P A G E
Thursday, December 23, 1999
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E D I T O R I A L P A G E |
Thursday, December 23, 1999 |
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Wounded
but victorious
THE
NINETIES THAT WERE |
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Waiting
for Apocalypse
Love
is not love...
Calcutta
versus Bombay |
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Wounded but victorious Ms Chandrika Kumaratunga is doubly blessed. She is the first and the only top Sri Lankan political leader to survive an LTTE attack. She is also the first to be re-elected to the all-powerful executive presidency. This time though her vote has slipped to 51 per cent from the 1994 figure of 62 per cent. The 11 per cent loss of vote should be attributed to, what Indian analysts tirelessly describe as, the incumbency factor. It can also be because of a major switch of loyalty by the Tamil voters. Then they massively supported her, attracted by her promise of earnest peace talks with the LTTE and early constitutional amendments to set up a contiguous Tamil-speaking province with a large measure of autonomy. This time they plumped for the United National Party (UNP) and its nominee, Mr Ranil Wickremesinghe, disgusted with the brutal and mostly fruitless military offensive, first in the north and later in the east. The worst sufferers were the civilians who often had to flee their homes and live as refugees in their own land. Also, the LTTE ordered an all-out mobilisation in favour of the UNP, threatening a fine of Rs 300 for every act of defiance. But Jaffna district is different as the Tigers have left it in the face of intense army pressure and the Tamils there retained their faith in Ms Kumaratunga. There is a pointer of sorts in this. The Tamils who have been liberated from the LTTE spell yearn for a solution even if it is to be achieved through partly military means and partly negotiations. In other words, soften up the Tigers to force them to talks and concede those demands relating to all Tamils. The majority vote she secured in the Sinhala-dominated southern and western parts of the island carries the same message. Hardliners have always advocated this and after the suicide bomber attack even moderates have joined them. If this analysis is
right, the re-elected President faces a hard time. The
soft option of resuming talks is not available to her any
more. And intensifying army operations has severe
limitations. As the battering the army received early
this month showed, the guerrilla tactics of the Tamil
Tigers are superb and they manage to remain almost
invisible until the attack begins. And not only are the
Tigers well armed and motivated, but they are also
ruthless and recklessly courageous. She can however
initiate the process of constitutional changes which will
include scrapping the office of executive presidency and
reinstate the Westminster model with Prime Minister being
the Head of Government. Ms Kumaratunga has been toying
with this idea for some time and she should start the
process for the simple reason that this very popular
change will give her a chance to unilaterally meet the
Tamil demands. The country is faced with deep economic
problems and during the month-long campaign, both leading
candidates had spelt out their solutions. Some of the UNP
proposals are excellent and she should accept them,
forgetting her earlier opposition. Such a statesman-like
gesture will also bring the two main parties somewhat
closer, which is essential to tackle the LTTE menace.
Despite her lacklustre performance during her first term,
she has won thanks to some extent the LTTE attack. This
is her last term as the Constitution bars her from
entering the fray again. As US Presidents know, the
second term is where action is. |
Nipping trouble in the bud SUBTERRANEAN images and symbols of communalism are more dangerous than the ones seen on the surface. The unwisely planned event for laying the foundation stone of a Rama temple in Surat district has fortunately gone well, thanks to the impregnable security shield created there obviously for the present. It attracted the attention of the members of the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday. Dr Manmohan Singh (Congress) spoke with his usual restraint: It is a matter of great worry and concern that the Gujarat government has “authorised the Hindu Jagaran Manch to lay the foundation stone”. The Leader of the House, Mr Jaswant Singh, assured him that “no official permission has been granted for the ‘shilanyasa’.” Dr Manmohan Singh cautioned: “If the idea is not nipped in the bud, it may give rise to ugly incidents all over the country.” Mr Jaswant Singh countered: “One should not cry ‘fire’ when there is no fire.... The government will ensure peace in the country. The government’s commitment to the country’s cultural diversity is unambiguous and our position is unaltered...” If the concern of Dr Manmohan Singh is viewed along with the reply of Mr Jaswant Singh, there is no fire anywhere and there is no need to cry fire! All the same, there are some disturbing signals. Reports suggest that permission had actually been granted for the “shilanyasa”, of course, keeping in view the “belief” that the Christian tribals of the area had no objection to the religious ceremony. The place called Halmodi is a rural pocket in the Vyara taluka, about 120 km from Surat. The District Collector-cum-Magistrate has seen the site. It is just 200 metres away from a prayer hall of tribal followers of Christ. Gods or their Regents do not quarrel. But their followers do. This gave rise to the fear of a breach of the peace. The visit of a Shankaracharya at the time of Christmas has, however, been postponed. Why? The Gujarat High Court,
sensing trouble, had directed the state authorities to
ensure that law and order would be maintained in the
area. Mr Jaswant Singh said that peace would be
maintained not only in Gujarat but all over the country.
The Special Secretary for Surat and Dangs (the place
which witnessed much disturbance a few months ago) had
reiterated that permission had been given “subject
to certain considerations”. Home Minister L.K.
Advani had been informed! The BJP-led Union
Government’s commitment to secularism was
“absolute”. So, why imagine and cry fire? But
it was good, indeed, to imagine a fire and get ready to
deal with it if the situation became difficult. This is
the lesson from the Ayodhya of 1992 and this is the
message from the Surat village. Ideas, with possible
disharmony, should be nipped in the bud or kept in
abeyance at any trouble-prone place until total
ground-level and community-specific tranquillity and
mutual trust are seen and felt there. Saffronised
segments in UP are speaking in a tone which is at
variance with the tenor of the government at least at the
Centre. What about the death of high-ranking Shiv Sena
leader Murali Bohra in a communal clash in the town of
Palaudi in Jodhpur district of Rajasthan? Groups are
clashing there on the issue of the transportation to
Bihar of “animals,” including cows, which
remain venerable symbols of staunch faith — from
birth to death — for members of certain sections of
society. As a wooden or golden Cross is not treated as a
manufactured piece of wood or metal, a cow is not thought
of by many as a mere bovine entity. The country, in its
entirety, is emotionally untranquil. We know in what
circumstances the Mathura and Kashi interlinked
structures belonging to two faiths are coexisting. Our
Halmodis require abundant thoughtfulness and our Palaudis
need arrangements for the protection of the life and limb
of the citizens. Most importantly, the Union Home
Minister must see to it that Nehru’s view, expressed
in Parliament, is followed both in letter and in spirit:
“The alliance of religion and politics in the shape
of communalism is a most dangerous alliance, and it
yields the most abnormal kind of illegitimate
brood”. |
Legitimate questions THE views expressed at the one-day seminar in Delhi on the proposed legislation for replacing the draconian TADA may not make the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance change its stand on the issue. Nevertheless, the BJP leadership cannot deny that it too had expressed concern, when it was in the Opposition, about the gross abuse of the provisions of TADA. Human rights organisations were more vocal than others in demanding the scrapping of TADA. They even provided evidence to prove that instead of helping the para-military forces in combating acts of terrorism and insurgency the law was being used for settling political scores. The provisions of the Act were also abused by an insensitive police force for harassing law-abiding citizens. The gross abuse of the law, meant for combating terrorism, was forcefully brought out by Gulzar in the much-acclaimed film "Maachis". Therefore, when the decision to scrap TADA was announced the champions of human rights were understandably happy. The BJP needs to be reminded that it had itself raised uncomfortable yet legitimate questions about the need for putting in place a draconian law for covering the inefficiency of the government in tackling terrorism-related problems. The same party is now keen to introduce a new set of provisions which, if cleared by Parliament, may only result in the proverbial "frying pan" being replaced by the potentially more dangerous "fire". Civil rights, human rights and democratic rights organisations have rightly described the proposed Bill as a TADA-twin and, therefore, equally repugnant. The seminar was
organised by the Law Commission for obtaining the views
of legal experts on the TADA-substitute. The popular view
which emerged from the day-long exercise was that
existing laws were adequate for dealing with any problem.
Justice J. S. Verma, Chairman of the National Human
Rights Commission, in his inaugural address did point to
the need for according public interest issues precedence
over individual rights. However, developments since 1975
show that draconian measures are usually introduced not
for protecting public interest but for preserving
political power. The increased threats to individual
liberty and life which the citizens of India are facing
today are the result of the failure of the political
class to provide good governance. The same political
class cannot be trusted with the judicious use of the
powers it wants ostensibly for protecting public
interest. It must be remembered that the sledge hammer
called TADA failed to destroy the monster of terrorism.
But it did kill countless innocent flies. That too not by
accident but, in most cases, by design. The new sledge
hammer with which the BJP-led NDA wants to arm itself is
not likely to have a built-in device for identifying and
destroying only terrorists and other anti-national
elements. When a surgeon gives unmistakeable signs of
having become a butcher it is better to hide the knife
with which he used to save lives, rather than trust him
with a new one. Given the terminal decline in the quality
of political leadership the better option would be to
give TADA a quiet burial rather than create a duplicate
with more diabolical powers than the original ever had. |
THE NINETIES THAT WERE EVEN those with unusually short memories are unlikely to have forgotten how turbulent, violent, unsettling and troublesome has been the decade of the nineties. One devoutly hopes that the next one will be better, but that remains a moot point. There is a lot even at the turn of the decade — when the country at last has a government with a potential to run its full term — that is deeply disturbing and worrying. However, it needs some mental effort to recall how disastrous the start of the nineties was. Just before the dawn of 1990 the Congress monopoly of power at the Centre was broken for the second time since Independence. Rajiv Gandhi was voted out and succeeded as Prime Minister by his erstwhile colleague, Mr V.P. Singh. The new government comprised the Janata Dal with only 145 members of the Lok Sabha. But it was “supported from outside” by the two opposite poles of the political spectrum, the BJP and the Left Front. Some regional parties joined the V.P. Singh government. The Bofors bribery scandal had played an important part in Rajiv’s defeat at the hustings. Mr V.P. Singh’s repeated promise to the electorate was that he would unmask the Bofors guilty men within 15 days of coming to power. He went out 11 months later without doing so, and it speaks volumes for the Indian system, indeed the Indian way of life, that the Bofors case has yet to be cracked fully even though a charge sheet has been filed and the last bunch of incriminating papers has been received from Switzerland. Almost literally hours after the formation of the V.P. Singh government Bofors and all other existing issues were overshadowed by the kidnapping in Kashmir of the daughter of the new Home Minister, Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, by Pakistan-backed militants. Pakistan’s proxy war in the sensitive Indian state had begun. Ten years later it rages on. However, it is a small mercy that by now the militants, with a heavy sprinkling of foreign mercenaries, and their Pakistani mentors both know that their objective of wresting Kashmir is a pipedream, the Kargil outrage of last summer and threats of more Kargils notwithstanding. Both nationally and internationally 1990 was a landmark year. In the wider world the Cold War drew to a close. The collapse of the Soviet Union was still a year away but there was much talk of “peace dividend” and a new world order both of which remain a distant dream. Nationally, the contradictions within the ruling combination, and between it and its “outside supporters”, proved too much even for that master of contradiction-management, Mr V.P. Singh. August was a critical month. This is underscored merely by recalling the sequence of momentous events. After a bout of vicious infighting within what was called the National Front but turned out to be a notional front, Mr Devi Lal was ousted from the government. On August 1 the Haryana patriarch announced a rally on August 9 to demonstrate his support. On August 2 President Saddam Hussein of Iraq invaded and annexed Kuwait. The impact of the Gulf War that followed, especially on oil prices, delivered a crippling blow to the already precarious Indian economy. On August 6, President Ghulam Ishaq Khan of neighbouring Pakistan dismissed Ms Benazir Bhutto, an elected Prime Minister, and set into motion a process from which the latest military coup by General Pervez Musharraf must not be divorced. At home, the very next day Mr V.P. Singh, largely to outflank Mr Devi Lal but also to consolidate his position generally, threw the Mandal bombshell. On behalf of the BJP, which later withdrew support and toppled the Singh dispensation, Mr L.K. Advani embarked on his “rath yatra” from Somnath to Ayodhya. There is no need to recall the reprehensible consequences of the subsequent Mandal-Mandir clash. Mr Chandra Shekhar became Prime Minister, with the Congress support from outside, but lasted precisely 120 days. This was a particularly gloomy period. India was having to pawn gold to avert default on the repayment of international loans. The country was riven by Hindu-Muslim killing over the Mandir and the social turmoil over Mandal reservations. Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination during the 1991 election added to national gloom from which emerged the minority government, headed by Mr P.V. Narasimha Rao. It is to Mr Rao’s credit that he made a bold and radical change in economic policy that paid rich dividends. He also managed to convert his minority government into one with a small but stable majority and made it last five years. But the methods he used for this purpose were so dubious that he is facing criminal charges in courts of law. He allowed rampant corruption, sometimes involving his near and dear ones, to flourish. And he let the Americans to pressurise him to backtrack on missile testing and even on a nuclear test in December, 1995. To cap it all, his economic reforms ran out of steam by 1994, leading to economic recession. Mr Rao’s cardinal sin, however, was to have been a silent spectator to the demolition of the Babri Masjid. His critics, of course, allege a lot worse, but that can be allowed to pass. The orgy of violence that followed continues to distort the national ethos and, in any case, contributed to the saffron surge. The continuing Congress decline was another contributory factor. From 1996 until September this year followed three years of instability, uncertainty and doubt about the viability of the system. Many extolled the virtues of coalition governments and proclaimed triumphantly that India had entered the “coalition era”. But nobody could ensure the durability of a coalition government because the coalition culture is lacking. Three general elections in as many years, with five Prime Ministers coming and going in quick succession, is surely too much. Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee’s first government was deservedly laughed out as a “13-day wonder”. His second lasted only 13 months. But by conducting the Shakti series of nuclear tests in May, 1998, it left its impress on history. To go ahead with these tests was a bold and necessary decision. But by trying to be jingoist over these and claiming the entire credit for a truly national effort entirely for the BJP, the Vajpayee government needlessly distorted the domestic debate on the nuclear issue. Nothing illustrates this more vividly than the problems in building up a consensus on signing the CTBT. This issue also underlines that despite high hopes and best of efforts over the last decade, relations between this country and the sole superpower, the USA, have not improved in any material way. Kargil seemed to be a turning point. But expectations aroused then soon turned out to be excessive. The military coup in Pakistan, too, has not changed things. President Clinton remains anxious to visit India and might arrive in March. However, for him the Indian signature on the CTBT continues to be important even though the US Senate has rejected this treaty and administered him a rebuff. What is the state of the republic at the turn of not only the decade but also the century? The talk of the change of millennium is, of course, bogus because the third millennium begins only on January 1, 2001. If consensus-building on the CTBT is proving difficult, the passage of the Insurance Bill and allied measures of economic reform is an encouraging development though it must be added that amendments made in the insurance legislation have not gone down well with foreign investors. Kargil blasted all the hopes aroused by the bus diplomacy and the Lahore Declaration. The post-Kargil escalation of trans-border terrorism, combined with the Musharraf coup, has put paid to hopes of a dialogue between India and Pakistan. Indo-American relations are still on hold, and the progress in the India-China dialogue is distressingly slow. Above all, however, our
internal woes must be our biggest worry. The scale and
viciousness of the Naxalite violence is but one of the
conflicts threatening to tear apart the fabric of
national unity. The ineptitude of the Indian State
magnifies the danger manifold. Never mind the violence
based on communal, caste and ideological considerations.
Underworld characters seem to rule the roost. Veerappan
has been thumbing his nose at authority for 20 years. |
Love
is not love... I LOOKED up from the book I was reading and with my vacant eyes stared at the shelf from where I had picked it up. There, reclining against the shelf, stood he, gazing at me. “Who are you?” I spoke with a start, “Have we met before? I don’t think I know you.” “You met me first in the college where you read a couple of my sonnets and then Julius Caesar. Since then you have been meeting me off and on, sometimes even in your office, during lunch break. Everytime you read a poem or a play of mine, you meet me. As for knowing me, you are the best judge. There are so many who even after a lifetime of reading my works, hardly know me”, he said. “Am I hallucinating? It can’t be you. You had died some four hundred years ago. And isn’t it in Stratford-upon-Avon that your home used to be? So much time, so much space, so much fame! How can you be here in my humbled home, across the continents, from a far off century?” I was in a hypnotic spell. He did little to help me out of my reverie, but explained his arrival in my study: “I keep hearing you recite my sonnets in the solitude of this room. So beautifully you do it! I have been wanting to come here personally for a listening session!” “For solitude, please thank my wife. She goes to her neighbourhood friends every afternoon for a gossip session,” I said, “leaving solitude and men in this room. But Sir, why has this become the chosen day for your visit here?” “For so many days, I have been enjoying your recitation. Coming from a distant country is no problem for the likes of me who abide in the graves. Today I grew restless and decided to come as you recited my 116th sonnet.” “What’s so special about it?” I asked. “It is that line — ‘Love is not love/Which alters when it alteration finds;’ and my declaration — ‘If this be error and upon me prov’d/I never writ nor no man never lov’d’. I wish I had not written them. I came to request you to tear this sonnet off your collection. Love has now only to find alteration to so easily alter. In my time though the difficulty was in finding even the first opportunity and the first love. Almost a lifetime of courting. Sleepless nights and restless days awaiting a nod of approval. And then the rendezvous. How one yearned to see a quiver of a smile on the Love’s face! How many verses one would not write between the endless hours of separation and a flicker of a meeting. Fear and apprehension stalked the strong urge for communication, leave alone a fleeting touch of hands! Where then was the question of alteration? So easy has it become today, that I feel like altering my own lines to read, “Love is not love/Which doesn’t alter when it alteration finds.” In this era of turbulent changes, fools alone should celebrate constancy in love. And is it not so easy now to obtain alterations at every turn of the corner?” The bard had indeed gone senile. Or was it me? Was I hearing the voices and seeing faces? It couldn’t be good old William who would ever question the Shakespearean statements. All those momentary urges of passion, those alphabets we call body language, those tides of furious physical attraction between two people that wane with as severe velocity as they rise with, can’t be called love. Oh come on, old man, rise from your slumber, I told myself. I was wide awake. The
book of verse was in my lap all right but the poet had
gone. My mind though was a flotsam. Had not
Shakespeare’s own love altered when it alteration
found? Or, is it that all expressions about experience of
mortal love are here and now statements and tomorrow is
another day? For love that alters not, you have to meet
the likes of Mira and Kabir. |
Secularism as a social instrument AS I look back as a student of literature on the great creative phase of about three hundred years in India’s history, spanning from the 13th to the 16th century, I feel that the country’s present-day polity can learn a great deal with regard to true secularism which that phase had developed and promoted not as a political weapon but as a formative social instrument and also as to how best it could be imbibed and strengthened to bring about a social metamorphosis in 21st century India. Islam had already become a social fact in India of the 13th century. It had definite social values and religious ideas and practices which differed fundamentally from those of Hindu India. The Hindu society too had been suffering from many social evils. In this connection S. Radhakrishnan says, “caste had degenerated into an instrument of oppression and intolerance and tended to perpetuate inequality and develop the spirit of exclusiveness. Especially in the aspect of sub-castes the system divided the Hindu society into such small units as to render the development of any common social feeling impossible”. When such a disintegrated society had to come face to face with Islam, the result was a chaos all over. A scene of confusion, of divisions, tensions, strifes and frustrations thus met the eye. History had, in fact, put India on trial. The new situation posing new challenges to the country propelled it to initiate a churning process in intellectual and social spheres. The dominant idea that emerged was adjustment and the creation of amity and harmony with the new factor of Islam in their midst. On the Muslim side too the original absolute frenzy had died away and Islam had by and large got out of the influence of the Moors of Spain and the Caliphs of Baghdad and they regarded themselves culturally and socially a part of the Indian moorings. In the sphere of religion too their absolute, infinite and sovereign Godhead found natural kin in the essence of monotheism of the Hindus. Therefore, an over-all tendency of the Muslims in general was now, apart from occasional moments of fanaticism, to live and let live. As a result, the interaction between Hindus and the Muslims on the philosophic and cultural levels gained considerable ground, and monotheistic creeds and practices became the driving force among the masses. It was, in fact, in this monotheistic ferment that a powerful and intellectually robust band of saints, faqirs, pirs and bhaktas rose to give a rousing call to the people in general for bringing about a change in their psyche and thus creating an ambience of mutual trust and understanding, human love, amity, spirit of brotherhood and non-violence and also freedom from fear, distrust and superstitions through the medium of their folk poetry. This phase in India’s literary history is commonly known as a Bhakti movement. Under this movement all the saints and bhaktas display an amazing boldness in condemning casteism, sectarianism and communalism, and in debunking empty and meaningless ritualism of their own time with equal vehemence and without any prejudice or, in today’s parlance, majority-minority complex. They were the real secularists and, for that matter, humanists. The greatest voices of that period whose poetic outpourings laced with folk music and message of hope, harmony and love need mention here are Guru Gorakhnath, Shaikh Farid, Swami Ramanand, Kabir, Namdev, Guru Nanak Dev, Malik Mohammad Jaisi and Guru Ravidas. Gorakhnath is said to be the founder of Yogamarg or Nathmarg, an important sect of a secular character, which in medieval India worked for the elimination of caste system superstitions and Hindu-Muslim differences. Shaikh Farid and Malik Mohammad Jaisi were the votaries of sufism which believes in universal love and justice. Sufism developed after fusing the essential of the Vedanta and the Quran. Sufis cherish to attain divine love through worldly love. In every soul they feel the light of divine. They, therefore, spread the message of love and amity. Kabir, Namdev and Ravidas were the disciples of Swami Ramanand, who is credited with having founded a spiritual training centre at Varanasi for all kinds and classes of people, who after training were commissioned to disseminate the message of social equality and brotherhood, and work for it. Of them, Kabir was the most pre-eminently articulate disciple in pointing out the prevailing socio-religious prejudices. He lived a practical life of weaver, weaving social visions too in his songs. He attempted to synthesise the religious spirit underlying Hinduism and Islam by discarding the gloss of theology, rituals and religious exclusivism in which today’s India finds itself embroiled, the chanting of the mantra of secularism notwithstanding. Kabir is often criticised for having made some uncharitable remarks about the orthodoxy of his time. But in Guru Nanak we find no such thing. His oracular utterances had a touch of divine love couched in simple folk idioms. “Ek pita, ekas ke ham bark” was his war cry. The later Gurus carried his message of secularism further. The compilation and preparation of the Guru Granth Sahib by fifth Guru Arjan Dev — wherein poetic sayings of prominent saints and bhaktas of all the creeds and communities of that time have been given due representation is an ever-shining example of secularism. Secularism is not a
negative or a passive concept but a positive and
proactive one, which calls for an unbiased involvement
also. Tolerance and equal respect for all religious
faiths are its hallmark. |
Waiting for Apocalypse PEOPLE all over the world are driven to a state of stupor and hysteria by doom merchants selling catastrophic prophecies of the closing millennium. Their proclamation: we are on the verge of destruction and the year 2000 will bring the end of the world. Cult leaders say that through their tutelage one can attain divinity and they alone can lead the people to another world when this world is destroyed. Most stories in circulation are fairy tales, product of superstitious minds and defy common sense. But explanations do exist, within the confines of the modern conventional scientific wisdom, for the many catastrophic possibilities like floods, climatic changes, pestilence, comet crashes, planets whizzing past the earth, war, Y2K cultism, wrong use of science and even a mad act of an individual. Here are some logical explanations. The Bible tells us of 40 days and 40 nights of rain. Other flood legends mention that tidal waves will rise violently, if a large cosmic body of the size of earth whizzes past the earth. Doomsayers had predicted flood in May 1999, when the planets Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn aligned on one side of the sun creating tremendous combined gravitational pull against the earth. The fear was that the tidal waves will violently rise causing unprecedented floods. Despite this gang up of planets against the earth, there was no flood and the doomsayers were proved wrong. Is the earth warming? This question has provoked innumerable debates among scientists. The earth’s mean temperature is likely to have risen between 1.3 and 4 degrees C with consequences such as rising sea levels and melting ice caps. Glaciologists say that about 34,000 sq km of the Arctic Sea ice is lost on an average every year. If ice deposits of Antarctic region and Greenland melt, the level of the ocean will rise and the rising tide will spill over about 2 million square miles of low-lying area up to a speculative depth of anywhere between 2 to 200 feet, says Anthony Milne in Flood Shock. One of Nostradamus predictions was that a great king of terror will come from outer space and strike the planet earth in July, 1999. Though this prediction too proved wrong, the logical interpretation for it is an asteroid strike like the one the Tunguska area of Central Siberia suffered in June 30, 1908. Greek philosopher Plato had mentioned about a great destruction on a world-wide scale. Another Greek story says that at long intervals, the course of the heavenly bodies changes, causing destruction on the earth. Will the earth go too far from the sun or too close to it? Will life on the earth freeze or burn? God inflicted floods, pestilence and war to rid the earth of the excess population, according to this Babylonian epic. “This noise of man’s king has become too much for me/with their noise I am deprived of my sleep. Let there be pestilence (upon mankind)”. An outbreak of a disease that spreads through airborne droplets or mosquito bites, and as deadly as AIDS, can wipe out much of the human race. The speed and scope of modern air travel could carry the virus across continents in a few hours. The three plague pandemics the world has witnessed killed more than 25 million people. Astronomers claim that an asteroid struck this planet 65 million years ago, wiping out 70 per cent of the planet and animal life. They now believe that a similar hit by an asteroid (of the size of 36 miles across) would blast the civilisation back to the days of hunter-gathers. There are thousands of potentially hazardous asteroids out there. Another claim of astronomers is of a star explosion which can vanish human race from this world. A neutron star explosion took place in the constellation in August, 1998, releasing an immense wave of energy. “If we could harness this energy, we could have enough power to power every city, every village, every light bulb until the end of the universe and far beyond”, said Mr Berkeley, a research physicist at the University of California. fortunately, the energy that reached the earth’s surface said to have equalled to only that of a dental X-ray. War has been, and will always be, the curse of civilisation. Its ability to destroy had been progressively growing. “Since the creation of the universe, there have only been a total 300 years which have not witnessed any wars” reveals historical records. The USA has averaged a major war bout every 25 years. Britain, Japan and the former Soviet Union averaged one every 12, 18 and 22 years respectively. It is said that 58 million lives perished in two world wars. For almost 50 years we have lived under the threat of a nuclear war. If a conflict breaks out between Israel and Arabs, the risk of a nuclear war would be most real. “India and Pakistan hate each other more than the United States and the Soviet Union hated each other during the Cold War and therefore the chances of nuclear war are greater now than ever”, says Jonathan Alter in Newsweek. The outcome of such a war will determine the very fate of nations and mankind. The nuclear arsenals available with our nuclear powers are enough to take the civilisation back to the stone age. Nuclear weapons are not the only terror weapons in the world. Chemical and biological agents such as sarin, VX, anthrax and botulinum can create greater terror in any future conflict. The South Koreans fear that 50 missiles carrying nerve gas would kill upto 38 per cent of Seoul’s 12 million inhabitants. An epidemic capable of wiping out the entire inhabitants of a big city can be unleashed by a few hundred kilograms of anthrax bacteria. If computers go on the blink, reports indicate, planes may crash, nuclear reactors and nuclear weapon systems may malfunction. In a Y2K-simulated test-run at a nuclear power plant’s control room in Pennsylvania, the computer systems had failed recently. “The Y2K could blank out command computers and panic Russian officers into suspecting an enemy first strike, thus, in the most extreme scenario, causing an unintended nuclear launch”, writes Pavel Felgenhauer, a military expert. An alarming rise in cultism is witnessed in America, Japan and China. Herff Applewhite, Monte Kim Miller, Shoko Ashara and Li Hongshi are all cult leaders preaching armageddon. Kim Miller even aims to instigate a war between Arabs and Jews in the final days of 1999 to hasten the second coming of the Christ. His followers are prepared for a provocation on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Man’s tendency to go against nature has now reached a bizarre and ridiculous level. Scientists have made it possible to multiply humans without mating, clone animals, produce seeds that will not reproduce. It will be calamitous if pollen from terminator plants cause widespread sterilisation in other plants. Catastrophy on a global scale can be created even by a single individual. Garrilo Princip shot dead the Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria. This incident set the whole world on war which cost more than 9 million lives and injuries to as many people. In another mad act, a Dutchman set fire to the Reichstag Building in 1933. Hitler quickly put the blame on Jews and convinced his people that his taking greater power alone will save the country. Six years later, this man’s troops invaded Poland igniting World War II. Pol Pot killed 2 million Cambodians. Stalin’s and Idi Amin’s victims number 20 million and 300,000 respectively. Doomsday stories are
difficult to believe. But it is more difficult to
disbelieve them. As the prophesied end of the world
approaches, people all over the world are getting
paranoid expecting an apocalyptically giddy time. Their
question: Will the odometer tick over from the present
millennium to the next? Common sense may be inadequate to
answer this question, but science offers convincing
explanations. Perils are plenty, but what is sure is that
the seers of tomorrow will also be asking the same
question in the year 3000, 4000 and so on, because
catastrophic stories get passed on from generation to
generation. — INFA |
Privileges of politicians A DENIAL a day has almost become a feature of the National Democratic Alliance Government’s functioning in Parliament since it began the winter session. The exercise begins with a party bigwig making a statement on a sensitive issue, followed by a strong denial in both Houses of Parliament. The result is embarrassment to the ruling alliance. At the end of it, there is confusion rather than clarity, about the Government’s objectives. The latest in the series is Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Ram Prakash Gupta’s statement and its subsequent denial by him and the Prime Minister. Mr Gupta reportedly told newsmen in Faizabad that the mandir issue may not be on the NDA’s agenda but it was very much on his government’s agenda. This raised a furore in Parliament and the Prime Minister promised to make statement after checking up with Mr Gupta. Later Mr Vajpayee told the two Houses that Mr Gupta had denied having made the reported statement. Before this Star TV played the videotape to the reporters and some newspapers published the impugned statement the next day. Earlier, Mr Bachchi Singh Rawat, a Minister of State, first made a statement on defence scientists developing certain kind of weapons. It was when he was visiting the UP hills. The statement was promptly denied by the Defence Ministry. Mr Rawat was shifted to a new ministry. He put his foot in the mouth again by saying that youth wanting to join the defence forces should undergo training with the RSS. The Prime Minister had to come to his rescue and face Parliament. His language in denying the statement was a bit diplomatic. He said Mr Rawat could not have made such a statement but if he had it was wrong. There was no such pre-condition for joining the defence forces. In these and similar other cases the leaders, as usual, blamed the media for distortion, mischief and misreporting. They could get away with it in the earlier days but now with so many TV channels in the field and even newspaper reporters carrying portable tape recorders and politicians eager to oblige, it only creates a credibility gap and, perhaps, contempt for politicians. Without credibility both politicians and the press stand to suffer. The printed word still has value and sanctity. Readers form their opinion on what they read. Had it not been so there would not have been circulation wars and craze for multiple editions. Members of Parliament enjoy the same privileges as their counterparts in the British Parliament. This, according to the Constitution, is valid till Parliament frames its own rules. Long battles have been fought over the issue. Both MPs and the media are divided on the issue or at least were. But most press persons have been favouring codification of parliamentary privileges to be sure where they stand in matters of reporting or misreporting. As it is the two Houses are supreme to accept or reject the recommendations of the Privileges Committee to which such matters are generally referred. Once there was a furious war of words between Prof. Hiren Mukherjee and Mr H.V. Kamath, both masters of parliamentary etiquette and procedure, but somehow carried by emotions they exchanged phrases like “Washington patriots” and “Moscow tailists” to describe the other. Acoustics in both the chambers were not so good then and there were no hearing aids too. Reporters in the gallery had to depend on their ears. But the din that was created by shouting from supporters of both leaders drowned almost everything that was said on the floor. Somehow, I had managed to get the two most objectionable phrases used by the two stalwarts and used them in the lead of the story. Next day most papers carried it as it had been given by the agency known for its parliamentary reporting then. Agencies did not give bylines then. My thrill as a reporter was shortlived as within a few hours I came to know that Mr Kamath had given notice of a privilege motion against the agency and its reporter. The motion was debated for a short while and no one was left with any doubt that the agency and the reporter were going to be hauled up. As the whole thing was tapering off both Mr Kamath and Hiren Babu stood up one by one and owned the epithets as reported. There was nothing more to be done. Taperecording of parliamentary proceedings had just begun but it could not be relied upon specially when several members speak simultaneously. The stenographic record liberally uses “interruptions” when ever such situations arise. There has always been a
kind of love-hate relationship between the press and the
politicians. To an extent both need each other for their
legitimate functioning. Laws give little protection to
mediapersons, and do not recognise the so-called
privileges. Had it been so, instances like the Uttar
Pradesh Chief Minister blaming the media for twisting or
fudging his statement would rarely occur. The only course
left to the tape recorder carrying reporters and Star TV
which videotaped the statement is to take legal action
against the Chief Minister. Knowing how the law operates
will it be worth it? Moreover, it will be an unequal
fight between a power wielder and a plebian. — IPA |
December
23, 1924 IF the Bombay Municipality, by a majority of three votes, decided at a recent meeting that its President should attend the Viceregal functions to which he had been invited in his official capacity, the Calcutta Municipality has by a far larger majority of 41 against 15 decided against its President’s participation in similar functions. One reason for this difference of municipal verdict is obvious. In one case the Swarajists are in a majority; in the other they are in a clear, though active and powerful, minority. But this, we believe, is
not the only reason. Another and equally important reason
is that in one case, unlike the other, public feeling is
at present very strong against certain measures and a
certain policy for which the Viceroy is directly
responsible. |
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