Daily Excelsior... Editorial

EDITORIAL

The gruesome murder of a Hindu boy by fanatics in the port city of Karachi has triggered a wide-ranging debate in the neighbouring country. The focus in the Islamic nation is on the life and fate of the minorities, draconian blasphemy laws and the virtual refusal of law-enforcing agencies to faithfully discharge their responsibilities. More than three weeks have passed after 20-year Jagdeesh Kumar, a worker in a garment factory in Pakistan's largest city, was lynched by a group of colleagues for allegedly making sacrilegious remarks. The gory happening had taken place in the presence of the police which looked the other way. It was on April 8. Till the time of writing, however, nothing has happened that can inspire confidence in Pakistani dispensation to hand out even-handed justice. In fact, as recently as on April 28, the Dawn, a leading independent daily of Pakistan, has commented in an editorial titled "The tragedy of Jagdeesh": "The police failed Jagdeesh Kumar in his hour of need and relatives say the law enforcers are now failing his family. Eyewitnesses maintain that a police contingent arrived while Jagdeesh was still alive but did next to nothing as the 20-year-old was beaten to death … it is immaterial to the argument here whether or not Jagdeesh offended anyone's religious sensibilities. No law in the land, however questionable, prescribes such a fate and consider also that we will never hear . . ..more

Punjab-chellenges on economic front

By B.K. Chum

Fourteen months are enough to assess the direction a state’s politics and governance takes after a change of government. It will, therefore, not be inappropriate to undertake the exercise in Punjab whose Akali-BJP government will complete its 14 months of rule in the first week of May. The period has thrown up divergent trends in both the arenas.......more

Infighting in Rajasthan

By Ahtesham Qureshy

Controlling forest fires

By G.L. Khajuria

EDITORIAL

Pakistan debates a
Hindu's murder

Gen Zia-ul-Haq had introduced blasphemy laws in the Pakistan Penal Code in the 1980s. A perusal of some of these provisions is self-explanatory. Section 295-B, for instances, states: "Whoever wilfully defiles, damages or desecrates a copy of the Holy Quran or of an extract therefrom or uses it in any derogatory manner or for any unlawful purpose shall be punishable for imprisonment for life." Similarly, Section 295-C says: "Whoever by words, either spoken or written or by visible representation, or by any imputation, innuendo, or insinuation, directly or indirectly, defiles the sacred name of the Holy Prophet Mohammed (PBUH) shall be punished with death, or imprisonment for life, and shall also be liable to fine." Then, there is Section 298-A: "Whoever by words, either spoken or written, or by visible representation, or by any imputation, innuendo or insinuation, directly or indirectly defiles a sacred name of any wife (Ummul Mumineen), or members of the family (Ahle-bait), of the Holy Prophet (PBUH), or any of the righteous caliphs (Khulafa-e-Rashideen) or companions (Sahaaba) of the Holy Prophet description for a term which may extend to three years, or with fine, or with both." There are additional features dealing strictly with the members of the Ahmadiya community. One of them is: "Any person of the Qadiani group or the Lahori group (who call themselves Ahmadis or any other name), who directly or indirectly posses himself as a Muslim, or calls, or refers to, his faith as Islam, or preaches or propagates his faith, or invites others to accept his faith, by words, either spoken or written, or by visible representation or in any manner whatsoever outrages the religious feelings of Muslims, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to three years and shall also be liable to fine." This has reduced Ahmadiyas in Pakistan to being worse than second-class citizens. Originally Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto had declared them as non-Muslims.

Not only have the contents of these measures but the manner of their implementation as well has left rational elements in Pakistan aghast. These have been misused to implicate, arrest and even assassinate political or personal opponents. Muslim fundamentalists have evoked them against religious minorities. A Pakistani commentator Kunwar Idris has noted: "Hundreds, maybe thousands, of people have been charged under this law, hardly anyone ever has been convicted by a court of law but quite a few, like Jagdeesh, have fallen victim to mob hysteria. Those tried by the courts and acquitted, nevertheless, had to suffer long confinement in prison." The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan has for long been demanding their repeal. A fact-finding team of the Commission has found that Jagdeesh had committed no blasphemy; instead, he was made a victim of personal vendetta. His assassins hurled the charge of blasphemy to save their skins (the laws allow the word of just one witness to incriminate a 'heretic'). Family members of Jagdeesh, who belonged to the Sindh province, have vehemently denied the allegation against him. One Pakistani observer has raised a pertinent query: "Why a raw youth coming from the Thar desert to work for a pittance in the stink of a Karachi tannery would defile the name of the Holy Prophet defies both reason and common sense." Such sentiments underlining the need for establishing the truth are the only silver lining in the entire episode. A section of the Pakistani intelligentsia is pressing its demand to bring the murderers of Jagdeesh to book. Prof Anwar Syed, professor emeritus at the University of Massachusetts who is currently a visiting professor at the Lahore School of Economics, is perturbed over "a group of Muslim militants accusing a fellow worker in a factory, a Hindu young man, of blasphemy and beating him to death while other workers, supervisors and guards watched silently and did nothing to stop this brutality." "Likewise," he has argued, "the larger Muslim community, including the professors of Islamic doctrine, stays virtually silent when these atrocities are committed against our Christian people. There can be little doubt that our claims of commitment to Islamic virtue and our professions of tolerance and regard for minority rights are false." The Dawn has pointed out that blasphemous laws are discriminatory "because the holy books and prophets of other faiths are not protected." These are the voices of sanity. Will they succeed?

Punjab-chellenges on economic front

By B.K. Chum

Normally the time a vanquished ruling party takes to overcome its post-defeat demoralisation depends on factors like its numerical strength in the new Assembly, its organisational health and the performance of new government. The period is usually longer if its numerical strength is small, like in the case of Haryana’s Indian National Lok Dal. But opposition parties with impressive numbers in the Assembly normally do not take long to recover from their electoral setback and in going on offensive against new regime. The Congress in Punjab, however, presents a contrary picture.

The party has a formidable strength of 44 MLAs against Akali Dal’s 49 and its ally BJP’s 19 in the 117-member House. But the party is in a shambles. It stands vertically divided between former Chief Minister Capt. Amarinder Singh and PCC President and CLP leader Rajinder Kaur Bhattal’s groups. As a result, the feud has affected the party’s organisational health. It has failed to launch a full-scale offensive against the government. However, Capt. Amarinder Singh, an acknowledged fighter and known for his legendary animosity with Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, had decided to hold public rallies parallel to those planned by the PCC. The party high command, however, asked him to drop his plan. Changing his strategy, he started holding Congress workers meetings in the Akali stronghold of Majha. He drew impressive response. Though acting belatedly to stop the party’s two top leaders from publicly feuding, the high command has failed to effect a real patch-up between them. Habits of Congress leaders die hard!

The situation in Akali Dal and BJP as also of Akali-BJP relations is not relatively as bad. Group rivalries in Akali Dal and BJP involving even some of their respective ministers often burst out in the open. The ruling allies also often indulge in pinpricking against each other on issues of power sharing and spoils of office. But the fear of losing power and Akali supremo Parkash Singh Badal’s commanding influence, his vote-catching potential and a give and take approach have so far been able to contain such tussles.

What, however, should be a cause of worry for the ruling alliance is the unabated declining state of governance and the government’s image. It will be a repetition to refer to the damage caused by some of the Akali-BJP government’s actions soon after assuming office 14 months ago. Among these actions were induction of nearly half a dozen Chief Minister’s relatives in the ministry and repeal of the Vigilance Act and hastily appointing the controversial Sumedh Singh Saini as Director of the Bureau. The motives behind such moves did not take long to get exposed as the prosecution witnesses in the disproportionate assets case against Chief Minister and his family members started taking U-turn. The Bureau also started registering cases against the ruling alliance’s political opponents and officers close to former Chief Minister Capt. Amarinder Singh. The criticism that like the former Amarinder Singh government, the Badal government is also indulging in political vendetta against its opponents has now forced the government to go slow in the matter.

Apart from the High Court’s adverse verdicts against the Bureau’s functioning and some other actions of the government, there are issues which have contributed to further soiling the government’s image. The aggrieved sections of people including employees who have not been paid salaries for months and the farmers, the Akali Dal’s traditional vote bank, are spontaneously holding demonstrations inviting police actions.

A government’s good performance is a panacea for most of its ills and faults. It also acts as a vote-catcher as has recently happened in Gujarat where the Modi government has returned to power. But due to the Akali-BJP government’s non-performance, the state of Punjab’s governance, development and financial health continues to be in limbo. Most bureaucrats have become just file-pushers avoiding taking decisions. The delivery system, the vital tool of mitigating people’s problems stands crippled. About the development and the state of Punjab’s finances, the less said the better. Chief Minister Badal is known for his passion for development. But in the past 14 months, little has happened on this front. Newspapers keep carrying reports about suspension of work at certain projects because of non-availability of funds. The Chief Minister and his son and Akali Dal President Sukhbir Singh Badal keep announcing grandiose development plans indicating shifting of focus to core infrastructure. Ironically, most of the 377 plans including Reliance Agri and Janata Land Developers projects, originally floated during the Capt. Amarinder Singh regime but rejected by the present government, are being cleared one by one now.

The biggest challenge the government faces is on the economy and financial fronts. That the state’s economy with its GSDP of 4.5 per cent against even Haryana’s 8.2 per cent and a sharp fall in per capita income is admitted by the government. Punjab’s debt will rise to Rs.57,369 crore from the present Rs.52,936 crore by 2008-09 end. The state’s finances will have to bear additional burden of around Rs.2,000 crore, besides astronomical arrears of two years, for implementing Sixth Pay Commission’s recommendations. The government has not so far demonstrated its political will to mobilise additional resources, first perhaps due to Municipal Corporation elections and now due to Zila Parishad and Panchayat Samitis elections slated for May 12, to be followed by Panchayat elections.

In the backdrop of the above scenario, the coming period will be challenging for the Akali-BJP alliance. Panchayat institution elections to be followed by next year’s Lok Sabha elections will be its first major political test. Since there will be no escape from mobilisation of additional resources, the government will have to resort to taxes. This is bound to evoke popular protests with their attendant adverse political fallout.

On how the government will handle the perceived dilemma will depend the future electoral fate of the ruling alliance. (IPA Service)

Infighting in Rajasthan

By Ahtesham Qureshy

Rajasthan has its version of conflict and rebellion within the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party. Like Maharashtra, the banner of revolt has been raised by some powerful MPs and MLAs of the party, and the target is basically Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje Scindia. But the reason this time is not purely political; there is a social cause too. The occasion is the government decision to allow a big industrial house to set up a mega power plant in Barmer district.

Obviously, the project requires huge farm land and the axe is falling on the poor "kisan" in that desert area. The implementation of the scheme has begun and the process is on to acquire land, dispossessing about 40,000 people in that poor area. This is good enough reason for the people to agitate against the government decision.

In Rajasthan, there is no plenty of agricultural land available for the government to give land in that district to avoid dislocation of the affected families. And the farmers are right in opposing the scheme. The power so generated is primarily planned for industrial use and for what has come to be known these days as development and economic growth. The poor farmer may not get much of the power so generated for his irrigation purposes. So, the "kisan" for whom BJP president Rajnath Singh and others show so much lip sympathy, will not be benefited after giving away his precious land.

People are sitting on indefinite dharna and holding daily demonstrations to express their resentment and resolve not to give up the land. And they are not alone; BJP leaders like Manvendra Singh, MP and son of BJP stalwart Jaswant Singh have joined in this demonstration in Barmer. What is more irrational about the scheme is that the power plant would be based on water-intensive technology. And this is a purely desert area, where ground water is not in abundance. There are no rivers or canals in this arid land. What is the logic in conceiving the lignite plant which would need huge amounts of water for its running?

There are reports that about half a dozen of the BJP MLAs from Barmer have also joined in opposing the project. But, as usual, there is no one in the State government prepared to listen. When the farmers in Barmer, Sriganganagar and other places hold demonstrations to demand more water for irrigation, they receive police lathis and bullets. But when a big industrial house needs water to run the power plant, it is afforded all state facilities. That is our concept of development! How ironic. The people are facing the prospects of huge food grain shortage. Normal wisdom would demand more intensive and extensive use of agriculture land for higher yields. But what the BJP Government is doing is the reverse: taking away more and more of farmers’ land for industrial uses.

Meanwhile, in another development, a powerful section of politicians is opposing an amendment in the law to prevent "sati", the custom of the unfortunate woman being thrown into the flames after the death of her husband. The UPA government has drafted a Bill to amend the 1987 law to prohibit sati. The proposed legislation would provide for another deterrent in the form of a collective fine on the whole village community where this ghastly act of throwing the unfortunate widow into the pyre of her husband (sati) happens. The idea is to involve the village as a whole in preventing this ghastly act. But, surprisingly, the move is being forcefully opposed by a Rajput minister, Sisram Ola, (who hails from Rajasthan) in the Manmohan Singh Cabinet. He is not alone in it; there are other Rajput leaders in the BJP and other parties who are also against the proposed change in the anti-sati law. Remember, it was the Roop Kanwar’s sati in a village in Sikar in 1987 which had jolted the conscience of the people and the law to prohibit it was enacted. But cases of sati are still reported from various areas in Rajasthan and other states. (IPA)

Controlling forest fires

By G.L. Khajuria

Come summer and we shall witness, "forest fires" and with the onset of hot spells when the temperature shall strides over 440C. The losses so emenating from such hazards are staggering. Besides, forest fires, fire incidents elsewhere in the offices stores and inhabiting colonies are immensely on the rise and engulfing such structures and reducing them into ashes. The loss of life, property runs into lakhs and crores. The preventive measures are, therefore, of utmost of importance as the saying, goes " a single stick can burn the whole forest"

"Long before in Victoria Docks, parked was a ship filled of explosives and ammunition. Men were guarding it and some one threw inside, a burning cigarette bit, then after explosive material, exploded. Someone rang the bell, fire service started their move, all the jawans then started falling in crew, courageously they went, to save others from death but the unfortunate was their luck which finished other from breathe, people saw sunshine's then after a week such was the fire causality touched the peak, 231 people killed 476 injured and it was a tragic scene, 14th April, 1944, disastrous Day fire service ever seen, let us pay homage to them who made this service groom".

In our State, forest most commonly engulf periodically the "Shivalik Ranges" from Lakhanpur to the last tip of the border touching, Poonch comprising mostly of scrub forest with chir pine as the, most economical species. The nature has itself provided "Chirpine' thick bark for its susceptibility but it is more prone to fire. Admittedly, man has made big stides in modern day's information technology and other allied fields, yet so far, no 'fool proof' method could be devised to counteract this malady which struct every year with the onset of summer-spells. In the higher stretches of forest where chirpine, blue pine, deodar, fir and spruce exist, the incidence are far lesser but once it engulfs those forests, it is havoc. The ground flora is burnt to cinder, off-shooting crown fire which spreads sweiftly, thus making the situation grave and uncontrollable.

Though the modern day's man has scrupulous advancement in science and technology, construction of roads bridges, hydel projeets and the like but all these factors such as road-links provide a smooth ground for the movements though forest and the unmindful man in his pleasuring travel throws cigarette bits which ignites the dry needles of springing wild fire uncontrollably engulfs big chunks of forest.

It does not go without saying that a poor forester is hapless and ill-equipped to encounter the menace without local co-operation whereas the forest laws provide that in the event of forest fire, it is obligatory on the part of locals to render all possible assistance under law. They are supposed to assemble at the site of fire give/record their attendence in exhinguishing forest fires and make all efforts with forest officials. However, invalids, old persons and female have been exempted from this purview of law and that is why, the local inhabitants are granted concessions in the issuance of timber/other concessions within their zones besides the grazing of domestic animals in the open forest excepts those prohibited under law in vogue. But ironically, the case is otherwise as the local response is very poor and it becomes cumber some to face the situation by the deptt. single handedly.

All the dead, dying and diseased fallen material left over after the exploitation by the deptt./SFC agencies are breeding grounds for spread of diseases whereby healthy crops are inflicked and more so with the onset of dry spell, this material provides impetus for further inflammation to the fire. The solution, therefore, lies in the disposal of such remnant material by debris burning under the close surveillance of the deptt or to issue such like small timber to the local concessionist.

In forestry parlance, wide strip is being laid down in the forest most vulnerable to fire. The width of strip varies with the nature/density of crop and the extent of vulnerability. All unwanted bushes, poles and even trees are cut and removed to make it into a wide passage so that in the eventuality of fire, it does not get an occasion to cross adjoining part of forests. The fire-lines formation are traditional practices and are utmostly warranted.

With the onset autumn, there is leaf, fall periodically both in the deciduous/coniferous forests which almost cover the forest floor, an inflammable material. In order, therefore, to safe-guard the forest from fire calamity, it becomes, imperative to collect all such leaf litter and remove to safer places for control burning under the supervision of forest department.

As is in vogue with fire service, department, necessary infrastructure such as "fire beater" pick-axes, bill-hooks, fire-proof jackets, hats and other infrastructure needs to be kept at the disposal of forest department together with taking assistance from fire service departments. This is imperative and warranted.

This is most helping aspect and the watch towers need to be constructed at equidistance for close surveillance and regular monitoring so that as and where fire occurs, rapid action can be taken instantly to combat and control from further spreading.

"Forest Protection Force" is the newly created and an independent wing provided with wireless sets and other communicative infrastructure. This wing has a long term role to play with to combat fire hazards. The force further needs to be invigorated and fortified to safeguard the green wealth.

Such constructions help in extinguishing forest fires in the much needed, areas besides fulfilling multi-purposes and can go a long way in combating the fire hazards. With the advancement of modem technology, most of the European/advanced countries are pressing into use of 'Foam gas' which grips and control the fire, the CFC (choloro floro carbon) and Halogen gases are further the most useful gases in extinguishing fire. These technologies need as well to be introduced in our country.

Dachigam wildlife sanctuary is the richest one over the globe for its 'hangul' inhabitation, apart from other wild animals, beautiful birds, insects and their ilk. The sanctuary was last year engulfed by hazardous fire which took heavy toll of wildlife of all strata. Though, of course, the fire was brought under control by a composite efforts put in by the wildlife deptt.including forest deptt,fire services, Forest Proteciion Force, Social Forestry, Soil Conservation, apart from local populace. But the losses that have accrued are quite unimaginative and are irretrievable, apart from emanating mounting pollution and warming in the outskirts.

Conclusively, therefore, it is quite pertinent to work out fool-proof strategies if at all, we humans have to live over this precious mother earth bestowed upon us by the almighty God and be fear of Him.