Divorce cases in Mumbai soar 86% in less than 10 years

Viju B, TNN | Jul 27, 2011, 01.09AM IST

MUMBAI: As the stigma around divorce dissolves steadily, an increasing number of couples in the city are choosing to end their marriage, sometimes soon after exchanging their wedding vows. Between 2009 and 2010, the number of divorces in Mumbai rose from 4,624 to 5,245, a spike of over 13%. Last year's figure is even more startling when compared to 2002's statistic of 2,805 - this means that the number of divorces has climbed by more than 86% in less than a decade.

Social scientists and psychiatrists explain this as a sign that the till-death-do-us-apart class of marriage is under strain. "Young couples marry impulsively and separate equally spontaneously. Divorce is now seen more as a corrective mechanism and a way to move forward in life," says psychiatrist Harish Shetty. Shetty states financial independence, multiplicity of relationships and ample career opportunities as some of the reasons for the increase.

"Gone are the days when the mother-in-law was the villain. Now you alone can save or break a relationship," he says. 'For today's women, divorce no longer carries a stigma'

As the number of divorce cases in the city rise, psychiatrist Harish Shetty cites financial independence and more career opportunities as some of the reasons behind this trend. There are enough instances to back Shetty's assertion.

Varsha Bhosle, who is in her late 20s, decided to end her two-year marriage after she realized that she and her husband "did not have any time for each other". Both of them worked in an IT firm at Malad. What proved the catalyst for the divorce was the husband's choice to move cities. "He wanted me to shift to Pune too. But I felt I had better career choices here. We were both ambitious anyway," Varsha says.

Kusum Singh, a financial consultant, got separated from her husband in January. "It was not that my husband was a bad person. But somehow we just drifted apart and I began seeing someone else. I felt bad for my husband, but after the initial heartburn even he understood ours was a loveless relationship," Singh says.

Lawyers say a major reason for the rise in divorces is that women have become more independent, financially and emotionally. They do not feel that ending their marriage would bring upon them a lifelong stigma. A majority of young couples these days, in fact, separate by mutual consent. "This saves them from the headache of going to court many times. One can get a divorce within six months and maybe two hearings," says Sajal Chacha, a family court lawyer.

Chacha adds there have been cases where young couples have divorced within six months or a year of marriage. "Elders in the family have become more accommodating and do not force their children into a second marriage if the first one fails," she says.

How to wipe out Islamic terror

Subramanian Swamy | Saturday, July 16, 2011in the DNA

The terrorist blast in Mumbai on July 13, 2011, requires decisive soul-searching by the Hindus of India. Hindus cannot accept to be killed in this halal fashion, continuously bleeding every day till the nation finally collapses. Terrorism I define here as the illegal use of force to overawe the civilian population to make it do or not do an act against its will and well-being.
Islamic terrorism is India’s number one problem of national security. About this there will be no doubt after 2012. By that year, I expect a Taliban takeover in Pakistan and the Americans to flee Afghanistan. Then, Islam will confront Hinduism to “complete unfinished business”. Already the successor to Osama bin Laden as al-Qaeda leader has declared that India is the priority target for that terrorist organisation and not the USA.
Fanatic Muslims consider Hindu-dominated India “an unfinished chapter of Islamic conquests”. All other countries conquered by Islam 100% converted to Islam within two decades of the Islamic invasion. Undivided India in 1947 was 75% Hindu even after 800 years of brutal Islamic rule. That is jarring for the fanatics.

In one sense, I do not blame the Muslim fanatics for targeting Hindus. I blame Hindus who have taken their individuality permitted in Sanatan Dharma to the extreme. Millions of Hindus can assemble without state patronage for the Kumbh Mela, completely self-organised, but they all leave for home oblivious of the targeting of Hindus in Kashmir, Mau, Melvisharam and Malappuram and do not lift their little finger to help organise Hindus. If half the Hindus voted together, rising above caste and language, a genuine Hindu party would have a two-thirds majority in Parliament and the assemblies.
The first lesson to be learnt from the recent history of Islamic terrorism against India and for tackling terrorism in India is that the Hindu is the target and that Muslims of India are being programmed by a slow reactive process to become radical and thus slide into suicide against Hindus. It is to undermine the Hindu psyche and create the fear of civil war that terror attacks are organised.
Hindus must collectively respond as Hindus against the terrorist and not feel individually isolated or, worse, be complacent because he or she is not personally affected. If one Hindu dies merely because he or she was a Hindu, then a bit of every Hindu also dies. This is an essential mental attitude, a necessary part of a virat (committed) Hindu.
We need a collective mindset as Hindus to stand against the Islamic terrorist. The Muslims of India can join us if they genuinely feel for the Hindu. That they do I will not believe unless they acknowledge with pride that though they may be Muslims, their ancestors were Hindus. If any Muslim acknowledges his or her Hindu legacy, then we Hindus can accept him or her as a part of the Brihad Hindu Samaj (greater Hindu society) which is Hindustan. India that is Bharat that is Hindustan is a nation of Hindus and others whose ancestors were Hindus. Others, who refuse to acknowledge this, or those foreigners who become Indian citizens by registration, can remain in India but should not have voting rights (which means they cannot be elected representatives).
Any policy to combat terrorism must begin with requiring each and every Hindu becoming a virat Hindu. For this, one must have a Hindu mindset that recognises that there is vyaktigat charitra (personal character) and rashtriya charitra (national character). For example, Manmohan Singh has high personal character, but by being a rubber stamp of a semi-literate Sonia Gandhi and waffling on all national issues, he has proved that he has no rashtriya charitra.
The second lesson for combating terrorism is that we must never capitulate or concede any demand, as we did in 1989 (freeing five terrorists in exchange for Mufti Mohammed Sayeed’s daughter Rubaiya) and in 1999, freeing three terrorists after the hijack of Indian Airlines flight IC-814.
The third lesson is that whatever and however small the terrorist incident, the nation must retaliate massively. For example, when the Ayodhya temple was sought to be attacked, we should have retaliated by re-building the Ram temple at the site.
According to bleeding heart liberals, terrorists are born or bred because of illiteracy, poverty, oppression, and discrimination. They argue that instead of eliminating them, the root cause of these four disabilities in society should be removed. This is rubbish. Osama bin laden was a billionaire. In the failed Times Square episode, failed terrorist Shahzad was from a highly placed family in Pakistan and had an MBA from a reputed US university.
It is also a ridiculous idea that terrorists cannot be deterred because they are irrational and willing to die. Terrorist masterminds have political goals and a method in their madness. An effective strategy to deter terrorism is to defeat those political goals and to rubbish them by counter-terrorist action.Thus, I advocate the following strategy to negate the political goals of Islamic terrorism in India.
Goal 1: Overawe India on Kashmir.
Strategy: Remove Article 370 and resettle ex-servicemen in the valley. Create Panun Kashmir for the Hindu Pandit community. Look for or create an opportunity to take over PoK. If Pakistan continues to back terrorists, assist the Baluchis and Sindhis to get their independence.

Goal 2: Blast temples, kill Hindu devotees.
Strategy: Remove the masjid in Kashi Vishwanath temple and the 300 masjids at other temple sites.
Goal 3: Turn India into Darul Islam.
Strategy: Implement the uniform civil code, make learning of Sanskrit and singing of Vande Mataram mandatory, and declare India a Hindu Rashtra in which non-Hindus can vote only if they proudly acknowledge that their ancestors were Hindus. Rename India Hindustan as a nation of Hindus and those whose ancestors were Hindus.
Goal 4: Change India’s demography by illegal immigration, conversion, and refusal to adopt family planning.
Strategy: Enact a national law prohibiting conversion from Hinduism to any other religion. Re-conversion will not be banned. Declare that caste is not based on birth but on code or discipline. Welcome non-Hindus to re-convert to the caste of their choice provided they adhere to the code of discipline. Annex land from Bangladesh in proportion to the illegal migrants from that country staying in India. At present, the northern third from Sylhet to Khulna can be annexed to re-settle illegal migrants.
Goal 5: Denigrate Hinduism through vulgar writings and preaching in mosques, madrassas, and churches to create loss of self-respect amongst Hindus and make them fit for capitulation.
Strategy: Propagate the development of a Hindu mindset.
India can solve its terrorist problem within five years by such a deterrent strategy, but for that we have to learn the four lessons outlined above, and have a Hindu mindset to take bold, risky, and hard decisions to defend the nation. If the Jews could be transformed from lambs walking meekly to the gas chambers to fiery lions in just 10 years, it should not be difficult for Hindus in much better circumstances (after all we are 83% of India), to do so in five years.
Guru Gobind Singh showed us how just five fearless persons under spiritual guidance can transform a society. Even if half the Hindu voters are persuaded to collectively vote as Hindus, and for a party sincerely committed to a Hindu agenda, then we can forge an instrument for change. And that is the bottom line in the strategy to deter terrorism in a democratic Hindustan at this moment of truth.
The writer is president of the Janata Party, a former Union minister, and a professor of economics.

How to prepare a Public sector firm for Privatisation - the Air India story

Air India, India’s national carrier-turned-cadaver, is waiting for its last rites. When last heard of, the airline had turned in a loss of Rs 7,000 crore in 2010-11, and was investing in an oversized hat to hit the government for yet another bailout masquerading as a turnaround package.




Only, the amounts this time are too staggering for Pranab Mukherjee to agree to without a fight. According to a report in The Times of India, the airline will need equity support of Rs 43,255 crore just to stay afloat over the next 10 years. Mukherjee is hoping to raise that kind of money by selling public sector equity this year. If he agrees to bail out Air India, it’s as good as kissing goodbye to this moolah.



With liabilities of over Rs 47,000 crore, the airline is on the verge of defaulting on its loans. Mukherjee will thus have to chip in with some money willy-nilly – even if he is not asked for the full sum that SBI Caps has suggested as part of its revival plan for the airline. The newspaper says Air India will require Rs 8,372 crore this year itself – Rs 6,600 crore to pay its bills for 2011-12 and Rs 1,772 crore to keep up with loan payments.




But for all this, the airline still won’t be able to make a profit till 2017-18. Air India, it seems, has been fixed – and fixed for good – by former Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel, who has often been accused by the unions of batting for Air India’s rivals till the ministry was prised away from his grip last January.



When Patel took over as Minister of State for Civil Aviation in 2004, the domestic carrier (then Indian Airlines) was market leader with a 42% share, but slipping. Today, it is No 5 – behind Jet, Kingfisher, IndiGo and SpiceJet – fighting extinction.



Here’s how Praful Patel did it – ruin Air India that is – and there’s nothing his successor Vayalar Ravi can do to rescue it.



First, load it with debt so high that it can never raise its head again. It is now clear the Air India’s financial problems began in 2004 when Praful Patel chaired a meeting of the board in which the airline suddenly inflated its order for new aircraft from 28 to 68 without a revenue plan or even a route-map for deploying the aircraft, says an India Today report.



An airline with revenues of Rs 7,000 crore was being asked to take on a debt of Rs 50,000 crore. Today, it’s losses themselves are Rs 7,000 crore. And the bailout it is seeking is as big as the cost of those 68 aircraft. The government might as well have gifted those birds to Air India.



Second, Patel presented a merger of Air India with Indian Airlines as the panacea for all ills. It is surprising how often ministers suggest mergers when public sector companies head for ruin. When telecom company MTNL was sliding, then Communications Minister Dayanidhi Maran was suggesting a merger with Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd. That didn’t happen, but both MTNL and BSNL are in the sick bay anyway. Praful Patel used the losses of Air India and Indian Airlines to push for their merger, claiming there would be cost savings from synergies. Worldwide, mergers usually destroy value. The Air India-IA merger has been the biggest man-made disaster in aviation history – thanks to their varying cultures and employee costs.



Says Gustav Baldauf, former COO of Air India who fell foul of Patel’s successor and had to quit: “The management never resolved the pending human resource (HR) issues related to the merger. I had warned the Chairman-cum-Managing Director and the Aviation Ministry of the consequences of introducing a single code without resolving issues first. But they never listened,” he told Mid-Day.


Third, Patel seemed to be batting for Air India’s rivals. He handed over lucrative routes to private players. Though Air India had no birthright to every lucrative route, Patel’s overnight manoeuvres in this regard suggested that he had a clear conflict of interest by being both Aviation Minister and board member in Air India.




A Tehelka report quotes Capt Mohan Ranganathan, an aviation expert, as saying that the airline handed over “flying rights on lucrative sectors in the Gulf to foreign airlines, including Etihad Airways, Qatar Airways, Air Asia, Singapore Airlines and several others…” One glaring instance of a sudden handover could not have come without Patel’s nod. Tehelka says that in October 2009, the airline sent “letters…to its stations in Kozhikode, Doha and Bahrain stating that it was withdrawing operations on the route” – a route in which the airline was making money hand over fist. Very soon, Jet and Etihad stepped in to fill the gaps, and so did Emirates.



Fourth, Praful Patel’s own airline preferences made it clear who he favoured. According to replies received under the Right to Information Act by one Jagjit Singh, Patel used mostly private airlines. Between June 1, 2009 and July 2, 2010, 26 of the 41 flights he took between Delhi and Mumbai were with Kingfisher. “It is intriguing that the minister who stresses the need for revival of the national carrier himself chooses to ignore it,” said Singh. And this happened just when the Finance Ministry was asking all government employees to use Air India for their official travel to help revive the carrier.




Patel’s haughty reply when asked about this preference of private airlines: “I am the Union Civil Aviation Minister and not the minister in charge for Air India. As a minister, it is not binding upon me to fly only one particular airline. I fly according to my convenience.” But when he ordered so many places for Air India, was he acting as Minister or superboss of the airline?



Fifth, Patel used his clout with Air India often for personal ends. Another RTI query showed that Patel’s kin used the Air India Managing Director’s office to regularly upgrade from economy to business class. Business class is a cost Patel’s family, which is rolling in wealth, can easily afford. So what does this say about Patel’s attitude to the airline?



But is the new Civil Aviation Minister going to reverse the rot set off by Patel?



According to a Financial Express report, the new turnaround plan does not look any more viable than the deadweight Patel cast on Air India by getting it to buy planes it could not afford. The newspaper quotes a Deloitte review of the SBI Caps revival plan which says it’s simply not viable.



Reason: Air India again wants to buy too many aircraft, just like Patel did. “Aviation consultancy Simat Helliesen & Eichner, which carried out a detailed route planning and capacity exercise, has suggested 87 narrow-body aircraft for Air India by 2015, but the carrier has proposed 143, according to Deloitte’s report dated February 11, 2011,” says the newspaper.



Deloitte’s comment: “The only justification that one can have for going in for such capacity expansion can, therefore, be the adoption of a strategy of buying market share through deploying high capacity into the market (with corresponding lower yields and consequent financial implications).”



This means Air India is planning to sink further into losses for years to come.



Over to you, Mr Ravi. Do you want to go down the same path Praful Patel pushed Air India?



The government’s best bet now is to cut its losses. Air India should be privatised or closed down.

The Bullet and the Elephant Express

 
By Raja Murthy

MUMBAI - While China has begun to earn billions of dollars exporting high-speed bullet train technology to the United States and Europe, the struggle of Indian Railways to manage its financial woes and modernization delays serves as a stark contrast between the operators of the world's two largest railway networks.

Cash-strapped Indian Railways has asked the Indian Finance Ministry for US$8.6 billion in the annual railway budget to be released this month, more than double the allocation of $3.47 billion in the 2010 budget for modernization programs.

Though railway revenues went up by 10.40% for the period 11th to 20th January 2011 - to $570 million from $517 million during the same period in 2010 - unconfirmed insider accounts says Indian Railways faces a $547 million budgetary deficit, with losses of $875 million between April and December 2010, the first nine months of its financial year.

In contrast, China Railways, which will invest $106 billion in railway infrastructure this year, has no money worries, allowing it to expand a high-speed railway network that with a combined length of 7,531 kilometers, is longer than the rest of the world's high-speed networks put together.

China latest fast train, the CRH380A, set a new record on December 3, 2010 by clocking 486.1 kilometers an hour in its Beijing to Shanghai trial. India's fastest trains, the Rajdhani and Shatabdi categories, average about 100 km per hour on their better days.

China's Railway Ministry plans to nearly double the high-speed rail network for its sleek bullet trains to 13,000 kilometers by 2012. In the same year, India hopes only to start basic work on its first high-speed rail track between New Delhi and Mumbai. Indian Railways has commissioned international consultants for pre-feasibility studies.

India might benefit from consulting China Railways for high-speed corridors, but this lack of a neighborly railway partnership only highlights how China and India, both expected to dominate global economy by 2050, have divergent strategies for their vast rail networks, a key to economic growth.

The 157-year old Indian Railways, hauling over 13 million passengers daily and calling itself the "Lifeline of the Nation", is closely linked to the common man, with its heavily subsidized fares; it offers 25% to 75% fare concessions to 50 categories of travelers, from the physically and mentally impaired to patients traveling for medical treatment, war widows, the elderly and students, including those from overseas.

China runs 91,000 km of train tracks, compared with India's 63,327 km, and both the state-owned behemoths are their country's single largest employer. The Indian Railways pay roll has over 1.6 million entries, with an additional 300,000 jobs to be filled in the next six months, Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee declared on January 27. China's Ministry of Railways employs nearly 3.2 million people, more than the country's 2.3 million army troops.

In contrast to the flashy, high-speed Chinese train dragon, the slower Indian elephant steadily trudges with a more down-to-earth outlook. The 2011 Railway budget, presented separately to parliament in February ahead of the general budget, is expected to stress enhancing passenger safety, such as improving signaling systems and installing safety-related technology such as anti-collision devices (ACD) and a train protection warning system (TPWS).

China Railways, on the other hand, is being accused of paying more attention to on-rail showboats like the bullet trains, whose tickets cost nearly that of air fares, instead of improving services for the masses.

Such grumbles are reported louder during the just completed week-long Lunar New Year holidays, when around 230 million people have to be transported, the largest annual migration in the world.

Migrant Chinese workers can wait for as much as three days, often braving bitter winter winds and hunger, for train tickets that cost about 400 yuan (US$61), nearly one-third of a blue collar worker's monthly pay.

The stress was too much for migrant worker Chen Weiwei this January, who removed his clothes, except for grey underpants, and ran shouting around Jinhua Railway Station in eastern China's Zhejiang province. He had snapped after waiting third in a queue for 14 hours, only to be told that tickets were "sold out". Later, the station authorities magically changed the "sold out" status and gave Chen five tickets.

In contrast, the equivalent Indian worker need pay only 629 rupees (about $13) for a reserved second-class ticket with a sleeping berth on the Himsagar Express, in its three-night, 3,715-km odyssey between Kanyakumari, in India's southern-most tip, to Jammu city, in India's northern-most Jammu and Kashmir state.

Indian Railways has the world's largest online ticketing service - but insider fraud is often suspected, with tickets in very popular trains sold out almost instantly when reservations opens three months in advance.

For most trains and routes though, India's nationally computerized train booking system ensures that tickets, from anywhere to anywhere within the country, can be bought from thousands of Indian Railways counters nationwide, including in a small one-high-street town like Igatpuri, 150 km from Mumbai.

Internet booking, too, has cut short once daunting queues, saving millions of man-hours. The Centre for Railway Information Systems, created to use the latest information technology, reported 8.8 million online ticket transactions in January 2011, a 75% success rate from 11.7 million transactions attempted.

While Indian Railways benefits from the country's rich software expertise, it continues to import technology, such as coaches from Germany for the fully air-conditioned Rajdhani trains, even though it owns facilities like the Integral Coach Factory in Chennai.

China, in contrast, has done with its railways what it has done in other industrial sectors: import high technology, jiggle it a bit, label it as "advanced Chinese technology" and then export it heavily, undercutting the original foreign technology providers such as Siemens, Bombardier and Alstom.

Not surprisingly, China's largest train maker, CSR, last week said it expected profits in 2010 to have gained more than 50% last year from $254 million in 2009. CSR earned $1.24 billion in overseas sales. CSR is now the world's third-largest high-speed train producer, just behind Bombardier and Alstom.

In December, CSR also signed an agreement with General Electric for a 50-50 joint venture to manufacture high-speed trains in the United States. The $1.4 billion deal is expected to add 2,000 jobs in the US.

China is also competing with Japan, South Korea, France, Germany and Belgium to build a 1,100-kilometer high-speed railway in California, connecting San Francisco, Sacramento, Los Angeles and San Diego in 150 minutes, at a speed of 350 kph.

The Indian Railways suffers no such international competition anxieties as its Chinese counterpart, but with increasing traffic between the two nations, possibilities of a trans India-China rail network, and a New Delhi-Beijing Friendship Express by year 2025 will not be far-fetched.

The real villain is Klepto-Capitalism

 

 

DNA / R Jagannathan / Thursday, August 12, 2010 2:28 IST

 
Infosys Technologies' chairman and chief mentor NR Narayana Murthy has the ability to say it like it is. A year before he hangs up his boots, Murthy has cut loose on our unspeakable netas and babus, accusing them of a fundamental lack of ethical behaviour — though in not so many words.
Our netas, he said, saw no need for transparency and behaved like masters. Our IAS babus were no better. Their general administrative skills and colonial mindset were largely unrelated to the needs of the day. As for governance, there's no such thing, and accountability is largely absent in the system. His solution: abolish the IAS and set up an Indian Management Service manned by specialists who were paid market-clearing wages.
 
Murthy is only half-right. He has diagnosed the symptoms, and said little about the underlying disease. The IAS as such is not the problem. The question is: why does the IAS cadre behave like it does? Why does it treat its customers (citizens) like chattel? Why do their bosses (the babus) focus more on accumulating wealth than on delivering governance? The answer lies with us. Murthy himself excoriated citizens for apathy, which allowed corruption to flourish and criminals to go unpunished.
 
To understand the malaise at its roots, we need to start with our flawed democratic system. The cost of winning elections creates a huge demand for unaccounted cash to bribe the voter with. This is why no honest person can hope to get into politics. Even the not-so-dishonest politician needs lots of moolah to win the next election. This can only come from corruption.
The system is built around this fundamental flaw. This brings us to the next big stakeholder in corruption: business. Since businessmen cannot afford an unstable policy environment, they have a stake in funding sleazy politicians. Businessmen running competitive enterprises cannot afford to divert huge sums of money to bribery and skullduggery — unless there is another source for it.
This is one reason why they get into rent-seeking behaviour. In order to generate volumes of cash without business risk, they seek opportunities to make money out of scarcity. In the past this was done by manipulating the licence-permit raj.
 
In the post-liberalisation era, the focus has shifted to land ("they ain't making any more of it no more") and spectrum (again, a limited resource).
Ever wonder why no one can afford a decent home in Mumbai or in any of India's big cities? Politicians and businessmen have ganged up on you to bottle up available land and make money for themselves. Land is released by netas and babus in driblets, so that prices can be raised forever, and slush funds generated.
 
Former World Bank chief economist Raghuram Rajan makes the same point in his latest book Fault Lines. He told DNA in an interview: "The predominant sources of mega wealth in India today are not the software billionaires who have made money the hard way by being competitive in a global economy. It is the guys who have access to natural resources or to land or to particular infrastructure permits or licences. In other words, proximity to the government seems to be a big source of wealth."
 
This is why when Murthy talks of lack of transparency, it is a mere description of the problem, not its underlying cause. If the neta, the babu and the lala (the rentier class of businessmen) are hand-in-glove to make a pile for themselves by generating scarcity, why would any of them want to be transparent? The neta-babu-lala combine is replacing genuine, participative democracy with a narrow kleptocracy laced with populism. To bring in the vote, the politician prefers the grand feudal gesture (doles for the poor) to genuine empowerment and reform; the businessman prefers land-grab (klepto-capitalism) to building a genuinely profitable business model through hard work; and the bureaucrat prefers to block change rather than facilitate it since he has more to gain personally from it.
 
The only way to weaken the nexus is by making democracy cheaper and election funding transparent. This may not eliminate corruption altogether, but would take away the main reason for it. Elections can be made cheaper by state funding of political parties and tax-free contributions, but we also need to use technology better.
If, for example, we create a countrywide broadband network that can reach every village, no neta will need to hire hundreds of jeeps and helicopters to reach his message to voters. He can do it from anywhere. He can communicate directly with his voters — just as his rivals can. Voters, armed with Nandan Nilekani's unique ID, will even be able to vote over the internet. The only way to stymie a corrupt kleptocracy is to make democracy less expensive.

Mumbai's rail toll tops Bhopal

  S A Aiyar,  13 June 2010, 05:32 AM IST


An outpouring of anger and passion has greeted the conviction of seven former Union Carbide officials for negligence in the Bhopal gas disaster. This caused the immediate death of 3,787 people, and the ultimate death of 15,000 to 20,000 people whose lungs were corroded by the gas.

If this anger and passion results in greater safety and accountability, India will be a more humane and just country. The chances of this happening are zero. India remains basically callous and unaccountable. Tragedies greater than Bhopal are constantly ignored and dismissed as "chalta hai."

Consider Mumbai's suburban rail services. Activist Chetan Kothari used the Right to Information Act to get data on people killed in Mumbai by the Central and Western Railway, which run through the city. Answer: 20,706 people have been killed in the last five years. This is six times as high as Bhopal's 3,787 immediate fatalities and higher than even the long-term fatalities estimated at 15,000-20,000.

On average, over 10 people die every day! If Maoists or Islamist terrorists kill 10 people, that is regarded as sensational news. But if the Mumbai rail system kills the same number every day, it is not even considered news. 

The information obtained by Kothari pertains to just five years, and to just one tiny part of the railways.  Fatalities across the railways for the last two decades could run into lakhs or the equivalent of five or six Bhopals.

A similar RTI exercise is needed for people killed by state electricity boards through uninsulated, loose and dangling electric wires. One estimate of accidental electrocution deaths in the 1980s was more than 3,000 per year. It is probably higher today. Again, this amounts to several Bhopals over the years. Here again we see no public outrage, only "chalta hai".

The Times, the British newspaper, used the RTI to get a break-up of Mumbai fatalities. In 2008, 3,443 out of 4,357 fatalities occurred when trains mowed down people crossing the tracks. As many as 853 fell off or were thrown off moving trains. Another 41 were hit by trackside poles while hanging out of doors, and 21 were electrocuted by overhead wires while travelling on the roof.

Cynics will say this is different from Bhopal: those crossing the tracks and riding on roofs were breaking safety regulations and exposing themselves to danger. But in Bhopal too, the Union Carbide plant was located outside the town, and illegal shanty-towns came up around it, violating safety and urban laws. Does that lessen criticism of the gas leak?

Union Carbide was lambasted for not using the best technology available to avert risks and deaths. But do we castigate the railways for not investing in the best safety technologies, and creating barriers to stop people from crossing the tracks? Union Carbide was slated for negligence in a shutdown plant. But the railways continue to be negligent year after year in a running organization that runs down people.

Many of us howled for justice after Bhopal. Many demanded the arrest of Union Carbide chief Anderson. Those convicted last week included Keshub Mahindra, the non-executive chairman with a largely ceremonial position. How many of us have demanded even the dismissal, let alone conviction, of the railway staff, Railway Board members or railway minister for the continuing holocaust in Mumbai?  The non-executive head of the railways is, formally, the President of India. Has anybody demanded that Pratibha Patil be prosecuted for continuing railway deaths? 

Alas no. The public displays not the slightest concern about our dismal tradition of having unaccountable and unsackable government cadres, who remain in their jobs and get promotions despite the most outrageous negligence.

Let me cite a recent PTI report. "Negligence by railway staff caused nearly half of all train accidents in the country during the last five years, official data has revealed. Of the 1,034 train accidents that have happened during the period 2003-2008, 488 of them, which accounts for 47.2 per cent, have been attributed to negligence by the railway staff, joint director of the safety directorate of the ministry of railways J S Bindra said in reply to an RTI application."

There you have it, from the horse's mouth. Yet none of those yelling for the blood of Union Carbide staff are yelling for the blood of railway officials. And so railway negligence and deaths continue unabated.

NGOs and the media suffer from a terrible double standard. They will pounce on negligence by a multinational, and rightly so. But they act as though the public sector has a licence to kill. That is disgraceful.

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Is Nehru Coming Back?

  

May 21, 2009

By Girish Mishra

 

Looking at the ongoing world-wide economic crisis and serious attempts at exploring ways and means to overcome it now and prevent it from recurring in the future, the return of Nehruvian approach seems to be a strong probability. Jawaharlal Nehru's return from exile after more than a quarter of a century has been forecast by none other than the greatest living historian Eric J. Hobsbawm in an article 'Socialism has failed. Now capitalism is bankrupt. So what comes next?' (The Guardian, April 10).

 

It will be interesting to note that it is the same Jawaharlal Nehru, the process of whose banishment was begun by the first non-Congress government, headed by Morarji Desai and joined by Charan Singh, the self-appointed guardian of Indian peasantry besides all sorts of Nehru baiters from the followers of Dr. Lohia to the RSS, in addition to some frustrated ex-Congressmen. This process got accelerated during the regime of P. V. Narasimha Rao when India embarked on economic reforms, inspired by the ten points of the Washington consensus, reached between the 15^th and 19^th streets of Washington, DC and formulated by John Williamson. A horde of economists and propagandists descended from America on India, especially New Delhi and Mumbai with their baggage of received wisdom. Some could manage entry into the corridors of policy-making process while others began spreading their wisdom through the media.

 

The collapse and disintegration of the Soviet Union, the virtual death of NAM and withering away of Congress Socialist Forum besides financial bankruptcy of the country, brought about by the V.P. Singh-Chandrashekhar governments had so demoralized the intelligentsia that, rightly or wrongly, it came to believe that there was no alternative to what was being done in the name of reforms. People like Gurcharan Das, a former sales executive of the US multinational, Procter and Gamble, arrived with his book India Unbound, blaming Nehru and his policies for all the economic ills of India. The book was showered with praises by protagonists of the Washington consensus, but eminent economists like Amartya Sen and Dani Rodrik pointed out the absurdities in Das's claims. Sociologist Dipankar Gupta logically countered the formulations and conclusions of Das by publishing his forceful book Mistaken Modernity. Yet the corporate-controlled media went on applauding him. The grapevine has it that he is soon coming up with a new book which is said to have traced the roots of the Washington consensus to the Mahabharata. One may recall that a former chief of the RSS had written a piece that was included by the then BJP government of Rajasthan in a school text book. It had asserted that nuclear weapons existed in ancient times in India and there was a non-proliferation treaty whereby only Brahmins and Kshatriyas were allowed to use them. As ill luck would have it, there was a big uproar in Parliament and this "great discovery" was deleted.

 

Let us turn our attention to Eric Hobsbawm. He says, even though we are living in the 21^st century, we are still in the grip of the basic ideas that are no longer credible. In fact they have "patently disappeared down the plughole of history." We have made two practical attempts to realize our ideal socio-economic formation in their pure forms. They were "the centrally state-planned economies of the Soviet type and the totally unrestricted and uncontrolled free-market capitalist economy. The first broke down in the 1980s, and the European communist political systems with it. The second is breaking down before our eyes in the greatest crisis of global capitalism since the 1930s. In some ways it is a greater crisis than in the 1930s, because the globalization of the economy was then not as far advanced as it is today, and the crisis did not affect the planned economy of the Soviet Union. We don't yet know how grave and lasting the consequences of the present world crisis will be, but they certainly mark the end of the sort of free-market capitalism that captured the world and its governments in the years since Margaret Thatcher and President Reagan.

 

"Impotence therefore faces both those who believe in what amounts to a pure, stateless, market capitalism, a sort of international bourgeois anarchism, and those who believe in a planned socialism uncontaminated by private profit-seeking. Both are bankrupt. The future, like the present and the past, belongs to mixed economies in which public and private are braided together in one way or another. But how? That is the problem for everybody today, but especially for people on the left."

 

The "pure, stateless, market capitalism" had different names in different countries. New Labour in Britain believed that socialism was irrelevant because the new strategy would generate more wealth and social-democrats had to see that it was equitably distributed. In India, the 10 points of the Washington consensus were dished out in the garb of economic reforms. Consequently, jobless growth became prominent, regional disparities and social inequalities increased rapidly. Vulgar display of wealth and ostentatious living styles became the norm. All these led to increase in corruption, crimes, kidnappings for ransom, terrorist activities and regional chauvinism.

Anand Giridhardas in International Herald Tribune (April 10, 2009) observes in the context of the ongoing economic crisis: "I worry far more for the developing world, for places like India, which has been mimicking the American superstructure without building an equivalent foundation, pursuing the effect without the cause.

 

"India seems, on the surface, to have arrived. There are the requisite global luxury boutiques; restaurants that serve sophisticated food in tiny portions with something called coulis drizzled across the plate; Indian firms that make multi-billion dollar acquisitions; software companies that write code for the world; songs that win Oscars and hearts many thousands of miles away.

 

"But perhaps it has all come too quickly, and served to crowd out the hard slog of constructing a modern society in more than name alone. Yes, India has Louis Vuitton, but how easy is it to be gay there? Yes, its companies have dazzled the world, but why do their workers complain still about the hierarchical, soul-draining work culture? Yes, it won an Olympic gold medal last year, but why has it been so hard to recast servants as people paid, not born, to serve?"

 

We have to ponder over the economic strategy we have pursued since 1991, after banishing Nehru. If we want a prosperous India for all, we have no alternative but to give up the belief that private profit-making enterprise is always better, more efficient way of doing things. We have to, in the words of Hobsbawm, "return to the conviction that economic growth and the affluence it brings is a means and not an end. The end is what it does to the lives, life-chances and hopes of people.... The test of a progressive policy is not private but public, not just rising income and consumption for individuals, but widening the opportunities and what Amartya Sen calls the "capabilities" of all through collective action. But that means, it must mean, public non-profit initiative, even if only in redistributing public accumulation. Public decisions aimed at collective social improvement from which all human lives should gain. That is the basis of progressive policy - not maximizing economic growth and personal incomes."

 

Prof. Amit Bhaduri in a recent article "A Failed World View" in Economic and Political Weekly (January 31, 2009) has very convincingly argued that the very basis - the Washington consensus - of our economic reforms and strategy is flawed and is not going to satisfy the masses of this country who look towards the Congress-led UPA for eradication of poverty, rapid increase in job-opportunities, lessening of regional imbalances and inequalities in the distribution of income and wealth. Liberalisation, privatization and unbridled profit motive cannot fulfill their aspirations. Planning and public sector have to be revived and state has to intervene effectively in the removal of regional disparities in development.

 

It is high time that Nehru is brought back and the Washington consensus and their votaries are given a goodbye. All those experts roaming in the corridors of power and advocating full convertibility of rupee on capital account and privatization of public sector commercial banks should be politely told to go back. The G-20 summit on April 2 in so many words underlined the irrelevance of the Washington consensus and asserted the increased role of state in economic affairs. Now with elections over and a popular government in the saddle one expects a statement that Nehruvian strategy is indispensable in the present circumstances.

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Bowling At The Death

Cricket's stars are a ruthless lot, many have crashed and burned at its hallowed pitch

ROHIT MAHAJAN, SMRUTI KOPPIKAR, SUGATA SRINIVASARAJU, CHANDER SUTA DOGRA, DOLA MITRA, AMBA BATRA BAKSHI
The game that begets a few stars is also father to thousands of disaffected, depressed men
Cases of suicide


Rambabu Pal: A prolific batsman from UP, he couldn't make use of the few chances he got in first-class cricket. Committed suicide at 34 in 2007.


Manish Mishra: Was acutely depressed after he failed to make the Uttar Pradesh Ranji Trophy team, committed suicide at 24 in 2007.


Subhash Dixit: One-time captain of India U-17, his career stalled before the Ranji level. Committed suicide at 22 in 2007.

Jhuma Sarkar: A regular in Bengal Under-19 women's team, failed to progress. Committed suicide at 23 in 2007.

***

The Enveloping Blues
Mohan Chaturvedi, 38: Was told he'd be touring Pakistan in 1989, but was left out. A wicketkeeper, he went into depression, says he was saved by his faith in God.
Obaid Kamal, 36: One of the best fast bowlers to never play for India. Was frustrated, says he was saved from suicide because of the Islamic injunction against it.
Suhail Sharma, 27: The all-rounder played for Delhi in Ranji Trophy, but struggled to find a job and was depressed for four years.
Dilraj Atwal, 21: The fast bowler was injured after being invited to bowl in the Delhi Ranji Trophy camp last year. Used to cry himself to sleep.
Feroze Ghayas, 36: One of the fastest bowlers who never played for India. Was depressed for some time, says he hurts even now.
Sumit Kundu, 21: Was Haryana Under-17 captain one year, on the sidelines the next. Went into a depression, gave up cricket forever.
Saikat Ganguly, 17: Was named the best junior cricketer of Bengal in 2006; was dropped at the trial stage even before the first tournament. Still in a slump.
Vinayak Samant, 36: For this lower middle-class boy who played for Mumbai and Assam, the India call never came. Went through lows.
***

Message In A...
Maninder Singh, 43: Hailed as a very special talent, played for India at age 17. Couldn't handle stardom, lost his rhythm, his career unravelled...and he took to drinking.
Sadanand Viswanath, 46: In 1985, he was a superstar in the making. Then he was dropped, took to drink and, lost his way, and lost everything.
Vijay Dahiya, 36: Still wonders why he was dropped from the Indian team, took to drinking and clubbing. Lost his way.
Reasons
Little room at the top
Only a select few can play first-class cricket, about 400 in India. Number of aspirants runs into lakhs.
Limited career options
Being onfield for hours a day, years on end, leaves little time to acquire other vocational skills. So no fallback options.
Arbitrariness of selection
Selection can be arbitrary at any level, and are often very biased. Players can’t come to terms with this.
Early success
Too much too early can distract you. Beginning of the end?
Injuries
Can end a career at any age, at any time.
***

Solutions
Keep expectations in check
Cricket must be a passion, not the career option.
Counselling
From very early, players must have access to sports psychologists who can guide them.
Fair selection
Save players from trauma, ensure that the selection process is absolutely fair.
Sports medicine
Still a developing science in the country, many careers are destroyed due to the lack of it.
More other jobs
The BCCI, with all its money, could assist players above U-17 to develop vocational skills, as is done in England.
(Outlook accessed many others who narrated their experience of confronting the dark side of cricket—but they didn’t want to be named.)

***

"The others become drunkards, slip into depression or just fade away into inconsequential careers, where they remain unhappy forever" —Yograj Singh, Cricket Coach

"Cricket can never be a career prospect. Disappointment is guaranteed. Success is not. Once that is established, depression cannot defeat you."—Arun Lal, Former Test cricketer

"You get selected 10 times and then you are dropped for no obvious reason. You see yourself as a failure. Even at the first-class level, it’s a gloomy life." —Aakash Chopra, Ex-India opener

***


Vijay Dahiya, 36, India
Last played for India in 2001, he couldn’t fathom why he was axed. "When you realise you won’t be chosen, the sacrifices you made earlier seem futile," he says. Started visiting nightclubs and drinking. No more bitter, he says all he has today is because of cricket.

In the alleys of old Lucknow, where the affluent share a wall with the indigent, there’s a three-storeys-high dwelling which houses 22 people of one extended family. In a second-floor room which betrays the lower middle-class background of its owners, Manish Mishra grins back at you, his eyes glinting. But it’s only a photograph, and Mishra’s siblings don’t smile, because he hanged himself here two years ago. In life, he overdosed on a passion for cricket. In death—apparently triggered by a tiff with his estranged wife over the phone—he embodies what is very often the fruit of that passion: the lingering frustration of failing in the game and a deep regret for having spent so much time at the nets that it left him with little else in the end. Not even time to escape with some other minimal skills that could help him pitch his tent in some other field.

"He used to say he wished had worked so hard in some other field... for he'd have found a good job..."

Mishra joined the Agra cricket hostel for coaching at the age of nine. He worked hard at his game, ultimately playing for Uttar Pradesh in the junior teams. Early morning, he’d walk to the field, often in borrowed trousers. That’s approximately where his cricketing career got stuck, and he ended up with a fourth-class job in the Railways, a whole world away from his dream of wearing the Indian colours. "He used to say he wished he had worked so hard in some other field...," his cousins say.It didn’t stop there. Bad luck dogged him, his mother died, there was marital discord. Then, without warning, came the night when he dragged the bed across to block his door and hanged himself from the fan.

Mishra didn’t die just because of cricket. No doubt, he took the extreme step because of circumstances at home also. But his frustration at the abject failure in his chosen field, at real or perceived injustices done to his talent, his anger at the venality of system, it all played a part till one day he snapped. In our cricket fields, this anger and frustration is shared by tens of thousands of boys and men who’ve played cricket. The game that begets a few dazzling stars also fathers thousands of disaffected, depressed men.

There are too many guileless, potential ‘cricket victims’ out there for us to ignore it any more. Raw, underage and prone to being felled by the game’s vicissitudes. Lots of cricketers and coaches Outlook spoke to testified to the fact that depression is a major malaise. Some confessed to suicidal thoughts. The list of 15 cricketers who admitted to suffering the ‘cricket blues’ isn’t exhaustive—they are just a few who agreed to go public with their stories, in the hope that the Indian cricket establishment would be prompted to help the young cope with the dark side of the sunny sport.

Former Test player Arun Lal, who runs the Bournvita Cricket Academy in Calcutta, admits that "depression exists in a big way in cricket". Coach Yograj Singh, who played one Test for India, admits a plain professional truth: only a handful among the hundreds of hopefuls have it in them to make it big in cricket. "The others become drunkards, slip into depression or just fade away into inconsequential careers, where they remain unhappy forever."


Saikat Ganguly, 17, Bengal
Jrs Named the best junior cricketer of Bengal in 2006, he was dropped at the trial stage before the first tournament. Slipped into depression, still avoids visitors. Flips through his scrapbook filled with clippings reporting his rise and fall in cricket. Advises his cousin to not play cricket.

The really disturbing thing is, the opposite of a life of glory is often not just a life of misery—some simply terminate. The gloom that descended upon Subhash Dixit’s house in Kanpur two years ago will probably never dissipate. In 2007, the family lost Subhash, the family’s beloved as also its main hope for he was at one time the junior India cricket captain. He was then 22, when cricketing dreams often start to die and a search for livelihood begins. But Subhash lacked the skills of the usual job-seeker. Aunt Sushma, her voice trembling, says he just couldn’t find a job. "He used to say he would have been selected for the Ranji team if we had the money or the contacts," she told Outlook. "Earlier, he used to pledge that he’d ‘do something in life’. Now I just wish he’d come back somehow."

In 2007, the family lost Subhash Dixit, their lone hope, for he was at one time the India Jrs cricket captain.

But Subhash isn’t coming back. He jumped to his death after leaving home, ostensibly to practise at the Green Park grounds in the city.

Obaid Kamal, who played for UP and Punjab and now coaches in Lucknow, says "people don’t know how frustrating it is to become a cricketer. (I found life in the jaws of death)." A swing bowler, Kamal was a regular feature in the Duleep Trophy teams of the 1990s. "Even when I got the most wickets, I did not get a call.When (Javagal) Srinath was injured in New Zealand in 1994, everyone said I should be sent to replace him. A spinner was sent instead!" he recalls. He declares he’s now put it all behind him, yet there were moments of despair when Kamal contemplated suicide; he says his mother’s words when he was a child—that suicide is "haraam, a sin that won’t be forgiven"—is what saved him.


Mohan Chaturvedi, 38, Delhi
Hailed as India’s best keeper, he went into depression after he was not chosen for the ‘89 Pak tour. Seen in Delhi’s Connaught Place with his pads and keeping glove on; he’d keep awake at night, crying. Says he’ll never let his son take up cricket.

Faith saved Mohan Chaturvedi too, who teetered on the edge for a while. Chaturvedi, a Delhi wicketkeeper, had been measured for the team gear before the 1989 tour of Pakistan. But he was not picked up; for an 18-year-old it was shattering. Always the standby, he gave up the game at 24. Depression ensued. "I withdrew from the world, I confined myself to my room," Chaturvedi, who’s now with the Income Tax department, says. "I stopped watching cricket, I hated the game, I had no hope." What saved him was his faith in god. Chaturvedi says, "God gave me the power to come out of depression. I used to go to the holy shrines every year, and that saved me."

It's emotionally sapping to play a game where luck has such a crucial role. The strain breaks cricketers.

Cricketers seem more vulnerable to depression than other sportspersons because the game, as writer David Frith (see column) puts it, "is unique in its propensity to take over a man’s psyche". In recent times, there have been many reports of high-profile cases of depression, including England’s Marcus Trescothick, Australia’s Shaun Tait and New Zealand’s Lou Vincent. For it’s emotionally sapping to play a game where luck has such a crucial role. The strain can break cricketers. Take the case of fast bowler Firoze Ghayas, who took 13 wickets on his first-class debut. Yet he struggled to become a regular for even Delhi, forget playing for India. "For a player with skill and ambition, sitting on the bench is like being in jail," he says now. "It still hurts, this pain will never go away. Why did it happen? Eventually, to make peace with yourself, one comes to the conclusion that it’s fate. Even if you are good and have performed well, if you don’t have luck or someone backing you, it all adds to nothing." Some, unlike Ghayas, are never reconciled.


Feroze Ghayas, 36, Delhi
Javagal Srinath once told him, "You’ve got raw pace, man!" Dennis Lillee thought he was a hot prospect. But he never played for India. His frustration in the mid-1990s bordered on depression. A coach now, he hopes to protect his wards from what he went through.

Cricket is also unique among team sports because of the clout the captain or the coach enjoys. In football, basketball or rugby, a player’s talent can’t be hidden, despite any level of scheming. "If the captain doesn’t like you, he can restrict you to a short bowling spell, or ask you to bowl when the batsmen are completely set, or to bowl only against the wind," says a former Delhi junior player. And heard of this? A Delhi cricket official whose son is a left-arm spinner managed to get all his counterparts dropped from the junior teams. The reason: so that there’s no competition for his son when he’s old enough to play first-class cricket. Then there are the debilitating injuries that nip the careers of hundreds of hopefuls.

All this, naturally, begets cynicism and frustration—always a close ally to depression.Many give up the game to brood indoors, cursing their fate or the system. Like Sumit Kundu, 21, for whom cricket was life for 10 long years. He was captain of the Haryana under-17 team, but in 2007, when he was preparing for the state’s under-19 team, he was told he was not good enough. Kundu slipped into depression. "I stopped going out with friends, used to cry for hours," he says. Kundu was wise enough to relinquish his dream early, providing him time to prepare for an MBA course. "I’ll never go back to cricket again. It’s too painful," he says.


Suhail Sharma, 26, Delhi
Couldn’t cement his place in the Ranji team. Went through torrid times for two years. "I feared I’d have to give up cricket and work crazy shifts like some of my friends, who start work at 4 am to oversee newspaper distribution, with no time for cricket," he says. A job with ONGC helped.

Outlook cited a few of these cases to Nimesh G. Desai, head of the Institute of Human Behaviour and Allied Sciences in Delhi. He confirms that the symptoms do indicate depression, but adds that no study has been done to gauge the incidence of depression among cricketers specifically. He also explained why the impact of failure in cricket is more severe than in other fields of human endeavour: "In cricket, as also in the movie industry, the stakes are very high, expectations are high, and there’s a high degree of emotional and physical investment. At stake is a high degree of social adulation, or retribution for that matter."

"In cricket, the stakes are very high as are expectations. There's a high degree of emotional, physical investment."

Often, budding cricketers chase their dreams till the very end, unable to read the writing on the wall. Some, like Vinayak Samant, 36, have managed to survive the trauma. From a lower middle-class family from the Mumbai suburb of Virar, this gritty wicketkeeper-batsman had had his share of lows—but never slipped into the darkness of depression. It’s only now, after 20 years of hoping, that he’s reconciled to his shattered dream of playing for India. Former India opener Aakash Chopra, who’s no stranger to disappointment, told Outlook, "Young players have big dreams, sometimes you are not good enough, other times you realise you need more than just performance on the field. You get selected 10 times and are then suddenly dropped for no obvious reason. You see yourself as a failure. Players, even at the first-class level, live gloomy lives, away from the glamour and money associated with cricket."


Sadanand Viswanath, 46, India
A rising superstar in early 1985, dropped from the team the same year. His father committed suicide; mother died soon after. He went "over the limit" with alcohol. A qualified umpire now, he says "too much expectation at a young age leads to disaster. Better to have delayed gratification".

In a sense, the Indian Premier League (IPL) is a welcome development for the forgotten, poor men of Indian cricket, for it has opened up new avenues for them. "It’s a boon," agrees Chopra. "First-class level players have worked very, very hard to reach where they are. Now more of them can make a better living from the game."

To succeed at the top, youngsters need endless passion, ambition and absolute confidence. For doubt is fatal.

But most are doomed to suffer in the shadows. Maninder Singh, a prodigy who faded away, says it would help if the coaches were honest with the parents."The coach’s conscience has to be clean and pure," he told Outlook. "They must be honest with a player, ask him to focus on studies if he has little talent or no future in the game." Adds Arun Lal, "Disappointment is guaranteed. Success is not. Once that is established, depression cannot defeat you. Cricket can never be a career prospect. It should be a passion and if it happens to become a career one day, great! But don’t count on it."

For the young players, the algebra for success is baffling: to succeed at the top, they need endless passion, ambition and absolute confidence. For doubt is fatal. This must be accompanied by maturity, for disappointments must and will buffet them at every step. It’s a very rare blend that succeeds, most don’t have it in them. All the more reason why parents must prepare their children for heartbreak...and a career in other fields.

Similarities in American and Iranian justice

 

Roxana Saberi And Vikram Buddhi – Compel A Comparison

By Dr. Buddhi Kotasubbarao

21 April, 2009
Countercurrents.org

 

Among the ways to measure the greatness of a country, the administration of justice ranks the highest and the military might the least.

 

A comparison of the case of 31 year old Iranian-American journalist Ms. Roxana Saberi sentenced by Iranian Court and the case of 37 year old Indian Graduate Student of Purdue University Mr. Vikram Buddhi awaiting sentencing after a helpless jury found him guilty in US District Court, has much to show the entrenched preferences of the United States of America.

 

With all the proclaimed adherence to the rule of law, the administration of justice in the United States fails as badly as in any other country of the world and sometimes even more badly. Neither the powerful and pervasive American media nor the recent popularity of President Barack Obama can hide this fact. Of course, like in any other country, there are people in the United States who are justice minded and rational but their role to set right the things is limited.

 

Saberi is charged in April 2009 of spying for the United States, convicted and sentenced to eight years imprisonment. Buddhi was charged in April 2006 of threatening to kill President Bush and others. The jury, which was deliberately kept ignorant of the law governing the case, found Buddhi guilty in June 2007 and his sentencing is yet to take place. But he has been kept in prison in Chicago, consequent to the jury verdict, awaiting sentence.

 

According to the media reports, Saberi was at first taken in custody in January 2009 for allegedly buying a bottle of wine, and subjecting her to other charges afterwards. Vikram Buddhi was at first interrogated in January 2006 by US Secret Service for allegedly posting messages on Internet Yahoo space which had called upon the people of Iraq to retaliate the perceived unjust Iraq war and to kill President G W Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and others. After thorough interrogation, the US Secret Service set Buddhi completely free in mid-January 2006 and in February 2006 the Secret Service even made a formal report that Buddhi is not a threat to US President or any other person. But for some mysterious reason, the US Secret Service arrested Vikram Buddhi on April 14, 2006 and launched federal prosecution charging that he threatened to kill US President and others.

 

Saberi's charge of spying for the United States is criticized because the evidence is not disclosed and the trial is held in secret. Buddhi's charge of threatening to kill President Bush and others has no evidence at all. If the Internet Messages on Yahoo space were to be treated as the basis for the charge against Buddhi then it is necessary to mention in the charge, the essential fact of Internet Messages and the call given to the people of Iraq through those Messages. But in none of the eleven counts of charge there is even a whisper about the Internet Messages on Yahoo space and the call given to the people of Iraq. Thus the entire charge against Vikram Buddhi is fundamentally flawed. It is not in conformity with the revered Constitution of the United States and the Statutory Law of the United States and the Rules made there under. Moreover, during the jury trial, the Prosecution failed to establish beyond reasonable doubt that those Internet Messages were really posted from Buddhi's computer.

 

Saberi's trial details are still to be known. Whereas Buddhi's jury trial Transcripts clearly show that the US District Judge James T. Moody discriminated against Buddhi. To assess whether there is 'true threat' it was necessary to instruct the jury on the commands of the First Amendment to US Constitution which affords protection when speech is made criminal. By established law Internet Messages are treated as speech. But Judge Moody openly declared his firm resolve to banish First Amendment from the case. Judge Moody boldly threatened the Defense Attorney John E Martin that the Defense Attorney would be embarrassed if he tried to explain to the jury linking the First Amendment and the evidence on record. While struggling to understand the case, the jury noticed a contradiction in a crucial Judge's Instruction to the jury and sent a written note to the Judge, seeking clarification. Judge Moody sent a prompt written reply to the jury asserting that there is no contradiction in any of his instructions to the jury and therefore the members of the jury should continue their deliberations. In twenty minutes thereafter, the helpless jury delivered guilty verdict.

Saberi's father was not allowed to witness his daughter's trial. However, there is no discrimination against Saberi's father as no public was allowed to witness the trial. Whereas in Vikram Buddhi's case, the father, Kotasubbarao Buddhi, was deliberately denied opportunity to witness his son's trial. Fraud was committed on the Court to keep Buddhi's father away from the trial. The prosecutor Philip C. Benson named Buddhi's father as a Government witness. There was no summons to give evidence as Government witness. Judge James T. Moody refused to hear the objection of Buddhi's father who was waiting for one year in the United States to witness his son's trial. The fraud got confirmed when Buddhi's father was not called to the Court as a Government witness. Naming him as a Government witness was only a ploy to keep the father away from the Court during the jury trial. Prosecutor Benson knew that Buddhi's father is an attorney of Supreme Court of India and also a knowledgeable person in computer networks with his Ph.D in technology from Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, India. US Prosecutor Benson fraudulently planned and succeeded in denying Vikram Buddhi the benefit of his father's experience and expertise. There is no known such unfair practice and professional misconduct of Prosecutors in Saberi's case in Iran.

 

Saberi's father and mother arrived in Iran to help in their daughter's case. There is no attempt from Iranian Government to remove Saberi's father or mother from Iran. Whereas in Buddhi's case, after the jury's guilty verdict on June 28, 2007, the Government of the United States has embarked on a meditated plan to remove Vikram Buddhi's father from the United States, though the father entered the United States on June 7, 2006 with an Emergency Visa issued by the American Consulate, Mumbai, to help in his son's federal prosecution in the United States.

 

On July 30, 2007, the US Authorities declined to extend the stay of Buddhi's father in the United States. On August 21, 2007, the US Authorities forcibly stopped Buddhi's father on a public road while he was on his way to file timely petition before appropriate forum for review of the decision declining extension of stay. Thus Buddhi's father, Kotasubbarao Buddhi, was denied his legal right to seek review from appropriate forum. There is no such arbitrary treatment from Iranian Government to Saberi's father.

 

After accosting Buddhi's father on a public road in West Lafayette of Indiana State, the US Authorities illegally took away from him his Indian Passport on August 21, 2007, handcuffed him, chained him and arrested him without a warrant. Thereafter US Authorities granted $1500 bond. But when a friend of Buddhi's father came forward to pay the bond amount and requested the release of Buddhi's father, the US Authorities refused to accept the payment. Only after subjecting Buddhi's father to inhuman treatment and humiliation for a week in three different jails at long distances apart- Mariano County jail (Indianapolis), Grayson County Detention Center (Kentucky) and McHenry County jail (Chicago), Buddhi's father was released on bond. But his Indian passport has not been returned to him so far. There is no such known arbitrary and inhuman treatment meted out by the Iranian Government to Saberi's father.

 

Buddhi's father being unable to have a just and fair decision from the Departments of US Government allowing a reasonable opportunity to help in his son's federal prosecution had to approach US Appeals Court, Seventh Circuit, Chicago. Buddhi's mother is in India alone remaining in anxiety over her son getting justice in US Courts. Iranian Government has not mounted any such ordeal on Saberi's father or mother. Instead, the Iranian President Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad has urged the Iranian judiciary to allow American-journalist Roxana Saberi a full and fair defense during the appeal process.

 

Buddhi's father sent a detailed letter dated October 21, 2008 to the then US Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey explaining the false and frivolous charge against Vikram Buddhi and the unfair trial and the discrimination. There was no response from Mukasey.

After President Barack Obama assumed office, Buddhi's father sent a concise letter dated February 9, 2009 to President Obama explaining the miscarriage of justice in Vikram Buddhi's case. The letter also explained that the case of Vikram Buddhi is not an isolated case and there is monumental failure of justice in the United States because of which the population-wise percentage of people in the US jails is the highest compared to any other country in the world. There is no response so far from President Obama.

Similar communications have been sent to US Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. and he has not responded so far.

 

On March 27, 2009 Vikram Buddhi's father sent letters to US Attorney General Eric H. Holder and to Inspector General, Civil Rights & Civil Liberties Complaints Office of the Inspector General, U.S. Department of Justice, explaining the prosecutorial misconduct in Vikram Buddhi's case. But there is no response so far from either of them.

 

However, surprisingly, about a week after posting the letters dated March 27, 2009 pointing out the professional misconduct of Philip C. Benson, US Assistant Attorney in Vikram Buddhi's case, reports appeared informing that US Department of Justice took action to vacate the conviction of former Alaskan Senator Ted Stevens, on the basis of "prosecutorial misconduct." and in the "interest of justice.". But so far no action is taken by US Department of justice on prosecutorial misconduct in Vikram Buddhi's case.

Never the less, notwithstanding US Government's complete silence over Vikram Buddhi's case, President Barack Obama promptly said he is "deeply disturbed and his thoughts and prayers are with the family" of Roxana Saberi. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has promptly expressed her "deep disappointment" over Roxana Saberi's case. "We will continue to vigorously raise our concerns to the Iranian government," Mrs. Clinton said in a statement released on Saturday April 17, 2009. According to National Public Radio of the United States, on Monday April 20, 2009, Mrs. Clinton in a stepped up call sought immediate release of Roxana Saberi, saying the charges against Saberi are baseless. There is no hesitation to find fault with Iranian Court verdict. What about the false and baseless charges against Vikram Buddhi in US District Court?

 

President Obama who studied and taught law is surely aware that the loss from erosion of justice cannot be compensated from the sway of eloquence and charm. It is unfortunate President Obama has no hesitation to disagree with a Court verdict in Iran and to express concern for Roxana Saberi, while remaining silent on the grave miscarriage of justice mounted on Vikram Buddhi in US District Court.

 

Who is there in the United States Government to express any concern over the blatant miscarriage of justice in the United States in Vikram Buddhi's case?

 

Justice is universal, not Iranian or American.

 

The above views are only for comparison of justice administration and not for extrapolation to draw inferences in any other sphere.

 

Dr. Buddhi Kotasubbarao is a former Indian Navy Captain with Ph.D from Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay in nuclear technology. After 24 years of active naval service, took voluntary retirement in the rank of confirmed Captain and thereafter became an advocate of Bombay High Court and Supreme Court of India. In a number of Public Interest Petitions represented the social organisation 'Citizens For A Just Society' founded by Dr.Usha Mehta, noted Gandhian, freedom fighter and Padma Vibhushan.
E-mail address bksubbarao@gmail.com

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Slumdog: Dilemma of a new India

 

1 Mar 2009, 0151 hrs IST, Deepak Chopra

After its sweeping win at the Oscars last Sunday, Slumdog Millionaire seems like the movie everyone wants, and perhaps needs. It has all the ingredients of escapist fare from the Great Depression — a populist hero who overcomes all odds to get the girl and the money. There's an added element of self-congratulation for the West: by seeing this movie, you can see India without getting your hands dirty or offending your nose, and cheer it on. Cinderella didn't walk through tenements and sectarian violence to reach her prince. But in this fairy tale, a concession must be made to modern realities. Dev Patel is symbolic of India here and now, fulfilling its wildest economic aspirations while being conscious of the darkest aspects of social decay and despair. If we follow the metaphor to its logical conclusion, India will get the money and the girl by rising above its slums. Perhaps that's why Slumdog has created an uneasy reaction in Mumbai and the rest of India. Rising above isn't the same as solving. Many well-born educated Indians have looked westward for a long time, which is easier than looking inward. They know more about the streets of London and New York than the teeming lanes of the ghettos in their own city. This is true, of course, among rich elites everywhere, not just in South Asia. Watching Dev cross the social line is triumphant, but it reminds you that there is a line. (Obama crossed the racial line in triumph, also, but notice how much heat his Attorney General, Eric Holder, took when he suggested in less than polite terms that America needs to be more honest and courageous about the whole problem of race.) Like fairy tales, symbols can pacify deep anxieties. India dreams of being a millionaire, but it lives with the anxiety that it's really a slumdog. Or, that the slumdogs will one day rise up against the millionaires. You can read the tea leaves any way you like. Another uncertainty attends the film. Having been made on a shoestring budget, Slumdog managed to outgross any number of big-budget Hollywood films. Last week, it ranked fifth on the US box office while its nearest Oscar rival, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, was no longer in the top ten. Brad Pitt, being a megastar, has pulled his film to $122 million, compared to Slumdog's $98 million, but is that really competitive? Ten movies on the scale of Slumdog can be made for the cost of one blockbuster that has yet to pay back its cost. The whole movie industry is watching closely, and the developing world is watching back even more closely. After two decades of action flicks with move-your-lips scripts that were primitive enough to appeal to immature male psyches, here is Asia — via the UK — sending back something sophisticated, poignant, and universal. It's like the ultimate retort to colonialism: the coolie and the wallah have more smarts than the sahib. Indians feel uneasy about that, too. Will the sahib turn his back and shut them out? Do South Asians have enough self-respect and stature in the world to at last forget that the sahib ever existed? We may know the answers in the near future. Bollywood didn't conceive Slumdog. It still purveys mindless entertainment, for the most part, interspersed with small independent films that challenge the West for thoughtfulness and freshness. It's not for lack of talent that India didn't produce Slumdog. But questions of vision and courage do arise. Past history and ingrained inhibitions make it hard for Indian artists in any field to be as frank and true to life as they should be. They have yet to seize freedom. If Slumdog is a viable symbol, the future it points to is just being born. An out-of-the-way picture can dare to be universal, which means that India may dare to be universal one day. The dispossessed people of Asia are suddenly aware that they have a place at the table where previously only the rich dined. Both developments are encouraging. Meanwhile, one can marvel at the bald fact that a Bollywood-style anthem, 'Jai Ho,' won the Oscar for Best Song, while Bruce Springsteen wasn't even nominated. The first Academy Awards of the recession turned out to be, as one headline proclaimed, the first outsourced Oscars of all time. The writer is a bestselling spiritual writer

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Priyadarshan the Malayalam film maker on Slumdog Millionaire quoted in the Financial Times

Priyadarshan Nair, an India film-maker, complained strongly that the film makes a mockery of India. "It's nothing but a mediocre Bollywood film, which has used references from several Hindi films very smartly," he wrote in the newspaper India Today at the weekend.
"India is not Somalia. We are one of the foremost nuclear powers in the world, our satellites are roaming the universe. Our police commissioners' offices don't look like shacks and there are no blind children begging in the streets of ­Mumbai."

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India's nuclear submarine plan surfaces

 Siddharth Srivastava

NEW DELHI - Expressing fears about cross-border terrorism in the wake of the November 26 Mumbai attack and keeping a close eye on China's military expansion, India announced plans this week to hike its defense budget by 34% to 1.4 trillion rupees (US$30 billion) and last week revealed that its project to build three nuclear-powered submarines is nearing completion.

"Things are in the final stage now in the Advanced Technology Vessel [nuclear-submarines] project. There were [mainly technical] bottlenecks earlier ... they are over now," Defense Minister A K Antony said on February 12.

The Advanced Technology Vessel (ATV) project is part of India's $3 billion plan to build five submarines and complete what it calls
a "triad" of nuclear weapon launch capability - from air, land and sea. India is concurrently developing the K-15 ballistic missile, which can be nuclear-tipped and launched from submarines.

Defense sources have told Asia Times Online that New Delhi has been actively seeking out assistance from France in the implementation of the ATV project, and that Russian engineers are already involved. The sources said that the sea trials of the nuclear-powered submarines should begin this month and that the submarines should be operational within the next three years.

The secretive ATV nuclear backed ballistic missile submarine (SSBN) project began in the late 1970's and is being implemented at a secret dry dock in Visakhapatnam, India's Eastern Naval command base. Observers have said that the submarines are a critical addition to India's weapons capabilities.

In a grim reminder of the possible dangers facing India from the sea, India's Naval chief Admiral Suresh Mehta warned this week that terrorists could smuggle "dirty" nuclear bombs via the nation's ports as they lack adequate security measures. Terrorists also used a sea route to infiltrate Mumbai.

Nuclear-powered submarines with their greater speed, power, range and the length of time they can stay submerged compared to conventional diesel-electric submarines are effective for sudden strikes as well as fast and stealthy protection from attacks.

New Delhi has been concerned about Beijing's strengthening of bilateral ties with Islamabad, particularly given recent tension on sea projects such as at the Gwadar port. China has also been developing ties with Sri Lanka and Myanmar to deepen its control over a complex energy-security conflict being aggressively played out in the region.

Given the ongoing tussle between India and China to control the waters of the Indian Ocean, the New Delhi government has been put under tremendous pressure from the navy to ramp up India's sea power. China has already spoken of creating three ocean-going fleets to patrol the areas of Japan and Korea, the western Pacific, the Malacca Strait and the Indian Ocean.

The ATV project has been in the spotlight as India's other attempt to procure a nuclear submarine this year received a setback when Russia "indefinitely" postponed delivery of the Akula-II class Nerpa nuclear submarine, citing incomplete sea trials and a lack of funds.

Further, the Amur shipyard in Russia's far east, where the sub is being built, is yet to finalize a new team following an accident in November in which 20 members were killed. The accident has led Indian media to describe the submarine as "cursed".

India has been looking at developing underseas capabilities to launch nuclear weapons, after gaining some competence in land-based nuclear delivery platforms for the domestically developed ballistic missiles Prithvi and Agni.

India has already developed a submarine-launched supersonic missile, a modification of the BrahMos cruise missiles, an achievement previously limited to only advanced nations such as the US, France and Russia. Ship and land launched versions of the BrahMos are being introduced in the navy and army.

The state-controlled Defense Research and Development Organization is also undertaking a joint development project with Israel Aerospace Industries to develop a surface-to-air missile which can be launched from land and ships.

Upgrade and renovation of India's navy will be an important aspect of India's US$50 billion defense modernization exercise. Under the plan, the projects code named 75 and 76 entail the production of 24 underwater vessels valued at US$20 billion to meet the challenges across the Indian Ocean.

In 2007, construction of the highly-advanced Scorpene submarine began at the upgraded Mazgon Dock in Mumbai as part of a US$3.5 billion deal for six such French submarines. As the Scorpene deal involves transfer of technology, it should be beneficial for both nations as India gains new technology and French firms gain a possible foothold in the big Indian market.

But significant delays are now expected in India's acquisition of the aircraft carriers Admiral Gorskov from Russia and two that are being developed at home. In early 2007, India purchased the 36-year-old US warship the USS Trenton (re-christened INS Jalashwa) with a gross tonnage of 16,900 tons for US$50 million.

The Trenton is the first ever US warship owned by the Indian Navy and the second largest that India possesses after the INS Viraat aircraft carrier. The Indian Navy plans to add 40 new warships to its fleet and the government plans to invest over 500 billion rupees (over US$12 billion) over the next 10 years on warships.

The government has encouraged the private sector to play a bigger role in the nation's defense, and India's largest engineering and construction firm Larsen & Toubro has announced plans to build defense warships and paramilitary vessels at a proposed facility in Tamil Nadu.

After the rude awakening of the Mumbai terror attacks, others branches of the military are also now pushing for more upgrades and additions.

The Indian Air Force, for example, is seeking 42 fighter squadrons up from the current 32 or 33 squadrons (each with 14 to 18 jets), to offset the phasing out of older Russian planes. The army, which has been allocated a large piece of the military outlay, is seeking more tanks and howitzer field guns.

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