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Monday,
December 17, 2001, Chandigarh, India  
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Time for total unity Relief for ex-detainees
Afghanistan: third time lucky? |
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Divali gift
General Aurora recalls ’71 war Older women lead a miserable life Girls defy hurdles to pursue education
1950, Literature: BERTRAND RUSSELL
Can there be two time zones for India?
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Time for total unity A crisis, as the Chinese say, is both an opportunity and a time for recrimination. The December 13 terrorist attack on the Parliament complex was one such in recent years. All political parties are resorting to recrimination rather than showing an exemplary sense of unity. Unity is the prime need, and the political parties should put their heads together and galvanise the people behind the security forces in smoking out the terrorist elements now and in future. The idea is to involve every Indian — in whatever way, minor or major — in the task of fighting the menace of terrorism and not identify himself as belonging to this political party or that, to this linguistic group or region or the other. That is a sign of maturity. And India has sadly failed in this. Every political group is trying to use the horrifying attack to gain petty political mileage. All opposition parties want to project the BJP-led alliance government as incapable of safeguarding national security and thereby debunk the rationale behind POTO. The Opposition has not sought an in-camera meeting with the government to thrash out a common strategy on the post-attack situation. It is waiting for an invitation instead of demanding one. It forgets that it is an essential part of the system, of which the government is just a part and, more importantly, the terrorist attack was against the system and not merely on the government. The hawks in the BJP — and they are many — are using the audacious attack on the Parliament complex to revive their old agenda of hot pursuit. Their masochism ignores the complicated Indo-Pakistan and international situation. Any attack on terrorist training camps across the Line of Control (LoC) will be misread as an Indian attempt at weakening the global resolve to liquidate international terrorism. The ideal thing is to use the December 13 assault as part of the Al-Quaeda-ISI network’s designs to wreck the democratic set-up and strengthen religious fundamentalism. This will immensely influence world opinion and bring in rich diplomatic dividends. What all this means is that the government should lead the nation and not merely fight the Opposition. The simple fact is that there are proven talents outside the alliance and it is the government’s obligation to tap them in the national interest. Today when the two Houses of Parliament meet there is going to be turmoil which was briefly interrupted by the terrorist attack and the weekend, and it is the responsibility of all to prevent it. Every MP should refresh his memory of what US law-makers did after the September 11 terrorist attack in New York and Washington. They simply pledged total support to the Bush Administration in whatever it decided to do. That was an expression of national unity unsurpassed since the British citizens rallied round Winston Churchill’s promise of more blood, more tears and more sacrifice at the beginning of World War II. |
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Relief for ex-detainees It takes time to realise and right the wrongs committed in the heat of the moment. But it has taken the Punjab Government unduly long — about 10 years — to compensate some 300 persons who were detained in Jodhpur jail after Operation Bluestar in 1984. Some may even question the very decision of the Punjab Government, taken about a week ago when Mr Parkash Singh Badal was hospitalised in New Delhi due to a thigh bone fracture, to grant Rs 1 lakh compensation to each of the detainees since they had been accused by the Punjab Police of waging a war against the state. But the Punjab Government takes the plea that they were innocent since the CBI, which had investigated their cases and filed a charge sheet, had later withdrawn it and the detainees were released after they had spent seven long years in prison. Earlier in September this year, the state government had waived the loans amounting to Rs 12 crore advanced to these former detainees between 1990 and 1992 for the purchase of transport vehicles under a self-employment scheme. A major part of the loan amount, that is, Rs 8.7 crore, was given out by the Punjab Finance Corporation. The rest of the burden has been borne by the state government. The Jodhpur Rehabilitation Committee had pursued their case and finally secured them compensation, even if delayed. But has justice been done? The key point in this is: were the detainees innocent? Since the operation took place on the occasion of martyrdom day of Guru Arjan Dev, a large number of devotees had gone to pay their obeisance at the Golden Temple. If those detained at Jodhpur were innocent, going by the withdrawal of the CBI charge sheet, then the amount of compensation is too meagre, given the long detention during which they could not pursue their education and, as a result, became handicapped for life, apart from wasting a major part of their youth in ,jail. The relief is not enough to meet the ends of justice, but a gesture to atone the state’s guilt feeling. But if they were guilty of committing crimes they had been charged with, such relief then is uncalled for. There are policemen, accused of committing excesses during the days of militancy, now facing the law. They would have a reason to feel bitter at such a gesture. The guilty, whether acting on behalf of the state or against it, should not go unpunished. The state authorities should not only act, but also appear to act, without favouring anyone on the wrong side of the law. |
Afghanistan: third time lucky? It has been often said that Afghanistan has been ruined by tribal rivalries, ethnic antagonisms, and clash of egos between irresponsible regional warlords. But this is less than half the truth, because Afghanistan has been laid waste much more by the imperial ambitions of its neighbours and by the half a century-long Cold War between the two super powers. Britain and Czarist Russia fought over Afghanistan for much of the 19th and 20th centuries. The Soviet Union marched its army into Afghanistan as part of its Cold War with America, and the latter retaliated by hugely arming any rag-tag Afghan militia that would agree to turn upon the Soviet
Union. While Iran played a small part on behalf of the Shias in the north-western fringe of Afghanistan, Pakistan weighed in massively by arming Afghani Pathans in the service of General Zia’s dream of establishing an Empire of God, extending right up to the Soviet borders. He ended up ruining the country by exploiting its ethnic animosities. Thus finished the first chance that post-Soviet Afghanistan had of building up a wide-based, representative and independent government of its own. As the Cold War between the two super powers subsided, Afghanistan got another chance to have a stable and independent government. But this ended in an even more costly failure. Learning little from President Zia’s failure, Pakistan refused to recognise that it would be in Pakistan’s own interests to help Afghanistan to learn to live with its ethnic diversity. Instead it tried to impose upon Afghanistan the monolithic rule of its most backward and most divided community, the Pathan tribes of Kandahar, and Afghanistan had to suffer its most barbaric and primitive regime. Both Pakistan and Afghanistan have paid a heavy price for that blunder. Afghanistan first became the breeding ground of the worst terrorist movement the world has ever known, and then suffered the devastating global war against terrorism. Pakistan has exposed itself to a degree of Pathan irredentism which can shatter the country. Now history has given Afghanistan its third opportunity, and the big question is whether the country will be third time lucky. Many things are in its favour this time, and it is best to go over these first. The most important is that the external environment now favours Afghanistan more than at any time. For some time to come the USA and Russia are unlikely to fight each other over Afghan territory or for military control over the country. The interest of each is likely to be limited to ensuring that the other does not block it out of the oil wealth of the region. But most of it lies outside the borders of Afghanistan, and to the extent that Kabul can control access to it, it can use this advantage to checkmate one claimant against the other. On the other hand if the two agree over routes of pipes, some transit charges can give valuable revenue to Afghanistan. On a wider scale, the United Nations has also shown sympathetic understanding of Afghan sensitivities, and the leaders of the United Front popularly known as the Northern Alliance have responded in kind. At one time they were touchy enough to ask Britain to seek Kabul’s permission before sending any more forces to protect and rebuild Balgram airfield. It was feared they might become as adamant if a United Nations peacekeeping force were imposed upon them. But the procedure evolved in Bonn has smoothed those feathers by leaving room for the new government in Kabul to invite the UN to send a force mandated by the Security Council. There is some unhappiness in Iran and Uzbekistan, and the Uzbek commander, Dostum, has declined to join the interim government for Afghanistan. But these signals are less worrisome than some contrary ones are reassuring. In the first place as soon as the Bonn agreement became public the Iranian Cabinet met in a special session and accorded approval to it. In the second place, a wild card though he may yet be, Dostum has given public assurances that even if he did not join the future government he would not oppose it. Now the problem has been put in abeyance for some months by leaving it to the loya jirga to chose a somewhat longer term government, perhaps six months hence. Pakistan may still try to fish in troubled waters if dissentions persist in Afghanistan, particularly if a substantial number of armed Taliban have, as suspected, melted into the Afghan population. But that number is unlikely to be large, and in using them Pakistan is unlikely to have the main advantage it had earlier, the huge pile of weapons left behind by America so thoughtlessly and the wanton disregard it showed when Pakistan began to arm the Taliban with this arsenal. And American myopia about Pakistan would have to be much worse than it is known to be for it to disregard all the evidence dug up by the New York Times to prove that the Pakistan army’s support for the Taliban was deep, continued to be so till very recently, and included secret airlifting of Pakistan officers who had worked with the Taliban, had been captured by the Alliance, and had been lodged in the prison at Mazar-e-Sharif. But the biggest difference between the two chances lost by Afghanistan earlier and its present opportunity is internal to Afghanistan : the quality of the Afghan leadership then and now. The main figures which have emerged this time are superior, in fact as well as in image. They may not have the charisma of Ahmad Shah Masood, nor the image of anti-Soviet and Islamic fervour pinned in the 1980s by some western and Pakistani media upon the eastern Pathan leader, Hikmatyar. But many of today’s Afghan leaders, like Mr Qanooni, Dr Abdullah Abdullah, Mr Karzai, and Mr Fahim are young, educated, modern minded, articulate and, above all, willing to narrow their differences in a common cause, and the best among King Zahir Shah’s men brought a welcome breath of the outside world to the deliberations in Bonn as well as in Kabul. The consequences were there for all to see. The Alliance was able to steer Bonn to a moderate course against the imposition of King Zahir Shah as a puppet regime much favoured by America, against the imposition of a peacekeeping force independent of the Alliance government on the one hand and the UN on the other, against the ban desired by America upon Alliance forces either entering or remaining in Kabul. This positive contribution of the Alliance was acknowledged, more than once, by none less than Mr Rumsfeld of the USA who was best able to see them from his overall command post. He complimented them for the restraint they showed in the areas controlled by them, and the peace they were able to establish soon in Kabul. He also protected the Alliance against the charge of the human rights brigade that the Alliance had slaughtered war prisoners in a jail near Mazar-e-Sharif. He confirmed the “prisoners” were armed Taliban soldiers. Similarly the UN Representative for Afghanistan, Mr Lakhdar Brahimi, has explained how the problem of getting the consent of the Northern Alliance for sending a UN peacekeeping force to Afghanistan was resolved at the Bonn conference. The Alliance clearly had the support of Russia on this issue and if it had persisted in disallowing any unilateral action by the UN a deadlock could have ensued. But as a spokesman for Mr Brahimi explained in Islamabad on December 11, the Bonn Agreement records that “the Afghan parties have asked the Security Council to consider the early deployment of such a force…. Nothing will be imposed upon the Afghans, so it is going to be done in full cooperation and collaboration with the Afghan administration of the day.” But not all dangers are over yet. To take the internal first: the worst hangover from the Taliban phase of Afghan politics is not the increased salience of Pathans but the multi-layered flux of loyalties within the southern Pathans, of Kandahar, and their differences with the eastern Pathans, of Jalalabad. Such fleeting loyalties can easily play into the hands of those who are going to have large amounts of money to spend in the name of the reconstruction of Afghanistan. This will only prove once again that it is as easy to subvert Afghanistan as it is difficult to conquer it, and among those who have shown some anxiety about it is the Deputy Director of the Carnegie Centre in Moscow of the Washington-based Carnegie Endowment for Peace. He said recently, “The most important lock on the international community is aid money.” Wider afield are the continuing uneasiness in Moscow over American intentions in Central Asia, and the persistent differences between America and Russia over the expansion of NATO, and America’s reported decision to abandon ABM and to opt for NMD. But on the whole the good signs for Afghanistan are more weighty for the present than ever before, and outweigh the bad omens. |
Divali gift “I
would accept a gift if it is reasonable, if it is big I would not. One needs to look at the practice of giving Divali gifts from the Indian cultural perspective rather than saying in general that receiving of gifts by government servants is corruption.” You guessed it. Who else but the self-same dyed in the drool, sorry wool, bureaucrat could proffer such risible rationalisation ? Should not liberalisation like charity begin at home ? Charity sees the need, not the cause, believe Germans. So do we. And if the highest exercise of charity is charity towards the uncharitable, so what. Better give than have to give. Said Seneca. Right. No, wrong. You believed what you want to believe. It was none other than our valiant Vittal, Chief Vigilance Commissioner, becoming who pronounced that the ceiling of Rs 500 on acceptable gifts was ridiculously low. But while recommending for an upward revision, the watchful Vittal took pains to emphasise the need for defining the “influence index” of a particular gift. An admirable attempt at acculturation. Keeping up with the Joneses. Keep it up. Lost in thought, yours truly travelled 16 years back in time to the Mussoorie Academy days. It was the guest speaker M.J. Akbar at his boiling best. The discussion digressed to corruption. He related a casual conversation between Haji Mastan, a top smuggler of his times, and the contemporary Chief Minister of Maharashtra, at a social get-together which Akbar said he partook in. Q. What is your annual budget for the Maharashtra police ? A. ‘X’ crores of rupees. Q. Mine is ‘X’ plus hundred crores. Tell me where shall their loyalty lie ? Lo, a furore, followed by a walkout. So much for the “influence index.” It is in tune with the times we live in that the progressive Punjab government having failed to find the “most honest officer” about four years ago, dolefully decided to abandon both the award of Rs 1 lakh and the search for the most endangered of the species. The more “catholic” among the cousins reasoned that such an award to anyone of them would impugn the honour of the rest and diminish their standing in the public eye ! An honest government servant can at best be a cartoonist’s delight. Or derision ? An eminent cartoonist once caricatured him thus: He is an honest officer. How he manages to live within his known sources of income needs to be thoroughly investigated by CBI ! Be it as it may, let the honest man at least get some credit, if not cash. But I am worried about the return gift which the givers would expect soon. If this is trade, then what else is Divali for ? Happy Divali, belatedly. |
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General Aurora recalls ’71 war The military hero of the 1971 war that resulted in freedom for Bangladesh has said the “turning point” came after Indian troops crossed the Meghna river even though the Pakistanis had blown up a strategic bridge. “We knew the Pakistani forces would destroy bridges. They thought they had cut us off after they blew up a bridge over the Meghna river. But we took them by surprise and crossed it at night with the help of the local people. “That was the turning point,” reminisced Lt. Gen. (retired) Jagjit Singh Aurora, the chief of the Indian Army’s Eastern Command, who secured the surrender of the Pakistani forces in Bangladesh. On December 16, 1971, Dhaka, the capital of what was then East Pakistan, fell to the Indian Army, leading to the liberation of Bangladesh. It broke up Pakistan and transformed the geopolitical situation in the subcontinent. Three decades later, the brisk two-week campaign, the third India-Pakistan war since independence, is still fresh in the mind of General Aurora. “In 1971, West Pakistanis were being tough on their own people, the East Pakistanis, whose land it was,” General Aurora, now 87, told IANS. “So the Indian military campaign against West Pakistan was not so much a war as a liberation movement.” Recalling events that led to the breakout of war, General Aurora said: “Wanting a greater say in their government, the East Pakistanis forced (Pakistan President) Yahya Khan to call elections. Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, a popular leader, got maximum votes. But Khan sent Rahman to jail provoking a rebellion. “Pakistan brought in enough forces from the west to control the east. But young East Pakistanis formed the ‘Mukti Bahini (Liberation Army)’. The Indian government began helping them after many people (10 million) fled to India. “We realised this illegal migration could pose a big problem and so asked (Yahya) Khan to act. But he showed no interest in resolving the issue. He eventually lost his temper and carried out air strikes on Indian airfields.” The third India-Pakistan war began on December 3, 1971, after Pakistani aircraft struck several airfields in northern India. Fierce fighting soon broke out involving all the three forces in both the eastern and western sectors. “We did not want to be the first to strike, so this suited us. When the army Chief called me up to break the news, I told him, ‘Let us get going but keep a bottle of whiskey for me to drink to Yahya Khan when the war gets over’.” As Pakistani forces fortified eastern wing towns, Lieut-General Amir Abdullah Khan Niazi, who commanded Pakistan’s Eastern Command, boasted he would take the battle inside India. Attacks in the western sector betrayed this strategy. But the war was over in two weeks as the Indian Army overran East Pakistan, taking 93,000 prisoners. A resigned Niazi signed the instrument of surrender with General Aurora on December 16, 1971, at Dhaka. General Aurora said smart strategies were responsible for the Indian victory. “Pakistan did not have enough forces to defend its eastern wing. Secondly, most East Pakistanis opposed the west’s rule. This helped us train the Mukti Bahini.” The Indian Army offensive soon cut off forces in East Pakistan from West Pakistan, coercing it to surrender. “I was a happy man. I knew that I had him (Niazi) there. He asked for peace. West Pakistanis had also sent a message through the U.S. that they want to surrender. I sent Niazi the surrender documents. The rest is history.” Although the 1971 combat was the last full-fledged war between the South Asian neighbours, their ties have not improved since.
IANS
India has more elderly women than men because they tend to live longer, but the life of most women over age 60 is one of misery. Most elderly women are widows and also poor, and are forced to depend on relatives for a living. A vast majority of them are unable to remarry because of social constraints. “Social constraints, superstitions and social practices keep them away from remarriage while poverty, unemployment and illiteracy threaten their survival,” says Asha Das, a former Secretary in the Social Justice and Empowerment Ministry. India is home to 76 million elderly, most of them women. Das said: “Elder women are more vulnerable than males as they have no access to economic resources despite statutory laws and provisions. Gender based discrimination makes life more painful and unbearable for an old woman.” Life expectancy in India has risen to 64 years now from 42 in 1951-60. The population of the elderly in India, which today stands at about seven per cent of the total, will balloon to around 13 per cent by 2025.
IANS |
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Girls defy hurdles to pursue education Twelve years of insurgency have not been able to dampen the pro-education spirit of the girls in Udhampur region of Jammu and Kashmir. They are determined to study and establish an identity of their own despite hilly terrains, vast distances, lack of infrastructure and above all, terrorist activities. Rita, who goes to a school located rather far from her residence, agrees that distance is definitely a problem. On top of it, there is the constant possibility of coming under attacks on their way to the institution. This is why the girls always travel in groups. “I walk 8 km everyday to attend school. My parents say that education is must for me. We always walk in groups because we are scared of being attacked,” she said. The government should, according to her, think of developing the necessary infrastructure to smoothen their journey to education. Another girl, Rita Devi, said: “I have left Poonch and have come to Udhampur because we can’t study due to militancy.” But statistics reveal a drastic fall in the number of girl students when they move from lower grades to the higher. It’s 28,475 in the middle school and 10,979 in the high school. Asked what could cause such a swift decrease at this level, Mr BL Jain, Education Minister, said, “Higher secondary schools for females are only 12 in number, whereas there are 39 middle schools and 353 primary schools. But primary schools can be found in remote villages also, while higher studies the girls have to be sent to far-off places. This being a hill area, the parents are reluctant to send their daughters anywhere far away from home. As such the girls have to abandon their studies after the primary level.” The Udhampur region is divided into 18 education zones. However, the administration is now formulating schemes like Rahghar-e-Talim, which will enable the pupils to study at home with the ministry making the necessary in-house arrangements, so that terrorism does not play the spoilsport. The schools have instituted committees to facilitate discussions between parents and the authorities on associated problems. Eight hundred such panels have come up in the state. The minister also informed that “we provide free uniform and textbooks to the primary school children.” The government should now think of ways to prevent militancy coming in the way of the education of these little girls.
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Can there be two time zones for India? After debating for almost 50 years, the authorities have started examining whether there can be two time zones for the country so that people in the East and West get an equal share of sunlight while working. Currently, India has one time zone. Time in the country is five and a half hours ahead of the Greenwich time which is taken as world standard. Indian Standard Time is based on local time in the city of Mirzapur in Uttar Pradesh and the time there is the standard for all places in the country. But the country occupies two time zones with some parts seeing an early sun rise and the others experiencing late sun rise. As the work timings are same for the entire country, people have been debating that to save energy consumption and put sun energy to maximum use, the country should have two time zones, Prof V.S. Ramamurthy, Secretary, Department of Science and Technology, said. Besides, there have been such demands by some industries too, Ramamurthy said, adding another way of maximising the energy use could be to have different office timings. There have been different opinions in the country on the issue, he added.
PTI Gene therapy helps sickle cell patients Researchers using a gutted AIDS virus and a custom-made gene have said they have corrected sickle cell anaemia in mice and that the approach holds promise for people. If so, gene therapy could be used to treat one of the most common genetic diseases. But the researchers, who published their findings in the journal Science, have said they are a long way from trying the approach in people. Sickle cell disorders are most common in people of African, Mediterranean, Indian and Middle Eastern descent, and one in every 13 African-Americans carries the sickle cell gene. It is recessive, meaning a person has to get two copies of the gene to get the disease, so about one in 450 African-Americans has sickle cell disease. Usually, oxygen is carried to red blood cells by haemoglobin. A protein called beta globin helps. In sickle cell disease, cells make an abnormal version of
haemoglobin, in which the chains of beta globin develop sticky patches, stretching the red blood cell into a characteristic sickle shape. Sickle-shaped cells get stuck in blood vessels and block blood flow, leading to
anaemia, stroke and organ damage. Reuters Breast cancer risk prompts call for review of HRT
A leading breast cancer surgeon has called for a reassessment of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) to reduce the risks and maximise the benefits. HRT replaces the natural hormones oestrogen and progesterone, to relieve the hot flushes, mood swings and other unpleasant symptoms women can suffer during menopause. The hormones also reduce the risk of osteoporosis, or brittle bone disease, and heart disease in older women. But Mike Dixon, a breast cancer surgeon at Western General Hospital in Edinburgh, Scotland, said research showed that women taking HRT have a higher risk of breast cancer and short-term use may raise a woman’s chances of developing heart disease.
Reuters
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Realisation cannot be gained by prostrating before holy men, touching their garment or doing similar things nor is it possible by making pilgrimages, bathing in rivers or retiring to some forest. It can be had by searching for Him within. True humility does not lie in bending the body forward but in bending the ego. True satsangi is one who sees himself in others. The only True Path is the path of Truth. True answers to all spiritual queries come from within. — From the discourses of Baba Gurinder Singh of Radhasoami Satsang Beas. *** O bars of self, You cannot shut me in. If you think yourself superior to the rest, in that instant, you have proclaimed your own inferiority. Return into thyself-content to given, but asking no one, asking nothing. Slowly and resolutely - as a fly cleanses its legs of the honey in which it has been caught, so remove thou, if it only be for a time, every particle which sullies the brightness of thy mind. In the sound of your voice I dwell as in a world defended from evil. — Swami Ramatirtha, Notebook III
*** There is no flaw In this law of Karma, No reservation. Actions performed in alliance with friends Are not taken into account. It is an exact and accurate regulation Of actions and reactions. Man eats what he cooks. That is, he reaps what he sows. — Atharva Veda, 12.3.48 *** Hirohito’s poems composed in 1946, 1948 and 1955. May we ever unswervingly follow the path of duty as do the sun and the moon! May we always serve humanity without demanding the price of our service. May we ever be benevolent, kind, self-sacrificing, detached and adjustable. May we surrender all and serve humanity like the sun and the moon. — Rig Veda, 5.51.15 *** Karmas form the substratum of the personality of a person. — Sri Guru Granth Sahib, suhi M 1, page 730 |
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