Before making any outrageous claims on border issues, Chinese officials are better advised to do their homework well about history and geography

Hua Chunying, the spokesperson of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, once again exhibited poor knowledge of history and even geography. She repeated her claims that Arunachal Pradesh is a part of Chinese territory. Soon after the Indian Prime Minister visited Arunachal Pradesh, she affirmed: “The Chinese Government has never recognised the so-called Arunachal Pradesh and is firmly opposed to the Indian leader’s visit to the East Section of the China-India boundary.”

True to form, South Block issued a weak rebuttal. One wonders why can’t New Delhi speak of the “so-called Tibetan Autonomous Region” or lodge a strong protest each time China does repair work on the road cutting across the Aksai Chin region of Ladakh? Indian diplomats are probably too shy for this. But we should learn from China to defend our interests more vociferously.  Hua’s sharp tongue expressed hopes that “India will cherish the momentum of warming bilateral ties and not take any provocative action.” What provocative action? Just the Prime Minister’s visit to an Indian state? Hua may not be aware but China’s refusal to acknowledge the McMahon Line is a relatively new phenomenon.

Let us go back to 1956. As India prepared to celebrate the 2,500th anniversary of the birth of Buddha, communist China was extremely nervous; eastern Tibet was on fire with the Khampa rebellion, while central Tibet was slowly getting contaminated by the revolt. After months of prevarication, Beijing finally allowed the Dalai Lama and the Panchen Lama to visit India for the celebrations. But Chinese premier Zhou Enlai was really febrile, he was aware that many Tibetans wanted the Dalai Lama to stay on in India; as a result, he visited Delhi thrice in a period of two months.

During one of his numerous encounters with Zhou, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru asked him: “But I do not quite understand what you meant when you said that Tibet in the past had not become a province of China?” The premier answered: “That Tibet is part of China is a fact but it has never [been] an administrative province of China and has kept an autonomous character.” For Beijing, the autonomous character would remain on paper only. Zhou even admitted that India knew more about Tibet’s past history: “For example, I knew nothing about McMahon Line until recently when we came to study the border problem after the liberation of China.”

Hua would be surprised to learn that China’s premier did not know about the line delineating the border between Indian and Tibet till the early 1950s. Nehru unnecessarily asserted that historical knowledge was not important: “History is gone.” He, however, added: “My impression was that whatever it may be in theory, for all practical purposes, Tibet has all along been autonomous.”

The clever Zhou repeated that though people like him never knew about the McMahon Line till recently, the Kuomintang regime knew about it. Referring to the McMahon Line, he spoke of a “secret” pact between British India and Tibet at the time of the Simla conference.

The Chinese do not like to remember that the Tibetans sat on an equal footing with them during the Simla conference between October 1913 and July 1914. To give an example, the proceedings of the third meeting of the Tibet conference held on January 12, 1914, mentioned the presence of Sir Henry McMahon, GOVO, KCIE, CSI, British Plenipotentiary and staff; Monsieur Ivan Chen, Chinese Plenipotentiary and staff and Kusho Lonchen Shatra, Tibetan Plenipotentiary and staff. They officially sat together for nine months; China suffers from selective amnesia today.

To come back to the Nehru-Zhou meeting, the Premier continued on the McMahon Line: “And now that it is an accomplished fact, we should accept it. But we have not consulted Tibet so far. In the last agreement, which we signed about Tibet [in 1954], the Tibetans wanted us to reject this Line but we told them that the question should be temporarily put aside.”

The Chinese Premier bluffed: “But now we think that we should try to persuade and convince Tibetans to accept it.”

Then, Nehru went on his favorite argument: “The border is a high mountain and sparsely populated.” He further asserted: “Apart from the major question, there are also small queries about two miles here and two miles there. But if we agree on some principle, namely, the principle of previous normal practice or the principle of watershed, we can also settle these other small points.”

It is a fact that it is the nationalist government which made the communists realise the extent of the Chinese territory in the area. It is Ren Naiqiang, an influential scholar during the Republican era, who first included parts of the north-eastern borders of India into the Chinese territory. In 1926, long before the beginning of the Japanese war, Ren had started wandering through Kham. In 1936, as the Nationalist Government formally established the new province Xikang (corresponding to Kham province of Tibet), Ren Naiqiang was encouraged by Liu Wenhui, the Governor of the new province, to produce a map of the area. Though the Chinese had never set a foot in the area, the new map included the North East Frontier Agency (NEFA) in China.

At the end of 1949, Ren Naiqiang met Marshal He Long, one of the seniormost generals of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and explained why his map was dependable; the Marshal was convinced and ordered the distribution of copies. On January 10, 1950, He Long sent his report to Mao Zedong strongly recommending that Ren’s map should be accepted and circulated amongst the PLA. It is after this encounter that China started “claiming” India’s NEFA (today Arunachal Pradesh). Before making outrageous claims, Hua should do her homework and know her country’s history. China has not always claimed NEFA.

(The author is an expert on India-China relations.)

Writer: Claude Arpi

Courtesy: Pioneer

NGT pulls up Delhi Government for noise pollution but we have to discipline ourselves first

The biggest obstacle towards addressing pollution in Delhi is that we  like to think of it in terms of the air that we breathe. Rarely do we talk about other types of pollution that impact our daily existence like that of water and sound. It usually takes reminders from the National Green Tribunal to jolt us back to our senses. And so it has slapped a fine of `5 lakh on the Delhi governmentfor its failure to check noise pollution in the western part of the city despite a compliance order issued four months ago. A quarterly report on the noise pollution in Delhi’s Rajouri Garden found that despite citizens’ crusades and complaints, bars and restaurants in the area were using loudspeakers and DJ systems during weddings and other celebratory functions. Violating time limits, such pleasurable activities were disturbing the lives of residents in a clustered locality, particularly infants and the aged. But given the noise pollution that continues unabated on Diwali nights despite Supreme Court rulings on bursting crackers, little wonder this neighbourhood complaint was not considered serious enough as a concern. Fact is noise pollution is actually as serious as air pollution. Research data by independent decibel survey agencies have shown that Delhi had some of the country’s noisiest roads. And citizens had the maximum amount of hearing loss proportionate to their age. Noise pollution in cities is directly linked to 64 per cent of hearing loss, said one study.

Most traffic junctions here record plus 70 decibels on a regular day, almost 10 over the limit allowed in commercial areas. In fact, ENT specialists have a separate marker as to what constitutes hearing loss here than what it is for the rest of the country. Noise pollution is now linked to many health issues, from irreversible hearing loss, anxiety attacks to hypertension and heart disease. Most importantly, loud honking, construction clatter, industrial hum and the thud of music from boom boxes have an overall impact on a person’s sanity and well-being, the quantum of which cannot be ascertained simply because it is not scalable. Often we train ourselves to be immune to sounds without realising we are upping our tolerance threshold and alertness levels and not simmering down even in a resting state. Data compiled by both the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) and Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC) have shown that sound levels in neighbourhoods at night too were above recommended levels. Which is why last October, the Delhi police declared 60  stretches of road as “no honking zones.” However, while it is easy to identify violations, it is the curbing mechanism which is difficult and frankly low priority. A fine is just `100, there are very few noise meters and there are more cars on the roads than speed cams to check limits and consequent volumes. We can all blame administrative will and the lack of a disciplinarian mechanism but the biggest control has to come from citizens themselves. If we are conscientious enough to modify our lifestyles and be more sensitive to our surroundings, follow rules willingly and not just because they are imposed on us, decongest routes and can lower our sound requirements since the city is always in the middle of an infrastructural overhaul, we would sleep in peace. It is the silence about our behavioural change that is truly deafening. And no amount of PILs and activism can change that.

Writer & Courtesy: Pioneer

The words and actions of the US have increasingly come under question owing to that intrigues, complexities and accompanying civilian atrocities in conflicts in Afghanistan and Vietnam.

The genesis, proceedings and the ultimate fate of the US involvement in both Vietnam and Afghanistan are plagued with eerie similarities. First, both — the Vietnamese and the Afghans — pride themselves on their fierce history of resistance to foreign invaders for centuries. In the case of the Vietnamese, it was the valiant repulsion of the Chinese, Mongols, French and the Japanese forces; whereas, the unforgiving battlefields of the Afghan swathes have been bloodied with forces of Alexander, Arab caliphates, Genghis Khan, Timur, Persians, Mughals, Sikhs, British empire and to the communist forces of the erstwhile USSR. Both races have a heightened sense of history and destiny that militates instinctively against any notion of a foreign “invader.” Both these lands have been at the forefront of the US’ efforts to counter the topical “ism” that threatened American interests. In the case of Vietnam, in the 50s and 60s, it was the Cold War fear of “communism” that drove US interest; whereas in the case of Afghanistan (post 2001), “religious extremism” replaced “communism” as the greatest security threat.

In both these conflicts, the US had played a covert, tactical and surreptitious role in inflaming the combustible ground situation. Insidious military and financial support was extended to the French forces in the 50s to re-colonise Vietnam, which later morphed into a full-fledged US military intervention by the 60s. Similarly, the less-than-covert military operations of the Central Intelligence Agency-Islamic State (IS), along with the Afghan mujahideen in the 80s, had lit the flames of religious extremism that ultimately morphed into the phenomenon of the Taliban. The pattern of sudden US disinterest is also common to both places as Vietnam would face in the mid-70s when the forces of Ho Chi Minh overran Saigon, as also in the essential US disinterest in the 90s as Pakistan-supported Taliban entered and butchered their way into Kabul. The genesis of both conflicts had unmistakable fingerprints of the US handiwork prior to the full escalation of the crisis. In both cases, the US had erred in its initial judgement as it had twice spurned appeals by the nationalist, Ho Chi Minh, before he turned a staunch communist; whereas, the American desperation to dislodge the communist Najibullah regime in Kabul had led them to honour and fete the Afghan mujahideen in the White House, who later turned on their original benefactors.

Signs of American “shock-and-awe” military tactics to bludgeon enemy lines were visible in the killing fields of Vietnam, where the Americans dropped more than three times the tonnage of bombs that the entire allied forces dropped in World War II. Today, Afghanistan has replaced Vietnam as its longest war and a record high number of bombs dropped in a year were registered in 2018. The definitive imagery of 388,000 tonnes of napalm bombs dropped in Vietnam was mirrored with the unabashed dropping of the GBU-43/B (also known as “Mother of all Bombs”) in Afghanistan — the most powerful non-nuclear weapon in American arsenal. However, despite the colossal commitment of weaponry and military might, the Afghan extremist groups today control more territory than at any point ever since the removal of their regime 17 years ago. The Vietnam War had led to over 58,000 American military casualties and the technology-enhanced Afghan war to yet another 2,400 American military casualties. The “cost of war” to the locals (civilians, soldiers and insurgents) was an unprecedented three million in the Vietnam War and over 111,000 in Afghanistan. From the official start date of the Vietnam War (November 1, 1955) to the signing of the peace treaty in January 1973 for facilitating the withdrawal of American troops, the realisation of an unsustainable “no-win” stalemate took 18 years. Today, nearly 18 years into the Afghan War (started in 2001, following 9/11), the Americans are walking the talk of another American withdrawal, this time from Afghanistan, following yet another stalemate.

Unfortunately, the looming fears of the imminent future are also similarly aligned as the Americans are negotiating with the Afghan Taliban (under the nudge and aegis of the equally unreliable ally, Pakistan) to facilitate the American troops’ withdrawal. In 1973, a similar face-saving treaty was signed by the representatives of the US, South Vietnam, North Vietnam and Viet Cong to ‘reunite’ Vietnam peacefully – even though the signatory north Vietnamese were knowingly violating the terms of ceasefire and agreement and by 1975, the entire South Vietnam territory had fallen to a full-scale invasion by the North. It is this doomsday scenario that has fuelled concerns in the Ashraf Ghani-led Afghan Government in Kabul as they fear the impact of an emboldened Taliban. From 1,50,000 foreign troops defending the beleaguered Afghan Government till 2016, to just about 7,000 (after the current US withdrawal plans), along with the well-known aspiration of “strategic depth” in Afghanistan for the Pakistani state – the military ability of the current Afghan Government in Kabul to withstand the IS-Taliban combined onslaught is extremely suspicious. The sudden vacuum following the US withdrawal in Vietnam in 1973 had led to the ultimate fall of the South Vietnam defences; the US “withdrawal” from Afghanistan in 1991 had led to the creation of the Taliban; and now the insecurity in Kabul is one of history repeating itself.

While history is yet to record its final verdict and victor in Afghanistan, in Vietnam, the Americans can technically claim to have “withdrawn.” However, objectively, the anti-US side overran the US protectorate and they rule till date. Thousands of insurgents were killed in US military operations and multiple more of the same were borne out of the sense of revenge, hatred and retribution against the US. In both cases the human, economic, military and the political “cost of war” became unsustainable and the common feature of “stalemate” wore out the largest military in the world. The intrigues, complexities and accompanying civilian atrocities in both conflicts have also led to serious questions on the morality, trust and confidence on the US’ words and actions. Afghanistan is still an unfolding saga, yet portents of a possible repeat of a Vietnam stare in the face.

(The writer, a military veteran, is a former Lt Governor of Andaman & Nicobar Islands and Puducherry.)

Writer: Bhopinder Singh

With the guiding lantern in hand and a vision to drive the new age developmental change in India, Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently quoted that 3.76 lakh new jobs were added within the Government sector. He also mentioned about growing contributions towards provident fund and the National Pension Scheme. If this pattern of growth in the job sector to be followed, at least ten million jobs have been created in India in the past five years. Present day India is facing several issues within the job market which mainly include insufficient jobs to job seekers ratio. Creating middle-class jobs has been a challenge with the appearance of a clear dichotomy of a few high-paying, high-level jobs and millions of low-paying jobs.

As Manish Sabharwal of the staffing agency, Teamlease, wrote a few years ago, there are a few Rs 25,000 per month jobs and little prospect for growth for low-level employees. Clearly, the situation hasn’t changed and this is just increasing the wealth and education divide in India. The problem is that neither Prime Minister Modi nor the Opposition has any solutions to this. The core problem is the much-ballyhooed “demographic dividend” in India, which now appears to have been an economy-crushing combination of lower maternal and infant mortality rates without a drop in fertility rates in large swathes of northern and eastern parts. At the same time, dramatic improvements in agricultural technologies and yields have reduced manpower needs. Further, large agricultural families are unsustainable, which has led to mass urban migration with a subsequent realignment in a manner of speaking of traditional caste structures. All of these are huge challenges that have been dealt with by politicians through either quota politics, again not sustainable without enough jobs, or cash doles. But neither of them is enough.

China’s stunning turnaround happened because it moved its people from unsustainable subsistence agriculture to factories and as many complaints as the weather had about China’s factories, they are a whole lot better than the ones in the West when they made the huge leap to the industrial revolution. The problem is that India seems to have missed the manufacturing bus. And while domestic demand has kept the economy afloat, the key consuming class is still around 20-25 million families. India’s ‘great middle class’ as The Economist magazine put it, is “ephemeral.” This is almost circular logic and the only way to boost jobs growth and, thus, demand, is to provide stimulus to the private sector not just to the small-scale industry, but encourage foreign investment with rational policy decisions. This should be the main job for whoever gets the hot seat come May end because we cannot dilly-dally any longer.

Courtesy – Pioneer

Trinamool Congress MLA Satyajit Biswas from Krishnaganj in Nadia district, was shot dead by unidentified assailants, when the 41-year-old was visiting a Saraswati Puja pandal where he had been invited to inaugurate the festival. The TMC immediately blamed the BJP for the crime.

“He had already inaugurated the Puja and was walking towards his car after coming down from the stage where he made a brief speech,” said locals, adding the assailants suddenly emerged and fired at him from point blank range and melted away.

“He seemed still to be alive while he was being taken to the nearby Shaktinagar hospital,” said party sources, adding he succumbed to his injuries on way to hospital.

TMC district president Gouri Dutta accused the BJP operatives for the murder and said, “He was an active member of the party and had managed to resist the BJP onslaughts in the region.” Most of the BJP members had migrated from the CPI (M) which till a year or two ago had a sizeable presence in the district, he added.

A large posse of police force was rushed to the spot and a pistol was recovered from the area, a senior police officer said.

RSS and BJP operatives were behind the attack, he said adding former TMC leader Mukul Roy who was currently in charge of the election affairs of the BJP in Bengal was pulling the strings from behind.

Biswas was a prominent leader from the Matua community which accounts for about two million votes in North 24 Parganas and Nadia and were currently being mollycoddled both by the BJP and the TMC.

The victim had played an important role in last year’s Panchayat elections in his constituency and the neighbouring Ranaghat North-east seat, sources said.

State BJP president Dilip Ghosh blamed the infighting within the ruling party for the Saturday’s incident.

“The rampant groupism in the TMC is responsible for this. They are joining the BJP’s name to victimise our active workers and put them behind the bar before the elections,” he said demanding a CBI probe into the incident. “We don’t have any faith in the Bengal Police. Let there be a CBI probe and the truth will come out by itself,” he said.

Courtesy: The Pioneer

Writer: Saugar Sengupta

Despite the fact that George Fernandes, was one of the best Defence Ministers for whom the welfare and well-being of the Army personnel came first, he was unfortunately not given his due. For a former Defence Minister, even the most unlikely, George sahab was laid to rest without the traditional military honours due to him. He was no ordinary Defence Minister but one under whose watch several landmark defence and security events transpired: The Pokhran nuclear tests, Kargil war, terrorist attack on Parliament, culminating in the first full-scale war mobilisation called ‘Operation Parakram’ and the implementation of the Kargil Review Committee report. There is no job description of a Defence Minister but the one Fernandes wrote out, securing the widely-acknowledged accolade of being one of the best in performance and popularity.

So, it was surprising that the Adjutant General’s Branch at the Army Headquarters failed to do George Saab the honours he eminently deserved. I saw only two Army officers in uniform, both from the President’s Secretariat, some soldiers from 5/1 Gorkha Rifles, who accompanied his body in a wooden casket carried in a 10 tonne truck instead of a gun carriage and two Army buglers, who played the Last Post without the rise.

The function was quite chaotic, apparently managed by the Delhi Police. There was no show by Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and other civilian and military dignitaries. Last year, India’s most decorated officer, Lt Gen ZC Bakshi — MVC, VrC, VSM, MacGregor Medal — the last of a bygone era passed away without even an appropriate wreath being laid on behalf of the Army. George Saab would not have let this omission passed uncondoned. He was not just the Defence Minister but also the only non-BJP member on the Cabinet Committee on Security. The BJP organised an awesome and poignant funeral with full military honours for late Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee but almost next to zero for George Saab, who deserved more.

The brown wooden casket, which brought Fernandes to his final full stop, reminded one of the Coffingate controversy which was turned into an alleged scam. Up till then, soldiers killed in action in Jammu and Kashmir and the North-East were cremated in the battle zone and their ashes delivered to the next of kin. He ordered the purchase of aluminium coffins from the US for the bodies of the deceased to be delivered to their homes. By this small gesture, he added dignity and respect to the sacrifice of soldiers. For Fernandes, it was always ‘Soldier First’, their welfare and well-being was his prime concern. He would love to share dal bhaat with the jawans and rarely, if at all, did he miss a chance to pick up their grievances.

This was best demonstrated by his fancy for the most difficult terrain on planet earth, Siachen. For him, this highest troop deployment became a pilgrimage to boost the morale of soldiers deployed there. He would especially order cakes from his hometown, Mangalore and carry them to Siachen every Christmas. He visited Siachen more than a dozen times, providing the personnel manning the forbidding heights with state-of-the-art equipment for survival. When bureaucrats in his Ministry delayed the provision of stores — like the snowmobiles for Siachen — he would pack them off to experience the pain of icy heights. Siachen became the benchmark for care and comfort of jawans.

He was extremely concerned about the mounting troop casualties. When the counter-insurgency grid got disturbed due to re-deployment of troops, resulting from Kargil and Pakistan-sponsored cross-border terrorism began to hurt, he explored some antidote strategies. The first was to declare that India would respond to cross-border terrorism by launching a limited conventional war under the nuclear threshold. The other option considered was clandestine: Employing reformed Kashmiri terrorists in a counter jihad but his heart was against  what he called immoral operations with a potential blowback. So, former Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar’s idea of using a terrorist to kill a terrorist had its votary at least a decade earlier.

No one could have imagined that the man in a crumpled kurta pyjama (which he washed himself) and one whose distaste for the military and its methods was well-known, would be steel firm in the pursuit of military values and discipline. When former Navy Chief, Admiral Vishnu Bhagwat, refused to comply with the directions of the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet because they were not in sync with the Navy Act, Fernandes signed his dismissal order. This was an unprecedented act in India’s brief military history. When former Army Chief, Gen VK Singh, dared to take his own Government to court following a string of shenanigans over his age row, Defence Minister AK Antony did not say a word to him. To me, though, he said: “He’s such a big man! The COAS…!”

Fernandes also dabbled in real-time secret intelligence operations to trap Arakan rebels. But his most serious and irreparable faux pas was calling China India’s Enemy No 1 and adding fuel to fire by leaking a letter that China was the reason for India’s nuclear tests. This diplomatic earthquake had to be subdued by the then Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh, who travelled to Beijing at the height of the Kargil war in what the Beijing media called: “Those who tie the knot have to untie it first.” This amounted to Singh retracting  Fernandes, naming China as the principal adversary for India and stating that China was not a threat to India. This admission by Singh untied the knot tied by Fernandes.

Fernandes had his share of scams: Coffingate, Tehelka, purchase of Barak missiles, the last of which implicated former Navy Chief Admiral Sushil Kumar too. On account of Tehelka, he had to step down while he was being investigated. Singh took over additional charge of defence and being an Army Major-turned politician, had a soft corner for service officers.

In one instance as Defence Minister, he recommended a Lieutenant Colonel for a one-year extension in his job as English language instructor in Laos, while as Foreign Minister, he rejected the same. Singh and Fernandes were thick as thieves which played a major role during Operation Parakram.

Fernandes was fluent in English, Hindi, Marathi, Konkani and even a smattering of Gorkhali he had learnt from his cook, Durga Bahadur.  George Saab left a deep imprint on the armed forces and the Ministry of Defence. At the funeral, his erstwhile assistant, Jaswal, recognised me and we both fondly remembered George Saab. He said Ashok, his PA, had died two years ago, adding: “But George Saab will live on.” Defence Minister Fernandes, like a soldier, will only fade away.

Writer: Ashok K Mehta (A retired Major General of the Indian Army and founder member of the Defence Planning Staff, currently the revamped Integrated Defence Staff)

Courtesy: The Pioneer

Owing to the fact that Union Minister Arun Jaitley was unable to present the interim budget, Piyush Goyal presented it for the Modi Government last week. Unfortunately, while there was a change in the person presenting the interim budget, there was little about this budget that could distinguish it from what India has seen over the past five years. This budget represented those values that the BJP Government has been repeatedly demonstrating ever since in power. In this week’s column, I will attempt to highlight how the interim budget was only a microcosm of the BJP’s approach to governance. It was irresponsible, ill-conceived and insulting.

Irresponsible: It is important to refer to the context in which the interim budget was presented. Frank Snepp, a journalist, had once said, “Disinformation is most effective in a very narrow context.” True words have never been spoken. While the BJP and its army of social media warriors tried hard to convince the people that this budget was a game-changer, it’s crucial to understand the context of the budget, which is that it was an interim budget.

An interim budget is typical in a democracy where the party in power is about to witness an election year, where it may be voted out and another political party or a coalition of various parties may be voted to power. Since the two Governments may have different fiscal and budgetary plans, as per established convention, the interim budget is usually limited to signalling and explaining to the country what would be the measures that the Government in power aims to pursue if voted to power again.

At this stage, a vote-on-account is also presented that details an estimate of the expenditure to be sanctioned till the final budget is passed by the next Government in power. This tradition has been followed by responsible Governments in India for over 70 years now. Someone forgot to give the BJP the memo.

As the West Bengal episode shows, the BJP has time and again demonstrated that it has no interest in acting like a responsible Government. This interim budget was no different. As I had said earlier, it is almost unheard of for a budget to introduce sweeping changes. But in this one, the BJP recklessly introduced some tax changes, which otherwise require debate and discussion.

I have heard that the rationale behind introducing the tax reform was that the middle class needed clarity about the tax structure at the beginning of the year. This seems insincere and convenient. Especially because the BJP is aware that this proposal may change further when the final budget is passed in Parliament after debate. So, to hear this Government, that regularly treats statistics and numbers as an inconvenience talk about the need of clarity for the middle class, brings tears to the eye. If only they made the people of this country cry a little less often.

Ill-conceived: Another piece of news that emerged last week was a leaked jobs report by the National Sample Survey Office, which detailed how India was going through its worst job crisis in 45 years. As per the report, its findings were withheld by this Government, which ultimately forced two senior members of the Statistics Commission to quit in protest.

While I could write every week about how the BJP has repeatedly shown utter disregard for any report, any institution or authority that sheds light on just how shambolic this Government has been, today, I want to talk about how this Government ignored the crucial issue of jobs in the interim budget.

This was especially surprising since jobs for the youth was one of the BJP’s primary election promises in 2014. While I initially reacted with surprise, I realised that since the BJP has been ignoring the jobs problem for the past five years, why should the interim budget be any different?

In any case, this omission speaks louder than the silence of the Prime Minister when asked an inconvenient question. It demonstrates that the BJP does not have a clear stand on any particular issue. Whether it’s the question of instituting a Lok Pal and tackling corruption or the issue of creating jobs, this Government’s only tactic has been to move from one issue to the other so that people do not stay and examine an issue long enough to question what is actually being done.

While jobs may have been a popular issue for the BJP in 2014, it is now avoiding the issue like a plague or ignoring a scientific report by a reputed institution that reflects the ground reality.

Insensitive: Another facet of the BJP that this interim budget displayed was just how insensitive this Government can be. Take the example of the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme announced during the interim budget. Under this programme, the BJP has offered direct cash support of Rs 6,000 per year to farmers who have a land holding of up to two hectares. This amounts to an insulting Rs 17 per day. The BJP is aware that it has failed our country’s farmers completely and believes that its latest attempt will help pacify them. This is unlikely.

Not only because of the insulting Rs 17 per day grant to the farmers but for the reason that people of this country are aware that this is just another jumla of the BJP Government like the ‘Smart Cities’ initiative or the ‘Clean Ganga’ promise.

The very idea of direct cash transfer is already in place in Telangana. The only difference is that in that State, first a survey was done and records were updated. Only then was the scheme implemented. In the case of the BJP, however, it has typically gone straight to announce the scheme without the slightest pretence of even attempting to make the scheme work. on the ground. This programme has all the tell-tale signs of a classic jumla.

The current BJP Government has had repeated opportunities at its disposal to mend ways and behave like a responsible Government, one that respects the country’s institutions and holds differing views from its own or at the very least a Government that is connected to the ground situation. But it wasted each and every opportunity. The latest interim budget is just another instance in a long line of instances of the Government choosing to stay true to its disappointing approach to governance.

(The writer is Jharkhand PCC president, former MP and IPS officer. Views are personal)

Writer: Ajoy Kumar

Courtesy: The Pioneer

Most statistics surrounding road deaths in India are shocking  because there comes a realisation that so many of these are wholly preventable. In 2017, over 26,000 people, who died in road accidents, had not been using their seat belt. In the same year, of the 48,746 people who died while riding scooters and motorcycles, a whopping 73.8 per cent did not wear helmets. This must be seen in the context of huge anti-helmet movements that are currently being organised in Mumbai, particularly in Pune, where politicians and self-styled civil society leaders have actively opposed the enforcement of headgear rules by the police. So, as the road safety week comes to an end, it becomes apparent that Indians care two hoots for the concept. Of course, using helmets and seat belts is no guarantee that serious injuries and death won’t happen but they can dramatically reduce the risk. In fact, insurance companies have been known to not pay out claims when they found that drivers or riders were not using safety equipment or were breaking the law by overloading a vehicle or driving on the wrong side among others. They are perfectly justified in doing so.

Later this year, several safety features will become mandatory for cars, including speed warnings, anti-lock brakes, at least one driver airbag and others. Two-wheelers, too, will have to feature anti-lock brakes and while this move will drive up the cost of vehicles and has some parts of the automotive industry cribbing, the fact is that these changes, while welcome, will not make much of a difference unless Indians start taking their own driving habits more seriously. Of course, there are some fundamental issues with road safety in India. For example, vehicles of varying speeds, particularly slow-moving e-rickshaws or cycle-rickshaws carrying goods such as reinforcing bars, operate on arterial urban roads and highways, posing a danger to themselves and other road users. At the same time, vehicles are overloaded far beyond permissible capacity. School vans ferrying children often carry 12 of them alongside the driver with school bags loaded on the roof, far more than the six-eight people the van should carry. The big problem in India is one of enforcement and the traffic police in many cities is overwhelmed by the scale of the problem. Just look at the rampant use of mobile phones while driving nowadays even by two-wheeler drivers. Indian road users are putting not only their own lives but those of others, particularly pedestrians, at risk. While official statistics said that just under 150,000 people died in 2017, we must accept that the number could be much higher and it  is unacceptable. If any government wishes to fix the country’s myriad problems, they should start with fixing India’s traffic first. If people are disciplined on the road, maybe they will be disciplined elsewhere too.

Writer and Courtesy: The Pioneer

Bibi Aasia Noreen, the Pakistani Christian woman who was on death row for blasphemy, is finally out of the woods. The Supreme Court of Pakistan recently rejected the final appeal against her acquittal. But she might still have to relocate to the West, as living in Pakistan could prove perilous for her. India could have set an example by inviting her to live in this country.

Imagine if Aasia Bibi were a Christian woman in India, working in an agricultural field alongside Hindu women. Consider a hypothetical scenario. Thirsty after working under the hot sun, she fetches a pail of water for fellow workers, but first drinks some herself from the metal mug lying beside the well. The other women,  suddenly realising that she is a Christian, wonder whether Aasia Bibi had “polluted” their well and “diluted” their religion. And then, angered and hurt, Aasia Bibi reacts by telling some horrible things about Hindu deities as though she had been reading BR Ambedkar’s Riddles in Hinduism: The Annotated Critical Selection the previous night.

What options would Hindu women have against Aasia Bibi? First, a cat-fight to teach her a lesson on the spot. Second, tell the owner of the land to dismiss her from services. Third, to complain to their respective husbands about the defilement. Fourth, to tell the priest about a local temple. Fifth, go to Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) karyakartas. Sixth, to go to the law enforcing authorities like police and court.

The third and fourth options would have been treated as nothing more than gossip-mongering. Also, since Aasia Bibi  is not a Bible-thumping Christian missionary, there would be little to excite the RSS and VHP karyakartas. The fifth option of approaching the law enforcing authorities would be positively dangerous for them as they would be hauled up under Section 3 of the Protection of Civil Rights Act, 1955, to enforce religious disabilities (denying access to water sources). Thus, rather than doing any harm to Aasia Bibi, they themselves would have ended up in prison for  up to six months besides depositing a penalty.

But on June 14, 2009, Aasia Bibi was unfortunately in an alternate universe called Pakistan. She was arrested on charges of making derogatory remarks about Prophet Mohammed, based on the evidence of Mafia Bibi and Asma Bibi. Qari Mohammed Salam, a local cleric, filed a case of blasphemy with the police, based on hearsay. The case spiralled in importance with a local court awarding death sentence to Aasia Bibi   for denigrating Prophet Mohammed in 2010, and later a Lahore court upholding its judgement in 2016.

The Pakistan Penal Code has several controversial sections (and sub sections thereof) ranging from 295 to 298-C under offences related to religion, commonly called “blasphemy laws” that are discriminatory against non-Muslims. The most dangerous of them are 295-C (use of derogatory remarks with respect to Prophet Mohammed) and 295-B (defiling the Holy Quran) which carry a punishment of mandatory death sentence and life imprisonment respectively.

Some of these deadly provisions were inserted in Pakistan’s Penal Code not when the Islamic Republic was founded but in the 1980s, when the rest of the world was seized with the idea of progress. Pakistan had inherited some blasphemy laws from the British period but those were religion-neutral. Their basic purpose was not to defend religious principles but maintain communal peace.

In three decades between 1947 and 1977, there were only 10 reported court judgements in Pakistan pertaining to offences against religion. The complaints were made mostly by Muslims against other Muslims, by non-Muslims against Muslims. No case was registered by a Muslim against non-Muslims for committing an act of blasphemy against Prophet Mohammed or “defiling” the Quran. But all these was about to change soon.

In 1974, when Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was the Prime Minister, the first amendment in the Constitution of Pakistan, 1973, was carried out to exclude the Ahmediyas from the legal definition of being a Muslim. The language of the amendment had a theological overtone incompatible with modern constitutions. It says that a person, who does not believe in the absolute and unqualified finality of the prophethood of the Mohammed, is not a Muslim for the purpose of the Constitution or law.

In 1977, General Zia-ul Haq came to power through a coup d’état. The ensuing 11 years saw increased Islamisation of Pakistan in various spheres. These included insertion of five provisions relating to blasphemy in the Pakistan Penal Code between 1980 and 1986. Close to 1,500 people have been charged under those sections till date though none were actually hanged.

A Federal Shariat Court (FSC) was established in 1980, with the power to “examine and decide the question whether any law or provision of law is repugnant to the injunctions of Islam”. The FSC’s decisions are binding upon the Government unless the latter successfully appeals to the Shariat bench of the Supreme Court.

When Section 295-C was introduced in 1986, it had a provision of life imprisonment as an alternative to capital punishment. But in 1990, the FSC recommended the removal of alternative provision of life imprisonment. Since the Pakistan Government did not appeal against this recommendation in the Supreme Court by the deadline of April 30, 1991, the capital punishment without an alternative attained finality.

A judgement of Peshawar High Court in 2006 expressed serious concern that whenever a person was charged with such an offence, the media gave extensive coverage and the accused person was abused by the society/people at large. Even under Islamic injunctions, the court added, it is for the Qazi alone to decide the guilt or innocence of the accused and none could be allowed to forejudge and condemn any person accused of such offence without facing proper and fair trial.

Right to fair trial is what the Supreme Court based its case upon in its judgements (dated October 7, 2015, and January, 28, 2019). But unfortunately, the court could not discard or challenge the atrocious rubric of blasphemy laws. This means there will be no end to this madness in Pakistan. The courts could not counteract blasphemy because they know it is an integral part of Islam. Its misuse though has been possibly as old as its application itself.

Nicholas Mannucci (1638-1717), the Italian adventurer to India, relates in his Storia do Mogor how a rich Jew in Aleppo (Syria) outwitted a Muslim Governor, who wanted to deprive him of his wealth,  life and religion by abetting blasphemy in the 16th century. The Governor asked the Jew, who was the greatest Prophet among Moses, Christ and Mohammed? Had the Jew said Mohammed, he would be asked to accept Islam. Had he mentioned the others, it would be considered a blasphemy and he would be put to death.

The Jew, however, proved cleverer than expected. He narrated a story of how a rich man had a precious stone, which each of his three sons wanted to inherit on his death. So he got two exact replicas made from the lapidaire; and gave away those to each son so that one had the original and the other two had replicas. But he told each to keep it a secret that he had given him the original and the false one to others. But only the father knew who got the original. So God gave three Prophetic  religions viz Judaism, Christianity and Islam to three races. While each thinks his religion is true, God alone knows the truth. The Muslim governor conceded defeat in his mission and even rewarded the Jew.

(The writer is author of recently published book, ‘The Microphone Men: How Orators created a Modern India’. Views expressed are his personal)

Writer: Priyadarshi Dutta

Courtesy: The Pioneer

It was expected that the fury and furore generated by the Sabarimala imbroglio would subside with the seasonal closing of the shrine. But controversy has resurfaced and resulted in a public outcry in Kerala once again. The latest provocation for the Hindus was the news widely publicised that the affidavit submitted by the lawyers of the Marxist Government of Kerala — that contained the names of women below the age of 50, who entered the Sabarimala shrine — is a fabricated list of lies. It has names of men and women over 50 years of age, whose age has been deliberately reduced and also the name of a woman, whose address cannot be traced.

A heap of lies concocted by the Government is beginning to get exposed. But the question of larger significance, which more and more Hindus are asking themselves, that too vocally now is: Why this haste to reform our rituals alone? Why resort to lies, police brute force and false propaganda to demolish Hindu faith?

Marxism and Hinduism in Kerala: Marxism anywhere cannot be tolerant of religion. But in Kerala (and in West Bengal too) the party confronted an Indian reality. They could not attack the faith of the organised religions who had well-established vote banks. In Kerala, therefore, Hindu faith became the primary object of derision. In this task, they always had the unstinted support of the Western-biased media.

Sanatana dharma and Marxism: As the erudite Purohit Swami wrote in his autobiography, “Civilisations superstructure may be very fine indeed but it totters like a house of cards, for the everlasting kingdom is established in man’s hearts and not an inevitable denouement outwardly to dazzle these eyes.” Marxist Governments in USSR, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and East European countries did totter like a pack of cards because they did not improve the inner man.

Marxism and social maladies: Hindu youths have been the most vulnerable targets for this loss of values and Marxist indoctrination. If weaned away from religious moorings, youth become rebellious and Marxist ideology can then be easily driven into such discontented minds. In northern Kerala, these unemployed and under-employed youth are being used as volunteers to carry out the political murder.

The intellectual pauperism: Sloganeering and repetitions of cliché have stunted independent thinking minds in the State. “Idiotically pompous” that is what most people have been reduced to by the communists’ propaganda. They vainly mouth fascism, sangh parivar, renaissance (navodhanam) or any other phraseology coined by the communist bandwagon. While Vedantic traditions and faith hold through time, the communists are flogging a dead ideology.

Sabarimala and its unique tradition: Sabarimala has always been a temple that was intended to instill qualities of renunciation, peace and bramhacharya. A 41-day period of discipline regarding diet restriction, sleep control and celibacy is followed by the devotees as they prepare for a visit to the holy shrine. Once they put on the bead garland, they are called swamys, suggesting they are worthy of respect. When the devotee reaches Sabarimala, he is better qualified to realise the ultimate truth, tatvam asi (thou art that) inscribed at the entrance of the temple. Sabarimala is not just a place of worship, it is a nursery for those desirous, who follow the path of yoga. It is for this very reason that the unique tradition of Sabarimala needs to be preserved.

Yogic traditions and media lies: Can’t the women too practise these very virtues and discipline? They can, and it for this very reason that all temples, including the temple of Ayyappa, are open to women of all ages. The Sabarimala idol is conceived by the devotees as a naishtika brahmachari, a youth who has conserved all his vital energy and performs tapas for God’s realisation. He is depicted as sitting in a unique posture, yoga pattasana, which tantric science says is conducive for the arousal of the Kundalini Shakti. If one observes the idol, with even a rudimentary knowledge of tantra and yoga (the writer claims nothing more), it can be seen that in this posture of sitting, pressure is put on the mooladhara chakra and the lower energy centres of the body. This posture is unique and Ayyappa idol at Sabarimala is the only deity depicted in this posture.

Is the total sublimation of the vital energy, conceived in the idol, ideally suited to be worshipped by women of reproductive age?

To denounce esoteric religious practices in terms of modern-day rationality would be as absurd as dismissing the bread and wine taken by the faithful Christians during Eucharist as being bakery items of gastronomical delights or giving a biological explanation to the virgin’s motherhood of Christ.

Romo Rolland knew the dangers of state interference in spiritual matters and he was prompted to say that had Shri Rama Krishna Paramahansa been born in the West, he would have been subjected to shock treatments.

Gender and Sabarimala: If my right to swing my walking stick ends where your nose begins, then the feminist bandwagon should realise that the right place to swing their walking stick is not the Sabarimala shrine. The faithful women devotees of Kerala realise this unique nature of the deity and this is the reason why they spontaneously carried out rallies against Government interference in Sabarimala. The faithful respect the right to worship for others and Sabarimala is the only temple (one or two local exceptions apart) where age restriction for women is followed.

The feminists, who still insist on swinging their walking sticks at other worshippers’ noses, are State-sponsored activists of various hues. Many have shady pasts, police cases pending against them and have Maoist affiliations too. When the State Government manipulates the list of young women, who have already entered the temple premise, it was the culmination of a large game plan that divine intervention has exposed.

Gender, Sabarimala and some common sense: Gender parity is a pre-requisite for the functioning of democracy. There are times when you have to give Caesar what is his due and to God what is due to him. But again, who shall decide where Caesar’s domain ends and God’s begin? Justice Indu Malhotra said in her dissenting note that the judiciary itself should not judge matters of spiritual significance.

Media and the propaganda of lies: Ayyappa is no misogynist, nor is his celibacy under threat if women visit the shrine. Neither Ayyappa nor his devotees have contempt for menstruating women or consider them unclean. These are arguments concocted by Western-biased media and the communist propaganda machinery. If the true significance of Sabarimala’s rituals and tradition is to be understood, surely it has to be by using the semantics of spiritual literature and not new fangled words imported from an alien culture. To paraphrase Sri Aurobindo’s observations on Western psychology, the secret of the beauty of a lotus flower cannot be unravelled by analysing the composition of the mud in which it grows but it can only be done by looking at the ideal of a lotus existing in some heavenly sphere above.

The last citadel and the long fight: Kerala is the last communist citadel and the LDF would fight with all collective strength of the Government machinery, police force and the numerical strength of its well-knit party cadre against any consolidation of the forces of Hindu dharma. They will try to buy over the Christian and Muslim vote banks and also use nefarious tactics of widening caste divide to split the consolidation of Hindu votes.

For the Hindus of Kerala, the battle is a long drawn out one. They will be isolated, maligned by the media and curbed by police power. What the Hindus of Kerala need is belief, the perennial nature of Sanatana Dharma that has survived greater onslaughts and invasions. But Hindus need to fight without forsaking the spirit of tolerance and compassion fostered by their faith, without becoming cowards in the bargain.

But in the political battle field, Governments of the day will only acknowledge the strength of the vote bank. In the neo-Darwinian political scene of India, it is the survival of the vote bank. And it is here that divided Hindus will have to think wisely, decisively and cast their votes. Hindu religion never did stoop to fascism.  It fostered civilisational values and strengthened nationhood. The writing on the wall is clearer now for the Hindus of Kerala than ever before.

(The writer is President, Thapasya Art and Literary Forum)

Writer: P Narayana Kurup

Courtesy: The Pioneer

The Kiru Hydro Electric Project is being implemented by the Chenab Valley Power Projects Private Limited (CVPPPL) and is a joint venture between the NHPC Limited, Jammu and Kashmir State Power Development Corporation Limited (JKSPDC), and PTC India Limited.

Satya Pal Malik, Governor of Jammu and Kashmir, Dr Jitendra Singh, Union Minister of State for Development of North Eastern Region, Dr Nirmal Singh, Speaker, Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly, Jugal Kishore Sharma, Member of Parliament, Lok Sabha and Shamsher Singh, Member of Parliament, Rajya Sabha also graced the occasion.

During the address Modi said that the hydro electric project shall not only meet the increasing energy requirement of the state but also provide direct and indirect employment opportunities to thousands of persons during the construction phase and thereafter during the operation phase.

Kiru HEP, to be constructed on River Chenab in the District Kishtwar, in Jammu and Kashmir, is one of the biggest hydroelectric projects under implementation in the state. The project is scheduled to be completed in 54 months at an estimated cost of Rs. 4708 crore. The annual generation from the project shall be 2272 MU. The project envisages construction of 135 m high concrete gravity dam and an underground power house with four units of 156 MW each (624 MW).

The Government of Jammu and Kashmir has accorded a waiver of free power at decremental rate for the first five years and the water usage charges for the first ten years after the commissioning of the project besides the exemption of levy of tolls on all imports. It has also given a consent for wavier of nine per cent state GST for the project on order to keep the project cost and its tariff at the minimum.  The government will get 12 per cent free power from the sixth year of the commissioning and the water usage charges after 10 years.

The welfare of the people affected from the hydroelectric project shall be taken care of through the proper implementation of a comprehensive rehabilitation and resettlement plan. The cost of the land for house and house construction assistance, scholarship to children of the project affected families, training program for skill development and so on has been included in the plan.  Also, a provision of Rs 29 crore has been earmarked in the plan for infrastructural development in the project affected areas to improve the socio economic condition of the people.

An additional one per cent free power towards Local Area Development Fund (LADF) shall be provided by the CVPPPL with a matching contribution by the Jammu and Kashmir Government after the commissioning of the project as per the Hydro Power Policy of the Government of India and an annual revenue of approximately Rs. 25 crore shall be available for the infrastructural development and welfare schemes for the Project Affected People on a continuous basis over the life of the project.

Extensive corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities have also been taken up in the region for the development of local area. The construction of the project will also lead to a considerable improvement of the roads and bridges as well as the communication systems and electric supply system in the region, thereby developing the area socio-economically.

The state of Jammu and Kashmir is bestowed with huge hydro potential and in the Kishtwar region there are many projects in the pipeline for construction. This potential has to be harnessed so that the state can become the power house of the country which will bring about an overall development of the region as well.

In a similar instance, the FFoundation Stone of the 1000 MW Pakal Dul HE Project of CVPPPL was also laid by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi in May 2018 and the construction of the project is in progress. The third project of the company- 540 MW Kwar HE Project, is also ready to begin construction after getting an investment approval of the project.

Writer and Courtesy: The Pioneer