Daily Excelsior... Editorial

Life without wife. Family without a home. Parents without a child. Youth without the job. And that Minister without the Portfolio. It is always a debatable point asto the adverse impact of all such things within but without. A retired person is as well without a cut-out task. His compulsive, possessive or intrinsic nature may compel him to do things which are otherwise the privilege of children and that wonderful phase termed adolescence. You indeed do things without motivation, provocation or any calculation. There is something like self-esteem, not necessarily egoism, that reinvigorate his spirits to continue living life king-size. Here king implies master of his own needs and will to do things which he could very well do without. As the lengthening shadows overshadow him in the sunset hour of his long life, there is yet that desire to live on and on and that too on his own terms. Then the day of reckoning comes which dwarfs his life without all the above. Then onwards it is life without portfolio when none recognises his entity as something or anything....more

The great betrayal in Afghanistan
By: Prof. K. N. Pandita

After five days of protracted negotiations in Islamabad, the United Nations representative signed a broad-based .....more

Corruption can revive militancy
TALES OF TRAVESTY
By: Dr. Jitendra Singh

The latest about Jammu and Kashmir in the national press is that the State Government has been defrauded of atleast Rs. 1,000 ....more

Indian defence- Indigenise
or perish
By : Praful Bakhsi
Wg Commander (retd)

India's dependence on foreign suppliers for technology in crucial sectors like defence, even after 50 ......more

Iranians-Vs-Saudis Proxy war in Pakistan
By Fazal Mehmood

Lahore : Punjab is, one again, in the grip of intense sectarian violence with an outbreak of target killings by militants from both sides. The fire of ongoing ...more

EDITORIAL

WITHOUT PORTFOLIO

Life without portfolio is without goal, without punch, without results. It leads to typicalities and behavioural transformation. More often it is goal of goal-less draw. He loses his humorous sense and the sense of involvement is at great discount. Think of the man who headed the family, earned for them to make them self-reliant and deployed all means fair or foul to manage the show with some degree of success and resultant satisfaction. Then think of the same man who faces rejection and rebuke at the hands of those who were tamed and brought up by him with great zeal and strenuous efforts spanning decades of self-less and dedicated life. It is a detestable proposition to become dependent and sub-servient to the dictates of even inconsequential persons.

And that Minister without Portfolio who faces the dual prospect of promotion and demotion alike. And he got to be dancing to all tunes set forth by the bandmaster. Worst still is the humiliation of being termed without portfolio. In desi language of Rabri style it may be akin to 'dhobi ka kutta na ghar ka na ghat ka.' If only he had a portfolio howsoever petty and inconsequential he would have been bossing over and passing orders with bundles of files awaiting his clearance. Just as suddenly all his inherent faculties would wake up to make him assertive in tone and tenor. But without portfolio is no less than a shuttlecock or football. Kicks here and kicks there. That is of course about Ministers.

And here is the million dollar news of Chief Ministers going the same way. First, it is Digvijay Singh who allocates all the portfolios and becomes the first Chief Minister without portfolio. One really wonders what compelled him to change his style. Hardly the ink dries in Madhya Pradesh, the news follows from Rajasthan that Ashok Gehlot also opts for becoming Chief Minister without portfolio. It appears that similar treat awaits all other CMs of Congress ruled States. Sonia has advised Congress stalwarts to learn from the mistakes of 8 month long BJP rule and the public rejection faced by them so soon after getting the mandate. Very shrewdly she has not told them to learn anything from their own mistakes of last five decades. The question that catches one's imagination relates to Vajpayee Government learning some lessons from Congress-how to rule, how to manipulate, how to ditch, how to exploit and yet come out unscathed. It is the considered view that Vajpayee should immediately ask all CMs of BJP/alliance ruled States to become CM without portfolios. It shall give them all the time on earth to fiddle around and come back full circle. It is as much true of Farooq Abdullah who should immediately become 'unencumbered.' By surrendering the External Affairs slot, PM is as well moving gradually to become PM without Portfolio. It shall help him oversee others better while not leaving any chance for others to have a peep into his domain, the domain 'without portfolio.'

The great betrayal in Afghanistan
By: Prof. K. N. Pandita

After five days of protracted negotiations in Islamabad, the United Nations representative signed a broad-based agreement with the Taliban leadership. One of the conditions of this agreement is that the UN would send back its humanitarian aid team to Kabul and Taliban would ensure its security. The Taliban have also agreed to set up an enquiry into the killing of three UN aid officials by the Taliban militiamen when Kabul fell into their hands. There is no mention of an enquiry into the massive violation of human rights by the Taliban, nor is there even the slightest censure of admonishment for gross violation of the right to life and freedom of thought of the people over whom Taliban have established their sway. If the unipolar power had no interest in Afghanistan, then censures, condemnations and sanctions would have been hurled at the face of Taliban. Nothing of the sort happened, and the UN concluded the agreement almost innocuously as if it was too insignificant an agreement between a 'legitimate and recognised' state and the world body.

In the aftermath of the withdrawal of the Soviet, Afghanistan presents a classical example of a lawless hunting ground where anybody can be killed by anybody for any reason and at any time. The Afghan war lords have seen to it that they surpass one another in bringing the land and its people to the brink of annihilation. Social scientists are disposed to call it the tortuous period of a tribal and frozen society transitioning to an open and modern society. The absence of a visionary statesman of great political farsight in contemporary Afghan society is lamentable. It was axiomatic of Afghans that they acceept anything under the sky but not foreign domination. Alas, even that quality, too, seems to be phasing out.

This summer the Taliban took the strategic and historic northwestern town of Herat, the traditional stronghold of the Hazarajat Shia community of Turko-Mongoloid origin. Situated close to the border of Khurasan, the eastern province of Iran, the Shia population of Herat and the Hazarajat had taken keen interest in the rise of Ayatollah Khumeini and the Islamic revolution of Iran. But since they had never been subjected to religious or sectarian discrimination at the hands of the Kabul rulers in the past, be it the monarchical regime of Zahir Shah or that of the left under Karmal and Najib, they had little reason to rise against Kabul and look towards Teheran.

When Afghans decided to resist the Soviet presence in their fatherland, the Hazarajat Shia population organised itself into Hizb-e-Wahdat and fought side by side with other warlords like Ahmad Shah and Hekmatyar against the Soviet. Their contribution to national resistance struggle in no way lagged behind any of the bigger and more powerful groups. But soon after the withdrawal of the Soviet from Afghanistan in 1990, the warlords fell apart and turned rivals, each wanting to out-smart the other in coveting the central power in Kabul. This forced the Hizb-e-Wahdat to become more inward looking and exclusivist because as a smaller sectarian group, its acceptability as the ruling party was out of question. Of Course in the form of a coalition Government, its position as holding vital leverage was unquestionable. That did not happen, and the two factions continued to be at loggerheads.

With the emergence of Taliban on the scene, the overall political scenario in Afghanistan changed considerably. The Sunni extremist Taliban, guided and supported maximally by Pakistan, another predominantly Sunni neighbour, announced the strict imposition of rigid Sunni Hanafi-Wahhabi brand of Islam which left no scope for other Islamic sects like Shia. Benefiting from their experience at home, Pakistani operative carried fire and brimstone into Afghan cauldron with the tacit purpose of fuelling anti-Shia sentiment among the Taliban. Pakistan's Wahhabi-oriented Islamic organizations had a role in it and the Americans were well informed on that. This was despite the UN recommendation that outside factors should not be allowed to interfere in Afghan situation.

One more reason for the Taliban to reject and dump the Hazaras was that their habitat lay to the west of Afghanistan close to Afghan - Khurasan (Iran) border. Naturally, it has much strategic importance not only for Afghanistan and Iran but also for Central Asian States in the overall geopolitics of the region.

The capture of Herat, Hazarajat and the Mazar-e-Sharif and Bamiyan by the Taliban militia this summer, and the resultant large scale massacre of the Shias especially the youth in Mazar-e-Sharif region is a grisly story which the western and the Islamic press suppressed with utmost care. The world has been kept ignorant of how the carnage was brought about by the Taliban fanatics. When the towns fell into their hands, they dragged civilian population out of their homes, separated the young people and butchered them mercilessly. The number of the murdered people rose to several thousand. It was a blatant genocide. The triumphant Taliban hunted down the Shias of Turko-Mongoloid ethnicity, wrecked thousands of their habitats and molested their women. The purpose was to change the demographic complexion of Herat and Hazarajat through ethno-religious cleansing, and thereby eliminate the obstruction inthe establishment of Wahhabi puritanic dispensation. It was in the background of this zealotry that eight Iranians (Shia) of the diplomatic mission in Herat also were gunned down by the Taliban marauders and scores of other Iranian were made prisoners.

No human rights organization, no NGO, none of western powers who firelessly pontificate on human rights observance, and not even the OIC, which claims to be the guardian of the interests of the Muslims, uttered a single word on this carnage. No Muslim country, no Muslim organization and no humanist among the the Muslim of the world was prepared to shed a single tear for the slain Hazaras of Afghanistan. But when a solitary Muslim gets killed, even by chance, at the hands of security forces in Kashmir, Chechniya, Bosnia, Greece or Israel, the entire Muslim world rises up to beat its breast. History knows no greater betrayal.

In this background, one could ask the Secretary General of the UN whether he feels any qualms of conscience in accepting the agreement of his organization with the Taliban without calling them to book for their acts of gross abuse of human rights of the Afghans? How could he keep silent on this grevious international crime taking place under his very nose? How can he ignore the bloodshed of innocent civilians in the name of religion? What is the purpose of his massive establishment maintained by the funds which the developing and the poor countries of the world, besides others, raise to project its hi-fi profile?

More shocking is the role of Iran in this saga of carnage and crime. The regime claiming to be the protector of the interests of the Muslims worldover, did nothing more than oozing out a few incoherent and hollow threats. It mobilised its toothless 2,70000 troops on Iran-Afghan border, fired a couple of sham artillery saivos towards Herat mountians and then succumbed to talks with Taliban who dragged her to the seal of her arch enemy in Jiddah. When Taliban declared that in case of an attack by Iran, all of Iranian cities would come under Taliban missile fire, was it a declaration of the Taliban or of their patrons across the border and beyond the coast? The self-styled champion of the Muslims of the world then withdrew to its shell. Now she will make peace with Taliban at their terms and then handover the "peace package" to the Hazaras with the superscript "The great betrayal is in place."

Corruption can revive militancy
TALES OF TRAVESTY
By: Dr. Jitendra Singh

The latest about Jammu and Kashmir in the national press is that the State Government has been defrauded of atleast Rs. 1,000 crore by a nexus that exists between the Excise Department officials and the Toll Tex agents at Lakhanpur.

From time to time, there are reports --- sometimes substantiated sometimes half-substantiated -- about one embezzlement racket or the other involving one State Department or the other. An inquiry is invariably announced on each such disclosure and thereafter nothing is known about the fate of the inquiry conducted. Meanwhile, reports of yet another corruption scam emanate and the people forget about the previous one. One day it concerns the Excise Department, the next day the Forest Department, then the Engineering Department and so on. Invariably, the persons accused in any such financial scandal are the ones enjoying high clout in the top echelons of Government hierarchy. Very often, the accused persons happen to be close kiths and kins of one or the Minister or a senior bureaucrat.

At the same time, corruption is galore also at another level. Of late, the process of making new appointments in any Government department has emerged as a lucrative exercise. To wield the authority of making new appointments in any cadre is the greatest privilege that a State high-up can aspire for. Because, a single exercise of making even a dozen new appointments could imply enriching a few odd senior functionaries by a couple of lakhs of rupees. How dangerously this trend can play with the psyche of the job seeking youngsters can better be evaluated in the light of the experience of late 1980s and early 1990s when the youth devoid of suitable vocation became the most readily available tools in the hands of the perpetrators of separatist militancy in Kashmir.

The Chief Minister Dr Farooq Abdullah has always been at pains to reiterate his resolve to eradicate corruption from the State of Jammu and Kashmir. He has more than once expressed his anguish at the existing culture of all-pervasive embezzlements and bribery. Dr Abdullah is an honourable man and he means what he says.

Be that as it may, just as the case of Jammu and Kashmir is said to be politically different from any other State of the Indian Union, similarly the case of corruption in Jammu and Kashmir should also be construed as different from that of corruption in any other State. Disenchantment, anger and discontent provoked by blatant nepotism, faceless favouritism and unquestioned corruption may find their possible natural buffers in the normal course but not so in the strife torn State of Jammu and Kashmir where alienation of the youth is precisely what the enemies of the country keep perpetually looking for.

Whatever the genesis of the turbulent 90s in Kashmir, even the most divergent postulators of Kashmir militancy agree on one common point -- that Kashmir would have been saved of much of the blood-shed if only the common masses had the satisfaction of receiving a fair deal from the powers - that-be as well as from the political cum administrative dispensation of the day. Whenever the legitimate democratic channels of justice get choked and the healthy democratic outlets of dissent get stifled, illegitimate channels and unhealthy outlets open up whether these be in the form of terrorist violence or militant outburst.

The common man in Kashmir who had just begun to experience respite after a decade long incessant militancy today finds himself cornered by an even more suffocating spate of all-round corruption. And, this should be a cause of worry for any right thinking citizen who feels genuine concern for Kashmir. Indeed so, because, allowing a contrary situation to develop would only facilitate the disruptive designs of the anti-India forces within and outside.

The need of the hour is to rise to the occasion and redeem the mute victims of injustice and discrimination. Time is slipping out fast in Kashmir. Let not the future historians curse the present custodians for having missed a rare opportunity to put the State back on the rails. Let not the common man be pushed to the wall so hard that he resorts to revolt in the belief that in doing so he has nothing to lose but everything to gain. Let not an otherwise sublime submissive Umapathy feel constrained enough to rise like an unruly tornado thus simulating poet Faiz's expression "Khaak-e-Raah Bhi Hum ------ Qair -e-Toofan Bhi--------------".

Iranians-Vs-Saudis Proxy war in Pakistan
By Fazal Mehmood

Lahore : Punjab is, one again, in the grip of intense sectarian violence with an outbreak of target killings by militants from both sides. The fire of ongoing Shia-Sunni violence has left as many as 142 people dead and another 208 injured over the last nine months. The terrorists appear, strike and escape, almost at will, leaving no clue behind. Mostly, the victims are shot in head, so adept are the terrorists.

There has been a mixture of indiscriminate shootings and targeted assassinations in Punjab, mostly centering round religious places. An attack on one side is responded to by the other with equal ferocity. The provincial government and the intelligence agencies know that pattern well, but fail to break it. A feeling of growing insecurity grips the frightened masses.

Available facts and figures about the sectarian strife in Punjab suggest that after a temporary lull, the terrorists are back with a vengeance. Sectarian militants from both sides now believe in eliminating the targets and not just injuring them, preferring to hit them in the head, leave no chance of survival.

During the first 25 days of November this year, as many as 17 persons were killed and another eight injured in seven attacks, bearing the sectarian stamp. Five of these belonged to the Tehrik-e-Jafria Pakistan (TJP), eight to the Sipah-e-Mohammad Pakistan (SMP) and four to the Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP).

Sectarian fanaticism and arms proliferation in Pakistan are a legacy of the decade-long Afghan war. Religious seminaries became the nurseries that regularly supplied juvenile Mujahideen to the war during all these years. Now that the war is over and the US dollar have dried up, these young men are not only back in Pakistan, but also unemployed. Charged with fanaticism, thousands of these armed zealots have made a new career with these sectarian outfits.

Engaged in bloody gun battles in and around Punjab, the SMP and the SSP are, in fact, splinter groups of two religio-political parties, representing rival Shite and Sunni sects.

The SSP was founded as a sub-organisation of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (JUI), comprising Sunni mullahs.

The SSP soon broke ranks with its parent party because of its 'completely different line of struggle.' On becoming independent, the first thing that the SSP did was to launch a protracted guerilla war against the Shiites who responded accordingly. And the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi happens to be another splinter group of the SSP.

A splinter group of the JP, the SMP, comprising Shiite mullas, was subsequently launched. After breaking ranks with the TJP, the SMP appears to have found a completely new raison d'etre, describing itself as defenders of the respect due to Shiite Iimams. The SMP is one of the most well armed splinter groups in Punjab. Its workers are suspected of a wide range of undercover activities which include large scale gun-running operations to raise funds for political purposes.

Both the SSP and SMP were politicised from their very beginning and armed to the teeth. Both accuse each other of fanning sectarianism and their activists are involved in sectarian killings. The assassination of the leading lights along the sectarian divide stoked the sectarian fire.

Iran and Saudi Arabia are waging a strategic war in Pakistan by massively funding organisations like SSP and SMP. "Unless Saudi Arabia and Iran stop funding such organisations, it is not possible to curb sectarian terrorism.

Instead of mediating a dialogue between Shiites and Sunnis, the government should invite Saudi and Iranian representatives to pledge with the government to stop partonising sectarian groups," observed a police official.

Pakistan's Intelligence agencies attribute the fresh wave of sectarian violence in Punjab to the ongoing war or words between Iran and Saudi Arabia over the latter's alleged support to the Taliban government.

The sectarian killings actually started with the killing of a TJP activist in Multan on November 11. The counter-attack was quicker and deadlier. The deputy secretary of the SSP, Allama Shoaib Nadeem, was killed along with three companions on November 14 in Islamabad in a Kalashnikov attack which left the victims dead on the spot. This attack was subsequently followed by the murder of a local SMP leader, Muhammad Arshad, who was shot dead in Okara on November 15. On November 16, a local TJP leader was shot dead in Jhang.

Another TJP activist, Agha Waji Abbas Naqvi, was killed at Gujranwala on November 18. Yet another deadly attack at a Majlis-e-Aza in Multan on November 21 left four dead. This was followed by the murder of TJP activist, Syed Zaki Abbas in Gujranwala, the very next day.

A cursory glance at these attacks shows that, other then the Majlis-e-Aza attack, all were target-shootings, mainly carried out by pillion riders, who belong to the death-squads of these organisations. The trained assassins are back in action despite the government's ban on pillion riding which initially helped the police to control the situation.

Since 1987, the accelerating violence has followed a clear pattern. Beginning with murders of religious leaders and active workers it steps up to attacks on mosques and religious gatherings. This is followed by hand-grenade and time bomb attacks on rival leaders, and a temporary lull is always succeeded by an outbreak of renewed and ferocious violence.

Sectarianism that sprouted under Gen. Zia-ul-Haq has spread far and wide enough to pose a serious threat to public peace and national integrity. Armed attacks on places of worship and the leaders and workers of different sectarian groups have become routine. And the country that saw only one death due to sectarian violence in its first thirty years (1947-77), has buried over 4000 people during the last two decades (1978-98) in just Punjab.

Observers familiar with the sectarian phenomenon in the Punjab are of the view that political expediencies and a lack of confidence in their mandate have resulted in the inability of successive governments to stem the growing sectarian violence. INAV

Indian defence- Indigenise or perish
By : Praful Bakhsi Wg Commander (retd)

India's dependence on foreign suppliers for technology in crucial sectors like defence, even after 50 years of independence is not only disheartening but alarming. Besides putting the national exchequer under severe strain, this dollar guzzling non profiting state of affairs poses a serious threat to national security.

The recent reluctance of Israel, pressurised by USA to not to help carry out the much awaited and highly sensitive upgradation of IAF's IL 76 heavy transport aircraft as well as AWAC (Airborn Warning and Control) configuration, and the MIG fighter fleet modernisation are only two such cases in a huge list of denials to India.

It is now well known-that the sanctions announced by the Americans are being carried out in spite of the goodwill being generated in India's favour.

The majority of defence upgradation and spare parts cases for the three services has been held up by the Russians due to either their inability to manufacture and supply to us the same or due to their marked reluctance in a allowing us to seek the same from our Western suppliers. This holds true also in case of our going in for some new equipment available with some other country.

The major cause of this predicament has been lack of a proper defence doctrine right from 1947 onwards and a totally adhoc way of functioning of the decision making bureaucratic bodies.

Even a hurried paper on the doctrine prepared by the Ministry of Defence, after 1995 RAND CORP report on the dismal planning and running of the defence of India cannot get us out of this morass unless we indulge in deep introspection of this subject and treat it as an emergency national issue.

AWAC's and Air to Air refuellers have been on the Indian Air Force's list of requirements for a number of years along with the fighter aircraft upgradation programme. In fact by the next two or three years over 150 MIG 21 Aircraft would be grounded, thus requiring an urgent action in this field to fill in this serious void in the national security scene.

Now let us look at the MIG issue more closely.

When India purchased this aircraft in 1963, the only other country in this region to have gone for this aircraft was China.

Even Pakistan went for aircraft of purely NATO or Western origin, and took another 25 years to go in for the MIG 21s.

China in the meanwhile equipped with proper defence doctrine went not only for complete indegenisation of its' aircraft industry, but also for reverse engineering of the imported equipment wherever possible. As a result China was never plagued with the problem of the aging aircraft like India.

In fac China started building modified and newer version of these and other aircraft, which it not only supplied to Pakistan but helped its KAMRA and other aviation projects to build these aircraft at home.

India on the other hand only stuck to licence building of these machines and continued depending on the erstwhile Soviet Union for the crucial spare parts and even engines. Now with most of these aircrafts on the edge of their flying career India is desperately requiring upgradation and modification of these, like China and Pakistan's programme for upgrading the MIG 21 to Super 7 and manufacturing of the FC 1.

However after long and jerky deliberations, the Indian defence bureaucracy finally decided to upgrade and modify the MIG 21 BIS fleet, and a number of foreign aircraft industries came forward for the task.

But the Russians decided to undertake the same, and even after three years nothing much has come of it due to a host of problems including the financial one.

How Russians have got such hold over the vast defence set up of India has to be properly understood from its genesis 35 years ago.

Having been denied the starfighter for its air force by the USA, India, went in for the MIG 21s from Russia in 1963 followed by the SU 7s in 1968.

On the transport side IAF was already flying the IL 24s and the ANI 2s. Till the introduction of MIG 23 in 1981, IAF had bought different versions of MIG 21, but was only licence producing the same as mentioned earlier. Thereafter India went in for the MIG 27, in 1986, MIG 29 in 1987 and the SU 30s in 1997.

Keeping abreast of its original policy of having weapons from diverse sources, India bought British Jaguars in 1978 and French Mirage 2000s in 1985. Of the above HAL licence produced the MIG 27s, and the Jaguars, with all the major parts being imported including the engines. Indian Air force also went all out being equipped on the transport and helicopter side by AN 32s, IL 76s, MI 17s MI25s, MI26s, a host of ground radar and surface to surface missiles.

The story was the same on the army and the navy front. From early sixties tanks like T55s, PT 76s majority of the artillery field guns and air defence guns and associated radars were from the Soviet Union 90 per cent of the naval submarines, frigates, missile boats and naval aviation aircraft and helicopters too were of Soviet origin.

In all the above mentioned cases nowhere did India make any attempt to get into some sort of local manufacturing arrangement or reverse engineering to indigenise the product so that we could subsequently earn foreign exchange through export of these systems as is being done by China or even Pakistan.

If India showed any interest to some other country to upgrade or modify its systems it nearly got its arms twisted by the Soviets.

A typical example of the same is the now famous and crucial case of the Advanced Jet Trainer, which is pending due to indecision on the part of the government for over a decade primarily due to the Russian influence as they want their own MIG AT to be selected as against the much proven British Hawk and French Alpha jet. Incidentally the MIG AT is only in the prototype stage and has yet to train a single trainee pilot yet.

Even then defence secretary Ajit Kumar and his high powered defence delegation to Russia is being made to consider the MIG AT every time it visits Russia.

However of late the Russians have realised after break up of the erstwhile Soviet Union, that their truncated defence industrial set up cannot cater to the massive demands of countries like India, which are totally dependant on it.

Hence it now allows India to go in for deals where a third country is dealing with it too or where it is completely helpless to supply any thing as in the case of 10 SU 30 MKI for India, where Russia has allowed French and Israel companies to fit inertial navigation system and long range air to ground missile weapon system on to the aircraft. That is how Israel ha s come about upgrading the Russian made Indian IL76.

In fact the Israelis have undertaken massive upgradation of the weapons the world over as the use of upgraded and mordenised weapons is the only answer, keeping in view the fact that a mordenised system is an good and efficient as any new system now coming out and many times cheaper than the new ones.

Somehow this crucial aspect has been ignored by India due to some reason or the other, and our total defence industrial set up has been denied this golden opportunity.

India is not only in a position to put its massive industrial setup and R and D to work in this direction and become a spring board in this region to help out the other developing countries in the field of defence, but if suitable incentive is provided to the private industries in the field of defence corporate sector, then not only we would be able to become self sufficient in this aspect, but we would also be able to earn the much needed foreign exchange.

This suggestion has been very strongly supported since 1990s by the three service chiefs, the Ordinance Factory Board (OFB), and the Defence Public Sector Undertakings (DPSUS). Encouragingly now the MOD has taken some positive steps towards this, and asked the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) to establish six task forces to identify specific partnership areas with at least seven DRDO (Defence Research Development Organisation) labs involved in developing dual use technologies, biotechnologies and software products.

This will enable India to evolve long term procedures for cooperation between private industry and the DRDO to counter sanctions against India, and also the denial of the dual use technology by the Western powers.

Speaking on the subject, Defence Minister George Fernandes said ''we have to find adequate response to the challenges posed by the sanctions''. He said privatisation would not only lead to upgrading obsolete machinery in DRDO establishments, but also help market Indian products and push up exports that totalled 2.50 billion rupees last year.

''There is a new sense of urgency and determination in the MOD and the private sector.''

Supporting the Defence minister, DRDO chief Abdul Kalam stated that private sectors involvement in defence design and production would increase from 10 per cent to 30 per cent and guide India towards its target of 70 per cent self reliance in military hardware by the year 2005.

All this calls for a complete overhaul in our thinking and planning at the national level on security matters.

The recently introduced defence export department will not be able to function unless the private sector is helped whole heartedly, and invites the top thinking minds into this.

But before all this let us make sure that our country has a well defined defence policy and security doctrine, the decisions are being taken correctly in a transparent manner at the right level by the right people to pave a path in the right direction

Had this been done, in the early fifties India would not have been jeopardising its security interest. (PTI)