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Never say die Empty rhetoric |
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Tainted ministers
For durable ties with US
My Lady Nicotine
Gender battle Arrest decline of Punjab economy Afternoon tea with “Russia’s Osama”
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Never say die The serial blasts in trains on Tuesday put Mumbai under the same kind of stress and strain which was its fate earlier in 1993. Mercifully, the city came through the ordeal unscathed. Mumbaikars proved once again that while terrorists might succeed in killing hundreds of people, they cannot kill their never-say-die spirit. Most significant was the fact that they did not react violently to the mindless killings. Such an eventuality would have made the killers happier. On the contrary, the residents of the financial capital of the country rose as one man to help those in distress. Total strangers helped the injured to go to hospitals. They also ignored their own safety to remove bodies from mangled bogies of various trains. Enough blood was donated at various hospitals to take care of operations. At venues of such tragedies, it is fairly common to see people stealing the personal belongings of the victims. Nothing of the sort happened in amchi Mumbai. Nor did the terrorists succeed in scaring the wits out of the survivors. The very next day, the public was out in strength —- in trains, buses and public buildings – as if to prove the point that while their hearts were crying, their resilience was intact. Schools and colleges remained open. Had life come to a standstill, it would have played into the hands of the enemies of the nation. But while the bustling city has proved its “business as usual” mettle, life has changed inexorably for thousands of persons who have either lost a near and dear one, or find him or her in an injured state. The nation owes it to them to make sure that the perpetrators are quickly apprehended and dealt with severely. Right now, the killers are roaming freely, and for all one knows, planning another similar attack. The best tribute to those killed would be to keep our eyes and ears open and inform the authorities of any suspicious characters or happenings. The intelligence agencies have failed miserably to sniff out the attackers. One just hopes that these are suitably geared to work on inputs provided by the public. |
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Empty rhetoric Prime
Minister Manmohan Singh’s promise to ensure the autonomy of the country’s
science and technology institutions cannot be taken at its face value. He said
the government would de-bureaucratise these institutions and ensure they
enjoyed academic autonomy. However, there is a big gap between his promise and performance as is borne out by the brazen manner in which some Union ministers are meddling in the affairs of apex institutions like the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences in New Delhi. AIIMS Director P. Venugopal is a world renowned cardiac surgeon. He commands great respect among the people and the doctors for his professional excellence. Yet, Union Health Minister Dr Anbumani Ramadoss peremptorily dismissed him. Worse, the minister had the audacity to humiliate Dr Venugopal by asking him to wait outside the AIIMS board room before moving the controversial resolution to sack him! The Delhi High Court has stayed Dr Venugopal’s dismissal, but the question remains: whether ministers and bureaucrats can continue their assault on the autonomy of premier institutions of excellence or not. Very recently, Prof C.N.R. Rao, chairman of the Prime Minister’s Scientific Advisory Council, complained to the Prime Minister that “excessive political and bureaucratic interference” has been stifling the country’s top research institutions. He aptly said, “science works when there is freedom; science cannot work when there is control.” The situation is no better in the states. The universities, for instance, have become handmaidens of the chief ministers and they hardly enjoy any autonomy. The whole atmosphere is vitiated down the line. Why should chief ministers appoint vice-chancellors? Similarly, why should a committee of IAS officers approve the recruitment of directors in science institutes? To insulate these from political and bureaucratic interference, there is need for a parallel mechanism where scientists and technical experts are recruited in a different way. Institutions like AIIMS can enjoy autonomy — realistic and functional — only when politicians like Dr Ramadoss are punished for their meddling. |
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Tainted ministers THE Supreme Court has rightly expressed its displeasure over the Centre’s failure to make its stand clear on the issue of tainted ministers. Significantly, the apex court has expanded the scope of the case by treating all the state governments as parties and issuing them a similar directive. This is a salutary move because the question concerns both the Centre and the states. On March 24, the Supreme Court had referred the issue to a five-judge Constitution Bench. However, it could not start hearing the case till date because of the Centre’s failure to respond to the notice. The Bench was specifically asked to examine whether a tainted person with criminal background or a person against whom a charge-sheet has been filed in a criminal case can be appointed a minister. The issue of tainted ministers has become a matter of great public importance because of the increasing criminalisation of politics. Out of sheer political compulsions, the Prime Minister — and the chief ministers — are appointing persons with criminal background as ministers, little realising its deleterious effect on the system and the quality of governance. Whatever may be the compulsions, tainted persons are a blot on the democratic system. While admitting the petition for a wider examination by the Constitution Bench, the Supreme Court has said that it is a question of a person not having the right to be a minister because of his criminal antecedents. Chief Justice Y.K. Sabharwal raised a pertinent question to the government counsel: Will the Centre appoint a person as a judge or as an Election Commissioner if any criminal charge is pending against him? The Centre and the states should promptly respond to the notice to help the Constitution Bench examine the issue expeditiously in the interest of good governance and purity of the system. |
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There is enough in the world for everyone’s need, but not enough for everyone’s greed. — Frank Buchman
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For durable ties with US
Understanding the perceptions of those who influence US foreign policy provides an insight into the factors that shape the directions that global developments will take. It was, therefore, interesting to meet key strategic thinkers in the U.S last month at a location close to the statue of Mahatma Gandhi, which adorns the lawns opposite the Indian Embassy in Washington DC. Those who participated in this CII-Aspen Strategic Dialogue in Washington ranged from Dr Henry Kissinger and Gen Brent Scowcroft, from the Republican Party to influential Democratic Party personalities like Sandy Berger, Strobe Talbot and Joseph Nye. These exchanges and subsequent meetings at the State Department, Pentagon, the Departments of Energy and Commerce and with senior members of the House of Representatives and the Senate gave a clearer perception of the challenges the United States and India face in fashioning a more productive and mature relationship. American perceptions about India have changed dramatically in recent years. India’s accelerating economic growth and capabilities in areas like industrial research and development and information technology have persuaded Americans and American corporations that the skills and talents of “the intelligent Indians” can be leveraged to make American industry and business more competitive. Secondly, India is seen as an example of how democracy and pluralism can face the challenges of global terrorism. Finally, while most Americans favour cooperation with China, there is concern that a growingly nationalistic China ruled by an unrepresentative leadership could become militaristic and jingoistic, destabilising the balance of power in Asia. A strong, economically dynamic India provides a stable balance to the strategic architecture of Asia and the politically volatile Middle-East. Most Americans now realise that the military intervention in Iraq has been a costly mistake. It has ignited anti-American sentiment in the Muslim world and undermined the US “war on terrorism”. Over 2500 Americans have been killed since the conflict in Iraq commenced in 2003, and there is no sign of a return to peace and stability. Pulling out soon from Iraq is ruled out and efforts to get the Iraqi government to assume a more effective role in fighting well-armed insurgents have little chance of early success. In the worst case scenario, the growing Shia-Sunni divide in Iraq could well lead to the sort of situation that prevailed in Lebanon. Superimposed on this situation are the growing tensions with Iran over its nuclear ambitions. Any precipitate American military action in Iran will be profoundly destabilising. Russia, China and even America’s European allies like Germany do not favour military confrontation on the Iran nuclear issue. New Delhi has to support diplomatic efforts that ensure that Iran strictly abides by IAEA safeguards and fulfils its commitments under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. The Americans, in turn, may eventually have to accept that Iran will retain certain limited enrichment capabilities, under strict international supervision. The Speaker of the Lok Sabha, Mr. Somnath Chatterjee, had hinted at such a course of action in Berlin recently. Adding to American security concerns has been the recent spurt in attacks in Afghanistan mounted by the Taliban, operating from Pakistan with ISI backing. Over 80,000 Pakistani troops have been deployed in Waziristan to fight elements of Al-Qaeda and their Chechen, Uzbek and other supporters. But, at the same time, General Musharraf has permitted sanctuary, safe havens, reinforcements, weapons and training to the Taliban along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, particularly in Baluchistan. An emboldened Taliban has mounted over 38 suicide attacks in recent months on American, Afghan and NATO forces in Afghanistan. But the last straw on the American camel’s back was the appointment by General Musharraf of Lt-Gen Ali Jan Mohammed Orkazai, a known supporter of the Taliban, strongly opposed to military action in Waziristan, as the Governor of the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP). Orkazai is negotiating a ceasefire within Waziristan and has ended military operations against Pushtun tribesmen supporting the Taliban and Al-Qaeda. Shocked by these “betrayals”, the Americans are now adopting a policy of carrot and stick to deal with General Musharraf in order to get him to end ISI support for the Taliban. On the one hand, they are voicing support for free and fair elections in Pakistan and advocating strong support for President Karzai. They are, on the other hand, resorting to ill advised moves like the supply and upgrading of nearly 100 F-16 fighters for Pakistan — a move which will inevitably encourage General Musharraf to play the jihadi card with impunity and undermine the India-Pakistan dialogue process. Washington is thus groping in the dark for an effective policy to deal with Pakistan. “Whither Pakistan” is a question on many American minds. The “nuclear deal” is the predominant focus of attention in any discussion with Americans. The House International Relations Committee and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee have cleared the deal, which is expected to get approval from the House and the Senate this month. But there is still a long way to go. India has to negotiate a bilateral agreement with the US on nuclear cooperation and sign an “Additional Protocol” with the IAEA. All this has to be cleared by the US Congress and the 45-member “nuclear Suppliers Group”, where reservations will be voiced by China, Scandinavian countries and members of the “New Agenda Coalition” like Ireland. While the operative parts of the legislation proposed in the Senate and the House conform to the provisions of the July 18, 2005, agreement, there are references, some of them “non-binding”, on issues like Iran, termination of international nuclear cooperation in the event of an Indian nuclear test and demands that India should accede to a Fissile Material Cut-Off Treaty (FMCT) that have caused concern in New Delhi. These references need to be carefully debated nationally/ before we consider signing contracts for imported nuclear power plants. There can also be no question of India capping its nuclear weapons programme, by acceding soon to an FMCT. One has, however, to appreciate the determination with which President Bush and Condoleezza Rice overcame strong domestic opposition to the deal, which aims to end three decades of international nuclear sanctions against India. We will succeed in developing a mature, durable relationship with the US only when we clearly define our core national security interests, on which there can be no compromise, and accelerate the process of economic reform and progress, so that engaging India becomes an imperative for global powers. It remains to be seen whether Dr Manmohan Singh can push through essential economic changes that will make India a power to be reckoned with. The current “compulsions” of coalition politics could well derail his efforts for sustained and accelerated economic
growth.
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My Lady Nicotine
Beautiful
women, flowers, snow-capped mountains, placid lakes, moonlit nights
and the songs of birds are not the only objects that have provided
inspiration to poets to compose their odes. One of my treasured possessions is a slim volume with the title “Lyria Nicotiana”. Published in 1898, it is a collection of poems edited and compiled by one William Hutchinson. The compiler says in his preface: “Once the fashion of smoking was introduced it rapidly grew into a craze. Authors discoursed learnedly on its excellent effects on health and maintained its sovereign virtue as a preservative against all disease and as a means of lengthening life.” Other authors, with equal assurance and display of learning proved it to be a venomous drug that would undermine the British constitution, physical and political. The book contains over a hundred poems. I have picked a few at random to illustrate the sentiments of the literati of yore. William Barclay, writing in the quaint language of the 17th century, said: “The statlie rich, late conquered Indian plaines/Foster a plant, the prince of all plants/ This plant at home the people and the priests assure/ Of his goodwill, whom they as God adore/ Both here and there it worketh wondrous cure/And hath such heauenue vertue in store. The “Indian Plaines”, of course, refer to America which Christopher Columbs had mistakenly taken to be India. A poem in an 18th century issue of the “Gentleman’s Magazine” said: “Tube, I love thee as my life/ By thee I mean to choose my wife/ Tube, thy colour let me find/ In her skin, and in her mind/ Let her have a shape as fine/ Let her breath be as sweet as thine/ Let, when her lips I kiss/ Burn like thee, to give me bliss”. In the 18th century drawing rooms of the upper classes snuff was considered to be more “genteel” than the pipe. William Cowper pleads for the latter in these words: “Says the pipe to the snuffbox, “I can’t understand/ What the ladies and gentlemen see in your face/ That you are in fashion all over the land/ And I am so much fallen into disgrace.” It was not till the 19th century that we come across the first clarion call against the use of tobacco which, however, was not regarded seriously by its votaries. The following poem has in it a foretaste of what we read in medical journals today: In spite of dire forewarnings that my brains will be scattered/ My memory extinguished, and my nervous system shattered/ That my hand will take to trembling, and my heart begin to flutter/ My digestion turn a rebel to my very bread and butter/ As I pull this mild Havana, and its ashes slowly lengthen/ I feel my courage gather and my resolution strengthen/ I will smoke, and I will praise you, my cigar, and I will light you/ with tobacco-phobic pamphlets by the learned prigs who fight you”. |
Gender battle An Army Lieutenant posted at Udhampur committed suicide recently. The officer happened to be a woman. Unfortunately, some of us have already jumped the gun and assumed that her gender had something to do with her suicide and have created a controversy about the very role of women in the Army. Women in military uniform are already a reality. They have been in the medical profession for a long time. Starting in early nineties they have also been inducted into certain other streams. Depending on their performance there may be a case for enhancing their intake in these streams and granting them permanent commission. However, they are still not taken into the combat arms. There seems a vociferous demand that this embargo be removed. It merits detailed examination. We must first analyse the reasons why women were inducted into the defence forces in the first place. One was the need to meet the societal obligation of providing equal opportunity to women. The second factor that influenced the decision was the desire to follow the western model where women have been part of the military for long. However, certain major dissimilarities between the two situations got overlooked. None of the western armies is facing a perpetually ongoing war-like scenario; they have no non-family stations and no primitive billeting in remote inhospitable locations. Our society is still relatively more conservative. We still follow the ‘ladies first’ principle and treat our women with respect. Our public transport still has seats reserved for women and one finds separate queues at various public ticketing counters. In rural India, where some 70 per cent of our society lives, men and women continue to perform their traditional roles. For example, one never sees a woman ploughing a field or driving a tractor. The Army draws its soldiers mostly from villages where ladies still veil themselves in front of male elders. It can be argued that all this needs to change and ‘we need to move with time’. Agreed. But where should the change begin? There are plenty of fields where our women can have greater participation and make meaningful contribution to the nation’s forward march. In view of our dangerous security scenario, we cannot afford to indulge in cultural experimentation with the defence forces. The ‘women in combat’ protagonists advance several arguments to push their view. ‘The Army men must change their mindset’; ‘Men continue to be protective and paternal’, ‘Women are equally capable’; and the somewhat patronising ‘women are fully trained; it is the men who need to be trained to accept them’. In a recent TV debate some lady police officers and Army lady doctors cited their personal example of how they were accepted willingly by their male subordinates. Unfortunately, they all miss the point. The hesitation to accept women in the combat units has nothing to do with the male mindset. Also, no one questions that women are equally brave, courageous, physically strong and resilient to withstand stress. There is no ideological resistance. The problems lie elsewhere. First difficulty is in the physical domain. Billeted as they are under primitive conditions, the combat units cannot provide the privacy and gender-specific requirements to women. It might sound crude but none of the lady officers in police or medical line have had to face the dilemma of drying their undergarments or performing their ablutions in open and in full view of males. Nor have they been in circumstances – such as long range patrols – where they had the need to share a blanket with a (male) colleague when the regulation single blanket in their backpack proved inadequate. And there are many other similar situations that call for privacy. The second difficulty is in combining military career with family life. It has been common with many of us that we were posted in remote non-family stations when our children grew up through infancy and toddler hood. We took it as normal part of our Army duties. But imagine what would happen if the absentee parent were a mother? Would the child grow up as normal? There is another crucial issue that merits consideration. Every combat person is vulnerable to be captured by the enemy. The images of the mutilated bodies of our officers and men who had been captured by the enemy during the Kargil war are still fresh in our memory. As a society that has a history where our women widowed in a lost battle preferred to commit johar rather than be taken captives by the victor, will we be able to withstand the trauma if the fate of our Kargil martyrs were to befall one of our women officers? Some of our soldiers that were taken prisoners in 1971 are still languishing in Pakistani jails under most inhuman conditions. Would we want to expose our women to such risks? And if so, for what compulsion? Our defence forces are highly disciplined. If required, may be the combat units can make special arrangements for providing the needed privacy to women; may be the commanding officers can exempt night duties for women; may be the Army can adjust the postings of young mothers; may be the Army can try to ensure that our women officers are not taken prisoners. But, apart from adversely affecting operational competence it will be a case of equal opportunities and unequal obligations. Things will change and it is a question of time before women join all units and all trades of the Indian Army. But in our context that time should be way off. Let us all change our society first and then change our defence forces and not the other way round. Let us empower our women at homes and in civil professions before we take the risk of tinkering with our most precious national asset. For now, let us spare our defence forces, our only guarantee of freedom and in fact of survival, from this avoidable experimentation. That is the fervent appeal of an old soldier who holds both the Army and women in high regard. ——
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Arrest decline of Punjab economy As a result of exemplary progress, particularly in the fields of agriculture and industry, Punjab state continued to maintain the top position in terms of per capita income till the early nineties. Recently, the rate of growth has slowed down drastically. Barring the states of Bihar and Madhya Pradesh, the growth of the Punjab economy was the slowest in the country during the past decade. The average annual growth rate in state agriculture including livestock has also declined, and no significant improvement has been noticed in the first two years of the10th Plan. The country level picture has shown a similar trend but the pace of deceleration was slower than that of Punjab. The poor performance of the primary sector in the country was mainly due to fast emergence of sustainability issues in high potential agriculture states like that of Punjab. After attaining an exemplary rise in production, Punjab agriculture is at a stage beyond which sustaining the growth rate is an arduous task. Being mainly an agricultural economy, the overall development of the state has slowed down. The performance of the manufacturing sector in Punjab almost matches that of the national level. But recently, Punjab has shown poor performance in this area too. The recent state policy of over-administration, frequent power shortage and political turmoil leading to business insecurity have discouraged industrial units more in Punjab than the neighboring states. The worst performance can be observed in the tertiary sector of Punjab which is growing by 5-6 per cent as compared to the country average of 7-8 per cent, pulling down the overall economic growth of the state. Various issues associated with sustainability of Punjab agriculture need to be highlighted with specific focus on policy issues. Obviously, there is remote possibility of attaining miraculous crop production in the state. However, augmenting post harvest technology with value addition is possible to some extent. It can safely be inferred that the shortfall in national food grain production would continue to compel the potential state agriculture in the direction of the rice-wheat system, in spite of genuine ecological problems and slogans of diversification. Within agriculture, dairy is the potential sub-sector which can provide a significant breakthrough. But the ground reality is that dairy farming at the existing level of productivity and input-output prices is not at all profitable. The policy measures in this connection should aim at setting up of commercial dairy units on scientific lines with architectural construction of cattle sheds and proper machinery in each village, with assurance of milk procurement at remunerative prices and soft loans to meet the investment needs. Apart from this an effective check on the quality of milk and milk products supplied to the consumers in the interest of public health is essential and strict legislation in this regard should be framed. This will also save the real milk producers from competition with spurious ones. Other needed steps are scientific processing of vegetables and fruits for catering to the needs of potential city centres, efficient transport services for the export market, and industrial use of crop residue which is currently burnt to the tune of 30 million tonnes in Punjab alone, causing serious air pollution and wastage. —
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Afternoon tea with “Russia’s Osama” The afternoon I spent drinking tea with the man who became Russia’s most-wanted terrorist was, considering the circumstances, quite civilised.
Was Shamil Basayev already a monster? I don’t know. At the time I met him in 1995, he was known as a guerrilla leader, a fighter in the Chechen resistance. He was not considered a terrorist in the West. But in the months and years that followed, as the Chechen conflict grew darker and more desperate, his tactics changed. For the next 11 years, he wreaked previously unimaginable horrors upon Russia. He masterminded assaults on a school, a hospital and a Moscow theater that killed an estimated 600 people, including 300 children. I met Basayev in April 1995 as a Times Moscow correspondent covering Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin’s war to keep the then-obscure region of Chechnya from seceding. Russian forces had just captured the Chechen capital, Grozny, after a long siege and devastating bombing campaign that had terrorized the civilian population. The Chechen rebels had been routed, but we heard they had headed for their mountain redoubt in Vedeno, where Basayev was in command. We drove up a riverbed and over rough dirt trails – avoiding the main roads, which were being bombed by the Russian air force – past a farmhouse with a hole from a rocket in its roof. The rebels said the rocket had killed the farmer’s wife, blown off the feet of the 21-month-old girl she was holding and killed six others. The father, they said, had not been a fighter. But now he had gone off to join Basayev. In Vedeno, we went to see Basayev. He turned out to be only 30, grave, well-spoken and polite but surrounded by the scariest-looking fighters I had seen. It was clear he commanded not just their loyalty but their awe; they treated him like a celebrity, the Che Guevara of Chechnya. Later, it became clear that he already was becoming their leading strategist. Over tea, he gave me the usual lecture about Russian war crimes against Chechen civilians, about Russian internment camps where Chechen males, fighters and civilians alike, were tortured. He told me that the Chechen struggle had only begun, that the Russian military colossus could win on the plains but could never beat the rebels in their own mountains. He said the Chechen fighters had studied guerrilla warfare from the losing side, in the Soviet army in Afghanistan. Now they would turn the lessons of their miserable compulsory military service against the Russians, pin them down and bleed them indefinitely. He boasted that he had been buying ammunition and materiel from corrupt Russian officers. He saw that I looked skeptical and politely ushered me into a back room, which was filled to the ceiling with Russian ammunition, grenades, automatic weapons and what looked like shoulder-held grenade launchers. The next time I saw him was two months later. He and his men had captured a hospital in the southern Russian city of Budennovsk and had threatened to blow it up with the patients inside. We watched in horror at a distance as the ever-inept Russian troops shot at the hospital. The Chechen rebels inside its maternity ward stood pregnant women in front of the windows, hid behind them and shot back from between their legs. At least 100 people were killed and many more wounded. A Russian woman with a bulging belly and a gunshot wound to the chest was released, carried out by two other hostages. I asked her what she would tell her unborn child. “I will raise him to kill Chechens,’’ she said. It’s been said that one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter. I disagree. I believe the day Basayev stopped attacking the Russian army and attacked that hospital, he committed an unequivocally evil act and forfeited any claim to legitimate leadership of the Chechen people. The most recent of Chechnya’s many tragedies is that its most clever and charismatic leader turned out to be Shamil Basayev. By arrangement with
LA Times-Washington Post
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From the pages of Baker’s dozen plus one
Instead of Hindi and English, all the 14 national languages of the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution will become an official language for at least one purpose of the Union, i.e. of the Union Public Service Commission. This was an idea which sprung straight from Mr Kamaraj’s head which he had reportedly been scratching vigorously ever since the burning language problem began setting individuals on fire. His proposal has now been enshrined in a resolution of the Congress Working Committee and will eventually become law when the necessary bill is drafted and passed by Parliament. Serious doubts will persist whether the best way of giving equal opportunity to candidates in U.P.S.C. examinations is to let them answer in their own languages. The scheme has a deceptive simplicity. |
When one feels supremely content, effulgent with light from within and without, calm and collected; one is very close to attaining the goal of truth. He feels a vast ocean of quietitude and peace descend on him. The cause of everything around him becomes easily apparent.
Evil deeds should be thought of as poison. A man who loves life would go out of his way to avoid poison. A man who loves his life should go out of his way to avoid Truth and untruth often co-exist; good and evil often are found together.
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