the benefits of reservation should get them at the cost of others among their own castes is a different kettle of fish. Even in the US, which is considered the mecca of capitalism, the private sector has institutionalised mechanisms to ensure social justice.

Few people realise that the first beneficiaries of reservation were the upper castes. Many professions like priesthood, teaching and soldiery were reserved exclusively for certain upper castes. As a result, dissemination of knowledge did not take place. To bring home the point, Christ and Greek philosophers like Aristotle are all depicted in paintings as sporting flowing beards. This means they did not have access to razors. In sharp contrast, Buddha who lived six centuries before Christ is depicted clean shaven in countless statues and paintings. This means Indians had mastered the technique of making sharp weapons, which they lost in due course like the mastery in metallurgy, the finest specimen of which is the iron pillar at Qutab Minar. This happened because the artisan was accorded a lower status than the one who could recite mumbo jumbo.

When the Battle of Plassey took place, there were many onlookers from the lower castes who watched as the small army of the British defeated Siraj-ud-daualah’s forces by hook or by crook. Why? Because the lower castes were not allowed to take up arms and were not involved in the decision-making process of the country. If each one of them had taken a stone and thrown at the British soldiers, a la David against Goliath, they would have taken the first available ship back to England.

If anything, this shows how caste-based reservation of yore had played havoc with national unity and helped the colonial powers. The pity is that vestiges of such caste-based social order are still in place in the country. There are temples where members of the Scheduled Castes are not allowed to enter, although there is no legal bar on their entry. Similarly, there are thousands of villages where the Dalits are not allowed to draw water from the village well. Nor do the Dalits have access to common village facilities. In other words, they are forced to lead segregated lives. Apartheid may have become a thing of the past in distant South Africa but for the Dalits it is a reality they have to live with every day of their lives in village after village in India.

It is for this reason that Parliament is compelled to extend the period of reservation for the Scheduled Castes, which was initially intended to last only 10 years. The Dalits have a case for such extension so long as they are victims of social discrimination. Can the same be said about the economically backward upper castes? In any case, it is within a person’s means to change his economic state. For a moment, let’s assume that the BJP has its way and reservation for the economically backward is a reality. A, who belongs to an upper caste, is chosen for a government job because he is economically backward. Then he wins a lottery and becomes rich. Will the state withdraw the job offer from him?

Or, to cite another example, a rich man squanders his wealth in gambling and is declared a pauper. Will he be entitled to reservation because he is now “economically” backward? Such cases are not figments of the imagination. Have we not heard about Bhakt Sudama, a noble but poor Brahmin, who was a friend of Lord Krishna? The moment Krishna is apprised of his poverty, Sudama’s humble hut metamorphoses into a glittering palace. When he returns home, Sudama cannot reconcile himself to the dramatic transformation in his status and suffers a heart attack.

Max Weber in his classic The Protestant Ethic and Capitalism traces the prosperity in the Protestant nations to the philosophy contained in the verse, “Seest thou a man diligent in his business? He shall stand before kings” (Proverb 22:29), that the Calvinists, Methodists and Pietists dinned into the ears of their followers. This refers basically to the idea that the highest form of moral obligation of the individual is to fulfil his duty in worldly affairs.

Taking his cue from Weber, David S. Landes built up a whole thesis, The Wealth and Poverty of Nations: Why Some Are So Rich And Some So Poor, the substance of which is that the state of richness and poverty is ephemeral and it is within the means of an individual as it is that of a country to change its economic status.

In other words, there are no rich and poor. There are only the lazy and the hardworking, the mediocre and the meritorious, the dull and the bright. The proverb says jokingly, “Either eat well or sleep well.” You can’t have both unless the BJP and the Congress join hands to provide reservation for the economically backward. 

MIDDLE

The modern ‘Field Marshal’
Shriniwas Joshi

The countryside of Shimla in rains is a beautiful sight — velvet green meadows and corn plants with almost ready corncobs gracing the terraced fields. There are scarecrows too. With times, their shapes, sizes and style have changed. In olden days, four branches lopped from a beol tree (Grewia oppositifolia) were converted into the legs and feet of the scarecrow. An inverted kilta (elongated V shapes basket) decked on the feet formed its body. A pitcher skilfully fixed on the closed end of the kilta shaped the face and the head. Clothed in rags, this scarecrow besides attracting the attention of village kids also kept the crows away.

Times changed. Simple villagers became worldly-minded. The black birds too attained “the knowledge of how to fear what is to be feared and how not to fear what is not to be feared.” The bobby standing in the fields became a comfortable perch for the crows. Invention is the daughter of necessity, so a mechanised scarecrow was contrived. A canister with some stones in it used to be hung on one of the branches of a tree near the cornfield. A long wire was tied to it with one end reaching the village dwelling. On every attack by the crows, the wire was pulled. The canister used to rattle and the crows would fly away.

Times changed further. There was less respect for law and order. The crows too became indifferent to the rattling of canister. They started using it as garbage bin for their leftovers. They were, no doubt, more civilised than some of us who did not hesitate in using the roads for throwing banana peels or food and drink disposables.

Today, terrorism prevailing in human society has taught the crows to attack not only the fields but also the open spaces where village belles put papad or bari in the sun for drying the homemade. I saw in one of my jaunts that a revised version of scarecrow to tackle the situation has come up. He sings while guarding the field.

A live scarecrow was on tune to the popular folk song. “O Ladi Shanta! Shantu tera gauria, tu be tesri Memo” (O bride Shanta! Shantu is your householder and you are his Memsahib).

And crows were all attention to the rhythm... but from a distance.

A modern Field Marshal has taken birth who knows that “music has charms to soothe a savage breast.”

Whistling through woods, the romance continues
Ruchika M. Khanna

An engineering feat. A nature lover's delight. A journey for both masses and classes. The Kalka-Shimla rail route, which completes its 100 years on November 9 this year, offers the perfect ambience of British nostalgia amidst lofty pines, lush greens and misty mountains. Since the first Briton went up in this train, the romance continues...

As the Railways prepares to celebrate the centenary of the Kalka-Shimla section, the old world charm offered by this 60 miles heritage route to the Queen of Hills, Shimla, continues to draw tourists. Other than the already existing five trains on this route, the Railways has added two holiday special trains and a rail car to keep up with the burgeoning tourist flow during summer. Such is the enthusiasm for taking this route, that all trains remain filled to capacity.

This is one of the four narrow gauge rail routes on a hill terrain, the other three being the Darjeeling, Ooty and Pathankot-Joginder Nagar routes. In fact, when the Kalka-Shimla route was proposed in 1891, the proposal was modelled on the Darjeeling route.

This is the cheapest way to reach Shimla. What draws the crowds more is the picturesque scenery along the way. Flanked by towering hills, the rail line, like the twin threads of silver, cling to the steep cliffs and ventures boldly over bridges, built over tiny streams that show off their radiance in the sunlight. The cool breeze sweeps your face as the train takes an arduous climb of almost 4800 feet from Kalka to Shimla in almost five hours.

On leaving Kalka, 2,100 feet above mean sea level, the rail line enters the foothills and begins its climb immediately on its departure from Kalka station. The train chugs along the line, whistling through the deodar, pine, ficus, oak and maple woods at a speed of 22 km an hour. As the journey begins, one is awed not just with the change in temperature and the view of natural vegetation, but also by the magnetic scenic glory of the railway stations and the Gothic style bridges along the way. These structures provide a journey back to the days of the Raj.

One of the most interesting features of the Kalka-Shimla route is the absence of girder bridges. There is only one 60-foot plate girder span in a pinewood near Dharampur and a steel trestle viaduct, which replaced a stone gallery in 1935, among the 869 bridges, representing 3 per cent of the line. Multi-arch galleries like ancient Roman aquaducts are the commonest means of carrying the line over the ravines between the hill spurs. In fact , the Railways proposes to declare two of these — the Sanwara and Kanoh bridges — as world heritage sites.

The names of most of the stations along the route —Taksal (where most of the kings of the era had their mint), Koti, Barog — and the history behind them keep you busy en route. Most of the 102 tunnels (the 1930's renumbering has not been changed till date, with numbers going up to 103, though tunnel number 46 does not exist now) too have a history of their own. The Barog tunnel, which is the longest on this route (3,752 meters), passes through fissured sand stone and has an interesting history about its name.

It is learnt that the tunnel has been named after a British railway engineer, Barog, who committed suicide after he failed to join both ends of this tunnel. He was reportedly fined Re 1 by the British Government, and ashamed of his failure, he shot himself. This tunnel, which remained the second longest tunnel in the country for several years, was finally constructed under Chief Engineer H.S. Herlington after the way for constructing this was earmarked by a local sadhu, Balku, during 1900- 1903 at a cost of Rs. 8.40 lakh. Interestingly, the incomplete tunnel constructed by Barog still exists.

The first main station is Dharampur at a height of 4,900 feet and 20 miles from Kalka. The gradient here is very steep, and in order to achieve flatter gradients required by the Railways, the line develops into three loops at Taksal, Gumman and Dharampur. After leaving Dharampur, the rail line gains on the road route by taking short cuts and tunnels so that up to Tara Devi, the distance by rail from Kalka is almost one-fourth mile less than the distance by road.

After crossing 24 miles from Kalka, the railway line is 5,200 feet above sea, where it falls to 4,900 feet at Solan, and further to 4,667 feet at Kandaghat (36 and a half miles from Kalka), where the final ascent to Shimla starts. From Tara Devi, the rail line goes round the Prospect Hill to Jatogh, winding in a series of curves round the Summer Hill and Burroughs under the Inverarm Hill to emerge below the road on the south side of Inverarm at its 59th mile, and thus reaches Shimla.

Gone are the days of travelling in the rickety coaches with wooden berths. In its place stand the freshly painted coaches which provide the comfort of chair car. Another coach, Shivalik Queen, provides the privacy in the form of coupe. For those looking for royal luxury, the Railways provides Shivalik Palace, a separate luxurious compartment with beautiful interiors, provision of sleepers and comfortable sofas for relaxing. This also has a well-equipped kitchen and an attendant to serve foods and drinks, along with attached bathroom. The other option for tourists is to take the rail car which takes lesser time to reach Shimla.

For those wanting to travel down memory lane, the Railways now offers a 25 km ride from Shimla to Katleeghat and back. But this comes at a cost of Rs. 1,08,000. This vintage narrow gauge steam locomotive (KC-520) was manufactured by Nort British Locomotive Company in 1905 and commissioned in 1906. This was withdrawn from active service in 1971 from this rail section after diesel engines were introduced. This was reintroduced in November 2001 and is generally operated for tourists, willing to pay the price. 

How the Simla route shaped up

It was in 1816 that the British government retained a part of the hill on which Shimla now stands after the close of the Gurkha war. The British established a cantonement at Sabathu and started the First Nasiri Battalion. Capt. Ross, its commandant, constructed for himself a log hut with a thatched roof here, which marked the beginning of Shimla.

Capt Charles Pratt Kennedy of Bengal Artillery succeeded Ross in 1821, and built a far more pretentious house, which was the first permanent house. Shortly after his appointment, he was entrusted with the control of local matters within the hills and designated as the Deputy Superintendent of Sikh and Hill Affairs. In 1827, Lord Amherst, the Governor-General, spent the summer at Shimla and found the place to his liking. It was under his successor, Lord William Bentinck, that Shimla became the summer headquarters of the Government of India.

However, the journey from the plains to Shimla was cumbersome. The first major achievement in this field was the opening of the Grand Hindostan and Tibet Road in 1856. Earlier, the mode of travel to the hills was by jampans (sedan chair fitted with curtains and slung on poles borne by bearers at an even sling trot) for women, and men usually rode the track via Kasauli, Kakkarhati, Haripur and Syree to Shimla. Then came the 58-mile tract to Shimla passing through Dharampur, Solan, Kairee Ghat, to be followed by the Kalka-Shimla Tonga Service.

It was during the tenure of Marquess of Dufferin as the Viceroy (1884 -1888) that the construction of a railway line was actively considered. A new company, Delhi- Umbala- Kalka Railway started the construction of the line from Ambala to Kalka in 1891. It took another ten years for extending this line to Shimla when Lord Curzon was the Viceroy, and the line was formally opened on November 9, 1903, after having spent Rs 1.6525 crore with a single track of 2ft. 6 in. gauge.

The railway stations

Interestingly, all the 20 intermediate stations on this route are located right next to the bridges. These railway stations were built here for the benefit of the labour employed for constructing the bridges, who could take rest here. Some of these intermediate stations have now been abandoned because of their being financial unviable. Though many of the small stations have a sale of less than Rs 500 a month, only a few like Jabli have been abandoned. Others like Koti, which had a sale of Rs. 86 last month, cannot be closed because of their operational importance, inform railway officials. Though the bus fares on this route have increased gradually, the Railways has so far dithered on increasing the tariff. — RMK

All for the body Richard Luscombe

Vera Lawrence’s sudden death at the age of 53 stunned her friends and family. They had always known her as a fit and lively woman. Although she was overweight she had never suffered any serious health problems.

The shock was compounded with the release of the coroner's report. The apparently clean-living woman died of a lung embolism caused by silicone leaking into her bloodstream. The post-mortem recorded six litres of liquid silicone in her body, damage to every major organ and 36 puncture marks in her hips and buttocks.

Lawrence, a secretary for a respected Miami firm, paid with her life for pursuing the American dream of everlasting youth and beauty. She died at a bizarre illegal gathering known as a 'pumping party', the victim of a shady underground network of unlicensed cosmetic surgeons who tour suburban America injecting willing participants with huge quantities of industrial-grade silicone.

Details of her death emerged last week in the trial of two people accused of her murder. The court heard how in recent years she led a secret life in which she attended many 'pumping parties' and received numerous injections of silicone in her quest to acquire more curves.

The trial, which heard that at the party Lawrence's buttocks had been injected with more than two litres of silicone intended for furniture manufacture, has focused attention on the seedy but lucrative industry in outlawed cosmetic enhancements, in which unlicensed 'doctors' can earn up to $1 million a year.

'There are daily silicone parties all over south Florida,' said Enrique Torres, chief criminal investigator with the state's Department of Health. 'People from all walks of life gather for food, drink — and to have all kinds of things injected into them. They're like Tupperware parties.

'I have a department of six investigators working flat out but we're barely scratching the surface of the problem. Since the end of 1998 we've made 211 arrests relating to the illegal cosmetic industry in Florida, 88 of them people practising without licences, injecting silicone and other unlicensed products. But the guys doing this are like cockroaches: when the light is on them they scatter and disappear, but when the light goes off again they always scuttle back.'

While the amount of silicone injected into Lawrence is considered extreme, cosmetic surgeons acknowledge that any quantity of the compound can cause problems. Bleeding and bruising are a mild side effect. Allergies, inflammatory reactions, silicone poisoning and the formation of granulomas - small, hard tumour-like growths - have all been reported in patients who suffered after silicone injections. Some patients have had limbs amputated.

In his closing speech at the trial in Florida, prosecutor Howard Scheinberg told jurors that Lawrence paid the ultimate price for the insecurities that drove her to seek backstreet cosmetic treatments and that the accused couple were in the 'illicit business of pumping chemicals into human beings for a quick buck'.

But before the jury retired to consider its verdict, one of the defendant's attorneys, Eric Schwartzreich, offered a different view. He said the cause of death was not that final injection it was the endless pursuit of the perfect body, which led her to accumulate silicone over many years.

'Do you know who killed Vera Lawrence?' he asked jurors. 'Unfortunately, Vera Lawrence killed Vera Lawrence.' The Guardian

SPIRITUAL NUGGETS

Tao is everywhere ... It is in the highest place but is not high. It is in the lowest place but not low ... It is everywhere but everywhere it is nothing.

— Chuang Tzu