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Sins of Salem Raja of crime |
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India calling Technology, competition and low tariff go together WITH the STD and ISD licence fee reduction announced on Thursday, long distance calls within and outside the country will become cheaper by at least 9 per cent from January 2006.
Quake and the blasts
Destination Haryana Understanding bird flu
How to combat the infectious disease New nuclear power plants ‘essential’
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Sins of Salem TERROR that knows no borders can be fought only by a worldwide system that brooks no double standards when it comes to dealing with criminals. Abu Salem’s extradition from Portugal, following a due process of law in Portuguese courts, augurs well for the international war against terror and must be seen as an example for other countries to follow. There have been, and continue to be, many cases where nations provide safe harbour to killers only on the ground that they are “one of ours.” A narrow view of realpolitik is invoked to justify the unjustifiable. Extradition had a different connotation when one man’s criminal could indeed be seen as a hero under another man’s liberal-humane framework. Today we see the spread of dark forces that slit the throats of children as easily as they lob grenades into fortified compounds, place bombs in crowded marketplaces, or blow themselves up in restaurants and trains. By no stretch of the imagination can they be fighting a just war. Mumbai, New Delhi, Srinagar, New York, London, Milan, Jordan, Baghdad, the terror trail is endless, and the perpetrators’ chain of death can only be eliminated by a determined international polity. India has had a hard time getting known criminals extradited. The post-September 11 relationship with the US and countless UN resolutions notwithstanding, international cooperation against terror leaves much to be desired. Abu Salem’s case was clear cut, and there is evidence tying him not only to the 1993 Mumbai blasts which killed 257 people while injuring hundreds of others, but also countless cases of extortion, contract killings and kidnappings. India had to give an undertaking not to impose the death penalty, which is outlawed in Portugal. Again, he cannot be sentenced for more than 25 years as the maximum sentence in Portugal is a quarter century. But one can always work with individual countries’ laws and sentiments. India will also do well to augment its own law-enforcement mechanisms and judicial processes. The only thing that is not open to compromise is the principle that terrorists and terrorism will not be tolerated.
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Raja of crime THE gravity of the misdeeds of Raghuraj Pratap Singh alias Raja Bhaiya waxes and wanes depending on which dispensation happens to be in power in his home state of Uttar Pradesh. He became a terror because of the political patronage he enjoyed. He was jailed under the Prevention of Terrorism Act because of the sweet will of his political opponents who ruled at that time. When the government changed, the cases against him were withdrawn for the same reasons. At long last, the courts have intervened and have quashed the order withdrawing the cases. He has resigned from the ministry. Whether he will once again go to jail or not will depend on the fate of his bail application before the special court. One thing is certain. He will not find the going as easy as it was in Uttar Pradesh when the case against him is heard in the neighbouring Madhya Pradesh according to the Supreme Court order. More than ensuring a fair hearing in the high-profile case, the apex court order is significant because it seeks to undo the mockery of justice sought to be made in Uttar Pradesh. Policemen were having to escort him as a dreaded criminal one day, and salute him as a minister the next day. The farce had gone on for far too long and it was imperative to call a halt to it. Unfortunately, the contagion is spreading. Politicians have vitiated the atmosphere so much that it has become impossible to have a fair trial, be it in Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat or Tamil Nadu. Ordering a case to be heard outside a state is a stinging slap on the face of the government there. Yet, the politicians have become so thick-skinned that not one has cared to resign on this issue. The links between politicians and criminals are so strong that there are reasons to apprehend that an attempt may be made to influence witnesses even in Madhya Pradesh. That is what happened in the Gujarat riots cases when these were moved to Maharashtra. The courts will have to guard against this possibility.
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India calling WITH the STD and ISD licence fee reduction announced on Thursday, long distance calls within and outside the country will become cheaper by at least 9 per cent from January 2006. The second fallout of the policy change is: competition will become stiffer which may lead to a further reduction in the tariffs. The entry fee for new players in the national and international long-distance segment has been slashed from Rs 100 crore for STD and Rs 25 crore for ISD to just Rs 2.5 crore for both. The net-worth and paid-up capital requirements, too, have been relaxed. These steps will facilitate the entry of new operators. The government had once proposed a “One-India” vision: a uniform call rate across the country. Thursday’s decision will bring the country closer to that vision. Currently, there are three long-distance tariff slabs based on the distance with the peak rate of Rs 4.80 a minute. Since the local call rate is 40 paise a minute, it may be difficult to reach an acceptable uniform price slab unless the rate is raised. The resultant revenue loss could be compensated by the increased traffic. The tele-density in the country is still very low, specially when compared to that in China. That is because for years a faulty policy framework had acted as a speedbreaker to the upcoming telecom revolution. Instead of treating the country as a single market—as was done in China—the government fragmented it into circles, which discouraged large foreign players. A hefty licence fee and lack of competition led to high tariffs. Imagine only a decade back the STD rates were Rs 40 a minute. Now the government is removing policy distortions and encouraging competition. It may not be that easy. For instance, rural local calls are subsidised by long-distance call rates. Any uniform rate may hit rural consumers, which will be opposed by politicians. Latest technology and competition alone can usher in cheaper tariffs. Any barrier to that needs to be dismantled.
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Let your life lightly dance on the edges of time like dew on the tip of a leaf. — Tagore
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Quake and the blasts
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WAS in Parliament House when the terrorists struck last time at Delhi, some four years ago. Not familiar with the building, they could not find the entrance. Still they killed three security guards till they were shot dead. We, the MPs of different political parties as well as independent members, felt so angry against Pakistan, which allegedly trained and harboured the militants, that both the Houses, the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha, insisted on the government taking some action. The then BJP-headed government rushed the armed forces to the border where they stayed put for nearly two years, confronting the Pakistan army, eyeball to eyeball. This time, after the blasts in Delhi, India’s response made more sense. No soldier was moved to the border. No protest was lodged with Islamabad. The fallout was taken in its stride. The Indian team which was at Islamabad during the blasts to finalise the points of entry at the Line of Control (LoC) was instructed to accept Pakistan’s demand for five and not to persist with India’s stand of three. The Manmohan Singh government appreciated the fact that more entry points would facilitate relief and rehabilitation of the earthquake victims on both sides of Kashmir. Many in Pakistan feared that the Indian team would go back. President General Musharraf himself thought that New Delhi would “haggle” over the number of entry points. So much so, he told Khaled Almeena, Editor-in-chief of Arab News, published from Saudi Arabia, one day before the agreement that “tomorrow you will see for yourself what is happening — whether we are haggling or they are haggling.” Musharraf turned out to be wrong because he did not anticipate Manmohan Singh’s anxiety not to disturb in any way the growing cooperation that was developing between the two countries after the natural calamity. Even otherwise, Islamabad has failed to appreciate the depth of India’s feelings to befriend Pakistan. People-to-people contact has helped change the mood and the usual tension has disappeared. Manmohan Singh has reportedly told Musharraf more than once that India wants to have the closest relations with Pakistan and jointly pursue efforts for the economic development of the region. Indeed, it was a bold decision by the Indian Prime Minister to agree to five entry points when the dead bodies were piling up in Delhi following the bomb blasts and when public opinion in India felt outraged after it had responded generously to the loss in Pakistan. (New Delhi has allocated $25 million for the quake victims). Manmohan Singh stood by his words that the process of conciliation with Pakistan was “irreversible.” But when terrorism from across the border remains unabated what does the Prime Minister do to mollify angry Indian opinion? This is the question which may be bothering him. A country where society is open and where all avenues of communication are free, it is not possible to influence people to think in a particular way. The terrorists have revived violence in the valley as well. New Delhi is bound to feel angry when the Lashkar-e-Toiba, Markaz Dawa and other Islamic outfits still operate from Kashmir under Pakistan, if not from Pakistan itself. This is the reason why Manmohan Singh was at pains to tell Musharraf on the phone that there were “external linkages” of terrorist groups, clearly telling Pakistan to put its house in order. The same point has been emphasised by the UN and the US. The response by the Pakistan foreign office was cliché-ridden. The spokesman said: “Unless they (India) share the evidence with us, it remains a mere claim which we cannot accept”. Musharraf was more forthcoming in an earlier statement: Pakistan was ready to join India in the probe into the attack and offered total and unequivocal support. Why couldn’t the spokesman repeat what Musharraf had said? Even if India’s allegation was a “claim,” it should not have been rejected straightaway. It would have been better if Pakistan had announced the constitution of a commission headed by its Supreme Court judge to go into the charge of cross-border terrorism which India has alleged continuously. The proposed commission can invite New Delhi to provide evidence or even travel to Delhi to get it. India would be embarrassed if it did not cooperate. Islamabad cannot just dismiss the religious aspect, “the jihad spirit”, which seems to animate militant Islamic groups and even Al-Qaida. Kabul has complained about it and New Delhi has pointed its finger at it. There is no doubt about the terrorists operating from the Pakistani soil despite its claim that it has banned such organisations and taken strong action against them. Islamabad will have to come out with something in the form of a visible action to prove its innocence. The pressure of religious parties, on which Musharraf depends, is understandable. But he cannot ride two horses at the same time. Whatever internal compulsions, he will have to close down militant camps, the addresses of which New Delhi has given. Their number may have come down. But even the operation of one camp arouses the suspicion that Islamabad wants to keep the option of such an alternative open if and when it wants to rebuild pressure on India. At this time, when both countries are in the midst of relief and rehabilitation, Musharraf’s observation in his interview that there was an opportunity to move on the political front makes little sense. Where is the time? Where is the congenial atmosphere? Where is the focused attention it requires? Both governments are busy finding shelter for thousands of people who are still living under the open sky. However necessary the talks on Kashmir may be, this is not an opportune time. Politics, quarrelsome by nature, may spoil whatever goodwill has been built so far between the two countries. All our attention should be focused on the rehabilitation at this stage and I wish it could be done jointly, not only at the official level but also at the NGO level. The Delhi blasts have already lessened the enthusiasm among the ordinary Indians who have been sending material and money directly or through the Pakistan High Commission. Pakistan has to take into consideration India’s sensitivities. Blasts on the one hand and the revival of violence in Kashmir have poured cold water over India’s eagerness to participate. Even if the two countries were to join hands wholeheartedly, their efforts may fall short of the daunting task that they are facing. Finding shelter, food, clothes and medicines for lakhs of people is not an easy job. According to the UN estimate, tens of thousands of people might die. How odd sounds the voice for a political discussion on Kashmir amidst the cries for help and
succour?
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Destination Haryana HARYANA Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda has claimed that the investment climate in the state is “looking up”, thanks to his government’s “dynamic” industrial policy and that the state has become the “preferred” investment destination and the revamped industries department is responding to “numerous” queries from prospective investors. Herewith some of the queries which have been attended to. Q: I am keen to invest in Haryana, but I am concerned and anxious about the Minimum Monthly Deposit (MMD) being collected by the State Electricity Board. Please clarify the position with regard to the MMD. A:
MMD is simplicity itself and there is no room whatsoever for any ambiguity or confusion. What happens in actual fact, is a temporary, daily-rated second division clerk in HSEB’s accounts section casually glances thru’ the morning newspaper during his tea break and if he reads that the total amount involved in the Bihar fodder scam could exceed Rs 10,000 crore, he immediately and automatically sets down Rs 10,000 crore as the MMD to be paid by the consumers within three days or face disconnection of power supply without notice. There is nothing high-handed or illegal about it. MMD has the sanction of HSEB’s higher level officials like meter readers and linemen. Q: My proposed new industry on the outskirts of Hissar needs uninterrupted, 24-hour supply of water. Please
clarify A: The Haryana Water Supply and Sewerage Board has been revamped across-the-board so that it’s now an entrepreneur-friendly utility. Night-duty valvemen of HWSSB have been given standing instructions to turn on a faint trickle of water at 2 O’clock in the morning for about five minutes every fourth day and you can collect and store your requirements in zinc sheet and plastic buckets and shaving mugs. Q: I want to start my industry in Haryana, but I am worried about the unscheduled loadshedding resorted to by the State Electricity Board. A: The HSEB has been partly privatised and its management fully professionalised and it is now a consumer-friendly utility. Before it resorts to a 24-hour loadshedding, it gives notice 23 hours and 55 minutes prior to that and so you can operate your industry without any anxiety. Q: Please explain the working of the “single window” system. A:
Single window is part of the ongoing administrative restructuring in the state and it is meant for fast tract clearances of statutory approvals. It is a compact cell consisting of more than 2,000 staff, including DGs, ADGs, Directors, Asst. Directors, first and second division clerks, steno-typists and peons and you can expect your request for a blank application form costing Rs 1 to be processed and issued within three years. Q: If I have to see the state industries minister on an urgent matter concerning my industry, will I have to wait long for an appointment? A: Not at all. The new code of conduct now in force requires ministers to be easily accessible to the people and you can see the minister after waiting on the lawns of his official residence during the blistering summer for about 10 hours. Or you can buttonhole him in the departure lounge of Chandigarh airport just as he is getting ready to airdash to Delhi to press the high command to allot him additional charge of excise and commercial
taxes.
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Understanding bird flu Viewing from this moral high ground, the focus of all our efforts must be to contain and isolate the infected host organisms and ultimately neutralise the H5N1 virus. As of now, the primary and exclusive host of the H5N1 virus are a few species of wild water-fowl and perhaps the entire range of domesticated poultry birds, though so far only chicken and turkey are reported infected. There is no unanimity among scientists yet on the primary source of this virus. When it first manifested in Taiwan, China, Hongkong and Thailand in 2001-2003 it was surmised that the primary host are the poultry birds. Quite logically, this led to the wholesale culling of about three million birds in these countries. Even when in 2004 a few dead species of the migratory wild water fowl in their breeding areas in China, Khazakistan and Siberia also tested positive, the weight of opinion still maintained that the vector was the domestic poultry and not the free-ranging wild birds. As of now both the wild water fowl and the domestic poultry are the vectors. When his non-discriminating virus enters the host it is of the low pathogene grade which is non-lethal. But once transmitted, the virus begins to mutate and attains snow-balling dimensions. That is the state that it becomes a killer and the infected bird dies within two to three days. Now where wild bird assemblages are concerned, fortunately they remain fairly scattered and the virus transmission process is slow. And in the scheme of nature, there are no recorded cases where an entire species has been wiped out by an epidemic. Generally, up to 70 per cent of the virus host species may perish and the remainder in all probability will develop immunity as creatures in the wild are better equipped to do so. Hopefully, and over a long period of time, the subject species will regain its optimum population levels. On the other hand, where commercial poultry industry is concerned, the birds live cheek by jowl and the virus transmission process is like an inferno. At that stage the probability of infection spreading to human beings is genuine and of a high order. Fortunately, thus far there is no proven case of transmission of the virus from man to man. Nevertheless, human beings will be at risk of infection either through the aerosol medium (breathing) or through ingestion of an infected bird or by touch. The last two risks can be easily countered by avoiding poultry from diet for a short while and this is where the media can again play a positive role by arousing consciousness of all segments of society. As for the aerosol risk, here the state will have the dominant role. All commercial poultry farms and small poultry keepers and even pigeon fanciers will have to be placed under surveillance checks by qualified vets. Infected units will have to be shut down and decontaminated. The industry may even have to be compensated for the loss of revenue. The common man will have to be advised on the safe buffer-zone to be maintained from all such facilities and where that is not feasible, to wear face and breathing masks. Even though the counter measures may appear elementary, their rigid implementation will test out the measure of vision and management skills of the government. Concurrently, the migratory and resident water fowl assemblages in the country will also monitoring on a war-footing. Fortunately, these sites are all listed in the National Directory of Wet-lands and they number just 145. For instance, in Punjab there are three sites only (Ropar, Harike and Kanjli), two in Haryana (Sultanpur and Bhindawas), three in Himachal (Pong, Renuka and Govindsagar) and just one in UT Chandigarh, the Sukhna Lake. Admittedly, there will be many more smaller water-bodies doting the countryside, but for the present they need not be put under the scanner. On the face of it the threat from migratory water-fowl as vectors of H5N1 to India may be of low grade. This becomes evident when we look at the migratory pattern of the bar-headed goose (one of the identified vectors) already maped out by the wildlife department of Aligarh Muslim University through an ongoing project, using telemetry tools. The time taken by most birds to reach their winter grounds in India can vary from 10 to 20 days inclusive of the time spent on the stopover sites en route. Most infected birds will perish in migration before entering India. But healthy birds which get infected at the last stop-over before India may well succeed in bringing the virus. No strategy to combat the H5N1 virus will succeed unless we also have in place effective and adequate preventive and curative medicine. Fortunately, tamiflu vaccine is claimed to be a positive safeguard where humans are concerned. The fight against the bird flu will be inconclusive until a veterinary variant of tamiflu is developed to provide immunity to poultry. Poultry keepers and pet owners should immunise the birds with the same commitment as we do for infants against polio and small pox. Central to the formulation of plans to combat the crisis should be the fact that the bird was the first and still remains the most predominant prey of the virus. At this juncture it is the bird which is beleagured and it deserves man’s empathy much more than is evident at the moment. Given the common resolve, effective management strategies will emerge sooner than later. And at the end of it all, we would have contained and ultimately vanquished the danger of bird flu pandemic both to humankind and to the birds, one of man’s dominos.
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How to combat the infectious disease THE Sars outbreak two years ago that had virtually crippled normal life in Hong Kong for months and had affected the economy has taught a few lessons to the state administration. More importantly, it has educated society. This is evident from the realisation that the state alone would not be able to meet the challenge of the awaited disaster. Dr Lo Wong, who was a member of the monitoring committee for the implementation of post-Sars measures, points out that the sheer number of people predicted to fall sick from flu would break any hospital system. It was impossible for any hospital system to take on a million sick persons with a contagious disease. The infectious disease specialist Dr Lo who says that the state health system was equipped to take on maximum 700 patients at its peak in April 2003. In a severe pandemic conditions followed by the outbreak of bird flu, at least a hundred thousand would need hospitalisation during the entire period of pandemic till it was brought under full control. He recommends that the state administration must have the community contingency programme to get the entire community involved in fighting the disaster as and when it comes. The government needs to start planning at the community level and not just at the hospital and government levels since it was apparent that some government employees assigned duties may also be affected and may not be available for duties. Liu Shao-haei, Deputy Director of Professional Service in the Hospital Authority says that private hospitals will take on emergency cases and suspend all elective operations during a certain period of need. There are 12 private hospitals and no one is sure how many patients they would be able to take. But the preparations underway here to meet the disaster would certainly provide some clues to India where the national disaster management mechanism is being evolved for four years without much success. The Kashmir earthquake only highlighted the insufficient efforts that have gone into preparing the mechanism. The failure of the Home Ministry to even provide space and provisions to the newly created disaster management mechanism was not only reflection on sensitivity but also on the failure of the officials even to realise the concept of disaster. The excuse offered for failures was that the notification took time to be issued. The officers concerned could not finalise even the notification for 11 months. And they would be handling the disaster management in India. Hence there is a great opportunity for some of them to study and learn from what is being put up with deep and due sensitive consideration to meet the challenge of the so far unknown.
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New nuclear power plants ‘essential’ BRITAIN
must consider building new nuclear power stations urgently if it is to meet its international commitments on cutting greenhouse gases as well as plugging a looming “energy gap”, a study by more than 150 experts has found. It concluded that renewable sources of green energy would be unable to generate enough electricity to meet the expected shortfall resulting from the closure of existing nuclear power plants. Power stations would be unable to supply 20 per cent of peak demand in 10 years’ time. John Loughhead, executive director of the UK Energy Research Centre and lead author of the study, said that cutting emissions of greenhouse gases from gas and coal-fired power stations was driving the need for fresh sources of energy. “If the UK is to continue on its path of reducing atmospheric emissions, then it will need probably to maintain some nuclear capability,” Dr Loughhead said. “Renewable sources of energy will play a growing role in the future, but... many of them still have a higher cost base and are going to need continued support both in development and deployment.” Nuclear power generates about 20 per cent of Britain’s electricity but many existing power stations are near the end of their lives and there are no plans to replace them following a moratorium on new plants. The Government is in the midst of an energy review and Tony Blair has signalled that he may approve the building of new nuclear power stations to help to meet Britain’s target of reducing carbon dioxide emissions. “If we envisage what life will be like without those nuclear power stations, and if you look at the development of the other generating technologies and our current demand growth patterns, the sums don’t add up,” Dr Loughhead said. The latest study comes out of a conference on energy organised by the British Geological Society, the Royal Society of Chemistry, the Institute of Physics, the Institution of Electrical Engineers and the Institution of Civil Engineers. Britain must consider building new nuclear power stations urgently if it is to meet its international commitments on cutting greenhouse gases as well as plugging a looming “energy gap”, a study by more than 150 experts has found. It concluded that renewable sources of green energy would be unable to generate enough electricity to meet the expected shortfall resulting from the closure of existing nuclear power plants. Power stations would be unable to supply 20 per cent of peak demand in 10 years’ time. John Loughhead, executive director of the UK Energy Research Centre and lead author of the study, said that cutting emissions of greenhouse gases from gas and coal-fired power stations was driving the need for fresh sources of energy. “If the UK is to continue on its path of reducing atmospheric emissions, then it will need probably to maintain some nuclear capability,” Dr Loughhead said. “Renewable sources of energy will play a growing role in the future, but... many of them still have a higher cost base and are going to need continued support both in development and deployment.” Nuclear power generates about 20 per cent of Britain’s electricity but many existing power stations are near the end of their lives and there are no plans to replace them following a moratorium on new plants. The Government is in the midst of an energy review and Tony Blair has signalled that he may approve the building of new nuclear power stations to help to meet Britain’s target of reducing carbon dioxide emissions.
— The Independent
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From the pages of Communal conferences Under the present restrictions regarding the expression of public opinion in India, no one expects that the use of platform or the character of public speaking will be satisfactory. It is doubtless easier to write well than to speak well on public platforms, and for this reason probably we have more good writers than speakers. The press in India, though subjected to the severe restraints of the authorities, has been a more useful and better developed means of public education than the platform and public speaking. Since the unfortunate proceedings of 1906-10, there have been very rare instances of public speaking except at some of our annual conferences and non-political platforms. But this state of affairs cannot continue long because public activity will not stop and public interests are bound to suffer by neglect.
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The queen and her companions walk about gorgeously arrayed. Though covered with exquisite gems, they bow humbly to the poorly dressed sages, they bow in recognition to learning, not to wealth.
—The Mahabharata Let us remember, if we want to be able to love, we must be able to pray! — Mother Teresa We reap what we sow. We get the fruits of our actions. — Guru Nanak
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A hitherto unchartered virus H5N1 has raised its ugly head with lethal potential to man and birds. It is a rare case of convergence of interests of man and bird against one common foe.