Daily Excelsior... Editorial

EDITORIAL

Salute to a hero

Forest loot

BJP politics taking
a new turn

By Amulya Ganguli

Playing down the
Chinese threat

By Major (retd) Dr Brahma Singh

Fine tuning relationship
with ASEAN

By Indu Prakash Singh

EDITORIAL

Salute to a hero

It is one of those tales that leave one amazed with mystery of our lives. On Republic Day the family of Captain Sunil Kumar Chaudhary was cock-a-hoop with joy. Its brave son had been awarded a Sena Medal for having performed a great act of bravery in Jammu and Kashmir some time last year. The following day it received the information that their son had again excelled himself but attained martyrdom in the process in faraway Assam. Initial happiness gave way to tears of sorrow and separation. On both the occasions he was doing his duty of ridding the country of the scourge of terrorism. There is no doubt that a grateful nation will always remember his supreme sacrifice. He was the young scion of a typical soldier family of this region belonging to Govindsar in Kathua district. He was scheduled to be married to a girl of this city on March 9. The world must have come to a halt for the time being for that young woman. It always happens that whenever a person passes away the sense of personal loss is always greater in the case of family members who are associated with him in everyday life. All our hearts go to them in their moment of grief. Capt Chaudhary and his family (his father and brother are also in armed forces while grandfather has served in the Indian National Army) constitute that section of our society that has made gallantry in battlefields a tradition in our part of the country. It is around them that an important component of Dogri literature --- veer ras (bars) --- revolves which in English may mean heroic ballads: they are sung in praise of the chivalry of a warrior. In recent times poet Kehar Singh Madhukar has been hailed as one of the topmost exponents of this genre of writing ("hands that hold the reins of time determine the course of history").

Soldier-poet Narsingh Dev Jamwal (thanks to that discerning critic and essayist Lakshmi Narain Sharma we have an immaculate English translation of Jamwal's Dogri poems) has thus described Jammu: "As a land of the holy and the brave thou hast won immortal renown, India glories in thee and thou art a priceless pearl in India's crown." At another place in the same poem Jamwal speaks out "Thou art an epic whose every word, aureate and brightly fair, rests upon a heroic act that can outlive Time's lethean stare". Of course, Lata Mangeshkar has lent her eternally melodious voice to songs penned by Padma Sachdev and Kishan Smailpuri stirring this land. They also centre on the theme of wars with a difference that they focus on women waiting for the return of their husbands and relatives from battlefields.

We in this State are exposed to all aspects of a war. Nothing impresses us more than the fact that our soil has produced decorated soldiers through generations. Nothing moves us more than the sight of bodies of our young men. Nothing keeps us more alert than the realisation that they have laid down their lives in defending our lives and the country. Capt Chaudhary is the latest addition to this continuing saga of the highest valour. Let all of us salute him with both our hands.

Forest loot

More skeletons are tumbling out of our woods. According to the latest disclosures in this newspaper, timber smugglers continue to be on the rampage. They are mocking at machinery set up for intelligence gathering, patrolling and surveillance. Grim statistics tell a horrifying tale. We have figures of only actual seizures. The plunder that goes unchecked can be anybody's guess. A total of 82500 cubic feet of timber worth Rs 76.57 lakhs has been captured during 2006-07. Similar yield till December during the current financial year is about 50300 cubic feet worth Rs 54.20 lakhs. The Government has claimed that a number of dossiers have been prepared against plunderers. These in turn have been sent to district magistrates for their detention under the Public Safety Act. There is silence, however, whether or not any arrests have been made. Instead, the Government feels that there is a need to amend the Forest Act to give it more teeth and has a proposal in this regard under consideration. There are vast empty spaces not only in the hills but also in the administrative apparatus. As many as 2025 posts are lying vacant in forest and allied departments. The Protection Force alone has 1048 vacancies. These details are apart from all that is already known. There is all-round corruption and the forest cover has shrunk by 16 per cent. Ministers have put the murky facts about these occurrences on record. The latest Economic Survey has also said a lot about the actual state of affairs. It has noted: "With the increase in population of both human as well as livestock the forests are under great pressure due to open grazing, heavy exploitation and excessive biotic dependence. Now the situation has become so alarming that in most of the areas the forests are lacking in natural regeneration and are at different stages of degradation…The deficit in demand and supply of forest produce (that is, timber, firewood and fodder) started pinching the State hard by mid-seventies. It was observed that part of the forest, degraded beyond repairs, was not able to regenerate/rehabilitate on its own." The Survey strikes a note of caution that the demand:supply gap continues to get further widened. Despite its pointed remarks it tells only half of the story. A series of reports in this newspaper have established the existence of a nexus between timber mafias and unscrupulous officers. Such muddy details are too well known to merit any repetition. Why can't we snap these obnoxious links?

What we evidently lack but refuse to admit is that we don't have the will to apply necessary correctives. We do indulge in brave talk but in the end it turns out to be hollow. This is true not only in the case of forests but almost every sphere of government activity. At least one minister has said that our forests require rest for three decades. It explains the seriousness of the situation. Yet, it does not address the problem. Why should we shirk our responsibility of replenishing the assets we consume? At the same time we should come down heavily upon miscreants. Let there be no mercy for them. By illegally felling trees they deprive us of healthy tonics of salubrious air, rich soil and fresh water. What are we sans green gold?

BJP politics taking a new turn

By Amulya Ganguli

It may sound like a cliché, but there is little doubt that the BJP's latest conclave marks its entry into a new era. For the first time since the Jan Sangh-BJP made its debut on the Indian scene, Atal Bihari Vajpayee stayed away from the national executive meeting because of ill health even though it was held in New Delhi. But that was not the only novelty about the meeting because it also marked the anointment of Narendra Modi as the primus inter pares among the next generation of leaders.

Only time will show whether the Gujarat Chief Minister's elevation has caused any heartburn among others in the same age group. If Sushma Swaraj's earlier rejection of Modi's first foray into national politics via his interaction with Jayalalithaa is a pointer, then there will be a few who will not allow Modi's ascent to go without a challenge, however camouflaged in diplomatic niceties.

Party president Rajnath Singh, for instance, is believed to be one who is not too pleased with Modi's growing importance in the aftermath of the Gujarat elections. Although he asked other chief ministers to emulate Modi during the national executive meeting, few have forgotten that he had ascribed the party's victory in Gujarat to team work and not due to Modi's presence at the helm.

If there is now a slight change in his stance, the reason perhaps is the RSS's acknowledgement, after an initial show of hesitancy, of Modi's contribution to the BJP's success. After all, nothing succeeds like success, and although the RSS may not like Modi's individualistic style of functioning, it seems to have realised that if elections are to be won, then Moditva is indispensable for the BJP as well as the saffron brotherhood. But even as Modi basks in the sunshine of adulation of a kind which he rarely experienced before, the focus in the near future will be as much on the party's prime ministerial candidate, L.K.Advani, as on the Gujarat strong man.

Although the BJP is opening a new chapter so far as the top personalities are concerned, its agenda remains unchanged. The emphasis is still on finding ways and means to consolidate its Hindu base of support by indulging in minority-bashing by highlighting Islamic terrorism and the UPA's supposed Muslim appeasement via the Rajinder Sachar report, the failure to hang Afzal Guru and allied topics. Incidentally, the party's ally, the Janata Dal (United), is not against the Sachar report.

However, the kind of anti-Muslim propaganda which the BJP's compact disc articulated on the eve of the Uttar Pradesh elections is evidently still the mainstay of the party's political line even if the CD was never circulated because of the Election Commission's objections. Given this communal approach, it is not surprising that the Ram Sethu issue is at the top of the BJP's election plank although it has the disadvantage of lacking an anti-Muslim angle which the temple issues - Ayodhya, Varanasi, Mathura - did. Even then, its value lies in projecting the Congress as anti-Hindu under its "Italian" leader and in tarring the DMK with the same brush to prop up the saffron camp's latest ally in Tamil Nadu, the AIADMK.

While the Ram Sethu controversy may form the backdrop of the BJP's election campaign, the party is likely to focus on emotive local issues to whip up anti-Muslim sentiments, as over an Ayodhya-style "liberation" of the Guru Dattatreya Baba Budhan Swamy dargah in Chikmagalur in Karnataka, a Sufi shrine which draws thousands of Hindu and Muslim devotees. Since the party regards Karnataka as its gateway to the south, the run-up to the assembly elections there will, in all probability, see a concerted attempt by the party and the Sangh parivar to foment communal tension over the issue.

The BJP's advantage is its present high morale on account of the party's successive victories in Punjab (with the Akali Dal), Uttarakhand, Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh. It also won the Delhi municipal elections while its ally, the Shiv Sena, won in Mumbai. The setback in Uttar Pradesh, therefore, now seems to be a long time ago. The BJP can also point with glee to the seeming disarray in the UPA ranks just as the latter used to earlier underline the leadership squabbles in the BJP involving Vajpayee, Advani, Rajnath Singh, Arun Jaitley and others.

While the BJP has been able to overcome its leadership problems with Advani's appointment as the "shadow" Prime Minister, there is still some uncertainty in the party and outside about what he stands for. Advani is no longer the fire-breathing rath yatri of 1990. Not only have the years in power awakened him to the realities of a diverse India, he has also been overtaken by Modi more aggressive Hindutva brand of politics while Advani himself has flirted with secular concepts by his praise for Jinnah, which horrified the RSS and astonished large sections in the BJP.

While Vajpayee's moderation is known, Advani remains something of a mystery - someone who may not really know his own mind or is confused about the party's line as he is torn between his hard-line instincts and seemingly successful moderate tactics of governance which are favoured by allies like the Janata Dal (United). Even as the BJP exploits the UPA's incumbency factor, it is the discrepancy between Advani's more moderate Hindutva and Modi's hawkish line which may prove to be the its Achilles heel.(IPA Service)

Playing down the Chinese threat

By Major (retd) Dr Brahma Singh

The optimism expressed by Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, on the ability of the Indian and Chinese leaders to settle the long outstanding border dispute between the two countries sooner than later, appears to be result of over simplification of issues involved. A deeper analysis of the Sino-Indian relations would show that the dispute between the two countries is not just a simple matter of border adjustments that could be easily sorted out across a conference table in a spirit of give and take but involves a serious case of clash of policy objectives. Interestingly the Chinese Prime Minister has expressed no such optimism. Evidently, being aware of the high stakes involved on either side, which could preclude an early solution to the problem, he is reluctant to make any commitment. Let us see what these stakes are.

Technically speaking, the policy objectives in international relations which every country aims at in pursuance of its national interests may be categorised under either ‘‘containment’’ or ‘‘dominance’’. ‘Containment’ implies status quo in international relations. The aim of this policy is peace because it would create a situation in which all nations submit to the present State of affairs and make no effort which is directed towards change- the cause of all wars. The policy of ‘dominance’, on the other hand, implies change in world order, either for reasons of expansion or for genuinely undoing the wrongs of history. The policies of ‘containment’ and ‘dominance’, therefore, always remain in constant conflict with each other.

India's policy has always been that of ‘containment’, just wanting to hold what in inherited at the time of Independence. On the other hand, China's policy is that of ‘dominance’, directed towards a change in world order, with the policy objective of regaining, what it calls, its ‘‘lost territories’’. What brings Indis in direct conflict with China is the fact that large chunks of Indian Territory, including the whole of Arunachal Pradesh and Assam, and parts of Bengal are included in China's list of ‘‘lost territories’’, which it has vowed to regain as part of its official foreign policy objective. To leave no doubt in any ones mind as to their intentions the Chinese continue to project these territories in their official maps as part of their own country. What further provocation on its part would be needed for us to realise the gravity and seriousness of the threat to our security posed by China ?

The Chinese claim may look absurd today but even false claims when allowed to lie unchallenged for a log period of time have a tendency to become real. Any false claim, that could be used as a readymade pretext for committing aggression has, therefore, to be treated with as much seriousness and urgency as a genuine one, especially when the claimant country openly insists on retaining its right to recover such ‘‘lost territories’’. This is in fact what the Sino-Indian dispute is all about. The border dispute, which is being continuously harped upon, is, in fact, only the effect and not the cause of the dispute.

There, nevertheless, appears to be a tendency in our country to play down the Chinese threat. Apparently the effort required to meet the threat from China is so colossal that an ostrich-like policy is being pursued and the threat is being conveniently swept under the carpet. Little wonder that while most defence analysts have been at pains to emphasise the threat to the security of the country from Pakistan few have highlighted the magnitude of such a threat from China. Even when the nuclear threat to the country is being considered, comparisons are drawn with Pakistan and not China, to our greatest saisfaction that we are ahead of the former. No mention of the existence of such a threat from China is made for fear of annoying the stronger foe and causing the threat to get activated. Remember the manner in which George Fernandes, the Defence Minister under the NDA Government, was literally hooted down and made to swallow his words by his own set-up at the Centre, when he blurted out that China was India's enemy number one. Though the manner in which the Defence Minister had said it could not be considered quite diplomatic, what he had said was true nevertheless. But the flutter, bordering on panic, that hs statement created within Government circles reflected the national psyche of letting the sleeping dog lie in the hope that dog may never wake up on its own.

Dr Manmohan Singh's attempt to down-grade the Sino-Indian dispute to a mere border dispute that could be settled quite easily is, probably, in keeping with the national psyche of following the easiest course even if it is not the correct one- that of preparing to face the Chinese threat squarely by raising our military strength to the level required for deterring China from recovering its ‘‘lost territories’’ by the use of force. At the end of his three-day visit to China, the Prime Minister is reported to have said that the world respected the strong and not the weak. How true it is what he said but unfortunately while elaborating he mentioned only the economic, political and social strength of a country and not its military strength. Political science believes that diplomacy that may be employed for settling international disputes is no substitute for military strength, as diplomacy to be effective must be backed by adequate military strength. Our hindi chini bhai bhai diplomacy failed once for lack of adequate military backing. It could fail again for the same reason. Let us remember that wars cannot be avoided by remaining militarily weak. As per an age old maxim if we wish for peace we must prepare for war. While there is no reason for us to feel unduly suspicious about the Chinese, we cannot afford to be complacent either.

Hitler may have used his maxim that ‘‘no country's territories were created by God’’ and that ‘‘ all boundaries between countries are the result of aggression at one time or the other’’ as an excuse for committing aggression for territorial gains, but for us it could at least serve to drive the fact home that territorial sanctity of a country is maintained by force and not merely through the goodwill of a neighbour.

Fine tuning relationship with ASEAN

By Indu Prakash Singh

The ministry of external affairs has prepared a draft document for approval by the cabinet committee on security to reorient India's relations with ASEAN countries. Over the last 50-years India's foreign policy with the ASEAN region has gone through three distinct phases-the first was the pre-Independence period when the two regions were linked together through the de-colonisation process unique to the region. Two events are considered a watershed in this period-the Asian Relations Conference of March 1947 and the 1955 Bandung Conference of Afro-Asian Nations, both of which addressed the significance of the newly emerging countries in the third world within the wider canvas of international relations and the roles that they could play.

The second phase encompasses a period from the early 1960s till about the early 1990s. The international scenario was dominated by the Cold War and it is within this background that the ASEAN was formed in 1967. Several factors can be attributed to the distance between India and ASEAN during these years. First, the ASEAN was seen as an extension of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organisation (SEATO). The fact that the ASEAN had emerged as an anti-communist grouping at the height of the Vietnam War had given this impression. As the conflict moved to Cambodia, the ASEAN rallied its position in support of the view that Thailand had emerged as a frontline state after the Vietnamese intervention in Cambodia. While the ASEAN threw its weight behind the Coalition government of Democratic Kampuchea (CGDK), India's backing and recognition to the Heng Samrin government did not help bridge the growing gap between the two sides. For the ASEAN itself, this was a crucial period where issues of internal and external concern brought its member-states together-considerations of security at the national and regional levels were critical concerns. As a result the states sought to retain continuity and legitimacy of the political leadership, which thereby ensured domestic stability and economic development. Despite the fact that the proposed objective of forming this grouping was economic and cultural, there is no doubt the ASEAN from its inception had a framework for political and security issues that could address regional conflicts in Southeast Asia.

In the early 1990s, a policy shift occurred in India with regard to its relations with the ASEAN region that is marked by two significant events-first, the end of the Cold war and the resolution of the Cambodian conflict. Second, India's own foreign policy shift was evident when it announced its 'Look East Policy' in 1991. There have been certain key achievements with the policy, critical to any assessment of ties between India and the ASEAN. First, India has moved from being a Sectoral Dialogue partner in 1992 to becoming a Full Dialogue partner of the ASEAN in 1995. Second, within the framework of the two processes, the Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia-Pacific (CSCAP) and the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), both steered by the ASEAN members, India's position has allowed it to have a key role in the multilateral processes on security that are critical to the Asia-Pacific region and has consequently ensured that its security considerations are recognised by these multilateral groupings.

Third is a very significant step as it leads to the institutionalisation of the (ASEAN plus one) as a formal structure of the ASEAN's annual processes. Past assessments of the ASEAN reflect the fact that the process of institutionalisation is a significant step in the development of its ties with its summit partners. Moreover, at a time when the ASEAN is seeking to enhance its linkages with the key players in East Asia, viz. China, Japan and South Korea which are linked to the ASEAN through the (ASEAN plus three), its decision to invest in the (ASEAN plus one) initiative reflects the growing importance of India in the region-both in terms of its economic interests as well as the fact that it would be a significant player with regard to the regional security considerations.

Fourth, as far as the economic ties between the two are concerned there has been significant progress. The latest initiative by India to propose an India-ASEAN Free Trade Area within the next decade is a concrete step towards furthering the economic ties. However, certain issues need to be addressed. One of the most crucial steps would be to equalise the tariff rates between India and the ASEAN. Another important factor is that India has offered to lower its tariff considerations for the newer members of the ASEAN. India's offer of $10-million assistance to Cambodia and Laos will be seen as a promising step. There is an overwhelming need to integrate the four new members of the ASEAN-Vietnam, Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia-on a par with the original six member-nations and these steps will contribute towards that goal. India's efforts and cooperation is also being sought by the ASEAN on the entry of Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam into the WTO.

Fifth, while trade will be a significant aspect and India will find itself being driven into broader economic ties within the framework of the WTO and the global economic trends, security aspects and the significance of the balance of power will continue to dominate the region. There is the need for a combined effort to address the issue of terrorism and the ASEAN has suggested finding a framework for this within the ARF. Another significant aspect is that with the latest confessions from North Korea on its clandestine nuclear weapons programme, the security scenario within East Asia is likely to be of prime consideration. The perceptions of the ASEAN states vis-à-vis China will be balanced by the ASEAN 'looking west' towards India as a significant player in maintaining regional balance. While China has greater economic integration with the region, there still remains apprehension over the strategic role it will play in the future. One clear example of this is the recent agreement on the Spratley Island issue where Beijing has said any settlement should be without prejudice to its interests. Therefore, it will be critical for India to look at how China evolves within the ASEAN psyche. In the past, the capabilities of India's blue water navy and the Indian nuclear tests had created some apprehensions. But India's willingness to accede to the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia and its endorsement of the Southeast Asia Nuclear Weapons Free Zone (SEANWFZ) has gone a long way in assuring the region of India's intent. The ASEAN looks at India's security needs more as a factor emanating from the compulsions of the geopolitical position that India holds, rather than being a derivative of any hegemonic designs on India's part. INAV