A political storm across India (PO)

By M. D. Nalapat


Although Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has a personal commitment towards a peaceful resolution of outstanding issues with Pakistan, he is no Indira Gandhi and hence may not be able to fulfil his vision. The first - and thus far only - woman PM of India had a substantial political base, one that she demonstrated in both 1969 as well as 1978. Both those times, she split the Congress Party, and while in 1969,more than 40% of the party remained with her rivals rather than cross over to her side, in 1978 about 80% of the party cadre joined her in preference to those she was opposed to. Since that time, the Congress Party has been synonymous with the Nehru family, and neither its cadres nor its leaders would even dream of looking beyond The Family for the top leadership were Manmohan Singh to ever split the party in the way that Indira Gandhi did, it is doubtful if even 1% of the cadre would come over to his side. The rest would remain loyal to the Nehru family, now represented by Sonia Gandhi, who has established her control over the Congress Party and the Union Government efficiently and smoothly. Of course, Prime Minister Singh is himself loyal to the Congress President, and hence the question of his walking away does not arise. The problem that he faces is that this lack of a political base makes it difficult for him to implement the policies that he favours.

From 2004 onwards, economic reform has slowed to a crawl, and can even be said to have been reversed by the many new restrictions that have been introduced by dirigiste ministers eager to strengthen their (lucrative) roster of discretionary powers. Had economic reform of the type favoured by Manmohan Singh been pursued by the United Progressive Alliance (UPA), the country’s rate of growth would have been closer to 15% than the 9% presently achieved. Much of the demand in the economy has come because of money held abroad by Indian nationals, that is returning to the country because of the fear that foreign financial institutions may collapse. These funds are helping to keep the stock market from collapsing, and are ensuring a steady rise in property prices India is one of the few countries where regulators were unable to distinguish between short-term and long-term funds. The same treatment is given to both investments in the stock and money market (that can be withdrawn any time) and money invested in plant and machinery, that is tied to the enterprise. 

Has Carla Bruni’s charm worked in India? (PO)

M D Nalapat

The Obama administration has largely reverted to the Clinton presidency’s policy of looking at India as a lesser power, although unlike Clinton, who began mouthing praise on Delhi only when US business interests in the country reached critical mass, Barack Obama has been generous with “wampum”, showering sugary words and making insubstantial gestures, even while it seeks to lock India into a dependent relationship now that Pakistan is drifting apart from Washington and moving into Beijing’s orbit. In the nuclear field, the Obama administration is insisting on conditions that collectively negate the Singh-Bush nuclear accord, in effect continuing to force India off the path of nuclear capability. In Space, although a few token gestures have been made, none of these has been followed up by any intensification of cooperation between NASA and the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). The grip of the Europeanist world view is too strong for President Obama to acknowledge that India is at least the equal of France, Britain or Germany, and needs to be so treated. Instead, the policymakers in the DC Beltway are still at work using their many friends in the Sonia Gandhi-led coalition to lock India into a one-sided relationship that would severely affect this country’s prospects for future growth and technological autonomy and excellence.

That the Sonia Gandhi-led administration ( for let us face reality, rather than cling to the legal fiction that any minister other than - perhaps - himself sees Manmohan Singh as the boss) is uninterested in going the China route of technological self-sufficiency has been once again illustrated by the decision to award the 126-aircraft contract to the French or to a French-led consortium. A senior Indian politician, who seems to have been given information from a rival country’s sources once it was clear that France was in the driver’s seat on what is expected to balloon into a $18 billion contract, has publicly accused France’s First Lady Carla Bruni of having intervened with Italian-born Sonia Gandhi in order to ensure that the contract went to Paris in one form or the other, something that has now happened. For more than a year, reports have been swirling around Raisina Road that “Number Ten” ( the 10 Janpath residence of the all-powerful UPA chairperson, who was born in Orbassano in Italy but has made India her home for four decades) was in favour of the French option, although such reports were not accompanied by any proof. It may be that Sonia Gandhi is simply being made the target of a smear campaign, so hopefully both she as well as Bruni will clarify the nature of their contacts and discussions before gossip spreads about the relationship that she shares with the Maino family, who are frequent visitors to India. Of course, given the timidity of the Indian media on all negative matters relating to Sonia Gandhi, the allegation made by Dr Swamy, the Indian politician close to both China and the US, has gone almost totally unreported.

A US-India Nuclear Alliance (USINPAC)

M.D. Nalapat

Although President George W Bush understood the need to ensure parity for India with France and the UK in a 21st century alliance calculus, the Europeanists within his administration slowed down his effort at ensuring an equal treatment for India. Much the same as Winston Churchill in the previous century, they regard it as a "country of a lesser god" that is simply undeserving of any except a subservient status. Sadly, the Obama administration has become even more a Europeanists' delight than its predecessor, and it has very rapidly sought to dilute the few concessions that President Bush succeeded in extracting from his skeptical team.

This has been especially pronounced in the nuclear field. It is not rocket science that India's ascent into middle income status will depend on a huge increase in its generation of energy, and that such an increase, given existing green technologies, will need to be powered mostly by energy from nuclear sources. The nuclear industries of India and the US have excellent synergy between them, provided the US acknowledges the implicit premise of the 2005 Singh-Bush statement and the 2008 unanimous vote of the Nuclear Suppliers Group to allow commerce and cooperation with India.

The non-proliferation lobby within the US (a group heavily represented in the Obama administration) made India its primary target since 1974, neglecting to take account of the leaching of nuclear and missile technology from China and other locations to Pakistan and North Korea. Small wonder that it has demonized the India-US deal as a "danger to non-proliferation efforts", despite the fact that a democracy of a billion-plus people is as much entitled to critical technologies as France or the UK. The reality, however, is that the Manmohan Singh government made several concessions to the US side that have had the effect of substantially degrading India's offensive capability. An example was the closing down of the CIRUS reactor, which was producing weapons-grade plutonium for decades. In exchange, India was to be given access to re-processing technology. Not merely has such technology continued to be denied to India, but the Obama administration is seeking to cap, roll back and eliminate India's homegrown reprocessing capabilities.

Apart from strong-arm (and secret) tactics designed to force India to agree to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) and the Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty (FMCT), the Obama administration is now seeking to force India to give up its Fast Breeder Reactor program. As if on cue, those commentators in the world's second-largest English-speaking country - including those not known for any previous interest in matters nuclear- who hew to the line of any incumbent US administration have used the Fukushima disaster to call for the FBR program to be abandoned.

Singh changes the pitch with Pakistan by cricket diplomacy (The National)

M.D. Nalapat

India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was born in what would become Pakistan in 1947, which is perhaps why he has so often sought accommodation with his western neighbour. In recent years, Mr Singh has quietly overcome scepticism in India's home and external affairs ministries, not to mention the intelligence agencies, who see the hand of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency behind every act of violence.

But even Mr Singh could not overcome the public's hostility after the Mumbai attacks in 2008, which New Delhi blamed on Pakistani military auxiliaries.

When both countries qualified for the semi-finals of the Cricket World Cup 2011, it took less than a day for the Indian prime minister to decide to use the event to cool temperatures on both sides. He invited Pakistan's president and prime minister to attend the match last Wednesday in the small town of Mohali, and Prime Minister Youssef Raza Gilani accepted.

Although the invitation has been depicted as an impulsive decision, Mr Singh had been looking for a way past the deadlock for the past two years. Economics ranks first and second in Mr Singh's affections, with politics following in a distant third. For years, he has striven for closer economic ties between India and Pakistan to build mutual prosperity but also strengthen the peace constituencies on both sides.

Just before the match, a meeting of the two countries' home secretaries in New Delhi dispelled considerable scepticism. The talks saw a significant change in the tone of discussions, with both sides foregoing the temptation to grandstand in front of the media. In New Delhi, the visit cooled suspicions that Pakistan's civilian leadership were complicit in the Mumbai attacks.

Corruption creating chaos in India (PO)

M D Nalapat

Especially since the 1971 defeat of the Pakistan Army in the east, the ISI has been seeking to weaken - and if possible destroy - the Indian State. The organisatioin has been funding, training and equipping multiple sources in India and abroad in furtherance of this objective. However, it has thus far had very little success, mainly because India is too big and too un-coordinated to suffer serious damage from the kind of tactics that the ISI specialises in. However, over the years, an enemy of the Indian people has emerged that is proving to be a potent threat to the future of the Indian Union. This is the shameless, uncontrolled greed of those at the apex of the political system in India.

Any visitor to the numerous discos of the 5-star hotels of Delhi will spot there a crowd of youths whose common factor is hedonism and access to cash. In selected discos can be recognized the sons and daughters of top politicians, officials and businesspersons, all having a wonderful time. This Community of Hedonists acts as a bridge between their parents, seeing to it that an opposition leader - for instance - avoids targeting the family of a ruling party VVIP. The daughters of businesspersons mix and mingle with the sons of high officials, and vice-versa, thereby helping to create a bond between the parents that ensures quick and reliable - if expensive - service for the businessperson at the hands of the official. Of course, the Intelligence Bureau stays far away from such dance halls and the farmhouses known to be the haunts of the fun-loving offspring of India’s elite.This, despite the fact that several foreign agencies and missions send attractive males and females to such locations,to ensnare the children of VVIPs.So loyal is Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram to his boss Sonia Gandhi,that he has converted the Intelligence Bureau into a personal detective agency designed to protect the First Family of India. Rather than focus on threats to the people and to the state,Chidambaram has reconfigured the IB to meet threats to the primacy of the ruliong family. Because this columnist is a critic of VVIPs (and has been so for four decades in journalism), not only the telephones of himself and his spouse,but informed friends claim that even that of his chauffeur are being monitored - clandestinely and illegally - by the IB.

Will Manmohan fall in March? (PO)

M D Nalapat

The Ides of March proved fatal to Gaius Julius Ceasar more than two thousand years ago, when he was felled by a large group of conspirators in the Theatre of Pompey in Rome. Several of those that stabbed him were his closest friends, people who may have been expected to defend rather than to murder him. These days, within Delhi and Mumbai, a similar group of conspirators has been active over the past eleven months, seeking to take away not his life but his job from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. And as in the case of Ceasar, many of those scripting his downfall are from his own party, and claim to be his ardent backers, often going before television cameras to “damn him with faint praise”.

Deja vu! A quarter-century ago, many of the same group that are nowadays active against Manmohan Singh were expending considerable effort on unseating his mentor, then Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao. The Congress Party’s second non-Nehru Prime Minister (after the short-lived 1964-66 tenure of Lal Bahadur Shastri had incurred the anger of loyalists of the family that owned the party, by his refusal to step down after two years in office and hand over charge to a faithful retainer, Kunwar (Prince) Arjun Singh, who had been Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh when the Bhopal disaster took place, and who made arrangements for the safe escape of Union Carbide chief Warren Anderson from Bhopal. Despite the fact that it was on his watch that the world’s biggest industrial disaster took place, his 100% loyalty to the Nehru family ensured that Arjun Singh was given his fill of important jobs, ranging from chief ministership to Union Cabinet status and also Governor of important states.

Economic chaos spreads in India (PO)

M D Nalapat

Banks that will not lend to companies even at very high rates of interest, because bank officers are wary of being questioned by the police about such loans. Multiple tax raids across the country on those not having VVIP protection, most of which end up getting compounded after the payment of bribes to the officers concerned. A mushrooming of regulations in each field of economic activity, so that the avenues for corruption get increased. Extreme incompetence on the part of governmental agencies, often deliberate. Targeted speculation in food grains and vegetables, that send retail prices shooting up while denying the farmer any benefit from such increases. A handful of big business interests who have free access to VVIPs and who can get appointed their agents to ministerships and to senior administrative appointments. This is the India of 2011,a country that must be bringing tears to the eyes of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who is facing sabotage within his own team, designed to make him unviable as in his present job.

Weeks ago, the mountain of speculaion about a thoroughgoing reshuffle of the Union Cabinet produced a mouse. The corrupt were rewarded rather than dropped. To take the example of Vilasrao Deshmukh, during whose tenure as Chief Minister of Maharashtra more than 30,000 farmers committed suicide. Despite the severe strictures passed on him by the Supreme Court, which pointed out that he favoured moneylenders rather than farmers, the Prime Minister was forced by the leadership of the Congress Party to give Deshmukh the portfolio that controls the administration of rural India, presumably so that he can make a dent in the population explosion by presiding over mass suicides of farmers, this time on an all-India scale. Of course, it is no secret that Deshmukh has been one of the most generous contributors to the financial kitty of the Congress Party. Friends in Mumbai often talked about huge suitcases filled with “ mangoes” that would be sent every few days from Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur to Delhi by chartered flights, so as to keep Deshmukh’s chair safe despite his having made Maharashtra one of the worst-administered states in the Indian Union.

Manmohan under attack from “Apex of Greed” (PO)

M D Nalapat

Since he took office for a second 5-year term in 2009, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has been a changed man. During 2004-2009, he stayed silent while a senior official in the Prime Minister’s Office (expected to become Head of the Civil Service in 2011,thanks to his loyalty to the apex of the Congress Party) used to make phone calls on behalf of the political bosses of the party, ensuring that road, power ,coal and other projects got diverted to those in the good books of the powerful. In some cases, individual companies secured benefits amounting to more than $12 billion because of changes in tax laws and in administrative procedures. No wonder that the most powerful in the land regularly travel in luxurious corporate jets maintaned by companies that are given such largesse. Once they land in Europe or elsewhere, jets from locations in Dubai, Sharjah and other such locations await them, to take them to other destinations. Those supposed to be watching out for such activities look the other way, as otherwise, they would be dismissed from the Union Cabinet or from the top echelons of the civil service.

Informed estimates place the personal wealth of the Apex of Power in India at nothing less than $16 billion, not bad for individuals whose only occupation is politics, a field in which (declared) salaries are often less than $1500 a month. Tax records show that the sons, daughters, sons-in-law and other relatives of important politicians have become dollar billionaires, owning vast properties and companies. To take just a single example, the son-in-law of a batchelor leader became one of the largest hoteliers in the country. The Indian media, whose owners are terrified of getting chased by the various departments of the government, never even asked how a batchelor could have a son-in-law! Of course, no media house ever mentioned the fact that this batchelor stayed in the house of a married lady for more than twenty years, with her husband confined to a small room in the same residence, suffering the agony of watching his wife with the batchelor, whose political career continued on its lucky streak, because the public were unaware of his personal habits. As former minister Arun Shourie says, for quite some time, politics in India has become a clubby setup, where both the ruling and opposition sides protect each other in private. Naturally, in public both sides pretend to be opposed to each other, although in the evenings, both sides get together and celebrate their wealth.

False morality in midst of immorality (PO)

M D Nalapat

During her younger days, the present Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha (House of the People, or Lower House in Parliament) Sushma Swaraj was a modern woman, definitely in step with the most progressive elements of the 20th century. Originally a Socialist before she joined the conservative Hindu-centric Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the 1990s, Swaraj championed the right of a woman to her own lifestyle, earning for herself condemnation from those who believe that a woman’s role is what has been described by the ancient Indian lawgiver Manu: as a slave of first her father, then her husband and finally her own son. She dressed soberly but attractively, and refused to observe “purdah” and avoid contact with men. In the modern world, men and women need to work closely together, so it was understandable that Ms Swaraj (who is happily married) functioned in close proximity to such socialist giants as former Defense Minister George Fernandes and former Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar, steadily rising in stature as a woman politician who understood the need for India’s society to modernize and move away from ancient restrictions and prejudices. However, once she took over as Information and Broadcasting Minister in the BJP-led government in 1998, Sushma Swaraj had a transformation, even demanding that female newsreaders in the state-run broadcasting service cover their arms fully while on air.

Clearly, this new avatar of a once-progressive woman politician would have been comfortable with the dress code enforced in Iran, where a woman has to be fully draped even in the privacy of her own home when men are present who are not husbands and sons However, Ms Swaraj should not be blamed for such a return into the medieval past. She naturally wishes to someday become the second lady PM after Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi, and has calculated that only a Saudi-style adherence to “modesty” and to its enforcement will gain her the support of conservatives in the BJP, many of whom marry off their daughters at a young age and are against the teaching of English to the young. These days, she demurely covers her head and modestly lowers her gaze when men are present, a very different avatar from her bold, pathbreaking past, a past that energized and motivated hundreds of thousands of young Indian women to follow her example and break free from the fetters of convention into a lifestyle that is closer to that followed in Europe or China.

Will Manmohan Singh be forced to quit? (PO)

M D Nalapat

In the 1960s for over three decades, probably the most influential non-official individual resident in India was Ottavio Quatrocchi, an Italian who had the blunt demeanour of an Australian rather than the charm that the people of that ancient civilisation are justly known for. Nearly 70 key projects were sanctioned during this long period to companies that “Mr Q” was considered to favour, especially Snam-Progetti. Those officials who dared to sanction contracts to companies other than the few favoured by Quatrocchi found their careers in India ended, including Cabinet Secretary P K Kaul, who was shunted off to Washington before completing his term in office, after a contract was won by another company instead of Snam. The then Petroleum Secretary, A S Gill, who was in line to be Cabinet Secretary found his career at an end after this decision was taken,and the minister concerned was swiftly removed from his post, as were others who dared take decisions other than those believed to have the backing of “Mr Q” What the source of the power of this Italian fixer is remains obscure.

However, none of his political allies could save his career in India once his name was outed in the scandal involving the purchase of Bofors guns in 1986. A year later, Swedish radio claimed that about $65 million had been paid as bribes to get the contract (peanuts in this day and age), and the Swiss authorities established that “Mr Q” was one of the beneficiaries. The Central Bureau of Investigation asked that his passport be impounded. Instead, on the recommendation of the minister looking after the CBI, Quatrocchi was allowed to fly out of India on 29 July 1993 to the safety of Kuala Lumpur. Since then, he has depended on his family members to ensure that contact be retained with influential individuals in India, a task that they have done so well that even today, he is among the few who can “get almost anything done” through the Government of India, including ensuring the return of the money that the investigating authorities say was a bribe paid to secure the Bofors contract. While other governments seek to confiscate the money stashed illegally away by the powerful, the Manmohan Singh government returned it to “Mr Q” a few years ago.

Outsourcing policy to foreign NGOs (PO)

M D Nalapat

After a gap of more than six years, your columnist is once again in the country that a century ago ran half the world. For years, indeed decades, he has been fascinated with the way in which a small island nation expanded across the globe to secure territory and resources to fuel its prosperity. Some say that much of the cause can be attributed to the spirit of democracy that pervaded the United Kingdom. However, this may be a simplistic view, for the reality is that the UK of the Empire period was a class-ridden nation, where the nobility (both economic and ancestral) had privileges denied to the many. Unlike in France or Russia, where there was a revolution against the aristocracy, the English never revolted against their nobility, except for the brief spasm of republicanism led by Oliver Cromwell four centuries ago. Of course, the difference between Britain and Russia was that in the former, it was much more easy for a low-born person to become wealthy than during the reign of the Tsars. When the nobility monopolised top positions the way the upper castes did in ancient India.

Inequality of income is a fact of life, but if this is accompanied by as severe an inequality in opportunity, then the society concerned becomes brittle and easy to break. In any country where a “caste” system develops, in which power and money get monopolised by a small segment on the basis of birth, there will come a period when such a society can no longer meet the needs and begins to fall apart. Such a danger exists even in the country that is today well on the way to becoming the next superpower, China. Should the Communist Party of China (CCP) get dominated by “princelings” (the children of top party leaders), then the hold of the party over the people will slacken, as will morale and motivation inside the party, which would change into an instrument for the retention of privilege created by birth. Already, a disproportionate share of the top echelons of the CCP comprise of cadres who were lucky to be born of influential parents. If this segment grows at the expense of those (such as current CCP General Secretary Hu Jintao) who were born from humble stock, the rapidly-evolving population of China would begin to lose respect and loyalty towards a party that has made China once again a Great Power.

Does “freedom” mean vote every 5 years? (PO)

M D Nalapat

Till two centuries ago, China comprised about 35% of the global economy while India accounted for around 26%. Only after the grip of European powers became strong in the 19th century that their economies contracted. The mentality of the European powers was that only they had the right to prosperity, while the rest of the world needed to be content as slaves. In India, Britain ensured the destruction of almost all of local industry, thereby seeking to create a market for its own manufactures. Certainly this brought some prosperity to the UK, but the wealth generated there would have been much more had India been allowed to continue to be a prosperous country. The markets for British produce would have been far larger. As for China, by squeezing revenue out of channels such as the opium trade, the European powers ensured the fall of the Imperial Dynasty and its replacement with a series of fractious and incompetent warlord regimes, a phase that ended only with the establishment of the Peoples Republic of China in 1949.

While China entered into its current period of economic growth through reform in the 1980s, till today India has continued with its colonial-era laws, that transfer obligations to the population and authority to the state Today, despite corrupt and incompetent governments at both the central and state levels, the Indian economy is growing at a speed of almost 10% annually, because of the savings of its people and their zeal for education and betterment. India is called a “free” country, while China is authoritarian, with no elections and single-party rule. However, here in Hong Kong, where your columnist has been since the beginning of the week, it would seem that people here have as much - if not more - freedom than people in Mumbai or Delhi, all of whom have to get permission from multiple authorities (usually in triplicate) before being allowed to do the simplest tasks.

Is Manmohan Singh’s time up? (PO)

M D Nalapat

Had Manmohan Singh ended his political career as Finance Minister of India during 1992-96, he would have earned a few pages in the history books as the individual who implemented the 1992-94 economic reforms, which did so much to ensure a higher rate of growth. However, once he took over as PM in 2004, that period was relegated to the background. Whatever be the soft-spoken thinker’s place in history, it will almost entirely get based on his performance as PM. And it must be said that the five years since he took office have been disappointing. Economic reform stalled, while corruption continued to skyrocket. Those tracking the workings of government claimed that the final decision on most issues - especially those involving procurement - were taken by Number Ten ( 10 Janpath, the official residence of Congress President Sonia Gandhi) rather than Number Seven ( 7 Racecourse Road, the PM House).

Although the habitually tame English-language media in India said otherwise, the fact is that the public were underwhelmed by the performance of the Central government. Prices shot up, while urban infrastructure deteriorated. The progress of road construction was slow, while the provision of broadband internet and affordable mobile telephone charges was delayed. The tax structure and the web of government restrictions became ever more oppressive, and yet the much-written about Father of Reform did nothing. Of course, he busied himself in foreign policy, but to the population of India, what matters is the home front, not the fact that Singh and his demure better half were lionized in capitals across the globe. Those who had for long admired the man and saw him as a redeemer felt bitter, and many did not hesitate to vent their frustration in public, although they were of course in a minority. As is their wont, much of the media were fulsome in their praise of the PM, compliments that they bestowed on every holder of that office.

However, since the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) returned to power in 2009, Manmohan Singh changed. Several VVIPs were jailed for corruption, a drive that finally began netting the big fish rather than minnows. Petroleum prices were decontrolled and the money earned from auction of spectrum went up by more than twenty times. It had been no secret that the PM was deeply unhappy at the meagre revenue secured by the auction of 2G, but could do nothing because the political leadership of the party protected the alliance partner responsible. But when 3G began to be auctioned, Singh stepped in rather than keep away the way he had from 2004 to that period, and ensured a huge windfall for the exchequer. Of course, there have been two major failures on his watch, the first being price rise and the second Kashmir. After a flawless election in 2009, the reins of office were handed over to an untested Omar Abdullah, who expected the people of his state to emulate the US electorate and choose good looks over competence. The grandson of Sheikh Abdullah has been a total failure as CM, and ought not to have been given the reins when experienced leaders were available. Omar is considered part of the Rahul Gandhi Brigade, and if so, this first test of fire of this youthful team has been a disaster.

Nirupama Rao comes calling in Pakistan (PO)

M D Nalapat

Unlike more conservative societies such as Saudi Arabia, which prize uniformity and discourage diversity, India prides itself on its mosaic of faiths and peoples. The food, dress and attitudes in an eastern state such as West Bengal is very different from that in the northern state of Rajasthan. The first has had a Communist government in power since the 1960s,while the latter still respects the Maharajas whose kingdoms were taken over in 1947 and who - despite having signed a binding covenant with the Government of India at the time – were deprived of their titles and much of their wealth in 1969 by then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, to whom the only law that mattered was her personal whims.

Even nearby states are very different. Maharashtra (where Mumbai is situated) is one of the most poorly administered states in India, where even the police are more likely to side with lawbreakers than with law-abiders. This was on international display less than two years ago, when a few scruffy youngsters held the city to ransom for three days after having come ashore from Karachi. The reaction of the Mumbai police (except for a very few instances of personal courage) would have made Inspector Clouseau of Pink Panther fame look serious. That it took more than 72 hours to clear them away from just three buildings revealed the sorry state of preparedness of Mumbai against a terror attack, in contrast to Pakistan, where action against desperados has been swifter. In contrast, the next-door state of Gujarat has a super-efficient government that ensures one of the highest rates of economic growth in India.

FM Qureshi seen as Army favourite (PO)

M D Nalapat

Although as yet far behind in quantitative terms, the Indian elite see their country as China’s equal. While rates of growth have decelerated in China since the 1980s,they have accelerated in India. And like Pakistan, the second most-populous country in the world has a young population, while China’s is ageing. By 2027, the effect of this is expected to boost India’s prospects of catching up with what will at that time be the world’s largest economy (in Purchasing Power Parity terms), China. Hence it was with anger that South Block, the home of the Prime Minister’s Office and the Ministry of external Affairs, heard of Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi’s “blank cheque” to the Chinese Communist Party to mediate the Indo-Pakistan dispute.

Earlier, US President Barack Obama had made a cringing visit to China, during which he had generously made to the Chinese leadership the offer first made by Bill Clinton 13 years earlier, of partnering with Washington in “managing” India-Pakistan relations. That offer had led to the mistrust of Obama that today pervades the Indian establishment Why did Foreign Minister Qureshi make such a statement just two days before Foreign Secretary-level talks between the two sub continental neighbours? He would certainly have been aware of the strong Indian distaste of involving any country in the bilateral tango between India and Pakistan, especially China, which since 1963 has been aligned with Islamabad in its bid to limit Delhi’s freedom of action. There are three theories doing the rounds within Raisina Road, the Indian Beltway.

Subdued reaction to India-Pakistan talks (PO)

M D Nalapat

Besides the current Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, India has had three PMs who were very much in favour of reaching out to Pakistan. The first was Morarji Desai, the austere Gandhian from Gujarat who became the first non-Congress PM of India in 1977. Morarji began the day drinking a cup of his own urine (and, perhaps for unrelated reasons, remained spry and fit throughout his 99 years). He was a pacifist who, as Finance Minister under Jawaharlal Nehru, reduced budgets for India’s military during 1959-62, a factor which experts believe helped cause the defeat of the Indian army at the hands of the Chinese. As Prime Minister, he refused to intervene in the matter of the imprisonment and subsequent execution of Z A Bhutto by General Zia, publicly saying that this was an internal matter of Pakistan’s. He refused Israel permission to use Indian facilities for a pre-emptive strike on Pakistani nuclear installations, and withdrew all Indian intelligence networks from Pakistan, a factor that probably contributed to his getting the Nishaan-i-Pakistan. Indeed, during his brief period in office, the Indian external intelligence agency Research & Analysis Wing (R&AW) was sharply reduced in size and scope.

The next PM who was very friendly to Pakistan was I K Gujral, the pipe-smoking Jhelum-born Punjabi intellectual who took over in 1997. He enunciated the Gujral Doctrine, which held that as South Asia’s largest country, India should make the most sacrifices for peace. As PM, Gujral ordered a halt to all offensive covert activities in Pakistan, a decision that even today impacts India’s capabilities in its western neighbour. It was during his time that visa procedures for citizens of Pakistan were first relaxed, and some people-to-people interaction took place after fifty years of freeze. After him, the BJP’s A B Vajpayee belied the rhetoric of his party by becoming very friendly to Pakistan, especially to Mian Nawaz Sharif, for whom he had a strong bond of affection. Vajpayee saw Sharif as a man of peace, and came to Lahore in a bus in 1999,creating the hope that peace was at hand. However, the absence of the then Army Chief Pervez Musharraf from the Vajpayee-Sharif Lahore Summit was an ominous sign, that was followed by the Kargil operation and the coup against Sharif. After Kargil, Vajpayee no longer felt confident enough to continue with the peace process, although he did go ahead with two unilateral cease-fires in Kashmir, that were used by the Jehadis to consolidate their position.

Nuclear Weapons: To Test or Not To Test? (UPIASIA)

M.D. Nalapat

Manipal, India — At precisely the moment that U.S. President Barack Obama is returning to the road travelled by Bill Clinton – trying to "persuade" India that nuclear weapons would make the country less, rather than more, secure – top scientists within the country have stated publicly that India’s 1998 nuclear test was a dud, and that the declared yields were false.

The assertion is not surprising – it dates back to the day of the test – but what is surprising is that this important question remains unresolved 11 years after the event.

The majority view among India's nuclear scientists has always been that the 1998 nuclear test was unsuccessful. Only a single scientist and his superiors in the Prime Minister's Office believed then – and still do – that it was a "great success." Understandably, the Manmohan Singh government is reluctant to conduct a serious peer review, preferring instead to rely on the opinions of a few in-house scientists on a matter critical to national security.

The "success camp," led by that determined scientist, R. Chidambaram, insists that the “yield” – or destructive capacity – was satisfactory. It relies on statements published in journals by the Bhabha Atomic Research Center, which made the bomb, to prove its point.

Its primary source is the internal BARC newsletter, which has no peer review process, is circulated only within the BARC/Department of Atomic Energy family, and has been known to publish practically anything that carries any senior BARC functionary’s name on it. In the case of the 1998 explosion results, the "proof" is the printed view of Chidambaram himself, as then director of BARC.

The Inconvenient Truth about Kashmir (gatewayhouse.in)

M.D. Nalapat

When floods hit the largely Buddhist enclave of Leh in Kashmir recently, the chief minister Omar Abdullah, representatives of state government and the Indian army were out providing relief. Absent, however, was the presence of Kashmiris from the rest of the state, notably the normally vocal Valley Kashmiris, in expressing support for their fellow co-habitants. They seemed unconcerned about the tragedy.

This went by unnoticed by the national and international media. But it was not lost on the majority of Kashmiris, confirming their views that those in charge of the state see themselves as being responsible only to one of the six major groups that form Kashmir: the Valley Sunnis, the Shia, the Buddhists, the Sikhs, the Hindus and the Gujjars. That single-pointed attention has kept wider Kashmiri interests unattended, but kept the Valley of Kashmir in the global spotlight.

Today, Kashmir is very much part of the cauldron that is "Af-Pak", the storm that is raging across the Pashtun belt in Pakistan and Afghanistan. As in Af-Pak, the base for the jihad that is being waged in Kashmir mainly comprises a small fringe of a single community – the Valley Wahabi Sunnis, who are 1 million of the total 6.7 million Kashmiri Muslim population.

In the case of Af-Pak, the indigenous Taliban fighters are almost entirely Pashtun, and from those human pools nurtured by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and the Saudi Secret Service during the 1980s to fight against the USSR. In the case of Kashmir, those involved in the current intifada are Sunnis - mostly Wahabis - from the Kashmir Valley who have financial and other links with the military in Pakistan and the numerous Wahabi religious trusts and foundations in Saudi Arabia that work at exporting their 300-year old faith across the world.

Why is Sonia Gandhi afraid of China? (UPIASIA)

M.D. Nalapat

Manipal, India — During the period when the Bharatiya Janata Party-led coalition was in office, from 1998-2004, India launched several initiatives to enhance links with Taiwan. Air links were expanded and foundations laid for a flow of Indian brainpower to Taiwan and a ramping up of investment into India. Today trade between India and Taiwan is close to US$6 billion, heading for $10 billion within the next year.

However, mainly because of a lack of attention from the Sonia Gandhi-led United Progressive Alliance government, Taiwanese investment in India, at a little over US$1 billion, is just one-fifth of what it is in much smaller Cambodia and less than 5 percent of investment in Vietnam.

This official neglect of Taiwan is motivated by the hope that kowtowing to China will result in a more accommodating attitude from Beijing on issues such as the border dispute – a proposition that has so far proved false.

It would seem that with Taiwan under the leadership of the Kuomintang, China is unconcerned about links between New Delhi and Taipei, barring the ritual expressions of dismay at India’s rare recognition of Taiwan's potential as a major source of investment.

Taiwanese diplomats unfortunate enough to be posted to New Delhi are subject to restrictions that are absent in the United States, the European Union, and in most of Asia – excluding countries such as Syria, Iran or North Korea. For example, the military attaché at the Taiwan mission in India has been barred by the Sonia-led government from meeting any – repeat any – serving officer in the three armed forces. He can meet only retired personnel, the older the better.

The Pakistani Army's Phony War on Terror (UPIASIA)

M.D. Nalapat

Manipal, India - Pakistan's U.S.-approved chief of army staff, Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, wanted a less unpredictable personality than Asif Ali Zardari as president of the country. But the crafty equestrian from Sindh insisted on the job, aware that the absence of high office would almost certainly mean either a death sentence or a fresh stint in jail, as Zardari faced several corruption charges.

Since then, "the chief" has seethed as Zardari admitted publicly that the jihadis fighting India in Kashmir were terrorists, and further, that he himself saw no threat from India, thus destroying the army's rationale for consuming more than one-third of the budget. By the time Pakistan's new president said that, like India, Pakistan was committed to a "no first use" policy on nuclear weapons, Kayani had made up his mind that Zardari had to go, and was searching for an opportunity to get him out.

The chief's undiplomatic descriptions of his nominal superior to his intimates have been many and acid, but his personal relationship with U.S. policy gurus has thus far ensured that Washington saw nothing untoward in the clear divergence of views and interests between the chief and the president – or in the chief's private musings about replacing the president. This was Pakistan, after all.

Mumbai 11/27 – the date that marks the midpoint of the three-day terrorist siege in the city – may have shaken the complacency of U.S. and EU policymakers about Kayani's suitability to lead an army touted as the linchpin of the allies in the war on terror.