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Not carnage; only accident VAT gets going |
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Setback in Andhra Peace must be given another chance THE decision by the CPI (Maoist) and Janshakti — the two main Naxalite groups in Andhra Pradesh — to withdraw from the three-month-old peace talks initiated by the state government is unfortunate.
Managing national security
2005 for Delhi-ites
Washington Diary AIDS: lessons from Botswana
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Not carnage; only accident THE Gujarat riots of 2002, arguably the worst slur on the face of Independent India, have all along been projected to be an on-the-spur reaction to the charring of death of 59 kar sevaks in a coach of Sabarmati Express on February 27, 2002. Now that the Justice U.C. Banerjee Committee has held that the train fire was not deliberate but only accidental, the riots that followed appear all the more heinous and inhuman. The report takes the bottom out of the specious arguments that men like Mr Narendra Modi have been forwarding all along, publicly and privately. It appears now that the train blaze was only used an excuse to target the minority community systematically and brutally. The committee report does not touch that angle, because that was not part of its brief, but it does make some damning observations about the functioning of governments in the State and at the Centre at that time. The then Railway Minister Nitish Kumar will be hard-pressed to explain why the railway authorities failed to conduct a statutory enquiry into the incident and thus breached the Railway Act as also the accident manual of the zonal railways. Not only that, the then Railway Minister and the Railway Board members did not even visit the site. The report of the Nanavati-Shah commission appointed by the Narendra Modi government to probe Godhra and post-Godhra riots is yet to come, but the Banerjee Committee interim report is corroborated by such a wealth of technical opinion that it is unlikely to be substantially different from the latter. Forensic experts have also spoken on similar lines. It is another matter that the Special Investigation Team (SIT) of the Railway Police has rejected the findings and strongly supports the conspiracy theory. The issue has been politicised to such an extent that the saffron brigade can be depended on to rubbish the report. Motives are going to be attached to its timing also, considering that it has come on the eve of elections in Bihar, Jharkhand and Haryana. But what matters is that the report has punctured the balloon of the vendetta mongers who are always on the lookout for an excuse to start yet another communal conflagration. |
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VAT gets going THE value added tax (VAT), being introduced from April 1, 2005, aims to create a single national market and ensure a uniform system of state-level taxes. However, the White Paper on the VAT, released on Monday, leaves 46 items for the states to decide their own taxes. Thus, states will continue to indulge in competitive taxation to lure investors and customers. Some states may tax foodgrains up to 4 per cent, others may not, leading to price imbalances. Besides, by giving special excise relief to certain states, the Centre has defeated the purpose of uniform taxation. The Centre’s compulsions are understandable in a federal setup. It is hard to make diverse states, ruled by different political parties, to agree to a common tax system. Nevertheless, the Centre is moving in the right direction. The VAT benefits are plenty. It is widely prevalent in developed countries. It will replace multiple taxation by a simplified system unless the states — each has been allowed to have its own version— complicate it. The nasty practice of tax evasion will stand curbed, resulting in higher revenue for the government and lower prices for the consumer. Taxes paid at every stage of value addition will be set off by input costs plus a reasonable profit margin. The malpractice of under invoicing will also get eliminated. The role of tax inspectors will get reduced due to self-assessment. The real test of the success of the VAT, however, will lie in its implementation, the basic aim of which should be: harassment of the tax payer must end. The VAT requires scrapping of turnover tax, octroi, local area development tax and all kinds of surcharge. However, the states are not willing to abolish local levies, fearing revenue losses, despite the fact that the Centre has committed itself to making good their losses, if any, on a diminishing basis. Haryana, the first state to implement the VAT, has not suffered any revenue loss. Instead, its revenue has gone up. But that is because it has retained certain local taxes. The states are opposed to the abolition of the Central Sales Tax, which ideally should not be there. But large, usually extravagant governments need funds to carry on and the citizens have to pay for their profligacy. |
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Setback in Andhra THE decision by the CPI (Maoist) and Janshakti — the two main Naxalite groups in Andhra Pradesh — to withdraw from the three-month-old peace talks initiated by the state government is unfortunate. It is bound to exacerbate tension and disturb peace in the state. It comes close on the heels of a cycle of violence and series of encounters last week in which the police killed 11 Naxalites, and the Maoist rebels shot dead four persons, including a policeman. The Naxalites blame the government for trying to suppress them in the name of negotiations. They have condemned the combing operations and fake encounters by the police. Whatever its compulsions, the police should not indulge in fake encounters as they are against democracy and human rights. Moreover, the government should tread with caution to sustain the goodwill generated since the declaration of ceasefire in June last. The peace process was started in May last by the Rajasekhara Reddy government. As a goodwill gesture, it even lifted the 11-year-old ban on the People’s War in July last. As the government remains committed to continuing the peace talks, the Naxalites should change their mindset and return to the negotiating table. They should not question the government’s primary duty to maintain law and order and protect the life and property. Is it justifiable for them to carry weapons, occupy lands, destroy forests and indulge in extortions and killings? In a democracy, there is no place for violence. Resumption of talks is a must as the state is not prepared to face another cycle of violence. The Naxalites have asked political functionaries to “either quit or face the consequences”. The fear factor cuts across party lines because the CPI (Maoist), according to intelligence reports, has emerged as a powerful extremist force in the country. Moreover, developments in the state will have a direct bearing in the other Naxalite-infested states like Bihar, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh. In Bihar, Munger Superintendent of Police K.C. Surendra Babu and four policemen were killed in a landmine blast triggered by Maoist rebels very recently. The CPI (Maoist) has now threatened violence in the run-up to the Assembly elections in the two states. The governments there need to take steps to ensure that the elections are held without the fear of the gun. |
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Grace is given of God, but knowledge is bought in the market. — Arthur Hugh Clough |
Managing national security IF the historical record of a National Security Council (NSC) in India is any indication, it seems we are not serious about how we intend to manage our national security which undoubtedly has become increasingly complex with the passage of time. This is one reason why the whole issue of a national security management system beyond the existing governmental structure has caught the attention of experts, political leaders and managers of national security. The debate about the pros and cons of the NSC and what shape it should take has now been going on for more than two decades. But most of the time it has been felt that we need one, and hence what gets debated is the model for the NSC rather than why it is required in the first place. If we look at the debate about the need for an NSC system closely the persistent theme that emerges is the need for “holistic” national security management. This by definition implies both the necessity of an integrated approach (since national security is increasingly complex to the degree of being multidimensional and no longer merely an issue equal to military defence), and also an assessment that something somewhere is not working to provide us with better national security management. The assumption is that the last element would be taken care of by setting up an NSC, often with a naïve belief of it being a panacea. But if the NSC is not designed to take care of the first element, then obviously it would fail to resolve the second issue. This is why it is necessary to focus on the need for an NSC first before we can honestly create one to fulfil that need. The role, post and the person of the NSA would then naturally fall into place after that. We have experimented with national security management systems over the decades and, therefore some of the clues to what should be done in future could be found in the past. When security was almost exclusively related to defence, a Defence Committee of the Cabinet (DCC) was established in September 1947 along with a complete organisation of 17 committees within the government to support it. It worked extremely well in directing and managing the longest war we have had to fight, that is, in J&K in 1947-48. But it had become defunct years before the 1962 Sino-Indian war with predictable effect. The reason was simply that the bulk of the supporting structures/institutions were not set up as stipulated by the Cabinet, or had stopped functioning. Recognising the need for a more comprehensive approach to national security, one such system was set up in 1990 by the V.P. Singh government which was more or less a precursor of the current model. Unfortunately, that model did not work, or rather it was never put into practice. The NDA government appeared to approach the issues systematically by setting up a task force to recommend the charter, role and structure of an NSC six years ago. The assumption obviously was that the country needed one anyway! But there is a full-fledged Cabinet system drawing its legitimacy and authority from the Constitution and the elected Parliament (unlike what happens in the United States where Cabinet members are not elected representatives of the people) and a vast array of ministries to govern the country. In principle, they obviate the necessity of an NSC. The task force, therefore, decided to first identify why India needed an NSC and after consulting a large body of people in the know of things, proposed a role, task and structure of an NSC. At the apex, obviously, only a committee of the Cabinet with the Prime Minister in the chair would have the requisite authority, power and legitimacy. The issue really is that of the organisation/structure below that. The sound principle of governance and management demands that such an organisation should be within the government structure, but which could receive inputs from experts and think tanks outside. But we have a dearth of think tanks engaged in serious policy-related research and studies (except in economic areas). So, along with reforming the system within the government, it would be vital to set up and nurture autonomous think tanks to undertake policy-related studies and their publication. A key weakness in our national security management is that of the almost complete absence of long-term strategic security planning. Even those who strongly believe in it are tied down by interminable routine made worse by the ever increasing burden of paperwork and meetings in an age of information technology where the country is a global leader. Our policy makers are left with little or no time to think ahead, over-involved as they are with current policy and crisis management. The problem is that we do not even have designated full-time staff in our ministries to undertake long-term thinking and planning so that short-term strategy and current policy could be vectored in consonance with it. Translate this situation into the need for a comprehensive integrated approach to national security management and the answer is loud and clear. If we do not have any dedicated system within each ministry for long-term planning and strategy evolution (implicitly requiring assessment of resources, trends and challenges) in relation to the responsibilities of that ministry, how can we plan for our security in a holistic manner that integrates the policies of each ministry into a holistic national security strategy and policy for the uncertain future? Setting up long-term strategic security planning capabilities in the ministries, therefore, is the cornerstone of an NSC. Policy making requires systematic assessments of intelligence information on the one side and policy-related research and studies on the other. Logically, these functions should be separated or fire-walled from policy making to ensure that one does not influence the other. Internal, external, technical, economic and military-related intelligence requires dedicated agencies and capabilities. But at the apex level their inputs must come together into a whole if they are to be of value to integrated national security management. This means there is need for a “national” assessment body. But do we have one? The Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) was to serve this purpose. It had its weaknesses. But it now stands subsumed into a secretariat, the NSC secretariat! The head of a suitably restructured JIC, therefore, should be among the inner circle of the Prime Minister’s advisers to give it the requisite authority and responsibility if we want an NSC system to improve national security
management. The writer is Director, Centre for Strategic and International Studies, New Delhi.
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2005 for Delhi-ites I
have been gazing intently into my crystal ball in a bid to ensnare the ethereal psychic waves and find out just what 2005 has in store for the Delhi-ites. My findings. For the Aries folk, those born between March 22 and April 20,2005 is likely to be a bumpy year. With Mercury transiting thru’ their birth sign and Saturn in a malefic aspect in their fourth stellar mansion, they will find themselves coming a beautiful cropper in unexpected potholes on Parliament Street and Barakhamba Road and breaking their precious necks. For those born under the Taurus sign, between April 21 and May 21, everything points to a house move, courtesy bulldozers of the demolition squad of the Delhi Development Authority. With Jupiter favourably aspected in their second stellar mansion, they can expect sewage-contaminated water to start trickling thru’ their taps at 2.30 in the morning instead of 3 o’clock. For those born between May 22 and June 21, the Geminians, the influence of Venus, the planet of love, will be pronounced and they can expect to escape the dragnet thrown by the anti eveteasing squad of the Delhi Police and convince the mobile court in Tees Hazari that they were wooing and courting and not eveteasing and get away with a light fine. For the Cancerians, those born between June 22 and July 21, 2005 is likely to be a financially rewarding year with both Delhi Telephones and the Delhi Vidyut Board apologising in writing for overbilling and sending refund cheques. For those born between July 22 and August 21, the Leos, Neptune will be debilitating and Sun transiting thru’ their zodiacal sign, their gambling and speculative tendencies will come to the fore. They will wager that all curbs on the construction of high rise duplex apartments and commercial complexes in the green belt will be abolished and FAR raised to appease the real estate lobby and win hands down. For those born under the Virgo sign, between August 22 and September 21, 2005 is likely to be a smelly year with garbage mounds in their neighbourhood remaining uncleared for months on end and growing to mountainous proportions and becoming star tourist attractions. For those born between September 22 and October 21, the librans, 2005 is likely to be, quite literally, the Year of the Dog with stray dogs in their localities barking and howling thru’ the night and driving them bonkers. A good year for investing in drug companies manufacturing anti-rabies vaccine. The poetic and literary streak in those born under the Scorpio sign, between October 22 and November 21, is likely to blossom during 2005 and they will be writing and submitting prosaic petitions to the New Delhi Municipal Corporation protesting the steep hike in property taxes and rates. Success in business is indicated for those born under the Saggitarious sign, between November 22 and December 21. They will get in on the ground floor of the most lucrative racket of ‘em all and set up as house brokers and palm off a crumbling, one-room thatched tenement in a squalid Trans-Yamuna squatters’ colony as a “posh imperial residency” and pocket a fat commission. For those born between December 22 and January 21, Mars will be ascendent and favourably aspected in their eight stellar mansion and they will find themselves standing in a queue a kilometre long to buy kerosine and have the hawkers flying at their throats. The New Year will find the Aquarians, those born between January 22 and February 21 in a relaxed mood and doing the things they enjoy most like gardening, that is, pulling out congress grass and other noxious weeds. For entertainment, they might join a video club that gets raided for
piracy. Good prospects are indicated for those born between February 22 and March 20 the Pisceans. They will be able to get their children admitted to a Urdu medium pre-nursery school in Daryaganj after paying a donation of just Rs
75,000. |
Washington Diary RSS tries to enter South with aid by Ashish Kumar Sen
AS non-resident Indians dig deep into their pockets to help the tsunami victims, there is a heightened concern that sectarian groups are exploiting the tragedy for their own divisive goals. Secular groups across the United States and Britain are specifically apprehensive about the US-based India Development and Relief Fund; and overseas chapters of the RSS, Sewa International and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad. Mr Chetan Bhatt, a reader in sociology at Goldsmiths College, University of London, has studied the proliferation of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh affiliates in the NRI community. He says in India the RSS is trying to “penetrate the southern states” under the guise of providing tsunami relief. “The RSS has had little success in South India and it hopes to spread its influence like it did in Orissa after the cyclone (in 1999) and in Gujarat following the earthquake (in 2001),” he said, adding that, “There is a pattern where you have a natural tragedy, the RSS launches an appeal and this is followed by a dramatic expansion of Sangh activities in the area. This expansion has invariably been accompanied by violence.” Established in 1925, the RSS advocates Hindu nationalism and seeks to convert India into a “Hindu Rashtra (Nation).” The RSS has been banned thrice in India, most recently in 1992 after the demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya. The RSS is not permitted by the Government of India to accept funds from abroad. Instead, US affiliates, which include IDRF and HSS, serve as fronts for organisations like Sewa Bharati, Jana Sankshema Samiti and Vivekananda Kendra in India, all of which are intrinsic parts of the RSS operations and subscribe to its anti-minority ideology. An ex-employee at the World Bank and a former member of the RSS, Maryland-based IDRF founder Vinod Prakash has in the past said IDRF has given “absolutely no money to the RSS.” In 2002, the US-based Campaign to Stop Funding Hate (CSFH) documented links between IDRF and RSS affiliates in India. Biju Mathew, a professor of business at Rider University and a member of the campaign, says of the long list of organisations that IDRF claims to support, only Sewa Bharati (Tamil Nadu and Kerala), Jana Sankshema Samiti (Andhra Pradesh) and Vivekananda Kendra (Tamil Nadu) are clearly identified as RSS affiliates. “Sewa Bharati [in Tamil Nadu] is housed in the same office as the Southern Region branch of the RSS,” said Mr. Mathew. In London, the Charity Commission is investigating Sewa International (U.K.) and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad following a number of complaints, including one from Lord Adam Patel of Britain’s House of Lords. “Lord Adam Patel claimed that not all the funds raised by the Gujarat Earthquake appeal (by Sewa International and the VHP) were applied in accordance with the appeal,” said Sush Amar, public relations manager at the Charity Commission. She said the commission has not placed any restrictions on fund-raising campaigns by these groups during the course of the investigation. Mr James Bishop, director of humanitarian policy and practice at Washington-based InterAction — the largest alliance of US-based international and humanitarian non-governmental organisations, acknowledges a precedent in which humanitarian tragedies have been exploited by “certain individuals and groups that posed as legitimate charities and engaged in fraud.” Mindful of these incidents, the Chicago-based American Institute of Philanthropy, a non-profit charity watchdog, has instructed Americans to send tsunami aid “to only those charities with an established track record of helping people in this region.” “During a highly publicised crisis, it is common for disreputable, fly-by-night ‘charities’ to take advantage of the public’s generosity,” the institute cautioned. Complaints about unequal distribution of aid in the tsunami-hit regions in India have started to pour in to human rights organisations. Brad Adams, Asia Director of Human Rights Watch, says the New York-based group has received reports of discrimination against Dalit communities in India by the authorities as well as by some aid groups and local communities. Noting the presence of a significant Dalit Christian population among the affected communities, Mr Mathew said the RSS, through its Tamil Nadu front — the Hindu Munnani — “has been trying to divide that community along religious lines for the last decade.” “The Hindu Munnani is most active in Tamil Nadu amongst the fisher folk communities,” he said “With an influx of funds, the Munnani will be able to launch an aggressive campaign against the Dalits. The region is prone to a fairly bad communal situation.” The emergence of Sewa International (US) and its role in tsunami relief efforts, Mr Mathew said, “is a matter of concern but also shows that IDRF has been affected by negative publicity and the Sangh felt the need to float a new front.” Secular groups have, in the past, been criticised for focusing on the activities of the RSS and its affiliates. After IDRF’s links to the RSS were exposed in 2002, a group calling itself Friends of India put together “A Factual Response to the Hate Attack on the India Development and Relief Fund.” Defending IDRF from charges of being discriminatory, sectarian and deceptive the Friends of India report said: “If indeed IDRF wanted to be deceptive, would it put up all the details of funds received and distributed for everyone to see on the Internet?” The group also noted that accusations that the RSS’ accounts are never audited publicly “does not have any meaning because audits are conducted of individual organisations that handle money. A group of people sharing common ideals has no need of any ‘audit’ except in communist or Islamic dictatorships.” In defence of its work, CSFH said: “While it is important to oppose all sectarian organisations, including fundamentalist Christian and Muslim groups, who wait in the wings to pounce whenever tragedy strikes, it is far more important to confront and expose the RSS in India because it is exponentially more powerful than any other such exclusionist organisation.” |
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AIDS: lessons from Botswana I
have worked for more than 20 years in Botswana as communication adviser and have observed the AIDS phenomenon unfolding in that country right from zero to the epidemic level. It may be worthwhile to narrate the story as it happened there because it might give the Indian authorities some food for thought. Botswana, like western countries, is an open society. It has a small population of less than two million people with almost all of them being Christian. The government has taken all possible curative and preventive measures against HIV/ AIDS for quite a few years. Some of them are listed below:- 1 . The treatment is provided to all AIDS patients free of cost. Particular attention is given to the pregnant women who are HIV positive to ensure that the disease does not pass on to the new-born babies. 2. A separate department has been created in the health ministry to coordinate all AIDS-related activities. 3. The State President himself talks to the people about this disease during his visits . The members of parliament are fully knowledgeable about the problem facing their country and during their tours they talk to their constituents, explaining all aspects of the disease and cautioning them against falling prey to it. 4. The religious leaders initially were reluctant to talk about the disease. But as the disaster unfolded they all have fallen in line with the government and are openly preaching safe sex and use of condoms in addition to other preventive methods. 5 All possible preventive measures are well advertised in the mass media like TV and radio. The majority of the population is very well informed about the causes of the disease and hence nobody shuns the AIDS patients, which is quite opposite to what happens in India. 6. The sex and AIDS education form part of the school level curriculum to apprise the younger generation about this deadly disease. The cultural taboos apart, this needs to be done in India too without delay to save the nation from the coming disaster. 7. All blood donations are religiously tested for contamination with the HIV virus and serious action is taken against the violators. 8. Always new needles are used for injections. All used needles are destroyed under supervision to avoid their being recycled. 9. Condoms are made available free of charge at certain places like hotels where people can take them out like money from an ATM. The government is also heavily subsidising the sales of this item. Their use is advertised even on bill boards prominently displayed in major cities and towns through the country. This measure has proven to be a major success against the spread of the disease. The same is being done in many other African countries. Can similar approach be taken in our country? In India, mass ignorance of the HIV/AIDS, unprotected sex, use of contaminated blood for transfusion and use of recycled contaminated needles for injections may be the major causes of the spread of the disease. If the current level of indifferent action about the disease continues, India will soon face a similar catastrophic situation as happened in Botswana and other African countries. The Indian authorities, therefore, need to take a cue from the Botswana story and start an all-out war in right earnest against the disaster waiting to happen. |
Do good wherever you can. Do not hesitate in helping others. The person who does good without looking for a return is at the highest stage of self-realisation. He does not need any yoga. He does not need any other form of prayer or renunciation. — The Bhagvadgita To enter the martial fields, the warrior needs nothing but strength of his arms and his might. His right to combat is sanctified by his valour. — The Mahabharata Do ordinary things with extraordinary love. — Mother Teresa  |
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