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Down the drain
Young man in a hurry |
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Pay for ‘bandhs’
Afghan worries over US pullback
Military audit
THE TRIBUNe CAMPAIGN
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Down the drain
THE monsoons are an annual occurrence. Equally regular are the tall claims made prior to them by officials that all flood control measures are in place. But most of these have been washed away right at the start of the rainy season this year, with many places like Ambala being flooded hopelessly. The whole region has been going through a harrowing time, taking away the joy of receiving the much-awaited rain. The common man went down under mainly because the boasts of preparedness made by various departments like those of irrigation, drainage and sanitation were only on paper. When the rain came, none of them stood the test. At most places, the sufferers had to fend for themselves, rather than government agencies stepping in to lessen their misery. The fury of nature has been compounded by human avarice. In rural areas, ponds have vanished. These not only used to store considerable amount of water but also replenished underground aquifers. Many of the new colonies have come up on beds of seasonal rivulets. Many others have no storm water drainage facilities. Many municipalities do not have funds to keep sewerage functional, let alone setting up new sewer lines. It is ironical that while Punjab and Haryana fight over river waters, they do not make any serious attempt to harvest rainwater, which not only goes waste but also causes floods. The situation has been made worse by the breaching of various canals. The root cause is that there has been a sharp decline in the amount spent on cleaning and maintaining the canal system. Even this meagre sum goes more towards lining the pockets of contractors and officials than towards the lining of canals. All these errors of commission and omission combined this time to rain misery on Punjab, Haryana and many other states. The end result is that the people who had been praying all along for bountiful monsoons have already started wishing that there is no more downpour. What an irony!
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Young man in a hurry
THE battle lines in Andhra Pradesh are clearly drawn with a defiant Kadapa MP, Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy, having decided to resume his second phase of yatra from Icchapuram in Srikakulam district on July 8 and the Congress high command sternly warning him not to do so. On June 29, Congress president Sonia Gandhi advised Jagan, son of the late Chief Minister, Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, not to undertake the yatra through the sensitive Telangana region, still tense over the statehood controversy. She told him that if he wanted to console the kin of those who either committed suicide or died of shock following his father’s death in an air crash last October, they could be assembled at one spot and given financial help. However, he rejected her suggestion. His first phase of the yatra was suspended on May 28 after the Mahbubnagar violence by Telangana protesters. Many observers see the yatra as Jagan’s desperate attempt to bully the high command following his failure to fast-track his political career and get himself catapulted to the Chief Minister’s chair. As Chief Minister K. Rosaiah is firmly in the saddle, Jagan has been trying to wrest the chair from him, little realising that capturing power is not always a cakewalk. While Rosaiah himself can boast of decades of experience in the party and as a minister in successive governments, the late Rajasekhara Reddy slowly worked up the party ladder and took 25 years to become the Chief Minister. Meanwhile, Rosaiah has sent a curt message to the party MLAs not to join the second phase of Jagan’s yatra, as participation in it would amount to indiscipline. Though it would be premature to guess how many MLAs would now join his yatra, it is clear that he is steadily losing his hold over the party and the legislators. Indeed, according to indications available, fearing disciplinary action by the high command, ministers, MLAs and other senior leaders close to Jagan have decided to boycott the yatra. It is a moot point what action the high command will take against Jagan for his open defiance of its diktat. But he would do well to understand that compliance, not defiance of the party directive, and some amount of patience may help him gain the leadership’s confidence. Bullying the party through blackmailing tactics will take him nowhere. |
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Pay for ‘bandhs’
Considering
the sporadic violence political parties resorted to once again
while enforcing Bharat Bandh on Monday, one would say there is a
strong case for extending an earlier path-breaking direction issued by
the Mumbai High Court. The court had held that political parties must
be made to make good the losses caused by violence during bandhs. The
high court had, in fact, imposed a fine of Rs 20 lakh each on the Shiv
Sena and the Bharatiya Janata Party in 2004-05 for calling and
enforcing a bandh to protest against a terror attack. Acting on the
direction, the Mumbai police had also managed to recover the cost of
damaged public and private property in some cases. On Monday also the
Mumbai police is learnt to have made good the use of the video cameras
given to it in recording the acts of vandalism and violence by workers
of the political parties while enforcing Bharat Bandh. Armed with such
video footage, some of which was acquired from TV channels too, the
police is expected to identify the miscreants and recover from them
the cost or compensation. The Supreme Court, which had upheld in
2007 a Kerala High Court order banning bandhs, clarified in 2009 that
while bandhs or complete shutdowns were illegal, “strikes and
hartals” were not. While industrial shutdowns are recognised as
legitimate forms of protest, no industrial law, however, upholds
violence or damage to public or private property. In any case, there
can be no legal, moral or political justification for damaging public
or private property or unleashing violence in a bid to enforce a bandh
or a strike. While political parties are against imposing a total ban
on bandhs as that would amount to stifling the voice of dissent, they
should have no caveat to a consensus on a ban on violence. There is,
therefore, a strong case for having a specific law governing the role
and liability of political parties and citizens during strikes and
bandhs. It is necessary to make them accountable for their action
during political protests and establish a legitimate system of
recovering the losses for damages. |
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A riot is at bottom the language of the unheard.— Martin Luther King
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Afghan worries over US pullback
Addressing the annual dinner of the Royal Asiatic Society in London in 1908, when Czarist Russia was expanding its influence in Central Asia and the “Great Game” for power and influence in Afghanistan was on, Lord Curzon proclaimed: “If the Asia Society exists and is meeting in fifty or hundred years hence, Afghanistan will be as vital and important a question as it is now.” His words were prophetic. The Soviet Union disintegrated in December 1991, after the western world chose to bleed Afghanistan during its ill-advised occupation of that country. More than a century after he spoke, the United States appears trapped in a quagmire, which many believe would lead to it becoming yet another Great Power bloodied and disgraced in a seemingly endless campaign in Afghanistan. President Obama has declared that his country’s objective is to “disrupt, dismantle and defeat Al-Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan.” The American strategy has been to assist Afghanistan’s elected government and build its military strength while at the same time using its forces to cripple the Taliban, which hosts Al-Qaeda on the territory it controls in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The Americans have also proceeded on the naive assumption that Pakistan would act decisively on its soil against the Taliban and Al-Qaeda. What has happened instead is that following the insensitive handling of Afghanistan’s President and starry-eyed illusions that General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani could be charmed into ending ISI support for the Taliban, the Americans are finding themselves trapped in a political and military quagmire in Afghanistan. Concerned at the prospects of an early American withdrawal from Afghanistan, President Karzai, for long a bitter foe of the ISI, is now asking Pakistan’s notorious intelligence agency to help him broker a deal involving “reconciliation” with Taliban military commander Sirajuddin Haqqani, a long-term “strategic asset” of the ISI, who has masterminded virtually every attack against Indians and the Indian Embassy in Afghanistan. According to American academic Jeffrey Dressler, both Sirajuddin Haqqani and his father Jalaluddin Haqqani have been long-term assets of the ISI. They are both members of the ruling council of the Taliban, headed by Mullah Omar. Jalaluddin Haqqani, together with the ISI, has established and supported Osama bin Laden’s jihadi network in Afghanistan and Pakistan since 1988. When the Americans invaded Afghanistan in October 2001, Osama escaped from the US bombing of the caves where he was hiding in Tora Bora. He was escorted to North Waziristan and has since been protected by the Haqqani network there. The Haqqani network, now led by Sirajuddin Haqqani, openly claims that its support for Al-Qaeda today is “at its highest limit.” It also provides haven and support to jihadis from Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, Chechnya, the Kurdish areas of Iran and Iraq and even from Germany. While General Kayani has stonewalled and stalled American requests to crackdown on the Haqqani network in North Waziristan on one pretext or another, the Americans were dumbfounded to learn that behind their backs the Pakistan Army was seeking to persuade President Karzai to give a leading role, probably involving de facto control of southern Afghanistan, to start with, to their protégé Sirajuddin Haqqani — an Islamic radical with inseparable links with Al-Qaeda. The original sinner in this misguided attempt for “reintegration” and “reconciliation” with the Taliban is British Foreign Secretary David Miliband, who evidently believed that by handing over the control of Afghanistan to the ISI, he could secure ISI support to deal with the radicals of Pakistani origin, now resident in the UK. The Russians have strongly opposed talks of “reconciliation” with the Taliban because they view any return of the Taliban as a recipe for radicalisation of Central Asia and the Caucasus. On July 1 an official spokesman of the Russian Foreign Office warned: “Attempts by the Afghan leadership with the support of western countries to establish a negotiation process with Taliban leaders to build a mechanism for national ‘reconciliation’ gives us serious cause for concern”. The spokesman added: “Work to return repentant Taliban militants to civilian life should not be replaced with a campaign to rehabilitate the entire Taliban movement”. Alluding the Taliban demands for American withdrawal as a precondition for any dialogue, Chinese “analysts” aver: “War is prevailing and continuing (in Afghanistan) and the peace process has not started. Peace on the foundation of conditions is not possible if the Taliban are not weakened”. The question that arises is that why General Kayani, scheduled to retire in a few months, is so keen on pushing “reconciliation” with the Haqqani network, backed by his ISI geniuses, when a well-known American analyst like Dressler says: ”The Haqqanis rely on Al-Qaeda for mass appeal, funding and training. In return, they provide Al-Qaeda with shelter and protection, to strike at foreign forces in Afghanistan and beyond. Any negotiated settlement with the Haqqanis threatens to undermine the raison d’être of US involvement in Afghanistan for over the past decade.” One can only conclude that like the Taliban leadership General Kayani and the ISI believe that Taliban resistance will force an early American exit from Afghanistan, with US readiness to agree to any settlement that helps in “face saving”. Concerned at the coming US withdrawal, President Karzai appears to be willing to cut a deal in desperation with the ISI and Mullah Omar, after peremptorily sacking or sidelining key officials suspicious of Pakistani intentions, like Intelligence Chief Amrullah Saleh and Army Chief General Bismillah Khan. Karzai himself is a Pashtun of the Durrani clan, which has constituted the ruling elite of Afghanistan since 1747 till the ISI-backed Taliban takeover in 1994 by Mullah Omar, who is a Ghilzai Pashtun. Sirajuddin Haqqani is also a Ghilzai Pashtun. The Ghilzais have not been as strong votaries of a “Pashtunistan” as the Durrani elite. Pakistan seeks to marginalise the Durranis and create a Durrani-Ghilzai divide, primarily to dilute and erode Pashtun nationalist sentiments. These are the factors External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna will have to bear in mind when he visits Kabul later this month. The Pakistan military evidently believes that bleeding the Americans out of Afghanistan is a prelude to dealing similarly later with India. General Kayani could, however, well be making political and diplomatic miscalculations akin to the blunders of other ambitious Generals like Ayub Khan, Yahya Khan, Zia-ul-Haq and Pervez Musharraf who led Pakistan to grief. Presuming that the ISI can get the Taliban to bleed the Americans quickly out of Afghanistan is a strategy with far-reaching and dangerous implications. Pakistan’s Generals may think they are clever. They are not necessarily
wise.
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Military audit Capture of Gwalior fort on a 200-feet-high scarped and isolated rock on August 3, 1780 was a rare military feat. When all else failed, Major Popham got made special set of cotton-stuffed boots for a rigorously trained small team under Captain Bruce. They climbed the fort-wall, jumped in noiselessly, quickly fought the guards and opened the gates for East India Company troops to enter. The fort fell without loss of life. Popham was highly decorated and subsequently retired; but in final settlement, he found a hefty sum deducted. After enquiry, he learnt, audit had objected that those boots were neither in regulation nor was he the competent financial authority! This shows “Audit-department” for military forces existed even then, just as today! Initially “audit-observations” are on rough sheets for a discussion at sub-unit (Major’s) level; then with unit-QM (who, though a Captain, holds the key to all the ‘materials’). ‘Observations’ can be nipped in the bud, before becoming ‘objections’, with advice from the auditors themselves. That secret can’t be divulged! There is fun too in audit! Pensioners have to submit annual certificates during November of being ‘alive’! You miss your ‘date’ or the certificate, the pension misses you! High altitude allowance was objected to at a place, being a foot short of the defined height. CO replied that when standing, men fulfilled the requirements; objection was withdrawn. Pointing out ‘carelessness’ in spelling snacks as ‘snakes’, its purchase from Annual Training Grant by the Commando Wing was once objected to. Army’s reply: “It wasn’t snacks but snakes for training of commandos”! Objection had to be waived off. (Remember Commando Nana Patekar, holding a snake in ‘Prahaar’)! After WW-II, Britain took reparations from Japan and compensated British soldiers who had fought against Japan and the allies in Africa. But Indian soldiers were ignored. Our governments too did not, till very recently, as audit stated, “soldiers had fought for another government”! On pickets troops normally leave after early breakfast, carrying packed lunch, to be self-contained during unforeseen delays due to landslides, rains etc: ‘Ab ka khana pet mein, agla khana pack mein”! On arrival at Base, any good unit would give them a hot meal; with lunch-presence marked at both locations! Observing this and working out the number of extra rations, auditors said, unit must either pay or “under-draw” equal quantity. A visit to the same auditors to sort out the mess (pun intended) provided the answer: write to brigade for enquiry to verify the extra rations drawn, while quickly under-drawing that quantity. That was done within next week. Committee convened after a week could find nothing amiss! Once in seven years, CAG-team (‘Test-Audit-Team’) visits. Their ‘objections’ become ‘Audit Paras’ in CAG-reports to Parliament. The juicier the find (like the electric carts in Chandigarh Golf Course allegedly meant for hospitals), the better the chances of a good ACR for the auditor. Now from the air force. Unaware that each runway has two directions and only one is in use at a time, for landing/take-off, an objection was raised on construction of two runways in an airfield (eg, Magnetic Direction 09/18)! Auditor was taken to the airfield and explained; objection waived! Once a trainee-pilot lost his bearings and could not locate his base! Running out of fuel, he ejected. Court of Inquiry held none to blame as the pilot was inexperienced. Auditors agreed but with a proviso that “the lost bearings be recovered”, not realising that the phrase meant ‘relative position’, a usage dating from the 1600s! Finally, a classic. A son was born on the night of July 14 to the sergeant-major of a British Army regiment in India. The father proudly registered it and received acknowledgement that the name has been entered in the records w.e.f. July 15. Sergeant-major complained but was shown a paragraph in the Military Accounting Code (India) which read: ‘Troops disembarking in the afternoon will be taken on strength as from the following morning, being deemed to have received rations on board before off-loading!’
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THE TRIBUNe CAMPAIGN The Sukhna Lake has filled up with the recent rainfall, but all is certainly not well with it. We need to look beyond the immediate future and find out ways in which this landmark of Chandigarh can be salvaged, The Tribune canvassed experts and sought their advice. Here are suggestions that can become the basis of a blueprint for action. 
Do an ecological audit
2. Watershed Management and Restoration Action Plan through gully control, vegetation contour ‘bunding’, water harvesting structures, etc. 3. Conservation of biodiversity and checking the introduction of Invasive Alien Species (IAS) of plants and animals. 4. Creation of permanent and active monitoring body of scientific experts for the maintenance of water quality and quantity. 5. Legislative and administrative measures with a mechanism of public participation.
Clean silt from lake-bed 2. The project can provide better results under a single authority. Centre’s intervention seems to be good option, in case of the Sukhna Lake. 3. The success story of silt dams in Aravari in Rajasthan has shown its impact on greening the catchment area. 4. The job of cleaning silt from the lake-bed, regularly, is of paramount importance in case of manmade lakes.
Be consistent & persistent 2. Vegetation holds the soil together and vegetation needs water. The process becomes complimentary after initial emphasis on plantation. 3. Silt retention dams are best suited for holding water sufficient for helping vegetation. 4. The catchment area of the lake is a forest area. So, instead of piecemeal handling, the project needs a comprehensive plan of action. 5. Once in a while efforts are not sufficient . The work and its implementation must be consistent, well-regulated and watched by the media.
Empty all check dams 2. There should be a rule to empty all check dams by October 15, so that the lake’s share of water is not retained in them. 3. A mechanism should be devised and be put on the lake to ensure silt-free water in the lake.
Ban urbanisation of catchment area 2. Total ban on urbanisation of catchment area, especially in the villages, including Khuda Ali Sher, Kansal, Kaimbwala and Saketri. 3. Dig out storage capacity and clear weeds from the escape channel. 4. Monitoring the programme of each department on regular basis by a senior officer from the Centre. Once the lake gets restored, the monitoring should still be done by the Adviser. 5. Spray chemical fertilisers and grass seeds after very monsoon.
Plant local vegetation 2. Afforestation policy must ensure that only those species which regulated the hydrological cycle, produced maximum oxygen and absorbed maximum carbon dioxide, besides meeting needs of the local community for fodder, fuel and food, are propagated. 3. Water does not stop naturally and will not percolate into the ground unless stopped with grass plantation over the area. 4. Chandigarh needs to follow a comprehensive and unified plan of action for saving Sukhna by combining efforts of involving the states of Punjab and Haryana which sharing the catchment area. The Centre needs to take over the project.
Make slew walls, spillways 2. The silted check dams in the catchment area should be desilted and surplus water in the check dams should be released by January every year, so that water level is maintained in the lake. 3. Spillways should be constructed for the free flow of water from check dams. Some mechanism should be devised to allow water to flow down. 4. At the regulator end of the lake, to avoid surplus water going waste due to heavy rainfall, slew wall should be constructed.
Check dams need de-silting 2. These dams should be kept functional throughout the year and should be desilted and again prepared for retaining silt during the rains.
Ensure water channel management 2. A silt removal devise in the form of a channel should be made at the regulator end and the present flow of water from upstream should be shifted to the regulator end.
Centre should take control 1. Declare Sukhna a property of National Heritage, with the Centre taking full control for its upkeep. 2. Rope in the World Bank for funding the ‘Save Sukhna’ plan and also for its upkeep. 3. A confluence pond needs to be dug up in the catchment area to prevent silt inflow. The lake needs to be divided into two parts-wet and dry. Dry dredging should be carried out in the dried-up portions. 4. Sand should be commercially disposed off. Silt could be dumped along the railway line. 5. Seek the Army’s help in de-silting the area. The Army should have no trouble in intervening to save a national heritage. 6. Bamboo grown in a pattern of ‘kila bandi’ (fort erection) will be very effective in checking the inflow of silt from the catchment area.
De-weed the lake 1. The efforts that have been made by the UT Administration are commendable and are worth replicating elsewhere. However, in case, simultaneous efforts are also made at the source feeding the Sukhna Lake, no de-silting work would be required for at least 10 years. 2. The lake has been de-weeded manually. However, latest techniques for eradicating this problem such as adoption of micro bubble technology for aerobic decomposition of weeds naturally would be the right answer.
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1. A thorough systematic ‘Ecological Audit’ of the wetland / catchment area and a thorough assessment of the soil texture, health, slope, above and below-surface water regime, apart from herbaceous and woody vegetation density, rhizosphere and biotic diversity of the whole catchment area and the wetland.
1. Check deforestation and plant more, particularly grass, to retain the water for recharging underground water reserves. 
1. Silt inflow will stop only if the soil is held together. 
1. There is no fear of excessive inflow of silt in the lake. Hence, the de-silting process is not required any more.
1. Draw a master plan by team of experts suggesting a time-bound action plan
1. Care needs to be exercised in picking a right kind of vegetation for the catchment area. Only local varieties should be preferred and water guzzlers like eucalyptus need to be avoided.
1. UT should spearhead a common centrally funded programme for the catchment area in totality irrespective of which state it falls into to start with.
1. The Society for Promotion and Conservation of Environment (SPACE) did a survey and found that one-third of the 150 water bodies, wherein check dams have been built, need immediate de-silting. A proper mechanism should be put in place so that water can be released.
1. There should be water channel management, especially below the check dams, so that clear water when flows down the stream does not carry silt with it. Extend channel management to the entire catchment area..