Daily Excelsior... Editorial

EDITORIAL

By Allabaksh

Pakistan president, Gen Pervez Musharraf, likes to conduct dialogue with India on an issue as vexatious as Kashmir through the media. He has never felt the need to talk to anyone in his own country before making his periodic announcements of what one of the Jihadists said 'unilateral concessions' to India. If Musharraf is only repeating what is being discussed .. ...more

Pollution shield for
global warming?

By Arvinder Kaur

Can pollution prove to be a saviour? Even as scientists are working overtime to bring technologies which can reduce pollution, a section of researchers is coming around to believing that man can hold any excessive heat thrown out by the sun and maintain a cool environment over the earth by creating a layer of pollution. .. ......more

Vote bank politics

By Arun Nehru

EDITORIAL

Not by law alone

Should one be surprised by the fact that 180 cases of torture and harassment of women have been registered with the women's cell in Jammu during September and October this year? Is it too revealing that 500 cases of family dispute were pending in the local matrimonial court in October? On an average one such case is filed every day. Looked from one angle it may appear to be a sign of awakening. That the people have become conscious of their rights is a safe conclusion. Indeed, it is heartening that women --- at least some of them --- are not prepared to bear with violence and discrimination on any count. If one casts the net wider it will be evident that women are prejudiced against even before their birth. How else can one explain the logic behind sex-determination tests? There is disturbing male: female ratio almost in every state. Generally the women grow up to face harassment both at homes and in workplaces. At least that was the situation till not very long ago. It is not for nothing that the United Nations has after careful debate adopted a "declaration on the elimination of violence against women". The declaration defines violence against women as "any act of gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual or mental harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or in private life." It provides useful framework for activities of responsible bodies across the globe including the World Health Organisation (WHO). In our country the Supreme Court has intervened to prescribe how women should be treated in offices. Of course, the recent law titled The Protection of Women against the Domestic Violence Act of 2005 has once again generated countrywide debate on the status of women. It is not applicable in the State as it is yet to be ratified by the Legislature.

A timely feature in the last Sunday magazine of this newspaper says that the Government is thinking of introducing an identical measure in the coming session of the Legislature. However, there are quite a few citizens who have in interviews expressed the opinion that there is no need of a new legislation in the State. Existing laws, in their view, are enough to seriously deal with the problem. All that is required is their sincere implementation in letter and spirit. They have given vent to varied perceptions about the Central Act taking into account the prevailing social realities. One of them is that the new Central law may be misused by unscrupulous women who may employ it as a tool to settle their personal scores within their families. Apprehensions have been expressed that the men may be subjected to undue pestering and the corrupt law-and-order machinery may be tempted to interfere in family matters. It is to be admitted that one of the most shocking aspects of our social life is maltreatment of women by women while living under the same roof. Indeed the complete absence of trust and spirit of accommodation within the ilk living in a similar milieu is baffling. More often than not it is the genesis of dowry menace and perpetual nuisance directly aimed at the young bride.

What is to be realised, therefore, is that society has to undergo a transformation of thinking for the better. It must learn to treat all human beings as equal regardless of their gender, caste or religion. Fortunately there have always been concerned parents who pay one and the same attention to the needs and development of their sons, daughters and daughters-in-law. Their number has only increased over the years. Women too have taken the initiative in their hands. They have proved that they are equal to if not better than men in all spheres. In extreme situations they have shown the capacity to stay and survive alone. There is thus some sort of balance in the social order as a whole. It has to be strengthened further. Law can merely facilitate the process. Eventually it is in our hands to be the change that we wish to see in our world.

Be on guard

Question papers have been leaked. Dummy candidates have been caught writing tests. Mark lists have been tempered with. Only recently we have learnt about wrong selection of "consolidated" lecturers. Now comes another bombshell. The Jammu Crime Branch has detected a number of bogus graduation and post-graduation degrees of the Magadh University located ironically in the holy city of Bodh Gaya (Bihar). Equipped with these documents many people have not only secured jobs but also promotions in various government departments in the State. It appears to be just a coincidence that the Crime Branch had stumbled upon these false papers during a routine verification of employees. Its suspicion was raised by the language and seal on degrees and the manner in which these had been issued. It sent them to the Magadh University for authentication. Much to its surprise it was told that there was nothing wrong. Unconvinced the Crime Branch deputed a team to the Magadh University to find out the truth. It was to learn that the University had sent no official communication validating the degrees. There was foul play all the way. Who had certified them earlier? The concerned authorities in fact said that they had not received any letter from the Jammu Crime Branch. Therefore, there was no question of their having sent any reply. Their supposed response that the Crime Brach had in its possession was yet another forgery. There can only be one obvious response. At least some officials of the Magadh University are involved in the fraudulent exercise. While it is for the University to identify black sheep one can pity those young persons of Poonch and Rajouri districts who have unknowingly fallen in the trap. Of course, there can't be any sympathy for those in the twin districts who have perpetuated the fraud on the home turf. The Crime Branch has so far collected about 100 questionable degrees. Some of them have been seized in this city.

As a natural corollary there should be a close scrutiny of educational qualifications of all employees particularly those who have obtained degrees from the Magadh University. Everyone has to be extremely careful these days. There are a large number of institutions offering degrees. One must doubly check their credentials before joining them. The risk otherwise is that one may run into trouble as it has happened in this case.

Musharraf’s Kashmir ‘concessions’

By Allabaksh

If Musharraf is only repeating what is being discussed away from the media glare through Track II diplomacy he is jeopardising the outcome of the efforts of quiet effort. Many believe that the key to finding a solution to Kashmir lies in narrowing down differences between the two countries. That will require Musharraf to take the on-going Track II exercise with some seriousness and resist the temptation to pop up on the small screen grandstanding on Kashmir.

By now he should have well realised that recycling the same proposals on Kashmir under different names has become pointless. Both Pakistan politicians and the Islamists and Jihadis waging acts of terrorisms against India in the name of 'freedom' for Kashmir invariably challenge his offers of 'concessions' on Kashmir.

Musharraf's 'solutions' have no relation to ground realities. How does he think, for instance, any mechanism for 'joint supervision' or 'joint control' in Kashmir can be set up involving two diametrically opposite countries: one driven by a combination of military men and religious forces neither of whom particular about democracy, and the other a secular country of vast diversity with a functioning though chaotic democracy.

His advocacy of 'autonomy', 'self-governance' or 'self-rule' as also demilitarisation is obviously a move to rid Kashmir of the presence of all Indian security forces. He has never realised that India cannot even think of any out of the box solution as long as the blood-thirsty 'freedom fighters' are not bottled up. The entire Pakistani establishment supports the idea that Pakistan cannot withdraw support to the 'freedom struggle' in Kashmir because that is Pakistan's trump card against India.

It is all very well for Gen Musharraf to ask India to show 'flexibility' on Kashmir or 'reciprocate' Pakistan's proposals, but he cannot pretend that his 'out of box' solutions for settling the Kashmir issue enjoy the backing of major political and religious quarters, not to mention his own army or the Jihadis who continue to be patronised by his ISI in the fond hope of annexing Kashmir.

His latest four-point formula for resolving the Kashmir issue has evoked a fair degree of scepticism in India but a loud condemnation from the Jihadis and many Islam-centred groups and mainstream political parties in Pakistan, all of whom accused him of a 'sell out'. Musharraf may be a powerful ruler of Pakistan but obviously he is unable to first prepare people in his own country to jettison their old views on the Kashmir.

The vehemence of negative reaction within Pakistan to Musharraf's 'solution' forced a statement by his Foreign Office that Islamabad had not changed its stand on Kashmir one bit. There are loud and clear indications that even in the most unlikely event of India agreeing to whatever he proposes on Kashmir, it will almost certainly be disowned by Musharraf's successor.

The Pakistan president himself has been a master of repudiation of commitments and initiatives of the previous governments. One of his first statements made soon after deposing Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif was to disclaim the Shimla pact. He also went back on the declaration by the then prime ministers of India and Pakistan, Atal Bihari Vajapyee and Nawaz Sharif, after the former had travelled in a bus to Lahore on a landmark journey prior to the Musharraf-engineered Kargil war.

If the Shimla pact was expected to lead to the final settlement of the Kashmir issue with Pakistan accepting the Line of Control as the international border, the Lahore declaration was seen as a precursor to easier flow of people between the two neighbours. Musharraf disowned these pacts saying that whatever happened in Simla 35 years ago was a submissive act by a vanquished nation under duress and the Lahore declaration was not binding.

So, there is nothing to prevent his successor or successors from rejecting on the basis of the precedent set by Musharraf himself whatever India and Pakistan may agree on Kashmir today. But that stage looks hypothetical when the pressure groups of Islamists and Jihadis in Pakistan insists that Pakistan continue to support the anti-India militants since 'the right to self-determination' would never be given up by the Kashmiris on either side of LoC. That the United Nations itself-and now even the European Union-thinks that plebiscite is no longer a practical solution for Kashmir is unknown to the Jihadis many of whom actually dream of an 'independent' Kashmir that even Pakistan is not willing to concede.

The Jihadis in Pakistan may be getting desperate for their own reasons. Some reports in the Pakistani media have suggested that they are not getting that many volunteers for carrying out acts of terrorism in India. The ISI too is unable to act freely in their support because of the focus it has drawn on its activities from the international community. The reduction in heavy subsidies from the ISI to the militant and separatist groups in Kashmir has also led to tensions within those groups.

Some analysts think that Musharraf likes to publicly air his proposals on Kashmir in the hope that his 'sincerity' in seeking a quick solution to the imbroglio is accepted in Pakistan and Kashmir. And in the West too. This might help him in silencing the rising crescendo of criticism against his rule at home.

As of now, the unstoppable unrest in Balochistan is adding to his problems as he gets ready to extend his term for another five years even as he comes under increasing pressure from the West to end his terror machine which operates not only against India but also Afghanistan much to the annoyance of the US and European governments.

(Syndicate Features)

Pollution shield for global warming?

By Arvinder Kaur

The proposal of a "pollution shade" was first mooted by a Noble prize-winning scientist, Paul J. Crutzen, who later described it as a joy to push policy makers into action. But, the idea has now caught on with other scientists and environmentalists, including NASA's Ames Research Center. Climatologists at the recent UN conference on climate change in Nairobi were too captivated by the idea though some felt it could become too drastic a step to be adopted.

According to the idea, if the sun warms the earth too dangerously, the time may come to draw the shade. The "shade" would be a layer of pollution deliberately spewed into the atmosphere to help cool the planet.

While many climatologists agreed that the proposal was worth a try, others suggested it should be tested and more work carried out to make sure there are no side effects. They are concerned that the sulphur dioxide injected into the stratosphere could fall back on earth as acid rain and create grave risks.

Crutzen, a Dutch climatologist, who first proposed the idea, meanwhile has said that he meant to startle policy makers - if they do not take action much more strongly than they have in the past, then in the end such experiments are called for. In his paper in the journal Climatic Change in August, he felt there is disappointing international political response to global warning.

He said balloons carrying sulfates and heavy guns be sent to the atmosphere where the sulfates can be fired into the stratosphere. The argument is when carbon dioxide keeps heat from escaping earth, polluting substances like sulfur dioxide, reflect solar radiation, helping to cool the planet. A massive dissemination of pollutants would be needed every year or two, as the sulfates precipitate from the atmosphere in acid rain. But what happens if the sulphur dioxide falls back on earth?

But proponents of the theory cite the case of the eruption of a volcano, Mount Pinatubo, in the Philippines in 1991, which sent sulfurous material into the stratosphere and had cooled the earth for about a year. Just half the amount of sulfate emission into stratosphere as that sent by the volcano will be sufficient and if nothing else, this pollution shield can give policy makers more time to find alternatives to fossil fuels.

The 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012, requires modest emission cutbacks by industrial countries but not the United States, the biggest emitter of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases, because it rejected the deal. Talks on what to do after Kyoto expires are all but bogged down.

Wigley said a temporary shield would give political leaders more time to reduce human dependence on fossil fuels as the main source of greenhouse gases. He said experts must more closely study the feasibility of the idea and its possible effects on stratospheric chemistry.

In past years scientists have scoffed at the idea of air pollution as a solution for global warming, saying that the kind of sulfate haze that would be needed is deadly to people.

According to the World Health Organization, air pollution kills about 2 million people worldwide each year and that reducing large soot-like particles from sulfates in cities could save 300,000 lives annually.

Urban air pollution has worsened in most large cities in the developing world, a situation driven by population growth, industrialization, and increased vehicle use. Despite pollution control effects, air quality has approached the dangerous levels recorded in London in the 1950s in a number of megacities, such as Beijing, Delhi, Jakarta, and Mexico City. In these cities, pollutant levels sometimes exceed WHO air quality standards by a factor of three or more. In some of China's major cities, particulate levels are as much as six times the WHO guidelines. Worldwide, WHO estimates that as many as 1.4 billion urban residents breathe air exceeding the WHO air guidelines.

The health consequences of exposure to dirty air are considerable. On a global basis, estimates of mortality due to outdoor air pollution run from around 200,000 to 570,000, representing about 0.4 to 1.1 per cent of total annual deaths. As the range of these estimates indicates, it is difficult to quantify the toll of outdoor air pollution. The health impacts of urban air pollution seem likely to be greater in some of the rapidly developing countries where pollution levels are higher.

The World Bank has estimated that exposure to particulate levels exceeding the WHO health standard accounts for roughly 2 to 5 per cent of all deaths in urban areas in the developing world. However, these mortality estimates alone do not capture the huge of toll of illness and disability that exposure to air pollution brings at a global level. Health effects span a wide range of severity from coughing and bronchitis to heart disease and lung cancer. Vulnerable groups include infants, the elderly, and those suffering from chronic respiratory conditions including asthma, bronchitis, or emphysema.

Air pollution in developing world cities is responsible for some 50 million cases per year of chronic coughing in children younger than 14 years of age. However, even healthy adults can suffer negative effects.

In fact, in the United States, two long-term epidemiological studies representing some of the most significant recent research on air pollution effects documented an increase in the death rate of those chronically exposed to dirty air. These studies, which compared death rates among many US cities with widely varying pollution levels, found that mortality rates were 17 to 26 per cent higher in cities with the dirtiest air compared with those with the cleanest air, and those with the dirtiest air had significantly higher rates of lung cancer and cardiopulmonary disease. These increased risks translate roughly to a 1- to 2-year shorter life span for residents of the most polluted cities. Higher infant mortality rates have also been associated with high particulate levels.

Studies performed in developing countries suggest that urban air pollution may have a tremendous impact on health. One recent analysis of Jakarta estimated that some 1,400 deaths, 49,000 emergency room visits, and 600,000 asthma attacks could be avoided each year if particulate levels were brought down to WHO standards. Meanwhile, in Latin America, exposure of some 81 million city residents more than one quarter of all city dwellers in the region to high air pollution levels is believed to cause an estimated 65 million days of illness each year.

PTI - Feature

Vote bank politics

By Arun Nehru

Election season has come and vote bank politics will prevail as parties fight for the majority/minority votes and caste equations are consolidated for the battle ahead. The minority issue is valid in UP and we see a drift on the Mohd Afzal issue , little action is taken on the foreigners issue in Assam, there is talk of reservations for minorities and now the PM makes a reference on benefits to the Muslim community and this creates a furore with the opposition and the PMO makes repeated 'explanations' on the subject. The SP consolidate their OBC/Minority base whilst the BSP minces few words with the Dalit vote bank. The BJP react and the Upper caste vote is the target. All this may or may not work but there is no lack of effort by the leaders to consolidate their vote share and I don't think that any party can claim any moral superiority on this issue. The ground reality is that all these issues do matter and can swing a 'few' votes and a 'few' votes is always the difference between victory and defeat in any election. A swing of 2% is enough to cause havoc in most situations. My assessment is a close fight between the BSP/SP [neither will get a outright majority] with the BJP in third place followed by the Congress and the Independents and anyone can align with anyone else to form a government. We may witness the biggest auction in political history as every MLA will be relevant in government formation if the SP/BSP are unable to muster a stable majority.

Secret political weapons will be deployed by most parties and in this area the SP may have a secret weapon in Amitabh Bachchan. There is little doubt that he is a living legend and his reputation extends beyond a conventional 'film star' and he will not in all probability address a 'election' rally but his presence at a 'social' event is enough to cause a 'minor' swing . Facts are facts and without doubt the Bachchan family are the first family in terms of media attention and public adulation and with the current vendetta syndrome and action initiated against them [ tax matters on Amitabh and Abhishek, expulsion on office of profit issue against Jaya Bachchan] there is little trust between them and Sonia Gandhi. Amar Singh may well have the last laugh in this situation and I think the Bachchan's may well make the difference between victory or defeat. The elections in UP will determine the future trends and the postures adopted by Coalition partners as 'numbers' will determine the future direction most leaders will follow. The Congress have little ammunition in their own arsenal as neither Sonia or the family will do extensive campaigning [security will be a excuse] but almost everyone else will be given full 'assistance' to battle Mulayam Singh [Mayawati, VP Singh, Lalu Yadav, Ram Vilas are some] but this may help the SP as a sympathy factor may surface in his favor.

We may well witness the most expensive elections in the State as political leaders to look after the poor, the weak and the deprived will campaign with private planes and helicopters, expensive cars and security arrangements and elections to the 400 member house may well exceed 500 crores and only a fraction of this will be reflected in the books. We continue to talk of criminality but cutting across party lines where is the cash for the elections coming from and is any major party exempt from this ailment. The position will not be any different in either Punjab [most expensive on election spending] or in Uttaranchal and sadly besides the legitimate contributors many criminals interests get a foothold into the corridors of power and it makes little difference to them as to who wins in the end. Things have changed but excessive usage of these monetary aids weakens the development of leaders and their commitment to the weaker sections. Mass leaders spend the bulk of their time in their States and in the rural area's but look into the schedules and life styles with their young successors and whilst they enter the Lok Sabha/ Rajya Sabha on there connections look into the time they spend in their area's and look into their usage of private planes and trips abroad and the fancy vehicles at their disposal along with their business interests and it is easy to understand why the success ratio in this class is limited.

The Congress and Sonia Gandhi have very little to do to keep control of the Coalition. As long as the Congress can retain anything over 125 seats and the BJP stay below 100 seats and both of these on current trends are a reality. The tactics must be not to interfere in the 'allies' interests either in the Center or in the States and barring accidents [TRS and JMM] with smaller parties there is no need to rock the boat. The anti incumbency trends will results in winners and losers in each state but change in governance will only come if there are major shifts in two or three states. The NDA lost to the UPA as fifty MP seats changed hands in TN/AP as the AIDMK/TDP were wiped out and clearly leaders on both sides have to keep a close watch on 'major' states, allow Regional leaders their freedom to act [this is being done] and for the Congress the danger does not come from the BJP but from a Left supported Third Front. The Nuclear deal with the USA is in trouble and clearly both the USA/India have to work out a workable agreement and these things take time. We have excellent relations with the USA and these must continue but we have our Regional interests and these cannot be ignored in the Nuclear field. The PM sadly does not have the clout and authority to give a decisive direction and both the Allies and the Opposition are aware of this weakness.