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Sops for exports Refund muddle Slow climb |
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Limits of power — A Tribune debate
Cultural shock
Sex and sensibility
US moves to speed up nuke deal Inside Pakistan
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Sops for exports THAT the third annual supplement of the foreign trade policy for 2004-09, unveiled by Commerce Minister Kamal Nath on Thursday, has offered sops to exporters is not a surprise. They needed some government help as the rupee’s appreciation against the US dollar, encouraged by the RBI in a bid to contain inflation, has hit them hard. The 12 per cent service tax exemption for all export-related services offered at home and abroad is no small benefit. The government could not have let down exporters at this time faced as they are with a stiff competition from their counterparts in China. Besides, these were necessary to meet the enhanced export target for 2007-08 of $160 billion — $10 billion more than the original target. The real surprise in the policy is the extension of the duty benefit schemes for exports to special economic zones (SEZs). Opponents of the SEZs, including Union Finance Minister P. Chidambaram, are already piqued at the revenue loss, estimated to be Rs 1 lakh crore, on account of incentives being given to the SEZs. On the one hand, the UPA government has banned the export of certain food items to control inflation and on the other the trade policy has offered incentives for agricultural exports. One interesting feature of the trade policy addition this year is the offer of incentives for encouraging the production and export of high-tech goods. The aim, according to the Commerce Minister, is to turn India into a production base for high-end technologies. Another area of focus is the small and medium enterprises (SMEs), which have been hit by the RBI’s tightening of money supply. The Commerce Minister has pleaded for credit on soft terms for SMEs. The RBI will have to intervene, sooner rather than later, to slow down the fast pace of rupee appreciation. Otherwise, Indian products will take a beating in the international market. |
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Refund muddle WITH seats available in various colleges being far less than the demand, students apply at various places, just in case. It costs a packet to get prospectuses and application forms but the students have no choice. Admission dates of various institutions vary. With so much of uncertainty in the air, they take admission in the very first college that gives them the green signal. If they are lucky, they also get a call from a better — or more suitable to them — institution after a few days. That is when their ordeal starts. The first college refuses to refund their fee, which in some cases may run into lakhs. Not just that, some colleges even keep their original certificates with them, with the result that most of them are stranded like bonded labourers. The problem has become so acute that the All-India Council of Technical Education (AICTE) has been forced to step in. It has asked the victimised students to report the matter to it, so that punitive action could be initiated against the erring colleges. This is one lead which must be picked up by other regulating agencies also, so that the student community does not suffer. No college should be allowed to hold the students to ransom like this. With there being a mad rush for seats almost everywhere, all that the colleges have to do is to keep some candidates on the waiting list so that the seats vacated by any student does not go waste. In fact, most colleges fill all their vacated seats but still force the leaving student to part with the fee he has paid. At best, they can deduct a token amount but forfeiting the entire fee is unethical. Allowing this kind of switchover may cause some administrative burden to the colleges but that will be nothing in comparison to the tribulation that the students leaving an institution and their parents face. This matter has gone before state consumer dispute redressal commissions also and they, too, have rightly favoured the students. |
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Slow climb THE second prototype of the National Aerospace Laboratories’ (NAL) Saras 14-seater aircraft has made its maiden flight, propelled by two new engines with more power and larger propellers. Coming as it does nearly three years after the first flight of the first prototype, questions about the project and whether it is going the slow way of other indigenous aircraft, are inevitable. The first Saras was seriously underpowered and overweight. Ability to control weight is key in aircraft design, and NAL engineers should never have allowed weight to get out of hand. Even with the new prototype, it is not clear if the weight optimisation programme begun by NAL is achieving the desired results. Saras is being developed in collaboration with HAL which is mainly helping out with its wings and landing gear. Doubts have chased Saras since the inception of the project. Post first-flight, everything from thrust to weight to the crucial question of cost has kept the project under a nebulous cloud. The aim is to ultimately use Saras as a feeder aircraft on short routes, providing access to remote areas, with only short, even semi-prepared runways, and as a light cargo plane, air ambulance or VIP transport. If an Indian agency can indeed produce a viable aircraft, it is sure to find buyers. While the design goals and the market niche are realistic, unless cost, operating ease, and performance parameters are in the desired range, success will remain a dream. A vibrant indigenous aircraft industry, including many private partners, is something that India sorely needs. NAL is a CSIR laboratory and criticism has sometimes cropped up about the multiple centres for aircraft design and development and the need for over-all direction from an aeronautics department akin to the space and atomic energy departments. But now that money has been spent and two prototypes are in the air, the NAL team should think about pulling out all stops to make the project a success. Simply to keep a few planes flying, and having a project on hand, is not enough. |
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A friend is one who knows us, but loves us anyway.
— Fr. Jerome Cummings |
Limits of power — A Tribune debate
The speeches made by the Prime Minister and the Chief Justice of India at the Conference of Chief Ministers and Chief Justices on April 8 have received wide coverage in the media, giving rise to this healthy debate. Both of them have voiced their concerns, among others, about the huge arrears of cases and the urgent need to dispose of the backlog and speed up justice. The Prime Minister made a few suggestions to overcome this problem. His suggestion that the courts may consider having more than one shift is practical, easy to implement and does not involve heavy expenditure. Chief Justice K.G. Balakrishnan, in his address suggested a few additional measures for tackling the problem of accumulated arrears of cases such as creation of additional subordinate courts and appointment of judicial officers thereto, besides appointment of ad hoc judges in the high courts. The main cause for judicial delay lies, according to the Chief Justice, not in the judiciary as with the executive and the administrative wing of the government. The Prime Minister’s view that public interest litigation (PIL) should not be misused for settling political scores is shared by many, including the Supreme Court itself, which has repeatedly held that a PIL should not be a political interest, publicity interest, or private interest litigation. Dr Manmohan Singh’s belief that the judiciary, the executive and the legislature have an obligation to the Constitution and to the people to work in harmony, each playing its vital role in improving the welfare and wellbeing of the people is also unexceptionable. It is his remark that the dividing line between judicial activism and judicial overreach is a thin one and that the takeover of the functions of another organ may at times become a case of overreach which was rightly highlighted by the media, sparking off this debate. The CJI in turn observed that judicial review sometimes creates tension between the judiciary, the legislature and the executive and such tension was normal and to some extent desirable. The Chief Justice adverted to the principle of separation of powers and the need to ensure that the judiciary as well as the other branches operate within the boundaries of the law, as the purpose of judicial review of legislation and administrative action was to realise democracy. The Prime Minister’s remark about the dividing line between judicial activism and judicial overreach and the CJI’s view about the tension caused by judicial review of legislative and executive action need to be understood in their proper perspective. Unlike the British Constitution, whose prime characteristic is parliamentary sovereignty, separation of powers is a basic feature of our Constitution. None of the three wings of the State — the legislature, the executive and the judiciary — is superior to the others. They are all co-ordinate organs of the Constitution, operating, each within its own sphere. The powers of each of them are well demarcated. All of them stand by the Constitution. The judiciary is entrusted with the task of protecting the rights of the people and securing their enforcement. The Directive Principles of State Policy are fundamental in the governance of the country and it is the duty of the three wings of the State to give effect to them. As the power of judicial review makes the judiciary act like an umpire, whose duty is to ensure that no organ of the State , including itself, trespasses on the area reserved for another branch, it needs to be exercised with circumspection. At times the judiciary is constrained to act like a legislature or the executive, in the discharge of its duty to secure the enforcement of Fundamental Rights. For instance, when the issue of vehicular pollution in Delhi, which affected the right to life of the inhabitants, was raised in a PIL, the court had to issue directions and monitor their implementation. Such monitoring cannot be regarded as overreaching or taking over the functions of the executive. The lapse on the part of the Executive in not controlling vehicular pollution, which affected the health of the people, had to be remedied by the Supreme Court as part of its duty to uphold the right to pollution-free life. This is an instance of positive, beneficial and permissible judicial activism. There is enormous scope for such positive judicial activism at present. Due to various reasons, including the compulsions of coalition politics, the executive and the legislature are unable to tackle criminalisation of politics, corruption in the administration, the menace of communalism and casteism which jeopardises the unity and integrity of the nation, growing lawlessness and terrorism seen in different parts of the country, fully. Electoral malpractices is another serious issue, which needs urgent attention to save democracy, but has not been given due attention. At a time when the executive and the legislature are unable to discharge their Constitutional duties to the extent necessary, the Judiciary cannot be said to be overreaching if it tries to grapple with some of these problems to the extent it can, in the course of judicial review of legislative or executive action or inaction. There are instances when the Supreme Court unwittingly entered the area exclusively reserved for the legislature as pointed out by Mr Anil Divan in The Tribune (April 16)In Jagadambika Pal vs. Union of India (1988), the court, without disclosing its source of power, if any, simply issued a series of directions — that a special session of the U. P. Assembly should be summoned on the specified date, the only agenda would be of a composite floor test between contending parties, the proceedings shall be peaceful and, disturbance, if any, caused would be viewed seriously and the Speaker should announce the result of the test faithfully and truthfully etc. Similar directions were given in Anil Kumar Jha vs. Union of India (2005) in respect of the Jharkhand State Assembly. Recently, in Raja Ram Pal vs. Hon’ble Speaker of Lok Sabha (2007) while upholding the privilege of Parliament to expel its members who had taken money for asking questions in the House, the court proceeded to assert that judicial review is available to a limited extent, even in the matter of recognised privileges. This does not appear to be correct, having regard to the scheme of separation of powers and the Constitutional bar on courts intervention in the internal proceedings of Parliament. Both the Prime Minister and the Chief Justice have, in substance, underlined the need for self-restraint and caution in exercising the powers and to respect the Lakshman Rekha , which separates the functions of the legislature, the executive and the judiciary. The judiciary is expected to act with exemplary self-restraint in this sensitive area bearing in mind that while all legislative and executive actions are subject to judicial review, judicial decisions are not liable to be reviewed by any other authority except the judiciary itself. All the three estates of the State have to work for the realisation of the Constitutional goals. Right now, none of them is free from deficiencies and drawbacks. All of them need to be strengthened with the best of manpower, which is available in abundance in the country, but remains unutilised. The writer is a senior advocate at the Supreme Court of India.
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Cultural shock
When Venkatesh Raju, an educationist from Hyderabad, landed in South Carolina, USA, his joy knew no bounds. He was among the handful of Indian teachers who had been given a chance to earn in dollars and spangle their CVs with “foreign” experience. Venkatesh’s American dream had been realised and he was just too eager to report at the front desk of a county school for which he had been chosen. The teacher reported on the appointed day. The school administrator introduced him to the whole class. “He is the new maths teacher from India and his name is “Van”, “Venkhay….” err Rahu. “Can we call you Rahu,” the administrator asked Venkatesh, after fiddling with the phonetics. A bewildered Venkatesh, ignorant of the syllabic fact that ‘h’ is pronounced ‘j’ in the US, tried to explain that part of his name was Raju, different from Rahu, a disruptive celestial body in Indian mythology. “We will call you Winks. That’ll be cool,” the students came to the petrified teacher’s rescue almost in unison. No respectful address. No Sir. No bowing. No feet touching…just plain simple Winks. It was the first cultural shock that Venkatesh Raju, alias Winks, faced. More such shocks were to follow. “Hey, tell us Winks,” asked a student, “How you Indians can survive without drinking, smoking or eating beef.” “We hear that you share a room with another male teacher from India. Are you gay?” asked another one. Winks soon realised that a diversion towards studies would be a perfect alibi to ward off inconvenient personal questions on issues so much a part of Indian life but viewed with a different perspective in that part of the globe. “Let’s start off with algebra,” he announced. “Waaa Paaa maaan,” an Afro-American student boomed. “What is that,” the teacher sought an explanation. “He is simply asking what page (are you on) man,” one of the so-called bright ones tried to decode the heavy accent. As time lapsed, Winks grew accustomed to the accent, students’ tantrums and the American way of life. He noted how students, in a fit of rage, stomped on books. Winks got used to presence of corporals, armed with handcuffs, in the school and teenage pregnancies stopped concerning him anymore. A few months later, Winks’ wife and seven-year old son, Sujeeth, joined him on dependent visa. Busy in his job as Winks was, his wife took Sujeeth for admission to a neighbourhood school. It was there that the counter clerk asked the lady. “What a lovely child you have. Are you married?” “Never ask an Indian woman with a child whether she ever married or not,” Winks’ wife almost yelled. Winks had a hard time that evening, explaining his in-tears wife that society is so different in the USA. A few days later, Sujeeth, came running home. “Janet of our class lives with two brothers, one Afro and another Hispanic, Jack has a sister, whose father is not the same as his and Russell’s mother is married to another guy and he now has a father and a stepfather.” “How many fathers do I have Appa,” Sujeeth inquired? Pause! Hell, with the dollars. Venkatesh, alias Winks, has booked three seats for India on Continental Airlines next monthend. For
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Sex and sensibility HE was nicknamed a ‘buffalo’. A muscular youth, he became the butt of ridicule in our village when on his first night, his nubile, bleeding bride ran out of his thatched house with thatched walls screaming for life. Next day, I overheard my grandfather advising him to be a little more patient and gentle with his adolescent wife. Though they lived “happily thereafter”, he could not erase the nickname till his untimely death. It was around the same time that a classmate, who was the most brilliant, asked me whether my mother entered the kitchen on all days of the month, for his mother would not step into the kitchen for three-four days a month. He was so inquisitive that he virtually pried on his mother and found out the truth about her problem. In all innocence, I told him that Christian women did not have “dirty” menstruation. In contrast, today’s children learn about sanitary pads even before they learn the alphabets. Those days information on sex came from sources as undependable as peers, agony columns in periodicals and advertisements of the so-called sexologists, one of whom advised conservation of semen, one drop of which, he claimed, was equivalent to one litre of blood. He described night emissions and wet dreams as a debilitating, if not deadly, disease. It was years later that I learnt some of the basics of human life when I read Desmond Morris’ The Naked Ape. I narrate these incidents to bring home the point that the hullabaloo about sex education with one state after another banning it is out of sync with the reality. Kerala, ruled by the Left, was the first to frown upon the sex education module prepared by the National Aids Control Organisation (Naco) and the Unicef, which teachers were supposed to use in imparting “adolescence education” to the students. States like Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra and Karnataka followed suit and the contagion is expected to spread to more states. In BJP-ruled Madhya Pradesh, it was the National Students Union of India of the Congress, which took the lead in demanding end of sex education. Soon, the Sangh Parivar affiliates joined the bandwagon and the state government readily conceded their joint demand. It is interesting that on the issue of banning sex education, both Hindu and Muslim fundamentalist organisations are hand in hand. They have particularly objected to a drawing of human body in the Naco-Unicef manual, which they say does not conform to Indian “culture” and “values”. Had Maharshi Vatsyayana, who wrote his magnum opus Kama Sutra, which has always been the most exported book from the country, been alive today, he would have been hounded out a la M.F. Husain by the cultural philistines for being “un-Indian”. It is a different matter that from Kamakya to Kancheepuram and from Konarak to Kurukshetra, thousands of temples have more revealing sculptural depictions of human body than the humble Naco-Unicef module can boast of. The argument advanced against sex education is that it is unnecessary and it will only encourage pre-marital sex. Both these assumptions are wrong, as even many married couples do not know some of the basics of life science. On a conducted tour of Tamil Nadu to study the success of family planning in the state in the early seventies, I heard the then state health minister Dr H.V. Hande narrate an incident when at a family planning camp a government doctor explained how to use a condom by putting it on his thumb. The doctor was horrified to know later that many men had condom on their thumbs when they had sex. The poor medical practitioner was blamed for the unwanted pregnancies in the village. A recent study in Mumbai has shown that even without the dreaded sex education, 64 per cent of boys in the age group of 14 to 19 had one or more sexual encounters. Out of them, 43 per cent had visited homes of disrepute to fulfil their desires. In Chandigarh, too, a study came up with similarly alarming figures. A more authoritative Indian Council of Medical Research study recorded 36,700 teenage abortions in Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Bangalore in one year. This is only a fraction of the actual teenage abortions carried out by quacks and in private clinics. The argument that parents are the best teachers about sex is hollow when most parents are uncomfortable even discussing the subject with their children. More often, they themselves have all kinds of wrong notions about sex. Today, doctors would laugh at the sex-related fears no less a person than Mahatma Gandhi had nursed as revealed in his autobiography. In rural Tamil Nadu, a study showed that 53 per cent of women in the 16-22 age group had urinary tract infection, which they were shy of admitting to an elder, let alone approaching a doctor to seek a medical remedy. To expect such women to enlighten their children on sex is to ask for the moon. Unlike in the past, children now live in an environment where there is an overdose of sex-stimulating advertisements on television and in newspapers. Medical experts have been noticing that in girls childhood has been shrinking with the puberty cycle beginning when they reach 10 to 12 years of age from the earlier 12 to 14. Only an ostrich-like attitude can overlook such developments, which are induced by the changes in lifestyle, food and climate. When a Class XI male student in the national Capital took obscene pictures of a female friend and sent it to other male friends via his multimedia-enabled mobile phone, it shocked the whole nation. But the sight of school children in pairs spending time in restaurants and coffee shops in Connaught Place when they are supposed to be in classrooms is so common that few people really notice it. The argument that children need not be taught about the dangers of AIDS is flawed as 50 per cent of AIDS victims all over the world, including India, belong to the age group of 15 to 24. Eighty five per cent of AIDS victims contract the disease through sexual contact. In such a milieu, the abstinence-is-the-best-policy approach that politicians like US President George Bush and religious groups advocate will not take the nation far. Call it sex education or life science education or any other name, children need to be taught about sex. Modern parents teach children how to report back to them if anybody touches them indecently. Such practices make sense in the light of the finding that over 50 per cent children have at one time or another suffered from sexual or emotional harassment, mostly within the confines of their homes. The horrible killings of Nithari underline the risks children of both sexes face. Yet, it is strange that those on the left as in Kerala and on the right as in Madhya Pradesh are united in brushing sex education under the carpet. But the very people who say that childhood is not the time when sex education is imparted ignore the fact that at least 50 per cent of girls pushed into matrimony every year are minors. Conjugal coitus from the age of 10 onwards is acceptable, but not sex education. They may scream but they cannot run away from the buffaloes of this world. |
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US moves to speed up nuke deal WASHINGTON – U.S. officials, frustrated by the slow pace of negotiating final agreements with India on US President Bush’s deal to give it access to civil nuclear technology, have informed the Indian government that they want a major push next month to complete negotiations before the deal unravels from bureaucratic inertia and increased congressional anxiety of India’s dealings with Iran. Indian Foreign Secretary Shiv Shanker Menon will visit Washington on May 1 for a couple of days of negotiations. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns will visit India later in the month to try to wrap up the agreement. “There is a strong sense of frustration in Washington, in the administration and in Congress, about the fact that the Indian side has progressed so slowly in this effort. We urge it to accelerate its efforts,” Burns said Thursday. “The bottom line is that we are committed to this deal. We do not question the goodwill of the Indian government, and I believe we will overcome the problems we are encountering.” Bush and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh agreed to the pact in July 2005, then agreed to an implementation plan in March 2006. Now the two sides are negotiating language to comply with a congressional bill passed last year that would permit changes in U.S. law to allow for the nuclear sales, even though India never signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Many nuclear experts condemned the agreement as weakening efforts to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons, but the Bush administration billed the deal as necessary to build close relations with India. U.S. officials suspect that India has made certain demands, such as retaining the right to test nuclear weapons. The congressional bill said nuclear cooperation could be suspended if India conducted a test, and some Indian analysts argue that the congressional bill changed the nature of the deal. The deal faces other hurdles, including approval by an international consortium that controls nuclear exports, India’s reaching a separate agreement with U.N. inspectors, and then a final vote in Congress. The delays have given hope to agreement opponents, who have seized on reports of India-Iranian military cooperation and an indictment last month charging that Indian government agencies conspired to obtain secret weapons technology from U.S. companies. “India’s stealing of U.S.-controlled technology, its formal military-to-military cooperation with Iran, and its rejection of U.S. nonproliferation conditions on nuclear cooperation are what you would expect of an adversary, not a partner,” said Henry D. Sokolski, executive director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center, a nonprofit organisation. The indictment suggested the Indian government violated a pledge made in 2004 that it would not try to avoid U.S. export control laws and regulations. The indictment listed an unnamed Indian Embassy official as an unidentified co-conspirator. The case has raised alarms and anger in Congress, with a number of letters circulating among lawmakers to express their dismay. Administration officials will not discuss the indictment but argue that India is actually building closer ties with the U.S. military. “All of our allies, every single one, have diplomatic relations with Iran,” said one official, speaking on condition of anonymity in order to speak more freely. “It does not have substantial military contacts with Iran.” By arrangement with |
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US moves to speed up nuke deal WASHINGTON – U.S. officials, frustrated by the slow pace of negotiating final agreements with India on US President Bush’s deal to give it access to civil nuclear technology, have informed the Indian government that they want a major push next month to complete negotiations before the deal unravels from bureaucratic inertia and increased congressional anxiety of India’s dealings with Iran. Indian Foreign Secretary Shiv Shanker Menon will visit Washington on May 1 for a couple of days of negotiations. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns will visit India later in the month to try to wrap up the agreement. “There is a strong sense of frustration in Washington, in the administration and in Congress, about the fact that the Indian side has progressed so slowly in this effort. We urge it to accelerate its efforts,” Burns said Thursday. “The bottom line is that we are committed to this deal. We do not question the goodwill of the Indian government, and I believe we will overcome the problems we are encountering.” Bush and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh agreed to the pact in July 2005, then agreed to an implementation plan in March 2006. Now the two sides are negotiating language to comply with a congressional bill passed last year that would permit changes in U.S. law to allow for the nuclear sales, even though India never signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Many nuclear experts condemned the agreement as weakening efforts to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons, but the Bush administration billed the deal as necessary to build close relations with India. U.S. officials suspect that India has made certain demands, such as retaining the right to test nuclear weapons. The congressional bill said nuclear cooperation could be suspended if India conducted a test, and some Indian analysts argue that the congressional bill changed the nature of the deal. The deal faces other hurdles, including approval by an international consortium that controls nuclear exports, India’s reaching a separate agreement with U.N. inspectors, and then a final vote in Congress. The delays have given hope to agreement opponents, who have seized on reports of India-Iranian military cooperation and an indictment last month charging that Indian government agencies conspired to obtain secret weapons technology from U.S. companies. “India’s stealing of U.S.-controlled technology, its formal military-to-military cooperation with Iran, and its rejection of U.S. nonproliferation conditions on nuclear cooperation are what you would expect of an adversary, not a partner,” said Henry D. Sokolski, executive director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center, a nonprofit organisation. The indictment suggested the Indian government violated a pledge made in 2004 that it would not try to avoid U.S. export control laws and regulations. The indictment listed an unnamed Indian Embassy official as an unidentified co-conspirator. The case has raised alarms and anger in Congress, with a number of letters circulating among lawmakers to express their dismay. Administration officials will not discuss the indictment but argue that India is actually building closer ties with the U.S. military. “All of our allies, every single one, have diplomatic relations with Iran,” said one official, speaking on condition of anonymity in order to speak more freely. “It does not have substantial military contacts with Iran.” By arrangement with LA Times-Washington Post
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Inside Pakistan For nearly a month the media in Pakistan has been carrying reports and comments about a possible deal between President General Pervez Musharraf and former Prime Minister and PPP leader Benazir Bhutto. However, nobody could be sure about it till Ms Bhutto admitted during an interview with Sunday Times that “I want a deal with President Musharraf, but it will be premature to say one is imminent”. In the course of her last week’s interview with Geo TV she had only confirmed that she was having negotiations with supporters of the ruling General. But what are the likely contents of the deal, believed to be “in the final stages”? According to Dawn of April 18, “the three-stage approach visualises General Musharraf’s re-election as President (by the existing assemblies), withdrawal of the cases against Benazir and Asif Ali Zardari, and, finally, Benazir’s return home.” This means both need such a deal for their political survival. “The ground reality”, as Dawn says, “is that the generals know that the ragtag coalition they have cobbled together is not going to help them much in fighting the rising wave of religious militancy. What is more, there are indications that even Washington would like the PPP and the military-led coalition to get together.” “If a deal is eventually worked out”, as The News points out in an April 19 editorial, “the biggest gainer will plausibly be Ms Bhutto and her beleaguered husband Asif Ali Zardari, since one of the compromises will be on the many cases registered against the couple. However, this may well be a purely personal gain and only time will tell whether it pays dividends to the party... For instance, there is one view that says a party which has through much of its existence railed against military dictatorships should not be supping with generals, and certainly not in exchange for benefits that will accrue only to its top leadership.” The argument, however, has no meaning when politics is devoid of values and principles. Politicians in Pakistan, as also elsewhere, are basically interested in realpolitik. Some time ago Ms Bhutto had signed the much-publicised Charter of Demands along with another exiled former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, when she vowed not to strike a deal with a military dictator. General Musharraf, too, had taken the pledge to cleanse politics of corruption soon after capturing power through a bloodless military coup, justifying it by invoking “the doctrine of necessity”. Now he is ready for a compromise with Ms Bhutto whose husband had earned the sobriquet of “Mr Ten Percent” because he insisted on under-the-table payment before most government schemes were allowed to be implemented during her prime ministership. The General will have to bring about a constitution amendment to ensure that the PPP leader becomes Prime Minister for the third time if she ultimately jumps on his political bandwagon. Musharraf’s worries The General’s plan to get re-elected as President by the existing National and Provincial Assemblies before their term ends is bound to be questioned, but that is not his problem. “Musharraf is unwilling to take a chance” when the King’s Party, the Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain-led Pakistan Muslim League loyal to the General, has little chance of faring well in the coming elections. Even in the 2002 polls the PPP had won the maximum number of seats. The situation is such that “Even the army may not be able to manoeuvre election results the way it did last time in his favour”, as journalist Murtaza Rizvi says in his article in Dawn. According to Rizvi, “The erstwhile military-mullah alliance, as the vernacular Press puts it, is in a shambles. The religious right, which by supporting an amendment to the constitution had indemnified the October 1999 coup, is no more in the General’s camp. The slot vacated is now being offered to Benazir Bhutto.” The crisis caused by the threat to law and order by the clerics of Islamabad’s Lal Masjid and the two madarsas associated with it has taken an interesting turn. Members of civil society, disappointed at the failure of the military-backed regime to take on the self-appointed guardians of Islam, have decided to expose the nefarious designs of both. Thousands of people who took out rallies on April 19 simultaneously in Islamabad, Lahore, Karachi, Peshawar and some other places condemned the extremist activities of the Lal Masjid clerics. The blistering heat could not dampen their spirits to fight for the common cause. According to The Daily Times, rallies were organised by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan in association with some other groups. The paper said in an editorial: “The clerics have broken off negotiations after PMLQ president Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain told the Voice of America that 80 per cent of the ‘dispute’ had been resolved.” Interestingly, the MMA, the powerful alliance of religious parties, is not backing the maulanas controlling Lal Masjid and its
madarsas. |
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