EDITORIAL
Too good to be true
Some times there are
reports from Pakistan that sound too good to be true.
Close on the heels of banning three militant outfits, the
Government in the neighbouring country has sealed their
offices. What needs to be noted in this context is that
this deadly trio includes the Khudam-ul Islam, which is
the banner under which the erstwhile Jaish-e-Mohammad had
been functioning ever since it was banned in Pakistan.
Off and on, the Jaish has been causing disturbances in
Jammu and Kashmir. So far as India is concerned, there
has been no reason for it to revise its perception that
the Jaish is an organisation of foreign mercenaries for
all practical purposes. On its part, the Jaish has also
never felt any necessity of changing its original name
while carrying out its violent underground operations on
the Indian soil. This is understandable because its
professed evil objective is to challenge the unity and
integrity of this country. In Pakistan, however, the
Jaish had little choice. It had but to acquire a fresh
identity after the United States had put it on its
much-dreaded terrorist list. Most probably, the Pakistan
Government would not have acted against its second
version but for the fact that the US Government has again
frowned upon it. Only a few days ago, the US envoy in
Islamabad, Ms Nancy J. Powell, had expressed concern over
the fact that the banned bodies had been allowed to
re-establish themselves under new names. It was much like
the old wine in new bottles. But before their heady
contents could cause illusions, the Pakistan leadership
has done well to crack the whip. The police in that
country are said to be hunting for former Jaish chief
Maulana Masood Azhar. In his search, the raids have been
carried out on, besides several homes and militant bases,
mosques in different parts of Pakistan. This does
indicate that the Musharraf Government is finding it
difficult with each passing day to extend patronage to
the perpetrators of murder and mayhem. It is, however,
too well known that the Maulana has received ample help
from Pakistan in building up a ‘jihadi’
factory. He was one of the three militants India was
forced to release — in his case from a Jammu jail
— in exchange for securing the freedom of Indian
Airlines passengers who were held hostages by the
terrorists in Kaandhar in Afghanistan three years ago.
What needs to be recalled in this context is that the
Pakistan authorities had arrested the Maulana earlier
also — along with Lashkar-e-Toiba chief Hafeez
Saeed. But the arrests then appeared to have been made
for reasons of expediency in the wake of 9/11. These were
not motivated by any genuine desire to curb the growth of
terrorism. This had become evident when both of them had
to be released as no formal chargesheet was filed against
them.
One sincerely hopes that
the Pakistan Government is not indulging in another
farcical exercise this time. It must understand that
terrorism does not spare anyone. If only the authorities
in the neighbouring country analyse the causes of
sectarian violence in their land, they may find it has a
lot do with the easy availability of weapons. While the
Jaish is a pan-Islamic terrorist forum, the other two
bodies that have been banned by Pakistan are more
connected with intra-religion violence within their own
country. By their nomenclatures, the Shia
Tehreek-e-Islami and the Sunni Millat-e-Islamiya give a
clear indication of their real intentions. They fight for
only their respective sects. Although described as the
socio-religious groups, they are actually the new names
of the militant bodies, Tehrik-e-Jafaria Pakistan and
Sepah-e-Saheba, respectively, and invariably use violent
tactics to hit each other. The founder of the Sunni
outfit, Maulana Tariq Azam, who was a member of his
country’s parliament and an ally of the present
Jamali Government, was gunned down in Islamabad last
month. Not surprisingly, the needle of suspicion has
turned towards the leader of the Shia group, Allama Sajid
Naqvi Islami, who has been arrested and charged with the
assassination.
It is difficult to say
whether these seemingly positive developments will have
an immediate fall-out on the State. Doubts persist
because Pakistan has not given up its intentions to keep
providing ‘moral, political and diplomatic’
support to what it describes as the Kashmiris’
struggle for self-determination. In real terms, what the
neighbouring country has been doing is to push the
terrorists across the Line of Control into this State to
destroy its rich cultural ethos. It is quite relevant to
note that Pakistan has not yet banned
Lashkar-e-Toiba’s new incarnation by the name of
Jamat-ul-Dawa. The Jaish and the Lashkar are the two
major terror outfits that keep striking in J&K. In
view of this fact, Pakistan Interior Minister Faisel
Saleh Hayat’s assertion that their Government had no
option but to crack down as instead of winding up their
shops, the banned outfits had assumed new identities is
not very convincing. Gen Musharraf has, on the other
hand, put up a brave face to dispel the impression, which
is entirely justified although, that he has been
compelled to act against the terror organisations in the
wake of the pressure of the global community as a whole
and the US in particular. His statement, therefore, that
he had reined in these groups in Pakistan’s interest
will be taken with a pinch of salt. Whatever that may be,
one, nevertheless, wishes that he would take this step to
the logical end. Only if that happens, one can look
forward to enduring peace in the sub-continent.
A scam a day
Even as the ink on the
stamp paper scam has not dried, one has come across the
cash-on-camera scandal leading to the exit of Mr Dilip
Singh Judeo from the Union ministry. The tape on which
the former Minister of State for Forests and Environment
has been caught in the act of having received money in
return for allegedly promising help to some people to get
mining rights in his home state of Chhattisgarh and
Orissa has already been beamed by television channels
into every house across the country. The interest will
now centre on the findings of the Central Bureau of
Investigation that has been ordered to conduct a thorough
probe in the sordid episode. What should set us thinking,
however, is that it has become a trend that the moment a
new scandal erupts, the country tends to forget an
earlier one that had held its attention for a long time.
In this case, for instance, the murky Judeo affair has
pushed the most shocking multi-crore-stamp paper scam
into background. If we look back, we will find that the
Bofors defence scandal, which became the prime reason for
the downfall of the Rajiv Gandhi Government, has
virtually been knocked out of the public memory. There
are many leaders of anti-Congress thinking who have to
come to power since then promising to punish those guilty
of having accepted bribes in this case. They have not
only been found unequal to the task but have themselves
been rocked by one scandal after the other. One has to
just recall, among others, the Tehelka exposure and the
petrol pump allotment racket in the recent times. What we
should worry about is that there is a danger in such
situations. If corruption in high places is not
effectively checked, public cynicism against the
political class as a whole will keep growing. This may in
turn keep people off the polling booths out of sheer
disgust, which will not augur well for our democracy.
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Cracking
the whip
By
Joginder Singh
A former
President when in office said that
"One of the clearest indicators of
the development of a society, is the
position and status women enjoy in that
society. Even though women’s rights
are recognised as human rights and they
are considered as best of human resources
and central actors for development, their
standing in our society is deplorable.
While
women’s movement is gaining momentum
and gathering pace and reaching one
milestone after another, the ill
treatment and atrocities on women are
recurring in regular and brutal manner.
No day passes without reading and
watching such gory incidents in print and
electronic media. Dowry system is not
only responsible for snuffing out lives
of our women at a very young age, but is
also primarily responsible for the
growing incidence of female foeticide in
the country.
Incidence
of rape, domestic violence, sexual
harassment at work place and trafficking
of women have increased manifold. No
place is safe for them, not even their
mother’s womb. They are put to death
even before they are born. The experience
of ‘Draupadi’ in the court of
the ‘Kauravas’, has become
symbolic of the ill-treatment metted out
to women in our country.
In one
poem, Atal Bihari Vajpayee says, "In
every panchayat ‘Draupadi’ is
robbed of her honour". She is
dishonoured, not only in panchayats but
also in the transport buses, trains,
offices and in the streets and even
sometimes in her home. The problem of
women in India is symptomatic of the
problem of inequality and injustice in
our society in general. The
discrimination suffered by women is in
one way a crying denial of the democracy
that is enshrined in our
Constitution."
The
capital of India is the best reflection
of society and like the rest of the
country, women are getting a raw deal not
only from outsiders, but also those who
should be guarding them. The following
figures tell a gory tale. 441 rape cases
were registered in Delhi in 1996, in
1999, 396, in 2000, 435, in 2001, 381, in
2002, 403 and in 2003 (till 30.9.03),
376. In this year, of the 376 rape cases
registered in Delhi, 346 cases were
worked out.
The
problem of humiliation of women
periodically gets highlighted whenever
any woman from a foreign country or a
woman diplomat is involved. The fact
remains that no woman is safe either in
the highly fortified and literally
invincible national capital or anywhere
else in the country. The situation is
grim. A rape case is treated just as
another crime, whose trial could take
years if not a decade to complete. The
delay itself leads to the, disinterest of
the witnesses. The result is that four
out of five accused walk free.
According
to the Supreme Court, trial of cases
involving sexual molestation and assault
requires a different approach than that
of a normal criminal case. At present
more than 56,300 rape cases are pending
in the country. There is no guarantee as
to when they would be completed and the
guilty brought to book. What is reported
to the police is only a small percentage
of the crime which actually takes place.
Most rape cases do not get reported and
registered in the police station because
people involved in the crime are either
friends or family members.
Moreover,
for the sake of so-called name and
reputation of the family and the future
marriage prospects of the girl, the
middle-class mentality of under playing
or covering up comes into operation.
One
suggestion which has been mooted is the
awarding of the death sentence to the
rapists. Even assuming that this is done,
academically, the deterrent effect, if
any, would be relevant only, to 10 per
cent of the reported cases. My experience
has been that any Court before awarding
the death sentence would like to make
sure that there is an impeccable evidence
beyond any shred of doubt about the
involvement of the accused. As the law
stands at present, the burden of proof is
on prosecution. The defence is to only
raise doubts and off goes the accused
scot free. Unless the law is changed to a
reasonable and not absolute proof as,now,
the introduction of death penalty would
be a non-starter.
More rape
counselling centres are required for the
accused and society rather than the
unwilling traumatised victims. As looking
after the rape victims is hardly a vote
catcher, it is at the best only
cosmetically a priority area for the
Government. Only stringent laws are not
enough, we need more vigilance and strict
enforcement to prevent rape cases. The
police state that most rapists walk free
as victims turn hostile in court for the
simple reason that the rapists are
usually known to them and that they are
not to be blamed.
According
to a research conducted by some NGO,
"Thirtyone per cent families
complained of disparaging remarks made by
investigating cops, 15 per cent were
forced by the police to enter into a
compromise with the accused, another 17
per cent said the police favoured the
accused. But it’s not just the
police who maltreated the victims.
Sixteen per cent families said they had
to wait up to five hours before getting
medical aid at hospitals. Added to this
were absence remarks from female doctors
with their male counterparts making
"undesirable remarks".
Another
major problem, which victims face at
court is the protracted litigation.
Parents want to help their wards recover
from the shock and ordeal of rape. A
lengthy litigation is totally an
antitheses of the same and spoils the
chances of marriage of the victims.
The real
emancipation of woman will come only if
they can stand an terms of economic
equality with man. We cannot have 50 per
cent people enjoying all the fruits and
the other 50 per cent, almost living like
surfs. The best way we can do something
in this matter is atleast ensure that in
our own families and in the families
known to us, the women are treated with
consideration and respect and are given
the best available educational
opportunities. Ultimately, the best
weapon in the women’s armoury is not
to submit and surrender to any blackmail
of sexual harrassment or rape. It is a
fact that nobody can make you do
anything, unless you are a party to it,
whether willingly or unwillingly.
Some women
have used Bobbitisation or severing the
male organ of their tormentors when the
rape was forced on them. This is the most
despairing expression and reaction. It
the castration of the accused, which many
enlightened members of the society have
been suggesting as a punishment. This
approach renders the tormentor unfit for
any crime against women for the rest of
life.
There is
no doubt that this approach is legal
under the law. It is covered under the
private Defence of the rape victim.
Infact, it falls one step short of it as
the Right of Private Defence can be
exercised by the victim to cause death,
in case there is no other way to ward off
rape. In my view the rapists deserve not
Only the highest punishment, but also
need to be ostracised from the society.
Bobbitisation, seen from that angle, is a
humane punishment, where the accused
meets his desserts at the spot. Rape is a
challenge of the millennium before the
society and anything which takes away or
obliterates this blot needs to be
encouraged at the Government, society and
individual level.
(PTI
Feature)
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Hal
buffeted by aproval process
By
Geoffrey Malone
When the
US imposed economic and military
sanctions following India nuclear tests
in May 1998, the state owned Hindustan
Aeronautics Ltd. (HAL) was forced to
return three US made engines for its
prototype Advanced Light Helicopter
project.
A contract
for the supply of more engines from
then-Allied Signal of the US was
rescinded and the project was delayed by
nearly three years while HAL turned to
French firm Snecma for its Turbomeca
engines to power the helicopter.
Mr. Nalini
Ranjan Mohanty, chairman of HAL, has not
forgotten that episode. He was travelling
in the US the week of October 28 to seek
partnerships with American defence firms,
but remained wary of unhindered access to
technology from and cooperation with US
firms.
Though the
US President, Mr. George W. Bush’s
administration lifted the sanctions on
India and Pakistan in October 2001 and
has sought closer strategic ties with
India, a recent report by the US Council
on Foreign Relations (CFR), a prestigious
think-tank in New York, and some South
Asia analysts say policy changes are
necessary to foster closer US-India
strategic ties. While the US and India
have gone from a period of estrangement
to a constructive engagement phase, both
sides would have to make policy changes
to become genuine partners, according to
the report on US policies toward South
Asia, released October 30.
Among key
recommendations for improving ties with
India, the report calls on the US
Government to treat India as a
‘friendly’ country in granting
export licences for transfer of defence
equipment, and easing of restrictions on
exports of dual-use items to India.
Mr.
Mohanty is keenly aware of the American
approval process for licences. During a
meeting with US Defence industry
executives organised by the US India
Business Council on October 28, in
Washington, Mr. Mohanty said several
American defence company executives were
keen to collaborate with HAL, but
"subject to approval from the US
State Department and the Department of
Defence." He worried that the
approval process would lead to delays and
eventual denials.
India is
seeking equipment for its Special Forces,
weapon locating radar, missile defence
systems, surveillance and electronic
warfare equipment, as well as broad
research and development cooperation with
American firms.
Designating
a country, as a ‘friendly’ one
in US policy talk is a "catch-all
term" that bestows certain benefits,
said Mr. Frank Wisner, co-chair of the
DFR report and a former US Ambassador to
India. "It doesn’t entitle a
country to get the latest gizmo (from the
United States) but it certainly allows
access into the core of the (US) defence
arsenal," Mr. Wisner said.
A
‘friendly’ country is usually
one rank below allies, such as the NATO
countries, Japan, and Australia, with
whom the US has mutual defence treaties,
said Mr. Frank Cevasco, a former Pentagon
official, now vice-president at defence
consulting firm Hicks & Associates,
Fairfax, Va. Being considered a
‘friend’ of the US would allay
some of the fears among Indian military
officials stung by earlier American
sanctions, Mr. Cevasco said. "You
can’t buy planes, and ships and
suddenly have the spares gone. The Indian
military is very sensitive to that."
The CFR
report dovetails with the October 4
comments by the US Secretary of State,
Gen. Collin Powell, to The Washington
Post that the Bush administration is
close to completing an agreement with
India, calling it a ‘glide
path’ that would allow an expansion
of trade in hi-tech areas, space launch
equipment, and the nuclear industry.
The
current US strategic and defence policy
towards South Asia is aimed at not
upsetting the India-Pakistan military
balance, but "what we are trying to
say today is that dehyphenation" or
viewing the US relationship with each
country separately, "is very
important," Mr. Wisner said.
"The
United States needs to develop a
relationship with India on its own
merits, but keeping an eye cocked because
the situation in South Asia is so
different," he said.
The
security concerns of India and Pakistan
are not comparable, said Mr. Sumit
Ganguly, a contributor to the CFR report,
and a political science professor at
Indiana University, Bloomington, Ind.
India had legitimate security concerns
that were "not on the same
plane" as Pakistan’s, he said.
To
strengthen its case for closer ties with
US, India should enforce its export
control laws more vigorously, and work
toward a more transparent weapons
acquisition system, analysts said.
India
could have driven a harder bargain for US
weapons and technology had it succeeded
in sending some troops to Iraq, the
analysts said. Forging closer ties with
India could run into US non-proliferation
concerns, said Mr. Gaurav Kampani, senior
research associate at the Centre for
Non-Proliferation Studies, Monterrey,
Calif.
At the
highest levels of administration, the US
Government is yet to determine that a
"strategic stake in India outweighs
US non-proliferation concerns," Mr.
Kampani said, echoing concerns of some in
the State Department.
Allowing
transfer of defence technology and sales
of military hardware to India could
"bump into the Nuclear
Non-proliferation Treaty and Missile
Technology Control Regime (MTCR)"
that proscribe sale of defence equipment
and technology to countries developing
nuclear weapons and long-range missiles,
he said.
Non-proliferation
and MTCR regimes, designed to stop the
spread of nuclear weapons and missiles
among such countries as Iraq, Iran, and
North Korea, should not be applied to
India, Mr. Ganguly said. "To lump
India along with (these) countries really
does considerable disservice," he
said. "We are dreaming if we think
we can get India to roll back its nuclear
programme." India’s strong
economic growth, estimated at about 7 per
cent in GDP terms this year, could help
the country catch up with China, Mr.
Ganguly said.
India’s
exports to the US are mostly hi-tech
products, including software, computer
components, and auto parts, and if that
trend continues, he said, "it will
leapfrog over (exports of) Halloween
dolls and coffee mugs from China,
fundamentally transforming the US-India
economic relationship." INAV
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Indo-Pak-ruing
the halfway logic!
By Dr. R. L. Bhat
Yeh daag daag
ujala, yeh shab gaziida sahar…
‘This
blotched light, this night-smitten dawn’
sang Faez Ahmad Faez and became the choir leader
of dissent in the subcontinent. That dissent came
to be directed more at the bit-failures of India
than the huge fiascos in Pakistan. As the high
hopes of freedom struggle failed to materialize
quickly in the early decades of freedom, the
finale of the independence was perceived to have
been a general let-down. That dead end pessimism
seems to have become less acute in the India of
recent years but was a common refrain only a
decade ago. Then, most of the intellectual types
would begin with ‘daag daag’
thing and go on to lambaste everything around
here. Very rarely, was that intimation of a
‘blotched ujaala’ played up in the land
where Faez lived, where he continued to live of
his own choosing and suffered countless
incarcerations. One has never understood who
promised Faez a better life and a bright future
in the Mamlikati-I-Khudadad which had nothing to
do with his progressive vision, way or wont.
Pakistan was carved out on a Muslim communal
agenda and there was no expectation ever of its
living a secular life.
Indeed, the best
argument its founder Jinnah presented to the
Cabinet Mission for creation of Pakistan was that
it would serve as ‘a ransom guarantee’
for the Muslims of India, as ‘the Hindus of
India would always be apprehensive of the fate
that could befall minority Hindus in the new Mamlikat
of Muslims! There was no promise, no vision, no
‘bright morns or free dawns’ in that
calculation. It was plain communalism used as an
ideology and a weapon; the plain mathematics of
getting the two communities of the Indian
subcontinent on what Jinnah called an ‘equal
footing’. No progress; no aspiration; no
stars-in-the-eyes-and-head-in-skies romanticism
there. Yet Faez the romantic revolutionary fell
for it. The other revolutionary and romantic Urdu
poet Josh opted for it to the great dismay of
Nehru. Why? That why is unanswered because nobody
has ever tried to ask, much less answer the
question? Was there-could there be-a promise in
that Jinnahian prescription to satisfy the tender
expectations of men like Faez and Josh? Could it
ever represent the ujaala Faez expected
and got dismayed when it did not turn up? Yet
they opted for it. Millions of other men opted
for Pakistan in plain acknowledgement of the
communal equation Jinnah was presenting them
with.
They chose no
devious deceptions to delude their thinking. They
sought no phony ujaalas in the idea of
Pakistan but plain and pure glory of Islam. Very
actively, consciously, knowingly, emphatically
they rejected the other vision, the vision of
secular, democratic, free and full-of-rights
India presented by the learned Moulana Azad.
Moulana was really learned, not learned in the
crafty art of advocacy. He was learned as much in
the Indian ethos as in the Muslim lore and
history. He came up with parallels and precedents
for each of the eventualities of a common life in
united India so that the Hindus and Muslims could
live in brotherhood. He brought up the instances
of Mohammad’s compacts with Jews and
Christians in Medina and his agreement with the
non-Muslims of Mecca, to buttress his case for a
joint living. He, who was at one time on the
verge of being declared Imam-ul-Hind, gave a
modernist, accommodative and tolerant
interpretations to the Muslim traditions and
history as well as ordinations to show them as
being compatible with the concepts of secular
democracy. As Azad bitterly admitted in his
famous Jama Masjid speech of 1947, he was
rejected. By the masses. By the leaders. By men
like Faez and Josh. For, they all accepted
Jinnah’s Pakistan.
Now, the
visionaries of our day tell us that those people
of Jinnah’s Pakistan, are all for peace,
amity and brotherhood with India. Some are even
postulating grandiose visions of an Indo-Pak
Confederation. One may not call all those
harebrained schemes and prescriptions devious but
are they any good? We are told that Pak people
are dying for peace. That it is Musharraf and his
ilk in politics, army or administration who are
standing in the way. That given freedom from
these manipulators they would come gushing and
embrace every Indian. Now that is a vision which
every right thinking person would welcome; every
right thinking person should go out of his/her
way to facilitate that vision. But is that vision
real and not a viscitude of other calculations,
this time peculiar to the people postulating
them? The same people also tell that Musharraf
and men and women like him are ‘forced to
take hard stands’ because they fear
rejection from the Pak society and people the
moment they dilute their hard stands.
That is why
beer-guzzling, if not wine-addicted, generals
become austere mullahs when they need to hold on
to the reigns of power. And, ‘austere’
crusaders for the faith are any day celebrities
there. That is how Kashmir, which has nothing in
common with any of Pak practices, provinces,
peoples came to run in the veins of Pakistan,
while the aspirations of Sindhis do not move
them. Nor do the woes of Mohajirs stir them. They
do not allow the PoK Kashmiris to visit Gilgit
and Skardu. They do not follow the UNO’s
simple and universal Declaration of Human Rights
in these Kashmir areas. Yet every real and
imagined violation of rights of Kashmiris in the
valley moves Ayubs, Zias, Musharrafs, Jinnahs,
Bhuttos and Nawazs even the Qazis and crusaders
there so much that they are ready to take on
India even stake the very existence of Pakistan
state for their sake. They did it four times, and
every time with enthusiastic support of the
people. Where did Faez and Josh stand in such
situations? These stalwarts of freedoms were not
famous for any opposition to this raving madness.
Yet peaceniks here are ready to swear that Pak
people are not for any of this. But is it really
so? That actually is the question which would
determine whether India and Pakistan would live
this century in peace or waste it fighting each
other. Indeed, everyone who skirts that plain
question is practicing a self deception.
And, hindering
peaceful solutions here! For, so long as
self-deception and devious-interpretation
substitute that grim reality of no solution would
come to the Indo-Pak tangle. That primarily
includes Kashmir.
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