E D I T O R I A L   P A G E

PERSPECTIVE

Gulf war may turn messy
Kiran Krishan
AN ancient predator rules over the American presidential seal—the Roman imperial eagle. Perhaps driven by its atavistic urges, the predator is now poised over West Asia, with bared talons, to snatch Iraq. Is Iraq ripe for picking? How and when would it happen? Who will stand in the US way? Will the moment of reckoning go away?

Will Saddam really risk a fight?
Ed Vulliamy
POLITICAL leaders are preparing their peoples for war. Mighty military machines are ready for action, as thousands of troops take up positions near the borders of Iraq. The bitterness of the rhetoric between Washington and Baghdad suggests war is inevitable, probably imminent. But whether that is true depends on calculations still being made by two men, Presidents George Bush and Saddam Hussein.

Of regular & contract teachers
Virendra Kumar
I fondly recall and reflect upon the experience that I had in the early 1950s while being part of the guru-shishya parampara — the tradition of the teacher-taught relationship in the system of gurukul education. In this tradition, the teacher enjoyed the fullest freedom of academic independence.

PROFILE

Apt choice for Phalke award
Harihar Swarup
YASH Chopra is known as India’s most successful director of commercial films and has acquired a unique position in filmdom. His unique position is attributed to his 40-year-long stint as director. Careers of most directors of popular Hindi movies rarely last more than a decade. None of his generation has demonstrated such creative and box-office staying power.

DELHI DURBAR

Would you like to work for ‘P’ Company?
IT is common knowledge that D Company refers to the vast underworld don’s empire of Dawood Ibrahim. An interesting message is making the rounds on the e-mail circuit which inquires from the viewer whether he would like to work in a company of over 500 employees. Before you wonder which company is being talked about here, let us give you a clue: you can call it ‘the P Company’.

• FM’s intervention
• Tehelka’s fallout
• It is police, after all
• Singing Minister

Future belongs to the printed book
Aruti Nayar
IT was his love for books that took Ashok Chopra, the lad from Shimla, to journalism and then into publishing. For the Chief Executive of Harper Collins Publishers, India and the Publisher and Executive Director of Books Today and India Today Book Club, confesses to being a poor student at the St. Edwards school, Shimla but with an all-consuming passion for books.

DIVERSITIES — DELHI LETTER

Ways of resisting...
Humra Quraishi
MONDAY evening saw the opening of the exhibition at Rabindra Bhavan , which has been curated by Amrita Shergil’s nephew Vivan Sundaram and is part of SAHMAT’s series of “Ways of Resisting —1992 - 2002”. Space constraints stare in the face, so it’s difficult for me to go into details, but let us quickly fit in what Sundaram has to say : “It has artworks, photographs, videos and archival material that represent ways of resisting the rise of fundamentalist and fascist forces.

• Bhatt and more

PERSPECTIVE

Gulf war may turn messy
Kiran Krishan

AN ancient predator rules over the American presidential seal—the Roman imperial eagle. Perhaps driven by its atavistic urges, the predator is now poised over West Asia, with bared talons, to snatch Iraq. Is Iraq ripe for picking? How and when would it happen? Who will stand in the US way? Will the moment of reckoning go away?

On Sunday, December 15, Iraq complained to the United Nations against the US and Britain for waging an undeclared war by air strikes and daily violations of Iraqi airspace.

It is ironical that the appeal came at a stage when invasion of Iraq by US led forces is almost certain and the institution approached for redress is itself teetering on the brink of irrelevance. Menacing signals are emanating from America. Primed by their leadership, US citizens want their war with Iraq—if only to exorcise the 9/11demons—real or imaginary!

In an article The Capital Makes Up Its Mind in The New York Times (Dec 12), Timothy Garton Ash writes: “Washington is at war. Washington is probably going to war. … People in Europe and the world beyond need to wake up to … realities.” Proof notwithstanding, Iraq has been pronounced a uniquely sinful nation in popular imagination and pronounced guilty of somehow colluding with the perpetrators of 9/11.

France, backed by Russia, did put up a spirited struggle against American designs in the UN Security Council. China, India and Germany have also made their opposition known to any action, which does not have the UN approval.

The USA on its part has made it clear that it does not consider such approval necessary.

The arrogance of the American administration is rooted in the reality of America’s brute military and economic strength and one-way dependence of the western democracies and Japan on the USA for their security. The UN has been reduced to a scarecrow, especially after the 1999 NATO campaign against Slobodan Milosevic in Yugoslavia.

If it comes to a show down, it is unlikely that opposition in the Security Council or outside will translate to a meaningful military coalition of nations to restrain America. The American administration knows this only too well

What form will American intervention take? It will depend on US aim(s)? If ouster of Saddam Hussein is the aim, as is being made out, operations are likely to follow a restricted pattern than if the objective is the restructuring of the polity and politics of Iraq and use it as a springboard for modifying the regional political architecture. America is yet to fully articulate its intentions but appears to have made up its mind on war, the UN inspections for WMD notwithstanding.

The war is already on, for in the words of Hobbes: “… ‘war’ consisteth not in battle only, or the act of fighting; but in a tract of time wherein the will to contend by battle is sufficiently known….” Iraqi 12,000 page weapons declaration is already being rubbished as incomplete, with gaps and disappointing.

Iraq and its unfortunate ruler are at the receiving end of a very visible and high decibel world-media-backed propaganda war aimed at public opinion in the home country, associates and neutral states.

Seeds of dissension have been sown in the Kurds in the north and Shias in the south. Aerial punishment is being meted out to selected targets for many months now. Forces, aircraft and ships are being positioned for the eventual assault

The USA has already brandished the nuclear card. President Bush has given license to the CIA to hunt down and kill certain terrorists. Whether Saddam Hussein figures on this list is not known.

The US administration has so far managed to convey an image of invincibility despite lack of support from its erstwhile clients like Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt.

What if Saddam gives up without a contest? Unlikely, but possible. Will he earn a reprieve? Wouldn’t the American public feel cheated of their war! What If the Iraqi president digs in his heels.

After its unfortunate experience and humiliation in Vietnam in the 60s, the American military has been studying and experimenting with various models of waging direct and indirect war and almost perfected the technique of a high-tech war without heavy involvement of the US ground forces.

The celebrated Air Land battle doctrine was practised against Iraq in the 1991 Gulf War. Prior to that, indirect war was fought successfully in Afghanistan by funnelling funds and weapons to local levies through a regional surrogate—Pakistan.

The Somalia intervention at the behest of the UN stands out as a minor unsuccessful blip as it exposed the soft US underbelly—its inability to take casualties.

The lessons have been well assimilated. In the Yugoslav campaign, President Milosevic was humbled through a high-tech aerial campaign using standoff precision-guided munitions (PGMs).

Seasoned military critics were proved wrong that the war aims could not be achieved without ground forces fighting it out hard on land. This was also the time when the United Nations was shifted to the margins in world affairs though it wouldn’t be the last time.

The 2001 Afghanistan War was waged by propping up the Northern Alliance against the medieval Taliban, with all the high-tech weaponry and aerial power thrown in. American ground forces were used in a very restricted manner, in small numbers.

What model will be used this time? Will it be a repeat of the 2001 Afghanistan model with the northern Kurds and southern Shias doubling for the Northern Alliance?

The Iraqi army is no rag-tag Taliban and the local levies may get embroiled in a long drawn out battle not to America’s liking. The sledgehammer of 1991 won’t be needed. But, will it be a short swift campaign?

America’s victory in this unequal conflict is certain though the war could turn messy if Saddam decides to raise the stakes by targeting US and its allies around the world in concentrated terrorist attacks and manages to produce some of the WMD he is credited with.

Where will an American victory leave other nations—probably with reduced and conditional sovereignty—they will have to get used to the security provided by the paramount power a la the British in India in relation to the kings of yore. Whose turn will it be next?

The writer is a retired Brigadier.

Will Saddam really risk a fight?
Ed Vulliamy

POLITICAL leaders are preparing their peoples for war. Mighty military machines are ready for action, as thousands of troops take up positions near the borders of Iraq. The bitterness of the rhetoric between Washington and Baghdad suggests war is inevitable, probably imminent. But whether that is true depends on calculations still being made by two men, Presidents George Bush and Saddam Hussein.

Saddam must decide whether he really wants to fight a war he cannot win and which could — if it goes the way he and some in the US say it might — end his rule and turn his country into the dust.

Meanwhile, Bush — for all his declared yearning for peace — is said by sources in both Washington and the United Nations to be a man with his mind set: it has become politically inconceivable, say insiders, for him to face an electorate in the future with Saddam Hussein left in power.

The consequences of their decisions are potentially catastrophic: for there are now two rival accounts of how this war would play out, if it happens.

One is that Saddam’s tyranny will implode like the Afghan Taliban and collapse after minimal casualties under pressure from without and within. The other, given credence by recent remarks from Washington and Baghdad, foresees a spiral into a furnace of chemical, biological, even nuclear, weaponry. While Iraq is said to be contemplating a “scorched earth” response to invasion, the US has promised “overwhelming force” with “no options” excluded.

Saddam continues to play with fire the way he has done since becoming president of Iraq in July 1979. But now the question is: can he be mad enough to face one last, invincible enemy? Or is he a canny survivor who will take the world to the edge of war, then climb down to remain in power? Recent stonewalling of the UN suggests that Saddam is spoiling for a fight, regardless. He is quoted by his latest biographer, British journalist Con Coughlin, as recently as last August, saying: “If they come we are ready. We will fight them on the streets, from the rooftops, house to house. We will never surrender.”

In a remarkable interview on Swedish television, Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz admitted he presumed there would be a war and that Iraq would lose it. But, he insisted, Iraq would win “politically”, inasmuch as the USA would be exposed to the world as bully and aggressor.

What makes Saddam think he can fight? He inhabits a deluded, paranoid world of absolute power within the confines of its own myopic authority. He is surrounded by acolytes and hard men of the Tikrit clan, from his home town.

What would make Saddam think he had a chance? He probably thinks he can take courage from the fallout of the last Gulf war. In 1991, the Americans did call for an insurrection, but took a calculated decision not to back the Kurdish and Shia rebels who undertook it, expecting allied support.

It was a betrayal of which Saddam took bloody advantage, and from which he thinks he can learn a lesson this time round. In April 1991, the road south from Baghdad towards the Shia port of Basra wound through the land — and Shia sacred cities — to which Saddam laid waste, a cemetery for what his Republican Guard did to the rebels once in flight from the surrounds of the capital.

How nasty could Saddam’s and America’s war get? Most analysts expect Saddam’s army to surrender as soon as it knows it will not get shot in the back, and collapse into the centre of the country.

But the Pentagon is divided over what would happen next, and how quickly Saddam’s regime would fall. The vision of Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz is that this would take days or weeks, as opposition groups rose to welcome the invader. But generals in the army and Marines contest that view, worried that not enough emphasis is placed on “worst-case scenarios”.

Coughlin finds that “as Saddam grew older, he came to believe, as had Hitler, in providence. Just as Hitler had refused to accept the advice of his generals that the Third Reich was doomed, so Saddam refused to countenance the concept of defeat.”

The worst-case model for Baghdad would be a miniature fall of Berlin, with the Republican Guard, loyal to Saddam, fighting street for street.

Already, Saddam has mobilised the Republican Guard in key positions around the capital. He has started to obstruct runways at a cluster of air bases towards the Jordanian border, one of the places from where an invasion would come. Spy satellites have spotted similar moves at bases along the south-eastern frontier near Kuwait and around the capital.

US intelligence reports claim to know about a “scorched earth” policy of throwing whatever weapons Saddam has at the invading army, contaminating water supplies, igniting oilfields, burning food stocks and wreaking havoc among the population.

Can Saddam avoid war? There are many who believe, warily, that war can be avoided. UN Chief weapons inspector Hans Blix — along with French and Russian diplomats at the UN — think that if Saddam wants to prove that he has no nuclear programme and has destroyed his weapons of mass destruction, he can avert war and even remain in power.

The head of the nuclear branch of Blix’s inspectorate, Mohammed al-Baradei, drew a gasp from reporters at UN Headquarters when he reminded them that the “final objective” was to disarm, not depose, Saddam — as though everyone had forgotten.

One French diplomat said: “If Saddam can prove, and put a lot of visible energy into proving, that he has taken action to destroy the arsenal he had in 1998, then he has a chance to make it very hard for the Americans to attack him. But he had better be quick.”

This would mean full access for the inspectors to up to 1,000 more listed sites, said Blix, plus sites claimed by US and British intelligence to contain “evidence” of banned weapons. Blix has chastised Britain and the USA for withholding intelligence, but is expected to get what he has asked for soon.

Saddam would also need to hand over scientists for interview, maybe even outside Iraq, and documentation pertinent to the destruction of weapons.

Such a climbdown by Saddam would endorse what logic there is in his past — namely, survival at all costs. But it may be too late, even without an invasion, with the appetite of his internal opponents whetted and his own weakness finally revealed.

There is the possibility that Saddam is more or less telling the truth. That, as former inspector Scott Ritter insists, he has little or no means of fighting a war and seeks to “maintain his credibility at home by standing up to the Americans but does not want to fight them,” as one Arab source put it.

But it will be hard for Saddam to prove a negative against an American war machine committed to proving the opposite and fighting him. And in the final analysis, the decision over whether to fight or comply may not be Saddam’s to make. For all the protestations of the Bush administration, there is a widespread feeling that its mind is made up; that the men who shied from deposing Saddam last time are hell bent on reckoning with their mistake. A convergence of sources have settled on the end of January or February as the time for inevitable attack.

Many UN officials admit they are waiting to see when — not whether — the USA is going to strike. Whatever other “geopolitical and security” motives the Bush administration may have for war, “it is something to do,” said one expert.

Sources say the USA is compiling what Washington will call a litany of “material breaches” by Saddam, whatever he does. An omission here, a non-compliance there, “which, though none may necessarily constitute a casus belli alone, will together amount to one; the whole being greater than the sum of the parts,” said an official.

That being the case, Arab sources at the UN make a point they think the USA has failed to grasp: “If Saddam presumes,” said the source, “that the Americans were going to fight the war anyway whatever he did, then why would he hand over a list of his weapons to fight back with, and tell his enemy where to find them?”

By arrangement with The Guardian.

Of regular & contract teachers
Virendra Kumar

I fondly recall and reflect upon the experience that I had in the early 1950s while being part of the guru-shishya parampara — the tradition of the teacher-taught relationship in the system of gurukul education. In this tradition, the teacher enjoyed the fullest freedom of academic independence. Once he accepted a person as pupil, he designed the course, mode and duration of instruction for him. His word was supreme. It was honoured instinctively, because the teacher himself was the “living” model of all that he taught.

About two decades later, I had the privilege of studying at the University of Toronto, Canada, for my doctoral degree. Here again the teachers had the fullest academic freedom. They were free to structure the course, its duration as well as the mode of delivery relevant to the need of their students. One of my revered teachers at the law faculty — Professor Albert S. Abel — was a replica of a traditional Indian guru. Once, on being asked by a visitor what subject did he teach, his spontaneous reply was: Well, really I do not teach ‘subjects’; I teach students.” His proximity with his students was all-pervasive. In fact, the thrust of the entire academic pursuit was to prepare students to meet challenges in life ahead creatively with commitment — the attainment of a doctoral degree was just the beginning of an end, and not an end in itself.

But why is the number of such enlightened teachers continually dwindling? Undeniably, it is true that there is something drastically wrong in our system of education. Recruitment scams that have come to light clearly reveal the unholy alliance between the “people in power” and the “de-merited dishonest contenders.” However, this dismal picture notwithstanding, the issue that I wish to raise here is, how come the same set of teachers, teaching almost the same group of students in two different sets of service conditions, perform differently, both qualitatively and quantitatively? I have vividly in view the students whom we teach law on the one hand as members of permanent faculty, and on the other as members of hired faculty.

The course for preparing students for judicial services is run by Panjab University through a part-time hired faculty. The strength of the enrolled students is about 60. Each student pays Rs 5,000 for the course extending over a period of two months. About 250 lectures are delivered during the stipulated period. The class is held in the evening. Four lectures, each of one-hour duration, are delivered in two different subjects at a time. Payment is made strictly on lecture basis at the rate of Rs 500 per lecture of two-hour duration.

As a point of contrast, in the regular six-semester law course extending over a period of three years, in each semester of four to five months, about 250 lectures of 45-minute duration are delivered. If calculated on the basis of the average salary drawn by the members of the permanent faculty, the cost per lecture would be many times more than what is given to the hired faculty on lecture-to-lecture basis. The cost per lecture would further escalate in the case of teachers with higher pay scale and lesser load of teaching work.

Having had the privilege of teaching under both the conditions of service, I have a sense to share. In regular teaching in the department, where I drew an assured monthly salary irrespective of the number of lectures delivered, there was hardly any perceived pressure of work. However, when I was invited by the university to teach the same course on lecture basis, almost to the same group of students as I taught earlier, I felt enormously pressurised both in terms of quality and quantity of the contents of my lectures. I shared this feeling with my other colleagues. Their experience was also similar. I wondered why the same set of students would become instantly “demanding” to the core in the class on lecture basis?

The differential demanding attitude of the students in my own view can be traced to the two sets of service conditions. In the case of regular permanent teaching faculty, students seem to have no option but to accept the teachers as they are. They cannot afford to be “demanding” beyond a limit because of the entrenched character of their service conditions. They are going to get their full salary irrespective of the merit of their contribution. Promotions are almost assured and time bound. In lecture-based appointments on the other hand, the requisite pressure is instantly generated on the teacher, because in case of non-performance or under-performance, students make the demand for instant change. Since replacement is possible under the terms of contract, the teacher has a very limited option: either to perform and stay, or to quit. The person managing the “show” has little option either, because the whole enterprise is result oriented and that, too, on lecture-to-lecture basis.

The distinctive feature of the much dreaded contract appointment is the element of accountability, which generates a certain degree of commitment. In the true tradition of teacher-taught relationship, accountability is an adjunct of teacher’s commitment. It is an offshoot of his sadhana. In its absence, it is invoked by imposing discipline from without. This is what is politely sought through contract appointment. Contract, thus, commits a person committed to his professed profession.

The writer, a former Professor of Law, is UGC Emeritus Fellow in Law, Panjab University, Chandigarh.

REFLECTIONS
Just one initiative will not do
Kiran Bedi

THIS time through this column I have two issues to reflect on. First, an interesting experience I had on my recent visit to Aurangabad which I think is worth sharing and emulating. The other is a news item I read in a national daily that set me thinking.

The Aurangabad experience is about a rather innovative reward ceremony. It was hosted by Mr P D Pagaria, a successful businessman and an auto dealer of the region i.e. Aurangabad and Jalgaon. He invited me to present scooters as awards to four meritorious students in a specially held function. He and his group had devised their own merit system. I am informed that Mr. Pagaria does this event every year and the presentation also is public which is very well attended by both elders as well as young persons.

For me, it was seeing and believing. The award ceremony was attended by not less that 10,000 persons, half of them were students of schools and colleges of the city. I gathered that the youth of the city wait for this annual event as it gives them an opportunity to listen to a speaker who brings with him or her ideas and inspiration. And because of Mr. Pagaria’s position each year he succeeds in getting a person whom he believes students would listen with respect and attention.

What I saw was no ordinary presentation. It was, rather, the spirit of doing business with a patriotic commitment. Each year this function is used as an occasion to inspire the youth to be worthy citizens and proud Indians.

I found the idea so simple and noble. Why can’t we have many more Pagarias? Why can’t each business house in our country similarly gift away in this manner even just one product/item from its production/storage/showroom? Something that is of interest/utility/value for the receiver.

The issues that the business community could be linked with are those with something to do with children, youth, women, elders, parents, workmen, artists, writers, public servants, services and so on. It would make “rewards or giving” powerful occasions for recognising deserving people in all walks of life, thereby harmonising society with respect and recognition for all. I see a total win-win situation for all i.e. the product that is gifted gets promoted without any extra special efforts when those deserving an award get it. The audience, i.e. spectators, gain inspiration in listening and witnessing the event. The recipient gets recognised and encouraged and further attains a status to spread motivation.

I tried to find out why Mr. Pagaria does this and where did he get his ideas from. I was informed he is son of a dedicated educationist who opened many schools. Mr Pagaria naturally carried forward what he got as a heritage or in his genes. What about those who did not have such fathers, would it mean that they cannot think this way or those who do have heritage of this kind, can conduct the way as Mr. Pagaria did? I asked myself.

The second issue that attracted me was what I read recently read of news of an inauguration of a Community Policing Resource Centre in the District Court complex in Amritsar. It was stated that this new concept would provide a single window redressal facility for various problems of the people such as: information about passport verification and arms licenses, etc.

It was also said that such centres will be equipped with computers, telephones, etc. A senior SP would oversee the one-stop service centre. The new item also indicated that such centres would be set up in all six police ranges.

Indeed a very interesting and admirable effort. But going by past experience, I hope it does not become yet another centre without any sanctioned staff and at the cost of diverting human resources from the already understaffed police stations or depleting law and order reserves.

I hope, it does not get abandoned after the originator and the innovator is transferred as it usually happens in our system. What also struck me was that before we open new centres, we should make enough efforts to strengthen the existing infrastructure.

Are we making the right efforts in making our police stations which every conman man understands and recognises as the real functioning help lines and single points for all help which the citizen comes for? What I fear is that with more such diversified centres a lay person coming to the police station now would be asked to go to another centre or station for help.

I wondered why we could not instead have computers at the police cell where the queries are answered by accessing the information available with the centre. And the existing staff —knowledgeable, sensitive and helpful while doing its multiple functions provides the required assistance. So therefore, just one will not do neither Mr. Pagaria nor Community Policing Resource Centre. We need all business centres and individuals who can contribute and all police stations to be real time help lines.

PROFILE

Apt choice for Phalke award
Harihar Swarup

YASH Chopra is known as India’s most successful director of commercial films and has acquired a unique position in filmdom. His unique position is attributed to his 40-year-long stint as director. Careers of most directors of popular Hindi movies rarely last more than a decade. None of his generation has demonstrated such creative and box-office staying power. No wonder he is acclaimed by cine lovers and the film industry as an apt selection for receiving the prestigious Dadasaheb Phalke Award, the highest honour conferred in the film industry. “Films have been my only passion in life”, he says and adds, “all my films revolve around the theme of human relations because I feel that everything might go out of fashion, but not human relations. As long as I live, I will continue making films on this unique aspect of human beings”.

The late Raj Kapoor was, perhaps, the only other director who had such a long and successful career as director as Yash Chopra, but Raj was an actor and producer also. Though known as a top director, Yash, surprisingly, never acted in a film. According to film critics, Yash’s depictions of romance are a development of Raj Kapoor’s ideas, especially the inner strength of the female character, while the men are often weak. Yash Chopra is the only director of the older brigade of filmmakers who has successfully moved with the times right from his first film — “Dhool Ka Phool” (1959) — to his latest “Dil To Paagal Hai” ( 1997). His most rewarding time began in 1989 with “Chandni”, a huge box-office success, which contained all traits of what has come to be known as “the Yash Chopra style”. Depicting the lifestyle of the super elite, with super-hit music used in songs pictured in foreign locations, romanticism and heroine-orientation have been the hallmarks of Yash style. His own favourite film, “Lamhe” gained popularity with the metropolitan elite and the overseas market.

Yash Chopra was born in 1932 in Lahore and his father was an accountant in the PWD of the British Raj in Punjab. He is the youngest of eight children of his parents — the age difference between him and his eldest brother is 30 years. He was brought up by his second brother, B.R. Chopra, who later came to be known as India’s “Movie Mughal”, having produced record-breaking TV serial —”Mahabharat”. When Yash was a child, B.R. worked as a film journalist in Lahore. While Yash went to Jalandhar in 1945 to continue his education, BR made a mark in Lahore as a film critic. Come Partition in 1947 and people were uprooted, but the Chopra family was lucky; BR migrated to Bombay weeks before the division of Punjab. A major section of the Lahore-based Punjabi film industry too moved to Bombay where BR’s talents proliferated. Yash soon joined his brother and worked with him as his assistant while their another brother became a cameraman.

BR gave the first opportunity to Yash to direct a film — “Dhool Ka Phool”, based on the story of a woman betrayed by her lover and subsequent fate of their illegitimate child. The film tries to make out that it were the parents, who were illegitimate and not the child. The film was a hit and its music remains popular even today notably the song: “Tu Hindu banega, na Musalman banega, insaan ki aulad hai, insaan banega”. There was no looking back for Yash and he produced four more films for his brother and mentor of which “Waqt” started a new trend in Indian cinema. Yash also gained valuable experience when initially he worked with I S Johar as assistant director.

Yash married quite late in life — at the age of 38 having tied the knot with Pamela Singh. Yash found a new source of strength in her who provided him not only a traditional “Punjabi” household, but helped her husband in administration, costume-making, story-writing and music. Their two sons, Aditya and Uday were born in 1971 and 1973. Yash not only became father in 1971 but founded his own set-up — Yash Raj Films. His first independently produced film, “Daag”, was a great success. It was a melodrama about a man with two wives.

“Daag” was followed by a number of classic Amitabh Bachchan movies, scripted by Salim Javed. They included “Deevar” and “Trishul”. Both movies were great hits. While “Deevar” turned as one of the most memorable Hindi films, “Trishul” has as its main ingredient a father-son conflict with an illegitimate son destroying his father for abandoning him and his mother. Once a gain, the mother is the crucial emotional force of the film. The four-decade-long career of Yash Chopra has been remarkable; doubtless, he is most apt choice for Dada Saheb Phalke Award.

DELHI DURBAR

Would you like to work for ‘P’ Company?

IT is common knowledge that D Company refers to the vast underworld don’s empire of Dawood Ibrahim. An interesting message is making the rounds on the e-mail circuit which inquires from the viewer whether he would like to work in a company of over 500 employees. Before you wonder which company is being talked about here, let us give you a clue: you can call it ‘the P Company’.

The Company, the message says, has the following statistics:

* 29 (of the employees) have been accused of spouse abuse.

* 7 have been arrested for fraud.

* 19 have more than three criminal cases pending against them.

* 117 have been charged and are being investigated for murder, rape, assault, extortion and robbery.

* 71 cannot get credit or loans due to bad credit histories.

* 21 are current defendants on various lawsuits.

* 84 have been involved in offences and have paid fines.

Could you guess which Company is being talked about here? The e-mail gives the answer: “It is a 545-member lower House of Parliament of India that works for you and me. The same group cranks out hundreds upon hundred of laws designed to keep the rest of us in line.... Can we do something about it?” It asks the viewers.

FM’s intervention

The release of Polaris chief Arun Jain and his company executive after their weeklong incarceration in Jakarta on December 20 demonstrated what diplomacy could achieve. India’s Charge d’Affaires in Jakarta, Amar Sinha, swung into action immediately after the Polaris executives were arrested by the Indonesian police on December 13. But it was the more illustrious Sinha, the External Affairs Minister, whose intervention did the trick. Yashwant Sinha telephoned his Indonesian counterpart, Hasan Wyrayuda, with the single-point agenda: immediate release of the Polaris executives. Immediately after, the Indonesian Foreign Minister wrote a sharply-worded letter to the police chief and the release of the Polaris executives followed. The Polaris case marked the fourth incident ever since Sinha became the EAM which propelled his stock up in the government: his focus on Indian neighbourhood (he visited all SAARC countries, except Pakistan); his success in the Commonwealth when he managed to convince the forum to continue to keep Pakistan out; and his recent success in South Africa where a meeting of select Non Aligned Movement foreign ministers took place to set the NAM agenda. The South African conclave was the brainstorming session to evolve a strategy to revitalise NAM. Sinha’s suggestions were accepted unanimously.

Tehelka’s fallout

The BJP is toying with the idea of playing the dalit card in the coming Assembly polls in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh in alliance with the Bahujan Samaj Party. But there is a problem. BJP’s senior dalit leader and former President, Bangaru Laxman, has been totally isolated within his own party, thanks to the Tehelka scandal. How an incident could have an adverse impact on the fate of any politician was glaringly visible at BJP President Venkaiah Naidu’s lunch, organised at his residence after the conclusion of the two-day national executive meeting. The moment Laxman entered the venue, party leaders did not throng him and even junior leaders were seen trying to keep away from him. Obviously, they wanted to take the necessary precautions as the whole place was swarming with camera teams from all major TV channels.

It is police, after all

The Polaris case showed how the police is the same virtually everywhere in the world. The Indonesian Foreign Minister wrote a tough letter instructing the Jakarta police to immediately release the Polaris executives— Arun Jain and Rajiv Malhotra. But diplomatic circles here are agog with the weird response from the Jakarta police. Though the Polaris executives were released, the police kept their passports for four days. This was the Indonesian police way of face-saving and assertion of authority.

Singing Minister

He turned a journalist just before Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee’s birthday. But on the B day, he turned a singer as well. We are talking about the PM’s Man Friday: Vijay Goel. The Minister of State in the PMO had prepared a compilation of the little-known and unknown aspects of Vajpayee’s life and “leaked” it as “special stories” to various newspapers. In fact, a national daily went to town claiming that Goel had prepared the compilation exclusively for that paper. On December 25, an impressive function was held at the India Gate lawns where, Vice-President Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, Vajpayee himself and his deputy L K Advani were also present. As the evening started becoming colourful with the well-known Bollywood music director Uttam Singh in full flow, Goel surprised everybody.

He grabbed the mike and broke into a Hindi film song “Ud ja kaale kanwa, tere muh wich khand panwa” from the blockbuster “Gadar”. Goel sang a good seven or eight lines of the song. Vajpayee and Advani were smiling. The next day Vajpayee had Uttam Singh, singers Shreya (of “Dola dola” song fame) and Hariharan. Shreya sang the “Dola dola” song from “Devdas”. Not to be left behind, Vajpayee also recited his poem “Jeevan Beet Chala” which he had written on his birthday in 1960. When everybody present praised Vajpayee the poet, he said he did not know that his own Council of Ministers had a lot of talented singers.

(Contributed by T V Lakshminarayan, Satish Misra, S Satyanarayan and Rajeev Sharma)

Future belongs to the printed book
Aruti Nayar

IT was his love for books that took Ashok Chopra, the lad from Shimla, to journalism and then into publishing. For the Chief Executive of Harper Collins Publishers, India and the Publisher and Executive Director of Books Today and India Today Book Club, confesses to being a poor student at the St. Edwards school, Shimla but with an all-consuming passion for books. This passion endures and gives him a cutting edge in the cut-throat world of publishing. A world that is marked by hype and where staying power is a test of endurance.

Recently in the city, where he began his journalistic career 25 years back, Chopra met a few wannabe writers who brought their manuscripts to him. And in an industry where publishers are known to shortchange authors, Chopra goes the whole hog to launch a writer’s book. “Mine was the first-ever column on books in the country and it was syndicated in 14 newspapers. Now I am taking a break because one does reach saturation point,” he says before talking about another first—the first book club in India that he started and which now has a readership of 14,20,000 members.

According to him, despite the focus on authors writing in English and the astronomical advances being given to writers and the media hype that accompanies the launch of each new book, we Indians are not a nation of book lovers. “We may spend Rs. 4,000 on a pair of Nike shoes without a thought but even Rs.400 for books seems a waste of money,” says Chopra. According to him, this apathy towards books stems from the fact that “for Indians loneliness and solitude are synonymous. We rarely spend time alone and, as a consequence, think or reflect.” Perhaps that is why, according to a survey by the Book Council of India, an average Indian reads only 14 pages in an year as compared to 70 pages read by an individual in the U.K. So even if people buy books to be “with it” and as a status symbol, they do not really read them!

Chopra rues the fact that when he joined the profession 25 years back, the average print run of a book was 2,000 copies and that is exactly what it remains even today. As far as the future goes, it belongs to the printed book. Neither computer books nor gimmicks such as books accompanied by audio cassettes have the staying power that a book has. “Books have been able to defy the death sentence despite massive increase in costs of basic inputs.”

After all, a book is not merely a commodity because it denotes an entire world of ideas. That is also why it can not be marketed the way a consumer durable is. Whatever is good will sell but it is not necessary that whatever seels will be good. Talking about his approach to publishing, Chopra is of the view that in publishing “each book is an industry by itself.” Thus the need to promote each author in a distinctive manner.

So if it is a red carpet for Shobha De at one launch, it is a kathak recital to mark the release of Uma Vasudev’s book and a panel discussion on the state of the nation on the launch of T.N. Seshan’s book. A favourite is the recent The Guru of Joy on Sri Sri Ravishankar. To the question that how much that is being published actually endures, Chopra is of the view that one-book wonders exist the world over and the Indian literary scene is no exception. There are new authors waiting to be tapped. However, he maintains “About 90 per cent of the publishing in the world has a life between butter and yoghurt.” Of the books published by him, 80 per cent are commissioned, 10 per cent are from the manuscripts received by them and remaining 10 per cent are reprints.

Chopra calls the veteran writer Khushwant Singh his godfather and mentor who has always encouraged him and who has the honesty very few Indians demonstrate. Anna Karenina remains an all-time favourite, a book he keeps going back to.

However, as far as writing a book himself goes, Chopra feels he neither has the will power or determination nor the grasp over the language to be able to write one. Known to be a perfectionist, he scrupulously revises each manuscript at least four times before it is finally published. To distress, since he is a “slave of the clock”, it is extensive travelling or off to watch a wild ass in the jungles of Kenya or lions at Gir.

DIVERSITIES — DELHI LETTER

Ways of resisting...
Humra Quraishi

MONDAY evening saw the opening of the exhibition at Rabindra Bhavan , which has been curated by Amrita Shergil’s nephew Vivan Sundaram and is part of SAHMAT’s series of “Ways of Resisting —1992 - 2002”. Space constraints stare in the face, so it’s difficult for me to go into details, but let us quickly fit in what Sundaram has to say : “It has artworks, photographs, videos and archival material that represent ways of resisting the rise of fundamentalist and fascist forces. Many of the works assembled in the project will have been part of political activism since the 1990s — of artists who have worked with collectives to confront the forces of regression. Several other works will have the longer-term agenda of developing a critical language that reflects and critiques the historical situation: The distortion of democratic and secular values, and the parodying of these values by the Right-wing ruling coalition. There are multimedia installations and sculpture that present political allegories to understand the present. The artists are Rumanna Hussain, Nalini Malani, N. N. Rimzon, Navjot Altaf, Sheba Chhachhi, Jehangir Jani, Pushpamala N. Walter d’Souza, Probir Gupta, Enas M. J. Vir Munshi, Tejal Shah .... There are works by painters who question the easy appropriation of the Indian tradition (of its myths and symbols) by the distorting ideology of Hindutva and who thereby reclaim an iconography that speaks about a creatively plural and syncretic culture.....This will be complemented by the work of painters who speak in a more urban/contemporary vocabulary of secularism.

The documentary section reflects upon the long-term changes that the ruling ideology is effecting and also about the consequences of an ideological mindset that valorises (male) aggression and justifies violence against already marginalised groups and communities in society.... Relatedly, there will be a continuous screening of video documentaries and thematized narratives by Madhushree Dutta, Sohoni Ghosh, Gopal Menon , Anand Patwardhan, Gauhar Raza, Saba Devan, Rahul Roy, Teesta Setelvad, Lalit Vachani, Suma Jossan and Virendra Saini.

One aspect stood out rather too blatantly that Monday evening — going by today’s general trend of saner elements lying low key or not making their presence felt — the people who came on the opening day were not large in numbers .The artists who generally throng Page Three parties on the circuit here were not to be seen and these included big impressive names like Satish Gujral. And though I am no art critic, each segment stood out as an eerie warning to the communal build-up which is unleashing confusion before actually striking. In fact, Vir Munshi’s artistic ‘cart’ on display at this exhibition said the needful with the artist questioning himself on his actual identity — whether he is a terrorist or a militant or a refugee or a runaway or just a helpless citizen of this country.

Bhatt and more

Last week I was in a dilemma of sorts — the choice was mine — either to go down and hear Hollywood’s Richard Gere or else to sit and interview Bollywood’s Mahesh Bhatt. I opted for the latter, for another reason, I knew that Bhatt would talk on issues which are hitting all of us, as never before. Yes, he spoke and spoke very strongly of the social divide along communal lines, being systematically brought about by the Hindutva forces at work. Unlike most Bollywood people, Bhatt doesn’t seem to give a damn to the ruling political set and says we have reached such a stage that it’s time that saner voices speak out against the mess being generated in the country. I think it is important to hear Bhatt for he comes from a mixed cultural backdrop — his mother was a Shia Muslim and his father a Hindu and yet their relationship continued against all odds. She not just lived with him but bore him two sons (Mahesh is one of them) and refused to hide or camouflage any of the details of her romance.... And before Bhatt could speak his heart out on this—his pet subject ,glimpses of which can be seen in some of his films — he had to rush back to Mumbai for news had come in of his son being arrested on charges of assault.

Around this time of the year the most happening place in the Capital is the Hungarian Cultural Centre on Janpath ...Christmas carols take off around the start of December and this year the highlight was Samsara Ensemble from Hungary. Set up by Hungary’s four young musicians it had a surprise item too — one of them (Peter Szalai) played the tabla, whilst the second (Ivan Nyusztai) played the ghatam....