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Avoidable stalemate
Aiyar-speak |
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Mr Cameron in India
Instability in Afghanistan
Mallya’s delivery girls
Pulses for Punjab Diversify to
Save the SOil
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Avoidable stalemate
THE manner in which the Opposition has been disrupting Parliament for the last three days is most unfortunate. Parliament could not transact business ever since its monsoon session started on July 26. The first day was adjourned after obituary references. After that, the Opposition parties, including the Left, the RJD, the Samajwadi Party and others have been demanding a debate on price rise through an adjournment motion. Their concern over the unprecedented price rise is understandable. But when the government is not yielding for a debate through an adjournment motion (which entails voting and thus considerable embarrassment to the ruling UPA in the event of its failure to muster support), the Opposition should understand its responsibility and act accordingly. On Wednesday, Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar concurred with Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee’s opinion that the government has not failed in its duty in checking price rise and that an “extraordinary situation” has not arisen to warrant a debate under an adjournment motion. Mr Mukherjee said he was forced to increase the petrol prices to restore financial discipline. Subsequently, the Speaker rejected the notices for an adjournment motion. Now that the Speaker has given her well considered opinion on the issue, the Opposition should not sit on prestige and extend cooperation to the government in the smooth functioning of Parliament. As she has rejected the notices for an adjournment motion, the best alternative before the Opposition is to seek a debate on price rise through a Short Duration discussion (without voting) under Rule 193. Through this, Parliament would be able to debate price rise for a full six hours or even longer. Parliament is the chief repository of people’s will and the Opposition would do well to make best use of this forum to ventilate the grievances of the common masses. In a functioning democracy like ours, the government and the Opposition have clear-cut roles and responsibilities. The Opposition wanted to “censure” the government through an adjournment motion (the government falls only if a money bill is defeated in the Lok Sabha). This is a perfectly legitimate activity and there is nothing wrong about it. But when it has failed in its attempt, it has no alternative than to cooperate with the government and allow Parliament to do its normal business. Any other method would amount to violating the established norms of parliamentary democracy.
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Aiyar-speak
Former Sports Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar is not exactly known to measure his words, but this time he has gone beyond simply shooting off his mouth. He has come out with a fatwa-like statement: “Those who are patronising the Commonwealth Games can only be evil”. Thank God he did not say “off with their heads” also. He made up for that mercy by thundering that he would be “unhappy” if the October mega event was successful. The message was clear: he would be happy only if the Games are a resounding flop. Such a statement from even an ordinary person would be off-putting; it is all the more so when it is made by a former Union Sports Minister and a nominated Rajya Sabha member. Mr Aiyar’s logic is that it is a waste of money to make huge expenditure on hosting the Commonwealth Games. If one goes by his line of thinking, every sport, every mega event, every big cultural or film festival must be banned till there is even one poor person in India. He seems to be reading from some moth-eaten book on Communism which even the Chinese have abandoned. No wonder even his party is finding it difficult to justify his outburst. Congress spokesperson Shakeel Ahmed said he would need to find out in what context and in “what state of mind” the MP had made these observations. Commonwealth Games Organising Committee Chairman Suresh Kalmadi has, of course, termed the sentiments “irresponsible” and “anti-national”. Indeed, Mr Aiyar has made himself prone to public ridicule by blurting out that “if the Games are successful, then they will start bringing the Asian Games and the Olympic Games”. Perhaps he does not realise that it would be a proud moment for every Indian — except, perhaps, a handful like him — if at all India gets the Olympic Games some day. May be he will brand all of them as evil, then? |
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Mr Cameron in India
IF the size of a delegation could signal the seriousness a country attaches to the other, then the largest British delegation ever to accompany a British Prime Minister to India would indicate that Mr David Cameron is earnest. He has , after all, arrived at the head of six of his cabinet ministers besides as many as 39 representatives of British business, art, culture and science. Unmistakably, the roles have been reversed and with Europe and the US yet to recover from recession, Britain is forced to look towards the East once again. Both China and India hold the key to a revival of British trade and commerce but while China has been a tough customer, Mr Cameron would hope for India to be more receptive. The shared English language, democracy and the parliamentary system and indeed the shared passion for curry, kebabs and cricket should make it easier for the two countries to reboot and fast-forward the relationship. The disarming Mr Cameron admits that Britain would have to work harder to earn a living and, to the credit of the youngest British Prime Minister in over 200 years, he appears to mean business. On his third visit to India and his first as Prime Minister, he appears focused on fostering a partnership in the areas of security, defence, science and climate change while persuading India to lift restrictions on legal services, banking and insurance. For India, Britain still remains a gateway to Europe and a hub for higher education. And despite the decline and the fading impact of the Raj, there is little let-up in the Indo-British love affair. It would, therefore, be the wrong time for Britain to drastically cut aid to India or to put a cap on immigration. Both the countries have still a lot to offer each other and in many ways Mr. Cameron’s visit marks a generational change. He and his deputy, Nick Clegg, who has reportedly been given the task of dealing with China, represent a new generation of British leaders and reflect the concerns of the ‘Gen next’ in both the countries. The impact of British colonialism was not an unmixed blessing for India. But new lessons need to be learnt from Britain about streamlining the bureaucracy and enforcing the rule of the law, both legacies of the British rule but distorted beyond recognition here. |
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Doubt is a pain too lonely to know that faith is his twin brother. — Kahlil Gibran
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Instability in Afghanistan
WITH Nato casualties on the rise, with President Karzai and his western backers keen on reconciliation with the Taliban and the prospect of American withdrawal after July 2011, insecurity and instability sum up the current situation in Afghanistan. With Nato failing to win out, the idea of regional cooperation on Afghanistan, presented by many western officials from time to time — and by Mr S M. Krishna at the Kabul Conference on July 20 — is an appealing one. Which countries would be involved and what are the chances of their reaching a consensus — whether on the political future of Afghanistan or on promoting its economic development? The countries likely to be involved in any regional dialogue would be the US, Afghanistan, India, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, China and Russia. The US has contributed some 100,000 troops to Nato’s Afghan campaign and staked its global reputation on defeating the Taliban. With military victory seemingly elusive, Washington would not be averse to countries in Afghanistan’s neighbourhood to work out an agreement that is in line with its interests. Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai would like to build a strong democratic Afghanistan under the 2003 constitution — a goal he shares with the US. But Nato’s failure to make headway, and his own inept brand of governance are obstacles to the achievement of this aim. Meanwhile, Nato’s deficiencies have reportedly prompted him to seek reconciliation with Taliban hardliners like Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Jalaludin Haqqani and the Taliban leader, Mullah Omar. This has caused some consternation in New Delhi, which regards all extremists as bad. India does not share a border with Afghanistan, and like Russia and China, is not contributing troops. But its goals are closest to those of the US — to defeat the Taliban and to build a strong state in Afghanistan which can develop the country. India is opposed to both Al-Qaeda and the Taliban if only because there is ever-growing evidence of their links with the Pakistani-based extremists who continually try to destabilise its half of Kashmir. Pakistan has sustained, trained and exported terrorists to Afghanistan since the US overthrew the Taliban regime in 2001. So innate in President Obama’s concept of Af-Pak is the idea that the key to Afghan security lies in Pakistan. Along with the Taliban, Islamabad can claim to share the dubious credit for frustrating the success of Nato’s Afghan campaign over the last nine years. It is determined to use its hold over the Afghan Taliban to as a lever to secure a decisive say in Afghanistan’s political future, and the current signs are that the US and its Nato allies may not be averse to giving it an important place at the negotiating table if it can use its clout to persuade militants to ceasefire. Pakistan will not be interested in the neutrality of Afghanistan – neutrality would restrict its influence there. It wants to persuade its Afghan puppets to keep India out of Afghanistan, though India has no military presence there and has given $1.3 billion in reconstruction aid. That is unlike Pakistan, whose political method of choice is to export extremism and to ‘bleed’ Nato and the Karzai government until they make “peace” on its terms. Iran, which is Afghanistan’s western neighbour, remains opposed to Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Its historical and cultural links with Afghanistan are symbolised by the latter’s Persian-speaking and Shia minorities. Like India and Russia, it does not want to see Pakistan calling the shots in Kabul. Teheran favours more regional trade with Afghanistan and would benefit from a reduction in the cross-border drugs trade. It has given around $600 million in reconstruction aid, and invested in electricity, transport agricultural projects in Afghanistan, notably in the area around the city of Herat. But Iran’s relations with the US are fractious largely because of its nuclear programme and its uncompromising stance on Israel. Saudi Arabia was one of three countries — including Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates — to recognise the brutal Taliban regime until 2001. The links between Osama bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda, the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban have sharpened its interest in Afghanistan, as had talk of Nato’s retreat from Afghanistan. It has bestowed some $500 million in reconstruction aid. It has also been involved in ad hoc and informal reconciliation talks between the Karzai government and the Afghan Taliban. To no avail: every confabulation only confirmed the wide gap between Kabul and extremists. Riyadh has a fractious relationship with Shia-dominated Iran and a close one with Sunni-dominated Pakistan. Riyadh and Islamabad are at one in wanting the Taliban included in a future government in Kabul and having a government and society steered by religious “Islamic” (read Sunni) law. That puts it at odds with the US, even as the Saudi desire for a stable Afghanistan coincides with US aims. Russia would like to see Nato succeed in Afghanistan, the Taliban put to rout, and an end to the narcotics which enter its territory from Afghanistan. It has allowed Nato troops to transit its territory en route to Afghanistan and has supplied fuel to Nato via Central Asia. It is disturbed at attempts by Karzai and the West to work out some sort of reconciliation with the Taliban. For, like India, Russia does not distinguish between good and bad extremists and does not wish to see Kabul coming under the influence of extremists exporting Islamabad. Moscow also fears that a war-weary US could beat a hasty retreat from Afghanistan, paving the way for resurgence of the Taliban, and the spread of extremist influence into its sphere of influence in Central Asia. China has fragile historical links with Afghanistan. It would gain from the defeat of the Taliban and the establishment of a stable state in Afghanistan. Both could help check the flow of extremists into its western province of Xinjiang, where it confronts the possibility of growing extremism among its Uighur minorities. China has invested $ 3.5 billion in the Aynak copper mine in Afghanistan and also in various infrastructure projects in irrigation, communication and health. As an economically expansive power and potentially the largest investor in Afghanistan, it would welcome a politically strong government in Kabul. But China has close strategic ties with Pakistan. So far it has been unwilling to put pressure on Pakistan to stop shoring up extremists. China fears that Nato’s success would consolidate the US position as the dominant power in South and Central Asia, and that its Asian rival, India, would benefit from a prolonged American presence in Afghanistan. China probably hopes that the US will gain the military vantage point in Afghanistan while refraining from putting pressure on Pakistan to give up its alignment with extremists. Like Russia, China does not have a large stake in Afghanistan at the moment. Both could increase investments there if security were assured. If New Delhi wants to explore the possibility of a regional approach, it would have to contend with Pakistan’s pathological fear and hatred of India, reflected at one level by Islamabad’s paranoia about the presence of less than 4,000 Indians in Afghanistan. Pakistan’s use of terrorist exports rather than reconstruction aid to counter Indian influence and to increase its clout in Afghanistan does not augur well for the emergence of Indo-Pakistani cooperation on Afghanistan’s political future. Added to that is the continuing western military dependence on Pakistan even as it plays its old double game of giving some military facilities to Nato while giving safe havens and training to the Afghan Taliban — and getting American largesse in return. More generally, divergent national interests and cross-cutting rivalries between the US, Pakistan, India, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Russia and China could block the emergence of a regional consensus on Afghanistan. India would have to work around these differences if it tries to forge a regional approach on Afghanistan. Such an approach could well turn out to be
elusive.
The writer is Visiting Professor, Centre for Peace and Conflict Resolution, New Delhi
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Mallya’s delivery girls
Distressed at the failure of LPG delivery system, Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas Murli Deora has hit upon a novel idea to make the new system consumer-friendly. Deora in his far-sighted approach has commissioned liquor baron and MP Vijay Mallya to take over the LPG distribution all over the country. According to sources, Mallya has accepted Deora’s proposal and has already started chalking out a roadmap to reach the housewives and their husbands, who have so far been suffering at the hands of illiterate delivery boys. Mallya has started in his usual flamboyant fashion. Unrolling his plan before the media, Mallya promised to make the LPG delivery system cozy and comfortable to consumers. Riding — read flying — high on the success of Kingfisher Airlines project, Mallya has launched his operations from Goa. He has assured the ministry to cover the whole of the country with his operations once he gets feedback from his delivery girls. Mallya, who is the Indian version of Hugh Hefner, founder of Playboy, has scanned various beaches in Goa to select most beautiful girls to deliver LPG cylinders. From the word go, consumers’ response has been tremendous. In most houses where arguments led to quarrels between husband and wife as to who should stay at home to receive the gas cylinder, now all husbands have volunteered to receive refills at home. Though initially wives did not smell a rat, but having accidentally seen a few scantly clad delivery girls, they quickly understood why husbands preferred to stay at home. In their brief, delivery girls have told Mallya that some husbands feigned illness to stay at home, others took leave against their wives’ wishes. Having got over-enthusiastic response from consumers, mostly husbands, Mallya has pulled out another trick. He said in future each girl would teach one new recipe with each refill delivery. This move has triggered off more differences than peace at home. More husbands are arguing with wives to learn cooking, insisting when kids return from schools, they would prepare lunch for them. Grapevine has it that most husbands, under the garb of preparing lunch for kids, first make tea for delivery girls and urge them to relax for sometime before moving to the next household. Alarmed at the prospect of their husbands taking leave on lame excuses, a delegation of working wives has shot off a letter to the Petroleum Minister, urging him to revert to the old system. Another group of aggrieved wives has written to Girija Vyas, MP and president of the National Commission for Women, to protect their conjugal rights. According to latest reports, the ministry has directed Mallya to restrict his operations to Goa alone, for the time
being.
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Pulses for Punjab To meet the shortfall of production over demand, the country had to resort to heavy imports of pulses which swelled to 3 million tonnes, valued at Rs 5,375 crore in 2007-08. The situation is likely to further deteriorate if the existing production scenario continues to persist, accompanied by a fast increase in the population. With almost one-fourth population below the poverty line the recent steep hike in the prices has made the availability of pulses for this section of society still more difficult, jeopardizing their food nutritional security further. Punjab has played a remarkable role in the food security of the country. The state having 2.4% of the nation's population, contributes 12% to the national foodgrain output, thus feeding about 10% additional mouths. However, the contribution to the national kitty was still faster in terms of cereals but as a result of the Green Revolution, the contribution of pulses has shown a negative trend. For example, the area under pulses, including gram, declined from 903 thousand hectares in 1960-61 to 22 thousand hectares in 2008-09 and thus production declined from 308 thousand tonnes to just 19 thousand tonnes. Unlike the cereal crops, an ineffective support price, lack of technological improvement, inadequate extension efforts and lack of government policy measures resulted in the concentration of state agriculture on rice and wheat crops and played havoc with the production of pulses. Farmers are obviously guided by a simple comparative crop economics and vulnerability due to high fluctuations in yield and price. To be more specific, the average yield of pulses could not make much headway while the average yield of paddy and wheat increased almost four fold mainly due to the expansion of assured irrigation, research and development efforts directed to these crops and market support. The realised yield of pulses at the farm level is almost 50% of the potential experimental yield. This gap needs to be bridged by demonstrating technology in the fields. Further, government policies on zero pricing of water not only caused an indiscriminately overuse of this precious resource, but also created a tendency to ignore pulse crops. Above all, pulse crops are prone to vital diseases, particularly the yellow mosaic virus and serious pests like pod borers, urgently calling for a suitable integrated pest management through research and development efforts. In the context of monoculture of paddy-wheat and associated emerging problems of water scarcity, deteriorating soil health, increasing seasonality in use of farm resources causing inefficiencies in the production system, burning of huge crop residue causing air pollution, diversion to pulses can play a miraculous role. The recent enormous hike in the prices of pulses has made farmers reconsider introducing such enterprises in their crop pattern. A little encouragement in terms of quality seed supply and extension support at this juncture can work well. Crop diversification in Punjab is essential but could be done on the basis of ground realities rather than by mere slogans. Areas having a low potential of paddy yield may be earmarked. For instance, there are 15 blocks of Punjab with about 7 lakh hectares of area under rice having an average yield of less than 2 tonnes/ha where the production of pulses can take off easily. The efforts need to be concentrated on such areas. The intervening period between wheat and rice (particularly basmati) can be gainfully utilized for short-duration pulses like sathi moong. Similarly, the late-sown wheat following cotton can be easily replaced by gram and lentil crops. Some efforts are made by the extension wing of the state in this direction but it requires proper monitoring rather than mere 'distribute seed and forget' approach. As a long run solution, research efforts through genetic improvement, particularly evolving varieties of short duration, high yielding and resistant to pests and diseases to minimize production risk need to be concentrated. Apart from targeting production strategy, wide gap between harvest price and retail price of pulses can be minimized and the benefit can percolate to farmers and consumers through formation of self help groups (SHG's) of farmers and resorting to value addition, particularly cleaning, packaging, standardization, storage, transportation and direct sale to the consumers. The minimum support price (MSP) of pulses announced by the central government for the marketing year 2010-11 is Rs3000/qt and Rs3170/qt for pigeon pea and moong respectively. Similarly, the MSP for gram is Rs1760/qt. On the other hand, the market forces have pegged the prices much higher, even three times of MSP, making the support system ineffective and ridiculous. Under such conditions, the role of state government becomes vital in revamping research and extension system in desired direction and even coming forward by intervening in the procurement system, protecting the interest of farmers and consumers.
The writer, a former PAU Professor and FAO consultant, now works as a consultant with Sir Ratan Tata Trust, Mumbai
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Diversify to
Save the SOil THAT the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides is detrimental to human health is universally recognised. Hence, even mainstream agriculture scientists and institutions are advocating integrated nutrition management and integrated pest management. For a
healthy child the first thing you need is a healthy mother. So the first need is to improve soil health in general and increase the organic content of soil in particular. Through chemical fertilisers we have been regularly and repeatedly feeding soil with only a limited number of nutrients. To ensure soil health, two things need to be done. First, mono-cropping has to be shunned like plague. If we continue with one or two crops, then we are repeatedly taking out the same set of nutrients in fixed proportions from soil and there is no simple method of chemically replenishing all of these. So, there has to be diversity in crop production. In fact, mixed cropping, with leguminous crops as one essential ingredient is advisable as these crops have nitrogen-fixing property (i.e. ability to convert huge amount of nitrogen available in the air to a form where plants can make use of it). It is common experience that wheat grown in the fields where guar (cluster beans) had been planted earlier gives better yield. The second important step in improving soil health is to use/sell whatever we can but return the rest to soil. This can be done by using crop waste for mulching. We can cut plant waste into small pieces and spread them all over the fields. Initially, it will provide cover to the soil, retain moisture reducing irrigation frequency and curb weed growth but as it decays, it will also return nutrients to soil. So, mulching is a simple, multipurpose tool. The use of insecticides and chemical fertilisers has to stop as these kill living organisms of soil. To aid the process of regeneration of living organisms in soil, simple preparations of animal dung and urine are used. These simple preparations introduce living organisms to the field where biomass is available for them to feed on and decompose. Mainstream agriculture scientists often calculate nitrogen available from cattle dung and come up with huge amounts of cattle dung that has to be used as farm yard manure to replace urea. Actually, in alternative agriculture cow dung is primarily used to introduce micro-organisms to soil and not to provide nutrients per say. Hence, many acres of land can be managed with just one or two animals. The sun is the only primary source of energy for earth and solar energy is mainly tapped by plants for use of other living beings, including humans. So, another basic principle of alternative agriculture is to maximise the tapping of sun energy. For that the field should, as far as possible, not be left without crops. Trees, with their deep roots, play an important role in providing nutrition to crops. They do so by transferring nutrients from the depth of soil, where they are generally available in abundance but which shallow rooted seasonal crops can not access, to top layer through their fallen leaves and fruits. Hence, every acre of land must have five to seven trees too. Around these trees, those crops can be grown which are tolerant of shade. If these simple steps are taken, soil health will improve tremendously. With healthy soil, plants, if grown with good agronomic practices, are likely to be resistant to pest and disease. Moreover, crop diversity will ensure that even if there is a pest/disease attack it does not go out of hand and only part of farmers' crop is affected. (By the way most of the farmer suicides have been reported from area of commercial monoculture.) Then, there are various home remedies like Neem preparations which have been found to be effective in controlling most of the pest attacks. These are some basic contours of alternative agriculture. Of course, alternative agriculture is not limited to these. There are many other things like the right way of irrigating a tree or sowing rice like wheat or producing more rice with much less water. All these need to be learned under suitable guidance but one can begin with the basic principles mentioned here on part of one's land. In the era of TINA (there is no alternative), it is difficult to convince people of the alternative, particularly if it is a self-reliant alternative with no business interest to promote it, which goes against the trend of the 'latest is best' and which has a laser thin difference with the 'all-past-was-glorious' approach. But we certainly have to look for alternatives for two reasons. One, chemical fertilisers are petro-derivatives and their reserves are fast dwindling. Secondly, we cannot have our food supplies mortgaged to mega corporations as GM technologies do. Coming back to the integrated nutrition and pest management, one will not have much to quarrel with it and insist on only natural or organic, if it meant using chemicals as a last resort, but in practice integrated nutrition and pest management is used as a smoke screen to ward off well-documented criticism of harmful consequences of these chemicals and gives an impression that chemicals are only one part of the package. With business interests there to promote the chemical part and no agency to promote other simpler, no-cost local alternatives in a sustained manner, it is not difficult to see what gets promoted. We need to recall that Bhopal happened at an insecticide plant and it had powerful promoters. On the other hand, alternative agriculture, which has nothing to sell and profit from, hence, no powerful promoters, is making a slow progress.
The writer is a Professor, Department of Economics, MDU, Rohtak. Email:
rajinderc@gmail.com |
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FOOD security is a fundamental welfare concern of every economy. Even the highly industrialised countries subsidise agriculture for keeping up domestic production. For India, having a huge base of population and its fast growth, it assumes still greater significance. The per capita availability of foodgrains went up from 467 grams per person per day in 1961 to 443 in 2007 even though at times we had to depend upon heavy imports. Within the components of foodgrains, the share of pulses, which so far are considered as a poor man's protein, constantly declined from 69 grams per person per day in 1961 to only 35 grams in 2007.