A tiger made to mew
FOR once Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee spoke like a Prime Minister when he asserted that the law of the land, and not the diktat of Shiv Sena boss Bal Thackeray, would prevail during the Indo-Pakistan cricket Test early next year in Mumbai.

Give farming a better deal
IN the ongoing war of words between the government and independent experts over the state of the economy, the mention of agriculture comes as a saviour. Sarkari financial pundits are unprepared to believe that the economic growth rate this year may not be more than 5 per cent, as calculated by those not associated with the government.


Advance planning
THOSE who “sell” special prayers and rituals for all occasions to the gullible may be encouraged by the report that women in Cornwall in England have been warned against delivering babies in August next year to avoid the risk of running into the solar eclipse during the same period.

Drama in American life
by K. F. Rustamji
THE Americans, whose culture has been moulded by cinema and TV, have made drama the prime motive of their lives. In every aspect — in romance, divorce, politics, courtroom — there has to be drama, and even the President of the USA can be dragged on to the stage for every indiscreet word or photograph that features him.

Developing nations: role
for India
by S. Sethuraman
THE Clinton Administration is playing a devious game with India, in coercive pursuit of its aim to bring India within the nuclear non-proliferation regime on its terms, by a highly selective and discriminatory approach in wielding its economic sanctions.

Your Lordships, know
thy onions
by Anupam Gupta
SIXTY years after the American Supreme Court, threatened by Roosevelt’s historic court-packing plan, abandoned judicial review in the economic field, the Indian judiciary is bracing itself to face its greatest ever challenge — onions. Will the courts now jump in to control onions, the rising prices of onions and other vegetables?

And now, honesty award
for Vajpayee
by Humra Quraishi
AMIDST all this electioneering comes in the news that on November 26, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee is to get the “Honest man of the year” award from the Sulabh Foundation. The earlier recipients of this very award were TN Seshan and Dr Manmohan Singh. And like in previous years there is similar criticism coming up again — don’t tell us that honesty is becoming such a rare quality that even men holding the high office of prime ministership have to be awarded for it.

Mind your own business
by Sanjeev Chaddha
BEING an entrepreneur is not everyone’s cup of tea. This hard fact was recently discovered, though not without much pain, by a friend of mine working in a government undertaking in a middle management position. Being professionally qualified and not fully satisfied with his present job, he felt that there was not enough challenge in his job.

75 Years Ago

American citizen arrested
BOMBAY: An American citizen named Dr E.L. Hinman has been taken into police custody and remanded for a fortnight for further enquiries. The charge against him is that of criminal breach of trust.

A tiger made to mew

FOR once Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee spoke like a Prime Minister when he asserted that the law of the land, and not the diktat of Shiv Sena boss Bal Thackeray, would prevail during the Indo-Pakistan cricket Test early next year in Mumbai. He was reacting to the Sena chief’s threat to unleash his sainiks and disrupt the match and even prevent the movement of the visiting players. That was Mr Thackeray’s way of punishing the neighbour for sending trained terrorists and killers across the border. His is not an empty threat, more to boost his own image than to cut the intended adversary down to size. He had indulged in such gimmicks in the past by virtually banning the entry of Pakistani singers into his city, warning squash player Jansher Khan of dire consequences if he played in Mumbai and once inciting his goon-followers to successfully dig up the pitch at Wankhede stadium, when Mr Manohar Joshi, now Chief Minister of Maharashtra, was a top functionary of the local cricket association. To be fair, the Shiv Sena was not in power at that time.

With the Prime Minister’s firm stand, the Sena supremo has piped down, content to mutter a “thank you” and smile his embarrassment away. This is the first time that he had to backtrack for the simple reason that it is the first time that somebody bluntly told him not to impose himself on others. Until now the authorities, both in Mumbai and Delhi, tended to ignore him lest his violent supporters started a riot in the name of restoring the authority of their leader. Many called him the “Bombay bully” but that was some time back and from a safe distance. His own venerating sainiks hail him as a “wagh” meaning tiger, the election symbol of the party. It is this image and a known streak of lawlessness in him that intimidated the government into inaction. The Prime Minister has risen above this and in the process exposed the tiger’s proclivity to mew if he could not roar. Well done.

Similar in impact is the policy line Home Minister L.K. Advani has laid down on the issue of making Vandemataram and Saraswati vandana singing mandatory in UP schools. He is not against the prayers but against forcing them on those who have reservations about them. Instead Mr Advani has asked the UP government to build a consensus, and avoid a conflict on a delicate question like this. A prayer has to be much, much above controversy if it were to stimulate devotion and forge fellow feeling among the participants. Simply put, a prayer has to unite and not divide, something HRD Minister Murli Manohar Joshi forgot when he ordered the singing of Saraswati vandana at the conference of State Education Ministers. As a veteran teacher he surely knows that he can force someone to study but not to worship, which is too intensely a personal matter to be amenable to outside impulses. Mr Advani’s sage advice should hopefully bury the incipient conflict.

Give farming a better deal

IN the ongoing war of words between the government and independent experts over the state of the economy, the mention of agriculture comes as a saviour. Sarkari financial pundits are unprepared to believe that the economic growth rate this year may not be more than 5 per cent, as calculated by those not associated with the government. The official analysts continue to insist that the figure would be higher than this — over 6 per cent. But those who insist on 5 per cent as the maximum limit say that their estimate is based on earlier reports that the country would record an increased agricultural yield, resulting in the enhancement of the purchasing power of a big section of the population. However, going by the latest assessment of the farming sector's performance, the unofficial calculation may go further down as adverse weather conditions have damaged the crops in many areas. This means that not only agricultural production will go down but also the recovery of the government's dues from this sector will not be on expected lines. Whatever the ultimate result, one thing is certain: the contribution of agriculture to the national economic growth is crucial. Agriculture continues to enjoy the status of the biggest private sector component in India, the primary source of livelihood for over 70 per cent of the population. Yet very little attention is being paid to its development as demanded by today's market forces. A recent study by the Punjab, Haryana and Delhi Chamber of Commerce and Industry has come out with an alarming scenario: the funds intended for investment on agricultural infrastructure creation are being diverted to other areas, to provide subsidies on inputs like fertilisers, irrigation water and power, as this can help in the consolidation of political following. This is unfortunate. Subsidies do play a role in the enhancement of agricultural production and hence in the empowerment of the farming class. But the development of infrastructure has its own significance.

Last month at the 12th conference on agricultural marketing in Jaipur, some useful suggestions were made to increase the purchasing power of farmers, which could propel overall economic growth at a faster pace. Since even now agriculture largely depends on weather conditions, there is need to implement more vigorously the price support policy as it exists in the case of 24 commodities. This support mechanism, as the experts rightly suggested, should be extended to cover certain other crops also as these have their own importance at the level of the regions where they are grown. This will ensure that kisans in every region get a reasonably remunerative price of their produce. When Indian farmers have a comparative advantage in the matter of some of their produce in the international market, there is need to give increased attention to the question of providing marketing facilities in the rural areas, specially in Bihar, Eastern Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Orissa which have remained neglected. In fact, agriculture is emerging as an area of great export potential. It deserves the formulation of a new policy to address the constraints faced by the farmers. However, it must be kept in view that the situation of agriculture is entirely different from that of industry. It cannot be left at the mercy of the private sector for its development requirements even in this era of privatisation. The government will have to play the commanding role, as agriculture’s very survival depends on the infrastructural facilities which cannot be provided by the private sector at an affordable price. Thus the government has to find ways to inject massive funds in this critical area.

Advance planning

THOSE who “sell” special prayers and rituals for all occasions to the gullible may be encouraged by the report that women in Cornwall in England have been warned against delivering babies in August next year to avoid the risk of running into the solar eclipse during the same period. The fact that the warning has been issued by members of the medical fraternity should add to the sense of joy of the superstitious. Behavioural scientists point out that the superstitious feel more comfortable when they see others performing the same seemingly absurd rituals to “ward off evil spirits” or to welcome the good ones. During the last major solar eclipse in the country a television network enlisted the services of Prof Yashpal for encouraging people to see the rare occurrence. Yet the streets wore a deserted look and pregnant women were told not to step out during the period of the eclipse. Even during the recent cosmic Divali, which not many people got to see in India, there were those who kept the lights on throughout the night for reasons which the rationalists may find difficult to understand.

However, before the superstitious send their greetings to the women of Cornwall “for reinforcing our belief” in the evil effects of solar or lunar eclipse on all life forms — which can only be countered by offering special prayers — they should be asked to read the full report. Yes, doctors have, indeed, suggested to women in Cornwall not to get pregnant this month because “they may end up giving birth in the middle of next year’s solar eclipse”. But the reason for issuing the warning has nothing to do with superstition. It is the scientific interest of the people of Cornwall in the once-in-a-lifetime phenomenon which is worrying members of the medical fraternity. They fear that so many people in the south-western English county may come out to see the total eclipse that women in labour may not be able to get to hospital through the traffic jam. As many as two million people are expected to descend on the region in nine months’ time for the best and longest view of the eclipse — the first to be seen in Britain since 1927. The warning to avoid August births was issued by the Medical Committee of Cornwall. Doctors have pinned the newsletter carrying the warning in their offices. If India had administrators with such foresight, the prices of onions may not have made the people cry.

DRAMA IN AMERICAN LIFE
Human rights of the famous
by K. F. Rustamji

THE Americans, whose culture has been moulded by cinema and TV, have made drama the prime motive of their lives. In every aspect — in romance, divorce, politics, courtroom — there has to be drama, and even the President of the USA can be dragged on to the stage for every indiscreet word or photograph that features him. That one photograph of Mr Clinton holding Ms Monica Lewinsky in a crowd (she doing her best to appear prominent) has been shown again and again a million times. Mr Clinton may have steered the world through the worst of times, and he may have acted with sense and purpose in dealing with the economy, but where there is need to produce political drama he and his family can be subjected to the worst type of human rights violations.

Arthur Miller (“The Crucible”) takes us back to the witches of Salem in examining the Monica Lewinsky story. How many good and honest men and women were burned at the stake to satisfy the public demand for sacrifice. His play brought out an aspect of American life that persists to this day — faith in rumour and the backchat of the neighbourhood, a certain type of frenzy generated by fear of God and communism, and a public desire to pounce upon it, magnify it, and condemn anyone unjustly, even hand out sentences of death to the undeserving.

If we look back at another period, the MacCarthy years, a host of scientists and prominent artists were pilloried for un-American activities. I suppose MacCarthy and Kenneth Starr come from the same stock of pseudo-puritans who combine the popular demand for punishment with the need to cash in on millions of publicity dollars. They trample on human rights with the pious aggression that is reminiscent of the way their ancestors were persecuted by religious fanatics and forced to leave their native land.

American politics has a strange desire to make much of the President’s shortcomings. Nixon was sent scrambling because his security committed a petty burglary to find out his rival’s plans, and he spoke stupidly and preserved the tapes. Kennedy was hounded even after his death. They tried to get Mr Clinton over property deals, and found at the end that he had a flirtation with a girl in his office. The Monica Lewinsky story does not add up to much. It is not murder, rape or even molestation. At the most it is dalliance, which is part of social life everywhere. Does a leader have to show that he is disinterested in women? On the other hand, it is violation of a family’s privacy in the most hurtful way, and we cannot say it is acceptable because it concerns the President of a nation. All the more reason for caution. It is to his credit that Mr Clinton did not make a mistake in those stressful months.

I wonder what would have happened in the Moghul period if a maulvi or a poet had tried to talk about the king’s pleasures to dethrone him. Even in Europe during Hitler’s time, a wrong word would end the man’s life. In the Soviet Union no critic could survive, except in Gulag. American society is trying to be different, and now it is making its own form of human rights violations — stamping on the powerful and the famous as if they were vermin. Americans feel that unless prominent men and women are ridiculed and cut to size, American society will disintegrate, and the media languish in poverty.

Human rights should protect the families of those who are maligned and traumatised by media persons who want to make personal or political gains out of their predicament. To say that a person in power can be maligned even unjustly because he is in a position of authority is a strange twist to the concept of human rights. If his wife and family are tormented beyond endurance by unproved allegations, stretched beyond the truth just to make up a story, it is undoubtedly a violation.

Americans are fond of drama. But it must follow the pattern of a well-constructed play or the plot of a short story. Step by step it goes up to the climax, and then there is a short brisk denouement which settles the issue. That is exactly what has happened in the Clinton case. The story unfolded bit by bit, the characters came into focus, the question about guilt arose. How much, what punishment? Suddenly at the height of the drama the November election provided the denouement. Mr Clinton’s party got an unexpected success. The electorate had ruled that the story had been told. It was time to end it, with the conclusion that a man’s private life, even in the case of a man in high position, must not be investigated in such a way that it magnifies his faults and brings suffering to his family. The real test is his performance in office. Only a democracy could have given such a clear verdict.

A new form of extortion is practised against the prominent. Many persons accused of having committed a crime threaten that if they are taken to court they would make serious allegations about the private life of the individual. If the case goes go to court, can a statement of an accused in defence, which is clearly defamatory, be used by the media? A good example is that of the personal assistant of Zubin Mehta, who defrauded him of $ 100,000. During the trial Susan McDougal made all types of absurd statements to damage the credibility of Zubin. Can these statements be used by the media against a musician of repute? Or is it right to make unfounded allegations against Mr Nawaz Sharif and Ms Benazir Bhutto about their accumulated wealth? The stories may seem interesting, but they have not been proved and are only allegations.

The story about the break between Imran Khan and Jemima was a clear breach of privacy.

In India the bashing of film stars is the stock-in-trade of film journalism. In fact, if a star commits an offence like shooting a black buck, he can be kept in custody, his father humiliated, and girls in the party made to feel that they had committed a murder. Others can get off with a fine for shikar, or just a warning if they don’t have money.

We have begun to think that a free and fearless media means that anything can be said about anybody. As far as people in authority are concerned, they seem to have no human rights at all. We have to devise laws to protect all whose life is affected by hype, whatever be their status or prominence.

Developing nations:role for India
by S. Sethuraman

THE Clinton Administration is playing a devious game with India, in coercive pursuit of its aim to bring India within the nuclear non-proliferation regime on its terms, by a highly selective and discriminatory approach in wielding its economic sanctions.

After a partial lifting of the sanctions, enforced in May last in the wake of the Pokhran nuclear tests, in order to help US business interests, Washington has now published a hit list of Indian government departments, organisations, research establishments and undertakings engaged in diverse fields such as atomic energy, space, defence equipment, electronics and power utilities, nuclear and thermal power. These entities are barred for business with American companies.

Since this new dimension to the sanctions already in force is more trade-related, though mostly in technology goods, India plans to take it up with the World Trade Organisation (WTO) on the ground that US action infringes rules and the spirit of the multilateral trading system. The blacklisting of Indian entities would affect the flow of critical equipment and technology, but equally the American companies and agencies stand to lose business.

Whatever the compulsions for the Clinton Administration in terms of the Glenn Amendment, its selective use of the waiver authority given by Congress to exclude multilateral development loans and the latest ban on US exports of goods and technology to a long list of Indian establishments strengthen the belief that the USA is determined to keep up its pressure on India to fall in line with its own ideas on nuclear non-proliferation.

The sanctions apart, India has already been facing a series of protectionary moves by developed nations, notably the European Union and the USA, in the form of anti-dumping duty and other devices against our exports.

Four years after the Uruguay round agreements came into force, the WTO has not been able to ensure a fair and equitable share of benefits for developing countries which undertook binding commitments in the interest of promoting an open and liberal global trade regime. While developing countries have, by and large, liberalised their trade policies and lowered barriers, the industrial nations are yet to respond in terms of their obligations to honour the development interests of low-income countries.

The time has come for a strong collective initiative on the part of developing countries to present a common agenda which would help to ensure equity in world trade relationships, in the context of the forthcoming reviews of the Uruguay Round agreement implementation at the ministerial-level in the WTO.

Far from addressing the genuine concerns of developing countries which are not deriving the projected benefits of the Uruguay Round, developed nations have embarked on bringing new issues which would involve even more sacrifices by developing countries. This has to be resisted with determination.

The Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Forum comprising 21 countries of the Pacific Rim, which was moving euphorically toward a Free Trade Area of Asia and the Pacific by 2020, has run aground with new tensions on trade opening measures. Japan has rejected calls for duty cuts on fish and forestry products. Developments, political and economic, in the ASEAN region are far from being conducive for any meaningful trade initiatives by APEC.

The tenth APEC summit at Kuala Lumpur (November 17-18) has been marred by the arrest and trial of the dismissed Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim of Malaysia and the ongoing demonstrations against Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammad by supporters of the former and by human rights groups calling for greater openness and democracy in that country.

Trade Ministers of APEC have decided to refer the unresolved trade issues to the WTO. This can only mean that the high hopes built around APEC as the world’s most dynamic trade grouping have begun to crumble. Asia’s developing countries in APEC have also resisted the developed nations’ call for wider opening of their markets at a time when the region is passing through its worst economic crisis in several decades.

In the context of the reversal of fortunes of the Asian Tigers and their economic revival being a matter of years, India can sound a larger number of developing countries (in G-77 and other groupings) in order to set an agenda based on their common interests around which negotiating strengths can be built.

This has become urgent as major developed nations are seeking further domination of the economic space by bringing within the WTO new areas in which their dominance cannot be broken by developing countries in the foreseeable future. — IPA

Mind your own business
by Sanjeev Chaddha

BEING an entrepreneur is not everyone’s cup of tea. This hard fact was recently discovered, though not without much pain, by a friend of mine working in a government undertaking in a middle management position. Being professionally qualified and not fully satisfied with his present job, he felt that there was not enough challenge in his job. Bubbling with energy and enthusiasm, he decided to start some part-time business of his own.

Now the question arose: which business to start off. Various ideas were discussed and research carried out to study their feasibility. Whether it should be the business of dealing in products or services was the first question to be answered. Since the scope of services has become quite limited due to the slump in the economy it was decided that dealing in products was the best idea.

Putting up a unit for manufacturing a product requires sufficient capital along with other resources, and then in a competitive environment there is no guarantee that the product would sell. So this option was kept aside by him. The other option left was trading of products. For trading also a set-up in the form of a shop, a godown, a network and other infrastructural facilities are required which involves a lot of expenditure. Since my friend wanted to start off the business with minimal expenditure, he also ruled out the possibility of setting up shop for trading in goods, the concept being financially unviable.

Keeping in view the present concept of service at the customers’ doorstep, he decided to launch a direct marketing network. The idea was to build up a team of sales persons who would sell the product from door to door. Two other like-minded persons were involved in the project as partners.

After the conceptual and planning phases now the actual implementation of the project began. A lot of research was done to find a suitable office for the project with the result that where the premises were found suitable the rent was not and vice versa. After a lot of fieldwork, ultimately the office premises were selected and token money was paid.

Then the partners paid a visit to Delhi for selecting the products and suppliers. It was observed that the entire capital had to be incurred in cash, and in the initial stages no credit would be forthcoming, thus making things difficult for a salaried class person. Further, the difference of opinion between the partners on various issues was the other factor disturbing the pace of implementation of the project. The approvals from the government and the exercise in getting the sales tax number were proving too cumbersome for one who had not experienced such difficulties earlier.

To cut the long story short, my friend felt all sorts of problems in the actual implementation of his project. All the facets of the project, that looked so strong on paper, went haywire during its actual implementation. After putting in around two months of hard work my friend’s concept of a challenge in one’s life had taken a beating due to the various speed-breakers involved in business. During this period his entire daily routine was disturbed. A cheerful and lively guy that he was before the start of this project, seemed to be lost somewhere. He could not pay attention to his job and would neither do well in his dream project since by now he had started feeling the heat. What he thought would be a part-time business turned-out to be a double-time endeavour.

The symptoms of putting in so much hardwork at both his job and business had clearly started showing on his face. What had seemed so easy at the planning stage turned out to be a nightmare for him, so much so that he abandoned his idea of business in midway. On assessment of the reason for the failure of a professional and a competent person in business can be attributed to the distinction in the personality of an entrepreneur and a manager. Whereas the former is a builder of an enterprise and an opportunity exploiter, the latter is an organisational developer and problem solver. “Thus East is East and West is West, and never the twain shall meet”.

“Higher the risks the higher will be the returns” is a fundamental principle of economics. An entrepreneur risks his entire capital and needs all the patience in the world to set up and successfully run a business. For this one practically needs to have the heart of a lion. Apart from the basic traits like competence, the initiative, intelligence and drive, an entrepreneur should have qualities like high speed of achievement, risk-taking behaviour, the desire to change and the ability to identify an opportunity.

This incident made me realise how hard it was to set up and sustain a new business. My heart was full of reverence for the first generation entrepreneurs who started from scratch and single-handed built their organisations. Their performance, some of them now known as business tycoons, is more creditable since they did not even possess the basic qualifications to launch a new business. But it has to be admitted that these people had great confidence in themselves and exploited the opportunities that knocked at their doors. So, if you are endowed in abundance with all these qualities, go ahead. Otherwise mind your own business.

Your Lordships, know thy onions

by Anupam Gupta

SIXTY years after the American Supreme Court, threatened by Roosevelt’s historic court-packing plan, abandoned judicial review in the economic field, the Indian judiciary is bracing itself to face its greatest ever challenge — onions. Will the courts now jump in to control onions, the rising prices of onions and other vegetables?

Unmindful perhaps of the larger issues involved, the Delhi High Court, a High Court of strategic location, has already exercised jurisdiction and entertained a public interest petition on the subject. Filed by the All-India Lawyers’ Union, the petition seeks a direction to the authorities to ensure adequate supply of onions and other vegetables in the market without delay and to control the unprecedented price spiral which, more than any imponderable of coalition politics, has the potential of dislodging the government.

Asked by the court to respond, the Delhi government denied on affidavit (on November 3) that it had abdicated its responsibility or that it had failed to discipline wholesale and retail vegetable traders. “There is no evidence of significant hoarding of onions by private traders,” said the affidavit. Hoarding in fact is not possible, it added, since onion has hardly any shelf life. The steep rise in prices was not because of hoarding or lack of effort by the government “but due to crop failure and non-availability of the commodity in both national and international markets”.

Construed as a clean chit to traders — the BJP’s principal social constituency — the government’s stand has drawn flak all around. Moving steadily further, the High Court has now sought the Centre’s explanation for the crisis and the measures it proposes to take and has posted the case for hearing next on January 6, 1999. The long adjournment granted despite the pressing nature of the petition betrays, in itself, the difficulty of adjudicating and devising relief in an area traditionally considered not fit or appropriate for judicial intervention.

This is precisely the dilemma that another important High Court, the High Court of Allahabad, has posed before itself. Split right down the middle, a Division Bench of the court referred to its Chief Justice on November 5 a petition filed by one Irfan Khan praying that the government be directed to take immediate steps to control the prices of onions, potatoes, tomatoes, mustard oil, salt and pulses.

Observing that the right to get essential commodities at reasonable price was a part of the right to life under Article 21 of the Constitution, Justice M. Katju took cognizance of the petition and issued notice to the Central and State governments for November 30. Not stopping at that, he also directed the Union Secretary for Food and Civil Supplies to be present personally before the court with an affidavit detailing the steps taken by the Central government in the matter.

Taking an irreconcilably contrary view, his companion on the Bench, Justice S.L. Saraf dismissed the writ petition, holding that the court was not competent to deal with the issue.

Control of prices, he held, was part of the government’s economic policy. It depended on market forces and fell exclusively within the domain of the legislature and the executive.

Whether the onion crisis is man-made or market-made, that is a brief but absolutely correct statement of the law and I doff my hat to the Judge for spurning the invitation to plunge into the uncharted sea of social and economic policy. “Price fixation is neither the function nor the forte of the Court,” the Supreme Court had declared in 1987 in the Cynamide India case, speaking through a Judge whom no one could suspect of harbouring any saffron sympathies.

“We concern ourselves neither with the policy nor with the rates,” he (Justice Chinnappa Reddy) had added, and “we will not revaluate the considerations even if the prices are demonstrably injurious ....” Six months later, he was followed and fortified by another great Judge, Justice Jagannatha Shetty in the Gupta Sugar Works case. “The Court does not (he said, speaking of price fixation of essential commodities) act like a Chartered Accountant nor like an Income Tax Officer.”

The contrary opinion of Justice Katju, if accepted, would bring back into Article 21 that very historically flawed understanding of “due process” — substantive due process in the economic field — which it took a constitutional and judicial crisis of the highest gravity in the America of the 1930s to overcome and repudiate and which the founding fathers of the Indian Constitution, wiser with the American experience, deliberately kept out of Article 21 while settling the language of that provision.

The original wording of the Article, recommended by the Constituent Assembly’s Advisory Committee on Fundamental Rights read: “No person shall be deprived of his life or liberty without due process of law”. In a change of far-reaching importance, the Drafting Committee headed by B.R. Ambedkar substituted “due process” — an American constitutional term — with “procedure established by law”, a phrase employed in the Japanese Constitution.

More on the subject next week, even if it sounds pedantic.

And now, honesty award for Vajpayee

by Humra Quraishi

AMIDST all this electioneering comes in the news that on November 26, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee is to get the “Honest man of the year” award from the Sulabh Foundation. The earlier recipients of this very award were TN Seshan and Dr Manmohan Singh. And like in previous years there is similar criticism coming up again — don’t tell us that honesty is becoming such a rare quality that even men holding the high office of prime ministership have to be awarded for it. I mean isn’t it taken for granted that the Prime Minister should be, rather ought be, honest! So what’s the point of awarding him for being so?

Whither are we going?

Moving on, the United Nations Information Centre observed the day for “Tolerance” on November 16 by inviting some key speakers who dwelt on the oft-repeated subject of how each faith leads you to the path of goodness and enlightenment. A few interesting points came up amidst otherwise dull speech renderings. One was former President of India R. Venkataraman’s observation that regular interfaith, meets could help solve the problem of communal intolerances; in fact he even pointed out that in Chennai (where he is based) every last Friday of the month they hold a meeting where members of different faiths read out from their scriptures and it has proved to be really beneficial. Then, the other was the opening speech of the director of this UN Information Centre, Feodor Starcevic, where he brought in a personal note”....between ages of 2 and 19, the formative period of human life, I lived in the city of my parents, Sarajevo, then in Yugoslavia and now a capital of a new state, born in great torment. The Sarajevo of my youth, and at any time thereafter, was a city where tolerance was so great, so total, that it never occurred to any of us that we were actually practising tolerance...inter-marriage was more of a rule than an exception and people respected customs and religions of others, I believe, even more than their own. It was a way of life in Sarajevo for many many years and the most admirable thing from today’s perspective was that it existed as naturally as earth, sky and water....”

Yet, all this crumbled in a short span of three years — 1992 to 1995 — in the worst possible form of ethnic violence. “The political struggles in Yugoslavia as a whole started eating away at the normalcy and tolerance, and created a whole new situation of ethnic political parties and ethnic divisions. High priests of intolerance emerged as new leaders....”

In fact whilst hearing Starcevic’s speech I kept thinking of the communally-biased political dimensions erupting here, in our very own country. The latest to get affected is the very education pattern and this alone could prove to have far reaching and disastrous consequences. To quote Abu Saleh Shariff, chief economist with NCAER and who has recently completed a ‘human profile’ of India’s rural social/educational/health/economic patterns “desecularisation of education, which has begun in Uttar Pradesh and in some other states would definitely affect the minority groups. One of the first fallouts will be that parents will pull out their children from government schools and put them in madrasas, which is not what the community wants but, then they are left with no choice..” Some other experts I spoke to also sounded apprehensive and pointed out that to bring in any form of desecularisation at the school level could indirectly bring about permanent divisions. Asks NCM chairman “Tell me why will a Sikh, a Christian or a Muslim parent send his child to school to learn just the Hindu scriptures?”

I think after the PM receives ‘the honest man of the year award’ he should in all seriousness and honesty answer this query, living as we are in a secular democracy.

Of qawwalis, exhibitions

If the going has got heavy for you let me quickly fit in how it was a delightfully enriching experience to hear qawwal Amjad Sabri (son of the legendary qawwals — Sabri brothers) at Habitat Centre. Around this time of the year a number of high class qawwals come from across the border and render at especially arranged mehfils, where needless to add only those genuinely interested gather. Then, Roshan Abbas, staged his latest production — “Graffitti — Postcards from School”. It was a mix of all the elements that go to make up the high school stage — a bit of studies, a dash of seriousness, moments of despair, frustrations and needless to add ample doses of those romantic distractions. In this particular musical theatrical. I, for one, was distracted by the low necked dresses of these schoolgirls. Forget about Kajol’s or Meghna’s revealing necklines in Bollywood, these youngsters, went even a few inches deeper. Anyway, let me not distract you all with this, for the play also focuses on the frustrations and expectations of an average teenager. In keeping with this, director Roshan Abbas tells me emphatically, “that’s why I want every kid to see this play ... so much so that the afternoon show is free for any student who comes here to Kamani theatre, with his or her ID card”. Before I move on to the exhibition slot one sentence about Roshan Abbas — probably one of the few small town people who has managed to make it big here and thankfully on his own talent and not working through a nexus, which is so typical of any ladder climber trying to find a footage. Off to the Hungarian Information and Cultural Centre, where as I had mentioned in last week’s column an exhibition of Aurel Stein’s works got inaugurated last Monday. It is impossible to fill in details of what lies exhibited for the man seemed almost obsessed with Kashmir — arriving there on April 12, 1888, to begin a most creative and fruitful period in his scholarly career. Soon after his arrival he took to translating Kalhana’s chronicle of Kashmir, Rajatarangini. Thereafter the list of his writings (vis a vis Kashmiri texts and intellectuals) is so amazing, that to gauge their dimension either you visit this exhibition or get in touch with Nityanand Shastri Kashmir Research Institute, New Delhi, the co-organiser of this exhibition.

Election bulletin

No need to write details of the state of electioneering in the Capital. You can simply gauge the mood by this oftrepeated quip: “For the last few months the BJP government made us cry for onions. Now it’s our turn to reduce them to tears?”.

75 YEARS AGO

American citizen arrested

BOMBAY: An American citizen named Dr E.L. Hinman has been taken into police custody and remanded for a fortnight for further enquiries. The charge against him is that of criminal breach of trust.

Inspector Smith of the CID, who made the application to the Presidency Magistrate for his remand, stated to the court that Mr Hinman had promoted two public companies in Bombay styled as International Transportation and Development Company and the World Drug Company in September, 1922. Both concerns were widely advertised. As the prospectus issued contained the names of some leading Indians as Directors, many were induced to buy shares.

The police enquiries showed that the companies were doubtful ones. The Directors’ meeting held last month resolved that the President of the companies, Dr Hinman, was to transfer a sum of about Rs 10,000 belonging to a company from his personal account to that of the company’s and only the Directors of the company were to operate the account.

The accused failing to do this, the Directors called for his explanation, which the accused declined to furnish. As the result of the complaint lodged, the accused was arrested. In the meantime, enquiries had been started.