Pakistan: some unforgettable queries

AT the time of the coming Lok Sabha elections the Kashmir issue is likely to be the uppermost in the mind of the Indian voter. He is puzzled as to why Pakistan is enamoured of Kashmiri Muslims when his treatment towards the other Muslims has been anything but friendly.

The Muslims of Bangladesh were a part of Pakistan but they could not tolerate the tyrannical rule by the rest of the Muslims of Pakistan and consequently became an independent country after a bloody war in 1971. Since then why has there been no move either by Pakistan or by Bangladesh to reunite once again and live as one unit as envisaged by Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan?

If Pakistan could not retain the Muslims of Bangladesh, it also has not shown any capacity to absorb the Muslims who migrated to Pakistan from some of the Indian states. Recently two of their leaders have started a hunger strike before the residence of the British Prime Minister to draw international attention to the threat of genocide which they are facing in Pakistan. What lesson should the Muslims of Kashmir draw from this?

The Muslims of Kashmir have all the disqualifications which the Muslims of Bangladesh and those from India have got and in addition a large number of them belong to Shia sect with whom the Sunni sect is always at war.

The Supreme Court of Pakistan has pointed out that the human rights of the Kashmiri Muslims in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir are not safe.

Legalities apart, where is the guarantee that there can be peace between the Muslims of Pakistan and Kashmir?

S. P. MALHOTRA
Panchkula

Politicians and army

This refers to Mr D P Jain’s letter, “Politicians and armed forces” (July 24), suggesting that all candidates for the coming Lok Sabha elections should be asked to file an affidavit that they would get one of their sons recruited with the defence forces of India so that they may also be able to fight with the enemy at the time of war and put their lives before the jaws of death.

The suggestion, albeit quite interesting, seems to suffer from a fatal flaw —it may not be legally/constitutionally proper for the contesting candidates to “force” their progeny to join the defence forces.

Making three years’ military service an essential qualification for a person to be eligible to contest elections to Parliament or a state assembly seems to offer a much better alternative. The proposal, if accepted and implemented, would, inter alia, help improve tangibly the tone of the august bodies, lending them decency and decorum in the bargain.

TARA CHAND
Ambota (Una)

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Tuition menace

The Haryana government has taken a right step by banning tuitions (The Tribune, July 25). It has been mentioned in the news item that the Haryana government has imposed a complete ban on private tuitions by the lecturers working in government colleges of the state with immediate effect.

More or less it has become a trend with the college and school lecturers (science group and commerce group) that they do not deliver goods in their respective classes; rather they press the students to join tuition at their residences. Thereby students have also been depending on the tuitions as a result of non-seriousness in their schools/colleges. Resultantly, the poor parents have to bear the burden. Not only this, some teachers charge exorbitant fees, that too in advance. The number of students is sometimes more than 100. One fails to understand how all this goes on. How these people escape the nets of their bosses, the Income Tax Department or the Vigilance Department.

I request the Punjab government and the respective universities to come forward and take similar steps to save poor parents from this unnecessary burden.

MADAN MOHAN RANDEV
Patiala

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Haphazard parking

Although a number of steps have been taken to regulate vehicular traffic at Zirakpur, truck parking still remains a neglected area. There is hazardous parking of trucks on the Pabhat-Chandigarh road, causing a lot of inconvenience to road-users. During the past few days two serious accidents have occurred near Nevedac Centre. In one case a Punjab Roadways bus stuck against a tree and in the other a truck carrying scooters was hit by another truck loaded with building material. This put the road-users to inconvenience for a couple of days.

The authorities concerned should initiate steps to control the parking of the vehicles, and the law violators must be dealt with sternly.

DINESH KUMAR SHARMA
Derabassi

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LIC job scheme

The Central Board of Secondary Education in collaboration with the Life Insurance Corporation of India offered a vocational course in life insurance at the plus two stage in selected schools all over the country in pursuance of the national policy on education and its programme of action. The teaching faculty was also provided by the officials of the LIC. The corporation assured the students who secure grade B2 and above in each of the three vocational subjects with a pass in the first attempt that their case will be considered for appointment as apprentices.

The LIC will also consider the feasibility of absorbing candidates securing grades B2 and above with the Data Processing Department.

The cream of the students of Chandigarh, seeing the employment opportunity, offered the life insurance vocational stream at the plus two stage. The corporation has, however, not offered any job to the students so far although they qualified the plus two examination a long time ago. The authorities should look into it and ensure that jobs should be offered immediately and they should not spoil the career of the younger generation.

The Union Ministry of Human Resource Development should direct the LIC to honour its commitment made in the National Policy on Education and its programme of action by providing jobs to the students who have completed the vocational courses.

K.M. MADAN
Panchkula