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Talking to Bodos Collapse
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MEA’s
meow Babu couldn’t have the last laugh The Ministry of External Affairs would make Anton Chekhov jump with delight. The reservations of the South Block mandarins about Chief Election Commissioner T. S. Krishnamurthy’s plans to visit the United States are somewhat amusing, if not odd.
Punjab’s progress
Sports-mortem
Dateline
London Delhi
Durbar
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Talking to Bodos Although some misgivings have been expressed about states taking the initiative to end extremist violence, it is all to the good that the Union Government is supportive of such efforts. Close on the heels of the Andhra Pradesh Government’s talks with the CPI (Maoist) comes news of Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi agreeing to peace parleys with the separatist National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB). In both cases, the UPA government of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has done right to defer to the wishes of the state governments. Over the decades, it is the Centre that has alienated the North-East through policies that relied primarily on using the security forces. That said, it must be borne in mind that the Centre’s responsibility is no less in keeping the nation united and on an even keel. This seems to have been acknowledged by the Union Home Minister, who has endorsed Mr Gogoi’s bid for talks — in response to the NDFB’s ceasefire declared on October 15 — and agreed to three-way negotiations. Both the Centre and the State need to jointly send the right signals, that: they are determined to strive for ending the 18-year separatist violence of militant outfit, but this in no way signifies weakness on their part. A large number of people have been killed in the last 18 years, which saw some of the worst bloodshed, and over 60 have died in blasts this month. The objective of the peace process being to better safeguard national integrity and security — through ending the sense of alienation — it is of utmost importance that the NDFB renounces violence and lays down arms without delay. The NDFB’s willingness to talk has encouraged some optimism. However, the authorities should not abandon keeping vigil in the sensitive state. |
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Collapse of a flyover While Panipat badly needs a flyover on the Sher Shah Suri Marg cutting through the city, the one it had on the road to Rohtak collapsed suddenly on Thursday morning. Fortunately, none was killed. The flyover, said to be built in the 1960s, was apparently in a state of neglect and nobody had paid any attention to its deteriorating condition. Hopefully, the government would soon order an inquiry to fix responsibility and award exemplary punishment. The incident should awaken the Haryana government, as also others, to similar dangers elsewhere. All bridges and flyovers should be examined afresh. Keeping computerised records of vital installations, their safety and repairs needs, and allocating need-based funds for their timely upkeep may be considered. The flyover collapse may be unfortunate, but it does not come as a surprise. All over India one can come across any number of road and rail bridges, flyovers, school buildings, historic monuments and ramshackle government structures that are on the brink. During rains and floods, buildings fall more frequently year after year and few lessons are learnt. Government agencies and state public works departments that build roads and bridges are notorious for using substandard materials. Post-construction care is awfully insufficient. Man-made tragedies resulting in losses of human life do not cause any public outrage and are stoically accepted. This attitude has to change. The citizens in a democracy have to be more demanding and enforce public accountability. India is emerging as an economic power on the international horizon. The country needs huge amounts of foreign investment. Some two lakh crores are needed just to upgrade the national highways and connect them to major cities in the next decade. The Prime Minister says the country urgently needs $150 billion worth investment. Incidents like a bridge or flyover collapse show unpardonable official laxity and may drag down the confidence level of businessmen eying India for investment. The country cannot afford to compromise on quality and safety. |
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MEA’s meow The Ministry of External Affairs would make Anton Chekhov jump with delight. The reservations of the South Block mandarins about Chief Election Commissioner T. S. Krishnamurthy’s plans to visit the United States are somewhat amusing, if not odd. However, one should not ignore certain aspects that make the Indian babu a dumber clone of the British original. The desi babus are known to take themselves serious even on April 1. The MEA order can easily be turned into a sequel to the Russian writers’ celebrated story captioned “On Official Duty” in which the protagonists do everything but their duty. Lack of gainful work, perhaps, turns seemingly intelligent individuals into unthinking babus. Jaspal Bhatti and his Nonsense Club would do their reputation injustice if they ignore the “MEA’s meow”. The story has elements that provide oxygen to his brand of humour. The US Federal Election Commission invited Mr Krishnamurthy for studying the November 2 presidential election. The babu who was given the file evidently takes P. G. Wodehouse a tad too seriously. He (or she) got into a state of frenzy by reading and rereading dark motives in the invitation to the CEC. Was the invitation a Trojan horse planted by the CIA for getting its moles in Kashmir by demanding the right to reciprocity? It is a different matter that international observers visited Kashmir in 2002 and praised the Election Commission for conducting the assembly poll under trying conditions. The South Block mandarins often look like MEA Musharraf’s cronies, from the era when the Pakistan President wanted to hear and talk only evil about India. The bestseller on the absurd orders and rules framed by the civil and foreign office babus since Independence is waiting to be written. Dr Manmohan Singh has recently said more than once that no power on earth can stop an idea whose time has come. For this one it is more than ripe. Ordinary Indians should know the face that keeps popping out of a regulation black bund gala at official functions. The Prime Minister has spared the country global ridicule by clearing Mr Krishnamurthy’s visit. However, he should not be merely asking the babu why he should stick to a precedent when there is a change in the situation. |
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That which does not kill us, only makes us stronger.
— Nietzsche |
Punjab’s progress
THE spectrum of regional inequalities in India is a very wide one with Punjab and Bihar having per capita incomes of Rs 25, 048 and Rs 5,466 respectively at the opposite ends. In 1965 Punjab’s per capita income was Rs 562 and was just 1.7 times that of Bihar’s Rs 332. Since 1965 Punjab’s per capita income grew 45 times over and is now almost five times that of Bihar. Bihar’s per capita by contrast grew by just 16 times. During the same period the national per capita grew from Rs 490 to Rs 16, 707, or by 34 times. Quite clearly Bihar has been growing at a much slower pace than the rest of the country, while Punjab has been growing at a faster pace. Compounding this extremely unhappy situation is the fact that the intra-state inequality too is much greater in Bihar than in Punjab. The Gini coefficient for Punjab is 0.29 while that of Bihar is 0.318. The movement of the Gini tells us a lot of the kind of society a country has evolved into. In socialist Cuba the Gini moved down towards greater equality from 0.55 in 1953 to 0.22 in 1986, while the Gini rose in the US from 0.35 in the 1970’s to 0.40 now. Most European countries get Ginis around 0.30 while most African countries have Ginis in excess of 0.45. So we should not be surprised that Bihar’s Gini is so much worse than Punjab’s. Better economic growth obviously leads to greater equalisation. Since 1950 India’s economy has been vigorously planned and continues to be so even after the so-called liberalisation began in 1992. The growth in the size of the 10 Plans is indicative of the pivotal role of the Plans in shaping the economic destiny of India. The First Five-Year Plan (1951-56) had an outlay of Rs 1, 960 crore while the GNP in 1951 was Rs 9, 506 crore. The Tenth Five-Year Plan (2002-07) by contrast has grown to Rs 15,92,300 crore while the GNP in 2002 was Rs 22,30,372 crore. Thus, while the GNP has grown 235 times over, Plan outlays have grown more than 835 times over. During the same period per capita income has risen from Rs 275 in 1951 to Rs 16,707 in 2002, or by about 61 times. One very obvious inference from this is that the State has been the main engine of economic growth in India and the Planning Commission, as it decides priorities and apportions resources, is the driver of this engine. Though the achievement of a greater equalisation of people and regions in India was not explicitly stated in the Constitution, the very notion of a socialistic society and democracy implies a determined thrust towards just that. Unfortunately, from all available data, it is obvious that this did not happen. In fact, the divisions between regions and people only deepened. Many studies are available that detail this. The question that remains is why this never became a political issue? Is it that our leaders do not care? Or is it that they do not know? Or has it never become an issue because the people in general do not care? Whatever the reasons, we have come to accept certain stereotypes. Such as the relative prosperity of the Punjab is due to the hardworking and innovative peasant, while the poverty of Bihar is due to the deep divisions in its society, corruption and lawlessness. Like most
generalisations these too are seriously flawed. Clearly Punjab prospered as India made huge investments in it. These huge investments were often at the cost of other regions. Let’s go back 50 years to 1955; it gives us a vivid snapshot of this. In this year the total national outlay for irrigation was Rs 29,106.30 lakh. Of this Punjab got Rs 10,952.10 lakh or 37.62 per cent. By contrast Bihar got only Rs 1,323.30 lakh, a meagre 4.54 per cent of the irrigation outlay. The Bhakra Nangal dam, one of Jawaharlal Nehru’s grandest temples of modern India, planned at an outlay of Rs 7,750 lakh, alone irrigates 14.41 lakh hectares (ha). Even after excluding this from Punjab’s irrigation plan, we see that its outlay is almost 2.5 times that of Bihar. Punjab has 50.36 lakh ha. of land and of this 42.88 lakh ha. is arable. Of this arable land 89.72 per cent or 38.47 lakh ha. is irrigated. Looking at it in another way 76.38 per cent of all land in Punjab is irrigated, thanks to the munificence of the Government of India. In contrast only 40.86 per cent or 71 lakh ha. of Bihar’s total area of 173.80 lakh ha. is under cultivation. Of this cultivated area only 36.42 lakh ha or 51.30 per cent is irrigated. Thus Bihar which is almost 3.5 times larger than Punjab has less irrigated land than Punjab. Even after accommodating for the difference in terrains in both states, the sheer difference in the irrigated acreage and the percentage of irrigated acreage, the direct result of public spending on irrigation in Punjab is telling. That Punjab grew faster than Bihar because of higher public investment can be easily discerned from per capita plan allocations from the First Five- Year Plan onwards. In the current Plan, Bihar has a per capita outlay of Rs 2,536.23 while Punjab has a per capita outlay of Rs 7,681.10, or more than three times that of Bihar. Higher public investment in a state also has other long-term effects. Higher investment results in greater tax collections giving rise to an ever-increasing entitlement to Central funds. In this manner the original injustice leads to perennial flow of rightful funds. There is no need to stress that bulk of the Plan funds are provided by the Government of India. This is well known. But what needs to be stressed is that there are many other less obvious benefits. For instance almost 50 per cent of the foodgrains procurement by the FCI is from Punjab, which means about half the food subsidy of Rs 25,160 crore too flows into the hands of Punjab’s farmers. Likewise, since Punjab consumes 8.01 per cent of the total fertilisers it stood to benefit by Rs 1,060.85 crore on this account. As subsidies will be constantly increasing, it suggests that in the years to come Punjab will only get more. But what is more lucrative and perhaps the most unfair of the benefits that Punjab garners for itself at the cost of others is by cornering over a third of all positions in the Indian armed forces. Given more money it is likely that Bihar would have fared better. It will be worthwhile to recall that in 1952, Dr Paul Henson Appelby, the well-known University of California Public Administration scholar, after a detailed study of public administration systems in the various states concluded that Bihar had the best government in India. We can now only speculate on the possibilities that might have been, had good government got good financial support. It is this Rs 77,000 crore hurdle Bihar must vault over first, if it is to catch up with the rest of
India. |
Sports-mortem Prime
Minister Manmohan Singh has expressed his “anguish” and “consternation” over the pathetic performance of the Indian contingent at the recently concluded Athens Olympics where India finished at the bottom of the medals table and he has asked Sports Minister Sunil Dutt to conduct a “post-mortem” and submit a report. Let’s read thru’ the Sports Minister’s autopsy report. I, Doctor Sunil Dutt do solemnly swear that I conducted a post-mortem on a body that was brought into the velodrome of the Talkatora indoor stadium in a hearse marked “India’s dashed medal hopes.” The body was accompanied by Mr Suresh Kalmadi who positively identified it as that of Indian sports, but that was immediately challenged by Mr Sivanti Adityan of the breakaway faction of the Indian Olympic Association who threatened to convene an extraordinary general meeting of the IOA and file a caveat in the Supreme Court if the identification was accepted at its face value. The body was in an advanced state of decomposition caused by an extended return journey home with leisurely stopovers in Frankfurt and Geneva for shopping sprees. I made a careful examination under a microscope of all the internal organs and I found them to be in a degenerate state and in my opinion, this was caused by bitter power struggles to capture sports bodies and use them as vehicles to further political careers, behind-the-scene manoeuvrings to capture sports federations, petty rivalry and interminable court battles. The death appears to have been instantaneous. I opened the chest and dissected the heart and found that Indian sport, weakened by strong doses of unprincipled and unscrupulous politicking, didn’t have the heart to compete in the international sports arena, while my investigation of the stomach showed that the victim didn’t have the stomach to slug it out in Athena even in the quest of a bronze medal. The jaw bones had suffered extensive bruises and contusions and lesions and this appears to have been caused by Indian sports taking solid body punches squarely landed on it by “foreign” coaches with dubious credentials demanding a payment of foreign exchange of $ 3 million for a week’s training assignment. Lungs and trachea were congested with water caused by Indian sports going down like a drowning toy duck in the preliminary swimming heats in Athens. A post-mortem x-ray examination showed that the collar bones and shoulder blades had suffered multiple fractures caused by Indian sports carrying heavy and back-breaking loads of ministers, sports body office-bearers and their families, petty bureaucrats and flunkeys on all-expenses-paid, round-the-world shopping and sight-seeing junkets. In my expert opinion, death of Indian sports was caused by massive ingestion of power politics and personal rivalries. The viscera has been sent for chemical analysis to the Ashwini Kumar faction of the
IOA. |
Dateline London
There
is an unprecedented interest in Europe in the US Presidential elections. I have not witnessed such interest in the UK during the last five elections for the US President. The US and European TV and print media have been sponsoring surveys and polls among its own readers and viewers to gauge European attitudes to the US policy and if they had any presidential preferences. They wanted to know whether they favoured Mr. Bush or Senator John Kerry. The Guardian of the UK took an unprecedented step by asking its readers across the world to write to undecided voters in Clark County in a key state of Ohio, USA, urging them to dump Mr Bush in favour of Senator Kerry. About 16,000 such undecided voters were contacted. Some of the letters and those written in reply by Americans, especially Republican supporters of President Bush, are carried in the newspaper and by its website and make an interesting reading. The newspaper initiative has been described as a joke, a sick joke at that, which will have no effect on American voting preferences. The " yellow teeth, tea-drinking Brits" were told to lay off. However,
the newspaper initiative has been the subject of much debate not only in the UK and some European countries, but also in the US. Some of the prominent newspapers have taken notice of this and at least one TV channel devoted all three hours to this issue. The CNN has been asking Europeans as to why they had so much interest in this US election and what areas of the US policy interested them the most. According to some, their major area of interest remained unilateral foreign policy, especially invading Iraq without the UN sanctions, its threats to countries such as Iran, Syria and North Korea, and total support of Israel against the Palestinians. People were also concerned about the Bush government's policies on environment and human rights. A few months back, a conference of about 100 prominent diplomats, media persons, politicians and political scientists, discussed this issue. Even though the proceedings were not meant to be reported, a senior British diplomat reportedly told the conference that if Europe, for that matter the non-American world, had a vote in the US elections, Mr Bush would be defeated hands down. This was later confirmed in a survey carried out in 10 leading countries of Europe and others around the world, including two of America's neighbours, Canada and Mexico and some traditional allies such as the UK, South Korea, Japan and Israel Opposition to the Bush administration was the strongest in France, Germany and the UK, where about 70 per cent of the respondents expressed a wish for a change in the November Presidential elections. Hostility towards Bush in these countries was strongest among persons below 26. Voters in eight out of 10 countries wished that the Americans would dump George Bush in the coming elections. This in spite of the fact that the Democrat challenger was not very clear on the US Iraq policy, which has provoked more anger around the world than any other single policy of the Bush administration. Ironically, Russia, an enemy in the cold war, was the only country in Europe, which endorsed the present incumbent. Russian President Putin said that a change in the White House would encourage terrorism. The Russian endorsement of Mr Bush can be understood due to the terrorist threat from Chechnya. The survey was undertaken soon after the Beslan massacre. Chechen rebels are believed to be involved in this outrage. Another country which supported Mr Bush was Israel. Two of the US neighbours, Canada and Mexico, wished the Americans to dump their President. Among the newspapers which published the survey are The Guardian, Le Monde in France, Asahi Shimbun in Japan, Le Prasse in Canada and the Sydney Morning Herald, Australia. The survey confirmed that Bush has squandered a wealth of sympathy around the world towards America since September 11, 2001. Most respondents differentiated between the Bush Administration and the American people. While they disliked the neo-conservative Bush administration, they bore no ill will towards Americans. Most even felt that it was important for the European countries to have friendly relations with the US. In Britain, as indeed, in Canada, Mexico and South Korea, more and more people now think that the American culture is threatening their cultures. The survey also endorsed the view of several commissions, including those set by the US and the UK governments to investigate the circumstances and events leading to the war and occupation of Iraq, that in the aftermath of Iraq misadventure the world has become more, and not less, prone to terrorism In the aftermath of the September 2001 attack by terrorists in the US and in view of the end of the cold war, most Europeans supported the US and UN in Afghanistan. But they were not convinced of reasons given by the US or the UK for the need to invade and occupy Iraq. The UN Secretary and indeed most of the world did not see any connection between Al-Qaida and the Saddam regime nor did they apprehend A nuclear or chemical threat from Iraq . The UN weapon inspectors had found no evidence of nuclear, chemical or biological weapons, which could be used against any country. In a recent interview with the BBC, the UN Secretary-General, Mr Kafi Annan, reiterated that the invasion and occupation of Iraq was illegal and that he had conveyed this to the Americans , the British and others in unambiguous terms. He also said that Iraq war had made security environment in the world more and less fragile since the Iraq war.
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Delhi Durbar M. Venkaiah Naidu, who left the party’s top position on Monday, caught the BJP high command on the wrong foot as none of the leaders, particularly five-time President Lal Krishna Advani, wanted him to step down at this moment. Initially, both Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Advani thought that Naidu, in his true elements, was only playing his time-tested resignation card to gain more mileage, but then by the evening when he did not relent despite entreaties by the top leaders, the party was confronted with a crisis. So the de facto President was asked to become the de jure chief as well. Left hold on
govt eases Even though there is the UPA-Left coordination committee, the Left leaders continue to speak in different voices. That has led to the impression among the Congress ministers in Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s Cabinet that there is confusion in the ranks of the Left parties. On the day of the coordination committee meeting, Finance Minister P Chidambaram rejected the Left’s opposition to FDI in telecom. However, the complaint by certain Left leaders is that Chidambaram and IT Minister Dayanidhi Maran take a long time in replying to their concerns. Law Minister H.R. Bharadwaj is a slippery customer, according to a CPI leader. Uma Bharti falls
by wayside BJP leader Uma Bharti has her critics in the party. They have so far kept her at an arms length in getting any organisational post in her home state. When the question arose who should succeed her as Chief Minister, she opposed the nomination of party General Secretary Shivraj Singh Chauhan. She preferred Babulal Gaur as she felt the latter will never be a political threat to her. However, there was a change of heart at the end of her fortnight long Tiranga Yatra. Chauhan became one on of her closest aides. When it was certain that Gaur will continue as Chief Minister, she wanted Chauhan to be made the BJP President in Madhya Pradesh. However, to Gaur’s relief, BJP leaders insisted that the present incumbent Kailash Joshi should not be changed. Some in the BJP insist that Uma Bharti was eyeing the national General Secretary’s post if Chauhan had moved to Bhopal. Veerappan and
politics With J Jayalalithaa taking credit for the elimination of forest brigand Veerappan, there was much rejoicing in the Special Task Force set up for this purpose. The country’s most wanted and elusive brigand lived and died by the sword, or bullet if you like, though at one time during the DMK regime in Tamil Nadu he was contemplating joining politics. Quick to spring to his feet, Janata party President Subramanian Swamy urged the Tamil Nadu government to sift through the belongings of Veerappan to bring to book those who had been
helping him. Asian Sheriff of
Gloucester Harjit Singh Gill, who grew up in Jalandhar, has become the first Asian Mayor of Barton. Originally from Dakoha village in Punjab, the 49-year-old Gill has been a resident of the UK for the last 26 years and spent nearly half this time in Gloucester. He has been working as a labour councillor for two wards in Barton and Tredworth where his two post office businesses are also located. In April 2003, he became the first Asian of Gloucester to have a lunch with the Queen. Contributed by Satish Misra, Prashant Sood and Gaurav Choudhury |
Meditate on God either in an obscure corner, or in the solitude of forests, or within the silent sanctuary of your own heart. — Sri Ramakrishna Enjoy God’s love, dear one, while youth is fresh and buoyant. — Guru Nanak To cultivate kindness is a valuable part of the business of life. — Johnson Be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you. — Ephesians They can conquer who believe they can. — Virgil |
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