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Left alone End of strike |
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Importing wheat
India’s vote at
IAEA
We need more Pintos
Managing transfers Why sparrows are
dying out Delhi
Durbar
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End of strike AFTER inconveniencing air passengers for several days, the Airports Authority of India employees have finally called off their agitation. The assurances they extracted in writing are not much different from the promises that had already been made. So, the agreement is more by way of a face-saver. Still, the country was held to ransom this way for four days, converting the airports into dumping yards. It was, perhaps, the firmness on the part of the government that did the trick. The employees also must have realised that they were fast losing public sympathy. The Left parties backing them, too, know in their heart of hearts that if China can build modern airports by involving private players, there is nothing wrong with India doing the same thing. Asking the restructuring to be done by the AAI itself is just not feasible considering that it does not have sufficient funds to undertake the massive operation. In any case, this money can be better utilised for taking care of airports in smaller cities. Now that this hurdle is out of the way, the modernisation process should start apace. The government has shown its seriousness in this regard by issuing contracts for the Rs 5,400-crore projects to the selected companies. One just hopes that legal challenges, too, will be sorted out expeditiously because the process brooks no delay. The sorry state of airports is not hidden from anybody. Even a government report has described them as “an embarrassment”. Both Mumbai and Delhi airports handle twice as much air traffic as they were designed to cater to. This not only leads to serious delays but is also a safety hazard. Even otherwise, it is an acknowledged fact that expansion of the aviation industry creates jobs, generates economic growth, increases tax revenue and promotes tourism. The process initiated in Delhi and Mumbai must be expanded to all airports of the country.
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Importing wheat THE government decision to import five lakh tonnes of wheat, forced by the rising prices in the southern states, shows it has mishandled the country’s food security. Last time wheat had to be imported was six years ago. Thereafter, wheat production improved year after year, peaking at 648 tonnes in 2002. Food stocks piled up to such an extent that from a crisis of shortage the country was faced with a problem of plenty. To cope with the situation of surplus, the government almost dumped wheat abroad — at prices which were lower than the production cost. Buyers mostly used it as cattle feed. To cut storage expenses, the government raised wheat allocations to deficit states and to below-the-poverty-line beneficiaries. Besides, the grain was offloaded in the open market for bulk buyers. The food subsidy bill, meanwhile, shot up. It was Rs 9,200 crore in 1999-2000. Now it amounts to a staggering Rs 26,000 crore. Blame this partly on excess production and partly on FCI mismanagement. The Centre, as a result, was forced to raise the prices of foodgrains offered through the public distribution system. As the stocks shrank, the government cut allocations to the food-for-work, Antodaya Anna Yojna and other Central schemes. Both decisions have got the Left howling. The reckless wheat dumping and the dwindling stocks, which dropped to 62 lakh tonnes on January 1 this year, have led to the price rise, though Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar would like everyone to believe that it is due to the changing food habits in South India. The cheerful northern farmers who may be expecting higher wheat prices this year due to the shortage may be in for disappointment: the imported wheat will arrive just when they will bring their own produce to the market in two months. The excess supply could cause a price crash. Thus, the wheat import decision has been badly timed too.
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Who will change old lamps for new ones? ... new lamps for old ones? |
India’s vote at IAEA THE International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) decided by 27 votes in favour to three against with five abstentions to refer the case of Iranian noncompliance with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards to the Security Council. Among those who voted in favour of the resolution were two Muslim countries, Egypt and Yemen (with significant Shia population), and among the abstentions were three Islamic countries, Indonesia, Libya and Algeria. The only Muslim country that supported the Iranian stand and voted against the resolution was Iran’s neighbour, Syria. This would explode the myth generated in this country by vote bank managers that the vote in favour of the resolution and against Iran would anger the Muslims of this country. It raises serious doubts whether those who put forward that argument were at all in touch with the Muslim opinion. Secondly, while on September 24 at the IAEA only 23 countries voted in favour of the resolution, 11 abstained and Venezuela alone voted against the resolution, on February 4 the number of the countries for the resolution rose from 23 to 27, the number against from 1 to 3 and the abstentions fell from 11 to 5. The most notable converts from abstentions to voting in favour were Russia and China. Those who argued that India voted against Iran on September 24 did so under US pressure should explain whether China and Russia voted this time under US pressure. We have not heard any explanation from the Leftists what made Russia and China change their stands. It is also quite obvious that the non-aligned bloc got split and there was no consensus among them either. All these factors taken together should highlight how realistic were those analysts and media people who focused on non-aligned solidarity, Islamic and Shia factors and the Russian and Chinese stands to condemn India’s earlier voting and tried to pressure New Delhi to change its principled stand on the violation of IAEA safeguards. During the debate the Egyptian amendment, which made a reference to the Middle-East nuclear-weapon-free zone idea was accepted by the US after it received strong support from Russia and the European countries. This was aimed at telling Israel and its supporter US that if there is to be peace and stability in the Middle-East, Israel will have to give up its nuclear weapons. Israel is one of the three countries (along with Pakistan and India) to remain outside the Non-Proliferation Treaty. This is a message to Israel that its arsenal is reversible. Pakistan is the record proliferator. It is in these circumstances the US administration and the other major powers — Britain, France and Russia — characterise India as the responsible nuclear weapon state with advanced technology which deserves the exceptionalisation treatment proposed under the July 18 joint statement signed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President
George W. Bush. Therefore, the present resolution not only aims at stopping the potential Iranian proliferation but also, in an implied manner, hints at the possibility of deproliferating Israel on the model of South Africa. The white minority in South Africa gave up its nuclear weapons when it accepted the black majority rule and, therefore, had no fears of conflict with the surrounding black African states. If there is peace between Israel and its neighbouring Arab states with the emergence of an independent Palestinian state, there will be no need for an Israeli nuclear arsenal either. The resolution is not meant to be acted upon immediately. The Director-General of the IAEA, Nobel Prize winner Dr El-Baradei, has made it clear that the agency’s report on the Iranian compliance or otherwise with the IAEA’s safeguards, which has been under investigation since 2002, will be ready only next month. Therefore, this resolution is meant to be a report to the Security Council and not a
statuary referral. However, Russia and China, which abstained last time on September 24, have now joined hands with the West to exert pressure on Iran to comply with the IAEA safeguards. The safeguards issue pertains to the Iranian acquisition of equipment and technology from Dr A.Q. Khan and Pakistan over a period of 16 years, from 1987 to 2003. Most of the people in our country who argue for the Iranian right to acquire enrichment technology under the provisions of the NPT tend to overlook the fact that the rest of the world lacks confidence in the Iranian peaceful intentions because of 16 years of clandestine proliferation by Iran from Pakistan. If Iran’s intentions are wholly peaceful there is no reason why Teheran should not come clean on its Pakistan proliferation and make a clean breast of it. Finally, the refusal of Iran to clear its name on A.Q. Khan proliferation and its reluctance to accept the Russian compromise proposal to have uranium enrichment done on Russian soil persuaded Russia and China to go along with the West in voting against Iran. Do the supporters of Iran have any explanation why it is unable or unwilling to purge itself of the proliferation charge and accept the Russian compromise? The vote clearly shows that Iran does not command credibility among 27 of the 35 members of the IAEA Board of Governors, including all five permanent members of the Security Council. Our domestic lobbyists for Iran were presumably motivated by two considerations. One stream was driven by blind anti-Americanism. The second stream had other parochial considerations in mind. The illogical and often extremist stands of these lobbies played into the hands of American unipolarists who connected up the Indian vote on Iran in the IAEA with the American Congress’s vote on amendments to their nuclear legislation necessary to extend to India the exceptionalisation from the NPT. The final outcome of the Iran vote justifies the stand India took on September 24, 2005. Since the Indian decision then was based on genuine national interests, there was no need for the country to reconsider it. Those who say that the Indian policy on Iran is not independent and not based on India’s national interests should explain whether Russia and China also do not have independent policies and how supporting Iran and opposing 26 other nations would serve Indian national interests, especially shielding the 16 years of clandestine proliferation. A debate on the issue in Parliament is necessary to expose those who are keen on shielding A.Q. Khan and his proliferation network. It is of interest to note that many of those who fervently support Iran’s clandestine proliferation are also opposed to India having a nuclear arsenal. It is difficult to understand the rationale of the people who support Iran’s clandestine proliferation even while opposing Indian nuclear
arsenal.
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We need more Pintos The
son came home with a message from his Principal Mr Pinto. The latter had wanted to ascertain my concurrence and availability to be the chief guest at a school function. I said I would be happy to. The next day another message came asking if it would be alright if Mr Pinto came the next evening to personally hand over the invitation card. That was fine with me. The son then added that his Principal would arrive at 7 p.m. and would depart at 7.15 p.m., reminding me that I must ensure to be ready in time to receive him. Mr Pinto came on the dot. He briefly filled me up on the significance of the occasion and gave a general resume of the school. Then he handed me the invitation card and made a polite remark: “I hope, sir, despite your busy schedule you would be able to reach the venue in time.” I gave my assurance and he departed on schedule. I reached in time and the function went off well. Some three months later there was another function in the same school. The District Education Officer was the chief guest this time and we were attending as parents. Everything was ready and the arrival of the chief guest was awaited. The parents were chatting and general gossip filled the air. As the arrival time came and went Mr Pinto became visibly impatient. He could be seen pacing up and down edgily. With his reputation for being a stickler for time one wondered what his next step would be. He did not let the uncertainty hang long. As it became five minutes past the appointed hour, Mr Pinto surveyed the assemblage. After a general sweep of the eye, he approached me in the second row. “I hope I will not be embarrassing you sir”, he whispered, “if I request you to take over as the chief guest.” “But you already have a chief guest”, I protested. “We had sir, but unfortunately he has no regard for punctuality. And I cannot expect to teach my students and my staff the value of time if I myself do not practise it.” “But what happens if the DEO lands up later?” I asked, still unsure how to react to this unusual situation. “He would be welcome to sit as a spectator”. There was no mistaking the finality of his decision. Seeing me still hesitant, he pleaded, “Please sir, you will do a personal favour by helping me set an example.” He then made a public announcement of the reason for change of chief guest and thanked me for agreeing to stand in. His remarks drew thunderous applause. The incident came back when I read about an unfortunate incident where some children fainted waiting in the hot sun for the chief guest to
arrive.
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Managing transfers Every
year the fear of transfer hangs like the sword of Damocles over the head of government employees. Aspirants of transfers converge at the state capitals with a flock of well-wishers for the furtherance of their cause. Some succeed in their mission and others return in despair. It is often said a transfer is not a punishment. It may serve as an effective instrument for reward as well as punishment. Frequent and arbitrary transfers of public servants affect the efficiency of the system. Frequent and untimely transfers not only pose a number of problems for government employees such as finding residential accommodation, admission of children, keeping the establishment at two places causing financial and other worries, but also affect the efficiency of the employees, which ultimately has a direct bearing on the performance of government departments. Sometimes, an important task given to an employee is also left incomplete due to his untimely transfer. If data pertaining to transfers of all groups of employees is collected, the amount paid as T.A. and D.A. would show a frightening figure, which otherwise could have been used for development purposes. Regarding the system of transfers and postings prevalent in the sixties a very beautiful depiction has been given in a report of the Administrative Reforms Committee appointed by the Government of Rajasthan under the chairmanship of the late Mr Harish Chandra Mathur, the then MP, wherein he observed: “In the matters of transfer and posting of government employees, there has been considerable undue interference by senior authorities in the powers of the subordinate authorities in this respect at all levels. Interference of this nature is one of the major causes of indiscipline in the services and of frustration and demoralisation amongst them, and this has indirectly resulted in inefficiency to a great extent. This practice must be stopped at all costs”. So there is a need to evolve a sound transfer policy for effecting transfers of government employees. The Government of India and some state governments have evolved some rules/procedures in this direction. The Government of India has an institution called the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet, which is empowered to take decisions in respect of the selection of officers to secretarial positions of the rank of Under Secretary and above. In the Government of India the other secretariat staff is also not transferred frequently and has a stability of tenure. Some state governments have also taken pioneering initiatives in this regard. The government of Gujarat constituted a high-level administrative reforms committee under the chairmanship of Mr G.C. Baveja, IAS (retd.) in September, 1985, which gave very useful recommendations regarding transfers. One of the recommendations made was that a government servant should not be transferred unless he had served for about three years at one station and this criterion was also recommended to be made applicable in case of the officers of the all India services. The Government of Andhra Pradesh also has a transfer policy for its employees, which contains the recommendation that every transferable government employee will be retained at one station for a minimum period of three years. Transfers made under policy guidelines always benefit the system. Personal experience shows that the adoption of ad hoc measures in effecting transfers is one of the causes of substandard performance by officials. No doubt, sticking to a particular seat for a long period one gains mastery, but it deprives him of all-round knowledge and experience of the organisation’s functioning, where he is employed, whereas rotational postings serve some sort of in-service training also. So while drafting transfer rules or enacting legislation on transfers the needs and exigencies of effecting transfers of different categories of staff, posted at the level of Secretariat, head offices, districts, subdivisions, tehsils and rural areas are required to be kept in view and a thorough examination has to be made as a single criterion cannot be applied to all of them. At the secretariat level clerks, Assistants and Superintendents can be transferred from one branch to another after every three years and the officials, whose services are considered essential in the department, can be shifted within the branches of the department. This policy can be made applicable to the staff posted in the offices of the heads of departments. Such transfers do not make any hole in the state exchequer. The employees working in public dealing and works departments, which are considered vulnerable to temptations, should be transferred strictly according to the transfer policy and no let-up be given in the tenure fixed for transfers. In the cases of teachers, doctors and other village functionaries, transfers should not be effected until and unless it is warranted under exceptional circumstances. Couple cases and mutual transfers can, however, be considered sympathetically as in such cases the government does not have to bear the financial burden, rather it adds to the efficiency and mental satisfaction of the employees. In complaint cases the delinquent, should be proceeded against and a suitable penalty be inflicted instead of transferring him elsewhere. Only then the aspirations of the general public for good governance can be fulfilled. |
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Why sparrows are dying out New
evidence is pointing at a solution to the greatest wildlife mystery of recent years - why the house sparrow has been vanishing from towns and cities. Many suggestions have already come and gone. Magpies, cats, pesticides, peanuts, climate change and home improvements are among the myriad causes that have been put forward for the sparrow’s startling disappearance, since The Independent highlighted it in 2000 with the offer of a £5,000 prize for the first properly accepted scientific answer. Our prize has never been claimed. But the offer still stands, and now comes research that, in the opinion of the world’s leading sparrow expert, may get closer to a solution of this enigma than anything that has gone before. It comes from Kate Vincent, a postgraduate researcher at De Montfort University, Leicester, who — for the past five years — has been closely examining house sparrow breeding success for her PhD thesis. Her research appears to bear out experimentally one of the theories that have been put forward for the birds’ decline — a similar decline in the numbers of the insects and other invertebrates that sparrow chicks need for the first few days of their lives. Sparrows are granivorous birds — they live on grain and other seeds (and the bread that is made from grain, when we put it out for them). However, when they are very young, in their first week, the chicks need animal protein in the shape of small grubs, flies, aphids and spiders. Over three years, Ms Vincent, 28, put up more than 600 nestboxes on houses in Leicester and the city’s suburbs and her remarkable finding was that, in the summer, completely unseen by the outside world, considerable numbers of sparrow chicks were starving to death in the nest. Furthermore, those whose diet had consisted largely of vegetable matter — seeds and scraps of bread — were much more likely to die than those whose diet had plenty of invertebrates. (With 50 per cent insects, they had an 80 per cent chance of surviving. With no insects, they had only a 30 per cent chance.) Ms Vincent worked out the chick’s diet by analysing their droppings. In an ornithological labour of Hercules, every time she weighed and measured a chick in the nest, she collected the poo it would tend to deposit in her hand; and then, under the microscope, she could identify in it the tiny remains of insects — an aphid leg here, a beetle mandible there — and estimate their abundance. The chicks that were dying were largely in the sparrows’ second brood of the year, and that provides an explanation for the population decline as a whole. As many young sparrows do not survive their first winter, every year the species needs two or three broods (of four chicks each) to keep the population at least level. If the second brood is failing, the population will start to fall. Ms Vincent found an 80 per cent success rate in the first brood, but only a 65 per cent success rate in the second. The strong implication is that insects and other invertebrates are becoming much scarcer in Britain in summer — which, although Ms Vincent’s research does not specifically prove this, is suspected by wildlife researchers. “Kate Vincent’s evidence, especially her finding of complete broods of chicks dead in the nest, is quite compelling,” said the world expert on the house sparrow, Denis Summers-Smith. “Insect decline may well be the crucial factor.” — The Independent |
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Delhi Durbar Anand
Sharma, the new Minister of State in the Ministry of External Affairs, has taken to his ministerial assignment like a duck takes to water. This is despite the fact that Sharma has become a Union Minister for the first time after spending decades in politics. Unlike many others, he did not wait for an “auspicious” day or time and took over office the very next day after he was sworn in. He held meetings with all the three Secretaries in the MEA — Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran, Secretary (East) Rajiv Sikri and Secretary (West) Shashi U Tripathi. He also called a meeting of the External Publicity Division. His charge is LAC countries — MEA jargon for Latin American, African and Caribbean countries, the same charge which Rao Inderjit Singh had before he was shifted to the Ministry of Defence. Moreover, Sharma plunged straight into diplomacy and willingly embarked on an official tour of Brazil barely 48 hours after his taking over. As they say, a journey well begun is half completed.
Just 10 cr for rural amenities Providing urban amenities in rural areas is one of the pet subjects of President A P J Abdul Kalam. He convinced Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his predecessor Atal Bihari Vajpayee that this was essential for the development of villages. Even though it has been adopted as a national programme, the Rural Development Ministry appears rather unenthusiastic. Consider these facts. A measely Rs 10 crore was allotted for rural amenities in the 2005-06 budget and in the first nine months of the financial year, hardly any money has been spent. A bird tells us that with the ambitious Bharat Nirman being accorded priority, this rural plan will continue to remain in its shade.
Rao called back A day before the Cabinet reshuffle, Rao Inderjit Singh, left for Brazil on official duty. On the reshuffle day he was in London for getting a connecting flight when he was conveyed the news that he was no longer Minister of State in the MEA and he was being shifted to the Ministry of Defence. He had to come back from London. Surely, he could have been spared this humiliation.
Punjabis gain in reshuffle Finally Punjab, Himachal Pradesh and Chandigarh got ample representation in the Union Cabinet — Ambika Soni, Pawan Bansal, Ashwani Kumar and Anand Sharma. All of them, at one point of time or the other had been associated with the media department of the AICC. Except for Pawan Bansal, who represents the Lok Sabha, all others are from the Upper House. Perhaps, Dr Manmohan Singh has inducted these leaders with an eye on the assembly poll in the state slated next year. But he has left many other Cabinet berth aspirants from the state like Dr M S Gill with ruffled feathers. Contributed by Rajeev Sharma, S. Satyanarayanan and R.
Suryamurthy
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From the pages of Quantity V. Quality There is at the present moment a note of despondency in the air over the number of Congress members. The complaint is that the members have been never so few as to-day. The complaint would be reasonable if the franchise being the same the response was less than before. It would also be reasonable if the influence of the Congress was to be measured by the number of members. Opinions would undoubtedly differ as to the measure to be applied for gauging the Congress influence. For me there is one measure. I attach the highest importance to quality, irrespective almost of quantity, the more so far Indian conditions. In the midst of suspicion, discord, antagonistic interests, superstition, fear, distrust and the like there is not only no safety in numbers but there may be even danger in them. Who does not know how often numbers have embarrassed us during the past four years? Numbers become irresistible when they act as one man under exact discipline. They are a self-destroying force when each pulls his own way, no one knows which way to pull. |
Blessed are the twelve months, the seasons, the lunar and the solar days, the hours, the minutes and the seconds when the Lord meets us spontaneously. — Guru Nanak At the time of their death, Hindus chant the name of Rama and Muslims that of Khuda, but neither of them remember God’s name during their entire lifetimes. — Kabir While travelling on a road, do not waste your breath in conversing on foolish topics with feckless travellers. If you cannot find a wise man to talk to, then keep your counsel to yourself and your thoughts under control. — The Buddha Work hard. Work well. And be happy with the results that you get. Do not aspire for a particular result and be upset when you do not get it. This is the essence of karma
yoga.
— Bhagavadgita
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