14-07-2017 (Important News Clippings)
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Date:14-07-17
Virgin to cow
Now the censor board wants to beep out Amartya Sen – it’s becoming dottier by the day
TOI Editorials
CBFC wants to beep out the Nobel Laureate when he says ‘Gujarat’, ‘Hindu India’, ‘cow’ and ‘Hindutva view of India’. This is passing strange. It’s of course been going snip-snip on a galaxy of scenes and dialogue but one thought the general objection was to sexual or supposedly unsanskari material and swearing. Exactly what does the ‘Hindutva view of India’ have in common with ‘virgin’, ‘intercourse’, ‘bastard’, ‘saale’ and ‘haramzade’? And since when has ‘cow’ become akin to a curse word that should be beeped out?
For our filmmakers it’s excruciating. They have created a cinema that stands tall in the world but is being knocked about at home, gutting a key source of Indian soft power. Udta Punjab had to face off girta censor. Lipstick Under My Burkha had to bust a gut to be unveiled. Centre must bring sanity back by implementing the counsel of the Shyam Benegal committee, whereby CBFC should certify films not censor them. Meanwhile Sen appreciates that even for people without an iota of interest in him, India’s censor board has made The Argumentative Indian a film to watch.
Date:14-07-17
सौर ऊर्जा विकास से से समझौता नहीं
अगर सौर ऊर्जा को बढ़ावा दिया जाता है तो ऊर्जा सुरक्षा में स्थायित्व ही नहीं आएगा बल्कि प्रदूषण कम करने और जलवायु परिवर्तन से निपटने में भी मदद मिलेगी। विस्तार से जानकारी दे रहे हैं सप्तक घोष (लेखक विज्ञान, प्रौद्योगिकी और नीतिगत अध्ययन केंद्र में शोध विज्ञानी हैं। लेख में प्रस्तुत विचार निजी हैं।)
Date:13-07-17
Making waves
Malabar exercise has far-reaching geo-political impact. India-Japan-US triad must be elevated to strategic status
The current week has seen the waters of the Bay of Bengal roiled by frothy wakes of warships and submarines of three navies as their jets streak across the skies. The 21st edition of exercise “Malabar” has two aircraft-carriers, a helicopter-carrier, nuclear and diesel submarines, cruisers, destroyers and maritime patrol aircraft belonging to the Indian, Japanese and US navies participating. For a week, these units, divided into “Red” and “Blue” forces will be pitted against each other in mock-combat, involving, surface, under-water and aerial warfare. Naval exercises don’t get more complex or sophisticated than Malabar-2017.
For the Indian Navy (IN) it has been a long journey from professional isolation of the non-aligned era, to being the belle of the Malabar ball. Soviet patronage and naval hardware had commenced flowing in the 1960s, but since they never undertook professional interaction or exercises at sea, the IN found itself clinging to outdated NATO doctrines. The disintegration of the USSR saw India losing not only its steadfast political ally and sole purveyor of arms, but also the inhibitions that went with non-alignment. The US, perhaps waiting for this moment, lost no time in despatching Pacific Army Commander, General Claude M. Kicklighter, with proposals for military-to-military cooperation in 1991.
Keen to shed its insularity, the IN initiated the first ever Indo-US naval drills in May 1992. These became the precursor for bilateral exercises with the navies of a dozen other nations, which have become an annual feature on the IN calendar. Having got off to a good start, the Indo-US exercises named “Malabar” were interrupted by US sanctions imposed after India’s 1998 nuclear tests. Resumed in 2001, these naval interactions have not only provided the IN invaluable insights into the tactics, doctrines, warfare techniques and best practices of the US Navy, but also enabled periodic self-assessment, using the world’s most powerful navy as a professional yardstick.
The path of these exercises has neither been smooth nor untroubled. Externally, China has sustained a determined opposition to Malabar because of its paranoid suspicion that India is colluding with the US in an attempt at “containment”. Consequently, when the 2007 edition of this bilateral exercise, held off Okinawa, was enlarged to accommodate Australia, Singapore and Japan, China issued a shrill demarche, conveying its fear and displeasure. It took another eight years before Japan was formally admitted to make Malabar a tri-lateral.
Domestic opposition to Malabar has come from diverse sources. Notwithstanding the steep decline of Communism as a political force, there is a strong residual streak of leftist ideology in many of India’s political parties. At the same time, the right wing has its ultra-nationalists and xenophobes. Thus, an accusation of being “pro-American” can still become a damaging political tool. Another factor that sometimes poses an impediment is the public anger about America’s continuing economic and military assistance to Pakistan despite its use of jihad as a strategy and its duplicity vis-a-vis anti-India terrorist groups.
However, it is the far-reaching geo-political impact of these exercises that needs to be kept firmly in sight. Although India’s traditional strategy of “non-alignment”, and its more recent mutation, “strategic autonomy”, have served to preserve its freedom of action, India’s past leadership did not allow it to come in the way of national interest. The aftermath of the 1962 Sino-Indian crisis as well as the impending 1971 Indo-Pak War saw our leaders suspend their beliefs in national interest — in the first case, to seek military aid from the West, and in the second, to sign a treaty of friendship with the USSR.
With the 1998 nuclear tests and the 2005 Indo-US nuclear deal having resulted in a fundamental transformation of India’s status, PM Modi has also given clear indications that India’sforeign policies will be guided by pragmatism and national interest, rather than idealism. As we note the hostility and aggressive posturing by a rising China, both on our land borders and at sea, we need to recall the words of Greek historian, Thucydides. “It was the rise of Athens,” he said, “and the fear that this inspired in Sparta, that made war inevitable.” Today, realpolitik demands that India take necessary steps to avoid the “Thucydides Trap” by ensuring a favourable regional balance-of-power, through cooperation and partnerships; striking short-term alliances if necessary.
Apprehensions about the Trump administration’s stance on Indo-US naval relations have been set at rest by repeated mentions, in the recent Trump-Modi joint statement, of Indo-Pacific security, of maritime cooperation and of the significance of exercise Malabar. Japan, too, is easing its laws vis-a-vis foreign military relations. The stage is, therefore, set for the three navies to expand their linkages beyond exercises at sea. In the realm of maritime warfare, the three navies could derive mutual benefit from their diverse operational expertise. Given China’s sinister intent in acquiring bases in the Indian Ocean, and increasingly frequent transit of PLA naval units through our waters, cooperation in strategic anti-submarine warfare as well as maritime domain awareness deserve top priority. Equally, amphibious operations, trade-warfare, maritime interception operations, anti-access concepts and, of course, disaster relief, must receive due importance.
Our navy’s indigenous warship-building programme is still heavily reliant on key inputs from foreign sources. We must seek help from the advanced US and Japanese military industrial complexes to acquire the competence for designing and building our own weapons and sensors. Heading our wish list should be electric-drive technology for our amphibious-warfare ships and (hold your breath) nuclear reactors to propel our submarines as well as aircraft-carriers.
Indo-US naval cooperation has, for 25 years, formed the sheet-anchor of bilateral relations, stoically weathering political and diplomatic storms. With the invaluable accession of Japan to this partnership, the India-Japan-US triad must, now, be elevated to strategic status. A proposal worthy of contemplation would be the creation of a “maritime-infrastructure and economic initiative” that reaches out to smaller Indian Ocean nations in an endeavour to wean them away from the Dragon’s maw.
Date:13-07-17
ABC of autonomy
Questions about the transparency and accountability of autonomous bodies must be answered.
The writer is member, Niti Aayog. Views are personal
There is a Committee for Review of Autonomous Bodies (ABs), chaired by Ratan Watal. The committee’s interim report is not in the public domain. Media reports and comments on what the committee has recommended, even in the interim, are therefore premature. They are uninformed and misinformed. This choice of words should remind you of a quote ascribed to Mark Twain. “If you don’t read the newspaper, you’re uninformed. If you read the newspaper, you’re misinformed.” The choice of quote is deliberate, since there is no evidence Twain ever said, or wrote, anything of the kind. The quote itself is uninformed and misinformed.
Instinctively, everyone understands the word “autonomy” and hence, “autonomous body”. However, private enterprise is also self-governing and independent of direct government influence or control. Therefore, if a review is being contemplated, there must be something beyond notions of self-governance and self-rule. The Right to Information Act’s definition of “public authority” provides some inkling of what one is after. “Public authority means any authority or body or institution of self-government established or constituted (a) by or under the Constitution; (b) by any other law made by Parliament; (c) by any other law made by State Legislature; (d) by notification issued or order made by the appropriate Government, and includes any (i) body owned, controlled or substantially financed; (ii) non-government organisation substantially financed, directly or indirectly by funds provided by the appropriate government”.
If we leave out NGOs, we have ingredients of a definition. First, an AB is set up by the government for a specific purpose. Second, it is independent in day-to-day functioning, but the government has some control over ABs. Third, the government funds ABs in some way — revenue expenditure, capital expenditure, or both. In 2012, the CAG Compliance Report for ABs, Report No. 33 of 2011-12, stated: “During 2010-11, the ministries of the Union Government released grants/loans aggregating Rs 46,449.48 crore to 496 autonomous bodies.” Note that these are 2010-11 figures. Incidentally, we are talking about Union government-level ABs and the Ratan Watal Committee is also about such outfits. There are other ABs at the state government level.
In 1955, there were 35 ABs. Today, there are at least 679 ABs. I used the expression “at least” deliberately. We have information about 679 ABs. The actual number of ABs could be marginally more. The oldest is clearly The Asiatic Society, established in 1784 by William Jones. In those days, even if the objectives were laudable, one didn’t look to the government for money. At best, one asked for land and even as late as the 1960s, sought financial assistance for constructing buildings. The Asiatic Society probably started taking recourse to government funding in 1984, when it became an institution of national importance. Of the 679 ABs, half were set up between 1984 and 1989.
Joseph Nye coined the expression “soft power” a bit later, in 1990. Several ABs are supposed to provide content that can feed into India’s soft power aspirations. Perhaps that’s why, until recently, they constantly faced soft budget constraints. They obtained nearly Rs 46,500 crore in 2010-11. In 2017-18, 679 ABs obtained Rs 72,200 crore. Other than the 2016 Report of Expenditure Management Commission (Chaired by Bimal Jalan), consider Rule 229 in General Financial Rules, 2016. This is on general principles for setting up ABs and I will quote only one clause. “Peer review of autonomous organisations — Ministry shall put in place a system of external or peer review of autonomous organisations every three or five years depending on the size and nature of activity. Such a review should be the responsibility of the concerned administrative division of the ministry/department and should focus, inter alia, on; (a) the objective for which the autonomous organisation was set up and whether these objectives have been or are being achieved; (b) whether the activities should be continued at all, either because they are no longer relevant or have been completed or if there has been a substantial failure in achievement of objectives; (c) whether the nature of the activities is such that these need to be performed only by an autonomous organisation; (d) whether similar functions are also being undertaken by other organisations, be it in the central government or state governments or the private sector, and if so, whether there is scope for merging or winding up the organisations under review; (e) whether the total staff complement, particularly at the support level, is kept at a minimum, whether the enormous strides in information technology and communication facilities as also facilities for outsourcing of work on a contract basis, have been taken into account in determining staff strength; and whether scientific or technical personnel are being deployed on functions which could well be carried out by non-scientific or non-technical personnel etc. (f) whether user charges including overhead/ institutional charges/management fee in respect of sponsored projects, wherever the output or benefit of services are utilised by others, are levied at appropriate rates; and (g) the scope for maximising internal resources generation in the organisation so that the dependence upon government budgetary support is minimised”.
Since public resources are involved, and all resources have trade-offs, I think these questions are entirely justified and no, they wouldn’t have been asked between 1984 and 1989. Part of the resentment about the Ratan Watal Committee seems to be because questions are being raised about transparency and accountability of ABs. Culpability (C) has been added to AB. That’s the ABC of it.
दायरा बढ़ाने की जरूरत
सोनल छाया
पूर्व राजनीतिक दलों को लंबे समय से आरटीआई के जद में लाने की मांग की जा रही है, लेकिन अभी तक कोई भी दल इसके लिए तैयार नहीं है। उनकी बेरु खी के कारण ही चुनावों में कालेधन का इस्तेमाल किया जाता रहा है। एक अनुमान के मुताबिक मई, 2014 के लोक सभा चुनाव में अरबों रुपये के कालेधन का उपयोग राजनीतिक दलों ने किया था। मामले में राजनीतिक दल हमेशा से चुनाव आयोग को गलत जानकारी देते रहे हैं। भारत में आरटीआई़ अधिनियम ने नई क्रांति का सूत्रपात किया है। इस कानून के तहत आम एवं खास दोनों सूचना मांग सकते हैं। आरटीआई ने सरकारी मुलाजिमों एवं नेताओं को खौफजदा कर दिया है। इस कारण आरटीआई कार्यकर्ताओं को सावधानी से काम करना पड़ रहा है, क्योंकि किसी सूचना से बड़ी हस्ती के जुड़े रहने पर आवेदक के जान को खतरा रहता है। 2005 यानी आरटीआई के अस्तित्व में आने के बाद से अनेक आरटीआई कार्यकर्ताओं की हत्या की जा चुकी है।
आरटीआई के तहत हर नागरिक को सार्वजनिक सूचना पाने का अधिकार है। फिर भी वैधानिक गरिमा, राष्ट्रीय हित, न्यायालय के विचाराधीन विषय, मंत्रिमंडल के फैसले आदि के मामले में सूचना दिए जाने से मना किया जा सकता है। लेकिन गलत और भ्रामक सूचना देने के मामले भी प्रकाश में आए हैं। आरटीआई कार्यकर्ताओं को उत्पीड़ित करने वाली घटनाओं में भी लगातार बढ़ोतरी हो रही है। पुलिस-प्रशासन और सूचना आयोग के बीच तालमेल के अभाव के कारण घोर अराजकता का माहौल है। सरकारी संस्थानों में भ्रष्टाचार का शुरू से ही बोलबाला रहा है, लेकिन इस मामले में निजी क्षेत्र को भी क्लीन चिट नहीं दी जा सकती। अस्तु, आरटीआई कानून निजी संस्थानों में उतना ही जरूरी है, जितना सरकारी संस्थानों में। जिन संस्थानों में जनता का पैसा लगा हुआ है, उनको आरटीआई के दायरे में लाया जाना चाहिए। कोई संस्थान निजी है, सिर्फ इस वजह से आम जनता को सही सूचना प्राप्त करने से महरूम नहीं किया जा सकता। एक लोकतांत्रिक देश में सूचना पाने का हक हर व्यक्ति को है। साबुन-तेल से लेकर हरी सब्जियां तक कॉरपोरेट्स बेच रहे हैं। शिक्षा एवं स्वास्थ जैसे महत्वपूर्ण क्षेत्रों में भी कॉरपोरेट्स का दखल है। नेता जनता के प्रतिनिधि होते हैं। वे ही सरकार के समक्ष जनता की बातों व समस्याओं को रखते हैं। इस तरह से आम आदमी का कॉरपोरेट्स एवं नेताओं से अटूट जुड़ाव होता है। ऐसे में कॉरपोरेट्स और राजनीतिक दलों को आरटीआई के दायरे से बाहर रखना जनता के साथ सरासर धोखा है। इसके अतिरिक्त दूसरी अपील के लिए 90 दिनों की समय-सीमा मुर्करर किए जाने से कुछ मामलों में सूचना मिलने में वर्षो लग जाते हैं। पूर्व मुख्य केंद्रीय सूचना आयुक्त वजाहत हबीबुल्लाह का मानना है कि आरटीआई के माध्यम से समाज के वंचित तबके को उसका अधिकार मिल सकता है। यह वह हथियार है, जिसके माध्यम से आम आदमी शासन तंत्र में अपनी सहभागिता सुनिश्चित कर सकता है।
मुख्य केंद्रीय सूचना आयुक्त सत्यानंद मिश्र भी कहते हैं कि यह कानून शासन को जनता के प्रति जवाबदेह बनाता है, मगर बीते सालों इस कानून के दुरु पयोग के मामले देखने में आए हैं। पूर्व प्रधानमंत्री डॉ. मनमोहन सिंह का मानना है कि लोकहित के नाम पर लोग निर्थक, बेमानी और निजी सूचनाओं की मांग कर रहे हैं, जिससे मानव संसाधन और सार्वजनिक धन का असमानुपातिक व्यय हो रहा है। साथ ही, इसके द्वारा निजता में दखलअंदाजी भी की जा रही है। डॉ. सिंह का यह भी कहना है कि सूचना का अधिकार कानून से किसी की निजता पर हमला होता है, तो इस कानून के दायरे को सीमित किया जाना चाहिए। उन्होंने आरटीआई अधिनियम और निजता का अधिकार के बीच संतुलन बनाए रखने की जरूरत पर बल दिया है। इन खामियों के बावजूद भी आरटीआई के लाभ से इनकार नहीं किया जा सकता। आज आरटीआई कानून समाज के दबे-कुचले और वंचित लोगों के बीच उम्मीद की आखिरी किरण है। इसलिए मोदी सरकार को मामले में हस्तक्षेप करते हुए निजी और राजनीतिक दलों को भी आरटीआई कानून के जद में लाने के लिए आवश्यक कदम उठाना चाहिए ताकि सभी तरह के तंत्र में पारदर्शिता और संबंधित लोगों की जवाबदेही को सुनिश्चित किया जा सके। इससे मोदी सरकार के प्रति लोगों का विास एवं भरोसा और भी ज्यादा बढ़ेगा।