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Thursday,
July 3, 2003, Chandigarh, India  
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By George! Peace at stake in West Asia WHAT OTHERS SAY
Paying for pensions MPs win the vote |
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Setback at Camp David
Sparks of rear imagination
City not so beautiful
Weather report proves too hot for censors
From Pakistan
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By George! DEFENCE
MINISTER George Fernandes' exasperation over the routine delay in defence procurement has come through in his interview with The Tribune. He has even hinted at the possibility of major defence procurements coming to a standstill. The context in which he vented his spleen was the inordinate delay in procuring an advanced jet trainer (AJT) for the Indian Air Force, a subject which has been hanging fire for a quarter of a century. Even as the Defence Ministry has been trying to cut the delay over the purchase of AJT, reports that aircraft manufacturers indulge in questionable sales promotion have come in. Whatever be the truth, such reports in the foreign media are bound to delay the purchase by three more years as Mr Fernandes has indicated. The disastrous impact this will have on the IAF pilots can be gauged from the fact that they have been pinning their hopes on an early procurement of AJT. The need for an AJT cannot be overemphasized given the different types of fighter aircraft they fly in all-weather conditions. But every time the government veers round to choosing an AJT, something or the other happens that casts a shadow over the deal. But with a clearly defined procurement policy and a properly constituted procurement board in place, this kind of a problem should have been addressed by now. But the latest developments suggest that the Defence Ministry has a long way to go before it can claim to have evolved a system that is effective and transparent. Unless tackled in time, the delay in procurement can have a crippling effect on the armed forces. The Kargil war exposed the chinks in the procurement system. The soldiers, sent to recapture the heights surreptitiously occupied by the Pakistanis, found themselves ill-equipped for the task. Leave aside costly night vision equipment, they did not have even proper boots and clothes that could withstand the biting cold. The situation was overcome by sending senior army officers to Europe on a procurement spree. This did not show the government in a good light. Yet, it is a tribute to the jawans that despite such shortcomings, they did a splendid job in ejecting the Pakistani invaders from the Kargil heights. The casualty rate on the Indian side would not have been that high if the soldiers had the necessary equipment at their disposal. If anything, the episode is a pointer to the risks involved in the delay in providing weapons and other equipment to the armed forces. While the forces cry out for modernisation and re-equipment, the ministry has been surrendering as much as 30 per cent of its capital allocation because of its inability to take timely decisions. Last year, the amount so surrendered was Rs 6,499 crore. Mr Fernandes would need to put in more efforts to speed up buying the needed military hardware the three services badly need, at the same time redeeming his promise to usher in a transparent and efficient procurement system. |
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Peace at stake in West Asia THE
announcement of ceasefire by Israel and Palestinian extremist groups has never looked so credible as it does today. The Hamas, the Islamic Jehad and the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade of Mr Yasser Arafat’s Fatah group have declared that they want to give up the path of violence if the world can help them realise their dream — a Palestinian homeland — through peaceful means. This is an encouraging development under the current situation. Clearly, Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas has succeeded in convincing the extremist leadership that the new road map for peace, authored under American guidance, has a greater chance of getting implemented within the specified timeframe — till 2005— than all the previous ones. He is hopeful of achieving success because the Bush administration has lately been pressuring the Ariel Sharon government to shun its rigid attitude on peace deals with the Palestinians. As a result, Israel has already begun troop withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and initiated steps for dismantling some Jewish settlements from the West Bank areas. More significant, Mr Sharon has not lately been insisting on destroying “terrorist infrastructure” before beginning talks with the Palestinian side. He has kept this issue aside, to be handled by Mr Abbas later. Any action against the well-entrenched extremists at this stage would have caused a chain reaction, leading to the much-publicised road map getting torn into pieces. West Asia experts believe that this is the result of American armtwisting of the Sharon government, though the US has never had as pro-Israel an administration as it has today. However, serious problems may arise when discussions begin on the release of Palestinian prisoners, allowing Arab refugees to return to their hometowns within Israel, complete dismantling of Jewish settlements in the areas occupied in the 1967 war and the future of Arab East Jerusalem. There are powerful lobbies in Israel which are resisting Mr Sharon’s drive to shift some of the settlements from the West Bank. These lobbies are also against setting free a large number of Palestinians languishing in Israeli jails because of their alleged links with extremist outfits. The Hamas and the Islamic Jehad have indicated that they cannot keep quiet forever if this demand is ignored. Their argument is that the release of the prisoners will help them keep their cadres on the leash. This is a tricky issue and may derail the peace process if it is not handled with care. |
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WHAT OTHERS SAY
Paying for pensions The economy remains depressed. The fiscal deficit keeps growing. Under these conditions, what should be the course for pension programs to support the elderly? If pensions are to be regarded as a stable and reliable livelihood assurance for old people, the national treasury will have to pay more to support the basic pension that every pensioner receives as one of the two minimum conditions. Another minimum condition might be to have rich old people pay more into the program. Revisions in the pension law adopted three years ago require an effort to secure stable revenue sources and raise the portion of pension fund contribution from central government coffers to 50 per cent by 2004 from 33 per cent now. The increase is not yet fixed, however, because welfare and finance ministries are at odds over how to pay for it. Chikara Sakaguchi, the welfare minister, is pressing the finance ministry to impose the increase, saying it is a done deal. Masajuro Shiokawa, the finance minister, refuses, saying the state of public finance makes the extra burden difficult to bear. Premiums paid through employee pension programs for salaried workers stopped growing and the programs fell into the red for the first time during fiscal 2001. Higher pension premiums are inevitable.
—The Asahi Shimbun When the rural affairs minister Alun Michael published the latest Hunting Bill at the end of 2002, this newspaper praised his efforts. He had crafted, we said, a tough but fair compromise on this most divisive of subjects; MPs and peers should therefore work to pass his bill. Six months later, after some extraordinary scenes in the Commons on Monday, the finger of blame should now be pointed at Mr Michael on this same issue. Nobody can deny that the minister's task in navigating his fragile craft down the parliamentary rapids was anything but hazardous. Yet he himself put his own bill at risk by trying to tinker with it when it returned to the Commons this week. Because Mr Michael's amendments to his own bill had precedence, he created a procedural situation where the incorrigible opponents of all hunting might have been denied a legitimate opportunity to wreck the bill by an amendment of their own. — The Guardian |
Setback at Camp David FOR
years the Pakistan establishment has sought to warn the Arab and Muslim world of the dangers of an “India-Israel-US axis”. In its website the “Voice of Islam” the Lashkar-e-Toiba recently proclaimed: “Jews, Christians and Polytheists (Hindus) are one even today. They were one even during the Battle of the Moat (Khandaq) against Allah’s Messenger”.
Yet Mr Brajesh Mishra’s speech in Washington stressing the need for Israel, India and the United States to cooperate in the war against terrorism seems to have sent shockwaves down the corridors of the Islamabad establishment. A new revelation seems to have dawned that unless Islamabad made conciliatory noises about Israel, Gen Pervez Musharraf would face hostile audiences in the US. Just before embarking on his odyssey to the hallowed precincts of Camp David, General Musharraf proclaimed that in view of the changing international scenario Pakistan has to consider whether its Israel policy needs to be reviewed. “This issue has to be taken up seriously and not on emotional grounds,” he averred. Not surprisingly, pro- Musharraf hacks joined the fray immediately proclaiming that Pakistan really had no reason to be inimical to Israel, especially as a number of Arab and Islamic countries enjoyed diplomatic relations with the Jewish state. But, sensing trouble with the Islamic parties that were already furious about General Musharraf’s support to the Americans against Al-Qaeda and the Taliban, his close confidante and Secretary of the National Security Council Tariq Aziz clarified that Pakistan would be the last Islamic country to recognise Israel. However, in order to keep the Jewish lobby in Washington happy, Foreign Secretary Riaz Khokkar simultaneously said that “Pakistan cannot be more Catholic than the Pope”, on the issue of recognising Israel. The all too realistic Israelis were not too impressed by all this talk, recognising that it was primarily a ploy to keep Washington’s powerful lobbies happy. Israel’s Ambassador to the EU Oded Eran termed General Musharraf’s comments as “positive”, adding that he hoped “it will not be a statement of political expediency”. Just what did General Musharraf take back to after his much-hyped talks in Camp David? He would certainly have concluded that despite protestations about its love for democracy in Pakistan, the Bush Administration would continue to support him personally as its best bet presently in Pakistan. But he could not have been too pleased with a number of things that Mr Bush alluded to, especially about the need to address “terrorism and cross-border infiltration”. Turning down suggestions of playing the role of a mediator in India-Pakistan relations, Mr Bush said: “Our role is to aid the process to move forward. The decision-makers will be the Governments of Pakistan and India.” Denouncing those resorting to violence in J&K, Mr Bush said: “One thing is for certain. We must all work together to fight off terrorists who would like to prevent a peaceful solution,” clearly indicating that those who crossed the LoC and indulged in violence were, in his judgment, terrorists and not “freedom fighters” engaged in “jihad”, as General Musharraf often claims. While Mr Bush sought to address Pakistani concerns by offering a five-year $ 3 billion aid package, he made it clear that “F 16s won’t be a part” of this. The real jolt General Musharraf received was from the newspapers of June 25 that reported an extensive background briefing given by a senior White House official. The senior official told the media that President Bush made a commitment to work with Pakistan to build a “moderate, enlightened Islamic democracy” and that General Musharraf had said he shared this vision. Unlike the categorical assurance that he gave last year that he would “permanently” end cross-border terrorism, General Musharraf merely told Mr Bush at Camp David that “he had moved against cross-border infiltration, that he had made sure that there were no terrorist camps inside Pakistani Kashmir”. The official, however, asserted that aid to Pakistan would be forthcoming only if the US Congress could be persuaded that General Musharraf was moving towards democratic government, ending his nuclear and military ties with North Korea and addressing American concerns on terrorism. The Bush Administration appears impressed by General Musharraf’s claims that he is clamping down on madarsas and extremist groups and encouraging modern, secular education. His claims on this score are, however, exaggerated and questionable. The Bush Administration is also impressed by General Musharraf’s actions in sending in troops to the tribal areas of the North-West Frontier Province to track down Al-Qaeda and Taliban supporters and prevent their infiltration across the Durand Line. In these circumstances, it seems unlikely that the Bush Administration will push General Musharraf too hard to promote democracy in Pakistan. But it will keep the Damocles sword of Congressional rejection of the promised aid to Pakistan hanging if he does not play ball on issues of direct concern to the United States. It seems clear that Pakistan is going to be cautious in responding to American requests for sending troops to Iraq. It may, however, be quite cooperative in allowing the Americans to cause problems for Iran’s religious leadership. Iran did figure in the discussions at Camp David. The five-year package of $ 3 billion contains about $ 1.5 billion for military assistance. This is partly to be used for upgrading Pakistan’s existing fleet of 32 F16s. The remaining amount will be used for getting attack helicopters, P 3C Orion maritime reconnaissance aircraft, spares for the existing equipment and possibly airborne surveillance systems. New Delhi has wisely avoided making strong comments on this package, whose details are yet to be finalised. In any case, the package will not be presented to the US Congress this year. It will be submitted for Congressional approval only next year, for financing in the budget year 2005 commencing on October 1, 2004. But there should be no question of relenting on the diplomatic pressure that we apply on Pakistan, through actions like denial of its readmission to the Commonwealth, or its admission to the ASEAN Regional Forum. India and the increasingly activist Indian community have many friends in the United States and particularly in the US Congress. We should strongly lobby against any military assistance whatsoever to Pakistan if General Musharraf does not end support for cross-border terrorism and dismantle the infrastructure for terrorism that exists there. The Bush Administration has, after all, made it clear that the passage of this aid package will be contingent on Pakistan ending all support for terrorism. Just on the eve of General Musharraf’s arrival in Washington, an erstwhile resident of Pakistan occupied Kashmir, Mohammed Rauf, was indicted on the serious charge of conspiring to blow up the Brooklyn Bridge. Rauf pleaded guilty, acknowledging that he had visited Pakistan and Afghanistan, where he met Osama bin Laden and other Al-Qaeda leaders. He had remained in touch with and assisted Al-Qaeda operatives till last year. When General Musharraf was still in Los Angeles, 11 persons, including some Pakistanis, were indicted for conspiring with the Lashkar in Pakistan to “prepare for and engage in violent jihad against targets in the Philippines, Chechnya and Kashmir”. Despite General Musharraf’s protestations about Pakistan being a “moderate” Islamic state, his policies have resulted in his country remaining the epicentre of global terrorism. The writer, a former High Commissioner of India to Pakistan, contributes a fortnightly column to The Tribune |
Sparks of rear imagination NEAR Himachal’s Barog, the overloaded apple-bearing truck ahead of us, groaned its way uphill. There was nothing spectacular about this shabby truck. Only the words at its rear caught my fancy. They read
“Sebon ki rani” (Queen of Apples). A painting of a kohl-eyed Pahari belle biting into a bright-red apple against a backdrop of snow-capped peaks and conifers completed the scenario. A truck was parked at a roadside dhaba with the caption
“Kinnaur ki chhamiya” painted at its rear. Its burly Sardarji driver jumped behind the steering wheel humorously commenting,
“Chal re meri chhamiya.” Yet another very ordinary one, described itself as
“Paharon ka husan”. Obviously the above connotations are feminine ones when the truck is considered as a gaddi, the vehicle’s female form. But when it assumes the masculine form of truck, it takes on harsh names like
chhora jat ka, sher da putar, shere-e-Punjab and so on. However, ultimately all are of course,
ma ka ashirwaad. For the drivers, their truck is nothing short of an airplane. Perhaps that’s why the truck drivers’ doors bear the words “pilot.” With no book to give me company on long drives, I find the captions and messages on trucks’ rear a most engrossing pastime. These have to be literally read in a hurry as vehicles on highways whiz past at 100 kmph. Therefore, they are catchy, crisp and terse. Some captions are original masterpieces. A truck disclosed,
“Mud mud ke na dekh, mein to kishto pe ayi hoon.” Another one shockingly confessed,
“Tata se ayi mein, Dilli me shingaar hua, driver se shaadi ki, helper se pyaar hua.” How did this practice originate? No one knows for sure. It must have been the brain child of a truck owner revealing his inherent tendency to decorate his surroundings, including belongings. Soon the practice spread, “But it was there before Partition. Initially the National Permit trucks did not carry these captions,” remembers Kamla Sharma of Shimla. Currently the autos are also getting hooked onto this. There are special commercial artists who paint on trucks, freely mixing with truck drivers, giving vent to their creative urges. Some captions are quite filmy, obviously the effect of Bollywood eg.
dil ka rishta, hum aap ke hain kaun and hai meri billo while others are imaginative, poetic and quite original like
pardesi mud gaye, yaad kar ke roya karogi. Free joota service was funny indeed. Portraits of gods and goddesses, legends like Shakuntala, Bhagat Singh and symbols like Cupid’s Arrow, are popular. Above the number plate, beside an artistic motif like a peacock’s feather, one often finds an old shoe or a parandi dangling to ward off the evil eye. Where else will you find such a fanciful combination except behind a truck of Punjab, Haryana or Himachal? Vehicular wisdom is like: Biwi rahe teep taap Do ke baad full staap. and Phool ko chherenge to kaante milenge Larki ko chherenge to chaante milenge. But the practice has come to stay, adding interest to the otherwise dull and dreary life of the truck drivers. After all amiron ki zindagi hai biscuit aur cake par, driveron ki zindagi hai steering wheel aur brake par. O.K. Tata. I have overtaken the last truck, Horn please? That was all of 13 mera 7. Phir milenge muqaddar. A piece de resistance is :Nadi kinare bulbul baithee Ore lal dupatta Agle kinare phir milenge Mat karna dil
khatta. |
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City not so beautiful FOR its modern layout, architecturally designed buildings, tree-lined open, wide and straight roads and streets, shopping centres in specified areas, educational institutions with large campuses, parks, gardens with an idyllic backdrop of hills, Chandigarh has come to be known as a beautiful city. It is certainly different from old cities and towns, which with the exception of their newly developed urban estates are mostly unplanned and congested. But there is a lot of ugliness too in the City Beautiful. In the Sector 17 one witnesses piles of garbage and litter here and there and unhygienic conditions around eateries. Toilets open to public use and those in the district courts and other offices stink. The incessant high-pitched calls of the conductors of long-distance buses to passengers at the I.S.B.T. to board their buses and those of the vendors selling uncovered cut fruit and all sorts of things on both sides of the broken footpath from the ISBT to Neelam Cinema and again near the Head Post Office are awful noise pollutants. No less annoying is the loud music coming from shops dealing in videos. Floors of a number of corridors often remain damaged making it difficult for the old people and children to walk them. All over the plaza run bicycles and for squatters the sector is the best place to sell fruit, cigarettes, pictures etc and polish shoes. This is just a partial view of the sector. A full round of it creates disgust in the minds of the visitors who look for tidiness, quiet and some sort of discipline and order. Obviously, the notion of the City Beautiful has not instilled in the residents a sense of civic pride. Unlike other cities, Chandigarh did not grow from a settlement at one place. Right from the beginning, its population was dispersed over a vast expanse of planned sectors. This wide dispersal of diverse population could not obviously be conducive to the creation of a resonably well-compact community. Aloofness, self-centredness and social insensitivity, born of diverse backgrounds, busy daily routine, recreation through TV in home and self-contained dwellings have bred impersonality and social distance. Fewer people feel concerned about the sorrows and sufferings of their neighbours. Lovers of Chandigarh might well say that such ugly features and inadequacies are more or less evident in other new cities as well. True, but the residents of well-planned cities like Abuja and Islamabad, as well maintained as Chandigarh, or perhaps better, and Canberra (unique in some respects) do not beat the drum of their beauty. In 1909 the Australians thought of making Sydney a city beautiful. After about a century they do not claim to have made it one, an astonishingly tremendous improvement of the place since then notwithstanding. The city’s suburbs by and large are environmentally attractive. Roads are very good, traffic is all orderly and community services are within access. Beautification of a city is a continuous process; there is nothing like having attained beauty. More importantly, how humanely and farsightedly the inhabitants of a place conduct themselves shows the level of its beauty. Ninon D E L’Englos said “That which is striking and beautiful is not always good but that which is good is always beautiful”. The writer is a former visiting Professor of Education at |
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Weather report proves too hot for censors CHINESE television censors have axed a controversial new weather programme after the scantily clad hostess’s flirty performances aroused nationwide debate over the limits of tasteful entertainment. “Star weather” featured former beauty pageant winner Wu Rong in the role of a bombshell meteorologist, flaunting her curvy figure while cooing fashion and beauty tips loosely based on the next day’s forecast. Hunan Entertainment Channel launched the nightly five-minute programme on May 26 in the southern province, known as a hotbed of cut-throat competition and adventurous programming in China’s increasingly commercial but still tightly regulated market. The report, as thin on meteorology as Wu’s skimpy outfits, titillated many viewers bored with robotic weathermen. But its racy format drew a backlash from more traditional audiences and national media attention. Hunan television officials suspended it two weeks ago. “There was pressure from above,” Liu Bin, the channel’s editorial director, told Reuters. “It was planned to be a life, trends and services programme. But it resulted in various interpretations among the audience.” Liu said the channel had failed originally to present a demo tape of “Star Weather” to the provincial regulatory body. But it could bring the show back if censors approved revisions. Chinese cultural authorities maintain strict regulations against nudity and innuendo, although advertisers, entertainment venues, magazines and Web sites test the boundaries. But television broadcasters and movie houses face tougher scrutiny. Viewers and critics have panned “Pink Ladies”, a new sitcom on Beijing Television marketed as China’s “Sex in the City”, partly for its prudish plotlines. Earlier this year, film tsars approved the release of a historical drama banned eight years ago when it was first made, only to block distribution again due to love scenes deemed excessively graphic. “Rice”, a portrayal of family ruined by lust and greed in pre-Revolutionary China, was based on the novel by “scar literature” master Su Tong and produced by state giant China Film Group. Video copies were sold underground at some stores. Episodes of “Star Weather” opened with shots of Wu’s writhing silhouette as she sashayed behind a gauze curtain. But many people thought the fuss overblown. A commentator on the Web site sina.com.cn defended Wu. “Male chauvinists have impaired women for more than 1,000 years. They cannot even let one girl’s career off the hook.”
— Reuters |
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From Pakistan ISLAMABAD: Speaker Chaudhry Amir Hussain has constituted a Public Accounts Committee for a probe into the financial irregularities pointed out by the Auditor-General in audit reports related to government departments, divisions and ministries. The committee will inquire into the financial irregularities unearthed by the audit in the accounts of various government departments during three years of military regime. The Auditor-General has presented the audit reports to the National Assembly Secretariat for the periods ending 1999-2000, 2000-01 and 2001-02. The PAC is the most important committee of the National Assembly. The committee will start functioning in the current month. Its chairman enjoys the status of a state minister. The committee completes its reports and presents them before the National Assembly.
— The Frontier Post MMA to challenge verdict PESHAWAR: NWFP Chief Minister Akram Khan Durrani has said the federal government will itself feel insecure if Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal parliamentarians are disqualified on the basis of minor objections. He also announced that the Election Tribunal’s decision of unseating MNA Ibrar Sultan would be challenged in the Supreme Court. Speaking to reporters on Monday after a dinner hosted by Speaker Bakht Jahan Khan at the NWFP Assembly, Mr Durrani asserted that the religious degrees issued by seminaries were equal to graduation degrees. If the religious degrees were invalid, the Pakistan Election Commission could have debarred those holding such degrees from taking part in elections. But it had allowed them to participate and had not raised any objection. The Chief Minister expressed the hope that the Supreme Court would decide the appeal against the Election Tribunal’s verdict on merit. In reply to a question about the recognition of Israel, he said parliament and other elected forums were enough to discuss and decide the issue. The MMA had its own separate stand on Israel, he added. The Chief Minister termed his meeting with Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Jamali on Monday fruitful and said he had discussed all issues in a friendly atmosphere. He said the federal government had paid Rs 6 billion as net hydel profit share to the province. — The Dawn Devolution plan opposed BHURBAN: The devolution plan introduced by the Musharraf regime still faces severe challenges due to growing tension between the provincial and district governments, lack of funds, linkage gap at different levels and low scope for the accountability process. Leaders of mainstream political parties, including the PPPP’s Naveed Qamar and ruling party MNA from Attock Malik Amin Aslam, raised different objections to the ambitious devolution plan before the multilateral creditors during the first day’s proceedings of a three-day forum organised by the National Reconstruction Bureau (NRB) in collaboration with the World Bank here on Friday. The transfers and postings in education and health departments are major source of discord between the provincial and district governments. District nazims from Karachi and Khairpur also spoke at the forum, saying that they were facing direct interference from the Sindh government. They also complained about the attitude of police and DCOs, and stated that the Police Department was behaving like a “state within a state”, and looking after the affairs related to law and order by district nazim should be deleted from the law. “The sitting ministers in the Sindh government are interfering in the affairs of the district government and we are helpless in this regard,” Niamatullah Khan, District Nazim of Karachi, said while addressing the forum. — The Nation |
To eat bitter things from the hands of a cheerful man, is better than to have sweets from the hands of a rude man. —
Sheikh Saadi Truth can only be know by following true teachings. have compassion on being and do some charity — Sr Guru Granth Sahib, M 1, Asa di War |
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