The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

Jagan Mohan quits
Sequel to his isolation in the Congress

MONDAY’S resignation of Jagan Mohan Reddy as the Lok Sabha MP from Kadapa in Andhra Pradesh as well as from the primary membership of the Indian National Congress is bound to affect the party’s long-term interests. Though there is no immediate threat to the stability of the new Kiran Kumar Reddy government, Jagan Mohan could well gain ground in due course as his emotive appeal as a wronged son of the late Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy mobilises voters. His mother, Mrs Vijayalakshmi, has followed suit by resigning as MLA, Puluvendula. In a letter to the party president, Mrs Sonia Gandhi, Jagan Mohan has obliquely blamed the party leadership for ignoring his claim for the Chief Minister’s post after his father and former Chief Minister Rajasekhar Reddy’s death in a plane crash 14 months ago. His claim to the top post as the inheritor of the YSR legacy was ignored by the party leadership when it chose veteran Congressman K. Rosaiah to succeed Rajasekhar Reddy. It was then claimed in justification that the 38-year-old Jagan was a greenhorn in politics and had no experience in the government. Moreover, he was embroiled in too many controversial deals in construction, real estate, trade and business running to hundreds of crores of rupees.

Last week, the party replaced Rosaiah with N. Kiran Kumar Reddy as the Chief Minister to strengthen the government, neutralise the Jagan effect and tackle the Telangana issue particularly after the Justice Srikrishna Committee submits its report to the Centre by December 31. Mrs Sonia Gandhi’s surprise meeting with his uncle, Y.S. Vivekananda Reddy, in New Delhi and an invitation to join the Kiran Reddy government triggered more trouble for Jagan Mohan Reddy. Not surprisingly, he has accused the party leadership of dividing his family.

The Congress leadership is not known to take rebellion lightly, but gave a long rope to Jagan Mohan Reddy. In defiance of Mrs Sonia Gandhi’s directive, he used the Odarpu yatra to attack the party. His isolation in the party was complete after a smear campaign was launched on his Sakshi television channel against Mrs Gandhi, the Prime Minister and Rahul Gandhi for the party’s rout in the Bihar elections. In the 294-member Andhra Assembly, the Congress has 156 MLAs. To split the party, he needs 52 MLAs as otherwise they would attract disqualification under the anti-defection law. That’s why he has asked his supporters not to quit the Congress for now. Chiranjeevi’s Praja Rajyam Party (18 members) and the Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (seven) can perhaps be depended upon to rescue the Congress, if necessary. While Mr Jagan Mohan Reddy may float a new party, he will create hurdles in the smooth functioning of the new government.

Responsive governance
Will babus do what is needed?

In theory, what we have is a government of the people, for the people, by the people. In practice, it is anything but that. Under the system in existence, the common man is a hapless creature who can be hassled for even routine matters. That is why the man on the street is mortally afraid of having anything to do with a sarkari establishment, be it a police station, a revenue office or even a hospital. The Punjab Government seems to have woken up to the harsh reality and has taken an initiative to usher in reforms in the home, transport, revenue, health and some other departments. On paper, it is a welcome enterprise. There will be simplification of procedure. There are also plans to provide multiple services under one roof, receive complaints to the police online and restrict the role of revenue officials in fixing rates of property, etc.

The proof of the pudding will lie in the eating. Sixty years of sloth and inefficiency have spawned a highly corrupt system where there are vested interests galore. Those supervising the initiative will have to be alive to the very real possibility of sabotage by those who have fattened themselves by taking the system for a ride. If the red tape is ruthlessly cut and accountability enforced, the system can indeed be made responsive and efficient. All that is needed is political will and the capacity to enforce the government’s writ without fear or favour.

A concerted effort has to be made to remove all the cobwebs. Fortunately, the advent of computers and other modern means has made supervision an easier task. Those at the helm of affairs will have to monitor the progress on a regular basis so that the initiative does not lose steam midway. The touchstone is whether the common man will be able to get his grievances redressed without a fuss and within a reasonable time frame.

Thought for the Day

Knowledge and timber shouldn’t be much used until they are seasoned. — American proverb

ARTICLE

The long road to freedom
Growing support for Suu Kyi’s fight
by Shelley Walia

THE rise of fascism is underpinned by irrationality becoming part of reason and nudging it towards its involvement with tyranny and domination. But the long journey from Jehovah to Jesus, from the Old Testament to the New is a journey that counsels all, as stated in the Book of Isaiah, to “seek justice, correct oppression, defend the fatherless, plead for the widow”. But there is one widow, Aung San Suu Kyi, who does not want others to plead for her. She has herself singlehandedly stuck to Gandhian principles, becoming a political axiom aspiring for liberation, non-violence and social justice.

Though standing alone with her supporters against a well-entrenched military rule, she does hope for a more spirited support from her neighbour India, whose stand until now has been lukewarm and ambiguous in view of the diplomatic engagement with the junta. India needs to extend its support for human rights, which must be given precendence over geo-political expediency. The victory of democratic institutions is a sine qua non to a future that keeps out any backing for anti-democratic forces in Myanmar.

Indeed, Suu Kyi is saddened by India’s non- committal stance on the fight for freedom and fundamental human rights. Keeping in view the common history of the two nations in their struggle against colonialism, a more defined foreign policy is imperative for the Indian nation to strike a note of friendship with its neighbour, underpinned by its long cherished legacy of liberty

The icon of democracy and free speech, Suu Kyi, daughter of Aung San, the father Burma’s independence from the British Empire in 1947 and assassinated by his rivals the same year, remained under house arrest for almost 15. A graduate from St Hugh’s College, Oxford, and a visiting fellow at the Indian Institute of Advanced Studies, Shimla, she completed her doctorate from the School of Oriental and African Studies, London. Influenced by Mahatma Gandhi’s philosophy of non-violence, Suu Kyi entered politics to work for democratisation, helped found the National League for Democracy, and was put under house arrest on July 20, 1989. She was offered freedom to be with her husband in Oxford who was suffering from terminal cancer, but she refused lest she was not allowed re-entry into her country. This is enough indication of her deep concern for an emancipated political future of army-ruled Myanmar, having one of the most oppressive regimes in the world. She remains central to the democratic aspirations of her people and her release “allows a tiny flicker of pluralist light into the murk of Burmese totalitarianism.”

For Suu Kyi, state intrusion always results in either resistance by the individual or submissive conformism that marks dictatorial systems. Society’s methodical and systemic ideals stand challenged wherever individual freedom is put under centralisation of power that always distorts public debate through social manipulation and regulation of institutions. She has persistently been of the view that the intellectual has to chastise the ongoing propaganda of misrepresentation and the façade of democracy put up by the junta, and look into the future as a visionary of a utopian Myanmar free from abuse and control.

The hallmark of Suu Kyi’s politics is dissidence, a form of protest that is integral to human society. People partake in justifiable political protests against their government out of allegiance to a cause and out of a conviction that the world can be made better through dissent that is essential for organisations with political cultures that stifle dissent. In fact, we are all dissidents at one time or another.

As the Nobel laureate emphatically said in her emotionally charged speech upon her release, “Even if you are not political, protest has to be allowed in society as we live in a world that is constantly changing; it is by protest that laws are changed for a better future”. Clearly, public protest is a right because an unjust law cannot be allowed to exist; people have the right to have it abolished or changed. If they do dissent, they must be prepared to accept the consequences of their action.

For Suu Kyi, the whole question of “speaking truth to power” is related to desiring freedom, a genuine interest in change through motivating forces behind reform. As Vaclav Havel writes, “You do not become a ‘dissident’ just because you decide one day to take up this most unusual career. You are thrown into it by your personal sense of responsibility, combined with a complex set of external circumstances.”

Vociferously opposing control of thought or speech, Suu Kyi has stood up for a concept that, according to Howard Zinn, allows “one to be suspicious of centralised authority, to insist on individual freedom, to be sceptical of all governments, and to insist on grassroots democracy.” The military machinery has not been tough enough to silence her, and she is still prepared even after her recent release to return to house arrest, not being sure of the iniquitous designs of the dictatorship with its policy of bondage and servitude. Her long struggle stands underpinned by a sense of duty and moral responsibility to resist the fraud of the recent elections feebly passed off as a legitimate national movement towards democracy.

Suu Kyi is of the view that, “It is not power that corrupts but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it…. Government leaders are amazing. So, often it seems they are the last to know what the people want.” More than anything, the people want their resource-rich economy to be pulled out of the clutches of the junta which is possible only with the final triumph of democratic forces unleashed visibly by the efforts of Suu Kyi.

This is clear from hundreds being arrested for exercising their constitutionally protected freedom. Censorship and surveillance, denial of due processes of law and excessive force - these are the high-handed tactics used by the state machinery to counter protest. Peaceful resistance to such an unjust practice or an unlawful war shows Suu Kyi’s deep-seated loyalty to the notion of liberty and free will. Independent thought and expression cannot be allowed to be smothered by any assault on one’s constitutional freedoms: “You have to stand up for what is right,” she has urged her fellow citizens. Support for this cause for democracy is visible in the wide public and military support she received after her long-awaited release. And it is hoped that sanctions against Myanmar will soon be rolled back, bringing to an end the days of hunger and deprivation for millions of Burmese, a change much awaited under the leadership of a woman who has relentlessly stood by her people over her long and painful journey to freedom.n

The writer is Professor and Head, Department of English, Panjab University, Chandigarh.

MIDDLE

Facing the Facebook
by Tejinder Singh Sodhi

NO doubt social networking site Facebook has become one of the most popular sites in the category but it took me a year to learn how to use this site.

When I expressed ignorance about Facebook, one of my friends commented: “You know, these days the person who does not have an account on Facebook does not “exist”. So I decided to ‘exist’ and signed up for an account on the site.

Though I had made an account but the usage seemed to me very complicated. So I started using the site only a year ago after learning it completely. Though I started to ‘exist’ after I created an account but my urge to use the site grew after I saw some people in my previous place of posting spending most of their time in office using Facebook on office computer.

With an account on Facebook I have achieved another important thing, which is ‘dual citizenship’ without owing the passport of another country.

I came to know about my ‘dual citizenship’ only after an international tabloid declared that Facebook had become the third most populated ‘country’ in the world after China and India.

“If Facebook would have been a physical nation it would by now had been the third largest populated country after China and India with 500 million active and increasing users,” the tabloid reported.

Once you are on Facebook you are addicted and there is no way to run away the temptation of using it most of the time. People write funny status messages. Sometimes these are quotes of very wise men. Sometimes people themselves become wise to give sermons; it had also become a mean to spread news and rumours.

Almost all of my friends and colleagues are on Facebook but I always missed the presence of one person whom I admired the most, though I made many people to join Facebook to stay in touch and if I was a paid agent of the company my fortunes would have run into millions for making people join the site.

One fine day that person, fed up by my frequent requests, jumped into this virtual country and joined it. I responded and immediately pushed the friend request button but since then with every passing day his friend list is getting bigger but I myself still wait to be accepted as
a friend.

It seems that he wants to keep virtual friendship with virtual people in virtual world and he is lost in the faces of Facebook and has forgotten to recognise a friend in the world’s third largest
country.n

OPED WIKILEAKS

America laid bare
By Jerome Taylor

The home page of the Wikileaks.org website. US State Department documents released by whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks provided candid views of foreign leaders and sensitive information on terrorism and nuclear proliferation. — Reuters

The doors to a previously hidden world of diplomatic intrigue and insults were dramatically thrown open last night as the whistle-blowing website Wikileaks published its vast tranche of secret American diplomatic communiqués. The release of hundreds of thousands of secret messages from staff at US embassies revealed how Washington has struggled to confront the geopolitical realities of a post-9/11 world.

It also exposed the often less than diplomatic language used by State Department insiders to describe some of the planet’s most powerful leaders. Contained within the quarter of a million secret memos are revelations that:

n The Obama administration has ordered diplomats to gather vast amounts of personal, biometric and banking details about key global figures, including the United Nations Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon;

n Key Arab allies in the Middle East, including King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, have pleaded with Washington to take military action against Iran’s nuclear programme;

n Tehran is thought to have obtained from North Korea a cache of Russian-designed missiles that could be fired at targets as far away as Berlin;

n US officials warned their German counterparts not to arrest CIA officers who were suspected by Berlin of being involved in America’s “extraordinary rendition” programme — the secret global abduction and internment of suspected terrorists;

n Washington has grown increasingly wary of Italy’s close ties to Russia, with one official describing Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi as the “mouthpiece of (Vladimir) Putin” in Europe.

n Officials from the US Drug Enforcement Administration accused the Afghan Vice-President, Ahmad Zia Massoud, of travelling to the United Arab Emirates with $52m in cash;

The communiqués — most written between 2006 and 2009 — use colourful language to describe political leaders in ways bound to cause embarrassment in Washington and abroad. The Russian President, Dmitry Medvedev, is referred to as a “pale and apprehensive man”, while Nicholas Sarkozy of France is “an emperor with no clothes” and Afghanistan’s Hamid Karzai is “driven by paranoia”.

Some of the harshest criticism is reserved for key anti-American leaders opponents. The Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadine-jad, is described by one official as being “like Hitler”, while North Korea’s dictator Kim Jong-il is called a “flabby old man”.

The German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, is praised as a strong US ally but dismissed as “risk-averse and rarely creative”. Russia’s Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, meanwhile, is derided as “an alpha dog” who plays Batman to Medvedev’s Robin.

One of the most revealing personal details is the disclosure that the Libyan leader, Muammar Gaddafi, is accompanied at all times by a “voluptuous blonde” Ukrainian nurse.

There are also claims of “inappropriate behaviour” by an unnamed member of the British Royal Family.

Iran’s nuclear programme surfaces frequently in the memos and is viewed as a key concern by the Americans and their Arab allies. Reports from US embassies in the Middle East suggest that King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia urged Washington to take military action against the Islamic republic and to “cut off the head of the snake.” According to Wikileaks, leaders in Jordan and Bahrain also backed the use of armed force if necessary. One of the reports quotes Zeid Rifai, the then head of the Jordanian senate, telling a senior US official: “Bomb Iran, or live with an Iranian bomb. Sanctions, carrots, incentives won’t matter.”

A message dated 24 February this year says that US officials believe the Iranians have stockpiled 19 advanced BM-25 missiles, based on a Russian design, with help from North Korea. They are thought to have a range of 2,000 miles — 800 miles further than any missile Iran has had before. The Tehran regime is not yet thought to have the technology to build a nuclear warhead small enough to fit inside a BM-25, but the memos offer growing evidence that Tehran has the ballistic capability to target western Europe.

There is also mounting concern about Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal, which the US fears could be seized by Islamist militants. The leaked memos suggest that, since 2007, US officials have mounted a top secret but so far unsuccessful attempt to remove enriched uranium from a Pakistani research plant. In a message dated May 2009, the US ambassador, Anne W Patterson, says that Pakistan refused to grant American technicians access to the reactor because they feared that local media might get hold of the story and portray the visit as “the US taking Pakistan’s nuclear weapons”.

The cache of messages also casts aspersions upon the way US embassy staff are involved in collecting personal data about foreign nationals, blurring the line between standard diplomatic work and outright espionage.

Even though a significant number of the secret messages date back to before Mr Obama took office, the White House was aggressive yesterday in its condemnation of their release by Wikileaks, saying the publication could “deeply impact” US interests abroad and put lives “at risk”.

However, Despite Washington’s fears that a vast amount of uncensored information was to be published by the website, Wikileaks went some way towards redacting the names of informants it believes might be persecuted. —The Independent

Real damage can be caused when personal trust, honour or national security is involved
Leaks could deal a fatal blow to global trust
Hilary Synott

Julian Assange

In the field of diplomacy, as distinct from that of military operations, leaks, indiscretions and premature publication of opinions which were presumed to be private are often no more than embarrassing, sometimes even hilarious. But the reason that all foreign ministries employ costly and sophisticated encryption techniques is that they can sometimes be positively damaging. It is likely that the current batch of WikiLeaks will include all these categories.

The leaking of the valedictory dispatches of some former British heads of diplomatic missions has often been more embarrassing to their authors than to the targets of their fulminations. But the fact that former foreign secretary Margaret Beckett put a peremptory end to the practice suggested that the embarrassment sometimes stretched to the government.

In any event, astute use of the Freedom of Information Act has ensured that many more such despatches have recently been published, well before the application of the 30-year rule which requires that most official documents must be freely released.

Britain and many other governments subject to similar legislation have had to live with such a situation, although with increasing difficulty when the issues concerned touch on national security.

Does it really matter whether a former British foreign secretary should air their view that the Prime Minister of Italy was unfit to govern? Or that the British press have stories of alleged murky dealings by the President of France? Not really, because the relationships between the countries concerned encompass much wider issues than the personalities involved.

Real damage can, however, be caused when personal trust, honour or national security are involved. When yet another former foreign secretary was reported in the aftermath of 9/11 to have described a head of government with whom he had been negotiating as being incapable of opening his mouth without lying, he was frozen out, at a time when Britain had important interests to pursue.

What will be damaging in the Wikileaks, then, will be revelations about views on the part of senior political figures about individuals or nations who may be able to retaliate, or when the cultivation of personal trust is essential in progressing whatever interests may be in play. This will apply particularly in relation to states which have an elevated sense of national honour and, more generally, to the Muslim world. Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan spring immediately to mind.

The proliferation of the right of freedom of information has already caused ambassadors to damp down the fires in their bellies, at the cost of the value which they can add to their political masters. The increasing practice of wholesale leakages may extinguish them altogether. Or perhaps, sadly, diplomacy will revert to the Talleyrand-like practice of dissimulation and secret personal emissaries.

Former British diplomat Sir Hilary Synnott is consulting senior fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies — The Independent

Inside peek at global crises
John Whitesides

The whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks released thousands of sensitive U.S. diplomatic cables on Sunday that include candid views of foreign leaders and blunt assessments of nuclear and terrorist threats.

Some of the cables made available to a handful of newspapers around the world provide an inside peek at U.S. diplomatic views and actions in North Korea, Iran, Pakistan and elsewhere.

The U.S. government condemned the release, saying it could compromise private discussions with foreign leaders and endanger the lives of named individuals living “under oppressive regimes.”

Here is a look at some of the main substantive revelations in the cables, published by the New York Times:

z China’s Politburo directed the intrusion into Google’s computer systems in that country, a Chinese contact told the U.S. Embassy in January, as part of a computer sabotage campaign carried out by government operatives, private experts and Internet outlaws recruited by the Chinese government. They have broken into U.S. government computers and those of Western allies, the Dalai Lama and American businesses since 2002, cables said.

z King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia has repeatedly urged the United States to attack Iran to destroy its nuclear program and is reported to have advised Washington to “cut off the head of the snake” while there was still time.

z U.S. and South Korean officials discussed the prospects for a unified Korea should the North’s economic troubles and political transition lead the state to implode. The South Koreans considered commercial inducements to China to “help salve” Chinese concerns about living with a reunified Korea that is in a “benign alliance” with Washington, according to the American ambassador to Seoul.

z Since 2007, the United States has mounted a secret and so far unsuccessful effort to remove highly enriched uranium from a Pakistani research reactor out of fear it could be diverted for use in an illicit nuclear device.

z Iran has obtained sophisticated missiles from North Korea capable of hitting western Europe, and the United States is concerned Iran is using those rockets as “building blocks” to build longer-range missiles. The advanced missiles are much more powerful than anything U.S. officials have publicly acknowledged Iran has in its arsenal.

z When Afghanistan’s vice president, Ahmed Zia Massoud, visited the United Arab Emirates last year, local authorities working with the Drug Enforcement Administration discovered he was carrying $52 million in cash. He denied taking the money out of Afghanistan.

z American diplomats have bargained with other countries to help empty the Guantanamo Bay prison by resettling detainees. Slovenia was told to take a prisoner if it wanted to meet with President Barack Obama, and Kiribati was offered incentives worth millions of dollars to take in Chinese Muslim detainees. In another case, accepting more prisoners was described as “a low-cost way for Belgium to attain prominence in Europe,” a cable said.

z Saudi donors remain the chief financiers of Sunni militant groups like Al Qaeda, and the tiny Persian Gulf state of Qatar was the “worst in the region” in counterterrorism efforts, according to a State Department cable. Qatar’s security service was “hesitant to act against known terrorists out of concern for appearing to be aligned with the U.S. and provoking reprisals,” the cable said.

z The United States has failed to prevent Syria from supplying arms to Hezbollah in Lebanon, which has amassed a huge stockpile since its 2006 war with Israel, the cables said. One week after Syrian President Bashar al-Assad promised a top State Department official he would not send “new” arms to Hezbollah, the United States complained it had information that Syria was giving the group increasingly sophisticated weapons.

z Yemen has helped cover up the American role in missile strikes against the local branch of Al Qaeda. According to a cable, Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh in January told General David H. Petraeus, then the American commander in the Middle East: “We’ll continue saying the bombs are ours, not yours.” This prompted Yemen’s deputy prime minister to joke that he had just “lied” by telling Parliament that Yemeni forces had carried out the strikes. — Reuters

Corrections and clarifications

n In the report “Medallists return home to warm reception” (Page 7, November 29) the fourth para says “…they expected him to do even better performance….” This is a wrong expression.

n In the box item headlined “Past JPCs” (Page 14, November 29) the first line “1987:Constituted to inq Held…” makes no sense. What was intended to be said was 1987: constituted to inquire into the Bofors scam the JPC held 50 sittings under the chairmanship of….

n In the headline “More tube wells for Kandi area” (Page 5, November 28) ‘tubewells’ should have been one word.

n In a report on Page 2 of the November 24 issue the Karnataka Chief Minister has inadvertently been mentioned as K. Rosaiah instead of B.S.Yedurappa.

Despite our earnest endeavour to keep The Tribune error-free, some errors do creep in at times. We are always eager to correct them.

This column appears twice a week — every Tuesday and Friday. We request our readers to write or e-mail to us whenever they find any error.

Readers in such cases can write to Mr Kamlendra Kanwar, Senior Associate Editor, The Tribune, Chandigarh, with the word “Corrections” on the envelope. His e-mail ID is kanwar@tribunemail.com.

Raj Chengappa, Editor-in-Chief