 |
|
Broader vision Spirited
politics |
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Mass
extinction
Poll scene and
ground reality
A ‘tyre-ing’
story
Battle cries reverberate
in Tamil Nadu From
Pakistan
|
Broader vision THE need for the BJP's Vision Document released on Tuesday can be questioned when the election manifesto of the National Democratic Alliance is in the works. After all, it is the NDA manifesto that the alliance is committed to implement if it is returned to power. However, the BJP was forced to go in for this document, primarily to keep its cadres and Sangh Parivar constituents reassured that it had not compromised on its core issues like Ayodhya, Article 370 and uniform civil code. Whatever be the compulsions to have the Vision Document, a dispassionate analysis of it suggests that the BJP's position on all these contentious issues has undergone a dramatic change. Of course, it is possible to pick holes in the Document and argue that the party has been too clever by half. But that is tantamount to saying that the glass is half empty rather than the glass is half full. What is noteworthy is that the BJP has indeed mellowed on all the three issues. It no longer speaks the language heard at the height of the Ayodhya agitation that come what may, the temple would be built on the spot where the Babri Masjid stood. Instead, it speaks about negotiations between the two communities and the binding nature of a judicial verdict if it comes. It no longer believes that a uniform civil code should be forced down the throat of the Muslims. Instead, it wants a "social and political consensus to be evolved before the enactment" of such a code, which will be in the nature of ensuring gender equality and constitutional propriety. Similarly, there is no demand for abrogation of Article 370, which protects the special status of Jammu and Kashmir. In fact, it glosses over the demand referring to the controversial article as a "transient and temporary provision" while focusing on the need to fight terrorism in the state. Critics of the party may see these changes as a clever ploy to hoodwink the voters but the point that responsibilities that came with power had softened the party cannot be gainsaid. In any case, a mellowed BJP which recognises that it cannot bulldoze the Constitution to have its way is preferable to the one which shrieks about hardcore Hindutva. What is, therefore, needed is to keep the BJP binding to the Vision Document, rather than finding fault with it for diluting its stand on Hindutva. |
|
Spirited politics The Punjab and Haryana High Court order setting aside the controversial liquor shop auctions concerning Hoshiarpur, Nawanshahr and Jalandhar districts is a welcome development. It should satisfy those who had alleged that the auctions, done quickly after clubbing the Hoshiarpur and Nawanshahr circles, were aimed at favouring liquor baron Ponty Chadha, who is close to those in power in Punjab. The fresh auctions should be held in a fair and transparent manner to avoid any loss to the state exchequer as it reportedly happened last time. The government should realise that it cannot be allowed !to ignore the established procedure or violate the rules on any pretext The judgement is a major setback for the Congress as the Opposition, particularly the Akalis, will obviously use the court order and the strictures it has passed to attack the government. The Congress may find it difficult to defend itself as the liquor controversy has come on the heels of the hue and cry raised over the appointment of DSPs and the promotion of certain PCS officers. This definitely reflects poorly on the functioning of the Amarinder Singh government. The election results are bound to show e extent to which people are disenchanted with their rulers, who seem to be more interested in subserving their own interests than protecting the interests of the voters. Most political parties, including the Congress and the Shiromani Akali Dal, are to blame for linking the liquor trade with politics in the state. If the late Congress Chief Minister Beant Singh is guilty of introducing the Ponty Chadha factor, Mr Parkash Singh Badal is responsible for the rise in politics of liquor baron Jagdish Garcha. Licences for liquor trade have been issued not only to reward the businessmen in the good books of the party in power but also the MLAs loyal to the head of the government. There is need to expose the unholy nexus, which has been causing great harm to the state and its people financially and otherwise. |
|
Mass extinction Normally, the decline in the population of breeding birds, butterflies and plants in some parts of England during the past 20 years should not cause worldwide concern. Since the country, by virtue of its well-known and well-studied biodiversity, is considered the canary for the rest of the globe, the possibility of a mass extinction of species is being taken as a grim reality. The findings, published in the US journal Science, come from government-funded scientists using data painstakingly amassed over the past 40 years by 20,000 skilled naturalists. The most comprehensive study ever conducted reveals that 70 per cent of butterfly species in Britain have shown signs of decline during the last 20 years. Two species have become extinct. As many as 28 per cent of plant species and 54 per cent of bird species have also declined in areas studied over long periods. But the real shock is caused by the fact that this decline is mostly man-made. During the past 500 million years, this blue planet of ours has seen five mass extinction events that took place about 439 million, 367 million, 245 million, 208 million and 65 million years ago, say the naturalists. These are considered to be cosmic events, either from outer space coming in, or some major perturbation like volcanoes, etc. But the approaching mass extinction event is organic because mankind has become so dominant on the earth that through its over-exploitation of nature, it eats, destroys or poisons the others. Optimists may say that continuous evolution and extinction is the way of life. But now extinction rates are at least 100 times greater than the natural "background" rate because of pollution, habitat destruction, hunting, agriculture, global warming and population growth. The man is the culprit. The wakeup call has been sounded for him. And there is no scope for pressing the snooze button any longer. |
|
|
Thought for the day Always be sincere, even if you don’t mean it.
— Harry S. Truman |
Poll scene and ground reality YET another, rather prestigious opinion poll has awarded a reasonably comfortable victory in the ongoing Lok Sabha elections to the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA). Understandably, the Congress has protested against this and is demanding that the veracity of the data should be checked. The pollsters themselves admit that since the poll had been conducted during the first fortnight of March, those who had been polled could change their opinion before the voting. Especially because at the time of interviews political parties hadn’t yet announced their candidates or their constituencies and no one could therefore know what the crucial caste configuration in various states would be. Even so the fact remains that most people, especially those belonging to the urban middle class, even those not at all friendly to the BJP and its allies, tend to believe the opinion poll’s findings to be accurate because these conform to their own perception. The state of the play at the time of writing reinforces this belief. To say this is not to deny that the Congress, as the principal Opposition party, and its president, Mrs Sonia Gandhi, have striven hard to overcome their undoubted handicaps. What they have succeeded in doing cannot be called too little but it surely has come too late. The mobilisation of both the party workers and the people at large that ought to have taken place over the last five years cannot be replaced by a few weeks of hectic and generally impressive “road shows” of Mrs Gandhi alone. This applies also to the critically important question of forging strategic and tactical alliances without which the Congress could as well have sat out of the electoral contest, given the great and growing fragmentation of the Indian polity. For, there can be no gainsaying that the party wasted a lot of time riding the Pachmarhi high horse of wanting to rule the country by itself. Even after its “Shimla sankalp” last year to join hands with other secular and “like-minded” parties, it acted rather belatedly. Consequently, although it has not done badly in the department of alliance building, it continues to suffer from three major disabilities. The first of these is that all the talk of a nationwide “Secular Front” having taken shape to confront and defeat the “Saffron Front” is pure make-believe, not a fact of life. What exists is a quilt-like combination of a number of state-wise alliances that can be called pragmatic, if not opportunistic. They are not at all ideological. Even the most formidable of them, the DMK-led bloc in Tamil Nadu, underscores this point. For the last five years Mr Karunanidhi had no compunction about being a part of the NDA and sharing the loaves and fishes of office at the Centre with the “communal BJP”. Now he is a bulwark of secularism. Then there is the revealing case of Mr Ramvilas Paswan, who was a minister in the United Front government, led successively by Mr H.D. Deve Gowda first and then Mr Inder Kumar
Gujral. Later, he nonchalantly joined the Government of Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Now, sailing under the banner of the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP), he is a part of the secular combination in Bihar, led by the redoubtable Mr Laloo Prasad Yadav’s Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), that includes the Congress, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) of Mr Sharad Pawar and the CPM. It is noteworthy that Mr Laloo Yadav has given the Congress only four Lok Sabha seats out of a total of 40 allocated to Bihar. Mr Paswan’s share is twice that of the Congress. This advertises the Congress party’s second major handicap. In most states where secular parties have come together, it is the junior partner that is often treated as a “supplicant”. Nowhere is the Congress plight more pathetic than in the politically key state of UP that elects 80 out of the Lok Sabha’s 540 members. Time was when the Samajwadi Party (SP) of Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav, the state’s Chief Minister, and the Congress were considered “natural allies”. Now Mr Yadav and his overactive Man Friday, Mr Amar Singh, are blandly rebuffing all overtures of the Congress — sometimes accompanied by threats — for an alliance or even seat adjustments. The Congress blames the SP for failing to follow the “secular path” even while being a secular party. The SP retorts that the Congress had fruitlessly “chased” the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) of Ms Mayawati for too long, only to be rejected by the temperamental lady. It was, therefore, too late to knock at the SP’s door. In a four-cornered fight in UP that now looks unavoidable, the Congress cannot but be at the bottom of the heap, with the SP on top, the BSP next and the BJP in the third position. This by itself would be disastrous enough. But the really catastrophic development that is the third and the worst difficulty for the formerly grand old party is Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav’s give-away remark that the Congress should talk to him after the elections. Not to put any gloss on the situation, the reality is that the pre-election alliances are all right as far as they go, but they do not go far enough. Mr Yadav in Lucknow, like all other strong state leaders, is trying to maximise their leverage by winning as many Lok Sabha seats as possible and then, in the configuration of political forces as they emerge, negotiate with the BJP or the Congress or whoever from a position of strength. In short, the real power play and fun and games would begin only after the elections. In this context it is obvious that Mr Vajpayee — as someone who has demonstrated rare ability to keep a coalition government going for six years and enjoys much greater acceptability than anyone else for the office of Prime Minister - has enormous advantage over Mrs Gandhi or whoever the secular front might project as its leader. No wonder then that the Congress, several of its allies and the Left Front, an informal supporter of the Congress only outside its three strongholds of West Bengal, Tripura and Kerala where the two sides are hostile to each other, are deeply suspicious of Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav. They think that he would have a very cosy, if covert, deal with the BJP. They would do well to recognise that other satraps in other states might have the same
idea. |
A ‘tyre-ing’ story When I got rid of my jalopy I had thought that my days of deflation were finally over. At the most inopportune moments and the most inconvenient places the old girl would stumble to a stop and I would be stranded with flat tyres right amidst madly-honking traffic making a terrible nuisance of myself. Or rolling up my sleeve and trying to literally jack up the car to get to the wheels changed with a number of curious bystanders drinking in my puny biceps and sweaty brows! With the jalopy gone, those days were gone too, I mused and stole a smile to myself. But it was perhaps soon. About two weeks after I got this Maruti van to adorn my not-too-tidy garage I was going on a trip to watch a cultural programme in the neighbouring town when right in the middle of nowhere the van slowed down and, dragging me to the left, halted. I got down and was greeted by a flat front tyre. I knew about cars, not vans and so my knowledge about the position of the jack and the stepney in a van was awful. I scanned every nook and peered into every corner but there was no sign of these essential tools! Heartbroken, I looked at the passing vehicles but none gave me a look of sympathy which could have encouraged me to ask for help. In fact, some drivers did manage a smile which looked more like sardonic grins to me. Then I hit upon the bright idea. I whisked out my cell phone and called a friendly travel agent back home. He responded immediately and sent a car with a driver who presumably was an expert at changing wheels! This lad got the jack out from under the seat and the spare tyre out from under the van like a magician conjuring pigeons. He fixed the wheel in a jiffy and left after receiving my profuse words of thanks. On my way back I had decided in an expansive mood to pay him a couple of tenners for his prompt work. When he reached home the travel agent's bill for Rs 250 was waiting for me, the charge for the vehicle "hired" to go to and fro! The van continued to shock me at the most unearthly places for a couple of years more. Desperate to get over the tyre travails, I approached tyre dealers who offered me what they said the best brands with the best discounts. But things remained much the same. Then a seedy-looking rep of a car financing company convinced me to go for a brand new car. And my suave mechanic voted for the hottest little car in the town. He assured me that the tyres of this car being 145/80 R 12 (something that I could not decipher but that sounded quite impressive) would be puncture-resistant. Indeed it was smooth sailing for a few days. Then one day as I returned to my car after a night show of Govinda laugh riot, I found that the laugh was really on me; the rear tyre on the left side had gone flat. It was another half an hour of gruelling, back-breaking "tyre-ing" session for me at that vacant theatre premises with a grumpy missus (because she was sleepy) and a grumpier sonny (because he was hungry) looking on without a trace of sympathy! I confronted the mechanic the next day and while giving the tyre for repair, he showed me a small iron nail which had done the damage. "Must be the handiwork of some miscreant, "he frowned and I was comforted. But recently it happened again. The missus and I were returning from a marriage reception where I had stuffed myself with goodies. Suddenly the car wobbled and slowed to a stop in front of the cremation ground! A flat tyre again! This time the front one on the left side. "May be, some evil spirit?" hazarded the exasperated missus. The next day the tyrewalla showed me the evil spirit--another iron nail! Now some well wishers have been advising me to go for tubeless tyres. Perhaps I would, once I decide what to do with these iron nails that seem to dog me, err…my car
everywhere!
|
Battle cries reverberate in Tamil Nadu
Election
results from Tamil Nadu have, in the past few decades, revealed a clear polarisation of votes between the AIADMK led by J. Jayalalithaa and the DMK led by M. Karunanidhi. Interestingly, the voters showed their preference in such a fashion that one of the two parties (along with its allies) were swept aside across the state. This has been the case in all the general elections between 1984 and 1999. A sub-text to the Tamil Nadu story is that the Congress, even after losing power in the state to the DMK in 1967 (and having to stay out of government since then), the Congress could count on at least two dozen MPs from Tamil Nadu in all the elections since 1984. The dynamics of the state’s politics also meant that the Congress could tilt the balance in favour of either of the two Dravidian parties. Hence, when Rajiv Gandhi decided to settle down with the AIADMK as its ally in the state ahead of the 1984 general elections, it helped the party win almost all the seats it contested. This was true in 1989 (the Congress won 27 out of the 28 it contested) even when
the Bofors controversy led to reverses elsewhere. The party swept the polls in 1991 from Tamil Nadu. But then, these are stories of the past. After 1996, when the Congress party was vanquished in Tamil Nadu, the equations have changed. The Congress is no longer a party that determines the course of politics in Tamil Nadu. It is another matter that the party continues to be in the news, thanks to its leaders and their penchant for agitating against each other rather than leading agitations on issues confronting the people. The Congress split in 1996 (when G.K. Moopanar founded the Tamil Maanila Congress) led to an exodus of the traditional partymen to the new party. The 1996 results, however, followed the pattern. The TMC, in alliance with the DMK swept the polls. The real decline of the Congress began then and in 1998, even the TMC lost badly. The DMK too suffered erosion. The DMK-TMC combine lost heavily. It lost in all but six out of the 39 Lok Sabha constituencies then. While the DMK lost several of its citadels in the northern Tamil Nadu districts to the Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK) led by its founder president, Dr S. Ramdoss, the TMC’s strong base in the southern districts were lost to the AIADMK as well as the BJP. Thus, the AIADMK-led alliance consisting of the PMK, the MDMK (of Vaiko) and the BJP could register impressive gains in 1998. It is this splintering of the social base of both the Congress and the DMK that will determine the poll prospects of the Tamil Nadu parties in this election. Over the years, DMK chief M. Karunanidhi was forced to settle down and do business with the PMK and the MDMK this time. While the entry of the PMK into the DMK-led front could mean consolidation of the DMK led front’s voter-base in the northern districts, MDMK leader Vaiko has emerged as the mascot for the front. The Congress, as a party, depends on all these individuals in this election. The DMK-led front indeed appears to have an edge in the northern districts. The strong consolidation of the Vanniar community (among the dominant backward castes in Tamil Nadu) lends the front this edge. There are, however, the following imponderables. Among them is the sense of resentment against Dr Ramdoss. The resurgence among the Vanniar community that set the northern districts on fire literally during the early nineties and made the PMK into a force is no longer visible. A cross-section of the community’s local leaders no longer perceive Dr Ramdoss as their leader. Meanwhile, popular matinee idol Rajnikant is bent on working against the PMK chief this time. The BJP is understood to have opened a channel of communication with Rajnikant already. This could mean trouble for the DMK-led front in this region from where it could have expected a large number of seats. The situation in the southern districts is no different. While the rapprochement between Karunanidhi and Vaiko this time has lent the DMK-led front a certain advantage in this region, known traditionally as the AIADMK’s citadel, the pronounced erosion of the traditional Congress base (as well as that of the TMC) in this region seems to give Jayalalithaa and her ally, the BJP, an edge. The Nadar community, among the strongest base of the Congress over the years seems to have moved to the BJP in the past few years. This trend that began after 1998 (when the BJP managed a foothold in Tamil Nadu, thanks to its alliance with the AIADMK) seems to have concretised in recent years. All this meant the BJP’s victory in the Nagercoil Lok Sabha seat, considered a Congress citadel even in bad times! It is this background that lends substance to the thinking that the verdict on May 13, 2004 may not lead to a clear mandate from Tamil Nadu. While the DMK-led front may appear strong and poised for a clean sweep if one adds up the percentage of votes polled by the various parties in the last election, the social and political dynamics that determine the poll outcome seem to favour the AIADMK-BJP combine. |
|
From Pakistan LAHORE: Forman Christian College has been granted the status of a university by the Punjab Government through Punjab Ordinance No 1 of 2004 issued by Governor Khalid Maqbool on March 29. Addressing a hurriedly called press conference on Tuesday evening at the college campus to announce the decision, the college principal, Dr. Richard Armacost, thanked the Punjab Governor, the Chief Minister and the Secretary, Education, for their cooperation in response to their application for full degree granting authority. Dr. Armacost said university status was especially important to them as this would help implement a four-year bachelors degree (honours) programme that will be worthy of accreditation by the same groups that accredit colleges and universities in the US or the UK.
— The Nation
Rise in defence
spending
KARACHI: Increasing military activities on the Pakistan-Afghanistan borders to combat terrorism has led to an almost 14 per cent increase in defence spending in the first half of the current fiscal year, the State Bank of Pakistan's second quarterly report reveals. The SBP report, released on Tuesday, informs that “these unusual operations are partially financed through receipts from the US, which show up in higher defence receipts”. The data shows that Pakistan’s defence spending shot up to Rs 87.3 billion in the first half of the current fiscal year as against Rs 76.7 billion in 2002-03.
— Dawn
Cricket unites
half-brothers
MULTAN: Half-brothers Rashid and Shahid Latif have been separated for decades by hostility between Pakistan and India but cricket has brought them together Rashid Latif, a former Pakistan cricket captain, has played 37 tests and 164 one-day internationals, while Shahid works for a newspaper in Kolkata and is an ardent supporter of the Indian team. Shahid, 50, is in Pakistan for the first time on a cricket visa after restrictions were eased for India’s first tour of Pakistan in more than 14 years. Rashid Latif sent him the match tickets from Pakistan. Both men are likely be in Lahore to watch the second Test between the two countries, cheering their respective sides.
— Dawn
Violence against
women
ISLAMABAD: The issue of honour killing (Karo-Kari) echoed in the National Assembly on Tuesday and Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayat assured the House that the government would not allow any discriminatory law against women. The minister gave the assurance while speaking on a calling attention notice that was moved by MP Bhandara, Mehnaz Rafi, Kashmala Tariq, Mian Riaz Hussain Pirzada and Dr Muhammad Farooq Sattar. The calling attention notice was about the incidents of Karo-Kari in the country and the selling of a girl by her father against her wishes at Mirpur Mathelo. The minister said the government would ensure implementation of the law in its true spirit and take serious notice for not registering an FIR in any case of honour killing. Faisal said although maintaining law and order was purely a provincial matter, the federal government would take notice of any case of honour killing if reported by members of Parliament.
— The News |
Hari is an ocean.
My eyes touch him. Mira is an ocean of joy. She takes him inside. — Mira Bai To the alone, life is eternal; to the alone, there is no death. The alone can never cease to be. — J. Krishnamurti There is no limit to God’s works, no end to His gifts. — Guru Nanak When good befalls a man, he calls it Providence; when evil, fate. — Knut Hamsun Everything flows, nothing stays still. — Heraclitus Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the men of old; seek what they sought. — Matsuo Basho |
| HOME PAGE | |
Punjab | Haryana | Jammu & Kashmir |
Himachal Pradesh | Regional Briefs |
Nation | Opinions | | Business | Sports | World | Mailbag | Chandigarh | Ludhiana | National Capital | | Calendar | Weather | Archive | Subscribe | Suggestion | E-mail | |
