The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

Abuse of the arrest law
Police must use the power judiciously

The Supreme Court’s ruling that the arrest of an individual should be the “last option” before the police needs a close look. A Bench comprising Justice Dalveer Bhandari and Justice K.S. Radhakrishnan has ruled that the police will have to tread with caution before arresting a person because any violation of the law will lead to the abridgement of his/her fundamental right to personal liberty. It also ruled that the courts should use the power of granting anticipatory bail with utmost circumspection. Unfortunately, India’s laws on arrest and pre-trial detention are in a mess. The National Police Commission’s Third Report states that 60 per cent of the arrests in the country were unnecessary and unjustified and that 42 per cent of the expenditure in the jails was over such persons as need not have been arrested in the first place.

Disturbingly, the police have been abusing the arrest law with impunity over the years. While it does not lag behind in arresting the small fish in any given case, it does not show the same enthusiasm and alacrity in catching the big fish. Consider former Union Telecommunications Minister A. Raja, the key accused in the 2G spectrum allocation scam and Commonwealth Games Organising Committee Chairman Suresh Kalmadi. Why has Mr Raja not been arrested until now? As for Mr Kalmadi, no FIR has been filed against him as yet, leave alone arrest. Of course, while his three former aides — T.S. Darbari, Sanjay Mohindroo and M. Jayachandran — have been arrested, charges of cheating and criminal conspiracy have been framed against three others — Lalit Bhanot, V.K. Verma and R.K. Sacheti. This smacks of double standards and shows the police in poor light.

The Bench has ruled that the arrest and grant or refusal of anticipatory bail should necessarily depend on facts and circumstances of each case. Nonetheless, one must admit that India’s law on arrest and pre-trial detention remains colonial. The common people fear that once an FIR is filed with the police, they are liable to be arrested unless politics or money intervenes. The Criminal Procedure Code sections are too vague and encourage false arrests while the anticipatory bail provisions are insufficient protection. Our policemen have become a law unto themselves and arbitrary arrests justify their tyranny. This brazen abuse of power should stop forthwith for the protection of individual liberty and freedom as guaranteed under the Constitution.

Bruni’s wish
Son fixation is not an Indian trait alone

Millions of son-crazed Indians are in exalted company. French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s wife Carla Bruni too wants a son. The First Couple of France walked bare-foot at the much-revered dargah of saint Salim Chishti at Fatehpur Sikri, where once Mughal Emperor Akbar’s heartfelt prayer to have a son was answered. Interestingly, the same wish now finds an echo in the sentiments of the wife of the head of state of a country, geographically far removed from India, and one who already has a son from a previous marriage.

Indeed, wishing for a son is no crime and Bruni’s wish too would have been dismissed as just another personal desire were it not for the fact that is has been revealed in a nation where obsession for a son has translated into the abominable practice of female foeticide. In all fairness to Bruni, perhaps, she is unaware of the gender imbalance in India as well as the dismal fact that since times immemorial Indians have concocted both religious and sociological reasons to justify their prejudiced reasons on the need to have sons.

Now the same Indians might be seen smiling or even smirking, perhaps smug in the assurance that they are not alone in their bias towards a male child. The politically and socially correct might deem that had the French First Lady expressed a desire for a daughter it could have sent down a significant message across the nation that continues to undervalue daughters. To both it must be said that though Bruni’s desire might apparently betray common gender prejudice, there is no need to read too much between the lines, since the social ethos of France stands in sharp contrast to our own. We must remember that not too long ago this so-called fairytale marriage was on the rocks and Bruni herself had expressed apprehensions whether it would last. Will a son cement the marriage further, as often it is expected to in India? Who knows? Perhaps, we will find out.

Thought for the Day

The kind of people who always go on about whether a thing is in good taste invariably have very bad taste. — Joe Orton

ARTICLE

Dichotomy in India-China ties
Wen’s coming visit provides an opportunity
by Zorawar Daulet Singh and Arun Sahgal

The complexity of India-China relations has envoked a cacophony of interpretations from observers in India and abroad. There is neither outright antagonism nor sincere bonhomie. New Delhi and Beijing have been grappling with a template to manage their bilateral ties. That this has been occurring in the backdrop of Washington’s own evolving approach to Asia and its two rising powers has made the process even more challenging.

In recent years, India and China have expanded the agenda of their engagement. In January 2008, the Manmohan Singh-wen Jiabao joint statement had called for common approaches on climate change, energy security, food security and restructuring of institutions of global governance. Their coordination over the climate change negotiations in December 2009, dubbed almost immediately as the “Copenhagen spirit”, exemplified a case of actual collaboration on a global issue. Simultaneously, contradictions on issues of high politics, especially regarding China’s sub-Himalayan strategic involvement, remain unaltered, enabling analysts to effortlessly paint an adversarial image.

How does one deconstruct the apparent dichotomy in the India-China equation?

The principal point to discern is that while India’s periphery is part of its core security interests, for China it is mainly linked to its (exaggerated) threat perceptions over Tibet and its overland strategic infrastructure (road and rail links, port development) part of a policy of periphery consolidation, and to secure and exploit potential geoeconomic opportunities in the long-term as Beijing seeks to develop southern and western China.

China’s core interests lie primarily in eastern Asia - Taiwan and the Han heartland - which are several thousand miles away from the Indian heartland and the reach of most of India’s military capabilities. In other words, China possesses more leverage over India’s core interests without reciprocal Indian pressure on issues that matter most to China.

Thus, discord is occurring in areas vital to India while cooperation is in non-core areas or on issues where China finds tactical solidarity with India useful. This fundamental dichotomy between the relations of India and China - discord at the regional level and collaboration at the global level - is unlikely to disappear in the coming years. From India’s grand strategic perspective, since its core interests lie in the subcontinent - territorial integrity, economic development and a secure periphery - it would be oxymoronic for these to be traded off for greater cooperation with China at the global or institutional level. And until India is able to construct material capabilities - both to deter China in the Himalayan theatre and a credible nuclear deterrence to ensure overall stability - and demonstrate an economic model that can integrate and reshape its periphery, the dual image of India-China relations will remain a relevant guide to policy makers and analysts.

Another vital issue in India-China relations has been the widening imbalance in their economic interactions. While most observers, including official statements, laud the $60 billion two-way trade, a dispassionate appraisal of the true state of Sino-Indian “interdependence” actually reveals a disconcerting asymmetry that should neither be celebrated nor suppressed in India’s China discourse. Accounting for nearly 20 per cent of India’s overall trade deficit and a dominant position as a leading supplier of telecommunications and power equipment for India Inc, China has acquired growing leverage over India’s development. In lieu, India supplies natural commodities like iron ore (44 per cent of the exports to China) that are swallowed by our neighbour’s giant industrial maw. If unaddressed, such leverage will inevitably spill further into the political sphere.

Assuming the above narrative captures the essence of bilateral relations, what issues should New Delhi prioritise in its discussions with Premier Wen Jiabao, who is scheduled to visit India in mid-December?

First, it is now generally accepted that India can no longer be the object of Chinese contempt in Asia. If China is seeking to reframe the terms of its relationship with the West, India, too, has persevered to reshape its own equation with the major powers, including Beijing. Analysts in China have conceded that Beijing’s erstwhile posture of benign neglect towards India has outlived its utility (if it ever had one), an impression that has been reinforced by the US courting of India in a gradual but sustained fashion. Logically, India must revise its own posture: from a grieving to a confident aspiring regional power.

Second, in recent years, India has arguably diluted its own stand on Kashmir to the point that India’s interlocutors are not even aware of its “red lines” on this vital issue. Contrast this with China’s consistent and unwavering position on Tibet, Taiwan, etc. India should take this opportunity to unambiguously articulate its core interests and simultaneously express a mutual intent to respect each other’s territorial sovereignty.

Third, New Delhi should convey its concerns over China’s surreptitious transfer of strategic technologies to Pakistan and urge it to adhere to its global non-proliferation obligations. For years, India’s own vulnerable status in the global nuclear system had precluded it from criticising China’s proliferation record. This posture should now be reversed. India should also express its reasonable and defensible position on terrorist safe havens in the subcontinent, a position recently reiterated to President Obama, even if it invites a blank stare from our Chinese interlocutor.

Fourth, a growing myth among India’s strategic community is that China is on the cusp of acquiring a permanent presence in the Indian Ocean region. The reality is that China is constrained in East Asia, surrounded by the most formidable naval armada ever assembled in world history. American submarines and aircraft-carriers regularly patrol in close proximity to China’s eastern seaboard, making the notion of China as an Indian Ocean power a distant aspiration. China remains essentially a continental power. Therefore, given the actual naval balance in the northern Indian Ocean, New Delhi may reassure Mr Wen that rather than undermining China’s energy and commercial sea-lanes, India seeks to promote an open and cooperative architecture in securing the maritime commons around India’s near abroad. China, on its part, needs to perhaps reassure India on its continental intentions by exploring confidence-building measures with India in the subcontinent - like forming a joint venture on an infrastructure or energy project in a neighbourhood state.

The policy challenge before both Asian powers is managing the other’s rise. New Delhi and Beijing both have officially exhorted that the world is big enough for each to grow and develop, and attain a commensurate status within a plural international system. Yet, neither has demonstrated any creativity to advance the logic of their argument. Perhaps, Wen’s coming visit will offer New Delhi another opportunity to restate its case and commence sophisticated discussions that should focus not on token declarations but on incremental gains.n

Zorawar Daulet Singh is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Policy Alternatives and Brig Arun Sahgal (retd.) is a Consultant at the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, in New Delhi.

MIDDLE

Race against time
by Pramod K Chaudhari

I am a rabbit and will soon outrun you,” claimed my childhood chum O.P. Raheja while running the Delhi Half Marathon recently. And I readily accepted his claim. “You are the best,” I said lest it should hurt his amour propre.

He was the best athlete of his college, but sowed his wild oats so much so that his capacity to outrun me has diminished over the years. Still I pepped him up, “Yes, I am a mere tortoise who even sleeps on the way.”
Our friendship was more important to me than the marathon.

Like the previous years, we practised running with much élan. On the D-day, we put on our running shoes and made tracks for the venue on a misty morn of Sunday. All the world and his wife seemed to be there — Jane, Julie and Janet.

The race started amidst a galaxy of stars like Bipasha Basu, Anil Ambani, Gul Panag, Pulkit Budhiraja, et al. Most of the runners were attired in colourful couture. One of them was doing a half Monty a la Salman Khan. You will be what you will be, said a motivator. There was a group of strong-willed uniquely abled enthusiasts who participated in the wheelchair event.

A member of the running fraternity even collapsed after the 18-km mark and died due to cardiac arrest. However, the unconquerable spirit lived on.

Soon I heard fellow-marathoners shouting ‘Bharatiya nari, kabhi na hari’. I saw that a fair foreign filly was the first among a group followed by a ‘Bharatiya nari’.

A marathoner shouted after sometime, “Do they think that we have come here just to support them. We are not supporters, we are also runners.”

She said this while we were on the row which was inching towards the half way near the hotel Le Meridien while the fast prize-winning marathoners were returning on the other side of the road.

After running for more than two hours, I developed cramps in my legs. Ironically if I stopped, I would have shooting pain in them and if I kept running, the pain would subside and became somewhat bearable. “May God give this kind of pain in the race of life also. You hurt yourself badly, but if keep running, you feel OK,” I soliloquised.

I kept running and chanted ‘Hey Ram, Hey Ram’. As I said it repeatedly, a co-marathoner mouthed, “Aapki Ramlila kab khatm hogi?” (When will your Ramlila end?). He was the same stud who met me in earlier marathons as well. Auld lang syne!

There was also a Ramlila of camaraderie. Three persons were dressed up in the manner of Ram, Sita and the ten-headed Ravan. They were holding hands and exchanging pleasantries. A rare show of Ram-Ravan bonhomie!

People were there from other countries also — Kenya, Ethiopia and even Japan. It was a kaleidoscopic race, yet a grand leveler!

There were colourful posters dedicated to a cause: Race of Love; Alert Today, Alive Tomorrow; Love your Body, Love the World adorned this smorgasbord of entertainment.

Moving towards the 21-km mark, I kept saying to myself, ‘Ab Dilli door nahin’, joking all along with the fellow runners.

Soon both the rabbit and the tortoise reached the finishing point together. Long live their amity!

OPED ENVIRONMENT

The Cancun meet is deeply divided. Governments are not taking a chance. They do not want to hear the noise of protests as they go about stitching a dirty deal that may not combat climate change or give the poor the right to development
Politics of climate change
Sunita Narain

This week the world is meeting, once again, to deliberate on a possible global agreement to cut emissions that are speeding catastrophic climate change. But this time in the Mexican city of Cancun, things are not expected to be much different from the disastrous outcome in Copenhagen last year.

The fact is that climate change deliberations are not about the environment. These are intensely economic negotiations as the world has to decide how it will limit greenhouse gas emissions, which in turn are linked to growth as we know it today.

What is cooking at Cancun
Negotiators at U.N. climate talks in Mexico are trying to define the climate actions required of developed and emerging economies to overcome the main block in sharing the burden of carbon emissions cuts.
Following are three proposals on the table at the November 29-December 10 negotiations in Cancun.
SITUATION NOW
n Only industrialised countries report their greenhouse gas emissions annually to the UN.
n The UN does not comment on progress toward emissions targets, although a country which misses its Kyoto targets will be penalised under a successor round
n Developing countries do not have to report their emissions regularly, or their efforts to control these. If they do publish, developed countries should pay for the reporting and measurement
INDIAN PROPOSAL
n All countries, rich and poor, which contribute more than 1 percent of global greenhouse gases will report to the United Nations every two to three years
n Other countries will report every four to five years
n A U.N. group, comprising experts drawn from around the world, would assess the reports
n Developed countries report their emissions, progress toward emissions cuts, and their contribution to green funds to help poor countries cut emissions and prepare for a hotter world
n Developing countries report their emissions, and progress to their climate actions to slow growth in emissions
EU PROPOSAL
For developed countries:
n Annual reporting of greenhouse gas emissions
n A full national report every four years on funding and technology help for developing countries, plus their own greenhouse gas emission projections
n New rules for international review of reports
For developing countries:
n Full national communication every four years, including emissions levels, projections, and mitigation actions planned and implemented and funding and other help received
n The poorest, least developed countries submit national emissions reports at their own discretion
U.S. POSITION
All countries:
n "We think there should be more reporting; not just on your inventories (emissions levels), but also on your actions," said Jonathan Pershing, deputy special envoy for climate change
nInternational review of commitments "could be formalized"
For developed countries:
n Annual reporting of emissions
For developing countries:
n "Our sense is that the bigger you are the more significant your emissions, it might be useful to have more frequent reporting"
n "Perhaps every two years might be acceptable. That's fine"
— Reuters

The world has to agree to cut emissions. But because carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels run our economies, the world also has to decide it will share not just ecological space but also economic growth.

The rich industrialised countries, with large historical contributions to emissions still present in the atmosphere, have to agree to reduce these so that they can make space for the rest to grow.

This is why climate change negotiations show the world on its worst behaviour: the already rich do want to share. They would prefer to point fingers at the countries, which are now joining the race to get rich.

But before we discuss what will happen in Cancun, let us get two things straight. First, the threat of runaway climate change is real; urgent and very serious. Climate scientists may not be able to pinpoint today if the variable and extreme weather we are seeing is because of climate change.

But they are certain that these are the kind of changes we will see in the years to come as the world gets warmer - more rain in less rainy days leading to floods and drought; more variable rainfall and change in temperature, which will impact crops. More storms, more diseases and disasters.

So be clear even as the world squabbles and procrastinates not to take action, we are in deep trouble. India and other countries in the region are very vulnerable to these changes. We are victims.

Secondly, let us also be clear that, as yet, the world has not found answers to cut emissions at the scale that is needed, without compromising growth. In spite of all the talk of renewable sources of energy and certainly the potential, the rich world remains seriously addicted to fossil fuels - coal, gas and oil - to run its industry or drive its massive fleet of vehicles. It is not willing to make the huge investments needed to transform its energy business.

It is in this backdrop that the world is meeting in the tourist beach city of Cancun. Climate negotiations started at the end of the 1980s. The first big agreement came, when in Rio in 1992, the world hammered out the framework convention on climate change. This agreement stressed on the urgency to combat climate change and agreed that the already industrialised countries would take the first action and would also pay the developing world to avoid the growth of emissions.

In the late 1990s came the next breakthrough when the developed world (called Annex 1 in the agreement) resolved to set legally binding targets under the Kyoto Protocol.

But soon things started falling apart. The US, by far the world's biggest polluter - responsible for one-fifth of the current emissions with less than 5 per cent of the world's population — walked out of the agreement.

The US rejected the Kyoto Protocol, calling it fundamentally and fatally flawed because it did not include China and India. It conveniently forgot that this global deal was premised on the principle that the rich would reduce emissions to make space for emerging countries to grow.

Then four years ago in Bali, Indonesia, there was a late-night breakthrough. The world agreed to the Bali Mandate, which provides for enhanced implementation of the terms of the climate convention.

It was agreed that the industrialised world will take on tough mitigation targets and that the emerging world - China and India - will also take domestic action to avoid emissions, but these would require funds and technology. The deal was hard won - it required the world to shame the US and its allies - to accept its will to decide in the common interest.

But if Bali was the turning point, then Copenhagen was the nadir of climate negotiations. In Copenhagen there emerged a new coalition of the willing - countries wanting to bring the US on board on climate negotiations at every cost.

The result of that meeting was the now infamous Copenhagen Accord, which aims at changing the terms of the framework convention by removing the distinction between the developed and developing.

Under this deal, the concept of historical emissions has to be set aside. All past records of pollution, of say the US, would be wiped clean. All countries would have to take actions (called differently) but which would have to be comparable.

To ascertain how comparable these actions are, the deal is to have a regime to measure, record and verify (MRV) emissions. This is what is being discussed and resisted in Cancun.

In this deal no money or technology is being promised. The assumption is that we are all 'big' boys who want a seat on the high table of polluters.

Therefore, the cost of transition to a low-carbon economy - and remember these will be substantial — will not be paid. In this deal we are equal sinners. The future of the Kyoto Protocol, which demands binding targets from rich countries, is at stake in Cancun. The US wants this agreement junked. Its followers are working hard to make it happen.

But all this would be acceptable if it moved the world towards an effective agreement to cut emissions and combat climate change. Instead what the US is promising is the mother of all bribes - it will not cut its emissions and will not ask countries like India to take actions that are substantial.

In Copenhagen the US came up with a weak and pathetic target of reducing its emissions some 17 below the 2005 levels, which translates to 3 per cent below the 1990 levels.

Now it says it cannot even do this. It says it will try and do close to 14 per cent below the 2005 levels, which means it will not cut at all below what the Kyoto Protocol sets the baseline for action. It wants business as usual. This is when it is now agreed that, based on any formula of science and politics, this country must reduce up to 40 per cent below the 1990 levels.

This when there is no doubt also that countries like India must take action to reduce emissions because it is in our interest to become rich without the pain of pollution.

But the fact also is that the big opportunity is for countries like India to leapfrog - move aggressively towards renewables and other solutions at the scale that will matter. This is why the world was negotiating a deal to pay for this transition. This is what is at stake at Cancun. Will the world decide to go in for a path, which safeguards its future? Or will it agree to a no-deal to appease the world's largest polluter?

The other part of the Copenhagen bargain was that the rich countries would make some US$30 billion available by 2012 to pay for adaptation in the most vulnerable countries. But even this promise has been reneged. No substantial new money has been made available in the last one year.

The meeting in Cancun is deeply divided. It is reported that the security is even tighter than what is was in Copenhagen. There are armed boats patrolling the waters to ensure nobody swims to the conference centre.

The conference centre has been sanitised - all participants are given badges and arm bands and have to report a distance away and await official transportation.

Governments are not taking a chance. They do not want to hear the noise of protests as they go about stitching a dirty deal that will not combat climate change or give the poor the right to development.

The end game of climate change is not good news for anyone. Let us hope governments will listen and act before it is too late.

The writer is a well-known environmentalist and Director of the Centre for Science and Environment