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Saturday,
December 15, 2001, Chandigarh, India
  
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A day after the attack Sad global response Osama bin Laden tape |
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“Primary” area of darkness
Motivating ’em for self-policing
‘PM has lost the grip’
1949, Physics: HIDEKI YUKAWA
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A day after the attack There is much surprise, and even shock, in the gunbattle in the Parliament complex on Thursday. The government is surprised that after several top-level meetings and top-secret guidelines, suicide terrorists could penetrate the perimetre — the outermost — security shield without being molested. The killers were thwarted by a quick-thinking CRPF woman constable who raised the alarm and lost her life. The Delhi police, manning the second ring of security, rose to the task in a valiant manner. It lost men but saved the integrity and dignity of the nation, and the symbol of democracy of the nation. The raw courage of the men, the humble constable carrying a less lethal weapon than the attackers, has been rightly and deservedly put on record by Parliament. Even at a moment of extreme tension — in the midst of a ferocious terrorist attack — the policemen kept their cool, followed the drill and took on the intruders with confidence. If the constables had failed, the nation will have a grave crisis and a deep red face. For the present, the terrorists have been defeated. Their plans to demoralise the Indian security system with a dramatic assault and leaving massive casualties have failed. The attack on the Red Fort (in December, 2000) was a minor success; the cycle bomb outside the North Block (the Home Ministry in April this year) was a quirk of terrorism but the well-planned one on the J & K Assembly (October 1, 2001) was a serious matter as was the subsequent claim that the Parliament House in New Delhi was the next target. Islamic fundamentalist organisations, including Al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden have openly targeted this country for terrorist attacks. All this meant that security should be on high alert. But the general attitude that the top echelons know the best and of the lower ranks that sab chalta hai queers the pitch. A senior officer in any intelligence or security agency depends on inputs from the juniormost officials. Often he does not know the working of the common man’s mind. But a foot soldier is part of the common man and can assess his thinking easily and also gather information without using force. The Indian security system suffers from the deeper and rewarding involvement of the lower level officials. Something more. Thursday’s events are shocking enough and provides a platform for the opposition parties to mount an assault on the BJP-led alliance government. But the right thing to do is to demonstrate national solidarity at a moment of grave democratic peril that befits a mature democracy. The government should go out of its way to solicit opposition cooperation as the US Administration did after September 11. An audacious attack is also an opportunity and all political leaders should opt for it instead of raising hawkish demands like hot pursuit. The world is with India at this hour and the country should be in tune with global sentiments. |
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Sad global response The attack on Parliament House by a group of armed terrorists has exposed the hollowness of the global commitment to stamping out all forms of terrorism from the face of the earth. The World Trade Centre in New York was a symbol of the economic might of the USA. Likewise the Pentagon is a symbol of its military muscle. But the building that was attacked by terrorists in Delhi on Thursday is a symbol of India's nationhood. It would be a grave error to make comparisons on the basis of the scale of damage caused by acts of terrorism. It was the presence of mind of the police force that prevented the incident from assuming the dimensions of a major catastrophe. However, keeping in mind the fact that India is the largest stable and functioning democracy in the developing world, the failed attempt to cause damage to life and property within the premises of Parliament House was as serious a threat to global democracy and freedom as the attacks that destroyed the WTC and caused damage to the Pentagon building on September 11. However, the Indian leadership itself is primarily responsible for the lukewarm reaction of the global community to the December 13 incident in Delhi. It was clear as daylight that President George Bush was not impressed by India's plea for including Kashmir in the global initiative for smoking out terrorists, bring them to justice and destroying terrorist training camps. He consistently refused to look beyond Afghanistan while talking about closing ranks for stamping out terrorism from the face of the earth. With the Afghan operation on its last leg, he is now talking about Iraq as the next target. His priorities clearly do not include the situation in the subcontinent. Delhi should have been more categorical and firm in extracting a commitment that acts of terrorism in Kashmir and the North-East would receive the undivided attention of the global community after the successful conclusion of the operation in Afghanistan. It is hurtful that the global community is not willing to view the attack on India's symbol of democracy as a terrorist act. The BBC radio and television networks did not go beyond stating that the Parliament building in Delhi was stormed by a group of gunmen on Thursday. The CNN did not give more than a minute to reporting the incident. This is in sharp contrast to the coverage of the September 11, and post-September 11developments by the Indian media. Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf, understandably, spoke more or less the same language as was used by the western media in describing the incident. But the western response should have been more forthright. The western media evidently takes its cue from the official reaction to an incident of global concern. The December 13 episode has exploded the myth that the western media is more free than the media elesewhere. The indifferent global reaction to the terrorists' attempt to cause damage to India's symbol of parliamentary democracy should serve the purpose of a wake up call. The indian leadership would do well to chalk its next step for dealing with the threat to the country's security without expecting much diplomatic support from the global community. |
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Osama bin Laden tape After weeks of internal discussion and top-level assessment of various pros and cons, the Pentagon has finally released a videotape in which Osama bin Laden, in conversation with some aides and a Saudi cleric, all but owns up the September 11 attack that killed thousands in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania. The US Administration claims the tapes are "irrefutably authentic", but the rest of the world is not too sure. To that extent, the release is a big risk. On the one hand, it has reopened the wounds of the relatives of the September 11 victims and they have protested vociferously. On the other, there is a big question mark on the authenticity of the tape itself. If at all it is proved to be fake or even doctored, the USA will end up with egg on its face and its credibility will be shattered. The real mystery is as to why a man like Osama bin Laden would allow himself to go on record while he is almost boasting about a ghastly terror attack condemned in most of the civilised world. The official explanation is that the tape was found in a house in Jalalabad and was apparently meant for the benefit of his followers only, for whom the crime was a big achievement. It was not supposed to fall into US hands at all. It bears a date stamp which says that it was made on November 9, the day Mazar-e-Sharif fell to the rebel Northern Alliance. What adds credence to the claim is the fact that the Taliban operatives fled many towns in a hurry, leaving behind highly incriminating secret documents, including some "souvenirs" from an Indian Airlines plane hijacked to Kandahar in 1999. Several countries in the Arab world have alleged that either the tape was cleverly left behind by Osama bin Laden so that it would reach the USA, or it is a fake. The world is divided into three camps as far as the involvement of Osama bin Laden is concerned. One camp, comprising mostly Arab nations, thinks that he is innocent and is being wrongly hounded out by the USA. The second camp feels that he is indeed involved, but wants conclusive proof. The third (the USA and its allies) is absolutely convinced that it is Osama all the way. The release is aimed at the second segment. Indeed it is being seen as firm evidence which will stand testimony even in a court. What has shocked many is the revelation that those who commandeered the planes to the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were treated as guinea pigs by those who masterminded the strike and were informed about their suicide mission only at the very last minute. As expected the videotape has been shown all over the world repeatedly. That raises another vital question. Weeks ago, Administration officials appealed to various broadcast outlets not to air videotapes made by Osama bin Laden, fearing they might contain coded messages to his followers to carry out further strikes. How come that precaution is not being taken this time? What is the guarantee that this tape does not have any secret messages? Does the change of official policy have anything to do with the fact that the previous tape was in favour of Osama and this one is against? |
“Primary” area of darkness Great news, at last, for the millions of not-at-school children of India. More than half a century after Independence and four decades after the unmet Constitutional deadline for universal primary education, elementary schooling is about to become a Fundamental Right: What this would mean immediately of course is a transfer of this obligation from Part IV to Part III of the Constitution, that is, from being a Directive Principle of State Policy to being a Fundamental Right. In other words, whereas the Principles are ordained to be “fundamental in the governance of the country” and “it shall be the duty of the State to apply these principles”, the provisions in Part IV, unlike the Fundamental Rights in Part III, “are not enforceable by any court”. Under the 93rd amendment now free and compulsory primary education becomes a justiciable fundamental right. What does this imply? That I, a marginal farmer or landless labourer or one of the millions of destitutes in this country, can now go to the Supreme Court because there is no school in or anywhere near my village, and thereby expect and get due relief? In theory, yes; in practice, no. It is one thing to have “the right to move the Supreme Court... for the enforcement of the (fundamental) rights” and vastly another, in fact virtually impossible, for the teeming masses to be able to do so. While a closer analysis of the 93rd amendment requires its detailed study, going by what has been said and written about it in the media, this eye-catching legislation is likely to go down, like most similar laws adopted over the years, as a gimmick which promises a lot but delivers little. A perusal of the concerned Directive Principle and the reported provisions in the 93rd amendment underlines this probability, and worse. Article 45 laid down that “The State shall endeavour to provide for free and compulsory education for all children until they complete the age of 14 years”. This directive was to bring about universal primary education within a period of 10 years from the commencement of the Constitution, that is, by January 1960. Needless to point out, the State simply did not endeavour enough or, rather, did not endeavour honestly, to meet the deadline, so that even many decades later there are more children out of school than ever before. How the long missing endeavour will suddenly materialise just because primary education will now be a Fundamental Right is impossible to fathom. After all, it is not a question of gazette notification or of merely expressing good intentions; involved in realising this fundamental right is an ocean of actions: to set up literally millions of schools, construct buildings, find and appoint qualified teachers, pay their salaries, provide all the plethora of tools and facilities necessary for imparting education, etc. The State will need a magic wand to bring this about in a reasonable period of time. Since such a wand is nowhere in sight, what the situation requires apart from sufficient funds for the purpose and even more crucially, is political will and administrative determination. It is precisely this that has been starkly conspicuous by its absence in the State’s effort in this regard over the past half century, with the demonstrable result of an education structure that is more a shambles than a system. It has been described variously, and correctly in every case, as an inverted pyramid (expanding on top and precarious in foundation), a Curate’s egg (good only in parts and, therefore, no good on the whole), a service which has for all practical and progressive purposes bypassed the poorest sections. Never mind generation after generation of children who have never stepped inside a school, those who do enrol don’t stay on for a variety of genuine reasons. According to the fifth all-India education survey conducted by the NCERT some years ago (and nothing has materially changed since), barely 50 per cent of primary schools have four walls and a roof; the rest “study” in sheds or tents or open spaces! Another authoritative survey revealed tens of thousands of schools without any teaching aids, without even blackboards (and many which have blackboards but no chalk:). It also told us about any number of schools without teachers or with ill-trained ill-paid teachers, most of whom themselves have not sudied till even class X, and about schools where, for lack of space and teachers, all children in the 6-14 age group are clubbed in one class. Can this be any sane person’s definition of education? Those who believe things will change radically as a result of the 93rd amendment would be well advised to banish the thought. The legislation does not assure the right to education as education is understood the world over. It gives this right “in such manner as the State may, by law, determine”. The character of this determination remains to be seen but going by the dimensions of the problem and the experience of how it has been dealt with so far, the prospect of entire chunks of the child population being relegated to what are called parallel streams of education seems dismally bright. This could take the form of the rather notorious concept of informal education or it could even mean teaching children through correspondence — teaching six-year-olds to read and write through written instructions!” If this be the intent, it indicates renunciation of the obligation of ensuring a certain minimum quality of education, thereby also perpetuating violation of the principle of equality. As if this is not deplorable enough, the new legislation is said to link the fundamental right to primary education with a fundamental duty of parents to send their children to school and, incredibly, “provide opportunities for education”. The first part of the proposed parental duty reflects a total and, one is constrained to say, wilful disregard of the ground situation. It suggests that parents do not send their children to school because of some perverse curssedness. The reality is abject poverty and, therefore, the need to earn whatever the child can wherever and howsoever, the need for help in fields and small household enterprises, or the need for (the girl child) looking after siblings at home, or simply the lack of a school in reasonable vicinity — in making the demand it does of parents, the government appears to dismiss out of hand these and other compelling reasons why huge numbers of children are not sent to school in this country. But it is not only that parents must send their children to school; they are to provide the opportunities for education”. What does this mean? That providing such opportunities is no longer the responsibility of the State but a legal obligation of the parents? If this is indeed what it means, it deserves to be resolutely opposed. I will be happy if this interim critique proves baseless in the light of whatever follow-up action is taken consequent to the 93rd amendment. But my basic criticism pertains to the very act of bringing forth such a legislation. As in combating the host of other grave deficiencies and infirmities plaguing our country, the cause of universal primary education is not merely a matter of laws and has in any case not suffered for lack of them. What can be a more fundamental right than the right to life, and yet people die of starvation in this country! Just what will this great act of making six years of schooling a fundamental right achieve? No other country has done this — not the capitalist USA, not the welfarist Sweden, not even socialist Cuba. Some countries like China have made schooling compulsory, but none to my knowledge has made it a fundamental right. These and other countries that have achieved universal or near-universal schooling simply set up the required number of schools and the required support systems and let individual and societal good sense do the rest. Do we need threats or imagined threats of justiciable rights and duties to do what any sensible and sensitive government should do on its own? Will new laws or a constitutional amendment make up for the lack of honesty, determination and, above all, political will that has characterised governmental effort in the field of primary education all these years? |
Motivating ’em for self-policing Three years ago on my return to the Delhi Police after an experience of prison management, I was posted as Joint Commissioner of Police (Training). I saw some striking similarities in both my postings. Both were very focused. In prison, I was dealing with prisoners and the prison staff. In police training, I was to deal with police officers as trainers and the trainees. To my surprise both the organisations were sulking. They were accusatorial and full of suppressed anger. Both were blaming others for whatever happened to them. Prisoners used to blame their friends, parents, relatives, the police, courts, complainants, witnesses, poverty, unemployment, exploitation, injustice, drug intake etc. The prison staff was unhappy due to the absence of promotional opportunities and their own security. They were blaming their seniors and their departmental policies. They were even accusing the prisoners for being violent, uncouth, illiterate, abusive and criminal behaviour. In the police, the police trainers said, I recall their words, “Madam, we are in a non-sensitive posting when I should have been an SHO”. “I have been wrongly sent here”. “I am here because I could neither pay nor pull strings as some of my colleagues could”. “Some of our friends are forever SHOs and some are never near it”. “Madam, now when I shake hands with my friends on my letting them know that I am in the Police Training School their hand shake sags — In fact the hand just limps”. Hearing all this, I realised the destructive effect the label “Non-sensitive posting” was having on many police officers. I wondered which police unit can be non-sensitive? If so, then why should it have been there in the first place? The trainers did have a justified grouse since police training schools fall in the category of non-sensitive units (armed battalions are others, to name a few). Unfortunately, this is the way the system is and nobody has yet either questioned it or attempted to change it. I thought to myself that when the trainers were basically disgruntled for justified or not justified reasons, what kind of teachers or supervisors would they be and in what way would they educate or administer here? Since now they are trainers and managers, how would they motivate the trainees? What message would they give to the new entrants? They needed positive, humane and just attitude to apply their skills. They also needed professional discipline. Who would teach them if the teachers themselves were not interested or the learning environment is non-existent. It’s on this understanding and assessment of reality prevailing at the Police Training College three years ago that I proposed one of the many remedies to this “deprivation”. The remedy was an offer of a programme which would help them scientifically understand themselves of what is going wrong and why? Who is responsible? Is the entire blame always outside the individual? What can one do to correct one’s own situation? It self-help possible? The scientific remedy was the technique of meditation called Vipassanan, which means to “look at oneself in a special way”. This is ancient Indian wisdom known to our seers and sages but which got lost for many centuries to be rediscovered by Gautama, the Buddha. It is through the practice of Vipassana that Gautama, the Prince became the Buddha. When I suggested this, the police trainers were very apprehensive and equally curious. Not different from what had happened as an initial reaction in Tihar prisons on the introduction of Vipassana for prisoners and members of the staff. But this time I told my police colleagues that I will personally do the course with the police trainers. And this is how the first course took place in the Police Training College in January 1999. The first ever to be held in a police training institute in India or anywhere else in the world. We all senior trainers completed the course. After the course was over it seems the trainers i.e. we police officers, got many answers. We shared these publicly before hundreds of our own trainees comprising young Sub-Inspectors and constables, besides colleagues. One of the senior officers who was amongst the meditators admitted before all his students that he was an alcoholic and he realised it was wrong. The senior police officers (same ones who talked of insensitive units and the hand limping) now motivated their police students to take the course. And the students responded with great enthusiasm and went on to do the courses. No wonder over 5,000 police officers men and women in the Delhi Police have till date, done the courses. Last fortnight the Delhi Police Training College completed its 17th course of Vipassana in which 1285 police recruits participated. What all did they say you will get to read in the next fortnight of “Reflections”. But all of them did travel a long distance in “self-policing”. (To be concluded) |
‘PM has lost the grip’ On a dark, wintry Delhi evening last week I went to meet Ram Jethmalani. With chaos in Parliament over Kargil coffins and POTO and with the political atmosphere in this very political city polluted with whispers that the Prime Minister no longer cares what happens to the BJP after him — apres moi, le deluge — I was keen to get the views of someone who knows Atal Behari Vajpayee well and has been part of his government. The house the famed lawyer and ex-minister inhabits is vast and ministerial. So I found myself wandering through a maze of doors that had me stumble first into his daughter Rani’s office, through another maze that led through a foggy garden and a dark kitchen, into a lighted drawingroom and then with Rani’s help into Mr Jethmalani’s small office filled with intimidating legal tomes. He sat behind a big desk covered in files and looked harassed and irritated. He had planned, he said, to go to the Rajya Sabha that afternoon where a discussion on the Tehelka issue had been listed but Parliament had, yet again, been disrupted. How can anything be debated or discussed until Parliament is allowed to function? His interest in the Tehelka matter is not just political but based on his decision to appear before the Venkatswamy Commission on behalf of Shankar Sharma whose company, First Global, was the main investor in Tehelka.com. As this column reported earlier Sharma’s business and his life have been virtually destroyed because the government decided to make him the villain of the piece. The persecution of Sharma and his wife, Devina Mehra, disturbs Ram. “I went to the Prime Minister and the Home Minister and told them that what was going on with the Sharmas had not happened to anyone even during the Emergency. They have been prevented from travelling abroad on the ground that they may default on tax payments but big tax defaulters are routinely allowed to travel abroad. He is unable to do any business, his life has been taken away from him. This is wrong, very wrong.” So why did he think these things were happening? How was the government functioning in this way? “Not being an insider (since July, 2000) I don’t know the internal workings of it so I can only tell you what I see as a perceptive citizen. I believe that there is no central control, the Prime Minister has completely lost his grip on things”. There was, he added ruminatively, no commitment left to the NDA manifesto for change, no commitment to governance. The only agenda seemed to be political survival. The government seemed to be totally isolated from public opinion. Ram was ousted from the Vajpayee government and he remains bitter about this. He believes that he was doing well as a Minister in both the portfolios he held and reminds me that although Urban Development was not for him an area of expertise he had made a serious effort to understand the nuances of his portfolio and had come up with an agenda for change. He concentrated his attention on public housing and believes that it was his influence that had caused the Finance Minister to set aside a huge amount in his first budget for the purposes of building housing for the poor. He had also worked towards the repeal of the Urban Land Ceiling Act — one of the main reasons why there is such a dearth of housing in our cities — but it had all been to no avail. “Just when I was beginning to get somewhere I was shifted — for no particular reason — to the Law Ministry where really I should have been in the first place.” Law being his area of interest and expertise it was easier for him to start a process of reform but once again he was removed before there was time for the changes he was bringing to take effect. He believes that the main reason for his removal was because of his clash with the Chief Justice and continues to believe that he was in the right and should have been supported by the government. So does he think the government will fall? Does he think it should fall? No, he says, because there is no alternative that is worth considering. It could be a case of going “from the frying pan into the fire”. Does he believe that there is anything good that the Vajpayee government has done, I ask, expecting him to echo the general view that says nothing at all. But, here, he hesitates and after pondering over the question for a moment, says that he thinks it started well. He thinks that it was right for India to go publicly nuclear because although we may still be no match for a combined China and Pakistan we have at least made it clear that we are strong enough to defend ourselves. He thinks there were other things that began well — the repeal of the Urban Land Ceiling Act, disinvestment of the public sector which he believes is necessary if the government is ever to liquidate our public debt whose servicing alone eats up 75 per cent of the government’s revenues. His assessment, in short, is that although the government began with good intentions and fine ideas it has somehow lost its way and has little will left to bring about change of any kind. It is a perception that far too many political observers in Delhi share for the Prime Minister. Delhi is a city in which rumours are easily believed and the one currently doing the rounds is that the Prime Minister and Sonia Gandhi have come to some sort of arrangement. He knows that the BJP will not win the next general election and she knows that she will ruin whatever chances she has of victory if she is seen once more to be toppling a government needlessly. So, according to the rumour, they have agreed that she will not disturb his government and he will help her in whichever way he can. The recent sacking of her meddlesome, sister-in-law Maneka from the Ministry of Culture is seen by many as proof of this arrangement. In the eighty days that Maneka was Minister she uncovered evidence of scams in the name of culture in which her sister-in-law seemed involved. This annoyed Sonia, or so they say, so she went off to complain to her new friend, Vajpayee, and shortly after his meeting Maneka was given the marching orders. Whether this is true or not, there is a perceptible change in Delhi’s political atmosphere. It manifests itself in the increasing importance of Sonia and the declining importance of the Prime Minister. It also manifests itself in the increasing credibility of the opposition parties and this became clear last week when they disrupted Parliament yet again but seemed for the first time to have public sympathy on their side. The Prime Minister needs to worry about this change. |
Allahabad  |
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Whenever man realises God he realises Him within himself. He cannot be realised in mountains, forests, idols and places of pilgrimage, nor in scriptures and holy books.... It is only after realising Him within, that one begins to see Him everywhere. *** Man will realise god only when he has reached the Third Eye. This is accomplished by first withdrawing all the consciousness from the body, upto the eye centre, and then taking it up by means of shabad or Nam (the Word or the Audible Life stream). Nam itself can be obtained only from an Adept... *** There is no salvation without Nam, no Nam without a Master, and neither is possible without the Grace of God. So first comes the Grace of God, second that of the Sat Guru (the holy preceptor), third the initiation into Nam and last but not the least, the effort of the disciple. — Maharaj Jagat Singh,
The Science of the Soul *** Answer a fool according to his folly. *** As a dog returns to his vomit, so a fool returns to his folly. *** Who so digs a pit shall fall therein. *** Boast not thyself of tomorrow; for thou know not what a day may bring forth. *** Let another man praise thee, and not thine own mouth. *** Open rebuke is better than secret love. *** Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful. *** To the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet. *** Better is a neighbour that is near than a brother far off. *** ...the righteous are bold as a lion. — The Bible: Proverbs, XXV, 27; XXVI, 5, 11, 27; XXVII I, 2,5,6,7,10; XXVIII, 20, 27;
XXIX, 11, 23 |
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