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Two more medals India is moving at last IT seems that India’s Olympic jinx is broken good and proper. After Abhinav Bindra, boxer Vijender Kumar and wrestler Sushil Kumar have got India two more medals. While Sushil Kumar will have to be content with a bronze, Vijender, who is already assured of a bronze after winning his quarterfinal bout, can convert it into silver and gold. That will be the biggest Olympic haul ever by India.
Must J&K spin out of hand?
Water finds its way
Patronising corruption Health
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Tackling terror After
dithering for years, the Union Government now appears to have shed its slackness in making out the case for continuing the ban on the Students’ Islamic Movement of India (SIMI). So its latest affidavit in the Supreme Court suggests. In its 42-page submission the Centre has gone the farthest it can — by citing the over 400 cases filed against SIMI – to establish the outfit’s support to terrorist and extremist activities in several states. The affidavit, which is packed with incontrovertible evidence, shows a new resolve on the part of the government to ensure that no quarter is given to SIMI, which is, admittedly, a grave threat to the country’s peace, integrity, security and maintenance of public order. The evidence marshalled by the Centre, and placed in the public realm, should serve to silence Messrs Lalu Prasad Yadav and Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav who have been batting for SIMI. These luminaries seem to be playing politics with an issue of utmost national importance under the guise of defending “minorities” and “secularism”. The government must now rein in its coalition partners and fellow travellers and ask them to desist from taking divergent positions on the issue. SIMI, as pointed out in the affidavit, is no less a threat to the “secular fabric of India”, and any defence of SIMI by equating it with the cause of secularism is unwarranted and dangerous. This is an issue on which all parties must unreservedly stand by the government and strengthen the case for sustaining the ban on SIMI. Had the Centre shown a similar resolve in the first instance, the setback — of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Tribunal quashing the ban and the Supreme Court having to stay the order — could have been avoided. In addition to making a watertight case, which ensures that SIMI remains banned, the Centre must act decisively to clamp down on SIMI reviving itself and fomenting terrorism through its front organisations. SIMI is waging war against the Indian state and it should be made difficult for anyone to go soft on the terrorist outfit.
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Saboteurs of justice THE conviction of senior advocates R.K. Anand and I.U. Khan by the Delhi High Court in the BMW expose case for obstructing the administration of justice is welcome. A two-member Bench consisting of Justice Manmohan Sarin and Justice Madan B. Lokur has not only stripped them of their designation of senior advocate but also barred them from appearing in the Delhi High Court and its subordinate courts for four months as “punishment”. It has found them guilty in NDTV’s brilliant expose that showed a disturbing nexus between the defence and the prosecution and a witness in the BMW case. The sting operation showed defence lawyer Anand persuading a witness Sunil Kulkarni to change his testimony to save Sanjeev Nanda in collusion with the public prosecutor I.U. Khan. Sanjeev, grandson of former Chief of Naval Staff Admiral S.M. Nanda and son of arms dealer Suresh Nanda, is charged with mowing down six persons with his BMW car in January 1999 on Lodhi Road in the Capital. According to the NDTV tape, which was closely examined by the Bench, Sunil asked Anand Rs 2.5 crore for refusing to identify Sanjeev. When Anand said this was too much, Sunil told him to get prepared for sending Sanjeev to the jail. Clearly, the criminal justice system will be reduced to a mockery if there is collusion between the prosecution and the defence and the witnesses. The two advocates should have been barred from doing legal practice for life — and not just for four months. Their offence is serious enough in making them unfit for practising law which, despite being law officers of the court, they have clearly vitiated. Moreover, they did not even apologise to the court for their misconduct and instead tried to evade justice. The BMW case and the ongoing Bansal case in Chandigarh have shown that there are black sheep parading as advocates who are wreaking havoc on the criminal justice system and bringing a bad name to the judiciary. It calls for firm measures to stem the rot in the system. What happened in Chandigarh last week is disturbing. The Ghaziabad Provident Fund scandal too has cast aspersions on the fair reputation of the judiciary. If those in the system so unabashedly indulge in corruption, people’s confidence in the judiciary is bound to get eroded. |
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Two more medals IT seems that India’s Olympic jinx is broken good and proper. After Abhinav Bindra, boxer Vijender Kumar and wrestler Sushil Kumar have got India two more medals. While Sushil Kumar will have to be content with a bronze, Vijender, who is already assured of a bronze after winning his quarterfinal bout, can convert it into silver and gold. That will be the biggest Olympic haul ever by India. While the celebrations are in order, it must be remembered that the country has far higher potential which has never got converted into international laurels. These gutsy boys have shown that it can be done. Now is the time to aim higher and strive to be in the top league, commensurate with the size and the population of the country. Now that the exploits of Vijender Kumar and Sushil Kumar have made people inquisitive about their background, the extremely negative surroundings in which they have been preparing are a matter of common knowledge. If they can do this well in such primitive conditions, they and many others can perform near miracles if given suitable facilities. Are the sports authorities listening? The nation is starved of sports heroes. The Olympic victories will draw many to the sports arenas in the days to come. The sale of guns has already gone through the roof after Abhinav’s gold. The powers that be will be doing a great service to the nation if they channelise this tremendous energy and hammer it into medal prospects. All that is needed is loving care and a will to make the raw talent rise to its full potential. Now that the appetite of the country has been whetted, let us not be satisfied with three or four medals. It is time to think in terms of 10 or 20, if not more. The London Olympics, 2012, is beckoning. The time to start preparations is now. |
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Tell me what you eat and I will tell you what you are. — Anthelme Brillat-Savarin
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Must J&K spin out of hand?
ONE should be grateful for small mercies. On Monday the huge and tumultuous procession taken out by the separatists in Srinagar passed off peacefully. This led to an audible sigh of relief though the procession’s purpose - to submit a memorandum to the UN Military Observers Group for India and Pakistan, demanding immediate self-determination - was totally opposite of what India has stood for during the last 61 years. There is also a three-day reprieve before the separatist agitation is resumed in full force. By contrast there was no scope even for a simulated sense of relief in Jammu where the Amarnath Shrine Sangharsh Samiti intensified its agitation that is ratcheting up both communal and regional hostility in the state’s two major regions. Few seem care that the catastrophic activity on both sides of Banihal has now entered its third month. Obviously, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s well-meaning but platitudinous appeals for peace and against divisiveness have fallen on deaf ears. The dispatch to Srinagar of the National Security Adviser and the intelligence honcho is a classic case of too little, too late. Today’s disastrous situation is a product of massive mishandling of Jammu and Kashmir by all Union governments and crass and self-serving performance of successive state ministries. But the future cannot be held hostage to the past. The Indian state must either produce a compromise acceptable to both sides or crack down on their anti-national activities. In either case, its action must be firm and fair. A depressing sign of the current state of affairs is that senior columnists, to say nothing of maverick Arundhati Roy, have offered the unacceptable counsel of despair that if Kashmiris don’t want to stay with India, “let them go”. Given the way things have been allowed to drift and degenerate, it may be no surprise that the separatists carry only Pakistani, green and black flags. But surely it should be a matter of the gravest concern that separatist mobs, shouting pro-Pakistan or pro-independence slogans can force the BSF to take down the national flag in Srinagar’s historic Lal Chowk. Moreover, if in the valley the dividing line between the separatists and mainstream parties like the People’s Democratic Party and the National Conference is getting blurred, in Jammu local Congress leaders and workers have joined the inflamed and inflaming agitation. In both regions wherever mobs outnumber the police and security forces, the latter are totally helpless. In any case, after the rather heavy loss of life in police firings - and the reaction to them, especially in the valley where Omar Abdullah is threatening to resign from the Lok Sabha that cheered him so lustily a month ago - the authorities have obviously decided not to interfere with the agitators as long as they don’t resort to violence. But for how long can this state of affairs be prolonged? This question acquires a sharper edge because the chances of bridging the divide between Jammu and Kashmir - and let’s face it, between the two communities - are not plentiful. A TV channel’s valiant efforts to promote “a dialogue across the divide” on Sunday flopped miserably. Partisanship has been the bane of Indian polity for a very long time. Yet those able to take a non-partisan and impartial view have not yet become extinct. In their contribution to the cacophonic debate, there is striking unanimity on three major points. First, that during the recent months when New Delhi ought to have been vigilant about the gathering storm in J & K, the Prime Minister was too preoccupied with the India-United States civilian nuclear cooperation deal to look after anything else. At the height of the agitation and counter-agitation he was engrossed in saving his government. But even after he had won the vote of confidence, it took him many days to convene the first all-party conference that yielded no worthwhile result. Secondly, as an inevitable consequence of the first, Jammu and Kashmir, as also the nation’s internal security, have been left almost entirely to the care of the Union Home Minister, Mr Shivraj Patil, who regrettably is wholly out of his depth, to put it no more strongly than that. Why he is not given some lighter responsibility and someone who would be a more hands-on minister given the task of running home affairs is for the Prime Minister to explain. Typical of the current Home Minister’s style is the statement he made 24 hours after 11 persons, including a senior Hurriyat leader, were killed in the firings on the crowd trying to cross the LoC. He declared that the government had “no objection” to opening the Srinagar-Muzzafarabad route for trade. Subsequently, the External Affairs Ministry clarified that India had indeed proposed the reopening of the road across the LoC, but Pakistan had not accepted it. What can be a more pathetic pointer to governmental ineptitude than that it took several days even to publicise that trucks carrying essential supplies were moving freely on the Jammu-Kashmir highway? All through the interval TV channels were playing up the protesters’ complaint of the “economic blockade” of the valley. Thirdly, and no less depressingly, the government’s incompetence is matched by the utter irresponsibility of the principal Opposition party, the BJP. Far from restraining its followers in Jammu, it has exploited their agitation to win the Hindu vote across the country. The saffron party has announced that it would carry Jammu’s grievance to other states until August 25 when BJP president Rajnath Singh and the party’s prime ministerial candidate L. K. Advani would jointly address a rally in Jammu city. The Samiti, remarkably, has told them to stay away. BJP leaders are crying hoarse that while the people of Jammu are being denied their rights, the separatists of Kashmir are being pandered to. The conflict, they claim, is between “nationalism and separatism”. It is a strange concept of nationalism that cuts at the very roots of national interest. Will separatism be defeated by creating an almost complete divide between the Jammu region and the Kashmir valley? Public memory may be proverbially short. But many still remember that during the years when Atal Bihari Vajpayee was Prime Minister, the Sangh parivar had pushed the proposal to “trifurcate” Jammu and Kashmir. After countenancing it for some months, Mr Advani, then Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister, had backtracked. Is that pernicious ideas being revived now, and if so, with what
intent?
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Water finds its way
I remember during monsoons our village, Nangal Ishar in Hoshiarpur district, became a virtual island, during the late 1970s and early 1980s. Different "choes" (seasonal rivulets) flowed on all sides. The already sketchy bus service, only twice a day, ceased operations for at least a month. Folks had to go wading through the choe waters at three places before reaching the town of Hariana, about 5 km away, to get their daily needs. In case I could manage a leave from my hostel in Dalhousie Public School in the hills of Himachal Pradesh, I always loved coming to my village during the rains. After getting down from the bus, I had to remove my shoes, pull up my trousers and fling my bag across my back before starting my journey. En route, there were villagers, including elders, walking through the gushing waters. Most of them carried their luggage on their heads. "Don't step that side. The water is deep", I could hear at different places in the water. Invariably, a local would extend his hand and walk me through the waters to the other end. I would join the children in my village in clearing the fallen trees from the roads, clearing waters from the school complex and even certain houses. The rains were the finest exhibition of human camaraderie. We would play innovative games in the waters. The ceased rain would have the air filled with colourful frogs croaking and clear waters even housed fish. In the evenings, we would gather in the "dehri" where the elders took centre stage. I remember the elders always said "the choe is changing its track every year. The flow is coming towards the village. People have started constructing houses on the choe beds, up the stream, which is very dangerous." This year, the pictures of washed-away structures, a little upstream from my village, were horrifying. A number of structures, constructed on the choe beds and along the banks, were washed away. Sucha Singh, an elder, said: "I always say don't play with nature. See, water has again shown its way." The rains story, this year, also had an interesting side. Children from different villages flocked to the choe banks, a day after the rains. Madan, an eight-year-old, said: "My parents always talked about flowing waters in the village. I never believed them because I don't remember to have seen enough rains, ever. Our hand pumps have gone dry and we have to bring water from the tap for our home. My father says our tubewell has dried up and we cannot afford a deep tubewell which costs a couple of lakhs." He quickly added: "Another thing, I now believe my grandfather who always says no one can challenge nature. I heard some dried-up hand pumps had again started giving off water this
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Patronising corruption THE stink of corruption has been with us for so long that all too many have got inured to it and treat it almost as a way of life. This spells danger as it has increasingly spawned a culture of immunity and impunity. The incidence of corruption falls most harshly on the poor and the weak and constitutes a direct and growing threat to poverty eradiation, respect for the rule of law and justice. This has led to a very cynical view of civic responsibility and ethical behaviour, an attitude that insidiously poisons the idealism of youth. The CMS-Transparency International (India) 2007 Corruption Study released a few weeks ago makes disturbing reading. Focussing on BPL households and 11 basic services, the finding is that a third of BPL citizens pay bribes to gain access to services to which they are entitled, with policing being the worst offender across almost all states. This is a damning indictment and cuts at the root of an inclusive society. Worse, the ailment, though diagnosed, has gone untreated year after year. The more we inveigh against poor governance the more we seem to hug it! Sting operations are in vogue because the rule of law has become problematic. The July 22 cash-for-vote episode is still under investigation but the Supreme Court judgement in the 1998 JMM case, grated immunity to receivers of bribes to MPs on the ground that they are covered by parliamentary privilege. If that be the law, why has it not been amended? It is because no MP or political party wants to be too closely questioned about sources funding, much of it from dubious quarters that they then patronise. The Chief Vigilance Commissioner has over the years brought to notice many infractions by civil servants. These have largely gone unpunished, barring the hounding of small fry, as no officer of the rank of Joint Secretary or above, or a minister, can be prosecuted for corruption without the sanction of his superiors a sanction that is rarely forthcoming. This has bred more immunity and hence more impunity. A recent media report has it that the government now contemplates extending this immunity to civil servants for a prospective period of ten years after retirement — by when we shall all be dead! A powerful UN Convention on Corruption, that India signed on the very last day and has now come into force, requires incorporation into national laws to be truly operational. Eighteen months after the event, India has not even begun this process and so cannot seek extradition of charged suspects, freezing of public or private funds secreted abroad, investigation of money-laundering trails and so forth. No one seems interested in vigorous and effective action though they plead lack of powers and cooperation. Why? Because possessing the power to upset shared apple carts might be inconvenient. Most blatant of all has been the determined resolve on the part of the Centre and most state governments not to allow police reforms to proceed despite innumerable commissions and committees of the best and brightest in the country, a wide consensus at that level and a ringing Supreme Court directive for their time-bound implementation. The Centre says it is for reform but the Home Ministry, which seems totally bereft of any leadership on any issue, has been totally supine, pleading that the police (and intelligence) are state subjects in which it cannot intervene. This absurd fig-leaf is unconvincing as the Centre has not really tried and has not cared to implement these reforms in Delhi and other Union Territories directly under its charge. With the police and intelligence agencies utterly politicised, and the criminalisation of politics and the politicisation of crime, the criminal justice system has broken down, resulting in resort to extra-judicial remedies. Judicial virtue has also been besmirched. The CBI and intelligence agencies have not been immune from political interference. We are unable to tackle terror more effectively for the same reason - internal rot. There is abhorrence for strong laws as these have been misdirected against the poor and the weak. One does not want a national security state or the derogation of human rights. The larger problem, however, is that even less draconian laws would be effective if stringently applied. But how can this happen when the instruments have been politically blunted? There is now evidence emerging that the latest bomb blasts in Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Jaipur and elsewhere are in part possible revenge killings for Gujarat-2002. If true, this would be barbarous and indicate the revival of private vendettas because the state is effete. But recall Narendra Modi’s heinous message broadcast when the Gujarat pogrom erupted: “If you seek peace, don’t ask for justice”. Are some of those desperately aggrieved now saying, “There can be no peace unless there is justice”? The Gujarat police was subject to gross political pressure and the rule of law and elementary justice subverted, this dastardly conduct being defended by some of the highest in the land. One cannot play with fire. Commissions of inquiry too have become dubious enterprises. Witness the 47th extension granted to the Liberhan Commission inquiring into the 1992 Babri mosque demolition — in God’s name why? — and the fifth extension given to the Nanavati Commission in Gujarat. We must act, and act now, to save the Republic. |
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Health THE way to a person’s heart is through his stomach, the adage goes. But researchers now think the way to a healthy heart might be through your gums and teeth. Evidence suggests that the healthier they are, the stronger and less disease-prone the heart is. If you don’t floss or brush, you might be setting yourself up not just for gum disease but also for heart disease. The link between what’s happening in your mouth and in the rest of your body goes further still: Gum disease might be a kind of early warning system, with poor oral health linked to diabetes, kidney disease, preterm labor, osteoporosis, Alzheimer’s disease and even certain types of cancer. “A lot of research studies are coming out that seem to suggest some possible link or associations” between oral infection and systemic disorders, says Sally Cram, a periodontist in the District of Columbia and consumer adviser for the American Dental Association. There’s a certain logic, of course, to the idea that your mouth — your body’s key opening to the outside — would be a harbinger of bodily health. Yet the connection is one that many people, even medical professionals, often overlook. Patients tend to minimize oral health, treating mouth issues as merely “dental.” Professionals echo this artificial dichotomy: Dentists and doctors don’t really talk to each other; they don’t attend the same conferences; they don’t read the same journals. But recent research indicating a link between their disciplines is attracting attention from both doctors and dentists. Several studies show a startling correlation between gum health and atherosclerosis, a condition underlying much heart disease: The worse a person’s gum disease, the narrower that person’s arteries due to a buildup of plaque. This holds even for young, healthy adults who have no other symptoms of heart disease. Many questions remain about the nature of the body-mouth connection. In gum disease (called gingivitis in the early stages, before it develops into full-blown periodontal disease), the tissue that surrounds the bones supporting the teeth become inflamed or infected. Often this results from the accumulation of bacteria in the plaque under the tissue holding the teeth. The bacteria release toxins and other chemicals that begin to destroy the bone. Scientists believe they circulate and cause damage elsewhere in the body; exactly how remains unclear. Observational studies show rates of preterm birth are higher for women with severe gum disease than those with milder or no such disease. A recent review in the journal American Family Physician noted that studies of nearly 15,000 women in “identified 24 studies demonstrating a positive relationship between periodontitis and preterm birth, low birth weight, or both.” Gum disease may also be implicated in a “small, but significant” increase in overall cancer risk for men, according to a recent study in The Lancet Oncology. The authors linked gum disease to a higher chance of lung, kidney, pancreatic and blood cancers. A similar pattern is emerging for kidney disease and Alzheimer’s. But as with heart disease and preterm labor, the question of what causes what has not been definitely answered. In diabetes, however, the body-mouth connection is clear-cut. Diabetics who have uncontrolled gum disease, Cram said, “have a much harder time (than other diabetics) controlling their blood sugar levels.” The reverse, she noted, is also true: People with uncontrolled diabetes are about “three to four times at greater risk of developing periodontal disease.” The cycle is very hard to break. You would think that physicians would be telling their diabetic patients to make regular dental visits to head off gum disease and that dentists would be advising patients who develop persistent gum disease to be tested for diabetes. But neither group of practitioners has been especially good at making the connection. Similarly, despite growing evidence of a link between preterm labor and gum disease, only 22 to 34 percent of U.S. women consult a dentist during pregnancy, according to a 2001 report in the Journal of the American Dental Association; other studies also show lower use of dental services during pregnancy. Among women who develop mouth problems during pregnancy, only 50 percent seek help; many of the rest worry that mouth treatment may be harmful to their babies. Regular visits to a dentist can make the mouth an early warning system for a variety of problems. Sores or fungus in the mouth, for example, are often the very first indications of infection by HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, or of cancer. Osteoporosis, a disease of the bones, could show up in a routine dental X-ray before you notice its impact on your hips or spine. By arrangement with
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Delhi Durbar Any author who pens a biography on a public personality never tires of telling the world about his or her close relations with the subject of the book. Panchayati Raj Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar, however, has chosen to do otherwise. When his book on Rajiv Gandhi was released at a special function earlier this week, Aiyar was at pains to dispel the popular perception about his friendly relations with the late Prime Minister. The minister went out of his way to point out that his relation with Rajiv Gandhi was purely professional. “He was the Prime Minister and I was an official in the PMO...I never addressed him as anything but Sir,” he told the audience. Both, however, had gone to the same school and university. Aiyar said he only got to observe Rajiv Gandhi from close quarters as he travelled extensively with him on work. Only somebody like Aiyar could have been this candid.
Pay changes As soon as the Union Cabinet accepted the recommendations of the Sixth Pay Commission, government officials, from top officials to messengers, immediately did their calculators to figure out their gains. One official was overheard saying that the increase in the house rent allowance (HRA) was so hefty that a situation may soon arise when senior officials would prefer to shift to their own private houses or rented accommodation instead of occupying a government house in order to claim the HRA. Others ere heard saying they might surrender their official cars and start using their private vehicles. This would allow them to claim the conveyance allowance, which also has been increased substantially. However, one thing was clear: no government servant was in a mood to work on the eve of the Independence Day as it was a celebration time for them.
BJP’s Muslim
The BJP has eventually discovered a true patriotic Muslim, one it has all along been looking for but could never really find. He is Suhail Ahmed nee Suhail Hindustani, who was introduced to the MPs’ panel investigating the cash-for-votes scam and the media by none other than Sudheendra Kulkarni, a member of L.K.Advani’s think tank, as a witness to the entire “sting operation.” Suhail is also a proud claimant to the saffron pedigree. In his own words, his grandfather worked for the Jana Sangh/BJP and was called Sageer Mian ‘Janasanghi’ Peeli Topiwale, who worked in Tonk and Ajmer Sharif. He works for the BJP because, as he says, he wants to identify himself with Maharana Pratap and obliterate the sins of Raja Man Singh, who had aligned with the Mughals, the media was told. Kulkarni introduced Suhail Hindustani as the key witness to the cash-for-votes drama. But after reading Suhail’s statement to the Speaker, one wonders whether the objective was to reinforce the BJP case or raise a question mark on the credibility of the operation as he has admitted that he is some kind of a middleman. Contributed by Anita Katyal , Ashok Tuteja and Faraz Ahmad
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