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)

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)

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)

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)