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Notes for votes Ulti Baazee |
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Sale of girls The bitter truth about Himachal Pradesh THE issue of the reported sale of girls in the Transgiri area of Sirmaur district of Himachal Pradesh figured in the Assembly on Monday.
Misunderstanding over right to strike
Humour in letters
More Colonels — at what cost? The poison in food
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Notes for votes RAILWAY Minister Laloo Prasad Yadav has jested his way out of many tight situations. Perhaps that is what makes him over-confident that he can make light of his on-the-camera distribution of notes to voters as well. He may not find anything amiss in what he did. After all, the notes-for-votes barter is quite the norm in the State he lords over – rather his wife does. But the Election Commission is not amused. It has not only threatened to derecognise his party but has even registered an FIR against the “note-worthy” minister. By his own boast, Mr Yadav is too seasoned a politician not to know what can land him in trouble. Then he should also know that he cannot defend the indefensible. The argument that he has given to wriggle out of the embarrassing situation is that he gives money to the poor, even when elections are not on. Agreed, but shouldn’t a politician of his vintage know that many other such activities are also perfectly legal till the Model Code of Conduct comes into force? When even roadside signboards have to be covered and development programmes have to be postponed once elections are announced, how can he go about doling out 100-rupee notes as if they are copies of his party manifesto? Interestingly, the feisty Laloo has quipped that he was only caught giving money and not receiving it. That is a shining example of the typical Laloo-speak which wins him standing ovation in party rallies, particularly in his home state. But it remains to be seen if the one-liner can convince the Election Commission and the police. Hardboiled bureaucrats are not known to be impressed by wisecracks. Despite all his bluster, perhaps Mr Laloo Yadav does realise that he has been caught on the wrong foot (and on the cameras). That is why he has obliquely said that although there is nothing wrong in what he has done, it will not happen in future. The decision to postpone his “Maha-ralla” is also a sign of the growing nervousness in the party. The organisation of the December 23 rally was another scandal which would have fallen foul of the Election Commission, given the blatant misuse of official machinery. |
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Ulti Baazee WHAT started as a student’s indecent behaviour has now developed international ramifications. The arrest of Mr Avnish Bajaj, CEO of Baazee.com, the auction site on which the sexually explicit clip was put on sale, has brought about expressions of concern from the US government—from Ms Condoleezza Rice, the Secretary of State-designate—and big business. The noise from the US is unwarranted, since it amounts to interference in an ongoing investigation. However, even Indian industry has protested the arrest, with Mr Kiran Karnik, the Nasscom president, saying: "We are dismayed with what has happened. To make such an arrest is strange, and moves towards a draconian approach.” This line of thought will find many takers, since someone who was obviously cooperating with the police has been arrested. Mr Bajaj has been charged under Section 67 of the IT Act, which prohibits transmission and sale of obscene data electronically. India can be justifiably proud of an early start with the IT Act, but there are several loopholes in it and, given the fast-changing pace of the IT industry as a whole, it needs constant updating. More than the Act, it is those who enforce the law who have to be sensitised. The police, because of lack of adequate exposure and training, is often at sea with regard to IT cases, and tends to get ham-handed. This is not the first time that an auction site has been held responsible for posting objectionable content. Earlier too, the French government had asked Yahoo! and E-bay to remove Nazi-related items from their auction websites. Similarly, Baazee too has reportedly removed items connected with sex and pornography. This means that it is technically possible to block access to certain kinds of items, provided there is a will. This is what the courts will examine in the coming months. India, like other nations, needs to keep an international perspective in dealing with IT. At the same time, multinational companies will have to keep the domestic concerns of nations that they deal with in mind in order to ensure that they do not get burnt by local laws. |
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Sale of girls THE issue of the reported sale of girls in the Transgiri area of Sirmaur district of Himachal Pradesh figured in the Assembly on Monday. The normal reaction of any responsible government to such reports will be to order an investigation and take appropriate action to check human trafficking, if any. However, while an official investigation is still in progress, the Chief Minister has refused to face the unpleasant reality. While not denying the occurrence of such incidents, he has called the report exaggerated. The State Commission for Women and the Sirmaur SP have confirmed that such shady transactions take place in the area. The disagreement is only on numbers. The matter, as Mr Virbhadra Singh has rightly emphasised, is very sensitive. It should not be used for scoring political points or to cause embarrassment to anyone. Trafficking in girls is not unheard of in this region. In Punjab and Haryana men outnumber women. So brides are bought and brought from outside. In April last year mediapersons saw seven migrant girls lined up for sale in Maghania village in Budhlada subdivision of Punjab’s Mansa district. Again, in August last year there were reports of sale of girls in Ferozepur district and the Punjab State Human Rights Commission took a suo motu notice of the media reports for follow-up action. Even if there are isolated incidents of girls being married to aged or mentally challenged persons in exchange of money, these are serious enough to warrant a thorough inquiry and preventive action. Such incidents are a blot on any civil society. Police action alone will not be enough. Since deals are struck with parents’ consent and girls are hardly in a position to protest, many such cases go unreported. A social awareness campaign needs to be launched with the help of NGOs. Since poverty is the root cause of such incidents in Sirmaur district, an over-all development of the area is required. |
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Nothing has yet been said that’s not been said before.
— Terence
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Misunderstanding over right to strike ONCE again a justifiable campaign has hardened against a judgment of the Supreme Court which has held that there is no fundamental or statutory provision empowering employees to go on strike. Some members of Parliament are, in desperation, suggesting the amendment of the Constitution for this purpose. But some facts need to be clarified to put the debate on the right track. The 2003 judgment was given in the context of a strike by employees of the Tamil Nadu government. The observations therein are relevant to the right of government employees only, and have no relevance to the right of other employees, workmen in the private sector, to go on strike. The real villain is the Central government which, by Rule 7 of the Central Civil Services (Conduct) Rules, 1964, mandates that no government servant shall resort to or in any way abet any form of strike. Various state governments have copied the above Central rule. On the literal interpretation of the rule, the view of the Supreme Court cannot be faulted. This interpretation has been continuing. Many trade unionists were dismissed from service under this rule, but still it remained on the rule book, notwithstanding the fact that in the interval and even now many in the Central government apparently sympathetic to the labour and even supported by left forces have been in power. This rule is not consistent with Article 22 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) which India has ratified, and which recognises the right of everyone to join trade unions for the protection of his or her interests and prohibits any restriction being placed other than those which are necessary in the interest of national security and public order. In a properly balanced collective bargaining situation, the trade union right to strike is a vital and necessary ingredient. Strikes will continue to occur — this prohibitive measure against strikes by public sector employees is not the answer. The courts in the US accept that labour possesses a right to participate in a primary strike, where workers’ complaints have reference to wages, working hours or other conditions of employment. The International Labour Organisation (the ILO), in its conventions No. 87, 98, 154 and 151, has accepted these rights. Convention No. 151, which is exclusively meant for public service, has specifically mandated that public employees shall have, as other workers, the civil and political rights which are essential for the normal exercise of freedom of association, subject only to the obligation arising from their status and nature of function. The instrument of collective bargaining by the members of a union extend to its members’ concerted refusal to work overtime during negotiations for the renewal of the expired collective bargaining agreement Thus, a transportation strike was held legal in the US by the court, observing that “there was no absolute right to strike at common law but there was a common law about the right to strike in the sense that a peaceful strike was recognised by the common law as lawful concerted activity and, therefore, legal if employed for a lawful object. The employees who peacefully struck for a lawful object were not liable to their employer even though the strike shut him down, bankrupted him, or put him out of business, and even though it also caused enormous and irreparable damage to hundreds of thousands of innocent persons not involved in the strike.” Some US courts have even given the right to strike a constitutional status when neither the Thirteenth nor the Fourteenth Amendment confers an absolute right to strike, but it has nevertheless held that the right to strike is property within the fourteenth Amendment and, therefore, cannot be taken without the due process of law. It has also been held that a state may not constitutionally forbid lawful strikes for lawful purposes although what is a lawful strike and what is a lawful purpose are presumably subject to reasonable legislative definition. The legality of a strike for a proper objective has been recognised in the United States for almost a century. A state cannot forbid a peaceful strike against an employer. In the US even the much-criticised National Labour Act has the right of a labour organisation to go for collective bargaining and thus recognises the right of such employees’ refusal to work. If an employer interferes with the exercise of that right by the employee it is considered an unfair labour practice. In India, though there may not be a fundamental right to strike (so long as the earlier decisions of the Supreme Court stand,) it is not correct to say that workers have no statutory right to strike. As a matter of fact, the whole scheme and spirit of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, would show that it recognises strikes as a weapon in the armoury of labour in the process of collective bargaining. The Act does not purport to take away the right to strike. As a matter of fact, this right has been impliedly recognised by the Act, though by legislation it may be circumscribed on considerations of national security or public order. It may be noted that the 2003 judgment purports to rely on an earlier judgment of the Supreme Court (1998) upholding a Kerala High Court judgment holding that a bandh is unconstitutional (this proposition with respect to being juridically fallacious and is subject to consideration by a larger Bench). It has, however, itself accepted that a case for bandh is obviously distinct and different from the case for a general strike or the call for hartal. Thus, none of these judgments prohibits the right of workmen to go on strike, subject to the procedure laid down in the Industrial Disputes Act. There is, therefore, much misunderstanding when it is said that the right to strike has been negatived by the Supreme Court. The true position is that the Supreme Court has only reiterated what is contained in Rule 7 of the Central Rules that government employees have no right to strike - an interpretation obviously flowing from the wording of the Service Rules. I feel that though getting indignant at the interpretation by the Supreme Court judgment may not be objected to, one wishes the trade unionists were at the same time to express their ire at the real guilty party - the Central government - which even in the face of such mass resentment by the labour has still not chosen to delete Rule 7 (which is the real mischief-maker). They may find their task easy. Of course, this is dependent on the political commitment and labour-friendly attitude of the UPA government. A sympathetic administration can straightaway repeal Rule 7 and thus remove a bitter fight with labour and also give it a feeling of participation in the reconstruction of the nation. The answer, therefore, for the protection of the right to strike has to be given by the Central government — it is not necessary to engage in any tortuous long-drawn fight of constitutional amendment. Of course, the judgment regarding the bandh may hopefully be reconsidered by the Supreme Court itself; or the political parties may call the bandh as general hartal and thus negate in practice the effect of the judgment. The writer is a retired Chief Justice of the High Court of Delhi. |
Humour in letters
READERS will readily agree that they do get funny, irritating, shocking, amusing letters just as they get exasperating telephone, water and electricity bills. Added to this is the latest edition (read addition) of letters from credit card companies. I never applied for a credit card. I got one. I haven’t activated it, yet every month or so, I get a letter that I owe them service charges, bills and so on. I throw them in my yawning w.p.b. I do admire their pest-like persistence. Every time I see their beautiful envelope, I smile. Everyone gets letters, which makes the postman a welcome visitor. Here goes a modest collection, which will tickle your humour bone. A lady working as a treasurer for a charitable organisation received a cheque of Rs 1500 from a retired army officer with a note: “Excuse me. I am not signing it because want to remain anonymous!” An astute woman started a garment exchange business to make both ends meet. She got a letter from an equally smart woman. It read: “I have two woollen coats belonging to my late husband. They are exactly alike, especially the bigger one!” A widower inserted an ad in a reputed woman’s mag: widower seeks a respectable wife to share his lot. A widow wrote back, “Please answer by return mail how large is the lot so that I may compare it with my own”. A fond but busy mother sent his son for haircut, put Rs 20 in his pocket with a note for the barber (read hair-stylist:) give Sunny a cut. Find Rs 20 in his pocket. If the cut is more, cut less.” Lots of greenhorns yearn to see their name in print. They write letters to the editor or meet contacts to see their “masterpieces” published. One was advised: better write to the editor to find out his requirements. She wrote: “I have to do an article for your newspaper. Kindly send me all the information you have on the subject. Thanks.” One smart wife wrote to a store selling washing machines. “You must give a four-year guarantee. You say: ‘It’s foolproof.’ I know my husband, you do not.” |
More Colonels — at what cost? ON December 17, 2004. The Tribune made a mention of the AV Singh panel report that is said to have got the government approval. The report suggests that 500 additional posts of Colonel have been sanctioned by creating an additional cadre of time-scale Colonels. The actual appointments to be upgraded being left to the Army, it also mentions that lower appointments will also be upgraded, with maybe Lt Cols commanding companies in place of Majors and Captains! This is surely not in the interest of efficiency of the Army, but merely satisfies individual aspirations for more pay and better status. But at what cost? Time-scale Colonels will be those not found fit on merit basis. Such individuals often tend to be a very bad example for the subordinates. It could also lead to situations where a merit-promoted Colonel, commanding a unit, is junior in service to a time-scale promoted Colonel in the same unit as second in command — certainly not a healthy situation for the good of the unit. To give a counter argument that the service top brass has accepted this is not relevant. The top brass goes in for such compromises seeing the government attitude to the needed straight forward methods. The top brass is certainly to blame for accepting (and proposing?) solutions that are going to have an adverse affect on the organisation. This officer cadre review will increase the age profile of the Army and also in the fighting units, which is certainly not in the interest of efficiency. The earlier cadre review had the impact of such age increases of fighting unit commander being even up very late 40 years of age. Pay and perks increase is needed and this should be decided independent of what the other government services are getting as the armed forces carry out totally different responsibilities under special constraints. The current increase in the officer cadre will only affect a minor number of officers whereas the need is to address the problem in the case of all officers and men. The warrant of precedence needs to be revised upwards for the services. Help from local civil authorities should be more readily and sympathetically available to armed forces personnel. The lower ranks retire at an early age and then find it a difficult to support life in civvy street as they normally have no special qualification and age too is against them. The shorter service limits are placed due to the nature of the physical fitness required and also due to lack of promotional opportunities in the pyramidal rank structure. The earlier and current officer cadre reviews and the earlier increase in the age of retirement (which has done much harm already) are not decided upon with the professional interest of the organisation but purely for individual benefit at the expense of the organisation. Surely very short sighted and harmful ! Early retirement has two aspects that merit consideration. First, pension has to increase with a higher percentage of the pay last drawn for juniors and less for the senior, with the dividing line at full Colonel. This will give some relief. Pension should automatically be adjusted for the retired ones whenever this is done for the serving personnel; one rank, one pension. There is then the option which would save a lot of money for the government and also keep service personnel serving longer by manning the para-military forces entirely with those retiring from the service. Those who once get posted to paramilitary forces should not be permitted to revert to the service. The paramilitary forces should continue to be under the Home Ministry. If this is adopted, service personnel would serve much longer; the pension due from the service would be saved till the retirement from the paramilitary force; the paramilitary forces would get fully trained and motivated personnel; the training facilities currently being run by the paramilitary forces, could be drastically pruned, again saving a lot of money. Above all, the functioning of the paramilitary forces will improve dramatically. This option will, of course, be vehemently opposed by the paramilitary forces as it would affect their empire. The issue, however, should be decided on the basis of what is good for the country. |
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The poison in food I
was shocked the other day when I saw a notice board at a water body reading “water is harmful for cattle drinking because of pesticide contamination” in the Terai area of Kashipur district. Grazing of grass in the fields has become dangerous for the cattle. It provides an easy channel for the entry of pesticides in the food chain. Human beings are subjected to an indirect intake of pesticides through aerosoles, fruits, vegetables, milk and food. The slow poisoning has so far not manifested in the form of a particular disease, but it is there. The government is not carrying out any study. The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) only once (1993) provided irrefutable evidence of the presence of pesticides in milk and other foodstuff. The presence of pesticides in cold drinks is a case of recent history. The farmer is placed in a catch-22 situation. If he does not use pesticides, he will lose his crop and the nation will face a famine. If he continues to use them, the entire population is subjected to slow poisoning leading to serious disorders at some point of time. There is hardly any cash crop (sugarcane, paddy, cotton) which does not require pesticide sprays for its protection. Wheat, no doubt, is more or less unaffected by the pests but then its problem is the simultaneous growth of a weed called baloori (flerix-minor) which has to be killed by using one litre of weedicide per acre. Only bajra, jwar and maize (millets) do not require pesticides but farmers do not grow these crops because their sale price is not even half that of cotton and paddy. The consumption of pesticides will come down by 50 per cent if farmers of alternate districts grow crops other than wheat (gram or mustard) in one season. In that case the weed (flerix-minor) can be taken out manually and destroyed. Alternatively, if farmers grow wheat in furrows, even then this weed can be taken out manually rather than using weedicides. This is the easiest solution to reduce the overall consumption by 50 per cent. For kharif crops, farmers must be directed to keep the land fallow up to 30th of June. Then the millet crops should be grown in alternate districts (50 per cent districts paddy and 50 per cent districts millets). The government should also increase the MSP of the millet crops to compensate the farmers. This pattern of diversification or crop rotation will break the chain of transmission of crop diseases to a great extent. Farmers should be encouraged to grow cotton as much as possible in place of paddy and sugarcane by increasing the MSP. This is because the pest sprays on the cotton crop do not easily come into the food chain. The real solution lies in developing pest-resistant crops through biotechnological and genetic engineering tools. BT Cotton has been the boldest experiment. Punjab farmers have adopted this variety this year with good results. The government should treat crop diseases as seriously as human diseases and set up research institutes to take curative and preventive measures. A genuine Green Revolution will come only when we are able to maintain the present level of food production (with 3 per cent annual increase) without the use of chemicals. It is going to be a big challenge of the 21st century for scientists, environmentalists and the intelligentsia. |
The Knowledge of Truth brings with it power. But if the power be mixed with arrogance, it slides back into ignorance. Power with humility is the hallmark of the learned one. He never boasts of his accomplishments or achievements. Instead, he tries silently to help others. — The Bhagavadgita The greatest warrior must eschew pride. Full of humility and grace before entering battle. The conceited warrior forgets and his arrogance leads him into mistakes. — The Mahabharata Love in action is what gives us grace. — Mother Teresa Non-violence is not a weapon of the weak. It is a weapon of the strongest and bravest. — Mahatma Gandhi  |
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