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Loss of face
Aborted justice |
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Rapes in Shimla The hill town is not safe anymore APART from the menace of narcotics, Himachal Pradesh is largely known as a low-on-crime state of peace-loving people. Therefore, two rape cases involving adolescent girls in Shimla have put this ‘Devbhumi’ under a scrutiny.
Unemployment & inequality
The runaway kite
US shutdown and the looming debt crisis
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Loss of face
THE embarrassment the Rahul Gandhi snub caused to the UPA government on the issue of the ordinance intending to provide a breather to the convicted legislators could have been avoided had careful thought gone into having a law that upheld the larger interests of the country instead of the political interests of the select few. Dr Manmohan Singh rightly resisted the pressure for his resignation. That would have meant going down in history on a negative issue. His government's attempt to pass a law to protect criminals in politics is unjustifiable. He should have put his foot down when the ill-conceived ordinance/Bill was brought forward. One shudders to think of the way laws are passed and decisions of far-reaching consequences are taken without the application of mind. The government-public disconnect stands exposed. On the one hand were the Supreme Court, the media and spirited citizens taking the stand that convicted MPs and MLAs should find no space in the legislatures, and on the other was the political class, almost united, in having a law to protect the convicts among them. The BJP, which switched sides in no time, did not oppose the abhorrent Bill but tried to delay it by having it referred to a parliamentary committee. The UPA backers like Sharad Pawar, who are now hurt, had not objected when the Congress and the government endorsed the ordinance. Some of the younger leaders like Shashi Tharoor reportedly objected but were silenced by their more mature, pragmatic seniors. The legislators, if jailed by political opponents, can be given relief if their cases are referred to fast-track courts. As the generational shift in the BJP has hurt elderly leaders like L.K. Advani, the Congress veterans too have been left with bruised egos. It took a much younger, inexperienced leader to point out what a wrong the Cabinet had committed. Rahul Gandhi seized the opportunity, righted the wrong and got away with all the credit. Now he should move beyond sporadic appearances on the political scene and lead from the front if the Congress is to put up a credible fight in the 2014 elections.
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Aborted justice
WHEN a government remits the sentence of a convict and releases him before the completion of the minimum sentence laid down under the IPC it virtually renders meaningless the entire prosecution and judicial process gone through to convict the person. That is what the Supreme Court meant when it told governments not to make a mockery of the law by reducing terms to below the minimum period. It has been the norm with most state governments, including Punjab and Haryana, to arbitrarily let people off the hook. As there are no criteria laid down on who qualifies for such a relief, influence or political motivations have been a major factor. This amounts to extrajudicial arbitration in what otherwise should fall strictly in the ambit of the judicial process. Besides out-of-turn remissions in specific cases, it is also the custom with chief ministers to announce blanket reduction in jail terms of all prisoners on occasions such as Independence Day, though they put a rider those convicted of heinous crimes would not get any relief. Such patronising gestures - and provisions in the law that permit it - come from the period of imperial British rule, when the rulers wanted to retain the power to intervene in a case if a court order did not suit their political goals. The convenience has been retained in the CrPC too. The Supreme Court has done well to put a rider on this, saying no one can be set free till he has completed the minimum sentence provided for in the particular case under the IPC. In life sentence, 14 years is the minimum period a convict has to serve. However, as most are released after this period, it has come to be seen as the 'full life term’, which it is not. Remission is required to release a person even after 14 years. This also distorts the proportion of crime and punishment, as people convicted of even extremely heinous crimes — which may have well attracted the death penalty — at times get away after 14 years. As it is, the law leaves many feeling unfairly treated; arbitrary intervention by
governments only makes it worse.
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Rapes in Shimla
APART from the menace of narcotics, Himachal Pradesh is largely known as a low-on-crime state of peace-loving people. Therefore, two rape cases involving adolescent girls in Shimla have put this ‘Devbhumi’ under a scrutiny. Though the state was among the first to realize the need for special police protection for women after the Nirbhaya case, resulting in the constitution of a committee in April this year, such cases jolt the confidence of its people in law and order machinery. One girl was allegedly gang-raped by her schoolmate and four others, and the other minor was allegedly abducted from near her house before she was drugged and raped and then abandoned. This reflects the social and cultural decay along with the failure of the police. If girls are not safe in schools, if they are seen as sex objects by their own classmates, it speaks volumes about serious flaws in parenting, schooling and lack of responsibility among all those who should be accountable for sensitising the young on gender equality. In a society where a significant number of people beat up women at home, think using abusive language is their birth right, women become easy targets of sexual violence. Only a tough administration and the strict enforcement of law can work as deterrents to such misadventurists. The state's police website shows a rising graph in the cases involving rape and abduction. From 126 rape cases registered in 2003, the number has gone up to 183 in 2012, and for abduction from 96 to 152. This should be taken seriously, for the town is a major tourist attraction and incidents like these could turn away tourists. After the Nirbhaya case, there was a 25 percent drop in the women tourist inflow to India, within three months. Before Shimla earns the notoriety of Goa and Delhi, its citizens and administration should wake up to the need for protecting women.
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At the touch of love everyone becomes a poet. —Plato
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Unemployment & inequality THE Indian economy is faltering even though there are some rays of hope. Exports are rising again due to the weakened rupee and agricultural growth is poised to be higher after a good monsoon. But one bad news is that unemployment has risen in the last one year from 3.8 per cent to 4.7 per cent, according to the Labour Bureau’s survey. This is hardly surprising because there has been a slackening of manufacturing growth to unprecedented levels and it is the manufacturing sector which creates jobs for the semi-skilled labour force. Agricultural growth has not been high either and it is the paucity of non-agricultural jobs that is causing an increase in unemployment in the villages. India's unemployment rate, however, is lower than some of the member countries of the EU, such as Spain, Portugal, Greece and France. In India, even part-time workers call themselves 'employed', so there is always an underestimation involved. Even if unemployment has risen to 4.7 per cent, it is still much lower than the unemployment in European countries, the US or UK. But unlike in the EU, the Indian unemployed do not get any dole. The unemployed youth in India pose a big problem for the future. There are going to be 423 million jobseekers by 2030. Only rigorous skill training of youth will enable them to get jobs. Unemployment, especially in the lower income groups, is a personal disaster and people with meagre savings recede into debt rapidly. One illness in the family can reduce the family to penury and push it below the poverty line. The lack of any kind of social insurance or security is what is lacking in India and has to be corrected. We are wasting millions of rupees on unnecessary expenditure like foreign travel of ministers and dignitaries but we still do not have in place a social safety net that may provide a minimum income to the poorest families to tide over their education and health expenditure. Families with low incomes, and who are without job guarantee or pension, are most vulnerable today, yet no one is talking of a universal social safety net. On the other hand, an increase in unemployment will only widen the income inequalities in the country. Already the inequalities are rising as is evident from an increase in the Gini coefficient (a number between 0 and 1) which has risen in recent years from 0.34 to 0.38 (at perfect equality of incomes, Gini is 0). But according to experts, India's Gini coefficient is not a proper indicator of rising inequalities because it takes into account the expenditure data rather than income data. According to them, the Gini coefficient is much higher at 0.54 when it is measured by income levels. Inequalities are rising because in every sector there is wide disparity between the big players and the small ones. In agriculture, 80 per cent are small and marginal farmers and the disparity of income between the big farmers and the small ones is huge. This disparity is increasing further with fall in agricultural incomes and inflation. Also as has been pointed out, the agricultural subsidies like free power and low priced fertilisers are cornered by big farmers rather than the small and marginal. In manufacturing sector too, most units are small or medium scale. There is a profusion of micro units and the small-scale sector contributes to 45 per cent of exports and employs 60 million people. Their productivity and incomes are low. Around 40 per cent of the employees in the manufacturing sector are in the low-paying food, beverages, textiles, leather, and garment units. The large industrialists have big incomes and capability to invest and earn high profits. Their deep pockets enable them to undersell their products and wean away competitors. In the service sector, too, only 2 per cent are high earners, who are in the finance, insurance or real estate sectors. Most of the service sector employees are in the informal or unorganised sector and are low-income earners. All domestic servants, guards, cleaners, street vendors, construction workers are in the service sector, but the difference in income between the top earners and the bottom ones is huge. This widening income disparity is evident everywhere - in towns, villages and big cities. The ultra-high net worth Indians are growing at the fastest rate among BRICS. They are worth $30 million and their number is at 7,850 in India. Counting in dollars, there are 69 billionaires and 2 lakh millionaires in India who can afford the lifestyle of the richest in the world. There is inequality in every country and Joseph Stiglitz in his book "The Price of Inequality" describes the growing inequality in the US. But in India, the contrast is glaring and unpalatable. People living without basic needs and human dignity are within a stone's throw of big mansions of the rich. The fatalistic nature of Indians enables them to tolerate such contrasts with stoic silence. There are few protests in India, considering the way the poor live and how they are treated. In the past, Indian industrialists were known for their simple living and philanthropic acts. Unfortunately, that era is gone and today only 19 per cent of the rich engage in philanthropic deeds. If we go deeper we find that government policies have been somewhat pro poor since Independence but have been diluted over the years. With the latest food security Bill as an example of equitable distribution, the UPA government can earn kudos for thinking about the poor. But on the whole, the government has not been able to eradicate corruption or establish better governance so that expenditure meant for the poor reaches them. All we hear of is how the middle men have pocketed the food grain meant for the poor or the money meant for the welfare of the downtrodden. Every country has had problems after the global financial crisis but many have tried to provide for the low income population in a humane and efficient manner. Hopefully with the news of rising unemployment there will be some action taken for the benefit of those in the lowest income bracket. Even if GDP growth rises, there will be growing inequalities unless there are strong policies aimed at the uplift of the vulnerable sections and the rich are taxed in an efficient and judicious manner. There should be some insurance against unemployment and sickness which will enable low income families to live with
dignity.
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The runaway kite Sipping
a hot cup of green tea, I was enjoying the freshly washed look of greenery in front of my house after the rainfall. Suddenly a lone kite caught my attention as it danced gleefully in a distant horizon above the rainbow. It was flirting with the cool breeze and seemed to enjoy the freshly painted rainbow that hovered behind. You don't get to see these beautiful images of playfulness with depleting hours and minutes of leisure that we used to have “to stand and stare”. The reverie however, took me back to my childhood days in Ambala Cantt, when I would carefully take out the kite from the cupboard and walk out to the garden outside to play with it, holding it delicately yet deftly from a short twine. The fear of losing the kite always predominated. And for days together the kite would remain a prized possession, tended, repaired, with varieties of strings, and decked with paper ribbons to form its tail. As I grew a little older, I ventured out to let the kite fly with other kites in the sky, dancing and chiding others playfully, though the fear continued to linger somewhere at the back of my mind, and would always avoid confrontation with a bigger kite around for the fear of losing it. I would pull it back and, with a short string tied to my finger, would gleefully run on the huge waterworks campus that housed our bungalow. And if at times I lost it and tearfully saw it floating down desolately beyond the boundary walls of the campus, a few children living outside our big campus, surprisingly would show immense consideration to keep an eye, would catch it whenever they can, and would rush to the massive iron gates that separated our world from theirs, and hand it over back to me fondly with a smile. As I stand by my window with the lone kite dancing in the azure sky, playing hide and seek with me, I could not but equate the mirth with my little bundle of joy, my daughter, which came into our lives some twenty-five years back. And perhaps, as has been my wont, I continued to cherish her company, with similar possessiveness I had for my kite, and would not let her venture out afar. Just like that little kite I have seen her dance around the house with her little pigtails bouncing gleefully, spreading smiles all around. She moved from home to school to college and then university, and even travelled to distant lands as part of her studies, and yet that yearning for her return to sweeten our hearts predominated. Yet the time seems to have come to see my kite move higher and higher, dancing with aplomb and grace, and despite the pull that binds us together, yet the string is unwinding and slipping away from my hands with speed, as she gets ready to runaway to her rainbow. It is time to let go, with love and care, and blessings. I await her
affianced.
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US shutdown and the looming debt crisis THE first top-level talks to break the policy deadlock between Democrats and Republicans has ended without any sign of a deal to resolve the fiscal impasse that has crippled vast swathes of the US federal government.
The ‘stars’
Ted Cruz: The showboating Republican Senator from Texas has been credited with leading the Tea Party faction in the recent assault against
Obamacare. Though he has tried to pin the blame for the partial government shutdown, the Senate majority leader, Democrat Harry Reid, polls show the majority of the Americans are holding the Republicans responsible. Mike Lee:
Described by some as Cruz’s main ally in the battle against
Obamacare, the Republican from Utah is one of the Senate’s most ardent public opponents of the act. He has argued it is “not ready” to be fully implemented, and should be delayed and several aspects de-funded. Michele
Bachmann: Never one to mince her words, the Congresswoman from Minnesota and Tea Party stalwart has backed Ted Cruz’s efforts, and accused Obama of trying “to get Americans addicted to the crack cocaine of dependency on more government healthcare”. Steve King: The fiery Republican Congressman from Iowa has gone as far as to say the shutdown may be a good thing, and that the stalemate will help clarify things for voters. “This will be decided in the hearts and minds of the Americans, who say hold your ground — we don’t want Obamacare — save us from that. Then we can hold our ground and get that done.”
President sObama had invited Congressional leaders of both parties to the White House to discuss the ongoing government shutdown and the looming crisis over raising the federal debt ceiling, due to be hit in just two weeks' time. Failure by the Congress to approve an increase in the ceiling could force the Treasury into a catastrophic default on US debt, throwing global financial markets into turmoil. But more than an hour of discussions at the White House ended with little sign of progress, with the Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives, John Boehner, addressing reporters following the meeting, saying: “We had a nice conversation, a polite conversation, but at some point we've got to let the process that our founders gave us work out.” Meanwhile, top US intelligence officials warned the shutdown “seriously damages” their ability to protect the country. The current situation was a “dreamland” for foreign spies, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told a Senate committee, saying that some 70 per cent of intelligence employees had been placed on unpaid leave. “This is not just a Beltway issue,” Clapper said, referring to the Washington DC political universe. The damage was “insidious,” affecting the agencies capability, “to support the military, to support diplomacy, and to support our policymakers.” Even before the afternoon meeting at the White House, attended by the majority and minority leaders of the House of Representatives and the Senate, it seemed unlikely the talks would open the way to a deal. Debt ceiling deadline
Earlier in the day, Republicans were maintaining their stance that any stopgap measure to fund the government, and thus end the shutdown, be accompanied by a delay in implementation of healthcare reform. Democrats, meanwhile, continue to insist on a “clean” bill, with no conditions, while time and again the White House has declared that 'Obamacare' — whose most important provisions are now coming into effect — is non-negotiable. Other developments also pointed to a prolonged shutdown. In a curtailment of his Asia trip that starts on his weekend, Obama is still to attend an Apec summit in Indonesia, but will skip the subsequent legs in Malaysia and the Philippines. This will see him back in Washington by the end of next week, as the debt ceiling deadline nears. The best hope of bringing an early end to the deadlock lies in the outrage of the public, and a rupture in the Republican party, held by Americans to be primarily responsible. So far Boehner, fearful of a right-wing uprising that could cost him his job, has refused to assert his authority over House Republicans. But a significant body of House moderates, as well as most Republicans in the Senate, argue that the intransigence of Tea Party and other conservative hardliners is leading the party to disaster.
What is the shutdown?
The law authorising funds to keep the US government functioning has expired. If the Congress fails to pass a new law, known in this case as a continuing resolution or a stopgap budget, to keep the money flowing, the federal government will have no choice but to begin putting hundreds of thousands of non-essential workers on unpaid leave and suspending services — or, to use the jargon, to shut down. Why doesn't Congress approve the new law? The Republicans who control the House of Representatives have attached an amendment to the stopgap budget that would delay funding for President Obama's health reforms by a year. The amendment would also repeal a tax on medical devices that is meant to pay for the reforms, known as Obamacare. The Senate, which is controlled by President Obama's Democrats, has made it clear that it will not authorise any measure that includes changes to Obamacare. What if they don't resolve their differences? Federal government agencies will have no choice but to put hundreds of thousands of works — estimates suggest that the final tally could be around 8,00,000 — on temporary leave. At
Nasa, for example, estimates suggest that over 90 per cent of the workforce will be asked to stay at home. At the Pentagon, active duty personnel, numbering around 1.4 million, will continue to work, but around 4,00,000 civilian employees might be put on unpaid leave. Moreover, many of those to who do continue working might see their paychecks delayed. National parks and public museums would also close. Those outside the US thinking of apply for a visa would also face delays, depending on how long the shutdown lasts.
Seeking to heal these differences and mollify public opinion, Republican leaders have come up with a new plan to restore funding in three areas where the shutdown has generated special fury — the national parks across the country now barred to tourists, veterans' programmes, and federally financed services in Washington DC. The anger was evident this week as visiting veterans, many of them in wheelchairs, broke through barricades around the World War II memorial on the National Mall, closed like other federal parks and museums. But even if they are approved by the Republican majority House, the exemptions faced certain defeat in the Democratic-led Senate. “We want the release of all hostages, not just a few of them,” a Senator said. “Instead of opening up a few government functions, the House of Representatives should reopen all of the government,” the White House added. In the meantime both parties are playing the blame-game, trying to win the crucial battle for public opinion. Republican hardliners believe that public dislike of Obamacare will ultimately win the day. For the moment though Democrats are far happier, confident that their opponents are on the wrong side of the argument. For the moment at least, that seems to be the case. According to the Quinnipiac poll, an overwhelming 72 per cent oppose a shutdown to stop healthcare reform.
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