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U-turn on Uma Hard times ahead |
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Spillover of Nepal’s crisis Maoist threat to India is a cause for concern THERE are some reports that the Maoist problem in Nepal is threatening to spill over into the bordering districts of India. The firing incident in Julaghat in Uttaranchal's Pithoragarh district on Saturday, in which a two-year-old girl was injured seriously, is the latest proof of an impending crisis.
The new Colombo spirit
The need for a clear, strong voice
Guru Granth Sahib’s message is for all Canada’s Punjabi Press lacks talent
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U-turn on Uma THE Karnataka Government's decision to withdraw all the cases registered against former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Uma Bharati is welcome. It would serve the larger public interest because ever since her arrest on August 25 in Hubli, political temperatures have risen with the leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress hurling charges and counter-charges against one another. The issue on which Ms Bharati has been arrested is emotional and it would not be in the interest of seasoned and mature leaders to play politics with the Tricolour. The Bharatiya Janata Party has given a call for a week-long "Satyagraha" from September 1 in Bangalore in protest against her arrest. Consequently, Chief Minister Dharam Singh's decision to withdraw all the cases against Ms Uma Bharati is bound to be viewed as an attempt by the Congress to defuse the controversy. In the past few weeks, the nation has been in turmoil on one controversy or the other. Parliament could hardly function because of the Opposition's chorus on the issue of tainted ministers. Amazingly, the Union Budget was passed without discussion in Parliament. Similarly, considerable time is being wasted on Veer Savarkar. Ms Uma Bharati's arrest has only exacerbated the situation. It is debatable whether the Karnataka Government was at all justified in re-opening a 10-year-old case against her. Courts go by the rule book and one cannot find fault with them. Still, it is good that the Dharam Singh government, without making it a prestige issue, has come forward to withdraw all the cases against her. There is a need for the Centre and other states to show similar flexibility and sagacity to resolve other issues. Instead of frittering away precious time, energy and resources on mundane issues, political parties and the governments — at the Centre and in the states — should concentrate on governance. The nation should not be allowed to drift. |
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Hard times ahead THE interest rates are set to rise. That is what the RBI’s annual report, released on Monday, indicates. Within hours of the RBI announcement, the State Bank of India raised its fixed interest rates on home loans by 25 to 50 basis points. Last month HDFC, and a week ago Standard Chartered Bank, had hiked their interest rates. Although the floating home loan rates have been left untouched, these too will soon harden. Many SBI loanees had sought to convert their variable interest rates into fixed rates. They will have to pay a conversion fee of 2.75 per cent of the outstanding loan amount. All this is bad news for loanees and loan aspirants. Higher rates will hit economic activity too. A slowdown in demand for loans will hamper housing activity, which, in turn, will have an impact on employment generation and reduce demand for steel and other housing inputs. In February this year the RBI had predicted an inflation rate of 4-4.5 per cent and was bullish about growth. That was after the country had achieved a remarkable 8 per cent GDP growth last year. In May the RBI got concerned about inflation. Monday’s report says inflation may inch upwards and the GDP growth may slow down. Last week Finance Minister P. Chidambaram was bravely holding out assurances that interest rates would remain stable. What has upset the RBI and Finance Ministry calculations? One obvious reason is the massive surge in global oil prices. The second is the erratic monsoon. The third reason the RBI report mentions is the hardening of non-fuel commodity prices globally. Inflation and interest rates are looking up worldwide. After the UK and Australia, interest rates in the US are set to firm up. The global fallout is inescapable. What should be done in this situation? One option before the RBI to contain inflation was to let the rupee appreciate-vis-a-vis dollar. But that would have upset the exporters’ lobby. Instead the RBI advice to the banks is: hike interest rates. An economist-led government has no easy options. However, sufficient food stocks and foreign reserves will help the government in meeting the difficult situation. |
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Spillover of Nepal’s crisis THERE are some reports that the Maoist problem in Nepal is threatening to spill over into the bordering districts of India. The firing incident in Julaghat in Uttaranchal's Pithoragarh district on Saturday, in which a two-year-old girl was injured seriously, is the latest proof of an impending crisis. The Maoists may have also established links with not only naxalite groups like the People's War but also with insurgent outfits such as the Kamtapur Liberation Organisation and the United Liberation Front of Asom. The arrest of Maoist leaders in Siliguri and Patna in the recent past cleared the doubts, if there were any, about their links with Indian extremist groups. After having made North Bengal a hub, they seem to have planned to infiltrate into the Uttaranchal areas bordering Nepal. All this should be a cause for concern for India. India's long porous border with Nepal poses a challenge to both countries. That is why the Nepalese government fears that the Maoists may use Indian territory to launch attacks inside Nepal. The extremists have threatened to target the border areas from September 8, when Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba will visit New Delhi. Mr Deuba may express his country's concern when he meets Indian leaders. India should, however, use the occasion to impress upon Nepal that it must not abandon the path of dialogue and democracy in the interest of peace in the Himalayan kingdom. The Maoist problem has got complicated more because of the failure of the palace to restore a democratic set-up. India, the most affected neighbour because of the crisis in Nepal, is naturally concerned about the situation taking a turn for the worse. The Maoists have given the indication that they will be as ruthless in dealing with their opponents as the Khmer Rouge was in Cambodia. These are, no doubt, trying times for both Nepal and India, which need to cooperate with each other so that the Maoist menace is contained. |
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Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.
— Oscar Wilde |
SEVENTEEN years ago around this time of the year Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi landed at Colombo airport by an Indian Air Force plane in the thick of the Sri Lankan crisis. He was not taken to the city in a cavalcade by road. Instead, he landed at Colombo's Galle Face by an Indian military helicopter as IAF planes guarded the airspace. Across the seafront were to be seen Indian Navy ships which had been positioned apparently for any contingency. As Editor of the Hindustan Times, I was one of the members of a large Press party which accompanied Rajiv Gandhi to cover his visit and talks with President Jayawardene. Sri Lanka was facing a grim situation caught as it was in ethnic crisis. President Jayawardene, who needed a helping hand, had clearly succeeded in persuading Rajiv Gandhi to lend him one. The result was the India-Sri Lanka Agreement which the two signed later in the day. Among other things, it provided for India sending the Indian Peace Keeping Force to bash up the LTTE which was threatening to carve out an independent Tamil Eelam in the northern and eastern Sri Lanka. One could feel the tension in the air. President Jaywardene's dissenting Prime Minister, R. Premadasa, stayed away to signal Sinhala opposition to the agreement. By agreeing to send the IPKF, India instantly provoked a strong reaction among the Sinhalas so much so that on the following day a Sri Lankan Navy rating attacked Rajiv Gandhi with a rifle butt when he was inspecting the guard of honour. India's Prime Minister could have lost his life that day a few minutes before he boarded the IAF helicopter for the airport to fly back to India. India had willy-nilly jumped into the Sri Lankan mess. In the process it actually earned the anger of both the Sinhalas who hated India for sending its troops to Sri Lanka and the LTTE which the IPKF was to fight against. What was essentially a fight between the Sinhalas and the LTTE became an open conflict between India and the LTTE. No wonder, President Jayawardene was known for his cleverness. Whatever President Jaywardene's calculations, India's relations with much of the dominant Sri Lankan opinion had become suspect. The IPKF was seen as an occupation force, and India as a hegemonistic neighbour. Centuries of a happy relationship had given way to a quick-fix that did not work but left a legacy of intense distrust. Seventeen years later, now one, however, experiences a sea-change in the relations between India and Sri Lanka. Distrust has given way to the belief that India means well for Sri Lanka and is a friend and not really a Big Brother, throwing its weight around. You can feel the change on landing at Colombo's Bandaranaike airport itself. An Indian no longer needs to get a visa for visiting Sri Lanka; the immigration officer at the airport simply looks at the passport, stamps a visa, virtually letting you walk across with a welcoming smile. Colombo city is an hour's drive away and you see, of all things, the Indian Oil Corporation's petrol stations. The IOC has secured rights to sell petrol at over 100 outlets along Sri Lanka's highways. In the eighties, India was worried that Sri Lanka might lease out the strategic Trincomalee port on the eastern coast to the Americans for setting up what they call Rest and Recreation facilities, perhaps a naval base close to the Indian coast. The Indian Oil Corporation now runs the oil tank farm at the port to maintain fuel supplies. The two countries have signed a Free Trade Agreement — the first for India with any nation. The two-way trade between the countries has crossed $ 1.33 billion. They are also working towards signing an Economic Partnership Agreement to expand bilateral cooperation, joint ventures and investment. India has also opened a credit line of $ 150 million to Sri Lanka. Sri Lankan Airline flies to as many as eight destinations in India, the Indian Railways are being considered for managing the Sri Lankan Railways for two or three years. Mutual cooperation is also envisaged in the areas of IT and peaceful uses of space. There is also a proposal in the works to start a ferry service between Colombo and Cochin and Colombo and Tuticorin. These developments are not of mean significance. They indicate the evolution of a new relationship between the two neighbours. Patience, changed perceptions and some effort have gone into rebuilding the ties. The two neighbours have come to realise that they have no choice but to live like brothers. The new Prime Minister, Mr Mohindra Rajpakse, Foreign Minister Laxman Khadirgamar, Opposition leader and former Prime Minister, Ranil Wickremsinghe and President Chandrika Kumaratunga's key peace negotiator, Mr Jayanta Dhanapala, they all spoke warmly about the current state of relations with India. "They have reached a level of irreversible excellence," Mr Laxman Khadirgamar tells his own people and visiting friends from India. Mr Rajpakse, who visited India recently, was no less warm about relations with India. Speaking to me in his office (a picture of Che Guevara was hanging prominently on the wall), even the General Secretary of the Janatha Vimukhti Peramuna (JVP), Mr Tylvin Silva, whose extreme Left-wing party intensely hated India until recently, told me that India after all is a friend of Sri Lanka. A major factor that has brought about a change in the quality of relations is New Delhi's categorical declaration that for India the integrity and unity of Sri Lanka is an article of faith and that any solution to Sri Lanka's ethnic crisis has to be found within the framework of Sri Lanka remaining one country. India has made it known that it would prefer a peaceful Sri Lanka in its neighbourhood instead of its remaining caught in an enervating conflict. Also, it will support a negotiated settlement which could restore peace in the strife-torn republic, is acceptable to all communities, ensures a democratic and plural polity and guarantees human rights for all citizens. With the withdrawal of the IPKF began the Sri Lankans believing in Indian credentials. Where the sight of Indian troops was an anathema to the Sri Lankans just a few years ago, the Indian Navy and Army personnel recently provided relief winning the hearts and minds of the Sinhalas in the flood-hit southern Sri Lanka. New Delhi is totally opposed to the creation of a separate Tamil State, an Eelam next to its southern coast. The creation of an Eelam is not in India's strategic and security interest. No one in India, not even in Tamil Nadu, can be fond of the LTTE, which was responsible for the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi. Indian opposition to the LTTE and Eelam has indeed brought India and Sri Lanka closer. What is significant is that the leaders of various persuasions in Sri Lanka are now keen that India should help in bringing about a peace settlement in Sri Lanka. Most parties, in fact, want India to put pressure on the LTTE so that it agrees to sign a peace settlement with the Sri Lankan government. India would welcome the resumption of the stalled peace process, leading to a negotiated settlement, so that there is peace in India's neighbourhood. And somehow it is sure that President Chandrika Kumaratunga would not be unmindful of India's essential security concerns while pursuing a peace settlement. India, however, has learnt the hard way that playing Big Brother to force a settlement is in nobody's interest — certainly not in India's. Wisely, it has come to realise that brokering a deal — even honestly brought about — doesn't win friends and influence
people.
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The need for a clear, strong voice LAST month I went to a golden wedding anniversary celebration. It was a wonderful function. The kirtan was so beautiful that it brought tears to my eyes and the Gianiji preached a wonderful sermon. He spoke in a rich baritone, each syllable clearly enunciated with a mellifluous cadence. His text was the old favourite “Faith Can Move Mountains” and the parable was of a middle- aged widow in Arabia who lost her only son when his boat sank to the bottom of the river. The woman refused to accept her loss: a holy man from the East would come and restore her son to her, she said. For 12 long years her faith did not waver and then Baba Nanak, in the course of his wanderings, arrived at her doorstep. She fell at his feet and begged for his intercession. Nanak stood on the bank of the river, raised his left hand and asked the river to restore to the widow what was rightfully hers. The boat with all its passengers emerged from the waters and the woman and her son were reunited. There were few dry eyes in the congregation at the end of the sermon. Fifteen days later I attended a bhog for a relative’s death. The preacher preached that our religion did not enjoin us to take the remains of our loved ones to Kiratpur. We were asked to cast them in the nearest running water and in case no such feature existed in our neighborhood, we were to scatter them in the fields and plough over them. By going only to Kiratpur we were once again perpetuating the ritual of taking the remains of the dead to the waters at Hardwar. I was appalled. I firmly believed that there could be no peace for the departed soul unless the remains were cast in the holy waters at Kiratpur Sahib. That night as I lay awake, troubled by the words of the preacher, other voices, other memories came drifting through the thick mists of time: the voices of preachers I had listened to as a child, the voices of my parents and grandparents as they spoke to me about our religion. The cumulative message of these voices, these memories, was that the Gurus had held no brief for miracles, in fact they had eschewed any act that could be interpreted as a miracle. Guru Nanak in his preaching had laid upon us the injunction that we free our lives from the religious rituals that had imprisoned us. I have since carried the din of conflicting voices and the chaos of confused messages in my mind. I pray each day, that before I go, I will hear a clear, strong voice tell me which of the two are the true reflection of the precepts of my religion: the forgotten lessons of my childhood or the comfortable beliefs of my old
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Guru Granth Sahib’s message is for all
LIKE Muslims and Christians, Sikhs are “ahle kitab”. Theirs is Guru Granth Sahib which celebrates its 400th anniversary on September 1. Unfortunately, the Shiromani Akali Dal, the organiser, does not have good credentials. Guru Granth Sahib is a pluralistic scripture while the Akali Dal is primarily communal and fundamentalist. For it to monopolise the celebrations is a travesty of justice because its leadership oozes parochialism. Not only that, it has not allowed the universal message of the book to reach the four corners of the earth because it has bottled it up in gurdwaras, where they feel secure against any liberal challenge. Guru Granth Sahib transcends creed and caste, cant and convention. It does not belong to the Sikhs alone. It consecrates the sayings of 11 Hindu bhakats and as many bard poets and seven Muslims, along with the teachings of six Sikh Gurus. No other religion has included in its holy book the sayings of others, however revered. Although it is a sacred book of the Sikhs, it belongs to the entire humanity and carries a message of brotherhood and sanj (togetherness). The Akali Dal has exploited the book for political gain and not let the world know the reservoir of spiritualism it contains. Its message of peace is all the more needed today when violence dominates society. Every man should command respect in the moment when he bows before his god. We may believe that his view of the divine lacks valuable, even essential, elements. His forms of worship may appear strange to us, sometimes offensive. But in the moment of prayer, every man is at his best. Guru Granth Sahib is an approach to such understanding. The book answers great questions raised in every human mind by the mystery of life. It helps us bear our sorrows. It tells man how to live and give assurance in the presence of death. It gives us strength in suffering. Another aspect of this problem is the wide gap which can open between the original teaching of a religion’s founder and what that faith has become after centuries of being worked over and interpreted by the founder’s followers. Within each religion, there gradually grows up a widespread of variations. The Sikhs have kept traditions intact but the politics of the Akali Dal to their exasperation has endeavoured to distance the religion from the teachings of the founder, Guru Nanak Dev, and the last preceptor, Guru Gobind Singh. Efforts have been made to argue that Lord Rama mentioned in Guru Granth Sahib is different from the one whom the Hindus worship. The intention is to draw a cleavage between the Hindus and the Sikhs for political ends. The present Akali leadership is most to blame for polarising the Punjabis. It brings in the Panth even in elections to panchayats because it believes it can bamboozle the Sikh masses in the name of religion. In this way, the Akalis act against the letter and spirit of Guru Granth Sahib, which breathes secularism and which knows no difference between the low and the high, the rich and the poor. Good old Akali leaders like Master Tara Singh and Giani Kartar Singh preferred India to Pakistan at the time of partition. In contrast, the present lot of the Akali leadership has the distinction of burning the Indian Constitution which includes special provisions for the protection of the minorities. Incidentally, Sikh representatives in the Constituent Assembly did not sign the Constitution when all members of different religions did. That lacuna still stares the nation in the face. The community’s signature should be obtained despite the Akalis’ negative role. It looks odd when the country’s Prime Minister is a Sikh. When the purpose of the Akali Dal is to polarise society, it is difficult to imagine that it will try to bury the hatchet on the Constitution. The fact is that the Akali leadership does not stop thinking beyond controlling the gurdwaras which give them patronage and funds. The Akali Dal did not condemn the terrorists in the 1980s, nor did it do anything to stall them. Except for Sant Harcharan Singh Longowal and a few like him, the Akalis connived at the lawlessness. The government unthinkingly attacked the Vatican of the Sikh, the Golden Temple, to stop terrorism. It should have gone into what led to the situation. New Delhi is still too immersed in political conveniences to assuage the hurt of the Sikhs. In a leading book on the world’s great religions, Sikhism is described as “a militant faith.” But this is an over-reaction to what happened in Punjab when politics went haywire. Still, this impression has given a bad name to the community. Some of its members have been killed in America for being mistaken as the followers of Osama-bin Laden. Religious tradition necessitates the Sikhs to wear a beard and a turban. But America does not appreciate this. The Sikhs also face problems in France where the head cover has been banned. But for the Akalis’ parochial approach, Punjab would not have been divided and re-divided. At one stage the demand for Punjabi suba (state) was a linguistic one. But the Akalis came out in their true colours when all that they wanted was a state which would have Sikhs in a majority. In the process, the “suba” was reduced to a “subi”. Even the reduced state of Punjab does not have Sikhs in majority because the migration of labour from other states has reduced the Punjabi-speaking population to 47 per cent. The Akali party has learnt no lesson from the mistakes it has committed in Punjab. It still plays with the sentiments of the Sikh masses. It hardly did anything for them when it was in power. Corruption and communalism had become its hallmark. Unfortunately, the Congress government has done no better. The basic thing that the Akalis do not appreciate is that democracy presupposes the separation of religion from politics. The idea behind it is that pluralism suffers if particularism is fed. The Akali Dal, like the Shiv Sena in Maharashtra, continues to harm Punjab’s secular ethos, the Punjabiyat. The Akali leadership does not seem to understand the letter and the spirit of the scripture. This is the time to tell the world the catholicity of Guru Granth Sahib’s teachings. Instead, the top Akali leaders have made the occasion a party affair. At one time, it did not want to invite the Prime Minister to the celebrations because he belonged to the Congress party. The only way out is for the community to assert itself to separate the celebrations from the Akali Dal. Guru Granth Sahib’s message is for all. The Akalis are coming in the way of spreading it, thanks to their politics. Guru Granth Sahib explores the spirit of different religions, how they mould men’s lives in various parts of the world and how they try to impress their image on the history of our times. The religion is a living element in today’s culture, not a museum piece. The youthfulness of Sikhism, its vigour and vitality, should help the community disseminate the message of peace and unity. The Akalis fail to understand even the basic truth. |
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Canada’s Punjabi Press lacks talent BY its sheer size, it overwhelms. There are 14 broadsheet-Punjabi weeklies, one daily and several monthlies besides some web editions in Greater Toronto alone. Punjabis from India and Pakistan are nearly equal in number, three lakh each. The Urdu-speaking, however, total up nearly six lakh. Others in large number are of Tamil, Bengali and Gujarati origin. Vancouver has 11 Punjabi weeklies besides some fortnightlies and monthlies. There are many in Hindi, Urdu, Gujarati, Bengali, Tamil, Sinhalese and English to cater to the needs of the South Asian population. The oldest among the Punjabi weeklies is Sanjh Swera and among English weeklies for Indians is Indian Journal, started nearly a quarter century back. Most of these weeklies are distributed free and one could just visit a grocery shop or a mandir, gurdwara or mosque and there are a plenty and pick up as many as one wished to. Any public place visited by South Asians has plenty of these publications, waiting to be picked up. Fine. The whole existence is linked to advertisements and most with skeleton staff and tightly controlled budget or sourced outside in India should be doing well. Many have 70 to 80 per cent advertisements compared to editorial content, that too placed in a slipshod manner. Jaspal Shetra, who edits South Asian Observer in English and Panj Pani in Punjabi, deprecates the tendency to spread superstition through advertisements, but sympathises with the editors/ publishers who have to run the show with small resources. “They can certainly forgo the income from advertisements spreading superstition and concentrate on healthy practices.” Eminent journalist Surjan Zirvi was sore that not much attention is paid to serious issues of multiculturalism. Even the language is not polished and the presentation is at times very poor. Another area where many weeklies suffer in varying degrees is that news from Punjab is in plenty and mostly outsourced or culled from newspapers back home, there is not much news from the country which they have made their home. Politics pertaining to gurdwaras or related to Indian politicians is covered. But here too the required depth is missing. In a multicultural society like Canada, the need to understand and promote cohesive cultural and social ties is perhaps greater. Maybe editors lack resources and manpower. “These newspapers serve a definite purpose by keeping alive our language and culture. But then how about making us understand the country that is our real home?” asks a young barrister Yadvinder Singh Toor. A major source of revenue remains advertisements from the private sector. These are enough to survive, but the government of Canada, which has huge funds to help the media, rarely comes to the rescue of the ethnic media. The government is more kind to magazines from the Roger’s media. The argument is that it is meant to help Canadian newspapers compete with the American media. “Our efforts to get government attention have failed despite Punjabis occupying high positions as ministers,” says Jaspal Shetra. Problems for the ethnic media are in abundance. But many of these like lack of professional talent and a sound approach towards issues in the country of their choice are of their own making. |
Whenever you are confronted with an opponent, conquer him with love. — Mahatma Gandhi Everything in the world may be endured except continual prosperity. — Goethe The long estrangement of the soul and the supreme-soul ends in their union through the contemplation of the True Word. — Guru Nanak Evil thought is the most dangerous thief; virtue is the most precious treasure. The mind takes possession of everything not only on earth, but also in heaven, and immortality is its securest treasure-trove. — The Buddha Men judge us by the success of our efforts. God looks at the efforts themselves. — Charlotte Elizabeth |
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