E D I T O R I A L   P A G E

PERSPECTIVE

MIDSTREAM
NMD rabble: post-Cold War realignment pains
Rakshat Puri
AS history’s kaleidoscope turns, we seem to be witness to the process of a changing pattern in world power placement. This is perhaps the most direct political importance of US President Bush’s national missile defence (NMD) plan. When the Cold War ended with the disintegration of the Soviet Union some kind of a bemused jumble resulted. Russia emerged as a nation by and in itself. The Central Asian and some other parts of the erstwhile USSR separated to become independent territories. 

Pitfalls of poll prediction
Prem Kumar
THE recent elections to five state assemblies threw up stunning results. Media persons have surely a way with words. They did not talk about surprise this time, though some of them used the word "stunning". Among those who were stunned, apparently, included most media persons themselves. They have nobody else to blame, least of all the voters, for this shock treatment.

PROFILE

Harihar Swarup
The bold & the beautiful
THIS is the story of two women: many traits of their personality are identical but several stand out in sharp contrast. Both have emerged as powerful regional leaders, can sway masses and never say die. J. Jayalalitha and Mamata Banerjee are bold, dauntless fighters, stubborn, temperamentally mercurial, dictatorial and known for throwing tantrums. Both exercise ironlike grip over the political outfits — the AIADMK and the Trinamool Congress — they head.

DELHI DURBAR

PM gearing up for second knee surgery
PRIME MINISTER Atal Behari Vajpayee is gearing up for his second knee replacement surgery by New York-based surgeon Chittaranjan Ranawat at the Breach Candy hospital in Mumbai. He is scheduled to get admitted on June 6 for the necessary check-up and pre-operative tests which is a normality. Mr Vajpayee is expected to be there for about 10 days before getting back to base in New Delhi.

• “It is now official,” says H.K. Dua
• BJP leadership rattled
• Mahajan enthuses Malaysian Traders
• Former CBI Director jumps red

DIVERSITIES — DELHI LETTER

Humra Quraishi
Demolition eyewitness from New York
EVEN as there have been talks doing the rounds that the MS Liberhan Commission probing the Babri Masjid demolition could be prematurely disbanded with just an interim report. And even as some of those particular politicians said to have played a role in the demolition tried to give themselves a clean picture, this week 36-year-old former journalist Ruchira Gupta’s testimony came up before the Liberhan Commission.

• Other happenings
• Two national days coming up
• Ghazal girls

Reducing the power of money and muscle
G. V. Gupta

TEHELKA expose' and politicians have again started talking of electoral reforms with an air of innocence. This has been going on for ages. The argument is simple. 'We have to be corrupt because the state does not fund us for election purposes.' Of course the unstated part is that once elections are state funded, we will find some other excuse to make easy money. This argument does not apply to politicians alone. Everybody wants to be state funded on pain of one crime or the other. Only, politicians make more since they enjoy power. We live in a socialist world.

Right electoral system is of vital importance for fair representation, stability, probity and flexibility in governance in a complex fast changing modern society and has to suit its objective conditions. We have thought of 'presidential system', a fixed five year term for Parliament, electoral bar on persons against whom criminal charges have been framed, restricting the right to vote to the educated, state funding of elections etc. The Election Commission has started stricter vigil on expenditure to keep it within the ceiling, auditing the accounts of parties, farming of election code, staggering of polling to reduce booth capturing. R.V. has suggested amendment to the first past system. We no more talk of proportional representation. But nothing has worked. The last world on funding has come from Indrajit Gupta Committee as endorsed by the Law Commission. They want the creation of a corpus of about Rs 600 crore to fund the parties subject to their following the norm of internal democracy, public scrutiny of properly maintained accounts, and selection of candidates on the recommendation of district units. The Constitution Reforms Commission is also considering the matter. There is general agreement that the present system has not prevented, in fact it has encouraged, the emergence of the corrupt, criminal, greedy, valueless, fragmentary and unrepresentative mafia to take over democratic institutions. It is encouraging instability and the weaker and exploited remain under-represented. On the question of reforms, the debate on Tehelka got the issue narrowed down to the question of state funding. How have we come to this pass? What is the way out?

The process starts with selection of candidates. An all-powerful central committee makes the selection on win-ability and group loyalty of the candidate. Win-ability is assumed to depend on the resourcefulness in terms of money, dominance through caste loyalty and muscle power; in brief the capacity to buy or scare the constituent. Loyalty to the organisation, intellectual ability and record of service are marginal considerations in cosmopolitan constituencies. Freedom from taint is a weight only ceteris paribus. The will of the constituency unit is meaningless and the candidate can be a 'para-trooper'. In state-centered economy and mai-bap administration, local unit is now mainly a rag-tag of \petty favor seekers. This is because of the way our polity has developed. Electoral laws and dominant discourse have helped the process.

Pre-independence Congress, RSS and CPI developed highly centralised structures though the need for organisation of local resistance kept them democratic. Colonial tradition, partition and Constitution with repeated amendments furthered the process. State-centered planning, investment and trade control designed to favor some at the cost of the other in the name of faster development made the Central Government all powerful. Assumption of party presidency by Prime Ministers, suppression of state governments and local bodies at the drop of the hat made the party weak and local units redundant. Industrialists found supplication more beneficial than good production. Avoidance of tax was better than earning more. The trick was to somehow get politically counted at the Centre. This created all pervasive corruption.

Dominant discourse of socialism helped. The Nehru-Ambedkar model thought of reform only through strong centralised state intervention. It was easy to charm modernist English media and state funded university intellectuals. There was hardly any space for independent intellectual effort. Failure of socialism has quietly shifted the debate to issues of identity: gender, caste, religion and community. This helps in perpetuation of concentration of power with the elite of all hues. This created a large number of single-leader, caste-based parties with no internal democracy.

Representative system, though based on the party system, did not recognise its existence formally till the introduction of 10th Schedule except marginally by E. C. through the symbol allotment on ballot paper. Even the certificate of victory did not mention party affiliation for many years. Any association with whatever structure, even totalitarian, could claim to be a political party and get recognised with the prescribed vote power to claim a symbol for universal allotment to its candidates. The idea was to provide for maximum freedom of association. Formal recognition was of individual candidate only with full freedom and responsibility. However, authority to recognise a candidate for allotment of party symbol was given to any authority designated by the party. Party centralised this authority. A political party, an association of any type, even with no internal democracy but declaring its faith in socialism and secularism, had to get registered with the E. C. under new Sec 29A of P.R. Act. A candidate had to declare his affiliation at the time of nomination. On election, an independent could not join a political party and a candidate of a political party could not leave it except as part of 1/3rd of the total strength of the legislative party even if the party was not recognised for symbol allotment. Totalitarian control of a cabal or an individual has become a norm except for cadre based parties which in turn suffer from the disease of 'democratic centralism'. Constituency based structures and local association lost all relevance. Political inter-mediation was usurped by an undisciplined rag-tag keen on personal pelf and privilege. Resistance now comes through old feudal and caste associations.

Reform, therefore, has to concentrate on democratisaiton of parties and restoration of the authority of constituency level organisation to nominate the candidate and the E. C. can do it. Public funding can play supplementary role if properly directed to that level.

1. The E. C. should start with recognition of a party at legislative constituency level and on the basis of enrolment of members rather than on the basis of votes polled. A party having, say, 4% of the electorate on its rolls with each member being so for a period of 2-3 years and contributing about Rs 15/- per year should be a party recongised by the E. C. Membership should be by a verifiable declaration with right to exit to join a new party by a similar declaration.

2. The E. C. should have permanent office at that level and keep parallel record of membership. Modern technology allows so without any difficulty.

3. Party recognition should proceed on a pyramid pattern. A party having 25% constituency level recognition and 4 % membership of the total electorate of the state could be recognised at the state level with similar pattern for national level.

4. A candidate approved both by the constituency and national authority of the party should be recognised as the candidate put up by that party. Otherwise he should be treated as independent. Approval of the constituency should be by way of E. C. supervised primary for the verified members. Only recognised candidate be allotted the symbol as at present.

5. Under Sec. 29A of P. R. Act, the Commission has the discretion to put conditions for registration of the party under its general powers of supervision, direction and control. It can devise norms of internal democracy and enforce them on the parties. Some movement in this direction has already taken place and needs to be carried further. Provision for constituency level primary can be made within that. That will do away with the present need to distinguish between registered party and recognised party. A party unable to acquire or maintain state recognition should be de-registered for that state and so for the nation.

6. For a Parliamentary constituency of about 1.2 m voters, the membership with create a fund of Rs 36 lakh every five years. A candidate for the party recognised for the constituency can be given public assistance of equal amount in the form of material only. The proportion of assistance can be increased for state level parties and some more so for nationally recognised parties. But the assistance must be directly to the candidate. Open and recorded contribution should be encouraged by providing for I.Tax rebate up to certain limit to the party with a recorded reason of preference in terms of politicies or programmes.

Such a scheme with necessary fine tuning will significantly reduce the influence of money and muscle power; restore the dignity of local political worker; force constituency level compromises and reduce caste and communal fragmentation; retain incentive for national cohesion and growth of national and regional parties and at the same time provide a chance to a good independent political worker but eliminate the 'para-troopers'. There will be no bogus party membership. Local issues will get back their legitimate space. It will be a shift away from the Nehru-Ambedkar model of top-down elite. westernised modernism and will transform the object to subject of development. Single leader parties may resist it the but Congress should remember that not long ago the DCC used to be almost the final authority to nominate a candidate. Such a scheme does not require any amendment in law, retains the 10th Schedule and minimises the requirement of public funding.

NMD rabble: post-Cold War realignment pains
Rakshat Puri

AS history’s kaleidoscope turns, we seem to be witness to the process of a changing pattern in world power placement. This is perhaps the most direct political importance of US President Bush’s national missile defence (NMD) plan. When the Cold War ended with the disintegration of the Soviet Union some kind of a bemused jumble resulted. Russia emerged as a nation by and in itself. The Central Asian and some other parts of the erstwhile USSR separated to become independent territories. The rest of the world, including the USA, the European Union, China and India, gradually changed their approaches and attitude to the new dispensation in Moscow as it moved towards consolidation through the tenures of Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin to the term of present incumbent Vladimir Putin. Nevertheless, the Cold War mindset seemed to continue to dominate policy.

The immediate significance of NMD relates to this. Disregarding for the present its political merits or demerits, the US plan—estimated to cost some $100-200 billion—signals a modification in the Cold War mindset. Bush spelt out his global security agenda in an address at the US National Defence University in Washington, in the course of which he said: “We need a new framework that allows us to build missile defences to counter the different threats in today’s world.” He indicated in his address that in Washington’s revised threat perception, the prime danger was no longer from Russia. The situation no longer coincided with the familiar “balance of terror” logic. The threat came today from a few small states that had acquired a small number of missiles and for whom, in Bush’s words, “terror and blackmail are a way of life.” Indeed, the fact seems to be that missile build-ups by blackmailing and terror-exporting states are introducing imbalance, instability and insecurity, primarily in Asia, and that, most of all perhaps, in India’s neighbourhood.

In this process, Bush has conveyed categorically that the situation makes irrelevant the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. This reportedly sent alarm waves through Russia. But the Russian leadership has not reacted in any kind of decisive rage, such as evident in the reaction of China. India, according to defence specialists here, has been formulating its position on NMD ever since, in the time of Bill Clinton, the USA began to move towards a new strategy as envisaged in national missile defence. One specialist, Brahma Chellaney, implicitly censures those, consequently, who have criticised the Vajpayee government’s positive response to the Bush plan—“its positive reaction to Bush’s announcement, thus, can hardly be described as impulsive or hasty.” Incidentally, reports say Bush would, under the NMD plan, reduce the US nuclear arsenal from 7,500 to 2,000 weapons. Russia is expected to follow suit, eventually.

Apart from what Bush has said in justification of NMD—that it is intended to counter and control the few small states which possess a few missiles and are given to terror and blackmail—the US defence plan signifies a leap into the future. It appears to spell out the fact that from strategic defence at sea, on land and in the air, the race has begun for strategic dominance in outer space. Technologies related to futuristic outer-space-conquest, and tactical manoeuvring for outer-space military bases and infrastructure, will characterise defence preparedness in the twenty-first century. We are moving inexorably and inevitably in the direction of wars conducted not only on earth and the atmosphere but also in outer space. If and when a major war breaks out, it may not be a kind of war that mankind knows. It is not certain that this indeed is the way in which Bush’s NMD drive is perceived generally. But it is interesting to note the reaction in some of the regions that have voiced concern or approval, and the flurry of high-level visits and exchanges it has occasioned.

There is obviously unease in Russia. The unease has increased with Bush’s almost blunt indication that the ABM has become irrelevant and that it will be scrapped. But mixed with Russian unease there seems also to be some effort at a rational appreciation of the changed circumstances. Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov evidently returned home from Delhi reassured that the warming of relations between India and the USA would not affect the close relations between New Delhi and Moscow. If demonstration of this were needed, it should be available in the manner in which Russia was extended facilities, and utilised them, at Chandipur-on-Sea to test its OSA-AK surface-to-air missile—and not on a commercial basis. The talks that took place between the Russian and Indian sides during Ivanov’s visit may not have wholly reassured Moscow. But they do seem to have modified Moscow’s initial alarm. Subsequent reports indicate that Russia did not thereafter reject entirely the NMD concept. The expectation was that Washington would offer, in due course, to discuss with Moscow international arms control for a fresh agreement in place of the ABM Treaty.

Meanwhile, on the eve of Igor Ivanov’s visit, the US National Security Adviser, Ms Condoleezza Rice, telephoned Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh, not only to say that the USA now looked on India as friend and partner, but also to inform him that Bush had decided to send a personal envoy to Delhi to discuss NMD. The envoy was US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, whose visit Washington is said to have considered very successful. The Indian response was said to be free of the nervousness evident in the European reaction. Indian commentators indicated that Delhi’s response was mostly positive because, among other things, (i) it considered enhanced missile defence as inevitable in the circumstances that were developing, in which a new framework for security and stability was imperative; (ii) it was convinced that NMD would affect primarily countries whose nuclear policy was based on strategies of offence rather than defence; and (iii) it believed that NMD would render the CTBT relatively unimportant. Later this month the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Henry H. Shelton, is expected to visit Delhi to work on “a closer relationship” between the two countries at the military level. MEA Secretary Chokila Iyer has been visiting Washington for consultations.

Meanwhile, also on more or less the eve of Igor Ivanov’s Delhi visit, Chinese Foreign Affairs Minister Tang Jiaxuan was in Moscow, to prepare for the visit to Russia in July of Chinese President Jiang Zemin. Jiang will be signing a new treaty of Sino-Russian friendship during his visit. Russian President Vladimir Putin, welcoming Tang, dwelt on “the vigorously developing relations” between the two countries and growing trade between them. Among other things, while in Moscow, Tang was reported ruling out yet again a strategic Chinese-Russian-Indian triangular association. Shortly after, Chinese Prime Minister Zhu Rongji was on a visit to Pakistan, as part of a tour of certain South Asian countries. At Islamabad, military ruler Pervez Musharraf dutifully echoed Beijing to declare Pakistan’s opposition to NMD, starting speculation about China’s attempting to organise an anti-US axis, among countries including Myanmar, North Korea, Pakistan, etc, for “dissuading” Washington from the NMD plan. On May 3 Beijing had already stated officially its view, that “destroying” the ABM Treaty would “spark a new round of arms race, which will be unfavourable to world peace, development and stability.” This is not likely to be the last word from China—or other capitals—on Bush’s NMD plan.

A Chinese envoy is reportedly expected in Delhi to discuss the NMD issue among other things. Also, reports say, Beijing is sending two navy ships, Harbin and Taicing, led by Rear Admiral Zhang Yan of China’s North Sea fleet, to Mumbai, to make up for Chinese absence from the International Fleet Review of last February. For its part, the Bush administration has sent Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly to reason with Beijing on the NMD issue. Kelly’s trip follows Armitage’s visits to India, Japan and South Korea. A large number of Americans are said to think it extremely important to persuade and win over China—and to make sure that Beijing is not annoyed. China has trade and investment opportunities for the USA worth a hundred billion dollars. And efforts to please China might extend, they feel, with American concessions on US arms deals with Taiwan. There is, though, also another view on the situation. Those holding this view tend to believe that once Bush’s NMD plan gets under way, Beijing will for its own sake recognise the irreversibility of the technological direction and take-off of NMD in the twenty-first century; and comprehend quietly its effect on the pattern of world-power placement. The Chinese are nothing if not realistic.

Pitfalls of poll prediction
Prem Kumar

THE recent elections to five state assemblies threw up stunning results. Media persons have surely a way with words. They did not talk about surprise this time, though some of them used the word "stunning". Among those who were stunned, apparently, included most media persons themselves. They have nobody else to blame, least of all the voters, for this shock treatment. Media people are fond of using impressive words before the elections and it often becomes difficult to justify this afterwards. Women, they are told in the textbooks of journalism, are a great subject of human interest. They would, naturally, not miss an opportunity to exploit this human interest element. The two political ladies from Tamil Nadu and West Bengal attracted the maximum attention. Both, Ms Jayalalitha and Ms Mamata Banerjee, are great fighters. The former speaks good English and must be impressive in Tamil too. Mamata is at her rhetorical best in whatever language she speaks and is bound to be better in Bengali.

The media predicted a close fight in both states. "Kante ki takkar", this is how many of them described it in good old Hindi. They had begun saying it much before the electioneering began and continued holding this position till the exit poll, that is immediately after the polling.

The election results did not reflect a close fight either in Tamil Nadu or in West Bengal. It was a landslide for Ms Jayalalitha in Tamil Nadu and a more than comfortable win for the Left Front and heart-breaking defeat for Mamata in West Bengal. The instant experts of politics, analysts of elections, media observers and commentators, will find many appropriate words to explain away the position and will search for alibis and excuses to what has happened against the predictions.

This brings us to the magic word, prediction, in elections. Prediction seems to be the in-thing in the media today. Starting with "What stars foretell" and ending with the future of nations and the globe, it is predictions all the way. As all important things in India start in the West, read the USA, it may be in order to quote from Bruce Feiler in his piece on the subject circulated through The New York Times Service, "Increasingly, stories no longer report on the past — they report on the future."

He elaborates on the point, "In effect, reporters have become what weather forecasters always were: predictors. And since predictions are often incorrect, news forecasters are now suffering the same fate as their weather colleagues. They are losing credibility and at times, becoming laughing stocks. Paradoxically, this is happening at a time when weather forecasting, enhanced by science and satellites, has grown more reliable. Since reporters have no such tools, the least credible person in the news-weather-sports triumvirate today is often the person reporting the lead story."

Talking about weather helped by science and satellites, one is reminded of a recent development only when the weather office had predicted, on a very hot day similar heat in the next five days (they were specific at least) in Delhi. The very next day, there was a duststorm and it cooled down substantially. The weatherman said it was a local phenomenon which could not be predicted and that it would last only briefly. There was a duststorm and drizzle at some places in the national capital — and it was cool again.

Back to our subject of elections, they perhaps offer the most exciting occasion for the media, assisted by experts, to make predictions. Sometimes they come true, and those who had made it never tire of reminding the people that they had said so. Very often they do not come true, not even taking into account the margin of error they predict along with the forecast. And, then, it is supposed to have been a last minute mistake by the leaders or a last-minute change of heart by the voters.

The fact is that very few predictors have their feet on the ground and their hand on the pulse of the people. This writer learnt his lesson way back in the sixties when he relied on the feedback of leaders of a political party which expected to sweep the polls to the Lok Sabha. It was swept away instead. The leaders, to be fair to them, apologised and said that they had been misled by their workers.

This writer, however, could not tell his bosses that he had been misled by the leaders who in turn had been misled by their workers. Since then this writer had been depending on the man in the street, the groups at panwalas and tea- stalls, the old men in village chaupals and women with veils working in farms. Not that the mood of the voter was judged absolutely accurately, it was nearer reality than what would have come from political leaders or experts.

Unfortunately, there is nothing much that can be done to improve the quality of predictions. The sources of information on which they are based are unreliable. The people who go about surveying the field are either too few or are inadequately equipped for that kind of work. The voters do not take them seriously or do not want to give out their mind. It is not very easy to understand the psychology of Indian voters which may vary in different contexts and regions. Those in Tamil Nadu are emotional, and those in Kerala are more calculating. The context too makes a difference. Ms Jayalalitha gets an overwhelming support because she is seen as being harassed by the opponents and is fighting back.

Mamata had it good as a minister and she was not fighting back any oppressors. This is just an example but there can be many more factors which need to be taken into account to assess the mood of the voter. Even then, it is just the mood you can claim to know in a general way. The moment you go into figures and percentages, you are entering uncharted and unpredictable territory. Still better, why not resist the temptation of predicting on every possible subject or at least reduce the frequency of predictions?

It may be futile to depend on the new courses of astrology being introduced in universities at the instance of the University Grants Commission. Even the opinion polls will not be of much help because of the woefully small samples. Political horse sense, even common sense, can help but not always. In any case there is enough by way of problems and issues to be dealt with rather than focus, of speculate, on the future.

The “missing” hundred million girls
A. J. Singh

IT may come as a shock to many, but it is, nevertheless, true. The greatest enemy of a girl child is not man but the educated woman, not even the uneducated woman. This fact came to light when Monica Dasgupta, a researcher, analysed the sex ratio data, now known among demographers as Khanna data from Punjab. According to it, second and subsequent girls "experience 32 per cent higher mortality than their siblings if their mothers are uneducated, but this gap jumps to 136 per cent if their mothers are educated."

And what holds true of Punjab is equally true of other North Indian states, particularly Haryana. No wonder, the latest census figures reveal a dangerously falling sex ratio in these states. For every 1,000 males, there are varying figures of females, with 870 as the lowest. It is an alarming trend but it does not seem to bother the powers-that-be. The reason: the politicians are interested only in capturing power — and all that flows from it — rather than in sociological issues. And there are not many social organisations — much less tall social leaders — who can bring about a change in the social attitude of the public against the female child.

This bias against the girl child has led to the killing of over one hundred million (ten crore) of them in a decade through various methods. Nobel laureate Amartya Sen calls these 'murdered' girls as "missing women". Many of these were killed right in the womb through induced or forced abortions or by other means as soon as they were born. In the states of Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Bihar — nicknamed as BIMARU (or sick) states — the foetus of the girl child is detected in the womb through high-tech aminocenteses test (AT). This is followed by induced abortion.

Everybody in any locality in Punjab or Haryana or elsewhere where such clandestine clinics flourish knows this but no one dare prove it. Such is the terror of the police in the public mind because the former is known to torture those very persons who come forward to give information about law breakers. In such a scenario can femals foeticide be stopped? Surely, provided the public is educated to give up out-dated and harmful social practices. The topmost among these is the heavy expense a girl's parents are expected to bear on performing the marriage of their daughter.

Nine out of ten couples told a survey team that to bring up a daughter meant setting aside at least four to five lakh rupees for performing her marriage alone. "We just can't afford it", said one couple. This couple further said that whatever money they were to spend on the girl's education or marriage eventually went to enrich the family into which she was married. On the contrary, they favoured raising sons only. Why? Because the money spent on their education comes back to the family by way of their economic contribution when they grow up. Again, the sons become the crutch for parents to lean on in their old age. On top of it, when they get married, they bring brides along with dowry.

This logic is common sense, but lop-sided even at its best. If there were no girls to wed, what would the boys do? Such a situation has begun to surface. In another 20 years, there will be too many eligible bachelors out in the marriage market chasing too few eligible girls. Such a situation can unleash a host of social evils like spurt in crime against women, abductions, forced marriages, buying and selling of women or girls and so on. The scenario is too dreadful to imagine. To avoid such a situation we need thousands upon thousands of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) countrywide to educate the public on this issue. They should hold discussions, go from door to door, talk to newly married couples and generate a movement to end the insane, practice of female foeticide.

Side by side, they should conduct on an anti-dowry campaign, targeting the vulgar rich for perpetrating this evil. They can set up marriage bureaux where marriages are performed with the barest minimum expense. Further, these NGOs should detect clandestinely-run sex-determination clinics and laboratories and force the police to get them closed. Wherever corrupt police officials are seen protecting such outfits, they should also be exposed with the help of the media.

Although the Constitution of India guarantees equal status to the sexes in every sphere of life, yet it stays only on paper. In every walk of life, the bias against women persists. One reason for this is the low status women have been given over the centuries in our male-dominated culture.

It is this discrimination that must be targeted by the NGOs. By educating the people in the urban and rural areas, they can make the people aware of this bias. The NGOs can also force the government to create new opportunities for the females in every sphere of life. These NGOs can help end pay discrimination in the unorganised sector of the economy or in private firms against women. All this will go a long way in elevating the status of women in the Indian milieu.

The bold & the beautiful
Harihar Swarup

THIS is the story of two women: many traits of their personality are identical but several stand out in sharp contrast. Both have emerged as powerful regional leaders, can sway masses and never say die. J. Jayalalitha and Mamata Banerjee are bold, dauntless fighters, stubborn, temperamentally mercurial, dictatorial and known for throwing tantrums. Both exercise ironlike grip over the political outfits — the AIADMK and the Trinamool Congress — they head. Jayalalitha, who has come to be known as the most “corrupt” Chief Minister of India during her first tenure, lives in princely style and is known for her collection of saris and sandals. In sharp contrast, Mamata has absolutely a clean image, lived in an M.P.’s flat in Delhi even when she headed the Railway Ministry, and has a modest house in a middle class locality in Kolkata. She has acquired the reputation of a street fighter.

Why have then people given such a massive mandate to Jayalalitha in Tamil Nadu and rejected Mamata in West Bengal? While Jayalalitha has trounced her arch rival, DMK’s Karananidhi, Mamata was thrashed by the Marxists in the assembly elections. Already convicted, Jayalalitha has thrown Constitution pundits in a tizzy following her swearing-in as the Chief Minister. She was debarred from contesting elections yet sprang a surprise by securing a landslide victory for her party but can a convicted person occupy the high office? The question is bound to raise a fierce debate and possibly, the highest court of the land may decide her future.

Both Jayalalitha and Mamata belong to post-Independence generation of India, had difficult childhood, remained unmarried, underwent years of gruelling public life and were many times scorned and humiliated . The age difference between the two is seven years: The AIADMK supremo is 53 and the Trinamool Congress boss 46. In a bizarre incident 11 years back in the Tamil Nadu Assembly, Jayalalitha was ferociously attacked, her sari torn and filthy abuses hurled on her. Images of a fighter Mamata conjure up as one thinks of her; raising her plastered hand in the Lok Sabha, in hospital bed groaning with pain; dragged and roughed up by the Kolkata police and physically thrown out of the Writers Building as she staged a “dharna” in front of the then Chief Minister, Jyoti Basu’s office.

Jayalalitha avenged the humiliation heaped on her in the state assembly by wiping out the DMK lock, stock and barrel in the battle at the hustings in mid-1991. Karunanidhi was the sole party candidate who was returned and he too resigned in disgust. It was the DMK’s turn to settle score with her five years later: she was thrown out of power and the AIADMK suffered grievous setback in the elections.

Subsequently, she was implicated in several cases of graft and prosecuted in one of them. The year 2001 again proved to be turning point in Jayalalitha’s turbulent political career and her party secured a landslide victory in last week’s elections, edging out the DMK. Unpredictability and vengeance have been two hall marks of her personality but nobody knows what will be her future course of action.

When Jayalalitha began her career as a film actress at the age of 15, she had never thought that she would one day become Chief Minister but a chance meeting with the “Mughal” of Tamil films, M.G. Ramachandran, popularly known as MGR, changed the course of her life. Initially she acted in as many as 50 films along with MGR but he had other plans for her. When the charismatic leader became the powerful Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, he inducted Jayalalitha in politics and made her the Secretary of the AIADMK. She changed roles; became a politician from a film star.

Rarely profile of a leader has changed so rapidly as that of Mamata Banerjee. She raised the banner of revolt against the West Bengal Congressmen in 1997 when the plenary session of the Congress was held in Calcutta to confirm the election of Sitaram Kesri as the party President. She organised a parallel rally, near the Netaji indoor stadium, where the plenum was held to register her protest. It turned out to be a roaring success with massive turnout while the customary rally at the end of the session was comparatively a flop. Mamata had then described the Kesri Congress as “indoor Congress” and her show as “outdoor Congress” comprising “Trinamool” (grass roots) workers. Subsequently, she did make her parent organisation an “indoor Congress”. Octogenarian Kesri tried to appease Mamata by ignoring her defiance and called her as “my daughter”. She retorted by saying “Kesriji calls me his daughter in public. I don’t need a father like this old bandicoot”.

Mamata was barely 29 when Rajiv Gandhi fielded her against the CPI stalwart, Somnath Chatterjee, in the December 1984 election. Everybody thought it was a wrong selection as she was no match to so firmly entrenched a leader like Chatterjee. Mamata performed a feat by “bearding the lion in his own den”. She trounced the Marxist leader and hit country-wide headlines.

Mamata’s career is again on the crossroads. A sympathetic Sonia Gandhi telephoned her soon after the assembly results were out to boost her morale and told her that all was not lost and that she should gear up to face the challenge ahead. It is too early to say if Mamata will stage a home coming but that possibility cannot altogether be ruled out.

PM gearing up for second knee surgery

PRIME MINISTER Atal Behari Vajpayee is gearing up for his second knee replacement surgery by New York-based surgeon Chittaranjan Ranawat at the Breach Candy hospital in Mumbai. He is scheduled to get admitted on June 6 for the necessary check-up and pre-operative tests which is a normality. Mr Vajpayee is expected to be there for about 10 days before getting back to base in New Delhi.

It is apparent the Prime Minister has laid great stress on the advice of Dr Ranawat of going in for another knee replacement surgery. Dr Ranawat, who has operated upon world famous people, has struck a close rapport with the Prime Minister and is invariably a special guest at Mr Vajpayee’s Race Course road residence whenever work has brought him to this country. Interestingly, a physiotherapist now accompanies the Prime Minister on his official tours abroad these days. Needless to say for the period that Mr Vajpayee is at the Breach Candy hospital, the Prime Minister’s office will function from that premises.

“It is now official,” says H.K. Dua

Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee’s Information Adviser H.K. Dua is keenly looking forward to his new diplomatic assignment as India’s ambassador to Denmark. When contacted Mr Dua, former editor of the Times of India and the Indian Express, observed in his affable style: “I can’t say it is not official any more” and that he will take up position in Copenhagen in the first week of July.

For a fortnight next month, Mr Dua will be travelling all over the country for what has come to be described as a “Bharat Darshan.” This is a standard procedure for all ambassadorial appointees. The outgoing Joint Secretary (External Publicity) R.S. Jassal will also be on a Bharat Darshan in June before he moves to Israel as the country’s new Ambassador to the Jewish State. The rumour mill has it that Mr Dua had his eye on Holland but instead was offered Guyana in the Carribean which he politely declined. Mr Dua is already going through the paces of briefings which will intensify after his “Bharat Darshan”.

BJP leadership rattled

The BJP leadership is rattled by the outcome of the mini general elections in the form of Assembly elections held in Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Assam, Kerala and the Union Territory of Pondicherry on May 10. The party’s widely discussed strategy of breaking fresh ground in Kerala and Pondicherry has come to nought. Similarly, the saffron brigade’s gambit of riding piggy back on ousted Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi’s DMK-led NDA in Tamil Nadu and Prafulla Mahanta’s Asom Gana Parishad in Assam has also taken a severe beating.

The corruption issue or the Tehelka expose was not an issue in Tamil Nadu where the people overwhelmingly sought a change because of the simmering sympathy wave for the AIADMK supremo J. Jayalalitha. The AGP fell by the wayside because of a strong anti-incumbency factor.

The BJP’s political ideologue — the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh — is outraged at the turn of events and wants some heads to roll. Despite Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee’s efforts to keep the RSS out of harms way, the hawks are sharpening their attack while pushing Union Home Minister L.K. Advani’s candidature to take over the reigns of stewardship of the BJP-led NDA. Mr Advani on the other hand is keen that nothing should be done to precipitate matters or disturb Mr Vajpayee’s applecart.

Mahajan enthuses Malaysian Traders

Even though the chemistry between Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and his Malaysian counterpart and host Mahathir Mohammad did not really gell, Union Information and Technology Minister Pramod Mahajan won kudos and set the tone for Indo-Malaysian partnership in the private corporate sector.

Laced with subtle humour, Mr Mahajan held the captains of industry spellbound for nearly 45 minutes providing an overview about India’s philosophy, politics, democracy and available business opportunities. Speaking extempore, Mr Mahajan succeeded in a large measure in getting the point across that India is the destination for investment.

Though hardly anyone in Malaysia had heard of Mr Mahajan, his interface with Malaysian business leaders added a new dimension to India emerging as an economic power to reckon with in the not so distant future. Many of the businessmen at the Putra World Trade centre in Kuala Lumpur felt that India had a potential Prime Minister in Mr Mahajan. If word got around about the views of Malaysian businessmen, Mr Mahajan might well be in trouble in his own party — the BJP.

Former CBI Director jumps red

Often in a rush, even law enforcers turn law violators as happened on Thursday night when former CBI Director Joginder Singh’s chauffeurdriven car jump the red traffic light possibly to reach in time for a live chat show at the studio of a private TV channel in Noida. Travelling in a Maruti Esteem, Mr Joginder Singh, who in his time was known to be a stickler for rules, now in post retirement blues appeared ready to break the same rules which he once enforced.

(Contributed by TRR, Satish Mishra and Girja Shankar Kaura)

Demolition eyewitness from New York
Humra Quraishi

EVEN as there have been talks doing the rounds that the MS Liberhan Commission probing the Babri Masjid demolition could be prematurely disbanded with just an interim report. And even as some of those particular politicians said to have played a role in the demolition tried to give themselves a clean picture, this week 36-year-old former journalist Ruchira Gupta’s testimony came up before the Liberhan Commission. Her’s could be termed an extremely crucial testimony — not only coming at this crucial juncture but because of the fact that Gupta had been an eyewitness to the demolition drama. Then working as the political correspondent for the Business India magazine she had covered the entire Rath Yatra and was actually present at the site when the demolition started. “Two domes fell in front of me but before I could see more I was physically abused and molested by a band of kar sevaks and dragged outside... .” Before I queried her on her testimony, I first asked the reasons for her responding to the summons to come down here all the way from New York (where she now works with one of the UN agencies) to testify before the Liberhan Commission . “I think as a citizen of this country it was my duty to speak the truth at any cost, it was important to tell the commission exactly what all I saw and heard that particular day... I know a lot of friends had been discouraging me, saying ‘kyon apna sar okhal mein de rahi ho’ , but I was absolutely sure...”

And now that she is over with the testimony does she feel any change in the attitude of the people and she is quick to say “I feel like a ‘achhut kanya’.... wherever I am going about in Delhi most people have started avoiding me, even friends are keeping a distance but as I said earlier the truth has to be spoken at any cost and the lies of some of the so-called leaders had to be exposed. In fact, I have a tremendous faith in the judiciary of this country and I feel that something will definitely come up out of this commission’s findings”.

Ruchira testified for the entire of last Wednesday before the Commission but space constraints come in the way of giving all the details of what she spoke but here are some of her comments: “There were definitely anti-Muslim slogans raised . And when I had pointed out that their shops and houses were being set on fire Mr L.K. Advani replied that Muslims are burning their own homes to get compensation! There was a mood of jubilation as the destruction began and I could see Uma Bharti hugging Murli Manohar Joshi... sweets were being distributed... two domes fell in front of me but before I could witness any more a group of kar sevkas started molesting me, pinching my private parts and some of them were all prepared to kill me amidst slogans of “Musalmaan, musalmaan hai”. Nobody, not a single one of these so-called political leaders came to my rescue and it is only when another kar sevak recognised me, (as I had earlier interviewed him) and he told the others that I was a journalist, that I was let off ! What all I heard and saw that day has left a deep impression ,each sentence is etched and I feel memories of that day would always haunt me...” says this old former journalist who is also known for the award winning film that she had earlier made on the child /girl trafficking going on at the Indo-Nepalese borders

Other happenings

The scene’s dull here. Pack -up time for the well-to-do and also for those well connected, to move towards the continent. And though there have been slight murmurs of discontentment in certain circles of the large bureaucratic delegation led by I&B Minister Sushma Swaraj for the Cannes Film Festival, but then, like all murmurs, everything inevitably settles down here. In the sense one distraction takes over the next. And now the bureaucracy is rife with talks about who the new Cabinet Secretary would be, with TRS Prasad’s term coming to an end, with his retirement in July.

Unfortunately, even in these days of the instant and the automatic, it is not always the case that the senior-most will automatically be the next incumbent, as closeness to the political leadership of the day seems as one of those necessary musts . Then, there are talks that there could be some further changes in the PMO itself (H.K. Dua, former editor and Press Adviser to the Prime Minister, has been posted as our Ambassador to Denmark and there are talks that Brajesh Misra would get governorship — though no new bifurcations are on !)

Two national days coming up

If I am not mistaken both the countries — The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and Lebanon —share the same date for their independence — May 25. And the Ambassador of Jordan to India, Hisham Muhaisen is hosting a reception on the day itself, whereas the Ambassador of Lebanon to India Mr Jean Daniel is hosting a dinner the very next day. “Though Lebanon obtained independence from Israel on May 25 but I am hosting this dinner a day later because the Jordanian National day function stands arranged.....”

Ghazal girls

Last week heard Mannu Kohli rendering one ghazal after another at the Habitat Centre and now this weekend is Anita Singhvi’s ghazal recital at the IIC.