 |
|
Slender is the thread Scrap MPLADS |
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Manpower crunch DRDO should evolve strategy to counter it The bogey of a manpower crunch has again been raised with regard to the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO). DRDO Secretary and Scientific Advisor to the Defence Minister M. Natarajan’s lament about “inadequate quality of scientists and engineers” and an attrition rate of 20 to 27 per cent, with the personnel mostly being lost to IT companies, is nothing knew.
Deal over N. Korean nukes
Hate eternal
Blair’s legacy of blight and despair
|
Slender is the thread MR
Mulayam Singh Yadav has none else than himself to blame for the tricky situation in which he finds himself caught up these days. He had rigged up a majority through intrigue and strategem and now that the prop sustaining his government has been pulled out by the Supreme Court, the fate of his government is somewhat uncertain. The way he had co-opted an obliging Speaker to legitimise a trickling out of MLAs from the BSP as a regular split was a mockery of law and parliamentary norms, and he has now been served his just deserts. But the Congress party at the Centre will be doing an equally unconstitutional deed bordering on impropriety if it dismisses his government and imposes President’s rule in the state. Such a step will not only be devoid of constitutional morality but also politically unsound. It has been established in case after case that a government cannot be dismissed unless it loses its majority on the floor of the House. The fear expressed by several Congress leaders, as also Mr V.P.Singh, Mr Ajit Singh and Ms Mayawati, that his continuation will lead to horse-trading is not enough to send the Mulayam government packing. Interestingly, the move is being stoutly opposed within the UPA by allies like the CPM and the DMK. Moreover, it is not certain that the President will sign on the dotted line if the Union Cabinet sends a proclamation for his signature, as he did when President's rule was imposed in Bihar. Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav has the dubious distinction of giving about the worst governance to the state. Corruption and misgovernance are the order of the day. The Nithari horror is only one aspect of this general breakdown of law and order. But an imposition of Central rule just a few weeks before the state is to go to the polls will only give him a martyr’s mantle. Not only that, it will strengthen the impression that the Congress is ever eager to misuse Article 356. The ill-advised step will not pay any political dividends either, because the real rivals of the Samajwadi Party in UP are the BJP and the BSP, not the Congress. Rather, the latter may have to pay a heavy price for trying to undo a constitutional impropriety through an equally unjustified act of its own. An active Governor and a vigilant Election Commission can ensure that Mr Yadav is not able to influence elections while remaining in power. The Mulayam government has proved its majority many times after August, 2003. It did so last month itself. Mr Yadav will be well-advised to do so again in the light of the new developments. But President’s rule is one option which is best ruled out. |
|
Scrap MPLADS THE Administrative Reforms Commission, headed by Mr M. Veerappa Moily, has rightly recommended abolition of the MPs’ and MLAs’ Local Area Development Schemes (MPLADS). In its report on the theme, “Ethics in governance”, presented to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the commission said the scheme should be scrapped as it infringed on the rights of the local government and led to “conflict of interests” that arise when legislators take up executive roles. The Moily panel’s recommendation is a reiteration of what several committees and experts have said about the scheme over the years. The scheme has received maximum flak for its failure to live up to the people’s expectations. Ironically, it is only the lawmakers — MPs, MLAs and MLCs — who have been defending the scheme for obvious reasons. The National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution has recommended its withdrawal on the ground that the scheme is inconsistent with the spirit of federalism and it militates against the demarcation of responsibilities between the legislature and the executive. More important, the Comptroller and Auditor-General of India has time and again pointed out that in many states, funds under the scheme have either been misused or have lapsed, or the unspent money has not been returned. Monitoring is non-existent, and the district and state authorities are not following the guidelines of the Union Ministry of Planning and Programme Implementation. It would be in the national interest if the scheme is scrapped and the huge funds earmarked for the purpose are transferred to the local governments, as suggested by the National Advisory Council. A five-member Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court is presently examining the constitutional validity of the scheme. It is specifically studying the substantial question of interpretation of Articles 275 and 282 of the Constitution in regard to the transfer of funds from the Centre to the states, and their impact on other provisions of the Constitution. While the nation eagerly awaits the judgement of the Constitution Bench, Parliament on its own should take the initiative and scrap the scheme. It would be eminently desirable for Parliament — and state legislatures — to spend funds judiciously for development. |
|
Manpower crunch THE
bogey of a manpower crunch has again been raised with regard to the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO). DRDO Secretary and Scientific Advisor to the Defence Minister M. Natarajan’s lament about “inadequate quality of scientists and engineers” and an attrition rate of 20 to 27 per cent, with the personnel mostly being lost to IT companies, is nothing knew. Not that the problem is not real. In the early 1990s, when the IT boom began in right earnest, youngsters quit DRDO labs in droves, especially from the many large complexes in Bangalore. There was no way that the labs could match the pay packets offered by the new IT companies. Even a successful and well-knit organisation like the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) was not immune, but they evidently managed it much better. From providing quality housing to its personnel to offering other incentives, the ISRO has used several strategies to control its attrition rate. Organisations working on strategic projects concerning national security have, the world over, managed to instil a sense of pride and mystique in being associated with them. But that will come only with consistent success, and the DRDO is woefully short on that count. The DRDO needs to create a working environment that not only recognises and rewards talent, but also retains it for the long, productive haul. The problem should also be seen in the larger context of the lack of job opportunities in basic science and research, and the consequent lack of interest among talented youngsters in taking it up. Indigenous capability in defence will always be in the doldrums in such a scenario, and that is a serious matter. The DRDO chief should work in conjunction with the Department of Science and Technology, the Ministry of Education and others concerned to see how the situation can be turned around. |
|
Politics are almost as exciting as war and quite as dangerous. In war you can only be killed once, but in politics — many times. —
Winston Churchill |
Deal over N. Korean nukes
THE
settlement arrived at in Beijing at the six-power meeting on the North Korean nuclear issue titled “Initial actions for the implementation of the joint statement” is a path-breaking document. It makes an effort to solve the North Korean proliferation problem and also shows the way to find a solution to the Iranian nuclear issue. It is a blow to the American hubris and it throws new light on the causes of nuclear proliferation, disproving a lot of conventional wisdom of the Western nuclear theology. Under this settlement, the US will have to negotiate directly with North Korea — which it had been refusing to do so far. The US will have to initiate steps to remove the designation of state-sponsor of terrorism from North Korea. The negotiations between the two countries are expected to lead to full diplomatic relations between the countries — a step North Korea has been demanding and the US has been refusing all along. It would appear that the US found it difficult to resist the pressure from other members of the six-nation group — China, Russia and South Korea. North Korea has agreed to dismantle its nuclear weapons and facilities provided its demands for diplomatic recognition, energy security and trade relations are fully met. North Korea will be the second country after South Africa to give up nuclear weapons. The South African white minority apartheid regime concluded that it did not need nuclear weapons once it gave up apartheid and got integrated into the international community. Now North Korea too appears to be coming round to the view that it could afford to give up nuclear weapons once the US lifts the apartheid it imposed on North Korea and it was integrated into the international community. The Western conventional nuclear theology postulates that countries go nuclear to acquire offensive capabilities vis-a-vis their neighbours or at least to have a deterrent capability against a larger or more powerful regional rival. What the Western theology overlooked was that many non-democratic nations decided to go nuclear to resist international pressure on them for a regime change. South Africa did so first. Pakistan, while negotiating with the US in 1982 on providing support to Afghan Mujahideen against Soviet forces, laid down the condition that its nuclear weapons programme could not be questioned by the US. The US Secretary of State, General Alexander Haig, accepted the conditionality. The US looked away from the Chinese proliferation to Pakistan and invoked the Pressler Amendment only in 1990 after the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan. Pakistani nuclear arsenal has become a guarantor against any US attempt to effect a regime change in Pakistan. The US, while thundering about democracy in the Greater Middle-East, does not talk very assertively of democracy in Pakistan. Pakistan’s nuclear capability has given it adequate leverage to resist US demands to deliver Osama bin-Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri, Mullah Omar and other leaders. Pakistan could also refuse to allow the US and the IAEA to interrogate the arch proliferator. Dr A.Q. Khan. According to many coalition military commanders, Taliban forces have safe haven in Pakistani territory though Islamabad claims to be a staunch ally in the war on terrorism. The US has only limited leverage on the Pakistani leadership. Long ago in 1967 Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, the father of the Pakistani nuclear programme, wrote in his book, “The Myth of Independence,” that only countries with nuclear weapons had genuine autonomy. Pakistan did not just proliferate nuclear technology and nuclear equipment. It also spread the message that the only way for a non-democratic country to resist regime change — especially when the US is bent on it — is to acquire nuclear weapons. The North Koreans and the Iranians decided to follow the Pakistani example. Now North Korea has indicated its willingness to give up its nuclear weapons provided the US gives up its aim to carry out a coercive regime change in Pyongyang. What are the lessons for the US on the Iranian issue arising out of the North Korean settlement.? It should start negotiating directly with Iran not only on the nuclear issue but also on restoring direct diplomatic relations. It should give up its self-proclaimed moral right of naming Iran as a member of the axis of evil. If Iran is incorporated fully into the international community and is reassured about its security vis-à-vis its Sunni neighbours, and the US publicly abandons its proclaimed intention to effect regime change in Teheran, there is every possibility that Iran too would give up its plans to develop the nuclear weapon option through the uranium enrichment process. The North Korean deal highlights that the world has changed and that the US cannot enforce nonproliferation unilaterally. It needs the cooperation of powers like China — the largest proliferator whom the US does not dare to question — and Russia and in turn it should show adequate flexibility and not indulge in doctrinal extremism of naming states as axis of evil or proclaiming its aim to bring about coercive regime change. An unfortunate fact is even as the Cold War has ended, the Cold War mindset is still prevalent among many US legislators, the bureaucracy and think tank personnel as was recently pointed out by President Putin at the Munich security policy conference. Reports from the US indicate that this deal would not have gone through but for the flexibility displayed by the Secretary of State, Dr Condoleezza Rice. The bureaucrats of the old school have already expressed their scepticism about the deal. One of them recently expressed his personal assessment in Delhi that India voted against Iran in the IAEA Board of Governors under US coercion. Such Americans cannot understand that in today’s world India can vote against Iran in the IAEA Board of Governors on the technical issue of Iranian violation of the safeguards procedure but still oppose sanctions or coercive action against Iran. The influence of such doctrinaire proliferation theologians both in the US and Western Europe will continue to delay the application of the lessons of the North Korean deal to Iran.The rewards to Pakistan and to North Korea show that the so-called “roguish” states in the US lexicon can successfully negotiate with it to exchange diplomatic relations, commercial and financial gains and guarantee of no coercive regime change against promises of appropriate nuclear policies. There is as yet no realisation that threats of coercive change in respect of non-democratic regimes is a proliferation-encouragement
measure.
|
Hate eternal SHE is a bitch, I hate her! She can commit suicide if she is so depressed.” “F…… Bitch, the amount of slaps I have got from her…..” “Is she still torturing the poor kids....” These are some of the excerpts from a hate campaign against teachers of a particular school on Orkut Google, a social networking site, the topic being, ‘’Hate is Eternal’’. As bitterness flows from one remark to another, children vent their contempt for some teachers in particular. Schools have taken the matter very seriously and asked the parents to monitor their kids’ activities on the computer. I wondered if spying on these conversations is ethical? “No, responds Mrs. Annie Koshi, Principal St. Mary’s School, “we have to respect and treat private spaces as private and not become moral judges based on these conversations. Haven’t we all talked ill of our teachers when we were students?” But most teachers do not keep the same view. They are offended and hurt “The students these days have no respect for anyone and parents have no time for them either” insists a teacher emotionally. The students insist the social networking sites are all for fun. “it is simply cool to be registered together in at least one, for chatting sake” pleads a VI standard girl, looking for some understanding. Most look scared when the issue of teacher abuse and derogatory language is brought to the fore and stand in clusters, promising to close their accounts. “The idea is not to scare them or keep them away from this wonderful technological medium that can bring the world to their feet but make them aware of the boon and bane that every technology can be”, says Mother’s International School Principal Mrs Mahrukh Singh. “There is no need to curb their freedom, no child will wilfully do wrong. All we need to do is to guide them through discussions and healthy dialogues,” adds Mrs Singh. While most parents have grudgingly accepted their children’s addiction to the computer, some show exasperation over how to keep a check on kids’ computer activities. A difficult question answered simply by 80-year-old freedom fighter, former dean of the SNDT Girls’ College Mumbai, Psychology Department, Mrs Harshita Pandit: “Parents have no bonding with their children these days. They are too caught up in their own activities and fail to spend any quality time with their children. Earlier it was said, “family that eats together stays together” but I would like to change it to, ‘A family that plays together stays together.” The point is reinforced when a student confesses with disgusted expression about the limited dialogue his parents have been having with him for years now, “Have you had food? Have you finished your homework? Do you have a test tomorrow?” That is all I ever get to hear from them! They have never tried to know me as a person!” he whispers holding back his tears. Parents blame the teachers for not being involved and committed with what the children are doing in school. “If she has been bunking classes regularly, then why have I not been informed?” complains a worried parent. On the other hand there are others who would happily put the onus of their children’s activities on school, “If they succumb to peer pressure and lose focus, then I have understandably not inculcated the right values in him” says Mrs Jyotika Kalra, a senior high court advocate and a mother of two adolescent children. When asked if she is able to find time to monitor her children she smiles and conveys beautifully, the definition of time. Time, she says, is nothing but
priority. |
Blair’s legacy of blight and despair THIS is the story of Arthur’s farthings. Arthur was my maternal grandfather, a small baker who married above his station - the family of my grandmother Phyllis strongly objected to the match – but who, with his new wife, bought up and ran a very profitable string of cafes across Kent in the 1920s. Arthur Rose was passionate about bowls – he was a member of the English bowls team (chief qualification: lots of money) – and was playing his favourite game in Australia when what our local Maidstone doctor had claimed was arthritis forced him to fly back to England. Wrong diagnosis. Arthur had cancer of the bone. The farthing – about the same size of a euro cent – was a quarter of an old penny. There were 12 pennies in a shilling and 20 shillings to the pound. Today, I reckon the farthing would be worth about 1,000th of a pound. Old British coins seemed very warlike to me; they appeared to be obsessed with crowns and portcullises and warships. I always preferred the Irish equivalent; the currency of “Eire” was embossed with birds and pigs and horses and harps. The Empire of Power versus the Empire of the Farmyard. But the friendly old British farthing – perhaps because it had so little value – carried the image of a diminutive wren. Back to Arthur. Phyllis was “Nana” to me but Arthur – through a two-year-old Robert’s misunderstanding of “Grandpa” – became “Gabba”. He was a canny man, devoted to Phyllis but reputedly stingy. After family lunch on Boxing Day, Phyllis would always secretly press a 20 pound note into my hand, an enormous amount of money for which I had to promise her that I would never tell “Gabba”. Then Arthur would appear, flourish a 5 pound note in front of the entire family and with great publicity hand it to me. “Gosh, thank you Gabba,” crafty little Robert would say loudly, ensuring a total of 25 pounds next Christmas. Phyllis died of cancer when I was about 10 but when Arthur died some four years later, my mother Peggy and her sister found dozens of cheques in Arthur’s drawer, all signed by Phyllis as gifts to her husband, all uncashed. They thought this was a sign of his refusal to spend money. I suspected it was a gesture of love. Only when he was dying did I really come to like Arthur. He encouraged me to be a journalist – my father was against it – and loved listening to my classical records as he lay in bed. He would sing the Volga Boatmen and, before he became too ill, he taught me to chop down trees. He treated me as a grown-up, which is what all small boys want. He loved his daughters and he admired my dad, Bill, and heard me many times telling Peggy that I was bored or saw me interrupting Bill’s television viewing of the Test match. “Robert needs something to do,” he said. So he ordered 3,000 farthings from the bank; they arrived at our home in Rectory Lane in currency sacks. Arthur walked into our large garden on his crutches and hurled them by the hundred on to the flower beds, behind bushes, around trees, over the long grass in the apple orchard. “Now, if you find them all,” he announced to his acquisitive grandson, “I’ll give you three pound notes.” In heavy rain or blistering sun, I spent weeks during Arthur’s dying years searching through the long grass and the flower beds for his farthings. At first, I collected them daily, by the cupful; then weekly, by the handful. A moment of boredom and Bill and Peggy would send me back into the garden to search again. I might find three or four a week. But of course, as the years went by and the rains swept across Kent, some of the coins slipped deeper into the soil to poison the roots of my mother’s flowers. Others were washed into the flower borders and then moved gently across the flooded lawns. Years after Arthur’s death, my father would be pushing the hand-mower over the lawn and there would be a metallic crack and Peggy and I would arrive to find Bill standing beside the machine with its broken blade. “It must have been another of Arthur’s damned farthings,” he’d say. Peggy even found one, around 1996, buried in the thick branch of a tree, six feet above the ground. After her death, I sold Rectory Lane and when I passed by recently, I noticed that the new owners have built an extension over the lawn; I have no doubt that somewhere beneath its concrete foundations, those little brass wrens are rotting quietly away. But I wonder now whether those farthings don’t symbolise the legacy of the British Prime Minister, Lord Blair of Kut al-Amara, the man who allowed New Labour to give Britain new dreams to occupy itself with. It all seemed quite harmless. Originally, many believed in him. Parliament even sanctioned the illegal war in Iraq because it trusted him, a decision that has cost more than half a million lives. No, unlike Blair, Arthur never lied. He once announced that he would refuse to pay his local taxes on the grounds that he would rather keep the money for himself (a decision he changed after discovering that Maidstone’s borough treasurer – who happened to be my father Bill – would have to take him to court). But Arthur happily sowed his money around our garden, little realising that for years after his demise, his legacy would rise up to break our mower blades and blight my mother’s flowers and embed itself in the bark of trees. Lord Blair’s legacy, I fear, will be the same. Long after he has written his self-serving memoirs – indeed, long after he has himself gone to the great White House in the sky – we will find that his political legacy continues to haunt and poison the Middle East and the governance of the United Kingdom. I never did get to cash in Arthur’s coins, of course. He died, in terrible agony, in Maidstone’s West Kent Hospital – “I wish I could drink something that would send me to sleep for ever,” he told a weeping Peggy – long before I had even collected 500 of his “damned” farthings. I wouldn’t wish such a fate on Lord Blair. But I wonder what our fate has to be. By arrangement with The Independent |
|
UN Secretary General faces third world backlash UNITED NATIONS – When U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon paid his first official visit to Washington last month, he received the White House version of a seal of approval: a presidential pat on the back and an invitation to phone President Bush whenever he needs help in responding to an international crisis. Ban’s warm reception appeared to signal an end to an era of U.S. confrontation with the United Nations that was marred by quarrels over the Iraq war, Republican-led corruption hearings on Capitol Hill and relentless threats of funding cuts. But such a turn of fortune in Washington comes at a price: Ban is facing a diplomatic backlash from developing nations, which suspect the former South Korean foreign minister of seeking to reshape the United Nations to accommodate U.S. interests and the desires of other wealthy member nations. They have stonewalled his early attempt to reorganize the U.N. bureaucracy. The standoff has weakened Ban barely a month into the job, as he faces one of the top challenges confronting every U.N. leader: how to strike a balance between the organization’s most powerful member and an influential bloc of developing countries that resist policies that appear to track with U.S. interests. “There is always suspicion no matter what the U.S. does because it is such an overwhelmingly powerful player,” said Munir Akram, Pakistan’s U.N. ambassador and chairman of the influential Group of 77, a Third World bloc. “I think that’s a natural function of being a big power, of being the biggest power.” Developing nations have already quashed a proposal to broaden the powers of the United Nations’ chief diplomatic arm, the Department of Political Affairs. The proposal generated fierce opposition after it was reported that the department might be headed by an American, former ambassador to Indonesia B. Lynn Pascoe, for the first time in a generation. The United Nations on Friday announced Pascoe’s appointment, along with those of other senior officials from China, Egypt and Japan. The latter office is particularly popular among poor countries concerned with the nuclear arsenals of powerful nations. “There is a lack of clarity,” Akram said of Ban’s initiatives. He said it is unlikely that the General Assembly, in which every member nation has a vote, would move quickly to take action on Ban’s initiatives. “It’s quite natural the secretary general wants to get his reform or restructuring proposals done as soon as he can,” Akram said, “but I think the processes in the General Assembly are such that do not lend themselves to fast-track decisions.” “The conspiracy theorists out there are convinced this is an American agenda and that this is a secretary general who is essentially responding to American demands,” Wolff said. To assuage such concerns, Ban moved early to assign key administrative posts to officials from the developing world, including a Tanzanian deputy secretary general, an Indian chief of staff and a Mexican management chief. He also backtracked from a pledge to carry out a broad inquiry into the financial practices of most of the U.N. development and relief agencies, a move that was popular in Washington but unpopular within the Group of 77. But those gestures have done little to counter the perception that Ban’s most important policymakers are recruited from the United States and Europe or that he is undercutting the influence of the United Nations’ Third World blocs. “He is, either accidentally or by design, taking on a lot of reform issues that pinch the NAM (Non-Aligned Movement) rather than ones that pinch the United States,” said Michael Doyle, a visiting professor at Yale University who served as an adviser to Kofi Annan. By arrangement with LA Times-Washington Post |
|
Chatterati With the Punjab elections over, the exhausted local netas of Punjab, who were supposed to be on holiday, are instead busy doing PR with independents and rebels who may win. Never has the common man seen a campaign so dirty and personal. The slanging matches of the candidates and their chamchas put all decent human beings to shame. The poster race to degrade each other, the verbal abuse at public meetings and the allegations, can all be done in a more civilized manner. No wonder our younger generations’ blood boils and they hate all politicians. Bribing whether in cash or kind and of course booze was plentiful. The Election Commission has to take firm steps to check this lowest form of election campaigns. It has left such a foul taste in everyone’s mouth irrespective of who wins or looses. The Punjab elections should be an eye opener for the common man and our children as to how low politicians can fall to achieve their goal. If this trend is not curtailed here and now, it is going to spread to other states which would be a shame! Sycophants everywhere Whoever thought sycophancy was the birth right of the Congress obviously thought wrong. Thanks to our belief in astrological advice, the BJP President Rajnath Singh decided to make February 13th his Birthday. Now, on Tuesday the 13th of February, a rally was organised by the BJP for protests against the UPA Government on price rise and various issues. This was virtually converted into a birthday bash rally for their principal. And of course the courtiers came with hazar chamchas laden with flowers and sweets. Forgotten were slogans against the spiraling prices. Workers and leaders were busy loudly cheering the party president. After all, in the recent reshuffle of his office bearers, one can clearly see he is supported by all within his party and the RSS. Windies calypso The search for new talent in the Indian Cricket team for the last one year has come full circle. The team for the World Cup has now been announced and every one is happy. It is extremely strong going by the big names since all the heavy weights are back. Viru dada now sits comfortably perched at the top along with Ifran Bhai in the middle. They are both expected to regain form in this fine spring weather before taking off for the West Indies. The Calcutta prince is among the runs and Sachin has also been hitting the right numbers in the last few matches. On paper, therefore, we should win. Unfortunately, they have been off-colour of late and losing a few matches. But this is more than made up by an adoring public and a big hearted BCCI, who forgive these heroes even if they perform at the rate of one in ten matches. Here is hoping for the best in the Windies calypso!
|
Do not be proud (of your wealth) and do not laugh at any pauper; your boat is still rocking in the ocean and you don’t know what can happen. — Kabir Holiness is to love God and love people. It is therefore not a luxury reserved for a favoured few. All are invited to be holy. — Mother Teresa |
| HOME PAGE | |
Punjab | Haryana | Jammu & Kashmir |
Himachal Pradesh | Regional Briefs |
Nation | Opinions | | Business | Sports | World | Mailbag | Chandigarh | Ludhiana | Delhi | | Calendar | Weather | Archive | Subscribe | Suggestion | E-mail | |
