Apex court’s new focus
IT was a dramatic day at the Supreme Court when a three-Judge Bench “recalled” a three-year-old judgement and in the process rewrote case law.

Another hostile act
IN all civilised national capitals, diplomatic personnel of other countries live like representatives of their governments. Not so in Islamabad.

Even milk kills now!
THE milk mafia of Uttar Pradesh is spreading providentially countrywide consciousness about the literally killer instinct of the avaricious.

TALIBAN’S MULTIPLE MENACE
An alarming situation
by Inder Malhotra
IT is time for the international community in general and for this country in particular in sit up and take note of the alarming goings-on in Afghanistan, a neighbour in which India’s stakes are too obvious to need stressing or explaining. Let there be no illusion about what is happening. The multiple menace presented by the Taliban of Afghanistan to Central Asia, South Asia and even China is turning from disastrous to catastrophic.

A golden puzzle
by Arvind Bhandari
IF the aphorism were to be reversed, it would read “gold is old”. This epitomises the situation in regard to the shiny metal, which is fast losing its lustre. The price of gold has touched an all-time low.

Woman cop shines in male bastion
by Reeta Sharma
IMPRESSIVELY dressed in police uniform this slim-trim woman unmistakably displays firmness, desire to succeed and achieve goals. It was in April, 1990, that she was recruited as an ASI in Chandigarh police and today she is SI (Sub Inspector) posted at the Sector 39 police station.

Power Dressing
by Avay Shukla
THE IAS is a troubled service these days. It sees itself as playing second fiddle to the IPS notwithstanding the two extra papers its members had to take in the UPSC exams. Its morale today is lower than that of the Navy post-Bhagwat, or the Indian cricket team pre-Sharjah, or the BJP pre and post-Jayalalitha. The problem is not spondylitis, or the haemorroids, or the gradual loss of vertebrae — these are common occupational hazards which the members of this twice-born service have learnt to take in their stride.

75 Years Ago

Cost of living in India
THE question of ascertaining the cost of decent living in India has been exercising the minds of the thinking sections of the public. Opinions vary a good deal, as the standard of decent living is not the same with all classes of people. But it is agreed that unlike the countries of Europe and the United States of America, there is hardly any definite standard of living in India.

Apex court’s new focus

IT was a dramatic day at the Supreme Court when a three-Judge Bench “recalled” a three-year-old judgement and in the process rewrote case law. The immediate beneficiary of the judicial review is former Petroleum Minister Satish Sharma but the law-abiding citizen has acquired court-mandated protection against capricious police investigation. The court says that the CBI or the police can be unleashed only after a prima facie case has been established and not to find if a crime has been committed. In other words, the Bench has waved a red light to the present practice of using the CBI to build a case or what the US law-enforcing authorities pithily call a fishing expedition. This view stems from an enlarged definition of the right to life (Article 21). The court says the Article does not guarantee merely the right to life but also the right to enjoy life without being persecuted by the police. Based on this, the court withdrew its earlier directive to the CBI to investigate if the former Minister was guilty of “any other offence”.

Another key feature of the landmark judgement is about the ambit of ministerial discretionary powers. The original judgement delivered in November, 1996, disapproved of the very concept since it was open to gross misuse and fined the Minister a whopping Rs 50 lakh for breach of trust. This fine has been cancelled and the blanket ban on discretionary powers has been partly lifted. The Bench says that Ministers are accountable for the way they exercise this sweeping power and should ensure that there is transparency in invoking it. In other words, discretionary power by itself is not pure evil but gives much room for its gross misuse. The remedy lies in tightening the procedure and not in scrapping the power itself. In this region where discretionary quotas have been in the news for all wrong reasons and which have repeatedly attracted the censorious attention of the court, the judgement will be read with much care.

More significantly, the judgement marks a major departure in judicial philosophy. In the mid-nineties the Supreme Court had embraced a crusading role to clean up society, the establishment in the first place, of accumulated moral dross. The presence of reformist luminaries like Justice Kuldip Singh imparted both urgency and direction to cracking down on unacceptable commissions and omissions. Public interest litigation became a handy tool to both goad laggards and rein in dynamic wrong-doers, and the long-suffering and frustrated public openly lauded the judicial activism. Now the dominant mood is to promote the human rights movement. The court does not hesitate in standing by the victims of gross human rights abuses and this subtly vibrates with the public sentiment. Funny, Mr Satish Sharma faced the wrath of the court in its anti-establishment mood but has benefited from its changed attitude. Remarkably enough, Mr Justice Saghir Ahmed was in the Bench that delivered the original verdict and has now presided over the three-Judge revision Bench. Never has judicial view received the kind of searching second look as the two judgements, and that speaks volumes of the stature of the court.

Another hostile act

IN all civilised national capitals, diplomatic personnel of other countries live like representatives of their governments. Not so in Islamabad. There, the diplomats are reduced to the status of hostages, especially if they happen to belong to India. They are humiliated and harassed on a daily basis and even physically harmed every now and then. There has been a sudden increase in such incidents after Pakistan suffered the ignominy of seeing its Kargil adventure boomerang. In the latest such incident, two staff members of the Indian High Commission were beaten up and forced to brutal interrogation after being framed by Pakistan intelligence agencies. This incident was one of a piece with the torture of Mr Yograj Vij, an attache posted in Islamabad, on July 6 and the assault on Mr N.R. Doraiswamy, another attache, on June 29. As was only to be expected, the culprits are yet to be identified, let alone punished. How can they be, when it is as clear as day that they belong to the intelligence agencies of Pakistan? The safety and security of all personnel in the High Commission is the responsibility of the Government of Pakistan but this has never been discharged. In fact, exactly the opposite has always been done. "Bullying tactics" is the only diplomacy practised in Islamabad. Obligations under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, 1961, and the bilateral code of conduct for treating diplomatic personnel are routinely flouted. But then, it is futile to expect any better from a nation which could torture and mutilate even the bodies of captured Indian soldiers. Compare that with the way the Indian army gave a proper burial to the Pakistani soldiers whose bodies their government even refused to accept and the insensitivity of the neighbouring country stands out in stark relief.

Such brutality may be Pakistan's way of venting its anger over the failure of its Kargil misadventure but it has to be told in no uncertain terms that India would not allow it to treat its High Commission staff as sitting ducks. The international community now knows about the Pakistani hand in aiding and abetting terrorism all over the world. The attack on the embassy staff is no less heinous a crime. It is time Pakistan was given elementary lessons in civilised behaviour. If that is not done immediately, representatives of other countries may be at equally great risk. Already fundamentalists aided and abetted by the Pakistan Government have openly declared that if any attack is launched on Osama bin Laden, not one American living in Pakistan will be spared. It is not just a wild threat. Ironically, just before launching any attack on the Indian staffers, Pakistan always accuses this country of maltreating or assaulting its High Commission staff in Delhi. That is just a clever ploy to hide its own bloody designs. Now that other Pakistani lies stand exposed, this propaganda should also be laid bare. India has turned the other cheek towards Pakistan for far too long.

Even milk kills now!

THE milk mafia of Uttar Pradesh is spreading providentially countrywide consciousness about the literally killer instinct of the avaricious. In spite of Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav's "samajwadi" (pro-society) support for the traditional milk-sellers —Yadavas and Ghosees — the Kalyan Singh government is hardening its attitude against the manufacturers and sellers of synthetic milk within the state as well as across its borders. Lucknow, Barabanki, Kanpur, Hardoi and Sitapur have gained notoriety in the synthetic milk scam. However, the government's anger or action has not deterred the traders in disease and death. They make sufficient khoya and paneer. The so-called byproducts of milk are sold in the open market at high prices in various urban areas. Since there is no regular check on such items, halwais buy them at relatively cheap rates these days. One can easily imagine the quality of sweets sold in huge quantities. Remember that NOIDA falls in U.P. and that it also means an extension of Delhi. Where does one go from here? July was a revelatory month; on the 10th, two trucks with bags of skimmed milk powder stopped at Udaipur in Rajasthan. Those instrumental in the "stopover" of the trucks were found adulterating milk powder with various substances, including crushed soapstone, which is usually used for making sculptures. It mixes well with milk powder. While soapstone costs Rs 8 per kg, skimmed milk powder is priced around Rs 60 for the same quantity. The news created waves in legal and social circles for some time. Then the protesters became silent for known reasons. On July 14, the Delhi High Court took cognisance of a complaint about the violation of certain provisions of the Prevention of Food Adulteration (PFA) Rules, 1955. Incidentally, this dispensation permits the presence of rat excreta in wheat, rice, maize, bajra, masoor, urad, moong, chana, arhar — and rodent-hair — (five pieces of rat-droppings per kg of cereals). Legal luminaries looked into the Constitution and the PFA Act of 1954. The obnoxiousness and injuriousness to human health stemming from food contamination became a subject of legal proceedings.

The Directorate of the PFA said that it had made its personnel alert, but Delhiites kept on consuming rodent-hair and sickening droppings. The Federal Food and Drug Agency of the USA found harmful pesticide residues in packets of cashewnuts, processed pulses, basmati rice, papads and pickles. The supplies were confiscated. Meanwhile, in the Union Capital's markets, chemically polished brinjals and gourds were noticed in immense resplendence. The glint and sheen, of course, came from harmful chemicals. The health authorities said the chemically polished edible objects might cause serious intestinal and kidney disorders. Preventive measures are not in sight and trade in them is as rampant in Delhi as in Chandigarh. Returning to the UP scene, we do not see any chance of a letup in the adulterated milk business. Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav has politicised the issue by blaming the BJP for the "harassment of poor milk-producers". A regular movement has been started against the Government's policy of putting an end to the manufacture and distribution of synthetic milk adulterated with urea, caustic soda, liquid detergents, sodium sulphate and soapstone. The pro-adulteration agitation is likely to continue until the last phase of the election in UP. Vote-bank politics, linked with the business of adulteration, creates a life-threatening scenario. Will the central anti-adulteration agencies help? The "white revolution" has been written off by mammonish reactionaries.

TALIBAN’S MULTIPLE MENACE
An alarming situation
by Inder Malhotra

IT is time for the international community in general and for this country in particular in sit up and take note of the alarming goings-on in Afghanistan, a neighbour in which India’s stakes are too obvious to need stressing or explaining. Let there be no illusion about what is happening. The multiple menace presented by the Taliban of Afghanistan to Central Asia, South Asia and even China is turning from disastrous to catastrophic.

On July 28, after nearly 10 months of relative peace, the Taliban, which controls 80 per cent of the Afghan territory, launched a massive offensive to wrest control of the remaining 20 per cent that is held by the Northern Alliance. All previous efforts of the Taliban to defeat this alliance have failed. This time round there are clear signs of desperation in the Taliban’s assault, if only because the Northern Alliance still occupies Afghanistan’s seat at the UN while the Taliban has succeeded in securing recognition from only three countries — Pakistan, which is its chief mentor and real creator, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

It may not be easy for the Taliban to achieve its objective. For, the forces of the legendary Mr Ahmed Shah Masood retain their capacity to put up stout resistance. They are based moreover in the Panjshir Valley described by strategists as “one of the most impregnable strongholds in the region”. Moreover, if the Taliban continues to receive more than substantial military help from Pakistan, both in men and armaments, so does the Northern Alliance from Russia and Iran, through the neighbouring nations of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.

Unlike the predominantly Pushtoon Taliban, the Northern Alliance includes many Uzbeks and Hazaras, while Mr Masood is a Tajik, enjoying fierce loyalty of the Afghans of Tajik ethnicity.

Even so, the challenge of the Taliban should not be underestimated nor some of its particularly pernicious aspects overlooked. In the first place, the current offensive, which is bound to continue for at least as long as summer lasts, means a complete rejection of the UN sponsored activity to end the conflict in Afghanistan and form an all-inclusive Afghan government. A week before the offensive began the two sides had met in the Uzbek capital, Tashkent, in the presence of the UN special envoy and a former Foreign Minister of Algeria, Mr Lakhdar Brahimi, as well as representatives of Afghanistan’s six neighbours — Iran, Pakistan, China, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan — besides those of the USA and Russia.

It was the leader of the Taliban delegation, Mr Amir Khan Muttaqui, who wrecked the talks —by declaring disdainfully: “It is stupid to make peace in the presence of the Americans” — even while the spokesman of the Northern Alliance, Mr Mohammed Abdullah, went on declaring that his side wanted to “persist in the dialogue process”. Mr Brahimi’s appeals that the two sides should at least discuss the exchange of prisoners and such other matters also fell on deaf ears.

The second new element in the Afghan situation is extremely dangerous and Mr Brahimi is among the first to draw pointed attention to it. Between 3,000 and 5,000 Pakistani fighters, apart from Arab Islamic militants and others are participating in the Taliban offensive. Both the Pakistani government and the Taliban deny that the Pakistanis fighting shoulder-to-shoulder with the Taliban forces include a large number of regular soldiers. But then similar denials have been issued also in relation to the invaders of the Kargil sector on the Indian side of the Line of Control.

In any case, no one denies the participation in the Taliban’s war by thousands of Pakistanis. In fact, a cover story in Far Eastern Economic Review, by a distinguished Pakistani journalist, Mr Ahmed Rashid, says that so many Pakistani Islamist militants are in Kabul that parts of the Afghan capital look like “suburbs of Pakistani cities”.

More revealing is Mr Rashid’s statement that the Arab jehadists who have joined the Taliban are organised in 055 Brigade “founded by the alleged terrorist Osama bin Laden” and that this brigade is an integral part of the Taliban forces marching northwards. The Review’s report adds that many of the armed insurgents from outside Afghanistan, helping the Taliban, are accused of “terrorist attacks in China, Iran, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and even Pakistan”. They help the Taliban militarily, and the Taliban “let them set up bases on Afghan soil”.

A safe haven is not the only gift the hardened terrorists get from the Taliban. They are also assured of a lucrative source of income: trafficking in Afghan heroin and smuggling consumer goods across Afghanistan. The extent of this nefarious activity is mind-boggling. Afghanistan’s traditional and normal economy has been all but destroyed. It has been replaced by a criminal economy based on drugs and smuggling (except for fuel and food all other smuggled goods are exported to other countries and their proceeds equal half of Afghanistan’s GDP).

Besides destroying Afghanistan — devastated more mercilessly after the withdrawal of the last Russian soldier than during the decade-long Soviet occupation — the drug-based economy is now threatening the entire region. For instance, officials in both China and Uzbekistana have been quoted by the international media as having said that drugs from Afghanistan are also funding Islamic insurgencies within their borders.

In February a Chinese delegation arrived in Kabul, for the first time in many years, to talk to the Taliban about Beijing’s concern that the tide of heroin from Afghanistan was funding anti-Chinese “Islamic and separatist movements in Xingjiang”. The Taliban bent over backwards to reassure the visiting Chinese that they were not “helping or harbouring Uighur militants”. But Western diplomats in Islamabad contradict this. Uighurs, they say, have “ties with bin Laden and Yoldesev (a leader of Uzbek Islamists running training camps in Afghanistan) if not with Taliban directly”.

All this has to be read in conjunction with the Taliban’s firm rejection of the US demand, backed by the recently announced sanctions that stop just short of declaring the Taliban-ruled country as a terrorist state for the immediate extradition of bin Laden. And yet America is talking in terms of offering the Taliban a choice between “cooperation and confrontation”.

It is this flip-flop in US Afghan policy which is responsible for the rise of the Taliban, the most retrograde and sinister proponent of global Islamic jehad, in the first place. From 1994 until 1997, Washington quietly encouraged Pakistan and Saudi Arabia to back the Taliban so that Iran could be chagrined. Even today the American policy is focused primarily on “getting bin Laden”. This, many friendly critics of the Clinton administration stress, is no way to save either Afghanistan or the wider region around it.

What lends a sharp edge to this state of affairs is the fact that bin Laden was once America’s great favourite. As a Pakistani columnist has written, “Today the USA is fighting a warrior created by the CIA in 1981. Inside Pakistan, most of the warrior outfits once funded by the CIA have turned anti-American.” The commentator has added that though bin Laden was behind the Somali warlord who killed 24 Pakistani soldiers in Somalia, “most Pakistanis sympathise with him.” This is surely underscored by the huge demonstrations right-wing Islamic organisations across Pakistan are staging in support of bin Laden as well as the Taliban.

This country must realise that Pakistan’s brazen and persistent cross-border support to terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir and the Taliban gameplan for Central Asia and China’s Xingjiang region are the two sides of the same coin. The stark reality also needs to be hammered home to the international community.

A golden puzzle
by Arvind Bhandari

IF the aphorism were to be reversed, it would read “gold is old”. This epitomises the situation in regard to the shiny metal, which is fast losing its lustre. The price of gold has touched an all-time low.

India, however, remains a golden puzzle. Whereas the world is moving away from gold, Indians still hanker after the yellow metal. The demand for gold in India has increased from 507.76 tonnes in 1996 to 736.74 tonnes in 1997 to 815 tonnes in 1998.

Indian women remain so dazzled by the glitter of gold that for their husbands it is mostly a no-win situation. Weeping on my shoulder the other day, a friend said: “My wife is crazy about gold. When the price shot up to $ 500 an ounce, she insisted on buying gold on the ground that the boom clearly showed it was a profitable investment. I made the mistake of recently informing her with a smirk that the world price of gold was now down to around $ 250 per ounce. She immediately insisted on buying more gold on the ground that it had now become a fabulous bargain.”

The craze for gold remains undiminished despite its having become a lousy investment. Ever since it reached a peak price of $ 850 per ounce in 1980, gold has been sliding down with only occasional upsurges. This slide has been somewhat cloaked in India because of the depreciation of the rupee against the dollar.

But in rupee terms also gold is just Rs 3,800 per 10 grams today against Rs 5,000 two years ago. And after adjustment for inflation, which means in real terms, the value of gold has slid by two-thirds over a decade. A safe investment in fixed deposits with reliable public sector companies at 15 per cent compound interest would have quadrupled your money in that period. Since bank deposits carry a slightly lower interest rate, they would have at least tripled over the same period.

From the standpoint of the economy as a whole also too much recourse to gold as a means of savings and investment is deleterious. Wealth held as gold is an idle hoard. The only economic function performed by gold is that it serves as raw material for the manufacture of jewellery which is exported, apart from lending itself to some limited use for industrial purposes. On the other hand, wealth held in the form of bank deposits, company deposits, shares, provident fund and other bona fide savings stimulates and expands economic activity.

The government has been liberalising the import of gold with a view to stabilising its price and reducing the premium on the international price. Two years ago the limit for non-resident Indians to carry gold into India was doubled from five to 10 kilograms. Then the government announced a list of banks and financial institutions which were allowed to import gold for sale in the Indian market. This brought the premium on the international price of gold down from above 15 per cent to about 10 per cent.

But liberalising the policy on gold only seems to feed the craze for it. Curbing the craze for gold requires an educational drive covering panchayats, communities, educational institutions and perhaps most important, women’s organisations. Age-old ideas and ignorance need to be eradicated. Our maid keeps depositing her little savings with my mother in the hope of buying a nugget of gold one day. My efforts to explain to her the advantages of putting her money in the bank have failed. Unfortunately, she is a representative of millions of Indians.

The other prong of an anti-gold drive, aimed mainly at the middle and rich classes, could, according to analysts, be the imposition of a tax on the possession of gold above a certain quantity. Those who want to hoard gold beyond a legitimate need to decorate themselves because of its ornamental value should be subjected to an impost. Further, the Union Budget, 1999-2000, decided to introduce a gold bonds scheme. It is reported that five banks will start implementing the scheme from this August-September. The likelihood, however, is that this innovative scheme will have to await the formation of a new government.

Through most of history till the last country lack of rule of law, catastrophes like drought and war, rampant banditry and rapacious tax collections made life and property unsafe. Gold was, therefore, preferred because it was portable, could be easily hidden and sold and was imperishable. Thus the yellow metal with this unique combination of qualities became a universal form of saving and insurance, with the result that even central banks started hoarding it in their vaults as a reserve.

The continuous decline in the price of gold is attributable to an increase in its supply. The International Monetary Fund and central banks have been shedding their gold reserves. The IMF has again announced that it will sell 10 million ounces of gold from its reserves of 104 million ounces. The Bank of England recently sold 25 tonnes of gold as the first step in cutting its reserves to 300 tonnes from 715 tonnes. The Bank of Switzerland has similar plans. Last year central banks of the Netherland, Australia and Argentina sold some of their gold reserves. Another factor augmenting the supply of gold is the discovery of new mines in Australia, China and Surinam.

The price of gold is expected to fall further in the coming months.

Power Dressing
by Avay Shukla

THE IAS is a troubled service these days. It sees itself as playing second fiddle to the IPS notwithstanding the two extra papers its members had to take in the UPSC exams. Its morale today is lower than that of the Navy post-Bhagwat, or the Indian cricket team pre-Sharjah, or the BJP pre and post-Jayalalitha. The problem is not spondylitis, or the haemorroids, or the gradual loss of vertebrae — these are common occupational hazards which the members of this twice-born service have learnt to take in their stride.

The problem, in fact, is sartorial: envy of the IPS uniform, its yards of gleaming leather and heavy clusters of medals. Whereas the older generation of the IAS with its different Weltanschaunng, did not give this upholstery a second thought, the younger bucks of today are a perturbed lot. As they see it, the public associates this exterior decoration with power and glamour, and in this department the IAS is as good as naked. Now, the IAS has never had a uniform, though the loin cloth was suggested immediately after independence but discarded since it could not accommodate the Mont Blanc fountain pen or the crested visiting cards, without which an IAS officer may as well be dead or, even worse, be mistaken for an ordinary citizen! For some time it appeared that the safari suit may be declared the official uniform of the service: not only did it have many convenient pockets (the suitcase came into fashion much later), it also modulated the expansive nether regions rather well. Unfortunately these properties were exactly what the widely travelled and well-fed SPG was also looking for, and they quickly appropriated this jewel of bureaucratic haute-couture, once again leaving the Emperor without any clothes, or uniform, as it were.

The IPS medals are another sore point. Over the years the policemen have devised a diabolic system whereby its members automatically get medals the older and more inefficient they become, having deemed to have earned them in the fullness of time. This irks the long suffering IAS which feels that with the advent of “secular” forces of the Bihar variety its members are at greater bodily risk than the IPS — they are regularly thrashed in trains, slapped in offices, and spat upon everywhere else. They also have to face the fury of violent mobs (known as the “down-trodden” these days) all alone as the IPS bloke usually retreats to the safety of the police station to “summon reinforcements”. And yet they get no medals!

To rectify this obvious injustice to the “iron-frame” before the rust sets in too deep, it is suggested that the following decorations could be awarded to deserving IAS officers:

Distinguished Service Medal: after 10 years, for faithful and exemplary service rendered to Ministers (present, ex and potential). Since competition for this award would naturally be very keen, only Cabinet Ministers can make nominations. More than one such award to an officer would automatically lead to reemployment after superannuation, or a ticket to contest the next elections.

Gallantry medal: can be awarded at any time to an IAS officer who has the courage to disagree with his Minister at least twice in one month. Along with the award he shall also be provided police protection. The medal can also be awarded posthumously.

The Purple Welt Ribbon: for officers assaulted/wounded by the leaders of secular and democratic political parties or the forces of social justice. Mere verbal abuse or threats shall not qualify for the award since this is now acceptable conduct even in Parliament.

V.C. (Vigilance Cross): to be awarded to officers against whom vigilance cases are registered by their IPS brethren, in acknowledgement of the sheer injustice of it all. A physical manifestation of their martyrdom.

After all style maketh the man and it maketh the IAS very happy.

Woman cop shines in male bastion

by Reeta Sharma

IMPRESSIVELY dressed in police uniform this slim-trim woman unmistakably displays firmness, desire to succeed and achieve goals. It was in April, 1990, that she was recruited as an ASI in Chandigarh police and today she is SI (Sub Inspector) posted at the Sector 39 police station.

Born and brought up at Gujranwala village in Ludhiana district, it was her childhood dream to work in the police force. They say if you don’t have dreams, it’s as good as existing in a vacuum. And in her case she still has many more dreams to achieve.

Jaswinder Kaur, eldest daughter of a humble home, has also made sure that her three younger brothers get educated and follow their own dreams. All three are staying with her in Chandigarh with she being the guiding force.

After joining as an ASI, she went through a very demanding and gruelling one-year training at Police academy, Phillaur. “We were trained into police-working, basic knowledge of law and physical upkeep”. Finally, when she joined her job, she was yearning to learn every bit of policing. Her seniors presumed primarily because of a mindset that a woman police could not be put on duty of a R.O. (Reserve Officer is required to do 24-hour duty at a stretch once a week). Jaswinder asserted that she be put on R.O. duty so that she would have more demanding schedule to learn every aspect. Sure enough her seniors didn’t find her lacking in any manner. Jaswinder had to prove her credentials as a woman cop (ASI) when a sudden and striking challenge (usual for policemen) came her way. She not only succeeded but also displayed outstanding presence of mind, grit and handled it with bravery. Chandigarh Administration rewarded her with a “Certificate of Commendation”. Besides Class I certificate was also given to her by the Inspector General of Chandigarh Police.

In conversation with her:

Q: What was that challenging situation that you faced as a woman ASI?

A: It was the night of July 3-4, 1995, and I was on duty at police station of Sector 31. A clash erupted between the residents of Labour Colony Number 5 and Air Force jawans over the accusation that the jawans had tried to molest a young girl, Meena, of the colony. By the time I reached the spot with my two constables, heavy stone pelting was on, jawans had put a moped on fire, labourers from jhuggies had also retaliated by burning tins of kerosene. Many injured were screaming and jawans were continuing with the ransacking of jhuggies.

Although we are not allowed to fire without the orders of the SDM, but something told me that there was no time to wait. The situation was already grim. Instinctively I took the decision. I asked the people to disperse or else we will be forced to fire. But they continued attacking each other. Finally me and my two constables began firing in the air. This helped us to control the mob but not without me receiving a taste of mob mentality. Somebody from the receding mob threw a stone at me which hit on my front teeth, badly injuring me (she reveals laughingly).

Q: Did the administration ask for your explanation for ordering firing?

A: Naturally it had to follow the procedure. So the then SDM Mr Inderjit Singh Sandhu came for, on-the-spot inquiry. After he reviewed the situation he declared that it was a correct decision to have fired in the air.

Q: What is your experience as a police woman with your male colleagues?

A: There are very few women in the Chandigarh police. Hardly about hundred plus. So initially men were a bit hesitant and aloof. But soon they accepted us as their colleagues. In fact we learnt everything from them only. They were quite cooperative and considerate. In nine years of my job with the ‘Chandigarh Police’, I have not faced any problem as a woman. Although our Indian society for centuries has been a male dominated one. But I think with the passage of time our men are beginning to accept women amongst themselves as professionals. There is so much visibility of women in various fields, which I think leaves a psychological effect.

Q: As a woman police person, what kind of man would you like to marry?

A: A policeman. In my kind of job which has no regular working hours, only a policeman will be able to coop with. Besides he will also understand the inevitable in-built complexities of this job. Whether you are a man or a woman, policing is primarily a very demanding work.

Q: Do your male colleagues treat you as equals?

A: As I said that initially they were a little apprehensive. For instance they did not put me on R.O. duty. But when I insisted that I would like to do this R.O. job so as to gain experience, they promptly put me on to it without any questions or hesitations, giving me a fair chance.

Q: So how was your experience of this 24-hour duty?

A: (She laughs) The very first time I had to face a hanging body. A man had committed suicide because he could not repay various loans. I had to bring his body down, and examine it physically to write my report. This experience removed any inhibitions of a woman. (She pauses and laughs again). You might find it funny, but it’s true. For a couple of consecutive R.O. duties that I was put on, somehow every time there was a body to be handled. Although it was a sheer coincidence, but it became a joke with my seniors. They began saying. “Jaswinder we won’t put you on R.O. duty because people have decided to die on the very day when you are on this duty.”

Q: How does the public react to police women on duty?

A: I think people have greater faith in women. May be its because Indian woman has an image of being more kind-hearted, considerate and understanding. In fact people openly request many times that their case may be assigned to a woman cop.

Q: Why does our Indian police suffer from the image of brutality, unfriendly and ridden with corruption?

A: I think the Indian police force has been used by our system as a ‘danda’. For every job miracles are expected from the police. If a murder or a robbery has taken place, the system expects immediate and positive results. One, this kind of pressure pushes the police. On the other hand our police has not been modernised sufficiently to handle criminals. Over the years the force has suffered, but has the system taken any steps to improve its image? It can’t improve on its own or by sermonising.

Q: Don’t you think our police indulges in brutality?

A: Trends are changing. With the awareness about human rights, both police as well as accused have begun acting differently. But I must say that this awareness and related laws are also being fully (misused) by the real criminals and thieves. I think now the system has to find and evolve a new methodology to pin them down.

75 YEARS AGO

Cost of living in India
By Moulvi Wahed Hassain, M.L.C.

THE question of ascertaining the cost of decent living in India has been exercising the minds of the thinking sections of the public. Opinions vary a good deal, as the standard of decent living is not the same with all classes of people. But it is agreed that unlike the countries of Europe and the United States of America, there is hardly any definite standard of living in India.

One should have regard for the glaringly disproportionate scale of pay under the Indian State Departments. The intelligent sections of the public should direct their attention to the problem of arriving at an approximate standard of decent living on a sound economic and equitable basis. The object of the Lee Commission has a different influence as it is concerned with racial distinction and class considerations.