bagchiblog

bagchiblog: Killing a Ramsar Site

2012-02-01T12:40:00.000+05:30

bagchiblog: Hunger and riches in "incredible India"

2012-01-31T19:40:00.000+05:30

bagchiblog: Hunger and riches in "incredible India"

Hunger and riches in "incredible India"

2012-01-31T19:35:00.002+05:30

A national daily presented the other day two contrasting pictures of India. On its front page were the findings of a research indicating the extent of hunger and malnourishment in the country and in one of the inside pages was a report on the explosion on its roads with millions of private vehicles causing traffic jams in its urban centres. One wonders whether these contrasting pictures in a single edition of a daily have caught the attention of those who frame and implement the country’s economic policies. They show, if anything, the growing economic inequality in the country, which can directly be attributed to the policies pursued since economic liberalisation. The government has taken some initiatives to deal with the pervasive hunger and malnutrition but the measures that have been taken seem to have failed to yield the desired results.

The daily cited the data collected by researchers of Global Hunger Index (GHI), a multi-dimensional statistical tool that was adopted and further developed by International Food Policy Research Institute, that reveal India has 213 million hungry and malnourished people. At the same time, it reported that the Food & Agricultural Organisation, a specialised agency of the United Nations, puts the figure at 230 million using, as it does, standard calorie intake formula for measuring adequacy of food. Since the GHI’s hunger index is based on a broader formula, its figures are marginally lower. The shameful inescapable fact, however, is that more than one-fifth of the country’s population suffers from hunger. Worse, the country hosts the largest number of hungry people in the world – about a quarter of world’s 820 million. The dismal statistics reveal that 21% of population is undernourished, nearly 45% of under-5 children underweight and 7% of them dying before they reach the age of 5. India is thus one of the most hunger-ridden countries – worse than even Sudan, North Korea, Nepal and Pakistan and better than only the Sub-Saharan countries of Congo, Chad, Burundi.

The report also cites the findings of the National Family and Health Survey carried out in 2004-05 according to which 23% of married men, 52% of married women and 72% of infants were anemic. The daily further reports that “global research has now firmly established that depriving the foetus of essential nutrients – as will happen in an under-nourished pregnant woman – seals the fate of the baby once it is born” making him susceptible to diseases, physical and mental retardation. So continuing to allow people to go hungry and malnourished is not just misery for them but also putting at stake the country’s future generations. It’s, therefore, time the government sat up, took notice and shook off its lassitude.

The other picture presents a vastly different view – that of the other side of the country’s economic spectrum. It displays the progressively increasing number of cars on the roads of urban India that result in almost daily traffic jams in not only metros but also in tier-II and tier-III towns. With a car density of only 15 per thousand (in 2006) things on the urban roads are bad enough. One wonders what will be the shape of things if this density becomes 100 per thousand. Delhi is reported to have already reached that density and its citizens are paying for it by way of huge, long drawn-out traffic snarls on a regular basis. Despite the rising inconveniences of the commuting public car makers are bullish about the Indian car market. Its phenomenal growth shows hardly any signs of abating.

Acquisition of a car today depends not so much on necessity as on the rising aspiration of the India’s middle classes, so much so that everybody from a petty trader to an office personal assistant acquires a four-wheeler. Perhaps, of greater interest is that of late the country’s biggest car manufacturer, Suzuki, has discontinued manufacture of the basic entry model with which it launched its operations in India. It now puts out models that are more sophisticated to cater to a discerning market that has since become a place of ruthless competition. It is now a far cry from the pre-liberalisation days when only three manufacturers monopolised the market and the number of vehicles produced was in mere thousands. Today about two dozen manufacturers are jostling to grab a piece of the ever-enlarging cake. During the last financial year as many as 2.5 million cars were sold in the country. The market is so lively that even the European and British luxury brands have set up shop here.

This apart the growing affluence of the middle classes is reflected by massive spreads in the newspapers of ads for high-end housing. Even prestigious foreign journals, such as The Economist and Time are used to entice NRIs and PIOs to buy what is on offer in India in the shape of luxuriously appointed houses and apartments (some even with private gardens) in gated complexes. In fact, gated complexes are proliferating all over the country around urban centres on farm lands and are snapped up by businessmen, industrialists, politicians, foreign returnees and the corrupt chasing, as they are, the Indian version of their “American Dream”.

The remarkable co-existence of abject poverty and growing affluence of the middle and upper classes made Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz, wonder about India’s future. Finding no clear roadmap for “where India is going today” he asked, “Does it see itself evolving like the US where even the middle class has not been sharing gains of the growth? Where the rich live in gated communities waited upon by the vast majority of the poor who earn in a lifetime but a fraction of what they receive in an hour?”

Various measures taken by the government for poverty alleviation, some of them in mission mode, have not yielded the results that were expected. This is amply testified by the statistics, particularly in the areas of poverty, nutrition and education. The reasons could be pervasive corruption and/or lack of governance. It is felt, while the rural missions could continue with better inspection and monitoring, the government could, perhaps try, in addition, the world’s favourite new anti-poverty device, the conditional cash transfer programmes (CCTP). Under these programmes governments give stipend and food to the poorest if they meet certain conditions, like sending children to schools or vaccinating the babies. These programmes have spread far and wide as they cut poverty, improve income distribution and help the next generation. Rules-based and generally uncorrupt, CCTP has benefited a number of countries in Latin America and Africa as it is good at providing what rural people lack: food, water, primary schools and simple health care. And, yet the key element for its success, as in several other missions, would be good governance.

bagchiblog: Killing a Ramsar Site

2012-01-31T14:29:00.000+05:30

bagchiblog: Killing a Ramsar Site

Killing a Ramsar Site

2012-01-31T14:02:00.002+05:30

One can be reasonably sure that on the 2nd of February next the ministers concerned of Madhya Pradesh government will mouth some platitudes about conservation of the Upper Lake and its adjunct the Lower Lake which together constitute Bhoj Wetland. In practice however, the local officialdom is more concerned about its “development” and by that they mean providing means for attracting more and more visitors to its shores or to its close proximity. Conservation is a word which does not seem to figure in their lexicon in so far as this fantastic natural asset of Bhopal is concerned, particularly when it is a Ramsar Site – a wetland of international importance, the only one in the state.

For the uninitiated, on 2nd February 1971 a convention was adopted by participating countries at Ramsar, an Iranian city, for “Conservation of wetlands of international importance, especially as waterfowl habitat” in recognition of their fundamental ecological functions and their economic, scientific, cultural and recreational value, the treaty eventually coming into force on December 21, 1975. The objectives set before the contracting parties were conservation and sustainable utilisation of wetlands, i.e. to stem the progressive encroachment on them and prevent their loss “now and in future”. Ramsar Day or World Wetland Day is celebrated every year on 2nd February to highlight the ecological importance of wetlands to the human community. India is among the 156 contracting parties.

Bhoj Wetland was designated as a Ramsar Site in November 2002, one of the main reasons being that it was an Important Bird Area (IBA), identified by Birdlife International and habitat for varied species of waterfowl. With its ecosystem stabilized over the last millennium of its existence, the Upper Lake presently represents all the features of a near-natural wetland. Its diverse flora provides sustenance to a large population of avifauna so much so that until recently many thousands of water-birds – domestic and migratory – could generally be observed annually.

Unfortunately, the Wetland is progressively losing this very attribute – the one that helped it in its recognition as a Ramsar Site. Of late, reports have appeared in the local press that birds seem to be avoiding this Wetland for roosting and are overflying to more congenial nearby water bodies. Local bird-watchers have noticed that among the hitherto regular migratory visitors black-necked storks, white storks, tufted pochards, common teals, mallards, bar-headed geese, etc. did not visit the wetland this year at all. Mohammed Khalique, a well-known local bird-watcher reported that he happened to find only one bar-headed goose that somehow lost its way into the wetland when in 2006 the species was seen in hundreds. Another bird-researcher, Sangita Rajgir, reported steep fall in the numbers of several migratory species that could be seen in thousands even five years ago.

Unsurprisingly, increasing human interference is being blamed for the loss of birdlife of this Wetland. Contamination of the waters due to yearly immersion of thousands of effigies of gods and goddesses painted with toxic paints after the Ganesh and Durga festivals as also chemical-based farming in the catchments and progressively intensifying tourism activities like plying of motorised boats and frequent assembly of people in large numbers in and around the Upper Lake have all contributed to make the Wetland inhospitable for water-birds. The addition of the tourism complex Sair Sapata, not even a kilometre away from the bird area, has become a big factor for the flight of birds from this IBA. Anticipating its likely impact, the Bhopal Citizens’ Forum had organised a photographic exhibition in December 2008 of photographs of birds of Bhoj Wetland taken by one of its member, reputed photographer AC Chandra. The intention was to sensitise the administration to the need to protect this IBA. All that, however, was to no avail as none in the government had eyes and ears for it. Even the Sports Authority of India complex that was built close to the bird area for year-round sporting activities has played no mean role in causing disturbance to the resident birds.

If today this Ramsar Site has ceased to be a bird area of significance the local government has to be held squarely responsible for the policies it adopted for its acute exploitation for generating tourism revenues. The most active in this regard were its Department of Urban Administration & Development and the State Tourism Development Corporation. Their collective acts of omissions and commissions have led to this unfortunate situation, putting under threat the Wetland’s Ramsar Status. Any talk of conserving this wetland on Ramsar Day by any of their representatives would, therefore, be pure and simple hypocrisy.

Row over Dow

2012-01-16T16:44:00.001+05:30

The row over Dow chemical sponsorship of the London Olympics 2012 has, of late, assumed larger proportions. While the Indian government asked the Indian Olympic Association to lodge a protest with the London Organising Committee for Olympic Games (LOCOG) 2012 for allowing Dow Chemical as a sponsor, the Vietnam Association for Victims of Agent Orange/ Dioxin (VAVA) has also asked LOCOG on behalf of 300,000 members of VAVA and three million victims of Agent Orange in Vietnam which to drop Dow Chemical as a sponsor.

The Indian Government’s protest was based on the linkage of Dow Chemical to the Union Carbide Corporation from the erstwhile Bhopal factory of which a lethal gas escaped in December 1984 killing and maiming many thousands. The VAVA, however, has protested for the reason that Dow was one of the companies which supplied toxic chemicals – collectively called Agent Orange – for use by the US military in the Vietnam War (1961-1971) devastating the country’s ecology and environment, leaving millions dead and suffering.

The Dow Chemical Company (TDCC) signed an agreement with the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in 2010 under which the former was declared the official World-Wide Partner for Olympics and for the Olympic Movement upto 2020. According to the agreement, Dow is also supposed to partner the National Olympic Committees across the globe. For the 2012 Games Dow is footing the bill for a temporary decorative wrap over London's Olympic Stadium. It, however, removed its logo from the wrap after widespread protests and demonstrations against its association with the Games.

The company's sponsorship deal has led to outrage among victims of the Bhopal tragedy. Rashida Bi of Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Stationery Karmchari Sangh said that her organisation had requested the Prime Minister and the IOC Chairman three months ago to register the country's opposition in the matter but her request went unheeded. "It is unfortunate that lawmakers in England are protesting against Dow's sponsorship of 2012 London Olympics but no step is being taken by the Centre or the IOC," said Satinath Sarangi of Bhopal Group for Information and Action. Some of the former Indian Olympians branded the Dow sponsorship as “offensive to the spirit of the Olympic Games” in a press conference held jointly by organisations fighting for relief of Bhopal gas disaster survivors. Even the Ministry of External Affairs in a letter to the Prime Minister's Office said that the company's sponsorship was a very sensitive issue and that there was strong public opinion against it.

TDCC is in the eye of the storm as the offending factory of Bhopal was owned by the Union Carbide Corporation (UCC) which is now its wholly-owned subsidiary. The process of acquisition commenced in 1999 and TDCC acquired UCC as a sequel to a transaction that closed in 2001 for $11.6 billion. Sebastian Coe, Chairman of LOCOG, has, therefore, defended the association of Dow with the 2012 Games. According to him, its links with the company that was responsible for the gas leak in Bhopal came long after the 1984 tragedy. He further said, “Dow were never the operators or the owners of that chemical plant in 1984, nor were they the operators or the owners of the plant in 1989 when the final settlement was agreed... Dow became the major shareholders in that company only in 2001, some 17 years after the tragedy. And the final settlement was upheld on two separate occasions by the Indian Supreme Court.”

From all appearances, Sebastian Coe is right. Clearly, Dow became the owner of the UCC in 2001 when the latter had no liabilities relating to the Gas Tragedy of 1984 – all its obligations having been discharged. One buys assets and not liabilities; had the liabilities persisted Dow might have refrained from acquiring UCC. Thus, legally speaking, Dow wouldn’t seem to be involved anyway with the Gas Tragedy. Its ethical liability also would seem to be extremely tenuous. Many, obviously, are accusing it of spending billions on supporting the Olympic Movement during the next decade yet turning a blind eye to the plight of the victims of apathy and neglect of its subsidiary’s. But, legally that would cut no ice and, hence the song and dance about removal of Dow as a sponsor appears misplaced.

So, one does not quite understand why the company is being targeted. The facts being what they are, it can in no way be held responsible for the plight of the gas-leak survivors. If any entity that needs to be blamed it is the Indian National Congress that was governing during the crucial period at the Centre and in Madhya Pradesh in the capital of which the gas-leak occurred. From fishing out a proposal kept on the ice for five years for establishment of the chemical plant with obsolete technology in the ‘70s to allowing its erection in Bhopal and encouraging building of shanties around it for political gains; to ignoring repeated alarms raised in the local press about its shoddy maintenance; to pegging the number of deaths at only 15000 when they were many more and are now proposed to be revised to 25000; to assuring Warren Anderson, Chairman of the UCC that he wouldn’t be arrested and then smuggling him out of India after being arrested and charged with manslaughter; to finalising settlement for a mere $470 million in 1989 after having lodged a claim for $3 billion towards compensation for the dead and surviving, simultaneously extinguishing the rights of the suffering survivors to pursue their claims for compensation; to restraining the Central Bureau of Investigation from appealing against the ruling of the Supreme Court given in 1996 that reduced the charges against management of the UCC factory as only acts of criminal negligence; to stopping remediation of the factory site by UCCs successor company and taking it back against the prevailing law exposing surviving shanty-dwellers to consequential environmental hazards it was the Congress that was responsible ruling, as it did, right through these years both at the Centre and in the state.

Even the current Congress-led government at the Centre decided against becoming a party in the ongoing compensation case of the gas victims in US courts, with the Law Minister saying “Our courts are competent and capable of resolving (the matter)”, as if he didn’t know that orders of Indian courts wouldn’t be enforceable in the US. Besides, the same government allowed the Bhopal Memorial Hospital, a top-class facility created for the benefit of gas-leak survivors, to go to seed with many of its departments virtually shut down having been starved of men and equipment. Congress’s has been a long saga of serving the cause of the UCC and apathy towards its victims.

Objectively speaking, VAVA’s protests are more justifiable as Dow played a direct contributory role by manufacturing and supplying to the US Army weapons of mass destruction aerial bombing of which led to mass scale deaths and destruction during the decade-long Viet Nam War. In case of “Bhopal”, however, it is our own politicians who did the victims in. Hence, why blame Dow?

Minister and the Bhopal Lake

2012-01-02T16:53:00.002+05:30

After his visits about two years ago to Hyderabad and Srinagar, Babu Lal Gaur, Minister for Urban Development & Administration (UAD) kept harping that the city’s Upper Lake would be developed on the lines of Hussain Sagar Lake and Dal Lake, respectively. The peripatetic UAD Minister seems to have a penchant for implanting on the local Lake whatever he happens to see elsewhere. It seems his obsession with the Hyderabad and Srinagar lakes has since petered out. Now that he and his daughter in-law, the Bhopal Mayor, have visited Chilika Lake in Odisha, reports have come in that the Minister will now strive to develop the Upper Lake like Chilika. That it is the second largest lagoon in the world with a far greater spread and the waters of which, unlike those of the Upper Lake, are brackish (that host the endangered Irrawadi dolphins) do not quite matter to him.

One must, however, give it to him that wherever he might be Bhopal remains in his consciousness. At times, however, it makes him commit excesses. He seems to want to do too many things at the same time. While, for instance, recommendations of international consultants invited earlier for comprehensive development of the water body and its catchments are reportedly still under consideration, the UAD minister not only had a rather ugly statue of the legendary Raja Bhoj installed on what must have been an old watch-tower projecting into the Lake, he went and had a model of an Indian Navy ship planted near the Boat Club. He was recently reported to be in negotiations with the Railways to locate an old steam locomotive too on the banks of the Lake. All this apart, he wants also to erect a museum close to the Lake depicting history of its development through a millennium, notwithstanding the fact that an Interpretation Centre about the Bhoj Wetland Project already exists next to the Boat Club. Perhaps, the Minister is not quite clear about how he would like to “develop” the Upper Lake, which under his stewardship may witness some remarkable hodgepodge around it. One can, however, see through his designs which aim at nothing except attracting hordes of tourists to the Lake.

That collection of large number of people is not conducive to proper conservation of a vital wetland like the Upper Lake does not quite occur to him. Numerous foreign and domestic experts on conservation of wetlands invited by the now-nonexistent Lakes Conservation Authority in seminars and workshops had suggested umpteen number of times prevention of collection of unduly large numbers of people around the Lake for reasons of preservation of its ecological health. But the Minister, in collaboration with the local Tourism Corporation, is hell-bent in doing just the opposite.

Though the minister’s penchant for “development” of the Lake is admirable yet one would have liked him to talk the language of its conservation instead of development. One craves to hear from him of maintenance of its catchments in conducive conditions with farms taking to organic farming precluding the flow of chemicals into the Lake; likewise one craves to hear from him of removal of encroachments from the Lake-shores that are progressively reducing its spread; one also craves for his directions for saving its bird area (bird-life being essential for a wetland’s health) that is now losing its avian guests because of disturbances to their habitat (by Sair Sapata tourism complex, for one); and how one craves to see orders issued forth from him to plug the sewers emptying into the Lake to restore to its waters their pristine purity.

Sadly, these will remain just cravings never to be fulfilled as sustainability of the Lake – not concrete and tangible – never quite appeals to the Minister who, being a politician, finds a melange or mishmash is something he could boast about and which would fetch him precious votes.

Bhopal - mitigating parking woes

2011-12-28T12:27:00.002+05:30

The local edition of Times of India recently came out with a series of features on parking problems in Bhopal. It covered several localities, mostly, what they called “congested”. Among them were No 10, MP Nagar Malviya Nagar and, of course, New Market. Curiously, there was no mention of the areas like Peer Gate, Moti Masjid, Budhwara and such areas of Old Bhopal that continue to remain deprived of attention of the authorities in this regard.

However, the newspaper missed a very important point relating to provision of parking facilities in these areas. It never seems to have appeared to it, and that is where the authorities are going to find land for the burgeoning number of 2 and 4 wheelers in the town. In the last ten years there has been a very strong surge in their numbers and thousands are being added every month regardless of rising fuel costs, congestion on the roads, unruly traffic and rising volumes of noxious, polluting and earth-warming gases in the city’s air. Jungles of two-wheelers are ubiquitous in the town, especially in centres of trade and business. Clearly, the parking problem is progressively becoming so formidable that the Municipal Corporation will be hard put to cope with the demand for parking places – whether spread over empty and vacant lands or in multi-storeyed parking lots.

What, therefore, are needed are measures to curb the rise in number of vehicles. True, acquiring a vehicle is basically aspiration-driven. Everyone aspires to own a vehicle and none could really hold it against them. But what one witnesses today is possession of multiple vehicles by families – a couple of four-wheelers (if not more) or one or more 4-wheelers in combination with one or more two wheelers. Many families, especially in the Chowk area, have as many as half a dozen two wheelers. With growing prosperity among the middle classes owning multiple vehicles has become commonplace. This indulgence is witnessed regardless of availability or otherwise of space in the house to accommodate all the vehicles. No wonder, in most of the residential areas one finds today cars parked for most part of the day and at night out on the narrow colony roads. Among many families of traders even the housewife has a four-wheeler for her exclusive use which is seldom used. This confirms the contention of Sunita Narain, the editor of the prestigious environmental magazine “Down to Earth”. According to her a vehicle sits on its four wheels for 90% of the time either at home or in a parking lot.

While raising the cost of petrol/diesel, hiking taxes on vehicles and making the parking fees prohibitive have been the common measures recommended for limiting the rise in the number of vehicles, a measure that has received attention lately is ensuring that the purchaser of a vehicle has space at home to park his vehicle. The purchaser of a new four wheeler will have to prove it to the vehicle registering authority that he has enough space at his place to park his vehicle. Difficult of enforcement, such a provision if enforced is likely to be expensive as the government will have to provide for manpower for verifications of claims by the purchaser. Many, therefore, consider it as impracticable.

What, however, is urgently required is to reduce the number of vehicles plying on the roads, particularly at peak traffic hours. For that many towns have adopted various measures. Some have ordered plying of vehicles of even numbers on some days and those with odd numbers on others. Others have adopted a far harsher method of imposing what is known as “Congestion tax”. A fee of 5 Pounds was levied on every vehicle that entered the highly congested Central London as congestion tax a few years ago. The fee may have been hiked by now. I recall as far back as in 1981 a car, even a taxi, could not enter the High Street of Singapore unless it had four occupants, including the driver. Each town and country puts together regulations according to its needs and keeping in view its capability of enforcing them.

We in Bhopal, however, suffer from a seemingly incurable malady of non-governance. This is more pronounced in so far as managing traffic on the roads is concerned. Traffic Police seem to have thrown in the towel. It is not that they are incapable. They, in fact, suffer from lack of manpower and, of course, interference from our revered “netas”. When the Bhopal Citizens’ Forum requested some of our ministers and MLAs that, given the uncontrolled, disorderly and riotous traffic on the roads, the Traffic Police should be allowed to freely enforce the extant rules they met with a veritable Chinese Great Wall. They were plainly told the “netas” could not keep quiet when their friends, relatives or constituents requested for intervention on being caught on the wrong side of the law. Not only their prerogative, it was their duty towards their constituents and near and dear ones. Nothing could be a more frank admission of subversion of governance by our elected leaders for personal interests. In such an environment Traffic Police can do very little. In all probability, therefore, respite from the chaotic traffic on the city roads in the foreseeable future is unlikely despite the recent claims of “sushasan” (good governance) by the state government in full page ads on the birthday of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

The best option, therefore, that commends itself is strengthening of the public transport system. Bhopal for a long time did not have a public transport system barring the ramshackle minibuses that were and still are a horrific terror on the roads. Under the JN National Urban Renewal Mission the Centre mercifully provided for modern and decent low-floor buses. Their fleet has been gradually enlarged and some more are likely to be added, including air-conditioned ones. Good, decent and punctual buses will only nudge people away from their personal vehicles, be it a two wheeler or a four wheeler. As roads become more and more congested (which is very likely when BRTS is commissioned) and traffic becomes more riotous pushing the figures of casualties northwards people will surely take to the buses. The managements of the transportation services will have, however, to inspire confidence of the commuting public in their services by running well-maintained buses punctually to attract the middle classes. Disruptions in services, as happened, recently would need to be strictly avoided. This will be of benefit in several ways, such as helping the commuter to save on daily commutes, saving precious fuel 70% of which is imported, reducing congestion on the roads and reducing emission of carbon in the atmosphere of an already warmed-up globe. A well-oiled public transport system will also help in mitigating the ever-increasing parking woes of the people. The Corporation may also find a bit of a respite from pressures for provision of larger and larger parking spaces. Since the Red and Purple buses are currently being run under the management of the Municipal Corporation it is in its own interest to strive for their ever-rising acceptance among the commuters.

Too many foreigners weighing down India

2011-12-23T16:54:00.000+05:30

A group of 140 overstaying Pakistani Hindus have expressed the desire to remain in India and make Delhi their home. They came to India from Sindh on tourist visa and for fear of being targeted are afraid to go back. With visas expired, they live in utter penury in Majnu Ka Tila in Delhi and have only one appeal for the Government of India that their visas should be extended. They would also like the government to provide them proper accommodation. These people from 27 families waited for years for their visas and were so desperate that once they got them they walked across to India. According to them they always felt unsafe in their own country and were subjected to discrimination. Not only they had no religious freedom, their children were ill-treated in schools, i.e. if they were allowed to join one. Always being told to convert to Islam, they would like to give up their home country and live in India, they said, just as numerous Bangladeshis, Nepalese and Tibetans live here.

They are mistaken if they think they are the only Pakistani Hindus who want to permanently make their home in India. Before them, hundreds and thousands of them came here with or without valid visas and never went back. And, all of them did not come only at the time of partition. Off and on, whenever, there were atrocities against Hindus, India would see an influx of Sindhi Hindus from Pakistan. A large number of them came after the 1971 War that resulted in dismemberment of Pakistan, arousing in it great antipathy for India and, of course, local Hindus. Even in normal times the process of ethnic cleansing has been continuing. Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh are two states which seem to have been receiving them in large numbers. In fact, the two states have been welcoming them more or less with open arms, presumably, for political gains. They constitute a solid vote bank for the BJP. An August 2011 report said that around 3500 Sindhis who migrated more than a decade ago on long-tem visas and residing in Madhya Pradesh are still awaiting citizenship. If anything, this is a great under-statement. There are far, far more than 3500 Sindhis in the state who do not have proper documents. Many of them have merged with the local population without observing official niceties and have established themselves in business.

Those now camping in Majnu ka Tila are right when they say numerous Bangladeshi and Nepalese are also living in India. Hindu Bangladeshi refugees always made a beeline for India whenever they were subjected to atrocities. Their numbers were never accurately determined but it is estimated that a million came post partition, another million in 1950s and around 5 million in 1960s, most came after the 1965 war with India. During the struggle for independence in 1970-71 about 10 million East Pakistani Hindus crossed over to India to avoid a veritable genocide. Not all of them went back; around 1.5 million are estimated to have stayed back.

But there has been no respite for India even after Bangladesh came into being. Migration, in fact infiltration, into India has been continuing and, currently, 20 million illegal Bangladeshis, mostly Muslims, are reportedly in residence in India. There is practically no state in Upper India which does not have their colonies. They have swamped several districts of Assam and border districts of West Bengal changing their demographics. In Assam as many as six districts now have Muslims in majority and in two in West Bengal. In Assam a violent socio-political movement was launched for their eviction. While the porous borders have helped easy accessibility, poor enforcement and rampant corruption has ensured the illegal immigrants to avail of the benefits they are not entitled to. Their presence in large numbers, largely by design, especially in the states of West Bengal and Assam (where their number is reported to be 5 million out of 26 million) has given rise to fears of Islamic fundamentalism and consequential security threats to India. There have been frequent reports of these illegal immigrants promoting the idea of a “Greater Bangladesh” inclusive of the Indian states of West Bengal and Assam.

The case of Nepalese in India, however, is entirely different. They are here in pursuance of the Indo-Nepal Friendship Treaty of 1950. Each, seemingly, fell into other’s lap out of fear on the emergence of the Red Dragon on their northern borders. The rise of Communist China in 1949 and its subsequent invasion of Tibet heightened their security concerns. Under the Treaty, Nepalese citizens in India have all the rights of an Indian citizen and they do not require visas to enter India, except a valid identification card while entering India by air. Both countries have also agreed to grant, on a reciprocal basis in each other’s territories, the same privileges in the matter of residence, ownership of property, participation in trade and commerce, etc. Curiously, however, while the citizens of Nepal have been exercising the rights granted under the Treaty Indians have not only have to have visas for entering Nepal but also are prevented under Nepalese laws to own and acquire property in Nepal. An estimated 10 million Nepalese are, as a consequence, residing and working in India, doing all kinds of jobs, including in the public and private sectors and in the Army, strengthening their country’s economy by remittances – largely informal – which amount to approximately 10% of its GDP.

Although the Nepalese find the 1950 Treaty unequal, strategic concerns apart, it appears to be highly unfavourable to India. The open borders between the two countries have allowed Nepalese to flood the country and take away from the locals millions of jobs in formal and informal sectors and share the resources that are increasingly becoming scarce. Besides, the open borders have been freely used by the Pakistani jihadists to spread mayhem and chaos in the country. While Nepal exports its so-called labour as a national policy, illegal Bangladeshis are plain and simple intruders having no right to be in India in such large numbers. Sadly, the Centre has hardly made any effort to prevent their ingress and has made, if at all, very feeble efforts to send them back. Even a rich country like the US adopts a very uncompromising attitude against those who breach its frontiers. Pakistan, on the other hand, is solving its communal problem by easing out its unwanted Hindus in hundreds and thousands. India, however has never taken up with Pakistan the question of crude treatment meted out to its Hindus even though President Musharraf during a press conference in Delhi had the audacity to make a comment about treatment in Indian Muslims. Surely he was aware that India hosted far more Muslims than Pakistan. He was, however, put in his place by one Maulana Madani who bluntly told Musharraf not get overly concerned about the wellbeing of Muslims in India.

This is not all. Apart from millions of Pakistani Hindus, Nepalese and Bangladeshis, there are a few thousand foreigners including Pakistanis and Bangladeshis who have overstayed their visas having entered the country with valid documents. Add to that hundreds and thousands of Tibetan, Afghan, Sri Lankan and Burmese refugees to complete the picture. In India’s 1.2 billion people its neighbours have, thus, made the substantial contribution of close to 10%. Had the country – virtually a sub-continental refuge – not been weighed down by these foreigners, its economic profile perhaps would have been far different.

Bhopal's dysfunctional municipal corporation

2011-12-08T15:20:00.002+05:30

A report in a local newspaper a few days back spoke about the callousness of the Bhopal Municipal Corporation (BMC) in handling complaints of felling of trees in the city. A large number of trees have been illegally felled and complaints were duly lodged with the BMC but no action was taken. Only BMC has the authority to permit felling of trees and for taking punitive legal action in case they are illegally felled. Thousands of complaints are reported to have been lodged but no action has been taken. The excuse of the BMC is that it does not have the required manpower. Fear has, therefore, been expressed that unless strict action is taken against those who fell trees without permission the city is going to be denuded of its trees.

This is not a solitary instance of the Corporation’s apathetic ways and of drifting along, doing nothing to improve the conditions in the city. Take for instance the matter relating to maintenance of the the Upper and Lower lakes the responsibility for which rests with the Corporation. Although the Upper Lake continues to be the source of drinking water for around 40% of the city’s population the Corporation has miserably failed to ensure its proper upkeep. Same is the case with the Lower Lake. Sewer lines still continue to pour into them despite expenditure of several crores of rupees that has been made to plug them. Encroachments around them, not prevented over the years in good time, abound and have led to shrinkage of their spreads. The Corporation, despite possessing the authority, the powers and the wherewithal, has remained a mute witness. Whether the inaction is because lack of availability of the required manpower resources or generous greasing of palms is a matter for investigation.

Again, the project of bringing waters of the Narmada River to the city. The government had once promised that Narmada waters would be brought to the town by November 2008. This was an extravagant assurance given in the face of acute shortage of water felt by the citizens during the summer of that year. However, three years on, according to a recent report, the BMC has not been able to complete construction of numerous water tanks to receive waters of the River. Only 40% of the work has been completed. Although the project was to be completed by December 2011, it is now likely to be completed by December next year, that is, if the people of this town are lucky. Adequate water supply for the citizens of this town still remains a distant dream.

Much has been written in recent times about the roads in the city. Apart from the roads that are to be converted into the BRTS corridor, most areas in new and old Bhopal have been dug up for various kinds of works such as laying of sewer or water pipelines. No one knows when they will be re-done. The works are being carried out on borrowed money – either loans from Asian Development Bank, the Department for International Development of UK, HUDCO or on grants under JNNURM. It would be interesting to ascertain to what extent the city is indebted to these lending institutions and whether the works carried out on loans have brought any improvement in the city or the lives of its denizens. Generally, the contractors carrying out these works are expected to put back the dug up roads in their original condition. But that seldom happens, as they, in active cooperation of municipal officials, do not do that and earn extra profits. As the Corporation is perennially short of funds chances of the excavated roads getting back to original condition in the foreseeable future are bleak. The only silver lining is that the government, nervous about the next elections, has asked the PWD to do them up. But how many of them it takes up and re-lays remains to be seen as the total kilometreage that has to be covered is pretty daunting. There are already reports of lack of funds for the purpose.

Instead of random digging of the roads it would have been desirable for the Corporation to take up only as much of the works as it could manage within the available financial resources. But, no, it has gone and dug up virtually the entire town causing inconvenience to every citizen, exposing them to dust and ill health. What is more, the roads inside the colonies too have been dug up. These are supposed to be maintained by the respective municipal councillors who take their own time to do them up and that too in their own shoddy way. Obviously, the upturned shoddy roads inside the colonies are going to stay as such for quite a while unless the astrological configurations of those who reside in them change for the better soon enough.

Between dug up roads and rampant encroachments on them it has become difficult for people to negotiate their way down to their respective destinations. Despite the availability of the required staff encroachments are never prevented. It could be either because of sheer incompetence or pervasive corruption. The Corporation does launch drives occasionally to remove encroachments but these are restricted to few areas and are, in any case, few and far between. Despite involvement of avoidable costs neither action is taken against the official who ignores or allows encroachments to occur nor is any fine imposed on the encroacher. Public money is thus repeatedly wasted. The Urban Administration Minister had once admitted that there was no system of fixing responsibility for the encroachments that occur on public spaces. No wonder, these occur repeatedly, mostly at the same places, allowing municipal officials to get away without any penalty for their negligence or corrupt ways. The larger interests of the people are, obviously, of no consideration.

The BMC has also failed to maintain cleanliness and sanitation, more so in the residential colonies of the town. Piles of garbage and overflowing sewers making the dusty roads slushy are more of a rule than exception. Barring the arterial roads and VIP areas, the rest of the town remains filthy and people are exposed to insanitation and health hazards. A local daily had covered a few weeks back all the wards one-by-one exposing the apathy and neglect of the Corporation in maintaining civic services in the town. Despite the exposure things have not improved. Looks like, the Corporation takes such exposures in its strides; it has become so brazen.

System-wise the Corporation is well-served. There are zones and wards with their respective heads and other paraphernalia. But nothing seems to work. The zonal heads have now been given Nano cars, presumably, to enable them to carry out their functions of monitoring and inspections more effectively. But there has hardly been any perceptible enhancement of civic amenities. Even earlier the Corporation was reported to be spending tens of crores of rupees on hiring vehicles for its officers but that had not improve matters. All its civic services have continued to remain in utter mess. In no way has the Corporation been able to lift the quality of life of the citizens of the town which, currently, is plumbing the depths.

Unless a radical change for the better overtakes it, the Corporation will have no business to continue to exist in its dysfunctional way.

The scourge of "paid news"

2011-11-29T12:57:00.000+05:30

“Paid news” has drawn its first blood. A sitting legislator, Umlesh Yadav, of Uttar Pradesh assembly has been disqualified by the Election Commission of India (EC) from contesting any election for three years as she did not include in her election expenses the amounts spent by her on advertisements which were published as news items in two Hindi papers.

The EC received a reference from the Press Council of India (PCI) which had held the two newspapers guilty of ethical violation. The PCI, apparently, had appointed an inquiry committee to investigate the complaint against the two dailies for having published “paid news” in favour of Ms. Yadav a day before the polling in her constituency in the 2007 Assembly elections. Eventually, the PCI forwarded the case papers of the adjudication to the EC for such action as it deemed proper. The order disqualifying the legislator was issued as a consequence.

In another case, the Election Commission is hearing allegations against Madhu Koda, the former chief minister of Bihar, who is alleged to have failed to file proper returns of his election expenses. The Income Tax department in a report is supposed to have stated that he paid Rs. 1.25 crore (Rs. 1.25 billion) to a TV channel for telecasting news favourable to him during the 2009 general elections. The “paid news” allegation cropped up against Koda when the Enforcement Directorate of Ministry of Finance and Income Tax (IT) authorities raided his residence and came across diary entries regarding payments made to media houses for reporting/telecasting reports in his favour. According to the IT department, against the permissible expenditure of Rs.25 lakh (Rs 2.5 million) Koda allegedly spent Rs.9.00 crore (Rs.9 billion).

Another politician of note, Ashok Chavan, the former chief minister of Maharashtra, has just lost his case against the EC in Delhi High Court. He had challenged the EC’s powers to investigate expenses incurred by him during the 2009 assembly elections. As the prestigious newspaper Hindu reported, his was a case that “embarrassed major newspapers that had run scores of hagiographic full pages of ‘news’ on Mr. Chavan during the poll campaign...pages without a single advertisement on them...and so much as a mention of his rivals in his Bhokar constituency...” While dismissing the petition as “devoid of merit” the court directed the PCI to put on the internet its own report on “paid news” which it had had to suppress under pressure from the media houses that were seen to have indulged in unethical practices. Chavan has since gone in appeal to the apex court.

The PCI has since received a fresh case of “paid news”, this time from Goa. A sting operation conducted by one Mayabhushan Nagvenkar has put Goa’s OHeraldO in the dock. Armed with transcripts of his audios and telephonic talks with the marketing manager of the newspaper Nagvenkar has approached the PCI.

The PCI defines paid news as “any news or analysis appearing in any media (print or electronic) for a price in cash or kind as consideration”. According to senior journalist, Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, who headed its sub-committee to investigate the evil phenomenon of paid news, substantial sections of the media have become participants and players in practices that contribute to this growing use of money-power in politics. “The entire clandestine operation has become widespread and now cuts across newspapers and TV channels, small and large, in different languages and located in various parts of the country. Worse, these illegal operations have become organised involving ad agencies and PR firms besides journalists, managers and owners of media companies. (The) So called ‘rate cards’ or ‘packages’ are distributed that often include rates for publication of ‘news items’ that not merely praise particular candidates but also criticise their political opponents.”

He says, numerous favourable or complimentary paid ‘news’ reports on certain candidates appeared in newspapers (and were broadcast on TV channels) across the country in the run-up to the last general as well as state assembly elections without disclosing the fact that these were transactional news items. The deception by the media houses, according to Guha Thakurta, assumed three facets. The reader was led into believing that it was independent news content and not an advertisement, the candidates concerned did not include the expenditure on the “ad” in their election expenses and the media houses, having received the moneys in cash, did not include them in their balance sheets.

Samir Lal, a former senior journalist who left the profession having got fed up with commercialisation of the newspaper industry, is more scathing about the goings-on in it. He says, “Indian media industry has unapologetic clarity about the nature of its business: it sells media platform to commercial clients, not news to readers.” With proprietors not interested in selling what good journalists produce, the crisis in India is not one of the media industry but of the profession of journalism. “News today is sleight of hand: paid news by politicians, private treaties with advertisers, celebrity coverage for a fee, PR feed masquerading as reportage, the business story slanted to serve the stock market, the deserving story not done”. With the marketing departments of media houses setting the agenda for the editors, India’s media barons are not really in news business. And yet, Lal says, news is unavoidable – to fill the gaps between the ads.

“News holes”, that’s what Noam Chomsky, the American philosopher and activist, calls them which are filled up by news after the advertising layout is decided. This happens even in as prestigious a newspaper as the New York Times which has been accused of “distorting, censoring and suppressing truth” – influenced as it is by the American establishment and the great US corporations. Stephen Lendman, a renowned American researcher and author, says that the US media delivers “a daily diet of ‘managed news’, infotainment and ‘junk food news’...” keeping people uninformed about what matters most.

The description above snugly fits the Indian media too. News today serves various commercial interests or those of the establishment in accordance with predilections of the owners, who hardly bother about the interests of the readers. Chomsky found Indian media, barring the singular exception of The Hindu, “pretty restricted, very narrow and provincial and not very informative, leaving out lots of things.” While most of the national dailies have their respective patrons and/or benefactors whose agenda they necessarily have to push, the regional and sub-regional press are generally out for sale. Though it is the second biggest market for newspapers with around 40-odd thousand newspapers published in the country and the reading public consuming 99 million copies (in 2007), its independence is something which one cannot vouch for. No wonder, the country was placed in 2010 at 122^nd out of 178 on assessment of press freedom made by the Reporters Without Borders – For Press Freedom, a non-profit that works for freedom of information. The claims that are frequently made of the Indian media being independent, unbiased and pillars of our vibrant democracy have, therefore, to be taken with fistfuls of salt.

It is a pity that the report of the Paranjoy Guha Thakurta sub-committee was somehow buried by none other than the PCI which is statutorily charged with the responsibility of governing the conduct of the Indian print (and broadcast) media. Flexing their muscles the large media houses, who would have otherwise been in the dock, successfully foiled the attempt to bring out the truth. The new PCI chief, Justice Markandey Katju, has already condemned his own institution as “ineffective” but has also asked for more teeth and enlargement of its scope to include even the electronic media. It would perhaps be more desirable for him, for the present, to have the Council reconstituted, if necessary by amendment of the Press Council Act 1978, and reduce the overwhelming representation of the media organisations (almost 66%) in it to enable it to be more objective in dealing with the aberrations like those of “paid news”.

Once again - the Kerwa tiger

2011-11-16T12:35:00.002+05:30

Very encouraging reports have been appearing in the newspapers about the forests around the Kerwa and Kaliasot dams close to Bhopal, a town of more than 1.8 million people. The camera traps installed to monitor the movement of the tiger that has repeatedly been seen in these forests have recorded a thriving wildlife population. Apart from the tiger, among the animals trapped in the camera are leopards, bears, wild boars, foxes and a species of cat that has so far defied identification and has not been seen for quite some time. It is through the instrumentality of the tiger that the forest department has acquired the knowledge about the presence of several species of wildlife in these forests. That they have survived for so long in the vicinity of such a large town despite the depredations of unthinking men is quite a wonder. None, however, knows how diverse the flora in these jungles is.

I recall having read in the net some of the impressions of these jungles recorded by a few former students of the National Law Institute University, an institution of national repute, built close to Kerwa. They used to go on treks in the jungles surrounding the Institute and had recorded glowing reports about them. They did not see tigers but they used to frequently see the other big cat, the leopard, apart from various other herbivores. These boys would venture into the forests for the sake of pleasure meaning no harm to their denizens. However, with the news of the wildlife population appearing in the press now, shikaris have started frequenting the forests. Fortunately the forest department has got wise about the goings on, thanks to the frequent sightings of the tiger.

The tiger seems to have settled down in this environment. Barring a few cattle-kills it has not harmed humans so far. In fact, according to reports that appeared in the vernacular press, a herder even chased it away with the help of his cane. Apparently, it finds the habitat conducive (recently reported to be excellent) and has, therefore, not moved back to where it came from, presumably the Ratapani sanctuary. As indicated earlier, either the prey-base has shrunk or the tiger numbers have gone up far too much for it to find itself comfortable in the sanctuary. The sanctuary should have become a tiger reserve but for the intervention of the Chief Minister who appears to be somewhat anti-tiger conservation. The Ministry of Environment & Forest of the government of India has already approved its conversion into a tiger reserve.

The forest department has, however, been mulling various options to deal with the tiger which, it seems, is kind of a problem for them. There was a proposal to fence off the Kerwa and Kaliasot dam areas. The latest, however, is to relocate it to Madhav National Park Shivpuri, which from available reports has inadequate prey-base to support tigers. There were reports of a tiger residing in it but it seems to have moved away to adjoining Kuno-Palpur forests. One wonders as to why the department is keen to take this trouble. If a tiger that is the denizen of the forest is confining itself within its boundaries there seems to be no reason to physically move it to as far away as Shivpuri. Quite rightly, an experienced forest officer, the former Principal Chief Conservator of Forests, JJ Dutta, has reminded the department of the case of the tiger that was relocated to Panna from the Pench Tiger Reserve. Guided by its strong homing instinct, it had started marching towards Pench. Luckily it was not poached before it was apprehended scores of miles away from Panna Tiger Reserve. Another forest old-timer, PM Lad, in whose time Van Vihar was created, has said that it is the humans who have encroached into the tiger territory and not vice versa. He felt that any harm coming to the tiger in relocating it would make a dent in the process of conservation of the species.

Obviously, everyone, including wildlife experts, wants the tiger to be allowed to rest in peace in the surroundings it finds congenial. One wonders whether the forest department, led by the Forest Minister, is being forced into action by colonisers and/or construction lobbies who are very close to the current government. One recalls that the tiger is moving in areas that include Chandanpura where the Sanskaar Valley School of the Dainik Bhaskar Group is located and where land-use change was proposed in the now-cancelled Bhopal Development Plan 2021. Curiously, all the forest areas around the town are being eyed by these lobbies and, perhaps, that is the reason for widening of the road to Kerwa that has been undertaken at the cost of about 10000 trees which are going to be felled.

Instead of translocating the tiger the forest department would do well to listen to voices of reason and take steps to ensure that it is comfortable in the forests of Kerwa and Kaliasot and that it in no way harms the humans in and around them. Such an action would retain the biodiversity of these jungles in their natural state for the benefit of everyone, including the people of Bhopal who, in fact, will benefit the most for reasons that hardly need reiteration. If for this reason the forests would need to be fenced, so be it.

Bhopal roads inflict ordeal on citizens

2011-11-11T16:53:00.001+05:30

What was once only feared has now come true. The dug up roads are causing not only inconvenience, they have also been instrumental in increasing sickness among the citizens. The Hindustan Times recently came out with an “unsettling” report based on the opinion of medical experts which suggested a rise in respiratory problems due to dust floating around in the city. Citing as evidence the contentions of some medical professionals, it was reported that nasal and respiratory allergies among the people are on the rise. Citizens of various localities have reported that constant inhalation of dust has led to sore throat and frequent sneezing. Among the factors that have contributed to rise are mainly the dust kicked up by the vehicles from the roads that have been dug up and ceaseless construction in the town.

The newspaper has also reported that the problem has been compounded by the Bhopal Municipal Corporation (BMC) which chopped down thousands of trees, many of them massive and decades old, in the on-going process of creating a BRTS corridor. Trees not only bind the loose earth, they also absorb a lot of dust, noise and atmospheric pollution. Among other benefits “Streetswiki” says “Street trees are a key feature of a liveable neighbourhood. Urban trees have significant and multiple benefits, from energy and water conservation to reduced road maintenance costs. A major transportation benefit is the favourable impact of mature trees on the pedestrian environment, particularly in urban areas. New evidence suggests roadside trees also increase traffic safety. While selecting, planting, and maintaining street trees present challenges, the benefits of trees far outweigh their costs. Cities can maximize these benefits through aggressive tree planting and maintenance programs.”

The Corporation has not made any efforts to substitute the felled trees by new plantations along the new corridor. A few months back when the Commissioner BMC accompanied the Principal Secretary Urban Administration & Development to a meeting of the Bhopal Citizens’ Forum he was asked about his plans of compensatory plantation along the upcoming corridor. He replied that a few thousand trees had been planted on a hill beyond Shahpura miles away from the town. There was no plan to plant trees along the roads. Obviously, like many other officials, he is not aware of the benefits of roadside trees. This is what has been the bane of India. A glaring example of the differences in our attitudes and those of the British is Delhi. While Lutyen’s Delhi has surfeit of roadside trees of native varieties, at places in double rows, the later additions to the expanding city like the settlements along the Ring Road are bereft of trees. The Ring Road and the Outer Ring Road have hardly any roadside trees.

The dug-up roads are another kind of scourge on those who ply the streets. The other day an auto-driver told me how not only his auto-rickshaw has repeated breakdowns because of the uneven, potholes and ditches-infested roads, his consumption of fuel has also gone up because he can never maintain an even pace. On top of that there have been repeated fuel price hikes. All these, plus the expensive medical attention needed because of exposure to acute pollution, have been cutting into his income. This applies to all those who have to commute in the city. BMC has been instrumental in whittling down the disposable incomes of the locals because of its lethargy and incompetence.

None knows when the ordeal of the people will come to end. Jaipur also created a corridor but it completed it within two and a half years flat. The Rajasthan government had established a special purpose vehicle to carry out the work. The Bhopal Citizens’ Forum had requested the chief secretary to create an empowered task force comprising technical and financial experts for enabling quick decisions in carrying out the works of JNNURM to prevent cost and time overruns but he, apparently, did not think it fit to pay heed to the Forum’s counsel. As on date, not one stretch of BRTS corridor is fully done and the commuters necessarily have to negotiate several lengths which are bouncy and dusty and at places barricaded. Looks like, the corridor will be commissioned when there will be no need for it as, given the frequent hikes in petrol prices, number of vehicles plying on the roads may drastically get reduced. Already, the recent hike seems to have had a tell tale effect

The main arteries perhaps will be taken care of even if it takes months and years to do so. What perhaps will take decades are the roads that have been dug up inside various localities for one reason or the other. Once dug, they stay dug and are never mended although the contracts provide putting them back in original condition. The contractors, engineering and other officials almost always swallow the money. The citizens of Bhopal have a long wait in front of them for a cleaner air and roads that are devoid of dust, scattered pieces of stones, potholes, ditches and overflowing sewers.

A pretty sorry plight!

Green construction in India

2011-11-10T16:33:00.004+05:30

Environmental conservation is virtually the flavour of the season. Human intervention with nature has mounted to such an extent over the last few decades that today the progressively degrading environment has started posing a threat not only to the Planet Earth but also to the wellbeing, even survival of the human race. Waking up to the serious threat, sustainable living has become a catchword that has prompted humanity to balance its progress with preservation of the surroundings that it sustains itself in. Aware that every economic activity impinges on the natural world, humanity today has become more conscious of the need to conserve the environment. Green construction or building green buildings is a manifestation of this evolving consciousness.

Construction by the very nature of the activities it involves makes use of natural resources. Primitive man had simple and limited needs. His abode therefore had very little impact on his environment. With the civilisational evolution human needs have escalated and greater sophistication in construction has hugely impacted on nature. The growing urbanisation, especially in the developing world, is going to tap not only more and more natural resources, it also is going to impact the environment more and more around the urban areas. No wonder, therefore, the concept of green construction, which in effect means erection of buildings that are environment-friendly in all respects, has acquired greater currency. It has been estimated that as many as 10% of the buildings that are going to be constructed in the United States during the current year will be green.

According to Wikipedia, “Green construction refers to erection of a structure using processes that are environmentally responsible and resource-efficient throughout a building's life-cycle, i.e. from the stage of siting to design, construction, operation, maintenance, renovation, and demolition.” It basically involves in efficiently utilising energy, water and other resources, protecting the health of occupants and, in many cases, enhancing their productivity and, last but not the least, mitigating waste, pollution and environmental degradation.

One has, thus, to be conscious of the environment at every stage of the building process. The stage of siting a structure is as important as those that follow it. Siting is important to ensure that the building is conveniently located near facilities so that the occupants do not have to needlessly commute long distances for their day-to-day needs. Besides, siting a building near existing infrastructure, like roads, sewers and storm-water systems (where provision is not made for recycling of waste water) allows builders to lessen negative impact on a building’s surroundings.

The architectural designing has to keep in view the soil of the site in order to ensure acceptance of the required structural loads, the climate of the area to reduce the artificial cooling or heating needs, availability of water resources to determine the need for water harvesting systems and so on. In terms of climate, the building’s orientation can be aligned in different ways with the movement of the sun to reduce the need for artificial lighting or electrical cooling or heating. It can also be so oriented with the general wind direction so that the structure lets in as much fresh air as possible and reduce its carbon footprint.

Another effective way of controlling energy consumption is by making provision for green roofing. A green roof needs not very expensive surface but it manages to appreciably reduce the temperature in the building and also positively impacts on the ambient temperature. Germany and the United States have gone in for green roofing in a big way and the gardens put up on the roof not only add aesthetics to the buildings but also pull off some of the greenhouse gases from the atmosphere besides promoting bio-diverse environment in urban spaces.

Architectural design of a green building, thus, can reduce energy consumption and control even its waste. After all, most important reason today of building green is energy conservation and to reduce carbon emission levels. By facilitating use of solar energy or, wherever possible, use of other renewable sources or by the use of insulated panels appreciable amount of energy can be saved. In the United States a few of the rural houses have gone off-grid, meeting their energy-needs with the solar energy that they capture and the energy produced by biomass.

Water efficiency is another area which is an important ingredient of a green construction. Water is the fastest depleting natural resource, more so in India. Not only its consumption, therefore, needs to be controlled, its waste also is to be eliminated. Wherever feasible, provision of harvesting rain-water is necessary to supplement the supply from the water utilities. Provision for recycling waste water for watering the green areas either on ground or on the roof is necessary. The basic idea is that a green building is a “zero discharge” structure. It does not let out any waste to pollute the surroundings.

Materials-wise eco-friendly constructions are resource efficient and call for the use of green construction materials. Several local and renewable materials have developed as a response to the knowledge that buildings often have a negative impact on our environment. Architects and builders worldwide are now using construction techniques that have been developed in response to local environmental concerns and the physical resource opportunities available, coupled with modern technological refinements. These buildings range from rammed earth construction, which involves clay-based material mixed with water, to straw houses since straw is a great insulator, a breathable material that filters the air passing through it, is fire-resistant when compressed and is of low cost.

The Government of India has been pushing fly ash products as eco-friendly and durable construction material. The country has a huge accumulation of fly ash in numerous thermal power plant sites which, unless made use of, are likely to cause widespread pollution. Among the fly ash products available are cellular light-weight concrete blocks that have, inter alia, better strength-to-weight ratio, reduce dead load resulting in saving of steel & cement, reduce foundation size and provide better thermal insulation, clay fly ash bricks that have better thermal insulation, are cost-effective and environment-friendly and fly ash based polymer composites that can be used as substitute for wood. One could complement it with organic paints for an improved quality of the indoor environment.

One would tend to wonder as to why one should go in for a green construction particularly when costs of such a constructions are higher. But that is a fallacy as the cost of construction of a green building is only marginally – about 4% to 10% – higher than that of a conventional building. At this marginally higher cost one gets benefits in different dimensions. The first dimension is environmental. Green construction enhances and protects biodiversity and ecosystems, improves air and water quality, reduces waste streams and conserves and restores natural resources. Their economic benefits are reduction in operating costs, shaping and expansion of market of green products and improvement of human productivity. The third dimension relates to social benefits which are enhancement of occupant comfort and health, minimizing strain on local infrastructure and improvement of overall quality of life.

In India green construction has been slow to catch on but there has been a distinct progress. From 6000 square metres of green spaces in 2003 they rose to 305,000 square metres in 2008. The Indian Green Building Council is promoting and fostering their construction. The first green building in India was the CII-Sohrabji Godrej Green Business Centre in Hyderabad. Kolkata’s Technopolis lays claim to be the country’s first green building for information technology which also makes money through carbon credits – about Rs. 75 lakh a year. It is the first building in the world to be registered under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change as a clean development mechanism project. Green construction can thus also be a money-earner.

Photo: Complex of the police chief, Gulbarga, India - a LEED Gold construction

(The article was published in September 2011 in the inaugural issue of "Shubhalaya", a real estate quarterly published from Bhopal and is reproduced here with its permission)

India in ferment

2011-10-27T16:59:00.002+05:30

India these days seems to be in ferment. If one picks up a newspaper one gets hit by headlines that certainly do not bode well for the country, at least, not in its immediate future. While one can discern a severe churning taking place in the country’s social, political and economic life, the government, at the same time, is largely perceived to be drifting along.

Protests against governmental actions/inactions both, at the Centre and in some states have been raging for months. Tamilnadu in the South has witnessed an agitation against the Koodankulam nuclear power plant that is only few months away from attaining criticality. The pathetic fate of far-away Fukushima in Japan and its ill-fated victims have justifiably induced fear in the surrounding villages of Koodankulam. People in general have become resistant to the idea of nuclear power and fearful of the nuclear power plants. Another anti-nuclear protest by villagers earlier this year in the idyllic Konkan region in Maharashtra’s Ratnagiri District against a mega Nuclear Power Park had boiled over for weeks and had even become violent.

Acquisitions of fertile lands under an antique law for mining, industry and power – thermal or nuclear – in pursuit of double-digit GDP growth gave rise to agitations of farmers and tribal communities in several states. The government has been hard put to subdue them. The country has also seen protests in the North-East, in Arunachal Pradesh and Assam, as also in the Himalayan states of Himachal and Uttarakhand against construction of dams for irrigation and generating hydro-power. While people, especially rural and tribal communities, have become more alert about safeguarding their rights and livelihoods, the governments, both at the Centre and in the states have been tardy in shedding their autocratic attitudes and have failed to take people into confidence before conceiving projects that impinge on their wellbeing. Today, with information being available at the remotest of outposts ordinarily people refuse to be taken for granted by governments and their functionaries.

A decades-old movement for creation of the Telangana state (to be carved out of the southern state of Andhra Pradesh) has gathered strength and is continuing now for months with no solution in sight. The Congress Party which had merged the region with the then newly-created Andhra Pradesh more than half a century ago against the wishes of the locals and against its own better judgement has now been facing the music. With passions running high, life in the state and its capital, Hyderabad, is paralysed with considerable impact on it administration and economy.

The social activist Anna Hazare’s two successive fasts, with unprecedented country-wide support, for enactment of a strong “Janlokpal” (anti-corruption ombudsman) law and later the government’s capitulation are recent history. India Against Corruption (IAC), led by Hazare and his team, are still hitting headlines. It has decided to canvass against Congress candidates at the 2012 state polls if the Parliament reneged from its commitments given during its last session for legislating for a strong “Lokpal” – the reasoning being the Congress leads the coalition at the Centre. Although the context might be different, IAC’s efforts of swinging elections away from the Congress remind one of the campaigns of The Tea Party in the US during the 2010 Congressional elections.

The United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government’s first tenure appeared sedate until, of course, the Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, insisted on signing the Indo-US Nuclear Deal even at the cost of losing support of one of his important allies – the Left – risking his government’s survival. The government did survive and win the “Confidence vote” only after the “cash-for-votes” scam exploded in the Parliament in 2008. The Congress-led ruling combine’s brazen efforts to soft-pedal investigations into the scandal invited a scorcher from the apex court. And yet, the trial that was hurriedly commenced, based on seemingly skewed investigations, appear to be farcical as none from among the beneficiaries – the Congress-led UPA government – of the scam has so far been hauled up. After IAC’s massive anti-corruption movement the government’s attitude appears somewhat brassy.

UPA I’s survival by dubious means has come to haunt it in its second avatar. All the scams that are currently hogging the headlines are of UPA I-vintage. The biggest of them all – allotment of 2G spectrum – saw a cabinet minister, a member of parliament (both of a southern ally) and a few corporate honchos into the jail, besides embarrassing the Prime Minister who tried to hide behind the nebulous “coalition compulsions”. He was, nonetheless, forced to act by an aggressive Supreme Court. Later, even the Comptroller & Auditor General (CAG) got into the act, putting the finger at the loss of incredible hundreds of thousands of billion rupees.

The relentless media exposes of scams of another few hundred thousand billion rupees during the run up to the Commonwealth Games in 2010 forced the Prime Minister into action to have it investigated by a former CAG. Having shot himself in the foot, he lost credibility. And, it led to a curious crisis of confidence that stalled governance and induced a policy-paralysis even as sycophants of Sonia Gandhi undermined his stature by repeated assertions about eligibility of her son to occupy the highest executive position.

Today, the busiest organisations are the courts, especially the Supreme Court, and investigative agencies like the Central Bureau of Investigation and other police outfits. While virtually every day there are reports of court orders pulling up a public organisation or an individual, every new day brings also the news of a big wig either being put in the coup or refused bail. A large number of politicians of different hues are in Delhi’s infamous Tihar Jail. While the Law Minister, strangely, feared for drop in investments with so many corporate heads in jail, the apex court was taken aback when warned by a government lawyer of destabilisation of the government if it went after high functionaries like the home minister, a case for whose prosecution contributing to the 2-G scam is also currently being heard.

A recent headline spoke of “scams, graft (are) hitting growth”. Indeed, GDP growth has slowed down. Scams and graft could well have been very important reasons. No less important has been the reason of inflation which has been biting the industry and the common man, the very aam aadmi, whom the UPA swore by. The prices have gone through the roof and what hurts the most is the food inflation that has moved beyond 10%. The declining value of the rupee has pushed a few more millions below the poverty line. And yet, the government unmindfully has sought to peg the poverty line at a ridiculous Rs. 32 .00 and Rs. 26.00 per day in urban and rural areas, respectively, fuelling fresh controversy. None in the government seems to have bothered to enforce checks on the inflated prices of essentials like vegetables and food grains. While the prices of agricultural produce rule high squeezing the common man the farmers commit suicide and, ironically, the cartels and middlemen make their piles. Even, the middle classes have got the wrong end of the stick with repeated hikes in interest rates to combat the prevailing inflation, pushing, inter alia, housing and automobiles out of the reach of many.

Economic growth has, on one hand, been accompanied by growth in numbers of billionaires, enriched ministers and MPs/MLAs, rising numbers of private aircraft, luxury yachts and high-end luxury cars and, on the other, by huge numbers of discontented and resentful poverty-stricken, malnourished and hungry – by some estimates around 60 million (77% by the reckoning of the late economist Arjun Sengupta) – in rural and urban India. Jobs remaining scarce, petty and other crimes have shown an inordinate rise. Snatchings, thievery, rapine, kidnappings etc. have become common. Worse, while mafias stalk the honest and whistleblowers, murder and rape have registered a sharp rise. Security of life and property has become tenuous.

Polarisation in politics has bred acute intolerance for a contrarian view. Two prominent IAC activists were assaulted – one was beaten up on camera for holding views on Kashmir disagreeable to the extreme right and the other for canvassing votes against the Congress if it did not fulfil its commitment of legislating for a strong Lokpal.

While pursuit of economic growth has made only the rich and the unscrupulous prosperous and happy, it has spread unhappiness and misery among a very large section of the people. At the same time, it has demolished the anchors of Indian society in a mad rush for money; the get-rich-quick syndrome is eating into its moral fibre. Ethical life in India today has been shoved on to, no, not the back seat, but the boot. Reversing this now well-established unholy trend might well be an impossible proposition.

Solace from a tiger in the backyard

2011-10-26T17:07:00.003+05:30

A tiger has been roaming around in the jungles near Kerwa and Kaliyasot dams about 25 to 30 kilometres away from the central Indian city of Bhopal. The jungles are lush and provide excellent habitat. These are part of the Ratapani Wildlife Sanctuary that is cradled in a portion of the Vindhya Ranges passing through the districts of Sehore and Raisen adjoining Bhopal. The sanctuary was prevented from being designated as another tiger reserve of the province of Madhya Pradesh by the political executive as the tribal people inhabiting the jungles feared their dislocation as a consequence.

During the past few months reports that would come in spoke of the big cat, apart from terrorising the villagers who live close to these dams, was making meals of their cattle. Scores of cattle were reported to have been killed by it but no harm seems to have ever come to any human. The villagers, perhaps promptly compensated by the government for their losses, have so far been patient and have resisted taking recourse to brutal killing of the beast – like the tiger which was mercilessly showered with lathi blows (the lathi is an Indian stick used in traditional martial arts) and was beaten to death near Rajnandgaon last month where it happened to have strayed in from a sanctuary near Nagpur.

This morning a hugely reassuring news-item appeared in a vernacular daily – something that has not been heard for many years. Falsifying the traditional antipathy of humans for the tiger, the farmers in the villages near the two dams are happy with the presence of the one that has been making frequent forays into what is literally their backyard. Its presence seems to have made the pests disappear, thus saving their crops. In normal years when the tiger wouldn’t be around blue bulls and wild boar would raid their farms and not only eat up their crops but also destroy the rest. With a prowling tiger around, these pests have made a clean disappearing act, enabling the farmers to reap a good harvest. They are also planning to raise a second crop.

To prevent the tiger to find access into this area which it seems to be fond of, the Forest Department has, of late, been planning to erect a fence. That, perhaps, would be working at cross-purposes with the farmers, now that they seem to have become tiger-friendly, having found its presence economically beneficial. Erecting a fence, in any case, was not such a good idea as that would prevent the tiger free movement in its own domain, the forests near the two dams being part of the Ratapani Wildlife Sanctuary. There could be several reasons for the tiger to make repeated appearances in an inhabited area. A degrading/shrinking habitat and increase in tiger numbers and/or lack of an adequate prey-base are the ones that immediately suggest themselves. Wildlife experts in the department would do well to investigate the phenomenon.

The repeated tiger-sightings in these jungles, however, speak so very well of the Forest Department’s efforts to maintain them making them congenial for the tiger and, surely, for other fauna as well as flora. They also indicate how Bhopal was once surrounded by lush green forests which the town has been progressively nibbling away at. The government rather thoughtlessly gave away parts of these forests for educational institutions run mostly by media groups, presumably, for a consideration. Even a couple of years back the developers and builders were trying to grab parts of these forests under the Bhopal Development Plan 2021 in connivance with the government agencies concerned. It was only the massive resistance mounted by the civil society groups that forced it to give up the entire plan. That these forests are essential for the town’s salubriousness does not seem to have been adequately appreciated. The greenery in the town has been largely lost with ongoing constructions and road-building so much so that it is now witness to extreme heat in summers. For the sake of the comfort of the citizens of this town it would seem to be incumbent for the Forest Department to keep protecting and nurturing these forests regardless of what it takes.

Photo: The reservoir of Kerwa Dam by Bandana Bagchi

Bhopal's iconic lake under threat

2011-10-08T16:50:00.004+05:30

Bhopal, the capital of the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, could have been such a beautiful city. It was endowed with everything a place could aspire for – green hills and valleys, several lakes and a few small gurgling streams. Climatically it was bordering on the ideal – equable, with mild summers, plenty of rains and moderate winters. All that has been lost because of “development”, now a dreaded word for those who are sensitive about the city’s environment that they have seen progressively deteriorating. The unrestricted urban expansion has been gobbling up the surrounding farmlands, colonising the green hills, transforming the city’s streams into sewers and its lakes into septic tanks. The developmental assault on the city’s iconic millennium-old Upper Lake, a drinking water source for the locals for centuries, ceaselessly continues unmindful of its vital importance for the city’s environment, water security and green cover .

The other day, quite paradoxically the local edition of a national daily brought out a huge spread on conservation of the Lake when the Chief Minister happened to inaugurate another “tourist complex” on one of its banks much larger than the existing Boat Club on another much frequented bank. . The complex has been given an ethnic name “Sair Sapata” that connotes to me (though I may be wrong) tours and travels. Although the newspaper suggested ways and means of conserving the Lake it cleverly avoided mentioning the need for reducing tourism activities in and around it (which, in fact, are on the rise) on various environmental counts.

The “tourist complex” is located at Prempura, close to the exit point of the waters of the Lake that flow towards a dam. Built over an area of 24 acres at a cost of Rs. 4 crore ($ 800,000) the complex is accessed through a suspension bridge (somewhat like that of Rishikesh on the Ganges in Uttarakhand on the foothills of the Himalayas) across the channel. It currently has a toy train, a restaurant with a glass floor through which the marine life (that have been able to survive the rising pollution of the waters being made of sterner stuff) is visible, four food kiosks, three view-points, a glass house, a two-acre children’s play-ground and several pedal boats. The floating restaurant Lake Princess, reportedly with dining facilities, was re-introduced and the chief minister had a ride on it with several of his cabinet colleagues and officials. The complex is supposed to remain open till 10.00 PM every evening. It seems, people are flocking to it in great numbers and one can see its lights till late in the evening from the Idgah Hills on the other side of the Lake.

While inaugurating the “tourist complex” the chief minister very rightly said that it was a very good “gift to the people of Bhopal”. It would indeed serve as a very good amusement park for the people of the city. Vast numbers of young locals would certainly haunt the place for dining and other recreational activities, just as they collect in large numbers at the Boat Club or in the DB Mall on holidays and weekends. However, one cannot really expect tourists, especially the discriminating ones and those from abroad, to visit the complex as it has nothing much to offer to them. Predictably, even as the complex was inaugurated French tourists were taken on a meandering heritage walk through the lanes of the old city. One therefore tends to think that naming “Sair Sapata” as a tourist complex was a misnomer. Expenditure by the state Tourism Development Corporation (MPSTDC) on such complexes for amusement of the locals would, therefore, seem to be unwise and misdirected when the heritage sites in the city that are of interest to the tourists are crying for attention.

The other day, a few members of the Heritage sub-group of the Bhopal Citizens’ Forum happened to visit the three-century old Rani Kamalapati Palace. It is an important heritage complex of the town with a pan-chakki (water mill) and a hamaam (Islamic bath-house). The Palace is the only structure that has seen a semblance of maintenance primarily because it houses an office of Archaeological Survey of India (ASI). The rest of the structures that lead to the bathing ghats (platforms) for the legendary queen on the Lower Lake are in utter decay. Likewise, the water mill and the bath-house are also in degraded state. The ASI, which is supposed to maintain it, has no money, getting for restoration and maintenance of all archaeological sites in the state covered by its local superintending archaeologist the measly amount of Rs. 4 crore, which the MPSTDC blew up on one complex, viz., “Sair Sapata”.

Worse, the waters of the Lower Lake that splash on the Palace walls and were once fit enough for a queen to bathe in are so filthy that any tourist who happens to see it would be appalled. They would also be appalled if they happened to visit the city’s heritage sites that are preserves of the state’s archaeological department. One would have expected that in order to promote tourism in the city the MPSTDC would lend a helping hand to the archaeological departments for restoring the structures and improving their surroundings. But it is obsessed with tourism on the Upper Lake (to the exclusion of all other lakes in the city) regardless of the adverse impacts of their handiwork on its ecosystem.

Apart from the Boat Club and assorted eateries including the floating restaurant that have a deleterious impact on the Lake waters “Sair Sapata” is going to seriously threaten the wetland’s bird life. One wonders whether while conceptualising the Complex all the environmental aspects were kept in view. Bhopal’s Upper Lake (known as Bhoj Wetland along with its twin little sister, the Lower Lake) is an Important Bird Area, a reason, among several others, that prompted its designation as a Ramsar Site. The Complex is too close to the bird habitat. A busy amusement centre, with constant comings and goings and screaming and yelling children in the children’s park, so close to it, is surely going to deter the birds to choose the wetland for roosting. Besides, its bright lights after sundown are going to cause disturbance to the roosting birds and make the site for them eminently avoidable.

A vast number of people would perhaps be happy at the amusement park being served to them by the government on a platter. But, the fact is that it is going to deal a lethal blow to the Upper Lake and its ecosystem. One cannot overlook the fact that the Upper Lake, with its adjunct, the Lower Lake, apart from being an important inheritance, also serves us in numerous ways. From keeping us hydrated and water-secure, to bestowing on the city a green cover under climatic conditions it micro-manages, the Lake is a natural asset for the townsfolk with a unique ecosystem serviced by its flora and fauna, both under and above water. Any disturbance in its delicate ecological balance could spell disaster for the Lake – and indirectly, for the local citizenry.

But, none seems to be concerned about such niceties. The political executive, led by the tourism bureaucracy just couldn’t care less. The politicians are concerned about their votes and others have a vested interest in expanding tourism activities. So, environment could be damned. One wonders whether all those who flock to the lakeside complexes or dine floating on the Lake Princess are mindful of the consequences of their patronage of the outfits thoughtlessly sold to them by short-sighted people for short-term gains in the name of promotion of tourism. One wishes if only people could be sensitive enough to shun them all!

A bureaucrat's faux pas

2011-09-29T12:31:00.003+05:30

“All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then your success is sure”, so said Mark Twain (1835-1910) years ago. How true it is till this day! Many a politician and bureaucrat in this country have been successfully ruling over the unsuspecting people with great aplomb and, yes, with utter ignorance.

A barefaced example of this was provided by Manish Singh, Commissioner of the Municipal Corporation of Bhopal, the capital of the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, recently in an interview when he was asked about neglect of the old city. He pontificated, “New city will always look more beautiful, developed and organised. This holds true in every part of the world. Since this part of the city came later it has more space for roads, houses, traffic and greenery... In old city there are constraints like want of space, encroachments, crowds and congestion, narrow roads and lanes, etc. and also protests against anti-encroachment drives.

Singh is seemingly unaware that the old quarters in almost all European towns are more beautiful than the newer parts. It is the older parts that the tourists flock to and, therefore, Singh’s, counterparts in such cities, a more alert and active lot, take greater care of these parts. Obviously, he also hasn’t heard of the term “downtown” used in America that originated from Manhattan Island of New York City in the early 19th Century and eventually came to be referred to the historical cores, more often the commercial hearts, of the cities across America. They are never neglected.

Bhopal’s old city is no different; only, unlike in Europe and the USA, it has been neglected by the municipality. It is utter fallacy to say old Bhopal is unplanned. People familiar with the town would know that, for example, besides what is known as the Royal Ensemble, the Chowk area was meticulously planned with roads (with thriving commerce) radiating from its core that houses a historic mosque. Even the area between Hamidia Road and Imami-Peer Gates complex (about an area of four square kilometres) is well-planned, it being divided into squares by several parallel roads.

Only, because of ignorance and palpable apathy, these areas have been allowed to go to seed. They have never been taken care of. Lack of governance has enabled rampant encroachments and total absence civic services.

Bleak future of Panna tigers

2011-09-23T16:37:00.002+05:30

Despite expenditure of enormous amounts of tax-payers’ money on tiger-conservation somehow we are not able to protect this national animal. Madhya Pradesh appears to be a prime example. Not only substantial numbers were lost in Kanha National Park, the entire population in Panna Reserve was wiped out necessitating relocation in it of tigers from elsewhere. No wonder, the state lost the sobriquet of “Tiger State”.

Panna Tiger Reserve has been in controversies for some years now and virtually all of them relate to its mismanagement. Despite the early warnings from several sources, including the nation’s tiger conservation agencies, the state’s forest department refused to pay any heed. While credible reports from 2002 onwards indicated that the Reserve was rapidly losing its tigers to poachers, the Principal Chief Conservator (Wildlife) obdurately kept claiming that it had 20-odd tigers. Instead of taking steps to check the veracity of the statements, especially emanating from the experts of the central agencies, the forest department, sticking to its guns joined issue with them.

This is not all. When, after the tigers were all gone by the close of 2008, an inquiry conducted by the centrally-appointed Special Investigation Team (SIT) came to the conclusion that the tigers were lost not for any ecological reasons but were mostly poached, the state government, not satisfied, set up its own enquiry committee. Its findings mostly contained half-truths and concluded that gender imbalance in the tiger population of the Reserve made the males go looking for (the depleting number of) females outside the Reserve, only to be poached. No mention, however, was made of the reasons for the growing gender imbalance or the failure of the Reserve’s director and his staff to notice the same and report it to the headquarters. Needless to say, no effort was also made to fix responsibility for the extinction of the tigers in the Reserve. The SIT, on the other hand, did make a mention of the gender imbalance that had occurred in the Reserve. It had concluded that on account of their smaller home ranges tigresses in the Reserve were consistently poached without let or hindrance giving rise to the progressive gender imbalance.

In any case, the cat is now out of the bag. Ajay Dubey of Prayatna, an environmental action group, has ferreted out information that the forest department recently handed over details of nearly two dozen cases of tiger deaths in Panna to the home department and asked for CBI inquiry into them. After examination, the department picked up three cases which, according to it, seemed worthy of independent investigations.

In one of the cases the forest officials had seized in 2007 a jeep with Uttar Pradesh registration that was forcibly trying to enter the Panna Reserve with armed passengers. A police report was lodged but no follow-up action was taken for several years. The jeep was later released to a close relative of a BJP MLA. It is not clear whether there was any attempt to poach tigers but the case is being handed over to the CBI. In another case, forest officials, acting on a complaint filed by a villager, recovered jaw-trap and bones of tiger. The tiger was reportedly killed between 2004 and 2005 but the offence was registered only in February this year. On being asked to furnish details of the case the director of the Reserve failed to comply. The third case is of a tiger that was killed between 2004 and 2005 a report regarding which was not lodged with the Police.
Evidently, the forest department had received several reports of poaching in the Reserve, but, obsessed as it was with tourism even in its core area it failed to do the needful. Clearly, whatever it kept summarily dismissing as “media hype” were not mere hyped up reports. They were based on facts. Tiger enthusiasts had become so concerned about the indifference of the forest department to the persistent poaching in the game park that some of them took the extreme step of filing cases in the apex court. During the same period, letters were written to Chief Secretary and Principal Secretary Forests by the Chairman and Member Secretary, respectively, of the Central Empowered Committee appointed by the Supreme Court of India. These, too, were not taken cognizance of. When it was virtually curtains for the tigers in the Reserve in June 2008 the Principal Chief Conservator (Wildlife) was still waxing eloquent about their presence therein in the prestigious Sanctuary Asia magazine.

Even after the Prayatna expose, the attitude of the department, including that of its minister does not seem to have changed. When asked about the new revelations the forest minister’s reply appeared like that of the proverbial ostrich. He asserted that his department was prevented from doing the needful by a dacoit gang that came and camped in the Reserve. It was, in any case, a patently wrong contention. According to the SIT, the outlaws were in the Reserve between 2006 and 2008 whereas poaching, a fact never given due credence to by the forest department, had been continuing since 2002.

Looks like, the Panna Reserve has nothing but a bleak future in front of it. Even the chief minister, putting humans before tigers in the Reserve, insisted on a moth-eaten buffer being delineated for it excluding the mines worked by his political cronies. This after he received as many as two letters from the Prime Minister for creation of a proper buffer based on scientific assessments. Besides, he made the department overlook the SIT contention that “Without a good buffer….. survival of small tiger population, even under moderate poaching pressure, is difficult”. And, Panna has severe poaching pressure, surrounded as it is by settlements of traditional poaching tribes, viz. Pardhi and Bahelia who, leave alone the Panna Reserve, poach all over the country. Even middlemen in tiger-trade are present in strength around Panna.

Unless the forest department sheds its bullheadedness the survival of the recently trans-located tigers and their progeny, if any, in the Reserve is likely to be in peril. Panna along with Sariska hold out an example to all the states that have tiger reserves of what the consequences can be if the legendary lethargy of official establishments in protection and conservation of this national animal persist. What seemingly needs to be done all around is to enhance the security around the reserves and prompt attention to the alerts received from various quarters, especially the knowledgeable people, about the wellbeing of tigers in the reserves. Poachers are prowling all over, more so in central India and hence there is need for greater alacrity in protecting the animals.

Supremacy of Parliament

2011-09-20T11:59:00.001+05:30

(Pasted below is a blog by a friend who is yet to create a bog for himself)

Our Constitution gives us a Parliamentary Democracy with a scheme of distribution of powers between the Legislature, the Judiciary and the Executive, at the Centre as well as the States. Recently, during Anna’s fast and demand for a strong Lokpal Bill to be put up before the Parliament, Central Ministers of the Congress Party in the Cabinet, questioned the wisdom of challenging the status, powers and privileges of the Parliament and its Standing Committee with regard to bringing in such legislation. It may be a mere coincidence that both these Cabinet Ministers happen to be eminent lawyers by profession as also with a long association with the Congress Party.

Writing in his book, ‘The President under the Indian Constitution”, published in 1963, Sh. K M Munshi, a staunch Congressite, Gandhian and a Cabinet Minister in Pt. Nehru’s Ministry, wrote, “In pursuit of his policy of securing Marxist achievements through democratic forms and processes, Prime Minister Nehru began setting up extra-constitutional authorities to meet the difficulty rather than depend upon the devices prescribed by the Constitution. He set up the Planning Commission nominated by him as an extra-constitutional super-Cabinet in economic matters; transferred the centre of power from the Cabinet to the Congress Working Committee(CWC), and reduced the position of the Congress Parliamentary Party(CPP) to a mere registering body.

He adds, “Sri K Kamaraj, as President of the Congress, by exercising extra-constitutional authority, introduced an extra-constitutional body consisting of members of the CWC, representatives of the CPP, members of the Union Cabinet not already on the CWC and special invitees. The election of Sh. Lal Bahadur Shastri as Prime Minister, instead of being left to the Congress Parliamentary Party, was decided by Sri Kamaraj through the application of the consensus doctrine.”

He further adds, ‘The Constitution was thus twisted out of shape. The Parliamentary Party was deprived of its legitimate role as the controlling body in the State……….. The Cabinet reduced to a rubber-stamping appendix of the CWC.”

Granville Austin, in his book, Working a Democratic Constitution: The Indian Experience”, published in 1999, wrote, “ … the federal structure of the Congress Party disappeared as many ministers became New Delhi’s instruments and the PM gained control of the Congress Party machinery. In New Delhi, the distribution of powers among the three branches of government was gravely unsettled. Mrs Gandhi’s grip on the CPP exceeded the power typically enjoyed by PMs in parliamentary systems, where PMs heed as well as lead their followers. The Executive Branch came to dominate Parliament to such a degree that Parliament lost any effective identity of its own. And, authority within the executive became concentrated in the PM’s office and then was exercised from Mrs Gandhi’s residence, to the exclusion of all but few.”

Even in the present context, the National Advisory Council under the UPA-2 Chairperson Smt Sonia Gandhi, is an extra-constitutional body, which is deliberating on tasks exclusively in the domain of the Parliament. It is drafting bills and deciding on matter which ought to be discussed in the Parliament. A Constitutional body such as the Public Accounts Committee has been reduced to petty politics.

It is clear that these extra-constitutional bodies are a greater threat and challenge to the status and powers of the Parliament. As honourable Members of this august body, the Ministers should speak against such practices. Anna never wanted the Parliament to be circumvented. He, however, wanted the public representatives to know and feel the pulse of the common man which, they seemed to have lost sight of. The spontaneous and enormous public response to his demand proved him right.

Arun Gurtoo IPS (Retd.)

43, Baghira Apartments,

E-5, Arera Colony,

Bhopal-462016

Ph. 0755-2467766. Mob. 9425030287

In Soviet-occupied Kabul

2011-09-16T13:26:00.001+05:30

In April 1983 I happened to go to Kabul on a Universal Postal Union (UPU) consultancy with the Postal Administration of Afghanistan. I got a rather short notice as I was told about the assignment only in the third week of March. Although Afghanistan was not really stable with the mujahideen resisting the Soviet occupation, yet there was no way one could say “no”, having been trained by the UPU to function as a consultant. Besides, we all believed in the concept of Technical Cooperation among Developing Countries (TCDC).

It rained in Delhi in the first week of April 1983 and it was unusually cool when I took the only flight – of Air India – that was available for Kabul. As the aircraft landed around 2.00 PM I could see it had rained in Kabul, too. The sides of the tarmac were slushy. A couple of broken-down out-of-commission Russian MIGs was parked alongside the runway. As we came out, a very cold breeze hit us. The pilot had announced that the ground temperature was 5 degrees Celsius. Looking around I could see the snow-capped Hindu Kush – just like one can see the Peer Panjals from Srinagar. Fortunately, I was well-protected having reluctantly piled on myself a woollen suit – madness in Delhi’s normal April weather.
------
As I entered a modest-looking terminal building an Afghani came up to me. He was the UNDP reception officer and promptly wanted to have a look at my visa. Although I told him that I had obtained a valid visa he would have none of it and insisted on seeing it. I handed it over and soon his trained eyes saw it. The visa was only for three days – all written in (for me, undecipherable) Dari. Our departmental official dealing with visas was not told about it. I was aghast, but the officer assured me that no damage had been done. This was the usual practice. For entering Afghanistan one had to acquire an entry visa, for staying a stay visa and before leaving one had to get an exit visa. Obviously, in an emergency none could get out in a hurry. Pocketing the passport, the officer said he would have to submit it to the Ministry of Interior and I was likely to get it back only after a week – a rather unnerving beginning to a two-month assignment.
------
The officer took me to the German Club where I was to stay for the two months that the consultancy would last. It seems, the UN Staff House had no spare accommodation, being fully occupied. It didn’t matter to me as long as the accommodation was good. Initially, I got a room and a week later I could move into a suite – a more spacious and comfortable affair. I saw later that a large number of Germans were in residence. Germans have had a long and close relationship with Afghanistan since the early part of the 20th Century. They became closer and more cordial after Mahammed Hashim, the then Prime Minister, brought about a distinct change in the relationship in 1935, moving Afghanistan away from the spheres of influence of Britain and Russia.
------
The Postal headquarters were located in the older part of the city across the Kabul River. It was a peculiar outfit with full complement of staff required for running the postal operations in the entire country several parts of which were not in the government’s control. There was a president at the top and as many as four directors general with assorted lower level officers and clerical staff for supervising and running the system which, in fact, served mostly Kabul. Highly disturbed as the place was, I couldn’t quite figure out why the Administration made a request for a UPU consultancy and, that too, on postal statistics.
------
My counterpart was one elderly gentleman, Mr. Amini, a retired officer who was well-versed in English. The driver, Daud, who used to ferry me to and from the office, was a very amiable young man. He was fond of my cigarettes and enjoyed them making himself comfortable on the sofa in my office. A fairly decent number of girls were working in the office. I was quite surprised to see them in Western dresses – some would be in denims and others in skirts with short hair and well made-up faces – a far cry from what happened later under the Taliban rule. They were quite outgoing and even came with Amini to meet me. Knowing only Dari, Amini would act as interpreter for them. There was, however, one lady by the name Zermina working in the philatelic branch who was fluent in English. A distant relative of King Zaheer Shah, she later joined him in Italy. She looked us up at New Delhi on her way up.
------
Before anything else I had to have some local currency. Amini took me to the currency market despite my protestations. I told him since I was with the UN I had to have my dollars converted by the official central bank. He said that was not necessary; in Kabul everyone bought and sold currency at the local market. At the market the rate of exchange would vary from shop to shop which were mostly owned by Sikhs – residents of Afghanistan for generations. They would speak fluent Dari and were, of course, also fluent in Punjabi. Later, I was told by another UN Consultant that every week the UNDP would be determining the exchange rate for dollars checking the rate at the same market. This system was, however, given up even when I was still in Kabul.
------
During the first week when I called on the Resident Representative of the UNDP I was told that one had to be very careful in moving around the town as most of it, including the settlements on the surrounding hills, were out of bounds. One could move around only in a limited area of 5 or 6 square miles. I myself noticed the heavy presence of the Russian Army on the roads with pickets virtually at every hundred metres. I had heard air force jets flying overhead as also the drone of helicopters. Somewhat unnerving was the instruction not to venture out of the town and not to try and take photographs. Disappointed, I put my camera back in the suitcase.

The Resident Representative, after the preliminaries, handed to me a project report and asked me to flesh it out as I went along with my consultancy work. When I happened to look at it later, I found the UPU, always short of money, was planning to sink another $100,000 in the country on another postal project. When I happened to visit the UNDP office next I told the Programme Director that as virtually the entire country was out of bounds there was no point in throwing good money into another project. I was, however, told the UN couldn’t be sitting around in Kabul twiddling its thumbs. No wonder, the UN Staff House with its scores of rooms and suites was brimming over with consultants of all hues. There were experts on agriculture when no one could venture out into the country and there were experts on even high-hill agriculture when the hills were in occupation of the mujahids.
------
On the first weekend, a Thursday (the weekly off being on Jumma, i.e. Friday), I happened to meet another Indian, an agricultural scientist, in the German Club restaurant. After tea he suggested a walk. Having been to Kabul several times during his ongoing consultancy he was more familiar with the place. We took a branch road which was not the artery that I was familiar with. Soon I saw at some distance numerous Afghan Army personnel hanging around. As we went closer, I realised that it was one of their major establishments. Most of them gave us a hard stare, perhaps wondering what we were up to. As we took the next turn after a few steps we saw some of the same personnel checking what looked like IDs of the locals and even of some foreigners in a rather rough manner. I was alarmed as I had no ID, my passport having been sent to the Ministry of Interior and the UN ID had not arrived till then. Were they to put me in the coup there wouldn’t be any relief at least until the next Saturday. My wife was to arrive the next day. If I were to be detained who would receive her? I almost got a panic attack. Resolving to bravely look straight at them, I (and my companion) slowly walked past. We were both in Western suits and perhaps that did the trick. They didn’t make any move to accost us. Later, my companion said that though he too did not have his passport but he had the UN ID and, hence, wasn’t overly perturbed. For me it was a hell of a close shave.
------
Another Indian FAO consultant, a veterinary scientist, Dr. RR Shukla, was in residence in Kabul for quite some time. Since he had initially stayed at German Club he used to get to know about the comings and goings there. That is how he came to know about us and promptly came over to meet us and invited us over to his place. He used to reside in the plushest of localities in Kabul. If, I recall, it was the Wazir Akbar Khan area where all the one-time elite of Zahir Shah’s time had built their palatial houses. They all fled away to the West as things got hot for them leaving their double-storied massive houses on rental, mostly to the UN staff. Their numerous servants were still in residence in several quarters at the rear. The houses were lavishly furnished and were reflective of the life and times of earlier years. Everything was on the house, from furniture to Persian carpets to expensive crystal ware. Fond of good living, Dr. Shukla, a “Saryu-pari” Brahmin from UP, used to live a high life and was a very pleasant company. During those disturbed times the companionship of Dr. and Mrs Shukla was a great relief. Often we would walk down from his house to reach the German Club just before 9.00 in the evening when the town would go under a curfew every night.
------
The days would seem normal but nights would be somewhat frightening. Leave alone occasional shrieks from the neighbourhood in the dead of the night, firing could be heard from surrounding hills. In a trough as Kabul is situated, the sounds would reverberate at night. Occasionally firing could be heard closer home. After one such episode we learnt next morning that some Russians were shot down during the night near their living quarters. Normally the mujahideens would be active during the night and we could hear the rut-tut-tut of gunfire almost every night. Invariably on the subsequent mornings two Russian helicopters with rocket-launchers mounted on two sides fly around on firing sorties and would raze the suspect villages to the ground. The drone of these helicopters kept us constant company. While the helicopters took care of the surroundings of Kabul, two jets would fly out every morning on sorties to strafe distant mujahideen concentrations.
------
The lights went out after a huge explosion one night and never came back for three weeks. For days we did not know what exactly had happened until one day somebody in the German Club told us the power plant had been knocked out by the mujahideens. It was quite a serious setback for the Russians. There wasn’t much of an inconvenience for us, though, as in winter-like conditions one didn’t need fans and the Club authorities would provide gas lamps at night. But the townsfolk must have had a terrible time.
------
Mohammed Akram, a junior level officer, was very fluent in English as well as Hindi – in fact he used to call it Urdu. He had been trained in the Postal Training Centre at Saharanpur. He would be a regular in my room and would have a smoke with me. One day he came in wearing a worried look and promptly sat down and lighting up a cigarette started frantically puffing at it. After quieting down a bit he told me he was deeply disturbed as he had been asked to fly with the mail to Kandahar. He said, barring the airport the Russians had no control over the town and even on the last occasion when a plane-load of mail was taken there it had come under mujahedeen fire. It was a dangerous assignment fraught with risks. Anything could happen; either the plane could be brought down or they could be captured on landing. In either event, he did not know whether he would ever be back. His trouble, however, was over the next morning. He came and told me the flight had been postponed.
------
Another afternoon he wearily walked in with a harried face. He almost fell onto the sofa, pulled the pack of cigarettes and the box of matches out of his pocket. He had gone to the main square and waited there for a couple of hours for a bus that came there every Thursday to disgorge 15-16 years old children who had been picked up earlier by the agents of the Russians for mobilisation against the mujahideens. His child was not there. He had been going and waiting at the square for several Thursdays in the hope of getting back his son who had disappeared about a couple of years ago. His mother had sent him on an errand and he never came back. Several months later, Akram came to know through his sources in the Interior Ministry that the boy was in the local jail. He could meet the child only once and was told that he was taken somewhere in the Soviet Union and was trained there in warfare. They also tried to brainwash him but the child, it seems, was made of sterner stuff. He, sort of, refused to sign on the dotted line and, therefore, was sent back to Kabul, but into a jail. With tears in his eyes, Akram narrated the entire agonising story. He and his wife had been living for those months with this excruciating pain and, what was worse they did not know how long it would continue.
------
The roads in Kabul were not as crowded as, I understand, they are now. But they used to have varied kind of traffic. Cars, bicycles, the occasional donkey carts, and hand-pushed carts selling a variety of stuff, all used to share the road-space. In the midst of this confusion there used to be the huge Russian Army, maybe, three or four tonners which would thunder down the roads unconcerned about the civilians using the roads. They would scatter everyone to the fringes and zoom past. Once they almost ran over my wife and me as we were trying to cross the street. Like any occupying army, the Russian soldiers would seem to view everything around them with contempt, standing at their pickets with Kalashnikovs in hand.
------
Street-life was indeed remarkable. On some pavements one would find European ceramic items and glassware. There was a profusion of very cheap French moulded crystal ware – till then unavailable even in Delhi. Pushcarts would be selling almonds, walnuts, pistachios, etc. like they used to sell roasted peanuts and grams earlier in India. Pistachios, I was told, grew wild on mountain sides and on an announcement over the radio anybody could go and pick them. Delectable Pakistani tangerines and green Afghani apricots would be available in roadside groceries.
One would also find people carrying numerous very large-sized naans slung from their shoulders. It seems, none baked naans at home although it is for Afghanis a dietary must. A community oven was perhaps cheaper and a hassle-free proposition. Amini used to tell me how they would have tea in the morning with naan and cheddar cheese. Having fallen on bad days, they could later have only a piece of naan and an apology for tea.
------
The bland food of German Club would often drive us to the Indian restaurants where we could get generally the Punjabi fare. There were numerous Afghani joints near about from where the aroma of barbecued meat would float around. I had tried it once but later gave up as it upset my stomach. A particular restaurant that we used to patronise because of its very decent Indian preparations was bombed one evening. I wonder even till today whether the bombing was aimed at Indians. Afghanis, then, were not anti-Indians at all. Nevertheless, that put paid to our excursions to Indian restaurants.
------
One of the directors general, Bismillah, was a very friendly sort though communicating with him was difficult. He did not know English or Urdu. Belonging to the high-altitude Panjsher Valley, the land of the famous Afghani fair and delicate beauties, he was a very fair-looking middle-aged man, appeared more like an Italian. He was a great friend and admirer of India, perhaps more so because he successfully went through a complicated surgical procedure at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi. He was a political appointee and belonged to the ruling Parcham party. He would give me a bear-hug every time I met him and every time I would find his holster in place. Amini told me Bismillah and his ilk lived from day to day – afraid of being attacked by the Opposition anytime. Despite being terribly short of funds Bismillah hosted a farewell dinner for me with Amini, the interpreter, as the only other invitee. He delivered a farewell speech for me – all in Dari.
------
On the last morning of our stay my wife and I called on the President of the Afghan Posts & Telegraphs. When he heard that we had not been to Emperor Babar’s tomb he promptly organised a vehicle and sent us away with the advisory that we should leave the place before 3.30 PM. The run-down, crumbling grave of the first Mogul Emperor amid overgrown bushes was very saddening. It had become a haunt of mujahids who generally collected there in the evening. By early afternoon the desolate place gave us an eerie feeling and we left much before the given deadline of 3.30 PM. It was good to know that with the aid of the Aga Khan Trust the tomb has been renovated and has since become a picnic spot for the war-ravaged and harrassed Kabulis.

Bhopal Municipal Corporation needs supercession

2011-09-12T15:55:00.004+05:30

All these years the state’s BJP government has been selling dreams to the citizens of Bhopal. They had been claiming that they would convert Bhopal into a Paris or Singapore. Every time a minister went abroad he would on return tell the people that with the natural endowment of the Bhopal they would make it better than many of the popular foreign tourist destinations. Most vocal in the respect was the current minister of Urban Administration and Development, Babu Lal Gaur. The people now know that all those were empty rhetoric as during the BJP’s rule this beautiful city or what could have been a beautiful city has hit the rock bottom.

The BJP has failed to ameliorate the plight of the people in almost all the three issues, viz. bijli, sadak and paani, on which it rode to power. The citizens of Bhopal are not only being deprived of daily water supplies and being subjected regular power cuts, they are also suffering the daily miseries because of broken down roads with ditches of various depths and dimensions filled with filthy water causing acute insanitation and lack of hygiene exposing them to the risks of accidents as also ill-health.

While BJP is protesting at the Centre about the run-down highways and the local Congress has launched a campaign against the terrible condition of the city roads there doesn’t seem to be anybody who is protesting about the shoddy condition of the roads inside the residential colonies. It is only Hitawada that has been publishing day after day write-ups along with photographs of the deplorable condition of the roads inside the colonies where the unfortunate citizens of this town live out their life.

For years the colony roads have not been constructed; at best they have been subjected to patch-work, expecting people to put up with what are apologies for the same. They have been left to the councillors to take care of who hardly ever have had a proper job done. The allotments to them are inadequate and on top of that they and the contractors siphon off their own substantial shares from the available meagre sums.

Idgah, which suffers the same plight as the areas covered by Hitavada but unfortunately has not been covered by it so far, is also another example of lack of attention to its roads. The two roads that lead to Idgah – one from Bhopal Gate and the other from the All Saint’s School – are full of ditches of various shapes and sizes travelling over which is fraught with peril for the lives of vehicles and those who ride them. They are of deceptive depths and, when filled with rain water, are dangerous. Before Eid they were covered up with rubble consisting, inter alia, of jagged stones that are real threats to tyres of vehicles, including those of the humble bicycle. Now the Municipal Council has decided to give the same treatment to all the potholes in the city, thus extending the risk and danger to all those who have to commute over them. The Ridge Road was repaired not too long ago by the councillor concerned. Only a small patch was concretised but that too now is in terrible condition. It got worn out within two years, so indifferent was its quality. The rest of the road has numerous potholes and deep gashes made by flowing water.

Even the roads that used to be reasonably good were dug up for various civic works but were never put back into original shape although the projects provided money for the same and, in all probability, the contractors were paid in full. The road to Shajehanabad and the one along the Babe Ali Stadium are testimonies to it. The Corporation has been merrily going on digging expeditions on money borrowed from Asian Development Bank and all the roads were ruined. The Asian Development Bank seems to have been a bane for Bhopal. It is only fattening up the municipal officials and all those who approve the projects and the loans and is inflicting only miseries on the citizens.

While an urban renewal mission is being implemented in the town its residential areas have been progressively regressing. What with flooding of roads with rain, fresh or sewer water and accumulation of garbage things have become so scandalous that the quality of life of residents is being adversely impacted. It now seems impossible for the municipality to improve matters, given its lackadaisical ways, defective organisational structure and ineffective ways of functioning. Neither the mayor nor the top bureaucrat and his minions have shown the required mettle. As regards the councillors less said the better. Any amount money spent now to improve matters will not help as the municipality seems to need systemic improvements to enable it to function properly for the benefit of the citizens.

If the degraded condition of the residential areas of the city is to be improved and the life of the citizens ameliorated the Municipal Corporation needs to be urgently superceded and an effective administrator appointed for a reasonable length of time so that the dysfunctional Corporation is put back on rails. There are instances where such urban renewals have taken place under effective leadership of competent administrators. The cities of Nagpur and Surat readily come to mind.

Immediate action would seem to be necessary as any delay in doing so would further degrade the conditions in the colonies of the city which, regretfully, also happens to be the state capital. Unless a people’s campaign is launched nothing worthwhile may happen.

The Indian "Class of 2011"

2011-09-09T15:07:00.001+05:30

The current year has been a year of protests. The “Jasmine Revolution” of Tunisia was the beginning of it all. It was an intensive campaign of civil resistance, including a series of street demonstrations and strikes by professionals that culminated in the ousting of long-time President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in January 2011. The demonstrations were precipitated by high unemployment, food inflation, corruption, lack of fundamental freedoms and poor living conditions.

The Tunisian protests inspired similar revolts in the region which went on to acquire the name “Arab Spring”. It was followed by the Egyptian revolution that led to the ousting of Hosni Mubarak, Egypt's president for three decades. Uprisings also took place in Bahrain, Syria and Yemen and major protests have taken place in Algeria, Jordan, Morocco and Libya - where a full-scale violent revolution has broken out and currently the tyrannical Muammar Gaddafi is on the run.

Bobby Ghosh writing in Time magazine reported that “all the revolts were led by young men and women, many of whom are novices at political activism. All use modern tools, like social networking sites on the internet and texting over mobile phones to organise their protests”. Not only does Ghosh call them “The Class of 2011”, he also feels they are the “the internet generation” who have felled two despots and forced other inflexible rulers to make concessions. Confirming Ghosh’s thesis, Fareed Zakaria, a senior journalist of Indian origin based in the United States, said that “the tensions let loose” in the Middle East encompassed “two of the most powerful forces changing the world today: youth and technology”.

A similar phenomenon overtook India recently during the movement launched under the aegis of India Against Corruption (IAC) for establishment of a strong and effective “Janlokpal”, an anti-corruption ombudsman. A few concerned citizens led by a hitherto obscure elderly Gandhian social activist from Maharashtra, septuagenarian Anna Hazare, joined hands to form the non-governmental organisation. Associated with other such organisations it launched a massive movement right across the country, the centrepiece of which was Anna who, using Gandhian technique, launched a fast and continued it for an incredible 12 days until the Parliament unanimously resolved to refer several of the issues mentioned by his team to its Standing Committee. A weak and ineffectual lokpal bill drafted by the government had already been referred to the Committee.

The protesters, mostly the youth of the country, “novices” at political activism, have, like in the “Arab Spring”, used technology to telling effect. Texting on mobile phones, the internet and its social networking sites Facebook and Twitter, all were used for dissemination of appeals to their compatriots. The backroom boys of the movement, some of them techies, management and media experts, managed a veritable ‘war room’ using technology so spectacularly that the crowds rolled in thousands whenever and wherever they wanted them to roll in. Working incredibly long hours, these youngsters gave to the movement all that they had. This was true of Delhi, where the people were induced to join in the protests from surrounding countryside, as also elsewhere in the country where, too, the units of IAC were being managed by similarly-equipped youngsters.

While the “Jasmine Revolution” and “Arab Spring” were against despotic regimes which inflicted miseries on the underclass the ‘Indian Spring’ was against widespread corruption in the country’s polity and the protests were strictly within the Indian democratic framework. The general revulsion among people was against largely corrupt political class and was accentuated by their attempts, including those of the supposedly honest prime minister, at cover-up of the recent series of scams involving mind-boggling sums.

Historically speaking, a bill for establishment of a “lokpal” has been pending in the Indian parliament for the last 43 years. It “wastes the paper it was written on” said the respected journal, The Economist. Somehow the bill happened to survive only as such having been repeatedly tabled but failed to become an enactment. It has always been the pervasive feeling that the bill would never be passed as it would sever the very hands that are always in the till, steeped in corruption as most politicians are. They would avoid passing the legislation as who would ever agree to sign one’s own “death warrant”?

The simmering ire against the self-preserving political class seemingly exploded once Anna came along. He struck a chord and caught the imagination of the people, more so of the youth. Protests, on the streets and in designated spaces became the order of the day all across the country. The universally derided Gandhi cap, a onetime preferred head-gear of corrupt Congressmen, saw a sharp upswing in sales. All because it is always perched on Anna’s head! A large number of youth and even children had “I am Anna” written on the cap in bold letters in languages of their use indicating their commitment to Anna and his anti-corruption movement. The venues of demonstrations in Delhi and elsewhere sported a sea of white caps interspersed by green, white and orange national flags.

Along with people’s ire against corruption, Anna has been able to arouse a palpable patriotic sentiment which is seldom witnessed in the country in such a mass scale. Divisive factors like caste, creed, region and economic status had all been set aside. Some commentators see the blurring of the line between Bharat and India – the country’s well-known rural-urban divide, though detractors billed it as an urban middleclass movement. The movement has infused a never-seen-before political consciousness among the youngsters – whether urban or rural, rich or poor, in the north or south or the east or west. Even the Indian diaspora took up the “Anna Chant”. Protests were held from Los Angeles to New York and from London through European capitals to Melbourne, with the protesters wearing what has now been christened the “Anna cap”.

And, yet the Indian tech-savvy “Class of 2011” has been different in many ways from those of “Jasmine Revolution” and “Arab Spring”. Their single-point agenda has been installation of an independent, powerful "janlokpal" who could deal effectively with the prevailing widespread corruption. Led, as they were, by a Gandhian, they were peaceful, disciplined and, above all, non-violent.

The Washington Post called Anna’s movement an “awakening which could change the face of India’s democracy...and change the national psyche and its tolerance for corrupt, arrogant and unresponsive leaders.” There is much in what it said. One could discern a steely resolve not only among the leaders of the IAC but also among the protesters. One, therefore, hopes that the political class, howsoever self-centred it might be, does not renege from the unanimous resolution that was adopted in the nation’s parliament. In case it does, surely, it wouldn’t be taken kindly by the country, especially its youth.

Tourism in hotbed of militancy

2011-08-30T17:29:00.003+05:30

The other day a photograph and a write up below it in a national newspaper rang a faint bell. It depicted children playing around in caves in what it called the “Kalaroos area” in North Kashmir. It also said that the Kashmir government is opening up newer areas in North Kashmir beyond Kupwara in the Kalaroos area and in and around Lolab Valley, hitherto the hotbed of militancy fostered by infiltrators from across the Line of Control (LoC) drawn after the 1971 war with Pakistan.

The bell rang rather weakly because of the weight of the years under which the memories of these two places lay buried. Way back in 1969 when I was posted in Kashmir I had had the occasion to visit both these places. Both of them are of exquisite natural beauty but Lolab Valley had a special distinction of hosting a secular Hindu clairvoyant in the midst of an overwhelming Muslim population.

The department of the Central Government that I worked for had a small establishment manned by a part-timer at Kalaroos. One cold March morning I received a telegram that the establishment had caught fire and everything in it, including a substantial amount of cash, had been lost. I had to go and, that too, in a jiffy. Next morning with a couple of inspectors I set out for Kalaroos. Proceeding via Sopore and Kupwara, we had our official vehicle parked at a place that was a kind of a pass between two ranges. The road to Kalaroos took off from that pass. Kalaroos was three miles up that road and the vehicle could not have made it as the road had a thick layer of snow on it.

Never have I had the occasion to negotiate such a torturous three miles as the one that I did with my junior colleagues that day. We had to climb a few hundred feet along the pretty wide road that was completely snowed under. Although it was a delightful day with bright sunshine and a bracing cold breeze blowing down the surrounding pine-covered mountains, the road was under ankle-deep of freshly-fallen snow. Walking on the snow is difficult but the effort gets more toilsome if one has to walk in ankle-deep soft and yielding snow with the feet sinking in with every step. Every time one has to pull one’s feet out to take a fresh step. It gets more laborious if one has to do so while walking uphill. For me it was nightmarish. The only thing that kept us going was the compelling beauty of the surroundings. Down below was the freshest and the whitest of snow-white snows with the mountain sides and the precipitous valleys dressed in bright green of the ever-green conifers and under the lapis lazuli blues of the sky were, again, snow-capped mountain tops gleaming in the bright March sun. It was ethereal – almost spiritual. Every bend of the road would open up a new vista – a panorama so arresting that one wouldn’t be human unless one stopped and beheld it.

We huffed and puffed our way up and eventually reached the village. It was located in a clearing and I noticed three chairs placed in the sun with a tray with about a couple of dozen shelled eggs. Dog-tired as I was I made a beeline for one of the chairs and literally collapsed into it. Recovering after a while as I took in the landscape I was amazed to notice an uncanny resemblance with the paintings I had come across of the Holy Land. The thatched rundown houses, the green pines in the background and the tall, extraordinarily fair, heavily bearded handsome men with pronounced Semitic facial features, draped in long ochre coloured clothes, it all appeared to me to be straight out of the Biblical times. The only distinguishing feature was the Islamic cap that some of the villagers had placed on their heads. The whole thing was stunning and picturesque and made the tiring trip memorable.

After finishing off the offiial work and consuming more than my normal quota of eggs to subdue my ravenous appetite I tore myself away from that incredible setting. Climbing down the mountain was not so difficult. As the afternoon sun was dipping down rapidly we decided to stop for the night at Chandigam in Lolab Valley. The place had a rest house which was said to have been built for the Late Indira Gandhi. It had hot and cold running water, a luxury not available in those days in most of the rest houses in Kashmir, and had a couple of extra bed rooms. It was situated at an elevation and hence commanded a panoramic view of the narrow valley in front, dominated by a lone poplar, and the thickly forested hills on its sides. It was a lush green little valley of indescribable beauty, mostly uncluttered by human interventions.

The hill that separated Kupwara from Lolab Valley was thickly forested with walnut trees. In the midst of this forest of walnuts was a resident clairvoyant who was popularly known as Baba. A religious recluse and a Hindu, he was known for being able to look into the future of whoever cared to go and ask him to do so. Having nothing much to do in the evening, we trooped into his lair. A fire was raging in a pit and around half a dozen devotees, all Muslims, were sitting closest to the entrance facing the Baba on the other side of the fire. As we entered the simple and austere enclosure Baba noticed us and asked us to be seated next to the fire. After some small talk about the Baba and his fame in the surrounding areas, one of the devotees told us the story of a Pakistani Lt. Colonel who had stumbled into Baba’s presence.

Lolab Valley was overrun by the Pakistani Army during the 1965 war. The Pakistani Army had also captured the hill where Baba was in residence. They used the top of the hill to fire at the garrison at Kupwara. Keen to clear the hill of all enemies, a Lt. Col. of Pakistani Army came to the Baba’s lair. As soon as Baba saw the officer he told him to get back home as his daughter was seriously sick. Even before he could recover from the shock a messenger arrived to tell the Lt. Col. to report to his headquarters. The officer left, organising a detachment to maintain a guard on the recluse. He did not return for a few days. After a week or so the guards were withdrawn and the Baba was told the daughter of the Lt. Col. had died.

One does not know whether the recluse is alive or not but I have had occasion to hear some local army officers in Bhopal who had had similar encounters with the Baba. Apparently, he was a kind of an institution; his was a much-visited lair by all those who happened to visit Chandigam.

It was only four years after the 1965 war with Pakistan yet I had visited Kupwara and Chandigam several times all by myself travelling in my own car. Never was there an unpleasant incident. Later, during the twenty-odd years of militancy, however, these two areas became popular with infiltrators from across the LoC. Now, it seems, the things have quietened down and the Kashmir Government is thinking of opening them up for tourism. One can only wish it Godspeed. Let the tourists enjoy the nature’s bounty in North Kashmir. After all, there is more to Kashmir than just Gulmarg and Pahalgam.

Madhya Pradesh loses its tigers and sobriquet

2011-08-19T17:52:00.003+05:30

That Madhya Pradesh lost the sobriquet of “Tiger State” after the last national tiger census conducted in 2010-11 is now history. Having had the largest number of tigers during the preceding censuses it was widely known as the “Tiger State”. Whether the sobriquet was given or assumed is not quite known. It is a pity that the state, despite the massive financial assistance and expertise lent by the Centre and availability of its own enormous human and other resources could not retain the sobriquet. Ironically, despite the rise in tiger numbers in the country from 1411 in 2006 to 1706 in 2011 it is Madhya Pradesh which lost the largest number of them – the number came down from 300 to 257. The only other ‘tiger region’ that lost tigers during the period was Andhra Pradesh – it lost 23 of them.

For its bull-headed and lackadaisical ways the forest department has been engulfed in controversies for some years now. The biggest of them all was relating to the Panna Tiger Reserve which lost all its tigers by the close of 2008. Despite the early warnings from several sources, including the nation’s tiger conservation agencies, the department refused to pay any heed to them. Its Principal Chief Conservator (PCCF-Wildlife), HS Pabla, mulishly kept claiming that the Reserve had 20-odd tigers when everyone else reported that they were disappearing fast, mostly because of rampant poaching. Instead of taking steps to check the veracity of the statements, especially of the central tiger conservation agencies, the forest department, sticking to its guns and displaying an adversarial attitude, joined issue with them.

This is not all. After the tigers were all gone, when an inquiry conducted by the Central Special Investigation Team (SIT) came to the conclusion that they were mostly poached the state government set up its own enquiry committee, as is evident now, to put a lid on the whole thing and to protect its PCCF. The state level inquiry came to the conclusion that gender imbalance in the tiger population caused by declining number of females made the males go looking for them outside the Reserve only to be poached or just get killed. No mention was made of the reasons for occurrence of the gender imbalance. Likewise, no mention was made of the failure of the Reserve staff or visiting forest officers to notice the progressive gender imbalance over the years. Needless to say, no effort was made to fix responsibility for the total disappearance of the tigers from the Reserve.

However, the cat is now out of the bag. Ajay Dubey of “Prayatna”, an environmental action group, has ferreted out information that the forest department recently handed over details of nearly two dozen cases of tiger deaths in Panna to the home department asking for CBI inquiry into them. After examination, the latter picked up three cases which, according to it, seemed worthy of independent investigations. Prayatna’s efforts indicate that the forest department had received several reports of poaching of tigers, yet it failed to take the needed steps either at the field level or in the headquarters. This corroborates the contention of the SIT which after evaluation of all the relevant factors concluded that there were no ecological reasons for the tigers to become extinct in Panna. According to it, a steady decline in the numbers of females was noticeable since 2003, the maximum decline taking place between 2003 and 2005, and then continuing on until 2007-08. Poachers brought down more females as they have smaller home ranges and hence they became extinct before male tigers.

Seemingly, obsessed with tourism, the department kept dismissing every report appearing in the media as “media hype”. The local MPs and MLAs had expressed concern and some cases were filed in the Apex Court too. During the same period letters were also written to Chief Secretary and Principal Secretary Forests by the Chairman and Member Secretary, respectively, of the Central Empowered Committee after its two visits to the Reserve. Developing a peculiar imperviousness, the department ignored them all. When it was virtually curtains for the tigers in Panna in June 2008, Pabla was still waxing eloquent about their presence therein in the prestigious Sanctuary Asia magazine.

After Prayatna's expose even the forest minister’s comments was ostrich-like – that his department was prevented from doing the needful by a dacoit gang that was camping in the Reserve. The SIT has categorically stated in its report that the outlaws were in the Reserve between 2006 and 2008, whereas poaching, a fact never given due credence to by the state, had been continuing since 2001.

Clearly the fall in tiger numbers in the state is a natural consequence of the dedicated efforts made and “due diligence” displayed by the Madhya Pradesh government and its forest department. Beginning with the chief minister, who put humans before the tigers in a tiger reserve and consistently opposed creation of a scientific buffer and succeeded in having a moth-eaten buffer delineated for the Reserve, all have contributed their bit. According to the SIT, “Without a good buffer….. survival of small tiger population, even under moderate poaching pressure, is difficult”. And Panna has acute poaching pressure, surrounded as it is with settlements of tribes that are traditional poacher, poaching tigers not only in Panna but all over the country.

When the death of the “Jhurjhura tigress” indicated involvement of sons of two prominent politicians who illegally entered the Bandhavgarh Reserve inquiry was handed over to CB CID just to kill it. Despite the lapse of 16 months, the CID is yet to come out with its investigation report and the case remains buried in its dark recesses.

Again, when on the lines of the advice tendered by the National Tiger Conservation Authority “Prayatna” filed a writ in the state high court to ban tourism in core areas, the department opposed it tooth and nail, the PCCF even advising hoteliers and tour operators to have themselves impleaded for the specious reason that tourism prevents poaching. He forgot that tourism, with its infamous tiger-shows, was very much prevalent in Panna and yet the Reserve lost all its tigers – most having been poached. According to the SIT report, during 2002-2005 “The management shifted focus towards tourism and during this period even the forest department in their document have accepted maximum number of poaching…”

Tiger-tourism seems to have remained a priority with the forest department but it has failed to protect the very resource (and its habitat) it was exploiting. Apart from Panna, the Kanha Reserve, the supposedly best-managed, lost as many as 29 tigers at the last count. It even lost nearly 3000 sq. Kms. of tiger-habitat that has led to frequent internecine fights for territory – many ending in tiger fatalities.

Besides, the department has achieved the distinction of clocking the third highest number of vacancies in “frontline positions” in the country – the very staff that are responsible for protecting forests and wildlife. There has, however, been proliferation in the higher echelons of the department. Quite bizarrely, even the Tiger Strike Force created by the state has had successes in catching poachers of only wild boars and stray ungulates. It has so far failed to catch a single poacher of tigers.

Now that Karnataka is the new “Tiger State” and Nagpur may become the “Tiger Capital” the question that nags one is whether the once-upon-a-time “Tiger State” will be able to save its tigers. Given the present dispensation, it seems unlikely. The dice are heavily loaded against the tigers. The top brass of the government do not seem to have a perspective for the tiger in the natural order of things. And likewise, the top brass of the forest department do not want to see reason and face facts. The days of “Shere Khan” in the jungles of Madhya Pradesh, therefore, appear to be numbered.

The threatened environment of Kashmir

2011-07-28T13:13:00.003+05:30

As the plane came to a halt at the Srinagar Airport one of the cabin crew denied us exit from the rear door. She said passengers had to go out through the front door as the Airport had an aerobridge. Surprised, I thought to myself that through the twenty-odd years of militancy the process of development in Kashmir had mercifully not been discontinued. It said much about the Centre’s patience with the turmoil that persisted all around in the Valley as also its belief in the efficacy of improvements in physical conditions on the ground. Perhaps, these were paying off now as this year Kashmir, seemingly, broke all previous records of tourists’ arrival. Our plane flew with a full load of passengers. It was not the only one; many more were flying in everyday as a result of the government’s “open skies” policy.

My wife and I were revisiting Kashmir after a hiatus of more than four decades. I had visited Kashmir once in 1957 with my parents and, then, I was there on a posting in the late 1960s. The changes we noticed during our brief visit, therefore, appeared to us to be remarkable. Hence, the surprise at being told about the aerobridge and the numerous jets that zoom in and zoom out every day. Time was when Srinagar had a non-descript airport – like the ones in many smaller towns of the country. It used to get only a couple of Indian Airlines flights every day – one hopping that connected Delhi via Amritsar and Jammu and the other connected Delhi directly – not by a jet but by a propeller-driven twin-engine Viking. The first jetliners to arrive were the French-built Caravelles that used to fly into Srinagar generally on alternate days. It is a far cry since then, with jetliners with full passenger loads now virtually milling around at the Airport.

Yes, Kashmir has changed and one sees drastic changes at practically every step. As we moved out of the terminal building to get to the travel agent’s vehicle we had to walk quite a distance to the parking lot where there was a veritable jungle of sport utility vehicles (SUVs) – mostly of tour operators. Forty years ago there were no SUVs and the few cars, mostly government vehicles, which would ferry passengers to and fro would be parked near the entrance to the terminal. It used to be a quiet place with few people hanging around before and after a flight – not the multitude one comes across today in a place that is now much larger yet gives one a feeling of being cramped.

Taken to Gulmarg on first leg of our visit to the Valley changes were visible right through the fifty-odd kilometre journey. Srinagar seems to have expanded towards Tangmarg for miles. Even villages looked somewhat bloated and, more importantly, with better housing. While concrete structures have apparently proliferated old houses have no longer the conventional roofing. Almost all seemed to have shiny corrugated tin roofs gleaming in the sun. Signs of progress and prosperity were amply visible and, happily even rural families have been touched by them. The numerous roof-top DTH mini-dishes testified to that. One could see an occasional tractor preparing the soil for the next crop. Farmers evidently have taken to farming of strawberries in a big way. Not only wayside stalls have been set up offering the fresh stuff, passersby are also invited to visit the strawberry fields.

Gulmarg is no longer of the same expansive green meadows I remembered from my first visit in 1957 where only a few stray horses grazed, presenting a picture-postcard view. It seemed to me to have shrunk, having become somewhat like a bigger-sized Khajiyar, a now ruined and over-built once- beautiful hill-station of Himachal Pradesh. Too many hotels and other structures have come up that seem to have the sinister motive of ‘crowding out’ the famous green spaces. There were too many tourists and, naturally, too many SUVs and far too many horses which have munched away the grass with gusto in some patches of the meadows down to the bare earth. It was only half way through the season and yet the things did not look very encouraging. Clearly, the place was being over-exploited; tourism pressure, particularly in summer, was seemingly adversely impacting its ambiance and ecology.

Down in Srinagar once again one noticed changes. Flyovers and over-bridges have come up to tackle that 21st Century menace of wanton automobile traffic. Apparently, those had become inevitable as was amply evidenced by the situation at Dal Gate – the place from where the famed Boulevard takes off. It was choked with traffic and the traffic-cops, (would you believe?) wearing gas masks, were trying their best to manage it. Far too many hotels, restaurants and shops have come up around the place, No wonder there are frequent jams. The Boulevard used to be the place where people used to go to take long walks and catch some fresh air. But, I saw locals sitting on the parapets along the waters of the Dal wearing gas masks to fend off the noxious fumes – a telling symbol of the current state of affairs. In and around Srinagar traffic jams have now become usual – on the main highway to Jammu near Badamibagh or near the saffron town of Pampore. We faced jams even in Khanabal near Anantnag on way to the other famous tourist resort of Pahalgam. That such jams have deleterious effects all round need hardly be emphasised.

While the beautiful Mogul gardens are doing well the fabled Dal Lake is not in a happy state. It was devoid of its blue hue and appeared green despite the uncluttered blue skies above. The recent efforts at cleaning the Lake do not seem to have helped. Acute eutrophication has caused intense weeding. The Central Government has intervened with massive aid but it hardly seems to be working. The machines deployed for de-weeding are proving to be unequal to the job. Sewage from houseboats continues to go into the Lake. Unless that is stopped infusion of cash may not help. The ring of sewer line is yet to materialise. No wonder, one can see the slogan of “Save the Dal” painted on walls. Will mere slogans help?

Cricket bat manufacturing seems to have become big business. Kashmir willow bats used to be available even when we used to play cricket about sixty years ago. If I recall, they used to be made in the Punjab then. But bat manufacturing has now become a thriving industry in the Valley. The Indian Premier (cricket) League has given it a fillip. On both sides of the highway we saw thousands of clefts stacked up, presumably to air-dry them to reduce the moisture content. Quite obviously, willows are being cut down in large numbers. In England for every willow tree felled for manufacturing cricket bats two are planted and carefully tended. One hopes this is what is being done in Kashmir too or else the industry will die a natural death.

The climate, too, has changed. The summers have become warm. We found Srinagar too warm for the month of May and had to use electric fans which were just not there forty years ago. Now they apparently are standard fixtures in all buildings. Though it could be because of the general warming of the globe but it would be a folly to put the blame entirely on it. Legal and illegal felling of trees, too many tourists and too many vehicles should also be reckoned among the reasons. Perhaps, it is time for the authorities to objectively evaluate the pros and cons of uncontrolled tourism. One does appreciate that tourism is the mainstay of the local economy yet one wonders whether unrestrained influx of tourists during the short season is sustainable. Every place, whether the tourist spots of Gulmarg or Pahalgam and suchlike or the places that are environmentally ravaged every year during the Amarnath pilgrimage by ever-increasing numbers, has a “carrying capacity”. An influx beyond that capacity surely is unsustainable, at least in the long run.

Although nothing can, probably, detract from its fabled scenic beauty, yet unless care is taken to ensure environmental conservation Kashmir known as the “Paradise on Earth” may not remain so for long.