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Thursday,
July 17, 2003, Chandigarh, India  
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The subcontinent’s child Something to live on An opening for BSP |
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Gains from the Beijing talks
Hobby burden
US technology workers oppose outsourcing
Political pact may face hurdles
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The subcontinent’s child
THE Delhi-Lahore bus service has been restored and the formality of appointing High Commissioners too has been completed because of India's gesture not to let December 13 stand in the way of mending fences with Pakistan. Noor Fatima was clearly not part of the script for improving bilateral ties. This 30-month-old girl from Pakistan may now become a powerful symbol of peace and friendship in the subcontinent. And why not? After all, the two countries share a common history and culture. Remove politics, politicians and generals from the frame and what emerges is not bitterness over Kashmir or any other politically engineered point of conflict between the people of the subcontinent. But so much poison has been injected into their minds that a single Noor can only provide a glimpse of what is possible if the leaders let the people seek the level of their interaction without fear or favour, let or hindrance. Friendship between the two neighbours should not be a slave to the distortions that religion-driven politics has created at the popular level in the subcontinent. The story is not about an Indian surgeon performing a delicate surgery on a child from Pakistan. It is about the triumph of the spirit of service and compassion over the sharpness or otherwise of the territorial boundaries. If this spirit is nursed to health, there is little that hotheads can do to prevent the ray of hope generated by Noor from banishing hatred and mistrust that have bedevilled the subcontinental relations. Indo-Pak goodwill is not about the fate and future of Kashmir. Poets, writers and musicians from the subcontinent have made a substantial contribution to the cause of keeping the spirit of friendship alive. But poets and writers usually become victims of repression under undemocratic regimes. Raees Amrohvi after migrating to Pakistan spoke about the Ganga-Jumni culture of the subcontinent in the poem "Take my salutation to Hind". A bullet was put through his head by a fanatic. In India Ali Sardar Jafri died a disappointed poet reciting at every mushaira the poem captioned "Who is the enemy?". Great works of art stimulate the minds. But gestures that do not touch the heart of the people become a passing aesthetic experience. Noor's tale is different. It has released plenty of human sentiments that do not respect the concept of territorial jurisdiction. |
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Something to live on THE Varistha Pension Bima Yojana launched by the Prime Minister on Monday is welcome. It seeks to address the problem of uncertainty facing a large section of the people who are on the verge of retirement. Unlike government employees, they are not entitled to monthly pension. At the time of retirement, they get at best provident fund and gratuity, which are, more often than not, easily spent than saved. This leaves them with no steady income. There is another section consisting of self-employed people who do not have even the benefits of provident fund and gratuity. Their condition is worse. These are the kinds of people who stand to gain from the new scheme introduced by the Life Insurance Corporation. By depositing a one-time premium ranging from Rs 33,335 to Rs 2,77,490, the policyholder is entitled to receive a monthly pension of Rs 250 to Rs 2,000. The scheme would be attractive as it also serves the purpose of life insurance. Nonetheless, the government does not want to promote the scheme as a pure investment option for those retiring from service. That is why there is an upper limit on the premium payable under this scheme. The targeted beneficiaries are people belonging to the lower middle class and middle class sections. They are also the ones who are likely to benefit from the health insurance scheme launched by the Prime Minister the same day. By paying a nominal premium, the policyholders will be entitled to reimbursement of medical expenses subject, of course, to a ceiling. The rising cost of medical treatment has made medical insurance almost mandatory for the people, particularly the aged. In any case, it is the aged who stand to benefit from the twin schemes. Much of its success will depend on how well the insurance companies popularise the policies not only by taking the message to the targeted people but also by paying the benefits in time. Medical insurance will become successful only if the insurance companies are quick in processing claims and settling them. Since the policyholders will be the aged, the companies will have to take extra care to ensure that they are not harassed in any respect. As it is, the old, now euphemistically called senior citizens, are one of the worst sufferers of administrative sloth and corruption. They do not have the stamina to elbow their way through crowds and suffer on that account. Unlike in high-tax Scandinavian countries where the aged are looked after by the state, here they are often at the mercy of their children. With the joint family system increasingly under threat, the aged are the ones who are hit the most. They need support through schemes like the Varistha Pension Bima
Yojana. |
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An opening for BSP THE
Bahujan Samaj Party’s swabhiman rally in Chandigarh on Tuesday marks the second step in the reassertion of Dalit identity and power in Punjab. After its rise in the early 1990s in Punjab, the BSP and its leader, Mr Kanshi Ram, started withering following a series of electoral setbacks. The Dalit vote again got divided. Some went back to the Congress, others sided with the leftists and still others aligned with the Akalis. For quite some time the Dalits maintained a low profile. Then Talhan provided an opportunity for the Dalits to assert themselves. Following a Jat-Dalit confrontation over the management of a gurdwara, the politically awakened but unorganised, better-off Dalits in Doaba joined hands to secure a settlement on their terms. Those who had feared the Talhan incident might cause fissures in the age-old Dalit-Jat relations were in for a surprise when UP Chief Minister Mayawati, addressing the BSP rally in Chandigarh, threw hints of an electoral alignment with the Jat-dominated Shiromani Akali Dal. She thundered at the Congress, blasting Capt Amarinder Singh for denying her permission to visit Jalandhar and for preventing BSP workers from participating in the rally, and squarely held the Chief Minister responsible for the Talhan clash and the subsequent violence. While no one, not even Mr Parkash Singh Badal, who has enough reason to get even with the Captain, has blamed the Chief Minister for what happened at Talhan, Ms Mayawati played politics with an eye on the coming elections. She bluntly told her admirers from Punjab that they had committed a blunder by voting for the Congress in the last elections. Fully realising that the BSP on its own cannot go far in Punjab, she has chosen to make common cause with the enemy’s enemy. At this juncture faced with vigilance raids, Mr Badal is in dire need of well-wishers and may respond positively to Ms Mayawati’s offer, but the increased inflow of migrant labour in Punjab is a cause of worry among his supporters and voters, and his siding with the BSP may erode his own political base. Punjab has the highest proportion of the Scheduled Castes to its population (28.3 per cent). The economic and political aspirations of this vast segment cannot be ignored. If the existing parties fail to address the Dalit issues, the BSP’s revival in Punjab is certain and it would not be confined to Doaba only. Thought for the day And much it grieved my heart to think — William Wordsworth
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Gains from the Beijing talks WHEN Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee visited China in February 1979, his Chinese hosts had an unpleasant, but not entirely unanticipated surprise for him. Disregarding the close and friendly relations between India and Vietnam, China’s supreme leader Deng Xiao Ping sent his army across his country’s borders to invade Vietnam. To add insult to injury, Deng proclaimed that the invasion was meant to teach Vietnam a “lesson” in much the same manner as China had taught India a “lesson” in 1962. While there was no similar “surprise” for Mr Vajpayee during his visit to China last month, the statements made by China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman about Tibet and Sikkim reflected the typical sense of superiority and insensitivity that is characteristic of Chinese behaviour, when dealing with neighbours it regards as less than equal. During his visit to China Mr Vajpayee acknowledged that “The Indian side recognises that the Tibet Autonomous Region is an integral part of the People’s Republic of China.” This is the first time that India has “recognised” Tibet as being a part of China. But implicit in this formulation is the rejection of the Chinese claim that Tibet has historically been a part of China. The Border Trade Agreement signed during Mr Vajpayee’s visit explicitly speaks of “Changgu of Sikkim state” and “Renqinggang of the Tibet Autonomous Region” as venues for border trade markets. Sikkim is thus explicitly acknowledged by China as being a “state” of India just as much as Tibet is acknowledged by India to be an “autonomous region” of China. But despite this, the Chinese spokesman asserted that India had changed its policies and recognised that Tibet was an “inalienable” part of China, while China had not recognised India’s claims over Sikkim. He asserted that Sikkim is “an enduring issue left over from history”. Thus, whatever the merits about their respective claims over Tibet and Sikkim, the world community was given the impression by China that the Indian Prime Minister had yielded on the issue of Tibet to the present-day emperors of the Middle Kingdom. One hopes we have learnt some lessons on handling and publicising such issues from our experiences in Beijing. The decision taken during Mr Vajpayee’s visit to upgrade the level of discussions on the border issue is a welcome one. Despite the setbacks we suffered in the conflict of 1962, we had demonstrated to the Chinese in Nathu La in 1967 and by the forward deployments on high ridge lines in “Operation Falcon” following the Sumdorong Chu intrusion in 1986, that India is more than capable of holding its own along the border. Moreover, given its contentious border problems with many of its neighbours, China has recognised that peace and tranquillity along its borders with India makes sound strategic sense. Agreements signed during the visits of Prime Ministers Rajiv Gandhi and Narasimha Rao and the progress made during Mr Vajpayee’s visit will not only help in promoting peace and tranquillity along the common borders and promote moves to settle the border issue, but also set the stage for economic exchanges across land borders. There is much that India can learn from the bold economic reforms and sustained growth initiated by Deng in 1978. While China’s global exports today are around $ 280 billion, our exports are barely 50 billion. While China’s investor-friendly policies have resulted in an annual FDI inflow of around $ 50 billion, India can barely secure an annual FDI inflow of $ 4 billion. However, a recent study by scholars at Harvard and the MIT arrives at certain interesting conclusions. It notes that while China has created obstacles for domestic entrepreneurs, India has been making life easier for local businesses. In recent surveys of private entrepreneurship, corporate governance and efficiency of capital markets in Asia, China ranked well below India. India can overtake China in overall performance if only our political elite will replace populism with reforms in key areas of infrastructure development, de-reservation in the small-scale sector and labour laws. The Harvard-MIT study brings out the limitations in China’s over-dependence on FDI. Just as we tended to get overawed by China’s military potential in the immediate aftermath of the 1962 debacle, we have for too long entertained unjustified fears about opening our markets to competition from China. Indian industry now seems confident enough to meet this challenge. While China still enjoys a trade surplus of around $ 900 million, India’s exports to China have been growing more rapidly than its imports. Over the past four years, our exports have risen from $ 539 million to $ 1.67 billion. Moreover, Indian entrepreneurs have been flocking to China to set up manufacturing and information technology units there. It would take many years for China to pose an effective challenge to India in service-oriented industries. One hopes that in the meantime economic reforms in India will enable our manufacturing sector to become more competitive internationally. Mr Vajpayee’s visit has consolidated the basis for a relaxed and tension-free atmosphere along our borders. It is significant that when large contingents of troops were moved from our eastern borders to our borders with Pakistan last year, China did not seek to create new tensions on its borders with India. But it would be naïve to believe that China is indeed reconciled to a nuclear and economically resurgent India playing a key role in Asia. There is no parallel in contemporary history of the type of nuclear and missile assistance that China has provided to Pakistan over the past two decades. It would be no exaggeration to say that no country has caused more damage to Indian national security than China. Over the past two decades China has provided Pakistan with fissile material, designs of nuclear weapons and components for Pakistan’s nuclear enrichment facilities. Even today China is providing Pakistan assistance to build unsafeguarded plutonium facilities that could assist Islamabad in developing thermonuclear weapons. The M 11, M 9 and M 18 missiles that China has supplied to Pakistan can carry nuclear warheads to target population centres across the whole of India. This assistance enables General Musharraf to adopt a policy of nuclear blackmail whenever he so chooses. Does this not constitute a Chinese effort to “contain” India? We either tend to regard China as our greatest threat, or believe that China looks at us with feelings of love, affection and goodwill. What we need to remember is that in its quest for growing global power, China’s foreign policy is pragmatic and not ideological. The Chinese Communist Party no longer confines its exchanges to “fraternal” communist parties in India. It has such exchanges with the Congress party and the BJP as well. In Pakistan, the Chinese are as comfortable with Qazi Hussain Ahmed and General Hamid Gul as they are with Ms Benazir Bhutto, Mr Nawaz Sharif and General Pervez Musharraf. Likewise in Myanmar, the Chinese leadership has a very cozy relationship with that country’s military rulers. The discredited Richard Nixon is still an American hero in Chinese eyes. What India can learn from China is that ideological rigidity, an inability to adapt to changing global power balances and nostalgia have no place in the conduct of foreign policy, or in the development of military and economic
power. The writer is a former High Commissioner of India to Pakistan |
Hobby burden “HOLIDAYS are meant for going out,” said my daughter. Bowing to her desire I gave the green signal. We packed our luggage to proceed to Delhi. Though I have a close friend in Delhi, from whom I have a permanent invitation to stay, I prefer to stay in a hotel. This gives me freedom to choose my itinerary and saves me from a lot of obligation. The Shatabdi journey from Ludhiana to Delhi was pleasant. The good thing about this journey is that one is never idle during those four hours. Either you eat or sleep with your head shaking from one side to the other and occasionally falling on your neighbour’s shoulder. After a while I began to think what holidays meant? I told my wife that holidays used to be an occasion to visit your relatives and a memorable event for both families. Now the priorities have changed. The host wants to run away the moment he learns about the impending disaster. Before we could lament over this change, the train arrived at the station and we proceeded to the hotel. We reached our friend’s house the next day to a warm welcome. As we sat together, I could see some restlessness on the face of my host. Being a doctor I sensed the tense atmosphere. “Uncle, sorry, I have to go for my summer camp. Please just give five minutes to my mama”, said the eldest son. The mother got up and said: “Excuse me, I will be back in five minutes”. I laughed and asked my daughter what he meant by summer camp? Before she could reply my friend’s daughter started laughing and said: “Uncle, don’t you know about the summer camp? Did not you see KUCH KUCH HOTA HAI? You remember where Kajol and Shahrukh Khan met and fell in love again?” Before she could narrate the whole story I thanked her and told her that now I fully understood the meaning of summer camp. Fifty minutes passed and our host was nowhere in sight. The tea and snacks got cold. How could we eat without the host? Exactly after 55 minutes the host returned. “ Are bhai sahib aap ne tou kuch khaya hee nahin”, she said apologetically. In the hotel room the environment was nice and peaceful. We invited our hosts and my knowledge about summer camps increased tremendously. His wife stressed that these camps are essential for the development of the child. I could see that her whole discourse was a straight lift from an article in The Tribune. We were invited to spend a full day with our host. I was a bit reluctant but had to agree in the end. At 10 am we were at their residence. There was total peace. I was a bit surprised to see such a nice atmosphere. It was in contrast to the atmosphere prevailing the previous day. “Let us have breakfast,” said the host. It was an abundant compensation for the previous day’s horror. We had barely finished half the breakfast when the bell rang. As the door opened, I heard a loud shriek: “Hello uncle, nice to see you.” It was the second son of my host. “Where have you come from?” I asked. “Uncle, from my hobby classes,” he replied. Leaving her breakfast, the host got up. We could understand her position. We wanted to return to the hotel. But she insisted that we stay on till dinner. After one hour the bell rang again and boy stepped in. “Hello uncle,” was all he said before the lady disappeared again. This ritual happened every hour. We felt pity for the lady and perhaps for the boy. The dinner was quiet with no more bells. The boy also seemed tired, but relaxed. I asked him how he was enjoying his holidays. He laughed and said “Uncle I get up at 6 am and then I am on the move till 7 pm. I attend painting, dancing, personality development classes etc. every hour till 7 pm.” I asked his mother why she wanted her son to learn everything in one go. She should spread his hobby classes till the next vacation and then choose the area of his liking. His chirpy little sister could not stay quiet and said:”Uncle, do you know mama wants bhaiya to learn whatever Hrithik Roshan did in MAIN PREM KI DIWANI HOON — horse riding, rafting and bungee jumping etc.?” As we were busy taking dinner, TV was showing the advantages of swimming. I noticed that our host was lost in the programme. Turning towards her son, she
said" You must join swimming. It is a whole-body exercise and, moreover, it is life-saving.” The boy said:”Mamma, where is the time?” She said:”
I don’t know but you can leave one of the classes. But you must join swimming.” The boy thought for a while and said, “OK mama then I will leave my studies.” (Main Parhai hee chhor
doonga). |
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US technology workers oppose outsourcing HOW does a country react when unemployment grows? The under-developed slide into anarchy where rioters reign supreme while the
developed ones, anticipating mass-scale uprising, take corrective measures to weed out the root cause of
joblessness. India falls in the former category. Remember 1979, when the All Assam Students Union (AASU) raised the issue of foreigners (Bangladeshis) exploiting the state resources and sought their deportation. More recently, nearly a month ago, Sainiks burnt question papers in a competitive examination just because Marathis were allegedly ‘not being given proper representation.’ How many times have Punjabi workers felt that migrant labour from UP and Bihar are snatching away their work? The US falls in the second category and its countrymen are doing precisely what they ought to after unemployment achieved an unprecedented growth rate there. The US states are banning outsourcing and Tom Tancredo, a Republican Congressman from Colorado, recently introduced a 15-line Bill proposing to eliminate all visas under the H1-B category, created in 1952 to provide the US economy with technically skilled foreign workers. We, as Indians, react state-wise. The US reacts as a country. As per the Bureau of Labour Statistics of the US Department of Labour, the US unemployment rate rose to 6.4 per cent in June. Employment within the IT industry, that had been on the decline since March 2001, shed a total of 4,34,000 jobs. The telecom industry shed 7,000 jobs in June itself. The Yankees are retaliating. The US tech workers have formed pressure groups to stop their jobs being usurped by what they call ‘white-collared sweatshops,’ states like New Jersey, Maryland, Washington, Connecticut and Missouri are actively considering bills seeking a ban on outsourcing and legislators propose to eliminate H1B visa. The latest report from India’s National Association of Software and Service Companies (Nasscom) says India accounted for 77,000 H1-B visas in 2001 but only 33,000 in 2002, and the total is expected to drop to 30,000 this year. Outsourcing and cheap labour from Asian countries, like India, are being held responsible for this no-job quagmire. To add fuel to the raging fire, a study by management consulting company, A.T. Kearney, forecasts that more than half a million jobs, or 8 per cent of the total workforce, will be outsourced offshore over the next five years by the US banks, brokerage firms and other financial companies. And India is being ranked as a “preferred country over all” for outsourcing. Chief Technology Officer of Intel Patrick P. Gelsinger has been quoted in The Times that the salary of one American engineer could pay for three engineers in India, four in China, or five in Russia. According to The New York Times, Forrester Research of Cambridge, Mass, predicted in a recent report that the acceleration in outsourcing would result in 3.3 million US jobs moving offshore by 2015 and that 70 per cent of these jobs will move to India, 20 per cent to the Philippines and 10 per cent to China. Unemployment is a bane for society and every state reacts in its own different way. Seeking a ban on outsourcing as well as H1B visa, however, seems contradictory. If the Big Brother bars the entry of skilled professionals by putting a ban on H1B visa, technical work is bound to flow out of the country since cheap labour won’t be there in flesh and blood to execute the tasks. That means outsourcing and offshore contracts will continue to stay. Rather, they’ll grow. If the US bans outsourcing too, its business interests can be harmed as production costs may escalate, thereby triggering inflation. It has been reported widely in the media that the US banking, financial services and insurance sector has saved $6 billion in the last four years, thanks to outsourcing. Due to these savings, more than one lakh new jobs were added thus boosting the economy. After all, it makes a lot of commercial sense to get work done in a cost-effective manner for more profit and that is precisely what can be achieved through outsourcing. Microsoft, too, plans to relocate its customer support work in Texas and North Carolina to India. On the other hand, anti-outsourcing lobby says that the US wages are high, no doubt, but a large part is deducted as tax. Without taxes, an employee may cost 40 per cent less to a firm. Recently, back home in India, there was a case of a Noida-based call centre employee, Asif Azim, stealing the credit card number of Barbara Campa, a US citizen, and making off with $ 575 worth of purchase from a Sony portal. He was later arrested and convicted. Personal data remains at constant risk and the lobby swears that so does the security of the country with vital information being passed on in alien land. A lot of anti-outsourcing Websites like www.washtech.org/wt, www.h1bvisasucks.com, www.hireamericancitizens.org and www.nomoreh1b.com are registering daily hits. Nearly a month ago, when Indian Commerce and Industry Minister Arun Jaitley, during his US visit, met Mr Robert Zoellick, the US Trade Representative (USTR), he was told that the US federal government considered Bills banning outsourcing “bad policy” and not only “opposes it but is trying to resist it.” Right now, the USA is caught between the devil and the deep sea and the sense of urgency is palpable. Its image of being a ‘coloured capitalist country’ is at risk. Uncle Sam should not act in a hurry. It should come out with a more viable solution to arrest plummeting profits, layoffs and the shooting unemployment graph. Else, it could be a classic case of hurry spoiling curry. |
Political pact may face hurdles
ISLAMABAD: The new round of talks between the government and the Opposition is unlikely to break the deadlock between the two sides as President Gen Pervez Musharraf has once again firmly refused to give any timeframe for removing his military uniform. Sources close to the President said here on Tuesday that Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali had been told by President Musharraf, during the three meetings they held in a matter of one week, that he would himself decide when to give up the uniform and that the Opposition must not insist on a firm timeframe in this regard. According to them, the President told the Prime Minister that he needed the uniform at this juncture to impress upon the world that the decisions that the government was in the process of taking up issues like Kashmir, Iraq and Israel had the blessings of both the elected civilian government and the army and, therefore, he could not oblige the Opposition or even Mr Jamali at this stage by announcing the date on which he would give up the uniform. —
The Dawn
When milk becomes unsafe
LAHORE: Barring those 3 per cent consumers who buy pasteurised or ultra heat-treated milk, the bulk of the population, particularly in cities, may be consuming a product that may be harmful for their health and growth. In the absence of a proper regulatory framework, milk is handled in such a crude way that the most healthy food is converted into a health hazard for the consumers. With 35 per cent of the 140 million population of Pakistan living in cities, only 2 per cent of the milk coming to cities is preserved according to international standards. The rest comes to the cities through the milkmen (gowalas) who use objectionable methods to prevent the milk from getting sour. —
The Nation
MQM leader held
KARACHI: Muhajir Qaumi Movement Vice -Chairman Iqbal Qureshi, who was taken in custody after his release from Landhi Jail, was booked under the Arms Act on Wednesday morning. Mr Qureshi was imprisoned under the MPO in Landhi Jail. His family had challenged his arrest in the Sindh High Court and he was released. Mr Qureshi was arrested by the Malir city police in Khokhrapar after an unlicensed pistol was recovered from him, police sources said. —
The News International
Cracks in MMA
ISLAMABAD: Cracks have started appearing in the MMA with assurance of support to the PML(Q)-led government by Maulana Fazalur Rehman and Maulana Samiul Haq during their Sunday’s parleys with Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Jamali. This was disclosed at a parliamentary party meeting of the PML-Q and allied parties, chaired by Mr Jamali, sources told The Frontier Post on Monday. They revealed parliamentary members were informed that Maulana Fazalur Rehman and Maulana Samiul Haq had assured support and cooperation to the government but their efforts to join the ruling coalition were being hampered by the Jamaat-i-Islami in the MMA. —
The Frontier Post
Renaming NWFP
PESHAWAR: The MMA government in the NWFP has resolved to settle the issue of renaming the province once and for all, a highly-placed source told The Frontier Post on Monday. “When there are no such issues, politicians would have no other option but to seek votes from the electorate on the basis of resolving their real problems. “The government, with this in mind, has decided to end the renaming problem and other such issues,” the source added. —
The Frontier Post |
Adorations to Om. Salutations to Om. Prostrations to Om. Devotion to Om. Glory to Om. Victory to Om. Hosanna to Om. Om is the mystic letter. Om is the immortal akshara. In Om the world rests. In Om we live and move. In Om we go to rest. In Om we find our quest... Om is verily Brahman. Om is Infinity. Om is Eternity. — Swami Shivananda, Bliss Divine O non-violent seeker! O persistent devotee! Get rid of the feelings of envy, greed And other evil impulses. — Samveda 308 Men reap the evil that they plough; the trouble that they sow. — The Bible, Job 4.8 |
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