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May 22, 2001, Chandigarh, India   
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It’s not just Manipur Enron endgame Students are not for thrashing |
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The
right to information movement
Gentlemen officers
Quest for new game plans
Can too much exercise kill?
Plague in Amritsar
Oh man, that car is really smoking!
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It’s not just Manipur WHEN Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee became Prime Minister for the first time he coined the highly evocative expression "the dharma of coalition politics". Technically he is into his third term as Prime Minister simply because on the earlier occasions neither the Bharatiya Janata Party nor its allies ever really took Mr Vajpayee's mantra for working a coalition government seriously. A combination of events in the past few weeks indicate that no coalition partner has learnt any lessons from the mistakes of the past. The developments in Manipur were part of the same malaise with which the Prime Minister has to deal with literally sickening regularity for keeping the NDA experiment going. The Samata Party-BJP standoff on the issue of power-sharing was built into the fragile arrangement. The fall of the three-month-old Samata Party-led coalition was entirely expected. It may have helped the combine to grab power. But grabbing power and providing a stable government are not the two sides of the same coin. Manipur needs a stable government and not an opportunistic alliance because of the problem of insurgency in the entire North-East. In a larger context even the nation needs a government that works and not one which survives each day hoping that tomorrow would usher in the era of stability. If Mr Vajpayee were to make an honest assessment of his terms in office, he would realise that no coalition partner ever allowed him the opportunity to practise the "dharma of coalition politics". It is not that Mr Vajpayee does not understand the difference between "dharma" and "samjhauta". In fact, he is a victim of the politics of blackmail. At the end of the day when the final stock-taking is done of the performance and non-performance of the coalition the BJP may wake up to the fact that its partners got more out of the arrangement than it did. The fact of the matter is that for the non-BJP combine jumping on to the BJP bandwagon was a zero sum game in which it had little to lose and much to gain. First, the BJP lost Rajasthan and Delhi to the Congress, which has now emerged as the most successful regional party. Before the votes for the four states and a Union Territory, which recently went to polls, could even be cast Mr Vajpayee said that the verdict would not be a referendum on the performance of his government. But the verdict did reveal the BJP's fast receding political hairline in the states in which it never had begun to show signs of striking roots. OK, West Bengal was lost because of the betrayal by Ms Mamata Banerjee. What about Tamil Nadu? And Assam? The BJP will continue to be the single largest loser in the future as well if it continues to practise the "politics of compromise" at the cost of the "dharma of coalition politics". |
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Enron endgame THE Dabhol Power Company has served a preliminary termination notice on Maharashtra State Electricity Board asserting its right to revoke the power purchase agreement. The notice, which will take effect after 180 days, can signal one of the three intentions. It can be the endgame; it can be a threat to force the board and the state government to buy power even at an exorbitant rate or it may be a gesture to appease its lenders like General Electric and Bechtal Corporation which have been pressing for a tough response. In retaliation, the board has slapped a penalty of Rs 400 crore, accusing the company of failing to maintain plant load factor at 95 per cent on two different days. It is not clear how this matters when it is not drawing even a unit of power; obviously the thinking is that a contract is a contract and has to be respected. It may all be shadowboxing, but shows how bitter is the relation between the two. The power from DPC is prohibitively costly, something like Rs 6 a unit and there is no way the board can accept the power – about 1100 MW – sell it at its rates and still stay solvent. Nor can DPC find a bulk buyer to which it can directly sell it. At one time the company was ready to divert electricity to a central agency, although the contract has bound the board to be the exclusive buyer. Legal experts believe that the notice is illegal since an arbitration process is already on. The reference is to the Madhav Godbole committee which the state government has set up to negotiate with DPC and reach an amicable settlement. The second meeting will take place tomorrow. But it is an exaggeration to call this arbitration. Mr Godbole is also the author of a report which has called for the scrapping of the power purchase agreement and the delinking of the natural gas terminal to reduce cost. Not unexpectedly the company has rejected the findings. This locks both the committee and DPC in an awkward embrace. If DPC winds up its operations it will cost the Centre slightly more than Rs 2800 crore to discharge its liability under the counter guarantee. It will also saddle the state government and the MSEB with another Rs 17,000 crore or more. With this kind of money the country could have constructed a super power plant with a capacity of 4000 MW. Again, the MSEB has cancelled the agreement with Reliance-proposed Patalganga project and Mittals-promoted Bhadrawati thermal plant. It appears that this move is to strengthen the legal basis of scrapping the power purchase agreement. This is a strange shadow-boxing in which there has been some blood-shedding. |
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Students are not for thrashing THE inhuman thrashing of a 10-year-old by a Manimajra school Principal because "she lost temper" is the latest in the series of cruelties children are subjected to in school. That corporal punishment is widespread in schools is evident from two other recent incidents: the Principal and a teacher of a Kotkapura school have been held guilty of locking up a group of students for many hours and a teacher of a convent school in Chandigarh has been suspended for hitting in the head a student who was still recovering from the previously sustained head injuries. Many minor forms of punishment such as making students stand up in the sun with their hands raised are hardly taken notice of either by the parents or the media. Insulting a student even with an insensitive remark can bruise his or her psyche for ever. Such insults have driven quite a few students to suicide. Inability to handle problematic behaviour reflects poorly on the system. Lending a sympathetic ear to a child's grouses can quite often help. Harmless pranks or occasional noises are only expected from children. The school authorities need to bear in mind the tremendous pressure exerted on the students. Often unrealistic parental expectations require a child to "outperform" his or her classmates. Fat syllabuses, heavy homework and unkind school working hours in extreme weather take their toll. The teachers too make harsh demands on the student regardless of his/her interest or talent. How can a student learn in a school where the environment is hostile or from a teacher who plays a terrorist? Let children enjoy their childhood too, while grooming them to play a meaningful role in society. |
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The
right to information movement TRAVEL in any direction through the arid, undulating land around Beawar in south Rajasthan; it’s like traversing a campaign map marked with historic revolutionary battles. The names of many villages and small towns huddled in the folds of the Aravallis have become familiar. They recall the scenes of a very different kind of engagement, but which will equally go down in history. Here local villagers have successfully confronted and exposed misrule non-violently, starting a movement that has spread through the nation. The weapon they have used is information. This is the cradle of India’s unique grassroots right to information revolution. Not all the names mark confrontations. The earlier names recall the preparatory phase, when a small band of social activists, some from far away, joining to form the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS), won local confidence by living in the area and identifying themselves with local causes. Like the small town of Bhim where the MKSS set up a fair price shop to bring down prices. Or Lutyana where Shankar Singh, the bard of the campaign, was born. Or Devdoongri, where Aruna Roy, once of the IAS, lives in a mud hut and with her small team has charted the course of the movement for over a decade. The scale of corruption unearthed, even in a small corner of Rajasthan, is mind-boggling. It shows why rural India remains poverty-stricken in spite of the thousands of crores supposed to be spent on development over the years. The cutting edge of the right to information movement is the jan sunwai (public hearing) where villagers assemble to testify whether the public works detailed in official bills and vouchers secured by them actually exist. Right to information gains force by being linked with right to livelihood. The occasion itself is an impressive demonstration of direct local democracy, with officials invited to be present. At the latest jan sunwai in Janawad (Rajsamand district) on April 3, an audience of about 3,000, most of them women in traditional multi-coloured “ohrnis”, sat through the day while the panchayat records were examined. Villager after villager got up to testify that some of the roads and buildings paid for had not been built, including a non-existence school, or the same building had been paid for more than once. Some were half-finished. Among the witnesses was the new woman sarpanch, who sat veiled through the day after confessing that she signed whatever was put before her. Securing access to the records had taken more than a year and to prevent some being copied, the local gram sewak had secured a stay from the Jodhpur High Court. Yet the outcome of the examination conducted at the jan sunwai was astounding. Out of the bills and vouchers detailing expenditure of Rs 65 lakh, no less than Rs 45 lakh was found to be misappropriated. The dirt could no longer be hidden. Nor could the delaying tactics of local officials. Less than a week later, three local officials involved were arrested. Thus Janawad gained a significant place in right to information history: for the first time a jan sunwai had forced the administration to take action against erring officials. The scandal had been substantiated not by hidden cameras but in full public view. The amount misappropriated in one panchayat provided an insight into the extent of corruption in development, exceeding the scope for corruption in defence. The Tehelka revelations pale into insignificance. Kot Kirana (December 1994), in Pali district, may go down as the scene of the first jan sunwai. This was before the State Government was forced to authorise access to panchayat records, but documents like muster rolls (listing names of people paid to work on a project) and payments for an unfinished patwar ghar were available. And the familiar spectacle of villagers standing up to cite false names in muster rolls and identify ghost buildings began. An FIR was filed against the junior engineer and gram sewak who had signed the false documents, but there is no record of action taken. A former Deputy Speaker of the Rajasthan Assembly camped there to prevent villagers from testifying but failed. Three more jan sunwais were held that winter to coincide with the approach of panchayat elections in Bhim, Vijaypura, Jawaja and Thana leading to similar exposures. The readiness of local villagers to stand up and give evidence against the local power structure, often in the face of those responsible for corruption, strengthened the movement and forced the government to consider the demand for right to information. The way was now clear to press the demand for official recognition of right to information. Beawar was the scene of a major engagement in April, 1996. A revealing jan sunwai was followed by a 40-day dharna in which the activists were fed and sheltered by the public. Milk and vegetables were contributed daily. Another 40-day dharna was organised in Jaipur. The demand got publicity throughout the country and could no longer be ignored. The Rajasthan Government responded reluctantly. Chief Minister Shekhawat announced that people had the right to demand and receive details of expenditure on development works in their villages, but the procedures prescribed were discouraging. Time would show that many local officials felt free to ignore or circumvent transparency orders. At Kishangarh, in Ajmer district, 60 applications were made for information, and a bandh threatened, before some was released. No action was taken against the local officials. Even so, official recognition of the right to information made it easier to insist on access to panchayat records. Some of the achievements at later jan sunwais were striking. In Kukarkheda panchayat, sarpanch Basanti Devi returned Rs 50,000 from the one lakh shown to be misappropriated at a jan sunwai, with the rest to be returned in two instalments in two months. In Surajpura, the sarpanch promised to repay fraud amounting to Rs 5 lakh. In Rawatmal the amount to be repaid was Rs 1.50 lakh. The impact of the grassroots campaign was soon felt. Three months after the Beawar jan sunwai and dharna in April, 1996, politicians, jurists, former bureaucrats, academics and others joined in demanding right to information legislation at a two-day conference in the chamber of the Press Council of India in New Delhi. A committee headed by Justice P.B. Sawant was authorised to draft a model Bill. The message spread to state capitals and Right to Information Bills were passed by six state legislatures. The Bills varied in quality, with loopholes purposely provided in some to evade answering inconvenient inquiries. A Central Bill in New Delhi has gone through several drafts and is currently before a parliamentary committee. Though encouraged by the local response, in 1996 nobody at Beawar could have hoped that the right to information movement would spread so fast. Its success was patent when the fifth anniversary was celebrated in the town soon after the epoch-making Janawad jan sunwai. Nearly 500 participants registered, with groups coming from distant states. Citizens contributed local hospitality; one even handed over the keys of his house to serve as headquarters. A local youth group took time off from visiting poor patients in hospitals to welcome visitors at the railway station. A hela group of 50 singers and drummers from Sawai Madhupur enthralled the gathering with an hour’s choral chronicle of the movement updated to Janawad. Nothing could have established the unique popular roots of India’s right to information movement more firmly. |
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Gentlemen officers THE Generals of the fifties were pucca Bara Sahibs. And Major General E. Habibullah, Commandant, National Defence Academy, was a Bara amongst Baras. His penchant for moulding his band of semi-literate ruffians into gentlemen was only surpassed by his love for sailing and horses — in reverse order! Digging in a heel into the horse’s flank was the biggest mistake one could ever make in his presence. His anger turned to rage, and in the process lost his voice as the riding stick shook penitently in his hand. The riding instructors — tall lean as a bean, and fiercely moustached with piercing eyes knew their drill well for such erring cadets. “Quit STIRR...UPPS, Tie up RAI...NNS. Ainter Valley of Death”. An enclosed bamboo circle with a dozen two feet jumps, it had only one entrance which served as the exit too for the horse — with or without the rider! End result, the medical officer in the sickbay become a qualified orthopaedic! The only one who got away was Roy Chowdhury. Five feet nothing on joining the Academy, he remained the same much to the consternation of the army doctor’s “Growth Forecast”! He too dug in his heels, but before Sultan Singh, his riding instructor could react, the horse took offence and charged for the stables. The entry was low and Chow took a flying leap at the low ceiling. That’s where Sultan Singh found him gently swaying. Sailing for the old man was not a hobby, it was an obsession. For him monsoons, with gusty winds and choppy waters differentiated the boys from the men. I cannot forget the day when Chacko, another pongo (army chap) was the cox and I his crew in an Eagle, a very light and fast sailing boat. It was late July and the elements —a light drizzle accompanied by heavy squalls tested our mettle in the massive expanse of the Kharakvasla Lake. On a hard port tack (sailing against the wind), the main sail had to be handled with the sensitivity of a violin. A slight give when the squall hit and pull the moment it passed. That day Chacko wasn’t at his musical best and on one occasion didn’t give in to the mounting crescendo, and before the conductor could cover his lapse, the mainsail touched water. I shouted, “Chacko jump. We are capsizing.” Chacko shouted back, “I cannot swim.” He went under with the boat over him. My second shout evicted a hollow sound from within. A dive under and the rat was evicted. It immediately started whistling loudly for the rescue boat. Any guess who was in the motor boat? Coming back to our remoulding as gentlemen! A galaxy of personalities from the fields of art and science, ambassadors and statesmen descended upon their quarry as guest speakers. Sonal Man Singh enthralled us with the nuances of Indian classical dance, while Prithvi Raj Kapoor gave a gripping portrayal of the “Pathan” with awesome intensity. Pt Jawaharlal Nehru with his profound wisdom thought he would first put his young audience at ease before embarking on his long monologue. We had come attired in our crisp white mess dress for the dinner night in Monkey Jackets, cummerbunds, et al. After dinner, he asked us all to come closer and sit down in front of the main table where he sat. Those days there were no mod wherewithals like terrycots. It was simple pure cotton, gleaming white and stiff with starch. It crackled as we sat to attention. An hour-long enlightenment on the founder of the Nation — Mahatma Gandhi followed, whilst the stiff collars of our monkey jackets ensured the neck too remained at attention. Pt Nehru marvelled at his attentive audience and remarked too. Finally it was time for the General with his usual aplomb to thank the guest speaker. He concluded by saying. “Please join me in thanking the Prime Minister.” We all waited with abated breath, and sure enough his initial clap went through empty air. The left hand missed the right! We more than made up for it with a standing ovation, but not before an odd squeak of amusement escaped a cadet’s lip. The cavalcade of VIPs departed and the Academy Cadet Adjutant took centre stage and remarked, “Very funny. Huh! Double to your squadrons and report back in 10 minutes in Field Service Marching Order with big packs... for my soliloquy.” |
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Quest for new game plans PRIME Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee has been the first to realise the crippling impact of the assembly elections. While others were waiting for the outcome this master strategist, whom his RSS tormentors call “negative” Chanakya, had already pressed into operation a set of damage control measures. It began with a surprise four-hour luncheon meeting with L.K. Advani. He now needed the help of this hitherto sidelined leader to break the tightening political siege all around. This was a week before the election. Now every political party is in the process of reassessing its role in view of the rapidly changing political mood. Even minor political players have begun their own strategy sessions. With an array of 11 Chief Ministers, the Congress is in a mood to strike back in a big way. However, it also finds itself stuck up on many crucial political and practical entanglements. All this calls for a break with the old mindset and working styles which the party finds difficult to get rid off. Its old whizkids have come up with several winning formulae to get back to power. No threat No one talks of an immediate threat to the Vajpayee government. As discussed in these columns, Vajpayee can actually improve his majority in the Lok Sabha by well-crafted defections and cooptions. His main problem stems from the party’s losing popularity as established by the election results. Three years in power hoped to enhance the acceptability of the BJP’s national leaders. In fact, the reverse has happened. On the one hand, the NDA allies stubbornly resisted any poaching into their domains, and on the other, the BJP became a victim of the former’s unpopularity. Thus contrary to the calculations, the party has got stuck up in all NDA-ruled states. There is no way of getting out of it in the near future. The collapse of the Vajpayee project has been another setback. The move to make the Prime Minister a universally acceptable figure had worked well until the 1999 elections when the NDA allies had sought Vajpayee rallies to attract anxious crowds. The BJP itself had claimed that even in states like Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, it was Vajpayee who had garnered bulk of the votes, not Karunanidhi or Chandrababu Naidu. He is no more so. Like his predecessors, the middle classes’ honeymoon with him seems to have ended. His failure to check the ever rising scandals and scams, some traceable deep into his PMO, frequent attacks from his own RSS parivar and the worsening economic condition of the poorer sections have all led to wearing off his much acclaimed teflon coat. When the perceived magic fails to work, colleagues and allies will turn less responsive. In the next stage, they will become more assertive. All his predecessors had experienced such symptoms of gradual downtrend in their stint in power. Earlier, colleagues and leaders lined up to meet him. Now one can see a reverse process. Instead of his leave-it-or-take-it attitude after the 1999 victory — at Chennai Vajpayee had publicly spurned interaction with the party and the parivar on government policies — now he has to seek Advani’s office to tame the RSS. Advani has held at least half a dozen meetings with the RSS, with Vajpayee and among all of them. Originally, the Vajpayee camp wanted to use the Jhinjauli meeting — at an RSS industrialist’s farm resort — to stage a virtual coup d’etat against Sudarshan, Thengdi and the SJM group. Initially, it looked working well. But the PM camp blames — rather thanklessly — Advani for the failure. H.V. Sheshadri too subscribes to the hardline posture. But he was roped in to give the conclave a better acceptability. Incidentally, Vajpayee gave a lunch to Sheshadri, Vidya and Madan Das Devi, the latter two belonging to the softline faction within the RSS. Narendra Modi, Krishnamurthy, etc are also for compromise on the issue of RSS’ economic and religious nationalism. Their brief from Vajpayee was to persuade the RSS leadership to take a formal decision to dump their hardline economic agenda. Peace with parivar Once such a formal decision is taken, campaign by the BMS “rogue” could also be suppressed. This will enable Vajpayee to have a peaceful border with the parivar. As part of the peace offer, he had offered some quid pro quo like putting one of their nominees in PMO and some fringe economic policy concessions. An astute negotiator, Vajpayee had tried to sell the long-term Hindutva advantages to the RSS side. Under the new curriculum, for the first time Hindutva will get a pride of place. In 10+15 years, a new generation of ‘enlightened’ youth will pass out of the schools with a Hindutva world view. Just for this alone, his government should continue, Vajpayee pleaded with them. Govindacharya and Gurumurthy have been dumped into oblivion. Dattopant Thengdi has been isolated and K.S. Sudarshan banished to the Nagpur barracks. From such brinkmanship is emerging a major anti-Vajpayee offensive by the ‘rogue’ outfits like the BMS and SJM and the VHP. If the government goes ahead with announcing its decisions without consulting the parivar, the outfits of the latter will from now on be free to protest against them in public. This will cause serious problems for Vajpayee. Amidst this confrontation come the unmistakable signs of a fierce minority backlash in states. Electoral evidence suggests that the minorities — both Muslim and Christian — have en bloc deserted the DMK despite Karunanidhi’s secular credentials. Mamata too suffered a similar fate, possibly due to the Left campaign that she would return to the NDA after the polls. Why the backlash now so strong? Secular allies First, during the past three years the NDA’s secular allies failed to stop the attacks on churches and nuns and communal riots. Second, Hinduisation of culture, education and text books under Murli Manohar Joshi. The educated sections of the minorities have spread the scare that will soon be forced to follow the Hindu religious texts to get a degree or certificate. This time the strategic voting by the minorities took place without any overt anger. This is going to be a serious worry for essentially secular parties like the TDP. The Congress faces a different kind of problems. Its jettisoning of the Pachmarhi line on alliances has paid it rich dividends. Tieups with the Congress offshots like the TMC and Mamata are not a problem. Now compulsions of competitive politics have made it compromise with a convicted person and those like PMK of Tamil Nadu. But the Congress finds it the only way to counter the BJP. The Congress, like others, has been left to choose between communalism and the corrupt. Hence with this election, every political formation seems to have opted for the diluted political thesis of preserving one’s own ethical chastity without bothering too much about the allies’ moral qualities. The Congress is the most widely present party. Yet it cannot form a government at the Centre without alliances. Some in the Congress are talking of a two-theatre strategy — fighting elections alone in its exclusive strongholds and forging tieups in alliance zones. For the latter, it needs considerable flexibility. While Mulayam Singh Yadav remains a slippery client, the electoral dialectics do not favour tieups with dominant provincial parties like the TDP and AGP. The Congress will find it hard to tackle such dilemmas. |
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Can too much exercise kill? THERE was no warning. As far as anyone knew, he was fit and healthy, as any regular gym-user in California would expect to be. Then Douglas Adams, just 49, cult author of the Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, collapsed and died during a workout on Friday. His fans are devastated, but what happened to Adams will send a frisson of fear down the spine of many a middle-aged treadmill-pounder who has never read his work. Did Adams overdo it? Was he pushing his body beyond its limits until his heart gave way? Unlikely. It could probably just as easily have happened in the street or in a bar. In the UK, 4,000 men of around his age die of a heart attack every year and the cause is not strenuous exercise - it is the steady damage they have been doing to their coronary arteries since they were in their teens. These arteries, which are only the diameter of drinking straws, are part of the heart’s own blood supply. Because they are narrower than those that convey blood around the body, they are more prone to get blocked with fatty deposits, called atheroma. Smoking, drinking and eating fatty foods all contribute. Unfortunately, the damage done in the wild days of youth cannot be undone, although healthy living and steady aerobic exercise can stop things getting worse. “Once it is clogged, it is clogged,” says Alan Maryon Davis, a public health doctor who works with the UK’s National Heart Forum. “There is some evidence you can reduce it, but not much.” All gyms give their customers medical checks, but although they can pick up risk signs, such as high blood pressure and high cholesterol levels, they cannot detect coronary heart disease. Adams’ blood pressure was said to be slightly high just days before he died, but that could mean nothing. “Blood pressure can go up just by virtue of going to see the doctor - it’s known as white coat hypertension,” says Dr Maryon Davis. If a GP is suspicious, he will refer the patient to a specialist for an electro-cardiogram (ECG), where the pumping of blood around the body is measured during exercise. “There are warning symptoms, such as sickness, a feeling of heaviness in the stomach like indigestion and dizziness, but in some cases a heart attack is the first sign that a person has coronary heart disease,” says Belinda Linden, a cardiac nurse with the British Heart Foundation. And half of them are fatal. There are people with a hereditary risk of heart disease and people who may have congenital damage that could cause them trouble in later life, but they are pretty rare among the huge numbers who suffer heart attacks. Some 74,000 men die of a heart attack each year in the UK and only 148 are under 35. There are 1,000 deaths among the 35 to 44 age group, nearly 4,000 between the ages of 45 and 54. The vast bulk are among older men, whose coronary arteries have become hopelessly clogged. Regular, steady aerobic exercise, such as walking or swimming or jogging, are safe, he says. So is the gym, if you are following a programme that has begun gently and steadily progressed to something a bit more demanding. But for a middle-aged man belatedly getting fit, launching into weight training is asking for trouble. Isometric exercise — where you are straining against resistance — puts pressure on the blood vessels and forces the heart to pump harder. For a man with furred-up coronary arteries, this is potential heart-attack stuff. So avoid heavy weights, he says, but sort out your lifestyle and get the habit of daily exercise. So many don’t. “You see all those people standing on the escalators - even going down. Use the opportunity to get into shape and keep your arterial system healthy.” |
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Oh man, that car is really smoking! Hey dude, check out my hemp mobile! Australian researchers believe that within a decade, cars could be made of hemp — the cannabis plant — as backyards and dumps overflow with rusty metal hulks and vehicle makers turn to biodegradable materials for car bodies. Alan Crosky of the University of New South Wales’ Material Science and Engineering School, said on Monday that hemp had turned out to be the most viable material, beating coconuts and banana trees in preliminary studies. “Disposal of old cars is a growing problem. It is only a matter of time before the expense of disposal becomes the owner’s responsibility and the consumer is forced to pay the full life-cycle costs of their car,” Crosky said. “Because this will increase the cost of cars, developing an environmentally friendly material that can be used to make the bodies of cars is now a viable option,” he said. Crosky told Reuters he had begun researching hemp to find ways of making sure it does not become brittle and could protect the passengers of a vehicle during an accident. Hemp is widely used in making textiles and rope. Research was at the preliminary stage but Crosky believed it would not be too long before hemp cars became a reality.
Reuters
Inhaled insulin working safely An inhaled form of insulin has been able to control blood sugar levels in diabetics for two years without harming their lung functions, researchers said on Sunday. “The inhaled insulin continues to work. It continues to maintain glycemic control, at least up to the two-year point we have studied,” lead researcher Dr. William Cefalu of the University of Vermont College of Medicine in Burlington told Reuters. Results from a two-year follow-up study of 140 patients who participated in one of three earlier mid-stage clinical trials of the inhaled insulin were presented in San Francisco at a meeting of the American Thoracic Society. The patients were treated with Exubera, a dry powder form of insulin being developed by Pfizer Inc., the largest U.S. drug maker, and Franco-German drug company Aventis SA. The insulin is absorbed into the body through an aerosol made by Inhale Therapeutic Systems Inc.. The delivery of insulin deep into the lungs may eventually allow some people with Type 1 diabetes to cut back on injecting themselves with insulin, while some people with Type 2 diabetes who take oral drugs to control their diabetes may be able to eliminate injections, Cefalu said. There are two types of diabetes — a disease in which the body does not produce or properly use insulin, a hormone that is needed to convert sugar, starches and other food into energy. In people with Type 1 diabetes, which accounts for 5-10 percent of all cases and most often occurs in children and young adults, the body does not produce any insulin and it must be injected daily for them to stay alive. In Type 2 diabetes, which accounts for 90-95 per cent of cases, the body does not make enough, or properly use, insulin. People with type 2 diabetes usually develop the disease after age 45 and they need diabetes pills or insulin shots to help their bodies use sugar, or glucose, for energy.
Reuters |
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SPIRITUAL NUGGETS All prejudices, whether of religion, race, politics or nation must be renounced, for these prejudices have caused the world's sickness. It is a grave malady which, unless arrested, is capable of causing the destruction of the whole human race. Every ruinous war, with its terrible bloodshed and misery, has been caused by one or other of these prejudices. ***** If priests of religion really adored the God of love and served the Divine Light, they would teach their people to keep the chief commandment, 'To be in love and charity with all men'. But we find the contrary... Religious hatred is ever the most cruel! ***** All religions teach that we should love one another; that we should seek out our own shortcomings before we presume to condemn the faults of others, that we must not consider ourselves superior to our neighbours.... Let us therefore be humble, without prejudices, preferring others' good to our own! Let us never say, 'I am a believer but he is an infidel', 'I am near to God, whilst he is an outcast'.... We have no right to look upon any of our fellow-mortals as evil. ***** Concerning the prejudice of race; it is an illusion, a superstition pure and simple! For God created us all of one race. ***** God has not created men that they should destroy one another. All races, tribes, sects, sects and classes share equally in the Bounty of their Heavenly Father. ***** The lovers of mankind... are the superior men, of whatever nation, creed or colour they may be. For it is they to whom God will say these blessed words, "Well done, My good and faithful servants". In that day He will not ask, 'Are you English, French or perhaps Persian? Do you come from the East or the West?' — Abdu'l Baha, Paris Talks, November 13, 1912. |
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