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Cruel and shameful Death for AIADMK men |
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Bandhs not for Bangalore
Time for meaningful talks
Driving blues in Chandigarh
The dying trees of Sunderbans Do we really care about animal rights? Delhi Durbar
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Cruel and shameful NOW
that suitcases containing IED devices have been found, it is a certainty that the fire in two coaches of Samjhauta Express which killed at least 66 persons was the handiwork of terrorists. To call them inhuman would be an understatement because they targeted innocent persons, whatever their religion or nationality. It is the government’s responsibility to identify them and punish the culprits. Till that happens, there is a very real danger of the climate for further progress on the peace dialogue between India and Pakistan being affected by the ghastly deed. This should not happen. The train has been on the hit list of some of the militant groups based in Pakistan, and the needle of suspicion can direct at any group which does not like India and Pakistan to live in peace. But whoever they were, their aim was obvious: to sour the relations between the two countries somehow. The timing of the attack gives the game away: it came on the eve of the talks between the Foreign Ministers of India and Pakistan, Mr Pranab Mukherjee and Mr Khurshid Mahmood, in Delhi. As such, the two countries should work in tandem to ferret out the culprits instead of laying the blame at each other’s door. This special bi-weekly train runs non-stop from Delhi to Attari, where the passengers are shifted to Samjhauta Express which goes to Lahore after Customs and immigration clearances. Obviously, the explosive devices were planted in Delhi itself. That is a very serious matter, considering that the security is supposed to be watertight in the national capital. If the terrorists can target such a high-profile train with impunity, no other train is really safe. But then, the terrorists have a long history of choosing soft targets. That is what they did during the Mumbai train blasts. It is for the nation to mount an eternal vigil. The record has been less than satisfactory. There is a flurry of activity after every new strike, but things go back to “normal” after a few days. That is why the term “red alert” has come to be treated as some kind of a cruel joke. Besides going after the culprits and taking due care of those affected by the blast, the government has also to reassure the public that it is equal to the task of protecting their lives and limbs. |
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Death for AIADMK men THE
conviction of three AIADMK activists to death and seven years imprisonment to 25 others by the Additional Sessions Judge of Salem in the bus-burning case in Tamil Nadu is bound to act as a deterrent to all those pursuing the politics of violence and murder. In this case, the judge found the accused guilty of murdering three girl students by setting fire to a bus as part of violent protests against the conviction of their party leader, Ms J. Jayalalithaa, in a corruption case seven years ago. It was a shocking how party activists acted in the most cruel manner to protect their leader’s interests. When the bus carrying students of Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore, was returning after a study tour, irate AIADMK workers near Dharmapuri did not let students alight and doused the bus with petrol. While some of them escaped from the blazing bus with serious burns, three were trapped inside and charred to death. This case had several twists and turns. The Jayalalithaa government tried every stratagem to derail justice and save the guilty partymen from punishment. Witnesses turned hostile one after the other during the trial at Krishnagiri. The Madras High Court described it as “a colossal failure and eyewash” and shifted the trial to Salem. Even then the state government took 15 months to notify the special public prosecutor’s appointment in the gazette, and that, too, after the High Court passed strictures against it and initiated contempt proceedings against the Home Secretary and other officials. The conviction of such a large number of AIADMK activists, including death sentence to three, can be considered as a stern warning to all other political parties in the country to behave and not to take the law into their own hands. If they do, they will have to face the consequences one day. Significantly, the conviction of all the accused was made possible only because of some witnesses’ refusal to retract despite threats to their lives by the powers that be. Thus, this case should serve as an example when key witnesses continue to turn hostile in high profile cases like the murder of Professor Sabharwal in Ujjain. |
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Bandhs not for Bangalore WHETHER
Bangalore calls itself Bengalooru or gets any other name, bandhs certainly have no place in it. The IT city periodically shuts itself down on some pretext, impervious to the pleas of its public-spirited residents and the corporate world - the latter unfortunately are viewed as aliens anyway. While this time it was over the issue of sharing the Cauvery waters, earlier the causes included the border dispute with Maharashtra, the death of a popular actor and the Kannada language issue. Bangalore is a global name due to the reach and quality of its IT services. it has a national and cosmopolitan character that is ill-served by regional wrangles. The Cauvery water dispute, of course, has a long history; the 1991 riots have still not been forgotten by the Tamil population in the city. While water is an emotional issue, politicians have done little to ensure that right information reaches the people. What is more, many have blatantly used it as a poll plank. Those articulating with the voice of reason have been shouted down. While the administration and the protestors this time have ensured that there is no violence, the bandh itself should have been avoided as an anachronism. Even more pernicious is the argument that the local people have somehow been hard done by Bangalore’s burgeoning IT industry, and the periodic unrest is a reflection of this skewed process of development. While it may well be true that a large portion of the IT workforce is from outside the state, global commerce, innovation and enterprise have their own dynamic. Giving precedence to narrow regional considerations will only lead to shackling such development. Equally suspect is the argument about identity struggles. While many concerns and grievances may indeed be legitimate, the street cannot be the place to work them out. That not only shows a desire to be disruptive and vengeful. Bangalore cannot afford it. |
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Punctuality is the politeness of kings.
— Louis XVIII |
Time for meaningful talks
SRI
LANKAN politics and the peace process are at their nadir. The latest enquiry ordered by President Mahinda Rajapakse following the dismissal of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) ministers loyal to former President Chandrika Kumaratunga was over an alleged conspiracy by his own party politicians to cause “physical harm to him”. Ironically, these ministers were obliquely accusing him of having them assassinated. Murphy’s law — Everything that can go wrong will go wrong — is operating in Sri Lanka. The Cease-Fire Agreement (CFA) is in tatters, the peace process is defunct, high and low intensity conflicts are continuing and the Army Commander, Lt-Gen Sarath Fonseka, has pledged to wipe out the LTTE from the east in two months, a de-merger of the north-east is complete, the southern consensus has broken down, a humanitarian disaster is looming and India and the international community seem unable or unwilling to help defuse the crisis. How much worse will things have to get before they get any better is anyone’s guess. Counselled by brothers and now key members of the party, Gothabaya and Basil, President Rajapakse is now determined to be another Premadasa, embalming the high legacy of the Bandaranaikes. What is his game-plan ? It is two-pronged: keeping the door open for talks while pursuing the military option. Clearly, Mr Rajapakse’s first priority is to ensure victory in a snap election. The present multi-party government is a pirated version of a national government and could come apart any time. Further, he wants to snatch the Sinhala symbol from the Sinhala chauvinist, the JVP/JHU. His military strategy is to make the LTTE redundant in the east and hold elections there, legitimising the demerger. That is not all. Egged on by the military, the strategy encompasses retaking the Elephant Pass and having a shot at Prabhakaran in Wanni. Mr Rajapakse will pay lip service to the CFA and the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) in order not to annoy the Donors’ Club. After consolidating his position politically, he will offer a political package to the LTTE, which from all accounts will be a diluted version of the recommendations made by the experts committee on devolution. This will be rejected by the LTTE but may be acceptable to non-LTTE groups. In an interview to BBC earlier this month, Mr Rajapakse said that it was wrong to have entered into a CFA with the LTTE and that he was ready to talk to the LTTE provided it laid down arms. He denied his government’s alleged complicity with the Karuna group. He wanted India to be more sensitive and lend more support to solve the conflict, a demand he has made since he became President. Last month, in an interaction with the media, External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee stated: “India will not intervene directly in Sri Lanka”, a declaration which could have been avoided, strategically. The LTTE for the first time is against the ropes. It is no longer regarded as the sole representative of the Tamils. The military advantage has shifted perceptibly in favour of the Sri Lankan government. But that need not deter the LTTE from having a crack at Jaffna. Unlike in the east, it is strong in the north — there is no Karuna. An LTTE buildup was reported last month. Alternatively — or in addition — it could do what it is best at: unleash a wave of suicide bombings and attacks in Colombo and the south. Preparations for such a bombing campaign are underway. Twenty-two members of Parliament from the Tamil National Alliance ostensibly loyal to the LTTE met Indian leaders, including Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, once during their three visits over the last six months to India. Both Delhi and Colombo want the Alliance to counsel the LTTE to return to the negotiating table. Parliamentary leader R Sambanthan has asserted that Sri Lanka’s territorial integrity and sovereignty cannot be delinked from the political package and power sharing. Sole TULF member of Parliament V Anandasangaree, a bitter critic of the LTTE, says that a separate state (Eelam) is unacceptable to India and Sri Lanka but the present state is also equally unacceptable. The non-LTTE Tamil groups like the EPDP, the PLOTE, the EPRLF and the newest TMVP (Karuna group) are reportedly forming a separate Tamil alliance. Mr Rajapakse must not fall into a trap of doing a deal with this grouping bypassing the LTTE, something that India did to its peril. A political settlement without the LTTE is feasible but peace without the LTTE is not possible. Despite the war, the economy has grown by an impressive 7 per cent per annum. This is mainly due to the four years of the CFA and the outstanding cooperation with India, which is likely to culminate in the first Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement later this year. Indian public and private investment in the strategic Trincomalee port area and elsewhere is estimated to be $ 1 billion and increasing with oil blocks on offer off the Mannar coast. Mr Rajapakse comes from Hambantota in the south. He is keen to develop this region with modern air and port facilities and rope in India. According to Vice-President (South Asia) of the World Bank, Mr Praful Patel, the two-decade long war has curtailed the economic growth by 2 to 3 per cent annually. Tourism is the worst affected by the ongoing war. The Sri Lanka bilateral donors’ group met recently in Galle and development assistance for 2007-09 would be $ 4.5 billion. With $ 4.5 billion pledged in 2003, the total package will be $ 9 billion. But the actual money flows would depend on the progress in the peace process. The devolution package is being awaited keenly. Some of the recommendations of the experts committee leaked to the media refer to Sri Lanka being composed of Sinhalas, Tamils, Muslims, Indian Tamils and others with the right to develop their own language, culture, etc. The unit of devolution is a province. There is no mention of a unitary or federal system and concurrent subjects are to be minimum. Further, an Upper House is to be elected by the provincial legislature. But these are just recommendations. Mr Rajapakse reportedly told the BBC that Sri Lanka would be a unitary state. In the late 1990s, the LTTE employed its stock of anti-aircraft missiles effectively bringing down government aircraft. At present it has none to deter Kfir jets which enjoy air supremacy. A recent sting operation in the US trapped many LTTE operatives trying to buy shoulder-fired missiles. It would be wrong on the part of the government to write off the LTTE. The way ahead is to restore the CFA and resume unconditional talks. A fair and just devolution package must be offered to the LTTE within certain time-lines. Tempting though the chimera of a military solution might be, but, if pursued, could lead to human distress on a catastrophic scale both in Wanni and Colombo. Posturing with the political package is no longer an
option.
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Driving blues in Chandigarh
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straight, leave four roundabouts, turn left from the fifth, cross two traffic lights and then on the second roundabout ……’ this is what a rickshawwalla explained to me the way to a particular sector in Chandigarh. I have been to the City Beautiful umpteen times, but soon after entering it, the confusion starts building up as to me all of its roads, roundabouts and sectors appear to be the same. Nearly half of the time I drive from Ludhiana to Chandigarh is spent enquiring the way to reach the destination, irrespective of how many times earlier I have been to that place. Coming back is also equally arduous. The other night I ventured straight on the road to Kurali instead of turning to Mohali because there was no guiding sign. It only became clear that I was put on the wrong road, when I found the Dara Studio and the Verka Milk Plant missing my route. Driving to Chandigarh has never been hassle-free for me and many of my friends for other reasons too. As a matter of habit, we Ludhianvis are the most undisciplined and careless people on earth. Apart from finding it difficult to understand the geography of Chandigarh , which leaves no time for us to enjoy its topography, we find certain traffic rules quite contrary to what we are accustomed to here in Ludhiana. There is hardly any person who has not been challaned while in Chandigarh for following “Ludhiana rules”. For example, jumping the traffic light is a sure sign of bravado in Ludhiana. Children and ladies sitting with you will tease you if you wait for the green light to steer a crossing. Parking the vehicle at the place of your choice is your birthright and nobody seems to mind it. Seat belt is frowned upon as an unnecessary accessory which not only mars the beauty of the sedan but if put around chest and waist is seen as punishment. And finally we cannot find a better place than the over-crowded Ludhiana roads to test the speeds of our cars. It seems that Chandigarh traffic cops are quite receptive to all the Ludhianvis. Any car bearing a Ludhiana number plate is seen by them as a good “shikar”. Last week when one of my friends was challaned for overspeeding, he ruefully told me that what a hell these broad roads are meant for if we have to snail drive at 55kmph. Most of Ludhianvis drive in Chandigarh under great stress because apart from other problems mentioned above, much of our energy is spent on avoiding the preying eyes of the traffic police. Lately I have started availing the services of a professional driver whenever I have to visit Chandigarh. Before proceeding, I make sure that the driver knows the routes of the city and is not given to the traffic rules of Ludhiana. For me, only a challan-free journey to Chandigarh is a safe
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The dying trees of Sunderbans IN
Bangladesh’s south-west lies the Sundarbans nature reserve, one of the last untouched places on earth – and home to the largest population of tigers left in the wild. But the trees in the Sundarbans have suddenly started dying. And not just that: they have started dying in a way nobody has seen before, from the top down. Nobody is sure what the cause is, but the country’s leading scientists think it is because in recent years the water has turned from fresh to salty. The Sundarbans is a massive mangrove swamp, and the sea has begun encroaching. What we are seeing may be one of the first casualties of rising sea levels caused by global warming. “Nobody can say for sure whether it is climate change because there haven’t been proper in-depth studies,” says Professor Ainun Nishat, one of the country’s leading environmentalists, and one of those involved in the UN’s recent climate change report. “But this is the sort of effect rising sea levels will have on Bangladesh. We are fighting climate change on the front line. But the battle has to be integrated across all countries.” Then there were the mysterious deaths of thousands of fishermen off the coast of Bangladesh last summer. The Bay of Bengal was unusually rough that year. Usually, the authorities only issue a storm warning to fishermen to stay at home once or twice a year. Last year there were four warnings in the space of two months. Every warning meant the fishermen lost valuable days at sea. When the last warning came, they could not afford to stay ashore and went to sea anyway. Officially 1,700 drowned, but many Bangladeshis believe the real number may be closer to 10,000. “Was it climate change? We don’t know,” says Dr Nishat. “Was it unusual? Yes.” The weather in Bangladesh is going crazy. Last week there was a freak tornado. Tornadoes occur regularly in Bangladesh – but usually only in the tornado season, in April. A tornado in February is almost unheard of. Then there were the strange events of 2004, when the tides in the estuary of the Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna rivers stopped changing. The water level just stayed at high tide. The same year the capital, Dhaka, was hit by floods so severe the ground floors of most buildings were under water, and they caught a catfish in one of the government buildings. In 2005, there was no winter. Westerners tend to assume the whole of the sub-continent is hot all year round; in fact Bangladesh, like much of northern India, gets quite cold in winter. Except it didn’t in 2005. Winter never came – with serious effects on the year’s potato crop. This year it has not been as cold as usual. “We have a saying, in February even the tigers feel the cold,” says Arun Karmaker, environment correspondent of Prothom Alo newspaper. “But these days a visitor to Bangladesh would find it hard to believe.” Bangladesh is on the front line of climate change. The entire country is basically one vast river delta, and that has always left it vulnerable to weather extremes. The villages of the south-east may often lack electricity or clean water, but a cyclone shelter is never far away. But the country’s climate experts say the weather is growing more extreme – and becoming unpredictable. And this is in the most densely populated country in the world, if you don’t count city-states or small islands, home to 147million people. That leaves a worrying question: what happens to those 147million people if parts of this already overcrowded country become uninhabitable due to rising sea levels. The problem is nobody really knows just how much effect climate change will have on Bangladesh. “We still don’t have a proper study of the impact of global warming here,” says Mr Karmaker. “Up till now, no one has done one.” The classic scenario of climate change in Bangladesh that has endlessly been played out in disaster predictions is of rising sea levels flooding most of the country, forcing as many as 40million people to flee. Scientists have measured small rises in the sea level at various points around the coastline, and almost all of Bangladesh lies less than 10metres above sea level. But what is less well known is that Bangladesh has a defence against that scenario: a huge series of dykes made of boulders that stretch along the entire coastline – a literal front line in the battle to survive climate change. The dykes were put up to protect against the storm surges from which Bangladesh periodically suffers, but should be high enough to withstand the predicted rise in sea levels. But that doesn’t mean Bangaldesh is safe from climate change, says Dr Nishat. “The dykes create their own problems,” he says. “By trapping rainfall on the inside, they could end up causing flooding. And they do nothing to stop salinity spreading through our water.” It is not just the Sundarbans that are already suffering the effects of rising salinity. Farmers in coastal areas who used to grow rice have switched to farming prawns, after the water in their paddy fields got too salty. The country has just developed a new strain of rice that will grow in salty water. But it could be more serious than that, Dr Nishat warns. “The direction of the monsoon has changed in the last few years,” he says. “The depression that brings the rain used to advance north across Bangladesh. Now it is heading west.” Bangladesh has suffered cyclones many times. But Dr Nishat says the change in direction of the monsoon may mean any cyclone spends more time gathering pace over the Bay of Bengal. “When Hurricane Katrine devastated New Orleans in 2005, it was only a category three hurricane while it was over Florida,” he says. “It was when it headed across the Gulf of Mexico that it turned into a category five. It gathered heat from the sea. And the Bay of Bengal is hot.” By arrangement with |
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Do we really care about animal rights? WE
shall never know how many and what manner of moments of ecstasy and anguish Mahatma Gandhi had experienced before he declared with finality that, “the worth of a civilisation is judged from the manner it treats its animals”. However, we may say with a degree of certainty that the Mahatma would have highly rated a huge crowd of Australians for their collective display of spontaneous compassion towards an animal which had lost his bearings in the routine of its life. On January 28, 2007, the men’s singles final of the Austalian Open tennis tournament at Melbourne had reached a stage where a break in the rhythm of the game could prove costly to either contestant. King Roger, as the Swede is fondly called, had taken the first two sets and was leading four games to three in the third. Fernando Gonzalez, the Chilean under-dog was readying to serve when a bumble bee landed on the court inches away from the player’s toes. In the follow up of the serve-effort, the bee would have been surely crushed under-foot. Just in time, the bee fluttered, which caught Gonzalez’s eye, and he promptly aborted the serve. Gonzalez attempted to lift the bee with his racket out of harms way. The bee instead made a brief sally and alighted close to the net. By now the two ball-picker boys and Gonzalez had encircled the bee and one by trapped it under his cupped hands. Lifting the bee ever so gently he released it deep inside the bed of massed flowers below the spectators front row. The spell of a few minutes hushed silence was at last broken by a collective and audible sigh of relief from the jam-packed stadium. There was no clapping or any other theatrics. The referee called the match resumed, just as calmly. That episode would have surely made the Mahatma’s eternal soul happy and proud of this segment of humankind! Especially so, after the huge spasm of anguish which his soul had endured in the land of his birth and at the hands of his own countrymen just a fortnight earlier. Yes, it was on January 13, 2007 that a draught mule, unable to haul an over-laden cart, collapsed-in-harness on a bustling city thorough fare. At a conservative estimate at least five thousand Indians on cycles, scooters, rickshaws, limousines and buses went past the scene without a thought for the distressed mule. Not one stopped by or used his mobile telephone to summon first aid from the SPCA, the PFA (People For Animals) or the Government Veterinary Dispensary. Not one cared to inform the traffic police to arrange succour for the suffering animal. The mule owner’s first concern was to commandeer a substitute mule-cart and transfer the same killer load onto it. Even at this stage no citizen or government representative bothered to get the weight of the cargo checked. India was proud to legislate in 1960 the “Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act” which specifies the maximum permissible cargo for a draught animal, separately for mules, horses, donkeys and oxen, depending on their body-size (small, medium, large), the condition of the road surface and so on. Does one in a thousand Indians know of the existence of this Act and its measures? Indeed, do they care to know? Possibly not one in ten traffic policemen has the requisite knowledge neither. It my well be the case that in our prosperous metropolises this Act may never have been invoked, say the last ten years. Once the cargo was re-despatched to its destination, one would have expected the stricken mule to receive care. A mobile fork lift would have neatly lifted the mule to the point when it could plant its hooves on ground. And an animal ambulance summoned from the PFA would have carried it home to rest and recuperate. But no such luck. By now a crowd had gathered around the mule more out of curiosity than sympathy. To the owner’s request for help in lifting the mule on to its feet, as many men as could find a hand-hold to clutch at the hapless mule’s tail, legs, head, ears and even mane, they tugged and they heaved. When the animal could take the indignity no more, in a supreme effort it stood up. And no one protested when the traumatised mule received its marching orders to get home. Need we wonder any more at the Mahatma’s strange barometer for the measure of a civilisation? |
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Delhi Durbar THE
hottest subject of debate in Delhi’s hyperactive political circles these days is whether superstar Amitabh Bachchan is being used by the Samajwadi Party to settle its scores with the Congress, or whether the Big B is using the SP to get back at the Nehru-Gandhi family, with whom he once enjoyed a very cosy relationship. After he fell-out with the Congress party’s first family, Amitabh Bachchan has moved very close to the Samajwadi Party general secretary Amar Singh. Although the superstar maintains he is completely apolitical, his wife Jaya Bachchan is in the Rajya Sabha courtesy the Samajwadi Party, and he himself has campaigned for the party in the last elections and is all set to do so again in the upcoming Uttar Pradesh assembly polls. Amar Singh has now suggested him as a presidential candidate, with a view to outsmart and embarrass the Congress. Even Amitabh Bachchan’s current high visibility media campaign is apparently aimed at shoring up the Samajwadi Party’s sagging fortunes in the coming elections.
Kaalapani postings Sikkim may be a beautiful holiday destination, even comparable to Kashmir, but the Supreme Court Collegium does not seem to think so. Increasingly, a posting to the state’s High Court is being treated as a “punishment” for judges who are perceived to have crossed the “Lakshman Rekha” of judicial discipline. The recent transfer of Justice B.J. Shethna from Gujarat to Sikkim after an open scuffle with brother judge P.B. Majumdar is being described by judicial circles as another ‘Kaalapani’ posting. Earlier former Punjab and Haryana High Court Chief Justice B.K. Roy, who had problems with his colleagues there and later in the Guwahati High Court, was also sent to Sikkim. However, this has met with strong disapproval from legal luminaries who feel it is not in the interest of justice in a remote and crucial border state or an important institution like a High Court to be treated as a dumping ground for judges.
Resources at rest Human resource development minister Arjun Singh has been “missing in action” for over six weeks now. He has not been coming to the office and has absented himself from the last six meetings of the Union Cabinet on grounds of ill-health. The wily Thakur, whose political instincts remain as razor sharp as ever, has apparently not stirred out of his house since he underwent a surgery more than two months ago. There is considerable speculation whether Mr. Arjun Singh will be well enough to resume his duties for the upcoming budget session of Parliament. In case doctors advise him further rest, the HRD minister may have to delegate his duties. There is also speculation that he could even be designated minister without portfolio but that could well the wishful thinking of his detractors in his own party. Contributed by Anita
Katyal,
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