Editorials - 06-08-2022

Nearly three years after Komal Lodha, a young farm labourer, was sentenced to death by a trial court for the rape and murder of a tribal child in his village, the Rajasthan High Court has found that he was wrongfully prosecuted in the case. Abhinay Lakshman reports on the police investigation that led to the conviction

On the evening of July 27, 2018, Naina (7) told her parents that she was going to a store close to their home in Rajasthan’s Mogyabeh village in Jhalawar district. She disappeared into the dusk. It was around the same time that Komal Lodha (then 17) was being served dinner at his home, his mother says. The next day, Naina was found 500 metres from her home — raped and murdered — and Lodha was arrested for her killing. He was convicted and sentenced to death by a trial court within a year of the incident.

Four years later, the State Police have been forced to reopen the investigation into Naina’s death and start from scratch after the Rajasthan High Court found that the DNA evidence in the case absolved Lodha and that he had been wrongfully prosecuted by the police.

As 21-year-old Lodha waits in a Kota jail for his conviction to be overturned, the residents of Mogyabeh, numbering less than 1,000, are clueless, just like the police, about who could have killed the tribal girl. But unlike the police, they refuse to believe that someone from their village could have murdered her. The villagers say they believed Lodha was involved only because the police had insisted that they had “test results” that pointed to his involvement. Today, despite the High Court’s finding, some still hold Lodha responsible, while others are confused.

Komal Lodha’s arrest

The men in the village recall how the police had arrived at their conclusion within hours of finding Naina’s body. “They stormed the village after the girl was found. The police called for every man aged 18 to 50, gathered us all at the government school here and started stripping us down. They checked our private parts for signs of injuries. Lodha was also there,” recalls 35-year-old Vimal as he lights a bidi in the village square.

Lodha’s older brother, Biramchand Lodha, was also picked up. “They kept saying they needed to identify anyone who was acting ‘nervous’. We were naked and the police kept touching our private parts. As far as I could see, everyone there was nervous,” Biramchand Lodha says.

Vimal, Biramchand Lodha and at least two other men in the village who describe having been subjected to the same unnerving process say that the police eventually pulled out three or four men from the line of suspects. They allegedly noticed a mark on one of them, Komal Lodha. As per court records, Lodha was arrested on July 28.

However, in the charge sheet, the police’s narrative of how they zeroed in on Lodha as the prime suspect is fundamentally different from the events that villagers in Mogyabeh recall. The police claimed that several villagers, including Naina’s parents and her cousins, had “seen her go away with Lodha”. The police insisted that they went looking for Lodha based on the statements of these witnesses and that a dog squad also led them to his home.

“We never told the police that we suspected anyone or that we had seen Lodha with our daughter. We did not even find the body; the police found it. The police came and told us the day after she was found that they had arrested Lodha and that he had killed our child. So, we believed them and held him responsible,” says Naina’s mother, after finding out in July this year about the Rajasthan High Court’s ruling. The FIR in the case, lodged on the complaint of Naina’s father, a day after she went missing, also does not mention the child being taken away by someone.

Eventually, when they deposed before the trial court, both parents insisted that they saw Lodha taking away their daughter. Moreover, the police had recorded statements of other villagers, including Naina’s minor cousin, who purportedly said they last saw Lodha with Naina. In court, however, all the witnesses admitted that they had not seen Lodha get violent with Naina or rape her or kill her.

While both Biramchand and his mother say they were not very close to Komal Lodha, they insisted that on the day Naina went missing, he was at home eating dinner, after which he went into his room.

The police filed their charge sheet against Lodha on August 7, within 10 days of his arrest and nearly two months before the DNA result from collected samples came back on September 9. The crime had occurred near the Assembly constituency of the then Chief Minister, Vasundhara Raje, who was getting ready to face an Assembly election months later.

The trial court in Jhalawar began hearing the case in 2018. In October that year, it concluded that Lodha was an adult even though his mark sheet and his school principal testified to his date of birth — both determining him as a juvenile as per the Juvenile Justice Act. Instead, the court relied on the statement of a doctor, who estimated that Lodha was between the ages of 19 and 21, based on his X-ray reports. This doctor was not a radiologist.

The charge sheet against Lodha was filed under Sections 363 (punishment for kidnapping), 376 (rape), 377 (unnatural offences), 302 (murder), and 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence, or giving false information to screen offender) of the Indian Penal Code; Section 5(m) and Section 6 of the The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO); and Sections 3(1)(w)(i) and 2(5) of the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, also known as the SC/ST Act, given that Naina was from a Scheduled Tribe. Save for the charges under the SC/ST Act, the trial court convicted Lodha of all other charges on September 23, 2019.

In addition to the witness statements, the police had used a purported confession by Lodha, recorded in police custody, to prosecute him in the case. After his arrest, the police team led by the Superintendent of Police, Jhalawar, brought Lodha back to the village from time to time to recover what they called “evidence”. This included the pair of slippers Naina was wearing when she went missing, which was recovered within 200 feet of where her body was found. In their charge sheet, the police said that Lodha’s confession allegedly led them to the slippers. They argued that the recovery made on the basis of the confession would strengthen the credibility of the confession even though Lodha denied the charges against him in court.

The DNA evidence

After relying on this evidentiary material, which the Rajasthan High Court has now ruled as “circumstantial”, the trial court relied on the DNA evidence presented before it by the prosecution to convict Lodha. The prosecution had submitted that the male DNA profile recovered from the victim’s vaginal swab and her leggings matched with the profile found on Lodha’s underwear. It had also said that the DNA profile from his underwear matched with the profile obtained from his blood sample. Placing this on record, the trial court had ruled that “there is no room for doubt” that Lodha had raped and killed Naina.

But what the prosecution left out and what the trial court failed to mention in its order was that two separate male DNA profiles were recovered from the vaginal swab and the leggings of the victim and two male DNA profiles were also recovered from Lodha’s underwear. The findings of the DNA analysis, recorded by the Forensic Science Laboratory in Jaipur, showed that one of the DNA profiles on Lodha’s underwear matched with his blood sample. However, the other male DNA profile on his underwear matched the male profile found on the leggings and vaginal swab of the victim and did not match with Lodha’s blood sample. This means that the DNA profile of the accused that was found on the victim had somehow appeared on Lodha’s purported underwear by the time it was sent for forensic analysis.

Based on these findings of the DNA analysis, the Rajasthan High Court concluded that the police had failed to look at the evidence at hand in their rush to prosecute the case, and evidence seemed to have been planted on Lodha to secure a conviction. What strengthened the High Court’s suspicion of evidence being planted was that the police showed recovery of the underwear nearly seven hours after Lodha’s arrest.

“They were clearly in a rush because of some kind of pressure. Otherwise, why file a charge sheet without even waiting for the DNA report to confirm their investigation,” asked advocate Nitin Jain, who was the first to find that the DNA analysis absolved Lodha, and made his case before the High Court.

Though the police in Jhalawar have reopened the investigation into the case based on the Rajasthan High Court’s direction, they are yet to start enquiring how investigators got it wrong the first time around. “Now that we have reopened the case, we will investigate it again and if we find anything that shows police misconduct, we will register an FIR and proceed accordingly,” says Richa Tomar, Superintendent of Police, Jhalawar. She adds that there is no breakthrough in the case on finding Naina’s killers.

A confused village

The locals in Mogyabeh village, which is located in the dense forests along the border of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, do not know what to believe anymore. While some of them refuse to revisit that chapter of the village’s history and continue to believe that Lodha killed Naina, others are no longer sure. Regardless, Naina’s rape and murder and Lodha’s subsequent conviction for it have changed the lives of the villagers forever.

On the one hand, Naina’s parents are livid that their closure came from the police’s apparent false claims. They insist on holding Lodha responsible for the death of their daughter till the police correct their mistake. “The police first came to tell us that Lodha was the one who killed Naina. We believed them, went to court, and eventually made our peace with the fact that the person responsible had been caught. Now the court is saying the police made a mistake. What are we to do? If it is their mistake, they should correct it and tell us who killed our daughter. Till then, we have no option but to believe that he (Lodha) killed her,” says Naina’s father.

On the other hand, Lodha’s family has been ostracised by the villagers. Friends of decades have refused to associate with them. Relegated to the outskirts of the village, Lodha’s family members keep themselves busy on their farms, where Komal Lodha used to help them. “We used to run a puncture shop in the village earlier. It was a very social place. Our friends used to chat with us there regularly. We had to shut shop and now barely anyone comes to visit us or talk to us. Every time we go into a store or pass by the village square, we get dirty looks. People keep calling us a murderer’s family and keep abusing us. After a point we considered leaving the village, but people we knew from nearby villages said we should stay put and that they would help us if needed,” Biramchand Lodha says.

The family has also been unable to get Lodha’s sister married because of the allegations levelled by the police against him. “Anyone who comes to see her eventually finds out about the case and then refuses to get their son married to our sister,” Biramchand Lodha says.

Instead of bringing them relief, the Rajasthan Police’s re-investigation into the case has only brought more trouble for this family belonging to the Other Backward Classes. “The police came back to question me a month ago. They kept asking me if the underwear recovered in the case was mine based on its brand, VIP. Then they asked me if I wear the same brand. But this is a popular brand. Half the men in the country probably wear this brand,” Biramchand Lodha says. He recalls how he was taken to the police station in 2018 and allegedly beaten up before the police concluded that he was not involved.

“Honestly, I do not believe that the police will get anywhere with the case unless they first talk to Lodha calmly, without intimidating him and check if he knows anything else about the perpetrators. It is possible that he was a witness to the incident and was subsequently framed,” Jain says. Now, a revision petition has been filed in the Supreme Court, challenging the top court’s order earlier this year upholding Lodha’s conviction, he says.

After the trial court convicted him and sentenced him to death in the case, Lodha approached the Rajasthan High Court with an appeal, where the conviction was upheld but the death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. Pressing for the death penalty, the State of Rajasthan then moved a death reference petition in the Supreme Court. The apex court again upheld the conviction but sent the matter back to the Rajasthan High Court for deciding on the death penalty. It was during this hearing that Jain decided to appear for Lodha pro bono and sought the chance to present arguments with regard to the DNA evidence. Following this, a two-judge bench of the Rajasthan High Court concluded that the DNA evidence absolved Lodha. But since the High Court had been restricted by the Supreme Court to only look at the sentencing, it commuted the death sentence to life in jail and was unable to overturn the conviction. It directed the police to reopen the case. As a result, Lodha remains in jail, “convicted” of rape and murder, waiting for either his appeal to be filed or for his revision petition to be decided by the Supreme Court.

The name of the victim has been changed to protect her identity



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New Delhi must note that Taiwan’s close economic links with China have not stopped Taipei from asserting its rights

The brief visit by the United States House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, to Taiwan, against stern warnings issued by China, has the potential to increase the already deteriorating relationship between the U.S. and China, with major implications for Taiwan. For China, its claims about a rising superpower might ring hollow if it is unable to unify its claimed territories, in particular Taiwan. For the U.S., it is about re-establishing steadily-diminishing American credibility in the eyes of its friends and foes. For Taiwan, it is about standing up to Chinese bullying and making its red lines clear to Beijing. The crisis that began with the visit of Ms. Pelosi to Taipei is still unfolding and there is little clarity today on how it will wind down even though it is unlikely to lead to a full-scale invasion of Taiwan or a war between China and the U.S.

For those of us in India watching the events as they unfold around Taiwan, there are valuable lessons to be learnt. To begin with, consider this. A small island of 23 million people has decided to stand up to one of the strongest military and economic powers on the planet, braving existential consequences. India is a far more powerful nation armed with nuclear weapons and with a 1.4 million standing military against whom China has only marginal territorial claims. And yet, India continues to be hesitant about calling China’s bluff.

To be fair, there is growing recognition in New Delhi that it is important to meet the challenge posed by a belligerent China, but there appears to be a lack of clarity on how to meet this challenge. To that extent, the Taiwan crisis offers New Delhi three lessons, at the very least.

Unambiguous messaging

The most important lesson from the Taiwan standoff for policymakers in New Delhi is the importance of articulating red lines and sovereign positions in an unambiguous manner. New Delhi needs to unambiguously highlight the threat from China and the sources of such a threat. Any absence of such clarity will be cleverly utilised by Beijing to push Indian limits, as we have already seen. More pertinently, Beijing, like everyone else analysing the Indian reactions to the standoff at the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in 2020, realises that one of the major reasons behind New Delhi’s rather muddled articulation of the Chinese aggression two years ago is domestic political calculations.

Till date, India’s leadership has not clarified to the country what really went on at the border in 2020 and whether China continues to be in illegal occupation of Indian territory. When domestic political calculations prevent India’s leaders from acknowledging the China threat, it provides Beijing the cover of ambiguity to pursue its territorial claimsvis-à-vis India.

Moreover, Chinese Psy-Ops will continue to exploit the absence of a national position or narrative in India about the threat that China poses. Even worse, ambiguous messaging by India also confuses its friends in the international community: If India does not clearly articulate that China is in illegal occupation of its territory, how can it expect its friends in the international community to support India diplomatically or otherwise? In other words, India’s current policy of ‘hide and seek’vis-à-vis China amounts to poor messaging, and confusing to its own people as well as the larger international community, and is therefore counterproductive.

Appeasement is bad strategy

Taiwan could have avoided the ongoing confrontation and the economic blockade during Chinese retaliatory military exercises around its territory by avoiding Ms. Pelosi’s visit to Taipei, or perhaps even keeping it low key. Instead, it chose to go ahead with the visit, with high-profile meetings and statements in full public view, thereby making it clear to China that it is unwilling to back down from its declared aims, no matter what the consequences were. Appeasement of China, Taiwan knows, is not the answer to Beijing’s aggression.

China today is a revisionist power, challenging the regional order; is intent on using force to meet its strategic objectives, and is desirous of reshaping the regional balance of power to suit its interests. With such a power, appeasement might work in the short term, but will invariably backfire over the long term. If so, we in India may be guilty of playing into Chinese hands by committing four mistakes.

First, India’s policy of meeting/hosting Chinese leaders while the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) continue(d) to violate established territorial norms on the LAC is a deeply flawed one. Recall the stand-off at Demchok and Chumar during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to India in 2014, and the visit of the Chinese Foreign Minister, Wang Yi, earlier this year, to India again, even as Chinese troops continue to be in occupation of Indian territory. While one could argue that diplomacy must go on despite the problems on the border, there is indeed a danger of Beijing viewing such diplomacy as examples of India’s acquiescence despite provocations.

The second mistake is unilaterally catering to Chinese sensitivities even during the standoffs between the two militaries. For instance, the parliamentary delegation visits and legislature-level dialogues between India and Taiwan have not taken place since 2017, coinciding with the Doklam standoff which took place that year. Why bother respecting Chinese political sensitives around Taiwan or Tibet when it is in illegal occupation of Indian territory, and seeks more territory from India?

The third mistake was the soft-peddling of the Quad (Australia, Japan, India and the United States) when China objected to it. During the 2000s, India (as well as Australia) decided to soft-peddle the Quad in the face of strong Chinese objections. It is only in the last two years or so that we have witnessed renewed enthusiasm around the Quad. In retrospect, appeasing Beijing by almost abandoning the Quad was bad strategy.

Perhaps the gravest mistake India has made has been the non-acknowledgement of the PLA’s intrusion into Indian territory in 2020, and its capture and occupation of Indian territory along the LAC since. Let us be clear: unwilling to acknowledge China’s illegal occupation of Indian territory along the LAC, for whatever reason, amounts to an ill-advised appeasement strategy, which must end.

Flawed argument

It is often argued that the growing economic and trading relationship between India and China is reason enough to ensure that tensions between the two sides do not escalate, and that the two sides must find ways of co-existing peacefully. While it appears to be a sound argument, let me pose that argument somewhat differently: is the economic relationship reason enough for India to continue to ignore recurring Chinese incursions on the LAC and keep making territorial compromises? Put differently, given that the economic relationship is a two-way process and that, as a matter of fact, the trade deficit is in China’s favour, China too has a lot to lose from a damaged trade relationship with India. More so, if the Taiwan example (as well as the India-China standoff in 2020) is anything to go by, trade can continue to take place despite tensions and without India making any compromisesvis-à-vis its sovereign claims.

Consider this. Mainland China is Taiwan’s largest trading partner, and China has an annual trade deficit of around $80 billion to $130 billion with Taiwan. More so, investments from Taiwan to China were to the tune of $198.3 billion by 2021, whereas investments from mainland China to Taiwan were only $2.5 billion from 2009 to 2021. In other words, Taiwan knows that despite the sabre-rattling by Beijing, given the economic interdependence between the two sides, China is unlikely to stop trading with Taiwan for, after all, China is dependent on the semiconductors produced in Taiwan in a big way.

In other words, the close economic relationship with China has not stopped Taiwan from asserting its rights, nor has it backed down under Chinese threats. So, should India, a far bigger economy and a military power, buckle under Chinese pressure worrying about the economic relationship with China? India for sure should do business with China, but not on China’s own terms.

Happymon Jacob is Associate Professor, Centre for International Politics, Organisation and Disarmament, School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi



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Online Dispute Resolution, or ODR, can help mitigate litigation risk and provide insights into consumer problems

India’s consumer behaviour has experienced a radical transformation at the most fundamental levels. The rise in smartphone use fuelled by affordable data plans has catalysed an online revolution in the country. The novel coronavirus pandemic has further accelerated the process of digital inclusion, and it is now not only routine to transact online and have food, personal care items or anything else delivered at the one’s doorstep, but it is also common to learn online, have medical consultations online, and even resolve disputes online.

These realisations have given India the opportunity to disrupt the status quo with its innovative abilities. Systems such as the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) and Aadhaar, the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) and the Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission have reengineered markets.

Despite the rapid advancement of digital platforms on the one hand and the pervasiveness of the Internet-enabled phone on the other, small enterprises such as localkirana stores have not gained from this. Online purchases from “near and now” inventory from the local store remain in a digital vacuum. This is because, to sell on numerous platforms, sellers must maintain a separate infrastructure, which only adds costs and limits participation. The distinct terms and conditions of each platform further limit the sellers’ flexibility. Consequently, small and medium-sized businesses have lost their freedom to choose and participate in the country’s e-commerce system at their will and on their terms. Alarmingly, centralising digital commerce transactions on a single platform creates a single point of failure.

Wider choice and access

Given this objective, the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) of the Government of India established the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) to level the playing field by developing open e-commerce and enabling access to small businesses and dealers. The ONDC network makes it possible for products and services from all participating e-commerce platforms to be displayed in search results across all network apps. For instance, a consumer shopping for a product on an e-commerce app named “X” would also receive results from e-commerce app named “Y”, if both X and Y integrated their platforms with the ONDC. This achieves the dual objective of wider choice for consumers on the one hand and access to a wider consumer base for sellers on the other.

The ONDC began its pilot in five cities in April 2022, i.e., New Delhi, Bengaluru, Coimbatore, Bhopal and Shillong. Currently, the pilot has expanded to 18 cities, and there are immediate plans to add more cities. With India’s e-commerce industry set to reach $200 billion by 2027, this shift from a platform-centric paradigm to democratisation of the nation’s online market will catalyse the inclusion of millions of small business owners andkirana businesses.

Better outcomes

Disputes will be the obvious by-product of this e-commerce revolution. Therefore, it is imperative to support this initiative with a modern-day, cost-effective, timely and high-speed dispute resolution system. The framework must adequately and efficiently cater to facets such as participants residing or operating in different geographic regions and the mass prevalence of low-value online transactions. Online Dispute Resolution, or ODR as it is popularly called, has the propensity to work alongside the incumbent setup and deliver quick, affordable and enforceable outcomes. The ODR is not restricted to the use of legal mechanisms such as mediation, conciliation and arbitration in an online environment but can be tailormade for the specific use case keeping the participants in mind. While the ODR commonly involves case management systems, integration of communication technologies such as email, SMS, WhatsApp, Interactive Voice Response, audio/video conferencing, overtime and with appropriate data sets in place, it can also involve advanced automation, the use of technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning to enable resolutions at the same time as it would take to initiate a transaction over the network.

From making dispute resolution simple to handling complex multi-party disputes; from 24x7 accessibility from the remotest regions to availability in regional languages; from enabling a safe and secure online infrastructure to ensuring minimal touchpoints, the ODR can not only digitise the entire value chain but can also facilitate an enhanced user experience.

Many e-commerce companies have turned to the ODR with the realisation that in order to maximise transactions it is important to ensure a positive dispute resolution experience. For example, the eBay Resolution Center uses the ODR and resolves over 60 million disputes between small traders every year through a platform that enables dealers and purchasers to directly communicate and, for the most part, without the assistance of a third party. Alibaba, one of the world’s largest retailers and e-commerce companies, too has adopted the ODR to resolve disputes arising out of transactions over the platform.

There is growing adoption

The ODR is no more a distant dream for India as well. Governments, regulators and private enterprises have been adopting and encouraging its use. For instance, the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) has mandated platforms in the UPI ecosystem to adopt the ODR for complaints and grievances connected to failed transactions. Ingram, SEBI SCORES (or the Securities and Exchange Board of India SEBI COm plaints REdress System), RBI CMS (or the Reserve Bank of India Complaint Management System), MahaRERA (or the Maharashtra Real Estate Regulatory Authority), MSME Samadhaan (or the Micro Small and Medium Enterprises Delayed Payment Monitoring System), and RTIOnline (or the Right to Information Online) are other examples of ODR systems that are widely used in the country.

The ODR will help mitigate litigation risk and provide valuable insights into problems faced by consumers. The courts and consumer forums can do away with matters which do not warrant their intervention, thus easing the judicial logjam. Consumers are provided with another choice for effective redress of their grievances, thereby building trust, confidence and brand loyalty. A dispute resolution framework that includes a customised ODR process can play a role in the network achieving its steep five-year target of adding $48 billion in gross merchandise value to India’s e-commerce market, a network of 90 crore buyers and 12 crore sellers with the least hiccups.

Bhaven Shah is the co-founder of Presolv360, an online dispute resolution company. Sidharth Kapoor is an advocate at the Delhi High Court and works with Presolv360



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India must set an example by balancing energy use and climate goals

Ahead of the 27th Conference of the Parties of the UNFCCC (COP 27), in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, in November, the Union Cabinet has approved India’s Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC), a formal statement detailing its action plan to address climate change. The 2015 Paris Agreement requires countries to spell out a pathway to ensure the globe does not heat beyond 2°C, and endeavour to keep it below 1.5°C by 2100. The subsequent COPs are a quibbling arena where countries coax, cajole and make compromises on the cuts they can undertake over multi-decadal timelines with the least impact on their developmental priorities. While the end product of the COP is a joint agreement, signed by all member countries, the real business begins after, where countries must submit NDCs every five years, mapping what will be done post 2020 to stem fossil-fuel emissions. India’s first NDC, in 2015, specified eight targets, the most salient of them being reducing the emissions intensity of GDP by 33%-35% (of 2005 levels) by 2030, having 40% of its installed electricity capacity sourced from renewable energy, and creating an additional carbon sink of 2.5-3 billion tonnes of CO2 equivalent through forest and tree cover by 2030. Being a large, populous country, India has high net emissions but low per-capita emissions. It has also, by participating in COPs for decades, made the case that the existing climate crisis is largely due to industrialisation by the U.S. and developed European countries since 1850. However, years of negotiations, international pressure and clearer evidence of the multi-dimensional impact from climate change have seen India agree to move away from fossil fuels over time.

At COP 26 in Glasgow in 2021, Prime Minister Narendra Modi laid out five commitments, or ‘Panchamrit’, as the Government references it, which included India increasing its non-fossil energy capacity to 500 GW by 2030 and achieving “Net Zero” by 2070, or no net carbon dioxide emitted from energy sources. However, the press statement on the Cabinet decision was silent on whether India would cut emissions by a billion tons and on creating carbon sinks. While India is within its right to specify its emissions pathway, it should not — at any forum — promise more than what it can deliver as this undermines the moral authority that India brings to future negotiations. India has expressed its intent, via several legislations, to use energy efficiently and many of its biggest corporations have committed to shifting away from polluting energy sources. Going ahead, these should be grounds for India, at its pace, to be an exemplar for balancing energy use, development and meeting climate goals.



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Bill’s withdrawal is a chance to check lacunae, but a data protection law brooks no delay

The stated reason for the Government’s withdrawal of the Personal Data Protection Bill, 2019, was that it will come up with a “comprehensive legal framework” on data privacy and Internet regulation. The Government has averred that a new draft will be in sync with the principles of privacy, in line with Supreme Court guidelines based on the landmark judgment on privacy, i.e.,Justice K.S. Puttaswamy vs Union of India , and would consider the Joint Committee of Parliament’s recommendations on the framework to regulate the digital ecosystem. The 2019 Bill had been rightly criticised by stakeholders, including Justice B.N. Srikrishna — he chaired a committee of experts that had authored a draft bill in 2018 — for overemphasising the national security angle, among other reasons. The 2019 Bill diverged from the Srikrishna Committee Draft in the selection of the chairperson and members of the Data Protection Authority (DPA) that shall protect the interests of data principals, and in the leeway given to the Union government to exempt its agencies from the application of the Act. The 2018 draft Bill allowed for judicial oversight in the selection process for the DPA, while the 2019 Bill limited the composition to the executive. The 2018 Bill allowed for exemptions to be granted to state institutions from acquiring informed consent from data principals or to process data in the case of matters relating only to the “security of the state”; it also called for a law to provide for “parliamentary oversight and judicial approval of non-consensual access to personal data”. In contrast, the 2019 Bill added “public order” as a reason to exempt a government agency from the Act, besides only providing for these reasons to be recorded in writing.

By choosing to withdraw the Bill, it is unclear whether the Government would address the demand for a realignment of the legislation with the 2018 draft Bill that came about after extensive consultations with civil society. Or whether this would be more in line with the JPC report, which has also been criticised by civil society for retaining provisions that allow the Government access to private data of citizens without sufficient safeguards. Dissent notes to the JPC report, by Congress MP Jairam Ramesh for example, went on to criticise the leeway granted to the Government on exemptions and how the ground of “public order” and not “security of the state” was liable for misuse. It is not clear if the Bill’s withdrawal is linked to opposition to mandatory “data localisation” from multinational Internet companies. Meanwhile, the lack of a proper data protection law in the country is an anomaly when compared with major countries. If the Government is indeed committed to a comprehensive legal framework on data privacy and protection, it must revert to the baseline provided in the Justice Srikrishna Committee recommendations and enact a law within a reasonable timeline.



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The weightlifters celebrated each other’s success on the podium and off it too, letting their hair down to Sidhu Moosewala songs.

If there was anybody who needed convincing that the bitter edge in the sporting rivalry between India and Pakistan was restricted to a segment of the fans, the weightlifting arena at the ongoing Commonwealth Games provided another example. Gold medallist in the 109-plus weight category, Muhammad Nooh Dastgir Butt of Pakistan and bronze medallist, India’s Gurdeep Singh, conducted themselves less like arch rivals and more like friends, rather brothers.

They celebrated each other’s success on the podium and off it too, letting their hair down to Sidhu Moosewala songs. That the two have known each other since their formative years, and share a common language and similar culture — from either side of the undivided Punjab of pre-Partition days — played its part. But the Pakistani lifter has also said that he has more admirers in the sporting fraternity in India than in his own country, and his two visits to India have proved that the stories of animosity that populate the prevalent narrative may not be the whole truth. Butt’s father, an acclaimed weightlifter himself, has had similar experiences in India, being accorded love and respect that would be an eye-opener for those who feel competition or hate is the dominant emotion in bilateral sporting ties.

It is a similar story in cricket as well. The picture of Virat Kohli hugging Muhammad Rizwan after a defeat in last year’s T20 World Cup went viral. Babar Azam tweeting words of encouragement as Kohli went through a lean patch was another example. There have been several instances of a player from one country helping out one from across the border, proving that sporting spirit, like art, cannot be restricted to geographical limits. As efforts are made to find common ground to foster better relations between the neighbours, maybe sports could play a bigger role.



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In the coming years, India's ambitious renewable energy programme and its other decarbonising initiatives like the thrust towards electric vehicles will place human resource demands.

Anew and ambitious economic alliance, formalised in June, is reportedly causing unease amongst policymakers in New Delhi. Intended to reduce the dependence of the member nations on China for supplies of cobalt, nickel, lithium and the 17 rare earth minerals, the US-led group, Minerals Security Partnership, includes Canada, Australia, Finland, Germany, France, Japan, South Korea, Sweden, the UK and the European Commission. The Union Finance Ministry has reportedly sought the Ministry of External Affairs’ help to find a place for India in the new alliance. The government’s concern isn’t misplaced. Critical minerals are essential components of several modern-day appliances, including smartphones and computers. They are building blocks of green technologies like solar panels and wind turbines and are indispensable for the transition to electric battery-driven cars. The International Energy Agency expects the demand for some of these minerals, such as lithium, to grow more than 40 times in the next two decades. This is likely to intensify the competition in the field.

China doesn’t just dominate supplies, it also has a head start of close to 25 years over other countries in developing the skills required for exploring and processing critical minerals. In recent times, Europe has woken up to the need to train mining engineering talent and taken steps to address skill gaps. In February, the Budapest-headquartered European Institute of Innovation and Technology launched a Battery Alliance Academy that will train 8 lakh workers by 2025 for the EU’s battery industry. Japanese corporations have made some headway in developing processing technologies. Policymakers in other countries have begun conversations to address the needs of the new knowledge economy. Last month, the Australian Resources and Energy Employer Association published a report estimating the industry’s workforce deficit. In several countries, including the US, there is talk of short-term collaborations with China — the new alliance notwithstanding. India has, by and large, remained an outlier to such initiatives. The country’s skill development programme has nothing by way of building expertise in this emerging field. Industry watchers believe this deficit is an important reason for the country’s exclusion from the US-led partnership.

In the coming years, India’s ambitious renewable energy programme and its other decarbonising initiatives like the thrust towards electric vehicles will place human resource demands. The country’s IITs and several other institutes do offer specialisation in mineral technologies. Such courses have to be upgraded, and several new ones initiated, to meet the challenges of the new knowledge economy.



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With even the latest forecasts suggesting that prices will remain well above the central bank's inflation target, the MPC should continue to focus squarely on inflation management

On Friday, the monetary policy committee of the Reserve Bank of India voted unanimously to raise the benchmark policy repo rate by 50 basis points. With the latest hike, the MPC has now tightened the policy rate by 140 basis points over the course of its last three meetings. The repo rate now stands at 5.4 per cent, marginally above the pre-pandemic level of 5.15 per cent in February 2020. The tone of the policy was in line with expectations with the committee emphasising the need for “calibrated monetary policy action” to contain inflationary pressures and bring headline inflation “closer to the target”.

The central bank’s commentary on both growth and inflation remained unchanged. On inflation, even though the consumer price index (CPI) in the first quarter of the year came in marginally lower than the RBI’s earlier projection, the central bank has broadly retained its earlier forecast for the full year, though with minor tinkering in the quarterly estimates. The inflation projection for the full year stands at 6.7 per cent. However, price pressures are likely to subside sharply in the second half of the year. After averaging 7.1 per cent in the second quarter, the RBI expects CPI to trend lower to 6.4 per cent in the third quarter, and 5.8 per cent in the fourth quarter, though there remains uncertainty over services inflation and how the rains will play out. Alongside, the RBI has also retained its growth forecast at 7.2 per cent for the ongoing financial year. While, going by the forecasts, growth is expected to slow down sharply in the second half of the year, the governor noted that “domestic economic activity is exhibiting signs of broadening”. As per the RBI’s surveys, capacity utilisation in manufacturing was higher than its long-term average, which, as the governor noted, signals the “need for fresh investment activity”.

With even the latest forecasts suggesting that prices will remain well above the central bank’s inflation target, the MPC should continue to focus squarely on inflation management, though the normalisation of policy suggests that the pace of tightening may moderate over the course of the next meetings. While the committee has not clearly elaborated on the extent of tightening it envisages as it seeks to bring inflation in line with the target, the commentary on the natural interest rate does provide some guidance. In the RBI’s June bulletin, economists at the central bank had estimated the natural rate for the post-pandemic period to be in the range of 0.8-1 per cent, which was 80 basis points lower than the earlier comparable estimate. Considering that the central bank has now projected inflation at 5 per cent in the first quarter of the next financial year, this does provide some sense of the likely path of the policy rate.



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The Kansas poll is the first electoral test for reproductive rights in the US since SCOTUS ruled that abortion was not a protected right under the US constitution and that the issue had to be “returned to the people’s representatives”.

Even a sweltering summer day couldn’t keep voters in the US state of Kansas indoors as they turned out in large numbers to support the reproductive rights of women. Nearly 60 per cent voters said “no” to the so-called “value them both” amendment which would have declared that the state’s constitution does not uphold the right to abortion. The results bolster what opinion polls have shown, both before and since the June 24 ruling by the Supreme Court of the United States which overturned the historic 1973 Roe v Wade judgement supporting abortion rights: Most Americans now believe that women should have autonomy over their bodies, including in the matter of pregnancy.

The Kansas poll is the first electoral test for reproductive rights in the US since SCOTUS ruled that abortion was not a protected right under the US constitution and that the issue had to be “returned to the people’s representatives”. The result has shocked “pro-lifers” who had looked on the ruling as having turned the tide in their favour and is all the more remarkable for having come out of a state in the conservative midwest, which mostly votes for the Republican Party, with its anti-choice stance. That abortion rights got more electoral support here than President Joe Biden did is a testament to the profound resonance that the issue of women’s bodily autonomy has, cutting across the US’s otherwise deep political divides.

Also Read |India’s abortion law progressive but excludes us, say trans men

Several other US states have either already challenged abortion rights or are preparing to challenge them in the coming months. To those fighting to protect these rights, which most American women had until recently considered guaranteed, the Kansas victory comes as an affirmation that while the obstacles before them are formidable, they are not insurmountable.



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Manoj Sinha writes: Three years after break from past, it is moving forward, becoming destination for tourists and businesses

Ideas and actions rarely get wind together to end decades-old social inequities. Visions can become virtues if they are accompanied by a determination to create an equitable society. Three years ago, Prime Minister Narendra Modi decided to offload the past that was holding back the 1.3 crore citizens of Jammu and Kashmir from realising their potential. He rolled out the process to build a new and vibrant Union Territory. He urged people not to lose even a single moment in the new journey of challenges and opportunities and promised to reach out to the last person in the last row. Jammu and Kashmir, since then, is walking the PM’s talk and has travelled quite a distance to re-arrange priorities of development, initiate deep reforms in governance, curb corruption, neutralise a well-fed terror ecosystem and realise the dreams of youth. Jammu and Kashmir can no longer be seen as a land of misconceived ambitions. In this Amrit Kaal, we are the new destination, not just for tourists but for businesses as well.

A series of targeted efforts to tide over governance bottlenecks, financial indiscipline and lack of monitoring has yielded results in the form of developmental projects. In 2018-19, only 9,229 projects were completed in a year. This has increased to 50,627 in the financial year 2021-22. Our effort is to ensure that Jammu and Kashmir is at par with the other states and UTs in most of the indicators. Rs 1 lakh crore is being spent to improve road connectivity and build tunnels, and we are determined to fill the resource gap in the creation of new infrastructure. Social sector spending has increased by 43.83 per cent and the economic sector by 45.60 per cent in the last three years. It shows the importance the Centre has attached to the overall development of Jammu and Kashmir. We have taken a slew of measures for improving the delivery of public services and prudent financial management. Implementation of the Janbhagidari Empowerment portal demonstrates the administration’s will to empower people through an initiative that enables them to oversee the works being executed and money spent in their area. It encourages them to become a partner in the development process. We have harnessed the power of information technology to eliminate red tape and enhance transparency. J&K was ranked first amongst the UTs in the recently released National e-Governance Service Delivery Assessment Report. More than 200 public services have been made available online to receive real-time feedback from citizens. Providing houses to people in rural areas, developing roads, putting in place primary health facilities and safe drinking water services, creating more avenues for education, employment, and agriculture, attracting private investment and bridging gaps between government delivery mechanisms and people’s expectations were some of the tasks we completed by building trust between the administration and the people.

Structural and institutional changes like ending the 150-year-old Darbar Move brought in another layer of transparency and improvement in governance. It also saved about Rs 400 crore annual expenditure that used to be incurred in shifting logistics from Srinagar to Jammu and back. It has also prevented the loss of at least one working month every year. We have adopted zero tolerance for corruption and more than 639 cases were registered against UT employees in the last two years.

The intelligentsia and PRIs were called upon to collectively rise to the task ahead in terms of strengthening agriculture, horticulture, planning projects for rural Jammu and Kashmir, unemployment and getting rid of inertia in governance. The thrust of the initiatives was to strengthen grass roots institutions and make villages the growth engine of the UT.

The security situation in the UT has undergone a sea change for the better. What was considered unachievable three years ago has been accomplished. Stone pelting and strikes have become a thing of the past. Strict action is being taken against troublemakers, instigators and agent provocateurs through legal measures. No civilian casualty occurred while managing the law and order situation in the last three years. For that, I have to thank the J&K police and the larger security establishment. The net result is the record footfall of tourists — one crore tourists visited the UT during the last seven months (January to July).

Jammu and Kashmir is trying to scale up infrastructure. Projects worth Rs 58,477 crore under the Prime Minister’s Development Package have picked up pace and direction after impediments and bottlenecks that hindered growth — land acquisition, forest clearances, utility shifting and court cases — were removed. Fifty new degree colleges have been established increasing the number of seats by 25,000. Big ticket infrastructure projects have come in the healthcare sector. Two new AIIMS, seven new medical colleges, two cancer institutes and 15 nursing colleges have been added and 140 health institutions are being upgraded. An additional 41,141 km of roads have been constructed. J&K is placed 4th in the ranking of states and UTs based on their performance in the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana.

Despite having a hydropower potential of 20,000 MW, J&K could tap only 3,500 MW in 70 years. In the last two years, projects for about 3,000 MW were revived. Earlier, J&K had shied away from agrarian change. With sustained interventions, the UT has achieved the third rank in the monthly income of agriculture households and was ranked the fifth best performing state/UT in agriculture and allied sectors. Thirty thousand jobs were generated in the government, 5.2 lakh youth were provided with the opportunity to become entrepreneurs under central and UT schemes, and more than five lakh women were associated with self-help groups. We are determined to utilise technology to train our youth for Industry 4.0. In the last 70 years, only Rs15,000 crore private investment was realised in J&K whereas in the last two years, the UT attracted proposals worth Rs 56,000 crore.

Dreams and aspirations are back in the lexicon of the common man in J&K, which has encouraged us to work harder. This synergy is fueling development. Har Ghar Tiranga has heralded a new dawn of Ek Bharat Shresth Bharat, which will offer more space for brotherhood and humanity in Jammu and Kashmir.



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P Stobdan writes: Three years after the abrogation of Article 370, people’s demands haven’t been met

Since the removal of Article 370, Ladakh has been through a range of emotions — from the initial euphoria to anxiety about its new status as Union Territory and the diplomatic and security challenges that followed. Attempts by Pakistan and China at internationalising Ladakh at the UN were blunted. However, China accused India of “undermining its territorial sovereignty” by amending its domestic laws; Beijing announced that it “does not recognise the new status”. Ladakh is being used as a pretext to backtrack on key border agreements — China even resorted to military hostility along the LAC and has refused to commit to the pre-2020 status quo.

For New Delhi, severing Ladakh from Kashmir was necessary to prevent it from getting engulfed in the vortex of instability that plagued the region, and to forestall any prospect of it falling in the list of international concerns. Be that as it may, the Ladakh problem was left behind by the British to protect India from the Russian, rather than Chinese, threat. The British did accept the extent of its boundary with Russia at Karakoram Pass in 1873. China too erected a pole at the Pass in 1892. Attempts to define a line east of the Karakoram and Kunlun ranges varied from the “forward” one proposed by William Johnson and John Ardagh to include Aksai Chin and Karakash River in India to a more “moderate” claim line endorsed by Lord Elgin in 1898. London approved George Macartney’s suggestion of dividing Aksai Chin between Britain and China along the Laktsang range, leaving Aksai Chin to China and Lingzi Thang to India.

It was proposed to Beijing in 1899 by Claude MacDonald, but China did not reply to the proposal. London adhered to it till the end of the Qing Empire in 1911. But in view of Russia’s advance in Xinjiang, the British, in 1927, adopted a forward strategy of favouring a boundary from Afghanistan to the Karakoram Pass running along the crest of the mountain range. The Johnson-Ardagh line once again became handy.

China claimed Aksai Chin after Li Yuan Ping first surveyed the area in 1890. Essentially, Aksai China was a KMT (Kuomintang) project that the Chinese Communist Party planned to execute. Chinese forays began in the 1950s when they began clearing the old Chang Chenmo trading routes. The routes in the eastern extremity via Kiam, Sumdo, Lumkhang, Nischu, Lingzi Thang, Kizil Jilga, Khush Maidan, Shor Jilga, Chung Tash and Karatagh moving towards Sumgal and to Karakash were made inaccessible. By 1958, the PLA had crossed the Khurnak fort and detained Indian troops near Haji Langar. With the construction of G219, other (western) Chang Chenmo routes via Pamzal, Gogra, Hot Springs, Shamal Lungpa, Dehra Compas, Samzungling and onwards to Kizil Jilga were made out-of-the-way.

Chinese aggression began on November 15, from DBO, Koyul Demchok sector, and continued till it declared a unilateral ceasefire on November 21, with the intention of retaining the area it occupied. It falsely claimed the captured area as the LAC of November 1959. Since then Chinese position has changed as per their convenience and as they progressively increased the extent of occupation.

In 2020, the PLA wanted to cut the most western Chang Chenmo route — Tangtse, Durbuk, Galwan, Murgo to DBO that runs along Shyok Valley. Earlier, in 2013, the PLA had tried to cut the Karakoram Pass by intruding into Burtse/Depsang Plains. India’s position in the 972 sq km Trig Heights Burtse/Depsang Plains still remains vulnerable. The PLA has been building a 20-km road below the Murgo post. Like in Galwan, the road here can potentially cut off the Indian supply line to DBO.

All in all, the intrusions are part of China’s strategy to push the Indian position west of the Indus and Shyok rivers and reach the line claimed in 1960. But India’s Aksai China policy is still ambiguous and bordering on the sanctimonious — “will take back every inch of territory from China”. No serious study is being conducted to resolve it. Some moderation will be required, though, while Prime Minister Narendra Modi is still in power. Worse, India does not have administrative capabilities over the vast area beyond Shyok in the east to Sesar in the north towards Depsang, Murgo, Burtse — no post office or police station.

Surely, the Army alone cannot hold the land. Heavy lifting has to be done now by the UT administration. Its official branches need to access the area regularly to take stock of its spatial reality, flora and fauna, wildlife, rare plant species etc. that are in abundance. As for the local sentiments, the Ladakhis do not seem to have a perspective on these issues. The conferment of UT status had initially caused a lot of excitement but it fell short of fulfilling their demands. At the heart of the matter seems to be power that has since been shifted to the Lt Governor. Their concerns are not issue-based but demand-based — lack of political representation, inadequate say in local governance, fear of losing control over land, employment opportunities and immigration et al.

It is inevitable, though Ladakh too has been corrupted by the Kashmir administration. No administrative accountability — financial or otherwise — existed. Now that all the central laws have been extended to Ladakh, the people appear crestfallen. Obviously, it will take time for change to happen. But whether legitimate or not, their demands need to be looked into. The formation of the Union Territory needs to be taken to its logical conclusion.



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Rajni Bakshi writes: His predictions about the future of our species may or may not prove to be valid. But the wide-ranging and independent manner in which he pursued questions will continue to inspire curious minds for a long time

James Lovelock, the co-founder of the Gaia theory, passed away last week. He was so wide-ranging a polymath that many descriptions of him seemed equally accurate — from visionary scientist to maverick and prophet of doom.

While Lovelock will be remembered for several discoveries and path-breaking ideas, his passing alerts us to the importance of independent inquiry. Most of his important ideas resulted from pursuing questions without the inhibition of seeking either corporate, state or academic approval. And yet, through his long life of 103 years, he did work in three domains — including inventing gadgets for MI5.

To some extent, Lovelock’s Gaia theory said what traditional knowledge systems in many cultures have been based on for millennia: That life has a longing for life and thus all of nature, from microscopic living organisms to rocks, are interlinked.

This was largely why Lovelock’s formulation of Gaia appealed to “back to nature” environmentalists across the world. However, Lovelock appeared to have little patience with the more poetic and romantic dimensions of modern environmentalists. In an interview published in New Scientist, Lovelock attributed the choice of the word “Gaia” to the author William Golding. Gaia, or Gaea in Greek, is the name for the primordial earth or mother goddess. The Gaia thesis emerged out of the work Lovelock did for NASA, on whether there might be life on Mars. This led him and biologist Lynn Margulis to delve deeper into the origins of life on earth. Together they put forth the formulation that the earth is a self-regulating organism and that when early lifeforms began extracting carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, this gave birth to a biological system which kept morphing to constantly recalibrate itself in order to sustain life.

This, in turn, led Lovelock to be among the first scientists to identify human-made climate change as a serious existential threat to our species. The idea that nature will hit back at humans for destroying the balance of planetary flows resonated with the environmental movement.

Though he was one of its visionaries, Lovelock was not locked into the environmental movement. He disappointed the environmental orthodoxy by making a strong case for nuclear power, which he insisted could be made safer. Renewable energy is important, Lovelock argued, but our species has run out of time. A sufficiently rapid survival response now demands a massive shift to nuclear power, Lovelock insisted, in order to significantly reduce carbon emissions and manage climate change better.

The doomsday scenario envisioned by Lovelock is that in the near future, much of the planet could become too hot to inhabit and the remaining humans, who are rich enough to do so, will retreat to the poles, which will then have a temperate climate.

His more recent musings, though intended to be optimistic, may seem still more depressing to many. In a book titled Novacene: The Coming Age of Hyperintelligence, Lovelock visualised the planet being saved by cyborgs. In an interview with New Scientist in 2019, he said that “the chemical-physical type of humanity has had its time. We’ve mucked about with the planet and we’re moving towards a systems type of thing, (a future species) running on cybernetics. The great thing is that if you run your systems on electronics or optical devices, they’re up to 10,000 times faster than what we’ve got at the moment, and this opens up enormous possibilities.”

But is the intelligence of the human brain, or even of machines designed by humans, really similar to, or to be equated with, the “intelligence” of life on earth? This is the central question going forward and it will require an inquiry that is truly independent of entrenched orthodoxies of “science” and the profit motive.

Lovelock’s predictions and extrapolations about the future of our species may or may not prove to be valid. But the wide-ranging and independent manner in which he pursued questions about our world and the role of humans will continue to inspire curious minds for a long time.

As Stephen Harding of Schumacher College wrote in a tribute to Lovelock: “Doing Gaia science with him was like being taken to the top of Mount Everest on the clearest of days and looking out on a vast panorama of snowy peaks undulating away majestically into the far blue distance.”

Bakshi is an author and founder of the online platform Ahimsa Conversation



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Menaka Guruswamy writes: What all 72 countries participating in the Games have in common is that Britain took our wealth. Hence our “commonwealth” is now British wealth

On August 4, at 3:30 am, police constable Amrita’s phone rang. It was her daughter Tulika Maan, calling to tell her sole parent that she had won a silver medal in the 78 kg category in judo in the ongoing Commonwealth Games. There are few things more inspiring than watching our athletes like Tulika shine against all odds. Sporting excellence is a realm where human beings marry skill, perseverance, and sacrifice — all the highest qualities possible in our species — while bringing joy to us viewers.

Meanwhile, as Tulika basks in her well-earned glory, PV Sindhu is hungry for a singles gold medal in badminton and is winning her matches with ease. Our male boxers are proceeding to the semi-finals, as has the men’s hockey team. On the face of it, there doesn’t seem to be much wrong with these Commonwealth Games that give our sportspersons a chance to demonstrate their skills. But there is something wrong with the very idea of these games.

The 2022 edition of the Commonwealth Games that are being held in Birmingham, UK, includes athletes from 72 nations and territories that had once been colonised by the British. Colonialism, which saw the impoverishment of colonies like India, has its underpinnings in racism and greed. What all 72 countries participating in the Games have in common is that Britain took our wealth. Hence our “commonwealth” is now British wealth.

The natives of the colonies were subjugated, civilised and then disciplined with devices like the Indian Penal Code, 1860. That Britain has a terrible immigration policy at present as well, which intertwines with its colonial past, was a point well made by the comedian Joe Lycett at the opening ceremony of the 2022 games — “I am going to do something now that the British government doesn’t always do, and welcome some foreigners.”

As The Guardian’s Tumaini Carayol reminds us, the games were once known as the British Empire Games (BEG), then the British Empire and Commonwealth Games, and then the British Commonwealth Games. Queen Elizabeth is the head of the Commonwealth. The closest relationships are still enjoyed by the settler countries – Australia, Canada and New Zealand. British citizens went to settle in these lands and while doing so virtually wiped out or rendered destitute the indigenous populations.

From India’s perspective the taint of the Commonwealth Games is more than just symbolic. The economist Utsa Patnaik speaking to the media in November 2018, explains that over roughly 200 years (1765 to 1938), the East India Company and the British Raj siphoned out nearly $44.6 trillion from India. She calculated this by taking India’s export surplus earnings as the measure and compounding it at a 5 per cent interest rate. Patnaik argues, “Indians were never credited with their own gold and forex earnings. Instead, the local producers were ‘paid’ the rupee equivalent out of the budget.” She adds that there was “virtually no increase in per capita income between 1900 and 1946, even though India registered the second largest export surplus earnings in the world for three decades before 1929.”

Patnaik is the author of many scholarly works like A Theory of Imperialism (co-authored with Prabhat Patnaik) and The Republic of Hunger. She illustrates what British colonialism meant for India through statistics on life expectancy and food consumption. Patnaik notes that India’s life expectancy in 1911 was 22 years. India’s per capita consumption of food grains went down from 200 kg in 1900 to 157 kg on the eve of the Second World War. By 1946, it fell further to an abysmally low 137 kg. This consistent starvation and impoverishment of India started with early British practices of greedy taxation. The British East India Company first got revenue collecting rights in Bengal in 1765 and it promptly tripled the tax revenue from Bengal. People were forced into starvation, and a massive famine in 1770 saw the death of roughly 10 million people, out of a total population of 30 million.

But such policies were not just implemented in the 1700s. Winston Churchill’s wartime colonial policies resulted in the death by starvation of approximately four million Indians in the Bengal famine of 1943. Britain’s wartime escalation was paid for by appropriating the land (for camps and airstrips, amongst other reasons) of Bengal’s poor. India was also forced to pay for British defence expenditure, above what was already paid in peacetime. The British kept presses in India working overtime to print Indian rupees during this time, pushing up inflation and making food more expensive.

The lack of a memory culture in India about what was done to us under the British Raj is a profound and persistent mistake. We have neither a government-established museum to memorialise the grief and loss of Partition, nor a good economics textbook to teach our young about the colonial-era impoverishment of India. There is a private museum to Partition in Amritsar, which I highly recommend. Nearby is also a memorial to the Jallianwala Bagh massacre where on April 13, 1919, General Dyer ordered his troops to fire 1,650 rounds into a large crowd of unarmed Indians resulting in hundreds of deaths. A hundred years later, in 2019, the then British Prime Minister Theresa May, when pressed in parliament by her colleague Bob Blackman to apologise on the country’s behalf, expressed her “regrets” but refused to apologise.

Our athletes need international competitions to participate in. Perhaps the government and sports ministry can support participation in other games and contests. Alternatives must be considered. In this era of fierce, chest-thumping nationalism, we need some quiet dignity as well. A dignity that would not countenance being part of a Commonwealth Games that celebrates our former enslavement. We should have asked for reparations for what was stolen from us. Unfortunately, nations don’t return stolen wealth. At least let us keep our dignity.

The writer is a Senior Advocate at the Supreme Court of India



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Coomi Kapoor writes: Post 2014, it seems government does not see media as the fourth estate and a co-stakeholder in our democracy

The notice to the Indian Women’s Press Corps to vacate its premises by July-end is yet another indicator of the media’s dispensability in Modi’s New India. The closure of the IWPC at 5 Windsor Place on Ashoka Road, a 27-year old institution, would mean one less forum where journalists can engage with people in public life. It would also be a major blow for many young women scribes who require a central place to operate from since their offices have mostly relocated to the faraway National Capital Region.

Nearly two decades ago, when the IWPC premises’ lease renewal seemed in jeopardy, Parliament passed a resolution backed by all parties, including the BJP, expressing solidarity with the institution and requesting that the IWPC be allowed to retain the premises as it had an important role in our democracy. Whether this time the IWPC gets its lease extended or is foisted with a new administration on the lines followed in the takeover of the Delhi Gymkhana, or is simply evicted, is still unclear. True, the government could argue that a government bungalow allotment is not the right of the media, but a favour bestowed originally by Narasimha Rao as prime minister in 1994.

The notice, however, does indicate the government’s dim view of the role of the media in a democracy. Earlier governments followed the tradition set by our liberal-minded first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, who believed that newspersons had an important part to play in acting as a watchdog on politicians, bureaucracy and constitutional bodies. They helped guard against elected representatives and bureaucrats exercising unfettered power and misusing the system. To function freely, the media necessarily needs to remain in contact with those in authority, so that it is in a position to deduce the truth and obtain accurate information on issues of public importance. Accessibility is a key factor in media-government relations.

But the government, post 2014, favours a more authoritarian model. It does not see the media as being the fourth estate and a co-stakeholder in our democracy. Rather, it is perceived as adversarial whenever there is a disagreement on policy issues. Instead of sharing information, the attitude is that the government and the media should work in separate silos. The government will provide its data and findings, but in return it expects a pliant media which does not ask questions. Some overreaching government media advisers assume that it is the duty of journalists to reproduce whatever is fed to them by official sources and even helpfully provide bullet points to highlight the main news. They interpret the term news “reporter’’ very literally. Someone who simply takes notes from the information provided by official channels.

The long established tradition of sharing information with journalists is slowly fading in many spheres. Rather, the idea is to maintain a distance. For instance, Central Hall in Parliament is now out of bounds for senior journalists even though they possess valid passes earned after many years of parliamentary coverage. The excuse for the journalist ban was Coronavirus, but though the pandemic restrictions have eased in most of the country and few in Parliament still wear masks, this is the fig leaf for the exclusion of journalists. Significantly, in the new Parliament building plan, there is no provision for a Central Hall, where correspondents could exchange notes with MPs. The media’s presence in Parliament House has also been drastically reduced. Media organisations are now permitted to send only one accredited parliamentary correspondent to cover the Lok Sabha and the number of days for coverage per week is also restricted. A few news agencies and official media are the only exceptions.

Correspondents with the once coveted Press Information Bureau (PIB) cards are no longer permitted automatic access to the North and South Block secretariats, housing important ministries such as home, finance or external affairs. An appointment has to be made first with the concerned official the journalist proposes to meet. Similarly, in Rashtrapati Bhavan, photographers are not allowed to cover functions in the Durbar and Ashoka Halls and investiture ceremonies. (The exception is the ceremonial reception for foreign dignitaries). The government prefers to rely on official photographers and agencies for fear that a prying cameraman might click a less than flattering profile.

Prime Minister Modi, whose compelling Mann Ki Baat talks are heard by millions, is surprisingly unwilling to address a press conference. He opts for a one-way dialogue rather than interactive exchanges. Former PM Manmohan Singh took advantage of this lacuna to remark wryly, “People say I was the silent PM. I wasn’t the PM who was afraid of talking to the press.’’ From the start of his tenure, Modi ended the practice of taking newspersons on the PM’s flight. Similarly, the president’s and vice president’s flights allow only official media on board.

Defenders of the government’s somewhat authoritarian approach towards the media like to remind their critics of the dark days of Indira Gandhi’s Emergency when total censorship was in place and there was a complete blackout of any anti-government news. Mrs Gandhi’s Emergency regulations and actions were certainly far more draconian and she was brutally frank in stating her intention of muzzling the press. Today, there are no sledgehammer measures in place, but there are subtle ways of sending a message across, whether it is unleashing the Enforcement Directorate on a media owner or dubbing dissent against the state as anti-national by dangerously equating the government with the nation. The degree of plurality of opinion in our mainstream television channels and newspapers, which could be expected in a country as large, diverse and stratified, socially and economically, as India, is sadly missing.

Objectivity is increasingly perceived as giving spokespersons of different parties the right to express themselves on topical issues, without the media taking an editorial stand. Television channel debates are particularly symptomatic of today’s malaise. People representing diametrically opposite views simply shout each other down without any attempt at a dialogue or rational argument. This results in a deeply polarised society, where there is no meeting ground because of the refusal to have any sort of sober and civilised exchange of ideas.

The writer is consulting editor, The Indian Express



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A report in this newspaper showed there’s a staggering pendency of 20,000 forensic tests at a Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) catering to Delhi police, and backlogs go up to 4-5 years. Forensics – chiefly cyber, biological/DNA, chemistry and ballistics – are at the core of modern criminal investigation. Also, good and timely forensic results upgrade the credibility of the justice system. However, for every police force in the country, and not just Delhi’s, the forensic process is of little help.

Orders of the constitutional courts have noted the severe understaffing of FSLs. In Delhi, over 40% of sanctioned posts are lying vacant, in Karnataka and Haryana the figure is 64%. In Odisha, which has the inglorious distinction of posting India’s second lowest conviction rate, 70% of scientific officer posts and 40% of assistant SO posts were vacant. Even CBI, India’s premier crime investigation agency, has blamed delay at the Central FSL end for its huge pendency rate.

Chargesheets are often filed without forensic reports because of the long delay in getting results. In a domino effect, trials get delayed and under-trial prisoners are incarcerated longer. While police look good in NCRB reports thanks to a high charge-sheeting rate, courts, hampered by lack of evidence, preside over pendency rates of over 90% in rape and other serious offences.

Forensic labs aren’t uniformly distributed either. More populous UP and Bengal had four and two functional regional FSLs respectively while much smaller Andhra Pradesh and Telangana had five each in 2021. With emphasis shifting to mobile labs and crime scene expertise, many more personnel are needed. Institutions like the National Forensic Sciences University can help tide over shortage of experts. But governments must start allocating more funds to forensic departments for upgrading technologies and filling vacancies.



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As Independence Day nears and the official Har Ghar Tiranga campaign gets louder, the ‘I love the national flag more than you’ variant of politics is also moving into higher gear. On top of this, Indians find themselves bombarded with grim warnings about wrong ways of displaying the Tricolour, folding it, wearing it, lettering it etc. All these squabbles, prescriptions and prohibitions just take the joy out of a citizen’s relationship with her nation’s flag.

Whether it is last year’s amendment to the Flag Code to allow flags made of materials other than khadi or the apex court upholding Naveen Jindal’s plea to allow hoisting of the national flag by individuals, liberalising our Tricolour rights is the only way forward. Negative models of nationalism are too caught up in their own defensiveness to value spontaneity, creativity, individuality – but these are much truer building blocks for love of the nation or its flag than the deadweight of overregulation.

The US Supreme Court has even ruled flag-burning as constitutionally protected speech, and an argument goes that sometimes this act can reinforce the greatness of a flag. But leaving this case aside, let’s remember how Indians have faced legal action for cutting a cake with the Tricolour on it or for wearing a sari with the same. Such memories are a real I-Day dampener. Let’s make some better, free-flying ones.



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If the recent round of extreme climate events in Delhi — abnormally high temperatures between March and May and erratic monsoon rainfall — are any indication, the Capital is in trouble. With the climate crisis footprint becoming bigger and bigger every year, it is vital for the city — a key political, economic, and cultural hub of the country — to adapt to the vagaries of the climate crisis.

While there is an array of climate adaptation measures available, the city government would do well to invest heavily and judiciously in a blue-green infrastructure strategy to address these climate extremities effectively and protect its citizens and the thriving economy.

The scope of characterisation of blue-green infrastructure may vary in India, as per its national, state, or regional features. However, blue infrastructure is usually used to indicate the utilisation of customised, footprint-lean, efficient instruments installed or retrofitted into conventional water-collecting systems.

While blue indicates water bodies such as rivers and tanks, green spaces include trees, parks, and gardens. Together, these spaces can address a host of urban challenges. While rain barrels and tiny green roofs make small-scale systems, enormous stormwater catchments represent large-scale blue-green infrastructure systems.

Over the past two decades, several blue-green infrastructure systems have been implemented worldwide to solve water-related urban problems. The Active, Beautiful, Clean Waters Programme of Singapore could interest Delhi as it focuses on holistic stormwater management.

Over the years, Singapore has created a widespread network of around 8,000 km of canals and 17 reservoirs for its water supply. The programme aimed to clean streams, rivers, and lakes by integrating drains, canals, and reservoirs. There was a paradigm shift in Singapore’s water governance with approaches of capacity building and community incentives.

The Grey to Green Initiative in Portland, Oregon, United States, is also relevant as it focuses on clean rivers through blue-green infrastructure. The strategies involved creating green streets, eco-roofs, street and yard trees, replacing culverts, re-planting, and removing invasive weeds.

Delhi’s water dynamics depend on blue-green infrastructure and have been envisaged in the draft Master Plan for Delhi 2041. The Capital city has 50 drain networks managed by different government departments. However, the drains are in poor condition, and the land around them has been encroached on by illegal colonies and markets. The drains were built to capture rainwater but are now filled with sewage and other waste.

Delhi needs to opt for smart water use and conservation. Green infrastructure is gaining traction in the city, but the government must also make blue infrastructure an integral part of its sustainability plans. In addition, adaptation and resistance to the climate crisis necessitate protecting and preserving the urban landscape’s hydrological and biological features.

The city must also develop infrastructure to capture and clean rainwater with the help of green roofs, permeable pavements, bioswales, rain gardens, modular systems, engineered wetlands, and absorbent landscapes to achieve water conservation goals.

To realise the full potential of an established drainage network, the city could focus on premise-based retention methods with active community involvement. These could be made effective by developing infrastructure to collect, treat, and store stormwater.

The collection of stormwaters could be done by constructing waterbodies, urban plazas, open fields, and building features. Water treatment would require effective infrastructure such as sedimentation basins, constructed wetlands, and vegetated and/or bioretention swales. Delhi also needs to explore the retrofitting of the present infrastructure, and it would require an extensive inventory of blue-green infrastructure. The city government must invest in building such an inventory since it will help build resilience to the changing climate.

Charu Bhanot is a research associate, and Sonia Grover is a fellow at The Energy and Resources Institute in New Delhi

The views expressed are personal



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The link between clean energy use in homes and women’s health is indisputable. The use of solid fuels for cooking in homes contributes significantly to air pollution, a major contributor to the disease burden in India. According to the government, the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY) has improved LPG coverage and as of January of this year, 90 million connections have been distributed across the country. But many households have still not shifted to this clean energy option for cooking.

Rekha Devi, a homemaker from Bokaro in Jharkhand says, “We are using chulha (woodfire stove) as the primary source of cooking as our monthly income is 8,000 and we can’t afford an LPG connection. I face severe eye irritation and coughing while cooking on a chulha, but have no other alternative.”

Surveys done by the Centre for Sustainable Development (CFSD) and Warrior Moms, a Mothers for Clean Air initiative, show that even in many homes with an LPG connection, women continued to use chulhas for various reasons. In Nagpur, 43% of women continued to use the chulha despite having an LPG connection. There are several other factors which prompt the use of chulhas, among them availability, affordability, accessibility and socio-cultural norms. “We surveyed 1,500 households across urban slums in Nagpur, as the issue needs to be prioritised. The city’s action plans to control air pollution should provide for adequate budgets to shift households from solid fuels to cleaner cooking alternatives,” says Leena Buddhe, director, CFSD. The story is similar in most other towns.

Much more needs to be done to shift attitudes in households and remove barriers in accessing and using clean fuels in households. First, the government has to identify vulnerable households from a lens of socioeconomic status and health indicators to provide subsidies for LPG. It also needs to, with the help of experts, look for alternatives that would both work for women and reduce the family’s financial burden. Behavioural change campaigns can address the myth that certain foods taste better when cooked on a chulha and impress upon households the benefits of a transition to clean energy both in terms of cost and health, especially for women.

“Burning solid fuels results in household air pollution that has an average contribution of 30-50% to ambient air quality in India and research has established that women and children are disproportionately impacted. The problem is more complex than we think and is rooted in patriarchal norms, social and economic status and accessibility to alternatives, “ says Neha Saigal, head of programme for the NGO Asar.

Adopting clean cooking fuel could work wonders to reduce the gender gap, if time spent on fuel collection and cooking time is reduced. This would have a domino effect on the empowerment of women in terms of possible access to education and employment, as well as for more leisure time — a concept that is virtually overlooked in most Indian households — and improvements in health.

The pandemic has exacerbated economic hardship and, therefore, the government must come up with a bouquet of options to get people to opt for clean fuel. While further subsidies may not be feasible, the government could look at micro-payment schemes for clean cooking fuel. The key lies in improving women’s access and agency when it comes to clean fuel as a way of preserving their health and freeing them up for productive, paid work.

lalita.panicker@hindustantimes.com

The views expressed are personal



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The secret presence and targeted killing of al-Qaeda’s deputy chief, Ayman al-Zawahiri, by a United States (US) drone strike in Kabul, just before the first anniversary of the Taliban’s rise to power, is a reminder that Afghanistan’s wars aren’t over. Fears of the Taliban harbouring transnational jihadis, forging a social contract undergirded by fear and lubricated by force, limiting women’s rights, failing to contain a famine but squabbling over meagre spoils, and promising the moon of geopolitical pragmatism but effectively bolstering fringe Islamists, have all come true.

Al-Qaeda’s presence in downtown Kabul underscores another uncomfortable truth: The US lost the war, botched its exit by signing the Doha agreement, and left the Afghans in a lurch. Celebrations around the US’s over-the-horizon counterterrorism prowess, and the alleged foresightedness of the withdrawal in the context of heightened tensions with Russia and China, mask the fact that global Islamists, parallel to Right-wing extremism, have strengthened over the last year and remain a serious disruptive force in global geopolitics.

For the so-called global war on terror that was fought on the premise of advancing liberal democracies, and the democracy versus authoritarianism binary of the current great power rivalries, al-Qaeda’s unceasing links with the Taliban raise a question: Can Afghanistan credibly be bracketed as a regional problem in the face of Russian and Chinese revanchism? It is tempting to think yes, it can be. But this is unlikely to be the case given Afghanistan’s acute economic and political distress and the structures of global insecurities.

To understand why this is the case, let’s first rid ourselves of two red herrings. One, can one trust the Taliban’s counterterrorism promises? No. Such a religion-inspired insurgent movement now governing one of the poorest countries can’t — and won’t — deliver on transnational co-Islamists. The internal political and physical costs of that are prohibitive. But then must one engage with it? Yes. Not because it’ll offer it legitimacy, but because that’s the only way to support the Afghans and, for the security-minded, keep an intelligence pipeline open.

Afghanistan’s explosive situation is of global consequence because of the shrinking and deepening of its conflict economy. External aid, the financial backbone of the Islamic republican State, has largely dried up, and alternative sources of revenue remain limited. The Taliban’s cross-border State sponsor, Pakistan, is polarised and collapsing economically. The resulting desperation, apart from fueling illicit trade, puts a premium on protecting high-value targets such as Zawahiri to charge strategic rent.

In the subcontinent, it is an article of faith that delivering such figures (who are of limited operational but high political value) on a cyclical basis convinces the US that Pakistan, and now the Taliban, are serious about counterterrorism. The reward, it is assumed, correctly or otherwise, comes in the form of easing economic pain by the Financial Action Task Force and more aid. To that effect, both Pakistan and the Taliban need to be on the right side of economics, even if their politics is framed in opposition to the US and its allies.

Then, it won’t be surprising if Zawahiri’s location was tipped off by someone from within the Taliban — if not from the Haqqani camp, then that of his detractors — with or without Rawalpindi’s approval. The combination of Mullah Yaqoob’s (Sirajuddin Haqqani’s competitor) interview to the National Public Radio in direct outreach to the US public hours after the drone strike, and Haqqani’s incredulous denial about prior knowledge of Zawahiri’s whereabouts signals that the Taliban insiders are not unduly perturbed by the strike (yet).

Optimists could see this as the Taliban letting the US take out a key adversary to normalise bilateral ties. But this could also mean that Zawahiri was past his due date as a leader, and his successor(s) could be younger, savvier, adept at exploiting intra-Taliban rivalries, and focused on delivering violence across the subcontinent, where communal fault lines are ripe for exploitation. For instance, a well-timed attack on an Indian city that is traced back to Afghanistan, will not just frustrate India’s outreach to the Taliban and complicate relations with Pakistan, but could also divert Indian attention away from China during critical conflict junctures (if not in a long-term sense). Reports of al-Qaeda-linked militants active in Assam are already coming in.

But can, and will, such Islamists, attack the US homeland or mainland Europe? Perhaps not soon. But to generate a global strategic effect, they don’t need to do that. If al-Qaeda and its franchises, or groups such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Jaish-e-Mohammad, the Turkistan Islamic Party, the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, and the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan —all of which remain active in Afghanistan — can exploit social fissures in their primary target States to complicate regional and global rivalries, that’s a success — and it is highly feasible.

India’s diplomacy on Afghanistan is unceasing. From hosting conferences and Afghanistan-centric meetings amid the Russia-Ukraine war, to deepening engagement with the Taliban that is domestically unpopular (among liberals and Hindu nationalists alike) but geopolitically unavoidable, New Delhi wants to obviate Zawahiri’s India-centric propaganda turning into reality. In a majoritarian political environment where Islamophobia has taken such deep root that distilling fact from fiction of Islamist radicalism is becoming onerous for practitioners (who are unable, or unwilling, to act on extremes coming from the Hindu Right), the Afghan situation is more serious than meets the eye.

There are no straightforward solutions. Just like the Cold War was a multi-dimensional competition between uneasy ideological categories ranging from liberalism, democracy, and communism, to political Islam, all with their diversities and tensions attempting to trespass a nation-State-dominated international system riddled with racial and ethnic politics, the situation today is not much different in its fissiparousness.

The perilous condition of the Afghans and Zawahiri’s killing — done from a distance and, without irony, hailed as tactical genius because the US withdrawal lured al-Qaeda back to Kabul — is a reminder that the broad brush of democracy that the US is offering as an operating principle to contain Russia and China remains ideologically compromised. But it also demonstrates how Chinese and Russian advocacy for multipolarity, driven by majoritarian insecurities, is totally bereft of social justice and economic equality. Neither Moscow nor Beijing has done much to improve the condition of the Afghans, despite keeping their missions open.

One year on, the true historical value and global strategic significance of Afghanistan is that it is as much an end of the road for failed geopolitical experiments, as it is an incubator of new political struggles. To forget about Afghanistan, or the plight of its people, must be done at one’s own peril.

Avinash Paliwal teaches at SOAS, University of London and is the author of My Enemy’s Enemy: India in Afghanistan from the Soviet Invasion to the US Withdrawal (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017)

The views expressed are personal



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Friday, August 5, was the third anniversary of the nullification of Article 370. It’s also the date on which Hamin Ast? A Biography of Article 370 was published by the Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy. This book could create an enormous stir because it argues that “the nullification of Article 370 is legally unsound”. It has four authors — Jinaly Dani, Pranay Modi, Kevin James, and Arghya Sengupta, the founder and research director of the Centre.

Hamin Ast argues the nullification of Article 370 is unconstitutional for three reasons. They are technical, and you need to know exactly what steps were taken and how that was done to understand them. Laymen may not find it easy to follow. But the issue is so important that I want to try to summarise the arguments.

The first is to do with the Jammu and Kashmir governor’s concurrence equating the constituent assembly with the legislative assembly. Here, it’s not so much how it was done — though that’s an issue too — but the character of the governor at the time that is the key concern. This concurrence was given when President’s Rule was applied in the state. The book says: “When the Governor of Jammu and Kashmir purportedly gave his concurrence on behalf of the Jammu and Kashmir government, he was not acting in his independent capacity, but rather as a delegate of the President… this amounted to the President seeking his own concurrence… can such self-concurrence be deemed to satisfy the requirements of law? The short answer is no.”

The second reason is the way Article 367 was used. This Article is intended to help interpret the Constitution. However, in this instance, when it was used to interpret the constituent assembly as the legislative assembly, it made “substantive changes to the provisions of the Constitution”. Hamin Ast says: “It is abundantly clear that this (was done)…not to resolve any interpretative conflict or confusion (but)… to clothe the legislative assembly with a specific substantive power which it did not have earlier.” It concludes this is an “improper and unlawful use of Article 367”.

Now to Hamin Ast’s third reason. It’s to do with the proclamation of President’s Rule in Jammu and Kashmir. This declared that all the powers of the assembly would be exercisable by Parliament “unless the context requires otherwise”. The context is, therefore, the determining factor.

What was this context? Hamin Ast says it was “the historic compromise between Jammu and Kashmir and the Union of India, which was embodied in the text of Article 370.” In turn, this means “the terms and conditions of Jammu and Kashmir’s constitutional relationship with India would be determined by the representatives of the people of Jammu and Kashmir jointly with the representatives of the people of the rest of India”. This context “required two hands to clap before any change could be made to this constitutional relationship”. The second hand was missing.

The book’s point is simple, but stark: “Even though the powers of the Legislative Assembly… had been taken over by Parliament as a consequence of the imposition of President’s Rule, the terms of the Proclamation… prohibited Parliament from exercising those powers on behalf of the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly in the context of Article 370.”

Now Hamin Ast is only the view of the Vidhi Centre. But the Centre and Arghya Sengupta, in particular, are highly regarded and widely acknowledged authorities on the Constitution. Their view matters and the fact it’s been published in a book makes it all the more significant. They wouldn’t have done that if they weren’t convinced of their case.

Of course, the Supreme Court has to still hear this matter. So far, it’s postponed doing so in the belief it can, if necessary, turn the clock back. Most people believe after three years that’s unlikely. Hamin Ast goes one step further. The book suggests it would be a constitutional travesty if nullification becomes a fait accompli.

Karan Thapar is author of Devil’s Advocate: The Untold Story

The views expressed are personal



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I have recently returned from what must be one of the closest approximations to paradise.

This paradise is in the Maldives, the Soneva Fushi resort. The Jaipur Literature Festival, which is now perhaps the world’s leading literary platform, had an edition here, to which I was invited. The resort is on a secluded island ringed by a translucent turquoise sea, where amidst forests of greenery nestle luxury villas each opening out to the sea. Indigo flies directly to Male, the capital of Maldives. From here you have to transfer to a seaplane. A 35-minute flight takes you deep into the Indian Ocean. A motor boat then transfers you to the shimmering white beaches of Soneva Fushi.

The Festival was a treasure house of intimate sessions on poetry, philosophy, science, culture, books and cuisine. I was in three sessions.

The first was in conversation with William Dalrymple and the acclaimed poet, Ranjit Hoskote, on the “Rediscovery of Indian Civilisation”, in which I spoke at length on how colonised countries grapple with the problem of reclaiming their history, steering clear of amnesia and xenophobia.

In the second, I was in conversation with scholar, administrator and former governor of West Bengal, Gopal Gandhi. The discussion was on his latest book, Restless as Mercury, an anthological biography of Mahatma Gandhi’s early years, from Porbandar to London and South Africa, in the Mahatma’s own words. Incidentally, the Mahatma is still, as a national survey has shown, the most loved icon of modern India, and his relevance is even greater today.

The third was a discussion where the legendary Oxford mathematician, Marcus de Sautoy, the flamboyant but brilliant Shobhaa De, and I were in conversation with Shashi Tharoor, on the future of humanity and our planet.

Carefully choreographed cultural events on the beach made up the evenings. The most memorable for me was Kutle Khan and his famous Manganiyar folk group from Rajasthan.

JLF in the Maldives was a marvel of planning. Full marks to the entire JLF team, and its directors, Sanjoy Roy, Namita Gokhale and William Dalrymple. Also a salute to Shiv Dasani, the amiable CEO of Soneva resorts, who has worked hard to nurture and enrich the ecology of the island.

PM Vajpayee and poetry

On my return flight from the Maldives, I read Sagarika Ghose’s highly readable and researched biography of Atal ji. He was truly one of the greatest leaders of India, emerging from the crucible of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), but with a liberality of mind and breadth of vision that mirrored the realities of India.

I had the great good fortune of knowing him well. Atal ji wanted me to translate his poems from Hindi into English. This was sometime in the year 2000, when he was the prime minister. When we met, I was prepared, since I had got wind of what he wanted to talk about, and had gone through his book, Ikyavan Kavitayen (51 Poems).

My first meeting with him will remain etched forever in my mind. He was seated in dhoti and kurta at 7, Race Course Road, the PM’s residence.

Main chahata hoon ki aap meri kavitaon ka angrezi me anuvad karein, I want you to translate my poems in English,” he said. I said I would be happy to do so, but I had three conditions. “Kahiye, Tell me,” he said, leaning towards me.

“I would not like to translate your purely political poems, but focus only on your personal ones, those that deal with the poignant and contemplative moments of your life; secondly, the selection of such poems would be mine, not yours. And, thirdly, please don’t say a final yes straight away, and wait until you see a few of my translations.”

The smile on his face lit up the room. “Manzoor hai, Accepted”, he replied, and we shook hands.

Ikyavan Kavitaen was finally published by Penguin as 21 Poems. Thirty poems were jettisoned. He never demurred, nor did he question my choice. On my copy of the book, which remains one of my most treasured possessions, he wrote in his own hand, “Pavan has translated my poems and made them more meaningful.”

Ghalib, faith and wit

Mirza Ghalib was deeply spiritual but not religious. He was disdainful of rituals, fond of his drink, and did not keep the Ramzan fast. The king, Bahadur Shah Zafar, was a devout Muslim. Both were friends, united by their love for Urdu poetry.

One day, during Ramzan, as they strolled together in the Red Fort, Zafar asked Ghalib: “Mirza Saheb, aap ne kitne roze rakhkhe?” Without batting an eyelid Ghalib replied: “Jahanpanah, ek nahin.” Zafar smiled at the deliberate ambiguity of the answer, and dropped the subject.

Pavan K Varma is an author, diplomat and former parliamentarian

Just Like That is a weekly column where Varma shares nuggets from the world of history, culture, literature, and personal reminiscences with HT Premium readers

The views expressed are personal



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Actor Ranveer Singh’s recent bold photo shoot for Paper magazine has led to FIRs being registered against him. One Lalit Tekchandani, who runs an NGO called Shyam Manoranjan Foundation in Mumbai, has complained that these photos have “hurt the sentiments of women in general and insulted their modesty”. The FIR adds that India has a “good culture” and such photos harm it. A Mumbai lawyer, Vedika Chaubey, has filed a similar FIR. 

Since two Hindus have filed the complaints, it would be pertinent to ask: Is Hindu culture really so prudish? Hinduism must be one of the most pragmatic and balanced religions of the world. In the Hindu world-view, the four highest purusharthas or goals of life are dharma, artha, kama and moksha. Collectively, they emphasise a balanced view of life, based not on arbitrary or unrealistic exclusion, but of inclusion in proportion, so that ultimately an individual could attain, after living a full life, peace and happiness, which is moksha.

The inclusion of kama among the four highest purusharthas is hardly indicative of Hindus being squeamish about sensuality. Kama, the god of love, akin to the Greek Eros, or the Roman Cupid, has been exalted in a hymn of the Atharva Veda as a supreme god and creator:  “Kama was born the first.  Him neither gods, nor fathers nor men have equalled.”  The Rig Veda pays similar homage: “May Kama, having well directed the arrow, which is winged with pain, barbed with longing, and has desire for its shaft, pierce thee in the heart.” According to the Taittiriya Brahmana, Kama is the son of Dharma, the god of justice, and Shraddha, the goddess of faith. By another account he sprang from the heart of Brahma, and there are other texts which assert that he is atmabhu or self-existent. The Harivamsha states that Kama is the son of Vishnu and Lakshmi, and this appears to be the more accepted view.

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According to the Puranas, Kama was asked by Brahma himself to distract Shiva from his deep meditation by arousing in him amorous thoughts for Parvati. This was necessary because the great demon Taraka could only be destroyed by a son of Shiva, and Shiva could not have a son until he broke his meditation. The Saurava Purana says that when Brahma asked Kama to perform the deed, the latter declared: “There is no hero, no proud woman, no learned man too powerful for me.  I pervade the whole universe, moving and still, beginning with Brahma the Creator.”  In Tulsidas’ Ramcharitmanas, there is a description of the powerful impact of Kama as he made his way to Shiva. Restraint, fortitude, knowledge, renunciation, devotion and wisdom ran helter-skelter as Kama approached; the scriptures hid in the mountains; all creation awakened to his touch; rivers swelled to reach the ocean; rivulets, ponds, creeks sought to merge with each other, trees bent towards each other; even the sanyasis and yogis could not resist his influence.

The story goes that Shiva, angered by the disruption in his meditation, burnt Kama to ashes.  He then requested Parvati to ask for a boon, and she answered: “Now that Kama has been killed, what will I do with your boon?  For, without Kama there can be no emotion between man and woman which is like ten million suns.  When emotion is destroyed how can happiness be attained?” Parvati asked that Kama be brought to life again, and so Kama was reborn, this time, according to the Bhagwata Purana, as Pradhyumna, son of Krishna and Rukmini. Another version is that Shiva said that he could not revive him in the same form as he was before. He agreed, however, to revive him in spirit, formless but still ubiquitous in his influence.

The cosmological acceptance of Kamadeva led to the emotions he personified — love, desire, sensuality — to be given a place among the four highest purusharthas of human life. That is why, all the major gods in the Hindu faith have got consorts, and neither the gods nor the goddesses are described as celibate recluses. That is why too, there is a scintillating sensuality in the arts Kalidasa (fourth century CE), one of the greatest playwrights of Indian literature, had a great deal of sensuality in his works. The verses of Bhartrihari, the philosopher poet of the fifth century CE, were uninhibitedly erotic, as were those of Bilhana, 12th century CE.  The love lore of Krishna, and his ethereal and passionate romance with Radha, inspired decidedly carnal devotional outpourings, triggered by Jayadeva’s Gita Govinda in the 12th century CE, and enthusiastically followed by a whole range of bhakti poets, like Chandidasa, Vidyapati and Bihari. 

The same interface between spirituality and sensuality is seen in many Hindu temples, most famously in Khajuraho and Konarak, where there is a profusion of erotic images. The fact that these images are displayed on the walls of a temple is proof that desire was considered in the Hindu world view as a part of the immense canvas of divinity. But this was not a prescription for uncontrolled licentiousness. The sage Vatsyayana, in his book, The Kamasutra, has an imaginary interlocutor ask him: Why do we need this book?  His summarised reply is that if dharma, artha and kama are pursued in proportion, and none in exclusion, they automatically lead to the fourth, moksha. The essential point is that there was a philosophical acceptance of desire, with eroticism as its natural attribute, even as there was no bar on those who wished to overcome desire, with asceticism as it deviational attribute.

It is ironical that the influence of Islamic conservatism, and British Victorian morality of the colonial period, has made the marauding Hindutva ‘moral police’ totally oblivious to their own tradition of the balanced but enthusiastic celebration of desire. They harass young couples in parks to protect their ‘good culture’ without knowing what that remarkable culture is. And, they feel that women are emotionless commodities whose ‘modesty’ they must protect if Ranveer displays his body. 



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My wife and I were preparing for a visit from an old colleague and his wife, who had recently shifted to Mangalore, when he called. “We’re going to be an hour late,” he said, “If you get hungry, eat, and we’ll eat when we get there.”

“Don’t worry about that,” I said. “We can wait an hour or two. But what’s happened?”

“Well,” he said hesitantly, “we had a brush with a bus.” It turned out that they were in a minor accident just six kilometres away, and the bus had gone on without stopping. “We’re fine,” he said. “Shaken but not stirred. The car’s still running, though the side’s caved in a little. We want to take it straight to the service centre and finish the insurance paperwork so we can get it back as soon as possible.”

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“How about seeing a doctor?” I asked.

“Not necessary,” he said, “we hardly felt the impact.”

“Do you want me to pick you up?” I asked.

“No, thanks,” he replied. “We’ll get a cab.”

“Right,” I said. “We’ll wait.”

The doorbell rang as I hung up, and on the doorstep stood Murthy, who, with his sixth sense for scotch, had divined that I’d bought a bottle. I couldn’t turn him away, so I invited him to lunch, telling him that it would be late. “Oh, that’s all right,” Murthy said, “I’m in no hurry.”

The wait turned out to be two hours, not one. “I hope you’re all right,” I said, when the couple finally turned up.

“Oh, yes,” said my friend. “I thought we’d take the car to the workshop and finish off the insurance paperwork. That took time.”

“Ah!” I said. “Red tape?”

“No,” he replied. “It’s a long story.”

“Right,” I said. “Tell us over lunch.”

“We were at an intersection,” he explained when we were seated, “waiting for traffic to go past. A Kerala government transport service bus was just behind us. The driver saw a gap before I did, and he charged past us, on the left. He misjudged the pass and his bumper scraped the side of the car.”

“Did he stop?” asked Murthy.

“No,” replied my friend. “He just kept going. Maybe he didn’t know that he’d scraped a car, but we can’t be sure. At the service centre they said government bus drivers tend to do that.”

“They do,” Murthy said. “They don’t care about accidents. If it’s nothing serious, they’re safe. If it does turn serious, their unions protect them.”

“So why were you delayed?” I asked.

“We went to an authorised service centre,” my friend said. “You don’t have to worry about the paperwork if you go to one. All you have to do is pay the difference between the cost of repairs and the insurance coverage.”

“That’s very good,” I said. Then, seeing his expression change, “Isn’t it?”

“Not for a five-year-old car like ours,” he said. “Authorised service centres don’t repair dented panels: they replace them. When we worked out the details, we found that the insurance covers just about half the cost of the repairs, and even that was a lot. We’d called a cab to bring us here, and the cabbie, who turned up while we were considering our options, figured out what was going on. He told us to take the car to a workshop he knows, where they repair body panels. We did that and discovered that this mechanic can do the repairs for less than half what the service centre charged. So we’d lose less if we went to him and didn’t claim insurance than we would if we went to the dealer and did claim it. And he’d do some of the paperwork.... That’s what took us so long.”

“Good,” I said.

“The story doesn’t end there,” my friend said. “The owner of this other workshop told us that he can pad his bill a little, by listing repairs he wasn’t going to make. That, he said, would reduce our burden.”

“Did you take him up on that?” asked Murthy.
“No,” said my friend. “That would be cheating... But I know people who would. They’d think me a fool for paying for a bus driver’s mistake.”

The conversation moved on to other topics, global warming and the Ukraine war and so on, until my friend and his wife left. Murthy stayed back to finish the bottle, and, between slugs of scotch, turned the conversation back to the accident. “Your friend’s conversation was revealing,” he said. “Most people would have taken up that workshop owner’s offer to pad the bill. Cutting their losses.”

“Yes,” I said, “but I wouldn’t do it either.”

“I know,” he said. “Your principles get in the way.”

“They don’t get in the way,” I said. “It’s a matter of choice.”

“Are you saying that you choose to pay for someone else’s mistake?” Murthy said. “That doesn’t seem much of a principle, does it?”

“I’m glad of that principle,” I said. “I can sleep at night because of it.”

“If you choose to give yourself sleepless nights over harmless little lies,” Murthy said, “you’re missing the whole point.”

“Perhaps I am,” I said, “So what is the point?”

“It’s government policy,” he replied. “Insurance is governed by government guidelines, as are government transport services. The government wants citizens to make the best of whatever they get. So everyone learns to evolve, to deal with whatever life gives them. That’s why Indians do so well abroad. The government is just doing what good parents do to their children. And you know what that means, don’t you?”

“What?” I asked.

“Spare the rod and spoil the child...”



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The manner in which the Narendra Modi government has been gunning for Congress leaders Sonia and Rahul Gandhi, it has everyone wondering about the real purpose of this relentless exercise which might just generate sympathy for them. Is it just political vendetta or is there a larger game plan afoot? One explanation is that the Bharatiya Janata Party wants to make sure that the Gandhis are not marginalised and remain politically relevant. This is particularly so in the case of Rahul Gandhi as it suits the BJP if the Nehru-Gandhi scion heads the Congress and is projected as its prime ministerial candidate. Having lampooned Rahul Gandhi successfully and discredited him as a leader of little calibre, the BJP does not want Rahul Gandhi to disappear from the public eye because his presence further strengthens Prime Minister Modi’s case if the two are pitted against each other. Though Mr Modi is way ahead of his rivals, the BJP would not want any other Opposition leader to take political centrestage ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls as it may prove difficult to destroy his or her credibility.

When Congress president Sonia Gandhi was called in for questioning by the Enforcement directorate in connection with the National Herald case, party members predictably took to the streets to protest against her interrogation. Interestingly, Manish Tewari was among the leaders who courted arrest while Ghulam Nabi Azad and Anand Sharma were called in to take on the Modi government for indulging in political vendetta. These three leaders were the leading lights of the G-23 leaders who had shot off a letter to Sonia Gandhi calling for effective leadership and an organisational overhaul. More importantly, these three leaders were conspicuous by their absence when similar protests were staged by Congress members on the days Rahul Gandhi was grilled by the Enforcement Directorate. The message was loud and clear. Mr Azad, Mr Sharma and Mr Tewari from the G-23, dubbed as dissenters, wanted to make it known that they are loyal to Sonia Gandhi but have a problem accepting Rahul Gandhi’s leadership. To that extent, it was best interpreted as a vote of no-confidence against the Nehru-Gandhi scion.

Here’s more on the firebrand Trinamul Congress MP Mahua Moitra. She was last in the firing line of the Bharatiya Janata Party over her remarks on Goddess Kali and lately, the social media has been poking fun at her for trying to hide her expensive designer bag from view during the Lok Sabha debate on price rise. It is perhaps Ms Moitra’s penchant for running into unnecessary controversies which prompted the Trinamul Congress not to field her in the price rise debate. Ms Moitra’s fiery oratory has won her many fans, especially in the media, following her maiden speech when she launched a no-holds barred attack against the Modi government. Since then it is expected that Ms Moitra would be fielded by the Trinamul Congress for every important debate. However, this time it was not to be as the party felt she should lie low after the remarks on Goddess Kali kicked up a row. Needless to say, there were many in her party who were not displeased with the decision as Ms Moitra managed to steal the limelight in every session while others struggled to be noticed.

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Will Uttarakhand chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami meet the same fate as his former counterpart from Tripura Biplab Deb? This is currently the subject of ongoing discussion in private conversations of BJP leaders in the hill state. The state unit, especially the party’s legislators, is constrained from going public with their grievances since the chief minister is backed by the BJP Central leadership but they have not reconciled to Mr Dhami’s return to the top job even though he failed to win his seat in the assembly polls. On his part, Mr Dhami does not have the stature or the experience to be an effective team leader.

As a result, Mr Dhami’s ministers take independent decisions while the chief minister is also happy working solo. Given the uneasy relationship between Mr Dhami and the other party leaders, it is speculated that as in the case of Tripura, the rumblings in the state unit have the potential of developing into a serious leadership crisis. Party insiders maintain it is not a question of if but when the situation will explode.

Though it was known for some time now that former Haryana Congress leader Kuldeep Bishnoi was gravitating towards the BJP, his formal entry into the party was delayed due to various reasons. The BJP leadership did not wish to rush matters as they did not want to alienate the party’s key ally, the Jannayak Janata Party, headed by Dushyant Singh Chautala, who is also the deputy chief minister of Haryana. The BJP government in Haryana is dependent on the 10-member JJP. The party obviously did not wish to upset the applecart by bringing in Mr Bishnoi whose family’s rivalry with the Chautalas is well-known as both families have their stronghold in Hisar. According to the political grapevine, a compromise formula has been worked out wherein Mr Bishnoi will focus on Lok Sabha polls while his son Bhavya will contest the state Assembly election.



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