The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

Exports pick up
Recovery, however, is still weak

India’s exports have started growing, thanks to government support and recovery in the US and Europe. The exports rose for the third consecutive month in January as recession has started receding. However, experts still talk of double-dip recession. Greece’s debt troubles are sending jitters across Europe and beyond. The growth of 11.5 per cent in Indian exports in January in such a difficult global economic environment is indeed commendable. The pick-up should be seen in the context of the low base effect in 2008, which saw a swift erosion of robust export growth. India’s exports fell for 13 months from October 2008 before turning positive in November 2009.

The government can claim part of the credit for the turnaround. It had slashed the excise duty from 14 to 8 per cent and the service tax from 12 to 10 per cent to help industry cope with the global downturn. The partial rollback of the fiscal stimulus announced in the Union Budget for 2010-11 has led to a small increase in the excise duty but left the service tax unchanged. The government’s reading of the situation is still mixed. The recovery, it feels, is not on a firm ground. The Economic Survey too has sounded a note of caution. The Indian concessions to textiles and clothing exporters have led the US to lodge a complaint with the WTO. The complaint may fall through as the recent Budget has not extended the benefit of cheaper credit to the textiles sector beyond March 2010.

Exporters, like other sections of the industry, have a habit of exaggerating their problems to milk the government. They should instead focus on cost-cutting and improving quality to survive in a highly competitive global market. There is also need to look beyond the US and European markets so that trouble there can be countered by pushing sales elsewhere. That is a valuable lesson many have learnt from recession.

Waiting for bloom boxes
Hype and hope greet breakthrough in energy

The idea of a loaf-sized unit generating enough electricity to fulfil the entire power needs of an American home or four or more homes in the developing countries, existed till now in the realms of science fiction alone. But thanks to the public presentation in California last week by the clean tech start-up, Bloom Energy, it now appears far closer to reality.

It was not surprising, therefore, when the announcement of the public unveiling of the so-called ‘Bloom boxes’ created a buzz in the Silicon valley which is normally associated with a new product launched by Apple and its founder Steve Jobs. That the incredible breakthrough in the energy sector was being spearheaded by an Indian-American, K.R. Sridhar, who had founded the start-up almost a decade ago, possibly caused more than a little excitement in India. Sridhar’s Bloom Boxes promised to generate electricity in one’s own backyard and free the consumer from dependence on companies supplying electricity through transformers and cables. A captive in-home power plant which is affordable, generates no sound or smoke and does not require heavy-duty maintenance appeared too good to be true.

To be fair to Sridhar, he has been quick to describe the Bloom Box as a product ‘of the future’. He has not claimed to have discovered a new principle or theory in Physics. The only secret he has kept up his sleeve is the coating of chemicals on ceramic plates which, when they come in contact with oxygen and some kind of fossil fuel, helps generate electric currents. What, however, lends credibility to his work is that the boxes have actually been used for the past ten months or so by companies like Google and e-Bay in their headquarters. And both the companies have reported that the boxes have enabled them to cut down on the cost of energy.

With the developing world yet to catch up with the high levels of energy consumption in developed countries, the hunger for energy is bound to grow. With the growth in demand, the cost of energy will become dearer and the race for newer and more affordable sources sources of energy is getting hotter. It is time India’s technological muscle too is directed towards meaningful research for energy security.

Thought for the Day

I can’t help it, the idea of the infinite torments me.— Alfred de Musset

ARTICLE

Pakistan opens a new front
Yet India remains immobilised
by G. Parthasarathy

EVEN as Pakistan steps up a concerted anti-Indian offensive on issues ranging from terrorism and Afghanistan to nuclear issues and river waters, the Indian establishment appears confused, divided and uncertain. Barely two days after Pakistan’s Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir described the evidence provided by India on the 26/11 outrage as mere “literature” and not “evidence,” the ISI’s Taliban allies struck at Indian nationals living in the heart of Kabul. Mr Bashir was reflecting the triumphalism in Pakistan over what was perceived as their diplomatic success in getting the Americans to force India to return to the dialogue table.

A spokesman of the Haqqani network, operating from across the Durand Line in North Waziristan, claimed responsibility for the Kabul attack. The Haqqani network had masterminded the attacks on the Indian Embassy in Kabul in 2008 and 2009. American journalist David Sanger was briefed in detail about Pakistan’s links with the Taliban by the staff of the Bush Administration’s Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell. Mr Sanger writes: “Musharraf’s record of duplicity was well known (in Washington). While Kayani was a favourite of the White House, he had also been overheard — presumably on telephone intercepts — referring to the most brutal of Taliban leaders, Jalaluddin Haqqani, as a “strategic asset”.

McConnell’s successor Admiral Dennis Blair also testified on February 2 that under General Kayani, Rawalpindi continues its support of a number of Afghan Taliban groups. All this is happening at a time when following the Istanbul and London conferences Pakistan is openly proclaiming that it will play the predominant role in “reintegrating” the Taliban in Afghanistan’s national life and that India has no role to play in Afghanistan. One hears some influential American friends now tell Indian interlocutors that India should reduce the “salience” of its role in Afghanistan.

While this may not be what the Obama Administration officially states, it is interesting that unlike Al-Qaeda, Taliban cadres are no longer described by the Americans as “terrorists,” but as “insurgents”. Mere platitudes are not enough to deal with this situation. India has thus far unquestioningly followed the American lead in Afghanistan. Has the time not come to tell the Obama Administration that we are tired of listening to calls for “dialogue” and that we could choose to review our policies on Afghanistan, by reviving old links we had with Iran, Russia, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan and by charting out a more independent path on relations with the Karzai government? Should we not devise a comprehensive strategy for responding effectively to Pakistan’s efforts to “bleed” us through a thousand cuts.

Pakistan has now opened a new front in its propaganda war against India. Though Pakistan’s Indus Waters Commissioner has stated that there is no evidence that India is violating the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT), national hysteria is being whipped up, led by General Kayani, alleging that India is deliberately denying Pakistan its legitimate share of river waters from the western rivers — the Indus, the Jhelum and the Chenab. The reality is that though the IWT permits India to build storage facilities of 3.6 million acreage feet (MAF), no such facility has been built so far, enabling an unimpeded flow to Pakistan. Moreover, while the Treaty permits India to irrigate 1.34 million acres from the western rivers, India is currently irrigating only 0.792 million acres from the western rivers. India would also be well advised to undertake measures for fuller utilisation of the waters of the eastern rivers whose waters continue to flow into Pakistan.

The Pakistan government’s own papers make it clear that Pakistan does not face a shortage of water (it receives a total of 139 MAF against the total flow of 169 MAF of water flows from six rivers of the Indus basin), but is faced with a crisis caused by poor and inequitable utilisation, with the lower riparian Sind and Balochistan provinces being deprived of their legitimate water requirements, by Army-dominated Punjab province. An inter-provincial accord on water sharing of 1991 lies in tatters because of the refusal of Punjab to abide by its provisions.

People in Sind province are finding that the Indus waters barely reach the Kotri Barrage and that their Southern districts are experiencing salinity because of the inflow of sea water. It is time New Delhi undertook an imaginative propaganda offensive on this issue, especially directed at the people of Sind and Balochistan. Finally, Pakistan seeks to deliberately delay the construction of hydro-electric projects in Jammu and Kashmir, even as it claims to be a champion of the Kashmiri people. New Delhi should go ahead with these projects undeterred by Pakistani propaganda, which inevitably stands exposed when the issue is posed to a neutral expert under the IWT.

Precisely a week before Pakistan’s Foreign Secretary arrived in India, Mr Zamir Akram, its Permanent Representative to the Commission on Disarmament (CD) in Geneva, launched a propaganda barrage against India claiming that India was responsible for nuclear proliferation in South Asia, that it had compelled Pakistan to go nuclear and thereafter test nuclear weapons in May 1998, by its nuclear tests in 1974 and 1998. He denounced the India-US nuclear deal and the subsequent end to international sanctions against India by the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) and demanded that Pakistan be granted similar waiver.

Mr Akram conveniently ignored the fact that Pakistan decided to go nuclear well before India’s 1974 nuclear test, that Pakistan is known to have tested a nuclear weapons on Chinese soil in 1990 and that the size, composition and nature of India’s nuclear deterrent are determined not merely by what Pakistan does, but primarily by developments in China.

While India need not descend to the level of Pakistan in blatant propaganda, South Block fails to realise that, led by General Kayani, Pakistan’s ruling military establishment has persuaded itself that it wields huge leverage with an Obama Administration, which has set a date for the commencement of withdrawal from Afghanistan and desperately needs Pakistan’s cooperation for a face-saving withdrawal. As viewed from Pakistan’s GHQ in Rawalpindi, New Delhi is perceived to lack any clear or consistent policy and appears ever ready to meekly bend to American diktats. The Indian government has only itself to blame for allowing this impression to gain ground internationally and domestically. The decision to suddenly change direction and agree to talks between Foreign Secretaries even before the Home Minister paid a scheduled visit to Islamabad has only strengthened this impression.

Unless the Union Cabinet sets its house in order and devises a clear policy of imposing high costs for Pakistani support to terrorism against India and Indian assets abroad, we will be perceived internationally as a nation incapable of defending its vital interests.

MIDDLE

Of the mind’s business
by Rajbir Deswal

Mind your own business” is not generally followed by a pleasing “please,” in tow, but a kind of disgusting gust, bordering on the side of rudeness and riddance-seeking, like swatting a bug with a “Go away or get off !” The true connotations tantamount to almost the expletives of the expression, which eluded me many times I was told to, ‘mind my own business’!

I had never known how seriously did the South Indian matinee idol Rajni Kant flaunt his verbalised challenging aggression, when he let loose that “maaeend it,” on his detractors, thereby flooring them more with the “valour of his tongue,” than the sword of his sinewy gesture, of slashing of the still air made musical by a thichang-phichang variety of the obtaining symphony in sync(-apologies Mr Shakespeare!).

Enlightenment came my way when I had to tell a musician to mind his business (of playing his guitar), on the pavement at Piccadilly Circus, in London. Obviously I had refused to, when he wanted me to, cough up money (that too in Sterling — my mind’s calculation again being at play!) after having shot his video in my handycam. He almost held me by the collar when my host told to him to “mind his bloody business” — one time again.

At home, our own variety of beggar-musicians don’t indulge in that kind of behaviour. Rather, they either ignore you or at the most hurl an innocuous curse invoking the Gods, for they know we understand Almighty, expecting us to “mind our business of charity.”

On a serious note, the business of mind is always productive to a great extent. But unfortunately that is not the intention of the one exhorting a hurl like that, rather, it is to just implore the offender in carrying on whatever business is at his hand, be it counting waves on a seashore or finding forms in clouds in the sky. Generally we refer to the mind’s business as the obtaining occupation.

But yes, if you tell someone to mind his business he may quip, “I have no business to mind!.” And also maybe he has a Freudian slip to blurt out, to make matters worse, like when once President Bush reportedly said in a speech he was giving to a group of teachers, “I’d like to spank all teachers.” Probably he wanted to say “thank” all the teachers; then they could have retorted, “Mr Prez, mind your own business of tackling the Iraq war!”

Mind blowing, mind boggling, mind washing, mind tracking; all these are understandable, but what is ‘mindless?’ — particularly when it qualifies, violence. How can violence be mindless, since a sharp machination and well-orchestrated endeavour go into its execution. It definitely becomes the mind’s business then. Which again means that mind’s business may always not be productive!

Sometimes it happens that you dial a wrong number, but surely the one at that time in your mind, which turns out to be a wrong one, because you were absent minded, and still captured in your own mind’s cobweb — of not letting you go “astray”. Isn’t it your mind’s business that you are minding at that time?

Remember the “absent minded professor” Brainard, missing his wedding to Betsy Carlisle, as a result of discovery of the Flubber? Was he really out of his mind? Or did he take his mind’s business a tad too seriously, in deciding not to marry at all. As I said, the mind’s business could be productive. And counterproductive too.

By the way, my course-mate while pursuing our Masters in English Literature, who whenever empathised with an assuaging ‘“Don’t mind” always quipped with a ‘I don’t have a mind to mind”, is a Reader in the English Department of a university. Shouldn’t I mind my own business!

OPED

Defence doctrine
Facing up to war on two fronts
by Gurmeet Kanwal

The Army Chief, Gen Deepak Kapoor's statement during the Army Training Command doctrine seminar in end-December 2009 that the Indian Army must prepare for a "two-front war" stirred a hornet's nest. Pakistan's Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi termed the statement "irresponsible".

Pakistan's official spokesman said such statements betrayed a hostile intent as well as a hegemonic and jingoistic mindset that is out of step with the realities of the time. "No one should ever underestimate our capability and determination to foil any nefarious designs against the security of Pakistan."

The Pakistani media also went ballistic. In fact, if any jingoism was displayed, it was by the Pakistani media. Ayesha Siddiqa wrote in Dawn on January 8, 2010, "Taking on two neighbours militarily and ensuring a ceasefire on its condition is New Delhi's dream."

Another commentator wrote, "Boasting of acquiring a capability for simultaneously taking on China and Pakistan, General Kapoor is bestowing a status upon India which, though highly desirable from an Indian perspective, simply belongs to the realm of impossibility."

Though the Chinese government did not react formally, Chinese analysts have been expressing their concerns for some time about a shift in India's military posture from defensive to "active and aggressive".

Hao Ding, an analyst at the Chinese Academy of Military Sciences, wrote on November 27, 2009, in the party-affiliated Chinese language paper China Youth Daily, "From the point of view of strategic guidelines, India has shifted to a line of 'active and aggressive defence', as a departure from the past position of 'passive defence'… In matters of strategic deployment, India has shifted to a strategy of stabilising the western front and strengthening the northern front as well as giving equal emphasis to land and sea warfare, in contrast to the earlier stress only on land warfare."

Pakistan and China's reactions notwithstanding, every single officer in India's armed forces is convinced that if there is another conflict, China and Pakistan would collude with each other and so India must prepare for a two-front war.

Even though no one actually wants a war, it is clear as daylight that if there is one, both of these military adversaries will act in concert. The reasons for this conviction are self-evident as the collusive nuclear-missile-military hardware nexus between China and Pakistan poses a major strategic challenge to India.

China is known to have provided direct assistance to Pakistan for its nuclear weapons programme, including nuclear warhead designs and enough HEU (highly enriched uranium) for at least two nuclear bombs.

China is known to have provided assistance and transferred dual-use technology and materials for the development of nuclear weapons.

China has also helped Pakistan to build a secret reactor to produce weapons-grade plutonium at the Chashma nuclear facility. China has transferred M-9 and M-11 nuclear-capable ballistic missiles and has facilitated the transfer of Taepo Dong and No Dong ballistic missiles from North Korea to Pakistan.

China and Pakistan have jointly developed a fighter aircraft - JF-17 Thunder/ FC-1 Fierce - and a main battle tank - Al Khalid, besides other military hardware like anti-tank missiles.

China has "guaranteed Pakistan's territorial integrity" and in the words of the leaders of the two countries, their friendship is "higher than the mountains and deeper than the oceans."

As part of its "string of pearls" strategy in the Indian Ocean, China has built a port for Pakistan at Gwadar on the Makran Coast. This port could be upgraded to a naval base for Chinese naval vessels with minimum effort.

China is clearly engaged in the strategic encirclement of India. During the 1965 and 1971 India-Pakistan wars, China had made some threatening military manoeuvres in Tibet in support of Pakistan.

It is also noteworthy that during the Kargil conflict in 1999, Chinese military advisers were reported to have been present at Skardu in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir.

China and India have failed to satisfactorily resolve their territorial and boundary dispute since the two nations fought a war over it in 1962 despite 14 rounds of talks between political interlocutors and many meetings of the Joint Working Group.

Even the Line of Actual Control (LAC) has not been clearly demarcated on military maps and on the ground due to China's intransigence. Patrol face-offs are common and an armed clash could take place any time. If it is not contained quickly, such a clash could lead to another border conflict.

Of late, while stability prevails at the strategic level, China has exhibited marked political, diplomatic and military aggressiveness at the tactical level. This has led to anxiety about Chinese intentions.

Hence, Indian analysts have concluded that during a future Indian military conflict with China, Pakistan is likely to come to China's military aid and vice versa. While the ability to fight on two fronts may be aspirational rather than real at present, recognition of the need to prepare for such an eventuality will drive future doctrine, strategy and force structures.

If the defence budget cannot sustain the capital expenditure that will be necessary to prepare for a two-front scenario, Indian diplomacy must ensure that the armed forces will never be required to face two military adversaries simultaneously.

And, if the Ministry of External Affairs cannot provide such a guarantee, India should be looking for a military alliance, despite the fact that Indian policy-makers dislike that term and not joining military alliances is a key element of India's foreign policy. A nation's foreign policy and national security policy must reflect the prevailing strategic environment.

The writer is the Director, Centre for Land Warfare Studies, New Delhi.

Migrant labour in Ludhiana
by Harpreet Kaur Bains

THE skilled or unskilled labour from other states, mostly from Bihar and UP, keeps farms and factories of Ludhiana moving all the year round. Its contribution to agriculture and industry is so vital that one sometimes begins to wonder if these two sectors can really run without it. After having entered into these major areas in a big way, it has penetrated now into almost every field and economic activity.

How they are attracted to this city can easily be noticed at Ludhiana railway station where they get down every year in large numbers. Though they keep coming throughout the year, they arrive in large groups during the sowing and harvesting seasons.

Farmers from all over the state come to Ludhiana railway station in order to take them along to their farms. A good number of them have been coming to Punjab for the last many years and after getting down at Ludhiana go direct to farmers with whom they have already worked or with whom they are well acquainted.

They are usually well-versed with their work and prove to be of great help to farmers. There is generally a good equation between the two and they both seem to be an integral and inseparable part of the farming process.

Realising their importance in the day-to-day work, many farmers employ them as full-time workers. Most of them are hard working and devoted to the task entrusted to them. They work from early morning till late at night without the least regard to their personal comfort.

Scientists of Punjab Agricultural University have rightly underlined their contribution to the development of agriculture in Punjab. If the district of Ludhiana has won the rare distinction of achieving the highest yield per acre in wheat in the world, the role of these solid, sturdy and steely hands can hardly be underestimated.

Some experts have gone to the extent of counting this determined and dependable labour force as one of the factors responsible for ushering in an era of economic prosperity in the agricultural sector of Punjab.

On account of their diligence and sense of duty, they have found a place in almost all factories of the town. It has been observed that many factory owners prefer them to local labour in the matter of employment. The reason is that they are simple, submissive, mind their own business and create no problems for the employers.

Most of them have acquired the skills required in the units where they work. They are, therefore, engaged on the daily wages as well as on a contractual basis.

It is perhaps due to this skilled and cheap labour that the exporters of Ludhiana can successfully compete in the highly competitive international markets and sell their products like hosiery goods, bicycles, bicycle parts, sewing machines, etc, at better prices.

With the liberalisation of the Indian economy, the exports from this city are steadily going up. With an increase in exports, labour from the other states is now more and more in demand.

Earlier, skilled labour from Hoshiarpur and other backward areas of Punjab used to come to Ludhiana and work on construction sites. With its mass exodus to the Gulf countries a vacuum-like situation was created which has been set right by equally efficient masons, carpenters, painters, etc, from Bihar and UP. Local contractors engage them without any hesitation and rely on them for all kinds of work. In several parts of Ludhiana, fruit and vegetable rehris and shops are manned by them.

Some of them have migrated to this part of the country along with their families and intend to stay here for comparatively longer periods. Their women and children assist them in their jobs or work in homes as part-time servants in order to supplement the family income.

A sudden serious trouble involving migrants erupted in Ludhiana recently when incidents of mob violence took place in certain areas of the town and there was considerable loss of life and property.

Fortunately, good sense prevailed soon and normalcy returned in a short time. Many organisations of industrial labour, farm workers and farmers along with trade union activists held protest demonstration, demanding justice for the affected migrant families.

Thus there was a strong realisation among almost all sections of society that migrants play an important role in the state of Punjab, specially in agriculture and industry.

With the return of peace to the trouble-torn town, many migrant families which had left have started coming back to Ludhiana, a city which offers to them many opportunities for remunerative work.

One can reasonably hope that in the years to come there will be a substantial growth in the trade and commerce of this city and it will hold out a market big enough to absorb the ever-increasing number of labourers from other states.n

Civil unrest after quake in Chile
by Jimmy Langman

The Chilean city just 50 kilometres from the epicentre of the weekend's devastating earthquake was finally becalmed by the introduction of martial law on Tuesday. But as frightened locals in Concepcion, Chile's second largest city, barricaded themselves inside their homes, the country was still struggling to get aid to the areas that needed it most.

About 3,000 troops patrolled the city yesterday as the nationwide death toll across the country rose to 796. President Michelle Bachelet had deployed the soldiers to quell looting and civil unrest. The declaration of martial law brought the city under curfew overnight until midday yesterday; the conditions were reimposed at 6 o'clock last night.

Local residents had begun to pour into the streets soon after the earthquake hit. And with the government unable to respond quickly enough to meet their needs, hundreds of poor residents eventually broke into supermarkets in search of food. Soon mobs were ransacking whatever they could get hold of throughout the city.

Angelea Villalobos, 41, saw looters driven back from a supermarket by police using tear gas and water cannons on Sunday. Now she and her family are barricaded in the rubble of their 1932 home and storefront. She and her neighbours have set up makeshift fences to keep outsiders at bay. Last night, she heard guns fired. "Until yesterday, this was a lawless no man's land," she said.

Others, like Caroline Poblete, 34, a housewife with two children, have complained that the government's response has been slow and inadequate. "I did not support General Augusto Pinochet, but right now we could use a Pinochet," she said in disgust. On Tuesday, the central authorities were still calculating how to get food, water and medical supplies to the worst-hit areas.

In Concepcion, basic services are still lacking in most of the city. Many residents ride the streets on bicycles as they have no access to petrol. Water service has been restored to only a few homes in the city centre. Buses are arriving carrying worried family members. And today newspapers arrived for the first time since the earthquake hit early on Saturday morning.

The reports from other parts of the country were not good. Aid workers in some of the smaller rural towns and port cities along the south-central coastline reported finding scenes of destruction worse than some had ever encountered before.

"I have never seen anything like this," said Paula Saez, a relief worker with World Vision who had only just returned from Haiti. She was reporting from Dichato, a small fishing town that like many others along the coast was hit first by the rattling of the ground that loosened buildings and moments later by an enormous rolling tsunami that smashed homes or simply lifted them from the ground. "Boats are in the middle of the city. The earthquake damaged some things but the sea took everything away."

Elsewhere, horrified locals heard of a busload of 40 holidaying retirees swept out to the ocean in the town of Pelluhue. And in the port city of Talcahuano, as many as 180,000 people are homeless, with 10,000 homes uninhabitable and many more in ruins, Mayor Gaston Saavedra reported last night.

The earthquake in Chile has probably shortened the length of the day by about 1.26 millionths of a second, according to a Nasa study. The magnitude 8.8 quake may have moved on its axis by about 7cm, Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory says.

Dr Richard Gross, a scientist at the laboratory in Pasadena, California, has calculated that the strength of the quake and its location resulted in a slight movement of the Earth's figure axis, around which the mass of the planet is balanced. One implication of the shift is that the speed of rotation around this axis has probably increased so that the day length has been shortened – a reversal of the historic process of the Earth's rotation slowing down and the days getting gradually longer over the millennia as a consequence.

— By arrangement with The Independent