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Editorials - 15-03-2022

Though not a crucial voting issue in Goa, it was used by the major parties to attack the newer parties and also to claim the loyalties of the native voters

The ‘local versus outsider’ debate is not just an election issue in Goa; there has been simmering discontent over it. It resurfaces in different ways during election campaigns, especially when established parties use the ‘outsider card’ against newer parties like the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Trinamool Congress (TMC) when the latter try to gain a foothold in the State.

Insider versus outsider

The Lokniti-CSDS survey found that the opinion of Goans only seems to be intensifying on the anti-outsider rhetoric. The survey asked Goa’s voters how serious a threat an outsider poses to Goa’s culture. More than three-fifths said it is a very serious or somewhat serious issue. This is a notable jump from 2017, when around half the voters felt the same (Table 1).

About half the voters fully supported the idea that only Goans should be allowed to buy land in Goa. Support for this idea increased from 2017, when four in 10 fully supported the idea. Moreover, a large chunk was also against the idea of giving ownership rights of housing units to outsiders who have lived in Goa for decades (Table 2).

Local Goans and migrant Goans held opposite views on what rights should be given to outsiders. Over a majority of the migrants said that they should have the right to buy land as well as seek ownership rights to the housing units they live in, but the locals supported these rights less.

The anti-outsider sentiment did not go in favour of any particular party. This was not much of a voting issue and no single party was either blamed for it or benefited from it.

Though the sentiment may not have emerged as a crucial voting issue, it was used by the major parties to attack the newer parties and also to claim the loyalties of the native voters.

Aastha and Vibha Attri are researchers at Lokniti-CSDS, Delhi



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The impact of the Ukraine war on global interconnectedness is a cause for worry in the post-World War order

Nearly three weeks into the Russian war on Ukraine, the cost to India is still to be counted. While some are focusing on how India’s refusal to criticise Russia’s actions, and the string of abstentions at the United Nations, would affect its relations with the West and its Quad partners (the United States, Australia and Japan), others are watching the economic costs that the unprecedented sanctions of the U.S. and the European Union will have on Indian trade, energy and defence purchases. However, the outcome that should worry New Delhi and other like-minded countries the most, apart from the devastating consequences for the Ukrainian nation, is the impact the Ukraine crisis is having on the global world order, which is fragmenting in every respect of global interconnectedness — in terms of international cooperation, security, military use, economic order, and even cultural ties.

The UN and Security Council

To begin with, the global order has broken down and events in Ukraine have exposed the United Nations and the Security Council for their complete ineffectiveness. Russia’s actions in Ukraine may, in terms of refusing to seek an international mandate, seem no different from the war by the United States in Iraq in 2003, Israel’s bombing of Lebanon in 2006 and the Saudi-coalition’s attacks of Yemen in 2015.

But Ukraine is in fact a bigger blow to the post-World War order than any other. The direct missile strikes and bombing of Ukrainian cities every day, exacting both military and civilian casualties, and the creation of millions of refugees, run counter to every line of the UN Charter preamble, i.e. “to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war...”, “to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbours”, as well as Articles 1 and 2 of the ‘Purposes and Principles’ of the United Nations (Chapter 1) (https://bit.ly/3w4BS5X).

The fact that Russian President Vladimir Putin broadcast his decision to “launch military operations” on Ukraine at the same time the Russian envoy to the United Nations was presiding over a UN Security Council discussion on the Ukraine crisis, speaks volumes for the respect the P-5 member felt for the proceedings. A vote of the international commons, or the UN General Assembly (UNGA), that decried Moscow’s actions, was brushed off in a way that was even easier than when the U.S. did when it lost the UNGA vote in 2017 over its decision to move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem.

Meanwhile, in their responses, other P-5 members such as the United States, the United Kingdom and France did not seek to strengthen the global order either, imposing sanctions unilaterally rather than attempting to bring them to the UN. Clearly, Russia would have vetoed any punitive measures, but that should not have stopped the attempt. Nor are the surge in weapons transfers to Ukraine a vote of confidence in the UN’s power to effect a truce.

Whither nuclear safeguards

The next point is Russian recklessness with regard to nuclear safety in a country that has suffered the worst impacts of poor safety and planning following the 1986 Chernobyl disaster (when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union), which is a challenge to the global nuclear order. Russian military’s moves to target areas near Chernobyl and shell buildings near the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant ( also Europe’s largest), show an alarming nonchalance towards safeguards in place over several decades, after the U.S.’s detonation of atomic bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 led to the establishment of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in 1956. The world must also consider the cost to the nuclear non-proliferation regime’s credibility: Ukraine and Libya that willingly gave up nuclear programmes have been invaded, while regimes such as Iran and North Korea can defy the global order because they have held on to their nuclear deterrents.

There are also the covenants agreed upon during the global war on terrorism, which have been degraded, with the use of non-state actors in the Ukraine crisis. For years, pro-Russia armed militia operated in the Donbas regions, challenging the writ of the government in Kyiv. With the arrival of Russian troops, the Ukrainian President, Volodymyr Zelensky, has invited all foreign fighters who are volunteering to support his forces to the country. This seeks to mirror the “International Brigades” in the Spanish Civil War of the 1930s, comprising foreign volunteers from about 50 countries against forces of Spanish military ruler Francisco Franco.

However, the role of foreign fighters has taken on a more sinister meaning after 2001 and al Qaeda, when western recruits joined the Islamic State to fight Syrian President Assad’s forces. British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss’s recent statement that she would “absolutely support” British veterans and volunteers joining the Ukraine war against Russia has since been reversed by the British Foreign Office, and it is hoped that other countries around the world, including India, make firm efforts towards preventing such “non-state actors” from joining a foreign war.

Economic actions

Economic sanctions by the U.S., the U.K. and the European Union (EU) also point to a fragmentation of the global financial order. While analysts have pointed out that the sanctions announced so far do not include some of Russia’s biggest banks such as Sberbank and Gazprombank and energy agencies (in order to avoid the disruption of oil and gas from Russia), the intent to cut Russia out of all monetary and financial systems remains. From the eviction of Russia from SWIFT payments, to the cancellation of Mastercard, Visa, American Express and Paypal, to the sanctioning of specific Russian businesses and oligarchs and pressure on Western businesses (McDonalds, Coca-Cola, Pepsi, etc.) operating in Russia to shut down, the arbitrary and unilateral nature of western sanctions rub against the international financial order set up under the World Trade Organization (that replaced the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, or GATT).

The obvious fallout of this “economic cancel culture” will, without doubt, be a reaction — a pushback from Russia and an exploration of alternative trading arrangements with countries such as China, India and much of the Eastern Hemisphere which continue to trade with Moscow. For the S-400 missile defence deal, for example, New Delhi used a rupee-rouble mechanism and banks that were immunised from the U.S.’s CAATSA sanctions (or Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act) for advance payments. Russian banks will now use the Chinese “UnionPay” for online transactions. Gradually, the world may see a “non-dollar” system emerge which would run banking, fintech and credit systems separately from the “dollar world”.

Isolation by culture

Finally, there is the western objective, to “isolate” Russia, socially and culturally, that rails against the global liberal order. While several governments including the U.S., the U.K. and Germany have persistently said that their quarrel is not with Russian citizens but with their leadership, it is clear that most of their actions will hurt the average Russian citizen. The EU’s ban of all Russian-owned, Russian-controlled or Russian-registered planes from EU airspace, and Aeroflot’s cancellation of international routes, will ensure that travel to and from Russia is severely curtailed. Some of this isolation of its citizens will work to the favour of an increasingly authoritarian Kremlin. Mr. Putin’s response to the banning of Russian channels in Europe and its allies has been to use the western media ban as a pretext to ban opposition-friendly Russian channels as well. The “isolation” extends to art and music: in the past two weeks the Munich Philharmonic fired its chief conductor and New York’s Metropolitan Opera let a Russian soprano, Anna Netrebko, go because they would not criticise the war. The Bolshoi Ballet’s performances in London and Madrid were similarly cancelled.

The perils of this comprehensive boycott of Russia are not without historical precedent. Speaking to his Parliament this week, Mr. Zelensky invoked British Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s “Fight to the End” speech, delivered at the House of Commons in June 1940, to speak about Ukraine’s commitment to fight Russia. European onlookers would do well to also remember Churchill’s other famous speech, “The Sinews of Peace”, delivered in the United States in 1946, when he first referred to the “Iron curtain coming down” between Soviet Russia and Western Europe. “The safety of the world requires a new unity in Europe, from which no nation should be permanently outcast,” Churchill had warned, although his words went in vain and the world suffered the consequences of the Cold War for the next four decades.

New Delhi needs to ponder

The events over the past two weeks, set in motion by Russia’s declaration of war on Ukraine, have no doubt reversed many of the ideas of 1945 and 1990, fragmenting the international order established with the UN, ushering in an era of deglobalisation and bringing down another Iron Curtain. India’s abstentionist responses and its desire not to be critical of any of the actions taken by the big powers might keep Indians safe in the short term. But in the long term, it is only those nations that move proactively to uphold, strengthen and reinvent the global order that will make the world a safer place, even as this war that promises few winners rages on.

suhasini.h@thehindu.co.in



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As hard power dictates terms in geo-politics, India’s Atmanirbhar push needs to move to mission mode

There is no finer teacher of war than war,” said Mao and as the Ukraine-Russia war nears the end of three weeks, it is time one takes stock of India’s position in the real world of geopolitics.

In the real world, ‘power’ talks — as Greek historian Thucydides wrote in the Fifth Century BC, “Right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power — while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.” The dogged resistance of Ukraine notwithstanding, ‘power’ has spoken through Russian actions, with Russian President Vladimir Putin demanding that all Russian demands be met, including a call to surrender. This leads to two fundamental deductions at the macro-level.

Ukraine is alone

First, a nation’s vital interests can be protected only by that nation itself. For all the pompous statements coming from the West, promises of arms supply being made and intelligence inputs that must be getting transmitted, the fact is that it is the Ukrainians alone who are facing the brunt of the Russian military might. It has always been conjectured whether the United States would come to the aid of a North Atlantic Treaty Organization ally in Europe, following a Russian advance, and risk its own cities in turn. The answer is starkly visible. Good intentions and media statements have never stopped a bullet and surely, there would be soul searching that is ongoing in the minds of allies such as Japan, South Korea and Taiwan too, as the fallacy of a ‘friend’ coming to fightwith you andfor you has been exposed, yet again.

The Indian parallel

India’s experience has been similar. During the 1962 India-China war, Moscow had no time for New Delhi (in fact, it sided with Beijing) and the Americans offered moral and logistic support, despite New Delhi’s request for military help. The 1965 war was one of redemption as India re-armed itself in a big way, a drive that continued and gave us the outright victory in 1971. Then, in 1974, it is to the credit of the Indian leadership for demonstrating India’s scientific capability through a ‘peaceful’ nuclear explosion and the leadership in 1998 for going overtly nuclear. To the common man, this constitutes power, but between two nuclear-capable nations, an atomic weapon is a deterrent in the nuclear realm and not a determinant of ‘conventional’ power. As India faces two nuclear adversaries, the reality of India having lagged in true indigenous conventional capability must be accepted. This leads to the second deduction.

For a nation to have strategic autonomy in matters of national security, self-sufficiency in defence research and development and manufacturing is an inescapable imperative. This would afford the required deterrence to prevent war, and to prosecute it (war) if deterrence fails. The sessions at the United Nations on Ukraine, where India abstained, saw New Delhi as a tightrope walker as it is heavily dependent on Russiaand the U.S., for political reasons as well as for arms.

Arms from the West too

After the Cold War ended, India diversified its purchases to dilute its dependence on Russia for arms. While the narrative has been on the MiGs, Antonovs, Sukhois, S-400, T-90 tanks, Grad rocket launchers, Kilo-class submarines,et. al , one overlooks the fact that India has become heavily dependent on the West too for a multitude of frontline armament systems. For example, the heavylift transport fleet of the Indian Air Force (IAF) relies heavily on the American C-17 and C-130J Super Hercules aircraft, while the helicopter fleet has the Chinook and Apache attack helicopters. Similarly, the Indian Navy has the Boeing P-8I long range aircraft for maritime surveillance and is acquiring MH-60 helicopters for anti-submarine warfare and Sea Guardian drones for reconnaissance. The Indian Army’s M777 artillery guns are from the West, the IAF’s Rafale and Mirage fighters from France, Jaguars from Britain and a multitude of drones from Israel; even the basic infantry rifle is being imported. And, India has signed three ‘foundational’ agreements with the U.S.; the sword of Damocles, through the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) is ever present. The list is very long and encompasses both ‘camps,’ as it were. Are there any doubts now about why, besides political reasons, we abstained in the UN Security Council vote? So, what is the way out?

The writing is on the wall. A nation’s standing in the pecking order based only on soft power is ephemeral. As the West twiddles its thumbs, ‘Ukraine’ proves that hard power dictates terms in geopolitics. Thucydides understood it in Fifth Century BC and we are in for a rough time if we do not get it even now. TheAtmanirbhar thrust of the Government in matters of defence research and development and manufacturing, though gathering pace, has to become a national endeavour in mission mode, bridging differences across the political aisle and providing a political continuum to underwrite it. There is no other way out.

Air Vice Marshal Manmohan Bahadur VM (retired) is former Additional Director General, Centre for Air Power Studies, New Delhi



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Lack of tactical unity among the Opposition parties worked in the BJP’s favour

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) emerged as the single largest party in the 2022 Goa Assembly elections that revolved around a consolidation of the double anti-incumbency force. The lack of a strong and unified front to capitalise on a strong anti-incumbency sentiment combined with the presence of a significant number of non-committal voters helped the BJP defeat the Opposition.

The Lokniti-CSDS survey data show that the anti-incumbency sentiment was stronger than what it was in 2017. Four in every 10 voters did not favour another chance for the BJP (5% points more compared to 2017). Three in 10 felt that the BJP should be given another term, and about a quarter were non-committal or unsure whether the party should be given another chance.

Despite such strong anti-incumbency, what worked in the BJP’s favour was that the anti-incumbency vote was split between the Congress and other parties. Of those who did not support another chance for the BJP, close to four in 10 voted for the Congress. The other votes were spread among the All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) alliance, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the Revolutionary Goans Party (RGP) and other smaller parties (Table 2).

The BJP converted one-third of the non-committal voters in its favour, while the Congress could attract only one-fourth of these voters. Due to a fractured Opposition, the remaining 47% of the votes of non-committal voters went to the other parties (14% to the Trinamool Congress+; 10% to the RGP; 6% to AAP; and 17% to independents and other parties). This worked for the BJP because had there been a united front, most of these votes would have gone away from the BJP.

In both North and South Goa, Opposition parties were unsuccessful in consolidating the anti-incumbency sentiment well. The anti-incumbency sentiment was much stronger in South Goa: close to six in 10 voters did not favour another chance for the BJP. This figure dropped to about four in 10 in North Goa. The consolidation of the anti-incumbency vote was poorer in North Goa than in South Goa — Congress was able to garner 42% of anti-incumbent votes in the South, while in the North it got only 34%. Here, a huge chunk of the anti-incumbent votes went to the TMC-Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party alliance (27%) and to the RGP (19%).

Though the BJP successfully consolidated 71% of the pro-incumbency votes in North Goa, which is a stronghold of the party with a higher Hindu concentration, in South Goa too, it was able to garner 83% of such votes.

It must also be noted that the vote choices of Goa’s voters suggest a churning rather than a stability of political loyalties. Both the Congress and the BJP lost nearly 40% of their previous voters to other parties. However, the BJP did a slightly better job at holding on to its previous supporters than the Congress (Table 3). The data also suggest that about a quarter of previous Congress supporters who did not favour another chance for the BJP in the State voted for the TMC-MGP alliance, the AAP, the RGP and other parties. However, only about half the previous BJP supporters who did not want the BJP government to return voted for the Congress, with two-fifths of them voting for other parties. Thus, the lack of tactical unity among the Opposition parties worked in the BJP’s favour despite a strong anti-incumbency sentiment against it.

Vibha Attri and Aastha are researchers at Lokniti-CSDS, Delhi



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The BJP lost a sizeable chunk of Bhandari votes, but made gains among upper castes and Scheduled Tribes

Caste played no less an important role in Goa than it did in other States. This is clearly evident from Lokniti-CSDS post-poll survey data. Nearly one-third of the voters in Goa considered their caste identity as a very important issue while deciding their vote. This importance accorded to caste by Goa’s voters was in fact slightly higher than what it was in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and Uttarakhand. No attempt at understanding voting behaviour in Goa would thus be complete without looking at how the State’s castes and communities voted.

An analysis of caste-wise voting preferences in Goa reveals that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which secured 33% of the overall votes, managed to regain its lost ground among the Hindu upper castes comprising around one-sixth of Goa’s total electorate. Nearly half (49%) of the Hindu upper caste community in Goa, which mostly comprises Saraswat Brahmins, voted for the ruling party. This was a good 10 percentage points more than the 2017 elections.

The BJP, however, seems to have lost considerable support among the Kshatriya Maratha community (roughly 6% to 7% of the electorate), which had voted in large numbers (more than the upper castes) for the party five years ago. The BJP’s vote share among the community is estimated to have declined to one-thirds (34%) this time from 53% last time. What makes this drop particularly significant is that Chief Minister Pramod Sawant is a Maratha.

The BJP also wasn’t able to repeat its impressive 2017 performance among the electorally crucial Bhandari Samaj community, which constitutes around 15% to 20% of Goa’s population. A little over two-fifths (44%) of the community voted for the BJP compared to over half (54%) in 2017. Over the years, Bhandari community members are believed to have grown resentful of the dominance of upper caste leaders in Goa’s politics. In 2017, when many upper castes had deserted the BJP, apart from the Marathas it had been the Bhandaris who had lent the greatest support to the ruling party. This time, the situation seems to have reversed somewhat – many upper castes returned to the BJP, but a sizeable chunk of the Bhandaris drifted away. Even the defection of one of the senior-most Bhandari Samaj leaders, Ravi Naik, from the Congress to the BJP before the polls could not stem this erosion of support. Bhandari voters did not show any great enthusiasm towards the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) either, despite the AAP naming Amit Palekar from the Bhandari Samaj as its chief ministerial candidate. It was the debutant Revolutionary Goans Party (RGP) and the Trinamool Congress-Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP) alliance that seems to have benefited the most from the BJP’s decline among Bhandari voters.

The BJP was able to offset its losses among the Bhandaris and Marathas by making gains not just among upper castes but also among the Hindu Scheduled Tribes (STs). It increased its vote share among the Hindu STs dramatically, to nearly three-fifths (58%) this time from almost one-thirds (31%) last time. Most of the BJP’s vote among the Hindu STs came from the Velip and Kunbi communities and not so much from the Gawda community, which voted more for the Congress than the BJP.

The Congress’s overall vote share declined to 25% this time from 28% in 2017. It lost support among upper castes, Marathas, Bhandaris and STs and only made some modest gains among the non-Bhandari Other Backward Classes. The party did do well among the Dalit community (only 2% of the population) and among Muslims (8-9% share of the population). However, it was unable to consolidate the Muslim votes in its favour to the degree that it would have liked. It was the all-important Christian vote (26-27% share) that the Congress would be most disappointed about losing. The party underperformed among Christians, which proved to be the most decisive blow to it.

Alaknanda Shringare is Assistant Professor in the Dept. of Political Science at Goa University, Panaji., and Shreyas Sardesai is with Lokniti-CSDS



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In Goa, the voters did not just vote along party lines

In Goa, the candidate has always mattered more to the voters than the party. The same trend was reflected in the 2022 Assembly elections too. In the CSDS-Lokniti post-poll survey, close to two-thirds of the voters said they considered the candidate while making their vote choice. This is nine percentage points higher than in 2017. This explains the instability of voter loyalty to parties. On the other hand, close to three in every 10 (29%) voters said that the party was more important for them than the candidate.

When voters said that the candidate was more important than the party, which attributes of the candidate were they looking at? Among those who voted along candidate lines, close to three-fourths said they assessed the work or performance of the candidate whereas close to seven in 10 (69%) said they focused on the educational qualifications of the candidate. Another three-fifths (58%) said they considered the personality of the candidate.

In the main question on voting considerations, caste emerged as an important factor for the voters while making their vote choice — in fact, slightly more so in comparison to the other States that went to the polls. But once voters preferred the candidate over the party, not many said that they look at the candidate’s caste — or so they claimed. Caste or religion become the least preferred attribute of the candidates (Table 1).

The Aam Aadmi Party and the Revolutionary Goans Party got many votes on party lines irrespective of who their candidate was. In the case of those who voted for other parties, the candidate of the party was a more important consideration than the party. For close to seven in every 10 voters of the Trinamool Congress and Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party alliance as well as the Congress, candidates were more important than any other factor while voting (Table 2).

The Bharatiya Janata Party performed relatively better among those who voted along party lines. Its gap over the Congress narrowed among those who voted on candidate lines. The emphasis on candidates over party was higher in South Goa than in the North. Incidentally, the Congress did well among the candidate-centric voters in South Goa (Table 3).

Jyoti Mishra and Chanda Rani are researchers at Lokniti-CSDS



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Any delay in Iran deal will deepen security crisis in West Asia and inflate global oil prices

The Vienna talks aimed at reviving the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), also known as the Iran nuclear deal, have hit a wall after Russia sought sanctions exemptions for its future trade and defence ties with Iran. European negotiators say “a good deal” is on the table. But Russia, which has been slapped with a barrage of sanctions by the United States and its allies over the Ukraine invasion, seeks written guarantees that those curbs would not “in any way harm” its ties with Iran. The nuclear deal, reached in 2015, started unravelling in 2018 as the Trump administration unilaterally pulled the U.S. out of the agreement despite international certification that Iran was fully compliant with its terms. After the U.S.’s withdrawal, Iran started enriching uranium to a higher purity and installing advanced centrifuges at its nuclear plants. Now, nuclear experts believe Iran is just months away from having enough high purity uranium to make a nuclear bomb, though the Iranian leadership has repeatedly claimed that it has no plan to make one. Western officials say the growing nuclear capability of Iran demands urgent steps to conclude the deal and curb its nuclear programme. Removing sanctions on Iran and letting Iran’s oil enter the global market could also ease oil and gas prices, which shot up after the Russian attack on Ukraine.

The West’s push to conclude the deal gives Russia added leverage in the negotiations, at a time when relations between Moscow and western capitals are at their lowest point since the end of the Cold War. The U.S. and Europe are reportedly looking for alternatives to revive the deal without Russia. But it would not be easy. Russia, an original signatory of the JCPOA, is a member of the joint commission that supervises Iran’s compliance. Under the agreement, Russia is also required to take control of Iran’s excess enriched uranium and work with Tehran to turn its Fordow nuclear plant into a research facility. In theory, the deal can be revived if other signatories take up Russia’s responsibilities. But it is not clear whether Iran and China would be ready to go ahead without Russia. While the Iranians have publicly said they would not allow any “external factors” to impact their national interests, Tehran is unlikely to ignore the sensitivity of Russia, an ally, and reach an agreement with the U.S., whose exit scuttled the original deal. This leaves the future of the nuclear deal in Russian hands. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the West’s response to it have already sent commodity prices soaring and shaken the global economy, which is yet to come out of the COVID-19 shock. A further delay or a total collapse of the Iran deal would not only deepen the security crisis in West Asia but also add pressure on global oil and gas prices. The signatories should not hold the Iran deal to ransom. They should continue to push for a collective agreement that could curb Iran’s nuclear programme and take the country into the global economic mainstream.



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The Congress should not shy away from introspection of its leadership

The Congress has precluded the possibility of any honest conversation at a proposed brainstorming on its plight by hailing the leadership of Sonia Gandhi beforehand. Ms. Gandhi and her two children, Rahul and Priyanka, control the party, but it would be illogical to attribute the collapse of the Congress party entirely to the Gandhi family. The meltdown of the Congress has been caused by a combination of several factors that evolved over decades. At the same time, the Gandhis cannot wash their hands of the debacle that they have led the Congress into. They failed to see the ground shifting under their feet and showed no imagination or willingness to work hard. Popular leaders were routinely sidelined and a cabal of court jesters was allowed to capture Rajya Sabha seats and control power. Mr. Gandhi who famously did not get along with the coterie that surrounded his mother, built a rootless, clueless one of his own, and made some disastrous choices such as appointing Navjot Singh Sidhu to lead the campaign in Punjab. In Uttarakhand, even in the face of a confused Bharatiya Janata Party, the Congress could not get its act together.

In some contexts, dynastic politics continue to flourish, but for the Congress, it has become a huge burden to carry. It is not that the party will miraculously revive if all three members of the Gandhi family move away from the party, as Ms. Gandhi suggested before the Congress Working Committee meeting on Sunday. What is clear is that the current arrangement that involves Ms. Gandhi as titular head, and her children functioning as two unaccountable power centres, has become untenable. Whether the Congress party has the capacity to hold itself together without the ritual of deifying the family remains an open question, but it can no longer shy away from making an honest effort to explore the possibilities of an alternative leadership that is more accountable and accessible. The Gandhis too must reflect upon their competence and utility for the Congress. The proposed brainstorming must focus on the existential crisis that stares at the party, and should not be used as yet another opportunity to find excuses to maintain the status quo. The party had appointed a committee to examine the causes of its performance in the 2021 Assembly polls in five States/Union Territory. The report was submitted, but rather than discuss it, the party chose to lock it away. The party must look for ideas and leaders from within its ranks to attempt a revival. It is an uphill task and anything short of a brutally honest introspection is doomed to fail at the outset.



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The National Development Council gave its stamp of approval to the prime minister’s 20-point programme. According to Planning Minister S B Chavan, the approval was given with one state, Tripura, expressing reservation.

The National Development Council gave its stamp of approval to the prime minister’s 20-point programme. According to Planning Minister S B Chavan, the approval was given with one state, Tripura, expressing reservation. West Bengal Chief Minister Jyoti-Basu had also expressed reservations with certain aspects of the programme but was not present when the resolution was adopted. The CMs of the other two Opposition states — Jammu Kashmir and Tamil Nadu — stayed away from the meeting, sending instead their finance ministers. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi admitted that progress on meeting the targets of the Sixth Plan had suffered but blamed the state governments.

Maruti’s Partner

A decision on which among the foreign car manufacturers should be invited to collaborate with the Maruti Car Company, now under the public sector, will be taken in the next two months. The close race to get into Maruti’s favour is between Japanese and British firms, French Renault and German Volkswagen. Indications are that British Leyland may bag the prize. The notable point in the British company’s favour is that most of Leyland’s cars have passed the test on India’s rugged and bumpy roads.

Pak wants talks

Pakistan Foreign Minister Abdus Sattar asked India to continue the talks for a no-war pact because the exchanges between the two sides at the Geneva conference were not grave enough. Sattar told reporters that Pakistan’s invitation to Indian Foreign Secretary R D Sattar was still “outstanding”. He said that there was nothing wrong in Pakistan raising the Kashmir issue at international fora.

Basu’s fears

West Bengal Chief Jyoti Basu said that Congress Party members in the state were talking of the prospects of President’s rule. This reflected the thinking of the ruling party at the Centre.



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For all that has changed in 22 years — poor countries have become middle-income ones, wars are back, as are tensions on the high seas — some things hopefully haven't.

When Herman and Candelaria Zapp set out in a 1928 jalopy — the car is called Graham-Paige — from Buenos Aires, the world was a different place. There were no smartphones, the internet was in its infancy, a place of knowledge and hope rather than disinformation and division, the twin towers stood tall in New York, and Russia was a diminutive shell overshadowed by its Soviet past. Since 2000, the Zapps have travelled to over 102 countries across five continents. For most of their trip, they depended on the kindness of strangers. The couple estimates that they have been hosted by over 2,000 families — for the rest of the time, they lived out of the car.

The Zapps’ home is the road. They have had four children in different countries, and in an era of strict visa regimes and rising insularity, managed to treat borders as what they truly are — arbitrary and artificial lines on a map. As the family expanded, so did the car. It was re-purposed and expanded to make room for the growing family. The trunk carried kitchen supplies, the engine doubled up as a stove and grill. And then there are the trials and tribulations — between them, the family has suffered from Ebola, dengue, malaria and been stranded during the pandemic.

When the couple left their home to become nomads, they had been married six years, had well-paying jobs and a home. The giving up of the middle-class paradise, though, was clearly worth their while. Already, Herman — now 53 — is contemplating sailing around the world. For all that has changed in 22 years — poor countries have become middle-income ones, wars are back, as are tensions on the high seas — some things hopefully haven’t. On their second trip around the world, too, the Zapps will hopefully find hospitality.

This editorial first appeared in the print edition on March 15, 2022 under the title ‘Home is a journey’.



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It comes at a time when the BJP's electoral successes in the latest round of assembly elections should have paved the way for building on that outreach, not retreating from it.

The 2022 annual report of the RSS, released on Saturday, claims that religious fanaticism is growing in the guise of “Constitution and religious freedom” and that “elaborate plans” have been made by “a particular community to enter the government machinery”. It is obvious that the report is talking about India’s largest minority, Muslims. The report is an unfortunate step back from the promise of a new outreach that RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat himself held out not so long ago. It comes at a time when the BJP’s electoral successes in the latest round of assembly elections should have paved the way for building on that outreach, not retreating from it.

At the “Bhavishya ka Bharat: An RSS perspective” conclave in Delhi, 2018, Bhagwat had said: “Hum log toh sarvlok-yukt Bharat waale log hain, mukt waale nahin hain (we believe in an inclusive India, not one that excludes)”. The Sangh, he said, believed that “the Indian Constitution is the consensus of the country” and argued that the “Hindu Rashtra” does not deny space to Muslims: “The day it is said that Muslims are unwanted here, the concept of Hindutva will cease to exist”. In July last year, Bhagwat said: “Cow is a holy animal but the people who are lynching others are going against Hindutva”. In February this year, he spoke against the hate speeches at the Dharma Sansad in December: “The statements which came out of the Dharma Sansad are not Hindu words, work or heart. If I sometimes say something in anger, then it is not Hindutva. The RSS or those following Hindutva do not believe in this.”

It is possible that efforts are being made to increase the presence of the minority community in government services, where it has been historically under-represented. The Sachar Committee, appointed by the UPA government, had documented in its 2006 report that the share of Muslims in employment is abysmally low at all levels and that “in no state does the representation of Muslims in the government departments match their population share”. For instance, the panel found that Muslims have a representation of only 4.5 per cent in Indian Railways — Muslims are about 14.23 per cent of India’s population as per Census 2011. In this context, any effort to increase the share of Muslims in government jobs must be welcomed as a step towards greater integration of the community in the national mainstream. It would help in blunting the perceptions of marginalisation of the community in times when a majoritarian nationalism is increasingly loud and plays the dominant role in defining the political common sense. The RSS would do well to reflect on its sarsanghchalak’s recent public pronouncements, and widen the opening, not seek to constrict or close it.

This editorial first appeared in the print edition on March 15, 2022 under the title ‘Going backwards’.



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Delhi and Islamabad must, at the very least, resume talks on conventional and nuclear confidence building mechanisms that have not been held for many years.

Over the last few days, Pakistan and India have given the world an unexpected real time demonstration of how two nuclear armed neighbours should behave to prevent a crisis from forming and escalating. A missile was fired from India and impacted more than 100 km inside Pakistani territory on March 9. The Pakistani military announced this more than 24 hours later at a press conference, making it clear that the missile was unarmed and had caused no loss of life on their side. It was also made clear to the Pakistani media that the Pakistani military was inclined to believe it was a mistake, but that it would wait for India to explain what had happened. The major general conducting the press conference delivered an admonishment to the Indian side about its “unprofessionalism” and “technical inefficiency”, as the missile, cruising at 40,000 ft was close to civilian flights, but he stayed with the facts. In turn, India did well to accept that a mistake had been made, that “in the course of routine maintenance, a technical malfunction led to the accidental firing of a missile” and expressed relief that no lives were lost due to the “deeply regrettable” incident.

It could have well been different, given the extremely strained circumstances between the two countries, the near-absence of diplomatic engagement, and the hostility evident in the rhetoric of the political leadership on both sides. Pakistan has acted with maturity and responsibility. By all accounts, it seems that the delay on both sides in announcing and acknowledging the incident was also intentional, perhaps giving both sides crucial time to make contact through the available channels, not all of them public. If so, it is an indication that despite the overt hostile posturing, the two sides remain engaged — a good augury. The 2021 agreement on observing the 2003 ceasefire on the LoC and International Border has been mutually beneficial, and both sides appear clear that it must be maintained.

At the same time, the incident cannot be brushed away. There are several unanswered questions, and many “what ifs”. Delhi is yet to make public any details about the circumstances that led to such an error. Apart from fast-tracking the court of inquiry and handing out quick and firm punishment to those responsible for this mistake, this incident shows that Delhi and Islamabad must, at the very least, resume talks on conventional and nuclear confidence building mechanisms that have not been held for many years.

This editorial first appeared in the print edition on March 15, 2022 under the title ‘Unmaking a crisis’.



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C. Raja Mohan writes: Whichever way it plays out, the current crisis has affirmed America’s pole position

Major wars have significant consequences for the internal and international politics of the combatant nations. The 1971 war between India and Pakistan, for example, not only liberated Bangladesh but also altered the balance of power between Delhi and Islamabad. In Pakistan, it produced a major effort — in the form of the 1973 constitution — to democratise a nation that was dominated by the Army.

Neither of those outcomes, however, survived the 1970s; in Pakistan, the army made a decisive comeback when General Zia-ul-Haq seized power from Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in 1977 and executed him in 1979. Zia also accelerated Pakistan’s nuclear weapon programme that neutralised India’s conventional superiority and restored the balance of power in the Subcontinent. He also leveraged nuclear impunity to institutionalise a strategy of cross-border terrorism against India.

Wars between great powers are far more consequential. The Napoleonic wars at the turn of the 19th century, the First and Second World Wars and the Cold War in the 20th century had a lasting impact on the international system.

The Napoleonic wars unleashed the prospect of radical internal transformation in Europe, but Napoleon’s defeat helped the conservative forces to restore the old order. But it also produced the Concert of Europe that limited local conflicts and sustained a regional balance of power for a century.

The First World War saw the collapse of the Ottoman and the Austro-Hungarian empires, created new nations in Europe and boosted nationalism in the non-Western world. The Second World War saw the defeat of fascism and the rise of the US and USSR. The diminution of European power helped accelerate the decolonisation of the global South. The Cold War ended with the defeat of Communism and the breakup of the Soviet Union and set the political stage for economic globalisation.

>Might Russia’s war against Ukraine turn into a global war and produce fundamental changes in the international system? The spectre of a “Third World War” has certainly begun to enter the discourse. Russia’s Vladimir Putin has signalled that the use of nuclear weapons is not off the table. US President Joe Biden has declared that he will defend every inch of NATO territory even if that involves the Third World War.

At the same time, Biden has said that the US will not fight Russia in Ukraine. French President Emmanuel Macron has said that Europe is “not at war” with Russia. Moscow, however, sees America and Europe as major parties in its war against Ukraine — given the military assistance they have provided to the resistance and the unprecedented Western sanctions on Russia.

Over the weekend, Russia has begun to bombard the western part of Ukraine that borders NATO. Its targets include bases and facilities that help coordinate the Western military assistance to the resistance. Unless there is an early diplomatic breakthrough, the conflict between Russia and the West is likely to sharpen in the coming days. Whether we are already into a Third World War or not, Russia’s unprovoked attack on Ukraine is triggering some major geopolitical changes across the world. At least five trends stand out. Not all of them might endure, but they help assess the current geopolitical flux.

First is the new dynamism in the great power triangle between the US, Russia, and China. Last June, Biden met Putin to explore the possibility of a reasonable relationship with Moscow. Biden hoped to distance Russia from China and focus all of America’s energies on the Indo-Pacific. But Putin chose to align with China and confront the US and Europe with an impossible set of demands including a sphere of influence in Central Europe and turning Ukraine into Moscow’s protectorate. As the Ukraine crisis unfolded, Washington has reached out to China — to restrain Russia before the invasion — and warn against supporting Moscow after the aggression. China’s public articulation has underlined “rock-solid” support for Moscow but it is under some pressure to balance between its Russian alliance “without limits” and its deep economic interdependence with the US and Europe. Whichever way this plays out, the current crisis has revealed America’s pole position in the great strategic triangle.

Second, the US primacy amongst the great powers has been reinforced by the restoration of strategic unity within the West. If President Putin and the Chinese leader Xi Jinping were taken in by their own propaganda on “American decline and Western disarray”, they might be surprised by the swift coming together of the West. While many trans-Atlantic differences remain on the nature and extent of sanctions against Russia, the crisis has revealed the enduring sources of Western unity.

Third is the American disciplining of Europe, especially Germany, where illusions of normative soft power and the faith in mercantilism had blinded the continent to geopolitical challenges presented by Russia and China. Europe’s belief that it can enrich itself in the Russian and Chinese markets while expecting Washington to do all the heavy lifting on security is no longer sustainable. The German decision on rearmament announced in the wake of the Russian aggression marks a definitive geopolitical turn in Europe.

Fourth, nowhere is the EU’s Russian dilemma more visible than in the energy domain where Europe is deeply tied to Russian imports of oil, natural gas, and coal. The EU pays $110 billion a year to Moscow for these imports. That the EU cannot boost Russian revenues while Moscow wages war in Europe is beginning to dawn on European chancelleries. While stepping up pressure on Europe to drastically reduce energy imports from Russia, Washington is reaching out to Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, and Iran to fill the gap created by the planned blockade of Russian energy supplies. With the American mind concentrated on Russia, no petro-state is a political “pariah” anymore for the Biden Administration. When it comes to war, “values” necessarily yield to “interests”.

Finally, Asia is beginning to adapt rapidly to the new US confrontation with Russia and China. Tokyo, which actively wooed a hard-to-get Moscow for more than a decade, has returned to a hawkish line. Sensing the dangers from a Sino-Russian axis and fearing that Europe could distract America, Japan is rethinking its nuclear abstinence.

Meanwhile, developments in Europe reinforce Tokyo’s determination to strengthen its conventional military capabilities and deepen the alliance with the US. South Korea’s president-elect, Yoon Suk-Yeol wants to strengthen ties with the US, and explore potential cooperation with the Quad — the forum that brings together America, Australia, India, and Japan. In convening a quick virtual summit of the Quad earlier this month, Washington signalled that there will be no dilution of its commitment to the Indo-Pacific. While the ASEAN remains torn between the US and China, many in the region are waking up to the dangers of betting that Beijing’s rise is irreversible, and that the Western decline is terminal.

The first major conflict amongst the great powers in the 21st century has presented India with multiple challenges, including its long-standing reliance on Russian military supplies. But this hinge moment in world politics is also an opportunity for Delhi to increase its heft in the changing global balance. More immediately, the crisis in Ukraine demands that Delhi move on a war-footing towards a rapid modernisation and expansion of its domestic defence industrial base that is so critical for sustaining India’s strategic autonomy.

This column first appeared in the print edition on March 15, 2022 under the title ‘The great geopolitical reset’. The writer is a Senior Fellow with the Asia Society Policy Institute, Delhi and contributing editor on international affairs for The Indian Express



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Rekha Sharma writes: Police pleaded that the time was not right to file cases, despite the availability of evidence. Even more disturbing was the court’s acceptance of this plea.

The Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court, D N Patel, retired on March 12. Judges, for better or worse, are known and remembered through their judgments. If today we remember Justice H R Khanna and shall cherish his memory for a long time to come, it is because of his judgment in the ADM Jabalpur case, holding that personal liberty is inalienable even when the country is in a state of Emergency. Justice Patel too had a similar opportunity, through which he could have covered himself in glory. But he allowed it to pass.

The case before Chief Justice Patel pertained to a criminal writ petition filed by social activist Harsh Mander, whereby he sought directions to the Delhi Police to register FIRs against BJP leaders Anurag Thakur, Parvesh Verma, Kapil Mishra and Abhay Verma, for allegedly making hate speeches alluding to those protesting against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act. These speeches purportedly led to violence in North-East Delhi and reportedly resulted in the death of 53 persons, and caused injuries to several hundred. Before the matter was heard by the Chief Justice’s bench, it had come up before a bench presided over by Justice S Muralidhar on February 26, 2020. The speeches were captured on camera, and the videos of the same were played in court.

In one video, Anurag Thakur was seen raising the slogan “Desh ke gaddaron ko”, and egging the crowd to complete the same, which responded by saying “Goli maro….ko”. The same slogan was allegedly repeated by Abhay Verma, a sitting MLA. In another video, Kapil Mishra, with DCP North-East Delhi standing by his side, was seen telling the crowd, “I am making one thing clear… we will hold our peace till Trump leaves. After that, if Jaffrabad and Chandbagh are not cleared in three days we will have to hit the streets…”. In yet another video, Parvesh Verma, MP, allegedly compared the protestors at Shaheen Bagh with those who were behind turning Kashmiri Pandits out of Kashmir, and also warned that such people could enter their homes, and rape their mothers and daughters.

After watching the videos, the court asked why no FIRs were registered on the basis of the same. In response, the Government of India, represented by no less a person than the Solicitor General, came with all guns blazing to defend the police’s action in turning a blind eye to speeches which, prima facie, answered the description of “hate speech”, and threatened to disturb the peace and harmony between different religious groups in terms of section 153A(a) and (b) of IPC. In his order, Justice Muralidhar noted that the refrain of the SG’s submission has been that the time was not “appropriate” or “conducive” for the registration of FIRs in relation to those clips. On being asked by the bench what would be the conducive time, the SG said that it was not possible for him to give any timeframe. The court asked the police to seriously consider the consequences that would ensue with each day’s delay in registering the FIRs. It posted the matter for February 27, 2020, after the Special Commissioner of Police assured the court that he would himself view all the videos, not limited to those placed in court, and take a conscious decision, which would be communicated to the court on the following day.

On February 26 itself, close to midnight, a notification was issued transferring Justice Muralidhar to the Punjab & Haryana High Court with immediate effect. Consequently, on the following day, the matter came before the Chief Justice’s bench. The SG submitted that the police were in the process of examining the audio/video clips, and that considering the complexity of the matter, they needed four weeks’ time to take a final decision. The court agreed to the request, and adjourned, posting the case for further hearing on April 13, 2020.

The court did not even bother to find out whether the Special Commissioner of Police had examined the videos, and taken a conscious decision on the same as per his submission before Justice Muralidhar’s bench. Besides, the police, which was obliged to promptly register an FIR on the apparent commission of cognisable offences and on account of Justice Muralidhar’s observations, got a reprieve. How could the police, which is supposed to maintain law and order at all cost, not register cases against the persons appearing in the videos, and hide behind the plea that the time was not appropriate and conducive for such an action? The plea, besides being not supported by any law, was frivolous and untenable. More disturbing was the ready acceptance of this plea by the court — which, under the Constitution, is the custodian and protector of the life and liberty of the people — when the videos prima facie showed that a particular community was being targeted. By adjourning the case to a distant date, the court put the same on the back-burner. In July 2020, the petitioner withdrew the writ petition, reserving his right to approach the jurisdictional court. His frustration can well be imagined when he decided to withdraw the petition although the jurisdiction to grant the relief rested in the High Court as well.

The heavens would not have fallen if the FIRs had been registered. Even if they were to fall, then, in the words of Lord Mansfield, “Let justice be done though heavens fall”.

This column first appeared in the print edition on March 15, 2022 under the title ‘Justice on back-burner’. The writer is a former judge of the Delhi High Court



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Prakash Karat writes: His theory drew upon the tradition of anti-colonial, anti-imperialist movements. His contributions to the intellectual resources of the Left movement will remain an enduring legacy

Professor Aijaz Ahmad, who passed away last week in Irvine, California, was one of the foremost Marxist intellectuals of our times. His significance as a Marxist theoretician came to prominence in the period after the retreat of socialism in the late 1980s, which led to the dismantling of the Soviet Union in 1991.

His erudition and talents were wide-ranging. He began his work as an Urdu writer and literary critic. He taught literary studies and cultural criticism at various universities in the West. He studied and wrote on philosophy, political economy and current world affairs.

Aijaz’s Marxism rose out of the tradition of anti-colonial, anti-imperialist movements for national liberation. This was enriched and synthesised with the Marxist thought emanating from the world’s metropolitan centres in the Sixties and Seventies. Thus, Aijaz was uniquely positioned to defend and nurture Marxist theory when many Western intellectuals abandoned Marxism in the post-Soviet era. He took on the series of post-Marxist, post-modern and post-colonial theories which pervaded academia in the West and which soon became influential in society.

His book In Theory: Classes, Nations, Literatures was first published in 1992. This work became a classic as it provided an effective and devastating critique of the philosophical and ideological positions of various “post” ideologies from the Marxist standpoint. The introduction of the book is a tour de force that provides the global historical context for the present conjuncture and the contradictions which are still unfolding in the world. This is a book that equipped Left-oriented students and the younger generation amongst the intelligentsia to take on post-modernism and other similar so-called radical narratives.

In the mid-Eighties, Aijaz came to India, the land of his birth, and lived here for three decades. He had a long stint as a Fellow at the Nehru Memorial Museum in Delhi. It is around this time that he wrote In Theory, and began thinking and writing about political and social developments in the country. Internationally, the demise of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War had brought about US hegemonic influence in all spheres, including culture and ideology.

In India, the twin processes of liberalisation leading to neo-liberal policies and the rise of Hindutva forces had begun. Aijaz was deeply engaged in studying and analysing these features. His essays and lectures on the rise of Hindutva, situating it in the background of the rise of the far-right worldwide and his continuing brilliant analysis of the nature of the RSS project to recast the Indian state by a long march through its institutions, has contributed to a better understanding of the Indian Left about these forces and what they portend.

At the global level, Aijaz engaged himself in looking at imperialism in the post-Cold War era. The war in Iraq and other wars of aggression by the United States and NATO forces were analysed to show how they were part of the imperialist project of world hegemony. Here again, he effectively combated the views of many Western Marxist scholars who argued that imperialism is no more a relevant category in the globalised capitalist world.

Aijaz was not an armchair academic. He always connected with movements against imperialism, national oppression and racism. In his years in India, he spent a lot of time giving talks to students and activist groups to help them to understand revolutionary theory.

For Aijaz, Marxist theory was never static. It always had to be linked to praxis. As to his own method, he said: “Whether it is the complete text of Marx or the very complex projects of Hindutva, there is no such thing as a final understanding beyond which one needs to go. One must always return to take another look, to think anew, and to reach a deeper understanding.”

Aijaz had a warm and engaging personality. He had the sensibility of a poet along with a razor-sharp intellect. He was always keen to forge new friendships and learn new things about the varied culture of India. I was fortunate to have had him as a friend for over two decades. The regular conversations we had were intellectually stimulating and he opened the doors for me to new books and ideas.

His last years were poignant due to his unfulfilled desire to live and die in his homeland. After living precariously on visa after visa, when it became clear that he would never get Indian citizenship because of his stint in Pakistan as a young man, he departed to take up the Chair of Comparative of Literature at the University of California, Irvine. Despite the prestigious chair that he held, he longed to be back in India. The last eight years of his life were, according to him, the life of an “exile”.

For his numerous friends and comrades in India, his works and contributions to the intellectual resources of the Left movement will remain an enduring legacy.

This column first appeared in the print edition on March 15, 2022 under the title ‘A Marxist for our times’. The writer is former general secretary, CPM



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Ashok K Mehta writes: Several alumni of the Rashtriya Indian Military College, Dehradun, have distinguished themselves in service of the nation.

Rashtriya Indian Military College (RIMC), Dehradun, previously the Prince of Wales Royal Indian Military College, turned 100 years young on Sunday. Pakistani cadets had departed from the college at the time of Partition. None of the 163 Pakistan old boys is around to call himself a Rimcollian though they started their own RIMC at Hassan Abdal, with the redoubtable Hugh Catchpole — whom India did not give an extension — as principal.

India’s most charismatic general and army chief, K S Thimayya (Timmy) was an alumnus. He remained unruffled even after a spat with Defence Minister V K Krishna Menon led him to resign, though he was cajoled out of it by Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. He was the first Indian to command a brigade in World War II, and my battalion 2/5 Royal Gurkha Rifles, was assigned to his brigade in Japan where he pre-empted a mutiny in the paltan. Generals Gopal Bewoor, V N (Titch) Sharma and S Padmanabhan (Paddy), all of whom went on to lead the army, also graduated from RIMC. Padmanabhan was desperate to smash the Pakistan army during Operation Parakram in 2001 but the then Defence Minister Jaswant Singh, a soldier himself, restrained him. The Air Chiefs who graduated from RIMC are Nirmal Suri and Birendra Dhanoa (of Balakot fame). Lt Gen C P Mohanty, who retired as Vice Chief Army in January, missed becoming the fifth Rimcollian Army Chief by a whisker.

Today, two of the six operational army commands are held by Rimcollians (a third will be added on April 1) while three Vice Admirals and two Air Marshals adorn the other two services. Other alumni, who distinguished themselves are Major Generals Shah Nawaz Khan and J K Bhonsle; the former had joined the INA. One army, two air force chiefs and one navy chief in Pakistan also graduated from Dehradun.
In 1996, Sharma led a dozen and more mainly flag rank officers to Pakistan when Maj Gen Naseerullah Khan Babar, a Rimcollian, was interior minister to Benazir Bhutto. Tongue in cheek, Dawn newspaper carried the headline, ‘Indian Generals invade Pakistan’. Our meeting in Rawalpindi with the colourful Colonel Inayatullah Hassan, who used to brew his own beer in his basement, was unforgettable. He offered his indigenous brew, which I politely refused. Reluctantly, he climbed a stool and pulled out from behind some books, a hidden bottle of White Horse. Sheepishly, he announced it belonged to fellow Rimcollian, General Gul Hassan, a retired army chief who came around routinely to sniff it, and occasionally, to take a sip.

In 1997, at RIMC’s platinum jubilee, a large contingent of Pakistani old boys arrived in Dehradun, led by former Air Chief, Asghar Khan. They were delighted at returning to school and revisiting their dormitories and sprung beds, which had not been shifted. Maj Taj Mohammad Khanzada, DSO, MC was as excited as a 12-year-old, showing his family his bed and cupboard.

RIMC was raised as Imperial Cadet College (Rajwada Camp) on March 13, 1922, with 27 cadets mainly from princely families; it also included ordinary people like Hiralal Atal, who was the first cadet captain and later became the first adjutant general of the Army. He asked Savitri Khanolkar to design the Param Vir Chakra, which was won for the first time by Maj Somnath Sharma, who died in action in Kashmir in 1947. Similarly, the first Indian officer to win the Victoria Cross was Prem Bhagat. Both were Rimcollians.

As part of the celebrations, Rimcollian old boys will play cricket, hockey and squash with younger cadets, whom they will probably trounce because the umpires and referees are old boys. Around 500 Rimcollians with families will commemorate the centenary and much fun and joy will be had.

This column first appeared in the print edition on March 15, 2022 under the title ‘Soldiers’ credo’. The writer, a retired Lieutenant general of the Indian Army, is an alumnus of Rashtriya Indian Military College



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Coomi Kapoor writes: The opposition has to take on a behemoth well-entrenched in government, bureaucracy, politics and the media

There is a pall of gloom over those who are not fans of Prime Minister Narendra Modi after his confident claim that the 2022 results would determine the fate of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, and they are a reflection of the country’s thinking for the next 25 years. It is not just political parties who are concerned, but also those who believe that a robust opposition is the only way to stave off the hegemony of an autocratic, single-party rule in a democratic polity. Modi’s electoral machinery has once again shattered conventional assumptions in Indian politics. In the post-Mandal era, caste identity is not necessarily the defining factor in voter preference. In bipolar contests, voter swings are not always determined by anti-incumbency. Assumptions that the government would pay the price for its blunders of the last two years, including its handling of the Covid-19 pandemic, dogmatically taking on the powerful farmer lobby and the economic slowdown, were all proved incorrect.

The fight between the ruling establishment and its opponents appears to be a David versus Goliath contest. The opposition has to take on a behemoth well-entrenched in government, bureaucracy, politics and the media. Its cadre based, 24X7 electoral machine takes full advantage of the latest technology in sample surveys and communications. The BJP’s carefully thought-out social engineering has created an inclusive umbrella in which even disparate castes from non-Yadav OBCs, SCs, once considered die-hard Mayawati loyalists, and Jats, angered by the government’s farm laws, have come together. The conspicuous absentees are the Muslims. Its opponents argue that battling the Modi juggernaut is like playing with a loaded dice: Whenever the chips are down, the BJP attempts to polarise society on communal lines. But the Hindutva card cannot explain success in states like Goa, Uttarakhand and Manipur and, in this campaign, even Yogi emphasised his development work more than Hindutva, though he did make some overtly communal remarks.

The BJP’s bigger asset is, of course, Narendra Modi. His appeal cuts across caste, income levels and all social strata. Modi gets the credit for the social welfare measures at the grassroots, whether gas cylinders, toilets or free rations. These schemes are noteworthy for their remarkably effective, unbiased delivery system reliant on an impersonal computerised list. The difference in Modi’s welfare measures from the past is that the beneficiaries were earlier dependent on corrupt intermediaries, a reality which even Rajiv Gandhi as Prime Minister once ruefully acknowledged. While Modi deserves the maximum credit for the UP win, Yogi Adityanath’s contribution as a hands-on CM who maintained law and order in the state, even if the police resort at times to high-handed methods cannot be ignored.

Ironically, one of the biggest contributors to the BJP’s victories was the opposition. In Goa, for instance, it was not just new entrants such as the AAP and TMC that whittled down the Congress vote share; even the infant Revolutionary Goans Party played a part in depriving the Congress of victory in constituencies that were earlier considered safe in south Goa. The BJP won several seats by narrow margins. The BJP’s vote percentage in the state in 2022 is 33.31, a mere one per cent more than 2017, when it decisively lost the elections, capturing only 13 out of 40 seats. This time, with practically the same vote share, it was victorious in 20 seats.

The index of opposition unity, which our pollsters are fond of expounding upon, was actually higher in Uttar Pradesh. It was not that there were fewer opposition parties in UP but the SP effectively grabbed the main opposition space at the expense of others. This explains why although the BJP vote share this time, at 41 per cent, was nearly 2 per cent higher than 2017, its seat tally came down by 57. The SP, which won 111 seats, had an impressive 32 per cent vote share. The BSP got only 13 per cent of the votes, down from around 22.2 per cent in 2017. The grand old party, despite Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s feisty antics, got a mere 2.3 per cent, down from 6.2 per cent last time. And yet the Congress had made it a prestige issue that it would contest alone and not in an alliance with the rest of the opposition.

As the Congress party disintegrates, since the entitled Gandhi family refuses to read the writing on the wall, the number of contenders for the opposition space has grown. The Gandhis, however, cocooned in their ivory tower, remain serenely convinced that they are the fulcrum for the rest of the opposition and the only moral bulwark against the communal BJP. The Gandhi siblings refuse to step down from their lead roles in their party, though they lurch from one blunder to the next — Punjab and Uttarakhand being the most recent examples, where defeat was wrested from the jaws of victory by whimsical, rash and ill-conceived decisions. With AAP’s convincing victory in Punjab, there is one more contender for the beleaguered Congress’s place. The advantage of the newbie is that it is led by a fresh face in his early fifties in a field crowded with those who are either founders or inheritors of political dynasties. Arvind Kejriwal is a face which north India, where the bulk of the country’s votes are from, can relate to — unlike most regional leaders.

In politics, it is always premature to make long-term projections. From my years in political journalism, I have learnt one lesson: Things seldom remain static and situations can change overnight. Remember the sudden transformation of the public mood during Manmohan Singh’s tenure when Anna Hazare launched his movement. Even the mighty Indira Gandhi, who we once assumed was invincible, tripped up in the 1977 general elections. She never believed that the rag-tag squabbling opposition leaders would ever join hands. The then opposition sacrificed individual egos and ambitions, because in the draconian days of the Emergency, they realised that if they did not all act together, they would be decimated individually. The future of India’s polity in the next quarter of a century depends not on the ruling party alone but on the opposition as well.

This column first appeared in the print edition on March 15, 2022 under the title ‘Victory & health warning’. The writer is consulting editor, The Indian Express



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The Karnataka high court has ruled that wearing of hijab is not an essential religious practice under Islam and thereby curbs on wearing it in educational institutions are a reasonable restriction under Article 25 of the Constitution that protects religious freedoms. The court upheld a February 5 government order mandating that uniforms prescribed by the respective college development committees and private managements must be adhered to by all students.

The verdict came on petitions filed by Muslim students who claimed a fundamental right to wear the hijab. Opposition by Hindutva groups to students wearing hijab led to considerable mob violence and college closures prompting the Karnataka government to issue an order leaving the appropriate uniform to respective college managements. It is certain that appeals to the Supreme Court will now ensue.

The high court’s method of analysing whether the government order withstood the essential religious practice test was followed in the Sabarimala judgment too where the Supreme Court ruled that curbs on women entering the temple was violative of their fundamental rights. The HC also rejected contentions that the right to free expression of the hijab wearing students was violated. It noted that a uniform did not discriminate between students and that in “qualified public places like schools, courts, war rooms, defence camps, etc., the freedom of individuals as of necessity, is curtailed consistent with their discipline and decorum and function and purpose”.

With the verdict likely to have repercussions across India, all eyes will be on the judicial, political and communal trajectories of this issue.



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Trustees of the Employee’s Provident Fund last week recommended an interest of 8.1% on the fund’s accumulations for 2021-22 – the lowest interest rate since 1977-78, when a rate of 8% was notified. But a blind comparison of interest rates over time can be misleading as the financial instruments available to EPF have been expanded to include equities. Yet, shortcomings of India’s huge social security scheme remain unresolved.

EPFO had 46.2 million contributing members at the end of FY 2020-21. Its legal mandate covers three separate schemes, of which EPF and Pension Scheme are the most important. However, these two schemes are intertwined as the PF deductions and an employer’s contribution are spread across them. Returns on EPF are linked to the investment performance but the Pension Scheme is hybrid – there is a partial government guarantee built into it. Most accumulated funds are directed into debt instruments – over Rs 14 lakh crore at the end of FY21. About 50% of this is invested in GoI and state government debt. Interest rates have trended downwards over the last three years and returns on EPF have followed suit. In 2020-21, the yield on debt investments was just 6.8%.

So, how does EPFO declare returns over 8%? Extra return comes from investing up to 15% of the annual inflows into financial instruments linked to equities. The risk-return profiles of EPF and Pension Scheme have changed over the last few years. However, there’s inadequate information on what’s happening to this retirement saving scheme, which is growing fast because of EPF’s mandatory nature and GoI subsidies to formalise jobs. Publicly available data on EPFO’s investments is scanty. This heightens concerns on lowering returns when retail inflation is firming up, even though the broad logic of lowering the rate is right.

EPFO needs to be more transparent about details of its investments. Separately, the Pension Scheme needs timely actuarial assessments as there is a sovereign guarantee involved. These are pretty urgent as the number of organised sector workers as well as pensioners is going to grow, and markets and the economy will face many uncertainties for a while.



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Improving maternal health is a multi-sectoral endeavour – encompassing better access to inputs ranging from education and nutrition to contraceptives and institutional delivery. So the welcome decrease in India’s maternal mortality ratio from 122 to 103 (maternal deaths per lakh live births) between 2015-17 and 2017-19, shown by SRS data, is actually the fruit of multiple interventions. Likewise, further improvements will also need sustained effort along all relevant vectors. India’s SDG target is to bring its MMR below 70 by 2030, which it can well meet in advance. Beyond this it should take inspiration from countries that have already brought their MMR down to single digits – like Belarus, Poland and the UK.

Large disparities in states’ performances need to be understood and  addressed. Kerala’s MMR improved from 42 to 30, suggesting it kept pushing up standards from an already high level. UP continues to have among the highest MMRs in the country at 167, but it has delivered a dramatic 49 points improvement from 216. By contrast, Bengal’s performance worsened from 94 to 109. State- or region-wise solutions will vary. One may need to focus on increasing marriage age and another, on increasing antenatal care visits. The Centre too needs to assess different schemes objectively and increase investment or undertake reform where needed. An issue that needs disentangling is why the distribution of iron and folic acid supplements has not reduced severe anaemia, as envisioned.

The most immediate nationwide need is to take stock of how the pandemic has hurt reproductive care services, to ensure that hard-won gains are not seriously reversed. Institutional deliveries, a core factor in improving MMR, took a hit. As did women’s access to Asha workers and their health counselling. The list goes on. The important question is whether all such services are now back on track, as Covid deaths drop back to the level of the pandemic’s initial weeks. India has seen health interventions improve health outcomes. But it can do much better.



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Close to four million students shifted to State-run schools in 2020-21, according to the Union ministry of education’s Unified District Information System for Education (UDISE+) report. The report shows that the bulk of the drop in the enrolment from pre-primary to Class 12 was found in the early classes (enrolment in pre-primary and first grade fell by 2.9 million and 1.9 million respectively) and that nearly 75% of schools did not have internet facilities and 59% had no computer facilities.

When read together with the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) survey and Azim Premji University’s field studies, it becomes clear that financial distress precipitated by the pandemic, the inability of many schools to conduct online classes, and migration caused by lockdowns have ravaged the education sector. Before Covid, stakeholders were concerned with what they called a “crisis of learning”. This has been exacerbated by Covid, but the UDISE+ data shines a light on what can be done.

For one, invest in government schools, in terms of teachers and infrastructure such as computers and internet connectivity. This also means a different training mode for teachers and the development of educational material that can be used for online classes. Many parents may still not have the wherewithal to enrol their children in pre-primary classes. These children must be identified and brought back to classrooms. A significant challenge is the learning loss due to the pandemic and the extended closure of schools. While schools have now reopened, the focus should be on reversing the learning loss and ensuring that any future infection spikes don’t harm learning levels the same way.



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Is the hijab an essential practice enshrined in Islam and is the Karnataka government violating constitutional rights by asking students to stick to school uniform? According to the Karnataka high court (HC), the answer to both questions is a resounding no. In a verdict on Tuesday, a three-judge bench dismissed petitions by female students who were barred by their colleges from wearing the hijab while attending classes. The court offered three reasons for its ruling: One, the hijab was not dictated by Islamic rule or the Quran and was mainly a cultural phenomenon that couldn’t pass the test of essentiality, as devised by the Supreme Court. Two, the State has the power to decide what students should wear in the classroom and can delegate that power to colleges. And three, the prescription of a uniform for classrooms was reasonable and did not violate any constitutionally protected rights.

This is the first time that a constitutional court in India has assessed the practice of wearing the hijab on the touchstone of essential practices. Just like with the 2018 Sabarimala verdict, its decision is unlikely to stem the swirling row – the petitioners have decided to approach the Supreme Court, some women have been refused entry into examination halls because they refused to remove the hijab and mobilisation on this issue is unlikely to die down anytime soon. Two points merit attention. In its closing paragraphs, the judges point to “unseen hands” that fomented unrest. It should not escape scrutiny that the ban on hijab came suddenly, in the middle of the academic session, and after years of local communities negotiating relaxations in the uniform code. It is also instructive that the incidents happened in a communally sensitive region where the discourse has become increasingly polarised.

The biggest casualty in the whole row is the education of vulnerable women. Government data shows Muslim women suffer from poor educational indices and school enrolment, with numbers far below the national average, and greatly depend on government institutions. To deny them education, and, therefore, an avenue to stand up to patriarchy, orthodoxy and poverty is a travesty. The HC has confirmed the right of schools to decide on uniforms but they should take into account the socioeconomic backgrounds of the students, and work to ensure that they are not forced to drop out. History and contemporary examples show that educated and empowered women are the best antidotes to dogma and orthodoxy. No one should stand in their way.



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The efforts of the Union ministry of Ayush (Ayurveda, Yoga, Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha, Sowa-Rigpa and Homoeopathy) in the recent past have elicited applause from the highest echelons of the political and constitutional authorities of the country. The ministry came into independent existence only seven years ago but the inherent strength of the Indian systems of health care and well-being, coupled with the zeal and vision of a very committed team, has charted an exponential growth path that has influenced the mindset not only of Indians but also the world. The Ayush sector has posted respectable growth in recent years and the importance of Ayurveda and Yoga has been acknowledged the world over during the pandemic.

Had it not been for the visionary support and strategic push to Ayush by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the synergised support garnered through governmental and non-governmental stakeholders would not have been possible. In a short span of time, the Ayush ministry has collaborated with more than 50 countries for the promotion of Ayurveda, Yoga and other Ayush streams, a testimony that the global academia and research fraternity is realising the strength and efficacy of Ayurveda and other Ayush streams.

The variety and range of topics for these collaborations range from pure science to experimental domains of applied sciences. One such example was the agreement between American Herbal Pharmacopoeia and Pharmacopoeia Commission for Indian Medicine and Homoeopathy (PCIMH), which laid the foundation for a significant pathway that will have far-reaching consequences for Indian traditional medicines in both the United States (US) and Europe and symbolise the growing importance of globally uniform pharmacopeial standards for traditional medicine. The ministry of Ayush has signed country-to-country memorandums of understanding (MOUs)) for research collaboration, establishing academic chairs of Ayush in foreign universities, setting up Ayurveda, Ayush hospitals, academic institutes, herbal gardens, exchange of experts, workshops and conferences.

Every year, 104 seats are allocated to foreign students to learn Ayurveda, Yoga, Unani and other Ayush systems. As of now, the ministry has signed 25 country-to-country MoUs with Nepal, Bangladesh, Hungary, Myanmar, Germany, Iran, China and Brazil, among others. Apart from this, 32 MoUs for undertaking collaborative research and academic collaborations have been signed with foreign institutes or universities and 14 agreements for setting up Ayush academic chairs have been finalised with foreign institutes; 37 Ayush information cells have been set up in 34 countries to disseminate authentic information. Ayurveda Day and the International Day of Yoga (IDY) are also being celebrated every year.

The re-designated World Health Organization Collaborative Centre (WHOCC) at the Institute of Teaching and Research in Ayurveda (ITRA), Jamnagar, has been given an extension for another four years, from April 2021 to April 2025. This collaboration started in 2013 in recognition of the knowledge-based expert services and specialties of ITRA in the field of Ayurveda. ITRA has taken up many activities such as the rationalisation and standardisation of health promotion guidelines of Ayurveda, development of standard Ayurveda treatment protocols for lifestyle disorders, orientation training programmes for foreign and national medical professionals on evidence-based uses of Ayurveda, development of strategic measures and capacity-building programmes for strengthening the pharmaco-vigilance of traditional medicines, among others.

The ministry is involved in collaborative research activities with many countries such as a randomised double-blind placebo-controlled crossover study of individualised Ayurveda management in sub-optimally controlled Type 2 diabetes mellitus being done by the Central Council for Research in Ayurvedic Sciences (CCRAS), ministry of Ayush, Government of India, University of Latvia (UL) and Arya Vaidya Pharmacy.

The Covid-19 pandemic has given the world an opportunity to think seriously about prevention and wellness. “Swasthasya Swasthyarakshanam (preserving the health and wellness of a healthy person)” — a concept well defined in the Charaka Samhita, one of the prime scriptures of Ayurveda — is the focus of the global community these days. The ministry of Ayush, along with reputed foreign institutes and organisations from the United States, the United Kingdom (UK), Germany, Brazil, and South Africa, has initiated clinical trials on mutually identified Ayush formulations to aid the recovery of patients suffering from Covid-19.

The All India Institute of Ayurveda and London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, UK, have signed an agreement on July 22, 2021, to conduct a randomised, placebo-controlled double-blind trial study on “Ashwagandha for promoting recovery from Covid-19 in the UK”. Furthermore, the All India Institute of Ayurveda is involved with Frankfurter Innovations zentrum Biotechnologie GmbH (FIZ), Frankfurt, in developing a project on understanding the “molecular mechanism of Guduchyadi tablets in combating Covid-19 infection- in-vitro & in-vivo study”.

The ministry of Ayush developed a mechanism for an accreditation scheme for Ayurveda courses across the globe which are not covered under any regulatory body to bring uniformity and standardisation to Ayurveda education. Under its ambit, the ministry has recognised Ayurveda and Yoga courses conducted by the Maharishi European Research University, Netherlands. The ministry is also exploring possibilities for the establishment of a European Institute of Ayurvedic Sciences (EIAS) in the University of Debrecen, Hungary. The ministry has deputed an Ayurveda expert at the Yoga and Traditional Medicine Centre, Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, and is in the process of deputing an Ayurveda expert at the Panchakarma centre established in Cuba.

This is not an exhaustive narration, but it suffices, I feel, to give a broader idea that the growth of Ayurveda, based on its innate potential for the wellbeing of humanity on a scientific base, has moved beyond an irreversible tipping point.

Sarbananda Sonowal is the Union minister for Ayush, and the minister for ports, shipping and waterways 

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The war against Ukraine by Russia has entered a perilous phase on multiple fronts, as a thaw between Kyiv and Moscow seems unlikely in the coming weeks with Europe, backed by the United States (US) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), applying hard sanctions and decoupling political and economic relations with President Vladimir Putin. In midst of this chaos, private citizens or “foreign fighters” have been both courted by Ukraine and promoted by some Western leaders to take up arms. This trend is problematic.

An Indian citizen from Tamil Nadu studying at Kharkiv University joined the Ukrainian side to fight the Russians. The United Kingdom’s foreign secretary Liz Truss backed British citizens travelling to fight Russia in Ukraine, and other European States also offered a lackadaisical response to their citizens looking to fight in the war. According to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, 16,000 foreigners have signed up to take up arms in support of the country.

The idea of foreigners travelling to fight for a cause is not new and can be traced back to conflicts such as the American and Spanish civil wars. However, more recently, the idea of travelling abroad to join conflicts has been attributed to jihadist groups and movements across the world, specifically from Europe, of Muslims looking to join the so-called Islamic State (IS) in Syria and Iraq. As a result, many academic and policy imperatives were mobilised to better understand this phenomenon and curtail such movements. However, over Ukraine, the same security threats seem to be not only acceptable strategic responses, but even promoted towards developing a larger insurgency infrastructure in the country.

This sudden acceptance of the concept of foreign fighters by some Western States and analysts reeks of opportunism and double standards. Many European States to date have their citizens who had joined IS languishing in makeshift prisons in Iraq and Syria, not knowing whether to integrate them back, imprison them at home, or outrightly cancel their citizenship due to their association with a proscribed terrorist group. And with the rise of far-Right groups and politics in the West, how will Ukraine as a conflict theatre be disallowed to become an ideological incubation chamber?

Analysts have recognised far-Right, neo-Nazi, and White supremacist groups not only gaining political strength, but organising tactically as well. In February 2021, US secretary of defense, Lloyd Austin, intensified the Pentagon’s efforts to clamp down on far-Right and White supremacist supporters within the American military ranks after the attack on Capitol Hill in Washington DC. Questions remain on how these fighters in Ukraine will be monitored for issues such as war crimes, conventions that govern conflicts, and their reintegration back into society. Double standards could undo work done by States to treat the issue of foreign fighters for what it is — a national security threat.

India is also one of the countries that strengthened its policy and legal response to foreign fighters only in 2015, considering the threat posed by IS. Even then, it was not due to the sporadic cases of Indians who joined IS in Syria or Afghanistan, but when thousands of Shiite Muslims answered a call by Delhi-based Shiite group Anjuman-e-Haideri to send them to places such as Karbala and Najaf in Iraq in order to protect Shiite shrines from IS attacks. While India has taken back some of its citizens that joined IS, it has also refused to take others, where reintegrating them legally and societally was a challenge. An increasing trend of privatisation of conflict is worrying, with countries such as Russia deploying private mercenaries like the Wagner Group to consolidate geopolitical interests, Turkey reportedly using fighters hired from Syria during the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war and so on. Finding merit in private citizens bolstering the Ukrainian frontline, while alliances such as NATO balk at getting involved militarily is a recipe for disaster, with implications on conflict strategy, and possibly giving weight to arguments such as “one man’s war is terrorism, and another’s fighting for freedom”.

Kabir Taneja is fellow, strategic studies programme, Observer Research Foundation. He is the author of The ISIS Peril: The World’s Most Feared Terror Group and its Shadow on South Asia 

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There is both clarity and ambiguity in Washington at the moment.

The clarity is with regard to Moscow. Across the American political spectrum, President Vladimir Putin is seen as the problem. There is relief at the return of Western unity, cheer about the belated European assertion on security, glee about how American intelligence got it right, hunger for more retributive measures, but supplemented with uncertainty about how the war will end.

This clarity is accompanied with ambiguity about Beijing. All segments of United States (US) political opinion and the strategic community see China as an adversary. But within that framework, three schools of thought have emerged.

The first sees China as an economic and technological competitor — but one that merits strategic accommodation. China is ambitious and distinct, but not out to wreck the global system, and, therefore, distinct from Russia. What flows from this view is that the US needs to boost its competitiveness, reduce dependence on China, but also find ways to work together and resolve geopolitical crises, including Ukraine.

The second school of thought has no illusions that China is a long-term economic, technological, military and strategic adversary; it is also aware of the Russia-China bond in recent years. But in the short-term, it senses Beijing’s discomfort over Russia’s action, and, therefore, an opportunity to wean Beijing away from Moscow. This would, in the best-case scenario from the American perspective, involve Beijing playing a “constructive” role in bringing the conflict to an end, but at the very least, entail Beijing not backing Russia in its military, geopolitical and information war objectives.

And the third view holds that the Beijing-Moscow axis is far more powerful than assumed, Xi Jinping and Putin have a chemistry, there is a structural logic to their relationship, both oppose the West-dominated global order and democratic political systems, possible Chinese assistance to Russia is evidence of this convergence, and investing hopes in Beijing would be a mistake. In fact, this school argues that the US runs the risk of ignoring the real battleground (Indo-Pacific), Washington does not have the attention span or resources or geopolitical strength to focus on two theatres simultaneously, and while it inflicts costs on Russia, its resource investment and military posture should be focused on Asia.

While all three impulses find a home within the administration, at the moment, the second school of thought is dominant. Tone down the aggressive public rhetoric vis-a-vis China, maintain intense private dialogue, adopt a carrot-and-stick approach (warn China that arms supplies Russia would be a redline; politely remind Beijing of how this moment offers the Middle Kingdom an opportunity to be a great, responsible power), and wait to see how Beijing plays its cards. This is the approach that the Europeans, who continue to hedge their bets on China, are most comfortable with too.

The next step in this dance will depend on Beijing’s response. It has three choices.

One, it can throw in its lot entirely with Russia — if it indeed wants to inaugurate a new phase of intense competition with the West, this is the moment. But there are indications that China recognises the costs of this approach, and while it is comfortable sharpening contradictions with its neighbours, it does not want to antagonise US and Europe entirely.

Two, it can continue to play the balancing act with a clear, pronounced tilt towards Moscow — so work with Moscow but also engage with Washington, Paris, Brussels, and Berlin; oppose sanctions in principle but find ways to work around it without getting shut out of the global economy; speak of sovereignty, but also defend Russia’s security interests; abstain from votes that condemn Russia but support Russia’s overall narrative against the West.

And three, it can actually project itself as a peacemaker, using its leverage with Moscow to dilute Russian demands but also working with the West to get Ukraine to accept a settlement. This is what Israel and Turkey are attempting to do, but if China enters the peacemaking theatre, the game changes. If it chooses the second or third option, China’s geopolitical value increases — and it can seek concessions on the wider relationship from the US in return.

What does all of this mean for India?

Those in Delhi who entertained the grand hope that the US would wean Russia away from China, and Washington and Moscow and Delhi could happily work together to counter Beijing, can bid their dreams goodbye. Those who assumed that US hostility to China was now a permanent and enduring fact, across all domains, may also need to revise their assumptions, at least in the short-term.

But, at the same time, those who assume that a possible US-China reset on a set of limited issues will suddenly transform Washington’s orientation towards Asia entirely are probably taking a leap too far. American security interests, partnerships, equities in the region are too deep for these to be bartered away; the US’s suspicion of Chinese intent and capabilities (as documented in the intelligence community’s latest annual threat assessment report) is now institutional; and American political mood towards China remains unforgiving. And so a reset may not necessarily mean a grand strategic deal aka 1971, and as long as there isn’t one, India can continue to rely on American strategic support on China.

But as the two major powers prepare to make choices based on their interests, calculations, and the political imperatives of the regimes in power, India must be prepared for shifting equations and a period of adjustment.

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In March 2012, a research scholar from the Harvard University, Dinyar Patel, wrote a series of articles in The New York Times titled: “The appalling condition of India’s archives, the reasons for the neglect and what can be done to fix the problem”. In the series, Patel flagged issues such as neglect, poor preservation of records, slow pace of digitisation, the lack of facilities for scholars, and the dearth of post-Independence records for historical research. He went on to say that country’s rotting history has a fighting chance for survival.

For nearly 10 years, The National Archives of India (attached to the Union ministry of culture), was without a regular head. In 2010, Mushirul Hasan, a former vice-chancellor, was appointed as a full-time director-general for three years. He added manpower and the conservation of huge corpus of fragile documents, appraisal and transfer of records of the post-Independence period was taken up in a mission mode. This resulted in the acquisition of nearly six lakh files from the ministries and departments. Further, approximately 2.5 lakh pages, including some rare manuscripts, were digitised. The National Archives also became an intellectual hub. Hasan reportedly told Patel, “I wanted to provide a corrective to institutional malaise.”

Historical background:

The National Archives was established as the Imperial Record Department in Calcutta (Kolkata) on March 11, 1891. It moved to New Delhi in 1911, and its building was designed by Edwin Lutyens. It has the largest archival repository in South Asia with over six million files and records, dating back to early part of the British colonial rule. It also holds documents of the Mughal and the Sultanate periods. Besides, private collections of eminent Indians, cartographic records and microfilms are also preserved. The institution also boasts of possessing the largest collection of the rare Gilgit manuscripts, one of the oldest manuscripts pertaining to the 5th to the 6th century.

Today, the National Archives stands at the crossroads. With limited resources, managing the sheer volume of records --- estimated around 200 million pages --- is indeed a herculean task. The institution has recently embarked on the ambitious project of digitising approximately 45 million pages in a time-frame, disruption notwithstanding, particularly due to Covid-19. Old documents are being conserved scientifically by trained personnel. The issue of the dearth of post-Independence records has also been addressed to a large extent and the records have begun to flow in from the ministries and departments.

When the National Archives celebrated its 125th foundation day in 2016, it launched a search portal www.abhilekhpatal.in. Today, there are over 2.7 million reference media (catalogue), which scholars from over 80 countries are accessing. The portal now facilitates online access to documents through a payment gateway, a first-of-its-kind in Asia. The same year also saw the release of declassified files relating to Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose and the Indian National Army (INA) by the Prime Minister on January 23.

The Netaji portal provides public access to nearly 40,000 pages of the life and times of one of the stalwarts of the freedom movement. In 2017, the prime minister also inaugurated the centenary celebrations of the Champaran Satyagraha - the first mass movement launched by Mahatma Gandhi on by opening an exhibition. The same year, the National Archives was the knowledge partner in the celebrations of the centenary of Sabarmati Ashram in Ahmedabad. These events brought the century-old institution into limelight again.

Despite the limitations, the institution has improved vastly. However, it deserves better investment. The preservation of tangible documentary heritage is certainly the collective responsibility of various stakeholders.

Tassadaque Hussain is former deputy-director of archives, Government of India

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The just-concluded assembly elections in five states (Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur) will be remembered for several significant shifts in India’s politics. But as the dust settles, we risk forgetting one of the most critical initiatives ever taken by a political party in India: The Congress’ decision to give 40% of its tickets to women in Uttar Pradesh (UP). If the move fizzles out from public memory, it would be a big loss for the cause of gender diversity in Indian politics.

It was nobody’s guess right from the beginning that the Congress’ initiative was unlikely to boost the number of women in UP’s new assembly. But regardless of electoral outcomes the decision remains a laudable one. Given the Congress’ shrinking relevance in India’s politics, it is highly likely that few will be encouraged to follow in its footsteps. It won’t be surprising if the party itself abandons this policy going forward. But women’s representation is a matter of equal rights, not a tool to be used instrumentally only for electoral gains.

The discussion around women’s dismal representation in India’s legislatures is woefully inadequate, and rarely goes beyond the women’s reservation bill that most political parties swear by and commit to in their manifestoes. Yet, the bill has been stuck in limbo for over two decades. The impasse seems to have been normalised to such an extent that all the conversation around it - if any - is repetitive, and lacks imagination. It then falls on the political parties to show their mythical commitment by fielding enough women on their own. The Congress did that in UP.

In India, the singular focus on the bill as a panacea means we have paid little attention to the fact that quotas can take many forms, and they can include voluntary quotas adopted by political parties. Well-designed quotas continue to make a critical difference to women’s representation in politics globally, research by the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) has shown year after year. The most recent IPU report on women in parliaments found that among the countries that held parliamentary elections in 2021, 30 had some form of quota system in place. But while countries with legislated quotas elected 31.8% women on average, the ones where political parties adopted voluntary quotas elected 32% women.

Iceland, Norway, Netherlands - countries known for gender equality, and with high shares of women in their parliaments - all have ensured high representation because political parties have internal policies to ensure representation of women at the candidate level, not because the law reserves seats for women.

In India, on the other hand, male-dominated political parties continue to be the biggest roadblocks for women to enter and rise in politics. And nearly all of them have abdicated responsibility to address this striking gap in our electoral democracy. For nearly all political parties, women’s role in politics seems to begin and end as voters. Election after election, the focus on the “woman vote” grows. In the 2022 polls, parties in the fray went all out promising cash transfers to women in addition to cooking gas cylinders, two-wheelers, and free travel in public transport.

It is in this context that the Congress’ decision (despite the party’s embarrassing failure) was a refreshing change in the usual fatigued discourse on women’s representation in India’s politics. The Biju Janata Dal and the Trinamool Congress had tried - more successfully - a similar policy in the Lok Sabha election of 2019, but neither party stayed committed to the policy when they contested subsequent assembly elections.

Seventy five women have been elected as MLAs in the 690 seats across the five states that just held elections. Together they make up a cumulative share of 10.9%, ranging from 7.5% in Goa to 11.4% in both UP and Uttarakhand. These are shameful and troubling numbers by any standard. But even more shameful are the shares of women among candidates. Even the Congress’ 40% experiment was limited to UP: It showed no interest in doing the same in the other four states.

All other political parties were equally disappointing. In UP, the Bharatiya Janata Party and Samajwadi Party gave tickets to only 12% women. In Uttarakhand, there were 11% women among the BJP candidates, and 7% among Congress contestants. In Punjab, the Aam Aadmi Party gave 10% tickets to women, the Congress 9% and the BJP 8%, in Manipur the Congress and the National People’s Party put forth 8% women among candidates, and the BJP only 5%. Goa was similar to Manipur with major parties fielding less than 10% women.

All told, the share of women candidates across all five states improved by 1.8 percentage points this year over 2017. But this tiny bump pushed up the share of women elected by 2.8 percentage points. If such a small expansion of space for women in the electoral contest can make a difference, imagine how different our elections and politics would look if all parties, including the Congress, made it a policy to give at least 40% tickets to women in all elections going forth.

Akshi Chawla is a writer and researcher tracking journeys of women in politics, and most recently worked on the IPU’s annual flagship report on women’s representation in Parliaments around the world.

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It’s beginning to seem likely that The Batman, the new film starring Robert Pattinson, will be among the year’s biggest hits. But so many people I know have come away saying that it is very dark. This theme has been reflected in the reviews (“the darkest Batman yet” etc.) and my guess is that the filmmakers are happy with this response: Why else would every scene in the movie be shot with so little light?

Grown-up fans of Batman will not be surprised by the darkness. But it will leave some kids disappointed. And it has come as a bit of a shock to fans of other superhero movies, especially those from the Marvel Universe. There are few wisecracks here and there are hardly any laughs.

So, is Batman different from every other super-hero? Why is the character so dark? Why is nearly every Batman movie a bit of a downer? Why isn’t it your typical superhero movie?

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I guess it depends on how you see Batman: Is he a super hero or is he someone who is much darker?

The semi-official mythology runs something like this: Batman was created in 1939 by Bob Kane as a dark avenging character. But in the 1960s, the hit TV series had a lighter, zanier touch and this influenced how Batman was perceived. It was only in the 1980s, that writers went back to Batman’s dark 1940s avatar. And the movies picked up on that.

As somebody who started reading Batman comics in the early 1960s, I am suspicious of this mythology. It is true that the 1960s TV show went for a camp tone and was often written for laughs. But even before TV came along, Batman was not the dark figure he is in the new movie. There were always outrageously costumed villains and the presence of Robin (who I find intensely annoying) ensured that there was a certain wholesomeness to the Batman of the comics.

Was it very different in the 1940s? I don’t know. But judging by the reprints I have read of the early comics, starting with the first story, The Case of the Chemical Syndicate, he was never particularly dark. Admittedly he had no compunctions about sending criminals to their deaths in those days. He would say things like ‘a fitting end for his kind’ when a criminal died.

The two Batman movie serials—in those days serials were made for cinemas with new episodes released each week—that were produced during the 1940s (now forgotten, they marked the first appearances of Batman on the screen with Lewis Wilson and Robert Lowery playing the hero) were not in the slightest bit dark --- one was just a nasty bit of wartime anti-Japanese propaganda.

So, like so much of the Batman mythology --- Bob Kane didn’t actually draw most of the comics and the world of Batman was really created by Bill Finger who was denied credit till recently ---- the references to the darkness of the early years are based on a rewriting of Batman history. He was your average costumed crime-fighter till the 1980s, even without the influence of the TV show.

The folks at DC Comics credit the re-interpretation of the character to Denny O’Neil who looked after the comic book in the 1970s but my view is that the Batman we see now on the screen (and not just in the new movie) is not the comic book character. He owes his creation to the boom in what are called ‘graphic novels’, that is, comics written for older readers with longer stories and adult themes.

The first graphic novel I read that portrayed a darker Batman was The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller. Set in the future, it had a 55-year-old Batman getting back into his stride. Later, Miller also wrote a comic book series that was published as a graphic novel called Batman: Year One. There were other graphic novels, among them The Killing Joke by Alan Moore, that seemed to me to redefine the character I had grown up reading about.

It is this graphic novel version of Batman, dark, screwed up by the killing of his parents and emotionally inadequate, that Tim Burton incorporated into his first Batman movie. Burton went against type and cast Michael Keaton, a former stand-up comedian and a fine comic actor as Batman to the horror of fans. Burton’s message was: Batman is not a super-hero, he is just a screwed up guy with no superpowers who has an obsessive compulsive need to fight crime.

For people like me who had grown up on the comics, this was heresy. Basically, what Burton was saying was not that different from what Frank Miller had suggested: Batman was only slightly less deranged than the criminals he was confronting.

And that’s pretty much how it has been in most of the movies ever since. The Christopher Nolan films went with a dark Batman. The two multi-hero films (Batman vs. Superman and Justice League) never had a chance to develop the character fully but the Batman vs. Superman idea came directly from the original Frank Miller Dark Knight graphic novel. And now Robert Pattinson has become an even darker Batman.

There are two exceptions. The first Joel Schumacher Batman (with Val Kilmer) moved away from Burton’s dark world with bright Day-Glo colours. I liked it (critics did not) and the film made more money than Batman Returns, the second Tim Burton movie. But Schumacher set the stage for the downfall of his version of the character by introducing the dreaded Robin. The next film Batman and Robin (with George Clooney) was packed with Robin and Batgirl and comic book villains and seemed designed to sell toys and merchandise. This was a bridge too far and the movie killed off the Batman franchise till Nolan rebooted it years later.

All Batman directors face a core problem. If you are going to make a film about a man or a woman with superpowers, then it may make sense to have strange, costumed villains. But if you are going to make a film about a deeply disturbed guy who wants vengeance then can you really introduce cartoonish costumed enemies? The two approaches don’t match.

Schumacher had lots of costumed villains in his films so he chose to go with a less dark Batman. Burton who had a dark Batman, tried to overcompensate by making the Penguin so dark that children left the cinema halls in tears. Nolan steered clear of costumed villains for the most part: his Joker was a psychopath who used his joker make-up like war paint.

The reason I liked the new film, directed by Matt Reeves, is because he finally creates a world in which a dark Batman can truly belong. In the comics, Batman is ‘the world’s greatest detective’, an aspect of the character that the movies always ignore. But The Batman plays up the detective element and though the word ‘dark’ is always used to describe the movie, it is more in the tradition of detective noir. There are no costumed villains. The Penguin is just a gangster and the Riddler is a serial killer like the real-life Zodiac Killer. There is a fancy Batmobile but Batman often seems to arrive walking. And like the Batman of Frank Miller’s Year One, he is still learning.

I don’t think this Batman can survive in the extended movie universe that DC has created where Batman has to fight demons and gods alongside super beings, Amazons and kings of the sea. This Batman has to inhabit a more realistic world.

Is that a problem? I don’t think it is. Just as there are many versions of the character, there can be many Batmans on the screen. Already DC plans to have two different Batmans in the new Flash movie (they are played by Michael Keaton and Ben Affleck). And we have got used to different Supermen (the Superman of the Supergirl TV show operates outside of the movie universe as does the Superman of the TV show Superman and Lois) and we accept that there are different Flashes (the movie Flash is not the TV Flash).

So why can’t we have many different Batmans? After all, there have been so many versions of the character through the years: Why stick with just one version?

Light or dark, realistic or fantastic; there can be a Batman for everyone.

Speaking for myself though, I will persist with the Pattinson version. And judging by the early box office returns, I am not alone.



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Leif Babin, a decorated former US Navy Seals officer and self-declared “student of leadership”, had once said “there are no bad teams, only bad leaders”. This quote is extremely apt in the backdrop of the continued outpouring of belief in India’s Congress Party, even after the debacle it faced in the recent Assembly polls, as articulated by many respectable people — not sycophants by any chance — whose opinions I have high regard for. Before starting this article, I recalled many written in recent years by several like me — secular Indians who believe in the “original” worldview and earlier dynamism of the Congress. People still hope the Congress leadership shall arise from its self-induced comatose state and lead the country back to times when hate was not normal, and when the majority community felt they owed security to religious minorities, that there was a need to empower and uplift the poor and not just keep them trapped in an endless cycle of receiving “charity” in the name of “benefits”. Could I, or other like-minded persons, say anything very different than what was previously stated after the latest four-hour long meeting whose outcome was known immediately after it was convened?

What do we make of a political party leader who, after another electoral rout that further chipped away at the territory it held previously, asks the general body a question whose answer is inlaid in its tonality: “Do you think I have made a mistake?” In this case, Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi — neither stopgap, nor permanent but someone holding the job for another, not yet willing to resume the job — had a specific poser: If some attendees at the Congress Working Committee meeting feel the Gandhi family is responsible for the state of affairs, she, Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra were ready to do any “sacrifice” for the party and withdraw. After seeing the fate of the small group with the G-23 nametag (one of them quit and is part of the BJP now) and how they were reviled by significant sections of the party with backing from the top brass, who would give an honest answer and publicly state that the “family” was indeed accountable?

Looking at repeated exercises like the latest CWC meeting, the Congress is little more than an old long-playing record, always stored at the bottom of the chest because that was the universal place in yesteryears for discs stuck in the groove. Families did not discard those records although they were jammed in a perpetual loop purely for reasons of nostalgia. Sadly, for the Congress, with its electoral capacity and influence diminishing by the day, it has been relegated to existing in the collective consciousness of those who don’t agree with the BJP’s majoritarian overdrive, as an unredeemed idea only because its leadership neither resumes charge after relinquishing it, nor do they allow anyone else to step in and try to revive its fortunes. At the end, one must ask the question: how much power does an idea have, if it is solely dependent on an ageing matriarch and GenNext — mind you, Rahul Gandhi will complete two decades in politics in 2024 — who neither wishes to resume charge, nor make way for someone else. How committed are they to the cause, the idea and ideals they represent?

At the root of the Congress’ inability to reverse the party’s decline that set in after 2014 is that the leadership has neither accepted its responsibility, nor apportioned it to anyone else. Instead, it has resorted to a blame game, laying the fault on the doors of the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi. This has been most evident in the accusations after several leaders, including Rahul Gandhi’s personal loyalists, began crossing over to the BJP, the latest being R.P.N. Singh. Although an unsparing post-mortem has been the need of the hour from 2014 onwards, especially after 2019, the emphasis has been on allowing the party to drift along. Rahul Gandhi resigned after the debacle almost three years ago and since then it has been clear Sonia Gandhi is merely holding on to the job till the time that her son thinks that it is an appropriate moment for him to resume charge. The problem with this approach — that the resignation was essentially a ploy to ensure sycophants gathered around imploring “please continue” to prevent criticism — which eventually surfaced in the form of the G-23 letter — is that it is dubious and motivated by personal interest of holding on to the office and not keeping the long-term interest of the party in mind.

Following the CWC meeting and the two decisions, that Sonia Gandhi will continue and her two children will not “withdraw”, and that organisational polls scheduled in August-September may possibly be advanced, there has been a concerted bid once again by the loyalists to brush uncomfortable issues beneath the carpet. It does not take much wisdom to comprehend that the much-delayed changes made in Punjab and Uttarakhand were the primary reasons for the party’s ouster from the former and failure to return to power in the hill state. The lessons have not been learnt and there is no certainty that the organisational polls shall be held because Rahul Gandhi may yet not be willing to take up the challenge. Despite the indignation that the leadership evokes, it continues getting the love of numerous people because they fear that in the event of its death, the Congress’ space shall be taken up by another BJP-like grotesque ideological imagination. But how long can the party survive on this belief? Eventually only those who have no utility elsewhere shall remain in the rump.

The big challenge before the Congress now, before it can stage a comeback as a credible challenger to the BJP, is retaining pre-eminence in the Opposition space and forming alliances with other parties. The number of Congress-ruled states has declined from 2014 and is now down to just two — Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh. These two will go to the polls in late 2023 and the BJP will get a shot at realising its objective of a “Congress-mukt Bharat”, in terms of state governments at least, if not in the ideas the party represents. There are polls in Himachal Pradesh, Gujarat, Karnataka and several states in Northeast India prior to that, but with the present disarray and the ambitions of the AAP, regaining territory is a daunting challenge.



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