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MSP below expectations Farm productivity needs a boost THE modest increase of Rs 10 in the minimum support price (MSP) of wheat is well below the farmers’ expectations, given the rate of inflation, the hike in farm input costs and a general rise in the cost of living due to the escalating oil prices.
Spying days that were
Heartless heartthrobs
Increasing cancer deaths in Punjab Scientists who explored Antarctica Defence notes
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For men in uniform THE cabinet approval for the setting up of an Armed Forces Tribunal will be welcomed by the three services for whom it meets a long-perceived need. Over 7000 cases pertaining to defence personnel are currently pending before the High Courts and the Supreme Court. These cases were of course a burden on a judicial system already struggling with a large backlog. It was also found that in most cases, the civil courts were not the best arbiters for the personnel governed by the Army, Air Force, and Navy Acts. Legislation for the new Armed Forces Tribunal Bill will have to be drafted with great care. Reports indicate that the tribunal(s) will be formed on the lines of the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) set up in 1985 to relieve courts from litigation pending in service matters of government employees. Unlike CAT, thankfully, the defence tribunal is to be provided with the status of a High Court, and its decisions can only be challenged in the Supreme Court. CAT received 13,350 cases from the courts, and in a few years the number went up to several lakhs. Though the rate of disposal was high, almost every decision was challenged in the higher court. Any tribunal is thus in danger of becoming an additional layer to plough through. Only the effectiveness of the initial legislation and efficiency in subsequent functioning can prevent this. Speed, responsiveness and the justice of its rulings will build up the tribunal’s credibility. All those seeking redress of genuine grievances should feel confident of approaching the tribunal. At the same time, there should be disincentives for frivolous litigation. The tribunal will be hearing a range of cases, from appeals of court martial verdicts to those regarding appointments and promotions. The latter have often spilled over into the public domain in recent years. An effective body will also act as a deterrent; those looking to play with the rules will think twice.
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Striking work ISN'T it strange that while the Left-ruled Bengal has woken up to the deleterious effect of bringing the state to a standstill through strikes, the Left leaders continue to swear by the discredited weapon on a national level! They are exulting over the “success” of their nationwide agitation on Thursday, unmindful of the incalculable loss to the nation and acute suffering caused to the common man by bringing airports, banks and other services to a halt. What a pity that such inconvenience has come to be seen as a measure of the success of a strike. When the agitationists are not bothered about the plight of their own countrymen, they cannot be expected to be sensitive to the fact that this has lowered the stock of India in international eyes. Foreign capital has started flowing into the country after a lot of hesitation. Investors are a hardened lot who frown upon such disruptions. There will be a heavy price to pay for such an irresponsible act. In any case, the Left cannot enjoy the luxury of hunting with the hounds and running with the hares simultaneously. It needs to remind itself that it is backing the government. The right forum for it to lodge its protests is Parliament and not the streets. If it is so incensed by the UPA government’s economic policies, its dilution of labour laws and the move to privatise Delhi and Mumbai airports, it must stop propping the government before it enjoys the position of an Opposition party. Apparently, all this has been done with an eye on the coming elections. But what has been forgotten is that the common man is tired of agitations for agitation’s sake. Public sector workers are shooting themselves in the leg by insisting on continuing with their notoriously unproductive ways. In the era of competition, they too have to learn to function professionally. While the workers’ interests have to be protected, that does not mean that lethargic production should be accepted as a norm. “Perform or perish” is the mantra of the 21st century. Left will ignore it to its own peril as of the country. By the way, labour laws in China, to which the Left supposedly looks up, are not any more liberal. It cannot strike work in China.
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MSP below expectations THE modest increase of Rs 10 in the minimum support price (MSP) of wheat is well below the farmers’ expectations, given the rate of inflation, the hike in farm input costs and a general rise in the cost of living due to the escalating oil prices. The agitating Punjab farmers, who stopped trains on Thursday to demand the waiving of loans, water and power dues, will have this issue too on their agenda. Last year too the rise was of Rs 10 and, before that, the then NDA government had given a Rs 20 a quintal incentive due to the 2002 drought. The MSP, whether of wheat or paddy, is not linked to the price index and whatever marginal rise is effected is bound to disappoint farmers. Farmers need to understand the government logic behind the less-than-expected hikes in the support prices. The year-after-year hikes in the MSPs, aimed to encourage self-sufficiency in food in those days of scarcity, have turned these into maximum support prices. The high costs of foodgrain handling and making exports at a loss have also shaped the present government policy. The government now wants farmers to shift from wheat and paddy to other crops. However, the increase has been marginal even in the prices of oilseeds and pulses, whose output is well below demand. The government has to make a fine balance in fixing farm produce prices, particularly in a situation where farmers are in distress due to declining returns from agriculture and consumers pay high prices. Low productivity and inefficient farming are partly to blame. Farming has to be commercially viable. Farmers take loans to buy expensive farm machinery, which their small-holdings do not justify and use excessive pesticides and fertilisers. The government and farm research bodies need to focus on how to raise farm productivity and profitability apart from building rural infrastructure and roping in biotechnology for a wider use in agriculture.
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The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong. — Mahatma Gandhi
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Spying days that were A Marxist mayor of Calcutta once suggested to the American consul-general that the city should be twinned with San Francisco. When the surprised American replied that Calcutta already had a twin in Odessa in what was still the Soviet Union, the mayor explained that he needed an official reason to visit his son in California. That episode, which the consul-general himself recounted to me at the time, comes to mind in the context of the recent espionage revelations. It is especially relevant in view of the claim by the authors of The Mitrokhin Archive — II, “It seemed like the entire country was for sale; the KGB — and the CIA — had penetrated the Indian government.” Apparently, “neither side entrusted sensitive information to the Indians, realising their enemy would know all about it the next day.” That character judgment possibly still holds true because of the social dynamics at work among educated, urban, aspiring and even intellectual Indians. Their British or American equivalent, for instance, is content with only domestic symbols of success. That India was awash with spies in the fifties, sixties and seventies — and perhaps still is — is established fact. Perhaps interest began even earlier. Allen Dulles, head of the American Central Intelligence Agency and brother of the egregious John Foster, visited India before Independence, stayed with the Nehrus in Allahabad, and was much taken with Vijayalakshmi Pandit. In 1967 the Communist Party of India published a book titled I Was a CIA Agent in India, supposedly by a John D. Smith, an American who had defected from the CIA and was writing a series of articles in Moscow’s Literaturnaya Gazeta. It is up to the individual reader to decide whether Smith ever actually existed and whether this was a piece of Soviet or American disinformation. The Soviets rarely admit anything but an American, Duane R. Clarridge, did describe his work in New Delhi and Madras in A Spy for All Seasons: My Life in the CIA. More than 10 years after he left Calcutta, an American diplomat with whom I and my family became extremely friendly wrote to us to say that, now that he had retired, his conscience obliged him to come clean about his past: he had always been employed by the Central Intelligence Agency. However, he assured us, in no way were his activities in Calcutta prejudicial to India or Indian interests. His mandate was only to keep a watch on the 200 or so Soviet diplomats in this city, many, if not most, of them in the employ of the KGB or GRU, the Soviet military intelligence. It was not difficult to identify Soviet spies, or, at least, the more prominent members of the team. Unlike the general run of Soviet diplomats, they were trusted by their masters to live outside the protective enclave. They socialised with Indians — particularly in Bengali intellectual circles where it was fashionable to be “progressive” — and were often seen in public places of entertainment. The belief was that their task was to establish preliminary contacts. Such stories can be multiplied. But some caveats have to be entered. First, suspicions and conspiracy theories run riot in the subcontinent. The fevered Indian, especially Bengali, imagination branded any American diplomat who spoke a smattering of Bengali (or any other Indian language) a CIA agent. Second, we must admit that while many decisions that the government in New Delhi took obviously appealed to the authorities in Moscow or Washington, they were not necessarily taken at the behest of either. In the early years, Indira Gandhi listened to her mentor, P.N. Haksar, whose views were those of the British Fabian intellectuals of the thirties. They — and he — needed no urging by the KGB. At the same time, it is ridiculous to rubbish allegations on the ground that someone like Promode Dasgupta led such an austere life that he could not have been bribed or that he was too patriotic to align himself with foreign interests. First, personal simplicity has nothing to do with it, for the money is needed for party political purposes. Daniel Patrick Moynihan tells us, for instance, that American funds were twice made available to Mrs Gandhi so that the Congress party could fight the Communists in West Bengal and Kerala. Second, no one should be surprised if in those days of the raging Cold War an ideologue identified the Soviet or American governments with his own national interest. Such alliances did not conflict with patriotism of the highest order. Indians who belonged to the Congress for Cultural Freedom saw no harm in accepting American funds to keep communism at bay. The only difference with their rivals on the other side of the political fence was that the latter were less frank about their purpose, objective and methods. But it was no secret that the Soviet Union despatched large and continuous consignments of English children books — usually innocuous nursery tales - to satellite communist organisations to sell and make money from the proceeds. But why blame parties and people alone? Even while the government was crying itself hoarse about “the foreign hand”, it was cooperating with the hand. When a CIA executive came to a seminar at the East-West Center in Honolulu, I said jokingly that it was the first time I had shaken “the foreign hand.” The center’s president, Mike Oxenburg, at once corrected me. “It’s the first time you have been aware of shaking ‘the foreign hand,” he said. True enough, given the proven duplicity — naturally in the national interest — of all political leaders. The CIA helped to set up RAW, the centre’s Research and Analysis Wing, and especially its Aviation Research Centre. New Delhi also cooperated with the CIA in Project Star Sapphire which set up radar defences along the Himalayas and planted sensor devices in the snows, on Nanda Kot mountain among others. That was how China’s Lop Nor nuclear explosion became known to the world. When Richard G. Heggie confessed to Morarji Desai, then Mrs Gandhi’s Deputy Prime Minister, that the Asia Foundation, which he represented in India, had taken CIA funds, Desai’s immediate rejoinder was to regret the public admission. Apparently, New Delhi had known all about the linkage and was prepared to overlook it, but that would become difficult after Heggie’s announcement. Though Asia Foundation was ordered to quit, even Mrs Gandhi regretted the exit when Heggie called on her to say goodbye. Spying becomes objectionable only when it benefits the adversary. Otherwise, everyone does it. Journals like Thought and Pratap in New Delhi and People in Bombay were closed down because of their CIA connections, but no action was taken against far better known publications with a Moscow link because New Delhi then needed the Soviet Union. Expediency apart, there’s another factor and that is our social frailty — the combination of garrulousness and ambition. Obviously, money and ideology do play a part; but in many instances, Indians will just pour out all they know — and some more — to a white foreigner who takes a kindly interest in them. This is especially true of progressive intellectuals whose craving for recognition (and admiration) knows no bounds. Their attitude recalls for me that old English verse — “You do not have to bribe or twist,/ Thank god, the British journalist./ But seeing what the man will do/ Unbribed, there’s no reason to.” India will remain dangerously porous so long as its middle class hankers so desperately for life or, at least, recognition
abroad.
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Heartless heartthrobs IT was the September of 1966. The setting was Mussoorie. The foundation course for the new batch of civil service trainees was in progress at the National Academy of Administration. One overcast afternoon two young men extended an invitation to join them on an excursion to the valley below. Having spent a third of my life in the Simla hills, such mountainous expeditions were for me child’s play. Well versed in the art of running downhill, grasping an odd branch here, embracing a tree trunk there, no one could have disputed my capabilities. While they exchanged notes about their respective alma maters the Punjab University and the Allahabad University, neither of my companions asked me about the Delhi University where I had pursued higher education - women’s credentials always being somewhat suspect. As we descended into the valley, large drops of rain began pelting down. Just then, something hard lurched inside my chest followed by the “thud- thud” of pounding palpitations, a condition I recognised from early childhood. At seven, I had been taken to the Military Hospital at Delhi, where a Colonel Joseph had reassured my parents that I had a “benign condition” called tachycardia which would have no effect on my health or longevity. Over the years I had learnt to halt the palpitations on command, simply by lying completely still, closing my eyes, taking a long deep breath and holding it indefinitely until the “dhak dhak” stopped. I had no experience, however, of handling this phenomena under the open skies, with the rain pelting down — certainly not surrounded by squelchy mountain mush. I closed my eyes and concentrated on stopping the palpitations. My companions hovered over me desperately wanting to know what had happened. I gasped back, “It’s nothing. I’ve got palpitations. It will stop soon.” They huddled together under a tree a little way from me but I could hear them perfectly well: “What are we going to do now?” Asked one. “We should never have asked her to join us. Trust a woman to do this”, replied the other. “Yaar, we’ve had it if something happens to her”, said the first. “We’ll get marching orders for sure,” came the morose reply. Whatever primed the gesture, they decided to carry me back to the academy. Don’t ask me how they proposed to do it, but at least the thought was there. My pitiful state, compounded by the continuing sound of thunder, and the prospect of being carried uphill by two aspiring pallbearers, scared the daylights out of me. As I took another deep breath, I heard one last solitary thud like the sound of a gavel inside my chest and the pounding stopped altogether. I stood up and said: “Let’s go.” Years later at a batch reunion, I recounted this story. By then my two batchmates of 38 years’ standing were far wiser and far weightier, each one flying the national flag, one in India and one abroad. As I told my tale, one of the wives (who had no such status in 1966) said somewhat accusingly, “But that’s not what P. described when he told me this story.” I wonder now what P. had told her.
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Increasing cancer deaths in Punjab The cancer of oesophagus, leukaemia, uterus, breast and digestive system is common. In the neighbouring Gidderbaha area deaths of about 200 people due to cancer have been reported recently. People attribute the cases of cancer to the use of pesticides and chemical quality of groundwater. Studies carried out by the Community Medicine Department of the PGI, Chandigarh, have shown that lack of education and awareness, use of tobacco and improper storage of pesticides may have also contributed to the cases. Further the levels of heavy metals such as arsenic, cadmium, chromium, selenium and mercury, and pesticides such as heptachlor, methion, chloropyrifos were higher in drinking water and vegetables than the permissible limits of the USEPA as compared to the samples from Chamkaur Sahib. Since the area lies in the cotton belt of Punjab, there is widespread and indiscriminate use of pesticides. The use of pesticides was only 624 tonnes in 1960-61, which increased to 7, 600 tonnes in 1995-96. A study of the Centre for Science and Environment (CES), New Delhi, has also found six to 11 pesticides in virtually all blood samples collected from the region. These pesticides include HCH, heptachlor, aldrin, chlordane, DDT, endosulfan, monocrotophos, chloropyrifos and malthion. However, the Punjab Health Department and PAU scientists have neglected the study, saying that it was not adequate. There is a need to have collaborative studies by various labs and agencies to know the truth. The geochemical studies of groundwater (tubewells and handpumps) in the various villages of Talwandi Sabo block carried out by a team of experts comprising Dr Naresh Kochhar, Dr G.S. Gill, Dr N.K. Tuli and Dr Veena Dadwal (Geology Department, Panjab University, Chandigarh, and Dr V. Balaram (NGRI, Hyderabad) have shown that trace elements such as AS, Pb, U, Ni and F, SO4 have concentration more than the permissible limits specified by the BIS, WHO and USEPA. These elements are carcinogenic. Though the values of U are much higher in the water samples, the radioactivity is within the permissible limits (<400 bql/l) as the gas is escapable. The high concentration of these elements in groundwater has been attributed to the rocks of subsurface geology i.e. granites, evaporates, including limestone and quartzites belonging to the buried Aravalli-Delhi ridge. The role of geological formation and health was highlighted by the writer in The Tribune of January 8, 2004. The interaction of groundwater with soils formed from the weathering of basement rocks is the main cause of bad quality of groundwater in the area. The correlation of chemical quality of groundwater in and around Talwandi Sabo with that of Chamkaur Sahib is not tenable as the subsurfaces geology of the latter is quite different. The buried Aravalli-Delhi ridge does not pass through it. It is pertinent to mention here that the Takhatmal and Taruwana villages in Sirsa district (Haryana) which are adjoining to the Talwandi-Sabo block do not report the cases of cancer, though the area has a similar geological setting and also lies in the cotton belt. The reason: the villagers do not drink groundwater. They have canal water. The simplest solution to the problem is to provide fresh drinking water from some different source.
**** The writer is a Professor in Geology, Panjab University, Chandigarh.
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Scientists who explored Antarctica INDIA'S quarter-century engagement with Antarctica has thrown up a number of heroes and heroines. One of the earliest ladies to embark on Antarctica research was Dr Sudipta Sengupta, then in the Geological Survey of India. She went there in the early eighties. Much later went an extraordinary person, Dr Kamal Vilku. Dr Vilku is employed with the CGHS dispensary and had served with Assam Rifles. She had been with her husband, Col K.S. Vilku, to the snowy high altitudes of Ladakh, HP, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram. In City Beautiful you can run into her colleagues who were with in her postgraduation in transfusion medicine at the PGI. Even after four years of her return from the longest stint of 16 months spent by any Indian woman in Antarctica, she has not tried to hog any limelight. Antarctica heroes rate her as a real-life heroine. It is time to make full use of her celebrity status to enthuse future generations of youngsters a yearning to go to Antarctica. Dr Vilku went for studying life in Antarctica, giving medical care to other team-mates and research on effects of the South Pole’s magnetism on human body. Her story appears on “the-south-asian.com” July, 2001 titled “A Doctor’s winter of discontent” by Isidore Domnic Mendis. According to Vilku, common problems associated with harsh conditions around the Maitri station or anywhere in Antarctica are: dental ailments, cold injuries, constipation, skin problems, hair loss and psychological stress in addition to a severe deficiency of Vitamins C, E and folic acid, which can be made up by eating lots of sprouts known for being great source of vitamins. They drank water from Priyadarshini lake (named after Mrs Indira Gandhi). Extreme cold does not let any minerals dissolve in water, hence the deficiencies in minerals and vitamins. All Antarctica aspirants have to undergo a psychological exam to test one’s mental tenacity to stand loneliness in a most inhospitable terrain, also called the last frontier. In summer the temperature could sink to -20°C and in winter up to -50°C. Winters mean no sunlight, summers mean only sunlight, no night. The sun rises in the East and sets in East in Antarctica. Summers could thus destroy a person’s orientation and one needs to be inside huts with thick curtains. The transition from winter to summer is remarkable i.e. first day is about 4-5 minutes longer! Another celestial phenomena worth seeing in Antarctica is the dance of beautiful lights in the sky due to electrified particles emitted by the sun. This is called Aurora Australis. One often hears a geologist left for wintering in Antarctica or another one saying he wintered twice in Antarctica. Penguins and Skuas leave in winter and come back with the onset of summer. A week or two of thick fog in North India sends everyone quivering. People at large do not even know the names of such heroes and heroines. It is time for India to pay its debt to the valiant 1,500-odd scientists who slogged in Antarctica for long to give India a place in the Antarctica treaty nations. Apart from India’s Maitri, there are 44 permanent stations of 27 countries in Antarctica e.g. Russia-5, USA-4, China, Japan, South Korea one each. The average population of campers in Antarctica is around 1,000. The rest are birds. It is mandatory for all countries to keep the place clean. They burn the garbage but bring back its ash. Any other country can inspect a camp of another country at a day’s notice. Dr Vilku painted a lot during her unique stay of 16 months and even cooked food for the entire party on Sundays, which were off for the cook. She dreams of leading an all-women expedition to Antarctica. Well done, Dr Kamal Vilku! May God give Delhi and Chandigarh more likes of you and your spirit! The Chandigarh Administration should not delay getting all Antarctica heroes and heroines to create a museum on Antarctica with their help and, what is most valuable, to inculcate their spirit amongst school, college and university young students as well as teachers. Nothing could be better than initiating such a venture on the Teachers’ Day. The Antarctica bug already bites PU geology boys and girls; it is time to encourage and support them through a system and not leave them to fend for themselves. It was 25 years ago Indira Gandhi took a momentous decision to send an Indian expedition to the Schirmacher Oasis Antarctica east coast under the leadership of a renowned biologist, Dr Qasim, and a geologist, Padma Shree C.P. Vohra, (Everest hero of 1965). Not many know that long before this official expedition one Prof. Sera of Punjab had been to Antarctica with a Russian expedition and on return he had raised heaven and earth in the Government of India to initiate India’s expedition. Finally when his voice reached the right quarters, C.P. Vohra, who is settled now in Chandigarh and was into glaciological investigations in the Himalayas, was asked to plan and execute this endeavour. It was later realised that a much more senior person like Dr Qasim should be the leader to raise the level of this expedition which took off from Goa on December 6, 1981, in a ship hired from Norway. It reached Antarctica in January, 1982, and since then 24 Indian expeditions have gone to Antarctica and a Centre of Antarctica Research (NCAOR) has been established at Vasco, Goa, and the GSI has an Antarctica division at Faridabad with a lovely museum depicting India’s participation in Antarctica research activities.
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Defence notes SURAJIT Sen not only became a household name through his sports commentaries on All India Radio and Doordarshan, but was also witness to the surrender of the Pakistani forces in Dhaka as a foreign correspondent. While covering the 1971 Bangladesh war first hand and moving along the Indian Army, he collected various letters from people who played a major role in the war as also photographs and mementos. One such memento was a Pakistani pistol then presented to him by the Indian Army. It is a point 32 weapon, made in Peshawar. Sen thought it right to hand over the historic artifacts to where they belong and formally handed over these mementos and documents to the Chief of Army Staff, Gen J.J. Singh, recently for display in any Services museum. As the first foreign correspondent to reach Dhaka after its surrender, Sen carried out many exclusive interviews which included that of the top political leaders, Bangladesh intellectuals, student leaders and members of Badr Bahini and Razakars. He also produced several special features to include “In the name of Islam” and “The Anatomy of a Pakistani Soldier”. Army focus on sports Gen J.J. Singh recently inaugurated a sports infrastructural complex at the Army Sports Institute at Pune. To be constructed at a cost of Rs 25 crore with an additional Rs 3 crore invested in sports and sports science equipment, the Institute will be one of the most modern and well-equipped sports institutes in the country. The world-class sports infrastructure will have wherewithal for the technical training of the six sports disciplines of archery, athletics, boxing, diving, wrestling and weight-lifting with fully furnished boarding and lodging facilities for 200 sportspersons. The Army feels that the new complex will help in preparations for the 2006 Doha Asian Games and the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Book on military law As part of the second reunion of the Judge Advocate General (JAG) Department, the Army Chief released a book “Military Law: Then, Now and Beyond”. Edited by Major-Gen Nilendra Kumar, the JAG, it has a number of articles which focus on legal intricacies of the ongoing special disciplinary cases and the ways and means to further expedite their disposal. Litigation pending before the higher judiciary on matters pertaining to the defence forces has also been appropriately addressed along with concrete suggestions to speed up justice. The book contains views of different experts on the composition and jurisdiction of the proposed Armed Forces Tribunal. Another notable feature of the book is an insight into viable options with regard to framing of tri-services legislation and the shape of innovative tools for training in military law.
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From the pages of Curzon — the reformer
Has Lord Curzon changed his colours in respect of his fiscal opinions? It may be remembered that in the fiscal despatch which the Government of India indited in October, 1903, Lord Curzon declared himself strongly in favour of Free Trade and opposed preference or retaliation in respect to Indian conditions. But it seems he is now of a different view. He thinks that the tariff should be used for strengthening the ties uniting Great Britain and the Colonies. Indeed, he did not care to refer even to the opinions he expressed some years ago. It will be interesting, however, to ascertain the sort of fiscal reform he would now propose for India. The entire body of the educated community in India is in favour of a system of protection for the development of the nascent industries of India, but the policy of the tariff reformers simply aims at protecting home-made English goods within the Empire by raising tariff walls against foreign goods and this would in no way help the cause of Indian industries. And the Free-Traders would retain the present countervailing duty on cotton duties. So there is little to choose between tariff-reformers and Free-Traders, so far as India is concerned.
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Success and failure are both difficult to endure. Along with success come drugs, divorce, fornication, bullying, travel, mediation, medication, depression, neurosis, and suicide. With failure comes failure. — Book of quotations
on Success Prayer must never be answered: if it is, it ceases to be prayer and becomes correspondence. — Book of quotations
on Religion In One moment’s search, in the heart of the one who truly loves me—There I am! — Kabir The world stands aside to let anyone pass who knows where he is going. — David Jordan When a man realises the truth about desire, anger and delusion, he eschews them. He understands and the need for self-control and begins to practice it diligently. — The Mahabharata If you must have a tangible symbol of the vast immanate, look to Om. —The Upanishads
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THE Malwa region of Punjab is turning into toxic hotspot. The villages of Jajjal and
Giana in the Talwandi Saboo block of Bathinda district, Punjab, have reported increased cases of cancer over the last five years.