|
|
Caste
census Distant
dreams |
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
A slap
most foul
Take
banks to villages
The day
“God” held my hand
Fear is
the key Only one
awkward point Recognising
where he erred…
|
|
Distant dreams
The
lure of the foreign shores is still strong, more so in the region. Indian emigrants have an enviable record of success and positive contribution to the countries they emigrated to, so much so that in many they are also among the lawmakers. While the educated Indian is welcome abroad, various nations have been drawing up their drawbridges to stem the stream of would-be immigrants, including Indians, to their lands. Canada, where Indians comprise just over 3 per cent of the population, also has a more strict policy now, though more than 32,000 Indians received permanent resident visas last year. However, for every success story, there are many failures. An unfortunate and major reason is that the documents provided by many applicants are often not up to the mark, sometimes they are even forged. Potential immigrants, often lacking in confidence and language skills, seek advice from various travel and immigration advisers, some of whom play a dubious role in misguiding them. When they are caught, the agents run away, leaving the applicants to fend for themselves. It was recently revealed that almost 700 travel agents in Punjab are proclaimed offenders, a shocking figure that highlights the gravity of the situation. Canadian Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism Minister Jason Kenney’s plea for India to frame a law that would check such ‘immigration fraudsters’ has to be seen in this background. Various statutes are violated by such agents who can and should be booked under existing laws. The government could also empower NGOs to guide people without monetary considerations and examine the documents before they are sent out to various embassies. The nexus between travel agents and illegal human traffickers also needs to be busted. Many lives have been lost and families ruined in the pursuit of distant dreams. While the Punjab Prevention of Human Trafficking Bill, now awaiting the Centre’s approval, is a long term solution, strict enforcement of existing laws, and proactive action by the police in arresting the offenders, proclaimed or otherwise, is an immediate step that will both save innocent emigrants as well as the nation’s image abroad.
|
|
|
A slap most foul
A
student
slapping a teacher would invite condemnation in any society. But that it has happened in a nation that has since times immemorial revered teachers as gurus is all the more shocking. What is worse is that Class VII student of a Chandigarh school slapping a teacher who pulled him up for not doing his homework is not an isolated incident. Similar cases where teachers have been assaulted, by outsiders too, have been reported in the past. In Chandigarh alone there have been four such cases in past two months. No doubt immediate action, as taken by the UT administration, was in order. However, it has been rightly realised by the Education Department that the slapgate involving an impressionable boy is symptomatic of a deeper malaise. Hence their decision to counsel the students is a wise one. Over the years there has been a growing distrust between the teacher and taught and the academic atmosphere — be it at schools or colleges — has been vitiated because of the chasm. Undeniably the conduct of some teachers has been questionable too and some of them have even been accused of sexual misdemeanour. However, the presence of a few black sheep among the teaching community is no excuse for students to turn the relationship upside down. If the law against corporal punishment has made teachers accountable for their actions, it is time students are made to realise that teachers are not “paid instructors” but mentors and guides who can and often do make the most significant contribution in a student’s life. The alarming and growing trend of diminishing respect for teachers needs to be arrested and reversed. A nation that boasts of guru shishya parampara and of disciples known for their sterling sacrifices cannot turn a blind eye to the outrageous conduct of students. At the same time it needs to look within to determine whether arresting a seventh grade student and slapping various charges against him can be a solution. The bridge between students and teachers needs to be built and not burnt.
|
|
|
You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty. — Mahatma Gandhi
|
Take banks to villages The
recent land rights issue of the Niyamgiri hills in Orissa seems to have been resolved with Rahul Gandhi’s intervention. We are relieved that the ancient Dongria Kondh tribal population would be able to save their hills from exploitation by commercial interests. With assurance from the highest quarters, they are not only safe but may also see more concrete actions being taken regarding their welfare and development in the future. While most leaders are talking of the vast divide between the rich and the poor, very little is being done to bridge the gap despite the numerous centrally and state sponsored anti poverty schemes. Though the poor are being helped with regular cash handouts (as in NREGA) and bailouts (debt waivers for farmers) the concept of inclusive growth which is increasingly talked about in government circles, is still without a convincing road map. Income inequality seems to be rising even though we have a huge middle class of over 250 million people. If the government policy of inclusive growth is followed sincerely, most of India’s 750 million poor and very poor should be able to climb into the middle class income category rather quickly and not slip back into poverty when some calamity or personal misfortune strikes them. While most in the middle class category can afford nice clothes, decent food, holidays and the rich living it up in a glaringly ostentatious manner, the tribal population in Orissa is still clad in simple garb, dwelling in mud huts without electricity and eating very basic food. They not only lack assets, education, health facilities, toilets, safe drinking water but are also not gainfully employed. They are however not alone in being deprived from the good life of the average middle class city dweller, because around 37.7 per cent of all Indian households do not have access to a water source and 49 per cent do not have proper shelter, 69.5 per cent do not have access to suitable toilets and 85.2 per cent of villages do not have a secondary school and 43 per cent Indian villages do not have an all weather road connecting them with towns. For centuries, the tribal populations in different parts of India have preserved their customs and are steeped deeply into their tradition and like the Kondhs worship the hills and forests. It is not enough to assure them that they are going to be heard in the future and the government should also provide them with alternate sources of livelihood so that they can have assets of their own for safeguarding their future. In the past they have been mainly dependent on forest products for their living and have for generations been food gatherers, hunters and small farmers. They also have a lively tradition of folk art which they practice for themselves and not for commercial purposes. For them to be able to start small businesses or improve their farming methods and forest activities, access to cash facilities is essential which means there has to be ‘financial inclusion’. Financial inclusion means that banking facilities are available to people in the remotest areas so that they can build savings, make investments, avail of credit and insure themselves against income shocks and emergencies. It is amazing that India has 40 per cent of the population who do not have bank accounts or roughly 400 million people are without banking facilities and only 5.2 per cent of India’s 6,50,000 villages have bank branches. According to a recent discussion paper of the RBI on the entry of new banks in the private sector, in March 31, 2009, the banking sector comprised 27 public sector banks, 7 new private banks, 15 old private banks, 31 foreign banks, 86 regional rural banks, four local area banks, 1,721 urban cooperative banks,, 31 state cooperative banks and 371 district central cooperative banks. The RBI claims there has been a progress in financial inclusion but more banks are needed for better services. As per the Dr. Raghuram G. Rajan committee’s recommendation, the RBI is considering giving new licenses to private banks to operate in India. This proposal however has come up with problems and one of the main issues is about whether these banks would be able to reach out to the poor. Since the bank nationalisation of 1969 when Indira Gandhi nationalised 14 commercial banks, India has tried to extend more credit to the poor through ‘priority sector’ lending scheme of the RBI in which all public sector banks are required to set aside 40 per cent of net bank credit as loans for the weaker sections and the agricultural sector. But the results have not been so good and many banks have not reached the targeted amounts over the years. The RBI also stipulated that banks should open at least 25 per cent of their total number of branches in rural and semi-urban centre but this too has not been fulfilled. The RBI is, thus, rightly cautious about extending licenses to more banks in the private sector. For improving the lives of the poor it is a very important to have financial inclusion because they cannot live on handouts and doles and ought to have sustainable sources of livelihood. Those who are financially excluded are also mostly uneducated and from the backward castes and communities and they hesitate to approach a bank manager. Most banks also do not find them creditworthy and are reluctant to give them loans as a result of which they have to turn to the exploitative money lender. With more access to banking, this attitude of bankers would change. Microcredit is a good alternative and has been successful in Bangladesh but it has not taken off very well in all parts of India. Self-help groups can help the poor with credit but these have not become popular in most areas. With ‘no frills’ account (or zero minimum balance requirement), banking could reach the tribal population which would enable them to improve and introduce innovations in their economic activities to achieve higher productivity and incomes. They could earn and save more and send their children to school. They could sell their handicrafts also and access raw materials and simple tools through bank credit. For financial inclusion, the tribal and below poverty line population could be given ‘smart cards’ and biometric authentication. These would ease identity management and ensure them easy accessibility, simplicity and flexibility in operating their accounts. Stopping mining in the hills is only the first step because more needs to be done to enable the tribal population to have a more decent standard of living that includes better sanitation, roads, power, education and health
facilities.
|
|||||
The day “God” held my hand It
was a cold November afternoon in Old Blighty two years ago when I went to meet Diego Maradona at Hotel Radisson Edwardian in London. Football’s resident God, donning the cloak of Argentina’s new manager, was there to address a press conference for which I was never invited but still managed to make my way in. The moment I shook hands with God, I realised it was a firm handshake. Maradona let my hand go but not before he spoke, “So, you are from India. I do not know how the game is played in your country. But we in Argentina have never played football. That is the domain of the Europeans and Africans. We always write poetry on the field.” He seemed to be excited — after all he was taking on the British press, for so long his nemesis. A journalist told me that the language of Maradona was always difficult to decode but I noticed that there was no such trickery as he projected himself as a man without artifice — and, to the profound dismay of the British press, utterly without contrition. A Maradona press conference is invariably a theatrical event because his emotional range rivals that of the most inspired actors. Once he made himself comfortable in front of the flashbulbs, the football icon indeed delivered a performance of effortless flair. Whether on his mission as national team manager or on the capability of his players, he was never less than compelling. Plus there was one exquisite moment in which he punctured delusions of English grandeur just as emphatically as he did in 1986. Let it not be forgotten that during the press meet Maradona revelled in references to the “Hand of God”. He coined the phrase himself in Mexico City in 1986 when, with England vanquished in a World Cup quarter-final only an hour before, he told assembled journalists that his outrageous first goal was netted by the “hand of God”. When a reporter, sitting beside me, asked him if he felt the faintest touch of remorse, he treated the boldness of the journalist — English, of course — with a curled lip of contempt. “England won the World Cup with a goal that never crossed the line,” he countered. The atmosphere in the room crackled. The debate over whether Geoff Hurst’s second goal in the 1966 final against Germany did or did not creep over the line had become monotonous. However, with Maradona picking up a ghost it again assumed the most extreme urgency. Old enmities between England and Argentina, with Maradona the most enduring symbol, resurfaced at a single utterance. But there was more. “The ball was that far short of a line,” he said, with an expansive hand gesture to express great distance. When the conference ended and as we moved out, not before the God blinked to me, we could see banners which read : “God comes to London” and “Give a hand to
Maradona”.
|
|||||
Fear is the key One of the principal drivers behind Tony Blair, the man and the politician, seems to be fear. It is without doubt the emotion mentioned most often in the book. Thus, Blair writes, "I didn't want to fight Gordon in a leadership contest. There was a rational explanation to this: such a fight required us to differentiate, and inevitably he would pitch to the left of me ... If I am honest, there was another reason I did not want a head-to-head contest: I was scared of the unpleasantness, the possible brutality of it, the sadness, actually, of two friends becoming foes." Or, "PMQs was the most nerve-racking, discombobulating, nail-biting, bowel-moving, terror-inspiring, courage-draining experience in my prime ministerial life, without question." Or, in describing how he felt after John Smith's death: "I kept a strong grip on myself, but the anxiety showed .. I would wake in the morning with the hair on the back of my head damp with sweat. What I could control when awake was overpowering in sleep." And even at the very start of the book, "On 2 May 1997, I walked into Downing Street as prime minister for the first time. I had never held office ... my predominant feeling was fear.". A lot of the book is directly or indirectly about how Blair deals with his fears, how fear drove him to make certain decisions rather than others, and how he learned to mask his fear. In the case of PMQs, he says that people always commented that he looked very relaxed, but in reality, he says, "I never relaxed for a moment". Blair became a master at masking his true emotional state, hiding his terror with that masking smile. Psychologists have spent many years distinguishing genuine smiles from masking smiles. Masking smiles are asymmetric on the face and fade abruptly as they leave the face, exposing the real emotion underneath. Gordon Brown often tried to cover his negative emotion with a masking smile, but every time the smile fell off his face you could read his true emotions of impatience and irritation clearly. Blair's great art was masking his fear and terror with a smile that seemed all too genuine. But his mastery of body language does not stop there. He comments that he and Princess Diana "were both, in our ways, manipulative people, perceiving quickly the emotions of others and able instinctively to play with them". Throughout the book, he describes how he uses his understanding of body language to his advantage. He writes, "A great belief of mine is that when you are negotiating with someone, the first thing is to set the atmosphere at ease; signify a little glimmer of human feeling; exchange a few pleasantries; and above all start by saying something utterly uncontroversial with which disagreement is impossible. Get the other person's head nodding. It's that nod which establishes rapport, and which is an early, tiny sign that all is not lost. I might say: 'I know you feel strongly about this.' Well, of course they do; that's why there's a dispute; and there would be a nod." There is something else I find very telling in the book: Blair's memories of childhood. I was particularly struck by his description of an event that happened in the playground when he was about 10 years old. He says that it was in this very situation that he first learned about courage and fear. He says that he can recall "the exact moment" when he got into a fight with a bully outside the gates of the Chorister School, Durham. This event would seem to be what psychologists call "a flashbulb memory". A flashbulb memory is a vivid and detailed memory that does not fade with time, unlike all other memories. It is full of clear images etched for all time on to the brain. These are hardwired memories, designed for human survival and shaped by evolution. These are the kinds of enduring and stable memories that you might have if you had ever been in a near-fatal car accident or escaped a bomb blast in Afghanistan, for example. The extraordinary thing about Tony Blair's flashbulb memory is that nothing much actually happened. So when the bully came upon the young Blair unexpectedly, "I turned on him and told him I would hit him if he didn't stop. He could tell I meant it, because I did and my eyes would have shown it — so he stopped." So in this flashbulb memory all that really happened was that the bully was stopped dead in his tracks. Nobody got badly beaten; no one was kicked and stamped upon; few punches, if any, were thrown. Blair's understanding of the situation is that it taught him something about courage, but from a psychology point of view it tells you more about the intense fear that the young Blair must have felt at that moment, plus the fact that he was surprised at his own actions in standing up to the bully. He didn't have to fight back physically, but he found a way of dealing with his own fear. As a consequence of this, perhaps threat generally was perceived as more prevalent in Tony Blair's subsequent life - in the same way that those who have survived bad car crashes, and have the resulting flashbulb memory, view the roads as more dangerous places than those who have not had the same experiences. Perhaps, his firm response (that look), directly encoded in the brain, was from then on set as the natural response to any threat. It would be fascinating to know if this bit of "character development" had not happened, and if this flashbulb memory had not been laid down, how Tony Blair would have dealt with all the other threats and bullies (he perceived) in the world along the way, and whether the world today would be a much more dangerous or a much safer place, as a consequence. — The Independent
|
|
Only one awkward point The
problem begins on page two of the opening chapter when Blair states his position. "I was and remain first and foremost not so much a politician of traditional left or right, but a moderniser." In a single sentence he de-politicises politics. Who does not believe themselves to be modern? Attlee "modernised" the state. Thatcher "modernised" the state. They took entirely different approaches based on beliefs that were rooted either on the left or right. Blair merely "modernises". He explains that what he sought was a "progressive alternative to the Conservatives", but thanks to his rootless imprecision the Conservatives claim to be the progressives as well. Most people I meet consider themselves to be "progressive" and indeed "modern". The terms are meaningless. Blair expands a little, but only with a list of familiar platitudes that were in some cases tested to destruction by what happened in office. He cites the value of being close to the US and at the heart of Europe, a third way blown apart by Iraq. He stresses the importance of supporting innovation and equality of opportunity. All parties are in favour of both. When I interviewed advisers who had worked with him in No 10 for a series a few years ago they all said he was a pleasure to work with, including those who disagreed with him in policy terms. They admired the calm decency under fire. In some cases they became Blairites on these grounds alone. They liked him even as he moved rightwards and invaded Iraq. My guess is that parts of the book will have a similar impact. They will charm. From my limited reading the political analysis will not withstand much scrutiny. He omits one awkward point. When he left office in 2007, after he had followed an unremitting "New Labour" agenda for several years, the Conservatives enjoyed a substantial lead in the polls. Blair is not only wrong about Brown, but also wrong in his assessment of the crisis. When banks were pleading for government intervention on an epic scale, having railed earlier against any state activity however tiny, something pretty big was happening. At the very least, the episode highlighted the benevolent power of the state in preventing several banks from going bankrupt. — The Independent
|
|
Recognising where he erred… From
Iraq, to terrorism, to public service reform, to criminal justice, the former Prime Minister plays the same tunes we heard from him. On the invasion of Iraq, Mr Blair makes his assertion that he does not regret the removal of Saddam Hussein. On the terrorism threat, he denies that his foreign policy played any part in stoking extremism. The sting of the book comes in the tail, when Mr Blair turns from his own record to that of his successor. He voices his "profound" disapproval of deficit spending. But deficit spending was what prevented the slump in Britain turning into something still worse. Mr Blair also displays his naive economic views when he remarks: "I was sure we had done plenty of redistribution and needed to give some TLC [tender loving care] to our middle class". But inequality edged up over Mr Blair's time in office, despite the redistribution of his Chancellor. On dealing with the deficits, Mr Blair says Labour should not have raised the top rate of income tax and, instead, put up VAT. But, as the recent analysis from the Institute for Fiscal Studies makes clear, this would have meant asking the least well-off to bear the greatest burden. Reading such views, it seems almost a blessing that Mr Blair was kept away from economic affairs by Mr Brown. Mr Blair is justified in mounting a vigorous defence of the many good things he did in office, from bringing peace to Northern Ireland, to the minimum wage, to civil partnerships, to public service reform. But even with the burden of office removed, it is plain that he will not, or more likely cannot, recognise where he erred. — The Independent
|
|
|
|
| HOME PAGE | |
Punjab | Haryana | Jammu & Kashmir |
Himachal Pradesh | Regional Briefs |
Nation | Opinions | | Business | Sports | World | Letters | Chandigarh | Ludhiana | Delhi | | Calendar | Weather | Archive | Subscribe | Suggestion | E-mail | |
T