Plane truths

THE Comptroller and Auditor-General’s report has said in so many words what was already being alleged in whispers: that the Sukhoi-30 aircraft was selected by the Defence Ministry and the Indian Air Force disregarding established procedure. Air Staff requirements, a prerequisite for import and induction of equipment, was not formulated, says the report placed before Parliament. Purchase terms for eight SU-30MK aircraft in 1997 and 32 upgraded SU-30MK multirole aircraft between 1998 and 2001 were even more damaging. The report says the eight aircraft were not suitable for the IAF and needed to be upgraded by “integrating indigenous and western avionics”. Of the 14 partially upgraded aircraft scheduled for delivery to the IAF by 1999, not even one reached as the DRDO delayed in developing some avionics system and some western equipment could not be purchased, partly because of the Pokhran II sanctions. The result was that instead of the upgraded aircraft, 10 additional SU-30K had to be imported at a cost of Rs 1,187 crore. These have to be upgraded at a considerable cost later. Moreover, the delays will have a critical effect on the IAF because it will have to live with a depleted force level or will be compelled to use the ageing fleet. The price that the IAF is having to pay for using the ageing fleet is tremendous. The crashing of MiGs has become a common occurrence.

Defence deals with the USSR were the best option at a time when the payment was in rupees and the price difference vis-à-vis the American and European suppliers was considerable. But there has been a seachange after the breakup of the USSR. Russia now insists on payment in hard currency. Most sale offers come with strings attached and spares have become a problem. What is worse, the quality of the arms and ammunition is not what it should be. India’s hands are tied to some extent because the western world is not willing to supply it because of the sanctions. But Russia is in worse condition and is desperate to sell to keep its economy afloat. Under such circumstances, hard bargains can be struck. Unfortunately, that does not happen, leading to suspicions that some personal deals have been struck. In the post-Tehelka period, one cannot disbelieve anything. There is a veil of secrecy in various deals on the plea that these relate to defence. It is good that the CAG report has not only brought out many irregularities in the aircraft contract, but has also pulled up the IAF for various other matters. For instance, it points out that while the Southern Air Command was set up in 1984 and it cost the exchequer Rs 314 crore, it was not fully operational even after 15 years.

Lok Pal is coming?

THE report that the Union Cabinet has at last given the go ahead to the introduction of the Lok Pal Bill in the Lok Sabha will need to be taken with a heavy dose of salt. A small pinch will not do, keeping in mind the ramifications of such a legislation and the long history of promises which were not fulfilled. The decision sounds almost unbelievable. In the last three decades the Lok Pal Bill came close to being tabled at least six times. However, the political leadership put the decision in deep freeze by giving reasons which were hardly convincing. A seventh attempt to introduce the Bill may indeed be made, not because the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance is serious, but because the continued Tehelka in the Lok Sabha may not allow any business to be transacted. In any case, tabling the Bill would be just the beginning of the long process of getting the seal of approval of the majority of the elected representatives of the people. And the Union Cabinet has given at least one major reason to them not to approve of the measure. The Joint Parliamentary Committee headed by Mr Pranab Mukherjee had recommended that MPs should be kept out of the purview of the Lok Pal. But for reasons which explain themselves, the Union Cabinet has decided to include the MPs, along with the Prime Minister, who can be investigated by the proposed authority for checking political corruption. Another reason for reviving the Lok Pal Bill may have something to do with the Tehelka controversy. It would send out the message that the Centre was serious about combating corruption in high places. The proof of the pudding is in eating.

The Union Government would indeed earn the gratitude of the people if it were to have the Lok Pal Bill passed. It would, to some extent, undo the damage caused by the Tehelka tapes. The tapes completely destroyed the faith of the people in the integrity of politicians and bureaucrats. For this reason the Lok Pal Bill should be introduced not as a damage control exercise, but to make available to the people a forum to help them in dealing with complaints of corruption in high places. Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee was among the more enthusiastic supporters of the proposed measure, based on the Scandinavian institution of ombudsman, as a member of the Janata Party government. The time has now come for him to redeem the pledge as Prime Minister nearly three decades after it was made.

Panja’s parting ways

IT is the season of splitting in West Bengal politics. The latest to threaten a crippling walkout from the Trinamool Congress is Ajit Panja, a former Union Minister of State and more popularly the lead actor in a drama based on Ramakrishna Paramahamsa’s life in that theatre crazy state. A day earlier seven sitting Congress MLAs quit the party and sought a new identity in the Nationalist Congress Party of Sharad Pawar. Another faction has floated a Congress Bachao Samiti. Earlier Mr Saifuddin Chowdhry left the CPM with a handful of supporters to set up his own ideologically liberal Party of Democratic Socialism. (The name is a straight lift from what former Italian Communists call themselves.) Of all these revolts, the most dramatic has been that of Mr Panja. He has impeccable credentials as an ardent anti-Congress and anti-Marxist leader of long standing. It is often said of him that he can win a Lok Sabha election from his Sealdah constituency for his party without any help from the party. He favoured the Trinamool Congress leaving the NDA Cabinet after the Tehelka exposure but being a fond admirer of Prime Minister Vajpayee, wanted his party to support the government from outside. He has pledged to work for the party but his forceful accusation against Ms Mamata Banerjee and his tearful departure will hurt the electoral prospects of the organisation he helped found in a number of ways.

The Trinamool Congress has nine MPs and four of them are opposed to the whimsical ways of the Bengal “tigress”. This means they can quit the party, return to the NDA fold and still duck the punitive provisions of the anti-defection law. In fact newspapers have reported during last few days that Mr Panja, his brother Dr Ranjit, Mr Nitish Sengupta and Ms Kamala Bose are in constant touch with the BJP to chart a return course. One loud indication came when Mr Panja sent out his customary calender to his voters on Bengali New Year Day on April 15 but did not include a photograph of his party leader and did not even mention the name of his party. The four alienated MPs are not united in ideology but are staunchly opposed to the authoritarian ways of Ms Banerjee. This will help the CPM-led Left Front in two ways. One, the traditional anti-Left vote will be badly divided and if the front can retain its following, it can easily ward off a defeat. Two, with the mighty Mamatadi in the dock the Trinamool-Congress electoral alliance looks a bedraggled one and not the sureshot winner that it was a few days ago. The smile on the face of Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya and his party comrades tell their own story. With Ms Banerjee as their main rival, they seem to think that they do not need friends.

Politics takes further nosedive
Both BJP and Congress to blame
Inder Malhotra

LONG years ago I had learnt the hard way how foolish it is to believe that “things are so bad that they cannot possibly get worse”. Sadly, they do, more often than not. Just a month after the state of affairs was supposed to have reached rock bottom, in the wake of the tehelka expose, Indian public life and politics have taken a further nosedive. The apparently unending downslide is murky, malodorous and multidimensional. All political parties and outfits are almost equally culpable for the monumental mess. But it is only fair to concede that the responsibility is much greater in the cases of the BJP, as the core of the ruling coalition, and the Congress, still the largest all-India entity and the principal opposition in Parliament.

What these parties are doing to each other and, in the process, to governance of a billion luckless people is alarming enough. No less depressing is what each major formation is doing unto itself because of underlying suicidal impulses. A quick, dispassionate check on what has been going on in the last few days should be a sobering experience.

India’s claim to be the world’s largest democracy has been eroded dangerously by what has been done to Parliament. The apex forum for democratic debate and decision-making was paralysed — for the 20th time in as many years — after the daily ritual of reducing it to the level of a fish market. Just when it seemed that this obstructionism was about to end and Parliament could come back to life, things were again thrown out of gear. Why? Because this time around the BJP decided to play the sordid game of oneupmanship that in this country usually borders on vendetta.

In the annals of dirty tricks that every government in this country — with the sole exception of that of Jawaharlal Nehru — has played on its opponents it is difficult to think of anything so crude (once again with the solitary exception of the St Kitts forgery) as the NDA government’s underhand attack on Mrs Sonia Gandhi. It inspired in the media a series of reports that some charges levelled against her had been sent to the CBI “for investigation”. As it happens, these are “charges” levelled by that maverick, Dr Subramaniam Swamy, President of the one-man Janata Party. The Congress reacted with predictable fury.

Surely Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee knows, even if his half-wit cohorts don’t, that there is hardly a leader in the country against whom Dr Swamy hasn’t made lurid charges. What is more remarkable, he has done so after prolonged kowtowing to the leader concerned, presumably because of his failure to get from him or her what he might have wanted. Ironically, it was almost exactly two years ago to the day that Mr Vajpayee’s previous government fell by a single vote, thanks at least partly to the same Dr Swamy. He was then full of praise for both Mrs Sonia Gandhi and Ms Jayalalitha and followed them wherever they went, rather like Mary’s lamb. And he made no bones about his hope that by their grace he would become Finance Minister in the alternative government in New Delhi. Was he then a party to the alleged activities of the two ladies he is denouncing now? More importantly, should any responsible government try to use the brainstorms and ranting of such a man as a weapon against its political opponents?

Contradictory statements by the BJP have made the situation worse. At first it was said that no investigation was being held against the Congress President and Leader of the Opposition, and that Dr Swamy’s letter had been sent to the CBI in a “routine manner” by a junior minister ‘without the Prime Minister’s knowledge”. Subsequently, the government “clarified” that Mr Vajpayee knew about the “routine reference” of the relevant file to the premier investigative agency. Add to this the intense lobbying and the unseemly tussle over the selection of the next CBI director and it becomes clear that the whole issue of Dr Swamy’s “charges” and the CBI has turned into a witches’ brew.

Nor is the deliberate delay in appointing the CBI Director because of rival pressures and pulls (the crucial post falls vacant on April 30) the only cause for concern. Far more shocking is the nonchalance with which all concerned are trying to wash their hands of the can of worms the arrest of the former chairman of the Central Board of Customs and Excise, Mr B P Verma, has opened up. The massive scale of corruption from top to bottom in the customs and excise administration that has been exposed in one aspect of this mother of all scandals. Far more alarming is the very fact that an officer who was under watch for dubious activities was appointed to the critically important post despite specific warnings of the Chief Vigilance Commissioner.

Nobody explains how such an appointment came to pass. Evidently inspired reports are appearing in the media that the Finance Minister, Mr. Yashwant Sinha, was not responsible for this curious selection, and that he was “under pressure” from the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO). There are dark hints that “caste politics” was at work.

The massacre of small investors at the stock exchanges continues despite the arrest of one or two big time crooks. What good is the SEBI chairman’s report to the Finance Minister when no inquiry has been held or is promised into the SEBI’s own culpability for the scandalous state of affairs?

On a different plane what can one say about a society and state that hypocritically pays lip service to Babasaheb Ambedkar, gives itself a holiday on his birthday but goes on heaping horrific atrocities on Harijans who now prefer to call themselves Dalits?

A brief word now about what various parties are doing to themselves. In this respect the plight of the Congress party is pathetic. It perhaps had no alternative but to play a second or rather third fiddle to Ms Jayalalitha in Tamil Nadu and Ms Mamata Benerjee in West Bengal. But did the Congress leadership have to demean itself in Kerala by surrendering to the blackmail of Mr K. Karunakaran? Doubtless, even a 1 per cent shift of votes can convert victory into defeat in that polarised state. But the way the former Chief Minister of Kerala has been placated will encourage others in that state and elsewhere equally obstreperously.

It is revealing that the main cause of Mr Karunakaran’s anger was denial of the party ticket to his daughter though his son, an MP, is being projected as the next Chief Minister of Kerala and Mr K. himself has the party ticket for the coming assembly poll. But then he alone must not be blamed for treating politics as the vehicle for promoting the interests of his kith and kin. The familial pattern is now well and truly established, and dynastic succession is but a logical extension of it.

No wonder that, on this score, there is trouble also in neighbouring Tamil Nadu where Mr Murasoli Maran has announced his “retirement from active politics” ostensibly for “reasons of health”. He was surely very ill recently and his recovery was considered a minor miracle. Even so, his announcement came only when the long-time DMK leader and Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, Mr M. Karunanidhi, made up his mind to pass on his mantle to his son with the improbable name M.K.Stalin. Mr Maran is senior to, and much more experienced than, the young man who is currently the Mayor of Chennai. Moreover, Mr Maran is also a nephew of Mr Karunanidhi. But then in the Indian milieu sons and daughters always take precedence over their cousins.

The most poignant and painful point, however, is that as a backdrop to all the messy goings-on merciless killings on a large scale are going on in the benighted state of Bihar as an integral part of the panchayat elections being held there after an interval of 23 years. Even by Bihar standards this is a strange way of celebrating democracy at the grassroots level. But the real horror is that there is not a trace of horror over it among the political class and the chatterati.

The Qasim factor in Kashmir

AFTER a long gap former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Syed Mir Qasim is in the news. He is one of the several leaders being involved in the process to find a lasting solution to the lingering Kashmir crisis. He is not in the driver’s seat, but he is one leader who can contribute immensely to the Centre’s efforts to bring normalcy to the troubled valley through the route of political dialogue.

Of all those being consulted by Mr K. C. Pant on behalf of the Central government, Mir Qasim is the most experienced player on Kashmir’s political chessboard. His just one remark has put the Hurriyat Conference leadership on the defensive. Mr Qasim is of the view that if the Hurriyat leadership is serious about establishing peace on a permanent basis, it must tame the hawks in its ranks. In fact, as he sees it, this should be done also by Pakistan as it is the hawks who spoil the show to protect their unholy interests.

Mir Qasim, who will be 80 in August, has seen Kashmir pass through different periods of trials and tribulations since it acceded to the Indian Union in 1947. An alumni of Aligarh Muslim University, he was the first Chief Minister with a rural background when he assumed office in 1972. Soon he earned the reputation of being the cleanest head of state government. At that time he enjoyed tremendous popularity which is missing today. But he is known for his courage of conviction. If given a proper role, he can serve as the most dependable bridge between the separatist leadership in Kashmir and the Centre. He has been part of the National Conference as well as the Congress and has strong secular and nationalist credentials. The Centre must make use of his rich and varied experience to untie the Kashmir knot.

Third bitter bahu

There is a proverb in an Indian language that a woman is lucky only if she gets an understanding and affectionate daughter-in-law. That was long before bride-burning and the saas being projected as the symbol of evolutionary cruelty in society. Seen in this perspective, the British monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, is uniquely unlucky. All her three daughters-in-law have given her days, weeks and months of emotional shock. Also one would-be one.

Queen Elizabeth is a happily married woman though her consort, Prince Philip, has been accused of ogling at other women. But it is not enough to charge him with being unfaithful to his wife and to that extent the marriage seems to be nearly perfect. But the trend stops here. Every other member of the royal family is afflicted with the infidelity disease, often of a terminal nature.

Her younger sister and at one time the second claimant to the crown, Princess Margaret, had a very popular love relationship with a divorced pilot, Peter Townsend but the palace overruled her desire to marry him. So she plumped for a photographer only to divorce him a few years later. She had a torrid affair with a younger man and the holidays she spent in a West Indian resort are part of the recent royal-battering story.

Princess Anne, the only daughter of Queen Elizabeth, went through the second marriage and is trying to keep her royal image by appearing in many meaningless social functions.

Now start her immediate travails. Her eldest son, Prince of Wales Charles, divorced his hugely popular wife Diana and admitted that his passions were focused on one Camilla Park-Bowles, who left her husband to be free to marry the Prince. These days they are seen often together and the grapevine has it that they will marry soon.

Diana, Princess of Wales, had a torrid affair with James Hewitt, the man lent by the army to teach her horse riding and he made a pile by writing a book about his sexual relationship. Also, her chambermaid came out with her own account of what went on in her bedroom even before her divorce. Of course, her later dalliance with the son of an Egyptian millionaire owner of a fashionable department store is part of recent history and personal tragedy. She died in a car crash with him in Paris.

Then there is the more notorious Fergie, Sarah Ferguson, wife of Prince Andrew, her second son. An American, she believed in free sex and, even while married to a high profile royal, had a well-published love life with an American businessman. When the tabloids came out with all the lurid photographs and details, she had to leave the royal lodging and financial support. Nobody knows what she is doing now.

Prince Andrew could have done worse. At one time he was dating Kitty Koo, a soft porn film star who loved to advertise her tangle with the Prince. The whole thing stank so much the Queen had to intervene to put an end to it.

The latest are the unkindly words of Countess Wissex, wife of the Queen’s third son, Edward. She was earlier Sophie Rhy-Jones, a very successful public relations executive and her husband has been a successful television producer. She fell victim to a common weakness — to talk big before a stranger. A modern woman, she berated the royalty, the political leadership and everyone else. Her business partner was more expansive and used more colourful description.

The Queen has ordered her to quit her job more as a punishment for what her partner said than for what she has said. British tabloids, which thrive in such sensational trivia, are having a roaring time. Poor Queen, her cup of woe is overflowing.

SPACE SAILBOAT

SOMETIME next autumn, the Pasadena-based Planetary Society intends to launch the world’s first space sailboat. The first privately-funded space mission will be the fruition of an 80-year-old dream: to create a spaceship that can travel through vast distances in space without carrying fuel.

The 88-pound craft will be launched on a converted Russian ICBM rocket from a nuclear submarine in the Barents Sea. At about 850 miles up it will unfurl eight 50-feet tall aluminised Mylar sails each 33 feet across at its widest point.

The idea is Einstein’s E = MC2: Light is energy. If it hits a sail, it transfers energy into momentum. We’re not talking solar wind, just light photons hitting a reflective sail surface and nudging the craft slowly into motion. The belief is that in unresisting space, speed can gradually increase to hundreds of thousands of miles per hour. Rotating sails steer the craft. NASA, the Russians and the Europeans are interested. Second Age of Sail, anyone? Guardian

CHILDREN WITHOUT IDENTITIES

An increase in overseas adoptions has provoked demands to prevent a new generation of “children without identities”- young people deprived of contact with their cultures. It is the first time in seven years that the number of inter-country adoptions in Australia has significantly increased, according to the ‘Adoptions Australia’ report brought out by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare.

The report found that there were 566 adoptions last year and 301 of these were of overseas-born children. Most of these children came from South Korea (26 per cent) followed by Ethiopia (15 per cent), India (12 per cent) and Romania (12 per cent). Twentyseven-year old Lynelle, who was adopted from Vietnam in 1973 said many adopted children often felt “a big, black hole” when it came to cultural identity.

According to a new research by the Benevolent Society’s Post Adoption Resource Centre on a sample of 30 overseas adoptees, now adults, most of these people experienced racism, bullying, isolation and discrimination. Most of the adoptees interviewed had anglicised names, little information about their birth, parents and little or no contact with their original culture. WFS

BREAST PUMP

The latest competitor to the Wonderbra is the new “Ultrabra Airotic” bra, described as utilising a “twin airbag” system. Women can increase their apparent bust size by up to two cups by literally pumping up their bras, and thus their cleavage.

The 28-pound ($40) bra has already been ordered by 100,000 women, says British maker Gossard. Company spokeswoman Christine Morgan says not all women “want to have huge breasts throughout the day, but do want to have them in the evening. The pumps can fit in your handbag so if you want to deflate during the day, or in the evening you can go to the loo and get your pump.” (PA)

What unity in the diversity at Americas’ summit?
Ajit Jain

CAN you imagine the physical dissimilarity between the 34 countries of the Americas which are trying to form a free trade area that would encompass 800 million people!

On the one side are the USA, Canada, Brazil and Mexico with a population of some 27 million to 30 million. On the other side are island nations like St Kitts with a total population of 45,000, Dominica with 77,600, Grenada with 107,200 people and St Lucia with 153,600.

Leaders of these enormously dissimilar countries will sit as equals in Quebec City for three days starting Friday to create a free trade area in the hemisphere that they argue would help their respective economies, create jobs, bring technology, increase education and thus overall prosperity for their peoples.

Of these 34 countries, 17 are Spanish-speaking, 14 are English-speaking — Canada has two official languages of English and French, one Portuguese-speaking — Brazil, one Dutch-speaking — Surinam and one French-speaking — Haiti.

Literacy in these countries varies between the lowest of 45 per cent in Haiti, 55 per cent in Guatemala, 57 per cent in Nicaragua to 97 per cent in the USA and Canada. Their per capita income ranges from a mere $ 300 in Haiti to $27,500 in the USA.

Imagine this disparity and how then the Free Trade Areas of the Americas (FTAA) agreement would be able to bridge this kind of disparity in the income of nations that are trying to forge this alliance, not to speak of the mountains of disparity between people in each nation.

These 34 leaders would be all male except for Panama’s President Mireya Moscoso. She would be the only female leader in Quebec City. How would women’s group react to this?

The male-dominated hemispheric political leadership society would have amongst them the former Catholic priest Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the former businessmen, the economists, the former military dictator and Guatemalan President Alfonso Portillo who has reportedly acknowledged killing two rival law professors in 1962 which he says was in is self-defence.

Peru’s former President Alberto Fujimori was in the news since 1992 when he seized extraordinary powers with the backing of the army, completely tamed the Congress and the courts as his lackeys and “ushered in eight years of nightmare and thuggery,” as the Globe and Mail newspaper reported as a part of its analysis of the summit. Fugimori, now in disgrace, is in self-exile.

Then there is Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, a burly looking former university professor, who through his manipulations has crippled his opponents and reformed the Congress and the courts. He wants his 24 million people to believe their problems can best be solved through personal appeals to the President.

These diverse leaders, with diverse backgrounds and interests, and diverse problems in their respective countries, will huddle together behind closed doors, protected by a steel wire fence that is three metres high and 3.8 km long. Some 6,000 policemen will be protecting them with many of them trained sharpshooters, who would be sitting on the rooftop of surrounding buildings watching movements on close circuit TV cameras.

A parallel People’s Summit will also run in Quebec City which is expected to be attended by 10,000 participants, opponents of FTAA, representing 700 groups, ranging from Greenpeace to the Raging Grannies, from all over North and South America. This summit has varied topics for discussion ranging from women and globalisation to the environment and the state’s role in the fight against poverty.

Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien, the host of the official Summit of Americas, said he’s not very concerned about the threat from 25,000 anti-FTAA demonstrators who are descending on the streets of Quebec City as they would be there just to have fun.

“People say to themselves that they have a chance to protest. They train for that... how to resist, how to make trouble,” Chretien said, adding that he regretted the fact that tight security would prevent the fenced-in leaders from mingling with supporters. IANS

75 YEARS AGO

Procession passed off peacefully

The Id passed off without any untoward incident. The district authorities had taken every possible precaution by strengthening the police guards in some quarters, and by taking out a squadron of infantry through the city. An aeroplane was hovering round the city this morning. The Tanzim procession, which had been so much talk of during the last two days, quietly passed through a portion of the city, and was headed by Dr Kitchlew and some other Tanzim leaders. The Tanzim volunteers were singing songs. In the afternoon Tanzim Dangals or wrestling matches were held outside the city.

Having faith in divine justice 
Kartar Singh Duggal

IT had been decided that India would be partitioned. The dividing line was to be drawn somewhere in Punjab in the west, and Bengal in the east.

Sitting in my office at All India Radio, Lahore, it occurred to me that while Bengal had two radio stations at Calcutta and Dhaka, Punjab had only one at Lahore. If Lahore were to become of Pakistan, Punjab in independent India would be left without a radio station. It was almost the end of July. I, hastened to contact Sardar Swaran Singh, a minister in the State Government and explained to him my concern. He understood the problem and asked me to draft a letter to Sardar Vallabbhai Patel who was the Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting in the Interim Government. The letter to Sardar Patel was duly sent.

Then came the Partition. Transferred and posted at the Delhi Station of All India Radio, I was busy first with the production of Independence Day programmes and then broadcasts directed at the refugees who were pouring in like an avalanche. I remained glued to my desk from early morning till late in the night. Refugees, old and young, men and women, came with their harrowing tales of woe. They had to be listened to with patience and their messages broadcast to their near and dear ones from whom they had been separated in the holocaust.

Engrossed in this assignment, I forgot the proposal for a radio station in Punjab.

Towards the middle of September, 1947, when I was attending the daily programme meeting, I happened to ask about a colleague whom I had not seen for some days. I was told that he had been sent to Jalandhar to set up a radio station for the newly created East Punjab state.

The news struck me like bullet.

I had visualised and initiated the proposal and when it came to be sanctioned, another officer of my cadre, who was junior to me in all respects, was deputed to implement it. What hurt me most was that it was kept a secret. Working in the same office, on the same premises, I was not taken into confidence.

It was plain injustice. “Is this the freedom for which we had fought”, I asked myself. Tears of helplessness would well up in my eyes and go dry. There was none I could look upto for justice. I had none other than God. By the afternoon I was running a temperature. I did not have a wink of sleep that night and kept tossing in the bed all the while.

But the refugees’ messages had to be attended to.

The next morning I got ready for office. “If God is just, no injustice will be done to me,” I told myself. On my way to Broadcasting House, I left the bus near Bangla Sahib Gurdwara to offer my prayers as was my routine. As I bowed before the Holy Book that morning, tears came in my eyes which I could control with considerable effort.

Hardly had I taken my seat in the office, when the Director-General’s orderly came in and said that the D.G. wished to see me urgently.

“Come in Duggal,” as he saw me, the Director-General left his seat and came forward to shake hands with me. And then sitting with me on the sofa explained to me over a cup of tea:

“The person sent to Jalandhar would not do. He has made a mess. You have to leave early morning tomorrow. Luckily the Punjab Governor, Mr C.M. Trivedi, is in town. His plane will carry you. The roads and trains cannot be relied upon these days. We must have a radio station within a week if not earlier. These are the Minister’s orders. Sardar Patel is wild at the delay.”

I could not believe my ears.

SPIRITUAL NUGGETS

Endurance, patience, self control, integrity, purity, restraint of the senses, wisdom, learning, truth, absence of anger, are the ten signs of virtue.

***

Harmlessness, truth, integrity, purity, control of the senses, saith Manu, is the summarised law for all the four castes.

***

If one sense of all the senses leaks, then understanding leaks through it, as water from the leg of the water-skin.

— Manu Smriti, VI, 92; X.63; II.94; II.99

***

In the process of self realisation, Evil desires are automatically consumed and destroyed.

— Rigveda, 2.30.5

***

Dispel the deep, dark curtain

Of ignorance, avidya, non-existence.

—Samaveda, 319.

***

I now realise the presence of the

Almighty Lord, the universal entity,

the one who is self-illuminated and radiant like the sun.

He is beyond all darkness; with this realisation now I fear not even death.

I proclaim, this is the path, the only path to salvation,

to the goal of life - the eternal bliss.

— Yajurveda, 31.18.

Speak for pleasure, speak with measure, speak with grammars richest treasure, Not too much, and with reflection — Deeds will follow word's direction.

— The Panchatantra, Book III