 |
| Thursday, January 6, 2000, Chandigarh, India  
|
Abdul Kalam's vision
BEYOND THE HIJACKING BUNGLE |
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| coalition, commands the services of the spin doctors to a degree never seen in New Delhi. No amount of spin doctoring, however, can obscure the hurt and the humiliation caused by the government’s mishandling of the hijacking of IC-814. Forgotten report on infrastructure by Vinod Mehta MORE than two years ago a committee headed by Dr Rakesh Mohan, Director-General, NCAER, submitted its report entitled “The India Infrastructure Report” which provided not only a comprehensive scheme for the development of infrastructure but also provided for a regulatory framework as well as made suggestions relating to fiscal measures to encourage the inflow of investment in this sector. The committee took more than two years to prepare the report.
Turning regrets to rewards
Taliban for diplomatic ties with India
January 6, 1925
|
Abdul Kalam's vision BHARAT Ratna Dr A.P.J Abdul Kalam is not only the father of the Indian missile programme but also the foremost visionary of the country. It is he who has played a sterling role in breaking the shackles of one's thought process. His capacity to think big was in full flow when he addressed the plenary session of the 87th Indian Science Congress in Pune on Monday. He talked of a state-of-the-art anti-ballistic missile (ABM) system based on the US Star Wars system, an intercontinental ballistic system and even a lunar mission. Had all this come from a lesser person, it would have sounded over-ambitious, but Dr Kalam has immaculate credentials and the reputation of bringing to fruition whatever he takes in hand. All spectacular realities are born out of such "impossible" visions. In any case, Dr Kalam is a visionary and not a dreamer. He has not only focussed on the shape of things to come but has also delineated what it will take to achieve the goals. For instance, when referring to the ICBM project, he has made it clear that it would be on right track only if adequate funds were made available for it. That is a big "if" indeed because official apathy and resource crunch have been the bane of many a defence project. Just look at the leisurely pace at which the light combat aircraft project started a decade back has been moving. No wonder, it is way behind schedule. His message to the country apparently is that as far as the scientific community is concerned, it has the necessary wherewithal to bring about technological advancements so as to fulfil the Prime Minister's vision of India becoming a developed nation within two decades. The rest is for the policy planners to decide. While a clear-cut vision is important for a nation, there is also need for a commensurate national will and desire to turn it into reality. He and the other two members of the science "Trimurti" — Dr K. Kasturirangan, Chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) in Bangalore, and Dr R.Chidambaram, Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) — are too urbane to reveal their mind on what they think of the political bosses. But their interaction while participating in the discussion, "Indian strategic technologies in the 21st century", gives sufficient hints about their line of thinking. They seem to be as concerned about the uneven progress made by the country in various fields. There is no denying the strides it has made in the missile programme and information technology. But look at the mess in terms of telephone density, roads, railways, drinking water, education and even electricity generation. For instance, the country has no option but to double its nuclear power generation to 40,000 MW even as it is preparing itself for a lunar flight shortly. No urgency has ever been shown in this regard. It is not possible to have islands of excellence amid a sea of backwardness. In place of the government taking the lead and speeding up the matter, it is the scientists who have been exhorting the country to learn from the few successful institutions which should become a role model for the others that are hopelessly caught in the red tape. Surely, enough money can be diverted from wasteful expenditures to take care of productive projects like those suggested by Dr Kalam. The progress that has been made and is likely to be made will be meaningful only when its fruits reach the most backward of the lot. |
UP’s own anti-ISI war HAND it to UP to mess up a reasonable idea. On Tuesday, the Ram Prakash Gupta government rushed through the Assembly a Bill that looks suspiciously anti-Muslim without necessarily being so. And the criticism and condemnation the legislation has provoked are directed as much at the hurry and hamhanded way it was pushed through as at the contents. Congress leader Pramod Tiwari rightly pointed out that the government should have consulted the opposition parties and built a consensus on the delicate issue. The Bill seeks to regulate, if not ban, construction of places of worship or conversion of old buildings into religious places. Prior permission of the district authorities is needed and unauthorised structures are open to demolition. This restriction applies to all religions but the state Home Minister was categorical that the government was targetting masjids and madarassas in border districts. For good measure he added that the population mix in these districts is changing, meaning that the percentage of Muslims is going up. How come they have migrated in a good enough number to alter the demographic balance in border areas? What has happened is that foreign funds are now available for religious activities and a number of individuals and institutions have come up to take advantage of the situation. Their activities, mostly setting up religious schools and building mosques, have become visible, giving the appearance of increasing concentration. The UP Minister’s is no sensational discovery. It has been known for at least three years that Islamic fundamentalists have become busy along the India-Nepal border and the ISI is trying to recruit agents from among frustrated, unemployed youth. This menace runs along the UP, Bihar and Assam border, making it a regional problem. Now one state has decided to tackle it in its own clumsy way, thereby setting back any combined effective counter. Ideally, the trouble should be attacked on two fronts. One, Muslim elders should be recruited to force the madrassas to conduct regular classes as well. The idea is to partly fund these institutions to the extent that they teach students general subjects and hold out a promise of government jobs to the educated. This social pressure should help. Two, vigilance should be heightened against ISI-related acts. In villages and small towns it is easy to first identify the likely victims of ISI propaganda and keep a tight watch on them. Rajasthan faced a similar situation last year when it witnessed a mushroom growth of foreign-funded madarassas in the Muslim-majority border areas. The then government raised an alarm but of late things have quietened down. Either the present government is looking the other way or the original drive has lost steam. UP and also the Centre should go into the issue in great detail. Is it too much to ask the UP government to come out with facts and figures which have warranted its action? Truth and a willingness to share it with the people are excellent ways of enlisting cooperation. |
Lele's prophecy comes true THE Secretary of the Board of Control for Cricket in India, Mr Jayant Lele, has denied ever having spoken against the Indian cricket team. Nevertheless, the prophecy made under his name in an interview put out on an internet website has come true. India has lost all the three Test matches of the Border-Gavaskar series to Australia by massive margins. Steve Waugh, of course, does not have to prove it to any one that his team is the best in both forms of the game of cricket. His claim that the current side would be remembered as the best-ever in the history of Australian cricket too may pass muster. Whether it is in batting, bowling, running between the wickets or fielding the Australians are clearly streets ahead of their rivals at the international level. But the Australians' all-round superiority should not be trotted as an excuse for the pathetic performance of the Indian team. Under Sachin Tendulkar it was expected to perform the miracle of emerging as the team of the new millennium. Why else was Mohammad Azharuddin shown the door after the World Cup tournament in England last year, in which India ended up at the bottom of the Super Six table? When Kapil Dev was appointed the national coach knowledgeable circles forecast even a brighter future for Indian cricket. The lacklustre victories, both in the Tests and the one-day games, in the home series against New Zealand was seen as proof of the beginning of a great partnership between Tendulkar and Kapil Dev. The team under their joint command was expected to make mince meat of the current giants of the game. However, an objective assessment would show that the performance of the team has gone below the level at which Azharuddin was asked to hand over the reins of leadership to the more talented and seemingly more dynamic Tendulkar. The bitter truth is that the team management [read Tendulkar-Kapil Dev] and the national selectors will have to share the blame, in equal measure, for the below-par performance of the cricket team in the Test series in Australia. The selection of the players for what is considered the most difficult off-shore tour was not entirely merit-based. The fact of the matter is that India could not have picked a weaker team for taking on the strongest team in the game of cricket. The Indian team which was beaten by comprehensive margins in the three-Test series did not have a settled pair of openers. Neither did it have a confidence-inspiring middle order or a set of allrounders to give the contest with game's current Goliath at least a semblance of a fight. The loss of form of Saurav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid meant that team had only Tendulkar to fall back on. The Indian bowlers once again proved that they simply lack the stamina to finish the job, which they usually begin well, of bowling out the opposition twice and that too without many runs on the board. The only redeeming feature of the tour was the amazing batting display by V. V. S. Laxman in the last innings of the final Test at the Sydney Cricket Ground. Hopefully, Laxman should now be a regular member of the team on the strength of his performance in Sydney and not because of the change of opinion in the "team management" about his talent as a batsman. Having lost the Test series by humiliating margins the "team management" would earn back some of the lost respect of the countless Indian cricket fans if it were to make it to the finals of the triangular one-day series involving Pakistan and Australia. On current form of the Indian team if a statement were to be made on behalf of a certain Mr Lele predicting its early exit from the tri-series, one need not have the instincts of a gambler to back his prophecy. |
BEYOND THE HIJACKING BUNGLE OVER the last 10 years India has had as many governments of different complexion and predictions, three of them headed by Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee alone. Despite their diversity, all of them have been almost equally lackadaisical and absolutely ad hocist in their approach. Except that the BJP, as the core of the current ruling coalition, commands the services of the spin doctors to a degree never seen in New Delhi. No amount of spin doctoring, however, can obscure the hurt and the humiliation caused by the government’s mishandling of the hijacking of IC-814. Granted that the Indian government had no leverage at all once it had allowed, rightly or wrongly, the hijacked aircraft to get away from Amritsar. This became all the more manifest after the plane landed, expectedly enough, in Kandahar, controlled even more effectively than Kabul, by the Taliban with which this country had not been on speaking terms. For the simple reason that it accurately believes the Taliban to be Pakistan’s willing partner in the crime of trans-border terrorism. Granted also that the lives of innocent passengers and crew, numbering 162, had to be saved. For this a price had to be paid and this was the release of three dreaded terrorists headed by Maulana Masood Azhar, a man so important to the promoters of terrorism that they had made three previous extremely heinous attempts to set him free. This time around the Maulana and his two equally murderous cohorts flew to Kandahar in the august company of the Foreign Minister, Mr Jaswant Singh, to be exchanged for the hostages held captive in a hell-hole for eight days. Right before the Foreign Minister’s eyes the hijackers, responsible for most brutal acts, rode into the sunset, scot-free and presumably laughing all the way to the Afghan-Pakistan border. In the given circumstances there might have been no other option. But to describe the terrible transaction as some kind of an “achievement” and indeed an “opportunity” that would enable India to wage an “even more resolute war against terrorism” is ridiculous rot. The impact of the deal at Kandahar is going to be disastrous. It has, in fact, started unfolding itself with the horrendous blast in the heart of Srinagar. Never mind the image of the government. The image of the country as a whole has been tarnished. A nation of a billion people, with tremendous talent and immeasurable potential, has been made to look a bumbling mass of bunglers. To this dismal denouement the contribution of the entire political class and a large section of the media has been quite considerable. But the bulk of the blame lies squarely on the shoulders of the government consisting of both the political and bureaucratic leadership. What the Prime Minister’s Principal Secretary, Mr Brajesh Mishra, has said on television raises more questions than it answers. He admits, for instance, that the NSG commandos had not reached Amritsar by the time the hijacked aircraft’s brave captain managed to land it there despite the hijackers’ abhorrence of being within Indian airspace. It is immaterial whether or not it would have been wise to use these commandos to storm the plane. The key question is: why weren’t they at or near Amritsar considering that the eight of the 12 Indian Airlines aircraft hijacked so far had eventually arrived at Amritsar’s Raja Sansi airport. Even if IC-814 was to land at any other Indian airport, it would have had to be in Amritsar’s vicinity. The bitter truth is that there was unconscionable delay in mobilising the NSG crack force. The manual on hijacking enjoins that it should be airborne within 30 minutes to await further instructions. Why didn’t this happen, in heaven’s name, when the so-called decision-makers had been told of the skyjacking a good two hours earlier? No one has so far contradicted or challenged published reports that the apex Crisis Management Group could not meet for quite a while because some of the members were “unavailable” and when the group did get together it did not have some crucial phone numbers! This leads to a no less agonising question. It is alleged that the Amritsar Air Control Tower (ATC) was rung up by someone purporting to be “G.Lal, Joint Secretary in the Union Home Ministry” directing that the plane be refuelled immediately. Some time later the Cabinet Secretary was on the line giving exactly the opposite instructions and telling the stunned official at the Amritsar end that no Joint Secretary by the name G.Lal existed in the Home Ministry. Doesn’t all this mean that India does not have a secure system of communication even during a crisis as serious as a hijacking? Whoever is responsible for this scandalous state of affairs can rest assured that he will never be held accountable. Even more shocking is the clean chit given to the Indian Airlines personnel at Kathmandu despite their dubious performance. It is bad enough that the mysterious entry “S.A.Qazi x 4” in the flight’s manifest has never been explained satisfactorily. What is worse is that neither IA nor the Indian government had insisted on frisking all passengers before embarking the plane even at so notoriously vulnerable airport as Kathmandu’s. PIA and Lanka Airways routinely take this sensible precaution. If past blunders are stupendous the future could be even worse. The source of future trouble is threefold. First, the boosted morale of the militants is manifest. Maulana Azhar is the Harkat’s kingpin and this murderous outfit, fired with jehadist zeal, has been hyperactive in the valley and the Doda area of Jammu, especially in the post-Kargil period. During these short months important positions of the security forces have been attacked more than 30 times. After the Srinagar outrage on Monday it seems that the citizens also will now be targeted once again. It is in this context that the release of Mushtaq Ahmed Zargar, a Kashmiri militant of some note, becomes dangerous. It has already unleashed second thoughts among those Kashmiri youth that had originally supported the insurgency but had later become disillusioned. Secondly, only the purblind will fail to take note of the dismay and demoralisation of the security forces that have fought a sinister enemy against very heavy odds for 10 years. They have paid a heavy price, in blood and gore, to arrest the likes of Azhar and Zargar. What are they expected to feel when these desperadoes are set free at the behest of even worse criminals? For their part the three Service Chiefs have bluntly told the head of the government how unhappy they are that they were not associated even with the management of the crisis created by the hijacking of IC-814. Thirdly, the diplomatic picture also does not look as rosy as it was made to appear on New Year’s Eve. The Taliban regime has evidently played both ends against the middle. They got a lot of credit from, among others, Mr Jaswant Singh and made a show of sweet reasonableness. In effect, however, they put their weight behind the release of the terrorists and mollycoddled the hijackers to the extent of allowing them comfortable exit while hiding their identity. The Internet has now disclosed that Azhar had been in frequent touch with the Taliban. Pakistan has been able, so far at least, to have the best of both worlds: loudly condemning the hijackers and masterminding all their moves. It got a further bonus. The Indian policy of having no truck with the Musharraf regime until cross-border terrorism was ended broke down. Since the return home of the hostages New Delhi has intensified its campaign to put the blame for hijacking on Pakistan. Mr Brajesh Mishra has cited some circumstantial evidence to this effect. But this by itself will not convince the international community that was, at best, lukewarm in condemning the hijacking. If the evidence exists, it should be made public without delay. Now that Mr Vajpayee has appealed to major nations to declare Pakistan a “terrorist state” the time has come to test his government’s claim that, in partnership with the USA, it has built up an “international coalition” against cross-border terrorism. The proof of the pudding will lie in eating it. Will America, which has yet to ask Pakistan to ban Maulana Azhar’s outfit, duly designated as “terrorist” by Washington, declare Pakistan a terrorist state? |
Forgotten report on infrastructure MORE than two years ago a committee headed by Dr Rakesh Mohan, Director-General, NCAER, submitted its report entitled “The India Infrastructure Report” which provided not only a comprehensive scheme for the development of infrastructure but also provided for a regulatory framework as well as made suggestions relating to fiscal measures to encourage the inflow of investment in this sector. The committee took more than two years to prepare the report. Can one ask the government what action is being taken by it on the report? What happened to the schemes like building national highways linking the North with the South and the East with the West? It would be recalled that the country would need between $ 150 billion and $ 200 billion in the next five years for the development of infrastructure in order to achieve an annual growth rate of 7 per cent — the target for the Ninth Five Year Plan. In other words the annual level of investment in infrastructure services was supposed to be about $ 30 billion by 2001 and about $ 50 billion by 2005. The current level of investment in infrastructure is around $ 17 billion per annum. The committee was in essence recommending the doubling of the annual investment on infrastructure from the current figure. This was an enormous amount. Obviously, the government was in no position to garner these resources in the near future. Therefore, the private sources of funding of infrastructure services became imperative. According to the committee, the private sector had a prominent role to play in the development of infrastructure. This called for the development of suitable mechanisms to direct the flow of resources into these sectors, drafting of new legislation, setting up of regulatory mechanisms and so on. As for the telecom sector, the committee envisaged an efficient telecom sector in the next five years. In order to achieve this goal, it had suggested that the existing Department of Telecommunications (DoT) should be corporatised as “India Telecom” in the form of a holding company with a host of subsidiary companies in each circle and another company for overseas calls on the pattern of the American telecom company AT & T. It may be mentioned that many companies have telecom structures similar to the ones as being recommended by the Rakesh Mohan Committee. There is Australian Telecom, Malaysian Telecom and so on. It is true that DoT as an appendage of the government is neither able to function on the scale it should nor is it in a position to deliver the goods. In its proposed avatar as India Telecom it was expected to venture abroad and compete with international telecom companies. The committee had also recommended further privatisation of MTNL, as well as the replacement of the Indian Telegraph Act, 1985, with the new legislation that takes into account the vast advances that have taken place in the past 100 years. As for the telecom licence fee, the committee was of the view that it should not be treated merely as a general resource mobilisation scheme but the funds so collected should be used for the development of telecom infrastructure. This was an important recommendation in the sense that the current telecom licence fee is so high that it is coming in the way of development of telecom services. However, the revenue sharing scheme is likely to replace the telecom fee scheme, but one is yet to see the impact of the revenue sharing scheme on the telecom sector. For the power sector, apart from a massive dose of investment it had recommended drastic changes in the pricing structure of power to make it more viable. It is suggested that the power sector should follow cost-based pricing in each consumer segment in a phased manner through a 10 per cent increase in the tariff per annum net of inflation. The committee was also for a regulatory authority to oversee the fixation of consumer tariffs, monitoring of service standards and approving of projects below the threshold specified for Central clearance. It was also for a total revamp of state electricity boards. In its view the SEBs should be corporatised to achieve results. It is common knowledge that almost all the SEBs are in the red; they are not able to recover the cost of the power supplied to the consumers. In many cases, the SEBs staff have been known to help certain unscrupulous users to steal power which explains the pathetic financial situation of the SEBs. Coming to the development of ports, the committee had suggested commercialisation of port operations allowing private parties to establish ports and to the port authorities to raise resources from the primary market through debt (issue of bonds) and equity (issue of shares).Immediately, the port authorities could be allowed to incur capital expenditure of up to Rs 500 million without seeking any approval. Much of the cargo would be mechanically handled. There would also be computer-based cargo clearance, including customs clearance, and that there would be a piece-based structure for port workers. There would be one mega port on each coast. This is important for the fact that at the moment none of our ports can handle even two million tonnes of foodgrains. As for the development of roads, the committee had recommended the setting up of a highway development fund, a roads board, drawing up of an infrastructure saving scheme, adoption of the “user pays” concept, toll-based roads and so on. It noted that the budget as proposed for road development had decreased successively over the five-year Plans. It had, therefore, recommended an extra-budgetary route to augment the resources for road development. As a first step, it had recommended that a substantial portion of the revenues from taxes on motor vehicles and transportation fuel be earmarked for road development. Secondly, it had recommended a special cess of 50 paise per litre on diesel and Re 1 per litre of petrol as well as a special cess of Rs 10,000 per commercial vehicle, Rs 5,000 per car and a 1 per cent cess on auto components to help raise the necessary funds for road development. Its third recommendation was for the constitution of a highway infrastructure savings scheme on the pattern of the national savings scheme to mobilise funds for road and highway development. In a broad way, the committee had recommended the use of pension funds through an appropriate mechanism for the development of infrastructure, suitable changes in the Income Tax Act to provide the sharing of depreciation charges, tax relief on investments with long gestation periods, and no tax on dividends for the individual shareholders up to a reasonable level on the equity investment. It had also recommended a single TDS rate to be developed for all debt instruments and also to permit private sector infrastructure companies to issue tax-free bonds. The committee’s report was very timely, and if its recommendations had been implemented in letter and in spirit it would have gone a long way in developing an efficient infrastructure of an international standard in the country in the next decade. One of the remarkable features of the report is that it has taken a holistic view of the development of infrastructure services and made recommendations from that angle. Some of its recommendations relating to resources are very innovative and their implementation would not call for any extra burden on the citizens. However, the fate of this committee’s report has been no different from that of the reports of various other committees gathering dust in government shelves. Will the next year’s budget look into the recommendations of this committee? — INFA |
Turning regrets to rewards I THINK of my life as a painting in perpetual progress in which light comes from the sunny days I experience and shadows from the sufferings I undergo. It is just like when an artist paints a landscape, he adds shadow to give his work depth. One of the darkest shadows we experience is when someone dear to us dies. A college-going girl whose fiancée died in a motorbike accident said, “I felt as if my whole life had dropped out from under me.” When life runs routine and uneventful, death surprises and shocks us. The first reaction to death is usually disbelief. Later, we also feel anger, and even guilt. All of these stages are natural and help us rebalance our life. In a recent tragedy a young man lost his younger brother in a car accident. He could not admit his own anger for the accident nor his own guilt for having survived. Such anger at the death of a loved one results, in part, from frustration. Friends and relatives spend a lot of time asking themselves why the death occurred. They are trying to find a rational reason for death but death is not rational. They become angry because their questions cannot be answered. Guilt also plagues us as we begin to reflect on the way things might have been. We tend to think back on the relationship and regret the things that we did not say or do with that person. One lady who did not have harmonious life with her husband but lost him early put it this way: “I would have liked to have had the time to straighten a few things out. I cannot do anything about that now, but I am going to make sure not to let things slide like that with anyone else close to me.” Turning regrets into rewards. Sane and sensible. The best way to handle these feelings is to be as aware of them as possible. Author of The Sorrow and the Fury says: “Let your feelings surface. If you feel like crying, don’t hold back the tears.” Death and sorrow are an inevitable part of life. Although it is often overlooked, some good can come from a death. It can be strengthening — a growing experience. Death forces us to become aware of our own feelings. As we do that, we gain a deeper understanding of other people’s feelings. A main function of sadness is to help adjust to a significant loss, such as the death of a close one. The introspection creates opportunity to mourn, and grasp its consequences. Let’s not be afraid of emotional hijacking caused by death or deadly blows. |
Taliban for diplomatic ties with India AFGHANISTAN'S ruling Taliban wants India to consider renewing diplomatic ties with Kabul, citing the close cooperation extended by the militia to resolve the hijacking of the Indian Airlines plane, a representative of the regime here has said. “Following the peaceful end of the hijacking, we think it is time when India has a great opportunity to consider starting diplomatic relations with the Taliban, which is the legitimate government of Afghanistan,” Abdul Hakeem Mujahid, the permanent representative-designate of the Taliban government to the United Nations, told India Abroad News Service. The hijacked Indian Airlines plane, going to Delhi from Kathmandu, was parked in the tarmac in Kandahar, southwestern Afghanistan, for seven days. Kandahar is the headquarters of the Taliban militia. The hijacking ordeal ended on new year’s eve when the Indian government released three jailed extremists in return for the freedom of the 161 passengers and crew. “We believe the momentum of cooperation between Kabul and New Delhi generated during the hijacking should be continued and diplomatic contacts should be established,” Mujahid said. “We do not know of any kind of tension between New Delhi and Kabul, so why cannot there be diplomatic relations between us?” he asked. India does not recognise the Taliban regime although it has made positive references to the cooperation extended by the militia in resolving the hijack crisis. New Delhi recognises the ousted opposition regime of Burhanuddin Rabbani whose representative is accredited as Kabul’s envoy to India. Mujahid claimed that what India knew about the Taliban government before the hijacking was based on “total misinformation” and entirely negative reporting by Indian and international media, besides what opposition forces had projected about the militia. “After the hijacking, I think the Indian government saw first-hand what was going on inside our country and the practices under the Taliban’s rule and, in view of that, I think the two countries should come closer,” he said. On December 30, asked if the Taliban regime might hand over the hijackers to India as a quid pro quo for New Delhi’s recognition of Kabul, Mujahid had replied: “No way.” He said the Taliban was not prepared to discuss the matter at a time when innocent human lives were in danger. On the issue of the alleged involvement of Afghan terrorists in Kashmir, Mujahid said the Taliban had reiterated several times that there was no involvement of its members in Kashmir, but the Indian government never believed Kabul. “Our policy is very clear. We do not want to intervene in the internal affairs of any of our neighbouring countries and at the same time we do not want any other country to interfere in our internal affairs,” he said. Citing what he described as an instance of negative media propaganda, Mujahid said during the Kargil crisis newspapers reported that Afghan Taliban fighters were going into Indian territory to capture Kashmir. One month later, he said, when the Taliban started a decisive counter-offensive against the forces of opposition commander Ahmad Shah Masood in northern Kabul, the same media wrote that the Taliban could not have won but for the help of Kashmiri Mujahideen. “How does one explain this contradiction?” he asked. He said the only problem with the Indian government is that it believes in propaganda and does not take into consideration the ground realities. But he said he does not think progress in India-Afghanistan relations would be impossible in the aftermath of the hijack drama, during which the Taliban and the Indian authorities worked closely. Mujahid was very critical of the role of the United Nations, saying the world body had totally failed to resolve the problems of Afghanistan in the last two decades. “The United Nations has been taking the interests of big countries into consideration while attempting to resolve the problems in our country, and not the facts or the realities on ground,” he said. “Because of this, the UN’s role in Afghanistan has been a complete failure not only during Taliban’s rule, but even before,” he added. — IANS
|
Putting quantity before quality BRITAIN’S philatelists threatened to bite the hand that feeds them when they warned the Post Office that they would close their albums for ever from December 31, 1999, if it continued to issue an excess of sub-standard stamps. The threat came as the Post Office prepared to release 48 new millennium stamps this year, a collection that leading stamp collectors claim puts quantity before quality. Peter Jennings, a fellow of the Royal Philatelic Society, said that the glut of stamps had caused many collectors to question the worth of continuing the hobby, and that some had decided the end of the 20th century was an opportune time to lay down their eyeglasses. Between 1840 and 1900 the Royal Mail issued 214 different stamps but now produce more than that number every three years. ``They are issuing too many new stamps and a lot of collectors have used December 31, 1999, to stop their collections and say they won’t be buying any of the stamps issued in the year 2000 and beyond,’’ said Mr Jennings. ``To safeguard the hobby of philately the Royal Mail needs to listen carefully to the views of stamp collectors and issue fewer new stamps,’’ he said. Mr Jennings’s comments come three days before the Post Office issues its first stamp of the 21st century, a first class stamp bearing a white portrait of the Queen on an olive background, a design which some have hailed as refreshingly retro in feel. ``It is a good, distinctive colour and a bold design,’’ said Mr Jennings. ``My personal opinion is that I hope it will persuade new collectors to start this hobby with the first stamp of the year 2000,’’ he said. The batch that has raised the collectors’ ire include scenes intended to commemorate the flurry of activity that has greeted the new millennium. Stamps released this month will bear images of Muncaster Castle in Cumbria which has just entered its third millennium, the Scottish Seabird Centre in Berwick, and the Torrs walkway in Derbyshire. Stamps featuring the tower blocks of Croydon, South London, and Mile End Park in East London are due for release later in the year. A Post Office spokesman said: ``We have been using some of the leading designers in the country and the stamps have been widely praised in this country and around the world,’’ he said. Last November the Post Office issued designs by artists including Bridget Riley, Ralph Steadman, David Hockney and Peter Blake. ``(British prime minister) Tony Blair named Royal Mail stamps as one of the designs of the millennium and they are on display in the dome, so they have won a lot of plaudits,’’ said Mr Simpson. ``This is an individual’s point of view and not in any way representative of a wider body of opinion. The stamps we have been issuing have been very successful and there’s no doubt they will continue to be successful.’’ — By arrangement with The Guardian |
January 6, 1925 THE announcement in an Associated Press telegram that the Right Hon Srinivasa Sastri has resigned his seat in the Council of State will be received with mixed feelings in the country. If the resignation is due to the state of Mr Sastri’s health, which has not been good for some time, it will evoke genuine and universal regret. If, on the other hand, it is due to Mr Sastri’s recognition of the fact that he is entirely out of his element in that gilded chamber of reactionaries and political nobodies, the decision will be generally welcomed. In the last case, however, the action taken by Mr Sastri imposes a corresponding obligation upon the country. A place must and ought to be found for him in the Legislative Assembly. Unhappily, the rules governing election to that body are so defective that there is a strict limit to the number of constituencies by which even a man of much outstanding position in public life and such remarkable gifts as Mr Sastri could hope that one such constituency will be able to induce its sitting member to make room for Mr Sastri. |
 | | Punjab | Haryana | Jammu & Kashmir | Himachal Pradesh | Regional Briefs | Nation | Editorial | | Business | Sport | World | Mailbag | Chandigarh Tribune | In Spotlight | 50 years of Independence | Tercentenary Celebrations | | 119 Years of Trust | Calendar | Weather | Archive | Subscribe | Suggestion | E-mail | |
