Daily Excelsior... Editorial

EDITORIAL

Increase frequency

Joyride in Valley

Criminalisation
of the police

By Joginder Singh

Forthcoming Assembly elections are important

By Arun Nehru

Democracy in Bhutan

By Mathew Joseph C

EDITORIAL

Increase frequency

There was an atmosphere of fear and disbelief when the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad bus service was launched by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on April 7, 2005. People were sceptical whether the experiment would succeed. The terrorists had served a notice that they would target the vehicle. To prove that they meant business they set fire to the Summer Capital's Tourist Reception Centre (TRC) building depriving us of a landmark. Yet, the bus rolled on. Since then it has indeed turned out to be one of the biggest confidence-building measures (CBMs) --- a term originally used by the Prime Minister during the inaugural ceremony. It has established that human desire to live together is greater than anything else. Once the ordinary citizens speak up it is not at all possible for a small group of hoodlums to divide them on communal lines. The Prime Minister had three years ago described the resumption of the bus service as "a small but significant step towards establishing good neighbourly relations." He had said that it would open a "new chapter" in the chequered history of the two countries since 1947. He should be happy that he has come true on both the counts. All earlier doubts have disappeared. The question whether there would be any taker for this bus has ceased to be relevant. Instead, another route between Poonch and Rawalakot has been reopened. In fact, it has been more active which is understandable. Indeed, the basic purpose that divided families are reunited is being achieved. Some people scoff at the statistics. According to them so far during the last three years only a few hundred have availed themselves of the facility which is a drop in the ocean. They are right if one goes strictly by the available figures. What they ignore, however, is that it is a limited bus service --- once in a fortnight. As a consequence it can't accommodate every aspirant. The majority of the people who want to undertake journeys have to per force cool their heels. In any case the perception is flawed that the idea of diluting the Line of Control (LoC) has not worked. The reality is that the Line drawn by violence in the name of religion about six decades ago is sufficiently thinned.

According to official data, 3020 persons have used this mode of travel to go to the other side of the LoC. On the other hand, 3500 have come here from the separated territory. More importantly, there are 14600 people waiting in the queue in our part of the State to undertake a trip to "Azad" Kashmir, as the occupied territory across the LoC is known. They have put in formal applications. On current reckoning it will take decades to meet the present demand. For, only 450 passengers can be ferried in a year given the available logistics. It is said that a proposal has been mooted to run these buses every week. As and when it is given effect it may provide some relief but it will not be able to satisfy one and all.

The need of the hour, therefore, is to take a realistic view. Both New Delhi and Islamabad should consider ways to further step up the frequency of bus services. Borders ought to be made irrelevant without being redrawn.

Joyride in Valley

That Railway Minister Laloo Prasad Yadav has reviewed the progress of work being done on the railway project in the Kashmir Valley raises some hope. He visited the Nowgam station and also travelled along with his family members briefly in the Diesel Multiple Unit (DMU). It is a positive sign that the train may finally run within the Kashmir region sooner rather than later. Mr Yadav himself has said so. It means that Qazigund will be linked to Baramulla and the route will be thrown open to the public. Arguably the Railways Ministry could have finished this stretch long ago had it not been bogged down by the enormity of the job in the arduous section between Katra and Qazigund. In the absence of proper homework there has been crisis at almost every stage. Even the seemingly easy Udhampur-Katra section in the lower Shivalik Hills has become a Herculean assignment. Foreign experts have been roped in to make up for our lack of planning and necessary expertise and experience even in this region. A train in the Valley has been the dream of many. In 1898 Maharaja Pratap Singh is said to have first explored the possibility of connecting Jammu and Srinagar by rail. Somehow his idea did not take off. Subsequently there have been other proposals. These have included building a track following the Jhelum river to link Srinagar and Rawalpindi and a line between Jammu and Srinagar via Reasi almost parallel to the Moghul road. As it happened while these schemes could not be implemented Jammu also got disconnected from the rail grid with the Partition. It took decades to restore Jammu's place on the country's railway map via Pathankot. More than two decades were then taken to extend the track up to Udhampur at 11 times the original estimated cost of Rs 50 crores. Taking it further to Srinagar has been a challenge for the best to reckon with. How does one proceed beyond Katra has always been a daunting proposition. It has now been overcome by declaring it a national project. It implies that it will be finished regardless of cost with the Central Government footing the entire bill. Admittedly, there has been a flawed approach in the beginning as no prior survey of the soil was undertaken. It seems, however, that the teething troubles have been conquered and the first train from Udhampur to Srinagar may chug in 2012.

Before that, as stated earlier, the local inhabitants and tourists will have the benefit of making trips between Qazigund and Baramulla. This should happen during the current year itself or in the beginning of next year. Once this part of the exercise is completed it should yield greater thoughts like, for instance, having a ring road around the Wullar Lake. One hopes that at the same time the steps are taken to get rid of diesel engines which don't go well with our State's sylvan environment. It can be done only if regular power supply is ensured for electric engines. The difficulty is that our State suffers from a paucity of this valuable resource. How do we then cross over this hurdle? It is a poser for our planners and administrators. They should apply their minds to find a solution.

Criminalisation of the police

By Joginder Singh

One of the Haryana IPS cadre officer of the rank of the Inspector General of Police, was recently convicted, nine years after a crime, which he thought, was one way, to cover up his dalliance and liaison with a married media woman. His crime was, the result of lust, which probably had worn off and its variety withered, in course of time. It has come out, that Shivani Bhatnagar, the victim in the case, had given birth to a child, fathered by the convicted accused, RK Sharma. She wanted him, to marry her.

The crimes of which many people and Nations, are ashamed, like Hitler's holocaust against the Jews, constitute their real history. The same is true, of individual human beings, though many Clintons of the world, have got away with them. While how, one lives one's own life, is one's own choice. But such a choice, does not include, finishing of people, whom you find inconvenient. The trouble is, that power becomes heady, when one is in a position of power. One feels, that one can literally get away with the murder. Two high profile cases involving policemen have recently dominated the National media, one of RK Sharma, the other of an Assistant Commissioner of police, who was considered an "Encounter Specialist".

The latter, was killed for allegedly trying to recover, money loaned to his property dealer friend. IG Sharma, according to the evidence, was a happily married person. But happy marriage has nothing to do with the passions and hidden motives and emotions inside the breast of every man. Haryana IG's case only show, that when women, whether married, or not go wrong, men will go right after them. If only age imparted wisdom, there would not be any old fools.

But the truth is that the other woman always looks more beautiful and more fascinating. Right from time immemorial, sex has been the guiding factor in the life of kings and commoners. The only difference has been, that the rulers could not only pick and choose, but also discard when they had their fill. One of the late Maharaja of Patiala reportedly had 365 wives, one for each day of the year.

The old rulers, were never apologetic, about their sex interests or sex lives. Some how we in India, have been rather hypocritical about our interest in sex. All love triangles and quadrangles whether in real life or reel life centre around sex.

But whatever old, unaccountable and despotic rulers may have done in the past, is not an ideal example, to be followed by their modern democratically elected rulers, or the officials working in the country. Unfortunately, police has a very appalling and shocking history, in these matters, as the following instances of the recent past will show.

Madhya Pradesh Director General of Police, was removed from his post, following the initiation of a criminal case against him by the economic offences wing under Section 420 of the Indian Penal Code in connection with the manner in which he got his son admitted to an engineering college in 2001 under the NRI quota.

Criminal cases have also been filed against his son and an Indore-based businessman, whose name figured as his grandfather in his college admission form. In reality, the so called grand father turned out to be an NRI residing in the US, who had picked the entire fees, of the DG's son for college education amounting to $16,500 spread over three years, comprising tuition fees and caution money.

In 2006, one of the Assistant Commissioner was sentenced to hanging for custodial death. The case against him, dates back to August 1987, when one Mohinder Kumar, arrested along with Ram Kumar, on charges of teasing a girl and assaulting a constable who had gone to arrest them. The duo was tortured at the Vivek Vihar police station in East Delhi. A day later, they were found lying in the nearby fields. While Mohinder died in hospital, Ram Kumar survived and became a crucial witness in the case. ACP Tyagi was the SHO of the police station. The trial court, while sentencing Tyagi on December 18, 2006 , said the charges of murder were proved and it was one of the rarest of rare cases that merited death penalty. However in appeal, High Court reduced his sentence to life imprisonment.

In February, 2008, Delhi high court slapped a Rs.100,000 fine on the Delhi police for illegally detaining three people in separate incidents in the city in 2007, and ordered an enquiry into the matter by the Central Bureau of Investigation ( CBI ) and punishment for the guilty officials.

The matter came to light when two people, Sanjiv and Dalip, approached the court, demanding a compensation of Rs 1 million or 10 Lakhs from the Delhi police for keeping them in custody without any reason.

The duo were arrested on February 3, 2007 from Samaypur Badli area and kept in custody for two days without the police registering a case against them.

They alleged that they were ready to execute a bail bond but were forced to remain in custody.

Following a CBI inquiry, into the killing of two alleged criminals, Jitender Pehal and Randhir Singh, in an alleged encounter with the police in 1994 a report was submitted to Punjab and Haryana High Court and a former Haryana DG was prosecuted for the murder. Another DG of Haryana is facing prosecution by the CBI for sexual harassment, which led to the committing of suicide a young girl.

In February 2008, CBI arrested two senior police officers in connection with, with what has come to be known as Moga sex scandal, in Punjab , in which several prominent people including politicians, businessmen and journalists were allegedly engaged in "extortion" after trapping unsuspecting people. The CBI arrested one IPS Officer, Devinder Singh Garcha, and an SP by name Paramjit Singh Sandhu. The names of a number of police officers, including IG and Commissioner of Police level had cropped up in Telgi Stamp scam. Infact, the catalogue of police men involved in criminal activities is too big to be recounted.

Jawahar Lal Nehru had said; ''A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new, when an age ends, and when the soul of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance" .

The problem here is, that for sixty one years of Independent India, the Nation has been waiting that some Government would wake up, bring about police reforms and end atrocities on the people, and terminate criminalisation tendencies, in the defenders of the common people, that is the Police. The regrettable feature is, that moment has not come and the people continue to suffer. Government should face the problem squarely, instead of taking the alibi, that the law will take its own course.

The first step should be to cleanse the police force of the criminal elements as not only Caesar, but Caesar's wife, should be above suspicion. Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced. That is the stark truth. (PTI)

Forthcoming Assembly elections are important

By Arun Nehru

The Karnataka elections are around the corner and the timing of the election will ensure that both the Congress/BJP will commit all their 'top guns' to the battle and perhaps it may be wise to still treat this as a three horse race with the JD[S] in contention as a distant but 'relevant' third! The Congress/BJP are dogged by 'internal dissent' as both have to many leaders in their ranks and the task of ticket distribution becomes very difficult and in these situations the error margin can be large and will result in 'independents' being elected and both sides have a great deal of homework to do in the next few days. HD Deve Gowda is fortunate as all his leaders have deserted and changed their loyalties but this may well be a blessing in disguise as they will create chaos elsewhere with a demand for seats. My feeling is that the BJP made a mistake by forming a government of 'limited duration' with the JD[S] and the Congress kept their distance when the JD[S] went shopping for allies after deserting the BJP and perhaps the moral advantage [if this exists] is with the Congress. The reports I am getting from Karnataka are a little different and many political beings in all three parties indicate a very strong fight between the Congress/BJP [both range between 75-90 seats] and HD Deve Gowda is still considered good for 25-35 seats. The BSP and Mayawati will also fight all the seats and will damage both the Congress and the BJP. Tough fight by any standards. The Congress effort will be spearheaded by Sonia Gandhi and Rahul [had a very successful tour of Karnataka and has a very positive media image] and it would be wise to post all their leaders [to many ] in their respective area's to avoid negative reactions and the BJP effort will be spearheaded by LK Advani, Narender Modi [successful visits ],Sushma Swarj and the campaign will be run by Arun Jaitly who has done a excellent job for his party in Bihar, Punjab and Gujarat and must be rated as the top election in charge in the country.

Success in this election may well go the party which can marshal their ample human resources in the most productive manner by effective ticket selection [to the extent possible] and avoiding internal dissent during the campaign. No election is ever easy and this election will be very hard fought. The result here may well impact [psychological] the next Assembly elections due in Delhi, MP, Rajasthan and Chattisgarh and in extreme case may affect the timing of the General election. My political feel still indicates a advantage to the Congress but the recent 'panic' reaction to the inflation situation can create problems and the effect of this is difficult to assess. PM Manmohan Singh has given a balanced view on inflation and perhaps the figure will 'dip' in the coming months but in terms of elections and the dominant 'have not' factor prices of food like cereals, vegetables and edible oil will be critical factor and percentage drops due to price controls and duty reduction on cement and steel will be good for 'sentiment' but it is the food essentials which may determine the public mood. The people of Karnataka deserve the best government possible and the JD[S] led government was a 'disaster' and hopefully the electorate be it urban or rural will elect a stable government for the future and avoid a 'public auction' of portfolio's which has become a standard procedure of Coalition governance.

The Southern states were largely responsible for the change from the NDA to the UPA and once again this can be the critical issue for the future. Karnataka trends will be visible after the elections and in Kerala I see the Congress recovering from the debacle of 2004 and will hold 10 out of 20 seats [can increase] but it is AP and TN which will determine the future. Telengana trends will be very different from AP and the TRS will battle both the Congress and the TDP and may well align with the BJP. The situation in Andhra Pradesh is not easy for the Congress on the anti incumbency factor but the TDP/Left alliance strength can only be assessed by the 'Chiranjeevi' factor and his entry into a possible alliance with the BJP and as things stand the situation is fluid. Tamil Nadu and the family affairs within the DMK give the advantage to the AIDMK and here again much will depend on the attitude of the PMK and the smaller parties and the Congress as per past trends can go either with the DMK/AIDMK and every party big or small will assess the situation and then take a decision based on political longevity for the future.

The global economic situation is 'chaotic' and the 'Developed' world seems to be suffering from a breakdown of regulatory systems and by any conventional standards the loss of many hundreds of billions is 'inexcusable' and if this had happened in the 'Developing' world there would be loud cries of scams and fraud. We have heard a great deal on 'subsidies' for the poor and the deprived and today we have the 'Developed' world giving a subsidy close to 200 billion dollars to leading financial institutions and banks for 'poor performance' and perhaps 'fraud' and a public investigation is necessary on the many millions and billions paid as compensation, fee's, consultancy and bonus etc to a handful of executives who have created this situation. We are seeing bank's going bankrupt, rouge traders losing 27 billion dollars in a French bank [can France afford this loss] and are we going to see more of this as the 'mess' unfolds in the coming months?

We are a part of the global economy and it is in our common interest that issues are resolved but the problem is that the leaders in the financial field do not know their own assets and liabilities. The USA has a GDP of 12-13 trillion and losses from the banks and the war in Iraq are over a trillion dollars and clearly there is much for the new President to do as the financial situation will remain chaotic for the better part of the year

Democracy in Bhutan

By Mathew Joseph C

The much awaited National Assembly election in Bhutan is over. The Election Commission of Bhutan 'successfully' conducted the election on 24 March 2008. The major contenders in the election were the Druk Pheunsum Tshogpa (DPT) - Bhutan Harmony Party - led by former Prime Minister Jigmi Thinley and the People's Democratic Party (PDP) led by Sangay Ngedup, the uncle of the present King Jigme Khesar Namgyal Wangchuck. In the fray the DPT won a landslide victory. It got 45 out of 47 seats in the National Assembly. There was a heavy turn out of voters (80 percent) in the first ever conducted National Assembly election on the basis of adult franchise. With this election Bhutan officially bid farewell to the absolute monarchy which came into being in 1907.

As per the Constitution, Bhutan will be having a bicameral Parliament. The upper chamber of the national Parliament is known as the National Council to which elections were conducted in December 2007 and January 2008. The National Council consists of 25 members of which include five members nominated by the king. The 20 members of the National Council represent the 20 Dzongkhags (districts) in the country. The National Assembly is the lower chamber of the Parliament.

According to foreign observers and the Election Commission of Bhutan the polls were conducted in a 'free and fair' manner. This claim to fairness has been torn apart by the opposition party, the PDP, itself. In protest against the irregularities in the election, the two National Assembly members of the PDP have resigned from the Assembly. The leader of the PDP Sangay Ngedup has complained to the Election Commission that the election proceedings were manipulated in favour of the DPT.

It is interesting to note that both these parties lacked any kind of identifiable political ideology. They were vying with each other to prove their loyalty to the king. They were campaigning on expected lines. Both were promising the people to bring about the much discussed 'Gross National Happiness' (GNH) better than the other. Apart from this the election campaign was uneventful in the context of the absence of an autonomous civil society and free media.

The effort to make Bhutan a constitutional monarchy was initiated by Jigme Singye Wangchuck, the fourth king of Bhutan, in 2005. In March 2005 the Government of Bhutan brought out a Draft Constitution. In December 2005, he abdicated the throne in favour of his son the present King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck. The formation of the bicameral national parliament and the elections conducted were based on the Draft Constitution which is going to be ratified by the new parliament.

Democracy in Bhutan is a gift of the ruler to the people. It is democracy from above. The way Bhutan's constitution came into being is an ample proof of that. Other countries where democracy came about as the result of people's struggles, constitution used to be drafted by the duly elected constituent assemblies. The ratification of the constituent assemblies makes them sacrosanct. But in the case of Bhutan this did not happened. The king himself arrogated the role of the constituent assembly and came out with a constitution and it was accepted by the various sections of the ruling elite.

Bhutan is a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural and multi-religious country. The main ethnic groups in the country are Sharchop (23.92%), Ngalong (16.5%), Bumthangpa (4.37%), Kheng (3. 64%) and Lhotshampa (the people of Nepali origin) (30.82%). The total population of the country is 7, 52,693. The ruling elite of Bhutan belong to the ethnic group of Ngalong. They are migrants from Tibet.

The transformation of Bhutan from an absolute monarchy to a constitutional one is actually a reaction of the ruling elite to the oppositional politics emerged in the country since the late 1920s. The oppositional politics in the country began from the people of Nepali origin in southern Bhutan. The over centralisation of power and socio-cultural marginalization kept the people of Nepali origin always in the political periphery.

The formation of the Bhutan State Congress (BSC) in 1952 was an important event in the history of oppositional politics in Bhutan. The BSC demanded for the granting of civil and political rights for all citizens, democratisation of administration and the abolition of feudalism. The hostility of the Government towards the BSC led its leaders to shift its headquarters to Siliguri in India. The BSC was active till 1969.

The oppositional politics in Bhutan once again became active in the context of the Bhutanization drive of King Jigme Singye Wangchuck in the later half of 1980s. In 1988 the Government conducted a census based on the discriminatory Bhutan Citizenship Act of 1985. In 1989, the Government imposed the Ngalong dress code and cultural practices over other ethnic groups through Driglam Nam Za (code of social etiquette). The promulgation of Driglam Nam Za led to the ethnic conflict between the Ngalongdominated state and the people of Nepali origin. As a result around one and a half lakh people of Nepali origin were expelled from Bhutan. Majority of them are now living in the refugee camps in eastern Nepal maintained by the UNHCR.

The political organisations which were formed in the wake of the movement against forced Bhutanization like the Bhutan People's Party (BPP), the Bhutan National Democratic Party (BNDP), the Druk National Congress (DNC) and the Bhutan Congress Party (BCP) and the human rights organizations like the People's Forum for Human Rights, Bhutan (PFHRB) and the Human Rights Organization of Bhutan (HUROB) are continuing their struggles in exile. The Communist Party of Bhutan (Marxist-Leninist-Maoist) is the latest entrant in the struggle for democracy in Bhutan

The carefully choreographed transition of Bhutan from an absolute monarchy to a constitutional monarchy through an apparently 'democratic' manner is an eyewash to hoodwink the international community. This exercise is to deviate the attention of the international community from the resolution of the refugee crisis developed out of the forced Bhutanization drive in the late 1980s and early 1990s and co-opt the emerging political dissent in Bhutan by its ruling elite.

(The writer is a Senior Assistant Professor at the Department of Strategic and Regional Studies, University of Jammu)