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On and off
After the Lebanese war
Unborn daughter
Boost industry for Punjab’s all-round growth Bangladesh succumbing to jihadis Delhi Durbar
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Congress conclave ANYONE present at the Congress party’s conclave in Nainital must have heaved a sigh of relief at its conclusion. It was an affair of long yawns, despite party chief Sonia Gandhi cutting short some attempts at speechification. At the end of the exercise what stands out is the little that was accomplished by the leading party of a coalition that has entered its third year in office. What was done actually underscores much that remains unattended. Mrs Gandhi made it clear that there would be no deputy prime minister and that she is happy with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as well as with Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar. Dr Manmohan Singh responded to criticism of the Havana agreement of a joint India-Pakistan mechanism for monitoring terrorism by saying that this was Islamabad’s last chance to make up for the “trust deficit” in ties between the two countries. There was no need for a conclave to make these points The time between the second and third years in office is usually a good time to take stock of achievements and failures, draw up a time line for implementation of neglected promises and policies and generally energise the party and the government with new directions and mission objectives. By these yardsticks, the Congress party’s conclave has been a non-event. Let alone charting a new course that would galvanise the party organisation and impart urgency to issues of governance, the conclave failed to address even issues that have assumed crisis proportions. The agricultural crisis and farmers being driven to suicide, be it in prosperous Punjab or ‘backward’ Vidharbha, was treated with a casualness that betrays indifference. Dr Manmohan Singh did touch on the points to be attended for mitigating the distress in the farm sector and Mrs Gandhi,while she was not opposed to special economic zones, wanted the long-term effects to be considered. The question is: Why were these not deliberated before the conclave where a plan to mitigate the crisis and reduce the indebtedness of farmers could have been presented. Former Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao had said famously that not taking a decision is in itself a decision. The Congress at the helm of the UPA seems to dutifully adhere to this dictum, be it on agriculture or disinvestment.
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Kargil lies General Pervez Musharraf has at last admitted, though indirectly, that the “mujahideen theory” floated by Pakistan during the 1999 Kargil conflict between India and Pakistan was not true. The Kargil heights were clandestinely occupied by Pakistan’s regular troops. In his memoirs, In the Line of Fire, he says, “As few as five units in support of freedom fighter groups were able to compel the Indians to deploy more than four divisions.” This is contrary to the Pakistani stand so far that it was the “mujahideen” in Kargil who were pitted against the Indian forces in the warless war. Mentioning the “mujahideen” as “freedom fighters”, the General conveniently forgets the riots in the Northern Areas which were caused when people came to know that their relatives who died fighting as regular soldiers were not being accepted as such by the army. If General Musharraf is to be believed, the then Pakistan Prime Minister, Mr Nawaz Sharif, was fully aware of the Pakistan army’s Kargil operations. Mr Sharif’s assertion that he was kept in the dark by his army chief is not true. The General gives the specific dates when Mr Sharif was given the necessary briefings. Of course, what Mr Sharif claims can also happen in a country like Pakistan where the ultimate power rests with the army. But then it reflects poorly on his functioning as prime minister. The truth is that both have not told the whole truth. They have revealed only as much as it suits their own interests. With a view to washing his hands off the humiliation Pakistan suffered as a result of its Kargil misadventure, General Musharraf tries to blame India for “provoking” the conflict. His whole purpose seems to be that he should not be known as the architect of the Kargil war, which led to the fall of the Nawaz Sharif government and his own elevation as the head of state through a military coup. Pakistan was a loser in all respects. The army, which has been responsible for most of its ills, was back to power again. The fledgling democracy was gone. Gen Musharraf needs to atone for these setbacks to Pakistan more than anybody else.
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On and off With the Indian Army resuming operations against the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA), prospects for a lasting ceasefire with the banned terrorist organisation have further dimmed. Indeed, there is ground to suggest that this charade of peace negotiations with this group should end once and for all, and the Army and the state police forces should launch a final, all-out effort to neutralise their offensive capabilities. ULFA has consistently used periods of quiet to regroup, restock and rearm, and preface a run-up to a scheduled round of “talks” with acts of violence. The resumption of army action follows the killing of a manager of a tea estate in Assam, following an extortion demand. What is more, ULFA has even imposed a “tax” on all Assamese. There was cautious optimism when ULFA, after 27 years of armed insurgency that has taken a heavy toll of human lives, laid down arms in August. The initiative was in response to the Centre’s pre-Independence day move to suspend army operations against them for 10 days. The Centre is in talks with the 11-member People’s Consultative Group (PCG), constituted by ULFA to act as an intermediary before direct talks can take place. This short-term ceasefire was subsequently extended. ULFA’s intentions have always been in doubt. In the run-up to the most recent round of talks with the PCG in June, ULFA had unleashed a wave of attacks, including the Guwahati market bomb blast. These were followed by a round of threats to journalists. ULFA leaders continue to talk about sovereignty as a core issue. But their support base among the people has clearly dwindled. Credible reports suggest that because of the prospect of “peace talks”, the Army has on more than one occasion been asked to pull back when operations got too hot for ULFA cadre. The Tinsukhia operation last year is a case in point. Such acts of generosity no longer have a place. Interlocutor Indira Goswami may mean well but ULFA now has been given one chance too many.
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Our sympathy is cold to the relation of distant misery. — Edward Gibbon
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After the Lebanese war There are two ways of looking at Lebanon after the 34-day savage Israeli conflict with Hezbollah. It severely complicates an already complex crisis surrounding the central problem of Israeli occupation of Arab land since 1967. Equally, the loss of Lebanese lives and devastation of Lebanon provide a new opportunity to grapple with making peace between Israelis and Palestinians. It is a characteristic of West Asia or the Middle-East that both these contradictory hypotheses are true. First, the delicate nature of the Lebanese state built on a sectarian edifice that apportions power among Muslims (Shias and Sunnis) and Christians on a 1932 census partially amended in 1990 is clear. The Lebanese were united behind the Hezbollah in coping with Israeli fire power. But once a ceasefire was arranged after America winked at the fighting to help Israel achieve its war aims, cracks have begun to appear. Hezbollah, which earned for itself an iconic status in the Arab world by fighting the mighty Israeli army to a standstill, has claimed victory and in a defiant show of force at a Beirut rally, Hassan Nasrallah demanded a new national unity government. Hezbollah remains in the government, but elections last year brought to power an anti-Syrian coalition after the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri. Hezbollah is supported and aided by Iran and Syria. Indeed, this assassination is a benchmark in Lebanese politics because Syria was allegedly implicated in the murder, leading to a UN inquiry, and Syrian troops were forced to withdraw from Lebanon after 29 years in the face of a groundswell. Syria has always viewed Lebanon as being in its sphere of influence — in fact, France split the present state of Lebanon from Syria in the early 1940’s. The falling out of Rafik Hariri with Syria stemmed from his opposition to Syrian insistence on extending the term of its ally Emile Lehoud, a Maronite Christian, through a constitutional amendment. It speaks of the nature of the Lebanese state that politicians have shied away from tinkering with the constitution, despite the Shias’ greater numbers than officially acknowledged. But an anti-Syrian alliance led by Saad Hariri, the murdered leader’s son, obtained a parliamentary majority. This alliance is now bestirring itself in the face of chest thumping by the Hezbollah leader. Nasrallah, in fact, said in a television interview that he would not have ordered the capture of two Israeli soldiers on Israeli territory had he known that Tel Aviv’s reaction would be as savage as it was, killing close to 1,200 Lebanese, most of them civilians, making nearly a million homeless and destroying Lebanon’s infrastructure. Hezbollah had built its following among Shias in southern Lebanon on the strength of its welfare work for the poor and needy providing them with rations and health care. Since the Israelis have pretty nearly destroyed the Shia homes, Nasrallah is acutely aware that he must act immediately to provide relief in the form of cash payments and reconstruction of homes. Each family was initially given $12,000 in cash and excavation of ruined buildings was begun on the second day after the cessation of hostilities. Hezbollah was preparing for a confrontation, as it demonstrated by the intensity of the fighting and crude Qassam rockets rained on nearby Israeli towns causing needless civilian deaths. The Israelis are arguing over their failure to achieve their main objectives — the first time against any Arab force — and Israelis are sceptical about the probes ordered to get at the truth. As these events take their course and the Lebanese drama is unfolding, optimists are arguing that the Lebanese conflict offers a new opportunity to grapple with the central Israeli-Palestinian problem. There are grounds for some optimism. America is hopelessly bogged down in Iraq and although the task of pacifying Afghanistan has been handed over to NATO — something of a Foreign Legion to pursue American interests — a resurgent Taliban is offering stiff resistance in the south. And the US is tangling with the Iranians over their nuclear programme, impatient to impose sanctions for which Europeans, apart from Britain, have little stomach. The Bush administration has a particularly sorry record on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Initially, it displayed its penchant for benign neglect; in effect a signal to Israel to destroy the Palestinian Authority’s infrastructure and confine Yasser Arafat to his partially bombed headquarters. Washington followed suit when Prime Minister Ariel Sharon declared Arafat a non-person and made it amply clear that the Israelis could do no wrong in President Bush’s eyes. In his speech to the UN General Assembly, President Bush made a half-hearted attempt to take a stab at the Israeli-Palestinian problem by announcing plans to send his Secretary of State, Ms Condoleezza Rice, to the region. Ms Rice’s earlier foray was less than successful because her brief was to prolong the fighting to suit the Israeli timetable; whatever devastation Israeli planes and ground troops were causing Lebanon. And in an unfortunate turn of phrase, she suggested that the world was witnessing the “birth pangs of a new Middle-East”. Much as one would like to see the success of President Bush’s new efforts, as and when they materialise, it is difficult to remain optimistic about the outcome. Before the Lebanese fighting started, Ms Rice had already blessed Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s partial unilateral withdrawal from the West Bank. And President Bush had already given Mr Sharon a carte blanche in retaining major settlements on the occupied West Bank and erecting a wall, which further dispossessed Palestinians of homes and land and barred direct access to occupied East Jerusalem. A more predictable outcome will be that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and tensions between Israelis and Lebanon will continue to fester at least till the end of the term of President Bush. It would require a superhuman effort for the president and his neoconservative advisers to change their mindset to see the stark injustice of continuing Israeli occupation of Palestinian land. For a time, President Bush Senior’s old advisers contested Bush Junior’s policies that have merely invited more strife in the world and earned America its worst international image ever. But they seem to have given up their efforts after having met a brick wall. There is little point in trying to persuade a leader who believes that he has direct communication with
God.
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Unborn daughter Khalil Gibran says that the soul of our children dwells in the house of tomorrow, which we cannot visit, not even in our dreams. But I think he is wrong. We, parents can dream and see our children in the future through our inner eyes. My dear would-be daughter-in-law, I am, today seeing you. I see you as a strong and confident woman full up to the brim with life’s unadulterated nectar. You are beautiful inside and you wear your beauty like a glowing halo that envelopes your personality. You are a whole person, complete with your opinions, beliefs, perceptions, principles, your own truths and values and that you also have the strength and conviction to justify and defend your stand. Though marriage may not be as important to you as it was to your grandmother but I’ll be content if it is one of the important aspects of your life out of several other commitments such as your career, your obligations to your parents etc. I see that you are feminine without being ashamed about your feminineness and with all the qualities endowed in this word because though the world often ignores this, it is the woman who makes the world go round. I hope you never wish to shun your feminine abilities, strengths and powers, intuitions and insights because it is due to these that you are so special. It is because of woman that life on earth is possible and worth living despite unending miseries. I want you to be a perfect foil to my son who I guess like all other males of the species will be endowed with a lot of physical strength but less of compassion, empathy and gentleness. The first 25 years or so I’ll bring up my son and then I see you taking over from me, coaxing, cajoling, rebuking, loving him and ultimately making him follow the path that best suits his individuality so that he is a fulfilled man. I am sure he will achieve this only with you. I see him realise the beauty, grace and dignity of the feminine body and mind through you. He will learn to discipline his actions and thoughts in order to win over your charm. I see his boyish indiscretions tempered by your deep tenderness. I shudder to think of the situation if my son fails to find you and has to lead a lonely life and is never able to achieve the fullness of the living cycle because of your absence. How imperfect his life will be, how meaningless and wasteful his days and nights will be! I shudder if such a thing happens that you are never allowed to be born by your parents for being a girl, that they murder you and throw you in a dump, that they never let you grow up, never let you enjoy your childhood, never let you eat and drink and care for your health. My son is two years old and I pray hard, my dear girl, that your parents let you be born.
Amen!
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Boost industry for Punjab’s all-round growth While the negative consequences of depending on rice as the main summer crop have often been highlighted by farm scientists, they have, at the same time, failed to develop alternative crops that consume less water as well as enjoy good marketing facilities — like oilseeds, pulses, sugarcane and cotton. In other words, these farm scientists have failed to develop high yielding varieties of seeds and other facilities for the growth of these alternative crops. And from past experience, one is not sure whether farmers would take to these alternative crops, including others like vegetable cultivation, horticulture, mushroom-growing and the like, which are often suggested. Not knowing the future of these alternative products, farmers hesitate to lessen their dependence on rice cultivation, particularly when it is a good income earner and there are less chances of their running into loss by its cultivation. Under these circumstances, the only alternative is not only to change the cropping pattern, but more importantly to build a state of assured future which farmers would appreciate. Also, while much is talked of contract farming and processing of farm products, there has not been any significant development in this area. Now, whether a few big players, playing the game both in Punjab and Haryana, would bring good income to farmers is yet to be seen. In any way, the much harassed farmer is keeping his fingers crossed. Considering all this, it is to be questioned why we didn’t realise two decades earlier the harmful impact of over-dependence on a couple of crops which had already played their role in the green revolution. It was the time when industrialisation of this state should have been started on a vigorous scale. Punjab is known for its high growth in small and medium industries, particularly engineering, agro-processing, textiles. In fact, during the height of the green revolution, it had practically lost its grip on these industries. At present, several states have proceeded ahead of Punjab in medium and large industries. Punjab does not have a single large scale engineering unit, just a few medium scale and several small units. Several of them are not in good shape, with no major breakthrough in technology. The same is the state of affairs of agro-processing industries. The couple of units that exist are run by multinational firms while small and medium units have little chance of surviving. Despite Punjab having a good market for 2-wheelers and automobiles, there is hardly any manufacturing unit in this area. Punjab is the world’s leading manufacturer only for bicycles. It is equally interesting to find that the largest engineering unit, Kapurthala Rail Coach Factory, is in the public sector. While in the private sector we have a couple of mega units manufacturing world-class bicycles, their manufacturers have never thought it advisable to establish car and two-wheeler units in this state. There are few large-scale textile units in the state, despite the fact that it is the largest consumer of textiles per head, both woollen and cotton products, in the country. All this shows that merely having a large market for a product is not sufficient ground for the establishment of large-scale manufacturing units. Punjab’s location is also not helpful for the growth of large industry. It is a land-locked state with much of its border opening to Pakistan with which it has hardly any trade. It is also not near Delhi — the country’s second commercial capital after Mumbai. Here it is Haryana that takes full advantage and it is little surprise that Haryana has several openings for large industry practically in every sector. Punjab’s highly skilled manpower, engineers and technicians prefer to migrate to other states because of lack of employment opportunities in their home state. In other words, while Punjab educates and trains a large number of skilled manpower, it loses them to other states. Thus there are several factors that go against the establishment of large industry in Punjab, notwithstanding the fact that it has several rich NRIs settled abroad who are ready to invest in Punjab if a conducive environment prevailed. It is also true that Punjab has hardly tried to frame a workable industrial policy, to encourage outsiders to invest here. It also suffers from a poor power situation, which goes against the development of large-scale industries. Unless these roadblocks are removed, this state would not be able to attract large industries and thus the poor state of industrialisation would continue.
***** The writer is director, Centre for Indian Development Studies, Chandigarh.
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Bangladesh succumbing to jihadis Bangladesh Prime Minister Begum Khaleda Zia has taken one more retrograde step that will be under the scrutiny of international jihad watchers across the globe and have a far-reaching impact on her country’s future. On August 21, 2006, Begum Zia declared that her government had decided to equate the “Dawra” degree awarded by the Quami Madrassas as a Masters Degree awarded by recognized universities in Religious Studies and the Arabic language. Begum Zia added that giving a similar recognition of Bachelor’ s Degree to Fazil and Kamil examinations would also be announced soon. The next day, triumphant patrons and Alims of Quami Madrassas declared that they will not allow the government to interfere with the curricula and working of their madrassas even if the government provides financial assistance. Quami Madrassas are orthodox, privately-run institutions, sustained on funds mainly received from questionable NGOs in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Pakistan, Egypt, Yemen, and Libya, amongst others. Most of these NGOs, like the Revival of Islamic Heritage Society (RIHS), Al Harmain Foundation, Benevolence Society and others are either banned in the West for their connections with the al Qaida, Taliban and other Islamic terrorist groups of the Wahabi following, or under a watch list. The Quami Madrassas witnessed an exponential growth after 2001, when the Bangladesh Nationalist Party-led four party alliance came to power in the country. The two other important alliance partners are the Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh and factions of the Islamic Oikyo Jote. The fourth partner is an inconsequential faction of the Jatiya Party. Begum Khaleda Zia is following in the footsteps of her late husband Zia-ur-Rahman. For political expediency and power, she has turned back the clock on liberalism, secularism and democracy, bowing to religious obscurantists. She has also recently tied up with the political party of former President, General H.M. Ershad, who connived to assassinate her husband and presided over the final burial of the secular Constitution of the country. The real activities of the mushrooming Quami Madrassas were revealed in a shocking book in 2005 by Hassan Rafiq, a reformed militant of the Harkat-ul-Jehad-al-Islami of Bangladesh (HUJAI-BD). The book was immediately banned by the Khaleda Zia government and copies confiscated, but some copies of a reprint in Bengali language are in clandestine circulation. When countrywide terrorism exploded in Bangladesh on August 17, 2005, followed by assassinations of judges and attacks on legal and government institutions, the demand of these terrorists was establishment of Shariat law and imposition of Arabic language. The Quami Madrassas that were accorded official recognition by Prime Minister Khaleda Zia on August 21, 2006, demand imposition of Shariat law, establishment of Arabic as state language and advocated armed jihad to attain these objectives. There is no difference between the demands of the religion-based terrorists and the Quami Madrassas which Prime Minister Khaleda Zia has brought into the mainstream of the country’ s education on August 21. In one shortsighted stroke, Prime Minister Khaleda Zia may have plunged the destiny of her country in a whirlpool of religious radicalism laced with violence.
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Delhi Durbar Science and Technology Minister Kapil Sibal apparently favours out-of-the-box thinking. Having raised the profile of the ministry through his frequent interactions with the media, he has taken some new initiatives to promote science-learning among children. The minister last week unveiled Science Safari, a 48-minute film that premiers on National Geographic channel and showcases several achievements of Indian science and technology in a travelogue format. The film has been produced with the money saved by slashing funds spent annually by the Science and Technology Ministry on advertisements that only listed its achievements in a plain manner. It is being seen as an outcome of public-private partnership. Sibal features in a promo for the film where his enthusiasm for science is visible. The film will be dubbed in regional languages and also shown on Doordarshan later. Sibal dismissed criticism in some quarters about the work for the film having been given to a particular channel and the cost involved, saying it was the only channel to respond to the ministry’s proposal and procedures for sanctioning money had been scrutinised by several committees. Bogus institutions The mushrooming of fake educational institutions is a problem not intrinsic to India alone. UNESCO, having had its name misused by several organisations worldwide, has decided to develop a web portal that will list the names of all the recognised higher educational institutes across the globe. UNESCO has simultaneously begun work on compiling details of institutions recognised by competent local authorities. The pilot project, which will initially focus on a dozen countries, will prevent students from getting enrolled in bogus institutions. In India for a workshop, Ms Stamenka Uvalic-Trumbic, UNESCO’s Chief of the Reform, Innovation and Quality Assurance division of higher education, said the portal will promote transparency and help students become informed decision-makers. Information at a premium The ban on recruitment in all major government departments for nearly a decade, as part of austerity measures, has adversely hit working in some critical departments. Apart from the Income Tax department, the others affected by this ban includes the Press Information Bureau responsible for communicating the government’s activities to the media. To compound matters, several ministers constantly complain about lack of adequate coverage of their charge to their information officers (IOs) without being able to do anything about additional manpower. Information officers looking after newsy ministries like Petroleum and Power find it extremely difficult to keep pace with the volley of questions from the growing bank of scribes, TV news channels, magazines, foreign news agencies, internet portals and trade magazines as well. An IO observed the other day that some years ago, he had two assistants to look after not more than 10 journalists with TV reporters nowhere on the scene. Now with a single assistant, the IO had to deal with more than 50 members of the Fourth Estate and the mobile never stops ringing. Further, the IO has been given charge of another ministry to oversee its publicity. For that homely feeling The Prime Minister has asked him to head the Group of Ministers on the politically sensitive sealing-of-buildings issue in the national capital. For a man who had to take a detour to enter the Union Cabinet (he is a member of the Rajya Sabha after having lost the Lok Sabha elections from Latur), the new responsibility of heading the GoM would indeed be a confidence booster.
***** Contributed by Prashant Sood, Smriti Kak Ramachandran, Manoj Kumar and
S. Satyanarayanan.
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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 At the end of the battle, the fields lie 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 Intoxicated by Priya’s Charms, Man advises others to follow her too. —The
Upanishadas
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Every time there is talk of any expansion of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s Cabinet, there is widespread speculation that Shivraj Patil will be shunted out of the Home Ministry. Patil, however, appears to be unfazed, and his aides point out that he is confident and carrying on with business as usual.