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Editorials - 09-11-2021

‘வடகிழக்குப் பருவமழைக் காலம் தொடங்கிவிட்டது. கடந்த ஒரு மாதமாக இந்தியாவின் பல்வேறு பகுதிகளிலிருந்து வெளிவரும் மழை வெள்ள பாதிப்புகள் குறித்த செய்திகள் கவலையளிக்கின்றன. கேரளமும் உத்தரகண்டும்போலத் தமிழகம் இருந்துவிடலாகாது!’ என்று தலையங்கத்தில் எழுதி முழுமையாக ஒரு வாரம்கூட ஆகவில்லை. தமிழகம் வெள்ளத்தில் மூழ்கிக் கிடக்கிறது. தலைநகா் சென்னை வெள்ளக்காடாகக் காட்சியளிக்கிறது.

தற்போது பெருநகர சென்னை மாநகராட்சியின் ஆணையா் ககன்தீப் சிங் பேடி, சென்னையின் ஒவ்வோா் அங்குலம் குறித்தும் தெரிந்து வைத்திருப்பவா். முதல்வா் மு.க. ஸ்டாலின் இரண்டு முறை மேயராக இருந்தவா். உள்ளாட்சித் துறை அமைச்சராகவும் இருந்திருக்கிறாா். கடந்த ஒரு மாதமாக, முதல்வரும் சரி, நகா்ப்புற வளா்ச்சித் துறை அமைச்சா் நேருவும் சரி, வருவாய்த்துறை அமைச்சா் கேகேஎஸ்எஸ்ஆா் ராமச்சந்திரனும் சரி, பருவமழையை எதிா்கொள்வது குறித்து அதிகாரிகளுடன் தொடா்ந்து ஆலோசனையில் ஈடுபடுவதும், அவா்களுக்கு உத்தரவுகளையும், வழிகாட்டுதல்களையும் வழங்குவதுமாகத்தான் இருந்தாா்கள்.

அப்படி இருந்தும், மழை வெள்ள பாதிப்புகளைத் தவிா்க்க முடியவில்லை என்றால், அதற்கு மூன்று காரணங்கள்தான் இருக்க முடியும். முதலாவது காரணம், நமது நிா்வாகம் அந்த அளவுக்கு மோசமாக இருக்கிறது. இரண்டாவது காரணம், சரி செய்ய முடியாத அளவுக்குத் தமிழகத்தில், குறிப்பாக சென்னை மாநகரில் மழைநீா் வடிகால் கட்டமைப்பு சிதைந்து சீா்கெட்டிருக்கிறது. மூன்றாவது காரணம், இவை இரண்டுமே!

சென்னையைப் பொறுத்தவரை மழை நீா் உடனடியாக வெளியேறாமல் தேங்கி நிற்க வேண்டிய அவசியமே இல்லை. இயற்கையாகவே வெள்ளம் வடிந்தோடும்படியான நகரமைப்பு, கடலையொட்டியுள்ள சென்னைக்கு உண்டு. ஆக்கிரமிப்புகள் அகற்றப்பட்டு முறையாகப் பராமரிக்கப்பட்டால், எவ்வளவு அடைமழை பெய்தாலும் சாலையில் சொட்டுத் தண்ணீா்கூடத் தேங்காமல் பராமரிக்க முடியும்.

சென்னை மாநகரில் கூவம், அடையாறு என்று இரண்டு ஆறுகளும், பக்கிங்ஹாம் உள்ளிட்ட 16 கால்வாய்களும், இது போதாதென்று பல கழிவு நீா் ஓடைகளும், திட்டமிட்டு நிறுவப்பட்டிருக்கும் மழை நீா், கழிவு நீா் வடிகால் குழாய்களும் இருக்கின்றன. சென்னையிலுள்ள இரண்டு ஆறுகளையும், 16 கால்வாய்களையும் முறையாகத் தூா்வாரிப் பராமரிக்காததுதான், மழை பெய்தால் இப்படித் தண்ணீா் தேங்கி நிற்பதற்கான அடிப்படைக் காரணம் என்று நாமே இதற்குமுன் பல தலையங்கங்களில் குறிப்பிட்டிருக்கிறோம்.

சென்னையில் பக்கிங்ஹாம் கால்வாய், ஓட்டேரி கால்வாய், கேப்டன் காட்டன் கால்வாய், விருகம்பாக்கம் கால்வாய், மாம்பலம் கால்வாய் உள்ளிட்ட 16 கால்வாய்கள் மட்டுமல்லாமல், ஏராளமான கழிவுநீா் குழாய்களும், சாக்கடைகளும் இருக்கின்றன. அந்தக் கழிவுநீா் குழாய்கள் ஏதாவது ஒரு கால்வாயிலோ, கூவம் அல்லது அடையாற்றிலோ கலப்பதற்கும் வழிகோலப்பட்டிருக்கிறது. மழைநீா் வடிகால்களையும், கழிவுநீா் வடிகால்களையும் பராமரிப்பதற்கு பெருநகர சென்னை மாநகராட்சி ஆண்டுதோறும் ஏறத்தாழ ரூ.500 கோடிக்கும் அதிகமாக நிதி ஒதுக்கீடும் செய்கிறது.

மழைக் காலத்துக்கு முன்னால், இந்தக் கால்வாய்களை சுத்தம் செய்வதும், மழை நீா், கழிவு நீா் வடிகால் குழாய்களிலுள்ள அடைப்புகளை அகற்றித் தயாா் நிலையில் வைத்திருப்பதும் நிா்வாகம் செய்திருக்க வேண்டிய முன்னேற்பாடுகள். செய்ததாகக் கணக்குக் காட்டப்படுமே தவிர, முறையாகச் செய்யாமல் விட்டுவிடுவதுதான் வழக்கம். அதுதான் இந்த ஆண்டும் நடந்திருக்கிறது.

ஜெயலலிதா முதல்வராக இருந்தபோது இதேபோல பெருமழை வந்தது. அதற்கு முந்தைய 30 ஆண்டுகளாகத் தூா் வாரப்படாமலிருந்த 16 கால்வாய்களும் தூா்வாரப்பட்டன. அப்போது எடுக்கப்பட்ட முடிவுகளும், நடவடிக்கைகளும் தொடா்ந்து கடைப்பிடிக்கப்பட்டிருந்தால், இப்போது தெருவெல்லாம் சாக்கடைத் தண்ணீராக ஓடியிருக்காது.

16 கால்வாய்களும் பொதுப்பணித் துறையின் கட்டுப்பாட்டில் இருக்கின்றன. அவற்றில் தொடா்ந்து தூா்வாரிக்கொண்டே இருக்க வேண்டும். ஆனால் செய்வதில்லை. சென்னையில் குடிநீா் வடிகால் வாரியத்தின் பங்களிப்பாக ஏறத்தாழ இரண்டு லட்சத்துக்கும் அதிகமான திருட்டு கழிவு நீா் இணைப்புகள் உள்ளன. இவற்றிலிருந்து வெளியேறும் கழிவுநீா், மழைநீா் வடிகால் குழாய்களில் விடப்படுவதும் மழை பெய்தால் தண்ணீா் தேங்கி நிற்பதற்கு இன்னொரு முக்கியமான காரணம்.

நகா் மற்றும் ஊரக வளா்ச்சித் துறையும், பெருநகா் வளா்ச்சிக் குழுமமும் பொதுமக்களின் நன்மையைவிட, ரியல் எஸ்டேட் அதிபா்களின் வளா்ச்சியைக் கருதி மட்டுமே செயல்படுவதுதான் இத்தனை பிரச்னைகளுக்கும் அடிப்படைக் காரணம். சென்னை நகரின் பழைய பகுதிகளைவிடக் கடந்த 30 ஆண்டுகளில் உருவான புறநகரின் பகுதிகள்தான் பெரும் பாதிப்புக்கு உள்ளாகின்றன. அது திட்டமிடலின் குற்றமே தவிர, இயற்கையின் சதியல்ல.

அடையாறு, கூவம், பக்கிங்ஹாம் கால்வாய் ஆகியவற்றின் இரு மருங்கிலுமுள்ள ஆக்கிரமிப்புகளை அகற்றுவது; விதிமீறல் கட்டடங்களுக்கு தரப்பட்டிருக்கும் திருட்டு இணைப்புகளை அகற்றுவது; 16 கால்வாய்களையும் தூா்வோருவது; தெருவோரக் கடைகளின் உணவுக் கழிவுகள் கால்வாய்களில் கொட்டப்படாமல் தடுப்பது போன்ற நடவடிக்கைகளை உடனடியாக அரசு மேற்கொள்ளாமல் போனால், இந்த நிலைமை தொடரும்; அடுத்த அடைமழையிலும் சென்னை வெள்ளத்தில் மிதக்கும்!

ஒரு கட்சியின் ஆட்சி மாறி, இன்னொரு கட்சி ஆட்சிக்கு வந்ததும் முந்தைய அரசு கொண்டுவந்த பல திட்டங்கள் கைவிடப்படுவதும் கிடப்பில் போடுவதும் இப்போதெல்லாம் வழக்கமாகி விட்டது. மாநில அரசுகளில் மட்டுமல்லாது மத்திய அரசிலும் இந்தப் போக்கு காணப்படுகிறது.

ஒரு காலத்தில் சிறப்பாகத் தொடங்கப்பட்ட ‘உழவா் சந்தை’ பின்னொரு நாளில் ஒதுக்கி ஓரங்கட்டப்பட்டது. அறிவுக்கு விருந்து என்று கூறி தொடங்கப்பட்ட ‘அண்ணா நூற்றாண்டு நூலகம்’ அடுத்த ஆட்சியில் அநாவசியமாக ஆகிப்போனது. புதிய அவைக்கூடம் என்று கட்டிய பொலியுறு மண்டபம், அது வேண்டாம் என்று வேறொன்றாக மாற்றப்பட்டது. வறுமைக் கோட்டிற்குக் கீழ் உள்ளோருக்கு வரப்பிரசாதம் என்று தொடங்கப்பட்ட ‘நூறுநாள் வேலைத்திட்டம்’ வீண் செலவு என்று விவாதம் எழுந்தது.

இவையெல்லாம் கடந்த காலத்தில் நாம் கண்ட உண்மைகள். அந்த வரிசையில் இப்போது, தாலிக்குத் தங்கம், அம்மா உணவகம், கூட்டுறவுப் பயிற்சி நிலையம் போன்றவை நுழைந்திருக்கின்றன. எதிா்க்கட்சியினா் ஆதங்கத்தோடு வெளியிடும் அறிக்கைகளினால் இவை இப்போது வெளிச்சத்துக்கு வந்துள்ளன.

இவற்றுள், இப்போது உச்சத்தில் இருப்பது அம்மா உணவகமாகும். இரவில் சப்பாத்திக்கு பதிலாக கலவை சாதம் போட்டதில் பிரச்னை தொடங்கியது. ‘அம்மா உணவகத்தை மூடுவதற்கான முன்னோட்டம்’ என்று முன்னாள் அமைச்சா்கள் குரல் எழுப்பினாா்கள். ‘இல்லை, கோதுமை மாவு இருப்பில்லாததால்தான் இப்படி நடந்தது’ என்று ஆளும் நிா்வாகம் அறிக்கை வெளியிட்டது.

‘அம்மா உணவகத்தில் ஆட்குறைப்பு’ என்று அடுத்த அதிா்வு எழுந்தது. தேவைக்குமேல் கூடுதலாகப் பணியாளா்கள் இருக்கும் உணவகத்திலிருந்து தேவையான இடங்களுக்கு மாறுதல் செய்வதாக அதற்கு பதில் வந்தது. விற்பனை குறைவாக இருந்து, போதிய வருமானம் இல்லாத அம்மா உணவகத்தில், வேலைநாள் பாதியாகக் குறைக்கப்பட்டு, சம்பளமும் பாதியாக்கப்பட்டது பிரச்னை ஆனது. அது ‘ஒன்பதாயிரம் ரூபாய் சம்பளம் வாங்கிய எங்களுக்கு இப்போது நாலாயிரத்து ஐநூறுதான் கிடைக்கிறது’ என்று அம்மா உணவகப் பெண்களைப் போராட்டத்தில் இறங்கச் செய்தது.

அதிகாரிகள் உறுதிமொழி அளித்து அவா்களை சமாதானப்படுத்தியுள்ளனா். இவையெல்லாம் அம்மா உணவகத்தை மூடப்போவதற்கான அறிகுறிகள் என்று முந்தைய ஆட்சியாளா்களை நினைக்க வைக்கிறது. சம்பளத்தைக் குறைத்தவா்களுக்கு ‘வேலை இல்லை’ என்று சொல்லி வெளியேற்ற எவ்வளவு நேரம் ஆகும் என்று அம்மா உணவகப் பணியாளா்கள் கவலையில் ஆழ்ந்துள்ளனா்.

பணியாளா் கூடுதலாக இருக்கும் இடத்திலிருந்து வேறு இடத்திற்கு மாற்றுவது தவறில்லை. அது நியாயமானதும் கூட. தேவையில்லாமல் பலபேரைப் பணியில் சோ்க்கும் வாக்கு வங்கி அரசியலால்தான் இந்தப் பிரச்சினை எழுகிறது. ஆனால், வருமானம் குறைவாக இருக்கிறது என்று சம்பளத்தைக் குறைப்பது நியாயமாகத் தோன்றவில்லை. ஏனெனில், கூலித்தொழிலாளா்களுக்குக் குறைந்த விலையில் ஊட்ட உணவு கிடைக்க வேண்டும் என்ற சேவை உணா்வில் உதித்தவைதான் அம்மா உணவகங்கள்.

முந்தைய ஆட்சியின் திட்டமாக, சேலம் ஏற்காட்டில் அமைய இருந்த, மாநில அளவிலான கூட்டுறவுப் பயிற்சி நிலையத்தை கோடைக்கானலுக்கு மாற்றுவதற்கான முயற்சிகள் நடப்பதாக செய்திகள் வந்துள்ளன. இது உண்மையாக இருக்குமானால், முந்தைய அரசு கட்டுமானப் பணிகளுக்குச் செய்த செலவு வீண் என்றாகிவிடும். இப்படி மக்களின் வரிப்பபணத்தை வீணடிப்பது மக்களால் தோ்ந்தெடுக்கப்பட்ட அரசுக்கு அழகல்ல.

இப்படி ஒரு அரசு கொண்டுவந்த திட்டங்களை இன்னொரு அரசு முடக்குவதற்கு, அரசியல்வாதிகள் மட்டுமல்லாது அதிகாரிகளும் காரணமாகின்றனா் எனலாம். ஏனென்றால், எந்தக் கட்சி ஆட்சிக்கு வந்தாலும் அதிகாரிகள் பதவியில்தான் இருப்பாா்கள். ஆட்சி மாற்றத்திற்கேற்ப அமைச்சா்கள் வேறுபட்டுக் கொண்டிருப்பா். ஒரு ஐ ஏஎஸ். அதிகாரி அமைச்சா் ஆகமுடியும். ஆனால், ஒரு அமைச்சா் ஐஏஎஸ் அதிகாரி ஆவது கடினம். இதனை உணா்ந்து சொன்னவா்கள் சுதந்திர இந்தியாவின் தொடக்கக் கால நம்முடைய அமைச்சா்கள்.

ஏன் அப்படிச் சொன்னாா்கள்? அதிகாரிகளின் ஆக்கபூா்வமான ஆலோசனைகளைப் பாா்த்துத்தான் அப்படிச் சொன்னாா்கள். முந்தைய ஆட்சியாளா்கள் சொல்லும்போதும் தலையசைத்துவிட்டு, பிந்தையோா் சொல்லும்போதும் தலையசைப்பது ஒரு அதிகாரிக்குச் சிறப்பாகாது. அமைச்சரே ஆனாலும் அவா் சொல்வதிலுள்ள நிறைகுறைகளைச் சுட்டிக்காட்டத் தெரிந்திருப்பதுதான் நல்ல அதிகாரிக்கு அடையாளமாகும்.

தங்கள் பொறுப்புணா்ந்து, தங்கள் அதிகாரம் தெரிந்து பணிசெய்யும் திறன்மிகுந்த அதிகாரிகள் இருப்பாா்களாயின் ஆட்சி மாறியதும் அவா்களைத் துறைமாற்றம் செய்ய அரசியல்வாதிகளுக்கு தைரியம் இருக்காது. இப்போது அப்படித்தானே நடைபெறுகிறது? ஆட்சிப் பொறுப்பில் புதிய அரசு அமா்ந்ததும் மாற்றப்படுபவா்கள் அதிகாரிகளாகத்தானே இருக்கிறாா்கள்?

அதுவும் ஐஏஎஸ் அதிகாரிகள் துறைமாற்றம் செய்யப்படுகிறாா்கள் அல்லது காத்திருப்பில் வைக்கப்படுகிறாா்கள். இப்படித் தங்களுக்கு வேண்டிய அதிகாரிகளைக் கையிலெடுத்துக் கொண்டுதான் இந்த அரசியல்வாதிகள், முந்தைய அரசு கொண்டுவந்த திட்டங்களை முடக்க நினைக்கிறாா்கள்.

மக்கள் நலத்திட்டங்கள் என்று ஒரு அரசு கொண்டுவந்த திட்டங்களை, இன்னொரு அரசு முடக்க நினைப்பது, அவை மக்கள் நலத்திட்டங்கள் இல்லை என்பதாலா? முந்தைய அரசுக்கு நல்ல பெயா் வந்துவிடக் கூடாது என்ற காழ்ப்புணா்ச்சியினாலா? இதனை மக்களால் புரிந்துகொள்ள முடியவில்லை. மக்கள் நலம் கருதும் அரசாக இல்லாமல் கட்சி நலம் பேணும் அரசாக இருக்கும் போக்கே இதில் தென்படுகிறது.

முந்தைய ஆட்சியின் மக்கள்நலத் திட்டங்களை தங்கள் கட்சியின் நலன் கருதி மாற்ற நினைப்பது மக்கள் நலன் நாடும் அரசுக்கும் அழகல்ல.

 

வங்கிகளால் அளிக்கப்பட்டுவரும் பல்வேறு வகையான கடன்களில் தனிநபர் கடன்களின் அளவு மட்டும் அதிகரிக்கத் தொடங்கியுள்ளது நாட்டின் பொருளாதார நிலைக்கு நல்ல அறிகுறியாகத் தோன்றவில்லை. நடப்பு நிதியாண்டின் இரண்டாம் காலாண்டில் (ஜூலை-செப்டம்பர்) மற்ற கடன்களைக் காட்டிலும் தனிநபர் கடன்களே அதிகமாக உள்ளன. இதற்கு முன் எப்போதும் இப்படி தனிநபர் கடன்களின் அளவு, தொழில் துறைக் கடன்கள் உள்ளிட்ட மற்ற கடன்களின் அளவைக் கடந்ததில்லை.

ரிசர்வ் வங்கி சமீபத்தில் வெளியிட்டுள்ள அறிக்கையின்படி, இரண்டாம் காலாண்டு வரையிலும் வங்கிகளிடமிருந்து அளிக்கப்பட்ட மொத்தக் கடன் தொகை ரூ.109.5 லட்சம் கோடி எனத் தெரியவந்துள்ளது. கடந்த ஆண்டின் இதே காலாண்டுடன் ஒப்பிடுகையில், தொழில் துறைக்கு வழங்கப்பட்ட இதுவரையிலுமான மொத்தக் கடன் ரூ.28.3 லட்சம் கோடியாகக் குறைந்துள்ளது; விகிதாச்சாரக் கணக்கில், மொத்தக் கடனளவில் 27%-லிருந்து 26%- ஆகக் குறைந்துள்ளது. அதே நேரத்தில், மொத்தத் தனிநபர் கடன்கள் ரூ.29.2 லட்சம் கோடி உயர்ந்தும் 25%-லிருந்து 27%-ஆக அதிகரித்தும் உள்ளன.

தொழில் துறையினருக்கு அளிக்கப்பட்ட கடனளவு குறைந்திருப்பதற்கு, அடிப்படைத் தொழில்களை நடத்துவோர் தாம் வழக்கமாக வாங்கும் கடன்களின் அளவைக் குறைத்துக்கொண்டிருப்பது ஒரு முக்கியமான காரணம். இரும்பு மற்றும் எஃகு, உரங்கள் மற்றும் மருந்துப் பொருட்கள் உள்ளிட்ட ரசாயனங்கள் ஆகிய அடிப்படைத் தொழில் துறையினர் வாங்கும் கடன்களின் அளவு குறைந்துள்ளது. சாலைகள், துறைமுகங்கள், மின்சக்தி ஆகிய துறைகள் வாங்கும் கடனளவு அதிகரித்துள்ளது என்றாலுமேகூட அதுவும்கூட உள்கட்டமைப்புத் துறையில் நேர்மறையான கடன் வளர்ச்சியாக பார்க்கப்படவில்லை.

வழக்கமாக ஜூலை தொடங்கி செப்டம்பரில் முடியும் காலாண்டில் வங்கிகளின் கடன் வளர்ச்சி விகிதம் அதிகரிப்பது நேர்மறையாக மதிப்பிடப்படும். அடுத்த காலாண்டு, பண்டிகைக் காலம் என்பதால் தொழில் துறையில் செய்யப்படும் புதிய முதலீடுகள் வேலைவாய்ப்புகளை அதிகப்படுத்தும் என்ற அடிப்படையில் வரவேற்கப்படும். ஆனால், நடப்பு நிதியாண்டின் முதல் அரையாண்டில், பெருந்தொழில் துறையினர் வாங்கிய கடன்கள் வழக்கத்தைக் காட்டிலும் 5% குறைந்துள்ளது. தொழில் துறையின் கடன் வளர்ச்சி விகிதம் 2.3% குறைந்துள்ளது. அதற்கு மாறாக, இந்த ஆறு மாதங்களில் வீட்டுக் கடன்கள், வாகனக் கடன்கள், நகைக் கடன்கள் உள்ளிட்ட தனிநபர் கடன்களின் அளவு வழக்கத்தைக் காட்டிலும் ரூ.73,000 கோடி வரையில் அதிகரித்துள்ளது. வங்கிகளால் இதுவரை வழங்கப்பட்டுள்ள தனிநபர் கடன்கள் மொத்தம் ரூ.29.2 லட்சம் கோடியாக அதிகரித்திருப்பதற்கும் அதுவே காரணம்.

கடன் வளர்ச்சி, தொழில் துறை உற்பத்தியில் நேரடி விளைவை ஏற்படுத்துவது. கடன் வளர்ச்சி விகிதம் நிலையாக இருந்தால்தான் வட்டியும் நிலையாக இருக்கும். சேமிப்புக்கான சூழலையும் அது உருவாக்கும். தவிர, தனிநபர் கடனளவை அதிகரிப்பதால் குறுகிய கால அளவுக்குப் பணப் புழக்கத்தை ஏற்படுத்தலாமேயொழிய, அதனாலேயே பொருளாதார நிலையை மீட்டெடுத்துவிட இயலாது.

வரலாற்றில் பூவுலகின் சராசரி வெப்பநிலை 2015 தொடங்கி, கடந்த ஏழு ஆண்டுகளிலும் அதிகமாகப் பதிவாகியுள்ளது. இப்போது நாம் கடந்துகொண்டிருக்கும் 2021-ம் இந்தப் பட்டியலிலிருந்து தப்பவில்லை. இதுவரை பதிவானவற்றில் அதிக சராசரி வெப்பநிலை கொண்ட ஐந்தாவது அல்லது ஏழாவது ஆண்டாக 2021 இருக்கும். இவ்வளவுக்கும் முதல் 9 மாத சராசரி வெப்பநிலை மட்டுமே கணக்கில் கொள்ளப்பட்டிருக்கிறது.

உலக வானிலை ஆய்வு அமைப்பு (WMO) வெளியிட்ட ‘உலக பருவநிலை அறிக்கை, 2021’ மூலம் இந்தத் தகவல்கள் தெரிய வந்திருக்கின்றன. 26-வது உலகப் பருவநிலை மாநாடு கிளாஸ்கோவில் தொடங்குவதற்கு முன்பாக இந்த அறிக்கை வெளியானது. “தீவிர இயற்கைப் பேரிடர்கள் இயல்பாகிவருகின்றன. மனிதர்களால் தூண்டப்பட்ட பருவநிலை மாற்றம் ஏற்படுத்திய விளைவுகளே இவற்றில் பலவற்றுக்கு அடிப்படைக் காரணம் என்பதற்கான அறிவியல் ஆதாரங்கள் வலுவடைந்துவருகின்றன” என்று உலக வானிலை ஆய்வு அமைப்பின் பொதுச் செயலாளர் பெட்டெரி டாலஸ் தெரிவித்திருக்கிறார்.

சமீபத்திய கேரள நிலச்சரிவு, சென்னை வெள்ளம், உத்தராகண்ட் நிலச்சரிவு-வெள்ளம் போன்றவற்றுக்கும் பருவநிலை மாற்றத்துக்கும் நேரடித் தொடர்பு இன்னும் உறுதிப்படுத்தப்படவில்லை. என்றாலும், பருவநிலை மாற்றம் காரணமாக இதுபோன்ற தீவிர வானிலை நிகழ்வுகள் அதிகரிக்கும் என அறிவியலர்கள் நீண்டகாலமாகவே எச்சரித்துவருகிறார்கள்.

இவை அனைத்துக்கும் வளிமண்டலத்தில் பசுங்குடில் வாயுக்கள் அதிகரித்ததன் தொடர்ச்சியாகப் புவியின் சராசரி வெப்பநிலை அதிகரித்ததே முதன்மைக் காரணம். நம் கண் முன்னாலேயே பூவுலகின் பருவநிலை எவ்வளவு மோசமாக சீர்கெட்டுவருகிறது என்பதற்கான அத்தாட்சியாக வானிலை ஆய்வு அமைப்பின் அறிக்கை கருதப்படுகிறது. ஒருபுறம் கிரீன்லாந்து பனிச் சிகரப் பகுதியில் வரலாற்றிலேயே முதன்முறையாக பனிபொழிவதற்குப் பதிலாகக் கடந்த ஆகஸ்ட் மாதம் மழை பெய்தது. சமீபத்திய ஆண்டுகளில் உலகெங்கும் காட்டுத்தீ நிகழ்வுகள் அதிகரித்துள்ளன.

2013 முதல் உயர்ந்துவரும் உலகக் கடல் மட்டம், 2021-ல் உச்சத்தைத் தொட்டுள்ளது. சராசரி வெப்பநிலை அதிகரிப்பின் தொடர்ச்சியாகப் பெருங்கடல்கள் வெப்பமடைவதும் பெருங்கடல்கள் அமிலமயமாவதுமே இதற்கு முதன்மைக் காரணம். இந்த நிகழ்வுகளால் உலகெங்கும் உள்ள சூழலியல் தொகுதிகள் மட்டுமல்லாமல், மக்களும் கடுமையாகப் பாதிக்கப்பட்டுவருகிறார்கள்.

இந்தப் பேரழிவுகளைத் தடுத்து நிறுத்தி, உலகம் இயல்பாவதற்கு கிளாஸ்கோவில் தற்போது நடைபெற்றுவரும் 26-வது பருவநிலை மாற்ற மாநாட்டில் உறுதியான முடிவுகள் எடுக்கப்பட வேண்டும். அப்படி அங்கே திட்டவட்டமான முடிவுகள் எட்டப்படவில்லை என்றால், மனித குலம் சந்திக்க உள்ள எதிர்காலப் பேரழிவுகளைக் கட்டுப்படுத்த முடியாது என்பதையே வானிலை ஆய்வு அமைப்பின் அறிக்கையும் மீண்டும் ஒரு முறை வலியுறுத்திச் சொல்கிறது.

பழங்குடி இருளர் மக்களின் அவலத்தைச் சொன்ன ‘ஜெய் பீம்’ திரைப்படம் மிகப் பெரிய வரவேற்பைப் பெற்றிருக்கிறது. இக்கதைபோல் பல நூறு விளிம்புநிலைக் குழுக்கள் சமூகச் சட்டங்களாலும், அரசின் அலட்சியத்தாலும் அன்றாடம் பந்தாடப்படுவது நிதர்சனம். இம்மக்களின் கோரிக்கைகளைச் சட்டமன்றத்தில் ஒலித்திட முடியாத நிலையிலே இவர்களின் மக்கள்தொகை உள்ளது.

தமிழகத்தில் சொற்ப எண்ணிக்கையில் உள்ள ஆங்கிலோ-இந்தியர்களுக்கு வழங்கப்படும் சட்டமன்ற நியமனப் பிரதிநிதித்துவம்போல் இந்தக் குழுக்களுக்கும் கொடுத்திட சட்ட வழிவகை செய்திட வேண்டிய காலக் கட்டாயத்தை ‘ஜெய் பீம்’ திரைப்படம் வலியுறுத்துவதாகப் புரிந்துகொள்ள வேண்டும். ‘பல்லாண்டு காலமாக எஸ்.சி./ எஸ்.டி. ஒதுக்கீடு உள்ளது. இதன் மூலம் பிரதிநிதித்துவம் பெறுகிறார்களே’ என்ற பதில் போதுமானதாக இல்லை என்பதற்கு ‘ஜெய் பீம்’ திரைப்படம் மூலம் நடக்கும் விவாதமே சாட்சி.

மேற்குத்தொடர்ச்சி மலையில் வாழும் பளியர், முதுவர், காடர், மலசர், இரவாளர், மலை மலைசர், காணி போன்ற சாதியினர் அரசின் கணக்குப்படி 25 ஆயிரம் பேர்தான். இவர்கள் அங்கொன்றும் இங்கொன்றுமாக வாழ்வதால் பஞ்சாயத்தில் வார்டு உறுப்பினர் பதவிக்குக்கூட போட்டியிட முடியாத நிலை. இந்தச் சாதியினருக்கான ஒதுக்கீடுகூட நிரப்பப்படாமல் விடுபட்டதற்கான பதிவுகள் உள்ளன. கோத்தர், குறும்பர், இருளர், பனியர், வேட்டுவநாயகர், சேலம் மாவட்டத்தில் ஊராளி, சோளகர் போன்ற குழுக்கள் பஞ்சாயத்து வார்டு உறுப்பினர்களாகவும், இரண்டு பஞ்சாயத்துகளில் பஞ்சாயத்துத் தலைவர்களாகவும் மட்டுமே வந்துள்ளனர். அதுவும் இவர்கள் ஒரு இடத்தில் மொத்தமாக வாழ்வதால் கிடைத்தது. தரைப் பகுதியில் குறவர், நாவிதர், வண்ணார், பூப்பண்டாரம், வில்லியர் என்ற இருளர், காட்டுநாயக்கர், ஜோகி, தொம்பர், புதிரை வண்ணார் போன்றோர் பஞ்சாயத்து உறுப்பினர் பதவியை எந்தத் தலைமுறையிலும் பெற முடியாத நிலையில் அங்கொருவரும் இங்கொருவருமாக வாழ்கின்றனர்.

சேலம் மாவட்டத்தில் மலையாளி சாதியினர் பெரும்பான்மையாக இருப்பதால் இவர்கள் மட்டுமே சட்டமன்ற உறுப்பினர் பிரதிநிதித்துவத்தைத் தொடர்ந்து தக்கவைத்துக்கொள்கிறார்கள். இதே போல் மீனவக் குழுக்களில் பட்டினவர், பரதவர் சாதியினர் பரவலாக உள்ளதால் இவர்களும் தொடர்ந்து சட்டமன்றத்தில் கால்பதித்துவருகிறார்கள். ஆனால், கன்னியாகுமரி முதல் சென்னை வரை உள்ள கடற்கரையில் முக்குவர், கடையர் போன்ற மீனவர்கள் சொற்ப எண்ணிக்கையில் சிதறிக்கிடப்பதால் இவர்களுக்கான பிரதிநிதித்துவம் கனவில்கூடக் காண இயலாத ஒன்று. இதில் விதிவிலக்காக காமராசர் ஆட்சியில் முக்குவர் சமூகத்தைச் சேர்ந்த லூர்தம்மாள் சைமன் மீன்வளத் துறை அமைச்சராக இருந்தார்.

‘‘வாகனப் போக்குவரத்து குறைவாக இருந்த காலத்தில் மீன்பிடித் தொழில் என்பது கருவாட்டுக்கு மட்டுமே. பவளம், சங்கு, பாசி, கடல் நுரை, சிப்பி போன்றவை சித்த மருத்துவத்தில் ரத்த அழுத்தம், சன்னி, விடாத காய்ச்சல், குளிர் காய்ச்சல் போன்றவற்றுக்கு மருந்துகளாகப் பெரிய அளவில் பயன்பட்டன. சேங்கொட்டை மரம் கடல் பரப்பிலும் தீவுகளுக்குள்ளும் வளர்வதால் இதன் கொட்டைகளைச் சேகரித்து, மருத்துவத்துக்கும் சாயம் ஏற்றவும் பயன்படும் வகையில் விற்றுவந்தனர். இவற்றையெல்லாம் தடைசெய்ததால் கடல் என்பது மீன்பிடித்தலுக்கு மட்டுமே என்று மாறிவிட்டது. தமிழ்நாட்டுக் கடல் எல்லை சிக்கலைத் தீர்ப்பதற்கு அரசிடம் தீர்க்கமான செயல்திட்டம் இல்லை. எங்கள் கோரிக்கைகளைப் பேசும் சட்டமன்றப் பிரதிநிதிகள் மீன்கள் தொடர்பாக மட்டுமே பேசுகிறார்களே தவிர, கடல் வளம் சார்ந்த கோரிக்கைகள் குறித்து இதுநாள் வரையில் பிரதிநிதிகள் யாரும் பேசவில்லை’’ என்று மீனவர்கள் கொதிப்புடன் பேசுகிறார்கள்.

‘‘மிகவும் பிற்படுத்தப்பட்டோர் பட்டியலில் உள்ள நாவிதர், புதிரை வண்ணார், சலவைத் தொழிலாளர்கள் போன்றோரைப் பொதுச் சமூகம் கீழ்நிலையில் வைத்தே பார்க்கிறது. இவர்களின் கோரிக்கை, தனி ஒதுக்கீடு அல்லது உள் ஒதுக்கீடுதான். நகரங்களில் அமைந்துள்ள உயர்தர அழகு நிலையங்களில் நாவிதர்களும் புதிரை வண்ணார்களுமே பெரும்பான்மையாகப் பணியில் உள்ளார்கள். ஆனால், அவற்றின் உரிமையாளர்களில் பெரும்பாலானோர் முன்னேறிய சமூகங்களைச் சேர்ந்தவர்கள். இத்தொழில் மீது சுமத்தப்படும் சமூக இழிவைக் கடை உரிமையாளர் சுமப்பதில்லை. இது போலவே சலவைக் கடைகள். இவர்கள் மேல் சுமத்தப்பட்ட இழிநிலையைப் போக்குவதற்காகச் சட்டமன்றத்தில் குரல் கொடுக்க வேண்டிய மிகவும் பிற்படுத்தப்பட்ட சமூகத்திலிருந்து சென்ற பிரதிநிதிகள் குரல் எழுப்பவில்லை’’ என்ற இம்மக்களின் ஆதங்கம் கூர்ந்து கவனிக்க வேண்டியதாக உள்ளது.

“வன நில உரிமை அங்கீகாரச் சட்டம்-2006-ன்படி வனத்தைச் சார்ந்த மக்களுக்கு வழங்க வேண்டிய 10 ஏக்கர் நிலம், மேய்ச்சல் தரிசு, குடியிருப்பு, வனத்தினுள் விளையும் சிறு மகசூல்களை அனுபவிக்கும் உரிமை ஆகியவற்றை வரையறுத்துக் கொடுக்க வேண்டிய அரசு இன்றுவரை வழங்கவில்லை. ஆனால், இம்மக்களைக் காட்டை விட்டு வெளியேற்றும் முகாந்திரமாக வனத் துறை, காவல்துறையினர் ஏற்படுத்தும் நெருக்கடியால் காட்டுக்குள் வாழும் இம்மக்களின் வாழ்க்கை மிகுந்த போராட்டமாக மாறிவிட்டது. இவர்களின் மக்கள்தொகை நாளுக்கு நாள் குறைந்துவருவது இதற்குச் சான்று. இவர்களது வேதனையைக் வெளிப்படுத்தும் வகையில் பழங்குடிச் சமூகத்தைச் சேர்ந்த எம்எல்ஏக்களின் குரல் இல்லை’’ என்பது பழங்குடி மக்களின் அழுகுரல்.

வியாபாரக் குழுக்களாக இருந்த குறவர் சமூகம் குற்றப்பரம்பரை சட்டத்தில் மிகவும் பாதிக்கப்பட்டதால் அவர்களில் கணிசமானோர் பல மாவட்டங்களில் மலம் அள்ளும் துப்புரவுத் தொழிலாளர்களாக உள்ளனர். விளிம்புநிலை மக்களின் உணர்வுகளையும் சமூகத் தேவைகளையும் அந்தந்தப் பிரதிநிதிகள் சட்டமன்றத்தில் பேசுவதற்கு நியமன உறுப்பினர்களை நியமிக்கப் புதிய சட்டம் கொண்டுவர வேண்டிய காலத் தேவை இருப்பதை இந்த அரசு புரிந்துகொண்டு செயல்படும் என்று நம்புவோம்.

- இரா.முத்துநாகு, ‘சுளுந்தீ’ நாவலின் ஆசிரியர்.

தொடர்புக்கு: rmnagu@gmail.com

கரோனாவுக்கு எதிரான போரில், உலக நாடுகள் தடுப்பூசிகளைப் பேராயுதமாகப் பயன்படுத்திக்கொண்டிருக்கும் வேளையில், இரண்டு வகை மாத்திரைகள் புதிய ஆயுதங்களாக வந்திருப்பது கரோனா சிகிச்சையில் ஒரு முக்கிய மைல்கல்லாகக் கருதப்படுகிறது.

அமெரிக்காவைத் தலைமையகமாகக் கொண்டு இயங்கும் மெர்க் நிறுவனம், ரிட்ஜ்பேக் பயோதெரபியூடிக்ஸ் நிறுவனத்துடன் இணைந்து தயாரித்துள்ள ‘EIDD 2801’ மாத்திரைக்கு பிரிட்டன் அரசு அவசரகாலப் பயன்பாட்டுக்கு அனுமதி அளித்துள்ளது. இது அட்லாண்டாவில் உள்ள எமோரி பல்கலைக்கழக ஆய்வாளர்களால் உருவாக்கப்பட்டது.

தற்போது கரோனா தொற்றாளர்களுக்கு வழங்கப்படும் ரெம்டெசிவிர், டெக்சாமெத்தசோன், ‘ஒற்றைப் படியாக்க எதிரணு மருந்து’ (Monoclonal antibody) ஆகியவற்றின் வரிசையில் புதிதாக இந்த மாத்திரையும் சேர்ந்திருக்கிறது. ‘மோல்னுபிரவிர்’ (Molnupiravir) என்பது இதன் வணிகப் பெயர். பிரிட்டனில் இது ‘லேகேவ்ரியோ’ (Lagevrio) எனும் பெயரில் சந்தைப்படுத்தப்படுகிறது. முதன்முதலில் கரோனாவுக்கு எதிராக வழங்கப்படும் வாய்வழி வைரஸ் மாத்திரை என்பது இதன் தனித்துவம்.

கரோனா தடுப்பூசிக்கு முதன்முதலில் அனுமதி அளித்த நாடு பிரிட்டன். ஆனாலும், அங்கு கரோனா பெருந்தொற்றுப் பரவல் இன்னமும் நீடிக்கிறது. அதைக் கட்டுப்படுத்த வேண்டிய அவசியம் அந்த நாட்டுக்கு இருக்கிறது. அதனால், இந்தப் புதிய மருந்துக்கு அனுமதி அளித்திருக்கிறது. இந்த வகையில் கரோனா தொற்றுப் பரவல் ஏறுமுகத்தில் இருக்கும் ஐரோப்பிய ஒன்றிய நாடுகள் உள்ளிட்ட உலக நாடுகளிடத்திலும் இது முக்கியத்துவம் பெற்றுவருகிறது. இந்தியாவில் இதைத் தயாரிக்கவும் ஒப்பந்தங்கள் கையெழுத்தாகின்றன.

மோல்னுபிரவிர் மாத்திரை கரோனா தொற்றைத் தொடக்கத்திலேயே கட்டுப்படுத்திவிடுவதால், தொற்றாளர்களை மருத்துவமனையில் அனுமதித்து சிகிச்சை அளிக்கப்பட வேண்டிய அவசியத்தைக் குறைப்பதிலும், அவர்களின் உயிரைக் காப்பதிலும் பெரும் பங்கு வகிக்கும் என்று வல்லுநர்கள் எதிர்பார்க்கின்றனர். இதன் மூன்று கட்ட ஆய்வுகளின்போது, மிதமான மற்றும் நடுத்தர பாதிப்பு ஏற்பட்ட கரோனா தொற்றாளர்களுக்கு இந்த மாத்திரை வழங்கப்பட்டது. 60 வயதுக்கு மேற்பட்டவர்களுக்கும், உடற்பருமன், இதயநோய், நீரிழிவு போன்ற துணை நோய்களில் ஏதாவது ஒன்று காணப்பட்ட கரோனா தொற்றாளர்களிடமும் ஆய்வு செய்யப்பட்டதில், இந்த மாத்திரை தொற்றாளர்களின் இறப்பு விகிதத்தை 50% குறைத்திருக்கிறது. 29 நாட்கள் அவர்களைத் தொடர்ந்து கவனித்த அளவில் இந்த மாத்திரை வழங்கப்பட்டவர்களில் யாரும் மரணமடையவில்லை எனவும், பொய் மாத்திரை (Placebo) வழங்கப்பட்டவர்களில் 8 பேர் மரணமடைந்துள்ளனர் எனவும் தரவுகள் தெரிவிக்கின்றன. இந்த வகையில் மோல்னுபிரவிர் மாத்திரையின் பாதுகாப்புத் தன்மையும் உறுதிசெய்யப்பட்டுள்ளது. மேலும், கரோனா தடுப்பூசி செலுத்திக்கொள்ளாத தொற்றாளர்களிடம் இது ஆய்வு செய்யப்பட்டதால், இதன் நம்பகத்தன்மையும் உறுதியாகியுள்ளது. இது கர்ப்பிணிகளிடம் ஆய்வு செய்யப்படவில்லை என்பது மட்டுமே குறை.

எப்படி வேலை செய்கிறது?

வழக்கத்தில், தொற்றாளரின் செல்களில் கரோனா வைரஸ் வேகவேகமாக நகலெடுத்துப் பெருகி வளரும் குணமுடையது. மோல்னுபிரவிர் மாத்திரை கரோனா வைரஸின் மரபணு வரிசையில் நகலெடுக்க உதவுகிற முக்கியமான நொதிகளை மாற்றியமைத்துப் பல்வேறு பிழைகளை உண்டாக்கிவிடுவதால், எப்போதும்போல் நகலெடுப்பதில் கரோனா வைரஸுக்குத் தடுமாற்றம் ஏற்படுகிறது. இதன் நகலெடுப்பு வேகம் குறைந்துவிடுகிறது. உடலில் வைரஸ் எண்ணிக்கை கட்டுப்படுத்தப்படுகிறது. இப்படி, கரோனா தொற்று ஆரம்பத்திலேயே அடங்கிவிடுகிறது.

கரோனா வைரஸிடம் இதுவரை காணப்பட்ட காமா, டெல்டா, டெல்டா பிளஸ், மியூ என எல்லா வகை வேற்றுருவங்களின் தொற்றையும் கட்டுப்படுத்தும் ஆற்றல் மோல்னுபிரவிர் மாத்திரைக்கு உள்ளது என்பது கூடுதல் நன்மை. உலக அளவில் 53 லட்சம் பேரை பலிவாங்கியிருக்கும் கரோனா தொற்றை முடிவுக்குக் கொண்டுவர இது ஓர் அருமருந்தாக அமையும் என்று வல்லுநர்கள் எதிர்பார்க்கின்றனர்.

18 வயதுக்கு மேற்பட்ட, ஏதேனும் ஒரு துணைநோயுள்ள கரோனா தொற்றாளருக்கு அறிகுறிகள் தொடங்கிய 5 நாட்களுக்குள் தொற்றை உறுதிசெய்து, இந்த மாத்திரையைக் கொடுத்துவிட வேண்டும். ஒரு வேளைக்கு 800 மி.கி. வீதம் தினமும் இரண்டு வேளைகளுக்கு மொத்தம் 5 நாட்களுக்கு இதை எடுத்துக்கொள்ள வேண்டும். மருத்துவரின் மேற்பார்வையில், வீட்டில் இருந்துகொண்டே இந்தச் சிகிச்சையை மேற்கொள்ளலாம் என்பது மற்றொரு நன்மை.

பைசர் மாத்திரை

மெர்க் நிறுவனத்தைப்போலவே பைசர் நிறுவனமும் ‘PF-07321332/Ritonavir’ எனும் கரோனா மாத்திரையைத் தயாரித்துள்ளது. அமெரிக்காவின் உணவு மற்றும் மருந்து ஒழுங்காற்றுக் கழகத்தின் (FDA) அனுமதிக்காக இந்த நிறுவனம் காத்திருக்கிறது. ‘பேக்ஸ்லோவிட்’ (Paxlovid) எனும் வணிகப் பெயரில் இது சந்தைக்கு வர இருக்கிறது; கரோனா தொற்றை ஆரம்பநிலையிலேயே தடுத்து, தொற்றாளருக்கு இறப்பு ஏற்படுவதை 89% தவிர்த்துவிடும் ஆற்றல் கொண்டது. இதைக் கர்ப்பிணிகளுக்கும் வழங்கலாம் என்பது கூடுதல் நன்மை.

இதுவும் கரோனா தொற்றின் அறிகுறிகள் தொடங்கிய 5 நாட்களுக்குள் எடுக்கப்பட வேண்டிய மாத்திரைதான். ஒரு வேளைக்கு 2 மாத்திரைகள் வீதம் தினமும் இரண்டு வேளைகளுக்கு மொத்தம் 5 நாட்களுக்கு எடுக்கப்பட வேண்டும். இது, கரோனா வைரஸ் நகலெடுக்கத் தேவையான ‘புரோட்டியேஸ்’ நொதியின் உற்பத்தியைத் தடுத்துவிடுவதால், தொற்றாளரிடம் இதன் எண்ணிக்கை கட்டுப்படுகிறது. தொற்று தீவிரமாவது மட்டுப்படுகிறது.

பக்கவிளைவுகள் அதிகம் இல்லாத இந்த இரண்டு வகை மாத்திரைகள் வழங்கப்படுவது நடைமுறைக்கு வரும்போது, தொற்றாளர்களுக்குச் சளிப் பரிசோதனைகளை உடனடியாக மேற்கொள்ள வேண்டியதும், பரிசோதனைகளை அதிகப்படுத்த வேண்டியதும், அறிகுறிகளை அலட்சியம் செய்யாமல் உடனே சிகிச்சை பெறவேண்டியதும் முக்கியமாகின்றன. அதற்கு அரசுகளும் சமூகமும் தயாராக வேண்டும் என்கின்றனர் வல்லுநர்கள். இது எல்லா நாடுகளுக்கும் பொருந்தும்.

அடுத்ததாக, தடுப்பூசிகள் செலுத்திக்கொண்டவர்களுக்கும் கரோனா தொற்று ஏற்பட வாய்ப்புள்ளதால், பெருந்தொற்றைக் கட்டுப்படுத்த கரோனா மாத்திரைகளின் பயன்பாடு அவசரமாகத் தேவைப்படுகிறது எனவும், தடுப்பூசிகள் மிகக் குறைவான அளவில் செலுத்தப்பட்டுள்ள ஏழை மற்றும் நடுத்தர நாடுகளில் கரோனா தொற்றாளர்களுக்கு இந்த மாத்திரைகளைப் பயன்படுத்தித் தொற்றைக் கட்டுப்படுத்தலாம் எனவும் வல்லுநர்கள் யோசனை கூறியுள்ளனர். ஆக மொத்தத்தில், தடுப்பூசியுடன் இந்த மாத்திரைகளும் பயனுக்கு வந்துவிட்டால், அடுத்தடுத்த கரோனா அலைகள் எத்தனை வந்தாலும், உயிராபத்து இல்லாமல் அவற்றை எதிர்கொள்ள முடியும் எனும் நம்பிக்கை பிறந்துள்ளது.

- கு. கணேசன், பொதுநல மருத்துவர், தொடர்புக்கு: gganesan95@gmail.com

போதைப் பொருள் கடத்தல் வழக்கில் 2009ம் ஆண்டு ஏப்ரல் மாதம் கைது செய்யப்பட்ட நாகேந்திரன் கே. தர்மலிங்கம், 12 ஆண்டுகள் சிறை தண்டனையை அனுபவித்துள்ளார். கைது செய்யப்படும் போது அவருக்கு வயது 21.

death sentence of Indian-origin Malaysian : மேல் முறையீடு தொடர்பான தீர்ப்பு இன்னும் நிலுவையில் உள்ள நிலையில் இந்திய வம்சாவளி மலேசியருக்கு சிங்கப்பூர் நீதிமன்றம் விதித்த மரண தண்டனையை திங்கள் கிழமையன்று ரத்து செய்து அறிவித்தது அந்நாட்டு உயர் நீதிமன்றம்.

போதைப் பொருள் கடத்தல் வழக்கில் 2009ம் ஆண்டு ஏப்ரல் மாதம் கைது செய்யப்பட்ட நாகேந்திரன் கே. தர்மலிங்கம், 12 ஆண்டுகள் சிறை தண்டனையை அனுபவித்துள்ளார். கைது செய்யப்படும் போது அவருக்கு வயது 21.

அவருக்கு மரண தண்டனை அறிவித்த அந்நாட்டின் முடிவை எதிர்த்து மனித உரிமை அமைப்புகள் மற்றும் சிவில் சமூகத்தினர் குரல் கொடுத்தனர். அவரின் எல்லைக்குட்பட்ட அறிவார்ந்த செயல்பாடு மற்றும் அறிவாற்றல் குறைபாடுகளைக் கருத்தில் கொண்டு, அவரது வழக்கில் சர்வதேச மனித உரிமைகள் சட்டம் மற்றும் தரநிலைகளை மீறியதாக அவர்கள் குற்றம் சுமத்தினார்கள். இந்த குறைபாடுகள் அவருக்கு ஆபத்தை மதிப்பிடுவதை கடினமாக்கியிருக்கும், மேலும் அவரது சூழ்நிலைகளை துல்லியமாக கணக்கிடுவது அவருக்கு கடினமாக இருந்திருக்கலாம் என்றும் அவர்கள் வாதாடினார்கள்.

மலேசிய பிரதமர் இஸ்மாயில் சப்ரி யகூப் சிங்கப்பூர் பிரதமருக்கு எழுதிய கடிதம் ஒன்றில் தர்மலிங்கத்தின் வழக்கில் மன்னிப்பு வழங்குமாறு கோரியிருந்தார்.

நவம்பர் 5ம் தேதி அன்று சிங்கப்பூர் உள்துறை அமைச்சகம், குற்றம் செய்யும் போது தான் என்ன குற்றம் செய்கிறோம் என்பதை நாகேந்திரன் நன்கே உணர்ந்திருந்தார் என்று கூறியது.

நாகேந்திரன் கே.தர்மலிங்கம் மீதான வழக்கு என்ன?

2010ம் ஆண்டு நவம்பர் மாதம் 22ம் தேதி அன்று 42.72 கிராம் ஹெராயினை சிங்கப்பூர் நாட்டிற்குள் கடத்த முயன்ற வழக்கில் குற்றம் நிரூபிக்கப்பட்டு, நாகேந்திரனுக்கு மரண தண்டனை வழங்கப்பட்டது. 2009ம் ஆண்டு மலேசியாவில் இருந்து வுட்லேண்ட்ஸ் சோதனைச்சாவடி மூலம் சிங்கப்பூருக்கு நாகேந்திரன் வர முயற்சி செய்த போது அவரிடம் போதைப் பொருள் இருப்பது கண்டறியப்பட்டு அவர் கைது செய்யப்பட்டார். அப்போது அவரது தொடையில் ஹெராயின் கட்டப்பட்டிருந்தது.

தர்மலிங்கம் தனக்கு விதிக்கப்பட்ட தண்டனையை எதிர்த்து மேல் முறையுடு செய்தார். ஆனால் அவருடைய குற்றம் மற்றும் தண்டனையை உறுதி செய்தது சிங்கப்பூர் மேல் முறையீட்டு நீதிமன்றம்.

2015ம் ஆண்டு பிப்ரவரி மாதம் தர்மலிங்கம் தன்னுடைய தண்டனையை மரண தண்டனையில் இருந்து ஆயுள் தண்டனையாக குறைக்க வேண்டும் என்று விண்ணப்பித்தார். அவரது மறு தண்டனையின் போது பரிசீலிக்கப்பட்ட பிரச்சினைகளில் ஒன்று, அவர் குற்றத்தைச் செய்த நேரத்தில் பிரதிவாதியின் மனப் பொறுப்பு பலவீனம் அடைந்திருந்தது என்று கூறியிருந்தனர். ஆனால் இந்த விண்ணப்பத்திற்கு பிறகு சிங்கப்பூர் உயர் நீதிமன்றம், குற்றவாளிக்கு தான் என்ன செய்தோம் என்பது நன்றாகவே தெரிந்திருக்கிறது என்று கூறியது.

சிங்கப்பூரின் உள்துறை அமைச்சகம் வெளியிட்டுள்ள அறிக்கையின்படி, அவர் சார்பாக அழைக்கப்பட்ட ஒரு மனநல மருத்துவர் அவர் அறிவுசார் ஊனமுற்றவர் அல்ல என்பதை ஒப்புக்கொண்டார்.

2015ம் ஆண்டில் கூறப்பட்ட அறிக்கையில், குற்றம்சாட்டப்பட்டவர் எளிமையான விதிமுறைகளில் திட்டமிடவும் ஒழுங்கமைக்கவும் முடியும் என்பதையும், சுயாதீனமாக வாழ்வதில் ஒப்பீட்டளவில் திறமையானவர் என்றும் நீதிமன்றம் அறிந்துள்ளது. பிரச்சனைகளை கையாளுவும் ஏய்க்கவும் அவரால் முடியும் என்பதை குறிப்பிட்ட நீதிமன்றம், அவர் கைது செய்யப்படும் போது, செக்பாய்ண்ட்டில் தான் ராணுவத்தில் பணியாற்றுவதாக மத்திய போதைப்பொருள் பிரிவு அதிகாரிகளிடம் கூறி தேடலை தடுக்க முயன்றிருக்கிறார் என்று கூறியுள்ளது.

இந்த வழக்கிற்கு எதிராக இப்போது போர்க்குரல்கள் எழ காரணம் என்ன?

அக்டோபர் 26ம் தேதி அன்று சிங்கப்பூர் சிறை சேவை தர்மலிங்கத்தின் தாயாருக்கு கடிதம் ஒன்றை அனுப்பியது. அதில் நாகேந்திரனுக்கு மரண தண்டனை நவம்பர் 10ம் தேதி அன்று வழங்கப்படும் என்று கூறப்பட்டிருந்தது. இந்த கடிதம் சமூக வலைதளங்களில் வைரலாக பரவியது. , மனித உரிமை அமைப்புகள் அவரது மன நிலைமையை கருத்தில் கொண்டு அவரை மன்னிக்குமாறு அரசாங்கத்திடம் முறையிட்டன.

இந்த வழக்கு ஐரோப்பிய ஒன்றியம், அம்னெஸ்டி இன்டர்நேஷனல், அமெரிக்க உளவியல் சங்கத்தின் சமூக நீதி பிரிவு, சிங்கப்பூர் மரண தண்டனை எதிர்ப்பு பிரச்சாரம் மற்றும் டிரான்ஸ்ஃபார்மேட்டிவ் ஜஸ்டிஸ் கலெக்டிவ் ஆகியவற்றிலிருந்து அரசாங்கத்தின் முடிவைக் கண்டிக்கும் அறிக்கைகளுக்கு வழிவகுத்தது.

ஐரோப்பிய ஒன்றியத்தின் பிரதிநிதிகள் குழு மற்றும் ஐரோப்பிய ஒன்றிய உறுப்பு நாடுகள் மற்றும் நார்வே மற்றும் சுவிட்சர்லாந்தின் தூதரகப் பணிகள் மரண தண்டனையை ஒருபோதும் நியாயப்படுத்த முடியாது, மேலும் சிங்கப்பூர் அதை ஒழிப்பதற்கான சாதகமான முதல் படியாக அனைத்து மரணதண்டனைகளுக்கும் தடை விதிக்க வேண்டும் என்று வாதிடுகின்றனர் என ஐரோப்பிய ஒன்றியத்தின் பிரதிநிதிகள் குழு தனது அறிக்கையில் தெரிவித்துள்ளது.

கொத்தடிமைத்தனம், பிற உடல் ரீதியான தண்டனைகள் பொதுவாக இருந்த ஆரம்ப நாட்களில் மரண தண்டனை என்பது மிகுந்திருந்தது. மரண தண்டனை என்பது ஒரு கொடூரமான, மனிதாபிமானமற்ற ஒரு அசாதாரணமான தண்டனை ஆகும். அந்த காட்டுமிராண்டித்தனமான நடைமுறைகளைப் போலவே, ஒரு நாகரீக சமுதாயத்தில் மரணதண்டனைக்கும் இடமில்லை என்று அமெரிக்க உளவியல் சங்கத்தின் சமூக நீதிக்கான பிரிவு தனது அறிக்கையில் தெரிவித்துள்ளது.

சிங்கப்பூரில் போதைப்பொருள் தொடர்பான குற்றங்களை எந்தச் சட்டம் கையாளுகிறது?

சிங்கப்பூரில் , போதைப்பொருள் தொடர்பான குற்றங்களைக் கையாள்வதற்கான முக்கியச் சட்டமாக போதைப்பொருள் துஷ்பிரயோகச் சட்டம் உள்ளது. போதைப்பொருள்களை சட்டவிரோதமாக கடத்தல், இறக்குமதி அல்லது ஏற்றுமதி செய்தால் மரண தண்டனையை இந்த சட்டம் உறுதி செய்கிறது.

குறிப்பாக இந்த சட்டத்தின் கீழ், 15 கிராமுக்கு மேல் ஹெரோயின் போதைப்பொருளை இந்நாட்டிற்குள் கொண்டு வரும் எவருக்கும் மரண தண்டனையை இது உறுதி செய்கிறது.

இருப்பினும், 2014 இல் செய்யப்பட்ட திருத்தங்களின்படி, சம்பந்தப்பட்ட நபர் கூரியர் அல்லது கட்டுப்படுத்தப்பட்ட போதைப்பொருளைக் கொண்டு செல்வது, அனுப்புவது அல்லது விநியோகிப்பது போன்றவற்றைக் கண்டறிந்தால், மரண தண்டனைக்குப் பதிலாக ஆயுள் தண்டனை விதிக்கலாம் என்று அறிவிக்கப்பட்டது.

Its commodification in the hands of one corporation could be detrimental to the Web 3.0 decentralisation movement

The race between technology companies to build the ‘metaverse’ has officially started. On October 28, 2021, Facebook Inc. announced that it was restructuring and assuming the corporate name, Meta Platforms Inc., announcing that ‘from now on, we’re going to be metaverse-first, not Facebook-first’. ‘Metaverse’ is a broad term encompassing interconnected 3D virtual worlds made possible through advancements in technologies such as augmented reality (AR)/virtual reality (VR), artificial intelligence (AI) and blockchains, originating from Neal Stephenson’s 1992 speculative science fiction novel,Snow Crash.

The metaverse space

Web 3.0 is the name given to the next generation of Internet architecture that will supposedly be free from the centralisation that is a part of today’s Web 2.0 Internet systems, which are largely controlled by tech giants such as Google, Facebook and Amazon. Web 3.0 proponents advocate the use of technologies such as blockchains and tokens to create a decentralised Internet for online interaction and online payments, and a hypothetical metaverse run on these platforms could be a good example of what an ideal future digital environment could look like; hence the push for an ‘Open Metaverse’ by some organisations.

In an ideal world, the metaverse would be a truly open and inclusive space for empowerment, expression and exploration. However, these are not likely to be the corporation’s goals in the world we live in. If the corporation’s previous products are anything to go by, the aim is likely to get to the next level of commodification of human interaction, where every single action, down to the tiniest levels, is tracked and surveilled for profits, and designed in a way to maximise data collection and keep the user coming back for more.

Facebook/Meta is not the only company that has been pushing for the idea of the metaverse to become a reality lately; although the branding exercise that has just begun will likely make millions believe so. The chosen name reflects an attempt to associate the idea of the metaverse with one particular corporation and turn it into a household name. Other companies that have similar metaverse-building goals, such as Epic Games, now face a huge disadvantage.

However, the metaverse in the hands of one corporation would surely be detrimental to the entire Web 3.0 decentralisation movement. Competitors are likely to pop up with their own versions of the technology, leading to a number of ‘Closed’ metaverses, which would basically be the Web 2.0 system all over again. Oligopolies or monopolies in something as revolutionary as the metaverse space is a cause for concern and competition law regulators might have to look into them someday.

What could be on offer

What kind of economic systems would exist in Facebook/Meta’s metaverse? Interoperability, or the ability to seamlessly transfer data between different virtual worlds is being promised, which allows for rich social and economic possibilities. One phrase that has been regularly coming up is the ‘creator economy’ that will become a reality in the metaverse thanks to the popularity of NFTs (non-fungible tokens) over the past year. NFTs will allow proof of ownership of digital assets, for example, virtual goods, paintings and memorabilia. However, the most common criticism of NFTs is that they are an attempt to create value and scarcity where there should not be — that they are nothing more than another new avenue for capitalist expansion. The arguments are that nothing in the virtual world is actually scarce, and any scarcity is actually by design. Artificially created scarcity helps drive profits and money-making. The debate continues. Metaverses have great potential to revolutionise fields such as education and health care, but as long as they are run purely from a profit motive, the benefits would likely be lesser.

Virtual economies might also develop around the customisation of metaverse ‘avatars’. Recent whistle-blower revelations have unveiled that the corporation was well aware of the psychological effects Instagram was having on teenagers. One can therefore assume that metaverse ‘avatars’ will be the new version of showing off glamorous social media profiles — both masking who the person really is behind-the-scenes, perpetuating narcissism, mental health issues and insecurities.

Regulatory concerns

Privacy and security are, of course, significant concerns, and indeed, Facebook/Meta has acknowledged this, declaring its commitment to creating secure platforms. Yet, rampant health and biometric data collection are expected to continue in the metaverse, as real world identities will be more connected to the system than ever before. Data breaches and theft, thus, could prove even costlier. While Web 3.0 systems are supposed to give more power to users over their personal data, it still remains to be seen if corporations such as Facebook/Meta will follow Web 3.0 standards or come up with their own standards in closed corporate metaverses. Cybercrimes could also take on new forms in these new virtual worlds.

Facebook’s role in promoting violent and hateful content to drive user engagement has been well documented. If left unregulated, something similar could happen on an even larger scale in immersive virtual worlds, through targeted advertising and propaganda. The corporation cannot be trusted to moderate its platforms properly if it goes against their economic incentives, as has been proven time and time again. Regulators need to step in right from the start when it comes to the metaverse, following a precautionary rather than a permissive approach instead of taking too long and allowing certain problematic and dangerous practices to get entrenched and difficult to deal with. The tussle between lawmakers around the world and Facebook still continues today.

Finally, metaverses will bring up challenging questions of jurisdiction and governance. In the distant future, virtual worlds could even someday grow into alternatives to the nation state itself, as the rise of blockchain-based DAOs (decentralized autonomous organisations) seems to suggest. Big Tech firms already have GDPs higher than several small countries — if they all get to operate full virtual worlds of their own, it could necessitate large-scale rethinking of the very foundations of technology law.

Real world costs, impact

The metaverse, as it is promised, will combine the technologies of cloud computing, big data, advanced AI systems, AR/VR, blockchains, NFTs and much more. Each of these technologies requires tremendous processing power and, consequently, would lead to a great cost in terms of the environment. The level of resource extraction required to run such a huge system smoothly is too gigantic to comprehend. And that is not even taking into account the exploitation of millions of underpaid workers upon which a lot of the critical infrastructure and supply chains of Big Tech depend. This stark reality behind our everyday conveniences is unknown to many, and this could only intensify with a corporate project as huge as the metaverse. Ultimately, a corporation is beholden to its investors and not to the public at large. With the metaverse, possibilities are aplenty. But so are the dangers.

Kaif Siddiqui is an LLM (Law and Technology) student at the West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences, Kolkata. Shifa Qureshi is a B.A. LL.B (Hons.) student at the Faculty of Law, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh

There is lack of recent data on the representation of various communities in education and employment

The Madras High Court’s recent verdict of quashing the 10.5% special reservation for Vanniyakula Kshatriyas within the overall 20% quota for Most Backward Classes (MBC) and Denotified Communities (DNC) has again highlighted the importance of quantifiable data as a prerequisite for reservation in education and employment.

Adopted on the last day of the previous State Assembly in February when the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) was in power, the special quota law, which envisaged 10.5% special reservation for the Vanniyakula Kshatriyas comprising seven sub-castes; 7% for 25 MBCs and 68 DNCs; and 2.5% for 22 MBCs, triggered controversy from the word go. Expectedly, the legislation was challenged before the High Court, which held it unconstitutional for a host of reasons. Even though the Court described the submission that the law was enacted only on the basis of “adequate authenticated data on population” of the MBCs and DNCs enumerated by the second Backward Classes (BC) Commission as the “main thrust” of arguments of Tamil Nadu’s Advocate General, it concluded that “there is no data, much less quantifiable data, available with the State government before the introduction” of the law.

No exhaustive study

It is a fact that no exhaustive study has been done to collect quantifiable data on the representation of different communities in education and employment since the second BC Commission, popularly known after its chairman, J.A. Ambasankar, carried out one during its existence (1982-1985). Even the State BC Commission, in its report of July 2011 to the State government in justification of 69% reservation for BC, MBC/DNCs and Scheduled Castes (SC)/Scheduled Tribes (ST) under the 1994 Act, did not give any community-wise break up of representation in government services. It furnished only the numbers of candidates belonging to the BCs and MBC/DNCs, who were chosen for the State Services and Subordinate Services during 2005-09, quoting the data furnished by the Tamil Nadu Public Services Commission, apart from those from SC/ST and Other Backward Classes selected by the Railway Recruitment Board, Chennai. Even though the mandate given to the BC panel was to come out with its defence of the 69% quota, the Commission could have provided the community-wise break up of recruitments made by the State government.

At least, now, with the High Court pointing to the absence of data as a reason to annul the 10.5% quota law, the State government should commission a study to compile the data on the way the benefits of reservation got distributed among BCs, MBCs and the DNCs. The study can be carried out either by the present BC Commission or by an exclusive panel, as decided by the previous AIADMK government in December 2020. When the existing BC Commission was set up in July 2020, one of the terms of reference was to examine the demand for internal reservation within the reservation provided for MBCs and make a recommendation on the matter. As made clear by the Court, the quantifiable data are required for providing any form of quota in favour of any community because the Constitutional stipulation of adequate representation in the services has to be met along with that of social and educational backwardness for any community to become eligible for reservation in employment.

Internal reservation

The need for internal reservation has been felt for more than one reason. Even in the 1970s and 1980s, two BC Commissions found certain sections of the communities more backward than others. The situation has got compounded in the absence of application of the creamy layer rule in reservation, a concept that is being opposed by political parties including the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and the AIADMK. Ironically, the first BC Commission (1969-70), headed by A.N. Sattanathan, talked of having a device for “skimming off periodically” top layers of the communities. The Ambasankar Commission advocated compartmental reservation, by grouping the BCs on the basis of backwardness. It went to the extent of saying that the words, “any backward class of citizens” in Article 16(4) of the Constitution “contemplates [sic] a plurality of backward classes and consequent separate reservation for these classes.”

The concept of quota within quota is nothing new to Tamil Nadu. In March 1989, a new category — Most Backward Classes and De-notified Communities — was carved out of the BCs and given 20% exclusively from the then quantum of 50%. In September 2007, Muslims in the BCs were provided with 3.5% and in January 2009, 3% for Arunthathiyars out of 18% quota for the SCs.

ramakrishnan.t@thehindu.co.in

Project Sampoorna’s success in reducing child malnutrition is a model that can be easily implemented anywhere

‘Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food’. This statement is often attributed to Hippocrates, the Father of Medicine, and quite literally sums up Project Sampoorna which was conceptualised and successfully implemented in Bongaigaon district of Assam.

An interlink

The project has resulted in the reduction of malnutrition in children using near zero economic investment. Sampoorna is in tandem with the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals and those set by the UN Secretary General António Guterres in the Food Systems Summit (September 2021) including the need to have food systems and social protection that support resilience and food security. Prime Minister Narendra Modi also had identified health and nutrition as priority areas and reiterated the need for a ‘Kuposhan mukt Bharat’ (Malnutrition Free India) while launching the Prime Minister’s Overarching Scheme for Holistic Nourishment (POSHAN Abhiyaan) (National Nutrition Mission) in 2017-18.

It was during Poshan Maah (Nutrition Month) in September 2020 that 2,416 children were identified to be malnourished in the lush green Brahmaputra valley district of Bongaigaon. The National Family Health Survey (NHFS)-5) has documented that the number of children under five who are stunted, wasted, underweight and the number of anaemic women and children in the district are higher than the national average — anaemia being a major determinant of maternal and child health.

These were corroborated by Project Saubhagya that was designed to reduce the maternal mortality rate and infant mortality rate of the district. A real time data sheet is updated by field-level doctors as and when a high risk pregnancy is identified, which is then followed up till safe delivery. The project has yielded encouraging results; maternal deaths for six months (April 1, 2020 to September 30, 2020 compared to April 1, 2021 to September 30, 2021) have fallen from 16 to three and infant deaths from 130 to 63.

Addressing child nutrition

The highest risk factor for high risk pregnancy is anaemia which is usually nutritional. The vicious cycle of a malnourished child growing into an unhealthy adolescent, and then further into an anaemic pregnant young woman giving birth to an asphyxiated low birth weight baby; this baby then facing possible developmental delays, only to grow into a malnourished child; and this child who struggles further for nutrition and appropriate care while the world around her barely makes ends meet is the one that sucks in all possibilities of a healthy society.

This portrays the worst-case scenarios, but truth is indeed stranger than fiction. In order to break out of this vicious cycle, the low-hanging fruit had to be targeted — children’s nutrition.

Malnutrition, patriarchy

Bongaigaon has 1,116 Anganwadis with a total of 63,041 children below five. The massive exercise of plotting their weights and heights in World Health Organization growth charts revealed a total of 2,416 malnourished children; 246 cases of Severe Acute Malnutrition (SAM) and 2,170 instances of Moderate Acute Malnutrition (MAM).

District Nutritional Rehabilitation Centres, or NRCs, usually have up to 20 beds; and a monthly intake of 200 SAM children is not practical. Also, parents of the children who are admitted forgo their daily wages (which to an extent is compensated by the Government) and abandon their farmlands for 10 days. Back home, siblings of the SAM child are not taken care of and may become malnourished. The treated child could also slip back to a SAM state after being discharged and if not cared for.

We needed to innovate now. Based on the success of the community-based COVID-19 management model (Project Mili Juli), we launched Project Sampoorna targeting the mothers of SAM/MAM children, the tagline being ‘Empowered Mothers, Healthy Children’. In addition, we identified the mother of a healthy child of the same Anganwadi Centre (AWC) and paired her with the target mother; they would be ‘Buddy Mothers’ (2,416 pairs). They were usually neighbours and shared similar socio-economic backgrounds. The pairs were given diet charts to indicate the daily food intake of their children; they would have discussions about this on all Tuesdays at the AWC. Local practices related to nutrition would also be discussed.

The major hindrance to the project was patriarchy. Mothers had to be empowered financially for sustained results. Therefore, they were enrolled in Self Help Groups (SHGs) under the National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM). By the end of three months, 74.3% of mothers were enrolled in SHGs; by the end of six months, enrollment went up to 75.6% and by the end of a year, it was 90%. Meanwhile, we arranged for 100 millilitres of milk and an egg on alternate days for all 2,416 children for the first three months, giving time for their mothers to stabilise themselves in the newly found jobs. The large hearted people of Bongaigaon adopted Anganwadis and filled the tiny stomachs with the much needed proteins and their hearts with love.

A sea change

After three months of Project Sampoorna, out of 246 SAM children, 27 (11%) continued to be SAM, 28 (11.4%) improved to MAM and a whooping 189 (76.8%) became normal. Out of 2,170 MAM children, 12 (0.6%) deteriorated to SAM, 132 (6.08%) stayed MAM and an unbelievable 2,015 (92.8%) became normal. The best was yet to come. Milk and eggs were stopped after three months but we continued to follow up to see how our Buddy Mothers Model and Women Empowerment Model were working. Mothers had done what institutions could not do for years. By March 2021, 84.96% of SAM children and 97.3% MAM children were normal; and by September 2021, 92.3% SAM and 98.9% MAM children were normal. Project Sampoorna had stood the test of time. Children who had not improved were checked and treated by doctors under the Rashtriya Bal Swasthya Karyakram (RBSK). UNICEF, IIT Guwahati, Tezpur University and the Social Welfare Department lent their support in periodic course correction.

Project Sampoorna had prevented at least 1,200 children from becoming malnourished over the last year. The National Nutrition Mission and the State government recognised our project in the ‘Innovation Category’. The Chief Minister of Assam, Himanta Biswa Sharma, has written an encouraging message for the project report which will be released soon. The model can easily be implemented anywhere in the world. We believe children everywhere have the right to stay healthy, and hope that the vicious cycle is broken sooner rather than later.

Dr. M.S. Lakshmi Priya, District Collector, Bongaigaon district, Assam, is a medical doctor turned IAS officer (2014 batch), from Kerala. The views expressed are personal

India has failed to fully appreciate the usage of international law as a means to advance its national security interests

Military experts, international relations academics, and practitioners like retired diplomats dominate the debates on global security in India. International lawyers are largely absent in these debates despite security issues being placed within the framework of international law. Today, international law covers a wide array of security issues ranging from terrorism to maritime security. Article 1(1) of the UN Charter recognises the maintenance of “international peace and security” as a principal objective of the UN. Notwithstanding the central role that international law plays in security matters, India has failed to fully appreciate the usage of international law to advance its national security interests.

Several misses

In recent times, several examples demonstrate India’s failure to use an international law-friendly vocabulary to articulate its security interests. First, India struck the terror camps in Pakistan in February 2019, days after a dastardly act of terrorism in Pulwama was carried out by a Pakistan-based terror outfit. In justifying the use of force, India did not invoke the right to self-defence since Pakistan was unable or unwilling to act against the terrorist groups operating from its soil; rather, it relied on a contested doctrine of ‘non-military pre-emptive action’.

Second, after the Pulwama attack, India decided to suspend the most favoured nation (MFN) status of Pakistan. Under international law contained in the General Agreements on Tariffs and Trade, countries can deviate from their MFN obligations on grounds of national security. Instead of suspending the MFN obligation towards Pakistan along these lines, India used Section 8A(1) of the Customs Tariff Act, 1975, to increase customs duties on all Pakistani products to 200%. The notification on this decision did not even mention ‘national security’.

Third, India wishes to deport the Rohingya refugees who, it argues, pose a security threat. However, India’s argument to justify this deportation is that it is not a signatory to the Refugee Convention. This is a weak argument since India is bound by the principle of non-refoulment (a customary international law principle that prohibits a country from returning refugees to countries where they face a clear threat of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, among others). National security is one of the exceptions to the non-refoulment principle in international refugee law. If India wishes to deport the Rohingya, it should develop a case on these lines showing how they constitute a national security threat.

Fourth, to put pressure on the Taliban regime to serve India’s interest, India has rarely used international law. For instance, India could have made a case for the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) using its implied powers under international law to temporarily suspend Afghanistan from SAARC’s membership.

That being said, there have been some instances where India has ably used international law for its national security objectives, such as in the Kulbhushan Jadhav case when it dragged Pakistan to the International Court of Justice and also in developing international law to counter terrorism.

At the margins

There are several reasons for international law remaining at the margins of foreign policymaking in India. First, there is marginal involvement of international lawyers in foreign policymaking. B.S. Chimni, a leading Indian international lawyer, argues, “the Legal and Treaties Division of the Ministry of External Affairs, which advises the government on international law matters, is both understaffed and largely ignored on policy matters”. Moreover, an international law expert has far greater incentive to join the government as a generalist diplomat than as an international lawyer. Second, apart from the External Affairs Ministry, there are several other Ministries like Commerce and Finance that also deal with different facets of international law. They have negligible expertise in international law. Third, there has been systemic neglect of the study of international law. Institutions created to undertake cutting-edge research in this discipline have institutionalised mediocrity and university centres mandated to develop the stream suffer from uninspiring leadership and systemic apathy. Fourth, many of the outstanding international law scholars that India has produced prefer to converse with domain experts only. Thus, they have failed in popularising international law among the larger public. If India wishes to emerge as a global power, it has to make use of ‘lawfare’ i.e., use law as a weapon of national security. To mainstream international law in foreign policymaking, India should invest massively in building its capacity on international law.

Prabhash Ranjan is Professor and Vice Dean, Jindal Global Law School, OP Jindal Global University. Views are personal

Despite falling COVID-19 cases, India must focus on improving vaccination and treatment

There is reason for optimism in India’s battle against the COVID-19 pandemic. Daily new coronavirus cases have dipped to a nine-month low. There were 10,929 new cases reported in the previous 24 hours on Saturday morning. Though the latest numbers on Monday show a slight rise at 11,451, the key cause for optimism is that the country’s active case load stood at 1,46,950 cases which was a 262-day low, according to the Health Ministry. The active cases were 0.43% of the total caseload and the lowest since the pandemic began in March 2020. The last few times daily cases went below 10,000 were on February 8, February 1, and before that on the January 25. Saturday’s numbers bring the country’s overall tally to 3.37 crore. Optimism however is a double-edged sword. The numbers may be at February levels but it should not be forgotten that India was hit by a lethal second wave — led by a dominating Delta variant — that saw daily cases climb to as many as 4,00,000 a day and excess deaths in several States many multiples of what was being reported by the Government.

Globally too, infections have not plateaued. The daily caseload has fallen by nearly a third since September but the virus continues to infect 50 million people every three months. On Monday, the world crossed a milestone of 25 crore cases since the pandemic began. However, the major difference between February and November is vaccination. About 74 crore first doses of the vaccine have been administered, which translates to 56% of the population. Close to 34 crore second doses have been administered which works out to a quarter of the population being fully inoculated. Coupled with results from serology surveys from States that show that many more have been exposed to the virus than official numbers indicate, this gives confidence that while the virus will continue to spread and infect, a smaller proportion of those infected will be seriously ill. The future demand for vaccination may depend more on adoption in children, or on the demand for booster shots from people worried about waning immunity. That the pall of fear has dimmed is apparent in the queues in airports, the crowds in tourist destinations and the rejuvenation in several indices of trade and economic activity. Whether all this socialisation — and the opening of schools in-person — will mean a surge in the coming months remains to be seen. The Government, while continuing to improve the last mile delivery of vaccines must not let up on advocating caution to avoid another wave of infections. It must continue to facilitate the upgrade of hospital infrastructure in every district; it should also shore up stocks of promising antivirals and ensure that vaccine companies increase supplies in line with their commitments.

Rahul Dravid will be expected to fetch India ICC trophies in his role as coach

Rahul Dravid’s appointment as coach of the senior men’s Indian cricket team had an air of inevitability about it. This was a natural progression for the former India captain, who, after his retirement in 2012, dabbled in commentary before slipping into the mentor-cum-coach template. He guided the India under-19 squad, the ‘A’ team and helmed the National Cricket Academy in his hometown Bengaluru. It was all building up to the Indian squad’s coach’s seat, which was falling vacant following incumbent Ravi Shastri’s contract winding to a close at the culmination of the current ICC Twenty20 World Cup in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). However, much like his steady batting that earned him the moniker ‘The Wall’, Dravid was in no hurry. He prefers the measured step and it is a trait that defined him right from his school days to the time he became one among the sport’s greatest batters, putting a heavy price on his wicket. A rounded personality, equally at ease on the ground or in the company of books, Dravid was always the team-man. He even donned wicket-keeping gloves in One Day Internationals just to lend balance to the playing eleven. He comes with the weight of great stature, the warmth of goodwill, and the pressure of expectations. This is not an easy position in a country where everyone has an opinion on everything about cricket.

Dravid the player batted with an in-the-trenches resolve defining his forays on the pitch. He was a remarkable close-in fielder too, an attribute that gets lost under his avalanche of runs. He remained an assertive captain and his act of declaring the Indian innings during the 2004 Multan Test against Pakistan, while Sachin Tendulkar neared his double century, remains one of the strongest team-first-records-later diktat ever issued in the annals of Indian cricketing history. But back then as a player or captain, Dravid was in control, but as a coach, his role is about getting the present skipper and the outfit ready for a contest besides finessing strategy. This is about transferring knowledge and hoping that his wards would deliver. It is tough, and in the past, men of pedigree such as Kapil Dev, Greg Chappell and Anil Kumble had a mixed run while evolving as the coach. India may have suffered a blip during the ICC T20 World Cup in the UAE, and yet this is a core-unit that has done well in the previous months, both at home and overseas. Seen in that light, Dravid inherits the right mix. Yet, there are missing links. Recently, India has not won any significant ICC silverware while the triumphs in 1983, 2007 and 2011 seem distant. This should offer enough food for thought while the 48-year-old dons the coach’s hat.

The results of the Karnataka bypolls come as a warning for the BJP, Congress and the JD(S)

The results of the just-concluded bypolls to two Assembly seats in Karnataka have exposed chinks in the BJP’s armour and show what challenges lie ahead for the principal opposition party, the Congress, and the Janata Dal (Secular) ahead of the Assembly elections in 2023. In particular, the new Chief Minister, Basavaraj Bommai, has faced a setback as the BJP lost the Hangal seat located in his home district of Haveri.

Bypolls to the Hangal and Sindgi Assembly constituencies were necessitated by the death of the MLAs in these areas. While Hangal had earlier been represented by veteran leader C.M. Udasi, a close aide of former Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa, the Sindgi seat was held by the JD(S).

A mixed bag

The BJP, which is in the process of building a second line of leadership in Karnataka by replacing Mr. Yediyurappa with his own protégé, Mr. Bommai, as Chief Minister, had taken the decision not to give ticket to Udasi’s family members. This was seen in political circles as an attempt by the BJP to loosen the Yediyurappa camp’s hold over the party. In a balancing act, the party fielded a supporter of Mr. Yediyurappa from Hangal. The bypolls, though numerically insignificant, saw a high-decibel campaign with the Chief Minister himself leading from the front along with a battalion of his ministerial colleagues. Mr. Yediyurappa and his son B.Y. Vijayendra, who is keen to enter politics, also campaigned in both the constituencies.

But the results were a mixed bag: the BJP lost Hangal to Congress candidate Srinivas Mane while it managed to wrest Sindgi from the JD(S) with a sizeable margin. Though a defeat in one seat can in no way be a pointer to the mandate in the next Assembly elections, the ruling BJP and the Chief Minister appear to be concerned as the Hangal results have indicated that the party has to take delicate measures to ensure that the supporters of Mr. Yediyurappa, who has considerable influence over the dominant community of Lingayats, wholeheartedly back the party. Some leaders have also said that the Hangal results could point to the possible impact of the BJP’s turn to hardcore Hindutva politics on voters in a seat that has a sizeable number of minorities, Other Backward Classes and Dalits. On his part, Mr. Bommai has said that he and the party will introspect on the reasons behind the defeat and take corrective measures. He also admitted that the Congress candidate in Hangal had “earned the goodwill” of the people in the constituency by helping them during the pandemic. BJP National General Secretary and State in-charge Arun Singh is visiting Karnataka to analyse the reasons for the defeat and to incorporate the lessons from these bypolls into the party’s strategy for 2023.

Lessons for Opposition

These results have certainly boosted the morale of the Congress that has won Hangal. However, the party is not devoid of problems as its strategy of importing the candidate from the rival JD(S) camp in Sindgi backfired. Admitting this, the Leader of the Opposition, Siddaramaiah, has said that there was an absence of co-ordination in the party as the candidate was a recent entrant.

For the JD(S), whose candidates lost deposit in both the seats, the bypolls have shown that the absence of a firm political stand and strategies by its leaders are leading to constant erosion of its vote share. The party’s efforts to expand base beyond the Old Mysuru region of south Karnataka did not get a positive response from the people as its tally in north Karnataka has reduced further to five seats now.

The bypolls have come as a warning ahead of the 2023 elections and all the three political parties are expected to rework their strategies.

satishkumar.bs@thehindu.co.in

Dr. Norman Borlaug, U.S. winner of the Nobel Peace Prize last year for his work in developing high-yield cereals, to-day [Rome, November 8] denounced “hysterical environmentalists” for attempting to block the use of chemicals such as D.D.T. in agriculture. In a lecture at the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organisation here, Dr. Borlaug warned that fertlisers and chemicals like D.D.T. were vital for adequate food production. “If agriculture is denied their use because of unwise legislation that is now being promoted by a powerful group of hysterical lobbyists, who are provoking fear by predicting doom for the world through chemical poisoning, then the world will be doomed not by chemical poisoning but by starvation,” he said. Dr. Borlaug’s 18,000-word lecture at the opening meeting of the FAO’s 16th Governing Conference was expected to initiate a major battle in the organisation over the use of D.D.T., FAO sources said. Opposition to his views may come on Tuesday when Dr. Sicco Mansholt of Holland, chief architect of the European Common Market’s agricultural policies, is expected to call for a phasing out of D.D.T. and its replacement by pesticides which do less damage to the environment. Referring to the so-called “Green Revolution” in agriculture for which he won his Nobel Prize, Dr. Borlaug said the use of heavy doses of fertilisers played an important part in creating the high-yielding cereals which had raised hopes of solving the world’s food problem.

The entire episode may be the result of taking political rhetoric too literally. Prosenjit sir, Pradhan Sewak isn’t the chief customer care officer.

Spare a thought for the tribulations of Bumba da. Arguably the biggest star in Bengali cinema over the last couple of decades, he suffers like an urban, upper-middle-class everyman. Prosenjit ordered food over Swiggy. But — wait for it — he was not able to enjoy the sumptuous meal he was looking forward to. Then, the plot thickened, not unlike the gravy in a good shorshe jhaal: The app said his food had been delivered, when it had not! When he called the people at Swiggy, they refunded his money. For mere mortals, this is a common enough inconvenience and we move on. Not so, Bumba da.

Prosenjit took to the digital platform favoured by activists who want to make themselves heard without sweating it out to highlight his ordeal. He tweeted an open letter (the most self-righteous of formats), tagging the Prime Minister and West Bengal Chief Minister, to “highlight” the issue. “What if,” the shocked superstar wrote, “someone is depending on the food app for their dinner? Will they stay hungry?” Burning questions, to be sure — but perhaps not meant for the table of heads of government.

However, before we judge him too harshly — as so many on social media did and are doing — a little context. Who really enjoys talking to customer care, either on the phone or through the bots that man so many text-based helplines? And in a country where who you know and how important you are allows you to skip lines, why does Bumba da’s sense of entitlement upset us so? Sour grapes, perhaps. After all, most people — particularly the higher one travels up the social ladder — phone a friend or a tout for everything from a passport to a driver’s licence. Besides, the entire episode may be the result of taking political rhetoric too literally. Prosenjit sir, Pradhan Sewak isn’t the chief customer care officer.

Virat Kohli isn’t the sort who likes to fade into the background, leads by example, and this format was the only one where he couldn’t do it.

In the end, Virat Kohli’s T20 captaincy and India’s campaign in the World Cup concluded without any fireworks. Neither was bad, even if both are now shadowed by failure. Kohli has rightfully taken pride in the team’s bouncebackability — a catchphrase of sorts for Indian cricket in the Kohli era — but the slip-ups will hurt when he looks back at his reign. The choice of out-of-form batsmen and absence of in-form bowlers was almost forced on him by the timing of the squad’s selection for the T20 World Cup. It was clear from the outset that it was up to Rohit Sharma and K L Rahul to carry India and once both failed in the first two games, India found themselves pushed out.

Over the years, Kohli’s captaincy improved, under the guidance of coach Ravi Shastri, but it’s in the team balance and composition where he faltered. He might have made tons of runs in T20 but he is not really at home in this format in contrast with the match-winning destructiveness that he displays with such skill and ease in other formats. Perhaps that too played its part in his captaincy. He isn’t the sort who likes to fade into the background, leads by example, and this format was the only one where he couldn’t do it. On field, as long as MS Dhoni was there, Kohli chose the best option for the team as a boundary rider and let Dhoni handle the details. It did show, though, that just like his batting, he could curb his ego and do what was best for the team.

Throughout Kohli’s captaincy, there have been recurring murmurs about the pull-and-tug with team-mates, especially the senior ones. In some ways, he was almost impatient in getting them to move on with his philosophy, but would eventually relent. It’s a testament to how far the team has grown in recent years that the benchmark seems to be ICC tournaments. It was taken as a given that the team would reach the knockout stage in big-ticket events — a far cry from earlier days when the path to that stage seemed much rockier. Ironically, in his last tournament, India couldn’t get there.

In Tripura, and elsewhere, the onus is on the judiciary to step in to raise the questions and draw the red lines in order to uphold the fundamental freedoms of citizens against a transgressing executive power.

The Tripura police’s decision to charge lawyers, journalists and 100-odd social media users with the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) for posts on communal violence is one more example of the flagrantly excessive use of a draconian law. This comes a few days after the Jammu and Kashmir police registered a case under UAPA against unknown students in two Srinagar medical colleges after they “cheered for Pakistan” in an India-Pakistan T20 match.The Tripura police, too, has pushed the interpretation of the harsh anti-terror law across vital distinctions and boundaries by wielding it against the authors of a fact-finding report, among others. Four lawyers from Delhi had gone to Tripura on a fact-finding mission after violence reportedly erupted against Muslims in the state last month, in a disturbing echo of the anti-Hindu violence that broke out, across the border, in Bangladesh during Durga Puja celebrations. The lawyers’ report, released online, flagged targeted vandalism of mosques and shortcomings of the BJP government in dealing with anti-minority mobilisations and recommended a judicial probe. None of this falls outside the remit of actions that citizens and members of civil society can — and do — undertake in a democracy to pressure governments to act. It is hard to see how any of this constitutes an offence under Section 13 of UAPA, which applies to an act that “incites secession” or “disrupts the sovereignty of India” or “causes disaffection against India”. Subsequently, owners of 102 social media accounts, including journalists who posted about the violence in Tripura and amplified the report, also faced charges under provisions of IPC “of promoting enmity” between communities, besides UAPA. The police have drawn a “one-to-one” correlation between the lawyers’ visit and social media comments that “potentially” create communal hatred, but the law itself — and the Supreme Court — have set a higher bar. A citizen’s right to freedom of speech and expression cannot be curtailed unless they resort to violence or incite violence.

Indeed, this appears to be a part of the playbook of heavy-handedness that has been perfected by governments. This involves the twisting of stringent laws such as the UAPA or the sedition law to quell dissent or intimidate anyone who contests or might contest the state’s version. While harsh laws have existed and been misused even earlier, what stands out today is the apparent lack of qualms in the ruling establishment in wielding them as weapons against citizens. In UAPA cases, the legal process can itself become a prolonged punishment, given the lower judiciary’s reluctance, barring a few exceptions, to grant bail to the accused. The Delhi High Court, however, struck a welcome dissenting note earlier this year while granting bail to anti-CAA activists — it criticised the state’s tendency to confuse “protest” for “terrorist activity”. Last month’s Supreme Court judgment in the Thwaha Fasal case, too, clears the path for less oppressive interpretations of the UAPA.

In Tripura, and elsewhere, the onus is on the judiciary to step in to raise the questions and draw the red lines in order to uphold the fundamental freedoms of citizens against a transgressing executive power.

The visit of External Affairs Minister P V Narasimha Rao to London in response to Lord Carrington’s long-standing invitation is likely to have a direct bearing on Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s four-day stay in Paris.

The visit of External Affairs Minister P V Narasimha Rao to London in response to Lord Carrington’s long-standing invitation is likely to have a direct bearing on Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s four-day stay in Paris. India’s politico-economic role in the Third World and non-aligned countries is recognised as vital both by France and Britain against the background of the situation in West Asia, South Asia and Southwest Asian countries, with particular reference to the developments in Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan. Since Mitterrand was elected President, France and India have established close relationships. This is, perhaps, because the French President’s views on many matters are similar to those held by Mrs Gandhi. But there is hardly any issue of significance on which London and New Delhi agree despite the fact that the two countries have traditional friendship.

Centre on Kerala

The Union Minister of State for Home, Yogendra Makwana, said that the Kerala government has decided to activate the police machinery for maintaining law and order in the state. Talking to reporters at the Raj Bhavan, he said he had given several instructions to the police with regard to law and order. He also assured police officers protection in the legitimate exercise of their duty. Whenever necessary, the National Security Act would be used and instructions have been given to officers to constitute a review board for the purpose, he said.

Trouble in Assam

While the Assam agitation leaders’ response to the Centre’s invitation for the 15th round of talks from November 19 is not known, the two sides are inevitably heading for a major confrontation. The agitators are firm on their decision to have a mass rally on November 18. The government is equally firm in not granting permission in an area which continues to be under prohibitory orders.

Rajeev Malhotra writes: Many of the ideas that she planted during her time in the rural development division of the Planning Commission grew into policies over time

Rohini Nayyar, a well-known economist, former principal adviser at the erstwhile Planning Commission and one of India’s foremost authorities on rural development passed away on October 24, stoically fighting illness and the consequences of the negligence of some doctors who attended to her in the last few years. She lived a full life as a professional, an ideal companion and anchor to her husband, Deepak Nayyar, a doting mother to her sons, Dhiraj and Gaurav, and as a compassionate person who cared for all, but particularly for those less fortunate. Her heart was in the right place, and she had a mind that was fearless, always engaging with issues that mattered, professionally as well as socially, never hesitating to take a stand when required.

She had a unique career trajectory. After completing her Master’s degree in economics from the Delhi School of Economics, where she also met Deepak, Rohini joined the IAS in the Uttar Pradesh cadre in 1969, serving in Agra, Kanpur and Lucknow. She left the service within a few years to be with her husband at Oxford, where she did her BLitt in economics. In time, she wrote her DPhil thesis on rural poverty in India at the University of Sussex, a pioneering institution in development economics. She then chose to combine her academic specialisation with her interest in administration and policymaking by re-joining the Government of India as adviser in the Planning Commission in the late 1980s. For almost two decades, until 2005, she headed the rural development division at the Commission, rising in rank from joint secretary to secretary. Such a long stint in one position is rare in the government system and it made Rohini’s domain knowledge indispensable to a succession of governments who were all keen to make an impact in rural India.

Many policy ideas that were seeded at her time in the rural development division of the Planning Commission were implemented over the years. She was an early advocate for rationalising centrally-sponsored schemes at a time when such schemes were proliferating. In the 1990s, she believed in the need for a rural employment guarantee scheme, an idea which the UPA government wished to implement in 2004. As fate would have it, she was due to retire in 2004 shortly after the UPA took office but she was asked to stay on in the Planning Commission for a year after her retirement to help design the flagship NREGA.

Her analytical contributions were equally significant. In the 1980s, her estimation of rural poverty and analysis of inter-state differences, based on quantities of food and other necessities consumed, rather than household expenditures, was a pioneering original contribution. In the 1990s, her estimation of district income along with Vinod Vyasulu greatly enriched the literature on rural development.

Rohini was not only a brilliant mentor to many of us in the Planning Commission, but also to academics and practitioners on the outside. To her subordinates, she was the ideal boss, accessible and empowering in every respect. She was frank, fair, and transparent in her dealings, never hesitating to speak her mind — values that are not so common among civil servants, especially in the present times.

There is one instance, fresh in my mind, which reflects the person and the professional that Rohini was. In 1998-99, the Planning Commission was taken to task by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance for not having prepared a human development report for the country, when even Bangladesh had one. The Commission was directed to prepare one in a limited time. The initial thought was to outsource it. I thought of this as a great opportunity for the Planning Commission. However, being a relatively junior officer at that time, I needed an adviser-level person to back the project. I approached Rohini, although I was in a different division, to provide her leadership to the proposed project. It took a couple of minutes to brief her and she was ready to walk to the secretary’s office to take responsibility on our behalf. We set up a team under her leadership to complete the task and presented the report to the prime minister and Parliament in the stipulated time frame.

Not once during the preparation of the report did she betray any sign of concern, as the buck stopped with her. She would often come to my office and share a cup of Darjeeling tea, a fondness that we both shared. It was her way of encouraging us to do a good job.

Her legacy will survive through all the lives she touched.

Girish Kuber writes: The BJP received a jolt when the Shiv Sena joined hands with the NCP and Congress after 2019 Assembly polls. Since then the three-party Maharashtra government has been in a fire-fighting mode.

Politics, as everyone knows, has always been about cut-throat competition. Politics is subterfuge. Politics, at times, is about deceiving friends and embracing foes; it is about winning. Politics is also about keeping at least one window open for arch-rivals. Politics is everything that normal human beings cannot think of. However, politics, though brutal, was rarely played with a jilted-lover mindset.

The BJP received an unbearable jolt when the Shiv Sena, after the Maharashtra state assembly polls in November 2019, refused to sign on the dotted line and did the unthinkable by joining hands with the NCP and Congress. Since then, the three-party Maharashtra government has been perennially in a fire-fighting mode. It’s understandable that an upset BJP would try to dislodge the Uddhav Thackeray-led ministry. What is, however, difficult to accept is the means for the purpose. One has to be super naive to believe that the actions unleashed by various central agencies have no politics to them.

Let’s take a look at some facts.

First, the case of deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar. It was the alleged involvement of Ajit Pawar in the irrigation scam that helped the BJP win office in 2014. If it was the fiery campaign against Sharad Pawar by the BJP’s late Gopinath Munde, helped by officials such as G R Khairnar, that propelled the BJP-Sena alliance to power for the first time in 1995, the corruption charges made by Devendra Fadnavis and others against Ajit Pawar helped the saffron siblings end the 10-year Congress-NCP rule in 2014. In office, the BJP-Sena government did precious little. The irrigation scam resurfaced in 2019 ahead of state elections when BJP leaders claimed that Ajit Pawar’s rightful place was in jail. What is incredible is that the BJP tried to make the same Ajit Pawar deputy chief minister in that ill-fated, short-lived Fadnavis government.

It was the BJP’s second consecutive failure in forming the government, the first being its inability to win over the Sena. It is not easy to digest two failures. Now that Ajit Pawar and his relatives are under the IT radar, the question is: Would this have happened had Ajit Pawar stayed with the BJP? Two state politicians — Harshvardhan Patil and Sanjay Patil, BJP MP from Sangli — recently said they have stopped worrying about central agencies since they joined the BJP.

Second, the case of former home minister Anil Deshmukh, who was arrested recently, on corruption allegations made by former Mumbai Police Commissioner Param Bir Singh. Central agencies have investigated Deshmukh on the basis of a letter written by Singh to the chief minister. Singh himself has admitted that he doesn’t have any proof of Deshmukh’s alleged wrongdoings. This is not to give a clean chit to Deshmukh who lacked the skills and maturity to run this crucial ministry. Not to forget, it was the BJP that made Deshmukh a minister for the first time in 1995.

Similarly, it was the BJP government that favoured Param Bir Singh for the powerful commissionerate of Thane. Singh had a special rapport with BJP bigwigs and was used to rein in the Sena. Ironically, it was Singh, who, in his capacity as the Director General (DG) of the Maharashtra Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB), gave a clean chit to Ajit Pawar in the alleged scam involving 12 Vidarbha Irrigation Development Corporation (VIDC) projects. The short-lived Fadnavis government, where Ajit Pawar was deputy CM, too had absolved the latter of wrongdoings in the alleged irrigation scam. Since Ajit Pawar was cleared by a BJP government in the irrigation issue, he is now being probed for his role in buying loss-making sugar cooperatives.

These absurd political developments beg the question: Why is the BJP so desperate to dislodge the Sena-NCP-Congress government?

The answer lies in the 2024 general elections and the BJP’s inability in making inroads in some big states. After Maharashtra, the BJP failed to cobble a winning alliance in Tamil Nadu and failed miserably in West Bengal. Along with Maharashtra, these states together send 129 MPs to the Lok Sabha. The increasingly hostile political atmosphere in Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana and Gujarat and the uncertainty in Punjab make the upcoming assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh crucial for the BJP. Though it is too early to hazard a guess about UP results, it is clear that the party will find it extremely difficult to retain, leave alone improve, its tally of 312 of 403 seats in the assembly. Yogi Adityanath was not the BJP’s face in the last assembly elections. This time he is. The polarising politics he has unleashed will test the BJP’s resolve in a state that sends 80 MPs to the Lok Sabha.

After UP, it is Maharashtra with 48 seats that sends the largest contingent of MPs. If things go wrong for the BJP in UP in 2024, Maharashtra will become crucial. The NDA, which included the BJP and Sena, won 41 seats in 2019, of which 23 belonged to the BJP. Now the situation is evenly poised with the combined strength of Sena-NCP-Congress matching that of the BJP. If this three-party government survives till the next parliamentary elections, the BJP will have a tough battle ahead. Hence, the attempt to pull down the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi government.

In politics, such attempts are justified. But not so reasonable are the ways pursued to achieve the goal. “Tum agar mujhko na chaho to koi baat nahi (It’s ok if you don’t like me)” is acceptable in politics, but never has “Tum kisi aur ko chahogi to mushkil hogi (But you cannot like someone else)” been a precondition. Developments in Maharashtra, after West Bengal, indicate the changing contours of politics.

C Raja Mohan writes: The time has come for it to begin a strategic conversation with Europe on Eurasian security. This will be a natural complement to the fledgeling engagement between India and Europe on the Indo-Pacific.

Delhi’s Indo-Pacific strategy has acquired political and institutional traction, thanks to intensive Indian diplomacy in recent years. It must now devote similar energy to the development of a “Eurasian” policy. If the Indo-Pacific is about Delhi’s new maritime geopolitics, Eurasia involves the recalibration of India’s continental strategy.

This week’s consultations in Delhi on the crisis in Afghanistan among the region’s top security policymakers, following the US withdrawal, is part of developing a Eurasian strategy. National Security Advisor Ajit Doval has invited his counterparts from Pakistan, Iran, Central Asia, Russia, and China to join this discussion on Wednesday. Pakistan’s Moeed Yusuf has declined to join. It is not yet clear whether China will attend. Pakistan’s reluctance to engage with India on Afghanistan reveals Delhi’s persisting problem with Islamabad in shaping a new Eurasian strategy. But it also reinforces the urgency of an Indian strategy to deal with Eurasia.

After years of self-doubt, Delhi has clinched the internal debate on the Indo-Pacific and has made it integral to India’s foreign and security policies. Given its novelty and strategic salience, the Quad or the Quadrilateral forum that brings India together with Australia, Japan and the US, looms large over the Indo-Pacific debate. But Delhi now has a mix of other important unilateral, bilateral, minilateral, and multilateral initiatives in the Indo-Pacific.

As in the Indo-Pacific, so in Eurasia, there is no shared international understanding of what constitutes the region. Among those who study the geography of the earth’s landmass and oceans, there are agreed definitions of the Indo-Pacific and Eurasia. If the Indo-Pacific describes the long stretch of tropical waters from the east coast of Africa to the central Pacific, Eurasia is the name of a tectonic plate that lies under much of what we know as Europe and Asia. But the trouble begins when it comes to the political geography of Eurasia. In Russia’s definition, Eurasia covers the former territories of the Soviet Union, which collapsed in 1991. In other words, it is about Russia’s political claim to a sphere of influence in its “near abroad”. Then there are various older usages like “inner Asia” and “Central Asia” that cover parts of the region. Given the deep connection between Muslim Central Asia and West Asia, some prefer the term “Greater Middle East” to describe parts of this region.

For Delhi, it makes sense to use the broadest possible definition of Eurasia in reimagining the region. The most important development in Eurasia today is the dramatic rise of China and its growing strategic assertiveness, expanding economic power and rising political influence. Beijing’s muscular approach to the long and disputed border with Bhutan and India, its quest for a security presence in Tajikistan, the active search for a larger role in Afghanistan, and a greater say in the affairs of the broader sub-Himalayan region are only one part of the story. As the world’s second-largest economy, China’s commercial influence is felt across the world. Physical proximity multiplies China’s economic impact on the inner Asian regions.

The impressive expansion of China’s Belt and Road initiative across central Asia and Russia, onto the shores of the Atlantic, and Europe’s growing economic interdependence with China have added to Beijing’s powerful leverages in Eurasia. These leverages, in turn, were reinforced by a deepening alliance with Russia that straddles the Eurasian heartland. Russia’s intractable disputes with Europe and America have increased Moscow’s reliance on Beijing.

Amidst mounting challenges from China in the Indo-Pacific maritime domain, Washington has begun to rethink its strategic commitments to Eurasia. The US withdrawal from Afghanistan is just the beginning of a long-overdue redefinition of US global strategic priorities. Even Europe, which has seen a massive deployment of US military resources since the Second World War, is not immune to the inevitable rearrangement of the US military’s global disposition. Washington and Brussels are now in the middle of an important debate on how to rebalance the trans-Atlantic responsibilities for Europe’s collective defence.

Whether defined as “burden-sharing” in Washington or “strategic autonomy” in Brussels, Europe must necessarily take on a larger regional Eurasian security role. More broadly, regional powers are going to reshape Eurasia.

India has certainly dealt with Eurasia’s constituent spaces separately over the decades. What Delhi now needs is an integrated approach to Eurasia. Like the Indo-Pacific, Eurasia is new to India’s strategic discourse.

To be sure, there are references to India’s ancient civilisational links with Eurasia. The collaboration between the Sangha and the Shreni in the Buddhist era produced lasting interaction between the two regions. India’s inward orientation after the decline of Buddhism did not stop the flow of Central Asian forces into the subcontinent. The arrival of the British in India and the consolidation of the Raj as a territorial entity in the subcontinent saw the outward projection of India’s influence into Central Asia. British rivalry with Russia during the Great Game in the 19th and early 20th centuries put Eurasian geopolitics at the top of undivided India’s security agenda. The Partition of the subcontinent and India’s physical disconnection from inner Asia, however, cut India off from Eurasian geopolitics. Overcoming the geographic limitation — represented by the Pakistan barrier— will be central to an expanded Indian role in Eurasian geopolitics.

While there are many elements to an Indian strategy towards Eurasia, three of them stand out. One is to put Europe back into India’s continental calculus. Before independence, many Indian nationalists turned to Europe to secure the nation’s liberation from British colonialism. After independence, Delhi’s drift towards an alliance with Moscow saw India neglect Europe’s strategic significance. As India now steps up its engagement with Europe, the time has come for it to begin a strategic conversation with Brussels on Eurasian security. This will be a natural complement to the fledgling engagement between India and Europe on the Indo-Pacific.

India’s Eurasian policy must necessarily involve greater engagement with both the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation. A dedicated military office in the Indian mission to Brussels, where both EU and NATO are headquartered, will be a crucial step towards a sustained security dialogue with Europe.

Second is to intensify the dialogue on Eurasian security with Russia. While Indo-Russian differences on the Indo-Pacific, the Quad, China, and the Taliban are real, Delhi and Moscow have good reasons to narrow their differences on Afghanistan and widen cooperation on continental Eurasian security.

Third is the substantive Indian collaboration with both Persia and Arabia. If Persia’s location makes it critical for the future of Afghanistan and Central Asia, the religious influence of Arabia and the weight of the Gulf capital are quite consequential in the region. India’s partnerships with Persia and Arabia are also critical in overcoming Turkey’s alliance with Pakistan that is hostile to Delhi.

India will surely encounter many contradictions in each of the three areas — between and among America, Europe, Russia, China, Iran, and the Arab Gulf. As in the Indo-Pacific, so in Eurasia, Delhi should not let these contradictions hold India back.

The current flux in Eurasian geopolitics will lessen some of the current contradictions and generate some new antinomies in the days ahead. But the key for India lies in greater strategic activism that opens opportunities in all directions in Eurasia.

Constantino Xavier, Riya Sinha write: It can generate positive spillover effects, strengthen India’s economic ties with its neighbours.

The Gati Shakti National Master Plan is another important step for India to upgrade national infrastructure and multimodal connectivity. According to the Economic Survey 2019-20, India will have to invest approximately $1.5 trillion on infrastructure to become a $5-trillion economy by 2024-25. However, while the Rs 100 lakh crore plan will have an important economic multiplier effect at home, it must also be leveraged to have an external impact by aligning it with India’s regional and global connectivity efforts.

The Gati Shakti plan has three main components, all focused on domestic coordination. First, it seeks to increase information sharing with a new technology platform between various ministries at the Union and state levels. Second, it focuses on giving impetus to multi-modal transportation to reduce logistics’ costs and strengthen last-mile connectivity in India’s hinterland or border regions. The third component includes an analytical decision-making tool to disseminate project-related information and prioritise key infrastructure projects. This aims to ensure transparency and time-bound commitments to investors.

One way to look at the Gati Shakti plan from a foreign policy angle is that it will automatically generate positive effects to deepen India’s economic ties with Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Myanmar and Sri Lanka, as well as with Southeast Asia and the Indian Ocean region. This has been the experience in recent years with India’s investment in roads, ports, inland waterways or new customs procedures generating positive externalities for these neighbours, who are keen to access the growing Indian consumer market.

Nepal, for example, in 2020 reached record export levels due to a series of Indian connectivity initiatives, including electronic cargo tracking systems, new rail and road routes, modernisation of border control systems, and the region’s first-ever bilateral petroleum pipeline. Any reduction in India’s domestic logistics costs brings immediate benefits to the northern neighbour, given that 98 per cent of Nepal’s total trade transits through India and about 65 per cent of Nepal’s trade is with India.

By reducing the cost and time of doing trade through infrastructure modernisation at home, India will continue to have a positive impact on the price of commodities and developmental targets in neighbouring countries. In 2019, trade between Bhutan and Bangladesh was eased through a new multimodal road and waterway link via Assam. The new cargo ferry service with the Maldives, launched last year, has lowered the costs of trade for the island state. And under the South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperation Programme, India’s investments in multimodal connectivity on the eastern coast is reconnecting India with the Bay of Bengal and Southeast Asia through integrated rail, port and shipping systems.

However, India can’t just rely on the plan’s automatic spillover effects. Connectivity plans at home include important strategic decisions that will impact India’s external economic relations, not only in South Asia, but also with Southeast Asia and the Indian Ocean region. Whether it is the alignment of a cross-border railway, the location of a border check post, or the digital system chosen for customs and immigration processes, India’s connectivity investments at home will have limited effects unless they are coordinated with those of its neighbours and other regional partners.

For instance, with its land neighbours, India’s border check posts, known as Integrated Check Posts (ICPs), only have mirror infrastructure with Nepal. Other key ICPs, such as the one at Petrapole with Bangladesh, face regular congestion due to lack of complementary infrastructure across the border. Similarly, countries in South Asia use different digital systems that have hindered real-time information sharing. While India recently joined the Transports Internationaux Routiers (TIR) convention, which facilitates cross-border customs procedures, none of its neighbouring countries in the east has signed on to it.

There are three avenues for India to ensure that the Gati Shakti Plan has maximum effect. First, India will have to deepen bilateral consultations with its neighbours to gauge their connectivity strategies and priorities. This is not just a technocratic exercise of coordination and harmonisation. Given political and security sensitivities, India will require diplomatic skills to reassure its neighbours and adapt to their pace and political economy context.

A second way is for India to work through regional institutions and platforms. SAARC’s ambitious regional integration plans of the 2000s are now defunct, so Delhi has shifted its geo-economic orientation eastwards. The Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) has got new momentum, but there is also progress on the Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal (BBIN) Initiative. Working through these multilateral platforms will help India develop a regional vision and standards for connectivity, reducing bilateral transaction costs.

Finally, India can also boost the Gati Shakti plan’s external impact by cooperating more closely with global players who are keen to support its strategic imperative to give the Indo-Pacific an economic connectivity dimension. This includes the Asian Development Bank and the World Bank, but also Japan, the US, Australia, EU and ASEAN. They come with expertise and expectations about connectivity standards, whether it is on e-commerce, environmental and social impact assessments of infrastructure or technology platforms. These external connectivity dialogues will give the Gati Shakti plan a truly regional and global dimension and help India achieve its developmental targets at home.

Arvind P Datar writes: Rushed arrests, denial of bail have upturned Constitutional principles and go against Supreme Court’s directions

The wholly unjustified arrest of the former chairman of the State Bank of India came close on the heels of the wholly unjustified arrest of Aryan Khan. Public memory is cruelly short and we have forgotten the fatal incarceration of 84-year-old Father Stan Swamy, the arrest — and denial of bail — to journalist Siddique Kappan, Rhea Chakraborty and many others who would not have been arrested in any democracy where the rule of law prevails.

Article 21 of our Constitution loftily states: “No person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law”. The Supreme Court has repeatedly laid down directions that make the granting of bail the rule, and jail the exception. It is a scandal that these directions are repeatedly ignored by trial courts and jail has now become the rule and bail the exception even in petty bailable offences. If a case is even slightly sensational, it is almost certain that an accused will not be granted bail till his case reaches the High Court. And, if Aryan Khan had been an aam aadmi, it is also certain that he would have spent several months in jail before his case even reached the High Court.

Undoubtedly, there are conflicting issues in granting bail. On the one hand is the personal liberty of the accused or the suspect and on the other, it is the interest of the community as a whole. No one can argue that every suspect should be released on bail, but it is time to seriously consider whether the practice of creating too many non-bailable offences and the routine denial of bail subserves the public interest at all. To start with, laws imposing almost impossible conditions for the grant of bail have to be amended. Section 45 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 requires the judge to be satisfied that there are reasonable grounds for believing that the accused is not guilty of “such offence” and that he will not commit “any offence” while on bail. Similar conditions exist in the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985 and the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967 as well. Barring the clearest of cases, how can a judge form the belief that a person is guilty or innocent at the initial stage? And how does the judge have the clairvoyance to predict the possibility of an accused committing an offence while on bail? Other areas that need urgent reform are the archaic requirement of furnishing security in every case and the considerable delay in releasing an accused even after a bail order has been passed.

The practice of making stringent criminal law provisions in tax and economic offences started in 1975. Every director or senior executive was presumed to be guilty and the burden was on them to prove their innocence. Each accused was presumed to have criminal intent and imprisonment was mandatory if the tax or duty was more than one lakh rupees. Thus, the fundamental principles of criminal law were turned on their head in the hope that draconian provisions would instil fear and tax compliance would increase. Just the reverse happened as the repeated samadhan and amnesty schemes have proved.

The unchecked tendency of arresting senior bank officials, company executives and civil servants must also stop immediately. Apart from being in complete violation of repeated and mandatory directions of the Supreme Court, it has a devastating and chilling effect on the decision-making process in banks and other institutions. In the 2G scam, more than a dozen senior executives languished in jail for more than 12 months, only to be acquitted later.

Indeed, there is no evidence that the practice of refusing bail has lowered the incidence of crime. On the contrary, it has resulted in almost 70 per cent of all prisoners being “undertrials”. Several of them await trial for years. The sad reality is that every undertrial is treated as guilty until he proves his innocence by getting an acquittal.

The decriminalisation of several provisions of the Companies Act, 2013 through the Companies (Amendment) Act, 2020 was indeed a great initiative and similar amendments can be made in several Central and state enactments. The Supreme Court should take suo motu notice of the unacceptable arrest raj and issue urgent directives until the Centre and states make amendments or issue ordinances. Moreover, it is also vital to sensitise judges to the importance of bail, particularly when most of the poor and illiterate accused have little or no access to legal assistance. There is also an extremely urgent need for the Supreme Court and high courts to send clear signals to the lower courts that the granting of bail will be the norm and no subordinate judge will be penalised in their career prospects for granting bail.

In the case of the former SBI chairman or Aryan Khan and so many other accused, what was the need to arrest them? What fatal result would have ensued if they were asked not to leave the country and report daily for investigation? Even if a transaction appears tainted by extraneous consideration, it can always be investigated and the guilty punished. But making an arrest at the FIR stage destroys a person’s reputation; a subsequent acquittal may heal the wound but the person will remain scarred for life.

Supreme Court’s disapproval of states withdrawing general consent to probe cases for CBI brings into focus the distrust between Centre and states. A number of opposition ruled states had withdrawn the general consent that allows CBI to investigate cases in their jurisdiction. Unlike the CBI which is constrained by the Delhi Special Police Establishment Act to seek consent from state governments, other premier central investigating agencies like NIA aren’t hamstrung by such a requirement.

Despite states withdrawing general consent, on a number of occasions high courts and Supreme Court have overridden the frivolous objections of state governments to order CBI inquires. At the root of the problem is the perception among opposition politicians that the Centre can force CBI to do its bidding in cases with political implications. The opposition has raised the argument that it is only politicians in their ranks who face action from central agencies.

It remains to be seen how SC will address this issue. In the past, it had termed the CBI a “caged parrot”. The breakdown of federalism is a worrying development. Strong federal agencies are in national interest because big crimes often straddle state and national borders and state agencies may not have resources or jurisdiction to thwart such offences. It is in India’s interest to spare CBI from political meddling. But how to achieve this end remains the big question.

Countries like the UK, US, Australia and Canada have recommended a booster shot for senior citizens, healthcare workers and those with comorbidities who got their second doses at least six months ago. It’s almost two months since booster shots began finding regulatory backing globally, but India’s position remains unclear. The data is revealing: 3.53 crore people received their second doses till May 8, six months ago. Nearly half of them are senior citizens and many remaining beneficiaries are healthcare and frontline workers. Less than 25% of present vaccine stocks – 15.6 crore doses are piled up with state governments – will be extinguished even if every one of this 3.5 crore cohort receive medical advice to take a booster shot and then turn up for their jab.

TOI has reported that experts are worried about vaccine stocks expiring, an appalling waste of resources if this were to happen. The situation of large vaccine stocks and those on the cusp of expiry easily allows social medicine – where governments are prioritising first and second doses presently  –  to coexist with personal medicine, where jabs are given to those worried about passage of time since second dose, consequent waning of antibodies and disease/occupational risks.

An abiding lesson from the Covid pandemic is to let go of rigid classifications and adapt to fluid situations. GoI’s original plan to fully vaccinate priority groups before the general population had to be abandoned. The ensuing vaccine demand ensured that GoI upped purchases and this organically boosted vax supplies. In private medicine, citizens pursue an array of wellness choices like getting flu shots or executive health checkups. Covid vaccination has also reached such a stage where India can cater to individual preferences. Many with mild and moderate symptoms at risk of severe Covid opted for the antibody cocktail in consultation with their doctors.

Western regulators started approving booster shots after breakthrough infections and scientific studies indicated waning vaccine efficacy over time. With Covid cases admittedly on a downward trajectory in India, triumphalist political tendencies are again manifesting. But we still don’t know enough about this disease to declare victory. To make informed choices, the next serosurveys must lay special emphasis on fully vaccinated individuals to understand duration of persistence of antibodies. Mix and match studies certifying safety and immunogenicity will offer greater choice of vaccines in the booster dose programme. Like the West, India can also easily pursue adult and child universal vaccination concurrently alongside booster doses.

Amidst several question marks, one meaningful accomplishment of the COP26 summit is that 105 countries have pledged to reduce their methane emissions by 30% from 2020 levels, by 2030. CO2 after all is not the only greenhouse gas of concern; IPCC research puts as much as a quarter of global warming at the doorstep of CH4 instead. Also of significance is why the Biden administration has taken co-lead in this global methane pledge – with support from even some of the larger oil and gas producers. In many ways this is the really low-hanging fruit in combating climate change.

Whether it is to plug leaky natural-gas pipelines or to cut emissions at the point of fuel-extraction from Earth’s crust, tech solutions for reducing methane emissions of the fossil fuel industry are readily at hand. Even better, the UN’s latest assessment is that over 50% of available targeted measures have negative costs – they quickly end up saving money. The question here is whether the industrialised meat production system will be part of the reform – globally 32% of anthropogenic methane emissions come from the livestock sector. Changing how we produce meat must be part of the climate solution.

Why hasn’t India signed on yet? Perhaps because of livestock and paddy cultivation (8% of CH4 emissions) issues. But India can upgrade both its large cattle and paddy economies. There is a lot of promise in experiments to get more grain for the same amount of methane as well as to reduce methanogenic activity in bovines and sheep. ICAR for example has developed a feed supplement that cuts down their methane emissions by 17-20%. We must also be active participants in a future of “green meats” or laboratory meats. Technology for this is already available, and given India’s startup culture, this is a potential green winner in India.

To treat this malaise in India's primary education, it has to be approached top-down as well as bottom-up - the latter being Hajabba's sterling example.

A catalyser, as distinct from the more familiar 'influencer', not only inspires but also gets things done. On Monday, Harekala Hajabba, a resident of Mangaluru, Karnataka, was awarded the Padma Shri, India's fourth-highest award given to a civilian, for being a catalyst for change in primary education. The change he has brought about is strikingly simple - providing children in his village of Harekala-Newpadpu with no access to school education, school education. And this he did by tapping the existing system, when he approached his local legislator to get a village school for the underprivileged constructed. The Padma Shri, in turn, highlights the efficacy of Hajabba's enterprise.

Universal primary education is something that India has, in decades of progress in other fields, failed. Last week, Unesco's annual State of the Education Report, drawing from GoI data, underlined the ground-level problem of India's pupil-teacher ratio (PTR) in primary schools - only 22% having PTR greater than 30:1. Then there is high teacher absenteeism, with the overall proportion of teachers in private schools with no job contract at an alarmingly high 69%. Government primary schools fare worse in terms of attendance and pedagogy, as noted by the Annual Status of Education Report 2020.

To treat this malaise in India's primary education, it has to be approached top-down as well as bottom-up - the latter being Hajabba's sterling example. While Hajabba's story of being an illiterate orange vendor, who was spurred into action after he could not respond to a foreigner's query about the price of fruit he was selling, becomes 'rural legend', his example shows what is to be done, not just by private enterprise but by public will and action, too.

With conventional instruments like bank deposits becoming less attractive, people need more non-cash instruments that are inflation-proof and safe. The government would do well to issue inflation-indexed bonds.

Five years after demonetisation, currency in circulation touched a decadal high of 14.5% of GDP in 2020-21, against 12.22% in 2011-12 and a low of 8.68 % in 2016-17, in the November of which year, large-value currency notes had been withdrawn/replaced. The growth rate of GDP began to decelerate from the 8% it had reached the previous fiscal and has remained anaemic since. Digital payments have gone up, true, but that has to do more with the spread of mobile broadband, vigorous recruitment of small and petty traders into the digital payment ecosystem by payments companies, and the incentive to switch to contactless transactions during the pandemic. Formalisation of economy got a boost from the adoption of the goods and services tax (GST) and digital payments sustain that momentum. Ever-increasing numbers of raids on tax evaders suggest that black money generation continues unabated. Systemic reform, not quick fixes, will curb black money.

Digital payments are three times their level in 2017-18. The RBI's digital payments index, with the 2018 level as 100, has risen to 270. The value of transactions made using the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) crossed a record high of $100 billion in October. Faster adoption of digital payments, widening the GST base and deploying data analytics on GST audit trails will throw up insights that bring down the use of cash. The RBI's preliminary estimates show that the household financial savings rate stood at 8.2% in Q3 2020-21, moderating for a second consecutive quarter after having spiked in Q1 2020-21 when real GDP contracted 24%. The ratio of bank deposits to GDP fell to 3% in Q3 from 7.7% in the previous quarter, but that of non-bank deposits remained the same at 0.1% of GDP. Savings in mutual funds rose, but the subscription rate to insurance and pension funds declined in Q3.

With conventional instruments like bank deposits becoming less attractive, people need more non-cash instruments that are inflation-proof and safe. The government would do well to issue inflation-indexed bonds.

Speaking to party workers and prospective voters over the past week across three rivers in Uttar Pradesh (UP) — Ganga (Kanpur), Gomti (Lucknow), and Ghaghara or Saryu (Ambedkarnagar) — I realised that the water bodies serve as informal boundaries, separating political cultures and idioms.

While the issues of price rise, unemployment, communal tensions, law and order, welfare benefits, national security, corruption, and stray cattle remained largely the same, the idioms used to express the sentiments around them varied greatly. Which among these will shape the campaign narrative, the verdict, and finally, the broader implications?

With over four months to go for the polls, voters in UP, like anywhere else in India, are reluctant to declare their political leanings and suggest they are in “wait-and-watch” mode till candidates are officially declared. But prod them a little, and one realises that a large majority of voters have developed strong sympathies for one political party or the other. And, in the process, they rationalise these pre-existing political sympathies using localised idioms.

So, for supporters of the current regime, the increase in petrol and diesel prices is a result of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government trying to raise money for free vaccinations or free rations. For the supporters of the Samajwadi Party (SP), the alleged deterioration in law and order, under the previous state government, is false propaganda spread by the media (and the BJP) to suppress the assertiveness of backward castes against the dominance of upper castes in every field, including the media.

In this climate, how must one interpret voices on the ground? First, in the run-up to most elections, issues are largely going to be common across political geographies in a state, with some variations based on local factors. Two, criticism of the incumbent is a given. Even sympathisers of any regime are never fully satisfied with the incumbent on all matters. Three, voters are more often than not likely to bring up the issue that is being discussed in the public sphere at that moment — be it in the community, political meetings, social media, or news. Four, one must be careful in interpreting colourful idioms used by some voters to drive their point home and extrapolating it to a large section of the voting population. Some voters are simply more expressive than others. And finally, reference to an issue does not mean that the voter’s political choice is going to be based solely on that issue in the polling booth.

The emerging discourse across these districts suggests that, unlike in the past, when the state witnessed a multipolar contest with four players — the BJP, SP, Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and the Congress — the 2022 assembly elections will be bipolar. The main competition in the majority of 403 seats will be between the BJP-led and the SP-led coalitions. In less than one-fourth of the seats, around 100, either the BSP or the Congress may emerge as a viable third alternative. The fact that many important politicians from these two parties have joined either the BJP or the SP in recent months substantiates this. Similarly, most smaller parties in the state are too busy negotiating a favourable deal from either of the two coalitions. And thus, the chances of a third party winning a substantial number of seats are slim, thereby creating a possibility in which a large portion of the BSP’s base is up for grabs in this election.

As polls approach, voters get swayed in one direction or the other by the emerging structure of political competition. This shapes the menu of choices that voters can finally choose from. They make some strategic calculations given their own preference matrix — in which caste- or religious-based identity is one of the most important. For these social identities are primary lens shaping ideological leanings and policy preferences among voters across the globe. And, the position of issues in the voter’s decision matrix changes as the campaign progresses.

And that is why campaigns matter as it makes certain issues more salient than others, certain leaders more appealing than others, and certain parties electorally more viable than others. It solidifies the choice of strong sympathisers to not only vote for their preferred party but also mobilise fence-sitters in its favour. This is not to claim that voters are purely rational actors driven by some sophisticated cost-benefit analysis. It is to suggest that the decision of whom to vote for is based on the competitive credibility of viable alternatives in their constituency, filtered by the consideration of who is more likely to govern at the top.

What will the national implications of the UP assembly results be? Given the political weight of the state in the Lok Sabha and the timing of the assembly elections being midway from the 2024 elections, the UP verdict is likely to shape the tone and tenor of political discourse for the next two years.

If the BJP manages to return comfortably to power, Yogi Adityanath will not only defy the weight of history in the state, where no incumbent chief minister has returned to power after a completing full term since GB Pant in the 1950s, but also emerge as a powerful contender for the top post in a post-Modi BJP. The party will have control over the political narrative, allies will be in awe and under check, and the Opposition will get further demoralised and fragmented.

However, if the BJP struggles to cross the halfway mark, the party will lose its advantage in setting the agenda for the campaigns in the run-up to the 2024 elections. It will galvanise the Opposition, embolden the allies to push and bargain harder, and the assembly elections in Gujarat may then turn more competitive. UP’s voters hold all the cards for now.

Rahul Verma is fellow, Centre for Policy Research (CPR), New Delhi

In Afghanistan, winter is coming. Almost three months after the Taliban dramatically seized power, governance remains at a standstill. There is a humanitarian crisis due to hunger and famine. Those who wanted to play the new “great game” over the dead bodies of ordinary Afghans are still counting the consequences of the spillover effects of the rapidly deteriorating security situation. There have been no victors in this appalling dynamic despite initial chest-thumping in some regional capitals. The United States (US) may have the luxury of moving on but regional players have to come to terms with the new realities of a highly volatile regional milieu.

As New Delhi convenes a meeting of national security advisers (NSAs) across the region under the chairmanship of Ajit Doval at the Delhi Regional Security Dialogue on Afghanistan, India is clearly signalling that it has no intention of giving up on its role as a key interlocutor on the issue.

India’s substantive engagement with Afghanistan over the last two decades was aimed at supporting the aspirations of ordinary Afghans towards the realisation of a stable polity — at peace with itself and with its neighbours. That paradigm still remains the most viable option as Afghanistan enters a new phase in its turbulent political evolution.

India’s regional outreach has been welcomed by key stakeholders. Russia, Iran and all the Central Asian nations are participating in the dialogue, thereby acknowledging that India has legitimate interests and leadership on this vital issue.

Pakistan, of course, is a different matter. Its initial sense of jubilation over a perceived “victory” in Afghanistan has waned. It is grappling with a fiasco of its own making as radicalisation sweeps through the Pakistani hinterland, forcing the political class and the military-intelligence complex to make compromises with the extremists. Islamabad’s India obsession continues to drive its worldview, reflected in Pakistan’s NSA Moeed Yusuf’s rejection of India’s invite. His description of India as a “spoiler” says more about Pakistan’s desire to view Afghanistan largely as a protectorate as opposed to an independent, sovereign nation, and reflects Islamabad’s reluctance to engage New Delhi. It also underscores its age-old desire to marginalise India.

China has predictably followed suit and decided to not attend the dialogue in India, but it has maintained that bilateral channels of engagement with India would continue.

For long, there has been an unnecessary debate in India and elsewhere about the country’s stakes in Afghanistan. As a neighbour, New Delhi’s stakes in the political trajectory of Afghanistan are self-evident. Since 2001, India’s proactive engagement in Afghanistan was a manifestation of those organic links that exist between the two nations.

As the political geography of Afghanistan shifted from Central Asia to South Asia, Kabul’s role as a link between the two regions is largely predicated on the strength of India-Afghanistan ties, not on Pakistan that itself is becoming marginal to the economic reimagining of the region. And while the West can afford to move out of Afghanistan, India will have to work with its regional partners in finding a long-term solution.

It is in this context that India’s decision to take a leadership role on Afghanistan is a welcome change from its historical reticence. Multiple challenges emanating from Afghanistan after the takeover by the Taliban require a comprehensive regional response and a new security architecture. No single regional State is in a position to deal with problems such as violent extremism, radicalisation, porous borders and drug trafficking on its own. Regional coordination is needed and, for that, security agencies across borders will have to work together.

India’s leadership will be essential in sustaining regional cooperation. India is as much a Eurasian power as an Indo-Pacific one. While global geopolitics may have evolved, regionally, New Delhi’s interests in and around Afghanistan converge significantly with those of Russia, Iran and Central Asia. Russia remains concerned about the spread of radicalism and extremism to its peripheries in Central Asia. Iran’s worry is around the persecution of Shia minorities and the refugee crisis. New Delhi remains one of the few powers that can manage to find some space to manoeuvre between Russian and Iranian priorities, on the one hand, and western anxieties, on the other.

After the Taliban’s takeover, many regional states initially viewed the Afghan challenge as one that could be contained within the borders of Afghanistan. There was a belief that as long as the Taliban was focused inwards and the borders of other nations were insulated, it wouldn’t matter. That was a false premise then, and events since have proven India’s longstanding position on the matter. The Taliban has made it clear that despite all the nudging of its Pakistani and Chinese backers, it has no governance agenda. The foot soldiers of the Taliban are different from the ones who were paraded around the world for almost a decade in the name of diplomacy.

Continuing instability in Afghanistan is a recipe for regional disaster. As a responsible regional stakeholder, India has to step up to the plate. Hosting the regional security dialogue is a welcome move. Even though it is unlikely to yield any immediate results, it will allow India to shape the strategic conversation in the region and underline its priorities. The Afghanistan challenge is a long-term one and it will require sustained leadership as well as strategic patience.

Harsh V Pant is director, Studies, and head, Strategic Studies Programme, ORF

At the Glasgow summit, besides announcing India’s new commitments, Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke of the importance of adaptation. The race to resilience is now in stride with the race to (net)-zero.

The past decade has been the hottest in recorded history with the spotlight on mitigation of greenhouse gases. The most vulnerable are the smallholders, pastoralists, forest-dwellers, fisherfolk and coastal communities. It is unfair that those who are least responsible for global warming are bearing the brunt of its adverse impact. Building capacities for robust adaptation action will help the poor cope better.

Adaptation must be central to India’s development goals. Four areas merit attention.

One, having an overarching mechanism that can encompass and holistically guide the dispersed and piecemeal development initiatives presently treated as a proxy for adaptation. A range of initiatives are being implemented under the National Action Plan for Climate Change by several ministries through their budgets. The schemes comprising strong adaptation components include the National Sustainable Agriculture Mission, a Sub-Mission on Agroforestry, crop diversification programmes, Systems of Rice Intensification, Zero-based Natural Farming, the National Initiative on Climate Resilient Agriculture, Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchai Yojana, safety net programmes such as the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), and crop and livestock insurance.

Ministries and agencies implementing these schemes, while pursuing their individual goals, are unable to assess and report the collective adaptation impact. The need is for an umbrella institution in the nature of a National Commission on Adaptation to synergise and capture the adaptation outcomes in the government’s development initiatives, to steer policies conducive to mobilising climate finance both globally and nationally, and through the public and private sectors.

Two, climate finance. It appears that climate finance for adaptation, on the scale required, will need to flow largely from domestic sources. For the period 2015 to 2030, India’s adaptation funds requirement will, estimatedly, be of the order of $206 billion in agriculture, forestry, fisheries infrastructure, water resources and ecosystems, not including disaster management. International finance for adaptation is limited. The Green Climate Fund has funded four projects in India amounting to $315 million, of which adaptation accounts for less than 25%.

A dedicated National Adaptation Fund for Climate Change (NAFCC) was set up in 2015 with an initial funding of 350 crore. The budget allocation declined in subsequent years. The 30 projects funded in the domains of resilient agriculture, forestry, coastal management, livestock and water, have been in the nature of pilot projects, about one per state. In its present format, NAFCC is unlikely to be able to bring any of these projects to scale for a major impact. The Fund needs revisiting.

Three, quantification and measurement of adaptation impacts. Adaptation must count in the lives of vulnerable communities. Quantifying adaptation is a challenge. Unlike mitigation, there is no single universal indicator or set of indicators to capture the adaptation happening at the ground level. The assumption is that mainstream development programmes with adaptation components automatically build resilience, reduce vulnerability and lower climate risks for the resource-poor. An appropriate metric based on global best practices is needed for quantifying and measuring adaptation effectiveness to enable prioritisation and scaling up of initiatives. Assessment of community resilience through vulnerability indices could be a starting point. Furthermore, an adaptation-centric monitoring and evaluation system is needed as the usual tools deployed for appraising centrally-sponsored schemes are not fine-tuned to evaluate adaptation impacts.

And finally, the promotion of employment and income programmes such as MGNREGS, which not only deliver livelihood gains but also co-benefit adaptation and mitigation. Nature-based activities undertaken in the scheme such as soil and water conservation, drought- and flood-proofing or afforestation produce both adaptation and mitigation benefits. Programmes for agroforestry and sustainable rice cultivation build resilience and foster synergies between adaptation and mitigation. These need to be strengthened.

In a world that will continue to warm, the poor in developing countries will unjustifiably suffer its worst consequences. Adaptation to the climate crisis will serve the cause of climate justice.

Rita Sharma is former secretary, ministry of rural development. She has also served as secretary, National Advisory Council; board member, World Agroforestry Centre and International Rice Research Institute

For a nation that was the largest regional donor for Afghanistan, India has had little say in shaping the response to developments in the war-torn country following the Taliban takeover in mid-August through various regional mechanisms.

Now, India is hoping to change that by hosting its first dialogue of key regional countries on Afghanistan on November 10. More significantly, the Delhi Regional Security Dialogue, to be chaired by National Security Adviser (NSA) Ajit Doval, will bring together the security tsars of seven countries, including Iran and Russia.

Though Pakistan and China were invited to the dialogue, their decision not to attend is hardly surprising, given the state of India’s bilateral relations with both countries. India-Pakistan ties continue to be at an all-time low, and New Delhi and Beijing are locked in a military standoff along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) that has taken relations to their lowest point in decades.

The Indian side is looking to the dialogue to help in forging a cooperative approach to tackle threats emanating from Afghanistan, including terrorism and radicalisation. The presence of top security officials from five Central Asian states – Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan – will be significant in this regard.

The dialogue will also help India remain relevant in shaping the response to developments in Afghanistan and build on the work it has done in the recent past, such as piloting UN Security Council resolution 2593, which New Delhi has held up as a template for dealing with the Taliban setup in Kabul.

According to an Indian assessment, the five main threats and challenges following the Taliban takeover are terrorism within Afghanistan and across its borders, radicalisation and extremism, cross-border movements that are a key concern for Central Asian states, drug production and trafficking, and the threat emanating from vast amounts of weapons and military gear left behind in Afghanistan by US troops.

While some of the countries attending the day-long dialogue, such as Russia and Iran, have engaged closely with the Taliban for some years, the Indian side believes they still have a high degree of convergence on the concerns and objectives in Afghanistan, such as ensuring an inclusive government in Kabul and inculcating a culture of moderation.

The dialogue will also look at ways to deliver humanitarian aid to the Afghan people – an area where New Delhi’s efforts to help have been stymied by Islamabad’s obdurate refusal to allow the shipping of Indian relief materials through Pakistani territory.

The need for humanitarian assistance is pressing as a UN assessment has shown that the shocks of drought, conflict, Covid-19 and an economic crisis have left more than half the Afghan population facing a record level of acute hunger. The assessment also highlighted the need for an urgent international response to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe as one-in-two Afghans will face emergency levels of acute food insecurity from November through the March lean season.

However, India will have to temper its expectations from the dialogue with some amount of pragmatism. While Tajikistan has taken the lead in pushing the Taliban to form an inclusive government with the participation of Tajiks, the political leadership of some Central Asian states, such as Uzbekistan, has shown a greater willingness to work with the Taliban to ensure stability in the region.

It is now a well-established political theory that elections in a democracy, especially in India, are won and lost more on emotional issues than the standard parameters of development, economy and law and order. With the advent of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), emotions have only sharpened and got polarised.

Understandably, the opposition in the poll-bound state of Uttar Pradesh was apprehensive that the ruling party would come up with some emotive and polarising plank just before the voting due sometime in February-March 2022.

Hence, when Akhilesh Yadav chose to kick off his electoral campaign by praising Mohammad Ali Jinnah, the entire political ecosystem was taken by surprise, including his own voters who are finding it difficult to defend the rhetoric in public and private discussions. Even the BJP was caught off-guard for the moment but it is a safe bet that the issue will keep recurring in the political debate for the next five months.

Jinnah’s enigmatic personality has been restricted to his role in the partition which led to the creation of Pakistan, and rightly or wrongly, his genius has been channelised down solely to the “two nation theory”, which expounded that Hindus and Muslims are two different nations and cannot exist together.

Any attempt to see the man beyond his established credentials has not gone down well with the Indian public. Adventurism by stalwarts such as LK Advani and Jaswant Singh in this regard only ended up landing them into political wilderness.

Hence, it was bewildering to watch Akhilesh Yadav credit Jinnah with independence from British clubbing him with giants like Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru and Sardar Patel. It is evident that this was not a slip of tongue as he went on to defend his stand telling the journalists to “read the history books again” in a subsequent press conference.

Now, anyone conversant with the political scenario in the country instinctively would tell you that Akhilesh Yadav was playing to his Muslim vote bank — even if it is not clear why any politician thinks Indian Muslims have any sympathy for Jinnah. But if one was to assume this was the motive, it is still intriguing, for Muslims in the state are already solidly behind the Samajwadi Party as all other ‘secular parties’ are not even in the race.

Notwithstanding the Priyanka Gandhi bravado, the Congress stands decimated in the state and the only other claimant for the minority vote, the Bahujan Samaj Party, seems a non-starter and is heading for an electoral disaster unless Mayawati manages to come up with a political understanding with the BJP in the coming assembly polls.

In spite of being labeled as the drawing-room politician, the Akhilesh Yadav-led coalition is the only political force which can put up any challenge to the ruling dispensation in the state. Ironically, he was never placed so comfortably viz a viz the minority vote, which right now finds him as its only hope to send packing a government the community believes is “anti-Muslim”.

And that is why political pundits are finding Yadav’s new-found obsession with Jinnah not only uncalled for, but also inexplicable.

The only reason that can explain the strategy is the Owaisi factor. Dubbed as the B-team of BJP and seen as “Vote-Katwa” (the divider of secular vote), Asaduddin Owaisi is slowly but surely making inroads in the minority community, especially the younger lot. As he himself mentioned in an interview, Muslims in UP love him but believe that a vote for AIMIM is in effect a vote for BJP.

Nevertheless, he has been quick to capitalise on the feeling of the community which believes that it has been let down by Akhilesh Yadav on a number of occasions, especially when the Samajwadi party seemed to desert Azam Khan as he was hounded by the Yogi government. Pictures of a visibly sick and frail Azam shook the community, which had a lot of faith in the arrogant persona of the leader who didn’t even hesitate to call Mulayam Singh names during the brief period he fell out with the party. Muslims believe that Akhilesh Yadav abandoned Azam just when he needed him the most.

Muslims also believe that Yadav didn’t bother hitting the streets even as men from the minority community were being targeted in the name of cow vigilantism. They call him a good chief minister but a weak opposition leader who, unlike his father, is afraid to stand with them fearing a backlash from the majority community.

Owaisi, on the other hand, is seen as a bold leader who is not shy to flaunt his Islamic credentials but is also willing to stand with the community in their hour of need. A segment of the minority believes that the politics is too polarised presently for the secular forces to beat BJP and they are actually voting for a strong opposition. And they find Owaisi much stronger to take on the government as compared to Akhilesh Yadav.

This is the comparison which is giving nightmares to Akhilesh. If an increasing number of Muslims get convinced that SP cannot deliver, they may well desert him and walk over to the charismatic barrister from Hyderabad, who is fast emerging as the first ever pan-Indian Muslim leader post-partition.

Desperation seldom ever leads to sound decisions. If Akhilesh Yadav thought that he could hit the election trail eulogising a controversial figure from history and move on to regular issues, he has a lesson in politics coming his way. The debate has just begun.

Anupam Mishra is a Prayagraj-based journalist and editor

“If I had to select one sentence to describe the state of the world, I would say we are in a world in which global challenges are more and more integrated, and the responses are more and more fragmented, and if this is not reversed, it’s a recipe for disaster.”

António Guterres, UN Secretary General 2019

Last weekend, thousands of people gathered in Glasgow, Scotland, and worldwide to put pressure on leaders to come up with a comprehensive climate-combat plan. The timing of the rallies was important. As one participant explained it, the first week of COP26 was all “sugar rush”, the second will be about sobering up and getting down to business.

The rallies were “a kind of a cornucopia of different groups,” NPR’s Frank Langfitt reported from Glasgow.

“People of all ages, from babies in prams being pushed by their young parents, to people in wheelchairs and some in crutches, the very young to very old, and from all over the world marched demanding immediate action to curb the climate catastrophe many were facing daily in their respective countries,” one of the participants, Carmen Miranda, told me. “The rain certainly did not damp or wash out the passion and determination of the protesters”.

Common cause

In the run-up to the Glasgow meet, there was a flurry of reports on the various facets of the climate challenge. But, while many got extensive media space, a report by the United Nations University-Institute for Environment and Human Security (UNU-EHS),Interconnected Disaster Risks 2020/2021, was lost in the din.

But the report is vital because it deftly and lucidly explains why tackling climate-related disasters need a united approach.

The report, published in September, analyses 10 disasters from the last year: Amazon wildfires, Arctic heat wave, Beirut explosion, Central Vietnam floods, Chinese paddlefish extinction, Covid-19, Cyclone Amphan, Desert Locust outbreak, Great Barrier Reef bleaching and Texas cold wave.

While these disasters occurred in different locations and did not initially appear to have much in common, the report explains their interconnections, highlights solutions, and provides recommendations.

Joining the dots

“When people see disasters in the news, they often seem far away,” said UNU-EHS senior scientist Zita Sebesvari, a lead author of the report. “But even disasters that occur thousands of kilometres apart are often related to one another and can have consequences for people living in distant places.”

To investigate interconnectivity between the 10 diverse events, the team looked at three levels of links between causes and effects for each event, and then looked for patterns in these levels across events where interconnections between them could be identified.

The first analysis was at the level of root causes, identifying disastrous events that stem from the same underlying factors. For example, Cyclone Amphan, which battered Sundarbans, shares root cause with the Great Barrier Reef bleaching, because high sea temperatures, thanks to increased greenhouse emissions, are responsible for both.

Then they analysed the level of influence between the disastrous events themselves, either where one event directly exacerbated the hazard of another (e.g. a cyclone creating conditions increasing the likelihood or severity of a locust swarm), or where an event had indirect influence on the exposure or vulnerability of people and/or places to another event.

Lastly, the scientists looked at shared impacts.

Root causes

The analysis showed many of these events shared similar root causes.

Human-induced greenhouse gas emissions were responsible for seven of the 10 disasters. Insufficient disaster risk management was responsible for seven of the 10 disasters. Environmental costs and benefits undervalued in decision-making were behind six of the 10 disasters.

Insufficient national/international cooperation was responsible for five of the 10 disasters. Proritising individual profits (cases where maximising profit is prioritised over other social concerns in the global value chain) was responsible for four of the 10 disasters Global demand pressures, which leads to consumptive demand for goods, was responsible for four of the 10 disasters.

Disasters are not only connected; they are also connected to us as individuals. For example, the record rate of deforestation and wildfires in the Amazon is partly due to the high global demand for meat: Farmland is needed to grow soy, which is used as animal fodder for poultry. This means that some of the root causes of disasters are in fact influenced by the actions of people far away from where the event itself occurs.

“Our actions have consequences, for all of us,” said fellow lead author Dr Jack O’Connor. “But the good news is that if the problems are connected, so are the solutions.”

Death by a thousand cuts

The disastrous events of 2020/2021 are linked not only by their causes, but also by their effects.

By far, the most commonly shared impacts, found in 10 out of 10 events, were the loss of livelihoods as hazards damaged infrastructure and ecosystems essential for income generation or otherwise removed or reduced the potential to earn a living.

Several of the disastrous events in 2020/2021 contributed to reduced food and water security in impacted areas, either through damaging food production or water access infrastructure directly or through increased financial vulnerability.

Humans are not the only ones who suffer the impacts of disastrous events. Extreme weather and climate change wreak havoc on the natural world, as precious biodiverse habitats such as coral reefs, tropical mangroves and Arctic tundra feel the heat, many species lose their habitats and attempt to either adapt or move to new areas.

The takeaway from the report is unambiguous: The failure to address interconnected root causes and emerging risks will accelerate the climate crisis, creating new and more intense extreme events, increasing vulnerabilities.

In short, a fragmented approach will be, as Guterres said, a recipe for disaster.

This festive season, as we worry about what the high-calorie intake did to our weight, we could spare a thought about our consumption habits — which don’t just include the food and drinks we consumed.

Making most of the festive discounts, did we buy things on impulse? Replacing the old with the new, did we discard too much, too soon?

Some of us have taken to waste-sorting, which is indeed a big help to the planet. But the effort has to be accelerated by both the authorities and the citizens. Recycling and composting cut the waste transported to the overflowing, simmering, methane-laden landfills that foul up groundwater, air and emit greenhouse gases, which have long-term effects on the climate. Efficient segregation also ensures that used products are transformed into raw materials, which can then be reused into the production cycle, thereby reducing the load on natural resources.

But recycling is only the next “most preferred” option in the waste management hierarchy after prevention-reduction-reuse. “Recycling is what we do when we are out of options to avoid, repair, or reuse the product first,” explains Annie Leonard, the creator of The Story of Stuff, a 2007 film on production and consumption trends and habits. Reduce, reuse and recycle are practices that can prevent cities from sinking under their own trash.

A reality check

Sinking in trash is no more just a metaphor to describe Delhi’s waste crisis. We have made it happen for real. In 2017, a section of the Ghazipur landfill, Delhi’s oldest mountain of garbage, gave way in an avalanche-like slide, killing two people and washing away cars in the canal running alongside. In August, a portion of the Bhalswa landfill collapsed, swamping eight hutments and vehicles with mounds of garbage. Fortunately, no casualties or injuries were reported.

Though tucked away in the farthest corners of the city, Delhi’s landfills are hard to hide. Stressing on the need to remove the “mountains of garbage” from Indian cities by processing all legacy waste, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said at the launch of the second phase of Swachh Bharat Mission (Urban) on October 1: “There is one such mountain of garbage in Delhi too. It has been sitting there for years, waiting to be removed.”

Two years ago, the National Green Tribunal directed Delhi’s three municipal corporations to clear legacy waste from Ghazipur, Bhalswa and Okhla landfills and set deadlines between 2022 and 2024. Last month, HT reported that the committee overseeing the three projects was told that only around 11% of the total legacy waste has been excavated and treated until July this year.

The committee has asked the municipalities to submit fresh deadlines for bio-mining — a process of separating components such as inert, plastic, clothes from the organic matter so they can be treated accordingly.

The civic bodies have cited their own reasons, such as intermittent rain and lack of space to process huge amounts of inert (stones, dust, silt), for the delay. It won’t be easy to get rid of landfills that got saturated years ago, just as it is difficult to find locations to build even “scientifically engineered” dumpsites.

Instead, authorities are now installing waste-to-energy plants. Such plants, experts say, release toxic pollutants if unsorted trash makes it to the incinerators, and require stringent emission controls.

Ideally, after segregation at source, wet waste should go to local composting and bio-methanation plants, recyclables to recycling units, non-recyclable, high-calorific waste for co-processing in cement plants or to incinerators, and inert to landfills. But would it not be easier to control the quantum of garbage by just discarding less?

Administrative action

Starting with making India open defecation free, Swachh Bharat Mission-Urban 2.0 is now focusing on making Indian towns and cities garbage-free. The performance indicator to assess the efforts of municipalities to reduce waste generated by homes, commercial and industrial set-ups has also been refined in the Swachh Survekshan 2022 with marks allotted for ward-wise penetration.

“By adopting the 3R principles (reduce, reuse and recycle), the focus should be on reducing the amount of waste, which is finally transported to the processing/disposal site or processed through on-site composting,” the toolkit states. It also asks cities to organise at least one zero waste social gathering between December 2021-January 2022 and have at least one Atmanirbhar ward with zero collection of wet waste by the municipality.

The municipal agencies in Delhi, which have consistently fared badly on the cleanliness index, are gearing up for the survey. The South Delhi Municipal Corporation has announced the setting up of crockery banks (where people can borrow steel utensils for social gatherings instead of using disposables), old books and toy banks, old clothes donation points in 28 municipal wards under its jurisdiction. The waste-to-wonder park at Sarai Kale Khan, which has imitations of the “seven wonders of the world” made of metal scrap, is being replicated.

Beyond cleanliness contests

But these initiatives can be institutionalised only if the authorities do it out of habit rather than as an administrative chore ahead of civic surveys, and citizens participate actively.

To maintain continuity on these initiatives, Swati Singh Sambyal, a waste management expert, makes a bunch of suggestions: Involve resident bodies so action trickles down to the ground; create systems by way of guidelines that could be adopted by all; institute penal provisions in case there is non-compliance; replicate initiatives across neighbourhoods and disseminate information about them.

“For example, what could one do to ensure there is minimum use of single-use disposables at a large social gathering? There should be a set of guidelines to refer to, which can be prepared with the help of NGOs working in the waste management sector. Steel utensils could be borrowed from a crockery bank that should be located nearby. Once the system is universalised, municipalities could also penalise events that have a high waste footprint, or say, ones that use single-use plastics, which are being banned now,” she explains.

In August, the Union Environment ministry notified the Plastic Waste Management Amendment Rules (2021) that prohibit the manufacture, import, stocking, distribution, sale and use of identified single-use plastic items. While making it mandatory for the thickness of plastic carry bags to be increased to 120 microns by the end of next year, the rules also ban the use of single-use plastic items such as tumblers, plates, cutlery, wrapping or packaging films. The ban on these will come into force from July 1 next year.

In continuation, Delhi government has formulated a ten-step action plan to phase out single-use plastic, detailing time frames for each action, deadlines and the agencies responsible for the task.

Authorities could also refer to Kerala’s Green Protocol under the ongoing Suchitwa Mission, which is a set of measures aimed at reducing garbage generation, and started by discouraging the use of disposables (including plastic, paper) and using reusable alternatives.

Starting with the National Games in 2015, where disposables were replaced by porcelain and steel crockery, cutlery and flasks, the administration has made similar interventions at large religious gatherings, youth festivals, public functions, elections and weddings. In schools and offices, they ask students and staff to use fountain pens instead of more disposable ball-point pens. Early this year, more than 11,000 offices in the state were given green tags, which mean that they ban plastic and disposables at the premises, remove unused furniture and have localised waste treatment facilities.

Sambyal says the Kerala model worked well because the authorities started by creating state-level guidelines, then trained municipalities, who in turn connected with people in creating zero-waste options to minimise consumption or have zero-waste events. They even have penal provisions for non-compliance. Now the model is being replicated in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.

Refurbish traditions

The wide availability of disposable products, over-packaging and over-advertising encourage us to not only consume more but also throw away more. Having gone so far on consumerism, can we ever retreat to a lifestyle that’s less disposable? Probably yes, if we can recycle some thrifty ideas from not so long ago.

There was a time when we reused every bottle and container that came with a household product and hardly shopped for plastic storage. Torn clothes were mended and shoes were repaired, gadgets and machinery many times over. There was little urgency to replace them with the latest models. Hand-me-downs were not frowned upon. Old clothes, shoes, plastic and metal were routinely bartered for steel utensils. Everything — from undone rope cots to discoloured utensils, broken watches and clocks to blunt knives — could be repaired, refurbished and reused.

Over the years, however, bartering, repairing and even shops selling second-hand products have decreased in numbers in big cities and the metros.

The draft national resource efficiency policy of 2019, in fact, lists out the roles of various stakeholders in promoting the transition to a circular economy, “which keeps resources in use for as long as possible extracting the maximum value, recovering and regenerating products and materials at the end of each service life.”

Consumers could do their bit by creating demand for resource-efficient products and services, share products (for example, car-sharing), undertake environmentally safe disposal of their end-of-life products and take personal responsibility for responsible consumption, the draft policy states.

Resource efficiency itself comes with multiple benefits. According to the draft national policy, it saves cost by reducing material use, reduces social conflicts due to mining, increases job opportunities and reduces climate change and environmental degradation.

In a policy brief on why cities need to advance towards zero waste, C-40 cities climate leadership group has listed out its social benefits. For example, on average, zero waste strategies create ten times more jobs than technology-intensive methods such as landfilling or incineration. Collection, sorting and treatment require more workers, and take-back, reuse and repair systems create local jobs.

Besides, initiatives such as community composting, repair shops, eateries that cook with surplus edible food, lending libraries for tools and equipment, help to bring communities together, the report states. It cites the example of an abandoned train station in Paris, which has been converted into a cultural centre for appliance repair, urban farming and dining-in.

Closer home, the repair café in Bengaluru has been since 2015 organising events where people can bring their broken items and get them repaired by repair specialists.

Reduce, repair and reuse are not alien concepts. These are traditional practices that just need refurbishing to make them fashionable again.

On October 15, the residents of Kundli woke up to the grisly sight of a corpse dangling from an upturned police barricade. The victim was identified as Lakhbir Singh, a 35-year-old Dalit labourer.

Violence against Dalits is an everyday occurrence. On rare occasions, a case of an atrocity committed against a Dalit gets reported in the newspapers. A smattering of voices is raised, and the incident creates a small ripple which soon dies down.

In Singh’s case, his killers, with their brutality, ensured the crime could not be ignored. He had 37 slashes on his body. They chopped off his left hand and broke his ankle and knee. They hanged the chopped-off hand grotesquely next to his head. They recorded his ordeal on their cell- phones. Lakhbir Singh was alive for 35 minutes before bleeding to death. One can see him in the videos begging his tormentors for relief from his agony.

Shockingly, there was no reaction from the anti-caste liberals. The pens of writers ran dry; the voices of Maoists who claim to fight for the oppressed were muted. Ambedkarites, who ostensibly “educate, organise and agitate” for Dalit rights, were defiantly quiet. Bollywood stars who fashionably speak against injustice turned their zeal in other directions. Human rights activists were nowhere to be found.

Baffled by the silence, I asked people, the usual ones, directly. One said he hadn’t read about it. Another said he only saw the headline and thought it to be another one of those atrocities commonly committed on Dalits. Some said they are not in the habit of writing or commenting on “every single thing that happens”. One Ambedkarite said brazenly, “What about it?” Many actually justified the killing. You see, Lakhbir Singh was accused of committing sacrilege on a Sikh holy book.

Since 2015, there has been a proliferation of sacrilege incidents in Punjab. Most often, the context of these accusations is land disputes between upper-caste Jat Sikhs, who have been illegally usurping land, which, by government law, is supposed to be leased to Dalits. When the Dalits began organising for their rights, the Jats retaliated with vicious attacks, often using sacrilege as an excuse. While politicians of all parties bend over backwards to appease Jat Sikhs whose religious sentiments are ostensibly hurt, murders committed by them go completely under the radar. Sikh society is so fixated on sacrilege that the one human rights group that did conduct a probe into the October 15 incident concluded that Singh, in fact, had committed sacrilege. The Punjab police booked him posthumously for sacrilege. His family has been ostracised and they were banned from cremating his body according to Sikh rites.

One can only speculate as to the immediate motive behind this particular murder. It could be the disgruntlement of the Sikhs over the appointment of a Dalit as the interim chief minister of the state. Or for the issue to be used by political parties in the upcoming elections in February, 2022. However, there is another reason behind the silence of the liberals, including those middle-class Dalits who have distanced themselves from the poor ones.

Singh’s murder was committed at Singhu border, one of the main sites of the year-long ongoing protests by (predominantly Jat) farmers from Punjab and Haryana against the 2020 farms laws. The lynching, farmer leaders alleged, was a conspiracy by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to smear the protests. Indian liberals, the most passionate supporters of the protests, don’t want the gruesome lynching of a Dalit to disrupt these protests. In their eyes, farmers are the only constituency who can end Narendra Modi’s regime.

What the liberals don’t understand is that the protesting farmers are utterly powerless. The laws affect under 6% of the farming population, almost all of whom are from just two states — Punjab and Haryana. The Green Revolution made it possible for this segment of ordinary farmers to produce small exportable surpluses, and transformed them into capitalist farmers. Not engaged in productive labour, they themselves they have no leverage of any kind. Modi is sitting pretty, tapping his index fingers together.

Unlike the liberals, the leaders of the anti-farm laws protests are aware of their powerlessness. From the beginning, they sought the participation of farm labourers, overwhelmingly Dalits who resolutely stayed away.

As capitalists, albeit small-scale, farmers strive to keep labour costs to a bare minimum. Caste is a convenient tool in their hands to put down Dalits. Last year, when the pandemic caused labour shortages, these farmers, who have been using migrant labourers, were forced to turn to Dalits, but offered them work at a lower rate than they pay migrants. When the Dalits refused, they were subjected to a social boycott.

Now, the same farmers are telling Dalits they have a common agenda against Modi. At the protests, they celebrated the birthday of Sant Ravidas, the guru of the Dalit Sikhs, while, under ordinary circumstances, caste Sikhs don’t allow Dalit Sikhs in their gurudwaras or langars. They don’t allow them to cremate their dead in the same grounds. When Dalits didn’t join the protests, with the help of clueless and/or corrupt leaders of agricultural labour unions, they resorted to busing a few Dalits to protest sites.

The liberal friends of the farmers glibly try to quash any notion that the atrocity at the Singhu border was caste-related, on the grounds that the killers themselves are Dalits. It is true that the men who claimed responsibility are Dalits. They belong to the Nihangs, a Sikh monastic sect. While the babas of all the Nihang groups are from the powerful landowning Jat caste, the foot soldiers are always Dalits, who join seeking basic necessities such as food. They delude themselves that being a monk will bring them respectability. But whether a crime is caste-related or not is determined not by the caste of the perpetrators. The lynching of Lakhbir is a caste-related crime because his caste, his being Dalit, played a role in targeting him.

Farm protests are doomed mainly because of outmoded agricultural practices, which depend on slave-like labour. These farmers don’t stand a chance against their competitors — the big global corporations. What kind of capitalist system worth its salt will allow freeloading in the name of price support? Still, the farm protests have, on their side, all the liberal spokesmen/women, writers, documentarians, activists, agitators, Greta Thunberg, Rihanna, and all the glamour.

In any case, the implementation of the laws is suspended. This will give the richer section of the farmers ample time to shift their assets out of agriculture, and strike some kind of deal with the multinational corporations. Meanwhile, the poor of India, including Dalit labourers, are facing the prospect of mass privations because the third farm law proposes to do away with price caps on essential commodities. To survive, they have to wage a fight — the success of which depends on maintaining independence from their current oppressors. Their natural allies are urban workers who, by dint of the crucial role they play in productive economic activity, can stand up to the juggernaut of the free market crushing entire sections of the Indian masses.

Sujatha Gidla is the author of Ants Among Elephants: An Untouchable Family and the Making of Modern India

Are films primarily modes of entertainment or do they hold the power to effect social change? The success of the Tamil movie, Jai Bhim, has brought this debate back into focus. Jai Bhim is the latest in a recent string of socially conscious movies on caste from Tamil Nadu, a list that includes Pariyerum Perumal (2018), Asuran (2019) and 2021’s Sarpatta Parambarai, among others. Together, this oeuvre has flipped the gaze on caste-oppressed communities, chronicled their assertion and oppressive caste groups and structures — while courting commercial success and critical plaudits.

Jai Bhim shows the struggle of a marginalised tribe, the Irulars, against police violence and custodial torture, helped by a young lawyer. The film makes three important points. One, though the British-era Criminal Tribes Act has long been repealed, its effect on police attitudes remains pervasive and authorities continue to use the “habitual offender” moniker to criminalise some groups. Two, custodial violence and brutality is not only rife, but also the harshest against marginalised people. And three, despite hurdles, anti-caste ground activism can move the needle on justice.

As films like Aakrosh (1980) and My Brother Nikhil (2005) have shown, films can spark a conversation on ignored issues, but often don’t have the power to implement structural changes. Four decades after India was shocked by Aakrosh, the precarity of peasants and labourers is, in some ways, even more dire. Yet, as other hits like Sairat (2015) show, jolting society out of its slumber can also help some people (in this case, inter- caste couples). In the short-term, at least, that is enough.

Heavy rains lashed Chennai and adjoining districts of Tamil Nadu from Saturday night through Sunday, forcing authorities to rescue at least 500 people, close educational institutions, and issue travel advisories. On Saturday, Chennai witnessed the highest rainfall in a single day since 2015. The India Metrological Department, on Sunday, said that a cyclonic circulation lies over north coastal Tamil Nadu, southeast of the Bay of Bengal and a low-pressure area is likely to form by November 9, which would then move towards the Tamil Nadu coast, bringing more rain for at least the next three days. Weather department officials claimed that the heavy rainfall episode is not linked to the climate crisis because such extreme rains have happened several times in the past. The record for the highest rainfall in Chennai on a single day in November is still that of 1976.

The heavy downpour has brought Chennai, India’s manufacturing capital, to a standstill. However, that’s not the only reason for such large-scale disruption. The extensive water-logging and flooding across Tamil Nadu’s capital have happened because of several other reasons: Wrong land-use planning, unsustainable urbanisation, failure of the civic authorities to remove encroachments such as the infrastructure around rivers, lakes, and watercourses, and delays in cleaning stormwater channels.

Interestingly, Chennai, one of the wettest cities in India, also suffers from a water crisis. This is because floods and water scarcity have the same roots: Urbanisation and heavy construction activities, without taking into account the city’s natural limits. The state’s climate action plan predicts that the average annual temperature will rise 3.1°C by 2100 from 1970-2000 levels, while yearly rainfall will fall by as much as 9%. Precipitation during the June-September southwest monsoon will reduce while the flood-prone cyclone season in the winter, when the state gets most of its rain from the northeast monsoon, will become more intense. That could mean worse floods and droughts. For Tamil Nadu, as for other parts of India, the message is clear: Change or perish.

There is a deep domestic churn in the United States (US) — and this will have an impact on both the future of the US and its ability to compete with China. Two events of the past week illustrate the possibilities as well as the challenges that the Joe Biden administration confronts. The first is the passage of the $1 trillion infrastructure bill — after much internal discord between centrists and progressive within the Democrats. An even more ambitious social safety bill, an integral part of Mr Biden’s and the Left’s agenda, remains pending but the infra bill, which had broad bipartisan support, will see a major investment in modernising American roads and rails, bridges and ports, and enhancing virtual connectivity. The second development was the victory of a Republican candidate, Glenn Youngkin, in Virginia, ousting a Democratic governor. The Republicans tapped into rising discontent against inflation, a sense among swing voters that the Democrats weren’t delivering, Mr Biden’s plummeting popularity, and familiar culture wars. The defeat in Virginia added to a sense of urgency among Democrats to get united behind the infrastructure bill.

Mr Biden, since assuming power, has articulated a fairly coherent worldview. He has consistently argued that the US faces tremendous challenges at home — infrastructure is inadequate and crumbling, citizens find it hard to make ends meet, jobs need to be created, and the State has a responsibility to invest in both the physical and the care economy. This, Mr Biden believes, will strengthen America domestically; send a message that democracies can deliver; and reduce the appeal of Right-wing demagogues who often leverage real economic anxieties. It will also create a stronger political and economic basis to compete with China. For India, a functional but also effective American democracy is good news.

But Mr Biden’s relatively sound diagnosis of what needs to be done has collided with messy political realities. His own party is divided between the Left and centrists. There are powerful economic constituencies that don’t want an expansion in the State’s spending commitments, either because of an ideological obsession with small government or because it will also translate into higher taxes. The Republicans are keen to shift the conversation entirely to manufactured grievances to tap into racist impulses, and are hoping to take over the House and the Senate next year, which will fragment power even more. Mr Biden has a tough year ahead. While the infrastructure bill should give him hope, the Virginia loss should make him anxious about what lies ahead. The polarised American political landscape means that partners such as India will have to remain closely engaged with all sides of the US polity.