EDITORIAL
Wages of Ceasefire
Last November when Prime
Minister Vajpayee announced the Ramzan Ceasefire in
Kashmir he sprang a surprise upon the whole world. With
that deft stoke the PM had thrown many people off their
feet. But in absence of concrete steps backing it, the
bold initiative just petered out and by the time it was
finally wrapped up it had done much damage to the
supremacy the security forces had attained over the
terrorists prior to it. Rejection of the ceasefire by the
terrorist organizations had been expected. The greatest
risk of the fine gesture had been that the militant
organizations would get an easy respite to re-organize
their cadres, supplies and shelters. A year before, the
withdrawal of troops in the wake of Kargil, had given the
militants a similar opportunity to revamp their networks
etc. Any ceasefire should have been preceded by a careful
evaluation of the risks involved and contingency plans
formulated to prevent the misuse of the goodwill gesture
of the militants to strengthen themselves.
It is now reasonably clear
that no contingency plans had been drawn to ensure that
the gains of security forces were not dissipated. While
the ceasefire got extended from one to two to finally six
months, the security forces saw their achievements being
destroyed one by one as the militants increased their
presence. Within weeks it became clear that the militants
were misusing the goodwill gesture. They revived their
links, increased their presence and mobility and
intensified their attacks upon the security camps and
installations. When the ceasefire was finally called off
the militancy had staged a robust comeback. Since then
the security forces have begun to build pressure to bring
the militants under control. Over the past two months,
they have scored some major successes eliminating a
clutch of hardcore terrorists. But the analysts are
divided whether to interpret the apparent successes as an
indication of the agencies gaining an upper hand. It
could be an indication of the extensive infiltration that
has taken place during the period, the numbers of
militants being simply so large that though a good number
of them have fallen in the security operations, their
presence is still high. Indeed, there are reports that in
the areas where the redevelopment of the security forces
has not yet been adequate, the militant presence is very
marked.
An inevitable corollary of
the substantial militant presence is that the people
begin to take to protest every militant killing. Since
the militants are in substantial numbers, their terror is
palpably felt. The 'captive' villages and towns cannot
but take to streets over every slain militant to escape
retribution from their living colleagues who are still
teaming around. This is the situation that comes handy to
the fundamentalist elements to press home their
'advantage' to the people, further lowering the moral of
the people. During recent days the influx of terrorists
across the Hiranagar and other Jammu borders has also
seen a good fillip. Now with the reports that females are
also being pressed into service from across the borders,
there is every possibility of the pretexts for the
protests increasing over the coming months. Though the
security forces have not only been active over the last
two months but have also dealt the militants some major
blows, but it appears that the people and the forces
shall have to pay some more wages for the long ceasefire.
Funds of negligence
The review meeting of the
Jammu and Kashmir Funds Organization conducted by the
Finance Minister has revealed how negligent the
organization has been toward proper management of the
provident funds of the employees. None of the six
districts in the division has been able to supply
up-to-date balance sheets to their subscribers in the
respective districts. All are running in arrears for
varying periods. Rajouri and Poonch districts are as much
as three years behind the schedule while Jammu is lagging
by two years Other districts have done slightly better
but are still trailing by one year. And, that is only
part of the story. There are large number of cases in
which the pre-1986 balance from Accountant General's
office still lies unadjusted. The inter-district transfer
of employees' accounts has been so tardy that employees
have begun the practice of leaving the accounts open at
the previous posting, hoping to collate all at the
retirement or sometime earlier. Consequently the
settlement of GPF accounts at retirement becomes a
harrowing experience for the employee. For those who have
served in the high altitude areas or far off places or in
the now disturbed Valley, it becomes a nightmare.
Provident fund is an
employee's cushion against the adversity and old age as
well as a contingency fund on which the employee can draw
to meet unforeseen expenses. Naturally the employees have
been perturbed when the management of the fund is not
very efficient or when the employee faces unnecessary
hurdles in operating the fund-money. Fifteen years ago,
when the maintenance of General Provident Fund of the
State was transferred from Accountant General's office to
the State Government Funds Organization, it was hoped
that the maintenance as well as access of the
subscriber-employees to their funds would be easier and
that the account-sheets (schedules) would be made
available to the employee in time after each financial
year. That hope has been roundly belied by the apathy in
the fund offices all over the State. The employees had
hoped that withdrawing money from their accounts would
become easier. It has become more difficult as the
employees are forced to produce dozens of 'statements'
and to run to different offices where they have served in
the past. Every extra step means more 'fees', more bribes
to be paid. Of course, the Fund Offices have their own
woes to relate. From paucity of staff and inadequate
premises, they face many operational problems, which are
not getting attended to. The account-clerks and accounts
officers are said to avoid being posted to the dry funds
organization. Computerization of the offices that could
have made their tasks easier has not taken place in one
Government department that most needed it.
While on one hand the GPF
subscriptions have fallen to the compulsory minimum, on
the other the employees are so disillusioned that they
now demand that the maintenance of funds, together with
withdrawal and refund facilities, be transferred to the
banks. There is merit in the demand. When the Government
is itself keeping the funds with banks there should not
be many problems if the banks directly maintain the
accounts of the individual employees. The Government has
already been using JK Bank as a conduit for payment of
salaries to the employees. If norms and rules for the
withdrawal and deductions are made clear and simple, the
operation of GPF accounts through the banks should give
the harassed employees much relief from unnecessary
troubles.
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Consequences
of criminalised politics
By K. P.
S. Gill
The murder
of Phoolan Devi in broad daylight and in
one of the relatively secure areas of the
national capital, raises a number of
crucial questions relating to
India’s internal security, policing
and the health of the entire criminal
justice system. In Parliament, however,
the Opposition’s attention was
focused primarily on the ‘collapse
of internal security’ and on the
progressive downscaling of VIP security
in general. In their comments, as is
becoming the usual case with most
Parliamentary debates, MPs were at best
skimming the surface of the real issues
involved. The truth is, and this is
something I have said again and again,
that the chickens are now just coming
home to roost. Political leaders and the
power elite in India-including the
protected senior bureaucracy, the
judiciary and captains of industry and
commerce-are now going to discover
increasingly, and at the expense of their
own personal safety and survival, the
cumulative costs and consequences of the
total collapse of the criminal justice
system that they have themselves
engineered over the decades.
VIP
security, and public security in general,
are not matters that can be divorced from
the context of the total law and order
scenario of the country, and those who
believe that positing a few armed guards
around a threatened person is sufficient
to ‘protect’ their lives
deceive themselves. When crime goes
unpunished everywhere – or is even
rewarded with political office or a wide
range of other pecuniary and
institutional benefits-, when the police
is denigrated, humiliated and
disempowered, when no corresponding
expansion and modernisation takes place
in the internal security network despite
the galloping advance of organised crime,
political violence, terrorism, and
general criminality among the public, all
personal security for the ‘chosen
few’ is an illusion, and everyone,
even the ‘most high’, are at
all times vulnerable.
The
security of life is the first and most
fundamental right of man "Times New
Roman" it is not a privilege that
attaches to high office. It is the right
of every citizen, and one that the
government of any civilised society is
expected to safeguard. And yet, witness
the decline of human security in all its
aspects in India. Compared to the growth
of population in the metropolii, the
relative strength of police forces has
remained near stagnant; the equipment and
infrastructure available to the
‘guardians of the law’ is
laughable in comparison to the
technologies and resources accessed by
those who challenge the authority of the
state; the general investigative and
forensic capabilities of the police,
today, are poorer than they were at the
time of Independence; the burden of
police responsibilities, on the other
hand, has expanded diametrically.
The total
modernisation of the Police in India for
the next five years would cost less than
one of the grand financial scams that
have become a routine occurrence, both at
the Centre and in many of the States.
Yet, while billions are siphoned out into
the private coffers of politicians,
bureaucrats, equally corrupt
industrialists and business magnates, and
the entire mechanism of criminal
collusion that now spans the length and
breadth of the country, every mearge
million handed out for policing and
internal security is widely resented as
‘non-developmental
expenditure’. And yet, the
modernisation and upgradation of
India’s police and internal security
apparatus would prove to be the most
lucrative investment that any government
could make, and would produce manifold
returns in development, in industry, in
commerce, in every sphere of life that
is, today, crippled, devastated, by the
pervasive sense of insecurity and fear
that results from the rampage of crime
and the collapse of the criminal justice
system.
The
matter, however, does not end with the
police. The arbitrariness, the unending
delays, the decline in integrity, the
moral ambivalence, and the apparent and
overwhelming failure to deliver justice
on the part of the Indian judicial system
is an equal, if non greater, scandal. The
legitimacy of the state rests on the
manifest and efficient delivery of what
is widely recognised as justice –
and the Courts, today, command less
public respect (which is not the same
thing as obedience or compliance) than
they ever did before. Once again, the
problem is at least partially one of
resources. Sessions judges are simply
overloaded with work, and even in the
best of circumstances it would be
unreasonable to expect a high quality of
justice under such pressure. In addition,
one has to see the antics of lawyers and
advocates, in order to believe and
understand the reality of judicial
processes in this country. But this is
compounded infinitely by the attitude of
confrontation that the Courts have
adopted with all other – and
particularly the Executive –
branches of governance. The police has
been the worst victim of judicial excess,
and this has most visibly been the case
in Punjab after the defeat of terrorism
in that State where the entire police
force was brought under hostile
investigation by a central investigative
agency under the unprecedented direction
of the Courts. When an impartial history
of post-terrorism Punjab is written, and
the treatment of police officers and
personnel is fully revealed, men will
marvel at the fact that policemen are
still willing to wear a uniform and risk
their lives in this country, and at the
sheer extent of collusion between certain
sections of the judiciary, the political
leadership, central investigative
agencies, and the so-called Human Rights
organisations that mushroomed after the
terrorist cause was defeated. This will
certainly be an abiding stain on the
record of civilised governance in India.
But the
record in Punjab is only the most visible
symptom of what is happening everywhere
in the country. When a policeman uses
force in the heat and turbulence of a
riot, or the chaos of a violent encounter
or gunfight with terrorists or armed
criminal, he is often arbitrarily branded
a criminal and brought under an
unsympathetic and intimidating process of
scrutiny that contravenes the norms of
evidence and justice that are intended to
be universal. And yet, the same justice
system is incomprehensibly magnanimous
– indeed protective and indulgent
– in its dealings with criminals and
terrorists who target innocent civilians
with acts of unimaginable brutality.
Such
discriminatory ‘justice’ does
not augur well for the rule of law and
the authority of the state. Worse still
is the continuous and unprecedented
barrage of judicial interventions in the
business of the Executive branch. It may
be recalled that there has been a great
deal of recent interference from the
Courts in matters relating to VIP
security – as also in other aspects
of policing – and successive
weak-kneed governments have succumbed on
many aspects to the temper tantrums of
various sections of the judiciary. It is
imperative that decisions relating to
policing and security be taken on purely
professional grounds, and it is the
decisions of the executive authorities on
the ground that are to be respected, not
the theoretical pronouncements of a
judiciary alienated from the harsher
realities of life and criminality.
It is
entirely unfortunate that, despite the
levels of fear that prevail in society
today, public security has yet to become
an electoral issue. It is only when
politicians find their careers at risk
that the hurtling criminalisation of
politics and society will begin to be
contained. There are, of course, two
other possible scenarios under which such
an outcome may be secured. First, if the
leadership of a political party in one of
the States or at the Centre realises that
it can win the undying gratitude of the
common man, and reap the most amazing
electoral benefits, by breaking the
collusive oppression of the criminal
elements that have come to dominate
society in India, and successfully
translates this realisation into its
policies and political programmes. The
second, less fortunate but, in the
absence of any positive action by those
who control the reins of government in
the country, inevitable scenario, is one
in which a significant number of
political leaders themselves fall victim
to the collapse of the internal security
system. Where concern for the national
interest is absent, concerns for personal
survival might just prevail. INAV
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Rigid
positions: What will Musharraf carry back
By
Salman Khurshid, Ex-Minister of State for
External Affairs
President
Musharraf's visit to India has been by a
circuitous and perilous route. He will
probably want to forget the uncomfortable
halt at Kargil. He will certainly not be
nostalgic about the deliberate and
conspicuous absence at Lahore, when Prime
Minister Vajpayee was taken for a ride.
The guns will boom again, but this time,
to welcome him. Soldiers will raise their
arms but this time to salute. No more
proxies, for the summit by definition
must be face-to-face man -to-man, not eye
for eye.
There is
no real agenda, because the one thing he
wants to talk about is what we will not
wish to here anything about. But of
course the Shimla Agreement, not
Pakistan's favourite document, does at
least envisage settlement of differences
through bilateral negotiations. Pakistan
wants the Kashmir Valley, because it
feels itself incomplete without it.
Perhaps they have just got into a habit
of desiring it. India cannot part with
J&K because it is a part of its
definition as a secular nation. If the
dispute were about territory or security
per se, there would have been no
objection to third party resolution
efforts. But a third party, friend, foe
or indifferent, cannot be given the right
to redefine the Indian nationhood. It is
India's good fortune that the world,
particularly the democratic western
powers have finally realized this.
No one
should expect wonders from the summit.
There is no indication that we have burnt
the midnight oil to come up with novel
ideas for peace. But there are some
unfinished tasks of the past that can
swiftly give work for the anxious
delegates on both sides. But where do we
begin, rather where will the leaders
begin? Economic cooperation is the most
promising window, but it is not something
dramatically new. We have talked a lot
about it in SAARC.
There is
some modest trade between us, although
Pakistan's shortsightedness forces trade
to take the longer sea route rather than
the convenient Wagah border crossing. Yet
we should not underestimate the power of
the market. It was not change of heart,
but the allure of the India market that
influenced the dramatic shift in the
American position. Where Americans rush
in, Pakistan's affluent elite cannot fear
to tread. India should not underestimate
the potential to its market or the
business priorities of the influential
Pakistani rich and mighty.
Peace
summits have a matter of timing, place,
space, and atmosphere. Sometimes it takes
considerable effort over a period to get
some of these right. Generally speaking,
they happen after battle fatigue is set
in or forces that have instigated or
supported the conflict have lost
interest. In Vietnam several months were
spent on the shape of the negotiation
table. Pakistan's defeat in Kargil was a
good point for a peace summit; our own
admitted disappointment with the
"cease-fire" in J&K would
certainly not add to our negotiating
strength.
President
Musharraf may have killed several birds
with one stone in issuing stern advise to
the conservative elements in his country.
But Prime Minister Vajpayee will have the
bitter resonance of Bal Thackeray's
intemperate statements in his ear when he
greets his guest. On the other hand, the
visitor will be worrying about the
world's reaction to his occupation of the
Presidential place. Of course, he has
been able to extract a positive greeting
from the Indian President on becoming
President himself. This is not something
he received even from China.
The road
beyond Agra looks very rough. But all
true followers of non-violence will hope
for the best for a lot. If India is to
ride fast and firm, a detour to the
valley is inevitable. It is too early to
tell if K.C. Pant will prove to be a good
navigator (or is it negotiator?). There
is a lot of work to be done in the
valley. We have alienated the youth. We
have made mistakes. The worst mistake was
to taking them for granted. We gave them
charity and subsidy where dignity and
opportunity were called for.
The unrest
in Punjab and J&K is a contrast in
point. In both cases there was foreign
instigation and help. In both cases a
strong and mean separatist movement took
hold of the youth and drove them to
violence. Yet we were able to get on top
of the problem in Punjab; but we are
still at sea in J&K. It may be
possible to conclude that the Punjab
trouble was born our to prosperity and
the J&K unrest in linked to poverty.
Poverty of body and mind takes time to
eradicate. So we cannot expect wonders
overnight, but a beginning must be made
somewhere.
It is
distressing to see that people entrusted
with the responsibility of looking for a
solution for the trouble in J&K, take
a tourist's view. It is native to look
for reasons for the trouble. We need to
look for an imaginative way out of the
stalemate. In the rest of India we have
to accept and recognize that Kashmir has
real people, not just carpet and dry
fruit traders. How often in different
parts of our country do we see Kashmiris
in jobs and positions of authority (with
the exclusion of the erudite Kashmiri
Pandits)? How many of us can boast of
Kashmiri friends? The key lies in giving
Kashmiris a stake in the country. Ten
years of preferential treatment for
Kashmiris in educational institutions,
public sector, and quasi-government
organizations will make a dramatic
difference.
The narrow
Banihal tunnel is a symbol of the
relationship we have with the
Kashmiris-narrow and susceptible to
climatic conditions. Many years ago some
of us had proposed the building of a new
railway tunnel. It would provide work,
while it was being built and when ready,
would open up tremendous opportunities
for the people of the valley. The
government has accepted that plan, but is
moving slower that a centipede. It seems
not to have its heart in the project. If
the Channel tunnel between UK and France
can be built and run successfully, so can
this. We only have to put our heads and
hearts togethers.
The bottom
line is that talking will not do any
harm. But it will not do any good either,
unless there is a clear idea about what
we want and the price we are ready to pay
for it. That is not to say that we have
to tell the Pakistanis what our plans
are. But not telling them should not be
an alibi for having plans at all. The
fact is that more the talks succeed, more
we will have to place the details on the
table. India and Pakistan have talked
before, but this time it might be
different. This is the first-time we are
talking as nuclear powers. There is some
physics in addition to the usual
chemistry of political summits-CNF
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Breast
feeding in the information age
By Dr Mahesh Gupta
Survival of
humanity is dedicated to the mother, who nurtures
generations.Since time immemorial man has
explored avenues of better nutrition both in
terms of quantity and quality. Nutrition is the
basic need of every creature for its growth,
development and survival.
In India, 25
million babies are born every year, ideally, all
should be exclusively breast fed for first six
months, but there are 13 million drop outs by the
age of 3 months and 20 million drop outs by six
months.
Since December
1991, Breast Feeding promotion net work of India
(BPNI) whose inception was based on the
recommendations of workshop on advances in human
lactation and Breast Feeding management has been
striving hard to protect, promote, support and
propagate breast feeding culture with broad
objective of community participation, education,
empowering women and enforcing law agencies.
BPNI is
commemorating its 10th anniversary this year from
Ist August to 7th August 2001 with vital theme of
'Breast Feeding In The Information Age'. It
stresses the importance of transforming and
conveying the facts of breast feeding via all
forms of communication such as Radio, Video,
Newspapers, internet, story telling role play and
folk media. The fact to be projected is that
Breast Milk is price less, readily available,
adequate in quantity, best in quality, acceptable
appropriate and tailored to the needs of new
born. It is not doubt the complete and most
nutritious. One of the major reasons of fading
Breast Feeding culture is the lack of acurate
information. In Todays' World of Tele
Communication and Information explosion, an
accurate and unbiased projection of breast
feeding would go a long way in protecting infants
against disease. To ensure healthy future for our
young ones and to fulfill their rights to
survival, development, protection and
participation effective communication on
exclusive breast feeding is emphasised.
Practice of breast
feeding in rural areas is subject to myths,
beliefs, customs, superstitions, oral
communications, elder dominance and experiences,
family models and community activities. This
culture was threatened by rapid
industrialization, migration to semi urban
pockets, glitz and glare of advertisement, new
desires, extensive and aggressive marketing
strategy of multi-national milk food substitutes,
unethical promotions of infant foods and of
course fragile flaws and enforcement acts. All
this resulted in disinformation, confusion and
lack of confidence in breast milk among both
health professionals and mothers.
Access to accurate
information on breast feeding is the right of
people. All sectors of society, have moral
responsibility to ensure support to women who
breast feed. Media has the power to stimulate
public participation and thinking so that the
right to breast feed and to be breast fed is
respected, facilitated, protected and fulfilled
at house hold, community and Government levels.
'Breast Fed is
best Fed'
'On the eve of
10th anniversary, the BPNI is commemorating a
Week from Ist August 2001 to 7th August.
(The author
is a Child Specialist and Co-ordinator BPNI)
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Why
this longing to have children?
By Uma Ramachandran
Any good
news?" is the usual question that most
couples get barraged with, a month or two into
the marriage. "Yes, we are doing well; we
seem to be getting on like a house on fire; we
are laying the foundation for a long
relationship," are neither the expected nor
the appropriate replies. One either beams at
one’s interlocutor and nods shyly invoking
much cheer and merriment, or one shuffles
uncomfortably and hangs one’s head in shame
accepting the reassuring back-patting that
appears a tad forced. If you fall in the former
category, you are warmly welcomed to the adult
world, all your past sins forgiven, and are
regaled with stories of how Uncle so-and-so just
had to look at his wife and that would do the
trick. If you belong to the latter category, you
are fed large quantities of almonds, chestnuts
and other assorted nuts until you feel sick, and
are advised to keep "trying harder"
even as not-so-subtle enquiries are made of your
technique and are expansively reassured about the
miraculous powers of the family deity and modern
medicine in that order. And finally, when that
much-awaited urine test turns out positive, your
spouse’s and your first reaction is more one
of relief than joy. At least until the ultrasound
report comes in and the whole gender issue gets
raked up.
It’s quite
extraordinary how, in our country, one’s
entire social network appears to have a stake in
the arrival of the first child-the second and
subsequent children are more matters of routine,
since your prowess is now proven. As an immediate
consequence, the decision on when to have
one’s first child or for that matter whether
to have children at all, is often taken away from
the couple’s hands. Victims of inordinate
familial and social pressure, large numbers of
young couples feel compelled to have their first
child within the first year of the marriage.
I need scarcely
remind you that children do make demands and have
to be responded to with, aside of love, a lot of
maturity and responsibility, and whether we like
it or not, they tend to impact significantly on
the marriage-positively, if the foundations are
well laid, but adversely if they are not. I am,
of course, not suggesting that children are best
avoided. I am sharply conscious of the unspoiled
pleasure they can bring to our lives and indeed
teach us more than our parents did. The point
that I am trying to drive home is that you should
have your children when you’re good and
ready to take on the responsibility, and not
because you want to give your parents a
grandchild or your siblings a nephew/niece or to
fend off the agonising pressure put on you by
your intrusive social network. The latter are all
the wrong reasons to have a child and the last
thing you want to do is to contribute to the
growing generation of "latchkey"
children who are vulnerable to a variety of
hazards in the social environment, not the least
devastating being child sexual abuse, and who may
inadvertently put more pressure on your
relationship than it has been configured to
handle.
It may be politic
at this time, to examine why the need to have
children is so strongly ingrained in us. There
exists a well researched body of literature on
the nature of the maternal instinct in animals.
The theory is that animals have developed this
instinct owing to the inherent need to propagate
the species for fear of extinction – to
ensure the survival of the species. But does this
apply to human beings as well? I mean, just look
around you. Do you really believe that the
survival or perpetuation of the human species is
dependent on whether or not you contribute your
mite? There are enough and more numbers to
reassure you that the species runs no risk
whatsoever from extinction. Yet, why do we have
such a pressing need to reproduce? While social
pressures contribute, they do little more than
touch a chord, press the right button, stimulate
an ingrained need that existed inside of you in
the first place. An surely, we cannot get around
this conundrum by invoking an animal instinct,
particularly when, after millennia of evolution,
we pride ourselves on belonging to a superior
species, can we? There has to be some other
explanation for our deep longing to have
children, for how devastated some of us feel when
we are told we cannot have any, for the feeling
of incompleteness and indeed emptiness that even
the more mature among us feel when the hatchlings
have flown the coop.
To understand the
origins of this parental instinct, and I use the
generic term not for reasons of political
correctness but because the need to reproduce
exists in both genders even if more strongly
manifest in women than men, we need to explore a
phenomenon that all human beings are subject to
– unconditional fear. Unconditional fear is
one of our two primal responses, the order being
unconditional love, which we experience when we
are born and is related to the experience of
surviving in a hostile environment. So, one of
the basic drives that impels us forward in our
lives is the fear of personal survival, not
survival of the species. And we do everything we
can to endure that all our survival needs are
taken care of thereby keeping the primal fear of
our survival at bay.
Another way of
looking at unconditional fear is to conceive of
it as a fear of our own mortality. We are all
going to die some day, a fact that, until we
actually face it from close quarters, we do not
have the wherewithal to come to terms with. So,
we obsess about increasing our life-span to the
extent possible. But we cannot all be Methuselah,
can we? However, human beings still have a need
to do everything possible in their lives to
ensure immortality. Some do it by, to the
exclusion of everything else, pursuing renown and
writing their names in the history books. Most
others do it by having children.
Our children
represent to us our lineage, our contribution to
the world, the products of our creativity, the
propagators of our names, the extensions of our
identities. Is it any wonder then that we have
such inordinate expectations of them to become
what we want them to, so our accomplishments live
on in enhanced form after us? By the same token,
this is also why we tend to forget Kahlil
Gibran’s exhortations to us that our
children don’t come from us, but merely
through us. And we find it so hard to "let
go" of our children when it becomes
necessary to do so. For, as long as we don’t
come to terms with this need for immortality that
is present in all of us as a reaction to the fear
of survival, we will obsess about having children
and tell ourselves that our parental instinct is
crying for expression. However, if we do come to
terms with our unconditional fears, we will have
our children because we want to, not because we
need to, and nothing could be better for an
unborn child than this realisation on the part of
its parents.
In this context,
by "coming to terms with our fears", I
mean owning that this fear exists in you (it does
in all of us); accepting the inevitability of its
presence and appreciating that no action of yours
is going to grant you immortality; legitimising
its existence as a normal human phenomenon; and
letting go of the compulsive quest for
immortality. If, after having done this, you go
ahead and have a child or two, you will be able
to value them more substantially than otherwise.
And more than
this, you would have given yourself the time and
opportunity to work on you marriage and configure
it in a manner that you, you spouse and the
children are the collective beneficiaries and
that your relationship with you children is a
balanced one in which neither you nor the child
gets carried away with the "ups" or
depleted by the "downs".
So, the next time
somebody asks you whether you have any good news,
try referring them, with as straight a face as
you can muster, to CNN, BBC or Star News. INAV
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