EDITORIAL
Correcting
PR bias
It is the duty of
the legislative assembly to make laws, to remove
legal anomalies and put corrective measures in
place. That is the primary purpose for which the
members are elected to this body. And, they have
been making laws, all the time. But how
insensitive the bodies of lawmakers are to
matters crying for legislative intervention, is
clear from the large no of cases where the people
have to approach the courts of law for all issues
of social correction and institution of
safeguards. Recently the Supreme Court taking a
suo motto cognizance of the desecration of
geological land-formations fined the cold-drink
companies and the Himachal Pradesh Government for
despoiling the earth assets there. And, High
Court of Jammu and Kashmir put in a much needed
correction in the State subject laws of the State
to give to the female half of the State
population the rights that the males have been
enjoying as a birth-right all along while the
women were denied the same without reasons, cause
or justification.
Denying women the
full equality is one of the vestiges of gender
bias of the previous ages that somehow was not
corrected with the changed perceptions of
egalitarianism and equality. Citizens, women's
groups and other organizations have been
protesting for long against the open chauvinism
in the State subject laws by virtue of which the
State subject status of the women of the state
lasts only till marriage. Then, if the woman
married a non-state subject, it lapsed.
Accordingly, all the permanent resident
certificates issued to females specify that it is
‘valid only till marriage’. There is no
such restriction in the case of men. In fact, if
a male permanent resident of the state marries a
non-state subject woman, that woman acquires the
status of a state subject by virtue of such
marriage. Even though the need for such
legislation was felt for a long time, Successive
legislatures failed to put in necessary
correction in the laws to confer on the female
half of the state subjects this right. As a
result of this discrimination on the basis of
sex, many women found themselves deprived of the
properties and other rights in the State, which
should have devolved to them naturally.
It was left to the
State High Court to remove this inequality of sex
and to restore to the women of this state their
birthright of full and lasting permanent resident
status. It did so in a full bench decision, last
month. As the court has observed the PRC status
is not akin to a domicile restriction but is
similar to the citizenship right. The existing
situation practically took the citizenship of the
females away for the fact of their marrying
outside the state and thus was contrary to the
enjoyment of the basic right. The practice has
deprived countless women of a right to facilities
and amenities, employments and other normal
rights in the State to which they had been born.
While one must heartily laud the court for this
very apt and egalitarian pronouncement it needs
be pointed out that, for the last fifty years,
the legislators of this State have totally failed
to give full equality to the women of this state
whom they represented. One may even ask did those
august members never know about this gender bias
or realize it? Or, did they deliberately ignore
the provision as well as need of correction? If
so, have they not denied the women of this State
of equality with the men illegally in
contravention of the constitution?
Discussing
Musharraf?
It was Oscar Wilde
who speaking of the British national sport, fox
hunting, produced that inimitable expression: The
English country gentleman galloping after a
fox-the unspeakable in full pursuit of the
uneatable. Something equally unmentionable is
happening in Pakistan where General Musharraf's
constitutional orders are being discussed. That
the elected legislators should have to come to
terms with the constitutional orders promulgated
by an unconstitutional usurper is the ultimate
degradation to which a democracy can be
subjected. The people's representatives are
forced to discuss the orders and indicate their
willingness to work under them, shows how much
the general has tailored their democracy. The
elections, their conduct as well as the results
have shown that there was tailoring at all
levels. Analysts point out that the clever way in
which the balance was left hanging between (the
‘Kings party’), PML (Q) - the (Q) is
for Qaide-E-Azm- and the fundamentalist
religionists is contrived to confound the
Americans as well as the home front and at the
same time to put the lids on the two major
players - Nawaz and Benazir.
Now who said that
militancy has no intelligence? It not only is
intelligent enough to put the democrats,
humanists, fundamentalists and the anti-terrorist
all into the same witches' cauldron but also
makes the elected legislators to discuss the
illegal orders of the unconstitutional authority.
But then it has been even cleverer. It got the
whole judiciary there to stamp its seal of
approval on the usurpation, by making it to take
new oaths of allegiance to the military regime.
Of course, the judges who had sworn allegiance to
the regime could not ‘technically’ call
that regime ‘illegal’. Now that
illegal, becoming legal and getting other
illegalities to be declared legal are twists and
turns that nobody except Oscar Wilde could
resolve in words. And, no college of juristic
brains of the world would be able to find
legality in that tangle of illegalities. One can
be certain that the legislators there are not
very worried over the legality or
constitutionality of the Legal Framework Orders.
They are flummoxed over the prime ministerial
berth and how to settle it. And there the LFOs
are serving as, as fine an excuse as any thing
else could. That done, the posts apportioned,
they'd quickly come to terms with the legality of
the illegal.
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Drawing
the lines
By
Joginder Singh
In the
world's largest Muslim country,
Indonesia, in a horrific bomb blast on
October 12, 187 persons were killed and
230 were either injured or were found
missing. The bomb blast in the tourist
paradise of Bali, a handiwork of the
terrorists was aided, abetted and
executed by Osama bin Laden's, al Qaeda.
al Qaeda has already threatened attack on
American economic interests. The surge of
terrorism incidents all over the world
clearly shows that Al Qaeda is firm and
kicking.
Despite a
coalition against terrorism, there is no
knowing, as to where and what will be the
next target. Freelance Islamic terrorists
want to have a free run and be the rulers
of the world. It is essential for India,
not to neglect, what is happening
elsewhere, on the ground that all these
happenings, are far from it.
In our
neighboring Pakistan, there is no
division between Army and so called
Jihadis or terrorists, in their
objectives. Infact, the Pakistani Army
uses terrorists, masquerading as Jihadis,
to further its objective of destablising
India and create trouble. Despite
international action to contain the
al-Qaeda, the terrorist network with
worldwide presence, is 'fit and
well" and poised to "strike
again at its leisure."
This
warning comes from a UN expert panel
group which, in a report released in New
York in October, 2002, said:
"Members of the al-Qaeda and their
associates are deployed in many countries
across the world and, given the
opportunity, they will have no
compunction, in killing as many people,
as they can, from those nations, that do
not conform to their religions and
ideological belief and which they
perceive as, their enemies."
The report
has been prepared by a monitoring group,
set up by the UN Security Council, to
trace the implementation by
member-states, of updated sanctions,
against Osama bin Laden, the al-Qaeda,
the Taliban and their associates. These
measures require all countries to freeze
the financial assets of individuals,
groups or organisations on the Sanctions
Committee list and to continue a travel
ban and arms embargo, on the remaining
elements of the Taliban, al-Qaeda network
and its supporters.
According
to the report, one problem in stemming
the activities, of the al-Qaeda, is lack
of coordinated action. Only a few of
those individuals, detained, sought and
identified by the USA are included on the
UN's consolidated list of those under
sanctions. Instead, nations are using
their own lists "unevenly",
seriously diminishing the effectiveness
of responses. The expert group, calls for
making "much greater use", of
the UN list.
On the
financial front, the report finds that
despite initial successes in freezing
some 112 million dollars in al-Qaeda
assets, the network continues to have
access to "considerable financial
and other economic resources." The
report recommends increased intelligence
and information sharing among countries
to address the problem. It also urges
greater efforts to track down and close
down businesses, supporting the al-Qaeda
and to regulate alternative banking
systems.
The report
also points out that members of the
al-Qadea and the Taliban "continue
to move undetected across international
boundaries," and urges stricter
border control procedures. The Chairman
of the UN monitoring group, Michael
Chandler, has warned, "There are
growing indications of the concentration
of the al-Qaeda in North Africa, the
Middle East, Central, Southern and
South-East Asia. We continue to be
collectively faced by an uprecedented
form of terrorism without frontiers, the
members of which are quite ruthless and
without principle, when it comes to
respecting people as humanity."
The
Security Council reviewed the report
during a closed-door meeting, and later
the President of the Council, Stephen
Tafrov of Bulgaria, said the Council
urged all member-states to provide
reports to the committee, monitoring the
sanctions against the al-Qaeda and other
associates entities.
Chechen
Muslim terrorists, who held over 700
hostages in Moscow, were killed on
October 26.
Pakistan
still continues to run with the 'hare and
hunt with the hunted'. It is following
the double policy of promoting Jihad and
giving shelter to the father of
terrorism, Al Qaida and the former
Talibans in its territory. It made its
best effort to disrupt the recent
elections in Jammu and Kashmir, which
recorded the highest turn-out of 52 per
cent.
A heavy
price in terms of causalities was paid
for having democracy in Jammu and Kashmir
-- 800 lives lost from the start of the
election process, 500 civilian and 270
security force personnel injured.
It is
clear from the results that nobody can
take the voters for granted or treat a
particular State or a Constituency as its
pocket borough. Ultimately Congress and
PDP have decided to join hands and cobble
a coalition, though the track record of
Congress in supporting others has been
dubious. It withdrew the carpet from the
two United Front Prime Ministers, Deve
Gowda and I K Gujral. In 1968, it
supported a Government of Akali
defectors, led by late Lachman Singh Gill
and withdrew support in a few months
time.
The
Western Nations are not bothered about
what is happening elsewhere, except under
its own nose or in its own territory. It
has no interests in fighting the
terrorists beyond its borders and is not
interested in the fate of other
countries, fighting terrorism. It will be
foolhardy to expect anybody else, to
fight our own battle. It is natural for
West to adopt double standards when it is
affected by the terrorism and consider
the terrorism faced by it more serious,
than that faced by India or others.
Pakistan
brands terrorists trained and funded by
it, as freedom fighters. We need not
lament or consider the situation as
ironic. Regretably, the External Affairs
Ministry has failed to deliver goods and
did not even do its homework before the
visit of Prime Minister to Western
Nations in October, 2002. In Greece, the
visit was branded as that of the
'Vegetarian Killers'.
In
Denmark, which is a country, with less
than half of population of Delhi, Danish
Prime Minister Rasmussen described the
election in Jammu and Kashmir as
"the starting point of an inclusive
and forwarding looking dialogue with the
people of Kashmir". These remarks
shows that even basic facts on Kashmir
were either not made available to Danish
Prime Minister or not absorbed by him. In
an earlier visit to Malaysia by the
Indian Prime Minister, the Malaysian
Prime Minister had described Indian
position as that of 'self assumed
greatness'.
It is true
that the job of the foreign service
officials depends on the pleasure of the
Prime Minister. But it seems that the
foreign visits of the Prime Minister have
been oversteteched with no proportionate
returns. Incidentally, the approach of
the External Affairs Ministry is totally
supercilious and unacceptable vis-a-vis
the Prime Minister an the whole country.
The
Defence Minister announces that the Prime
Minister would visit Pakistan for SAARC
Meet. But the External Affairs Ministry
representatives says; "After the
dates are finalised, we will take a
decision whether the Prime Minister will
travel". The representative just
stopped short of saying that a Babu in
the foreign Ministry will decide, whether
the Prime Minister should go abroad or
not. In other words, should the Prime
Minister let a clerk decide as to what is
to be done by him and where he should go
and whom should he meet and with whom he
should eat. May be the officials around
Prime Minister feel more comfortable when
abroad, rather than being confined to
mundane business in India.
When there
is a war going on against terrorism, it
is time for the leaders to lead from the
front and not by brave statements from
the foreign soils. It is not enough to
condemn terrorism by lip service. It is
time to show grit and determination, by
boosting the morale of those who are
trying to uproot his scourge from the
countries. Enough is enough, so far as
the so-called arm chair intellectuals and
Babus are concerned. They should not be
allowed to hijack the country and have
all authority, with no responsibility.
PTI
Feature
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Proactive
policing: The New Mantra
By Sudha
Passi
The Police
have inherited a legacy of suspicion and
dislike. For these reasons there is
insufficient respect for the police
today. But now that the country is free,
both public and the police must change
their attitude," the first Home
Minister of independent India, Sardar
Vallabhai Patel once said.
More than
a decade later, the country’s first
Prime Minister, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru
said at a conference of Inspector
Generals of Police, "The police
force comes in contact with the public
from day to day. The only way to have
these contacts is that they should be
friendly contacts, constant contacts and
contacts in which each respects the
other."
Nearly
half a century after the country’s
leadership envisaged a social image for
its law enforcement agencies, the police
force continues to remain largely
isolated, its image having plummeted to
new lows. The image of a cop in India is
anything but friendly. For most people he
is a trigger-happy bully who can be
easily bought over by the moneyed and the
powered. Ironically, these are the images
which have been fed more by media reports
and rarely by personal contacts with the
uniformed men.
A senior
police official who has studied the
subject in detail and prepared a
blueprint to enhance the public image of
the force as a
"proactive’’ rather than
reactionary means of maintaining law and
order attributes the problem to little or
no public interaction with the forces and
complete lack of knowledge of the
criminal justice system in the education
system.
In a path
breaking study covering more than 2,000
students in 45 schools across nine Indian
cities, Dr U N B Rao, Joint
Commissioner of Delhi Police, found a
marked difference among the
children’s attitudes towards the
Police if they were made aware of the
criminal justice system, the working of
the police force as also the constraints
they faced.
Inputs
about related systems like legal system
and jail were also found relevant and
contributory, says Dr Rao, who designed
special modules for police-student
interactive sessions stretching about
four months to feel the pulse of the
children towards the police force and
their expectations from the law and order
enforcing body.
The
interactive sessions, which were very
informal, covered all kinds of schools
— public and Government, rural and
urban as also children coming from
various socio-economic backgrounds.
Rao
divided the children into two groups and
subjected one of them to the interactive
sessions that were supposed to gauge the
impact of the interaction along six
parameters: awareness about police,
awareness about criminal justice system,
attitude towards police behaviour, civic
sense and social responsibility and
attitude towards police integrity.
While the
control group or the group that did not
undergo any interactive session gained
between the pre-intervention and post
intervention phase a mean of 0.15, the
experimental group or the one which was
exposed to interaction with the police
gained 2.7, which was nearly 18 times
more than the control group.
Not
surprisingly, it unfolded that
adolescents from English medium schools,
including Kendriya Vidyalayas stated
overwhelmingly (66 to 84%) in comparison
to their counterparts from vernacular
schools (56 to 62%) that they had never
or rarely met a cop. But perceptions of
the met and not met categories together
indicated that public are afraid to lodge
complaints - as much as 75%, and perceive
the police is corrupt (40 to 69%).
In the
absence of direct interaction, the images
vis-a-vis the police are shaped by the
media, especially the print.
Interestingly,
however, the attitude of adolescents did
change substantially with awareness of
their working conditions, knowledge about
the criminal justice system as also
system failures did not alter their
attitude towards police integrity.
Rather, the interactive sessions led to a
greater expectation from the force with
the young adults not expecting week
morals from the uniformed men.
Rao also
found civic sense and social
responsibility improve after interactive
sessions with the police. During the
interactions with the adolescent
students, he found a lot of curiosity
among them about the police and a fair
degree of concern for anti-social acts
and keenness to intervene. In certain
situations they also opted to resort to
riskier interventions which could have
technically amounted to be
‘unlawful’. "It was at
this stage that their interaction with
the police seemed to have helped them
resettle for a more effective,
appropriate and safer intervention,"
he observes.
He also
noticed among them mixed feelings
regarding making police service as a
career. Says Rao, "Policing to
maintain law and order, and to prevent
and detect crime is a vital requirement
for the growth and welfare of the
society. It is a matter of civic sense
and social responsibility of an
individual that encourages him/her to
agree to join the police force or
otherwise."
But why go
in for a proactive approach or an
‘unconventional’ approach at a
time when the police seems hard pressed
in tackling incidents of crime and coping
with what is seen as ‘routine’
duties. And why choose adolescents for
public- police relations
In a
country where education on the criminal
justice does not form part of the
curriculum even in higher classes, it is
only natural that people do not even know
what policing is about and what to expect
of the law enforcing agency. Not
surprisingly, a study in 1994 indicated
that in Delhi, 78 per cent of the
complaints reaching police were of
non-cognizable nature, which called for
judicial sanction even to register and
investigate, as without such sanction
police in India were not supposed to act.
Adolescents
need to be targeted as theirs being an
impressionable age and "minds which
are relatively cleaner states where much
could be written," At 200 million,
adolescents constitute a ‘soon to
become adult, force that needs to be
focused upon towards healthier
nation-building.
In western
countries like US, where drug abuse and
gun culture are major law and order
challenges there are special- police
liaison officers attached to schools, for
large-scale interaction with children.
Children thus grow up with a positive
attitude towards the police and see them
in positive light.
Law
enforcement has been the main output of
the Indian police (more than 53.3%)
whereas social support is found to be the
main occupation of the police forces of
developed nations like Israel,
Netherlands and the USA. The UK police
gave the highest importance to patrolling
aspects. In Singapore and Japan,
community policing has become the theme
of policing.
"A
proactive policing approach aims at not
only the prevention of crime but also
equipping the prospective victims of
crime to fight back and a consultative
approach both within the rank and file of
the police and with the public. It is an
approach seeking to plan far ahead, where
public are associated in both planning
and working for the police. The
priorities are decided by the public
rather than by the police managers. This
paradigm shift may sound rather unusual
for police forces in developing
countries," says Rao.
For all
the constraints one may cite for
overlooking the approach, investing in
human resources and social is an
invaluable investment worth giving a try.
More so, when in the words of the senior
police official, who has experienced the
service inside out, there would be no
additional drain on the force in terms of
money and manpower.
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Ending
infiltration not enough
By CNF
Bureau
In an
interesting turn of events, US spokesman
have take over the role of Indians
insistent on the demand that Pakistan
stop sending across trained, armed and
motivated terrorists to kill and scare
the common Jammuite and Kashmiri.
It may not
be just a coincidence that two
distinguished Americans laid stress on a
single point on the same day at the same
place, that is, India's capital.
Ambassador Robert D Blackwill openly
accepted the fact that India was a victim
of terrorism which was entirely
‘external driven’. The occasion
was a FICCI meeting on US-India economic
relations. It was in answer to a question
he had said: India is a victim of
terrorism. The problem in Kashmir is
cross-border terrorism. In our judgement
all (terrorism in Kashmir) is external
driven.
The other
spokesman was Richard Haass, director
(Policy Planning Staff) in the US State
Department, meeting some presspersons in
New Delhi. He gave the example of
American and Soviet diplomats having
‘extensive exchanges on a daily
basis... even at the height of the cold
war". Confirming that the
"infiltration across the LoC is
continuing" and was a cause of
"considerable concern" to the
US, which would consistently seek the
resumption of talks between India and
Pakistan. Infiltration must stop
completely, he stressed again.
Next day
came more statements - assuring, advising
patronising. Assistant Secretary of State
for South Asia Christina Rocca in
Washington stressed the imperative of
dialogue between India and Pakistan.
Cross-border
infiltration, according to her, is down
significantly, but conceded "there
is still some infiltration, which is an
issue of concern to the US. It is one
(issue) we will continue to talk to
Pakistan about," certifying
President Musharraf has taken action to
end infiltration. Then she patted her own
back (Bush administration) for making
"tremendous strides" in the
relationship with India on all fronts.
This she
followed up with subtle pressures in
these words: There are a lot of
businesses that are interested. However,
the situation in India is such that they
are hesitant about going in. This is one
of the reasons you find us encouraging
the so-called second generation reforms.
But she assured that the
business/economic aspect of the bilateral
relationship had not dropped off the
screen.
As for
Blackwill's remarks that terrism in
Kashmir is entirely "externally
driven", the Foreign Office is
Islamabad lost no time in calling it
"inaccurate" and
"ill-considered". A spokesman
advised the envoy "to desist from
pronouncing himself on Pakistan-India
issues". Pakistan's reaction is
understandable. After all, Mr Blackwill's
remarks amount to undermining Pakistan's
decades old canard that the violence and
killing that the world has been witness
to in Kashmir is an indigenous struggle
and the likes of Musharraf have no hand
in it. Pakistan can never admit its guilt
in this respect, because that would mean
the end of its game in that State.
Ms Rocca's
and other US officials' repeated stress
on dialogue in beyond doubt made with
good intentions, but at the same time
suffers from certain misconceptions. A
dialogue process may at best keep the
guns at bay, but only on the border,
hopefully including the LoC, and not
within the Kashmir valley and the Jammu
region. Guns will never fall silent, as
long as terrorists get them. Who supplies
them guns, cartridges, grenade and
rocket-launchers? Definitely not
patriotic Indians. Pakistan/ISI may be
using some local elements who turn
saboteurs for money.
Terrorists
and insurgents are the soldiers of the
proxy war Pakistan is waging to prove to
the world that Kashmiris are dying to
fall into its Islamic lap. The day
bullets stop flying and killing innocent
civilians in Kashmir, Pakistan will be
totally exposed in the eyes of the world.
Lest our
American friends forget, the real issue
in Kashmir is vacation of aggression and
illegal occupation of Indian territory by
Pakistan. Will Islamabad ever agree to
talk with India on the modalities of
withdrawing its forces from the occupied
part of Jammu and Kashmir and returning
the territory?
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