E D I T O R I A L   P A G E

EDITORIALS

Indian Bribe Service
THE CBI has thrown a spanner in the well-oiled wheels of the gigantic corruption machine. Only the really gullible will be surprised to learn that the PA of a Central minister takes money for giving a lucrative posting to an Indian Revenue Service official. 

Invasion legitimised
THE United Nations on Thursday provided further proof of its irrelevance in protecting the interests of the weak nations. The US-led coalition invaded Iraq without authorisation from the UN Security Council. Russia, France and Germany had dared to raise their voice against the war for reasons that are not difficult to understand. 

A force multiplier
THE reported go ahead by the US to Israel for the sale of its Phalcon radar system to India is bound to provide a boost to the Indian defence capabilities. Phalcon is a system used for anti-aircraft warning and is a major force multiplier. India has been looking at various other options.

OPINION

Cold warrior from the closet
US now needs nukes to fight terror!
L.H. Naqvi
WHERE was the international media, the watchdog of global peace and human interests, when US Secretary of Defence Donald H. Rumsfeld made a passionate plea before the Senate on Tuesday for the lifting of the ban on research for the development of nuclear arms? The vote in favour of lifting the ban was a formality that was completed at the end of a listless debate on the danger of America going nuclear.

MIDDLE

Anyone for teaching?
R.K. Kaushik
PRESIDENT John F. Kennedy and President Ayub Khan of Pakistan met only once and that was in July, 1961, in Washington. Both the leaders had all the dissimilarities which could be imagined for such an interaction. Kennedy was the youngest ever President in the history of the USA having become President at the age of 43.

SIGHT & SOUND

Dazzling celebrity week
Amita Malik
THE viewer must by now be dizzy with the deluge of celebrities who filled the small screen last week. Aishwariya Rai, of course, at Cannes and I am with all the leading dress designers of India who said publicly that her outfits were hardly a tribute to India or the most beautiful feminine garment in the world, the sari.

Another face of terror
Roopinder Singh
AMERICANS are getting used to seeing the kind of overt display of security by the police that is treated as routine in Third World nations. With the state of alert being ratcheted up to Orange, the second highest, by Department of Homeland Security yet again, policemen and vehicles are to be seen everywhere and everyone is edgy.

A digital ‘Prayas’ for village development
Bijendra Ahlawat
Faridabad
Clear concepts and well defined objectives fuelled by will power and zeal are perhaps the basic things one requires for success in any venture. Jiva Institute, a non-profit organisation based here, is among the firm believers of the strategy that is usually missing in social welfare programmes. It claims that unless there is an interaction and involvement of the people you target, no scheme or programme of development would be a success.

Villagers get health cover via Net
Dinesh C Sharma
JIVA Institute, a non-profit research and development organisation based in Faridabad, was collaborating with the Media Lab Asia, a joint venture of the MIT, USA, and the Ministry of Communications and IT until the latter with drew from the project. Digital cameras were provided to Tikawali village youth under this project, and they were trained in film-making for about six months until the latter withdrew from the project.

EDITORIALS

Indian Bribe Service

THE CBI has thrown a spanner in the well-oiled wheels of the gigantic corruption machine. Only the really gullible will be surprised to learn that the PA of a Central minister takes money for giving a lucrative posting to an Indian Revenue Service official. Those who are familiar with the ways of the world will be shocked only at the fact that the dramatis personae were stupid enough to get caught. It is the worst-kept secret of the Indian babudom that every prize posting comes at a price. Arranging transfers, postings and promotions in the income tax, excise, customs and police departments (the list is incomplete) is a full-fledged industry with a turnover running into ten-digit figures. Specific police stations, ports or airports are literally auctioned off to the highest bidder. The whole operation is carried out with such finesse and camaraderie that hard proof is hard to come by. The Rs 4 lakh or so that the deputy income tax commissioner paid to the personal assistant of the Minister of State for Finance Gingee N. Ramachandran was the standard seed money. One can well imagine the total profit that the IRS official was anticipating from his Mumbai sojourn. Multiply it with the number of officials who have similar morals to get a fair idea how high the stakes are. That is why India is such a poor rich country. There will be self-righteous cries from the bureaucracy in the days to come that such corrupt men are an exception and that there are black sheep in every herd. But the fact is that white sheep are hard to come by and black is the colour in vogue.

Now that the CBI has disturbed the idyllic setting, the subterranean animals will go into hibernation. Make no mistake, it is not going to be a long rest. They will be back in business soon enough, and with a vengeance. To compensate for the higher risk, the going rates of ‘nazrana’ will also go up. The only way to control the monster somewhat is to corner it ruthlessly without fear or favour. Even more important is to dig the burrows all the way. The trail may reach very exalted quarters. Catching such high and mighty is not going to be an easy task. The CBI will have to steel itself and the government will have to back it sincerely if the drive is to have any meaning. The tip of the murky iceberg has been scratched. Now is the time to go at it hammer and tongs. Last time this particular PA was visited by the CBI was in 1996 for allegedly selling coupons for LPG cylinders available through the MPs’ discretionary quota. The MPs were hardly brought into the picture. One hopes that the enquiry will be more broad-based this time.

Invasion legitimised

THE United Nations on Thursday provided further proof of its irrelevance in protecting the interests of the weak nations. The US-led coalition invaded Iraq without authorisation from the UN Security Council. Russia, France and Germany had dared to raise their voice against the war for reasons that are not difficult to understand. For equally obvious reasons they decided to give up the stand that offered neither short-term gain nor long-term profit to them. They decided to lead the 14-member band that played the tune the US wanted the Security Council to play after the Anglo-American occupation of Iraq. American foreign policy is a mixture of physical and verbal aggression. Physical aggression helped it add Iraq to its kitty of nations that need to be "saved" from the scourge of terrorism. During Thursday's debate on the revised US-British resolution for lifting the crippling economic sanctions, US Ambassador to the UN John Negroponte used verbal aggression that left no member in doubt what would happen if the demand was turned down. He wanted the sanctions to be lifted for ending the suffering of the Iraqi people. Had America been as responsive to their suffering before the invasion of Iraq, nearly 5,00,000 children may not have died for want of food and medicines. The irrational sanctions were slapped by the Security Council at its bidding. The economic squeeze forced thousands of women into prostitution and an equally large number of men into committing suicide.

The pressure that the US can bring to bear on the Security Council members, particularly the non-permanent ones, to gain their votes on the Iraq resolutions was never in doubt. Even Syria did not have the courage to express its reservations on the proposed arrangement that legitimised the illegal occupation of Iraq by the US-led coalition. The best it could do was to abstain from voting on the controversial resolution that sanctified the invasion of Iraq. It gave America and Britain a free hand to refashion Iraq's political profile at their convenience. The resolution that was passed 14-0 — with Syria abstaining — provided no clue about the time that the occupation forces would need for handing over the administration of Iraq to the native people. The immediate economic fallout of the lifting of sanctions was reflected in the global slump in oil prices. Iraq has the world's second largest oil reserves. Iraqi oil is also the best in terms of quality. Now the American and the British administrators would have absolute right over it, all in the name of helping the impoverished people of Iraq rebuild their lives. However, as far as they are concerned, Saddam Hussein was the devil and the present arrangement is the deep sea.

A force multiplier

THE reported go ahead by the US to Israel for the sale of its Phalcon radar system to India is bound to provide a boost to the Indian defence capabilities. Phalcon is a system used for anti-aircraft warning and is a major force multiplier. India has been looking at various other options. Indigenous efforts, including that of the Defence Research and Development Organisation, have not borne fruits, which is hardly surprising because such systems are enormously sophisticated and need a very high level of integration between various airborne and land-based systems. India's aspirations for an indigenous aircraft warning and control system came crashing down when a Russian-built aeroplane, in which certain systems were being tested, crashed in 1998. India has zeroed in on the Israeli system, which is to be installed in a Russian Ilyushin-76 aircraft. Israel is the leading contractor in this deal, in which three such aircraft are to be provided, and the Russians are also involved. Since the Indian defence systems are sourced from various countries, such an international mélange is only to be expected.

India was disappointed in the beginning of the year at the US opposition to its efforts to get the Phalcon AWACS and the Arrow-2 anti-ballistic missiles from Israel. It is now obvious that much lobbying followed and India has now managed to secure the cooperation of the US in this matter. The role of National Security Advisor Brajesh Mishra in underlining the need for mutual cooperation among the US, Israel and India is also credited with for the change in the US attitude. His recent meeting with those in the Bush administration, including the President himself, helped in this regard. He also used the occasion to invite Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to visit India. His visit will further cement the trilateral arrangement. The Israeli AWACS is formidable. India has reportedly looked at the Russian IL-76 AWACS platform and also an aircraft from Chile, but both were not found to meet the requirements of the IAF. AWACS is a crucial force multiplier since it controls the airspace and directs aircraft to various targets. When the Phalcon-equipped aircraft are deployed by the IAF, the nation would join the select few—the US, Britain, France, Israel, Saudi Arabia and Russia—which have such capabilities. The increasing cooperation between India and the US and Israel on the one side and Russia on the other, just underscores the mutual interdependence that is the hallmark of the realities of the post-Cold war era. India is on the right path in equipping itself to deal with all potential threats, and for this it has rightly been focusing on its requirements and meeting them through various means, including lobbying at the right time.

OPINION

Cold warrior from the closet
US now needs nukes to fight terror!
L.H. Naqvi

WHERE was the international media, the watchdog of global peace and human interests, when US Secretary of Defence Donald H. Rumsfeld made a passionate plea before the Senate on Tuesday for the lifting of the ban on research for the development of nuclear arms? The vote in favour of lifting the ban was a formality that was completed at the end of a listless debate on the danger of America going nuclear.

Rumsfeld has grown in strength and stature, in direct proportion to the loss of clout of Secretary of State Colin Powell, after the successful invasion of Iraq. After President George W. Bush it is his voice that is heard with awe by opponents and respect by friends. He wanted the lawmakers to allow research on low-yield weapons, considerably less lethal than the ones that were dropped on Hiroshima.

Who was Rumsfeld trying to bluff when he said that the administration “wanted to study these weapons, not to develop, not to deploy, not to use”? One more toy gun in the hands of the sole superpower for bullying the world into submission? Of course, these new nuclear toys would be as harmless as the cluster bombs that were dropped on civilian targets in Iraq in defiance of the provisions of the Geneva Convention. Or the bunker busters that used banned warheads for reaching the targets they missed.

The ban on research on nuclear arms technology was imposed over a decade ago to win the trust of a world not yet used to doing business in a unipolar international order. An order in which America was to ultimately become the arbiter of the fate of nations that did not share its vision of peace and democracy. Saddam Hussein was praised for his secularism and backed with arms and dollars for taming the seemingly defiant Iran.

Osama bin Laden and the Taliban were invented for pushing back the Soviet tanks from the strategically important piece of global real estate called Afghanistan. After the Cold War both Saddam and Osama and outfits like the Al-Qaeda and the Taliban, became the most deadly face of international terrorism.

Remember the global tension when the United Nations Security Council was hearing the reports of the weapons inspectors about the nuclear arms and weapons of mass destruction in Saddam Hussein’s sanctions-weakened hands? The arrogance of the American Ambassador left neither the friends nor foes of the US in doubt about the future shape of things in a unipolar world. Neither the personal charm of UN Secretary General Kofi Annan nor the collective might of the Security Council could stop America from invading Iraq.

How should the global community react to the disquieting development now that America has come out openly in favour of resuming nuclear arms research? Should it be treated as an internal matter of a sovereign nation? Should only America have the right to mess around with the sovereign status of other nations? Should not the free world take the lead in building diplomatic pressure for the shelving of the diabolical agenda that would without doubt trigger a fresh arms race? Should not America be declared the biggest threat to world peace?

The permission to research the development of small nuclear weapons is just a ploy for muting domestic and global criticism. Next on the White House agenda is the development of a nuclear bunker-buster bomb that would be six times more powerful than the one that destroyed Hiroshima 58 years ago.

Rumsfeld’s request was not as harmless as he made it sound in his speech. He wanted the lifting of the ban so that the potential of low-yield nuclear weapons could be researched for dealing with the threat to global peace from biological and chemical weapons. He wanted billions of dollars to be sunk in an enterprise that would have no application whatsoever for raising the “shock and awe” capabilities of the US military juggernaut? The US Defence Secretary believes that the rest of the world does not know the difference between marbles and missiles.

It is evident that the global sense of relief and hope that the nuclear arms race would end with the Cold War was based on a gross misreading of America’s real intentions. It never was and never will be interested in a world that implements the collective will of most countries in favour of reduction in spending on and manufacturing of arms by members of the civil society.

America has the biggest market share in the global arms industry. Does the administration have an effective mechanism for monitoring the route that these weapons take for reaching destinations where terrorists breed like worms? The breed and multiply on the weapons that reach them through known clandestine routes.

Critics had rightly argued that adding low-yield warheads to the world’s nuclear inventory would simply make their eventual use more likely. In 1994 a law was passed in America that prohibited laboratories from undertaking research and development that could produce precision nuclear weapons of less than 5 kilotons. They believed that low-yield nuclear weapons would blur the distinction between nuclear and conventional warfare.

It was the initiative of the then President Bill Clinton that ended US nuclear testing in 1993 which was followed by the signing of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty in 1996. The Senate refused to ratify the Treaty. The world was shocked, but the decision to ban nuclear arms research helped in muting the scale of criticism.

After the Pokhran tests in 1998 India had taken a principled stand on the issue of supporting the CTBT. Wide-ranging consultations with all the main political parties resulted in a consensus in favour of monitoring the global trend in general and America’s position on the contentious issue in particular.

Jane’s has compiled a voluminous report on the project. The technical details would be of interest to members of the scientific community. But what should help the free world articulate its response to the demand to lift the ban on nuclear arms research by American institutions is the chilling conclusion that exposes the lie that Rumsfeld presented before the Senate as the gospel truth. There is no guarantee that the low-yield weapons would be able to reach hidden caches of biological and chemical weapons more efficiently than the present missiles that the Anglo-American coalition used against Iraq.

However, the primary reason why the global community should mount diplomatic pressure on President Bush to abandon the project is the unacceptable high levels of radiation that the so-called low-yield weapons would generate.

According to Jane’s, “a decision to conduct even one test of a low-yield weapon might cause a storm of international protest and weaken the global consensus on hindering nuclear proliferation. Countries other than the US are faced with regional challengers who increasingly use underground facilities. A US decision to use nuclear weapons for destroying deep underground bunkers would legitimise the proliferation of nuclear weapons by other states for precisely this purpose.”

MIDDLE

Anyone for teaching?
R.K. Kaushik

PRESIDENT John F. Kennedy and President Ayub Khan of Pakistan met only once and that was in July, 1961, in Washington. Both the leaders had all the dissimilarities which could be imagined for such an interaction. Kennedy was the youngest ever President in the history of the USA having become President at the age of 43. He had legendary charm and came from a very rich family of Brooklyn, Massachusetts. He had his education in one of the famous universities of the world (Harvard). He was intellectually oriented and even his undergraduate thesis in Harvard University culminated in a book which became very famous in those times (“Why England Slept-1940”). Kennedy enjoyed massive support among people of the US. Ayub Khan on the other hand came from a lower middle class family of Rawalpindi. His father was a Risaldar Major in the British Army and had fought in World War I. Ayub Khan was from his father’s second wife and was born on May 14, 1907, at Rehana village, 50 miles from Rawalpindi, had his school education there and joined Aligarh Muslim University and later got selected and passed out as King’s Commissioned Indian Officer (KCIO) from Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst in June, 1927. He was a batchmate of our former Army chief, Gen Jaynto Nath Chaudhary of Calcutta.

The two met in Blair House near White House one evening in the third week of July, 1961.

The Pakistan Embassy in Washington had made meticulously elaborate arrangements for the meeting which was to be followed by dinner.

When Kennedy arrived with his wife he was animatedly and gleefully received by President Ayub and his wife. There were four smartly dressed boys in the age group of 11/12 years to welcome and present bouquets to the Kennedys. The four boys probably represented the four provinces of then West Pakistan (Punjab, NWFP, Sindh and Baluchistan).

As the President entered the Blair House building he shook hands with the first boy who was in a typical Lahori dress and asked him as to what he wanted to become in his life. The boy answered with a kid’s exuberance: “Sir, I want to become a businessman.”

Later, Kennedy shook hands and accepted the bouquets from the second boy who was in a Pathani dress of the NWFP and asked him the same question. The small boy replied that he wanted to become an Army Officer.

The same drill was performed with the third boy who was wearing a Sindhi dress. His ambition was to become an income tax officer.

The fourth and last boy wearing a Balochi dress also presented bouquets and told the President that he would like to become a successful property dealer.

Kennedy turned towards President Ayub Khan and said “Mr President, what sort of nation are you going to build where nobody wants to become a teacher? Remember, it’s not grand capitals but great teachers who make a nation great.” President Ayub Khan heard the advice silently.

It is not out of tune to mention that one of the informal agendas in the meeting that night was regarding financial package to be given to Pakistan for building its grand new capital, Islamabad, where construction had started on somewhat low key in 1960. Perhaps Kennedy was hinting in that direction also.

SIGHT & SOUND

Dazzling celebrity week
Amita Malik

THE viewer must by now be dizzy with the deluge of celebrities who filled the small screen last week. Aishwariya Rai, of course, at Cannes and I am with all the leading dress designers of India who said publicly that her outfits were hardly a tribute to India or the most beautiful feminine garment in the world, the sari. Her beauty might have dazzled, but for Indians, the rather passe Parisian touch to her outfits should have made way for the classic lines of the sari, of course with modern touches which did not interfere with its timeless, beauty. Our actresses, with the exception of a few like Rekha, get terribly confused and misled by dress designers who have no concept of what foreigners might admire, as against their page 3 fans in India. Of all the channels covering Cannes, the most sophisticated and detailed reports came on NDTV’s English Channel, particularly in the matter of exclusive interviews. I have never seen such an array, which was missing earlier of Indian press and media correspondents at Cannes. So for once there was competition.

Then there was the 50th anniversary of the climbing of Everest, with both the dignity of Sir Edmund Hilary and the warm memory of Tenzing Norgay lighting up the small screens. Of all the special programmes on various channels, I found different and touching a programme on National Geographic, Mission Everest, which showed young boys and girls raw recruits to mountain climbing, being put through their paces with the basics of adventure, including, crossing a fish pond on a slender rope or falling into the water and swimming to safety, the lesson being that mountain climbing, let alone Everest, are not exactly picnics.

One of the most touching tributes to someone who still remains a celebrity in the hearts of her endless fans was the programme on Helen who came on the stage at the end to do a mesmerising turn or two on the stage, which were reminiscent of her past glory and yet a warm interaction with an obviously adoring audience of fans of all ages. Although in the glamour-laden Indian film do in South Africa the younger Saif Ali generation was tolerant of long speeches, Dev Anand and Rekha, he at passionmate length and she with brief and effective one-liners, brought back not only nostalgia but a reminder of what was truly the golden age of the Mumbai cinema which is fast losing its confidence as well as its identity.

Then the Nisha anti-dowry saga continued to dominate the small screen, what with other rebellious brides, including an unexpected Muslim bride from Old Delhi, showing greedy bridegrooms exactly where they get off. It might be a drop in the ocean and dowry is hardly likely to fly out of the window but such TV exposes will act as an encouragement to rebellious brides. The small screen is watching India-wide and what a boon to people who are not literate enough to keep up with newspaper reports. To actually hear and see the brave girls, their supporting parents is worth a thousand words in print.

Of course on the reverse side we had horror also hitting the headlines, the terrible fire on the Frontier Mail still fresh in the memory. The Madhumita whodunit is not exactly pleasant reading or viewing and has highlighted the ugliness of political corruption, which thinks nothing of blatantly covering up the misdeeds of its own lawbreakers and history sheeters, including cold murderers of inconvenient girl-friends. In comparison, the goings on of the Shilpa Shetty family and the mafia dons seem like child’s play. That the Hyderabad mother, who had swapped her baby daughter for someone else’s baby son, if not looking as happy as the mother who went on hunger strike until she got her son back, was also arrested for her wicked deed, should drive home a valuable lesson to other women watching TV and wishing to follow suit. In the end, justice does catch up with babyswappers.

One of the genres left out in my piece last week on thematic trends on Indian TV was the thriller, which has also been a staple on television world-wide since its earliest days. Not to forget. The Master of Suspense and his rivetting programme, Alfred Hitchook Presents. Well, Indian TV is no exception and we have had our own strange cops, even Ruby Bhatia having chipped in at times. So I thought I would catch up with contemporary thrillers, having found only CID Inspector worth watching in small doses. I found both DD Metro’s Hello Inspector and Sahara’s Raaz The Thriller supremely unthrilling. Shaky plots, poor acting, ugly close-ups of severed limbs and loud, unnecessary music, a deadly bore by any standards. I am certainly not tempted to watch future episodes, thank you.

Another face of terror
Roopinder Singh

AMERICANS are getting used to seeing the kind of overt display of security by the police that is treated as routine in Third World nations. With the state of alert being ratcheted up to Orange, the second highest, by Department of Homeland Security yet again, policemen and vehicles are to be seen everywhere and everyone is edgy.

The explosion at Yale University, on Wednesday, in which fortunately no one was injured, has again brought terror back in to the homes of most Americans, already on the edge since the past two years, following the 9/11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.

Huge media coverage of such incidents and the changing threat scenarios have seriously impacted the American psyche.

An average American is not known for his felicity with international issues and ignorance and power make a potent Molotov cocktail. Add to it insularity, fear and prejudice, and the mixture becomes all the more lethal. Often there is an overpowering urge to lash out and the latest such incident is the shooting in which Avtar Singh Chiera, a 52-year-old truck driver, was injured after he was shot twice, in Phoenix, Arizona, USA, on Monday. The incident is being treated by the local authorities as an unprovoked hate crime.

Turban-wearing Sikh immigrant Balbir Singh Sodhi was gunned down on September 15, 2002. The police acted promptly and arrested a White aeronautical worker who has since been convicted.

A number of Muslims have also been killed in hate attacks, including Ali Almansoop, naturalised Yemeni and a father of four, killed on September 21.

Often there have been cases of “mistaken identity”. Adel Karas, 48, a grocer from Egypt and a Coptic Christian, was killed on September 15.

Having spent five years in the USA, where I studied and cut my teeth into journalism, I am more upset and dismayed than shocked at what has been happening.. I was a minority in New York, but then everyone was a minority in some or the other sense-language, skin colour, religion, appearance, educational qualifications, and accomplishments. It is, perhaps, in the lack of accomplishments that all of us are in a majority!

I lived in the shadow of the World Trade Centre. Like other Sikhs, I was not stared at, and neither was there any discrimination. There were so many institutions and facilities that I went to in my professional capacity, and at no time did I feel singled out. I don’t know what it would be like now.

Various immigrant organisations have been floated to help bring into focus the concerns of the new minorities and these include the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee and the Sikh Council of Education & Religion whose National Chairman, Dr. Rajwant Singh, has been prominent in focusing US government and media attention to Sikh issues. There are actually dozens of such organisations, including SMART and they are all working, though often not in a coordinated manner to help their brethren.

Cherie Yannone, a neighbour of Chiera posted the news about the attack on a website called attacksonsikhs.com. Her personal comment says “This man is our neighbour. We learned about the shooting when a local television news crew came to our house to interview us about the incident. We had no comment as we were stunned by the news. This peaceful man has been a friend to my children, especially my two sons, and has been a good neighbour to everyone on our street. Although he will make a full recovery from his wounds, I am sure his life will never be the same...”

Surely the nation that seeks to ensure that security of the world also needs to look within and take pro-active measures to ensure the safety of all its citizens, no matter where they have emigrated from.

A digital ‘Prayas’ for village development
Bijendra Ahlawat

Mr Rishipal Chauhan, an engineer by profession, says people learn from themselves and the idea behind production of “Prayas” is to use this concept. The locals, who have seen “Prayas”, have learnt a lesson and perhaps this is the reason that the project has got a tremendous response. The project is targeted to create a multi-pronged development strategy, a visual community software system, network independence, local content generation and financial strength. He hopes the model of Tikawali village is replicated in the area and such centres are set up in other villages also so that the socio-cultural and economic issues are dealt with locally.

Villagers get health cover via Net
Dinesh C Sharma

JIVA Institute, a non-profit research and development organisation based in Faridabad, was collaborating with the Media Lab Asia, a joint venture of the MIT, USA, and the Ministry of Communications and IT until the latter with drew from the project. Digital cameras were provided to Tikawali village youth under this project, and they were trained in film-making for about six months until the latter withdrew from the project.

Jiva runs another project under which ayurvedic healthcare is being provided to villagers on a regular basis, using hi-tech gadgets of PDAs (personal digital assistants). It is called Handy Vaid (now renamed as TeleDoc). The idea is to bring timely health advice and medication to the patient’s doorstep by making innovative use of PDAs.

A representative carrying a PDA through the village collects information and queries from the villagers using a pre-designed consultation form. This information is then transferred to a doctor in the city, who diagnoses the problem and suggests appropriate treatment, precautions and medication. The doctor’s diagnosis and suggested treatment is then once again transferred to the PDA and carried back to the villager.

This project is the brainchild of Dr Partap Chauhan, who established the first online Ayurvedic clinic in the year 1995 and since then has been providing consultation to patients throughout the world. “Through the Internet, I could reach out to patients all over the world but I was not able to reach out to patients in villages just a few kilometres away. So, I thought of using PDAs to collect patient information — in the same way as patients give their care histories on my website - and then providing them the medicine”, says Dr Chauhan.

Sunder Singh with his PDA goes round the village everyday - the timing and localities he visits are fixed - and meets people who want to consult Dr Chauhan. He collects their case histories, comes to the city and downloads the data on a PC, which is accessed by doctors and pharmacists.

The medicine packets are delivered the next day. One packet costs the villagers Rs 70, compared to Rs 200 to Rs 300 if they were to consult a regular doctor in the city or even in the village. In addition, there is saving in terms of time.

“We have five-six jhola doctors (quacks) in the village. They charge up to Rs 100 for ordinary ailments, and Rs 150 for injecting glucose. The cost of medicines is separate and we are not sure about these doctors. There have been cases of children dying due to medicines given by them”, says Mahipal Singh, now a regular user of Handy Vaid.

Although home remedies and ayurveda are not new to villagers, they seem to have all forgotten it like cityfolks. “This way I am able to reintroduce these concepts in village life”, says Dr Chauhan, who interacts with villagers during regular check-up camps organised in Tikawali and other areas.

Tikawali is being used as a field laboratory to test new applications of digital technologies developed by Jiva. Grassroots Feature Network