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Instant edict Jail for Salman |
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No kidding Speaker and his MPs LOK Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee is in an unenviable seat. Proceedings in the House are disrupted almost routinely and observance of discipline and decorum, as revealed by Mr Chatterjee’s exasperation, is more the exception than the rule. His patience must have been strained to the limit for the Speaker to tell MPs “children are more disciplined than you”.
Faulting 123 for nothing
Acronyms anonymous
Do you know where your kids are? Fighting hunger with hope Inside Pakistan
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Instant edict AS any harried homemaker would tell you, retail vegetable vendors are not the most public-friendly lot. In fact, they are used to fixing prices on their own, which at times are high enough to amount to daylight robbery. Given a chance, they are also not averse to fleecing with the help of suspect quality and quantity. Small wonder that when they are given some competition by big retailers, who offer lower prices, consistent quality and electronic weighing, they go berserk. On the very first day of the opening of Reliance Fresh and Spencer’s retail outlets in Uttar Pradesh on Wednesday, they resorted to arson and protests and ransacked the stores. The administration was supposed to maintain law and order, but in a surprise move, it instead ordered district authorities to shut down all large-format retail stores. Chief Minister Mayawati even alleged that the big retailers were causing a law and order problem. In other words, the fault was not of arsonists but of the victims. The message that the government can be arm-twisted by resorting to violence will not be lost on anyone. In fact, the abject surrender may encourage people in other states to indulge in similar unlawful activities. Strangely, all this is being done in the name of helping the common man. Why is the choice not left to the “common man” -- whether he wants to shop at the big retail store or a corner shop? Ms Maywati has also scrapped her own new agricultural policy on the ground that it is anti-farmer. Incidentally, it was introduced as recently as on August 3, when more than two dozen senior bureaucrats hailed it as a “never-before” forward-looking policy which could transform the fortune of the farmers in the state. How it could turn anti-farmer within three weeks defies logic. Under this policy, private companies could enter into a contract with local farmers and share the benefits of the produce. The decision to shelve it has obviously been taken for political reasons, but it may come to be seen as a victory for the BSP’s arch-rival Samajwadi Party, whose MP Banwari Lal Kanchhal has been leading the attacks against the Reliance stores. This type of U-turn one day after the Mayawati government completed its first 100 days in office hardly presents the dispensation in a good light.
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Jail for Salman THE Jodhpur Sessions court has rejected the appeal of Bollywood actor Salman Khan against his conviction in the chinkara (black buck) poaching case. District and Sessions Judge Kamal Raj Singhvi has also upheld the five-year jail sentence and a fine of Rs 25,000 awarded to him by the lower court. Surprisingly, the actor failed to appear before the court on Friday on the ground that he missed the flight to Jodhpur from Hyderabad where he was shooting for a Telugu film. With this ruling, he will have to surrender before the Sessions court, if the Rajasthan High Court does not stay it in the meantime. Chinkara is an endangered species and its poaching is an offence under the Wildlife Protection Act. Though the Act has been very weak in checking poaching, it has been used very effectively against Salman Khan for killing a chinkara during the shooting of Sooraj Barjatiya’s film, Hum Saath Saath Hain. The actor’s conviction was based mainly on the eyewitness account of his driver Harish Dulani who claimed during the trial that he saw Salman shooting the animal. The prosecution argued that even if the driver’s testimony was ignored, there was strong circumstantial evidence against the actor. For instance, the animal’s blood samples taken from the places where it was hunted and cooked as also on the Gypsy used for poaching were found to be true by the Forensic Science Laboratory. Though Salman Khan has the legal option to appeal against the verdict, the judgement proves that all are equal in the eyes of law. If one has committed a crime, he has to undergo punishment in accordance with the law. The criminal justice system is the same for one and all and there cannot be a separate system for celebrities. This is the essence of the rule of law. Mumbai’s Special TADA Court Judge Pramod Dattaram Kode had proved this while sentencing Sanjay Dutt to six years imprisonment recently. Jodhpur Judge K.R. Singhvi has followed suit in the case of Salman Khan. Such bold rulings will help restore people’s confidence in the judiciary. |
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No kidding LOK Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee is in an unenviable seat. Proceedings in the House are disrupted almost routinely and observance of discipline and decorum, as revealed by Mr Chatterjee’s exasperation, is more the exception than the rule. His patience must have been strained to the limit for the Speaker to tell MPs “children are more disciplined than you”. And, from his remarks it appears that the scene is no different from that in a school where a student has to be asked to sit, another to go out and so on. Time was when school students used to hold a ‘mock’ parliament as part of co-curricular activities. The term ‘mock’ came to be replaced by ‘model’ because the exercise was intended to educate children in parliamentary behaviour, provide practice in debate and discussion and inspire an interest in public affairs. School authorities may now have to seek the Speaker’s view on how to hold model parliament sessions and what models of conduct would reflect accurately the way our MPs behave and function in Parliament. It should also be clarified to school authorities whether the exercise should continue to be called ‘model’; and if so, what parliamentary models are healthy for impressionable minds to emulate. It is imperative that Mr Chatterjee draw up guidelines so that children, in being compared with Honourable Members of the House, do not get notions about themselves. There is, of course, the minor issue of whether Children’s Day can continue to be celebrated by schools. Or, should this occasion be made a privilege restricted to MPs alone, subject to the celebrations being under the strict supervision of the Speaker? The alternative — don’t even think about it — of sending MPs back to schools would be a recipe for disaster. A grateful nation owes much to Mr Chatterjee for desisting from such a recommendation much as everyone sympathises with him for what he has to endure. We don’t have to launch a save-the-schoolchildren campaign yet. Thank you, Speaker Sir, for sparing the children of lesser houses. |
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Friendship multiplies the good of life and divides the evil. — Baltasar Gracian
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Faulting 123 for nothing
SOME sections of our political establishment, especially those who were in power till May 2004, have come out with a lot of objections to 123 deal based on their deep suspicions of US motivations derived from the history of first five decades of Indo-US relations. Especially they focus on US cutoff of fuel supply to Tarapur and the US Democratic Party’s policy — insisted upon by US Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott, in his dialogue with NDA foreign minister Jaswant Singh — of cap rollback and elimination of Indian nuclear weapons. Therefore, some of them are persuaded that the 123 agreement is an elaborate charade to cap India’s strategic capability and establish a tight control over the Indian nuclear sector. This approach overlooks the history of developments in Indo-US relationship since 1998 and in international politics and is based on a static view of global developments. It should be recalled that the Indian Prime Minister justified the Shakti tests on the basis of India having to balance China. At that stage not only President Clinton did not buy that argument but even issued a joint statement in Beijing during his visit that China had legitimate interests in the subcontinent. A year later in 1999 Clinton played a constructive role during the Kargil crisis and that led to the initiative by the NDA government to improve relations with the US. Indian diplomacy resulted in very fruitful Clinton visit to India and the Indian Prime Minister calling US “ natural ally”. Yet Clinton and his democrats were unyielding on India’s nuclear status. Things changed with George Bush becoming President. In 2000 in an article in “Foreign Affairs” Dr Condoleezza Rice had advocated greater US interest in India as a balancer of China.Rice became the National Security Adviser in 2001.The NDA government was able to get the US Administration to modify its policies and launch on Next Steps in Strategic Partnership.This involved US changing its traditional policy on proliferation. While this was under discussion there was a change of government in India in May 2004 and the UPA took over from the NDA. In January 2005 Condoleezza Rice became the Secretary of State and the US foreign policy evolved further. President Bush and Dr Rice proclaimed their intention to help India in its moves to become a major power in 21st century. They felt that India’s rise and growth were essential as a balancer against China (not to contain or confront Beijing ). In this approach they had the broad support of European Union leaders and Russia . With that support they came up with the plan to modify the Non-proliferation Treaty regime to accommodate India and India only. This strategy was a top-down one in US. While it has broad bipartisan support there are many politicians and sections of bureaucracy who do not approve of modifying the NPT fundamentalism to make India a balancer of power in Asia. The 123 agreement has to be viewed against this changed US strategic perspective. Therefore it should not be scrutinised with reference to past experience when nonproliferation theology ruled US policies. The present opportunity should be seized to demolish the technology apartheid erected around India and get the 45 Nuclear Supplier Group countries to acknowledge India as a state with nuclear weapons with which they will do nuclear business. It must be understood that this is a great leap in the US and Western approaches since President Clinton exhorted to the Indian Parliamentarians to give up the nuclear weapons in March, 2000. It would be an unforgivable folly to give up this opportunity. An appropriate assessment of the present global strategic situation is necessary to appreciate the reasons why India is being offered this opportunity, not by US only but powers like Russia, France, Germany, UK , Japan and others. Looked at as a bilateral agreement between India and US many conspiracies are read into it about capping our strategic arsenal and dominating our nuclear activity. If it is viewed as a move to balance China from becoming overwhelmingly dominant power in Asia then the agreement would be seen in its true perspective. Rejecting this agreement will gladden the hearts of the Chinese and their nuclear surrogates, the Pakistanis. If India does not accept this during the Bush Administration one cannot be sure that any succeeding Democratic Administration would be as committed as Bush and Rice have been. China would like to see this India’s liberation from technology apartheid wrecked without its being directly blamed for it. They have been using Pakistan as a surrogate to countervail India. By rejecting this international proposal backed by US, Russia, Germany, UK and Japan India will isolate itself and lose its credibility in the international system as a player in the balancer of power game. Countervail-ing India on one side through Pakistan and growing faster than India — economically, technologically and militarily China would be able to dominate India in Asia. Is that what the leadership which conducted the Shakti test wants? When the issue of exempting India from Nuclear Nonproliferation framework was being discussed in the US Senate, Senator Joe Biden said that he did not like the agreement. He would not have negotiated this kind of agreement, but still he would vote for it since the relationship with India was important. That showed statesmanship rising above party parochialism. Some people may find faults with 123 agreement and may have improvements to suggest.Now that the agreement has been finalised do we go ahead with it or kill it and enable China to dominate in Asia and use Pakistan to countervail India perpetually? Do the people who object to 123 agreement have any alternative to enable India to rise as a balancer of power in Asia without integration with other major powers? Let us think it
over.
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Acronyms anonymous
I
am
hopelessly lost and bewildered and if I am going batty, it is due to the taut nerves caused by having to hack through a dense thicket of acronyms in a bid to get a Half-Nelson on the Sri Lankan Tamil ethnic conundrum. Acronyms have really got my goat — thanks to a surfeit of TELO, LTTE, PROTEG and what-have-you. Just as I relax a bit, smugly complacent that at last, I have managed to get a hang of the Tamil ethnic strife in Sri Lanka, yet another acronym suddenly pops out, like a rabbit out of a magician’s hat and upsetting my cosy applecart. But then I suppose, the Sri Lankan Tamil acronyms do serve a nebulous purpose of sorts like, for instance, when the Sri Lankan government delegation at the Norwegian brokered peace talks in Bangkok puts forward a perfectly preposterous set of proposals for resolving the long running feud, the chap representing the Tamil United Liberation Front (TULD) can wiggle his ears, put his tongue out and say derisively: “tulf!” (which is the Oxonian way of saying phooey! and the bloke representing the People’s Liberation Organisation of Tamil Eelam (PLOTE) can drive home the point by accusing the Sri Lankans of PLOTE-ing with the Americans and the Israelis to ‘do in’ the Tamils. Quite a few acronym tigers are roaming in the bushes outside the Government House in Bangkok where the peace talks are being held. While the Tigers of Eelam Liberation Organisation (TELO) is content with baring its teeth and snarling at the Sri Lankans more fierce Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) has actually pounced on the Sri Lankans, badly mauling them. Other acronyms, too, are having a field day in Bangkok: PROTEG — Organisation for the Protection of Tamils of Eelam against Genocide — quite a mouthful that and EROS. I tried to unravel the EROS mystery and even got as far as “Eelam” and “Revolutionary” and then the trail went cold and I called off the search as a bad bargain, but it would be a relief to know that EROS stands for love, after all. The redoubtable Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Dr Karunanidhi is doing his bit to stoke the acronyms fire and keep it burning. He has just announced the launching of the Tamil Eelam Supporters’ Organisation (TESO) and it is not likely that his arch rival Ms Jayalalitha will let her “bete noire” get away blithely with his brazen act of oneupmanship and she might soon launch a Tamil Eelam Backers’ Organisation (TEBO). It is quite possible that the Sri Lankan President assailed from all directions by implacable acronyms, will throw in the towel and concede the Tamils’ demand for a separate homeland. Hey, did you know that I am the founder and moving spirit behind OFTFCWCUSLTA — One Of The Few Chaps Who Can Understand the Sri Lankan Tamil
Acronyms? |
Do you know where your kids are? What seemed to be an essentially American problem some decades ago is now a glaring Indian reality. It was in the 1980s that this writer heard the phrase that preceded Fox television channel’s 10 O’Clock News every night: “It’s 10 p.m. Do you know where your children are?” Call it the effect of globalisation or the expansion of the global village, the ills attributed to Western – read more urbanised societies – are now evident in India too. Of course, the impetus for penning down this piece comes from the recent news of the kidnapping and subsequent murder of a Mumbai teenager, Adnan Patrawala. There has been much speculation that he and his murderers met though the social networking site called Orkut, though a report has denied it. There is, however, no doubt that Adnan was a member of Orkut. He describes himself in his profile as “wrds cant describe me but i m always coool wht more?” Orkut had over six crore and 84 lakh members at the time of writing this article. They are connected with each other through the Internet. Orkut is only one such site, its rivals include Facebook and Myspace. At this time there are over a hundred communities (member groups) on Orkut that pay homage to him and discuss the case. Social networking sites work because of the need among users to connect with friends and family, to find like-minded people, and share their pictures, videos, information about their passions. When we see Adnan’s profile, his communities included Quit Softdrink and others woven around the brand icons that fascinate teenagers: Sony Ericsson K850i, Levis Jeans @ India, Provogue, Davidoff Cool Water perfume, Starbucks Lovers and Skoda Laura Awesome Car. When you are a member of a community, you meet others and form friendships. In fact, if there is one thing the Web is good at, it is allowing people to establish superficial relationships and such sites have the potential of vastly increasing the reach and exposure of the user. In this very potential lies a pitfall. As German philosopher Immanuel Kant famously said: the only thing that is good without qualification is good will. In fact, in the absence of good will, anything can be, and sometimes is, abused. Social networking sites have come in for extensive criticism because from time to time they host hate groups, perverted people and paedophiles and become forums intimately linked with criminal acts. Adnan made online friends, some of whom may have had a hand in his kidnapping and killing. Do we blame the website for the crime? No. We can’t. While it facilitated the interaction between the individuals, how they acted is their responsibility. All too often youngsters tend to get overly fascinated by the lure of the Internet, and also the virtual communities that it has spawned. Let’s be frank, it is a very powerful and alluring attraction and many parents too proudly say that their children are “doing computers” when all they are doing is online chatting. This, like many such activities, is not good or bad in itself, but it can be a waste of time. A recent study by SurfControl, an internet security company, said that Australian workers who kept a close watch on their Facebook profile page while at work were costing their employers up to US $4 billion a year. When we were young, our parents insisted that we bring our friends home from time to time. This allowed them to build a rapport with our friends and vice versa. Today’s parents often lack time to spend with their children. They feel guilty and thus give the children unbridled access to the Internet, among other things. This is when the situation gets out of hand. As a long-time Internet user, when asked, I have often suggested that children should surf the Internet in a common area of the house. No closed doors should be allowed. Children who know that their parents can see what they are doing will behave better, online as well as offline. Unfortunately, parents often don’t know what their children are doing. This is especially true of the rich urban middle class that seems to have time for everything else but their children. What happens? You have youngsters with guns killing girls, or mowing down people with their parents’ BMWs. Today, thousands of Indian are being forced to confront the reality that they really don’t know where their children are – not only geographically, but more importantly, where they stand, what their activities are and what kind of friends they have. Fox is a channel owned by media magnate Rupert Murdock, as is STAR TV in India. As yet, STAR News does not open with the credo: “Do you know where your children are?” Are we neglecting our duties towards our children and contributing to a society where it might soon need to do so? We might well be, unless we refocus our priorities and make it our business to keep a watchful eye on our children and their activities. |
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Fighting hunger with hope SRinagar: Shakeela makes her way up the rocky terrain and goes down on her knees in prayer. The spot marks her husband’s grave and is her most frequented place where she comes often, seeking solace from the challenges she has been struggling with since she became the head of her family after her husband’s death. Shakeela is not alone. Dardpora in Kralpora block of Kupwara district has nearly 122 widows and about 300 orphans. Most of the men killed were “militants” shot dead in encounters, while some were killed as a fallout of internal rivalry within militant groups. Whatever the reason, the impact on the women remains the same. “Life for us (widows) is so hard, we have become hard rocks and the tides of time no longer torment us in anyway”, rues Shakeela. Most widows choose to remain single instead of considering remarriage, even though it is a socially accepted norm. Financial constraints result in difficult conditions, with little or no help coming from government or non-government organisations. The village is a popular site for individuals within and outside the state who visit the village to carry out various research studies and surveys. Yet no help is forthcoming for the struggling women and children. “They come here and make tall promises but to this day no one ever came back after their research was over,” the villagers point out. At times, the locals are so wary of outsiders that they are hesitant to speak about themselves. Understandable, since the times when they have spoken their heart out with the hope that it would somehow improve their situation brought no changes. Nearly every household here houses a widow and orphans with no “reliable” source of finances. Rafiqa Bano lost her husband in 1990. Seventeen years down the line, she lives separately with her two daughters and has no family support from her in-laws. Her husband was severely injured in militant firing. The Army took him to a hospital but after one month brought him back in a deteriorating state. He died shortly after. Rafiqa says she did not receive assistance of any kind from the government or any voluntary association. Sarwar Jan was widowed after her husband was killed ten years ago by unidentified gunmen. Left with six daughters and a son, she used the ex-gratia relief of one lakh rupees to invest in the ducation of her children. Hearing and speech impaired Zaytoon lost her husband in 2003 and was left with three children. Her eldest daughter believes that her father died due to relentless suffering caused by the Army. “Every time he was arrested, he was tortured brutally and one day he turned insane and finally he died,” she says bitterly. “Death may have relieved Samad (her husband) from pain and torture, but we continue to live and suffer,” laments Zaytoon. Fatima lost her father-in-law and brother- in- law to the insurgency. Two years later, her husband was killed in a clash between two militant groups, the Al Burq and Hizbul Mujahideen. Naseema lost her husband only a year after their marriage. In 1999 her husband crossed over to Pakistan Occupied Kashmir (POK). Soon after his return home, he was killed in an encounter. Naseema has no children and stays with her parents. “I do not want to marry again”, she states. “These widows refuse to remarry. Often we try to motivate them to reconsider but they prefer to live with their children and the memories of their husbands. They are convinced they want to live and die for their children. Such women would choose financial independence over remarriage,” observes Abdul Khaliq, a local. Another reason for the unpopularity of remarriage is that the young widows, often in their twenties, receive proposals of marriage from far older men. Social attitudes, he adds, need to change and young men should step forward to participate in this social process. Kralpora block of Kupwara district has 37 villages, one of which is Dardpora. Like other villages of Kupwara, Kralpora has been badly affected in the last two decades of political upheaval. Local estimates reveal that there are more than 600 widows in the Kralpora block alone and nearly 1,200 orphans. The deaths have also had a sever impact on the local economy, making livelihood sources even more scarce. This, despite the village of Dardpora being mere 120 km from the city of Srinagar. Basic amenities like water and electricity are irregularly supplied. Rain-fed agriculture is the primary source of livelihood with little access to irrigation. The popular choice of crops is consequently crops like wheat and maize that require less water for cultivation. The difficult terrain makes this village highly inaccessible. Its location in the vicinity of the international border makes it vulnerable for violent clashes. Shameema recognises the Darwinian rule of “survival of the fittest” play itself out in the strife torn state of Jammu & Kashmir. She has learnt it the hard way. Her husband, Abdul Rashid of Safapora Phalpura, Baramulla district, worked as a Special Police Officer. He was abducted seven years ago by unidentified gunmen and has not been heard of since. His wife recounts, “Seven years back, at a time of sowing season of rice, five gunmen came to our house and took him away. Later, close sources said that he was killed, as the gunmen were actually militants.” In any other situation, any wife would have prayed to see her husband alive; she would have impatiently waited for the news of her husband’s wellbeing, and hoped that he was alive. The harsh lessons that these wives have learnt have brought on a perspective that is quite contrary to this one. Two decades of political uncertainty have taught women here to be practical: the truth is that hungry stomachs cannot be fed on mere illusions and hopes.
— Charkha Features |
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Inside Pakistan Now that the Supreme Court of Pakistan has upheld the constitutional right of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and ex-Chief Minister of Punjab Shahbaz Sharif to return to their country, the question being asked is: where is the original of the "Confidentiality and Hold Harmless Agreement" they reportedly signed before leaving for Saudi Arabia on a 10-year exile in 2000? The Musharraf regime could not produce the original of the document on Thursday nor did it declare where it exactly was. According to Daily Times (Aug 24), "The news from the Gulf is that the real document containing the 'agreement' was lying with the late Prime Minister of Lebanon, Mr Rafik Hariri, who was said to be a business partner of the Sharif family together with some members of the Saudi family. The report also says that the Saudi government 'lost interest' in the prosecution of the 'agreement' after the death of King Fahd. This forces us to presume that the approach of Crown Prince Abdullah to President Musharraf for the release of the Sharif family was made on behalf of the then King." Whatever the truth, as The News says, "Arguably, they (the Sharif brothers) remain the most potent political force in Punjab, the one province that can make or break governments and elections in Pakistan, and the Supreme Court ruling is bound to heat up things there." But will the Sharifs really come back to Pakistan? The cases instituted against them have been reopened and they may be arrested immediately after landing at the airport itself. Going by the assertion of independence by the judiciary, they may get bail without much difficulty. As The Nation commented, whatever the consequences, "the Sharif brothers do not have a choice except to return at the earliest. They should also not ignore that leaving it to the party to decide the matter will be perceived to be as lame an excuse as their own decision to proceed abroad in the dead of night." Lawyers’ drive The lawyers of Pakistan, it seems, are determined to prevent Gen Pervez Musharraf from perpetuating his rule. As part of their anti-Musharraf drive, the Pakistan Lawyers Forum has approached the Supreme Court to restrain the The Forum has quoted a judgement of the apex court in Mian Nawaz Sharif vs President of Pakistan in which it was held that, constitutionally, "the President is the head of the state and represents the unity of the republic, and his position is of a non-partisan person". He should, therefore, maintain his "neutral" image and keep out of politics. The Dawn report had it that the Forum wanted the court to direct him neither to enter into any deal with political parties like the PPP nor to act as "the head of the PML(Q)", derisively called the Pervez Musharraf League. Since the Supreme Court, presided over by Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, is unlikely to favour General Musharraf, "ministers and leaders of the Opposition are freely talking about a new martial law", as senior journalist says in his column in The News (Aug 22). This is bound to lead to a "grave crisis" in Pakistan. That is why an editorial in The News (Aug 23) advised General Musharraf to concentrate on his "re-election as a civilian and seek a vote from the new parliament that will convene after the elections" in view of his latest talk of "a stable political environment" for faster economic development. Pipeline politics If everything goes as planned and the US continues to influence the governments in Islamabad and Kabul, the once abandoned Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan (TAP) gas pipeline will become a reality in three years. According to Business Recorder (Aug 23), the Pakistan government has "awarded the contract" for laying the $10 billion pipeline to the International Oil Company of the US. An earlier attempt to bring Turkmen gas to South Asia, including India, could not succeed because of the war in Afghanistan. Why India has been left out this time is not known. But the progress over the TAP pipeline is closely linked to US diplomacy "to outflank two rivals in the region: old Iran and new Russia", as Daily Times commented on August 21. This should be seen against the following background: "America has been opposed to the Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline while Russia, which takes Turkmenistan gas at cheap rates, puts it into its international pipeline and sells it at a high price in Europe, is opposed to Turkmenistan selling gas to anyone else", as Daily Times points out.
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What a country! Here parents need to be reminded about minding their children! This was the smug thought that cropped up in my mind more than once. We don’t have any thing like this in India; our society is so different… How wrong I was!