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Saturday,
October
18, 2003,
Chandigarh, India
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New Iraq resolution Right to
strike |
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“Repentant rogue”
Mother Teresa:
Saint of the Gutters
Bottle dilemma
The state of medical institutions — 4
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New Iraq resolution A
major advantage of being a superpower is that at some point of time even the most virulent opponents of its policies fall in line. The smirk on President George W. Bush's face became more pronounced when a new resolution on Iraq was adopted unanimously by the 15-member United Nations Security Council. France, Germany, Russia and China voted in favour "to bring international solidarity to the reconstruction effort". Perhaps, the biggest surprise was Syria's decision to support what essentially remains the agenda of the US, now enjoying the backing of the entire Security Council. Whether the resolution will translate into relief for the occupation troops in the line of fire of Iraqi snipers and suicide bombers is not clear. What the passage of the resolution has done is give President Bush a face to show to the domestic audience that has turned hostile because of the disturbing reports from Iraq. In the global context it was a resolution that few members liked and yet no one dared to oppose. It authorised the deployment of a multinational force backed by the UN. However, it may add to the problems of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who has been facing President Bush's demands for Indian troops. An entire paragraph will need to be reworked for explaining to the domestic audience that mandating the deployment of a multinational force "backed by the UN" is another name for a peacekeeping force under the UN flag. India has thus far refused to play ball with the US that has its eyes on the militarily efficient Indian jawans compared to the panicky "bred-in-comfort" American soldiers. Make no mistake that the adoption of the resolution has paved the way for President Bush to apply greater pressure for the world to share a larger burden of the US occupation of Iraq. The 15-0 vote in its favour does not require exceptional skills to interpret its global message. It is going to be a tough call for nations that believe in respecting international laws and national sovereignty to not share the military burden of running Iraq after the passage of the latest resolution. They will have to share it under the eagle eyes of the US, at least for the next two years, the flexible timetable for handing back Iraq to the Iraqis. It is going to be an even tougher call for India in election mode. |
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Right to strike PRIME MINISTER Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s observations at the 39th session of the Indian Labour Conference on the need for a consensus on the employees’ right to strike should be seen in the context of the widespread criticism of the Supreme Court ruling by the labour unions. On the face of it, Mr Vajpayee’s expression of willingness to sit with trade union leaders and find a way out of the situation is encouraging. What more can they expect from the Prime Minister when he himself volunteers to help resolve the issue by evolving a consensus among all sections? On a different plane, one cannot lose sight of the political compulsions of various parties, including the BJP and the Congress. Having their own respective trade union wings, they cannot afford to antagonise the employees. Consequently, it won’t be surprising if all the political parties joined together on the issue. The adverse reactions to the Supreme Court judgement delivered on August 7, 2003, were not entirely unexpected. But howsoever welcome and encouraging the ruling may be, strictly from the point of infusing some discipline and duty-consciousness among the trade unions, there are some practical difficulties in enforcing it. For instance, the Supreme Court has suggested that the employees should approach the tribunals, either challenging the FIR or against the imposition of any penalty by the government. It wants the tribunal to pass orders within two weeks from the date of filing such an application. However, given the way they function, will it really be possible for the aggrieved employees to expect speedy justice from the tribunals? Tamil Nadu is a glaring example where over two lakh employees were dismissed peremptorily and the State Administrative Tribunal was headless and non-functional! Considering the fact that in most cases, it is the government’s adamant attitude and refusal to listen to the grievances of the employees that lead to a strike, the former, in its own interest, should try to avoid such a situation at any cost. A strike in any office, industry or undertaking will do more harm than good to both employees and the employer. Thus, there is all the more need for a reverse mechanism which enjoins a special responsibility on the authorities themselves to take prompt and effective steps to avoid a strike before things get out of control. On their part, the employees too should give due primacy to their duties over rights. The Prime Minister’s initiative to hammer out a mutually acceptable solution to the issue would have served the purpose if the message inherent in the Supreme Court ruling is understood by all — no one has the right to hold the country to ransom by going on strike. |
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“Repentant
rogue” THIS year’s Man Booker Prize, given to DBC Pierre, a Mexican-Australian writer of sorts, has created a stir in literary circles. The writer is a self-confessed “repentant rogue”: a cocaine and gambling addict, a smuggler, an unsuccessful film-maker and a graphic artist, who spent his early years in what he termed as a “pit of deceit and failure”. Pierre borrowed money from friends and acquaintances and never returned it. But the worst he did was to an American painter, Robert Lenton, now 75. He duped Lenton into signing a property document in Spanish, which the artist could not read, and deprived him of his flat. After years, weighed down by his guilty conscience, Pierre decided to repay his debts. He made a film which failed. Then he turned to writing books. This time luck favoured him and his book, “Vernon God Little”, fetched him the 50,000 pound sterling Booker prize. Now he hopes to repay his creditors, particularly Lenton. Ironically, it was Lentin who found out Pierre in his new role as a novelist when he saw his photograph in a newspaper recently, but forgave him. DBC (Dirty But Clean) Pierre’s real name is Peter Warren Finlay, aged 42. His father was a wealthy scientist settled at Mexico City. Finlay lost his father to a brain tumor when he was 19. Finlay took the pseudonym from a cartoon character called “Dirty Pierre” popular in Australia. The award-winning novel is about an American teenager who “pointlessly lies himself into a corner and ends up on trial for his life after a media witch-hunt”. After Pierre was unmasked, the Booker jury Chairman, Prof John Carey, made it clear that the revelations about the author of “Vernon God Little” had no effect on the judges’ decision and described the novel as a “coruscating black comedy reflecting our alarm and fascination with modern America”. The issue that the award of the Booker to a former conman raises is not new. It has been debated endlessly and without a conclusion: whether a work of art or literature should be judged on its own merits or the artist/writer’s personality and past should be taken into consideration while conferring on it a top honour. Some of the best known writers have been less than humans in real life. But readers continue to enjoy their works. There are others who feel that writers are role models for society and should conduct themselves with dignity and grace in public life. Anyway, the present controversy will definitely fuel the sale of Pierre’s books. |
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Thought
for the day The surest way not to fail is to determine to
succeed. — Sheridon |
Mother Teresa: Saint of the Gutters MY host introduced me to a middle-aged, well-dressed, stocky man who appeared absolutely normal except that he believed he was Joseph Stalin. It was not difficult for me to strike up a conversation with him. What was far more difficult was to stop him. He was one of the hundreds of inmates of Antara, an asylum for the mentally sick that had come up in 24 Pargana district near Kolkata. Today, nearly 20 years after my visit, Antara has grown into a big institution providing succour to the mentally imbalanced who are brought there from all over West Bengal. Few people know that Antara owes its existence to Mother Teresa. As she began her missionary endeavor on the streets of Kolkata, picking up the dying and giving them dignity that they always longed for but was denied, she realised that there were many among them who were mentally ill. She and her Missionaries of Charity had neither the necessary specialisation nor the facilities to handle such people. Mother Teresa spread word about the need for an institution that could take care of the Stalins and save them from temporary insanity that could degenerate into permanent insanity. A young Kolkata business executive saw in Mother Teresa’s desire a call and set about fulfilling her long-cherished dream. Whenever he faced any crisis in running the institution, he only had to turn to Mother Teresa and she was there to give him a helping hand. Today Antara is not listed among the numerous institutions Mother Teresa had set up. Nonetheless, the asylum is an epitome of her foresight and vision. Her enthusiasm for work was almost messianic and mind-boggling. I understood this as I tried to keep pace with Mother Teresa on her visit to Bhopal to set up a centre of her Order in the City of Lakes in the mid-seventies. I had reason to follow her that day as the local Missionaries of Charity sisters had promised to squeeze in an interview for me during that hurried visit. Despite her best efforts, Mother Teresa could spare some time only late in the evening. The agnostic that I was at that time with little reverence for the religious, I asked her some uncomfortable questions like why she was against abortion and why she did not support the Communists who, too, wanted to help the poor. It made no sense to me at the time when she said vehemently, “Abortion is murder in the womb. A child is a gift of God. If you do not want her, give her to me.” As for striking at the root of poverty, the pet theme of the Communists, she excused herself from a discussion on the subject. For her, it was one hovel at a time. As I shook hands with this wisp of a woman, I realised how strong and agile her hand was. Years later when I acquired a copy of M.F. Husain’s famous painting depicting a faceless Mother holding a dying man in her lap a la Pieta for my drawing room, I could easily relate to the painting for I knew that there was no exaggeration in the artistic depiction of her extraordinary strength. What gave Mother Teresa so much vigour despite the frailty of her body? Her biographer Navin Chawla has beautifully answered this question in an article in these very columns earlier this week. As I read Chawla, I was reminded of a visit I made three decades ago to the Leprosy Sanatorium at Nooranad in Kerala. There I was taken aback to find two white Catholic nuns cleaning and bandaging the wounds of the severely handicapped inmates. “I will not do it even for a thousand rupees!” exclaimed my companion, to which one of the nuns said smilingly, “Nor would I, had it been for money.” For her and countless others like Mother Teresa among the dying in Kolkata, Fr Damian among the lepers of Molukai island, Peter Claver among the slaves in Latin America and Albert Schweitzer among the tribal people in the African forests, they see the work as a mission commanded by their saviour. It was this command that inspired a young girl from Skopje in present-day Macedonia, Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu, to leave the comforts of her home to join a community of Irish nuns with a mission in Calcutta. Nowadays it is fashionable to see Mother Teresa’s work as that of a great social worker. She was a social worker par excellence but what set her apart from the motley crowd of social workers, who succumb to blandishments from publishers and lecture-circuit agents, was that she did social work not because it was glamorous but because she believed it was her bounden duty to do so. When she lifted a dying person from the road, she saw in him the image of the peripatetic preacher from Nazrene, who died on the cross soon after pronouncing the eight blessings known as the Beatitudes. Mother Teresa was not free from controversies. In 1994, a British television documentary, Hell’s Angel: Mother Teresa of Calcutta accused her of accepting contributions without questioning the source, including the likes of Haitian dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier. Undeterred by the criticism, she just responded, “No matter who says what, you should accept it with a smile and do your own work.” She had no time to argue that the attack was the handiwork of a postmodernist, who begins his job suspecting that (for example) Mahatma Gandhi or Mother Teresa must be crooks and who sees his job as an attempt to unmask their pursuit of power — preferably on the BBC. Christopher Hitchen who did the BBC documentary would have got further meat for his hatchet job had he met an executive of a tobacco company in Kolkata who could offer Mother Teresa only packets of cigarettes. She accepted cigarettes from her not because she smoked but because she could pass them on to some of the aged poor who badly needed them. When Pope Paul VI gave her a Lincoln Continental for her personal use, she got it auctioned so that she could establish a colony for leprosy patients in West Bengal with that money. Countless are the people who learnt the art of giving from her. Mother Teresa had to face criticism for being the single most vocal opponent of abortion and contraceptives. But she believed in certain moral absolutes, which made abortion repugnant. It is not because she was not worried about the growing population but because of the larger ethical issues involved. When she could have compromised, she preferred to swim against the tide. Mother Teresa had no pretensions of greatness. She considered herself simply as an eternal bride, who saw in the humblest of the humble and the poorest of the poor, the smiling face of her bridegroom. Small wonder that the Catholic Church has waived certain conditions to beatify Mother Teresa. For starters, beatification is a solemn act by which a deceased person is formally declared by the Pope to be one of the blessed departed and, therefore, a proper subject for a mass and office in her honour. It is, usually, a step to canonization, under which the Pope proclaims the sanctity of a person whereupon she is worthy to be honoured as a Saint and is put upon the Canon or Catalogue of Saints of the Church. For the people at large, Mother Teresa had become a saint the moment she came out of the cloisters and began nursing the needy on the streets of Kolkata. For them, tomorrow’s function at the Vatican is of little consequence as they had found a living saint in her when she was alive. She will always be remembered as a Saint of the
Gutters. |
Bottle dilemma AS the Shatabdi train from Chandigarh steamed into the New Delhi station, the public address system crackled with the exhortation that passengers either take the complimentary mineral water bottle with them or destroy it, “to prevent its misuse”. I contemplated the one litre bottle that we had been given. I had drunk barely a quarter of its contents. In an airconditioned environment one does not feel too thirsty. I had no intention of lugging an opened bottle all the way home. But if I destroyed it I would have water all over my seat and the floor. And if all passengers did likewise, the compartment would be flooded. That set me thinking. Why don’t the Railways give half-litre bottles instead of the larger ones? A few who want it can get a second one. Back home, I looked up the time-table and did a rough calculation. I counted 20 Shatabdi trains. Each train has at least eight coaches, seating 65 to 70 passengers. Assuming a load factor of 50 occupied seats per coach, that would give us 400 passengers per train. Multiply this by 20 and by 365, and you have 29,20,000 passengers travelling by these trains in a year. If the Railways can save even Rs 2 per bottle by substituting half-litre bottles for the larger one, that would net them over Rs 58 lakh every year. This was just a thumb-rule calculation, but I thought my idea was brilliant. I recalled an article I read in the Reader’s Digest a long time ago about a man who suggested to the Swedish Match Co that, considering the number of sticks in a match box, if they have a striking surface on only one side, instead of two as it was then, they could save a million dollars every year. They accepted the suggestion and gave him one year’s savings as a reward. I did not expect the Railways to part with a year’s savings, but a generous supply of complimentary rail travel tickets would have sufficed. I am always game for some Bharat Darshan. So, I shot off a letter to the Railway Minister with my full calculation. This was in March, 2002. Till date I have not even received an acknowledgement. But a little later, while travelling by the new Jan Shatabdi to Chandigarh, I did see half-litre bottles being passed around. It did give me some satisfaction and notched it up to a service I had done to the country. Never mind if it had not even been acknowledged. The funny part was that the receptacles in which the bottles were placed were meant for the larger ones and throughout the journey one heard them thud-thudding as they kept slipping to the floor. But to my dismay, when I returned by the normal Shatabdi to Delhi, I saw the one-litre bottle again in circulation. I then learnt from the rail staff that the Railways had, in their departmental wisdom, decided to stick to the larger bottles for these trains. The Shatabdi takes three hours between New Delhi and Chandigarh, the Jan Shatabdi four. For the longer journey a small water bottle had been provided, and for the shorter trip a larger one! This absurd situation has now been put to an end by stopping altogether the distribution of complimentary beverages and snacks on the Jan Shatabdi. However, for passengers in the faster train the dilemma of the manner of disposal of the larger bottles still remains. At the end of each trip, I still don’t know what I should do with it. What I do know is that my Bharat Darshan plans have been derailed for the
moment. |
The state of medical institutions — 4
DAYANAND Medical College and Hospital (DMC) is a “home-grown” institution of Ludhiana set up by the Arya Pratinidhi Sabha, which today has a token representation on the managing body. Started by Dr Banarsi Das Soni as a medical school for training doctors and providing medical care in a rented building in 1934, the school admitted 20 students in the first batch. The school was shifted to its own building in 1937 and christened Dayanand Medical College in 1964. Much of the credit for the sustained growth of DMC goes to the late Hans Raj Dhanda, who became the founder-President of the DMC Managing Society. DMC and CMC do not work in tandem, though their goal is the same: serving the community. The faculty in the two institutions desires networking. While CMC conducts its own entrance test for admission into MBBS, DMC follows the government system and is allotted students on the basis of joint entrance test. The fee charged from MBBS students is different and so are the service rules and conditions. While CMC prohibits doctors from doing private practice, DMC allows it with certain conditions. Yet, in a short span of 39 years, DMC has earned for it self the reputation of giving patients a feeling of a “family hospital”! DMC is not free from in-house problems. In July-August, 2002, the institution was hit by a 45-day strike. The employees wanted the Hero DMC Heart Institute, operative since April 1, 2001, to remain part of the parent DMC. The management was opposed to this. The strike caused a loss of Rs 17 crore. In the absence of any hierarchy or rational promotion policy, decision-making is reportedly influenced by extraneous factors. Some faculty members hobnob with the management for promotional and pecuniary benefits. A common refrain is that the management even lacks a professional approach. With fresh elections held recently, there is a forlorn ray of hope that things may improve. While a section of the doctors says private practice is as much to the benefit of the institution as to patients, another section feels that this encourages ‘’misconduct and greed’’, and sets wrong precedents for junior doctors. Yet another school of thought is that this system gives patients an option to go in for either private or hospital treatment. Besides, this also gives them direct access to the doctors. Since patients of doctors engaged in private practice are also admitted to the hospital, this system ensures proper patient care because at stake is the reputation of the doctors and credibility of DMC. The doctors are entitled to a share from DMC, which it pays out of the earnings collected from fee and other charges realised by way of doctors’ visits, procedures and investigations done during the treatment of the indoor private patients. “The password at DMC is — commerce”, says a senior consultant in all seriousness. There is a flip side to this system, as well, say insiders. ‘’It is not unusual to prolong the stay of the indoor patients and also subject them to multiple investigations. There is a tendency of over investigation’’. But the management denies this charge.
"Whether one avails of the OPD facility by paying Rs 10 as ‘purchee fee’ or gets admitted to the hospital, one gets to see the consultant concerned’’, say Mr Balraj Kumar and Mr Jagdish Behal of the Managing Society. DMC is 1,100-bed hospital. The Heart Institute has 150 beds. There are nearly 2,000 employees and 200 faculty members. The Society also runs a College of Nursing, set up in 2002, besides the 70-seat Medical College. The fee for admission to the MBBS course is Rs 1.60 lakh. For an NRI seat the total fee is US $, 75,000. Student fee and funds, hospital and investigation charges etc. constitute the bulk of DMC’s Rs 60 crore annual budget. Besides the undergraduate courses, says the Medical Superintendent, Dr Sandeep Puri, the College offers post-graduate courses in Anatomy, Physiology, Pathology, Pharmacology, Medicine, Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Paediatrics, Dermatology, Ophthalmology, Otolaryngology, Orthopaedics, Anaesthesiology, Radio-diagnosis, Psychiatry and Social and Preventive Medicine. This year there was no admission into post-graduate surgery. And, today, if there is stagnation in several departments, there are also vacancies at the professor-level as well as at the junior teaching staff level. The waiting halls are well kept but OPDs are congested and require better ventilation; so do toilets. It is widely accepted that DMC has received a major stroke in the setting up of the Hero DMC Heart Institute. This, primarily, is for want of good, reputed doctors. The five-storeyed centrally air-conditioned building housing the Heart Institute has missed many a heart beat since its opening. Commenting on its performance, a managing society member says its the mortality rate is 4 to 5 per cent. Its presence weighs heavy on the heart of the management, which is reeling under debt because of the loans raised — Rs 24 crore. DMC boasts of its services and patient care available in specialities and super specialties. Says Dr Puri, “For the first time
endeavour is to bring all these services and the Intensive Care Units of faculties concerned under one roof. An 88-bed unit is being set up for this purpose. These ICUs will be available in one place for medicine, surgery, stroke, pulmonary heart diseases, gastroenterology, plastic surgery etc. Our aim is to give standard tertiary care to the patients. Our concept is to give consolidated and integrated medicare to the critically ill patients”. On the strengths and weaknesses of DMC, Dr Puri says the real strength is “affordability” of medicare and “availability” of private consultation. On weaknesses, with typical bureaucratic twinkle, he says, “There is always scope to do better, improve quality and standards of patient care, medical education and nursing”. However, some senior consultants admit that DMC acts “miser” when it comes to giving of free treatment to the poor patients; It is seldom given. This, how-ever, is refuted by the society members who cite several examples of poor and deserving patients being treated. “In fact, we are running health centres at Hebowal and Puhar for poor patients. Our blood bank is one of the best, which caters to the needs of even poor patients. To write off expenditure incurred on the poor patients is a common practice with us”. The faculty says that the management is partisan in distribution of budget and other facilities to the departments, promotions are done on a pick and choose basis and there is 20 per cent shortage of nursing staff. The faculty also points to the growing sense of frustration, stagnation and lack of back-up support from the management because of which several qualified, reputed doctors, over a dozen, have left the hospital since 1994. Majority of them even set up their own nursing homes, nearby. DMC hospital is the first and the only institution in India having in the department of orthopaedics the facility of unique technique of external fixator, perfected by the internationally renowned Prof. Oganesyan from Russia, reads the College Prospectus-2002. It also claims that the hospital had set up the first Haemo-dialysis unit in the state, besides the modern intensive coronary care unit, intensive care units, stroke units and respiratory intensive care units. DMC also offers facilities for diagnosis and treatment of vitreo-retinal diseases. Another plus point it highlights is DMC’s urban and rural health delivery systems and training of students and doctors under the department of social and preventive medicine. Models of health care delivery and community oriented learning have also been developed in these areas, in addition to research on community health problems. DMC has good infrastructure. It is currently in the process of consolidating its activities, even as it branches out, particularly to the rural communities. Its focus is on specialties. |
He who remains in fear of God, becomes fearless. — Guru Nanak O Son of Being! With the hands of power I made thee and with the fingers of strength I created thee; and within thee have I placed the essence of My light. Be thou content with it and seek naught else, for My work is perfect and My command is binding. Question is not, nor have a doubt thereof. — Baha’u’llah The earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof; the world and they that dwell therein. — Psalms |
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