Yet another massacre
THE massacre of 19 persons in Doda and Poonch districts of Jammu and Kashmir on Monday night means the continuation of Pakistani savagery.

Poll and paddy price
PRE-POLL concessions come in various guises. In these model code of conduct days, they come as routine administrative decisions. But it is all too easy to see through them.

China-Taiwan standoff
THE international community should not lose sleep over the exchange of “unpleasantries” between Beijing and Taipei over the future of Taiwan.

POST-KARGIL DIPLOMACY
Challenges that lie ahead
by Inder Malhotra
AS was only to be expected, after Pakistan’s forced withdrawal from Kargil, pressures have begun to grow for what, for want of a better expression, can only be called a “speedy revival” of the Lahore process for solving all India-Pakistan problems, including Kashmir.

Recovering the cost of Operation Vijay
by Arvind Bhandari
AT the time of writing, speculation is rife whether the Vajpayee government would promulgate a Presidential Ordinance to impose an across-the-board levy on all tax-payers to mobilise additional resources to defray the cost of Operation Vijay.

Photography — her obsession
by Reeta Sharma
THERE is a distinct quietness, poise and marked dignity of low profile of this lady. In a crowd of four or six you may not even notice her but interaction of a few words will leave an impact of a well-meaning person. Never eager to overtly assert herself yet she is firm like a rock without letting politeness slip away.

Being close to the temple
by D.R. Sharma
FIFTEEN years ago we built our modest matchbox house and put up a “To Let” placard on one side of the gate and prayed for a gentleman-tenant. Since we knew quite a few harried houseowners, with tales of delinquent and devious tenants, we were somewhat wary of conmen and glib talkers. We just wanted someone who could help us clear our numerous debts and act as a good host if we ever chose to visit him. Not that all lawmen and physicians are fiends, but we didn’t want to take any risk and preferred a plain, sensitive salarywala who would pay the rent on time and vacate the house when asked for.

75 Years Ago

Sarvabhaum Maheswari Sangathan
THE first meeting of the Sarvabhaum Maheswari Sangathan met at the Marwari Vidyalaya on Monday evening. There was a large attendance of visitors and delegates.

Yet another massacre

THE massacre of 19 persons in Doda and Poonch districts of Jammu and Kashmir on Monday night means the continuation of Pakistani savagery. It can be also interpreted as a consequence of the desperation of the Pakistani politico-military establishment after its ignominious rout in the mountainous region of northern Kashmir. It should not be difficult to see the contours of the Pakistani aggressive plan. This is the fourth bloodshed of its kind in the state during the period of just three weeks. June 30 saw the wanton killing of 17 persons in Poonch. Then followed the murder of 12 labourers in Anantnag and a subsequent carnage of the most abominable kind. Among the latest victims were five members of a Village Defence Committee and four members of the Border Roads Organisation. The brave words of Director-General of Police Gurbachan Jagat notwithstanding, the prevention of such incidents appears to be a very difficult assignment for the state police. The Army has a Himalayan task to complete and it has to match the cunning of the Pakistani forces with standard and ethical battle practices. The eight days of silence in the Mushkoh valley was suddenly broken two days ago by the Pakistani Army which has kept many of its regulars and mercenaries holed up in at least three major pockets of the embattled region. As we have repeatedly observed, there is no cause for celebration because Pakistan does not abide by the line of action mutually agreed upon. The pull-out from Dras-Batalik-Kargil belt is far from being complete. The Line of Control (LoC) remains violated. The aggressive troops who retreated are still close to the LoC and it does not take much time to make their guns spit fire on our positions.

It is necessary to remember that the happenings in the valley are not unrelated to Islamabad’s aggression in the mountains. Proxy war has been upgraded to regular warfare. There has been no misjudgement of the USA by India. The American government supported the successive regimes in Pakistan — including military regimes — to the hilt. India understood its clear slants amounting to tacit support. Now the situation has changed. President Clinton, having seen the manifestations of Pakistan-sponsored terrorism, has tried to come close to realism. The result is his present position on the LoC and the aggression in northern Kashmir. The US President had spoken to Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee on the recent developments earlier this week too. Through a statement made by a National Security Council spokesman, he has got the Doda killings and the attacks on civilians unequivocally condemned. The “perpetrators and those who give assistance to the perpetrators” have been chosen for a reprimand in unusually harsh words by Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who is scheduled to meet External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh in Singapore during an ASEAN meeting next week. Understanding the USA also means appreciating the changing American perceptions. There are two things to be done immediately. The request of Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah for more security men is to be granted post-haste. And the enemy of India in Kashmir is to be bled white wherever his presence is felt. Too much Indian blood and resources have been lost during the past decade. The Dodas and the Anantnags have to be made silencing symbols. The average Kashmiri is fully alert. Nothing failed like failure over the past several years. Nothing should succeed like success from now on.

Poll and paddy price

PRE-POLL concessions come in various guises. In these model code of conduct days, they come as routine administrative decisions. But it is all too easy to see through them. The increase in the kharif procurement price of paddy is one such. It amounts to Rs 50 a quintal for both the common and fine and super-fine varieties, now grouped as grade A. The government has touted this as the highest ever increase in minimum support price. It is true, but barely so. The increase is in terms of a leaner rupee after it has shed some value over the years. In terms of percentage, it comes to 11.36 for the common variety and 10.6 for the grade A. In contrast, the procurement price was increased by a hefty 17 per cent in 1992-93 and a handsome 12 per cent in the previous year. Further, the government claims that it has ignored an important recommendation of the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Price (CACP), which wanted the increase in procurement price to be restricted to Rs 25 for those states where power is supplied free or is highly subsidised as in the case of Punjab, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. The government has, however, opted for uniform increase, citing as reason administrative difficulties in enforcing dual price. This is the second indication that the government is keen to use the procurement price to woo rural voters. There is also something for the urban masses. The issue price, at which rice is sold by fair price shops, has not been increased at all. This has added to the food subsidy for the current year as much as Rs 430 crore. The hope is that the urban poor will take note of this bonanza at the time of voting in September-October.

The government, by its own admission, has not even bothered to inform the Election Commission of this kisan-friendly decision. It claims that this is a normal administrative matter and taken every year in mid-monsoon days. This is true. But 1999 is an extraordinary year, when the country has a government that has lost majority support in the Lok Sabha. It would have been better if the government had informed, even if only formally, the Election Commission, as constitutional propriety would demand. This is not the only case where the government has decided to bypass the Election Commission. On the same day, it transferred 14 senior IAS officers and, in the process, revamped the Finance Ministry. Here too, the Election Commission should have been formally informed. Newspaper reports indicate that the Election Commission has decided to take an extremely lenient view of these Cabinet moves, believing them to be neutral in electoral advantage and administratively necessary. The government expects that a higher procurement price will bring in more paddy to the buffer stock. This may not materialise for the simple reason that the maximum contribution to the FCI stocks comes from Punjab and Haryana where both production and procurement of paddy are price-neutral. And anyway, the Central pool has around 10.5 million tonnes as against the optimum stock of 10 million tonnes for this part of the year.

China-Taiwan standoff

THE international community should not lose sleep over the exchange of “unpleasantries” between Beijing and Taipei over the future of Taiwan. The so-called standoff between China and Taiwan is not likely to change the political script on the ultimate union of the “two Chinas”. Both are committed to the one-China policy and so is the USA which established diplomatic contact with China for indirectly conveying to Taiwan the message that it should not take the controversy beyond the unstated but universally understood limits of political rhetoric. The root of the current round of controversy can be traced to a statement made by Taiwanese President Lee Teng-Hui on the one-China policy. He was quoted as having emphasised the need for an early “State-to-State” dialogue between mainland China and Taipei for evolving a mutually acceptable one-China policy. He told a morning audience at the Presidential Palace that “one China is not now. There is a possibility of one China only after the future democratic unification”. His latest statement also did not give any clue to a climbdown from his controversial policy-shift on July 9 in which he called for “State-to-State” talks between the national government of Taiwan and the Communist regime of mainland China. The little yelp from Taipei was enough to make the dragon go through the motions of spitting fire. Xinhua carried a report claiming that the Chinese President had told President Bill Clinton that Beijing would not rule out the possibility of using force for the reunification of the two Chinas if Mr Lee Teng-Hui was not made to accept the position that “State-to-State” talks were not possible between Beijing and “what is an integral part of China”.

The Chinese reaction indicates Beijing’s impatience with the “political distortions” Taipei was trying to introduce in the one-China policy. To indicate to the international community that China meant to carry out the threat of “use of force on the issue of Taiwan”, the People’s Liberation Army’s navy recently held a conference in Beijing for reviewing its immediate and long-term strategies in the region. This was followed by the first military exercise in the Taiwan Strait since 1996. Soldiers were heard chanting: “We will liberate Taiwan”. Taiwanese troops too have been put on alert level two, a step away from an alert for war. In a desperate effort to gain the sympathy of the international community Taipei has reportedly interpreted the recent Chinese announcement of having developed the neutron bomb as an attempt to intimidate Taiwan. However, it is doubtful whether President Lee would be able to win many supporters for his last-ditch attempt for a “State-to-State” dialogue between Beijing and Taipei for the implementation of the one China policy. No one would like to antagonise the dragon for a speck of land which tomorrow, if not, today, would be handed over to mainland China.

POST-KARGIL DIPLOMACY
Challenges that lie ahead
by Inder Malhotra

AS was only to be expected, after Pakistan’s forced withdrawal from Kargil, pressures have begun to grow for what, for want of a better expression, can only be called a “speedy revival” of the Lahore process for solving all India-Pakistan problems, including Kashmir.

To nobody’s surprise, the loudest and most frequent clamour for this revival has come from the beleaguered Pakistani Prime Minister, Mr Nawaz Sharif. His efforts to misrepresent the Kargil misadventure as a “tremendous triumph” in “internationalising” the Kashmir issue has backfired. He is in deep trouble with both the rabid Islamists who are blaming him for having “betrayed” the Mujahideen and the liberal, sensible Pakistanis who are telling him that the Kargil outrage, even if tactically brilliant, was a strategic stupidity, as the circumstances have shown it to be.

“Never in 50 years since Independence”, writes a respected Pakistani commentator in the Dawn, “have we looked less like a state and more like a ‘stringless Pinocchio’ capering to a dance choreographed at Blair House”. This is not an isolated view by any means. Gen Mirza Aslam Beg, Lt-Gen Assad Durrani, a former chief of the ISI, incidentally, and many others are also busy berating Mr Sharif for the Kargil disaster.

No wonder he feels the ploy of having restored the Lahore process and thus made Kashmir the “centrepiece” of the India-Pakistan dialogue would enable him to save himself from meeting the fate of Ayub Khan after the 1965 war and the Tashkent Declaration. Especially because he and his spin doctors, headed by the Information Minister, Mr Mushahid Hussain, are making a song and dance about US President, Bill Clinton’s promise to take a “personal interest” in “accelerating” the bilateral Lahore process.

And therein lies a serious twist. The Pakistani withdrawals from Kargil — which, according to another writer in the Dawn, nail Pakistan’s “humiliation on the mast” — have taken place under an agreement between Mr Clinton and Mr Sharif, not as a result of any understanding between New Delhi and Islamabad.

To be sure, no one understands better than Mr Clinton himself, and a “caretaker” one at that, can possibly enter into substantive and serious negotiations, and that too with a neighbour like Pakistan, at election time. Even so, the US President has found it necessary or expedient to endorse Mr Sharif’s call for a quick restoration of the bilateral process under the Lahore Declaration as soon as there is cessation of hostilities.

Mr Clinton’s statement apart, there are authoritative reports that an early resumption of the high-level India-Pakistan dialogue will be the main subject of discussion between the US Secretary of State, Ms Madeleine Albright, and the Indian Foreign Minister, Mr Jaswant Singh, when they meet in Singapore at an ASEAN gathering in the next few days. Other countries are likely to endorse this if what is being said by various ambassadors in New Delhi’s Chanakyapuri is any guide.

Under these circumstances, it is imperative that New Delhi should have a clear, well-thought-out and fairly long-range strategy for dealing with demands and pressures for an immediate resumption of the Lahore process. Vague contours of such a policy are visible to seasoned observers of the South Block but the precise policy lines have yet to be firmed up.

Both Pakistan and the USA need to be told, politely but firmly, that the Lahore process is not a tap that can be turned on and off at will. Lahore was all about mutual confidence and trust which has been “betrayed” by Pakistan under Mr Sharif. The notion that the Pakistani army acted on its own and presented the Prime Minister with a fait accompli in Kargil, popularised by Mr George Fernandes, has been debunked by the Pakistanis themselves. Mr Jaswant Singh, a wiser man, has repeatedly said that Mr Sharif’s forces violated not only the LoC but also “the territory of trust”.

It is absurd to believe that the trust can be restored on the morrow of withdrawals. In any case, far too many Pakistanis in responsible positions are still threatening “many more Kargils”.

Consequently, the first step that New Delhi and Islamabad have to take, with or without any prodding by Washington, is to arrange for a series of meetings between the military and civilian officials of the two countries. A thorough verification of vacation of the Indian territory by the Pakistanis, including the clearing of all mines and booby traps that have been left behind, is the first unavoidable measure.

Thereafter, the senior officers of both sides will have to sit down to work out clear-cut and credible agreed measures to ensure that Kargil is never again repeated anywhere along the LoC. Other countries, in similar situations, have had joint patrols of sensitive areas, joint or separate serial surveys of which prior intimation is given to the other side and so on. Is Islamabad ready for such positive measures? In short, the point is that rather than leave it to Pakistan to set the agenda — as has unfortunately happened all through during the last half a century — India should go on taking a series of initiatives and making concrete proposals. The “international community” will then see who is doing what.

Even after the assurances that the Kargil-type mischief will not be repeated are in place the conditions for a return to the Lahore process will not be complete. To achieve that result there will have to be another credible and verifiable guarantee that the decade-long trans-border export of terrorism into Jammu and Kashmir will also cease forthwith.

The scrupulous respect for the LoC is for the entire line and not for the Dras-Kargil-Batalik sector only. The Americans at least understand this. They can therefore be told that until the sanctity of the entire LoC is restored the shattered Lahore process cannot be brought back to life. Moreover, the Lahore process is guided by the Simla Agreement, not independent of it.

It is possible, indeed probable, that Pakistan would respond to the Indian position by asserting emphatically that official-level talks in the past have yielded nothing and they would yield little now. The Pakistani argument, likely to be backed by the USA and others, would be that the top leaders must meet, put Kargil behind them and give their officials “new directives” to make a fresh start.

In such an event the Indian reply should be obvious. If Mr Nawaz Sharif is so keen to have a second summit with Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee even before the coming elections are completed, let him travel — by bus or otherwise — to New Delhi. After all, Mr Vajpayee did make the historic journey to Lahore. It is the Pakistani Prime Minister’s turn to reciprocate it.

How necessary it is for Mr Sharif to make amends for the betrayal of trust is underscored by the Dawn commentator, quoted earlier, in eloquent words. “The Indians”, he wrote, “came to Lahore with an olive branch. We responded with Kargil. Today, the Indian nation is on a war footing, demanding vengeance, and we are advocating ahimsa”.

No diplomatic effort, however, skilfully pursued, can succeed unless it is backed by the people at home, as Mr Sharif has discovered to his dismay. Mr Vajpayee also needs to bear this in mind. Even at the best of times the Prime Minister failed to build up the national consensus behind his nuclear policy after Pokhran-II, followed by Chagai. The exigencies of electoral politics are already muddying the post-Kargil, pre-poll scene. This has got to be nipped in the bud. The Congress and other Opposition parties must give national interest precedence over petty partisan or parochial ends. But the responsibility of the man in the driver’s seat is clearly much the greater.

Recovering the cost of Operation Vijay
by Arvind Bhandari

AT the time of writing, speculation is rife whether the Vajpayee government would promulgate a Presidential Ordinance to impose an across-the-board levy on all tax-payers to mobilise additional resources to defray the cost of Operation Vijay.

In view of the nationalistic fervour whipped up by the successful Kargil military operation, people will not cavil at such a government move. But the question arises: whether it is necessary for the caretaker government to take a policy measure of this nature. As in the case of operations of the Indian Peace Keeping Forces (IPKF) in Sri Lanka or even the Indo-Pak war in 1971, the Kargil operation will not have a serious negative impact on an economy as big as India’s. Moreover, there has been buoyancy in revenue collections in the April-June quarter of the current financial year. Desperate hurry, therefore, is not warranted and we should wait for the formation of a duly elected government in October.

When the new Lok Sabha is constituted, it could not only discuss and approve the mobilisation of whatever additional resources are required in the wake of the Kargil operation, but also undertake a thorough and comprehensive parliamentary examination of India’s overall defence needs, an exercise which has never been conducted till today. Further, even as the valiant soldiers stand sentinel on our borders amidst untold hardships, it would behove the new government to demonstrate the country’s solidarity with them by curbing the wastage and extravagance that mark national life.

The scope for cutting the flab in the Indian nation is tremendous. While the modalities of an austerity-cum-economy drive could be worked out by an “expenditure commission”, a few measures come to mind straightaway. Firstly, the President, who is also the Supreme Commander of the armed forces, should set an example for the nation by jettisoning the anachronistic trappings of pomp and pageantry that surround his office. Secondly, the bureaucracy, both at the Centre and in the states, should be cut by at least 30 per cent over the next 10 years. The Fifth Pay Commission, while recommending substantial hikes in the salaries of government employees, had emphasised that simultaneously administrative reforms should be introduced to cut the bureaucracy. The United Front government succumbed to the blackmail of the unions and hiked the pay scales of the under-employed babus, but it was too weak-kneed to attempt reforms.

Thirdly, nearly Rs 5000 crore would be saved if the government were to stop bribing the articulate middle and rich classes by giving them subsidised foodgrains. Fourthly, the racket of ministers and bureaucrats taking off on meaningless global jaunts should be stopped forthwith. Fifthly, all bloated public sector undertakings should be privatised and pruned.

Both India and Pakistan are so poverty-ridden and low in terms of the human development index that it is a truism to say that neither can afford over-militarisation and a full-scale war. The latest Pakistani budget, presented on June 12, reveals that defence expenditure has been hiked by 11 per cent over last year’s spending and now takes up 22 per cent of the total budget of $ 12.5 billion.

Eminent Pakistani economist Mahbub-ul-Huq had chalked out how Pakistan’s defence spending could have been better utilised for social development and poverty alleviation programmes. He strongly advocated a reduction in military spending for both India and Pakistan by 5 per cent a year over a period of five years. This would have released $ 20 billion, a sum that is four times the resources required for achieving universal primary education in both countries in the next five years.

If India can scarcely afford militarisation, Pakistan can afford it still less. Pakistan is among the most illiterate countries in the world. Nearly 70 per cent of the Pakistani adults cannot read and write. Pakistan is the only country where expenditure on education as a percentage of the GDP has fallen since 1990. Budgetary allocation for technical education has been slashed by 76 per cent since 1996. Access to health care and drinking water has been denied to half the population. About 40 per cent of the children under five are malnourished. Pakistan has one of the widest divergences in the world as regards the distribution of income. In Lahore and Karachi people live in poverty while the vulgarly rich 400-odd families flaunt their mansions and luxuries. If India has gained notoriety for corruption, Pakistan literally takes the cake for venality.

Pakistan’s proclivity to repetitively take on its giant neighbour does not make sense. Pakistan’s population is 14 per cent of that of India. Its GDP is 19 per cent of that of India. Given that India spends 2.5 per cent of its GDP on its military, Pakistan would have to spend 13 per cent of its GDP on defence to match the Indian military budget in absolute size. This is impossible unless Pakistan, with its tottering economy already in a tailspin, wants to go down the drain.

Being close to the temple
by D.R. Sharma

FIFTEEN years ago we built our modest matchbox house and put up a “To Let” placard on one side of the gate and prayed for a gentleman-tenant. Since we knew quite a few harried houseowners, with tales of delinquent and devious tenants, we were somewhat wary of conmen and glib talkers. We just wanted someone who could help us clear our numerous debts and act as a good host if we ever chose to visit him. Not that all lawmen and physicians are fiends, but we didn’t want to take any risk and preferred a plain, sensitive salarywala who would pay the rent on time and vacate the house when asked for.

With this profile of the tenant in our mind, we waited for the calls from some house-hunters. The very first caller sounded so suave that I began to visualise him as our prospective tenant — which indeed he became. When he asked on the phone what we expected of him and I explained our priorities, he got politer still and said: “That’s me, sir.”

Not an advocate, not a businessman, not even a dental surgeon. Just a company executive with a diploma in personnel management. And, then, he came with his wife to take a look at the three -bedroom abode that we had raised with diverse grants and subsidies. “How elegant, how compact, how home-like,” were the epithets he used to compliment our sense of taste. Even a hard-nosed house-owner would be vulnerable to such an effusive praise of his dwelling unit.

To shorten this narrative, we asked them to move in rightaway and declined their offer of “some” advance. They promised to pay the utility bills and the house rent in the first week of every month. “You give me the name of your bank and your account number and stop worrying about small things,” he remarked after assuring me that he would give standing instructions to his bank to transfer the amount to our account number on the first of every month. “Once you let us live in your house, you might one day ask us to stay on till your retirement 15 years hence,” remarked the gentleman-tenant. “Two of our previous landlords can testify to our basic human decencies.” When he mentioned their names I thought I should have waited for another call.

Exactly a month later I called the bank manager to find out whether the rent had been deposited. It had not been. Two months later his reply was no different. Feeling a bit disoriented when I checked with the tenant with decent antecedents, he uttered: “Well, we had been away on a pilgrimage to the South. Don’t worry; I’ll do the needful tomorrow.”

That tomorrow-thing is another story of dismay and anguish. Suddenly I remembered something, they both had mentioned when they came to collect the key of the house which they found elegant, airy, compact and home-like. “Above all, sir, it’s so close to the temple which we habitually visit twice a day,” had remarked the God-caring couple.

Photography — her obsession
by Reeta Sharma

THERE is a distinct quietness, poise and marked dignity of low profile of this lady. In a crowd of four or six you may not even notice her but interaction of a few words will leave an impact of a well-meaning person. Never eager to overtly assert herself yet she is firm like a rock without letting politeness slip away.

Neena Teji is the first woman photographer of this region. There could be other women interested in photography but Neena has scaled heights taking practical training of all aspects of photography. Besides assisting her husband in his studio she takes private assignments of aspiring woman models, doting parents wanting to capture memories of their new-borns at various stages. Blessed with a farsight Neena maintains an amazing library of every printed material, books and articles on photography. No wonder she is at present aiming at acquiring expertise in “digital photography” as she thinks the future belongs to it.

Born in Mhow in Madhya Pradesh, Neena finished her Senior Cambridge from ‘Loreto House,’ Calcutta. She passed her pre-medical in flying colours from Shimla but refused to join the MBBS course. “I could not bear even the thought of dissection”. Eventually she graduated from St Bedes, Shimla, and as were the trends then she too soon got married to Tej Bans Singh Jauhar.

Within a year of her marriage, Neena Teji began assisting her husband in the studio in her spare time. The 24 years that she has invested in photography is an amazing story of a steel-like will of a lady yearning to educate herself and perfecting in one particular art. With practical training from her husband today she has made a place for herself outside his studio.

Yet another passion has obsessed her, and that is “computers”. She is getting herself trained into the new hi-tech world of computers because digital photography is directory associated with computerisation. She plans to open a studio exclusively for women along with her son who is doing MCA (Masters in Computer Applications). The following are the excerpts of the conversation with Neena Teji

Question: Were you keen on photography or it just happened because of the surroundings that you were in?

Answer: Really, I had no clue to photography. It just got around because both my home and studio were full of everything related to photography. I began reading everything on the subject and fiddling with a vast collection of cameras of my husband. But the turning point was brought in by the staff of the studio. You see whenever I went to assist my husband in the studio the staff would tend to dismiss me. At times they would even take me for a ride too.This bugged me and I decided to learn everything about photography, right from lab work to clicking. Teji (her husband) himself gave me practical training in every aspect of it.

Q: How did you find the lab work since clicking, as compared to it, is considered rather fancy?

A: Well, lab work is more technical. Colour-photo processing in 1981-82 was all done manually. There was no skilled staff available for the same. Teji trained me into it and I assisted him during my spare time as I had a home and in-laws to look after besides rearing my two children. By the late eighties, automatic colour-photo machines had arrived to ease us of the pressures.

Q: As a woman photographer have you faced any difficulty and difference in customers’ dealings towards you?

A: She answers without any trace of agitation. Mostly not only men but also women in the first place visibly don’t want to recognise me as a photographer. They are hesitant to accept that I can give good results. Whenever I am in the studio mostly people automatically tend to address my son or my husband for querries. My presence is undermined. But I neither get offended nor blame them because after all they unknowingly suffer from mind-set against the capacity of a woman. But interestingly once photographed by me they often insist on my doing the job. (A serene smile spreads on her face.)

Q: What is the status of photography in India today?

A: Oh, today photography has acquired a dignified status. But this is only a recent trend. This profession till recently was not considered any worth. You can imagine it from the fact that many people had criticised my parents for marrying me off to a man who was a mere photographer. People are now beginning to accept that photography is an art.

Q: How do you view the contemporary Indian woman?

A: Looking back in retrospect I can say that Indian women are progressing. In my grandmother’s generation nobody could have imagined a woman photographer or a woman IPS, IAS, journalist, a building contractor, an Air Force pilot, an architect etc. However few their number may be such women have become a precedent for the next generation of women to follow. Although education has still to reach to the last girl in our country, nevertheless there is a progress on this front. I must say that the electronic media despite all its adverse affects has also played a role in making Indian women better aware.

Q: How do you view the Indian national political scene?

A: Its very depressing and scares me as a citizen. None of our politicians are left with any credibility. Few like Atal Behari Vajpayee are not allowed to make a difference in today’s degenerated political scenario. Sure, in governance a leader has to depend upon a dedicated team to implement his convictions and commitments. From where will such leaders find such a team?

Q: How do you rate women politicians of India?

A: They have proved to be worse than men. Majority of them are visibly corrupt, obsessed with themselves, inefficient and least concerned with the betterment of their followers. Jayalalitha, Mayawati, Phoolan Devi, Rabri Devi etc all fall in the same category. Only women leaders with a difference are Mamta Banerjee and Maneka Gandhi. Mamta is a remarkable leader of the poor masses and leads a very simple life. Similarly, Maneka has made Indians environment conscious. But mostly women politicians have failed us.

Q: Do you think our nation is corrupt?

A: Today, unfortunately everything has a price in our country. Corruption is seeping into our day-to-day life. Adulterated milk, food, vegetables — falsely maintained green, any and everything has become a victim of corrupt practices. However, I won’t say everyone is corrupt. In which case the system would have collapsed by now.

Q: Kargil must have generated a passionate respect for our jawans in your mind too. But are you aware that an order issued by the Ministry of Defence, as late as June 7, 1999, declares that there will be no increase in the pension of personnel below officer rank. However, the pension of all officers will increase by 12 per cent and that of Generals by 24 per cent? How do you view it?

A: No, I am not aware and I think its not only unfair but also outrageous. In any case jawans are not paid very well in the defence forces. This kind of order smacks of discrimination. Why jawans have been denied increase in their pension? In fact it is they who fought on the front. As against the number of officers who sacrificed their lives the number of jawans is nearly 30 times more. I think a major portion of donations/contributions pouring in should be spent on the betterment of jawans only.

75 YEARS AGO

Sarvabhaum Maheswari Sangathan

THE first meeting of the Sarvabhaum Maheswari Sangathan met at the Marwari Vidyalaya on Monday evening. There was a large attendance of visitors and delegates. Vyakhyan Vachaspati Pandit Atmaramji, Rajyaratna of Baroda, presided.

Resolutions were passed encouraging Hindu sangathan, foreign travel, elevation of depressed classes and opening of intermarriage with various subsections of the Maheswari community, such as Beikaneri, Kolwal Marwari, Deswali, Gujarati and others.

The second meeting will be held on next Tuesday under the presidentship of Rai Bahadur Shiam Sunder Lalji, Minister, Alwar.