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US aid slashed
A small gesture
Blaming the victim |
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Impasse on Lokpal shameful
‘Heartmarts’ at my door
A troubled country
Children of the Taliban
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US aid slashed BY suspending a major chunk of the annual $1.1 billion military aid to Pakistan, President Barack Obama has provided proof, if it was needed, that the US is no longer interested in treating Islamabad as a “key ally” in the war against global terror. The aid suspension has come as a result of a $662 billion defence spending Bill becoming a law after Mr Obama had put his signature on it. Recently the US Congress had voted to freeze $700 million of the massive military aid to Pakistan unless Islamabad stopped the smuggling into Afghanistan of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) clandestinely manufactured in Pakistan. These IEDs have been used by Afghan insurgents to kill or maim US soldiers engaged in the war against terror along with troops from other NATO member-countries. The US, apparently, has taken the major step in accordance with its new policy on the Af-Pak area. Washington DC is no longer interested in maintaining the kind of relationship with Pakistan that has existed so far. It has come to realise that it cannot depend on Pakistan for protecting its interests in Afghanistan as Islamabad is not willing to play its cards the way the US wants it to. Islamabad has also stopped cooperating with the US in carrying out drone strikes against the Taliban bases in Pakistan. Perhaps, the US also wants to send to Islamabad a clear message that if Pakistan can harden its stand vis-à-vis the US after the killing of 24 Pakistani soldiers in a US military attack last November under controversial circumstances, Washington DC too can tighten its screws on Pakistan. The truth is that the US aid to Pakistan on the pretext of helping its military to effectively fight terror had no justification since the very beginning. It was never used for the intended purpose. The US funds were used by Pakistan to buy military hardware to improve its strike capabilities against India. This money also helped Islamabad in funding anti-India operations of certain terrorist outfits based in Pakistan. The US has, in fact, suspended its military aid to Pakistan too late in the day. But it is better late than never.
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A small gesture THE government decision to allow direct investment in Indian stock markets by qualified foreign investors comes at a time when the overall sentiment is weak, the economic growth is slowing down and foreign institutional investors (FIIs) are pulling out of the country. A falling market cannot be reversed by small announcements. The stock markets almost ignored the decision as the BSE Sensex ended virtually flat on Monday. In 2011 India was one of the worst-performing stock markets in the world as the Sensex lost about 5,000 points. FIIs withdrew Rs 2,497.50 crore from India, resulting in a sharp decline in the value of the rupee. Towards the end of the year the government made a bold move to open up multi-brand retail to 51 per cent foreign direct investment (FDI) and to send a signal that reforms were on track but opposition parties and some coalition partners forced the UPA to put it in deep-freeze, at least until the assembly elections in five states are over. Given the bitter standoff the Congress had with some of its allies and the opposition BJP over the Lokpal Bill during the extended winter session of Parliament, it is unlikely that major reforms like allowing FDI in retail, aviation and insurance, which need support of at least the UPA allies, could be carried through soon. However, if the BJP is seen as standing in the way of reforms, it would face the consequences. But first of all the Congress should set its own house in order and convince the allies about the need for focusing on the economy. Since the budget is around there is a chance to make investor-friendly policy changes, cut fiscal deficit and improve the financial condition of the government. The goods and services tax (GST) can be a big game-changer. Instead of making piecemeal announcements the government should address the bottlenecks holding back growth. Foreign investors will return once growth picks up.
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Blaming the victim
Déjà vu.
The remark of the Canadian police officer that women should avoid dressing like ‘sluts’ in order not to be victimised sexually or physically which provoked SlutWalks worldwide finds an echo closer home. Andhra Pradesh Director-General of Police V Dinesh Reddy’s observation that it is skimpy dresses of women that lead to rapes, once again, has strong undertones of misguided male machismo. That he reiterated the same “blame the victim” approach that has been used since time immemorial to justify crimes against women is as shocking as ludicrous. What is worse is that he finds support from representatives of some women groups as well as from none other than the Karnataka Minister of Women and Child Welfare. All this is a clear indicator that bigoted attitudes run deep and enjoy societal sanction. Even in the 21st century, the mindset of people, irrespective of the high positions of power that they occupy, is locked in medieval ages. In a convoluted twist of logic and reasoning, societies world over continue to impose strictures and diktats on women on how to dress. Indeed, sensibilities vary from culture to culture and perhaps women’s right to dress as they please is not without certain unwanted ramifications. However, what is provocative for one may be sensible for another. In Sudan, a woman was fined just for wearing trousers. While the DGP has expressed concern over skin show and provocative dressing, the real concerns of women like providing protection to them are seldom addressed. The DGP’s contentious claim “rapes are not in the control of police” rings hollow. Whatever be the dress of a woman, it should never be used as a ruse to explain the rising graph of violence against the fairer sex. While women’s right to dress must be left to their discretion and judgment, the police, society and the government would do well to provide an enabling mechanism to ensure the safety of women. Prescribing dress codes and moral policing will certainly not safeguard women against sexual assaults. It is time men like Mr Reddy realised that assault has more to do with male desire to dominate and little with clothes and even sex.
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Until lions have their historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify the hunters. — African proverb
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Impasse on Lokpal shameful TEAM Anna’s farce ended, not with a bang but a whimper, with “80 crore Indians” or whatever never in sight whether in Mumbai or Delhi. They never were there in any such like numbers, despite bogus referenda and other gimmickry and media magnification. That bluff has been called and the underlying humbug and blackmail increasingly exposed. Yet Anna is girding for another round with an anti-Congress poll campaign to boot. If he and his friends had followed the debate in both Houses of Parliament, they would have seen who opposed the Lokpal Bill — the BJP, the Trinamool Congress, the SP, the Left, the BSP and some others. But they did not wait for Parliament. They had rallied around another of Anna’s pre-determined fasts and announced dates and timetables without caring to know what Parliament might do with the Bill. It was for them still the old war cry “Our Bill or No Bill”. Why? Because they had decided the official Bill was “useless”, “toothless”, “a joke”. They called on Parliament to defeat the Bill on the plea that for the suffering people of India, in whose name they claimed to speak, half a loaf is far worse than no bread. Sadly, the Opposition in Parliament too has hugged the theorem that half a loaf is worse than no bread. The government made out a cogent case in both Houses and did, in fact, accept some amendments on the floor of the House to meet critics half way, but to no avail. The major sticking point suddenly became the alleged assault on federalism by virtue of legislating for Lok Ayuktas in the states in a Central Lokpal Bill. The argument is specious in view of the fact that the government was duty-bound to fulfil its “treaty” obligations under the UN Convention on Corruption which India has ratified. Further, it had accepted an amendment making the application of the Lok Ayukta section subject to the consent of each state. Where is there any violence to federalism here? Three other issues were pressed by the critics. First, the CBI, which deals with more than just corruption cases, should be under the Lokpal and totally independent of the government. Secondly, that Category C and D Union appointees (including peons, drivers and such like) should be under the Lokpal and not the Vigilance Commissioner though the latter would be bound to report to the former. Objection was also taken to the explanation that the prescribed 50 per cent representation in the eight-member panel of the Lokpal bench, excluding the chairperson, would mandatorily go to SC/ST/OBC, minority or women nominees in order to reflect the plurality and diversity of India without reserved quotas for each segment. The official position in all these matters was not unreasonable. There are real dangers in creating a new and all-powerful supra-bureaucratic-cum-police monolith virtually accountable to none. Those who doubt the efficacy of the structures and mechanisms proposed in the Bill had no reason to believe that all future options are closed. Surely, if a year or two down the line, the actual working of the Lokpal were to prove to be inadequate or hamstrung, nothing would preclude this or any successive Parliament from moving amendments to cure such defects. Nothing is foreclosed. After all, the Constitution itself has been substantively amended many times Over and beyond these matters, some members of Parliament thought the Bill went too far in encompassing certain categories of trusts and NGOs, even if only above a certain financial threshold, while others argued it did not go far enough insofar as it excluded the corporate sector. On both counts the government has a point. Trusts and NGOs do get foreign funding and in some instances have been known to indulge in malpractices. Corporates too are prone to corruption and can and must be dealt with through other mechanisms without overloading the Lokpal. The Whistle-Blowers Act was adopted without controversy by the Lok Sabha and will give heart and muscle to men and women who stand up for principles. However, the Bill to vest the Lokpal with constitutional authority was shot down on the ground that the Lokpal Bill as conceived was full of infirmities. The Congress could not muster the two-thirds majority required for a constitutional amendment and displayed poor floor management. Yet this by itself would not have mattered, and the Constitution Bill could have been re-introduced at a later time, without impeding the establishment of a Lokpal. However, this was not to be. Though in a minority in the Rajya Sabha, the government could have got the Lokpal Bill passed by a simple majority with some friendly support. However, it was rudely let down by its own UPA allies, the TMC being the most adamant. Seeing the way things were going, the government perhaps wisely thought it fit to close the debate by midnight, December 29, the last day of the extended session, and not seek a vote on the tactical plea that the 187 amendments moved would need careful consideration. The tearing up of the Bill by an RJD member was disgraceful and should not go unpunished. Gratuitously attributing motives to the Chairman for adjourning the House sine die on account of choreographed disorder is equally unacceptable. Rival conspiracy theories have been floated to divert blame by insinuating mala fides to others. This will not wash. The Lokpal Bill as passed by the Lok Sabha is still alive. This leaves the government with the option to bring it up in the Budget session, after further consultation or amendment. In the latter case, the Bill will need to go back to the Lok Sabha for its approval, failing which a joint session of both Houses will have to be convened to settle the matter. Though all is not lost, the current impasse is a national shame. The government’s handling of matters has been slipshod and lacking in timely consultation. The BJP has adopted a petty partisan stand that puts embarrassing the Congress above the national interest. And the Trinamool has repeatedly betrayed every canon of collective responsibility and seems to be in the UPA only to extract what it can. Mamata Bannerjee has failed to grow and is becoming a prime example of everything a coalition should not be. The Prime Minister must take a call on this and other alliance partnerships as the next thing an “ally” might well do is to pull the rug from under the Finance Minister when he puts the next Union Budget to vote. The government must also stop trying to parley with and placate Anna. The man has put himself out of court. Governance cannot be outsourced to the streets. Rather than be pushed about by others, the government needs to unfold a positive agenda of economic and systemic reform that rallies the country to positive thinking and action in 2012. There is life beyond Anna, Mamata, the BJP and the UP elections, and even the Lokpal, which is a desirable tool but not a universal
panacea.
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‘Heartmarts’ at my door MANY, many years ago — like most first-time visitors from India — I too was absolutely goggle-eyed to be at a supermarket in the US. It was truly to be in the land of plenty — a retail cornucopia, where killer sales and deals were to be bagged. If one merely needed a breakfast cereal — rows of infinite varieties were on sale which made it a connoisseur’s task to pick one. One couldn’t even decide which breakfast sausages to buy along, the choice so awesome! No wonder, back home, even the biggest stores in Chandigarh looked peanut-sized in comparison. But over the years, all the glamour and awe of those giant stores abroad has given way to rediscovering the simple joys of street-side shopping at home. The human drama, interaction and warmth of this street show are eternally fascinating. The earliest callers at our house are the newspaper boy and the milkman. While the former is always in a tearing hurry to deliver the papers and perpetually moaning about the late arrival of the Delhi papers, the latter is involved in no such paper chase. He is a relaxed, wizened old man who delivers milk in poly-packs from a bicycle cart. Always game for a bit of gossip and news, he relishes my early morning reportage of the headlines from the freshly arrived newspaper. But the most eagerly awaited visitor is the “sabziwallah” doing his rounds. He lets out a full-throated, guttural cry of “mattar” (peas) as his sales pitch to herald his arrival. This sends all the housewives scurrying for their vegetable baskets. Panditji — as he is fondly called by all — prefers for some strange reason or marketing strategy to advertise peas only, round the year. But it works, and his customers flock to him eagerly; perhaps because of his fair measures and the freshness of the vegetables or even more so because of his personalised enquiries about the welfare of all our family members. By the afternoon, the pattern of street vendors doing the rounds changes significantly. Those catering to the daily needs give way to the ones serving a more select clientele. In come droves of “pashmina shawl sellers” and carpet sellers, “only the finest from Mushirabad — who must sell out the entire stock today!” Occasionally, a vivacious hill lass, who promises pure, golden honey — straight from the flower-decked meadows of the Kulu valley — shows up to seduce with her irresistible wares. However, the last such caller at our household is the bread-wallah, who announces his arrival with the musical tinkle of his cycle bell. Astride an old Hercules bike, he carries a big steel trunk laden with oven-fresh bread, cakes, cream rolls and even pizzas. Loaded with such mouth-watering goodies, he is quite the favourite of the neighbourhood kids — who keep adding their own orders to the list handed out by their mothers. Amidst such an ambience of warm, human encounters who would miss trudging a lonely shopping trolley in an
oversized, impersonal, supermarket? No, thanks, Wallmart or Tesco!
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A troubled country
PAKISTAN is in the midst of several crises. The picture at this stage appears dismal. However, even in this period of despair there are exceptions that inspire confidence in its future. The other day I was fortunate to witness such an instance, during a PIA flight from Islamabad to Lahore. I was struck by wonderment when I heard a woman's voice announce, "This is your captain and it is a pleasure to welcome you aboard; I will be flying you to Lahore.…" PIA has a few women pilots in its service, but it was my first time to take a flight captained by one of them. Well done. If Pakistan has been able to provide such opportunities to its women (though sadly not to a larger number), then there is still hope for us despite the very poor and venal leadership provided by some of those who head our leading institutions. I am a believer in the dictum that if there are a few good men left amongst us at the helm, then we shall emerge much stronger from our struggles than many may think. The point that is worrisome, however, is whether we will be able to retain our institutional coherence that is essential for stability; without strong and vibrant institutions a country stops progressing and begins to decay. Pakistan has been no stranger to turbulent times since its birth. It was the resilience of its citizens and some of its leaders heading various institutions that kept it going. By early 1960 it was marked as one of the upcoming Asian tigers with a head start compared to others. Those were the years when the Koreans and others came to learn how to develop economies and how to create national airlines and many other things. Our promise was nipped in the bud by the crass stupidity of initiating a war with India. Had we not made that error of judgment, the fate of Pakistan may have been quite different today. The recent deterioration in the civil-military governance structure is yet another step taking us down. Generally speaking, such results are expected when expediency rather than principles prevail. It is not understood why we criticise the US vehemently when we ourselves forced it to intervene as revealed recently by the publication of Condoleezza Rice's account of how the US brokered a deal between President Musharraf, who was then the army chief, and Benazir Bhutto, leader of the PPP who was tipped to become Pakistan's next prime minister. Ms Rice's account indicates that Gen Musharraf manipulated Washington to become a player in Pakistan's internal affairs. It brings to mind a comparison with the ongoing ‘memogate’ affair in which the conduct of Husain Haqqani, Pakistan's former ambassador to the US, and by implication that of President Asif Zardari, has been challenged in the Supreme Court; if their conduct is considered treasonous, one wonders if Gen Musharraf was not equally culpable. The recent downward slide in US-Pakistan relations took a turn for the worse when the US Senate passed the defence authorisation bill, freezing the roughly $700m earmarked in aid to Pakistan, pending assurance that Islamabad would take steps to prevent militants from using improvised explosive devices (IEDs) against US-led forces in Afghanistan. According to an article in the National Journal, "the number of IED attacks in Afghanistan has spiked to an all-time high [according to US military officials], because of the free flow of critical bomb-making materials from neighbouring Pakistan. "Senior military officials said there were more than 1,600 strikes involving so-called 'improvised explosive devices' in June, setting a new record for the long Afghan war, and underscoring the dangers posed by militants operating inside both of the troubled countries. The number of IED strikes in June 2011 was nearly 25 per cent higher than the monthly average for the conflict. In May, for instance, there were 1,250 IED attacks." Connecting Pakistan to the IEDs opens up yet another Pandora's box. What is the message from Congress to Pakistan - that it should prevent Afghan militants from laying IEDs? It has not been possible for the International Security Assistance Force to do so since 2004. Or is the message more threatening and is the US charging Pakistan for the presence of the IEDs in Afghanistan? This truly may be a flight of the imagination if that is what is meant. Yet, another more pernicious deduction perhaps is that Pakistan is being pressured to act against the Haqqani network that is considered to have singular expertise in the use of IEDs. However, research indicates that IED warfare was unknown in Afghanistan and was a skill that was brought by Arab fighters from Iraq after 2004 and was allegedly encouraged by the Iranians. According to a 2009 report in the Middle East Quarterly, the Iranians were providing some Taliban factions Iranian-made IEDs as well as heat-seeking missiles against the western forces. Though the Iranian government denied any such involvement, sections of the Iranian establishment were alleged to be behind such moves. Several media reports from Afghanistan suggest that Iran has been increasing its operations in Afghanistan in an effort to gain influence with the contending insurgent factions and to hasten the departure of US troops from the country. This analysis tends to show that Pakistan has limited influence in the IED matter. On the other hand, the recent declaration of jihad by the Defence of Pakistan Council, a forum for hard-line Islamist parties, indicates the need for caution and the lowering of institutional tension, otherwise larger social unrest may follow soon. The writer is the Chairman of the Regional Institute of Policy Research,
Peshawar. By arrangement with Dawn, Islamabad.
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Children of the Taliban ACCORDING to a recent report, the Afghan Taliban have reached an agreement with the Karzai government that will end their attacks on schools and teachers. In return, the education department will have the curriculum vetted and approved by the extremist group that will also have a say in the selection of teachers. The Pakistani Taliban have a much simpler education policy: they just blow up school buildings, paying especial attention to girls' schools and colleges. To further discourage parents from trying to educate their kids, these zealots kill and kidnap them at every opportunity. These are the people we are supposed to negotiate with, according to large sections of our political class and right-wing media. But whenever reports of talks between the Taliban and the government do the rounds, they are firmly repudiated by the terrorists who repeat their mantra of no talks until their interpretation of Sharia law is imposed across the whole country. So basically, they are demanding that we surrender before any negotiations can take place. According to their calculus, by constantly slaughtering unarmed civilians and attacking state institutions, they will weaken the will of the government as well as the population to resist. Thus far, their estimation of the establishment's stomach for the struggle has not been far wrong: witness the abject position our politicians and administration took when they handed over Swat to the terrorist group headed by Maulana Fazlullah. Had not these criminals overreached, they might still have been terrorising Swat. The reason for the Taliban's rejection of all modern education is that they want to drag us down to their level of ignorance. We must never lose sight of the fact that religion has nothing to do with the ongoing struggle: the fight is, and always has been, about power. It is also true that most Muslim countries have failed to put forward a consistent counter-narrative by their generally shambolic performance. This absence of good governance has given the extremists greater appeal than they deserve. Having said this, let us not forget what a disaster the Taliban were when they were in power in Afghanistan. They not only isolated their country by their stone-age approach to government, they gave religion a bad name by their brutal treatment of women and the non-Pashtun minorities. In Pakistan, we have the example of the alliance of the Islamic parties who governed the then NWFP province under Musharraf's regime, having come to power with his help. Widely seen as corrupt and ineffective, they opened the doors to further extremism. More than anything else, we should deplore the Taliban's benighted attitude towards education. By banning girls from going to school, and imposing their barbaric worldview on learning, they wish to consign future generations to the same ignorance they revel in. Politicians like Imran Khan should ask themselves if they would like their children to grow up and be educated under a Taliban dispensation. Despite their ignorance, they understand that to exercise total control over a subject population, you have to control what the younger generation absorb. In the mediaeval era, the Church recognised this truth and staffed schools with priests. Only the arrival of the Enlightenment wrested control of learning from the papacy. Among so much else, children educated in madressahs are denied any knowledge about the wonders of the universe. Who, for instance, will teach them about the implications of the possible discovery of the Higgs boson, recently announced by the director of the Large Hadron Collider at Cern? To convey the excitement the increasing probability of a breakthrough has generated in the scientific community, here is Lawrence M Krauss, cosmologist at the Arizona State University, quoted in the New York Times: "If the Higgs is discovered, it will represent perhaps one of the greatest triumphs of the human intellect in recent memory, vindicating 50 years of the building of one of the greatest theoretical edifices in all of science, and requiring the building of the most complicated machine that has ever been built." One of those who contributed significantly to the building of this 'theoretical edifice' was Prof Abdus Salam, the Pakistani physicist who was honoured for his work with a Nobel Prize. In Pakistan, he was largely ignored by a reactionary establishment that was rabidly hostile towards his Ahmadi belief. Kepler-22b is the most likely candidate for a world that might sustain life found so far. This has been a fruitful year for scientists searching the skies for extra-terrestrial planets, and over 1,000 have now been identified. But for me, the most exciting scientific possibility of the year has been the report that certain particles might have travelled faster than light. The controversial experiment has been repeated with similar results, and should it be confirmed, it will have enormous implications for the tested theory of relativity and our view of how the universe is constructed. One of the fundamentals of the theory postulates that nothing can travel faster than light. And thus far, all research and experience seemed to confirm this law of physics. But researchers who reported their findings recently might force a re-valuation of what has been taken as gospel for decades. Sadly, all these wonders will be denied to children brought up and educated under the Taliban and their ilk. Those who want us to share power with them need to think again. The writer is the author of "Fatal Faultlines: Pakistan, Islam and the West". By arrangement with Dawn, Islamabad.
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