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Kashmir as ruse
Party-pooper |
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Enviable India
Massive Maharashtra mess
The Roundabout
Rooting out terror
Tiny PCs, tiny prices, big headaches
Delhi Durbar
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Kashmir as ruse
PAKISTAN has raised the Kashmir question at the United Nations at a time when it stands thoroughly exposed for its involvement in the Mumbai terrorist strikes. Its ambassador at the UN had the audacity to say at the Security Council on Wednesday: “The best outcome of the (Mumbai) tragedy would be the resolution of the issue of Kashmir…” Islamabad’s tactics to hide its sins, however, had little impact on the world opinion despite China coming to its rescue by mentioning “the root causes of terrorism”. Terrorism cannot be justified on any pretext. Nor can it be linked with Kashmir. External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee has rightly asserted that the “simple formula” propounded by Pakistan in desperation cannot help end the menace. Pakistan’s behaviour reflects its unholy intentions even when the world has virtually issued an ultimatum that it must be ready to face the wrath of the global community if it fails to fulfil its promise of not allowing any territory under its control to be used for terrorism. Neither India nor the US is satisfied with the arrest of some terrorist leaders like Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Masood Azhar and Lashkar-e-Taiyaba commander Ziaur Rehman Lakhvi. Islamabad needs to do a lot more to contain terrorism. Ignoring Pakistan’s misleading tactics, the Security Councicl has declared the Jamaat-ud-Dawah, the front organisation of the Lashkar-e-Taiyaba, as a terrorist oufit and put a ban on it and on the movement of its top functionaries — Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, Z.R. Lakhvi, Haji Mohammad Ashraf and Mahmoud Mohammad Ahmed Bahaziq. Thus, a clear signal has been sent out to Pakistan to act swiftly against these perpetrators of terrorism. It is heartening to note that the Council members were almost unanimous in declaring the Jamaat a terrorist entity. China, the lone dissenter whenever resolutions in this regard were moved in the past, too, had no hesitation in going along with the rest of the world. The Security Council’s decision is a major diplomatic achievement for India. It has been successful in its diplomatic drive against the Pakistan-based terrorists and the organisations involved in this heinous activity after what happened in Mumbai. Ultimately, the international community has accepted the Indian view of terrorism. Now there is need to ensure that the terrorist masterminds are brought to justice and the banned entities are never allowed to operate under assumed names, as had been done by the LeT after the UN declared it a terrorist outfit in 2005.
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Party-pooper
UMA BHARTI, the fiery sanyasin, who broke away from the BJP and formed her own Bharatiya Jan Shakti Party (BJSP), had little going for her even before the elections to the Madhya Pradesh Assembly. However, while the election may not have served her purpose — of ensuring that the BJP does not return to office -- it has brought home the fact that the lady is not the force she reckoned herself to be. Far from inflicting any serious damage to the BJP, she has only hurt herself. Though her BJSP won seven seats, she had to bite the dust in her own constituency of Tikamgarh. It may be cold comfort that the BJSP —which shares its initials with both the BJP and the BSP — could manage the same number of seats as the more powerful Bahujan Samaj Party of Ms Mayawati. In the run up to the elections, Ms Bharti had declared that if the BJP won a second term in Madhya Pradesh, she would quit politics and retire to Kedarnath for meditation. Like all political promises, this, too, needs to be taken with a sackful of salt. Regardless of whether the stormy petrel of Hindutva retreats to a holier environment, she may reflect on why she had been marginalised in politics. She has a following of sorts in pockets of Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, particularly among sections of OBCs. She had been a force within the BJP, to the extent that her tantrums could not be ignored and her threats of breaking rank always sent the BJP leadership into a huddle. All that seems to be history now. Her rushing forward to the defence of Pragya Thakur and others in the Malegaon case on the presumption of this being a “Hindu cause” has obviously not earned her either friends or votes. In her campaign she was more obsessed with defeating the BJP than winning herself. It should now be clear that by herself she can never be the political force she aspires to be. There might yet be hope for her if, despite her preoccupation with herself, she seeks out allies who may be useful in sustaining the constituency she has
cultivated.
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Enviable India
THE World Bank’s latest annual report paints a grim picture of the world economy. It has dubbed the present financial crisis “the most serious recession since the 1930s”. The two countries that are widely believed to drive global growth are China and India, a fact buttressed by the World Bank too. As China’s growth is export-led, it will feel the pain of recession more than India, where domestic consumption fuels growth. But given India’s poorer fiscal position, it does not have China’s financial clout to spend its way out of trouble. Against China’s growth stimulus package of $586 billion, India’s recent $4 billion push appears paltry. The World Bank has lowered the growth forecast for India to 6.3 per cent this year and 5.8 per cent next. Still, it is a relief that India has escaped the global financial turmoil with only bruises. Earlier, it had seen from a distance the Asian Tigers fall prey to relentless greed. This time the damage is there but limited to those firms and sectors integrated with the global economy. In fact, India’s growth would have still slowed even in the absence of a sub-prime crisis. In the fight against inflation, the Reserve Bank of India had hiked the interest rates to such an extent that industry was feeling the heat. Now as inflation has softened, the RBI has begun loosening the monetary policy, albeit in a painfully slow manner. The government does not have many options to take on the slowdown. It has no money to spend on infrastructure. Its request for higher World Bank aid is unlikely to be met as there are other countries with more pressing needs. What the government should do in these circumstances is to drastically cut oil prices, taxes and interest rates. Surprisingly, at the time of a crisis the country is without a regular Finance Minister. An already burdened Prime Minister may let bureaucrats run the show.
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Marriage always demands the finest arts of insincerity possible between two human beings. — Vicki Baum
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Massive Maharashtra mess ALTHOUGH the assembly elections in five states have understandably boosted the Congress party’s drooping morale, it ought to remain ashamed of the manner in which it has handled the political fallout in Maharashtra of the unprecedented Mumbai massacre by Pakistan’s Lashkar-e-Taiyaba. Maharashtra is one of the only two large states that the Congress rules though in partnership with the Nationalist Congress Party of Mr Sharad Pawar. (The other is Andhra Pradesh that the Congress governs on its own.) At no stage, however, has the Congress-led Maharashtra government been free from tension and trouble. The party high command’s handling of its affairs has been lackadaisical at best and casual at worst. At the time of the sea-borne attack on Mumbai, Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh was away in Kerala. It took his minions quite some time to locate him. Consequently, it was two hours after the slaughter had begun that the request for the National Security Guards commandos could reach Delhi. The subsequent delay is a separate story. During the Congress Working Committee’s meeting that decided, albeit reluctantly, to ease out Mr Shivraj Patil, there was sharp attack also on Dr Deshmukh. He made an offer of sorts to the committee that he would go, if it were thought necessary. He then returned to Mumbai publicly to declare that there was no reason for him to resign. Some of the Congress president’s advisers were indeed arguing that his retention would cause fewer problems than would his exit. That is when Mr Sharad Pawar showed his hand. He is unquestionably the most influential politician in Maharashtra, with no one in the state Congress to hold a candle to him. Worse, though a product of the Congress under the leadership of Yeshwantrao Chavan, Mr Pawar had ditched the party not once, but twice. The second time around in 1999, he did so in protest against Mrs Sonia Gandhi being the party’s prime ministerial candidate despite being foreign-born. No wonder, his current partnership with the Congress in both Delhi and Mumbai is utterly uneasy. The first thing Mr Pawar did was to order Maharashtra’s Deputy Chief Minister, Mr R. R. Patil, owing allegiance to the NCP, to resign. Incredibly, this gentleman had blandly declared that there was no reason for him to put in his papers because “such minor mishaps” happened routinely in big cities. However, Mr Patil complied with Mr Pawar’s instructions immediately. Thereafter, there was no way the Congress could keep Mr Deshmukh in the saddle. By this time, angry crowds in Mumbai were shoe-beating his portraits. Even after accepting Mr Deshmukh’s resignation, the Congress leadership found itself in a quandary over the choice of his successor. Its attempt to arrive at a consensus with Mr Pawar made no headway. For, even at a time of a grave national crisis, the curse of caste cast its dark shadow. The NCP believes the Marathas to be its power base. It, therefore, did not want a Maratha Congressman as Chief Minister. Its preference was for the Union Power Minister, Mr Sushil Kumar Shinde, a Dalit and a former chief minister of Maharashtra who was sent as Governor to Andhra, to make way for Mr Deshmukh. Soon thereafter, he was brought to Delhi to join the Union Council of Ministers. Ultimately, the Congress party’s choice fell on Mr Ashok Chavan, not a high-profile member of the Deshmukh Cabinet. His main qualification, apart from being a Maratha, is that he is the son of the late S. B. Chavan, a fairly successful Maharashtra Chief Minister who was out of his depth, however, as Home Minister in the P. V. Narasimha Rao Cabinet. All this was sideshow compared with what followed. Mr Narayan Rane, Revenue Minister in the Deshmukh Cabinet, ascended the stage and attacked the Congress high command in general and Mrs Sonia Gandhi, in particular. She had no business, Mr Rane thundered, to appoint Mr Ashok Chavan to the job that should have rightfully gone to him. He is threatening to bring down the Congress-led ministry and slinging so much mud on Congress leaders that some of it might stick. He is even alleging that several Congress leaders, including those in high office in New Delhi, are in collusion with the perpetrators of the unspeakable Mumbai outrage. He has not named any names, however. He says he would do so at “appropriate time”. The crowning irony is that even in the midst of this mess few Congressmen are prepared to acknowledge that in Maharashtra today they are paying the price for their original sin of welcoming into the party fold a character like Mr Rane. He is a former Shiv Sena chief minister of the state and a principal hatchet man of the Sena’s founder, Mr Bal Thackeray. In course of time, there was a parting of ways between Mr Rane and his mentor. Shortly, thereafter the Congress welcomed Mr Rane with open arms. He then won a byelection with a huge margin. Immediately, he was made a minister and given charge of the coveted portfolio of revenue. He also claims, with what degree of accuracy it is difficult to say, that he was also promised that he would be made Chief Minister. This “breach of faith”, he says, is the reason for his rage. The Congress high command has “suspended” Mr Rane for the present. It seems that he would quit the party before he is expelled. But the fundamental question the Congress must answer is: What kind of secularism, undoubtedly its basic creed, was the Congress leadership promoting by inviting into the party Mr Rane and his cohorts wedded to the Shiv Sena’s bigoted policies? Are pure opportunism and expediency the only guides of the party that is the core of the United Progressive Alliance? This is by no means the end of the Maharashtra story. Well before the Congress could finalise the selection of Mr Ashok Pradhan, the NCP chief nominated Mr Chagan Bhujbal Deputy Chief Minister in place of the deservedly dismissed R. R. Patil. Since public memory is proverbially short, not many people may remember that Mr Bhujbal, too, is a former Shiv Sena stalwart. Years ago Mr Pawar, as Congress chief minister, had “persuaded” Mr Bhujbal to cross over to the Congress party. With the formation of the NCP, Mr Bhujbal knew where he had to go. Since the new Deputy CM belongs to an OBC, he is spearheading the move to get the Marathas recognised as OBCs and thus entitled to reservations in jobs and institutions of higher learning. The Congress does not know how to cope with this problem or with Mr Rane’s formidable clout in the coastal region of
Konkan.
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The Roundabout NEXT to the serial monotony that is its architectural claim to fame, residents and tourists alike would perhaps cite the roundabout as the one defining feature of City Beautiful. One does not know for sure if there are roundabouts in Corbusier's native Europe. But we have bought and sold the popular myth that this is a ‘phoren’ feature of stellar significance. I could never understand why. In every city I lived in before this, roundabouts are simply called "chowks“. Nobody really makes a great fuss over them. I discovered how they had captured the imagination of writers when I read in my child’s Punjabi textbook the line “Chandigarh is famous for its roundabouts.” True, they are beautifully landscaped by corporates and the flowers are what keep many a jaded soul alive. Some of them have a central feature, like the Matka Chowk which the posh set prefers to call the Rose Garden roundabout. Some acquire interesting names like Labour Chowk by virtue of their function and some are named for a newspaper office next to them. Even experienced drivers insist it can be quite tricky negotiating a roundabout. The curve probably comes as a nasty surprise to those used only to linear trajectories, particularly at high speeds. Perhaps it is often also a high of a different sort. The resentment of motorists at having to share precious road space with flowers and shrubbery often leads to disastrous consequences. In larger cities there is nothing to break the tedium of driving for miles together on grey concrete with only some dusty bougainvillea for company. What is worse, people prefer the bleakness because they do not know that things can be any different ! One other peculiarity is that rainwater accumulates around these structures for about two hours after a snap shower, with vehicles breaking down in the deluge. The joke goes that a farmer from a rain-starved village came to the city for a High Court appearance. He got stranded at a roundabout when the auto he was travelling in broke down after a heavy downpour. He reportedly went back impressed and told his mates, “If in Chandigarh they can make it rain only at the roundabouts why can’t the Government use the same technology to bring rain only to our fields? Why waste it on our village roads!” A drive round the city roads will yield two observations of considerable significance to the citizen: The police is only a roundabout away. So is the icecream vendor. On hot summer nights, the latter operates under the watchful eyes of the former, while young and old indulge a sweet tooth. What I have also learnt is that the roundabout is a unit of distance and not merely a landmark. Each time you ask for directions to a particular place, you are simply told, “It is just two roundabouts away.” Go figure! Roundabouts will continue to be blamed for traffic snarls, tragic accidents and waste of taxpayers’ money. But any talk of demolishing one even on grounds of safety will have the whole city converging in protest at…The
Roundabout!
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Rooting out terror THE
al-Qaeda-inspired terror strike has ignited spontaneous public revulsion against politicians, particularly those engaged in divisive, vote-bank politics. The media has reported that Shaheed Karkare’s widow refused a grant from Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi. Shaheed Maj Unnikrishnan’s father shut the door on Kerala Chief Minister Achutanandan, inducing him to insult India’s valiant saviour. Instinctively, the public has realised that Indians must unite to defeat terror. In addition, ensuring effective policing and intelligence along with boosting counter-terrorism organisations assumes criticality in this battle. It is clear that the public outrage over such a colossal internal security failure demands an overhaul of our approach to counter terrorism. Hence, it is vital that root causes of terror be identified and eradicated. Our first-past-the-post election model ensures that the best caste-arithmetic manipulator is declared the elected representative, when in actuality he responds only to the biggest minority in his constituency the average of which, across constituencies, would probably not exceed 17 per cent. ‘Social engineering’ is thus encouraged by our electoral system – endlessly dividing and re-dividing our people. Secondly, fractured verdicts coupled with crass opportunism result in frequent mid-term polls. Consequently, state and Central governments are perpetually in an election mode, necessitating constant, competitive populism and diverting the attention of governments from real issues. There is also a need to have a fixed tenure for legislatures like in the US system. This would minimise horse-trading and encourage responsible governance. Besides, it will also offset the expense of conducting run-off polls. Uniting Indians is one facet of fighting terror. Revitalisation of the security and intelligence agencies is equally vital. IAS bureaucrats, who exercise authority over the police and the intelligence agencies, have perfected the art of ‘power without accountability’. All major decisions on modernisation, training, deployment priorities etc. are a prerogative of bureaucrats, whereas the subordinate organisations become answerable for failure in execution. There is now talk of a ‘federal agency’ for combating terror. Such an agency must have comprehensive functional autonomy coupled with unambiguous accountability. Only the Army has the experience of dealing with terror and with an impeccable track record, the envy of world-class powers. In fact, they send their personnel to our Army for training. The nation cannot afford to ignore this expertise any longer. Experienced Army officers must be inducted at the helm of any such organisation. The proposed agency must have a unified structure going all the way down to the district level with special units for metros and major cities. Its responsibilities must extend to home-grown and foreign-origin terror as well Naxalism. Mumbai’s 26/11 signals that al-Qaeda has declared war on India. It is, therefore, time that our defence forces (including the NSG, manned by Army personnel), which displayed the
only effective response to the attack, are strengthened. This includes equipment as well as remuneration and motivation. As regards intelligence, counter-terrorism intelligence must be part and parcel of the proposed agency. It should have the latest modern equipment and highly trained experts. We should not be shy of taking help from any friendly nation to train our boys. The key to effective functioning of the agency, once it is suitably organised and equipped, is to ensure suitable HRD policies and legislate suitable conduct rules which foster a high degree of motivation, while ensuring exemplary disincentives for non-performance. Finally, the third step to counter terrorism is revamping the police, particularly at the grassroots level. Today, the police in all states exists only for VIP duties, including personal tasks of senior IPS/IAS officers. The poor constable is overworked, deprived of amenities and totally untrained for even routine police work, leave alone countering skilled and
fanatic terrorists. On September 22, 2006, the Supreme Court directed the state and Central
governments to actuate seven practical mechanisms for police reform. The court directive required compliance from all governments by December 31, 2006, and filing these with the court by January 3, 2007.Till date, only Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Mizoram, and Nagaland have complied. Most states are dragging their feet. Moreover, nine states have passed laws or ordinances to circumvent the Supreme Court’s directions. These are Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Gujarat, Kerala and Rajasthan, with the Bihar Police Bill 2007 being particularly perverse. It is high time police reforms are undertaken energetically. The nation is crying out for a strong message to foreign perpetrators that such outrages will no longer be tolerated. Diplomatic demarches will not
suffice; effective action is the call from the people.
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Tiny PCs, tiny prices, big headaches HOW little laptop is enough? And how few dollars will it cost you? The ultralight laptop has traditionally been a luxury item. But over the past couple of years, sanity has returned to this end of the computing universe: You can pay less for less of a laptop. The WiFi-enabled laptops go by the term “netbook.” Netbooks promise little more than Web access, weigh less than three pounds and start at under $400. They’ve become one of the few bright spots in the computer market. That makes sense. Any netbook can provide an excellent alternative to computing as we know it. For little more than the price of a high-end smartphone, you can buy a machine with a real screen and keyboard and the ability to run programs you already know. But many netbooks ship with cramped keyboards that defy touch-typing, screens that require constant scrolling to view Web pages and stripped-down software setups that make installing extra programs difficult — if you can download copies, as these minimal machines lack CD or DVD drives. A test of five netbooks — Acer’s $459 Aspire One, Asus’ $549 Eee PC 900, Dell’s $494 Inspiron Mini 9, Lenovo’s $399 S10 and MSI’s $349 Wind — showed how much work the industry has to do on this concept. Despite major differences in software (Windows XP or Linux) and storage (hard drives or flash memory), these five models had one thing in common: obvious, avoidable errors. Most of those were ill-considered design compromises forced by their tiny size and light weight. (The Asus, the lightest of the bunch, weighed only 2.2 pounds; the Lenovo was the heaviest, at 2.7 pounds.) Their worst issue was keyboard design. The Asus, the Dell and the MSI feature narrow period and slash keys — the most common punctuation in Web addresses. Those three and the Lenovo exile the right-hand Shift key to the right of the up-arrow key, inviting you to select a previous line of text by accident and then overtype it with the next keystroke. Netbook screens also require some adaptation. The roughly 10-inch LCDs on the Lenovo and the MSI and the 8.9-inch displays on the other three leave little room for most Web pages, especially with the browser toolbars that Dell, Lenovo and MSI saw fit to pre-install. Storage is yet another area of compromise. Limited amounts of flash memory left only about 3 gigabytes free on the Acer, 10 GB on the Dell and 15 on the Acer. The Lenovo and the MSI used hard drives with 50 to 60 gigabytes open. Those drives took a toll in battery life, however. When asked to play through a loop of MP3s while reloading two news Web sites, the MSI expired in two hours, the Lenovo in 2 hours 15 minutes. Expandability is on the short side, with only two or three USB ports each, plus a memory-card reader (SD cards only on the Acer and Asus, SD and Memory Stick on the Dell, MSI and Lenovo models). The Dell, MSI and Lenovo computers also included Bluetooth wireless. Most of these netbooks’ software was also problematic. The Lenovo and MSI netbooks arrived with Windows XP Home, which seems a safe choice but doesn’t fit here. These limited machines have little room for the wealth of software Windows supports. The open-source Linux operating system costs less (as in zero) and provides far better security. And as it’s set up on the Acer, Asus and Dell, it features all the basic tools you might need: the Firefox browser, music and photo tools, and the Microsoft-compatible OpenOffice productivity suite. Acer put all these options behind a remarkably simple interface, with large, can’t-miss shortcuts for each installed program. Unfortunately, adding software to it required far more tinkering than most users would accept. It also failed to print anything, even though it claimed to recognize an HP printer/scanner. Asus’ version of Linux looks almost as simple but badly needs to be simplified once you get past the first layer of program shortcuts. And it wasn’t much more hospitable to add-on programs. Dell, by contrast, bundled Ubuntu Linux, a slightly more complicated but far more capable version of Linux that easily stands up to XP. If only the Mini didn’t have such a wretched keyboard. If you’re buying a netbook as your sole computer, knowing that you’ll only use it on the Web, Acer offers the best bet for now. If, however, you’re buying it as a third or fourth computer and are willing to tweak it to fit your own needs, look at the MSI. But it might be better to wait. If these manufacturers have the good sense to steal each other’s best ideas, we should see significantly better choices before long. —
By arrangement with LA Times-Washington Post
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Delhi Durbar THE new Home Minister, P Chidambaram, is likely to continue having his say in the affairs of the Finance Ministry despite the fact that he has been given a mammoth task of managing the country’s security in the wake of the Mumbai terror attack. This is evident from the latest government move under which Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will hold the reins of the Finance Ministry with inputs from P Chidambaram. The grapevine has it that the PM will be assisted by Chidamabaram in replying to questions in Parliament pertaining to the Finance
Ministry. Poor Chidambaram, a reluctant Home Minister, will certainly have his hands full but who knows he may excel in his new job as well!
All is fair in love! Surprisingly, none of the Congress colleagues of former Haryana Deputy Chief Minister Chander Mohan, who now prefers to be called Chand Mohammad following his recent conversion, has any interest in his personal affairs. When a senior Congress leader was recently quizzed about the party’s stand on the Chander Mohan issue, his response was interesting. “Let him be… it is for his family and wife to decide what to do with him,” he said, adding that as far as the Congress was concerned, it
preferred not to speak on the issue at all. While there may have been cases abroad when people have forsaken great fortunes for the sake of love, the leader from Haryana and son of former Chief Minister Bhajan Lal may, perhaps, be the first in the history of Indian politics to throw away his “takht aur taaz” for the sake of love.
Mocking BJP —SMS way As the results of the assembly elections in Delhi started pouring in with trends predicting a loss for the BJP, a trail of SMS messages started to flow on mobile phones targeting the BJP leadership, especially those who were directly in charge of the party campaign in the national capital. The first SMS targeting BJP chief ministerial candidate Vijay Kumar Malhotra and the BJP’s slogan in Delhi made an interesting reading.
“BJP ko bhaari pade Malhotra”, it said, mocking the BJP slogan “Delhi ko mehngi padi Congress”. The second SMS that rolled out made Arun Jaitley its target. It
said: “Jaitley: bahar sher ghar mein dher”. Indeed, a correct assessment of the BJP leader, who has led many a party campaign successfully outside the national capital but failed miserably on his home turf. Contributed by Bhagyashree Pande, Vibha Sharma and Girija S Kaura
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