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Parliament can’t be
held up Special
powers a must |
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Transfers without pain
Kashmir a fulcrum
of friendship
To die again and
again
Unity in diversity
at Leh
Delhi Durbar
|
Parliament can’t be held up Crime and politics should stay miles away from
each other. But wishes cannot be horses in the real world. The two not
only mix freely but also transform themselves into an entirely new
compound which has been corroding the innards of the Indian system.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's statement that the tainted ministers
will stay in the government is surprising. Coming from a man of his
integrity, it has tremendous pathos. All this is happening because no
attempt has been made earlier to check the entry of criminal elements
into the hallowed precincts of the Lok Sabha. Now that they are there
and coalition politics is a grim reality, it is indeed not easy to bar
their entry into the Council of Ministers. Of course, having chargesheeted men as ministers makes the malaise all the more glaring
but society should be equally worried about their getting elected in
the first place. The public wants not only the Cabinet to be rid of
the taint but also expects its representatives to be clean as well.
Dr Manmohan Singh's remarks that the NDA ministry too had several
charge-sheeted ministers is an immediate retort, may be well-merited,
but it does not solve the problem of Messrs Taslimuddin and Co's
presence in his Council of Ministers and sharing power with
him. While the concern of the BJP and its allies at the
criminalisation is understandable, they cannot take things too far.
Holding up the proceedings of the Budget session will amount to
matching one error with another. If having men with a criminal
background in the ministry is condemnable, so is the attempt to halt
the proceedings of the House. The boycott will be as
counter-productive as a similar action by the Congress and the others
in the previous Lok Sabha against the then Defence Minister George
Fernandes. Why should Parliament be made to suffer for what
politicians are failing to tackle. |
|
Special powers a must Defence Minister Pranab Mukherji is justified when he says
that the Armed Forces (J & K) Special Powers Act 1990 is still needed to
ensure normalcy in Jammu and Kashmir. Since the monster of terrorism is
very much alive in the border state, the security forces must be armed
with special powers to accomplish the task assigned to them. Experience
shows that they cannot function effectively if they have to run to the
District Magistrate every time they want to detain a suspected terrorist
for questioning or launch an operation against such motivated killers.
The law has not only been helpful in keeping the forces' morale high
despite the reverses they have suffered, it has also acted as a
deterrent for the merchants of death and destruction. Any stiff law,
however, requires caution to be observed lest it should be misused.
Excesses might have been committed here and there in the process of the
anti-terrorism campaign carried out under the special legislation. But
this is understandable under such circumstances. No innocent person
should suffer even in a highly tricky situation. After all, the security
personnel deployed in Jammu and Kashmir are supposed to not only
eliminate terrorists but also safeguard the people, whose support they
need. When the Armed Forces Special Powers Act was promulgated in
Jammu and Kashmir, only six districts were covered initially. The law
was extended to the other six districts when the situation became grim
there too. Since then it has undoubtedly helped the security forces to
have the upper hand in the battle against the terrorists. The menace
has, however, unfortunately not disappeared because of the infiltration
from across the border. For some time the infiltration has declined, but
there is the danger of it rising again with the melting of snows.
Moreover, Pakistan is yet to completely dismantle the terrorists'
infrastructure there and in Pok. Thus, no government in New Delhi can
afford to deprive the security forces of the special powers they have.
The situation has not improved to the extent that it can be managed
without a stringent law. |
|
Transfers without pain Step
by step, Mr Arjun Singh is clearing out the mess left behind by his
predecessor, Mr Murli Manohar Joshi, in the Human Resource Development
Ministry. After reversing Mr Joshi’s controversial decisions to slash
the IIM fees and introduce biased history books, the new Human Resource
Development Minister has given a humane touch to the previous regime’s
transfer policy for the teachers of Kendriya Vidyalayas. The new policy,
announced on Wednesday, takes particular care of problems faced by women
teachers and lays down clear-cut guidelines for effecting transfers. As
is widely known, transfer has become a tool of harassment in the hands
of those at the helm of affairs to make a recalcitrant employee fall in
line. Off and on, there are instances of sexual exploitation of women
employees and extraction of bribes under the threat of transfer to an
inconvenient place. Family life of many a working woman with
school-going children gets unsettled if she is transferred to a far-off
place. Quite often the woman has to quit her job as in our social milieu
it is the woman who is entrusted with the primary responsibility of
taking care of children. Besides, a displaced teacher suffers from many
disabilities. Apart from bearing additional financial burden on account
of running a separate household, she is torn between obligations at home
and school, and cannot be expected to do justice to both. An institution
also cannot expect such a teacher to put in her best in her work. The
students are the ultimate sufferers. The new policy, which emphasises on
transfers with consent within a limited zone, is bound to be greeted by
the large body of KV teachers. The states too need to adopt a similar
humane approach in case of their employees so that a proper work culture
is ensured and employees are not inconvenienced on petty, personal and
non-administrative grounds. |
|
Laws grind the poor, and rich men
rule the law. — Oliver Goldsmith |
Kashmir a fulcrum of friendship THE Foreign Secretaries of India and
Pakistan have met to commence a comprehensive, composite dialogue.
This could have happened nearly five years ago but for Pakistan’s
Kargil war. However, a good beginning has been made and Kashmir too
has been discussed as a prelude to more intensive deliberations on
this topic in ensuing rounds. As always, Pakistan-backed jihadis have
sought to up the ante because peace spells danger for them. Meanwhile,
a fractured Hurriyat remains divided on talking with the Government of
India. Many Hurriyat leaders met the Pakistan Foreign Secretary in
Delhi and are anxious to visit Islamabad and Muzzafarabad. None should
be prevented from doing so as there is nothing they can say there that
they have not said here. Moreover, they will be unable thereafter to
sit on the fence without inviting more ridicule. Pakistan has been
zealous in demanding Kashmiri participation in any talks. What better
means of accomplishing this than permitting people on either side of
the LoC to bus across from Srinagar to Muzaffarabad (Jammu to Sialkot
and even Kargil to Skardu) to visit the other with the aid of simple
documents and minimal fuss. Jihadis do not come through legitimate
crossing points and so there should be little additional security
risk. India has little to hide and should, indeed, take the initiative
to invite leading Pakistani media persons, scholars and professionals
to visit J&K and see things for themselves. They would be astonished
by the contrast between what they see and hear and the propaganda on
which they have been fed for decades. Myth will fade before reality to
create a crisis of conscience and credibility in the minds of these
visitors about what Pakistan has billed as the “core issue”. Far from
being afraid to talk about J&K, India should compel Pakistan to
confront the truth about the “core” issue. It is equally important for
Indians to do so. Since Simla, 32 years ago, two generations of
India’s decision makers have not uttered what a trivialising Press
calls the “K-word”. The old books on J&K that had the facts and
sequence of events are out of stock and not easily found even in
libraries. In the result, negotiators, administrators, legislators,
academics and editors, barring a few, practice fluent punditry with
scant knowledge apart from what they and the world have heard from
incessant and noisy Pakistani propagandist chatter. India’s silence
all these years has allowed Pakistan to set the terms of discourse:
What is “Kashmir”; who is a “Kashmiri”; what is the “dispute”; why was
the now-effete UN Resolution of August 13, 1948, not implemented; who
is the self and what is to be determined in all the talk of
“self-determination”; what is the relevance of the LoC; how is Siachen
an issue; and what is Pakistan’s locus standi in J&K and that of PoK
and the Northern Areas within it? Both Pakistan and India need to
understand the “core” issues. Otherwise, the talks will degenerate
into the kind of grandstanding witnessed in Agra and flounder in the
quicksand of make-believe. General Musharraf has urged that old and
untenable positions be discarded and has pleaded for give and take. In
rejecting the LoC he is possibly making a rhetorical statement to buy
time while Pakistan comes to terms with reality. If this is not so,
then he must be firmly reminded that Pakistan cannot win at the peace
table what it has been unable to gain through 50 years of war, proxy
war and terror. Even though the truth hurts, the veil of deceit must
be torn off or cast aside. Then alone will Pakistan be able to come to
terms with itself and India be able pragmatically to give, more than
take, without compromising from a sense of guilt or helplessness.
Peace too must rest on a moral basis. What does Pakistan get by
accepting the LoC (with such subsequent minor adjustments in relation
to administrative, environmental and security considerations),
transforming what was a ceasefire line into a friendly border? It will
legitimise Pakistan’s illegal occupation of two-fifths of J&K and
enable to see itself as a sovereign nation and not merely as the
“other” in relation to India. The burden of this charade on Pakistan
has been enormous, compelling it to disown much of its history,
culture and sense of composite nationhood. It is this recognition of
self, not Kashmir, that is Pakistan’s “unfinished business of
Partition”, its jugular vein and something that could give its
disfigured nationhood “strategic depth” and meaning. The Cease-Fire
Line was drawn under the Karachi Agreement of July 27, 1949, signed by
the Commanders of the Indian and Pakistan armed forces and the UN
Military Observer Group, and later renamed the Line of Control under
the Suchetgarh Agreement after the Simla Accord in 1972. It defined
the Line as going from NJ 9842, the last designated coordinate in the
Northern Sector, “thence North to the glaciers”. Such a line, drawn as
indicated, clearly places almost all of Siachen on the Indian side of
the LoC. It was only Pakistan’s redrawing of this Line from NJ 9842
northeast to the Karakoram Pass in the late 1960s, following a
mischievous and gratuitous re-demarcation of this segment by the US
Defence Mapping Agency around 1967, in an act of cartographic
aggression, that compelled India to occupy the Glacier in 1984 or else
risk losing it by default. Once Siachen is firmly anchored in the LoC
it can be demilitarised and made part of a Karakoram-K2 International
Heritage Glacier Park, hopefully including Shaksgam (unauthorisedly
ceded by Pakistan to China in 1963) as part of an India- China border
settlement. The LoC itself represents a broad ethno-cultural divide of
J&K’s plural and polyglot society and therefore has a validity of its
own. A Srinagar-Muzzafarabad bus service could be the first step in
making this a “soft” border, with protocols to facilitate movement,
trade, tourism, pilgrimage, transit and cultural exchange between the
two sides. This could in stages lead to joint and overarching
mechanisms for border management, environmental conservation, joint
ventures, shared tourism packages, and the development and integrated
management of the shared water resources of the Indus to realise the
full potential of that river system in an Indus-II Treaty that would
not override but reinforce Indus-I. Joint defence and a loose
“condominium” within twin Indian and Pakistani sovereignties could be
a longer-term goal commensurate with the ideal of a South Asian
Community earlier envisaged by a SAARC Eminent Persons Group and
subsequently endorsed in principle at a SAARC summit. With greater
Centre-State and regional autonomy, as may be worked out by India and
Pakistan on either side of the LoC, the people of J&K could enjoy a
self-determination that guarantees them the best of three worlds. With
neither India nor Pakistan formally abandoning its aspirations in and
for J&K, the state could become the fulcrum of a new relationship of
friendship and cooperation between them. Borders matter less than
relationships across them. A solution in J&K does not lie in
territorial or religious division. Transforming relations across the
J&K/LoC border offers the best hope of a lasting and just
non-territorial settlement that could be a balm to South Asia and an
example to the world. The writer is a former Editor of The
Hindustan Times and The Indian Express |
To die again and again It
is interesting how on occasions great minds belonging to two different
civilisations, almost a world apart, express some of their basic
thoughts in words which appear to be echoes of each other. Schopenhauer,
the famous German philosopher, describes the life of man on this earth
in the terms of a weakling riding a very strong and well-built horse
which is rushing along at breakneck speed in a hilly area. The
problem, however, is that the horse is blind and without any reins or
stirrups. The rider thus has no means whatever of controlling it and
can only see helplessly that any moment the horse might dash itself
against the rocks or plunge down a deep gorge along with him. His
heart is thus in his mouth all the time: in fact, the danger to him is
so grave and imminent that it makes him die a death again and again. Ghalib
expresses the same thought in almost identical terms. His couplet on
the subject runs as follows: "Rau mein hai rakhsh-i-umr, kahan
dekhiye thamey/na haath bag per hai, na paa hai rakaab mein." (The
steed of life is in a rush, let us see where it stops/ there are no
reins in my hand, nor are my feet in any stirrups). Another thought
on a different theme which figures very prominently in Ghalib’s poetry
is that heaven is a mere illusion created by man himself only because
it offers him a pleasant prospect. Two among numerous couplets of his
in which this idea finds expression are: "Ham ko maaloom hai jannat
key haqiqat leikin/ dil ke khush rakhney ko Ghalib yeh khayal achcha
hai". (I know the real truth about paradise, but/the thought of
it serves to keep man in good cheer). The other couplet is: "Taa’t
mein taa rahey na mai-o-angbeen ki lag/dozakh mein daal do koi leikar
buhisht ko". (Lest worship bear the taint that it’s for the sake
of (heaven’s) wine and honey/ let someone consign heaven to
hell) Tailpiece: Entasis is an unusual phenomenon to the effect that
if the shaft of a column, pier etc. is made quite straight then the
illusion of a slight concavity in it gets created. In order to
compensate for this and to ensure that the line appears to be
straight, a corresponding convex curve is given to the structure. The
ancients were quite familiar with this phenomenon. For instance, in
the marble pillars of Parthenon, the Greeks introduced the necessary
convexity to make them seem to be absolutely straight. |
Unity in diversity at Leh
The three-day Sindhu
Darshan festival, organised recently along the banks of the mighty
Sindhu river near Leh, celebrated the unity in diversity of the
country. The Sindhu Darshan which since its inception in 1997, has
been regarded more of a festival for religious bigots. However, the
three-day festival in Shey Manla, near Leh, from June 18 to 20 this
year, saw a tilt towards spiritual secularism. From its earlier
“avatar” of a festival comprising rituals, rites and superstitions,
the Sindhu Darshan in its new manifestation exhibited the rich
cultural heritage of Ladakh and, in essence, became an event for
promoting tourism and exhibiting national integration. There was a
low turnout of tourists at the festival this year. Officials in Leh
say that change in the schedule of the festival might have played a
spoilsport (this festival is generally organised in the second week of
June). Against the modest attendance of 75 tourists in 1997, it jumped
to 1,700 in 2002 and over 2300 in 2003. This year, a small number of
pilgrim-tourists, on the banks of the Indus, were seen only on the
inaugural day of the festival. This year’s Sindhu Darshan festival
began on a secular note with the mixing of the waters collected from
the Brahmaputra, Ganga, Yamuna and the Godawari into the Indus. Though
the ritual of calling Army/ ITBP jawans in the festival for promoting
brotherhood (with pilgrim tourists tying rakhi on their hands) was
observed symbolically, the number of jawans and their “rakhi sisters“
had decreased since last year. The cultural festivities, restricted
to the first day alone, were aimed at bringing out the rich Ladakhi
culture, rather than a Hindu culture. The Union Minister of State for
Tourism, Ms Renuka Chowdhary, too said that henceforth the festival
would be aimed at promoting tourism in the Ladakh region The Sindhis,
who had travelled to this mountain desert from different parts of the
country to take part in a special pooja, prayed for the permanency of
the river and welfare of the world, amidst the recital of Boddhik
chants by monks who converged from different monasteries in the
region. And it was not just the Sindhis, but people from other
religions like Sikhs, Buddhists and Christian foreigners who stepped
into the ice-cold waters of the river and prayed that the river, which
had led to the origin of life, should carry the message of unity and
communal harmony. Mr Kuldeep Singh of Mohali, Punjab, who had come
here for the Sindhu Darshan, while rubbishing the Hindu ideology of
the Sindhu Darshan festival, said that he had travelled all the way to
Leh to pay homage to the river that had been the cradle of the Indian
civilisation. Similar views were expressed by Ms Lajwanti Peswani
and Mr Baldev Peswani from Mumbai, who after offering their prayers to
Lord Jhule Lal and collecting water of the Indus to be taken back
home, prayed for the welfare of the universe. ‘’The river gives the
fundamental message of oneness and underlying unities — unity in the
diversity of man, unity in the diversity of nature and unity in the
diversity of religion. So why restrict the festivities to the Sindhis
or Hindus,” they said. Ms Rakhi Mehtani, a resident of Ahmedabad,
says that she has been visiting Leh for the Sindhu Darshan for the
past three years and found people of all religions participating in
the festivities. Are we finally beginning to get out of our communal
nemesis? Well, the change in the political leadership at the top hopes
to redefine the cultural heritage and reconstruct the religious
thought to a nationalist thought. It’s time that the pure is separated
from the profane. As Swami Vivekananda has rightly observed, “Each
nation, like an individual, has one theme in life, which is at its
centre. In India, religious life forms the centre.” Hence a
reawakened Hinduism (not religious bigotry, but a commitment to a
selfless way of life and to the cultural heritage of the land) is a
must to keep the country’s institutions from fragmenting. If the
celebration of festivals without associating these with narrow
religious motives is the first infantile step in this regard, let the
spark spread everywhere so that spiritual secularism reigns. For the
first time, three Pakistani Sindhis attended the festival. It was
reportedly at the intervention of the Jammu and Kashmir Chief
Minister, Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, that permission for travel of these
Sindhis was granted. Janardan Baghwan Das, alias Sain Sadaram Saheb, a
priest, was accompanied by his associates Lakshmi Chand, a singer, and
Satram Das. |
|
Delhi Durbar Several ministers had sought the Prime Minister’s
permission to visit Paris on one pretext or another but ostensibly to
attend the wedding of steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal’s daughter. They
were disappointed as the Prime Minister politely but firmly turned
down such requests. In circulars to his Cabinet colleagues Dr
Manmohan Singh has urged them not to waste time chasing publicity. He
has also instructed all government officials not to entertain anyone
who uses the Prime Minister’s name to get work done. A simple man
not given to any ostentation, Dr Singh gets so immersed in work that
doctors have to intervene urging him to take a breather and have his
lunch, which is invariably a simple vegetarian affair.
PM from
Nandyal? Just before his day-long visit to Andhra Pradesh on
Thursday for a first-hand assessment of the reasons for suicides by
farmers, speculation began that he might contest for the Lok Sabha
from the Nandyal constituency, which was once represented by PV
Narasimha Rao. Aides of Dr Singh dismiss the reports as rubbish. Dr
Singh has hardly had any time to think of getting elected to the House
of the People. Abdul Kalam’s gesture At the glittering Padma
awards function in Rashtrapati Bhavan on Wednesday, President A P J
Abdul Kalam showed the rare gesture of walking half way to the
distinguished awardees to pin the medallion and present the scroll.
When he found renowned and aged artistes finding difficulty in walking
up to the area where Kalam was seated, the sprightly President set
aside protocol. He briskly walked up and did the honours. He also had
a word with all awardees. The President had a ready smile and a
special pat for the awardees.
Vajpayee on the move Even though
Atal Bihari Vajpayee is expected to move out of the official Race
Course Residence of the Prime Minister next week, it might still take
a while for new head of government Manmohan Singh to move in. This is
because the RCR requires a facelift. Meanwhile, Vajpayee will move
into a sprawling bungalow at 6A, Krishna Menon Marg, which has been
readied in keeping with the tastes and needs of the former Prime
Minister. Riaz Khokhar in a spot When Pakistan Foreign
Secretary Riaz Khokhar arrived in the Capital for the talks with his
Indian counterpart Shashank, the situation in his country had
undergone a change with Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali having quit as
Prime Minister. Therefore, he could not hand over the invitation
from Mr Jamali to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Khokar overcame a
delicate situation by extending an invitation orally to Dr Singh of
behalf of the new Pakistani Prime Minister, Chaudhary Shujaat Hussain,
assuring him that the formal one will follow in a week’s
time. Contributed by Satish Misra, Gaurav Choudhary and S.
Satyanarayanan |
What more can a man in the
street want to learn than this, that the one God and Creator and Master
of all that lives pervades the Universe? — Mahatma Gandhi
Seek ye
first the kingdom of heaven, and all else shall be added unto you.
—
Saint Matthew Call no one bad. — Guru Nanak Vedanta provides you
the inner growth and development with which alone you will be able to
relish and rule the world. — Swami A. Parthasarathy |
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