EDITORIAL
Unholy
to core!
One of the most
universally accepted tenets is that religion is a
sacrosanct thing that must not be attacked nor
made a point of any struggle whatsoever, except
where there is patent religious persecution. By
the same reckoning it is meet for the persecuted
religionists to seek a just dispensation. Else,
religion is a sacred private affair that must not
be interfered with. Everything that impinges on
this sacred observance is an unholy act that
cannot be accepted. That puts the recent
terrorist attack on the pilgrims on their way to
the holy shrine of Amarnath in the category of
the most heinous crimes not only against this
State, nation or people but the humanity as well.
Of course, terrorism is an unacceptable thing
that has been rejected, as unjustified at the
root, all over the world. And terrorism that
makes religion as its base and target is doubly
condemnable. The recent activities of the
terrorists in the State show how unholy this
terrorism is. Their latest sacrilege proves that
it is unholy to the core.
It is not clear
what the terrorists want to show except that they
are barbaric through and through. Targeting
people in a camp on their way to a holy shrine is
not justified on any ground. It is not even an
indication of the prowess of the terrorists. It
is not a great thing to atttack a convoy of
thousands of innocent men, women and children;
it's easy, and if you have a bakra to
spare, a sick man or a psychopath handy, any gang
of two-men can do it. Go, barge in, shooting your
way through; you would get a few victims before
you get killed. And that is what the Fidayeen has
done. He crept close and began shooting
indiscriminately before he was felled to a dog's
death. You have to be sick to the core to call
that bravery. You have to be a psychopath to even
contemplate that sort of venture. And if the
perpetrators of the crime thought that they were
doing a Godly deed that 'God' can only be the
Satan. So what is the point that was sought to be
made? Yet some people, in fact, a whole
'organization' of men, who are proud of their
righteousness, did think of such a foul deed,
planned it and executed it.
And that is the
truest face of the marauders who are sabotaging
this State. It is black in thought and deed,
barbaric in tooth and claw, condemnable in toto.
It is a sin against humanity to even think of
these fellas as men of the human species. To say
that they deserve our pity is being unjust, to
say they deserve our contempt is to be mild; they
deserve nothing from us, neither sympathy nor
hate, but stern action that would see the earth
cleared of their satanic presence. One could say
that these here are animals but that would be a
disrespect to the subhuman creatures which many
people believe are more compassionate, more
discerning and certainly not so ruthless. Indeed,
the civilized world is running out of
descriptives to characterize their actions and
beliefs in their true and fuller implications.
But one thing is clear; the human beings cannot
accept these people among themselves as their
equals, of their kind. That they are human in
form and potential is enough to indicate how
beastly the humans can get if lead along the dark
paths. The conventional wisdom holds that the
people, who have led them there, are more
condemnable than these perpetrators of inhuman
acts. At the every least their mentors and
patrons are as culpable, as condemnable as
despicable as these.
Arrears
action.
The Division Bench
of the State High Court has in an important
decision decreed that the electricity connections
of the defaulters of the electricity bills, who
have more than one lakh in arrears for more than
three months, should be disconnected, the major
defaulter in the electricity bills are the
so-called big sharks while the general populace
suffers the effects of their acts. Thus in the UP
electricity board where the engineers went to
public with the list of defaulters it was
revealed that the 'biggies' are most to blame for
not paying their dues. Similarly in bank loans it
is the big houses and major loanees who account
for the two-thirds of the outstandings called the
NPA's. These parties with their power, money and
reach can easily get the officials not to act
against them. Their dues accumulate, the boards
go into loss and the result is a general
curtailment of the service. Ironically these
defaulters, again with their power, often manage
to get fuller supplies while the public suffers
for their sins. The court has done well to order
that they be brought to book.
At the same time
it is pertinent to point out that the electric
supply authorities must be held responsible for
the undue curtailments, cuts and disruptions that
they force upon the consumers. They have all
along been getting away with any level of cuts,
scheduled or unscheduled. More often these cuts
are arbitrary and unscheduled without any regard
to the suffering of the people. Another irony is
that the unscheduled curtailments and cuts are
mostly inflicted on the localities and people who
pay their dues promptly. For one thing these
people have nothing to cuddle up to the powermen.
Secondly, it is the general fate of the
law-abiding citizen in this country to be beaten
with law while the law cozies up to the unruly.
This State of affairs starts a circle that leads
to a greater lawlessness and greater disobedience
of the rules and regulations. While it is welcome
that the court should come to the aid of the
department in realizing its dues, it is also a
duty of the authorities to see that the honest
consumer does not suffer, is not punished for
doing the rightful thing. If the dues are to be
paid promptly, the supplies too must be prompt
and adequate. Or, shall that provision have to
wait for another PIL ?
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US
games on Kashmir
By Atul
Cowshish
By being
so overtly pusillanimous towards the USA,
the Vajpayee
Government has made sure that it will no
longer carry any conviction when it says
that Kashmir is an internal matter of
India and not an ''international'' issue,
as the wily Pakistani dictator has been
saying and his American patrons are only
too willing to endorse. It would have
accounted for little had it been only the
scheming Pakistani ruler who wanted to
''internatinalise'' the Kashmir
''dispute''. All his predecessors tried
to do that only to see their listeners
yawn in boredom. Unexpected changes in
global politics have made the US an avid
dancer to Pakistani tunes. It was really
no surprise to hear the US Secretary of
State, General Colin Powell, declare that
Kashmir was on international agenda and
thus immensely pleasing the dictator in
Islamabad after his latest visit to the
sub-continent. The US administration has
made it abundantly clear that it now
considers poking its nose in Kashmir its
divine right and Indian protestations can
go to hell.
If the NDA
Government really means what it says
about Kashmir- that it is an internal
matter of India- it would have been gutsy
in rebuffing the provocative statements
made by Colin Powell during and after his
recent visit to India. Incredibly, a spin
was put on Powell's anti-India assertion-
not by his officials, but by an Indian
official who told reporters that when
Powell said Kashmir was on the
''international agenda'', he only meant
that ''international terrorism is on the
global agenda!''
It is hard
to believe that there will be any Indian
who is so daft as to accept that
gobbledygook from the Indian
spokesperson. The clue to the shocking
spin to Powell's statement by Indian
officials lies in the woolly statements
on cross-border terrorism and
infiltration put out by senior Indian
Ministers- L K Advani, the self-styled
later day Sardar Patel, George Fernandes
and whoever holds the External Affairs
portfolio. All of them say that
infiltration levels have dropped.
But senior
Army officers in Kashmir are saying that
infiltration might have dropped for a
brief period, there is no evidence to
suggest that it has actually stopped; in
fact, it has again risen lately. The
Pakistani dictator himself says that he
is not going to close down the terrorists
training camps as it his ''internal''
matter. But our Ministers, after years of
mouthing ultra-nationalist slogans are
now competing with each other to endorse
the Musharraf point of view! They are
bent upon surrendering themselves totally
before the Americans, enjoying the warmth
of US embrace that has the merit of
destroying nearly every leader and nation
it took under its wing totally-- in Iran,
Egypt, the Philippines to name a few.
The US
''discovery'' of global terrorism is
barely 10 month old. But the ''bad guys''
discovered post 9/11 were trained and
equipped by the US through its own dirty
tricks departments. The US had refused to
accept that the army of trouble shooters
in foreign lands it was raising would
bring trouble to the world, the US
included. Now, they have become
Frankenstein monsters. But the US is
still not willing to learn any lessons-
it only wants to go on giving sermons to
most of the world and ''teach'' lessons
to a few of them who have repulsed
American advances in the interest of
their honour.
These evil
creatures who live by terrorism were
conceived and nourished initially by
Washington and subsequently trained
assiduously by their major domo in
Islamabad. They could still have escaped
the label of being ''bad guys'' had they
continued spilling Indian blood as they
did for 10 years or more. Unfortunately
for the US, they have turned their
attention to America. As a nation that is
quick to spot the US dollar and known for
constantly taking U-turns, Pakistan has
also started crying wolf to say that it
is a ''victim'' of terrorism. The US
promptly agrees; India protests are
dismissed by both who disregard the
mountain of evidence that establishes
that Pakistan has always been and
continues to be the breeding ground of
terrorism.
Where
Pakistan is concerned, the US has always
adopted the ''three monkeys'' policy :
hear no evil, speak no evil and see no
evil. The US leaders are stated to be
cautious in making ''balanced''
statements on the current situation in
the Indian sub-continent. It is only by
this ''balancing act'' with a tilt
towards Pakistan that the US can reward
Islamabad for ''cooperating'' (?) with
the US in its ''war'' (?) against
terrorism.
Pakistan
will go on milking the US and the West-
as it has done for the past 55 years.
Indian leaders and diplomats are merely
content to hear an occasional word of
(grudging) praise from the visiting US
officials. It was not very long ago that
the otherwise very status-conscious
Indian protocol allowed Jaswant Singh
when he was External Affairs Minister to
run literally every fortnight or so to
see and talk to a comparatively junior US
official, an Assistant Secretary of
State. Such displays of servility and
spineless does not bother the
ultra-nationalist party that rules India
whose leaders with all their bombast
appear almost effeminate in facing
uncomfortable interlocutors.
The Indian
claim that Pakistan is continuing to
germinate terrorism receives scant
attention in public pronouncements by the
US but the Government looks for ways, not
to protest against the obvious US
''tilt'', but to give a spin that shows
the American statements as being ''not
anti-Indian''.
The US is
now getting so emboldened by the Indian
timidity that it has started to encroach
deeper into India's internal matters.
Consider the imperious manner in which US
officials tell India to ensure ''free and
fair' polls in Kashmir which should be
conducted under the supervision of
international observers. It is the same
US which not very long ago had become the
laughing stock when conducting the last
Presidential election that installed Bush
in the White House.
It is only
a matter of time-- should the Vajpayee
Government remain in office long enough-
before the US would be demanding a closer
''international'' (by which it means
American) supervision in all elections in
India and insisting that ''human rights''
records in every nook and corner of India
meet the US standards. The US obsession
with human rights is understandable; it
provides it an opportunity to hide many
of its sores like the growing racial
abuses, indignities heaped on immigrants
by officials, and brutal assaults on
coloured detainees.
A
Government with guts would have told the
Americans off a long time ago. Countries
like Pakistan have reasons to blindly
praise and welcome every word that the
Americans say because of the obvious
goodies that Washington brings to
Islamabad. India has no such compulsion.
So why doesn't New Delhi ask the
Americans to ''lay off'', as Musharraf
would say.
The US
demand for international observers in
Kashmir is an act of brazen arrogance
because US itself is so apprehensive of
international scrutiny of its armed
forces conduct even when it is on- for
God's sake- peace missions. In
Afghanistan, it goes on merrily bombing
civilians but would not accept anyone,
least of all the UN, finding fault with
the US armed forces. Dozens of
assassination plots have been prepared to
get rid of the Iraqi leader without
presenting any cogent and morally
justifiable reasons to punish him. The
Palestinians are under notice from
Washington to change their leader if they
have to even hope for a free state of
their own. For a long time, killing
popular leaders in Latin America was a
popular pastime of the CIA- with full
knowledge of top US officials, Presidents
included.
This is
the country that demands ''fairness'' in
other countries. And why? For clear
political propaganda and gains. Assuming
for a second that India does allow
''international observers'' in Kashmir
during the forthcoming polls to the State
Assembly, does anyone have to guess what
their report will say: A downright
denunciation of the conduct of election
and thus hand over a propaganda ploy to
Islamabad which Washington would use to
bend India more.
Many in
India tend to read too much in the US
''assurance'' that it would ask the
Pakistani dictator, Gen Parvez Musharraf,
to stick to his words that cross-border
''infiltration'' (note, the word used is
not ''cross-border terrorism'') comes to
a naught. The sheer vacuousness of this
is stuperfying. These words are being
heard from both Musharraf and his
American patrons for over six months
without any change in ground realities.
Typical of
the foolhardy manner in which Indian
diplomacy works, the initial drop in the
number of unwelcome Pakistanis and others
trained by them entering India was played
up in India as though New Delhi was in a
hurry to tell the Americans that
everything was moving in the right
direction. But even the most foolish
Indian knows that it is not simple for
things to move in the right direction
when it comes to Indo-Pak relations.
Having
received endorsement from India itself-
the aggrieved party- about decline in
infiltration, both the Americans and the
Pakistanis must be laughing in their
sleeves. India has played into their
hands but is squirming to see its hands
tied.
The
Americans are playing a game when they
tell India on behalf of Musharraf that
infiltration in Kashmir will stop. The
Americans also bring another
''assurance'' that Pakistan will not
cause any disruption-- violence during
elections in Jammu and Kashmir.
The
J&K elections are unlikely to be
peaceful. But Pakistan will use words by
Indian leaders to wash its hands off any
blame for that violence, and put the
blame on Indian ''oppression'' in
Kashmir. The US will heartily nod its
approval for the Pakistani stand.
Washington
may not use the kind of crude language
that Islamabad habitually employs towards
India-- because that is the only language
it knows. But the net effect of the
exercises in the two foreign capitals
will be the same : damn India. South
Block would then be busy again coining
new illusory phrases to praise the US
stand. (Syndicate Features)
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ISI’s
powerful network in Nepal
By B L
Kak
Nepal and
India are two immediate neighbours. Nepal
is a landlocked Asian country in the
Himalayan mountain range. It is bounded
on the north by Tibet, on the east by
Sikkim and West Bengal, on the south and
west by Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.
Differences of opinion between India and
Nepal on some issues have already become
an open secret. But they haven’t
affected what the ruling establishments
in New Delhi and Kathmandu have often
termed as the "close, friendly and
time-tested ties" between the two
countries.
India’s
commitment to Nepal’s economic
development is equally an open secret.
Nepal knows that India can, if tackled
properly and in a friendly manner, be
more helpful than China and Pakistan. But
Pakistan, which has no historical and
geographical link with Nepal, has been
allowed unbridled freedom not only in
Kathmandu but also elsewhere in the
Himalayan Kingdom.
At a time
when parts of Nepal have also experienced
horrors of terrorist violence, one would
have expected the powers-that-be in
Kathmandu to adopt a tough posture
towards the presence and activity of
Pakistan-aided ultras and subversives in
the Himalayan Kingdom. Ruling
establishments in Kathmandu were found,
during the past one decade or so, pretty
soft towards Pakistan, in spite of Indian
protests against the activity in Nepal of
anti-India elements.
King of
Nepal, Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev,
paid a State visit to India from June 23
to 28 this year. Indian leadership was
not to blame when Nepal’s King was
confronted with pointed questions
vis-à-vis the continuing activities of
Pakistan’s ISI in Nepal and across
the border into India. New Delhi’s
perturbation and serious concern, which
found a forceful expression during Indian
leaders’ meetings with King
Gyanendra, had obviously been the product
of irrefutable evidence India has had
with regard to the presence of a powerful
ISI network in Nepal.
There is
evidence to suggest that Nepalese
authorities do not want to be harsh
towards Pakistan and its ISI operatives
and modules in Nepal, obviously because
of the growing Sino-Pakistan
collaboration and cooperation. For
obvious strategic and political reasons,
China would not like Nepal to be stable
and strong. Beijing’s relations with
Kathmandu are cordial. But Beijing
hasn’t appeared to be strongly
opposed to the Maoist violence in Nepal.
This, of course, is a significant
development.
Equally
significant is Kathmandu’s
appreciation of the Government of
India’s support to steps taken by
the Nepalese Government to restore
normalcy and order in the Himalayan
Kingdom. However, more significant than
this is Kathmandu’s reservations on
the demand for decisive action against
the deeply-entrenched ISI network in
Nepal. The Minister of State for External
Affairs, Mr Digvijay Singh, informed the
Lok Sabha, during question hour on July
17, that New Delhi is concerned about ISI
misusing the Nepalese territory and the
open India-Nepal border for activities
inimical to India’s interest.
Recently,
the Nepalese Government apprised
Government of India of steps taken in
Nepal against a set of Pakistani
officials. These Pakistanis also included
some staffers of Pakistani chancery in
Kathmandu, who had possessed explosives
and fake Indian currency. But the
Nepalese authorities haven’t refuted
reports about the continuing activities
of ISI in Nepal. Pakistan does not view
Nepal as a small country of two crore
people but one with 1,700-km open border
with India, giving the ISI enough scope
for launching subversive activities
against India.
The
ISI’s activities in Nepal range from
RDX rerouting to drugs trafficking and
running the counterfeit currency racket.
When the Pakistan Embassy was opened in
1964, there were only three officers.
Today there are more than two dozen. And
more than half are suspected to be ISI
operatives. In 1974 two Pakistani PoWs
escape front the Ranchi prison and
reached Kathmandu from where they
travelled to Karachi via Bangkok. The
incident was an eye-opener for Pakistan,
which realized the immense potential that
Nepal offered for ISI operations against
India.
On several
occasions in recent years, it was
established that explosives were brought
to Kathmandu in Pakistan Airlines
flights, often by persons carrying
diplomatic passports. The none-too-old
blast in Delhi’s Lajpat Nagar, which
killed 20 persons, was planned and
carried out by ISI men from Kathmandu.
The original idea was to trigger two
blasts, one at Lajpat Nagar and the other
at Ahmedabad, but Assadullah, who was to
trigger the blast, was caught on the way.
Three ultras arrested after the Lajpat
Nagar blast told the police that all the
planning was done in Kathmandu, where
they were given 18 kg of RDX and Rs 1.25
lakhs.
Pakistan
has also used Nepal as a base to regroup
Kashmiri militant outfits and given them
arms and money to carry out activities in
India. Activists of J&K Islamic
Front, J&K Liberation Front, Al-Jihad
and Hizbul Mujahideen are coordinated by
the ISI station chief in Kathmandu.
Nepal’s porous border with India is
exploited fully by the ISI for
infiltration of militants besides sending
in arms, ammunition and explosives.
Recently, five large consignments,
containing high-grade explosives, were
marked for Jammu and Kashmir. But they
failed to reach the destination. Dramatic
raids carried out by security personnel
at two places close to UP’s border
with Nepal in the Terai region aborted
the smugglers’ plan to arrange the
passage of the explosives into J&K.
The seized
explosives also included RDX and TNT.
When RDX is mixed with TNT, a more
powerful explosive called Composition
is formed. The explosive, according to
official analysts, is not manufactured in
Pakistan but imported from Poland and the
Czech Republic. Much of the imported
explosive is meant for terror strikes in
Indian cities, particularly Jammu and
Kashmir.
Following
the receipt of reports about the growing
interest of Nepal-based Pak functionaries
in the most strategic Terai region, New
Delhi had to alert security and
intelligence agencies along India’s
border with Nepal. As the frequent visits
of Pak officials to the Terai region in
recent times had aroused suspicion among
Indian police and intelligence officials,
higher-ups in Delhi’s North Block
were left with no alternative but to hold
consultations with the Deputy Prime
Minister and Home Minister, Mr LK Advani.
The development was followed by fresh
instructions to the security and
intelligence agencies in Bihar and UP to
intensify vigil along the Indo-Nepal
border.
Police and
intelligence officials in the two States
have voiced apprehension that the visits
of Pak chancery officials to the Terai
region are intended to promote subversive
activities through institutions like
mosques and madrassas in the
border areas. According to one account,
over a dozen madrassas in some
areas on the Nepali side of the border
are actually engaged in anti-India
activities. Financial assistance to these
institutions is channelized through banks
like the Habib Bank of Pakistan and also
through some Indians living in the Gulf
countries. Habib bank has become a
partner of Nepal’s Himalayan Bank.
Intelligence
reports say that foreign currency is
converted into Indian currency in Nepal
through Himalayan Bank and brought into
India covertly with the sole motive to
pay ISI recruits operating in India,
including Jammu and Kashmir.
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Heart
diseases: an impending epidemic
By
Arvinder Kaur
With the
Delhi Government announcing its plan to
launch a lifestyle diseases control
programme with special emphasis on heart
disease, the severity of the disease and
need to control it effectively has once
again been highlighted.
There are
an estimated 60 million patients
suffering from Coronary Artery Disease
(CAD) in India alone and doctors say an
increasing number of young Indians are
falling prey to the disease. Over 30 per
cent of these were women. All this was
leading to large scale morbidity and
mortality.
A decade
ago the incidence of heart disease was 30
per 1000 in the Indian population. Today
around 10 per cent of the population
above the age of 20 is suffering from
coronary artery disease.
WHO also
has projected a very grim picture of the
heart diseases scenario in India.
According to its projections, by 2020,
coronary heart disease would account for
one-third of all deaths in the country.
Today, one-fourth of all the deaths are
from heart disease.
Medical
experts say Indians, as a race, are
genetically predisposed to having CAD and
four times more prone to heart attacks
compared to Caucasians (Whites). Indians
are also ten times more prone to having
heart attacks at a younger age than white
Caucasians. The disease in Indians is
early, more fatal, more diffuse and more
complicated.
It is not
just India, but most developing countries
which are today facing an epidemic of
these lifestyle diseases. In the last
three decades, the incidence of heart
disease alone has increased by 4-6 fold
in urban areas and 2-3 fold in rural
areas in India.
Seeing the
large number of population which is
affected, what we need is a national
policy on the lines of AIDS policy, which
should stress on preventive aspects
besides creating awareness about the
disease.
Coronary
artery disease is an acquired disease
because of modifiable and non-modifiable
risk factors. Typical modifiable risk
factors are smoking, uncontrolled blood
pressure and diabetes and high
cholestrol.
However,
Indian risk factors are different from
the west, they typically being potbelly
obesity, high triglyceride levels,
diabetes and high blood pressure.
The very
fact that animals do not suffer from
heart attack disease implies that heart
attack disease is preventable. However,
the incidence in doctors is no different
than in the normal population indicating
lack of awareness about prevention.
The CAD
scene in India is a very alarming but the
good news is that the Spectrum of
treatment of the disease is now complete.
Lifestyle management techniques are
widely available which help in risk
factor reduction. Those who need
intervention, can choose from drugs alone
to angioplasty or even surgery.
Infact, a
great deal of research worldwide is being
devoted into developing safer options to
manage the disease, its cost component
and to avoid bypass surgery.
While drug
coated stents (introduced last month in
India) have given new dimension to
angioplasty, doctors are propagating more
and more the use of yoga, dietary and
lifestyle changes and also alternate
therapies to manage the disease
comprehensively.
Angioplasty,
which is in use for over 25 years now,
was a major achievement in treating CAD
non-surgically. However, the main limit
was narrowing of arteries in first six
months in approximately 20 per cent
patients, requiring a repeat angiplasty.
With the
introduction of new drug-coated stents,
the risk of repeat angioplasty has nearly
been overcome. Also, surgery will be
reserved for few acute cases now.
Stents
coated with drugs enter the blood vessel
wall and check the recurrence of
blockages at the implanted site. The
results are comparable to the best
results achieved by bypass surgery.
One of the
major concerns in this non-surgical
treatment, however, is the very high cost
of these smart stents. Each stent is
priced at Rs 145,000 per piece. However,
the market forces and competition are
likely to bring down the prices
considerably.
However,
most of the patients are not able to
afford such a costly treatment in the
country. While there are 15 million
angioplasty cases in India, only 25,000
angioplasties are actually done each
year.
In such a
scenario, prevention and management of
the heart disease is a major challenge
before the health authorities and experts
today. The solution, thus, lies in
cost-effective interventions.
The stress
has to be preventive cure.. any yoga or
behavioural modification combined with
lifestyle change and strict diet control
is very effective in controlling the
disease.
A study
conducted at the All India Institute of
Medical Sciences in New Delhi recently
evaluated the possible role of lifestyle
modification (incorporating Yoga) in
retarding CAD.
In a
controlled clinical trial, 42 men with
angiographically proved CAD were
randomized to control or yoga
intervention and were followed for one
year. The active group was treated with a
user-friendly programme consisting of
yoga, control of risk factors, diet
control and moderate aerobic exercise.
At one
year, the yoga group showed significant
reduction in number of anginal episodes
per week, improved exercise capacity and
decrease in body weight. Serum total
cholestrol, LDL cholestrol and
triglyceride levels also showed greater
reductions.
Another
study in Pune also concluded that Yoga
alleviates stress, induces relaxation and
provides multiple health benefits to
practitioners.
PTI
Feature
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