A diplomatic failure

The quiet departure from India of Majed Hassan Ashoor, the Saudi Arabian diplomat accused of sexually assaulting two Nepali maids at his residence in Gurgaon, is a blow to New Delhi, both in terms of its pursuit of the issue on the diplomatic front and its commitment to fight crimes against women. Mr. Ashoor and some others face serious allegations. The women, rescued by the police from his apartment, allege they were held against their will, denied food and water, beaten and repeatedly raped over a period of at least 15 days. Their medical examination appeared to support the charges. India could not even question the accused before he flew home. If early reports are true, Mr. Ashoor’s departure was part of a diplomatic bargain struck between India and Saudi Arabia. Though New Delhi’s decision to release the name and designation of the diplomat — Mr. Ashoor was the First Secretary at the Saudi Arabian Embassy — is an unusual step, it failed to coax the Saudis into lifting his diplomatic immunity and bring him to justice. Saudi Arabia should have cooperated with India in the investigation, setting a precedent for its own diplomats and other nations in such situations.

As far as India is concerned, the case is far from being resolved. With the diplomat’s departure, what was a triangular crisis has acquired the form of a bilateral standoff between India and Nepal, which is an important neighbour. Apparently upset over the departure of Mr. Ashoor, Kathmandu insists India should continue the investigation to bring the diplomat’s partners in the crime to justice. The fact that the women in question were also victims of human trafficking networks needs to be taken into account. India thus has a legal and moral responsibility to get to the bottom of the case. At the same time, it is time for the international community to revisit the Vienna Convention, which offers a high degree of legal protection to diplomats and their families in the countries where they are posted. The Convention was meant to enable diplomats to carry out their duties without obstruction in the Cold War environment. Using its provisions to save diplomats facing charges of heinous crimes such as enslavement and rape cannot be justified under any circumstances.

Reasons for partition

India and Pakistan won independence in August 1947, following a nationalist struggle lasting nearly three decades. It set a vital precedent for the negotiated winding up of European empires elsewhere. Unfortunately, it was accompanied by the largest mass migration in human history of some 10 million. As many as one million civilians died in the accompanying riots and local-level fighting, particularly in the western region of Punjab which was cut in two by the border.
The agreement to divide colonial India into two separate states - one with a Muslim majority (Pakistan) and the other with a Hindu majority (India) is commonly seen as the outcome of conflict between the nations' elites. This explanation, however, renders the mass violence that accompanied partition difficult to explain.

One explanation for the chaos in which the two nations came into being, is Britain's hurried withdrawal with the realisation it could ill afford its over-extended empire.

If Pakistan were indeed created as a homeland for Muslims, it is hard to understand why far more were left behind in India than were incorporated into the new state of Pakistan - a state created in two halves, one in the east (formerly East Bengal, now Bangladesh) and the other 1,700 kilometres away on the western side of the subcontinent [see map].
It is possible that Mohammed Ali Jinnah, leader of the Muslim League, simply wished to use the demand for a separate state as a bargaining chip to win greater power for Muslims within a loosely federated India. Certainly, the idea of 'Pakistan' was not thought of until the late 1930s.
One explanation for the chaotic manner in which the two independent nations came into being is the hurried nature of the British withdrawal. This was announced soon after the victory of the Labour Party in the British general election of July 1945, amid the realisation that the British state, devastated by war, could not afford to hold on to its over-extended empire.

An act of parliament proposed a date for the transfer of power into Indian hands in June 1948, summarily advanced to August 1947 at the whim of the last viceroy, Lord Louis Mountbatten. This left a great many issues and interests unresolved at the end of colonial rule.
In charge of negotiations, the viceroy exacerbated difficulties by focusing largely on Jinnah's Muslim League and the Indian National Congress (led by Jawaharlal Nehru).
The two parties' representative status was established by Constituent Assembly elections in July 1946, but fell well short of a universal franchise.
Tellingly, although Pakistan celebrated its independence on 14 August and India on 15 August 1947, the border between the two new states was not announced until 17 August.
It was hurriedly drawn up by a British lawyer, Cyril Radcliffe, who had little knowledge of Indian conditions and with the use of out-of-date maps and census materials.
Communities, families and farms were cut in two, but by delaying the announcement the British managed to avoid responsibility for the worst fighting and the mass migration that had followed.



Many have wondered why the British and Indian leaders did not delay until a better deal over borders could have been agreed. One explanation is that in the months and years immediately following World War Two, leaders on all sides were losing control and were keen to strike a deal before the country descended into chaos.
Immediately before World War Two, India was ravaged by the impact of the Great Depression, bringing mass unemployment. This created tremendous tensions exacerbated during the war by inflation and food grain shortages. Rationing was introduced in Indian cities and in Bengal a major famine developed in 1942.
The resulting discontent was expressed in widespread violence accompanying the Congress party's 'Quit India' campaign of 1942 - a violence only contained by the deployment of 55 army battalions.

The last months of British rule were marked by a naval mutiny, wage strikes and successful demonstrations in every major city.

With the cessation of hostilities, the battalions at the disposal of the government in India were rapidly diminished. At the same time, the infrastructure of the Congress Party, whose entire leadership was imprisoned due to their opposition to the war, had been dismantled.
The Muslim League, which co-operated with the British, had rapidly increased its membership, yet still had very limited grassroots level organisation.
This was dramatically revealed on the 16 August 1946, when Jinnah called for a 'Direct Action Day' by followers of the League in support of the demand for Pakistan. The day had dissolved into random violence and civil disruption across north India, with thousands of lives lost.
This was interpreted by the British as evidence of the irreconcilable differences between Hindus and Muslims. In reality, the riots were evidence as much of a simple lack of military and political control as they were of social discord.

Further evidence of the collapse of government authority was to be seen in the Princely State of Hyderabad, where a major uprising occurred in the Telengana region, and with the Tebhaga ('two-thirds') agitation among share-cropping cultivators in north Bengal. A leading role was played in both by the Communist Party of India.
Elsewhere, the last months of British rule were marked by a naval mutiny, wage strikes and successful demonstrations in every major city. In all of these conflicts the British colonial government remained aloof, as it concentrated on the business of negotiating a speedy transfer of power.

Strong support for the idea of an independent Pakistan came from large Muslim landowning families in the Punjab and Sindh, who saw it as an opportunity to prosper within a captive market free from competition.
Support also came from the poor peasantry of East Bengal, who saw it as an opportunity to escape from the clutches of moneylenders - often Hindu. Both were to be disappointed. Independent Pakistan inherited India's longest and strategically most problematic borders.

The heartland of support for the Muslim League lay in Uttar Pradesh, which was not included within Pakistan.

At the same time, 90% of the subcontinent's industry, and taxable income base remained in India, including the largest cities of Delhi, Bombay and Calcutta. The economy of Pakistan was chiefly agricultural, and controlled by feudal elites.
Furthermore, at the division of India, Pakistan won a poor share of the colonial government's financial reserves - with 23% of the undivided land mass, it inherited only 17.5% of the former government's financial assets. Once the army had been paid, nothing was left over for the purposes of economic development.
The great advantage enjoyed by the Indian National Congress was that it had worked hard for 40 years to reconcile differences and achieve some cohesion among its leaders. The heartland of support for the Muslim League, however, lay in central north India (Uttar Pradesh) which was not included within Pakistan.
Muslims from this region had to flee westwards and compete with resident populations for access to land and employment, leading to ethnic conflict, especially in Sindh.

The Sena and its twisted logic

It is difficult to say whether the Shiv Sena takes offence or feels proud when its founder Bal Thackeray is spoken of as a terrorist with a religious cause. After the weekly Tehelka carried a cover story with pictures of Thackeray, Dawood Ibrahim, Yakub Memon and Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale above the legend, ‘Who is the biggest terrorist?’, the Sena responded in a rather strange manner. While condemning the depiction of Thackeray alongside those who engaged in violence in the name of religion, the Sena organ Saamna, in an editorial, asked Hindus to act as “human bombs” and invade Pakistan. Thackeray, the editorial wrote approvingly, had instilled the “fear of Hindus” in Indians of other faiths. Far from defending the Sena founder against the charge of being a Hindu terrorist, the editorial appeared to be defending his support of violence in the name of Hinduism. What differentiated Thackeray from the others? According to the editorial’s reasoning, the Sena founder was a dharmabhimaani, a person who took pride in his faith, and not dharmaandh, someone who was motivated by blind faith. This line of defence, whether true to the facts or not, would have been fine but for the editorial’s exhortation to Hindus to turn themselves into human bombs and attack Pakistan. In one stroke, the disputes between India and Pakistan were turned into a Hindu-Muslim issue. By arguing that Hindus would have to be highly religious if they wanted to respond to Pakistani extremists, the editorial, in effect, identified nationalism with Hinduism.

The veiled threats aimed at Tehelka and the exhortations to violence are typical of the politics of the Sena, which is mostly a combination of Marathi chauvinism and Hindutva. Normally, the Sena when in power is less virulent than when it is out of power. But of late the party has been under pressure in Maharashtra, having ceded political space to the Bharatiya Janata Party. Having been for long the senior partner in the alliance of the two Hindutva parties, the Sena ended up as a poor second to the BJP in the Assembly election last year. Although its breakaway group, the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena led by Raj Thackeray, is no longer serious competition, the Sena doubtless feels obliged to push the limits of its extremist politics. As the senior partner in government, the BJP, which usually bristles whenever there is talk of ‘Hindu terror’, saying the phrase is an oxymoron, will have to ask the Sena to give up its aggressive brand of politics laced with threats of violence and talk of communal hatred. The Sena must be made to necessarily tone down its rhetoric, and behave more like a responsible party in government. 

Calculated devaluation

When China sneezes, the world catches a cold. In a surprise action that set off shock waves across the globe and led to the currencies of many a nation taking a tumble, the People’s Bank of China cut its daily yuan reference rate by 1.9 per cent on Tuesday. Even before the rest of the world could come to terms with the unexpected devaluation, Beijing made a further 1.6 per cent cut the very next day. The moves especially had a sharp negative impact on many Asian currencies. Though the rupee too fell to a two-year low on Wednesday in the wake of the double-dose devaluation, the Indian currency has been relatively less affected compared toits Asian peers. After the consecutive cuts, the People’s Bank of China clarified that “there is no basis for a sustained depreciation trend for the yuan”. It justified the second-round cut by citing a fall in the spot market. Is the devaluation an indication of China moving towards a more market-determined currency rate? Its subsequent intervention in the spot market to quell a further fall in spot rates, however, has led to a guessing game. Nevertheless, the International Monetary Fund is optimistic that the Chinese move will let market forces have a greater role in determining the exchange rate. The timing of the action – read in the context of a decelerating economy and in the light of China's heavy dependence on exports – suggests that it is a calculated move meant to regain economic momentum. It is a win-win move for China, in a manner of speaking. After all, Beijing is also making a strong pitch to make the yuan a global reserve currency at the IMF. For that to happen, it has to move closer to a mechanism of market-determined exchange rates. 

The immediate tumble in global currencies aside, the wider implications of a largely devalued yuan on individual economies of the world will play out intensely in the minds of policy-formulators within governments across the world in the coming days. In the era of the inter-connected world, it is incorrect for central banks, especially of bigger nations such as China and the U.S., to assume that they could operate in separate silos. Given its overbearing status as an exporter, China’s step may trigger rearguard action on the currency and trade policy fronts. For New Delhi, in particular, this throws up a fresh challenge as it battles to stem a slide in exports. It has to make counter-moves to stop quickly and effectively the flooding of Chinese goods in the wake of the yuan devaluation, which could have a cascading effect on a host of sectors.

A ban and some questions

There has been little logic or clarity to the government’s actions around banning a popular brand of noodles, and now its unbanning by the Bombay High Court is unlikely to clear the air either. In June, the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) said the snack, Maggi, was found to be “hazardous and unsafe for human consumption”. This followed from samples testing positive in some States for high levels of lead and monosodium glutamate (MSG), according to the FSSAI. Simultaneously, samples tested in other States came back with a certification of safety; Nestle, the manufacturer, said that 2,700 samples had been tested in India and abroad during the last few months and that all of them were found to have levels of lead far below the danger mark. The company maintains that it does not add MSG to its noodles. However, panic set in swiftly; the product went off the shelves across the country, partly in response to bans by individual States, and partly as a result of consumer fears. The High Court has now found that no opportunity was given to the company to prove its side before the ban was imposed, and that the tests were not conducted in accredited laboratories. While lifting the ban, it ordered further tests that follow proper norms. A class action suit against Nestle filed by the government before the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission remains in process. 

These contradictory signals leave the consumer confused and unsure where to turn for authentic information. When taking on a powerful multinational, the FSSAI should have been equipped with the full facts before putting what now appears to be half-baked information into the public space. If the food regulator is unable to follow proper norms, the consumer is left with little confidence that it is properly regulating the manufacture and sale of thousands of other potentially harmful food products in the Indian market, ones that are particularly prone to adulteration. There is little standardisation in food testing procedures, and laboratories — there are already too few of them — may throw up wildly differing results. In such a situation, Indian consumers, particularly parents of little children, are often forced to look up whether a particular ingredient in permitted by food regulators in the United States or the United Kingdom, given the utter lack of proactive, reliable information from their own food regulator. Companies will meanwhile have grounds for grievance against the FSSAI for the loss of revenue and reputation they might unfairly suffer. If India intends to ensure stringent food norms, it will need to be armed with the facts. Unsubstantiated warnings that have to be rolled back in no time inspire confidence about them in neither the consumer nor the industry.

Terror trumps the agenda

The Gurdaspur provocation will spur the Modi government to focus on terror in talks with Islamabad and end flip-flops that defined its Pakistan policy over the past yearThe excitement from Ufa had barely settled in Delhi when a terrorist attack in Gurdaspur provoked a familiar rush of angst and adrenalin. After nearly a decade the international boundary in Punjab had been breached, raking up dreaded memories of the insurgency of the Eighties. With the Line of Control up north in Jammu & Kashmir also tense, intelligence officials wondered if India was in for another round of prolonged insecurity on its western borders.

The big question was if the thaw in Ufa would survive the most recent onslaught of terror. A mere cup of tea barely a year ago between Pakistani high commissioner Abdul Basit and Hurriyat leader Shabir Shah had been enough to put a scowl on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's face. Just like that, India had cancelled impending talks between the foreign secretaries of India and Pakistan.

The terse message to the Pakistanis: Either you are with us or against us. In the new Narendra Modi dispensation, India would not tolerate any fuzzy feelings of warmth between old friends. The Hurriyat leaders may be Indian citizens but they were breaking biscuits with the Pakistanis. A mere tea-party had become a symbol of insurrection.

Police fight militants during the encounter in Dinanagar, Gurdaspur, on July 27.

So imagine the surprise when government officials declared, in the wake of the Gurdaspur blasts, that the show would go on. India would continue its newly opened dialogue with the Pakistanis. The two national security advisors, Ajit Doval and Sartaj Aziz, would meet some time in August, soon after Modi hoists the tricolour for the second time from the historic ramparts of the Red Fort.The mind boggles at the alacrity with which the Prime Minister has decided to throw out all his old templates. Pakistan was no longer the enemy for a variety of reasons-and among the most important is the fact that Modi will soon be embarking on his second visit to the US, to appear before the UN General Assembly in New York and perhaps even make a side trip to Washington D.C. to meet President Barack Obama.
Certainly Modi wants to show the world, at the UN and elsewhere that India, with its size, economy and willingness to break with old shibboleths, is the true leader of South Asia. But since leadership requires the ability to bite both lip and the proverbial bullet, another template was in order to deal with Pakistan.
And so disregarding pressure from an RSS increasingly concerned that he was making peace with the Islamic Republic, the Prime Minister has decided to change the game. Talks with Pakistan will continue, but only on a one-point agenda: terrorism.
The joint statement at Ufa, government sources say, is already heavily loaded in favour of a discussion on the subject and all its manifestations. At Ufa, Pakistan even promised to do what it could to deliver voice samples of the Mumbai attack accused, such as Zaki-ur Rehman Lakhvi, to India.
"The talks between the two NSAs will be about terrorism, terrorism and more terrorism," government sources said, adding, "the composite dialogue as we know it, when both sides talked on all issues, is dead."
The sources said that the Gurdaspur attack was a deliberate attempt on the part of the Pakistani security establishment to roil the waters and so anger the Indian government that it had no option but to cancel the dialogue.
"But we will do no such thing. We will do exactly the opposite. It is clear that someone in Pakistan, by sending three terrorists into Gurdaspur, don't want the talks to continue. They are hoping India will cancel the talks so they can tell the world, See, we told you so," the sources said.
In fact, across the corridors of power in North Block and South Block and elsewhere, politicians and bureaucrats are girding up their loins to deal with worse-case scenarios. The uneasy feeling that more Gurdaspurlike attacks, in the wake of the Yakub Memon hanging as well as in the run up to the Aziz-Doval meet could take place, hangs around the place.
But Modi is determined to deal with the oncoming slings and arrows of misfortune with renewed energy. Travelling the world over the last year and hearing the world speak to you in very different ways from the time you were chief minister has certainly helped to focus the Prime Minister's mind.
Government sources point out that the three men who were inserted into Indian territory carrying GPS preset to the Dinanagar police station in Gurdaspur district, had to have been mentored, guided and perhaps even trained by the all-powerful Pakistani security establishment. These men were also reportedly carrying night vision devices with US military markings, only used in counterterrorism operations, and which may have been given to the Pakistani military for its own use.
The violation of the Punjab border is significant because unlike the Line of Control in Jammu & Kashmir, this is an agreed-upon border. Home Minister Rajnath Singh told the Rajya Sabha on July 30 that preliminary evidence suggests the attackers might have infiltrated taking advantage of heavy rains and swollen streams along the India-Pakistan border.
The sources were unwilling to say whether these men are Lashkar-e-Taiba cadres or elements within the jihadi groups gone rogue. But they believe the Pakistani security establishment was using them, perhaps "to test the waters in India's Punjab" to possibly reignite a "Khalistani movement of sorts".
It is believed that several Sikh jathas or groups that regularly travel to Sikh shrines inside Pakistan have been addressed by "Khalistani leaders", while the capitals of Western Europe as well as the US and Canada in which large Sikh populations reside are being "sounded out" to perhaps join a potential movement in case the need arises.
On both sides of the border it is widely believed that the main reason for the growing ferment in Punjab is political discontent, and that the state is ripe for change. The ruling Shiromani Akali Dal and its ally, the BJP, don't agree on a number of issues, although they still remain a part of the Union government. However, the Congress party in the Opposition remains unable to step into the political vacuum because it is itself divided and the Aam Aadmi Party, a growing third force, isn't ready yet to jump into the fray.
Enter the Pakistan based terrorist who is finding it increasingly difficult to infiltrate into Jammu and Kashmir, not only because the Line of Control is fenced or that the large numbers of security forces have successfully kept infiltration down, but also because the people of the Kashmir valley have made it clear that accession to Pakistan is a low priority.
That is why, says Lt Gen (retd) Syed Ata Hasnain, a former commander of the 15 Corps based in Srinagar, these cross-border terrorists are being forced to move south. With the 15 Corps "tightening" security in the Valley and the 16 Corps, deployed south of the Pir Panjal, also following suit, it has become "very difficult" to infiltrate both men and material into Kashmir, Lt Gen Hasnain said.
Turns out that the first big district south of the Pir Panjal is Gurdaspur. Once the summer home of the Lion of Punjab, Maharaja Ranjit Singh, Dinanagar became the choice target of attack of the three Pakistan-based terrorists. Within kissing distance is the Ravi river, and on the other side is the Shakargarh tehsil, part of Gurdaspur before 1947 and now integrated with Pakistan's Sialkot district.
Sources also point out the pattern in the up-and-down peace dialogue with Pakistan over the years, how peace moves are often preceded or succeeded by terror attacks, so as to derail them. The classic example is, of course, the Lahore bus ride in February 1999 followed by the Kargil conflict that summer. The failed Agra summit of July 2001 was succeeded by an attack against the legislative assembly in Srinagar in October and the parliament in Delhi in December 2001. As a result India cancelled flights and stopped giving visas, but Pakistani terrorists were back in Kaluchak, Jammu, in May 2002, killing civilians and army personnel and nearly sending both nations to war.
More recently, within three weeks of Nawaz Sharif attending Modi's swearing-in on May 26 last year, the Pakistani army violated the ceasefire 19 times. And two weeks after Foreign Secretary S. Jaishankar visited Pakistan on March 3 to break the ice, terrorists from Pakistan mounted strikes in Samba and Kathua. Analysts say that China played a key role in getting its "all-weather partner" Pakistan to come to the Ufa talks. Over the last year Pakistan's international influence has grown by leaps and bounds, both with the US and China, because it has been able to get the various Taliban factions to talk to the Afghan government in Murree, a hill station not far from Islamabad. The second round of these Afghan talks is slated for July 31.
Neither side is said to have expected much from the handshake in Ufa. But surprisingly, sources from both sides say, the hour-long Modi-Sharif conversation went well. Both sides had expected acrimony-in fact, they had prepared for worst-case scenarios-but instead, they got agreement on all key issues.
In the wake of the Gurdaspur incident, producing a joint statement certainly seems the easy part of the high-stakes India-Pakistan engagement. Implementing any fancy communiqué on the ground is the torturous part.

China and Pak against India

It was in the year 1971 when the two South Asian rivals declared war on each other, causing a great loss to the lives, property and territory in case of Pakistan. “As the topic sounds controversial, before we begin we would like to tell that every information in this article is sourced. The article was written after a detail analysis of various sources. All the relevant and immediate sources are listed at the end of the Article.”

Background

Countries Involved in 1971 War, Click to Enlarge

Before 1971, Bangladesh used to be a part of Pakistan as East Pakistan. According to Najam Sethi, a well respected and honoured journalist from Pakistan, East Pakistan always complained that they received less development funds and less attention from the West Pakistan (Punjabi) dominating government. Bengalis in East Pakistan also resisted the adoption of Urdu as the state language. The revenue from export, whether it was from the Cotton of West Pakistan or Jute of East Pakistan, was handled mainly by West Pakistan. Lastly, in an election conducted just some months before the war, the victory was gained by the East Pakistani leader and still he was not given the power, thus fueling the movement in East Pakistan.
Pakistani army started its operation in East Pakistan to contain the movement and anger among the Bengalis. It is reported that the army was involved in mass killing of public and mass rape of women. India was aware of this and was only waiting for a trigger to start the war. India started receiving huge number of refugees which became unmanageable, pushing it to intervene in the situation. The situation soon attracted the attention of many other countries. Thus the war later was not only between India and Pakistan, but many countries were involved in 1971 Indo Pakistani war (War of Liberation of Bangladesh) directly or indirectly.
In May, Indira Gandhi wrote to Nixon about the ‘carnage in East Bengal’ and the flood of refugees, burdening India. After L K Jha (then the Indian ambassador to US) had warned Kissinger that India might have to send back some of the refugees as guerrillas, Nixon commented, ‘By God, we will cut off economic aid [to India].’
A few days later, when the US president said ‘the goddamn Indians’ were preparing for another war, Kissinger retorted ‘they are the most aggressive goddamn people around.’

US and China Connection, A Little Known Fact

(All Excerpts and Sources from 929 page long Volume XI of the Foreign Relations of the United States)
US sympathized with Pakistan, because of various reasons. Among them two reasons were that: firstly, Pakistan belonged to American led military Pact, CENTO and SEATO; secondly, US believed any victory of India will be considered as the expansion of Soviet influence in the parts gained by India with the victory, as it was believed to be a pro Soviet nation, even though they were non aligned.
In a telegram sent to US Secretary of State Will Roger, on March 28, 1971, the staff of the US consulate in Dhaka complained, ‘Our government has failed to denounce the suppression of democracy. Our government has failed to denounce atrocities. Our government has failed to take forceful measures to protect its citizens while at the same time bending over backwards to placate the West Pakistan dominated government… We, as professional public servants express our dissent with current policy and fervently hope that our true and lasting interests here can be defined and our policies redirected in order to salvage our nation’s position as a moral leader of the free world.’
This brought China in the picture. US needed help from China and the messenger was Pakistan. US  approached China very secretly on this issue, who was more than welcoming as it believed that their relations with US could improve from this onward.
During the second week of July, 1971, Kissinger arrived in Beijing, where he heard the words by then Chinese Prime Minister Zhou Enlai: “In our opinion, if India continues on its present course in disregard of world opinion, it will continue to go on recklessly. We, however, support the stand of Pakistan. This is known to the world. If they [the Indians] are bent on provoking such a situation, then we cannot sit idly by.’ On this, Kissinger responded that China should know that the US also backs Pakistan on this issue.
Indira Gandhi, the Indian prime minister in those times decided to tour most of the Western capitals to prove Indian stand and gain support and sympathy for the Bengalis of East Pakistan. On November 4th and 5th she met Nixon in Washington. Nixon straight forwardly told her that a new war in the subcontinent was out of the question.
The next day, Nixon and Kissinger assessed the situation. Kissinger told Nixon: ‘The Indians are bastards anyway. They are plotting a war.’
The pressure increased in East Pakistan, which attracted Indian attention. Indians were preparing for war and were concentrated on the Eastern front. To divert the pressure, on December 3, in the dark of night, even before India could attack East Pakistan, Pakistan opened western front and air raided six Indian Airfields in Kashmir and Punjab.

The CIA reported to the US President that Indian Prime Minister believes that the Chinese will never intervene militarily in North India, and thus, any action from China would be a surprise for India and Indian military might collapse in tensed situation caused by fighting in three different fronts (East, North and West).
Hearing this, on December 9, Nixon decided to send the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise into the Bay of Bengal to threaten India. The plan was to Surround India from all four sides and force them to retreat and leave East Pakistan.
On December 10, Nixon instructed Kissinger to ask the Chinese to move some troops toward the Indian frontier. ‘Threaten to move forces or move them, Henry, that’s what they must do now.’ China feared any action on India might attract Soviet aggression. At this, US assured China that any action taken by Soviet Union will be countered by US to protect China.
Pakistani army had somehow maintained their position and resisted Indian advancement. They believed China is preparing to open the Northern front which will slow down or completely stop the Indian advancement. In fact, the myth of Chinese activity was also communicated to Pakistan’s army to boost their moral, to keep their will to fight and hope alive. Lieutenant General A A K Niazi, the Pakistani army commander in Dhaka, was informed: “NEFA front has been activated by Chinese, although the Indians, for obvious reasons, have not announced it.” But Beijing never did.
In Washington, Nixon analysed the situation thus: ‘If the Russians get away with facing down the Chinese and the Indians get away with licking the Pakistanis…we may be looking down the gun barrel.’ Nixon was not sure about China. Did they really intend to start a military action against India?

Soviet Union / Russian Role in the Indo Pakistan 1971 War.
As India had decided to go on with the war, and Indira Gandhi had failed to gain American support and sympathy for the Bengalis who were being tortured in East Pakistan, she finally took a hard move and on August 9, signed a treaty of peace, friendship and cooperation with Soviet Union.

The State Department historian says, ‘in the perspective of Washington, the crisis ratcheted up a dangerous notch, India and the Soviet Union have signed a treaty of peace, friendship and cooperation.’ It was a shock to America as this was what they feared, expansion of Soviet influence in South Asia. They feared that involvement of Soviet Union could sabotage their plan.
On December 4, just one day after Pakistan raided Indian airfields in Kashmir and Punjab declaring war on India, America’s proxy involvement in the war was becoming clear. Thinking that the Soviet Union might enter the war if they come to know this, which could cause a lot of destruction to Pakistan and American equipment given to Pakistan, US ambassador to the United Nations George H W Bush [later 41st president of the United States and father of George Bush] introduced a resolution in the UN Security Council, calling for a cease-fire and the withdrawal of armed forces by India and Pakistan. Believing India can win the war and Indira Gandhi being determined to protect the interest of Bengalis, Soviet Union vetoed out the resolution, thus letting India fight for the cause. Nixon and Kissinger pressurized Soviets to a very extent but luck did not support them.


On 3rd December, 1971, the World was shaken by another war between India and Pakistan. Pakistani airforce raided Indian cities and airstrips. The Indian PM, Indira Gandhi, brought the country in the state of emergency and ordered Indian army to reflect the aggression. Fierce military operations developed on the ground, in the air and in the sea.
Historic document: “Confidential. December, 10, 1971. Moscow. For the DM Marshal Andrey Grechko.
According to the information from our ambassador in Delhi, in the very first day of the conflict the Indian destroyer ‘Rajput’ had sunk a Pakistani submarine with deep bombing. On December, 4 and 9, the speed boats of India had destroyed and damaged 10 Pakistani battle ships and vessels by Soviet anti ship P-15 missiles. In addition 12 Pakistani oil storage were burned in flame.”

Britain and Soviet Confrontation

Confidential – The Commander of the Military Intelligence Service Gen. Pyotr Ivashutin.
“The Soviet Intelligence has reported that the English operative connection has come nearer to territorial India, water led by an aircraft carrier “Eagle” [On December 10]. For helping friendly India, Soviet government has directed a group of ships under the command of contr-admiral V. Kruglyakov.”
Vladimir Kruglyakov, the former (1970-1975) Commander of the 10th Operative Battle Group (Pacific Fleet) remembers:
“I was ordered by the Chief Commander to track the British Navy’s advancement, I positioned our battleships in the Bay of Bengal and watched for the British carrier “Eagle”.
But Soviet Union didn’t have enough force to resist if they encountered the British Carrier. Therefore, to support the existing Soviet fleet in the Bay of Bengal, Soviet cruisers, destroyers and nuclear submarines, equipped with anti ship missiles, were sent from Vladivostok.
In reaction English Navy retreated and went South to Madagascar.
Soon the news of American carrier Enterprise and USS Tripoli’s advancement towards Indian water came.
V. Kruglyakov “ I had obtained the order from the commander-in-chief not to allow the advancement of the American fleet to the military bases of India”
We encircled them and aimed the missiles at the ‘Enterprise’. We had blocked their way and didn’t allow them to head anywhere, neither to Karachi, nor to Chittagong or Dhaka”.
The Soviet ships had small range rockets (only upto 300 KM). Therefore, to hold the opponent under the range, commanders ran risks of going as near to the enemy as possible.

“The Chief Commander had ordered me to lift the submarines and bring them to the surface so that it can be pictured by the American spy satellites or can be seen by the American Navy!’ It was done to demonstrate, that we had all the needed things in Indian Ocean, including the nuclear submarines. I had lifted them, and they recognized it. Then, we intercepted the American communication. The commander of the Carrier Battle Group was then the counter-admiral Dimon Gordon. He sent the report to the 7th American Fleet Commander: ‘Sir, we are too late. There are Russian nuclear submarines here, and a big collection of battleships’.
Americans returned and couldn’t do anything. Soviet Union had also threatened China that, if they ever opened a front against India on its border, they will receive a tough response from North.

Role of Sri Lanka

Pakistani high commissioner in Colombo, Seema Ilahi Baloch said in her speech addressed to Lanka-Pakistan business council in Colombo in June, 2011 that Pakistan can never forget the help which Sri Lanka offered to Pakistan during the 1971 war between India and Pakistan.
“We in Pakistan cannot forget the logistical and political support Sri Lanka extended to us in 1971 when it opened its refueling facilities for us,” she said.
Pakistani Aircraft destined to East Pakistan flew taking a round of India via Sri Lanka, since they could not fly over Indian sky. This forced Pakistan to get its aircrafts refueled on the way. Sri Lanka eager to help Pakistan, allowed Pakistani aircrafts for refueling at the Bandaranaike airport.
The war ended with the surrender of Pakistani army as they missed American help due to quick Russians who blocked both America and China from preventing India to advance. With this, a new country named Bangladesh was formed, which was recognized by the whole world and by Pakistan in the following year with Shimla Agreement.


SOURCE : The World Reporter ...

Net Neutrality: What You Need to Know Now

 What is Net Neutrality?

Net Neutrality is the Internet’s guiding principle: It preserves our right to communicate freely online. This is the definition of an open Internet.

 

Net Neutrality means an Internet that enables and protects free speech. It means that Internet service providers should provide us with open networks — and should not block or discriminate against any applications or content that ride over those networks. Just as your phone company shouldn't decide who you can call and what you say on that call, your ISP shouldn't be concerned with the content you view or post online.

 

Without Net Neutrality, cable and phone companies could carve the Internet into fast and slow lanes. An ISP could slow down its competitors' content or block political opinions it disagreed with. ISPs could charge extra fees to the few content companies that could afford to pay for preferential treatment — relegating everyone else to a slower tier of service. This would destroy the open Internet.

 

 

 

What was the FCC’s ‘Open Internet Order’?

The FCC’s 2010 order was intended to prevent broadband Internet service providers from blocking or interfering with traffic on the Web. The Open Internet Order was generally designed to ensure the Internet remained a level playing field for all — that's the principle we call Net Neutrality (we say “generally,” since the FCC’s rules prohibited wired ISPs from blocking and discriminating against content, while allowing wireless ISPs to discriminate against but not block websites).

 

In its January 2014 ruling, the court said that the FCC used a questionable legal framework to craft the Open Internet Order and lacked the authority to implement and enforce those rules.

 

Did the court rule against Net Neutrality? 

No. The court ruled against the FCC's ability to enforce Net Neutrality under the shaky legal foundation it established for those rules. The court specifically stated that its “task as a reviewing court is not to assess the wisdom of the Open Internet Order regulations, but rather to determine whether the Commission has demonstrated that the regulations fall within the scope of its statutory grant of authority.”

 

When the FCC made its 2010 open Internet rule, it relied on two decisions the Bush-era FCC made, rulings that weakened the FCC’s authority over broadband Internet access providers. Nothing in the January 2014 court decision prohibited the FCC from reversing those misguided decisions and reclassifying ISPs as common carriers.

 

In fact, both this decision and a prior Supreme Court decision showed that reclassification would provide the best means of protecting the open Internet.

 

What does ‘reclassify’ mean? 

When Congress enacted the 1996 Telecommunications Act, it didn’t want the FCC to treat websites and other Internet services the same way it treats the local access networks that enable people to get online. Congress understood that the owners of the access networks have tremendous gatekeeper power, and so it required the FCC to treat these network owners as “common carriers,” meaning they couldn’t block or discriminate against the content that flows across their networks to/from your computer.

 

However, in a series of politically motivated decisions first by FCC Chairman Michael Powell (now the cable industry’s top lobbyist) and then by FCC Chairman Kevin Martin, the FCC decided to classify broadband Internet access service as an “information service,” meaning that the law sees it as no different from a website like freepress.net or an online service like LexisNexis. These decisions removed the FCC’s ability to prohibit ISPs from blocking or discriminating against online content (it also removed the FCC’s ability to ensure that ISPs protect your privacy). 

 

In Verizon vs. FCC, the court stated that the FCC lacks authority because of “the Commission’s still-binding decision to classify broadband providers not as providers of ‘telecommunications services’ but instead as providers of ‘information services.’” 

 

On Feb. 26, the FCC voted to define broadband as what we all know it is — a connection to the outside world that is merely faster than the phone lines we used to use for dial-up access, phone calls and faxes.

 

Doing so gave the agency the strongest possible foundation for rules prohibiting discriminatory practices.

 

What did the FCC vote on?

The new rules, rooted in Title II of the Communications Act, ban throttling, blocking and paid prioritization.

 

Why is Net Neutrality important for businesses?

Net Neutrality is crucial for small business owners, startups and entrepreneurs, who rely on the open Internet to launch their businesses, create a market, advertise their products and services, and distribute products to customers. We need the open Internet to foster job growth, competition and innovation.
Net Neutrality lowers the barriers of entry for entrepreneurs, startups and small businesses by ensuring the Web is a fair and level playing field. It’s because of Net Neutrality that small businesses and entrepreneurs have been able to thrive on the Internet. They use the Internet to reach new customers and showcase their goods, applications and services.
No company should be able to interfere with this open marketplace. ISPs are by definition the gatekeepers to the Internet, and without Net Neutrality, they would seize every possible opportunity to profit from that gatekeeper control.
Without Net Neutrality, the next Google would never get off the ground.

Why is Net Neutrality important for communities of color?

The open Internet allows communities of color to tell their own stories and to organize for racial and social justice.
The mainstream media have failed to allow people of color to speak for themselves. And thanks to economic inequality and runaway media consolidation, people of color own just a handful of broadcast stations. The lack of diverse ownership is a primary reason why the media have gotten away with portraying communities of color stereotypically.
The open Internet gives marginalized voices opportunities to be heard. But without Net Neutrality, ISPs could block unpopular speech and prevent dissident voices from speaking freely online. Without Net Neutrality, people of color would lose a vital platform.
And without Net Neutrality, millions of small businesses owned by people of color wouldn't be able to compete against larger corporations online, which would further deepen the economic inequality in our nation’s most vulnerable communities.

So what can we do now?

The cable and phone companies — and their allies in Congress — willl do everything they can to dismantle this win.

why not give away gas subsidy

 *Reform Act of 2014*

 1. No Tenure / No Pension: Parliamentarians collect a salary while in office but should not receive any pay when they're out of office. 

 2. Parliamentarians should purchase their own retirement plans, just as all Indians do.

 3. Parliamentarians should no longer vote themselves a pay raise. Their pay should be linked to the CPI or 3%, whichever is lower. 

 4. Parliamentarians should lose their current health care system and participate in the same health care system as the Indian people.

 5. Parliamentarians with tainted records, criminal charges & convictions, past or present should be summarily banned from the parliament and fighting election on any pretext or the other.

 6. Parliamentarians should equally abide by all laws they impose on the Indian people.

 7. All contracts with past and present Parliamentarians should be void effective 1/1/15 

The Indian people did not make this contract with them. Parliamentarians made all these contracts for themselves. Serving in Parliament is an honor, not a lucrative career. The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators, so ours should serve their term(s), then go home and back to work. No surrender of subsidies like LPG by citizens unless all subsidies available to MPs and MLAs withdrawn including subsidised food in Parliament canteen 

Surviving LAMO Storm after Namo Victory....

The axe forgets, but the tree remembers.
This African proverb best explains the current plight of Rajasthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje, who is facing the toughest battle of her political life. One more push and the Dholpur Maharani could be dethroned.
Reports suggest the BJP leadership has refused to defend Raje and her son Dushyant, who is being called the party’s Robert Vadra. The BJP may in fact probe some of the charges against the ‘Maa-Beta’ sarkar and initiate action if she is found guilty.
Unlike Sushma Swaraj, who was defended by Rajnath Singh, Arun Jaitley and the RSS, nobody in the BJP is crying for Raje. “As regards with the Rajasthan issue is concerned, the details have to be taken into account. I think Vasundhara ji has spoken slightly yesterday (Tuesday), surely she will revert,” BJP leader Ravishankar Prasad said.
So, Raje is on her own.
The signs are ominous. On Wednesday, as TV channels screamed “off with the Queen’s head’ and called her a coward for running away from questions, Raje desperately tried to meet party chief Amit Shah. But Shah didn’t seem keen to meet her in a hurry.

Reuters

The BJP’s problem is that it has realised Raje’s case is indefensible. The financial transactions between her son, Jhalawar MP Dushyant Singh, and Modi are almost similar to the deals between Vadra and DLF. The paper trail shows that he got nearly Rs 11 crore for a company that exists just on paper through the Mauritius route. This is a classic case of round-tripping of money and the paper trail points to slush funds being laundered. The BJP will look stupid defending an encore of Vadragate.
The case against Raje is scandalous. Modi has confessed that Raje supported his application for immigration in Britain and then tried to keep it a secret from the Indian authorities. If the allegation of helping a fugitive is proven, it could amount to treachery, even treason. If the case against Raje is proven, the BJP’s claim of being a party of nationalists would turn into a joke.
Raje’s defence depends on just one argument: that she didn’t sign the document pledging support to Modi’s immigration plea. But her silence on the issue, her inability to face the media, to fight her battle like Swaraj did, suggests Raje is at the mercy of her critics and the high command.
If Raje stands isolated today, much of it is her own fault. She has had a history of blackmailing the party leadership, throwing fits and bending in the direction of the wind. She has no permanent friends but life-long enemies.
In the summer of 2013, when Raje began her campaign from Charbhuja, she didn’t invite Narendra Modi. When Rajnath Singh, who was the BJP president then, began to speak, hundreds of workers started shouting ‘Modi, Modi’ to remind Raje of her folly. Over the next few weeks, Raje corrected her course and began leaning towards the Narendra Modi camp.
But, it is unlikely, the PM would have forgotten the slur.

Before that, she had threatened to quit if her demand for being made the state BJP president wasn’t accepted. To force the party’s hand, many legislators in the Raje camp submitted their resignation to her; some of them even suggested that they were ready to float a new party.
And, soon after the NDA won the election, Raje reportedly demanded that her son be made a minister in the Modi government. In the ensuing fight, Rajasthan — a state with 25 MPs— was completely overlooked and was allotted just one seat in the Cabinet (rape accused Nihalchand Meghwal).
Back then, the BJP didn’t have too many options. Elections were on the horizon; Raje was the party’s only mass leader and the Centre was weak. The internal dynamics within the BJP have changed dramatically since then. To use a famous Dilbert line, Raje, who was the bird then, is now the statue. As the muck gets thrown at her, her rivals would see this as an opportunity to teach her a lesson.
Many powerful forces are working against Raje. It can’t be just a coincidence that Lalit Modi himself revealed that she secretly tried to help him and then released ‘incriminating’ documents against her. Something must have gone horribly wrong between Modi and Raje over the past two years.
Raje may have forgotten some of the things she did in the past, but her rivals still remember them. This looks eerily similar to Badlapur.

Land Accusition Bill - 6 Main Points

The Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (Amendment) Bill, 2015, popularly known as Land bill, was adopted by the Lok Sabha on Tuesday. Here are the six important facts you need to know:-

1	The Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (Amendment) Bill, 2015 seeks to Amend the Act of 2013 (LARR Act, 2013).
2	The Bill creates five special categories of land use: 1. defence, 2. rural infrastructure, 3. affordable housing, 4. industrial corridors, and 5. infrastructure projects including Public Private Partnership (PPP) projects where the central government owns the land
3	The Bill exempts the five categories from provisions of the LARR Act, 2013 which requires the consent of 80 per cent of land ownersto be obtained for private projects and that of 70 per cent of land owners for PPP 7projects.
4	The Bill allows exemption for projects in these five categories from requiring Social Impact Assessment be done to identify those affected and from the restrictions on the acquisition of irrigated multi-cropped land imposed by LARR Act 2013.
5	The Bill brings provisions for compensation, rehabilitation, and resettlement under other related Acts such as the National Highways Act and the Railways Act in consonance with the LARR Act.
6	The Bill changes acquisition of land for private companies mentioned in LARR Act, 2013 to acquisition for ‘private entities’. A private entity could include companies, corporations and nonprofit organisations.

Railway Budget 2015: Mr Suresh Prabhu, CEO or politician?

Railways minister Suresh Prabhu has been given the challenging task to transform Indian Railways.

Economist Bibek Debroy chaired a committee to reconfigure the Railway Board as well as to suggest steps for resource mobilisation for major projects. The committee’s interim report is awaited.

In the meantime, the World Bank made a presentation to Prabhu outlining the experience of other countries in transforming their railway systems. It recommended that the Indian Railways be reconfigured along separate businesses and do away with the departmental structure. It was, however, constrained in the range of recommendations it put forward, since the Prime Minister had declared no change in ownership can take place.

So, the World Bank came up with anovel recommendation: of periodically having the Railway Board reviewed by a ‘supervisory board’. Apart from the Railway Board chairman, other members would be drawn from business, banking, and academia — but none from the government or political class.

The Acworth Committee had made a similar recommendation in 1923. But the government of the day scuttled the ability of the committee to function independently by filling it from within the government.

Even if a supervisory board is constituted, its ability to influence the functioning of the railways will be limited by the fact that it won’t be able to review the performance of the railway minister.

The railway minister wears two hats: a political one, and as head of one of the largest commercial organisations in the world. While Parliament is the correct forum for the review of the politician, for the Indian Railways ‘CEO’, a supervisory board would be the right forum.

There is another fly in the ointment. A commercial organisation is a department of the government subject to all government rules. Moreover, the officer cadre that manages the Indian Railways is the civil service with promotional and other incentive systems identical to other central services. Such a system works in accordance with the rules, at its own pace. Everything is time-bound.

Moreover, the Railway Board is not a board of a commercial organisation but an operational one. The seven members manage the railways on a day-to-day basis where each functional member is supreme in his area and the chairman arbitrates when two or more functions are involved. This arrangement remains effective and it manages to run 14,300 trains daily in very challenging conditions.

Even as it is a department of the government, the railways remains acommercial enterprise. The government can’t escape taking decisions as shareholder and as board of directors. Parliament performs the function of shareholders, approving the budget and laying down what it can and can’t do.

Similarly, the Union Cabinet performs the role of the board of directors, since it makes all the top appointments, and any decisions regarding fare structure and other policy issues. However, neither Parliament nor the Cabinet thinks of itself as shareholders or board of directors. Across both fora is the railway minister, performing the function of a managing director.

Over the years, railway ministers have used funds for political commitments at the cost of commercial viability. Suresh Prabhu has a choice before him. Does he to want take on the mantle of managing director of Indian Railways? The answer will determine which way the train rolls.

If he decides to be a managing director, he can send out a signal this Thursday by tailoring part of his Budget speech to be that of a company CEO presenting the year’s performance to its shareholders. Prabhu can also revive the stalled project to reform the railways’ accounting system, which will enable that the Indian Railways’ performance is seen in commercial terms.

He needs to set a target for increasing market share in goods movement and identify the target customers for shifting on to rail. For that, an understanding of what the customer considers of value — and creating that value by innovation and investment — is required

N.O.T.A. - Why Waste a precious vote ?

Dear voters, curb your enthusiasm.
The "none of the above" (NOTA) button that electronic voting machines will have from now on does not give you the 'the right to reject' all candidates.

According to former chief election commissioner S Y Quraishi, the Supreme Court in its order has just given "the right to register a negative opinion."

He said the new provision does not mean that all candidates in a constituency stand rejected or defeated if the number of NOTA votes exceeds the number garnered by the highest vote-getter.

"Even if there are 99 NOTA votes out of a total of 100, and candidate X gets just one vote, X is the winner, having obtained the only valid vote. The rest will be treated as invalid or 'no votes'," Quraishi said in an opinion piece in The Indian Express on Thursday. Quraishi was India's chief election commissioner from June 2010 to July 2012.

He then said that NOTA may not affect election results, the option would "ensure secrecy of the voter wanting to make a choice that amounts to abstention, and also to ensure that nobody casts a bogus vote in his place".

He said the court did not say anything on the right to reject since People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL)  which filed the petition demanding NOTA did not ask for the right to reject.

The only use of NOTA, he said citing the order, that it would put "pressure political parties to nominate only good candidates."

On the actual use of NOTA, Quraishi said, was to give privacy to the voter who does not want to vote for any of the candidates in his constituency.
He said when ballot papers were used for voting, voters would put "a blank slip into the ballot box, some would deliberately spoil the ballot by stamping it in more than one place or write sab chor hain (they are all thieves)".

"All these amounted to invalid votes. These were counted but did not have an impact on the result."

But after EVMs came in 1998, that secrecy or the chance to invalid votes was taken away "since the pressing of a button is accompanied by a loud beep, audible in the entire polling booth and even outside. No beep would mean non-voting and everyone would know. This not only violated the voter's secrecy but also made him vulnerable to reprisals."

He said the court order also upheld negative voting.

"A voter may refrain from voting for several reasons, including the reason that he does not consider any of the candidates worthy of his vote. One of the ways of such expression may be to abstain from voting by not turning up at all, which is not an ideal option for a conscientious and responsible citizen. Thus, the only way by which it may be made effectual is by providing a button in the EVMs to express that right. This is the basic requirement if the lasting values in a healthy democracy have to be sustained, which the Election Commission has not only recognised but also asserted."

MEMORIES OF THE EMERGENCY - L.K Advani

Today, India commands respect in the world, not only because it is perceived as an emerging economic power, but also because from among the developing countries, it is the only one that has been functioning as a vibrant and vigorous democracy.

Within the country, however, many are blissfully unaware that in June 1975 we came very close to a situation when the ruling party wanted to bury multi-party democracy and introduce a single party set up. In my blogs this month, therefore, I have been consciously trying to recall the happenings of the Emergency inflicted on the country on 26th June, 1975.

The country needs to be intensely alive to this phase of independent India’s history. Allowing this phase to be forgotten would be tantamount to doing a grave disservice to Democracy!

As I pointed out last week two events that took place on 12th June, 1975 led to the Emergency. And the Emergency brought to the surface the innate distrust some leaders of the ruling party have always had for democracy. Smt. Gandhi herself once said those days: “The nation is more important than democracy”.

The National Herald, the daily paper in Delhi started by Pandit Nehru, wrote an editorial then praising the one party system in African states like Tanzania as being no less virile than the multi-party system. The paper observed:

“The Westminster model need not be the best model, and some African states have demonstrated how the people’s voice will prevail whatever be the outward structure of democracy. By stressing the need for a strong Centre the PM has pointed out the strength of Indian democracy. A weak Centre threatens the country’s unity, integrity, and very survival of freedom. She has posed the most important question: If the country’s freedom does not survive, how can democracy survive?”

***

Numerous books have been written on the Emergency of 1975. Most of these have been written by Mrs. Gandhi’s critics. These days I am going through an interesting book written by an admirer of hers, Uma Vasudev, a well known journalist who shortly before the imposition of the Emergency had an appreciative book published about her with the title “Indira Gandhi – Revolution in Restraint.”

But the Emergency and all that happened during that period deeply disturbed her.

The upshot was yet another book about the same leader titled “Two faces of Indira Gandhi”.

The book opens with this passage :

“Sitting out in the political cold in the hills of Pachmarhi in June 1976, six hundred miles away from India’s capital, Pandit Dwarka Prasad Mishra, Indira Gandhi’s master tactician and confidant in her battle for intra-party supremacy in 1967-69, related an anecdote to an administrator friend calling on him: “There was a political prisoner I knew in the thirties who was so fond of his pet cat that he was allowed to keep it with him in his cell. One day his nerves cracked and he beat the cat blue. The cat sat cowering in a corner, not knowing where to turn, for the cell door was locked and it was trapped. Each time its one-time protector would come near, it would shrink against the wall and whimper. The jailor heard the cries and came running. As soon as the cell door flew open, the cat, instead of rushing out, leapt at her owner’s throat in such ferocious anger that he nearly died before they could release its grip. The moral of the story is,” said Mishra as his tiny eyes gleamed behind his glasses, “that if you want to hit the enemy, you must leave a way out for him. Otherwise his despair can make him a killer.”

The reference was Maoist but the application was nearer home. It was one year since Indira Gandhi had declared an internal emergency in India on 26 June 1975. The opposition elite was still in jail, including such big names as Jayaprakash Narayan, Morarji Desai, Atal Behari Vajpayee, Raj Narain, L.K. Advani, and Piloo Mody – together with men from her own Congress Party like Chandra Shekhar, Mohan Dharia, Krishan Kant, Ram Dhan, and P.N. Singh. Censorship of the media was still in force. Argument and dissent were mouthed in whispers, while rumour aggravated fear. The politician and the intellectual subsisted in uneasy confrontation, the area of direct knowledge became narrower and narrower, and truth seemed to have more than the seven colours of the rainbow.“

Continuing with this line of analysis, Uma Vasudev writes in the last chapter of her book captioned “Dark Side of the Moon” :

A determined old man walked into Bangalore’s jail one day in June 1976. He wanted to see Lal Krishan Advani, president of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh, who was incarcerated there with a hundred other detenues since the bleak dawn of the emergency. When Advani appeared before him, the man saw a tall, slim, distinguished-looking and fair Sindhi, with very regular features, a moustache, and a quiet manner which gave nothing away.
“Well ?” smiled Advani.
“I’m sixty-five,” the man burst out. “I can’t stand what she’s doing. I’ve done whatever I wanted to. I’ve nothing more to live for. Tell me what to do. I’m prepared to die. I can go and shoot her”.
“No,” said Advani.
But the average worker inside the jails was getting impatient. There was a growing feeling that the leadership within was becoming complacent and that there were no plans towards a new move.
“You seem to think there’s no need to do anything any more,” complained Advani’s companions in prison.
No authoritarian regime had been overthrown by violence, thought Advani. There was no alternative but to wait for the people to rise.
“There was so much anger against Indira Gandhi at the time. Do you think she might possibly have been assassinated then, or if she had managed to scrape back to power later ?” I asked.

“Considering the extent to which she had gone, she might have, perhaps – had this been another country. But not in India. India is too big and it’s not in the temper of the people; otherwise, it would have happened even earlier. Besides, the leadership of the political forces opposed to her is positively opposed to this kind of thing also. They disapprove of these measures. There is too strong a commitment to peace.” Said Advani.

Press censorship during the emergency was extremely strict. Criticism of the Government, the ruling establishment or even of the Emergency was not permitted.

I was therefore surprised to receive in Bangalore jail where I was kept for the greater part of those nineteen months a copy of the QUEST (a quarterly journal from Mumbai dated Nov.-Dec., 1975), which carried an article by Ashis Nandi which in substance said to the rulers that if you persist with your present course of action you would be inviting assassination. The article bore the tell-tale title “Invitation to a Beheading : A psychologist’s guide to assassinations in the third world.

An excerpt from this article read :

“The relationship between an assassin and his victim is deep and enduring. Death only openly and finally brings them together. Of course, there are tyrants who turn virtually everyone in a country into a prospective assassin and leaders who build bastions against their assassination in the minds of men, thereby reducing the circle of prospective assassins to the microscopic group of hired psycho-paths and the mentally ill.
Emperor Nero belonged to the first category and Martin Luther King to the second. There is also the special case of rulers who by the consent of the majority are tyrannical within the country and, to the extent they get the chance, in the world outside. Their pathology leads to collective suicides rather than individual assassinations. Adolf Hitler is the hackneyed but glaring example of the species. But such leaders are hardly typical. There is a much broader range of situations where the ruler is popular and charismatic but propelled by his inner drives, prepares the ground for his assassination. In such cases there is a close fit among the motivational imperatives of such a man, his attempts to remould the polity after his own psychological needs, and the type of invitation he extends to his potential assassins.
The first characteristic of such a ruler is an inability to trust deeply and wholly. Though his flamboyant style may hide it for a long time, he lives in an inner world peopled by untrustworthy men. Even when he trusts some, it is transient. A chain of lieutenants comes in and goes out of his favour in a fashion reminiscent of people getting in and out of a railway compartment.

The ruler suspends this suspiciousness only in the case of his family members, men recruited from outside politics to act as ‘commissars’, and politicians who have no independent bases and are fully dependent on him…”

***

When Uma Vasudev met me after my release and had a long discussion with me about the Emergency happenings, the National Herald’s advocacy of a one party setup like that of Tanzania, (a point that her book referred to above had also mentioned) came up in the discussion. Ms. Vasudev said to me: But is it not true that while this editorial was written on August 11, a fortnight later, on August 25 the same newspaper wrote:

“The PM has made it clear in recent days that there will be no attempt to establish a one party system in this country and that she is not thinking in terms of a constituent assembly or a new Constitution. As far as the party system is concerned, the one party system, however well it might answer needs theoretically, will not be forced; it can come about only in the course of natural evolution, and at present there is no such prospect.”

Uma Vasudev, after citing this statement of the Prime Minister, asked me: “What happened between August 11 and August 25 ?”

My immediate answer was : “Mujib’s assassination on August 15”, I added: “That gave her a shock; and made her realize that the kernel of Democracy must be maintained.”

L.K. Advani
New Delhi

19th June, 2010