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Choosing
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Honour
for ElBaradei
The
Purohit affair
A Mughal
Garden
Maritime
security Health Delhi Durbar
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Neglect of research
Sam Pitroda, Chairman of the National Knowledge Commission, is a worried man lately: India is losing in the vital area of higher education and research. Careers in teaching and research are no longer attracting the talent. Less than 1 per cent of graduates opt for doctoral studies. The end result is that instead of leaders and innovators, we are having a surfeit of assembly-line technocrats who cannot think out of the box. Compare that to China and the shortcoming appears all the more stark. While there was an 85 per cent growth in the number of doctorates in China between 1991 and 2001, India showed only 20 per cent growth. Far too much is responsible for this dismal scenario. Universities are not run professionally; appointments have been politicised and administrative autonomy is lacking. Ironically, the Knowledge Commission’s recommendations to reduce regulation and at the same time improve governance has not gone down too well with Mr Arjun Singh’s Human Resource Development Ministry itself. Another significant reason for this decline is the diminishing money allocation for higher education. India is cashing in on the foresight of leaders like Jawaharlal Nehru who established many institutions of higher learning. The spinoffs are still coming our way in diverse fields like science and technology, atomic energy and space as well as the expertise that has helped India story in many other areas. But the neglect of higher education has led to a reduced allocation for it. In any case, the total allocation for education overall has never been anywhere near the ideal mark — neither for primary nor for higher education. The Knowledge Commission has called for a target to triple the research base in the country within the next 12 years. That is being ambitious, but it is better to aim high. The government will not only have to undertake the arduous task with missionary zeal, it will also have to create an entirely new research and development environment. If India is to occupy the high chair on the world stage, it will have to give a new cutting edge to the quality of its research. Those who can duplicate the ideas of others can make good money, but real progress requires a huge army of innovators who can come up with original thought.
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Honour for ElBaradei
Few
people will have worked as hard and consistently for years together for promoting the use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes as International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohammed ElBaradei has done. He has been an outspoken advocate of the application of nuclear technology for development-related activities, without bothering about the opinion of powerful countries, which have their own agendas. He has guided the IAEA quite independently, successfully resisting pressures from world capitals. The selection of Dr ElBaradei for this year’s Indira Gandhi Prize for Peace, Disarmament and Development is, therefore, absolutely justified. He has been a tireless campaigner for nuclear non-proliferation, with prejudice towards none. He has been convinced that India must be associated with the international efforts for nuclear disarmament because of its unblemished record as a nuclear weapon state. That is why he had no reservations about the operationalisation of the India-US civilian nuclear deal. He has been of the view that India must be in a position to generate as much nuclear energy as possible to sustain its economic growth. In his opinion, India can contribute considerably to the drive for preventing climate change by increasingly relying on nuclear energy to meet the fast growing demand for power in the country. Dr ElBaradei, who studied law in Cairo, his birthplace, and New York, is the recipient of a number of coveted awards, including the Nobel Prize for Peace, which he shared with the UN agency he heads. An advocate of “atoms for peace”, he got his third term as the Secretary-General of the IAEA despite the US being unhappy with his otherwise admirable record. He and well-known UN inspector Hans Blix came out with the finding that Iraq under Saddam Hussein had no trace of nuclear weapons or infrastructure for their manufacture, contrary to what the Bush administration wanted the world to believe. He has also had the courage to refuse to take the US line on the issue of Iran’s nuclear programme. He is a firm believer in resolving disputes through peaceful and diplomatic means. The Indira Gandhi award has rightly been conferred on him.
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Every American woman has two souls to call her own, the other being her husband’s. — James Agate
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The Purohit affair THE detention of Lt-Col S.P. Purohit by the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorist Squad for his alleged links with the Malegaon blasts is an extremely sensitive and serious issue which challenges the very apolitical and secular fabric of the Indian Army. The BBC in its programme “50 Years After the Raj” had described the Army as the last bastion of Indian democracy. Because this unprecedented incident smacks of anti-national activity and goes against the ethos of the Army, regarded as the number one patriotic institution in the country, the media must handle its reportage with great care and caution, eschewing sensationalism. There should be no trial by the media. Equally, no one in the government or outside should try to politicise the issue during the pre-election debates on who is soft and who is tough on terror as this will be fraught with most serious consequences that can affect the Army, indeed the armed forces. Unfortunately, political mudslinging, reminiscent of the Kargil days, has already started. Prima facie, in an offence of this nature, which is so unique that it is outside the Army Act but a civil offence, the Army is required to let civilian authority investigate it. Other cases in this category pertain to culpable homicide and rape. For the rest, the Army is the legitimate authority for prosecution and trial under the Army Act. In the Purohit case, investigation is, therefore, a concurrent responsibility of both civil and military authorities. It is vital that the military’s intelligence and legal branches do not allow the ATS or any other investigating agency to transgress the investigative norms. The civil, police and intelligence record in terrorist acts in the country has seldom gone beyond producing pencil sketches of alleged bombers. Despite the Army’s image being sullied previously with events like Tehelka, the Siachen fake encounters and sundry cases of corruption, it continues to be revered in the country. But helping to make bombs for terrorists is the enemy within. The Army believes and hopes that this is a freak incident, an aberration. The secular credentials of the Army are intact and being zealously guarded. This is a tradition inherited from the colonial British Army, assiduously nurtured at the time by insulating it from the people by keeping it in cantonments, not even letting Indian Army personnel mix with British soldiers or any foreign armies. Just before Independence, the Army enjoyed high warrant of precedence, high salaries and a key role in decision-making through near-parity with civil services. The historic row between Viceroy Lord Curzon and Commander-in-Chief Field Marshal Kitchener was a turning point in civil-military relations establishing political authority over the military. After Independence, while the military was substantially downgraded in pay and prestige, civil and police services were elevated to curb the political ambitions of the military. The unresolved core issues relating to the Sixth Pay Commission and the Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw’s last rites have further lowered military morale. Over the last 60 years, witnessing the slow rot in governance, some chinks — one through which Purohit has appeared — may well have developed in the secular ethos of the Army. After Independence the Army has played a key role in nation-building and come into direct contact with the people starting with the North-East in curbing secessionist movements and aiding civilian authority in governance. The buffer of the cantonments was removed long ago as the Army got a ring-side view of the nexus among politicians, the underground forces and the bureaucracy. From single-party rule at the Centre, we have moved to an era of multiparty coalition governments leading to corruption and crisis in governance. A surplus of democracy and deficit of discipline has polarised the country into sectional and communal vote bank politics. Keeping the Army unaffected by the transformation in the socio-political milieu in the country will not be simple or easy. Military tradition, regimental spirit, training culture, other checks and balances and routine professional practices have maintained and preserved the secular and apolitical mentality, but the environment has got so vitiated that controlling sentiments and emotions of soldiers is no longer a command of discipline. There is a danger of the heart overruling the head. We saw this happen soon after Operation Bluestar when a number of retired Sikh officers were alienated and demotivated. Times have changed, and so have the routine and life in the military. There is also a generational change in outlook and disposition of soldiers. Nowadays it is difficult to make the youth join the military, which in the case of the Army is rarely the first choice. Persons joining the Army, especially the officer corps, no longer represent the elite or upper middle class. The value system has changed and is changing. Officers and soldiers have political affiliations, are allowed to vote and join political parties after retirement, subscribing to political ideology denied to them while in service. The military has also begun questioning the undue and unfair civilian bureaucratic control, depriving it of a role in decision-making, in shaping the destiny of the country. The internal security situation has spiralled out of control. Whether or not it is devising an effective response to the Naxalites or countrywide acts of terrorism, not to mention the politically motivated military operations in Assam and the rest of the North-East, the government has been unable to come up with any answer except: “We are not soft on terror.” For soldiers there can be no greater frustration than to see the helplessness and inaction of the government which behaves as if its hands are tied at the back. These are difficult times for the government and the military. Ordinary citizens are traumatised by terrorist bombings and know that their fate is in God’s hands and not in the hands of those whom they elected to govern. Retired officers are courting arrest and returning medals, unprecedented as a collective act. Colonel Purohit’s alleged actions appear to be the diktat of his conscience but violative of the high military values and tradition, though being eroded by the socio-political environment. They also reflect the signs of the changing times. The government and political parties have to lay down red-lines in playing politics, insulating the military and national security from partisan politics. Governments also have to be sensitive to the physical and emotional needs of the soldiers. The Purohit affair is a warning for the government that it has a duty towards maintaining internal security and protecting the citizens of the country. As for the military, what it took for granted in the past requires introspection. There is need for recalibration of secular traditions on the one hand and stricter monitoring and enforcement of codes. It is time to go back to the
basics.
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A Mughal Garden I
remember
its wide and colourful expanse. As children my friends and I used to play cops and robbers on its lawns, hiding in its bougainvillae bushes or climbing up its hoary banyan tree. Begum Qudsia, daughter of Shah Jehan, had laid out her pleasure garden here. Her sister, Begum Roshanara, lies buried in another garden a couple of miles west of the walled city. But the Qudsia is just outside the city wall, or what remains of it. In a corner of it my college had its tennis courts and cricket field. And it was here that the annual All-India tennis tournament was held before its sponsors decided to move it to the then Imperial Delhi Gymkhana. When I reached man’s estate my boyhood playground still held its old magic for me. I used to drive there on moonlit nights, my current girl-friend by my side. Parking the car, we would take a stroll or sit on a bench, saying things that young people say under the influence of the moon. Then, some 50 years ago, the powers that be decided to build an inter-state bus terminus. They looked around and saw that the garden lay along the national highway connecting the east to the west and the north. There couldn’t be a more strategic spot in the whole of Delhi. Both beauty and history had to surrender to expediency. On my periodic visits to Delhi I watched with growing sorrow the bulldozers riding roughshod over the piece of land that had been the pride of my old college. The small pavilion where we used to store our cricket and tennis gear had been converted into a rest room for the contractor’s workmen. What finally took shape as the ISBT complex is one of the ugliest buildings it has been my misfortune to see. It looks ungainly from outside and offers no amenities to passengers except, perhaps, the smelliest public toilet in the city. However, all was not lost. The northern portion of the original garden which runs parallel to the river bed, was left untouched except for the costly superimposition of a “Japanese” garden. The ancient stone archway still stands, its walls bearing the usual graffiti of names dates and hearts pierced with arrows. Someone had written one of Mirza Ghalib’s verses in Urdu. Translated into English it reads: “Again my heart is restless, again my breast/Yearns for the mortal wound of
love.”
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Maritime security
More
than 90 per cent of India’s trade, to and from, is transported by sea. Totalling $ 400 billion this year, it measures at about 35 per cent of the country’s GDP. Less than a fifth of this trade moves in Indian merchant vessels as we just do not have enough of them; the rest moves in ships under foreign flags underscoring the fact the we should be as much interested in their safety as in those of our own. Yet, as recent events are showing we are far from appreciating the seriousness of threats that are being posed to safety of sea-borne commerce in the Indian Ocean, an area of vital concern to our maritime interests. Take the case of the vessel MT Stolt Valor hijacked by Somalian pirates in the Gulf of Aden. This was a vessel owned in Japan, registered in Hongkong, leased out on time charter to a Norwegian company and crewed by about two dozen of which 18 were Indian. It was carrying cargoes for India. After being kept hostage in Somalian territorial waters for 42 days, it was released when more than $1 million was paid in ransom money, representing blackmail of an extraordinary nature. What is more, dozens of vessels have been similarly hijacked, a Saudi Arabian tanker carrying oil worth $100 million being the most recent, all for varying amounts of money. Warships of some countries, principally the USA, have been in the region but have shown impotence to do anything. Obviously, insufficient motivation has something to do with it. An Indian warship sent to the area post the Stolt Valor episode has not only succeeded in preventing the hijack of two vessels through a strong show of force but in a remarkably assertive action, sunk one of the mother ships of the pirates. This act alone will decisively curb criminal activities in those waters. Well done, the
Indian Navy. We cannot afford to remain complacent to the disturbing scenario. Even if trade grows 10 per cent annually, well below the current rate of 25 per cent, it will cross $1 trillion by 2015 and the number of ships coming and going from our ports will double. As a major power in the region with far-flung interests, India must be prepared to play a more proactive role than it has done so far. This requires not only capability but also mechanisms to ensure, first the pooling of resources internally and then, coordinating and cooperating with others, both littorals and outsiders. Looking at the first, we have nearly a dozen agencies in the country which have something to do with affairs
at sea. The Navy, the Coast Guard, marine wings of the BSF, Customs, organisations involved in offshore activity like the ONGC, the departments of shipping, lighthouses, fisheries, tourism, ports and oceanography are only some of them. They have resources and deploy assets at sea quite regularly, some almost all the time. Then there are the marine police wings in states, albeit of poor quality. Between them they have access to information and intelligence, both prerequisites to actions, which can prevent criminals from acting freely at sea, near our coast and even beyond. For example, there is full information available of the location of every ship under the Indian flag and its intended movement. There is, by and large, information on deployments of Indian crew on different ships and on vessels coming to or going from Indian ports carrying cargoes. It is, therefore, astounding that no preventive action was taken when it was fully known that reactive measures would, at best, be frustrating and time consuming. The principal reason for this is the complete lack of inter-agency coordination. Information is held but not collated, analysed or shared, the last least of all. Proposals to create some sort of a Maritime Commission or an agency to look at things holistically have been ‘under consideration’ for more than a few years but bureaucratic cussedness and turf considerations have prevented any forward movement. This is disappointing and not allowing responses commensurate with either our interests or our capabilities. It is necessary that the required momentum should be given to setting this house in order and the push must come from the National Security Adviser himself. The second thing is to get cooperative networks in place. While some progress has been made in the South East through Navy and Coast Guard linkages with many countries, we have, for some reason, remained inhibited in the West, which, considering our energy route is at least as important, if not more. India has to become a key player in security arrangements at sea in that part of the world. Concurrently, thought must be given to group ships together in the dangerous waters and move them under the protective cover of a warship. This might delay them a little but
better late than very late. Once again, inter-agency coordination is essential for this to happen. Finally, there must be political will to ensure the nation’s rights and to safeguard its concerns. We must be prepared for aggressive action when all else fails; safety of the Indian nationals is as much a responsibility of the state as its own. India must move quickly in recognising newer dimensions of its security interests, which are now increasingly getting focused on the seas surrounding it. To put it in blunt terms, we need to put
our act together. The writer is a former Commander-in-Chief of the Eastern Naval Command and a member of the National Security Advisory Board
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Health Where
are the keys? What did I go into the kitchen for? Should I be worrying about my -- you know, that thing, memory? Or is this just what happens to everyone with age? Here are answers to common questions about memory loss, gleaned from interviews with three experts: neuroscientist James McGaugh of the University of California, Irvine; Dr. Gary Small, director of the UCLA Memory Clinic and the UCLA Center on Aging; and Dr. William H. Thies, vice president of medical and scientific relations at the Alzheimer's Association. Question: I think I'm losing my mind. I agree to a meeting and then completely forget about it. I'm introduced to someone and five minutes later don't remember his name. Do I have Alzheimer's disease? Answer: Forgetting things you have learned recently is a red flag for early Alzheimer's disease, our three experts say. "The ability to consolidate and store new memories is the first thing to go," McGaugh says. "Established memories hang out for a long time." Alzheimer's sufferers might still have a rich recall of childhood memories, beloved songs and complex activities, such as playing tennis, but not remember the name of a grandchild. But the significance of such memory lapses depends on how forgetful you always have been and whether you were focused and paying attention when you learned someone's name or set off to get something in the next room. Distraction often causes lapses in people with perfectly intact cognition -- mainly because the initial stimulus was incompletely processed. "You never really learn it if you don't pay attention," says Small, author of "The Memory Bible" and a new book, "iBrain." When a person who has always been meticulous about keeping appointments starts missing them, that is a worrisome change. A person who has always been a bit disorganized or easily distracted might have other problems, including attention deficit disorder or chronic depression. If the memory lapses are consistent with a lifelong pattern, our experts say it's unlikely to be Alzheimer's disease. Q: Maybe I'm just getting older. But at work, what used to take me two hours to do now takes four. I've always been sharp and fast on the job, but I'm not performing at my peak. A: Struggling with familiar tasks and experiencing problems with abstract thinking can be early indications of Alzheimer's disease. The aging brain can compensate for its declining performance for many years: It knows more about the world and its patterns than a younger, swifter brain. But if established work routines don't come as easily as they did, perhaps the benefits of age are being undermined by disease. For example, if you're failing to detect and recognize patterns on the job -- say, anticipating from experience where production bottlenecks will happen -- it's worth raising the issue with your doctor. Finding numbers difficult to add up in your head or the route to your next appointment difficult to visualize could be signs of stress and distraction -- things all of us have plenty of at work. But if things you've always done on the job now stump you, that is a problem warranting medical evaluation. Sometimes, making mistakes doing things that are virtually automatic gives us a sign that something's wrong. When Dad takes a left turn instead of a right to head home from the grocery store, that should not be dismissed as absent-mindedness. Those with early Alzheimer's often become disoriented in the performance of familiar tasks. The speed at which those difficulties have set in is important to note. The onset of Alzheimer's symptoms is generally gradual and insidious -- making them easy to dismiss as the mental decline that comes with aging. In the case of a person who has suffered a stroke or fallen into depression, difficulty with routine chores and mental calculations can be relatively sudden. Q: I misplace things. And when I'm talking, I am sometimes at a loss for the word I need. What's wrong? A: Putting your glasses in the refrigerator or a pantry cabinet rather than on your bedside table may be a sign of a problem: Misplacing things in inappropriate places is an early sign of Alzheimer's disease. It is also time to consult a memory specialist when you ask your spouse if she's seen your glasses and you have trouble thinking of the word for them, or if the word that comes out is not the right one. Sometimes, those with early Alzheimer's disease say they will get close, but a tad off the mark, to the word they're looking for -- "that thing for my nose" instead of "glasses." Sometimes they'll just find themselves stumped. The way in which problems appear can give clues to the cause. Sudden word-retrieval difficulties might be a sign that a stroke is taking place or has occurred. A barking dog and ringing telephone that jangle your concentration while you're looking for those, those ... whatchamacallits might signal that distraction is to blame. — By arrangement with
LA Times-Washington Post
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Delhi Durbar While Manmohan Singh would not utter a word against George Bush, his Finance Minister P Chidambaram thinks the US President was bad for the world economy. In a statement, which raised many an eyebrow at the World Economic Forum, Chidambaram said US President-elect Barack Obama has a better understanding of economic issues and seems capable of handling the situation arising from the financial meltdown. He also made a categorical statement that Bush apparently could not understand much about the world economy. Compare this to what Manmohan Singh had told Bush when they met in September in Washington. “People of India love you”, the PM told Bush-- a statement which did not go down well even within his own party. However, there is no need to
guess who loves whom in the grand old party.
Actors missing
The BJP has all along managed to attract crowds to its election meetings by mobilising film stars. But this time round, one can hardly see any new Bollywood actor campaigning with BJP leaders. According to the grapevine, the reason is that the main mobiliser of film stars is Vijay Goel and he is sulking for having not been considered for the chief minister’s post in Delhi. So now the party’s media cell coordinator Navin Kohli, a one-time DD anchor, has been pressed into action and he came up with one Shaina N.C., who claims to be a fashion designer from Mumbai, to campaign for Vijay Kumar Malhotra in Delhi. Wonder if the move will improve the BJP’s prospects in the electoral battle!
Quota numbers
The court of the Chief Justice of India virtually turned into a mathematics classroom earlier this week. This happened when a Constitution Bench was hearing a petition on the OBC quota in higher educational institutions.
All the five judges, lawyers and others present in the packed court were seen doing their back-of-the-envelop calculations to arrive at the number of seats that are supposed to go to students belonging to the SC/ST, OBC and the general category. The judges were exchanging their calculations. Senior advocate K.K. Venugopal, counsel for the petitioner, had a tough time explaining the percentages to the judges, particularly Justices R.V. Raveendran and Arijit
Pasayat. Apparently, there was an effort to find a way out for the provision of 27 per cent reservation for the OBC without affecting the already available percentages for the SC/ST (22.5) and the general category (77.5). In this case, the total percentage would come to 127, while anything above 100 per cent is a mathematical improbability. Contributed by Bhagyashree Pande, Faraz Ahmad and R. Sedhuraman
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