Remembering Jallianwala Bagh
AN abiding myth associated with the freedom movement is that it helped India win independence without bloodshed.

University blues
UNIVERSITIES, one has been persuaded over the years to believe, are sources of universal light, understanding, knowledge and wisdom.

Russia and Balkan crisis
THE NATO military action against Yugoslavia, to punish it for its refusal to sign the Rambouillet accord on Kosovo, as dictated by Western powers, has one powerful message for every nation aspiring to become a military leader: there is no point in acquiring military might if it is not backed by sufficient economic muscle power.

POWER STRUGGLE IN DELHI
by Inder Malhotra
TILL the moment of reckoning on the floor of the Lok Sabha, both sides in the no-holds-barred power struggle in New Delhi will go on claiming victory.

Caste conflicts & Ambedkar’s ideas
by K. L. Johar
AS we observe the birth anniversary of Baba Saheb Bhimrao Ambedkar today it will be worthwhile to reflect in all seriousness what he had once very aptly remarked.

A young girl’s ‘gory path’ of murder
PATIALA: “I am condemned for my wayward conduct but no one gives me audience to explain the circumstances that drove me to this gory path,” says Harjinder Kaur, popularly known as Rano of Gajewas village in Patiala district, now facing trial for murdering four members of her family and causing the disappearance of a fifth relative.

Rhyme, not reason
by Lalit Mohan
SOME of the more popular English nursery rhymes, which we teach in our schools, appear to be products of a perverse imagination. Children’s minds are impressionable and the poems they learn should convey pleasant images, and teach the right values, but that is unlikely to happen as long as the current favourites remain in vogue.

75 Years Ago

The Bengal situation in Parliament
WE have sometimes thought that in the present stage of transition India has far more to gain from the more progressive and pro-Indian of British politicians being in opposition than by their being in office. The reason is clear. In opposition they can give all the support they like to those principles for which India has been fighting.

Remembering Jallianwala Bagh

AN abiding myth associated with the freedom movement is that it helped India win independence without bloodshed. A correct reading of the history of the period would show that the freedom fighters’ commitment to the doctrine of non-violence was absolute; but it did not stop the British rulers from killing them with the ruthlessness usually associated with beasts. Countless countrymen sacrificed their lives under the inspirational leadership of Mahatma Gandhi to earn for India the status of a free and sovereign nation. Each region has a magnificent tale to tell about its contribution to the freedom movement. From among the blood splattered pages of the history of India’s independence emerges a unique story of a Baisakhi exactly 80 years ago which saw Punjab lose 20,000 men, women and children to the hail of bullets from the troops of General Dyer at Jallianwala Bagh in Amritsar. The unarmed people had collected at Jallianwala to protest against the attempt of the British rulers to curtail the civil liberties of Indians through provisions contained in the infamous Rowlatt Bills. The crowd was restless because Saifuddin Kitchlew and Satya Pal had been detained and Mahatma Gandhi was not allowed to enter Punjab. A memorial now stands in Jallianwala Bagh as a mute testimony to what Winston Churchill later described as a “monstrous event”. The Jallianwala Bagh incident is not the personal tragedy of those who lost their loved ones on April 13, 1919. It was a watershed in the history of the freedom movement.

Rabindranath Tagore returned his knighthood and the mindless bloodshed steeled the resolve of every patriotic Indian to sharpen the weapon of non-violence for driving out the British. Yet official apathy has reduced the monument to the martyrs at Jallianwala into an unkempt piece of brick and mortar which is dusted and spruced up every year on Baisakhi for the odd VIP to pay lip service to the contribution of the countless Bhagat Singhs, Raj Gurus and Ashfaqullahs in the country’s freedom struggle. An amount of Rs 2.50 crore for sprucing up of the memorial is lying unused because of bureaucratic red tape. The entire complex is gradually turning into a garbage dump because of the indifference of the Amritsar Municipal Corporation and the district administration. Some years ago the customary reversal of arms and the sounding of the Last Post were done away with during the official ceremony at 4 p.m. — the time General Dyer ordered the troops to open fire at the unarmed congregation. Why? Because the police contingent arrived half an hour after the ceremony was over! Must the people of India forever remain dependent on an indifferent bureaucracy and self-seeking politicians for raising appropriate monuments and organising memorial services for those who gave their lives without expecting anything in return for the freedom of the country? A nation which forgets its martyrs loses its ability to defend itself against internal and external threats. Remembering their tales of valour and selfless sacrifice helps us recognise the need for constant vigil against the enemies within and without. It was the loss of instinct to secure our borders through lack of hero-worship which resulted in centuries of self-invited subjugation.

University blues

UNIVERSITIES, one has been persuaded over the years to believe, are sources of universal light, understanding, knowledge and wisdom. Panjab University, Chandigarh, has inherited great traditions—both academic and administrative. Therefore, it hurts rather deeply when one comes to know that in the matter of holding of examinations, it has started getting lax. This year large sections of undergraduate students were asked to get ready for tests from the first day of this month. The scheduled date coincidentally happened to be April Fool's Day. A summary announcement said that the examination schedule had been changed. The postponement dampened the enthusiasm of those who had literally burnt the midnight oil to give the proof of having learnt much during several months. Examinations have become compulsory rituals. But they remain ordeals of sorts which must be gone through for the purpose of getting a piece of paper called a certificate, a diploma or a degree. So, having reconciled this with the academic prank, students and their guardians kept on looking for another day. It could be April 5, which passed off uneventfully. A new schedule followed which mentioned the magic number 17. Now, the tests which were scheduled to begin on April 17 have been postponed "until further orders", which means "indefinitely". We have made certain frequent observations about the teaching, administrative and disciplinary conditions obtaining in what Dr S. Radhakrishanan used to call temples of learning. The three universal functions of a university widely recognised are the accumulation of new knowledge, perpetuation of our cultural inheritance and professional training. The two main components—the teacher and the student—have to work in concert to give purposefulness to a university. The student is resource material in the accepted sense of the term. His mind is to be enriched and his character is to be moulded. All our Education Commissions have emphasised these points. But now a third element has entered. It has been personified and called the politician. He has been able to falsify even Henry Adams who had said: "A teacher affects eternity: he can never tell where his influence stops." Think of Ruskin: "Teaching is a painful, continual difficult work to be done by guidance, by watching, by warning and by praise, but above all by examples." Ruskin has been closer to the modern-day reality in universities than Adams. The catalyst called example has vanished from the system. Teaching has become a wage-earning proposition underlined by din and bustle during strikes and work-stoppage. However, examinations have mercifully been held. Certificates, diplomas or degrees — real or fake — have been considered by job-givers and some sanctity has been attached to examination schedules and datesheets. Now universities have started ignoring the value of these also. The teaching of arts is suffering in quality. Departments of science are showing poor enrolment, and disproportionately greater emphasis seems to have been given to various business courses, including the ones related to MBA. But even for an MBA course, examination schedules and datesheets are mandatory. The Education Ministry is a myth. The University Grants Commission is a partial reality living on the oxygen of financial powers from day to day and college and university departments are becoming non-serious meeting places of some of our enlightened minds. Perhaps, teachers will have to take upon themselves the responsibility to run the administration of universities. A good teacher is a good person also. In the words of Aldous Huxley, he should have faith in the moral and spiritual reality of the universe; and in the universe, April Fool's Day does not occur frequently in a year.

Russia and Balkan crisis

THE NATO military action against Yugoslavia, to punish it for its refusal to sign the Rambouillet accord on Kosovo, as dictated by Western powers, has one powerful message for every nation aspiring to become a military leader: there is no point in acquiring military might if it is not backed by sufficient economic muscle power. This is clear from Russia's helplessness in decisively coming to the aid of its brotherly neighbour (the Russians and the Serbs of Yugoslavia are of the Slavic race) having historical ties with Moscow. Russia has been openly opposed to any move to find a military solution to the Kosovo crisis even before NATO's nearly 400 jets began pounding targets in Yugoslavia, but its wishes have been ignored. On April 9 Russia — which has the declared capacity to destroy the world many times over even today when it is faced with the worst economic crisis in its history — warned the NATO countries that their irresponsible behaviour could lead to a European war or another world war if Moscow was forced to enter the Balkan arena. An otherwise strongly worded warning was, however, treated as a voice of protest from a tamed bear by the Western leadership. The West knows that Russia cannot move beyond this, as its economy is solely dependent on financial and other aid from the institutions controlled by the West, particularly the USA, the surviving super power. Russian plight is so painful that it is not in a position to pay even salaries to its soldiers on a regular basis. Its forces are in a state of demoralisation after the breakup of the Soviet Union. It is just not in a position to take on NATO, at least under the circumstances. After the collapse of the communist bloc and the Soviet might becoming a thing of the past, it has moved so close to the USA that many world watchers have begun to describe it as an appendage of Washington. The Russian leadership is now realising that Moscow cannot play its role independent of the USA so long as it remains dependent on Washington for its economic reconstruction.

There is a tag in the Russian warning — that NATO must desist from using ground troops to accomplish its task in the Balkan area. Since NATO has so far avoided taking this course one can interpret it as giving respect to the Russian anger. The truth, however, lies elsewhere. NATO members are unwilling to involve their ground troops in the Balkan conflict as that would amount to risking the lives of a great number of their soldiers which may lead to the emergence of strong public opposition to the step taken against Yugoslavia. That will also amount to risking their political future by leaders of the NATO countries. But without the use of ground forces NATO's Balkan strategy is unlikely to bring the desired results. This is a serious dilemma before NATO, as explained by the change in its stand from seeking Yugoslav leader Milosevic's unconditional acceptance of the Rambouillet accord to wanting him to negotiate a political autonomy agreement with the Kosovo Albanians. Whatever the ultimate outcome, its impact on the thinking of the Russian leadership is clearly understandable.

POWER STRUGGLE IN DELHI
Country the main sufferer
by Inder Malhotra

TILL the moment of reckoning on the floor of the Lok Sabha, both sides in the no-holds-barred power struggle in New Delhi will go on claiming victory. The numbers game is indeed much too close. Political loyalties, fitful and purchasable even at the best of times, are now infinitely more so, if only because a few minuscule groups and splinters have acquired importance out of all proportion to their strength.

Under these circumstances, it would be foolhardy for any objective observer — as distinct from palpably partisan pundits for whom their wish is the father of their thought — to try to predict the eventual outcome of the far from savoury strife. But one thing can be stated with total confidence and without fear of contradictions. No matter which side, the beleaguered BJP-led coalition or the anti-saffron combination determined to oust the Vajpayee government, wins, the country has already become the real loser.

India has been trapped in a debilitating and demoralising political uncertainty for a whole decade, not since 1996 only. Mr P.V. Narasimha Rao’s ability to stabilise his government — through shockingly dubious methods for which he is now being called to account in various courts of law — should not take in anyone. The rude reality is that since December, 1989, this country has had six governments and the seventh one may well be in the offing.

Consequently, governance in the world’s largest democracy has gone to pieces. Every shaky and opportunistic coalition has had to make shabby and harmful compromises time and again. Those not sure of how long their hold on the levers of power will be have made it their business to loot the national treasury and the nation as fast as they can.

This sorry state of affairs is bound to be aggravated, not mitigated, no matter whether the Vajpayee government manages to scrape through or collapses and is replaced by, what looks increasingly likely, a minority Congress government backed “from outside” by the motley crowd of Leftists, the two Yadavs and others who are agreed on giving the BJP the boot but on little else.

In the event of the present ruling dispensation surviving, its majority will be reduced to a pathetic figure of two or three. This will place it under the untender mercies of groups so rapacious and uncaring that Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee’s troubles with the temperamental Ms Jayalalitha would look like a tiff between extremely cordial friends. Alternatively, where is the guarantee that a Congress government, whether headed by Mrs Sonia Gandhi or her nominee, will not be needled, nettled and subjected to unreasonable demands by those backing it without being able to join it.

A major and malign factor complicating the situation is that the level of political contention, already dangerously high, continues to escalate. Witness, the kind of abuse the BJP propagandists are showering not only on the Congress but also on Ms Jayalalitha who they were trying to placate, humour, cajole and please by stooping as low as humanly possible. All of a sudden the saffron party’s spokespersons have discovered that the lady from Chennai is arraigned in a long list of corruption cases. Was this fact unknown to Mr Vajpayee and Mr L.K. Advani in early 1998 when they forged their alliance with her gleefully? The Congress is also attacking the BJP more sharply than ever before, Mrs Sonia Gandhi even declaring that the “BJP is digging its own grave”.

Never mind the unspeakably messy Bhagwat-Fernandes affair, which will explode in Parliament with the force of a mini-nuke, even the test of Agni-II, unconscionably belated but absolutely essential in national interest, has become a football of partisan politics. This test should have been conducted at the latest by the first week of March when all preparations for it were complete. Why it was postponed has never been satisfactorily explained though the general belief is that the government succumbed to American pressure.

This has made the timing of the test suspect. The parties and individuals opposed to the BJP-led government have lost no time to decry this. The irony, however, is that around the time the test was beginning at Wheeler Island, Ms Jayalalitha issued a statement charging the BJP with compromising national interest by deferring the flight-test of the enhanced Agni.

To do so may be a cry in the wilderness, but one must appeal to the political class not to treat national security as a football of partisan politics. The BJP government may go and the one led by the Congress might come in. That, too, might fall, and yet another election might again fail to yield a clear majority for either side in the next Lok Sabha. But the Agni project must go on and should indeed be accelerated. For, without a certain number of thoroughly tested Agnis, India cannot have a minimum but credible nuclear deterrent worth the name. And the brazen missile attacks on Yugoslavia by the US-led NATO has demonstrated more cruelly than ever before that only a convincing deterrent in possession of the targeted country can save it from the fate of the Yugoslav Federation and Iraq.

However, to revert to the ongoing posturing as a prelude to the trial of strength in the Lok Sabha, a few broad points can be made without attempting to forecast what will happen.

First, the BJP’s stridency and bombast does not conceal a certain amount of nervousness on its part. There can be no other meaning of its gratuitous announcement, after a Cabinet meeting, that it will not seek a vote of confidence in the Lok Sabha. “Those who doubt our majority”, say the ruling coalition’s spin doctors, “should move a vote of no-confidence, and we will prove our majority in the House”. This is an almost exact repetition of Mr V.P. Singh’s famous last words in October, 1990, when, interestingly, the BJP had pulled the rug from under his feet.

It is understandable that after being ditched by Ms Jayalalitha, the BJP should try and woo her arch foe, Mr Karunanidhi, the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, whose party, the DMK, commands six votes in the Lok Sabha. But there is a clear undercurrent of desperation in the frequency with which the Prime Minister personally, the Home Minister, Mr Advani, and the Petroleum Minister, Mr V. Ramamurthi, have been telephoning him. All this pales into insignificance, however, compared with the frantic phone call to Ms Jayalalitha long after the BJP top brass had declared war on her. This lends credence to the belief, shared by many, that the fault lines within the Sangh Parivar, of which the BJP is but one member, are more lethal than those between it and its fractious allies or vociferous opponents.

Secondly, the Congress, in repeating like a mantra that it does not want to topple the BJP-led government which is going to collapse anyhow under the weight of its own contradictions, is also protesting too much. Evidently, Mrs Sonia Gandhi and her trusted advisers are aware of the enormous difficulties in sustaining a government in the prevailing ambience of political fragmentation which, combined with an appalling lack of scruples, has converted the Indian polity into an ethical wasteland. But, then, her party, which is second largest in the Lok Sabha but is still the largest political formation in the country at large, must play the role consistent with its distant past. For that it would have to first overcome the causes which have led to the party’s precipitate decline in recent years.

The third and the most crucial problem the country faces is that the glorification and romanticising of coalition governments during recent years has outlived not only its utility but also its futility. The country has either to outgrow this syndrome or evolve the necessary coalition culture, now conspicuous by its total absence.

Caste conflicts & Ambedkar’s ideas
by K. L. Johar

AS we observe the birth anniversary of Baba Saheb Bhimrao Ambedkar today it will be worthwhile to reflect in all seriousness what he had once very aptly remarked. “Change in the human society can be brought about neither by mere counting of heads nor by breaking of heads, but by appealing to heads as well as hearts”. It is agonising to look at the prevailing social, economic and political scenario in the country when tensions are sought to be built up on the basis of caste, creed and religion merely to garner votes. Recent caste and religious conflicts in Bihar, Maharashtra and Orissa have ended up breaking many heads and hearts. Articles 25 to 28 of our Constitution under the Fundamental Rights give us freedom of conscience and free profession, practice and propagation of religion, freedom to manage religious affairs and other allied matters.

Then where is the conflict? The conflict lies in the misrepresentation of these articles by vested interests who thrive on creating tension and conflict among peace-loving citizens of the country. Communalism, casteism, religious hatred, bigotry and disrespect for the Constitution are responsible for the lack of real progress in our country. Caste and religion are used simply as instruments of political manipulation.

Fiftytwo years have rolled by since India attained Independence. If we look at the canvas of time of this period, we shall soon realise that instead of binding the festering wounds of communal frenzy in the wake of Partition, things have worsened as caste and communal divide has deepened. We must pause, ponder and ask ourselves the reasons for it.

Dr Ambedkar firmly believed that glaring inequalities on the social and economic front were largely responsible for this sordid scenario. His own life became one long ceaseless struggle to bring some relief to the disadvantaged sections of society who had suffered in silence for centuries. Almost with a fatalist outlook, these victims of social tyranny had acquiesced in and accepted the imposition as if it was ordained by God. Dr Ambedkar raised the banner of revolt against this inequitious caste-ridden society.

Dr Ambedkar had a pinch of upper-caste orthodoxy in his own life. As a student, he was not allowed to sit close to his classmates. Later although everyone in the Law College at Bombay where he was serving as a professor recognised his erudition and scholarship, he was not qualified to draw drinking water from the same utensil from which upper-caste professors were taking. Still later, he was prevented from entering a prominent temple in Eastern India even though the Viceroy and his wife the two aliens were allowed to enter and pay their obeisance. Ambedkar could well imagine that if this was the treatment meted out to him, it must be much worse with the millions of dumb illiterate dalits. His mind was made up. He decided to undertake the onerous task of social transformation and ameliorate the lot of the poor, the needy and the downtrodden. In order to make them realise that social equality was their inalienable right, he went whole hog to awaken their frozen consciousness.

Although some efforts at secularising the social order had been made by Mahatma Jotirao Phule in Maharashtra and Periyar E.V. Ramaswamy Naicker in Tamil Nadu, credit primarily goes to Ambedkar who as a social revolutionary went into the problem of eradication of the evil practice of untouchability and social inequalities. He often argued that one did not become great by belonging to a particular caste but one attained greatness by virtue of one’s work in the social and economic fields. Defining greatness be once remarked, “a great man must be motivated by the dynamics of a social purpose, and must act as the scavenger of society”. As a social liberator, he wanted to liquidate the caste system and usher in a single-caste society, or a casteless society of equal men and women. To him, this social transformation was not one of showing charity by some towards others, but one of fulfilling one’s duties and obligations.

His intellect came into full play to promote the cause of regeneration of Indian society, and he wrote books like “who were Shudras”. “The Untouchable” and “Annihilation of Caste”. His message went loud and clear through the various journals like Mooknayak, Bhishkrit Bharat and Janata in the late thirties.

India is a mosaic of different religions, languages and cultures. If multi-religious, multi-lingual and multi-cultural society like India has to march forward as a civilised nation, its total secularisation is a pre-requisite. It will be a matter of elation and pride if in the next 10 or 20 years we can say triumphantly that India has only one class of people — Indians — first, last and always. This alone will be a fitting tribute to Dr Ambedkar.

The writer is a former Vice-Chancellor of Guru Jambheshwar University, Hisar.

Rhyme, not reason
by Lalit Mohan

SOME of the more popular English nursery rhymes, which we teach in our schools, appear to be products of a perverse imagination. Children’s minds are impressionable and the poems they learn should convey pleasant images, and teach the right values, but that is unlikely to happen as long as the current favourites remain in vogue.

The top of the charts is the old ditty about Jack and Jill going up the hill for whatever reason, which ends with the young boy badly injured with possibly a gash in his cranium and the girl following battered and bruised from a tumble down the slope. The image of blood flowing from a serious head injury, and possibly both of them lying swathed in bandages, is certainly not a happy one, and yet in schools kids are required to jump and dance with joy when they recite the tale.

Even more morbid is the one about the cradle rocking on a treetop where, when the wind blows, it plummets to the earth with the baby in it. It is extremely doubtful if the infant could have survived such a fall, but this is the denouement that is greeted with applause whenever a child is asked to recount the story in verse.

Another sad ending, which brings forth appreciation from beaming adults when their wards recite it, pertains to the story of the poor egg, painted in picture books with human features, who falls from a wall and is broken irreparably into several pieces. Only a sick mind can find something joyful in it.

What are we trying to teach the children through such tripe? The predominant sentiment that runs through these rhymes is that of misery. Blood, gore and death are hardly the stuff children’s stories should be made of. Young minds should be brought up to think of the world as a pleasant place. As it is there is so much that is wrong here. Images of pain or deprivation should be kept away from them for as long as possible, but that can hardly happen if they are taught that, while everyone else gets a bag of wool from the black sheep, the poor boy who cries down the lane gets none. Where is the concern for the underdog, which is one of the values we are supposed to inculcate? What about our much touted love for animals, when in nursery rhyme the dog does not even get a bare bone from Mother Hubbard’s cupboard?

Fear is another sentiment that should be kept away from young minds, but this can hardly happen if the school poem tells them of the cat whose principal claim to fame was that she frightened a little mouse under a chair. Or, of a spider who scared Miss Muffet and made her run in away in fright. Is that a nice thing to happen to anyone?

What are these stories supposed to convey, anyway? The children are not at fault if they go about parroting what we tell them to and grow up with the feeling that the world is a very nasty place where all the time people are either getting seriously hurt, or being frightened, or where those deprived always get a raw deal. It is about time teachers and parents realise that what is being taught to them in the guise of innocent nursery rhymes is pure trash, which we dish out because aping what people do in the west has become a habit with us. I would prefer our own “Chanda Mama Door Ke” any day. At least it has a happy ending.

A young girl’s ‘gory path’ of murder

PATIALA: “I am condemned for my wayward conduct but no one gives me audience to explain the circumstances that drove me to this gory path,” says Harjinder Kaur, popularly known as Rano of Gajewas village in Patiala district, now facing trial for murdering four members of her family and causing the disappearance of a fifth relative.

Now lodged at Patiala Central Jail, Rano bursts out: “Ours was a very happy family when we lived in Sangeri village. Since my maternal grand parents did not have any male child, after the death of my grandfather my parents shifted to Gajewas on my grandmother's request.”

She adds: “I am the eldest child of my parents. My miseries began when I was hardly 14 and a student of eighth class. Labh Singh, then sarpanch of the village who owns land adjoining our farmhouse, volunteered to teach me mathematics without charge. The seeds of tragedy were sown with his coming into my life. It was he who lured me into sexual activities and led me astray.”

Rano recalls: “In early 1996 I was returning home. Labh Singh took me to a sugarcane field and assaulted me sexually. I narrated this incident to my parents. Members of the panchayat, however, advised my parents not to air this incident as it would bring a bad name to the family. They also brought about rapprochement between Labh Singh and my parents. Encouraged by the inaction of my parents, Labh Singh never spared me as and when he found me alone in the house or in the fields.”

“I have been lodged in this jail for the past several months,” she says, “I rarely take food and keep weeping during the night in the memory of my parents. I am also worried about my younger brother and sister.”

Stoutly built and sporting a flowing beard, Labh Singh, a 65-year-old former sarpanch of Gajewas village lodged in the same jail, however, dismisses Rano's allegations as baseless. “I have grown up sons and daughters-in-law. My grandchildren are of Rano's age. Keeping in view my age, do you think I can commit such a heinous crime?” he asks and adds: “I am a victim of group rivalry in my village.”

Episode I

The murder of Rano's parents, Jarnail Singh and Amarjit Kaur, and her brother, Amritpal Singh, on April 18, 1996, and later of her maternal grandmother, Bachan Kaur, had sent shivers down the spine of Gajewas residents.

To begin with, it was believed by one and all that the deceased had died due to accidental food poisoning. The police, too, completed the routine formality of preparing an inquest report under Section 173, Cr P.C. After getting an autopsy conducted on the bodies, it sent their visceras to Patiala for chemical examination.

The real story came to light however six days later on April 24 when Lakhvinder Singh, Rano's first cousin, made a statement to the police.

He told the police that a day before this gruesome episode, he had come to meet his uncle Jarnail Singh at Gajewas. Jarnail Singh complained to him that Rano was a spoiled child and misbehaved with every member of the family. Lakhwinder also disclosed that his uncle's driver, Avtar Singh alias Tari too had come to Jarnail Singh's house on April 18. After asking Avtar to get a duplicate copy of his van's registration book prepared from Samana, Jarnail Singh and his wife left for the fields.

Rano, said Lakhvinder Singh, called Avtar to the backyard of her house. He claimed to have overheard Rano telling Avtar that she was nagged by her family members. She also told him that they objected to her meeting him. Therefore, she suggested that something should be done immediately. Avtar promised to do "something" the same day. Lakhvinder maintained that the murder of Jarnail Singh, his wife and their son was the handiwork of none else but Rano and Avtar.

On the basis of his statement, the Samana police booked Rano and Avtar Singh under Sections 302 and 34, IPC and arrested them. After sustained questioning, Rano helped the police recover a plastic bottle containing insecticide mingled with tea leaves. This bottle too was sent to Patiala for chemical examination.

In his report the Chemical Examiner opined that the bodies of the deceased as well as the plastic bottle recovered from Rano's house contained organo-phosphorus group of insecticide. His findings proved that the deceased had been given organo-phosphorus in their food which caused their death.

Rano narrated the entire episode in the first person in an interview to Sarita, a well known Hindi magazine. She said she loved Avtar. But he did not respond to her overtures. She requested Labh Singh to help her marry Avtar Singh. She promised to keep Labh Singh "happy" even after marriage. Labh Singh told her that none of her family members would agree to her marriage with Avtar. Therefore, some strategy would have to be evolved.

Labh Singh persuaded Avtar to respond to Rano's advances though he was hesitant to begin with. Rano's parents got wind of it and objected to her activities. After some days Labh Singh told Rano that he would supply her some "medicine" which she should mix in food. After consuming the poisonous food, all members of her family would die and the decks would be cleared for her marriage with Avtar. He took an assurance from Rano that she would not name him to the police even if she was implicated in a case. He promised that he would render her all possible financial help and use his influence to get her released on bail. Labh Singh also advised Rano to name only Avtar in case the police registered a case. Rano acted as advised and poisoned her family to death. She named only Avtar as her accomplice.

As promised Labh Singh extended all possible help to Rano. She was enlarged on bail and was back home in August, 1996.

Episode II

Labh Singh again started frequenting Rano's house and indulged in the same old immoral activities. At this stage one Gurjant Singh, an old classmate with whom she had been in love, also arrived on the scene. Both Labh Singh and Gurjant Singh started staying in Rano's house till late in the night. This was objected to by her maternal grandmother. And when one night Labh Singh suggested to Bachan Kaur that Rano should be married to Avtar, the old woman would have none of it. In the stillness of that night, Bachan Kaur was strangulated to death by Labh Singh and Gurjant Singh in Rano's presence. Her body was buried in a 10-feet deep pit in the backyard of the house under a septic tank.

For a couple of months no one got to know of the strangulation of Bachan Kaur. However, one day Babu Singh, Bachan Kaur's brother, came to Gajewas and asked Rano to tell him the whereabouts of his sister, otherwise she would have to face unpleasant consequences. At that time Gurjant Singh was also sitting with her in the house. He took out his scooter, asked Babu Singh and Rano to sit behind him on the pillion and drove towards Sangrur. At a distance of about 2 km Babu Singh asked Gurjant to stop near a canal. Babu Singh alighted from the scooter and walked a few steps on the bank of the canal.

Gurjant immediately suggested to Rano that they should remove Babu Singh from harm's path. She nodded. As Babu Singh went down a few steps for washing his face in the canal, Gurjant kicked him in the back. He fell into the canal. Gurjant caught by him by his hair and drowned him. Later, he lifted his body on his shoulders and threw it in the nearby bushes.

In April,1997, Karamjit Singh, another brother of Bachan Kaur came to Gajewas and enquired about the whereabouts of his sister and Babu Singh. Failing to get a convincing reply, he went to the police station and lodged an FIR against Rano, Gurjant and Labh Singh. All of them were arrested and subjected to sustained custodial interrogation for several days. Accompanied by an Executive Magistrate, a police party went to Rano's house and recovered the body of Bachan Kaur from the pit and sent it to Rajendra Hospital, Patiala for postmortem. The body of Babu Singh has, however, not been found till today.

In his report Dr Deepak Walia of the Rajendra Hospital held: “The cause of the death in this case, in my opinion, is due to asphyxia as a result of throttling. Throttling is sufficient to cause death in ordinary course of nature.”

In the first episode involving the murder of Rano's parents and brother, the police filed a challan in the court of the Subdivisional Judicial Magistrate of Samana, Mr R P Nagrath against Rano and Avtar Singh. Mr Nagrath committed the case for trial to the Additional Sessions Judge, Patiala, Mr O P Goel, on July 27,1996. Rano, however, preferred an application in the court of Mr Goel saying that her date of birth was August 12,1979. Since she was a juvenile at the time the alleged offence was committed, she prayed that her case be sent to the Juvenile Court for trial.

On August 14,1996, the Additional Sessions Judge separated her case and ordered that she be tried by the Patiala Juvenile Court presided over by the Chief Judicial Magistrate. The Judge also directed the police to put up a separate challan for her prosecution. The Juvenile Court has recorded the evidence of a few prosecution witnesses. The case will now come up for hearing in the last week of April.

As for Avtar Singh, he was charge-sheeted by Mr Goel under Sections 302 and 34, IPC. The prosecution examined five witnesses, Harmel Singh, Gurmail Singh, Megh Raj , Lakhvinder Singh and Harpreet Kaur. None of them supported the prosecution theory that Avtar had a hand in the murder of Rano's parents and brother.

Mr Goel held finally on June 2,1997 that there is not "even the slightest evidence on the record of the case" to prove that Avtar Singh had a common intention with Rano to commit the murder of Jarnail Singh, Amarjit Kaur and Amritpal Singh, or that he had brought the poison and supplied it to Rano.

The Judge further ruled: " I hold that the prosecution has failed to prove its case against Avtar Singh and as such I acquit him."

As for the second episode of Bachan Kaur's strangulation, the Judge charge-sheeted Rano, Labh Singh and Gurjant Singh under Sections 302,34 and 120-B. Rano and Gurjant were also chargesheeted under Section 364/34, I.P.C. for causing the disappearance of Babu Singh.

This case is now listed for April 26 before the Sessions Judge, Mr K. S. Grewal. Rano's younger sister, Harpreet Kaur, will step into the witness box on behalf of the prosecution that day.

75 YEARS AGO

The Bengal situation in Parliament

WE have sometimes thought that in the present stage of transition India has far more to gain from the more progressive and pro-Indian of British politicians being in opposition than by their being in office. The reason is clear. In opposition they can give all the support they like to those principles for which India has been fighting.

In office they are too often apt to betray a nervous anxiety to show that the difference between them and their opponents is not really so great as the latter imagine and in some cases there is no difference whatever.

On the other hand, the Conservatives and diehards, who while in office would naturally effect a certain amount of moderation, at least in their utterances, become literally wild in the exhibition of their irresponsibility when they are in opposition.

Consequently, there is no one left to do even lip-homage to true Liberal principles. We are reminded of this truth by certain questions that were recently asked in the House of Commons regarding the position that has arisen in Bengal owing to the refusal of the salary of the Ministers.

All these questions were asked by Conservative members, who have never been friendly to the reformed regime and who, in the present case, were in an indecent hurry to get back to the days of undiluted autocracy by killing the Reforms, and the Minister who answered them showed no greater faith in or enthusiasm for the Reforms than his interrogators.

One of the questions was whether in consequence of the rejection of the vote for the Minister’s salaries in Bengal the transferred subjects were going to be transferred to the reserved side so as to enable the Governor to restore the grant. The question not only showed an utter ignorance of the Constitution, but was too obviously a case of the wish being the father to the thought.

And yet the Under Secretary contented himself with merely pointing out that the proposal was not feasible under the Constitution, and did not even add a mild rebuke to the questioner on account of the spirit underlying his suggestion.