India’s leap of faith for food security

India’s leap of faith for food security India’s truly landmark Food Security Bill to fight poverty and malnutrition which cleared its passage through parliament this August ( 26 August 2013) promises food security to 800 million people or two-thirds of its population at virtually throw away prices. Billed as the world’s largest welfare programme, it promises 75% of the country’s rural population and 50% of urban population rice at Rs 3 (7US cents or 5p) a kg, wheat at Rs 2 a kg and coarse grains at Rs 1 a kg. And it’s not just a promise, it’s already being delivered in parts of the country. Over the coming weeks and months it will cover the entire nation. Pushed through against the given wisdom of the economists of World Bank, IMF and their allied tribes in India and elsewhere, it sets out a model of human development from grassroots upwards rather than trickle-down palliatives to save lives or improve living standards. But economists like Nobel Laureate Amaratiya Sen and Professor Jean Dreze have broadly backed it, even though it falls short of their expectations. In fact, Prof Dreze resigned from the National Advisory Council of Congress president Sonia Gandhi because the bill did not go far enough or was not comprehensive enough. Shortcomings notwithstanding, it’s a leap of faith against dire warnings of the cost of food subsidy which could top Rs 1 lakh crore ($20 billion) a year. And it’s a leap of faith for India’s current coalition United Progressive Alliance government led by the Congress party which in turn is headed by Sonia Gandhi. It’s also the fulfilment of the party’s promise which it made in 2009 when the UPA returned to power for its second consecutive term of five years. Speaking on the final day of debate in Parliament Mrs Gandhi said: "Some people ask - do we have the resources for such a legislation? I would like to say, the question is not about resources; we will have to manage resources for this." . "The question is not if we can do this. We have to do this," she told MPs and urged them to pass the welfare measure which was part of the “empowerment revolution” for the people of the country and deserved unanimous support. The UPA had unveiled its bold welfare vision for the Aam Admi or the Common Man by launching Narega, the 100-day guaranteed rural job plan for all adults in villages across the country midway through its first five year term which began in 2004. The jobs scheme, which covered the entire country by the end of the first term, lifted the wages and spirits of rural workers in an unprecedented sweep and proved a major factor in swinging the 2009 election for the UPA . Unfazed by the barrage of corruption charges but buoyed by the people’s response to its welfare programmes, the UPA has definitively launched the second tranche of its welfare strategy in the shape of the just cleared Food Security Bill. This latest initiative has all the makings of an election swinger in 2014 and could win a hat trick for the UPA. It could indeed be a “game changer” politically for the parties and economically for the Aam Admi. Sushma Swaraj, the BJP leader of the opposition in the Lok Sabha, may have tried to make fun of the Food Security Bill by calling it “Vote Security Bill” but her party still saw the wisdom of voting for it. Any party voting against it could see itself branded as anti-people. As a result nearly 300 pin prick amendments were dismissed and the bill was carried by a voice vote.

Kashmir: A Northern Ireland type solution

Kashmir: A Northern Ireland type solution by Subhash Chopra (written in 2010) The stone pelters and ‘Azadi’ chanters of the Vale of Kashmir are in the news (summer 2010) for all the inspired reasons, thanks to the personalities and powers behind them. The tragic maelstrom into which the impressionable youth of Srinagar and adjoining areas on the Indian side of the Line of Control have been drawn has already taken a toll of over 50 lives since early June this year(2010). And every fatal casualty is turned into mourners procession accompanied by yet more fiery speeches in the name of God, religion, ‘Azadi’ or ‘freedom’ by the likes of Syed Ali Shah Geelani, the leader of the hardline Islamist faction of the separatist Hurriyat conglomeration which has always shied away from fighting elections. The pictures are dramatic and the television and print media of India is in the forefront for portraying the patently anti-Indian activity, giving a lie to the human rights pundits across the LoC and sympathisers abroad a barrage of anti-Indian allegations accusing India of perpetuating state terror, curfewed nights, mass murders and worse. Very few bother about revealing the easily visible factors behind the pictures. The stone pelters are portrayed as peaceful marchers, forgetting the brutal reality that stones too can maim and kill. The stone throwers don’t just stop there, they burn buses and police posts and whatever comes their way. Yet they must be met with the greatest care. However provocative and misguided, they are our brothers and sisters, and sons and daughters. Dialogue which seems to be failing should not be abandoned. Protesters should be cooled with huge showers of water cannon in the valley which has plenty of water, followed by tear gas rather than bullets. And bullets, if at all needed, should be of the rubber bullet type. Police and other security personnel should be rigorously trained to hit below the knee to disable them, avoiding fatal injury. Live bullets should be the very last resort, only against klashnikov militants and grenade throwers. For in the ultimate analysis every person’s death diminishes all of us. Tragically media quite often becomes part of the propaganda in the name of press freedom. Instead of balancing the story, the pictures are laced with incendiary commentaries and broadcast as the full story which at best is only half the story. The other half of the story, voiced by the anti-Azadi and anti-Jihadi population of Kashmir is quietly given the go-by. The anti-‘Azadi’ voices come from large parts of Kashmir, especially from the Hindu-majority Jammu and Buddhist majority Leh region of Ladakh and the Shia-Muslim majority of Kargil region of Ladakh. And within the paradise valley too there are muffled voices muzzled by foreign funded and gun-toting Islamist militants. And what does this vu vu zela of ‘Azadi’ mean? There is no single meaning or interpretation offered even by its proponents. The literal translation of Azadi may mean freedom but in the Kashmir context it means different things to different people. For Hurriyat’s Geelani faction it certainly means a hardline, Sunni Islamist Kashmir as part of Pakistan. For a much greater number of Kashmiri Muslims ( 43 per cent according to a recent poll) , Azadi has come to mean an independent Kashmir, independent both of India and Pakistan. The poll conducted on both sides of Kashmir by British think tank Chatham House found that only two percent of the Muslim majority state of Jammu and Kashmir on the Indian side would like to join Pakistan. In other words 98 per cent of the people of the state are against joining Pakistan. Even in the Pakistani-controlled Azad Kashmir region only 50 per cent voted in favour of Pakistan. It is reasonable to infer that in a more free climate, considerably less than 50 per cent would plump for Pakistan. Given the history of Pakistan’s performance as a state very few would cast their lot with it. The demand for Azadi or independence is not universal in the whole of Kashmir. Nor is it a practical proposition in view of the long history of the issue and the religious and political ramifications both in India and Pakistan. India cannot agree to a second partition of the country on the disastrous religious grounds. Nor can Pakistan let Kashmir go out of its “strategic depth”, to use an alternative word for control. Yet the people of Kashmir, all sections including the quarter million Pandits ethnically cleansed out of the valley by the Islamists and the Sikhs who are currently being threatened to quit the valley– not just the ‘Azadi’ chanters, must be part of any settlement. The elected representatives of the two sides of Kashmir could join the negotiations between India and Pakistan, making it a four-way search for a settlement. The ground reality in Kashmir is that there are not just two voices in Kashmir – one pro-Pakistani and jihadi, the other pro-India. There are many voices that make up Kashmiryat – a historically secular culture which itself is part of the sub-continent’s composite culture – that is being sought to be extinguished by religious militants. Given the diversity of participants and regional interests, no solution can be acceptable to all or any single group, just as the 1947 partition of India was not wholly acceptable to any side. It was unacceptable to Congress-led India to whom division was anathema; it was unacceptable to Muslim League led by Mr Jinnah to whom a country without corridor linking eastern and western parts meant a moth-eaten Pakistan; and it was unacceptable to Britain which wanted to leave a united country and united army. Yet all three sides had to swallow the bitter pill and reach a compromise for a divided India falling massively short of an ideal solution. Similarly for Kashmir all interested parties will have to be satisfied with some compromise. The search for a compromise solution has been attempted, with political leaders looking amenable to some formula. Back in 1980s, Indian prime minister Rajiv Gandhi and Pakistan prime minister Benazir Bhutto had established a kind of rapport which held promise for the future. In fact many years after Mr Gandhi’s assassination and during Ms Bhutto’s exile, she told a media gathering in New Delhi that the India-Pakistan entente could be achieved while the Kashmir issue could be left for future resolution. The same kind of solution was voiced by her husband Asif Ali Zardari soon after taking over as President of Pakistan, but had to retract under pressure from the country’s Army. Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and former Indian Prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee had also established a very promising rapport which was disrupted by the Kargil (Kashmir) war between the two countries. Fortunately the dialogue was resumed during the rule of General Musharraf despite his Kargil role. Gen Musharraf’s dealings with Vajpayee’s successor Prime minister Manmohan Singh signalled even greater promise of a compromise solution on Kashmir when Pakistan’s political developments overtook, resulting in his loss of power and office. According to Pakistan’s then foreign Minister, a Kashmir deal between India and Pakistan was only ‘a signature away.’ Whatever the strength of that optimistic assessment, Gen Musharraf’s ‘out of box’ search for solution had raised the hopes for a sort of compromise envisaging retention of line of control and de facto sovereign control across that line by each side but making borders irrelevant. The 1947-49 United Nations resolutions , he accepted, had become outdated, implying an end to the idea of a plebiscite for Kashmir joining either India or Pakistan. Gradual co-operation, consultation and eventual demilitarisation by the two sides of Kashmir was to be explored and trade and free movement of people allowed to flourish. A kind of Northern Ireland solution looked feasible on the horizon, though nobody used that terminology. The encouraging feature of this history of the Kashmir issue is that all major political power centres in Pakistan, including Pakistan Peoples Party, Muslim League (Nawaz Sharif) and even the military in Musharraf days have at one time or other moved toward a compromise solution on Kashmir. There is still hope for such a way out of the imbroglio, only if ‘Azadi’ and ‘human rights’ promoters and instigators behind the misguided stone pelters can be held back. ................................................................................................

Jihadi attacks sabotage Indo-Pak-Afghan talks

Jihadi attacks sabotage Indo-Pak-Afghan talks By Subhash Chopra The killing of five Indian soldiers in Kashmir by state or non-state jihadis and the Taliban attack targeting the Indian Consulate in Jalalabad, east of Kabul, within the first week of this month ( August 2013) are a triple Samjhota sabotage – aimed at destroying peace prospects among India , Pakistan and Afghanistan. The Pakistani authorities, as expected, have denied any hand in the deadly skirmish in the Poonch sector. The Taliban too have routinely denied any part in the Jalalabad attack that missed the Indian target but killed 12 Afghans, including eight children in a nearby school. The brazen attacks are clearly timed to torpedo current efforts of the leaders of the three countries trying to give a new push for peace in the region following the emergence of the new government of Pakistan led by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. Just days earlier Pakistan Prime Minister had sent special envoys to Afghanistan and India to renew the peace process. He had sent senior diplomat and civil servant Sartaj Aziiz to Kabul as a personal envoy to President Hamid Karzai to douse the fires of suspicion and mutual recrimination that have become the norm between the two countries over the past several years. It was and is a timely gesture to reduce the immense distrust that has developed between the two neighbours. In a parallel move towards India, the eastern neighbour, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif sent Mr Shahriyar Khan, a senior and seasoned diplomat and uncle of the late cricketer Tiger Pataudi, to New Delhi with special greetings for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and other leaders to kick start closer relations on which both leaders are already agreed. Nawaz Sharif’s public declarations for stronger ties with India before and after Pakistan’s recent elections have gravely discomfited pro-Taliban elements in several quarters in Pakistan. The attacks are clearly designed to cast a big shadow over the meetings of the Indian , Pakistani and Afghan leaders on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly session next month in New York. Nawaz Sharif’s repeated declarations to improve trade relations with India, including possible purchase of electric power, have sorely disturbed fanatical elements, many of whom are in quite high places within the Pakistan establishment. His refusal to mention the thorny issue of Kashmir during his election campaign has not been forgotten by the militant elements. In fact, his search for peace with India goes long back to his earlier stint as Prime Minister when he invited former inidian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in what is fondly remembered in both countries as the halcyon days of bus diplomacy of 1998. That was before he was toppled from power and exiled. This time he has returned with a solid mandate but he still needs to be wary of saboteurs who regard India as eternal enemy and consider Afghanistan as a protectorate providing ‘strategic depth’ to Pakistan. Another key element of this sabotage was the easy movement of people between India and Pakistan following the new implementation of the facility of no prior visas for senior citizens above 60 years crossing the borders. All that hassle of travelling long distances and endlessly waiting at the mercy of babus and clerks could hopefully become a thing of the past. Coming back to the Jalalabad attackers who have fired this warning shot at the peace makers in the three countries, it is safe to presume that they are a Taliban faction, whether supported by rogue elements in Pakistan’s ISI or acting independently. Whether they are the Haqqani faction or some other group is immaterial. It is equally certain that the attackers find Jalalabad an easy target as it is a short drive from the Afghanistan – Pakistan border behind which they have safe sanctuary ,indeed militarised power houses. ..........................................................................................................