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The more the merrier
Sectarianism in Pakistan
Friendly skies |
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Should death penalty be abolished?
Beware of JoJo!
Arab Spring was waiting to happen
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The more the merrier THE RBI has thrown wide open the doors of India’s highly regulated banking sector. Any private firm, public sector entity and non-banking finance company can apply for a bank licence up to July this year. Under its draft rules issued in August 2011 the RBI had barred real estate companies and brokerage houses from applying for bank licences. The latest rules, released on Friday, keep no sector out but require the applicants to have “sound credentials and integrity” and “an impeccable business track record of 10 years”. The initial paid-up equity capital requirement is Rs 500 crore. After 14 banks were nationalised in 1969, the growth of India’s banking sector has been rather slow. Lack of competition kept services poor and customers dissatisfied as public sector banks enjoyed a near monopoly position. Bank employees’ unions held the government -- and the nation -- to ransom, extracting fat salary hikes by strike threats. In the past two decades the RBI has allowed only 12 new banks. The entry of private banks has improved the services. They pamper customers but extract a price. New technology has made banking much easier and hassle-free. However, still large sections of Indian’s population have no access to banking services. The new rules require that one of the four new branches should be located in a village. The government’s new direct cash transfer scheme may bring banks and villagers closer. While the proliferation of bank branches in every nook and corner of the country is welcome, the need for stricter vigilance becomes obvious. The RBI has so far maintained commendable supervision over public and private banks. When many top banks in developed nations were failing during the 2008 global financial meltdown, Indian banks remained unshaken. Though the new rules do provide for adequate caution, the RBI will have to ensure that malpractices common in India’s corporate sector do not creep into the banking sector. There are lessons to learn from the US sub-prime crisis, which shook the world as regulatory and rating agencies were caught napping or looking the other way.
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Sectarianism in Pakistan THE killing of 85 Shias in Quetta in Pakistan’s Balochistan province last week brought into sharp focus Islamabad’s policy of using extremism to achieve its internal and external objectives. The extremist outfit that has claimed responsibility for these killings in two bomb blasts, the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ), is well known for its base in the Sunni population of Pakistan, but no major action has been taken to uproot it. Its leader, Malik Ishaq, has been taken into custody, but he may be let off after the loss of these innocent lives becomes a thing of the past. Who can think of destroying the LeJ root and branch when the outfit has its major support base in Pakistan’s Punjab province, which continues to maintain its dominance over the armed forces? The LeJ, an offshoot of the Sipah-e-Sahaba, a much bigger organisation promoting extremist ideas, has reportedly been involved in most of the killings of Shias in Pakistan. Earlier, Ahmedis (popularly known as Quadianis) were on top of the list of the extremist sectarian outfits like the LeJ. Now it seems the Ahmedis have been replaced by the Shias. This is clear from the fact that during this year (in less than two months) as many as 200 Shias have been done to death at different places in Pakistan. The figure for last year is 400 Shia casualties in sectarian incidents of violence. One theory doing the rounds is that the Shias, who constitute one-fifth of Pakistan’s population, are being persecuted to force them to leave their homeland in large numbers so that the community becomes irrelevant, at least politically. If this is true, the development may be connected to the sectarian politics in West Asia, where sectarianism has emerged as the new threat to stability. Shia Iran is supporting Shia extremist and other groups in different West Asian nations whereas Saudi Arabia-led Sunni regimes in the region are on the other side of the fence. Islamabad needs to learn from what is happening in West Asia, not far away from Pakistan. It must devise a strategy to prevent the targeting of Shias, otherwise the sectarian fire may lead to Pakistan becoming another Iraq, where Sunnis and Shias have been baying for each other’s blood ever since the fall of the Saddam regime.
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Friendly skies
Airlines, as we have recently seen with Kingfisher woes, have to sometimes fly in turbulent weather, but still there is no dearth of takers for this industry. The Malaysia-based Air Asia plans to enter the Indian skies after making an initial investment of $15 million in a venture that has roped in Tata Sons as well as Telestra Tradeplace Pvt. Ltd. Air Asia has built its reputation as the largest discount carrier in Southeast Asia, and it plans to move in fast with its head, Tony Fernandes, a Malaysian whose father was Indian, maintaining that the new joint venture would be flying in the Indian skies by the end of the year. The Tatas have for long eyed the aviation sector, which is hardly surprising, given that the group was the pioneer of aviation and its heads, be it JRD Tata or Ratan Tata, have been fliers themselves. Ever since the government decided to allow foreign airlines to own up to 49 per cent of local carriers, in September last year, there has been talk of international alliances. There is already buzz about Jet Airways being in talks with the Abu Dhabi-based Etihad Airways, with the latter planning to invest in Jet Airways. Such alliances will inject fresh capital and talent into various airlines; bring in more corporate responsibility and increased competitiveness. All this would contribute towards the stability of the sector, which has been badly shaken by various factors in the recent past. Air Asia’s entry is also expected to spark competition between various airlines to offer low fares to travellers, something that is bound to be widely welcomed. Indian skies have not always been friendly to the airlines, especially private airlines that mushroomed following liberalisation. The new alliances may provide just what the beleaguered airlines need to keep themselves afloat. They may, indeed, also give them the flight plan towards a more prosperous future.
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The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled. — Plutarch
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Should death penalty be abolished? THE hangman's noose has been once again in the news for the past two weeks. But it has been — much longer — on the conscience of legislators, of judges and of the thinking public as also on the conscience of people like former President Abdul Kalam: his humane stand had stirred up a controversy that was needed. The hanging of Afzal Guru has again ignited the spirit of the “abolitionists”. Hang the death penalty, they said as they implored President Pranab Mukherjee. But (on this occasion) India's Head of State was not on their side. The truth is that the death penalty is not so much a legal or constitutional issue as a sociological one. It evokes divergent responses in different people — and judges, being human, are no exception, nor are presidents! In India, there has always been a cleavage of opinion. For some it was a matter of conscience. I remember my senior (Sir Jamshedji Kanga) telling us in the nineteen fifties about a senior District Judge, Khareghat, who was due to be elevated to the Bombay High Court. In those days the capital sentence could only be imposed by a High Court Judge. Khareghat declined the honour on the ground that he could not, and would never be, a party to the death sentence: he would rather not be a High Court judge (which is why some of us from Mumbai have not yet forgotten the name of that District Judge)! The abolitionists have always had a strong lobby. Recent events in various countries (especially in the developing world) have driven many to the conclusion that murder will never cease to be an instrument of politics until the execution even of proved murderers is regarded as immoral and wrong. In the world of today there are fewer and fewer men (and women) condemned to death for murder, and more and more executed for political views. As long as death remains a permissible instrument of government, those in power will always justify its use. Besides, (and this is a particularly pertinent point) the hangman's noose ends the search for truth — what if the judges were wrong? The question plagues our conscience. Judgments of courts can always be recalled and reviewed; execution of sentences of death never. Niall McDermott, distinguished Secretary-General of the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), Geneva, said that while conveying to the then President of India, the ICJ’s plea for mercy for Kehar Singh (one of Indira Gandhi's assassins): "In the country of my birth (the Republic of Ireland) there is a saying that the grass never grows under the gallows." But President Venkatraman had already made up his mind — and Kehar Singh was hanged. Many years ago Benazir Bhutto, then Prime Minister of Pakistan, while addressing a meeting of heads of delegation of the SAARC countries, put aside her prepared script and, responding to Bangladesh President Ershad's speech condoling the death of General Zia, indignantly recalled that if her own father had not been hanged because of the tyranny of the same General Zia, he (her father) would have been alive and a free man! Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto's execution was the "judicial murder" of the decade — four justices pronouncing him guilty (for a murder he swore he did not commit) and three voting for his acquittal (on the ground that there was no reliable evidence to convict), the latter included my friend Justice Dorab Patel: Dorab had become one of Pakistan's most senior judges only to resign on principle after refusing to take an oath of allegiance in 1981 to the Chief Martial Law Administrator and Chief of Army Staff, the same General Zia-ul-Haq! On the other side, the argument of the "retentionists" is that the death sentence has a deterrent effect — not by the fear of death but exciting in the community a deep feeling of abhorrence for the crime of murder. I remember in 1973 when Jagmohan Singh's case was being argued (where the constitutionality of the death penalty was first upheld by the Supreme Court), Chief Justice Sikri said, in the course of arguments, that he was certain that if the death penalty were abolished, entire villages in Punjab would be wiped out in a wave of reprisals! He had been the Advocate-General of that state for many years. Other distinguished justices from this border state (like H.R. Khanna) and other border states have expressed similar views. How can a deep feeling of abhorrence of the death penalty be sustained (say the “retentionists”) when known and hardened criminals sentenced to imprisonment for life are set free through statutorily permissible paroles and remissions after only a few years of incarceration? They have a point. What then of the future? In the Oliver Wendell Holmes Lectures delivered in September 1981, Justice Brennan said: “I believe that a majority of the Supreme Court will one day accept that when the state punishes with death, it denies the humanity and dignity of the victim….. That will be a great day for our country and our court." He was speaking about the United States and its Supreme Court of which he was a distinguished member. There are many in this country who would like to see the Supreme Court of India utter similar sentiments. Perhaps, hopefully, one day, it will but I venture to predict that it will only be — and can only be — when the system of criminal justice effectively ensures that persons who would have got hanged but for the constitutional outlawing of capital punishment (like persons guilty of horrendous murders) would never return
to society. Till then the great question will continue to haunt us all — as it had troubled President Kalam: “Is it really necessary to hang people in order to convince people that killing people
is wrong?” The writer is a well-known senior advocate of the Supreme Court of
India.
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Beware of JoJo! WHEN our JoJo arrived, he was a palm-sized treasure that trembled despite being snug as a bug in a red Santa Claus cap. The weakest pup in a litter of six, he could barely take in milk from a dropper. Heaters, quilts and woollies kept him warm even as he grew in size, strength and spirit. Soon he was all over the place and under beds and tables. He intelligently made the connection between the ping of the microwave and his milk being warmed, so he danced a merry jig in anticipation of his dairy fix. At night he chose the warmest spot on the bed and plonked himself at my feet, working his way to the crook of my arm as the January temperatures nosedived. He quickly learnt to kick doors open and alert us if doorbells rang, mobiles buzzed or pressure cookers swooshed. A white German Spitz is not usually guard dog material but JoJo is a most unusual dog, even if I say so myself. He concluded very decisively (if unfairly) that plumbers were vile and electricians were no good, so he barks at both with an audacity unexpected of someone so puny. At 18 months, he decided that he has a problem with postmen, tailors, milkmen, dhobis and other regular visitors. He intimidates guests and looks upon children as overgrown toys. A friendly yap at the ankles could turn into a spirited attack. “A mouthful of thigh”, my daughter labelled him. “Mom, I want a dog I can proudly introduce to my friends!” she wailed. “I have to lock him up each time they come. Then he barks the place down and bangs at the door so hard I cannot have a conversation!” To stem the teenage tirade, I remind her with a baleful glare, “And who was it who wanted a pet dog!” No footwear or stationery survives JoJo’s sharp onslaught. Socks, vests and hankies are all JoJo’s. Please do not shudder at the sight of our little darling jumping all over the sofa – remember, that’s why it’s called FURniture. You cannot make casual visits to our home – we need advance warning and you will still have to wait outside while we settle JoJo. For all his fierceness, he is such a great guy when only his family is around. He gives us a rapturous welcome when we return home, talks to us with his dark chocolate eyes and snuggles into our arms with unquestioning acceptance, more than making up for his apparent lack of social skills. Pugnacious and bold, he is a pet with an attitude. You cannot bring home a dog with the temperament of your choice, for like people, they are born with a certain personality. I hope all our neighbours realize this too. JoJo’s staccato midnight barking (at the sound of footsteps or a car turning into the lane) can be disruptive – not that we’ve ever asked our neighbours about it. I am banking on the fact that they are not likely to venture into our drawing room to complain about JoJo anytime
soon!
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Arab Spring was waiting to happen In 2002 the Arab Human Development Report identified freedom, empowerment of women, and knowledge as the three deficits that hampered human development in Arab countries. The public mood of pessimism was summed up in the remark that “we, Arabs, do not have the power to do anything and there are certain alien forces that control our destiny.” The despondency of two lost generations, in which modernity was imported as a product rather than as a process, also propelled a quest for alternatives: of an imagined past, an ideal of authenticity, an instrument of mobilisation well rooted in the consciousness of the masses. This brought forth Islamism in different manifestations. It was psychologically reassuring. As an instrument of protest, it sought democratic governance to deny the legitimacy of the authoritarian state.
The urge for change The war and the prolonged period of occupation and resistance to it in all its manifestations impacted on the Arab status quo but on a delayed-action fuse. The regimes that have tumbled, and those that are challenged, failed to gauge the urge for change in the majority segments of their youthful populations. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan demonstrated the limits of the military capacity of the United States in a non-conventional conflict. The military and political conflicts in the first decade of the present century brought to the fore other fault lines that have left their mark on the balance of socio-political power in individual countries of the region. These have taken the shape of:
The new situation The impact of each set of challenges has been different. In Iraq, the Kurdish demand for greater role in governance in a highly centralised Arab state has been long standing. The US-led war against Saddam Hussain has resulted in a de facto autonomous Kurdish region in Iraq where the authority of Baghdad is minimal and frequently contested on matters of daily governance. In Syria domestic political discontent against one-party rule, encouraged and assisted materially by some regional and other powers, has assumed the form of a full-fledged civil war with no end in sight. This has given Syrian Kurds a little elbow room though without external recognition; it is likely to be complicated by neighbouring Turkey’s stern policy towards its Kurdish population. The new situation in both countries has prompted apprehensions about efforts to give shape to various projects of cartographic engineering in the region, or as Hassanein Haikal put it recently, “a New Sykes-Picot.” The democratisation of the political process in Iraq, in the wake of the war of 2003, projected for the first time the demographic reality of the state and resulted in the emergence of Shias as the majority politico-sectarian faction. The loss of political power by the Arab Sunnis of the country was deeply resented and continues to be contested. It also has wider geo-political ramifications.
In 2004 the King of Jordan contributed, allegedly at the prompting of his chief of intelligence, the term “Shia Crescent” to the political vocabulary of the region. Unconsciously, perhaps, it helped highlight the geopolitical gains that accrued to Iran in the wake of the Iraq war. Iran has sustained its assistance to the Hezbullah in Lebanon; there is, however, no evidence as yet of a material Iranian impulse in the simmering of discontent in the Shia segments of the Bahraini and Saudi population since this emanates from domestic factors and pre-date the Iraq war. The immediate details of the political eruptions in the past two years in Tunisia and Egypt are known to most people; the backdrop is not. Since independence in 1956, the Tunisian public or people (sha’b) mostly subscribed to the ideal to a homogenous, united, modern, Francophile and secular body-politic and a paternalistic relationship in a ‘pact of obedience’ to the Leader (Zaim). Economic grievances did surface from time to time but did not transform themselves into movements for rights. Egypt is the very reverse of the relative tranquillity of Tunisia though the Tunisian protests served as an inspiration. A perceptive observer has recently noted that two years after the initial turmoil ‘Egyptians don’t really know the balance of forces in their own homeland.’ This reaffirms Leon Trotsky’s observation that ‘the masses go into a revolution not with a prepared plan of social reconstruction, but with a sharp feeling that they cannot endure the old regime.’ The leaderless protestors in Tahrir Square and elsewhere in Egypt, fully assisted by modern communications technology and ad hoc mechanisms of defence against police tactics, focussed on toppling the Mubarak regime.
Leaderless protests The first stage of the Egyptian revolution was essentially leaderless and reflected the aspirations of all segments of society. Its limitations became evident with the progress of events. The electoral process and the constitution-making brought to the fore the Muslim Brotherhood as the most organised socio-political force on the scene. It is strong but not unchallenged; on the other hand, while both the Salafists and the liberal-secularists have mobilised against it, they do not find convergence on critical values and tactics. The most recent events thus tend to highlight nature of the challenge: how to forge a democratic system while integrating the Brotherhood and other Islamists into the political game. Violence, until recently, was generally avoided. Ominous signs of a reversal are now emerging. A new organisation, the Black Bloc, made its appearance in the last week of January, claiming to be ‘formed in reaction to the Muslim Brotherhood’s military wing’. In a first reaction, the Ministry of Interior has called them terrorists and ordered their arrest. A challenge is being mounted by the liberal-secularists, but not the Salafists, to the legitimacy of the President himself. The Brotherhood’s uncompromising position on the making of the constitution and the electoral law has hardened the political divide which can only be addressed by the proposed National Dialogue.
The place of Islam A critical question discussed in different fora and on different planes, directly as well as elliptically, is the place of Islam in society and in State policies. In a book published in the year 2000 American journalist Geneive Abdo wrote that ‘the religious transformation of Egyptian society appeared obvious to me shortly after I stepped out in the Cairo breeze one Sunday evening in 1993’, adding that ‘the Islamic revival was broad-based, touching Egyptians in every social class and all walks of life.’ The only outstanding question, she concluded, ‘is to what degree the religious revival will take over Egyptian society.’ The Brotherhood, with deep roots in society and in professional groupings, subscribes to the amorphous dictum ‘Islam is the solution.’ Some in this audience would know that in terms of the political theory of Islam, governance is to be by consultation, allegiance is conditional, and dissent admissible. This, in modern terminology, would tantamount to democratic governance. The political history of Muslim societies, however, is characterised by the opposite. The choice often is between form and content. The paradox is summed up succinctly by the French-Algerian scholar Mohammed Arkoun: ‘Islam is theologically Protestant and politically Catholic.’
How do these developments affect us in India? Needless to say, political turbulence and economic disruption on our western flank, as in other neighbouring regions, would be an unwelcome development. Formally, a change of regime would not impact on our perceptions since Indian state practice does not admit of regime recognition. Nor is India generally given to pronouncement of value judgements on the domestic set-up of other countries unless such a step is motivated by more compelling considerations of statecraft. Barring a serious divergence of views on questions of our national interest, therefore, the new regimes in these countries would not have an adverse impact on our bilateral relations. On the contrary, hard economic and geo-political interests would ensure harmonious relationships. In the final analysis, therefore, the changes, voluntary and expressive of popular will, are to be welcomed. We know only too well that democratic institution-building requires commitment as well as patience and a temper of tolerance. To the extent our assistance is sought, it should be made available without being prescriptive. The transition to a democratic system would be genuine and durable as long as it is autonomous. Suggestions of imposition would be a negation of both. There is, of course, another scenario to be reckoned with. What would happen if the democratisation process falters, if disagreements take the shape of violent dissent, if the principle of majority rule within the framework of equal rights is not adhered to, if newly installed democratic governments fail to meet public expectations on better governance, social justice, employment and growth? Would renewed turbulence induce external intervention – regional or extra regional? Would it make the region resemble Pandemonium, depicted by the poet Milton as the capital of Hell where the great Satan would be the ruling deity? Excerpted from the Asia Centre Annual Lecture on ‘What Might Be Happening In West Asia’ delivered by the Vice President of India at the Asia Centre, Bangalore, on February 15.
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THE so-called “Arab Spring” did not happen suddenly. What is happening in some West Asian lands today by way of political turbulence has had a long gestation, was waiting to happen, and is in the nature of serial volcanic eruptions whose intensity and duration is difficult to predict. 