Bhopal has returned from the dead

The Union Government is set to buy silence through fresh payouts to keep the Congress’s guilty secrets under wraps


Unusually for an event that happened more than 25 years ago, the Bhopal gas tragedy has dominated mindspace for two full weeks since the trial court pronounced its verdict on the guilty men on Monday, June 7. Once the judgement came, skeletons began to tumble out of a range of cupboards, causing acute embarrassment to the Government in Delhi as well as the Congress. The Prime Minister acted with uncharacteristic political acumen by quickly constituting a Group of Ministers (GoM) under workaholic Home Minister P Chidambaram and it seems its report will indeed be submitted within the stipulated 10-day deadline.

The likely contents of the GoM report are not difficult to anticipate. In fact, the most important part has already emerged with the suggestion that the Planning Commission will release Rs 984 crore as grant for rehabilitation, compensation, cleaning up and other leftover jobs of the humungous tragedy. Two rounds of compensation have already been distributed to the victims, ranging between Rs 10 lakh for the families of the deceased to Rs 50,000 for those marginally affected.

The gas leak devastated some of the poorest parts of the city, inhabited largely by Muslims. It is a measure of their resilience, ironically moulded by fatalism that enabled them to revert to their homes and jobs as they tired of waiting for official largesse to come their way. Another dose of compensation will obviously be welcome but nearly 26 years after the event the money can hardly be expected to reach those who most needed it in the tragedy’s aftermath. In fact, over 3,000 listed victims are yet to collect their dues because they have left what they believed was an accursed city and migrated elsewhere.

Therefore, additional compensation is not the core issue as we revisit Bhopal 1984. Arguably, there are ongoing concerns over rehabilitation, reclamation of the devastated localities, relocation of toxic waste, and regeneration of groundwater contaminated by the seepage of chemicals. It is unbelievable that after more than two decades even the waste has not been shifted out of Bhopal because authorities continue to quibble over who should pay for it and where it should be dumped. While the Government contends that Union Carbide (now owned by Dow Chemicals) must bear the costs, the company cites various judgements to say that its responsibility is over. The Madhya Pradesh Government has started to remove the waste but the chosen location, on the outskirts of the industrial town of Pithampura, is being resisted.

NGOs continue to cry hoarse over groundwater contamination around the UCC plant, but the State Government says it spent Rs 14 crore laying pipelines to provide clean water to these colonies so that they don’t have to tap groundwater. Interestingly, property developers seem to have decided that the vicinity of the erstwhile factory is a perfect spot to construct high-rise apartment blocks. Accordingly land prices there have gone up significantly.

To my mind, these are nuts-and-bolts issues that should have been resolved long ago but weren’t thanks to proverbial bureaucratic sloth. Hopefully, the new package will pave the way for these matters to be sorted out without further delay. Basically, there are two facets to the reopening of the Bhopal case — administrative and political. While the administrative lapses have no doubt been Himalayan, we are probably heading towards closure on these issues. But the political aspect has got revived in a big way and till convincing answers are given to the queries raised in the last fortnight, the ghosts of Bhopal will not be excised.

Three things are clear. First, Warren Anderson came to India by arrangement with the Government, having been assured “safe passage” by the Ministry of External Affairs in consultation with the political leadership. Second, the Central Government ordered the State Government to give instant bail to Anderson when he was put under house arrest in Bhopal, and flew him back to Delhi by official aircraft where and he interacted with senior officials during the brief sojourn. Third, despite the specious arguments advanced by the ruling party, Anderson could not have flown in and out of India without the knowledge and consent of the highest political authority, namely, then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi.

It is apparent that the Government went out of its way to appease Union Carbide and its then chairman in the purported belief that bending backwards would open the flow of US investments to India. This assessment belied the sycophantic mindset of India’s foreign policy establishment as well as political leadership. The fear of annoying Uncle Sam was so all pervasive that the Congress threw caution to the winds and treated Anderson as if he were a visiting Head of State! In that sense, the Indian Establishment equated one US-based multinational company with the US Administration. Is it surprising that stories are being carefully planted about then President Ronald Reagan having a telephonic chat with Rajiv Gandhi, presumably to direct the Prime Minister to fall in line? Incidentally, this was first hinted at by Congress general-secretary Digvijay Singh who has since been asked to shut up.

On the backfoot, the Congress has tied itself up in knots. Mr Pranab Mukherjee’s semi-credible claim that Anderson had to be “rescued” from Bhopal because of a law and order threat has now been completely contradicted by the interview to CNN-IBN by Mr MK Rasgotra, former Foreign Secretary. Initially, the effort was to put the blame on then Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Arjun Singh so that Rajiv Gandhi could be portrayed as a babe in the woods who knew nothing of the shenanigans of his partymen. This incredible line of defence fell apart almost instantly and now Mr Arjun Singh is threatening to bare all! PV Narasimha Rao was dragged into the picture as the next fall guy but a robust riposte from his son seems to have smothered that diversionary tactic.

The fact is that the Congress cannot run away from the guilt of Bhopal. It seriously underestimated the extent of the tragedy and was happy when former Chief Justice AM Ahmadi converted the case into one caused by negligence, that is, an accident. It was the agreement, which the Union of India initialled in 1989 with Union Carbide that quashed all claims of justice for the victims of Bhopal. The Government is now trying to apply a soothing balm by doling out taxpayers’ money. But the guilty men sitting in America have been allowed to get away through what amounts to a conspiracy against the people of Bhopal. India did not cause the gas leak; those who did have got away paying a mere $ 478 million. And we are left to pick up the bill for the devastation only because the Government must keep the Congress’s guilty secrets under wraps.

Manoosiyat of dirty politics

Double standards in politics are rising as vertically as the priceline and there seems to be no dearth of political leaders who are out to have fun at the expense of their respective voter manoos.

Look at Shiv Sena. The bhaiyyas have been in Mumbai for ages. So have Shiv Sena and Bal Thackeray. And the ’twain have co-existed peacefully, even when the non-manoos did not know Marathi. So why is the manoos vs non-manoos campaign so young? Because it is nothing but turf war within Sena, not so much over manoos and non-manoos as between Raj Thackeray and the Uddhav-Bal combine. Can someone tell us if the Sena has a quota for Marathis manoos in its party recruitment drive? Like, only 10 per cent non-Marathis allowed?

To add appeal to their outrageous campaign, (why does the Government always allow it to snowball), the Sena chooses its targets carefully. This time it is superstar Shah Rukh Khan.

Now, there are a hundred more serious issues the Sena could have raised rather than go after a frivolous opinion expressed by a personality who has no impact whatsoever on policy.

So what if SRK feels Pakistanis should have been in the IPL? Does it matter if Afridi is missing or present? What matters, and what the Sena should be after, is the complacence of Pakistan on 26/11. With such an organised force, the Sena could go all out to pressure the Centre into taking some action against Pakistan and the perpetrators of 26/11 blasts; how come the Sainiks are yet to go after Kasab? Why have they not gone on a rampage demanding his immediate hanging from the Taj Mahal Palace? After all, they are hardly known to respect law or the judicial system. Why just centre around banning My Name Is Khan? Will that serve any purpose for the nation and its manoos, even its Marathi manoos? All it will do is give free publicity to the film.

Let’s come to SRK himself. Much as you love him he, too, has become an epitome of double standards. First he ignores the entire Pak line-up in bidding for his team KKR at the recent IPL auction. Some days later, he issues a statement saying Pak players should have been picked up! He then refuses to apologise and says it is his private opinion. It is another matter altogether that as the controversy unfolds with the Sena turning ballistic, King Khan gets inordinate publicity for his film My Name is Khan.

Thanks to the Sena and SRK’s obvious courting of the Muslim segment, the opening buzz will take care of MNIK’s returns — on both sides of the border.

Simply put, Sena gains terrain and SRK eyeballs for his film in a win-win controversy. The aam manoos, meanwhile, keeps footing the bill.

As the controversy threatens to die down, in jumps Rahul Gandhi with his ‘I-have-to-become-an-icon’ campaign. He gets all the brownies to say simply and convincingly that Mumbai belongs to all Indians. He then takes a quick ride through the megapolis, including a hop into the local train, as the Sena looks the other way. Was it that the Sainiks were on tea-break or, did the cops finally showed us how they can manage to quell any movement if they really, really want to?

Let’s end with the biggest double-standards votary of them all — the Union Government. Our PM, the economic reform king of yore, has just announced that the food crisis is here to stay. Of course, he does not say if his Government will tackle it but he is, nevertheless outraged that chini, daal and sabzi are selling like gold dust. Perhaps, it’s here that he could put the delectable “zero tolerance” phrase to best use – and if the Centre is not doing so on its own, can the Shiv Sena please launch a campaign against it on the following issues — zero tolerance to price rise, zero tolerance to corruption and zero tolerance to terror. It’s sounds much more appealing and reasonable than its current zero tolerance to non-Marathi manoos!

Our Courts are chocked!!

The Union Law Minister has recently announced that the number of undertrial prisoners languishing in various jails across the country will be reduced by two-thirds within six months. Under the law, the Government has powers to release convicted prisoners after certain years of imprisonment. However, it has no such powers when the matter involves an accused undertrial. Of course, the Government can at any time withdraw any case pending in a court of law as well as deny sanction to prosecute any accused in cases where sanction is required. But convicting or freeing those under trial falls within the ambit of the judiciary.

The Government’s stated reason for freeing a large number of them is that many of those who are under trial and languishing in our prisons are in such a position because they could not get adequate legal aid. In some cases, prisoners have been behind bars for more than the maximum term of imprisonment for offences they had been charged with.

According to the Law Minister, the Chief Justices of High Courts would appoint a task force to monitor the plan. The task force, under the chairmanship of the state legal service authority or a senior judge, would depute teams to visit jails and identify prisoners who deserve to be freed. The teams would look into individual cases to identify those who were entitled to be released. The Law Minister has said, “Of the undertrials, roughly around two lakh have been in jail for several years essentially because of delays in the justice delivery system.” It appears that the Union Cabinet has approved the plan.

On the face of it, the plan seems excellent and a small step towards decongesting our prisons. According to a survey conducted and released in November, last year by the International Centre for Prison Studies, Kings College, London, in 218 countries and territories, a total of 3.73 lakh prisoners are lodged in nearly 1,336 prisons in India. As per the study, more than 9.8 million people are held in different prisons throughout the world. The study stated that the maximum number of prisoners across the globe is in the prisons of the US, which host 2.31 million prisoners. The US is followed by China (1.57 million), Russia (0.89 million) and Brazil (0.47 million).

The real problem does not lie with the courts but with the Government that knows what needs to be done to solve the problem of delay in our courts. Yet it chooses to skirt the issue.

As per the information furnished by the Law Minister to Parliament in December, 2009, a total of 3,11,39,022 cases were pending in courts across the country. The detailed break up is as follows:

# Supreme Court: 52,592 pending cases

# High Courts: 38,74,090 pending cases

# Maximum pending cases: Allahabad High Court — 9,11,858

# Pending cases in Uttar Pradeshs district and subordinate courts: 51,60,174

# n Total pending cases in subordinate courts: 2,64,09,163


Strength of judiciary:

# High Courts — Sanctioned: 886, Actual in position: 606

# Subordinate courts — Sanctioned: 16, 685, Actual in position: 13,556


Average disposal per judge:

# High Courts: 2,504 cases per year (2008)

# Subordinate courts: 1,138 cases per year (2008)


According to one estimate, the number of judges required to dispose of the total pending cases promptly is 1,547 in the High Courts and 4,400 in the subordinate courts.

Addressing a gathering in Chennai in July last year, Chief Justice of India KG Balakrishnan said: “We are not able to bring it (the number of pending) cases down significantly, though we want to. Some States in the country don’t pay enough attention to the judiciary. Unless there is a large number of courts, how can the pendency come down?”

For speedy and quick disposal of cases, several committees have been formed in the past. In 1924 a committee was formed under the chairmanship of Justice Rankin. After independence, other committees constituted included the Justice SR Das Committee in 1949, Justice JC Shah Committee in 1972, the Satish Chandra Committee in 1986 and the Justice VS Mallimath Committee in 1990. But the situation from 1926 to 2010 remains virtually the same. The Law Commission, in its 120th report submitted in 1987, examined the problem of understaffing in the judiciary and recommended 50 judges per million of population instead of the present 9.5.

The inadequate number of judges is a major reason for the delays in the disposal of cases. Thus, the solution to the problem lies in the hands of the executive and administrative wings of the Government, and not the judiciary. Former Attorney-General of India Soli Sorabjee, in a lecture in London, lamented that the criminal justice system in India was on the verge of collapsing because of understaffing in the judiciary. He also observed, “Justice delayed will not only be justice denied, it will be the rule of law destroyed.”

More than 60 per cent of the pending court cases in India are due to the action or inaction of some Government official towards a citizen or a group of citizens. The same observations have been made by the Supreme Court more than once. The Arrears Committee headed by Justice VS Mallimath (1990) has identified the following causes for the accumulation of backlog of cases in the High Courts.

(i) Litigation explosion;
(ii) Accumulation of first appeal;
(iii) Inadequacy of staff attached to the High Courts;
(iv) Inordinate concentration of work in the hands of some members of the Bar;
(v) Lack of punctuality among judges;
(vi) Granting of unnecessary adjournments;
(vii) Indiscriminate closure of courts; (viii) Indiscriminate resort to writ jurisdiction;
(ix) Inadequacy of classification and granting of cases; and,
(x) Inordinate delay in the supply of certified copies of judgements and orders, etc.

The problem of court pendency, delay and quick disposal of cases is not something new. Letting off those under trial and in judicial custody is no solution. The initiative taken by the law Minister is commendable. But it doesn’t do anything to alleviate the misery of the common man seeking justice. Much bolder steps are needed. The Government must remember that unless it maintains justice, justice will not maintain us. A crisis looms large and a solution brooks no further delay.

A schizophrenic Government

It’s perplexing how suddenly and rapidly India has slipped into schizophrenia in recent months. Take the perennial issue of Pakistan to begin with. At one level, the Government is believed to have gently nudged organisers of IPL to keep Pakistani cricketers out of the high-profile event.

Opinion is divided on whether this was appropriate on the sponsors’ part, many saying that our diplomatic and security issues with Islamabad should not have spilled over into the playing field, while others believe you can hug each other on the cricketing arena while the Pakistani Establishment holds a gun at New Delhi’s head. But having left the IPL organisers to face a barrage of criticism from cricket lovers for this stealthy decision, the Government itself is getting ready to resume the dialogue with Pakistan, ignoring Islamabad’s victorious smirks. If this is not schizophrenia, I don’t know what else it can be called.

Why do we want to talk to Pakistan at this juncture? Frankly it baffles me. After suspending the dialogue after the heinous 26/11 events admittedly plotted and directed from Pakistani soil and executed by Pakistani nationals who sneaked into India, the Government firmly declared not to talk till Islamabad showed concrete and visible progress in proceeding against the masterminds. In the interim came the shameful Sharm-el-Sheikh episode, demonstrating yet again Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s inability to stand firm. India capitulated without apparent reason and even agreed to include Balochistan in the Joint Statement.

Probably taken aback by the intensity of the furore at home in its aftermath, New Delhi appeared to steel its resolve not to talk to our Western neighbour, till progress happened on 26/11 culprits. The deliberately slipshod manner in which Pakistan went about prosecuting Jamaat-ud-Dawa bosses, exposed Islamabad’s duplicity once more although proof was hardly required for its two-faced policy.

Pakistan succeeded in its gamble of tiring India out, assured in the belief that Washington would put enormous pressure on New Delhi to initiate talks again, making the Government desperate enough to clutch at straws to resume the dialogue. Hence the plaintive cries heard last week from Home Minister P Chidambaram urging Pakistan to show some movement on 26/11, howsoever small, so that India could revise its stand. No gesture was forthcoming. Pakistan Prime Minister triumphantly responded by saying that India had been pressured into talking again and categorically declared that these would not be mere “talks about talks”, and nothing short of the resumption of the Composite Dialogue would cajole Islamabad back to the negotiating table. Having put out the second cheek to be soundly slapped even as bruises on the first cheek were still smarting, India has little option except to again genuflect at the altar of Pakistani high-handedness.

Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani has also made it clear that he expects “substantial progress” on Kashmir as and when the dialogue resumes. This is a line clearly dictated by Washington too. President Obama’s team has been consistent in pushing India to concede ground on Kashmir so that, according to them, Islamabad can focus on Afghanistan without worrying about India and also mollify domestic opinion. It is a measure of the US State Department’s naivette that it thinks Pakistan will agree to settle Kashmir with India once and for all. The fact is that Islamabad, irrespective of who controls the reins of power, will never want to part with the biggest, low-cost weapon in its armoury. In the last few weeks, it has demonstrated its ability to raise the temperature of militancy in the Valley, while India has been pushed into going ahead with its stupid, defeatist policy of withdrawing 30,000 troops from the troubled State. Taking full advantage of Indian pusillanimity, militants have infiltrated the Valley in large numbers and provoked a series of incidents. A wily ISI, remote-controlling separatist outfits, are said to have placed vast sums at the disposal of jihadi outfits to engineer regular pelting of Indian security forces with stones in order to disorient and demoralise them and, perhaps, force them into retaliation. Almost every other day separatists successfully organise massive street protests against counter-insurgency operations, raising the pitch against routine patrolling or questioning of suspects.

There is a clear pattern in this plan of action. Pakistan is working on two fronts, one inside the Valley and one at the diplomatic level. They have achieved their first aim that of pressuring India to pull out sizeable number of troops to create a killing field conducive to the militants. Now, with the US rapping India on its knuckles, they hope to accomplish the second aim of dragging India to the negotiating table like a penitent child. I hope that Parliament’s Budget Session will witness uproarious scenes on this capitulation. It must be made categorically clear to the Government that there is no need for any talks with Pakistan in the foreseeable future; that public opinion here will not brook bartering away Jammu & Kashmir under US pressure or otherwise; and that the nation’s interest cannot be sacrificed for Manmohan Singh to pursue his elusive dream for a Nobel Peace Prize. One of his predecessors led India into disaster after disaster vis-à-vis Pakistan and China in the hope of being recognised and feted as a harbinger of world peace.

Even as the Prime Minister embarks on this dangerous and self-demeaning policy one of his party colleagues has been busy cultivating terror sympathisers back home. In yet another bizarre instance of schizophrenia, a top office-bearer of the ruling party went on to merrily attack his own Government over the Batla House encounter, which had resulted in the martyrdom of policeman Mohan Chand Sharma, decorated posthumously with a gallantry medal. Digvijay Singh, Congress general-secretary and former Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, committed outrage on the nation’s sentiment by going to Azamgarh to visit the family and friends of terror suspects in the Batla House shootout and had the audacity of declaring the encounter as “fake”.

It does not help to try and back out from the assertion made at a public meeting by later claiming that all he wanted was a “speedy trial”, because TV cameras captured his original remark. Instead of taking disciplinary action against the redoubtable Mr Singh, his party has mildly sought merely to distance itself from him, saying this was his personal opinion.

It is clear that the Congress Party, in a mad scramble to garner a section of Muslim votes (fortunately most Muslims do not share Mr Singh’s assessment), will stoop at nothing to nurture a vote bank. But then, why blame him alone? His party’s heir apparent, buoyed by a fawning media, has been on a rampage against his opponents in Maharashtra, blissfully overlooking that, in the first place, it was his party’s Government that proposed a 15-year-domicile rule for awarding taxi licences in Mumbai thereby reinforcing the Shiv Sena-MNS brand of regional chauvinism!

498-A INVITATION TO FALSE CASES

If u never demanded dowry, she can still file a case under 498-A and without investigation u can be arrested by police. Provision of 498 A empower the women but if we will see in today’s circumstances, the provisions of 498-A are enough to make the man weak. Once F.I.R. is lodge under 498-A, whether it is vague or false, u will have very less chance. Now women are taking unjust profit of this section of Indian penal code. Today numbers of false cases are increasing and our society is suffering from this problem. In this type of situation, boy doesn’t have anything except some safeguards like collection of evidence. It is a very critical situation, to save the society from this situation, there must we some laws in favor of men, due to which man can be protected in court of law. There must be balance in our social system. If man is strong more than woman or woman is strong more than man, both situation are harmful for our society. 498 is a playing the role of harmful weapon. The provision of section 498-A is so much rigid and in favor of women, this fact invites the false cases under 498-A of Indian penal code. To balance the situation, legislation should make some laws in favor of men and try to develop balance in society. The basic aim of laws must be justice and balance in between society.

God made this beautiful earth. He did not do any classification but he made man and woman. This classification was the need of human being. Man was dominant over woman in society, but now both our equal, our constitution also providing this equality. According to the provision of constitution, there should be no discrimination on the basis of sex. It is very difficult to say that section 498-A of Indian penal code is unconstitutional because the intention behind this provision to protect the women. And our legislation is empowered by constitution to make special laws for women. But in the zeal to protect the women, legislation should not ignore the man and the current position of society. In whole in the name of protecting women, 498-A is making weak the man, and creating imbalance in society. If man can torture the woman, then woman also can torture the man. Both are human being. So legislation should think on this point of view and try to make some provision to protect the men.

By-Anubhuti Mishra
(writer is a student of JNU,Jaipur)
(Originally recieved and edited on 24th of nov 09)

Nobel Prize for Peace has lost all credibility

The only serious danger in Barack Obama’s Nobel Prize for Peace is that he might take it seriously. The early indications are that he will. Mr Obama might have saved himself a great deal of trouble by saying thanks, but no thanks. But he could not resist an award whose credibility collapsed the moment he got it.

After the obligatory reference to humility, he added, a little more grandly, “I will accept this award as a call to action.” At least he admitted that there had been no action so far. What on earth did the fatuous Nobel Committee see when they surveyed the map of the world in the last six months? Did they find that Mr Mahmoud Abbas, Mr Benjamin Netanyahu and Mr Obama had created an independent Palestine while Hamas was engrossed in playing Patience and Hizbullah had gone for a conference in Tehran? Or that India and Pakistan had signed a treaty solving Kashmir while benign Barack hovered gently in the background, always within camera range?

The only substantive decision that Mr Obama has taken in terms of war and peace is to ramp up the war in Afghanistan far above Mr George W Bush’s scale of intervention. He is on the point of sending upwards of 50,000 more American troops so that Viceroy-Lord Dick Holbrooke, and his bevy of Pentagon Generals, can fight for another decade on the killing rocks of a battlefield that saw serious action during Alexander the Great’s time and has not paused since. If outsiders do not turn up, Afghans simply go to war against one another. Alfred Nobel thought that his Peace Prize should go to leaders who disband standing armies. Mr Obama may be perfectly justified in upgrading the still largely somnolent American presence in Afghanistan into a full-scale fighting force, but the chaps in Oslo might have waited till the shooting stopped. They waited for Nelson Mandela and Mother Teresa to grow old. Why couldn’t they have waited for Mr Obama to become middle-aged?

Their official excuse is that Mr Obama symbolises hope. That’s nice. It broadens the scope for future winners. All you have to do is hope, and possibly pray, that the Lashkar-e-Tayyeba have reinvented themselves into vegetarian Gandhians and your post box might have a nice letter from Oslo in October 2010.

The big ticket hope is non-proliferation. If you think about it coolly — very coolly — one chap who has done far more than Mr Obama for non-proliferation in the recent past is Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. He actually dismantled a nuclear weapons facility. He may have done so under pressure, but he has done something. Mr Obama has given a few pretty speeches and knocked on the table at the United Nations. Mr Obama has made no effort to rein in the most powerful nuclear weapons power in history, a nation that refused to accept any international control or convention and continues to develop the most sophisticated nuclear weapons technology. That country is, of course, the United States of America. I suppose Oslo did not think of a Peace Prize for Col Gaddafi for fear of ridicule. Col Gaddafi does not belong, as it were, to the right sort of country, plus his acceptance speech might have taken a full day. But does anyone have any idea when the ridicule for the Obama decision will begin to ebb?

Mr Obama is too sharp not to understand this, and it will further whet the temptation to lend some substance to the hype. He is not going to withdraw from Afghanistan because of this medal; and climate change is Mr Al Gore’s parish. So his big push is likely to be on nonproliferation. He dare not do anything about America’s nuclear muscle; and he has assured Tel Aviv that he will continue the policy of ignoring Israel’s secret cache. There is little he can do about the Big Five, and North Korea is Ms Hillary Clinton’s show. Pakistan is too much of a military pal at a time of dire need, and Pakistan has a good excuse as well, India. So his options boil down to just this: Abort Iran’s programme and bully India into as much compliance as possible. If warrior Bush was dangerous for the region between the Nile and the Indus, peacenik Obama could be troublesome for the land of the Ganges.

Is it possible that the Oslo peace mafia had run out of people to hand this prize to? Not every recipient is going to get a chapter in the history books, even though they might be worthy enough. It is not easy to recall the name of the winner in 2008. But the range of the prize has been expanded from reformed warriors to humanitarians. We all know of course that Mahatma Gandhi was never found worthy of the Nobel Peace Prize, but then they would have probably considered Jesus Christ too good to be true as well. (Jesus was a non-violent opponent of European colonisation as well, in his case, Roman.) But we have not completely run out of worthy individuals or institutions. The doctors who do selfless work in conditions of utmost misery, like Darfur or other conflict zones in Africa, deserve both the applause and the money. The Aga Khan might not need the money, but there should be some recognition of the extraordinary restoration work his foundation has done to preserve the great monuments of human civilisation — that too is a commitment to peace.

But there is one good, even great, reason for giving Mr Barack Obama the 2009 prize, although it was omitted from the citation. Mr Barack Obama threw out Bush Republicans, the biggest band of warmongers in recent American history, from power in Washington. This must surely count as a signal contribution to world peace.

Tricks to learn from Pakistan

Pakistan may be a failed state politically and socially. But it is demonstrably successful militarily and diplomatically. More successful than India, if you want to rub it in, for they have achieved what they set out to achieve. We have not.

Different types of dictators ruled Pakistan. All of them had one immutable objective: Make the world recognise Pakistan as a hyphenated equal of the unequally bigger ( in size, population, economy) India. Pakistan has achieved that objective - in the early days with the connivance of Britain which was an interested party in the India-Pakistan confrontation in the UN over Kashmir, and subsequently with the help of China which ensured that, as soon as India exploded a nuclear device, Pakistan did too.
The smartness with which Pakistan plays the diplomatic game is best reflected in the mileage it gains vis a vis America, and the mileage we do not gain. In the Cold War era, it was simple: Pakistan just joined the American bloc while India ploughed the non-alignment path and thereby incurred America's wrath.

More recently the game has been subtler. Yet, otherwise bankrupt establishments like Pervez Musharaff's and Ali Zardari's have been playing it very cleverly. A US-Israeli strike against Pakistan's nuclear assets was widely speculated after America expressed fears of the Pakistani bombs falling into Taliban's hands. Suddenly the Pakistan Government joined the American side and genuinely went to war against the Taliban. Domestically it was a risk, but it won America's appreciation.

America's appreciation meant that Pakistan's real game - making India run around in circles - could be played on Pakistan's terms. Consider, for example, the toing and froing Pakistan has been doing with great relish over the Mumbai terror attack. And consider America's all-words-and-no-action reactions to it.

More pointed from America's policy perspectives was the fact, revealed by the New York Times, that Pakistan had been illegally modifying anti-ship missiles and maritime surveillance aircraft for attacks on India. The US Government lodged a formal protest and Pakistan formally denied the charge. That, for all practical purposes, was that.

As India fumed in its characteristically vegetarian style, Musharaff rubbed salt into the wound saying publicly that arms provided by America to fight Islamic terrorists were instead used to bolster defence against India. Forget his subsequent retraction under pressure, for he was speaking the truth when he said he was "proud he did it for Pakistan". America said it took Musharaff's disclosure seriously. That, presumably, was that.

This is the same America that made such a fuss about the end-user clause in its nuclear deal with India. Unlike India, Pakistan uses the clause as a joke. Which seems all right with the US. Last March the Obama administration was reportedly considering increasing developmental aid to Pakistan three times ( current rate $ 450 m. a year) and boosting military aid as well (currently $ 300 m. a year).

Obviously, Pakistan knows how to manipulate American yardsticks to its advantage and how to get away with it. Can we imagine a Manmohan Singh or an A.B.Vajpayee signing the end-user agreement as America wants and then twisting it " proudly for India".
Adding insult to injury, India paid nearly Rs 13 crores in three years to Barber Griffith and Rogers, a Washington lobbying company, to get the nuclear deal passed by the US Congress. Pakistan also must be employing lobbyists in Washington. But they get in return what they want. We get what the Americans want. As a bonus we also get American travel advisories asking its citizens to stay away from India. Now we know why Ali Zardari is always plastered cheek to cheek with a grin hearty and toothy at once.

100% inflation in 100 days

The first 100 days of the second UPA Government is an occasion that will go largely unnoticed in the country. Even the TV polls and the lavish advertisements are unlikely to register too much in the public consciousness. The simple reason is that, all pronouncements notwithstanding, 100 days is a contrived benchmark to assess the performance of any Government. Most people need a longer time span before they can come to a decision about whether a Government is a performing or non-performing one and whether or not it corresponds to their sense of self-interest.

At the risk of jumping to hasty conclusions a few observations may be in order. First, while there is dissatisfaction with the Government’s inability to control food prices — said to have increased 100 per cent in 100 days — this has not yet translated into a larger political dissatisfaction with the Congress. A Government in its second term may not enjoy a prolonged honeymoon but this doesn’t imply that the process of estrangement has begun. Politically, the UPA Government still looks comfortable and this level of comfort has little to do with performance. After the fear that the 15th Lok Sabha election would throw up an inconclusive verdict, India seems reassured that a stable Government is in place.

Secondly, the absence of the Left from the cast of the ruling coalition hasn’t meant a spurt in the reforming zeal of the Government. The Congress is essentially a party wedded to the idea of an intrusive and interventionist state. There has been no change in that philosophy and the global endorsement of spendthrift Governments to fight recession has meant that the UPA will not depart from its well-trodden path of statism. If there was an expectation in corporate circles and among innocent business journalists that the comfort zone of politics will facilitate some radical change, the first 100 days has done nothing to provide it nourishment. On the contrary those believers in responsible fiscal management may find enough in the unmanageable fiscal deficit to fear for the future.

Finally, while the Prime Minister came out of the general election with enhanced personal stature, he has chosen to not drive home the advantage in the first 100 days of his second innings. Manmohan Singh was never an assertive Prime Minister. His reputation for playing it safe and trying not to ruffle feathers is legendary. This may not win him a huge fan following but it has also ensured that a campaign of visceral hate against him is unlikely to ever succeed. His image and reputation have been built on decency and understated competence. In recent months, he tried to break the mould only once — at the Sharm el-Sheikh summit with the Pakistani Prime Minister. But this attempt to think out of the box and be extra generous towards the neighbourhood rogue has enthused neither the country nor the strategic affairs community. Rather than persist, Manmohan chose to retreat without fuss and reserve his cards for a future occasion. The Sharm el-Sheikh fiasco also ensured that the bid to accommodate “global concerns”, a euphemism for US pressure, on climate change has been put on hold. It will probably be re-emerge unexpectedly at the Copenhagen Summit.

Manmohan Singh may want to give the impression that he is a political novice but there is no doubt that the goodwill the UPA Government continues to enjoy at the end of an unspectacular 100 days owes a lot to him. While many of the UPA Ministers are thoroughly incompetent and some of them lack integrity, the overall impression that the country is heading in the right direction owes a lot to popular trust in the Prime Minister. As long as this trust is not shaken, the UPA will continue to be treated indulgently.

It is also a truism to suggest that this trust will not be shaken as long as the main Opposition party continues to wage war against itself. Manmohan Singh and the Congress seem to be shining when compared to a BJP that has completely lost sight of its political responsibilities. The main Opposition doesn’t lack the ammunition to either take pot shots or undertake sustained artillery fire on the Government. Unfortunately, its present leadership is either incapable or has lost the will to fight a long war.

Mohan Bhagwat said in his Press conference last Friday afternoon that the BJP must resolve its own battles, without looking outside mediation. Once this principle is accepted and the leaders who have a stake in the future put their heads together — as they belatedly did on Friday evening — it will not be long before the BJP begins to get its act together. There are some long-term issues of strategy that need careful deliberation but two immediate priorities — one honourable retirement and one dishonourable discharge — are apparent to all but the wilfully obtuse. It is also clear that any delay in doing what has to be done — on grounds of either compassion or astrology — will only worsen the situation, provoke a scorched earth response, guarantee a political defeat in Maharashtra and ensure that the second 100 days of the UPA look far better than the actual experience.

The BJP is a lot into Mao Zedong these days. Three years before he instructed his deranged Red Guards to “bombard the headquarters”, the Great Helmsman penned a few lines of poetry that are worth repeating: “On this tiny globe/ A few flies dash themselves against the wall,/ Humming without cease/ Sometimes shrilling, sometimes moaning…/ Away with all pests!/ Our force is irresistible.” Bad poetry, but a nice thought.

India’s tryst with trust but verify

The Pakistanis must be laughing their guts out listening to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s borrowed formulation that we must adopt a “trust but verify” approach to our relations with their country. First of all, there is nothing original about this formulation because it was said by somebody else in some other context. Second, “trust but verify”, as everyone knows, was an afterthought. Mr Singh shockingly committed himself at Sharm el-Sheikh to trusting and talking to Pakistan without any kind of verification. Unable to bear the political heat on his return, he was compelled to do a bit of a somersault.

But, what Mr Singh has not realised is that without sounding so ponderous, many of his predecessors — Jawaharlal Nehru, Lal Bahadur Shastri, Mrs Indira Gandhi and Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee, to name a few — have preached the ‘trust but verify’ principle. As the history of the sub-continent shows, politicians only ‘trust’. They do not ‘verify’. That is done by our armed forces and our soldiers and hapless civilians lay down their lives in the process.

Here, in brief, is the saga of ‘trust but verify’:

August 1947: At its inauguration, Pakistan’s founder Mohammed Ali Jinnah declares that this new country wants to live in peace with India. The Indian political leadership ‘trusts’ him.

October 1947: Over 5,000 heavily armed tribesmen intrude into Kashmir. The Indian Army moves in and while driving the intruders out, ‘verifies’ their credentials. It finds that they are recruited and armed by the Pakistani Army.

However, Pakistan denies the charge. But some time later its Foreign Minister tells the UN that all forces fighting on the ‘Azad Kashmir’ side are “under the over-all command and tactical direction of the Pakistan Army”. This is our first tryst with this great principle — trust but verify.

December 1947: Having trusted Pakistan and verified that it was up to no good, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru flies to Lahore for a meeting with his Pakistani counterpart Liaquat Ali Khan.

India gets no guarantees from Pakistan but the business of “trusting” Pakistan begins afresh.

1958: The Prime Ministers of the two countries sign a pact which says pending settlement of disputes, “there should be no disturbance of the status-quo by force”.

1959: This year sees another joint statement in which the leaders of the two countries resolve “to solve border disputes by negotiation”.

August 1965: The Pakistani Army despatches hundreds of infiltrators into Jammu & Kashmir, but disclaims responsibility. However, UN observers ‘verify’ that armed Pakistanis have crossed the ceasefire line from the Pakistani side. A full scale war erupts.

The Indian Army captures several strategic positions on the Pakistani side, including the Haji Pir bulge and the Tithwal Pass. As the war progresses, Home Minister YB Chavan informs the Lok Sabha on September 6, 1965 that the armed infiltrators were regular and irregular soldiers of the Pakistani Army but Pakistan however has assumed “a posture of innocence”. The war ends with a UN-sponsored ceasefire. However, despite this betrayal, Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri signs a truce with Ayub Khan at Tashkent and returns to Pakistan all the major gains of the war.

The Tashkent Agreement says both countries will “abjure force” and will ensure “non-interference” in each other’s internal affairs. So, consequent to ‘verification’, we are once again convinced that Pakistan has betrayed our trust. But, what do we do? On the advice of the Soviet Union, we again start trusting Pakistan and hope it will “abjure force”. The then Foreign Minister of Pakistan, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, pooh-poohs the agreement but our Foreign Minister, Sardar Swaran Singh, tells the Lok Sabha on February 16, 1966 that the agreement will help in “stabilising peace between our two countries”.

1971: Pakistan gets back its swagger and wages yet another war on India. This conflict is brought about by the flood of 10 million refugees into India following the crackdown by Pakistan’s military dictator Yahya Khan. The war culminates in the dismemberment of Pakistan, the creation of Bangladesh and the return of these refugees to their homeland.

The conflict ends with the Pakistani Army surrendering on December 17, 1971. Apart from losing its eastern wing, Pakistan loses 5,000 square miles of territory in the west and over 93,000 of its soldiers become prisoners of war. Following the war, Bhutto replaces Yahya Khan as President and the West steps up pressure for yet another “peace accord”. This leads to the Shimla Accord of July 1972.

Under this agreement, the two countries once again agree to settle differences “by peaceful means”. The agreement also says both sides will respect the Line of Control and refrain from use of force in violation of this line. Bhutto gets back the lost territory in the west and the POWs. Thus, from India’s point of view, the biggest ‘achievement’ in Shimla is Pakistan’s so-called commitment to bilateralism. This is touted as a major achievement and we get back to the business of trusting Pakistan all over again.

Bhutto, however, sings a different tune. Pakistan will shed its blood to support “the liberation war” launched by the Kashmiris, he says. Yet, Sardar Swaran Singh claims in the Rajya Sabha on July 31, 1972 that this accord is the “first step towards establishing durable peace on the sub-continent”.

February 1999: It is now Prime Minister Vajpayee’s turn to ‘trust’ Pakistan. He undertakes a dramatic bus journey to Lahore and signs an agreement with Nawaz Sharif which expresses sentiments similar to those in the Tashkent and Shimla accords.

May 1999: The Indian Army ‘verifies’ and finds large scale intrusion of Pakistani troops into Kargil. Hundreds of Indian soldiers lay down their lives as they drive out the intruders.

December 1999: Terrorists hijack an Indian Airlines flight IC 814 to Kandahar. We ‘verify’ that the terrorists are Pakistanis.

2001: Mr Vajpayee once again “trusts” Gen Musharraf and invites him for talks to Agra.

December 2001: Terrorists attack our Parliament House. We ‘verify’ and inform the world that the perpetrators of this daring assault on our democratic institution are Pakistanis.

2004: Mr Vajpayee again visits Lahore and signs yet another joint declaration. Once again, Gen Musharraf promises that “he will not permit any territory under Pakistan’s control to be used to support terrorism in any manner”. We trust him.

November 26, 2008: Pakistani terrorists mount a sea-borne attack on Mumbai, killing and maiming hundreds of people. We 'verify' that this horrendous assault was planned and executed with the blessings of the Pakistani establishment.

July 2009: It is now Prime Minister Singh’s turn to ‘trust’ Pakistan. Action against terrorists by Pakistan need not be linked to the dialogue process, he says, but later modifies this. “Trust but verify” is our motto he says! So, the political leadership is now back to ‘trusting’ Pakistan. Civilians beware!

Manmohan deserves Nishaan-e-Pakistan

Viewed from the perspective of India, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s latest peace overture to a recalcitrant Pakistan seems bewildering and a trifle misplaced. How, it is being legitimately asked, can you repose trust in a Pakistan that is unwilling to own up to its misdemeanours and, indeed, is content with the mollycoddling of extremist and terrorist forces? Just because Atal Bihari Vajpayee too was guilty of a similar misjudgement doesn’t necessarily justify its persistence.

Yet, it is important to realise that India’s desperate desire to give its difficult neighbour the benefit of doubt is not an isolated move prompted by some weakness of the national character. Pakistan, which was worsted after the 9/11 attacks and the Anglo-American ‘war on terror’, is on the verge of recovering lost ground and scoring a major foreign policy triumph. This is not because the Manmohan Singh regime is weak and supine. That is only a small part of the problem. The real advantage for Pakistan lies in the fact that an economically devastated West has lost the political resolve to persist with the war in Afghanistan. It is looking for ways to extricate itself from what is generally being regarded as a no-win situation. What India is doing is creating the conditions for an ignominious Anglo-American retreat from Afghanistan. Being nice to Pakistan is a part of India’s facilitation process.

The extent to which defeatism has overwhelmed the West is most evident in the hysterical British reaction to the death of 22 of its soldiers last month. The July toll may seem small by Indian standards — the Maoists have killed more policemen and para-military forces in Chhattisgarh in the same time frame — but in British eyes this is unacceptable. From the perspective of other European participants in the multi-national force it is even more so. The only German soldier who killed a Taliban insurgent had to be flown back home for trauma therapy and the legendary Luftwaffe has ceased all night operations because it is seen as too risky.

There was a naive belief in some European capitals that involvement in Afghanistan actually meant overseeing good works by social workers in the Provincial Reconstruction Teams. The soldiers, it was assumed, would keep a benign eye on things as earnest young do-gooders helped Afghans rebuild schools, practice gender equality and climb up the Human Development Index. When that romantic dream turned into a nightmare amid the harsh realities of Afghanistan, the inclination of European civil society has been to cut losses and run back home.

The Afghan war is without question an unpopular war. The Americans may want more boots on the ground and a few targeted operations, including the one with the menacing name Operation Panther’s Claw, but this is widely seen as a face-saving precursor to departure. Maybe the bases in Baghran and Kandahar may remain, but for all intents and purposes, the war on terror is drawing to a close without any sign of victory.

For Pakistan, this is fantastic news and it is doing its utmost to hasten the departure of the international forces. Having carefully helped the Taliban regroup after the debacle of 2001 and continue its low-intensity guerrilla war, Pakistan is now intent on projecting itself as the proverbial poacher-turned-gamekeeper. It has implored the West to outsource the pacification of Pushtuns to it. After all, no one is said to know the forbidding terrain around the Durand Line better than Pakistan. In return, Pakistan wants the West to create the conditions for its ‘approved’ intervention in Afghanistan.

Ideally, Pakistan has two demands. First, it wants the West to guarantee that the shift of military might from the eastern front with India to the western front will not involve India taking advantage of the situation. Second, Pakistan wants the West to realise that it would be difficult to manage the internal fallout of training its guns on the Taliban unless there is some ideological compensation, such as some recognition of Pakistan’s role in Kashmir. As of now, the West has merely impressed upon India the need to free Pakistani forces in the east so that it can join the main battle in the west. For India, this has meant lowering the temperature on Pakistan-sponsored terrorism directed against India. As of now, the West hasn’t really arm-twisted India on the Kashmir issue. But that is only a matter of time. New Delhi has already demonstrated its inclination to crawl when asked to bend.

The coming months are going to be crucial for Afghanistan. On the face of it, President Hamid Karzai seems set for a clear victory in next month’s presidential election. However, it is clear that both Pakistan and the so-called civil society groups in the West are betting on his ex-World Bank rival Ashraf Ghani as a wholesome alternative to Karzai. Ghani has the support of the anti-Karzai Pushtuns but lacks the incumbent’s ability to garner the votes of the minority communities linked to the erstwhile Northern Alliance.

The presidential election isn’t likely to be entirely free and fair. Given the troubled state of Afghanistan, it can hardly be so. Moreover, the democratic culture hasn’t really taken roots in Afghanistan. Any result that favours Karzai is likely to be strongly disputed by the Ghani camp and the scepticism is certain to be fuelled by both Pakistan and Western Governments anxious to leave Afghanistan to god and Pakistan. It is a possible man-made crisis over the election results that may well set the stage for Pakistan’s formal re-acquisition of its lost ‘strategic depth’.

By refusing to play hard ball in Egypt last month, Manmohan Singh thought he was trying to help the West get its act together in Pakistan. The consequences of his generosity may well be Pakistan’s victory in Afghanistan. The Indian Prime Minister deserves a Nishaan-e-Pakistan award.

The VIP syndrome

It was just as I thought it would be. Amidst all the rage over frisking of our former president, A P J Abdul Kalam himself never registered a protest. From whatever I have known of him through papers,media etc and his books, I felt he would not have objected to going through a security check.

He comes across as a humble and learned man and he reflected the same when the incident happened at New Delhi. Perhaps he understands that the security requirements of the present time are much different from the law that was written in 1934. 9/11 had never happened then and certainly IC 814 had not been hijacked. He knew his responsibility and he acted accordingly.

While it can always be debated whether Kalam was particularly checked for the way his name sounds, we should also hope that other "VVIPs" act in the same dignified manner when asked for security checks. They are no super mortals and they need to realise that. In fact at a time when the agencies across the world use diplomatic channels to carry out espionage activities, it is time we think over a "VVIP" Act, written nearly seven decades ago. Our VVIPs are incensed because they consider themselves demi gods and frisking would dent that image. And therefore this entire song and dance.

We have always been complaining that most of the acts under our law are archaic. Then doesn't this act be one so as well? Shouldn't we work toward amending this too? The security needs have changed and so the act must change too.

Coming back to Kalam, he has again come forth as a model citizen and its not only MPs and VVIPs who should learn from him but we too need to realise that security checks help us. Be it at malls, stations or airports, if we complain about them, then we should not complain about terror acts.

And as far as getting even with America comes, we should frisk all VVIPs and could have done it when Hillary Clinton was in India. Remember the old adage? Don't get mad, get even.

Hillary bouquet: 3 pacts, an invite for PM

Putting the India-US relationship as a “personal priority” and intending to make deepening of relations as “signature accomplishment” for the Barack Obama administration, US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday concluded three agreements — on crucial end use monitoring arrangements for defence equipment and technology, a technology safeguards agreement on space cooperation and a science and technology endowment fund.

The high-point of the visit, however, was the invite extended to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for the first “state visit” to Washington during the Barack Obama administration on November 24. The invite was extended at a lunch at the PM’s residence, which was attended by Rahul Gandhi.

Hillary said that the PM had told her that approvals for sites for two nuclear parks have been given, which will be developed by the US. The two sides are at Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh.

Clinton, who met the Prime Minister over lunch, Congress chief Sonia Gandhi over tea and then held talks with her counterpart, External Affairs Minister S M Krishna, said in the evening, “Our governments agreed to have a India-US strategic dialogue, which will have five pillars.”

The joint statement, released after the Krishna-Clinton meeting, said the foreign ministers would chair the dialogue, which will meet annually in alternate capitals and will focus on a wide range of bilateral, global, and regional issues of shared interest and common concern.

After the talks, Krishna said, “We have agreed on the end-use monitoring arrangements that will henceforth be referred to in letters of acceptance for Indian procurement of US defence technology and equipment.” The two sides also inked a Technical Safeguards Agreement that will permit the launch of civil or non-commercial satellites containing US components on Indian space launch vehicles.

As regards technology transfer in lieu of the India-US nuclear deal, Hillary also assured that the US was not opposed to transfer

of technology through appropriate channels to appropriate governments.

Describing her goal for a “stronger” partnership based on common interests, shared values and mutual respect, she described the dialogue as a “forum for action” and will not just be restricted to secretaries and ministers but between people from both sides.

Clinton also invited Krishna for the first round of the Strategic Dialogue in Washington in the coming year.

OTHER KEY ELEMENTS OF THE CLINTON-KRISHNA TALKS

• With the goal of a world free of nuclear weapons, Krishna and Clinton agreed to move ahead in the Conference on Disarmament towards a non-discriminatory, internationally and effectively verifiable Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty. “India and the US will also cooperate to prevent nuclear terrorism and address the challenges of global nuclear proliferation. A high-level bilateral dialogue will be established to enhance cooperation on these issues,” the joint statement said.

• Building on the success of the India-US Civil Nuclear Initiative, India and US will begin on July 21 consultations on “reprocessing arrangements and procedures”, as provided in Article 6 (iii) of the 123 Agreement, said the statement.

• Reaffirming the commitment of both governments to build on recent increased coordination in counter-terrorism, Clinton invited Home Minister P Chidambaram to visit Washington. Both sides reaffirmed their commitment to early adoption of a UN Comprehensive Convention against International Terrorism which would strengthen the framework for global cooperation.

• As members of G-20, both pledged to work together with other major economies to foster a sustainable recovery from the global economic crisis through a commitment to open trade and investment policies. Both sides reaffirmed the commitment of both governments to “facilitating a pathway forward on the WTO Doha Round”.

• The two sides noted that negotiations for a Bilateral Investment Treaty would be scheduled in New Delhi in August 2009, and resolved to harness the ingenuity and entrepreneurship of the private sectors of both countries with a newly configured CEO Forum that will meet later this year.

• Both sides expressed interest in exchanging views on new configurations of the UNSC, the G-8, and the G-20.

• Both affirmed importance of expanding educational cooperation through exchanges, institutional collaboration; agreed to expand “role of private sector” in strengthening this collaboration.

• Noting the high potential that exists due to the complementarities in the knowledge- and innovation-based economies of the two countries, it was agreed that the agenda and the initiatives in the bilateral High Technology Cooperation Dialogue should continue.

• The two sides agreed to develop a Women’s Empowerment Forum to exchange lessons and best practices on women’s empowerment.

Best fuel for india's growth

Goldman Sachs, the investment bank that did not collapse in the rout of 2008, has once again produced a report on India which says India could grow 40 times bigger than it is today by 2050. It is indeed hard to imagine this, but perhaps the suave new Human Resource Development Minister, Mr Kapil Sibal, might not find it so.

There are 10 challenges outlined in the new Goldman Sachs report — things that need reforming to make this potential become a reality. The key points are all weighty, and include one on education reform.

In 2009, the surprising thing is that India’s secondary education Budget is the lowest among all emerging market countries, let alone among BRIC nations. This, even as the National Knowledge Commission wants to increase the percentage of 18 to 24-year-olds educated up to university level from the present pathetic seven per cent to a modest 15 per cent. Of course, this means huge absolute numbers in a population of at least 1.1 billion.

To strengthen higher education, the National Knowledge Commission has proposed an increase in the number of universities from 350 today to 1,500 by 2016. The target, we can be sure, is unlikely to be met.

Even if this target were to be met, the corrupt practice of charging ‘capitation fees’ in private medical and engineering colleges, the confusion over AICTE recognition, and the bottleneck of hardly any new universities set up by the Government since independence, tell a sad story about the state of higher education in our country.

This is compounded by dismal quality issues across the educational spectrum and then there is the hot potato of land, which needs to be acquired at market rate if the setting up of a new university campus is not to become a source of controversy and strife.

But assuming these hurdles can be overcome with enlightened handling, we don’t seem to know very much about quality in secondary or higher education. The IITs and IIMs are collaborations, but they are ridiculously short on seats and no amount of hiding behind the merit argument can actually justify the shocking shortage.

So, in the main, all we can provide is education that resembles the processing of herds through the rickety gates of higher learning, and that, too, for those who score in the nineties in their school board examination. Or those who get degrees by never going to college.

In this global age, what we have is clearly a much-degraded form of higher education that turns out graduates who cannot think or innovate. So, as we stand, more of the same will not meet the needs of our future.

And education reform is, after all, just one of the 10 issues that Goldman Sachs has outlined. But judging from our track record, it may be necessary, and practical, to import quality in the form of good foreign universities encouraged to open branches in this country on a FDI basis.

This may also help us meet a part of the National Knowledge Commission’s target by 2016 in a qualitative manner. At present, not even one Indian university features even in the ‘Global 300’! China has six universities that feature in the list of top 300, and all of them are collaborations with Western universities.

Indeed, despite our shortcomings, we have much to thank Goldman Sachs for. It is because it was a Goldman Sachs economist of Irish extraction, Mr Jim O’Neill, who coined the term ‘BRIC’ in 2001. Suddenly India was included alongside Brazil, Russia and China as the shape of the future power structure. This has, over the last eight years, changed the perception of India’s potential.

Gradually the term has gained traction and though very different in themselves, the BRIC countries have decided to pull together of late. There is even a new hotline being put in place between India and China at the highest levels of Government.

Earlier this month, BRIC was referred to, half in jest, as “The Gang of Four” by a commentator on the BBC as its leaders were photographed executing a four-way handshake at Yekaterinburg in Russia. The BBC commentator may have inadvertently upped the ante because BRIC discussed some weighty matters at the Yekaterinburg Summit on June 15-16 without waiting for permission from, or participation by, the West.

Matters such as BRIC ambitions on developing an alternative global reserve currency beyond the US dollar came up for discussion. After all, China has lent the US over $1 trillion and is very concerned about the declining value of the US currency. India, Russia and Brazil have also parked some of their dollar holdings in US treasuries, and are also worried, if not to the same extent.

BRIC also wants a greater say in the disbursement of global development funds via the IMF and the World Bank, to reflect the shifting balance of power.

And perhaps, there was some unintended symbolism at work beyond the ‘gang’ remark, because these deliberations took place at Yekaterinburg. And it was Yekaterinburg too that saw the end of one era and the consolidation of another. For it was there that Tsar Nicholas II and his entire family were executed by the Bolsheviks on the night of July 16, 1918.

Contemporary symbolism was equally evident not just because of BRIC piggybacking on the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation Summit at Yekaterinburg. The SCO even gave President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran, fresh from a controversial election victory, a forum to fire a vituperous, if predictable, broadside against the US and ‘Western imperialism’.

These are still early days for big ticket Indian reform, even though it has been nearly 20 years since 1991. But even at our slow pace, the world has seen us implement a large part of the Golden Quadrilateral roads project, and surge on to an impressive telecom revolution. They, on their part, don’t think we will fail to reform our education systems as well. What we probably need is a booster dose of self confidence and policy dynamism of our own, to get it going.

Policy needs to be changed

In diplomacy, messages are often not direct or straightforward. Sometimes lessons from one theatre have relevance for another. The belligerence of North Korean dictator Kim Jong II over the past few weeks is a sobering reminder of how things can go wrong if a paramount power decides to speak softly without waving a big stick.

On May 25, Pyongyang tested a nuclear device. A North Korean ship is currently on the high seas, apparently carrying an illegal cargo of missiles and other weaponry to Burma. On July 4, Independence Day in the United States, Mr Kim has promised to fire a missile in the direction of Hawaii.

The expected range of the Taepodong-2 is 6,500 km and Hawaii is just over 7,000 km from the launch site. Chances of the missile entering American waters/territory are small, but it will travel over Japan. On the whole, it will be the most serious infraction in the US’s Pacific region since Pearl Harbour.

It is ironical the North Korean leader’s muscle-flexing has taken place only months after a new and supposedly conciliatory resident arrived at the White House. After all, US President Barack Obama’s team made effusive noises about the conduct of foreign policy that would be different from President George W Bush’s sledgehammer, “with us or against us”, approach.

How did North Korea behave in the Bush years? As far back as 2002, Mr Bush named the Pyongyang regime as part of the “Axis of Evil”. In 2003, Pyongyang withdrew from the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty and in 2006 tested a nuclear device. The then American President pushed for economic sanctions and used China — the one country with influence on Mr Kim — to bring North Korea to the negotiating table.

North Korea did not give up its clandestine mission. Nevertheless, it checked itself. There were no overt displays of aggression. Mr Kim agreed to shut down some nuclear facilities. He recognised that in Mr Bush he had an implacable foe, one who would hit back and hit back hard if provoked.

Six months after the Republican President left Washington, DC, the North Korean megalomaniac has triggered an East Asian crisis. He has reneged on his promise to close nuclear installations and reverted to Bomb-making.

What does this tell us about Mr Kim and about political adventurism in general? The North Koreans have indicated they don’t think much of the Obama crowd, they see America’s resolve as weakening. They have also paid a left-handed compliment to Mr Bush —acknowledging he put the fear of god into them.

There are three implications to the crisis. First, it will give others ideas. Teheran has already more or less rebuffed Mr Obama’s offer of talks. In backing the wrong horse in the recent election — and misreading the mood of the Iranian people — the US State Department didn’t help its cause.

Of course, domestic unrest in Iran is at its most potent in some 30 years and this will allow the Americans to claim the moral high ground. However, it will amount to a tactical rather than strategic advantage. In the larger reckoning, Mr Obama cannot talk his way out of trouble on the Iranian front.

In the battle against Osama bin Laden and the international army of Islamists, Mr Obama has not backed down, but he has occasionally sent ambivalent signals. His speech in Cairo earlier this month pandered to the sort of negativism and overdone self-pity that is the staple of Al Qaeda apologists.

Perhaps Mr Obama was only using the polite phrases to set the stage for stern decisions. That remains a prospect for the future. For the moment, the Cairo speech can only be seen in isolation, and can get very qualified applause.

Second, Mr Obama is being put to test. He came into office with limited experience and with the reputation of being a foreign policy lightweight. To be fair, Mr Bush too had very little international exposure in January 2001, but was backed by a formidable Republican machine.

In contrast, Mr Obama’s original foreign policy advisers — some of whom he has despatched to relatively inconsequential posts in the United Nations — were the liberal extreme of his country’s strategic affairs establishment. Mr Obama campaigned on a theme that promised to end wars, not take the US further into conflict, work within multilateral systems, be cautious rather than impulsive.

All of that sounds nice — until one is faced with a first-rate, real-life crisis. If North Korea indeed gets a missile close enough to Hawaii, Mr Obama will encounter media frenzy. What will he do?

In a sense, this could lead to a microcosmic examination of the theory which holds that, if a 9/11-style attack were to repeat itself in his presidency, Mr Obama will be obliged to strike back with greater lethality than Mr Bush. His political and personal background will make it difficult for him to do otherwise, lest the public see him as ‘weak’.

Third, Afghanistan or Pakistan, North Korea or Iran, even India or China: The more Mr Obama tries to distance himself from the Bush template, the closer he moves towards it.

Mr Obama’s broader strategy for the war on terrorism is no different from the one Mr Bush set out. His easy touch has not worked with North Korea and Iran and sooner or later tough measures will be called for to tackle two nuclear programmes that America and its allies — in two separate parts of Asia — see as non-negotiable. For all the early camaraderie with Beijing and neglect of New Delhi, recent interactions between the Obama team and Indian interlocutors suggest the honeymoon with China is going to be short-lived.

Different global environments call for different modes of diplomacy. After 9/11, Mr Bush correctly calculated the world was headed for a Hobbesian interlude. Maverick actors — dictators like Kim, freelance commanders like bin Laden, mobster institutions like the Pakistani Army — would need to be treated with a mix of straight talk and unvarnished power projection.

That realism was a critical element of the Bush doctrine. It remains the former President’s most abiding foreign policy legacy. Mr Obama can paint it in another colour, give it a new name; ultimately, he has to embrace it.

Red tide rising in Lalgarh

The All-India Coordination Committee of Communist Revolutionaries, of which the Darjeeling district committee of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), which spearheaded the Naxalite movement, was an important constituent, became the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) in 1969. The latter, however, splintered soon thereafter and, at one stage, there were about 40 different groups and parties professing allegiance to the Maoist political stream. Yet, despite this and the harsh repressive measures, the movement spread from the Naxalbari area to Debra and Gopiballavpur in Midnapore district in West Bengal, Mushahari in Bihar, Lakhimpur Kheri in Uttar Pradesh and Srikakulam in Andhra Pradesh within a short period.

The movement has continued to grow, and now covers substantial tracts in West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, with contiguous areas of these States forming a ‘Red Corridor’ stretching from Andhra Pradesh to Nepal. It has also established a presence in Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. The insurrectionary violence now being witnessed at Lalgarh and elsewhere in India is led by the Communist Party of India (Maoist), formed in September 2004 through the merger of the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) People’s War and the Maoist Communist Centre of India.

A significant feature of the Maoist movement is that, stamped out in one place, it has raised its head in another. Thus, suppressed in West Bengal by the end of 1972, it re-emerged as a force in Andhra Pradesh, where it had been crushed earlier, by mid-1970s and in Bihar in the 1980s, and then in the other States.

One reason for the movement’s survival and spread has been the inadequacy of the state’s response. Counter-insurgency is a highly complex and multi-dimensional business spanning territories as far apart as psychological warfare, electronic surveillance to human intelligence-gathering and actual operations on the ground. Each of these areas requires expertise, state-of-the-art equipment and motivation of the highest order, which is lacking in most State police forces steeped in sloth and venality. In fact, it is the predatory nature of the State police forces that makes it difficult for them to enlist popular support against the Maoist, and easy for the latter to whip up popular anger against them and make them targets of attack.

The impact of this basic drawback has been aggravated by the fact that the police are poorly armed compared to the Maoists who often sport AK series rifles against their .303s. They lack adequate communications equipment, an absence which has been acutely felt in Lalgarh, and mobility, there being very few adequately armour-plated vehicles which can withstand landmine blasts. Even the special outfits that several State Governments have cobbled together have not helped because of inadequate weaponry and equipment and the fact that officers and personnel leading them are from the State police establishments and thus tend to be defined by their ethos and conventional mindsets.

Besides, police forces have to be led at the political level by leaders who command respect by virtue of their personal attributes and who either themselves have the vision and intellect to recognise the magnitude of the challenge posed by the Maoists and the nature of the response required, or are wise enough to leave matters to police officers who have it. There are few such leaders at the State level. Rather, the majority of them, including those in ministerial chairs, are known to be corrupt and not terribly bright, which makes it easy for the Maoists to run down not only them but the entire parliamentary system of Government as an instrument of exploitation and class domination.

Political leaders are frequently unable to identify officers who have the integrity, commitment, intellect, sensitivity, political acumen and courage to lead counter-insurgency operations — as opposed to those who have not. The factionalism that prevails in the Indian Police Service — as also that of the Indian Administrative Service — cadre of various States, makes the matter particularly difficult. Poorly-led police forces are at a serious disadvantage when facing most Maoist leaders who are educated, committed and have years of operational experience behind them.

Maoists also have the advantage of a ready reservoir of recruits from tribal and other disprivileged families that find themselves deprived of their traditional means of livelihood and uprooted from their meagre landholdings and homesteads by a ruthless, inhuman process of development that principally benefits the emergent upper and middle classes at the cost of the poor. Matters are compounded by a rapacious, extortionate and arrogant bureaucracy which strips citizens of both money and dignity whenever an opportunity presents itself, and which constitutes something very similar to the New Class which Milovan Djilas defines (The New Class: An Analysis of the Communist System) as being “made up of those who have special privileges and economic preference because of the administrative monopoly they hold”.

The state being still the principal instrument of development, with functions extending from running banks, hospitals and insurance companies to providing electricity and water connections to homes and factories, the intense and widespread alienation that follows cannot be overstated. One then hardly needs to be surprised by what one is witnessing in Lalgarh. And there will be many more Lalgarhs without a fundamental change in the way India is governed.

Wrong strategy to fight poverty.

In the 1980s, Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi rued the bitter fact that only fifteen rupees out of every hundred, earmarked for any poverty alleviation programme in India, actually got through to the ‘real poor’, the intended recipients. The rest went without a trace, presumably into the pockets of various facilitators.

Even at the time, the more cynical set the effective percentage at nearer 5 than 15, with inflated bills and sub-standard deliveries added in. This is obviously unacceptable in a country where the bulk of the people are poor, earn less than $ 450 a year, even 62 years after independence, with nearly a quarter of our billion plus population Below the Poverty Line; defined by the World Bank at an income of $ 1 or less a day or $ 365 a year.

The Indian Government defines the Poverty Line much lower, at an income of just Rs 10 a day, stating that it is enough to buy food that can deliver 2,000 calories of nutrition. It is difficult to see how this is feasible in 2009 unless the presumption is that multiple family members will beg, borrow or steal at least Rs 10 daily. Over 300 million eligible-for-work Indians are both unemployed and languish below the Poverty Line.

Internationally, also in the 1980s, Irish rock-star-activist Bob Geldof of the Boomtown Rats organised the Band-Aid (Song: Do they know it’s Christmas), and Live Aid concerts in 1984 and 1985, respectively, watched live on TV by over 400 million people in 60 countries.

Live Aid, in particular, raised nearly $ 300 million, right in the first flush, for the starving in Ethiopia, while advancing the capabilities of global satellite television, the so-called ‘global jukebox’, with simultaneous live concerts on different continents, hooked up and broadcast in real time.

Geldof persisted with the serious work of getting the succour to the needy after the razzle dazzle of the concert was over. And unhappy with the chronic leakages in disbursement, he set up a parallel administration to reduce the waste, profligacy and corruption endemic in a great deal of charity work, as even more money poured in; but with predictably mixed results.

Much of the funding or the relief material was siphoned off by NGOs and Ethiopian Government agencies, even the carefully vetted ones, that were not above profiteering on the misery of the helpless. Black markets prospered on Live Aid largesse. This, even as the entire effort benefited from the sympathy of the world, provoked by the massive publicity generated — not the least of which were from the harrowing, prize-winning images of the starving and dying shot by highly acclaimed photo-journalists.

The subsequently knighted Sir Geldof’s moral successor in the Irish rocker cum economic activism stakes, Sir Bono of U2, is more philosophical about the actual good that concerned people are able to do, choosing to persist regardless.

Initiated into the charity arena by Bob Geldof, Bono helped organise Amnesty International’s Conspiracy Of Hope global tour in 1986 alongside rock star Sting. Bono subsequently organised Live 8 in 2005 and remains committed to his fund and awareness raising efforts for a host of global issues to this day.

Viewed in broader terms, celebrities and charities, ranging from causes such as AIDS to global warming, and the vanilla, if vital, universal needs of education and health, have been enjoying a mutually beneficial relationship for quite some time now. The protagonists feature the stars of Hollywood, the international sporting world, entertainers of various hues, senior Western politicians and ex-Presidents of the US, Nobel laureates and so forth, in its fold.

But here in India, or internationally, in all the global distress spots, the rate of disbursement of relief to the most needy continues to be badly afflicted.

The United Nations and its agencies, less headline-grabbing, perhaps less glamorous, definitely less self-serving, but with demonstratably long-term commitment and steadiness of purpose, also plough on with dogged determination. They are realistically attuned to doing as much as they can. They carry out authentic and formidable research on their subject areas before acting, despite the corruption and the thicket of political pressures applied to them under the guise of nationalism.

Meanwhile, over 20 years after, Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi is famously focussed on the trials and tribulations of the poor in rural India, seeing in their betterance the panacea to most of India’s ills.

He is allegedly the prime mover in many of the UPA Government’s recent rural upliftment initiatives, which have been riddled with delays, sluggish implementation, and rampant corruption. Mr Gandhi, on the campaign trail recently, put the figure of actual benefit to the target audience at just one rupee out of ten.

Clearly therefore, something needs to be done to overhaul the popular models of poverty alleviation. The United Nations, no fair-weather friend to the task, privately bemoans the lack of strategic thinking in this regard, the near non-involvement of academics and thinkers who might be able to fashion plugs for the loopholes.

But perhaps the answer lies in buying something to show for your money, creating rural and poverty alleviating infrastructure, instead of targeting the minimum guaranteed employment programmes with their on-paper progress and their dig-a-ditch-and-fill-it-back-up dynamics.

By this reasoning, the rural roads programme, initiated by the previous UPA Government, has/will probably yield better results than yet another ‘rozgar’ programme. Infrastructure development also possesses a bottom, budget overruns notwithstanding, unlike hand-out style poverty alleviation which gives new meaning to the term ‘bottomless abyss’.

The United Nations set itself some millennium goals for ‘all United Nations Member States’. In 2000 it wanted to “eradicate extreme poverty and hunger” by 2015, amongst a host of other objectives such as “universal primary education” and “environmental sustainability”. Peopled by highly skilled professionals, it is nevertheless used to revising its time-lines.

But, perhaps if it developed a consensus with the Indian Government, and those of other countries, that it will only fund poverty alleviation infrastructure, instead of intangibles, more than the disgraceful five to 10 per cent of the funding may yet turn out to the benefit of the poor.

It is not everyone’s case, but those less concerned with the exigencies of creating compliant vote-banks may see merit in encouraging the abject poor to help themselves via decent and plentiful facilities placed within their reach.

Tribute to a great Martyr whose birthday was forgotten by his nation on 11th june in the name of world cup.

सरफरोशी की तमन्ना अब हमारे दिल में है
देखना है जोर कितना बाजू-ऐ-कातिल में है

ऐ वतन करता नहीं क्यूँ दूसरा कुछ बातचीत
देखता हूँ मैं जिसे वो चुप तेरी महफ़िल में है
ऐ शहीद-ऐ-मुल्क-ओ-मिल्लत,मैं तेरे ऊपर निसार
अब तेरी हिम्मत का चर्चा गैर की महफ़िल में है
सरफरोशी की तमन्ना अब हमारे दिल में है

वक्त आने पर बता देंगे तुझे ऐ आसमां
हम अभी से क्या बताएं क्या हमारे दिल में है
खेंच कर लायी है सब को कत्ल होने की उम्मीद
आशिकों का आज जमघट कूचा-ऐ-कातिल में है
सरफरोशी की तमन्ना अब हमारे दिल में है

है लिए हथियार दुश्मन ताक में बैठा उधर
और हम तैयार हैं सीना लिए अपना इधर
खून से खेलेंगे होली गर वतन मुश्किल में है,
सरफरोशी की तमन्ना अब हमारे दिल में है

हाथ जिन में हैं जूनून,कटते नहीं तलवार से
सर जो उठ जाते हैं वो झुकते नहीं ललकार से
और भड़केगा जो शोला सा हमारे दिल में है
सरफरोशी की तमन्ना अब हमारे दिल में है

हम तो घर से ही थे निकले बांधकर सर पर कफ़न
जान हथेली पर लिए लो बढ़ चले हैं ये कदम
जिंदगी तो अपनी मेहमाँ मौत की महफ़िल में है,
सरफरोशी की तमन्ना अब हमारे दिल में है

यूँ खडा मक्तल में कातिल कह रहा है बार-बार
क्या तमन्ना-ऐ-शहादत भी किसी के दिल में है?
दिल में तूफानों की टोली और नसों में इन्कलाब
होश दुश्मन के उड़ा देंगे हमें रोको न आज
दूर रह पाए जो हमसे दम कहाँ मंजिल में है,
सरफरोशी की तमन्ना अब हमारे दिल में है

जिस्म भी क्या जिस्म है जिसमे न हो खून-ऐ-जूनून
क्या लड़े तूफ़ान से जो कश्ती-ऐ-साहिल में है
सरफरोशी की तमन्ना अब हमारे दिल में है
देखना है जोर कितना बाजू-ऐ-कातिल में है.

अमर शहीद पंडित राम प्रसाद बिस्मिल जी

Politicians face credibility crisis

With the second Manmohan Singh Government looking more like a Congress Government, it is possible that the illusion of single-party dominance is going to become the framework of political discourse for the next few years, or at least until there is a crisis which proves unmanageable. This effortless return to the mental parameters of the Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi era may not be a good reflection of ground realities. But the resounding post-facto endorsement of the chattering classes for the Ruling Party of India has, unfortunately, never been marked by profundity.

The natural corollary of this winner-takes-all mindset is that after being at the receiving end of some initial derision, the vanquished will be left to lick their wounds in private. Both the deflated Ministerial aspirants in the BJP and the frustrated puppeteers in the CPI(M) know that they have a lot of listening and explaining to do. But they also know that some perfunctory show of contrition will suffice to defray the immediate frustrations of the foot soldiers. Apparatchiks, particularly those who exist in a cloistered environment of the party offices, know that they can put off exercising hard options by falling back on the need to take a considered decision.

Time and events being great healers, a rigorous post-mortem can be shelved indefinitely if the immediate pressure to take remedial action can be averted.

It is paradoxical that despite functioning in a democratic environment, the internal regime of India’s political parties is grounded in committee room secrecy. This wasn’t always so. Till the late-1960s, the Congress, for example, had a reasonable degree of inner-party democracy. Elections to the All-India Congress Committee and its State counterparts were held regularly and were often fiercely contested. The annual AICC sessions were marked by speeches that were robustly critical of the Government’s policies and the party leadership.

Open, rumbustious discussion was also a hallmark of the Socialists. Ram Manohar Lohia fought bitter inner-party battles with the likes of Asoka Mehta, Chandra Shekhar, NG Goray and Nath Pai. His flamboyant followers such as George Fernandes, Raj Narain and Madhu Limaye were great votaries of the “change or split” path.

Communism in India was nominally wedded to the Leninist tradition of party organisation that ensured a paramount role of the Central Committee and Politburo-the proverbial vanguard of the vanguard. Yet, and particularly after PC Joshi injected intellectual vibrancy into the party in the mid-1940s, the undivided CPI boasted a culture of political discussion.

The subjects of concern-the class composition of the Indian state and the relevance of “bourgeois democracy” were two all-time favourites-may have been abstruse. There was also an exaggerated reliance on what Lenin “himself” or Mao Zedong may or may not have prescribed, and cravenness before discreet instructions from Moscow. However, despite these constraints, the political “line” was thoroughly dissected. The Communists moved seamlessly from “correctness to correctness”.

The tradition of political openness received a grave setback after the Congress split of 1969 and the Emergency. The emergence of an all-powerful leader and the dynastic principle meant that decision-making was arrogated to the one and only leader. In the 1990s, the Congress suffered three major electoral defeats. Yet, apart from one brain-storming session in Panchmarhi, the party did nothing to address the grave problem of political erosion. The Congress’ recovery in 2004 and the awesome advance in 2009 owed little to any well considered plan of rejuvenation. It was an outcome of happy circumstances.

Rahul Gandhi has proclaimed his intention of democratising the Congress. The intention is noble and suggests that the heir apparent may have cottoned on to the root cause of the decline of political culture-a problem he has tried to circumvent by making politics into a caste. However, the extent to which the Congress reverts to its original moorings will depend on the calibre of its top leadership. It is one thing to promote inner-party democracy in the good times. Bad times often prompt a regression.

Curiously, it is the BJP which faces a problem not dissimilar to that of the Congress. If the Nehru-Gandhi family acts as an adhesive in the Congress, it is the RSS which plays Pope in the BJP. The BJP’s problems have multiplied on two counts. First, the RSS has eroded its moral authority and social influence thanks to its unwillingness to face contemporary realities. Second, success in electoral politics has triggered a breakdown of ideological certitudes and added to the charms of aggregative politics. The RSS has tried to hold things together by command. Diktat has replaced informed choice and this enforced regimentation has in turn stymied the party’s renewal.

After Atal Bihari Vajpayee and LK Advani, the party’s presidents have lacked the depth to pursue creative politics. Since the defeat in 2004, the BJP has curtailed inner-party debate, not least because the minders and their nominees have lacked the competence to handle intellectual scrutiny.

Restoring the credibility of politics and the political class is a national challenge. As democracy strikes deep roots, more and more people want a say in how parties behave and who they project. The Primary was once an American quirk but it has now become crucial to the British system as well. In India, people are offered choices on election day but have no say in determining the shortlist. To strengthen the quality of democracy, a system of constant interaction involving the top and the bottom is imperative.

The country pays lip service to the argumentative India; it is time to show similar respect to the arguments.