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Finally, it is over Shortage is not surplus |
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Abrogation of Article 370 not possible
Discovering Lucknow in London
How much do Nigeria’s schoolgirls matter?
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Finally, it is over Sporadic incidents of violence apart, polling for the 16th Lok Sabha has been completed successfully and the Election Commission should be lauded for that. Conducting peaceful elections has always been a challenge in this large and diverse country, given the criminalisation of politics and the use of religion, caste and even riots in influencing the outcome. Still, countries experimenting with democracy watch with envy the mammoth democratic exercise in India and seek to learn from the experience. There is still scope for improvement. The blatant and indecent use of money power by major parties denies a level-playing field to new and smaller entrants. It is not enough to limit the expenses of the candidates. The political parties too should be restrained from obscene poll expenditure, which is largely funded by the corporate sector. Parties forming a government tend to benefit their corporate sponsors through favourable policies or resource allocations. Non-transparent poll funding is at the root of rampant corruption. Secondly, there is no fear of the law in politicians who make wild, unsubstantiated allegations and get away with it. The EC's neutrality has been questioned by no less a person than the BJP's prime ministerial candidate. A day after the Chief Election Commissioner defended the Varanasi District Magistrate's decision to deny the BJP a particular venue for holding a rally, Election Commissioner HS Brahma chose to blame the EC's "weak leadership for its not-so-smooth functioning". There can be no better way of damaging a constitutional institution than working at cross purposes. This brings into question the manner of EC appointments and the sole reliance on IAS officers. The EC must be above board and its members should not be seen as appointees of a political party. Charges of bias sometimes come up because the EC depends on state officials for the conduct of elections. Since the bureaucracy is usually politicised, it is better to deploy officers from outside the state where polling is held. Every election is a learning experience and throws up problems and solutions. Democracy can be strengthened if right lessons are learnt.
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Shortage is not surplus IT seems tiresome to chide the Punjab Government over its 'power surplus' claims every time there is an outage in the state. But the irony of the situation and the repeated loud claims of the SAD in this regard make it impossible to see the matter in any other light. On Saturday there was a major blackout in the Malwa region after a fire at a substation near
Moga. But that was only indicative of the overall breakdown of the power sector in the state. The thermal power plants set up in the private sector are yet to make any meaningful contribution to the state's requirements. There is no surety of their coal supplies and ability to get online in near future either. The distribution network is in a shambles, and the power corporation has been found fudging figures to pass off transmission losses under the free farm supply. There are issues about testing of coal quality. Irked over these and other matters, its employees are demanding cancellation of the extension granted to the CMD, who has presided over the mess. Coal supply for the government's own power plants has been stalled over a dispute with the mining contractor. The end result of all this is that while the Deputy Chief Minister has not let pass an opportunity to announce that Punjab has become 'power surplus', ever since the day of polling the state has been seeing regular power cuts. The power corporation has proposed purchasing Rs 2,000 crore worth of electricity from outside for the paddy season. Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal has repeatedly said the government cannot go back on its promise of free power to farmers. But a situation where farmers do not get the promised eight hours of supply and the paying consumers have to pay extra for the emergency purchases the corporation makes seems anything but a welfare measure. Halfway through the SAD-BJP combine's second stint in power, the state has neither given its farmers an alternative to paddy, nor become self-sufficient in power.
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Thought for the Day
I like intelligent women. When you go out, it shouldn't be a staring contest.
—Frank Sinatra
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The female population of Hyderabad H.H. THE Nizam's Dominions, according to the last census report, contains only 968 females to 1,000 males of the population. Various reasons are given for this reduction in the female population. It is pointed out that at birth the number of both male and female children is nearly equal and remains so up to a certain age. As the great bulk of the population consists of Hindus, with Hindu social customs which do not recognise purdah, the causes of female decay must be found in unhealthy social and religious customs as early marriage, compulsory widowhood, &c. But a curious fact recorded in the report is that of the males and females who immigrated into the State from outside there was an excess of 3,084 males and of the emigrants from the State there was an excess of 40,000 females. Death sentences in India SIR Henry Cotton has written for the annual report of the society for the abolition of capital punishment two articles on death sentences in India and the Crown Colonies. In the civilized world death sentences are now regarded as legalised killing, and strenuous efforts are being made to secure the abolition of capital punishment. This has been done in France, Switzerland, Holland, Norway, Finland, Russia, Argentine Republic, Belgium, Venezuela, Guatemala, Costa Rica and Italy. The task is not easy in countries where as in several of the Asiatic countries (e.g., China) capital punishment is prescribed for very ordinary offences. But reformers are nevertheless working at their object unwearied by the failure of their efforts. It is a process of educating whole classes and communities accustomed to regard legalised killing as something very natural.
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Abrogation of Article 370 not possible BJP president Rajnath Singh has called for a debate on why Article 370 of the Constitution should not be abrogated. One wishes he had sought this enlightenment before including the provocative item of abrogation of Article 370 in the BJP election manifesto. Apart from the legal angle, Togadia's hate speech against Muslims and a politically dishonest attempt by BJP and RSS leaders to paper it over should be a justification enough for the retention of Article 370 for the Muslim majority state of J & K.
On August 15, 1947, when India became independent, J&K was not a part of its territory. It was only by the Instrument of Accession, dated 27.10.47, signed by the Maharaja of J&K that the state acceded to the Dominion of India. By clause 3 the Maharaja accepted that the matters specified in the schedule are the matters with respect to which the dominion legislature may make laws for the state of J & K. The instrument further provided that the terms of instrument shall not be varied by an amendment to the Act or the Indian Independence Act, unless such amendment was accepted by the Maharaja. The instrument also clearly laid down that nothing in the instrument shall be deemed to commit the state in any way to the acceptance of any future Constitution of India. This instrument accepted only a limited number of matters -- Defence, External Affairs, Communications -- with respect to which the Indian legislature could make laws for J&K. This special relationship of J&K found its reflection in Article 370 of the Indian Constitution which laid down that notwithstanding anything in the Constitution, the powers of Parliament to make laws for the state shall be limited to those matters in the Union List and the Concurrent List, which, in consultation with the government of the state, are declared by the President to correspond to matters specified in the Instrument of Accession, and such other matters in the said lists with the concurrence of the state the President may by order specify. Thus by virtue of Article 370 Parliament can legislate for J&K on matters other than those mentioned in the instrument but only after obtaining the concurrence of the state of J&K (emphasis supplied). Thus J&K has special status, unlike the other states in India where Parliament can legislate on its own on subjects mentioned in the Union and concurrent lists. It is no doubt true that Article 370(3) provides that the President may by notification declare that this article shall cease to be operative, but the proviso clearly lays down a limitation that the recommendation of the Constituent Assembly of the state shall be necessary before the President issues such a notification. It is not disputed that the Constituent Assembly of J&K has never given any such recommendation. In that view Article 370 cannot be withdrawn by Parliament purporting to exercise the power of amendment given by Article 368. That the power to amend the Constitution is not totally unfettered admits of no disputes vide the famous case of Keshvanand Bharthi, (1973) in which the Supreme Court held that a "Constitution like ours contains certain features which are so essential that they cannot be changed or destroyed". There is also nothing very special in laying this limitation in Article 370. Even Article 368 limits the power of Parliament to make any amendment to the Constitution which would result in a change in any of the lists in the Seventh Schedule; such amendment shall also require to be ratified by the legislatures of not less than half of the states. Under our Constitution the Governors are only formal heads of state and have no powers at all in the administration of the state which is vested in the Cabinet. But yet by the Constitution Amendment Act 1956, Article 371 provides for a special responsibility of the Governor for the establishment of separate development boards for Saurashtra and Kutch (in Gujarat) and Vidharba in Maharashtra for an equitable allocation of funds for the development of the area. No objection by the BJP has been raised which curtails the power of Gujarat Chief Minister Modi, while there is not such limitation on the chief ministers in other states. Article 371G, introduced by the 55th Constitution Amendment Act 1986, provides that no Act of Parliament in respect of the ownership and transfer of land shall apply to the state of Mizoram unless the legislative assembly of Mizoram by a resolution so decides. This provision is identical to Article 370 of the Constitution regarding J & K. The BJP was a party to the above amendment. Why does the BJP apply double standards in the case of the Muslim majority state of J & K?. Even in the USA such is the width of state autonomy that an advocate getting his law degree from Washington University cannot as a matter of right practice in the state of New York. No one has suggested that this is endangering the unity of the USA. Recently in the election fever even the Congress seems to have got entrapped when it gave an election promise to separate Ladakh from the territory of J&K and even give it a separate legislative assembly. This is the most provocative suggestion, which can only inflame the sentiments of people of J&K against India, apart from the fact that it is not legally possible because the J&K legislature will never give its consent, as provided by Article 370. It needs to be appreciated that the retention of Article 370 is a matter of self-respect and honour and an assertion of their distinct identity for the people of J&K. Can't the BJP leaders, even when most of the parties in J&K are desirous of finding a lasting solution, be statesmen enough to give up their opposition to Article 370, which no Kashmiri can possibly agree to abrogate because it is a matter of preserving his special identity? Faced with this reality, politicians must realise that all talk of abrogation of Article 370 is moonshine and a non-issue. It is also a very sensitive matter touching the credibility of our secular professions and the justifiable fears of the minorities. With all this, when it is also patent that the abrogation of Article 370 is not legally and constitutionally possible, is there any moral, political or logical justification to keep up this empty noise? I submit there is none.
The writer is a retired Chief Justice of the High Court of Delhi
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Discovering Lucknow in London THE Haryana Roadways bus barrelled down the road like a tropical cyclone scattering all before it to the four corners — pedestrians, two-wheelers and lesser mortals in passenger cars. Heaven forbid that you should come in the way of two such buses from our neighbouring states Haryana and Punjab imitating Formula One. Only the broad backside of that venerable beast, the buffalo, seemed more than a match for these vehicles. We often hear that we are a 5000-year-old civilisation. So, where has all that tehzeeb disappeared in just over a half century? That question took me down memory lane to a couple of incidents which happened in Europe some decades ago. The first was in Aachen, Germany, where my cousin was a teacher in its famous technical university. My cousin baby-sat their two little twins while Eva, my German sister-in-law, took us out to sample a German meal. Walking back to the car park some time after midnight, we bumped into half a dozen other people, all patiently waiting for the pedestrians’ light to turn green so as to cross an absolutely empty street. German discipline, I thought; then asked Eva, “There’s not a car or policeman in sight, why don’t we just walk across?” “Nein, nein — it’s now the motorist's time to use the road. He can come at 150 kmph and if we are in his way we'll spend the rest of our lives paying up the penalties!” That was my first lesson in time-sharing of public facilities. Some weeks later we were in London. The streets were teeming with traffic and pedestrians could cross only at zebra crossings. Of course at Pelican crossings, pregnant women, mothers with prams and senior citizens had the liberty of pushing a button and all traffic would halt while they crossed over. All others had to wait for a gap in the stream of vehicles. I was waiting patiently when I spotted a gap behind an approaching green car. As the green car neared the crossing, I put one foot onto the road and prepared to cross behind it. A look of consternation crossed the Englishman driving the green car. I saw him glance quickly into the rear-view mirror, then push down on the brakes. Surprised at his reaction — so foreign to my experience back home — I signalled to the driver, pehlay aap! He signalled back, pehlay aap! Meanwhile all traffic behind the green car had come to a uncomplaining halt while we enacted Lucknavi tehzeeb in London. Now I knew where our 5000 year old tehzeeb had gone. It has gone West!
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How much do Nigeria’s schoolgirls matter? WHEN members of the Islamist terror organisation Boko Haram abducted more than 200 schoolgirls from the town of Chibok in north-eastern Nigeria last month, they disguised themselves in military uniform. The girls, who knew that many schools in the state of Borno have been attacked by jihadists, initially believed that the unexpected visitors had come to take them to a safe place. But as they climbed reluctantly into trucks and on to motorcycles, the men began firing into the air and shouting "Allahu Akbar". Some of the girls decided to make a run for it, but the majority were coerced into travelling to a bush camp. There the terrorists forced them to cook for their captors.
To say that Boko Haram opposes gender equality is an understatement. The group's name is a Hausa phrase which translates as "Western education is sinful"; abducting teenage girls fulfils several of the group's aims, bringing the girls' education to an abrupt end and forcing them into traditional female roles. Of course, Boko Haram doesn't just target girls; in February, it carried out a massacre at a rural boarding school in the neighbouring state of Yobe, where most of the 43 victims were boys. But it was clear from the outset that the kidnapped girls were at high risk of sexual violence, a point made by the British Foreign Secretary, William Hague, in one of his first statements about the abduction. Last week, these fears appeared to have been well-founded when unconfirmed reports suggested that the girls had been taken out of Nigeria and were being forced to "marry" members of Boko Haram. It should not need pointing out that "marriage" in this context means domestic enslavement and mass rape. The former British prime minister Gordon Brown, who is now United Nations special envoy on education, observed that the girls' desperate families still do not know “whether they're about to be murdered or used as sex slaves”. Nigeria is one of three countries which have just announced their endorsement of a Declaration of Commitment to End Sexual Violence in Conflict, an initiative by the British government which has been signed by more than three-quarters of UN member states. So what are the Nigerian authorities doing about this egregious example of sexual violence within their own borders? When I spoke to the Foreign Office recently, a spokesman told me that Mr Hague had offered assistance to the Nigerian Minister for Foreign Affairs, Aminu Wali, two weeks earlier – and was still waiting for a response. Almost three weeks after the girls were seized, there is mounting anger in Nigeria about the government's failure to locate and rescue them. Officials tried to play down the gravity of the incident, claiming that just over a hundred girls had been taken but latest figures suggest at least 223 remain missing. Fifty-three escaped but the military, which claimed to have rescued most of the teenagers, has had to admit its failure to retrieve a single one. Distraught relatives went into the forest armed with bows and arrows but were warned to turn back by local people, who said they stood no chance against the heavily armed jihadists. “We don't know where they are up until now, and we have not heard anything from the government,” the father of one of the girls told The New Yorker last week. He is one of the lucky ones: his daughter Deborah Sanya, 18, took one look at the terrorists' camp and realised that her only chance was to run and hide in the forest. She persuaded two of her friends to go with her and they managed to get to a nearby village. But her cousins and many of her friends are still missing. On last Friday’s morning's Radio 4 Today programme, the Nigerian Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka described the abduction as an “atrocity”. Soyinka has been critical of the Nigerian government's response almost from the start, previously accusing the President, Goodluck Jonathan, of insensitivity towards the girls' plight. But it has to be said that it is not just the Nigerian government which is open to this charge. Where were the international television crews and big-name foreign correspondents when so many teenage girls were abducted? Without intense scrutiny from the world's media, a weak government fighting an undeclared war with well-armed terrorists was never likely to mount the kind of search and rescue operation demanded by such dire events. Anyone who doubts the power of the world's media to affect the actions of governments should consider the very different response to the disappearance in March this year of a Malaysian airliner. The unsolved mystery of Flight MH370 is a tragedy for the relatives of those on board, and it now looks as if they may not discover what happened to their loved ones for months or years. But the missing plane remained at the top of the international news agenda for weeks, long after any realistic hope of finding survivors had faded. Politicians held daily press conferences, despite having next-to-nothing to report. There is a very good chance, by contrast, that the Nigerian schoolgirls are still alive – and could be rescued. Mr Brown has called for international military assistance, including air support. But the sluggish response of the international media speaks volumes about the low priority afforded to violence against women and girls. Scouring thousands of miles of ocean for debris is much more appealing, it seems, than reporting on the abduction and probable enslavement of more than 200 female students. What’s Boko Haram *
Boko Haram regards the Nigerian state as being run by non-believers, even when the country had a Muslim president. Founded in 2002 *
Official Arabic name, Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'awati wal-Jihad, means "People Committed to the Propagation of the Prophet's Teachings and Jihad" *
Initially focused on opposing Western education * Nicknamed Boko Haram, a phrase in the local Hausa language meaning, "Western education is forbidden" *
Launched military operations in 2009 to create an Islamic state * Founding leader Mohammed Yusuf killed in same year in police custody *
Succeeded by Abubakar Shekau * Military claims to have killed Shekau have turned out to be untrue *
The outfit has cells that specialise in bombings. Northern Nigeria has a history of spawning militant Islamist groups, but Boko Haram has outlived them and is far more lethal, with a global jihadi agenda.
At a glance, the rise and growth of a militant outfit that wages a global jihad
Nigeria's militant Islamist group Boko Haram — which has caused havoc in Africa's most populous country through a wave of bombings, assassinations and now abductions — is fighting to overthrow the government and create an Islamic state. Its followers are said to be influenced by the Koranic phrase which says: "Anyone who is not governed by what Allah has revealed is among the transgressors".
Boko Haram promotes a version of Islam which makes it haram, or forbidden, for Muslims to take part in any political or social activity associated with Western society. This includes voting in elections, wearing shirts and trousers or receiving a secular education. Boko Haram regards the Nigerian state as being run by non-believers, even when the country had a Muslim president. The group's official name is Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'awati wal-Jihad, which in Arabic means "People Committed to the Propagation of the Prophet's Teachings and Jihad". But residents in the north-eastern city of Maiduguri, where the group had its headquarters, dubbed it Boko Haram. Loosely translated from the local Hausa language, this means "Western education is forbidden". Boko originally meant fake but came to signify Western education, while haram means forbidden. Since the Sokoto caliphate, which ruled parts of what is now northern Nigeria, Niger and southern Cameroon, fell under British control in 1903, there has been resistance among some of the area's Muslims to Western education. They still refuse to send their children to government-run "Western schools", a problem compounded by the ruling elite which does not see education as a priority. Against this background, the charismatic Muslim cleric, Mohammed Yusuf, formed Boko Haram in Maiduguri in 2002. He set up a religious complex, which included a mosque and an Islamic school. Many poor Muslim families from across Nigeria, as well as neighbouring countries, enrolled their children at the school. But Boko Haram was not only interested in education. Its political goal was to create an Islamic state, and the school became a recruiting ground for jihadis. In 2009, Boko Haram carried out a spate of attacks on police stations and other government buildings in Maiduguri. This led to shoot-outs on Maiduguri's streets. Hundreds of Boko Haram supporters were killed and thousands of residents fled the city. Nigeria's security forces eventually seized the group's headquarters, capturing its fighters and killing Mr Yusuf. His body was shown on state television and the security forces declared Boko Haram finished.But its fighters regrouped under a new leader, Abubakar Shekau, and have stepped up their insurgency. In 2010, the US designated it a terrorist organisation, amid fears that it had developed links with other militant groups, such as Al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, to wage a global jihad. Boko Haram's trademark was originally the use of gunmen on motorbikes, killing police, politicians and anyone who criticises it, including clerics from other Muslim traditions and Christian preachers. The group has also staged more audacious attacks in northern and central Nigeria, including bombing churches, bus ranks, bars, military barracks and even the police and UN headquarters in the capital, Abuja. Amid growing concern about the escalating violence, President Goodluck Jonathan declared a state of emergency in May 2013 in the three northern states where Boko Haram is the strongest — Borno, Yobe and Adamawa. Deployment of troops has driven many militants out of Maiduguri, their main urban base. They have retreated to the vast Sambisa forest, along the border with Cameroon. The group's fighters have launched mass attacks on villages, looting, killing and burning properties in what appeared to be a warning to rural people not to collaborate with the security forces, as residents of Maiduguri had done.
Terror graph * Despite its vast resources, Nigeria ranks among the most unequal countries in the world, according to the UN. The poverty in the north is in stark contrast to the more developed southern states. However, in the oil-rich south-east, the residents of Delta and Akwa Ibom complain that all the wealth they generate flows up the pipeline to Abuja and Lagos. *
Boko Haram has stepped up its campaign against Western education, which it believes corrupts the moral values of Muslims, especially girls, by attacking two boarding schools — in Yobe in March and in Chibok in April. *
It abducted more than 200 schoolgirls during the Chibok raid, saying it would treat them as slaves and marry them off — a reference to an ancient Islamic belief that women captured in conflict are part of the “war booty”. *
A similar threat was made in May 2013, when it released a video, saying it had taken women and children — including teenage girls hostage in response to the arrest of its members' wives and children. Later on, there was a prison swap. *n Boko Haram’s urban bombing campaign, targeted the capital on April 14, when at least 70 persons were killed in an explosion near a car park and on May 2, when 19 people died.
—The Independent
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Recently, while driving on one of the Tricity’s wider roads, I was rudely pushed aside by a young driver in a macho SUV who seemed to say “Hey! Out of the way! I’m going first!” Barely missing me, as the SUV zoomed past, my companion exclaimed Bees lakh ki gari hai; lekin dus paise ki tehzeeb nahin!
