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Powerless in Punjab Act on EC order |
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Unwelcome passenger Sheikh Rashid doesn’t deserve visa The Government of India had no alternative to saying “no” to Pakistan Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed’s application for visiting Jammu and Kashmir by using the Muzaffarabad-Srinagar bus service on June 30.
Eco-threat from
Siachen
The poet
What hinders
Punjab’s growth Accepting children
as they are Chatterati
From the pages of
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Act on EC order The
Election Commission’s directive to the Bihar Government to execute all non-bailable warrants against criminals is timely. With the State Assembly elections likely to be conducted in October-November, the commission is keen on tackling this menace as a priority. In no other state have criminals so brazenly vitiated the electoral process as in Bihar. This is mainly because of their nexus with the politicians. The commission must ensure that the government implements its directives. It is a pity that even though the Patna High Court had initiated the process for nabbing all the criminals in January, just before the last Assembly elections, no headway could be made. The Director-General of Police told the High Court that over 20,000 criminals were absconding in the state. The figure is indeed mind-boggling and, apparently, there has been no significant improvement in the crime situation in the state since then. Surprisingly, even though non-bailable warrants together with property attachment orders had been issued against these criminals in January, they continue to roam freely in the state, thanks to political patronage. Known as Bahubali, these criminals spread panic and terror among the voters who are forced to follow their diktat in voting. Governance, either under an elected government or under President’s rule, makes no difference to them. The Election Commission’s fiat to the government for strict compliance of its orders should be viewed against this background. The commission also issued a string of directives to the government on Thursday to improve communication facilities in all police stations, repair the roads and disburse funds to the Chief Electoral Officer for the photo identity card programme. As these are very important for the smooth conduct of the elections, these need to be implemented with the attention they deserve. The elections held last time were bitterly fought. In Chhapra, the election was countermanded and in Madhopur, a repoll was ordered in many polling booths following rigging and violence. Every step should be taken to prevent the recurrence of such irregularities in the ensuing elections. |
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Unwelcome passenger The
Government of India had no alternative to saying “no” to Pakistan Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed’s application for visiting Jammu and Kashmir by using the Muzaffarabad-Srinagar bus service on June 30. New Delhi’s decision is on expected lines as he had already been declared persona non grata after Hurriyat leader Yaseen Malik disclosed recently that Sheikh Rashid ran a terrorist training camp called “Freedom House” near Islamabad till 1991. It is inconceivable for India to allow a person like Mr Rashid to reach this side of the Line of Control by making use of the newly started bus service. His involvement in the promotion of cross-border terrorism is too serious a matter to be ignored. If he had some grace the minister should have desisted from trying to reach Srinagar on the pretext of meeting his relatives. The “peace bus” cannot be allowed to be misused by politicians and others who have their own questionable agendas to promote; the bus service is meant for promoting people-to-people contacts, for facilitating meetings between members of divided families. That is why India expressed its unhappiness when the Government of Pakistan encouraged the visiting Hurriyat leaders recently to indulge in politicking. They tried to do whatever they could for their separatist cause. Their activities in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir appeared to be aimed at queering the pitch for peace. The peace constituency on both sides was feeling uneasy as their irresponsible utterances could have an impact on the on-going India-Pakistan composite dialogue process. Sheikh Rashid’s presence in Pakistan Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz’s Cabinet will remain an irritant in the peace drive even if it does not influence the course of events. Pakistan’s prominent opposition leaders and top retired Generals have confirmed his involvement in jehadi and terrorist activities. Many opposition politicians have, in fact, asked for stern action against the Information Minister for his shady activities in the past. Despite his closeness to General Pervez Musharraf, Sheikh Rashid should have been shown the door by now. A person like him can always be expected to sabotage the efforts for normalisation of relations between the two neighbours. The earlier the General acts against him the better. |
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Life is as tedious as a twice-told tale, /Vexing the dull ear of a drowsy man.
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Eco-threat from Siachen The
Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, for a moment came tantalisingly close to committing himself to a settlement of the Siachen confrontation when he expressed a desire to turn the area into a mountain of peace. Having said that, he seemed to have backed off more than he advanced by uncompromisingly stating that India could not agree to any alteration of the border. Since the spring of 1984 the Siachen glacier has been the bone of contention between India and Pakistan. Till Pakistani troops appeared in the area in 1983, it was a pristine no-man’s land whose sole importance was that its snowmelt fed the Nubra river. Now the Siachen glacier has acquired another dimension, which fuels passions in both countries. India has paid a high price to secure the Saltoro ridge, and Pakistan still cannot stomach that the Indian Army had once again whipped it. Thus, 16 years after the Indian flag was first hoisted both countries still battle it out in the Siachen. The Siachen is not without strategic significance for India. About halfway up the Nubra valley the old caravan route turns northwards to the Saser-la Pass. The pass is the only crossing on the Saser Mustagh range that juts out from the Karakorums to the area the Indian Army calls Sub-Sector North (SSN) consisting of Daulat Beg Oldi (DBO) and the Depsang plains. The only other route to SSN is the longer winter route along the Shyok valley. Because of this lack of easy access, our posts in SSN are difficult to defend. Many military experts do not believe that SSN can be held for very long against a Chinese thrust. Therefore, withdrawal from the entire Siachen area would mean that not only are we providing an easy access into the Nubra valley to the Pakistanis but also to the Chinese. The Pakistanis also have built many roads that take them quite close to the Saltoro ridge. Once the heights are in their possession, coming down the ridge-line onto the glacier itself does not need much effort. Similarly, if the Chinese take SSN, holding the Saser-la becomes vital. An Indian military withdrawal from the Siachen would mean that only Khardung-la stands between the invader and Leh. This cannot be accepted. Much has been written about the costs incurred by India and Pakistan over Siachen. While the economic costs are huge, the human costs too have been very high. Both sides together have lost around a couple of thousand men. There are other costs too. A unit having once served its tenure on the Saltoro ridge cannot go back to that deployment for nearly eight years. This is the toll extracted by such a duty. While we may consider such costs as affordable, we must think of a more serious consequence that we can ill afford. That is to the fragile environment of the glacier due to the large number of troops in the Siachen and the contiguous areas. India alone has a brigade deployed to support the troops on the glacier. Both countries have at least one battling battalion each on the perennially snow-clad heights. This means approximately 1200 men on the ecologically sensitive glacier. The consequences of so many men permanently stationed on this very fragile eco-system can be imagined. The sub-zero temperatures that prevail throughout the year do not allow for any bio-degradation and there are no worms to thrive on biological wastes either. Just lots of Indians and Pakistanis! Consequently, all waste material is stored in metal drums and dropped into crevasses. Solid human wastes alone would amount to over a thousand kilograms each day. Assuming a metal drum holds a hundred kilos, it would mean that both sides together dump at least 10 solidly packed drums of excrement each day into the crevasses. This is 3500-4000 drums each year. We have together been there for more than a decade and a half. We are talking about 55,000-60,000 drums of frozen excrement already there, packed and preserved in ice, waiting to float down the Nubra someday. Just to give the reader some idea of the space this involves - imagine drums lined up 10 to 12 deep all along 4.5-kilometre route down Rajpath from India Gate to Vijay Chowk. This does not take into account all the tetrapacks, empty cans, ammunition casings, packaging and other garbage that is similarly disposed of. Quite clearly, making a mess of things acquires a new meaning in the Siachen! This writer has for long been a determined opponent of any withdrawal of our forces from the Siachen. But what one witnesses happening there compels rethinking. An American commander in Vietnam once said something about having to destroy a town to save it! Are we doing the same to the Siachen glacier? Till not long ago the Siachen glacier used to be 82 kilometres long. The brutal war being fought since 1985 has directly contributed to it receding by several kilometres. We cannot allow this for very long without irreversible and serious consequences to the larger eco-system. But a simple withdrawal by both sides is not a feasible solution. Any solution must take into account the operational requirements of India, which faces two armed and ready claimants to its territory. But with a little sagacity and imagination, we can fashion a solution to halt the ecological devastation in its tracks. To do this, we simply need to drastically reduce the number of men deployed in the area. Suppose India and Pakistan can summon good sense and goodwill to mutually withdraw from the Saltoro and the ridge-lines opposite it. “Trust but verify” is a commonly used arms control dictum. Since we cannot trust our gods also not to pass up a chance to slip a knife into the other, India and Pakistan need a foolproof system to prevent easy and unobserved ingress by either side. The first step towards this is for both countries to destroy the many access roads. Ecologists the world over will applaud this, and both countries are in need of some applause for good sense. Next would be to provide for joint surveillance to allay each other’s worst fears about the other. India and Pakistan can do this without the Americans having to broker it and giving them room to play their own games. A complete withdrawal from the valley will not assure Indian security concerns in the Saser Mustagh range and SSN lying ahead of it. India’s security concerns vis-a-vis China will require it to move men and material along the old caravan route over the Saser-la pass. To facilitate this it will need a few permanent posts along this route and possibly over the glacier. But this will not require it to occupy the Saltoro ridge-line, thereby allowing Pakistan to withdraw from the positions facing them. Now we need a mechanism to reassure each other. This can be evolved bilaterally. One of the solutions can be periodic joint aerial surveillance of the area. For instance, on a given day Indian and Pakistani aircraft can fly alongside and conduct photo-reconnaissance. Or both countries can be allowed to fly unarmed aircraft on a certain corridor quite freely to check on the de-militarised status of the ridges and to study the military situation on collateral areas. Another possibility would be to have flights on the same aircraft so that what is seen can be discussed and sorted out immediately. The modalities for these such as the airfields and helipads to be used, the two sides can easily work out meeting places for clarification and discussion, and evaluation of aerial photography. The next step should be to make the glaciers a conservation area with a joint authority to sanction and regulate trekking and mountaineering expeditions. Then we are still left with the job of cleaning up. The costs of hauling out the garbage of years will be quite enormous. Any sensible person will agree that it is better to spend money on cleaning up rather than on messing up the place. If we don’t agree on this, it will be poetic justice if the frozen excrement finds its way into warmer waters, and then both Indians and Pakistanis will have to literally wallow in their own dung! In the meantime, the shit keeps piling
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The poet
In addition to being a teacher of English I am also something of a writer. I have moderate ability and have achieved moderate success. Some of my work has been translated into other Indian languages like Punjabi, Hindi and even Telugu: some has never been published at all. One of my books has been reprinted every year since it was first published nine years ago: one sold just two hundred and eightyseven copies. I am, by and large, content. But there was a time when I wanted desperately to publish a poem. My first effort was a composition to a beautiful new girl when I was in class seven: “Oh Shriya* if thou were a beggar My love for thee would never stagger. (Something, something, something, something) I’d stab myself with a sharp dagger.” I was too shy to give my masterpiece to her directly. I glued the edges of the pages together and left the book where she was sure to find it: curiosity would make her slit open the pages and realise not only how much I loved her but also what a great poet I was. Unfortunately the book fell into the wrong hands. Randeep*, the hero of the class, found it and all my classmates had a field day tearing this doggerel verse to pieces and ragging me about it. I was sure all my poetic aspirations had been crushed forever. Then, 11 years later, I met the most beautiful girl in the world. She left me and the pain caused my poetic aspirations to rise again. I wrote what, I felt, was a truly wonderful poem. The trouble was how to get her to read it. Then one of my friends came to my aid. He wrote a letter to the Editor of the local paper: “Dear Sir, “Some years ago, I came across a remarkable poem called ‘The Wayside Tree’. Unfortunately I have lost the poem and the name of the poet. Could one of your readers please enlighten me?” This letter was duly published and a week later the same columns carried a reply: “Dear Sir, “I too loved ‘The Wayside Tree’ and am happy to share it with your readers: ‘Because you did not come last night / I could not sleep. / But I have put away my begging bowl / and will not ask:/ will you come tonight?/ Can a traveller rest for always/ In the shade of the wayside tree?/ So I have taken to the road again / The pain, the parting, what matter they?/ I was just another man / who had loved a girl’. The poet’s name is Harish Dhillon.” Needless to say, this is the only poem I have ever had published and needless to say, my friend is now one of the leading marketing wizards of the
country. * The names have been changed for obvious reasons.
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What hinders Punjab’s growth Stagnating agriculture or even a
slow-growth agriculture is not the answer to the income problems of the agricultural/ rural population of the state. The agriculture sector must be relieved of the excessive pressure of the population. The present push-out effect of the rural unemployed must be replaced by the pull-out effect through the generation of attractive, gainful, off-farm employment opportunities in the industrial and services sectors. Agriculture must become a part-time profession for a large majority of small farmers. A major part of the rural income must come from off-farm employment. The present pattern of industries, in its very nature, attracts only migratory labour. The employment provided by these industries, does not attract the Punjabi unemployed youth. According to a PAU survey, the migratory labour and their dependents constitute about 17 per cent of the population of the state. There is a large-scale unemployment among the Punjabi youth, specially in the rural areas. Apart from other fallouts, this is leading to an increasing numbers of unresolved crimes in the state because the migratory labour is not registered with the police in the state and their antecedents are not known. Employers here resist their registration with the police to avoid the payment of minimum wages mandatory under the law. According to police sources, in Ludhiana, for example, 65 per cent of the crimes are committed by the migratory population alone. Another 17 per cent of the crimes are committed together with Punjabis. It is only 18 per cent of the crimes that are committed by Punjabis alone. Punjab needs to develop industries and services that can be ancilliarised and provide clean jobs at reasonable wage rates near their villages. The approach of running after prospective investors and persuading them to invest in the state will not sell Punjab because capital never flows to the areas which lack good roads, efficient transport, a regular supply of power and clean, responsive governance. All of these three determinants are utterly lacking in Punjab. If the state has to develop industrially, it must substantially improve its road network to the international standards. A start should be made with building a separate six-lane toll speedway right from the point the National Highway No.1 enters the state up to the borders of Pakistan. This speedway should not touch any city and have only four or five exit/entry points that would connect the major cities and towns on its sides. The length of this highway will be around 325 km. It would require acquisition of not more than 7,500 acres. If land is acquired at Rs 10 lakh per acre, it would require not more than Rs 750 crore. This much amount the state can easily spare through rationalisation of expenditure and plugging the leakage of taxes. After the land is acquired, construction should be contracted out on the BOT basis through global tenders. This toll motorway can pay back its cost in less than 10 years. With this speedway, assuming the relations with Pakistan would progressively but irreversibly improve, the state will get effectively connected not only to Pakistan, but also to central Asia. The second infrastructural investment has to be on a large nuclear power plant. Punjab needs extra 10,000 megawatt of electricity in the next three decades if the state has to develop into an industrial state. No other source can satiate such a huge power demand. Not to speak of coal-based thermal power plants, even gas-fired power plants cannot meet this huge electricity demand in future. Punjab, being a border state, often security concerns are expressed as an argument against setting up of a nuclear power plant in the state. It is a misplaced concern because any harm done to the nuclear power plant in Punjab will equally affect Pakistan. If mutually agreed, Punjab and Pakistan both can set up their nuclear power plants adjoining their common borders. With this, not to speak of war, even a single bullet will not be fired by any side on this border. Punjab will become the most peaceful state and safest area to live. Today, nuclear technology is absolutely safe and India has developed an edge in nuclear power technology over the rest of the world Corruption-free good governance is a pre-requisite for development. All other determinants of growth and development get muted if corruption and indifferent governance becomes the order of the day. Unfortunately, corruption has seeped into our veins. There is no place where one can claim absence of corruption. You lift any lid, the pot stinks. Our politicians are driven by their personal agenda only. The party agenda, if at all known to individual politicians, is only a secondary concern. They ditch their parties for petty personal gains without any burden on their conscience. The national agenda and development concerns do not enter their calculations. Unfortunately, ours is a no-punishment society for the rich and influential persons, who are the major drivers of corruption in the country. The fault lies in the election system itself. Today it costs not less than a crore of rupees to contest an assembly election. Where does this money come from? Those who contribute to the election funds of individuals and parties, unload only the black money and consider the contribution as the seed for a bumper harvest at a later stage when the financed candidates and parties come to power. Unless our election process is freed from the shackles of unearned money and our law-makers are effectively debarred from offices of profit, there is no hope of our economy moving on its optimum growth path. Punjab is no exception on this front; rather the standards of corruption in the state are the highest in the country. Astonishingly, bribing in the state today has gone out of the reach of the common man as have gone education and health for him. The most corrupt are those who hold the responsibility for removing corruption. Bridling corruption is crucial for the attraction of investment. It is not that this menace cannot be tackled. All these three determinants of investment for growth and development are within the capacity of the state, but the question mark is on the vision and political will to do so. |
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Accepting children as they are A parent once asked me, “Do you think we expect too much from our children?” How many ask themselves this question? How many teachers? For 40 years at least I have fretted over this, recommended the reading of Hatter’s “Castle” where A J Cronin builds up the killer stress on a child to devastating disaster. Parents have only a child or two to love, indulge, and pile their ambitions on to. We were six in the family and the only ambition occasionally expressed to me by my mother was, “come first, become a doctor.” My father did not even do that. Together they educated us to the best of their ability and proceeded to love and enjoy us. We had some rules, but no strain. Parents and teachers need to slide from the height of their expectations and ambitions (I won’t say ideals, because they seem to be forgotten in the rate race) They have to get right down to the mental age and the channels their child is inclined to take. A child has his own time table of growth and learning where environment has its own contribution to make. To push him to your expected goals to be achieved at your expected time can be shattering. Such damage is not easy to pinpoint. Only an experienced and concerned teacher can relate the damage to what happened earlier. So the distress keeps its insidious hold as it piles up. By then the psychologist will have a bigger task. Well, then what are the expectations of some parents? Often they are supposed to have the moral stature of saints learning capacity of the smartest around us, be little replicas of us, take on all our own unfulfilled ambitious, play the games we like, meet and play with the ones we consider socially suitable, however dull, empty or soul killing their company, they have to listen to lectures about our great achievements, those of the Joneses progeny or of their own siblings. They must do at least as well as us, if not better. So put in a nutshell, parents want achievers with the intellect of a genius, interest of a scholar, manners of a true gentleman, hundred to ninety per cent marks, first or second position, get the expected job: IAS, IFS or IPS, MNC, any would do nicely. Parents must try and remember that to get down to their children, they must come down the ladder that exalts them as this ladder is no more than age and experience, and reach out to the beating heart. Parents, guilty of not spending enough time with their children if they are both working, are inclined to fits of great indulgence or great chastisement when things go wrong. This confuses the child and makes him insecure. Sometimes I feel the poor and less educated parents living, closer to nature and instinct in a down to earth world make better parents as they are not hyped up or tense about the time frame of education and the cut-throat competition of today. The parent is often inclined to ignore the feelings of a child. What he seems to feel is that the child is his property as he is a piece of his flesh. But each child has a right to be himself to be an individual. He has a right to esteem for what he is or what he may or may not be. Parents often forget that. Parents must accept their children as they are and give them the security of love - not to be confused with indulgence. |
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Chatterati by Devi Cherian It may be a bit late, but a new ethics panel to screen parliamentarians is a good idea. Immediately it is the entrepreneurial MPs under the lens. Anil Ambani, Vijay Mallya, Lalit Suri, RP Goenka, Ratan Jindal will now have to formally declare their areas of interest before taking part in a discussion in Parliament. The committee of ethics is going to maintain a register of assets and liability of a member which will be periodically updated. There is going to be a register of member’s interests, including regular activities, remunerative activities, undertaking, shareholding of controlling nature, space consultancy and professional engagements. And the member taking part in the discussion, will have to declare his areas of interest. Well, hopefully, this may have an impact in some ways on the discussions of the House.
Cooks to win over voters It is very apparent that men are the smarter lot. It is now during his G-election campaign in the Brent non-constituency in London the sitting Labour MP flaunted his culinary skills to win voters. The main item on this Labour MP’s menu was poori paneer, obviously with an eye on the dominant Gujarati community amongst his voters. Well, the voters were impressed. After all, in their own nation they do not get such meals cooked by candidates. And the voters are always happy with this tradition. But in this nation, voters are so sturdy, they do not get impressed by the spirit. Our politicians usually have booth capturers ready. But to my knowledge, there is yet nothing to compete with the poori paneer, even though there is sometime a joke around that a politician may be able to build his future in politics around his ability to make a privacy bolognaise. It is always good to come out with new ideas and a sense of humour even though the emphasis in our nation has been more “roti-kapda and makkan” for all.
Left more visible on DD now Here is one more reason why the Left won’t like government firms to go out of the state’s hand. With their megaphone leaders and gigabyte issues holding forth ever since the UPA government took charge, the visibility of the Left parties has registered a steep high this year. Congress President Sonia Gandhi does not get that much coverage on DD. In the first five months of the UPA government coming to power, Sonia Gandhi’s coverage also included her appearances in her capacity as Chairperson of the National Advisory Council and Chairperson of the UPA. During the period, the BJP president got 4 hours and 11 minutes of coverage while the NCP chief appeared on Doordarshan for 1 hour and 15 minutes. Sonia Gandhi was captured just under three hours of coverage on the public broadcaster in the same period a year ago while the BJP president was on air for almost five and a half hours. So sample this, as against the tiny four minutes coverage that state broadcaster Doordarshan aired the CPI, the party has managed to get coverage of 1hour and 5 minutes. Similarly, CPI leaders were 1 hour and 21 minutes on air in 2004 as against just three minutes for the same period for the previous year. |
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From the pages of 1891: Dark Year
The year 1891 will be long remembered as a dark page in the history of Railways in India. The two accidents on the Bengal-Nagpur and the North-Western Railways have resulted in a total of casualties entirely unprecedented in this country. Of these two, one was a real accident, which no amount of foresight or precaution could have prevented. The later accident on the North-Western Railway was due to a cause which is always preventable. If neglect or carelessness of this kind, due to whatever cause, were to become more frequent, no one would dream of travelling by rail without insuring his life beforehand. If all possible precautions are taken and work and responsibility fairly divided among railway servants, serious accidents, at least, resulting in loss of life would be of very rare occurrence. Ideas of false economy sometimes interfere with the efficiency of Railways.
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Worship nothing but God; be good to your parents and relatives, and to the orphan and the poor. Speak nicely to people, be constant in prayer, and give charity. — Book of quotations on Islam God has explained to me, and I stand convinced, that there is only one creator of the wide world. We should always remember Him.—Guru Nanak No man should think lightly of evil. No man should say, "I can deceive fate". "Nothing will happen to me". Little drops of water gather into a mighty river. So too small evils join together to drown a man in his own filth. — The Buddha Welcome the monsoon. Worship the rain bearing dark bellied clouds. Their offspring will sustain the crops that nourish life for all mankind. — Book of quotations of Hinduism Priya (Pleasure) is sought for sensual gratification. — The Upanishads At the end of the battle, the fields lies purple with the blood of fallen heroes. Corpses are piled high, as vultures and jackals feast on them. The victors try to rejoice but it is a hollow victory over empty palaces devoid of life. — The Mahabharata A wise person will move forward, striving for self-improvement. The joys of happiness can only be realized by actually living lofty principles.
— Book of quotations on Happiness  |
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