Over 2,500 refugees from Myanmar have landed right in front of the 13th century tomb of Sultan Garhi — an Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) protected monument — at Rangpuri area near Vasant Kunj. ..Registered as ‘asylum-seekers’ by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), these families from Northern Rakhine state of Myanmar landed in Delhi a month ago and had camped in Vasant Vihar.”Following complaints from people in Vasant Vihar, they voluntarily shifted to another location,” said Nayana Bose, associate external relations officer, UNHCR. They started reaching the tomb from Sunday evening and trickled in till Monday too. Zia-ur-Rehman, from the group, said, “We demand a valid ‘refugee’ status. There is a meeting on May 15 (and) we plan to stay here till then.“

I decided to dig deeper and found that the JNU Students Union has got involved and is demanding that “The issue of refugees languishing on the streets of Delhi for more than a month in the summer heat has to be addressed immediately. As of now, the refugees only have an asylum status. The government and the UNHCR must grant official a refugee status to them so that they can avail their basic rights with a sense of dignity”

I also learnt that:

Over 600 Rohingya Muslim families had fled from Western Myanmar to India about two years ago… They arrived in Delhi on April 9

Just how did these 600 families turn up one fine day in the heart of New Delhi after “travelling” for over 2 years in India? No one seems to know. I then discovered (via an email from Sh Mohan Sethi) that the shift to the site at Vasant Kunj (from the UNHCR office in Vasant Vihar) happened sometime on 7th May. Subsequently an all-party meeting of the local panchayats and RWAs was called, which was also attended by the local MLA and leaders from Congress, BJP and others. It appears that the refugees had been in Vasant Vihar for at least a week before the move to Vasant Kunj (how did no one notice?). They moved to Vasant Kunj on someone’s “invitation” (Were they promised some shelter/arrangement if they moved here?). It was not clear who was providing these refugees with food, water etc.  After a lot of deliberations, the meeting concluded with a decision to wait until 15th May and see what happens after that.

The local RWAs subsequently invited a few TV channels to cover this “news” and yesterday also met CM Sheila Dikshit who assured them that the refugees will bemoved by 16th May. A few questions still remain..

• Who is ensuring, taking care of basic hygiene and sanitation needs of these 2500-odd men, women and children?
• What about their basic needs (water, food, shelter)?
• Who is making sure that the conditions do not lead to an outbreak of disease or an epidemic?
• What about security concerns?
• Is a watch being maintained at the site?
• What about the risk of vigilante action?
• What about the security risk posed by the “camp” being just a few kms away from the airport?
• What about the risk to safety and security of local residents?

Now, a little bit more about who exactly are these refugees and why did they move out of Myanmar / Burma? To most of us who are blissfully unaware of India’s geography and the strategic vulnerability along the entire north-eastern region of India, the presence of Burmese refugees in New Delhi might look like an oddity. Elsewhere in India, it is anything but..

…According to local media reports, about 50,000 displaced Burmese have been living in different parts of neighbouring Mizoram, bordering Myanmar and Bangladesh, and working at various shops and factories after obtaining work permits.

While the Rohingya Muslims are being pushed out from Myanmar, their increasing numbers in the sparsely populated and heavily forested north-eastern Indian states are a cause of concern. Many of the local people have turned hostile to the steadily increasing numbers. The fear is that these people will slip into the general Indian population. [source]

The situation is not confined to Mizoram..In neighbouring Tripura, the situation might soon become equally grim..

Infiltration of Myanmarese nationals to Tripura through Bangladesh has emerged as a new problem in the frontier state that is surrounded by Bangladesh on three sides. Since July 2011, 95 Myanmarese, comprising Rohingya Muslims and Buddhist tribals, have been detained in Tripura after they sneaked into the state through Bangladesh. Myanmarese nationals illegally crossing over into India has also become a major problem in Mizoram, with unofficial estimates putting the number of such infiltrators at around 40,000.

The Indian Passport Act permits Myanmarese nationals, particularly Chins and Burmese Mizos, to travel up to 16 km inside Mizoram as they have relatives on both sides. But most people travel beyond the 16-km limit and stay back causing both population and law and order problems for Mizoram.

It is not clear why Rohingya Muslims do not cross over to Bangladesh but the reasons may be economic. However, India is not alone in terms of their destination. And here is an account of some of the “discriminations” they suffer in Myanmar.

Coming back to Delhi, who might be providing these “refugees” food, shelter and such other basic necessities? This report has a clue (“Refugees claiming to be ‘Burmese’ at Delhi; Source: The Sangai Express / Ninglun Hanghal):

..The refugees numbering more than five hundred lives in small tent camps, thought(sic) the lad claimed that the number would be even more than that. They came all the way by road , train, most of them have scattered in different parts of the country Sajjid said.

He further explained that Muslim communities in Delhi support and help them and provide their basic food and water. Speaking in fluent Hindi, the lad further explained that they are applying for refugee status from UNHCR..

On asked what they would do after that , the lad explained that they would demand for basic rights and facilities to be provided under the refugees status.

But the fundamental questions remain: How and why did these “refugees” trek across thousands of kilometres to camp in New Delhi? Who was leading them? Who guided them? Who is providing for them? And what exactly does the government plan to do about it? Is it really hoping that they will simply go back if asked politely?

And how many are they? No one appears to know for sure (in keeping with the great tradition in Indian media). The HT report mentions “over 2500“; Indian Express (re. JNU students) mentions “600 families“; the E-pao report above mentions “500″ or more and this report mentions “..700 people“. Questions and more questions…

Finally, guess what – according to “The Hindu” – is the most important dimension to this situation?

The controversy over the camping of Myanmar refugees in a protected area in Delhi has several dimensions, the most important being that the land is home to a 13th Century mausoleum for Altamash’s son, the second to be built in the Indian subcontinent [source]

Truly “MerA BhArat MahAn” मेरा भारत महान !

P.S. The Rohingya (Rohingiya) Muslims are not the only refugees from Myanmar in India..There are Christian refugees too (- not that you would notice this if you simply read the news-reports; Most simply mention “refugees”).

Recommended Readings: 1 un-named leader, 1000 illegal settlers and vote-bank politics…Notes from North-East: Indigenous Cultures, Demographic Invasion and A story about British vote-banks..

Also read: Some startling stats from the eastern front…, North-East  “burning” and “India Breaking” – Read this and Weep

Update: Just came across this odd-statement from CM Sheila Dikshit:

..DDA, chief minister Sheila Dikshit on Saturday said that a way would soon be found to relocate them. “Earlier it was thought that the land belonged to Waqf Board, but it is not so. The land belongs to Delhi Development Authority (DDA),” Dikshit said.

So it is OK to encroach on Waqf land? or is it OK to encroach on Waqf land by Muslims from the Ummah? Just wondering.

* Title inspired by John Le Carre; Image courtesy: E-Pao.net

The Mauryan soldier does not himself the Royal treasuries enrich nor does he the Royal granaries fill.

He does not himself carry out trade and commerce nor produce scholars, thinkers, littérateurs, artistes, artisans, sculptors, architects, craftsmen, doctors and administrators.

He does not himself build roads and ramparts nor dig wells and reservoirs.

He does not himself write poetry and plays, paint or sculpt, nor delve in metaphysics, arts and sciences.

He does not do any of this directly as he is neither gifted, trained nor mandated to do so.

The soldier only and merely ensures that:

• The tax, tribute and revenue collectors travel far and wide unharmed and return safely;
• The farmer tills, grows, harvests, stores and markets his produce unafraid of pillage & plunder;
• The trader, merchant and moneylender function and travel across the length and breadth of the realm unmolested;
• The savant, sculptor, painter, maestro and master create works of art, literature, philosophy, astronomy and astrology in peace & quietitude;
• The architect designs and builds his Vaastus without tension;
• The tutor (‘acharya’), the mentor (‘guru’) and the priest (‘purohit’) teach and preach in tranquility;
• The sages (‘rishis, munis, and tapaswees’) meditate and undertake penance in wordless silence;
• The doctor (‘vaidyaraja’) tends to the ill and the infirm well, adds to the pharmacopoeia, discovers new herbs and invents new medical formulations undisturbed;
• The mason, the bricklayer, the artisan, the weaver, the tailor, the jeweller, the potter, the carpenter, the cobbler, the cowherd (‘gopaala’) and the smith work unhindered;
• The mother, wife and governess go about their chores and bring up children in harmony and tranquility;
• The aged and the disabled are well taken care of, tended to and are able to fade away gracefully and with dignity; cattle graze freely without being lifted or harmed by miscreants.

He is thus the VERY BASIS and silent, barely visible CORNERSTONE of our fame, culture, physical well being and prosperity; in short, of the entire nation building activity.

He DOES NOT perform any of these chores himself directly: he ENABLES the rest of us to perform these without let, hindrance or worry (‘nirbhheek and nishchinta’).

Our military sinews, on the other hand, lend credibility to our pronouncements of adherence to good Dharma, our goodwill, amiability and peaceful intentions towards all our neighbour nations (‘sarve bhavantu sukhinaha, sarve santu niramayaha…’) as also those far away and beyond.

These also serve as a powerful deterrent against military misadventure by any one of them against us.

If Pataliputra reposes each night in peaceful comfort, O King, it is so because she is secure in the belief that the distant borders of Magadha are inviolate and the interiors are safe and secure, thanks to the mighty Mauryan Army constantly patrolling and standing vigil with naked swords and eyes peeled for action (‘animish netre’), day and night (‘ratrau-divase’), in weather fair and foul, dawn-to-dusk-to-dawn (‘ashtau prahare’), quite unmindful of personal discomfort and hardship, loss of life and limb, separation from the family, all through the year, year after year (‘warsha nu warshe’).

While the Magadha citizenry endeavours to make the State prosper and flourish, the Mauryan soldier guarantees that the State continues to EXIST! He is the silent ’sine qua non’ of our very being!

To this man, O Rajadhiraja, you owe a debt for that very guarantee which is the vital key-stone of our nationhood arch.

Please, therefore, see to it, suo motu, that you are constantly alive and sensitive to the soldier’s legitimate dues in every form and respect, be those his needs or his wants, including his place in the social order. Do thereafter (‘tadanantara’) ensure that he receives these in time or preferably ahead of time, in full measure, for he is NOT likely to ask for them himself.

This is so because before getting so completely wrapped up in his onerous, harsh and exalted charge, the soldier has assumed with good reason that the State, in return for his extraordinary burden and services, has freed him from all responsibility towards his own present and future welfare as also that of his family back home in the hinterland. He is thus very clear in his mind when deployed at a distant border outpost, fighting lumpen groups within Magadha or when campaigning in far away lands that he need only look out in FRONT for the enemy of the State and concentrate only on his MILITARY ONUS and aim (‘shatrunjaya’), completely free of all temporal worries. This assumption is a holy sacrament and an unwritten covenant that exists between him and the State. And rightly so!

If ever things come to a sordid pass, O King, when, on a given day, the Mauryan soldier has to LOOK BACK over his shoulder (‘Simhawalokana’) prompted by even a single nagging worry about his and his family’s material, physical  and social well being, it should cause you and your Council the greatest concern and distress!

I beseech you to take instant note and act with uncommon dispatch to address the soldier’s anxiety. It could be on account of harsh living conditions, inequitable material compensation or asymmetric Court or societal dispensations affecting either his self respect or his family’s material welfare, or both. If any in your household, in your Council or among your courtiers is/ are responsible for allowing matters to come to such a pass, punish him/ them exemplarily without loss of time and send him/ them to serve for four cycles of seasons (‘Chaturrutuchakre’) alongside the soldiers, on the border outposts. If they perish, those would be their just desserts. If they survive, they will return wiser and wizened, more responsive to and with greater empathy for the soldier’s cause.

If you first learn of your soldiers’ problems and needs from your own trusted informers (‘gupt doota’) and NOT from the Commander-in-Chief (‘Senapati’) himself, relieve him of his charge and retain him not for another day. No matter how good a horseman (‘Ashwarohi’), a swordsman (‘Khadgaveera’), a wrestler (‘Malla’), an archer (Dhanurdhara) or a tactician (‘Rana neetigya’) he is, dismiss him (‘ardha chandra prayoga’) for failing to keep his ear close to the military ground. Dismiss him also for not having the gumption and courage to be the first to tell you of the soldiers’ anxiety and needs before the others do. The Senapati owes a downward loyalty and sensitivity to his troops in much the same way and measure as he owes these upwards to you, for this is a unique and age-old essential feature of sound military leadership and an article of faith between the troops and the General!

It is my bounden duty to caution you, My Lord, that the day when the Mauryan soldier has to demand his dues or, worse, plead for them, will neither have arrived suddenly, overnight nor in vain. It will also bode ill for Magadha. For then, on that day, you, My Lord, will have lost all moral sanction to be Rajadhiraja ! It will also mark the beginning of the end of the Mauryan Empire!

Please share…this ought to be read widely – especially with those at the helm of our affairs.

Somewhat Related: The web thickens… and Read this and weep..

*** Excerpts ***

India needs 1, 00,060 MWe of power while we are generating only 1, 00, 034 MWe. Of this –

• 60% is Thermal power which uses coal, diesel and natural gas as fuel
• 25% is Hydro
• 7% is from non-conventional sources like solar, wind and bio-gas; and
• 2.9% is nuclear

World average for nuclear power is 20%. 75% of all France’s power requirements is met by nuclear energy.

• 20% US
• 18% UK
• 12% Germany; and
• 5% China

In addition to its already existing and functioning nuclear reactors, China has 20 new nuclear reactors at an advanced stage of development while another 15 are in the offing. India’s GDP and nuclear capability – nuclear power generation and nuclear defence arsenal will play a critical role in deciding India’s place in global geopolitics.

…It is imperative that all facts about civilian nuclear programme around the world and India’s energy requirements be placed before the nation in terms of hard numbers.

Per capita power consumption

• (India) National per capita consumption – 503 units
• China – 2500 units
• America – 13,000 units
• Tamil Nadu – 900 units

India’s nuclear reactor history so farIndia has 20 nuclear power plants

• Kaiga, Karnataka – 4
• Kakrapar, Gujarat – 2
• Kalpakkam, Tamil Nadu – 2
• Narora, Uttar Pradesh – 2
• Rawatbhatta, Rajasthan – 6
• Tarapur, Maharashtra – 4

Total power generated from 20 nuclear reactors – 4780 MW

Nuclear units under construction: 9 of which

• Kalpakkam – 1
• Koodankulam – 2
• Kakrapar – 2
• Rawatbhatta – 2
• Banswara, Rajasthan – 2

Total power that will be generated upon completion – 6700 MW

Facts about Tamil Nadu’s energy requirements and power generating capabilities

Tamil Nadu needs – 12000 MW
Tamil Nadu generates – 7000 MW
Deficit in meeting state requirement – 5000 MW

Given the fact that the two nuclear reactors ready for commissioning in Koodankulam will generate 4800 MW power, Jayalalithaa owes the people of Tamil Nadu an explanation for denying them access to much needed power. People of Chennai suffer one hour power cut seven days of the week while some cities and towns suffer six to seven hours power cut every day. As things stand the situation does not look likely to improve.

*** Excerpts End ***

Here are some more facts and figures to put all this in perspective:

India suffers from a severe shortage of electricity generation capacity. According to the World Bank, roughly 40 percent of residences in India are without electricity. In addition, blackouts are a common occurrence throughout the country’s main cities. Further compounding the situation is that total demand for electricity in the country continues to rise and is outpacing increases in capacity. Additional capacity has failed to materialize in India in light of market regulations, insufficient investment in the sector, and difficulty in obtaining environmental approval and funding for hydropower projects. In addition, coal shortages are further straining power generation capabilities. In order to address this shortfall, the Indian government continues to work towards adding capacity. ..EIA projects that electricity consumption in India will grow at an average rate of 3.3 percent per year through 2035. To meet this growth, India will have to expand their current generation capacity by 234 GW.

But this is unlikely to happen anytime soon..

India will miss the power capacity addition target for the 11th Five Year Plan, Union power minister Sushil Kumar Shinde made this admission while addressing media persons at the annual economic editors conference on Wednesday (Nov 5, ’09).
“We have performed much better in terms of new capacity addition in the 11th Plan as generation capacity worth 18,235 MW has already been commissioned till early October 2009. However, due to various project-related delays, the entire planned target for the plan period may not materialise,” Mr Shinde said. (source)

Apparently, the “Power generation figures were unrealistic:

Deputy Chairman of Planning Commission, Montek Singh Ahluwalia, today (Mar 26, ’11) said it would be an achievement if India could achieve capacity addition of 52,000 MW of power generation at the end of 11th five-year-plan in 2012 despite much higher projections earlier.
…At the outset of 11th plan, target was 78,000 MW of capacity addition, but within two years it was scaled down to 62,000 MW, and now even if the country could add 52,000 MW, it would be a big “achievement”, Ahluwalia said here.

Not surprisingly, India’s per capita energy consumption is amongst the lowest in the world. So if you are amongst the 200-odd million people who enjoy uninterruprted power, count yourselves lucky..and spare a thought for the hundreds of millions who have never known what reliable electric supply means.

Meanwhile, trouble continues at Kudankulam..

Additional References: India Energy Portal; * I have requested my friend Ashutosh (who is an “Energy Expert”) to write a detailed post on this whole issue. I should be able to publish it soon.  Comments, thoughts and additional references, data sources welcome.

Image Data Source: IEA Key energy statistics 2010 and “Energiläget 2050″ by prof. Cristian Azar and Kristian Lindgren ChalmersGöteborg (Swedish) via Wikipedia.

Vatican says Nothing Wrong with Nuclear Power

Nuclear power should be considered a useful energy source, a senior Catholic cardinal has said on Wednesday.

…“With maximum safety requirements in place for people and the environment, and with a ban in place on the hostile use of nuclear technology, why should the peaceful use of nuclear technology be barred?” Martino, the Pope’s justice minister, told Vatican Radio.

“Excluding nuclear energy because of a preconceived principle or for fears of disasters could be a mistake and in come cases could have paradoxical effects.

…Pope Benedict on Sunday marked the fiftieth anniversary of the International Atomic Energy Agency by calling for “progressive and agreed nuclear disarmament and to favour the peaceful and assured use of nuclear technology for real development” [link].

End nuclear power now, say bishops

Catholic bishops in Japan said Thursday they want an immediate end to nuclear power generation.

During a press conference at Motoderakoji Cathedral in Sendai City, they launched a document entitled End Nuclear Energy Now: Coming to terms with the tragic disaster of the Fukushima Daiichi accident.

…The bishops acknowledged that, if nuclear energy were to be abolished, Japan would be left with an energy deficit, and that the problem of CO2 would still need to be addressed. But they insisted that humans have a responsibility to protect “nature and all life, which are God’s creatures,” and to pass a safe environment on to future generations.

…Japan has “a culture, national wisdom, and tradition of living in harmony with nature,” and its Shinto and Buddhist religions are also infused with a similar mentality. And “in Christianity, we also have the mentality of noble poverty.” [link]

P.S. Should the Church even comment on this? What do you think? What is its locus standi to comment on such an issue which has no obvious link to religion?

Also read: Cases against anti-nuke Church officials

These men – along with many others – eventually succumbed to an enemy that had an overwhelming advantage in men, weapons and resources. The Chinese aggression in 1962 should not have come as a surprise but Nehru was too much in love with “Panchsheel” and in thrall of “Hindi-Chini Bhai Bhai” to notice that something was amiss. The result was a disaster. As TIME Magazine noted,

…the fighting has shown that the Indians need nearly everything, except courage. Chinese burp guns fire 20 times faster than Indian rifles. The Indian 25-pounder is a good artillery piece, but is almost immobile in the mountains and cannot match the Chinese pack artillery, recoilless guns and bazookas. Each Chinese battalion has a special company of porters whose job it is to make sure the fighting men have ample ammunition and food. The Indians must rely on units from their unwieldy Army Service Corps, who were never trained to operate at heights of 14,000 feet and over mule paths. In addition to bulldozers and four-wheel-drive trucks, the Indians need mechanical saws that can match the speed of those the Chinese use to cut roads through forests.

India’s catastrophic unreadiness for war stems directly from the policy of nonalignment which was devised by Nehru and implemented by his close confidant Krishna Menon.

..after five years under Nehru’s hand-picked Defense Minister, Krishna Menon, the Indian army was lamentably short of ammunition even for its antiquated Lee Enfield rifles.

And such was the extent of a sanguine and relaxed attitude in New Delhi that a road built by China in the heart of Aksai Chin did not come to the notice of the government until two years after it was built.

Nehru bravely noted that “We cannot allow that barrier (the Himalayas) to be penetrated because it is also the principal barrier to India“. But the words had little impact.  The Chinese went ahead and occupied 14,000+ square miles of land that belonged to India in the 1962 war. Not much seems to have changed. This land continues to be under Chinese control. Its troops are stationed on this land. While we euphemistically call it “Line of Actual Control” (LAC), for all practical purposes , this is an international border – along which Chinese forces regularly assert their “right” – with force when necessary.

The 1962 conflict exposed the soft underbelly of our defences: the poorly equipped and ill-resourced armed force – men with canvas shoes fighting in sub-zero temparatures in cotton uniforms…

The men were in cotton uniforms, canvas shoes and were living in the open after marching through slushy roads… There were no porters and everything had to back packed [link]

One of the lessons that India should have learnt (or to be more precise, our political leadership should have learnt) from that period was the need for battle-readiness and preparedness when it comes to China – whose behaviour is frequently devious and usually inscrutable & opaque.

Why am I opening wounds from the past, you may be wondering? Because, almost 40 years since, we appear to have learnt nothing. I discovered yesterday that…

Indian Army’s plans to beef up presence on the Indo-China border have met with fierce resistance from two unexpected quarters — the finance and the environment ministries.

..the ministry of finance is not agreeable to spend a whopping Rs12,000 crore to set up a Mountain Strike Corps even as a plan to create an alternate, all-weather route from Siliguri to North Sikkim to rush troops to the Indo-China border has been rejected by the ministry of environment and forests on the grounds that the alignment passes through eco-sensitive areas.

This refusal of funds comes amidst reports that China is “..training two divisions in high altitude warfare”.  It also comes in the context of this conclusion from an internal study by the Indian Army: “The study group looked at the combined threat from Pakistan and China in a future war and concluded that the bulk of the fighting would take place in the high mountains” [link].

But what do the powers-that-be do? Remain blithefully ignorant of the enormous risks to national security – and continue life as usual – even as China moves steadily ahead, inch-by-inch, from Ladakh to Arunachal. Kyaa karein? We are like this only…

Related Posts: “Never Again The Same”, Inch by inch, slowly but surely, we keep loosing territory… and  Nightmare at Noon* – Water Wars

P.S. It is worth pointing out that India and China have never been neighbours in history…As Prof Brahma Chellaney has noted:

It was not geography but guns…that made China India’s neighbour