P A G E
Wednesday, February 10, 1999
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E D I T O R I A L P A G E |
Wednesday, February 10, 1999 |
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Indefensible
Ministry
PRESIDENT'S
FUNCTIONS |
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USA
‘reliant on’ Indian software men
Not
years but moments
Slaughter
of milch cattle |
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Indefensible Ministry AIR Marshal P.K.Ghosh has succeeded where Admiral Vishnu Bhagwat failed; he has survived the intrigues of the babus in the Ministry of Defence and secured his promotion. In the process he has thoroughly exposed the hatchet job some bureaucrats love to indulge in. He has to fight a year-long legal battle in the Delhi High Court and convince the Judges that the former secretary, Mr Ajit Kumar, and his assistants had repeatedly misled the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) and the Prime Minister. A Division Bench was so upset that it threatened to initiate contempt of court proceedings against him and fixed February 12 as the next date of hearing. So the babus got busy during the weekend and persuaded the good Air Force officer to come to an out-of-court settlement. It is obvious that in return for promotion, he would withdraw his petition and thus save Mr Ajit Kumar and two others. Whether the court allows the withdrawal of the petition, which has anyway become infructuous in view of the promotion, or insists on an apology remains to be seen. A second concession the ministry has to offer is to transfer the director rank officer, who prepared the brief for the ACC, to another desk in the same wing. No punishment this, but a public admission of hanky panky. Both the nature of the earlier mischief and the present settlement prove the stranglehold the IAS officers have in running the ministry. As the Air Marshal told the court, the ministry denied that there was any vacancy though he was the seniormost and fully qualified officer to fill it. Vital information about his service record was held back from the ACC which led to the rejection of his claim. This was against the express directive of the High Court. It was while hearing this case that the Bench expressed its anguish at senior officers of the armed forces resorting to litigation, which was an unhealthy precedent and there are more than 1,000 cases pending before various courts in the country. In passing, the court advised the ministry to settle the case by mutual consent instead of prolonging it and further damaging the command structure. The babus have now clung on to this narrow escape route to get themselves out of the mess. The promotion and transfer
of the director-level officer should not be the end of
the matter. The Defence Minister, who spent considerable
time and energy in demonising Admiral Vishnu Bhagwat for
defying the civilian authority, should apply the same
yardstick to judge how and why the ministry officials,
including Mr Ajit Kumar, defied the same civilian
authority and tried to ruin the career of an Air Force
officer. Repeatedly misleading the ACC and the Prime
Minister is no less an offence than insisting that a
promotion order is “unimplementable”, as
Admiral Bhagwat did. Now Air Marshal Ghosh has been
promoted to a “super numerary post”, meaning
that there is no vacancy and he is being accommodated in
a slot created specially for him. When a regular vacancy
arises the new post will be abolished. This is
unprecedented and the sole motive is to help the three
respondents, including Mr Ajit Kumar, escape the
court’s wrath. It is all very extraordinary, and
even if the Defence Minister is unwilling to discuss the
case in public, he should conduct a detailed enquiry and
find out for himself how the bureaucrats play favourites.
It is not a question of one officer, it is about
restoring the confidence of the armed forces in the
fairplay of the civilian authority. |
BJP’s Rushdie card WHY has the Government of India given permission to Salman Rushdie to visit the country? The Mumbai-born Booker Prize winner was given a visa last week by the Indian High Commission in London, 10 years after his controversial novel “The Satanic Verses” was banned in the country following protests from Muslim organisations. The unhappy relations of the Bharatiya Janata Party with the minorities is not a secret. A party which wants to spread its political base across the country cannot afford to isolate the minorities. Against this backdrop the seemingly inexplicable rise in the incidents of Christian-bashing across the country by members of the Sangh Parivar do not make much political sense. These incidents have only resulted in the Muslims and the Christians coming closer. Now it has annoyed the Muslims. There has to be a method in the madness unless the BJP has decided to commit political suicide. Perhaps, there is. There should be no doubt whatsoever that the historical differences between the children of Abraham, the Muslims and Christians, cannot be forgotten overnight. In fact the fundamentalist Muslim groups in the country, which draw inspiration from the Taliban, cannot complain about the proxy “jehad” being conducted against Christians in India on their behalf by members of the Sangh Parivar. As far as the BJP is concerned it would rather have 15 crore Muslims on its side at the expense of the doubtful support of members of the Christian community. All that the BJP needs to do is to make the right noises to subvert the gameplan of the Congress which is showing signs of winning back the trust of the Muslims. Who gave clearance for the
cricket Test series between India and Pakistan? The
BJP-led coalition. Who launched a campaign against the
series being held in India? Hindu fundamentalists
represented by the Shiv Sena. By inference, the Indian
Muslims welcomed the resumption of sporting ties between
the two countries. Even if one per cent Muslims were to
give credit to the BJP for the successful conclusion of
the cricket Test series it would be a major gain for the
party perceived to be “anti-minority”. Granting
of visa to Rushdie for visiting India appears to be the
third part of the BJP’s hidden agenda for gaining
the confidence of the Muslims. The reaction of some
Muslim groups to the proposed visit to India by Rushdie
was on expected line. The Government has been warned that
his visit may unleash a fresh wave of unrest in the
country. The BJP may allow Muslim anger against the visit
to turn into rage. And then as “a goodwill
gesture” cancel Rushdie’s visa. The Muslim face
of the BJP, Union Minister of State for Information and
Broadcasting, Mr Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, has already been
put on the job for gauging the Muslim mood on the issue
of Rushdie’s visit. He told reporters in Rampur that
“if required the government would re-think on the
issue”. In the same breath he added that “Mr
Rushdie is visiting India as everyone has a right to
visit any country” but “he was not being
welcomed by the government and was not visiting the
country as a state guest”. He agreed that what
Rushdie wrote in the controversial book has hurt the
religious sentiments of the Muslims. But the issue has
not yet reached a flashpoint for the BJP to intervene.
When that happens who would take the credit for
respecting the sentiments of the Muslims? The answer is
obvious. |
Teaching the teachers MANY tears have been shed over the falling standard of education in various institutions but these have not been enough to make the authorities take remedial measures. But when officials who have themselves been instrumental in framing the curriculum and overseeing the entire process of imparting education allege that the whole edifice is collapsing, things cannot be allowed to degenerate any further. Recent Press reports have brought out these details in stark relief. A former Dean (Research) of the National Council for Educational Research and Training (NCERT) has been quoted as having admitted that “no evaluation of teacher training courses and how best the curriculum relates to the quality of effective teaching in schools has been done in the last 130 years of the formalised teacher education system in India”. In a way, this revelation sums up all that is wrong with the system. How can someone who is himself or herself not fully trained to teach enlighten his wards? It would be like raising a high-rise building without a foundation. And letting things drift for as long as 130 years tells its own story. The only conclusion one can draw is that nobody is really bothered about the fate of the students. The results are disastrous, to say the least. The value of a degree has been diminishing year after year. There was a time when being a BA was considered to be such an honour that those who had passed the examination used to append the “title” to their names (remember people like Kaviraj Harnam Das, BA?) Today, even an MA will become a laughing stock if he did the same thing. Teaching is not only about
having knowledge about some subject. It also involves the
skill of imparting this knowledge to others in such a way
that they can learn it with the minimum of difficulty in
the minimum of time. Unfortunately, another expert has
revealed that of about one lakh people who take to
teaching every year, few are adequately trained to face
the classrooms. There are hardly any in-service training
programmes. According to the data provided by the Human
Resource Development Ministry, as many as 60 per cent of
the teachers do not get in-service training at all. Nor
is their evaluation done in a proper manner. There are
around 2,600 universities offering B.Ed courses to more
than 80,000 students every year. What is regrettable is
that quite a few of them have become so commercialised
that they offer these courses on a theoretical basis.
Since the curriculum is not taken seriously, many of the
B.Ed students derisively call these “correspondence
courses”. The problem is that every substandard
teacher who goes to a classroom leads to improper
education of more than 50 students every year. When this
goes on year after year for decades, the debilitating
effect can well be imagined. Since many of the boys and
girls who pass out after being trained by such teachers
manage to get government jobs on the basis of their
degrees, the vicious circle spins faster and faster. It
is true that several universities which were awarding
more than 30,000 B.Ed degrees every year have been
derecognised. But even that drastic measure has not been
able to stem the rot. Lack of quality education is a
luxury which the country can ill afford. |
PRESIDENT'S FUNCTIONS RECENTLY there was a suggestion in the Press that President K.R. Narayanan has been trying to model himself on the lines of Dr Rajendra Prasad, the first President of India. If the impression being sought to be conveyed is that the present President is as alert about his duties as the Head of State as was Dr Prasad, it must be considered a healthy development. However, all we know from the President himself is that he considers himself to be a “Working President” who has, by and large, functioned impeccably, drawing the admiration of the nation, except for the controversy over his notings in the files on appointments to the Supreme Court. I have already written on this controversial issue and have no desire to pursue it further. If I have chosen to write on the office of the President again, it is because the suggestion that Mr Narayanan has been treating Dr Prasad as a role model made me refresh my memory about the working methods of the first President. It has been fully recorded by Mr Valmiki Choudhary, who has edited the Dr Prasad papers, which runs into 22 volumes or so. One volume is devoted exclusively to the President and the Indian Constitution. There is an illuminating chapter in it on the judiciary. Mr Valmiki has shown that the President did take active interest, in a healthy sort of way, in the appointments to the High Courts, with the willing cooperation of Prime Minister Nehru and Deputy Prime Minister Sardar Patel. There is the instance of a judge, Mr Nawalkishore, who had the grievance that he was not being confirmed as the Chief Justice of the Rajasthan High Court. He saw Dr Prasad and spoke about the injustice being done to him. The President made inquiries and found that the Rajasthan government had not suggested the name of Mr Justice Nawalkishore, though the Home Ministry was actively considering the appointment of a Chief Justice for Rajasthan. The Secretary to the President informed the state (Home Affairs) ministry of Dr Prasad’s views. The official records showed that the Home Secretary, Mr H.V.R. Iyengar, had proposed the appointment of Mr K.N. Wanchoo as the Chief Justice of the Rajasthan High Court. He claimed that the proposal had the support of the Home Minister and the Chief Justice of India. Both the Prime Minister and the President approved of it, and a warrant of appointment was being prepared. However, a new development took place. Nehru wrote to the President that he was greatly disturbed at the casual manner in which this appointment was being brought about. The files indicated that it was the Private Secretary to Sardar Patel, Mr V. Shankar, who had sounded the Chief Justice of Allahabad and the officers of the Home Ministry and then set the ball rolling. The Prime Minister objected to Mr V. Shankar and Mr N.M. Buch recording their personal views about various High Court judges. He felt that for a Private Secretary to deal directly with the Chief Justice of India showed a lack of decorum and the courtesy the holder of that high office deserved. It also came to Nehru’s notice that the Allahabad Chief Justice had objected to the appointment and when asked in writing for his opinion, he said that he had nothing to add to his original note of disapproval. Mr V.P. Menon saw the Chief Justice, who ultimately agreed to the appointment, provided it was provisional. But this could not be implemented because there was no provision in the Constitution for a provisional Chief Justice. The President had a talk with Sardar Patel, who was not amused by the Prime Minister putting his views in writing without prior consultation with him. He said it was at his instance that his officers had conducted the exploratory talks because experience had shown that an informal approach was more effective than formal correspondence. Sardar Patel concluded his letter to the Prime Minister by observing: “Receiving from you and writing in reply long letters is a new experience to me. Frankly speaking, I do not relish it.” Mr Justice Wanchoo was finally made the Chief Justice, keeping in view the special requirements of the Rajasthan High Court, but the President’s note on Mr Justice Nawalkishore at least ensured him the salary of a Chief Justice. The case of Mr Justice Nawalkishore is interesting because it shows that the first President did make suggestions on the appointment of judges, that the Prime Minister not only meticulously read the files but was also insistent that in the appointment of judges bureaucrats should have no role to play. It further shows the kind of rapport that existed among the President, the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister, despite the known differences between Dr Rajendra Prasad and Nehru and between Nehru and Patel. To each, principles mattered and each not only held the higher judiciary in the highest esteem but was also keen that nothing should be done to lower the standards. Mr Choudhary has traced the evolution of the method of appointment of judges and mentioned some other cases too, but it is his summing up that is really interesting. He says that it was fortunate that Dr Prasad not only played his role in the writing of the Constitution but in its implementation as well. It was also fortunate that Prime Minister Nehru and his Cabinet colleagues were equally imbued with the desire to promote people’s welfare and fully cooperated with the President in laying down healthy precedents. This is the crux of the matter. It has to be borne in mind the kind of problems Mr K.R. Narayanan is faced with. As I have mentioned earlier, the President is out of sync with his Council of Ministers. This is the feedback from Rashtrapati Bhavan sources. If proof was needed, two recent instances are the leaking out of the President’s notings on the files of Supreme Court appointments and the open suggestion from Home Ministry sources that the President had gone back on his earlier indication to the political executive about the fate of the recommendation for President’s rule in Bihar. The unfortunate fact is that, over the years, the President and his Council of Ministers have become cool towards each other and stiff formality, even non-consultation, has replaced informal discussion. Mr Valmiki Choudhary’s book shows that Nehru not only consulted Dr Prasad in advance about the appointment of Ministers and Governors but the President exercised his right to summon the Defence Minister, even the three Defence Chiefs, in order to keep himself fully informed about the nation’s defence preparedness. There was the classic instance of Dr Prasad interviewing, on the Prime Minister’s suggestion, Mr Sukmar Sen before he was appointed the Chief Election Commissioner. In comparison, the President is a lonely person today. To be fully informed about what has been going on in the government must be proving difficult for him. That is why it is all the more important for him to do nothing that would give those opposed to him an opportunity to show him in poor light. The task before Mr
Narayanan is how to do what the Constitution expects him
to do, that is to defend, uphold and protect the
Constitution but without giving the impression of being a
rival centre of power. |
Blair’s three-way election test SOON Prime Minister Tony Blair’s Labour government will be tested at the polls in a way that is unusual for a British administration so recently brought to power. It faces not only the normal local elections on May 6— almost exactly two years since it took office — but also on the same day elections for the new Scottish Parliament and for the new Welsh Assembly. The results could produce some surprises for a party that astonished even itself by coming to power on May 1, 1997, with a majority bigger than it had dreamt possible. The local elections, which take place in the regions and cities each year, produce a limited picture of a government’s popularity because of traditionally low voter turnout. The Scottish and Welsh elections will be quite different. Turnout could be high. For people in mainland Britain it will be a totally new experience to vote for a regional parliament. The election will produce in effect a mid-term verdict on what was so cleverly packaged and sold to the people as a slightly left-of-centre concoction called New Labour. The next general election must be by mid-2002, but when governments feel confident they usually go for a new mandate in their fourth year. Ideally Mr Blair will want to go to the polls in 2001. As of now, nothing looks like stopping him romping home again. The Conservative Party under Mr William Hague continues to cut a sorry figure indeed. The latest public opinion polls show Labour even further ahead than ever, with a rating of 56 per cent against 24 per cent for the Conservatives. But Mr Blair will be wary after his recent experiences. Few apter phrases have been uttered by British politicians than that coined 30 years ago by an earlier Labour Prime Minister, Harold Wilson. It was the simplest of thoughts and it has become a political cliche: “A week is a long time in politics.” For Mr Blair, bouncy and self-confident, the words have proved as uncomfortable as they always were. Sudden events can change a political scene overnight, as they did just before Christmas. A government that seemed accident-resistant and still looks to be set for a decade or more of power was suddenly made to realise that it could not walk on water. It had a series of nasty shocks — ministerial resignations, including Peter Mandelson, President of the Board of Trade, forced by indiscretions and personal misdemeanors, suggestions that one or two ministers have been living it up by flying Concorde or dining at five-star hotels, and quarrelling between ministers that has bubbled to the surface. None of this has been as serious as incidents that brought the preceding Tory government into such deep disrepute. A reminder of those bad days came in January when former Cabinet minister Jonathan Aitken confessed in court to perjury. He has been left to stew for several weeks pending the judge’s decision on how long he must serve in jail. A mystery remains as to how Mr John Major came to put Mr Aitken into the government in 1994 — as First Lord of the Treasury, no less — when it had been well known for several years that he was a dubious character. The Aitken case, which was about sleaze, was a timely reminder of a murky past and the Blair government has entered 1999 slightly shaken. The squeaky clean image that had looked so attractive in days when Conservative MPs admitted accepting payment from lobbyists to ask questions in the House of Commonwealth has been tarnished. Public cynicism about MPs has returned. The comment that politicians are “all the same” has returned. The opinion poll that shows Labour riding so high also shows that 52 per cent now believes that the government has not upheld high standards of public life. The good news for Britain is that people are now much more on their guard against sleaze, and governments will in future have to watch their step. Mr Blair is plainly aware and nervous of developing this type of Achilles heel. The problem facing politicians in an increasingly materialistic global climate is that they feel the need to keep up with each other. Thus when Mr Jack Cunningham was accused as Agriculture Minister of staying in an expensive hotel in Brussels officials pointed out that if British ministers stayed down the road in a modest place while all their other European opposite numbers were in a more prestigious one Britain would be seen a third-class country. This excuse is repeated round the world. Presidents, Prime Ministers and ministers feel they must travel grandly to uphold their country’s international position. Each is tempted to outdo the other. Labour may have lost some credibility in the last few weeks on this sleaze issue and lost some votes. In the local elections it will be defending thousands of seats held at a time Labour was at its zenith of popularity and it is certain to lose some. In Scotland it may be in for a shock. The Scottish National Party, which wants full independence, could win so many seats Labour may have to go into a coalition in the country’s first government for almost 300 years. When the going gets rough
the Conservative party turns ruthless. The next big
political development in Britain could be the replacement
of Mr Hague as party leader. This will reopen deep party
divisions over whether Britain should join the European
Monetary Union, launched so successfully on January 1.
And this could even tear the Conservative party
permanently into two — Gemini. |
Not
years but moments THE biblical age is no more relevant as the life-expectancy has increased considerably in recent years. Now the persons in their seventies and eighties are quite active not only physically but intellectually also. They want to play their role in life unhampered. For them life is a continuous affair and there are no breaks or disruptions. They consider their life a boon and are eager to cover miles and miles before they go to sleep. The other aspect of the human life is of the persons who are terminally ill. They find themselves stretched “upon the rack of this tough world”. They long for a word of sympathy or a gesture of compassion. What happens when there is no light at the end of the tunnel? The life must go on like the show. The image is that of a bubble sinking on the surface of still waters. What more can be expected where there is nothing more to expect? At long last the calm ensues the turbulent existence. But where is the calm for yet another category of persons — otherwise alive and kicking. For them the misery starts when they stop moving along with the time. Imperceptibly the time moves ahead leaving them behind, fossilised like milestones. Yet the problem is not always that of time but of space also. Space is even more metaphoric than the concept of time so far as the enactment of human drama is concerned. One needs space to exist in this world. Likewise, the mind craves for space so as to function untrammelled. The inner spaces in fact delineate the personality of a person. The more clustered the mind is the more narrow the view of life is bound to be. The moments that one remembers in the course of life are like spaces in the continuous flow of time. These spaces are the sum-total of one’s itinerary on this planet. During these spells one is face to face with the reality of life. Reality of course is an ambiguous term but it reveals its true nature when one comes out of the narrow confines of one’s preconceived nations. Still to look back at the decades of existence and calculate the moments which had been worthwhile, one way or the other, is an arduous task. But the effort can yield a good crop of images to serve as glow-worms in utter darkness. Glory be it to those who can visualise — a child whom one has tickled into laughter or a young person whose imagination one has stimulated for conceiving new ideas or a girl whose confidence in one has been well-reposed or the woman in love who has cleansed one’s mind of the lingering lust or the old man whose eyes light up on observing one’s act of veneration for him or a stranger who has discerned in one’s eyes the lost glow of friendliness or the chirpy bird that has settled fearlessly on one’s window — sill or the setting sun whose fading glow reminds one of its birth the next morning. Indeed the basic existential problems are there all the time in a man’s life. It is the evanescence of life that disturbs human psyche quite often. The individual sense of loneliness as well as aloneness is the main cause of the sense of anguish in human beings. The impossibility of establishing genuine communication and contact with others has resulted in the paradox of the self that can never know itself. In fact there has occurred the dreaded psychic split in the personality of the man of today. The vacant spaces not only in the flow of time but also in the human mind need be occupied with ever-lasting images — good, beautiful and true. In the words of the budding poet Sreedevi Nair — You love me? how do I know Should I be thrilled by Songs never sung Portraits never painted Honey never served? |
USA ‘reliant on’
Indian software men THE eighth round of Indo-US talks, with a focus on nuclear reconciliation, has left the impression that despite cajoling, pressures and sanctions, the USA cannot do much to prevent India from carrying out its new missile tests. India’s nuclear weapons programme, according to the perception of some American policymakers, has a bigger punch than anything coming out of Iraq. Yet, the USA has not moved in any forceful way to stop it. Obviously, India has something the USA cannot do without. India does not have an overwhelming trade surplus like China. Nor does it have a steady and faster policy on economic reforms. What is it, then, that stops the USA from going any further to bring India around? San Francisco-based Pacific News Service commentator Andrew Robinson, a freelance writer, who worked as a consultant on Internet-related issues in Bangladesh and India for three years, says that it is true President Clinton recently vowed to “restrain” India and Pakistan. But the fact is, the administration refuses to take serious action because, without India, the information technology industry — the largest sector of the US economy — could be in the soup. One-fourth of the world’s programmers are Indians, and, according to a recent issue of the Migration News Bulletin from the University of California at Davis, one-third of wages paid in entire IT industry goes to Indian infotech technicians working in the USA. It is, however, an irony that the Indian Government has not taken any advantage of this favourable factor during the talks. As the USA continues its war-cry over Iraq’s ability to develop weapons of mass destruction, India is allegedly preparing to test a missile that can — if mounted by a nuclear warhead — obliterate just about any city in Pakistan in less than two minutes. The Prithvi SS-350, with a range of 217 miles, is scheduled to be tested soon. Coupled with India’s newly developed nuclear warheads, the Prithvi missile system would seem to represent a weapon far more lethal than anything Iraq could produce, says the Pentagon. Following India’s nuclear tests, the Clinton administration imposed economic sanctions eight months ago to make clear its categorical opposition to the tests. But, not long after, President Clinton decided to support an increase in the quota for Indians who wanted to immigrate in response to pressure from high-technology companies and to a US Department of Commerce report, which estimated a shortage of over one million programmers, particularly in the light of a danger from Y2K menace that could cause unprecedented disaster. Within two months of the imposition of sanctions against India, Congress passed a Bill increasing the quota of H-1 work visas from 65,000 to 90,000 this year, and to 115,000 by 2002. Why so sudden a jump? In 1996, India exported $ 1.1 billion worth of software and the Indian companies seek to raise it to $ 3.6 billion by 2000. India’s infotech industry and the government knows that US demand for Indian programming has become a financial jackpot for the Indian economy. Compared to such figures, Mr Clinton’s withholding of $ 140 million in aid, refusal to export military equipment to India, and opposition to World Bank loans totalling $ 1.5 billion were hardly a rap on the knuckles. Just about everyone in India knew opposition to World Bank funding and a reduction of US influence were exactly what the BJP hardliners had been lobbying for in India. So the nuclear tests gave the BJP-led government a remarkable advantage, according to this perception. On top of this, the increased immigration quota was an unexpected godsend. The value of the US dollar compared to the Indian rupee is so high, that a garland of $ 20 notes draped around one’s neck — a popular photographic pose for Indian taxi drivers in New York city to send to proud parents back home — would be enough to support many Indians for the rest of their lives. “Just about every Indian working here sees the hypocrisy,” says Srinivas Thummuluri, an Indian student studying for a computer science doctorate in the USA, “when America condemns India’s nuclear tests, but less Indians come into this country and make dollars to send back home.” Mr Dean R. O’Hare, Chairman of the US-India Business Council, reportedly said during a recent tour of South India that US investors now see “India emerging as a global economic power in the leading growth sectors of the 21st century”. Clearly, software,
programmes from South Asia has become what oil has always
been in West Asia something Americans cannot live
without. At the same time, observes Bruce Eisenstein,
President-elect of the Institute of Electrical and
Electronic Engineers (IEEE), programming software is
“work that Americans don’t really want to
do”. — IPA |
Of strategic studies and
culture MOTORING from Chandigarh to Patiala for the 13th National Congress for Defence Studies, Globalisation and National Security was not just Lt-Gen B.K.N. Chhibber (retd), the Governor of Punjab, who inaugurated the seminar and delivered an address. Scores of enthusiasts yearning for security-related information hit the dusty and pot-holed road to Patiala for an intellectual feast at Punjabi University. Also attending the seminar were many ladies. As the redoubtable Air Commodore Jasjit Singh, Director of IDSA, pointed out in his keynote address, national security concerns are all about core values and national interests, which encompass issues broader than military or defence. While core values of two nations may conflict or converge, their interests may converge even if their values differ. Much can be derived from this. For example, Indian and Pakistani interests of stability for the larger concern of economic growth at the present juncture may induce both countries to relegate the relative significance of their conflicting attitudes over Kashmir. In viewing the future contours of India’s security being shaped by globalisation in all spheres, one must of necessity enlarge the scope of enquiry to adopt a multi-disciplinary approach. Put differently, the effects of mass communication, economic, sociological and environmental aspects have to be superimposed on political and defence issues. The media for example, with its tremendous capacity to transcend natural and man-made borders and barriers, has a profound effect in shaping the minds of people. Access to satellite-based information allowed by Gorbachev in the mid-1980s contributed to the collapse of the former Soviet Union. In the Indo-Pak context, in the early 1990s the trans-border reach of Zee TV had its own unique impact. Recall how in a survey carried out in Pakistan, some common folk said “Madhuri de de, Kashmir le le”! (Give us Madhuri take away Kashmir). Reading further into the meaning of this apparently cowboyish banter, you will find a deep-seated yearning for more of that culture of song, dance, drama and even interaction that has eluded the people segregated by an artificial and hostile divide. Media’s effect in countering insurgencies has also not been studied in-depth. Most studies are narrowly related in scope and content and do not address issues at the macro level with an inter-disciplinary perspective. You will find that the unstable regions have been in the periphery of India which is also marked by a diminished reach of the media. The link between media and economic growth is too intricate to be ignored, as is the connection between economic neglect and instability arising out of socio-economic depravation. Far from a globalised outlook, we have yet to come to terms with balancing the national contours of the socio-economic issues impinging on national security concerns. Action at the executive level is spurred by public opinion which remains feeble in the absence of centres which promote strategic studies to spread awareness. Public opinion also helps to mould and push government policies which can be sustained in the international comity. Just like the paucity of media centres, we in India cannot boast of many institutes of learning which promote security studies and related research. Since defence is linked closely to political science and international issues, many universities have defence studies winged under the tutelage of the political science department. Others like the Punjabi University have a separate Department of Defence and Strategic Studies (DDSS). Strangely, Panjab University at Chandigarh was at one time contemplating whether to continue with defence studies as an area of enrichment in its political science department. The requirement, on the contrary, is to create more think-tanks and upgrade the existing centres of strategic studies. Rather, a National Strategic University will help to focus on the multi-disciplinary aspects of this vital subject. In Pune the Centre for Advanced Strategic Studies is associated with the DDSS of Pune University. Of the many invigorating seminars which I attended there, three observations merit attention in a lighter vein. As the best brains were got in to present their views, the Vice-Chancellor once remarked that if it was difficult to get to Delhi, he would “bring Delhi to Pune”. Almost 20 per cent participants were females — students and lecturers in defence studies which is taught in all affiliated colleges. And it was a treat to see the members who included retired generals, admirals and air marshals, ex-governors and intellectuals from all walks of life partaking of the simple Maharashtrian vegetarian fare served for lunch, to continue discussions with added vigour. I connect this with what Benazir Bhutto once said: “Vegetarianism promotes intellectualism”. Does this explain the
varying shades of strategic culture in parts of India? |
Slaughter of milch cattle THE Bombay Municipality has passed a resolution calling upon the Municipal Commissioner to take steps to stop the slaughter of cows and buffaloes under the age of eight years at the municipal slaughter houses. A Parsi member, who introduced the debate, supported the proposition on the ground of insufficiency of milch cattle in this country and the consequent limited milk supply. In spite of the Municipal
Commissioner pressing on the House to put the matter
before a committee for consideration, the resolution was
passed by 43 votes against 10. |
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