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Bail, not jail
Playing with lives |
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Temporary marriage mart
Refurbishing govt’s image
Passing on
It is time to deliver on promises to give both authority and autonomy to panchayats, promises made often in the past
A potential game-changer
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Bail, not jail
BJP
leaders Jaswant Singh and Yashwant Sinha may have been prompted by political considerations when they questioned the wisdom of the courts in denying bail to former Telecom Minister A Raja and DMK Member of Parliament Kanimozhi, both arrested in connection with the 2G spectrum allocation scam. But politics aside, the leaders did well to raise a fundamental question involving the criminal justice system. With the process of trial in the case having started following the Central Bureau of Investigation completing its inquiry, suggested Singh, there is no reason to hold them behind bars because they obviously cannot tamper with evidence already collected by the CBI. What is more, it is a settled principle of law that everyone is deemed innocent till proven guilty. Detaining undertrials in jail, therefore, will amount to punishing them even before they are found guilty. In a country where trials tend to go on for ever, there is even greater need for the courts to exercise restraint. With the CBI’s rate of conviction known to be poor and with most of the accused, and certainly the rich and the powerful, getting off lightly due to inadequate evidence, courts may find it tempting to deny bail to the accused. But that makes very little difference to the influential undertrial, who can pull strings from inside the prison and even secure preferential treatment there. It is the ordinary undertrials, who enjoy no such luxury and are even denied their right to defend themselves properly when the courts deny them bail. If there is strong enough evidence against anyone, the correct course is to complete the trial and punish the guilty expeditiously. The Supreme Court, which is monitoring the 2G case, should, therefore, ensure a speedy trial and direct the CBI to desist from filing an unmanageably long chargesheet or produce an unmanageably long list of witnesses, which is usually designed to drag trials indefinitely. That, and not denial of bail, would serve the interests of justice better.
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Playing with lives
Even
ordinary waste strewn around carelessly is bad for health. When biomedical waste is thrown along with municipal solid waste, it can kill. Yet, that is exactly what many of the hospitals of Punjab have been doing. When the Punjab Pollution Control Board (PPCB) conducted surprise checks at 108 hospitals and health care facilities across the state on Sunday, 20 hospitals were found to be violating waste disposal rules. Among them were eight government hospitals and 12 private hospitals. Being conscious of the fact that biomedical waste can play havoc with the health of thousands of people, the Bio-Medical Waste (Management and Handling) Rules, 1998, are very stringent and ordain that all hospitals and health centres segregate biomedical waste into different containers and bags according to colour code. These containers are to be transported from the premises of the Common-Bio-Medical Waste Treatment Facility located at Mohali, Ludhiana, Pathankot, Amritsar and Bathinda. However, the rules are merrily ignored even by reputed hospitals. They either dump their waste – comprising solids, liquids, sharps and laboratory waste — along with municipal solid waste or throw it away in an unhygienic manner, unmindful of the fact that this is infectious and can pollute the entire locality. It is dangerous for humans as well as the environment. The PPCB has been running a sustained campaign for the past one year against this menace. If the practice still continues, it only shows that some people are incorrigible and will not mend their ways till harsh punishment is meted out to them. It is necessary to keep a close watch on the various biomedical waste facilities because they too are known to be cutting corners at times. While taking action against the erring institutions, the authorities should also focus on the hygiene within the hospitals. If they can be so callous about waste disposal, they might be equally uncaring about the hygiene on the hospital premises. The cases of hospital-induced infections are not uncommon.
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Temporary marriage mart
In
the recent arrests of qazis, brokers and the so-called grooms from the old city of Hyderabad, the police was surprised to find doddering sheikhs being replaced by young Sudanese and Somalian students as grooms. But the remaining script remained the same. The well-oiled network involving travel agents, hotel owners, brokers and clerics who marry off poor Muslim minor girls under mut’a, a kind of temporary marriage with religious sanction, involves too many stakeholders in the bride bazaar, which continues to flourish despite a few arrests and once-in-a-while reports appearing in the media. Almost 20 years ago, Ameena, an 11-year-old frightened girl, huddled up in a UAE-bound flight, was spotted by an alert airhostess, who discovered that she was being taken to Sharjah by her 70-year-old husband. The heart-rending story of the helpless girl’s rescue caught people’s imagination and the Hyderabad bride racket was busted. A temporary crackdown slowed down the process; thereafter it was business as usual. An estimated 300 Arab men come to Hyderabad every year on the pretext of medical treatment or tourism who are actually on the lookout for young temporary brides. The police says at least 35 such marriages take place every month. Since some of the Gulf countries like Oman and Saudi Arabia have made it mandatory for their citizens to get a license if they wish to marry outside the country, a new trend has emerged. The Arabs do not come in person, but operate through brokers or middlemen and the nikah ceremony is conducted on the telephone. The girls are then trafficked out of the country and after the contract period often end up in brothels. If Punjab has earned notoriety for its deserter NRI husbands, Hyderabad has come to be known for its bride bazar. The sociological factors engineering both trends are lack of education, poverty, greed, unpaid loans and lust. If sheikhs and NRI husbands are cruel, the parents of the vulnerable girls are equally responsible for treating their daughters as baits. The girls need education and the community needs to change the archaic Qazi Act, which gives sanction to mut’a.
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The art of life is the art of avoiding pain. — William Lyon Phelps
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Refurbishing govt’s image Governments
are out of steam after traversing some distance. It happens all over the world because the enthusiasm with which they start functioning peters out, the promises which they make become remote and the schemes which they take up lack push. This is the most charitable explanation of the Manmohan Singh government’s non-performance. It has no sense of direction. How can it direct the nation? This comes out clearly as the government reaches midway to its five-year tenure. Yet, it does not realise how strong the groundswell of public opinion against it is. The agitation by Anna Hazare gave evidence of that. People came out in the open in his support throughout the country. The government assessed the mood at that time correctly and sat with the representatives of civil society to draft the Lokpal Bill. The issue is corruption and the government has to attend to it. By reshuffling the Cabinet, people’s anger is not going to go away unless they see some concrete steps to eliminate corruption. The battered government has to come up with the answer to explain why the system does not function. The government’s ham-handedness can be judged by the way even the Finance Minister’s office in the secure North Block was broken in to bug and leave chewing gums to mock at the entire exercise of security. By changing portfolios the Prime Minister does not improve the efficiency of departments or quicken the pace of decisions. And what do you do about integrity? Practically all ministers of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh are mixed up with a magnet in the corporate sector or the other. Ineptness has, in fact, become the hallmark of the government. Even if you were to leave out corruption, which has been the maximum since Independence, you would find numerous examples of sloth and slovenliness strewn all over the administration. Maybe, there is a purpose behind it, probably to cover up the fallout of an unholy alliance between ministers and bureaucrats. The government seems to live under the illusion that the subsidies and pro-poor yojanas (plans) keep the aam aadmi happy. Half of the allocation does not reach him and what reaches him tends to make most among the indolent and hopelessly dependent. Punjab and Haryana are two examples where agriculture labour prefers to draw a dole than work. What depresses me is the Prime Minister’s belief that nothing is wrong with the government and that its image has been damaged by the media and the judiciary in that order. He should realise that both are the consequence, not the cause. The cause is the series of scams which would have remained unexposed if journalists had not brought them before the public, and judges had not pulled up the administration. Dr Manmohan Singh goes by what the bureaucrats tell him or the senior ministers suggest. They are cut off from the public and do not know about its thinking. Having been a bureaucrat for most of his life, Dr Manmohan Singh should have known how to make the administration function quickly and responsive. My feeling is that time is running out. The Prime Minister does not reaslise that he has no leeway and must act now if he does not want the situation going out of hand. He should compare his last tenure with the present one. Then it looked as if he had thought over the steps he was taking. Despite the pressure of coalition partners, he had his way. True, he performed less than expectations, but did not seem out of depth as he looks today. In the current tenure, he does not seem to get anything right. Understandably, he feels uncertain because he has to manage some 24 parties and does not have the chunk of 60-odd members from the Left to depend on. (They themselves have been reduced to 16). But the coalition dharma does not mean that he should connive at the corruption involving its members. The correspondence between him and ex-Telecommunications Minister A. Raja shows that he knew about the corruption among DMK members in the Cabinet and still he did not do anything about it. Dr Manmohan Singh should have at least warned DMK chief K. Karunanidhi instead of placating him. True, Congress president Sonia Gandhi dictates the terms and she was not willing to disturb the applecart in the beginning of the second term. The issue of price rise is a serious one. There must be something wrong somewhere to allow it to go haywire. By saying that inflation is “causing worry,” the government does not mollify the angry nation. I get the impression that the rulers have no idea of coping with the ever-increasing prices. “We have no magic wand,” is the stock reply when pressed to explain why prices are inordinately high. Why did the government let the situation reach such a pass in the first instance? No economist is required to tell the government that it is a question of demand and supply. What is required is productivity. The government has no immediate plans to do so. Probably, it has referred the matter to the Planning Commission, which will tell us in good time what steps to take. By that time inflation would have risen still further. Has the government ever tried to cut its expenditure? One no longer hear the word “austerity” in official circles. Almost 75 per cent of petrol and diesel is utilised by vehicles of government and the public sector undertakings at the Centre and in the states. Why doesn’t the government reduce the cavalcade of cars and security personnel with a minister or a VIP? I thought BJP leader L.K. Advani would have been sensitive enough to voluntarily cut the number of cars and security men when he travels at least within New Delhi, a protected area. In fact, all opposition leaders in the country should unilaterally surrender all vehicles that follow them except the one which carries the security men. This may be one way to shame the government. The Prime Minister and the Congress president are now engaged in an exercise to refurbish the image of the government. They should recall how Jawaharlal Nehru and Lal Bahadur Shastri stressed on economising the government expenditure. Shastri even gave a call for “miss a meal” since food was in short supply. That spirit in leadership is lacking. Concrete steps are required to convince people that the government is serious about eliminating corruption as well as avoiding wasteful expenditure. A government which appears out of steam cannot prove its dynamism by the Prime Minister’s briefing to some editors. He should come out of purdah more often and face the
nation.
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Passing on I
recounted the notes, six of them in all. These were crisp, almost the size of a donkey’s ear. It was my first salary, Rs six hundred! Literally earned through blood and sweat as fifteen days were accounted for, amidst intense war. Ironically, a few batchmates were not destined to earn their maiden cheque. As the just-born Bangladesh was still finding its feet, there were no markets around. So the treasure remained in the tunic pocket and even survived a wash. Being the juniormost in the unit, I was detailed on stores collection duty to Chittagong. In the port city, I found electronic items and watches to be a good buy. After due deliberation, I homed on to a watch; Swiss automatic with day and date. There couldn’t be a better present for dad, I thought. He had purchased a Tissot to commemorate my arrival and it had been on him for 20 years. So when I came home on leave and handed over the gift, he was choked with emotions and pride. Dad had opted for an early retirement to look after lands and domestic affairs. To me he was more of a friend. His day included picking/dropping me at school, help me in extra studies and in the evening hone my outdoor skills. When I left for boarding school in the South, dad made it a point to receive and see me off at Delhi (instead of at home station), traversing 400 km one way. I idolised him particularly for his courage. An ‘Indian National Army’ (INA) Veteran, he was an expert at unarmed combat. With a single blow of a hockey stick he could put a cobra to sleep. A born optimist and a motivator, my father’s deep influence continued to act as a catalyst in my achievements. Fit as a fiddle at 78, it came as a rude shock when his chronic sore throat ailment was diagnosed as malignant. As I was headed to take over a battalion in Siachen, dad flew to Australia for advanced treatment. I got the news of his passing away during an ongoing operation. Barely minutes before his death, he enquired about me from my wife. Dad breathed his last, with the watch strapped to his wrist. Two decades on, it was time for me to hang boots. Prioritising the post-retirement commitments, it was evident that replacement of the ‘Hatch Back’ will have to wait. Just 10 days before the D Day, my son called up from the U.S., surprising me with a present on Father’s Day. I was overpowered with excitement like a kid, with tears in my eyes! My son’s gift is very dear to me and I don’t let anyone touch it. When I drive it, I am filled with pride and nostalgia of the bygone days. During my last meeting with dad, I shared my burden — inability to reciprocate his devotion and sacrifices. Smiling, he patted me and whispered: “You can, by passing it
on”.
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It is time to deliver on promises to give both authority and autonomy to panchayats, promises made often in the past The
Panchayat elections, held successfully in J & K after 33 years, are significant for various reasons. These polls, at the very least, have revived people’s faith in democracy and democratic institutions and sent out a clear message to the separatists.
The last Panchayat elections were held in the year 2001 but polling, at that time, was partial and not held in many parts of the Kashmir Valley due to the poor security scenario. There were only 2702 Panchayats in 2001 but this time the number of panchayats, where polling took place, went up to 4130. Besides the 4130 Sarpanches, voters also elected 29719 Panches this time. The ruling coalition, headed by the young Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, can take justifiable credit for conducting the elections. The Government worked hard to ensure maximum participation of the people and ensured the peaceful conduct of the election. The Chief Minister Omar Abdullah was right when he said that Panchayat elections are not going to solve the problems overnight. But at the same time, these historic elections have thrown up an opportunity for the ruling elite to channelise peoples’ increasing faith in democracy.
Onus on govt
While the people have performed their duty as citizens, the ball is in the court of the government to make the panchayats work and deliver on promises. The onus is on the government now to make local self government participatory and empower the panchayats with decision-making powers at grassroot levels. Arguably, Jammu and Kashmir has suffered due to centralisation of power. Due to the unique topography of the region, many parts of the state remain inaccessible, underdeveloped and backward because developmental policies are formulated with largely Jammu and Srinagar cities in mind. The centralised approach to planning seriously hampered the process of uplifting backward areas and has led to lopsided development in the state. Policies and plans are conceived without adequate appraisal of ground realities and without appreciation of the needs of the people. Now that panchayats are being constituted at the village level, there is need to empower such institutions to realise development objectives of the government and to target the marginalised and the neglected lot of the society. More effective law
But the existing Jammu and Kashmir Panchayat Raj Act does not appear robust or versatile enough to fulfil the real spirit of local self government. Although the government has constituted a high power committee to finalise powers to be delegated to the panchayats, there is apprehension that the ruling elite would conspire to deny real authority to the panchayats. Such fears stem from the fact that though the state government has repeatedly claimed that it would make the existing Jammu and Kashmir Panchayati Raj Act of 1989 more effective but the promises remain largely on paper. There is provision of nominations in the existing state law, points out eminent commentator Balraj Puri. While in the rest of the country, the chairman of the district board is directly elected by the elected Panchayat members, J&K Panchayati Raj Act provides for the chairman to be nominated by the government. Puri points out that although a provision has now been added for an elected vice chairman of the district board, all powers will continue to be exercised by the chairman nominated by the government.
No grants, no reservation
And most important of all, the Jammu and Kashmir Panchayati Raj Act has neither fixed the minimum amount of grant-in-aid from the state to the panchayats nor provided an autonomous machinery for objective allocation of funds. “The state Act does not ensure financial viability or even autonomy of the panchayats and leaves enough financial power in the hands of the state government, which can be used arbitrarily to influence the working of the panchayats”, observes Puri. Former Dean, Social Science, University of Jammu, Prof Hari Om also feels that the existing Panchayat Raj Act of the state would make Panchayats “toothless” bodies with neither financial nor decision making powers. He does not mince his words while saying that without decentralising power, the Panchayati Raj institution would remain a show piece in the state. The Jammu and Kashmir Panchayati Raj Act 1989 does envisage the formation of a three-tier Panchayati Raj Institution but there is also provision of nomination in the Act, which allows the government to appoint its own men to control the panchayats. Similarly there is no provision of reservation of seats for women or Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs). Actually, as per the existing Jammu and Kashmir Panchayat Raj Act, there is a real possibility of panchayats emerging more as quasi-governmental institutions rather than instruments of effective local self government. Sections 9 and 52 of the state Act also empower the government to supersede the Panchayat and remove the chairman and members of Panchayat Adalat.
Development boards
In the state Act, not even a single member of the District Development Board is directly elected. According to section 45 (3) of the Act, the government nominates the chairperson while MPs and MLAs are ex-officio members. Others include chairpersons of Block Development Councils, Town Area Committees and Municipal Councils. The power with the government to nominate chairperson of the District Development Board makes this important tier of Panchayati Raj at the district level an extension of the government machinery than a real local self-government institution. There is, therefore, a growing demand that the chairman should also be elected. “The existing Panchayat Raj Act of the state by and large centralises the power; so there is urgent need to take radical steps to seriously decentralise the power at grass-root level”, observes legal luminary Baldev Singh Slathia, who cautions that without adequate empowerment of the Panchayat, the entire exercise could well turn out to be futile. Unlike other parts of the country, the situation is very different in Jammu and Kashmir, where separatists and other groups have always desperately sought opportunities to discredit the Indian democratic system. With over 80 per cent of the people in rural areas reposing their faith in democracy, it is high time the government honours the mandate of the masses by genuinely empowering the panchayats. One way to do it is to give powers comparable to what panchayats enjoy in the rest of the country by virtue of the 73rd Amendment to the Indian Constitution.
A potential game-changer There was surprise in store for almost every ‘stakeholder’ in the panchayat elections. For a change, the separatists, barring Geelani’s hardline fringe, behaved wisely by refraining from their habitual poll boycott call that was doomed to fail. The mainstream parties, deeply unsure of their grass-root strength, easily fell for the idea of contesting on non-party basis. The normally cautious and apprehensive security-obsessed administration was surprised at the peaceful poll despite an overwhelming turnout of voters. The almost half-a-year long phased polling process did not lose its high pitch and, more importantly, remained peaceful barring a couple of highly localised incidents. To sum up, the scenario turned out to be radically different from what one could have predicted before the polls in this conflict-ridden border state. Like the proverbial blind men’s elephant, every contender—and non-contender—has his own version of how it happened and what it means. But the preliminary estimate shows quite a disturbing trend for the state’s number one political force—the National Conference. Perhaps among the major mainstream contenders, only the NC has reason to feel happy about panchayat polls having been held on (face saving) non-party basis. Its two main competitors in the field, Peoples Democratic Party and (NC’s ruling coalition ally) Congress have emerged stronger at the grassroot level. NC’s overall performance compares poorly even with its showing in the 2008 assembly polls in which it emerged as the single largest party with 30 seats in the 87-member House. The Congress appears to have done better than expected and at many places, it has managed to push the NC to unlikely third place. But it is the PDP which seems to have been the voters’ favoured choice including, notably, in many of the NC’s strongholds in the Kashmir Valley. These segments include Ganderbal constituency held by chief minister Omar Abdullah and Kangan, Budgam and Charar-e-Sharief represented by senior ministers of the NC. The PDP is not yet able to comprehend the dynamics of its unexpected showing because the precise final tally is not yet available. But the NC has been trying to make up for its loss in the polls by making tempting post-poll offers to win over candidates elected in the non-partisan contest. In a relatively small place like J&K, political affiliations are difficult to conceal. Congress could not have remained untouched by the euphoria. The demand for 3-year rotational chief minister has become louder. Omar has to start his day with public declarations that his promised six-year tenancy is under no threat. The Congress rank and file feel that the panchayat poll outcome has revealed serious shortcomings in governance under Omar which, if not checked, could eventually hit both partners in the long run. In plain language, they want the coalition with the NC to remain but with chief ministership passing into the hands of the Congress. Their alibi: ‘We can do a better job’. This urge explains the madness in the method of visiting Congress veterans, Dr Karan Singh and Makhan Lal Fotedar, who publicly agreed (though not supported) to the demand for change of guard. Fotedar made unflattering comparisons between relative performance record of two governments supported by the Congress—-one led by Omar Abdullah and the other by PDP’s Mufti Mohammad Sayeed. The Union Home Minister P Chidambaram had to calm ruffled NC feathers. The political significance of the panchayat elections had actually been under-estimated by one and all. Till the results started trickling in and formed a different political pattern, Omar used to be vociferous in assuring ‘full empowerment’ of elected self-governing units. The suddenly reduced pitch of his commitment, after results of every phase came out, was apparently noticed even in New Delhi. Media reports said that the Centre had exhorted the chief minister to ensure full empowerment of panchayats. Omar in turn retorted: ‘When will Delhi learn to talk directly to me and not through the media ?’ The PDP, having tasted blood, suspects that the Rs 600 crore annual funds from the Centre meant for panchayats in the state might not be utilised properly or misused for partisan political interests. The Congress too is suspicious, though not so openly. The coalition partner wants the chief minister to go for immediate reform of the state’s outdated panchayat law and incorporate federal constitutional amendments that grant full functional autonomy to local self-governance units. That is how a ‘lowly’ election fought on non-partisan basis promises (or threatens) to turn into a potential game changer in more than one sense. And that too in a state notorious for its obsession with ‘Big Game’ politicking. The writer is a commentator
based in Srinagar
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