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Onus on
sarkar Relief
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Pulitzer
for Mukherjee
Banning
of books
On
writing a bestseller
There is a long list
of indications for ultrasound during pregnancy, including foetal
well-being, which is such a generalised term that it virtually allows
ultrasonography on demand with little requirement of application of
mind at the hands of the ultrasonologist
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Relief over rain
The
excitement over the official forecast of a normal monsoon this year is understandable even if a clearer picture will emerge only after a June review. The celebrations may be premature also for the reason that the Indian Meteorological Department’s predictions are not foolproof. Yet the news that rain will be 98 per cent of the long-term average brings relief – for the farmer, the consumer and the government. India is a large market and any shortfall in rain and the consequent impact on farm production raises the possibility of food imports, which sends global farm commodity prices soaring. Despite a good wheat crop and sizeable buffer stocks, the government is wary of wheat exports. Excess grain production calms global markets but brings under the spotlight the issues of inadequate storage, processing and wastage. The advance forecast of the south-western monsoon can help the farmer plan his kharif crops. This is the season when water-consuming paddy is cultivated. Since crop diversification has not become popular due to lower returns from alternative crops, paddy remains the mainstay of Punjab and Haryana farmers, the deteriorating groundwater level notwithstanding. Even if the good monsoon predictions turn unfavourable, farmers do not let the rice crop fail. Almost 98 per cent of the cultivated land in Punjab is under assured irrigation. The heavy dependence on tubewells, however, raises the costs of farming leading to demands for compensation. Deficient rains hike the government’s food subsidy bill. While a bumper crop will spread joy all round, it will ease government worries on high food inflation. Lower inflation will, in turn, stop or reverse interest rate hikes -- much to the benefit of industry. A good harvest raises rural incomes and stokes consumer demand for manufactured goods. Industry cannot thrive if agriculture languishes. Even though agriculture’s contribution to the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) is just 17 per cent, it helps the government achieve an 8-9 per cent growth rate, which attracts foreign investment and boosts stock markets. A good monsoon, thus, contributes to Indians’ over-all well-being.
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Pulitzer for Mukherjee
By
winning the prestigious Pulitzer prize Siddhartha Mukherjee adds one more name to the literary elite of the world with origin in this country. “The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer” selected for the general non-fiction category by the Pulitzer had already featured among the 10 Best Books of 2010 in The New York Times Book Reviews Sunday, which is a rare feat for a work of non-fiction. This, in fact, speaks volumes about the literary merits of the book which treats a technical subject like the history and prognosis of cancerous cells with great sensitivity and understanding. The book chronicles narratives of lethality of the dreaded disease braved by individuals of great resilience. Balancing compassion and pragmatism, so required while dealing with the technicality of medicine and human experience of suffering, the oncologist turned writer also puts preventive measures for cancer back into focus. In several interviews he has emphasised upon the need for campaigns against smoking and chewing tobacco, a major cause of cancer among young men and women. For a country like India, where the treatment for cancer is beyond the reach of a common man, this is a good strategy. Another preventive measure he has been advocating is screening for breast cancer in the appropriate age group and at proper time, and its treatment with hormonal therapy. At any given time, nearly 15 lakh cancer patients are in need of facilities of treatment and follow-up in India. Therefore, for the poorer countries like ours, prevention is a better way of dealing with the menace. Cancer has become one of the 10 leading causes of death in India, largely due to ignorance about its timely detection. By an estimate, provided by National Cancer Control Programme, there are nearly 1.5 million cancer cases at any given time. Over 7 lakh new cases of cancer and 3 lakh deaths occur annually due to cancer. Oral and lung cancer in males, and cervix and breast in females account for over 50 per cent of all cancer deaths in India, which can be prevented by taking small preventive steps. Author Siddhartha Mukherjee has indeed done well to focus on this deadly scourge.
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Joy can be real only if people look upon their life as a service, and have a definite object in life outside themselves and their personal happiness. — Leo Tolstoy
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Banning of books
People
belonging to my generation grew up in the aura of Gandhiji's moral leadership and in the heady spirit of freedom struggle. His satyagrah weapon has been accepted as one of the biggest tools in the armour of mass struggles, to be followed by unarmed masses against the deprivation of their rights and denial of social justice. Martin Luther King, the leader of the civil rights movement in the US, openly acknowledged his inspiration from Gandhiji which was reiterated when President Obama during his visit to India without embarrassment acknowledged that he would not have been the President but for the inspiration derived by the Afro-American people from Gandhiji's teachings of satyagrah. Einstein himself, one of the greatest persons of the past century, paid a tribute to Gandhiji when he said, "Generations to come shall scarcely believe that a man like this ever existed on earth." India rightly declared him as the Father of the Nation. Thus, Gandhiji needs no praise from any writer, Indian or foreign, to establish his place as one of the most outstanding moral leaders of the world in centuries. It was, therefore, very disquieting when one read the original announcements by the Law Minister of India that it was intending to ban the book on Gandhiji written by American author Joseph Lelyveld which purports to suggest that Gandhiji was bisexual and racist, notwithstanding the categorical denial by the author himself that "he has not alleged that Gandhiji is a racist or bisexual in his book". Had less panic been shown by those in authority they would have found immediately that this slur was coined by the reviewer in newsmagazine Daily Mail, London, which has a This was doubly disquieting especially when democratic minded grandsons of Gandhiji themselves rightly took a position against the banning. Gandhiji's life was an open book and he put everything in his own writings. Many in India have commented adversely on his experiment on Brahamcharya, mentioned by Gandhiji himself, but his moral leadership has not suffered. Nevertheless, the government continued insisting either on banning the book even without having read it, not even seen it because it had not been released in India yet. It was only after eminent public men spoke against the ban that the government reacted and had been constrained to say that no action was required against the book. But, surprisingly, a Congress spokesperson, though refusing to comment when asked by the Press whether the partly wanted a ban on the book by taking cover under a strange explanation, said that "if the government has to take any action legally, the Congress does not comment." This effort to create dichotomy between the party and its government is not acceptable in political life. Would one be right in hazarding a guess that this panicky dichotomy is fuelled by the slimy action of Modi, the Chief Minister of Gujarat, who with his tongue in the cheek has banned the book purporting to show his loyalty to Gandhiji but dubiously keeping quite at his genocidal actions of 2002 when he shamefacedly justified the murder of hundreds of Muslims at the hands of the government-provoked police action in assisting communal mobs. Modi, purporting to respect Gandhi memory by banning the book, cannot wash off the blood stains of 2002. But, apparently, the Congress spokesperson, fearing that Modi may not use the ban to challenge Congress loyalty to Gandhiji, has purported to keep open the question of banning the book in future - this is immature thinking. The government should know that people of India are mature and self-confident enough not to be affected by such derogative, cheap polemics of foreign media. The iconic position of Gandhiji is not so week that it needs to be defended by resorting to the undemocratic method of banning the book. In this atmosphere I fear a more serious danger that if the government were to be allowed to ban the book it might use this precedent in future against all other critical writings against the government to ban them. Such an eventuality would be a serious blow to one of the cardinal principles of our Constitution — the freedom of speech and expression guaranteed to every person. The Supreme Court in a number of cases has emphasised that our commitment to the freedom of expression demands that it cannot be suppressed unless the situations created by allowing the freedom are pressing and the community interest is endangered. The anticipated danger should not be remote, conjectural or far-fetched. It should have proximate and direct nexus with the expression. The court has highlighted in various cases that the freedom of speech and expression guaranteed by Article 19 (1) (a) is one of the most precious liberties in our secular, socialist republic. The freedom to speak one's mind openly, although not always in perfect good taste, is protected under our Constitution. The US Supreme Court has also put it trenchantly by observing that it is the purpose of the First Amendment guaranteeing free speech to preserve an uninhibited market-place of ideas in which truth will ultimately prevail, rather than to countenance monopolisation of that market, whether it be by the government itself or a private licencee. The strong support for free speech, in the words of French philosopher Voltaire, needs to be constantly remembered by the governments, namely, "I disagree with every word you say but I shall fight to death for your right to say so." The governments of the US and Britain have refused to ban the books which have doubted the crucifiction of Jesus Christ, the very foundation of Christian religion. No one has still suggested that the books be banned nor have these books led to a decline in the number of followers of Christianity. We in this country have had embarrassing instances of book banning both by Central and state governments. There has been a lot of criticism and the image of the country as a free, open society has suffered. It is time society leaders showed courage and raised their voice against the banning of
books. The writer is a former Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court.
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On writing a bestseller I
write
with a fair amount of regularity. But what I write has always been modestly successful and never been worthy of making it to the bestseller list. But my deep and abiding awareness of my severe limitations as a writer has not prevented me from having an occasional and fierce desire of wanting to write a bestseller. During one of these delusions of grandeur, I hit upon what I felt was a surefire formula for a bestseller. I roped in two of my colleagues and they too were enthused by the project. We first found a Barbara Cartland novel which had had about three dozen reprints. It was one of the standard Barbara Cartland romances about a tall dark and handsome hero from an aristocratic family and the beautiful, naïve daughter of a tenant farmer. The romance went through the usual ups and downs but true love finally triumphed. We took the basic plot and, in what we considered a highly creative set of meetings, transposed it to an Indian setting, with the dark hero becoming fair and other such suitable transformations. We added episodes of violence and sex which we thought are mandatory for a bestseller. Then we parcelled out the chapters between us and got down to the serious matter of writing. We would meet after each chapter had been written and try to bring some uniformity to the style. Looking back I think we succeeded admirably. Once we had a complete manuscript we persuaded another colleague, from the Hindi Department, to translate the manuscript into Hindi. Of course, everything was official and an agreement had been drawn up and signed in which each of us would have a 25 per cent share in the millions that would accrue to us by way of royalty. We found a publisher. Our translator colleague made a trip to Lucknow to negotiate the terms and sign the agreement. Of course, the fact that the book had been published under a pseudonym took some of the gloss off our achievement. We waited with bated breath: we did not have long to wait. By the end of the year the book had had five reprints, had been translated into Urdu and the film rights had been sold. Our millions came in the shape of a cheque for the princely sum of Rs 7,857: the publisher claimed that each print order had been of a hundred copies and that according to the contract the translation and film rights had been made over to the publisher in return for his agreeing to publish the novel! We knew that our translator colleague had stolen from us, but then in a sense, the entire venture had originated in a theft. I have never again made a deliberate attempt at writing a bestseller but that doesn’t keep me from hoping, once in a while, for the miracle that will transform one of my modest attempts at writing into
one.
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There is a long list of indications for ultrasound during pregnancy, including foetal well-being, which is such a generalised term that it virtually allows ultrasonography on demand with little requirement of application of mind at the hands of the ultrasonologist Section 4(2) of the Act specifies that no pre-natal diagnostic techniques shall be conducted except for the purposes of detection of any of the following abnormalities, namely:
n
Chromosomal abnormalities; Section 4(3) says that no pre-natal diagnostic techniques shall be used or conducted unless the person qualified to do so is satisfied that any of the following conditions are fulfilled, namely: n
Age of the pregnant woman is above 35 years; Thus, very specific provisions have been enumerated as indications for a pre-natal diagnostic technique such as ultrasonography. However, these provisions get thoroughly diluted in Form F of the Pre-conception & Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Rules, 1996 read with Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Regulation and Prevention of Misuse) Amendment Rules, 2003. In the last part of Form F there is a column of Important Notes. The (ii)nd note reads as under: During pregnancy Ultrasonography should only be performed when indicated. The following is the representative list of indications for ultrasound during pregnancy: n
To diagnose intra-uterine and/or ectopic pregnancy and confirm viability. Thus it enlists 23 indications as a representative list of indications for ultrasound during pregnancy. Here evaluation of foetal well-being is also an indication. Foetal well being is such a generalised term that it virtually allows ultrasonography on demand with little requirement of application of mind at the hands of the ultrasonologist. 2171 ultrasounds were reported on pregnant women in district Mahendragarh during the month of January 2011 as per information sought from the office of Civil Surgeon cum District Appropriate Authority for the PNDT Act. Foetal wellbeing was the indication in 1847 (>85%) cases. Thus, it is clearly evident that this loophole is being utilised to defeat the very purpose of the act. According to Rule 9 of the PNDT rules, every ultrasound clinic has to maintain a register showing (in serial order) the names and addresses of the pregnant women who underwent ultrasonography as a pre-natal diagnostic technique. Further, a record has to be maintained in Form F. The register is not issued by the district appropriate authority. Similarly Form F bears no serial number. For an unscrupulous imaging centre, it is very convenient to under-report the ultrasonographies conducted by it. Since the F form has no serial number, it can be torn off if the imaging centre wishes to under-report the ultrasounds conducted. Similarly, two sets of registers can be maintained: one actual, one for reporting purposes. The drugs Mifepristone and Misoprostol are widely used as medical termination of pregnancy pills. Mifepristone blocks the hormone progesterone needed to maintain the pregnancy. Because this hormone is blocked, the uterine lining begins to shed, the cervix begins to soften and bleeding may occur. With the later addition of the second medication, Misoprostol, the uterus contracts and the pregnancy is usually expelled within 6 to 8 hours. These drugs are available with chemists over the counter. Drugs, which are so potent and which can be so easily utilized for killing the female foetus, must only be available through a written prescription of a registered medical practitioner competent to conduct a medical termination of pregnancy under the MTP Act, 1971. Then there is technological aspect. The record of ultrasounds conducted can be easily deleted from the ultrasound machine or they may not be saved at all by the person conducting the ultrasound. The inter-district or inter-state migration of the couples willing to get the sex determination test done poses an important challenge. If the enforcement gets strict in one district, such families can avail the facility in neighbouring district or state. Accompanying social movement is a must in tackling this as it is primarily a social evil. District administration, Mahendragarh, is geared up to fight this stigma and solicits the support of medical fraternity, civil society organisations, religious groups, panchayati raj institutions and individuals. Dr Saket Kumar MBBS, MD (Paediatrics) is an IAS Officer of Haryana Cadre posted as Deputy Commissioner,
Mahendergarh.
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A
Making the indications for ultrasonography during pregnancy more specific by removing the "important notes" part of Form F.