P A G E
Thursday, June 3, 1999
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Thursday, June 3, 1999 |
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Chambers’
orchestra
BUS
DIPLOMACY AND AFTER Can
new Israeli PM bring peace? |
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N-scientist’s
magnificent rural obsession
No
smoking
Proposed
Gurdwara legislation |
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Chambers’ orchestra TWO leading business chambers selected Tuesday to orchestrate their demand for a consensual political approach to economic policies. The assertive chief of CII (Confederation of Indian Industry), Mr Rahul Bajaj, was content to dash off letters to 22 (yes, 22) political parties listing his demands and seeking a common outlook on all of them. As is to be expected, the issues relate to the second phase of economic reforms and his pet theme of extending preferential treatment to Indian companies. He wants speedy privatisation of all PSUs, stepped up public investment, slashing of fiscal deficit and faster deregulation to ensure that projects are cleared within 90 days. There is a rub in all these. There are no takers for the public sector units and the stock market is still ambivalent; much of the regulation owes its origin to plug rampant malpractices by the private sector. The situation has not changed radically enough to dismantle the old monitoring system in a hurry. The 90-day limit for final clearance of all projects is reasonable, but the problem is that the promoters often file incomplete or deliberately misleading documents, mostly relating to environmental safeguards. FICCI took a more activist road. In the morning it organised a joint seminar with the National Council for Applied Economic Research, an elitist think-tank, at which the latter presented a cheerless projection of the growth prospects. The economy is likely to grow at 5.7 per cent, lower than the government target and much lower than what is required to mitigate the effects of persistent poverty. The cold statistics in the paper fully supported the pessimistic analysis, but then the emphasis was on industrial sector and exports. Rural life and rural demands got a short shrift. That question concerning nearly 70 per cent of the population unexpectedly cropped up when leaders of various political hues set out the outer limits of their reforms urge. CPM leader Sitaram Yechury threw the general trend of discussion out of gear by pointing out that industrial health depended on demand growth, which can come only from the rural side and nobody was doing anything about increasing the purchasing power of the villager. His point was that if a vast majority of the people are outside the ambit of the economic system and reforms, the country, and indeed the economy, have to readjust the old growth matrix and keep the focus confined to the urban middle classes, which would soon hit a roadblock as it seemed to have already done. The fat was on fire.
Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha had to respond as this is
an election year and the humble villager can create
problems if he feels ignored. So he lauded the CPM
approach but in his “personal capacity” and
disclosed that he had been thinking on the lines of
taxing the rural rich and pushing through land reforms.
Unfortunately for him, both are totally outdated now.
Since land reform measures were noisily but
hypocritically legislated in the fifties, two new
generations have come up and that fact has ended big
zamindaris as known in pre-independence days. True, there
are still a few thousand or so big landlords but have
found ways to skirt the ceiling laws. If the rural rich
are to be taxed to yield a meaningful revenue, the
landowners should be encouraged to declare their real
holding and that means a final farewell to land reforms.
The Left demands land reforms in a different context, and
not in that of Mr Sinha which is to buy peace in the
blood-splattered central Bihar. Of hammering out a
consensus, there were no encouraging signals, which only
brings out the inherent contradictions in the approach of
various parties. |
Africa after Mandela JUNE 2, 1999, would remain an important date in the post-apartheid history of South Africa. On this day the people for the second time after the abolition of white rule exercised their right to elect a new National Assembly and nine provincial assemblies. But what made the day unique was the absence of President Nelson Mandela from the contest for any post. The African National Congress which he helped build as a potent weapon of peace for dismantling the well entrenched apartheid structure is expected to sweep the polls. He had made known his decision to retire from active politics, so that he could spend more time with his grandchildren, in the middle of the term of the first democratically elected National Assembly. It is not for nothing that Mr Mandela is called the Gandhi of South Africa. He was impressed and influenced by Mahatma Gandhi’s insistence on using non-violence as a powerful weapon for achieving freedom from British rule for India. There were those within the ANC who had reservations about the success of the Gandhian methods in destroying the demon of apartheid in South Africa. In the end Mr Mandela
was proved right. He spent 27 years in prison but never
gave up the dream of seeing South Africa as a
multi-cultural and multi-racial society with equal rights
for everyone irrespective of the colour of one’s
skin. In one respect the nature of the challenge before
him was more complex than the one Mahatma Gandhi faced in
India. “Quit South Africa” was not the
objective of the ANC.The African continent, perhaps,
offers the only example of the white man cutting his
umbilical cord with his parent country and settling down
to exploit and rule over the simple people in the
territory he occupied. South Africa was one such
territory where the black natives were forced to serve
their white masters. Yet, Mr Mandela never used the
language of hate for fighting apartheid. It is measure of
his greatness as a statesman that even after achieving
the objective he kept his promise of ensuring equality of
opportunities for all in multi-racial South Africa. But
the most unique example he has set for even established
democracies is the decision to make way for the next line
of leadership to shoulder the responsibility of governing
the country. Democracy is not only about giving people
the right, irrespective caste and colour, to elect their
representatives. It is also about giving the electorate
new faces to choose from. Democracy can never be under
any kind of threat in the hands of leaders like Mr
Mandela. |
|
YET another avoidable tragedy has taken place in Delhi. It is a miracle that all the lives affected by the flames on Monday have not been lost. Lal Kuan is a congested locality and an ill-organised business hell-hole. The figure of the dead was said to be around 50 on Wednesday evening. But a few victims with more than 80 per cent burn injuries are being written off by the survival record-keepers. Some frightened families have taken their gravely injured kin away from the L.N.J.P, Guru Tegh Bahadur and R.M. Lohia hospitals, hoping that better treatment would be provided by private practitioners. There was another blaze in the Sitaram Bazar area of the Central District. In the first incident of horror a chemical container exploded spewing a ball of fire which burst and escalated. It caught in its deadly snare many people present in the vicinity of the "transport office". Several buildings, including a hospital, were seen ablaze soon after. The loss of property will be mathematically juggled with by clever financial manipulators. But "crores" is the word. The Prime Minister and the Home Minister have shown sympathy and announced financial relief through the area M.P. But what about the priceless lives? The exact number of the dead will never be known. Hospital records are being "perused" by interested persons. It is a pity that even in tragic circumstances, politicking, greed and Satanism within man do not stop playing their game. It is not the time for making allegations. But one cannot avoid mourning the total absence of the sense of public safety and private protection in our society and administration. Lal Kuan and Sitaram Bazar are located in the same segment and in similar chaotic conditions. Does the Municipal Corporation have a duty in respect of inspecting business areas with residential pockets around? Why should a transport office store highly inflammable material in an apparently ignition-prone manner? Scientifically speaking, uncontrolled fires fuel themselves by vaporising the solid or liquid materials they find in their path. A house fire or a forest fire may begin with easily ignitable materials. As the fire grows, it radiates more heat. The heat contributes to further growth, and the process accelerates as long as fuel and oxygen remain available. In a house fire, a phenomenon known as flash-over occurs when all the surfaces in the place reach their ignition temperature. At this point, a relatively small fire suddenly ignites the remaining materials, filling the place with flames. What ultimate role does
the Government of Delhi have to play in such a callous
atmosphere? What about the Central Government which has
its seat in New Delhi and offices all over the city?
Delhi must be made safe for residents, workers and
visitors. We have an infernal Capital. One of the first
fire-fighting organisations was established in ancient
Rome. Augustus, who became emperor in 27 B.C, formed a
group called the vigiles. The vigiles patrolled the
streets to watch for fires. They also served as the
police force in Rome. And we are living in the year 1999! |
BUS DIPLOMACY AND AFTER MR Atal Behari Vajpayee must be a very disappointed man today. The enthusiasm that he had brought to his journey to Lahore with the hope that it would end the troubles with Pakistan and start a new dialogue should lie shattered. What must he be thinking of the assurances of support he gave to Mr Nawaz Sharif? The hope that it kindled a new friendship lies buried in the corpses and the remains of aircraft that lie on the wastes of Kargil, Dras and Batalik. Has Mr Vajpayee also fallen into the same trap as Jawaharlal Nehru, who took the dispute to the UN for reconciliation and ordered a ceasefire but became a victim of power politics, Lal Bahadur Shastri, who signed the Tashkent declaration, Indira Gandhi, who after winning the Bangladesh war returned the conquered territory and the prisoners of war, and Rajiv Gandhi, who after a discussion with Ms Benazir Bhutto, was about to create a valley of peace in Siachin? Mr Vajpayee must be wondering whether his friendship with Mr Nawaz Sharif was based on a mutual assurance that all would now be well or that Pakistan was just playing a game. In fact, in coming to an understanding with Mr Nawaz Sharif, granted that he was sincere and wanted peace, was the Pakistan Premier the sole master of the situation. Do we forget that when Mr Nawaz Sharif asked his Service Chiefs to come over to Lahore and be present at the arrival of the Indian Prime Minister, they refused? Would this prove the old charge that the political leadership is way away from the military establishment and it is the latter that calls the gun tune? Mr Nawaz Sharif cannot claim to be innocent of what is happening. He has the power to put a stop to the warlike dance that has been going on along the Line of Control. This is one conclusion. The second concerns the intentions of the ruling establishment. Even when Mr Vajpayee was in Pakistan, Mr Nawaz Sharif saw to it that he did not commit himself to a reciprocal visit to India. A proposal had at that time been put forth that when Mr Vajpayee went to Lahore, Mr Nawaz Sharif should come to India with him on his return journey. But this proposal did not go very far. Neither did Mr Nawaz Sharif say when he would visit India. Mr Vajpayee’s visit consequently remained a unilateral gesture. Our politicians in power and diplomats should have seen to it that Mr Nawaz Sharif should be able to make a quick reciprocal gesture but he didn’t. Was he powerless or not willing? Has Pakistan not reconciled itself to friendship with India? When Mr Vajpayee was there the Pakistan Foreign Minister, Mr Sartaj Aziz, left no stone unturned to convey that the Indian Prime Minister’s bus journey could only be a flash in the pan. Did Mr Nawaz Sharif, if he sincerely meant to improve relations with India, carry the country with him? Mr Aziz is no respecter of peace with India. The Pakistan game is clear. It wants to make soft noises with India, mainly to satisfy the international opinion and give the impression to aid-givers that it wants to have good relations with New Delhi. But the military establishment and the ISI have instructions to keep Kashmir, especially the LoC, at boiling point. It would not be content to have peace in Kashmir because then the issue that makes the most headlines worldwide and gives the ruling establishment in Pakistan the reason to continue in power have little appeal. Are we then back at the zero point of relations with our neighbour? Its tactics are clear. Whether it fires missiles or sends in militants, the excuse is that India has been intruding into Pakistan territory. Thinking in Pakistan moves about in two ways. Islamabad wants to keep on disturbing the LoC. As it has done in the Kargil area, it wants to keep on occupying strategic points on the Indian side of the LoC. This will keep the tempers up and help Pakistan manage to occupy more land by disturbing the LoC and cut off as many strategic links on the Indian side as possible. In the present case it obviously wanted to snap the Srinagar-Leh road link. Already the Pakistani intrusion became known much too late to the Indian authorities. In another few days the Srinagar-Leh road would have become totally vulnerable. This done, Pakistan would have been in a commanding position. The Indian defence authorities, headed by Mr George Fernandes, should bear the responsibility for the ignorance of what was happening in an extremely strategic part of the country. The other part of Pakistan’s game-plan is to keep Kashmir disturbed. Before and after Mr Vajpayee’s visit militants have been coming into Kashmir — Pakistani army regulars, individuals and Afghans trained with equipment supplied to them from other countries. True, the internal situation in Kashmir had improved and the tourists were flocking there. But every week there had been reports of killings in Kashmir. When the valley becomes a little safer, Pakistan wants to create trouble in Jammu. Then what inference should one draw from the effects of Mr Vajpayee’s well-intentioned bus journey to Lahore? Even the BJP’s harsh critic, the Congress, welcomed the journey. But we have to admit, in view of later developments, that the hopes were exaggerated. Not enough work was done in the government to know what Pakistan ultimately wanted. Is it for peace or confrontation? Remember the way Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto assured Indira Gandhi at the Simla Conference that he would have the Line of Control turned into an international border? This was an assurance which persuaded Indira Gandhi to sign the Simla Agreement, but it was never implemented, either because Bhutto never wanted it to be carried through, or his rule ended soon after. But the effect is that the assurance was never carried through. The assurances of
friendship exchanged between Mr Vajpayee and Mr Nawaz
Sharif fall into the same category. This has been well
proved by what has happened in Kashmir and alongside the
LoC since the famous bus journey. Not much credence
should, therefore, be given to that undertaking. The
basic point to know is whether Pakistan wants peace. |
Can new Israeli PM bring peace? IT is generally believed that West Asia is the politically most explosive region in the world. There had been scenarios suggesting that a third world war would erupt from this region. The leadership struggles and political movements in West Asia had attracted the attention of the entire world. A further intriguing mystery has been created with the return to power of the Labour Party in the recent Israeli elections and the choice of Mr Ehud Barak as Prime Minister. The Labour and its allies scored a comfortable majority over the coalition government headed by the Likud Party chief, Mr Benjamin Netanyahu. Like Mr Netanyahu, Mr Barak is one of the most decorated soldiers in Israel and took part in some of the most dangerous raids against the Arabs. In 1972, along with other members of the elite commando unit, Sayeret Matkal, Mr Barak stormed a highjacked aircraft at Tel Aviv airport and rescued the passengers held as hostages. He was also part of the Israeli unit which launched daring raids on Beirut killing several Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) leaders and blowing up their headquarters. A “fighting soldier” was always greatly admired in Israel. Mr Barak spent 35 years in the army, retiring as its Chief of Staff. Many such soldiers, on retirement, joined Israeli politics, opting either for the Labour or the Likud. Mr Barak, who was known for his meticulous planning, was lured into politics by another war hero and former Prime Minister, Yitzak Rabin, and was groomed as his successor. Though lacking in communication skills, Mr Barak rose swiftly in the Labour party hierarchy. He became a minister in Rabin’s Cabinet and the leader of the Opposition after the 1996 general election. The defeated Prime Minister, Mr Netanyahu, possessed some of these qualities, which enabled him to win the last elections. The Israelis had hoped that with his military background, he would negotiate a peace settlement with the PLO, without sacrificing Israeli national interests. Hopes rose high when Mr Netanyahu and the PLO chairman, Mr Yasser Arafat, shook hands on the lawns of Mr Clinton’s White House and signed a peace accord. Unfortunately, the accord could not be implemented mainly because of the intransigence of the Netanyahu government. The former Prime Minister and his coalition partners were under the delusion that they could achieve peace and security without doing justice to the Palestinians. In fact, the Likud government tried its best to sabotage the peace accord, causing acute embarrassment to its friends, particularly Mr Clinton. Mr Netanyahu’s exit from power was inglorious, full of screams and threats from the Palestinians. He had come to power scoring points on the issue of the Oslo peace accord, not doing justice to Israel’s internal security. The people believed him because Arab terrorists had bombed Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. The argument that peace making was a long and painful process and that the hatred and misunderstanding of several decades could not be wiped out in a few months, did not go well with the Israelis. Hardliners in Israel had backed the Likud government believing that Netanyahu was capable of destroying the Oslo peace accord from within. The Likud government also talked tough, this being a ploy to extract more and more concessions from the PLO and the USA. They hoped that a stage would be reached where the PLO would reject these demands and in the process could be accused of breaching the peace movement. Finally, the hardliners pushed their own Prime Minister to a position where it was impossible for him to negotiate at all. The Likud came to believe that it could achieve peace in the region without doing justice to the demands of the Palestinians. The final act of this self-delusion was reached when the former Prime Minister believed he could use his considerable communication skills to sell his ideas to his people. Fortunately, this did not happen. Mr Netanyahu’s approach convinced only the diehards and the fundamentalists in the country. The Israeli people wanted to give the peace accord a chance and their own country to play fair. This did not appeal to the former Prime Minister who let loose a barrage of virulent attacks on the Labour Party and succeeded in dividing the country between the moderates and the extremists. The extreme groups both in the Left and the Right took to the streets and the campaign was both violent and dirty at times. Such an approach boomeranged on the Likud campaign. The Israelis were confronted with the fanatical approach of Mr Netanyahu, which had split the nation, and the cool, calculated, commonsense approach of the Labour leadership. The people wanted to get rid of the old wounds and scars. The 13 per cent difference of votes between the two clearly indicated that Israel was ready for a major change. Mr Barak is for the
peace process but, at the same time, has not raised false
hopes. The Labour Party under Mr Barak had stalled the
influence of Jewish fundamentalists, who, with their
quaint 18th century costumes, were threatening to take
the country back to that century. |
No
smoking MY father was once a champion chain-smoker. About one-tenth of his monthly salary used to be siphoned out by smoking. It was sheer resolution that once he threw away the entire stock and vowed never to touch it again, he never touched a cigarette again for the remaining forty odd years of his life. And he was a happy fellow ever afterwards. Now that he was a changed man, he used to have a dig at the smokers with “Can’t you light two together?” He would recount the following words of James-I of England from “A Counterblast to Tobacco”: “A custom loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain, dangerous to the lungs, and in the black stinking fume thereof nearest resembling the horrible Stygian smoke of the pit that is bottomless.” Whatever may be the public relations exercise, smoking is going on unabated. Once a child is initiated into it, he continues to be a prey. In fact the smokers harbour very funny notions — linking smoking even with the mark of manhood ! But how long can they brush aside the harmful effects of tobacco? The statutory warning “cigarette — smoking is injurious to health” is too mild for them. Hence the doctors usually display the directly odious: “cancer cures smoking”. Nobody can be wrong in believing that a cigarette has fire at one end and fool at the other. A non-smoker, besides remaining healthy, can save sufficient amount of money by not indulging in this wasteful and harmful exercise. A French national had written the following words outside his cottage: “Built by not smoking”. Once I was travelling by bus from Shimla to Chandigarh when the driver halted at some midway resort for refreshment. I noticed a man having the most uncommon miscellany of refreshment. He lighted a cigarette, bought a cold drink, a couple of samosas and a cup of tea. He would sip the cold drink, have a bite of samosa, sip tea and then have a puff at a pipe, repeating the same exercise in order until the clouds of smoke made it impossible for me to sit inside the bus. Then thundered the driver’s voice — “agarbatti band karo” — and the butt was immediately flung out. In Himachal, smoking is banned in public places, and yet it has been going on unchecked because the non-smokers are usually not vociferous in protesting. They invite the hazards of passive-smoking. A very interesting
incident once occurred in my presence at a cigarette-pan
kiosk a little below The Mall at Shimla. A man came to
purchase a packet of cigarettes, paid the amount and
lighted one cigarette there and then with the help of the
smouldering tip of a snake-like chord. No sooner did he
light it than a big monkey came on the roof of that kiosk
and bending downwards slapped that smoker very powerfully
in the face. The man was dazed for a moment. But I
don’t know whether a violent reminder from the world
of simians made him give up an evil habit. and I
don’t remember exactly whether it was May 31 that
day! |
N-scientist’s magnificent rural obsession
THIS is a follow-up on the life of an Indian nuclear scientist, Dr B.V. Parameswara Rao covering the past three decades. He is one of those brilliant Indian scientists whose dissertation on nuclear chemistry had been accepted by the Pennsylvania State University of USA as a “rare and original idea”. The one who, armed with a doctorate from the USA opted to decline Associate Professorship at Pennsylvania State University at a salary of $ 2500, in 1967. The one who could not be allured to stay back in the USA even on a still higher salary from two American companies. He was being driven by the passion to return to his native village, Dimli in Visakhapatnam, to work for the villagers. His country offered him the top job in India’s Atomic Energy Establishment. But he was obsessed with his own dream, which he had expressed in a poem. “Let’s have a dream and work for it, Worry not if it were to be utopian Worry not if others jest at it or even ridicule, Worry not if you were termed lunatic Worry if you do not have a dream” For him, the time had arrived to fulfil his dream — ridicule and jeers notwithstanding. He was determined to turn his dream into a reality at any cost. He was to unlock the shackles of perennial poverty, ignorance and deprivation of his villagers. Villagers from Dimli were obviously sceptical of Dr Parameswara Rao, who was a stranger to them when he floated the idea of collecting funds for a school to be started by the villagers themselves. But his determination to fulfil his dream soon overwhelmed as well as inspired the villagers to join hands with him. Rs 57,000 was collected from the villagers, and the US Peace Corps in Hyderabad donated an additional $ 2500. Villagers donated not only land but also did “shramdan” in building the school, Dimli’s children did not have to walk 10 km to attend a school anymore. They had their own high school by 1968 and they happily dug into books and slates, oblivious of the fact that the unassuming ‘Master-ji’ teaching them was a nuclear scientist with a doctorate from the USA. It was not only the little innocent children who were unaware of the academic credentials of this ‘Master-ji’. Even the state government of Andhra Pradesh, its bureaucrats and mighty politicians and “His Highness, the Governor” — none had any inkling about this bespectacled, soft-spoken person running from pillar to post to seek the permission to start the school. What do you think helped him? Oh, it was not his conviction, his commitment to his dream, his truthful desire, but his fluent English, which actually alarmed one ADC to the then Governor. The ADC had asked him, “Are you a graduate?” When Dr Parameswara Rao hesitantly disclosed his qualification, the ADC was stunned. Rest was to be history. In the school, he made sure the village children were not reduced to be merely educated as literates. In the courses, he included farming techniques, dairying etc. He did not want them to be migrating to the cities after schooling. However, from his own education and vast exposure he knew that starting a school was only a milestone. And that just a school was not enough for the villagers’ all-round growth. He was aware of the marshland (about 1000 acres) at Vakapadu, near Dimli, destroyed by cyclonic storms. People on its periphery were extremely poor, as their few small-scale salt pan were often destroyed by tidal waves. He began thinking about imparting an improved technology to these villagers. Dr B.V. Parameswara Rao soon put up a small-scale salt factory with the assistance from the Andhra Pradesh Small Scale Industrial Development Corporation, and salt production began in 1973. It soon became a major source of assistance to more than 300 household of fishermen and Harijans. The derision, jeers and scoffings at the Master-ji’s strangeness soon turned into admiration. Meanwhile Parameswara Rao had organised a visit of 15 young farmers of his village to the famous “Anand Dairying” in Gujarat to learn modern and scientific dairying practices. By 1974, “The Divvela Cooperative Farmers’ Service Centre” was founded. This reached out to marginal farmers and landless labourers. Soon, aid from OXFAM followed and a Dairy Development Centre too was founded. It is not as if dreams began turning into reality with his magic touch. Dr Parameswara Rao had to face stiff opposition at every step while handling sceptical farmers, innumerable obstacles created by red-tapism, arrogant and corrupt bureaucrats. He was often thrown out of government offices. But he never let his dream be forgotten although Pennsylvania State University was holding his job vacant for him alone. By 1995, Dr Rao’s community development programme had widened its sphere from dairy development to poultry keeping, salt manufacturing, to prawn culture, to minor irrigation alongside consistent non-formal education. His “authoritarian father”, who was initially very disillusioned by his son’s decision to return from the USA to that remote village, which he himself had not visited for years, was also forced to change his mind. The father now expressed a desire to fund a trust in the name of his family for Rao to pursue “the good work for uplifting villagers”. Soon the Bhagavatula Charitable Trust (BCT) was founded in 1976, for which the initial infrastructure was provided by EZE (a German organisation). As if BCT was founded with some kind of premonition, because 1977 witnessed the worst ever and ferocious cyclone. It rendered thousands of villagers homeless. The BCT plunged into relief work by launching a unique scheme of “food for work”. So, people got food when they jointly worked in rehabilitating villagers, retrieving salt-tracks, building huts, etc. Dr Parameswara Rao was always pained at the vast stretches of wasteland all around. So in 1978, BCT began a wasteland development programme with aforestation in 50 acres, leased from the A.P. Government, with a grant from OXFAM along with a fodder development programme supported by EZE. Dreams, if followed by truthful perseverance and with a sense of commitment, will turn into a reality. That’s what Rao’s poem said. And how could a wasteland not turn green if you wanted it so? Since then the BCT has never looked back. By now, estimated 5000 acres of wasteland has already been reclaimed. Visiting Haripuram (where BCT’s office is situated) and Yellemenehili, both of which are about 100 km away from Vishakhapatnam, you will find that the entire area has now been turned into lush green lands. A casual remark, yet
from the core of her heart, by an old village woman had
made sensitive Parameswara Rao sit up. She said:
“You have all these programmes for men only, who
squander them. Don’t you have anything for women? In
1980 he began working for women. The efforts of the past
nearly two decades have changed the entire scenario of
these villages with women running thrift programmes,
balwaris, ration shops, mahila mandals, adult education
and what not. Today, Dr B.V. Parameswara Rao is revered
in each hut, by each child, man and woman, irrespective
of age group. The bonus — well! Dozens of nationally
established professionals have shunned their lucrative
jobs to join hands with him in this remote village called
Haripuram. |
Proposed
Gurdwara legislation LAHORE: In March, 1921, the Punjab Government introduced a Bill to deal with the management of the Sikh Gurdwaras and shrines in the province, but the Bill encountered considerable opposition and was ultimately dropped. During the following year, several further attempts were made by the Government to frame a measure, but none of them obtained the requisite support. Ultimately, a Bill was passed in November, 1922, but it was not approved by the Sikh members of the council and had not actually been put into force. The Government understands that a considerable number of Sikhs would be glad to see an Act passed with the same object, either in amendment of or in substitution for, the Act of November, 1922. It has, for some time past, let it be known that it was ready to consider any proposal made to this end, provided that they were reasonable and would be likely to receive substantial support from the interests concerned. No such draft measure has, however, up to date been put forward for the consideration of the Government. His Excellency, the
Governor in Council, has decided to appoint a committee,
at the same time, to report as to the best means of
dealing with the question of the kirpan issue. |
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