Militants strike again
THE attack in the high security cantonment area in Srinagar by militants on Wednesday evening in which a Major and five jawans were killed (according to first reports) should leave no scope for doubt that General Pervez Musharraf is a greater threat to the security of India than Mr Nawaz Sharif ever was.

An encouraging trend
IT is now more or less certain that the government does not have to impose an additional tax to mend its skewed finances. It is because the finances are no more skewed.

by Hari Jaisingh
DISASTER MANAGEMENT IN INDIA
Need for coordinated system with human touch
The devastating super cyclone in Orissa is a national calamity and it should be seen as such with a view to evoking the right response from an otherwise slow-moving administrative machinery.

Why was China neutral during Kargil action?
by M.S.N. Menon
THROUGHOUT the Kargil war, India’s gaze was turned away from China. Why? Because it was not India’s intention to rub China the wrong way.

Chance acquaintance
by Raj Chatterjee
HE was slim and narrow-hipped. His legs were long, his features good. His aroma pervaded the pressurised cabin of the aircraft — an amalgam of tweed, tobacco and an exclusive hair tonic, a bottle of which I permit myself the luxury of buying on one of my rare visits to the UK.

75 Years Ago

Correcting and contradicting
In one single and comprehensive communique issued by them, the Bengal Government corrected and contradicted as many as ten statements appearing in nine different newspapers.

Militants strike again

THE attack in the high security cantonment area in Srinagar by militants on Wednesday evening in which a Major and five jawans were killed (according to first reports) should leave no scope for doubt that General Pervez Musharraf is a greater threat to the security of India than Mr Nawaz Sharif ever was. The dreaded Lashkar-e-Toiba has claimed responsibility for the attack. That it has the support of the Chief Executive of Pakistan is not a classified secret. In fact, the three-day conference of the Toiba at Muridke near Lahore, attended by over 10 lakh activists, was backed by the General. The support to elements engaged in promoting cross-border terrorism in India is part of his strategy to buy peace with the fundamentalists who had taken objection to his Kemalist utterances. It is significant that the attack by a suicide squad in Srinagar was timed to coincide with the opening of the Toiba conference, which will formally end today after renewing the resolve to step up the scale of violence in Kashmir and elsewhere in India. However, the real author of the revised anti-India policy is not the Lashkar-e-Toiba but General Musharraf. He is playing a dangerous game of survival and will, therefore, not hesitate to pull out all stops, including the one on the nuclear arsenal. He will justify his hostile acts by projecting India as the biggest threat to regional security. The circumstances which forced him to grab power leave him with no option but to play the game of “war and peace”: war with India and peace with the people, the fundamentalists and the military establishment of Pakistan. By promising to root out corruption he is buying peace with the people. By supporting the militants he hopes to succeed in keeping the fundamentalists on his side. And by whipping up anti-India sentiments he may succeed in reducing the scale of the unstated reservation in the military establishment in accepting a Mohajir as the ruler of Pakistan.

Be that as it may, what should be of immediate concern to India is the ease with which Pakistani militants are able to gain entry in high security zones. The whole world knew about the plans of the Toiba to step up the scale of violence in Kashmir during its annual congregation in the first week of November. Urdu daily Nawa-e-Waqt had carried in October an extensive report on the Toiba’s plan to target Indian troops in Kashmir. The Nawa-e-Waqt report was picked up by newspapers in India. Yet, the Army establishment in Srinagar evidently treated the advance warning about the Toiba’s plans with the same indifference which it showed to the information of shepherds about the Pakistani intrusion in Kargil. The pre-dawn attack by Pakistan-trained foreigner mercenaries on a Rashtriya Rifles camp in August in Kupwara was the first instance of the terrorists entering the Indian Army’s “den”. They killed an officer and five soldiers and made the military establishment look silly. Two days before the August attack Indian newspapers had carried reports on the Lashkar’s plan to spread its operations in Kashmir. In July Pakistan militants stormed the BSF headquarters, killed a DIG and four others and took 12 persons as hostages in Bandipur. The latest incident in Badami Bagh in Srinagar, the hub of military operations in Kashmir, has once again exposed the seriousness of the shortcomings in the country’s intelligence-gathering apparatus. What is the remedy? Heads should have rolled for not detecting the intrusions in Kargil. Heads should have rolled for the security lapses in Kupwara and Bandipur as well. And heads should roll for the latest outrageously daring attack in the cantonment area in Srinagar.

An encouraging trend

IT is now more or less certain that the government does not have to impose an additional tax to mend its skewed finances. It is because the finances are no more skewed. The latest figures compiled by the Controller General of Accounts show that revenue collection is very close to the budget projections and expenditure is not very much higher. The situation is easily manageable. It is in stark contrast to the picture at the end of July. Then the receipts were badly lagging behind target, the outgo was ballooning and both revenue and fiscal deficits threatened to go haywire. Tax collection in the first half of the financial year is higher by nearly 35 per cent compared to last year thanks to an inflow of advance tax. Upto July this account recorded a sharp fall because of higher tax refund. Spending is once again even after the sudden jump during the Kargil conflict. Non-tax revenue like dividends from public sector units and interest income have shot up spectacularly in August to Rs 21,036 crore to restore health to the government accounts books. Still, there are a few grey areas. Non-Plan expenditure has grown by 19.4 per cent while the budget expects a growth of 7.7 per cent for the whole year. Interest payment is higher this year by 22 per cent, fully 8 per cent more than anticipated; “other expenditure” has increased by 17.4 per cent while the budget provided for a mere 2.9 per cent. The reason? The Kargil conflict, of course.

The revenue collection is bang on target at Rs 68,463 crore, or 37 per cent of the expected annual figure, which is quite impressive. But the net tax collection has increased only by 11.8 per cent as against the budgeted 20.8 per cent. The latter shows itself in a sharp widening of the deficit. The fiscal deficit is 10 per cent less than what it was in the first six months of last financial year, but this is an illusion. In his last budget Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha had shifted small savings to the public account and this simple change in accounting procedure has artificially compressed the deficit. This is clear from the steep increase in revenue deficit. The budget wanted it to contract by 10 per cent — a hope based on a cut in non-Plan expenditure and additional tax and other collections — but in fact it has gone up by a hefty 21.7 per cent. It is a moot point if this process will be reversed in the second half of the year, even given an encouraging trend of higher tax revenue in October. A clinching evidence of a slight imbalance in the government finances is the hectic market borrowing — 85 per cent of the yearly target in six months. The alarming downturn in revenue collection during the first four months and now the astonishing turnaround prove that volatility is not a malaise peculiar to stock markets. Even public finance is vulnerable to it.

by Hari Jaisingh
DISASTER MANAGEMENT IN INDIA
Need for coordinated system with human touch

The devastating super cyclone in Orissa is a national calamity and it should be seen as such with a view to evoking the right response from an otherwise slow-moving administrative machinery. It is probably the worst ever crisis the people in the coastal areas of eastern India have suffered on account of nature’s fury. The latest blow came soon after the October 19 cyclone which hit Orissa’s Ganjam district at a wind speed of 200 kmph. The present cyclone struck the state’s 10 coastal districts at a speed of 260 kmph.

We have probably no answer to nature’s dance of death and destruction. Still, we can forewarn the people of dangers ahead, organise safety measures and mobilise the administrative network for every possible assistance. This is all the more necessary in an underdeveloped society like ours where the average citizen has hardly any means even for sheer survival. This is where we fail as a nation, though we do rise to the challenge howsoever slowly and haltingly.

We need stronger human bonds at the level of the district administration with the poor and the havenots who suffer the most in a calamity. They are left in the lurch both by God and the lesser gods of today’s India. The system of disaster management as it exists is imperfect and inadequate. It is lopsided and reflects ad hocism. We live from one type of disaster to another without ensuring continuity and upgradation in the tools of disaster management with the help of the latest technology.

Can’t we learn from our own disastrous events. The entire coastal region of Orissa, West Bengal and Andhra Pradesh are vulnerable to cyclones. The coastal states in eastern and western India have suffered considerably. Indeed, whether it is cyclone, floods, earthquake or drought, the country is struck by one form of tragedy or the other quite frequently. But experience shows that official response in such calamities is invariably inadequate and relief operations are slipshod. This reflects poorly on the system which gives the impression of being insensitive to human sufferings.

After his aerial survey of Orissa’s cyclone-hit areas along with Union Home Minister L.K. Advani, Defence Minister George Fernandes said: “The Centre is drawing up the framework of a formal disaster management setup to deal with the crisis.” Nothing can be more shameful than the absence of a well-oiled coordinated system which should know how to work on a war-footing during natural disasters.

Not that disaster management plans do not exist. The Ministry of Agriculture has a full-fledged unit called the Natural Disaster Management Division, which is supposed to manage natural calamities and coordinate relief operations. A committee under the chairmanship of Mr J.C. Pant, a former Agriculture Secretary, has been working on improving natural disaster management planning. It has reportedly evolved certain procedures to deal with natural disasters effectively.

Very few people know about the existence of the disaster management division. In any case, knowing how an official unit functions, it must be working in a routine manner, thanks to the close minds of the functionaries at the helm and red-tapism.

More than elaborate procedures spelt out in the files, people expect prompt action at the human level. Everything should be automatic once the disaster signal is switched on.

It will be worthwhile to quote Davinder Kumar’s report in Indian Express ( October 31) here: “In an age of supercomputers, satellite phones and cutting-edge technologies, the Natural Disaster Management Division of the government did nothing more than coordinating the evacuation of people from coastal areas. The respective state governments followed the same drill mechanically, waiting for the devastation to happen. No mechanism for relief was put in place which has now led to a mad scramble with little results. All that the Chief Minister of Orissa has managed to do since then is to repeatedly plead with the Prime Minister on his satphone for aid from his Bhubaneswar residence.”

The same report also exposes the working of the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD), which has a separate division for cyclone warning. It did sound warnings through AIR and Doordarshan but without the desired results.

Why? Mr Subhash Gupta, Joint Secretary of the Indian Red Cross Society, has a very simple answer to this communication gap. He says: “The IMD bulletins are so technically overdosed that it is difficult even for the educated people to make out what the department wants to say. “Simple things are described in such difficult official language that people just do not understand. So I doubt if the people of Orissa and West Bengal, or for that matter a government official in the state, could make anything out,” he adds.

These two examples show a serious gap in our disaster management system. It also underlines the callous approach to human tragedies. Looking at the frequency with which the country and the people have suffered because of severe natural calamities, a new and effective scientific approach is urgently needed to tackle the various facets of disaster management.

Perhaps very few people know that the National Institute for Disaster Management was set up in Bhopal in 1987 at the prompting of the late Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi, following the Bhopal gas tragedy. But it seems that its effectiveness is limited because of inadequate staff and resources.

Not that Indians are not capable of managing crisis situations. We have the basic infrastructure as well as the technology to properly monitor the signals from disaster-prone zones. But in the absence of modern technological backup, serious gaps have appeared in the way, reflecting poorly on how the various governmental agencies function.

Then there is the question of attitude. Official apathy can be seen everywhere. This has been very much visible in the present situation as well. As an expert put it: “The general impression that Indians are incompetent at crisis management has something to do with their attitude.” In such matters, everything flows from the response system at the official level.

We probably do not realise the havoc caused by deforestation and ecological degradation. As well-known environmentalist Sunder Lal Bahuguna says: “As of now, the government has no concrete disaster management policy. Many disasters are first created by us and then crores of rupees are spent on rescue and relief operations. The government should focus more on a sustainable model of development which can avoid man-made disasters.”

This is, of course, a larger issue which needs to be thoroughly debated at the national level. For the present, we should prompt a positive thinking for proper pre-disaster management and post-disaster relief operations and measures.

We ought to learn from other countries which have revamped their setups so as to act in time and effectively to minimise human sufferings. A thoroughly professional and efficient response system holds the key to satisfactory disaster management.

I wish to quote from a Times of India report ( November 17, 1996) concerning the warning system developed by the University of Lisbon to trace an earthquake-prone zone: “It is a well-coordinated system which can pick up seismic waves in 25 seconds; it takes only 10 seconds for Lisbon to send a warning to the civil authorities directly or indirectly and 15 seconds before the earthquake hits the city. This centre has enough time to switch off the city’s gas and power systems.”

We can surely learn from other countries’ experience and seek the help of international agencies to update our disaster management technologies in various areas. As of today, we depend on the armed forces to come to the rescue of the civilians. And they have responded admirably well to the call of the nation. In the case of the Orissa disaster, the nation has to once again salute the officers and jawans of the defence forces for allround rescue and relief operations.

It is high time the civilian authorities learnt a lesson or two from the discipline and preparedness of the Army and had a fresh look at the functioning of the various agencies which often add to the confusion.

As for our political leaders, the less said, the better. They love their aerial surveys, hold out false promises and move on to the next business on the agenda. They hardly provide any healing touch to the people in distress.

We shall probably see yet another dose of committee raj and wait for yet another disaster to repeat the cycle of patchwork responses. The people in agony deserve a better deal. We need efficient disaster management with a human touch.

Chance acquaintance
by Raj Chatterjee

HE was slim and narrow-hipped. His legs were long, his features good. His aroma pervaded the pressurised cabin of the aircraft — an amalgam of tweed, tobacco and an exclusive hair tonic, a bottle of which I permit myself the luxury of buying on one of my rare visits to the UK.

This was a domestic flight, New Delhi-Bombay, on which we shared a seat, he by the window, I along the aisle from preference. An aisle seat allows an unimpeded journey to and from the toilet.

He wore heavy, black, horn-rimmed glasses and had the look of an intellectual though, of all things, he was reading the Wall Street Journal and scribbling notes on a memo pad.

I am not a talkative person. Some of my friends say I am not even sociable. I had no desire to disturb my companion’s deep study of a prestigious publication. I opened my briefcase and drew out a Graham Greene paperback, one I had read several years before.

Palam was half-an-hour behind us when I heard a discreet cough by my side. The man had put his magazine on the folding table in front of him and was looking at me with an amused smile.

“So you prefer Greene to the modern clap-trap one sees on bookstalls here as well as in England. My own preference is for Le Carre though, perhaps, he lacks the finesse of Greene. But he packs more action into his books. It’s a pity neither of them is much in fashion these days. Like most things, even crime novels seem to have been taken over by sex.

“Such as?” I asked.

“Oh, chaps like James Hadley Chase, Irving Wallace, Robert Ludlum. If you’ve read one of their fantasies, you’ve read them all. Same situations, same people chasing or running away from the same people. The world on the brink of total destruction at the press of a button. One gets bored with the stuff.”

I was intrigued by his knowledge of the “stuff” I find fascinating. It didn’t quite fit in with his “in-depth” study of the WSJ. I decided to probe him further.

“Do you go in for all this modern bedroom stuff? Harold Robbins, for example who, I am told, has made more money than any best-selling novelist with the possible exception of Jacqueline Susann.”

“I’ve read only two of his books”, he said, “and I’m not likely to pick up another. John O’Hara was pretty down to earth at times but never ‘clinical’ in his intimate scenes. He left a great deal to one’s imagination. Robbins, I feel, endows his leading characters with powers beyond the ordinary, and life, I have found, does not emulate him with any degree of accuracy in the bedroom.”

He laughed as he said this, showing a set of regular though tobacco-stained teeth.

I was more than curious. Discarding my normal reserve, I asked him what he did for a living.

“I’m a stockbroker”, he said to my great surprise. “Just someone in the City, as they say in England. I came over for a bit of sunshine. I’ve never seen such glorious weather, though I’m told it’s the coldest winter you have had in a decade. By the way, if you’re interested, my name is Smith — just Smith” and he picked up the Wall Street Journal. I knew I had been snubbed for being too inquisitive.

America’s carrot & stick policy
by R.A. Singh

MUCH was made here of the fact that President Clinton wasted no time in waiving sanctions against India after signing into law the Defence Appropriations Bill giving him extensive waiver authority. But when one reads the fine print, it becomes immediately clear that Mr Clinton’s actions do not in any way amount to a special dispensation for India although the USA has once again proved its democratic credentials.

For India, the President waived sanctions applying to the U.S. Export Import Bank, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC), and sanctions under the International Military Education and Training Programme (IMET). Also cleared were loans to the Government of India by any US bank and US Department of Agriculture credit guarantees or other financial assistance to support the purchase of agricultural commodities, of course, from US farmers. It is worth noting that part of the benefit in all these exemptions, which were already there under an earlier one-year waiver, will accrue to the USA.

What still remains on the banned list is significant: World Bank, IMF and Asian Development Bank loans; sale of defence articles, services, design and construction services; and the export of dual-use goods and technology.

In deference to Congressional ire over the military coup in Pakistan, Islamabad has been banned from Ex-Im Bank, OPIC and IMET programmes. But it is still eligible to get US Agriculture Department credits and credit guarantees for the purchase of US agricultural commodities as well as to US bank loans to the Pakistani government.

A White House spokesperson went on record to indicate that more waivers were possible for India. The carrot was there, but the stick was not far behind. A number of senior administration officials, including Energy Secretary Bill Richardson (on the eve of a trip to India), and Assistant Secretary Karl Inderfurth in Congressional testimony and in speeches, made it abundantly clear that the tone and tenor of future US relations with India (which had great potential for greatness) would depend on India’s cooperation in the security and nonproliferation fields. In other words, India had better sign the CTBT as the first course in a geopolitical dinner that would include on the menu other benchmarks mandated by the USA: adherence to the Fissile Material Control Treaty (FMCT), nuclear and missile restraint, including non-development and non-deployment, and so on.

The Clinton Administration’s enhanced and apparently positive preoccupation with India in recent days has a logic of its own behind it. First, it tells the world — and the US Congress — that America looks with more benign fondness at a democratic India, whereas it tends to frown at the military junta that has taken over in Pakistan by overturning a duly elected government. Secondly, if India falls in line, it would then be far easier to put pressure on Pakistan to behave. After all, haven’t successive Pakistani regimes said Islamabad would go along with the NPT and the CTBT if India does so first?

The Clinton Administration has been mentioning in laudatory terms a “commitment” India has made to build a national consensus on adhering to the CTBT. But given the cavalier manner in which the US senate gave the boot to CTBT ratification, despite Herculean efforts by President Clinton and pressure from his European allies, it is more than clear that America’s nonproliferation leadership is dead on the vine. In any case, the rest of the world had the sneaking suspicion that by trying to prevent others from developing nuclear weapons, the US was merely attempting to safeguard its own current superiority. It is also true that if the next incumbent of the White House is a Republican (a not unlikely possibility), his administration will give short shrift to the CTBT.

The US Senate rejection of CTBT ratification is certain to cool Russian and Chinese ardour for the treaty. With an autocratic China on one side and a military regime with no accountability on the other, it would be unwise of India to foreclose its nuclear options merely to appease America.

India cannot lose sight of the fact that when it comes to making dual technology available to India or in sponsoring India for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council, the USA has always retreated into a bureaucratic mode of mouthing meaningless platitudes. America never seems to think in terms of India’s needs, interests or security. It seems to care more for the benefits to be derived from India’s vast and growing consumer market.

Incidentally, a Rupublican administration in Washington will only make things tougher for India, for the GOP has always had a soft corner for military regimes in Pakistan. Under the circumstances, India under Mr Vajpayee’s stewardship must not think in terms of a year or two from now. The need of the hour is a long-term nuclear policy that takes care of the nation’s security and is not swayed by the ebbs and tides of near-term politics. Unless America provides ample proof of its amicable long-term intentions, India must be prudent in proffering its hand of friendship.

Yet another reason for such caution is the fact that President Clinton, not unlike his predecessors, has displayed a soft corner for China. There has been a spate of US intelligence reports over the years quoting chapter and verse about China’s unabashed practice of exporting nuclear and missile technology and material. The beneficiaries have included North Korea and Iran, two nations the USA describes as “rogues,” as well as Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. But Mr Clinton has gone out of his way to turn a blind eye to the transgressions because here again he is concerned more with the massive Chinese market.

It is also true that Mr Clinton is more than eager to be known by posterity for his foreign policy achievements. He is obviously quite taken up with Nixon’s opening to China and the historical Shanghai Communique more than two decades ago. Mr Clinton wants to be known as the President who brought one-fifth of the world population into the global mainstream. In the process, democratic India, which is not really a problem, gets scant attention. Perhaps it is time India did what the Chinese have been doing: eat the carrot and reject the stick.

Why was China neutral during Kargil action?
by M.S.N. Menon

THROUGHOUT the Kargil war, India’s gaze was turned away from China. Why? Because it was not India’s intention to rub China the wrong way.

It will be recalled that in both the 1965 and 1971 Indo-Pak wars, China’s intervention on behalf of Pakistan was blatant. It threatened India, although it never carried out the threats. Against such a background, China’s neutrality in the Kargil conflict was a big puzzle. How is one to explain this? This is because China changed its course, albeit partly.

With the end of the cold war, the USA has become the sole super power. China is not reconciled to this: it wants a multi-polar world in which it can have a say. But it also wants to promote good relations with the USA for trade and technology. Today, the USA is not only China’s first trading partner, but also a major investor in the Chinese economy. And the USA has been willing to share its high technologies with China. So, its relation with the super power has become complex.

The USA, on its part, is not ready to offend China openly as its main interest in that country is economic. Though it will keep a sharp eye on China’s global ambitions and try to block its way, Washington is unlikely to disturb the present economic relations. China knows this.

China does not look at India and Pakistan today the same way as it did during the cold war years. Then China was an adversary of the USSR, and India was one of Moscow’s closest friends, while Pakistan was a friend of both the USA and China. Today, Moscow is a “strategic partner” of both China and India. This has naturally brought about a change in China’s attitude to Pakistan and India.

At one time, China wanted to win over the Muslim world, and thought that Pakistan and Iran could be useful. But events have shown that Pakistan is a liability in Central Asia. And in Xinjiang, a province of China with a Muslim majority, Pakistan has been of no help in containing Muslim militancy. There is clear evidence that the militants of Xinjiang have linked up with the Islamic militants of the world, more so with the Taliban, which is under Pakistan’s patronage. Militants of the PoK are also said to be in contact with Xinjiang.

Today, Pakistan is a nuclear and missile power, thanks to China. Why did China take this great risk? One view is: It wanted to turn the Islamic world against Washington. It was a “grand strategy.” It was not mainly designed to create a nuclear parity in South Asia, as is often believed. China saw the Pakistan bomb as an Islamic bomb. But it least suspected that Islamic fundamentalism could pose a major threat to its own interests. Throughout South-East Asia, there are prosperous Chinese communities. Today, they are under the threat of Islamic fundamentalism. And there is the threat to Xinjiang.

China has also discovered that its close relations with Pakistan have turned India, potentially a great power, into an enemy with unpredictable consequences. It is, therefore, keen to neutralise this. It does not want India to have an alliance with the USA. This may have implications for Tibet and Xinjiang. Hence accommodating India’s anxiety has become an important calculation in Chinese policies. This is reflected in a major policy statement of the Chinese Prime Minister Zhu Rongji. “India is an important neighbour of China and the development of good neighbourly and friendly cooperation with India is one of China’s basic national policies,” he had declared. This explains why China chose to remain neutral over Kargil.

There are other factors. For instance, like the USA, China seeks peace in South Asia. It does not want to encourage adventurism in a region with nuclear armed nations. This became very evident when China turned down the arguments of Pak emissaries to Beijing one after another. First, it was General Musharraf, followed by Foreign Minister Sartaj Aziz, and finally Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. They all wanted China’s support for their “adventurism”. China refused to oblige. There was an immediate reason — hostile world opinion against Pakistan. Naturally, there was a sense of despair and panic which explains why Nawaz Sharif readily accepted the deal offered by President Clinton. There was no other way to save face. In the event, Pakistan had to agree to withdraw its troops from Kargil and restore the sanctity of the LoC.

Pakistan had hopes that China would help it to internationalise the Kashmir issue. For this, Pakistan first of all needed the blessings of Washington, which was wanting. What is more, the “special relations” which existed between the two was a thing of the past. The West is rather disillusioned with Pakistan. This has to do with the growing Islamic fundamentalism and terrorism, and the role of terrorists like Osama bin Laden. To this is to be added Pakistan’s nuclear ambition and its readiness to use blackmail. And, of course, the Kargil adventure, which was the last straw. Intrusion of Pak soldiers into India and the plot to cut off Ladakh and the Kashmir valley from India were the worst forms of adventurism, especially when both India and Pakistan are nuclear armed. It was Pakistan’s calculation that it could get away with a fait accompli because India is already committed to not using the nuclear weapon first.

Pakistan’s gamble created a global antipathy against it. It truly isolated Pakistan from the world community. This is one reason why neither Beijing nor Washington was willing to internationalise the Kashmir issue. Even the Organisation of Islamic Conference was not ready to support Pakistan in this adventure.

In any case, China had made it clear to Sartaj Aziz that the Kashmir issue “is a complicated affair with a long history and should be, and could only be, solved through peaceful means”. According to him, India and Pakistan must find an effective approach to bring about a political solution to the Kashmir issue through negotiations.

It must be a matter of concern to China that there are today four powers in Asia with nuclear weapons. This has unnerved the nations without nuclear arms in Asia. There is a demand for de-nuclearisation of Asia. This will be highly embarrassing to China, being a major nuclear power. The world knows that India took to nuclear arms largely because of the Chinese nuclear threat.

Can India, therefore, take China’s neutrality for real? One cannot be sure on this. But the logic is in favour of China’s neutrality.

China has realised that its Islamic enterprise has come a cropper. Besides, it was paying too high a price to Pakistan for keeping up tension on the sub-continent. There is change in China’s thinking. China is unlikely to take sides on the Kashmir issue. This has been voiced in no uncertain terms by the Chinese Prime Minister who said that Kashmir is a “historical issue, involving territorial, ethnic and religious elements”.

Surely, what he wanted to convey was that China does not want to interfere. There are two other factors — the change of attitude of Washington towards Pakistan and the Kashmir issue, and the growing cordiality between India and the USA.

75 YEARS AGO
Correcting and contradicting

In one single and comprehensive communique issued by them, the Bengal Government corrected and contradicted as many as ten statements appearing in nine different newspapers in the Presidency.

This method, which we believe has once or twice been tried in our own province on a smaller scale, has both its advantages and its disadvantages.

Its advantage lies in the fact that by the systematic issue of such communiques the Government can carry on a campaign of publicity more effectively and less costly than the maintenance of an organ of its own.

Its disadvantage lies in the fact that the contradiction of so many statements in one single communique necessarily fails to secure that individual attention to each at the hands of the public which the issue of separate communiques on each subject and probably a more careful selection of the statements to be contradicted would secure for it.