The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

The law catches up

FORMER Chief Minister Jayalalitha has joined the unillustrious company of former Prime Minister Narasihma Rao as a convict declared so by a special court. Actually, it is the other way round as she had earlier been awarded a one-year jail term for bending rules to permit a hotel to build two extra floors. Now she has been nailed for transferring government land to two companies owned by herself and her alter ego at a quarter of the guideline price, or the market value. It was an organised loot and she and her friend profited to the tune of nearly Rs 5 crore. It is a case when the law catches up with her at long last. She escaped once when the Madras High Court quashed a chargesheet but the Supreme Court overruled and reinstated the case. Her three-year sentence will strip her of the right to fight elections and with Tamil Nadu going to the polls to elect a new Assembly in March next year, it is a cruel blow to her political ambitions of staging a comeback. She will try to whip up sympathy as a person persecuted by the wily DMK chief M.Karunanidhi and she will succeed. But she cannot occupy the top chair and rule in her own whimsical, autocratic fashion. Newspapers talk of her stepping down as leader of the AIADMK and anointing a nephew of her close friend, Mrs Sasikala Natarajan, in her place. Mr Dinakaran is now a Lok Sabha member and is a totally untested entity as a politician. His one and the only qualification is that he belongs to the tainted Jaya-Sasikala dynasty. The Tansi land case, in which Ms Jayalalitha has earned a three-year jail term, is the toughest she faced. It has been so since 1992 when she rushed through the deal with the help of willing accomplices in her Cabinet and top bureaucracy. She faces trial in one more case, dubbed the unearned crores case. The value of gold jewellery and other items she has accumulated has been conservatively fixed at nearly Rs 65 crore. One commentator, known for his sobriety, has said that it was not corruption or misuse of power but an arrogant display of feudal beliefs and plain greed. For an unmarried, single woman, she has an unsatiable hunger for money and loves to shows it off.

Vying for front page treatment is the filing of a chargesheet against the mighty Hinduja brothers. The CBI had always had them on its radar screen ever since a newspaper linked their name to the Bofors purchase and the commission involved in it. Two of the three brothers are British citizens and the third lives in Switzerland. They claim that the money, approximately about Rs 10 crore, is not connected to the guns scandal and one Swiss judge has upheld their point. But there is no documentary proof and the CBI has charged them with cheating, conspiracy and corruption. The last one is laughable but the other two charges will need lot of legal finesse to prove. An extradition plea will succeed only if the crime in one country, in this case India, is recognised as punishable in the other country, namely Britain and Switzerland. The chances are they are not. Receiving a commission for putting through a sale is not a crime, even in India although we pretend that the tribe of middlemen has not born in this sacred land. Further, the Hinduja brothers seem to have built their fortunes on facilitating big deals and they have not been hauled up so far. The CBI is unlikely to succeed where others have failed or have not even tried.

Today a New Delhi special court will sentence the convicted Mr Rao and Mr Buta Singh thus making corruption and punishment the special flavour of the week. Poor Prime Minister! His historic knee operation has taken a back seat but the BJP is unfazed. It is claiming success in “its” anti-corruption drive. Not that it has initiated these prosecutions but it itself and its allies in the government are not involved in any of the cases, at least for there present. Mr Rao is a Congressman, Ms Jayalalitha is a Congress ally and the Hindujas are everywhere. They are close to the PMO, one report says that they have a staunch supporter planted there, and also to Mrs Sonia Gandhi. The BJP suddenly finds a gift in court cases launched by others in different times, an issue it can milk in the coming elections in five states. And it says it will without inhibition.

Indonesian chief in action

WHEN Mr Abdurrahman Wahid took over as the new President of Indonesia in October last year after the democratic elections for the first time in 45 years he was expected to move swiftly against the army's corrupt Generals who had been bleeding the country white by their overt and covert actions. But he could do very little so far. One reason that comes to one's mind immediately is that he has been facing certain serious problems, including the East Timor crisis, that might have acted as roadblocks. But now he appears to be on the job of implementing the promises he had made during the hotly contested elections---bringing to a stop the army's intervention in running the governmnent, introducing democratic reforms, minimising corruption, etc. The first proof of his being in action in this regard has been provided by the decision to remove the controversial army chief, Gen Tyasno Sudarto. He was personally told by Mr Wahid that he was being removed from the significant position he had been occupying for a long time. This is part of the wide-ranging changes expected in the army and the combined Indonesian military, better known by its short name TNI.

Communal clashes have been continuing in the country even after the East Timor crisis has resulted in its independence because sections in the military have been playing the spoilsport. The President had to act tough one day. The recent killing of three UN workers and a series of bomb blasts perhaps forced him not to wait any further for the right moment. But he seems to be treading cautiously so that his actions do not cause large-scale unrest in the armed forces. The decision to ask General Tyanso to himself announce his dismissal shows the element of caution. Certain other officers may also face the President's axe to complete the process of change he has started. Dealing with the errant Generals may, however, not be easy for Mr Wahid, according to Indonesia experts. There are various groups in the forces and some of them have been opposed to Mr Wahid's elevation as the chief executive of the country. Obviously, they may use the opportunity provided by the action against the top officer of the army to spread unrest against Mr Wahid. And the President knows this full well. He is a tactician and may try to use one group against another to make them realise that the Suharto era has ended and they should confine their role to defending the country's borders. If the President succeeds in dealing with the Generals the task of implementing his other promises will become easier.

GROWING FRUSTRATION OF KISANS
Agriculture needs fresh strategy
by Hari Jaisingh

THE anger of farmers in Punjab and Haryana against the central team collecting paddy samples for procurement is symbolic of the growing frustration of the people against official callousness coupled with non-governance and non-performance of government agencies.

Most officials at the helm of agricultural affairs have probably no knowledge about the various problems of the two states. The Green Revolution is no more all that green. There are new compulsions at play and the farming community does not know where it should turn to. The problem of plenty is now as serious as was the period of food shortage in the fifties and early sixties. Today’s bounty is the result of the pioneering efforts put in by the kisans and the agricultural universities in the region.

Ironically, there are no takers for paddy being grown in Punjab and Haryana amidst accusations and counter-accusations about its quality between the central authorities and farmers.

How and where things have gone wrong? Who is to blame for the present messy situation? My one-line answer will be: bureaucratic mindset. Officials in the Agriculture Ministry and the central agencies operating from airconditioned rooms have no idea of how farmers sweat it out to feed the nation.

The world is changing. So is its responses. But for government functionaries time stands still. Their thinking is 20-year-old and their response goes back to 30 years. What are being added to this set of thinking or non-thinking are the local-centric perspectives under which problems are seen in isolation and on an ad hoc basis.

FCI chairman Bhure Lal has his own angularities. He is concerned more about the moisture, standardisation and colourisation of the grain than about the agonising expression on the faces of thousands of farmers who have put in their precious resources to get the fruits of their efforts.

The left hand of the Union Agriculture Ministry, for that matter, does not know what its right hand is doing. No wonder, we do not have a dynamic, viable and realistic agricultural policy. Adhocism is all. And this tendency is invariably guided by vested interests operating in various areas.

There is no point in blaming Punjab Agriculture University (PAU) as some FCI officials seem to be doing. In fact, the whole attitude of the central authorities is casual as some news reports suggest: “Those who inspect and assess the grain do so by simply throwing paddy grains up in the air and rubbing them between the fingers and the palm. They hardly use the inspection kid meant for this purpose.”

This is not surprising. We know how government agencies function. They are casual about everything. This casual approach can be attributed to the absence of a sound policy perspective and the lack of seriousness to look at problems from the viewpoint of the sons of the soil.

The real problem with Indian agriculture today is its over-bureaucratisation. The authorities strike one posture publicly and do just the opposite of what they say. There is an obvious mismatch between words and action.

The politico-bureaucratic establishment indulges in shadow-boxing without addressing itself to substantial issues facing the country’s agriculture. True, there is a pressing need to reorient our agricultural universities and reorganise their research in tune with the changing needs from the grassroots upward.

There has to be a totally fresh approach to various problems facing Indian agriculture. As it is, the farm sector has not been able to keep pace with the technological changes. For this purpose, new efficiency and sustainability levels are necessary to meet today’s challenges.

Interestingly, the Planning Commission in its recent mid-term review of the Ninth Plan candidly underlined the fact that the whole approach to agriculture during the past decade had been directed at securing increased production through subsidy on inputs such as power, water and fertilisers rather than through building new capital assets, irrigation and power.

There is now an urgent need to tackle some of the major require- ments and structural issues like the rationalisation of subsidies on inputs, institutionalisation of rural credit, opening of a lease market in land, popularisation of integrated base management and integrated nutrient management, strengthening of post-harvesting handling, processing and storage of grains and other related products.

The poor storage facility is in itself scandalous which requires a serious probe. There are vested interests operating in this area which connive with corrupt officials and their patrons.

Viewed in a broader perspective, India needs to evolve agricultural policies compatible with the norms of the globalised world. Of course, these steps have to be taken keeping India’s interests in mind.

The Union Agriculture Ministry does not have much achievements to boast of. It is not sure where India’s interests lie. That is the reason why it hops from global pressures to domestic compulsions, without doing its homework.

Take the case of subsidies. According to a study, “Of the total export subsidies on wheat in the world, the share of the top five countries (the USA, the European Union, Canada, Turkey and Hungary) was 95 per cent during the period 1986-90. For rice the figure was 100 per cent and the countries subsidising their rice exports most were Indonesia, the European Union members, Uruguay, the USA and Colombia. For most of the products, the European Union is the largest user of export subsidies, particularly for sugar and dairy”. (Political and Economic Weekly, October 9-15, 1999).

It won’t be an exaggeration to say that Indian agriculture is fairly efficient in the global context. All that is required is proper understanding of Indian strength by the country’s politico-bureaucratic establishment with a view to streamlining farm polices so that the maximum possible advantages are derived from the changing global situation.

Unfortunately, Krishi Bhavan is caught in the shadow of its distorted policies and postures. Not knowing India’s strength, it gives the impression of being ever-willing to succumb to global pressures emanating from the developed world which is protective of its agricultural interests.

How come we don’t seem to care for the farmers and overall agricultural interests of the country? The custodians in New Delhi owe an explanation to the nation.

An agenda paper discussed during a brain-storming session organised by Punjab Agriculture University in October, 1998, threw up certain disturbing points given below, as highlighted by Ramesh Chand in his article “Emerging crisis in Punjab agriculture” (Political & Economic Weekly, March 27- April 2, 1999):

(i) The economic conditions of a vast majority of farmers have deteriorated and these cannot be improved with the existing cropping system and the technology which has already been exploited to 75 per cent potential.

(ii) The family income of about 47 per cent of the farmers from crops plus dairying is lower than the income at the lowest pay scale for unskilled worker in the state.

(iii) About 20 per cent of the farming population is below the poverty line.

(iv) The watertable in central Punjab is going down at the rate of 0.23 cm per annum. If this decline continues for the next 15 years, about 2 lakh centrifugal pumps will have to be replaced by submersible pumps which at the current prices will cost Rs 2000 crore or about Rs 5,000 per hectare of the net sown area.

(v) Then there is the problem of salinity and waterlogging in certain areas of Punjab.

(vi) A widespread deficiency of micronutrients has appeared in the soil and there is an increase in weed infestation, pests and disease outbreak.

(vii) The burning of combined harvested rice straw has resulted in serious environment pollution.

Some of the problems identified above along with the current messy situation underline a serious crisis in Punjab agriculture. This calls for a fresh thinking and new strategies centred on the Green Revolution technology. We simply cannot ignore the growing discontent among farmers. This frustration is mainly due to their “failure” to get the expected farm income and other operational problems.

The central team collecting paddy samples has either no idea or has a limited understanding of the problems being faced by farmers. Whose failure is this? I shall equally blame Mr Parkash Singh Badal’s government for its failure to stay ahead of the times and view the farmers’ problems with an eye on tomorrow.

Punjab needs a total departure from past practices. The initiative for this purpose has to come from the Punjab and Haryana authorities. It is a pity that the leadership in the two states seems to be more preoccupied with smaller things of life than addressing itself to the larger issues which should guide Punjab and Haryana in the post-Green Revolution situation.

As it is, Punjab’s march on the economic front has been both slow and lopsided. Only a new dynamic thinking, determined efforts and the right lead can put the state on the fast track of development. Is Mr Badal ready for a leap forward? If so, he will have to unlearn a few things and pick up the threads from the grassroots.

“Bika hua saman...” here and there
by Suchita Malik

INDIAN economy is indeed opening up. It is opening up to bring in a competitive market much to the relief of the hassled consumer and to the chagrin of the producers and the traders. The seller’s market has slowly started giving way to the buyer’s market be it the cars, the televisions, the refrigerators and what not. Consumer’s supremacy is coming around and gaining ground.

The phenomenon of “sale” is again one of the international imports. Before this concept came in here, it was the regime of haggling and negotiating between the shopkeepers and the customers, which though still continuing, is on its way out. But this animal called “sale” is really mind-boggling. Eye-catching banners declaring massive sales of 50% with a minuscule and deftly hidden “upto” are the order of the day. And then, you have these sales around the year under different banners: summer-sale, winter-sale, autumn-sale, grand clearance sale, “sabse bari sale”, pre-renovation sale and what not. The concept of chain-stores announcing their “sale” plans at all the locations has also set in. No doubt, the sale strategy has worked well and it is continuing to work well.

One point of the real “dadagiri” of our trading stores has been their meticulously followed principle of “Bika hua saman vapis nahin hoga “or” Things once sold will not be taken back.” The coming up of big stores of the likes of Ebony and Big Jo’s in the market has introduced some dent in this. But if the stuff is sold during the “sale”, this condition is strictly enforced by all without any exception. The concept, thus, was imported after deleting the difficult parts.

Anybody having shopped here (in India) and there (in Western world) would have perceived the stark difference. In UK, for example, you could return the garment any time stating that you did not want to retain it only if you had not used it. You could return it without any hassles if it turned out to be a defective piece and get your money and apologies in return. This is borne out of personal experience. It was a unique experience in the USA where my sister-in-law claimed the difference between her purchase price and the reduced “sale” price only because she had bought it only a week before the same line of garment was put on sale or else she would return the garment.

We were in Glasgow for a year. It was January. My husband and I were on our weekend round of the nearby Marks & Spencer. He got fancy for a newly introduced line of woollen trousers. It was priced at £ 37 and was very expensive going by our means. He was so keen on it but the price was a major deterrent. Seeing his keenness, I also supported and made him buy it out for himself. He bought it but never wore it. The stickers remained intact. Came February, and another of our rounds and he noticed that the same trouser had come on the reduced price list, £ 30 this time. He rushed back home, brought the old one, returned it for £ 37, turned around and bought another piece for £ 30. The glow on his face was like that of a child having found a treasure. This exercise continued with every reduction in price at levels of £ 24, £ 20 and £ 16. He was lucky to get his size every time. By now, it was June and he seemed contented with the last catch.

It was the end of September and we were packing up. One of those last few rounds of the stores and suddenly, I saw him almost yelling. He had found one piece of the same trouser, and his size, marked at £ 8. He did not think once before changing again. For me, it was an experience. I was wonder-struck at such reductions and perhaps even the margins. But then, my husband also explained the sound economics and commerce behind this.

I was baffled. I am still not able to reconcile with the warning: “Bika hua saman vapis nahi hoga”. I am looking for the day when we also will have genuine sales here and this warning will be ticked off.

Aged population & emerging issues
by Arvind Bhandari

THE United Nations has been designating special days for specific subjects. One of the most important such days in the UN calendar is the International Day of Older Persons, which fell on October 1.

The world is going through a demographic transition. Socio-economic progress and advances in medical science have increased life expectancy. Simultaneously, fertility is falling. As a result, we have the phenomenon of “population ageing”. The number of old people is increasing and ensuring a proper quality of life for them is both a matter of concern and a challenge to the world community. Therefore, the UN had designated the last year of the millennium as International Year of Older Persons, 1999.

In the last 50 years global life expectancy increased by 20 years to its present level of 66 years. The fall in fertility is dramatised by the Chinese and Indian experience. In China, fertility fell from 5.5 in 1970 to 1.8 in 1998. The corresponding figures for India are 5.0 and 3.1.

Within the last five decades, the proportion of the world population of over 60 years old people has changed from one in 13 to one in 10. In Europe, it is already one in five. The current global population of old people is 580 million, of whom 355 million (60 per cent) live in developing countries. The world is expected to have 1 billion old people by 2020.

In India, life expectancy was just 23 years in 1901. It took 50 years to add nine years and bring it to 32 years in 1951. It took another 30 years to add 20 years and bring it to 52 years by 1981. It took 15 years to add 10 more years and bring it to 62 years in 1996. Our life expectancy will be close to 70 years before 2020. India’s current population of old people is over 70 million.

Rich countries can afford to look after their old reasonably well. Mr M.M. Sabharwal, President Emeritus, HelpAge India, a non-government organisation, says: “In Australia, there is a career attached to every old person. The government and society make various arrangements for aged persons. They have special clubs, games, shows, theatre and cinema. There was a golf competition for the aged when I was there.”

Compared to this, what poor countries like India can do for their aged is limited. The lacuna has to be made up by the joint family system which, unfortunately, is breaking down. Urbanisation, economic crunch and employment of women are resulting in nuclear families. A recent study, quoted at a seminar organised by the Institute of Human Behaviour and Allied Sciences in New Delhi, pointed out that 40 per cent of the elderly in the Capital had no care-givers.

It is a challenge to the Indian society, particularly social scientists, to devise ways and means to arrest further breakdown of the joint family system. The World Health Organisation has rightly pointed out that old persons should not be treated as a burden. It says: “Old age is not an affliction but a great opportunity to make use of the resources acquired over the course of life. Old people can be a tremendous asset to families and the community”.

In Singapore, people who can afford to look after their aged parents but do not do so are prosecuted under the law. A Bill on the Singapore pattern was introduced in the Himachal Pradesh assembly, but it has not become law. It is problematical whether the joint family system can be resuscitated by the force of law. It is more a matter of self-realisation on the part of people of their filial duty towards their aged parents.

The Indian government is trying to help the aged, but its efforts meet a very small fraction of the need. A national policy for older persons was approved by the Union Cabinet in the recent past. It talks in rather pompous terms of state support of the aged as regards financial security, health, shelter and protection against abuse and exploitation. As a follow-up, the Centre some time ago constituted the National Council for Older Persons, headed by Mr J.S. Verma, former Chief Justice of India. It comprises representatives of Central and state governments and NGOs. But these initiatives are only on paper.

Only about 15 per cent of the working population is employed in regular salaried jobs. This segment has social security in the form of provident fund, gratuity and pension. Senior citizens above the age of 65 also have concessions regarding rail and air travel and income tax. The main problem faced by a number of old persons of the middle class is not so much economic security as emotional deprivation because of social ostracism.

It is the economic condition of the aged below the poverty line which is a cause of worry. The Agewell Foundation and HelpAge India estimate that 40 per cent of the elderly live below the poverty line and 90 per cent of them are in the unorganised sector. Three years ago the Central Government started the National Old Age Pension Scheme for the rural sector. It has about 54 lakh beneficiaries, each of whom gets a pension of only Rs 75 per month. The Prime Minister recently launched the Annapurna scheme under which 10 kilograms of foodgrains are to be given free to rural senior citizens every month.

The state governments have their own patchy pension schemes. Under the Delhi government’s old age pension scheme, which is supposed to cover 80,000 persons, a beneficiary gets Rs 200 per month. But a recent special audit showed that about 11,000 names in the scheme were bogus.

Taboos tear apart relations
By Jason Burke

LONDON: The rugged dry hills of northern Pakistan are almost 4,000 miles from the rolling dales of northern England. But if you stand at the corner of some streets in Bradford or Derby or Huddersfield they feel a lot closer. Old men, their beards dyed orange with henna, rest in the evening sunlight on their way to the mosque. Boys, in white round prayer caps and the traditional baggy trousers worn in Karachi or Peshawar, play cricket with a makeshift bat. Women pull their headscarves tight up to their eyes when a stranger walks past.

Rukhsana Naz grew up in streets like these. A bright, educated woman, she had been married at 16 to an older man. At 19, she was pregnant by her childhood sweetheart. Her mother told her the child was ‘an insult to (her) husband’. When she refused an abortion and demanded a divorce, Rukhsana was invited to a family dinner where her brother, Shazad, strangled her with a skipping rope. Her mother, Shakeela, helped hold her down. Her actions had ‘shamed’ the family, the court was told.

Rukhsana Naz’s killers were jailed last year. In June 1995 another Pakistani girl was run down and crushed to death by her brother-in-law for a similar offence in Bradford, England. Tasleem Begum was 20 and had been married for four years to an older Pakistani man. She too fell in love. She too transgressed traditional codes of behaviour and brought shame on her family.

Such killings are not rare in South Asia and the Middle East. There are 5,000 of these ‘honour killings’ every year across the world, according to a recent UN report “Living Together, Worlds Apart: Men and Women in a Time of Change”. They occur both in the rural areas, where age-old traditions, value codes and modes of justice still hold sway, and in the cities, where newer tensions have sparked increasing violence towards women. Supporters say the killings maintain social order in changing times; critics allege that chauvinistic men use the ‘family honour’ as a pretext for punishing women who want more freedom.

In the United Kingdom honour killings are also happening. The Observer has found that the deaths of Tasleem Begum and Rukhsana Naz fit into a broader pattern of violence against women within the South Asian community.

Since Tasleem Begum died, nearly five years ago, there have been at least 20 other deaths in Britain that can be connected with ideas of ‘honour’, as well as hundreds of acts of lesser violence. Campaigners claim the honour code — and its accompanying concept of shame — is a key factor in the repression of the rights of tens of thousands of Asian women in Britain.

Recent cases involving ‘honour’ in the UK include.

1. A Wakefield man axed to death by family members for continuing an affair with a younger female relative. Beheading is a way of committing an ‘honour killing’ in rural southern Pakistan.

2. A 49-year-old man in Bradford, Jahangir Hussein, jailed last year for murdering his wife and two daughters because he (wrongly) thought they were having affairs.

3. Mohammed Merheban, a 25-year-old who killed his friend and brother-in-law whom he suspected of having an affair with his wife. He told Liverpool Crown Court he had committed the murder because his honour had been insulted. A family member told the court that, if he had not acted, ‘he would not be allowed to live within that society. That is how people are brought up’.

4. A woman in Nottingham who died after being kept in her house for 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and a woman in Birmingham who was chained to her kitchen sink for months on end to prevent her leaving the home and behaving immodestly.

5. Jaspal Sohal, a west London woman battered to death by her husband with a hammer. He saw killing her as preferable to having her leaving him and damaging his izzat (personal honour).

6. A young Sikh woman who married a Hindu man preferred having her home burnt to the ground by her family.

7. A prospective son-in-law blinded in one eye by his fiancee’s Sikh brother — on the orders of his father — because he ‘was not good enough’.

8. A series of suicides of young women told that they could not marry their lovers because they were from the wrong religious background or caste.

There are many other cases involving serious violence where the ‘honour’ of some of those involved has been important. Legal documents studied by The Observer reveal a host of lesser incidents. They include cases of women being slapped after being seen talking to man ‘without permission’ in the street or walking without a veil or even going to work.

And there are, as with all domestic violence, tens of thousands of cases that are never reported to the police.

Home Office specialists say in the UK, women who come to the attention of the police have been assaulted on average 30 times. Philip Balmforth, a police community officer who works with Asian women in Bradford, told The Observer he received about 300 requests for help from victims of abuse, abduction or forced marriages last year, twice the total of 1995. Last year 120 women came to him for help after being subjected to violence within the family. A quarter of those were assaulted by relatives other than their partners.

He estimates he hears less than 1 per cent of such incidents. An Essex police report of 1998 refers to ‘gross under-reporting’ of such attacks throughout Britain and in the South Asian community in particular.

“These girls are caught by a double whammy”, said one refuge worker who did not want to be named for fear of reprisals. “If they are in a strict environment, they are more likely to suffer abuse. But they are less likely to report it.”

Tejinder lives in east London. She is in her twenties, articulate and self-confident. She was married young to a friend of her father’s and is now living in a refuge. Through an intermediary she told her story to The Observer. The details are kept vague to protect her and her family.

“During the first year of our marriage there were indications my husband was abusive,” she said. “There were things he would say that I wouldn’t like. (Soon) the violence became a regular feature in our lives. I found myself having sex with him to keep him from beating or raping me. I was under enormous pressure not to talk about it.”

When Tejinder did tell her in-laws about the assaults, she was told that she ‘ought to be careful because as far as everyone in the community was concerned her husband was an honourable man and if she tried to leave him both their “izzat” would be questioned. When she spoke to her own family about the abuse their response was harsh.

“They told me bluntly that no one would take me in... Your brothers are not going to put you up and your father is not going to give you roti (bread). Those were their very words,” Tejinder said.

Tejinder was interviewed by Ayesha Gill, a sociologist at the University of Essex. In the past year she has spoken to hundreds of such victims of domestic violence. “Asian women are taught to hide problems that may bring shame on the family or the community,” she said. Other researchers say the pressure of living up to expectations is a key factor in the high suicide rates for young Asian women.

Many of those suicides concern the police. In March last year Uzma Shaheen and her two-year-old daughter burnt to death in her own home. Her last words — screamed down the telephone to the emergency services as she choked on the smoke filling her bedroom — blamed her husband for lighting the fire.

Shaheen was on the point of leaving her arranged marriage, a court heard this year, and had visited support workers dealing with abused women. Her husband was acquitted of killing her after a judge heard evidence that Shaheen had contemplated burning the house down and committing suicide in the months before her death.

Other suicides lead to “Romeo and Juliet” headlines in newspapers. In one tragic case this year a young Sikh woman hanged herself after being told by her parents that her relationship with a Muslim boy should stop.

Such pressure to conform, combined with high expectations, can lead to massive strain on young women. Veena Raleigh, an epidemiologist who has studied suicides among Asian women, said the tight-knit domestic unit with a strong sense of family pride could be a contributory factor.

“Such a close institution has tremendous pay-offs such as very low delinquency and very high educational achievement”, she said. “But a problem is that women have no self-identity. You are a mother or a wife or a sister. You are never yourself. That leads to tremendous pressures”.

In some cases suicide has nothing to do with failing to live up to expectations of a loving, if demanding, family. Some of those that Philip Balmforth, the community officer with the Bradford police, deals with involve women who have been prisoners in their own homes. He has rescued young Pakistani women who, but for the journey from Manchester airport to a northern town, have never left their flats or houses.

Last winter Balmforth managed to get a woman out of a flat where she had been kept by her husband, a drug user. The marriage had been arranged in Pakistan and the woman could not speak English. “We had to teach her how to use money, how to use telephones, how to take the bus”.

Growing concern about a related issue — forced marriages — recently led the Home Office to set up a working group. Though the analysis was useful, its key achievement was breaking the taboo on publicly speaking about such an subject, experts say.

But any government involvement is fraught with difficulty. There are estimated to be only around 100 forced marriages a year. Domestic violence — and the value systems that legitimise it — is a far thornier issue.

Some fear that focusing on ‘honour and shame’ can lead to the Asian community being stigmatised and stereotyped. Baroness Uddin of Bethnal Green, who co-chaired the forced marriages report, told The Observer it risked reinforcing old and dangerous prejudices.

However, activists such as Hanana Siddiqui of the Southall Black Sisters, say that, though the Home Office insists “multicultural sensitivity” will not lead to “moral blindness”, the Government is wary of taking on the leaders of ethnic communities over cultural traditions.

It is important to emphasise that, overall, levels of domestic violence in the Asian community in Britain are probably lower than the national average. Nor can religion be blamed. Muslim, Hindu and Sikh religious leaders all stress that their faiths are non-violent and abhor violence to anyone, especially women. Optimists say that, as the Asian community becomes more assimilated and the older, conservative traditionalism dies away, the issue will resolve itself.

Often the victims of violence are women born or educated in the UK whose aspirations are very different from those of older family members.

Shamshad Hussain, the Bradford community worker, remains worried. Change, she says, has to be carefully managed.

“Unless we all unite to take an honest and strong, intelligent and open stance on this issue now, you are likely to see a backlash of traditionalism by young people, particularly young men, as a defence against western values that threaten them and their traditional position”. For many Asian women in the UK, Hussain points out, it is already too late.

(Observer News Service)

SPIRITUAL NUGGETS

To be really educated means not to conform, not to imitate, not to do what millions and millions are doing. If you feel like doing that, do it. But be awake to what you are doing.

— Jiddu Krishnamurit, Beginning of learning

***

Each one of you has struggled upward from the stone to a plant,

From the plant to an animal,

From the animal to a man.

Do not slide into an animal.

Rise higher to divinity

Shining with the new effulgence of love.

—From the discourses of Sathya Sai Baba

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One cannot become divine unless one already is. We can become only that which we are. Becoming is nothing but unfolding: the hidden becomes manifest. But the hidden is as much as the manifest. And once we know that at the source we are divine, then a great trust arises that nothing can go wrong. Even if we go as far away as possible, we remain divine. The sinner is as divine as the saint. There is no distinction at the root, at the source.

— Osho, The Ninety- Nine Names of Nothingness

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Thou art Atma! Atma art thou. Realise this and be free. Nothing can hinder thee from the realisation of thy essential nature.

— Swami Shivananda, Bliss Divine, Introduction

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It is not speech that man should seek to know;

He should know the speaker.

It is not smell that man should seek to know;

He should know the one who smells.

It is not visual appearances that man should seek to understand;

He should understand the seer.

It is not sound that man should seek to know;

He should know the one who hears.

It is not taste that man should seek to know;

He should know the one who knows taste…

It is not mind that man should seek to understand,

He should know the one who thinks.

— Kaushi Takibrahmana Upanishad, 3.8

***

The Supreme Lord is not two. To me belongs the glory of meditating that I, his devoted servant, am he. As one imagines, so one becomes. Therefore, practice the meditation of “I am he”. Then all your actions will become his action.

— Natchintanai, The Collected Songs of Sage Yogaswami