Poverty of QUEEN of England and the RICH Indian INCs, Debate on TERROR in Indian Parliament, Cry for WAR Against Pakistan, Starving Enslaved Common Masses and ZIONIST Global ECONOMY and its Ruling GalaxY Hegemony.Obama to offer Israel 'nuclear umbrella' - Report.Pentagon Welcomes Pakistani Raids, Calls for Sustained Effort Against Terror Networks as Pakistan moves on Mumbai Accused

[PalashKL]

Poverty of QUEEN of England and the RICH Indian INCs, Debate on TERROR
in Indian Parliament, Cry for WAR Against Pakistan, Starving Enslaved
Common Masses and ZIONIST Global ECONOMY and its Ruling GalaxY
Hegemony.Obama to offer Israel 'nuclear umbrella' - Report.Pentagon
Welcomes Pakistani Raids, Calls for Sustained Effort Against Terror
Networks as Pakistan moves on Mumbai Accused

Troubled Galaxy Destroyed Dreams: Chapter 122

Palash Biswas

UN: nearly one billion starving
Almost one billion people worldwide are starving after rising food
prices pushed 40m more towards hunger and under-nourishment, the UN's
food agency reported yesterday.

The UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said that the food
crisis had left an estimated 963m people - around 14 per cent of the
world's population - unable to afford to eat enough calories to lead a
normal life.

The majority of the hungry come from the developing world, with 65 per
cent living in seven countries: India, China, the Democratic Republic
of Congo, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Pakistan and Ethiopia, the State of
Food Insecurity in the World 2008 report said.

The goal, set in 2000 by the Millennium Development Goals, of halving
the number of hungry people by 2015 has suffered a "serious setback",
said FAO director-general Jacques Diouf, who called on wealthy
countries to invest $30bn a year in agriculture.

"This sad reality should not be acceptable at the dawn of the 21st
century."


Food Crisis Leaves 40 Million More People Starving (Update1)
Email | Print | A A A

By Jason Gale

Dec. 9 (Bloomberg) -- Forty million people joined the ranks of the
world’s undernourished this year, and the global economic crisis may
add more even as food prices decline, a United Nations agency said.

The Food and Agriculture Organization estimates 963 million adults and
children are suffering from prolonged food deficiency, mostly caused
by higher prices for staples such as rice. Almost two-thirds of these
live in India, China, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Bangladesh,
Indonesia, Pakistan and Ethiopia, the Rome-based agency said in an e-
mailed statement today.

The situation may deteriorate further as the worst financial crisis
since the Great Depression reduces demand in developed countries for
exports from developing nations, and erodes investment and development
aid, the FAO said. It expects cereal output to expand by 1 percent or
less in developing countries this year, compared with at least 10
percent in developed nations.

“If lower prices and the credit crunch associated with the economic
crisis force farmers to plant less food, another round of dramatic
food prices could be unleashed next year,” said Hafez Ghanem, FAO’s
assistant director-general, in the statement. “Emerging economies in
particular are subject to lasting impacts from the credit crunch even
if the crisis itself is short-lived,” FAO said.

Prices of major cereal crops have declined by more than 50 percent
from the peaks reached earlier this year, Ghanem said. Even still,
FAO’s Food Price Index, which tracks global prices of six major
agricultural commodity groups, was 28 percent higher in October than
it was two years earlier, the agency said.

‘Distant Dream’

“World food prices have dropped since early 2008, but lower prices
have not ended the food crisis in many poor countries,” Ghanem said.
The finding is reported in FAO’s annual “State of Food Insecurity in
the World,” released today.

“For millions of people in developing countries, eating the minimum
amount of food every day to live an active and healthy life is a
distant dream,” Ghanem said. “The structural problems of hunger, like
the lack of access to land, credit and employment, combined with high
food prices remain a dire reality.”

In sub-Saharan Africa, one in three people -- or 236 million -- are
chronically hungry, the highest proportion of undernourished people
globally, according to the FAO report.

“The crisis has mainly affected the poorest, landless and households
run by women,” Ghanem said. “It will require an enormous and resolute
global effort and concrete actions to reduce the number of hungry by
500 million by 2015,” a target set under the UN’s Millenium
Development Goals.

Most of the increase in the number of starving people occurred in the
Democratic Republic of Congo “as a result of widespread and persistent
conflict,” FAO said. The proportion of undernourished people surged to
76 percent from 29 percent, according to FAO.

About 46 percent of Congolese are chronically malnourished because of
poverty and insufficient local food production, said Claude Kalinga, a
spokesman for the UN’s World Food Programme. Those most affected are
children aged 6 to 30 months, and pregnant and breast-feeding women,
he said.

“Food insecurity is exacerbated by wars, the population’s physical
insecurity and its being displaced,” Kalinga said in an e-mail today.
Eastern Congo has been wracked by a 14-year conflict that’s displaced
about 1.5 million of the country’s 62 million inhabitants, according
to the UN.

To contact the reporter on this story: Jason Gale in Singapore at
j.g...@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: December 9, 2008 20:13 EST
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601100&sid=aGgQrD5EwniQ&refer=germany

"Terrorism is like a tree. Terrorists are leaves on that tree…. As
many terrorists you kill, leaves will grow back. Organisations are
branches…If you cut a branch the tree will still remain". - President
Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan(in his first TV interview after the
Mumbai attack)

Poverty of Queen of england is EXPOSED in Global Melt Down and
RECESSION as Her Majesty is BOUND to control costs in house keeping in
her Royal Palace! As the Previleged Civil society of Shining
FREEsenSEX XXXXX India of Durable Commodities and Capital Goods,
Zionist Ruling Hegemony of Manusmriti and Apartheid we may feel
Resilient enough as INDIA INCs generate more Aggression in
ESCALATING the Killing Fields! debate on TERROR and Internal Security
engages Indian Parliament as the CREAMY LAYERS of Ruling Class and its
TOILET MEDIA creates BLIND NATIONALISM unprecedented to DECLARE WAR
against PAKISTAN! Enslaved Common Masses are PREDESTINED of STARVATION
as well as REPRESSION, Inherent Inequality as well as INJUSTICE. We
are SIEGED within a ZIONIST GLOBAL ECONOMY and its Ruling Galaxy
hegemony is quite DISSATISFIED with its current Licenece of MASS
DESTRUCTION. Just Invoke the NUCLEAR, CHEMICAL and BIOLOGICAL Gods and
Goddesse! But the Queen is also a FULL FLEDGED symbol of the DECLINE
of GODDESS POWER Infinite as well as IMPERIALISM! How do we DEFEAT
Fascism and ZIONIOSM, that`s the question!

According to the Global Hunger Report, India is ranked 96th out of the
119 countries surveyed (GHR does not include the North American,
Western European countries, and Australia, since it assumes that there
is no hunger in these countries, and evething is hunky dory!)... More
importantly, in terms of child malnutrition, India ranks 117/119 (we
beat Nepal and Bangladesh on this count)


In 50s and 60s, India did not produce enough grains to feed its
population, and we were dependent on foreign food aid (Lal Bahadur
Shastry, India’s 2nd Prime Minister, even made an appeal to people to
keep fast for one meal a week as a solution - and bizzaire though it
may appear to people now, but a large number of Indians actually
followed that appeal).


Pakistan has put an Islamic leader linked to the Mumbai (Bombay)
attacks under house arrest, reports say. The cleric, Hafiz Mohammed
Saeed, has been accused by India of heading the militant group Lashkar-
e-Taiba.

Pakistan's Interior Ministry on Thursday ordered detention of 8 Jamaat-
ud-Dawa leaders, including its chief Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, Dawn News
channel reported quoting police sources. The offices of Jamaat-ud-Dawa
linked to the Mumbai attacks were closed, a day after the outfit was
declared a terrorist group by the United Nations, an official said. It
was unclear whether the moves against nine Jamaat-ud-Dawa premises in
Karachi represented the beginning of a major crackdown on the group.
Its headquarters remained open Wednesday, as did other branches across
the country.

Pentagon Welcomes Pakistani Raids, Calls for Sustained Effort Against
Terror Networks!


The Zionist World Bank gangsters failed to RESIST the GLOBAL Meltdown
despite Indian Incs BOOM BOOM! But Chidambaram is promising change in
the scenerio of Internal security as the World POWER CENTRE Oval
OFFICE in the White House succeeded to plant him in the HOME MINISTERY
and the ENTRY of ANOTHER GENOCIDE MASTER MIND Montek Singh Ahloowalia
seems to be MANDATORY in Indian FINANCE MINISTERY to feed the Hungry
MONEY MACHINE, Weapon Industry,Chemical Monsters, NUCLEAR Maniacs,
Corporates, India INCs, Toilet MEDIA, MNCs, Builders, RETAIL Chain and
PROMOTERs. It took eight years of damage under Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld
and Rove to get a Barack Obama to the White House. It took the greed
of a few investment bankers to bring the world to its knees and force
a rethink of a global economic order. Will a convergence of oceans
rising, economic crisis and terrorism finally compel a unity beyond
platitude as the first condition for survival?

American Jews can add the "sin of market manipulation" to their
transgressions recalled on the Yom Kippur Day of Atonement, according
to allegations made by Hamas.we can now rightly pin the blame for the
current gobal economic crisis, as yet another chapter in the evil
dealings of the Zionists.This latest revelation has been exposed by
our Hamas brothers. Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhum has outlined yet
another plot by the Zionists to oppress Muslims, but this time by
economic means. This in turn looks like it could eventually upset the
Camel Urine market and put many of these warriors for Allah out of
work. We need to fight this oppression, that looks set to undermine
the Uhmma!

26/11 was a hostage mission for ransom: Ajmal confesses

Mumbai, Dec 11 (PTI) The militants involved in the November 26 Mumbai
attacks had a clear mission: to take hostages and contact media to
"make demands" after attacking the crowded Chhatrapati Shivaji
terminus, arrested terrorist Mohammed Ajmal Amir Iman has said.
"We were instructed to carry out firing during rush hours... Then we
were to take some people hostage... To contact media people and make
demands. This was the strategy decided upon by our trainers," Ajmal,
the only terrorist arrested alive after the November 26 terror
attacks, has said.

In a statement recorded by the police during interrogation, he said,
"We were shown a film on VT railway station. The film showed commuters
during rush hours." "Then we were to take some people hostage, take
them to the roof of some nearby building and contact Chacha (LeT
functionary Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi), who would have given us numbers to
contact media people and make demands," Ajmal said.

Ajmal and his accomplice Ismail Khan had formed a team code-named VTS
and were shown the location of the rail terminus on satellite maps on
the internet.

The operation to attack the city which was originally scheduled for
September 27 was cancelled for some reason and the group of ten stayed
in Karachi till November 23, he said.

On November 23 the group of ten left with Lakhvi and a trainer
identified only as Kahfa from Azizabad near Karachi where they took
two launches before they boarded the vessel 'Al-Hussaini' to sail into
Indian waters.

"While boarding the ship, each of us was given a sack containing eight
grenades, an AK-47 rifle, 200 cartridges, two magazines and a
cellphone," he said. PTI

Investigations into the Mumbai terror attack have pointed to the
possibility of involvement of the underworld don Dawood, police
revealed on Thursday. ZEE news reports.


India’s political class united in Parliament on Wednesday and
unanimously passed a resolution condemning the terrorist attack on
Mumbai.


"I apologise to the people of the country that this dastardly act
could not be prevented," said Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in the Lok
Sabha and promised that the country’s security apparatus would be
improved to prevent a repeat of what happened in Mumbai.


Singh alleged the "epicentre of terrorism" is located in Pakistan and
demanded that the terror infrastructure in that country must be
dismantled.


India has exercised "utmost restraint" but it should "not be
misconstrued as a sign of our weakness". India cannot be "satisfied
with mere assurances."


At the end of a daylong debate in the Lok Sabha, Singh read out a
resolution that was passed with unanimous acclamation by the entire
House.


The Pentagon has welcomed Pakistan's raid on alleged terrorist bases
in its northwestern region, but says counter-terrorism efforts need to
be made on a sustained basis. Press Secretary Geoff Morrell says
neither Pakistan nor India has asked the U.S. military for help in
responding to the Mumbai attacks. But at a news conference Tuesday he
welcomed Pakistan's raids in its tribal areas, which are reported to
have netted the alleged mastermind of the attacks.

"We see it as a positive step," he said. "I think what all the
problems we have emanating from Pakistan, terror-wise, is that this is
a problem that needs to be dealt with on a sustained basis, that it
can't be done in fits and starts, that there needs to be a constant
and vigilant effort to go after the terrorist networks that exist
there and throughout the region."

Morrell said the United States is prepared to help both Pakistan and
India deal with their terrorism problems, but he would not comment on
whether the United States has asked for any specific action, such as
access for its experts to the captured terror suspects.

President-elect Barack Obama has called the terrorist safe havens in
northwestern Pakistan the biggest threat to the security of
Americans.

During a speech at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York,
President Bush said Pakistan has some of the most dangerous
"ungoverned spaces" in the world. He said the United States wants to
help Pakistan and other countries get control of such areas.

"The Pakistani people and government understand the threat because
they have been victims of terror themselves," said Mr. Bush. "They are
working to enforce the law and fight terror in the border areas, and
our government is providing strong support for these efforts."

U.S. air strikes in Pakistan's tribal areas, which have resulted in a
number of civilian casualties, have been sharply criticized by
officials and the Pakistani public. But President Bush repeated that
while the United States wants to help partner nations deal with their
own terrorism problems, it will do whatever it must to protect its
troops just across the border in Afghanistan.

In a column in Tuesday's New York Times newspaper, Pakistan's
President Asif Ali Zardari said Pakistanis understand the threat of
terrorism because they have repeatedly been the victims of it. He says
terrorists have killed nearly 2,000 Pakistanis so far this year alone.
He said he is determined to fight terrorist groups in his country, but
he also warned Indian officials and ordinary citizens not to use the
Mumbai attacks to stir up anti-Pakistan feeling and to push for
military action. He said if that happens, the Mumbai terrorists will
have accomplished their mission.

On the other hand,the top U.S. military officer says he is concerned
that the global economic crisis could create instability and,
potentially, more terrorism around the world, particularly in African
countries and other relatively poor areas.

Admiral Mike Mullen says the global economic downturn could create
more terrorists.

"I'm very concerned about the global financial crisis and its impact
globally on security," he said. "I think it will impact on security,
over a period of time. As food prices continue to go up, as other
costs continue to go up, as this pressure is brought globally, I think
the possibilities for increased instability, as opposed to increased
stability, are there. Without being precise about where that might
happen, I just think the extent of this, or the length of this, is
going to have an impact on increased instability in countries that are
already under a great deal of pressure because their economies aren't
that healthy in the first place."

Admiral Mullen says jobs are the key link between the economy and
security.

"With a stable economy, jobs come," he said. "You are able to expand
and create the kind of positive cycle that gets you away from the
violence and other options for unemployed young men, in particular."

At a Pentagon news conference, the admiral also noted that terrorists
need places to train and take refuge, and he says economic troubles
can also result in more of those, as governments have fewer resources
to devote to securing their territory. He says the problem puts
"enormous" pressure on African countries in particular, where many
governments have very large areas to defend and terrorists have been
trying to gain a foothold.

"I am concerned about the potential for a safe haven in Somalia, as I
am in Yemen," Adm. Mullen said. "And I try to pay attention to the
evolution of potential safe havens, these two in particular, and
specifically to the one in Somalia. So I'm extremely concerned about
that."

Admiral Mullen, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, did not
suggest any U.S. military operations to eliminate or prevent the
creation of terrorist safe havens. The Pentagon has a variety of
programs designed to improve the defense capabilities of partner
nations in Africa and elsewhere, and the U.S. government also has aid
and development programs that may help ease the impact of job losses
caused by the economic downturn. But the admiral says the effort to
reduce global terrorism may get more difficult as job losses increase
and all countries tighten their defense budgets, including the United
States.

Meanwhile,U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates is in Afghanistan, where
he says the Pentagon aims to send at least two more combat brigades by
next summer 2009.Before arriving in Kandahar Thursday, Gates told
reporters on the plane that he expects the U.S. to remain involved in
what he called "this struggle" - a reference to the war in Afghanistan
--for quite a long time. But he said he wanted to make sure Afghan
forces are "out in front" in the battle against insurgents and the
Taliban.U.S. officials have said the U.S. could send as many as 20,000
troops to Afghanistan next year, to join the 32,000 it already has
there, along with nearly as many from other NATO countries.

In New Delhi,Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said on Thursday that
Pakistan was the "epicentre" of global terrorism and the world needed
to deal with it "sternly and effectively".Indian cabinet members,
speaking before parliament Thursday, said those who laid siege to
Mumbai certainly came from Pakistan, but they are ruling out military
retaliation. An opposition leader calls the challenge facing India "a
war-like situation."

Tough language regarding Pakistan was aired in India's parliament , in
a session devoted to the terror attack on Mumbai. In his first
official remarks to lawmakers, the country's new home minister,
Palaniappan Chidambaram, indicated that intelligence findings leave no
doubt as to where the attack originated.

"The finger of suspicion unmistakably points to the territory of our
neighbor, Pakistan," he said.
The interior minister announced that 20 new schools will be set up,
nationwide, to train commandos and other personnel in counter-
insurgency and anti-terror techniques. A special coastal
command will be established to try to prevent more militants from
again using the sea to enter India for terror strikes.

Chidambaram says the entire region is "in the eye of the storm of
terror."

His fellow cabinet member, External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee
told lawmakers - some of whom shouted for revenge against Pakistan -
that a retaliatory strike is not an option. But he insists Islamabad
completely dismantle the terrorist infrastructure on its soil.

"What we are most respectfully submitting, suggesting to the
government of Pakistan, please act," he said. "A mere expression of
intention is not adequate."

Opposition leader L.K. Advani, of the nationalist BJP party, accuses
Pakistan of sheltering organizations such as Lashkar-e-Taiba, known as
L-e-T, which is blamed for the 60-hour siege of Mumbai.

"If South Asia is today in the eye of the storm of terror, the
epicenter of this storm is Pakistan," said Advani.




A United Nations Security Council panel Wednesday has ruled that the
Jamaat-ud-Dawa charity is a front for L-e-T and designated four L-e-T
leaders as terrorists, including one who was among the suspects
arrested this week by Pakistani authorities.
Police in India say they have identified the nine suspected Islamic
militants killed during the three-day siege of Mumbai and uncovered
new details about them - including their hometowns in Pakistan. The
terrorist attack and the way it was carried out is being studied by
terrorism experts to learn what lessons can be drawn from the
assault. Experts in Washington warn future terrorists may use similar
tactics as the Mumbai attackers.
The small gang of terrorists that attacked Mumbai came armed not just
with guns and grenades, but also carrying cell phones, GPS and other
high tech gear.

And this level of sophistication is worrying to experts, who warn the
Mumbai attacks could be the start of a dangerous trend.

"The beach landing, the GPS, the use of Google, cell phone
communication, I think it is far more sophisticated than the 9/11
attackers which [who] were effectively using flight control software
and box cutters," said David Heyman, a Homeland security expert at the
Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

Experts say the international community must be aware that if
terrorists are using more sophisticated technology, they could someday
carry out attacks with radioactive material or biological weapons.

Nuclear non-proliferation expert Leonard Spector says the ruthlessness
shown by the terrorists in Mumbai raises concerns about Iran's nuclear
ambitions. He says if Iran develops nuclear weapons, there is a
danger that nuclear material might end up in the hands of terrorists.

"We may have a situation where the weapons exist but who controls them
day to day, who is responsible for each aspect of their manufacture,
for keeping the weapon grade nuclear material, for example, as the
weapons are made," he said. "All this is opaque to the outside world
and perhaps not so clear cut internally."

Being better prepared is part of the answer, say experts, who note
India has elaborate plans on paper to deal with nuclear or biological
attacks. But in the case of Mumbai, Indian security forces were
caught completely off guard, says Heyman.

"On the surface, there are a lot of good steps being taken there, but
what we saw was how spectacularly unprepared they were for these types
of attacks," he said. "They have fewer than a hundred boats to cover a
coast that of the size of our coast, the United States coast."

Yet experts say alert citizens can prevent terrorist attacks such as
the case in London in 2006, where a plot to use liquid explosives on
planes was foiled.

"An investigation was started a year prior to that because a citizen,
a neighbor of one of the participants in that plot told police that
some strange activity was going on there," said David Heyman.

Pakistan has arrested at least 20 people, including two militants
alleged by India to be key players in the Mumbai attacks, but India
has made it clear it wants to see more action.

New Delhi on Thursday announced a massive overhaul of its security and
intelligence agencies in the wake of the attacks, which provoked a
public outcry over the government's response.

Among the new measures, the government will seek to create an FBI-
style national investigative agency, beef up coastal security, better
train police, strengthen anti-terror laws and increase intelligence
sharing, said Home Minister P Chidambaram.

"Given the nature of the threat, we can't go back to business as
usual," Chidambaram told Parliament.

Under pressure from India and the United States, Security Council
panel on Wednesday declared Jamaat-ud-Dawa a terrorist group subject
to UN sanctions including an asset freeze, travel ban and arms
embargo.

US officials say the group, which has offices, schools and medical
clinics around the country, is a front for Lashkar-e-Toiba, a banned
militant group accused by India of carrying out and planning the
Mumbai attacks.

Sindh provincial home secretary Arif Ahmed Khan said nine Jemaat
offices in Karachi were ‘sealed’ on Wednesday, but gave no more
details.

Pledging support for a full-scale war against terror, Opposition BJP
on Thursday said the Government must stop ‘running’ to Washington
hoping that the US would come to its rescue in tackling Pakistan-
backed terrorism.

"Please stop running to mummy (US) hoping that somebody else will help
the country to tackle terrorism,” senior BJP leader Arun Shourie said
initiating a discussion in the Rajya Sabha on the recent terror
attacks in Mumbai. He said the government keeps pinning its hopes on
US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice coming to India to resolve the
country's problems with regard to terrorism.

Asking the government to stop the peace process with Pakistan, he
said, "your intelligence record shows that ISI is now knitting
together Indian insurgent groups".

Observing that China was propping up Pakistan, Shourie said Islamabad
was supporting terrorism and at the same time putting the onus of the
peace process on New Delhi.

Advising the government to come out of the ‘self-denial’ mode, he said
four days before the Mumbai terror strikes, former Home Minister
Shivraj Patil was taking consolation in the figures showing comparison
of terrorist attacks during the NDA and the UPA governments.

The starving of India’s farmer
Yoginder K. Alagh
Posted: Nov 30, 2005 at 0000 hrs IST
When one set of instruments fails, to some the answer is to have more
of the same—only larger, bigger and deadlier. I always dread those
whose answer to each failure is to set up newer and bigger
institutions. Nothing is ever given up; the old ones drag along,
crippled. Once the spit and polish wears off, the new ones face the
old problems and we are all back to square one. Delhi’s propensity to
make cooperatives, CBOs, autonomous agencies, public-private
partnerships and so on, must go.
The mess in agriculture is by now well known, since the best critiques
have been incorporated by the government itself. But very few real
solutions are forthcoming. Profitability rates in Indian agriculture
have fallen and in a market driven agriculture, this drives investment
to other sectors and seeds, agro-chemical and credit inputs do badly.
The argument is that the small Indian farmer is inefficient. Those who
don’t understand the problem will never solve it.

In a set of painstaking studies of virtually all the farm management
data available—and while it needs improvement, it is one of the
richest data sets available of its kind anywhere in the world—
economist Abhijit Sen, presently looking after agriculture in the
Planning Commission, has shown that the factor productivity of Indian
farming has, in fact, improved in the ’90s. In plain words, this means
that per rupee of labour, capital or input use, the small Indian
farmer is getting more output than earlier. It is true Sen shows that
the earlier pattern of small farmers being more efficient is changing
and size class does not seem to matter, but he reminds us that most
farmers are, in fact, small and getting smaller.

Aha, you can ask me, if the grain of truth is that efficiency has
improved, what is your problem? It is in the fact that growth of
inputs has gone down from the ’80s. You may be more efficient but if
you are starved of inputs, you stay at low income levels. Decline in
the annual growth rate of fertiliser use was from 7.8 per cent
annually during the 1980s to 4.3 per cent during the 1990s, due to
increasing fertiliser prices. Very large imports in cash crops like
cotton and oils meant that cash crop prices did not rise
correspondingly. The situation in the early parts of this decade was
worse, though it improved marginally in the last two years. Irrigation
growth is almost half of what it was earlier. No wonder, when the
economy is booming, agriculture, where efficiency is improving, is not
doing well.

Paradoxically, some of the input supplying industries are doing well.
A few years ago, a New Pricing System was introduced for fertilisers.
It was not really new, since its outlines were given by some of us in
the mid-’80s and it was again recommended by all the expert groups who
went into it, but with firm level price fixing given up, the
incentives to improve efficiency spurred cost and energy reduction and
by now our average costs are much below import prices and a large part
of our industry is better than Chinese or American efficiency levels.
The industry is ready to fly, like a lot of India. There are two
jokers in the pack. Energy prices are going out of the window and we
have a very macho interventionist energy pricing policy. Second, at
this stage it would be chimerical to raise fertiliser prices and stab
ourselves in the back. But it is not beyond our ingenuity to keep on
the reform track, to push the remaining laggards in productivity to
improve or quit, to expand efficient capacities, design incentives for
industry to develop and push new products, including the
environmentally savvy ones to the farmer and prepare for the final
decontrol.

In seeds, we really have to get back to the drawing board. This column
has been citing the examples of hybrid paddy and Bt cotton to argue
that the legal systems which were created to determine foolproof
safety controls on genetically engineered seeds were used to look into
productivity, cost or other commercial aspects which they were not
meant to do. The economic tests were supposed to be met by the market.
Also, there was no thinking on the relationship between the user
groups, co-ops, farmer groups, small technology companies in which
India has strength and the multi-nationals.

The kind of coordination mechanisms which were developed earlier and
lead to the spread of the HYV technologies have been weakened and no
new successful working models put in place. Newer systems run into
problems. But if at high levels of policy-making, solution systems do
not exist, the experiments fail. Sanat Mehta was quoted in this paper
last week with a wake-up call, showing that in the case of Gujarat
cotton quality and productivity has crossed global levels, but lakhs
of farmers are still persecuted. It is easy to break past systems. It
is difficult to build new ones. The sooner we do it, the better off we
will be.
http://www.indianexpress.com/oldstory.php?storyid=82929



Killers will pay for slaying innocent Indians: Rahul

Declaring that the Mumbai terror strikes were a "war on India",
Congress MP Rahul Gandhi said on Thursday that the message should go
to the perpetrators that there is a "cost" to killing innocent
Indians.
"It is not enough for us to protect the people ... we should go one
step beyond. People who have done this should understand very
clearly ... not only do we hold lives of our people highly, but there
is also a cost to killing innocent Indians," Gandhi said.

Participating in the discussion on the Mumbai terror strikes in the
Lok Sabha, he said that India will not stand around and tolerate
people coming into her cities and killing ordinary Indians.

When the terrorists attacked Mumbai, they did not attack the young or
the old, Hindus or Muslims, upper or lower castes but Indians, he
said. "If our enemies view us as one, we have to act as one."

Gandhi said a "national priority and a national response" was needed
to deal effectively with the "war" being waged against the country.

"We will fight this war against terror and win this war," he said
lauding the unity shown by Parliament in response to the Mumbai
attacks.

Gandhi's sister Priyanka Vadra watched the speech from the Speaker's
Gallery, while his mother and Congress President Sonia Gandhi was
present in the House.

India Releases Names of Suspected Gunmen in Mumbai Attacks
Indian police have released the names of nine suspected gunmen killed
during last month's three-day terrorist siege in Mumbai.

Police investigator Rakesh Maria told reporters Tuesday that
authorities have uncovered new details about the suspects and traced
their hometowns to Pakistan. Maria also released the gunmens' aliases
and showed photographs of eight of the suspected attackers.
Authorities say they withheld a photo of the ninth suspect because his
body was too badly burned.

It was not immediately clear how police tracked down the suspects'
hometowns, but Indian authorities have been interrogating the lone
surviving gunman in the attack.

Nobel Winner Urges Obama to Push for Mideast Settlement

Nobel Peace Prize laureate Martti Ahtisaari is urging U.S. President-
elect Barack Obama to focus on solving the Middle East conflict in the
first year of his presidency.

The former Finnish president and veteran diplomat spoke Wednesday in
Oslo, Norway as he received the 2008 prize for decades of global peace-
making efforts.

In his acceptance speech, Mr. Ahtisaari said U.S. partners in the so-
called quartet - the European Union, Russia and the United Nations -
must also remain committed to a peace deal that encompasses the larger
region as well. He said the credibility of the international community
is at stake.

Laureates of the 2008 prizes in literature, economics, medicine,
physics and chemistry also received their awards in the Swedish
capital, Stockholm Wednesday.

French scientists Luc Montagnier and Francoise Barre-Sinoussi were
honored for AIDS research, along with German researcher Harald zur
Hausen, who discovered the virus that causes cervical cancer.

The literature prize went to French author Jean-Marie Le Clezio, while
Princeton University professor and newspaper columnist Paul Krugman
won for economics. Japanese-American physics laureate Yoichiro Nambu,
87, and his two Japanese co-laureates, Makoto Kobayashi and Toshihide
Maskawa, were honored for their research on the nature of sub-atomic
particles.

The chemistry prize went to U.S. researchers Martin Chalfie, Roger
Tsien, and Japanese colleague Osamu Shimomura for work on fluorescent
proteins.

Recipients get a diploma, a medal, and a $1.2 million cash prize. The
awards are traditionally given out on December 10, the anniversary of
the death of Alfred Nobel, the industrialist and inventor of dynamite,
who created the prize endowments.

UN Urges Israel to Ease Palestinians' Plight
The United Nations Human Rights Council is urging Israel to take steps
to ease the plight of Palestinians.

The council approved a report on Tuesday, calling on Israel to improve
the conditions of Palestinian prisoners and lift the blockade on the
Gaza Strip, among other measures.

A U.N. official for human rights in the Palestinian territories,
Richard Falk, issued a stronger rebuke in a statement, saying the
International Criminal Court should investigate the situation in Gaza,
likening Israeli policies to a "crime against humanity."

Israel reopened its border crossings with Gaza on Tuesday, to allow
trucks transporting humanitarian aid into the territory.

The Israeli military said it allowed in some 40 trucks carrying food,
medical supplies and cooking gas as well as fuel for Gaza's power
plant.

Israel had tightened its blockade of the territory since a series of
cross-border rocket attacks last month.

Also on Tuesday, Israel allowed a small boat carrying pro-Palestinian
activists to sail to Gaza from Cyprus. The group brought in
humanitarian supplies and also transported a Palestinian man who has
been separated from his family in Gaza for several years.

Israel and Egypt closed their borders with Gaza for most traffic after
the Hamas militant group took control of the territory last year.

In other news, a United Nations spokeswoman, Michele Montas, on
Tuesday announced that the "quartet" of Middle East peace negotiators
and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will meet at the U.N. in New
York on December 15.

The quartet is made up of the European Union, Russia, the U.N. and the
United States. The group has strongly backed peace talks that were
launched in Annapolis, Maryland last year, even though few expect an
agreement by the end of this year, as originally planned.


India Inc beats slowdown blues, fires on all cylinders
11 Dec 2008, 0700 hrs IST, Krishna Gopalan & Kausik Datta, ET Bureau

MUMBAI: The big guns of India Inc have taken the slowdown in their
stride, and are going ahead with their expansion plans. A number of
large Formula for successful biz India Inc on crossroads industrial
houses ET spoke to said there is no question of going slow on projects
which are in advanced stages of completion. Only those that are on the
drawing board may be reviewed. They said more than availability of
funds, falling demand is the key concern.

Big groups, continue to pour money into their flagship projects.
Consider the case of Tata Steel, which is looking to make investments
in both existing projects as well as greenfield ones. The company’s
plant at Jamshedpur is in the midst of an expansion, which will see
its capacity going up from the current 3 million tonnes (MT) to 10 MT
by 2010.

The company’s total investment will be Rs 27,000 crore, with
Jamshedpur alone accounting for Rs 12,000 crore. The rest — Rs 15,000
crore — will go into setting up a 3 MT plant at Kalinganagar in
Orissa. “There are some projects that are high revenue generating for
us, like Jamshedpur and Orissa. These are on the fast track,” Tata
Steel’s managing director B Muthuraman told ET recently.

The story is not too different for Tata Motors, which is going ahead
with its investment plans for the famous small car project. The work
on the plant at Sanand, Gujarat, is progressing steadily. The auto
maker is also going ahead with its
Rs 6,000-crore investment plan for existing plants.

A proposal for setting up vehicle-testing facilities is also on
track.

The situation is pretty much the same for the diversified Aditya Birla
Group. DD Rathi, chief financial officer and whole-time director of
Grasim Industries, the group’s cement company, said they would go
ahead with those projects that have already been initiated. “At the
same time, we are doing a reality check on the upcoming expansion
plans,” he said.

“We have no dearth of finance to execute new projects. We just want to
be doubly sure that the timing of a new project is right, since a lot
has changed globally over the past three months,” Mr Rathi said.
Grasim has added 2 MT capacity last year and another 15 MT this year.
Once the projects are completed, Grasim’s total capacity will go up to
50 MT.

The Sajjan Jindal-owned JSW Group is also going ahead with those
projects that have reached financial closure. Its power projects in
Karnataka, Maharashtra and Rajasthan, which will have a total
installed capacity of 2880 MW, are well on track. The company has
lined up an investment of Rs 11,500 crore for these projects.
There is no change in our schedule, as these projects are at an
advanced stage,” said Seshagiri Rao, the group’s director (finance).
The group’s steel business is also in an expansion mode, with total
capacity set to rise to 10 MT from the current 4 MT. Mr Rao, who
admitted that the outlook for the steel industry is looking bearish
today, remained optimistic about meeting the deadline.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/News_By_Company/India_Inc_beats_slowdown_blues_fires_on_all_cylinders/articleshow/3821037.cms

Mukesh Ambani named among world's top chemical kings!

Billionaire businessman Mukesh Ambani, who heads the country's most
valued corporate group, has been ranked sixth among the world's 40
RIL's first crude from KG basin World's largest refining companies
most powerful faces in the chemical industry.

In a list compiled by international chemical business information
provider ICIS, Ambani has moved up four positions in this year's list,
topped by German chemical major BASF Chairman and CEO Jurgen
Hambrecht.

Ambani is the only Indian on the ICIS Top 40 Power Players list for
2008, where he follows Dow Chemical's Andrew Liveris (second), Saudi
Arabian firm Sabic's CEO Mohamed Al-Mady (third), Kuwait's
Petrochemical Industries Co's CMD Maha Mulla Hussain (fourth) and
China's Sinopec Chairman Su Shulin (fifth).

According to the report in the weekly magazine ICIS Chemical Business,
under Ambani's leadership, "Reliance Industries continues to dominate
the Indian petrochemical scene and to push forward with
diversification and globalisation plans".

In the report, ICIS stated that these people have changed the face of
global chemical industry through mergers and acquisitions, policy
leadership, innovation or financial performance.

Although Reliance Petroleum's new world scale refinery- cum-
polypropylene (PPP) complex at Jamnagar progressed ahead of schedule,
the start-up has been delayed due to the slump in the markets, it
added.

British journalist on mission to redistribute India's wealth
New Delhi (IANS): Award-winning British journalist and author Alan
Hart is on a mission to find 12 international experts, mainly
economists, to thrash out a policy for equitable redistribution of
wealth in India.

"I will fund the experts' trip to India. They will have to debate the
state of the country's economy and present a paper on how to
redistribute wealth in this country. We will network with private
groups across India so that the paper is not thrown into the dustbin
by the government. India is going to be an economic model for the rest
of the world to follow," Hart told IANS.

The 65-year-old former Independent Television Network (ITN) reporter
believes that "India will be torn apart by rage" if steps are not
taken quickly to redistribute wealth. He also fears that India's pro-
US stand may harm the country.

"Look at the map of the world, India is surrounded by Muslim nations.
It makes no sense for India to proceed this way as a puppet of the US,
which is in alliance with Israel. The country is battling an economic
crisis along with the rest of the world, which could lead to World War
III.

"It needs to deflect the situation. India has a potentially huge
middle class but more than 750 million people still live below the
poverty line. It still accounts for 40 percent of the world's poor,"
the former BBC presenter said.

Hart, who was close to Mother Teresa and also made a film on the
Missionaries of Charity for his independent production company World
Focus, identifies easily with poverty.

"I was born in an impoverished family in World War II Britain. My
father juggled three jobs at a time, but I went to the best grammar
school in Britain," he said.

World Focus is also credited with making a full-length two-hour
documentary movie on global poverty - "Five Minutes to Midnight".

"The leaders of the Western world have to tell their people that we
cannot go on living beyond our means. The days of good old materialism
are over and people have to take smaller slices of the global cake.
Though capitalism is the only way to create wealth, it has been badly
managed," Hart said.

Hart, who has been reporting on the Middle East for nearly 40 years,
has just released his new book "Zionism: The Real Enemy of the Jews".
It is a two-part volume on why the modern state of Israel, the child
of political Zionism, has become its "own worst enemy and a threat to
peace in the region".

The book also explores why the whole of Arab and the wider Muslim
world is in an explosion of frustration, "waiting for its time to
happen". Hart says his empathy lies with both sides - the Jews and the
Muslims alike.

"I am waiting to see if US President-elect Barack Obama has a magic
wand to change America's foreign policy in the Middle-East and change
the world in the process - bring back Israel to its 1967 order with
Jerusalem as the capital of the two nations with an open border," he
said.

Hart began his journalistic career at the age of 17, when he reported
on the uprising of Blacks against White settlers in Malawi.

"I studied at the university of life when I landed in the darkest part
of central Africa - Malawi - at the age of 17 to become a journalist,"
he recounted.

Since then, he has seen many wars. In Nigeria, where he flew in with
Irish Catholic priests to cover the Nigeria-Biafra war in 1967, Hart
found an "entire village of malnourished children with ginger hair,
swollen bellies and wizened faces as if they were 100 years old".




"I was moved to tears and ITN had the courage to keep its camera
rolling," he recalled.

Covering the Vietnam War was the turning point in Hart's life, when he
started questioning whether the US was justified in spending $6
million per minute in a conflict that it could not win.

Hart plans to soon pen his memoirs, which will be published by Delhi-
based Contemporary India Publishers. But for the moment, finding the
right wealth managers for India is on top of his agenda.


US arms sales fuel conflict around the world: Study

Washington The US arms trade is booming, sales reached USD 32 billion
in 2007, and more than half of the purchasers in the developing world
are either undemocratic governments or regimes that engaged in human
rights abuses, a private think tank reported.
Timed to the 60th anniversary of the UN's Universal Declaration of
Human Rights, the report by the New America Foundation, a nonpartisan
policy institute, named 13 of the top 25 arms purchasers in the
developing world as either undemocratic or engaged in major human
rights abuses.

The 13 listed in the report were Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, United
Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Egypt, Colombia, Jordan, Bahrain, Oman,
Morocco, Yemen and Tunisia.

Sales to these countries totaled more than USD 16.2 billion over 2006
and 2007.

The total ‘contrasts sharply with the Bush administration's pro-
democracy rhetoric,’ the report said.

Also, the report said that 20 of the 27 nations engaged in major armed
conflicts were receiving weapons and training from the United States.

"US arms transfers are undermining human rights, weakening democracy
and fueling conflict around the world," the report said.

William D Hartung, the lead author of the report, said, "The United
States cannot demand respect for human rights and arm human rights
abusers at the same time."

US arms sales grew to USD 32 billion in 2007, more than three times
the level when President George W Bush took office in 2001, the report
said.


New Delhi: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Thursday apologised to the
country for the government's inability to prevent the Mumbai attacks
and
vowed to gear up the security apparatus to prevent recurrence of such
incidents besides building pressure on Pakistan to end the scourge.

Making an intervention during the debate on the Mumbai attacks in Lok
Sabha, Singh noted the action by Pakistan against Lashkar-e-Taiba
chief Hafiz Mohd Saeed but asserted that Islamabad needed to do "much
more" to take things to logical conclusion and convince the world
about its actions.

Outlining steps to gear up the country's security system to meet the
"unprecedented threat", he said the government has decided to set up a
National Investigation Agency, decentralise NSG, form more commando
units, strengthen coastal security by making the Coast Guard the sole
force responsible for it and step up air surveillance.

"I apologise to the people of the country that this dastardly act
could not be prevented," he said referring to the Mumbai strikes and
acknowledged that acts of terrorism have witnessed an increase
resulting in death of hundreds of citizens.

Observing that the "epicentre of terrorism" is located in Pakistan, he
underlined that the terror infrastructure in the neighbouring country
must be dismantled and India cannot be "satisfied with mere
assurances."

Singh said India has so far exercised "utmost restraint" but it should
"not be misconstrued as a sign of our weakness".



Meanwhile, Equities continued to remain choppy with a negative bias on
Thursday even after inflation dipped to 8 per cent from its 8.4 per
cent previous session. Buying was seen in metals, realty and banking
stocks while IT stocks continued to decline.

In WASHINGTON: The House of Representatives approved bailout
legislation on Wednesday that would force U.S. automakers to
restructure or fail, sending the measure to the Senate where
prospects for passage appeared grim.

JERUSALEM: US President-elect Barack Obama plans to offer Israel a
strategic pact designed to fend off any nuclear attack on the Jewish
state by
Iran, an Israeli newspaper reported on Thursday.

Haaretz, quoting an unnamed US source close to Obama for its
information, said Obama's administration would pledge under the
proposed "nuclear umbrella" to respond to any Iranian nuclear strike
against Israel with a US retaliation in kind.

No immediate comment on the Haaretz report was available from Israeli
officials or the US embassy in Tel Aviv.

Iran denies its nuclear programme has military designs. But virulent
anti-Israel rhetoric from Tehran has spread fears that the Israelis,
who are believed to have the Middle East's only atomic arsenal, could
attack their arch-foe pre-emptively.

FRANKFURT: The European Central Bank's chief economist downplayed the
likelihood of an interest rate cut in January, saying that after
three straight reductions, the ECB's room for manoeuvre is now very
limited.

MANILA, PHILIPPINES: Asia's emerging economies will slow next year as
the global financial crisis saps export demand and capital flows, the
Asian Development Bank said on Thursday.

Swift, decisive action by policy makers will help stem the impact of
the crisis, the Manila-based bank said.

TOKYO: The global financial crisis may have ravaged banks in the West,
but look East for a different story.


In Asia, banks are bruised but not collapsing. Governments haven't had
to resort to massive bailouts. And some are even expanding while their
Western counterparts fold, another sign that the world's economic
center of gravity may be shifting east.

Their resiliency, however, and the region's ambitions to become the
world's next financial leader face major tests ahead. Volatile equity
markets are eroding bank assets, the global slump is battering Asia's
export-driven economy, and a jump in bad loans from failing firms
looks inevitable.

For now, Asia is keeping banks in business by embracing less risk and
drawing on experience fighting its own financial problems of the past,
including the region's 1997-98 crisis. Public finances, external
balances and corporate balance sheets are on sounder footing due to
smarter macroeconomic policies, tighter bank supervision and better
risk management systems.

None of the major banks in the region is expected to need big bailouts
such as the ones Citigroup Inc. and insurance giant American
International Group have received from the U.S. government, analysts
say.

At HOME:Confirming the fears, Reserve Bank of India Governor Subbarao
Thursday said, the near-term outlook for the Indian economy remains
uncertain. There are indications that FY09 growth projections will be
cut and FY10 will be a “more difficult year”. There will be “painful
adjustments” despite it taking steps, RBI said.

Some economists have since lowered their forecast to below 7 per cent
the IMF forecasts a 6.3 per cent GDP growth in 2009 for India. And the
effects of this are starting to show, with job cuts being announced by
the aviation and IT industry. This has led to fears about job safety
among other industries.

Meanwhile,sending a strong message across the border, External Affairs
Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Thursday said if Pakistan did not "act"
in the wake of the Mumbai terror strikes, then there could be a
situation that India "doesn't want."

"I expect them to act. Otherwise it will not be business as usual.
There would be situation that we do not want," Mukherjee said
intervening in the debate on Mumbai terror attacks in Rajya Sabha. At
the same breath, Mukherjee also made it clear that the government was
not suggesting an "eye for an eye" approach in the wake of the terror
attacks.

India wants Pakistan to hand over 40 people it believes are behind
militant attacks and other crimes, India's foreign minister said on
Thursday, but ruled out military action against its neighbour as a
solution.

"We have given them lists of 40 persons not one, not 20 - lists of 40
persons and we have also pointed out that their denial is not going to
resolve the issue," Pranab Mukherjee told Indian parliament during a
debate on the Mumbai attacks.

Indian officials had previously demanded that Pakistan hand over 20
suspected militants, some of them linked to last month's Mumbai attack
in which 179 people were killed by gunmen that New Delhi believes were
from Pakistan.


"I have been listening to views to be too strong in our formulation
and in our approaches. Eye for eye is something which I do not
subscribe to. That way, everyone could have become blind,"
Mukherjeesaid invoking the saying of Mahatma Gandhi.

"I have never accused the Pakistan government of being responsible.
Very carefully I used the word 'elements' in Pakistan," he added.

"I have told the Pakistani government to act, it would help them and
would also help us," he said.

Mukherjee said that mustering international support in the wake of the
Mumbai attacks do not amount to inviting intervention in the Kashmir
issue.

"There is no scope for a third party intervention in Kashmir," he
said.

Asked by an angry lawmaker why India was not attacking Pakistan after
so much proof of its complicity in fomenting trouble in India,
Mukherjee replied: "That is no solution."

Islamabad either denies the presence of the suspects demanded by New
Delhi or says India has not presented enough evidence to warrant their
extradition. The list includes the founders of at least two Kashmiri
militant groups fighting Indian rule in the disputed Himalayan region
who New Delhi says have broadened their activity to attack other
Indian cities as well.

"You may deny but how are you going to convince your own people when
these faces appear in the TV screen," Mukherjee said, urging Pakistan
to do more to stop attacks from its soil. Global pressure has seen
Pakistan raid several Islamist militant training camps and detain or
arrest some of the militant leaders India wants extradited.

But India is not satisfied. "Please follow it up seriously," Mukherjee
said, recalling similar measures by its neighbours when militants
attacked the Indian parliament in 2001.

"Therefore if it is not followed to the logical conclusion - complete
dismantling of the infrastructure facilities available from that side
to facilitate terrorist attack, of banning the organisations - how
does that help us?"

Why Green Revolution

The world's worst recorded food disaster happened in 1943 in British-
ruled India. Known as the Bengal Famine, an estimated four million
people died of hunger that year alone in eastern India (that included
today's Bangladesh). The initial theory put forward to 'explain' that
catastrophe was that there as an acute shortfall in food production in
the area. However, Indian economist Amartya Sen (recipient of the
Nobel Prize for Economics, 1998) has established that while food
shortage was a contributor to the problem, a more potent factor was
the result of hysteria related to World War II which made food supply
a low priority for the British rulers. The hysteria was further
exploited by Indian traders who hoarded food in order to sell at
higher prices.

Nevertheless, when the British left India four years later in 1947,
India continued to be haunted by memories of the Bengal Famine. It was
therefore natural that food security was a paramount item on free
India's agenda. This awareness led, on one hand, to the Green
Revolution in India and, on the other, legislative measures to ensure
that businessmen would never again be able to hoard food for reasons
of profit.


However, the term "Green Revolution" is applied to the period from
1967 to 1978. Between 1947 and 1967, efforts at achieving food self-
sufficiency were not entirely successful. Efforts until 1967 largely
concentrated on expanding the farming areas. But starvation deaths
were still being reported in the newspapers. In a perfect case of
Malthusian economics, population was growing at a much faster rate
than food production. This called for drastic action to increase
yield. The action came in the form of the Green Revolution.


The term "Green Revolution" is a general one that is applied to
successful agricultural experiments in many Third World countries. It
is NOT specific to India. But it was most successful in India.

What was the Green Revolution in India?

There were three basic elements in the method of the Green
Revolution:

(1) Continued expansion of farming areas;

(2) Double-cropping existing farmland;

(3) Using seeds with improved genetics.

Continued expansion of farming areas

As mentioned above, the area of land under cultivation was being
increased right from 1947. But this was not enough in meeting with
rising demand. Other methods were required. Yet, the expansion of
cultivable land also had to continue. So, the Green Revolution
continued with this quantitative expansion of farmlands. However, this
is NOT the most striking feature of the Revolution.

Double-cropping existing farmland

Double-cropping was a primary feature of the Green Revolution. Instead
of one crop season per year, the decision was made to have two crop
seasons per year. The one-season-per-year practice was based on the
fact that there is only natural monsoon per year. This was correct.
So, there had to be two "monsoons" per year. One would be the natural
monsoon and the other an artificial 'monsoon.'

The artificial monsoon came in the form of huge irrigation facilities.
Dams were built to arrest large volumes of natural monsoon water which
were earlier being wasted. Simple irrigation techniques were also
adopted.

Using seeds with superior genetics

This was the scientific aspect of the Green Revolution. The Indian
Council for Agricultural Research (which was established by the
British in 1929 but was not known to have done any significant
research) was re-organized in 1965 and then again in 1973. It
developed new strains of high yield value (HYV) seeds, mainly wheat
and rice but also millet and corn. The most noteworthy HYV seed was
the K68 variety for wheat. The credit for developing this strain goes
to Dr. M.P. Singh who is also regarded as the hero of India's Green
revolution.

Statistical Results of the Green Revolution

(1) The Green Revolution resulted in a record grain output of 131
million tons in 1978-79. This established India as one of the world's
biggest agricultural producers. No other country in the world which
attempted the Green Revolution recorded such level of success. India
also became an exporter of food grains around that time.

(2) Yield per unit of farmland improved by more than 30 per cent
between 1947 (when India gained political independence) and 1979 when
the Green Revolution was considered to have delivered its goods.

(3) The crop area under HYV varieties grew from seven per cent to 22
per cent of the total cultivated area during the 10 years of the Green
Revolution. More than 70 per cent of the wheat crop area, 35 per cent
of the rice crop area and 20 per cent of the millet and corn crop
area, used the HYV seeds.

Economic results of the Green Revolution

(1) Crop areas under high-yield varieties needed more water, more
fertilizer, more pesticides, fungicides and certain other chemicals.
This spurred the growth of the local manufacturing sector. Such
industrial growth created new jobs and contributed to the country's
GDP.

(2) The increase in irrigation created need for new dams to harness
monsoon water. The water stored was used to create hydro-electric
power. This in turn boosted industrial growth, created jobs and
improved the quality of life of the people in villages.

(3) India paid back all loans it had taken from the World Bank and its
affiliates for the purpose of the Green Revolution. This improved
India's creditworthiness in the eyes of the lending agencies.

(4) Some developed countries, especially Canada, which were facing a
shortage in agricultural labour, were so impressed by the results of
India's Green Revolution that they asked the Indian government to
supply them with farmers experienced in the methods of the Green
Revolution. Many farmers from Punjab and Haryana states in northern
India were thus sent to Canada where they settled (That's why Canada
today has many Punjabi-speaking citizens of Indian origin). These
people remitted part of their incomes to their relatives in India.
This not only helped the relatives but also added, albeit modestly, to
India's foreign exchange earnings.


Sociological results of the Green Revolution

The Green Revolution created plenty of jobs not only for agricultural
workers but also industrial workers by the creation of lateral
facilities such as factories and hydro-electric power stations as
explained above.

Political results of the Green Revolution

(1) India transformed itself from a starving nation to an exporter of
food. This earned admiration for India in the comity of nations,
especially in the Third World.

(2) The Green Revolution was one factor that made Mrs. Indira Gandhi
(1917-84) and her party, the Indian National Congress, a very powerful
political force in India (it would however be wrong to say that it was
the only reason).



Limitations of the Green Revolution

(1) Even today, India's agricultural output sometimes falls short of
demand. The Green Revolution, howsoever impressive, has thus NOT
succeeded in making India totally and permanently self-sufficient in
food. In 1979 and 1987, India faced severe drought conditions due to
poor monsoon; this raised questions about the whether the Green
Revolution was really a long-term achievement. In 1998, India had to
import onions. Last year, India imported sugar.
However, in today's globalised economic scenario, 100 per cent self-
sufficiency is not considered as vital a target as it was when the
world political climate was more dangerous due to the Cold War.

(2) India has failed to extend the concept of high-yield value seeds
to all crops or all regions. In terms of crops, it remain largely
confined to foodgrains only, not to all kinds of agricultural produce.
In regional terms, only Punjab and Haryana states showed the best
results of the Green Revolution. The eastern plains of the River
Ganges in West Bengal state also showed reasonably good results. But
results were less impressive in other parts of India.

(3) Nothing like the Bengal Famine can happen in India again. But it
is disturbing to note that even today, there are places like Kalahandi
(in India's eastern state of Orissa) where famine-like conditions have
been existing for many years and where some starvation deaths have
also been reported. Of course, this is due to reasons other than
availability of food in India, but the very fact that some people are
still starving in India (whatever the reason may be), brings into
question whether the Green Revolution has failed in its overall social
objectives though it has been a resounding success in terms of
agricultural production.

(4) The Green Revolution cannot therefore be considered to be a 100
percent success.

Bush Says Starving India Eats
Too Much

By Kavita Krishnan

09 May, 2008
Countercurrents.org

Karl Marx, born on 5 May, 1818, nearly two centuries ago, had in 1867
laid bare the "intimate connection between the pangs of hunger of the
most industrious layers of the working-class, and the extravagant
consumption, coarse or refined, of the rich, for which capitalist
accumulation is the basis" (Capital Vol I, Ch 25). In May 2008, nearly
a century and a half later, as we hear Emperor Bush hold forth on
global hunger, we are reminded that capitalism and global wealth
remains just as intimately wedded to hunger.

The global policeman Bush, in the time-honoured traditions of backyard
bully, has long harboured the habit of dictating to nations who their
friends and enemies should be. Now, he has taken to telling nations
how much they should eat, and of wagging a disapproving finger at poor
nations whose middle class has made some improvements in its diet.

Bush's sentiments (and those of his lieutenant Condoleezza Rice) reek
of callous contempt for the world's poor. They lay bare the fact that
the only perspective Bush and US imperialism is capable of is that of
the US corporations. In Bush's words, the growing purchasing power of
the middle class in the developing world is "good" because "y'know,
it's hard to sell products into countries that aren't prosperous."
But, lamented Bush, "you start getting wealth, you start demanding
better nutrition and better food". In other words, India's growing
appetite was pushing food prices up and causing the rest of the world
go hungry. Unfortunately the world's people haven't mastered the art
of being markets, not mouths: of tightening the belt over their
bellies while loosening their purse strings...

Bush is the head of the nation whose successive governments used its
military to ruthlessly batter a long list of Latin American and
African countries into being pliant suppliers of cash crops for the US
corporations; and in the process devastating the food security of
these nations. Major General Smedley Butler has described how, as a US
Marine, he had been "a high class muscle-man for Big Business...a
gangster for capitalism" who had helped to make Honduras, Mexico,
Haiti, various Central American republics, Nicaragua and the Dominican
Republic "safe" for plunder by American fruit, oil, and sugar
corporations and banks in the early twentieth century. His latest
exploit has been to "make Iraq safe" for US oil corporations, in the
process devastating its economy, its infrastructure, and its thriving
health and education structures. Now, Bush has the gall to offer in
charity what his nation has plundered by military muscle and economic
arm-twisting. Like a rapacious wolf dressed up as a kindly and
nurturing mother, he describes the US as an "unbelievably
compassionate and generous nation" and offers to help the poor
countries out by "buying food directly from farmers as opposed to
giving people food." So, the deepest desire of the US corporations –
to have the farmers of developing countries as captive and direct
producers for them alone – is projected by Bush as generosity!

The US today along with a small and exclusive club of 'developed'
countries guzzles a disproportionate share of the world's scarce
resources including fuel, paper, and food. It is also responsible for
a disproportionately high share of global pollution. Although
constituting only five percent of the global population, the U.S.
emits more carbon dioxide, consumes more paper and other forest
products, and produces more municipal waste than any other country.
Yet Bush refused to curb carbon emissions in the US, saying "the
American way of life is not negotiable," and peddling the absurd
theory that cows were more responsible for such emissions than cars,
and so countries like China and India ought therefore to bear a
greater burden of curbing emissions!

Annual per capita foodgrains consumption in the US is over five times
that of India, and three times that of China, according to figures
released by the US Department of Agriculture for 2007. On an average a
US citizen consumes 1046 kg of grain, and around twenty times more
meat and fish and sixty times more paper, gasoline, and diesel than
the average Indian. But in India, since the entry of globalisation,
the average per capita consumption of food grain has actually gone
down from 177 kg per person to 155 kg per person: which is the same as
the hunger levels seen during famine in times of the British Raj. And
in India, foodgrains absorption is rising fast for the (mainly urban)
middle class, which boosts the national average. A large section of
rural poor are actually reduced to as low as 136 kg per capita per
year – which is the same as that of starvation-hit sub-Saharan Africa.
Bush grudges the 350 million-strong Indian middle class its improved
diet: he is blithely silent about over 350 million rural Indians who
are below the average food energy intake of sub-Saharan African
countries! Studies have shown a long-term tendency towards declining
per capita calorie consumption, especially in rural India – that is,
Indians are growing hungrier year after year. Deaths by hunger are an
all-too common phenomenon which Indian rulers are united in denying.

And these millions owe their hunger directly to the rural job losses,
income decline, land grab, slashed government expenditure on rural
development, slashed PDS and increased grain exports – all of which
are policies aggressively promoted by the US-backed IMF-World Bank,
and faithfully forced on Indian people by Manmohan Singh and his
predecessors.

Of course, the actual food consumption of the poor Americans is less
than the national average. Hunger and homelessness are a growing
phenomenon in the US, the world's richest country. According to the
U.S. Department of Agriculture, in 2006 over 35 million people lived
in food-insecure households, including 13 million children. Adults
living in over 12 million households could not eat balanced meals and
in over 7 million families someone had smaller portions or skipped
meals. In close to 5 million families, children did not get enough to
eat at some point during the year. This hunger at home is all the more
horrific when one knows that more than sufficient food grains are
grown in the US – but is fed to cars as 'bio-fuel' rather than to
hungry people!

Bush's bratty and bullying arrogance is really nothing new: we expect
nothing better. The real question is why Manmohan Singh, our Prime
Minister, describes a man with such contempt for India and for the
poor of the world, as 'India's best friend'? Why insist on continuing
with US-dictated policies which favour imperialism and force millions
of Indians to live in misery and hunger?


Kavita Krishnan,


Editorial Board, Liberation, Central Organ of CPI(ML)
http://www.countercurrents.org/kavita090508.htm



"In the next few weeks and months, it will be my endeavour to take
certain hard decisions and prepare the country and the people to face
the challenge of terrorism," Chettiar Chidambaram said.

Among those steps, he said, were decisions to create a Coastal Command
to secure India's 7,500 km (4,650 miles) shoreline, fill vacancies in
intelligence agencies, upgrade technology, raise new commando units
and build counter-insurgency and terrorism schools. O.K.

Chidambaram also proposed strengthening laws relating to prevention,
investigation and punishment of terrorist acts.

"One of the bills is for setting up a National Investigation Agency,"
he said.

Here YOU ARE! AFPSA continued Since 1950s and POTA had not been enough
for our Plight. Why don`t they invoke MISA once again!

Second stimulus package likely next week, Kamal Nath, ANOTHER
Washington SLAVE declares tp APPEASE the KILLER MONEY MACINE while the
PARLIAMENT remains in SESSIOn and no one from OUR POLITICAL
Represtantive is a little concerned about the STARVING MASSES! No body
asked how DARED the Chettyiar GANG, Supreme SLAVE PRIME MINISTER,
MONTEK AMERICAWALA, FINMIN and RBI diverted NATIONAL Revenue BYPASSING
Indian Parliament!

Mind you, the Reserve Bank has already pumped in additional Rs 3 lakh
crore into the system to ease credit crunch being faced by the
companies!

And LOOK for the GOONDAGARDI!The Reserve Bank of India on Thursday
strongly defended that the monetary policy measures taken by the apex
bank had yielded positive returns! And the AMERICANISED ZIONIST
government is likely to come out with a second stimulus package to
propel economic growth, Commerce and Industry Minister Kamal Nath said
today! State Bank of India, India's biggest bank, said on Thursday
there was some concern that the economy would require further stimulus
beyond the interest rate cuts and extra spending announced last
weekend!


"We have to ensure that our domestic demand continues and government
will be taking all steps... We are again looking at something
(package) for next week," Kamal Nath, the SLAVE, told reporters after
a function organised by Spanish Institute of Foreign Trade and
industry chamber Ficci here.

Asked whether the monetary measures adopted by the central bank had
failed to revive the economy, RBI governor D Subbarao told reporters
here, "Steps taken by the apex bank have resulted in positive
returns".

He stated that the recent measures reduction in repo and reverse repo
rates to infuse liquidity are appropriate.

Asked if there was further scope for reducing the CRR from the present
levels of 5.5 per cent, the RBI governor said that the apex bank was
constantly reviewing the situation.

"Going forward, RBI will do whatever is appropriate", Subbarao said.

"In the next review of the economy, the apex bank would set targets
for growth and inflation", he said.

The second stimulus package, kamal Nath said, would be aimed at
generating employment and ensuring that the credit needs of the
companies are met.

In the next package, the Minister said, "We will look at engineering
sector, greater re-finance facility for exporters and textile and
agriculture sectors."

As part of an estimated about Rs 35,000-crore stimulus package last
Sunday, the government reduced four per cent excise duty across the
board and announced plans to raise public expenditure by additional Rs
20,000 crore during 2008-09.

Besides, the government announced incentives for exports sector, and
also mentioned sops for and small and medium enterprises which will
shortly be announced by banks.

Meanwhile,the rate cuts and stimulus packages implemented by world
governments to bail out recession-hit industries and revitalise the
economy are Tips to get your dream job When dream job is not perfect
doing little to encourage consumer spending as the same companies are
cutting jobs to reduce costs to tackle the situation. Experts feel,
this trend in rising unemployment will push the global economy deeper
into trouble.

More spies and police, modern gadgets and a national investigation
agency are among a slew of measures India is taking to prevent
militant attacks like the one on Mumbai last month, the home minister
said on Thursday. The move comes after criticism that the government
was not doing enough to prevent attacks, such as the one on India's
financial capital that killed nearly 200 people, because there were
vast gaps in its intelligence and security apparatus.

"I have found that there is a tendency to treat some intelligence
inputs that are not specific or precise as not actionable
intelligence," Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram told India's
parliament in a statement about the Mumbai attack.

"Further, the responsibility for acting upon intelligence input is
quite diffused."

Chidambaram, who took over when the incumbent minister resigned after
the Mumbai raids, admitted the coast guard and navy had intelligence
that a vessel carrying militants could enter Indian waters.

In November, employers in US slashed 533,000 jobs, the most in 34
years, according to the latest US Bureau of Labour Statistics report.
It's the fourth time in the last 58 years that payrolls have fallen by
more than 500,000 in a month, making the unemployment rate of 6.7 per
cent the worst since 1993.

Not only in US, but lay-offs and fears of job losses have hampered
consumer spending across the world. In Europe, the unemployment rate
rose by 0.4 per cent to 7.7 per cent in October compared to last year.
In France, it was 8.2 per cent, up 0.2 per cent from a year earlier.
In Canada, the jobless rate was 6.3 per cent in November, rising by
0.4 per cent from a year ago. In UK, the unemployment rate in August
was 5.7 per cent, higher by 0.4 per cent than in August 2007.

Emerging economies like India have also not been spared. The global
recession has considerably slowed India's growth. The Indian economy
recorded a growth rate of 7.8 per cent in the first half of the
current fiscal, down from 9.3 per cent in the year-ago period.

CHIDAMBARAM was quoting again and again RISILIENCE of Indian ECONOMY!
What happened?

Now just see , what happens to be the internal SECURITY Scenerio
despite Strategic Realliance in US lead, despite CIA, MOSAD and RAW
feedbacks they could not resist ISI and Foreign Nationals and Five
Star India had to be ENCOUNTERED by MUMBAI CARNAGE! They happen to be
RESPONSIBLE for our Saftey and security!But the boat couldn't be
intercepted and 10 heavily armed gunmen attacked several Mumbai
landmarks during a three-day siege, a strike India has blamed on
nuclear rival Pakistan.

Intelligence reports of a suspected Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) vessel
attempting to infiltrate into Mumbai was shared with the Coast Guard
as well as the naval intelligence, Home Minister P. Chidambaram
claimed Thursday, while asserting that India cannot go back to
"business as usual" with Pakistan.

But the Failure FINANCE Minister dislodged, now HOME P. Chidamabaram
Thursday acknowledged the National Security Guard (NSG) was the
country's "best trained and best equipped force" to combat terrorists
but also admitted that it suffered poor logistics!

India's security agencies have long been criticised for lacking a
cohesive counter-terrorism plan and poor intelligence gathering and
analysis. Police are badly armed and often have nothing more than a
stick with which to fight militants.

Highlighting poor security coordination, Indian newspapers have
reported that one suspected supporter of the Mumbai attackers who was
arrested in Kolkata was in fact an undercover officer trying to
infiltrate Kashmiri militant groups.

Bombs and other attacks have hit India with such regularity that the
country has been called one of the most dangerous places in the world.
Some 400 people have been killed in about a dozen militant strikes
this year.

Bombing investigations too have followed a predictable drill: bombs go
off, police round up suspects, usually Muslims, and then the trail
goes cold.

A flurry of anti-terrorism measures, critics and opposition parties
say, has come to be the government's standard knee-jerk response to
any terror attack.

In September, India said it was building a new counter-terrorism
centre and revamping policing and intelligence gathering after a
series of bombs killed at least 20 people in New Delhi earlier that
month.

Slamming Pakistan for linking Mumbai attacks to non-resolution of
Kashmir issue, India on Thursday asked it to take "serious" action to
completely dismantle terror infrastructure and end infiltration but
maintained that war against the neighbour was not a solution. On the
other hand,terming Pakistan the "epicentre" of terrorism, opposition
leader L.K. Advani Thursday cautioned the government against relying
completely on the UN Security Council to bring the perpetrators of
the "terror war" in Mumbai to justice.

"We are trying to pressurise Pakistan by moving the UNSC. But we
should not forget our experience in terms of Kashmir. We should take
whatever action we can take on our own strength, as this is our
problem. We should not expect too much from the UNSC," Advani said in
a statement in the Lok Sabha.

"The world says that South Asia is in the eye of the storm on
terrorism. Let us realise and say it candidly that the epicentre of
the terror is Pakistan. We moved UNSC but we haven't named Pakistan. I
don't know why."

Addressing the house after Home Minister P. Chidambaram, the Bharatiya
Janata Party's (BJP) prime ministerial candidate said the Nov 26
attack on India's financial capital was a "terror war" that was the
fallout of "cross border terrorism".

"It is not just terror, it is cross border terrorism, a word which
Pakistan's former president General Parvez Musharraf refused to accept
during (the 2001) Agra summit. He instead termed the terrorism in
Kashmir as the fight for liberation," said Advani, who was deputy home
minister in the BJP-led government then.

He said Pakistan's crackdown of terrorist groups was hogwash.

"We should not be fooled by the crackdown operation of Pakistan
against terrorist groups," Advani said.

Assuring the government of the opposition's support in all "stern
decisions" aimed at rooting out terrorism, Advani also pointed fingers
towards Pakistan's intelligence agency ISI for perpetrating terror in
the country.

"Pakistan President (Asif Ali) Zardari has accepted that non-state
actors on Pakistan soil are fomenting terrorism. ISI itself is a non-
state actor because it is not under the elected Pakistan government
and is answerable only to the army," he added. He said the Nov 26-29
Mumbai terror siege which killed 172 people was an attack on the
"economic progress" and the "peaceful coexistence of multi-religions"
in India.


Talking tough in the Lok Sabha, external affairs minister Pranab
Mukherjee raised questions over Pakistan's sincerity in curbing
activities of terror groups operating from its soil as he suggested
that "house arrest" of Lashkar-e-Taiba chief Hafiz Mohd Saeed was not
enough.

Intervening in the debate in Lok Sabha on Mumbai attacks, he said
India has repeatedly given Pakistan a list of 40 terrorists, including
Dawood Ibrahim, with a demand that they be handed over and expressed
hope that Islamabad would respond positively.

He asked Pakistan to come out of the "denial mode" on existence of
terrorists, including "non-state actors", who operate from the
confines of that country as he wondered: "did the non-state actors
come from heaven, did the non-state actors come from another planet?"

Mukherjee also slammed Pakistan for creating a war "hysteria" by
indulging in "propaganda" on the basis of a hoax call that "big power"
India was going to attack.

"That is not the solution," he said when Shiv Sena member Mohan Rawale
said India should attack Pakistan in the wake of the terror strikes.

Rubbishing efforts by Pakistan to link the terror strikes to non-
resolution of Kashmir issue, Mukherjee asserted that such a "straight
jacket simple formula" will not help solve the problem as the series
of attacks in India are part of global terrorism.

"It (attacks) is not related to Jammu and Kashmir issue. It is part of
global terrorism," Mukherjee said in the House amid repeated thumping
of desks, significantly on both ruling and opposition sides.

"I don't believe in straight jacket formula. It is not as simple. It
is complex...It is not that if Kashmir issue is solved, everything
will be in place," the external affairs minister said.

Referring to the "solemn assurances" given by the then President
Pervez Musharraf and his successor President Asif Ali Zardari to end
terrorism emanating from Pakistan, he said "expression of intent is
not sufficient" and that Islamabad needs to "act" to convincing
levels.

He pointed to the "house arrest" of LeT chief and said it was "not
convincing" as even after the reported action by Pakistani
authorities, Saeed was appearing on TV channels.

"What does house arrest mean? Laws, Indian Penal Code, in Pakistan are
the same as in India, the names may be different. He should be either
in judicial or police custody," Mukherjee said.

Suggesting that Pakistan could be indulging in non-serious actions
against terrorism, he said the "same scenes were played out after the
attack on Parliament in December 2001... The Lashkar-e-Taiba was
banned but it changed name, the signboards were changed but the faces,
ideology and activities remained the same."

Demanding complete dismantling of terror infrastructure existing in
territories under Pakistan's control and end to infiltration, he told
Islamabad "Please follow up seriously... it (action) should be taken
to its logical conclusion."

It is not India-Pakistan issue, not a Jammu and Kashmir issue...
Terrorism is not confined to borders of any country. It is
international
phenomenon," Mukherjee said, describing terrorism as the biggest
threat to the world post-Cold War.

Noting that terrorists have struck in important tourist place Jaipur,
science and technology hub Bangalore, industrial hub Ahmedabad and
financial capital Mumbai during the year, the external affairs
minister said there is a "design" and "method" behind these attacks.

"We tell Pakistan, please do not deny facts. Accept it," he said, as
he observed that there was a "sense of anger and outrage" in India
over the Mumbai attacks and people want the government to "rise to the
occasion" and send a "resolute message" to Pakistan.


During the debate which saw unusual unity between ruling and
opposition benches, Mukherjee asserted that India will not allow its
"territorial sovereignty and integrity to be played with" and "nobody
should dare to attack us. This message must be conveyed."

Apparently hinting at the disconnect between the political leadership
and military establishment in Pakistan that allows terrorists to
operate from that country, he said Islamabad needs to address its
internal problems and that New Delhi was ready to help in this
regard.

Seeking to highlight this aspect, he said Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh was promised that Director General of ISI would visit India to
help in probe into Mumbai attacks. "But within hours, it was denied.
It may be Pakistan's internal problem. They have to solve it.
International community should help."

Underlining that India was in the process of building an international
campaign to highlight the fact that terrorism against this country is
emanating from Pakistan, Mukherjee said majority of the world leaders
he spoke to agreed that Mumbai terror attackers came from Pakistan.

He, however, said India has to deal with Pakistan patiently as it is a
neighbour which cannot be changed.

"I am not indulging in jingoism. I am simply expressing my anger. We
have to deal with the situation. We cannot change our neighbours. The
issues cannot be ducked. The issues cannot be sidelined," Mukherjee
said.

"Whatever be the depth of our anger, it is a phenomenon which cannot
be switched on or off. We have to patiently deal with it.

"Those who talk of thousand years of war after failing to win in an
open battle field did it with an objective to cause great harm to this
country. We are not provoked. We have no intention to be provoked," he
said.

The minister said India has already expressed anger and outrage to
Pakistan over the Mumbai attacks in which foreigners were targeted for
the first time.

He said that 26 foreigners from 13 countries were killed in the
attacks and said he had conveyed to their countries regret for not
being able to protect the "guests".

The attack was planned and the terrorists came from Pakistan, he said
adding, even during the operation their controllers in Pakistan were
guiding them as action was shown live on television.

Mukherjee criticised news channels for live coverage of the three-day
long operation to "enhance" viewership at the cost of national
interest and said there was need to "draw a line".

Experts welcome UN ban on Jamaat-ul-Dawa; put doubts on Pak

The United Nations' decision to ban Jamaat-ul-Dawa, (JuD) the front
organisation of Lashker-e-Taiba, has been welcomed by security
experts but they feel that its translation in letter and spirit by
Pakistan is still under a cloud.

"It is a welcome move to the extent that the committee of nations
understand the gravity of the threat and feel the need for a
collective response," says former Intelligence Bureau Director Ajit
Doval.

The experts feel that the move will have little impact on JuD's
importance as a terror group within Pakistan unless authorities, in
the calculus of grit, find the consequences of siding with terrorists
are far more dangerous than the advantage of eliciting their support.

"It's a positive move," says former Director General of Jammu and
Kashmir Police Gopal Sharma.

"One needs to understand that Jamaat-ul-Dawa is mother organisation of
Lashker-e-Taiba. It's literature spewing venom against India and
promoting communal hatred was recovered in Kashmir way back in 1990,"
Sharma, who retired recently as Director General of Seema Sashtra Bal,
said.

"They (Jamaat-ul-Dawa) had circulated pamphlets in Kashmir that they
would target people here and convert it (Kashmir) into another
Chechnya," Sharma said.

Sleuths, telecos must cooperate to fight terror: PM

In the aftermath of the Mumbai terror attacks, Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh on Thursday said an effective cooperation was needed between
security agencies and the telecom industry to combat such incidents.

"It is very important that there should be effective cooperation and
coordination between the agencies whose responsibility is to safeguard
the security of the country and producers, all actors in the industry
(of technology)", he said while inaugurating the India Telecom 2008
conference.

Singh said this while endorsing FICCI president Rajeev Chandrasekhar's
suggestion that there was a need for very serious upgrade in the
government's thinking on the level of cooperation that is currently
engaging with the telecom industry to counter terrorism.

Mumbai attacks: Pakistan vows to comply with UN curbs
ISLAMABAD: Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani said on
Thursday Pakistan would comply with the UN Security Council decision
of listing four leaders of an outlawed militant group blamed by India
and the US for the Mumbai attacks.

"Pakistan has taken note of the designation of certain individuals and
entities by the U.N. ... and would fulfill its international
obligations," a statement from his office quoted him as telling
visiting US Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte.

The United Nations Security Council placed sanctions against Pakistan-
based Jamaat-ud-Dawa, a front organization for Lashkar-e-Taiba,
declaring it a terrorist organization.

The Council panel has designated four men linked to the Mumbai attacks
as terrorists subject to sanctions.

The four men are believed to hold leadership positions in the banned
Pakistani militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba that is accused of
orchestrating last month's attacks that left over 180 dead in Mumbai.

Designated as terrorists subject to UN sanctions were Zaki-ur-Rehman
Lakhvi, Lashkar's operations chief; Muhammad Saeed, the group's
leader; Haji Muhammad Ashraf, its chief of finance; and Mahmoud
Mohammad Ahmed Bahaziq, a financier with the group.
The Security Council's al-Qaida and Taliban sanctions committee added
them to its list of terrorists subject to the assets freeze, travel
ban and arms embargo under a council resolution adopted this year.

The US Treasury Department last week designated the men as terrorists
and ordered any US assets frozen.

Earlier on Wednesday, in what is being read as the first sign of
Pakistan wilting in the face of growing international pressure,
Islamabad had said that it will ban Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JUD) “the
political arm of Lashkar-e-Taiba, which has been recruiting fidayeen
killers like the captured terrorist Ajmal” if the United Nations
Security Council (UNSC) declared JUD a terrorist outfit.

It's learnt the UNSC has already initiated the necessary steps to ban
JUD and tighten the screws on its chief Hafiz Saeed, regarded as a key
man behind the Mumbai carnage, who is wanted by India as a criminal
terrorist. A Saeed-specific ban is also a certainty, said government
sources.

Pakistan, which had denied the complicity of Lashkar in Mumbai
attacks, had to make the statement about banning JUD at the UNSC
because of the near-unanimity in the Security Council about JUD's
involvement in terrorism. The UNSC move marked a global concert
against Pakistan because of its failure to carry out its repeated
pledges to India and others to crack down on terrorist camps.

``After the designation of Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JUD) under resolution 1267,
the government on receiving communication from the Security Council
shall proscribe the JUD and take other consequential actions, as
required, including the freezing of assets,'' said Abdullah Hussain
Haroon, Pakistan's permanent representative in the UN. Sources said
that he gave an undertaking to the same effect to the world body on
Tuesday.

Indian officials seemed satisfied with the impending ban on JUD by
Pakistan.

Haroon also said that no LeT camp would be allowed to operate from
Pakistan. Pakistan's NSA Mahmud Ali Durrani had reiterated on
Wednesday that his country would follow all UN resolutions. ``We will
follow any UN resolution. There should be no doubt. If our
investigations prove the involvement of any organisation in Pakistan,
we will definitely ban it,'' Durrani told a news channel.

Meanwhile, Pakistan PM Yousaf Raza Gilani confirmed on Wednesday that
police had detained Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi and Zarrar Shah, the two
members of LeT whom India has blamed for the attacks in Mumbai. He
said that the allegations against them are being looked into.

Stop running to US for tackling terror: BJP to govt

Pledging support for a full-scale war against terror, Opposition BJP
on Thursday said the government must stop "running" to Washington
Latest on Mumbai attacks hoping that the US would come to its rescue
in tackling Pakistan-backed terrorism.

"Please stop running to mummy (US)" hoping that somebody else will
help the country to tackle terrorism, senior BJP leader Arun Shourie
said initiating a discussion in the Rajya Sabha on the recent terror
attacks in Mumbai.

He said the government keeps pinning its hopes on US Secretary of
State Condoleeza Rice coming here to resolve the country's problems
with regard to terrorism.

Asking the government to stop the peace process with Pakistan, he said
"your intelligence record shows that ISI is now knitting together
Indian insurgent groups".

Observing that China was propping up Pakistan, Shourie said Islamabad
was supporting terrorism and at the same time putting the onus of the
peace process on New Delhi.




Criticism, Terrorism and Crisis:Why Religon



http://www.ireport.com/docs/DOC-159423
Posted by: Hariscnnir // 3 days ago // viewed 97 times
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Last updated: 3 days ago
The United States of America which shows its most concern towards
keeping peace and prosperity of the world, what they actually doing to
keep this world save from all kind of terrorism. As they are super
power, so more responsibilities are on them. The policies and action
taken by the US government is just for their own interest so far and
trying to keep targeting Muslims all over the world. Its not just
happening now, it's from the decades because not only the Muslims but
every one else, who against the un-justice and raise their voice for
truth, equality and justice. From where it actually starts and turns
into violent?

The propaganda against muslims and Pakistan not just started in years
or months nor after the saddest incident happened on 9/11. It's all
started after their religious growth and becomes a part of developing
and futurist nations, people around the world start and showed their
hate towards Muslims and Islam and start criticizing them, called them
conservative, extremist, terrorist, 3^rd^ class citizen and looked
them with suspicious eyes, who lives in some other western countries,
the false propaganda and perception made by foreign policy makers in
west and western media. Islam teaches the lesson of love, peace,
justice, equality and to live simple life. Muslims never criticize any
one nor interfere in any other religion. Every day, every time around
the world raising fingers on muslims for any sort of terror or
incident. Trying to led them down made strict polices just for them,
eye on their moments, degrade them, treat them in suspicious manner,
make them irritate, humiliate them, give them feelings that they are
just bad and made fun out of their religion and their most respective
Prophet (S.A.W). American and other people around the world have that
feeling that Muslims hate them. No they don't, muslims all over the
world never hate any one nor criticize any individual belongs to any
religion, they just against the policies and an aggressive attitude of
governments, their polices and one sided media. Those who are
terrorist and extremist belongs to any religion have no soil, no
religion and no faith. Why specifically mentioned terrorist with the
name of Islamic terrorist and point out muslims. They are just
terrorists. Muslims are human being too just like others, they have
equal rights and respect as they give and have for others.

If muslims are terrorist and involve in all terrorism, then why all
over the world have their interest and have businesses with Arabs and
other muslim states, why they want them to help the world in their
economy and crisis. Muslims from Arab and Asia invest billions of
dollars not just in American economy, all over the world as they
called their self super powers. How you shake hands with them and how
you expect to make good relations with them and called them your ally.

9/11 made the cause of war in Afghanistan against Taliban. Taliban was
early supported and used by internationally against Russians for their
own interest. Pakistan is the major ally to US in war against terror
and most effected by this, we gave our ground and air spaces, deployed
our forces on Afghan borders, help Nato forces in every way for the
sake of peace, because we are not terrorist but the most victimized
people by all such terrorism, our economy suffers, our innocent people
died in several spy missile attacks, our solders martyred, internal
threats and external foreign pressures. In spite of all, we are on our
stance to defeat this terrorism and terrorist. What the cause of war
in Iraq, just for few wanted leaders, which wasn't to hard to searched
and arrests them. What war causes, the death of innocent people and
families at large and made them homeless, starving and made them hate
and regret against those who apart of that war, as no such weapons and
mass destruction found from Iraq. Why Palestinians still targeting by
Israelis, killing innocent people and made them shelter less. All over
the world, people are in danger and lives in fear. What would you
expect from a child who learn and see all this from the childhood and
from those who left to be alone after when their loves once their
father, mother, brother, sister or child killed or lost their lives in
such wars and suspicious attacks. By doing wars and make people
against you, wanted to keep peace. Why this world and media not stands
with us and show their gratitude towards us.
Western media and few of their analyst made news spicy according to
their taste, shouts and criticize more and tried to give perception
that such terrorism done by muslims and trying to involve Pakistan in
that. In London on 7/7 several underground blast exploded, and every
one around the world pointing fingers on muslims, specially on
Pakistan, but after investigation, we saw that they were British born,
but their parents belongs to Pakistan but anyhow they made their
connection with Pakistan. Yes their religion was Islam, neither they
were muslims nor Pakistani, cause they grew up and born in UK, in
British culture. In the same way when Mumbai attacked by some
terrorist and left innocent people dead, it was very sad moment for
all of us too and we are with them in that. But what Indian government
did, used to point out and raised their fingers on Pakistan thou it
was very early and have no such investigation or any evidence. Most of
all Indian and the western media CNN made most of it and trying to
relate connections with Pakistan in different ways. Many innocent
people died in that. They have to be fair for every one. They cannot
see what happened in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Palestine, Iraq and the
unresolved issue of Kashmir. Since many years on the name of war and
suspicious attacks made by collision forces and killed several
innocent people and made many of them homeless, why they don't raise
their voice against all such killing of innocent people, because they
are muslims and lives in Islamic states. Pakistan is the most effected
country cause of this war in every way but we are doing all this to
help people and to keep peace in the world. Because our war is not
against any individual or any religion, it's against all sorts of
terrorism and terrorists, what ever religion they have and from where
ever they belong. What we got in the end, all sort of allegations and
criticism around the world. The all Councils, Human right
organizations and international media all over the world just played
their role like a spectators, Kashmir issue is the biggest proof that
the Indian forces openly killed innocent people in including children,
rape their women and made the whole Kashmir's hostage. They are
scarifying their lives just for the cause of freedom and independence.
Now, what is the impact of all such wars and policies, the whole world
suffers and in global crisis. Use of such power and wars gives nothing
except more crisis and more global recession, the whole world effect
by this and which includes most of US. Despite of peace in America the
people feel insecure and in fear because of their policies and action
taken by their government against the world. It a universal law every
action having same reaction. The newly elected government in US is the
proof of that, what their people wants and why they need the change.
Aggressive policies must need some changes and better solutions not
only for an individual's interest but for the interest of this world.
The whole world looking for the peace and prosperity and have few
hopes with the newly elected American democratic government to do
something better for the people of this world in real.



Advising the government to come out of the "self-denial" mode, he said
four days before the Mumbai terror strikes, former home minister
Shivraj Patil was taking consolation in the figures showing comparison
of terrorist attacks during the NDA and the UPA governments.

Referring to coastal security, he said barring one, none of the
remaining 35 islands in Lakshadsweep was properly staffed by
intelligence agencies.

Noting that the country remained vulnerable because terrorist groups
backed by the neighbouring country use high technology like voice over
internet protocol, he warned that in the next five years the
terrorists would use non-conventional weapons like chemical and
nuclear arms in miniature forms.

Shourie said the 'proxy war' started by former Pakistan President Zia
ul Haq has kept India "bleeding" for 35 years with no damage to them.

Advising the government to judge Pakistan by the ground realities, he
said "please do not go by joint statements that you sign with their
leaders".

Rejecting the theory of using minimal force, Shourie said the
government should go with full force to win over the proxy war
unleashed by Pakistan.

"Not an eye for an eye. But for an eye, both eyes. For a tooth, whole
jaw," he said.

He observed that violence in Jammu and Kashmir had come down in the
last one year because Pakistan was preoccupied with its own problems
in troubled areas like Balochistan, the tribal belt and other places.

Terrorists have technology and money, we have sticks’

Reuters
Posted: Dec 11, 2008 at 1417 hrs IST

Mumbai Indian police are grappling with global positioning systems
(GPS), satellite phones and Google Earth images on the trail of the
Mumbai attackers and finding themselves hobbled by technological
inadequacy.
So far, police have found four GPS handsets, one satellite phone, nine
mobile phones and computer discs with high-resolution images and maps
of the 10 sites that were attacked. The use of the Internet to make
calls has also hampered the investigation.

"The use of technology has made it very difficult for us," Param Bir
Singh, a top officer in Mumbai's anti-terrorism team, said.

"For the people we are dealing with, money is not a problem, and even
the ones that are not very educated are trained in all manner of
devices and know how to make interception difficult."

The lone surviving terrorist of the Mumbai attack reportedly told
interrogators in Mumbai the 10 terrorists, who led the three-day
siege, were shown videos and Google Earth images of the targets during
their training in camps in Pakistan.

"They probably used the GPS for navigation and the satellite phone
when they were on the sea, and then used the mobile phones to stay in
touch with their handlers during the operations," Rakesh Maria, lead
investigator of the police, has said.

Ratan Shrivastava, a defence expert at consultancy Frost & Sullivan
and a former army officer, said ‘hostile groups’ that have attacked
India have always used very sophisticated technology and were
typically very well-trained in the use of technology.

"While the Indian armed forces are well-equipped and our intelligence
services have the capability to take on these technologies, there is
very little coordination between them and the police, which is ill-
equipped," he said.

He said a large part of the intelligence gathered these days is from
monitoring the airwaves and intercepting conversations and e-mails but
India lacked the resources and coordination to analyse and respond to
the intelligence.

Mumbai police acknowledge the difficulties and the militants' apparent
ease with sophisticated technology.

Singh said militants used VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) and
satellite phones, making it harder to intercept conversations. They
also used multiple phone cards for mobile phones and routed e-mails
through servers in different locations, which make it harder to
trace.

There were also some reports they used BlackBerry devices to scan the
news after the siege began, but the police have denied finding
BlackBerry devices on the terrorist.

Security analyst Ajai Sahni was dismissive of Indian police forces'
standard-issue weapons.

"Our police are still running around with lathis (sticks) and World
War-II era rifles. We are simply not equipped to respond to a
sophisticated system of this kind."

SECURITY HAZARD

In Mumbai, a public interest litigation filed by a city lawyer has
sought a ban on Google Earth for providing easy access to ‘sensitive’
defence and civilian establishments, which poses a security hazard to
the country, according to local newspapers.

Earlier in 2008, Indian security agencies expressed fears the
BlackBerry e-mail device could be used by militants to send e-mails
that could not be traced or intercepted.

The Telecom Ministry in July cleared the service.

Google Earth is putting checks in place to alert governments when
sensitive images are downloaded, but militants around the world have
used off-the-shelf technologies to stay ahead of bigger, better-funded
agencies, security analyst Sahni said. So banning these services is no
solution to tackling terror.

"If you ban something, people will still find ways to get around it,"
he said, pointing to India's earlier attempts to curb mobile phone use
in Jammu and Kashmir and the northeast.

"And where will you draw the line? Will we ban mobile phones all
together, and ban automobiles and airplanes because they are also
being used by attackers?"



Mumbai attacks show up India's technology shortcomings


11 Dec 2008, 1804 hrs IST, REUTERS

MUMBAI: Police are grappling with global positioning systems (GPS),
satellite phones and Google Earth images on the trail of the Mumbai
attackers Mumbai: CCTV footages
Taj: Then & now
Oberoi: Then & now
More Pictures
and finding themselves hobbled by technological inadequacy.

So far, police have found four GPS handsets, one satellite phone, nine
mobile phones and computer discs with high-resolution images and maps
of the 10 sites that were attacked. The use of the Internet to make
calls has also hampered the investigation.

"The use of technology has made it very difficult for us," Param Bir
Singh, a top officer in Mumbai's anti-terrorism team, told reporters.

"For the people we are dealing with, money is not a problem, and even
the ones that are not very educated are trained in all manner of
devices and know how to make interception difficult."

The lone surviving gunman of the Mumbai attack reportedly told
interrogators in Mumbai the 10 gunmen, who led the three-day siege
that killed 179 people, were shown videos and Google Earth images of
the targets during their training in camps in Pakistan.

"They probably used the GPS for navigation and the satellite phone
when they were on the sea, and then used the mobile phones to stay in
touch with their handlers during the operations," Rakesh Maria, lead
investigator of the police, has said.

Ratan Shrivastava, a defence expert at consultancy Frost & Sullivan
and a former army officer, said "hostile groups" that have attacked
India have always used very sophisticated technology and were
typically very well-trained in the use of technology.

"While the Indian armed forces are well-equipped and our intelligence
services have the capability to take on these technologies, there is
very little coordination between them and the police, which is ill-
equipped," he said.

He said a large part of the intelligence gathered these days is from
monitoring the airwaves and intercepting conversations and e-mails but
India lacked the resources and coordination to analyse and respond to
the intelligence.

Mumbai police acknowledge the difficulties and the militants' apparent
ease with sophisticated technology.

Singh said militants used VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) and
satellite phones, making it harder to intercept conversations. They
also used multiple phone cards for mobile phones and routed e-mails
through servers in different locations, which make it harder to
trace.

There were also some reports they used BlackBerry devices to scan the
news after the siege began, but the police have denied finding
BlackBerry devices on the gunmen.



Oversight panel questions US Treasury on bailout plan
WASHINGTON: With a skeptical tone, a congressional panel reviewing the
government's $700 billion rescue package for the financial sector is
Countries in recession|questioning the Bush administration's spending
of bailout funds and challenging its reluctance to use the money to
reduce foreclosures.

In a report to be made public later Wednesday, the oversight committee
spelled out 10 pointed queries to the Treasury Department and
questioned whether its shifting remedies constitute a strategic
response to the financial crisis. The review represents the latest
critical assessments of the Troubled Asset Relief Program, the massive
federal intervention into the nation's financial system.

The 37-page draft offers no specific conclusions, but the questions
suggest sharp disagreements with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's
stewardship of the program and echo some of the criticism raised in a
Government Accountability Office audit of the program last week.

"The American people need to understand Treasury's conception of the
problems in the economy and its comprehensive strategy to address
those problems," the draft report said.

The panel's chairwoman, Elizabeth Warren, a Harvard Law School
professor and a Democratic appointee to the oversight group, is
scheduled to testify about the panel's report Wednesday before the
House Financial Services Committee, chaired by Rep. Barney Frank, D-
Mass.

Republican Rep. Jeb Hensarling of Texas, the panel's only Republican,
also will testify, though he declined to sign the report. He said he
had raised several concerns with the panel over access to resources
and other issues that "have not yet been addressed."

Also on the witness list for the hearing are Gene Dodaro, the GAO's
acting comptroller general, and Neel Kashkari, director of the
Treasury office that oversees the bailout program.
The tough reviews come as the Bush administration is considering
seeking access to the second half of the $700 billion fund. All but
$15 billion of the first $350 billion has been allocated in the two
months the program has been in place.

Many Republicans, such as Hensarling, were suspicious of the bailout
from the outset. And Democrats, including President-elect Barack
Obama, have argued that instead of simply injecting money into banks,
the government needed to use the funds to halt rising foreclosures.
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke has predicted foreclosures in
2008 will reach about 2.25 million.

The oversight report noted that Treasury was considering having
mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac guarantee and purchase 30-
year fixed mortgages with rates as low as 4.5 percent. But the report
said the program was designed only to encourage new home buyers.

"The program does not appear to offer any help to already distressed
homeowners," the draft said.

Much of the criticism aimed at Paulson centers on his decision to
shift the program's mission from purchasing troubled assets from banks
and other financial institutions to infusing capital into banks by
buying stakes in their equity.

"What is Treasury's strategy?" the draft report asks. "Is the strategy
working to stabilize the markets?" and "Is the strategy helping to
reduce foreclosures?" The draft presses the Treasury to answer those
questions and more.

At one point the report notes that Congress is demanding that the auto
industry restructure itself in exchange for $15 billion in bridge
loans and challenges the Treasury to do the same with banks.

"Has Treasury required banks receiving aid to: Present a viable
business plan; replace failed executives and/or directors; undertake
internal reforms to prevent future crises, to increase oversight, and
to ensure better accounting and transparency; undertake any other
operational reforms?" it asks.

Last week, the GAO concluded that the government must toughen its
monitoring of the bailout fund to ensure that banking institutions
limit their top executives' pay and comply with other restrictions.
The auditors said the Treasury Department has no mechanism in place to
track how institutions are using $150 billion in taxpayer money that
the government injected into the banking system as of last month.

Kashkari, in a speech Monday, defended the Treasury's management of
the program, arguing that the financial system is more stable now than
it was two months ago. He also predicted that bank lending has been
affected by low confidence in financial systems, the credit crunch and
the economic downturn.

"As confidence returns, we expect to see more credit extended," he
said.


White House, Congress agree on outlines of auto bailout plan

WASHINGTON: The White House indicated late on Tuesday an agreement in
principle was in place with Congressional leaders on a 15-billion-
dollar
automotive industry rescue package, but said negotiations were not yet
over.

"We will continue to work with Congress to finalize legislation the
president can support," said White House spokeswoman Dana Perino.

However, "a great deal of progress has been made," she said of the
legislation to shore up the ailing Detroit Big Three -- General
Motors, Ford and Chrysler.

Senator Carl Levin from Michigan, the base for the auto industry, said
he understands that an "agreement has been reached," and that it was
only a matter of time before a bill is ready to go.

"This gets us to the 20 yard line, but getting over the goal line will
take a major effort," he said.

A senior administration official said the main point for the White
House is certifying the companies can prove they are "viable" and that
taxpayers wouldn't foot the bill for a fresh round of loans in coming
months.

The White House also emphasized the need for a designee or "car czar"
to oversee the billions in funds and to ensure the companies fulfill
their restructuring plans.

If the designee establishes a company has been unable to do so, the
government can withdraw federal funds, the senior administration
officials said.

Congressional Republicans, however, have expressed angst about an open-
ended commitment to rescue the firms from their own managerial
mistakes.

"Taxpayers should not be asked to finance any firm unwilling to make
the difficult decisions across the scope of their businesses," Perino
said, warning that dramatic restructuring includes "deep and
meaningful concessions from all stakeholders" in the companies.

Earlier Tuesday, Perino stressed: "Our insistence that long-term
viability be reflected in the legislation is something that we have
held very strong feelings about, and that has not changed.

"There will not be long-term financing if they cannot prove long-term
viability."

Short-term loans of 15 billion dollars are meant to sustain the car
giants through March, allowing president-elect Barack Obama time to
address their crisis after he takes office on January 20.

Obama has called a collapse of the auto industry "unacceptable," but
said Sunday he wanted a supervisory process that would hold the
companies' "feet to the fire."

GM and Chrysler are first in line after warning they are fast running
out of cash. Ford, though equally hampered by slumping sales, says it
faces no immediate liquidity crisis but wants a nine-billion-dollar
line of credit.

While the Democratic-led Congress was ready to extend a larger amount
of aid, the Bush administration has balked at giving any more than 15
billion dollars and insists -- like Obama -- that the automakers must
retool for the long haul.

White House and congressional negotiators held talks late into Monday
and the emerging total proposed is less than half of the 34 billion
dollars the auto giants say they would need to stave off a
"catastrophic collapse."

House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the automakers must
be "preserved" as it was "essential to our national security that we
have a strong industrial and manufacturing base."

But government help must not amount to "corporate welfare," she told
reporters, mentioning former Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker as
a possible presidential czar to supervise the companies'
restructuring.

Influential Republican Senator Richard Shelby, whose state of Alabama
hosts assembly plants of Toyota, Honda, Hyundai and Mercedes-Benz,
said many in his party were grumbling at the helping hand being
offered to the Detroit giants.

Republicans in Congress could not sign off any deal "because I believe
the American people need to know the details of this, to realize this
is only the downpayment on a lot of money to come in the future," he
told MSNBC.

The proposed legislation calls for the "car czar," a presidential
appointee to oversee the overhaul of the Big Three US automakers,
which have been losing ground for years to their Japanese rivals.

In return for the loans, the government would get an equity stake and
the automakers would have to improve their fleets' fuel-efficiency and
also examine using their excess capacity to build bus and rail cars
for public transit.

The bill also requires the automakers to sell their private jets and
places strict limits on executive compensation, similar to a recent
bailout for financial firms buffeted by the global credit crunch and
toxic mortgage loans.

Already deep in debt, does the US government have enough funds to keep
baiing out its industries too often?

Blow or bailout? US auto rescue uncertain
11 Dec 2008, 2021 hrs IST, REUTERS

WASHINGTON: The House of Representatives approved bailout legislation
on Wednesday that would force US automakers to restructure or fail,
sending Wall Street Pink Slip party
More Pictures
the measure to the Senate where prospects for passage appeared grim.

"Gonna be tough, but haven't lost all hope," one Democratic aide said
of chances in the Senate, which could vote as early as Thursday on the
plan to provide up to $14 billion in bridge loans to help avert
collapse of one or more carmakers.

Democrats sought to reclaim momentum in the bailout effort, with the
bill they negotiated with the Bush administration clearing the chamber
by 237-170.

"This legislation is about offering Detroit and America a chance to
get back on track," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a floor speech
before the vote. "It gets down to a question of tough love."

The White House weighed in just before the vote with a public
endorsement aimed at Republicans skeptical of the rescue and demanding
a tougher approach for helping General Motors Corp, Ford Motor Co, and
Chrysler LLC.

"We believe the legislation developed in recent days is an effective
and responsible approach to deal with troubled automakers and ensure
the necessary restructuring occurs," White House spokeswoman Dana
Perino said in a statement.

Democrats advocated passage based on the belief that government
inaction could lead to an industry collapse that would cost taxpayers
far more than the loans intended to see them through March and help
them restructure.

While the House stuck to its plan for quick action, much uncertainty
surrounds the bill's fate in the Senate where a razor-thin Democratic
majority cannot ensure passage.

Senate Democrats will have difficulty reaching the 60 votes necessary
to overcome procedural hurdles, which some Republicans have vowed to
erect to slow or even block the legislation.

Democrats need up to a dozen or more Republicans to win passage, a
Democratic aide said.

"The critics have been very vocal. The question is where are the
(Senate Republican) supporters of the Big Three," another Democratic
aide said.

US recession to worsen, deflation a risk: Report
11 Dec 2008, 1447 hrs IST, REUTERS

SAN FRANCISCO: The "nasty" US recession will tighten its grip next
year as unemployment rises and weak home and stock prices imperil
consumers, Ghosts of 1929
2008: Year of global financial crisis
Countries in recession
finance firms and debt-laden businesses, a UCLA Anderson Forecast
report released on Thursday said.

Additionally, a sustained retreat in prices for goods and services is
a very real possibility that would further drag on the economy,
according to the forecasting unit's report.

"Where only last quarter we were worried about inflation, we are now
worried about its very rare opposite: deflation," the report said.
Falling prices would cut demand and discourage employers from hiring.

"The record collapse in oil prices has brought with it welcome relief
to motorists throughout the country and an effective tax cut of $440
billion in the form of a lower oil import bill," the closely-watched
report said. "Nevertheless the swift fall in oil prices is now
lowering the absolute level of consumer prices and bringing with it
likely declines in nominal GDP over the next three quarters."


THREE FOR THOUGHT: WHAT YOU NEED TO READ ABOUT ... INDIA

Passages to India
With world attention on the subcontinent following last week's
terrorist attack on Mumbai, Anosh Irani offers reading that conjures
the heart and soul of this complex land
ANOSH IRANI

December 6, 2008

Persian poet Hafez once wrote, "Like a great starving beast my body is
quivering, fixed on the scent of light." No one expresses spiritual
hunger more fervently and eloquently than this 14th-century mystic.
However, most of us, unlike Hafez, go on a spiritual quest only when
there is pain, when we are plunged into darkness. And at no point in
Mumbai's history is this hunger more apparent than after the terrorist
attacks that began on Nov. 26.

In the same way that 9/11 was not just New York's problem, these
attacks should not be the sole concern of Indians. The world is now a
glass bottle and countries are the marbles in that bottle - shoulder
to shoulder, jostling for space, some vying for attention, some simply
trying to fit. If one marble moves, the vibrations are felt by all.
And right now, India is shaken.

So what can citizens of other countries do? A good start would be a
greater understanding of a land and its people. For everyone, from the
Mumbaiite to the Martian, the following three books shed light on the
Indian heart and mind.

In a recent article in The New York Times, Suketu Mehta wrote, "My
bleeding city. My poor great bleeding heart of a city. Why do they go
after Mumbai? Perhaps because Mumbai stands for lucre, profane dreams
and an indiscriminate openness."

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His magnificent book Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found (Knopf, 2004)
provides a look into that netherworld where dreams are born, a
netherworld that is very much on the surface. He shows that just as
the city of Bombay/Mumbai is a collection of seven islands, it is also
a fusion of the nation's dreams. Everyone comes to the city ready to
sweat, to go hungry, to get shot, to get trapped in labyrinthine
bureaucratic webs, to pay bribes. It is all tolerable only because at
the end of it a shining dream awaits.

Mehta's book illustrates how this shining dream can quickly turn into
a nightmare. Part travelogue, part social inquiry, Maximum City is a
deconstruction of that mass dream. What is also moving is the passion
he feels for the city. This book is his love letter to Bombay:
soulful, humorous and leprous all at once.

If Mehta chronicles what it means to be a Bombaywallah in the present
day, Pavan K. Varma, in Being Indian: Inside the Real India (Penguin
Books India, 2004), spans the length and breadth of the entire
country. The narrator is like a crazy lizard walking along the wall
that is India, feeling the cracks of the past, pondering, then zipping
across to a remote corner, pondering again, darting his tongue out in
absolute relish at the future, viewing this nation of a billion people
in a billion ways.

The opening of this book sets the tone. In a gentle manner, Varma
takes us to Hardwar, a holy city for the Hindus, a place of countless
pilgrims. He writes of how, even in winter, one can spot people in the
Ganges, braving its ice-cold waters: "They have a transparent glass
pane in their hands and spend the day looking through it at the fast-
flowing waters. Their unblinking eyes speak of a concentration perhaps
greater than that of the throng of devotees nearby. But their purpose
is different: not prayer, not salvation for a departed soul. Their
attention is focused on the coins on the river bed, which they trace
and scoop out expertly with their feet."

It is this dual nature that he captures beautifully: the traditional
or the projected image versus the truth, a truth that unmasks the
tradition and leaves one gaping at the sheer hypocrisy of it all. He
writes of the Indian's obsession with power and his ability to let
morality take a back seat in the pursuit of it. Then, when the end is
achieved, morals re-emerge, like a rabbit out of a hat. But at all
times, it is clear that the Indian magician is in control, and he is
not ashamed of this duality. To him, it is not a clash at all. He
celebrates it as though it were a marriage of convenience. Born out of
this marriage are some beautiful googlies - to use a cricketing term -
anomalies that shatter every common perception about what it is to be
Indian.

A bookseller in Victoria once told me, with respect to a 600-page
novel she was holding in her hand, "With every page I read, this book
kept getting heavier and heavier." It was perhaps the most succinct
review I had ever heard of Rohinton Mistry's A Fine Balance
(McClelland & Stewart, 1995). What the bookseller was referring to was
the gravitas, the weight of tragedy she felt as a reader that made the
load almost unbearable. That is what only a great novelist can do.
Before you know it, the characters are closer to you than your own
kith and kin, and their journey becomes yours, their travails make
your intestines churn.

If Mehta and Varma give us myriad voices and journeys, Mistry captures
the injustice of a nation with only four characters: a young Parsi
man, an older Parsi woman and two tailors. This book helps one
understand conflict in India through the eyes of those who cope with
it. Reading A Fine Balance is like being out at sea. The storms of
injustice keep coming in, the crew keeps surviving, until a final
tragedy obliterates the reader's every hope.

And yet this novel captures the endurance that lies in all human
beings. It is almost spiritual in nature, and I daresay that if Hafez
were alive, he would appreciate the light in it. No matter how dim, no
matter how frugal, a simple strand of hope is taken by the characters
in this book and converted into dreams, a quality that is human but
also very Indian. I truly hope that this is one characteristic that
India's schizophrenic nature cannot destroy, that this one rule, this
one giant cliché, has no opposite, no exception.

Anosh Irani was born and raised in Mumbai. He is author of The Song of
Kahunsha, a 2007 selection for Canada Reads.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20081206.BKREAD06/TPStory/Entertainment

Where the forecasting unit in summer had projected a "subprime"
outlook for the U.S. economy through the end of next year with growth
at just above 1 percent, it now sees the economy facing a winter of
discontent.

"The news from the economy is bad," the report said. "The recession
that we had previously hoped to avoid is now with us in full gale
force."

The UCLA Anderson Forecast unit expects real GDP to shrink by 4.1
percent this quarter and by another 3.4 percent and 0.8 percent in the
first and second quarters of next year, respectively, as consumer and
business spending weaken and as the foreign trade that had propped up
growth much of this year sags.

"Because Europe and Japan are already in recession and China and India
are suffering from a significant slowdown in growth, the export boom
of the past few years will wane," the report said. "Make no mistake
the global economy is in its first synchronized recession since the
early 1990s."

By late 2009 the U.S. unemployment rate will hit 8.5 percent, compared
with 6.7 percent in November, as employers shed an additional two
million jobs over the next year.

The historical long-term trend of 3 percent growth will not resume
until 2010, the report said.

The administration of President-elect Barack Obama and Congress should
act quickly next year to pass an economic stimulus package, said David
Shulman, the report's author.

"They're talking a lot of infrastructure, which makes a lot of sense.
They're talking a middle-class tax cut. I think when Congress gets
through with this they'll be raining money on the economy," Shulman
said.

Israeli PM: 'Ashamed' of Hebron Settler Violence Against Palestinians

By VOA News
07 December 2008




Israeli PM Ehud Olmert attends the weekly cabinet meeting in
Jerusalem, 07 Dec 2008
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has criticized recent attacks by
Jewish settlers against Palestinian civilians in the West Bank city of
Hebron.

Mr. Olmert told his Cabinet Sunday that he was "ashamed" after seeing
video of Jewish settlers shooting at Palestinians late last week.

He said the violence amounted to a "pogrom," a word most often used to
describe organized attacks or persecution against Jews.

On Thursday, Jewish settlers shot three Palestinians and burned
Palestinian homes and olive groves. The settlers were angered that
Israeli police had forcibly evicted a group of them from a disputed
house, in accordance with an order from Israel's Supreme Court.

Meanwhile, an Israeli human rights group said discrimination against
Palestinians in the West Bank is reminiscent of the apartheid regime
in South Africa.

The Association for Civil Rights in Israel says the discrimination in
services, budgets, and access to natural resources between the two
groups constitutes a gross violation of the principle of equality.

The group also notes the lack of proper infrastructure and access to
health services in Arab neighborhoods.

Some information for this report was provided by AFP and AP.

Asia Hit with More Bad Economic News
By Kate Pound Dawson
Bangkok
11 December 2008




People look at stock market display in Seoul, 11 Dec 2008
The global economic slowdown continues to take a toll on Asia. New
data from China show growth is slowing, while the South Korean central
bank has made an unprecedented interest rate cut. And things are not
likely to improve next year.

China's government revenue slumped more than 3 percent in November -
another sign of the weakening economy.

The Chinese Ministry of Finance said Thursday that tax cuts, intended
to stimulate spending and slumping demand, caused the fall in tax
revenue. It was the third straight monthly contraction.

The government also says last month's inflation rate sank to 2.4
percent, the lowest in nearly two years. Although consumers might
welcome slower price increases, analysts say the decline indicates
weakening demand for consumer goods and commodities.

In Seoul, the Bank of Korea slashed its benchmark seven-day repurchase
rate by a record 1 percentage point, to 3 percent. The cut was the
fourth in two months and puts the rate at a historic low.

Lee Seong-tae, the central bank's governor says the economy will slow
down for some time, because exports are likely to lose steam as the
global slump continues.

He says more cuts are possible, if this jolt to the financial system
does not revive lending and demand.

Thursday, the Asian Development Bank cut its forecast for regional
growth. It says Asia's developing economies are likely to average 6.9
percent growth, this year, and 5.8 percent, next year. The non-profit
development lender earlier had expected growth of 7.5 percent this
year and slightly more than 7 percent in 2009.

The ADB says the problem is the rapid contraction in the American and
European markets - cutting demand for Asian exports.

Lee Jong-Wha is the head of the ADB's office of regional economic
integration. He unveiled the new forecasts in Hong Kong and said,
although most Asian economies will not fall as far as the developed
markets, the region will not escape unscathed.

"Our projection is up to now based on the information, we made a
judgment that Asian countries may not get pneumonia, but still will
get a cold," Lee said. "This much is pretty sure. Winter is coming and
we'll get a cold."

He says China and India, which have seen dramatic growth in the past
decade, will see their economies slow. The ADB says China will expand
by about 8.2 percent in 2009. That is down from 9.5 percent this year,
and nearly 11 percent in 2007.

India's growth is forecast to slow to about 6.5 percent next year,
well below the 9 percent expansion, last year.

Although those growth rates might draw envy from many countries in
recession, Indian and Chinese leaders worry about being able to
generate jobs for millions of unemployed workers.

Many governments, around the region, are looking for with new ways to
kick start (invigorate) their economies. In Thailand, the government
has declared January 2 will be a holiday, in addition to the
traditional holidays of December 31 and January 1. Officials hope many
Thais will use the long break to travel and shop, giving a boost to
the tourism industry, which has been hit hard by both the global
economic crisis and domestic political tensions.

Thursday's flurry of bad news pushed some Asian stock markets lower.
Shanghai's main index was off more than 2 percent. But the benchmark
indexes in Tokyo and Seoul managed to close up by about three-quarters
of a point.

Snap ties with Pakistan: Indians
11 Dec 2008, 1300 hrs IST
With less than a fortnight gone after the terror attacks in Mumbai,
young Mumbaikars are seething and in a mood for unilateral, aggressive
action, More Pictures
whatever the consequences. Young urbanites in some of India's other
biggest cities are only a little less in 'do it now' mood.

The responses to a whole slew of questions on who must take the blame
for the attack and what should be done to tackle the menace drew
unequivocal answers from Mumbai respondents in particular. Clearly the
city is at the end of its tether and fed up of being repeatedly
targeted.

To a question on whether the Pakistani government supported the
attacks, for example, the answer was a loud Yes from 100% of those
polled in Mumbai. But it wasn't as if in other cities there were too
many people willing to buy Pakistani president Asif Ali Zardari's 'non-
state actors' line. Between 77% and 94% in the other cities too
rejected that theory.

So should India take out the terror training camps in Pakistan
irrespective of the c o n s e q u e n c e s ? Again 100% of Mumbai
respondents said yes, but in cities like Chennai and Bangalore this
was a minority view. Somewhat surprisingly, the strongest support for
such strikes apart from Mumbai, of course came from Kolkata, Lucknow
and Pune, cities that have not really felt the heat of terror too
much.

On the question of whether India should immediately snap all
commercial and social links with Pakistan, there was a more even
response across cities other than Mumbai, which again gave a 100%
thumbs up to the suggestion. However, Delhi was noticeably less
enthusiastic about it than most other cities, perhaps because of its
greater social and cultural links with Pakistani cities.

Mumbai — more than any other city — is for the idea of India
presenting all the hard evidence about Pakistan's involvement in the
terror strikes to the United Nations Security Council. That, however,
is clearly not a sign that young Mumbaikars are willing to wait for
the international community to act to solve India's problem. Whereas
only 59% overall expressed the view that terror is a problem that
India must solve on its own, in Mumbai 98% were for such a course.

Who in the political leadership must pay the price for a failure of
such a magnitude with such drastic consequences? Interestingly, while
43% overall felt the PM too must carry the can, only 11% in Mumbai
shared this view. In Chennai, in contrast, 87% said the PM too must be
held accountable. Respondents were allowed to make more than one
choice in their response to the question.

Will P Chidambaram do a much better job than Shivraj Patil in the area
of internal security? About 60% overall thought he would and only 26%
disagreed, but worryingly for the current home minister, one of the
cities less optimistic on this count was Chennai, the capital of his
home state.

The responses to a question on whether any other party could have
handled terror better were also very interesting. Not only did over
three-fourths of those in Mumbai say no party would have done a better
job, 78% in Narendra Modi's Ahmedabad too expressed this view. Clearly
young urban Indians are not willing to accept any political party's
claims to being tough on terror. Should India be willing to let go of
Kashmir if that means buying peace for the rest of the country? The
overall response is along expected lines with 76% rejecting the idea.
But what's interesting is that in Delhi a majority are willing to make
that tradeoff and perhaps more surprisingly in Ahmedabad too 38%
weren't averse to it.

Is India paying for wrong policies adopted by the developed world
towards Islamic nations? Over 60% thought it was, with Mumbai once
again agreeing wholeheartedly. In contrast, in the three southern
cities, opinion on the issue was almost evenly divided. Mumbai apart,
Ahmedabad was the city in which the largest proportion of respondents
see the West as having to share the blame for the predicament we
face.

One of the tougher options posed in the questionnaire was whether
defence budgets should be cut so that more money can be allocated for
internal security. It was truly revealing about the extent of the
insecurity felt by urban Indians that a majority (56%) said yes and
only 2% found it a difficult choice to make.

Support for the idea of cutting defence budgets to accommodate more
spending on homeland security was strongest in Bangalore (93%). In the
northern cities of Lucknow and Jaipur, however, a majority felt this
was not a very good idea.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/India/Snap_ties_with_Pakistan_Indians/articleshow/3823174.cms

Is the jobs panic justified?

11 Dec 2008, 1723 hrs IST, BusinessWeek

By: Peter Coy

It was bad enough when Iceland got into financial trouble and
practically sank into the frigid North Atlantic. It was worse when
your next-door neighbor lost his home to foreclosure. But now things
are really getting scary: Your own job may be at risk.

Unease turned to incipient panic on Dec. 5 after the government
reported that the U.S. economy lost 533,000 jobs in November, making
it the worst month for employment since the grim days of December
1974. The holiday party chatter is all about layoffs. Everyone wants
to know how long the jobs hemorrhage will last and how bad it will
get.

Forecasting job losses is incredibly difficult because a lot depends
on when banks finally get back to the business of providing credit.
The recent news on that score is not good. On Dec. 9 the Treasury
Dept. auctioned one-month bills at 0.00%—evidence that risk aversion
among potential financiers is more extreme than ever. "We've got so
far to climb out of this [financial] hole that if we start today, then
on any reasonable time path we might still be climbing out a year from
now," says Robert V. DiClemente, chief U.S. economist of Citigroup (C)
in New York. Predicts the AFL-CIO's chief economist, Ron Blackwell:
"Things will get worse, perhaps much worse, before they get better."


Also Read
? New rage at work: Used, revamped IT gear
? Six tips to help you land a new job
? Layoffs are not the only answer to beat slump


That said, this job bust won't last forever. There are forces at play
that will eventually pull the economy out of its free fall. The key is
smart government policy that sets politics aside. It must provide a
combination of short-term consumer stimulus and long-term investments
without stepping over the line into wasteful and innovation-stifling
industrial policy.

BusinessWeek asked top economists from Wall Street, academia, labor,
and business, and got a wide range of predictions for what lies ahead.
The optimists see job growth as soon as spring, with the economy
losing only about 750,000 more jobs between now and then. The
pessimists predict the economy will keep losing jobs until late next
year or 2010, with additional losses of well over 2 million jobs,
bringing the peak-to-trough decline to more than 4 million. All of the
forecasts take into account President-elect Barack Obama's pledge to
"save or create" 2.5 million jobs—implying that these predictions
would be even more dire if no additional stimulus were planned.

The quick-snapback scenario assumes a reasonably healthy financial
sector. If the financial system keeps struggling, though, the spiral
will continue: Cash-strapped companies will be forced to step up
layoffs, causing cutbacks in consumer spending that will push
employers to cut even more jobs. "I've been cautioning everybody that
as long as financial conditions are as impaired as they are, questions
about when the job market will hit bottom are premature," says
Citigroup's DiClemente.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Is_the_jobs_panic_justified/articleshow/3823952.cms

Cos look at ways to cut tax on global deals


10 Dec 2008, 0119 hrs IST, ET Bureau
NEW DELHI: Indian corporate houses are now paying more attention to
minimise their tax outgo while doing business internationally, says a
global tax
survey released on Monday by audit and advisory firm Ernst & Young.

Indian tax executives are spending more time on a key barometer of
efficiency in a business spanning different countries — the effective
tax rate (ETR) or the net global tax outgo, says the survey. A lower
ETR indicates sophistication in organising an international supply
chain, said a senior official with the audit firm.

Greater attention on the net global tax outgo will increasingly become
crucial as countries, which are now slashing taxes to stimulate their
economies, would attempt to shore up their revenues once their
economies sail through the current crisis, E&Y national director, tax
and regulatory services, Srinivasa Rao told ET.

“Almost 70% of respondents (tax executives) report that ETR planning
is either very important or critically important to the tax function.
42% of the Indian respondents to the survey report that ETR planning
is critically important to their tax function,” said the survey titled
— Steady course: unchartered waters. Attention on the tax burden on
account of cross-border commerce indicates the global integration of
India’s economy.

However, the awareness about ETR among Indian tax professionals is
still way below the global average, although Indian companies are
growing big in international markets, says the survey.

“The survey of 541 tax executives from 18 countries (including India)
shows that the majority of respondents now spend up to 20% of their
time on tax risk issues. In India, the figure is slightly lower with
many of the respondents (31%) spending around 10% of their time on tax
risk issues. Improving the tax function to address risks is vital, and
more than 90% of respondents say that tax risk management will be an
important area for them over the next two years,” the survey says.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/3815716.cms

Layoffs are not the only answer to beat slump
10 Dec 2008, 2002 hrs IST, BusinessWeek

By Rick Wartzman

The layoff announcements are mounting by the day: 50,000 at Citigroup,
12,000 at AT&T, 6,000 at Sun Microsystems, 2,500 at DuPont, 1,200 at
United Airlines, 850 at Viacom.

In all, major U.S. companies said in November that they were going to
whack 181,671 jobs, the outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas
reported this week. That was the most since January 2002 and brought
the total number of reductions planned this year to more than 1
million. On Dec. 5 the Labor Dept. said nonfarm payrolls fell by a
larger-than-expected 533,000, while the unemployment rate climbed to
6.7%, its highest point since October 1993.

Given the fragile state of the economy, it's not surprising that
employers are more likely to hand their workers a pink slip than a
turkey this Christmas. But perhaps bloodletting isn't the only answer.
Certainly, it isn't the only one that Peter Drucker would prescribe.

Not that Drucker was blind to the need for keeping a lid on costs.
Indeed, he taught that enterprises big and small should always be
asking themselves not how to make a particular aspect of the business
more efficient but whether it should exist at all. "The question
should be: 'Would the roof cave in if we stopped doing this work
altogether?'" Drucker explained. "And if the answer is 'probably not,'
one eliminates the operation. It is always amazing how many of the
things we do will never be missed."


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Auto Sales Worst Since 1983
Factory Slump Puts China on Verge of 'Recession'



What's important, Drucker said, is to make this a routine exercise—not
something that happens only during downturns. "Businesses that
actually succeed in cutting costs," he said, "don't wait until they
have to cut costs."

Investing in Knowledge Workers

In the same way, Drucker believed in investing in productive assets as
a regular, everyday function—and there was no doubt as to where he
thought investment should be channeled in this day and age. "The most
valuable assets of the 20th century company were its production
equipment," he wrote. "The most valuable asset of a 21st century
institution...will be its knowledge workers."

One person who has acted on these words—with extraordinary results to
show for it—is K.H. Moon, the former chief executive of Korean
consumer-products maker Yuhan-Kimberly. (Full disclosure: Moon, who is
now a member of national Parliament in Seoul, until recently served on
the board of the Drucker Institute, which I run.)

It was during the late 1990s, amid the Asian financial contagion, that
Moon looked around and was disgusted by what he saw. "At almost all
companies," he recalls, "the management just followed the old wisdom—
massive layoffs."

Yet Moon felt that simply to slash employment was irresponsible, and
he began to persuade his colleagues that there was a better way to go—
not just to survive but to grow and prosper. This "was not the time to
lose jobs," he says, "but to build our capability, personally and
companywide."

To get there, Moon took several bold steps. One was to accelerate a
push to a new staffing system, moving from a three-crew, three-shift
arrangement to a four-crew, two-shift model. By spreading out the work
this way—Moon has likened it to "job sharing in Western countries"—the
company figures it has been able to employ 25% more mill workers than
it otherwise would have.


The Economic Crisis - A Conspiracy by US Government, American
Jews
October 22, 2008 No. 2091
Memri Dispatch 2091

Arab Columnists: The Economic Crisis - A Conspiracy by U.S.
Government, American Jews
In recent articles, several Arab columnists wrote that the global
economic crisis is the result of a conspiracy by the U.S. government,
by American Jews, and/or by the Zionists. They claimed that the
conspirators were aiming to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian
state, to seize Arab wealth, and to take over the global economy - all
as a means of increasing their influence in the world.

Following are excerpts from the articles:

Egyptian Parliamentary Foreign Liaison Committee Head: Economic Crisis
"Part of Global Political Conspiracy"

Egyptian Parliamentary Foreign Liaison Committee head Dr. Mustafa Al-
Fiqqi wrote in the London daily Al-Hayat: "During the summer holidays,
I was preoccupied with the global issue of the conspiracy theory. I
examined everything that was happening around me in light of this
theory, applying historical analysis to gain insight into events and
opinions. [I was led to this] after scrutinizing, on a daily basis,
the financial crisis that has shaken the American economy, impacting
banks and markets, individuals and institutions, salaries and
allowances...

"In my opinion, the current economic crisis, which is expected to get
worse, is a new kind of conspiracy. It started in September, only
seven years after the first [conspiracy, i.e. the September 11
attacks]. This time, the aim is to take over the property and capital
of the Arabs, and to create a new climate of economic plundering in
the wake of the political plundering. Such is the Western mentality -
it excels at reaping what others have sown and at seizing anything
that they have no right [to take]...

"The Bush administration was trained and impelled, by the American
conservative right and by Jewish circles, to carry out this mission
[in two stages] - at the beginning of [Bush's] first term in office,
and at the end of his second term in office. The aim is to achieve two
major goals - a global political [goal] in 2001, and a global economic
[goal] in 2008. There is no doubt that small nations, poor countries,
and areas rich in natural resources - especially oil - are bearing the
brunt [of the economic crisis]. I assert that the developments
sanctioned by this American administration - which, in my opinion, is
the worst in history - is the result of a hidden conspiracy, whose
results are now evident and clear to every sensible person...

"There is a close connection between [the events of] September 2001
and [those of] September 2008, which are mutually complementary, in
that political influence cannot be achieved without economic control.
Accordingly, the current U.S. administration has placed both together
in one bag, producing [a single] new phenomenon that has encompassed
the entire world and has demonstrated that the end of the political
cold war does not [necessarily] mean an end to the economic cold
war...

"Let me only say that, in my opinion, it would be wrong to assume that
the Jewish mind is not involved and implicated in these developments.
I reiterate that the global economic crisis is part of the global
political conspiracy..." [1]


Lebanese Columnist: The Crisis is a Move Devised by the Jewish Mind
and the Zionist Lobby

Lebanese columnist Fuad Matar wrote in the Lebanese daily Al-Liwa and
Saudi daily Al-Yawm that the Jews and the global Zionist movement had
deliberately instigated the financial crisis in order to prevent Bush
from fulfilling his promise to establish a Palestinian state before
the end of his presidency.

Matar wrote: "While financial crises are natural, especially in
capitalist regimes such as the U.S., the gravity of the [current]
crisis, its co-occurrence with the impending end of [Bush's] term in
office, and the statements made by [Bush] himself and by his senior
aides... who promised that Bush would fulfill his promise before the
end of his term as president, and that two coexisting states would
emerge [in Palestine] - [all] this compels us to raise the possibility
that global Zionism is behind the financial crisis. [Its object is] to
prevent President Bush from continuing his efforts to fulfill his
promise, especially after he stated - nay, almost swore - before Arab
and international leaders that he would not step down before a
Palestinian state was established.

"Some might [disagree with me,] saying that Jewish money and the
Jewish mind constitute the main nerve of the financial world and of
the real estate investment [sector] in the U.S., and that it is
therefore hardly likely that Zionism would destroy financial, real
estate and investment institutions in which [Zionists] play an active
role, whether as shareholders or executives, [merely in order] to
embarrass the U.S. president and prevent him from fulfilling his
promise to establish a Palestinian state, which... would jeopardize
the continued existence of Israel.

"[However,] if the [Palestinian] state is established, it will be
entitled to some of the money that has [heretofore] gone directly into
Israel's pocket. [Indeed,] a large part of this money would go to
Palestine, [both] for the purpose of rebuilding it, and in order to
stamp out revolutionary ideas, and any notions the Palestinians might
harbor regarding their religious and historical right to Palestine and
regarding the right of return.

"[So] why is it illogical to assume that this is indeed what happened
- especially considering [the fact that] the mind that used other
people's money to plan and build the institutions that are [now]
collapsing is capable of building others to replace them? [Moreover,]
it owns media outlets of every description - [e.g.] newspapers and
television stations, both land and satellite - which will cause people
to [work with] these institutions and invest in them again, as if
nothing ever happened.

"It must be mentioned that those who lost [money as a result of the
economic crisis in the U.S.] are not those masterminds and capital
owners [i.e. the Zionists], but rather the Arabs - [specifically] the
moderately wealthy and the ordinary people - and also those who,
[tempted by] the American dream, came to the U.S. from China, Europe,
the Arab world, Russia, and from some of the Asian countries, and
saved money in order to invest it and make a profit.

"[Moreover], one can suppose that the Zionists made a significant
change in their plans, [and decided that] the time has come to
transfer the Zionist strategic base from the U.S. to Europe, when the
possibility arose that a black man, Barak Obama, would head the U.S.
They have focused [their efforts] on East European countries, such as
the Czech Republic, Romania and Hungary.

"Among the signs [that support] this supposition is [the fact that]
they brought to power French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who is of
Jewish origin and is sympathetic to the Jews. [They may also produce]
another Sarkozy to replace the current prime minister of Britain,
Gordon Brown, who is in the midst of a serious leadership crisis that
may end his [political career], as happened to Margaret Thatcher.
After Britain, they will attempt to press other governments into their
service..." [2]

University Lecturer and Columnist Dr. Umayma Al-Jalahma: The
Rothschilds Are Behind the Crisis

Dr. Umayma Ahmad Al-Jalahma, lecturer at King Faysal University in
Saudi Arabia, claimed that the global economic crisis was instigated
by the Rothschild family as part of an ongoing campaign to take over
the world financial markets. In an Al-Watan article titled "Who Is
behind the American Crisis?" she wrote:

"Like many others, I too am following the severe financial crisis in
the U.S., [and contemplating] the possibility that it may spread to
[other countries] in the West and East. [Examining this crisis,] I see
only the recurrence of previous global crises, whose instigators
always remained hidden behind the scenes. Since I believe that the
real value of learning history does not lie in merely knowing the
facts, but in absorbing them and taking a lesson from them... I will
[now] present historical events [related to] wealthy families that are
still with us today and are still managing money, which has become the
source of their global influence and hegemony.

"Some say that the facts of the current American crisis are clear, and
that there is nothing hiding behind the scenes, but I disagree. [I
believe that] those hiding behind the scenes are numerous. [These are
forces] that are accustomed to staying hidden and working in the dark,
especially [when the moment is right] and hegemonies are ripe for
toppling.

"One of these [forces] is the Rothschild family, owner of a global
financial empire... I will describe here [several] fiscal plans that
this financial octopus [has put into effect and] has exploited their
outcomes - [plans] which were based on the destruction of countries
and peoples.


"In 1815 the Battle of Waterloo between Britain and France took place,
and in it Napoleon was defeated by the commander of the British army,
[the Duke of] Wellington. It must be mentioned that the Rothschild
family financed both sides, since it gave Napoleon 5,000,000 liras,
while other sons of that family smuggled huge amounts of gold through
France for Wellington's [use]. And why not? [In their eyes,] the end
justifies the means, and their goal was to control the capital and
thereby to control the world.

"Many historians have pointed out that immediately after the British
victory, agents secretly sent word of this victory to the Rothschilds
in Britain. The head of the family, Nathan Rothschild, concealed the
news, spreading rumors of a French victory. [Then] he sold all his
shares in the London stock exchange, and urged other shareholders
associated with him to do the same. Within a few hours stock prices
plummeted, and when the price reached five cents [a share], Nathan
hurried to buy all the shares in the market at this low price. On the
morrow, London awoke to the news of a British victory and of a
financial crisis that brought all the shareholders to ruin. The price
of the shares bought by Rothschild and his associates rose twentyfold
within a few hours. A few years later, Nathan said of this deal: 'It
was the best move I ever made.'

"The [Rothschilds] did not stop there, for they also wanted to take
over the French financial markets. France, for its part, meant to
borrow funds from French banks to cover the astronomical cost of its
defeat... but the Rothschilds manipulated the prices of the French
government bonds, which had been high the year before. [At that point,
their price] began to fall for no apparent reason, and the Rothschilds
came and bought them up by means of their agents in France.

"This family is still alive and making money; in fact, its influence
is still growing, and now spans Europe, America, Japan and other
[countries]. Whether it sits [openly] at the discussion table or hides
behind the scenes, it has influence. Moreover, the active part it
played in the advent of Zionism and in the occupation of Arab
Palestine is clear to all..." [3]
----------------------------------------------------------------

[1] Al-Hayat (London), October 7, 2008.

[2] Al-Liwa (Lebanon), October 3, 2008; Al-Yawm (Saudi Arabia),
October 5, 2008.

[3] Al-Watan (Saudi Arabia), October 5, 2008. Umayma Al-Jalahma has
published other antisemitic articles, including one in which she
accused the Jews of killing teenagers for ritual purposes for the
festival of Purim. See MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 354,"Saudi
Government Daily: Jews Use Teenagers' Blood for 'Purim' Pastries,"
January 12, 2002, http://www.memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=subjects&Area=antisemitism&ID=SP35402#_edn1.
For more by Al-Jalahma, see Special Dispatch No. 494, "Author of Saudi
Blood Libel and Professor at King Faysal University Lectures at Arab
League Think Tank: 'U.S. War on Iraq Timed To Coincide With Jewish
Holiday Purim,'" April 11, 2003, http://memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=archives&Area=sd&ID=SP49403
and

Special Dispatch No. 547, "King Faysal University Professor: Jews
Consider Iraq Part of Greater Israel," August 5, 2003,
http://memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=archives&Area=sd&ID=SP54703.

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Zionism’s dead end: Separation or ethnic cleansing? Israel’s encaging
of Gaza aims to achieve both


by Jonathan Cook


Global Research, June 27, 2008



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The following is taken from a talk delivered at the Conference for the
Right of Return and the Secular Democratic State, held in Haifa on
June 21.

In 1895 Theodor Herzl, Zionism’s chief prophet, confided in his diary
that he did not favour sharing Palestine with the natives. Better, he
wrote, to “try to spirit the penniless [Palestinian] population across
the border by denying it any employment in our own country … Both the
process of expropriation and the removal of the poor must be carried
out discreetly and circumspectly.”

He was proposing a programme of Palestinian emigration enforced
through a policy of strict separation between Jewish immigrants and
the indigenous population. In simple terms, he hoped that, once
Zionist organisations had bought up large areas of Palestine and owned
the main sectors of the economy, Palestinians could be made to leave
by denying them rights to work the land or labour in the Jewish-run
economy. His vision was one of transfer, or ethnic cleansing, through
ethnic separation.

Herzl was suggesting that two possible Zionist solutions to the
problem of a Palestinian majority living in Palestine -- separation
and transfer -- were not necessarily alternatives but rather could be
mutually reinforcing. Not only that: he believed, if they were used
together, the process of ethnic cleansing could be made to appear
voluntary, the choice of the victims. It may be that this was both his
most enduring legacy and his major innovation to settler colonialism.

In recent years, with the Palestinian population under Israeli rule
about to reach parity with the Jewish population, the threat of a
Palestinian majority has loomed large again for the Zionists. Not
surprisingly, debates about which of these two Zionist solutions to
pursue, separation or transfer, have resurfaced.

Today these solutions are ostensibly promoted by two ideological camps
loosely associated with Israel’s centre-left (Labor and Kadima) and
right (Likud and Yisrael Beiteinu). The modern political arguments
between them turn on differing visions of the nature of a Jewish state
orginally put forward by Labor and Revisionist Zionists.

To make sense of the current political debates, and the events taking
place inside Israel and in the West Bank and Gaza, let us first
examine the history of these two principles in Zionist thinking.

During the early waves of Jewish immigration to Palestine, the
dominant Labor Zionist movement and its leader David Ben Gurion
advanced policies much in line with Herzl’s goal. In particular, they
promoted the twin principles of “Redemption of the Land” and “Hebrew
Labor”, which took as their premise the idea that Jews needed to
separate themselves from the native population in working the land and
employing only other Jews. By being entirely self-reliant in
Palestine, Jews could both “cure” themselves of their tainted Diaspora
natures and deprive the Palestinians of the opportunity to subsist in
their own homeland.

At the forefront of this drive was the Zionist trade union federation,
the Histadrut, which denied membership to Palestinians -- and, for
many years after the establishment of the Jewish state, even to the
remants of the Palestinian population who became Israeli citizens.

But if separation was the official policy of Labor Zionism, behind the
scenes Ben Gurion and his officials increasingly appreciated that it
would not be enough in itself to achieve their goal of a pure ethnic
state. Land sales remained low, at about 6 per cent of the territory,
and the Jewish-owned parts of the economy relied on cheap Palestinian
labour.

Instead, the Labor Zionists secretly began working on a programme of
ethnic cleansing. After 1937 and Britain’s Peel Report proposing
partition of Palestine, Ben Gurion was more open about transfer,
recognising that a Jewish state would be impossible unless most of the
indigenous population was cleared from within its borders.

Israel’s new historians have acknowledged Ben Gurion’s commitment to
transfer. As Benny Morris notes, for example, Ben Gurion “understood
that there could be no Jewish state with a large and hostile Arab
minority in its midst.” The Israeli leadership therefore developed a
plan for ethnic cleansing under cover of war, compiling detailed
dossiers on the communities that needed to be driven out and then
passing on the order, in Plan Dalet, to commanders in the field.
During the 1948 war the new state of Israel was emptied of at least 80
per cent of its indigenous population.

In physically expelling the Palestinian population, Ben Gurion
responded to the political opportunities of the day and recalibrated
the Labor Zionism of Herzl. In particular he achieved the goal of
displacement desired by Herzl while also largely persuading the world
through a campaign of propaganda that the exodus of the refugees was
mostly voluntary. In one of the most enduring Zionist myths,
convincingly rebutted by modern historians, we are still told that the
refugees left because they were told to do so by the Arab leadership.

The other camp, the Revisionists, had a far more ambivalent attitude
to the native Palestinian population. Paradoxically, given their
uncompromising claim to a Greater Israel embracing both banks of the
Jordan River (thereby including not only Palestine but also the modern
state of Jordan), they were more prepared than the Labor Zionists to
allow the natives to remain where they were.

Vladimir Jabotinsky, the leader of Revisionism, observed in 1938 --
possibly in a rebuff to Ben Gurion’s espousal of transfer -- that “it
must be hateful for any Jew to think that the rebirth of a Jewish
state should ever be linked with such an odious suggestion as the
removal of non-Jewish citizens”. The Revisionists, it seems, were
resigned to the fact that the enlarged territory they desired would
inevitably include a majority of Arabs. They were therefore less
concerned with removing the natives than finding a way to make them
accept Jewish rule.

In 1923, Jabotinsky formulated his answer, one that implicitly
included the notion of separation but not necessarily transfer: an
“iron wall” of unremitting force to cow the natives into submission.
In his words, the agreement of the Palestinians to their subjugation
could be reached only “through the iron wall, that is to say, the
establishment in Palestine of a force that will in no way be
influenced by Arab pressure”.

An enthusiast of British imperial rule, Jabotinsky envisioned the
future Jewish state in simple colonial terms, as a European elite
ruling over the native population.

Inside Revisionism, however, there was a shift from the idea of
separation to transfer that mirrored developments inside Labor
Zionism. This change was perhaps more opportunistic than ideological,
and was particularly apparent as the Revisionists sensed Ben Gurion’s
success in forging a Jewish state through transfer.

One of Jabotinsky disciples, Menachem Begin, who would later become a
Likud prime minister, was leader in 1948 of the Irgun militia that
committed one of the worst atrocities of the war. He led his fighters
into the Palestinian village of Deir Yassin where they massacred over
100 inhabitants, including women and children.

Savage enough though these events were, Begin and his followers
consciously inflated the death toll to more than 250 through the pages
of the New York Times. Their goal was to spread terror among the wider
Palestinian population and encourage them to flee. He later happily
noted: “Arabs throughout the country, induced to believe wild tales of
‘Irgun butchery’, were seized with limitless panic and started to flee
for their lives. This mass flight soon developed into a maddened,
uncontrollable stampede.”

Subsequently, other prominent figures on the right openly espoused
ethnic cleansing, including the late General Rehavam Ze’evi, whose
Moledet party campaigned in elections under the symbol of the Hebrew
character “tet”, for transfer. His successor, Benny Elon, a settler
leader and rabbi, adopted a similar platform: “Only population
transfer can bring peace”.

The intensity of the separation vs transfer debate subsided after 1948
and the ethnic cleansing campaign that removed most of the native
Palestinian population from the Jewish state. The Palestinian minority
left behind -- a fifth of the population but a group, it was widely
assumed, that would soon be swamped by Jewish immigration -- was seen
as an irritation but not yet as a threat. It was placed under a
military government for nearly two decades, a system designed to
enforce separation between Palestinians and Jews inside Israel. Such
separation -- in education, employment and residence -- exists to this
day, even if in a less extreme form.

The separation-transfer debate was chiefly revived by Israel’s
conquest of the West Bank and Gaza in 1967. With Israel’s erasure of
the Green Line, and the effective erosion of the distinction between
Palestinians in Israel and the occupied territories, the problem of a
Palestinian majority again loomed large for the Zionists.

Cabinet debates from 1967 show the quandary faced by the government.
Almost alone, Moshe Dayan favoured annexation of both the newly
captured territories and the Palestinian population there. Others
believed that such a move would be seen as transparently colonialist
and rapidly degenerate into an apartheid system of Jewish citizens and
Palestinian non-citizens. In their minds, Jabotinsky’s solution of an
iron wall was no longer viable.

But equally, in a more media-saturated era, which at least paid lip-
service to human rights, the government could see no way to expel the
Palestinian population on a large scale and annex the land, as Ben
Gurion had done earlier. Also possibly, they could see no way of
persuading the world that such expulsions should be characterised as
voluntary.

Israel therefore declined to move decisively in either direction,
neither fully carrying out a transfer programme nor enforcing strict
separation. Instead it opted for an apartheid model that accommodated
Dayan’s suggestion of a “creeping annexation” of the occupied
territories that he rightly believed would go largely unnoticed by the
West.

The separation embodied in South African apartheid differed from
Herzl’s notion of separation in one important respect: in apartheid,
the “other” population was a necessary, even if much abused, component
of the political arrangement. As the exiled Palestinian thinker Azmi
Bishara has noted, in South Africa “racial segregation was not
absolute. It took place within a framework of political unity. The
racist regime saw blacks as part of the system, an ingredient of the
whole. The whites created a racist hierarchy within the unity.”

In other words, the self-reliance, or unilateralism, implicit in
Herzl’s concept of separation was ignored for many years of Israel’s
occupation. The Palestinian labour force was exploited by Israel just
as black workers were by South Africa. This view of the Palestinians
was formalised in the Oslo accords, which were predicated on the kind
of separation needed to create a captive labour force.

However, Yitzhak Rabin’s version of apartheid embodied by the Oslo
process, and Binyamin Netanyahu’s opposition in upholding Jabotinsky’s
vision of Greater Israel, both deviated from Herzl’s model of transfer
through separation. This is largely why each political current has
been subsumed within the recent but more powerful trend towards
“unilateral separation”.

Not surprisingly, the policy of “unilateral separation” emerged from
among the Labor Zionists, advocated primarily by Ehud Barak. However,
it was soon adopted by many members of Likud too. Ultimately its
success derived from the conversion to its cause of Greater Israel’s
arch-exponent, Ariel Sharon. He realised the chief manifestations of
unilateral separation, the West Bank wall and the Gaza disengagement,
as well breaking up Israel’s rightwing to create a new consensus
party, Kadima.

In the new consensus, the transfer of Palestinians could be achieved
through imposed and absolute separation -- just as Herzl had once
hoped. After the Gaza disengagement, the next stage was promoted by
Sharon’s successor, Ehud Olmert. His plan for convergence, limited
withdrawals from the West Bank in which most settlers would remain in
place, has been dropped, but its infrastructure -- the separation wall
-- continues to be built.


How will modern Zionists convert unilateral separation into transfer?
How will Herzl’s original vision of ethnic cleansing enforced through
strict ethnic separation be realised in today’s world?

The current siege of Gaza offers the template. After disengagement,
Israel has been able to cut off at will Gazans’ access to aid, food,
fuel and humanitarian services. Normality has been further eroded by
sonic booms, random Israeli air attacks, and repeated small-scale
invasions that have inflicted a large toll of casualties, particularly
among civilians.

Gaza’s imprisonment has stopped being a metaphor and become a daily
reality. In fact, Gaza’s condition is far worse than imprisonment:
prisoners, even of war, expect to have their humanity respected, and
be properly sheltered, cared for, fed and clothed. Gazans can no
longer rely on these staples of life.

The ultimate goal of this extreme form of separation is patently
clear: transfer. By depriving Palestinians of the basic conditions of
a normal life, it is assumed that they will eventually choose to leave
-- in what can once again be sold to the world as a voluntary exodus.
And if Palestinians choose to abandon their homeland, then in Zionist
thinking they have forfeited their right to it -- just as earlier
generations of Zionists believed the Palestinian refugees had done by
supposedly fleeing during the 1948 and 1967 wars.

Is this process of transfer inevitable? I think not. The success of a
modern policy of “transfer through separation” faces severe
limitations.

First, it depends on continuing US global hegemony and blind support
for Israel. Such support is likely to be undermined by the current
American misadventures in the Middle East, and a gradual shift in the
balance of power to China, Russia and India.

Second, it requires a Zionist worldview that departs starkly not only
from international law but also from the values upheld by most
societies and ideologies. The nature of Zionist ambitions is likely to
be ever harder to conceal, as is evident from the tide of opinion
polls showing that Western publics, if not their governments, believe
Israel to be one of the biggest threats to world order.

And third, it assumes that the Palestinians will remain passive during
their slow eradication. The historical evidence most certainly shows
that they will not.

Jonathan Cook is a writer and journalist based in Nazareth, Israel.
His latest books are “Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq,
Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East” (Pluto, 2008), and
“Disappearing Palestine” (Zed, forthcoming).

Jonathan Cook is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global
Research Articles by Jonathan Cook

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9461

anti-caste
on caste, communalism, and class struggle in South Asia
http://diary.typepad.com/anticaste/notes-towards-a-materialist-analysis-of-caste.html
notes towards a materialist analysis of caste in India


Marx touched on the caste system in a number of places. See
particularly his classic description of the Indian village community
in Capital (Vol. I, Part IV, Chap. XIV, Section 4) which, along with
related passages from Marx’s writings, is discussed and evaluated by
Indian Marxist economic historian Irfan Habib in his essay on “Caste
in Indian History” (1987) and also in his “Marx’s Perception of
India” (1983).

Marx saw the Indian caste system as a special solution to the problem
of the division of labor before the rise of capitalism. Outside of the
village community--in towns or in the trade of surplus goods between
villages--castes traditionally functioned as hereditary guilds. Inside
the village community, where Marx understood there to be no commodity
trade at all, castes functioned as an “unalterable division of labor”
providing for those necessary crafts and services too specialized to
be done in individual peasant households (and which therefore could
not be supplied by the domestic “blending of agriculture and
handicraft”). These service castes--the barber, the washerman, the
potter, and so on--were “maintained at the expense of the whole
community.” So the caste system allowed each village to be self-
sufficient, while at the same time maximizing the surplus that could
be extracted in the form of rent by the state.

The need for some such system to guarantee the minimally necessary
division of labor in agriculturally based class societies without a
developed monetary economy is explained in Norwegian anthropologist
Fredrik Barth’s illuminating study of “The System of Social
Stratification in Swat,” an outlying region in northwest Pakistan
(published in Leach, 1960). Barth points out that agricultural
activity peaks twice a year: at planting and harvest times. To get the
most out of the land, all the technical resources of the community
need to be mobilized to act in coordination with each other and the
work going on in the fields. If a hoe breaks, a smith needs to be
ready to mend it promptly, and that would never happen if the village
smith needed to devote his time and energy to his own plot at these
peak seasons. Barth explains that while in a monetary economy the
necessary specialization and coordination between specialists (between
the smith and the carpenter to repair the hoe, for example) could be
achieved through wages or cash payments between individuals, in an
essentially non-monetary economy production teams need to be assembled
on some other basis. In Swat, “[i]n the definition of its boundaries,
and in its system of sharing profits, each team is hierarchically and
centrally organized. The landowner [that is, an upper-caste landlord]
is the pivot on which the organization is based.” Members of dependent
service castes are obliged to work for the landlord in return for a
traditionally apportioned share of the harvest. Thus caste duties
serve to organize production.

What is particularly interesting from a materialist perspective about
this example is that the peoples of Swat are all Sunni Muslims who not
only find no warrant for hierarchical caste distinctions in their
official religious ideology but a good deal against them. What this
says about the purely supplementary place of ideology in the caste
system, limited to reflecting and reinforcing the basic material
relations, need not be underlined.

The production relations described by Barth, as he points out, closely
resemble the system of patronage which continues to exist throughout
the subcontinent in a more or less advanced state of decay. First
described in the 1930s, it’s been called the jajmani system by
anthropologists. The system defines hereditary duties of service and
patronage between lower-caste jajmans and upper-caste, landholding
kamins. Under this system, unlike classic patron-client relations,
kamins actually own the services of their jajmans and their respective
descendants and can buy and sell them (the services, not the people).
A comparative theoretical analysis of the studies of the jajmani
system published up to 1963 was usefully carried out by the American
anthropologist Pauline Kolenda in “Toward a Model of the Hindu Jajmani
System,” which includes an extensive bibliography.

Since then in an important 1966 paper, the Japanese historian Hiroshi
Fukazawa established that for the area whose records he studied in the
medieval Deccan the jajmani system only applied to the priestly caste
(brahmins); other service castes were not family servants tied to
individual landowners but servants of the village as a whole, as
described by Marx and his sources. Fukazawa speculated that
descriptions of modern jajman-kamin relations represented not the
survival of an age-old traditional system, as had been presumed, but
the decay of the traditional system under colonialism. This finding
has been confirmed and extended by the American historian Peter Mayer
in his “Inventing Village Tradition: The Late 19th Century Origins of
the North Indian ‘Jajmani System’” (1993).

For an exposition of the contemporary decay of the jajmani system, see
Patronage and Exploitation (1974) by Dutch labor sociologist Jan
Breman.

Possibly relevant to the analysis of the Indian caste system is the
concept of a “people-class” developed by the Belgian-Jewish Trotskyist
Abram Leon in his materialist study of the Jews, whom he argues
“constitute historically a social group with a specific economic
function.” Leon describes how this special function necessarily
operated in the context of a larger, alien political economy (“in the
pores” of European feudalism, as Marx put it), and notes that Jewish
communities were set apart from the surrounding society by language,
religious custom, and internal social organization. The Jews were
defined as a caste by Max Weber and, in the Marxist tradition, by
Kautsky; then-Trotskyist Max Shachtman in the 1933 document published
as Race and Revolution notes that it was Lenin’s preferred term for
them. Dozens more such economically specialized, socially isolated
“self-reproducing but not self-sufficient communities” around the
world and throughout history are listed by historian Yuri Slezkine in
the suggestive first chapter of The Jewish Century (2004). Not all of
these groups are commonly called castes, but they could be; all the
groups I know of that are commonly called castes have a traditional
occupation or economic role, be it current or historical.

On how and why the peoples of South Asia organized themselves into the
caste society par excellence, see Caste: The Emergence of the South
Asian Social System by the American anthropologist Morton Klass. Klass
proposes that the caste system was originally formed through the
combination of individual primitive egalitarian clans into a class-
stratified settled society with the rise of agriculture. In this view,
each former clan was forced to find its own economic niche inside the
new society as either a group controlling access to the land or one
providing services to (primarily) the landed groups; these groups
meanwhile retained the kinship boundaries that kept them socially
separate. Although Klass describes his theoretical approach as
“eclectic,” his basic argument is actually historical materialist. His
identification of the local marriage-circle as the basic functional
social unit of the caste system is particularly clarifying.

(September 2008)





rfan Habib, Essays in Indian History, Tulika Books, New Dehli, 1995.



Fredrik Barth, in E.R. Leach (ed.), Aspects of Caste in South India,
Ceylon and North-West Pakistan, Cambridge UP 1960.



Pauline Kolenda, Caste, Cult and Hierarchy, Folklore Institute, 1983.

Hiroshi Fukazawa, The Medieval Deccan, Oxford UP 1991.


Peter Mayer, “Inventing Village Tradition: The Late 19th Century
Origins of the North Indian ‘Jajmani System,’” Modern Asian Studies,
Vol. 27, No. 2 (May 1993).

Jan Breman, Patronage and Exploitation: Changing Agrarian Relations in
South Gujarat, India, University of Califronia Press, 1974.

Abram Leon, The Jewish Question: A Marxist Interpretation, Pathfinder,
1970.

Yuri Slezkine, The Jewish Century, Princeton UP, 2004.


Morton Klass, Caste: The Emergence of the South Asian Social System,
Institute for the Study of Human Issues (ISHI), 1980.

on some recent atrocities against untouchables



Here are three cases of atrocities (the term used for hate crimes
against untouchables) recently reported in the Indian press.

On May 21 in a village called Thinniam in the state of Tamil Nadu a
housing dispute between a caste-Hindu man and two untouchables ended
with the untouchables being forced to eat human excrement. On
September 7 another untouchable in an unrelated land dispute was
forced by six caste Hindus to drink urine. (Outlook magazine, November
6, 2002)

The third atrocity took place in Duleena, Jhajjar district in the
north Indian state of Haryana. On October 15 a mob returning from
celebrations for the Hindu festival of Dussera lynched five
untouchables for skinning a dead cow. They were murdered in a police
station in the presence of three subdivisional magistrates, the Deputy
Superintendent of Police, and about 60 to 70 police (Report of the
Left Parties Delegation to Duleena, Jhajjar District Haryana, October
18, 2002). This lynching was part of the cow protection campaign taken
up by the ruling BJP and lumpen Hindu-fascist gangs like Bhajaranga
Dal and Vishwa Hindu Parishad, which is mainly directed against
Muslims.

As heinous as these incidents are, they are not typical. More typical
atrocities involve burning down hundreds of huts in untouchable
colonies and massacring the people who live there, often scores of
them at a time. Two such incidents occured in Andhra Pradesh, where I
was born, in 1985 and 1991. In 1985 nine untouchables were murdered in
Karamchedu when an untouchable woman objected to the caste Hindus
using the untouchable drinking pond for washing their buffalos. In
1991 15 untouchables were killed in Chundur after an untouchable man
put his feet up in a movie theater.

Between 1995 and 1997, 300 untouchables were killed in the state of
Bihar alone and in three large massacres over the following two years
more than 100 more were killed. Between 1994 and 1996, 98,349 cases of
atrocities were registered with the police nationwide (Broken People,
Human Rights Watch, 1999).

India is a caste-ridden society and untouchables are at the very
bottom of the hierarchy. They are forced to live in impoverished,
segregated colonies on the outskirts of towns and villages and to take
up the most menial or degrading jobs, such as those dealing with dead
animals and human feces. (The Jhajjar untouchables who were lynched
for skinning a dead cow were actually performing the occupation forced
upon them by caste law.) Until the 1920s untouchables did not even
have their own segregated water sources. They had no free access to
any water at all. They had to beg the caste Hindus to pour water for
them. As a result of struggles led by missionary-educated Christian
untouchable teachers they now have separate water sources in most
villages--they have taken a step up to Jim Crow. Even this
pathetically limited demand provoked bloody opposition from the caste
Hindus. In the villages you can still see old Christian teachers with
their hands chopped off.

Over 14% of India's population--160 million people--are considered
untouchable. 520 million more belong to oppressed backward castes with
traditional occupations like weaving, washing, pottery, and cutting
hair, and over 60 million are members of scheduled tribes. Upper-caste
Hindus make up only 15% of the population.

After decades of covertly casteist and communalist Congress rule, the
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) now makes Hindu chauvinism based on the
caste system its open political program. And this encourages attacks
on untouchables as well as on Muslims and other minorities. The rise
of the BJP and Hindu fascism began in 1992 with the demolition of the
Babri Mosque and the massacre of over 2000 Muslims in its wake.

The so-called communists in India today argue that raising the caste
question blurs the primacy of class. Class is primary, but the working
class has to take up the cause of all oppressed people--in India,
untouchables and backward castes, tribals, Muslims, Sikhs, national
minorities, and women.

Since the 1970s the increasing proletarianization of the rural labor
force due to advances in agriculture has resulted in a new wave of
consciousness among untouchables. But this militancy is being taken
advantage of by petty-bourgeois activists who have organized all-
untouchable political parties with bourgeois programs. They also tried
to divert consciousness by asking the UN race conference in Durban
last year to include the caste question in their final document. At
the insistence of the BJP government, the conference refused to add
any reference to caste or discrimination by occupation.

Even if caste had been included in this document it would not have
done the untouchable masses any good. Only a socialist revolution can
wipe out this 2000-year-old system of oppression. Untouchable and
backward-caste workers will play a vital role in this struggle.

(November 18, 2002)




Subject: “The second stage of Liberalisation, Privatisation and
Globalisation which includes privatisation of higher and professional
education, Conversion of retail marketing into global marketing,
Centralisation of retail market into private hands is a conspiracy to
nullify and thereby sabotage the constitutional rights of the
indigenous people ( Mulnivasi Bahujan Samaj) of India so as to force
slavery on them.”
From last year on 16th April at ShivajiPark, Mumbai, we started
organising the joint celebrations of our great leaders. We are
organizing these joint celebrations of the birthdays of our great
leaders at Ahmedabad on a national level this year.

On this day we are discussing this issue, “The second stage of
Liberalisation, Privatisation and Globalisation which includes
privatisation of higher and professional education, Conversion of
retail marketing into global marketing, Centralisation of retail
market into private hands is a conspiracy to nullify and thereby
sabotage the constitutional rights of the indigenous people
( Mulnivasi Bahujan Samaj) of India so as to force slavery on them.”
Rashtriya Mulnivasi Sangh will organize 15000 meetings till the end of
this December to highlight this issue. There will be a nation wide
awakening through such programmes.
We must seriously understand and comprehend this issue. LPG stands for
Liberalisation, Privatisation and Globalisation. This programme of LPG
was started by the Congress Party in 1990 and the Congress Party takes
the credit of this programe. We too give credit of the implementation
of the programme of LPG to the Congress . The Bharatiya Janata Party
is an accomplice of the Congress Party and they together started
implementing this programme of LPG. At that time i.e. in 1990 Narsimha
Rao was the Prime Minisiter and Manmohan Singh was the Finance
Minister. Today Manmohan Singh is the Prime Minister. The Central
Government has implemented aggressively this programme of LPG for the
last 17 years.

Even all the state governments have become excited and enthusisastic
and are looking forward to implement this programme of LPG. Thus both
the BJP and the Congress are aggressively implementing this programme
of LPG. Even the Communists are taking the initiative in the
implementation of LPG.

What have been the consequences of LPG on Mulnivasi Bahujan Samaj? The
policy of LPG has been implemented for the last 17 years but the
Mulnivasi Bahujan Samaj is ignorant of the adverse effects of LPG.
The Government does not want to provide information about the adverse
effects of the policy of LPG. In fact they want to hide this
information from the Mulnivasi Bahujan Samaj. There is a conspiracy
behind all this. We want to awaken the people regarding all this and
make them aware of this conspiracy and then organize them.
The Central Government started implementing the policy of LPG in
Government Sectors and Public Undertaking Sectors. The BJP, the
Communists and the Congress together have started privatization in the
Government and the Public Undertaking Sectors. The Scheduled Castes,
the Scheduled Tribes, the Other Backward Classes and the indigenous
Converted Minorities have reserved seats in the Government sectors and
the Public Undertaking Sectors. There are about 2 Crore government
posts and atleast 1 crore of these posts would have been occupied by
the persons amongst the SCs, the STs, the OBCs and the indigenous
converted Minorities. If we were to consider that an average family
consists of 5 members then atleast 5 crore people were directly
dependent and could have made their living on these government posts.

But as the programme of LPG is being aggressively implemented
Reservation for the SCs, the STs, the OBCs and the indigenous
converted Minorities in the Government Bureaucracy and Public
Undertaking Sectors has become practically null and void. There may be
the provision for reservation in our Indian Constitution but it exists
now only on paper. Practically the reservation policy has become
completely null.

There has been a complete ban on Recruitment for the last 12-13 years.
If there is recruitment there will be reservation. If there is no
recruitment there will be no Reservation.

Educated people amongst the Mulnivasi Bahujan Samaj who read news and
watch television do not have any information. Those who need to know
and be informed are completely ignorant. If the educated people from
amongst the indigenous people are ignorant who will educate the
illiterate people.

Kumbhkaran was maligned in Ramayana because he used to sleep for 6
months at a stretch. Our people are Grand grandfathers of Kumbhkaran
as they have been sleeping for 17 long years.

Thus the first adverse effect of LPG was that Reservation was
nullified.
The policy of Reservation guaranteed reserved posts and the
availability of these jobs provided inspiration and motivation to the
people in the villages who starved themselves but educated their
children so that their children could aspire to occupy those
Government posts. But now as the policy of Reservation has become
null, this inspiration and motivation no longer exists. Even the
motivation for learning and getting educated has died down.
Lack of education will lead to lack of development of the brains of
our people. Our people wouldn’t be able to distinguish between what is
right and what is wrong. They will not be able to reason, analyze and
make decisions.

You know that an animal does not have the ability to reason, analyze
and make decisions. The ruling castes want to push our people down to
the level of animals. LPG is the program to make animals of our
people. Even our educated people do not have this information. Who
will educate the illiterate?

The implementation of the policy of LPG has forced 60 crore people in
India below the Poverty Line. One new class has emerged amongst these
60 crore people. This is the class of 25 crore people who have been
forced below the Starvation Line.
The Ruling Castes use the Hindi word ‘Kuposhan’ for the English word
‘Starvation’. Our people do not understand the Hindi word Kuposhan.
They think that Kuposhan is some sort of a disease. But in ordinary
Hindi
kuposhan means Bhookmari. The Godowns of the Food Corporation of
India are full of every kind of grain. But this food is not sent to
the starving population of India. They Government say they do not have
money to send food to the starving people of India. But the Government
allocated 400 crores to the Indian Space Research Organisation to plan
a mission to the Moon. The Government says it has no money for the
poor.
This is mass slaughter by forcing starvation on the Mulnivasi Bahujan
Samaj. There is not a single line about this catastrophe in the
National Newspaper. Thus our people do not have any information
regarding all this.

The wedding ceremony of Aishwarya Rai and Abhishek Bachhan was
highlighted daily in these news channel and newspapers. But the same
media does not print a single line about the starvation deaths in our
country. We see that the head of a family commits suicide by consuming
poison. He even poisons his own family members. They report that
investigation is in progress. But I say is there any need for
investigation. Just go and look into the utensils kept in the kitchen.
Our people blame it on their fate. Our people say it is the writ of
the Brahma. But it is the writ of the Brahmins.

Nehru was the first Prime Minister of India. The first Five Year Plan
planned a budget of 3700 crores. In Sonia Gandhi’s time i.e today the
total expenditure of just one year is about 5 lac 1000 crores rupees.
If Sonia Gandhi wishes she could remove the starvation and poverty of
our people in just 5 years. If A.B.Vajpayee wishes he could do the
same. If the Brahmins who plan the budget of India wish then they
could end this starvation and poverty of our people. But they simply
do not want to allocate any budget for eradication of poverty and
starvation of our people. It simply means that our poverty and
starvation is the writ of the Brahmins.

We need to seriously think of this and act accordingly. Sooner or
later those who are not below the poverty line will be forced below
the poverty line or even the starvation line. This is a Mass-Slaughter
programme being implemented by the Government. These were the
catastrophic consequences of the first stage of Liberalisation,
Privatisation and Globalisation.

The adverse consequences of the policy of LPG should have made the
government to terminate this policy immediately. But they knowingly
started implementing the 2nd stage this programme of LPG.
The 2nd stage of LPG includes:
1) Creation of SEZ i.e. Special Economic Zones.
2) Absolute Privatization of Higher and Professional Education
3) Conversion of Retail market into Global market to centralize and
monopolize retail market into private hands.

These are dangerous programmes which spell impending doom for the
future of the Mulnivasi Bahujan Samaj. These three programmes are
being implemented on a large scale.

Do you know how a bill is passed? First it is put up for discussion
in the Rajya Sabha, then in the Lok Sabha and then the President gives
his approval. After all this procedure it is finally published in the
gazette.
But without any discussion this bill (SEZ) was passed in the
RajyaSabha
and the LokSabha. If the bill would have been discussed, the people of
India would have known about the adverse consequences of SEZ. This
bill was passed without discussion. Any bill which is passed without
discussion is absolutely Unconstitutional. The President shouldn’t
have given his approval to this undiscussed bill and unconstitutional
bill. But the President gave his approval. Even the Supreme Court has
not opposed this unconstitutional bill. All of them are in this
Conspiracy. We need to understand this.
They call Mr.Kalam, the President, a true Rashtrawadi (Nationalist).
Is he a fool or a donkey that he does not understand simple things? He
has signed on a bill which was not discussed in the Parliament. He
could have asked them to discuss the Bill. The Constitution of India
has bestowed such powers on the President. But the President didn’t
exercise any of his power. He should have but he didn’t. Thus they are
all in this conspiracy.

It is written in the bill that for a Special Economic Zone minimum
2000 hectares i.e. 4500 acres of land and maximum 35000 hectares i.e.
80000 acres to 1,00,000 acres of land must be allocated.

There was widespread unrest in West Bengal over this land acquisition.
Due to this growing unrest the Government says that the land allotment
to SEZ will be 1000 acre minimum to 10,000 acres maximum. But this
latest statement has been issued to befool the people. It has been
done to deflate the growing opposition of the people. Factually such
an order has not been passed. It is a huge conspiracy.
They are betraying this country. Therefore they cannot be trusted at
all.

It is mentioned in the bill that only 10% of land allotted to SEZ will
be used for development of industries. The rest i.e. 90% of the land
will be used for developing Real Estate. Real Estate means Handling of
the land to Big Builders so that they could build multi-storey
buildings.

If only 10% of land will be used for industry then only 10% of the
total land allocated for SEZ must be actually allotted. But in reality
1 lac acres land is being allotted.

Thus through a simple bill the government along with the state
governments wants to buy agricultural land from farmers at a cheap
rate and sell it even more cheaply to capitalists.

Before develop of Real Estate on the SEZ land, one acre of
agricultural land will normally cost 1, 00,000 rupees.
After development into Real Estate the same land will cost 10 crore
rupees.
1 lakh acres of Real Estate land will cost 1, 00,000 * 1, 00,000,000
rupees. Thus the land of the Mulnivasi Bahujan Samaj is being forcibly
bought by the government to sell it cheaply to the Capitalists. This
is nothing but a huge Land Scam.

The Government says that the Capitalist will use his own money to
develop the land. But in reality the capitalist will earn 1, 00,000*1,
00,000,000 rupees and will only invest 1%-2% of what he earns. Thus
this is land scam.
Just imagine of what huge proportion this land scam really is?

The Government has proposed a tax exemption of 2, 00,000*1, 000*
10,000,000 (2 lakh1000 crores) rupees annually for SEZs.
There will not be Custom Tax, production tax, sales tax, etc
There will not be any duty on raw material imported. There will be no
duty on finished goods exported. There will be complete tax exemption
for 15 years. Thus the total tax exemption will be 15*2, 00,000*1,
000*10, 000,000=30 lacs 1000 crore rupees. This is nothing but Tax
evasion with the help of a simple bill and by making a law. By simply
passing such a bill they want to put all this money into the pockets
of the industrialists. Industrialists like Tata, Birla have become
great by looting India’s wealth. They say that we do not have merit.
But are they becoming millionaires, billionaires by their merit or by
looting the country’s wealth? Plundering the country’s wealth is not a
sign of being meritorious. Those who loot and plunder the country’s
wealth are called Dacoits. Everywhere in the world such people are
called as Dacoits. This is carried in a joint way (check)

If this amount (30 lac 1000 crore rupees) goes into the government
treasury instead of going into the Industrialists’ pockets then it
could be spent on our peoples’ health, education etc. But this money
will now go into the Industrialists’ pockets. The government wants to
put all this money into the Industrialists’ pockets. This is nothing
but TAX SCAM.
Harshad Mehta who laundered 1000 crores died of blood pressure and
heart attack. But these people have sound hearts and even their blood
pressure is normal.
This is a planned conspiracy.

The bill of SEZ says that the SEZ’s will be foreign territories. It
says that the SEZ will be deemed to be a foreign territory. Why do
they say that the SEZ’s will be foreign territories? Does our
constitution apply to Nepal, Bangladesh or Pakistan? The answer is no
simply because Nepal, Bangladesh and Pakistan are foreign territories.
The bill simply says that the constitution will not be applicable in
SEZ’s. No Indian law can be enforced in SEZ’s. No person will be
allowed to even enter these SEZ’s without permission and a pass. I had
to apply for a visa before going to England. I enquired what exactly
does visa mean. They said it is an entry pass. If you want to enter
into Ambani’s SEZ you will have to procure an entry pass. Thus an
Indian citizen will have to procure an entry pass to enter a SEZ as it
will be a foreign territory.



If the constitution is not applicable to SEZ, then it is nothing but
betrayal of the constitution. Thus land is being brought at throwaway
prices and is being converted into foreign territories. This is
betrayal of the nation. If the constitution is not applicable then all
the fundamental rights enshrined in the constitution become null.
Those who do not have fundamental rights are called as slaves. Slaves
do not have fundamental rights. Those people who will live in SEZ’s
will be nothing but slaves. They will be made slaves. They won’t have
any rights. They can’t go to the High Court and the Supreme Court
because SEZ’s will not be in the jurisdiction of these courts. These
SEZ’s will be called as Ambani Region, Tata Region, Mahindra Region
etc and the Industrialists who own these regions will say that SEZ’s
is a foreign territory and the constitution of India is not applicable
to any foreign territory. The Supreme Court and the High Court will
not have any power to adjudicate on a case from a SEZ because SEZ will
not be under their jurisdiction. Lawyers know that a case of Vadodara
can be adjudicated upon in Vadodara but not in Ahmedabad. The Brahmin
who wrote the draft of SEZ explicitly mentioned that SEZ will be a
foreign territory so that it cannot be challenged in any Indian Court.
Just imagine if all the territory of India is converted into SEZ, will
the Indian Nation exist? Every region will be a foreign territory
where the Indian constitution will not be applicable. Does the
Parliament have a right to make such a law? The answer is definitely
no.

The Constitution of India says that India is a sovereign country.
There cannot be a nation without a nation. Thus SEZ is nothing but a
dangerous conspiracy of unimaginable proportion.

The Bill of SEZ says that if any industrialist who invests in SEZ by
taking loans from any foreign institutions goes bankrupt then all his
loans will be cleared by the Indian government. The responsibility of
clearing the loan will be the responsibility of the Indian Government.
Now any scheming foreign or Indian Industrialist will invest in SEZ
and then declare to have become a bankrupt. He will run away with all
his money. But the Indian Government will have to clear his loans from
the money that it collects as tax from us. The Indian Government is an
accomplice in this conspiracy. Our MLA’s and MP’s are part of this
conspiracy. They have sold themselves. These MLA’s, MP’s, Chief
Ministers are all slaves who have sold themselves. Everything is being
done against the law of the land and against the constitution of
India. If this programme of Creation of SEZ’s was in the interest of
the nation why was not it discussed in the Parliament? If SEZ’s were
for the welfare of the nation why was not it discussed in the
Parliament? They say that this programme is being implemented to
transform India into a great nation. If this is true why was not it
discussed in Parliament? If it would have been discussed in the
parliament people would have come to know about it. But they wanted to
hide the real motive. This clearly suggests that it is a huge
conspiracy. There will be no Labour law in SEZ’s. A worker will have
to work for 16 hours and will receive the salary of 8 hours. Our
people do not know the difference between service and slavery. If you
work for 8 hours and receive a salary for 8 hours’ work then it is
service. But if you work for 16 hours and receive a salary for 8
hours’ work then it is slavery. Our Mulnivasi Bahujan Samaj is
basically a labour class.

Thus SEZ is a programme to enslave the Mulnivasi Bahujan Samaj. It is
a programme to make slaves of us and that too of the worst kind.

The next programme of the ruling castes is to absolutely privatize
higher education and professional education. Sukhdeo Thorat, a
scheduled caste person, from Amravati near Nagpur was made the
chairman of the University Grants Commission. He was formerly a
lecturer in the Jawaharlal Nehru University. The main work of UGC is
to give grants to 250 Universities across India. The grants facilitate
admissions of the students belonging to SC’s, ST’s and the OBC’s.

Now Arjun Singh has introduced a bill which seeks to amend some
functions of the UGC and to make all universities completely
autonomous. This bill is under discussion in the parliament, in the
parliamentary committee. Autonomous universities will be completely
free from Government regulations. No grants will be issued to
universities from now on. Whatever kind of education these
universities aim to provide, be it professional or higher education,
they will be permitted to provide, by giving them the right to exact
exorbitant fees. Thus the poor will be systematically debarred from
getting professional education and higher education.
The poor will be unable to seek admission to professional courses like
Engineering, Medical, MBA etc as he will not have the capacity to pay
10-15 lakh rupees annually for such courses.

They have started a campaign named, “Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan”
This campaign says that all children shall be educated till the 8th
standard. Students shall be promoted from one standard to the
following higher standard without conducting any sort of examination.
In such way a student will be gradually promoted to standard eight.
These students will not be able to write even their own names. Such
will be the kind of education without examinations. Even a 8th
standard pass student shall not be able to write his father’s name.

Exams are conducted for the development of Merit. A student has to
necessarily study for the examinations which leads to development of
merit in him. With this merit our people can compete with them. But
this is not being allowed to happen.

In Maharashtra, in Marathi, we call this method of promoting students
without subjecting them to examinations as, “Dhakkal Pass”.
This will retard the development of the minds of our people. Our
people will not be able to distinguish between what is right and what
is wrong. They will not be able to think logically. They will not be
able to compare and study. They will lack ability to analyse and
assess things. They will not be able to form their own opinions. They
will be incompetent to draw inferences and conclusions. Thus they will
be totally incapacitated to make any decision. A leader is essentially
a person who can make decisions.
A leader is able to make his progress and his community’s as well.

They want to convert us into a herd of animals. Not many people are
required to drive a herd of animals.
I want to mention an incident regarding the ‘Rabbari-Bharwar’
community in Gujarat. Once a jeep driver who was carrying extra
passengers was caught by a constable and brought before the Inspector.
The driver explained that he was only carrying 9 passengers. The
Inspector asked the constable how many passengers did the driver
actually carried in his jeep. The constable replied that the jeep
carried 15 passengers. The driver then explained that he was carrying
only 9 passengers because the rest of the persons belonged to the
‘Rabbari-Bharwar’ community.

They do not even consider these people as passengers. Such is their
plight!
Can we expect the ruling castes even to consider these people as human
beings? A ‘Rabbari-Bharwar’ drives a herd/flock of sheep and cattle.
But now our people will be dumb driven cattle for the ruling castes.

By debarring us from getting Higher and Professional education they
are planning absolute devastation of our people.

Most of the people employed in the retail sector in India belong the
the OBC’s and the Muslims. 4 Crore people have got self-employment in
the Retail Sector. The Government does not want to provide employment
in the Government Sector and the Public Undertaking Sector. Even Self-
Employment in the Retail Sector is being systematically ended. Big
Malls and Outlets will slowly destroy whatever self employment our
people had in the Retail sector. Now Ambani will sell ‘spinach’ in his
Malls. He will send his trucks directly to the farms and purchase
vegetables from the farmers. The trucks will carry those vegetables to
the respective malls. Ordinary vegetable-sellers will not get any
vegetables to sell in the market. They will lose their employment.
Thus the Industrialists will takeover completely the Retail market of
India. 4 crore people, mostly belonging to the Other Backward Classes
and the Minorities will be directly affected and they will lose their
work.
Our future and our physical world will be controlled by the
Industrialists. This is nothing but slavery.

Our Mulnivasi India will be plunged into the mire of slavery. It means
that the first stage as well as the second stage of Liberalisation,
Privatisation and Globalization is a conspiracy to enslave the
Mulnivasi Indians and Our Mulnivasi Bharat. These programmes are not
being implemented to make India great but to enslave India. Our highly
educated people such as IASs, IPSs, IRSs, Doctors, Engineers, and
Lawyers etc say that it is not possible to oppose LPG.

In the Lok Sabha elections of 2004 ordinary people brought down the
Government of Bharatiya Janata Party and Atal Bihari Vajpayee was
brought down on the road. Just by the ordinary people of India!

Congress was brought to power but the ordinary people wanted a
complete halt to Privatisation. But the Congress Party continued with
Privatisation. In the recent elections to the 5 states Congress was
completely defeated. After that elections took place in another three
states in which Congress lost again. Now there are impending elections
in Uttar Pradesh. Newspapers are already saying that Congress will be
number 4 party in UP. Such is the miserable state of Congress before
the UP elections! And such will be its plight even after the UP
elections.

Ordinary people have brought them down on the roads. Ordinary people
have shown that they have the capacity to oppose. But our educated
people who have the required intellectual capacity say that it is not
possible to oppose LPG! They are nothing but offspring of Eunuchs!
Normally Eunuchs are not capable to produce children. Eunuchs are not
capable of producing children but still these educated people (who say
that it is not possible to oppose Liberalisation, Privatisation and
Globalisation) are the offspring of Eunuchs. It means that they are
bastards. A bastard is a person who has two fathers.

Ordinary people opposed these programmes in Nandigram in West Bengal.
Buddhadeb Bhattacharya, CM of W. Bengal was forced to take back his
decision to create SEZ in Nandigram. The Central Government was forced
to change its programme of SEZ.
If people are awakened and prepared it is possible. This is a
dangerous situation for the Mulnivasi Bahujan Samaj.
It is possible to oppose all this. It is possible to fightback and
repel this attack on the Mulnivasi Bahujan Samaj.
Our forefathers and our leaders had created a Nation-wide Movement for
our independence. But this movement was destroyed by Congress, Gandhi
and the stooges of the Congress.

On this occasion we pledge to resurrect the movement of our leaders.
To resurrect the movement of our leaders we need five types of means
and resources- time, talent, money, labour and brains. All these have
to be given to resurrect the movement. If you contribute these above
mentioned resources you can resurrect the Nation-wide movement of our
great leaders. That movement had given us constitutional rights and
had removed us from the mire of slavery. That movement needs to be
resurrected. We will organize such programmes in various regions and
capitals of various states of this country. This will be nation-wide
programme. We pledge to spread this movement in all the regions of
India. A similar programme of state level will be held in Rajkot in
Gujarat. We will utilize our full strength in Gujarat to organize this
programme.
http://www.mulnivasibamcef.com/Pages/page3o.html


December 09, 2008
ON THE SEPTEMBER 26-29 MUMBAI ATTACKS


We're told that this atrocious assault on several sites in the city
was the work of the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Toiba. Vijay Prashad
("The Fires in South Asia," Counterpunch) points out:

"The Lashkar is one of those organizations that emerged in 1991 out of
the detritus of the Afghan jihad (it was formed in Kunar province).
Carter’s Brzezinski vowed to 'sow shit in the Soviet backyard.' His
Afghan toilet overflowed into South Asia."
But was it them? Ayesha Ijaz Khan ("Mumbai Terror Attacks,"
Counterpunch) writes:

"The fact that the Indian government is accusing Pakistan is taken
with a grain of salt as this is not the first time the Indian
government has blamed Pakistan, only to find later that Pakistan had
nothing to do with the violence it was being accused of.
Interestingly, four times previously the Indian government falsely
accused Lashkare Taiba directly as the organization sponsoring violent
incidents in India, and Pakistan indirectly for harbouring the
militant group, although Pakistan officially banned the outfit in
2002.
"In each of the incidents, namely, the Chattisinghpura massacre, the
attack on the Indian Parliament on 13 December 2001, the Malagaon
blasts and the Samjhota Express incident, investigations were either
refused or revealed that neither Lashkare Taiba nor Pakistan but
groups from within India were responsible."
Alexander Cockburn, writing in The Nation, raises the question of
perspective:

"No Western journalist chose to bewail a huge human catastrophe when
that same chief minister of Maharashtra, Deshmukh [who resigned last
week, accepting 'moral responsibility' for the attacks], supervised
the destruction of 84,000 homes in Mumbai back in 2004-2005, nearly
three times the number rendered homeless in Nagapattinam by the
tsunami. 'Many people will be inconvenienced and will have to make
sacrifices if the city has to develop,' Deshmukh said then. Once
again, the lowly were making sacrifices in the interests of the
mighty, many of them real estate gangsters in league with Deshmukh and
the ruling Congress party.
"There was no talk of 'moral responsibility' and no hand-wringing in
the Western press about the barbarism of making 84,000 families
homeless. Nor did Deshmukh feel compelled to acknowledge moral
responsibility when the 2006 figures issued by his own bureaucrats
recorded 1,400 suicides (undoubtedly a huge underestimate) by Indian
farmers in just six districts in the Vidarbha region of his state,
driven to death by carefully planned 'liberalization' of the farm
economy, overseen by federal Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. This state
terrorism was of Western origin, promoted by economists, World Bank
officials and journalists like the Times's Thomas Friedman and Keith
Bradsher, stepping onto Indian soil armed with Friedmanite recipes and
with cell-phone contact to terror centers in Washington, Harvard and
Chicago. Almost exactly a year ago, the Indian journalist P. Sainath
reported that close to 150,000 Indian farmers committed suicide in the
nine years from 1997 to 2005."
Finally, in "Hotel Taj: Icon of Whose India?" the Tamil writer Gnani
Sankaran questions where the cameras were pointed, and why. Which is
the true icon of Bombay, the Hotel Taj, "where the rich and the
powerful of India and the globe congregate," "the icon of the
financiers and swindlers of India," or the first site attacked, the
Chatrapathi Shivaji Terminus (CST) railway station? It's through the
latter that

"Indians from Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, West Bengal and
Tamilnadu have poured into Mumbai over the years, transforming
themselves into Mumbaikars and building the Mumbai of today along with
the Marathis and Kolis.
"But the [TV] channels would not recognise this. Nor would they
recognise the thirty odd dead bodies strewn all over the platform of
CST. No Barkha Dutt [NDTV English news editor] went there to tell us
who they were. But she was at Taj to show us the damaged furniture and
reception lobby braving the guards. And the TV cameras did not go to
the government-run JJ Hospital to find out who those 26 unidentified
bodies were. Instead they were again invading the battered Taj to try
in vain for a scoop shot of the dead bodies of the page 3 celebrities.
"In all probability, the unidentified bodies could be those of workers
from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh migrating to Mumbai, arriving by train at
CST without cell phones and pan cards to identify them. Even after 60
hours after the CST massacre, no channel has bothered to cover in
detail what transpired there."
http://diary.typepad.com/anticaste/

July 28, 2008
DESCENDANT OF MEDIEVAL PARIAHS IN FRANCE
The last untouchable in Europe (The Independent (UK))

"For the 40-something mother-of-three, the story of her bloodline is
marked with a unique sadness: because she belongs to an extraordinary
tribe of hidden pariahs, repressed in France for a thousand years.

"Marie-Pierre is a Cagot."
See:

‘Cagots’ of Béarn: The Pariahs of France by Gérard da Silva
(International Humanist and Ethical Union)

An Accursed Race by Victorian novelist Elizabeth Gaskell

Posted at 03:26 AM in caste | Permalink | Comments (0)

April 01, 2007
AGAINST THE INDIAN GOVERNMENT'S DEFENSE OF CASTE BEFORE THE UN
Misrepresenting caste and race (Seminar [New Dehli])
by Balmurli Natrajan

Before issuing its report (see March 2, 2007 below) on caste
oppression in India, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racism met
with a delegation from the Indian government that included the
anthropologist Dipankar Gupta, who defended the government's position
that since caste is not race, the committee had no jurisdiction. In
this commentary, Balmurli Natrajan takes on Gupta's arguments, which
are reprinted below his remarks in summary form.

Posted at 11:58 PM in caste, race, reports | Permalink | Comments (0)

March 02, 2007
FOREIGNERS AND NON-HINDUS TREATED AS OUTCASTES
American pays fine for entering temple (IBNLive)

"Roediger still seems to be in the dark as to why he was treated this
way. 'It was like an entrance fee or something I guess. I was not
aware of the rules for entering into the temple,' said Roediger."
See also:
Activists criticise destruction of food in the name of religion
(IANS)

Posted at 02:19 AM in caste | Permalink | Comments (0)
REPORT BY UN COMMITTEE ON THE ELIMINATION OF RACISM
UN report slams India for caste discrimination (CBC News [Canada])

"The report found more than 165 million Dalits continue to face
segregation in housing, schools, and access to public services. It
also said many are forced to work in degrading conditions and are
routinely abused by police and upper-caste community members who enjoy
the state's protection."
Posted at 12:01 AM in caste, reports | Permalink | Comments (0)

February 13, 2007
NEW HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH REPORT
India: ‘Hidden Apartheid’ of Discrimination Against Dalits


"Exploitation of labor is at the very heart of the caste system.
Dalits are forced to perform tasks deemed too 'polluting' or degrading
for non-Dalits to carry out. According to unofficial estimates, more
than 1.3 million Dalits – mostly women – are employed as manual
scavengers to clear human waste from dry pit latrines. In several
cities, Dalits are lowered into manholes without protection to clear
sewage blockages, resulting in more than 100 deaths each year from
inhalation of toxic gases or from drowning in excrement. Dalits
comprise the majority of agricultural, bonded, and child laborers in
the country. Many survive on less than US$1 per day."
Posted at 12:04 AM in caste, reports | Permalink | Comments (0)

February 04, 2007
ESTIMATED 1.3 MILLION MANUAL SCAVENGERS IN INDIA
Manual waste disposal occupies millions in India, despite ban (Agence
France Presse)

"Chandravati, who is over 70 and like many Indians uses a single name,
takes home about 300 rupees (6.60 dollars) a month. When she is lucky,
she also gets a slice of chapati bread from her employers. 'They throw
the chapati at us from a distance. If this is not untouchability, then
what is? We are not allowed into the house,' she says, flashing a
toothless smile."
Posted at 12:18 AM in caste, labor and caste, manual scavenging |
Permalink | Comments (0)

January 29, 2007
MUKHTAR MAI: EXTRAORDINARY STORY OF A LOW-CASTE PEASANT WOMAN WHO
STOOD UP
After being gang raped by her village elders, Mukhtar fought back...

"Mukhtar and her family are from the lowly Gujar caste and are
expected to be subservient to the Mastoi. She thought that she was
being asked, as a respectable woman, to speak to the village elders on
behalf of her brother. As Mukhtar, accompanied by her father, Ghulam
Farid Jat, an uncle and a family friend, approached the mosque, she
could see a large gathering of men outside. This was the panchayat,
the village council. What she didn't know was that it had been taken
over by the Mastoi men, who had resolved that to appease the honour of
their caste, she must be raped in revenge for what they claimed was
the rape of one of their women by Shakur."
See also:
Breaking the silence: review of Mukhtar Mai's new memoir, In The Name
of Honor (The Asian News.co.uk, February 9)

Mukhtar Mai: history of a rape case (BBC News, June 28, 2005)

see anti-caste article: Muslims and Caste

Posted at 12:44 AM in caste, Muslims, women | Permalink | Comments
(0)

January 22, 2007
COURAGEOUS EXILED WRITER SPEAKS OUT
TASLIMA NASRIN: Let's Burn the Burqa (Outlook India)

"My question to Shabana and her supporters, who argue that the Quran
says nothing about purdah is: If the Quran advises women to use
purdah, should they do so? My answer is, No."
See below:
anti-caste: September-October 2006: CLERICS VS. SHABANA AZMI AND SANIA
MIRZI ON MUSLIM WOMEN'S DRESS

And see also:
Britain: Racism and the Islamic Veil (Workers Hammer, newspaper of the
Spartacist League/Britain, No. 197, Winter 2006-2007)

Posted at 01:31 AM in Muslims, women | Permalink | Comments (0)

January 08, 2007
50,000 HOMELESS CHILDREN ON THE STREETS OF DELHI
Braving every day (The Hindustan Times (Harsh Mander))

"Some of Ratul's friends also take up other seasonal occupations like
working with caterers in the wedding season, reserving places in the
trains during vacations, selling cinema tickets at higher rates,
cleaning cars or taxis, buses or lorries, even trains, as vendors for
tea and food stalls, apprentices in roadside automobile repair
garages, carrying loads and shoe polishing. Contrary to common
prejudice, only one in ten street children begs for a living, and most
of these are very young."
Posted at 01:52 AM in children, poverty | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 31, 2006
REVERSAL OF NEGATIVE TREND FOR INDIAN LABOR?
Big rise in trade union membership (The Hindu)

"While the biggest gainer is the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh-backed
Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS), which that has added almost 33 lakh
members to its 1996 strength of 27 lakh, the CPI-affiliated All-India
Trade Union Congress has moved to the third position with 33 lakh
members from the fifth slot in 1996 when its membership was nine
lakh."
Posted at 01:56 AM in working class | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 25, 2006
ATROCITY IN BIHAR
Dalit woman paraded half-naked for stealing fruit (India eNews)

"A middle-aged Dalit woman in Bihar was tonsured and paraded half-
naked on the orders of the husband of a woman village head for
allegedly stealing a few bananas."
Posted at 02:00 AM in atrocities, dalits (untouchables) | Permalink |
Comments (0)

December 16, 2006
STATE-BY-STATE REPORT ON CONDITION OF UNTOUCHABLES
Victims, still (Frontline)

See also:

further special coverage in Frontline in the wake of the militant mass
protests over Khairlanji:

on dalit activism: At a crossroads

on atrocities: Khairlanjis of the past

see anti-caste: KHAIRLANJI MASSCRE: Maharashtra Burning

Posted at 08:35 PM in atrocities, dalits (untouchables), reports |
Permalink | Comments (0)

November 25, 2006
CASTE OPPRESSION AND WOMEN'S OPPRESSION REINFORCE EACH OTHER
Untouchable burnt to death after accusing high-caste man of rape (The
Independent (UK))

"Asha accused a local upper-caste man of raping her last year. It was
no small matter for her to go to the police in Indian rural society,
where being a victim of rape is still considered deeply shameful....
In the villages, a man accused of rape may be found guilty and
punished by the courts. But a woman who comes forward as a rape victim
is certain of her punishment by society. She faces little prospect of
marriage, and life for an unmarried woman in the villages is bleak."
Posted at 12:51 AM in caste, women | Permalink | Comments (0)

November 13, 2006
HINDU RIGHT TARGETS UNTOUCHABLES
Arrest dalit 'rapist', says saffron brigade (DNAINDIA.COM)

"Countering dalit outbursts in the aftermath of the Kherlanji
massacre, the saffron brigade, which had kept silence over this
incident, joined hands on Monday. It brought Bhandara city to naught
by raking up a case of alleged rape and murder of a 10-year-old minor
OBC girl by a history-sheeter, belonging to the scheduled caste. The
bandh [protest shutdown of city shops], which didn't have the
collector's permission, was a success."
Posted at 12:23 AM in dalits (untouchables), hindu right | Permalink |
Comments (0)

October 29, 2006
CLERICS VS. SHABANA AZMI AND SANIA MIRZI ON MUSLIM WOMEN'S DRESS
On leading Bollywood actress Shabana Azmi, after she said Muslim women
need not wear a veil:

"She is a woman who sings and dances and should confine herself to her
profession and not speak on things she has no knowlege of."--Imam Syed
Ahmed Bukhari
see 'Naachne Gaane Waali Aurat' (Outlook India, October 29, 2006)

On tennis star Sania Mirzi:

"The dress she wears on the tennis courts not only doesn't cover large
parts of her body but leaves nothing to the imagination."--Haseeb-ul-
hasan Siddiqui, leading cleric of the Sunni Ulema Board. See pics
here!
see Tennis star deflects clothing row (BBC News, September 9, 2006)

Posted at 11:54 PM in Muslims, women | Permalink | Comments (0)

September 29, 2006
KHAIRLANJI MASSACRE
September-December 2006
MAHARASHTRA BURNING

An atrocity left unpunished and a hero’s statue desecrated drive
untouchable masses into the streets across India’s second-most
populous state.


September 29: Four members of an untouchable family are horrifically
lynched by men and women of the dominant caste in the tiny village of
Khairlanji.
November 6: After over a month of negligence by the police and
inaction from the state government, mass protests by untouchables
break out in Nagpur and spread throughout the district.
November 28: A statue of the Independence-era untouchable leader B. R.
Ambedkar is beheaded in the city of Kanpur.
November 29-30: Untouchable youth take to the streets in spontaneous
protests across the state. In Bombay large groups target public
transportation, emptying buses and a train and setting them on fire.
The rape/murder of the Bhotmange family in Khairlanji village occurred
on September 29, but it was only at the end of October that the story
first broke in the national press, under the ironic headline “Just
another rape story.” There are hundreds of atrocities against
untouchables and over a thousand rapes of untouchable women officially
reported every year in Maharashtra state alone. And how many go
unreported? As the Khairlanji lynching itself might have. If it hadn’t
been for two surviving blood relatives who secretly witnessed this
public massacre, the case would never have been registered with the
police: even now, no one else will talk.

So why did the news of this particular horror spread mainly by word of
mouth throughout the region and across the state? Why this time did
rage over the incident simmer for two full months before finally
boiling over in an unprecedented statewide uprising of the untouchable
masses that took India by surprise?....

...see anti-caste article: MAHARASHTRA BURNING

see also:

Khairlanji and Its Aftermath: Exploding Some Myths by Anand Teltumbde
(Economic and Political Weekly, March 24, 2007)

Dalits, Like Flies to Feudal Lords by Shivam Vij (Tehelka, November 4,
2006)

Village quiet after it ganged up to hack Dalit mother, 3 children by
Vivek Deshpande (The Indian Express, November 8)

Khairlanji: How the Other Half Dies? (Central Chronicle [Bhopal],
November 14)

He lives to see justice done by Meena Menon (The Hindu, November 17)

Dalit blood on the village square by Lyla Bavadam (Frontline, November
18-December 1)

A Flag Over the Dead by Dilip D'Souza (Tehelka, November 25)
Kherlanji's Strange and Bitter Crop by Satya Sagar (November 29)

Maharashtra: Dalit anger leaves 4 dead, 60 injured (rediff.com,
November 30)

Dalit Rage by Smruti Koppikar (Outlook India, December 5)

The fear of democracy of the privileged by P. Sainath (The Hindu,
December 8)

Khairlanjis of the past (Frontline, December 16-29, 2006)

A real agenda for Dalit liberation by Praful Bidwai (Frontline,
December 16-29, 2006)

And see from Sujatha's family history:
Adavi Kolanu: "Humilated for wearing nice clothes, for being clean,
for being literate, for being a teacher, for desiring to be treated
with dignity."

Posted at 02:03 AM in atrocities, dalits (untouchables) | Permalink |
Comments (0)

September 09, 2006
MANUAL SCAVENGING PERSISTS DESPITE GOVERNMENT DENIAL
India's Shame (Frontline)


A Frontline investigation found that the state of denial extends to
the national capital. The affidavit filed by the Delhi government in
the Supreme Court has accused the petitioners of levelling "bad
allegations against answering respondent without verifying facts". On
a visit to Nand Nagri near Shahdara in the National Capital Region in
order to verify, Frontline met Meena, who is a volunteer with the SKA
and has been working as a manual scavenger since she was nine. Says
Meena, who is in her mid-twenties: "I remember the first time I had to
carry a basketful on my head. I slipped and fell into the gutter. No
one would come to pick me up because the basket was so dirty and I was
covered with filth. I sat there, howling, until another woman
scavenger arrived. She hosed me down and took me home. But that day I
felt like the most unfortunate child in the whole world."
See also:

Out in the open (on scavenging in Tamil Nadu) and Part of the system
(Andhra Pradesh) in the same issue

But see:

this critique of the Frontline coverage by activist Vidya Bhushan
Rawat: India’s Shame: Some Unanswered Questions from the Frontline
Reports

Posted at 02:57 AM in dalits (untouchables), labor and caste, manual
scavenging | Permalink | Comments (0)

August 01, 2006
NEW REPORT SURVEYS 565 VILLAGES ACROSS INDIA
Untouchability in Rural India by Ghanshyam Shah, Harsh Mander, Sukhdeo
Thorat, Satish Deshpande, Amita Baviskar, 2006. New Delhi: Sage
Publications. 216 pp.

from a review by Radhika Govinda:

"Untouchability in Rural India is based on an exhaustive survey of 565
villages in 11 major Indian states. [...]
"It highlights how untouchability exists in some form or the other in
more than 80 per cent of the villages under study, most extensively in
personal and religious-cultural spheres and less visibly in public and
political spheres. Food and water touched by Dalits is considered
polluting by upper castes: Dalits are denied access to water sources
in 48.2 per cent of the villages surveyed; in over 70 per cent of the
villages surveyed Dalits are prohibited from inter-dining and entry
into non-Dalit houses. In 64 per cent of the villages, Dalits are
denied entry into common temples. Despite repeated promises from
several governments since Independence, Dalits continue to carry night-
soil on their head in over 25,000 Indian towns and villages. As many
as 40 per cent of schools practise untouchability while serving mid-
day meals, making Dalit children sit in a separate row. Even NGOs are
not immune to such practices. In a country that prides in its
democratic traditions, Dalits are either denied access to polling
booths, or are forced to form separate lines to enter them in 12 per
cent of the villages. They are prevented from entering the police
stations and ration shops in more than 25 per cent of the villages
surveyed.
"Another core chapter, that deserves mention, focuses on Dalit women
and the practice of untouchability. In this short but remarkably
succinct chapter, the authors illustrate how, weighed down by the
oppressive structures of caste, class and gender, rural Dalit women
experience untouchability in multiple spheres and how this affects
their everyday life. Women are regarded as male property and as
bearers of the honour of their community. Attack on Dalits, therefore,
often takes the form of physical and verbal abuse of Dalit women.
Dalit women's bodies become the site on which caste violence is played
out."
Posted at 02:18 AM in dalits (untouchables), reports | Permalink |
Comments (0)

July 11, 2006
CHILD LABOR IN INDIA
Two stories: children working as household servants and stitching
soccer balls. In both cases, as the articles note, the children are
low-caste or Muslim.

Indian Child Labourers Show Ugly Side of the 'Beautiful Game' (July
10, 2006)

Domestic child labour rampant in Delhi (NDTV.com, August 2, 2006)

Posted at 01:16 AM in caste, children, labor and caste, Muslims,
poverty | Permalink | Comments (0)

June 24, 2006
CASTE OPPRESSION AND WATER RIGHTS
Every summer the convergence of climate, archaic infrastructure, and
caste-based segregation brings us dozens of horror stories in the
press about the denial of drinking water to untouchables and the
atrocities that often result, no doubt representing a tiny fraction of
the total such cases. Here are two recent ones:

Dalits of Gaya untouched by water (CNN-IBN, May 25): "The upper castes
throw away our buckets whenever we go to fill water."

Dalit villager pays heavy price for water in Madhya Pradesh (NDTV.com,
June 24): "Pradip, a young Dalit man from a remote village in Madhya
Pradesh, decided to fight back when upper caste people in his village
refused him water. Instead, the 20-year-old was beaten up and as a
result, 250 Dalit families from his Chotiche village have been denied
access to water."

Posted at 01:40 AM in dalits (untouchables) | Permalink | Comments
(0)

May 26, 2006
RESERVATIONS CONTROVERSY
Letter from India: Addressing inequality in a land ruled by caste
(International Herald Tribune)

"For a snapshot of the social importance of caste in modern India, you
just need to turn to the matrimonials section of any daily paper. A
small minority of the advertisements declare CASTE NO BAR, but most
are arranged according to caste groupings, and go along the lines of:
'Engineer with multinational corp. seeks beautiful girl from decent
Brahmin family.' Sociologists estimate that more than 90 percent of
people marry within their caste."
Posted at 01:38 AM in caste, dalits (untouchables), reservations
(affirmative action) | Permalink | Comments (0)

May 21, 2006
UNTOUCHABLES BOUND BY HEREDITARY OCCUPATION
Dalit workers continue to face prejudice (NDTV.com)

"But even today, in India's biggest cities, the men and women who
enter the sewers to clean the city's filth are dalits."
Posted at 01:46 AM in dalits (untouchables), labor and caste |
Permalink | Comments (0)

May 17, 2006
UPPER-CASTE BABY-KILLERS DEFEND "MERIT"
Violence feared in Indian caste row (The Guardian (UK))

"The protests have disrupted hospital services across northern India,
with the student shutdown supported by doctors. In Delhi television
crews filmed babies being refused medical treatment because of a lack
of staff."
See below: April 20, 2006: anti-caste: RESERVATIONS (AFFIRMATIVE
ACTION) BILL PROPOSED

Posted at 01:50 AM in dalits (untouchables), reservations (affirmative
action) | Permalink | Comments (0)

May 12, 2006
MASS ATROCITY BACKED UP BY POLICE
Justice for Dalits still a dream (The Hindu)

"When the Dalits attempted to take out their procession, the police
stopped them. The next day, in blatant violation of the law, the
sarpanch allegedly instigated upper caste youth to attack the Dalits
with hatchets and sickles by making announcements on a loudspeaker
from the local temple. The attackers did not spare even women and
children.... Instead of arresting those who attacked the Dalits, the
police arrested 15 Dalits on false charges ranging from 'dacoity' to
'attempt to murder.'"
Posted at 01:54 AM in atrocities, dalits (untouchables), police |
Permalink | Comments (0)

April 28, 2006
MOVIE SHOWS HIDEOUS OPPRESSION OF WIDOWS
MARRIED TO BARBARIC CUSTOM (The New York Post)

The Hindi-language film Water by director Deepa Mehta, released this
week in New York, exposes the custom of child marriage and the
traditional treatment of widows as outcastes. Though it's set during
the rise of the Independence struggle in the 1930s, these practices
are still prevalent, particularly (but not only) in rural areas--see
links below. We don't usually offer links to the right-wing New York
Post, but their critical review (see link above) happens to get the
politics just about right.

See also:

The film's initial production in India was called off in 2000 in the
face of government harrassment and attacks by Hindu-right thugs. It
was finally made in Sri Lanka after a long delay. Read this excellent
first-person account of the thwarted shoot: The Politics of Deepa
Mehta's Water (Bright Lights Film Journal, April 2000).

And see:

Indian widows focus on devotion, fatalism (The Mercury News [San
Jose], April 2, 2006)

A Young Woman Says 'No' to Rural India's Child-Marriage Tradition (The
Washington Post, September 5, 2005)

India Child-Marriage Laws Ignored (CBS News, May 13, 2005)

Poignant writings on widowhood in Hindu society (The Tribune
[Chandigarh, India]), September 29, 2002)

India's neglected widows (BBC, February 2, 2002)

Though Illegal, Child Marriage Is Popular in Part of India (The New
York Times, May 11, 1998)

India's widows live out sentence of shame, poverty (CNN, November 6,
1997)

Posted at 01:56 AM in women | Permalink | Comments (0)

April 20, 2006
RESERVATIONS (AFFIRMATIVE ACTION) BILL PROPOSED
A minister in the Indian government has proposed a bill that would
more than double the reservation quota (number of seats reserved for
students oppressed by caste) in elite higher educational institutions
run by the central government. He wants to add a reservation for the
Other Backward Castes (castes considered low but not untouchable) to
the existing one for untouchables and tribals. What is the 49.5% quota
all about? (rediff.com, April 12, 2006) explains the plan in some
detail.


The anti-reservations slogan "Save Merit" really means "Save Caste
Privilege." Praful Bidwai in In Defence of OBC Reservations (The
Nahvind Times, April 20, 2006) punctures the hypocrisy of those who
take it up:

"Those who oppose affirmative action radically, in principle, on the
ground that it’s anti-merit, are comprehensively wrong in assuming
that our society and government run on the basis of merit, as distinct
from social status, clan loyalties, wealth, sifarish, political
influence, overt bribery, etc. Even the best of our competition
examinations don’t accurately assess merit. Take the case of the IITs,
where admissions are dominated by candidates from privileged families
who can afford to send them to the coaching centres of Kota in
Rajasthan for long months at the expense of lakhs of rupees."
In What Mandal Really Wanted (Outlook India, April 14, 2006) S.S.
Gill, the secretary of the Mandal Commission, defends that
commission's 1980 report. When its recommendation that reservations be
extended to Other Backward Castes was finally put into practice in
1989, it provoked a vicious casteist reaction nationwide. In response
to what is now being proposed, Gill asks, "Why do we still require the
crutch of reservations to enable students from the deprived sections
to stand on their feet even 60 years after Independence? What has
happened to the tall claims of affirmative action aimed at raising the
educational and economic standards of the SCs, STs and OBCs, so that
their children are able to compete on their own merit?"

But even the minimal reforms he says are necessary are utopian in a
capitalist India dominated by imperialism. And, while it's important
to defend any gains for the oppressed including reservations, why
shouldn't everyone be able to get a decent education and a good job?

See also:

How Sharad Got A Life: "As did Amit, Risha, Parag and many like them.
Quotas empowered them to take on challenges. Here's their side of the
story." (Outlook India, April 24, 2006)

Say Yes to Affirmative Action by Praful Bidwai (August 9, 2004)

on the history of reservations policy in India: Logical step by P.S.
Krishnan (Frontline, April 22-May 5, 2006)

Posted at 03:12 AM in dalits (untouchables), reservations (affirmative
action) | Permalink | Comments (0)

April 18, 2006
HINDU MONARCHY CRUMBLING
King No Longer Sacred in Nepal (Reuters)

"'Gyanendra, thief, leave the country' is the warcry of the tens of
thousands campaigning against his rule, a slogan that would have been
heretical just a few years ago when the Shahs were worshipped by the
Himalayan nation as reincarnations of the Hindu Lord Vishnu."
See also:

This Turbulent Monarchy: Nepal and the Shah dynasty (AsiaMedia,
February 17, 2005) traces the rule of the bloody Shah dynasty from its
founding by the eighteenth-century military king Prithvi Narayan Shah,
who upon conquering Kathmandu Valley "cut off the lips and noses of
every male citizen of the city-state of Kirtipur (save those who were
musicians) after they successfully resisted his invasion
force." (Obviously a music-lover.)

See also:

Turmoil (The Hindu, February 20, 2005) discusses the recent social
context:

"The democracy movement had politically mobilised the voiceless, but
post-multidemocracy, the representational pyramid remained even more
restricted than under the Panchayat regime. Bahuns (Brahmins) and
Chettris (including Ranas, Shah-Thakuris) made up 29 per cent of the
population and monopolised 70 per cent to 90 per cent of the jobs and
political representation. Many of the 69 indigenous nationalities
which fought for multi-party democracy would turn to the Maoist
revolution for their liberation. Indeed the insurgency is a testament
to the failure of Nepal's experiments with (autocratic and) democratic
governance to make a real difference to the desperate poverty and
plight of the vast majority of Nepal's 24 million people. Forty-two
per cent of them remain under the poverty line ... ."
But the Maoists, who should be defended against the police and the
military, offer no political alternative. They actually made a bloc
with the old king, Birendra. One of their leaders declared in 2001:

''Many Marxists called the Maoists royalists. There were similar
thoughts between King Birendra and us, with reference to many national
interests. There was unannounced unity in the approach between us in
many contexts. So, it was natural for the colonialists and their
brokers to be frightened.''
See Maoist ideologue blames India, US for massacre [of royal family]
(rediff.com, June 6, 2001).

Update: (November 21, 2006) The Maoists have joined the bourgeois
government and will liquidate their militia into the national army.
See Nepal celebrates peace deal with rebels (The Guardian (UK),
November 22).

Posted at 02:24 AM in caste, Nepal | Permalink | Comments (0)

April 12, 2006
BUSINESS NEWS
Air India Now Offers Business Caste Seating

"'More legroom, wider seats—and no need to associate with the manual
laborers,' a spokesman for the airline said Tuesday. 'Our business
travelers must have lived good past lives to deserve this.'"

The Onion is a satirical weekly newspaper parody published in the
U.S.

Posted at 03:35 AM in caste | Permalink | Comments (0)

April 01, 2006
WORKING IN PAKISTAN'S COAL MINES
Exposé: Death in the Mines (Newsline (Karachi))

"Bonded for their working life through contractors, young boys of 13
work till they are 30 years old for a paltry sum until their damaged
lungs can no longer withstand the chronic exposure to coal dust."
Posted at 02:37 AM in Pakistan, working class | Permalink | Comments
(0)

March 31, 2006
CASTE IN NEPAL
Caste-based Discrimination Endures in Nepal (OhMyNews.com)

"Dalits in Nepal are prohibited from walking in front of upper caste
people and need to make an alternate path behind them."
See also:

more on caste from same journalist: When Caste Overshadows Humanity

Posted at 02:40 AM in caste, dalits (untouchables), Nepal | Permalink
| Comments (0)

March 13, 2006
CASTE-BASED BONDED LABOR IN PAKISTAN
PAKISTAN: Free at Last, From Generations of Bonded Labour (Inter Press
Service News Agency)

'''All my family members worked, including my mother and younger
sister. My mother would say we have to work to pay off the loans taken
by my grandfather from the landlords. However hard and long we all
worked, the exorbitant interest on the loan my grandfather had taken
was never paid.'''
See also:

In Pakistan, 'slavery' persists (The Christian Science Monitor,
December 15, 2003)

Posted at 02:44 AM in caste, labor and caste, Pakistan | Permalink |
Comments (0)

March 07, 2006
ANTI-HINDU COMMUNALISM
Terror in Varanasi, nation on alert (The Indian Express)

"The blast at the railway station was so powerful that it left a deep
crater on the platform. The area was splattered with blood and human
remains. The blast at the temple set off panic and led to a near
stampede as people scrambled for cover. Two weddings were on in the
complex when the explosion took place. People were seen ferrying the
injured, including several elderly women, to the hospital. Rescue
workers struggled in narrow lanes and bylanes to bring out the injured
from the blast site."
Posted at 03:48 AM in communalism | Permalink | Comments (0)

February 24, 2006
GUJARAT MASSACRE AFTERMATH
Life sentences in India riot case (BBC News/South Asia)

"A court in India has sentenced nine people to life imprisonment in a
high-profile case related to the 2002 riots in the western state of
Gujarat. Twelve Muslims and two others were burned to death when the
Best Bakery was attacked by a Hindu mob."
See also:

this summary of the Best Bakery case from rediff.com: Best Bakery: Why
it is so important

The Hindu's editorial: A tortuous quest for justice

And see:

anti-caste article: on the 2002 anti-Muslim Gujarat massacre

Posted at 03:56 AM in communalism, Muslims | Permalink | Comments (0)

February 21, 2006
POLICE ATROCITY IN HARYANA
Dalit youth dies in police custody (The Tribune (Chandighar))

"Harjeet Singh, a Dalit youth of Niko Sarai village in Dera Baba Nanak
area, was killed in Batala police’s custody allegedly due to torture.
The police cremated his body at night without informing his family."
Posted at 04:00 AM in atrocities, dalits (untouchables), police |
Permalink | Comments (0)

February 19, 2006
MASS ATROCITY IN HARYANA
10 injured in attack on Dalit colony (The Tribune (Chandighar))

"In what could be termed as the recurrence of the Gohana incident, an
armed mob of upper castes, mostly Rodhs, allegedly attacked Ravidas
Colony at Mehmadpur village of the district today morning. The only
difference between the two incidents was that instead of torching
houses of Dalits as had been done in Gohana, Ravidasis were allegedly
attacked with sharp-edged weapons, including axes and swords."
Posted at 04:05 AM in atrocities, dalits (untouchables) | Permalink |
Comments (0)
UNTOUCHABLES IN RURAL UTTAR PRADESH
Virtual prosperity (The Indian Express)

"ELECTRICITY may still be a distant dream for Dalits in this Uttar
Pradesh village where 70 per cent of the families live below the
poverty line and many are bonded labourers, but that has not stopped
their children from learning to use the internet or handle digital
cameras. Indeed, some Dalits from this village of 360 families where
half the land is owned by gun-toting Brahmin landlords who still
regard banks with unease, have gone on to become teachers, army
officers and Railway officials...."
Posted at 04:03 AM in dalits (untouchables), poverty | Permalink |
Comments (0)

February 07, 2006
HINDU-RIGHT CAMPAIGN IN U.S.
Now, Multicultural Hindutva (Outlook India)

On the Hindu right's current campaign to revise the grade-school
textbooks in California (and therefore, because of that state's weight
in the textbook market, all across the U.S.).

See also:

this letter by Professor Vinay Lal to the president of the California
Board of Education

Creationism By Any Other Name… by historian Romila Thapar and Sanskrit
scholar Michael Witzel (Outlook India, February 28, 2006)

this entertaining commentary by Vijay Prashad (CounterPunch, December
31 / January 31)

Update: February 28, 2006

In a press release two organizations protesting the Hindu right's
proposed revisions, the Friends of South Asia and the Coalition
Against Communalism, claim victory:

"The intense struggle over the content of Indian history in California
textbooks ended yesterday afternoon at 2 p.m. with the special
committee of the California SBE voting unanimously to overturn a
majority of contentious changes proposed by Hindu right-wing groups."
Posted at 04:08 AM in hindu right | Permalink | Comments (0)

February 06, 2006
MILITANT STRIKE BETRAYED BY LEFT FRONT
After a four-day strike by over 20,000 workers against selling off the
Mumbai and New Dehli airports to private companies, part of the
Congress-led government's privitization drive, is called off by union
leaders from the reformist left parties, the capitalist press
celebrates:

PM shows 'spine', wins battle with Left (Reuters):

"India's government has won a crucial victory against its Communist
'allies' over airport modernisation, and will now move forward more
confidently on its own reform agenda, analysts said on Monday."
The Left's 'own goals' (rediff.com):

"Even tactically, the Left bungled because air traffic controllers and
public sector airline employees continued to work, so all that the
strikers could achieve was nuisance value, not disruption of air
services.... It might be argued that some of this is just shadow play,
and the Left didn't really want to stop the privatisation of airports,
since one of its leading lights, Buddhadeb Bhattacharya, the chief
minister of Left Front-ruled West Bengal, had said last year that he
would like to privatise Kolkata airport. Equally, the Left Democratic
Front in Kerala has never criticised or come in the way of the
privately-run Kochi airport. The Left's aim, ahead of the elections in
West Bengal and Kerala, was probably to demonstrate to the big public
sector unions and their members that it still supported them, a sort
of Communist equivalent of going to a temple or church."
Posted at 04:16 AM in working class | Permalink | Comments (0)

January 28, 2006
BOOK ON MANUAL SCAVENGING
Exposing an abhorrent practice (Frontline)

review by S. Vishwanathan of India Stinking by Gita Ramaswamy:

"'In an age when mechanisation with harvesters and tractors has
rendered thousands of manual labourers jobless," Gita notes, "it is a
standing testimony to the lasting virulence of the caste system that
public facility cleaning and sewage disposal are still handled by
human beings.'"
See also:

Soiled tracks by Kancha Ilaiah (Outlook India, January 16, 2005)

Posted at 04:23 AM in dalits (untouchables), labor and caste, manual
scavenging | Permalink | Comments (0)
ATROCITY IN PUNJAB: BANT SINGH
Casteist assault (Frontline)

"On January 7, Bant Singh, a resident of Jhabbar in the southern
Punjab district of Mansa, was surrounded by a group of Jat youths from
the same village. The upper-caste men brutally beat him with iron
rods. Three days later, after gangrene set in, doctors amputated his
limbs."
Posted at 04:20 AM in atrocities, dalits (untouchables) | Permalink |
Comments (0)

January 02, 2006
ATROCITY IN BIHAR: SIX BURNED ALIVE
Caste waters run deep in Bihar village (newkerala.com)


"The village in Vaishali district bristled with tension, anger and
pain Monday, a day after the 45-year-old woman and her five minor
children were torched to death in their hut because her husband
refused to withdraw a police complaint against a Yadav for the theft
of a buffalo. While the killings came as a shock to members of the
backward agrarian Koeri caste to which the victims belonged, they were
quick to point out that they were not allowed to keep cattle and those
who dared flout the unwritten rule paid for it."
Posted at 04:26 AM in atrocities, dalits (untouchables) | Permalink |
Comments (0)

September 27, 2005
ATROCITY IN BELKHED VILLAGE (AKOLA), MAHARASHTRA
The riots and wrongs of caste (The Hindu (Opinion)) by P. Sainath

"The Dalits here are impoverished agricultural labourers. Some of
these tiny, ruined dwellings housed 12 or more people. The over 150
families in the basti have homes bunched together, often joined by
common walls. The flames must have spread quickly."
Posted at 04:30 AM in atrocities, dalits (untouchables) | Permalink |
Comments (0)

September 24, 2005
RESISTANCE PROVOKES REACTION
Barber women ‘sexually abused, paraded naked’ by upper community
(United News of India)

"Four women of the Bhubanpati village told reporters here on Thursday
that they were 'punished' on September 19 because their husbands had
refused to wash the feet of 'baratis' during a marriage ceremony
sometime back."
Posted at 04:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

September 21, 2005
ATROCITIES IN HARYANA
Caste war shows India's lowest class still faces struggle (The Chicago
Tribune)

"Higher-caste members say the Dalits just want attention and set their
own homes on fire, shaved their own mustaches and made everything else
up.[...]They say the Dalits are treated equally in Badhram and live
pretty well. "'They even have tractors and motorcycles,' said Jagan
Singh, a farmer and former village leader who belongs to the Zamindar
land-owning caste. 'They even have trucks.' "'Mobile phones,' one man
shouted. 'Color TVs,' another pointed out. "'They eat butter chicken
every day,' Singh added."
Posted at 04:38 AM in atrocities, dalits (untouchables) | Permalink |
Comments (0)

September 06, 2005
MASS ATROCITY IN GOHANA, HARYANA
There's a much larger house on fire (The Hindu (Opinion)) by P.
Sainath

"About the time 50 Dalit houses were set ablaze in Gohana, the country
marked 50 years of a law giving effect to the Constitution's abolition
of untouchability. As if to rub in the irony, 25 more Dalit homes have
been torched in the same week. This time in Akola, Maharashtra."
See also:

'Gohana is Haryana's shame today' (rediff.com, September 1, 2005)

Prosperity Sharpens Caste Animosities (Inter Press Service News
Agency, September 19, 2005)

Posted at 04:41 AM in atrocities, dalits (untouchables) | Permalink |
Comments (0)

September 05, 2005
CASTE AND WOMEN'S OPPRESSION
A Young Woman Says 'No' to Rural India's Child-Marriage Tradition (The
Washington Post)

"Not only does Chaudhry accuse her would-be in-laws of demanding money
in exchange for her freedom, but the leaders of her caste -- a
powerful informal council known as a caste panchayat -- have also
threatened Chaudhry and her family with the ultimate sanction of
excommunication, or ejection from the caste. Such an outcome would rob
the family of its social standing and damage the marriage prospects of
Chaudhry's 18-year-old brother, among other things."
Posted at 04:45 AM in caste, children, women | Permalink | Comments
(0)

August 25, 2005
UNTOUCHABILITY IN ORISSA
Dalit girl reprimanded for riding cycle through village (rediff.com)

"Her only fault was that she rode her bicycle to college through a
village to attend college. Mamata Nayak, who wants to be a teacher,
was reprimanded by upper caste villagers for daring to ride on the
village road."
Posted at 04:48 AM in dalits (untouchables) | Permalink | Comments
(0)

August 13, 2005
REPRESSION OF HONDA WORKERS IN GURGAON, HARYANA
On July 25 Indian television showed footage of hundreds of striking
workers surrounded by cops and made to crawl on the ground as the cops
worked their way through the crowd beating heads, backs, and limbs
with thick, metal-tipped clubs and continuing to beat as their victims
lay bloody and senseless for a full 45 minutes. It was like the Rodney
King video on a tape loop....
...see anti-caste article: on the repression of striking Honda workers
in Gurgaon, Haryana

See also:

Target, trade unionism (Frontline)

For a 'New deal' for labour by Praful Bidwai (Frontline, August 13-26,
2005)

Malls of the few, chawls of the many by P. Sainath (The Hindu,
Opinion)

Posted at 04:51 AM in police, working class | Permalink | Comments
(0)

August 12, 2005
ATROCITIES IN HARYANA
Landlords set 3 houses on fire (asianage.com)

"Landlords have ostracised dalits and confined to their homes 45
persons belonging to the Scheduled Castes since July 20, when they
offered prayers at a local temple. Dalits have been beaten, and the
moustache of one dalit man is lopped off every day."
http://diary.typepad.com/anticaste/

India: Murshidabad’s Starving Masses

Jalangi lies 50 Km east of Bahrampore, the district headquarters of
Murshidabad. Predominantly inhabited by Muslims and dalits, the area
was earmarked for East Pakistan, before the British colonial rulers
changed the partition plan at the last minute, in 1947. Today, Jalangi
is a resettlement town on the banks of River Padma. Changing of the
river course and massive erosion of its embankments has resulted in
the original Jalangi town now being completely submerged in water. The
bulk of the surrounding cultivated lands had turned into sand beds;
homes have been devastated; and livelihoods and livestock,
destroyed.

Having travelled 250 odd Km to Jalangi, which took us almost eight
hours, we visited several villages: Dayarampur, Dairepara, Ghoshpara,
Farazipara, Hoggledaire, Muradpur, Noadpara, Gauipur, Bhangapara and
Schoolpara. The desperation of these villages was unfathomable. While
the River Padma had devoured virtually everything, the rapid erosion
has displaced its inhabitants leaving them with little option but to
beg or toil as agricultural labourers to feed their families. If they
were fortunate enough they managed one meal a day; if not, they simply
starved. Majority of village children suffered from night blindness
due to a lack of vitamin A and Reports indicated several people had
died of starvation.


Desperation of an aging villager Ayub Ali of Paraspur and Mohammad
Zazir of Dakshin Ghoshpara told us that they were compelled to move
three times in the last decade while Ummat Ali Shah and Sanajeev
Karmakar’s father had died of broken hearts—being unable to cope with
the shock of losing everything. Shamsher Shiekh of Dayarampur who had
been a prosperous farmer had become a pauper.

The CPI(M) controlled Gram Panchayat (village council) seems to have a
monopoly over this desperate situation. Incidents of death due to
hunger go largely unreported because villagers are threatened and
coerced into silence. Villagers also told us how CPI(M) functionaries
in the Gram Panchayat were busying themselves shamelessly
appropriating most of the relief materials meant for river-erosion
victims. In a desperate bid to survive, villagers were forced into
toiling in other peoples’ lands for a pittance, begging or joining in
the rampant cross-border smuggling. In 2005, under the National food
for Work Programme [NFFWP], the CPI(M) functionaries devised ingenious
methods of extortion from poor villagers. For instance, they demanded
as levy for party funds, two rupees for every Rs. 32 earned as a day’s
wage and 300 grams of rice for every 7 kilograms received.

Actually, it seemed the CPI (M) MLA, the police, the Border Security
Forces [BSF], Customs and other officials colluded with each other in
the extortion and smuggling rackets as well as other crimes.

Reports also illustrate the severe shortage of food and the desperate
measures taken by the people to survive. More than 600 families have
been forced into abject poverty and are facing starvation. The
situation is so bad that teenage girl of poverty stricken families
have been forced to marry men from Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab,
Haryana and Rajasthan. The ‘dalaals’ (women agent/pimps) are engaged
in a brisk trade of finding brides for the ‘Ghataks’ (matchmakers) to
enter into fake marriages paying between Rs.20, 000 to Rs. 30,000. It
is said that the male ‘dalaals’ have performed scores of fakes
marriages and sell them to those who operate in the red-light
districts of Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and even Arab countries, where
they work either as maids or sex-slaves.

Despite this untold suffering and devastation, one Gopen Sharma—also
known as Gopen da—has become a cry in the wilderness. He has stood
firmly against BSF and police atrocities in Jalangi, opposed smuggling
and rampant corruption, mobilized victims of starvation and
demonstrated before the Block Development Official (BDO), the
Murshidabad District Magistrate (DM), the Governor and UNICEF offices.
But this naturally earned him the wrath of the authorities who
instigated the police to fabricate a case against him and his absence
arrested his mother and younger brother.

The following stories depict the untold pain and suffering of the
people of Jalangi who are confronted with the atrocities of the BSF
and the police, the violence and exploitation of the smugglers and the
functionaries of the CPI(M) who are allegedly in league with criminal
gangs. These are the voices of the voiceless, the starving poor of
India—the land of plenty and largest democracy in the world.

TARUN KANTI BOSE
E-mail: tarunka...@gmail.com
The spectre of starving India
Combat Law, Issue #3 : The Right to Food

Combat Law, Issue 3 - I was in Jaipur for a meeting organised by
Kavita Shrivastav of the People's Union of Civil Liberties (PUCL),
unconnected with starvation deaths, where I met Jean Dreze, a
professor of economics at Delhi. He suggested that I visit a village
nearby to see the extent of hunger in the countryside. An hour's drive
from Jaipur and we were in another world -that of the dispossesed.
People had no food at all and fluoride in the well-water had
prematurely aged the youth.

Miles away were the godowns of the Food Corporation of India (FCI) -
full of grain, some of it rotting and a feast for rats. This is the
spectre of starving India.

In December 2000, the Union Minister for Consumer Affairs and Public
Distribution wrote to all chief ministers admitting that five crore
people are victims of starvation. A few days later, the Chief Minister
of Rajasthan complained to him that he had heard that lakhs of tonnes
of food grains were lying in the godowns of the FCI and that there was
a proposal to dump it in the sea, to make storage space for the next
crop. When Manoj Parida, Senior Regional Manager of the FCI, was
interviewed on the Star TV news channel, he said that he could only
give the grain to the states if the central government allocated it,
and that his dilemma was that he couldn't just throw it away!

In 1988, in the case of Kishen Patnaik, when starvation deaths were
brought to the notice of the Apex Court, the court accepted the
assurances of the Government of Orissa that the situation would be
looked into, and hoped that starvation deaths would cease. Ten years
later, another petition was filed, detailing hundreds of starvation
deaths. In 2001, when Kavita Srivastava of the People's Union of Civil
Liberties (PUCL), Rajasthan, filed a petition, the condition of the
people had not changed.

No will to Act

Why is it that with 60 million tonnes of grain in surplus of the
buffer stock, India still has hunger on this scale? Why are half of
India's children malnourished? No answer. Shanta Kumar, the minister
responsible, remains unruffled despite widespread condemnation. And
the Prime Minister appeared on television recently to say that the
reports of starvation deaths are false and politically motivated. All
this in a situation where it has been calculated that it is cheaper to
give grain away free to the poor than to transport and store it! A
compassionate court would have none of that. It found it
incomprehensible that a litigant would have to move the highest court
merely for a direction to government to implement its own schemes.

"Cut the flab somewhere else", said the Court when confronted with the
argument that the states had no funds to feed hungry children.

"Cut the flab somewhere else", said the Court when confronted with
the argument that the states had no funds to feed hungry children.
From The Ratlam Municipality v. Virdichand (AIR 1980 SC 1622) onwards,
the Apex Court has held that when it comes to the enforcement of a
fundamental right, courts will not entertain the argument of financial
incapacity. Hunger spreads not because the State lacks the funds to
act but it chooses to use its money elsewhere in what V. R. Krishna
Iyer once called "a perverse expenditure logic". A second aircraft
carrier for the Navy, to be purchased soon, will cost a thousand
crore, an amount that could feed all of this nation's children. But
macho muscle flexing is more important than that! And we have examples
of ostentation such as the foreign trip of the Vice President of
India, Krishna Kant, and his family, at the State's expense.

Schemes in disarray




The British evolved a Famine Code which ensured that anyone needing
food in a famine area had only to turn up at a work site - a road, a
school building, a watershed management programme - to get work. At
the end of the day, she would get half of her wages in grain. Famine
records show that the prompt implementation of food for work
programmes reduced hunger and prevented starvation deaths. For those
unable to work - the old, infirm and disabled - there was a dole of
fifty paise per day.

Fifty years after Independence, this Famine Code is in disuse and the
elaborate procedure laid down for tackling famines disregarded. The
watered-down remedy - the Employment Assurance Scheme - provided for
employment for two family members on food for work projects for 100
days in a year. This was never implemented. And recently, the Prime
Minister announced from the Red Fort that the scheme was being
upgraded and renamed the Sampoorna Gramin Rozgar Yojana. This
'upgraded' scheme provided work for only ten days in a year!

The ration card system, the only mechanism in place to feed the poor,
is in disarray. In India's capital, the identification of Below
Poverty Line (BPL) families started after the court case and there
were many complaints of corruption in the issuing of forms.

The Midday Meal Scheme, introduced as far back as 1995 and requiring a
cooked meal to be given to all children in government and government-
assisted schools, was implemented fully only in Tamilnadu. The Delhi
government only gave a few biscuits to its schoolchildren. The
Annapoorna Scheme, which provides grain to the poorest of the poor at
Rs. 2 per kg was also not implemented. The beneficiaries of the
National Old Age Pension Scheme usually received their pensions six
months late if at all.

No wonder that the Comptroller & Auditor General, in his Year 2000
Report, found significant systematic weaknesses in the fair price shop
system. He found the reports of employment generated not genuine. The
Employment Assurance Scheme, which promised a hundred days of food for
work, in practice provided only nine days of work. Scarce resources
were lost in the labyrinth of a slothful administrative system. The
report found one-fifth of rural households facing the prospect of
hunger. Forty percent of all households did not get two square meals a
day. Concluding, the Computer & Auditor General found serious flaws in
design, execution and monitoring of the schemes.

A study conducted by the Tata Economic Consultancy Services found a
large number of bogus ration shops, and 30 per cent of the grain being
diverted.

Supreme Court Orders

The court directed that the targeted public distribution system be
fully implemented by January 2002 and that all governments complete
their identification of BPL families, issue ration cards and
distribute 25 kg of grain per family per month by that date.

A similar order was passed for the Antyodaya Anna Yojana scheme, under
which the poorest of the poor get grain at Rs. 2 per kg. The Supreme
Court directed that the governments should consider giving the grain
free to people who are too poor to buy it. It directed governments to
provide a cooked midday meal in all government and government-assisted
schools. It directed governments to implement the National Old Age
Pension Scheme fully by January 2002 and to make payments of pension
by the seventh of each month.

Similarly directions were made in respect of the Annapoorna Scheme,
the Integrated Child Development Scheme, the National Maternity
Benefit Scheme and the National Family Benefit Scheme.

The last order is dated 8.5.02. In this order the gram panchayats have
been empowered to frame the Food-for-Work schemes, wherein special
emphasis is to be given for the poor, women and dalits. Contractors
are prohibited. The gram sabhas are also empowered to conduct a social
audit of all the food and employment schemes and to report instances
of misuse of funds. On such reports being made, the authorities are
required to punish the guilty.

The gram sabhas are also empowered to monitor the implementation of
the various schemes and to have access to relevant information as to
how beneficiaries are selected and how benefits are disbursed. A
grievance redressal procedure is set out in this order. Complaints of
non implementation of the Supreme Court's order is to be made to the
CEO / Collector and these complaints are to be acknowledged with a
receipt. Ultimately, it is the Chief Secretary who is made
responsible. Dr. N.C. Saxena, former Planning Secretary and Mr. S.R.
Shankaran, former Secretary, Rural Development have been appointed as
commissioners of the Supreme Court for the purpose of looking into
people's grievances. The Supreme Court has also directed government to
frame clear guidelines for the proper identification of BPL families
as there were complaints that this criteria is neither clear nor
uniform. Ration shops have been directed to remain open throughout the
month during fixed hours, the details of which should be displayed on
notice board.

Transparency

Most officials do not know of the schemes in their own jurisdiction.
There is no way for people in a village to know what schemes they are
entitled to. The order of the Court in the Rajasthan PUCL case will
hopefully change the situation for the better. A translated copy of
the Supreme Court order and the list of the beneficiaries of each
scheme are to be displayed on every gram panchayat notice board and in
schools. Doordarshan and AIR are to publicise the schemes.

All said and done, even with the Apex Court order, the level of
compliance will go up to, say, 35 per cent. Hunger will remain
institutionalised. As along as priorities do not change, half of
India's population will be kept deliberately hungry by State policy.
Only a revolution can change that. Madhura Swaminathan in her recent
publication Weakening Welfare has studied the Public Distribution
System (PDS) in India. Noticing that food deprivation and insecurity
persists on a mass scale, she concludes that this situation of mass
deprivation is likely to worsen in the current context of
"liberalisation, structural adjustment and the weakening of welfare
systems". She argues that there is need to expand and strengthen - not
undermine or disband the PDS system. She has identified 'targeting' as
a dangerous policy introduced as a mechanism to ultimately close down
the PDS. This part of the article is largely taken from her book.

History of Public Distribution System


1964: FCI set up a sole central agency for procurement, storage,
transportation and distribution of food commodities viz. rice, wheat,
sugar, edible oils, kerosene and coal.
1964-1978:Drought of 1965/67 and 1972 / 73 provided strong impetus for
the expansion of PDS.
1978-1991: Food grain distribution through PDS peaked in 1991 at 20.8
MT.
1991 onwards: Food grain distributed through PDS falls substantially
to 14 MT in 1994. Stocks accumulate. Between 1991 and 1994 PDS process
double. The poor are priced out. Sales drop. Stocks build up. At this
point because global prices are temporarily high export taken place at
the cost of nutrition in India.
1997: Targetting introduced. Between 1998 and 2001: APL prices were
increased 85% (wheat) and 61% (rice) and BPL prices by 66% and 62%
respectively.
The Spectre of Mass Hunger

A shift is noticed from cereals to other food items of lesser
nutrition among the poor. The National Sample Survey data, shows that
per capita consumption of cereals declined in every state except
Kerala.

The National Sample Survey data, shows that per capita consumption of
cereals declined in every state except Kerala in both urban and rural
areas. A shift is noticed from cereals to other food items of lesser
nutrition among the poor. This exacerbates undernourishment.
Nutritional surveys done by the National Nutrition Monitoring Board
confirms this inadequacy of food (and cereal) intake by large parts of
the population is below the recommended intake of 460 grams. Referring
to "hidden hunger" it found an inadequate intake of micronutrients,
which play a critical role in body functioning. The National Sample
Survey Organisation found in 17 of India's most populous states that
the average caloric intake declined between 1972 and 1994. The decline
was particularly sharp in rural areas. At the all-India level total
calories per head in rural areas has fallen on 2149 by 1999-2000
compared to 2211 in 1983, a decline by 72 calories per head. This
level of 2149 calories per head in 1999 - 2000 is substantially lower
than China or Brazil's level of 2757 calories and 2797 calories in
1993. It is also lower than Tanzania or Kenya's level of 1980.

A commonly used indicator of undernourishment is Body Mass Index
(BMI). This is the ratio of weight (kg) to the square of height (m).
18.5 is normal. Using this indicator, Shetty and James found 46% of
persons chronically deficient in 1991-1992. Severe undernourishment
was observed among 9%. In other words one half of the population in
the country is malnourished. Of these 53% of children were found to be
undernourished and 21% severally undernourished.

Poverty Line Excludes Many Hungry Persons

The original standard for the definition of the poor was thrice the
food expenditure as it was shown that poor families spend 1/3 of their
expenditure on food. Any household that spends more than 1/3 of its
income on food is considered poor in the United States and eligible
for food stamps. If this standard is used in India 95% of all
households would be considered poor. If one uses the China standard of
food share of 60%, then 80% of the rural population and 60% of the
urban population would be poor. Thus in India, the top 20% of the
population can be excluded from systems of food security.

When there is mass hunger the weight attached to every undernourished
person who is wrongly excluded should be much higher than the weight
attached to a rich person who benefits from the scheme. The conclusion
drawn by Swaminathan is that the proportion of persons suffering
deprivations in food and nutrition is higher than those below the
poverty line. For example 37% of urban household were BPL in 1993-94
while 80% of households were calorie deficit.

If the objective of PDS is food security then it should also look at
those facing the risk of undernourishment. While anthropometric
measures suggest 50% adults are undernourished, 70% of households are
deficient in food consumption.

Decline in Per Capita Offtake

There are sharp regional variations in total and per capita offtake.
Some of the southern states, Andhra Pradesh,Tamil Nadu, Kerala and
Karnataka, accounted for almost one half of the PDS offtake of grain
in the country. By contrast the four northern states Bihar, Madhya
Pradesh , Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh accounted for only 10% in 1995.
Kerala was undoubtably the leader with a fair system of public
delivery. The average per capita offtake was 53.3 kg. per year as
compared to 2.3 kg. in Bihar and 4.6 in Madhya Pradesh.

The most striking feature of immediate post structural adjustment
(1991-1995) was the widerspread decline in per capita offtake. In
Uttar Pradesh and Bihar in 1987, 98% of the rural population did not
purchase any grain from PDS. In Kerala by contrast, 87% of the
population purchased grain from PDS. The data indicated that PDS was
not serving the vast majority of the country's population and that
there was a near total collapse of the PDS system in Bihar and some
northern states.

Corruption and Maladministration


In Thane district in Maharashtra, Swaminathan found that ration cards
of scheduled tribes showed full offtake though the tribes had not
purchased food from the ration shops. Other researches have found
bogus ration cards, poor quality grains and short weighing of foods.
Researchers have estimated that only 17% of the wheat lifted from the
FCI by the state governments reaches the final consumer in Bihar!
Insufficient supply of grains was the most important reason given for
not using PDS. 40% did not buy grain because there was none to be
bought.

Targets, Food stamps and other rackets: Sabotaging the PDS In recent
times advisors to the G.O.I. and the World Bank have suggested a shift
from PDS to a system of food stamps or coupons. Such advice generally
ignores not only the experience of other countries but also the
inherent difficulties in implementing such a system. Swaminathan
points out that a food stamp system entails extensive book keeping,
revalidating of coupons and the possibility of fraud by the
counterfeiting of coupons.

Two major moves were made by government of India to sabotage the PDS
system; in all probability with the nudging of the WB and the IMF. The
first came in 1992 with the Revamped PDS (RPDS) and the second in 1997
with Targetted PDS (TPDS). This comes together with another major
policy shift in the 1990's away from the agricultural strategy of self
sufficiency in food grains production.

In many tribal areas poor families were excluded from the Public
Distribution System if they stated that they ate meat!

One way of weakening the PDS in the early 1990's was by repeatedly
raising the price in the PDS shops. These prices were increased to
such an extent that the cumulative price increase of food grains in
the PDS shops was higher than the rise in the general price index.
Coupled with this, government sharply reduced the supply of food
grains to the PDS since 1991. Thus from 1991-1998 there was a fall in
per capita offtake. Revamped PDS involved tagretting specific areas
such as drought prone, desert, tribal, hilly and urban slum areas.
Targetted PDS used the poverty line to demarcate poor and non poor.
This system was so arbitrary and irrational that it resulted in large
numbers of poor persons being excluded. There was no method at all to
determine whether the family fell below the poverty line. The income
criteria was not followed in most states and particularly in the rural
areas as, following the started income criterion would result in 90%
of households falling below the poverty line. Reports from many rural
areas indicated households were classified as falling below the
poverty line on the basis of visual inspection as to whether the
household had a tiled roof or a mud floor. In many tribal areas poor
families were excluded if they stated that they ate meat!

Swaminathan's study of the revamped and targetted PDS found that
entitlements were lower in the revamped PDS areas than under general
PDS. She found that retail prices in PDS shops in Maharashtra were the
highest in the country and rising faster than at the national level.
As a result quantities of grain sold were falling since 1991.
Targetting had replaced the per capita norm by the family norm. Using
the poverty line resulted in misidentification of households and
mistargetting. Moghe in his study of Maharashtra found that when
targetted PDS was announced there were 60 lakhs households, according
to the central government, eligible for BPL category. The state
restricted this number to 43 lakhs.

In slums, households were classified as BPL or APL on the basis of a
few queries resulting in absurdly low numbers. In Dharavi, Asia's
largest slum with a population of 0.5 million, the Rationing Control
Officer identified only 365 BPL families in 1997 and after 're-checks'
the number fell to 151 in 1999!

Where do you stand, Dr. Sen?
Amartaya Sen's support for the movement to save the PDS is crucial.
His support would mean much. His position however is not clear. There
are broadly two camps. The pro-PDS and anti-PDS. Both speak of concern
for the poor, so the debate can be confusing.

The pro-PDS camp (anti globalisation)
Seek the expansion and strengthing of PDS
Universal coverage
Increased subsidies or at least the present level
Continued procurement from farmers (reforms are fine if poor farmers
and not the rich benefit from procurement)

The anti-PDS camp (Pro-globalisation)
Seek an end to PDS
An end to procurement
Free market as the solution
Food stamps as a replacement for PDS


The World Bank has recommended that PDS be targetted to the "very
poor" and that a distinction be drawn between the "very poor" and the
"moderately poor" to improve transfer of food to the "ultra poor". The
very poor are defined as households that have expenditure less than
3/4 the BPL expenditures. The remaining 1/4 are defined as moderately
poor. In short, an extremely narrow form of targetting is being
propagated to groups within the poor. This, Swaminathan concludes, is
most undesirable. What we need is a system of near universal
provision. At most the top 20% of the population can be excluded.

When there is targetting especially with a low income cut-off, errors
in measurements can mean disqualification for a genuinely poor person.
Secondly, there is an incentive to cheat. Thirdly, time specific cut-
offs make little sense when there is downward income mobility. Gaiha
in his 1987 study found that 13% of the non poor in 1968 had become
poor in 1970.

Planned Destruction of India's Agricultural Production

Usa Patnaik has written on this issue. In this part of the article we
rely on her inputs. Food grain output dropped sharply to 1.66%
(1999-2000) compared to 3.54% for the previous decade. There was a
decline of 8 million ha in the area sown to food grains. The sharp cut
back in government rural development expenditures reduced growth in
rural employment to only 0.6% (1993-1999) as compared to 2%
(1987-1993).

Surplus production of a few 'advanced countries' accounts for 4/5 of
the global trade in cereals. These countries have focussed their
attention on the markets of the 'developing world'. To penetrate these
economies and attack their agricultural production systems, the
advanced countries ensured that their export of grain would be at very
low prices so as to make local prices appear exorbitant. One of the
ways in which the prices were kept artificially low was by the grant
of large subsidies to the farming sector including grants to agro -
business corporations.

During 1980 to 1986, for example, cereal prices fell by one-fourth;
the US increased the Producer Subsidy Equivalent (PSE) as a % of total
value of agricultural output from 9% to an astronomical 45%. European
countries followed suit. Ten European countries raised the PSE to
agricultural output percentage from 25 to 66 while Japan raised it
from 71 to 93. These highly inflated susbsidy levels of the mid-
Eighties were then deliberately made the base from which a mere one
fifth cut was undertaken by advanced countries in the Agreement on
Agricultural of GATT in 1994.

There is another indicator of farm subsidies. It is called the "Total
Support Estimate (TSE)". This is the figure of total support to
farmers. The USA which had reduced its TSE to 34% of it value of
agricultural production by 1997, raised it by 51% in 1991 and then
hugely in 2002 thus transferring between 71 to 96 billion dollars
between 1997 and 1999 to the farm sector. There is a Farm Bill before
the US Congress proposing to pay additional subsidies of 73.5 billion
over the next 10 years. Similarly, the 24 OECD countries including
Japan increased their TSE from 46.5% in 1997 to 59.4% by 1999.

As a result, the global prices of major staples like rice, wheat and
maize have been halved and developing countries where protection has
been removed have become vulnerable.

The proponents of globalisation thus have double standards. While
massively subsidising their farm sector including massive agro-
corporations, the argument is simultaneously made in the developing
world for subsidies to be removed! Advanced countries have through
incessant pressure applied succeeded in getting quantitative
restrictions removed fully, years before the mandatory date. They are
now pushing for the winding up of the PDS. Thus opening up to free
trade in agriculture is taking place at the worst possible time when
global food prices have been crashing. After grain inputs for Eastern
Europe and CIS countries declined sharply in the early 1990's, the USA
turned its attention to penetrating South East Asian countries using
the familiar rhetoric that all subsidies were bad. The Philippines,
for example, gave up its functioning grain procurement and
distribution system and became a net importer of US grain.

Suicides

In India, liberalised trade policies have resulted in massive losses
for farmers. Farmers in Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Karnataka and
other states have been devastated. Many have committed suicide. Cotton
farmers have been killing themselves since 1998. In the first month of
2002 over 25 new cases of suicide were reported from Andhra Pradesh.
Many have resorted to selling body parts such as kidneys. Recovery
proceedings have resulted in the taking away of land, houses, farming
tools and equipment and even household articles including utensils!

Swaminathan has demolished the myth that the 'burden' of food
subsidies is too high, pointing out that food subsidy as a percentage
of GDP has remained unchanged over the last 31 years at 0.31% of GDP.
This compares favourably with Sri Lanka (1.3% in 1984), Mexico (0.63%
in 1984) and Tunisia (2% in 1993).

Kerala leads the way

According to Swaminathan, the Kerala experience shows that with
political commitment food security can be obtained. The establishment
of an effective PDS system in Kerala was the outcome of a strong
people's movement for food. As a result the coverage is almost
universal. In 1996, 95% of households were covered. The poor depend on
and use PDS more than the rich. The functioning and delivery system is
better than in other states.

Colin Gonsalves
August - September 2002

Colin Gonsalves is an advocate practising in the Supreme Court of
India and one of the Joint Editors of Combat Law.
http://www.indiatogether.org/combatlaw/issue3/starve.htm







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