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Political Diary
New Companies Bill:NECESSARY, BUT LET’S NOT RUSH,by Shivaji Sarkar, 23 January 2009 |
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Economic Highlights
New Delhi, 23 January 2009
New Companies Bill
NECESSARY, BUT LET’S NOT RUSH
By Shivaji Sarkar
The
Government appears to be in a hurry to pass the new Companies Bill introduced
in Parliament during last session. In the wake of the Satyam fraud its concern
is not out of place. However, it would be prudent to put off its passage as the
Bill may require additions and improvements following emergence of new aspects
daily.
As
of now, the Bill is with the Standing Committee for a thorough all-party
review. It should remain there for some time, notwithstanding the Lok Sabha
elections drawing closer. Obviously, the Government is under pressure to
showcase its will for corporate cleanliness before it goes to the electorate.
The
new bill is meant to replace the Companies Act 1956. It is a major exercise.
Once a bill is passed, amendments to it would involve another such exercise. The
Satyam incident has come as an eye-opener. Every day new facts and methods of
committing a long-term fraud are being unearthed. Each needs to be plugged and
dealt effectively. However, the new bill stresses more on penalties, which are
necessary. But provisions of penalties alone can not be a solution.
The
Satyam investigation has just begun. The Serious Fraud Investigation Office
(SFIO) is looking into eight subsidiaries of Satyam and all their financial
affairs. Estimate is that it would take at least three months to submit its
report. And, this is precisely the government’s problem as electioneering
around then would be at its peak. Its capacity to take decisions would undoubtedly
be under the scanner of the Election Commission’s model code of conduct.
Truly,
a catch 22 situation! The government wants to go to the electorate without any
stigma attached or handing over opportunities to the opposition. But it fails
to realize that the electorate is not so naïve. If the seriousness and
complication is explained, the people would understand.
One
can say that it is not just the failure of the law but also its implementation
procedures. After all, the past two decades of globalization have witnessed the
rise of “corporate power”. In addition, it has seen an increase in corporate
irresponsibility at a global level, with India being no exception. The
nation, like the global system too has been trying to learn how ingenious this corporate
world could be in defrauding.
The
corporate have taught the globe that they are unworthy of the sovereignty they
have been touting since the 60s. In fact, while the US debates, the corporate is busy bulldozing
all ethical concerns saying it is above national sovereignties. In reality, it
has become a trans-national affair to hoodwink all governments. World over they
have suffered and so has India.
Satyam
is not a stand alone case. Prior to it there have been massive frauds but were wished
away as “exceptions”. Some were swept under the carpet of Mumbai stock scams in
the past 15-odd years. But no stock scam is possible without the willful participation
of companies. And, in all these scams the names of a few companies came up
uniformly.
From
time to time, the methodology of some non-Indian MNCs too has been questioned. But
despite existing provisions in the Companies Act, it was rarely enforced. Even
in the present case we find that it is not restricted to Satyam. At least eight
other companies are active partners. The probe may very well throw up some more
names.
Clearly,
Sartyam has symptomised this corporate mindset. The new bill should make this
its hallmark. It needs to take care of the implementation process than a mere
addition of provisions, which might again remain in the books alone.
The
present bill has been drafted by a committee headed Dr JJ Irani. The Minister
for Company Affairs says it has simplified the procedure and that it would not
require to be amended by Parliament in case a change is required. What he is
implying is that the Companies Act 1956 has been amended 25 times and the new
procedure would obviate this process.
Simplification
should be welcome but not in this case. Amendments to laws are done in
Parliament so that a detailed scrutiny of the new procedure can be undertaken. Taking
this right of Parliament is inappropriate. It simply means that the bureaucrats
could make changes, thereby giving them not only undue and unnecessary powers but
also making them susceptible to corporate influence.
Of
course, Parliamentary procedures are a bit tardy but these are reliable and
always open to debate. On the other hand, bureaucratic decisions remain on files
and the deliberations too are often not made public. How then would one ensure
that the decisions would be fair? Even if they are, why should a devious method
be adopted to avoid parliamentary scrutiny, in effect people’s scrutiny, of a
new policy? The bill needs to scrap this provision as the common apprehension
is it could be misused. Worse, the very purpose for it being sought to be
introduced would in all probability be defeated. Are we trying to open another
can of worms while trying to shut one?
The
concept of introduction of Limited Liability Partnership (LLP) is also unclear.
Presently chartered accountants, company secretaries, lawyers, cost accountants
and others are not permitted to be partners. A CA cannot have a company
secretary as a partner. However, the new bill seeks to do away with it.
But
it is not as simple as it looks. Nobody is sure of the fall-out of such a change.
Nobody knows whether it would check fraud or make it easier? It requires a
detailed discussion before Parliament could accept the provision. The Standing
committee needs to deliberate on this further. This is not an issue that could
be passed because someone has proposed it. There are many ramifications.
The
new bill seeks to make the procedure of setting up a company simpler. It is
welcome. However, we have seen that even with complicated laws companies that
are set up do not enjoy credibility. During the past few years 1,50,000
companies opted for an exit route and got themselves delisted and names deleted
from the official list. These companies could register themselves despite what
is now being projected as complicated laws. If it is simplified it would
certainly not solve the problems. The chances are that many new ones may come up
and that the official system may be manipulated by the unscrupulous.
For
all these reasons, the Companies Bill needs to have a thorough re-look and be
thrown to open debate. Amending the bill is not just an economic question. Let
the nation not create an instrument and then repent or backtrack as for the many
laws that it has made. -INFA
(Copyright, India News and Feature Alliance)
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Lesson From Malegaon:PARTIES MUST TURN MIRROR INWARDS, by T.D. Jagadesan,21 January 2009 |
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Open Forum
New Delhi, 21 January 2009
Lesson From Malegaon
PARTIES MUST TURN
MIRROR INWARDS
By T.D. Jagadesan
The Malegaon
blast case is hotting up with the Maharashtra Police Anti-terrorism Squad
filing the chargesheet. Other than the case, all eyes would be on what the BJP does
and says. Will it continue to fumble and adopt double standards or will it
acknowledge the an extremist side of Hindutva?
Recall when Ravi Shankar Prasad, the BJP’s amiable
spokesperson, seemed strangely out of form at a press conference after the
arrests were made. It was unusual, so also the subject under discussion --- Hindutva’s
terror connection. A veteran of countless television study debates, Prasad stumbled
and stuttered unable to face the volley of questions on the revelations linking
a handful of Hindutuva, followers to terror attacks in Malegaon and other places.
Asked the hacks: what happened to the BJP’s stand that
terrorism brooked no leniency? The BJP had no qualms about labeling every
Muslim terror suspect as a terrorist; it campaigned for the return of the
draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act, which placed the burden of proof on the
accused. Yet it now wanted the presumption of innocence applied to terror
suspects from its own fold. Why? The party wanted the maximum freedom granted
to terror investigators so that they felt no pressure. Yet it now complained of
police excess. Why?
That was then, in the early days of some Hindutva warrior’s
newly-discovered terror links. As the Maharashtra ATS set off on the saffron
terror trail and arrested a gaggle of activists, among them Sadhvi Pragya Singh
and a serving army officer, the BJP seemed in shock. At a loss for a strategy
to deal with this unexpected twist in the terror plot, the party lurched from
one unclear position to another --- from the tried and tested “let the law take
its course” through outrightly denying the terror link to urging a fair trial
for the accused. Party strategists worried that they had lost the terrorism
plank, and wondered how the new revelations would play out in the electoral
arena.
Judging by the BJP-RSS’ current aggression, the moment of
self-doubt has passed. Evidently the Hindutva terror angle, which formerly
discomfited the parivar, has since become an opportunity to deepen the communal
divide. BJP Chief Rajnath Singh, who has been photographed with Pragya Singh,
earlier claimed that he was embarrassed to have been found in the same frame. Today, he is out on a link to defend her,
going so far as to call the arrest a “huge conspiracy”, and offering full
protection of his party.
The RSS’ initial restraint has similarly given way to
belligerence calculated to incite divisive passions. The crackdown on Pragya
Singh and others had sent the VHP’s Praveen Togadia into a torrent of abuse and
anger. Warning of reprisals against the ATS and the UPA government, he had fumed:
“they are committing the sin of describing a Sadhvi as a terrorist. I promise a
political backlash against this.”
The BJP’s others point, that arrests should be based on hard
evidence, is unexceptional, though this is an unprecedented first from a party,
which has never before attached any importance to evidence. “The Congress must
realize that terrorist investigations can be solved not through propaganda but
only through hard evidence and non-politicized investigation.”
A word of caution is necessary for the BJP’s opponents too.
This is not a moment for gloating or finding satisfaction over the involvement
of Hindutva elements in terrorism. Terrorism is serious, whether of the
Islamist or Hindutva variety, which is all the more reason to ensure that it
does not become a tool for settling political scores or to target the innocent.
It can be no rationale person’s case that investigation into Islamist terrorism
must be meticulous, impartial and transparent but that a wild goose chase is
permissible when the suspects are of Hindutva persuasion.
The BJP is fully within its rights to question the ATS on
the veracity of its findings. Yet this right by no means extends to threatening
the ATS or warning of a backlash. There is also the party’s blatant double
standard. When the Delhi police killed two Muslim terror suspects in an
encounter at Batla House, and made arrests from the neighbourhood, the BJP did
not wait a second to call all of them terrorists and angrily swung at human
rights activists who picked holes in the police version.
The party called Mushirul Hassan, Jamia Millia University
V-C, anti-national for his offer to provide legal assistance to the terror
suspects. It stuck to this, despite a clarification from him that the funds
were being privately arranged by students and teachers. Today, the BJP has
promised to arrange the best legal help for Pragya Singh and others.
If this is an irony, so is the fact that every
terrorism-related charge the party hurled at its political opponents is now
recoiling on it. Terrorism had been the BJP’s biggest plank, topping the agenda
at every party meet and providing the basis for its political resolutions. The
party contended that it alone had the will and inner strength to counter
terrorism, which posed the single-most potent threat to the country’s unity and
integrity.
From this vantage nationalist position, the BJP attacked its
opponents. The Congress and its allies were soft on terror because they coveted
the Muslim vote bank. Human rights activists and even some within the UPA were
openly sympathetic to Muslim terror suspects, offering them legal help,
countering the police claims and so on because they looked at terrorism from an
anti-national perspective.
Amidst all this, the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate, L K
Advani was heard summing up his party’s position on terrorism thus: “let me
make it absolutely clear that we shall never conduct ourselves in such a
short-sighted way that history would hold us guilty of not doing our duty at
the right time and in the right manner --- our vision is not limited by the
considerations of where our party will be after the next elections. Rather, it
extends to caring about where India will be after a hundred years, after a
thousand years.”
Has the BJP passed the test of the “right time” and “right
manner” set by its shadow Prime Minister? Clearly not. The “right manner” at
this “right time” would have been for it to openly acknowledge the possibility
of some extremist Hindutva elements being involved in terrorism while stressing
the importance of transparency in all investigations.
Such a stand would not have tainted the Hindu community. Far
from it, it would have strengthened Hindu society and underscored its
celebrated openness. Instead, the BJP and the Sangh have clung to a single
defence: That as nationalist forces they were above board, indeed that Hindus
could never be terrorists, much less Hindus who subscribed to cultural
nationalism.
This is an absurd claim. Gandhi’s assassin, Nathuram Godse,
was a product of cultural nationalism. The LTTE and the National Democratic
Front of Bodoland (suspected to be involved in the serial Assam blasts), are
not religious extremists but would loosely fill in the Hindu category.
For long the BJP and the Sangh have lamented the absence of
moderate, outspoken voices among Muslims, voices that would frontally confront
the reality of terrorism. It is true that Muslim have largely been in denial
about Islamist terrorism. But that situation is slowly but surely changing. The
evidence is in the unequivocal condemnation of terrorism by over 6000 clerics
at a meeting of Muslim clergy in Hyderabad last November. The BJP must follow
this bold lead rather than bury its head in the sand and believe in the
pristine purity of Hindutuva.
There is much more that is wrong with our approach to
terrorism. Investigative agencies have tended to talk loose and fast, leading
to too many quick-fix arrests. Last week, the Andhra government announced
compensation to at least 15 innocent Muslims who were wrongly arrested by the
Hyderabad police and tortured in custody. Cops on the Hindutva terror trail
have made many contradictory claims. Television channels that ran defamatory
stories about “Muslim terrorists” are now flooding the screens with salacious
details of the “sadhvi and the sant.”
For the challenge of terrorism to be squarely met we need
investigators who brag less and concentrate more on finding clinching evidence.
We need a more responsible media, and finally we need political parties that preach
less and have the courage to turn the mirror inward. –INFA
(Copyright, India News and Feature
Alliance)
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Shrine Board Controversy:MAKING GROUND FOR AMARNATH-II?, by Sant Kumar Sharma,27 January 2009 |
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Events & Issues
New Delhi, 27 January 2009
Shrine Board
Controversy
MAKING GROUND FOR
AMARNATH-II?
By Sant Kumar Sharma
The newly formed National Conference-Congress government in Jammu and Kashmir may
well be heading for troubled times, this time of its own making. The State
Congress Chief and Union Water Resources Minister Saifuddin Soz appears to have
laid the foundation for a huge controversy in the days to come, by requesting Governor
N N Vohra to include a member of the Buta Malik (a Muslim) family in the Shri
Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB).
Vohra, as the SASB chairman, had recently reconstituted the
board by nominating six eminent persons. Those included were Sri Sri
Ravishankar, Dr Kapila Vatsayan, noted environmentalist Sunita Narayan, Justice
(Retd.) G D Sharma, Pandit Bhajan Sopori
and Dr Ved Kumari Ghai. However, as there are some vacanies left, Soz wrote to
Vohra last week suggesting that a member of the Buta Malik family to fill one
such vacancy. But it is easier said than done as there are too many questions
that the demand is likely to raise.
The nominations were made by the Governor under Jammu and Kashmir Shri
Amarnath Ji Shrine Act, 2000 (Act No XVII of 2000), enforced vide SRO 54 dated
12.02.2001 with effect from 21.02.2001. By this Act, “the administration,
management and governance of the Shri Amarnath Ji Shrine and the Board fund” is
vested in a board “comprising a Chairman and not more than 10 members”.
Under the Act, “The Governor of the State of Jammu and
Kashmir, if he be a Hindu, shall be the ex-officio Chairman of the Board, and
if the Governor be not a Hindu, then he may nominate any eminent person of the
State, professing the Hindu religion, and otherwise qualified to be a Member to
function and the Chairman of the Board’’.
Therefore, it is crystal clear that the Governor himself (or
herself) cannot be the chairman if he or she is not a Hindu. The spirit of the
Act is thus plain and it does not allow for a Muslim to be a member of the SASB.
Regrettably, through his suggestion Soz has tried to subvert
this mandate, at a time when the relations between the Jammu
and the Kashmir regions are not at the very
best. In fact, his demand also has the potential to create further communal polarization.
Not just for a region, but for the entire state. Observers fear that if this
demand is fulfilled, the repercussions may be felt far and wide, way beyond the
State’s boundaries. After all, last year’s Amarnath land row and issues related
to the shrine have had the potential to stir Hindus all over India and even
abroad.
Incidentally, Buta Malik is credited with having
rediscovered the cave
of Shri Amarnath in 1850
and for 150 years, the members of his family were associated with the conduct
of the annual Amarnath pilgrimage till the creation of Shri Amarnath Shrine
Board. When the board was created, the hereditary rights of the family over the
affairs of the Amarnath shrine were taken away.
Incidentally, simultaneously with the Buta Malik family, the
rights of the Dashnami Akhara, which
is the custodian of the Chhari Mubarak
(holy mace) of Shri Amarnath Ji, in the chadhava
(offerings by devotees) were extinguished.
All this was done through none lese than a legislation duly
passed in the State Legislative Assembly. The National Conference President
Farooq Abdullah was then the Chief Minister and since then, no Muslim has ever
been a member of the Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB).
What is the logic of Soz’s demand in seeking representation
for a Muslim on board the governing body of a Hindu shrine? The way governing
bodies associated with affairs of various religious denominations are being run
members of the respective religions or sects run their affairs without
interference from anyone.
The Shaivite Hindus run their affairs according to Shaivite
practices just as Vaishnavites run their own affairs according to their own
beliefs. Similarly, the Protestants and Catholics run their own affairs and the
members of one sect are not allowed to participate in governing boards of
another, leave aside religion.
In the Muslim community, the divide is along sectarian lines
and the Shias and the Sunnis have separate Wakf boards. As the names denote,
the Shia wakf boards are run by Shia Muslims alone and the Sunni wakfs are run
by Sunni Muslims. No Shia is a member of a Sunni board or vice versa. Even in the
case of Sikhs, the affairs of the community are conducted by the Sikh Gurudwara
Prabandhak Committee (SGPC) and nobody else but a Sikh can be a member of its governing
body.
All across India, traditions shows that there is no place
where members of one community or followers of one religion or another
participate in governing the affairs of another community. The Congress must
watch out its electoral prospects in the coming Lok Sabha elections. They might
just get seriously compromised if a Muslim is made a member of the Shri
Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB).
Remember that when Shri Mata Vaishno Devi Shrine Board
(SMVDSB) was created in 1986, the hereditary rights of the Baridaars (descendents of Pandit Shridhar, the founder of the holy
cave shrine) were extinguished. What is so special about the so-called “rights”
of Buta Malik family, which the Congress State President is trying to get
restored?
Those aware of the request are a worried lot because if the demand
is conceded, it has all the potential of fanning communal passions in the Jammu
region for sure (as also elsewhere in India among the Hindus). By airing his
views in this manner, the Union Minister may have scored some brownie points
with some sections in Kashmir but in the process has rubbed the Hindus the
wrong way.
A word of caution is thus necessary for young Omar
Abdullah’s Government. The Governor can ill afford to concede to such a demand
and the Congress should not push for it. If it does, the State can as well say
goodbye to any hopes of a bumper tourist season in the coming months as the
foundations of Amarnath II would have been laid firmly. Building up an
agitation on the basis of appointment of a Muslim on a Hindu shrine board will
not be a difficult task for the 11 opposition legislators of the BJP. It should
not be forgotten that the people voted for peace
With the next round of elections, the Lok Sabha poll, round
the corner, there is no better way to fan communal passions than implementing
Soz’s suggestion. Years ago his single vote, in defiance of the National
Conference whip, had toppled Vajpayee’s government.
It is even more pertinent to remember that far from becoming
weaker the BJP had come back to power and completed a full five-year tenure in
the office at the Centre in the following general election. Another aspect worth
remembering is that Ghulam Nabi Azad’s Congress-led government had bowed out of
office on the issue of Amarnath land row. The NC-Congress combine does not need
enemies, specially not at the every beginning. ---INFA
(Copyright, India News and Feature
Alliance)
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Introduction of Bt Brinjal:WILL IT OUTGROW THE CONTROVERSY?, by Radhakrishna Rao,19 January 2009 |
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EVENTS & ISSUES
New
Delhi, 19 January 2009
Introduction
of Bt Brinjal
WILL
IT OUTGROW THE CONTROVERSY?
By Radhakrishna
Rao
Silently and quite efficiently, efforts are
on to introduce a genetically-engineered version of brinjal, a popular and
widely-consumed vegetable that figures prominently on meal menus across regions
and social classes, even as the controversy over the poor performance of the
Bt.cotton introduced earlier continues to be in focus.
As social activists, environmental
researchers and a section of the agricultural scientists point out, it is for
the first time that a genetically modified vegetable is being permitted to go
through the field trials without studying the pros and cons of introducing a
vegetable carrying an alien genetic material. For the current scientific
literature on the effect of GM (genetically modified) food on human health is
not sure and clear about the nature and extent of the effect exerted by the
genetically engineered food on the human well being.
Everything is going as planned and Bt.brinjal
is expected to hit the market in a year’s time. But then what gives an ominous
tone to the introduction of Bt.brinjal is the recent scientific study in Australia,
which says that consumption of GM food could be one of the contributing factors
to the increasing incidence of infertility.
In Europe,
where there is a strong public opinion against the GM food, US agrochemical
giants have not been able to make much headway in promoting their genetically
engineered food products. For instance, in Switzerland, the moratorium on
introducing genetically engineered food
was extended on public demand. In Italy
and Austria,
government-funded studies have gone to show adverse impact of growing and
consuming GM food.
Scientists at the Hyderabad-based Centre
for Sustainable Agriculture wonder why there are no independent studies aimed
at evaluating the impact of GM food from a variety of angles or an effort at
labeling GM food products in India.
Not labeling the products would imply that consumers will be left with no
choice in so far as picking the food products is concerned.
Significantly, the research and field
studies for the development of Bt.brinjal is done in Bangalore and Dharwad in Karnataka. Meanwhile,
reports appearing in a section of the media point out that Maharastra Hybrid
Seed Company(Mahyco), which is the
Indian marketing arm for the US agrochemical and biotechnology giant Monsanto,
has already received approval for the seed production of Bt.brinjal. However, the claim that
Bt.brinjal would help end poverty is being questioned by experts familiar with
the GM crops. Experience with Bt.cotton has already gone to show that with a
heavy input cost including the purchase of seeds every sowing season, the
farmer stands to gain little.
A fear expressed by some experts is that Bt.brinjal,
which is engineered by the introduction of a gene from soil bacterium with a
view to insulate it against the shoot and fruit borer, could prove an
environmental hazard in the long run. Besides, there are a number of local and
high- yielding varieties such as Pusa Kranti and Pusa Navkiran brought out by
New Delhi-based Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) which are quite
popular with farmers. So the big question is: why the need for Bt.brinjal? The
answer could be that brinjal is also an important ingredient in some of the
ayurvedic preparations.
Meanwhile, Mahyco has been charged with
impropriety while going through the animal study aimed at assessing the impact
of Bt.brinjal. There is an apprehension that Cry IAc gene isolated from the
soil bacterium and introduced into brinjal could have negative impact on the
human system. Moreover, no cost benefit analysis of going in for Bt.brinjal
cultivation has been carried out so far. As pointed out it is also important to
investigate the cost benefit ratio for the farmers to arrive at a valid
conclusion as to whether or not the new technology is economically viable.
With the Bt.cotton under cultivation for a
couple of years already facing pest infestation, there is an apprehension that
Bt.brijal too may become vulnerable to the pest attack. In this context, the ICAR has already
developed technology for non-chemical management of brinjal. Pest management is
possible without chemical pesticides. Also, it’s ridiculous to suggest that an
increase in brinjal production can address the issue of poverty. And the long
term fall outs of consuming GM food are not yet fully understood.
Incidentally, field studies have shown that
pest resistance to Bt.cotton was witnessed in some parts of the country in the
very first year of the planting. Similarly, scientific evaluation of the GM
crops has shown that their cultivation has increased the incidence of some fungi
and secondary pests, which were not a major problem earlier. Similarly, the
pollen grains from GM crops planted in one field can adversely affect the non
GM crops in the adjoining fields.
Sometime last year, Balsaheb Thorat, the
Maharastra Minister for Agriculture had stated that Bt cotton was a failure in
Vidarbha, once considered the cotton belt of India. And accordingly some analysts
feel that Bt.cotton amounts to pushing farmers into a veritable booby trap. As
per an official report of Andhra Pradesh Government on the performance of
Bt.cotton in 2002—the first year of its commercialization—in North Telangana
region the net income from Bt.varieties was lot more less that income generated
from the local non Bt.varieties.
Similarly, an in-depth article carried in
Current Science says that India’s Bt.cotton technology is faulty and will fail
to protect against the widespread menace of bollworm infestation. The article
based on an extensive field study carried out by the Central Institute for
Cotton Research (CICR) says that because Bt.toxin expression is lower than the
required level, the threat of bollworm infestation continues to loom large.
Moreover, the bollworm is not susceptible to Cry IAc toxin exuded by Bt.cotton.
Moreover, this study says that the poor performance and less than expected
yield of Bt.cotton in India is mainly due to the fact that it is being produced
as hybrid containing only one copy of the Bt.gene as against the two copies of
the Bt.gene.
Even as the opposition to GM food products
continues to persist, Monsanto is working on developing genetically-engineered
versions of corn and soyabean. These varieties are known to be resistant to
drought and insects. Moreover, they are claimed to give best value to the
farmers developing high-yielding GM varieties that can be grown under water
stress conditions with low production cost to be the biggest challenge of the
next decade. Let’s wait and watch if the claim is proved right.---INFA
(Copyright, India
News and Feature Alliance)
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‘Business’ Of Illegal Migrants:IT’S TIME TO BELL THE CAT, by Poonam I Kaushish, 17 January 2009 |
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POLITICAL DIARY
New Delhi, 17 January 2009
‘Business’ Of
Illegal Migrants
IT’S TIME TO BELL
THE CAT
By Poonam I Kaushish
The chickens seem to be coming home to roost. This adage
rang true last week with the out-of the-blue statement by the Union Home
Minister Chidambaram that “illegal migrants had no business to be in India. I don’t
regard a Bangladeshi as a Muslim or a non-Muslim. He is Bangladeshi. He has no
business to come to India
unless he has a visa. He has no business to live here unless he has a resident
permit. He has no business to work here unless he has a work permit.”
Did one hear right? Does Chidambaram really mean business? Has
New Delhi
finally woken up to grim realities and changed its mind and tune? Are happy
days here again for the picturesque, though largely neglected North-East? Or,
should one dismiss this as another ploy to hoodwink the ‘asli Bharatvaasi’ and the Supreme
Court on the Union Government’s lackadaisical attitude to protect the
North-East from “external aggression”.
Last week, the Apex
Court sharply rapped the Centre for making little
progress in issuing multi-purpose national citizen cards and fencing the
border. It also sought details about the tribunals’ set-up under the Foreigners
Act and the number of illegal migrants deported from Assam and other parts of the
country.
Either way one looks at this, it is the first time that any
Congress Home Minister has talked of the menace -- of illegal migrants, over 25
million illegal Bangladeshis, without communalizing the issue. If he genuinely
intends eradicating this scourge he needs to be applauded and supported.
Paradoxically, even as all the parties swear by secularism,
competition for the minority votebank has consistently communalised the issue.
Most parties have recklessly imported them to inflate their vote banks. Bypassing
the ugly reality that illegal migrants have completely changed Assam’s
demographic landscape, threatened the livelihood and the identity of the
indigenous people.
Recall, after the Supreme Court struck down the Illegal
Migrants (Detection by Tribunal) Act (IMDT), which was brazenly pro-migrant and
prejudicial to the interests of the genuine Assamese, in 2005 the UPA
Government amended the Foreigners Act to woo the minorities (read Muslims). Unlike
in the case of the rest of the country, wherein the onus of proof of not being
an illegal migrant is on the accused foreigner, the changed law shifted the
burden of proof in the case of Assam
from the accused to the complainant, as under the IMDT Act.
What has brought about the welcome change now in the
Government’s speak? The recent terror attacks and its serious security
implications whereunder various anti-India outfits, specially Pakistan’s ISI, are increasingly using Bangladesh as its base to infiltrate terror into
India
in the garb of migrants. With no method of differentiating between a militant
and an immigrant a grave security threat is posed.
Not only that. There are over 200 ISI camps operating across
the border. The ISI has sent many Bangladeshis to undergo training as saboteurs
in Pakistan.
According to RAW sources, the ISI has unleashed “Operation PINCODE” to bring
the entire North East under Islamic rule. With Bangladesh in the throes of a
low-key Talibanization, this spells double trouble. Stated a senior defence
official, “The situation is more serious on our eastern border than on the
western front."
This is borne out by the 42-page report of former Governor
of Assam,
Lt Gen SK Sinha in March 1998 to the then President KR Narayanan. He stated:
“Demographic changes are eroding the socio-religious fabric, bases and
sanctuaries are mushrooming for trans-border support for secessionist and
separatist insurgency movements. With 6000 Bangladeshis daily crossing the
border, the environment is conducive to the seeding and development of local
bases for the ISI and Al Qaeda who are working for the disintegration of India.”
Worse. “The long cherished design of Greater Bangladesh
making inroads into the strategic land link of Assam with the rest of India can
lead to severing the entire land mass of the North-East from the rest of the
country.” As things stand today, the scale of infiltration is such that eight
districts of Assam
have Bangladeshi Muslim majority. Over 85% of the total encroached forest land
is with Bangladeshis and 50 of the 126 Assembly Constituencies are their
stronghold.
According to intelligence reports, “In the 70 years between
1901 and 1971, Assam’s
population increased from 3.29 million to 14.6 million – a 343.77 % increase”
over a period when the population of India went up by only about 150 per
cent! Further, the Muslim growth rate in areas bordering Bangladesh was
more than 60 per cent compared to the districts far away, where the growth rate
varied between 30 and 50 per cent (1971-1991). Clearly, this unnatural growth
is a byword for illegal migrants
Seven districts of Bihar,
the North East and Rajasthan have been affected as a result of large-scale illegal
migration. Even the Union Capital has over 5 lakhs and Maharashtra
over 50,000 illegal Bangladeshi migrants. Tripura is a tragic example of the
obliteration of the local identity. In Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh too,
illegal Bangladeshis have taken full advantage of our lax laws to secure ration
cards. From rag pickers to domestic help, agriculture workers to
rickshaw-pullers et al are mostly Bangladeshis.
Importantly, the time has come to make a clear distinction
between the genuine Indian and the Bangladeshi migrants. True, the Home Minister has minced no words of crying a halt to
the influx from across the border, detect and deport the illegal migrants. But
he would require the support of the entire polity.
For starters, the Home Ministry needs to come out with a
White Paper disclosing the harsh facts and spelling out the Government’s plans
to combat it. For this, the Centre would need to adopt a two-pronged strategy: Those with ration cards and those who have
sneaked into the voters list should be asked to produce their birth
certificates and proofs of lineage. Today most Bangladeshis flaunt ration cards
to avoid deportation.
Two, all bonafide citizens must be issued multi-purpose
identity cards to establish their Indian identity. If necessary, Bangladeshis could be issued work permits for two
years. With a firm rider: no voting rights and no permanent settlement. North
Block also needs to look at its immigration laws and plug the loopholes.
From the long term point of view, our politicians will have
to cry a halt to vote-bank politics. Easier said than done, given that power
and politicians are indivisible. But they need to realize that in matters of
national security there is no place for communal agendas or narrow sectarian
politics. In practical terms, the
need of the hour is strict policing and border management.
Fencing the border is not the answer as the BDR immediately
removes the barbed wire. Local people need to be recruited for policing along
the 4,990 kms porus border. The fact is that if one cannot stop infiltrators at
the border, then there is no way one can push them back. Crucial in view of
Dhaka’s refusal time and again to admit that any of its nationals have
illegally migrated to India.
Is the Government capable of defusing this powder keg? Mere assurances of being pro-active will no
longer do. It may be necessary to launch a series of major offensives to drive
home the message to the illegal immigrants.
The need of the hour is to understand the seriousness, deal assertively with
the issues and set up time-bound measures once and for all. Clearly, it is time
to bell the big fat cat of illegal migrants. ----INFA
(Copyright India News and Feature Alliance)
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