 |
Wednesday,
December 5, 2001, Chandigarh, India  
|
Punishing Arafat not fair Jayalalithaa scores a point Dinner diplomacy |
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Maoists on the rampage in Nepal
A struggle against odds
A new little canvas for art & literature
1934, Chemistry: HEROLD UREY
Preparing toddlers to face the world
|
Punishing Arafat not fair After the escalation of violence in Israel and the Palestinian Authority areas for some time Mr Yasser Arafat finds himself in a most difficult situation today. Israel blames the Palestinian leader for the suicide bombings by activists of Hamas whereas Palestinians accuse him of using sweet language against an aggressor country which sends its troops inside their areas in pursuit of suspected targets on a flimsy pretext. Extremists are on the ascendant on both sides. They are ruthlessly busy destroying the gains achieved by Mr Arafat in cooperation with the late Prime Minister of Israel, Yitzhak Rabin, after they signed the historic Oslo Accord in 1993. Rabin fell to the bullets of an Israeli extremist on November 5, 1995, for his pragmatic policy of land for peace, and Mr Arafat is being rendered ineffective for the sins of Hamas, an organisation which once enjoyed the support of Israel, the country it hates today. If Mr Arafat disappears from the scene or is deprived of his leadership role, there will be total chaos in that part of West Asia leading to horrifying consequences. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, whose government has declared the Palestinian Authority as a "terror-supporting entity" and Mr Arafat's Al-Fatah organisation as a terrorist group, should realise that despite all his weaknesses, Mr Arafat is the best bet available for establishing peace in the region. But Mr Sharon, hated by the Palestinians for his role during the infamous massacre of the hapless inmates of West Beirut's Sabra and Chatila camps in 1982, considers the Palestinian leader too as nothing less than a terrorist. Hence the Israeli drive to destroy Gaza City's international airport and a heliport used exclusively by Mr Arafat. His all three helicopters have also been destroyed so that he cannot fly to different towns to take stock of the emerging scenario. The arrest of at least 110 Hamas militants along with the order to put under house arrest the extremist outfit's spiritual leader, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, by the Palestinian Authority forces could not satisfy the hawks in Israel. There are demands from certain Israeli leaders, seething with anger because of unabated suicide bomb attacks, that Mr Arafat should not be allowed to live in the Palestinian Authority areas. Being upset with the killing of innocent Israelis in terrorist violence is understandable. The grief-stricken people deserve to be sympathised with, and India is among the countries which have expressed such sentiments. But why punish a person who has no control over the organisations — Hamas and the Islamic Jihad — carrying out terrorist strikes inside Israel? The extremist Palestinians are strongly opposed to the dialogue process Mr Arafat wants to restart with Israel to settle the remaining issues coming in the way of establishing peace in the region. They believe that the Palestinians cannot get justice by holding out an olive branch to Tel Aviv. The present policy of Israel to tackle terrorism by the use of force, avoiding the path of conflict resolution through dialogue, will strengthen the hands of the enemies of peace. If Israel is following in the footsteps of the USA, which launched a devastating military campaign against terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden and his Taliban supporters, it is not justified. America has inconclusive proof against the Saudi fugitive and yet built up an international coalition to destroy the menace root and branch. Israel has done nothing on these lines, and one cannot believe that it has facts to brand the most respected Palestinian leader as a terrorist. Israel should not leave the path of reason in its hour of crisis. |
|
Jayalalithaa scores a point Ms Jayalalithaa, the famous or infamous former Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, is having the last laugh. She has walked free from the three-year sentence in a land deal, which blocked her way to become an MLA and Chief Minister. A division bench of the Madras High Court overturned the judgement of a special court and found her and a host of bureaucrats not guilty of any legal impropriety. It was in this case she had earned a three-year prison term, attracting the legal bar under the Representation of the People Act and had to sit out the Assembly election in May last. With the upholding of her appeal on Tuesday, this infirmity has evaporated and she is as clean and spotless as any detergent can make her. There are few hurdles on her path to complete political revival. The government of Tamil Nadu, totally under her thumb, will not appeal against the verdict and the Supreme Court will not entertain a public interest litigation. Mr Subramaniam Swamy has threatened to approach the apex court in his capacity as the original complainant in the Tansi land purchase case which got Ms Jayalalithaa the three-year imprisonment which crippled her political career, although for a brief period. It is doubtful if the apex court will accord locus standi on him. Anyway, an appeal will take years to reach the final stage and the Iron Lady can rule the roost until the next Assembly elections. There is a long time for Ms Jayalalithaa to savour her legal success. She has two options, both safe and without any risk. She can immediately stake her claim to become Chief Minister. The Supreme Court had invalidated her earlier term between the middle of May and September 21. This does not cover six months, the period an unelected member can be a Minister or Chief Minister. So her earlier tenure as Chief Minister is in legal terms non-existent. Even if it is not so, she has two more months to go and she would like to demoralise her critics by becoming Chief Minister without any loss of time. Two, the earliest date of a byelection in the state can only be in February when Punjab, UP and Manipur go to polls. She does not have that kind of patience, nor any political compulsion, to wait for another three months. The days of an end to a rubber stamp Chief Minister and the days of iron rule have dawned on Tamil Nadu. |
|
Dinner diplomacy Believers in the adage that the leaders who sup together come together are in for a disappointment. The much anticipated meeting between Mrs Sonia Gandhi and estranged comrade Sharad Pawar will not materialise after all. It has been almost finalised that she will not be travelling to Mumbai to attend the Nationalist Congress Party leader's 61st birthday celebrations on December 12. More than the refusal, what has come as a disappointment to votaries of rapprochement is the blunt manner in which the invitation has been rejected. A party spokesman said cheekily that the Congress President receives many such invitations but does not have time for most of them. As if to hit back, Mr Pawar disowned the invitation, which had been earlier confirmed by party MP Praful Patel. Perhaps the nay vote had something to do with the fact that the birthday boy had also invited men like Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee, Mr George Fernandes and Mr Pramod Mahajan to the "apolitical" do. Hopes about coordination between the two parties had been raised following the coming together of Mrs Gandhi and Mr Pawar at Mr Somnath Chatterjee's dinner the previous Sunday. Insiders say that they hardly exchanged any words, but their mere presence under the same roof sent conjectures flying, which have now been grounded. However, she is certainly warming up to another sworn detractor, Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav. The two were not only together at Mr Chatterjee's dinner but are also likely to come face to face again on Mrs Gandhi's Iftaar party in New Delhi on December 11. It has been firmly converted into an opposition conclave. Obviously, the Samajwadi Party supremo occupies a more prominent place in the Congress scheme of things than the Maratha strongman. Incidentally, Mr Pawar is not among the invitees, as of now. All these overtures are in the light of the forthcoming election in the electorally crucial Uttar Pradesh. Although the Congress is hardly a force to reckon with in that state, both parties know that even a friendly contest among them will be to the benefit of the BJP. So, both are keen to avoid a confrontation. That does not mean that a pre-poll alliance is in the offing. Even a mention of such an understanding will cost the Congress dear. As such, both parties are positioning themselves only for a post-poll understanding. If the Congress can wrest a respectable number of seats, it can negotiate from a vantage position. But Uttar Pradesh is the taboo word for now. Everything is ostensibly being done for the sake of floor coordination in Parliament. Mutual rivalries have harmed the Opposition no end and the Left parties seem keen to end the Congress- SJP animosity. The withdrawal of a private Bill by Mr Amar Singh proscribing Indians of foreign origin from holding any high political office in the country indicates the shape of things to come. There are many BJP-provided opportunities which can bring the former rivals together. The most significant of them is the Prevention of Terrorism Ordinance. And a close second is the controversy over the doctoring of history textbooks. |
Maoists on the rampage in Nepal The recent events in Nepal, where militancy and terrorism unleashed by Maoists have forced the Government of Nepal to declare a state of emergency in the kingdom, are extremely serious developments for the security of not only Nepal but also the entire subcontinent. The maximum adverse impact will undoubtedly be on India if the sway of the Maoists is not curbed soon. Unfortunately, on account of the preoccupation of the media with the war in Afghanistan and other related and unrelated issues and events, the full import of the tragic events in Nepal as well as their repercussions have neither been adequately highlighted nor analysed in sufficient detail. This needs to be corrected. The importance of Nepal to India cannot be overstated. Strategically located as a buffer state between two large and populous countries, India and China, both vying to be powers of consequence in the region, if not the world, Nepal’s geographic position is unenviable. Nepal is a small country, having an area of barely 141 thousand square kilometres. There is, however, great diversity in its geography. From the lowest elevation of about 600 ft in the southeastern part of the country to the highest elevation in the world on the northeastern border, Mount Everest at 29,028 ft high, the highest place in the world is only a distance of a little over 100 miles. Its northern border runs roughly along the crest of the Himalayas and the southern border lies in the Gangetic plains. The entire length of Nepal from east to west is about 500 miles and at no point is the country wider than 140 miles. Its border with China is 1236 km long and that with India longer still, 1690 km. The harsh terrain of the bulk of the country, its landlocked nature, the lack of infrastructure and inadequate communications, especially in the hinterland and a weak economy, all point to only one conclusion — an insurgency of any kind spells disaster. Nepal has already been through a catharsis only in June this year, when practically the entire lineage of Nepal royalty was wiped out in one night of horror, ostensibly by the Crown Prince himself, who perhaps did not know what he was doing. Within six months of that tragic event we see another major catastrophe unfolding itself in Nepal. The rampage by the Maoists is not new or recent. They have been active in Nepal since late 1995. However, the recent upsurge is both audacious and at a much larger scale than before. It squarely places the issue at centre-stage and is a pointer to what an uphill task it would be for the people and the Government of Nepal to bring order and harmony among the populace. Earlier this year, the Maoists had gone on a similar rampage in their strongholds in central Nepal, when they had attacked police stations and killed many policemen and civilians. At that time, the Royal Nepal Army (RNA) was not released for conducting operations against the Maoists, perhaps at the behest of the late king, the supreme commander of the RNA. The present carnage and events thereafter are much more serious. Not only have the insurgents targeted army camps and killed a large number of personnel of the RNA but also have proclaimed a parallel government and claimed that a large number of districts in western and central Nepal are fully under their control. Till the events of September 11 in the USA the prevailing view was that such actions were a manifestation of dissent against the existing governing structures and institutions, and although the use of force was condemned, some quarters tended to condone such activities on the grounds that there were sufficient reasons for the frustrations and resentment of the people and it was the callous attitude of the government which had forced them to take up arms against the state. Thus, there was a certain grudging acceptance, or at least the inevitability of such actions. The ultimate solution was seen in negotiations and the amelioration of the grievances of the population, which had made them rebel. This has substantially changed after September 11, or should change, even in our region. No one can be permitted to get away with murder on grounds of ideology, freedom or any other esoteric label which tends to be given to such actions. This is not to say that legitimate aspirations of the people should not be met, but violence and that too mindless violence of the type being perpetrated by the Maoists in Nepal must be condemned in the strongest possible terms. Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee has already emphatically and unequivocally stated early this month in the UN General Assembly that “We must firmly rebuff any ideological, political or religious justification of terrorism. We should reject self-serving arguments seeking to classify terrorism according to its root causes.” The dangers of this Maoist upsurge to the security of Nepal are clear. It is a challenge both to the constitutional monarchy as well as to the nascent parliamentary democracy in this Himalayan kingdom. Such upsurges, unfortunately, have a tendency to attract those who like to fish in troubled waters. There are already reports of support being pledged or provided by Pakistan and China through their covert organisations. Intelligence reports also hint at a developing nexus with the plethora of Indian insurgent groups, which operate in the areas adjoining Nepal. The nearer and ideologically similar are the Maoist Communist Center (MCC) and the People’s War Group (PWG), both dominant ultra left outfits, covertly operating in at least three states of India. A little further away geographically, but having congruity in the methodology of attempting to achieve their aims and objectives, however warped they be, are insurgent groups like ULFA. Such linkages do not augur well for the security of India, which is already beset with a host of insurgencies, which need both constant attention of the government and prolonged employment of the security forces. This brings us to the crucial question of how India should respond to the challenge thrown up by the Maoists of Nepal. Basically, there are only two responses. The first is what we are currently doing — pledging full support, condemning the Maoists, asking concerned state governments to “tighten” security along the border with Nepal, deploying token forces, like the SSB, knowing them to be inadequate, and hoping that the Nepalese Government would be able to somehow tackle the Maoists and win the war against them. The second option is to take a closer look at the future so that we don‘t repeat the past mistakes. The stakes of India in the current situation are very high. Nepal cannot be allowed to drift into a prolonged situation of internal turmoil. Therefore, we need to extend the maximum possible assistance to the neighbour. South Asia today is beset by a host of insurgencies — some are ideological in nature, others have political connotations and still others aspire to change the existing borders of nation-states. A recapitulation will be tantamount to a repetition of well-known facts. However, the region owes it to its people to get together against the scourge of terrorism, militancy and insurgency. India, being the largest and most powerful country of the region, has the maximum stakes and should consequently take the lead in this endeavour. Giving the lead does not mean fighting wars of other nations, but it does mean assuming a leadership role and assisting the countries beset with insurgencies or terrorism in all possible ways. These include, besides political and diplomatic support, economic assistance and material support — which means the wherewithal to deal with terrorists militarily. We do have the Treaty of Peace and Friendship with Nepal dating back to the 1950s. In recent years Nepal has sought to review the treaty and India is agreeable to it, but not much headway has been made in drafting a new treaty. Notwithstanding this, the policy of the Government of India is clear as far as terrorism is concerned; we will oppose it with all our might. There are three areas which need to be addressed to at the earliest. These are the management of the border, the release of military equipment to the RNA and raising its expertise. The Indo-Nepal border is an open one. Consequently, it lends itself to the movement of persons across the border with only some checks being conducted at both sides. The Maoists are likely to move across it with impunity whenever it suits them. India can play a major role in ensuring that such movements are kept to the bare minimum, if not eliminated altogether. Such monitoring and border management cannot be left to the state governments which do not have the resources to do so. Reports mention that the Special Subsidiary Bureau (SSB), a central police force now under the Ministry of Home Affairs, is likely to be entrusted with this task. It will be able to do so only if it is properly equipped and trained. Since it was earlier performing a different role, it will need time and training, an increase in strength and a motivated leadership to accomplish the task. The second area — the release of military equipment — is apparently already being actively pursued. The appropriate arms and equipment to fight the Maoists should be made available at the earliest while others not of immediate concern, like artillery guns and heavy engineering equipment, can follow in due course. The third and perhaps the most important area is enhancing the expertise of the RNA. The RNA is a disciplined and well-trained force, most of whose officers and some of its rank and file have been trained in various establishments of the Indian Army. However, they do not have any experience of tackling insurgency and terrorism. On the other hand, the Indian Army has a vast professional experience relating to the conduct of counter-insurgency and counter-terrorism operations. No other army in the world has such expertise and professional acumen in this field. This expertise should be shared with the RNA to the maximum. Military-to-military relations between the Indian Army and the RNA have always been close. The Indian Army used to have an Indian Army Training Team in Nepal in the fifties and the sixties. It was wound up in August, 1970, at the request of the Government of Nepal. It was apparently done under pressure from the communist lobby in the palace at that point of time. Whatever were the compulsions then the time has come to revive the arrangement. It will benefit Nepal immensely. The positioning of an Indian Army Training Team in Nepal should be undertaken as a matter of priority. The Maoist challenge needs to be met squarely by Nepal, and India must support the kingdom in all facets of this endeavour. The writer is a retired Lieut-General. |
A struggle against odds SULTANPUR-CHILKANA (SAHARANPUR): After passing by several burqa-clad women on the dusty streets of Saharanpur last weekend, one meets with an element of scepticism Rehana Adib, who has won the Rotary India award for outstanding contribution to the cause of women
empowerment. But opinion changed as Rehana recounted her 13-year-old journey marked by milestones of struggle, social ostracism, use of force by the police and false implication in half-a-dozen cases. Today this 40 year-old champion of women’s rights is looked upon as a role model by girls and women of her community. Rehana decided to free herself from the shackles of customs and taboo by defying her community’s dress code for women. By abandoning the burqa, she risked the wrath of members of her community who humiliated her father and banned his entry to the mosque. “Those were difficult times. For three years, nobody visited us. They even refused to have sweets on Id.” The year 1989 was a turning point in Rehana’s life. Married at the age of 14 into a conservative Muslim family, she was confined to the four walls of her house and led a veiled, self-forgetful existence with the burden of feeding five daughters. Rehana’s return to her father’s home in Saharanpur with her husband and children proved lucky for her. With negligible say in exercising a choice on her family size, she was carrying another child in the hope of satisfying her in-laws’ craving for a son. Around the same time, the Disha founder and Director who was looking for Muslim and Dalit facilitators for a four year long project on women empowerment, offered her a job. She took up the challenge and was entrusted the task of touring villages to educate inhabitants on a host of issues such as land reforms, equal wages for women agricultural workers, movement against alcholoism and liquor vends and gender equality. In June 1993 while spearheading an agitation in Saharanpur for the removal of a liquor vend in Pather village, Rehana was among several activists who suffered baton blows of the police and had to be hospitalised for several days. Despite police repression, the government had to accept defeat to the moral force behind the anti-liquor movement and remove the vend in question. Again, in 1997, she was injured while participating in a demonstration to express solidarity with Zeenat Naaz, the then Chairman of Nagar Panchayat in Deoband block in Eastern Saharanpur, who had been humiliated by the police. Rehana recalls how their team improvised folk songs and urged women to speak up. Persuasive messages as Tu bolegi, mooh kholegi, tabhi zamana badlega had the desired effect and provoked women to think for themselves. She started with a salary of Rs 700 and a travel allowance of Rs 300. As co ordinator of the women cell and legal aid programme, she now earns Rs 4000 and has constructed her own house. The cell counsels women in difficult circumstances and helps them seek legal redressal. For Rehana’s family, the countdown has begun for the award function scheduled in the Capital on December 13. They are thrilled with the recognition promised by the award and think that it is the most wonderful Id ‘tohfa’ their ‘ammi’ could have received. Her husband, Mukhtar Ahmed, a metal caster and children, are now deciding amongst themselves who should accompany her to the function. She will share the award money (Rs 2 lakh) with Pune-based Maharishi Karve Stree Shiksha Sanstha. Rehana’s eldest daughter, Mehraj and second daugher, Sahadab, students of Munna Lal degree college, Saharanpur, teach at adolescent education centres for Muslim girls run by DISHA. Rehana who has studied till Class IX finds literacy a key to empowerment. Her nine year-old son is enrolled in a public school. “I want all my children to be able to hold a pen,” she says. Since its inception in 1984, Disha has tried to protect the livelihood of weaker sections and challenge various kinds of social discrimination. Rehana is deeply indebted to her father, a primary school teacher, for encouraging her to change her circumstances and to Disha for contributing to her growth and capabilities. “Were it not for their support and training, I would not have been selected as a delegate for the International Women’s meet at Beijing in 1995,” she says modestly. Falsely implicated in at least seven cases on charges as running away from the police lines and attacking policemen, Rehana has to appear in court cases every now and then. Not a single month passes without a court hearing and she is fed up with keeping these dates. But December 13 is a welcome out-of-court date fixed by Rotary — a recognition of her extraordinary grit, honest sweat and toil. |
|
A new little canvas for art & literature They use small letters to write its name and call it “the little magazine”. It is anything but that. A big, beautiful magazine, using black and white contrasts, reminiscent of Guru Dutt films, to present contemporary art, literature, cinema and such hot subjects as terror has made a quite appearance, saving the country’s magazine journalism from going the Time-Newsweek way. There are no sales gimmicks, no revealing pictures of the female body, no championing of women’s causes and no tips on relationships. Nor made-up tales for the bored, urban women, neglected by busy, money-chasing husbands. And no advertisements, which is understandable. How they are going to survive is a mystery. Quite a few literary and art magazines have folded up in the recent past. Sarika in Hindi was intoxicating and keenly awaited. Parallel cinema and publications depicting it like Cinema India too went out of circulation. A whole new generation has grown up without a bedside magazine on literature and art. When Amrita Pritam shut down Nagmani, one missed her and her fan club’s literary, romantic and even sentimental outpourings on broken relationships. When Aarsee died, one thought it was the end of literary journalism in Punjabi. But Ankhi is holding out hope with his Kahani Punjab. The literary and art world badly needed a sort of platform the little magazine has provided. Remember Nirupama Dutt, the sweet-voiced Express staffer who kept the Punjabi literary scene alive with her pen-portraits of writers, is on the staff of the little magazine along with like-minded “freaks” like Pratik Kanjilal, Antara Dev Sen, Devina Dutt and Shailja Gopalan.”Freaks” because they must be a crazy lot to undertake such an expensive, but very loveable venture. Kumar Vikal, her favourite (and he wrote a poem irritatingly called “Nirupama Dutt Main Bahut Udas Hun” on her), but an over-rated Hindi poet, comes alive in the latest issue of the 114-page magazine with her translation of his two poems. Also present is Paash, a hugely talented poet lost tragically at an early age to terrorist bullets, with three poems : “War and Peace”, “Grass” and “A jail poem”. Gulzar’s four Urdu poems on riots have been translated by Devina of which my favourite pick is : “Last night the gods were tested/ Last night His houses were burned in my city”. Pakistani poet Harris Khalique also calls for a mention: “It is time to say goodbye/ to your unrequited love,/ for a people,/ their land, their sea, their river,/you thought your own”. The Sept-Oct issue is essentially devoted to terror. Folk musician Pete Seeger explains why he believes we shall overcome. The first-person tales from victims in J & K by Pamela Bhagat present the bruised psyche of the Kashmiris. But the outstanding part of the magazine, priced at Rs 75, is the visual delight provided by a deft layout and artistic illustrations that stir the imagination. The TLM team needs many more hand-holders for encouragement and survival, and the country, apart from Tarun Tejpals, such freaks.
N.S. |
Recently it was announced that the East Bengal Railway was undertaking certain schemes for facilitating the transshipment of tourists and for giving them all possible facilities over the railways. The G.I.P. Railway also was reported to be making arrangements for providing a luxury train for tourists and encouraging more visitors to travel over the railways. Much of the expenditure involved in such schemes is intended to benefit first and second class passengers — mostly coming from abroad. But what about tourists in India itself and the passengers travelling by the lower classes? India is a continent by itself whose beauties and varieties are not seen by millions of Indians who are unable to travel long distances in the absence of special concessions. Have the railways no duty to Indian tourists and no schemes to encourage travel by them?  |
|
Preparing toddlers to face the world Little boys and girls not yet two summers old can be seen being hurried to play schools to arm themselves with the right tools to face the battle ahead, the all important admission in an upmarket institution. Parents stop at nothing, be it the astronomical sum demanded as admission fee or the long distance the child has to travel everyday. They are willing to sacrifice anything. Ranjana Sharma, mother of a two-year-old boy, says: “I visited nearly five schools in South Delhi, looking for a suitable place where Saksham could spend at least three hours everyday. I did not know it would turn out to be such a tedious process. At first my priority was that the place should be close to home, but the facilities provided by the other schools were so attractive that I finally settled for one nearly 6 km away from our house.” Asked what was the need for the young one go through the rigours so early in life, Ranjana, a doctor by profession, said it was definitely due to the competitive nature of today’s generation. “The steep initial fee of Rs 21,000 notwithstanding, I think I made the right decision” she replied. It also means three hours of escape for mothers tired of the demanding routine of bringing-up baby. “A few hours for myself are sheer blissful for me,” says Asha, mother of twin daughters Sneh and Sunaina. “I feel refreshed by the time the twins are back from play-school.” For Rajesh Prothi, an executive with an MNC, the decision for a play school for his two-and-a-half-year-old son Shaswat was all important because he was determined not to fall for the gimmicks offered by them. “It was difficult to find a place where the kids are treated in the old fashioned way, with loving care, instead of rushing them from one activity to the other like zombies. I settled for ‘Jimbaroo’ at Greater Kailash after I spent the day there. The teachers are very polite and caring. In the beginning, we were encouraged to spend at least an hour everyday at the play school and after just one week Shaswat had overcome his fears and was enjoying himself.” Some parents share the view that sending children to play schools at too young an age is not such a good idea. “At two, my daughter Fiza is barely able to look after herself. She picks everything from her elder sisters. She can play games on the computer, knows many rhymes and is happy and playful all the time. I don’t want to pressurise her with school at the moment. Being so young she’s suseptible to infections and I’m sure no school can present a hygienic, warm surrounding suitable for a child so young,” she said emphatically.
ANI Internet cuts into TV-watching time A new survey suggests that the Internet is not cutting into the time people spend with their friends and families — it’s cutting into their TV-watching. Internet users watched 4.5 hours less of television a week than Americans who do not go online, according to the study, released by the University of California at Los Angeles. “Without question, Internet users are ‘buying’ some of their time to go online from the time they used to spend watching television,” said Jeff Cole, director of the UCLA Centre for Communication Policy. Internet users socialised with friends slightly more than non-users did, and they spent nearly as much time socialising with family, the study found. Users and non-users spent about the same amount of time on most household activities, like having meals and playing sports. The exception was television. Non-users spent 16.8 hours a week watching television, versus 12.3 hours for Internet users. The telephone survey of 2,006 US households was conducted from May to July. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
AP |
|||||
Violence... is like a stone dropped in a lake; the waves spread and spread; at the centre is ‘me’. As long as the ‘me’ survives in any form very subtly and grossly, there must be violence. Violence is everywhere, among the highly educated and the most primitive, among the intellectuals and the sentimentalists. Neither education nor organised religions have been able to tame man; on the contrary they have been responsible for wars, tortures, concentration camps and for the slaughter of animals on land and sea. The more he progresses the more cruel man seems to become. Violence is not only in the killing, in the bomb, in revolutionary change through bloodshed; it is deeper and more subtle. Conformity and imitation are the indications of violence; imposition and the accepting of authority are an indication of violence; ambition and competition are an expression of this aggression and cruelty, and comparison breeds envy with its animosity and hatred. Where there is conflict, inner or outer, there is the ground for violence. Division in all its forms brings about conflict and pain. The tears of mankind have not washed away man’s desire to kill.... You will cry but will educate your children to kill and be killed. — From Beyond Violence, Krishnamurti’s journal, October 10, 1973, October 17, 1973; Krishnamurti to Himself, April 26, 1983 * * * Meat is not necessary food, because a diet containing whole cereals, milk, pulses, vegetables and fruit in the right amount, and no meat, is in every way a satisfactory diet. — Dr W.R.
Aykroyd, Health Bulletin, No. 30. p.15 * * * The milk of the she-buffaloes... is not so useful in promoting the growth of intellect as a cow’s. It is due to this reason that the Aryas have always regarded the cow as the most useful animal. — Swami
Dayananda, Satyartha Prakash * * * The riches and beauty (of the youth) are like the shade of the swallow-word tree. — Sri Guru Granth Sahib, Dhanasari M 1, page 689 |
 |
| Punjab | Haryana | Jammu & Kashmir | Himachal Pradesh | Regional Briefs | Nation | Editorial | | Business | Sport | World | Mailbag | In Spotlight | Chandigarh Tribune | Ludhiana Tribune 50 years of Independence | Tercentenary Celebrations | | 121 Years of Trust | Calendar | Weather | Archive | Subscribe | Suggestion | E-mail | |
