The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

EDITORIALS

Move beyond rhetoric

Rhetoric is the bread and butter of most politicians. Take away from them this tool for making public speeches and they may actually end up doing what they ought to be doing for solving the myriad problems the country faces today. As far as the media is concerned, not reporting the rhetorical statements of politicians should not be counted as a miss. However, this is easier said than done when a leader of the stature of the Deputy Prime Minister makes public speeches in which he brings up the subject of global terrorism. His speech deserves both coverage and comment because what he says reflects the government's thinking at the highest level. For instance, the speech he made while inaugurating the 51st All India Police Games at Bhiwani on Thursday. Mr L. K. Advani spoke at length about the similarities between the Al-Qaida network of Osama bin Laden, the Taliban of Mullah Omar and the ISI of Pakistan. Indeed, their objective and style of functioning are identical. In the course of his speech Mr Advani appealed to the international community to treat the ISI on a par with the Al-Qaida and the Taliban because they are the "source of global terrorism". It goes without saying that an appeal to the international community is usually addressed to the USA.

The Union Home Minister's reference to the 9/11 attack and the role of the Afghanistan-based terrorist outfits left no scope for doubt that he too wanted President George W. Bush to include the name of the ISI in the list of the most dangerous global terrorist organisations. How will that help India in its own fight against the elements that planned hijacking of an Indian Airlines plane to Afghanistan, the daring attack on the country's Parliament, the infiltration in Kargil, the acts of subversion in Jammu and Kashmir and those who implement their anti-India agenda from bases in Nepal and Bangladesh? Promises have been made in the past about pursuing a proactive policy for dealing with the ISI-sponsored acts of terrorism. It is safe to presume that the policy has not been abandoned. But has it made the country less prone to terrorist attacks? All that the policy has done is give the ISI a larger-than-life image. There was a time when it was said that Pakistan cannot survive without a hate-India policy. Unhappily, the Indian leadership has fallen into the same trap of hate-mongering to cover the blatant security lapses of the government in dealing with the threat to national security with far greater efficiency than has been on display so far. Equating the ISI with the Al-Qaida or with the devil itself will not not help India wage an effective war against terrorism on its soil. President Bush followed the policy of giving every anti-American dog a bad name. But did the policy of giving a bad name help him eliminate the Al-Qaida and the Taliban? Mr Advani is seasoned politician who knows that the proof of the pudding is in the eating. Has the policy of blaming every act of terrorism on the ISI has made any difference? No. So how will equating it with the Al-Qaida help? Improved intelligence gathering and effective house-keeping should replace the tendency to blame the ISI for every security breach.

Starvation deaths

The propaganda blitzkreig indulged in by some television channels on the starvation deaths in Rajasthan may look reasonable and justifiable, considering the sheer extent and magnitude of the problem. However, amid all the hullabaloo, politicians and the media seem to have missed the wood for the trees. Facts have become the worst casualty and dissemination of information seems to be coloured and one-sided. These television channels tend to overlook some basic facts that govern the lifestyle and habits of the tribals in the state. For instance, there has been considerable coverage on their eating habits. The reports reached a crescendo after Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot himself tasted some grass the other day to prove the reports wrong. Mr Gehlot, a typical politician that he is, has taken resort to this method even at the risk of being branded as populist. A dispassionate assessment of the situation would suggest that the grass, being eaten by the tribals of the three districts of Baran, Dausa and Churu from where starvation deaths have been reported, is a staple diet. It is not poisonous, as is being claimed by some BJP politicians and others; it is an essential ingredient in the rotis prepared by the tribals, even though its nutritional value is yet to be studied by experts and is thus open to question. It is believed that ghas-ki-roti, as it is called, is a popular food among the tribals who cook it using locally grown leafy vegetables like sanwa.

The same is the case with reports of official failure. If deaths because of starvation are indeed true, officials cannot be absolved of the blame and accountability will have to be fixed on them. The dismal failure of the anti-poverty programmes, including the Drought Prone Area Programme (DPAP), in various states does point to the ineffectiveness and irresponsibility of the implementation agencies and executive authorities. But it is also true that the Supreme Court has laid down guidelines for effective storage and distribution of foodgrains. It has specifically laid emphasis on appropriate distribution networks at the field level, fixing responsibility on Deputy Commissioners at the district level and on Chief Secretaries at the state level. It is, however, not known how the system went wrong in Rajasthan. If there is absolutely no problem with distribution networks, as the officials claim to be, why do people complain of non-sanction of ration cards and foodgrains? The complaint of supply of extremely subsidised foodgrains to those not falling under the Below Poverty Line (BPL) category is widespread and needs a thorough investigation. Some of the affected families say, they haven’t got any foodgrains from the public distribution system (PDS) this year even though entries in their cards speak otherwise. Undoubtedly, something has gone wrong with the system which has become top heavy and needs to be overhauled and result-oriented. It is common for politicians to blame the state government for narrow partisan ends and particularly with elections round the corner, but there are limits of propriety and one should not lose sight of the poor human face.

Delimitation muddle

An agitation is considered successful only if it manages to paralyse life in the area of its influence. To that extent, the bandh in Kangra district on Thursday against the proposals of the Delimitation Commission has not been all that big a draw. The strike influenced only a few pockets like Baijnath and Palampur. But that does not mean that the government has been able to change the sentiments of the people. There is strong resentment indeed, which is something the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party cannot afford to see festering so close to the elections. The Chief Minister’s group has obliquely referred to the mischief played by people owing allegiance to Union Minister Shanta Kumar but the fissures go deeper than that. The feeling of stepmotherly treatment is very much there in the so-called new areas and the delimitation issue has only strengthened it. The consequences that may emerge during the forthcoming elections may not be too palatable for the ruling party. What must be causing worry among the policy planners is the fact that things are not moving very smoothly in Lahaul-Spiti either. Instead of a consensus or even a show of unity, there is an open division in the party that bodes ill for its electoral prospects.

It was convenient for the BJP to pooh-pooh the Congress stand by saying that it was trying to politicise the issue. But to add to its discomfiture, even its partner in the government, the Himachal Vikas Congress (HVC), has also jumped into the fray. Although it has not condemned the delimitation outright, it has urged the government to postpone the process till the Himachal Assembly elections scheduled for February next are completed. That is the line taken by Mr Shanta Kumar also. Since some BJP MLAs too are strongly against a few of the proposals of the panel, the Chief Minister may find the delimitation potato too hot to handle. Till now, the attempt has been to hustle the opponents into silence. But if the protests become shriller, a course correction may become necessary. In that eventuality, postponing the delimitation beyond February may become an honourable way out. Whatever the merits or demerits of the exercise may be, it is true that there is very little time to complete the process after suitably listening to the objections and claims of the people. The hilly terrain and lack of adequate means of transport make it all the more desirable. Things may crystallise after the proposed visit of BJP national secretary Arun Jaitley to the state.

New Solicitor-General

Kirti Raval

The photograph of Mr G. Mohanty, CBI spokesman, was inadvertently published along with the news item about the new Solicitor-General, Mr Kirti Raval, in the “In The News” column on this page
(November 7).

The correct picture of Mr Raval appears here. The error is regretted.

— Editor

OPINION

Why deterrence never worked
A classic case of diminishing returns
Harwant Singh

The decision of the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) presumably on the advice of the National Security Advisory Board (NASB — an unwieldy and poorly constituted body) to pull back the troops from the border has not come a day too soon. Continued deployment of troops in their battle locations had come to serve no useful purpose and was, in fact, turning into a case of diminishing returns. It is, perhaps, the time to analyse the effectiveness of our coercive diplomacy and deployment of defence forces to deter Pakistan from carrying out cross-border terrorism. How far were the objectives achieved? Was the very idea of deterrence, in the given situation, flawed? However, it may be recalled that in a lead article, “Dithering on deterrence” dated February 4, 2002, we had pointed out that “We can now fight the ‘war of lists’ of wanted personnel... and learn to live with cross-border terrorism.... We lacked resources, but more the vision and the will to create a powerful military which could put the fear of Allah into Pakistan and make it desist from continuing with proxy war against India,” which it engineered right from the eighties; starting with Punjab.

The initial decision to mobilise the defence services and their deployment for an offensive, consequent to the terrorist attack on Indian Parliament on December 13, 2001, was more a knee-jerk reaction than a part of a well thought-out and thought-through strategy . After all, India had been suffering unending cross-border terrorist attacks in J and K for close to 12 years. It was more the lack of suffering understanding of what could constitute coercive diplomacy and military deterrence and their synergy in the given circumstances that could result in a coherent and purposeful outcome. The so-called economic sanctions imposed on Pakistan, the denial of Indian airspace to civil flights, withdrawal of staff from our High Commission etc had no effect on its economy, nor was there any appreciable diplomatic fallout, nor were the operations of Pakistan Airlines seriously hampered. But a reciprocal action by that country for our civil flights denied us direct access to Kabul at a critical juncture when the future of Afghanistan was being reshaped and Indian help and presence had become essential. Though we do reach out to Kabul, but only by a circuitous route. While we removed the restrictions on Pakistani civil flights, the counter-restrictions continue for reasons to keep us as much out of the Kabul picture as possible.

The dictionary meaning of coercion implies that it must restrain by force, and consequently coercive policy must have the power to coerce. Similarly, deterrence must have the means to frighten, hinder, or prevent the opponent from doing something you do not want him to do. In simpler terms, it means that the one resorting to deterrence must have, not only the necessary wherewithal to apply a credible force, which when applied would inflict unacceptable damage on the opponent but also the essential will to do so. It must carry conviction with the one on whom deterrence is focused. In the event the desired corrections in the policies and actions etc of the opponent does not come about, consequent to the application of deterrence, then the manifestation of the application of force would undeniably surface. The entire gambit of mobilisation and deployment of Indian defence forces must be looked through the prism of these elementary features of deterrence and its application. Mere resort to rhetoric, such as, “proactive policy”, “zero tolerance,” “ruthlessly dealing with terrorists,” “Aar par ki Larrai,” etc had failed to impress Pakistan. Therefore, it had convinced itself that the Indian leadership lacked the essential will to act firmly for one, and it did not have the necessary military superiority to severely punish Pakistan. While it may not be unreasonable to assume that Pakistan banked on the international community to refrain India from attacking, it depended more on its own ability to last out well, an Indian offensive.

Nearly a decade and a half of starving of the Indian defence forces of essential funds had substantially debilitated its offensive potential. Not only was modernisation given a goby, even replacement of obsolete and obsolescent equipment could not be carried out. Building up of necessary stocks of reserves of ammunition and other war-like stores up to minimum acceptable levels had not been possible. All this could not be lost on our adversaries. The addition of 320, state of the art T-80 tanks to Pakistan’s inventory, along with a whole range of other equipment in the early 1990s, vastly improved its potential to stall a possible Indian ground offensive. On the other hand, the Indian position saw only a downward slide due to the aging of existing holdings of equipment and want of replacement of wastages due to normal wear and tear.

While the IAF, as always, enjoyed marked superiority over the PAF, the unremitting frequency with which its frontline MiG-21 aircraft have been falling out of the sky threw up a range of unhelpful signals.

The Indian Navy has long been a neglected service. To offset the Indian superiority in tanks, aircraft, ground troops etc, Pakistan depends more on their counters in way of anti-tank, anti-aircraft capabilities and firepower etc. The essential information about most armies, down to units and their equipment profiles, is available in various international publications. So Pakistan, as also we, have been aware of each other’s military capabilities.

These unfortunate ground realities could not, as some of us expected, frighten Pakistan out of its wits once the Indian deployment for an offensive was put in place. In fact, General Pervez Musharraf made bold to declare that there was balance of power in South Asia. Consequently crossborder terrorism continued unabated, with the normal fluctuation in its frequency and intensity. When the attack on the families of Indian soldiers at Kaluchack took place and the Indian cup of patience at last seemed to overflow and our offensive appeared imminent, some of us who saw on TV, the discomfiture of General Pervez Musharraf felt that, at last, the military deterrence was having the desired effect, but any right-thinking Indian too was equally perturbed at the prospects of a war.

Around that time Pakistan’s representative at the UN had talked rather irresponsibly, of the certainty of use of nuclear weapons by his country, in the event of an Indian offensive. This posturing by Pakistan in itself had brought added pressure from the USA for reigning-in the jehadi elements operating in J and K, as also a possible threat of “taking out” of Pakistan’s nuclear capability, seemed to work. Viewed from this angle, the June, 2002, speech of General Musharraf can be rationalised. As time passed and there appeared no gains from the continued deployment of the Indian defence forces and no facesaving device appeared viable, General Musharraf was constrained to remark that it was not for him to provide the same. Finally, the successful conclusion of elections in J and K provided the figleaf and the much needed escape route for withdrawal of troops.

The nuclear factor had come into play in the nineties itself, as Pakistan was known to have covert capability in this field. At least on two previous occasions, it had threatened to use nuclear weapons to thwart a possible Indian offensive and the same had, in that country’s perception, worked. Therefore, at the initial stages of troop deployment in December, 2001, the Indian concern centred on the nuclear capability of Pakistan and the prospects of use of nuclear weapons by that country were factored into Indian calculations. However, a more detailed analysis by some of the defence experts (‘Military Build-up on Indo-Pak Border’ The Tribune dated January 16, 2002) obviously appeared to have resolved the Indian dilemma and made clear the fact that Pakistan would not risk taking recourse to such an action as it would certainly result in the decimation of that country.

Once Pakistan acquired the covert nuclear capability as a hedge against the so-called Indian military superiority, it was time for this country to think afresh and recast and redefine her strategic thinking. There was the need to reorient and realign defence policies and military strategy. Instead, our political leadership and the top brass in the defence services continued to prepare for the last war and that too half heartedly. We ought to have shifted the focus of our priorities to another area, which not only met our immediate concerns but also our long-term strategic security requirements. However, we continued to think in terms of more tanks, heavy guns, self propelled guns etc. While the Arun Singh Committee was quick to grasp the need for this reorientation, the more hidebound top brass continues to display rigidity in its thinking and resistance to change.

Mobilisation of the armed forces and their move back to the barracks, consumption of fuel, compensation for crop damaged, dislocation of over a million people, etc, would perhaps work out to nearly Rs 10000 crore. Large tracts of the border have been mined. Demining of the areas could lead to more casualties and most of the mines would be unsafe for future handling and will need to be replaced. Expensive equipment exposed to the elements would have suffered deterioration. Some of the highly secret troop dispositions have been revealed. Above all, deterrence as such is less likely to work in the future. All this failed to achieve any worthwhile results.

Finally, the elections in J and K and the formation of a new government there is not likely to bring about a sea change in the situation in that state as it relates to cross-border terrorism. The developments in Pakistan, more so the emergence of MMA as a political force in the crucial provinces does not augur well for that country, but more so for peace in J and K. India has to be prepared for the long haul. While we retain, nay enhance, out capabilities to deal firmly with cross-border terrorism in J and K, there should be no aversion to entering into a comprehensive dialogue with Pakistan on all issues, even if cross-border terrorism is not completely terminated.

— The writer is a retired Lt-General.

ON RECORD

Confused political leadership hampering reforms & growth
Gaurav Choudhury
Tribune News Service

Dr Jay Dubashi has been a leading economist of his time and associated with the BJP for decades. An engineering graduate from Bombay and a doctorate from the London School of Economics, Dr Dubashi has been a core member of the economic think-tank of the party. During the Morarji Desai government, he was an adviser to the Union Minister of Industry and later became the convener of the BJP economic cell.

Today, however, he is a disappointed man and charges the BJP with belying all expectations of being a party with a difference. As a member of the team which had drafted several manifestos, including the much-hyped national agenda for governance, Dr Dubashi feels the writing is clear on the wall that the BJP will perform poorly in the 2004 general election. In a no-holds-barred interview to The Tribune in New Delhi, he talks about wide-ranging issues.

Excerpts of the interview:

Q: You have been the adviser to the BJP for quite a long time. How has your experience been?

I thought that if the party comes to power, some drastic measures will be taken. But as it turned out, this party is no different from any other party.

Q: You were a member of the original think-tank which drafted the national agenda for governance. Are you happy with the way things have evolved?

In a democracy, it is necessary to calculate the cost of reforms against the benefits that may accrue thereof. When Dr Manmohan Singh started the economic reforms process in 1991, the tempo was there initially. But after three years, the whole thing came to a halt. The Congress lost in the next general election. Why did the Congress lose if it had brought in reforms. If people were happy with reforms the Congress should have won the elections.

Q: Are you predicting that the BJP will lose the next general election?

Yes. There are many reasons for this. The BJP has not been able to impart a vision for the nation. The BJP was expected to change the whole accent of governance. It has only been interested in somehow capturing and staying in power. For any party in power it is necessary that it conveys to the people the vision that it has for the nation. The political leadership should be able to implement the manifesto. I think the BJP has failed in this aspect. There are still two years left for the general election. The party can change.

Is anybody realising what is happening in UP? The Chief Minister has put an elected MLA under arrest on charges which have not been proved. Should the party in power conduct itself in such a manner? I never really expected it from the BJP. It was supposed to be a party with some difference, some ideals and some principles. Before you set out to change the face of India, you need to set your own house in order. I somehow get the feeling that the leadership is confused. It does not really have a vision. On the other hand, a leader like Nehru was able to give a certain direction and vision to the country.

Q: The Tenth Five Year Plan has set a target of 8 per cent growth rate. Do you think the target is realisable?

I do not think it is realisable on a sustainable basis. We may have one or two years where the growth rate is 8 per cent. I do not think the growth rate can be sustained over a period of five years. We do not have the kind of capacity to sustain a very high level of growth. To sustain a certain level of growth you have to build up a certain capacity. During the last three to four years very little investment has gone into capacity building. Also, reforms need to take place in agriculture to come out of this stagnation.

Q: Which are the areas that require immediate reforms?

It is not only about reforms. I do not know why so much noise is made about reforms. I think it is more about investment than anything else. Consider the manufacturing sector for instance. Since the stock market collapsed two years ago, the industry has not picked up at all. There is very little money going into steel, cement and similar other areas. Growth cannot take place without investment and somebody has to invest - either the private sector or the public sector. In the public sector, very little investment is taking place. Instead, we are more focused on selling off public sector undertakings. The private sector is not investing due to depressed demand.

Q: Are you arguing against the PSU disinvestment programme?

Disinvestment is a very microscopic part of our economic policy. I really do not know why such a big fuss is made about disinvestment of PSUs. Even the tenth plan talks about disinvestment to the tune of Rs 78,000 crore over a five-year period. This is about Rs 16,000 crore a year. This amounts to less than 1 per cent of the total planned investment. Over the five-year period, we have planned to invest Rs 6,00,000 crore a year. Against this amount, the disinvestment receipts of Rs 16,000 crore is not even one per cent. I am not against disinvestment. But even if we had it, I do not think it justifies the fuss created around the issue.

Q: But how do you think the money for investment will be generated?

This is the basic dilemma of all developing countries. We do not have adequate capital. That is why we want foreign investors to come here. The five year plan has set a target of attracting FDI of the order of $ 8 billion a year. This translates into Rs 40,000 crore a year. If it does not come, the growth targets will be affected. More foreign investment is going to China and Malaysia because we are politically unstable.

Q: Is political instability the only reason behind inconsistent FDI inflow into India?

I would say it is one of the reasons. Foreign investors think that reforms in India are not really going on. Agriculture contributes about 25 per cent of the income generated in India. On the other hand, about 70 per cent of the total population is dependent on agriculture. Productivity in agriculture has to go up. We need structural reforms in agriculture. The average agriculture holdings are going down due to an increase in the population. Either the size of the holdings needs to be increased through cooperative farming or corporatisation of agriculture has to take place to reap the economies of scale in the farming sector.

Q: Economies of scale in agriculture can be achieved only through larger land holdings which goes against the tenets of land reforms. Are the two situations compatible?

Land reforms was necessary at the time of Independence. But the same land reforms are now coming in the way of increasing productivity in agriculture. All over the world agriculture holdings are increasing through cooperative farming or corporatisation. It is imperative to withdraw people from agriculture. We cannot have a sector which generates 25 per cent income and supports 70 per cent population. This can be done only when the manufacturing sector is growing. In India, the one basic factor that is militating against growth is poor political leadership. Our politicians always tend to take the easy way out. We need a political party or a person who has the credibility to say that certain policies are not good for the nation. Nothing will work if we do not take some drastic measures. Unfortunately, we do not have that kind of leadership.

SIGHT & SOUND

The doubting viewer
Amita Malik

I have never ceased to doubt the canny quality of Indian viewers. They have now been watching the politicians whom they voted to power performing antics much of the time, shouting at each on panels and not always using parliamentary language. They now vote accordingly. The viewer, even if not literate or “not educated” according to the standards of the snobbish elite who draw up programmes for them, can sometimes even anticipate the reactions of the media.

Take, for instance, the Ansal Plaza shootout. We had no papers on the day after because of the Divali holiday, so one cannot say the viewer was influenced by newspaper reports. The TV bulletins had not yet started analysing the event in terms of credibility. But during the same evening, after the shootout had been reported and bystanders interviewed, I started getting telephone calls from friends. “Did you watch that?” they asked, adding, “The police action looked a bit too slick, don’t you think?”

Other reactions were in the same sort of sceptical tones, going as far as saying: “Looked like a put-up job to me.’’ While one particularly doubting viewer asked: “How did the reporters reach the spot so quickly and within minutes. Had they, like the police, also known what was going to happen?” Now I am no political analyst, but when I saw the reactions along the same lines in some papers the morning after, I thought perhaps a shade too optimistically, that papers do reflect at times the reactions of the common man and woman and that they have been underestimating them for years. So, after all, we are a democracy.

But if the viewers and the papers next morning acted coolly and with individual opinions,I must confess I was appalled at the TV coverage between the studio and the outside reporter. The reporters on each channel who do outside coverage with calmness, eloquence and good factual details can be counted on the fingers of one hand. To begin with we got a bunch of excited, sometimes incoherent reporters, speaking too fast, breathlessly and repeating the same things over and over again until the more experienced reporters, some of whom had had experience in Gujarat and other trouble spots took over.

As is usual, the anchors and newscasters in the studios, mostly not experienced enough to cope, did even worse. I have yet to hear a more confused and silly set of questions to the already confused reporter on the spot. Certainly Rupali of Star News and Monisha of Zee News should not have lost their heads, spoken so fast and asked impossible questions within minutes of the event being reported. Such as: “Are they Pakistanis? ’’And ,“How did the police know they were coming there?’’ The hapless reporter had to cook up something in the absence of authentic information from the police, who were still at work and not making statements. So they should have stuck to bystander reports.

The moral of the story, for both reporters and anchors and newscasters at the studio end, is not to speak so fast in crisis situations, to talk at a reasonable speed, because they are supposed to be cool professional observers and to ask questions which can be asked at the moment based on what can be seen while the reporter should concentrate on known facts and not speculate recklessly. I think the younger bunch of reporters should get special training in outside reporting, particularly in crisis situations. And experienced reporters and anchors should always be on standby duty, Divali or no Divali ,so that channels report with objectivity and a sense of responsibility.

After the death of Priya Tendulkar, we all wondered why there is no up-dated programme of the ‘‘Rajani ’’ type on TV, which looks at corruption and sloth in everyday life.I began a search and the nearest I found to it was “Office, Office” on SabTV. The last episode, with Pankaj Kapoor being arrested falsely for murder was overdone, with too much canned laughter and rather filmi, but it had a credible base. Earlier episodes connected with bribe-taking were bettetr and redeemed by Pankaj’s acting — the rest mostly overact.

TAIL-PIECE: The West Indians are among the most civilized cricketers in the world, both on and off the field. One seldom sees them throwing tantrums. Their commentators are the same. Soft-spoken, generous, witty and never losing their cool. When everyone had started referring to Rahul Dravid as The Wall, Michael Holding gave the title elegance by referring to him as The Great Wall of India. And when Sachin scored his century in Kolkata ,he said: “Kolkata, India, the whole world is happy. And even West Indians, with half a heart.”

TRENDS & POINTERS

This ‘nose’ knows pneumonia

An electronic “nose” the size of a personal stereo can diagnose pneumonia by taking a series of brief “whiffs,” researchers report.

Dr C. William Hanson, III, a University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine lung expert, says the electronic nose is so sensitive that it can identify specific types of bacteria such as strep or staph “by making a fingerprint of the odor.”

In his pilot study, the nose was as accurate at diagnosing pneumonia as a traditional test. Hanson presented his findings at CHEST 2002, the annual meeting of the American College of Chest Physicians.

Hanson used the nose, called Cyranose and is made by Cyrano Sciences Inc to test air samples drawn from the breathing tubes of patients on ventilator support. Ventilated patients often develop at type of pneumonia called ventilator acquired pneumonia, or VAP. Usually physicians use X-rays or sputum cultures to diagnose the disease but those methods can take hours or days. UPI

Coffee lowers diabetes risk: study

Good news for coffee drinkers.

The cup that helps millions of people get started in the morning, and several more cups throughout the day, may reduce the risk of diabetes, Dutch researchers have said.

Scientists at Vrije University in Amsterdam said components in coffee seem to help the body metabolise sugar, thereby reducing the risk of diabetes, which affects 130 million people worldwide.

“This is the first study that comes up with the idea that coffee could actually be beneficial for type 2 diabetes,’’ said Rob van Dam of the university’s Department of Nutrition and Health. Whether it’s filter, cappuccino, latte or espresso, coffee contains minerals such as magnesium, potassium and other micronutrients that have health benefits. Reuters

Social groups offer richer lives

Youth who stop participating in group activities once they leave school are generally less happy than the minority who keep up activities with others, a Singapore survey has shown.

Those without group activities have fewer closer friends, fewer adult mentors they can turn to for advice and are generally less happy with life, the survey found.

The National Youth Council, which commissioned the survey, is hoping to see a rise in the number of working youths participating in groups focusing on hobbies, arts and other areas. DPA