The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

United against terrorism
Needed a fight to the finish

TERRORISM is the biggest threat facing the nation today. It is a sad reflection on our security system that the terrorists are able to strike at will, even in the national Capital. The blasts on Saturday were similar to the ones in Ahmedabad and Jaipur earlier, the modus operandi and the components of the bombs being the same. If the police version is to be believed, they were also the handiwork of the same set of people drawing their inspiration from the same ideology and belonging to the same group. Yet the pity is that the police have been unable to nab the masterminds of these blasts. Come to think of it, as you read this, they may be planning another strike at another place at another time. If anything, this shows the need for all political parties to come together to fight the menace as one man.

It may be politically convenient for the Opposition to blame the UPA government as the blasts occurred in the Capital. On its part, the Centre can blame the Opposition-ruled states for allowing the previous blasts to occur. Also, they can blame the Centre for not allowing the enacting of tough laws to deal with the terrorists. Again, they can blame the Centre for sitting tight on the Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA)-like laws passed by states like Gujarat and Rajasthan. But such nitpicking will not serve any purpose except encouraging the terrorists to exploit the divisions to their advantage.

The message that should go out to the terrorists is that the nation is united in fighting against them. They should know that they cannot exploit whatever differences that exist among political parties on certain issues as they are all one when it comes to protecting the security and integrity of the nation. The blasts underscore the urgency for the Prime Minister to summon an all-party meeting to discuss the steps that need to be taken to deal with the situation. Such a meeting should decide whether there should be tougher all-India laws against terrorism. The Chief Ministers’ Conference can as well be called to discuss the measures necessary to fight terrorism. Let the terrorists know that the nation will spare no effort to end the scourge.

Fall of the rupee
It weakens battle against inflation

THE rupee has seen a rapid fall in the recent days, touching a new low of 46 against the dollar on Monday. It had slightly recovered on Friday but the latest Lehman Brothers crisis in the US may increase the dollar outflow. The weakening of the rupee is not an isolated development. The dollar has been on the rise against all major currencies worldwide. There is a link between the dollar and global commodity prices. When the food, fuel and metal prices were rising, the dollar was on the decline. Now investors are withdrawing funds from commodities, whose prices are falling triggered by a slowdown in various countries, and are parking them in dollar assets. The dollar, which has seen the emergence of the euro as a major rival, has reasserted its supremacy in global trade.

Despite reasonable growth prospects, indicated by the latest official growth data for July, India has seen the outflow of foreign institutional investment. In the week ending September 5, the country’s foreign exchange reserves dipped by a record $6.5 billion. It is the steepest weekly decline since December 2005, when the RBI had to redeem India Millennium Bonds. The cash outflow has been provoked by the US sub-prime crisis, which has bankrupted quite a few top investment institutions. Though a weak rupee is supposed to benefit exporters, they are not cheerful due to lower demand in the US and Europe.

For Indians a strengthening dollar means costlier foreign travel and education. Investors stand to lose as the FII selling has brought down the stock markets. The government’s battle against inflation has got a blow as imports become expensive. All products with imported components will see a price rise. The advantage of the oil price fall has been partly wiped out by the rising dollar. The RBI intervention to prop up the rupee has been limited. Perhaps, it wants to enhance India’s export competitiveness.

Thought for the Day

Four legs good, two legs bad. — George Orwell

ARTICLE

Polls mean self-determination
There can be no veto on elections
by B.G. Verghese

The Mirwaiz has said that he will oppose elections in J&K, due before January, as he stands for self determination. Reports have him warning main line parties “to fear the wrath of the people” and expulsion from Kashmir if they play “dirty politics” by contesting the polls.

This is a brave statement from a man who dares not own up who killed his own father. Umar Farooq claims to speak in the name of the “people”. Which people? He appears to have got his arithmetic seriously wrong, for elections truly equal self-determination. And it is elections he fears, as does Geelani and their mentors in Pakistan. So too Mehbooba Mufti of the PDP who, with her father, has made a fine art of running with the hare and hunting with the hounds.

Like all separatists, jehadis and assorted self-determination warriors in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and Pakistan, these elements worry that a free and fair poll could mean end-game for them, having exhausted every trick in the book. The Indian state just won’t go away and the people are fed up with being used as cannon fodder for a “cause” that is becoming less and less attractive and more and more corrupted. The disturbances in parts of Srinagar and elsewhere in Kashmir fetch crowds, zealots and lumpens among them, but it is doubtful if they represent the people in whose name they take to the streets, looking for trouble and working themselves into a fury when they invite it.

In Jammu, the situation is different. There the Parivar is drumming up hate and regional hostility to build what it hopes will be a winning electoral plank.

Nay-sayers argue that elections cannot be held given the prevailing tension. But these very critics created and now stoke violence with scarcely disguised appeals to religious bigotry and non sequiturs, such as immediate opening of the road to Muzaffarabad for trade as if somebody in India has only to say Open Sesame for a desperately eager Islamabad to oblige. This is not naivety but mendacity. There can be no veto on elections and those who miss the electoral bus must be left to rue their fate.

If violence impedes voting, those responsible will need to explain their conduct and face the consequences. Even otherwise, those insistently calling for self-determination and “azadi” and looking across the LOC for succour and support need to examine Islamabad’s record of self-determination in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, the Northern Areas, the country’s tribal belt and, indeed, in Pakistan itself. When confronted with this simple fact, on either side of the border, one is met with sullen silence and a quick change of subject.

This does not mean that issues of autonomy, regional disparity, human rights and development should not be addressed. But the agenda should address real problems, explore doable solutions and look at the future rather than harp on the past. The National Conference has shown the wisdom and courage to seek elections as a step towards conflict resolution, The Congress has been namby-pamby, leaving it to the Election Commission to decide, with some mistakenly hoping that a postponed poll may hold out better electoral prospects for it in the Jammu region. On the contrary, it will signal that the Congress has run away from the battle and has nothing to offer.

The Governor has wisely called for a dialogue and has offered to talk with all elements, including the separatists. The Prime Minister’s task force reports are on the table along with earlier propositions regarding autonomy and his Amritsar proposal for cross-LOC cooperation to build jointness across a soft border. This should excite the imagination of people and parties on both sides and could give a head start to any proposed Manmohan-Zardari talks to get the peace process rolling again.

Meanwhile, the BJP is plumbing new depths of irresponsibility by calling for “nationalisation” of the Jammu-Srinagar-Amaranth route in the name of faith. It has now formally nailed Hindutva to its electoral mast, which Advani will carry on yet another of his divisive yatras. The Congress and other political parties also do no good to anybody by continuing to subsidise the Haj, Kailash-Mansarovar yatra and other pilgrimages that are turning faith into commerce in the name of “secularism”. They also recklessly involve government in religious management across faiths, increasingly eroding the distinction between state and religion.

The situation in Pakistan remains extremely fragile as the US bombards terrorist dens in its tribal belt and the IAEA makes more sordid revelations of A.Q. Khan’s nuclear blackmarket. As nemesis overtakes Pakistan, which is yet honestly to confront its inner contradictions instead of living in permanent denial, it remains in India’s highest interest to support liberal democratic forces in that country. There is absolutely no question of walking out of Kashmir to resurrect the two-nation theory and a second Partition.

Wider autonomy and variable regional autonomy, as negotiated, can be conferred through the two-way entrustment mechanism of Articles 258 and 258A which has been creatively exploited in the Northeast. Nor need there be fear of any domino effect. J&K, like Nagaland, is ripe for settlement and is sui generis. The quantum of autonomy is ultimately a matter of trust. Therefore, abandon petty legalities. Build trust.

MIDDLE

Defusing my “home” bomb
by Surinder Gosain

Neither am I in any way connected to the high-tech bomb disposal squads of the police or the NSG, nor can I claim to profess any knowledge of explosives. But I still have to my credit the “heroic” task of averting a bomb blast. No, it was not in a market or a crowded mall but my own little flat.

The incident happened a few years ago in Delhi. I was in a tearing hurry to get ready and reach my office since I had already “wasted” enough time in going through the stack of newspapers I was subscribing to. Two extra newspapers delivered to me with complimentary stamp on the front pages had added to the delay.

As it happens, it was a day when everyone and everything was running behind schedule, right from the doodhwala to my maid. Even my ‘bread-cum-andewala’, who otherwise rings the doorbell as soon as the rickety clock on my wall strikes 8 am, failed to turn up, forcing me to have some dinner leftovers for my breakfast.

Despite all this, I was determined to make it to my office on time, not for any other reason but just to avoid another “red mark”, which incidentally overshadows my signatures in blue ink, in the attendance register. The fourth “red mark” (not in a week but a month) could have been a death knell for my valuable casual leave and I was determined to save it with all my might.

Anyway, hurriedly, I rushed to the bathroom to get a quick bath with a towel on my shoulder. Hardly had I opened the shower tap, I heard my cook yelling “Sirji, Sirji, Aag lag gai”. “To hell with you…I am in a hurry…”, I yelled back. But in a jiffy I realised that something could well terribly go wrong.

Wrapping my towel uncouthly, I rushed out of the bathroom. Looking towards the kitchen, I found the cook trying to douse flames on the plastic tube of the LPG cylinder in the kitchen. “Come out of the kitchen and rush out of the house”, I shouted, without realising that I could have stunned my neighbourhood if I had followed my own advice and ran out with just a towel covering my Schwarzenegger-like body — we have the same kind of bulges but it’s a different matter that he has them on his chest, I, on my tummy (if you can still call it that).

I entered the kitchen without realising that I did not even belong to a fire-fighting squad. But something flashed in my mind, don’t know how it worked in all that heat and tension, and I removed the gas regulator from the cylinder and successfully separated the tube from it. Fortunately, the fire had not yet reached the inner part of the tube. What if the cylinder had burst, meanwhile!

The incident really makes me think about the cops who dare to go near those scary live bombs, wrapped in innocuous looking plastic bags, planted by senseless terrorists, to defuse them. A blink of eye can sometimes cost them their lives.

OPED

Costlier energy
India, China alone not responsible
by Vijay Sanghvi

The two rising economic giants of Asia, India and China have more than a third of the world population inhabiting in them. But their energy consumption was only two and a half per cent of the world consumption. Yet George W. Bush, American President, blamed India and China for the economic crisis that the world is passing through at present.

He claimed that the rising demands for energy and food in these two countries was responsible for the present crisis.

These two countries consume only one-tenth of the energy consumption level of the United States. Obviously, his reasoning had come from the lack of correct information.

It is true that both India and China have witnessed a steady increase in their energy consumption for many years. Increasing economic growth attended by high industrial activity has been the main reason for it.

However, it needs to be noted that high consumption was also due to the transfer of production capacities to the Asian region by developed nations from Europe and America as they were exploiting the cheap labour of Asia by outsourcing their production capacity.

These countries get a share as service industry but profits are gobbled up by the corporations that have shifted their production units to Asia.

But in real terms it also means Asian reasons have to have a higher energy consumption while developed nations save the same for their other domestic purposes.

The developed nations were achieving their national energy security at the cost of Asian nations and thus were putting an additional burden on Asian people for their domestic consumption.

But the Asian consumption was not responsible for heavy fluctuations in crude prices in international markets. There were other factors responsible for pushing up crude prices. Geopolitical instability, terrorist activities, regional conflicts have contributed to it. Above all, the use of oil as a major commodity for speculation by Europeans has contributed to pushing prices up as the developed nations do not show any intention to monitor the use of their hedge funds.

The burden and risk faced by all Asian countries to their national energy security systems cannot be underplayed. Energy is important not only for economic growth and prosperity but also for social progress and stability.

The concept of energy security needs to be expanded because real risks were not “below ground” depletion of resources but “above grounds”- political instability and terrorism. It calls for a new security concept.

India has not exploited all its natural and other renewable resources for energy generation to the fullest extent. However, there were limits imposed on its exploitation for various reasons. A major portion of thermal energy came from the use of coal but it was becoming unhealthy and is frowned up on due to emissions and the impact on the environment.

Hydro generation has the limitation of locations that entail long transmission line requirement.

Even the exploitation of solar and wind resources has climatic and locational limitations despite the long coast line that India has.

With the future projection in mind, the Prime Minister turned to exploiting an easier but costly source of nuclear energy.

It is easier to import nuclear fuel than oil that requires bulk carriers, large volumes of storage facilities and transportation to refineries that are located at a distance from importing stations and are open to risk in the changing world with increasing terrorism.

His efforts have been frowned upon by the Left-oriented politicians and also the scientific community, who have offered no alternative system to firm up the national energy security system because they are also prisoners of traditional concepts like the planners in India are.

The traditional planners believed locating power generation capacity for huge volumes in one location and carry them to long distances through transmission lines.

It involved in huge loss of transmission and also due to theft, a part in collaboration with the staff and some without their knowledge, but this loss accounted for nearly 40 per cent of total generation.

But time has come when planners would need to do out-of-box thinking and new concepts for energy generation so that renewable sources can be exploited to a full extent to meet the growing need.

As the Western countries are turning to conservation and efficiency in saving energy, India also would need to cut down its transmission losses.

The country has invested a few thousand crores on its rural electrification programme over the years. It is a different story that it has yet not been achieved because of huge costs and efforts required to reach remote villages.

The very fact that it required a long haulage ought to have acted as a deterrent and forced the planners to think of a different methodology to reach villages with power supply.

What was the point in making farmers wait for erratic power supply from a distance generating station to irrigate their farms when they could have easily met their requirement by harnessing solar energy without depending on any of outside resources.

The entire region and all consumers have to fret and fume for hours to no end when the generating units or transformers are shut down for maintenance

Many similarities in living conditions, agricultural practices and needs of people in most Asian countries should make them cooperate and devise new methods as the European methods cannot suit the traditions in Asia for exploiting other sources of energy generation and strengthen their energy security and thus eliminate dependence on oil coming from instable regions. Only when India and China develop, can Asia claim that its century has come.

Turbulence rocks global financial markets
by Martin Zimmerman

With financial markets facing one of their most tumultuous weeks in recent memory, investors can be forgiven if they’re reaching for the rip cord right about now.

The news over the weekend was truly trauma-inducing. Lehman Bros. Holdings Inc., one of Wall Street’s best-known investment banks, was teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. Merrill Lynch & Co., another faltering blue chip name, was seeking salvation through a shotgun marriage to Bank of America Corp. Insurer American International Group was looking to sell assets and borrow from the Federal Reserve to raise cash.

But many market veterans contend that dumping stocks now would be a mistake, even though the U.S. stock market — already down 20 percent or more from its highs of last autumn — might have further to fall.

“The basic rule for investors is to never panic,” said A.C. Moore, chief investment strategist for Dunvegan Associates Inc. in Santa Barbara, Calif. “And never means never.”

That advice can be hard to stomach when 401(k) plans or personal investment portfolios are taking on water. It might be especially tough Monday. Futures trading Sunday night was indicating a sharply lower opening on Wall Street, and a bankruptcy filing by Lehman probably would trigger a new wave of selling, especially among other financial stocks.

But for investors whose portfolios are properly diversified among stocks, bonds and cash, selling now would only lock in losses and reduce the chances that they can profit when the market eventually rebounds.

“I’ve talked to financial planners recently who have put their customers totally into bonds,” said Nancy Langdon Jones, a financial planning consultant in Claremont, Calif. “I just think that’s stupid. There are opportunities out there. You’ve got to stay the course.”

Bonds, along with cash investments such as money market funds, are typically seen as a safe haven from the volatility of the stock market. But over the long run, their returns lag the stock market, and many investment advisers generally tell clients to keep at least some money invested in stocks even after they enter retirement. Even investors who didn’t have their portfolios balanced with the mix of stocks, bonds and cash appropriate to their age may simply have little choice but to hang in there.

“I think the time to sell has already occurred,” said Kevin Marder, president of Marder Investment Advisors Corp. in Los Angeles.

Marder is among those who see buying opportunities in the market’s choppy waters. He’s dabbling in health-care stocks, which he thinks could be leaders in pulling the market out of its doldrums.

Keith Wirtz, chief investment officer of Fifth Third Asset Management, agrees that now is the time to be buying.

“It’s most rewarding to buy when the market feels the least comfortable, and it feels really uncomfortable right now,” he said.

He advises 401(k) holders to keep making their payday contributions but to shift the investment mix a bit away from cash and bonds and more toward stocks. One caveat: Wirtz suggests reducing exposure to foreign stocks. He thinks Europe and Asia are just beginning to deal with economic problems that have been plaguing the U.S. for several months, and markets in those regions might take longer to recover.

One thing seems certain: Financial stocks won’t be the catalyst for a market turnaround. They’re simply too beaten up for that, although Marder and Moore think that even that battered sector holds some promise for picky investors.

Big regional banks such as Wells Fargo &. Co., Northern Trust Corp. and US Bancorp Inc. all hit bottom months ago, Marder said, and retail brokerage Charles Schwab Corp. appears to have avoided many of the problems plaguing its industry.

If Lehman does file for bankruptcy protection, the company’s stock probably would become worthless. Lehman bondholders should fare better, although how much they receive for their holdings would have to be determined during bankruptcy proceedings.

In addition, the Securities and Exchange Commission said Sunday night that it is “taking actions” to protect Lehman customers.

Even with these reassurances, however, Lehman account holders could still face considerable inconvenience should the company fail.

For Marder, the current turbulence caused by the credit crunch and the housing collapse, while creating opportunities, will keep investors on edge for awhile.

By arrangement with LA Times-Washington Post

Delhi Durbar
Thanks, Mishra

Among the first phone calls Prime Minister Manmohan Singh made after he received the news from Vienna about the NSG waiver was to Brajesh Mishra, National Security Adviser in the NDA government.

For the past several months, Mishra has openly supported the Indo-US nuclear deal, much to the embarrassment of the BJP, which has vociferously opposed the N-deal, accusing the UPA government of surrendering its right to test a nuclear device.

The Prime Minister thanked Mishra for his support while giving him the good news from Vienna and indirectly suggested that it might be a good idea if he were to go public with his appreciation. The result was that Brajesh Mishra was on virtually every television channel, all praise for the nuclear deal.

Marathi champion

In a bid to keep its allies in good humour and attract new partners, the BJP has had to go back on its well-known position. For instance, it had whipped up Hindu passions by promising them a grand Ram Mandir in Ayodhya but had to abandon the plan when the choice was between the mandir agenda and the formation of the NDA government since it had allies like the JD-U and the TDP, which wanted to be seen as secular.

The last straw came earlier last week when the party, which has been championing the cause of the Hindi language, revised its stand as party spokesman Prakash Jawadekar attacked Jaya Bachchan for declaring herself a Hindi-speaking UPwallah at a public function.

The reason for this diatribe was obvious: the party’s senior partner in Maharashtra, the Shiv Sena, is in desperate competition with dissident leader Raj Thackeray in whipping up “Mee Marathi” passions in Mumbai.

Jawadekar, who comes from Maharashtra, insisted on giving his “bytes” to television channels in Marathi, refusing to elaborate in English or Hindi, declaring with a glint in his eye “This is only for the Marathi press.”

Show goes on

Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi’s visit to India could not have come at a more inopportune time —just a day after Beijing tried to block a consensus in favour of the India-specific waiver at the NSG meet in Vienna.

Some officials went to the extent of suggesting that New Delhi should convey to him that he was an unwelcome guest in India after China’s “great betrayal” at Vienna.

The Prime Minister, however, intervened to say that the show must go on. ‘’We can change friends but not our neighbours,’’ he argued with those seeking the cancellation of the visit. Yang was given a cool response at all his bilateral engagements.

The Taj Mahal Hotel on Mansingh Road where he held talks with Pranab Mukherjee was virtually declared out of bounds for fear that Tibetan refugees and other demonstrators might start taking out processions against the visit.

Contributed by Anita Katyal, Faraz Ahmad and Ashok Tuteja