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Three cheers for India!
Interlocutors for Kashmir |
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BJP govt scrapes through All eyes are now on Karnataka High Court Karnataka Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa proved his government’s majority support in the State Assembly for the second time in a week on Thursday as directed by Governor Hans Raj Bhardwaj. Mercifully, the floor test this time was smooth, peaceful and orderly compared to the chaotic scenes during the first floor test on October 11.
Concerns over currency wars
No handicap
Putting Punjab first
Limit power subsidy to the needy Corrections and clarifications
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Three cheers for India!
India has never had a formidable reputation as a sporting nation. Indeed, for a long time Indians have been known as good, gracious and perennial losers. But as curtains came down on the 19th Commonwealth Games in New Delhi, there were reasons to look back with satisfaction at the accomplishments of our sportspersons, specially the women. They were instrumental in securing for the country its first medals in the track and field events after a gap of 58 years in the Games. There were no expectations from them and nobody hoped for an athletic gold, but the women proved the critics wrong. Similarly, an unassuming gymnast secured for India its first ever medal in gymnastics. While our shooters, wrestlers, archers and boxers did the nation proud, and expectedly so, the shuttlers and the paddlers managed to spring a few pleasant surprises. Unexpected losses on the tennis court and the boxing ring were overshadowed by the surprise wins elsewhere and the highest ever haul of gold. While our indifferent record in swimming, rugby, netball, etc, was maintained this time as well and although in the total medal tally India figured way behind Australia and England, the investment made on training and generous funding of different sports associations in preparation for the Games seem to have paid off to an extent. But the individual successes can scarcely brush aside the organisational failures, our lacklustre performance in most team games and the disparity between world class sporting facilities in the national capital and the absence of quality infrastructure at the grassroots. We need to take a fresh look at the working of the Indian Olympic Association and different sports associations and rid them of vested interests, political or otherwise. There is also need for ‘world class’ auditing to determine financial irregularities in spending public money. We need to ensure too that the renovated stadia are not used for Diwali melas, weddings, concerts, exhibitions and political rallies and our athletes denied their use. It is also a sobering thought that even the spectacular opening and closing ceremonies were helped in no small measure by technology and expertise from abroad. Foreign coaches and training abroad also played a role, underlining just how far we have to travel in the business of sports and building a sporting culture. What is more, the forthcoming Asian Games and the Olympics will be more deserving and far more demanding benchmarks to test our sporting skills. So it’s time for India to get up once again, get better and get going.
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Interlocutors for Kashmir
THE much-awaited team of interlocutors on Kashmir has finally been announced by the Centre. The search for a senior politician to head the team may also end soon. The complex situation in the valley needed such an arrangement for initiating dialogue afresh to establish peace there. The task before the interlocutors is very challenging. One hopes they will come up to the expectations of the nation. It will not be easy for them to bring all those representing different shades of public opinion to the negotiating table. There is no dearth of elements competing among themselves to exploit the people’s feelings. The separatist leaders’ reaction to the appointment of the Centre’s interlocutors is strange. What hardline Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani says has proved once again that he is always on the lookout for an excuse to keep himself away from any dialogue process. His statement that the Centre should first consider his five demands, including the acceptance of Kashmir as a “dispute”, should be viewed against this backdrop. Leave Geelani alone. Moderates like Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Yasin Malik must cooperate with the team of interlocutors. Although the interlocutors are not politicians, as Mr Yasin wanted them to be, they have the mandate to take a stand. There is need to bring normalcy in Kashmir as soon as possible, and the best way to do so is by holding talks with all shades of public opinion. The people in the valley have been passing through very critical times for some time. Troublemakers have been having a field day. They have been misleading people to indulge in frequent clashes with the security forces. This factor and the call for a bandh on any pretext by the separatists, particularly Mr Geelani, have virtually paralysed Kashmir’s economy. There is widespread unemployment in the valley. Besides the revival of economic activity on a large scale, there is need to focus on the stretched healthcare facilities. Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has released Rs 6.46 crore for the purpose, but this is not adequate. More funds must be made available for healthcare and other such purposes soon to win over the people’s hearts in this hour of crisis.
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BJP govt scrapes through
Karnataka Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa proved his government’s majority support in the State Assembly for the second time in a week on Thursday as directed by Governor Hans Raj Bhardwaj. Mercifully, the floor test this time was smooth, peaceful and orderly compared to the chaotic scenes during the first floor test on October 11. The BJP government could scrape through the test with 106 members voting for and 100 — the Congress (73) and the Janata Dal-Secular (27) — against it. The chastening thought for the BJP is that the government could sail through only because of the changed configuration and reduced strength of the Assembly following the Speaker’s controversial disqualification of 11 BJP rebels and five Independents. The Karnataka High Court will soon adjudicate on the petitions challenging the Speaker’s hurried decision to disqualify 16 MLAs at about 6 a.m. before the October 11 vote. While it has reserved the ruling on the 11 rebel BJP legislators’ petition, it will continue hearings on the five Independents’ petition on October 18. Significantly, while refusing to grant interim relief to Independents to vote in Thursday’s test, the High Court made it clear that this test will have a bearing on the court verdict. Thus, in case the High Court declares the disqualifications as null and void and revives the 16 MLAs’ membership, the Yeddyurappa government will have to seek a fresh floor test again. In a functional democracy, a political party (or a coalition) can continue in office as long as it enjoys the majority support of the House and not otherwise. It is equally important that all the constitutional functionaries — the Governor, the Speaker and the Chief Minister — follow the rules of the game and uphold the Constitution in letter and spirit. Sadly, none of them lived up to their task in the current episode in Karnataka. While the High Court is examining the Speaker’s conduct, the Governor behaved in a partisan manner and has lowered the dignity of the high office by recommending President’s rule in a hurry and engaging himself in a tirade against the government. He sought to rectify his folly by ordering a second floor test, but the damage has already been done. |
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The world is disgracefully managed, one hardly knows to whom to complain.
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Concerns over currency wars
AS was perhaps to be expected, deep concern over “currency wars” breaking out dominated the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank at which almost all countries were represented by their finance ministers. This was clearly a reflection of cries of currency wars, especially in relation to China, that have been reverberating across the United States for quite some time. Indeed, the first steps towards such a dismal denouement may well have been taken already. For, at the end of September, the US House of Representatives passed a Bill authorising the Obama administration to impose countervailing duties on Chinese imports if China failed to revalue its currency. America’s frustration and anger over what it sees as Chinese “intransigence” seems understandable. On all occasions since November last year — when on a visit to Beijing President Barack Obama went to great lengths to placate his hosts in the hope that they would respond positively to his urgent request for a revaluation of the yuan, as the Chinese currency is named, but drew a blank — China has resolutely said no to the US demands for a revaluation of the yuan. Just a few days before the passage of the anti-China Bill Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao, at a meeting with Obama on the fringes of the UN General Assembly flatly refused to budge from the Chinese position. To the passage of US law Beijing’s reaction was that it would retaliate and others would join the trade wars. At the IMF ministerial meeting over the weekend the Governor of the Chinese People’s Bank, Zhou Xiaochuan, stated that the value of the Chinese currency had nothing to with the high rate of unemployment in the US and Europe. He advised the US to “practice self-criticism” about its economic policies. He wasn’t alone in pointing out that the US and its allies were concentrating on China but were reluctant to blame each other for “misalignments” in their currencies. This was a pointed reference the US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner’s refusal to comment on Japan’s decision to lower the value of the yen. Brazil has also done roughly the same thing. The Managing Director of the IMF, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, was firm in declaring that currency wars had to be avoided, that the issues troubling various countries had to be settled through negotiations, and that the Fund was prepared to play the “leading role” in resolving whatever problems arose. In a globalised world, there was need for everyone to work together. All this Strauss-Kahn said on October 7 when the dollar fell to a new low against a basket of currencies. By an interesting coincidence, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee was asked at a different forum what should be done about the possibility of currency wars. His reply: “Currency disputes have to be settled by consultation, not by confrontation.” The next day Strauss-Khan spelt out what he intended to do. He said that in order to ensure “systemic stability” the IMF would start issuing “spill-over” reports, which really meant that whenever the action of one country started affecting the economy of others, it would sound a warning of sorts. Remarkably, there were not many takers for this offer. One reason for this could be that in the past China had blocked for years the IMF’s “negative review” of its foreign exchange policies and agreed to the publication only after the Fund “watered down” the document’s language. Another reason came to the surface when the French Finance Minister, Christine Lagarde, discouraged the IMF chief’s scheme and pointed out that multiple forums were handling currency problems, and no “new setting” was needed. Instead, she promoted the plan of the French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, to leave it to the G-20 the responsibility of reconciling currency disputes. Significantly, Pranab Mukherjee supported this idea. The G-20 will hold its summit in Seoul in November, shortly after President Obama’s visit to India. France will take over the G-20 presidency early next year. At least partly this should explain the hiatus between American policies and pronouncements and actual action. A fortnight after the adoption of the Bill on trade with China the administration has done absolutely nothing. Indeed, Geinther said after the Bill’s passage — with overwhelming bipartisan support — that the US was not embarking on trade wars. This did not prevent him, however, from issuing a strong warning a few days later to those whose currency policies might “intensify short-term distortions” in relation to exports. Even those US commentators that have welcomed the House’s Bill and want to “take China on” are advocating that this should be done with the cooperation of the international community, not unilaterally. The reason for this dichotomy is that the current crisis has revived the memories of 80 years ago when similar trade wars had pushed the whole world into the Great Depression of 1930. To be sure, 53 per cent of the Americans now believe that free trade agreements have hurt the US. The figure is up from 46 per cent three years ago and 32 per cent in 1999, according to a Wall Street Journal/NBC survey. This has disturbed many thinking Americans who have started sounding alarm bells. They are also ridiculing the Democrat-Republican unity in the HoR because the two parties in the US today, in the midst of the mid-term election, are as bitterly hostile to each other as the BJP and the Congress back home were in 2004 and long afterwards. Incidentally, rival candidates of the two US parties are using China as a weapon to accuse each other of being “soft on China” and thus against America! India, too, is being mentioned in this connection, though to a much lesser extent. Against this backdrop, an eminent economist, Douglas Irwin, writing in Wall Street Journal under the heading “Goodbye Free Trade”, says: “So, is it back to 1929? Is the ghost of Great Depression preparing to rise? If we want to avoid destructive, beggar-thy-neighbour trade wars that brought down the world economy, we have to draw lessons from (past mistakes). Today American policy makers should focus not on China but on our own Federal Reserve that must increase money supply.” The most revealing statistics Professor Irwin has cited are: In 1929, total US imports in proportion to the GDP were 5 per cent and in 2009 the percentage was 15. The corresponding figures for China are 3 per cent in 1970 and 21 per cent in
2009.
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No handicap
Over a decade back, an old colleague drew my attention to an advertisement in the paper announcing the opening of DDA Qutub Golf Course and inviting aspiring golfers and others to apply for membership of the club. My interest was immediately aroused. It was not for the love of golf but to become a member of another elite club in Delhi, enjoy club facilities and use it for social networking that lured me to this. My friend called for a brochure and the application form. Filling out application forms or any other forms is a bit of a ritual in my house which I must confess I am solely responsible for. The forms are always photocopied, filled with a pencil first, proofread for any mistakes and only once it is errorless is the original form filled with a pen and in complete — almost reverential — silence. Hence the process for this form also began. I was flying through it when at a particular column I came to an abrupt stop. The column read – Applicant’s Handicap. I was astonished at the insensitivity of the way the question was phrased and why at all was it there in the first place. But then I felt that may be the club plans to create special infrastructure and facilities for the physically challenged and therefore has requested for this information. So what if their language lacks finesse; at least their hearts are in the right place. I wrote a quick ‘no handicap’ and proceeded to complete the form. Shortly after submitting the form, the membership of the club was granted to me. I took my family to the club for a customary round of tea and snacks. We rarely visited the club again but I continued my membership which added to the list of the clubs I was a member of. Around six years after, in 2005, my daughter’s father-in-law, a retired senior officer of the Indian Air Force, came to stay with me at Delhi. He is a passionate golfer. I took him to the Siri Fort driving range for a session. While practicing he invited me to try out a few shots. At the age of 55, I held a golf club for the first time and instantly got hooked to the game. Back at Shimla, I became a member of the Army and Civil golf club to try my hand at the game. On day one, Amrit Chopra, an avid golfer at the club and now a friend, saw me hitting hockey-type golf shots, but still invited me to play with him and took me under his wing. The first question he asked me was: “What is your handicap?” I was stunned into silence wondering if my game was so bad that he felt that I might be suffering from some physical impediment. Seeing my blank shocked face, he explained the concept of a ‘handicap’ in golf. It was Amrit’s turn to be shocked and baffled now as I laughed continuously thinking about the golf membership form I had filled a decade
ago.
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Putting Punjab first Even the sacked Finance Minister has never pointed a finger at the reckless spending ways of the Chief Minister and his colleagues, political extravagance and bureaucratic burden the government bears, all of which contribute substantially to the state’s mounting debt. India’s economic scene is changing fast, while Punjab is still caught in a bind, thanks to lack of a visionary leadership. States are fast developing infrastructure and compete for foreign direct investment. Why foreign investment has bypassed Punjab is an issue that needs wider discussion. The economic reforms undertaken by the Centre and some of the progressive states aim at limiting the role of government to essentials like health, education, law and order. Governments are withdrawing from areas where the private sector can perform better. Yet Punjab has not seen any reduction in the role of the state. Shrinking the size of the government has never been an issue in the state. The Centre has passed a law limiting the number of ministers to one-tenth of the strength of the assembly. But the Punjab leadership has sought to adjust party MLAs as parliamentary secretaries. The Himachal Pradesh High Court has observed that if a parliamentary secretary functions as a minister, it would tantamount to perpetrating a fraud on the Constitution. In Punjab parliamentary secretaries function as ministers. Sukhbir Badal’s traditional politics, like that of his father, aims at sharing the spoils of office with supporters. His proposal to revive the Upper House of the Vidhan Sabha should be seen in this context. Regardless of the burden on the near-empty treasury, key political leaders, required to win elections, have to be adjusted. The Badal government has made serious efforts for ending political unemployment. When was the last time any Akali leader even spoke, let alone do anything, about unemployment among youth? There are over 60 boards and corporations, which have political heads. The Chief Minister heads the 11-member Potato Development Board. There is pressure now to saddle boards with vice-chairmen as well. There is even a cow protection board. The reforms suggest every state must close or disinvest in all loss-making public sector units. As the Finance Minister, Mr Manpreet Singh Badal has seldom pushed for administrative reforms or downsizing the government. Instead Punjab is creating new wasteful bodies. A Punmedia Society has been set up to handle publicity and adverting wings of the state. A state is supposed to have one Chief Secretary and one Director General of Police. Punjab politicians often pick up juniors or bring someone from outside for the two top posts. Then those senior to them are also promoted to the same rank and get the same benefits. There are about half a dozen officers of the rank of Chief Secretary and an equal number of the rank of DGP. Every minister, MLA, IAS and IPS officer has VIP security. For Akali leaders being in power means having the most expensive car with the red beacon, a maximum number of gunmen regardless of the security threat and issuing commands to the DCs and SSPs. One VC complained that ministers and MLAs approach him for the transfer of even class IV employees. Political interference in administrative affairs and poor decision-making lead to needless litigation the cost of which is borne by the government as well as the employees concerned. ASI Dilbagh Singh’s increments were stopped in 1979 and he challenged it in court. The case reached the Supreme Court where too the state plea was dismissed. For 31 years he fought for justice. It is amazing how the state wastes its time, energy and the taxpayer’ money on small cases. The state has a large army of lawyers on its rolls often engaged in trivial legal battles. If decisions are based on transparent rules and principles instead of the whims and fancies of ministers and officials and if high costs are imposed on erring decision-makers litigation costs can be reduced. It is not that just that the taxpayer bears the high cost of governance; the quality of service provided is also substandard. To be fair, the politics of extravagance is not confined to the Akali Dal. The BJP has been vociferous in defending its own vote bank in urban Punjab. Whenever, the state regulatory commission recommends a hike in the power tariff the party opposes any additional burden on the urban and industrial consumers. Once it forced the government to absorb the power tariff hike, thus reducing the state’s ability to raise resources. The record of the previous Congress government was no better. It too had resorted to liberal subsidies, including free power to farmers, maintained the idle force of parliamentary secretaries and made lttle effort to limit the state expenditure. At that time too the government was run by taking loans and no administrative or economic reforms were pursued. Capt Amarinder Singh too as Chief Minister did not have the courage to take on the power employees and unbundle the state electricity board. The bane of state politics is that hard decisions, which are in the long-term interests of the state and its people, are either not taken or are delayed due to the fear of losing elections. It is, therefore, understandable that Manpreet Singh has found only feeble support from the BJP and Congress leaders. In such a self-defeating and self-seeking political culture leaders like Manpreet Badal feel out of place and lose out to the majority despite being right. If he has got wider public and media support, it is because he is seen as a well-meaning leader capable of taking difficult decisions, which may not be good for winning the next election, but good for the next generation.
The Badal government has made serious efforts for ending political unemployment. When was the last time any Akali leader even spoke, let alone do anything, about unemployment among youth?
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Limit power subsidy to the needy THE debt waiver package offered by the Central Government for Punjab has put forth two conflicting viewpoints. On the one hand, the pure economic perspective urges the state to accept all conditions that are a part of the package. On the other, the populist perspective rejects the conditions as politically and socially unsustainable. Punjab’s debt to date is around 70, 000 crores. The Union Finance Minister has offered to write-off half of the total debt. This is a welcome move. Punjab should avail this golden opportunity. Availing this opportunity is, however, a Herculean task. The clash of the perspectives is due to different sets of rules of the game of each perspective. Interestingly, both limit their arguments mainly to the power subsidy. Other conditions have been talked about casually. The economists’ approach forcefully argues that free power to the agricultural sector is against all canons of economic theory. Freebies are also counterproductive from the point of view of over-exploitation of natural resources, especially soil and water. The political approach argues that agriculture is the lifeline of Punjab. It is passing through a crisis, specifically the declining rate of returns on agricultural investment and gigantic farm debt culminating in pauperisation of farmers and their suicides. The existing financial crisis in Punjab is partly due to unprecedented borrowings from the Centre during militancy. The political pundits say it is not justifiable to shift the liability of the militancy period to Punjab. The question is not whether to follow the economists’ approach or the populist approach, but of Punjab’s interests. A condition-wise analysis suggests that those who support the cause of Punjab should agree with the pre-conditions such as introducing change-in-land use charges, reforming Punjab Roadways and PEPSU to making them profitable, facilitating CAG audits of the local bodies, the Punjab Infrastructure Development Fund and putting all government collections in the Consolidated Fund. The bordering pre-conditions include imposing the property tax, the CAG audit of the Rural Development Fund and no pre-mature withdrawals from the PF by the employees. These pre-conditions can be settled quickly through dialogue. Politically sensitive issues related to reducing the annual power subsidy and a hike in irrigation charges deserve special attention of the economists and policy makers. The agrarian economy of Punjab is in turmoil. The average net farm income of marginal farm families is less than that of a peon in a government office. According to the Arjun Sengupta Commission on the unorganised sector workers, the average monthly income per household is around Rs 1,578, whereas the lowest paid government employee gets Rs 10, 000 per month. The families of marginal farmers are economically broke. In Punjab on an average 30, 000 farmers are leaving agriculture annually. Their conditions are equally bad in the field of education and health. Studies have shown that rural students constitute only 4 per cent of higher education students. The share of poor farm families is rock bottom. Most of the children of poor farmers are matriculate and constitute the largest share of educated unemployed in the state. The rural health scenario is the worst, particularly in the cancer belt of Malwa. Given the pathetic economic and social conditions of small and marginal farmers, the continuation of the power subsidy is fully justifiable. Moreover, the continuation of the subsidy is prescribed in the backdrop of the food crisis. The need of the hour is to make the subsidies target-oriented. Instead of extending the power subsidy across the board, the need is to rationalise it and limit it to small and marginal farmers. The differential power tariff policy will enable the state government to grant more subsidies to poor farm families and at the same time save a huge amount on account of subsidies. For helping the marginal and small farmers and also landless families in place of the power subsidy, the system of education, health and food vouchers may be introduced. These voucher programmes can help improve the access of the poor to education, health and food. Subsidising education and health in the long run can facilitates the shift of population from agriculture to non-agricultural sectors in the state which is urgently needed. In brief, Punjab must reap the benefits of the offer of the Central Government. Most of the pre-conditions can be met straightway. The debatable and politically and socially sensitive pre-conditions relate to the rural economy of Punjab. Free power to the farm sector emerges the most contentious issue. Limiting free power to small and marginal farmers is suggested as a middle path. In the long run alternative programmes such as education, health and food vouchers can be considered as substitutes of free power to agriculture. The voucher scheme would not only enhance the employability of poor farm families in occupations other than agriculture but would also be beneficial to the Ssate for environmental sustainability.
The writer is a former Dean, Faculty of Arts, Panjab University |
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Corrections and clarifications
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The headline “Eight new Central Govt counsels” (Page 3, October 14) is faulty. The plural of counsel is ‘counsel’, not ‘counsels’. n
The word “fares” has been mis-spelt as “fairs” in the headline of a report on the work of the Mohali Municipal Council (Chandigarh Tribune, Page 4, October 14).
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The box item “Buy shares worth Rs 1,00,574.20 cr” (Page 17, October 14) should have said “FIIs buy shares worth over Rs 1 lakh crore”.
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The headline “PML-N files chargesheet against Mush” (Page 17, October 13) is misleading. It gives the impression that former President Musharraf has been chargesheeted in court. The fact is that as a political party, the PML-N has made some charges against him. Despite our earnest endeavour to keep The Tribune error-free, some errors do creep in at times. We are always eager to correct them. This column appears twice a week — every Tuesday and Friday. We request our readers to write or e-mail to us whenever they find any error. Readers in such cases can write to Mr Kamlendra Kanwar, Senior Associate Editor, The Tribune, Chandigarh, with the word “Corrections” on the envelope. His e-mail ID is kanwar@tribunemail.com. Raj Chengappa,
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THE politics of the bickering Badals has at least cast the spotlight on Punjab’s economic deterioration. Politics often dominates the Punjab scene and economics tends to take a back seat. Manpreet Singh Badal has brought the issue of ballooning, unmanageable subsidies to the centre-stage. Subsidies do drain the scarce resources, no doubt. But there are other equally serious issues which need attention.