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A non-Budget Untangling Tehelka Laloo on the rampage |
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Strange are the ways of politics
Lore of the flies
Follow Up Tired of not
being heard?
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A non-Budget ONCE an epitome of progress, Punjab today is an example of bad financial management. Its 4-per cent growth rate is lower than the national average of 6 per cent. The fiscal deficit has got worsened and the government, surviving on borrowings, has no funds for development. Unsurprisingly, therefore, the state's 2004-05 Budget levies no taxes, announces no concessions, except a minuscule hike in the pension for freedom fighters, and unfolds no plans to improve the state of education, health and infrastructure. Such an unenthusiastic exercise in budgeting is rarely seen. It appears the government has fudged revenue and expenditure figures to make them less scary. Why this financial mess in Punjab? The salaries, pensions and interest payments eat up 110 per cent of the state's revenue. The Budget promises that this will come down to 83.95 per cent, largely because of debt-swapping. The state has a top-heavy police and civil administration. Its employees are one of the highest paid in the country. It recently restored Leave Travel Concession and merged 50 per cent of DA with the basic pay and pension. As a result, the state has sunk deeper into the financial quagmire. Instead of winding up unviable public sector undertakings, the government has appointed MLAs as their chairpersons. The sale of its stake in Punjab Tractors has been mishandled. The Disinvestment Commission is yet to show results while the Johl commission's suggestions for revenue mobilisation have not been implemented. Then there is poor tax management and collection. Leakages amount to a whopping Rs 1,000 crore. Inheriting a near bankrupt treasury, the Punjab Chief Minister boldly restored water and power charges and promised more reforms at the start of his term. Today, debilitated by a series of questionable decisions, faction fight and the recent electoral setback, he dithers on reforms. What's more, he even hints at free power for farmers, forgetting that Mr Parkash Singh Badal lost the last election despite massive populism. Steps to correct the fiscal imbalance are widely known. There is need to limit borrowings and cut interest costs, contain pension and salary liabilities and implement the recently enacted Fiscal Responsibility Act. |
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Untangling Tehelka THE Tehelka tapes are genuine — all 16 of them, 100 hours of secret video recordings — says an expert who has deposed before the Phukan Commission. This is in consonance with what most people believe: the allegations of corruption in defence deals exposed by the Tehelka tapes on March 13, 2001, were true. Some heads have already rolled in the Army that started proceedings against the personnel who figure in the tapes. There were even confessions and explanations from the persons involved, all of which suggest that the tapes were genuine. The sting operation shocked the nation as it exposed the level of corruption in defence deals. The people realised how easy it was for the undercover reporters to reach even the bedroom of the Defence Minister and to entice the president of the ruling party. Mr George Fernandes resigned as Defence Minister in the wake of the scandal, only to come back to the post after the din had subsided. On the other hand, there was a shrill campaign, led by the Samata Party leader, Ms Jaya Jaitly, questioning the motives of the journalists. She was in the forefront alleging that the tapes, the main evidence in this case, were "spliced", or "manipulated". This effectively delayed the case even as the then government did everything possible to ruin the financial condition of the news portal and its employees. The Justice K. Venkataswami and Justice S.N. Phukan commissions which were set up to inquire into the episode were asked to probe the motive of the Tehelka journalists in doing the story, something which no commissions of inquiry had ever been asked to do. Since the expert has testified that the tapes had been edited, both sides claim victory. Be that as it may, corruption in defence deals is too disquieting for the nation and the new government would do well to help expedite the case. While justice must be done and the guilty brought to book, there should, however, be no witch-hunt or vendetta. |
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Laloo on the rampage RAILWAY Minister Laloo Prasad Yadav is on a roll. After saddling the department with kulhars, khadi and chhachh, he is set to tinker with the reservation of berths in trains. He proposes to convert reserved compartments into general ones during daytime. Apparently, he is unmindful of the fact that this will cause immense hardship to the people who reserve their seats and want some semblance of comfort during long train journeys. Their reservation has to be for 24 hours and not just for the night-time. Perhaps the minister wants to introduce the system which is already in vogue in his home state where muscle power and not reservation is what matters in sleeper coaches. Mercifully, the harebrained proposal has been opposed by none other than Minister of State for Railways Naranbhai Rathwa himself, and rightly so. But knowing Mr Yadav, there is every chance that he will pull rank, unless the public extends whole-hearted support to his courageous deputy. He is unwilling to learn any lesson from the right royal trouble caused by his kulhar order. They are bulky, costly and environment-unfriendly. So many of them are required that they are being machine made now. That defeats the very purpose of the scheme, which was to provide employment to the potters. Similarly, the khadi that he has introduced is costly and difficult to maintain. Besides, it can be a fire hazard. It is time the retrograde steps were reversed. In any case, these are not the kind of "reforms" that should engage the attention of the new Railway Minister. The empire that he heads has a very poor record in terms of safety, punctuality and cleanliness. Right now India happens to be light years behind even developing countries, leave alone the advanced ones. It is here that he should be expending his energy. |
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It is an inevitable fact that bureaucrats will care more for routine than for results. — Walter Bagehot
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Strange are the ways of politics A lot of people complain that economic policies are unduly influenced by politics. It is often claimed by this section that the two — politics and economics — should somehow be separated from each other so that changes at the political level do not impact economic decisions. Such a distinction is, however, difficult to draw, particularly in a developing country like India with a democratic polity. Economic issues exert a strong influence on political behaviour in a complex manner and shape the outcome of elections in more ways than one. Whenever there is a discussion about frequent political upheavals and economic stability, the examples of Japan and Italy come up. Japan has seen a series of governments come and go since 1976 when the Liberal Democratic Party lost its monopoly on power in that country for the first time since World War II. This has not prevented Japan from becoming the strongest economy in the world after the United States. Italy’s experience is even more remarkable: in the 58 years since World War II, there have been as many as 54 governments in that country. Despite the fact that each government has lasted barely a year, Italy is among the six most industrialised countries in the world. Thus, one should be careful about drawing any facile conclusion about the effects of political instability on economic development. In India, economic issues have invariably been highlighted by politicians — from the famous “gharibi hatao” slogan, used effectively by Indira Gandhi in the early 1970s, to the recent call by the BJP-led NDA government to focus on “bijli, sadak, paani” in the run-up to the 14th general election. Yes, economic issues did matter a lot in the elections but not in the way the supporters of the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government thought they would. Far from being swayed by the India Shining/Bharat Uday advertising campaign, voters in most parts of the country did not remain indifferent to the past government’s attempts to paint a rosy picture of the state of the economy. On the contrary, many reacted angrily to the advertising campaign. “If you are using my (taxpayers’) money to tell me I should be ‘feeling good’ when I know I’m not, well, then I will vote against you!” seemed to be the manner in which many responded. An illuminating paper entitled “The Simple Economics of General Election 2004” by Arvind Virmani has focused specifically on the potential economic factors underlying the results of the recently concluded elections. Virmani, an economist who had worked in the Ministry of Finance and the Planning Commission and is currently heading the ICRIER (Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations), acknowledges at the outset that actions such as voting in an election are extremely complex phenomena that depend on a host of economic and social factors such as caste, feudal state machinery, informal terror and so on. He then outlines how economic conditions probably impacted voting patterns in different parts of the country. Virmani argued that India has, in fact, been “shining” for the last 24 years relative to the previous 30 years. Against the 3.5 per cent per year “Hindu rate of growth” — a phrase coined by the late Prof Raj Krishna — of the economy between 1950 and 1980, the growth rate stood at an average of 5.8 per cent between 1980-81 and 2003-04. Despite the pre-election the average voter knew from her/his personal experience that there had been a significant slow-down in the Indian economy since 1996-97: average growth of gross domestic product between 1999-2000 and 2003-04 stood at 5.6 per cent per year against 6.7 per cent in the previous five years. “Thus, the high growth rate of the last two quarters of 2003-04 (even taken at face value) may not have affected Indian voters, contrary to what was assumed by neutral observers/analysts,” writes Virmani. Looking at the election results of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, it can be seen that economic growth had decelerated considerably by 45 per cent and 60 per cent respectively of the growth rates in the second half of the 1990s. Therefore, neither the global reputation of former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Digvijay Singh as a “social sector innovator and leader in decentralisation” nor the efforts by former Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot to project good governance could help them much in the face of slower economic growth. Virmani debunks the conventional wisdom on Bihar’s growth performance. The average rate of growth of Bihar’s GDP in the last five years (1999-2000 to 2003-04) is roughly 60 per cent higher than what it was in the previous five years (4.8 per cent per year) and this, he argues, explains why the Rashtriya Janata Dal under Mr Laloo Prasad Yadav improved its performance. In both Andhra Pradesh and Orissa, the rates of economic growth were more or less what they were over the last decade. “Yet one incumbent won and the other lost,” he points out, explaining that whereas Mr Chandrababu Naidu raised the benchmark of expectations against which he was judged, Mr Naveen Patnaik lowered the people’s expectations. In addition, whereas Mr Naidu had already served two terms, Orissa’s voters were more charitable towards Mr Patnaik who has served only one term. Also, agricultural growth had come down sharply by 20-25 per cent in Andhra Pradesh. It has been highlighted that the average annual rate of growth of the agricultural sector in the country as a whole had declined sharply from 3.5 per cent between 1994-95 and 1998-99 to a meager 2.3 per cent between 1999-2000 and 2003-04. States like Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka have been particularly hit by a poor rainfall in the last five years. On the other hand, the compound (not average) rate of growth of agriculture in Bihar was around 50 per cent higher in the two comparable periods, Virmani has stated. He has added that “the anti-incumbency factor is closely linked to the slow and steady deterioration of governance systems”. The Delhi government headed by Mrs Shiela Dixit apparently bucked anti-incumbency through “better governance and sincerity of purpose”. On the other hand, the RJD in Bihar and the Left Front in West Bengal were the only two state governments to win three consecutive terms (in the case of West Bengal, the Left Front has won five elections in a row). Virmani fondly quotes a senior journalist to claim that “the use of coercion and fear” helped keep the vote banks of the incumbent regimes intact in these two states. He forgot to mention one additional factor that could have muted anti-incumbency sentiments in Bihar and Bengal — the political opposition to the ruling formations in both states was perceived by voters to be much
worse! |
Lore of the flies WE buzz around you, irritate you, lap up your food as well as filth. We are the flies, tiresome and tireless, unclean and unavoidable. You intolerant humans usually deal with a nuisance in only one way — you simply kill it. Since time immemorial, you have been our terminator number two (after God, of course). We have a lifespan of just a few weeks, but you make it even shorter, using methods like poisoning, swatting and electrocution. Quite often, people kill us just because they have nothing else to do. The swatter is the ideal companion for idle humans. “Makheeyan marna” is not merely a figure of speech — it is a popular time-pass activity of officegoers. In contrast, we have deep respect for those who prefer to doze in office rather than hurt a fly. Much to the displeasure of non-workers, the swatter is giving way to the flykiller machine. This technological abomination reminds us of the electrified fence in POW and concentration camps. Those trying to escape got electrocuted the moment they touch it. The pull of freedom blinds them to the danger; in our case, it is the source of light that lures us to a “shocking” death. It is no doubt a sophisticated and clean way of getting rid of us. However, we are fortunate that you reserve your most effective and ingenious methods for exterminating other humans. That is understandable, since we flies can never evoke the hatred that some of you feel for other members of your species. William Shakespeare, an honour to your not-so-honourable race, has aptly compared the human condition to our own: “As flies to wanton boys are we to th’ gods — They kill us for their sport.” But there are very few of you who are wise and humble enough to accept this truth. Some even dare to play God and kill their fellow beings at will, only to realise one day that they themselves are mortal. The Bible has rather unkindly linked us to the “prince of demons”, Beelzebub, who has ostensibly been made our lord. However, another William (Golding) has evened things up by hinting that humans, too, have the same demonic lord. Jean-Paul Sartre, who refused your greatest accolade, the Nobel Prize, has used us as a powerful symbol to present you in poor light. He has shown us feeding on your sinfulness, gorging ourselves on your guilty conscience. Take these biting lines from “Les Mouches” (that’s what the French call us): “We shall settle on your rotten hearts like flies on butter; / Rotten hearts, juicy, luscious hearts.../ We are the flies, the suckers of pus.../ All your life we will be with you, / Until we make you over to the worms.” (That scared you, didn’t it?) So, you see, whether it is literature or life, you and us are inseparable. If you really want to see less of us, try to keep your surroundings clean and ensure proper disposal of garbage. But we guess you find it convenient and enjoyable (ugh!) to kill us. Well, carry on then, eliminating us one by one, while we go on multiplying with amazing rapidity. Uncontrolled population is one of your biggest problems, but it is our biggest
strength. |
Follow Up
THE police mindset and archaic laws often do not view crimes against women beyond murder, rape, kidnapping etc. Crimes like dowry demands, domestic violence, sexual harassment and forced incestuous relationships have begun to be taken seriously only recently. A law on domestic violence is yet to be enacted by the present Congress government. The "Crime Against Women and Children Cells" by the Indian police were introduced only about 15 years ago. The Chandigarh Police started such a cell in 1989. H G S Dhaliwal, the outgoing SP, took charge of the cell on April 15, 2001, and changed its name to “Women and Child Support Unit”. “We changed the name to give a psychological push to the police personnel to unshackle their mindset", says Dhaliwal, who spent three years relentlessly changing the very concept of dealing with crimes against women and children. No wonder, the Chandigarh Police has been shortlisted for the "International Webber Seavey Award for quality in law enforcement". Hundreds of police units from all over the world compete for this award. Of these 25 are short-listed for the final award. It is for the first time that any state or UT police in India has earned this position. “We competed for this award on the strength of our performance and innovative ideas to deal with situations faced by women and children in distress. We analysed the data available in the cell from 1989 to 2001, identified problems, debated on possible solutions and prepared work manuals to win the confidence of women and children and mitigate their sufferings with the help of experts and trained unit staff”, explains Dhaliwal. The unit was awarded the IS/ISO 9001: 2000 certificate for providing quality policing to women and children. “Ours is the only unit in the country to have earned this award. The unit work does not end with solving cases or effecting reconciliation and rehabilitation of warring couples. We follow up the solved cases for at least six months". Earlier, cases from rich families were assigned to favourite DSPs and Inspectors, while these from slum areas were directed to the police force of the area. Dhaliwal ordered that the cases would go to the respective police stations of the area without any discrimination. This helped in pre-empting influence. On political interference and pressures from corridors of power in settling marital disputes, he said all units in the country were faced with it."But these are not more than 10 per cent of the total cases". Dhaliwal initiated a “Youth Contact Programme” under which he visited Panjab University, colleges and senior secondary schools in Chandigarh. The students were apprised of relevant laws and gender issues, and motivated to participate in the community policing programme. Students participated in the Women and Child Support Unit in handling issues and were awarded certificates. Dhaliwal and NGOs made some 120 such demonstrations. In all, 31 NGOs are now actively involved in this unit. Another radical step that the Chandigarh Police initiated was to check the misuse of the IPC Sections 498-A (husband or his relatives subjecting a married woman to cruelty) and 406 (criminal breach of trust resulting out of misappropriation of dowry articles by the groom and inlaws of a woman). Dhaliwal says, “Often it is the lawyers who push the girl's side into slapping Sections 498-A and 406 charges against their inlaws to pressurise them. Hence, the woman’s sisters-in-law, brothers-in-law and other relations are often named in the FIR, which meant their arrest with non-bailable warrants. Over the years, we had realised, and NGOs also agreed with us, that many innocent inlaws were deprived of their hard-earned social status and pride. We ensured that this did not happen. Feedback from neighbours and NGOs often provided a fair idea of the level of interference of the inlaws". Experts often counselled the warring couples with amazing results. From 2001 to 2004 of the total of 2,373 complaints received, 70 per cent of the warring couples either agreed to live together again or parted amicably without going to the court. Only in 181 cases FIRs were registered. In the past three years, dowry articles worth Rs 5.13 crore have been restored to women, who had mutually agreed to dissolve their marriage. |
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Tired of not
being heard? A recent study, oddly centred on the behaviour of birds, has thrown up something women have known for years: men just don't listen. Or, more specifically, they only listen when they want to listen. Get the pundits discussing their football team's form, and their ears suck up all the information available in the manner of high-powered vacuum cleaners. This is what most men mean when they claim to be `good listeners' - they can listen to soccer commentators for hours. Where women are concerned, forget it. They're still vacuum cleaners, only this time you might as well stick them away in a cupboard out of sight with the rest of the broken domestic appliances. That's what a clever woman would do, but what about the rest of us, what about screeching frustrated freaks like me? It seems that when most of us aren't listened to, we tend to fall into the trap of saying what we've said again and again and again. So much so that the relationship turns into endless repeats of conversations you never wanted to have in the first place. For years, men have classed this kind of thing as nagging, but I think we're on to them now: there are no such things as nags — just women forced to repeat themselves again and again, because they're simply not being listened to. Why we all keep falling for this selective gender deafness is probably a matter for hardened psychotherapists to mull over (I can see the self-help book now: Daddy, Can You Hear Me?), but in the short term maybe we should all stop getting so wound up and have a little fun with it. When your guy dons his ‘ear-plugs of love', suggest all sorts of outrageous things, or just do them anyway and pretend you've told them all about it (‘Oh come on, I've been going on for ages about how I was going to sexually proposition your best friend/torch your car/put your clothes in the dustbin'). Alternatively, we could take their `nagging' jibes to heart and just stop talking altogether: there would be a whole new generation of women conducting their relationships through the medium of mime, turning the `sound' down, as it were, confining their input to anguished grapplings with imaginary glass panes. Then, if the worst comes to the worst, and the relationship dies, they could always launch lucrative second careers entertaining the tourists. Still though, this `not listening' thing is a bit much, especially when considered alongside another study which claims that people are blind to the faults of those we love. Codswallop, of course (the men I've known have never seemed blind enough) — but what is going on with this new vogue for disability analogies for relationships? We're all in our way emotional cripples, but deafness... blindness? It's getting like the Three Wise Monkeys out there. All we need is a bit of `speaking no evil' to complete the set, though arguably this would never catch on in a world of pain (that needs to be gossiped about and commented upon while incredibly drunk in wine bars). The Three Wise Monkeys theory also fails because most people can only manage one clever simian at a time. Maybe it is just one of the ghastly anomalies of human relationships that the more women need to be heard, the less men are prepared to listen, until finally the couple stops being a couple, presenting instead the sick tableau of a maddened harpy screaming fruitlessly into the still stone face of a statue. I would like to blame men entirely for this. So I will.
— The Guardian |
The holy teachings that come from the mouths of Godly men seem to be uttered by those men themselves, while in reality they proceed from God. — Sri Ramakrishna Whatever happens, is all in Your will. — Guru Nanak Each day is a little life; every waking and rising a little birth; every fresh morning a little youth; every going to rest and sleep a little death. — Arthur Schopenhauer Avarice is the vice of declining years. — Bancroft |
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