 |
|
Unconvincing case Thunder in the sky |
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
AIDS scare
Under US pressure
Cricket widows, beware!
News analysis Japanese working women have to serve tea for the men On Women’s Day – one for the men
|
Unconvincing case CAUTION seems to have been thrown to the winds when the Badal Cabinet decided on Tuesday to abolish the Punjab State Vigilance Commission. Significantly, it was one of the first decisions of the Cabinet. Minister Captain Kanwaljit Singh who explained the Cabinet decisions justified it on the ground that the promise to reduce non-Plan expenditure was part of the election manifesto of the Shiromani Akali Dal. He said the Vigilance Department was sufficient to meet the needs for which the Commission was set up. Unfortunately, the minister’s argument will not carry conviction with the voters. Why is it that the Cabinet showed alacrity in implementing this “promise” when the Chief Minister could not even distribute portfolios among the ministers? The decision has definitely sent a wrong signal to the voters, who were promised a corruption-free government. It was just a few months ago that the Vigilance Commission was set up following the advice of the National Vigilance Commission. The Commission, headed by a retired High Court judge, has not even been given a chance to perform before it was decided to wind it up. Unlike the Vigilance Department, which works directly under the government, the Commission was expected to enjoy a measure of autonomy in its functioning. Throughout the Congress tenure, the Akalis had been claiming that Chief Minister Amarinder Singh was misusing the Vigilance Department to fix his political opponents. It, therefore, marks a turnaround for Captain Kanwaljit Singh to claim that an independent Vigilance Commission was not necessary when the Vigilance Department was under his government’s control. The manner in which the prosecution has been behaving with regard to the corruption cases against Mr Parkash Singh Badal ever since he became Chief Minister shows how political changes impact trials in such cases. Nobody has accused the prosecution of behaving in a strange manner at the instance of the new rulers. However, the latter cannot ignore the fact that the people are watching all such manoeuvrings. At this rate, it may even become necessary to transfer the cases to another state to free the trial from political pressures. By its shortsighted decision to abolish the Vigilance Commission, the Badal Cabinet has only strengthened the suspicion about its motives. |
|
Thunder in the sky AS the Sukhois, Mirages, MiGs and Jaguars, not to mention the huge refuelers and the helicopters, roared over Chandigarh’s skies for the Presidential fleet review of the Indian Air Force, those watching the spectacle would have indeed backed the Indian air warriors against the best in the world. And when the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces expressed the hope that the IAF would become “a model airforce for the rest of the world to emulate” by 2025, many a heart in light blue uniform would have lifted with pride. And while there is no doubt at all that our flyers, engineers and support personnel indeed do their best to “touch the sky with glory” it was also an occasion for strategic planners to think about what would actually be needed to become such a model force. President Kalam invoked a vision of future wars and the future battlefield. He talked of space, land and deep sea encounters, of missiles and dominance of the electro-magnetic spectrum, of unmanned combat vehicles and reconnaissance airplanes that could fit into the palm of the hand. To become a model air force in such a scenario is a big task indeed, and while the IAF is without doubt capable of achieving this within the 2025 time-frame, the capital, training, and technology inputs required are simply enormous. As the IAF celebrates its platinum jubilee, it is indeed an opportunity to put the force on a trajectory that slingshots it towards such a vision. While acquisitions and concomitant licensed manufacture have to be put on the fast track, like the proposed 125 aircraft order, much will need to be done to enhance true domestic capability. It is difficult to think of a model airforce that has to buy all its weapons and weapons platforms from sources outside the country. Whatever technology purchases the IAF makes in the next few years must be closely linked to enhancing domestic technological and manufacturing capability. |
|
AIDS scare
A FAIR is not the place where people go to get themselves checked for the HIV virus. Those who walked into the AIDS examination centre at Anandpur Sahib during the Hola Mohalla festivities apparently did so for a lark. Imagine the shock of the personnel belonging to the Punjab State AIDS Control Society manning the camp when they found that out of about 100 persons who visited them, as many as five were HIV positive. The sense of surprise they felt must have been overshadowed only by that of the victims themselves. Among them was a young couple. The husband was a truck driver who probably introduced the infection to his wife, the mother of a child. If so many HIV-positive people can be found at just one fair in one day, just imagine the number of people roaming all over Punjab, blissfully unaware that they have contracted the dreaded virus! They are not only putting their own life on the block but also that of many others, including their family members. Despite tall claims, the fight against the dreaded disease is not quite as efficient as it ought to be. Most people are still not aware of the gravity of the situation. Due to the stigma attached to it, even those who should get themselves tested refuse to do so. They carry it along the length and breadth of the state 0151 nay, the country. India is fast becoming the AIDS capital of Asia. The most vulnerable are truck drivers and drug addicts. Yet, the services of sex workers along the highways are very much available and the drugs are still injected through shared needles. Equally worrisome is the increased incidence of HIV-AIDS in adolescents. The ostrich-like approach has already played havoc. It is necessary to open more and more channels where all sections can discuss sexuality-related topics freely. Equally vital is adequate funding, access to treatment, peer education and support system.
|
|
It is one thing to show a man that he is in error, and another to put him in possession of truth.
— John Locke |
Under US pressure EVEN as some of our television channels are asserting that Gen Pervez Musharraf is India's "best bet" for peace and harmony in the region, scholars in Pakistan seem to think otherwise. In his book, "Frontline Pakistan", about the mutually reinforcing links between the ISI and jihadis, Pakistani journalist Zahid Hussain writes: "A major reason for Musharraf's failure to root out extremism and jihadi forces is lack of consistency in his policies. Most of his actions lack commitment, having been undertaken under pressure from the US and the international community". Hussain terms General Musharraf's policies in the American "War on Terror" as "tactical". This should be evident from the fact that less than 24 hours after the visit of US Vice-President Dick Cheney to Islamabad to deliver a tough message that the US Congress would withhold military and economic aid to Pakistan if it did not end its support for the Taliban, the Pakistan authorities arrested Mullah Obaidullah Akhund, one of the top three members of the Taliban's leadership council. It is no secret that Quetta has remained the hideout of Taliban leaders ever since they were thrown out of Afghanistan in December 2001. General Musharraf has provided sanctuary and support to the Taliban for five years on Pakistani soil in the belief that the Americans could be kept happy by periodically arresting second ranking Al-Qaeda leaders. Stuck in a quagmire in Iraq, the Americans turned a blind eye to the Taliban build-up in Waziristan and Balochistan for over four years. But in 2006, the Taliban emerged as a potent force attacking US-led NATO forces all along Afghanistan's border regions with Pakistan, with many of its Pakistani volunteers prepared to undertake suicide attacks on the Americans and their British and Canadian allies. Faced with the prospect of heavy casualties in Afghanistan, an angered US Congress warned that it would make aid to Pakistan conditional on an effective Pakistani crackdown on the Taliban. Already under pressure from domestic public opinion on Iraq, President Bush was forced to acknowledge that the man whom Condoleezza Rice has described as America's "stalwart ally" in the "war on terrorism" was actually double-crossing him by aiding the Taliban. When polite messages asking Pakistan to "do more" against the Taliban failed, Vice-President Cheney descended on Islamabad. But it would be naïve to believe that merely because of these developments the US is looking for "regime change" in Islamabad. General Musharraf remains America's "best bet" in Pakistan. The reasons appear all too obvious. Even as it seeks to extricate itself from Iraq, the Bush Administration is determined to force Iran to comply with its demands on ending its nuclear enrichment and reprocessing programmes. The Iranian role in arming the Hezbollah in Lebanon, the extremist Shia groups in Iraq and backing the hardliners in Palestinian ranks has prompted an American response designed to contain and destabilise Iran. In diplomatic terms, this has involved putting together an alliance of "moderate" Sunni States. At its Doha Summit, the Arab Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) comprising Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman and the United Arab Emirates demanded the establishment of a Persian/Arab Gulf nuclear weapon-free zone. Egypt and Jordan have joined this GCC effort, with the Arabs making it clear that they would seek matching capabilities if Iran proceeded on its present path. In Iraq, the Americans have "persuaded" Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to bring together Iran and its ally Syria with the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, Iraq's Sunni Arab neighbours, the Arab League and selected Islamic countries in a conference to promote peace and stability in Iraq. Iran will find itself rather isolated is such a gathering. What has been the contribution of General Musharraf to "Sunni containment" of Shia Iran? Surprising even his own countrymen, beset by problems of Shia-Sunni strife and resurgent Talibanisation in the Northwest Frontier Province, General Musharraf proclaimed that he was off on a trip to Saudi Arabia and select Muslim countries (while pointedly excluding Iran and Syria) in order to resolve the Palestinian issue and bring peace to Iraq. His efforts were followed by the emergence of a new grouping of Sunni Muslim States comprising Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Turkey, Indonesia and Malaysia. The Foreign Ministers of these countries met in Islamabad just prior to Cheney's unexpected visit, in which he was accompanied by the CIA's counter-terrorism head Stephen Kappes. The seven Foreign Ministers are reported to have discussed the developments in Iraq and the Palestinian issue, with Turkey's Foreign Minister going to great lengths to aver that the gathering was not directed against Iran. Voicing scepticism, the Iranians have referred to this initiative as an attempt at "marginalisation of Iran and Syria". Cheney's visit was followed by a visit to Pakistan by British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett. Just preceding these developments, a Pakistan-based Sunni terrorist group, Jundullah, attacked the Iranian city of Zahedan close to the Iran-Balochistan border, killing 13 members of Iran's Revolutionary Guards. On February 27, four policemen were killed in the Iranian province of Sistan-Balochistan by terrorists who fled back to Pakistan. Pakistan's Ambassador was duly summoned to Iran's Foreign office and on March 2 Iranian leader Hojatoleslam Ahmed Khatami said: "Though Pakistan is our neighbour, little by little it is losing its neighbourly manners. Pakistan has become a haven for terrorists who kill people in Zahedan.” Earlier, the semi-official Tehran Times accused Pakistan of providing "logistical and political support" to the Taliban in Afghanistan. Tehran is now constructing a 700-km, 10-ft high wall on its border with Pakistan. Interestingly, all these developments followed some American think-tanks showing an unusual interest in ethnic fault-lines in Iran, by bringing together Baloch, Kurdish, Azeri and Turkmen minorities in Iran on a common anti-clerical platform. In these circumstances, General Musharraf is proving that he is a useful ally of the United States in the Islamic world, as the leader of an Islamic country guided by "enlightened moderation". How far he succeeds remains to be seen. While some would urge that India should now play a more active role in the emerging power alignments in the Gulf, it would be well advised to remember the adage that only fools rush in where angels fear to tread. India has developed and should maintain good relations with all the major players in the oil-rich Persian Gulf while counselling restraint and warning against any precipitate military action. Unlike General Musharraf, we are not faced with the dilemma of supporting jihad in Afghanistan on the one hand while pleading for American military and financial assistance on the other.n
|
Cricket widows, beware! WIVES of cricket buffs, brace yourselves for over six weeks of sleepless nights. The World Cup is round the corner, having in store plenty of matches that will keep your husbands glued to the telly till three or even four in the morning. Julius Caesar met his end on the 15th (Ides) of March, while your ordeal will begin on the 13th. If you have a bit of interest in the game, the whole experience won’t be all that dreadful. Otherwise, this critical period will demand extraordinary patience and forbearance on your part. The golden rule is not to expect anything from your spouse while the matches are on. He won’t help the kids prepare for their annual exams; he won’t have dinner till around midnight, when the players will have their lunch break; moreover, he will certainly not get up early next morning or reach office on time. If he is fond of drinks, his rate of consumption will rise steeply, particularly that of chilled beer. The scenario will be especially bad for those of you who have only one TV set in the house. If your hubby is of the benign sort, he will let you move it out of the bedroom. However, he might not remain gentle if you tell him to turn down the volume. For the sake of ghar ki shanti, it’s better to thrash out a compromise rather than thrash each other. Your cricket-crazy partner won’t be content with watching only India’s encounters. His curiosity will make him look at the other top teams as well, keeping him (and you) awake night after night. When “the owl” finally goes to bed, don’t be shocked if he exclaims “Good shot, Sachin!” or “Well played, Lara!” in his sleep. There is a ray of hope —in the form of pushovers like Bermuda, Canada, Scotland and Ireland. When these lilliputians face the Gullivers, the (mis)matches generally won’t last very long and your couch potato will be “free” a couple of precious hours earlier than usual. The electricity department could come to your rescue with late-night power cuts, but it won’t be surprising if he keeps the invertor fully charged for the “emergency”. Emotional blackmail might prove to be an exercise in futility. If you threaten to go to your parents’ place, he’ll be more than happy to let you leave while the World Cup is in full swing. If you declare, “I’ll break the TV set”, he will simply laugh at your empty threat. Act smart, make him promise to give you a valuable gift in return for letting him watch the action uninterrupted. If everything else fails, try for a job at an all-night call centre. You might not meet all their specifications, but they could take you on “compassionate grounds”. After all, for the entire duration of the WC, you’ll be better known as a CW (cricket
widow). |
News analysis AFTER losing power in Punjab and Uttarakhand, the Congress has reason to cheer about the consolation prize it has won by retaining power in Manipur. In the 60-member House, it got 30 seats - 10 more than its strength in the last Assembly. Chief Minister Okram Ibobi Singh has started his second innings and has thus achieved the distinction of being the first Chief Minister in the state to complete a full term. The new Secular Progressive Front ministry consisting of the Congress (which has 29 members as Mr Ibobi Singh has won from two seats), the CPI (four) and the Rashtriya Janata Dal (three) is expected to give a stable government. The Chief Minister sought to replicate the UPA model at the Centre in the state by continuing its alliance with the CPI and including the RJD in the new ministry. Efforts are also on to rope in the Nationalist Congress Party which has done remarkably well this time by winning five seats (two more than its strength in the previous Assembly). In fact, the NCP hoped to play a key role in the ministry making. However, it opted out and decided to wait and watch. In addition, the hill-based Nationalist People’s Party with its three members has also extended support to the new government. Despite its electoral success, the Congress cannot boast of a good track record. Mr Ibobi Singh’s previous tenure was characterised by inefficiency and lawlessness. There was no development worth the name. Most people are deprived of basic amenities like clean drinking water and electricity. On top of all this is the government’s failure to check corruption. Still, why did the voters support the Congress? The Congress’ success could be largely attributed to the stability plank which it had successfully orchestrated during the election campaign. The voting behaviour also suggests that the people have always voted for the party that ruled the Centre. This is because of their keenness to keep New Delhi in good humour in anticipation of its benevolence towards Imphal. Suffice it to mention, like other smaller states, Manipur depends largely on Central largesse. More important, this explains why the people did not take the Congress to task even for its failure to repeal the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958, notwithstanding a mass movement in the nook and corner of the state against this notorious legislation. The Centre has been reluctant to take action in the regard despite the recommendation by the Justice B.P. Jeevan Reddy Committee to scrap the Act after a fact-finding report. This was indeed a major issue in the elections. Every political party promised to work for the repeal of the Act, if returned to power. Consider the Congress record: it not only blocked a resolution to have the Act removed in the just dissolved Assembly but also did not include it in its election manifesto. Of course, to be fair, all that the previous government did was to lift the “Disturbed Areas” tag on seven districts. Apparently, this action could have given voters some hope for the future. The Chief Minister has now said that the Congress is keen to see that the Act was withdrawn “as early as possible”. It will be done as soon as the law and order situation improved and the government can implement all the major development projects in the state. Another reason that helped the Congress return to power is the opportunistic role of many politicians who joined the Manipur People’s Party (MPP), just before the elections. Clearly, the voters taught a fitting lesson to time servers and defectors. The MPP had to contend with just five seats in the new House. In the Imphal Valley comprising 40 constituencies, the MPP claimed a “regional wave” in its favour during the campaigning. Same is the case with the United Naga Council (UNC) which floundered in the elections on the question of the Naga identity. There has been tension between the Naga tribes and the majority Meitei plains dwellers. The Meitis want no compromise with Manipur’s territorial boundaries but the Nagas want the Naga-dominated areas of Manipur to be attached with the neighbouring state of Nagaland to create a Greater Nagaland state. Even though 10 Independents supported by the UNC won the elections, the electoral divide between the hills and the valley proves that the UNC remained outside the mainstream polity on the issue of Greater Nagaland. Tackling insurgency will continue to be the main challenge of the new government. It is an eloquent tribute to the political wisdom and electoral consciousness of the people of Manipur that they turned out in large numbers to exercise their franchise. They refused to follow the militants’ diktat and voted without fear and favour. The voting turn out ranged between 80 and 85 per cent during the three-phase polling. This is a national record. No doubt, there were stray incidents of firing and intimidation by the militants. However, these paled into insignificance in the context of the voters’ tremendous enthusiasm and excellent turn out. In addition to insurgency, the Ibobi government needs to grapple with other issues like lifting of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, a decision on the state’s boundaries, infrastructural development and commercial boosts. In its election manifesto, the Congress promised to increase the state plan’s allocation, improve highways and begin work on a rail link to mainland. The government can make headway in this regard with the Centre’s benevolence for two more years, till the general elections. |
|
Japanese working women have to serve tea for the men
TOKYO – During her many years working for a major Japanese trading company, Michiko Koseki said, she and her female co-workers have suffered a series of indignities both small and large. But the 59-year-old clerical worker was nevertheless shocked a few years ago when her company suddenly decided to move all the men in her department to nicer offices while keeping the women in the old work space. The affront, she said, did not end there. Koseki, whose job involves handling invoices and customs forms, was then ordered to trek down the hall to serve tea to male employees and visiting customers. The logic: There were no female employees in the new work area, a problem in a country where women in the office are still expected to pour beverages during business meetings. “I bitterly complained, but my boss said, ‘We can’t hire a new woman just to pour the tea,’” said Koseki, who has joined five other women in a broad sex discrimination suit against the company, Tokyo-based Kanematsu Corp. “And of course, there was no way a man was going to do it.” She continued: “Women in this country were supposed to be taking a big step forward. But for many of us, it feels like a step back.” In Japan, home to the world’s second-largest economy, women have entered the workforce in record numbers over the past 15 years. The phenomenon was once heralded by many as the start of a new era of sex equality in a country where women have long lagged a step behind men professionally. But leading academics and workers rights groups say the vast majority of Japan’s 27 million female workers have instead encountered a far different reality: a system of corporate discrimination based on sex. As many Japanese companies have sidestepped weak labor laws, they have relegated women to “administration tracks” with substandard pay and fewer prospects for promotion, while channeling men into “career tracks” with greater opportunity for upward mobility and higher compensation. The number of working women in Japan picked up after the burst of the economic bubble here in 1991, when companies began hiring more of them as a cheaper source of labor. Many of those new hires were brought on as part-time or contract workers without benefits or job security. Although many assumed that those positions would evolve into better-paying full-time jobs, statistics show that hasn’t happened. Today, Japan has a record 8 million part-time workers – more than 90 per cent of them women. “As women have come into the workforce, there has been only fractional progress in overall equality in the workplace,” said Mutsuko Asakura, a professor of labor law at Tokyo’s Waseda University. “In some companies, you’ve actually seen women fall further behind.” Critics say Japan has also failed to keep up with Western legal standards in the workplace, including on the issue of sex discrimination. A UN study released last year said Japan ranked behind all other industrialized nations in terms of empowerment of women, with 10.7 per cent of senior corporate and political positions held by women, compared with 42 per cent in the United States. In Japan, women on average earn 44 per cent of what men earn – the widest income gap between sexes in the developed world. Even as the percentage of women in the workforce rose from 37 to 41 per cent between 1980 and 2005, the number of women in top management positions climbed only slightly, from 1 per cent to 2.8 percent Many analysts here see closing the gender gap as one of the most critical issues confronting the country. With a strong anti-immigration policy and a low birthrate, which caused a decline in Japan’s population last year for the first time since World War II, analysts say Japan needs to fully incorporate women into the workforce. “Unless we begin seeing a major shift, with women integrated more equitably into corporate Japan, it is going to be very difficult for this country to find the labor needed to sustain the economy in the future,” Asakura said. Special correspondent Akiko Yamamoto contributed to this report. By arrangement withLA Times-Washington Post |
|
On Women’s Day – one for the men IT’S time again for that annual chorus of celebration to mark Women’s Day. And time again for two distinct, even diagrammatically opposite, voices of social consciousness to rise over the din. One, the cheerleaders, who will raise a toast to all those women who make up the shining face of Brand India. The second voice, of the detractors or the doomsayers, will let out a lament for the less privileged sisterhood in the Other India, an India whose face isn’t shining but is pockmarked by social ills like foeticide, dowry deaths, rapes and what not. As the paradox remains, and glitz collides with the grim and rhetoric meets rejoicing in this yearly social discourse – often amounting to no more than lip service – little thought goes to those people who are collaborators, if not protagonists, in the success stories being scripted by women all around. Yes, the male of the species, who in some way or the other champions the cause of women. That doesn’t just mean the men in the spotlight, the other halves of the Indra Nooyis, Kiran Mazumdar Shaws or Renuka Chowdharys. It could be the man in the street, the guy next door, a father, brother, husband, even a colleague. Let’s not treat them as mere footnotes in the tales of women’s progress. As the yearly trophies are handed out to women, both ordinary and extraordinary, surely some men too merit the hurrahs, if not thunderous applause. Doesn’t the husband who after the birth of a daughter did not force his spouse to try for a son deserve to be feted on this occasion too? He can, after all, be a role model for other husbands and fathers, like the bhaiyan who lives down our lane and has impregnated his reed of a wife for the second time in the past year in his obsession for a beta. So do all those men deserve to be felicitated who put their foot down when their avaricious parents wanted to make dowry demands. Or those guys who’re ready to take as their wives dark-skinned girls despite social conditioning to the converse, reinforced by all those commercials for fairness creams that make whiteness the benchmark of marital eligibility. And at the workplace, why not applaud all those male bosses and colleagues who don’t solicit sexual favours from the women, particularly the unattached ones, in exchange for a promotion or plum posting, especially in this age where job-hopping and bed-hopping often go hand in hand? This train of thought may raise the hackles of the feminists. “Why be grateful for what we rightfully deserve?” they’d argue. But it must not be forgotten that in the forward march of women, there are men who are not just walking with them but giving them a gentle push ahead, and not pulling them back. So, let’s give them a hand too. |
Whatever inclines a man to the middle path and establishes him in the mean course is conducive to good morals. The man who acts on the right occasion follows the mean path, which alone can lead to good. — The Koran When his clothes become old and worn, man changes them for new ones. As the body becomes old, tries and worn, the soul leaves it and goes to another that is new. Those who grieve over death do not understand this. They feel that the soul must have died along with the body. — The Bhagvad Gita God himself creates and the adorns us with his love when he casts his gracious glance upon us. — Guru Nanak |
| 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 | |
